Sydney Barnstable is a graduate of the NIMAS Omni-Corps program for gifted action figures and his curious brand of genius has made him an early legend.

Syd is consumed with systems analysis and technical minutia and has thus far been interested in little else. He reads only complex scientific journals, has no identifiable hobbies or non-geek passions and, without exception, those who have served with him have been able to learn almost nothing about him personally.

Syd mumbles, using long and sometimes impenetrable verbiage, and rarely completes a sentence. Often this mumbling is directed to machinery and some believe that he communicates to the P8 engine core much like a dissociative stepfather. Stranger still, at times it appears to be a dialogue.

Syd is the inventor of low-watt "Bulb Drive", the innovative new technology behind the P8's unique warp core.