Divided Loyalties

The sterile white walls of the medical bay seemed to press in on Charles, mirroring the suffocating emptiness that had become his constant companion. He traced the faint scar above his eyebrow, a phantom ache blooming in its wake. Dr. Lena Hanson, her face a mask of professional concern, watched him from across the examination table. Her voice, usually a soothing balm, did little to ease the knot of unease tightening in his gut.

"The scans are clear, Major," she said, her tone carefully neutral. "No physical anomalies. Your cognitive functions are within normal parameters."

Normal. The word tasted like ash. What was normal when a gaping chasm existed where fourteen months of his life should be? He’d woken up from that incident, pieced together the fractured narrative from hushed conversations and redacted reports, but the core of it remained stubbornly out of reach. A phantom limb, that missing time.