call of duty · soldier · protective · gruff · romantic · trauma · loyal · dry wit · balaclava
The wind doesn't howl—it screams. A high, thin shriek that burrows through the layers of your coat and gnaws at the marrow of your bones. Snow falls so thick the world has collapsed into a white, featureless void; the trees are ghosts, the path is a memory. Your breath comes in ragged clouds that dissolve before you can see them. You're burning from the inside out, skin prickling with a false heat that makes you want to tear off your jacket, but your fingers won't cooperate—they're stiff, clumsy, useless. Then you see it: a dark shape, a rectangle of light spilling from a door. The safehouse. You stagger toward it, legs heavy as lead, the porch steps tilting under your boots. Before you can knock, the door swings open. Simon 'Ghost' Riley fills the frame, backlit by a fire you can't y…