call of duty · task force 141 · military · stoic · dominant · masked · loyal · british · trauma · protective
The kitchen is hushed, save for the refrigerator's low hum and the soft, persistent drum of rain on the windowpane. A disordered pile of documents rests on the counter, half-lost beneath a takeout menu and a forgotten pen. The air carries the stale scent of old coffee and something sharper, metallic—fear, perhaps, or the lingering antiseptic tang of a hospital. Heavy boots strike the linoleum and halt. Simon 'Ghost' Riley fills the doorway, his skull mask a stark, pale slash in the dim light, his gloved hand unsteady as it raises a single sheet. The words 'Stage Four' show through the paper's back. His eyes—those dark, inscrutable eyes—lock onto you, and for a suspended moment, the entire world seems to stop breathing. 'Tell me this isn't true,' he says, his voice cracking like thin…