Craig Porter

Craig Porter's parents were terraformers, and he spent most of his childhood going from barren planet to barren planet and making them habitable. During this time, he developed an interest in science and building things. Once of his proudest achievements was a small hut he built at the edge of a lake when he was twelve years old.

Having grown accustomed to a nomadic life, Porter applied to Starfleet Academy and was accepted. While there, he had a difficult time deciding where to focus his energies. While his roommate, Sean Russell, was content to study security procedures and tactical operations, Porter divided his time between engineering and sciences. During an Academy training scenario, he also learned that he had a real aversion to being captured. An Academy counselor attributed it to a fear of being kept in one place. Porter didn't have to worry much about that. After graduation, he was posted to eight different ships in two years. These transfers weren't due to any problem with his work; he was a sold, dependable officer. But he didn't really excel in either engineering or sciences, so he was tops on the transfer list when people who stood out more became available.

The constant moves did cause him to develop a healthy level of sarcasm, though. He finally ended up on the USS Secondprize, where he served under Jaroch in the science department. Here, he was reunited with Russell and formed a friendship with Lisa Beck, since the two of them were often left on the bridge while the command officers went on various missions. This also meant they were usually stuck bailing the command officers out when they got into trouble. Porter's friendship with Beck didn't mean he was above helping Scott Baird in the revenge prank he played on Beck, Emily Sullivan, and Claire Webber. (Star Traks 3 [TRK])

Porter and Beck found themselves in a more serious situation when Myna attempted to destroy the Secondprize. With the command officers all out of the picture, Beck and Porter disobeyed the false ambassador's direct orders in an attempt to rescue Patricia Hawkins and Travis Dillon from the holodeck. (Star Traks 4 [TRK]) During the Secondprize's first encounter with the Multeks, Porter manned the science station and helped assess the capabilities of the Multek ship. Immediately after this, he was transferred to Waystation along with Beck, Russell, Tina Jones, and Lt. Cmdr. Walter Morales. While Beck stayed at Starbase 219 to supervise construction of the station, Porter went to Bracktia Prime with the other officers to pick up Dr. Amelia Nelson. There, Porter was forced to insert the Midon symbiont into Nelson in order to save the symbiont's life from Hinaree terrorists. Porter and Nelson were taken hostage by the Hinaree, which just thrilled Porter. When Russell and Jones rescued them, Porter went after the Hinaree leader himself to thank her for the hospitality. After finally getting to Waystation, where Porter was posted as the Science Officer/Chief of Operations, the crew soon found themselves under attack from both the Multeks and the Romulans. Porter was able to remotely take control of Bradley Dillon's ship and fly it into the Romulan Warbird, seriously damaging the attacking vessel. (Star Traks 5 [TRK])

As life on the station settled down, Porter discovered that several components were disappearing from around the station. He traced the thefts to Russell, but he was arrested by Russell's creation, Compucop, before he could do anything about it. After Morales and Jones freed the crew, Porter and Russell destroyed Compucop. (House Arrest [WAY]) When Colonel Martin Lazlo became sick of Beck's command style, he asked Porter to find a habitable planet he could take his Federation Marines to. Porter recommended Ridalis Two, which turned out the be populated by dangerous squirrels. (Send the Marines [WAY]) While on a scouting mission on Stardate 50357, Porter and Beck were captured by the Multeks, another event that made Porter oh so very happy. Fortunately, they were soon rescued by Morales, Russell, and Nelson. Nelson noted that bad things seemed to happen to people who went on missions with Porter. (Field Trip [WAY])

While performing a sensitive calibration on a transporter, Porter accidentally opened a breech into the Happy Universe, which allowed the Happy denizens to briefly kidnap Yeoman Jones. (Close to Home [WAY]) His life got even more eventful when Karyna arrived on Waystation. He identified Karyna's Q nature and found himself left in command after Karyna took Beck. Lazlo took the opportunity to seize control of the station, beating the living hell out of Porter in the process. He threw Porter and Nelson in the brig, where they remained until Russell rescued them and the three were able to make their way to ops. Before the chaos started, Porter had asked out Dr. Nelson and been rejected, another in a long series of rejections that had marked his relationships with women. (That Sinking Feeling [WAY])

During the renovation of Waystation, Porter went with Jones to survey the saucers of the USS Exeter and USS Cheever that were being used as the base of the new station saucers where she was kidnapped by the Phantom of the Exeter, a.k.a. Nurse Jim. (That's The Spirit [WAY]) Porter's continual problems relating to women caused him to seek the help of Counselor Ray Miller, who informed Porter that his problem was that he was seeing women as some sort of alien species rather than people. Porter quickly got to put Miller's advice into practice when Jaraan, a potential investor in Bradley Dillon's Starfleet Suites Hotel, arrived at Waystation Village and took an interest in Porter. He fell for her quickly and went so far as to agree to become her Drulik and return to her homeworld with her where he could work on the ship he had designed. After finding out that Drulik was basically equivalent to harem boy, Porter changed his mind and stayed on Waystation. His confidence with women did increase slightly, though. (Relationship Jitters [WAY]) During the Starshine Kids' take over of the renovated station, Porter stayed aboard the USS Orleans, which went to convince the Multeks to help them take back the station. Porter tricked the Multeks into helping and ended up in command of the Orleans when Captain Jack Woodall was injured. (Lip Lock [WAY]) Soon after this, he had a brief romance with Lt. Ariel Tilleran of the USS Explorer. (Worlds Apart [WAY])

Porter was on the scouting mission that first encountered the D'Ceti. Despite an initial misunderstanding, Porter was able to make contact with the D'Ceti captain and convince her that the Federation was peaceful. He transported the D'Ceti back to Waystation only to learn that a Multek fleet was on the way to destroy the station. Disobeying Beck's order to evacuate and to set off Waystation's self-destruct mechanism, Porter borrowed a cloaking device from two Romulans visiting the station for a science conference and hid Waystation from the Multeks, who left without incident. For his actions, Porter was promoted to lieutenant commander. (The Way We Were [WAY])

By the time of the Forever incident, Porter had been promoted to commander and was working as the head of the Temporal Physics Department at Starfleet Sciences. He went to Forever alone to scout out the situation and was captured by Morticent. Rather than get upset as he usually did when captured, he decided to take advantage of the situation and accept Morticent's offer of lots of sex. When the opportunity presented itself, he sent a warning message to the Secondprize about Morticent's presence at Forever and managed to sabotage Morticent's ship. He was about to be killed by Guardian #492 when Rydell stopped Forever, making his death completely unnecessary. Porter then returned to Earth with the others. (Please Hold For Oblivion [TRK])