She hadn’t expected the courthouse to feel more like a battlefield than any place she’d been since medical retirement.

At the security checkpoint, the metal detector beeped once when she walked through. The officer’s hand started moving toward his scanner before she could speak.

“Navy Cross,” she said simply. “And the service dog’s collar and harness.”

The officer’s hand stopped mid-air. His eyes moved from the medal to her face, then to Atlas, then back to the medal again. Something shifted in his expression—a recalibration, a recognition of what he was actually looking at.

“You’re clear, Captain. Thank you for your service.”

“Thank you,” she replied, with the small nod that never quite let those words fully land. They never did.

Her lawyer, a precise man named Kevin Walsh, was already seated in Courtroom 3B when she arrived. He stood when he saw her, offering a tight, reassuring smile, then glanced at her uniform with the barely concealed discomfort of a civilian trying to calibrate an unfamiliar situation.