Stillness Isn't Peace [3/4]

Posted on Mon Jun 9th, 2025 @ 8:35pm by Sergeant Jace Morven

1,887 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Prologue
Location: USS Guinevere
Timeline: 2388

Starfleet Enlisted Preparation Programme, 2369

The confrontation didn’t start with fists. It rarely did. It started with words. “You think you’re better than us?” the youth sneered.

Human. Broad-shouldered. Clean accent...Earth-born originally but raised outside the Federation. Cadet Rolven Marris. Not desperate like some; just behind enough to need SEPP before sitting for entrance exams. That didn’t make him unique, but it made him feel superior compared to those from outer systems, especially colonies without replicators or standard schooling.

Jace didn’t answer. He sat on the bench in the locker room, peeling tape from his hands after the final combat assessment. The skin across his knuckles was raw. Again. He didn’t care. Wouldn’t even think of asking for a dermal regenerator.

“You never talk. You don’t train right. You’ve got no control,” Marris pressed, stepping closer. “You’re not one of us. You’re a thug they dragged in off some backwater dredge.”

Jace stood. Not to threaten. Just done sitting. He was taller by a few centimetres. Lighter, too. Didn’t matter. He looked at Marris with the same blank stillness he’d offered the punching bag earlier. “I don’t think I’m better,” he said quietly. “I think I’m still alive.”

The room went still.

Marris flinched. As if truth had sharp edges. As if he knew deep down that if he pushed harder, Jace wouldn’t stop at words. Even though Jace had tried to be better.

When Jace walked away, he didn’t look back.

The weeks that followed were tight with tension. It was the end of the programme. The last chance to prove themselves, those who had passed the exams, who had adapted, who had earned it.

Jace had been one of them, even if no one wanted to say it out loud.

He stood out, not by effort but by instinct. In isolated moments, he excelled: problem solving, tactical puzzles, strategy. Not because he followed the manuals…he couldn’t read the manuals…but because he saw patterns others missed. That had been enough to get him here.

Now, two evaluators. A PADD. A list of recommendations and concerns. Korrin sat beside him, fingers laced. For once, she looked tense.

“Morven has passed,” said the Vulcan assessor, with the distant tone of someone more relieved than impressed, if you could attribute emotions to a Vulcan's voice. None of the youths in this programme were Vulcan. All were outliers: outcasts from fringe colonies or systems with no Federation oversight. “Marginally. His academic performance is below standard. While physically proficient, his interpersonal skills are…” A pause. Cool. Cutting. “…unsuitable for long-term assignment within Starfleet’s primary exploratory divisions.”

The second evaluator, a Betazoid, a lieutenant commander, spoke more gently. “We’re recommending enlistment to the Federation Ground Forces. Structured, martial. Roles more directly tied to colony defence and suppression. He’ll be…utilized. And less likely to fall behind.”

Jace didn’t react. He watched them like stars…far away, cold. He heard them, but felt nothing. Beside him, Korrin shifted. A small crack in her calm. She almost spoke. Then didn’t.

The rest of the meeting passed in a blur. Later, in her office, she told him the truth: “They’re feeding you to the part of the Federation that bites.” Her voice was quiet. Like she was letting him go and hated herself for it.

Jace stared out the window. Ships moved across the stars like ghosts. Coming and going. Every one of them had a destination.

What did he have? This.

“I don’t care,” he said and he wanted to mean it. He wanted not to feel the sting, that they didn’t trust him with red or gold or blue. That they didn’t think he could be more than a phaser in a uniform. A weapon.

She looked at him. Really looked. “I do,” she said.

“Why?” The question came raw. He swallowed hard.

“Because you’re not stupid, Jace. And you’re not just angry. You survived things that would’ve broken others. You remember things after hearing them once. You map a room in seconds. You see people when they don’t think they’re being watched.”

He had no words for that. None he trusted his voice to carry. She handed him the recommendation. He didn’t try to read it. Just held it like an anchor. “Ground Forces Basic. Three weeks. Earth.” She hesitated. Then stepped closer. “Don’t let them shape you into just a weapon,” she said. “You’re more than that. Even if they don’t see it.”

A stone lodged in his throat. “I’m not good at anything else,” he muttered.

“You’re better at everything else,” she said. “You just never got the chance.”

U.S.S. Guinevere, 2388

He eased down onto the bunk, hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling. He should eat. Find the mess. Fuel his body.

But the past was pressing too close today.

Meeting his CO. Meeting Doctor Cressida Vale. Enough to open the floodgates. Experience taught him to ride it out—follow the memories to their end. Otherwise they’d bleed into his sleep. So he closed his eyes and let himself fall back.

Earth – Ground Forces Training Base Echo-5, 2369

It rained the day Jace arrived.

Not a soft spring rain…colder. Sharper. Like water hosed over blood. He loved it. Even as it raised goosebumps, he tilted his head into the rain and let it wash over him.

The shuttle bay roared: orders barked, boots on metal. No Federation flags here. No speeches about unity or peace. No dreamers.

This was a forge.

No one asked names the first week. Just ranks. Unit numbers.

His was Echo-23. That was enough.

The days bled together. Wake before dawn. Run until lungs burned. Eat fast. Train harder. Sleep like the dead. Weakness wasn’t discussed. You didn’t talk about fear. You beat it out or washed out. And Jace?

Jace thrived.

He didn’t just learn techniques: he adapted. Dropped the polished forms for what worked. Fast strikes. Clean finishes. Control over flair. He kept his breathing calm when others broke behind the firing range. The instructors noticed. Called him ‘efficient’. Others whispered ‘cold’. He didn’t speak unless ordered. When he did, it was clipped. Measured. The loud ones? He stopped hearing them.

The trust he had begun to build at SEPP? Buried. Hidden deep. This place didn’t care about connection. This place taught obedience, purpose, violence.
Sometimes, late at night, in the silence of the barracks, he’d remember Korrin’s voice.

You’re not just angry.

He’d push the thought away like a threat.

The next day, he broke another recruit’s nose in live-blade drills. A clean strike. No emotion. The instructors praised his reflexes. And for one moment, some part of him whispered: Is this all I am?

The rest already knew the answer.

U.S.S. Guinevere, 2388

He rose. Went to the mess.

Replicated a balanced meal. High protein. Carbs. Some fibre.

He didn’t eat for pleasure. But mint tea, sweetened with sugar he added himself rather than get the replicator to do, he still kept in mind. It reminded him of… gentler things. Belonging, once.

But not today.

Today he sat alone in the mess, watching everyone else. Still apart.

Echo-5, Phase Two – Squad Ops, Mid-2369

It wasn’t Basic anymore.

It was Phase Two. Teamwork, coordination. Five-person squads clearing buildings, covering angles. Practicing for real deployments in volatile systems.

Jace hated it.

His team, ‘Redwood’, was on its third field sim. Insurgent clearance. Dense woodland. Real terrain. Sim rounds. The goal: Clear and hold the cabin. No casualties. Ten minutes. Jace moved the way he always did: silent, efficient, decisive.

“Observe. Assess. Eliminate.” The sergeant’s words.

Redwood hesitated at the door.

He didn’t.

Jace surged in. Dropped one with twin strikes. Shot the next in the gut. Room cleared before the rest had stepped through the threshold.

“Echo-23. You broke formation protocol again,” The sergeant’s voice cut over comms, frustration making it vibrate. He said nothing. Stood there, breathing steady. The simulated enemy groaned on the ground. “You were told to coordinate, Morven. Not act alone.”

Behind him, Redwood entered. Ashen, known as Echo-12, glared. He was young. And right now he was furious.

“I had it!” Ashen barked, looking at Jace as he moved closer.

“You froze,” said Jace, flat, calm. No venom. Just truth.

“Teamwork isn’t optional!” the sergeant snapped.

But Jace had stopped listening. Not out of defiance. Just… to him, nothing about what he did felt wrong. The threat had been neutralised. The objective achieved. He didn’t trust others unless they earned it. And asking for help? When seconds mattered? He couldn’t.

Redwood was still staring daggers as they reset for the next drill. Jace walked out first, rifle down, eyes sweeping the terrain. Mission over.

He didn’t care if they trusted him.

Not yet.

U.S.S. Guinevere, 2388

The memory almost made Jace drop the fork.

For a half-second, it was 2372 again, and he was still that recruit…raw, cornered, adrenaline humming under skin too tight. He stared at the stainless steel utensil, fingers suddenly tense around it, white-knuckled.

He understood teamwork now. Or at least how to make it look like he did. Experience had carved that into him. Not a lesson. More like a scar. He made it work the only way he knew how…by doing more. Picking up slack. Carrying weight others couldn’t. He’d never really learned to lean on others. Just to brace harder.

People called that leadership sometimes. They were wrong. It was instinct. A wolf watching the flock, choosing to kill for it instead of from it.

Weakness triggered something in him…but not contempt. Not superiority. Not the usual predator's bloodlust. It made him move. Quietly. Decisively. As if the universe had whispered that someone needed to stand between a target and the impact. And he’d answer without ceremony.

That hadn’t always been true. It came later. During the war, mostly. When pain and proximity blurred into something else. Something sharp.

He’d come from the 103rd back then. A decent enough unit. Not warm, but real. He hadn’t made friends but he’d picked up better habits from people who still had a pulse behind their eyes. Sergeants who didn’t scream unless it mattered. Nurses who didn’t waste words, just waited until you figured out how to be worth the trouble.

And then came the transfer.

To the 77th.

The kind of battalion where the word “reputation” carried weight. Even the greenest enlisted knew what that meant. No shine, no polish. Just attrition. And the ones who didn’t get transferred out usually didn’t transfer anywhere ever again.

A cold pit settled in Jace’s gut.

Looking back… if he saw someone like Sergeant Tho now?

He’d shoot him. No warning. Just a trigger pulled in silence.

To be continued in part 4

Sergeant Jace Morven
Platoon Sergeant
USS Guinevere

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