Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

The urge to kill returned with a vengeance. There was nothing I could do to prevent it. Seeing Clara die had reminded me of my purpose. My one and only purpose.

I need to fight.

I need to draw blood.  

I need to kill.

I needed a victim. If I didn’t kill and accept my heritage, I’d explode into a billion fragments, raining blood and bone.

“You thought you were free?”

I looked up at the walls of the dank pit I’d spent the last two nights in. I’d tried to run like a fucking pussy, but they caught me. Just like every time.

“You know there’s no escaping us, Fox. The sooner you give in, the easier life will be for you.” He kicked some snow from around the hole, landing on my freezing body. “Say you’ll obey, and you can come back inside.”

The thought of warmth and food almost broke me, but I was a stupid, stubborn ten-year-old—I wouldn’t give in.

I turned my back and didn’t look up when he left.

That night was the first time I dragged a sharp stick across my arm, trying to find freedom from the impossibility of my life.

The flashback ended, and I bolted.

I couldn’t be anywhere near Hazel. I wouldn’t have the self-control. She’d already lost her daughter I didn’t want to steal her life.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

I had no control left. I was a machine. A Ghost. I’d been stupid to try and change my life path. I needed to purge. I needed pain. Agony. Torture. I couldn’t live in a body while my soul tore itself into pieces.

Throwing myself down the stairs onto the floor of Obsidian, I searched the early arrivals.

You won’t find redemption here.

My mind darted into the unknown, feeding me alternatives that I’d never thought of.

Go back. You’ve accepted who you are. Go back. Go home.

My hands clenched at the thought of returning to Mother Russia. Returning to the place where my life was ruined. I would renounce everything: turn my back on Hazel, admit I could never heal. Everything I’d fought so hard for was a complete fucking joke.

Ghosts didn’t have families. Ghosts felt no pain.

So why am I in so much fucking pain?

My vision went hazy. I couldn’t do it anymore. Hating myself for my weakness; flaring with shame for my needs, I grabbed a pen from my pocket and stabbed it into my palm.

The agony washed through me with a wave of heat, followed by prickles of release. It granted a small spotlight of rationality in the chaotic storm of confusion.

I knew what I had to do.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

Zel owned me more than anyone, and I wouldn’t survive without her. Clara had gone. Hazel was all I had left. I’d kept secrets from her. So many fucking secrets.

I wasn’t worthy. I wasn’t safe.

But I could change all that.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

My heart died in my chest at the thought of betraying her. She would need me. She deserved a shoulder to cry on and another person to share the burden of grief. But I couldn’t. Not yet. Not while I existed on the border of Ghost and sanity. I couldn’t hug her. I couldn’t console her pain.

The moment I let my guard down, I would snap her neck.

I couldn’t give Zel what she needed. I wasn’t whole.

And I meant to fucking deserve her.

My anger turned outward, focusing on the handlers who’d fucked up my life.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

The conditioning throbbing in my brain was right. I needed to kill. And now I had my victim. I was done being an outcast. I was done not being normal.

I thought Clara had been my cure.

I was wrong.

The fucking cure was inside me all along. I held the key to fixing myself by returning to my past and annihilating them.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

“Fuck this.” I let down all my walls. I welcomed the ruthless conditioning with open arms. I smiled as the ice entered my limbs and filled my head with fog. I allowed my muscles to remember exactly what I’d been programmed to do.

I went Ghost.

And I lost myself.

* * *

Mother Russia.

The Iron Fist of a past I couldn’t out run. Bleak and barren and home to my misery.

I only vaguely remembered how I got here. I bought every ticket in the first class cabin to ensure no one touched me. I locked myself into the freakish persona of an assassin and no one—not even the air hostesses came near me.

The moment I landed, I stole a 4WD to drive into the snowy wilderness. I said goodbye to no one. I just disappeared.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

The conditioning throbbed harder and harder, recognising its place of origin. I was returning to my handlers and the training was fucking ecstatic to embrace the true machine I was.

I had no belongings apart from some cash, passport, and my memories, but that’s all I needed. The establishment stole me when I had nothing, and I would return with nothing.

And then I’d make them fucking pay.

Over and over again.

I was ready to go rogue and dance in blood. The ice was back in my veins, howling like a Siberian winter. I’d embraced who I truly was—who they made me become.

“You’re not a bad man. You can’t be a bad man because I love you and well, I couldn’t love a bad man.” Clara’s voice whipped around me with the artic wind.

I shook my head as a fresh, crippling wave of grief threatened to overshadow the rage. I couldn’t let myself mourn. Not yet. Not when I had so much to do.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

Sucking in a deep breath, I deliberately pushed Clara from my thoughts.

I stood on the perimeter of the establishment, hidden by thick trees. Thunder rumbled above, chasing jagged lightning, illuminating the compound in flashes of white.

My skin crawled beneath my black attire. Home. Hell. My place of birth from child to killer.

Snow flurried like icy tears—glistening in the dead of night, raining over the landscape and hiding a multitude of sins. Russia was just like I remembered—frigid, ruthless, uninhabitable.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

Australia, Hazel, Clara,—all of it seemed like a dream. I felt as if I’d never left this terrible wasteland and everything in me said to run.

Beneath the pulsating conditioning all I wanted to do was run far, far away and never look back. I didn’t want to be here. I wanted to be fucking free from all of this.

My muscles tensed. You will be free. Kill them all. Make them give you freedom by taking their fucking lives.

Straightening my back, ignoring the howling wind and jagged teeth of frost, I prepared for battle. I would win tonight. I would take back what was mine.

“You always were a weakling, Fox. Got to beat that compassion out of you.”

The flashback came from nowhere as I stared at the gargoyle embellished facility—so similar to the building I’d erected at home.

“You’re no one to anyone anymore. You’re an orphan, a drifter, an unknown. We are now your family, your shelter, your owners. Never forget that.”

Rows upon rows of windows, containing cell upon cell of new recruits and old, glowed dimly in the night. My heart thundered to think how many more they’d ruined while I’d been gone.

“Time to work, Fox.”

I rolled over, clenching my teeth against the broken radius in my left arm. I couldn’t remember a thing.

My handler laughed. “Trying to recall what some dickshit paid you to do last night? You won’t, Operative Fox. We programed you to forget. You’re brainwashed to suffer short-term amnesia whenever you complete a mission. That way you cannot compromise yourself or us if you’re ever caught. You cannot lie if you don’t remember.”

I wrapped my hands around my head, trying to squeeze the flashbacks from my thoughts. I couldn’t go to war compromised. I had to stay clearheaded and be the ultimate Ghost.

A sudden image of Clara consumed me, almost bringing me to my knees. Her innocent smile, her intelligent eyes—all gone.

“Roan, don’t fight with my mummy. She needs you.”

My stomach snarled, tangling with my heart. I was a fucking bastard for leaving her. Abandoning her and Zel when she needed me most.

I couldn’t breathe at the thought of never seeing Clara again. I’d never fight the horrible urge to kill such innocence again all while falling madly fucking in love with her.

Hazel replaced her daughter, taking me hostage. Her tears, her grief gripped my heart while the haunting sound of her wails danced on the wind. I hated that I wasn’t there for her. I hated I wasn’t man enough, strong enough.

Kill. Sever. Bleed. Devour.

Blinking, I forced them both from my thoughts. They had no place here. Nothing else existed but the machine I was and the bloodbath I was about to indulge in.

 Balling my hands, I took a step out of the tree line. Exposed in the cleared snowy moat of land around the house, I shed everything but my mission. I ceased to be Roan. I ceased to be heartbroken by a little girl’s death. I ceased to hate myself for not being there for the mother.

For this mission, I was nameless.

I was Karma. I was Fate.

I ran.

The backdoor, fortified with iron that I helped maintain, and a lock I helped design, barred my entry. Scraps littered the snow from dinner and trails of blood drifted off into the distance where local wolves took recruits that hadn’t made the cut.