Ang Binshou

Family

Ang Binshou was born at Starbase 11 in 2362 to Ang Kha-ti and Susuki Naru. The Ang family had been living at the starbase for over a century, and while most had served in Starfleet in some capacity, Kha-ti’s great-grandfather was a civilian who had opened up a teahouse on the base in the 2240s. The starbase had been operational for over 50 years at that point, and as the population grew and families began to establish themselves there was a community effort to create more cultural and recreational facilities. Thus, the Âng Têlâu opened for tea, dim sum, and kang-hu-tê ceremonies, with Kha-ti as its most recent heir and proprietor.

Naru was a refugee from the Raville II colony, recently destroyed by the Tzenkethi. He had lost most of his friends, family, and possessions, and had no intention of staying on Starbase 11 any longer than was necessary until he found the Ang teahouse. While it was in many ways different from the Urasenke school his grandparents had practiced back in Japan on Earth, it felt like a calm, nostalgic, and safe place for him. He spent many hours and days there while he recuperated, and he and Kha-ti got to know each other very well.

Two years later they were married. They expanded the scope of the teahouse’s service with Susuki family traditions and expertise, and they expanded the scope of their family with the birth of their child.

Childhood

Binshou was a shy and quiet child from the start, despite his parents’ best efforts to help him socialize. In addition to age-appropriate work at the teahouse and learning the family’s crafts, he was enrolled in judo at the youth rec center. He applied himself to tea, judo, and school work with equal diligence, but despite–or perhaps because of–the constant presence of other people, he preferred solitude.

He made exceptions for the notably mute Abaris people, refugees who had been relocated from their destroyed planet to Starbase 11 in 2273. After adjustments to the air filtration systems and inoculations against their psychedelic spores, the mushroom-like species had been permitted to stay and make their homes in the natural areas of the Starbase. This included the teahouse gardens, and Binshou loved the calm hours he could spend watching them create art or tend to plants.

That was the normal pattern of his childhood. He did very well in school, and though other children considered him with indifference at worst and fondness at best he never had close friends.

Dominion War

He was 11 years old when the Dominion War began, and though Starbase 11 was not on the front lines, the atmosphere on base became saturated with constant tension. For students, extracurriculars were often canceled due to instructors being called into active duty, and safety drills became more specific and frequent.

As the war dragged on, Kha-ti and Naru began floating the idea of Binshou going to live with extended family back on Earth for the duration, just as his maternal grandparents had done. Though he rarely had cause or inclination to contradict his parents, on this point he was always adamant that he wanted to stay at the Starbase. Eventually, a compromise was made that he would indeed return if the frontlines drew any closer.

Unfortunately, the front lines jumped directly to their doorstep before any of them had a chance to leave. In 2375, a Dominion fleet launched a surprise attack on the starbase. Thirty percent of the base was destroyed, and there were hundreds of casualties. Binshou’s mother was among them.

The shock of his wife’s death compounded with the loss of his family 15 years earlier had a profoundly traumatic effect on Naru and left him in a state of withdrawn catatonia. With the teahouse in shambles and his only living guardian mentally compromised, Binshou had no choice but to finally join his extended family back on Earth.

Adolescence

From then on, Binshou and his grandparents lived with an aunt and uncle in Taiwan, with his father in the care of a psychiatric facility nearby. He was initially enrolled in a local judo class, but he dropped out almost immediately: the loss of his mother, his home, and essentially his father, and the massive upheaval of his life had pathologized his shyness into severe social anxiety. He became afraid to speak in class or even meet anyone’s eyes and didn’t leave home unless strictly necessary.

Fortunately, one of these necessary outings was to his psychiatrist, Dr. Teijo Dan. He was a specialist in trauma, and he helped Binshou navigate his grief, confusion, and sadness as he adjusted to his new life. It took some time, but during his last few years of secondary school, he gradually started to come out of his shell. Dr. Dan wrote one of his letters of recommendation for Starfleet Academy, and the two are still in contact to this day.

Starfleet Academy

Ang Binshou knew immediately that he wanted to take the medical track at the Academy, but his original intent was to eventually gain a posting as a medical officer. It was guilt that changed his mind: the guilt that wracked his mind daily about leaving his father behind, or about joining Starfleet despite Starbase 11 giving his family an open and indefinite invitation to reopen their teahouse. How best to tackle that guilt? Why, by studying psychiatry himself, of course! Medice, cura te ipsum.

He also began practicing judo again, and though perhaps he didn’t make any close friends he’s still in contact with some of his old classmates.

Early Career

Ang spent much of his residency at Starfleet Medical treating patients of the attack on Mars three years prior. The Dominion War veterans in particular afforded him a chance to study the effects of a traumatic experience on patients with pre-existing trauma.

Upon completing his residency and becoming fully certified, he accepted an assignment to the medical ship USS Lavoisier as a staff psychiatrist. The mobility of the ship allowed him to dig deeper into studies on interspecies biopsychiatry, publishing studies on how different biologies and cultures responded to trauma.

USS Galaxy

Eventually, Ang transferred to the USS Galaxy as their attending psychiatrist. Here he had an opportunity to work with patients on a more long-term basis, and also perform an uncomfortable number of fitness-for-duty evaluations. Being his first not-strictly-medical posting, it also led him to many adventures and encounters one might not experience outside a Starfleet ship of the line.

The most memorable of these was perhaps the time the Galaxy was performing a joint mission with the IKS K’rol, and after a series of conversations and confrontations with one of their crewmembers, Ang ended up on a date with a Klingon named Rurj’. He hadn’t realized at the time that discussions about tea culture and song lyrics would qualify as a successful courtship, but he counted it as a happy accident, and the two are still in a long-distance relationship to this day.

Transition to General Medicine

Change begets change, and though he’d been considering it for a while, it wasn’t until he started his relationship with Rurj’ that Ang finally decided to return to general practice. He started with shadowing the CMO on the Galaxy, and then went on rotation through various assignments over the next several years to re-train.

Recent Developments

In January of 2401, Ang took a psychiatric assignment on the USS Intrepid of the Fourth Fleet, treating officers who’d recently lost their previous captain in a particularly shocking manner.

In February of 2401, he took another psychiatric assignment in the Fourth Fleet, this time doing a fitness-for-duty evaluation on the USS Olympic.

In March of 2401, he finally completed his re-training and found himself promoted to lieutenant commander and assigned to the USS Babylon as their new Chief Medical Officer right on the brink of the return of the Lost Fleet. During the crisis, they were ordered to locate a spaceborne lifeform that had been spotted attacking and fleeing from Dominion ships. A Betazoid crewmember–Lt. Ixabi–was tasked with making contact with the creature, and in addition to monitoring her physical well-being during the process, Dr. Ang also eased her anxiety by helping her train before first contact. Eventually, the crew convinced the lifeform to accompany the Babylon back to a Federation base where it would be safer, and where the two cultures might learn more about each other. [Mission 1: In Leviathan’s Wake]