Ponizovje South
Mission Time: Day 2
1258 Hours
He went on for about half an hour. The sound of the water continued to swell until it seemed to surround him, like being in a massive stormcloud just before the thunderclap began. Snake felt his way around a corner, one hand trailing over damp rock, and suddenly water was running over his boots. The current was shallow and fast.
I think I've found the aqueduct.
He rounded the corner. The water foamed around his ankles, then it was up to his knees, and then it was sloshing around his thighs. The thunder of the water had deepened to a steady roar. The tunnel he was in was quaking steadily. For awhile Snake thought he wasn't going to be able to struggle against the current, but then he saw a huge jet of water breaking away from the main sluice into another cavern. And as he struggled forward, he reached the mouth of the cave.
The water was waist-high here, a river sliding listlessly between two parallel rows of mangrove trees that curled up at the top, so that it was almost creating an extension of the cave Snake had just left. He started to wade forward, following the sluggish current.
A bird cried from the far side of the river. It echoed, re-echoed . . . and then Snake heard it. A low whirring sound from somewhere up ahead. Mechanical.
He saw it as it crested over the top of the mangroves—or more precisely, he saw the light. A huge white eye of light glaring balefully down at the river, sweeping from one bank to the other slowly and mercilessly. A spotlight. Snake lurched to one bank, crouching against one of the mangroves. The spotlight was fixed to the bottom of a saucer-shaped craft about five feet wide, with a large ducted fan spinning rapidly underneath. There were also two boxy protrusions on either side of the craft, which were (he realized) the source of all the whirring. Each sounded like a miniature jet engine. There was a pilot manning it.
A flying fucking saucer, Snake thought with bitter wonder. And then he realized, No, not quite. More like a platform. Some kind of—
He keyed up his codec. "Sigint," Snake whispered. "You're not gonna believe what I'm seeing right now."
"What is it, Snake?"
"There are flying platforms out here."
"Is that all?"
Snake was bewildered. "Is that all?"
"It just sounds like a type of personal VTOL aircraft," Sigint said. "You know they were working on those in America, right?"
Snake scratched his head. "I'd heard stories, sure, but . . ."
"Yeah, back in the fifties. They were supposedly going to be used for scouting and patrol missions, as well as to spot for artillery units and transport troops into rough territory. They even got an initial prototype off the ground in 1955."
"No shit?"
"No shit. But the thing wasn't fast enough,and there were problems with getting it to stop and turn in midair. So they ended up scrapping the project."
"Well, someone looks to have continued it," Snake muttered, glancing back in the direction of the man hovering over the treeline.
"I bet the ones you see there were built by the Soviets after they got their hands on the American design plans," Sigint said. "The American model used a pair of contra-rotating motors to generate lift. But I'd think the Soviets would use jet engines on their models instead. They must have kept going with their research after the U.S. abandoned its own project. Now they've finally overtaken us. You gotta give them credit for sticking with it."
"Yeah," Snake said dryly. "I'll give 'em a gold star before they shoot me."
"Are the platforms armed themselves?"
Snake squinted, trying to make out any armaments on the craft. There didn't seem to be any affixed on the platform, but the pilot did have a Scorpion submachine gun tucked in the crook of his arm.
Sigint whistled when he heard Snake's report. "The recoil on that weapon is low enough so they should be able to fire one-handed in full-auto mode. That gives them some serious firepower."
"Great."
"You think you can shoot them down, Snake?"
Snake studied the contraption as it skated over the mangrove trees. "The armor plating looks pretty thick," he observed. "Doubt anything I've got handy could make a dent in it."
"Then you'd have to gun for the pilot."
"But don't try for it if you can help it," Zero broke in. "Remember, Snake: infiltration may not be paramount, but if you can avoid conflict, best to go the safe route."
"Roger that."
Snake switched off the codec and raised his Colt. The platform whirred, swerved, started back up the way it came. The spotlight dragged along the river.
He skirted along the edge of the river, mindful to stay in the shrouded shadow of the mangroves. He kept his eyes on the spotlight as it raked the river, saw the shimmering flashes of fish darting to escape its blinding presence. When the edge of the light came within a yard of Snake, he pressed his back against the bole of a mangrove and froze. He remained there, eyes fixed forward, until the large white eye continued inching down the river.
Once it had passed, he continued creeping upriver, constantly glancing back at the platform. The pilot had his back to him now as he continued operating its console, swiveling the spotlight to and fro. Snake wondered if he should chance a pistol shot, but decided that Zero was right. Stealth was the best policy.
Snake slogged onward, noticing the sky had started to take on a smoky, overcast quality. A breeze began to stir through the mangroves, rustling the vaulted branches overhead. A storm was brewing.
He'd traveled maybe a mile up the river before the rain started to fall, but before it did, he saw the warehouse. It was on the edge of where the river pooled into a small reservoir. A wooden pier jutted out into the water, and even from here, Snake could see armed guards posted there. Snake wondered if they were on alert for him. EVA would know.
He stepped back into the shadows of the mangroves as the first droplets of rain pattered on his shoulders, and he keyed the codec. "EVA?"
No response.
"EVA, are you there?"
Nothing but silence. Snake's brow furrowed as he puzzled through the possibilities. He keyed it up again. "Major? EVA isn't responding to the radio."
"Right," Zero chimed in.
"Right?"
"Snake," the major said patiently, "she's been talking to you from inside an enemy facility. She's not always going to be able to answer the radio. Don't assume something's wrong just because you aren't getting a response. Don't worry about EVA. Stay focused on your mission."
"Right," Snake muttered.
He was about to move closer when something caught his eye. He froze, reaching for the binoculars he'd tucked in one of his pockets. He brought them up and put them to his eyes.
A figure was scrambling out of the warehouse onto the concrete loading bay. From the momentum and the fact that he was off-balance, Snake reckoned he'd been shoved. The man was wearing a crumbled white lab coat and his glasses were askew on his thin face, but Snake recognized Sokolov immediately.
"Get your hands off me!" Sokolov grunted. "I'm not going anywhere!"
A hulking figure was standing over him on the dock. Snake had only seen him once before, but it had only been nine days since he had, and even then, he would never forget that massive figure with the grotesque scars on his face.
It was Volgin.
Volgin had someone else in tow: a mousy young woman in a beige uniform. She looked less like a soldier and more like a secretary or a librarian. Snake could see that the girl looked absolutely terrified to be in the presence of the monstrous GRU colonel.
Volgin shook his head. "Really now," he said. "How many times must I tell you?"
He placed a slab-like hand on the young woman's shoulder, nearly cupping her entire upper arm in one palm. Suddenly, a blue-white flash burst from the man's gloved hand, and the woman shrieked with pain and pitched forward, staggering down the steps.
"Tanya!" Sokolov stared in horror as Volgin walked down the steps after her. The woman was groaning, clutching her wounded shoulder.
"Each time you resist," Volgin said to Sokolov, "your lover will suffer the consequences. Do you understand?"
"Volgin . . ." The scientist started forward, balling his fists as he did so. The guard shoved him back with the butt of his rifle. He doubled over with pain, then looked at Volgin with unadulterated hate. "Goddamn you."
Volgin bared his teeth in a sadistic snarl. He picked up the girl again, and blasted her with another blue bolt of electricity. Tanya screamed soundlessly, and dropped to the concrete in a moaning ball of pain. Another one of the Spetsnaz guards seized Sokolov by the arm and shoved him toward the warehouse.
"Hold it right there, traitor!"
Sokolov jerked his head at the voice. He and the guard looked at the man who had spoken. He was leaning against the cement-block wall, twirling one of his revolvers lazily.
Ocelot walked over, still twirling the gun at his hip, as he circled Sokolov. The guard holding the scientist let him go. The scientist never took his eyes off the young man with the killer's eyes and the killer's gun.
When he'd completed his circuit, Ocelot stopped twirling the gun. He held up his other hand. Between two fingers, he held a gleaming .45 round.
"Let's find out just how lucky you are," he said. "Watch closely."
He snapped open the revolver with the other hand, and demonstrated the empty chamber. He slipped the round in one of the six bores, then snapped it shut. He then took two other revolvers from his waist, and held them up as well. Both were empty.
"You saw me put a single bullet in one gun," he said. "I'm going to pull the trigger six times in a row. Are you ready?"
The scientist's face went pale. He looked wildly at Volgin, who was only watching with mild amusement. He looked back at the major, who had a determined look on his face. "Oh God . . ."
Ocelot tossed one of the pistols in the air. As he did, he switched one of the other guns to his other hand, and then tossed that into the air as well. He caught the first gun and repeated the process, juggling the three pistols in the air, pointing them at Sokolov's chest as he caught them. His hands were a blur, incredibly dextrous, and yet Ocelot seemed almost nonchalant about—
CLICK!
Sokolov cringed at the loud dry snap of the empty chamber. Ocelot stepped closer, his hard gaze never faltering, his hands dancing in the air as the guns did their deadly trick.
CLICK!
Another dry crack. Sokolov moaned. Ocelot advanced.
CLICK!
Sokolov squealed in fear and fell to the hard concrete. He scurried on his ass, holding his hands up in front of his face.
CLICK!
Ocelot's hands spun the guns faster, catching them deftly, twirling them, tossing them. His eyes never left the pathetic little bald man with the spectacles.
CLICK!
Sokolov screamed at the last one, and then his face flushed as a large stain spread in the front of his trousers.
Ocelot's thin-lipped smile turned into a sneer. "Maybe your luck hasn't run out yet," he told the scientist. "But let's see . . ."
His finger tightened—but there was no trigger to pull.
He hadn't even heard The Boss come up behind him, hadn't felt the hard grip on his right wrist, hadn't felt the gun being plucked from his hand as he had caught it, and it wasn't until The Boss pulled the trigger and the revolver sounded off that he even realized what had happened. The shot echoed and re-echoed, sounding strangely hollow in the culvert the warehouse had created on the shore of the lake. The bullet had blown a hole in one of the empty oil-drums stacked on the wharf, knocking it into the water where it bobbed like a cork.
Ocelot turned, and saw The Boss standing there, his gun in her hand. He tried to say something, but couldn't make his jaw work.
The Boss glared hard at the young GRU major. "There's no such thing as luck on the battlefield."
Volgin grinned. It gave him heart, seeing the ambitious Ocelot being put in his place. It also made him secretly glad that he was not the object of The Boss's rage. He would never have admitted being afraid of anyone, certainly not a woman . . . but this one was different. It made him anxious, but Volgin never let any emotion betray him. Besides, why fret? The Boss was on his side.
He snapped his fingers, and two of the Spetsnaz guards hurried over. They scooped up the sobbing Sokolov and dragged him into the warehouse, babbling and moaning with his pants full of piss.
The Boss was still glaring at Ocelot, her eyes like hard chips of ice. "You'd better stay in line from now on," she said evenly. "The Cobras will take care of him."
She thrust the pistol she'd snatched from Ocelot back into the young man's chest. He grunted, and held it up . . . and saw the firing mechanism and the barrel had been removed. He stared at the useless hunk of metal and wood numbly. The Boss had dismantled the gun, faster than he ever would have believed! Seething, he stormed off toward the warehouse.
The Boss watched the angry young man go. Volgin reached in his pocket and picked up a handful of rifle shells, tucking them between his fingers. "Has the CIA dog been disposed of yet?"
The Boss's gaze softened, and she lowered her eyes mournfully. "The Pain is dead."
"What?" Volgin's reaction was one of towering rage. One massive gloved fist sparked alight and he slammed it into the nearby wall, gouging a crater in the cinderblock surface. He roared and punched it again, burying his arm to the elbow in the hole. He stepped back, his rage cooling, but the heavy aroma of ionization hung around him like a cloud. "He may be a child, but he's definitely one of yours."
He flexed his fingers, and several brass cartridges clattered to the floor. He'd wedged them between his knuckles, and they lay on the ground smoking, having been discharged when Volgin had punched the wall, sparked by the electric field the giant Russian generated.
"I fear Khrushchev may have a hand in this," Volgin said, turning back to The Boss. "We have no time to lose. You must eliminate him before the final test."
The Boss looked at him, her steely gaze hardening once more. "Don't worry," she said, and she turned to the warehouse door. "They'll be able to handle it."
Volgin followed her gaze, and saw something rolling out of the doorway. Through his binoculars, Snake saw an ancient man, small and withered, tucked in a wheelchair. He was wearing a sniper's ghillie suit, had a rifle laid across his lap, and his bald skull was stained with liver spots. He had a huge shock of white beard that reached down to his chest as his bony chin rested there. He was asleep.
The old man's wheelchair was seeming to move of its own accord, and as Snake watched, it stopped just short of Volgin and The Boss. Snake couldn't be sure, but he thought he saw something from behind the chair. A shimmer, like moonlight through water.
The Boss looked at the shimmer. "I'm leaving him to you, The Fear."
Suddenly, the shimmer seemed to waver, and then Snake saw a scrawny man in camo fatigues materialize behind the old man's wheelchair. He was pale and hatchet-faced, his mouth split in a wide grin that reminded Snake of a shark's smile. His teeth were filed points. His fingers were honed to razor edges, like claws. His spindly body reminded Snake of a spider, but it was the man's eyes that fixated him. His eyes were yellow, feral somehow, like a wild cat's.
The Fear bowed deferentially to The Boss. Then, with a loud animalistic whoop, he sprang in the air—and Snake lost sight of him in the darkness. He thought he saw a streak of silver across the water, but that was insane. No man was that fast . . . but then, he would never have expected a man to be able to control hornets at will, or another to generate enough electricity from his own body to kill ten men.
Volgin himself was still secretly awed by the skills the Cobras possessed. Had he been an older man, perhaps he would have found a place among their ranks; certainly, that would have been an option. And why not, with his talents?
Still, The Pain's death unnerved him even more than it had angered him. He had faith that the spider-like assassin with his stealth suit would finish the job of killing the man tracking them, but even so, in the back of his mind he worried. What if The Fear failed, as The Pain had? Perhaps the Cobras were not as invulnerable as he had thought.
Volgin looked at the old man in the wheelchair, who still snored weakly. He stood staring at him for a moment, this strange time-traveller from the year 1860 or so, who remembered when there were no cars, no electric lights, no nuclear weapons, no Soviet Union. It was hard to believe that he was capable of anything more than snoozing. He looked like he belonged in a hospital rather than the battlefield. Or in the grave.
"The old man is always sleeping," he commented. "Is he all right?"
The Boss looked at him curtly. "The End is saving what life he has left in him for battle. Normally, he's dead. But he'll wake up when the time is right. And when he does," she added, "it will be the end for the boy."
Above them, the pregnant clouds finally erupted, and rain began to come down hard, hammering the corrugated roof of the warehouse. Volgin stood there, turning his gaze away from the old man to the young thing cowering on the ground near the dock. Tanya looked up at him, her eyes filled with fear behind her spectacles. Volgin lumbered toward her, taking pleasure that each step sent a jolt of horror in the girl's body.
"Sokolov isn't worth your love," the giant grunted. His scarred face broke into a demonic grin, which never bode well for anyone on the receiving end of it. He bent down and took her forearm in one huge hand, lifting her to her feet. "You can entertain me until the rain stops."
He led her away, muttering as they made their way inside the warehouse.
"Kuwabara . . . Kuwabara . . ."
The Boss looked up, her gray eyes filling with rain. All of a sudden, she felt cold. But it was a familiar cold, a comforting cold. There was also a presence there with her, in that curtain of rain. She sensed . . . him.
"The Sorrow?" she whispered. "Is that you?"
She felt a familiar tickling on the nape of her neck, and she whirled around, out of fear or relief, some emotion she was not quite sure of. But there was no one there.
Just the rain.
Snake watched The Boss suddenly whirl around in the rain, and he instinctively stiffened—but she wasn't looking in his direction. Even through the binoculars, he could see that her cold flint-like stare had softened for the briefest of instances. He had not seen her like that before, and it puzzled him.
The Boss stood there in the rain for a moment, and then she walked over to the old man in the wheelchair. She took the handles and started wheeling him towards the warehouse after the others. As she did, a trio of guards poured out of the alcoves and took positions on the docks over the lake. Snake watched The Boss until she and the old man disappeared in the warehouse.
Snake stowed his binoculars and keyed up his codec. "Major," he radioed. "Sokolov's been hauled off."
"They probably caught him trying to escape from the lab," Zero mused. "Didn't Volgin say they still needed to perform the final test?"
"Yeah."
"Then Sokolov must have been taken back to the lab." Zero's voice took on a dangerous pitch. "You need to get to the lab and get Sokolov the hell out of there."
"That warehouse is located south of the lab," Para-Medic chirped. "Make your way through it. Keep an eye out for sentries."
Yes, mother, Snake thought sardonically. He gauged the distance between his current position and the dock. There was no way he could get on shore without swimming there. He took a deep breath and pushed himself into the reservoir.
The water was deeper here. Twenty feet, at least. Despite trying to focus on the task at hand, his mind kept drifting back to what he'd just seen. The events had played out so bizarrely. And now another Cobra had been dispatched to take him out. But the one they'd called The Fear hadn't known he was so close, and had instead disappeared into another direction completely. Still, he'd have to keep his eyes peeled for him.
But if I can get to Sokolov, maybe I won't have to deal with him at all, he thought, interrupting his steady, gentle strokes to tread water so that he could scan the shore around him. He didn't see any more guards other than the three left manning the pier. No flying platforms.
Still, he couldn't help but feel he was being watched.
Stroke after stroke after stroke.
Snake was feeling the effort in the muscles now, but as he closed in on the pier, Snake felt confident that he could take these three guards by surprise. They were lax, hunched in the brisk chill the rain had brought. They didn't see the sleek shadow pass to their left, didn't see the CIA agent reach the shadow of the platform and pull himself up to the metal runs alongside the fat wooden leg of the dock. They didn't see him grasp the rungs and pull himself up, and only one of them heard his bootheels hit the wood and was turning around when Snake plugged him in the head. The guard pitched to the side wordlessly, and both of his compatriots were grabbing for their weapons when two more shots added them to Snake's count.
Snake lowered the Colt, looking about anxiously, expecting to hear gunfire ring out. But there was only silence. The sultry breeze brushed his soaking clothes. One of the guards had dropped his submachine gun on the dock. He bent down and scooped it up. There was a full magazine. Poor son-of-a-bitch.
Unable to believe that his infiltration had gone so smoothly, he moved swiftly but silently toward the warehouse.