She came to know him over time.

Unlike most people she had come to know, with knowledge came trust.

"This is ridiculous! She doesn't talk! How could you possibly stay in communication?"

"Look, his other options are a dog and a horse. I'm sure the Boss can figure it out."

To go on her first mission, Ocelot had instructed her to sneak into the Boss's helicopter at 0700 hours as he distracted the guards, so the staff and Miller wouldn't find out she had gone until later. The flight to the Angola-Zaire border, about 1800 miles from Mother Base, would take at least thirteen hours, so they would arrive in the dark of night.

She looked forward to observing the enigmatic Big Boss in his natural element, and was excited at the prospect of honing her skills again. Fidgeting and looking out the window behind the pilot as they gained altitude, she heard the sound of the iDroid closing and Big Boss clipping it back onto a chest strap.

She was suddenly aware of his unrelenting stare out of the corner of her eye. Was he actually staring at her chest? Did he have that kind of attitude toward women? She didn't want to believe it. She knew that he never spent time with women, but one never knew. Some men simply liked to flirt. Hell, even she used to flirt, although it had been years ago. But in this case, they barely knew each other, so it was inappropriate; it didn't matter how attractive or admirable he was.

In her former life, men had gawked at her so rarely because she had been in a high position and wore full gear turned shapelessly bulky with stuffed pockets-but it did happen, and she would always snap at the gawker, "What's your problem?"

But she couldn't talk now and she wasn't the leader here, so she turned to glare at the Boss, frustrated that she had to wear so little to survive. And he was indeed gazing at her breasts. No, wait...his eye was unfocused and going right through her, his expression impassive. What was he thinking about? She continued frowning at him with narrowed eyes, and it took him a second before he noticed and blinked. She turned away just as he focused on her face.

"Sorry," she heard him say, and she turned, surprised. He gestured to the obsidian-like shrapnel embedded in his forehead. "Sometimes, I..." He paused and looked away as if deciding whether to disclose something private. He made his choice and fixed her eyes with his own.

"You'll need to snap me out of it if I see things that aren't there," he stated. It sounded like an order.

Stunned, Quiet nodded.

She had always liked to show off her skills. She lived for the thrill of being on the battlefield. It made her feel excited, thoroughly alert, supremely confident, and at the same time, serene.

She spotted Big Boss as a quick movement crawling through the grass up a hill. He had to feel the same way about his work; it was clear after going on a half-dozen missions with him. Once, when they had cleared a task in a matter of minutes, he had given her a tiny smile and held up his fist in a gesture that said, "Success! Good job!" She couldn't help it and had impulsively smiled back at his innocent satisfaction.

Focusing on the hilltop, she scanned again for more targets in range. The communication device Miller had given her was essentially a radio with a camera for recording the position of targets, which the Boss's iDroid would receive. She kept the device strapped on her left shoulder holster, but only when they were in the field; otherwise, she kept it turned off and in a pocket because she disliked the thought of anyone spying on her. She pressed a button on the radio and hummed a few notes to let the Boss know she had locked onto a target.

"Fire," whispered his voice from her earpiece. Using her sniper rifle equipped with tranquilizer darts, she started picking off targets that had the best line of sight to him. Phwew! sounded her weapon, firing in a perfect cadence. She hit a target who had just spun around and lifted his weapon to aim at the Boss. He gave her a thumbs up and sent the man into the air with a Fulton recovery pack, then snuck inside a building.

She changed her location to cover the building's other entrance. She reloaded without missing a beat. Phwew! Two men saw their friend fall, so she had to speed up the tempo for them before they searched around for the Boss. Phwew!

Oops. She'd gotten cocky with her headshot streak and in her routine had shot a target that the Boss had just grabbed in a headlock after springing out from the shadows. Through her scope she saw him frown in her general direction, looking a bit too much to her left since he couldn't see her through the bushes. Big Boss let the target drop to the ground and had to kick him and wait for him to become coherent before asking him where their objective was. She pressed her radio button and let static go through to say sorry.

Once, the Boss had tasked a crew of four newer recruits with gathering medicinal plants. To save GMP, he had them ride along with him and Quiet, since they were headed for the same five-mile radius for a mission. Unfortunately, the Boss had chosen nighttime for the drop-off, and the crew didn't have D-Dog to help them find the plants.

They were supposed to have gathered Wormwood and Haoma, and instead were waiting in the helicopter with bunches of any plant that included small yellow flowers. There were also some small white flowers, some large yellow flowers, and some weeds with flowers. Flashlights and night vision goggles weren't the best tools for identifying flora, Quiet thought. Big Boss asked the soldiers how their collecting had gone, and they reluctantly presented the plants in their canvas bags, embarrassed. He peered into them and immediately sneezed, causing a cloud of dust and pollen to puff up into the helicopter cabin.

He sneezed a few more times as the helicopter took off, causing Miller to ask over the radio if he had caught a cold. When the Boss answered in the negative, Ocelot suggested that he might have an allergy to one of the plants they had collected. Usually, he theorized, Big Boss traversed the Afghan landscape without problems, but it was flowering season for many of the plants, and the crew must have collected a flowering plant that was rare enough for him to barely notice symptoms unless subjected to a significant quantity. Hearing this, the soldiers tied off their bags of plants and placed them under the front seat beside the pilot, and opened the doors briefly to let the cool night air blow away remaining pollen.

Someone passed the Boss a handkerchief, and all the others followed suit. He muttered his thanks but kept sniffling, and his eyes got so puffy and watery that he had to lift his eye patch to wipe tears accumulated beneath it. He cleared his throat and coughed due to the excessive mucus production. Quiet, sitting beside him, thought he must feel miserable, and all she could do was help him take off his larger weapons to lean them against the wall. She picked up and handed back his canteen which he had taken out and suddenly dropped due to a forceful sneeze.

"Snake! What was that noise? You okay?" asked Miller's voice.

"Yeah," managed the Boss in a nasal tone, "Dropped my canteen. I'll be fine, Kaz."

"I-I can't listen to this anymore," said Miller. "You sound horrible. I'll get the medical staff to look at those plants when you're back. I'm out."

"Boss! Check the first aid kit in the back," said the pilot.

"Are you having trouble breathing? Any swelling? There should be an epinephrine autoinjector in the kit," said Ocelot.

"It's not that bad," said the Boss through a handkerchief.

"Well, take something anyway or tranq yourself if it gets too bad. You still have over twelve hours to go."

Big Boss didn't reply and Quiet glanced at him leaning stoically against the cabin wall. She realized he would have to go around her to rummage through the kit, so she turned to her right and opened the cargo compartment.

She found the kit, knelt on the floor, and opened it on her seat, picking out a couple pills of diphenhydramine. She touched the Boss's knee and he accepted the pills wearily, taking them with a swig from his canteen.

Fifteen minutes later, all but one of the new recruits were asleep. Quiet noticed a light pressure on her shoulder as the helicopter swayed. She couldn't see the Boss's functional eye since he was on her left, but the antihistamines must be taking effect because he had stopped sneezing and was nodding off. He caught himself before he leaned on her too heavily, looked around, then slumped back against the cabin wall when he judged everything was fine. She wanted tell him not to fight the drugs, that she would stay awake to keep watch, so she sat up straighter, caught his eye, and gave a quick nod, putting a hand on his forearm. He nodded back and settled into the seat to sleep.

She learned that the Boss always put others before himself.

A morning mission to extract a researcher and gather intel had gone on much longer than usual. While scouting, Quiet had spotted a mining camp half a mile away. Miller had asked the Boss to extract the children as soon as he saw from the binocular data how thin, ill, and dirty they were. So after completing their mission, they snuck into the camp, stole a truck, and drove back to the LZ with the five children and two women who had acquiesced. It was nearly 0940 by that time, and the oppressive desert sun began to beat down on them.

Miller had sent two Diamond Dog soldiers and a medic with Pequod to assist with handling the extra people, and they all barely fit into the helicopter.

"I'll take the next one," Big Boss said. Quiet noticed him eyeing the water and packaged meals that the soldiers took out for the children, but he looked away when they clamored for it.

"Are you sure? It's going to be 106 degrees by the time the other chopper gets there. Two of the kids are sitting on the floor; they don't take up much space. With a little Tetris, you could make it work," proposed Ocelot.

"Tetris?" asked Big Boss.

"It's, uh, a video game that just came out in Russia a couple months ago."

"We'll wait."

They waited for the next three hours for another helicopter to arrive from a ship in the Indian Ocean. Big Boss chose some shade under a rock face, and she chose a location with higher elevation to keep watch. It was in direct sunlight, so it was actually nice until she realized her body was thirsty, and there was no water to be found unless she went back to the mining camp. She looked there and the horizon shimmered. She didn't carry a canteen because she had always been able to find fresh water, but after today she thought she would make space on her belt for one.

"Quiet, come here." Big Boss's voice sounded raspy. He was lying on his front, propped up by his elbows, when she went to kneel beside him. He sat up and held out his canteen for her to take, but she moved his wrist higher and scooted closer. She was afraid that if she poured it herself, she would be unable to move and would use all his water. He understood and poured a small stream over her head. The parasites absorbed them instantly, and she sighed in relief. He leaned against the rock and took a sip. She heard his stomach growl. He turned to pour more water onto her, but she pressed it back to him. It was her fault not planning for unexpected circumstances.

He drank most of the rest of the water within the next hour and a half, and was sitting still against the rock face, occasionally squinting out into the sun to scan for threats. He had offered the canteen to her again, but she had refused a second time.

"I'm used to it," he said, and he capped it and didn't drink. His lips were chapped and dust from the sand lined his face.

They had to move several feet when their shadowed area shrank. When Quiet stood up, she felt suddenly dizzy and it seemed as though a wave of heat had washed up over her head. She took a few blind steps and flopped back onto the ground as soon as she had reached the wider shaded area.

Big Boss leaned over her, concerned, and she merely blinked. She was so thirsty, but their helicopter would be there soon with water. She just had to save her energy and wait. She would just close her eyes for a few minutes.

Droplets of lukewarm water sprinkled on her face and chest, making her jump. When she opened her eyes, she nearly laughed aloud at the absurdity.

Big Boss was spraying his water pistol in short bursts into the palm of his prosthetic hand, which he held over her body. He had accidentally hit her with the weapon right after he had developed it, and she had flinched because it packed the same powerful PSI no matter how one pulled the trigger. He was letting it flow from his hand to avoid hurting her and to avoid splashing it everywhere. She felt revived almost immediately and smiled at him with her eyes.

"This thing does have a use, after all," the Boss said hoarsely, smirking slightly. "Should have thought of it earlier, but I forgot because I never use it." He shifted over to drip water onto her abdomen. She sat up when he was done, and he handed it to her to use on herself. He took his last ounce of water, shaking the canteen into his mouth. She passed the water pistol back to him when her thirst had been sated, and he opened the back where it was filled and drank from there, not caring that it was tepid tap water last filled a week ago.

She closed her eyes and listened. One helicopter, three miles to the south-southwest. They would both be just fine.

He didn't stare at her body again, but sometimes his eye would meet hers from across the cabin of the helicopter. She would hold the gaze and often give him a reserved smile, and for a few moments they would study each other with an easy understanding. Words were unnecessary. They accepted each other as they were, and asked for nothing.

After disabling Sahelanthropus, Big Boss wanted to go back to the last known location of Skull Face to finish him off and destroy his vials of vocal cord parasites. Quiet chose to remain in the helicopter when he and Miller disembarked.

She could hear everything, so she knew her former employer was done for-but frankly, all she felt was indifference and an odd sense of justice and pity.

She had long stopped walking on the winding path of revenge. She had left her past behind. Alongside an extraordinary man, she was living for the present, fighting for the future.

The person she had been before no longer existed; that person had died in flames at a hospital that night in Dhekelia.

Now, there was only Quiet.