Home - COD Simon Ghost Riley X Female OC

Chapter 29 ALTERNATE ENDING PART 1

And I'm damned if I do, and damned if I don'tSo here's to drinks in the dark, and the end of my ropeAnd I'm ready to suffer, and I'm ready to hurtIt's a shot in the dark, and right at my throat

***From way back when they were imprisoned together, the first third will look familiar. It does not alter the original events that followed, think of it as an alternate timeline. Part 2 will be posted directly after this, and then back to your regularly scheduled programming***

Simon didn't sleep. Mariana wept herself into a nightmare at some point and he held her until she woke again. Her small apologies were the only real words they shared for the rest of the night.

He had thought for hours about what would go down that day. He would be made to stand and appear menacing and dangerous, which he knew how to do. He wondered if they realized that they were the ones in danger. He knew how to escape from a predicament in which he had a gun to his back. It didn't usually involve a woman in his arms but he could make it work. And if he took a bullet on the move, he would still have a few minutes to maneuver her away from them and to safety, worst case scenario.

He had a fantasy in which she killed the falcon, in which she ruined him the way he had attempted and failed to ruin her. But it was risky and he didn't want her to have blood on her hands.

His now battered heart couldn't stop worrying about Soap, that the only goodbye they really had was standing next to each other, watching Mariana. If he got to see the Sergeant again, he would tell him that they were friends. He didn't care that he would be crossing his own lines. Only a few people meant to him what the Scotsman did, sharing trust and easy companionship. It would destroy him to think that Johnny had died not knowing that.

They drew it out. No one came in to feed them. Mariana stirred and sat up, her hips stiff from straddling him, and was immediately awash with guilt for sleeping their last night away. Simon could see the lone red light from the camera in the corner glint off the tears on her cheeks. He reached for her face and wiped them away. He wished he could tell her to stop, but she wasn't whining, and she wasn't panicked. He couldn't justify the urge. Maybe it was because it was making him feel like crying, too. She had lost her hope, something he still held a thin thread of, and that was a heavy load for him to bear. She had built her entire survival on that hope. The best he could think to do was destroy every single person that dared to try and take it away from her. He worried that he was a part of that. Maybe that's where the sacrificial urge came from. To make it right.

"We're a team." He told her. "Okay?"

She nodded. She had no fight left. "Thank you."

"How's your leg?" She asked him, what must have been hours later.

He ran his hand over the bandage wound tightly around his thigh. He had changed the wrapping himself while she was gone last. It didn't feel great, it hadn't been cared for like he knew it needed to be, but the stitches had held. It was warm to the touch which would be alarming if he thought they were going to have to sit there another day.

"It's alright."

It couldn't have been but a few minutes later, the door opened. Simon didn't look at who came through, he kept his eyes on her so he could see the shape of her face in the light that came in with them. And then he stood, taller than any of the four men that walked in. Mariana looked up at Simon for a second but stayed seated, content to let him intimidate them.

One of them reached for her like he would take her arm and pull her up. Simon stepped forward, his chain scraping on the ground. The man stood back up quickly, and Mariana pulled herself up on her own. She looked up at him again. He was pale, dark circles framed his eyes, and he looked every bit the ghost they thought he was. He didn't need the mask.