FULL NAME: Chakotay
SPECIES: Human (of South American Rubber-Tree people descent)
HOME PLANET: Trebus
YEAR OF BIRTH: Now said to be 2329
FAMILY: Son of Kolopak and a lovely woman who suffers badly from chronic neck-pain. His father called him a 'contrary' - someone who was out of step with the rest of the tribe - blaming the fact that Chakotay was a footling-breach birth. He's now known to have a sister, and also a cousin in Ohio.
LAST FORMAL EDUCATION: Starfleet Academy, 2344-2348
NOTED SPECIFIC TRAINING: Trained as a pilot over Earth's North American continent, spent some time on Venus learning how to handle atmospheric storms and dodge asteroids in that system's asteroid belt. Narrowly avoided remedial training for 'First Contact' situations after an embarrassing misunderstanding with a Tarkanaan Ambassador.
LAST KNOWN OFFICIAL POSTING: Lieutenant Commander, U.S.S. Gettysburg, under Captain Madolyn Gordon. Resigned Commission 03 March 2368
CURRENT STATUS: Maquis commando and wanted felon, Captain of the lost Maquis fighter, 'Liberty', now serving as First Officer aboard the U.S.S. Voyager N.C.C 74656, lost in the Delta Quadrant, replacing Commander Cavit (deceased).
MARITAL STATUS: Unknown, but he seems to be 'available' whenever TPTB need him to be (See: 'Known lovers', below)
KNOWN LOVERS Sveta, Seska, Riley, Kellin, Tessa - all strong, independant females with a science or engineering background
OTHER FEMALES IN HIS LIFE: His mother, of course - who disappointed and confused him when she explained the science behind the Spirit Quest. His unnamed sister. B'Elanna - an old friend, a Maquis and the only person he'll allow to question his orders. They met when she was Engineer on a Bolian freighter (delivering weapons to the Maquis) and Chakotay saved her life. Janeway - elusive, currently trying to be his Captain and his best friend, ignore the sparks of electricity that crackle off the bulkheads when he's around, and conveniently forget that New Earth ever happened. Then there's his Spirit Guide - either a classy timber wolf or a hissy-fit snake, depending on her mood
PERSONAL CHOICES: Left his tribe at fifteen years of age because he found them too insular and predictable - their world-view extended only as far as their place in the tribe on their home-planet. They also rejected helpful modern-day technology out of hand. Almost left Starfleet before graduation because he hated it's arbitary and overly exacting, 'rules for the sake of rules', but he came to terms with that. Eventually resigned his Commission because the Federation and Starfleet refused to protect his homeworld from the Cardassians. Fiercely protective of his privacy, also chooses to be a vegetarian.
INTERESTS: Science, space exploration (especially early Earth launches), anthropology, general archeaology, communication skills (once figured-out how to commune with a Terrelian seapod), sand painting, boat-building, decorative carving of stone or wood, cookery (possibly something he was forced to learn for his own safety on New Earth), piloting shuttles or Voyager when he gets the chance, zoology/animal behaviour, ancient legends with hidden meanings that fit right into those awkward little lulls in conversation, and the philosophical writings of Dante.
SPORTS: swimming, skiing, hoverball, velocity, wrestling, mountaineering, boxing and seeing just how far he can elevate Tuvok's left eyebrow - a sure sign that our favourite Chief of Security is, 'perplexed'
LIKES: The colours cream, blue and brown for casual wear/clothing, likes to run long distances for recreation and to clear his head, enjoys hot (as in 'stolen') mushroom soup, Neelix's corn salad, Janeway's vegetable biryani (if sick-bay is on standby), cream and two sugars in his coffee (if he has a choice he prefers to drink water or tea), he also likes information "In a nutshell".
DISLIKES: Hates snakes, challenges to his authority, being left out of the Command loop by Janeway & Tuvok, dislikes carrots, fried foods upset his stomach and he thinks pudding is slimey. The jury's still out on Tom Paris, but if the dude breaks B'Elanna's heart, you just know he's a dead man!
SOME BAD HABITS: ** Manipulative redheads with hidden agendas | Partially peeling fruit before putting it back in the fruitbowl | Compulsive Eco-destruction (inconsiderate, aggressive 'parking' of shuttlecraft on previously unspoilt planets) | Decking crewmembers who won't listen to his orders | Brushing-up on his Tic-Tac-Toe game when he's supposed to be focused on bridge-duty | Compulsive littering (losing and leaving his DNA all over the Delta quadrant) | Propositioning Tarkanaan ambassadors during first contact meetings (he blames their difficult sign language, we believe it was the smile and the dimples) | Biting his tongue when a beautiful, thoughtful gift is callously rejected (some people are just itching for a crash course in good manners) | Meekly allowing beautiful, manipulative redheads to 'define parameters' | Forgetting the Unforgettable | Keeping us waiting for his turn at 'Talent Night' | Always being a gentleman (sometimes you just need to grasp an opportunity - like showing a certain redhead what she's missing - either under a table during a storm, or under the guise of CPR) | Stubbornly trying to help looney-tunes annoraks with big time machines - even when they're never satisfied | Possibly ejecting the warp core, decompressing the bridge, or locking Janeway in her Ready room every time he puts a glass of water down on his, 'active console' office desk| Only being able to start a fire with some of Janeway's hair for kindling (she has to bring her own marshmallows, too!)
SOME GOOD HABITS:** Manipulative redheads with hidden agendas | "Seven? Who's she then.... is she that tall girl in Astrometrics?" | Taking out looney-tunes Kazon with his own precious, 'little ship that could' to save people he doesn't even know yet | Leaving his corporeal body and going 'soul-walkabout' through a dark nebula to save his friends | Hiding that smile and those dimples under Vidiian make-up (EEEK!) to save his friends | Wilful and determined use of his smile and dimples to get his own way | Resolutely resisting the urge to check behind the couch for the phantom pan-pipe player (who suddenly starts playing during his pakra ceremonies) | That tattoo (sure, it has deep, spiritual significance, but hubba hubba!) | "Either we maintain our command structure or else we settle our differences the old fashioned way."| Building beautiful 'splinter-free' bathtubs & headboards| Saving
chatty, 5' 5" redheads (who expect in-depth weather warnings from monkeys), from mean, green Plasma storms | Thoughtfully leaving his grandmother's recipe for monkey biryani behind on Voyager | Gracefully accepting paternity suits from looney-tunes, manipulative Cardassian redheads, then going after his son | Neck-rubs that seem to measure 10 on the 'Janeway' scale | The way he so obviously adores our B'Elanna | Single-handedly rescuing terrified alien girls from lava lakes with an effortless 'fireman's lift' | Looking yummy - even in naff Ferengi 'ear' jewellery and 'sixties retro | Crying as Janeway died in his arms | Saving our favourite spotted, be-whiskered Talaxian and helping him through a debilitating crisis of faith | "There's plenty of time" | Taking the mother of all spears with him when he sleep-walks | Going out of his way to help alien scientists prove their 'Distant Origins' | "You're a gung-ho kind of gal, aren't ya?" | Spacing a Borg jamboree when it double crosses him | "Eyes Open" | Finding Mama Kate's & Helm-boy's Threshold offspring, keeping a straight face and restricting himself to, "I don't know how I'm going to enter this into the log" | "Give my best to Kathryn" | Losing his cool with a redheaded female Q (who's taller and bitchier than he is) | Being bothered and jealous about Q's plans and chat-up lines| That wonderful twisted sense of humour! We'd love to see more of it :)
**This is sort of a mixed blessing - at least, as far as J/Cer's are concerned.
Here's what the official Star Trek Site biography section has to say on Chakotay. Please bear in mind that there are discrepancies between this information and the information gleaned from Jeri Taylor's books, but as so little of it was ever explored on screen - and thereby made 'canon' - it's sadly and annoyingly upto us, the fans, to decide which version we wish to accept and which we wish to reject. Maybe if the character had stuffed a couple of grapefruit up his shirt we wouldn't have this mess ; we'd have solid, irrefutable facts. But there ya go... that's what Star Trek has become - a house built on ever-shifting sand and conveniently changeable character backstories.
FEDERATION BIOGRAPHICAL DATABASE FILE: Chakotay
**Includes updates through SD 55000 (2378); updated addenda pending
A Native American descendant, this onetime Starfleet lieutenant commander resigned from his position as an instructor in Starfleet's Advanced Tactical Training in 2370 to join the Maquis, sparked by his father's death fighting Cardassians on the tribe's homeworld along the Demilitarized Zone. Chakotay is a gentle man but resolute, and is one of the Maquis who are truly in the fight for principle, not mercenary gain or violent outlet - as was one of his students, Lt. Ro Laren.
Today Chakotay looks to his spiritual Mayan background for inner comfort - and doesn't mind sharing that belief with others, when asked, or even enduring some good-natured ribbing about it from Torres and Paris, among others. He uses a spririt guide summoned by his medicine bundle, prays to speak with his father for guidance, and uses a Mayan-descended medicine wheel for self-healing. With amother suffering from ongoing neck muscle spasms, he is also reportedly an excellent masseuse.
However, he didn't always have such reverence for his ancestors' ways. His father Kolopak was insistent upon finding their peoples' ancestral home and did so in the Central American jungle in 2344, when Chakotay was 15. But the young man had already been casting his lot with Starfleet crews patrolling the border, and stunned his father on that trip with the news he'd be leaving the tribe to attend Starfleet Academy after his newfound aquaintance Captain Sulu agreed to sponsor him at Starfleet Academy, even at his young age. Despite that resistance, Chakotay dis learn many survival skills from his father, such as building log cabins and fire-starting.
Chakotay's piloting skills trace back to extensive and early Starfleet Academy training. From a freshman course over adjacent North America, he went to Venus to master atmospheric storms and had yet another semester dealing with asteroids in the Sol asteroid belt.
The virtual estrangement between father and son lasted until 2371 when Kolopak died defending his home in the early days of Cardassian harassment, even as the final border treaty was being signed. Chakotay took to wearing his tattoo, a symbol of those jungle descendants, to honor his father, who wore it also; even his own name is a cherished gift from his tribe. Later Chakotay reported considering archeology as a second occupation, either in the field or in academics.
Chakotay's people, tracing their lineage back past Mayans to the Rubber Tree People of Central America, resisted the intrusion of more technological societies until the devleopment of warp drive in the 21st century allowed them to leave Earth and find their own home for good. One 20th century forebear he knows of was a schoolteacher in Arizona.
Even today its members avoid modern devices such as transporters wherever they can, and he was taught that nothing is personally owned save the courage and loyalty in one's own heart. Despite his tribe's move, the adult Chakotay means Earth when he thinks of "home" - from the Arizona desert and the Baja California peninsula over to the Gulf of Mexico.
Known members of Chakotay's Maquis crew include B'Elanna Torres, Lon Suder, Kurt Bendera, Kenneth Dalby, Mariah Henley, (First Name Unknown) Ayala, (FNU) Hogan, (FNU) Jackson; Bajoran nationals Seska, Gerron and Jarvin; and a Bolian, Chell.
With an undercover agent from the crew of Captain Kathryn Janeway aboard, Chakotay's craft disappeared in the Badlands a week before Janeway's new U.S.S. Voyager itself was lost on SD 48307.5 and presumed destroyed.
File Update: Delta Quadrant Addendum
Appended by Capt. Kathryn Janeway, U.S.S. Voyager
The former Maquis leader has had his share of pains before: the revelation that Tuvok was Janeway's spy; the death of Kurt Bendera in a Kazon battle, after he'd helped in out in a brawl on Telfas Prime; and the defection of his former lover Seska - whom he's further shocked to realize was a Cardassian spy all along in his Maquis crew, and who continues to manipulate that guilt.
Despite such trials, and his Maquis sympathies, Chakotay's own moral courage rings out as strongly as mine when the chips are down - and it is to his credit that he has accepted my command and enforced the embracing of Starfleet ways among his old crew fully and with vigor, including assuming equal discipline - and, I've heard, a right cross if necessary. And I am especially indebted that he convinced me to gamble on his nominee for chief engineer - although I must take the blame in overriding my convictions in seeking an alliance with the Trabe or Kazon as he'd suggested.
The convictions of both his people and Starfleet served him well when keeping his life and dealing with the Kazon boy Kar and his elders - and putting his own safety on the line to fake his death, saving Kar's naming honor. He apparently has more than one medicine bundle made up, or else he thought to take it with him in the rush to beam out with Kar.
Chakotay had seemed to be on the way to mending fences with Tom Paris when our ruse that couldn't include the commander had to be hatched to trap our Maquis informant to Seska; I know he was not only annoyed at the act but miffed that he was left out of the loop, but it did further the performance beautifully.
Checkout review update, Kathryn Janeway, SD 50100:
Seska is dead. Having secured our vessel once and for all from the recent short-lived Kazon take-over, I note not only Chakotay's heroics in securing our planetside position with the suspicious but sentient natives, but also his mixed mood in learning that Seska's child, presumed to be his, proved not to be. I only trust that Seska's demise will allow the commander to leave this phase of his life behind without guilt and manipulation.
Personal addenda, Level 1 classification, for SFC eyes only:
I write this after having spent six weeks quaratined alone with the
commander on an immunizing Class M planet under threat of carrying a
viral epidemic to the crew. While personal log are not the purview of
this file entry, I feel compelled to comment on Chakotay's survival
skills and his commitment to easing our personal burdens alone, before
we had any hope of seeing our ship again. We likely have a long journey
ahead of us, and I feel somehow invigorated that he and I have fostered
such a smooth relationship. Where our personal feelings lie beyond that
is an issue that must not interfere with crew safety and security, but
there are times when I believe the commander, despite his best effort,
gets downright jealous or giddy.
--KJ
