First, here's the legal stuff. It's pointless and has no real weight, but it's here anyway.

The closest I come to owning most of the characters is owning a copy of the relevant game(s). All non-original characters and locations are therefore the properties of their respective copyright holders. Since no-one actually reads this, it's unlikely that I'm going to get sued over it, but please don't anyway.

Second, content warning. This fic contains spoilers for both Call of Duty 4 and Modern Warfare 2, some strong language, self insertion and severe sad git moments.

Now that all that pretentious bollocks is out of the way...

Call of Duty: Flip-Side

Chapter One: Begin Again.

Private Jon "Sakura" Rose
Charlie Team
22nd SAS Regiment.
Credenhill Barracks, Herefordshire, UK
Day 1, 2011. 0500 hrs.

The buzzer was relentless, shaking Jon out of whatever level of sleep he was in. He reached over, whacked the clock by his bed to shut the alarm off and sat up, looking over at the clock as it sat on the table. 0500. He slid off the bunk, and rooted around on the floor, trying to find his physical training gear in the half-light, before banging his head on something, swearing, then reaching for the light switch on the wall, and grabbing his trousers and T-shirt off the end of his bed. The last items were his jumper, which was hanging off the back of the chair, and his trainers, which were by the door. The routine had been the same every day since he'd joined the Regiment a week ago. As a result, everyone in the team had finally stopped calling him the FNG, if only because he wasn't totally green anymore.

Truth be told though, he'd been lucky to get there at all. He'd enlisted in the army straight out of secondary school, and served a tour with The Rifles in Afghanistan. He'd applied for Selection at the first chance he got, but nearly got binned several times. He barely passed at the end of it all. And now here he was. He turned on the TV, which he kept set on BBC News, and listened as the reports talked of a worsening crisis in the Middle East, and the ongoing civil war in Russia.
Nothing new there, then.
Today, the team was up for weapons training, but that wasn't until 1100. Jon was off for a run round the base, both to wake himself up completely, and to kill time until the cafeteria opened for breakfast at six.

Jon walked from the barracks to the firing range in hangar two. He heard an engine sound, and looked up in time to see a Blackhawk fly over and touch down beyond the fence. On board was a team in black kit, gas masks and all, and looking beat-up and worn out. Jon recognised the leader, if only because he was a bit distinctive. Captain John Price.

On the range, Jon was passed a rifle from the armoury. A Diemaco C8, with a red-dot scope, AN/PEQ-2 laser sight and M203 grenade launcher. Otherwise known as the L119A1 in British service.
"All right Private. Take that to Station four and wait for the go."
Jon checked the chamber was clear, then walked down the firing line to the fourth booth, before picking up the safety glasses from the bench, and taking the ear-defenders off a nail and putting them round his neck. He then picked up a magazine from the bench and slapped it into the well, before hitting the bolt catch with his thumb and flicking the selector from safe to semi-automatic.
"All right gents. Most of you know the drill. For those of you that don't, hit the five targets as they pop. After that, the targets will be blocked by a plywood sheet, but will still pop up in the same order, so hit 'em again. Then the cluster of three at the back will pop at random to test your ability to snap shoot. OK? Stand to and wait for the first target." Captain Tom Williams, Charlie Team leader, was supervising.
Jon pulled the ear-defenders up onto his head, and levelled his carbine down the range. The first target swung down, and he put a bullet into it. The targets then alternated between top and bottom, and Jon missed two of them, before the wood sheet swung up. He then followed the same pattern as he saw the upper target swing down again, with three missed. The sheet then dropped again, and the three targets at the back of the range popped up in a random order, falling as they were hit, and rising again. Two misses.
"Cease Fire! Cease Fire! Clear and secure your weapons!"
Jon pulled the magazine out and racked the charging handle to eject the unfired round still in the chamber, before flicking the safety back on and taking off the protective gear.

Back in his room at the barracks, Jon was listening to the news whilst laying on his bunk, reading a book.
"A video apparently showing the assassination of President Yasir Al-Fulani by known revolutionary Khaled Al-Asad has been aired on a number of Middle-Eastern networks. As a result, the Pentagon announced it would be shifting forces in the Gulf to a heightened state of readiness..."
Jon got up and switched off the TV, before sighing deeply. Outside, he heard a helicopter starting up, and went to the window in time to see Captain Price and his team boarding a Blackhawk for parts unknown. There was a knock at his door.
"Hey Jon. Get your arse over to the briefing room. We're getting deployed."

In the briefing room, Captain Williams was giving a run-down of what exactly they were being deployed to do.
"OK. The Yanks have drafted us to provide operational support to their operations in the Middle East, dealing primarily with the sabotage and demolition of enemy infrastructure. Out first target is an enemy radio tower close to the coastal city where the Marine Force is due to make landfall at 1300 local time tomorrow. So gear up and be ready to go. Wheels up in half an hour."

Less than an hour later, Jon was stood on the tarmac at RAF Mildenhall, ready to board the MC-130 that was due to drop them and their gear behind the lines. He was dressed in desert camo gear, like the rest of Charlie team, and watched as the pair of Land Rovers they would be using were loaded into the hold, before following the others aboard and watching as the ramp was slowly closed, and the engines whined into life...

A/N: OK, there it is. For those of you who don't possess an above average knowledge of guns (which would be most of you, sorry if that's patronising), the Diemaco C8 is the Canadian built version of the M4A1 carbine, and standard issue weapon to the real SAS. I just opted to assume that the M4A1 SOPMOD in the game was actually a C8, and only called that so everyone would understand. And that's the first of many bits of sad-gittery (is that even a word?).