The brothers asked Marcus to give a witness statement through counsel. The network could lose a transport contract, costing drivers and dispatch workers their jobs. Marcus knew several of those workers personally and refused to treat their livelihoods as disposable.
Together they distinguished operators who had followed orders from managers who had rewritten manifests. They asked investigators to protect ordinary employees and find safe replacement transport before canceling service.
Outside, someone was locking a bicycle against a railing while another person crossed the street with groceries. Such scenes once seemed distant from the questions consuming them. Now they understood that public systems reached into precisely those mundane routines. A record could determine whether a ride arrived or whether someone was allowed to enter a school. Getting the record right was not an abstract virtue.
The next step required patience that none of them particularly wanted to give. Calls might not be returned. A request could be refused for reasons unrelated to the merits of the case. A witness might need weeks before feeling ready to speak. They made room for those realities, reminding one another that urgency did not give them permission to pressure a vulnerable person into a convenient answer.
There were moments when anger would have been easier to carry than uncertainty. Anger supplied an explanation and a direction. Uncertainty required them to listen to people who might remember events differently, or who might have reasons to protect themselves. It did not mean every account was equally reliable. It meant reliability had to be established rather than announced.
By the time they left, the facts had not become simpler. They had become more exact. One witness remembered a time but not a face. Another could identify a location but not the reason someone went there. That was enough to establish a direction for the next question, not enough to claim a final answer. The difference protected the people whose lives would be affected by whatever came next.
Owen remembered the cold differently from Daniel. What stayed with him was the color of the booth and the feeling of a towel being placed around his shoulders without a lecture. He wanted the story to honor that memory while remaining accurate about everything else. They owed each other honesty. It mattered more than pride. Nothing had been settled yet. The question remained unanswered. Their work was not finished. They chose to proceed carefully. Someone needed to listen. It could not be ignored. That was the difference between a story and a verifiable record. That much mattered.
When Daniel showed Marcus the most recent inspection report, Marcus recognized the name of the mechanic who had once warned Teresa about the vans.