Sorry it's been a little while guys! It took a little longer to finish this one as we're drawing close to the end of the arc. Next one might be the last one for Shattered Ends.

I would've had this out earlier but work has been getting busier, meaning I've been getting home a little later and more mentally drained. That and some minor family stuff (nothing dramatic or anything, so don't worry).

Anyway, enough from me about me. You guys have a chapter to read!

Enjoy!

Skye and Emily sat in silence as the two young women watched the sun rise over the grassy hills in the distance. The air was cold and frigid; a stark contrast to the mid-summer climate they had left behind in the US. Still, the near-zero temperatures did little to distract the two young women from the beauty of an Australian sunrise.

"… it's something, isn't it…" Skye said, her voice a near-whisper as she curled up a little bit tighter in the blanket she was wrapped in.

"…. Yeah." Emily agreed, just as quiet as she covered her mouth to prevent a yawn from escaping. Much like their brief sleep on the private jet, neither of the two girls had gotten a good night's rest. And it was showing.

The two of them drifted off into a light sleep, their bodies resting against and supporting each other as they dozed off. Shelby watched this from the doorway nearby, a full mug of coffee in her grasp as she smiled sadly. It was good to have everyone together but Shelby wished it was under much better circumstances.

It had taken roughly half a day to get to the rural property that her husband's parents owned north west of the capital: they had to get three vehicles to carry all twelve of them plus their belongings, and renting vehicles on such short notice was quite difficult; they had to stop by various shops to buy food and other critical supplies; and finally had to make the long trip on the back roads in order to identify and counter any potential tails. Yes, they were in another country, but Shelby and the others didn't want to test just how far General Shepherd's reach was.

A soft yawn from behind made her turn around to see a half-asleep Andrew walk into the kitchen, and she had to conceal a smirk as the young man made a beeline for the still-hot kettle and coffee.

"Morning Andy…" She said quietly, not quite sure about who else was awake at this early hour of the day.

"… Mornin' Shelby…" He muttered around a fresh cup of coffee that was lifted to his lips. "… oh, that's the stuff."

"Hey… how are you holding up? I haven't had a moment to see how you and the others were doing amongst all of this…" Shelby asked him, taking a seat on a stool by the counter. "Don't take this the wrong way, but just because you're the oldest guy here doesn't mean you're exempt from grieving like the rest of us…"

Andrew sighed at her question, and shook his head slightly. "It's… it's fine… I mean, it's not like I never expected this to happen at all. I'm no stranger to the risks and the like that come with being an 'army kid'. Like, in the back of my head I knew that one day I'd come home from school or work one day and find out that my Dad's been killed whilst fighting overseas, or something along those lines." Andrew sat up a little and looked at her, his eyes starting to water ever so slightly. "I… I just d-didn't know that it'd h-hurt this much."

Shelby wasted no time in getting up and walking around to rest a consoling arm around Andrew's shoulders, pulling him into her side much like she would with her own daughter. He started to sob quietly into her chest. "I-I don't know wh-what to do now... there w-was so much m-more that I w-wanted to do with h-him…"

All that Shelby do was hold him close and help him finally vent the built up emotion that had slowly but steadily accumulated over the last couple of days. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Kelly had woken up and was standing by the entrance to the kitchen from the hallway, no doubt having heard the small discussion and subsequent breakdown. The mother and daughter shared a look, and Kelly nodded in acknowledgement as she slowly backed away and let her friend have his time to grieve.

It was cold. Too cold. Bone-freezing cold.

Yet Shade had a mission, and not even sub-zero temperatures were going to stop him from accomplishing it. The week and a half had passed in a blur; the airport massacre, the pursuit in Rio, the oil rigs, the gulag, the sub-base, Hotel Bravo and the chase for General Shepherd, the escape and fight in India.

After India he was given a choice: stay and fight, and risk everything to clear his name and get revenge on his fallen friends; or go home and keep the fight from reaching his family. Captain Price had given him the choice, and said that with all that they'd been through he wouldn't look down on him if he opted to leave. 'Not every battle is meant to be fought', Price had said.

The ringing sat-phone had given him a third option. Shade had answered it, and almost collapsed at the raspy Scottish accent on the other end of the line. Archer and Toad had escaped to a town on the outskirts of Tbilisi and had holed up there to rest and recover from their ordeal. Toad was in a rough way, but the stubborn bastard had lived through so much that he wasn't about to give up now.

After the call had ended, Shade turned around to make his choice.

And it was at the outside edge of a town called Didi Gupta where Shade was, sitting in a rented Jeep that he had hired after boarding an international flight under a fake name and credentials to the capital of Tbilisi. He had taken another sat-phone with him, and recorded the number that Archer had used to call him the first time.

With a sigh, he pulled the phone from his pocket and dialled the number, then held the phone to his ear.

The five kids were walking along one of the many dirt paths that rang along the property they were staying in for the foreseeable future. Holly and Rachel had run ahead, the younger girl leading the older one on a wild chase as they both ran amongst the trees and light bush nearby; Charlie walked near them as he listened to some music on his phone in an effort to keep an eye on his sister and the younger girl.

Andy and Kelly hung back behind them, walking beside each other in comfortable silence. They were both reflecting on the last few days, occasionally their thoughts would drift to their fathers and the team in general.

"… I'm sorry." Andrew's apology seemed misplaced to Kelly. In her mind, it should be her apologising to him about his loss.

"Why?" She berated herself for saying something like that, when she had meant to say something along the lines of 'Don't be'.

"For any time in the near future where I may come off as feeling jealous or anything along those lines…"

"… because my Dad's still…" She didn't want to finish the sentence, both out of how uncomfortable it made her feel and because she didn't want to upset Andy any further.

"… yeah. I mean, I probably have every right to be… but we don't know what happened out there. For all we know, it could have been the other way around right now. Or that trying to save my Dad would have meant the death of yours… or that my Dad saved yours." Andrew sighed and stopped walking, choosing to stand in the middle of the path with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. "I guess what I'm trying to say is-"

"Don't." Kelly interrupted him, wrapping her arms around his midsection and pulling herself against him to hug him from behind. "You don't need to say anything about anything like that. I know what you're going through, even if it's not exactly the same. Yes, my Dad's still alive… that could still change though. It could change at any given moment." She let go and spun him around to face her. "As long as we have each other though, we'll get through this. I don't think either of our Dad's would want us to dwell on them when we have every opportunity to live our lives in their memory."

The two teens stood there in silence, nothing else needing to be said at that moment in time. They held onto each other, that unspoken promise that they'd be there for each other regardless of what happened.

"Kelly?"

"… yeah?"

"… thank you…" Anything Kelly had to say in reply was forgotten as Andy leant down and gently pressed his lips against hers.

Charles looked back at the two of them and chuckled under his breath. "… about bloody time…"

"… and the situation is growing worse and worse as Russian Forces sweep over Western Europe in the wake of multiple chemical attacks across major capital cities, including but not limited to Paris, London and Berlin." Toni shook her head in shock and disgust as she changed the channel on the TV to another news story that was covering the developing war in Europe.

"There goes the idea of flying out to the family back home…" She said to both Shelby and Caitlyn as she sat down on the couch beside them. During the flight over, each of them had gone through what they had planned to do once they landed. Caitlyn wanted to spent a week with them before making her way back home to Ireland in order to get closer to family and friends of both herself and Archer over there. With the string of attacks that took place though, that idea was no longer viable.

"I can safely say that without a doubt, this was what the boys were fighting to prevent. Now that they're gone, whoever they were after was able to get away with all of this." Caitlyn said with a sombre voice. "What did Tommy say again?"

"He told me that it looks more than likely that General Shepherd played a part in all of this… wanted to try and get revenge for his loss in the Middle East. The general made it his mission to go after whoever supplied that weapon and made that possible. And it seems that he made it his personal mission upon taking command of the Task Force." Shelby answered as she stood up to head to the kitchen, repeating some of the information that Shade had

"Wait, he was in command when that bomb went off in Saudi Arabia?" Caiti asked.

"Yeah. Lost something along the lines of thirty thousand troops, with twice as many injured. That's not including the allied forces that went in with the US as well: Canadians, Australians, Brits. Everyone took a loss that day." Toni sighed as she shook her head. Shelby wanted to say more but a breaking news alert caught everyone's attention.

"This just in from Afghanistan: Lieutenant General Hershel von Shepherd, a key military leader of US and Allied Forces operating in the Middle East, has been found dead after the wreckage of a US helicopter was located earlier today in the desolate region. Whilst reports as to the exact nature and cause of his death are unconfirmed, there is speculation that a coalition special operations task force and a private military company are both involved. General Shepherd was in command of allied troops during the campaign against Khaled Al-Asad…"

The gather women could only stare at the television screen in shock, a multitude of thoughts running through their head. Slowly, they all turned to look at each other as they all came to the same conclusion.

"They got him."

Shade, Archer and Toad were seated in the back row of the small regional airliner: Toad had passed out on his partner's shoulder from a mix of fatigue and the dull pain he still felt from his leg wound; Archer was not far behind him, trying his best to keep awake whilst Shade tapped away a message on a burner phone he had bought at the airport they had departed from.

It had been an ordeal to leave Georgia with the two other soldiers. They didn't bring passports with them, so an international flight out of the country was not a feasible option. They had hopped from airport to airport, and illegally crossed multiple borders to reach where they were now: on a small chartered airliner operated by a discount airline in South East Asia. It was amazing what the right amount of US currency could do in this region, especially if you wanted to become invisible whilst in plain sight.

It had been at the terminal in Bangladesh when news had broken about the General's death. No doubt it had been the work of both Captain MacTavish and Captain Price, which was both good news and bad news to the three survivors of the team. It wouldn't be long before the Task Force was pinned with the blame, and to none of their surprise, it was in Thailand when they had heard that the Task Force had been officially disavowed by the UN and NATO. The announcement had included the statement that members of Combat Team H were marked as wanted men, having been 'directly involved' with the General's death, whilst the members of all the other combat teams were either discharged honourably or returned to their previous units.

Shade was relieved at that last piece of news: the last thing he wanted was the careers of at least a hundred professional soldiers tarnished and ruined through the actions of a corrupt and criminal commanding officer. Whilst it meant that there was a price on his head, he could sleep a little easy knowing that it was only just him and a few others, not the entire unit.

He put the final touches on the message, double checked it for any details that might compromise his personal security or the security of his recipient, then sent it.

The band was broken up. Members are going back to previous groups. I've been ditched by our agent though, can't go back to my old band. I'm going to come home when I can.

It was about half an hour before he received a reply.

I saw the news myself. It sucks; you guys put out a lot of good albums. Shade chuckled and shook his head as he worked on the next message.

Believe me, I agree with you on that. I talked to some of the roadies, Micky and Frog; they're stranded and need a place to crash for a bit. You okay with that?

Am I okay with that? Of course I am! I mean, they're not the drummer or the lead vocalist or the others, but they're better than nothing.

Yeah. Look, I've gotta go. Give the rug rat a kiss for me, will you?

Of course I will. See you and the boys soon.

Like I said, almost there guys! One more to go before we're back to happy and crazy times!