Fleet Captain Kelvan Vos, Overseer of the great trial of Nazir, had been resolute in his task to keep the trial as fair and impartial as he could, but not even the ageing Efrosian could stand watching a woman he respected getting so utterly dismantled by the prosecution. He’d needed a recess, so he was sure Nazir needed it, too. He’d retired to his private quarters, where he would make his deliberations in the coming hours, and had taken the time to freshen up for the rest of the hearing. With time against them, he was almost certain they would end up adjourning to the following day, but he would do everything in his power to ensure Nazir had a resolution, one way or another, as soon as she could. He didn’t need to be a counsellor to see the toll recent events had played on her and for it all to be dragged up in front of a bipartisan crowd had to be gut-wrenching.

When he returned to the bench, gallery and judicial teams alike stood before him, he was happy to note that the Fleet Captain looked a little more steeled than she had before. Even if the case went the way he suspected, he didn’t want her to be destroyed as a result. She’d done too much and earned too much respect for that to happen.

Slipping back into his chair, he slammed the wooden gavel against its plate, and the session resumed. Captain Marten was instantaneously back on her feet, ready to press home her attack one last time.

“Fleet Captain Nazir,” she began, all refreshed and focused, “you’ve explained that you were acting to protect a military base during the mission to Eridanus. However, the evidence clearly shows that this base never existed. Isn’t it true that you were prioritising a delusion over the lives of your crew and the civilians under your protection?”

Keziah shook her head, eyes focused on the prosecutor. When she spoke, her words were loud and clear again. “I made a decision based on the intelligence I believed to be credible at the time,” she explained clearly, “It was not a delusion.”

Marten pursed her lips and nodded slowly as she took a few steps towards the Captain’s table. Another denial, of course. She’d have to go harder.

“But there was no military base, was there?” she asked, looking the diminutive Trill square in the face. “The only thing at stake during that mission was the lives of innocent civilians—civilians you left to die because of your unfounded paranoia.”

There wasn’t a dry palm in the house as staff across the bridge watched in horror as the captain and first officer squared off in the middle of the command centre. All the while, events unfolded around them that threatened everything the Federation had worked so hard to achieve. The red alert klaxon had long since faded into background noise as the unbelievable back and forth between the two senior-most officers engulfed the entire bridge.

Noli waved her right arm at the view screen, urging the Captain to reconsider her course of action. Panic had gripped her, her voice betraying her emotions with every word.

“Captain, please! They’re targeting the transports. They’re firing on unarmed ships!” the Bajoran pleaded, glaring at the captain, who never faltered.

Instead, Nazir remained fixated, her eyes never leaving the Operations console she’d circumvented from Voran. “I’ve told you, no. We can’t divert resources. The base needs to be protected,” her words were clear and unwavering.

Noli took a step towards the Captain, demonstrating an emotion somewhere between exasperation and anger. Those around them were so worried that Noli might even lay her hands on the captain that Prida practically flew down the steps to ensure that things couldn’t turn physical.

At the CONN, Henry decided he needed to support the XO. He’d never turn on his captain, but even he had to admit that things were not as they seemed. “There is no base, Captain. You have to see that. We need to break orbit and help those civilians,” he whispered, leaning across towards the Trill, trying his best to appeal to her.

Taking a deep breath, the Trill did her best to hide her faltering voice. “At the time, I believed the base was real. I believed that allowing it to fall would lead to even greater devastation,” she explained to everyone in attendance.

“But it didn’t exist!” Marten barked back, showing her first signs of frustration from her line of questioning. How could she continue to stand her ground in such a way? “It didn’t exist and because of that belief, hundreds of civilians died. Isn’t that correct?” the prosecutor argued again, her tone much sterner this time.

Taking a deep breath, Keziah closed her eyes. For a moment, she was back on the Lakota bridge, in a sort of disembodied state, observing the chaos from her ghost-like position, all eyes staring at her as she refused to alter course. Noli argued her case, Henry pleaded with her, Prida tried her best to calm the situation whilst everyone else looked on in horror. It was a disaster, and it was of her making, so when she opened her eyes again and glared at the Cardassian, she gave the desired, perhaps unexpected response.

“Yes,” she admitted at last.

Realising her case was close to collapse if she allowed this line of questioning to go unanswered, T’Prynn swiftly rose to her feet. She’d resolved to help her defendant as much as possible, so she wasn’t going to let her hang herself, guilty or not.

“Objection,” the Vulcan called out, then swiftly elaborated for the judge. “The prosecution is framing the witness’s actions in a negative context without considering the extreme stress of the mission at hand.”

Perhaps he was letting his feelings get the better of him, but Fleet Captain Vos agreed on this occasion. “Sustained. Captain Marten, rephrase your question.”

And for the first time, Marten felt like the case might not go entirely her way after all. Taking a deep breath, she nodded in Vos’ direction and thought of a way to rephrase. “Fleet Captain Nazir,” her tone lowered again, “do you believe that your state of mind, exacerbated by unauthorised medication, led you to prioritise an imagined threat over the actual dangers your crew was facing?” Inwardly, she was proud of that. She felt she’d skewered the defendant worse than she had before.

Nazir hesitated for a minute, exchanging glances with her counsel before answering. “I can’t deny that my mind was under pressure,” she answered, “but I acted based on what I believed to be in the best interest of the Federation.”

Over the din of voices arguing their case, officers from across the departmental divide falling into line one way or another, a shrill beeping at tactical drew the attention of the staff.

“Captain! They’ve destroyed the first transport! More are coming under fire,” Mitchell reported, her hands dancing over the controls as she made sense of what she was seeing. Make sense? How the hell was she going to make sense of any of this?

“Captain Nazir!” Noli barked angrily, shrugging free of Prida’s grasp and standing just inches from the Captain’s fragile frame. “We need to act now. If we don’t, everyone out there will be lost.”

Nazir remained silent, fixated on the operations station.

“Keziah…” Noli whispered, dropping her voice to the quietest she could, “Don’t do this. Don’t be remembered this way…”

For the first time in what felt like hours, Nazir’s eyes flickered. Slowly but surely, she cocked her head and looked into the watering eyes of her executive officer.

“Divert all power to shields and weapons,” she instructed firmly, “Henry, move to defend the transports.”

As Noli heaved a sigh of relief and turned with her Captain to return to their command seats, common sense prevailing at last, the silence was almost deafening.

Standing at the tactical rail, having abandoned her post, Lieutenant Mitchell shook her head slowly. “I’m sorry ma’am,” she choked back tears as she delivered her report, “but it’s too late…”

“Fleet Captain Nazir, despite your epiphany at the eleventh hour, your judgment—clouded by medication, stress, and paranoia—led to the deaths of hundreds of civilians…”

There was a stunned silence in the courtroom as Marten delivered her parting blow.

“The reality is that you were unfit for command, and as a result, lives were lost. I rest my case, your honour.”

Stepping back to her table, the Cardassian showed the first signs of humanity that she had shown all day, shaking her head slowly as she, like the rest of the tribunal, like the defendant herself, was left to process the enormity of the civilian loss, and the case she had just proven to the best of her ability.

All except Captain T’Prynn, however. Being a Vulcan, she had no reason to weigh the facts presented to her any more than she already had. Her job now was as it had been all session; to assist her client to the best of her ability.

Rising to her feet, the Vulcan calmly, stoically, approached the stand.

“Fleet Captain Nazir,” she began her cross-examination, “you have spoken about the intense stress you were under during the mission to Eridanus. Would you describe for the tribunal the psychological, personal toll that previous missions have taken on you?” It was, perhaps, odd to hear a Vulcan stress the impact of events on a personal level, but she had to humanise the situation and give her client every possible chance of coming out of this unscathed.

Taking a sip of water from the glass in front of her, the Fleet Captain took a moment to compose herself. Then, nodding slowly, she went into detail on everything that had happened to her since the Dominion had invaded the Deneb sector. She told them about assuming command of the Hathaway and being injured during the ship’s mission to capture Thot Rodyn, to then learn that her previous command, the Nogura, had been destroyed by a Breen battlegroup. She talked about having to watch as her new XO at the time led the ship in its efforts to liberate the homeworld of one of their crew, at great personal cost to the ship. Then there had been the Frontier Day debacle, the constant threat of Changeling infiltration, and the assimilation of younger crew members that had caused the loss of so many friends and family across the Federation, including Chiera, Udraa, Varru and Bachmann. Weeks later there had been the losses in the former demilitarised zone, and the chaos of the Underspace situation. Every event, and all the smaller ones in between, had taken their toll on the Trill, and as she recounted to the court, everyone, even the Cardassian

“The toll was immense,” she looked across at the Vulcan sadly, “I lost colleagues, friends. The pressure to stay vigilant… it became overwhelming at times.”

“And despite all of that, you remained in command, leading your crew through countless dangerous and high-stakes missions,” the Vulcan added quickly.

“Yes,” Nazir nodded, taking the opportunity to look into the gallery for the first time and note some of the reactions to her testimony. To say there were mixed reactions was an overstatement, but at least the court was no longer locked in against her. If she could sway the gallery, perhaps there was hope that the judge could be swayed also.

Back to the matter at hand, the Vulcan looked deadpan as she asked her next question. “Did you believe, at the time of the Eridanus mission, that you were acting in the best interest of Starfleet and the Federation?”

Taking a deep breath, the Trill answered firmly, with more conviction than she had shown before. “Yes, I did.”

“Captain Marten has suggested that your actions were reckless and that you were unfit for command,” T’Prynn turned and addressed the court, trying to win over more of the gallery with her words. “Do you believe that your judgment was impaired by stress or medication during the mission?” she asked the defendant.

Hesitating, Keziah took a moment to formulate a clear answer that wouldn’t undo the positive momentum they seemed to be building. “My judgment was strained, yes. I can’t deny that,” she answered, “but I acted with the information I had, and I believed my decisions were necessary to protect the sector. I see, now, that I was wrong.”

“Thank you Fleet Captain Nazir,” the Vulcan nodded respectfully to her client and then turned to the judge. “The defence rests,” she then confirmed to the judge.

“Fleet Captain Nazir,” Vos spoke, looking across at the Trill. “I understand that process must have been difficult for you. Before the tribunal adjourns for the day, do you have any final words?”

Rising to her feet, Nazir composed herself. Her hands clasped tightly behind her back, she looked at Vos, rather than the courtroom.

“I accept full responsibility for the lives lost. I made the decisions I thought would protect the Federation. I never intended for this outcome, and I would do things very differently if I knew then what I know now. I only ask that you consider my record and my dedication to Starfleet when making your deliberations.”

“So noted,” Fleet Captain Vos nodded in appreciation of his colleague’s words. “This court is now adjourned for today. We will reconvene tomorrow at zero-nine-hundred.” With a single, loud smash of his gavel upon the base plate, the session came to an end.

Watching as the gallery started to clear, Fleet Captain Nazir tried her best to focus on the faces she knew, exchanging glances with the few people who would make eye contact with her. When she eventually, some would say inevitably, locked eyes with Noli, the Captain wasn’t sure how she would feel. But in that moment, a great sense of clarity swept over her.

“Captain T’Prynn,” she called to her Counsel. When the Vulcan approached the bench, the Trill lowered her voice and leant towards her.

“I need to speak with Fleet Captain Vos…”