Chapter 25

"What!!?" Campbell raised his eyebrows in surprise and looked straight into Velkan's eyes. "What do you mean, you came up with the shadow Philanthropy… and what is 'The Fiction'?"

Campbell could see by Velkan's smile that the reaction was exactly what he wanted. Velkan then raised his head and reached for his cane that was sitting on top of the desk. He held it in his hands and looked at it intensely. "I like to think that The Fiction is what holds this nation together"

Campbell was puzzled and Velkan loved every minute of it. "I'll explain. As you may or may not know the Patriots have a tight grip on the United States, but they can't keep track of every detail. Even in a modern era as ours, sometimes important things, things that should be kept secret tend to fall through the cracks and found their way to the public. The Fiction takes care of these problems. Things that are seemingly not important are handled by people, normal, upstanding and patriotic people, much like me" Velkan said as took the cane and walked around until he stopped behind Campbell, due to the restraints Campbell couldn't move. He had to stay sitting down hearing what Velkan had to say.

"After I suffered the terrible accident that disfigured me, I was almost demoted. My faith in the military had diminished. Fortunately other people found my qualities to be essential. I was indeed recruited by the Patriots, but not to do wet works. No! I was meant to do bigger things. After I saw what they were offering I just couldn't resist. I was to be in charge of the Military branch of 'The Fiction'. That meant an immense amount of control of several military operations in several countries"

"What does this have to do with Philanthropy?" Campbell asked turning his head to the side.

"Well, the patriots had caught wind of a new NGO (Non Governmental Organization) called Philanthropy that aimed to stop Metal Gear variations throughout the world. Something like that had to be watched over. To make sure that Philanthropy didn't do anything without the Patriots knowing someone had the idea of contributing money to the NGO in hopes to at least have some control over it, but this proved very hard because of Solid's Snake and Otacon's distrustful nature. However I had an idea, a few days of after Philanthropy's formation I made arrangements for the creation of a shadow Philanthropy. It would operate without knowing anything about its sister. In fact the operatives weren't even that, everything was bogus. The U.N. recognizing us was the only thing that took for any person to be interested and so everyone worked under heavily scrutinized conditions."

"You…" Campbell sounded rather agitated. "How could you…how could you keep so many people in the dark. All those operations…"

"Oh please Campbell!!! I was doing what was needed and in fact the shadow Philanthropy really did stop several Metal Gear iterations around the globe. As for keeping people in the dark I think you should ask yourself that.

However wrong it seemed Campbell knew that Velkan was right about this one thing. In the years that he was in the shadow Philanthropy not once did he thought he was working for anything but a true organization.

"Some news was filtered out of course, the Manhattan incident of 2007 and the Big Shell affair in 2009 for example. In fact anything that covered the real Philanthropy was covered and reshaped. And you bought it" Velkan placed his hands on Campbell shoulder and lowered his head to Campbell's right ear. "Face it Campbell you were eating it up and you loved every second of it"

Campbell closed his eyes. Damn!! How could I have been so gullible! Velkan took out his hands from Campbell's shoulders and went around him. "I think that's enough, don't you?" Velkan was smiling. "Will you tell your niece to come out and be a good girl or do you want me to come and look for her?"

Campbell quickly raised his head. He knows Meryl's here. "She's not coming and if you go out and find her you'll only end up dead"

Velkan's expression changed. "Interesting, you actually believe that! That means you have something up your sleeve and that makes me curious"

"Sir! I'm sorry to interrupt but one of the men found something." The Major was right beside Velkan.

"What?" Velkan replied.

"The vent system sir…"

"What are you talking about, we know that there is a vent system, we saw it in the plans." Velkan snapped back at the Major.

"It's not that sir, we thought they were enclosed, but there seems to be an access point to the vent system in the server room."

Velkan quickly turned his eyes to Campbell. Could that be it!! "That's quite resourceful Campbell"

Campbell made no motion, but he really didn't have to.

That's not it, is it Campbell? Your heart rate tells me that's not it! It's something…what could it...oh I get it now. Velkan turned to the Major and whispered to his ear. "Change the radio frequency to a secure one, one of the enemies might be carrying one of our radios" I should've done it sooner. Velkan thought as he waited for Campbell's reaction when the Major picked up his radio and said to everyone listening to change the radio frequency to a secure one. That was it! Campbell didn't react but Velkan could see something that no one else could.

"Major!" Velkan left Campbell and headed towards the men near the elevator. "Get some men ready to come with me. We are going on a hunt"

"There's no door!!" Raiden pointed out the train car in front of them had no visible door.

"Crap!" Snake directed his eyes to the side of the train car and saw that it only had a side door. The he noticed some stairs on the train car "Get on the roof. We can get to the engine car." He pointed to the stairs.

Both headed up the stairs, Raiden first, followed closely by Snake while the Comanche got closer to the train. "Snake its coming straight towards us!!" Raiden said noticing that the Comanche was coming head on. "Here!" Snake pushed Raiden to the other side of the train car. A small ledge was all they needed. "Grab on!!" Both grabbed on the ledge of the train car and jumped to the opposite side from where the Comanche was coming. The wind rushed past their faces as they hanged on the side of the train car waiting for the Comanche to pass by. Raiden saw the vegetation by the side of the railroad go by fast, they were cruising at an amazing speed. After the Comanche flew by they got on the roof again and headed towards the engine car. They kept low so that the wind couldn't throw them down. After a few seconds the Comanche was coming again, but this time it was right in front of them, it had creep up on them without they even noticing. It was coming really fast and Snake and Raiden just reacted by lying flat on the roof of the train car. The Comanche rushed past them at an incredible speed and at a very low altitude.

"Why didn't it fire on us!?" Raiden inquired as he lied flat on the train car roof holding his M4 tightly.

"I don't know." Snake replied seeing the Comanche turning around again. "I think it's trying to get us off the train." He said whilst getting on his feet and looking at the Comanche. Snake then reached for his M4 and pointed it to the Comanche. "If he doesn't fire at us then we'll fire at him!!"

Marsh was getting impatient while flying around trying to get them off the train. They're good! The next fly by Marsh risked even more by lowering the Comanche further. As he got closer to the train car he saw both men firing their guns. The bullets hit the Comanche, but nothing severe happened. It's now!!

Snake saw the Comanche flying even lower than normal. "It's going to hit us!!" Both jump to the side of the train again and waited for the train to go by, but it didn't, instead it flew around the flat train car and was now in front of Snake and Raiden. Its propellers were getting closer to them, they couldn't go up to the roof without getting hit by them, the only way was to let go. "Snake!! We have to let go!!" Raiden shouted through the noise.

"No!! Hold on!" Snake replied and shimmied across the ledge towards the flat car, once he got there he let go and landed safely. He whipped around and took out his M4. He looked inside the Comanche's cockpit and saw, through the night vision goggle the person piloting it. Black hair was covering most of the person's face, but he could discern a look of defiance. Snake didn't hesitate to fire. The bullets hit the cockpit protective glass making several holes on it. Fortunately Snake's fire made the Comanche move away, giving Raiden the chance to go back to the roof. Snake's magazine was empty, so he quickly replaced it. The Comanche however hadn't given up yet. Its 20mm cannon fired furiously and the next thing Snake felt was a sense of weightlessness and then everything went dark.