Jai
Male

Place of Origin: Miri

A seemingly human preadolescent male whose religious habit of shaving his head often has him mistaken for a little Deltan boy. An elaborate mandala tattoo spreads from his back to his extremities, terminating on the forehead, back of his hands, and the tops of his feet, a religious habit that marked the child deemed the reincarnation of the Lamapa guru in the Karma Lama school of Buddhism that developed on Earth Two (Miri’s Planet).

Jai still struggles with the dichotomy of who he thinks he is supposed to be and is still discovering who he really is. Outwardly he is quiet, contemplative, and selfless. The truth is he has the wide-eyed wonder for the universe and the enthusiastic energy appropriate to his true age, to include a streak of mischievousness. Balance and harmony between those two sides of himself, the real and the spiritual is the daily war that he wages, and one in which his only enemy has forever only been himself.

Jai bears a somewhat unique burden in being the living manifestation of the only religion or religious leader to have survived the holocaust on Earth Two. Orphaned and left in the care of a Buddhist monastery in the area that would have been called Tibet on Earth, Jai was identified at the age of six to be the 13th reincarnation of the leader of the Gyalwa Lama school of Buddhism as it was practiced on that world at the time. Dubbed Jay Prakas Gyatso, his life in the temple became even more ordered and structured for him. He was expected to be quiet and contemplative, to say the least for deeply spiritual, as he was introduced to a series of rituals and habits that was part of their religion. The religion that he was destined to head.

Jai wasn’t formally recognized as the 13th Lamapa guru until he completed the ritual of the marking, in which the prospective Lamapa guru meditates on their past lives while receiving the mandala tattoo worn by all Lamapa gurus since Obaydullah Tenzin Gyalwa Lamapa, the first Lamapa guru. Jai’s ceremony, like much of his life, had less to do with when he was ready and was instead selected for him to be the celebration of his tenth birthday.

In a way, the holocaust of Earth Two was both a blessing and a curse. Jai found his life and destiny returned to him, as his survival – and, more importantly, what he did with his life – now depended on him and him alone. Once the terror and anxiety had subsided, he was happy at first. One of a handful of rag-tag orphans who struggled to survive in the frozen winters of the temples in which they had once meditated. As the struggle to survive took its toll on the children, Jai increasingly turned to meditation to try and set aside all fears, and instead try to find the answers to the many problems that the Onlies in Tibet faced.

In the aftermath of the arrival of the Enterprise, Jai found his freedom once again. This time in an unfamiliar place, an unfamiliar time. It was the 23rd Century and Jai saw nothing in it to which he could relate, so he again retreated back into the familiar meditation. Only this time it was different, as he discovered he could debate philosophy and meditation with people of entirely different worlds – Vulcans and Andorians.

He traveled to Vulcan and studied the Kholinar. He traveled to Andoria, and to Earth where he debated the 49th Dalai Lama in a discussion about the mayahana sutras, life, and everything after. At a certain point, Jai had stopped trying to be what people wanted him to be and somehow still wound up at the same result: Three hundred years after the death of their world, their religion and traditions continued on in him.
But rather than finding answers, Jai found that he more often found questions. And the pursuit of those questions led him to seek knowledge beyond the walls of a temple or an archaic text. He caught up on all the education he had missed, and all the time between the 20th and 23rd Century, and was accepted to the Trill Science Academy. There, he found himself in the study of life. In a way, it made sense. His faith and belief gave him answers to what was beyond life, but told very little about life itself.

After a lifetime of 300 years of meditation, a decade went by in the blink of an eye and saw Jai become a veterinary doctor, who studied and advocated for ecosystems and animals throughout this vastness of space that he had learned was known as the Federation. It was the Dominion War that convinced him that veterinary medicine might not be knowledge enough. Even still, no matter what it’s exploration charter, Jai wasn’t at all comfortable with the thought of a Lama guru being in the uniform.

And the wheel came full circle. Jai had become like those who had transformed spirituality into a dictate of ceremonies and so determined what he was and what he wasn’t. It would be another decade before he would have a epiphany and realize he was the only one holding himself back.

2383: Cadet, Starfleet Academy, Life Sciences (Pre-Medical) Program
2386: Commissioned, Ensign, Medical Student Intern, Starfleet Medical Academy
2388: Medical Student Resident, Pediatrics Division, Starfleet Medical
2389: Promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade (Medical Officer)
2390: Emergency Medicine Residency, Starfleet Medical
2391: Assigned, Assistant Chief Medical Officer, USS Vesta
2397: Assigned, Chief Medical Officer, Haumea Colony