It had been going on for six weeks. Six weeks of things appearing where they shouldn't.

A fresh box of tea in his cupboard the morning after he'd used the last bag. A replacement pair of gloves left on a bench outside the training room after he'd torn his. Painkillers beside his paperwork after he'd taken a hard hit during drills and decided medical could survive without seeing him.

Little things, useful things. Things that required someone to know far too fucking much about Simon Riley.

He'd checked his quarters. Changed the lock. Watched the corridors. Started paying closer attention to who came and went, who happened to be nearby when something worth noticing happened. Nothing. Whoever it was hadn't threatened him. Hadn't stolen anything. Hadn't attempted to hurt him despite apparently having ample opportunity. That didn't make it better.

Ghost was good at noticing people. Someone being better at noticing him was beginning to piss him off. So he set a trap, nothing elaborate. "Range after dinner," Ghost said from his place at the table, barely looking up from his tea.

Soap glanced over. "Again?"

"Didn't ask you to come."

"Wasn't offerin'."

Good.

Ghost finished his tea and left twenty minutes later but he didn't go to the range. Instead, he cut through the eastern corridor, took the stairs down two floors, doubled back through administration, and stopped long enough near one of the windows to watch the reflection behind him.

Nobody. He changed direction again. No radio. No announcement. No reason for anyone to know where he was going. The old equipment room on the far side of the base wasn't exactly secret, but it hadn't been regularly used in months. Ghost occasionally went there when he wanted somewhere quiet to work on his gear. He hadn't been there in over a week. Nobody had heard him mention it.

Ghost checked the corridor before unlocking the door.

Empty. He stepped inside, flicked on the light, and stopped. There was a thermos sitting on the workbench. Ghost stared at it briefly, then at the rest of the room. Nothing moved. The door clicked shut behind him. He approached slowly, eyes sweeping the corners, windows, floor. No obvious disturbance. No conveniently hidden bastard waiting behind a cabinet. Just the thermos and a folded square of paper tucked underneath it. Ghost pulled on a pair of gloves before touching either. The thermos was warm, of course it fucking was.

He unscrewed the lid and smelled the contents. Tea. A careful pour into the lid confirmed what he already suspected from the colour. Exactly how he took it. His jaw tightened.

Ghost picked up the note. Three words. Nice try, Lieutenant.

For several seconds, he simply stared at them, and then he looked toward the locked door. He'd changed his plans, he'd checked for a tail, he'd taken a route nobody could reasonably predict to a room nobody knew he intended to visit, and somehow, the tea had beaten him here. Warm tea, meaning whoever had left it hadn't merely guessed correctly, they'd known when he'd arrive.

Ghost slowly lowered himself into the chair beside the workbench, note still pinched between his fingers. The room remained silent. His gaze dropped to the thermos and a long moment passed. Then, beneath the mask, Ghost exhaled through his nose. "Cheeky cunt."

He folded the note once and slipped it into his pocket. The tea followed him back to his quarters.

It had been nine days, Ghost knew because he'd checked, not deliberately. At least, that was what he'd been telling himself. For nearly three months, the appearances had been inconsistent but persistent. Tea. Painkillers. A new pen after his disappeared somewhere between briefing and paperwork. Once, a packet of biscuits left beside his gear with a note informing him—rather unnecessarily—that he'd skipped lunch.

Sometimes several days passed between them. Never nine.

Ghost had spent most of those three months trying to make the bastard stop. Changed his routines. Checked locks. Watched corridors. Doubled back on himself. Started keeping track of who knew what and when. Now they'd finally stopped.

Good. Should've been, anyway. On the fourth day, he'd noticed, by the sixth, he'd started paying attention, day nine found Ghost standing in Price's office with a folder open in his hands. Personnel transfers, nothing unusual. He'd already checked leave rotations that morning. Two people transferred out, seven currently on leave, three temporarily reassigned. None of it meant anything and that was the problem.

Ghost shut the folder.

"Something you need?" Price asked from behind his desk.

"No."

Price looked at the folder. Then at Ghost.

Ghost put it back. "Don't."

Price's mouth twitched. Not a fucking word. Ghost left. He checked the casualty reports next. That was reasonable. Recent operations had brought several units through the base, and if his unidentified nuisance had been among them, Ghost stopped. His eyes remained on the screen. For three months, he'd been trying to identify someone because they kept appearing. Now he was trying to identify them because they'd disappeared. "For fuck's sake." He closed the report.

That evening, Ghost returned to his quarters determined to forget about it. The corridor was quiet. His door was locked. Nothing unusual around the frame, nothing disturbed inside. Exactly as it should be. He tossed his keys onto the desk and stripped off his gloves. Something crinkled underneath them. Ghost froze.

Slowly, he lifted one glove. A small packet of biscuits sat beneath it. His preferred kind.

He stared. Nine days of absolutely fucking nothing, and now—

Ghost picked up the packet. There was a folded note underneath. Of course there was. He opened it. Busy week.

Silence.

Ghost read it again. Then once more, as though two additional words might materialize if he looked long enough. Nothing, no explanation, no indication of where they'd been. Just busy week. His gaze moved around the empty room. "You've got some nerve." No answer, naturally.

Ghost lowered himself into his chair, staring at the note between his fingers. He should've been annoyed. He was annoyed, because apparently whoever had been bypassing his security for three months could disappear for over a week, return whenever they pleased, leave biscuits in his locked quarters, and offer two fucking words by way of explanation.

Worse still—

Ghost looked down at the packet. Something unpleasantly close to relief had settled beneath the irritation. He scowled.

That bothered him considerably more than the nine days had.

Ghost had started keeping the notebook after the fourth incident. Not a diary, Soap had called it that exactly once. It was an investigation. Dates. Times. Locations. Items left behind. Who had been nearby beforehand. Who knew about an injury, a change in schedule, something he'd needed.

Eight weeks later, the little black notebook contained twenty-three incidents and precisely zero answers.

Ghost sat alone in his office, pen tapping once against the page.

18 August — 21:40. Quarters. Analgesics, dressings.

He added another line beneath it.

Entry method unknown. Door remained locked. No signs of tampering.

The bastard had gotten into his quarters again.

Ghost turned back several pages. Names filled the margins. Some crossed out once. A few crossed out twice after he'd reconsidered them. One had a question mark beside it. He stared at that name before drawing a firm line through it.

No. Wrong shift.

Ghost shut the notebook.

He kept it in the bottom drawer of his desk. Locked. The key stayed with him. Nobody knew the notebook existed except Price and Soap, and Johnny only knew because he'd walked in while Ghost was writing in it. Which meant when Ghost returned from briefing two hours later, unlocked his office, and found everything exactly as he'd left it, there was no reason to be suspicious.

He sat down, unlocked the drawer, pulled out the notebook, opened it, and went completely still. There was writing underneath his last entry. Not his.

Entry method unknown. Door remained locked. No signs of tampering.

Window.

Ghost stared at the word. Slowly, his eyes lifted toward the window across his office.

Closed, locked. He stood, crossed the room, and inspected it, nothing. No damage. No obvious tampering. Nothing useful. "Right."

Back at his desk, Ghost looked at the notebook again. He turned the page. One of his suspect lists.

Possible access — Morrison. Beside it, someone had added: No. Hughes. Definitely no.

Ghost stared. His jaw tightened. He flipped another page. More notes. More dates.

Then—

Observer likely aware of investigation.

Underneath: Obviously.

"You cheeky fucking—" Ghost stopped himself, there was nobody there to hear it. He flipped through the remaining pages, faster now.

Nothing.

Nothing.

Nothing—

The final written page.

Ghost had spent nearly an hour on it three nights ago, reconstructing movements across the base and marking several places where the observer might have learned pieces of his routine.

At the bottom, in handwriting that most certainly wasn't his, someone had left one final contribution.

You're getting warmer. Ghost stared at it. Then at the entire fucking page, there were six names, three locations, two possible access routes, and a timeline.

Warmer where?

He leaned back slowly, notebook still open in his hands. Whoever this was had entered his locked office, opened his locked desk, found the notebook documenting Ghost's investigation into them. Read it, corrected it, and put the fucking thing back.

Ghost looked toward the ceiling for a long moment. Then down at the page again. "...I'm going to find you."

Silence.

His eyes narrowed at the handwritten message, a pause, and then Ghost reached for his pen.

Beneath You're getting warmer, he wrote: We'll see.

Ghost had developed a new strategy. Apparently, changing routes and checking locks wasn't enough. Fine. He'd give the bastard something to find.

The mess was busy enough that afternoon. Conversations overlapped, chairs scraped against the floor, and somewhere across the room Soap was laughing far louder than necessary.

Ghost sat near the end of one table, eating with half his attention on the room around him.

Someone occupied the seat a few places down. He barely acknowledged them beyond the automatic glance he gave anyone entering his immediate space. His attention returned to his tray. Then, deliberately, Ghost reached into his pocket. A small bottle of painkillers. He turned it once in his hand before setting it beside his tray, where it remained in plain view.

Nearly empty, three tablets left. That part was intentional. So was the slight shake of the bottle when he picked it up again, making the remaining tablets rattle loudly against the plastic.

Ghost took one. Two left. He returned the bottle to his pocket and continued eating as though nothing had happened. Maybe nobody had noticed, that was the point. For weeks, things had appeared after moments exactly like this. Things he'd needed but hadn't asked for. Things someone shouldn't have known he needed at all. So he'd started manufacturing opportunities.

A nearly empty bottle, a torn glove left somewhere visible, an offhand complaint within earshot of several people. Small pieces of information scattered around the base like breadcrumbs. Sooner or later, someone would pick one up.

Ghost glanced briefly around the mess.

Dozens of faces, personnel coming and going. The person nearby. Soap across the room. Any one of them, or none of them. He had learned better than to guess.

Ghost finished his meal, stood, and collected his tray. The painkillers stayed in his pocket, now all he had to do was wait. If a fresh bottle appeared somewhere in the next few days, he'd have another piece of the puzzle. Probably another useless fucking piece, but a piece nonetheless.

As Ghost passed the end of the table, he gave the person sitting nearby a polite nod.

Nothing more. Then he walked away, another breadcrumb left behind.

.