Question for a question friend!
Why did your Star Trek OC join Starfleet? What made them make that decision? Have they ever regretted it?
Jason Stillway joined mostly because they wanted adventure; she was partly inspired by their grandparent, Connor Stillway, who worked as a biologist on the enterprise during TOS. Initially, she wanted to observe the biochemistry of newly discovered life forms and reverse-engineer potentially useful features into something that could be used in technology. After graduating from the academy with a doctorate in biomechanics and working aboard the Enterprise G for some time, she began to feel like she was hitting a dead end just doing research; when she, Vaul, Shura, and Kerosa were transported to the Andromeda Galaxy in a freak accident, she found she enjoyed leadership and being able to support the growth and improvement of others. Upon finding their way back home, Stillway switched to the command track, slowly working her way up the ranks until she was eventually assigned to be captain of the Odyssey. She doesn’t regret joining Starfleet at all, but sometimes she misses just doing scientific work, and often feels a bit overwhelmed at the amount of responsibility she has— but by this point she’s committed to what she considers the “greater good,” and knows that she’d regret stepping down.
Kerosa joined Starfleet in the hopes of finding a place where people would see her for who she is rather than her heritage; growing up in a Klingon family, she often felt isolated from others due to being half-Romulan, whereas during her time as a Romulan mercenary she felt like she was continually shoehorned into roles she didn’t really want because those around her saw her as a Klingon before anything else. She hasn’t regretted her decision to join Starfleet in the slightest— it’s home to her.
After his traumatic first pon farr, Vaul/Penope left his home planet, feeling like he didn’t deserve to stay; he was trained to be a doctor on Vulcan and practiced there for a time, but due to his growing up off-world he felt like he didn’t belong, and was constantly paranoid that other Vulcans thought lesser of him for it. He joined Starfleet to get away from all that. Does he regret it? It’s hard to say. The job was miserable— working with people and patients who didn’t have their emotions under control was enormously stressful for him, and he still couldn’t get away from other Vulcans… but it is how he met Stillway and the others, who supported him and helped him get over a lot of his struggles, going so far as to help her realize who she really wanted to be… so maybe it isn’t all bad.
