Childhood in Sydney
Claire grew up in the busy city of Sydney, Australia on Earth. Her parents are both Anglo-Saxon descended Australians. Most of her childhood was spent watching and later on working in her father's vehicle repair facility, using her innate ability to figure out what was wrong with equipment.
Regularly, her father took her out into the Blue Mountains for camping and fishing trips, and she took up archery during this time. Claire spent a lot of time at Bondi Beach, and won numerous surf life-saving medals at the local surf life-saving club, where she joined Nippers (children's category) and progressed on from there.
When she was 6, Claire was enrolled in the Sydney Girl's Grammar school. At school, she excelled in sports, in particular track athletics and gymnastics, and history. Also, Claire excelled in languages which she took a love in, picking up Mandarin Chinese, French and Aboriginal over her primary and secondary schooling. Claire took up aikido, and became very good at it.
Claire wasn't one of the most popular girls in primary school, just being average. However, once she hit high school, she became quite popular. She began dating, and found that she was attracted to the rough wild type.
During her secondary school years from age 16, Claire and a female friend, Sammy, started an very intimate experimental relationship together. They were practically inseparable but decided to each go their own way after high school. To this day, Claire has some hidden nagging doubts about what could have been with Sammy.
It was also during high school that Claire stumbled on Sun Tzu's 'The Art of War'. After reading the book, her outlook on life changed and she became a Taoist. However, to this day, she has trouble with keeping her nature on track with Taoism.
Enrolling in Starfleet Academy, San Francisco
At the age of 18, Claire secretly applied for the Starfleet Academy Entrance Exam after faking her parent's permission and was accepted. Shipping out on a transpacific cargo transport destined for Chicago, Claire arrived in the United States and hitch-hiked her way to San Francisco. Despite the size of Sydney, San Francisco was a very large place and took a lot of getting used to. It was also her first time away from home and she became very homesick, going back home whenever she could. When Academy security were alerted to what she had done by the Sydney Police, Claire contacted her parents and let them know that she really wanted to be in Starfleet. Finally, everything was sorted out and she continued her studies.
Claire excelled in many of her subjects to the surprise of her lecturers, considering she chose an irregular course plan that contained subjects from the Engineering, Security, Science and Tactical tracks. Many of her instructors told her that she should follow one path, but she had dreams of something higher. Also, she took numerous language courses.
Claire was involved in a number of martial arts clubs, and went to weekly sessions at a local Zen Buddhist temple, becoming very acquainted with the monks.
At the Academy, Claire started a fairly active social life to help alleviate her homesickness and was going out with a friendly Betazoid counseling cadet, Benten Ritari, for most of her Academy time. But towards the end of their academy studies, they decided to split up amicably since both of them were destined for incompatible duty assignments. To this day, Claire and Benten keep in contact when they can.
As a student, Claire was fairly wild and gained a tattoo of an eagle on her back. Also when she was a student at the Academy, some other cadets convinced Claire and some of her female friends while very intoxicated that it would be a good idea to have all hair below their necks flash-burned away. While the procedure did not cause any physical damage, it is irreversible.
In her second year during her Planetary Survival course, Claire risked her own life to help save some fellow cadets who were buried in a freak landslide. The Academy Commandant put Claire's name forward for a commendation.
First Assignment - USS Victorious
After the Academy, Ensign Barnes was assigned to the USS Victorious, a Miranda-class medium cruiser, under the command of a Russian captain named Grigori Ivanoff. After a short term of unusually bad performance that was not expected for someone with her records, an accidental explosion in a manifold and discovery of alcoholism, she was transferred to Security after Captain Ivanoff realized she was far better suited to Security then Engineering and had fared very well with Security courses at the academy. The ship's counselors suggested that a pet from Australia might help her, and with consultation, she applied and was given permission by both the Australian Department of Wildlife and Starfleet to be allowed to keep a koala as a pet onboard, naming him Blinky Bill after the Australian cartoon character. Within fifteen months and a total change, Claire had risen to the rank of Lt (j.g.) and Assistant Chief of Security. Captain Ivanoff was not happy about some times when she jokingly helped encourage some conspiracy-nutters that he was actually a Romulan spy and they raided his quarters to sort through his replicator's trash receptacle, getting them quickly transferred away.
During her time as Assistant Chief of Security, the Victorious was involved in several time-related incidents and Temporal Investigations under command of Admiral Falcyon started taking an interest in the ship, Claire in particular after she showed an honest willingness to do the least harm to the timelines as was necessary.
Aboard the Victorious, Claire picked up Bajoran and Trill from some of the officers aboard ship and studies of the ship's language library.
Tholian Incident
Less then three months later, the First Officer and another higher-level officer was killed during an away team mission during a particularly nasty incident with the Tholians. Since the Victorious had been damaged badly & unable to help, Claire took command of the team & Epsilon Nine colony, protecting the colony from ground-assault by Tholian cruisers and received the Andorian Battle Star for bravery.
During her time aboard, Claire made friends with a female medical officer, Lt Holly Goodhead, and their friendship quickly blossomed into a passionate romance. Ivanoff did not seem to mind his security chief's choices and over the next four years, Claire served very well.
Victorious's Final Mission
During an away mission on a First Contact assignment, the team that Claire was in was caught by the planet's defense forces after finding out that the Romulans had already made contact. Holly and Claire were held in a female prison for two months until a Ranger extraction team was able to get them out. During this time, Claire sat up every night as guard over her emotionally-fragile friend, surviving on an hour of sleep each day when it was daylight.
The final straw was when one of the guards took a shine to Holly and made it clear that the doctor was to come with him. Realizing quickly what he meant as Hol struggled, Claire bravely volunteered to do what he wanted if he left Holly alone. The guard accepted and used her body quite a lot. Despite insistent asking from Holly, Claire refuses to let her friend know what exactly happened.
Shortly after the rescue while the Victorious was try to repair the damage done by the Romulans, the Victorious was attacked by two cloaked Warbirds. Captain Ivanoff was fatally wounded and Claire helped the Security chief with command duties, saving the damaged Victorious and its crew by outwitting the warbirds, even though she had been injured when an exploding console had shot a foot long spike through her left shoulder.
Two Galaxy-class and another Miranda-class vessel arrived soon after and one of the Galaxy-class vessels escorted the Victorious back to the nearest starbase.
Claire was glad that Blinky Bill wasn't hurt and had been well-looked after by Sickbay.
Temporary Stay on Earth
Upon arrival at the starbase, the ship was classified as unsalvageable and decommissioned. The crew was given leave for a month, before they would be split up for transferring to other vessels. Claire and Holly were transferred back to Earth as instructors at the Academy for recuperation and counseling. Claire ended up having to have shoulder reconstruction surgery, but has had no problems since and gained back full strength & mobility.
While Holly delighted in the comfort and safety, it became obvious quickly that Claire's personality was not suited for effectively what she considered to be 'desk duty'. The Academy commandant was reluctant to give her up, but finally accepted a transfer request to any ship, even if it meant a demotion, so she wouldn't resign her commission. Holly told her that she wants Claire to be happy, and will not get upset if she gets into another relationship.
Transfer to the USS Galaxy
Although she was very sad that she had to be away from Holly, Claire was happy that she had been reassigned to the USS Galaxy under the command of Captain M'Kantu. Claire is glad to be back on a frontline ship and doesn't mind being just a normal security officer. She brought Blinky Bill with her.
During her time as on the Victorious, Claire gained the reputation of 'charging in where angels fear to tread with all guns blazing'. It is greatly hoped that her recklessness will be tempered on the Galaxy, but is doubtful.
Claire does not like visiting Sickbay, and will only visit when she is seriously hurt. However, she believes in a double standard and will really crack down on others not looking after themselves.
While this does seem contrary to her nature, deep down, Claire is very logical and tries to resolve situations with the least damage and loss to life or property. She is very compassionate, believing that the best way to get the most of others is to realize that even aboard a starship, there are issues other then Starfleet and duty.
She believes more in the ideals behind laws then the exact letter of the law. So far, this has not caused her any problems but she knows it is only a matter of time.
Claire has a mischievous streak that has at times caused her problems. However, she knows when to be serious. Sometimes though, she can be a bit mouthy and insubordinate.
Overall, Claire is a very stable person and does not crack under pressure.
Claire is a very friendly person, getting on with most people, and has been known to walk upto complete strangers to start a conversation.
During her Academy years, Claire became an alcoholic due to homesickness, but went into counseling for it when it was discovered during her first year on the Victorious. She has not touched any alcohol for five years, and is very careful with what she drinks. Even after the rape in the prison, Claire stayed away from alcohol since she knows that even a taste could lead her back to that terrible path.
At first glance, Claire looks like she is too delicate and gentle to be a Security officer. However, that is a horrendous mistake, because she is very good at her job.
Claire's specialties involve law enforcement, undercover work, interrogations, crypto graphical analysis and computer crime investigations. She has had exposure to forensic science, and knows how to work a crime scene without disturbing evidence.
Claire has greenish-gray eyes and her hair is blonde. She is naturally ambidextrous.
From her Academy days, Claire has a tattoo of an eagle on her back. Sometimes, she also wears small unobtrusive earrings. Normally, Claire wears a brooch on a necklace that was given to her by her grandmother shortly before she passed away. Inside, a holo-picture of her grandmother can be found.
Claire loves solving mysteries and regularly can be found with her head in a detective novel, preferably either in the Victorian era or around the prohibition era of the United States.
In her quarters, she has numerous antique copies of paper-style books. Her most cherished part of this collection is copies of all the Sherlock Holmes stories from Arthur Conan Doyle. In addition, she has an antique copy of Sun Tzu's masterpiece, The Art of War, in Mandarin. She can be often found in the holodeck with a deer-stalker hat trying to solve a randomly designed mystery.
Claire is very resourceful and always prepares well for anything in life. This was clearly shown in her Security and survival courses. From her school days, Claire has always been very passionate about gymnastics plus track & field athletics.
She is an expert kick-boxer, having won numerous medals throughout Starfleet and the Federation. Also, Claire is highly trained in various forms of martial arts - aikido, karate, a form of Rigellian tae-kwan-do, ju-jitsu and three Vulcan forms with no Terran counterparts. With ease, she can bring down a Klingon or Gorn using their own strength against them and disable them using a version of pressure-points, making up for her lower strength.
She has no problems with fighting dirty against a target if her job necessitates it. During her Academy hand-to-hand combat classes, she was regularly told off for kicks below the belt to male cadets.
Claire has child-like flexibility and agility from a life of gymnastics. Claire also won numerous medals for gymnastics, and trains daily. Gymnastics work helped a lot with the recovery of her left shoulder.
Claire taught herself archery from a fairly early age and is a crack shot with a keen eye and superb long distance vision. According to medical reports, her vision is considered to be 20/10 on the Snellen scale.
When she joined the Academy, these skills translated perfectly from archery to phasers. Claire is just as proficient at armed melee combat as she is in long-range and martial arts. She can regularly be found running fencing, archery or melee combat simulations in the holodeck, or in the ship's gymnasium.
Claire's quarters contain an arsenal of swords, daggers, spears and other historical weapons from many Federation worlds. Her most prized weapons are a matched set of Katana and Wakizashi Japanese Samurai swords, and a longbow believed to be the weapon used by the man upon who the Terran legend of Robin Hood of Locksley was based on.
Koalas, like Blinky Bill, do not drink water directly very often but instead get the necessary liquid through their diet of eucalyptus gum leaves. In Aboriginal, koala means 'no water'. They are quite heavy and sleep most of the day, thus a pretty low maintenance. However, they eat a lot and are a quite vulnerable animal, needing lots of protection. Claire keeps a small genetically-modified eucalyptus tree in her quarters that does not grow very high, so consequently, the smell of eucalyptus is quite strong in her quarters but she got used to it years ago. However, the tree has lots of strong branches to hold her pet. A few times a day, she replicates eucalyptus branches with leaves and puts them within reach of Blinky. He has an untippable water bowl nearby just in case he needs it.
