Story

Profile Overview

T’Plau

Vulcan Female

Character Information

Assignment

Commanding Officer, DFC Jarok
Challenger

Born

T’Plau

Start of the month of T'ke'Tas, Year of ShiKahr 8694 (1st August 2085)

Shi’Kahr, Vulcan

Summary

T’Plau is a Vulcan High Command officer and the former Chief Armoury Officer and Third Officer of the Earth starship Challenger (NX-03). She left Challenger after being promoted to Commander and made the commanding officer of the Vulcan cruiser Jarok. T’Plau was the first Vulcan to be placed on the Coalition of Planet’s officer-exchange program.

Appearance

She has the typical features of all Vulcans: dark hair and pointy ears, other than that she is normal looking. She does however wear her brown hair longer than most with it reaching just below her ears.

Physical Description

  • Height: 5′ 6″ (1.68 m)
  • Weight: 140 Ilbs
  • Hair: Auburn-Brown
  • Eyes: Blue

Personality

An efficient officer who fallows orders, T’Plau is logical and exudes an air of calm. She is truly satisfied with her job which is a contradiction to the Syrranites’ way of belief. T’Plau rationalises this by thinking that not having a defence is illogical as enemies would take advantage of it.

Strengths & Weaknesses

She is highly logical, is cool and calm under pressure. She has never worked with humans and as such may appear awkward around human traditions and their customs.

Ambitions

T’Plau is highly curious about the galaxy and is currently fascinated with the development of humanity. She wants to be part of a ship that pushed the boundaries of known space and expand on her knowledge.

Languages

  • Vulcan
  • Andorian
  • Klingon
  • Earth language of English

Hobbies & Interests

  • Martial arts of numerous species,
  • firearm practice,
  • kal-toh,
  • meditation

History

Political Information

  • Affiliation: Vulcan High Command, Confederacy of Vulcan

Family

  • Mother: T’Rene
  • Father: Solar
  • Brother: Solpak
  • Sister(s):
    • T’Ruil
    • T’Sanry
  • Spouse: Captain Muroc, Commanding Officer of the T’Shear

Biography

Early Life

Raised in Shi’Kahr as the eldest child of T’Rene and Solar, there was a lot of pressure on her to excel in her life. Her early life was pretty standard. T’Plau was betrothed to Muroc, whom was the eldest son of a Vulcan Minister and a Lecturer at ShiKahr Academy, which was set to be sealed when they both reached adulthood. Her early schooling showed her natural talents for reading people and instinctively knowing they were lying.

Vulcan High Command Career

Early Career

As T’Plau reached her adulthood she was married to her husband Muroc but continued her studies at the academy in ShiKahr where she met several Syrranites who’s underground teachings appealed to her and she started to practice the teachings secretly. Her studies at the academy covered a range of subjects including engineering and science-based materials. After her studies she was offered a position in the Vulcan Security Directorate where she worked with her Syrrannites allies to stop the directorate arresting too many of her people.

Vulcan Security Directorate

T’Plau also invested several ministers whom where suspected of being corrupt and selling classified materials to other species most of which had suspicious evidence that did not seem to be correct but painted a convincing picture which forced her to report them to her superiors even though she mentioned to them that she felt the material was manufactured the High Council immediately classified the evidence and removed said ministers. Each time disappointing T’Plau a little more each time.T’Plau was then assigned to recover missing agents captured in Klingon and Andorian territory. She was requested to recover thirty-two agents and of which she managed to return twenty-four of them either recovering them or confirming them as dead. This operation required her to exercise expert covert skills as well as unsupported operations. She evaded capture at the hands of both species numerous occasions but allowed herself to be captured to locate the last few of the agents. She withstood the torture and managed to fashion an escape but not before rescuing two of the three agents held. The last one refused to return with her and even attacked T’Plau which left her with no choice but to end his life with her smuggled disruptor.

D.F.C. Sakra

When she returned to Vulcan, she was assigned to the Sakra which was a D’Kyr-class combat cruiser. T’Plau was assigned as a weapons operator which involved her understanding how the weapons worked, how to use them and how to repair them. During her time on the Sakrashe saw combat against the Andorians and other hostile races on more than one occasion.

T’Plau learned the most in her career as a weapons operator as she worked with various experienced officers to learn everything she needed. This included understanding the basics in engineering and helm operations. T’Plau honed her craft running simulations to predict movements and increase the weapons’ effectiveness in battle. T’Plau proposed to the High Command that they should allow the fleet to perform war games to increase the skills of the pilot and tactical officers’ skills. It was a suggestion that was met with great approval by her superiors as it seemed logical to train in this manner as it reduced chance of mistakes under fire.

Sakra was assigned as the head of the opposing force for the first war games which seemed to be going excellently until one of the vessels fired live weapons on the unshielded ships and took out the Sakra‘s life support systems. T’Plau whom had studied engineering went to help and was immediately put to work by the sub commander whom was so impressed by the standard of her work that he transferred her to his department. This started a new chapter in T’Plau’s life now in the engineering department. She felt like she had been thrown in at the deep end and felt out of place but with some mentoring from her commander she quickly started to pick up the procedures and methods used on a day to day routine.

T’Plau found her time in the engineering department enlightening as it gave her a greater knowledge on the department’s function and its effects on every other department in the ship.

T’Plau spent most nights studying the engineering principles set down by Sub Commander Sapreta, hoping that she could supplement her practical learning with a firmer theoretic grounding in the area she was now working. After a few years in the Sakra‘s engineering department she felt comfortable in the role however knew it was not where she belonged. She stayed in the department for a few more years in an attempt to solidify her knowledge which would allow her to function better in the tactical roles on the ship. This helped her as it gave her a better understanding of weak areas on other ships by their configuration. T’Plau was assigned as engineer in charge of weapons repairs which gave her extended skills with functionality of the weapons. During her time in this role allowed her to start to make improvements on the existing design. T’Plau was noticed for her actions and she was moved back to the tactical department as its Chief Tactical Officer when a replacement was required.

Her time was not spent on improving her skills but instead teaching the younger officers. She started a tough training scheme which drilled into her subordinates. T’Plau was also involved in several conflicts with Klingons and Andorians improving her knowledge of the species with every battle. T’Plau used logic to predict the actions of her opponents shooting at where the enemy was going to be rather than where they were.

Her faith in logic and the teachings of Surak were enhanced when one of the leaders of the Syrrannites, T’Pau, ascended to the High Council and started to make changes in the Vulcan system starting with the reduction of serving officers in the navy. While she was aware that T’Plau had aided the group in their work, T’Pau felt that T’Plau would serve the Vulcans best in a cultural exchange. T’Plau would go onto a Human ship and a Human would be given the chance to join a Vulcan ship. This program was performed on several roles in an effort to allow relationships between Vulcans and humans which had been a master servant role to become one of equals.

Challenger (NX-03)

It was decided that T’Plau would be assigned to the NX-class Challenger as it was lacking a Chief Armoury Officer at the time. She joined the ship when it was saving a convoy of Earth colonistsheading to the Archer system. While on board the Sakra, T’Plau would engage the Romulans for the first time and aided the Challengerin its attempts to defend their colony ships. They saved the colonists and escorted them to the Archer system, but prior to their arrival they discovered the new Earth colony was about to come under Romulan siege. During her transfer to the Earth ship, T’Plau formed a good working relationship with Captain Burton almost immediately; this was most likely to their shared backgrounds in security and tactical. However, T’Plau joined Commander Levesque in questioning the captain’s judgement when he decided to take their small convoy in to the Archer system to help other Starfleet vessels. Her objection was noted in his log, but nothing more came from it.

When Challenger was invited to Andoria by its new chancellor, Captain Burton relied on T’Plau to be his guide due to her past experiences with the Andorians. She escorted him when he visited Chancellor Margerit and remained at his side during their mission.  She supported his decision to join an Andorian task force when one of their colonies was attacked. She was impressed when Burton was made an honouree member of the Andorian Guard with the field promotion of Commander. She helped him in his efforts when he had to assume command of the task force on the behest of the Andorian Chancellor.  T’Plau was instrumental in finding a weakness to the Malurian-Nausicaan’s plan in keeping Docana, the Andorian colony they had invaded. She was part of the team to disable and take control of a minefield that had been setup. Her team discovered that the mines were Romulan in origin. They were able to use the minefield against the Malurian-Nausicaan forces which contributed to the successful liberation of the colonists. However, during the incident their shuttlepod had to crash land on Docana due to being heavily damaged from the shockwave created by exploding mines. After leaving their crash site, her team took refuge in caves under a large mountain range with other Andorian survivors. There she helped Commander Stanton’s efforts in developing a good relationship with the senior officer from the Andorian Imperial Guard: Commander Anthi. Eventually Challenger rescued them all once the external threat had been dealt with.

During the middle of 2155 the ship was ordered to make official first contact with the Deltan species on behalf of the Earth Commonwealth and its allies in the Coalition of Planets. Again, T’Plau was part of Burton’s diplomatic team to visit the planet for the first time. Initially the first contact went well with both side exchanging ideas peacefully, but the ship was dragged in to an ongoing conflict the Deltans were having with a neighbouring race known as the Carreons. When Commander Stanton was forced to became acting first officer, T’Plau assumed the duties of second officer. In fact, her tactical skills came in to full use when the Carreons began a campaign of attacking the ship on a regular basis. As their weapons weren’t as advanced compared to Starfleet’s the ship received little damaged until they persisted and repeated their attacks almost daily. It was during this period that she became closer to Captain Burton and Commander Stanton. On a daily basis she would meet with Captain Burton to develop tactics to defend the ship and analyse their enemy’s strengths and weaknesses. In their last battle they engaged a Romulan Bird-of-Prey which they discovered was using a telepresence capturing system to control Carreon vessels. They were able to avoid being captured themselves and disabled the craft; unfortunately, the Romulans were not prepared to be captured and destroyed their ship. The shockwave from the exploding ship severely damaged Challenger further. Burton told her along with the rest of the senior staff his decision to order the crew to abandon ship when it became heavily damaged and unable to sustain the entire crew. T’Plau and Stanton remained on board to help Burton with repairs and get the ship back to the Deltan home world. Fortunately, they were rescued by their Andorian allies on board the Avenkerev. The friendship that she and Stanton had developed with the Andorian CO, Commander Anthi and its chief engineer, Lieutenant Dreu helped them in securing much needed help to get the ship up and running to a decent level. When Challenger eventually returned to Delta she returned to her position as third officer when Commander Levesque was rescued. T’Plau assisted with the repairs to the ship, taking charge of the Deltans teams, however she was cautious at allowing them to have free reign on the vessel.  When the Carreons launched all-out final assault against the Deltans, Captain Burton decided to intervene and attempt to open a dialogue with the Carreons for a ceasefire. He hoped with the knowledge they had about the Romulans and their involvement that the Carreons would stand down. Unfortunately, the Deltan military attempted to use the ship in bold last ditched attempt to take out a Carreon armada by detonating its warp core through the use of a computer virus. The Starfleet crew were able to eject the warp core before it destroyed them. Once again the Andorians came to their aide and rescued the Challenger. In due course the entire crew were retrieved. T’Plau was placed in charge of this and she oversaw the removal of all Starfleet technology from the world (that was inhabited by a pre-warp civilisation). Captain Burton assigned T’Plau the job of debriefing the entire crew from their time on the alien world and was responsible in preparing their official report for Starfleet.

D.F.C. Jarok

T’Plau was highly praised by her superior officers for her work while on Challenger to the point they decided to promote her to the rank of commander and make her the commanding officer of the new Suurok-class combat cruiser, the Jarok. Initially she was not satisfied at the new assignment, as she thought that her time on Challenger was too short and that her work to ensure the Coalition Officer Exchange Programme was a success was prevented. After many discussions with her husband, Muroc as well as the Vulcan Ambassador to Earth (Soron) she accepted the promotion. Her acceptance was also spurred after the Romulans attacked the Vulcan world of Marek. Nevertheless she decided that her work on the Coalition Exchange Programme had not ended, instead she placed her new command on to it as well. After a brief stint working with Commander Anthi and the crew of the Avenkerev, T’Plau took a page from Captain Burton’s book and appointed her new first officer: Lieutenant Thom. Thom, who was Anthi’s first officer, agreed to the short-term transfer due to the fact that he, with Anthi, supported the notion that both their governments needed to do more to assist their allies on Earth with the war effort. Both Vulcan and Andorian ships had become vulnerable from attacks from the Romulan’s new telecapture weapon and their ships were easily overwhelmed. As a result Earth ships were now having to hold the frontlines for Coalition territory. T’Plau, Anthi and Thom did not agree with this and agreed to work towards the common goal of ensuring the alliance survived through the exchange programme. Their hopes were to be an example to others and to encourage more collaboration between the two former enemy states in supporting the Earth Commonwealth.