Chapter 2

'Well, here goes nothing.'

Slowly, I approached him and untied him. Now this really was a risky gamble, but if he tried anything I was ready for it. Or at least I hoped I was.

"What do you want exactly?" he asked, his voice was gruff.

"Nothing much, Solid Snake. I know everything about you. Outer Heaven, Zanzibar Land, Shadow Moses… Even the Tanker Incident, the Big Shell and your little group known as Philanthropy. To be honest, we could use your help Snake." I paused for a moment, sitting down behind the desk once more, "Our forces are under trained for what we are going up against. We could use someone with your skill and combat experience to train them."

"Why would you want training from a terrorist like me? Also, why should I help you? I have my own reasons for being here. I don't have time to train a bunch of rookies."

"Yes, I can imagine you would. But that is where we come in. In exchange for training, we would be more than happy to help you complete your mission. We know the area and you don't. We also have information that you don't. Why don't you talk to your friend about it? Hal, isn't it?"

With that Snake grunted and placed two fingers up to his neck, activating his in ear radio, contacting his friend Otacon. I looked once again at my computer screen and began to type and pull up files. I had always been good with computers. 'Man, I never thought this would actually come in handy before.' I thought to as I continued to type away, paying no mind to Snake who was still on the radio with Otacon.

After a little while of talking and a bit of arguing, Snake ended the call.

"So what is it Snake? Will you help us?"

"What exactly would happen if I said no?" he asked, perking an eyebrow.

"Nothing most likely, but it would help to have someone who knows they're way around here. Its quite easy to get lost here. Plus, I am quite certain you need some of the information I have."

"I'll do it, but under my terms. One of those being I would like to know who the hell I'm talking to."

"Deal." I said much too eagerly, "My name's Fox."

Snake looked at me oddly for a moment, as though another memory was brought to mind. But, like before, he soon shook it off and I resumed my talking.

"Now, I need to know something from you; what exactly are you doing here and why?"

"Philanthropy got word that there was development of a Metal Gear out here. The fighting and impending war would have been the perfect cover for it." He said leaning forward in his chair, resting his elbows on his knees. "That kind of a weapon is a threat to any and everyone. I came here to find out if it was true; if it is, I'm to destroy it."

"Huh… That actually doesn't surprise me. I've heard a bit about that. It's a nuclear walking battle tank, correct?"

"How did you know that? That's supposed to be classified…" Snake questioned, a bit surprised by the sound of it.

"The same way I know who you are without asking. I have my ways. If it is so classified, how do you know about it?" I retorted.

"We have our ways."

I smirked slightly, this was amusing; but now to get back to business.

"So, any ideas on where this Metal Gear might be…?"

"Philanthropy has a few ideas where they could be hiding it. But we don't know where it is for sure."

"It seems as though we have our work cut out for us then."

That was an understatement. I wasn't even quite sure what this 'Metal Gear' looked like, let alone how or where to find it. This wasn't really my area of expertise. Thankfully, we had some time to plan for that. Or so I thought anyway.

Before our training even began, everything began to turn down hill even faster. One seemingly calm and fairly uneventful night quickly turned into a blood bath. A night when a few of our best fighters had gone out on a raid of one of the smaller enemy bases in the area. I had gone with them. We knew not of the bloodshed at base until we returned.

When we saw what had happened, we were surprised that anyone was even still alive. Upon entering the first room, we all assumed that there were no survivors; that is how brutally we had been attacked. The first few rooms were covered in crimson and littered with the bodies of most of the people we had on base. Other rooms had been ransacked; every draw and file had been scattered on the floor. One of the most sickening parts was that half of them were small children; all with the same, terrified expression on their face. All is fair in love and war.

A few small bits of hope had been instilled though as we continued to search the rooms. A soldier hiding in a washing machine; a few small children huddled together behind some stairs. Those few surprises were enough to keep me looking and investigating what had happened there that night. I was the only one who even had the composer or will to go look in the guard tower to see if anyone remained alive up there.

We had two make shift watch towers each manned by two people at a time. They were both almost like another room built on top of the highest parts of the two big buildings that made up our base. One was on the north side of the base and the other was on the south side. Each consisted of a peaked roof and low walls on the outer edge with a railing running about a foot above that. That night we only had enough people to man the one tower though. Everyone else was needed for other guard duties or was out on the raid.

As I climbed to the top of the tower, my stomach tied itself in knots. Wolf had been on duty that night. I stopped climbing, my heart was racing. I wasn't sure if I could handle the sight that was most likely awaiting me at the top of the tower. At first glance, into the tower I felt as my heart stopped. There were two people in the tower. Both dead; the sniper was shot through the heart and the other was...stabbed in the back? After a moment I realized, only one body was one of ours. It hadn't registered with me at first; my brain had been too overwhelmed.

I quickly finished my climb up the ladder and through the hatch in the floor. Almost as soon as I had entered the tower, I was pinned to the railing with a knife across my throat being held in and arm bar. I just laughed. I was too glad to do anything else. My best friend was still alive.

"Wolf! It's alright it's me! Fox!" I shouted ecstatically. I really should have been sorrowful and distressed at the moment because of the bloodbath that had happened here but one of the few people that was important to me was still alive.

Surprised, Wolf quickly let me up and took her knife off of my throat.

"I thought you were all dead." She said as tears started to fill her eyes. Wolf had always been the most innocent and sensitive of all of us, this was no doubt just as traumatic to her as to the small children inside.

"Wolf… What happened here?"

"I-I don't know… Falcon and I were on watch. At first, e-everything seemed quiet…" then her voice dropped off and she started to sob.

"Wolf, calm down, please, I need to know what happened up here tonight." I said, placing my hands on her shoulders, trying to comfort her a bit. "Everyone who is coherent enough downstairs to talk says they had no warnings or anything. What happened?"

At that statement she seemed to brighten up a bit. The news that anyone was still alive looked like a surprise to her and after a moment, she started to speak once more.

"Everything seemed so quiet. Then one of the motion sensors to the south east tripped and Falcon was checking it out with his scope when he just collapsed and… I-i-I couldn't stop the bleeding. I tried to radio everyone in the base but no one responded… I th-thought they were all….they were all dead!"

"Well, they aren't. Not all of them anyway."

After a few more moment of discussion, we both climbed down and joined the others inside the base. We all checked the base a few more times before beginning a long and strenuous debriefing before planning our next move.

"Would all of you calm down!" I shouted over all of the chaos and disorder. Everyone was bickering and panicking over what had happenned.

"But Fox, they are going to kill us! All of us! What else are we supposed to do?" Seal's older brother, Jackal responded.

"Maybe we should just surrender…" Seal muttered under his breath. Then before I even knew what I was doing, I had smacked him so hard he had a handprint on his face for the next week. My face was burning red and his was no doubt stinging badly.

"Don't say that again. Look at how far we have come! And you would just give it all up that easily? Yes, we might die, but wouldn't you rather die fighting for something you believe in instead of living the rest of your life knowing you could have done something to change the future for the better but instead you just sat by and watched your world crumble and fall apart around you because you were too scared? If you want to leave and let your parents deaths go to waste, then you know where the door is. Otherwise, calm down and we'll figure this out. Panicking isn't going to solve anything." I said, half shouting; both out of anger and just trying to get over the noise in the room.

"Okay, so what do you propose we are going to do then, oh wise one?" started one of the snipers from the Apollo division, her code name if memory serves, was Lynx.

"Well, my great and mighty plan was to hide in the trees and throw pies and slushies at them until they surrender."

"Figures…" she muttered. Wolf just chuckled and I smirked.

"Okay, now if we are done sassing each other, I do actually have a few ideas of what we could do; although, I am still partial to the pies and slushies idea…"