Chance Raschen

Author's Note

Star Trek: Freedom was the fourth game that I submitted this character to, and the only one that didn’t demand that I rewrite him to fit a “cookie cutter” format. Over time I’ve been asked to make minor changes here and there, and other things I altered because I just couldn’t make it work; but the premise of the character has never changed and remained completely intact mercifully.

Physical Description

Chance Raschen

Age: 36

Race: Human

Gender: Male

Eye Color: Blue

Hair Color: Dark Blond

Height: 69”

Weight: 185 lbs

Blood Color: Red (Type: O Neg)

Skin Color: White

Build: Average, yet firm

A handsome man in a plain looking way with a slightly weathered look about him; clean shaven; neatly groomed, short hair; a warm, encouraging smirk usually on his face; with a calm and determined look in his eye and he walks with the swagger of a true survivor.

Medical/Psychological

He has scars from various types of puncture & stabbing wounds; plus phaser, chemical, and electrical burn scars on legs, arms, and torso. About half of his injuries came from actual battle; the others were from torture he was put through at various time of his Pre-Starfleet career. He doesn’t mind regenerators being used on his internal organs, but will not allow them to be used on his skin.

A psychologist at the academy wrote in his dossier “Subject has never completely, emotionally recovered from the death of his fiancé more than 10 years ago; do to this fact, the subject wishes to die and yet still pursues life to its fullest. Subject also repeatedly uses unorthodox methods that continually exhibit a unique resourcefulness, but sadly doesn’t appear to have any stable moral grounding whatsoever in order to achieve crew objectives, depending on the situation.”

Family Background

Chance’s mother, Margaret, and Franklin, his biological father, met while vacationing on Risa. After a short and invigoratingly intimate relationship; the two never attempted to remain in contact each other. As a result, 9 months later on Stardate 2371.12.06, Chance entered the world a bastard child. Margaret held her newborn baby boy in the hospital; the doctor asked what the baby boy’s name was to be. Lost in her thoughts, the new mother didn’t even hear the doctor’s question and mumbled to herself “What are the chances?” All that the doctor heard was “Chance”.

His mother worked as a bookkeeper/office administrator for her father, a bounty hunter named Edward Raschen. He was respected by everyone on both sides of the law, and was referred to as “Easy Ed” because of his calm appearance and kind demeanor while he wasn’t working. He could also be vicious, unrelenting, and ruthless in his pursuit for those he was hired to capture when kindness was mistaken for weakness.

After a couple of years, Ed and Margaret started a new firm called Impetuous Industries. The company’s base products remained bounty hunting, and security consultation. Once the company expanded into shipping, then eventually into research and development; Impetuous Industries eventually became contracted to several military and civilian shipyards and space stations throughout the Federation. The headquarters for Impetuous Industries was located on the family’s 300 acre ranch in Texas on Earth.

At 14 Chance, with his mother’s approval, started to accompany Ed on bounty hunting excursions. It was Easy Ed that first started teaching Chance tactics, the use of weapons, blockade running, smuggling, and piloting.

Chance celebrated his 18th birthday on Romulas because he had joined his mother on a trip there for a contract negotiation with a business competitor. It was that same trip that he met someone of, what he considered, to be unmatched beauty. T’Lela was a Sub-Centurion in the Romulan military however. Much to the surprise of her father, whom Margaret had contract negotiations with, and the encouragement of his mother, T’Lela and Chance courted and after a couple of years were eventually engaged to be married despite her father’s objections about Chance’s parentage.

Pre-Starfleet History

Hardy-Knox University

As a young man Chance never got involved with anything illegal. However, he spent most of his time skipping school to be intimate with whatever girlfriend he had at the time, or for work. Not having any intentions to join Starfleet, he applied to the Houston Texas campus of Hardy-Knox University and was accepted. While there he learned piloting, navigation, resource management, and general operations of starships. Two years later, Chance graduated and received his civilian crewman and ship captain’s licenses. T’Lela and her father made the trip to Earth so the young couple could be married.

Privateer

Federation Irregular Forces

Chance originally had no intention of joining Starfleet, but he did have a sense of "for God and Country". When the Cardassian-Federation War started just days after his graduation from Hardy-Knox University; the couple agreed to postpone their wedding until the war was over. While T’Lela returned to Romulas with her father, Chance joined the Federation Irregular Forces.

Federation Irregular Forces

The F.I.F. consisted of privateers and mercenaries hired by the Federation to augment Starfleet and the Marine Corps and were required to wear an identification patch on their right arm; their motto was “Auxiliary Power Redefined”.

Serving as a ship’s captain while in the F.I.F., Chance decided to use the name “Chance Temerarious” as a pseudonym during the war. He was also given a Letter-of-Marque' by the Federation Council which authorized him to attack and destroy, capture, or to take as prize enemy vessels. He was also commissioned to provide logistical and combat support to special units behind enemy lines on some of the Federation’s more clandestine interests. He had also partaken in some of the Federation’s legitimate, front line military campaigns.

Throughout the war there were only two instances where Chance showed the unrelenting, ruthless viciousness of a bounty hunter.

The first occurred while escaping a Cardassian Prisoner-of-War compound. An Andorian named Thrall admitted to murdering Chance’s fiancé T’Lela during his attempt to escape in Chance’s ship, the Star Hawk, alone and leave his fellow escapees behind. A Klingon known as Colonel Kree-ton, thwarted Thrall’s plan.

Chance Temerarious

In his fury, Chance avenged the death of his bride to be by beating the Andorian to death with a spare piece of pipe. Chance then returned T’Lela to Romulas, and placed her lifeless body at her father’s feet. After Chance told him how T’Lela died and how he avenged her death; her father placed a hand on Chance’s shoulder saying “I thank you, my son”.

The second was at a starbase designated Echo-Bravo 454; it was there that mere moments after the Cardassians surrendered the base to teams of the F.I.F. the Klingons, lead by Colonel Kree-ton, attacked their F.I.F. allies. During the retaliation against the Klingons, Chance led a team that captured a D-12 class Bird-of-Prey and used it to help destroy Kree-ton’s ship, a Vor’cha class ship.

Within a week after the Cardassian-Federation War was officially declared at an end, the Federation Irregular Forces were disbanded and all Letters-of-Marque' were made null and void. Any of the privateers and mercenaries that decided to join Starfleet or the Marines Corps was welcome to do so and “In appreciation of meritorious wartime service” was allowed to continue wearing the patch of the Federation Irregular Forces on their uniform.

Civilian Contractor

After the war, Chance continued serving the Federation as a civilian contractor providing the same kind of logistical and combat support for covert operations that he did during the war. He also kept using the pseudonym Chance Temerarious, which had become his alter ego.

He spent some time as 1 of only 24 civilian captains that took part in a Starfleet Intelligence program to rescue Federation citizens from behind enemy lines by any means necessary. It was dubbed Project: Scarlet Pimpernel. As Captain Temerarious, Chance was responsible for the rescue of roughly 200 Federation detainees from various enemy compounds.

Chance was later sent to protect Federation interests by fighting in the wars between the Ferengi Alliance and the Orion Syndicate. First he fought for the Ferengi against the Orions; and then again the following year for the Orions against the Ferengi. Chance was well rewarded on both occasions.

After several years Chance became very dubious as to the merits and stability of the Federation. For years he was regularly sent to go along Federation borders and attack enemy military shipments until Starfleet was able to re-establish the balance of power in those areas and “drive out the pirate treat”.

Chance hit a point in life were he decided that he wanted to become a ships captain in the shipping division of Impetuous Industries; but his mother, and grandfather dissuaded him on the facts that his past privateer activities would hurt the company in foreign territories. They also recommended that he should join Starfleet to regain at least some legitimacy, and pay his debt to society before joining the family’s firm. Chance agreed and contacted a Starfleet recruiter on Mars.

Starfleet History

Starfleet Academy

When he enrolled into the academy at age 33, Chance was able to receive credit for the civilian Crewman and the Vessel Captain licenses that he received from Hardy-Knox University. As a result, Chance only really had to attend the third and fourth years at the academy, which he used to study military tactics and operations. He also managed to maintain possession of his ship (Star Hawk); this helped make it possible for Chance to rapidly meet all of his field training requirements by taking part in various kinds of missions during school breaks. It also earned him extra income as well.

During his “forth” year, a Deonitz’s Intel agent named D’rajevon convinced Chance to infiltrate the “rebellious” 52nd Fleet and to take charge of a team assigned to capture a warship and take it to Bajor. After having had the dubious honor of graduating with the lowest passing GPA in academy history, Raschen was assigned to the U.S.S. Dennison as an Operations Officer.

USS Dennison

During his first few weeks on the Dennison, Chance reconsidered his position in the civil war. He also discovered that the rest of his team wanted to defect as well. They just weren’t sure how to go about it. When the Dennison pulled into space dock, and after being promoted to Ensign (S.G.) at a late night meeting, Chance and his confederates managed to capture the ship along with Capt Davis, Lt Cmdr McDermott, Cmdr West, and Lt Cmdr Banowsky without any casualties. After announcing the groups desire to defect to the 52nd Fleet, Chance surrendered the Dennison back to Captain Davis and released the rest of his prisoners.

Chance was arrested and charged with Mutiny and Treason. Early the next morning, he was found guilty by a drumhead Courts-Marshall and was sentenced to 2 years probation, due to the pending battle for sector 001. Less than a week later, the civil war was over and Chance was given a choice to remain in Starfleet or be sent to prison for murder, treason, mutiny, piracy, and profiteering. Needless to say, he agreed to stay in Starfleet.

After spending a night in the brig, Chance accepted a temporary reduction in rank to Ensign (J.G.) by Captain Archibald Stakes, who immediately reassigned Raschen to Captain Susan Rivers and the U.S.S. Rosenante. Later that morning, Raschen boarded the Star Hawk and departed; Doctor Lewis Nymes was the only one to see him off.

USS Rosenante

During his jaunt in the Star Hawk to meet up with the Rosenante, Chance responded to a distress signal from a civilian freighter in the Davros System. Upon coming out of warp, he was attacked by 7 ships of unknown origin. Using pirate like tactics, he managed to damage 2 of the ships; the first withdrew from the engagement and the second followed the Star Hawk into a planetary gravity well and was destroyed. The Star Hawk was also lost to the gravity well, but not before Chance was rescued by the U.S.S. Rosenante.

• More to come as the journey continues...

Other Information

With the help of his mother’s uncanny money management skills, Chance is independently wealthy in his own right.

Current Assignment

Operations Officer, U.S.S. Rosenante

Awards

Starfleet Squadron Commander's Commendation; given on stardate 2407.07.10 for outstanding participation in the battle against Doenitz forces during the Civil War

Rank Progression

2407.01.15: Ensign (J.G.) 2407.07.16: Ensign (S.G.) 2408.01.09: Ensign (J.G.)

Also Known As

Chance Temerarious

Skills

Chance has a working knowledge of bounty hunter tactics; starship and urban warfare; cargo and troop transport; blockade running and smuggling; he is also an accomplished pilot and duelist.

Medical/Psychological Profile

He has scars from various types of puncture & stabbing wounds; plus phaser, chemical, and electrical burn scars on legs, arms, and torso. About half of his injuries came from actual battle; the others were from torture he was put through at various time of his Pre-Starfleet career. He doesn’t mind regenerators being used on his internal organs, but will not allow them to be used on his skin.

A psychologist at the academy wrote in his dossier “Subject has never completely, emotionally recovered from the death of his fiancé more than 10 years ago; do to this fact, the subject wishes to die and yet still pursues life to its fullest. Subject also repeatedly uses unorthodox methods that continually exhibit a unique resourcefulness, but sadly doesn’t appear to have any stable moral grounding whatsoever in order to achieve crew objectives, depending on the situation.”

Hobbies

Enjoys visiting his family, Shakespeare, history, parties, sailing, and horseback riding