Chapter 4:

"You should have killed those guards." I groaned, opening my eyes to see Roach stood in front of me frowning. "Is this a common theme now, how many times you can lose consciousness?"

"Shut up Roach." I stood up, looking around the small cave I'd been shoved into. There was only one exit, the door and it was more than likely locked, not that I could open it anyhow since my hands were tied.

"Ghost?" My name crackled through the comm set hidden in my vest, seems the guards missed it.

"Yeah Soap?" I called loudly so my voice would be picked up, I had no way to get the comm near my face.

"Price is about to blow the place, where the hell are you?"

"I've been compromised and there's no way out."

There was a moment of silence before he answered. "Ok, we'll come and get you then."

"There's no time, just do it already. If you come back and we all get caught that's the end and Shepherd wins." Roach looked up sharply at that and I shook my head at him.

"No! We've already lost Roach not you too!"

"Goodbye Soap."

I navigated the comm against the door handle and pressed down on it so the link went dead. The last thing they needed to hear was me dying. I looked around again in the hopes of an exit and spotted a small hole at the centre of the ceiling, the only problem being it was several feet higher than me. I could climb it but first I needed to untie my hands.

"There's rocks." Roach pointed at the corner of the cave when I looked at him. Picking up a particularly jagged one, I set to work cutting the rope binding my hands. "Oh shit, better hide the rock."

He was right, footsteps were growing louder outside and I quickly slid it up my sleeve, moving to stand in the centre of the room. The door slammed open and the man who walked in looked like the one in charge, the big dog. He strode over to me, grabbing my shirt to pull me closer to him. "Where is Shepherd?"

He was American, then again the Shadow Company weren't the usual militia we were normally dealing with. These were trained by Shepherd, trained to take down the Task Force and we were the best of the best. "Dead."

"You're lying."

I shook my head, pulling free of his grasp with a smirk. "No. I'm the one who pulled the trigger after all. I'm pretty sure he's dead." That riled the man up, he snarled and punched my jaw. I stumbled back, regaining my posture so I didn't fall before spitting out some blood. "That all you got?"

"You'll pay for this."

He started advancing on me but whatever he was going to do never happened as an explosive set off somewhere in the compound. "Oops, did I forget to mention that?"

"You idiots!" The man shouted as he left at the guards outside. "Didn't you check for the others?"

The door slammed shut and locked again. After a moment I began hacking at the ropes again. After a few minutes they were broken and I dropped them on the floor, rubbing my wrists as I looked at the wall more closely. The cave was man made, probably by explosives so it was easy enough to climb. About halfway up however it smoothed out and the only way to get up was to leap across the gap where a ledge was on the other side of the wall.

"Ah, shit."

"Think you can make it?" Roach was sat on the ledge, looking across at me curiously. "It's a long jump."

"Well I'll die anyway if I stay here." Roach nodded in agreement and I began swinging back and forth to gain some momentum. Once it seemed enough, I let go as I swung towards the ledge, just grasping the edge before I fell. "I don't suppose you can help me up, can you?" Roach just laughed, shaking his head. "Didn't think so." I hauled myself up into the edge and lay down on the flat surface to catch my breath.

It was lucky I did as the door below swung open, I crawled to the edge to look down and saw the man from before had come back. He was stood in the middle of the room, holding the broken rope and looking around in shock at my disappearance. I would have laughed if it wouldn't have given away my position. The second set of explosives went off and the whole room shook, the ledge I was on started crumbling away and I had to move quickly before it fell.

The man heard the rock fall and looked up, running from the room as the ledge fell and thankfully didn't notice me as I began climbing to the hole again. I was running out of time fast, when Price set off the third explosives the whole room would collapse and I needed to be out of it to survive.

I could reach the opening from where I was and hauled myself up and luckily, it led outside. Scanning the area, I soon found the rendezvous point and began climbing down the rocks. Unfortunately Price decided to set off the next explosives and as the cave systems collapsed below, I lost my footing and fell the rest of the way.

"Ghost you have to get up." Roach's voice sounded near me and I lifted my head to find him crouched nearby. "Move, they're coming." I could hear their voices behind me, what was left of the Shadow Company was regrouping and right now I was an easy target. "Move!"

I scrambled to my feet at the words and ran into the forest, turning on my comms again. "Price!"

"We see you Ghost, keeping heading north and you'll meet us in a few clicks." I ducked as a spray of bullets came my way, ducking behind a tree. "I would hurry, what's left of them are after your blood now."

"Thanks for the advice." When the he billets stopped I took my chance and started running again. This process continued for several minutes and I almost laughed in relief when the trees thinned out and I found I was on the edge of a quarry, a heli sat in the centre a few yards ahead. I slid down the edge of the quarry, stumbling to my feet and began running again as the Shadow Company started shooting from the top. "That better be you guys in there!"

The blades started whirling and Soap appeared at the side and grinned at me, grabbing my arm as I reached it and hauled me up. "Glad to see you made it. Nikolai let's go!" The heli took off, the quarry collapsing underneath it and it took the re manners with the Shadow Company with it.

"So now what?" Roach was sat next to me, sitting precariously on the edge of the heli, legs dangling over the edge. Not that it would matter if he fell since he was already dead.

"Makarov." I answered and Soap looked at me sharply. "We need to find Makarov."

"Slow down Ghost, one thing at a time." Soap put a restraining hand on my shoulder when I tried to stand up. "You need to heal, going after Makarov in your state is suicidal. We're going to Nikolai's safe house to regroup and plan from there."

I sighed, nodding in agreement and he removed the hand. "Soap's right you know. You need to heal or you'll end up like me." Roach informed me with a sad smile. "I don't want you to die because you're too headstrong."

I snorted and managed a smile of my own. Although he wasn't really Roach but a figment of my imagination, he still acted like him. Apparently I paid too much attention to him when he was alive. Soap had sat down, satisfied I wouldn't be straining myself any further and I sighed, resting my head on the wall. Looking outside as the dust settled around the collapsed quarry I smiled as I realised we were one step closer to our final goal, Makarov. And I would be the one to pull the trigger, for everyone we had lost, for the Task Force, for Roach.