"Farid!"

For a moment, the worn down man stood and stared at the infamous Raul Menendez, casually leaning on (of all things) an anti-aircraft launcher. He had worked hard earning that man's trust - to get into his inner circle - to relay what information he could to the CIA. And it worked very well, except now this Nicaraguan finally was catching onto a mole. Hopefully he didn't suspect it was him - though his hopes felt very much in vain. Just a moment ago, he had battled through the thick of everything the Yemeni Army had to throw at them. Now here he was, practically out of breath and his ears ringing from a near deadly encounter with a grenade.

As Farid approached Menendez, whose hand remained outstretched in greeting, the older man snatched his wrist and held up the hand to the sunlight. Off it glistened crimson blood from a few soldiers he cut down with a sword. Dangerously close, his fingers began to tremble and he tried to swallow despite his fuzzy, dry throat. Menendez spoke with a voice just slightly above a whisper. "American blood on your hands, Farid?"

Right away at the question, he pulled his hand back and nodded. He shouldn't be here, he knew that. He should be fighting this terrorist... but he was, wasn't he? Wasn't that why he was here? "Of course, Menendez. We must get you to safety. We have lost too many men." Part of him honestly wished he had the ammo in his gun to kill him and get out of here alive. That'd be preferable to lying like this.

"Victory is not measured by losses, Farid..." said Menendez as he turned away and lifted the launcher up on his shoulder to aim. Just as he did, a VTOL came flying in.

Harper's voice crackled in over his comms. "Farid... Are you still with me?" There was a loud bang as the launcher was fired and hit the airship, causing it to spin down to the ground. "We're hit!" Harper shouted. "We're going down!"

The spiraling VTOL crashed down, taking a balcony with it. "It is measured by gains," Menendez said and tossed Farid the launcher, which he quickly put down at his feet. Then started towards the downed airship not unlike an excited boy about to receive a big present.

However, Harper continued to shout over the comms in his distress. "Dammit... Fuck... I... Argh."

Farid turned to the crowded VTOL as all the others of Cordis Die were cheering, and Menendez announced, "Here!" With that, his friend was dragged out for all to see.

Not for even a second did Harper stop struggling. "Aaargh! Let go of me!" He demanded as he thrashed in the grip of two terrorists. His scarred up face sneering with pure anger as he was shoved down to his knees and Menendez crouched down in front of him. For a moment the crowd quieted down.

"You knew that I would be here," Menendez inquired, "Who betrayed me?"

If only Harper were a little bit stronger, then he could have escaped those two - and Farid knew Menendez would have his neck snapped by the man's vice grip. Unable to free himself though, Harper could only snarl at him, "You're wasting your time, you fucking... bastard! You... You won't get SHIT from me!" Of course, his unwillingness to answer earned him a slap across the face, and Menendez stood up as the crowd started to cheer again. It seemed like Harper was just only able to voice his retaliation at this point. "Come on! Is that all you got? Huh?"

"Farid!" The man in question looked up from Harper a bit startled to see Menendez aiming a Five Seven pistol right at him - having pulled it from one of the followers holsters. Wide eyed, he gawked at the Nicaraguan approaching him. With each step, Farid took a slight step back ready to run if he needed to. Then Raul flipped the gun around to hand it to him. "Kill him."

"Yeah that's it." Harper snapped, "Kill me, Egghead!" Farid took the gun and slowly approached. Harper shouted at Menendez, paying no mind to Farid's quiet approach. "And you! You spineless piece of shit! Getting others to do your dirty work! What kind of man are you? Huh?" As he shouted this, the two men lifted him to his feet. When Menendez went behind Harper, out of his line of sight, Harper looked back again to meet undercover operative's terrified face.

"Show your loyalty by following my orders, Farid!" Menendez said, and the agent pressed the barrel of the pistol to Harper's temple. The terrorist begun to pace now, watching with narrowed eyes.

The Seal glared at him with pale gray eyes and said in a daring tone, "Do it, Egghead. Do your job."

"NOW, Farid!" Menendez demanded, eyeing him from behind Harper.

There was something about the look Farid had right now, a sort of deer in the headlights expression, that spoke volumes about his obvious fears and hesitation. True, he had a job to do. He was an undercover operative. Not a traitor. It wasn't his job to shoot his allies. Or good friends for that matter. What did Harper mean by 'do your job'? Farid wasn't sure anymore. He wasn't sure of anything anymore.

Nothing seemed real. The smoke in the air, the blood pounding in his ears coupled with his friend's shouting, the terrorist very obviously suspecting him of being a mole... No. The only real thing was he had a gun pressed to someone's head. He could shoot him, and he'd live. Or he could shoot the other guy, and he'd probably die...

"Do it, man!" This someone dared. "Come on! You don't got the fucking stones to shoot me! Come on, Egghead! DO IT!"

He looked away and pulled the trigger, blood splattering on the follower he stared at. That moment, he felt as though the world was moving in slow motion as he backed away and watched the two men flip Harper's head back - glassy eyes staring off and mouth hanging open. The nightmare was real. What he had done... What had he done...?

His eyes burned and blurred as he looked up to see another VTOL begin to hover overhead, the gunner shooting down through the smoke at the Cordis Die supporters on its decent. He didn't hear it. He didn't hear any of the bullets flying. He didn't hear the screams, the frightened cries to retreat. All he heard the the blood in his ears, and the pounding of his twisted heart against his ribs.

An explosion, probably from the men inside the airship, sent him flying back off his feet and left him numbly staring up at the plumes of thick, black smoke and embers. His senses faded to nothing and for a short time he found himself safe in the grasp of oblivion. Maybe nothing was true...

If only it lasted longer than a few seconds for him. He blinked his eyes open, confused as he saw David Mason striding his way. The Seal held a hand down to him to help him up, and he accepted it. "Farid." Mason could only seem to say as he pulled him up to his feet.

"Section," he only said. Then he saw him again. Harper was there on the ground with a bullet hole in his head, a small pool of blood formed from it, and Salazar was there knelling beside him with a hand searching for a pulse. It was real... It was very, very real. Farid's heart sunk as low as it probably could then. He killed his friend.

I killed Harper, he thought to himself in shock. I killed Harper. I killed Harper. I killed Harper!

David looked down to Salazar with frown, his eyes hidden behind the special glasses his wore. Salazar met his stare and soberly announced the obvious yet unthinkable:

"Harper's dead."

Something like a fear begun to sink in; would they kill him for what he had done to Harper? He just wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't own up to it now, but all he managed to do was point towards Harper and trail off with "I..." before the tears started to burn back and he squeezed them shut with a quiet sob. His throat closed on him, and his heart started to twist painfully. But what he tried to say was more than obvious.

Mason put a hand on his shoulder, and assured, "You had no choice." Then pulled away and moved around Harper's body.

"Menendez is heading for the Citadel overlooking the town..." Farid forced out, pointing in the general direction of it. His eyes just weren't able to peel away from Harper. All his fault. Harper's death was all his fault...

David pressed his lips together and looked to Salazar, "Salazar, arrange for a MEDEVAC extraction back to the Obama." Then knelled down beside their friend.

As David closed Harper's eyes, Salazar guided Farid away from the destruction with a solemn, "Come on. Let's go." But Farid didn't look away, not until he had been nearly dragged along the first few steps and he needed to look forward to keep from falling over. He didn't want to leave. He just wanted to stay there, crawl up beside his friend, and die hoping he'd forgive him.

That wasn't an option. After he was handed off to another Navy Seal, and Salazar left to help David get Menendez, he was quickly extracted to the Obama.


"Tears shed for another person are not a sign of weakness. They are a sign of a pure heart."
― José N. Harris


For some reason, the ceiling seemed so calming...

Well, maybe not calming. But it served to distract him from his guilty conscience. The hatch pattern felt so familiar to him despite only being on an aircraft carrier a handful of times. The repetition gave him something else to think about as he searched for dents or some asymmetrical hatch mark in the pattern...

Asymmetrical... Like Harper's face...

Farid groaned to himself and raised his hands to his face. His eyes started to burn again, and he forced himself not to let the tears escape. Traitors didn't deserve to cry. He didn't deserve something as innocent as that. If tears cleanse the soul, then he wouldn't let his tears go. He was a horrible person, and hadn't a right to such a luxury.

He didn't notice the door open until David's voice made itself known in the small cabin. "Farid?"

The Yemen didn't move his hands, and croaked, "What is it, Selection?"

"I know you're blaming yourself for what you had to do back in Yemen," the Seal said, "I just want you to know that it's not your fault."

His heart twisted again. "No, it is. I shot Harper. I'm nothing short of a traitor."

"That's not true," David disagreed, "you were doing your job, and you were cornered into a bad situation because of it. You aren't at blame for it." Farid shifted and turned on his side to face the wall. Stepping forward, David eyed him carefully. "Farid?"

Next thing he knew, a gun was flung back at him, a Five Seven pistol with blood crusted on one side. It skittered on the metal floor and David stared at it with a bit of surprise.

"What the hell?" He murmured.

"Section, traitors should not be left alive. So do your job and get rid of me." Farid said with a voice that sounded almost tired.

David kicked the pistol behind him and shook his head. "I'm not going to shoot you, Farid. You're not a traitor, and I know that. You're just going through survivor's guilt."

"You do not need to pretend like you care," Farid replied, not moving, "after what I have done, I know you must hate me... I..."

He had enough. David moved over to the cot and pulled Farid half off the mattress with a hand curled in his shirt. "Listen to me, Farid," he faltered a moment when he saw the dead look in Farid's dark eyes, normally very lively. He practically shook him to get his full attention. "Listen to me! I don't hate you. Nobody hates you. You were just doing your job. Snap out of it and get a hold of yourself, okay?"

Farid looked down at the hand fisted in his shirt. Harper's words rung loud and clear in his head: "Do it, Egghead! Do your job!"

"Farid!" David gave him a good shake, thinking that he lost the man's attention.

"Even if you don't... Harper... Harper probably does," Farid said lowly, his vision blurred and eyes burning again. He looked up at David again with tears streaming down only to get lost in his beard.

David eased his grip on Farid's shirt and let the man hold himself up on the cot. "You're wrong. Harper could never hate you; he'd understand." The rest of what he wanted to say went unspoken, but the other knew what it was: "You two were close friends."

Farid looked down again and rubbed at his eyes. No tears. He didn't deserve to shed them.

For some reason, Mason stopped him, and the Yemeni man looked back up at him as fresh tears took the place of what he rubbed away. "Look, I know it's hard. But trust me, it helps to cry a bit now than keep it all bottled up." David knew from experience when his father died. Woods never snapped at him for crying, but would pass similar advice and be around to offer council to him. "I know you probably don't want to cry, like you think you have no right to, I know what that's like. Don't beat yourself up over this. It's only going to make things all the worse. What do you think Harper would ask you to do, right now?"

He thought about that for a second and said weakly, voice barely holding. "He would tell me to quit worrying."

David nodded. "That's right. He wouldn't want to see you like this. He'd want you to pick yourself up and keep going, and not give up and hate on yourself like this. So don't."

"Okay..." Farid nodded, and pulled his knees to his chest. His heart still continued to twist in his chest, but in some way, the lecture helped. Mason brought up a very good point, and it had been one he had forgotten.

Harper would have understood. Maybe he wouldn't forgive his untimely death, but he would at least understand.

Mason put a finger to his ear piece, as if listening to something - he wouldn't know, since he didn't have one in at the moment - and acknowledged the message. "I've got to go supervise Menendez's interrogation. Could you do me a favor and keep an eye out for Chloe? She should be in the control room upstairs."

Farid nodded again and got off the bed. He'd need to tough things out for now. After all, people still seemed to need him around. "I will."

I won't fail you all again, Farid swore to himself, I promise that much.


"Only the weak are cruel. Gentleness can only be expected from the strong."
- Leo Buscaglia


The echoing noise of explosions vibrated on the walls of the war room as Farid stared intently at the computer screen with Chloe. Systems were going down left and right, and they lost defenses so very quickly. They needed to find out why and quickly so the aircraft carrier wouldn't be a sitting duck. Even Admiral Briggs was doing what he could to fix the problem. Shut everything down, was that man's idea.

It sounded crazy to him, considering Menendez was somewhere on the ship - no one knew where - and no one in this room knew where. At that thought, he bit the inside of his cheek and glanced up at the room's occupants; a few soldiers, Salazar, a technician working in the room behind them, and Briggs with that technician. Comms had gone down as well, so he wasn't sure what was going on outside this room.

Obviously violence, he knew that. The gun shots coming from outside the room and down below made that more than clear to him. But security feed was down right now. He didn't like it. What happened? Salazar came here in a rush, and had explained that Section was trying to help fight back and reclaim the carrier. He also said that Menendez could be anywhere on this ship, since he escaped from the interrogation room.

His thoughts were swarming with guesses right now. What if Menendez and Section happened to bump into each other? Was David dead then? Or Menendez? He was in the dark, and he hated it.

The sound of a gun being readied alerted him then, and he looked back to see Briggs being held hostage by Menendez, a pistol pressed to his jaw. As the soldier nearest to him took aim, the terrorist shoved the barrel of the gun into Brigg's skin. "Back off!" He demanded.

Farid stepped back with Chloe, who rose from her seat, and continued back until he was a few feet from the computer. The US sailors lowered their weapons, and watched him with angry glares. Menendez walked Briggs up to the computer, and just then the Admiral started to shout.

"Salazar, shoot through me! Kill this son of a bitch!"

The sounds of gun shots rang in Farid's ears, and he saw the two men go down heavily with Brigg's angry scream with that. It was Salazar, he realized very quickly.

The traitor pointed his gun at Chloe next. There was no time to think about it. He couldn't let her die. He jumped out in front of her with a cry. Pain ripped through his chest, and his vision flashed brightly with stars when he hit the ground. His thoughts seemed to halt now as the obvious echoed in his mind. He was hurt. He couldn't move because it hurt so bad. He couldn't form the words to curse at the pain, he couldn't even form a cry in his throat. The wind was knocked right out of him and he couldn't seem to get air.

Then, very slowly, his vision inked out and the pain seemed to fade...


Hey guys, thanks for reading. I'm fairly certain that this will continue, but if not, then I'm happy to leave it like this. I'm writing this mainly 'cause I feel like Farid doesn't get enough love when he clearly deserves it. Actually, his deaths are a lot more emotional than some other deaths you see in CoD (such as Soap's). The very fact that he dies no matter what you do, but you can change how, kind of makes me feel a bit sad. So I try and give him a death to be proud of.

The reason I chose this particular scene of him dying is because when I saw it, I thought to myself, 'I wonder what'd happen if he survived that.' So this is a bit of AU. Of course, I don't want to touch his "no kill Harper" death, because his body turned into a sack, and the other two deaths seemed a bit more... eh... definite. He was only shot in the shoulder, after all.
But yes, I'm aware that he actually dies in the game, no matter what you do. This is AU because it's assuming he survived the shot to his shoulder.

And for those who want to know, I'm using the steps used to get the very good ending. To get this particular death you need to save Chloe Lynch in Karma, because if you save her later he kills DeFalco (since you apparently can't) and then gets his brain blown out by Salazar.

Don't forget to review! I really do love constructive criticism.