Maxwell Simmons

Born on the 14th of July 2371 in Plymouth, England, Maxwell Percy Simmons is the youngest of three children to Josephine and Mary Simmons. His older siblings are Kathleen and David, two and three years old respectively. Maxwell was always regarded as a clever child by his teachers, but always in conjunction with other statements such as ‘difficulty in making friends’ or ‘argumentative with teachers’. His inquisitive mind was clearly frustrated with the pace of learning and teachers who insisted that social interaction and play were just as important to scholastic education.

As he progressed through school he continued to excel at academic studies, especially in physics where he was able to find a slightly more practical application to the mathematics that he was so thoroughly in love with. Again however he spurned most social time in favour of further study, often self-directed and against the wishes of his mothers who found themselves having to balance the desire for their child to be more well-rounded as well as wanting to foster his evident intellect.

This situation continued throughout high school, Maxwell becoming the subject of bullies who saw him as a loner and easy pickings, or were jealous because he could hold conversation with students years above him, in a purely academic sense. Maxwell’s preferred company became his reading materials or students years above him who he made connections with via extracurricular activities and who were, at least for awhile, on the same level of learning as he was. Those relationships tended to be short-lived however as his abrasive attitude and obvious lack of social niceties became evident and kids being kids, they preferred to hang out with others their own age.

Ready to graduate high school two whole years early his mothers had finally made a decision and opted to hold Maxwell back, citing his lacklustre grades in the non-science subjects and his need to develop better social skills. They reasoned, nigh-futilely with the boy, that he’d have a better time of it with those his own age versus at university. Maxwell reckoned he’d have a better time with those of a similar intellectual capacity instead. Ultimately he lost to his mothers’ wishes and remained at high school another two years where he spent the time expanding his studies into the fields his parents were concerned about, which to this day lends him to be a bit of a know-it-all.

When Maxwell finally did graduate from high school, he’d set his sights naturally on tertiary education, but also on getting out from under his mothers’ interference. His application to Starfleet wasn’t for the Academy campus on Earth, but for the satellite campus on Mellstoxx III. There he was able to disappear deep into his preferred subjects, though occasionally running into problems whenever he was forced to face the harsh realities of Starfleet Academy life – non-sciences based courses and required learning. While he was able to graduate his preferred subjects with ease, things such as self-defence, flight qualifications and survival training where experiences that Maxwell wasn’t keen to repeat and swore he’d do what he could to avoid going forward.

The only thing that had kept Maxwell in Starfleet Academy in the face of these undesirable requirements he now faced was the promise of being out in the great beyond, making discoveries before anyone else. The thought, the prospect of being the first to see something, the first to document it, name it, catalogue it – this was the fuel that kept Maxwell Simmons in Starfleet not just through this Academy years but beyond.

Maxwell has been able to live up to the promise multiple times now, but his inability to work well with colleagues has hindered his career opportunities multiple times now, his promotion record is a fair indication of that as he’s never been promoted early in his entire career and in fact was delayed by six months in achieving Lieutenant due to interpersonal conflicts with his then commanding officer.

Most recently Maxwell Simmons has found himself assigned to the USS Atlantis, NCC-90562, and had been on her immediate predecessor, NCC-81424. He had been a potential candidate for the position of Chief Science Officer but was rejected in favour of someone else.