by Project Itoh
“It predates the implementation of the System,” I explained. “By some miracle, it was never recycled. It’s getting tough these days, finding decent guns that aren’t ID-locked.”
Snake took the gun into his hand and inspected the weapon’s condition. He pulled back the slide, looked into the chamber, and checked the magazine’s spring.
“You coming?”
“Of course,” I said. “I’ll follow you wherever you go. The CID informants who said they saw Liquid here should be a little farther up. Head for the rendezvous point.”
“It’s a battlefield out there.”
“This Metal Gear has stealth camouflage. Like a wizard’s cloak of invisibility. I won’t attract any attention.”
“I’m jealous.”
“Jealous? Of what? The Metal Gear? Or me, back in Nomad?”
“Both.”
As Snake emerged from the rebel’s stronghold, a birdlike creature flew overhead. Snake quickly dove into the open doorway of a building, but his aged, weak lungs were already filled with sand from the desert storm. With some effort, he managed to force his mouth closed, stifling any cough that might have given away his position, but what he couldn’t conceal was the cold sweat that rolled down his bandanna.
“Are you all right?” I asked. The Middle Eastern climate wasn’t kind on his ailing body, and it pained me to watch Snake force himself through it.
But he didn’t acknowledge my concern. He only asked, “What was that thing?”
“A Slider. A PMC aerial weapon. Look, here comes another.”
One more flew directly overhead. The strange thing looked like a bird, only without a head or a tail, just wings. The Slider dove down and flew toward a distant building where the occasional burst of gunfire echoed. Then, as the creature shot back up into the sky, a giant explosion rocked the building, obliterating it.
“That,” I said, “was a cluster bomb. A precision bombing UAV.”
“And I thought I saw a rear-facing gun too. That’s not something I’d like to go up against.”
Snake swiftly scanned the room he’d ducked into. Through a shaft of light that cut through a skylight, motes of dust floated through the middle of the room. Aside from that, no other light cut through the dimness. But even in the darkness, this space was clearly unusual: parked directly in front of Snake was a Stryker armored personnel carrier.
Snake drew his Operator and cautiously approached the vehicle. An ice bucket packed with several cans of Narc Cola rested on the floor. Narc had been a subject of controversy a few years back because of its drug-related name.
But Snake was less interested in the bucket of sodas than what was beside it—an M4 carbine rifle. Even if he had made it unarmed into the center of the rebel stronghold, Snake felt insecure carrying only a single pistol. His own gun still readied, he approached the rifle and reached his other hand toward the larger gun.
Suddenly, Snake sensed a presence behind him. In one smooth, swift motion, he put both hands on his semiautomatic and turned to face the unknown presence.
A monkey.
Well, to be honest, neither Snake nor I was quite sure what the creature was. Don’t get me wrong, its body was technically that of a monkey—a gibbon, to be precise—but this monkey hadn’t a single strand of ape hair. A monkey without hair is like a human without clothes. I was struck by the (admittedly groundless) feeling that I was being affronted by some terribly shameful sight.
The monkey opened its mouth.
Then the voice came: “Pretty sweet, huh?”
Snake blinked, worried that senility had joined the host of other maladies old age had brought.
The hairless monkey grabbed an ice-cold can of Narc, pulled the tab, and started gulping the soda down. The scene was so surreal, Snake could do nothing but watch it. Then the voice spoke again.
“Whoa, hold it! I’d appreciate it if you didn’t point that thing at me.”
This time, Snake could perceive that the speaker wasn’t the monkey, but someone beyond it, in the darkness. He held his gun trained on the shadow of the APC, from which emerged an African man with short hair dyed white and teeth dyed even whiter. He wore a tailored suit coat and tan camouflage cargo pants, and dangled a white handkerchief in one hand—perhaps as a white flag of truce.
The hairless monkey belched.
“I’m neither enemy,” explained the man, smiling as he slowly walked toward Snake, “nor friend.”
He waved the handkerchief, and like some magic trick, he pulled away the cloth to reveal a grenade in his other hand.
Snake looked down the barrel of his gun at the man and said, “You’re not with the militia, and you’re not PMC …”
The man nodded. “I’m a weapons wholesaler.”
“ID guns won’t do me any good.”
Snake kept his pistol aimed at the stranger and his attention on the entire room.
The arms dealer wagged a finger at Snake. “No need to worry, ’cause all my shit’s been laundered.”
“Laundered?”
“You see, I take ID guns like the PMCs use and make some mods. Then you can use ’em without having to match IDs. In other words, I’m a gun launderer. You can call me Drebin.”
“Drebin?”
“Yeah, you know, Drebin. The Naked Gun? Leslie Nielsen? The comedian? Don’t tell me you’ve never seen it.”
Drebin placed the grenade on the floor and laid the handkerchief over it. Then he plucked the cloth back up, and the grenade was gone.
“All of us in the profession, all over the world, share the nickname. Not that I ever met any of ’em personally. Me, I’m Drebin number 893.”
Painted on Drebin’s APC was a stylized revolver cylinder and the words EYE HAVE YOU!
Drebin put away his handkerchief. “You ain’t a registered PMC employee, are ya? You need a guy like me.” He picked up the M4 from the ground and handed it to Snake. “Consider it a welcome gift.”
Snake didn’t trust the man yet, but he took the M4 and ran through a basic weapon check. With everything in working order, he slapped in a full magazine, aimed out a window, and squeezed the trigger.
“I can’t pull the trigger.”
“Really?”
Snake displayed the trigger, completely locked. It wouldn’t budge.
“Wait,” said Drebin, “I got it. I bet you’re using an older generation of nanomachines. Sometimes they don’t really jibe with the new System.”
“Who are you?”
“My day job’s working at ArmsTech Security. I’m in charge of production control—so I get my hands on the ID chips before they’re even registered. It’s a side of AT the public don’t see.” Drebin gave Snake and his muscle suit a once-over. “From the looks of it, you ain’t with any state army. But you ain’t exactly green, neither. You’ve got last-gen nanomachines. So I’m guessing … former US Army?”
Snake eyed the man suspiciously. Drebin said he was an arms dealer, but was that the real story? What if he worked for Liquid? Or the Patriots?
Drebin must have sensed Snake’s doubts, and he stopped probing. “Let’s talk business.”
“Business?”
“I make my living off the war economy. I’m green collar—green like an army uniform, green like a tank. The only thing that separates me from bein’ white collar or blue collar is that I earn my keep on the battlefield. The only thing I trust is money. So if you’ve got money, I can help you out. We’ll keep it strictly business.”
“What do you get out of it?”
“This,” said Drebin with a theatrical gesture, “is a war zone. There’s product coming in here by the truckload. Whatever guns you find and don’t need, I’ll take and buy ’em off ya. That’ll earn you points you can cash in for services.”
“Like what?”
“I’ll launder your ID guns—no more locks. And I can also sell you the guns I’ve got in stock. Let me show you …”
Drebin waved Snake over to the rear of the APC. The hatc
h was open, revealing racks upon racks of weaponry stored on the interior walls of the vehicle. Drebin climbed inside and soon reappeared with a medical transport cooler.
“To ensure you can use non-ID guns, I’m gonna have to suppress the old nanomachines you’ve got in ya. Otherwise, they’ll interfere with the System.”
He took a plastic pouch from the cooler and tore off the top. Inside was a syringe.
“Here. Let me stick you with this. It’s full of suppressor nanomachines.”
Snake drew back. No matter how reasonable he sounded, this man was a stranger—worse, he was a stranger on a battlefield.
“Relax, it won’t hurt.”
“The pain isn’t what I’m concerned about.”
“What, you don’t like shots?”
Snake laughed. As bad an idea as this sounded, he wouldn’t be able to get very far with only the Operator. He acquiesced and held his neck out.
Drebin injected the needle into Snake’s neck. The pain was intense, and the old soldier couldn’t stifle his cry.
“See?” Drebin said. “No sweat. Now you can use non-ID guns, no problem.”
Snake rubbed at the base of his neck, then took the M4 back into his hands. He aimed at the wall and squeezed the trigger. The muzzle flashed and the bullet lodged into the concrete.
“There, ya see? You name it, I can launder it. Well, I’d better be on my way.”
Drebin started packing everything back into the APC. The monkey downed the last of his soda and let out a deep belch.
Drebin shook his head. “Man, he’s gotta give that shit a rest.”
“Looks like you’re doing pretty well for yourself.”
“And why do you think that is? System codes are the law now, and control’s essentially absolute—paving the way for fat profits, if you’re willing to bend the law. Demand keeps on growing thanks to the war economy. I sell ID guns to the PMCs and state armies, and naked guns to terrorist groups and paramilitaries. And these ID guns can’t be sold on the black market. The System’s practically a license for us arms dealers to print money.”
He returned the ice bucket to his vehicle, saying, “Privatizing the military’s made the PMCs big and bloated. And the fatter the PMCs get, the blurrier the line between civilian and soldier is gonna get. Sooner or later, the whole damn human race is gonna be green collar. More like, we’re all gonna be fighting proxy wars. But hey, this war economy puts the food on my table.”
Drebin closed the hatch from the inside, then stuck his head out the driver’s side window. “You’re green collar too, ain’t ya?” He returned Snake’s cold stare with a genial grin. “It’s in your eyes. You’ve seen a lot of combat.”
“What makes you think you know me?”
“Nothing to be ashamed of. I’m the same way. I grew up here too. I got no interest in the outside world.”
The APC’s engine started, and Drebin spoke over the noise. As he pointed first to his own eyes, then at Snake’s, he said, “Eye. Have. You.”
The vehicle sped out of the room and out of Snake’s sight.
3
THE CID RENDEZVOUS point was located in a building on the outskirts of the city.
Removed from the area of the fiercest fighting, the location made a suitable meeting place. Not because the building wouldn’t draw much attention—as the city fell into ruin, few structures stood out anymore, not even the ones in the city’s center—but because the constant threat of cluster bombings within the city proper tended to put a damper on long conversations.
Drebin’s M4 at the ready, Snake stepped inside.
Sunlight filtered through the cloth roof of the courtyard at the core of the five-story building. Any traces of life had long since gone.
I told Snake that the meeting point was on the top floor, and he started up a staircase decorated with colorful arabesque tilework.
Snake climbed one flight of steps. Then another.
He gritted his teeth, and I knew his ankles, his knees, his hips, all of his joints were crying out in agony. Snake was beset by old age and all its maladies—including osteoarthritis, arteriosclerosis, aortic stenosis, and a slowed healing process.
Normally, a person has decades to adjust to the gradual deterioration of the human body with age. Snake had to confront it over a period of years.
By the time he reached the last flight of stairs, he was breathing heavily. Muscle suit or no muscle suit, five flights of stairs were no easy feat for the body of a seventy-year-old.
I suggested he take a break, but he ignored me. With great effort, he made it to the top and exited to the roof. I bit my lip. Snake was fighting a battle between his body and the world, and there was nothing I could do to help him.
Once out in the open air, we saw that this was only half the roof—another partial floor occupied the remaining space. Taking care to walk silently on the balls of his feet, Snake stepped inside and into a room littered with empty bottles of liquor, formerly a bar. Snake passed through and saw his destination.
His rifle trained in front of him, Snake carefully pushed open the door to the room. Thankfully, the hinges were mostly free of rust, and no squeak broke the quiet. Through the crack in the doorway, Snake peered into the room. It seemed empty.
Just as he set foot inside, Snake sensed someone behind him and turned.
From behind the doorway stepped a soldier, armed and with his gun pointed at Snake’s head.
“Drop your weapon!”
The soldier’s voice sounded young.
Snake glimpsed the man’s weapon out of the corner of his eye. It was trembling.
He was reminded of an incident on Shadow Moses. It was just like when Snake had first met Meryl. She resisted alone against the rebel FOXHOUND unit—maybe she was trying to live up to the memory of the man she believed to be her father, the Gulf War hero. When she saw Snake, she didn’t know if he were friend or foe, and she’d held a trembling FAMAS at his head just like this man was doing now.
Snake dropped his Operator, raised his hands, and turned to face the soldier.
“Don’t move!”
The man’s voice was as shaky as his gun. Snake couldn’t help but grin—this really was just like before.
“You haven’t even taken the safety off, rookie.”
“Careful, I’m no rookie! I’m a ten-year vet!”
Snake deliberately flicked his eyes to the safety on the soldier’s XM8.
Lacking the confidence to see through Snake’s bluff, the young man nervously glanced at the side of his rifle. The safety was off, but he didn’t have time to bask in satisfaction. By then, the veteran Snake had already made the young man pay the price for letting his guard down.
Snake grabbed the XM8 and yanked the rifle forward. The young soldier lost balance, and Snake connected his elbow to the man’s face. He hooked his leg around that of the soldier and, still gripping the rifle, sent him flying to the ground.
CQC—short for close quarters combat—was the hand-to-hand fighting style developed during the Cold War by The Boss and her disciple, Naked Snake, aka Big Boss. Snake had mastered it.
Not one second after he had dropped his guard, the soldier was staring up the barrel of his own rifle.
This was a ten-year veteran? How the hell had he ever survived that long?
“Don’t move!”
Now another gun was at Snake’s head.
Snake’s eyes moved up the ridiculously large barrel of the gun to find, with no great surprise, a Desert Eagle. The weapon was tremendously powerful for a handgun, but if a weaker female attempted to fire it one-handed, the recoil would probably snap the bones in her wrist.
But the voice that now spoke to him was definitely that of a woman.
“CQC … a real Big Boss, huh?”
Snake kept the XM8 pointed at the soldier on the ground as he eyed the woman with the Desert Eagle. She wore a balaclava, which hid all of her face except for her eyes.
“Lower your weapon!” she ordered. �
��Slowly now. I wouldn’t try anything funny if I were you.”
Snake noticed that there was more pointed at him than this woman’s peculiar choice of a firearm. Two laser dots held steady on his chest.
Judging from the gear worn by the woman and the younger soldier, the two were likely with the CID special ops unit. No matter where the battlefield, Americans stood out. Then Snake noticed the emblem sewn onto the woman’s combat chest harness.
A sharp-eyed fox holding a combat knife in its mouth.
“FOXHOUND?” Snake said.
The woman’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, but soon a look of surprise washed over her.
“Snake?”
She lowered her weapon and pulled off her mask, revealing a familiar face. She had grown up since Shadow Moses, and no youthfulness remained in her appearance. Only her chic hairstyle was unchanged.
Meryl Silverburgh.
Colonel Campbell’s so-called niece who had fought alongside Snake on Shadow Moses Island.
“It’s been four days,” Meryl said, “since Liquid arrived in the area.”
She handed Snake a photograph. He squinted and moved the glossy paper closer and farther from his eyes, trying to find the sweet spot where the photo wouldn’t be blurry. Meryl looked away.
I wasn’t surprised she hadn’t recognized him at first—the aging had been so fast and severe, he looked like a different person than he had only years before.
When he told her about the disease, she couldn’t hide her shock. Since she was little, she’d fondly listened to stories of the legendary man, and when she’d met him on Shadow Moses, her feelings toward him grew. Now, seeing the unthinkable transformation of the man she’d once fallen for, she seemed truly disturbed.
Though Snake could understand her feelings, he also knew there was nothing he could do about them. What surprised him most was that beyond the initial and short-lived shock, she was handling the news so well. She seemed unnaturally calm.
The picture was of a man once known as Revolver Ocelot.
An agent of the Patriots and a former FOXHOUND member, Ocelot had lost his right arm on Shadow Moses and had the limb replaced with one belonging to the fallen Liquid—some even thought that Liquid’s personality had taken over through the transplanted arm.
