“Tommy Reed,” the captain said again, his voice cracking. “Second Battalion, the night the truck went off the mountain road.” My knees nearly buckled. Nobody had called me that in ten years. The captain’s hand shook as he pulled a worn, folded photograph from his jacket. “I have carried this every day since,” he whispered. Hannah gripped my sleeve, and the whole cabin leaned closer.

He held the photo toward me, and my breath caught. It showed a younger version of him, bloodied and thin, strapped to a stretcher, with a man’s arm wrapped around his shoulders. That arm wore my unit patch. “You dragged me out of that wreck on one good leg,” he said. “You told the medic to take me first. I never learned your name, only your call sign. This morning, I saw the manifest.” Then he looked at the businessman and said, “Sir, a word with you. Privately.”