Ashes in the Darkness

Love and Hate

Ghost watched Kate's upper lip flex with fury, something he seldom saw in her face before. She was always so calm and collected, stoic, and sober, but her emotions popped through that mask now. "Completely off the grid," she answered.

"We'll find him," Price said with his fingers encircling the top of his empty glass. "He'll pop up at some point.

"We have bigger fish to fry," Laswell said. Although the alcohol was in her system, her face remained sober as she turned to Price with a serious look. John Price's eyes furrowed together in a pleading look that said, 'please don't tell me there is another missile.' But Laswell fingers tapped the wooden board of the bar eagerly, "I've been trying to dig up as much as possible on the Russians that attacked that convoy."

"That's a dirty job," Price said, pounding his empty glass on the bar. The bartender looked down at him, already dreading pouring another glass. "Kate this is over, let it be."

"It's the same group John," Kate ignored Price's plea to end this, ruffling through her pockets, "the same men who ambushed you in Kootenai, who traded Alex for the missiles, who have been pushing drugs for the Las Almas cartel. They are an ultranationalist group, and they have a new leader..." Taking out a picture of a man she handed it over to Captain Price.

Price's eyes squinted and then glazed over as he stopped breathing, as he slowly raised his glare back to Kate he hesitated for a moment. He recognized exactly who was in the photo, and for all the fucking oxygen he had been on the last few days in the hospital, he felt like he couldn't catch his breath. "He's not new."

"What?"

Setting the photograph face down, Price passed it down the bar. First to Gaz who furrowed his eyebrows together in question, curious and confused at the man in the picture. It slid to Soap next who nodded in disbelief, purple eye sockets only seeming to get deeper. It passed the Ghost who refused to pick it up at first, not sure if he wanted to put a face to Jamie's killer. But darkness seeped from his tear ducts and fingertips, dribbling all over the bar top, saturating the ether around him. He grabbed the picture and saw the eyes first, a mirror image of his own, filled with darkness and hatred... but also faith. Faith drenched the high cheekbones and slick black hair, he was handsome, and clean. Everything a sadistic man would be. Ghost stared and stared, imagining what it would be like to bash his face in the same way he did Hassan's. So, this was the man responsible for ripping Jamie's body apart and putting her in a grave? Oh, how he was already fantasizing about the hunt for him, the bloodlust already warming his body and making his spine shiver with excitement.

Swinging his eyes back to Price, he let himself sadistically smile under the mask once more. Not a smile of happiness, not like the smile he gave Jamie in the forest after they made love. No, this smile was evil, cruel, and vengeful. His neck cracked as he passed the picture back to Price. "His name?"    Laswell asked, seemingly confused at the recognition from Price and then his obvious fear.

Breathing in deeply through his nose, he downed the next glass of whiskey and slammed it on the bar. Leaning closer to Kate, he smirked just slightly, "Makarov."

One Week Later-

Ghost stood at attention facing Captain Price's desk with a twinge of summer sweat soaking into his mask. A violent guitar riff stuck in his head as he watched John take his time on the computer, shuffling around papers, groaning, and then shuffling around papers again. Something was bothering him, like someone picking at a scab over and over again. Ghost knew the feeling; the same feeling had been scratching away at his insides too. Things had felt like a fever dream since they had taken out Hassan and stopped the missile over Chicago, his mind replaying Jamie's death, pounding Hassan's face in, him getting stitched up at the Chicago hospital, sitting in that bar watching the aftermath of their near miss.