The air inside Site Hotel Bravo was thick with dust and the acrid smell of aged concrete. Deep beneath the mountains of Afghanistan, in what had once been Lieutenant General Shepherd's sanctuary and Shadow Company's operational nerve center, two men stood in the dimming light of failing emergency bulbs. Captains John "Soap" MacTavish and John Price existed in that peculiar silence that comes before the storm—when everything has been said, and only action remains.
Price's weathered fingers gripped a cassette tape, its plastic casing worn from handling. The tape would be their testament, their insurance policy against Shepherd's lies. On a nearby monitor, flickering and distorted, Price's own face stared back at him—labeled traitor, terrorist, war criminal. All courtesy of the man they'd once called general.
"We're now in the endgame, Soap." Price's voice carried the weight of every betrayal, every fallen brother. The familiar rasp of his accent seemed to sharpen each word into something solid, immovable. "You and me, we'll drive the final nail into the coffin and kill that son of a bitch once and for all."
Soap met his captain's eyes, and for a moment, his thoughts drifted like smoke to faces he'd never see again. Roach. Ghost. Good men. Brothers. The memory of their deaths—Shepherd's bullets, the fire, the ditch—burned hotter than any rage.
"You're right, Price," Soap said quietly, his Scottish brogue carrying an edge that hadn't been there before all this started.
Price leaned toward the recording equipment, his blue eyes hardening as he began to speak—not to Soap, but to history itself:
"This is for the record. History is written by the victor. History is filled with liars." He paused, letting the words settle like sediment. "If he lives and we die, his truth becomes written—and ours is lost. Shepherd will be a hero, 'cause all you need to change the world is one good lie and a river of blood. He's about to complete the greatest trick a liar ever played on history. His truth will be the truth."
The silence stretched between them.
"But only if he lives and we die."
The destruction of Site Hotel Bravo's main command center had been biblical in its fury. The "danger close" artillery strike had turned reinforced bunkers into tombs, crushed steel and stone into powder. The mountain itself had seemed to scream.
Now, racing through the underground river system in a Zodiac inflatable boat, Price and Soap cut through black water like a knife through flesh. The roar of the outboard motor echoed off ancient stone walls, mixing with the staccato crack of gunfire and the deeper thunder of explosions somewhere above them.
Soap's hands were white-knuckled on the boat's controls, his body moving instinctively with each twist and turn of the subterranean waterway. Water sprayed across his face, cold and sharp. Behind him, Price had braced himself against the rubber hull, his rifle barking in controlled bursts.
Shadow Company mercenaries lined the cavern passages, their muzzle flashes like fireflies in the darkness. Price's shots were precise, methodical—center mass, headshot, next target. A Zodiac emerged from a side channel, and Price adjusted, sending a burst into its motor. The boat spun wildly, its occupants thrown into the churning water.
"Helicopter, twelve o'clock!" Soap shouted over the chaos.
The Pave Low descended into a wider chamber ahead, its rotors creating a hurricane of spray and noise. Its door gunners opened up, tracers carving glowing lines through the darkness. Price ducked low, felt bullets punch holes in the Zodiac's rubber skin, hissing as air escaped.
They plunged deeper into the cave system. Rock formations rose from the water like the teeth of some ancient beast. The cavern opened into an underground lake, impossibly vast, its ceiling lost in shadow. Shepherd's Zodiac was a dark shape ahead, cutting hard to the left around a formation of stone pillars.
OpFor militia had taken positions on the rocks—Shepherd's last-ditch allies, desperate men with nothing to lose. Their AK fire was wild, undisciplined. Price returned fire with the cold efficiency of a man who'd been doing this for thirty years.
The water narrowed again, funneling them into rapids. The Zodiac bucked and pitched like a living thing. Soap fought the controls, using every ounce of his skill to keep them from smashing into the rocks. White water exploded around them. The roar was deafening.
Ahead, impossibly, Shepherd was boarding a Pave Low helicopter that hovered low over the rapids, its skids nearly touching the frothing water. The general's silhouette was visible for just a moment before he disappeared into the aircraft's belly.
"Hold her steady!" Price roared, already bringing his rifle up.
Soap gritted his teeth, muscles screaming as he fought the current. The Zodiac shuddered and spun, but he managed to keep the bow pointed forward, giving Price a stable shooting platform for precious seconds.
Price fired. The first burst went wide, sparks dancing off the Pave Low's armored hull.
He adjusted, breathed out, fired again. Closer. The helicopter began to rise.
Third time. Price led the target, squeezed the trigger, and sent a sustained burst into the tail rotor assembly. Metal shrieked. The rotor seized, then disintegrated in a shower of fragments.
The Pave Low immediately began to spin, its pilot fighting for control he'd never regain. It corkscrewed sideways, away from them, over the rapids toward—
"Price! Waterfall!" Soap's warning came too late.
The current had them. Soap yanked the controls, trying to turn, to beach them on the rocks—anything. But the river was a living thing with its own intentions, and it pulled them forward with inexorable force.
The world dropped away.
For a moment, they were suspended in mist and noise and weightlessness. Then gravity reasserted itself with brutal clarity. The Zodiac hit the plunge pool below with bone-jarring force. Price was torn from the boat. Soap felt the impact drive the air from his lungs, saw stars, tasted blood.
Then there was only darkness and the muffled roar of falling water.
Soap's eyes opened to a copper sky.
He lay on his back in shallow water at the river's edge, smooth stones digging into his shoulders. Every breath sent spikes of pain through his ribs. His left hand, he realized slowly, was still gripping his combat knife—fingers locked around the handle in a death grip he couldn't remember making.
He forced himself to sit up, coughing, spitting out water and blood. The world swam for a moment before settling. The waterfall thundered behind him, a curtain of white against dark rock. Mist hung in the air like a shroud.
"Price?" His voice came out as a rasp, barely audible over the water.
No answer. The shore was empty except for debris from their boat—a torn piece of rubber, a floating equipment pack.
Soap got to his feet, unsteady, dripping. His training took over, assessing: rifle gone, sidearm still holstered, knife in hand. Multiple contusions, possible cracked ribs, but mobile. He could move. He could fight.
And there—maybe a hundred meters downstream, visible through the mist and settling dust—the Pave Low. It had come down hard, a broken insect of metal and composite, half-submerged in the river, its remaining rotors bent and shattered.
Soap began to move toward it, each step deliberate, controlled. His boots squelched in the mud. The air tasted of dust and aviation fuel. Somewhere in the distance, he could hear voices—panicked, pained.
The sandstorm was building, he realized. The sky had darkened to the color of old brass, and wind-driven sand was beginning to sting his exposed skin. Perfect. Shepherd's luck holding even now.
As Soap approached the crash site, he spotted movement. One of the pilots was crawling away from the wreckage, dragging himself through the shallow water with his arms. His legs trailed uselessly behind him—broken, most likely, from the impact.
The man heard Soap's footsteps and turned, eyes wide. He opened his mouth, perhaps to plead or to call for help.
Soap didn't give him the chance. He closed the distance in three long strides, dropped to one knee, and drew the knife across the pilot's throat in a single fluid motion—left to right, deep and certain. Blood mixed with river water. The man's eyes went glassy. Soap moved on without looking back.
The second pilot had made it to a tumble of rocks twenty meters from the main wreckage. He was in better shape than his companion—sitting upright, at least, though his flight suit was dark with blood from a wound Soap couldn't see.
The pilot saw Soap coming and fumbled for his sidearm. His hands were shaking badly—shock, blood loss, or fear, probably all three. He managed to raise the pistol, center mass on Soap's chest, and pulled the trigger.
Click. Click. Click.
Empty. The pilot stared at the weapon in his hand as if it had personally betrayed him.
Soap kept walking, knife held low and ready, his expression unreadable.
"Wait," the pilot said, voice cracking. "Wait, please—I've got a family, man. I've got a—"
Soap was on him. The first stab went into the chest, right side, between the ribs. The second and third followed in quick succession, mechanical, efficient. The pilot's pleading turned to wet gasps, then silence.
Soap stood, breathing hard, and wiped the blade on the dead man's flight suit. The knife had been Ghost's, he remembered suddenly. A gift, years ago. It felt right that it should taste Shepherd's men.
A sound cut through the wind—footsteps on gravel, moving fast.
Soap turned and caught a glimpse of a figure disappearing into the gathering sandstorm. Shepherd. Running from the helicopter wreckage, deeper into the wasteland.
Of course the bastard had survived.
Soap followed, letting the storm swallow him.
The sandstorm had become a living wall of stinging particles, reducing visibility to mere meters. Soap moved through it like a ghost, following the sound of footsteps, the occasional glimpse of a shadow. His eyes stung and watered. Sand worked its way into his mouth, between his teeth.
Then he saw him.
Shepherd had collapsed against the rusted hulk of a burned-out car, half-buried in the sand. The general was clutching his side, breathing hard. Blood seeped between his fingers. He looked up as Soap emerged from the storm, and something like resignation crossed his face.
But only for a moment.
Soap didn't hesitate, didn't speak. He lunged forward, knife raised for a downward stab aimed at Shepherd's throat.
The general moved with surprising speed for an injured man. He caught Soap's wrist with both hands, stopping the blade inches from his neck. They struggled for a frozen moment, muscles trembling with effort.
Then Shepherd twisted, using Soap's momentum against him, and slammed the younger man's head against the car's metal frame.
The impact was devastating. Soap's vision exploded into white stars and black spots. His grip loosened. Shepherd shoved him backward, and Soap fell heavily onto his back in the sand, the world spinning sickeningly around him.
Through the haze, Soap saw Shepherd draw his own knife—a wicked tactical blade, probably taken from one of the men he'd had killed. The general dropped down, straddling Soap's chest, and drove the knife into him.
The blade punched through cloth and skin and muscle, and buried itself in Soap's chest. The pain was distant at first, abstract. Then it bloomed into something hot and all-consuming.
Soap tried to move, to fight back, but his body wouldn't respond. His vision was darkening at the edges. He could hear his own breathing, wet and labored.
Shepherd leaned in close, his face twisted with rage and something that might have been grief.
"I lost 30,000 fucking men in the blink of an eye!" The general's voice cracked, raw with emotion. Spittle flew from his lips. "Remember the nuclear explosion that killed the 1st Force Recon when Makarov ordered the strike? Thirty thousand! And you know what happened next?"
Shepherd's hands were shaking as he gripped the knife still embedded in Soap's chest.
"The world just fucking watched! They did nothing! NOTHING!"
The general straightened, drawing a .44 Magnum from his hip holster. His movements were deliberate now, almost ritualistic. He loaded two rounds into the cylinder—Soap could hear the metallic clicks, impossibly loud—and snapped it closed with a flick of his wrist.
Shepherd aimed the massive revolver at Soap's head, the barrel a black hole that filled Soap's entire field of vision.
This was it, then. After everything—Zakhaev, Makarov, the gulag, Brazil, the oil rig—this was how it ended. In the sand. Betrayed by the man they'd trusted.
At least Ghost and Roach wouldn't be alone.
Soap closed his eyes.
Then—impact. Weight. The roar of the Magnum discharging, but the bullet cracking past Soap's head into the sand instead of through his skull.
Soap's eyes snapped open to see Price—blood-streaked, battered, moving like vengeance itself—tackling Shepherd off him. The two men went down in a tangle of limbs.
Price. Alive.
The captain and the general rolled in the sand, trading savage punches. These weren't the controlled strikes of trained combatants anymore—this was primal, desperate. Shepherd caught Price across the jaw with an elbow. Price responded with a head-butt that split Shepherd's eyebrow.
They separated, both scrambling to their feet.
The .44 Magnum had fallen in the sand between them.
Both men saw it at the same instant. Price lunged forward, attempting to kick the weapon away, but Shepherd was faster. The general snatched it up and immediately brought it to bear on Price's head.
"The last bullet is for you, Price!" Shepherd's voice was almost triumphant, despite the blood running down his face.
His finger tightened on the trigger.
BANG!
The shot echoed across the wasteland, swallowed quickly by the howling wind and sand.