When I saw the address of our childhood home, I felt such coldness in my heart as if the dampness of the coast had crept into the room.
“Forward this message to the cybersecurity service immediately,” I told Major Levan.
“I have already forwarded it,” he answered.
The admiral looked at Brandon.
“Do you have anything else to say?”
Brandon moved his lips, but could not make a sound.
His phone rang. Father’s name appeared on the screen.
“Answer,” the admiral said.
Brandon reached out, although I saw how his fingers tensed.
“Dad, I can’t talk to you now.”
Father’s voice was so loud that everyone in the room heard it.
“Where are you? What did you do? Did Cassandra do something to you?”
Brandon looked toward me.
“I did nothing. This is her revenge.”
I did not lower my head.
“You are running from your own words, Brandon.”
Major Levan turned on the voice recorder again.
Brandon’s voice sounded in the room: “If you refuse, you will lose your job.”
Now these words were not heard from other people’s mouths. It was his voice. His tone. His threat.
Brandon grabbed the chair.
“Turn it off!”
“This is your voice,” I said.
“I did not say it like that.”
Dr. Nino placed the technical conclusion on the table.
“The recording is certified. The electronic log is certified. The camera file is certified. No lawyer can change the time, place, and voice.”
Brandon called Father, but this time no one answered.
A few minutes later his lawyer came. He was a tall, tired man holding a leather bag.
“This situation can be resolved,” he said. “My client will apologize and an internal agreement will be drawn up.”
“False safety reports do not disappear through an agreement,” the admiral answered.
The lawyer quietly said something to Brandon. Then he shook his head.
“I cannot defend you in this case if you do not tell me the full truth.”
Brandon lowered his eyes.
“Father told me that Cassandra would ruin everything.”
The air in the room seemed to stop.
“Father?” I asked.
“He told me that your promotion was temporary. That if I destroyed your authority, I would become important in the family again.”
I expected anger, but felt only exhaustion. For thirty years Father had held the same scales between us, only Brandon had always stood on one side.
That same evening I went home.
Father was sitting in the kitchen. There were two cups of coffee on the table, but he had touched neither. Photographs of Brandon’s awards hung on the wall. Not one picture of me was there.
“Did you send the message?” I asked.
He looked at me for a long time.
“I was only protecting my son.”
“No, Father. You were hiding the truth.”
“He was always weaker than you.”
These were the first honest words I had heard from him.
“That is why you belittled me?”
He could not answer.
In the end Brandon had to appear before a military court. His authority was revoked, the falsification of the reports was confirmed, and the technicians he had threatened were publicly apologized to. The court did not sentence him to prison, but his military career ended and he was forbidden to work in the security field. Father underwent a separate legal process because of the loss of his pension benefits and obstructing the investigation.
I did not attend a single hearing where I would see Brandon with a humiliated face. My business had never been revenge.
My business was to make sure that someone else’s next mistake would not cost a life.
Three weeks later I went aboard the ship again. This time no one mocked me. The sailors were doing their work, the metal surfaces glittered in the sun, and new rules were already in force in the technical department.
A small board hung on the wall, on which was written: “Truth is the first rule of safety.”
Major Levan passed beside me.
“General, the coffee is burnt again.”
“Then let’s find good coffee,” I answered.
For the first time in a long while I laughed without feeling guilty.
Two months later I moved to a new city. I rented a small apartment near the coast, began running in the mornings, and in the evenings taught young officers how to protect people not only from the enemy, but also from the fear of their own superiors.
One Sunday my little niece, Elene, came to my room. She was Brandon’s daughter and still looked at everything through a child’s eyes.
She drew a ship on a sheet of paper. There was a large sun above it, and on the deck stood a woman who had two small stars.
“Is this you?” she asked.
“I think so.”
“Daddy said that you are very strict.”
I looked at her colored pencils.
“Sometimes the truth sounds strict, but that does not mean that a person is bad.”
Elene nodded and added one more small star to the picture.
“This is for you, when you will no longer have to prove anything.”
That evening Brandon wrote to me for the first time.
“Cassandra, everything went too far. Father is old. I made a mistake. Perhaps just once you could talk to me as a sister?”
I looked at the message for a long time.
Then I answered:
“I am not avoiding talking to you. But I will no longer continue living in your place.”
He called once more. This time I did not answer the phone.
I went to the window. The first fine snow of winter was falling on the coast. I still held that dark coat, at the collar of which Brandon had torn off the metal clasp that morning. I had it repaired at a workshop and sewed a small inscription inside: “Do not let anyone take your name away from you.”
I put on the coat, locked the door, and went outside.
On the road toward the sea, the wind struck my face, but for the first time I did not try to resist it.
Sometimes freedom does not come with noise.
Sometimes it simply tells you not to return to the place where they constantly humiliated you.
I did not return.
And that night, when the snow left small white spots on my coat, my name was, for the first time, only mine.
