Ok, so, while not my first story, this is my first fanfic. Set in the COD4 timeline, as the US marine Sgt. Paul Jackson, but in my timeline, the nuke never goes off and we see Paul Jackson's story continue into the rest of the story, with the addition of Captain Pelayo, the pilot he rescued. Leave reviews, please, it'll motivate me to continue if you actually like it.

"Seal Team Six has located a possible nuclear device at Al-Asad's palace to the west. NEST teams are on the way. Until the device is verified safe, all forces are to fall back to the east, over."

The smooth voice of command sent a long shiver up my spine. Nukes, here? Suddenly, for the first time in the invasion of this small, middle eastern territory, I was genuinely afraid. Nevertheless, I kept my hands firmly attached to the mark 19 grenade launcher I was operating on the Sea Knight. Directly ahead of me was a fearsome Cobra attack helicopter, piloted by the skilled and charismatic corporal Pelayo, and her co-pilot Keating. I was glad to have them with us; they'd cleared out most of the large threats my mark 19 couldn't blow away.

Keeping tight to the formation, the large Sea Knight lurched on its side, heading to the east, with the Cobra still in my vision. Lieutenant Vasquez placed his hand on my shoulder, causing me to look up at his bitter face. "Jackson, don't stop burning those fuckers, you've done a good job." I smiled up at him, not expecting this sudden compliment, and replied with a short "Yes, sir." Before returning to face the Cobra. I expected we would be just about in the safe zone by now, until my retinas lit up with a flash coming straight from Pelayo's tail rotor.

"We're hit we're hit! I've lost the tail rotor!" The unmistakable voice of the girl cried through my helmet and into my ear. I watched as her Cobra violently spun out of control, headed straight for the city outskirts below. "Mayday mayday, this is Deadly, going in hard!" she cried again. Suddenly her playful and cool composure was swapped by a panicked shout.

"We're going down." She finally said before crashing into the narrow street below, flanked by imposing structures, definitely teeming with the enemy. Now, the voice of the Sea Knight pilot came through my helmet. "We have a Cobra down. I repeat, we have a Cobra down." Staring down at the crash site, I notice small figures leaving the buildings, making a beeline for the wreckage.

"Deadly this is Outlaw Two-Five, come in, over!" The pilot said again. Now I had a direct line of fire on the enemies below. The Sea Knight circled around the wreckage, and I opened up with the grenade launcher, tearing up the ground and the figures with it. In panic, they seemed to fall back to the buildings. "Command, I have a visual on the crash site. I see small arms fire coming from the cockpit. Request permission to initiate search and rescue." The pilot said, with much more urgency in his voice than before, bringing out a slightly southern accent.

"Copy 2-5, be advised, you will NOT be at a safe distance in the event that nuke goes off. Do you understand?" The still calm voice of command warned. I saw men with Russian RPGs run across rooftops, only to fly down from them after a quick burst of fire from my mark 19. "Roger that. We know what we're getting into." The pilot said, almost boastingly. "Alright 2-5 it's your call. Retrieve that pilot if you can. Out." And with that the sound of Command disappeared. We were getting into hot shit here.

The Sea Knight, still circling around the crash, attracted some small arms fire, but I supressed them as I saw we had begun to descend. "Deadly do you copy? What's your status, over?" the pilot asked. A small cough and the crackle of a damaged radio signalled that at least one of the Cobra pilots had survived. "I'm here!" Pelayo spluttered, completely panicked. "…Keating is KIA! Hostiles moving in fast! I could sure use some help down here!" I opened fire on the dark corners of the street, seeing gunfire getting closer and closer to Pelayo. "Hold on. We're coming to ya." The pilot reassured her, just as the Sea Knight touched ground and I lined up with the other marines to dismount and rescue Pelayo. The ramp opened and we slid out, taking positions and easing the fire off Pelayo best we could. I finally saw her, at the end of the battered street, stationary in her cockpit with a small weapon. I glanced over to Vasquez and he nodded at me, signalling for me to make a dash to her. I stood up from my crouched position and began to sprint toward the downed Cobra.

I was pretty sure I'd just ran straight past several enemies, but my only focus was reaching that damn pilot. Command had returned to the channel, but his voice was muted as I was deafened by the intense fire all around. Vasquez had gotten on the radio too. "We got 90 seconds, Jackson. Get the pilot! No one gets left behind!" His gruff voice spurred me further as I finally reached the Cobra. man, what a mess. Keating was leaning out the side of the cockpit, motionless, and Pelayo was covered in red stains and her face was pouring with melted makeup. She clutched an MP5 and helped gun down some enemies as I reached my hand out to her.

She looked up at me, almost helplessly, and so I dragged her out carefully and secured her in my arms. Even with all her pilot gear on, she was light as a feather. "Get to the Sea Knight! We'll hold down these corners, go, go!" Vasquez once again filled me with optimism and I dashed, holding the pilot close to me, into the safety of the chinook, Lt. Volker, the flight assistant, ushering me in. I sat her down gently onto the bench, and placed my hand on her shoulder, a sort of way to ask if she was okay. She looked brightly up at me and nodded, with a relieved smile and aimed down her MP5 towards the street. With everyone on board, Volker muttered something into his headset. Now would be a good time to get the hell outta here.

I sat down opposite an exhausted Pelayo. Once again Command spoke through the comms. "Outlaw this is Command. We have a probable nuclear threat in the capital. Proceed to the minimum safe distance until the all clear is given by the NEST team." I reached for my holstered M4 and fired off some grenades from my under barrel M320, taking out the enemy soldiers surrounding the Sea Knight. As the last of our Marines piled on board, Vasquez shouted down to the pilot, "Go, go!" The pilot replied a witty "This is your captain speaking" joke and told his co-pilot to put his foot down. "All US forces be advised we have a confirmed nuclear threat in the city. NEST teams are on site and are attempting to disarm. I repeat, we have a confirmed nuclear threat in the city. NEST teams are on site and are attempting to disarm. I had my hands clenched tightly to the small handle that kept me sat down on the Sea Knight, its rear ramp still wide open. If it went off, we would all be gone, and it would have all been for nothing. I looked around, and it seemed my anxiety was shared around the others. They all fidgeted and looked out towards the ruined cityscape.

However, nothing ever came. Soon the streets and infrastructure below us turned to fields and motorways. It seemed that we had gotten out alive. We reached a US controlled forward operations base and the pilot, who I thought definitely deserved commendation for his flying, settled us down on the makeshift helipad. "That NEST team better disarm that nuke, we gotta get the fuck back in there!" I heard some others converse as we all stood up to exit the battered Sea Knight. Seeing the weary female Cobra pilot I rescued wince in pain as she tried to get on her feet, I reached over and let her balance on me as we left together. Descending down the ramp the strong middle eastern sun hit me. In the city it wasn't as bad, since the looming buildings gave us plenty of shade, but here there was no such shade, and we were exposed to blistering heat. "Damn, feels as though that nuke really did go off." I remarked, earning a painful smile from Pelayo. I set her back down on some ammo crates placed in the small shade of the FOB command building. Her head immediately leaning back against the wall. "I'll come back in a second, if there's anything you need" I said, looking down at her injury. She gave a quiet, and slightly embarrassed "Thanks" and I turned to look for Vasquez, as no one was really sure what to do while waiting for this nuke threat to blow over.

I found the broad and imposing lieutenant stood over a map, with the Sea Knight pilots, who had rather fittingly adorned a pair of aviators. "Sir, is there anything you want us to do?" I asked facing him. He turned to look at me, stern as always. "I don't have more of an idea than you, Jackson, just rest up and make sure that pilot gets what she needs." He replied, his eyes wandering over to Pelayo who was now sat with her knee in her hands, her face scrunched up in pain. "Yes sir, I got it." I said and jogged into the small building, which was sure to have some sort of medical bay within it.

"Is that it?" I said quietly to myself, coming across a pile of small boxes marked with a large red cross on the front neatly placed in the corner of one of the small rooms made out of MDF. I took one and carried it back to Pelayo, who looked like she was on the way to passing out soon. "Hey, I found this, it'll help." I said, looking down into her slightly watery eyes, making the remnants of her makeup disappear down her cheeks. "Alright, keep holding your knee. Is that the only injury you have?" I asked. Opening the small case I found some bandages, a morphine injection and other medical essentials. She shook her head and so I gently replaced her hand, tightly holding her knee with mine. "It'll be fine, I'll give you some morphine, and apply this field dressing. The morphine will sting." With that last sentence she looked at me with her eyes widening slightly. "Here, take this." I told her and I gave her a roll of bandages to put in her mouth to take the pain.

"Okay, I'm starting now." I warned her and proceeded to lay her leg down on the ammunition boxes she was seated on. Cautiously, I took my hand away from her deep gash, and extremely carefully spread a layer of morphine powder over her wound. I could see it definitely had worked, as in an instant all her limbs had suddenly tensed up, and her teeth were thoroughly dug into the roll of bandages. "We're almost done, don't worry." I tried my best to smile at her, and gently wrapped a field dressing around her leg, tightening it and closed the emptied case. And with that she spat out the bandage roll which had been torn to shreds by her teeth. "How are you feeling? We need to get you cleaned up." I said, seeing her hands and her torn leg, stained with blood. "Not gonna lie, like shit. But thanks, I don't know how long I was gonna hold on for there." She beamed at me, trying her best to stand up. "I don't mean to be a complete suck up, but could ya help me to the bathroom?" I could see her attempt at puppy-eyes and I graciously obliged.

She slung her arm around me, and I effortlessly picked her up and walked with her back to the FOB building, to find the bathrooms. "O-over there, I think" She pointed out through her gritted teeth, motioning towards a doorway. "Hey, uh, don't take this the wrong way, but, uh, getting washed, like, without help... are you gonna manage?" I asked her sheepishly. I noticed her visibly blushing at my question and replied even more sheepishly then I had asked. "Well, I may need help with something…" My eyes widened and then she winked at me, increasing my disbelief. "Getting this damn helmet off, it's stuck." I let out an audible laugh at her tease and proceeded to take off her flight helmet. It was no issue; I think she just didn't have the strength to pull it all off. Placing it on the floor, I led her into the small shower and gently unhooked my arm from around her shoulders. She quickly reached out and leaned on me, and then the wall. "Pelayo, seriously." I held out my arm. "I hate being this useless, I can do this, thanks, uh, fuck. I don't know your name" She smiled, blushing even more. "Sergeant Paul Jackson, and no, you're not useless. At least you weren't in the city. You're one of the best pilots I've ever seen." I said, taking my hand and supporting her back as she struggled to unzip her flight suit. She looked at me, almost flirtatiously, and then drew the shower curtain, separating us.

I waited for her outside the shower, and my daydreaming was interrupted when I heard her voice over the shower. "Hey, Jackson, ya there?" she shouted out. "I'm here." I replied, standing up. "I forgot to say, man. I owe you my life for what you did for me, that was some seriously cool shit you did back there!" she shouted back. I didn't know what to say. "Ah, well, orders are orders!" I said back, jokingly. I heard her chuckle on the other side of the curtain and I returned to my seat, patiently waiting for her to get out. I had almost forgotten that we were in the middle of a combat operation with the threat of a nuke going off at any second.

Welp, that's my first chapter. Leave some constructive criticisms for me, potential story ideas, whatever! I'll try to be as communicative with my readers as I can, especially if this story takes off. Thanks.