Mia continued.
“We reported internally.”
“They’re saying software filter covers it.”
“Does it?”
“Usually.”
Daniel closed eyes.
There was that word again.
Usually.
He had spent decades listening to people explain unsafe things with averages.
“What do you think?”
he asked.
“I think it needs another validation cycle.”
“How long?”
“Six weeks.”
“And that delays?”
“Launch.”
“How much money?”
Silence.
Daniel knew.
“A lot.”
“Yes.”
Victoria leaned toward phone.
“Mia, what are they asking you to do?”
Mia hesitated.
“Sign off that residual risk is within target.”
Daniel looked at Victoria.
Victoria’s expression had gone still.
Mia added:
“I refused.”
“Good.”
“They asked again.”
“Good that you refused again.”
“They moved meeting to tomorrow with vice president.”
Daniel almost said something angry.
Victoria touched his arm.
She asked:
“What evidence do you have?”
Mia answered immediately.
“Raw test data.”
“Logs.”
“Video from test rig.”
“Three engineers replicated.”
“Written risk assessment.”
“Did you preserve copies appropriately?”
“Yes.”
“Company systems only.”
“No confidential theft.”
“Good.”
Victoria looked at Daniel.
He understood what she was doing.
Not telling Mia what to believe.
Asking whether conclusion rested on evidence.
Mia’s breathing steadied.
Victoria continued.
“Who disagrees technically?”
“Software lead says filter is sufficient.”
“Has he reproduced all failures?”
“No.”
“Then tomorrow is not about your courage.”
“It is about whose technical argument survives review.”
Mia was quiet.
Daniel smiled slightly.
Victoria was better at this than he was.
Mia said:
“They could fire me.”
Victoria did not say they would not.
She said:
“Yes.”
Daniel looked at her.
Mia was silent.
Victoria continued.
“And that matters.”
“You have a mortgage.”
“You have your own family plans.”
“You do not become morally pure because the stakes are expensive.”
Daniel nodded.
That sentence was important.
It was easy to tell other people to risk jobs.
Harder when the risk was theirs.
Mia whispered:
“What would Mom do?”
Daniel’s chest tightened.
Rachel.
Even decades later, Mia sometimes asked.
Daniel thought.
“Your mother would ask you whether you could live with your name under it if something happened.”
Silence.
Mia exhaled.
“That’s what I thought.”
The next morning, Mia entered the review meeting carrying no dramatic speech.
Only data.
The vice president opened with schedule pressure.