I've gone back and forth with how I wanted this story to follow the timeline of MW2 and MW3, and I've kind of found a middle ground where it will kind of follow the timeline, and sometimes not. With how intricate the actual story is, I think for this story's sake it's better that way.

Let me know if this is something you think I should continue, and free weapons crates to those who do. :)

Disclaimer: I don't own Call of Duty or any characters, just my OC: Audrea "Firebird" Falco.

"Shepherd's bringing in someone else." Captain John MacTavish, also known by his field name 'Soap,' looked up from the document he was reading to see Simon Riley, field name 'Ghost,' walk into his office, his mask and sunglasses still covering his face. Soap cocked an eyebrow at Ghost and leaned back in his seat. "And I didn't know about this because…"

"Apparently he's damn good, too. Praises coming from all over the bloody place." Ghost leaned against one of the shelving units in the office, his eyes scanning over the paper in his hand. He poked a finger to a sentence on the page and looked at Soap. "Some work as a fighter pilot and a hell of a sniper. Best in the Canadian Forces-"

"The paper if you please, lieutenant." Soap shot Ghost a look and leaned forward on his desk, reaching a hand out and motioning for the paper. Ghost sighed and leaned forward, placing the paper in Soap's hand and then leaning back, crossing his arms. "When do you think they'll get here?"

Soap scanned quickly over the paper and then made a face, looking up at Ghost. "Well…if you would take the time to read the entire description you would have seen that it was today," Soap lowered the paper from his face and stared hard at Ghost. "And how did you get this in the first place? It was directed to me."

Soap placed the paper down on his desk and poked a finger into the top right corner where his name was typed. Ghost stayed silent for a moment and then shrugged, pushing himself away from the shelving unit and moving towards the door. "Hey, at least I got it to you, right Captain? You should be thanking me for that."

Soap watched him leave with a glare visible on his face, a sigh leaving his lips. "Ghost!"

Soap ran a hand over his short Mohawk as he walked towards the entrance to his base where General Shepherd and the new recruit were supposed to arrive. He stared at the ground as he thought about the reason why the new member was being brought in at such short notice. With the lingering threat of a new world war with Russia, it was understandable that Shepherd would want to have a full team ready. The best possible team at that.

"So who's this guy supposed to be, huh?" Soap approached the rest of his team, minus Captain Price who only seemed to be around for vital missions, resting near a stack of bins holding supplies, hearing one of the more mouthy members of the team, Mike "Meat" Harver, ask about the new recruit.

"No name, no nothing. The paper didn't say shit. Quit asking." Ghost was lying back against one of the bins in full gear, mask and all, and rubbing a hand over his forehead in annoyance with Meat's constant questions.

"You know, I just hope the new guy isn't as annoying or as slow as you." Lee "Flash" Miller smirked at Meat, poking him in the shin with his boot. Meat looked over at him and glared hard. "One day I'm going to just accidentally blow your head off on a mission and then that pretty little mug of yours will just be food for the coyotes."

Flash glared back at him and opened his mouth to retort when Soap cut in between them, raising a hand. "That's enough. You two know how I feel about friendly fire jokes."

Soap sent both soldiers stern looks as they remained quiet, turning their gazes towards the gated entrance they were standing near. A loud groan sounded from behind the group as Ghost stretched and stood straight against the bins, looking over at Soap. "When the hell are they supposed to get here?"

The distant sound of tires racing against a dirt road seemed to answer Ghost's question. Soap and the rest of Task Force 141 shot their gazes in the direction of a jeep racing towards the base. Soap grinned and pushed himself away from the bins, walking closer to the entrance as it began to open. "Right on time."

The jeep pulled to a slow stop in front of the group and died down, General Shepherd jumping out from the drivers' side as a woman exited from the passengers' side.

"Ah, Captain MacTavish! It's nice to see the entire group here to greet their new teammate." Shepherd grinned as he saluted Soap, the salute being returned to him by Soap.

"I thought it would be best that they all meet for the first time together." Soap glanced back at the group as they watched Shepherd, returning his gaze back to the General. Shepherd grinned widely at Soap and then stepped back, placing a hand on the back of the woman standing next to him and pushing her forward gently. "Captain MacTavish, I would like to introduce to you your new sniper and long-range weapons specialist, Sergeant Audrea Falco."

Audrea saluted Soap with a confident grin as he stared at her, his mouth hanging slightly agape. There were a few noises coming from the rest of the group as Soap regained his composure, slowly raising his hand to salute her back. "Very nice to meet you, Audrea Falco."

"And a pleasure to meet you, Captain. I'm excited to be working with the Task Force." Audrea gave Soap a slight nod before lowering her hand back to her side, the grin staying present on her face.

"Look at that, I'm late for a meeting," Shepherd's voice shook Soap's gaze on Audrea and he looked over at him, noticing Shepherd was now quickly walking back to the jeep. "I'll leave the rest of the introductions up to your team, Captain MacTavish!"

Without waiting for a response, Shepherd got into the jeep and sped off out of the camp, the tires of the vehicle groaning in response to how fast he was going.

"Always gotta bloody be somewhere. I think he's just downright insane." Ghost's grumble was loud enough to be heard by everyone and Audrea snorted, Soap shooting a look back at Ghost. Soap's gaze slowly reached Audrea's form again and she looked up at him, straightening her posture to attention.

"At ease." Soap slowly nodded at her, holding his hands up and motioning for her to loosen her rigid stance. Audrea took a breath and then eased her posture, crossing her arms over her chest and then watching as Soap walked towards the other men standing around.

"I guess you'll want to meet the rest of the men you'll be working with," Soap glanced back at Audrea and then motioned towards Meat. "This is Mike Harver. We like to call him Meat."

Audrea grinned at his field name as he nodded his head slightly and held an arm out. "Pleasure to meet you, m'lady."

Soap made a subtle face at Meat before moving on to Flash. "This is Lee Miller. We call him Flash because he's a damn quick bastard."

Flash looked at Audrea with a slight smile, quickly sending a wave in her direction. Soap quickly moved towards a sleeping form lying on the boxes behind Flash, roughly shaking his shoulder as the form shot up to attention. Soap shot him a look before looking back towards Audrea. "This is Gary Sanderson. We call him Roach because…well, he just doesn't die."

Audrea sent Gary an amused grin as he stared in shock at her. He cleared his throat and then grinned, waving at her as he fixed the hat on his head. He kept his voice in a slight whisper as he looked at Soap. "Did I miss something? There's a girl here?"

Soap shot a look at Gary before shaking his head and moving towards Ghost, slapping a hand on his left shoulder. "This bundle of joy is Simon Riley, but we call him Ghost. He's also my second in command."

Audrea looked at Ghost as he remained silent and unmoving. She wasn't sure if he was even looking in her direction through the darkly tinted sunglasses he wore. Her attention was soon shifted back to Soap when he cleared his throat, moving to stand in front of her again as the rest of the men stared at her in interest. "And you can call me Soap."

"Soap?" Audrea's eyebrow cocked in amusement and Soap just shook his head at her, reaching a hand up.

"Don't ask. It's a long story," He smiled at her before crossing his arms. "Do you have a field name? Or something you'd like us all to call you?"

Audrea placed a hand to the back of her head, pulling on the end of her ponytail a bit. "Well, my old squad called me Firebird."

"Firebird," Soap said the name and grinned, looking back up at Audrea. "I like it."

The sun beat down mercilessly on Soap as he walked across the long concrete parking lot towards the military training facility after finally meeting his new recruit.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. The large door to the facility creaked as Soap opened it, closing it with a loud thud behind him as he walked toward a group of men overlooking a large training area.

"Ah, MacTavish!" Shepherd's voice cut through the small chatter that was going on between the men, two others turning to look where Shepherd's gaze now was.

"Sir," Soap nodded at him with an eyebrow raised, noticing he was back from his meeting quite early, and walked over to stand next to the group. He nodded at the rest of Task Force 141 standing around. The door on the ground floor opened slowly, Audrea walking through and kicking the door shut behind her.

"Oh, wow." Roach was the first to make a sound, moving towards the railing to get a better look at the ground floor. Soap's eyebrows rose as he moved forward, taking in Audrea's new look as she stood by the starting point of the course. She was checking over a Colt M16A4. Her wavy brown hair was tied up tight in a ponytail and moved swiftly around with her movements. Her bulletproof vest was positioned on top of a black t-shirt, a half-face balaclava pulled down under her chin.

Soap took notice of how the bottom half of her attire was quite odd – well, odd enough for Task Force 141 standards. Her utility belt held packs for bullets and supplies and hugged her hips right above grey shorts. A holster sat on each thigh with the right one holding a large knife and the left one holding a Desert Eagle. The long, thick thigh-high's trailed down into knee-high combat boots, worn and dirty from combat.

Shepherd grinned as he waved down to Audrea, her blue-grey eyes slowly landing on his form. "Are you ready, Sergeant Falco?"

Audrea smiled, raising a gloved hand to give Shepherd a thumbs up. She set down the M16A4 and picked up a Barrett .50cal. She checked the ammo and then lowered it to her side, looking up towards Shepherd. "Sir!"

Shepherd grinned and pulled a stopwatch out of his jacket pocket, clicking a button. "And… start!"

Audrea's boots hit the ground hard as she sprinted forward, sliding to a squatting position behind a concrete slab and taking out the first four targets with ease. She twisted around and ran to the right, taking out two more targets as she passed.

"Holy shit…" Roach mumbled to himself as he watched her run through the course, taking down target after target in one shot. Audrea slid behind a steel beam, shooting over at three more targets before moving on, smirking and deciding to add some flair to the training. As she jumped over a concrete slab, she hit one last target at the end of the course before landing an aerial cartwheel. She landed hard on both feet, rising slowly from her crouched position and smiling to herself as she turned around to look at the men.

Shepherd stared down at her as he clicked a button on the stopwatch, Soap blinking hard once from beside him. The arm Ghost was resting his head on slid slowly out from under him, causing him to stumble a bit and cough as he straightened up.

"Bravo!" Everyone snapped their gazes to Roach who was clapping wildly from the balcony, Audrea's smile going wider as she took a bow in his direction, resting the rifle over her right shoulder. Shepherd cleared his throat and then looked down at the stopwatch, showing it to Soap. "I told you she was a peculiar one."

"More than that," Soap looked down at Audrea as their gazes met, the left side of her mouth slowly turning upwards into a smile. "That's unbelieveable."