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Commander Rize Tedeza
Name Rize Tedeza
Position Commanding Officer - USS Europa
Rank Commander
Character Information
| Gender | Female | |
| Species | Human | |
| Age | 35 |
Physical Appearance
| Height | 5'6" | |
| Weight | 123 IBS | |
| Hair Color | Naturally black, but prefers to die it purple | |
| Eye Color | Violet | |
| Physical Description | Captain Tedeza is fairly tall for her age and is in peak physical condition. She tends to pull her hair up into a set of twin-tails with loose bangs, but has been known on occasion to let her hair down. |
Family
| Relationship Status | Single | |
| Spouse/Partner | None | |
| Children | None | |
| Father | Captain Yasaburo Tedeza [Commanding Officer, USS Viper (NCC-74291), 2373-2377] | |
| Mother | Nao Tedeza | |
| Brother(s) | None | |
| Sister(s) | None | |
| Other Family | None of note |
Personality & Traits
| General Overview | Captain Tedeza is a tough, headstrong woman who holds a reasonable degree of maturity over her charges. Though she endeavors to be fair and understanding, she can at times be bluntly opinionated on how she feels that things need to be done, even going so far as to override direct orders if she feels they would put her charges in jeopardy. With her father having served as a Commanding Officer during the Dominion War, Captain Tedeza is highly educated in various forms of self-defense, and is both independent and physically strong as a result of her upbringing. While talented in the field of espionage and deeply respected by her peers, she is paranoid enough to carry a vintage Glock 17 on her person at all times. Though she tries to distinguish her personal hobbies and interests from her obligations to the Federation, Captain Tedeza secretly harbors an affinity for “feminine” things, though she is highly uncomfortable in sharing her interests for fear of being perceived as weak. |
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| Strengths & Weaknesses | + Prioritizes the preservation of life above all other principles. + Well-trained in hand-to-hand combat and other means of self-defense. + Kind, diligent, and (usually) sensible towards both her peers and commanding officers. +/- Tends to dig her heels in in regards to what she believes in. - Sometimes forgoes orders if she feels they jeopardize her charges. - Paranoid enough to carry a lethal firearm on her person at all times. - Has an affinity for girly things. |
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| Ambitions | TBD | |
| Hobbies & Interests | o Parrises Squares o Military paraphernalia o “Girly” things o Cosplay |
| Personal History | Rize Tedeza was born on February 14, 2360, to a wealthy family in the village of Masonwood, a Japanese tourist town in southern Hokkaido modeled after the historic French city of Colmar. Her father, Lieutenant Yasaburo Tedeza, had dutifully served in Starfleet’s Advanced Tactical Division for over a decade, and (due to the nature of his occupation) was keen on ensuring that his only child knew how to defend herself in the likelihood that he wouldn’t be there to protect her. Most of his time between deployments was spent teaching Rize various forms of self-defense; by the age of five, Rize was allegedly capable of subduing her nanny. (The nanny quit shortly after the alleged incident occurred, much to her mother’s annoyance) When Rize was twelve, the Dominion War broke out and then-Commander Tedeza was abruptly called away on duty, having been dispatched aboard the Defiant-Class USS Viper (NCC-74291) to oversee the transportation of munitions to Federation-allied home worlds in the Alpha Quadrant. In 2374, a convoy that the Viper was escorting was ambushed by a Dominion patrol, and despite the best efforts of its crew, their numbers were quickly cut down by enemy forces. With the warp core leaking and heavy casualties piling up, Commander Tedeza rallied the remaining crew members and cut a full retreat, leading their attackers on a tense 3-hour chase before backup arrived and ushered them to safety. For his quick-thinking and valor during the encounter, Commander Tedeza was promoted to the rank of Captain and was given full command of the Viper. His multifarious tales of heroism left an impression on the young Rize, and inspired her from an early age to pursue a career in Starfleet. In her teen years, Rize began to seek out gainful employment in order to cover her tuition expenses. Her father, who just so happened to be on shore leave at the time, referred him to an old friend of his; Lieutenant Takahiro Kafu, a retired and widowed Security Administrator who had been managing a café in downtown Masonwood. As it turned out, Takahiro owed Yasaburo a small favor from back in their academy days, and was more than happy to employ Rize part-time at his establishment. While working at the café, Rize quickly became acquainted with Takahiro’s daughter, Chino, who was also working part-time at the establishment and lived in the space directly above. While at first she didn’t care much for the younger girl, with time Chino eventually opened up to her and shared some of the emotional challenges she had faced growing up without a mother. Feeling somewhat bad for how she had ignored the younger girl, Rize elected to make herself a more active part in Chino’s life, and from then on became someone with whom the younger girl could confide in with regards to her day-to-day troubles. About a year into her employment at the café, Rize was cleaning up in the backrooms one night when she encountered what she thought was an intruder and nearly shot her with her father’s antique service pistol. Fortunately, Chino arrived just in time to talk her down and introduced the “intruder” as Cocoa Hoto, the daughter of her late mother’s childhood friend. Cocoa, as Chino proceeded to explain, would be staying with her family while attending high school in the area. Rize wasn’t quite certain what to make of the new girl at first, for while she was hardly lacking in charisma, her attention span left a lot to be desired. But in spite of Cocoa’s shortcomings, her unbridled enthusiasm eventually wormed its way into Rize’s heart, and she ultimately came around to valuing the friendship they shared. Towards the end of her High School tenure, Rize was approached by Cocoa and Chino one rainy afternoon shortly after they’d closed up shop to ask what she was planning on doing once she eventually graduated. Figuring it wouldn’t hurt to satiate their curiosity, she divulged with them her lifelong aspiration to follow in her father’s footsteps and serving a venerable career in Starfleet, charting out strange new worlds, discovering new lifeforms, and continuing to go where no man had gone before. Cocoa, naturally, seemed fascinated with the prospect, and decided on the spot that she was going to follow Rize into Starfleet once she was of age. Rize attempted to talk her down from the notion, saying that the field posed its fair share of risks; but was surprised when Chino— ever the rational one of the trio—voiced similar interest, arguing that while all career fields posed some element of risk, it should hardly serve as a deterrent that drives you to fulfill your passions. Rize had never heard such prophetic words from a 15-year-old girl before, and decided that if it was what the two girls wanted, she was in no position to be raising an objection. Rize formally enrolled at Starfleet Academy’s Tokyo campus in 2378, with the field of Command as her primary major and Security as a Secondary major. She was eventually joined by Cocoa in 2379, and not long after that Chino in 2380; though the three of them were studying in vastly different fields (Rize had taken up Command and Security, Cocoa had decided to pursue a career in Flight Control, and Chino had elected to study to be a Yeoman), the odd trio managed to keep in close contact with each other over the course of their overlapping tenures. Rize proved particularly fastidious in her studies—especially in regards to her persistence in attempting to “beat” the infamous Kobayashi Miru scenario; though one of her instructors attempted to explain to her that there was no legitimate way to beat the program, she quickly countered by saying that a true hero never expects the odds to be in their favor, but continues to try because they have the hope that they can save a life, even if it’s just one. This response ultimately formed the basis for her ideologies as a leader; that her first and foremost priority would always be the preservation of life. Rize graduated from Starfleet Academy with honors in 2382; after bidding a tearful goodbye to Cocoa and Chino, with whom she now shared a dedicated friendship, she was assigned to the Ambassador-Class USS Osaka (NCC-26593) as a Security Officer. Her first few years aboard the Osaka were relatively uneventful, save for a voluntary promotion to Lieutenant Junior Grade in 2384; but it was during this span of time that she began to develop close bonds with the Osaka’s crew. One such officer, Lieutenant Commander Gabriel Hess, became something of a mentor figure to Rize; though he was nearly thirty years her senior and working in Operations, he always had time to listen when Rize needed to talk, or simply to blow off steam. Rize’s first notable promotion came in the spring of 2387, when the Osaka was assigned to establish contact with the Ritians, a Beta Quadrant race who had only recently achieved warp capability. Rize was assigned as part of the away team who beamed down to the surface to speak with the Ritian Imperial Consulate. However, when the conspiratorial Minister of Defense falsely accused the away team of slaughtering the Emperor’s prized race horse in a calculated bid to seize power, Rize and company were imprisoned and forced to partake in several rounds of fierce gladiatorial combat. It was here on the fields of battle that Rize’s hand-to-hand training was put to good use, and she utilized a combination of strength and wit to overpower several opponents that were easily twice her size. Eventually, the crew of the Osaka was able to uncover the Minister of Defense’s deception, and safely extracted the away team with minimal casualties. For her valor, Rize was promoted to full Lieutenant and offered the position of Assistant Chief of Security. During a Christmas party later that year, the Chief of Security, Lieutenant Commander Robert DePaul, and several other officers suddenly took ill, and were determined by Medical Staff to be contaminated with what appeared to be a variant of the Anthrax virus. After quarantining the entire ship, Rize managed to trace the source of the infection to spores laced in the wrapping paper that had been used for a gift exchange, and raised the possibility that this was a deliberate bio-attack on Federation Personnel. Through careful coordination with Intelligence, Rize successfully tracked down the culprit of the attacks, whom upon interrogation revealed that he was an undercover agent for the Tal’Shiar, who had been ordered to carry out the attacks as an act of defiance against the Federation for their recent annexation for a sector of space that had formerly been a part of the Romulan Neutral Zone. The agent was promptly shipped off to stand trial for bio-terrorism, and Lieutenant Commander DePaul, deciding that it would be in his best interests to transfer to a specialized medical ward in order to seek treatment for his condition, recognized Rize's potential as a security officer and recommended her as his direct replacement. Rize was surprised to find she was being offered the position of a department head just barely five years into her Starfleet career, as she felt she had just been doing her job; but she was hardly one to look a gift horse in the mouth, and accepted her promotion dutifully. In 2390, the Second Officer of the Osaka, Commander Jayde Northampton, was offered an Executive role aboard Starbase 751, and so the position of Second Officer suddenly became vacant. The first person offered the position was Lieutenant Commander Hess, having previously declined promotion on two prior occasions. For the third and final time, Hess turned down the offer, stating that Rize would serve as a much more suitable candidate for the position. Though this meant he would never see promotion for the remainder of his service, Hess’s wishes were obliged, and Rize was formally appointed as the Osaka’s Second Officer. In 2392, Rize was approached by Captain Moeka China, a decorated Dominion War veteran who was scouting out potential recruits for her most recent command, the USS Ayanami (NCC-61027). After combing through Rize’s files, Captain China had concluded that she was an ideal candidate for her Executive Officer, citing her numerous accomplishments in such a short span of time as one of several contributing factors that had formed the basis of her judgement. Rize was shocked that she was already being approached for a major command role—and by someone with as storied a legacy as that of Captain China, no less—but after giving it some careful deliberation, she reluctantly declined Captain China’s offer; Though she was honored to have been considered for the position, she felt that the place she belonged was on board the Osaka, and wanted to stick it out for a little while longer. Rather than being disappointed (as Rize was expecting her to be), she was surprised that Captain China was amiable about the whole ordeal, and even complimented her for remaining loyal to her fellow crew mates at the expense of holding herself back. She was convinced that Rize possessed the latent underpinnings of a true leader, and promised that she’d be keeping an eye on her. In early 2394, the Dominion, in a move that was decidedly out-of-character for them, approached the Federation with the intent of tying up loose ends and entered talks to establish diplomatic relations between the two powers. On May 18 of that year, the Osaka was conducting a routine patrol in the Bajor sector when the crew received an emergency broadcast from Commodore Kaede Kayano of the USS Yamato (NCC-71807-A). The diplomatic talks, as it had transpired, were a ruse; the Dominion’s true objective was to mobilize and extract the Female Changeling, a Founder who was serving 100 concurrent life sentences in a maximum administrative facility for her role in the instigation of the Dominion War. Recognizing the severity of the situation, the Osaka was quick to divert its course and rendezvous with a small Federation, Klingon, Romulan, Cardassian, and Bajoran coalition that had mobilized to intercept the advancing Dominion Armada. However, in spite of the coalition’s best efforts to impede the Dominion’s advance, the tables were stacked against them from the start, and the Osaka was unfortunate enough to find itself on the receiving end of a Jem’Hadar battery. With the ship sustaining heavy damages in the ensuing barrage and the Warp Core literally minutes away from going critical, Rize barely had enough time to gather her bearings and issue an evacuation order before she and several others were beamed to safety aboard the USS Cerberus (NCC-TBD). At the end of the day, the Osaka sustained the highest casualty rate of any allied vessel involved in the conflict; Rize was one of just a meager 200 survivors. Following a six-month stint in a rehabilitative facility to help her cope with survivor’s guilt, Rize voluntarily requested a domestic reassignment for the indefinite future; Starfleet Administration obliged in her request, and managed to secure her a teaching position at Starfleet Academy’s Tokyo Campus. In 2396, now-Fleet Captain China once again approached Rize with a new proposition; in recognition for her bravery during the Battle of Bajor, Theta Fleet Admiralty had expressed an interest in delegating Rize command of the USS Europa (NCC-71852), a Galaxy-Class Explorer that had recently been brought out of mothballs as part of a mass expansion effort intended to drum up morale in light of the renewed Dominion threat. Rize was reluctant to accept the commission at first (ever quick to point out that she had only barely assisted in helping to evacuate the Osaka before she was beamed to safety), but Fleet Captain China assuaged those concerns, assuring Rize that she had done everything in her power to save as many lives as possible; even if she couldn’t save them all, she persisted in the face of insurmountable odds because she hoped beyond hope that any one life was a life worth saving. Reminded of herself from a more optimistic time in her life, Rize ultimately accepted Fleet Captain China’s commission with a renewed sense of purpose, and boarded a shuttle for Utopia Planetia, where the Europa was dry-docked and scheduled to undergo a refit. |
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| Service Record | -2382: Graduated Starfleet Academy with a Major in Command -2382-2384: USS Osaka (Ensign- Security Officer) -2384-2387: USS Osaka (Lieutenant, Junior Grade-Security Officer) -2387: USS Osaka (Lieutenant – Assistant Chief of Security) -2387-2390: USS Osaka (Lieutenant – Chief of Security) -2390-2394: USS Osaka (Lieutenant Commander – Chief of Security, Second Officer) -2392: Passed up promotion and transfer to USS Ayanami (NCC-61027) -2394: Leave of absence -2394-2396: Starfleet Academy, Tokyo Campus (Commander, Security Instructor) -2396-????: USS Europa (Captain- Commanding Officer) |