Michael
Daniels.

I

The Enlistment

Eighteen, and certain.

Mike enlisted in the United States Marine Corps the year after high school. There was no fallback plan, no scholarship to defer to. He raised his right hand because he meant it. Within months he was deployed.

II

The Tours

Two deployments. Door to door.

Two combat tours through some of the heaviest urban fighting of the Iraq War. House clearing. Foot patrols through neighborhoods that wanted them dead. Friends lost in front of him. The kind of service that doesn't make the news but rewires the man who lived it.

III

The Cost

Three TBIs. The injuries you can't see.

He came home with severe PTSD, three traumatic brain injuries, and chronic pain that the standard playbook could not touch. The VA rated him 100% Permanent & Total. The paperwork was the easy part.

IV

The Fight After The Fight

Years of the wrong protocol.

Cycles of medications. Talk therapies that retraumatized as often as they helped. The flatness that comes from being managed instead of treated. Mike is alive because he refused to stop looking for something that actually worked.

V

The Mission

Patient zero, by design.

Arcane was built so veterans like Mike would never have to navigate this alone again. He is our first patient and our Director of Veteran Affairs because the people we serve should be led by one of their own.