And I decided to go a lot AU with the story so don't expect me to follow the canon of the game. Because reasons. And because I'm the queen of AUs so… be aware that this story will soon go very AU. If it's not your thing, you're warned.


First came the shower curtain, a thick olive green plastic curtain that was quickly installed by an overly zealous technician. Then came a larger cot and a more comfortable pillow.

On the next deployment, Snake showed up at the helipad with his normal gear plus a large backpack. Once comfortably seated and with Pequod skillfully leading the chopper to Afghanistan, he opened it and pulled a bunch of books out of it.

"Let's see, Ocelot's intel team has found quite a few books. Apparently people like this Stephen King these days, here we have The Shining, Carrie and The Dark Tower. Big enough to entertain us for a while."

He placed the three tomes on the floor of the chopper, then fished for more stuff. "A favourite of mine, Fahrenheit 451, Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheeps and last but not the least, another colossal doorstopper, War And Peace. Pick your read."

The choices were a bit staggering. Quiet knew of Stephen King, though she had never read anything from him. A bit awkward, she picked The Shining from the pile and gave it a cursory look. It certainly was long, thick enough to last at least a few hours worth of travel. The description seemed intriguing, even if she wasn't much of a horror fan, but as long as she didn't have to listen to the the noise of the engine for three hours, she could even read a commented edition of the Holy Bible for all she cared.

She looked at him and saw he had picked The Dark Tower, as it was the only book he had left out when he had packed again the tomes.

By the time Mother Base had disappeared behind the horizon, they were both immersed in their readings. From time to time Quiet dared to look at him. Snake seemed pretty drawn in the book in his hands, his blue eye darting along the lines quickly. He was a speedreader, definitely.

As time passed and pages were turned, the sniper found herself more and more comfortable in the cramped space of the helicopter and she unconsciously shifted on her seat. She turned to press her back against the co-pilot seat and stretched her legs on the small bench, boots hanging from the edge. Pequod had told her that the deployment time to Afghanistan was even longer than the time they needed to reach Africa, better get comfy so she wouldn't have strange aches and pains on the battlefield.

Snake too had made himself as comfortable as he could, one leg crossing over the opposite thigh and pressing his back to the metal wall of the cabin. His book rested on his legs while he lazily turned the pages. The fact that he wasn't trying to wring out words from her exploiting the casual conversation a book could bring on relieved her. After she had deployed with him a couple of weeks earlier, guards patrolling the platform close to her cell had started trying to make her talk. A barrage of questions, from mundane and innocent to lewd and rude, that had often made her throw a nicely placed middle finger up in the air towards the soldiers.

It turned out that Snake had provided her books just to let her survive the boredom of deployment, a pastime activity he was already used to, considering how fast he read. He wasn't trying to make her talk. It wasn't a trick. It was an offer of peace, one of those commodities he had spoke of after their first mission together.

She wished she could thank him with words, but she'd have to rely on her skills in battle to show her gratitude for those little things.

Speaking of battles, hours later Pequod announced they were about half an hour from the landing zone, yet Snake hadn't briefed her on the mission. When they went to Africa he had explained his plan pretty early during their trip, this time, nothing.

Only when the pilot spoke, he put down his book and took the iDroid. "Quiet?" He called. "Briefing?"

Smiling briefly, she put a piece of scrap paper in between the pages and set the book, before sliding closer to him and the map he was showing.

"We don't exactly have a mission today, nothing major at least. We're going to do rounds, move around the area of operation and… well, we'll do some damage to the Soviet army in order to undermine them. Nothing major, I'm talking about stealing materials, capable soldiers, weapons and vehicles," he explained. "We're going to remain in hostile territory for three, four days maybe, as long as we can resist or the Soviets discover the trick and counterattack."

It sounded dangerous. He had highlighted some guardposts and outposts, all on the same road, that led to the Soviet base camp. She really hoped he didn't intend to infiltrate that place, it was a fortress and she didn't know if she could provide enough cover, even with her special enhanced abilities.

"I've done this before. Guardposts aren't a huge problem, there are usually four or five guards there. Six tops, in my experience. Outposts of course are way more crowded, but there are more places to hide. I'll try to steal a vehicle early on, so I can follow you faster and not let you rot in boredom every time you finish scouting a new outpost."

Quiet smiled, remembering how long it had taken him to reach the abandoned village he was going to infiltrate two weeks prior, on foot and all alone.

"Support unit is ready to help us in case we're in trouble, but I've made sure to deploy troops on the other side of Afghanistan in the past month, to trick the Soviets into thinking we have interests in that territory. Ocelot's unit found enough evidence that showed the trick worked, and security is more lass in the southeast part of Afghanistan, and that most of the resources have been moved here, to keep them safe. And easier for us to steal them. The officers that had the great idea are going to have a nasty couple of days when we'll be over with our raid."

The sniper knew all too well what he was aiming at. Depleting their resources, or at least nick them, to slow them down. He had no interest in single handedly destroy the Soviet army in Afghanistan, their presence after all allowed Diamond Dogs to thrive with the different contracts they took in the area. But making things easier wasn't such a bad idea, if the wanted to keep the DD personnel alive and able to be deployed in combat zones. And replenishing the newly expanded Mother Base with fresh, capable soldiers in the midst of it would only do good to the morale and, of course, the earnings of the mercenary company.

The plan wasn't bad, but it relied a lot on a certain degree of improvisation, something she had learned that could make things either really easy or an absolute nightmare. One misstep and they would both be killed or worse captured. But Snake seemed quite sure of his abilities, also he had already done something similar in the past. Still wary but more inclined to trust him, she nodded in agreement with his exposition of the plan. Not that she could do much to voice her disagreement.

"Right. Now, I promised I would get you a real sniper rifle with tranquilizing darts, and the R&D guys delivered. Actually, I devoted a small team to take care of weaponry made from your own design, you have five people at your disposal to work on any weapon you may need."

She knew her eyes sparkled at the idea, and beneath his thick beard she saw him smile when ne noticed. He pulled a deep blue nylon bag from the space between the wall and his seat and opened it, revealing what looked a lot like her customized Renov ICKX, but the stock and the chassis were painted blue. The caliber looked the same, but the chamber was a little larger to allow the casing of the tranq darts to fit properly. It looked like a well made gun, she looked forward to test it.

What surprised her was the second weapon he handed her. Her own personal pistol, the one he had taken from her after he had defeated her at the Ruins. She grabbed the handle and looked up at him. His eye was trained on her, probably studying her reactions. "Kaz keeps telling me I shouldn't give it back to you. He's convinced you're going to kill me the first time I turn my back on you," he explained. "But I decided to trust you. And you need a sidearm."

The weapon was in pristine condition. He had cleaned it personally, she was pretty sure of it, with the same care he had used to clean her old rifle.

"There are mags in this bag." He pulled a backpack into view from beneath his seat. "Six for the pistol, I have no idea how many for the rifle, guys at the support unit took care of them. You should be covered for at least two fairly awful infiltrations attempts. Support can drop more, if you need them. Ready?"

She nodded and pulled the bag closer. This is going to be fun. She thought.

Not thirty minutes later, Pequod left them at the LZ near Spugmay Keep, the first stop over of their tour.

As soon as they set foot on solid ground though, Snake hurried off behind a fallen boulder, excusing himself. Quiet turned towards him, curious about that snappy conduct, but couldn't help but giggle when she heard the distinct noise of a zipper being tugged open and a long sigh of relief from the soldier.

He must have felt the need to relieve himself for quite some time.

As she waited, she sat on a stone of the once magnificent wall and proceeded to load her rifle with a fresh mag of tranquilizer darts. The wait wasn't long though, as Snake appeared from behind his makeshift toilet wiping his fleshy hand with a disposable wet wipe. "What?" He inquired, noticing that she was probably still smiling.

She shrugged her shoulders and stood. Nothing.

"Have you ever had to stop during a mission to pee? It's not that uncommon."

True. It wasn't uncommon and it had happened too. After all, good hydration was one of the moot points of a successful mission, because it kept the mind clear and the body working, making the soldier more efficient. One side effect was, of course, that said soldier would need to expel the liquids in excess, and during her own time with XOF, she had to take care of that in the middle of the mission, sometimes.

"How about we start our tour? There's a guardpost, half a kilometer ahead of us," he explained while wearing his tactical glove. "Want to go ahead and test that rifle?"

He didn't have to repeat it one more time. Feeling the rush of adrenaline almost numb her brain, she speeded towards said guardpost and started her recon round on it. Way before Snake could even see the outpost down the road, she had completed her recon, identified a large container of gasoline cans and spare electrical parts, tracked the three guards and found a suitable sniping point. Once she was set, she marked her finding on her iDroid to let Snake know and prepared to fire when ordered.

She had her scope trained on the neck of a Soviet soldier when Snake arrived at her sniping point and lay down prone beside her, scope in hand. "Seen anything interesting?"

Quiet looked down at him and mumbled something. Nah.

"Mmh, seems like a poor guardpost with little to nothing that could be useful. Even the guards posted here, look at them they're sloppy soldiers, and the scanner confirms it. Oh wait a sec, there's one with the medic badge, that one could turn useful. It's the one on the observation tower. I think I'm going to Fulton him. Now, I want to see if the R&D guys did a good job with that rifle, fire at will."

The low recoil startled her, when she fired the first dart. Being gas propelled and not with gunpowder, each shot had a dampened recoil she wasn't used to. It wasn't bad though, she could catch up with it, though she didn't mind the feeling of the shot travelling down her arm and chest through her shoulder. It wasn't indispensable, but all the other rifles she had ever used had a different feeling to them, she just needed to get used to this one.

Through her scope, she saw the small dart, shaped like a bullet, stick to the neck of the soldier. He fell like a soggy cloth half a second later. The narcotic inside that dart was extremely powerful, she really didn't want to be on the other end of that thing.

She shot twice in the span of the next ten seconds and two more soldiers fell. The iDroids chirped in unison: Guardpost Captured.

Quiet caught a brief smile on Snake's face, while he stood up. He brushed off some dust from his clothes and started heading down the guardpost. "It shouldn't take long, you're free to go ahead and take a good look at the village, if you want."

She pointed at her position and then gestured to the road.

"You want to watch out for incoming patrols?" He asked, and she nodded in reply. "Alright."

It was barely visible, but see the sudden deflation of his chest as he let out a sigh of relief. Someone would be watching his back and he felt safer that way.

That was a huge display of trust in her, despite her previous attempts at killing him. But sometimes she doubted he remembered the first time. His hospital room was dark, he was scared to death and things happened really, really fast.

She sighed and mindlessly hummed a tune she had heard so long before she couldn't remember if she had indeed heard it or if she had come up with it on her own. The only thing she knew was that it helped her relax and steady her hand, allowing her a more precise aim.

It took him less than ten minutes to gather what he deemed useful for Mother Base and Fulton them so the support helicopter could grab them and bring them back. Then they repeated the same procedure with Da Shago Kallai. That outpost took a little longer, not only because there was much more stuff to gather and people to Fulton, but also because the village had much tighter security.

"You know…" he started while he took care of a tranquilized soldier and moved him out of view. "The first time I entered this village, I had woken up from the coma. Like… two weeks before? I have absolutely no idea how I managed to pull the whole infiltration through. Not to mention the Skulls…"

She cringed when he mentioned the Skulls. Despite technically being akin to the members of the Skull Unit, having received a less radical parasite treatment, she despised them. They gave her the creeps, full blown nightmares were born from knowing that they existed and that they were once people.

Fuck it… She thought, focusing back on Snake and his movements.

"Quiet, shoot that guy," he ordered then. Said guy was a soldier on patrol not too far from him. She waited a moment for him to be out of his comrades' view then shot him. He barely felt the sting then fell right in Snake's arms, without a sound.

"Damn he's heavy…" he muttered as he dragged the tranquilized soldier inside a dilapidated building.

He cleaned the place. Between his own gun, choke holds and her, the eight soldiers were all taking naps in less than fifteen minutes. He spent the next half hour gathering every resource he found and fultoning it for the Support Team to pick up. Methodic and thorough, like a surgeon.

Damn that man was a continuous surprise. She had to admit that the first impression she had, the let down of all her expectation back in the helicopter heading to Africa, was wrong. She had been so wrong. In two hours he had infiltrated a guardpost and an outpost, cleaned them both and stole their resources.

Wow. That was everything she could think about.

And then he was nice to her. Well, they weren't best friends or anything, but he acted around her and treated her like she was a human being. She wasn't exactly sure she wanted to kill him before and forth with her mission, and after the last couple of weeks, she was even more inclined to let him be and forget the whole mission. In two weeks, Big Boss had treated her way better than any XOF officer she had served under in the past seven years.

She was still reloading her rifle, musing over the happenings of the last few days, when he arrived right beneath the ridge she had occupied as a sniping point driving a dust-covered jeep. "Tired yet?" he inquired, crossing his arms over the steering wheel. "Because I'd love to take a look at the Lamar Khaate Palace before the sun sets."

He was smiling.

Not a twitch of his lips, not a half smile or a chuckle, a full blown smile.

And that smile didn't look half bad on him!

Mentally slapping herself, Quiet stood, throwing her rifle over her shoulder as well as the bag with her ammo, before she jumped down beside the car. After that, she shook her head to answer him.

"Good. Jump in then, I know you can just go faster on foot, but I don't mind the company."

Shaking her head, wondering how much company she could as she didn't speak, but nevertheless she hopped in the passenger seat. After all, driving instead of running through the desert, was a much better option. For once, she could just enjoy the ride.