Nearly a hundred soldiers froze as a major shoved an unranked woman into her food, completely blind to the trap he had just sprung on himself.

Reeves and two armed military policemen—who had just hurried through the double doors after hearing the disturbance—marched Major Richard Halden out of the dining facility. Halden’s head was bowed, his polished boots shuffling across the dirty floor, his uniform stripped of authority, leaving only the pathetic shell of an abusive coward exposed to the light of day.

The double doors swung shut behind them with a heavy hydraulic hiss.

The mess hall remained frozen in silence. Nearly two hundred soldiers stood at attention, their eyes fixed on the woman standing at table seven.

Isabella Grant looked down at herself.

Her uniform was a mess. The collar was soaked with cold brown gravy, instant potato flakes were drying against the fabric of her chest, and the cut on her forehead had begun to seep a tiny trickle of dark crimson that ran down the side of her temple. She looked like a soldier who had just crawled out of an artillery crater.

She looked up at the room.

"As you were," she said.

The order was delivered with quiet authority. Across the hall, soldiers slowly lowered their arms and took their seats, though nobody resumed eating. The chatter that usually accompanied breakfast was entirely absent.

Isabella turned her attention to Private Ethan Carter.

The young soldier was still standing against the support pillar, his hands trembling so violently that he had dropped his patrol cap into the puddle of spilled water.

Isabella bent down, scooped up Ethan’s wet cap, and gently shook the excess moisture from the fabric. She stepped toward him, holding out the cap.

"Private Carter," she said softly.

Ethan snapped to attention, his eyes wide and terrified. "G... General, Ma'am!"

"Take your cap, son."

Ethan reached out with trembling hands, taking the damp headgear. "I'm sorry, Ma'am. I didn't mean to drop the canteen. I didn't mean for him to—"

"You didn't do anything wrong, Private," Isabella interrupted, her tone softening into genuine warmth for the first time that morning. "Exhaustion is a command failure, not an enlisted failure. When a commander works his troops past the point of basic physical safety, he is the one who has failed his duty."

She looked down at his dropped canteen on the floor.

Isabella knelt on the linoleum, picked up the scratched aluminum bottle, and set it upright on the table. She reached for the paper napkins, wiped the dust from the rim, and handed it to Ethan.

"Go to the barracks, Carter," she said. "Tell the duty sergeant that General Grant has placed you on mandatory seventy-two-hour rest and recovery. If anyone questions that order, tell them to speak directly to me."