Burning The Midnight Oil Part 2: Trouble In Paradise
Posted on Sun Jan 18th, 2026 @ 10:45pm by Vice Admiral Sidra MacLaren & Commodore Stephen MacCaffery
3,062 words; about a 15 minute read
Mission:
The Tavrik Accord: Orchestrated Chaos
Location: Temporary Command Bungalow, Island Chain Seven, Tavrik III
2300 Hours
The storm outside treated the bungalow's shielding with the same contempt Governor Veln had shown the treaty. Rain lashed the transparent aluminium like gravel thrown by an angry mob, while the wind howled a low, dissonant note that vibrated in the floorboards, as if nature itself sought to voice the chaos unleashed by the shattered accords.
Stephen MacCaffery ignored it.
He sat in a pool of yellow light, the desk lamp holding back the Tavrik night. The rest of the room yielded to shadow. The dress whites were gone, replaced by a linen shirt faded by years and trousers that hung loose at the waist. He no longer resembled a Federation envoy. He looked like a man waiting for the sentence to fall.
A silhouette broke the corridor light beyond the hiss of the door. Not Khorev—he was likely dissecting the facility, hunting ghosts. The sentry was one of his Hazard Team, standing with the stillness of a weapon waiting for orders. Khorev had lost a sheep and would not leave the shepherd unguarded, even if it meant posting his most formidable shadow at the door. The presence was reassuring, but it pressed close.
He crossed to the desk. The holographic interface waited, its blue glow painting the walls. Petty Officer Sato’s toxicology report spun on the display, a molecular chain twisted into a nightmare. Stephen needed answers from the report to identify the toxin and understand its origin, critical for proving the murder that smoldered in the data. He knew this was the key to confronting the chaos that surrounded the Diplomat's death.
Stephen stared at the single word pulsating on the holographic display.
MURDER.
The Diplomat was dead. He had died on the medical suite floor, suffocating on platitudes and poison beside Thess Kalon. The Arbitrator, the believer in compromise, had been folded away with the bloodstained uniform. What remained in the chair was colder: a mind built on statute and evidence, knowing peace was not a gift but a verdict. In the bungalow's dim light, the Deputy Judge Advocate General began to assemble his case. With the precision of a courtroom, Stephen cataloged his thoughts: Exhibit A, the toxin as the instrument of murder. He weighed the burden of proof, aligning facts as if presenting them to an unseen jury. Each piece of evidence drove him deeper into a battlefield of justice and retribution, his thoughts prosecutorial and relentless.
Stephen stared at the word. The anger he had buried in the medical bay, the rage he had swallowed when Sella Tharn smiled, now burned cold in his gut. It was a hard knot, sharpening his focus. He did not want to shout. He wanted a conviction.
"Computer," Stephen said, his voice rough in the silence. He drew a short breath, his jaw clenching momentarily as if to anchor his resolve amidst the swirling urgency. "Secure channel. Encryption Lambda-Nine. Priority One. Admiral MacLaren, Epsilon Fleet Command."
The screen shimmered. The Federation seal rotated, dissolved, and revealed the image of Vice Admiral Sidra MacLaren.
The channel opened into the heart of Fleet Operations.
Sidra MacLaren stood at a terminal in the center of the command ring, framed by the steady red glow of the alert column. The light caught in her hair, no longer a crown of flame but something tempered now, threaded with gray she neither concealed nor resisted. The years had not dulled her presence. They had honed it.
Fleet Operations was tight. She was still issuing orders from here. Not loud. Not chaotic. Focused. Security overlays scrolled in disciplined layers. Tactical feeds updated in real time. Somewhere in the lattice of data, the changeling’s shadow lingered, unresolved and unwelcome.
The call had not been scheduled, but it had been expected.
Sidra’s eyes narrowed a fraction as the channel resolved.
Stephen MacCaffery appeared on the screen.
No. Not the Commodore.
The absence of uniform struck first. Linen instead of Starfleet. A man no longer presenting himself as a Federation envoy or legal authority, but as something stripped down and waiting. It was not what she had expected after instructing Captain McKinney to have him report in.
The discrepancy registered. It did not show.
She did not move, but the decision was immediate.
“Ops,” Sidra said, turning her head just enough to address the officer at her right. “Transfer this channel to my office.”
No reprimand. No explanation. A correction of venue, nothing more.
“Aye, Admiral.”
The command ring dissolved as the system rerouted. Red light gave way to the controlled neutrality of her office. The door sealed, cutting off Fleet Ops and its measured urgency, leaving only the hum of systems and the steady glow of her desk display.
Sidra remained standing.
Only then did she address the man on the screen.
“Commodore,” she said evenly, the title deliberate. “I was expecting a report.”
A pause. Measured. Evaluative.
This was not the moment for reassurance. Not for absolution. Tavrik needed containment, not comfort.
“What do you require,” she continued calmly, “to move this forward without escalation?”
Stephen caught his own image in the return feed, a ghostly picture-in-picture haunting the display’s corner. The shift from Ops’ tactical chaos to the silence of her office sharpened the mistake he had made.
Sidra wore the crisp blacks and grays of a flag officer, the starbase lighting carving her authority from the shadows. He sat in a sweltering bungalow, sweat-stained linen open at the collar, looking less like an envoy and more like a man serving a sentence in the colonies. It was a lapse in tradecraft. You did not report a crisis to Fleet Command looking like a beachcomber.
Stephen stiffened, spine finding the verticality of a dress uniform that was not there. He placed his hands flat on the desk, grounding the loose energy, and met the Admiral’s gaze.
“Apologies for the attire, Admiral,” Stephen said. The tone was flat, stripped of the husband’s warmth, and offered no excuse for the humidity or the hour. Command didn't care about the weather. “I was not anticipating a secure channel update this rotation.”
He did not wait for absolution. He swept the personal failure aside and engaged the problem.
“At nineteen-hundred hours, Var Thess collapsed during the reception. Acute neurological failure. He was dead within forty-five minutes.”
Stephen tapped the interface, sliding the encrypted medical packet across the subspace link.
“Toxicology confirms a synthetic neuro-agent. This wasn't natural causes, and it wasn't an accident. It was an execution performed in front of three delegations.”
He watched her eyes track the data transfer, but pressed on.
“I locked down the entire island. Atmospheric shields stand at full strength; I’ve scrambled the transporters. Twelve suspects, three hundred witnesses, and the killer. They’re all trapped in here with me. By sealing the lid, I contained the evidence and the operative. If I hadn’t, things would already be worse.
He leaned into the light, letting the harsh desk lamp etch the fatigue and resolve onto his face.
“The Vethari ship has taken up an orbital overwatch position,” he continued, his voice dropping an octave, tightening. “McKinney is holding them at arm's length, but the Vethari are broadcasting offers of ‘humanitarian assistance’ that sound suspiciously like boarding parties. They are testing our resolve. The Valley Forge is a good ship, but she’s alone up there.
Stephen’s eyes hardened. “I need a support ship on station with the Valley Forge, Admiral. I don’t need it to posture or fire; I need it watching the back door. We’ve sealed this island as tight as we can, but if anything—or anyone—is going to slip through our containment, it’ll be from orbit. I want another set of eyes and hull plating up there to make sure nothing gets past us.”
He paused, tight-lipped.
“And we are not scrubbing the summit,” he added, cutting off the contingency he knew the computer models were already proposing. “If we evacuate, the Kaldari will assume we’re complicit or incompetent. We stay. We finish this. But from here on out, it’s not a conference. It’s a crime scene with a diplomatic agenda.”
Sidra let the data finish transferring.
She did not interrupt. She did not react to the word execution, to the orbital posture, or to the weight he was carrying alone on Tavrik. She absorbed it, eyes moving steadily, assembling the picture as a whole.
“I spoke with Captain McKinney not long ago,” she said at last. “The USS Tempest was already ordered to your location.”
Her gaze remained fixed on the screen.
“She is ninety minutes out and will take station with the Valley Forge.”
A beat.
“Any additional hull with comparable capability is two days away,” Sidra continued. “If you want them anyway, say the word. I will send them.”
No qualifier. No judgment.
She shifted slightly, one hand resting against the desk, her tone unchanged but more deliberate.
“You have not yet reviewed the command-level advisory I issued earlier,” she said. “Read it.”
That was all.
She did not explain it. She did not frame it for him. She watched his face as he absorbed it, not for reaction, but for understanding—for the moment the implications settled into place.
Then she spoke again.
“I know what you need to do,” Sidra said calmly. “You need to secure the evidence, build the case, and prove what happened.”
Her eyes held his.
“But the Vethari are no longer posturing.”
A pause. Intentional.
“Convince me,” she said evenly, “why we do not remove them from Tavrik now.”
Stephen nodded, the motion small but definitive, acknowledging the asset she had just placed on the board. The tension in his shoulders, a rigid knot that had lived there since the toast, loosened by a fraction.
“Thank you for the Tempest,” he said, his voice low, vibrating with genuine relief. “McKinney has been holding the line, but the Valley Forge is stretched thin providing logistical support to the surface. He can’t be everywhere.”
He glanced at the tactical display where the Vethari ship loomed.
“The Tempest doesn’t just watch our back; she locks the door. If this were an execution, the Vethari didn't pull the trigger alone. Someone handed them the weapon, and I need the system sealed tight until I find out who.”
When she mentioned the command-level advisory, Stephen paused. He pursed his lips, a sharp, self-recriminating exhale escaping through his nose. He shook his head.
“That was an oversight,” he admitted, offering no excuse about the chaos or the timeline.
He met her gaze on the screen, his expression contrite but focused. “I haven’t reviewed it yet. I will correct that immediately. Khorev and I will go over the recommendations and implement the protocols within the hour. If there are holes in my perimeter, we’ll close them.”
He leaned back into the chair, the leather creaking in the silence of the bungalow. The question of removal hung in the air—convince me.
“We keep them here,” Stephen said, his voice hardening into the tone he used when closing a difficult arbitration, “because right now, Sella Tharn is operating on arrogance. She believes this lockdown is a bluff. She thinks I am a soft-handed diplomat who will crumble if she leans hard enough. Expulsion feeds their narrative of Federation imperialism. Detention… detention makes them suspects.”
He gestured vaguely toward the ceiling, toward the orbit where the new ship would soon arrive.
“With the Tempest alongside the Valley Forge, we aren’t just presenting a target; we’re presenting a wall. It’s a physical barrier and a psychological checkmate. They haven’t made a direct threat yet because they think they’ve already won. If the Kaldari twitches, McKinney can intercept. The additional security teams on the ground will ensure we don’t end up in a firefight in the corridors.”
Stephen leaned forward into the pool of yellow light, his blue eyes sharp.
"We forestall violence by showing we are ready for it. The next forty-eight hours are the crucible, Sidra. If I hold the pressure, if the containment does not break, I can force them to negotiate for their lives, not their profits. We stay. We act. We write a peace they cannot escape."
Thunder rolled in from the storm, sharp and unyielding, echoing the weight of what came next.
Sidra did not respond immediately.
She watched him finish, watched the way the storm pressed in around the edges of the screen, the way the light caught the resolve in his eyes. He had answered the question. Fully. Precisely. She did not need to hear another word.
Slowly, she exhaled.
Sidra moved at last, crossing the short distance to her desk and lowering herself into the chair. The motion was deliberate, controlled. Her hand rose to her collar, fingers finding the familiar weight there. She unfastened the rank tabs and let them settle into her palm.
They were warm from her skin.
She did not look at them for long.
The gesture was symbolic, nothing more. The walls stayed up. They always did.
Her gaze lifted back to the screen, scanning him again, not as Fleet Command assessing risk vectors, but as someone who understood exactly how close he had been standing to the edge. She would read Khorev’s report later. Line by line. She would absorb every procedural failure and near miss when she had the distance to carry it.
Not now.
Right now, she did not want to know how close he had come to lifting that glass himself.
What she wanted was simpler. Human. To be there. To sit behind him, to work the tension out of the knots she could almost see between his shoulders, to rest her lips briefly against his temple and breathe in the familiar, grounding presence of him.
She stayed where she was.
“Damn it, Mac,” she said quietly.
Not sharp. Not angry. Just tired, threaded through with something harder to name.
“This is why we don’t cross these lines.”
A pause. The truth sat between them, heavy and unvarnished.
“I shouldn’t have done this.”
She let the silence breathe for a moment, neither asking forgiveness nor offering it.
Sidra’s hand closed slowly around the rank tabs in her palm.
“For the record,” she said quietly, “every instinct I have says to get on the Caelestis and burn for Tavrik.”
She looked back up at him.
“I’m two days away.”
Not frustration. Not complaint. Just fact.
She leaned back into the chair, shoulders settling as if she were bracing against competing weights. There were limits to how much she could hold together at once, even now, even here. She chose her words with care.
“There’s something you don’t know yet,” Sidra said. “Something only a handful of people do.”
Her eyes stayed on his.
“Indi Hawk was the changeling.”
The words landed without ornament.
“And she likely has been since she arrived.”
She paused.
“We do not know how deep it goes,” she continued. “We do not know what she accessed before we realized what she was. We do not know who else might be compromised, or who may be acting on information that was never meant to leave Fleet Operations.”
She stopped there. Anything beyond that would have been speculation, and she could not afford it.
“That advisory I told you to read exists because the ground shifted under us,” Sidra said quietly.
Her fingers loosened around the rank tabs, then curled again, grounding herself in the familiar weight.
“I am telling you this because Tavrik is already volatile. Because you are holding a sealed system under diplomatic pressure. And because if there is coordination anywhere, it will not announce itself.”
She leaned forward slightly.
“Assume nothing. Trust the process. And if something feels wrong, even if you cannot yet prove it, I want to know.”
A pause.
“This stays between us for now,” she said, though she knew it was an unnecessary statement. “Until I say otherwise.”
Then, more softly, not command and not reassurance, but truth.
“I am not sure how much longer I can keep all of this balanced at once.”
Stephen watched the fracture in Sidra’s composure, a rare tremor in the voice that usually commanded fleets with unwavering certainty. He leaned toward the pickup, his own exhaustion eclipsed by the urgent need to bridge the void between them.
“Sidra. Look at me.” His voice dropped into the low, steady register that could calm panicked witnesses. “Don’t regret this. Don’t doubt yourself, or me. I am exactly where I need to be—not just as a diplomat, but as the husband who knows your mind, and the lawyer who sees through a lie. Trust that.”
He let the silence breathe, encryption humming in the background. “We’ll handle this. It’ll be messier than we planned, and it will take longer than any of us wants, but we will contain it. Trust in what we’ve built.”
Then the name registered—Indi Hawk—hitting him like a physical blow. Stephen sat back, a sharp exhale escaping as he ran a hand over his face, feeling the day's accumulated grit. Indi wasn’t just an officer; she was a fixture, a touchstone in Sidra’s command. The betrayal cut deep, not just tactically, but intimately.
“Indi,” he breathed, the word bitter on his tongue. “I... I can’t believe it. But it explains the advisory. It explains the paranoia. If they reached her, they can reach anyone. You made the right call, securing things. I agree with you. Completely.”
He looked at her image. The pixelated silhouette of his wife. He wished he could reach through the subspace link, take the PADD from her hand, and simply sit in the silence with her.
“We’ll get through this, Sid,” he said softly, offering a weary but genuine smile. “The Great Bird of the Galaxy doesn’t give us more than we can handle—just tests our suspension now and then. Stay strong. I’m right here.”
End Log
Vice Admiral Sidra MacLaren
Fleet Commander
Epsilon Fleet
and
Commodore Stephen James MacCaffery
Federation Special Envoy
Tavrik III
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