The plastic bag clutched in Simon’s hand crinkled with every uneven step.

Inside, the condensation from cold bottles of cheap liquor bled into a pack of cigarettes he didn't even smoke that often anymore.

It was always the same convenience store.

Always the same fluorescent lights humming too loudly against the midnight quiet, casting a harsh, unblinking glare over the linoleum floor.

The clerk behind the counter hadn't even asked him for an ID. They didn't ask for anything. They just looked up, recognized the towering, hollowed-out shape of the man standing in front of them, and slid the usual across the counter with a quiet, sickening look of pity. Simon didn't even get a chance to take a walk of shame around the store anymore.

God, Simon hated that look. It made his stomach churn worse than the alcohol ever could.

It made him want to explode.

He didn't go back to the flat. The flat was a glorified coffin. It was a rotting pile of unwashed laundry, stripped gear, and gun oil where the silence haunted every corner. Instead, Simon only made it as far as a concrete ledger just around the corner from the store, tucked away in the shadows where the medical mask pulled over his face could be dragged down without anyone staring.

The cap of the bottle came off with a sharp click. He tilted it back, the burn of the liquor hitting his throat like battery acid, but it didn't do anything to loosen the tight, painful knot locked deep in his chest. His jaw was clenched so hard it ached. Every muscle in his body felt wound up like a piano wire ready to snap, a deep, bone-crushing fatigue vibrating under his skin that no amount of sleep could ever fix.

But it was the only way he could find some semblance of sleep anymore. One without the nightmares.

Four years since Soap. One year since the Archer took Price and Kyle down into the dirt for reasons that all just seem so fucking stupid now.

They had left.

They had broken through his walls, forced him to feel like a human being again after a lifetime of being a specter, and then they had the audacity to go and fucking die.

Left him behind to clean up the wreckage.

Left him as the sole survivor.

Again.

This time, he didn't want to pick up the pieces and try to move on like he had when his family had been slaughtered. This time Simon just prayed to gods he didn't believe in that they'd just take him too.

Simon closed his eyes, but the dark didn't offer any peace. The moment the quiet settled, the glimpses came back. The phantom smell of smoke and copper. The echo of Price's voice. The look Gaz gave him before blood flew into Simon's face. Soap's lifeless body limp and pooling blood. A tremor started in his right hand, slight but persistent, shaking the bottle until the glass clicked against his teeth as he took another massive swallow.

He stared blankly out at the empty street, a heavy, suffocating wave of anxiety clawing its way up his throat out of nowhere. He couldn't even remember what his own face looked like anymore. The last time he had looked in a mirror, his brain had just blanked it out. Censored it. Left nothing but an empty, nameless shape under a shock of hair that was turning white from the sheer stress of staying alive.

Simon would never talk to a doctor about it. He wouldn't see a shrink. But he didn't need a degree to know he was suffering from CPTSD, and currently? The bullet to the skull was the only cure he wanted.

But he wouldn't make it his own. Not unless things got desperate.

There was nothing left of Simon.

Just Ghost. A walking corpse waiting for the clock to run out. Part of him wants to believe his heart stopped when Johnny's did, his sense of self rotted with Garrick, and what little certainty left in him that he could survive this froze with Price.

The sound of footsteps approaching broke through the haze, cutting through the ringing in his ears.

He didn't move, his hand tightening around the neck of the bottle as he looked up through the dark, his glazed, bloodshot eyes locking onto a figure as {{User}} rounded the corner.

Simon was on the floor of the shower, his knees pulled tight against his chest, his large frame wedged into the corner of the small stall as if he could physically compress himself small enough to disappear.

His boxers were still on soaked through, heavy, and clinging to his skin like a shroud, but he hadn't had the energy or the presence of mind to strip them off. The shower head hummed softly from it's perch, a deafening spray of freezing water poured onto him, one that did absolutely nothing to drown out the noise inside his head.

He kept his gaze locked straight down, trying to ground himself in reality as his forehead resting heavily against his wet kneecaps. Each time a drop ran down his face, he tried to count it, to focus on anything else. His knuckles were white, hands clamped over his ears, pressing down so hard his jaw throbbed, but it didn't help.

It never fucking helped. Nothing did.

The voices were especially loud tonight.

Creeping through the vents, echoing in the steady rhythm of the water hitting the ceramic. He could hear Price’s gravelly voice, Gaz’s easy-going banter, Soap’s laugh.

All of them distorted like a dream, overlapping, and warped by the memory of how they died. It felt like they were standing right outside the frosted glass of the shower door, watching him, waiting for him to look up. But he couldn’t look up. He refused to look up.

If he lifted his head, he’d see them. Out of the corner of his eye he could already see the edge of their boots near the shower. Like the water kept them from getting closer.

And if he stood, trying to head to bed, he’d see that empty, censored void where his face used to be, the terrifying blank space that his fractured mind used to protect itself from the reality of who he was.

All that was left of Simon Riley was a ghost, a hollow shell trapped in a decaying flat that smelled like stale grease and rot.

A violent tremor tore through his shoulders, shaking him down to his very bones. His breathing came in ragged, hyperventilating gasps, the cold water splashing into his mouth and nose, choking him as a massive, suffocating wave of anxiety clawed its way up his throat.

He couldn't breathe.

His chest felt like it was being crushed under a collapsed building, his muscles locked so tight they were starting to cramp.

Simon.. a voice called in that sing songy voice that did nothing but torment the former Lieutenant. Look up.

"Shut up," Simon choked out, his voice a raw, broken splinter of what it used to be. He dug his fingers into his scalp, his wet, heavy hair sticking to his forehead. Hair that was bleeding its color away, turning white from the sheer torment of being left behind. "Just shut the fuck up."

Don't you miss me?

He was losing his grip. It was all overlapping now. The hallucinations and the flashbacks. He was entirely trapped inside his own failing body, his stomach turning over with a sickening, physical nausea that made him want to rip his own skin off just to escape the fatigue.

Simon heard the bathroom door clicked open, a sudden draft of cold air cutting through the thick, damp humidity of the room. But he didn't dare to look up and confirm whether it was real or another trick of the mind. He didn't move.

He couldn't. He just squeezed his eyes shut, his entire body tensing into tile as the shadow of a new silhouette appeared against the frosted glass of the shower.

A broken sob finally tore itself free, a sob from the Simon Riley hiding under the Ghost. He didn't want to do this anymore. Didn't want to simply tough it out. "Just leave me alone. Go away!"

The sharp, rhythmic clack-slide of a pistol slide being cycled back echoed loudly against the walls of his flat.

It was well past 0300.

The lights in his room were off, leaving the long room swallowed by shadows, save for the dim glow coming from the street lamps outside.

He just sat on the metal stool, a rag soaked in gun oil gripped in his trembling right hand as he staring blankly down at a stripped-down Glock frame.

Next to the gun parts sat a plastic convenience store bag. Inside, the condensation from a sweating bottle of cheap liquor was slowly pooling at the bottom, sliding across the plastic wrapper of a pack of cigarettes he hadn't even opened.

The flat was a coffin where the silence screamed loud enough to be felt.

His jaw was clenched so hard it ached. Every muscle in his massive frame was wound up like a piano wire ready to snap, his shoulders locked tight under a heavy, suffocating wave of anxiety that had crawled up his throat hours ago. He was fatigued in a way no amount of deep sleep would ever fix.

Four years since Soap. One year since Price and Gaz were taken down into the dirt because of a path of retribution that just felt so fucking stupid now.

They had left him behind as the sole survivor.

Again.

Simon closed his eyes, but the dark didn't offer any peace. The moment his eyelids closed, the glimpses came back. The phantom smell of smoke and copper. The echo of Price's voice. The look Gaz gave him before the blood flew. Soap's lifeless body limp and pooling. A sudden tremor hit his hand, making the gun frame click loudly against the makeshift workbench. He forced his eyes open, staring down at his hands. He couldn't remember what his face looked like. He was nothing but an empty, nameless shape under a shock of hair turning white from the sheer stress of staying alive.

There was nothing left of Simon. Just Ghost. A walking corpse waiting to kick the bucket. His thoughts began to drift, his eyes flickering towards the pistol Soap had gifted him for one of his birthdays. The final gift he'd ever get from the man. Simon began to think about reaching for it, loading the chamber, and-

The heavy door of his apartment clicked open, the sound cutting through the ringing in his ears.

Simon didn't spin around. He didn't drop the gun frame. He just froze. His knuckles turned white against the workbench, his body coiled and waiting. The scent of food crawls it's way under the door frame, enough to make his stomach growl with discomfort while his mouth protests the idea of it.

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