Sean Barrows

Appearance
Sean stood a 6’2” with broad shoulders in a v-frame physique. His face had a soft tan complexion with the hint of Romulan ridges on his forehead from the dominant genetics of his grandmother. Likewise his hair maintained the straight, jet-black aesthetic which settled behind his ever so slightly pointed ears. His eyes were dark and penetrating, always more going on beyond the surface. While he looked like he could have been an athlete in his college days, he appeared more refined and statesman-like in his late thirties.

Personality
Sean is suave, classy, decisive, the type to make a person feel very at home by appearing to take a genuine interest in them. He’s driven, competitive, observant, a wealth of experience and culture. He can be vindictive when his buttons get pushed, though he is not the type to make a scene in public.

Ambitions
Sean sees the job as a stepping stone to Admiralty, where he hopes to lead all of Starfleet Strategic Operations at some point.

He eventually wants to have a personal life, a family to carry on the line (most importantly a son), though how he’s going to find the time or be able to act like a normal person is beyond him at the moment.

Morals

 * The ends justify the means, especially when it comes to the continued survival and dominance of the Federation.


 * Decisiveness and the chain of command are paramount to a functioning Starfleet and a good commander. It’s better to make the wrong call a lot of the time than to be indecisive. Confidence inspires confidence.


 * Never let people see behind a certain mask. Being too genuine is what can get a person into trouble, something he learned quickly as an intelligence agent. Appearances are what make society function.

History
Sean Barrows grew up in a fleet household. His great, great grandmother spent time serving aboard the USS Enterprise as a Yeoman (Yeoman Barrows - “Shore Leave”) where she had a brief entanglement with the famed Admiral, then doctor, McCoy. The fling didn’t last, but a legacy did, as she had a son and retired from her position within the fleet. Her son then entered Starfleet himself, rising to the rank of captain and commanding his own ship. His son did the same, serving during a particular time of distrust with the Romulans. He entered into battle with a Romulan warbird which resulted in victory, taking aboard survivors from the ship before its warp drive finally exploded. When he did, he met t’Mar, a Romulan Subcommander turned prisoner of war who stole his heart. They eventually had a son together, Sean's father, Jason Barrows.

In his youth he would take trips to the various ships his father commanded, sometimes extended ones for months where he would benefit from the larger starships where families held classes. Sean got on well with most people, but because he was always on the move away from Earth and back again, he didn’t really have any close friends. He never knew when he would be shipping out again. He heard his mother and father argue over whether it was a good way to raise a child several times, but his father always maintained it would be positive for his development to expose him to the workings of Starfleet early, assuming Sean would eventually take up the mantle.

On the starships he learned cursory science, following mission reports from his father and his father’s colleagues who would sometimes give him access. It allowed him to track the flow of information, see how people operated in the military environment, giving him a leg up on the other kids who weren’t as curious about the matters of adults.

His grandparents, meanwhile, retired to earth, his grandfather giving Sean tutoring in history, with his Romulan grandmother teaching him about their culture. He appreciated those visits and treasured the elders in their retirement, cultivating a respect for authority and command which would serve him in later years.

When at home, his grandparents would take him to baseball games periodically. Sean enjoyed baseball, even liked throwing a ball with his grandpa, but he never lingered around in one place long enough to be able to join a team or get good at the sport. It became something he could admire from afar and enjoy.

On a visit to Starbase 499, Sean met Commodore T’Rin for the first time as a teenager. For all he knew, she was a standard starbase commander, but there was much more to her position which she didn’t tell the teenager. Sean took an interest in operations all the same, letting the Vulcan know he intended to be a starship captain someday.

Sean’s father was promoted soon after, commanded the U.S.S. Rothschild, and lost his life in the Borg cube incident in 2366. Though rather than have an adverse reaction to the danger, it drove Sean further. Someone had to protect the people from these threats, and he wanted to be like his father.

With connections inside Starfleet command, Sean was able to benefit from young apprentice programs where he actually could go out aboard starships and watch the crew, sometimes helping out when his expertise fit. It gave him a different high school experience than a lot of other kids where he got His uncle, Commander Frank Barrows of the USS Argon, was a diplomatic officer who showed Sean the ropes and actually was able to get him in on several negotiations for worlds coming into the Federation during this time, bringing Sean to high society parties, diplomatic functions, events, culturing Sean in a way few would ever experience outside of textbooks.

During this time, Sean was able to spend more time on Starbase 499 with Commodore T’Rin, working on a soft-commission in basic operations jobs during his time there, serving maintenance requests, acting as a gopher for both T’Rin and the quartermaster of the station, usually ending up getting them tea or coffee when they needed it.

As he worked there for longer, Sean naturally received more access in a Wesley Crusher-style mentorship as it developed. He was told about her very real job as a member of Starfleet intelligence. Her task was to run operations of sector 232 of the Beta Quadrant, specializing in gathering information on worlds close to the Romulan Neutral Zone for potential admission into the Federation, with a hopes of bolstering Fed positions in the area through expansion. Sean took an interest in her work (at least, what he was allowed to see, as she kept him to public information and nothing classified).

He helped her with data management and organization of non-classified files, cultivating bio profiles on top Romulan senators, commanders, and other public figures as information was gathered on the subjects. He helped in building profiles as an analyst, his work being used to give to field agents as dossiers for their missions (which he was never privy to what those specific missions were, as T’Rin was careful).

When his time was up at the starbase, T’Rin gave him a list of what he needed to do when he entered the Academy to be of use to her and her team. With his partial Romulan heritage, personality of keeping close to the vest, and strong work ethic, he was seen as a good potential secret agent, since he would have Romulan DNA anyway, easily adaptable for espionage missions. Sean and T’Rin had a final conversation he had to be in at the top of his class, because agents in her intelligence division needed to be the best with such a dangerous enemy nearby.

Because of these work programs, Sean entered the academy late, starting his Freshman year as a 20 year old in 2369. Being older than his class and more experienced, he was often the type people came to for advice, study notes. He was well respected by his class, making friends easily, but keeping his relationships on a somewhat superficial level, even at the young age falling into the role of the captain/commander dealing with his subordinates.

Sean arrived at the academy, working on intelligence and command, envisioning himself to be a starship captain someday much like his family’s legacy, much as he had done before, even with his experience in intelligence. He saw the path of intelligence to be a good one for going into command because it had to deal with gathering data, processing it, and making decisions which could affect the life and deaths of others at any moment.

With a natural predisposition toward playing the political game, Sean quickly became a favorite with professors and students alike. He fell in and was recruited by Red Squad at the beginning of the Dominion War in his senior year of 2372, opening up avenues to work in secret missions with top members of the academy under Admiral Layton. He got on well with the other students and the admiral, being seen as someone who was dependable in a crisis due to his stoic nature and ability to stay on task.

When Layton was arrested, it crushed him. Sean took a couple of weeks to himself to examine his life. Starfleet principles were important, and Layton had in many ways betrayed them, but he still was doing what he thought best for Earth. This was a balance he’d have to figure out during his career.

At one point, he was given command of a ship of cadets on a “training mission” to intercept supply lines of materials the Breen were delivering to the Dominion to create their Alpha Jem’Hadar clones. The mission was a resounding success, though only those in his class were aware.

Back at the Academy, he had been in an on-again off-again rivalry, depending on when he was away, with a Romulan-born female cadet who seemed to be competing at the top of the class with him on multiple occasions. Over the years, it had become frustrating.. Exams always either ended with him getting top marks or her, and he began studying excessively in order to keep up with the competition. The others in the Red Squad fraternity warned him he’d been missing activities, but he had to win at all costs. This woman unnerved him.

He was so irritated at one point, that when in Red Squad training, Sean was brooding over the Romulan, when he saw a new, insubordinate Bajoran cadet, Dija Zera, who was being hot-headed about following orders, wanting to do things “her own way”. The fight escalated as Sean got in her face, going back and forth with verbal sparring and eventually leading to a conversation where Sean listed off his familial, elitist history within Starfleet to make the point his way was the more experienced, and better way. The result was Dija punching him in the face, giving him a black eye. Such insubordination was intolerable in Red Squad, and Dija was removed. Sean cursed himself for losing his cool, vowing to be careful with incidents with subordinates in the future.

Soon, Sean noticed there were efforts to sabotage his studying efforts he could pinpoint back to the Romulan (but without evidence). Study sessions were canceled. Notes went missing. He decided two could play at that game and co-opted a virus to erase her personal PADD information before one crucial exam. Both of them were too good to get caught, but those escalations ended up becoming dangerous. Pranks became physical, and the missteps were clearly going to get one of them hurt.

The board at the academy took notice, bringing them both in, threatening censure and bad marks if it continued. At that point, it dialed down, at least as far as most knew. Still, James Ross, son of Admiral Ross noticed Sean’s increasing frustration and his grades and relations with other Red Squad cadets starting to suffer as a result, and brought Sean out on more missions with Red Squad to get him away from her. The anger never died down, however, but the danger did de-escalate because of a lack of proximity. “You’re going to lose your career over a woman,” James warned him. Sean ignored the warning.

When final exams came, however, she was able to beat him out by one point. It ended with him as salutatorian while she reached the valedictorian status.

Sean’s bitterness over the matter never dissipated. He couldn’t believe he’d lost to her. When he finally transferred into intelligence, the bitterness remained, though he’d hoped he’d gotten rid of her. His scores and the news of his performance in covert missions with Red Squad were enough for T’Rin to accept him.

He began with modest duties, getting trained in the art of observing people, manipulating them. He’d be brought to diplomatic functions, told to talk to aides outside of the official conferences. There he learned to monitor body language, hobbies, small talk, to garner and glean information as to targets.

Once he was able to provide steady reports, observe body language, glean details about people based on their habits, their words, their subtle tics, he graduated to being implanted to transmit messages to on the ground field agents. This progression required timeliness, paying attention to his surroundings to not get caught or noticed, and also a diligence in working with the agents. After several simple missions like these, Sean began to gain the trust of T’Rin and the intelligence department to place him on more critical assignments.

With the Dominion War heating up, the responses of the Romulans became of interest to Starfleet Command. They needed agents on the inside. A cell was formed under T’Rin, conscripting Sean to undergo surgery to extend the small points of his ears and his forehead features to appear more fully Romulan. He both showed a temperament similar to Romulans in his psych profile, and would already have the green blood due to his heritage which would keep him safe in the event of cuts or scrapes being seen by others.. He would be inserted on the inside as a senator’s aide at their Central Committee. The only problem was -- one other ended up on this mission as well, the Romulan girl from the academy. He seethed at the idea of working together, though they would be stationed in different places in order to maximize the ability to have reach and glean information.

They were deployed, and through Sean’s connections, he could see all the information flowing about the Romulans. The Romulan delivered well, as she always did. He made it a point to try to get better information. It became a competition again, even though no one other than T’Rin was watching.

Sean managed to transmit back data on a new superweapon the Romulans were talking of building, but the Romulan girl got the glory when she retrieved the full schematics two weeks later. The Romulans ended up abandoning the project, but she had beat him again at his own game, causing further frustration.

A crucial moment in the Dominion War came when the Romulans were negotiating a non-aggression pact. Senator Vreenak was working toward this end along with a coalition. Sean, from his position, began sowing seeds of mistrust among Vreenak’s chief opponent in the Senate among the aides. It created a faction that wanted to enter the war and side with the Federation. A perfect situation for the Federation to latch onto. His efforts on Romulus paid off as the Romulans ended up entering the war upon the assassination of Senator Vreenak, which looked like it was caused by the Dominion when they were unhappy with him meeting with the Federation on DS9. The Romulans entered the war effort soon after, the faction Sean had been cultivating winning out

Efforts successful, the war going into full effect and changeling tests being done often, it became too hot to keep Sean in, and so he was extracted and sent back to command. T’Rin was promoted as a higher-up in Strategic Operations at Starfleet Command to direct war efforts, which left a vacancy at Starbase 499, when the XO was promoted to Captain, the second officer then rising in the ranks to XO. There were two candidates: Sean and the Romulan girl.

Sean ended up winning out in the position, promoted to commander and the Second Officer position of the station after managing to resolve a crisis between two worlds nearby, both of whom wanted to enter the Federation, but both of which were warring factions opposed to each other. The prince and princess of each world had fallen in love with each other unbeknownst to their parents, wanting to elope but understanding it was an impossible Romeo & Juliet situation. Sean was able to get this information from the young prince through his charms and sharing a few drinks, which he then brought to the diplomatic officer on the station to be able to use the information to resolve peace talks. Despite the disgust the two planets’ peoples had together, love triumphed and the two worlds gained peace through the marriage, both submitting applications to the Federation afterward. Starfleet was very impressed with the information gathered and promoted him thusly.

But the Romulan girl similarly received a quality post near the Cardassian border. While it was a victory, it became a pyrrhic one as the Cardassian front escalated in importance, the Romulan diminishing as they allied with the Federation. His job directing agents became easier and more stable for a time.

The Romulans went to painstaking efforts to hide the existence of the Reman people, something uncovered by intelligence as well as the efforts of the USS Enterprise. After the incident with Shinzon, intelligence was used to keep the Romulans on their toes and focused inward on their problems, keeping them off being aggravated by the Federation after the Dominion War had winded down.

He still kept tabs on the Romulan girl, who became a fast superstar in the intelligence world, but both of them were getting to the point where they were “aging out” of the spy game, something much more suited for the young who had nothing to lose, no vested interest in careers or starting families.

Sean realized it was starting to get late in life for himself, and with his familial history, he had pressure to start a family of his own. He became involved in several vapid relationships but none of them stuck. He couldn’t get out of “spy mode” to let himself treat people like normal. It’d killed more than one possibility. One came close, and he got engaged before ending up sabotaging the efforts subconsciously.

In the year 2380, he excelled in his position as second officer and holding a post in strategic operations as secondary duties,, interfacing with the agents from intelligence and passing strategic information and recommendation onto the fleet for various conflicts and deployments. He found the work rewarding, enjoying being a part of moving the pieces across the galactic chessboard. However, it became clear he was overly qualified for a second officer position in a matter of years, but at the same time, he was not a good fit for many of the exploratory of science vessels for a first officer position, because of his chiefly military and intelligence positions. He tried to let the powers that be know of his ability in diplomacy, but he was always passed upon for Starship duty, plus the CO and XO of the station liked his work ethic and wanted to keep him there.

Starbase jobs tended to be a place where someone could settle in for years, the ideal family environment, but it also made Sean itch for action of his prior career. He was too close to home in the Federation for anything beside minor security incidents but developed an impeccable record during the time, and more and more of the station’s operations were fed to him by his two senior officers as they realized they could rely on him.

The good news was, he’d accumulated a lot of leave over the years. He used the time to explore the different cultures of the Federation, go back to Earth and wine and dine with the Admiralty. He made himself good friends at Starfleet Command, putting his intelligence career to use for his own personal goals now with no war going on. He got in the ear of several folk that he wanted to get into starship command, and they listened.

In 2382,, the captain of Starbase 499 announced a surprise retirement. Sean was then promoted to XO of the station and full commander, while the XO moved up into the captain’s spot. They worked well as a team, with Sean able to handle the duties he enjoyed on a starbase with a lot of traffic -- people, disputes, flight exercises of the squadrons, while the captain took on more paperwork and official appearances.

Starfleet Intelligence still brought information to Sean to disseminate back home to T’Rin at Starfleet Command. The Romulans had been quiet since the incident with the Enterprise-E and the Remans, the last of his intelligence lines starting to dry up, forcing him to settle more into the day-to-day operations of the Starbase as a primary job.

Sean was popular among the crew. Even though he was often tapped to handle difficult disputes between clashing personalities, he garnered a reputation for always taking the time to listen. Holding an office visit never hurt anything, nor did giving a soft smile to a crewman in a crisis. They were tricks from the spy trade, subtle body language movements to make people feel comfortable, and in doing so, he was able to de-escalate a number of situations before they became crises.

In 2384, Starbase 499 was hit by a neurological virus brought in and released from Entek Prime. Though Sean had little experience with medical, he was able to enact an efficient quarantine which prevented the spread and garnered time for the CMO to come up with a solution and cure for the virus before anyone on the station died. The crew was loyal to him and moved quickly, as did the civilian population of the base. The crisis management resulted in him being brought to Earth for a medal, which he didn’t feel like he deserved, the medics being the true heroes, but buzz about his competency as a commander circled through the fleet.

Now, his record was impeccably clean, having worked hard and been diligent to stay in good graces of the higher-ups his entire career, in addition to, his family having a great history in the fleet and connections. His former mentor T’Rin now in Admiralty at Starfleet Command, he was looked upon as a stellar officer. T’Rin as well as his captain from Starbase 499 recommended him for a command position at Deep Space 9, which would play more to his skills as a strategic location by the wormhole. It wasn’t a starship as he’d always dreamed, but at least it would be more interesting than a homefront supply starbase.

Core Courses

 * ADMIN101: Star Fleet Operations
 * ADMIN110: Chain of Command and General Protocol
 * DIPL101: General
 * ENG221: LCARS Programming 1
 * ENG231: Computer Memory and Personnel Interfaces
 * ENG232: Replicators, Transporters, and Holodecks
 * ENG233: Sensors, Communications, and Helm Systems
 * HIST101: Birth of the Federation
 * LANG101: Federation Standard
 * LANG110: Major Species (Elementary) - Cadet's Choice
 * LAW101: Federation, General
 * MATH101: Concepts
 * MED101: First Aid and Field Medicine
 * PHYS101: Concepts
 * PILOT101: Runabouts and Shuttles
 * SURV101: Starship Emergencies
 * SURV110: Environmental Suits and Zero-G Training
 * TAC101: Combat, Unarmed
 * TAC110: Combat, Small Weapons
 * BIO101: Concepts
 * XEN101: General

Majors

 * COMU 101: Communications
 * COMM 101: Command and Control
 * DIPLO 101: Basic Diplomacy
 * DIPLO 200: Diplomacy With Hostile Species
 * SURV 101: Survival Strategies
 * SURV 200: Starship Emergencies
 * Tac 150: Combat, Martial Arts
 * Tac 210: Small Unit Maneuvers
 * ARM110: Phasers, Rifles and Artillery
 * Tac 300: Tactical Analysis
 * LANG 300: Romulan Language
 * LAW 100: Federation Law
 * LAW 300: Romulan Law
 * CIV 300: Romulan Government And Civics
 * ENG 220: Computer Systems
 * PILOT 101: Basic Piloting
 * ETI 101: Etiquette Among Different Cultures
 * MED 150: Field Medicine

Minors

 * CW 101: Creative Writing
 * HIST 101: Earth History
 * His 220: Early Starfleet History
 * Art 101: Introduction To Fine Art
 * MUS 200: Klingon Opera
 * Art 330: Romulan Historical Art

Trivia

 * He has been to the Moscow Ballet, London Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Corvix Klingon Opera


 * If he ever gets to play baseball, he can show one of the most wicked curve balls out there


 * His mother lives on Earth and does charity work for the families of fallen Stafleet officers

Likes

 * Classic human culture from ancient books such as Dante’s Inferno and Crime and Punishment to classical music and ballet.


 * People who display high class, hobnobbing with the upper echelons of society


 * Vehicles, especially ancient ones. Flying and driving fascinate him and classic vehicles give a pilot more control over their destiny without the safeties modern computers offer. It thrills him.


 * Gambling, but more in situations where he can make a strategic choice like over a baseball game rather than spinning a dabo wheel… though the latter can be fun too.


 * Fine spirits like aged cognac or French wines.

Dislikes

 * Species who aligned with the Dominion during the war, not trusting them.


 * Not being able to find a clear path to victory (Kobayashi Maru type scenarios) not just in major command decisions, but also in his personal life


 * Cheap replicated food or synthehol. Why waste the time?