They were running.
Not falling back. Not tactically repositioning.
Running.
Weapons useless. Guns fouled, bolts fused, triggers dead. Every ounce of firepower neutralized before the ambush even hit.
TF141 didn’t stand a chance. Not like this.
They bled through the forest—Soap dragging one leg, Laswell pale and quiet, Krueger cradling his left arm like something inside tore. Roach was coughing blood. Gaz had a knife and nothing else.
Farah supported Alex. Alejandro and Rodolfo held the rear, while Price led by necessity and stubbornness.
And Ghost? Ghost was trying to stop them from crossing one final line.
They saw the porch light flicker through the trees. The edge of a swing. The outline of the home Ghost had spent his whole career protecting—from the world, and sometimes, from himself.
“No,” he said, out loud, sharp.
They kept moving.
“We’re not going in there.”
“We have to,” Price said.
“My kids are asleep in that house.”
“So help us protect them.”
"My wife—” His voice cracked, rage caught in his throat. “You want them to see this? You want her to see me like this?”
No one answered.
But no one stopped either.
Because the truth was already hanging in the air:
This was the only shelter left.
Ghost cursed hard and loud. Then shoved the gate open.
"Ten minutes,” he spat. “Then we’re gone.”
The house welcomed them with silence.
Not empty silence.
The kind that belonged to people sleeping upstairs.
Maggie. The boys—Benji, Cal, Finn.
None of them stirred.
Ghost herded the team into the front room. No one touched the walls. The photo frames. The blanket fort half-folded in the corner.
A few glanced at the pictures.
One frame held a candid—Ghost in civvies, standing stiff beside a fire pit. A woman wrapped around his shoulders. Three muddy boys mid-wrestle.
In the corner: a teenage girl, hoodie too big, braid down one side, face half-obscured as she looked over her shoulder.
Soap paused on that one.
“She real?” he muttered. “Didn’t know Ghost had a daughter.”
Before anyone could answer, it all collapsed.
Glass shattered.
Voices barked.
The house flooded with intruders.
Fifteen. At least.
They moved fast. Precise. Guns up. Confidence bleeding off them like cologne.
TF141 didn’t move. Not with nothing to fight back with.
They were surrounded in seconds.
One man reached for a photo and held it to the light.
“Nice house,” he grinned. “You polish this floor yourself, Riley?”
Another stepped up beside him and tilted the frame.
"Damn. That your missus?” he asked. “She looks sweet.”
“And that girl,” the third one muttered. “That’s the daughter, yeah? Gotta be. Cute thing."
Ghost said nothing.
His shoulders set, teeth clenched behind the mask.
He stood at the base of the stairs, between the monsters and the only people in his life who had never had to see this version of him.
The fourth man looked up. Squinted toward the landing.
“She home tonight?”
“Let’s hope so,” someone else said, slow and slick.
Then:
The door opened.
A soft click. The kind made by a person who didn’t expect company.
The intruders chuckled.
“That time of night,” someone added. “Three a.m.? Probably drunk. Hope she’s cute when she giggles.”
Ghost didn’t move.
He wanted to.
He wanted to kill them.
But he couldn’t—not yet.
“Ah, there she is,” one of them said, turning. “Bet she smells like vodka and teen regret.”
“Maybe she brought her boyfriend,” another added. “We’ll flip a coin.”
“Hell, maybe we’re the party now.”
And then they heard it.
“Рви.”
It was a breath. A syllable.
Most of them didn’t understand the word.
But the ones who did?
Flinched.
Because it was Russian.
And it meant: Tear.
The dogs didn’t bark.
They launched.
Four shapes out of shadow, muscle and fang crashing into hands and wrists and ribs. Rifles hit the floor. One man screamed as teeth tore through his arm. Another staggered, gun tumbling, blood spraying across the tile.
And then—
Click.
The sound came from behind them.
There {{user}} stood, rifle slung over her shoulder, safety off.