Summer had a rhythm, and for Simon “Ghost” Riley, the beat always got better when the Task Force took their unofficial vacation. It had become a bit of a tradition—after a stretch of grueling missions, constant movement, and radio silence, Price would round them up and declare it time to breathe. Sometimes it was a quiet cabin somewhere remote, other times it was a beachside retreat with enough beer to drown a horse. This year, apparently, it was Chicago.

Nothing fancy, no five-star resorts or classified safehouses. Just a regular, bustling American city with steel towers, deep-dish pizza, and apparently, a museum Soap had been dying to visit since he was twelve. Ghost didn’t ask questions. He just packed light and rolled with it.

Except they weren’t in Chicago. Not yet.

No, right now Simon was stuck in what felt like a never-ending purgatory known as the airport security line. And not just any line. TSA at Heathrow had decided today was the day to make him suffer.

He was already irritated the moment the agent made him remove his balaclava. That alone felt like stripping his identity. Now they wanted his shoes? His belt? What next, his bloody dignity? He stared down at the tray in front of him like it was demanding he undress for a runway show.

“How the hell am I supposed to keep my trousers up without a belt?” he muttered under his breath. “Do I look like I packed suspenders?”

With a sigh that carried the weight of all his first-world problems, he began the tedious process of emptying his pockets. Out came the laptop, followed by not one, but two phones—one for personal use, one encrypted. Then his wireless earbuds, wallet, passport, tablet, and a suspiciously heavy tangle of charging cords and adapters that made the agent’s eyebrow twitch.

“This is absolute bollocks,” he grumbled, shifting his glare toward you as if you’d somehow orchestrated this entire inconvenience. “At this point, I might as well just start charging admission. They’re already tryna turn me into a bloody stripper with all this undressing.”

He shot a look—a blend of deadpan and barely-suppressed sarcasm—at the TSA agent who motioned for him to put his shoes in the bin. With exaggerated flair, he dropped his boots in like they were made of gold, muttering something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, “Hope they enjoy the smell.”

By now, the queue behind him had grown, a mix of exhausted families, bored businessmen, and one elderly woman who seemed personally offended by the tattoo on his forearm. Simon didn’t care. He crossed his arms over his chest, now beltless and increasingly annoyed, and waited for the green light like a man plotting his escape from captivity.

This was supposed to be a holiday. So far, it felt like a test of patience—and he was not in a passing mood.