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Ghost died when Johnny died. Not in the literal sense, although Ghost found himself wishing that he had.
No, this was worse. It was like the life had been drained from Ghost’s world. His sense dulled, or maybe there just wasn’t much to feel anymore. The food he ate tasted more bland than it had before, the already-colorless base seemed still less lively. You never really appreciate how much you have until it’s gone.
Ghost never slept in his room. He claimed Johnny’s room as his own, and if he wasn’t there, he could usually be found on the roof, staring at the sky like he was looking for something. He hadn’t been on a mission since Johnny’s death, being deemed unfit with his inability to focus, react, do anything.
Price was worried. Ghost knew it- he wasn’t blind to the concern on Price’s face when he caught Ghost picking at his food during meals. But thankfully, he seemed to know that nothing good would come of bringing it up. All he could do was look the other way when Ghost switched rooms without authorization and changed the guns he used, because then he was at least doing something.
He would lay for hours in Johnny’s bed, pillow clutched to his chest like he was a scared child. And Ghost certainly felt like one. He had no clue what to do with himself. He couldn’t make himself do anything anyways- his limbs felt like lead, his stomach like a never-ending pit. He never felt real anymore, his movements always delayed, and living felt like he was disconnected from his body. On the days he could get up, he’d try to eat, but found no point. What was he eating for anyway? To keep his body alive, functioning? Why should he bother? He was sick of being a soldier, he was angry that being a soldier was what killed Johnny. Could he even call himself a soldier if he couldn’t even protect the one person he ever truly loved?
Ghost wanted to run, but he knew there was no way to run from this. No matter where he went, he’d never forget him. He doubted he’d ever find a reason to live- Johnny had become more vital to his existence than air, food, sleep, anything. He didn’t know when that happened, didn’t know when he’d begun to take the man’s presence for granted. Oh, but what he wouldn’t give to have his Johnny back. He would have done anything, anything at all, just to say goodbye. To tell him how much he meant to Simon.
It wasn’t fair. He wanted to be angry, but he didn’t know how to be. He was mad at Makarov, at Soap, at himself. Surely he could’ve done something. He should have done something.
He cried in Johnny’s bed because it was the closest thing he could get to his arms, woke in the middle of the night with his hands reaching for just one last touch, for any bit of contact. Of course, his grasping hands never found purchase, and he’d feel the pillow beneath him grow wet with tears as he tried desperately to pretend that Johnny was just outside the door, that Ghost would be able to bump his shoulder to Johnny’s like he always had.
He truly had never cried as much as he did now. He’d never really mourned, and now he was sorely unsure of what to do with himself. Sometimes his whole body would shudder, chest heaving as he gasped into the pillow that now smelled only faintly of Johnny. Sometimes he couldn’t cry, staring at the trinkets Johnny had collected- a piece of sea glass, a unicorn figurine, a Scottish flag, the photos of the 141. Sometimes he’d lay there, motionless, as tears silently dripped onto the bedding beneath him.
Ghost became the definition of his callsign. If he ever left Johnny’s room, he would be silent, eyes never really focusing on anything anyone else could see. More than a few of the members would get scared shitless when they went to get water at 4 in the morning only to find Ghost sitting at the table, staring at the seat Johnny always sat in.
By the time TF 141 had received a tip on Makarov’s whereabouts, Ghost was a shell of a man. He rarely ever left Johnny’s room, and never went to the mess hall. The moment he’d heard the rumors about Makarov, he was in Price’s office, demanding to be told what he knew. And Price had told him- there wasn’t much to go off of, just some coordinates and a date. A group was being assembled- Ghost hadn’t been the only one who wanted revenge.
It was surprising when he didn’t ask to go, though. Price would’ve let him, if he’d asked. But once Ghost knew, he’d just left, gone back to Johnny’s room.
“Where ever you go
My heart will follow.”
The next morning, Ghost was gone. It was like he’d never been there, his belongings all in the same place as they had been when Johnny had died, only really missing some clothes from his closet that Ghost had rotated through throughout the months. Johnny’s room was left similarly- his clothes were the only thing gone- and a photo, but no one other than Ghost or Johnny himself would’ve noticed its absence from where it was taped under the bedframe.
“I love you so
I’ll be true to you
Take my love with you
To any port or foreign shore.”
Three weeks passed before Price received news that Makarov was dead. A single shot to the head had done him in, but not before two words had been brutally carved into virtually any and every available space of skin; For Johnny. The carvings were deep, precise, and made anyone who looked at them shudder just imagining how it must’ve felt.
“Darling you must feel for sure
I’ll be true to you.”
Ghost was never heard from again, but his knapsack containing the missing clothes and a single photograph of two men–Simon “Ghost” Riley and John “Soap” MacTavish–was discovered a short week later, at the same cliff they’d scattered Johnny’s ashes on.
“Soldier boy,
oh my little soldier boy,
I’ll.
be
true.
to.
you.”