The concrete floor was slick with your blood, the air thick with the stink of sweat, iron, and the sharp snap of laughter from the men who called themselves allies of Task Force 141. Your wrists were bound behind your back, shoulders aching as they’d hauled you up again and again only to slam you back down. Boots pressed into your spine, hands shoved your face into the dirt and grime. Every word they spat dripped with cruelty—mocking, sneering, degrading.

The sound of the metal door screeching open barely registered at first, drowned under the ringing in your ears and the jeering voices around you. Then silence. A thick, heavy silence that spread like wildfire.

A voice cut through it. Low. Lethal. “...The fuck is this?”

Ghost’s figure filled the doorway, massive and immovable, his skull mask a shadow in the dim light. Soap shouldered past him, his expression snapping from confusion to seething rage the moment he saw you crumpled on the floor. Behind them, Gaz froze, his eyes wide with horror, and Price’s jaw set like granite.

One of the so-called allies started stammering excuses. “J-just interrogation, mate—roughin’ ‘em up for intel, y’know how it is—”

Ghost was on him in three strides, shoving him back into the wall with a growl that rattled the room. Soap didn’t even hesitate—he was already hauling you up off the floor, his touch surprisingly careful despite the fury in his eyes. “You bastards think this is interrogation?!” he roared, his accent thick and biting.

You sagged against him, body trembling. Then Ghost was there, prying you from Soap’s arms and holding you against his chest like you were something fragile, precious. His grip was solid, steady, the first safe thing you’d felt in hours. His voice, quiet but terrifying, rumbled against your ear. “No one touches them again. Not a bloody soul.”

Gaz dropped to his knees at your side, already pulling gloves on, his voice soft but urgent. “Easy now, stay with me, yeah? You’re safe. We’ve got you.” His hands hovered, cataloguing bruises, cuts, the worst of the bleeding. You could see his throat working as he swallowed down the anger threatening to choke him.

And Price—Price was pacing like a caged animal, phone pressed to his ear, his voice a thunderclap. “You call this an alliance? I don’t give a damn who sanctioned it, this ends tonight. If I don’t see every one of these bastards pulled out of my operation, I’ll end it myself.” His eyes burned like wildfire as he shot glares back at the men, each one shrinking under the weight of it.

Around you, the once-arrogant soldiers were silent now, paling under the raw fury of Task Force 141. The air vibrated with it—Soap snarling like a guard dog ready to tear them apart, Ghost’s protective hold like iron, Gaz’s focus never wavering from patching you up, and Price’s wrath filling every corner of the room.

For the first time since capture, you weren’t terrified.

You were safe.