A/N: I own nothing except the laptop I wrote this story on.
"So where are you from, Rabbit?"
"Hmm?"
"I asked where you are from." Fox said, grinning a little bit as he nudged his friend in the shoulder. It was dinnertime at Mother Base, and in between waiting for the below-average spaghetti (that everyone but today's cook compared negatively to egg noodles and ketchup), those that were in the mess hall were passing the time by doing what they did best: interacting. Talking. Telling stories.
"America."
"No shit, I know that's where you're from. What I want to know is where you're from." Fox said. When Rabbit continued to look at him with a combination of confusion and slight annoyance, Fox rolled his eyes. "I mean your heritage. What's your heritage?"
"Does it really matter?" Rabbit asked. "The Boss made us all sign the same pledge, you know. We have no nation other than Mother Base, and no people other than the Diamond Dogs. I'm from America, yeah, but I'm from Mother Base. That's all that matters to me."
"Bulllllllshit." Fox said.
"Why? Why is that bullshit?" Rabbit asked, now absolutely annoyed. "I've bought into the Boss' message and beliefs, and I don't see why you're criticizing me for it."
"He's not criticizing you for it, he's just pointing out a reality." Osprey said. "Sure, we're all Dogs together, but that doesn't mean that we can just forget where we've come from overnight. I certainly haven't. Especially considering where the Boss continually works." He sighed. "I may be a Diamond Dog, but I will forever be one of the Pashtun." He cleared his throat, rubbing his chin as he did it. "I see no reason why I should have to abandon every last bit of my old identity. If anything, I can bring it to Mother Base and showcase the best of it."
"See?" Fox said, positively beaming. "I told you that you were being a stick-in-the-mud, Rabbit. And it's not like I'm gonna judge you for it, bub."
"Who's judging who, now?"
The men looked up at the voice. Howling Badger was standing over Osprey's back, and along with her were a few more of her friends. She was staring at them all with cryptic eyes and smile. "Mind if we join you boys? The mess is getting rather packed."
"Go for it." Fox said.
The ladies all took a seat, completing the table.
"Now, I feel like we missed out on a very interesting conversation." Badger said. "What were you all talking about?"
"We weren't talking about anything. Fox here wouldn't shut up about it. He wants to know where I'm from."
"America, right?" Badger asked, raising an eyebrow.
"No, not that." Rabbit said. "He wants to know my heritage."
"Well, what's wrong with that?" Badger asked. She brushed one of her greying locks back behind her ear.
"But the Boss-"
"Rabbit, let me let you in on a little secret." Badger said, a motherly tone of tough love in her voice. "The Boss has us as a nation, not as a bunch of mindless drones. We're here of our own free will."
"Explain that to the schmucks that he pulled out of Afghanistan last week." Hissing Coyote said. She was on her second cup of coffee that evening, with a third waiting in the wings. "Don't think there's anything 'free will' about being Fulton'd out of a place."
"Well, maybe so." Badger conceded, a mischievous smile on her face. "But Commander Ocelot is pretty convincing, isn't he? All he had to do was point out the fact that we get paid more than empty promises, and they all get in a fight to be the first to kiss the Boss' shoes."
"How do you know that that's what they really think?" Rabbit asked. "Maybe they've been brainwashed."
"If that's what you think, then it's probably because you work with too many computers and not enough people." Badger said. "People aren't designed to be 'things,' they deserve dignity. Perhaps there's nothing dignified about a Fulton, but the aftermath sure is." She cleared her throat. "Anyway, how about I make you a deal, Rabbit. We all go around the table and say where we're from, and what our heritage is. That way you aren't embarrassed."
"But I'm not-"
"Great! I'll start." Badger said. "I'm from Australia, if the accent wasn't a dead giveaway. Brisbane, really. My family's been there for about as long as I can remember. And I came to the Boss after I heard about him and my RAAF commission was up."
"RAF?" Fox asked. "Isn't that British?"
"We're part of the Queen's territory, sweetie." Badger said. "Well, not really. But I wouldn't be surprised if those dunces in parliament finally get around to severing the last link between us and England. I'd better my money on it happening in the next few years." She winked. "Also, you're thinking of the Royal Air Force. I'm from the Royal Australian Air Force. Similar sound, but not the same thing."
She looked over at Hissing Coyote, who nodded.
"I'm from Ghana, originally. But I got some schooling in Britain, which explains my accent. My family is mostly of the Akan, though I am sure that there are a few other tribes that my ancestry dips into." She shrugged. "Some of my family back home worry about the state of things, but I have never really cared about politics that much. I know that, in the end, the communists and the capitalists are all squabbling and they sound like baby ducks. Quack, quack, quack." The rest of the table chuckled.
"What are you then?" Fox asked. "Communist?"
"Try apathy-ist." Coyote said. "I do not care either way."
"Fair enough." Fox muttered. "What about you, Angel?"
Grey Chameleon just rolled her eyes, and ignored Badger's smirk.
"My mother is from Kyoto, and my father is from Grand Rapids."
"Where the fuck is Grand Rapids?" Osprey asked.
"Western Michigan."
"Western Michigan?" Fox asked, raising an eyebrow. "There can't be a lot of Japanese Americans out there."
"Not nearly as much as in the Metro-Detroit area." Chameleon said. "Look, can we stop talking about me?"
"See, at least one person gets it-"
"Quiet, Rabbit." Badger shushed him. "How about you, Fox?"
"Philly." He said, grinning wide enough to show off all of his teeth. "Typical Italian bunch from South Philly, that's where I'm from. City of Brotherly Love, right?"
"More like Brotherly Shove."
"Fuck off, Rabbit."
"What about you, Pequod?" Badger asked. Everyone turned to the pilot, who was clearly trying his best to enjoy the "noodles" that were on the menu that night. "Where are you from?"
"States."
"Oh, don't be like that." Badger said. "Everyone else here gave us a little bit more than that. Clearly you weren't born in the sky, destined to nurture and pilot Baby through the clouds and get the Boss in and out of danger, hmm?"
"I might've been." Pequod said, still not looking up at her. Badger looked determined.
"You know we're not going to let your jokes get away with everything, sweetheart. Would you do it for old Badger dear and tell us some more?"
"Fine." Pequod said. He set down his fork and looked at everyone at the table. "I have a riddle for you. You are stranded on a deserted island, with two other people: Hitler and Stalin. You find a genie's lamp, and he promises to take you off the island and home, but on one condition: you must empty the gun he gives you. There are only two bullets, and both men must die. Who do you shoot first and why?"
The table was silent. Badger shook her head.
"What about you, Pequod?"
"I shoot Hitler twice." Pequod said. "Because every Pole with half a brain knows that you always take care of business before pleasure."
After a round of more stupefied laughter than anything, Fox spoke.
"You're Polish, Pequod?"
"Hundred percent." Pequod said. "My dad fled the country with his family after the Germans surrendered, and the Soviets got out their dividing tape for my homeland. He met mom in Chicago, and ever since I was little I've lived in and out of Chicago Polonia until I started flying helos and caught the eye of Revolver Ocelot. He hired me, and I've been here ever since."
"I never would have guessed." Fox said.
"Really?" Pequod asked, his eyebrow raised almost to the top of his forehead. "Did this not tip it off?" He rolled back the sleeve of his t-shirt to expose his left bicep, where there was a massively ornate tattoo of an eagle. "This is the Polish coat of arms, dumbass. You've seen me wearing sleeveless shirts while washing Baby countless times. How have you never noticed this?"
Fox just shrugged.
"I always assumed that it was the American eagle."
Pequod facepalmed so hard they thought he was going to knock himself out.
"Do you have thoughts on the Pope visiting Poland a few years ago?" Coyote asked. "I'm not much for religion myself, but I have to imagine it is a big deal back home."
"It's bigger than you think." Pequod said. He rolled back his other sleeve to expose his right bicep: an incredibly ornate tattoo of a cross and intricate designs splashing out from it. "Even if you aren't, these days if you are Polish you are Catholic. Solidarity, my friends. It will bring down those dupeks from 'Mother Russia.' You watch."
"You sure about that, Pequod?" Rabbit asked. "This is a world superpower, you know. I think you're fighting a losing battle."
"Jeszcze Polska nie zginela." Pequod retorted. "Poland is not yet lost. Those Soviet fuckers made the same mistake that Hitler's Huns made before them, and then the Tsar and the Habsburgs and the Prussians before that: you can swallow Poland, but you can never digest it." He motioned over to Osprey. "A shame they never learned this lesson the first time, because now Osprey's country is kicking the shit out of them. And any chance I have to rub their noses in it while I'm working with Boss, I'll take it."
"Wow, Pequod. I never would have pegged you to care about-"
"I know, I know. I don't care about much, Rabbit." Pequod said, drawing a chuckle from the others. "But I'm Polish. And every Pole worth his or her salt knows their history. It's all we've got half the time, because the other half of the time we have no country." He shrugged. "Which is what makes Mother Base nice. I know I will always have a home here, and from here I'll fight so that my people have their home again too." He looked positively giddy. "It's gonna happen. Those assholes don't know it, but they're dying: the Soviet Union won't make it to the turn of the millennium, just you watch. And it's going to be kickstarted by the country that's been bullied by Germany and Russia since the dawn of time."
…
Later that night, as the sun was setting, she decided that it would be best to take a walk along walkway between the Command Platform and the medical platform. She didn't know what it was, but being out late at night and hearing the Seychelles beneath her lapping at the pylons and posts holding up the nation at sea was intensely calming to her aging bones. She sighed, and leaned against the railing, sailing out into the vast abyss in front of her.
"Badger."
She turned around, and slowly pulled herself into a salute.
"Evening, Boss."
"At ease, Badger." Snake had clearly been walking back from the Medical Platform himself, and was not about to enforce decorum between the two of them. "You barely have to salute me, you know. You're more experienced than I am."
"Maybe in sheer number of years of service, sir." Badger said. "But certainly not in terms of ability or in the events that happened in my years. I've had a rather uneventful career, to be honest."
"Can't really say the same, huh." Snake admitted, reaching into his pocket and pulling out his phantom cigar lighter. Badger wrinkled her nose.
"I don't see why you don't just smoke the real thing, sir. I have some good ones back in my bunk."
"Wouldn't want you to blow your share on me." He said. "And I can be awfully picky."
"They're just cigars, sir."
"I suppose so." Snake said. He turned to look at her. "So we're still a go for tomorrow?"
"Of course, sir. I've been giddy just waiting for it."
"Good." Snake said, taking his first puff. "I think it'll be a nice change of pace for the men and women to work with you in charge of drills tomorrow." Badger raised an eyebrow.
"Sir, I've trained extensively in CQC and ran Iron Man competitions in my off time until I volunteered for your army. I don't think 'change of pace' is the right way to describe what I'm going to do to them tomorrow. It certainly won't be easy on them."
"Who said anything about easy?" Snake asked. He looked at her, with the gall to appear innocent. "I just said a change of pace."
Their laughter carried down the pathway towards the edge of the Command Platform, where a certain gunslinging intel offier was out having a nightly smoke of his own. He heard the noise, and struggled not to smile.
"Oh…I'm gonna need a camera for tomorrow…"
A/N: Just another day in the Seychelles.