"He saw a woman in a blue shirt who didn't belong. She saw a young sergeant blinded by arrogance. In the silence of a crowded military mess hall, a single shove would reveal a truth that could bring an entire base command to its knees, a truth hidden in plain sight. The air in the mess hall was thick with the ghosts of yesterday’s dinner and the promise of today’s blandly functional breakfast. It was a smell unique to military life: part industrial cleaner, part over-brewed coffee, part the coll