Tahir al-Assad

Tahir grew up as the middle child out of seven. His four sisters and two brothers were raised in a loving home with parents who strongly encouraged the development of their children’s minds. Tahir learned far more from his adventurous and caring mother as a child than he ever learned in school. With their father often away on business to provide for his ever growing family, their mother diligently raised them to be courteous, inquisitive, and independent. They did not grow up wealthy, but Tahir’s parents saw that they never wanted for anything. 

Tahir could recall many times when he witnessed his mother stretch one meal to last for a week, but he and his siblings were taught to be thankful for what little leftovers they had. Not having much in the means of entertainment in their home, he and his siblings grew up in nature, spending any free time they had in the outdoors. Tahir’s learned mother taught them all she knew about the nature around them, and Tahir proved to be a willing student, drinking in his mother’s lessons on useful plants and medicinal herbs with an ever inquisitive mind. With seven children and small means, Tahir’s mother had learned to rely on the earth for resources, and many households in the village turned to her for doctoral advice. 

The first medical procedure Tahir performed was on a baby rabbit that had been mauled by a dog. Even Tahir’s mother doubted the animal could be saved, but she encouraged Tahir to practice his growing skills just the same. When Tahir was able to nurture the small animal back to life, his mother knew he had a gift. He began to accompany her on visits to other members of the community as she assisted with everything from cuts and broken bones to playing midwife at births. Tahir raptly studied everything his mother did, and when he announced that some day he was going to be a doctor, she could not have been more proud and supportive. 

Since Tahir’s parents could not afford to provide him with an expensive education, he chose to enlist in StarFleet to continue his medical training. Diving into his doctoral studies with the same enthusiasm and passion he showed when learning as a child, he easily excelled in his classes. Tahir thirstily drank in the knowledge provided by skilled surgeons and experienced doctors, and he soon became recognized as one of the more daring doctors, willing to attempt difficult procedures and pulling them off with ease. 

One of the most difficult times in Tahir’s medical career, began with a call notifying him that his beloved mother had fallen deathly ill. Tahir immediately returned home to be involved in her treatment, but he only felt helpless as he watched the light in his mother’s eyes slowly wane away as she seemed to wither before him. No amount of tests could diagnose the issue and not even the most skilled of doctors could determine the root of her unknown disease. Try as he could, Tahir could do nothing to save her, and was forced to watch as her bright eyes closed forever. Yet with her final breath, she gave him one last bit of instruction. “Human life is the most valuable thing in the galaxy,” she told him, “and it must be protected at all costs.”

This message changed Tahir’s life, and served to give him even more of a drive in his medical studies. Although Tahir was never willing to risk a life in his procedures, unlike most doctors, he was not one to turn down an opportunity to save a life in a risky procedure due to the fear of marring his doctoral record with a death on the operating table. An untarnished record was hardly worth the possibility of saving another person’s life, and so with reckless abandon he would try anything he believed may help to lengthen the spark of life in his patients. It was as though every patient he treated reminded him of his mother, and he attacked every disease and ailment with the same undying tenacity he had given her. 

With his fearlessness in attempting experimental procedures on what was believed to be the most hopeless of cases, Tahir assisted in developing ground breaking techniques and proving various medical theories that changed the course of many procedures and treatments. His knowledge of rare diseases and skill with little known treatments made him the go to for many doctors when encountering unknown ailments. His ability to assess and diagnose unknown diseases that had only just been discovered in the galaxy became unrivaled as his knowledge of human biology and physiology grew. Yet throughout all this, Tahir remained the same compassionate and empathetic boy his mother had always raised him to be.