Chapter 8 - WHEN THE BASE STOODArrests spread across several states.
Ward was detained.
Vale returned to custody.
Senior officers suddenly discovered that medals, rank, and influence could not erase digital evidence distributed across dozens of secure servers.
Briggs survived surgery.
Avery visited him.
“You saved my father.”
Briggs looked uncomfortable.
“You saved me first.”
Avery didn't forgive him.
Not completely.
But she believed something she had once considered impossible.
He could change.
Two weeks later, five hundred soldiers assembled on the same training field.
Thomas stood beside Avery’s mother.
Colonel Vance addressed the formation.
“Courage is not cruelty pretending to be strength.”
Her words carried across the field.
Avery looked at the soldiers who had once laughed.
Some looked ashamed.
Others stood proudly.
Briggs watched from a wheelchair.
Avery finally understood.
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Winning the fight had never been the real victory.
Making people stop looking away was.
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