Lyran von Thune

-=Needs significant updates=-

Early life
Lyran was born and raised into the Hysperian nobility. He led a life of luxury and privilege as the son of Count Herbert von Thune and Baroness Catherine de Grand Jour, and received the best education money could afford. Being the third son of his line, however, meant that his chances at ever inheriting the family estates were always limited.

While he had more freedom in the matter of his choice of careers than his elder brothers as a result of this, he was nevertheless expected to join and graduate from the Royal Naval Academy so that, should the need ever arise, he could be called up from the reserves to serve in a position fitting his lineage. Fortunately, he had always had an eye on the stars and his impressive discipline (especially for a youth his age) made him well-suited for a career in the military. He joined the Academy at the age of 14.

A particularly talented youth, he earned his commission as a Midshipman with a specialization in starship security and the gentlemanly arts of chivalry at arms at the age of 16 years old. It has been a matter of some debate whether his selection as part of an exchange program with Starfleet in the 2360s was due to merit or to patronage. Whichever the case might be, he was assigned to the USS Victor with a provisional rank of ensign.

Federation Starfleet Exchange program and first tours of duty
His assignment as part of the exchange program was not exactly what he had expected. He had dreams of serving on the Enterprise, or some other high-profile or avant-garde ship. It seemed to him that he might have drawn the proverbial short straw when he received news of his posting. The USS Victor was already three decades old when he reported for duty to the newly minted Captain (Cmdr) Hallie Leung.

Ol’ Frankenstein, as it was called in hushed voices by engineering and operations crews in spacedocks and starbases across the alpha and beta quadrants, had quite the reputation. Over the dacades, the USS Victor has been poked full of holes, burned, crash-landed,  left adrift in an asteroid field with its shields knocked down, depressurized, sabotaged… and yet nothing seems to keep her down, as if she had a will to live all it’s own. All of these scars have greatly contributed to the long running joke that the name Victor actually comes from Victor Frankenstein rather than the latin word for ‘champion’.

Whatever the case, Victor was one of the ships assigned to the Cardassian Demilitarized Zone. It was hoped that a few simple ‘show the flag’ operations would be sufficient maintain order in the sector, something even a relatively junior commanding officer could handle. History tells us that the strategy was a miscalculation on Starfleet’s part, but that Captain Leung was more than up to the task.

The old ship saw action a number of times against the Cardassian Union, and each time, Lyran has proved to be a considerable asset to the young captain through surprising strategic insight, acumen and suggestions of unorthodox Hysperian tactical doctrines designed to give ships an edge against often technologically superior enemies. For his efforts, she rewarded him with a field promotion to (actual) ensign so he could take on further responsibilities as part of her crew.

Starfleet having read Leung’s account they decided to confirm the field promotion should he desire it, on condition of the completion of a few courses that could be done over Zoom–I mean subspace communications, to bridge him over to Starfleet’s standards. He accepted the offer and his new place in Starfleet. He served bravely as a ground support combat officer for much of the late Cardassian, Galen and Tzenkethi conflicts.

The Defense of Jurahaya
During the Cardassian conflict, Juhraya colony eventually became hotly contested. Fearing an impending invasion, it was decided that a party of security and engineering personnel should beam down to the surface and assess the defensive capabilities of the colony, and see to what could be done to shore them up should an attack come. Meanwhile, the USS Victor would continue it’s flag-waving tour and come pick them up in a few days.

Assigned to this mission, Viscount von Thune  was tasked with training the colonists in guerilla and defensive tactics until he had raised a decent militia. While an invasion was very much seen as an inevitable outcome, it was not expected to come any time soon. When a Cardassian warship appeared in orbit out of nowhere, it took everyone by surprise. Perhaps it had been monitoring the Victor and was just waiting for the best moment to strike, when it was out of immediate range. The Cardassians launched troop transports and assaulted the main settlement. While under fire, the Starfleet crew managed to launch a distress call, but the Victor would not be able to offer support for a few hours still.

The colonists, supported by the handful of Starfleet personnel and Viscount von Thune, were ready and offered a spirited resistance. In an unprecedented upset, the colonial force obliterated several Cardassian raiding parties and even managed to seize two Cardassian troop transports and capture professional grade military weapons and gear they would be able to repurpose. The ground fighting continued for hours until the Victor chased the Cardassians out of orbit. Documents describing invasion plans on other nearby Federation colonies were found on board the captured transports and were instrumental in preventing eventual massacres.

Battle of Panora
Quite possibly the most famous action taken by Viscount von Thune during the Cadassian conflict is remembered today as the Battle of Panora, where one of the transports captured on Jurahaya was voluntarily crippled in orbit of an uninhabited class-m planet near the Cardassian border. Using simulated damage to life support systems, a makeshift lifesigns manipulator and stolen identification codes, they used a distress signal to lure the Kreklar, a Galor-class cruiser. The first batch of “survivors” were beamed on board, and blasted their way through the operations personnel and secured the transportation room as more and more of the raiders were joining them. With lightning speed, strike teams secured engineering and other strategic locations while Lyran led a handpicked few to the bridge sword in hand. Boarding action was successful and the only prize of the conflict was secured with minimal casualties on either side. Crucial intelligence regarding Cardassian fighting capabilities was gained from the reverse-engineering of the ship.

Further adventures
With the beginning of the Dominion cold war, the USS Victor was sent to the alpha quadrant to strengthen the defense of the core. The situation turns into a powder keg in 2372, the Klingons declare war and the USS Victor is at the forefront of that conflict, destroying a number of birds of prey with her squadron. Lyran earned himself a commendation for bravery, engaging a boarding party of blood-thirsty, balth’leth-wielding Klingons on their own terms using his sword and nothing else. The move was regarded as reckless by the Starfleet Personnel Office, but they could not deny the morale impact he had in the fighting. What mattered to him however was that he had established a reputation for himself, among his peers but also among the Klingons who had survived the failed boarding attempt.

By the time the Dominion War officially started, he acted as Chief tactical Officer and later Executive Officer of the USS Victor, the XO having been reassigned to a ship having lost its CO in the early confict. Having fought the Cardassians for years, Leung and von Thune’s undeniable understanding of the Cardasian art of war was critical to the success of the USS Victor’s engagements in the early Dominion War,  until the Battle of Tyra system, where Captain Leung was killed. As executive officer, he assumed command of the USS Victor and managed to not only escape the massacre, but also to rescue at great cost the USS Sarek with its tractor beam.  Because Starfleet was unable to find a suitably senior replacement for Captain Leung, he remained in the chair for the remainder of the conflict.

Upon conclusion of the conflict, he was promoted to Commander and  confirmed as the commanding officer of the USS Victor. The following few years, due to the superior planetary support capacities of the the Ambassador class, the ship was assigned on missions to assist in the re-building of worlds and colonies across Federation space. He was promoted to Captain in 2380. In 2385, USS Victor was part of the task force dispatched to Mars in response to the synth attack. They were witnesses to the destruction of the orbital facilities and the ignition of the atmosphere.

[Further assignment information will go here depending on what TF he gets tossed into]