Ashley Michael Danrisa
Male

Place of Origin: Chicago, Earth

Ash is naturally good-looking and cultivates an intentionally nondescript look, though that all goes away once he sets his attention on you. He is physically fit, with a lean, hard body from regular exercise. He has very small, barely visible scars over much of his body, none more than a centimeter in length, and precisely placed over various nerve clusters and other highly sensitive pain receptors.

Gregarious and charming, a ladies’ man, deceptively ‘normal’ and highly observant, more of a ‘talker’ than a ‘fighter’. Often remains superficial, not letting others get close, not hardened enough for some of what he’s done and seen. He worries that his special abilities might eventually drive him insane.

Ash is a scion of an old and established Federation family on Earth. Sometime in their past, around the time of the founding of the Federation, their ancestor Meredith Danrisa managed to be one of the first to give birth to a Human/Vulcan hybrid after she fell in love with a Vulcan fellow scientist helping with Earth’s fledgling warp program. Needless to say, the family was appalled and the ‘experiment’ was never repeated, the bloodline eventually diluting back to Human to be barely discernable, except perhaps for a slight pointing of Ash’s ears, but it’s hard to tell.

But there seemed to remain enough of the Vulcan blood in the family line that would unlock human psychic potential occasionally. This usually resulted in some minor trick, and often resulted in a crazy old aunt or uncle. But on occasion these little quirks were actually useful, though they didn’t necessarily protect the individual from the ‘family curse’ later in life. These eccentrics were usually kept hidden away from polite society. Ash’s family was different in that it produced not one, but two of these anomalies in the family, although not of the same caliber.

Ash’s branch of the family was based in Chicago, though they had homes elsewhere in the United States and Europe as well. He was the youngest of three children, spaced five years apart. Ash’s father Michael was a shipping magnate, owning a fleet of cargo ships that moved within the Federation and also across borders. He was plagued by persistent – but never proven – rumors of ties to the Orion Syndicates, and, in fact, his shipping company was just as frequently a Syndicate smuggling company. And with great wealth comes great political influence, as well. The family had a bit of a downfall, however, toward the end of the Dominion War when his Syndicate ties were exposed following a raid on an Orion/Dominion joint research station by Captain Artemis Pierce.

Ash’s mother Amileigh was the daughter of another wealthy Federation family, though one with a cleaner reputation. It was more a marriage of financial and political convenience than love, as her numerous affairs would prove. She was a socialite; hosting functions for dignitaries was her passion, and she was more often in San Francisco or Paris than in Chicago, leaving the raising of her children to a succession of nannies.

Ash’s older brother Ransom, ten years his senior, eschewed the family’s xenophobic traditions and became a noted xenobiologist, working as a civilian doctor at Starfleet Medical Headquarters in San Francisco.

It was Ash’s older sister Analeigh that was the family embarrassment. She clearly inherited the ‘curse’ of their ancestor’s interbreeding. Physically, she developed perfectly normal, but mentally she seemed to lag behind. She never speaks. She is highly aware of other people’s emotions and needs, has a rapport with animals, and seems to have a preternatural sense of her surroundings, to the extent that she seems to be slightly precognitive.

And Ash worshipped her. He knew that she was brighter than people gave her credit for. Though she never talked, and seemed content and excited to watch grass grow or paint dry, he knew that she was truly special, and not ‘special’.

Ash actually shared his birthday with his sister Analeigh. Given his mother’s indifference to the family, Analeigh, five years older than him, played with him and, when she was older, actually cared for him while the nanny diddled their father. They were inseparable.

Ash learned he had inherited the curse when he was thirteen. His sister touched his cheek and he was overcome by flashes of just what their father had been doing with his daughter for several years, stumbling drunk into her room to have his way with her.

Ash had never hated anyone before. Now he burned with a cold flame. His father was in bed with an attack of nerves following the exposure of his Syndicate ties. Ash went into the bedroom and put a pillow over his face, stronger than the weak struggling of his father. He was stopped from murder by his sister, who pulled him off and hugged the anger and hate out of him. But that was the point at which Ash decided he would do everything in his power to get away from his family.

Ash moved Analeigh out of the main house to the guest house and moved in with her. She was of age now and started working at a local diner and was an instant hit with the customers. Besides being beautiful, she seemed to know exactly what you wanted and when you needed it, never interrupting your conversation or your reading or thinking.

When Ash graduated high school, his brother Ransom managed to get him a commission to Starfleet Academy. Ash figured being on a ship out among the stars was about as far away from his family as he could get.

In the Academy, Ash did decently. He was hardly a stellar student, more into socializing than studying, but he passed his classes. He did much better in the hands-on learning. He also had the help of a Vulcan counselor in getting his abilities under control. Ash wasn’t expected to get a choice ensign position, but someone had been watching his progress.

Artemis Pierce was the man that had nearly ruined Ash’s father with his raid on an Orion/Dominion research station in the last year of the Dominion War. Following the war, Pierce was the scapegoat for a Starfleet witch hunt against Section 31 and was demoted and booted from the Fleet and his last command, Project Peacemaker, was mothballed. But Pierce was a hard man to keep down, and he knew where the skeletons buried their skeletons. When Starfleet Intelligence resurrected Project Peacemaker, he got himself recommissioned to captain it once more. And then he started to handpick his crew.

Pierce had seen something special in Ash and recruited him into the top secret program. He trained him in intelligence gathering and field work and eventually he was assigned to the Peacemaker, a highly classified stealth ship capable of long-range incursion behind enemy lines for recon, extraction, and black ops.

Ash served with the Peacemaker team for three years. When Romulus was destroyed, Starfleet Intelligence needed information fast. Ash and several others were chosen to enter what remained of the Star Empire under the guise of Starfleet and civilian aid groups. Ash served for almost two years delivering aid in the Empire and gathering intel on the rising factions struggling for the carcass of one of the quadrant’s largest powers.

But then Ash grew too close to an asset he was cultivating and fell in love with the daughter of one of the Romulan warlords. They were discovered together, the young woman was slain, and Ash barely escaped with his life, his cover blown. The Peacemakers extracted him and Pierce reluctantly granted his petition for reassignment.

Ash transferred to the USS Illustrious, and later the USS Nimitz, as Chief Intelligence Officer, where he began a relationship with the XO’s yeoman, a civilian named Nathalie McCay.

During a peaceful diplomatic mission to observe the entrance of Salonia into the Federation, Ash was caught in the chaos when dissident factions riled up by Romulan agents derailed the ceremony. Ash and the Nimitz’s Chief of Security, Selina Markham, were taken captive by the Salonian intelligence operative Thall Bos and tortured for information. Ash helped Selina through the ordeal by taking her pain into himself, but in the process accidentally telepathically bonded to her, heightening the sexual tension already between them.

On the subsequent mission to the primitive world of Landoria to deal with Romulan agents experimenting with Omega particles, the Nimitz was destroyed and Nathalie was killed, leaving Ash bereft.