Carrigan Trent (KIA)

Personnel File
Name:	Commander Carrigan Trent
Rank:	Effective: Commander; Substantive: Lieutenant-Commander
Species:	Human
Age:	37
Gender:	Male
Birthplace:	Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
Height:	6'2" / 1.89m
Weight:	190 lbs/ 86.18kg
Hair:	Dark brown, starting to show some grey
Eye color:	Grey
Interests
Electronic warfare Communication and sensor protocols and emissions Security protocols Intelligence analysis Unconventional system usage Data manipulation Acoustic music, passable guitar player 20th century rock music Traditionally brewed alcoholic beverages Earth historical fiction Cooking
Education
Service Record
Decorations

Background Story

Carrigan Trent was born to a great deal of expectations. He was supposed to attend Queen's University in his native Kingston, get a degree in political sciences and follow the family tradition of public service and political aspirations. However, such games did not appeal to him and, going behind his parents' backs, he undertook the requisite testing and it was with nothing beyond his father's curses and the clothes on his back that Trent joined Starfleet and left for the Academy.

Over the course of four years training, Trent developed a very keen edge for the world of tactics. In fact, his innate ability to quickly grasp a situation and make almost instantaneous decisions quickly saw him internally promoted as the Cadet Leader of his class. Granted, not all of his calls were appropriate but his willingness to stand by any of his decisions, good or otherwise, and accepting the consequences regardless of their nature, quickly won him the respect of his instructors and classmates alike.

Upon graduation, Carrigan was assigned to the science vessel U.S.S. Fermi and, for a time, it felt to him as though it was a waste of his time and a dead-end to his career. That is, until he was introduced to what would become his greatest fascination: the use of systems not usually associated with combat for tactical purposes. And, as an Ensign with but 18 months active service under his belt, he submitted and published his first professional paper in Starfleet's Tactical Development Journal: Use of Short Duration Unmodulated Sensor Pulses for Shield Geometry Vulnerability Assessment. He was one of the youngest and most junior contributors to this publication.

Following his publication, Carrigan was promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade and transferred to a listening post on the edge of Ferengi space. As part of the small crew there, he developed a great degree of skill in analyzing and deconflicting long-range sensor data and after another year, he was promoted to full Lieutenant and he received his first command: six months of being in charge of his own listening post and its crew, a duration in which he made a name for himself by greatly developing the known order of battle of Ferengi vessels in his area of responsibility and optimizing the flow of information between sensor platforms.

At the end of this tour of duty, the yet combat-untested Lieutenant finally was given a post as CTO of a ship on the Cardassian border. And there, he finally got his baptism by fire. Over the course of the first year, he was in no less than 17 skirmishes and minor engagements, either with Cardassian warships or Maquis terrorists. Before long, Carrigan Trent was awarded nearly back to back promotions and reached the rank of Commander. This rapid progression was accompanied by a matching climb in positions from his ship's tactical officer through an Executive Officer's seat and eventually culminated with his second command, the Saber-class U.S.S. Harrier.

This starship command had never been intended to be an easy one. Having spent only a short time in the position of Executive Officer and at the rank of Commander, Trent was considered as somewhat inexperienced to take command of a ship even as diminutive as a Saber-class vessel. However, the combination of a captain who had recently retired, a crew who had gotten lazy and a first officer with a tendency to falsify readiness reports led to the Harrier's ability to operate on the Cardassian border to being severely impeded and Carrigan was deemed to be the most suitable candidate to assume command and shape up a crew that had fallen apart and a ship in shambles.

However, after a complete change of the senior staff and two solid months of gruelling drills and extended duty hours, the U.S.S. Harrier was once again fit for operations. The imposition of a stark, severe discipline had been the first shock to this crew that had gone lax in every aspect, but combined with the punishing schedule of training and maintenance, the men and women of the Harrier were reminded of who they were and before long, they were imbued with a renewed sense of purpose and a newfound pride in themselves and their ship and morale grew by leaps and bounds.

And it was not long before the Dominion War started they rejoined their task force's operations and resumed their place as a valuable asset on the Cardassian border.

This is when things took a turn for the worst. While providing a security presence for the evacuation of a mining outpost in the DMZ, the Harrier detected a single Jem'Hadar fighter and Trent deemed it a lone scout. And, after convincing his task force commander to allow him to engage and prevent this single ship from getting reinforcements, Trent initiated a combat action, only to fall into a well-planned ambush. In a matter of eight and a quarter minutes from entering effective weapons range, the U.S.S. Harrier was adrift and venting atmosphere, a broken hulk. Thankfully she was relieved, the Dominion forces destroyed and her survivors rescued. However, the cost was appalling: from a complement of sixty souls, only twenty seven had survived the onslaught and none were uninjured; a further four would succumb to their wounds. And when Carrigan Trent awoke from stasis, it was to discover his left leg was missing from mid-thigh down and his left arm had suffered the same fate from the elbow.

Trent spent the remainder of the Dominion War on medical leave back in Earth. During this time, he recovered from his injuries and spent a great deal of time in physical therapy, learning to use his prosthetic limbs, and even longer in counselling for his greatest perceived failure and the loss of his ship and crew. During this time, he fell into a deep depression and battled several bouts of alcoholism and suicidal tendencies. However, he managed to pull through but not without a cost. His confidence, a leader's greatest asset, was shot and he knew he would likely never command again and he requested a demotion to the rank of Lieutenant.

However, there was a silver lining. While his days as a tactical officer had most likely come to a close, Trent was offered a position within Starfleet Intelligence. One where he would still be involved with what he knew best and had a passion for, one where would still be allowed to wear his uniform and serve openly and not have to hide within his fellow officers. After completing the initial Intelligence Officer training, Carrigan then proceeded to join the Intelligence Academy's Advanced Tactical and Strategic Support Division in order to undertake the intensive specialized training in electronic warfare, communications exploitation and analytical techniques that added on to the already keen skills he had acquired on his own. When Trent graduated from this extensive training program in early 2377, he was granted, again, the rank of Lieutenant-Commander and attached to the staff of Admiral Sankolov as his Intelligence officer.

After a short time in Admiral Sankolov's personal staff, Carrigan Trent began to notice a series of unusual trends with the upper echelons of Starfleet. Reports were starting to go missing, computer records were altered or deleted. But what truly made him realize something dreadfully wrong was afoot was when a high-priority analysis he prepared that should have been disseminated urgently was first stalled and then reclassified so high if could not be used by starships in operations. And when lives were lost due to the mishandling of his report and no one in Sankolov's staff or Starfleet Intelligence appeared to share his outrage, he simply knew the senior ranks of Starfleet had been compromised. Adding to this, he started noticing subtle shifts in behaviour and other irregularities with a number of other admirals and a few key members of their staff, Sankolov and his own entourage included. And what covert tricorder and internal sensor scans he managed to get of these people, to his dismay, revealed nothing out of the ordinary and completely destroyed his initial theory of some Founders having managed to infiltrate Starfleet Command despite the extensive security measures out in place during the Dominion War and this lack of information led him to further frustrations, but yet he continued his investigation, not knowing what to look for.

However, there was precious little solid proof he could bring forward. However, when he consulted other Intelligence Officers in other staff positions, he was either brushed off or given ominous warnings about his course of inquiry. And that is when he began his own investigation in the rot he discovered permeated Starfleet Command and he chose to bide his time and compile as much evidence as he could gather, waiting for his opportunity to make his move.

Personality profile

Carrigan Trent is a dedicated and loyal man, but he is also a scarred one. The guilt over his mistake, one that led to the deaths of thirty-seven men under his command, weighs heavy on his conscience still and the destruction of the only ship he'd ever commanded haunts him. He is known to have flashbacks if this battle, particularly of the explosion that caused severe burns to his arm and leg, and of the brief exposure to hard vacuum before being beamed to safety that caused the damage that actually warranted the amputation of two of his limbs.

But despite requiring frequent medication and his tendency to self-prescribe unhealthy amounts of alcohol, he is still a solid officer and while his confidence has been crippled, he has made it his life's mission to prevent such an event again for anyone and to support fellow officers whose minds are as scarred as his.

Carrigan has managed to hold on to a dry sense of humour and a certain degree of compassion. Also, he remains passionate about his work, especially as he now seeks a way to expose and oust the impostors from within Starfleet Command.

Physical Profile

As a result of his injuries, Trent has grown rather gaunt and has not yet managed to regain the lost weight. However, he still possesses a wiry build and strength. As a rather unusual move, he refused the synthetic skin finish that would normally cover his prosthetic limbs. Instead, his artificial left arm and leg are fully exposed, the amalgam of metal, polymers, servos and sensors visible to one and all where they are not covered by his clothes. This is, however, no fashion statement. It is to serve as a reminder of where hasty action without enough information or preparation can lead.