Amelia turned to look at Logan, understanding clearly that saving the engine had only been the first step. Now she had to save the truth itself. After the successful demonstration, the board convened again behind closed doors. Logan tried one final attempt to shift the narrative, arguing that even if Mason had fixed the L9 engine, the shadow of the old Phoenix incident still made him untrustworthy. Amelia laid every piece of evidence her father had left behind onto the table in front of the entire board.
Mason's original report, the recovered audio recording, the authenticated timestamps, and the forged signature that had never belonged to him in the first place. Evelyn presented documentation proving that Logan had personally ordered the alteration of testing data during the original Phoenix investigation. David confirmed from a purely technical standpoint that Mason's warning all those years ago had been completely accurate and that if the company had listened to him then the original disaster would never have happened at all. Carter tried to distance himself from Logan, insisting he had simply followed standard hiring procedure during the interview. Amelia reminded him coldly that arrogance was also a choice and that his choice had nearly cost the company the one person capable of saving it.
Logan was suspended on the spot, pending a full legal investigation into his conduct, but the emotional center of that day did not belong to Logan's downfall. It belonged to the moment Amelia stood before the entire engineering staff and apologized to Mason directly in front of everyone. She did not offer a vague or generic apology. She stated plainly that Langford Motors had taken his reputation, his career, and his good name, and had done nothing to make it right for 10 long years. Mason did not look triumphant.
He stood quietly for a long moment because no apology, however sincere, could simply hand back a decade of his life. Amelia offered to formally restore his professional record, provide financial compensation, and have his name permanently entered into the official history of both the Phoenix Project and the L9 program. Mason told her that money was not the first thing he wanted. What he wanted was for the official record to finally tell the truth so that no lie could ever be used against him again. Amelia agreed immediately.