Beckett Mariner

Beckett Mariner was a female Human Starfleet officer who lived during the late 24th century.

Both of her parents served in positions of command in Starfleet: her mother (and later captain), Carol Freeman, attempted to keep a close eye on her activities aboard the USS Cerritos, while her father Alonzo Freeman was an admiral. Mariner has gained considerable experience and formidable skills as a Starfleet officer, but untreated survivor guilt from having to serve in the Dominion War almost right out of Starfleet Academy before she could recover from a friend being killed in action caused a serious psychological fear of the responsibilities of command that has impeded her career. As such, for all her professional accomplishments, she preferred to remain at the rank of Ensign and endeavored to keep herself there by deliberately engineering demotions and reckless behaviors with the outward veneer of an arrogantly defiant and self-destructive attitude that often brought her to the risk of court martial.

Childhood

Mariner was the daughter of Starfleet captain Carol Freeman and admiral Alonzo Freeman. (LD: "Second Contact")

As a child, Beckett dressed up as Toby Targ each Halloween, even after she became too old for the character. (LD: "Crisis Point")

According to Beckett, her mother became a "jerk" when she was eight years old. (LD: "Crisis Point")

For a time, Mariner lived on Starbase 25, during which she went by "Becky", a name her father still used later in her life. (LD: "An Embarrassment Of Dooplers", "Grounded")

Mariner was left handed. (LD: "I, Excretus")

Mariner had taken two and a half years of horseback riding lessons, though this did not help her in 2381 when she unsuccessfully attempted to ride a horse within Starfleet's Old West Planet holographic training drill. (LD: "I, Excretus")

Starfleet Academy

Marriner attended her first year at Starfleet Academy in 2368. (LD: "Old Friends, New Planets") Mariner excelled in the Academy, getting the best grades in her class. She was often noted as being a bit of a role model for her class, and that she always made sure her class kept up with her. Many, such as her friend and classmate Amina Ramsey predicted that Mariner would be the first of her class to get promoted to captain.

Together, the two got to a lot of mischief, such as stealing Professor Rubichik's old special car and driving it into the bay. (LD: "Much Ado About Boimler")

Mariner was also friends with fellow cadet Sito Jaxa, who encouraged Mariner to pursue a degree in xeno-history. Her first taste of the topic came during her first year, at which time she was excited to learn about the Xindi and Preservers. (LD: "Reflections", "Old Friends, New Planets")

Mariner idolized Sito for not letting her mistakes as a cadet define her and succeeding in spite of having to repeat a year, and was devastated to hear that Sito was presumed killed in action. (LD: "The Inner Fight")

Starfleet career

Mariner prided her ability to think for herself in critical situations, as she had served aboard five different Starfleet vessels, including the USS Quito, and had "seen stuff". There was a time when she was interested in advancing in rank, though her views regarding promotion and the importance of the senior staff had become somewhat jaded by 2380. (LD: "Second Contact", "Cupid's Errant Arrow")

On one harrowing occasion, she was trapped in a sentient cave for weeks, describing it as "a dark place that knows things." She also noted that she had almost been decapitated by a singing crystal, and was once held in a Klingon prison where she had to fight a yeti for her shoes merely because the yeti wanted to be antagonistic. (LD: "Envoys")

She kept her battle scars from a fight with a tentacled man that stabbed her with a barnacle blade in the chest, a fight on Magus III that left a scar on her right shoulder, a scar on her left bicep from Nanibia Prime, and a scar on her hip from a fight in Scottsdale. After Commander Jack Ransom stabbed her left foot with a crystal sword on Gelrak V, she intended to allow the skin to heal into a new scar as well. (LD: "Temporal Edict")

At some point, she befriended and blood bonded with General K'orin. Years later, she recalled that she and K'orin had done some "off-the-books grey ops stuff back in the day," and together had worked on Jaxxa Prime, Vulcan, and Earth. (LD: "Envoys")

At another point in time, Mariner became acquainted with her mother's mentor, William T. Riker. Riker was indebted to Mariner, and despite being responsible for "hooking" her up with all of her contraband, such as Romulan ale, she insisted that Riker saving the Cerritos from the Pakleds did not make them "even". (LD: "No Small Parts")

Mariner had once been promoted to lieutenant junior grade, but was demoted for crashing an Oberth-class starship. (LD: "Parth Ferengi's Heart Place")

Deep Space 9

Sometime between 2372 and 2375 Mariner served aboard Deep Space 9. During this time, she once broke Worf's mek'leth, and, apparently, had it mended before he noticed it was gone. (LD: "We'll Always Have Tom Paris") Mariner later described hating the station, and had, in fact, incurred a sizable tab at Quark's, which equated to "a stack of latinum." The tab was cleared years later when Mariner blackmailed Quark with a data chip copy of "that hologram with your head on Kira's body" that Kira Nerys had altered to his embarrassment, and had deleted what he thought was the only copy in 2373. (LD: "Hear All, Trust Nothing")

During this time, Mariner fought in the Dominion War. The widespread death and destruction that surrounded her exacerbated the trauma of learning of Sito's death so much that she began to associate promotion with sending people to their deaths, leading to severe survivor guilt that caused her to continually self-sabotage and get herself demoted. (LD: "The Inner Fight")

Atlantis

Also sometime during the 2370s, Mariner served aboard the starship Atlantis, when nearly half of the ship's crew succumbed to a Kerplickian lice infestation. Since Starfleet was embarrassed by the situation, it was never logged in official records. Mariner took advantage of that fact when she started a rumor that she was a specially trained black ops spy who had killed those who had otherwise simply and officially had mysteriously disappeared.

In 2381, Honus, a Cerritos bartender, shared these rumors about what happened aboard the Atlantis with Ensigns Brad Boimler and Sam Rutherford which caused them to briefly second guess their relationship with Mariner. (LD: "Mugato, Gumato")

USS Quito

While aboard the Quito, she participated in establishing first contact with the Galardonian High Council in 2379. Sometime during 2370s (after stardate 47025.4), she experienced the death of her good friend and crew mate, Angie, who was eaten alive by a Harvongian while their ship was docked at Deep Space 9. The experience was traumatic, causing her to be on high alert in 2380 when she thought something similar could be happening to her friend Boimler. (LD: "Cupid's Errant Arrow")

During her time aboard the Quito, she spent time in the brig on many occasions and was eventually demoted to ensign and transferred to the Cerritos by her father, under the command of her mother, Captain Carol Freeman. Carol agreed to the transfer under the condition that if their daughter didn't fit in with the crew, Alonzo would transfer her back to the Quito. (LD: "Second Contact")

USS Cerritos

The Cerritos was Mariner's fifth ship posting. (LD: "We'll Always Have Tom Paris") Her fellow command division officer and eventual friend Brad Boimler noted that she hated to give the orientation liaison tour, but offered to provide a tour to Ensign D'Vana Tendi to get her to help moving shore leave contraband. By this time, she had been serving on the Cerritos for a year, and could only really be considered to be friends with engineer Sam Rutherford before Tendi's arrival.

In 2380, while supporting second contact efforts with the Galardonians, Captain Freeman asked Ensign Boimler to monitor Mariner's activities. He eventually believed he had caught her selling Federation weapons, but she had actually been providing needed farming equipment to local farmers in an effort to bypass Starfleet bureaucracy. (LD: "Second Contact")

Aboard the Cerritos, Mariner's assigned bunk was A12001 on Deck 11, in the LD sleeping quarters shared by lower deck officers on beta shift. (LD: "Envoys", "Terminal Provocations") For a brief time, she received another promotion to lieutenant, and as such, received her own quarters, before being demoted back to ensign. Her promotion was actually a scheme to get her to resign to another ship after she disrespected Captain Freeman in front of Captain Durango. (LD: "Moist Vessel")

Starbase 80

Mariner was transferred to Starbase 80 by Captain Carol Freeman after being accused of besmirchcing the USS Cerritos and its crew. She briefly served there before before resigning from Starfleet. (LD: "Trusted Sources") She then became the partner of Petra Aberdeen in the Independent Archaeologists Guild. (LD: "The Stars At Night")

Return to the Cerritos

Following her short-lived resignation from Starfleet, Mariner returned to the USS Cerritos, where she was welcomed with open arms. Furthermore, Mariner realized that she preferred being part of Starfleet with its ideals. To that end, Mariner explained to her mother that she had a new resolve to seriously advance in the ranks, and persuaded the Captain to have a most reluctant Commander Ransom assigned as her mentor. (LD: "The Stars At Night")

Shortly after her return, she was promoted to lieutenant junior grade after the Cerritos transported the USS Voyager to Earth. (LD: "Twovix") At this development, Mariner's reflexive self-destructive behavior flared up again and she began to resist this change. However, despite her reluctance and insubordinate behavior during an away mission on Narj's Miraculous Menagerarium, Ransom refused to allow her to self-sabotage. During the mission, two Humans accidentally displayed at the menagerie that her away team had been assigned to retrieve released a moopsy from its enclosure in order to murder proprietor Narj, forcing Narj and the away team to flee the bone-drinking creature. After taking refuge in the main control room, Ransom got her to realize and acknowledge that her behavior made no sense. After the moopsy broke in and consumed Narj, Mariner unknowingly trapped it in the control room, resulting in the moopsy causing the station's orbit to decay. Ransom stopped her from sacrificing herself to lure the moopsy out and allow him and Ensign Gary to restabilize the orbit, instead ordering her to punch his teeth out to lure it out and back to its enclosure safely. As they went to retrieve the Human exhibits, Mariner noticed that a painting of an umbrella was upside-down, leading to the away team discovering their culpability and abandoning them at the menagerie. (LD: "I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee")

However, the survivor guilt that caused her erratic conduct was not addressed at this time, resulting in her self-destructive behavior continuing and her emotional state becoming increasingly unstable. This did not go unnoticed when the Cerritos was on a diplomatic mission to Ferenginar; after Mariner got into a bar fight, Quimp noted that while immature rebellion was hardly out of character, it was especially noticeable this time as she had nothing to be upset about for once, something Mariner was unable to refute. Although the two parted on good terms, Quimp asked Mariner to figure out what was causing her issues before it was too late. (LD: "Parth Ferengi's Heart Place")

Unfortunately, after the Ferenginar mission, the issue started to escalate into suicidal behavior, resulting in several violent away missions. On one occasion, she leapt out of a shuttlecraft to fight "a pile of junk" after mistaking it for a Borg drone; on another occasion, during a visit to an outpost on Persioff IX, she responded to to tremble lizards breaking through a force field fence by going outside without donning an antivenom suit to lure the extremely dangerous creatures away and repair the fence. This eventually prompted Freeman to distract her from a search for Nick Locarno, apparently targeted by a mysterious ship that was stealing non-Starfleet vessels, by sending her on an away mission to a disabled weather satellite orbiting Sherbal V. Unknown to anyone, Locarno was the pilot of the ship, Nova One, and Sherbal V was the planet mutineers he was recruiting into Nova Fleet were marooning their commanding officers on. As such, the away team was attacked by the IKS Che'Ta' and forced to beam onto the planet. Mariner got into a fight with Ma'ah, but the duel was suspended when the two were forced into a cave to shelter from a glass storm. With nothing else to do and Ma'ah noticing that she seemed troubled, Mariner ended up pouring her heart out to Ma'ah about how Sito's death and the Dominion War had left her disillusioned with Starfleet and afraid of promotion because she was terrified of ordering friends to their deaths. Ma'ah responded by telling her that she was not honoring Sito's memory and that Sito would never approve of her erratic behavior, causing Mariner to reevaluate her attitude and come to terms with Sito's death; while her stance on Starfleet's flaws was unchanged, she conceded that Sito would think she was "acting like an idiot." With newfound faith in herself, Mariner then rallied the stranded crews together, only for Locarno to abduct her and bring her to the Detrion system. On Nova One, Locarno greeted Mariner as an old friend even though she only vaguely knew him through Sito, and, much to her horror, introduced her to Nova Fleet.

Locarno attempted to use her as an anti-Starfleet symbol, but she instead condemned Locarno and his plan on a live subspace broadcast, stole a Ferengi-made Genesis Device Locarno was using as a deterrent, and fled on the USS Passaro. Unable to leave the system due to a trynar shield, she was instead forced to evade Nova Fleet within the system. All the while, she refused to fire a single shot on her pursuers, instead attempting to reason with them. Knowing the Genesis Device needed to be kept out of Locarno's hands permanently, she attempted to reach the lifeless Detrion 9 to detonate it there, only to be forced into an ion storm. Locarno, following Mariner in, called her an apologist for Starfleet, but she retorted that she would never put people in danger the way he was and refuted his claim that Sito died for no reason. She then flung Joshua Albert's death in his face, and, when he tried to blame the Academy professors for not letting Nova Squadron practice the Kolvoord Starburst, bluntly told him that the tragedy was the result of his own narcissism. When Nova One caught up with and disabled the Passaro, Mariner activated the Genesis Device before Locarno could board, and briefly fought him before being unexpectedly beamed onto the Cerritos captain's yacht as he attempted to shoot her; during the cat and mouse between the Passaro and Nova One, the Cerritos had breached the trynar shield by flinging the Orion destroyer Retribution at it. Mariner begged for Locarno to be saved, but Locarno, unaware that the full deactivation sequence was locked behind a paywall, refused rescue by raising shields and stubbornly attempted to disarm the device, and the captain's yacht was forced to flee the imminent Genesis Wave. The detonation transformed the ion storm and all matter within into a new planet, named Locarno since Locarno's atoms were part of it. Mariner returned to the Cerritos and apologized for her recent behavior, but then received some bad news: in exchange for the Retribution, Tendi had been forced to agree to leave the Cerritos and return to her role as Mistress of the Winter Constellations. (LD: "The Inner Fight", "Old Friends, New Planets")

Personal interests

Mariner was highly proficient at hand-to-hand combat and was a master of anbo-jyutsu. She was well-practiced at martial arts because it could be done alone, and she often lacked friends at her postings. (LD: "Mugato, Gumato")

Mariner enjoyed spreading rumors about herself because she liked "having a mystique." (LD: "Mugato, Gumato")

Mariner claimed her "secret" was never eating after seven o'clock. (LD: "No Small Parts")

Mariner was skilled in playing the electric guitar, preferring the hard rock genre and used an amplifier when performing. (LD: "Temporal Edict")

Personal relationships

Family

Carol Freeman

Mariner's relationship with her mother was often rocky, and conflicting to the point where both of them hoped to keep their relationship as mother and daughter a secret from the rest of the crew. Mariner did not want to be seen as any different from the rest of the crew, and Freeman didn't wish for it to be known that one of the most rebellious officers of the fleet was her daughter. They managed to keep this relationship secret, until Boimler stumbled upon the secret by accident, and inadvertently revealed the relationship to the crew of the Cerritos via an open communications channel. (LD: "Crisis Point", "No Small Parts")

Freeman's patience with Mariner was very often tested, and in 2380, she sought numerous ways to get her transferred off the ship, though none of these methods was successful, and Mariner even caught on that Freeman was trying to have her transferred.(LD: "Second Contact", "Moist Vessel")

Despite this conflicting relationship, Mariner still loved her mother, and when the two cooperated together, they could accomplish impressive feats together. At one point, Freeman had Mariner briefly promoted, initially with the hopes of transferring her off the Cerritos, but with how effective the two worked together in a crisis, she wondered if Mariner would actually be a good addition to her senior staff. While Mariner ultimately got herself demoted again, the two later agreed to work together to provide a positive change in the ways Mariner was good at but Freeman was limited to do under Starfleet protocol. (LD: "Moist Vessel", "No Small Parts")

While Mariner was not above taunting Freeman often, and giving her a piece of her mind, the two learned to see past their differences and their quarrels and find a new respect and love for one another. While the two didn't always understand one another, their conflicts never hurt their love for one another, and Mariner logged that as much as Freeman could be a "pain in the ass", she would do anything for her. (LD: "Crisis Point", "I, Excretus")

In 2381, Freeman accused Mariner of besmirching her and the Cerritos to FNN reporter Victoria Nuzé when she had done no such thing and transferred her to Starbase 80 as revenge, leading to an outraged Mariner resigning. Freeman was not notified of Mariner's resignation until she contacted the station in a desperate attempt to apologize upon learning that Mariner's unauthorized interview had contained nothing but praise. Despite this, Mariner came to the aid of the Cerritos without a second thought upon learning of the Texas-class crisis, and, once the crisis was over, forgave Freeman for her actions, noting that her own poor behavior likely contributed to Freeman's rash decision making. (LD: "Trusted Sources", "The Stars At Night")

Friendships

Quimp

Quimp was one of Mariner's oldest continuous friends. He helped her out on occasion and genuinely cared for her well-being. (LD: "Envoys", "Parth Ferengi's Heart Place")

Bradward Boimler

Mariner considered Boimler her best friend, and the two often worked together on missions. She used affectionate nicknames like "Boims" for him.

Though their friendship started a bit rough, and though their personalities and approach to their missions could be drastically different, with Boimler being more by the book, while Mariner would act more on instinct, they worked well together, and developed enormous amounts of respect for one another. As a show of friendship, Mariner decided to become Boimler's mentor with the intention of getting him into a captain's chair. She also helped restore some faith in himself as a Starfleet officer by deliberately making herself look bad when he got close to quitting Starfleet. (LD: "Second Contact", "Envoys", "Strange Energies")

When Boimler accepted a promotion, and transfer to the USS Titan, Mariner was very angry and hurt that he didn't say goodbye and held a grudge against him for a brief period of time. While she missed him, she did eventually understand his decision, and was happy for him. Even three months after the transfer, Mariner, Tendi, and Rutherford kept up the habit of leaving an open booth for Boimler when using the sonic showers due to his discomfort with public nudity.

Boimler's time on the Titan was limited, however, and when he returned to the Cerritos, Mariner was very excited to see him return, and welcomed him back instantly (though she wasn't above giving him a little flack for leaving). While she welcomed him back, she did hold a small bit of anger at him, which was revealed during a visit with Boimler to Starbase 25. While Mariner was angry with him for never apologizing, Boimler was angry that she was being selfish, and that he earned his promotion to the Titan. The two eventually reconciled, with Boimler giving her the apology she had been waiting for. (LD: "No Small Parts", "Strange Energies", "Kayshon, His Eyes Open", "An Embarrassment Of Dooplers")

Despite the arguments Mariner and Boimler could often find themselves in, the two were practically inseparable to the point where Tendi did not dismiss the assumption that they're dating, and they were often mistaken for a couple. They affectionately teased one another, and Mariner considered Boimler her "number one." (LD: "We'll Always Have Tom Paris", "An Embarrassment Of Dooplers")

D'Vana Tendi

Mariner and Tendi were friends, but did not have a very close relationship for a while. Since Tendi was closer with Rutherford more often than not, for the first year that Tendi served aboard the Cerritos, Mariner was completely unaware that Tendi even had a first name. Tendi was also unaware of a lot of Mariner's service history with Starfleet. Mariner also had a habit of associating Tendi with common stereotypes associated with Orions, much to the discomfort and frustration of Tendi, who was trying to distance herself from such stigmas. (LD: "Crisis Point", "We'll Always Have Tom Paris")

Despite this, the two did grow closer as friends as time went on to the point where in a single mission, Tendi disclosed more information about herself than even Rutherford knew. Mariner saw Tendi as a very kind and good person and was willing to take the blame for her when she'd get into trouble.

William T. Riker

Mariner was friends with Riker and his former mentee. He often provided her with contraband, such as Romulan ale. (LD: "No Small Parts")

Dating

Mariner was pansexual and had dated "bad boys, bad girls, bad gender nonbinary babes, ruthless alien masterminds, [and] bad Bynars." (LD: "We'll Always Have Tom Paris")

Mariner once dated an Anabaj to make her mother angry. (LD: "Envoys")

Aboard the Cerritos, Mariner went on one date with Lieutenant Steve Levy in 2379, but ended it because he believed conspiracy theories, such as that "Wolf 359 was an inside job." (LD: "No Small Parts")

Jennifer Sh'reyan

Mariner's relationship with the Andorian, Jennifer Sh'reyan, started incredibly rocky. She claimed to hate her at first, and was particularly annoyed by Andy Billups calling her by Jen's name. (LD: "No Small Parts", "Strange Energies") This tension between the two continued through 2381, until the Cerritos had to engage in a rescue of the USS Archimedes. Mariner and Sh'reyan worked together to help Ransom manually navigate through a debris field by sight. When the Cerritos collided with a piece of debris, Sh'reyan saved Mariner when she became dislodged, and nearly drifted out into space. Mariner later thanked her for saving her, and they both apologized to one another for how they'd been treating each other. (LD: "First First Contact")

The two started dating shortly afterward, though Mariner was a bit shy about it. It was implied that Mariner was afraid of long-term commitment. Her friends teased her about it, though they were ultimately supportive of their relationship. Mariner at one point was very shy about meeting Sh'reyan's friends. When she was invited to Castro's salon, she went out of her way to be overly polite, as she was worried that Sh'reyan would break up with her if her friends didn't like her. Sh'reyan saw through the act and assured her that she liked Mariner for her short tolerance of people, and has been looking forward to seeing Mariner go hard on her friends. Reassured, Mariner proceeded to stun them all when they were panicking in a blackout, much to Sh'reyan's amusement. Sh'reyan later told Mariner that it was her unpredictability that she loved the most about her. (LD: "Mining The Mind's Mines", "Hear All, Trust Nothing")

Appendices

Appearances

Background information

Mariner was voiced by Tawny Newsome.

In developing the characters for Lower Decks, Mike McMahan described all four leads in an 10 August 2020 TrekMovie.com interview as a combination of other Star Trek characters, parts of himself, and people in his life. Mariner had elements of Captain James T. Kirk, Kathryn Janeway, and Jean-Luc Picard, "she knows the rules, but also sometimes feels like she should bend them because she knows better."

He further compares her to "Maverick in Top Gun... he's great at flying a jet, but he also buzzes the tower." [2]

McMahan named Mariner after his sister, Beckett Mariner McMahan, and based her relationship with Captain Freeman on his sister's relationship with their mother "when my sister was younger and would throw down with my mom occasionally." [3] [4]

No explanation has been given for Mariner having a different surname than either of her parents.

Beckett Mariner appears as a duty officer in Star Trek Online.

Apocrypha

An alternate timeline version of Mariner appears in the comic miniseries Star Trek: Sons of Star Trek where she's a commander and the first officer aboard the USS Avery.

External links

• Beckett Mariner at StarTrek.com
• Beckett Mariner at Memory Beta, the wiki for licensed Star Trek works