Post 237: Things we Hide
Posted on Mon Aug 31st, 2026 @ 10:35pm by Admiral Christopher Bradley & Lieutenant Peter McMahon
1,869 words; about a 9 minute read
Mission: A Leap of Faith
Recovery, Chris Bradley had decided, was considerably more complicated when your wife happened to be the Commander-in-Chief of Starfleet.
There was nowhere to hide.
At least, there wasn't supposed to be.
Chris was getting stronger. That much wasn't an act.
Physical therapy had become part of his daily routine, and every week brought measurable improvement. Exercises that had left him exhausted a month earlier were becoming manageable. His strength was returning. His balance was better. The cane was still nearby more often than Chris cared to admit, but increasingly it was leaning against his desk rather than actually in his hand.
He was working again, too.
Officially, on a reduced schedule.
Dakota had been very clear about that.
His doctors had been even clearer.
Chris had listened attentively to all of them.
Then proceeded to interpret "reduced schedule" rather creatively.
Because there were things neither his doctors nor Fleet Admiral Dakota Olvera knew.
The headaches hadn't completely stopped.
Neither had the occasional tremor in his hand.
His damaged eye sometimes blurred when he was tired, and there were still moments when standing too quickly caused the room to shift beneath his feet.
Chris had become very good at hiding those moments.
Especially from Dakota.
That wasn't easy.
She knew him too well.
She knew the slight change in his voice when he was hurting. She knew when he was pretending not to be tired. She knew the difference between Chris leaning against something casually and Chris leaning against something because he needed it.
So he'd adapted.
If his hand trembled at breakfast, it disappeared beneath the table.
If his vision blurred, he'd find something else to focus on until it cleared.
If his balance faltered, he'd make reaching for a chair or bulkhead look entirely intentional.
And whenever Dakota asked—
"How are you feeling?"
Chris answered truthfully.
"Better."
He simply omitted the rest.
Better wasn't the same thing as recovered.
Dakota didn't need to know that yet.
There was something else she didn't need to know.
Not yet.
Chris waited until late in the afternoon before locking the door to his office.
His official work was finished.
That meant the real work could begin.
He reached into a concealed compartment beneath his desk and removed a small encrypted storage module.
The project never touched the Starfleet network.
That rule had been absolute from the beginning.
His wife was Commander-in-Chief.
His nephew worked in Strategic Operations.
Between Dakota Olvera and Peter McMahon, Chris was surrounded by people whose careers largely consisted of discovering things other people didn't want discovered.
He was beginning to suspect he'd chosen the wrong family for keeping secrets.
Chris connected the module to an isolated terminal.
The Starfleet interface vanished.
A black screen appeared.
BRADLEY AUTHORIZATION ACCEPTED
A second authentication followed.
Then a third.
Finally—
PROJECT ACCESS GRANTED
Hundreds of files appeared.
Structural designs.
Engineering studies.
Power-generation requirements.
Propulsion models.
Defensive systems.
Computer architecture.
Independent communications.
Command-and-control systems.
Materials estimates.
Construction timelines.
Crew projections.
Supply requirements.
Emergency operations scenarios.
And simulations.
Lots of simulations.
Chris opened the master design.
A wireframe rotated slowly across the screen.
It had started as an idea.
Something to occupy his mind during recovery.
Then it became an engineering exercise.
Then a strategic exercise.
Then Chris had made the mistake of realizing it might actually work.
After that, he hadn't been able to leave it alone.
Chris opened the latest simulation.
POWER SYSTEM STABILITY: 92.1%
Better.
Another.
STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY: ACCEPTABLE
Another.
AUTONOMOUS OPERATIONS ENDURANCE: 83.7%
Chris leaned forward.
"Come on..."
The simulation completed.
MODEL VIABLE
A small smile appeared.
"There you are."
His hand trembled against the desk.
The smile vanished.
Chris pulled his hand away.
The tremor continued.
He closed his fist tightly and waited.
Ten seconds.
Twenty.
Eventually it stopped.
He flexed his fingers.
Then went straight back to work.
Dakota definitely didn't need to know about that.
The project was another matter.
Eventually, she would have to know.
There was no conceivable way to actually build something of this magnitude without the Commander-in-Chief finding out.
Chris wasn't trying to keep it secret forever.
He simply needed time.
Time to prove it wasn't merely the product of an admiral recovering from a near-death experience.
Time to prove the numbers.
Time to solve the engineering problems.
Time to have an answer when Dakota inevitably looked at him and asked:
Why?
Chris opened the strategic projections.
That was the heart of it.
The Synthulan attacks had changed everything.
Earth.
Starfleet Command.
Entire fleets.
Gone.
The Federation had survived, but Chris had seen how quickly systems everyone believed permanent could simply disappear.
Starfleet had always planned around redundancy.
Another fleet.
Another base.
Another communications relay.
Another command center.
But what happened when all of those things failed at once?
Chris had spent a lot of time thinking about that while recovering.
Too much time, perhaps.
The answer slowly rotating on his screen was what he'd come up with.
Something independent.
Something capable of surviving when conventional infrastructure collapsed.
A command center.
A refuge.
A fortress.
A lifeboat.
A strategic reserve.
Maybe all of them.
Chris still hadn't decided what to call it.
For now, its designation remained deliberately meaningless.
PROJECT: C-17
He opened another engineering model.
A chime sounded at the door.
Chris froze.
Another chime.
Then—
"Uncle Chris?"
Peter.
Of course it was Peter.
Chris moved quickly.
Files closed.
Storage module disconnected.
Starfleet interface restored.
Unfortunately, moving quickly remained something his body occasionally objected to.
As Chris stood, the room suddenly tilted.
He caught the edge of the desk.
Hard.
His damaged eye blurred.
For several seconds he remained there, breathing slowly until everything settled.
"Uncle Chris?"
"I'm coming."
Chris straightened.
He grabbed his cane.
Not because he needed it.
Because having it nearby made the explanation easier if Peter noticed anything.
Chris unlocked the door.
Lieutenant Peter McMahon stood outside.
Strategic Operations.
His nephew.
And currently one of the last people Chris wanted standing outside his office.
Peter looked at him.
"Why was the door locked?"
"Because I enjoy privacy."
Peter glanced past him.
"Doing what?"
"Work."
"You finished your work."
Chris stared at him.
Peter smiled.
"Strat Ops."
"Nosy."
"Occupational requirement."
Chris stepped aside.
"Was there something you needed, Lieutenant?"
Peter entered.
"Actually, yes."
Chris returned to his desk.
Peter started explaining something about strategic readiness projections.
Chris listened.
Mostly.
Because Peter was standing considerably closer to the desk than Chris liked.
And beneath a PADD approximately thirty centimeters from Peter's hand sat the encrypted storage module.
Peter continued talking.
Chris casually moved the PADD.
And the module beneath it.
Peter stopped.
"What?"
Chris looked innocent.
"What?"
"You just moved that."
"It's a PADD."
"I can see that."
"Congratulations."
Peter gave him a suspicious look.
For one uncomfortable moment, Chris was reminded exactly whose family Peter came from.
McMahons noticed things.
Chris changed the subject.
"What's the readiness problem?"
Peter hesitated.
Then returned to his report.
Chris listened carefully this time.
It was actually relevant.
More relevant than Peter realized.
Several of the vulnerabilities Peter described were already accounted for in C-17.
A few weren't.
Chris mentally added them to his list.
Then Peter said something that caught his attention.
"If we lost the primary command network and the backup relays simultaneously, we'd have fleet elements operating independently for hours. Maybe days."
Chris became very still.
Peter continued.
"We need some kind of independent fallback. Something outside the existing command architecture."
Chris stared at him.
Peter noticed.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"That wasn't a nothing look."
"I have a lot of looks."
"That one was definitely something."
Chris leaned back.
"Keep going."
Peter did.
And Chris listened.
By the time Peter finished, Chris had added seven modifications to C-17 in his head.
Peter looked at him again.
"You sure you're okay?"
"I'm fine."
"You're rubbing your hand."
Chris stopped.
He hadn't even realized he'd been doing it.
"PT."
Peter's expression changed slightly.
"You're overdoing it again."
"I'm sitting in a chair."
"Apparently Bradley stubbornness burns calories."
Chris smiled.
"Was there anything else, Lieutenant?"
Peter understood the dismissal.
He stood.
Then paused.
"Mom would've told you to knock it off."
Chris's expression softened.
Mentioning his sister—Peter's mother—still had a way of doing that.
"Your mother told me to knock it off about twice a day."
"Usually because you deserved it."
"Usually."
Peter headed toward the door.
Then stopped.
He looked back.
For just a second, Chris wondered if Peter had seen something.
"Go home, Uncle Chris."
"I will."
"Today."
"Get out."
Peter grinned and left.
The door closed.
Chris waited.
Then locked it again.
He retrieved the storage module.
Black screen.
Authentication.
C-17 returned.
Chris immediately opened the strategic architecture.
Peter's words remained in his head.
Something outside the existing command architecture.
Chris added a new requirement.
PRIMARY NETWORK INDEPENDENCE: MANDATORY
Then another.
FLEET COMMAND CONTINUITY FOLLOWING TOTAL COMMUNICATIONS FAILURE
Another.
DECENTRALIZED AUTHORITY PROTOCOLS
He sat back.
Peter had unknowingly solved part of the problem.
That presented another problem.
Sooner or later, Chris was going to need help.
Engineering expertise.
Tactical expertise.
Operations.
Strategic planning.
There were perhaps three or four people he trusted enough.
Peter was one of them.
Tom Ryan was another.
But bringing anyone inside meant the secret stopped belonging solely to Chris.
And once Peter knew, Chris would be asking his nephew—a Strategic Operations officer—to conceal a major strategic project from the Commander-in-Chief.
From Dakota.
Chris wasn't prepared to put him in that position.
Not yet.
He opened the master file.
PROJECT DEVELOPMENT: 67%
SYSTEM INTEGRATION: 36%
RESOURCE MODELING: 51%
CONSTRUCTION FEASIBILITY: 74%
Chris stared at the rotating design.
He had learned something while lying trapped and injured, uncertain whether he'd survive.
Starfleet was powerful.
The Federation was resilient.
Neither was invulnerable.
The next enemy might not give them time to rebuild.
Chris intended to make sure they wouldn't need it.
Something that could operate when fleets were scattered.
Something that could command when command no longer existed.
Something that could shelter people when worlds weren't safe.
Something that could fight if there was nobody else left to fight.
A contingency.
An insurance policy.
A last line of defense.
Chris looked toward the locked door.
Dakota would understand the strategic logic.
That wasn't what worried him.
She would also understand him.
She'd recognize the fear buried underneath every engineering diagram and tactical simulation.
She'd know exactly why he'd started designing it while recovering.
And she'd probably realize he was still having symptoms within five minutes of looking at him.
Chris wasn't ready for either conversation.
So, for now, Fleet Admiral Dakota Olvera would continue believing her husband was doing his physical therapy, getting stronger and slowly returning to work.
All of which was true.
Peter McMahon would continue believing his uncle was merely spending too much time behind his desk.
Also true.
And Project C-17 would remain where Chris Bradley wanted it.
Hidden.
He removed the storage module and slipped it into his pocket.
His hand trembled slightly.
Chris closed his fist until it stopped.
Then he picked up his cane and headed home to his wife.
Tomorrow he'd do his PT.
Tomorrow he'd do his official work.
And when nobody was looking—
Chris Bradley would keep building the future.
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