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Chapter 7/2 of Skin Of Thunder Nostos And The Knife (previous chapter) (next chapter) (all SOT chapters) (masterlist) Simon 'Ghost' Riley x fem!Reader

“He followed the thread back to you, Ariadne in periwinkle. But the labyrinth was inside him now, and your gaze was the knife that refused to cut him free.”

Downtown London crouched beneath a bruised sky, stained with ink, the darkness slick and suffocating, pressing down like a hand around the throat of God.

The hum of distant traffic sounded like whispers from another life, broken voices weaving through the smog, stitched with the sharp bark of a dog that wouldn’t shut up and the laughter of drunk men who hadn’t yet realised the evening was swallowing them whole.

From his cramped flat, Ghost watched distorted shadows dance across the peeling wallpaper, casted by the streetlamps below. Neon seeped through the blinds like a surgical blade, slicing him open in thin, clinical ribbons of light. Somehow his bed felt smaller tonight. He lay rigid, staring upward at the ceiling, which felt impossibly close, like a coffin lid ready to close.

It was a dull canvas for his mind’s twisted cinema.

He rolled onto his back, the cold mattress creaking beneath him, gaze fixed blankly upwards. Sleep was a luxury long abandoned, replaced by endless nights spent wrestling with demons that wore faces he recognised all too well. Bloodied hands, empty eyes, whispers in the dark. And now, among them, was you. Your voice was a ghost of its own, more persistent than the dead he carried on his back. It lingered like the scent of gunpowder on his fingertips. Because you wanted him to confront himself, but Christ, you had no clue what lay beneath the mask. No bloody clue the Pandora’s box you were desperate to pry open.

It had been four days since he left the base.

Four days hollowed out by silence so thick it pressed against his eardrums like the deep sea, a pressure that didn’t burst him, only crushed. During his voluntary exile, he cleaned his entire flat, not to tidy, but to repent, scrubbing the tiles like they were sins, vacuuming dust from the corners where memory congealed.

He moved through it all like a revenant.

Washing laundry that wasn’t dirty, scrubbing dishes that weren’t stained, cutting his hair with the precision of a soldier dressing a corpse, shopping for groceries in the fog of strangers. He cooked food he didn’t eat. Lit cigarettes he didn’t smoke. Slept with the telly on just to drown out the sound of his own mind clawing at the inside of his skull. Oh, and he drank. A lot. Not to forget, but to remember things differently, until the bottle’s mouth became a confessional, and his silence tasted like rot.

He drank to feel you.

Ghost was clawing at the walls of a cage he built himself. All he could think about was you and he wanted to burn it out. Carve the image of you from his brain with fingernails and whiskey. But it stayed. You stayed. And he hated how badly he wanted to be fourteen again, not because it was easier, but because pain was simpler then.

So he drank until the room spun like a carousel and he could almost see her, his lovely mum, standing in the corner again, hands wringing the hem of her apron. Ghost wanted the pain. He wanted the sting of his father’s hand across his face, sharp and red and real. Wanted the sound of his mother screaming his name through bruised lips and trembling teeth, her voice splitting the tiny kitchen like lightning tearing a house in two. Because for a single, sickening moment, he’d be close enough to reach her again. Just to crawl back to her warmth, to that tragedy of a woman who once kissed his bruises and pressed damp hands to his fevered brow like prayer.

Ghost wanted his mum to tell him what to do with you.

But the dead didn’t answer.

There was no one left to ask. His mother was bone now. Ash and absence. There was no absolution waiting for him in the dark. Only the walls replied, groaning like they were fucking sick of him, too. His flat smelled like disinfectant and smoke, and the only voice left was the one in his head, whispering things he couldn’t outrun.

You are your father’s son.

You are your—

Ghost shifted, fists clenching around rumpled sheets as he forced his eyes shut. He wanted to forget everything, at least for tonight. Yet sleep remained a distant shore, forever receding no matter how fiercely he swam towards it. His ocean of thoughts churned like stormy waves, tossing him mercilessly until he could barely breathe. But he wasn’t afraid of dying. No, he was afraid of wanting to live.

Because it meant he might need you.

As the hours dragged their carcasses across the floor, Ghost found himself teetering on the lip of sleep, that trembling and fevered edge where reality softens just enough to let the rot seep through. He lay there like a body not yet buried, the ceiling above him a void, a mouth with no teeth as the city bled in through the cracks. His eyelids sagged, breath slowing, and for a heartbeat he welcomed it. Finally, that last inch before falling. Sleep wasn’t rest, not for men like him. It was oblivion. And oblivion was holy.

In his dreams, you were in Manchester with him.

It was summer, but the sun was wrong. Somehow it was too sharp, too white and too hungry. It seared everything it touched. Bloody hell, and you were there, laughing on Tommy’s rusted bike, the wind threading your hair into ribbons, your smile the only real thing in that melting place. Your mustard colored dress tangled around your thighs, sweet as blood on milk teeth.

“Come on, Si,” you shrieked joyfully.

Not Ghost. Not Lieutenant. Not sir.

Just Simon.

He was just a boy in this dream. Small, dirt on his kneed, breath hitching in his chest like he hadn’t earned the right to air. And you were you, exactly as you were now, radiant and unreachable, sunlight caught in your lashes, your laughter slicing him open.

You told him to chase you.

And he did.

Because how could he not?

You were his. Even in the wrong time, the wrong skin, the wrong world—

—you were his.

“Wait,” Simon begged, stumbling forward. “You have to stop!”

He ran, barefoot and panting, legs sticky with sweat and panic, the gravel biting into his soles like a thousand tiny needles. You were always just out of reach. And you never looked back. You never slowed down. And the sun—God, it burned. It melted into his dark eyes until all he could see was your outline, blurred and brilliant and cruel.

“I have to go home,” Simon cried out, voice cracking like snapped bone. “He’s gonna be so angry—please, give the bike back—I need to go—he’ll hurt me, please—”

Then his feet tangled—

—and the world tilted.

You never listened.

You never fucking listened.

His mobile buzzed.

Ghost jolted upright, heart kicking like a boot against his ribs, breath stuck in his throat as if he’d just been yanked from the dream by the collar. His phone lit up the room like a morgue drawer opening, cold, white and sterile.

Fuck. He didn’t even remember closing his eyes.

The screen glowed with a number he didn’t recognize. His hand closed around it, knuckles pale with the force of his grip, dread sinking teeth deep into his gut. Only a handful of souls walked this Earth with his personal number and they knew damn well it weren’t for fucking social calls. Emergency only. Life-or-death. So who the fuck was this?

He brought the phone to his ear with a growl.

“Who’s this?”

“Ghost? Is that you?”

His blood turned to ice—no, to shards, jagged slivers scraping through veins suddenly too narrow to carry the weight of his pulse. His gut coiled tight, a sick knot of anger braided with fear.

For a heartbeat, he was certain this wasn’t real, just some cruel, looping dream dragging him back to Manchester, back to the scorching pavement and the echo of your laughter fading down some endless road. A feverish hallucination stitched together by whisky and weariness, taunting him with the only voice he both craved and feared.

Yours. Always yours.

“The fuck is this?”

There was a pause, and then you giggled.

A real one. Not like in his dream, where it was haunting and hollow. No, it was a real laugh, messy, clumsy and unfiltered, followed by a faint snort, like you were half embarrassed by it, and he swore something cracked open in his chest.

“It’s just me,” you said, giggling still. “Jesus, calm down.” The laughter turned sheepish, and Ghost stood up fast, the room spinning a little.

He pressed a palm to the wall to steady himself.

Fucking hell.

This was exactly what he deserved, wasn’t it?

Some divine bloody punishment.

“How’d you get this number?” He snapped, already pacing, muscles coiled tight.

This had to be a dream.

His flat was cold, dark and dead, yet somehow he could still feel the Manchester sun burning his skin, hear your voice like it was stitched into the walls. It didn’t belong here. None of it did. This wasn’t right. No, you weren’t supposed to call him, weren’t supposed to reach him here. This place, this flat, it was his personal grave, buried far beneath the reach of anyone he cared for. Including you.

Especially you.

You hummed, the warmth in your voice frayed at the edges now, softer than before. More vulnerable. It pulled him back to reality. Back to you. “Ah, well—I saved everyone’s number. Emergency contacts, remember? But listen, that’s not important right now, I—”

Ghost stood by the window, parting the blinds with two fingers, peering down into the street below. London stared back, neon glaring, puddles shimmering like pools of mercury beneath the white street lamps. The world felt strangely alien, distant somehow. Unreal. Like he was still trapped in his own head. He dragged a hand down his face, calloused fingertips catching on the stubble at his jaw, urging him to wake up fully.

“I—” you started again, hesitating, your voice dropping to something more fragile, uncertain. “You’re in London, right? Still on leave?”

Ghost’s jaw clenched so tight it made his ears ring.

He didn’t reply, just waited for you to get to the bloody point.

“See, I’m out with my friends and they… well, they’re all a bit tipsy, and—” You murmured, like you were confessing a sin, accompanied by distant laughter, girlish and drunken whispers echoing faintly behind you. “And they said I should call you.”

Ghost blinked hard, frustration pulsing behind his eyes.

He couldn’t believe his ears.

“The fuck are you on about?”

A muffled snort sounded through the line, followed by a feminine voice, still urging you on. You sighed, your sweet voice trembling slightly now, edged with that familiar vulnerability he’d spent days trying to erase from his memory. “I, uhm… told my friends about you. More than I meant to, honestly, and—shit, they convinced me to call.”

Ghost blinked again.

His back hit the wall beside the window, shoulder blades landing with a dull thud. The city below blurred into meaningless shapes. Now, it was your voice that painted everything with meaning, whispering his ruin into the goddamn phone.

There was a long silence on his end.

Not tactical. Not measured. Not the sort of quiet you keep on a stakeout, waiting for the target to show their face. It was the kind of silence that only existed when something cracked open inside you, and everything started pouring out. Except nothing did. Because he didn’t have words for this. Ghost didn’t have tools for it. No briefing, no procedure. Just you, your voice skipping over the line like a stone on dark water, pulling ripples out of places in him that had been still for too fucking long.

“I’m sorry,” you added, quieter now. “I shouldn’t’ve called. It’s just—I thought maybe you wouldn’t pick up, and then you did and—oh, now I feel stupid.”

Ghost exhaled through his nose, slow and sharp.

“Hang up, then,” he muttered, low. “Spare us both the fuckin’ trouble.”

It was cruel.

He knew it in the marrow of his bones, in the echo of his mother’s voice warning him about kindness turned into knife, but still, he didn’t stop. He couldn’t. Because every second your voice bled through the phone, every syllable trembled like a bloody memory soaked in salt, it scraped something raw inside him. Peeled him back to sinew and sin, to the tender flesh he’d buried beneath drink, beneath distance, beneath the grit of pretending he didn’t care.

You were a wound speaking in ruin. A siren dragging its nails down the inside of his ribcage. And with each breath you gave him, he bled a little more—

—because you didn’t hang up.

Instead, you continued. “I guess I just wanted to ask—I mean, I just wanted to know if you’re alright. That you’re—you know. That you’re okay. I mean, I—”

“Fuckin’ hell,” he muttered, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “You pissed?”

“…Uhm, maybe a little.” You giggled again, softer this time, like you knew you were on thin ice, like you knew the weight of his name on your tongue might break you both. “But not that drunk. Not—I mean, not wasted or anything. Just—uhm, comfortably tipsy.”

“Don’t call me pissed out your skull and tell me you’re not.”

“I’m not pissed,” you objected childishly.

“You’re slurrin’, love.”

You went quiet. Ghost rubbed his eyes.

Your voice dropped then, barely audible now. “I just—I dunno. You disappeared. Again. And I guess I thought maybe—maybe I said too much. Or didn’t say enough. And I couldn’t—”

Ghost turned away from the window, dragging a hand through his short, damp hair. He paced. The floorboards creaked under his bare feet like dry bone. The air in the apartment had grown thick, warmer somehow, like your voice had soaked into the wallpaper, into the floor, into the hollow of his fucking throat.

“Listen—”

“I’m not good at this,” you interrupted suddenly. “At—at knowing what’s too far. Or what’s okay. I just—I just wanted to know that you’re alright.” Your words stumbled out, heavy with nerves and the weight of whatever drink had made you bold enough to call him. “I’ve always been like this. Since I was a kid. Oversharing, I mean. Saying too much. Being too much. My dad used to say I’d get myself hurt if I—but I—I can’t live like that, Simon. I never could. And maybe I’m a fool for it, but I—”

Ghost stopped pacing.

He should’ve told you to sod off. Should’ve hung up. Cut the cord before it tangled further. But he couldn’t. Bloody hell, not when you sounded like that. Not when your voice hit him like shrapnel to the ribs. Ghost exhaled, slow and deep, the sound dragging from the pit of his stomach like something dying. You didn’t even realise what you were doing to him, did you? You never did. You never fucking understood the damage you dealt—

—sweetly, softly, unintentionally.

“Comin’ to get you,” he muttered.

“What?” you breathed, caught off guard.

“Fuck’s sake, just stay where you are,” Ghost said again, firmer this time, already grabbing the jet black shirt from the back of his chair and pulled it on over his head with a rough jerk. “Don’t leave. I’ll come get you.”

“Wait, you don’t have to—”

“Don’t care. Stay put.”

He bent to grab his worn jeans, yanked them on with fingers that moved like muscle memory, like ritual, breath catching slightly as the room tilted for half a second. His stubborn hangover still clung to the back of his skull like dried blood, but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered now but getting to you. His boots sat by the door with military precision, laced tight, waiting like loyal dogs as he stepped into them.

“You don’t have to—” you tried again. “I shouldn’t’ve called. I’m sorry—”

But he wasn’t listening. Not really.

He was already moving, slamming his baseball cap low over his eyes and dragging his black surgical mask up over the lower half of his face, the fabric familiar against his skin, a quiet veil he could breathe behind. He yanked his coat from the hook by the door and shoved his arms through the sleeves, movement fast and angry, as if he could somehow outpace the ache coiled behind his sternum. His fingers flew through the motions as he threw up his hood like they were made for this—preparation, protection, damage control.

“Name of the pub?” he barked, voice hoarse.

“Er—Hold on.” You fumbled with the phone. There were irritating noises in the background. Music, laughter, some bloke yelling about tequila like it was the Second Coming. Then your voice came back, clearer but nervous. “The Grey Mare. It’s off Meard Street. Soho.”

“I’ll be there in twenty.”

“But Simon—”

He hung up before you could say anything else.

Before he could.

The phone slid into his pocket.

He needed both hands free. For the wheel. For the weight of this choice. For the hollow in his chest that had started to echo when he heard your voice again. The stairwell reeked of mildew and cigarettes. Every step echoed as he descended. The night had grown colder, it bit sharper, like it knew something was about to change.

Like it wanted to see it bleed.

The London streets were slick with rain.

Ghost didn’t remember getting in the car. Didn’t remember the way his fingers curled around the door handle like they were choking it, knuckles white. He just drove. He gripped the wheel tighter than necessary as he pulled out of his narrow street, headlights smearing across wet brick and dark pavement. Soho wasn’t far, but the drive stretched like wire under tension, each red light another nail through the heart. Rain flicked against the windscreen in nervous bursts, like even the sky couldn’t decide if it should cry or not.

His hands trembled on the gearshift.

Just once. Just for a moment.

Fuck. What the hell was he doing?

He should’ve never let this happen. He should’ve told you to go home. He should’ve stayed in his flat and let the memory of you dissolve like aspirin in the morning. Should’ve never let you near him. Should’ve built the wall higher. Should’ve scorched the bloody ground beneath his feet before letting you step close.

But then he remembered your voice.

I just wanted to know that you’re alright.

He didn’t know what he was going to say.

Ghost didn’t have a speech ready, no tactical approach to this situation. But you’d called him. After everything. After the silence, the argument, the look in your eyes when you’d told him you were done begging him to be human.

He parked half a block away, somewhere off Wardour Street, the kind of alley where piss and perfume lingered in equal measure. He killed the engine, shoved the door open, and stepped into the night. He stepped out into the wet, cold air, shoulders hunched against the drizzle, hands in his pockets. The streets were busy with bodies spilling from clubs and kebab shops, people blending into the Friday night. He moved like a shadow, weaving through it all, ears tuned to the cadence of your voice.

Ghost didn’t need to ask where you were.

He knew, knew before the turn, before the light changed. He felt you before he saw you, like gravity bending toward a star. He could’ve found you blindfolded in a burning city, through fog or fire or riot, guided by some merciless tether buried in his ribs. Even if a hundred hands dragged him back, even if they carved him down to bone—

—he’d still find you.

And there you were.

Perched on a bench outside the pub like some forgotten deity from a myth no one had written yet. One foot tucked beneath you, phone gripped in both hands like it might float away, head bowed beneath the soft blur of city lights. That daft periwinkle coat you always wore clung to you, sleeves darkened at the cuffs from the damp. Your hair was a halo of chaos, twisted back in that way you always did when you weren’t trying, but still managed to look divine. And your cheeks glowed like you’d stolen fire from the gods and didn’t know where to put it.

Your top glittered, sequins catching the amber light like a sky swallowing itself into dusk and shimmering like spilled stardust. Red, violet and indigo, colours he never thought could look holy on skin. But they did. On you, they did. A fucking galaxy written across your chest. You didn’t look real. You looked like a siren mid-breath, a goddess waiting at the edge of war, soft and unbothered while men burned for the right to kneel.

You looked unholy in your softness.

Like a cathedral dressed in neon—

—a saint cloaked in sin.

Ghost froze.

Something in him broke open.

Ghost felt the weight of you like revelation, like prophecy etched into bone. In that moment, all he wanted, all he needed, was to press his face between your thighs, to disappear into the scent and heat of you, to be unmade in your softness and drowned in the sacred altar where your warmth lived. Not for pleasure. Not for sin. But for absolution. To be ruined by you in the most reverent way a man could ask for. As if the only peace left in this goddamn world waited there. As if his salvation was the sound of you gasping his name.

His boots scuffed the wet pavement, and your head snapped up.

Eyes wide. Lips parted.

Like you hadn’t really believed he’d come.

Ghost stopped a few feet away, soaked through the shoulders already, staring down at you through rain and neon. He didn’t speak. He didn’t have to.

Your voice broke the quiet. “Jesus Christ. You really came.”

He stared at you for a long moment, chest burning with something ancient and endless.

“Told you to stay put, didn’t I?”

You huffed a laugh and looked away, embarrassed. “I did.”

He stepped closer. “You still drunk?”

You shook your head. “No.”

Ghost sighed. “Alright?”

“I don’t know,” you said. And it wasn’t a lie.

Another breathless beat dragged through the rain, each drop ticking like a slow countdown off the brim of his cap.

You looked up at him, eyes wide, searching, as if you couldn’t quite tell what story his silence would choose to write this time. Would it be rejection? Would it be the cold turn of his back, boots retreating into shadow while the night swallowed you whole? You looked at Ghost like you expected punishment, like you feared he might vanish with the rain and take your name with him. And God, he almost did. Almost turned. Almost broke.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he said, voice low, “C’mon. Let’s get you home.”

A pause.

Then you rose, slowly, like the earth itself had to loosen its grip on you. The hem of your coat fluttered in the breathless hush between raindrops, and your hand slipped your phone into your pocket with a finality that made Ghost’s lungs tighten. You didn’t speak. You didn’t have to. The moment stretched, quiet and trembling, as you lingered beside him, your eyes lifting to meet his dark ones beneath the wet brim of his cap.

And oh, how you searched him.

Like you were looking for the path home in the wreckage of his face. For mercy, maybe. For the echo of that tenderness he buried so carefully. For a flicker of warmth he’d let slip once, too rare to trust, too sacred to name. Nostos, the old word whispered somewhere in the cradle of your gaze. The ache of return. Not to a place, but to a person. To him.

And then, you whispered, barely audible, “You look like shit, sir.”

Ghost huffed. Almost smiled.

Almost.

“You too.”

“You were the Iliad, he the ash after the fire. He brought the blade back with him, yes—but left the hand that held it.” Skin of Thunder Chapters