Small Wins [3/6]

Posted on Sat Jun 21st, 2025 @ 11:55am by Sergeant Jace Morven

1,821 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Prologue
Location: USS Guinevere
Timeline: 2388

Still in his bunk. No sleep. Just memories drifting through the dark.

He exhaled.

Not sleep. Not yet.

Sliding down with practiced quiet, bare feet met the floor without sound. Every movement smooth, every line of tension controlled. No one stirred. The replicator glowed faintly, its idle light pulsing softly in the corner. He kept his voice low, almost a whisper, so not to disturb the light sleepers around him.

“Mint tea. Hot. Sweet.”

The cup materialised with a soft hiss. He didn’t take it immediately…just stood there, letting the steam curl upward, the sharp, clean scent filling the still air. When he finally cupped it in his hands, the warmth was solid, grounding.

Leaning back against the bulkhead beside the replicator, not hiding…just holding space.

His mind drifted…not to the corridor, not to the way the Trill had touched his arm, not even to the kiss itself. It was what came after that lingered. The quiet. The not-feeling-like-a-weapon feeling. The space he’d carved out where no one barked orders and nothing needed saying.

He sipped. Hot. Sweet.

A flicker of relief passed behind his eyes.

Not perfect, not fresh or dried leaves...but good enough.

He hadn’t flinched. That mattered more than he was ready to admit. He hadn’t turned away from the softness. Not then. He didn’t want the name. Still didn’t. But he wanted the memory…not of the man, not of the moment—just the feeling that, for a brief while, he didn’t have to be steel.

He carried the cup back to his bunk, sat down, held it close. Stayed quiet, letting his mind follow the familiar currents. No point in pushing it down. Not now. Not when the memories came at him like a grenade tossed in a curve overhead.

Trajectory.

Memories.

Dominion Frontline Deployment — January 2375

The rain here was oily. Not real rain…not like Earth’s, not fresh, not even clean. It fell in sheets that clung to skin and seeped into the seams of gear like rot. The trenches they’d been dropped into weren’t trenches at all…just collapsed stone channels carved between dead husks of infrastructure and rusted machinery. The Jem’Hadar had hit the eastern approach two nights ago. The air still stung with burnt flesh and warp coolant.

Jace crouched against the wall, rifle slung tight across his chest, his left shoulder bleeding from diving away from a disruptor blast. Not bad, just a layer of skin scraped raw, the fabric torn. Not worth leaving this rock now, not with battles raging overhead and ships firing in the atmosphere.

Martinez sat across from him. Their face was smeared with dirt, blood flecked near the cheek…but it wasn’t their own. Their shoulders trembled.

The squad had lost Raimi during the night.

No one had said it aloud yet. The medic had tried to stabilize her. Kerren had screamed. Terrow broke down, refusing his weapon until Jace grabbed him by the collar and shoved him back into gear. But Martinez…Martinez had been the one to strip Raimi’s armour off her lifeless body. The one who carried it three klicks back to the fallback line. The one who refused Jace’s offer to take over.

Now they were quiet. Too quiet.

Jace watched without blinking. Mud crusted the cuffs of their fatigues. Their helmet lay discarded beside them, dented. They hadn’t spoken in hours. Hadn’t touched their rations.

Then, without warning, Martinez buried their face in their hands.

A sound escaped them. Low. Guttural. Grief, raw and unarmoured, the final fracture after holding together for so long since their brother died.

Something hard twisted in Jace’s chest. This was the thing he was bad at. Not war. Not violence. This He shifted closer, wordless. Dropped into a crouch at their side.

Martinez didn’t flinch but didn’t look up either. “I keep seeing her,” they whispered, voice hoarse. “I keep seeing her eyes... when I closed mine.” Their fingers clenched against their brow. “She trusted me. I told her she’d be fine. Told her to cover left, and--”

“You didn’t kill her,” Jace said, quiet but firm.

Martinez let out a harsh, breathless laugh. “Didn’t save her, either.”

Silence pulsed between them again. Around them, the trench breathed, boots stomping mud, distant comms crackling, curses as someone slipped. Life continuing. War waiting to breathe again.

Jace didn’t say I’m sorry. Didn’t say She knew the risks. He didn’t have words for that kind of comfort.

Instead, he unhooked his canteen and handed it over without comment.

Martinez took it, hand shaking. Drank. Didn’t look at him. Didn’t pull away.

After a long minute, Jace finally spoke again, eyes scanning the trench.

“You remember last rotation? That bar. The Trill.”

Martinez blinked, voice cracking less now. “You mean the guy who kissed you like you were real?”

Jace gave a faint grunt. “Yeah. Him.”

Martinez gave a breath of a laugh - ugly, but real. “You let someone kiss you. That’s the most... person-like thing I’ve seen you do.”

Jace didn’t smile, but something in his posture softened. “You’re allowed to grieve,” he said. “You’re not dead yet.”

Martinez looked at him then, eyes rimmed red, jaw clenched hard to hold it all in. “I hate this fucking war,” they said, not caring who heard.

Jace just nodded. “Yeah.” He didn’t offer a hand. Didn’t hug. Just stayed there, sitting in the dirt with them...side by side, scarred and angry, with blood in their boots and ghosts on their shoulders.

Eventually, Martinez rested their head against the wall, eyes closed.

And Jace kept watch.

Like always.

U.S.S Guinevere, 2388

Jace looked down at the cup in his hand. The warmth had gone cold. The mint wasn’t sharp anymore; just a faint trace, lingering in the air like a ghost. He took a slow sip anyway. Sweet. Clean. It scrubbed the back of his throat like it was chasing something away.

Raimi had been solid. Reliable. Not flashy, not loud—just there when you needed her. She had a way of holding the squad together without even trying. Terrow leaned on her more than anyone admitted, especially once the cracks started to show. Her loss hadn’t just left a hole; it twisted the whole formation. Everything pulled tight around that empty space.

But it was Martinez’s grief that stayed with him.

Raw. Loud in the way silence can be. Jace didn’t know what to do with that kind of noise. Death, he understood that. Inevitable. Expected. One of them drops, you push forward. Adjust. Move on.

Martinez hadn’t.

Not at first.

That was the part Jace never figured out. Not the death itself...but how it could break someone open.

He told himself it wasn’t his place to sort through it. That was the line, the armour. You didn’t mourn. You endured.

But that wasn’t true. Not really.

He processed it, just differently. Barred his teeth. Found the next target. Became the thing the enemy feared to face. Grief wasn’t a wound for him. It was a weapon. Sharp, aimed, always ready.

That was the trade.

Martinez felt it.

Jace carried it.

He took another sip, slower now. Let it settle heavy in his chest.

The tea was still sweet. Still warm, if only barely.

Funny, he thought, how something as simple as a cup of mint tea could settle a man built on scars and steel.

It was enough.

Four Days Later, 2375 Operation Sentry Hook – Dominion Pressure Front

The brief had been short. Brutal. Recon and hold on the west flank: an old Dominion outpost, half-buried under orbital fire. Scout the tunnels. Clear any lingering resistance. Reclaim the uplink relay buried in the wreckage. Ping a go-code for the orbital sweep.

No one pretended it was simple. Every trooper knew what recon and hold meant.

Jace moved like always...front of the line, muzzle of his phaser rifle high, eyes scanning faster than instinct could catch up. Behind him, the squad breathed in ragged rhythms: Kerren’s loud, uneven breaths; Terrow whispering low, barely audible; Talvis, the transfer, running comm checks for the third time in twenty minutes. Martinez was quiet.

Too quiet.

But not broken.

The tunnels were scorched and crumbling, heat-warped struts jutted from walls like broken ribs. They swept three corridors, two sub-chambers. Minimal resistance: scattered Jem’Hadar units, fallback security, not the hardline vanguard.

Until corridor six.

The flank ambush hit without warning, a sudden surge, flashes of grenades exploding, and a full squad of Jem’Hadar bursting from a service alcove. Jace barked a warning and dropped low, phaser rifle barking tight, controlled bursts.

Talvis went down. Shoulder hit. Kerren snarled, dropped to cover, dragging her back with one arm.

“Cover right!” Jace shouted. He didn’t have to look.

Martinez was already moving.

They rolled into cover, brought up their phaser rifle, and laid down suppressive fire like a textbook drill...only cleaner. Sharper. Angry, precise. Not frantic. Focused.

A Jem’Hadar broke through the left flank, blade drawn. Martinez met him head-on. They caught the swing with the butt of their rifle, slammed it into the enemy’s gut, then drove their boot into the Jem’Hadar’s knee. He dropped hard. Martinez didn’t hesitate, press of the trigger, one stun shot set to kill to the head. Down.

Jace took it all in, profile sharp: movement, threat, outcome.

Then silence.

He rose from cover, checked angles, confirmed it was clear.

The medic stabilized Talvis. Terrow held perimeter, pale but present. Martinez stood over the fallen enemy, chest heaving, rifle still gripped tight.

Their eyes met.

Something passed between them.

Not gratitude. Not pride.

Understanding.

Martinez gave a short, sharp nod. “You owe me a drink.”

Jace’s lip twitched. “I don’t drink.”

Martinez arched a brow. “Then mint tea, arsehole.”

The tension broke just enough.

Jace nodded. “Fine.”

They regrouped.

An hour later, bruised but intact, back at fallback, Martinez helped Jace double-check the perimeter before the medics took over. Telvis was alive. Shaky, but upright. The squad was quiet but moving.

And Jace?

He watched Martinez.

Watched how they held steady through blood and noise and the scream that hadn’t left this planet’s wind since they’d landed.

Watched how they didn’t break.

For the first time in a long time, he felt something besides the dull throb of duty.

He felt hope.

Small. Fragile.

But real.

To be continued in part 4

----

Sergeant Jace Morven
Platoon Sergeant
Alpha Squad
USS Guinevere

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