"Major."
There was something immensely satisfactory about seeing one's elders pulling a salute every time he crossed them in the halls.
Liquid returned the salute. He let his hand twist up a little further than regulation, a habit engrained from his days with the SAS, but also a little to infuriate the lower ranks. They didn't dare to correct him; the last person who had tried that was inducted into the unit and stationed in the Pentagon as the official FOXHOUND liaison, a position which consisted primarily of coffee runs and endless requisition forms.
"At ease." He let his accent slip, too. Patriotism still ran high among the enlisted, and it rankled them to no end that a limey from across the pond could push them around.
He continued down the corridor, leaving the grunts to do whatever grunts did when they weren't being yelled at. Truth be told, there wasn't much else to do besides pace and hover over the shoulders of his subordinates. Oh, there was endless training and paperwork, but even throwing some starry-eyed intern into the dirt lost it's appeal after the two-hundredth time.
The sharp clack of very non-regulation heels on linoleum pulled him from his thoughts.
"Wolf."
The sniper grinned sharply, and fell into pace with him. Liquid knew that his unit all felt the effects of confinement. Sniper Wolf was far better at hiding it than the rest of them, but even she had taken to wandering the base.
"I could kill a man for some action." She sighed, pushing a hand through her hair.
Liquid scoffed. "We're in enough trouble as it is. Kindly refrain from lengthening our probation."
"Bah, politics."
"You aren't the one standing trial in front of a military tribunal."
"Maybe I ought to go in your place," she smirked. "I could wear one of mother's dresses, speak Kurdish?"
"Wolf, we need them to like us. These are Americans, they're petty."
She hummed, and they fell into silence. The hallways were mostly uninhabited during the evenings. The troops were in the barracks or at the mess hall, and the scientists didn't venture up from the labs out of some old high school instinct regarding muscle-types and lockers. Sometimes he ran across the other FOXHOUND members, but that was mostly limited to Wolf or Octopus. Ocelot spent his time hovering over the shoulders of the researchers or pissing off the soldiers in the firing ranges. Raven loomed on the roof of the communications tower, and Mantis was having an isolation fit, and lurked in his room.
It was insurmountably stupid to keep them pinned up in the middle of Bumfuck Island, Nowhere. Even if guarding the R&D here was as vital as the higher-ups implied, they certainly didn't need an elite task force confined on-base 24/7. Under review or not, FOXHOUND would be better utilized elsewhere.
"Liquid-" Wolf said sharply.
He glanced up, and then a little researcher ran face first into his chest. Liquid didn't move; he was six foot and nearly two hundred pounds, it took more force than an anemic nerd could produce to push him over, but the researcher fell backwards in a tangle of elbows and styrofoam cups.
Liquid frowned, and brushed at the burning coffee seeping through his shirt.
"Owww..." the researcher rubbed the back of his head. He got up slowly, sighing at the empty coffee cups. "Dr. Tost is gonna kill me." He glanced up.
In a typical fear situation, the parasympathetic nervous system activates the 'fight-or-fight' response. This triggers a series of reactions down the spine: blood flow increases, pupils dilate, the stomach and intestines stop digesting food, and the mouth halts the production of saliva. The energy spent during digestion was redirected to the extremities. All of these reactions serve to prime the body for immediate and rapid motion, whether it be punching or sprinting.
The man took one look at them, and froze like a deer in headlights.
"I, uh, uh," he stammered. "Sorry, uh, sir?" His hand twitched up to his glasses and hung there, like he planned on a salute but then thought better of it. He glanced at Wolf, who seemed as unimpressed as ever, and blanched. "Uh, ma'am."
Wolf raised an eyebrow at him.
"I n-need to go." He jabbed his finger down the hall, narrowly missing Liquid's arm, and stumbled back towards the labs.
To his credit, he managed to keep from running until he was nearly ten feet away.
"Well, that was obnoxious." Liquid scowled at his shirt. The coffee had cooled to mildly scalding now, and was rapidly headed towards cold and clammy.
"I think you scared him, boss. Poor thing will be twitching for weeks."
"Hmm." He didn't even like good coffee, much less the sludge they had on base. He was still British at heart, and drank tea on principle. "I smell like a university kid."
"I'd lend you a shirt, but I don't think it'd fit."
"Ha ha, Wolf, you never run out of clever things to say." Liquid said dryly. He stopped poking at the stain. It was a good thing that their uniforms were olive drab, otherwise he would have a large, obvious coffee spot all over his shirt tomorrow morning.
"You could just take off your shirt?" Wolf started pacing down the hall. Liquid followed, keeping step with her out of habit.
"I'm in enough trouble as it is, I don't need some grunt getting the wrong idea and filing sexual harassment charges."
He pulled off his greatcoat as he walked; there was no reason to let the coffee dribble onto that, too.
Wolf laughed. "We both know you'll end up sauntering around the base half-naked anyways."
"I have had reasonable justification every time that has happened." Liquid sniffed.
"Sure, boss."
The next morning was cold and disgusting, but it least it was better than warm and disgusting. Liquid rubbed sleep out of his eyes and crawled out of bed. Officer housing was only slightly better than what the grunts had, but he at least had a room to himself, even if it was slightly smaller than a college dorm and he still had to share communal showers.
His living quarters currently consisted of a stiff mattress balanced precariously on a bed frame, a small wardrobe, and a little desk and chair tucked into a corner.
He pulled on a new shirt, which looked like of all of his other shirts except for the one that now had a large bleach stain in the middle. Liquid was never very good at laundry. Then went on the bulky trousers, which he neatly tucked his shirttail into, and the belt, which was more of a safety hazard than not. It took no thought to realize that a belt gave an enemy combatant a good place to grab and throw, and its inclusion was clearly made by someone with more a mind for aesthetics than practicality.
The base was still quiet, a combination of it being o' five-thirty and severely undermanned. Liquid pulled on his greatcoat as he walked.
There wasn't much for a high-ranking commander of a niche special forces unit to do in the middle of an island in the middle of the Arctic circle. Sure, he could endlessly micromanage about patrol routes, but there was still a pile of paperwork sitting at his desk and a nine month probation and another psych evaluation waiting for him if he tried to start anything.
He got to the commander's room, which he refused to call an office on principle that offices were utilitarian. It was a nice little room, a touch gaudy and ostentatious, but it accomplished the task it was meant to accomplish. Even if it was a gross waste of space. No office needed couches, much less a military one.
It had a desk and a chair and a massive pile of paper work lurking in his inbox, looking like it remained upright only through sheer spite towards gravity. He slumped into the chair and slammed his head on the desk.
The pile of papers fluttered to the ground.
Liquid fished the nearest one off of the ground. It was page three of fourteen of a report about some inconsequential chain of command drama that would never matter to nor effect FOXHOUND in any way.
He rolled his eyes, and tracked down the other thirteen pages. Speed reading came easily with a profoundly gifted IQ level, and he managed to skim over the report in less than five minutes. Nothing but endless bickering about who got to yell at whom about irrelevant nonsense.
Liquid rolled his eyes and groped around the desk drawer for a stapler. There was no sense in letting the papers get lost, even if it was the saddest excuse of a dick-measuring contest he had ever witnessed. His hand drifted past the pens, the pencils, and the staple remover before he managed to find it.
He aligned the papers neatly, and positioned the stapler at a forty-five degree angle to the top corner. Never let it be said that Liquid Snake was anything less than thorough. He pressed the stapler to a click.
The paper remained unstapled. Worse, it had developed an irritating little dent of failure in the corner where it was supposed to be meticulously stapled.
Liquid heaved a sigh so mighty Homer could write an epic about it and yanked the desk drawer open. After a few seconds of unfruitful searching, he slid the drawer shut and stood up.
As much as he liked not having to dodge grunts and twitchy scientists, being in such an underpopulated base had its draw backs. For one, there were no secretaries from whom to steal office supplies. Even FOXHOUND had secretaries, although those were mostly recruit hopefuls with sprained ankles who were on desk duty for two weeks and had nothing better to do.
Liquid wandered down the hall. Supplies were kept in the basement labs, along with all of the other necessary but not immediate things, like medical supplies and Nikita ammo. Typically, he'd send someone else to run his errands; he was a high ranking commander, he had more important things to do rather than find office supplies, but he was bored and a paper abyss waited for him back at his desk. Even a staple fetch-quest was more appealing than that.
He tapped the call button, and the elevator arrived with a ping. At times, he wasn't entirely sure whether or not it was safe to stick both management rooms and living quarters in the same building as nuclear war heads, but managed to console himself that he was already sterile and would probably die before leukemia set in anyways.
Liquid sighed and stepped into the elevator and pressed for the second basement. The elevator shuddered to a halt, and the doors slid open.
The flooring down here was loose, and rattled too much when he walked. Even the heel-toe trick he had learned back in basic didn't work.
The door on the left had some messy, illegible graffiti scrawled across it. Liquid held his hair back and stood in front of the door. It opened with a blast of air and he walked down the hall. The labs were supposed to be empty this early, the researchers didn't officially start working until nine, but it wasn't unusual for one of them to start early on some program or other.
So it wasn't a major surprise that one of the terminals was active.
There was a man on the computer in the northwest most corner of the room, typing rapidly. He was skinny and pale, with dark bruises from too little sleep smudged under his eyes, and bristly stubble on his chin. He wore thick glasses and a thin hoodie. There were two monitors in front of him, both of which he was half paying attention to, one with some brightly colored cartoon playing, and the other with code scrolling across the screen.
It was that clumsy nerd who splashed coffee all over Liquid's shirt.
Liquid rummaged in the nearest desk for staples. The programmer didn't notice, but those science types were always absentminded. Also, he was wearing headphones.
His hand closed around a nearly full box of staples, and he let himself smirk in victory.
He turned to leave, but snakes were just as prone to curiosity as cats, and he glanced over at the terminal. Liquid had no background in programming, but the code flying across the screen didn't look like it belonged in a walking TMD. He sidled forwards, peering over the scientist's head. No, that didn't look right at all.
"What are you working on?"
The man jumped, and if Liquid had been a little closer and a little shorter, he would have smashed his head against Liquid's jaw. Liquid glanced at the man's name tag, pinned loosely to his jacket: Dr. Hal Emmerich, PhD. The project head, then. ArmsTech contractor, MIT, impressive resume.
"I, uh, the melee program, uh, sir?" He glanced up at Liquid. "It, uh, was buggy in the VR, so I'm writing a patch. Uh, the program itself can't be changed, its too specialized, so a patch is the only solution. Sir." he babbled.
"A melee program?" Liquid squinted at the computer screen. The programmer unsubtly switched off the other monitor playing the cartoon. "Why would a TMD need one of those?"
"W-well," he stammered, "REX isn't any good at close combat, it only has the machine gun and the energy cutter, which is fine against troops but useless against anything with decent plating."
Liquid leaned against the desk, and Emmerich flinched away. "You're predicting knock-offs?"
The programmer blinked. "Uh, yeah. How did you know that?"
"Lucky guess. A tank isn't mobile enough to be a match for something like, ah, REX, did you call it? And it could shoot down aircraft, you said soldiers weren't a problem, so that leaves a vehicle similar to the TMD as its only threat."
"Yeah, that's it." Emmerich fought a yawn. "I mean, REX isn't supposed to go anywhere just by itself, but its better to be safe than sorry, y'know."
"And I imagine this little project of yours is unsanctioned?" Liquid knew he was very good at being intimidating. One didn't achieve command of a high tech special forces unit while looking like they spent the weekends knitting and gardening. The programmer quailed.
"Huh? No, we got permission." he mumbled.
"Why the early start then? I thought you were called in much later than this?"
"Early?" Emmerich frowned. "I thought, hm, what time is it?"
"Five," Liquid glanced at his watch, "forty-eight."
He blanched, and leaned back in his chair, hands over his face.
Liquid ignored him. "What does this mean?" He jabbed at the screen.
"Huh," Emmerich looked at the text, pushing his glasses higher up on his nose. "Oh, that's just a data packet, the source code pulls that and processes an exchange between REX and the operator. The ER model summarizes the database and provides the commonality relationship..."
The programmer descended into technobabble.
"...so the relay packet can communicate with the drivers," he paused for a second, and glanced up at Liquid. "Oh, uh, I was rambling, sorry, uh, sir. Its a bad habit I have, see, and-" he ran a hand through his messy hair.
"So," said Liquid, cutting the other man off mid-sentence, "this makes the TMD process commands more quickly?"
"Not necessarily, but we don't-," Emmerich looked up at him, confusion plastered across his face. "Wait, you followed that?"
Liquid narrowed his eyes at the man. He knew he looked like an oversized surfer, what with the dark tan and bleached hair, and military intelligence was one of this favorite oxymorons, but honestly. Only the very high ranks went to the idiots, and Liquid was just a Major.
"Uh, sorry, I didn't mean it like that." Emmerich ducked his head sheepishly. He blushed. "It's just that y'know, military guys don't usually, uh, care about this kind of stuff." He had an odd look on his face, kind of like Wolf had when she found someone to listen to her ramble about her dogs.
Liquid's watch beeped loudly in the silence. He pushed up his sleeve and glanced at it. 'O six-hundred already.
He nodded at Emmerich, and turned around, his coat flaring dramatically. He was at the doorway when Emmerich said something.
"W-wait!"
Liquid glanced back at the man.
"Ah, what's your name?"
"Liquid Snake." He said without preamble, and left.
"That researcher who threw his coffee at you is up here again." Wolf gave the barest gesture over her shoulder.
"Hmm, I thought they avoided coming out of the basements?" Liquid said in between bites. The canteen on Shadow Moses was just as bad as canteens anywhere else, but the food was plentiful and he was hungry.
"Yes, and he's brought a friend along this time." Wolf picked the pork out of her food and piled it on Liquid's plate.
Indeed, there was another researcher with him today, some chubby Indian woman. They were hovering around each other, jumping every time a soldier got within a five foot radius.
"Emotional support, perhaps? They tend to get flinchy in public settings." Liquid was fully aware that he was discussing Emmerich and his companion like they were a distinct species (although in his defense he had been given no information to the contrary), and he was being a bit rude.
He hadn't told Wolf about his discussion with Emmerich last Monday morning. While she was certainly more trustworthy than say, Ocelot, and they did have a tentative friendship based mostly on their mutual dislike of the American government, he didn't hold her above finding out how to use that information, trivial as it was, against him.
So, he stayed quiet, and let the researcher gawk. No doubt he was still surprised that Liquid had managed to follow his rambling. Even the meek, shy, unassuming types got arrogant and haughty around the uneducated. Besides, it didn't matter to him either way. He had more important things to worry about. Like paperwork. And military tribunals.
One of the genome grunts sauntered by, and elbowed Emmerich in the ribs. He gasped and grabbed his side. The other researcher swatted at the solider. He laughed cruelly, and ducked out of range. Emmerich puffed up, and pointed at the guard. His voice was lost in the roar of the cafeteria, but it was easy to tell that he was as much of a stuttering wreck as ever.
Liquid stood up. He was good at looming. Very good, in fact. Liquid Snake rated as one of the foremost loomers in the US military, and made top one-hundred across the globe.
The crowd of soldiers parted before him like the Red Sea before Moses, which was very appropriate, considering their location.
Emmerich was still red-faced and sputtering, and the woman was scowling and fidgeting like she wanted to punch the soldier when Liquid came up and quietly dropped his hand onto the man's shoulder.
"Private," he said, and the man went very still, "would you care to explain what you just did?"
"Uh, sir, I-," he saluted. His face was pale, and he was sweating.
The cafeteria was quiet, and the few remaining soldiers were suddenly very engrossed in their meals. Wolf lounged in her seat, looking like a sated cat. Emmerich had managed to pull himself back to his full height, and looked slightly ill.
"Private, I asked you a question." Liquid let go of the man's shoulder. He stumbled, and saluted tightly.
"S-sir, I, i-it was just a joke."
"Doctor, ah," Liquid glanced at the woman's ID badge, "Kaur? I believe you witnessed this?"
"If it was a joke, it wasn't a funny one." She said through clenched teeth. "I oughta' smack you."
"Private, I'm assigning you to janitorial work for thirty days, in addition to your current duties. Report to the base manager tonight, and explain your new situation to him. Dismissed." The man fled, and Liquid turned. His food was only barely palatable warm, and it was certainly cold now.
"Thank you." Kaur smiled at him.
"Just doing my job." Liquid called over his shoulder.
Kaur nudged Emmerich in the ribs.
"Oh, uh, thanks." He said lamely, rubbing his head.
Kaur tittered and whispered into his ear. Emmerich turned red, and batted his hands at her.
"That's him?"
Liquid caught the tail end of their conversation as they scurried back down to the basement. He dropped into his seat. His food was cold. Wolf gave him a sly look.
"What?" He snapped.
"Feeling charitable today, boss?"
He didn't respond; he was above that.
"Just doing what I'm supposed to, Wolf." Then again, maybe he wasn't.
"Hmm," she said. Liquid speared a lukewarm chunk of pasta with his fork, and chewed vigorously, avoiding eye contact with her.
"I'm just wondering, boss," she continued after a moment of quiet, "how you managed to notice that."
"I-"
Wolf cut him off. "Staring is rude, Liquid Snake. Ta." She gracefully stood up and glided away, and left him sitting there, mouth hanging open like an idiot.
The TMD was a glorious giant fucking robot.
To be perfectly honest, it looked stupid, and remarkably unstable. The radome was still uncovered, and placed in an area very easy to attack. A bipedal machine at its core was much more unstable than something with treads, or a quadraped. It resembled that robot from the alien movie his roommates in basic had dragged him to see back in '86. The cockpit didn't allow the pilot to observe the outside with opening the hatch. That laser was absolutely useless.
"This is a marvel." said Liquid.
Baker side-eyed him and continued speaking with the design engineer. Emmerich wasn't up here. Instead, some older, thin, balding man with a limp was dragging the DARPA chief and the president of ArmsTech around the TMD. He didn't seem to have much enthusiasm for the project, not like Emmerich did. But he didn't have a stutter and the inability to look people in the eye.
Not that Liquid noticed.
"Boss," Wolf hissed, "pay attention."
He glared back at her. "To what, Wolf? The tour?"
If there was one thing Liquid hated more than politics (and perhaps the SIS), it was showy gestures designed to tell the higher-ups simultaneously that everything was going as scheduled, and that they needed more money. Showing off REX to DARPA was big and impressive, but the data generated in the virtual reality tests was far more useful in determining the future of the project. But that was the way science was, he supposed, the bigger and flashier headlines the thing made, the better funding it would receive. After all, 'WALKING TANK' made better press than 'Test Data Suggests a Mobile TMD is Efficient'.
"Ah, Major?" Baker looked at him.
"Sir?"
"I trust there haven't been any problems with security?" The man may have been bloated and fish-eyed, but he was shrewd. He was clearly quite aware of FOXHOUND's little botch-up in Russia, and clearly willing to use that knowledge.
"That would be correct, sir." Liquid gritted his teeth, kept his voice level, and ignored the quick look Wolf gave him.
"Hmph." Baker directed his attention back to the engineer, who was wringing his hands as he glanced nervously between the FOXHOUND commander and the ArmsTech president.
Raven was looming over by REX, looking as statuesque as the machine itself. The ravens perched on the struts of the roof cawed depressingly, the noise lost in the clatter and chaos of the hangar. He was still brooding about the peptide injections. The only one who had been able to skip out on them this time was Mantis, who was too underweight for even the most mundane of chemicals. Even a small amino cluster would pile up on a blood vessel, and then FOXHOUND would need a new psychic.
The engineer lead them over to REX's skull. The cockpit and most of the piloting systems were still unassembled. Liquid knew that the AI for the machine was unfinished. The project was outsourced to some little college lab in England who had a hard time making dates.
Baker and the DARPA chief had their heads huddled together, whispering hurriedly about funding and security. Liquid glanced at Wolf. She seemed just as bored as he did, and was picking at her chipped manicure.
"Major," said Anderson, "do we have any candidates for piloting the TMD?"
"Only in the Air Force, though I can't say I've heard much about it. I was under the assumption that it would be run by an AI, primarily."
"I hear you're quite the pilot yourself, Major."
Liquid preened inwardly. "Yes, well, I have a responsibility to my unit, Mr. Anderson."
Wolf laughed. The four men stared at her.
"Aha, Raven was telling me a joke, you see." She said. Wolf rarely stuttered, even in English, and the lie sounded convincing, despite the fact that she obviously pulled it out of her ass.
Raven said nothing, and continued to glower.
"Well," said Baker, "I think I've seen enough. Of course, we'll be checking on the project's status in ninety days, as discussed. Hopefully, we'll have convinced those English bastards into working on schedule by then. Ah, no offense intended," He held up his hands to Liquid in a placating manner.
"None taken, sir." Liquid hid his scowl. Really, did they think him so petty?
Well, he was, but that was no reason for everyone to assume.
Anderson's earpiece crackled. He tapped it. A tinny voice fizzled through the radio, too quiet for Liquid to catch.
"Kenneth, we've got clear weather for the next hour or so."
"Well, we'll head back to the mainland then." Baker shook hands with Liquid, then the engineer, "Good luck."
The engineer walked Anderson and Baker back to the entrance of the hanger, where two men in dark suits with radios were waiting to take them back to the heliport.
"Tch," said Liquid, "that arrogant ass."
"What, boss, don't like your flaws being pointed out?" Wolf said, her voice saccharine.
"No, Wolf, I don't like my time being wasted by bureaucrats." Liquid said just as sweetly.
"Afraid you'll run out of time to do paperwork?"
"Stop fighting." Raven's voice boomed over the noise of the hanger.
Wolf scowled. "I've got to feed the family. Don't wait up." She stalked out of the room, as graceful as her namesake.
"Right, paperwork." Liquid sighed, and began the slow trudge back to the commander's room.
He was on page twelve of twenty-three when his eyes started crossing from seeing the terms 'strategic' and 'terror' so many times.
Liquid dropped the report back on his desk, and leaned back in his chair. At least the big, ostentatious pseudo-loveseat was comfortable to sit it. It even had wheels, but he wasn't bored enough to start scooting across the room like a child. It would take at least three more reports on whatever the president thought about oil prices before he would be willing to sink to that level.
He glanced at his watch. It was late, but not late enough to turn in and call it a night.
His mind drifted back to REX. He was a pilot at heart, raised at the controls of a decommissioned Hind rusting in the RAF hanger. It was tempting to think about piloting that monster, but jumping positions while under review was unwise. Hell, he wasn't even sure if his psych eval. still checked out.
He stood up, kicking the chair back under the desk. Pacing, pacing was easy to do. It was mindless, didn't require any signing or thinking. He let his feet drag him out of the office and down the empty corridor.
The labs on the first floor basement were deserted and dark. Liquid could see the blinking green dot of light as the security cameras panned back and forth across the room. He gave himself a second to remember that the area was lit with infra-red, and that the cameras could 'see' at that wavelength, even if the typical person couldn't. He had met all types back in his hunt for members of the new FOXHOUND, including some woman who could see at all wavelengths of light. She didn't make his unit due to age and language barriers.
Liquid stood in front of the door to the stairs, his right hand loosely holding his level ten keycard. He could go down. It was just four flights, short enough that it would be lazy to take the elevator, but long enough that it took a bit of will to convince himself to put forth the effort. His paperwork could wait. It was just meeting minutes and patrol reports.
He sighed, and stepped forwards. The door slid open with a quiet hiss, displaced air and metal against felt buffers. The stairwells at Shadow Moses were damp and dank. The cold seeped in through the rock and spread through the air into one's lungs, so that breathing took as much concentration as firing a gun.
His footsteps echoed down the stairs. Four flights went by without a thought, and he flashed his card in front of the door. The labs were mostly empty. He walked down the hallway as quietly as he could, and glanced into the window in the door. He squinted. Tilted his head. It still didn't make any sense.
"What are you doing?" He stepped through the door. Emmerich jumped.
He was huddled around a computer terminal, with some muted bright cartoon playing on a netbook, and surrounded by bags of... something.
"Uh," Emmerich said.
"Are these jellybeans?" Liquid picked up a bag and shook it slightly.
"...yeah?" Emmerich pushed up his glasses and paused his cartoon.
"Why?"
"Um, y'see, Mingming, uh, Dr. Xu, is in Seattle, for his wedding. His fiancee proposed last month, and she handled everything, honestly, I think she ought to be in charge of our contracts." He waved his hands around. "So, Dr. Xu always has a bag of candy with him, so its our wedding present. Sannvi was helping, but she has to do a report for the company tomorrow, so she turned in early."
"You're telling me you gutted a man's computer and filled it with candy for a wedding present?" Liquid put the bag of jellybeans back on the ground.
"Well, when you put it like that it, uh, does sound pretty stupid." Emmerich frowned, digging a flathead screwdriver in between the panels of a desk drawer.
He huffed. "Could you get this open?"
Liquid took the screwdriver, tossing it in the air and catching it by the handle. He crouched next to Emmerich, and wedged apart the particleboard. Honestly, this was very surreal. He wasn't quite sure if perhaps he had fallen asleep on top of his reports, and was now dreaming. Although, if he were dreaming, this was a sharp turn from the 'reliving battles' type of dream he normally had.
"Wow," Emmerich dragged a tired hand over his face, "I'm not sure why I asked you to do that. I'm sorry."
Liquid squinted at the other man. "How long has it been since you last slept?"
"Uh, Tuesday?"
It was Thursday.
"Why?"
"I don't know, I just couldn't sleep." He yawned. "Too much stress maybe? Too much coffee? The beds here suck?"
Liquid snorted. "This is nothing compared to basic. I stuck a rock under my bunkmate's pillow when he beat my jump time, and he didn't notice for a week."
"Jump time?" Emmerich tilted his head.
"How fast we could make a HALO jump without breaking our legs. It was never officially sanctioned, of course, but stick a room full of sixteen year old boys together and you're bound to get something stupid as a contest."
"Hmm, my roommate and I just argued about homework."
Liquid watched silently as Emmerich upended a bag of jellybeans into the shell of a computer.
"This is repairable, right?"
"Huh, oh, yeah. This is a blown out computer, from back when we were just starting design trials and didn't know we needed the Crays. We blew up three Linuxes trying to get REX to walk without falling over. Mingming's actual computers are over in the locker." He gestured vaguely to the north-west corner of the room.
"Really? I couldn't imagine it would take that much to make the TMD move. It's just a tank with legs, correct?" Liquid handed Emmerich another bag of candy.
"Well, not quite. REX actually controls more like a walking V/STOL aircraft than something with treads. One of the guys on the piloting design team worked on the Harrier, back in the seventies."
Liquid nodded. "So the air intake was just replaced with, what, hydraulics?"
"Yeah, but that's why we've been having so much trouble with our melee program. REX is getting too heavy to be able to move quickly. We tried to redesign some of the launch platforms, and the plating on the legs, but its too late in the design phase."
"Pity. You'll just have to work around that the next time someone wants a walking TMD."
"Haha, yeah. If there's one good thing working with robotics, its that someone always wants a new one." Emmerich shoved his glasses up.
"Hmm, maybe I'll get a chance to pilot one someday."
Emmerich glanced at him. "Uh, I don't think I ever introduced myself. I'm Hal Emmerich."
"Liquid Snake." Liquid stuck out his hand.
Hal shook it. It felt like shaking hands with a fish, and Liquid stopped himself from squeezing too hard.
"Right, I asked before. That's... some name." Said Hal.
"Code name. If I told you my real one, I'd have to kill you."
"What, really?" Hal shifted back.
Liquid laughed. "No, don't be stupid."
Hal grinned, and yawned. "Mmm, what time is it?" He asked as he dumped the last bag of candy into the computer.
"It's only twenty-two hundred hours. Well, considering how long you've been awake..."
"Aha, yeah. Why are you down here, anyways? Did you need the test data for something?"
"Avoiding paperwork, actually." Liquid stood up and his knees popped.
"I didn't think they made you military types do paperwork."
"We live in a bureaucracy, Doctor, everyone does paperwork. Here." He held his hand down to the engineer.
Hal took it, and Liquid pulled him to his feet. And then a little off his feet.
"Sorry about that." Liquid pushed the engineer off of his chest and back to standing under his own power.
"Ah, no problem." Hal pushed up his glasses. His face was a very interesting shade of red that, until now Liquid had only seen in artificially colored foods, and the lipstick Wolf wore when she was very angry.
He looked down at Hal. "Right. Goodnight, Dr. Emmerich."
"Night." Hal gave a little wave.
Liquid took the elevator up. He rubbed his hand across his mouth, gnarled fingers catching on his chapped lips. He was smiling. He hadn't smiled like this in a long time.
It felt nice.
"You look more stupid than usual today." Naomi Hunter, PhD, MD, was one of the foremost researchers in nanotechnology and gene therapy. She was brutally clever, smartly pretty, and also a raging asshole.
"It is a pleasure seeing you too, Dr. Hunter." Liquid shifted on the cot, distinctly aware of his own nudity.
"Ready for your shots, Major?" She said dryly, flicking the syringe with her pointed nails.
He grimaced.
"Maybe if you hadn't gotten that tattoo, you could get injections in your arm like everyone else."
"Maybe if your nanomachines didn't dissolve ink, it wouldn't matter." He lifted his arm behind his head, exposing the side of his chest.
"Mm, don't be such a baby, Major."
Liquid winced as the needle slid between his ribs, and the burning sting of nanomachines and peptides. Dr. Hunter pulled the needle out, and stuck a gauze pad on the injection site. Liquid reached across with his right arm and held it in place.
"Why can't you just use the right arm?" He said, tenderly rubbing his ribs.
"I have told you before. Oxygen degrades my nanos. If I stuck them in the right side of you the percentage that get picked up by the vena cava increases."
"Yes, yes, and then I'd have to come in every other week to get jabbed by a needle."
"And you waste my nanomachines. Really, is an hour in my office and then the rest of the day off once a month all that bad?"
"Sometimes I wonder."
"Alright, up." She batted at his arm. "Anything to report, any abnormalities? I heard someone on base had food poisoning, have you experienced that?"
Liquid stood up, his arms spread. Dr. Hunter glanced him over with medical effiency. "No, no, and no. My vision went a little spotty when Ocelot's revolver misfired and I smacked my head against a wall, but that's happened before. Why do I have to be naked, again?"
"You have a history of hiding injuries, Major."
He scoffed. "It was only the once." Dr. Hunter gave him a look.
"Alright," she said, "I'm willing to pass you a clean bill of health, but, Liquid?"
He glanced at her.
"Watch yourself. Keep your stress levels low, and don't engage in any combat."
"Worrying about me, Dr. Hunter?" He tugged on his clothes and leaned against the wall to tie his shoes.
"You do sign my paycheck." She handed him back his dogtags. "They used your last psych eval. as an example of potential instability."
"Ah."
"Exactly. You're lucky that no one else wants FOXHOUND or you might be on probation already. Send in Sniper Wolf when you leave."
Liquid left the room without bothering to finish lacing up his boots. Wolf spotted him, and headed into the small clinic without any prompting.
His jaw ached from grinding his teeth.
It was very infuriating to not have people trust you, but it was more infuriating to know that it was entirely your fault.
Liquid let his feet lead him to the TMD hangar, past the queued genome soldiers. Shadow Moses was painfully undermanned. There were about fifty genome soldiers, FOXHOUND, and the twenty assorted scientists and engineers working on the TMD, and now Dr. Hunter and her gaggle of nurses.
REX was as imposing as ever, perhaps more so in the sparsely populated room. Liquid dragged himself up the ladder onto the catwalks. His side twitched, and he let his head rest against the dirty metal rungs for a second. Nanomachine shots did this to everyone, and this was the reason that FOXHOUND and the genome soldiers got them staggered. While Liquid, Wolf, and Octopus, plus twenty-five of the genome soldiers were in some state of misery ranging from burning pain to mild cramps and drowsiness, Ocelot, Raven, and the remaining genome soldiers only received their peptide combinations. Then next month, they switched. The only exception was Psycho Mantis, who was too fragile, and had the ability to communicate by telepathy, rendering nanomachines useless.
Liquid leaned back against the cool metal of a support strut. It was times like this that he wished he smoked, or chewed gum. Something mindless and repetitive to keep his mouth busy so he didn't grind his teeth.
If he squinted, he could see a few blurry researchers through the thick glass of the launch control room. He contemplated wandering over and seeing if he recognized any of them, but thought better of it and tucked himself further into his corner instead.
The sound of shoes on metal rang, and Liquid glanced towards the ladder.
Hal Emmerich's messy hair poked over the corrugated iron.
"Aren't you supposed to be working?" Liquid rubbed his forehead, trying to blink away the haziness.
"Uh, no. They don't want us messing with REX during check-ups in case something goes wrong, remember?" he heaved himself up from the ladder, his breathing heavier with exertion.
"Right, right." Liquid muttered.
Hal looked at him. "Oh, nanos today, huh? I'm sorry, I'll leave you alone."
"No, its fine," Liquid waved his hand. "I just won't be very good conversation."
The engineer smiled a little, then turned away to look up at the TMD.
"I'm not sure you're ever good at conversation."
"Very clever, Doctor."
"I try." Hal sighed. "Look at it," he gestured at the TMD, "sometimes, I can't really believe that this actually happened. Y'know? Like, I'll wake up and still be working at the Pentagon. Or worse, still in grad school." He laughed. He had a pleasant laugh.
"Hmm, it couldn't have been all that bad."
"You try being under twenty-one in a doctorate program."
Liquid glanced at him. "I didn't take you for the partying type."
Hal turned around. "Huh? Oh, no, no," he shook his hands wildly, "I was young, is all. You, get, uh, resentment, from the guys there working on their first PhD at forty."
"And I imagine that your youthful brilliance was what spawned the walking TMD?"
Twin spots of red burned high on Hal's cheeks. "Don't tease," he muttered.
"I'm not teasing, Doctor. Really, the machine is remarkable. I can't fathom what inspired you to design it." Liquid sat at the base of the wall, the back of his head pressed up against the cool metal.
"Uh, well actually that came from anime. Y'know, uh, Japanese animation?"
Liquid didn't know. He nodded anyways.
Hal rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah, it's a little silly in retrospect. But the ideas are sound. It's like, uh, cell phones and Star Trek. The original idea probably didn't come from media, but it was definitely influenced by it. Besides, the most advanced robotics research is being done in Japan. You know that that little Honda robot can recognize itself in a mirror now? They've got a long history of robotics in their movies."
"Like Godzilla monster movies?" Liquid mumbled, only half paying attention.
"No, no. Like, well, mecha anime. America may have been the first to use a robot as a character, but the Japanese really mastered it. I, well," he faltered, "I got the idea for REX from anime to begin with. I just wanted to be able to create something like that, to see it in real life, with a real purpose. I mean, REX will shoot down missiles."
"I didn't take you for the military type."
"Well, it's a means to an end, I guess." He sighed. "That sounds bad. I mean, I like to create things, but not to hurt people, but to protect them. I think that's what science should be used for, not WMDs. People who can make something, knowing that it'll be used to destroy, to burn away people and leave nothing but ash... they, they're sick." He rested his head on his arms.
"Sometimes people need to be destroyed." The desert. Cold, dusty nights and burning days. Liquid shook his head.
Hal glanced down. "Yeah."
Liquid blinked away the haze in his eyes. "I didn't expect you to agree."
"I know I'm young, but I'm not that naive. But, still..." he sighed, "I don't think science should be used that way. You need to be responsible with the things that you create. It's like Jurassic Park, y'know?"
"Never saw it." Liquid let his head loll to the side and his eyes slide shut.
"Oh, it's really great; it was the first PG-13 movie I ever saw. I like the book a bit better, it really goes into the technology; you can tell Crichton does his research, but the movie is pretty good, too. See, this man, Hammond, funds this..." Hal's voice trailed off.
Something shook his arm.
"Are you okay, Liquid?" Hal crouched in front of him, blurry.
"Fine," he mumbled, "just tired."
"The nanos?"
"Mmmhm."
Hal sat next to him along the wall, his knees tucked against his chest. The harsh lines of his back were softened under his oversized sweater, and the sleeves hung baggy over his skinny arms.
"I imagine it gets pretty boring up here, huh?"
Liquid nodded slowly.
"I, uh, heard rumors, well, actually, Saanvi, that's Dr. Kaur's first name, she told me. Anyways, she heard from her friend in the medical staff that you used to be a pilot. I guess being stuck on an island is a lot different than flight, huh?"
Liquid glared at him bleary. "'Stuck' is an odd choice of words, Doctor."
Hal's eyes widened behind his glasses. "Oh, well, that's just what I've overheard, is all..."
"Ah, military men," he rubbed his eyes, "you'll never find bigger gossips."
"Yeah," Hal flushed, "you wouldn't believe the things they say about the woman in your unit, the one with the-," he mimed pulling down a zipper on his sweater. "Oh, uh, that was rude, sorry."
Liquid snorted. "Sniper Wolf can handle herself, believe me."
"Well, I mean, with the way you, uh, jumped to our, that is Saanvi's and I's, defense like that, I assumed you were one of those protective types."
"Protective types?"
"Yeah, like the kid on the playground who gets into fights all the time trying to stop bullies."
"Really, Doctor, you think too highly of me."
"You can call me Hal, y'know."
Liquid said nothing.
Hal broke the silence. "I didn't think what we were doing here was that important we needed a Black Ops team."
"I'm not Black Ops, just special forces."
"Well, you don't need special forces to guard a R and D project. I mean, there aren't even any live nukes here anymore."
"Why so curious?" Liquid caught Hal's eyes. They were the ugly, flat gray of the sky before a storm, made artificially small through his glasses.
"I, uh," Hal's gaze flicked away and back, like he wanted to stare but couldn't, "I just uh, you seem different."
"Different?"
"Well, you didn't yell at me for spilling coffee all over you." He cracked a self-depreciating grin.
Liquid snorted. "It's just a shirt. Although I wonder why a senior project lead was on coffee duty?"
"Oh, I lost a coin toss." Hal shrugged, the bones of his shoulders lost under fabric.
"Bad luck."
"Yeah."
Hal stood up, cracking his back and brushing dirt off of his pants. "I've gotta go," he looked sad for a moment, "see you."
Liquid stared after him. "Wait," he said.
The engineer turned around.
He could say it. Hal Emmerich was a very intelligent man, he would understand necessity. He might even understand circumstance and bad timing. But he was a pacifist at heart, really, and he could never understand the death of non-combatants. He was nothing special, really. There were a million other engineers with mad ideas; he wasn't unique or new. If Hal Emmerich hated him for what he did, then it couldn't matter less to Liquid.
Liquid Snake opened his mouth.
"Goodnight." he said.
"We're using standard rules: rounds last ninety seconds, back on the ground for seven seconds is a loss." Decoy Octopus's nasal baritone was muffled through his ubiquitous balaclava.
Liquid rubbed the rough, tattered bandages layered over his knuckles. "First one to win a round is the victor?" The words slurred around his mouth guard.
The genome solider grunted, tugging a knot at the base of his thumb tighter. He had about half a foot on Liquid, but wasn't nearly as brawny. He wouldn't be a hard fight; Liquid was the commander of FOXHOUND for a reason.
Shadow Moses didn't have a proper gym or shooting range, but it did have an empty warehouse that the grunts had jerry-rigged into service. Wolf lurked here when she wasn't busy with her dogs. A few old mats tossed in a corner was no real substitute for a boxing ring, but Liquid had fought in more slipshod places before.
While technically this was a demonstration of self defense, it was obvious that no one would take it that way. The gaggle of Genome soldiers surrounding them were getting restless and twitchy. They just wanted to see their CO bleeding with a mouthful of broken teeth. Liquid often shared that sentiment about the top brass. He stepped into the ring. His stomach rolled and his heart felt like it was being compressed by his lungs. Nerves, it was just nerves.
He hadn't been nervous about fighting in years, but that was besides the point.
Octopus had found an old whistle in one of the storage closets, and blew a piercing note.
"Alright," he shouted. "watch and learn."
The genome solider met Liquid in the center of the mats, and they shook hands as well as they were able with their gloves pulled over the layers of tape on their fists. Then the grunt punched Liquid in the jaw, and his head snapped to the side.
Octopus shouted, and Liquid ran a wrapped hand along his chin. No blood, but the bruise would be bad. He ran his tongue along the inside of his mouth, prodding the coppery patch of skin in his cheek. He spat bloody phlegm onto the mat and ducked low, lashing out with his foot at the other man's knees.
The other man stumbled, but caught himself and lashed out at Liquid with a right hook. Liquid pulled his head back. The fist blurred past his nose. He drove his knee into the man's stomach, and shoved him to the side as he folded over. The genome solider gagged as he pushed himself back up.
"You can forfeit at any time, you know." Liquid sneered.
The genome solider growled at him, gasping for air. He hunched over and pulled his fists in front of his face. Liquid ducked the first punch, and snapped his fist out at the second, catching the man's arm at the elbow. The joint cracked, and the genome solider yelped in pain. Liquid kicked the inside of the man's knee, and he crumpled to the ground. Liquid's chest heaved, and sweat ran through his hair and beaded on his neck like a clammy hand.
Octopus blew a sharp high note. "Seven seconds." He reached down to pull up the genome solider, but the man batted his hand away, and staggered to his feet. A few genome soldiers separated form the crowd and pulled him back into the conglomerate.
Liquid pulled off his gloves and wiped the blood and spit from his face. His spine prickled.
"Yes?" He drawled.
"That was violent, for a training match." Octopus said without breaking his stare. He held out a towel. "Something's wrong?"
"No." Liquid grabbed the towel without looking at him.
Octopus sighed, and scratched his head through the balaclava. "I should report this."
"You only report violence if it's 'in excess and out of character based on prior observations'. I think you'll find that I've always been this prone to breaking jaws."
"Actually it looked like his collarbone and fibula."
Liquid pulled his shirt on and clapped Octopus on the back. He stumbled under the weight. "You, my friend, are entirely unfunny."
"It must be why we get along so well." Octopus deadpanned. "but seriously, Major." He looked at Liquid with his pale, piercing eyes, "get your issues fixed. If this unit gets disbanded because you can't deal with your life, I will hunt you down and castrate you."
Liquid scowled at him. "Asshole."
Octopus laughed. "That's my mother-in-law's nickname for me too."
The grunts were working maintenance on the Abrams under Raven's supervision. If there was a flaw to FOXHOUND, it was the extreme specialization of its members. For example, Liquid could pilot practically any flying thing under the sun, from a prop-plane to a V/STOL, but he knew next to nothing about tanks or other treaded vehicles. Hell, he had barely passed his driving test back when he first took it, and that had been in the eighties.
He was walking towards the labs again. It was a bad habit, like chewing pen caps, or a cocaine addiction. Doctor Hal Emmerich, PhD, was a bad habit. It really wasn't good for Liquid to spend so much time around a civilian, especially some nobody contractor, even if he did have extensive background checks. He was a liability, and he was making Liquid into a liability.
The stairs smelled less musty than they had when he had first come down here, and there were boot scuffs on the textured steel. The lab door slid open loudly in the silence, and Liquid's footsteps echoed. A flicker of light in the corner caught his eye.
"Up late again, Doctor?" he walked towards Hal's station, letting an easy grin slide across his face. "I'm beginning to suspect that you're just trying to burn your way into another vision prescription for insurance benefits. It's clever, but I can't say I condone it"
The engineer was slumped over his desk, his head pillowed in his arms. He slept the way he did everything else: obnoxiously, but somehow, unfathomably, endearing. His glasses were crushed against his nose, and drool puddled beneath his mouth. He snored like an asthmatic. Liquid had heard that sleep made people beautiful, but really it just made Hal uglier. Without his animated movements and rambling, he looked tired and dead, with baggy eyes and skin sallowed to look like bloodless fat.
Liquid took a step towards him, hyper-conscious of how loudly his footsteps echoed. Hal's glasses looked like they were digging into his skin. When he woke up, there would be a perfect imprint of a pair of bulky BC frames pressed onto his face in red was absolutely certain that he would laugh at the engineer.
He reached for the glasses. His hand felt sweaty, then dry when he rubbed his fingers against his palm. The dry rasp of skin against skin made him flinch. A tingle buzzed through his hands, like the kind of nerves when one looks down from the bay door of a high altitude plane, but without the fun adrenaline rush from the HALO jump that came afterward.
He had to move Hal's head a little: he had the arm of his glasses pinned between his ear and the table. His hair was thick and felt like straw. No doubt he was one of those people who thought it was okay to skip conditioning and use soap to wash his hair.
Liquid folded the glasses and set them on the desk with a quiet click. He rubbed the cuff of his greatcoat. Hal was often cold in the empty, Alaskan base, and it was colder underground in the labs. He never complained about it, but it was obvious in the way he piled on sweaters and huddled next to the Crays when they were processing multiple versions of REX at the same time. It was stupid. It was very, very stupid, and Liquid felt silly for even considering it.
He sighed through his nose, pulled his FOXHOUND coat off, and draped it over Hal's shoulders.
Liquid Snake was not a romantic. He could admit to being melodramatic, and occasionally vain, and when he was being very honest with himself, obsessive. He was barely even friendly, and was stand-offish to most people. There were people never meant to be in a relationship, and he was one of them.
He turned with a flair that would have been there if he still had his coat, and headed toward the door.
"Liquid?" Hal asked, his voice thick with sleep.
Liquid paused by the door. "Go to sleep, Hal." he said finally, quietly.
"You used my first name." Hal mumbled, burying his face into his arms.
Liquid's gaze dropped to the floor. Was he feeling guilt? Indigestion? He had a creeping, buzzing feeling in his hands, like looking down from a rickety bridge, but knowing that you can't fall. The door softly wooshed shut behind him, leaving him in the empty hallway. He looked down, trying to avoid glancing through the little window on the door. He caught sight of the faint glow from the computer out of the corner of his eye. The indigestion feeling increased, and he felt his cheeks flush red.
He leaned against the far wall and slid to the floor, rubbing his chest. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. He had a fucking crush, like some schoolboy.
And it was on some nerd, too.
REX made a sound like thunder and fire as it revved its engine, then settled down into a gigantic cat's purr.
The crowd erupted in a cheer. Liquid could see Hal and Dr. Kaur towards the the front, hunched over a monitor, both of them barely keeping themselves from jumping in joy.
Wolf snorted.
"What?" Liquid looked down at her.
"They're acting like it's a child learning to walk."
"I guess it is, for some of them."
"Oh," Wolf arched an eyebrow, "is this empathy? From the Liquid Snake?"
"Shove off." Liquid said.
"We leave in a week, Major."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing. But, Liquid," she looked at him seriously, "you should get your coat back."
"What."
"You're out of uniform, Major." Wolf drifted away into the crowd, looming after some red-head.
Huh. How had he missed that?
Hal was smiling. Someone in the crowd was passing around alcohol. He was tempted to call it contraband and confiscate it.
Liquid looked at the festivities, the shouting and the jumping, and quietly retreated to his office.
There was a rapping at the door.
"Come in." Liquid said without looking up.
"Uh, hi, Major." Hal hovered in the doorway, looking unsure.
"Doctor," Liquid stood up too quickly, and slammed his knees into his desk, "come in."
He pushed his chair out of the way and stepped out from behind the desk as gracefully as possible.
Hal winced. "That was pretty loud, you oka- oh my God!"
"What?"
"Your face! What happened?"
Liquid touched the tender spot on his jaw. "Just a training accident. I'm fine."
Hal slid into the room, glancing at the gaudy décor. He had a bundle poorly hidden behind his back.
"That bruise looks awful, are you sure?" he touched his own jaw.
"I've had worse."
"Mr. Tough Guy, huh?
Liquid snorted.
The both glanced down, and an uncomfortable silence crept into the space between them.
"I can't believe it's over already." Hal shifted his weight. "It just doesn't feel like we spent three years up here for this."
"I was only here for four months."
"Ah, right. Our 'special forces team'. We didn't end up needing any protection, huh?"
Liquid gritted his teeth.
"Liquid?" Hal looked concerned.
"We," Liquid paused, "I botched a mission. We were never here to protect the project. We were here until the media found something else to report on."
"Oh."
"That's not just... I," Liquid pushed his hair back, "I don't regret it. Being sent here."
The tension was like fog, and the quiet was oppressing.
"Uh, Liquid?" Hal broke the silence.
"Hmm?"
"I, uh, well," he took a breath. "Y'see, I, uh, fell asleep and I guess you gave me this," he gestured to the folded coat in his hands.
"Ah, well..." Liquid began.
"Anyways I wanna tell you thanks and that was a nice thing to do so I made you this, y'know, as a thank you sort of thing," Hal paused for a breath. "So yeah, thanks." he shoved the folded coat into Liquid's arms, and crammed a little box on top of it.
"What-"
"You're welcome, bye." Hal practically ran out of the room, his eyes fixed on the floor.
Liquid stared after him, dumping the box on his desk. He shook out the coat and eyed it critically. It looked fine, so he draped it over the back of his chair as he sat down.
The box looked like off-brand Tupperware, flimsy and stained with spaghetti sauce. He pulled off the lid.
Hal had made some rice... thing, with a side of something that looked like it could be meat. It was artistic, to some degree of artistic, and if he squinted he could make out a robot.
It meant something, he was sure, but internet service out in the middle of the Arctic Ocean was spotty at best. Typing 'silly dinner in box with vague robot' into Yahoo probably wouldn't turn up anything worthwhile. Besides, they still ran dial-up.
He dug a fork out of his desk drawer and poked the rice. It didn't look bad, per say, but the rice was clearly made in a microwave and the meat looked like bagged ground beef. Liquid sighed and snapped the lid back on before tossing it into his desk drawer.
Maybe he could try this his way.
Liquid opened the door from the stairs and almost gave Dr. Kaur a black eye.
"Sorry," he grabbed for the pile of boxes in her arms before she could drop them.
"Ah, Major," she pushed her wire-rim glasses higher on her nose, "Hal is busy with his lab station."
"I-I'm not-"
She patted him on the arm and took the boxes back. "I told him you wouldn't get his lunchbox scheme."
"What?"
"Good luck." The elevator pinged open and she stepped in.
Liquid stood there for a while. He shook his head and pulled his hair back in an elastic from around his wrist.
The basement lab was half-packed, and looked like the aftermath from some fistfight. The scattered remains of a gutted computer were strewn across one of the work stations. Liquid toed a jellybean into an air register on the floor.
Hal was huddled over his station, slowly dumping the contents of his drawers into a battered cardboard box. His messy hair was pushed behind his ears, and his glasses were slightly crooked,or maybe it was his face that was crooked. Liquid felt a grin and a blush creeping up his cheeks, and tugged down the sides of his mouth with his thumb and forefinger.
"Would you like to have dinner with me?" Liquid asked, leaning on the back of Hal's chair.
"Huh?" Hal looked up at him. His puzzled frown turned into a grin at this angle, but also his eyes and chin had switched places. Well, everything had its pros and cons.
"Well, I say dinner, but I mean we split an MRE on the top floor of the communications tower during a break in the blizzard."
"D-dinner?" Hal turned red, and stared at his work. "I-I don't-"
Liquid planted his elbow on the desk and leaned down. "I can guarantee it'll be better than what the mess serves."
"Well, I, it's just that the..." Hal trailed off.
"Hmm?"
"I'd rather not, I mean I, uh."
Oh.
Liquid's gut rolled with humiliation, and the sting of rejection felt like copper in his mouth. At least Hal was too polite and too embarrassed to report him for asking and telling.
"I've misinterpreted. Sorry, bye." Liquid said tersely.
"W-wait!" Hal held up a hand to stop him.
"Yes?" Liquid didn't look back at him.
"REX's hangar."
"What?"
"Let's go to REX's hangar, it ought to be empty, we could, uh, eat there. It's too cold in the communication tower. That's why I, ah, yeah. I didn't mean to make you think I didn't want to, uh, have... dinner." Hal didn't look him in the eyes.
Liquid felt an irrepressible smile well up under his cheeks, and fought to keep it down. Hal looked vaguely concerned.
"Are you okay? Your face..."
"I'm fine. Everything's fine." he covered his mouth. "I'll see you at twenty-hundred hours?"
"Sure." Hal smiled.
"Here." Liquid gave the rest of the Creamsicle cookie to Hal.
"Thanks." Hal gingerly balanced the bag of lasagna on Liquid's shoe and took the cookie. They weren't out in the middle of the desert, and therefore couldn't find a convenient rock on which to prop the heating pack, as per the instructions. Hal's shoes were threadbare, and looked like they would dissolve if someone looked at them wrong, so Liquid had sacrificed one of his boots, and was currently sitting on his foot in an attempt to ward off frostbite. He was just grateful that Hal was too polite to comment about how badly his feet smelled.
"So..."
Maybe he wasn't.
"Yes?"
"You, well," he pushed up his glasses, "you really did want to pilot REX, didn't you?"
"Not really." Liquid didn't meet his eyes.
"Oh," Hal looked startled, "I just thought that that would be like some sort of ambition thing."
"FOXHOUND is my ambition. I managed to save the program from being decommissioned after its former leader retired to be with his family."
"How heroic of you." Hal smiled and jostled his shoulder.
Liquid snorted. "Honestly, some days I feel like it's more trouble than it's worth."
"Hm, if you think that a well trained military group is a hassle, you should try managing a lab full of high school interns and grad students."
"I honestly didn't think that you science-minded types of delicate constitution were so liable to start screeching and throwing things."
Hal chuckled. "Well, with the high school kids, it's all about dating, and with the grad kids, it's all about plotting each other's murder to weed out the competition."
"Once Sniper Wolf pushed a man out of a window for kicking her dog."
Hal had a sideways smile: the right side of his mouth kicking up like it was trying to escape his face.
They settled into silence. REX loomed under the bright fluorescence lighting, concealed beneath a draped protective sheet. Liquid shifted his socked foot around, trying to ward off the pins and needles feeling. Hal was sitting next to him about a foot away. He was half considering trying the yawn thing.
"I'll miss this." said Hal.
Liquid hummed in agreement.
"I'd, uh, miss you, too." Hal glanced away.
Liquid looked down at him. Butterflies frantically swarmed in his stomach. This was... well, not unlikely, perhaps, but certainly unexpected. He rubbed his hands on the legs of his pants, trying to will away the tingling feeling.
He trusted Hal. Hal was simply the sort of man who inspired trust. Not perhaps because of his outstanding character, but because if he was ever given an opportunity to betray, he wouldn't recognize it. Hal was the type to keep secrets for years and then forget them. He could tell Hal.
Liquid whispered a string of syllables to the empty air.
Hal glanced up. "Huh?" The word registered, and his eyes widened behind his glasses. "Your n- uh, I don't, uh, I'm not sure I'm allowed to know that?"
"Know what?" said Liquid. "It could mean nothing, for all you know."
"You don't strike me as the kind of man who says meaningless things."
"You'd be surprised."
Hal smiled sadly.
"We shouldn't ever go to Jupiter together."
Liquid narrowed his eyes. "What?"
"It's a movie reference, geeky stuff, it doesn't matter."
"You said it, of course it matters."
"You're such a flirt." But Hal grinned anyways, the edges of his eyes crinkling.
Liquid winked at him, then laughed. Hal slid closer, so that their shoulders were touching. He was warm, even through the FOXHOUND coat. Liquid let his arm drape across the other man's back. Hal leaned into the embrace, and rested his head on Liquid's shoulder.
The snow drifted lazily across the sky outside.
"I really like you, you know," Hal blurted out. "but I don't think I'm worth a court martial."
Liquid looked at him until he blushed and glanced down. " I think you are." he said softly.
Hal smiled fondly and pushed his glasses up. The storm outside was howling, and the shutter doors of the hangar slammed in their frames. Liquid was more content than he had been in a long time.
"Kiss me?" he said.
"Sure."
END
Notes:
As a pivotal part of Liquid's backstory hinges on a throwaway line from a novelization of a video game, I feel that I should expand on it a little bit. In the MGS4 novel, by Project Itoh (which is actually pretty good, btw), its mentioned that Liquid didn't know about his origins until after he was rescued from Iraq. Then he drifted a bit, and was scouted by FOXHOUND, which he got command of, due to Campbell's resignation. Ocelot joined up at some point, and told him he was a clone. The novel disregards the weird genetic mess from the first game and states that Liquid is so pissed because he thought he was bound to a fate decided before he was even born, and that he was left in a POW camp while Solid Snake was hailed as a hero.
References:
The alien movie with the robot from 1986 is Aliens, starring Sigourney Weaver. If you haven't seen it you should watch it.
I'm not actually sure if the designer of cellular phones was influenced by Star Trek, but the devices they used greatly resemble modern day hands free bluetooth head sets.
Liquid's name is Frank, after the second astronaut in Kubrick's film, 2001: A Space Odyssey (the one that HAL dumped into space).