Reginald Barclay
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| [Source] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
If every village has an idiot, apparently so does every ship in starfleet and Reginald Barclay fills that role for the Enterprise-D. We first hear of him through complaints of other crew members about his ineptitude, tardiness and lack of effort.
He wastes much of his time in the holodeck endulging in fantasies about other crew-members, particularly female ones, to escape from and cover his intense insecurity. He also included a prostitute in Alexander's western-themed holodeck program; Worf did not approve.
He is one of the few people in the Federation who fears using the transporters. This wasn't considered so terrible with characters like McCoy or Pulaski, but its supposed to be another sign of Barclay's insecurity. Its even named "transporter phobia".
Once his mind was given an intelligence boost by an alien probe. He was able to improve the Enterprise's warp drive to take the ship to the probe's home systems. This was how the aliens, more aliens of the week called the Cytherians, studied other species. Barclay's intelligence returned to its normal level after the experience, though there were apparently some lasting effects, such as the ability to predict checkmate with 3-D chess.
In spite of his lack of confidence, he attempts to self-diagnose any possible medical conditions he might have. One such attempt resulted in Dr. Crusher's prescribed treatment causing the crew of the Enterprise to "devolve" (yet another Star Trek abuse of evolution) into animal-like forms. Barclay transformed into a spider-like creature.
In 2373, he was aboard the Enterprise-E when they traveled back to 2063, where he met and shook hands with Zeframe Cochrane while he was helping get the Phoenix ready for First Contact.
When the USS Voyager became lost in the Delta Quadrant, Barclay became obsessed with its safe return.