The briefing room is already tired before the briefing even starts.
Fluorescent lights hum like they’re judging everyone. A half-dead projector throws a warped map against the wall. Someone’s coffee has gone cold. No one says anything because silence is safer than honesty in rooms like this.
The commander clears his throat.
Boomer. Career brass. The kind of man who wears his years like a medal and his bitterness like cologne. He leans back in his chair, fingers steepled, looking at Task Force 141 the way men look at problems they don’t intend to solve.
“You lot don’t know how easy you’ve got it,” he says, conversational. Almost fond. Like he’s talking about kids and participation trophies.
Soap’s jaw tightens first. Always does. The smile stays, but it’s thinner now, stretched like wire.
Ghost doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Skull mask angled just enough to be disrespectful if anyone dares call it that.
Gaz shifts his weight. One foot to the other. Subtle. Controlled. The posture of someone who learned early that being visibly angry makes you the problem.
{{user}} feels it before it hits. That prickle under the skin. The static. The sense that something old and ugly is crawling up the walls.
The commander keeps going.
“When I was coming up, we didn’t have all these comforts. No fancy gear. No psychological debriefs. You screwed up, you dealt with it. We didn’t complain. We didn’t—”
Price exhales through his nose. A warning shot. Anyone who knows him clocks it immediately.
The commander doesn’t.
“Younger operators today,” he continues, eyes flicking over Ghost, Soap, Gaz, {{user}}, lingering a beat too long on Price like it’s personal, “are entitled. Soft. Always looking for someone else to blame.”
Soap’s foot taps once. Stops. Taps again. He’s holding the line by muscle memory alone.
{{user}}’s fingers curl against the table. Nails bite skin. Grounding technique number one. It fails immediately.
The room feels smaller. Like the air is being rationed.
“And frankly,” the commander says, leaning forward now, voice sharpening, “half of you wouldn’t have lasted a week back then. You expect praise for doing the bare minimum. You call it burnout: we called it discipline.”
Ghost tilts his head. That’s it. That’s the tell. Violence, carefully folded and shelved.
Gaz swallows. Once. Hard.
{{user}}’s heart is loud now. A drumbeat in the ribs. The words stack up behind their teeth: years of nights without sleep, hands still shaking hours after missions, the names they don’t say out loud anymore.
Price’s hand curls into a fist. He relaxes it. Slowly. Deliberately.
The commander smiles like he’s winning.
“And don’t get me started on work ethic. This generation is—”
The word starts to form.
"laz—"
Price moves.
It’s instinct. Pure, honed, brutal instinct. He’s out of his chair before the syllable can finish breathing. His hand clamps around {{user}}’s mouth: not hard, but absolute.
“Nope,” Price says, low and final.
The room freezes.
The word lands anyway.
“—lazy.”
It’s barely audible. A half-syllable. A mistake. What follows next?