Ghosts of the Past (A Call Of Duty: Ghosts Fanfiction)

Chapter Fifteen

"Where are they?"

    My eyes flickered open to reveal a dim lightbulb swinging, jaw so incredibly sore and stiff from the blows. My head throbbed, no screeched, in protest from the loud, booming voice of my interrogator. The mustiness of the room was barely noticeable over the stench of my own blood which stung my nostrils.

    I'd been out for a while. I didn't know for how long, but I did know my brain had been kind enough to envelope me in a dream, a more pleasant one than this. The interrogator had repeatedly beat me in and out of consciousness, almost controlling it to his liking. I could barely remember the questions through my daze, my daydream of what could've happened with Kayla Hurst. 

    I remembered clambering out of The Pit and sneaking around with a broken wrist. The trek up the side of the hill....reaching the car only to be intercepted by Rorke. I remember being shot—my ankle still burned as I thought about it—and then being taken back to this horrid place. Ropes were bound tightly and then this man entered to put me through hell. I remembered my mission and those behind it. I remembered how absolutely fucked I was....

    "I'll put you out again if you don't answer." 

    His voice was like a hiss in my ears as he dipped down next to them from behind me. I blinked and swallowed, my throat and sinuses sore from the force of water rushing through them. I knew I would have bruises from being hit and swelling from them too. 

    I wished for my mind to take me back to the world it'd created to try and protect me. It was something my child brain had often done as I grew and went through situations with my father. It was a coping mechanism of sorts and a way my mind shut off the danger around me. 

    Rorke offering help and being kind had been a mere hallucination. Carter, Jase, and the rest of the situation had been fake. A figment of imagination working to try and shield me from the hell I was enduring. 

    "I-I don't know," I didn't even recognize my voice as it spoke. "I barely know anything." 

    It was a first in the time I'd been down in the dark room—it felt like days honestly—that my torturer allowed me to speak. He'd broken me and it hadn't even been hard. 

    "How do you not know?" the large man circled around me like a predator, brown eyes glossy with a hunger to inflict more pain. 

    "I was only there two weeks maybe," my chest hurt yet not because of physical blows; I was letting the Ghosts down and it hurt worse than any throbbing ache I had. "They never included me in meetings or...." I swallowed, "....important things." 

    The hard eyes of the soldier strayed to a dark window to the side of the room. I coughed once, drawing his attention back to my bloodied and broken self. He straightened, eyeing the next tool he wanted to use to cut me, burn me, or whatever the fuck he decided. 

    "Please," I murmured, salty and stinging tears dripping out of my green eyes. "Don't. I've told you everything." 

    The silence was heavy. I could only hear myself heaving for air and in a constant state of anxiety. 

    "If you have nothing else to contribute, then I will make this quick....only because you made this easy for me." 

    Dread spread through me and I let out a moan of defeat as my head rocked back. Heavy and full of guilt, I felt my body shudder. The interrogator moved to pick up a knife, feeling the sharpness of it between his fingertips. His form reappeared alongside and then in front of me which caused my muscles to lift my head back to center. 

    Do not show your pain....hide your weakness. 

    It was Keegan's soldierly voice that rang in my ears. He'd never spoken such words toward me but it sounded like something he would order. It made my chin raise and eyes to grow a bit brighter.