"This place is beautiful!" she exclaimed the very moment she entered his safehouse. Her sapphire eyes, they could see the beauty of the elegant, stately fortress hidden within the mountains through the boxes of equipment, the vast numbers of men going in and out of the place, as well, as the signs that they had been living there for a long, long time. The entire structure had high ceilings, and large windows, the living room had been filled with computers, news clippings… She could even see the plans for the attack on the airport…

He smiled, and kissed her discreetly on the temple, noting a few knowing snickers on the part of his men. There was no doubt that those bumbling gossips, Anatoly and Viktor had told them that he had taken a strange liking towards her. "I'm glad that you like it," he replied. "I know that you're tired, come, my dear."

Taking her hand, he led her upstairs, carrying her bag of things with his free hand. It was not much, only a second catsuit, and an M4A1 that the Loyalists had given her, along with the appropriate ammo, and a few kinds of medication. He brought her to his room, the only place that was clean and not littered with papers, cellphones, ammo, and whatever knick knacks that about fifty men would leave without a woman's touch. "You'll have to share this room with me when you are here," he told her, after he had closed the door. "I do not trust my men with a woman as beautiful as you are."

Chuckling, she brought an arm around his neck, clasping her fingers on his shoulder. "And can you trust yourself with me?" she asked him almost teasingly, her sapphire eyes, almost gleaming. He kissed her, a full, passionate kiss, to prove his point, and she was satisfied with his answer.

They had remained like that for a few long moments, exchanging sweet nothings into one another's ears, as if they had been lovers long parted. That evening, he told her that she was to depart for Rio de Janeiro in the next morning to take out Alejandro Rojas; it had been a mission that she had accepted without another word.

And when night came, that was when he started to see the signs. She had just emerged from her bath when she retrieved some pills that he instantly recognized. "The Loyalists must have taken great care of you," he said, watching her as she took the medicine with a glass of water. She nodded, and smiled that smile that was so iconic of her, replying that Kamarov would not allow her to leave unless she took the medicines with her, although she no longer felt any more pain where he had shot her.

She had assumed that those pills were painkillers, it must have been that she was not aware of their nature. When he had learnt that prolonged inability to dream had staggering effects on the human mind, he had acquired huge doses of this particular pill to "deal" with the victims that he had wanted to torture. However, when used in prescribed dosages, the effect would be temporary… But what could she have seen in her sleep to have needed such powerful drugs to even sleep?


If only he had seen it earlier… Perhaps, she would still be here at that moment… But he knew that it was impossible. If she was still alive, she would have been torn between helping him, and fighting alongside the ones that she had gave her loyalty to, the Task Force 141… She could have already seen the outcome of the war, and chose the best way out…

He could see the new species of butterfly flying all about the room, like the other one in Moscow… Somehow, he could not help but to wonder whether those things represented Anya… They had been discovered in Afghanistan and Russia the day that she had passed on… And whenever he seemed to have thought about her, they would appear before him…

The men, they were all assembled in tents all around his safehouse, now cleaned of any form of equipment, which had been moved to about two of those tents. Instead, there entire place was filled with sleeping bags, for those who were injured and needed medical attention. In fact, he had moved into one of the tents himself, to provide space for those who had needed him.

Everywhere he walked, he received curt, polite nods, and he had nodded back. "They have great respect for you, I can tell," Anya's words rang in his head, and he knew exactly why. Unlike those useless fools in the Kremlin, he knew what it was like to be a soldier, to be a man in the field. Hence, he chose to eat, and sleep like one of the men, it was a choice that he had made since day one.

He went into the tent that was used for dining purposes, and had gotten a tray of food for himself, just like the rest of the men. He took a place in the center of the arranged tables, and ate among them, much to the initial shock of those around him. "Do not let me bother you, please," he told them with a chuckle, and they continued to eat in silence, until he saw one of the men take out a photograph of his family, of his wife and his three children. "They are beautiful," he told the man rather appreciatively. "Your son looks like your wife."

The man nodded, and thanked him. "They're all waiting for me, I don't know what'll happen to them if anything happened to me." The man was young, there was no doubt that he had married young. "My son's only three, and my daughter's five…"

"Do not worry," Makarov told him. "We will see an end to this war, I swear to you." At those words, he knew that each and every single eye there, was focused on him. "They might have been able to enter our lands, but I promise you with my life that they will never take Moscow, the heart of our great mother." It was then, when he knew that he had the undivided attention of his men, each and every single one of them. "We have already decimated their East Coast, and we will show them that the sons and brothers of Russia will never fail to defend all that is dear to us…"

A loud chorus of cheers chorused throughout the tent, and Makarov allowed the ruckus to continue for a few moments. He knew well how to rouse the morale of his own men. He knew that no matter what happened, they would look towards him for leadership and for guidance. And he would. He would lead them to glory, and they will prove to the world that Russia was not as weak as the world had thought her to be.


"A toast, my brothers, to the brave First Battalion of the US Army Rangers!" Kamarov said in English and in Russian, back at the makeshift base that they had erected after they had salvaged what they could from the Loyalist base, which luckily, had only been partially destroyed, due to the destruction of the bombers before they could make a return run. As it was cold, they broke out on the vodka and drank to their heart's content.

"Aww, man, don't," Foley said. He was not much of a drinker, and could not even take three glasses of red wine before feeling tipsy, much less the amount of vodka that the Russians were giving him. "It's what we are supposed to do."

However, Kamarov seemed to disagree. "No, my friend, you have saved my comrades, and our friends from the 141," he replied. "I am eternally grateful for your timely arrival and presence." There was a jovial smile on the Russian's face, as if that his base had not been destroyed at all.

MacTavish just walked over to Kamarov and took out the bottle of vodka from his hands and said, "Alright mate, you've clearly had too much for yourself, don't push it over to Foley."

"Heh, he thinks I can't hold my liquor," Kamarov said to the guy next to him. "Alright, Captain Soap, let's see how you fare with the rest of the bottle." MacTavish rolled his eyes, and looked towards his boys from the 141, who were all egging him to accept the challenge.

Price, however, was not too sure about it. Wait a minute; he had never seen MacTavish drink, ever. "The Captain's… the opposite of Foley, to put it nicely," Archer explained to the older Captain. "He's won more drinking games that we can even count."

And thus, MacTavish started to empty the contents of the vodka down his throat, ignoring the burning sensation that it brought totally, leaving some of the men to wonder what this man was actually made of. "Dude, seriously!" Dunn said to Toad and Ghost. "Your Captain's practically all muscle, no wonder he can drink a whole bottle of vodka neat!"

The men from the 141 practically burst out into a bout of heavy laughter. "You know, I've never thought of that before," Ghost mused. It could be MacTavish's high rate of metabolism at work, which was why he could practically drink alcohol as other people would drink water…

Outside the tent, Roach was taking a smoke when he was spotted by Ramirez. "Hey there," Roach greeted him, offering the kid a cigarette, which he politely declined. "I heard that you guys were the ones who recaptured the White House. Good job."

Ramirez flushed a little. Being the Private, he was not used to much praise, but it had been a truly… exhilarating time, even though it was supposed to be outright traumatic and shocking as well. "Thanks," he replied shyly. "There's something I wanna ask you…"

"Fire away," Roach told the kid, remembering that not so long ago, he was the FNG as well. Things were indeed awkward, whenever you were starting out on something, particularly in the army.

"Was Maria… really an Ultranationalist double agent?"

Roach had to be honest, that question took him quite aback. It seemed to him that Anya, whom the Rangers knew as Maria, had been rather an important part of their team. In fact, she had to be, seeing that Dunn was her best friend and Ramirez seemed to look up to her, by the way he had chosen his words. Taking a deep breath, and a deep puff of his cigarette, Roach said, "From what I know, she went straight to Makarov the moment she recovered from her injuries, but she was just working together with him and not for him."

MacTavish and Price had told them that Anya herself had denied being an Ultranationalist. Her return into the ranks of the 141, had been targeted at the them, to increase their caution towards Shepherd, whose deception she had known very early on. And in all honesty, Roach knew more than anyone that she succeeded in doing that. The only way she could have been discovered to be an American agent, was that she was betrayed by Shepherd. And not only that, since she was not the only person incapacitated in the attack on the airport, the Russian government could have discovered that it was a Russian op, and not an American one. That would explain that every single one, Makarov, Shepherd, and Vorshevsky himself, had been in cahoots with one another.

"She's like a big sister to me," Ramirez told Roach. "I joined the army when my parents died, and she took care of me, ever since I got into the Rangers." His improved ability to

"Let's see how lucky you are, kiddo," Anya once said to Roach, helping him to jump over a ledge when the Gulag was crumbling down due to the heavy fire from the Navy.

And when Ramirez thanked him, and walked away, Roach saw another one of those yellow butterflies that he had seen after Anya's memory appeared before him. "Take care of Ramirez for me, Roach," he almost heard her voice. "Thank you."