Trekipedia

Tucker, Charles “Trip” III

Trip—his father and grandfather were both Charles, so “Trip” was derived from “triple”^[19]—was in Starfleet for 13 years, and knew Jonathan Archer for nine. The two officers met when Archer was a commander involved with the NX Test Program and Trip was a lieutenant on Captain Jefferies‘ engineering team. Trip and Archer teamed up with Commander A.G. Robinson to convince Starfleet and its Vulcan advisors that the NX program was worth keeping on track. Though they resorted to unorthodox means, including the launching of an NX test vessel without permission, they were ultimately successful.^[19]

From then on, the duo shared a strong bond, and once endured harsh survival training in the Australian outback together. The captain described his chief engineer as “tough as nails,” and saved Trip’s life several times. During an Omega training mission on Titan, Trip’s EV pack froze up; he got nitrogen narcosis and tried to remove his helmet—Archer ordered him to keep it on.^[3] Likewise, when the two were stranded on a brutal desert planet, Archer saved a delirious Trip from succumbing entirely to heatstroke. For his part, Trip was always there when the captain needed cheering up. When Archer was depressed about the Enterprise‘s botched first contact with the Kreetassans, his chief engineer lightened the mood with a data module of the Stanford vs. Texas water polo match.^[13]

Prior to his time on the Enterprise NX-01, Trip had only been to one inhabited planet beyond Earth—and it was “inhabited” by dust-dwelling ticks.^[1] He craved adventure, and tended to get “antsy” when things were too dull.^[2] Luckily, Enterprise‘s mission was packed with new experiences. Trip went down in history as the first Human male to become pregnant and the first example of interspecies pregnancy involving a Human after his encounter with the Xyrillian female Ah’len. During his brief experience being “with child,” Trip experienced all the usual hormonal irregularities, resulting in mood swings and fluctuations in appetite. Luckily for him, Enterprise managed to locate the Xyrillians and transfer the embryo.^[3]

As he proved time and again, Trip was an ace engineer, and claimed that he couldn’t sleep without the warp engines online. Attacks from an unknown race prompted Trip and Lieutenant Reed to lead the crew in building a complement of phase cannons from scratch while in mid-space, effectively upgrading the Enterprise‘s weapons. They accomplished in two days what would have taken the armory team at Jupiter Station at least a week.^[5] He was key in saving the ship from some strange, large-lobed alien thieves,^[8] and was left in command of the Enterprise on several occasions—one time, he even successfully impersonated Captain Archer.^[12]

Though he appeared to be the charmer when it came to the ladies, Trip once claimed that he was involved in only three relationships, all of which ended badly. A long distance romance with Natalie from Pensacola didn’t work out, and he regrets that he was unable to say good-bye in person. As a Starfleet trainee, he was infatuated with a waitress named Ruby at Mill Valley’s 602 Club—the same Ruby that Lieutenant Reed once had a relationship with. Ruby had names all picked out for her children, and claimed that she would marry the first man who could guess them—Trip did his best, but was unsuccessful. Trip’s first dance was at Bayshore Elementary in Panama City, Florida, and he later expressed regret that he was unable to approach the girl he had a crush on, Melissa Lyles. Despite practicing the two-step for weeks with his brother, Trip ended up spending the whole dance in the corner with his friends.^[6] In 2152, Trip experienced a flirtation with Kantare beauty Liana—he gave her a tour of the ship and a protein resequencer programmed for five flavors of ice cream.^[9] He also had a romantic encounter with Kaitaama, the first monarch of Krios Prime. The two fled their alien captors together and ended up spending some time on a humid, swamp-like planet.^[15] Trip experienced a flirtation of a significantly more uncomfortable kind when one of Dr. Phlox‘s wives, Feezal, attempted to romance him. Although Phlox was very encouraging, Trip ultimately rejected Feezal’s advances.^[17]

When he first joined Starfleet, Trip lived a few blocks from the Vulcan compound, and in 10th grade he had a Vulcan biology teacher, Mr. Velik. (ENT-) None of this tempered his distrust of the Vulcans, who he saw as cold and rigid in their ways. Subcommander T’Pol challenged his preconceived notions. Though she and Trip clashed many times regarding protocol—prompting T’Pol to remind Trip that she outranked him^[1]—the two shared a grudging respect and an unusual bond. When Trip inadvertently learned that T’Pol’s pre-arranged marriage might have forced her to leave the Enterprise, he managed to convince her to follow her gut and stay aboard.^[4] Trip also found a Vulcan friend in Kov, an engineer and member of the unconventional V’tosh ka’tur. The chief engineer’s friendship and guidance eventually convinced Kov to contact his long estranged father.^[7] Another interesting alien encounter came in the form of Zho’Kaan, an Arkonian. When Trip and Zho’Kaan both crashed on an inhospitable moon, they started out as combatants, but ultimately developed something of an understanding.^[16]

Trip also forged an unlikely bond with Malcolm Reed, whose buttoned-up nature seemed diametrically opposed to the chief engineer’s friendly manner. When the duo was stranded in a damaged shuttlepod for several days, they initially clashed, as Trip was given to what Reed called “treacly optimism.” In the end, they discovered they had more in common than they thought, and at one point, Trip even tried to sacrifice himself so that Reed would have a better chance of survival. Luckily, they were both rescued by the Enterprise,^[6] and lived to spend some memorable shore leave time together on pleasure planet Risa. The two men went in search of fun at a Risan nightclub—and ended up getting mugged. They managed to escape, but did their best to avoid detailing the incident to their fellow crewmembers.^[11]

Not all of Trip’s friendships developed smoothly, however. When The Enterprise made first contact with the Vissians, Trip took it upon himself to befriend the cogenitor, a third gender used for reproduction. He attempted to get the cogenitor to see that it was equal to its fellow beings, teaching it how to read and opening its eyes to such things as music and engineering. The Vissians, however, did not take kindly to this, particularly when the cogenitor requested asylum aboard the Enterprise. Archer denied its request, and it later committed suicide. This encounter taught Trip that he sometimes acted too rashly when it came to encountering new species.^[18]

Trip’s nephew was in Ms. Malvin’s fourth grade class at the Worley Elementary School in Kenmare, County Kerry, Ireland, in 2151 and the students sent the Enterprise some drawings and questions regarding life on a starship. Trip was asked to field a question about flushing the ship toilets—and expressed dismay at being asked a “poop question.”^[4]

Trip had interests outside of engineering, and enjoyed taking pictures of the many new sights encountered by the Enterprise. He also took photos of Captain Archer, so that an Oakland artist would be able to paint the captain’s portrait, to be displayed at Starfleet Command. (ENT-04) He was quite athletic, and very much enjoyed the game of Geskana, which was introduced to him by charismatic alien leader Zobral.^[10] Despite his jovial nature, Trip was known to tear up during the occasional movie. His favorite food was pan-friend catfish, particularly his mother’s recipe,^[14] and his favorite flavor of ice cream is Rocky Road. (ENT-)

Trip experienced a devastating tragedy in 2153—his younger sister, Elizabeth, was killed when the Xindi attacked Earth. Elizabeth, whom Trip called Lizzie, was an architect living in Florida. This deep, personal loss has made Trip determined to track down the Xindi in the Delphic Expanse.^[20]

Portrayed by Connor Trinneer.