Nico Oliveria

Nico was one of two fraternal twins born on Vega colony to Celine and Maridel Oliveira. His mothers were both scientists, Celine an Agricultural Researcher and Maridel a cyberneticist. Together they raised Nico and his sister Abby in quiet suburbia until 2285 when Mars was attacked. Maridel’s career ended overnight as a total ban on synthetic life closed her laboratory.

Nico was only 12 years old when his parents became political activists. Until then he had never had an issue at school or with friends. Life had been pretty normal. After his parents began protesting the synth ban life changed for him and his sister. They were constantly bullied at school. Nico and Abby became extremely close during this time as their parents seem to have forgotten all about them. Without each other, they might have allowed the depression to become even worse than it was.

In 2387 when Nico was 14 years old his parents decided to move the family to Earth so they could protest more directly. While en route to Earth on the old cargo freighter their parents had booked travel on suffered a sudden loss of internal dampening as they emerged from warp. Everyone on the ship was killed instantly except for Nico and his sister who had been sneaking around the ship and were playing around in an escape pod they had just accidentally powered up. While they were injured the escape pods inertial dampeners were able to keep them from dying. The ship itself was ripped into two sections as the cargo failed to stop traveling at a significant portion of C.

When rescue ships from Earth arrived 10 minutes after their disastrous departure from warp they found the two teens still in the escape pod. Nico knew his parents had to be dead he was already showing an aptitude for engineering and he was pretty sure what had happened. They were taken aboard a training ship full of midshipmen on their training cruise. He could see on the horror on the faces of the cadets who found them. They didn’t have years of Starfleet training to fall back on yet. They were simply not ready for what they had found on the old cargo vessel.

Nico and Abby’s parents had both been only children and their parents were either out of the picture or no longer living. Much as it has been for the last two years they were on their own again. The Captain of the training vessel, Captain Jacobs, took them under his care until they returned to Earth the next day. There he had arranged for foster parents, friends of his, to meet them. Carol and Marcus Merritt would be their new parents, and though it was a hard loss losing their biological parents the Merritt’s were devoted to their new children.

Nico and Abby both applied to Starfleet Academy and were accepted when they were 18 years old. Moving from Atlanta to San Fransico they would once again rely on each other to get through the next four years. Both of them still suffered some bouts of depression and anxiety, but together they could always pull through

Nico didn’t always make the best decisions at the Academy. He would sometimes push his challenges of professors a little too far. He also embraced the hookup culture at the Academy.  He had a dozen relationships in his Freshman year, but after nearly failing out he received a visit from Captain Jacobs, now retired, who helped ground Nico in the reality of his situation. He vastly improved his grades in his Sophomore year, though he would never be a top of his class graduate.

At his graduation, Abby walked with honors, and Nico was just happy to have walked at all. Captain Jacobs and the Merritts were there to see them both graduate and there were no judgments regarding Nico not graduating with honors. It probably meant it wouldn’t serve on a brand new ship of the line, but Nico was ok with whatever assignment he received. His biggest worry and cause of all of his anxiety was for the first time him and Abby would be separate.

So a week later he and Abby said goodbye for the first time in their lives as she was assigned to a new Curiosity class ship while Nico was on his way to an aging Ambassador class ship the USS Zhukov. Nico was a little bummed for about a day, but he really was happy to just be an engineer on a starship for the first time. It took him a while to make new friends, but slowly he started to open up. He developed a solid friend group while also proving himself a capable engineer.

When the Assistant Chief Engineer spot came open he boldly applied for it. Much to his surprise, he got the job and the promotion to Lt JG. The promotion came before Abby’s, a point he may have mentioned once or twice. He was sure the Chief Engineer had wanted him to have this role, but he was also sure there wasn’t an abundance of Lt JG’s rushing out to apply for a position on an aging heavy cruiser. Two years later, after 4 years on the Zhukov, the crew was informed that the ship would be put in for a maintenance check. This check would determine if the ship would return to active duty following a refit or be retired. Having been an engineer on the ship for four years Nico immediately began to look for a new assignment.

He found several Assistant Chief Engineer spots he felt qualified for and put his application in, but another posting had also caught his eye. Another Ambassador class ship was finishing a refit and needed a new crew. This position, however, was for the Chief Engineer Officer, and while he had been Assistant Chief Engineer for two years he would be very young for such a position. Still, he took the game as he did two years prior and once again fate smiled on him, and a few weeks later he was saying goodbye to his old friends as he headed to Starbase 38 to join the crew of the USS Adelphi as her new Chief Engineer.