Lieutenant Hamlyn Ambrose

Character Information

Gender		Male
Species		Human (Terran)
Age		43

Physical Appearance

Height		6'2"
Weight		215lbs
Hair Color		Brownish, streaked with grey
Eye Color		Hazel
Physical Description		Tall and broad, Hobb has a boxer's build, though he's slower than he'd like to admit these days. With brownish hair now turning to grey, and a permanent five o'clock shadow the Engineer looks a little worse for wear most days.

Family

Spouse		N/A
Children		N/A
Father		Hamlyn John Ambrose
Mother		Julia Ambrose
Brother(s)		Max
Sister(s)		Doris
Other Family		Various Aunts and Uncles

Personality & Traits

General Overview		Hobb is friendly but does keep his distance. Mostly quiet he enjoys listening to others do the talking. He is quite fond of the vessels he serves upon and is a firm believer that they each have a unique personality. Never tolerating foolishness, he occasionally winces at the way younger pilots talk to one another
Strengths & Weaknesses		A dedicated engineer, Hobb always gives 100% to his job. Having personal pride in the work he and others around him do is important which can lead to occasional clashes with others. Although a competent fighter pilot by Starfleet standards Hobb has avoided flying them or having any part in their maintenance since the war. The man has also avoided deadly violence since his time in the fighter corps and is reluctant to use it. Hobb is a friendly man, but he is quiet and often prefers solitary work and pursuits where he can, due to his experiences in the War. Over time he tends to thaw with his fellow crewmembers. One part of his life where Hobb allows his personality and competitiveness is on the sports field. Preferring rugby and boxing he gets into it and can be over the top if not checked.
Ambitions		His short-term goals have been met: to head his own department so he can organise the work to his standards and liking. Long-term Hobb would like to head up a Starfleet Corps of Engineering ship, though he recognises that it would require a lot of work and personal development.
Hobbies & Interests		Although an Engineer, Hobb enjoys a few outdoor pursuits and sports, particularly horseback riding, rugby and boxing. In his quieter moments he enjoys putting models together in his quarters, finding that directed downtime keeps his mind quiet and focused.

Personal History		Hamlyn Robert Ambrose was born in New Mexico in 2353 to a ranching family. Hamlyn being a family name, he was soon nicknamed ‘Hobb’ by his family. The Ambroses were a caring, but no-nonsense family and expected their kids to help out on the family ranch which had been in their position since early after First Contact, when the Vulcans had helped in cleaning up the land. As the eldest of three children, Hobb was used to taking more responsibility than the others. His father, however, encouraged him to indulge his mechanical hobbies, seeing them as being useful around the place. At school he was mostly average, though he stood out in his science and physical education classes, where he enjoyed rugby, baseball, and later on when at university, boxing. During his teenage years he realised that he had more passion for the sciences and engineering than for work on the ranch. Hobb also saw how his brother enjoyed the ranching life, and so applied to the engineering program at the University of the Federation based in northern California. Hobb found that university agreed with him. He was astounded by the number of species that came to study at the campus, and was delighted to hear their stories. This kindled his wanderlust and sense of adventure, and he quickly moved to major in Engineering. Whilst studying, he would take odd jobs at mechanics’ workshops in the area to earn a few extra replicator credits. The declaration of war against the Dominion cut short his academic plans. Instead of a year studying engineering on Denobula, Hobb, eager to take up arms and go off on a genuine adventure, signed up for the war effort. Applying to the Starfighter corps Hobb found himself quickly adapting to his new environment. He enjoyed the life and the group of young people he was with. Being a native of the Sol system, Hobb was assigned to the Starfleet Flight school. It had a reputation for training some of the most accomplished pilots in Starfleet before the war. Neither the best nor the worst pilot, he was lucky that Starfleet was in dire need of recruits in the costly early part of the war. His unit was deployed in late 2374, in time to participate in the battle for Deep Space Nine. Here, his squadron and their carrier the USS Ark Royal took heavy damage, forcing Hobb to confront the possibility that very few of them would return from the fighting. Such were the casualties sustained, Hobbs squadron was disbanded, and he was rotated to a new squadron, but still aboard the Ark Royal. In order to train the new recruits, the carrier was taken off the front lines to conduct patrols meaning they saw little action until the early part of 2375. After the Breen entered the war, the Ark Royal and her fighter squadrons engaged in hit-and-run mission that sapped Hobb’s energy and moral. Until Starfleet’s engineers were able to negate Breen weaponry, they were forced to disengage at the first sign of an enemy vessel. As the war ground on, Hobb realised that none of his squad members were the ones whe had trained with. It was at this point, friends and families noted, that he began holding himself a little distant from those around him. The final push into Cardassian space left Hobb battered and bruised. The Ark Royal and her squadrons saw constant action, and took heavy losses. By the Battle of Cardassia, Hobb merely felt relief that the war was over. In the immediate aftermath of the war the Ark Royal was tasked with patrolling Cardassian space in order to keep the peace. As they rotated on an off duty with seemingly no end in sight, Hobb resolved to resign his commission with Starfleet. Most of his comrades were gone or were contemplating the same. It was only a chance conversation with a senior member of the crew who pointed out that Starfleet had offered to re-train veterans to replace the personnel lost during the war. After a few days of thought Hobb decided to transmit his application to the Academy. The former starfighter pilot found himself in San Francisco in 2376. He enjoyed his time at the Academy and immediately majored in Engineering whilst taking a minor in Operations. Though he would stay in Starfleet, he resolved to be a fixer and restorer of ships rather than someone who would destroy them. Hobb found joy once more in competing at sports. Though he was a little older and slower than many of his contemporaries, he found the activities themselves satisfying. He slowly became more like his younger self, as he relaxed into Academy life and with regular sessions with the Counselling staff. All too soon for the man, he was sent on his cadet cruise in 2379, serving aboard an SCE vessel, which would leave a lasting impression on the cadet. His first assignment out of the Academy was aboard the appropriately named USS Methuselah, an Excelsior-class vessel that had been taken out of mothball by Starfleet due to the shortages they experienced after the War. A propulsion specialist, Hobb found his first tour to be a quiet one as the Methuselah patrolled the border with the Romulan Star Empire, mostly chasing down bands of pirates, smugglers and Orions. He found he was once again enjoying life in Starfleet, and where once he was a distinctly average pilot, he was good engineer. Following an extensive refit, the Methuselah was re-assigned to Deep Space Six. From her home base the Excelsior-class vessel was dispatched on a short-duration exploration mission beyond Zakdorn. There was a secondary aspect to the Methuselah’s mission: assess how far the increasingly turbulent and unstable Romulan Empire had penetrated the further reaches of the Beta Quadrant. For Hobb, who was promoted to Engineering Officer for the tour considering his earlier excellent work, the assignment was again a quiet one. Most of the time the Methuselah would catalogue gaseous anomalies and quasars. Only occasionally would she be engaged in stand-offs with Romulan vessels or become involved in First Contact situations. Following the conclusion of its exploration mission, Hobb was transferred from the Methuselah to the USS Jefferson, another aging Ambassador-class vessel under the command of Curzon Bennett. The Jefferson was tasked with patrolling the Klingon border, keeping unruly Klingon incursions in check as they had been steadily rising in the decade following the Dominion War. In 2387 the Jefferson was dispatched along with a taskforce of Starfleet vessels to the Cardassian Union in order to stabilise Cardassian space against the long, drawn-out collapse of law and order following their defeat. Although Hobb was initially uneasy on returning to Cardassian space, he found working alongside the Cardassians crew was a mostly pleasant experience. It was during this time that Hobb experienced his first full-scale conflict since the Dominion War. In a short, sharp confrontation a gang of hard-line Cardassian militarists staged a coup against the civilian government and absconded with a fleet’s worth of vessels. The Jefferson taskforce, joined by Union ships, engaged the putschists in a series of running battles. During this conflict, Hobb found himself promoted to Assistant Chief Engineering Officer in 2387. Following the conflict, the Jefferson was assigned to patrol the Talarian border for the crew to rest up. Hobb was reassigned at the end of his tour of duty with the Jefferson. His latest posting was with the USS Nautilus, an Akira-class vessel. It was the first time since the war he had found himself aboard a carrier vessel. For much of the first few months of his time aboard the vessel, Hobb tried to avoid the hangar bays as much as he could. As time went by, however, he found his time aboard a carrier much more pleasant as an engineer rather than a starfighter pilot. The early part of his assignment with the Nautilus was spent patrolling the Tzenkethi border, a test of the crew’s metal. Frequent small-scale incursions kept them on their toes and following a gruelling year they were transferred to patrol the space between the Badlands and the Ferengi Alliance. On this extended tour the Nautilus would frequently encounter aggressive Breen raiders who would harry the ship for days at a time. Much of the missions undertaken, however, were humanitarian in nature. Where invited, the Nautilus would assist local governments in solving their issues. For the most part this meant rooting out pirates and smugglers, which Hobb was well-used to by now. On other occasions however, the Engineering department would be called on to solve water reclamation problems, fix bio-domes and the like. These were the jobs Hobb enjoyed most, naturally. On one memorable fly-the-flag mission to Ferenginar he lost a month’s worth of latinum at a Dabo table. At the conclusion of his tour with the Nautilus, Hobb was offered a lectureship at the Academy for a year. Having been away from earth for the best part of a decade, he eagerly accepted. The time spent teaching in San Francisco allowed him to reconnect with his family and spend time on the ranch. Following his stint at the Academy, Hobb was assigned to Starbase 580 as Assistant Chief Engineer. Here he experienced more administrative work than he ever thought possible, and a lot less hands-on work. Although he had met some pleasant people as part of his work, he felt that the posting was not to his taste. Hobb much preferred life and work aboard a starship. He put in for a transfer in late 2393, which was soon accepted as the USS Tokyo, an Akira-class vessel. His time aboard the Tokyo was quiet and routine. For the most part, the Akira-class vessel was assigned prestige postings, flying the flags at First and Second Contacts, and various diplomatic functions as the Federations attempted to build and expand on the recovery. At the end of 2396, realising he had served on the Tokyo longer than he had in many of his previous postings, and wanting something more challenging than polishing the warp core. Having his transfer approved, Hobb soon found himself on the way to the Columbia.
Service Record		2373-76 - Fighter Pilot, Ensign, USS Ark Royal, Vikrant-class vessel 2376-80 – Starfleet Academy Veteran Program 2380-82 – Propulsion Specialist, Ensign, USS Methuselah, Excelsior-class vessel 2383-86 – Engineering Officer, Ensign, USS Methuselah, Excelsior-class vessel 2386-87 – Engineering Officer, Ensign, USS Jefferson, Ambassador-class vessel 2387-89 – Assistant Chief Engineering Officer, Lieutenant (JG), USS Jefferson, Ambassador-class vessel 2389-91 – Assistant Chief Engineering Officer, Lieutenant (JG), USS Nautilus , Akira-class vessel 2391-92 – Academy Assignment, Propulsion Mechanics Lecturer 2392-94 – Assistant Chief Engineering Officer, Lieutenant (JG), Starbase 580 2394-96 – Chief Engineering Officer, Lieutenant, USS Tokyo, Akira-class vessel