A Human, Hoshi was born in Kyoto city, Japan, on 9th July 2128. She was the second of three children.1 A highly intelligent woman, Sato had an incredible gift for languages - she could learn a new language in a matter of hours. She was a very isolated child who spent her days with private tutors studying linguistics. She even came to believe that it was normal be alone. Her grandfather Michio was the last person she really felt close to.2Sato went to school to further study linguistics, graduating second in her class before going to Starfleet academy.3 A black belt in Aikido, in her second month she was expelled for breaking her commanding officer's arm after an argument over a poker game. She was readmitted because Starfleet believed it needed her expertise in languages.4
In 2151 Sato agreed to join the NX-01 as communications officer. She found space flight difficult, and after a few weeks requested a transfer back to Earth duty after she discovered a group of corpses hanging off hooks on an Axanar vessel. She subsequently overcame her fears and withdrew her transfer request.3
Sato was also afraid of the transporter system. When she was forced to use the device for the first time in 2152, she experienced a hallucination during the rematerialisation process. Although this only lasted for seconds in objective time, she experienced over a day of subjective time in which she battled the steadily escalating effects of the transport on her body whilst attempting to prevent an alien plot to destroy Enterprise.5
In 2153 an alien named Tarquin contacted Sato telepathically, offering to assist the NX-01 with the Xindi mission if she would agree to live with him as his companion. She declined, leading Tarquin to attempt to force her to remain. She ultimately convinced him that he had no right to compel her to remain and he agreed to release her and to assist Captain Archer.2
In 2154 Sato was kidnapped from the NX-01 by Commander Dolim after he and the Insectoids stole the final version of the Xindi weapon.6 Dolim tortured her and implanted neural parasites in order to force her to decode the access codes for the weapon. She attempted suicide but was unsuccessful, and eventually did break the access codes.7 A MACO team from Enterprise rescued her, and although still feeling the effects of her treatment she was able to assist Captain Archer in reboarding the weapon and sabotaging it as it approached Earth.8
Hoshi attended a celebration held for the NX-01's senior officers after the ship returned to Earth.9 She returned to duty after a short break, assisting with the Augment crisis10 and the Vulcan civil war11 Both Hoshi and Trip were infected with a silicon based virus whilst investigating a new planet. They were killed by the virus, but thanks to the intervention of an Organian observer who was studying the crew's reaction to the virus they were both revived. Neither Hoshi nor any other member of the crew retained memory of the incident afterwards.4
Hoshi designed improvements for the universal translator which helped to make the inter-species conference held on Earth in 2155 a success. She also discovered tampering to the devices which uncovered Gannet Brooks, a covert operative spying on the delegates.12 She took command of the NX-01 whilst Archer and his officers attempted to prevent the terrorist organisation Terra Prime from threatening Earth with the Verteron array on Mars. She resisted pressure to destroy the array because of the collateral damage this would involve.13
In 2161 Hoshi and the crew of the NX-01 travelled to Earth, where she attended the founding ceremony of the United Federation of Planets.14
Hoshi retired from Starfleet in her late thirties with rank of Lieutenant Commander. She went on to develop the Linguacode translation matrix which remained in use aboard Federation Starships until at least the 2260s.15
Hoshi eventually moved to the Tarsus IV colony. When a fungus destroyed much of the planet's food supplies in 2246, Governor Kodos ordered four thousand colonists murdered in order to ensure that the rest had enough food to survive until rescue arrived. The 118 year old Hoshi and her family were amongst those murdered. She was buried in Kyoto with her husband, Takashi Kimura.16
Played by
References
