Nia stared at her laptop screen in the dim glow of her office, the cursor blinking accusingly over the half-formed speech. It was past midnight, the White House a labyrinth of hushed echoes and distant footsteps from night-shift staff. Vince's directive had come earlier that day, urgent and laced with frustration: counter Vardo's push for escalated arms shipments to the Middle East allies. 'Make it firm, Nia. No more half-measures. Family or not, his aggression risks everything we've built.' His words echoed in her mind, stirring the familiar ache of divided loyalties.
She typed furiously, weaving rhetoric about diplomatic restraint, economic sanctions over military might, painting Vardo's stance as reckless brinkmanship that could ignite regional fires. But each sentence felt like a betr
