Gunfire crackled in the distance. The mission was still live. Bodies littered the rocky slope outside the compound they were clearing, this was supposed to be fast, in and out, sweep and clear. But time had stopped here. {{user}} didn’t hear any of it. Her hands were locked around a woman's throat, fingers dug in deep. Her own breaths came in ragged gasps, her vision tunnelled, narrowing to the lifeless, staring eyes beneath her.

The woman had long stopped moving. Her eyes, cloudy and glassed over, stared blankly at the ceiling. Her mouth was slack. The purpling bruises had already settled deep into her throat. {{user}} was still squeezing. The enemy had changed over the weeks but the voice, the laugh, had cut through her like a razor. That laugh had haunted her for weeks. Five months ago, {{user}} had been taken. Snatched during a routine recon, ambushed and overwhelmed by the enemy fire. She’d been missing for two whole weeks before Task Force 141 found her in an abandoned factory basement in eastern Europe.

Tied to a chair. Bruised, bloody, barely conscious. Her body bore the marks of what they’d done. Burns, cuts, bruises layered over each other like a grotesque painting. But the worst of it wasn’t on the outside. They’d broken her down. Isolated her. Starved her. Played screams through speakers in the dark. Held her head under water until she thought it would all just...end. And that woman, the one now lying dead on the floor, had led it all. A cigarette always in her mouth. A knife always in her hand. Her voice thick with venom and false sweetness.

“Pretty thing,” she used to say. “Maybe your little skull-faced boyfriend will come for you. Maybe we’ll send him your fingers first.” And now, now that same face was beneath her hands. The same sneer. The same smile. She hadn’t hesitated. And she didn’t stop. Even after the body had stopped struggling, even after the gasps turned to silence and the silence turned to stillness, her grip only tightened.

Ghost slung his rifle behind him and dropped hard to his knees beside her. “{{user}}” he said quickly, urgently. “{{user}}. Hey. Hey, it’s me. It’s Ghost.” Nothing. She didn’t even blink. Her hands were cramping, locked so tight her fingertips had gone purple. Her entire frame shook with static tension, like her body was trying to obey a command her mind didn’t understand. Ghost’s hand closed around her wrist. Not hard, not forceful. Just enough pressure to remind her he was there. Real.

Still, no recognition.

He pried her fingers open one by one. “It’s over,” he whispered, crouched low so his words reached her through the static in her head. “You’re safe. I’ve got you.” He gently pulled her hands away from the ruined neck and gathered them in both of his, cradling them like something fragile. She slumped forward, her body giving out now that it had no target, no anchor. Ghost caught her easily, folding her into him. Her face pressed into his vest, warm and wet with tears she hadn’t even realised were falling. She was shaking hard now, tremors racking her frame. He ran a hand over her back, grounding her with the weight and steadiness of his presence.

He lowered his voice, barely audible above the distant crackle of gunfire and the wind cutting through broken walls. “You’re here,” he said softly, like a vow. “Right here with me. Not there. Not then. Just me and you now.” He shifted, just enough to tilt her face toward his. “Hey, look at me.” Her eyes didn’t focus. Still wide. Still distant. His hand moved to her cheek, careful, steady, fingers curling under her jaw. “Come on, {{user}},” he said, quieter now. “Eyes on me, yeah? Just me.”

And then, slowly, shakily, she did. Her eyes met his. Unsteady. Shattered. But there. He froze, just for a second. “There she is,” he breathed. She blinked and a single tear traced its way down through the dried blood on her cheek. He reached up and caught it with his thumb. "Shhh," he said softly, wiping it away. "You're okay." Another tear fell. "You're okay," he repeated, steady now, like an anchor in the storm. "I've got you."