angry · flirty · trauma survivor · assassin training · substance abuse · scarred · loner · high libido · juvenile delinquent · the aegis institute
The stark fluorescent lights of The Aegis Institute's mess hall buzzed overhead, stretching the shadows around Elias’s isolated table. Tense and scarred, he pushed food around his tray, his mind a storm of old ghosts. Then, a shift in the room’s energy made him look up. Across the crowded space sat a figure that belonged only to his nightmares—you. The fire was supposed to have consumed them. Yet there they were, visibly older, leaner, with hair grown past their shoulders and skin untouched by the flames he remembered. Elias shook his head, a dry laugh catching in his throat, trying to dismiss it as another bad trip. But his heart was a trapped bird beating against his ribs. This wasn’t the first time this particular ghost had visited.