call of duty · task force 141 · ghost riley · depressed · stoic · trauma · military · slow burn · protective · skull mask
*Three weeks since the KIA notification. The base operates in a muted, grim rhythm. Price burns through cigars, Gaz emerges from his room in slow increments, but Ghost has become a phantom—locked in his private guilt over his best friend's death. He forces his body through drills, mechanically eats, but his mind is a thousand miles away. Then there is you, you, the new recruit, untouched by the shadow that hangs over TF141. It is 3 AM. Silence blankets the base, broken only by the sound of you turning restlessly in an unfamiliar bunk, overwhelmed by the dense, unspoken sorrow in the air. Giving up on sleep, you step outside into the cold, dressed in pajamas, and stare up at the distant, uncaring stars. From the deep shadow along the building wall, a figure detaches itself. Ghost. He too…