/Author's note/

Hello everyone! This is the very first fanfic that I've had the honor of writing and I hope you all enjoy it. As you can tell, the story is heavily based on the Call of Duty 4 mission: Aftermath. However, I did add some scenes that never happened in the original (or even in the remaster) to add a little bit of drama.

Chapter 1: Remember me?

They were all dead.

There was nothing more that could describe what I just saw, what I felt.

I thought it was over…

We thought it was all over…

We all thought that we would go back home, reunite with our families and forget the upheaval that war has brought to us. The ideality of going back home to your motherland to be praised as a war hero is just total bullshit to me. Will all of us be remembered after what happened here? Or will the world simply move on and continue celebrating these "memorial days" as an excuse for their carelessness.

Joseph Stalin once said:

"The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic."

30,000 U.S marines will simply become a statistic in the history books after a few days. Our names, our blood, our sacrifce, our existence…will all just turn into plain text in the records but a mere blank page in the history books.

Will the world remember the countless men I've killed, the bullets that I've taken, the things that my very eyes have seen? In the end, no one will truly care and the next generation of marines will suffer equally.

Chapter 2: Reminisce among the flames

I don't even know why I'm still awake. I wanted to die already. The burning sensation on my face as the inferno of the CH-46 Sea Knight tortures me. The dust constantly enters my lungs in an attempt to kill me as early as possible. The helicopter was obviously in ruins. There was fire eveywhere and God knows how much radiation has contaminated it's metal. Either I was going to die here or die on the hard , radioactive cement below me. I started crawling towards the ramp just to see if there's even anything recognizable left of the modernized desert.

Flash. NBC-1 Nuclear. Bravo - NB-0 6-2, 6-3-4. Charlie - 90 degree grid. Hotel - surface. Juliet - 90 seconds.

All what my ears could hear was the radio chatter. It was hard to believe any of these technologies would still work even after all the destruction.

I suddenly heard what sounds like a woman transmitting a message.

Be advised, nuclear detonation detected, fallout predicted within a radius of 7.4 miles…

Personnel within primary affected zone are ordered to commence immediate evacuation…

Contamination centers are being established at this time, and they should be operational within 2 hours…Personnel are advised…

to seek medical attention at the first available opportunity.

She's most likely to be one of the lucky ones who managed to avoid the destruction , just like the rest of the population.

I looked up to my gloves. It was completely torn apart. All I could feel was the sheering pain of my lacerated hands. The blood of my hands was just dripping like my wife's tears.

I wonder what she could be doing at this moment. She may be having a fun Friday night drinking with her co-workers. Tequila was always her favorite alcohol. It was pretty much the reason why we met in the first place.

As I crawled towards the ramp, all I could think of was her sweet face. It's been a month ever since I last saw her beautiful brunette hair, her snowy face, her slender body. I always teased her about her height. She was short, sure, but it didn't really matter.

It was hard to reminisce all of this while you're injured hand constantly gets torched by the burning metal of the helicopter's floor. All I felt was a burning sense of radiation and certain death. The dust just made suffocate even more; what a way to add up to the torture.

I reached the end of the rainbow…or rather the end of my life.

Shit…the city was in complete ruins. There were stumbled cars and debris everywhere. It makes me question the destructive capability of the weapons that we use. The city was blood red. Clouds of dust just kept injecting my eyes.

All of the buildings were in flames. Countless buildings fell to their structural demise. It felt like I was already in hell. Who knows? Maybe I'm already in hell and Satan is going to come and euthanize me with his stereotypical pitchfork.

I felt a slight rumble. I looked up and a skyscraper began it's collapse. Swarms of fire and brimstone crashed the building and it met it's untimely fate.

So this is what hell looks like, huh?

Chapter 3: The end of all things

The dust and the radiation made me staggered and I fell face-flat onto the middle-eastern asphalt.

It felt so painful. I started coughing out blood and all I could do was just suffer as the entirety of my human body started losing it's sanity. I looked up and I saw the huge cloud that the nuke set up. It was a simple symbol of destruction. It's tall mushroom cloud plainly represented the high advancement in the science of destruction.

I saw Pelayo lying cold on the ground. She was breathing her last amounts of air. Hearing her gasp for extra time of life just made me feel pity for her. Just like the rest of us, we all thought we were going back home after we rescued her from the crash. I got to admit, if only she never crashed along with Keating, we would make it out of here safely along with the others. But then again, it's a moral obligation to help our comrades. At least I managed to do one last good deed before we all die. Hopefully, when we see each other again in hell (or in heaven, who gives a shit), we'd be the best of friends.

She finally died moments after. Her glazed eyes looking towards me at her last breath.

After a while, I regained my strength to stand up and I continued walked along the destruction.

I immediately saw Lt. Vasquez. Just like me and practically anyone who's still alive amidst the destruction, he was roaming around the underworld.

It felt like both of us were at purgatory. I can tell that Lt. Vasquez was losing his human strength. It's such a shame to see a strong and courageous man die a cowardly death. I guess America has no more need for heroes like him. Lt. Vasquez was a man I highly respected. I fought with him in the outskirts of the middle east up until the full-scale assault in the capital city. He deserved a better death than this.

He looked at me.

His eyes were blood shot of fear. What was a great and fearless leader of the 1st Force Recoinnassance now turned into a peasant of the nuclear world.

Lt. Vasquez only looked at me for a short time until he continued walking, I'm guessing after all the trauma he's been through, especially today, He finally lost his ability to see the bright side of things. All what his eyes could see was the cruelty and derangement of the world he was born in.

I continued to walk but then I suddenly tripped and the pain went back. The pain signals just kept going back and forth as if they were in an infinite loop. I suddenly started choking for air but all I could breath was the dust.

I looked up again and I saw that Lt. Vasquez finally succumbed to his wounds. He was dead on the floor with a growing pool of blood surrounding him.

I did nothing but just look at the poor man's corpse until I saw a strange figure approach the cadaver.

My eyes were blinded by dust. I wiped my eyes off in hopes for a better view and there it was…it was…

A woman.

Chapter 4: The inevitable future

She was dressed in a beautiful white dress. Her skin was glowing white and she had blazing brownish hair similar to that of my wife. Come to think of it, the figure also has the same stature.

Who the fuck is she?

What's happening to me?

I'm becoming insane.

This cannot be real.

It must be the radiation. It's frying my brain. It's signaling the grim reaper to come and claim me. I'm done.

She started walking towards a nearby playground. I followed the mysterious woman.

My body was starting to fade. My legs started shutting down. My arms just lost all communications to my brain. I'm disintegrating. The radiation is devouring me.

I reached the playground and there she was.

In front of her, there was child playing on the swing. The child strongly resembled my 5 year old daughter, Sam. I then saw a man who I assume to be the father feeding a bottle to an infant.

No…no…no…no…NOOOOO!

This can't be happening.

Am I delusional?

The mysterious woman looked towards me and my suspicions were confirmed.

It was her…my beautiful wife…Rachel.

She sat beside the man on the bench. The man looked at me. It's me. A hallucination of my peaceful self.

And there he was lying on my arms…me and Rachel's second daughter who hasn't even been born yet.

It's over.

I fell down on the floor. My legs have finally given up. My ears have gone deaf. My brain is the only functioning body part right now. All it's doing is processing my death.

I was losing my breath. I'm dying.

I looked to my left and I saw a grave stone with my name on it.

There she was…Rachel was mourning beside it with my daughters. Sam is already grown up while our unnamed daughter is still a toddler.

Suddenly, a man just showed up and comforted Rachel. I took a look at his face and it wasn't me.

Who the fuck is this guy?

Rachel hugged the man and the man kissed her on the forehead afterwards.

They then approached a stroller and pulled out a baby from it. It was a boy.

They smiled together and they both left.

I wanted to cry inside but my brain no longer has the capacity to do so.

I looked at the tall mushroom cloud again and I felt my heart starting to die. My eyes started fading as I look up to the inevitable future of my family.

Rachel…I love you so much, baby…please don't for-

Name: Sgt. Paul Jackson

Status: K.I.A

Epilogue:

Male Newscaster: Something has happened...

British Newscaster: What appears to be an explosion of an epic proportion...

Female Newscaster 1: Reports remain sketchy and unconfirmed at this time...

Male Newscaster: Damage appears to be total... to set off what appears to have been a nuclear explosion in his own country...

British Newscaster: Maybe the start of something larger that on whether Al-Asad was among the victims in what may have been a suicidal...

Female Newscaster 2: What I can see from the hotel here is a mushroom cloud, about 45 by...

Female Newscaster 3: ...Continue to burn across a massive wasteland, that was once a capital for this thriving nation...

The TV was creating an image I never wished to imagine. This can't be…

I panicked as the thought of it kept getting worse and worse.

No…my husband can't be dead.