Back to You [An Endgame Continuation]

The Ghost Story

§Ｔｈｅ  Ｇｈｏｓｔ Ｓｔｏｒｙ§
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p.o.v: Elena

24 Hours Earlier

Despite the moonless sky, the city was bright with glowing street lamps and stoplights that would alternate beams of red, yellow, and green onto the cars driving below them. Light emanating from windows reflected onto the sidewalk where I walked, and as my black heels made imprints on the snow, I couldn't help but feel an odd sense of familiarity. I had been around snow nearly my entire life. It only seemed fit that it would follow me like a shadow when I arrived here in the United States two years ago.

My eyes glanced up from the ground and down the street in front of me. My apartment was now a block away, and I couldn't help but look briefly over my shoulder.

There it was. The other shadow I feared had followed me from Russia.

I turned back around and felt the chilled air pass over my lips as I breathed it in. My long blonde hair curled around my uniform name tag where the name "Elizabeth" was sketched into it, and a shudder rippled through me. I was still uncomfortable in my skin as I wore this new identity, and the sense of anonymity still felt foreign. However, my loneliness and constant state of dread were achingly familiar, and I knew it was because of the fear.

The fear that they would come after me.

They'd drag me back there or kill me for escaping that place. The nightmares of what they would do kept me tossing and turning in the night, as well as causing me to look over my shoulder every time I found myself alone.

My father, who fled with me to the States, was an ammo manufacturer for the black market. And although I pestered him endlessly about the criminal risks, his only response was that it was all he knew. The vague disconnected backgrounds of the buyers never concerned him as long as he got his paycheck.

I interrupted my line of thoughts with a scoff. I knew all too well that my father valued money above all things. Even morals.

I climbed up the steps to the second floor of my apartment complex, checking to make sure the halls were empty before walking in front of the door labeled 201B. I wiggled my key into the lock as worry grabbled at the back of my mind. HYDRA was gone, I reminded myself as I did frequently. It had wasted away to nothing; all that remained was the past. My past.

But unfortunately, that was still enough to suspend me in a restless state of unease.

I pushed open the white wooden door and was trailing the kitchen tile with my eyes, excluding the shadow that was looming in the arm chair across the room. I inhaled sharply as soon as it entered my vision, and my hand shot out under the right cabinet to retrieve my gun. But it wasn't there.

I looked back over at the figure and noticed he was twirling something in his hands that resembled my exact silencer model. The silver winked at me mischievously in the dark.

"You should probably find a better place to hide this, Miss Nobakov," the shadow scolded in a low airy voice. I could just barely see his arms resting on his knees as he studied the gun with a distant curiosity.

"How do you know my name," I warned as I flipped on the light switch beside me and slid my fingers into my pocket, feeling around for my fold out knife.

"I know everything about you, Elena," the man replied, and now that fluorescent light was reaching his face, I was able to see his gelled brown hair, chubby face, and narrow deceptive eyes.

My face hardened into stone as I moved closer, ignoring the familiar voice in my head that was telling me to run. "I seriously doubt that," I said as I concealed the knife in my palm. "Now unless you want me to slice open your carotid artery, I'd explain who you are."