#tarisbackyard

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"Stay alert. He'll be through here, I know it."

The voice—brassy, and with an English accent—echoed through the cavernous room, the subaquatic cave-cum-submarine dock that served as the covert delivery point for the nuclear disposal facility on Alaska's Shadow Moses Island.

"I'm going to swat down a couple of bothersome flies." Klaxons buzzed and alert lights began to rotate, casting a red glare across the room in flashing oscillations as the owner of the voice, Liquid Snake, a man with long blonde hair and a heavy brown longcoat, set the dock's freight elevator to motion, rising out of the cave to the surface.

Climbing out of the freezing ocean, Solid Snake slipped behind a crate at the water's edge and called in on the codec radio implanted into his ear.

"This is Snake. Colonel, can you hear me?"

The throaty voice of Roy Campbell, the operation's commander, hummed in Snake's ear. "Loud and clear. What's the situation, Snake?"

"Looks like the elevator in the back is the only way up."

"Just as I expected. You'll have to take the elevator to the surface."

"Got it. Okay, I'm ready to go." Snake closed the channel and shed his diving gear, then set to work.

Thankfully, there were only two soldiers patrolling the dock, the small space not requiring much in the way of manpower, even on alert for infiltrators as they were. The sightlines, however, were another matter. The dock was stacked with crates and machinery, filling the room with blind spots. Snake took advantage, though with each footfall in the echoey chamber, it made him wince inwardly. Every step felt as loud as an explosion to his adrenaline-heightened senses, and he felt like every time his boot touched stone, he would be made instantly.

The guards tended to keep a route on their rotation, trying their best to cover for one another's blind spots amid the mess of the dock, and in the end it was a simple matter for Snake to make it past them to the elevator.

The sudden buzz of klaxons and flashing of lights nearly scared him out of his skin. He cast about quickly, tucking himself behind a forklift that sat near the elevator as its platform descended, another soldier—dressed in white, arctic camouflage and carrying a rifle like the others—riding it to the bottom. When it came to a halt and the soldier walked out, Snake slipped behind, reactivating the thing before its noisy, flashy alerts had time to stop. The soldier turned around after a long moment to see the platform already passing the top of the entrance, and sagged. He whipped out his radio.

"Dock to HQ, Dock to HQ. We have an intruder on the freight elevator heading to surface. Over."

Liquid's voice crackled to life on the other end. "HQ to Dock, roger that. Seems we were right on the money. All patrols stay on guard; it's showtime. Things are about to get interesting. Over and out."

*

"Boss, do you really think the extra muscle was necessary?" Ocelot asked, frowning as he watched crates stamped with the brand name Mann Co being opened, weaponry and equipment being unloaded from them and disseminated through a team of mercenaries from Reliable Excavation and Demolition gathered at ground level of the repair hangar, the near-finalized Metal Gear REX towering over them to little acknowledgment from the group.

Well, most of the group.

The one in brown overalls wearing goggles was looking REX over like an auto mechanic checking out a particularly cherry hotrod.

"Normally? No, not even slightly. Especially with this group of loose cannons," Liquid hummed, crossing his arms over his chest. "But discovering that cache of Australium's thrown a severe wrench into our plans. Were it not for that, we'd be able to carry on with our plan as initially intended. Nuclear arms and treaty-defying prototype superweapons are quite well enough, but stockpiling a transformative element like Australium here makes this facility even more precious to the US than we could have imagined."

"You think they'll show force?" Ocelot asked, lifting an eyebrow, turning to regard his commander.

"No. I still don't think they want to risk the information getting out. They sent him. He's their gambit."

Ocelot swept an arm out to the group of mercenaries clad in red uniforms, chattering excitedly and double-checking their equipment. "So why the extra firepower?"

"In case the Old Woman knows what we've stumbled onto, too."

"The Old Woman? How would she even know?"

"She has eyes and ears everywhere, Ocelot. There's not a mercenary, soldier, or government on this planet that doesn't get nervous at the mere thought of that skeletal old battleaxe. Congress has backed down before trying to hold her accountable. Which means she holds enough cards and has her hands in enough pockets to operate with impunity." Liquid let out a heavy breath, watching as the mercenaries immediately set to bickering and horseplay, while their field medic cooed sweet nothings to a dove sitting on his finger. "Where there's Australium, there's her."

"So you hired one of the Mann brothers' teams of mercenaries? Isn't she all over that war? Some people say she's orchestrated the whole thing."

"Who better than someone experienced in dealing with her, then?" Liquid joked.

"Well I'll be," the mercenary in overalls—Engineer—marveled, ambling over them with his eyes were locked on REX the whole time. "This here's a Metal Gear, ain't it?" he gestured to the eponymous walking weapons platform. "Clever thing; hidin' development o' this beaut way out here."

Liquid's brow furrowed at the immediate familiarity with which the man spoke, and how casual he was, looking up at something as simultaneously majestic and terrifying as the walking international treaty violation before them. "You're familiar?"

"Shoot, sure am. Y'know I was followin' Dr. Madnar's Powered Gear work pretty close back when he was first developin' it? Took a bit o' doin' gettin' that kinda intel across the iron curtain, but robotics developers have a way o' bein' chattier than a bunch o' hens 'bout that sort o' thing, even if it runs counter to our own good. Never got to work with the feller, sadly. I'm sure you know; that whole Outer Heaven thing when he tried to defect, and all the fallout from that. Shame, too. He was a genius when it came to replicatin' humanoid upright locomotion in robotics and weapons dev. Coulda revolutionized a few fields if he played ball a little better and weren't so keen on drinkin' Big Boss' brand o' Flavor-Aid and endin' up in Zanzibar Land. Shame to lose a mind that brilliant."

Liquid's concern quickly settled into a frown, unsure whether to be offended or appreciative of the way the man spoke of Big Boss, let alone how much he seemed to know intimately. "Mister—"

"Doctor," Engineer corrected, immediately clocking the taller man's unease. He very obviously didn't know who he was talking to, and while he wasn't keen to bandy about his family's name so cavalierly, he was intent on proving his bona fides. "Dr. Dell Conagher," he rejoined, offering a hand to shake.

Pursing his lips for a moment, Liquid accepted the handshake, impressed with the pressure the man applied, and how very clear by his amiable expression and the barest twitch of his forearm it was that he was barely trying to apply any. It was a very clear display of power, and he couldn't help but respect it. "Dr. Conagher. I do know that name. Forgive me for not realizing to whom I am speaking," he replied generously, clearly to placate the man.

"Thought I should make it clear I ain't just yankin' yer chain here," he replied simply, thankful his shadowed goggles hid the roll of his eyes. "And that I got a reason to be impressed there's a Metal Gear here at all, what with how the fella championin' the design got hisself offed six years ago."

"I see," Liquid hummed, turning his gaze back to REX. "The project's had a new lead. Passionate fellow."

"But you ain't gonna tell me his name," Engineer chuckled.

Liquid shrugged one shoulder. They were going to be on site, it was worth the REDs knowing who is and isn't expendable. "I will, actually. A Dr. Emmerich. While his work on REX should be finished, do make an effort not to harm him unless necessary. He's a very useful bargaining chip for us in making our demands."

"Emmerich, huh? Well I know Huey Emmerich drowned some years back, so I'm guessin' it's one o' his kids? Can't be Emma, she's still in school. Hal, then?"

"You know them?"

"While most o' my patents are in artificial intelligence for weaponry, I got a handful in biomechanical engineerin' and the like. Plus, I've got quite a few papers o' my own published in the field o' cybernetics. You don't get to be a big wheel down at the cracker factory when it comes to combinin' meat 'n machines without gettin' to know Huey Emmerich. Or, you didn't, at least. I'd say that's a shame too but, well, I met the feller, bless his heart."

All of that finally had Liquid's full attention. "I must say I'm a bit surprised I've never seen your name come up in all of this, Dr. Conagher."

"Me? Shoot, naw. Bipedal weapons development's interestin' 'n all, but it's also pretty lavish, if you ask me. Big budgets for big machines for fightin' big wars. Weren't never the Conagher style. We tend to develop on the up close 'n personal. Sentry guns, teleporters, dispensers. Stuff you set up quick, take down quick, and move on up as the fight moves. I do work with replacement limbs, too. While the folks in control rooms got their fingers on the button, there's still fellers on the ground that gotta have their fingers on the trigger. All in all, if I'm gonna be involved in a war crime I'd rather it be automated gunfire, not automated deletion of entire cities."

"Admirable," Liquid hummed, earnestly. It was nice to meet a weapons developer who actually walked his talk.

"That, said, y'ever think about spreadin' out the sensor array on this baby instead o' keepin' it all contained to a single radar dish, though?" Engineer added, gesturing broadly to REX. "Seems like a pretty glarin' design oversight. I could probably whip up a decentralized—"

"Hey Hardhat! They shipped me a freakin' pistol without a firin' pin! Amateur hour shit!" the youngest of their number, Scout, called over, interrupting. "Think you can you jury rig me up somethin'?"

Engineer sighed and shook his head. "I'll get back to y'all," he assured Liquid and Ocelot with an apologetic smile. "If you'll excuse me." Turning on his heel, he loped back over to the group, grousing, "Tarnation Scout, can't you see I was havin' a conversation? Lemme see this peashooter."

Ocelot shot a sidelong look to Liquid, his lip quirking up. "Softening up to the new hires?"

"They're here to play keepaway," Liquid grunted with annoyance. "To keep the Australium from becoming a problem. They, and it, are not our priority."

"Expendable to a fault. And here I thought you cared about your men, Boss."

Liquid snorted. "I care about my brothers; the genome soldiers."

"And FOXHOUND?"

Liquid shot Ocelot a look, a mixture of insult and disdain curling his lip at the question.

*

The soft whuff of a cloaking device barely registered to Gray Fox's sensors. He froze in place, silently stalking through the halls of the disposal facility. He hadn't anticipated someone else this deep into its bowels already, and certainly not someone using Australian technology. He turned, scanning the area with infrared sight, and caught sight of a short, narrow, feminine shape with long hair tucked up in a low bun holding still and scanning the hall in turn. By the shape of her, she wore a shotgun slung across her back and a large revolver at her hip, a dress, and what looked like corrective glasses, the latter two of which seemed almost alarming in a stealth situation. To test things, he began to slowly move, creeping down the hall in the direction he'd been heading, and watched her startle, seeing the soft ebb of his optical camouflage. She drew the shotgun.

Stealth was only part of her game, it seemed.

"Spy?" she ventured, keeping her voice a low hiss.

"Sometimes," Fox replied, a little amused at this strange little woman inserting herself into such a fraught situation. She was clearly capable enough to get in here, but not aware or well-trained enough to practice anything better than the most basic stealth.

He watched her thermal outline stiffen up in surprise.

"I don't know who you are, and I don't care. I didn't see you, you didn't see me," the woman said. Fox expected fear, or at least anxiety, but she sounded so resigned, like this was a complication she didn't want to have to deal with. Like her survival wasn't in doubt, like he wasn't a threat, merely a distraction.

He'd be offended if it weren't so curious a reaction. Instead, he found himself merely intrigued.

But she wasn't why he was here. And in the pursuit of that, she was immaterial.

Fox nodded quickly enough that she would see the ebb of his camouflage. "I'm just a ghost," he replied. "Not here to haunt you."

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As the freight elevator crested the surface and came to a halt, Snake's eyes darted about, taking stock of the area. It was dark, the middle of the night, and the area was lit with spotlights at all angles in an attempt to increase visibility, but creating strange slivers of shadow in different directions. Wind sliced through the air like blades of ice, pasting the steady snowfall against vertical surfaces to create layers of opaque ice. He was at the heliport of the oceanside entrance to the facility, a flat, open area slotted into a mountain valley, bordered on both sides by steep rockface and the other by a cliff leading down into the icy waters of the Bering Sea. The main entrance to the base sat opposite the water, looming and imposing possibly more than the mountains it had been wedged into, a large warehouse door at its centre with a catwalk above for security patrols, turning and following the western rock wall. Along that side it overlooked a small storeroom. At the centre of it all was a raised helipad with a railing around it, a chopper sitting on it, inactive.

Scattered around the area were a few stacks of crates, supply shipments awaiting recieving, logging, and transport indoors. It seemed those operations had ceased when FOXHOUND had made their move and taken over, interrupting logistics for their terrorist plan.

It almost seemed too convenient for Snake's liking as he slipped from the elevator to behind one of those crates, crouching and calling in to the radio team.

"It's Snake. I'm in front of the disposal facility."

Warmth finally entered Campbell's voice for the first time since the operation had begun, the cold stiffness of his briefings and initial communications beginning to wear off as the old soldier settled back into his old role as Snake's radio contact. "Excellent, Snake. Age hasn't slowed you down one bit."

The voice of the operation's medical specialist, Dr. Naomi Hunter, cut in on the line. "How's that Sneaking Suit working out?"

"I'm nice and dry," Snake confirmed, a bit of sulkiness bleeding into his voice as he admitted, "but it's a little hard to move."

"Bear with it. It's designed to prevent hypothermia," Naomi replied, mirth in her voice. "This is Alaska, you know."

Snake held back an annoyed huff. "Take it easy, I'm grateful. If it weren't for your suit and your shot I would've turned into a popsicle out there."

"An anti-freezing peptide, Snake. All of the genome soldiers in this exercise are using it."

"I see. I'm relieved to hear that. Already tested, huh?" Casting his eyes to the cliff leading out to the ocean, he changed the subject. "By the way, how's the diversionary operation going?"

Cambell cut back in, "Two F-16s just took off from Galena and are headed your way. The terrorists' radar should have already picked them up."

The sudden roaring whine of an engine ripped through the small valley, resounding off the walls to be almost deafeningly loud. Snake peeked from behind the crate to see the helicopter's rotors begin to lurch to life, their slow spin quickly speeding and adding whooshing beats of air to the cacophony filling his ears. Its cockpit sat open, a white-clad soldier speaking with a man standing beside its nose, his long blond hair whipping and long brown coat billowing in the rotor-winds.

Snake recognized the old-fashioned outline of the machine immediately. "A Hind D? Colonel, what's a Russian gunship doing here?"

The blond man in the long coat turned and sauntered over to the Hind, hefting himself with little effort into the cockpit and closing its dome over him.

"I have no idea," Campbell replied, "but it looks like our little diversion got their attention. Now's your best chance to slip in unnoticed! There are only eighteen hours left until their deadline. You've got to hurry!"

The Hind lifted off from the helipad and into the air, keeping relatively low in the scheme of aircraft before tilting westward and leaving the valley, growing blizzard be damned.

A new voice cut into the frequency, a young woman. "Wow, he must be crazy to fly a Hind in this kind of weather."

"Who's that?"

"Oh, sorry, I haven't introduced you two yet. This is Mei Ling. She was assigned as our visual and data processing specialist."

As Snake was quickly briefed on Mei Ling's role on the operation, he darted across the heliport, taking stock of the area and possible points of ingress with his binoculars. Behind him, the ocean crashed and the winds whipped, and he didn't hear a single thing as the soft whoosh of a cloak activated.

"First, I want you to infiltrate the disposal facility and look for the DARPA chief," Campbell instructed. "Get whatever information you can from him about the terrorists. If he's alive, that is..."

Snake thought for a split second he detected the scent of tobacco, but considering he was in the middle of admitting to smuggling his cigarettes in with him, he figured it must be sense memory. After all, with the wind buffeting him as it was, there was no way he could catch the scent of a cigarette. Not unless someone was smoking literally right next to him, upwind.

"I'll let you decide on the best COA. I'm counting on you, Snake," Campbell signed off. Snake tried not to wonder why it sounded less like an order and more like a plea. Something felt off about this op, even considering the nature of it all to begin with.

At this point, it would be more surprising if something weren't off about an op that he was involved in. He filed that pessimism aside and locked himself in. He had work to do.

It took little effort to stay out of sight lines, the increasing snowfall and placement of the spotlights helping him stick to the awkward slices of shadow as he skirted walls to stay out of the line of sight of the small smattering of security cameras that dotted the area. Upon mounting the catwalk, he spied a ventilation duct and made for it, tucking himself in as Campbell rung in his ear to inform him that the Hind D had shot down both F-16s that acted as his cover diversion.

"We got a message from Liquid. He said if we try something like that again, he'll launch the nuke! Snake, hurry up and get in there! That Hind will be coming back soon!"

*

"Did you catch all of that?"

"Sure did. The signal tapper worked like a charm. I'm impressed you got it on the fella."

"Mon ami, you truly think so little of me?"

"Spy, that's Solid Snake. I think that highly o' him is the long 'n short of it."

A soft scoff puffed over the radio as Spy held back a full laugh. "Regardless, this is our opportunity to move as well. Taking the heliport will be dramatically more difficult if we're here when that Hind returns."

"Sure 'nough. We still clear in the air yet, Scout?"

"Don't see 'nothin'," came Scout's voice over the radio, the wind whipping past his headset microphone garbling the hell out of his words. "I'm in place on the western ridge, don't see shit; not even with the binocs."

"The Hind's lights'll be a dead giveaway, so keep your eyes open, son. Alright, fellas, let's get this party started! BLU ain't payin' us to not take this point!"

Spy stole into a corner and kept still, watching with amusement as the show began. Twin trails of smoke streaked into the air, the wind stealing them away as quickly as they appeared as two points of blue—barely visible in the night sky against the backdrop of ocean and ice—soared up and over the edge of the cliff.

Demoman and Soldier's boots clomped loudly onto the concrete of the heliport as they cleared the railing that acted as the only safety measure between it and the edge of the cliff. In the moment before any of the genome soldiers noticed them, a grin found its way across Demoman's face. "Aye, love the company camouflage. Get 'em, lad."

Soldier let out a full-throated scream and charged, rockets soaring and bullets flying in reply amid the panicked yelling of men caught deeply unawares by heavy ordinance.

Demoman calmly ducked behind a crate, set up a sticky trap on either of its sides, and tossed down the teleporter Engineer had given him, which began to slowly auto-build as it hit the ground. "Teleporter goin' up," he reported.

"Weird as hell hearin' you say that," Scout quipped.

"Aye, fair enough. What's the ETA, Engie?"

"Twenty-one seconds from the word, 'go'," Engineer replied. "Entrance already built 'n ready."

"So see ye lot in about..."

"Ten," Engineer confirmed.

"Grand. "We'll get this point taken, then." With that, Demoman switched to his grenade launcher and strafed out of cover, more explosions rocking the entrance as screams of surprise and agony rang out into the night air.