The Road to Outer Heaven
Chapter 11: The Cover-Up
By, Frank Hunter

A wave of machine gun fire sprayed through a shelf of steel pipes and Snake once more hit the deck and retreated, sliding on his belly toward thicker cover. Steele was not hesitant in the slightest to open fire on the intruder, with a clear shot or not, and the nuclear stockpile which rested very close by did not seem to be doing anything to dissuade him. He had, however, decided to strap the RPG-7 to his back in favor of an assault rifle. Snake thanked God and fate for small favors. The commander, though a little overeager, apparently was not willing to cause obscene damage so quickly.

Snake continued his slow retreat into the dark maze, followed by this over armed, overzealous madman. He wished that he'd managed to collect a claymore mine or two on this mission. A trap like that in the right place probably could have ended this fight fairly quickly, but all he had were his firearms and his green pineapples, and he didn't want to use the grenades. A stray throw or retaliation from his assailant could very well cause a nuclear explosion. Snake, unlike Steele, had a will to continue living.

"Afraid to stand and fight, dog?" the commander yelled at him blindly. "Not so tough when it's a fair fight, are you?" Snake wasn't sure how fair the fight really was, but the question at least prompted him to momentarily wonder how well Fox was doing with the girl. After all, all he really needed to do here was to buy some time until Fox managed to collect the dossier and return to finish the fight with Steele. It was simple. Just hide and survive, and it would all be over in due time.

But Snake knew that wasn't the way it really was.

What if there is no Gray Fox? What if that girl actually manages to kill him? Snake allowed himself to contemplate this thought while he rolled onto an empty shelf. He dropped out the back side just as the commander turned the corner, and trained his crosshairs on the point where Snake had just been.

If Fox failed, it would be up to Snake to finish here as quickly as possible and resume the chase after the girl. If Fox failed, and Snake could not collect the dossier, it would be solely his fault that the mission was a failure. He would no doubt be rejected from FOX-HOUND, if he wasn't killed in South Africa before that. He knew that he needed to start thinking of this in terms of a solo mission. Next time, if there was a next time, there wouldn't be a Fox to help him at all. The whole deal would be on his shoulders. Why should this job be any different?

Turning another corner, Snake found himself face-to-foot with the monstrosity under construction in the hangar. He could hear the footsteps of Commander Steele not too far behind him. They were slowing down, and the man's breathing was harder and heavier. That's what he gets for toting so much artillery, Snake thought to himself.

"This is insanity, boy," the commander yelled, while Snake took a look up the side of the steel foot. "You're telling me," he muttered. There were still panels missing from the sides of the foot, and wires jutting out through small openings. "You're working toward the end of the world," Steele continued. "You can't want that." Snake redoubled his desire to end this as quickly as possible, and take off after the mission objective himself. Wedging his boot into one of the open panels in the side of the behemoth, he began to climb.

When the foot was finished, Snake had no doubt it would be a smooth, metallic surface. However, it was still unfinished enough to give him plenty of footing, and he managed his ascent without much difficulty. The commander ran by beneath him once during his climb, but apparently didn't have the creative insight to actually look up, and missed Snake altogether. Once before reaching the top, he heard the thunder of machine gun fire and braced himself, certain that he'd been found out. But, the commander was not even nearby. The man was getting panicked, shooting at shadows. That made the situation even more dangerous, but in a way made Solid Snake more confident. He had the high ground, and the upper hand.

He reached the top of the foot and lowered himself into a prone position. Un-strapping the R4 rifle from his back, he loaded the chamber and took a deep breath. His eyes having adjusted a bit to the dark, he scanned the hallways below and without much effort, found the commander still weaving in and out like a mouse in a maze.

Snake steadied the rifle, with its butt against his shoulder and its barrel rested on a risen piece of the construction project's armor. He held it steady, and watched the commander run a little longer. Once more, the man turned a corner and opened fire on a pile of debris, resulting in a scattered scurrying of rats that must have, up until that moment, considered the place a haven. But Steele didn't stop for long. He was dragging and panting, but still moving. Snake waited longer. He would only have one shot; that much he knew. If he missed, his position would be sacrificed. A sniper that revealed his location was as good as dead, that much he remembered from his Green Beret training, but against an enemy so armed was even worse. There was no chance in hell he'd be able to safely avoid the RPG from his vantage point. If Steele knew where he was, within seconds there would be an explosion on top of the metal foot, and Snake would either be blown off or blown away entirely. Not gonna happen, he said to himself. One shot's all I need. Just need the right angle.

After another minute of yelling, swearing, and aiming, Steele finally stopped for a breather, and Snake cursed inwardly. The commander had come to rest with a shelf of girders between himself and the other man. He was leaning against it; his back just showing around the side of it, and Snake tried to line up a shot, but couldn't guarantee a kill. The head was blocked, and the bulk of his body was blocked. Snake could shoot straight, he had confidence in that, but there was no real certainty that the bullet which grazed the back of his adversary would incapacitate him, let alone kill him. Snake squinted, trying his very best to line something up, but he simply couldn't. To make matters worse, half of the man's protruding back was blocked by the damn RPG he had strapped to his shoulder…

The RPG! The Idea hit Snake like a tidal wave. That maniac reloaded it before he took off after me. He shifted his focus, and sure enough at the tip of the RPG-7, a grenade sat at rest, ready to be fired. It was true, if the commander knew his location, that grenade would become Snake's worst enemy, but as long as it was strapped to the man's back it might be made his greatest ally.

Snake steadied his hand, and checked to make sure the nuclear stockpile was still on the other side of the room. It was. All of this reasoning had happened in less than ten seconds. The grenade, which swayed on the end of its launcher with each breath the commander drew, was moving more slowly now. The man was catching his wind, and it would only be a matter of moments now before he began to move again. That couldn't be allowed, it might ruin the plan. The grenade slid to the left, and Snake trained his sight on where it just was, waiting. The few moments felt like a lifetime.

With a final inhalation, Commander Steele straightened his back. He was about to take his first step forward toward the scattered debris pile when he heard the gunshot off to his side. Beginning to twist his body in response, he heard the clang of metal on metal just behind his head. The commander did not have time for even one thought to go through his head before a wave of shrapnel took that very path. The exploding grenade blew the back of his head to a bloody pulp, and knocked the girders just next to it off their shelves. The falling metal collapsed against the lower part of the man's body and pinned his legs to the ground, crushing them beyond repair.

Snake watched the beginning of this from his vantage point, but took a swift jump off the metallic foot before the chain reaction could reach its conclusion. He needed to reach the commander, disarm him, and confirm his death as quickly as possible. That was the safest way to handle this. Snake weaved his way through the still-falling mess of metal, his R4 held out in front of him at the ready. Though he didn't expect there should be any more trouble from the commander, it didn't pay to be careless.

After a couple of twists and turns, he found the bloody mess that used to be his adversary lying on the ground. His lungs were still pumping, an action that must have been a force of sheer will alone. A good deal of his skin had been torn from the bone which had held it in place. A good deal of the bone had also been shattered. The man was broken, his rifle forgotten off to his side, but Snake wasn't taking any chances. He cocked his weapon.

The wheezing breathing from the commander became louder, but his head did not turn in Snake's direction. Snake didn't believe him capable of such a motion anymore. Nevertheless, the man knew he was there, and through a great effort managed to speak.

"Pleassse," he wheezed in a raspy choke. "Don't re…return it to them. They spell doom for…for us all."

"Rest easy," Snake assured him, coming slowly closer and around to his front. "We don't work for Outer Heaven."

The man said nothing, but his breathing continued on in that forced way. His curiosity, whatever bit of it was intact, was piqued. "W…who?" he stammered.

Face to face with the wreck of a man now, Snake saw no need to keep the secret from him anymore. He wouldn't be telling anyone, after all. "We're operatives with FOX-HOUND, and the U.S. government."

Commander Steele coughed violently and spit up an amount of blood which might have been alarming in other circumstances. Here it just fell into the puddle around him. The man closed his eyes. "That…that…is much worse."

Snake sighed and raised his rifle to the dying man's head. With this situation unfolding around him, the last thing he needed to deal with at the moment was anti-American prejudice. There was no chance in hell that bringing the documents in question to Big Boss back at headquarters could be as detrimental as a return of this metal monster to the violent and unstable nation of Outer Heaven. It was just the babble of a dying bigot.

After a few more strained respirations, Snake pulled the trigger, and the single gunshot echoed through the hangar. With the final bullet in his head, Steele was finally dead and the horrible sound of his breathing stopped. Snake wasted no time and made a break back toward the door that Suhn had fled through earlier.

Turning past the final obstacle of construction materials, the hallway came into view, and Snake almost couldn't believe his eyes when he saw Gray Fox booking it at full speed back toward him. Under his arm was a folder full of papers.

"Fox!" he yelled, half in excitement, half in amazement. He smiled at the veteran soldier.

Gray Fox didn't return the gesture. "Come on," he shouted and gripped Snake's arm, altering his direction back into the hangar. They passed the remains of the commander sprawled across the floor. Snake reprimanded himself for the emotion later, but as they ducked around the fallen man he felt a twinge of anger at Fox for not even uttering a word of congratulation or understanding. He just kept running.

Not a minute later the two of them stood before the nuclear stockpile, and Fox approached it. Dropping to a knee, he tossed the folder on the ground beside him and opened a panel on one of the warheads. Pressing a button, he found that it was very much alive.

"What the hell are you doing?!" Snake demanded, almost panicked. He wanted nothing to do with these bombs.

"We need to destroy this facility," Fox replied, his veneer of calm wavering under the circumstances. "Boss's orders."

"We're going to nuke it?!" Snake demanded again. Fox didn't answer. He was busy recalling the instructions he'd been given by FOX-HOUND's nuclear tech a few minutes back, in the hallway by the fallen body of Suhn.

"What about Zamdela? There's a town here well within blasting radius!"

Fox faltered at that thought, but only for a second. He had brought a timer up on the small screen behind the panel. "This is a hardened shelter. It'll probably contain the blast." He set the timer for fifteen minutes.

"You don't know that!" Snake growled at him.

Fox pounded his fist on the nuke and turned his cold gaze to Snake, pinning him as fully as if he'd slammed him to the ground with his hands. "We don't have a choice!" he yelled at the rookie. "It needs to be destroyed, Snake. We DO NOT have a choice!"

Snake's eyes darted left and right, taking in Fox's piercing stare for a moment before coming to a realization. "…you saw something in the files. You read them, didn't you?"

Fox scowled, and released Snake from his stare, returning his attention to the bomb. He again didn't answer.

"What was in there?" Snake asked.

"It's better you don't know," Fox told him half-attentively, pressing several more buttons. "It would be better if I didn't…"

He hit one final button and the timer set to 15:00:00 began to quickly count down.

"What about us?" Snake asked his mentor, as Fox snatched up the folder and got to his feet. Snake followed suit. "We won't get to the LZ in time."

"Chopper's on its way. It'll meet us at the perimeter in ten minutes. Slight change of plan, I know, but it's necessary." Fox turned to look at him one last time, but the painful stare that was there before was now missing. Now it was just an air of sincerity. "Snake, you've done well here. You've done nothing wrong, and you'll have my approval to get into the unit when we get back. But for now, shut up. Stop asking questions and just follow my lead. I know what's going on here, and you don't. If everything doesn't go well we may not get out alive, so let's go." He pulled his pistol and cocked it. Snake did the same with his R4, slamming another magazine into it. He did this without a word.

"Back to the surface," Fox said, and took off toward the elevator at a sprint. Snake followed, his veins practically pumping pure adrenaline, and prepared for this last mad dash for victory.

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