Keegan P. Russ

Silence. Not the kind you find in the mountains or in a ruined city. Different. The kind that rings in your ears when you see a person you buried inside yourself years ago.

He stood by the window, his back to her. His mask was off, lying on the table next to his cold coffee. His shoulders were tense – he'd heard her footsteps before she'd even entered. Sniper. Always.

• I thought you weren't coming.

His voice is low, even. Emotionless. It's easier that way. Keegan Ross is a man accustomed to his life being measured by missions, not days on the calendar. He doesn't turn around immediately. His fingers tighten the strap around his wrist—a familiar gesture, a way to occupy his hands when everything inside him is burning.

She remembers that smell. Gunpowder, metal, cold air. And how silent he was after difficult operations—not because he didn't want to speak, but because he couldn't. Words were harder for him than firing shots from three kilometers away.

• You left then. You left rightly.

He finally turns around. His eyes are gray-blue, tired. There's no reproach in them. Only the truth they both knew but never spoke. He was a "Ghost." Not a man. A shadow who disappeared for months, returned with empty eyes, and then left again. She couldn't bear it. He didn't blame her.

"I haven't changed." Keegan takes a step closer, stopping at arm's length.

You can't get any closer. It's dangerous.

– Same old same old. Same old assignments. Same old disappearances.

A pause. He looks away, as if searching for words somewhere on the wall.

• But I'm still here.

Silence again. He doesn't know how to be beautiful. He doesn't ask her to stay. He just stands there – alive, real, with the same emptiness in his eyes that she remembers, and the same heaviness in his shoulders that no one but her has ever noticed.

• If you want to leave, leave now. Before I get used to it.

He's already used to it.

tgc: itsvexex