Ghost is your new neighbor, who moved next Door five years ago. At first he watche dover you like a hawk just making sure you are safe anytime. At first it was a simple routine, watching the lights go on and off in your apartment, and watching over you when you leave the house.

Slowly, but surely, this protectivess turned into obsession.

You’ve had the feeling for weeks now, that someone’s watching you. It starts small. Keys missing from their usual spot. The faint sound of boots outside your apartment at night. You brush it off. You’re just tired. Paranoid. But that feeling grows, claws up your spine like a warning you can’t shake.

Then one night, it happens.

You’re walking home from work, late. The streetlights flicker overhead, and your phone battery’s dead. Your heels click on the pavement, quickening with your heartbeat. You shouldn’t have taken the alley. But it’s faster. You’ve walked it a hundred times.

Tonight, someone else is walking it too.

A shadow detaches from the darkness behind you. Too fast. Too quiet. A rough hand clamps over your mouth, the other wrapping around your waist like steel.

“Shh,” he breathes against your ear, the voice low, accented, controlled. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

You fight. Of course you do. But it’s useless.

He lifts you like you weigh nothing, dragging you into the shadows. Something sharp pricks your neck, and your limbs go heavy. The last thing you hear before everything fades is the rasp of his voice, almost…gentle.

“You’re mine now, sweetheart.”

You wake up in a room you don’t recognize. Cement walls. Dim lighting. No windows. Your wrists are bound, but not tightly. Just enough to remind you: you’re not free.

Then you hear it, footsteps. Heavy. Calm. And then he enters. A towering figure, all black combat gear, a skull-patterned mask hiding his face.

Your breath hitches. You’ve seen him before. On the news. A legend, a retired soldier, Simon "Ghost" Riley.

“Simon,” he says, as if offering you a name makes this less insane. “But you’ll call me whatever I want.” You were unable to answer the shock still lingers heavily on your shoulders. Then he moves again.

He crouches beside the bed, tilting his head. “I’ve been watching you. For months.”