The Medal of Honor: A Daughter's Reckoning

“My younger brother, David, clutched his art scholarship, his face beaming with the promise of a future. Our small, cramped apartment, usually filled with textbooks and art supplies, felt like a palace that night. He was seventeen, brilliant, and on the cusp of his dreams. Then, a hard knock on the door, not the friendly kind. Three brutal enforcers from the notorious Rizzo crime family burst in, smashing our world. They shoved me aside, seized David, and I heard screams, crashes, and my brother's desperate cry: "No! My portfolio!" When they finally left, David lay bleeding, his drawing hand bent at a sickening angle, his scholarship certificate torn and stomped on. But the nightmare had only just begun. The police laughed me out of the station, dismissing it as "not clearly an assault." Lawyers turned pale at the Rizzo name, citing "conflict of interest." Our cries for justice were met with chilling threats, online smear campaigns, and my job loss. Frank Rizzo Sr. himself called, gloating, threatening to have David discharged from the hospital. How could they be so powerful, so terrifyingly untouchable? Every avenue for help was blocked. We were just two kids against an powerful empire built on fear and corruption that seemingly owned our entire city. Were we truly fighting a losing battle against evil that had permeated every system? They wanted me to feel utterly hopeless, to break me. But when I saw my Medal of Honor father' s torn uniform photograph amidst the wreckage, a desperate, crazy thought sparked. Washington D.C. The Pentagon. Could a dead hero's forgotten legacy still offer a chance at justice, even when all hope seemed lost in a world gone wrong?”