Our [Music] [Music] story begins in the year 1918, in the midst of a conflict that at the time was known as the Great War. What began as a swift military campaign had become a prolonged catastrophe of decay and despair. Nobody knew this more than the Central Powers, who found themselves either splintered, weakened, or imploding. Soldiers, meanwhile, were driven to the brink, fighting out of duty more than belief, while civilians at home bore the weight of instability.

Though it was difficult for many to see, the war was running on fumes, cemented when, on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the guns of the Great War finally fell silent with the signing of an armistice. The following year, the Treaty of Versailles would mark the true end of the war, but not of its countless consequences. The treaty, among other things, imposed harsh reparations on Germany, sowing economic and political instability that would outlast the peace. President Woodrow Wilson's vision of a new world order through the League of Nations faltered within the Senate, preventing peace through diplomacy. Across Europe, empires were crumbling and borders were shifting, reinforcing the uncertainty many felt during the war.

In reaction to these developments, the 12 most influential and wealthy individuals from the United States, Soviet Union, and Republic of China gathered for a secret meeting that would later become known as the Wise Men's Committee. Their core philosophy was that their status obligated them to foster peace among the world's major powers, ensuring that the world would not fall into a conflict like that of the Great War ever again. Thus, the organization that arose from this meeting was known as the Philosophers.

A few years after the founding of the Philosophers, a member of the Wise Men's Committee named Unknown fathered a daughter who, given her heritage, would also remain anonymous. Though she would dawn a number of aliases over the years, her ultimate title would be that of the Boss. Throughout the next decade, when the Boss was just a child, her father would share knowledge of the Philosophers with her. He explained that though they were imperfect, the Philosophers played a key role in shaping the world for the better. However, over the next decade, this benevolent goal would be lost, as one by one, the members of the Wise Men's Committee passed away. The last to go was the Boss's father, who was killed by his fellow Philosophers for sharing his knowledge of their organization with his daughter.

Meanwhile, in Germany, Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime worked to rearm the country and expand their territory as a result of the instability brought on by the Treaty of Versailles. On September 1st, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, forcing Britain and France to respond with declarations of war. What followed was the beginning of a broad and complex conflict that would go on to engulf the entire world. A second great war that would come to be known as World War II, retroactively renaming its predecessor World War I.

Around the beginning of World War II, the Philosophers pulled together a fund of $100 billion to assist the Allied forces in their fight against the Axis powers. The countless transactions made with this money were kept on a single microfilm and were overseen by a group of Philosophers who were in charge of laundering the money in various banks throughout the world, such as Switzerland, Australia, and Hong Kong.

Two years later, on December 30th, 1941, an unnamed soldier was killed in Egypt during the Western Desert Campaign. Though the soldier's body was never recovered, his close relation to the Boss prompted David O, later known as Major Zero, to recover a winged dagger pin from his corpse and deliver it to the Boss, who would honor the soldier by keeping the pin with her at all times.

By early 1942, the Philosophers used their vast collection of resources to fund a number of state-of-the-art weapon and super soldier programs aimed at assisting the Allied forces. One such program was the clandestine Manhattan Project, directed by General Leslie Groves and physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. The project brought together some of the world's leading scientists at sites across the United States. The most famous of which was at Los Alamos, New Mexico.

In the summer of 1942, Germany launched an offensive toward the Soviet Union's southern territories, aiming to seize their natural resources alongside the city of Stalingrad. The subsequent Battle of Stalingrad quickly became one of the most brutal battles in history, prompting the Allied forces to deploy their experimental super soldiers to shift the tide of the battle. It was after that point the Boss would assemble them under her leadership. So began the Cobra Unit, which included soldiers such as The Fear, The Fury, The Pain, The Sorrow, and The End. Each of which were named for the emotion they most exemplified on the battlefield.

The Fear, as his name implies, used fear as his primary weapon. To do so most effectively, he altered his body in a number of sadistic ways to inspire a primal fear in his enemies. The Fury was known for his brazen anger, prompting him to adopt fire as his weapon of choice, as it was just as unwieldy as he was. The Pain was inflicted with two separate parasite strains that gave him the ability to control insects, most notably hornets, as well as induce an adrenaline rush in response to pain. The Sorrow had somewhat unique and supernatural abilities that allowed him to commune with the dead. As such, he felt incredible sadness on the battlefield. Though this skill proved to be invaluable, as with his ability he could somewhat predict the outcome of conflicts simply by communing with the dead. Last and most elderly of the Cobra Unit was The End, who, unlike his colleagues, felt nothing on the battlefield. This, in tandem with his photosynthetic skin and increased lifespan thanks to parasites, gave him incredible focus and patience on the battlefield, as he could simply lie dormant for weeks on end, trusting his scouting parrot would wake him when his targets were in sight.

Given each of their extraordinary abilities, the Cobra Unit were each implanted with a microbomb to keep them from being taken prisoner and their bodies from being studied after their deaths.

Around the same time, the US military began enlisting Code Talkers, Native Americans primarily from the Navajo Nation, who used their native language to securely transmit vital information across battlefields. Assisting these Code Talkers was a Navajo man named George, who in the 1880s was kidnapped by the United States government. It was in their custody he was given the name George and forced to learn English, a language he came to deeply resent, believing it to be a tool of cultural erasure and subjugation. Decades later, George would be given the name Code Talker, a title that he voluntarily kept as a reminder of his youthful trials.

The following year, the Soviet Union, fearing America's capability to construct a plutonium bomb, planned to assassinate John von Neumann, the pioneer of the project at Los Alamos. To do so, they leaked information that stated Neumann was a Nazi saboteur, prompting the United States to send the Boss to assassinate him at Los Alamos. Shortly before the mission, however, the Boss discovered that she was pregnant with The Sorrow's child. Distracted by the news, she was caught in a shootout with the guards, instinctively covering her belly to protect her child. A bullet from one of the guards struck her head, grazing her brain, and later putting her into a 3-month coma. Six months after waking up, she made a full recovery.

On June 6th, 1944, as part of Operation Overlord, also known as D-Day, the Allied forces deployed the Cobra Unit to the beaches of Normandy with the ultimate goal of destroying the Axis Powers' V2 rocket installments. It was while partaking in this invasion, the Boss gave birth to a child who was quickly seized by the Philosophers. Though the identity of this child would never be revealed to the Boss, he would eventually become known as a young Ocelot and later Revolver Ocelot.

That same year, the United States identified significant uranium deposits within the borders of the Navajo Nation. Over the following years, Navajo workers were hired to mine the uranium at various sites, often without adequate safety protections or awareness of the health risks, leading to widespread environmental contamination and severe health problems among the Navajo people. Despite this, mining would continue for decades to come, a tragedy that Code Talker sought to end.

While the exact timing is unknown, it's probable that around the early to mid-1940s, a rural village in northern Transennylvania allied with the Axis powers, who used their village's factory to repair and manufacture weapons. That is until one day the Allied forces got word of the village's factory, which they promptly carpet bombed. Trapped inside the factory was a young boy whose skin was set ablaze, forever burdening him with severe nerve damage as well as pale, shrink-wrapped skin. As a result, the boy would eventually become known as Skull Face. When Skull Face arrived in the infirmary, the nurse, looking at the suffering the boy would have to endure, remarked that they should let him die. Yet, Skull Face lived on thanks to a species of parasite that continually regenerated his dying cells, effectively putting a pause on what would have otherwise been a gruesome death. Even still, the words of the nurse would remain with him for the rest of his life, as they were his last memory of his original language, a language that was eventually stripped from him forever when the Soviet Union invaded his village.

On July 26th, 1945, the Allied powers issued an ultimatum to Japan in the form of the Potsdam Declaration, warning that failure to surrender would result in their destruction. When Japan did not respond, the United States planned to carry out the first use of nuclear weapons in warfare. On August 6th, a B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb, nicknamed Little Boy, over the city of Hiroshima. That same day, a scientist for the Manhattan Project fathered a son named Huey Emmerich. Three days later, a second bomb known as Fat Man was dropped over the city of Nagasaki. Combined, the bombings caused an estimated 200,000 deaths, the vast majority of which were just civilians.

Around the same period, a Soviet officer named Boris Volgin, one of the men in charge of laundering the Philosophers' money, would use the chaos of the war to steal the Philosophers' microfilm, giving the Soviet Union exclusive access to the vast collection of wealth the Philosophers had hidden throughout the world.

On September 2nd, 1945, Japan, pressured by the devastation of the atomic bombings, formally surrendered aboard the USS Missouri, bringing World War II to a definitive end. It was at that point Code Talker resumed his pursuit of creating a biological deterrent that would end the domination of the English language. Though it was unclear how he would accomplish this, he soon began investing a great deal of research into this very endeavor.

Meanwhile, the loss of their vast collection of wealth fractured the unity of the three branches of the Philosophers. Symbolizing this fracture, Korea was divided along the 38th parallel, with the Soviet Union occupying the north while the United States occupied the south. This division led to the creation of two contrasting governments, each of which claimed complete control over the entirety of Korea, setting the stage for a deadly conflict.

Around that same time, the US military began flooding into the city of Yokosuka as part of the US occupation of Japan. As they did so, a US Army officer named Miller met with an unnamed Japanese woman. Soon enough, the two of them conceived a child. Though Miller was a loving partner, he would eventually abandon the both of them and returned to his other family in America before the child was born. Though a single mother in a nation set ablaze, the woman decided to look past the flames towards the world she wished to help build for her child. So when she looked upon her child's eyes, there was only one name that fit: Peace, or in Japanese, Kazuhira.

Over the next few years, the tensions between the Philosophers only grew greater, as the power vacuum left in the wake of World War II positioned each nation against one another. The mounting tension that followed would spark conflict the world over, creating numerous proxy and trade wars that would later be dubbed the Cold War. Thus, the Philosophers had become the very thing they were created to combat in the first place. They had become war itself. The only remaining trace of their cooperation being the microfilm containing the locations of their amassed wealth, outlasting the organization itself. The microfilm became known as the Philosophers' Legacy.

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On June 25th, 1950, Soviet-backed North Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel, invading the US-backed South and launching the Korean War, the first major conflict of the Cold War. Just over a year later, the United States conducted an atomic bomb test in the Nevada desert known as Operation Buster-Jangle. Doing her part to help her country, the Boss took part in these tests, exposing her to a substantial amount of radiation that rendered her sterile. Soon after, she was sent to Korea to assist the US in the Korean War. It was there she came into contact with a highly skilled soldier simply named Jack. Witnessing his promise, the Boss took Jack as her apprentice, molding him into a world-class soldier and using their combined skills to develop a combat technique known as Close Quarters Combat, or CQC.

In 1954, the United States began Operation Castle Bravo at Bikini Atoll, the first of many tests for the hydrogen bomb. Among many others, Jack was a part of these experiments, rendering him sterile as a result of the radiation exposure. About a year or two later, when Kazuhira Miller was 10 years old, his mother fell incredibly ill, leaving him to run her shop and provide for the both of them. It was during this period that Miller stumbled upon a picture of his father. Desperate to seek his assistance, he began showing the picture to the American troops in Yokosuka in hopes that somebody would eventually recognize him. And though it took many years, someone eventually did.

On October 4th, 1957, the Soviet Union successfully launched the world's first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1. Taking them by surprise, the United States, assuming themselves superior in the fields of science and technology, feared that if the Soviets were capable of launching a satellite into space, they could use that very technology to create a nuclear missile. That same year, the first ever High Altitude Low Opening, or HALO, school was established to give the United States military an edge in covert infiltration, enabling special forces to infiltrate enemy territory with minimal detection and maximum precision. Top of her field, the Boss was invited to instruct there.

Early the following year, the Soviet Union established the Vostok program with the goal of putting a man in space. Lagging behind, the United States sent their own satellite, Explorer 1, into space just before midnight on January 31st. Hoping to accelerate their progress in the mounting space race, the United States founded the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, about 6 months later. Pressured by the Soviets' progress, NASA started Project Mercury just a few months later in an attempt to put a man in space before the Soviets. For this very purpose, seven men known as the Mercury 7 were selected for the mission. Due to NASA's haste, however, the United States suffered numerous launch failures, forcing them to resort to stealing and sabotaging Soviet technology to maintain their progress.

In June of 1959, NASA's numerous failures and the clandestine nature of the Soviet space program prompted the United States government to plant a sleeper agent within the Soviet ranks to gather intelligence and sabotage their progress. Trusting her to find a way to do so, President Eisenhower hand-selected the Boss for the mission. Given the mission's covert nature, the Boss, from Jack's perspective, unexpectedly abandoned him just when he felt he needed her most. Similarly, the information of the mission was withheld from the CIA, who, viewing her as unreliable, refused to assist the Boss from that point forward.

After she was abandoned by the CIA, the Boss resorted to tapping into the old Philosopher spy networks for assistance with her mission. A decision she knew would eventually come back to haunt her. Soon enough, however, she made contact with a cabal of Soviet Philosophers who had grown disillusioned with the Soviet Union's one-party communist state. Working tirelessly to gain their favor by supplying them with money or smuggling them past the Berlin Wall, the Boss eventually planted a sleeper agent within the highly secretive OKB-1 Soviet Design Bureau.

Over the next little while, the sleeper agent within OKB-1 gave NASA invaluable information that helped them catch up to the Soviets. It was at that point, however, the CIA swooped in to take credit for and command of the operation. Not long after, the access agent the CIA provided to the sleeper agent began siphoning the sleeper agent's pay. Deciding the risk was no longer worth the reward, the sleeper agent accepted a deal from the Soviets. Though we don't know what the specifics of the deal were, we do know that it was overseen by The Sorrow. Under the Soviets' influence, the agent was tasked with feeding the Americans false information, ensuring they would always remain a step behind the Soviets in the ever-escalating space race.

Around the same period, the Soviet Union stopped aiding China in nuclear weapons development, causing their hydrogen bomb and space rocket projects to fall behind. Upset by this prospect, the Chinese Philosophers began a plot to steal the Legacy for themselves.

Though the timing is unclear, it's likely that around the early 1960s, Huey Emmerich befriended Soviet weapons engineer Dr. Alexander Granin, the designer of the famous SS-1C ballistic missile system, or as it's more well-known, the Scud launcher. Given his past development, Granin became obsessed with an idea he had for a nuclear missile-equipped bipedal walking tank that he dubbed Metal Gear. Believing this concept to be the missing link between infantry and artillery, Granin shared this concept with his peers. However, it was heavily criticized by all except Huey Emmerich, who even in his youth saw promise in the project. In addition to this, Granin's deep hatred for fellow scientist Dr. Nikolai led Granin to ally with Guru, the anti-Khrushchev faction of the Soviet Union. Given that Sokolov was a closely guarded secret of Khrushchev, it's with Khrushchev that Granin would head the OKB-812 research bureau, also known as Granin's Research Bureau, which was overseen by Colonel Thunderbolt Volgin, the leader of the group, Boris Volgin's son, and the inheritor of the Philosophers' Legacy. Using his near-endless supply of wealth, Volgin funded Granin's research, hoping it would lead to the "next evolution of warfare." However, given that Granin's vision was far too technologically advanced for the time, Volgin would eventually set his sights on Sokolov, who had been developing a much simpler and cheaper-to-produce rocket-propelled IRBM-equipped tank known as the Shagohod. Translated from Russian, it means "the treading behemoth."

It was by this point, in the midst of the chaos of the Cold War, that Skull Face, driven by his vengeance, killed countless Soviet agents, military officials, and soldiers over the course of several months, making their deaths look like a series of freak accidents. Afterwards, Skull Face defected to the West, where he joined the British Army's Special Air Service, or SAS. It was there he met the SAS's own Major Zero, who made Skull Face his Executive Officer, or XO.

In September of 1960, two NSA codebreakers known as Adam and Eva took to a news program in Moscow to disclose the NSA's unsavory cryptanalytic missions as well as announce their defection to the Soviet Union. Around that same time, the sleeper agent within OKB-1 reported back to NASA, informing them that he had successfully tampered with multiple Sputnik rockets. However, these were likely false reports or simply accidents that the sleeper agent took credit for to reinforce his credibility with NASA. All of this came to a head when Sputnik 5 successfully launched two dogs into space, which the agent reported to be a simple fluke. Finding this to be suspicious, the Boss double-checked the Sputnik 5 blueprints, finding an ejection device on the capsule that did not belong. Even after sharing this with NASA, her suspicions were ignored, as they believed it to be a simple ejector for the flight recorder in the event of an accident. Maintaining her doubts, the Boss begged the CIA to investigate. Yet, they denied her request, forcing her to take matters into her own hands and go to OKB-1 herself.

Upon arriving at OKB-1 in early January of 1961, the Boss had learned that the sleeper agent had turned double agent and had been feeding America lies the entire time. In addition to this, the Boss learned that, opposed to what NASA had been told, Sputnik 5 was actually quite advanced, possessing the capability to eject the pilot at an altitude of 7,000 meters, finally giving the Soviets a proper method of landing and recovery. Of course, the Boss passed this information on to NASA, much to their horror. However, when the CIA heard about it, they took advantage of the newly inaugurated President John F. Kennedy by telling him that the Boss had selected an unreliable agent and failed to control him by means of holding his family hostage. JFK, having no ties to the Philosophers, took the Boss's actions as nothing short of traitorous intent. Branded as a traitor, the Boss was then relegated to NASA's guinea pig for the Mercury program, which had proven far too dangerous for the Mercury 7, all of whom had become nothing short of celebrities.

It was at that point in late January of 1961 that the Boss met a NASA scientist who would later be known as Dr. Strangelove. After their initial interaction, Strangelove would foster a deep affection for the Boss, something that would eventually blossom into an all-consuming love. The very next day, NASA got reports that the Soviets were making incredible progress with their space program. They even managed to add windows to their capsule, which forced NASA to do the same. They knew that it wasn't enough to simply beat the Soviets into space; they had to prove that they had the same, or better yet, superior technology. Trying to reach this moving goalpost, NASA worked relentlessly to add windows to the crew compartment, which proved extremely dangerous for the Mercury 7. Windows not only added complexity to the aerodynamics but weakened the structural integrity and made it difficult to shield the crew from the substantial amount of radiation in space. As a result, NASA decided to remove the Mercury 7 from the test launch altogether, selecting the Boss to take their place, as she had already been exposed to radiation once before. Despite the chances of survival being less than 20%, even if the ascent into space went smoothly, the Boss accepted the risk.

Sometime after, Strangelove performed an X-ray of the Boss's head, discovering the scar she got from the guards at Los Alamos. Strangelove thought it would provide the Boss an excuse to abandon her mission. However, the Boss refused, noting that while she was grateful for Strangelove's concern, she had to remain loyal to the end. Despite her reluctance, Strangelove trusted the Boss's judgment and helped conduct tests for her inevitable launch. Over time, the Boss's presence and willingness to be subjected to experiments gave NASA invaluable data that helped them accelerate their research. As a result, she garnered a great deal of recognition from the higher-ups at NASA, who dubbed her the "Mercury Lady" and planned to use her as propaganda alongside the Mercury 7.

Soon enough, however, NASA got word that the Soviets were planning on launching Vostok 1, manned by Major Yuri Gagarin, into space on April 12th. Trying to beat them to the deadline, they hastily prepared the Boss for her own launch that very same day. In the still of night, April 12th, 1961, the Boss was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, into space. Flying eastbound to give her a view of the Earth illuminated by the sun. The Boss officially entered space at 1:30 a.m., believing herself to have beaten the Soviets by mere minutes. It was at this vantage point that she saw something that would change her forever. From the window of her cramped capsule, she saw a world without borders, where all nations, all ideologies seemed equally abstract and absurd. Following this epiphany, it became her life's mission, her will, to make this dream into reality, no matter the sacrifice.

While Gagarin landed safely back in the Soviet Union, the Boss's capsule crashed down to Earth. The window threw off the aerodynamics, causing it to veer off course. Unable to decelerate, the capsule missed the splashdown area by a wide margin and plunged into the ocean. As the Boss's pod began to sink, Strangelove, who was stationed with the recovery crew, jumped into the ocean to rescue her. Bloody and bruised from the impact as well as burnt from the radiation, the Boss slipped into a six-month coma.

Soon after, it was revealed that, opposed to what NASA had assumed, they had actually lost the race by only a few mere minutes. What should have been a proud day for America ended up being struck from the history books, as it was also revealed that Gagarin's flight was not only first, but also much higher and longer. And most importantly, he and the craft made it back safely. While Gagarin only grew in popularity, the government moved to remove not just the Boss's flight, but all evidence of her existence from the Mercury project. Soon enough, their official stance was that the Mercury Lady never existed in the first place. To cover their tracks, they even stated that the Boss was part of the botched Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba. By the time the Boss was ready to return to service, the military refused to take her back, forcing her to go underground. In the public eye, the Boss was still a legendary World War II hero. But outside of that, she was nothing. Authorities in Washington even wished she had simply given them a nice quote and died an honorable death, because that at least they could use. But alive, the Boss was nothing. A ghost of a bygone era, a relic of a time when people still believed in something as worthless as virtue.

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After waking from her coma in late 1961, the Boss was contacted by the Philosophers, who required her to travel to the Soviet Union in order to "repay her debt" for using the Philosopher spy network back in 1959. When the Boss arrived in Tselinoyarsk, a lush jungle within the Soviet Union, she came face to face with her former comrade, lover, and the father of her child: The Sorrow. Despite working closely with the Soviets as well as the Soviet Philosophers, it wasn't until this point The Sorrow realized that it was the Boss who had planted the sleeper agent. The two were then forced to fight to the death. If either of them survived, the Philosophers stated that their child would suffer. Given no other choice, The Sorrow laid down his own life, allowing the Boss to live on.

When the Boss returned from the Soviet Union in early 1962, she was left with and treated as if she was nothing, despite having sacrificed everything for her country and their ideals, or at least what she thought their ideals were. It was then that an old friend of hers from her SAS days, Major Zero, reached out to her. Together, they laid the groundwork for what would later become a covert Black Ops unit known as FOX, that specialized in one-man infiltration missions.

That same year, Dr. Sokolov, the Soviet weapons scientist and head of OKB-754 design bureau, wishing to defect to America alongside his family, got in contact with Major Zero, who at this point was working at the CIA. Finding him to be a valuable asset, Zero led the operation that successfully smuggled his family over the Berlin Wall. Planning to smuggle Sokolov himself next, the CIA helped him make the two-week-long 800-kilometer trek to Berlin. After reaching safety, however, Sokolov succumbed to exhaustion, forcing the CIA to check him into a hospital in West Berlin.

Shortly afterward, on October 16th, 1962, President JFK was given intelligence that the Soviets were deploying intermediate-range ballistic missiles, or IRBMs, in Cuba, kickstarting the Cuban Missile Crisis. Over the next 12 days, the world teetered on the brink of a nuclear exchange until on October 28th, a deal was finally made. Publicly, the United States stated that they would remove their IRBMs from Turkey in exchange for the Soviets pulling theirs out of Cuba. However, in reality, the US already planned to pull out of Turkey, and their real offer was instead. After the deal was struck, Sokolov was immediately returned to the Soviet Union, where he was forced to work on the Shagohod under KGB supervision.

Following this exchange, the United States and Soviet Union began negotiating for peace. So something like the Cuban Missile Crisis would never happen again. This seemingly upset the Soviet and American Philosophers, who on November 22nd, 1963, allegedly assassinated JFK, pinning the blame on Lee Harvey Oswald. Hours later, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as president aboard Air Force One, effectively ending peace negotiations between the US and Soviets. Khrushchev, already unpopular within the Soviet Union for his agricultural and de-Stalinization policies, fell out of favor with his own party. Using this to his advantage, Colonel Volgin attempted to rally the anti-government forces to replace him.

By 1964, Kazuhira Miller had finally discovered who his real father was. Hoping to contact him, he sent his father a note where he proposed that he would travel to the United States in order to meet him. After some time, his father simply replied by sending him some money, which Miller used to place his mother in a hospital and travel to America. A selfish act he later came to deeply regret. When he finally met with his father, he learned that after returning to the states, his father became an instructor for soldiers in Virginia. Years later, his son and Miller's half-brother died in the Vietnam War. By the time Miller had met his father, he had already retired from teaching, could barely walk, and was completely alone. The only thing he had left was money, a portion of which he gave to Miller, who used it to learn English and pursue higher education.

That same year, Major Zero and the Boss formed the FOX Unit. Its primary members being Major Zero, the team commander; Paramedic, real name Dr. Clark, the medical expert; and Jack, the lone infiltrator. Unknown to the Boss, shortly after the creation of FOX, Major Zero created a secret unconventional support unit to complement FOX named XOF. Its purpose was to make sure any operation FOX undertook went smoothly and left no trace. Trusting him to carry out the task, Zero appointed his XO, Skull Face, the commander of the team.

In July of 1964, the Boss was contacted by the American Philosophers in order to participate in the Virtuous Mission, an operation to recover the Philosophers' Legacy from Volgin. In preparation for this mission, the Boss once more used the Philosopher spy network to get into contact with Colonel Volgin. Volgin, hoping to acquire the help of the Boss and therefore the Cobra Unit, suggested the Boss defect from the United States and join him in procuring the Shagohod. With both the Cobra Unit and the Shagohod, Volgin hoped to shift the balance of the Cold War and unite the world under Soviet leadership. Appeasing his vanity to gain his trust, the Boss promptly defected, even going so far as to procure a Davy Crockett nuclear device and warhead as a show of goodwill toward Volgin and his cause.

Once she was allied with Volgin, the Boss shared her knowledge of Sokolov's whereabouts with the CIA, hoping to procure Sokolov before he could finish the weapon he was working on. The Virtuous Mission was then adopted by the FOX Unit, who had no knowledge of its true purpose to secure the Legacy. Similarly, neither the FOX Unit nor the Boss had any knowledge of the CIA's third asset, who alongside the Boss was tasked with securing the Legacy. Though he was known by many names, the CIA knew him as Adam, a covert double agent veiled under the identity of Major Ocelot, the head of the Spetsnaz's elite Ocelot Unit.

Just days before the Virtuous Mission took place, a Chinese Philosopher spy infiltrated OKB-754 to procure the Philosophers' Legacy from Volgin. To do so, she posed as a KGB operative named Tatyana, allowing her to get close to Volgin and learn where the Legacy was hidden.

Days later, on August 24th, 1964, the Virtuous Mission officially took place with Jack performing the first ever HALO jump in order to infiltrate Tselinoyarsk. After a rough landing in which Jack lost his backpack, Major Zero appointed Jack the codename Naked Snake, alluding to the fact he was going into the mission completely bare. After Snake collected his backpack, Zero introduced him to Paramedic and the Boss, who Zero noted was a last-minute addition to the operation. After a short-lived reunion between the Boss and Snake, Snake traversed through the jungle to an abandoned factory where Sokolov was being held. As they left the factory, Snake and Sokolov were confronted by Major Ocelot, who killed the KGB forces before calling in the Ocelot Unit. Using his CQC skills, Snake took down the unit before confronting Ocelot himself, suggesting his technique would lend more to a revolver rather than a semi-automatic pistol. After meeting back up with Sokolov, Sokolov explained his involvement with the Shagohod development and ensured Snake knew what was at stake if he was not extracted.

Soon after, the Boss, assisted by the Cobra Unit, confronted Snake and Sokolov. As Snake sought to understand what was going on, The Pain and The Fear kidnapped Sokolov. Storm clouds blanketed the sky and Volgin made his entrance. The Boss then revealed her defection to Snake before disarming him, breaking his arm, and throwing him off the bridge. As Snake fell, he desperately reached out for his former mentor, grabbing hold of her bandana as he fell into the river. Minutes later, Snake was awoken by a call from Zero and Paramedic, who walked Snake through curing his wounds. Meanwhile, Volgin and the Cobra stole Tatyana as well as the Shagohod. As they transported it to Graznigrad, Volgin's main base, Volgin used the Davy Crockett the Boss had gifted him to nuke the Shagohod design bureau. Shortly afterward, the Soviet Union picked up on FOX's military aircraft, inciting an international incident.

When FOX returned to the United States, their failure to secure Sokolov nearly got Zero and Snake executed and Paramedic stripped of her medical license. Their fate changed, however, when the White House received an unexpected call. A few days after the Virtuous Mission, President Johnson received a call from Khrushchev about the incident in Tselinoyarsk, informing him that in retaliation for the strike, the Soviet military had been placed on secondary alert, one step away from nuclear Armageddon. Johnson, of course, denied any and all involvement and informed Khrushchev of the Boss's defection about one week prior. Khrushchev, unwilling to accept this as coincidence without proof, gave Johnson one week to provide evidence of America's innocence. If they could not, Khrushchev assured Johnson that he would be ousted from his position, and that the person who filled it would retaliate in the only way they knew how. With the world teetering on World War III, the plan to secure the Philosophers' Legacy needed to be greatly expanded and revised if they wished to both obtain the microfilm and clear America's name.

Soon enough, the director of the CIA, a man known as Hot Coldman, came up with what he viewed as an ingenious solution. A grand plot that if successful would end in America getting their hands on the Legacy and the Boss dying at the hands of her own apprentice. The former giving them a means to supersede the Soviets and the latter proving America's innocence and providing them with yet another legendary hero whose status would surpass that of the Boss herself.

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On August 30th, 1964, the FOX Unit was sent back to Tselinoyarsk to take part in Operation Snake Eater. Its primary goals were to rescue Sokolov, find and destroy the Shagohod, and eliminate the Boss. With their previous point of entry ineffective, FOX was forced to deploy Snake using a manned drone. During his descent, the drone was intercepted by Soviet fighter jets, knocking the drone off course and forcing Snake to eject early.

Around the same time, the spy posing as Tatyana took the identity of Eva in hopes of playing both the Soviet and American sides of the conflict to learn the whereabouts of the Legacy. After Snake landed, Zero repeated their mission objectives, noting that alongside himself and Paramedic, Snake would also be supported by a weapons and technology expert named Sigint, or Donald Anderson. In addition to this, Zero gave Snake a passphrase to give to Adam upon their initial interaction. That passphrase being, "Who are the Patriots?" And Adam was to respond with "Liilu Leelo."

After the briefing, Snake was confronted by the Boss, who disarmed him and destroyed the drone before he had a chance to conceal it. At some point during their fight, the Boss managed to implant a transmitter into Snake so the Cobra Unit could track his movements. As Soviet troops closed in, the Boss pressured Snake to abandon his mission before she was forced to kill him.

Stranded in the jungle without a weapon, Snake eventually made his way back to the abandoned factory where he planned to meet with Adam. Yet, when he arrived at the factory, it was not Adam he was met with, but Eva. To confirm Eva's identity, Snake prompted her to answer the passphrase given to him by Zero. However, they were interrupted by a squad of GRU soldiers. When Eva eliminated them, Snake took the act as evidence that she was who she claimed to be. Inside the factory, Eva gave Snake some equipment and pointed him north to the laboratory where Sokolov was being held. Though Snake wanted to continue forward, Eva demanded that he stay and rest until morning. Snake hesitantly followed suit while Eva sent a message to her superiors.

About an hour later, Snake and Eva found themselves surrounded by the Ocelot Unit. After Snake took them down, Ocelot fired six shots from his fancy new revolver to get Snake's attention. When Snake arrived to find Ocelot holding Eva at gunpoint, he pointed out that since he had already fired six shots, he literally did not have what it took to kill him. Taking this as her cue, Eva took down Ocelot before leaving to meet up with Volgin.

On his way toward the lab, Snake was once again ambushed by Ocelot, who had procured a second revolver, giving him 12 shots to take Snake down. Before their standoff could come to an end, however, The Pain sent a swarm of hornets to break up their fight. After falling to a nearby cave to escape the hornets, Snake eventually confronted The Pain himself. After a long and grueling fight, Snake eventually came out on top.

Continuing north, Snake stumbled upon a warehouse where he saw Volgin threatening Tatyana in front of Sokolov. Ocelot then threatened Sokolov with his own over-the-top version of Russian roulette before the Boss stepped in to put him in his place. Soon after, she ordered The Fear and The End to stop her apprentice before he could threaten their plan further. When the warehouse was clear, Snake made his way through it before arriving at the laboratory. Disguising himself as a scientist, Snake eventually confronted Granin, who, after explaining the travesty behind Volgin's decision to choose Sokolov over himself, pointed Snake toward Volgin's main base called Graznigrad. Sometime after Snake left, Granin, suspecting that he would be killed, sent the blueprints for his Metal Gear project to Huey Emmerich just before he was tortured to death by Volgin.

Backtracking to the warehouse, Snake was confronted by The Fear. After taking him out, Eva informed Snake of Sokolov and the Shagohod's status before giving him a rendezvous location at the top of a mountain. At the foot of the mountain, Snake was ambushed by The End. After he was dealt with, Snake had a thrilling time climbing a ladder to the top of the mountain. It was there Snake met with Eva, who gave him a key to the tunnel under the base. Afterward, she pointed him toward the west wing of the weapons lab of Graznigrad, which Snake could use to access a disguise of a high-ranking personnel. The most obvious candidate being GRU Major Ivan Ryenovich Raikov.

Using the key Eva gave him, Snake entered the tunnels below Graznigrad, where he eventually confronted The Fury. After defeating him, Snake entered the base and tracked down Major Raikov, knocking him out to obtain his officer uniform. Using this disguise, Snake entered the West Wing while Eva stole C3 explosives from the armory and procured the Shagohod data from Sokolov. Directly afterward, Snake met with Sokolov, who informed him of Volgin's grand plan to mass-produce the Shagohod, thus creating a power imbalance that would end the Cold War. Shortly afterward, Volgin entered the room and very subtly deduced Raikov's false identity. After shooting Sokolov, Volgin was taken down by Snake, who himself was subdued by the Boss.

Over the next few hours, Snake was tortured by Volgin for the CIA's knowledge of the Philosophers' Legacy. In the process, knocking out the transmitter the Boss had placed earlier. Volgin then demanded to know whose it was. After the Boss admitted it was hers, Volgin had her display her loyalty by carving out Snake's eyes, unmaking that which she had made in the first place. Just before the Boss could do so, however, Tatyana intervened, prompting Ocelot to let luck test her loyalty with a game of Russian roulette. Snake, watching the bullet's placement within the revolver's chamber, kicked Ocelot just before he could shoot Tatyana, positioning the barrel directly in front of his right eye.

After Volgin left the room, Ocelot shoved the Boss's transmitter back into Snake to keep tabs on him. Afterwards, the Boss shot Snake with a fake death pill to aid in his escape. When it was just Snake and Tatyana left, she informed him of an escape route out of Graznigrad via the sewers. Not long after, Snake was placed into a cell where he made conversation with a man named Johnny. Johnny explained that all the firstborn sons in his family were also named Johnny, a tradition he felt would continue until the end of time.

After escaping the cell, Snake made his way to the sewers where he found that Volgin had sealed off the escape Eva had planned for him. With nowhere else to go, Snake made a run for the sewer outlet on the side of the mountain. Cornered by Ocelot and Volgin's men, Snake was forced to jump into the river below. As he was carried downstream, his mind slipped into unconsciousness. It was in this state The Sorrow was able to reach out to him from beyond the veil of death, forcing Snake to confront all those who he might have killed during his journey.

When he awoke, Snake regrouped with Eva, who returned his equipment and assisted him in removing the transmitter if he didn't remove it himself. She then gave him the C3 she had procured and instructed him on using it to destroy the Shagohod by destroying the fuel tanks within the central wing of Graznigrad. While Snake made his way to the main wing and planted the C3, Eva planted bombs on the bridge outside of Graznigrad, then attempted to steal the Philosophers' Legacy from Volgin's vault. However, in the process of doing so, she was captured by Volgin.

Not long after, Snake finished planting the timed explosives, where he was then confronted by Volgin, the Boss, and Ocelot. After explaining his rise to power to Snake, Volgin handed the Legacy off to the Boss, who left with Eva while Snake fought with Volgin. With only minutes until the C3 detonated, Snake took down Volgin with the assistance of Ocelot, who stated his motive for helping Snake was because he wanted to battle himself. However, in reality, those were simply the orders given to him by the CIA, who ultimately needed Snake to kill the Boss.

While this was happening, the Boss, seeing through Eva's many layers of disguises, told her the truth behind her mission, hoping that Eva would share it with Snake, as she was forbidden from doing so. Immediately afterward, Eva rendezvoused with Snake outside of the main wing, informing him of the Boss's location and their method of extraction. Just then, Volgin, using the Shagohod, tore his way out of the main wing. As Snake and Eva made their escape, Ocelot feigned an attempt to stop them to reinforce his GRU identity. Following this charade, Snake and Eva led Volgin to the bridge outside of Graznigrad, where Snake shot Eva's C3 just as Volgin was crossing it. The collapsing bridge forced Volgin to ditch the back half of the Shagohod, allowing him to confront Snake and Eva for the final time. Using an RPG to disable the Shagohod, Snake forced Volgin to reveal himself. With Volgin fully exposed, Eva distracted him while Snake brought him to his knees. When the battle was all but over, Volgin was fried by a bolt of lightning, erupting him and what remained of the Shagohod in a wall of flames.

But before they could get a moment of peace, GRU soldiers chased after them as they made their way to the extraction point. Just before they arrived, however, their motorcycle crashed, impaling Eva with a piece of debris. While Eva insisted Snake move on without her, Snake was unwilling to do so. Instead, tending to her wounds before escorting her through the jungle.

When Snake and Eva eventually made it to the lake, Eva prepared the wig for takeoff while Snake went to confront the Boss. Just before he did so, the Boss used the very thing that started this whole mess to destroy Graznigrad. Immediately afterward, the Boss remarked that she had waited her whole life for this moment to test whether or not Snake had the spirit of a soldier. Understanding that she was at life's end, the Boss shared her past with Snake, knowing that after he knew her story, there was nothing more she could give him. When she was finished, she called in an airstrike to their position, forcing Snake to take her out in just 10 short minutes. Thrown into a long and grueling battle, Snake, just as his superiors had planned, came out on top. In her final moments, the Boss handed Snake half of the Legacy, as well as her gun, the Patriot, which she

prompted Snake to use to end her life.

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As Snake regrouped with Eva aboard the wig, Skullface, who had been monitoring Snake the entire operation alongside his XOF unit, encountered the boss's corpse, taking from it her cherished winged dagger pin. Similarly, Vulgan, the Pain and the N's bodies were collected for study. Vulggins was recovered by Soviet scientists where it was then taken to a paranormal research facility in the outskirts of Moscow while the end in the Payne's parts were collected by an unnamed parasite research foundation with ties to the original philosophers.

As Snake and Eva ascended into the sky, Ocelot met them for a final encounter. After fighting hand-to-hand, Ocelot pulled a revolver on Snake, prompting Eva to toss one to Snake. As the tension between the two of them grew, Ocelot suggested they partook in a final showdown. He then placed a bullet within the chamber of one of the revolvers, shuffled them around, and let Snake choose the one he wanted. Regardless of his decision, the bullet he placed was a blank, giving Ocelot an opportunity to jump out of the plane.

Snake and Eva were then intercepted by two Soviet aircraft, which threatened to ground their plane. Just before they could do so, however, Kruev ordered them to disengage. Hours later, Snake and Eva arrived in Alaska, where they stayed the night at a safe house within the Galina Air Force Base. After a fairly restless night, Eva, following her orders, attempted to kill Snake. However, her love for him kept her from doing so. Instead, she recorded a message in which she revealed her true identity as a Chinese spy, her reasons for stealing the philosopher's legacy, and the truth behind the boss's fake defection. Afterward, she fled to China, possessing a fake copy of the philosophers's legacy. While it is not known where she obtained this copy from, it is clear that she would eventually be reprimanded for not completing her mission, resulting in her eventual exile from China.

It was around the same period, or possibly even sooner, that Ocelot stole Granon's Metal Gear plans and handed them off to the CIA. It's likely that at that point, or possibly even during Operation Snake Eater, that CIA director Hawk Coldman was demoted from his position for his knowledge of the operation. While it is not clear what position he was demoted to, he would ultimately end up as the CIA station chief in Latin America.

When Snake awoke the next morning, he listened to Eva's recording, his world shattering as he realized the country he swore to serve had manipulated him into killing his own mentor. Not long after, Snake was escorted to Langley, Virginia, where after returning one half of the real philosophers's legacy to Zero, President Lyndon B. Johnson personally awarded him a medal for his heroic actions during Operation Snake Eater. Along with the medal came the new title of Big Boss. Though this title was meant to serve as a tribute to his great victory, Snake couldn't help but view it as a grim reminder of what he had done. And maybe even more importantly, what he didn't do. He didn't live up to her noble principles. He didn't match her indomitable strength or grand vision. What he did was follow orders. and his mentor died because of it. Of course, the government was completely apathetic to both his grief and his guilt. After all, with the boss gone and her legacy forever tarnished, they would need someone to take her place.

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In the wake of operation snake eater, code talker was approached by the research foundation that had procured the N's body. After thoroughly studying the N's parasites, Code Talker, wanting to study them even further, decided to inject himself with them, giving him, among other things, photosynthetic skin and an increased lifespan. With these gifts, he continued to use the foundation's resources to further his research into parasites with the ultimate goal of creating a biological deterrent for the ever-expanding English language.

It was around that same time, Strange Love learned of the boss's traitorous death at the hands of her own apprentice. Of course, she didn't believe that the boss, the woman she loved, could betray the country she gave everything to. Being a scientist, Strange Love proposed two hypotheses of her own. Either the boss did it to unite east and west, as was her ultimate will, or that it was an act of suicide, as she blamed herself for the state of the world. Either way, she vowed to do whatever she could to learn the truth and clear her lover's name.

In 1965, Sigint or Donald Anderson joined the United States's Advanced Research Projects Agency or ARPA, later known as DARPA. Similarly, it was around the same time Strange Love joined ARPA as well, where she planned to spearhead AI research for space travel, which she viewed as far too dangerous for humans. It was while she worked at Arpa that Strange Love got the name Strange Love, which was meant to be both a reference to the popular 1964 film of the same name and a cruel jab at her sexuality. However, she quickly adopted the name for herself, feeling no shame in being different from others.

3 years later, in 1968, Eva disappeared in Hanoi, Vietnam in the midst of the Vietnam War. That same year, Kazuhiro Miller graduated college and returned to Japan to check up on his mother. But when he arrived, he was devastated to learn that her condition had gotten so bad, she didn't even know who her own son was anymore. Yet, Miller remained in Japan, joining the Japan Self-Defense Force at the age of 22 to pay their bills.

In 1969, as cold war tensions and the nuclear arms race intensified, the United States and Soviet Union began the Strategic Arms Limitations Talks or SALT One to reduce the risk of nuclear conflict and limit the growth of their arsenals. Though the talks did not strictly reduce the number of nukes in the world, SALT 1 proved to be a major success, prompting further negotiations early the next decade.

About a year later, Miller's mother tragically passed away, prompting Miller to leave the JSDF and return to America to be with his father. However, this too was short-lived. As soon after arriving in America, he found that his father had committed suicide. With no place to call home, Miller began drifting around the world, accepting various contract work wherever he felt his skills were needed.

By this same point, Zero had become disillusioned with Western ideals, believing them to be misguided by the plague that was individualism. As such, Zero officially disbanded the Fox unit and used the two halves of the philosophers's legacy, half of which Snake was given by the boss and half of which Ocelot procured sometime after Operation Snake Eater to fund a successor to the American philosophers that would truly seek to fulfill the boss's will. her vision of a unified world. But while the boss envisioned a world united through empathetic understanding, Zero misinterpreted this as a world of enforced uniformity. A world where he alone controlled the flow of information to ensure that there could be no division because everyone would be fed the same information and therefore manifest the same thoughts and desires. Believing Zero to be well-intentioned, Donald Anderson, Dr. Clark, Ocelot, and most importantly, Big Boss himself joined the organization. To Zero, Big Boss was the most crucial part of his master plan because he knew that every grand movement needed an equally grand symbol. Big Boss would become this very symbol, a tool that Zero would use to garner powerful allies and conduct monumental change.

In 1971, Big Boss created Foxhound, a unit that attempted to carry on the traditions of Major Zero and the Fox unit. Unlike Fox, which remained a clandestine Black Ops unit until its eventual demise, Foxhound soon became an official unit in the US Army. That same year, Snake rescued Eva from Hanway Vietnam, where she then joined Zero's organization. Not long after, however, a rift would begin to form between Big Boss and Zero. This came after Big Boss observed how Zero had warped his identity by layering it with exaggerations and lies until it became almost unrecognizable. Made worse when he realized that Zero was not using this to unify the world, but to instead grasp at power. Foreseeing what Zero would eventually become, Snake relinquished the Big Boss title, a name that had taken on a new meaning and one that he never really wanted in the first place.

Left without his most powerful icon, Zero decided to create a few of his own. Using DNA Dr. Clark collected from Snake, Zero created Les Enfants Terribles, the terrible children, a cutting-edge cloning project headed by ATGC, a biotech company with ties to DARPA. The goal of this project was to create not just mere clones of Naked Snake, but near-perfect soldiers who could eventually surpass him in both skill and status. While initially the project hit many roadblocks, likely due to the experimental technology used at the time, their first successful embryo came after they used an egg from one of Dr. Clark's Japanese assistants, fertilized it with Snake's DNA, then transferred it to Eva, who volunteered to serve as the clone's surrogate mother. Not long after, they had a total of eight healthy embryos, six of which were aborted to encourage strong fetal growth. It's at that point they began to modify the DNA of the embryos themselves, giving one of the embryos the dominant traits of Snake while the other got his recessive traits. In addition to this, the clones were modified with a rapid aging mutation, meaning that the older they got, the faster they would age. This was done as an extra measure of security, a fail-safe in case the clones ever fell into enemy hands. Similarly, their DNA prevented them from fathering children and contained an all-encompassing terminator gene, meaning that they could not be cloned themselves.

9 months later, in 1972, Eva gave birth to two healthy baby boys. The genetically superior clone that expressed Naked Snake's dominant traits was named Eli, though he would later become known as Liquid Snake. Meanwhile, the genetically inferior clone that expressed Snake's recessive traits was named David, though he's better known as the legendary Solid Snake.

While the specifics are unclear, it's around the same period that a third clone was also created. Unlike the so-called twin snakes, the third clone did not undergo any genetic modifications to alter his gene expressions, making him the "quote unquote" perfect clone. Though he still remained burdened with rapid aging and the Terminator genes. While it is not known who gave birth to this child, it is clear that it was not Eva and that he was born around the same time as his dominant and recessive counterparts. Neither solid nor liquid, this child would eventually become known as Solidus Snake.

Not long after the clones were born, Snake, finding both Zero and his grand project to be extremely immoral and distasteful, left Zero's organization in disgust. Eva followed shortly afterward, while Ocelot maintained minimal contact to keep tabs on Zero. Sometime after Snake left, Zero contracted some kind of unknown illness that forced him into hiding. To continue his work, however, he set up a safe house in Hell's Kitchen, New York, strictly maintaining contact with his agents via proxy so as to not reveal his location or condition. It was at that point he restructured his organization into a new, far more clandestine group known as Cipher, a word that dates back to the Arabic "cifher," meaning zero.

It was around this point that a young girl named Pacifica Ocean was recruited by Cipher sometime after she was orphaned. Under Cipher, she became skilled in all things espionage and proved to be incredibly intelligent. Utilizing her skill set, Pacifica was ordered to infiltrate the CIA, who themselves sent her to infiltrate the KGB sometime later.

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After parting ways with Zero and Foxhound, Snake looked to fulfill his own interpretation of the boss's will. To Snake, this meant a world where soldiers like the boss were free to be the soldiers they were born to be. a place outside of east and west where they had the agency to embrace who they were. Snake dubbed this concept Outer Heaven and sought to manifest it by creating a private military known as Militaires Sans Frontières or MSF. Translated from French, it means soldiers or army without borders, reflecting Outer Heaven's core principles of unity and freedom.

When MSF was in its infancy, basically a squad of mercenaries rather than a true army, they were contracted by the Colombian government to train their troops and deal with a band of guerrilla revolutionaries. It was during this operation that Snake and his crew ambushed a group of rebels that were trained and led by Kazuhiro Miller. After eliminating Miller's entire unit, Snake captured and attempted to interrogate Miller. Assuming he was destined to die, Miller attempted to take Snake with him to the grave by pulling the pin on a grenade. Snake, however, managed to keep pressure on the safety lever, therefore stopping the explosion. Not long after, Miller passed out from his wounds.

Despite what Miller tried to pull off, Snake took an unusual interest in him. After a bit of digging, he found that Miller had a history of being exceptionally stubborn, clever, and ambitious, yet mostly devoid of the ego that usually accompanied those traits. As such, Snake ultimately decided to spare Miller and offer him a position within MSF. Hesitant to accept, Miller bought himself a week to think the decision over by proposing a series of contests between himself and Snake in exchange for his freedom. Over that week, however, Miller's opinion of Snake completely flipped after observing the way MSF soldiers viewed him. To them, Snake was not simply their commander. And in fact, the word leader barely even fit his description. To the men that served him, Snake was nothing short of a god, an icon who not only provided for them, but instilled within them a sense of purpose. Despite this, Miller still attempted to reach out to his own men for assistance. When Snake got word of this, he ultimately decided to ignore it, allowing Miller the best chance at escape to show him just how poorly he understood MSF. When it was eventually time to partake in the contests, Miller bought plenty of time for his soldiers by challenging Snake to a series of low-stakes challenges. When the ambush actually took place, Snake revealed just how powerless Miller really was, prompting Miller to finally give in to Snake's demands and join MSF. A decision that almost immediately began to pay dividends for the both of them, as Miller, an expert in all things operational, quickly rose the ranks of MSF, eventually finding himself as Snake's second in command and one of his most trusted comrades.

In 1972, building on the progress of SALT 1, the United States and Soviet Union proposed SALT 2 to address the ongoing development of more advanced nuclear weapons rather than the increase in sheer numbers. Though they would not come to an immediate agreement, the negotiations would continue for years to come.

On December 23rd, 1972, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake hit Managua, the capital city of Nicaragua. Left nearly completely destroyed, Managua was flooded with international aid, a great deal of which was embezzled by the Nicaraguan President Somoza and his national guard. It's likely that after the earthquake, a Nicaraguan rebel surnamed Valenciano abandoned his rebellious spirit in favor of raising his two kids, Amanda and Chico, in peace.

In 1973, Code Talker discovered a version of a primordial organism called Archa that could metabolize uranium. Immediately, he saw potential in the Archa as a way to end the uranium mining on Navajo land by ridding the land of uranium altogether. Yet, to fully realize this vision, the Archa would have to be researched further, something that would take a great deal of money for an act that would provide zero monetary value.

That same year, the Valenciano family was met by a group of Sandinista students. Empathetic to the Sandinista cause, their family harbored them until their eventual escape from the Nicaraguan National Guard. From that point forward, the National Guard saw their family as criminals and began constantly harassing them for their alleged crimes, eventually driving Amanda and Chico's father to officially join the Sandinista cause, resulting in their mother abandoning them and their family moving to the mountains of Costa Rica. Not long after, their father became the commander of the Sandinistas.

It was at that point the Soviet Union began to set their sights on Latin America, viewing it as the next and possibly final key combat theater of the Cold War. As such, they offered to support Commandante Valenciano and the Sandinistas by supplying them with a cocaine purification plant disguised as a banana and coffee factory. While difficult, Commandante Valenciano ultimately decided to accept the offer with the understanding that he was being manipulated by the Soviets into selling cocaine to America.

Around the same period, Hot Coldman had become the CIA station chief in Latin America, eventually resulting in the founding of the Peace Walker Project, which aimed to ensure world peace by perfecting the theory of nuclear deterrence. Coldman believed that humans were incapable of true nuclear retaliation, which he felt was the primary weakness of nuclear deterrence theory. The Peace Walker project was Coldman's solution. A collection of mass-produced AI weapons that possess the capability to first detect a preemptive nuclear attack, then immediately retaliate with calculated precision. By mass-producing this capability, Coldman believed that nobody would be willing to launch a nuke in the first place, as by doing so they would only be ensuring their own destruction as well. To bring this idea to life, Coldman formed a group known as Peace Sentinel and allied with a KGB operative named Vladimir Zadornov, who agreed to provide Peace Sentinel with funding and technology in exchange for a foothold into Costa Rica. If all went as planned, Zadornov hoped that by covertly funding Peace Sentinel, which had clear ties to the CIA via Coldman, they could easily spread anti-American sentiment in Latin America. When combined with the KGB backing of the Sandinistas, the Soviets felt they had a clear lead in the mounting struggle for Latin America.

Following through with their agreement with the KGB, Peace Sentinel covertly invaded Costa Rica sometime in 1973 by posing as a multinational security firm that was hired by the Development Corporation of Costa Rica. After their initial invasion, Peace Sentinel set up various bases across the nation and began hiring mercenaries to maintain control over the country. It was at that point Huey Emmerich, who was working on a bipedal locomotion system for lunar rovers at NASA, caught the attention of Goldman, who shared his intention to close the nuclear deterrence loophole. Huey, wanting to impress his peers and enthralled by the idea of working to dismantle what his father helped create, accepted Coldman's offer. Not long after, Coldman used his CIA contacts to procure Granon's Metal Gear designs, which he gave to Huey to accelerate his research into bipedal locomotion. All that was left after that point was to find an expert in the highly advanced decision-making AI that would tie the entire project together, being the world's foremost expert on artificial intelligence. Strange Love became the obvious choice. While Huey designed the bipedal locomotion as well as the weapon system AIs, also known as the Reptile Pods, Strange Love was tasked by Coldman to develop an AI that was calculating, devoted, and of sound logic. Strange Love, of course, couldn't think of anyone better fit for the task than her late love, the Boss. Coldman agreed and gave Strange Love access to everything the CIA had on the Boss, including personal history, military records, physiological data, and practically everything else the Boss had ever done. Using this material, she began working on the far more complex Mammal Pod, an AI based on the Boss's memories and the compliment to Huey's Reptile Pod. If successful, Strange Love felt she would have effectively brought her love back to life. Not just her memories, but the Boss's mind as it was when she was alive. This, she hoped, would finally allow her to accomplish what she set out to do a decade prior. Learn the truth of the Boss's defection and clear her name.

Months later, Huey and Strange Love, alongside the rest of Peace Sentinel, ended up developing four unique AI-controlled weapons called Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon, and finally Peace Walker. Pupa was based on the design of the Shagohod, which Huey had found using Granon's research notes. Similar to its predecessor, Pupa was designed for speed, which called for the removal of the rear launcher and auger arms in favor of a more streamlined design. Chrysalis was created for aerial combat as well as airlifting capabilities. To this end, it was capable of lifting up to 500 tons and was equipped with unmanned drones called Kidnappers. Cocoon served as a moving fortress for Peace Sentinel. As such, it was outfitted with dozens of machine gun turrets, a mortar launcher, missile launchers, and various other defensive and offensive weapons. Last but not least was Peace Walker, which as its name suggests was the crown jewel of the Peace Walker project. Unlike the other machines, Peace Walker was the project's primary method of nuclear deterrence. When Peace Walker detected a nuclear strike, its two AI pods, Reptile and Mammal, would act as the weapon's brain, with the Mammal pod acting as the cerebrum, giving it advanced problem-solving capabilities, while the Reptile pod acted as the cerebellum, allowing it to take action. When combined, Peace Walker was capable of carrying out a devastating retaliatory attack on the most appropriate target as determined by the Mammal pod.

Sometime after the four weapons were constructed, Peace Sentinel stormed and captured the Sandinista's cocaine purification plant, resulting in the death of Commandante Dante Valenciano. Left his de facto Commandante, Amanda fled with Chico and the remaining Sandinistas to a boat house, which served as their final refuge.

By this point, around October of 1974, Strange Love, approaching the final phase of the Mammal Pod's development and therefore the Peace Walker project as a whole, attempted to verbally simulate Operation Snake Eater to discern the reason behind the Boss's defection. However, no matter what Strange Love attempted to do, the Mammal Pod would only ever come to the same conclusion. Using a Davy Crockett as a bargaining chip, the Boss would defect to the Soviet Union. And when her apprentice would eventually come after her, she would ultimately lay down her own life. Assuming some critical part of the Boss was missing, Strange Love decided to look to Snake for answers.

With the Mammal Pod nearly complete, Coldman began importing nuclear warheads into Costa Rica with the intention of launching a nuke, a necessary step in proving Peace Walker was a genuine threat, therefore ensuring its effectiveness as a nuclear deterrent. If successful, Coldman knew he could convince the CIA to fund the mass production of Peace Walker and subsequently get his old job back. It was also by this point Zero planned to secretly assist MSF's development, hoping it would allow him to build MSF into Cipher's ultimate deterrent, possibly get Snake back on his side, and keep tabs on Peace Walker. To accomplish this, Zero got into contact with Miller, who more than anyone else wanted MSF to succeed. Miller, seeing the value in Cipher's resources, accepted Zero's proposal under the condition that they were not allies nor enemies. They were simply business partners who provided each other with a valuable service.

It was around that point a handful of key events occurred. While the exact timing of these events are unclear, the evidence as presented alludes to the following order of occurrence. Sometime around mid to late 1974, Zadornov adopted the identity of Ramon Galvez, a professor at the University for Peace. He did so to acquire the assistance of MSF, who he wanted to use for two primary reasons. to shape the Sandinistas into a formidable army and to [ __ ] Peace Sentinel enough that he could take command of Peace Walker. He would then launch a nuke at Cuba, therefore instilling the at that point formidable Sandinista rebels with enough anti-American sentiment that they would forever side with the Soviets. No doubt aware of Zadornov's plan, Zero then tasked Pacifica Ocean with taking on the identity of Paz Ortega, a young peace-seeking student who had accompanied Zadornov, or rather Galvez, in contacting MSF. Because this task required only those capable of fooling Big Boss himself, Pacifica was brought to meet with Zero face to face at Zero's Safe House in Hell's Kitchen, New York. an extremely unique opportunity that not even Skullface had the privilege of doing. There she proved herself capable of taking on the identity of Paz, positioning herself alongside Galvez.

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In late October of 1974, Strange Love once again performed simulations with the Mammal Pod inside her lab. In these simulations, Strange Love talked the AI through a scenario in which the United States was under attack by the Soviets. Using this information, the Mammal Pod concluded that the best option was to strike an American Air Force base. When Strange Love questioned this decision, the AI simply stated that there was no reason to risk retaliation, as by doing so, it would only prolong humanity's suffering. When Strange Love accused it of siding with the enemy, the AI asked how exactly to define what an enemy was in a world without borders. Moving on, Strange Love presented it with further scenarios, always finding that it was loyal to a fault.

At this exact same time, a French ornithologist named Cecile was studying birds outside the lab. While doing so, she accidentally recorded Strange Love and the Mammal Pod's conversation. Directly afterward, Strange Love heard Cecile approached the lab, resulting in her capture. It was after that point, around November 1st, Paz found Cecile's tape recording of the Mammal Pod and was then apprehended by Peace Sentinel. Not long after, she escaped her captors and returned the tape to Galvez. It was at that point Miller, aware of Galvez and Paz's identities, reached out to the two of them to set up a meeting with MSF in Colombia. Of course, Miller knew that Galvez and Paz would try to use them to further their own causes. He simply hoped that MSF could grow big enough by the time that happened that they could eventually stop it themselves.

On November 4th, while training MSF soldiers in Colombia, Snake was interrupted by Miller, who introduced him to Galvez and Paz. Galvez, attempting to hire MSF, informed Snake of a covert military force that had been spotted in Costa Rica. In exchange for their help uncovering the identity of this military, Galvez offered MSF an offshore plant in the Caribbean, which they could use as a permanent headquarters. Given that MSF wanted to cut ties to any and all nations, the platform's position in international waters would give them far more agency in their operations. While Miller was eager to accept the offer, Snake urged Galvez to seek a political solution. After all, he did supposedly work for the University for Peace. As Galvez and Paz awaited an answer outside, Miller attempted to convince Snake to reconsider Galvez's offer, noting the advantage of having a permanent base for MSF. Snake, however, was concerned that if they finally settled down, they would eventually have to resort to the same deterrence tactics as any other nation, shaping them into the very warmongers they sought to break away from. Snake then noted that if Galvez was correct in assuming the force had CIA ties, it stood to reason that that meant Galvez himself was KGB. After inviting them back inside, Snake alluded to Galvez's true identity, allowing Galvez to drop the facade and reveal the true reason why he was there. Still not enough for Snake, Galvez then showed him Cecile's recording of the Boss AI, knowing it would be more than enough to reel him in.

Over the next 5 days, Miller moved MSF operations to their new offshore headquarters, which he dubbed Mother Base. Despite the poor state of the plant, Miller was hopeful that they could eventually transform it into the Outer Heaven both he and Snake had always envisioned.

On November 10th, Snake infiltrated Costa Rica, where he quickly learned that Peace Sentinel were transporting nukes via barge to a location in the mountains called Ezeroo. Requiring more information about the environment, Snake was then tasked with making contact with the Sandinista Commandante at a nearby boat house. Unaware that he had died weeks earlier, he was instead met by Amanda and Chico. As Amanda shared her knowledge of Peace Sentinel's activities with Snake, Chrysalis ambushed the group and eventually kidnapped Chico. While Amanda and the Sandinistas chased after Chrysalis, Snake followed their trail to a supply depot that was guarded by an APC. Once it was destroyed, Snake spotted Amanda just as she was yanked into the air by a kidnapper. When the kidnapper was dealt with, Amanda requested that Snake rescue Chico for her, promising that he would have valuable information about Peace Sentinel's transport routes. Not long after, Amanda passed out from her wounds, prompting Snake to send her to Mother Base.

When Snake eventually found Chico, he learned that the nukes he was after would ultimately be transferred to a truck, which on its way to Eizeru would disappear through a tunnel. Though Chico assumed this to be the work of a spirit named Elb Basiliscoco, Snake knew it had something to do with whatever the CIA was working on in Eizeroo. Afterwards, Chico revealed that he told his captors the location of his fellow Sandinistas. Though deeply ashamed of this, Chico was convinced by Snake to move past his mistake to become a new man and dedicate himself to Snake's cause. Immediately afterward, Snake sent Chico to Mother Base, then moved to intercept the nuclear cargo at a train terminal. When he arrived, however, the cargo had already been moved onto trucks, which had made their way into the tunnel to Eizeroo. Just then, a tank blocked off the tunnel, forcing Snake to take an alternate path. When Snake finally arrived at the Eizeroo facility, he found the nukes had already been offloaded. Investigating further, Snake stumbled upon Coldman and Huey discussing Coldman's plan to use Peace Walker to launch a nuke. Huey thought the idea insane, stating that he joined Peace Walker to stop a nuclear war, not incite one. No longer needing him, Coldman pushed Huey down a set of stairs and left the facility while Snake and Huey met. Soon after, Peace Walker was airlifted out of the facility by Chrysalis, while Pupa was deployed to stop Snake. When Snake eventually crippled it, Huey instructed him to climb inside the AI pod and strip it for valuable parts before it was ejected. After the pod ejected, Snake conversed with Huey about Coldman's motives and planned to use Peace Walker. Afterwards, he gave Snake the location of Strange Love's lab and tasked him with destroying the Mammal Pod to stop Peace Walker.

Over the next nine days, while Snake traveled to Strange Love's lab, Huey and Miller cooked up the idea for MSF's own bipedal weapon that they dubbed Metal Gear Zeke. Metal Gear in reference to Granon's original design, and Zeke, which was a code name given to certain Japanese aircraft during World War II. During this same period, Cecile, who had been captive for weeks at this point, escaped from Strange Love's lab with nothing but the clothes on her back.

On November 19th, Snake on his way to Strange Love's lab encountered Cecile. While she didn't know much, she did know that the voice she recorded and the one Snake heard originated from the Mammal Pod, piquing Snake's interest even further. When Snake eventually entered the lab, he encountered Strange Love alongside the Boss's horse, which Strange Love had found sometime in the past decade. Wasting no time, Strange Love immediately criticized Snake for killing the Boss. Snake, of course, shared that he was told he had to in order to prevent a nuclear catastrophe, a fact that Strange Love couldn't accept. Despite this, she invited Snake to meet with the Mammal Pod, likely hoping that their interaction would be the final key to perfecting the pod. After learning of the reasons why Strange Love modeled it after the Boss, Snake entered the pod and eventually passed out. Minutes later, Snake awoke to see the Mammal Pod being transported from the lab. Soon after, Chrysalis confronted Snake. When Chrysalis was defeated, Miller pointed Snake 15 miles north toward a quarry that served as a front for the Peace Walker development facility. Using the Boss's horse, Snake traveled to the quarry over the next 2 days, finally arriving on November 21st. As he entered the quarry, Snake was confronted by Cocoon. Like he did with Pupa and Chrysalis, Snake took the machine down before stripping it for components. Snake then traveled inside the facility where he found Coldman and Strange Love preparing Peace Walker for its final test. With little time, Snake infiltrated the Mammal Pod, attempting to converse with the AI before ultimately deciding to destroy it. Just then, Snake was ambushed by Coldman, who explained that his grand plan was put at risk by both MSF and the ongoing SALT 2 negotiations, both of which he planned to end in one swift move. After capturing Snake, Strange Love interrogated him to learn the truth behind the Boss's death. Snake, of course, knew that she had died a hero loyal to her country. Yet, he couldn't reveal the truth as he knew that it was the only thing Strange Love needed to complete the Mammal Pod, and therefore Peace Walker. So Snake repeated the lie that the Boss was nothing more than a traitor. Despite this, Strange Love saw through the facade, finally realizing that it was Snake's mission to kill the Boss and the Boss's mission to be killed by him. At last, Strange Love had the final piece she needed to fully realize the Mammal Pod and bring her beloved back to life. Unable to pry the truth out of him, Snake was taken to a cell. After a quick escape, he doubled back toward Peace Walker to destroy it once and for all.

When Snake arrived to do so, he found Coldman had gotten his hands on Paz and that Strange Love had finished the Mammal Pod. Coldman then informed Snake that his plan was to destroy Mother Base, therefore ending the threat MSF posed and proving his theory of nuclear deterrence. Furthermore, the nuclear fallout of the strike would devastate the surrounding fishing and farming economies, giving Peace Sentinel a vast workforce to help mass-produce Peace Walker. As Peace Walker ascended to the surface, Snake fired a single bullet at the machine. Little did he know, Peace Walker was incapable of a preemptive strike. However, this single bullet allowed the machine to activate its self-defense system to battle against Snake. After a long battle, Snake nearly crippled the machine. Just then, a Peace Sentinel helicopter fired a shot at Peace Walker, causing it to switch target priority to the helicopter, which they used to lead it away. Using the Boss's horse, Snake chased after Peace Walker. When they eventually encountered a steep slope, the horse, loyal to Snake's commands, continued to press onward, eventually plummeting to the ground just as Peace Walker reached water. Unable to catch up to Peace Walker, Snake turned back to check on the horse. With no means of saving it, Snake, thinking back to how he ended his late mentor, put the horse out of its misery.

2 days later, Snake arrived in Lago Cosibula, Nicaragua, where Peace Walker was going to launch the nuke. That same day, President Ford and General Secretary Brezhnev continued SALT 2 negotiations in Vladivostok, Russia, hoping to come to an agreement to limit their nation's nuclear arsenals. In Nicaragua, meanwhile, Snake infiltrated a United States missile base which Peace Sentinel was using to carry out their attack. After reaching the communications tower, Snake got into contact with Paz, who informed him that Coldman was headed for the control tower to enter Peace Walker's final launch data. Meanwhile, Miller had MSF evacuate Mother Base, leaving behind only a skeleton crew of soldiers to man the base. As MSF created a blockade around the missile base, Snake finally reached the control tower. Learning from Coldman that to carry out their attack, he planned to send false data to Peace Walker to force it to launch a nuke. Just as Cold Goldman was explaining this, Galvez, or rather Vladimir Zadornov, entered the room, revealing to Coldman his true plan of using Peace Walker to launch a nuke at Cuba. In doing so, America would be seen as the villains of the Cold War, and anti-American sentiment would spread like wildfire across Latin America, giving the Soviets a great deal of leverage over the United States and ending the age of deterrence. Zadornov then grabbed hold of Paz and commanded her to shoot Coldman. When she couldn't, he fired the gun for her, wounding Coldman just enough that he was able to carry out the attack on Cuba. Zadornov then revealed to Snake his true plan of manipulating MSF into shaping the Sandinistas into a formidable army and the KGB's puppets. Yet Zadornov miscalculated the allegiance of the Sandinistas. As just then, Amanda, Chico, and their fellow Sandinistas confronted Zadornov. Surrounded, Zadornov and Coldman were taken prisoner by MSF while Snake elected to stay behind to finally destroy Peace Walker.

Meanwhile, Coldman used the last of his strength to enter the final launch data, which he had altered to also include a false signal sent from Peace Walker to NORAD, indicating a Soviet nuclear strike. If his plan worked, his final moments would be spent proving that the United States would not carry out a retaliatory attack and that Peace Walker was the only true means at which they would create true nuclear deterrence. Following Coldman's untimely death, Snake confronted Peace Walker for the final time. After an extremely lengthy battle, Snake eventually crippled Peace Walker, stopping the launch, but not the transmission to NORAD. Believing the nuclear strike data to be legitimate, NORAD sent news of an immediate nuclear attack to the Pentagon. Unable to contact President Ford as he was occupied at the SALT 2 negotiations, the decision to retaliate was primarily given to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the highest-ranking military officer. Just 12 short minutes until they believed the nukes would hit. They decided to go through with the retaliation, proving Coldman wrong. With no way to stop the signal, Snake commanded Huey to get him in touch with NORAD. Once accomplished, Snake used the one thing he knew would pique their interest, his title of Big Boss. Just as Snake planned, the Chairman accepted the call. However, he still required proof that he was indeed talking to the real Big Boss. Snake reasoned that if the Chairman knew the name of Big Boss, it meant he was there at the ceremony where he was given the title. The Chairman then confirmed Snake's assumption, leading Snake to share that he refused to shake the CIA director's hand, a fact that only those present at the time would actually know. Trusting the words of America's greatest soldier, the Chairman immediately called off the retaliation. However, the others refused to do so.

At that very moment, the Mammal Pod made itself vulnerable, which to everyone else seemed completely unexpected. However, Snake knew that this was proof that at least in some small way, the Mammal Pod did indeed harbor the true will of the Boss. Only she would sacrifice herself for the greater good of humanity. So, it stood to reason that her AI would do the same, allowing Snake to end it like he did the Boss. In doing so, the Peace Walker AI was dealt a great deal of trauma. Similar to the real brain, this trauma was compensated for by transferring a small amount of the Mammal Pod's last will over to the remaining healthy part of the brain, that being the Reptile Pod, which while primitive, continued to transmit the signal. In a last-ditch effort to stop the transmission, Snake fired everything he had at Peace Walker. After damaging it enough, something within the Reptile Pod snapped, giving that small amount of the Mammal Pod that still remained complete control over Peace Walker's actions. Free to make its own choice, Peace Walker, acting on the Boss's will rather than calculated logic, chose to march into the water, therefore ending the transmission. At that same time, Snake threw the Boss's bandana into the water. Over the past decade, the Boss had been the only thing he refused to abandon, the one burden that kept him from his true evolution. But by abandoning his bandana, by unshackling himself from the Boss and her sacrifice, Snake had shed his skin, finally becoming the legendary Big Boss.

In the immediate wake of the Peace Walker incident, Zadornov was taken into MSF custody while both Paz and Strange Love were somewhat absorbed into the organization. With Huey and Strange Love working together, MSF was finally able to complete Metal Gear Zeke using salvaged components from the various Peace Walker project weapons. Among these was Peace Walker's nuclear warhead that they recovered from the bottom of Lake Nicaragua. Concerned about its potential environmental impact and even more so about MSF's vulnerability, Miller urged Big Boss to install the warhead on Zeke. Miller argued that deterrence was essential, that only by possessing the power to strike back could MSF avoid being struck first. Though reluctant, Big Boss ultimately agreed, realizing that if MSF was to survive as a nation without borders, it would need to play by a different set of rules.

In the days after MSF became the world's seventh nuclear power, Zadornov, with the help of Paz, escaped from MSF numerous times. Each time Big Boss was forced to retrieve him, giving Paz an opportunity to modify Zeke with a water-filled manned cockpit. The water acting as a method of crude suspension for the operator. It was during this time MSF created an annual festival called Peace Day. Miller, who was quite fond of the idea, pressured Paz and Zadornov to help him perform a song all about peace since all their names roughly translated to peace. While internally Paz viewed herself as a hardened spy, she soon grew quite fond of the idea and Peace Day as a whole.

Just under one week later, Miller informed Zero of Zeke's completion, prompting Zero to order Paz to hijack it. Paz, who had truly come to enjoy her time on Mother Base, wanted to buy herself enough time to take part in Peace Day. So, she freed the door knob for a final time, waited until nobody was watching, then snuck into the hangar. Inside, she attempted to sabotage Zeke just long enough to delay her ultimate duty. Just then, Chico spotted her. Though she knew that killing him was the only true way to secure her identity, she couldn't bring herself to do so. Instead, she decided to follow through with Zero's orders by hijacking Zeke.

After finding then killing Zadornov aboard Mother Base, Big Boss was informed of Zeke's hijacking. When he went to stop it, he saw Paz in the pilot seat. It was then Paz told Big Boss of her true allegiance and identity. She then offered him an opportunity to ally with Zero, becoming the sword and shield of Cipher, their ultimate deterrent. When Big Boss refused, Paz was forced to resort to plan B, using Zeke to destroy Big Boss, then launch a nuke at the east coast of the United States. This would not only end Big Boss's influence, but make MSF a worldwide pariah, unifying the world against Zero's greatest threat. Following a long and difficult battle, Big Boss arose triumphant, crippling Zeke and hurling Paz into the ocean. Directly afterward, Miller revealed the reason why he reached out to Zadornov and Paz in the first place, explaining that the Cold War was destined to come to an end, replaced by an era of anti-terrorism and regional conflicts, a world where war was a business, and that they alone had the opportunity to build it with MSF at the forefront. Big Boss, however, stated that their interference with Peace Walker put them on the radar of the global superpowers, meaning that they had no choice but to become a superpower themselves. This wasn't a battle of ideology, but one of evolution. Big Boss knew that their way of life was a threat to the world and that the world would sooner destroy them than adapt.

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Around 1975, Cipher excavated an ancient cadaver from a permafrost region that was infected with what would later be dubbed vocal cord parasites. Seeing the utility in using these to target specific ethnicities, Cipher had Dr. Clark resurrect the parasites using a method called reverse evolution. While the specifics are unclear, this method involved finding a relative of the parasite that was originally discovered by the Chinese philosophers and mutating it to match a common ancestor of both the vocal cord parasite and its Chinese relative. Once that was accomplished, they forced it to evolve down the other path until they effectively brought the vocal cord parasite back to life. Yet sometime after the parasite was resurrected, Cipher abandoned the project in favor of developing a weapon that could target individual genetic profiles rather than entire ethnicities.

Sometime around the mid to late 1970s, an excavation team in the Sahel region of central Africa discovered a hominid skull that Cipher dubbed Sahelanthropus, meaning man of Sahel. Further research made it evident that the skull's unique shape and positioning meant Sahelanthropus walked upright a whole three million years prior to Orrorin tugenensis, the then oldest known bipedal hominid. Given that Cipher was working on groundbreaking genetic research, they opted to cover up the discovery to control the narrative of human evolution.

In the immediate aftermath of the Peace Walker incident, Zero, observing advancements in digital information technology such as AI and the ARPANET, knew that all of his efforts in recent years would be made irrelevant by the next era of humanity, an era that would be controlled entirely by digital information. Zero knew that machines, specifically AIs, were not bound by the constraints of individualism. Acting as a collective, he believed that they would become a unifying force to enact his ultimate goal. Thus, to remain at the apex of humanity's evolution, Zero pivoted Cipher's goals to focus on digital information processing. Doing so without hesitation, Zero used the data he learned from Peace Walker to begin the initial stages of creating an advanced AI network to unite the world. It's suggested that when Skullface learned of this plan, he finally decided that Zero had to be stopped before his plan could result in the complete domination of the English language. Believing this to be a gross misinterpretation of the Boss's will, which he believed to be unity via deterrence, Skullface decided it was time to make his move to act in opposition to Zero and kill the one person he held just as dearly as the Boss. To accomplish this task, Skullface took XOF to Cuba, where they took command of a United States black site called Camp Omega. Not long after, Skullface got reports that Paz had survived her battle with Big Boss and had been rescued by

A crew of Blelesian fishermen. When he eventually had her in his custody, he took her prisoner to Camp Omega, where he planned to torture her to learn more about MSF and Zero's location.

Around mid-February 1975, Strange Love and Huey completed the reconstruction of Metal Gear Zeke. With no other reason to stay, Strange Love then left Mother Base.

About a week later, the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency contacted MSF, informing them that they had reason to believe MSF was in possession of a nuclear weapon, as they had observed them purchasing nuclear fuel from Usbekiststan. Miller, believing this to be the work of Cipher, shared the information with Big Boss, who told him to refuse the inspection, as the United Nations had zero jurisdiction over them. However, soon after the refusal arrived, Huey independently sent the UN a letter in which he stated that MSF had changed their minds and were willing to fully cooperate with the United Nations to prove they did not possess nukes.

When Miller and Big Boss learned of this, they knew that their hands were tied and another refusal would arouse suspicion. So, the plan became to embrace the inspection and fully cooperate. Over the coming weeks, MSF prepared Mother Base for the UN inspection by hiding Zeke on the ocean floor and evacuating all civilians apart from Huey from the base.

By March 4th, Amanda, who was on assignment in Cuba, learned of P's imprisonment at Camp Omega. After informing MSF of this, Big Boss and Miller decided to send Chico to Amanda in Havana, Cuba, to keep his mind off the upcoming inspection and Paw's imprisonment. However, while the ship that was transporting him was refueling in Santiago de Cuba, Chico escaped with the intention of rescuing Paw himself.

Around March 7th, Chico arrived at Camp Omega. While searching for Paw's in the Southeast prison camp, Chico was caught by guard dogs, violently restrained, and thrown into a cage alongside his tape recorder. A little later, the guards dumped a young woman in Chico's cage. While he did not recognize her at first due to her buzzed hair, Chico eventually recognized her as Paw.

A few days after Chico's arrival, Paw was ripped from her cage, where she was then tortured and interrogated by Skullface daily for information about Cipher. On March 12th, Chico was taken from his cage and escorted to P's location. Upon arrival, Skullface hit Chico multiple times, noting the unlikelihood of rescue and the impossibility of escape. With his situation clearly laid out, Skullface then tore the clothes off Paw, revealing the result of his torture and ordering his men to pause in full view of Chico. Afterwards, he pulled Chico toward Paw and threatened to string him up unless he her as well. Unwilling to do so, he revealed the details of MSF to Skullface, including the location of Mother Base, their approximate population, and the existence of Metal Gear Zeke.

With that and the knowledge that the UN was conducting an inspection of Mother Base, Skullface began to formulate a plan that involved luring Big Boss to Camp Omega, while XOF posed as UN inspectors to destroy Mother Base and assassinate Big Boss. The next day, Skullface planned to pit Chico and Paw against one another by telling Paw that Chico had revealed information about MSF and forcing Chico to whip Paw. Afterwards, Skullface met with Chico in his cage, explaining that they were handing Paw off to Big Boss under the condition that Chico was left behind. When Chico took the bait, Skullface offered him a chance to escape, but only if he agreed to record an SOS message for Big Boss.

A day or two later, Chico recorded the SOS message, at which point he was then dragged back to his cage. Sometime later, Skullface interrogated Paw for the location of Zero, as Paw was the last person to see him since he and Big Boss parted ways. When Skullface finally managed to break her, she told him of Zero's location in New York.

The following day, MSF received Chico's SOS. While Big Boss was hesitant to leave Mother Base during the time of the inspection, he knew that Paw was their only connection to Cipher. So, backed by only a single support helicopter camedo and a trusted medic, Big Boss made his way to Camp Omega.

During this period of chaos, XOF spies aboard Mother Base successfully planted C4 on the legs of Mother Base. Simultaneously, Skullface and XOF prepared Paw for surgery, planning to use her as a Trojan horse to kill Big Boss while they destroyed Mother Base. To do so, they put her to sleep before cutting her open, removing all of her nonvital organs, and placing two explosives inside of her. One in her intestines and the other in Well, a place Big Boss would never think to look. With the bombs in place, Paw was given a survival window of less than 24 hours, giving Big Boss just enough time to rescue her, but not enough time to save her. Making matters worse, he followed this act by returning Chico's recorder. Knowing that when Chico was rescued, Big Boss would listen to what Chico had recorded over the past week. With the trap set, XOF and Skullface evacuated from Camp Omega, leaving behind their XOF patches to pose as UN inspectors for Mother Base.

Simultaneously, at exactly midnight on March 16th, 1975, Big Boss infiltrated Camp Omega. After sneaking to the Eastern Prison camp, Big Boss found and secured Chico. As Morpho arrived to pick up Chico, Big Boss asked Chico about P's status. Chico, adamant that Paw was dead, handed Big Boss a recording that pointed him toward Paw's location. When Chico was safe aboard Morpho, Big Boss followed the sounds of the tape recorder to the heart of the camp's main facility where Paw was being held.

After Big Boss returned to Morpho with Paw, Chico discovered the surgery scars on Paw's torso. No time to waste, Big Boss ordered the medic to remove the bomb. Afterwards, Huey contacted Big Boss to inform him of the arrival of the UN inspectors, optimistically proclaiming that by the time they were finished, MSF would be the poster boys of world peace. Shortly after, Huey led the inspectors to the control tower of MSF at their request. Using the central control tower, XOF had practically complete control over Mother Base, which they used to [ __ ] MSF and capture Huey. Not even hours later, Morpho arrived to see Mother Base in flames. While Big Boss did everything he could to help Miller and his fellow MSF soldiers in their battle, XOF had already done their job. In the end, all he could do was save Miller as Mother Base sank to the bottom of the ocean.

Miller, devastated by the collapse of what he viewed as his life's work, looked to Paw for retribution, ordering her to start talking. Startled by this, Paw finally gained clarity. Stumbling to the doors of the helicopter, she informed them of the second bomb, then leapt from the chopper. Just then, the explosive detonated, predicting the explosion, the medic shielded Big Boss from the fire, impaling him with over a 100 pieces of shrapnel and shredding his left arm. Damaged by the explosion, Morpho spun out into an adjacent XOF chopper, killing Chico and the pilot, as well as mortally wounding Big Boss, Miller, and the medic.

Not long after the attack, Zero got word of the disaster, which prompted him to send choppers to the scene to check on the status of Big Boss. Soon enough, they found the only survivors of the attack on Mother Base: Miller, Big Boss, and the medic. Despite their many disagreements, Zero decided to assist Big Boss by fabricating a misinformation campaign that kept the world from understanding the truth behind the incident and that Big Boss had managed to survive. Using this as a smoke screen, he then transported the three survivors to a hospital in Colombia, where Big Boss quickly fell into a coma.

When Zero was given the news of Big Boss's condition, he immediately formulated an ambitious plan that would keep something like this from ever happening again. This plan involved subjecting the medic to a great deal of both physical and psychological experiments with the ultimate goal of creating a perfect body double, a phantom of the legend himself. To do so, the medic was put into a state of hypnogogia, the veil between sleep and lucidity. It was in this state they planned to use powerful suggestions to imbue the medic with the memories and skills of Big Boss and later perform surgery to make him look the part. If all went as planned, not even the medic would understand his true nature, chalking up any discrepancies as side effects of the lengthy coma.

Trying to keep only those he trusted involved, Zero contacted Eva, who agreed to head the operation, which was to take place at a remote British military hospital on the island of Cyprus. As the medic and Big Boss were being transported to Cyprus, Zero informed Ocelot that he was in no way involved with the attack, but that he had an idea of who it was. He then followed this by sharing where Big Boss was being sent, his own illness, and his intention of handing the responsibilities of looking after Big Boss over to Ocelot. When Ocelot had a clear understanding of what was being asked of him, Zero told him that there was one final thing he would need to know. However, it would be best if he saw it himself when he arrived in Cyprus.

Sometime after this, Miller recovered from his injuries, where he was then contacted by Zero. Similar to his conversation with Ocelot, Zero told Miller that he had nothing to do with the attack on Mother Base and that he would provide him with financial support so he could continue doing his mercenary work while Big Boss was in a coma. Afterwards, he assured Miller that he wished to someday see him and Big Boss reunite, promising that he would be informed of his awakening with the phrase "V has come too." What he did not explain was that this phrase did not indicate the awakening of Big Boss, but of his body double, which Miller would be made to believe was the one and only Big Boss. While Miller accepted Zero's assistance, he assured him that when Big Boss did wake up, they would first go after whoever destroyed MSF, then go after Zero himself.

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The world's reaction to the destruction of MSF was fairly short-lived. As with no clear culprit, the media could only blame money-minded private militias. When it was later revealed that the United States was one of MSF's primary clients, the Secretary of Defense had no choice but to deny any and all involvement. Similarly, reports suggested that shortly before the incident, the International Atomic Energy Agency had visited the site for a nuclear inspection. However, both the UN and the IAEA stated that quote, "No such inspection took place."

In Africa, meanwhile, news of MSF's nuclear capabilities and subsequent destruction prompted South Africa to accelerate its own nuclear program in secret out of fear that other private militias would soon follow MSF's lead. It was around that same time Zero punished Skullface for his defiance by stripping him of his political influence and exiling him to Africa. With time, however, Cipher began to ease up on surveillance, giving Skullface just enough wiggle room to reestablish a private military, the answer to him and him alone.

It was after that point Skullface began looking into other promising research involving microbes, eventually stumbling upon Code Talker's Archa. However, instead of viewing it as a way to dispose of uranium, Skullface envisioned it as a method to enrich it into weapons-grade uranium. Of course, Code Talker saw this as a despicable use of his discovery. However, he was forced to go along with it when Skullface held the Navajo people hostage.

While in Skullface's custody, Code Talker managed to create an artificial variant of Archa he called metallic Archa that could metabolize metal. However, he would later discover that a small subset of metallic Archa could also enrich uranium when stored inside yellow cake, a product of the traditional uranium enrichment process. It was during the same period Skullface learned of Code Talker's research with vocal cord parasites. Fascinated by the power of language himself, Skullface used Cipher resources to procure a sample of Dr. Clark's vocal cord parasite, which he ordered Code Talker to evolve to solely identify language as well as make it lethal and transmissible.

To accomplish this, Skullface had Code Talker selectively breed parasites inside a factory in the Enumba Industrial Zone, Central Africa, that would become known by the locals as the Devil's House. The selective breeding process involved kidnapping hundreds of people from local communities, infecting them with vocal cord parasites, making an incision into the patients' vocal cords, and implanting an acoustic tube that was hooked up to tape recorders. At that point, the vocal cords of the patients were then subjected to an endless loop of randomized dialogue from a specific language. Over time, this would train a small percentage of the parasites to recognize the patterns in a specific language and use it as their signal to hatch from the larynx of the host and migrate to the lungs where they would then mature. The small percentage that responded were then bred over countless generations until they had a strain of the parasite where enough of them would respond that they would migrate to the host's lungs, mature, and literally consume them from the inside out.

When lethality was accomplished, all that was left was to repeat this process for literally thousands of languages across the planet. The most important of which was the English strain, which Skullface was forced to develop in secret so as to not risk Zero discovering it. If everything went as planned, Skullface would use the English strain of the parasite in combination with Metallic Archa to enact his ultimate plan of stopping Zero and unifying the world. By using the English strain, he planned to wipe English off the face of the earth, therefore liberating the world of its greatest parasite. Furthermore, Metallic Archa would allow him to sell accessible and affordable uranium enrichment to developing nations that did not have access to enrichment infrastructure. By doing so, nearly every nation on Earth would have access to nuclear arms, leveling the playing field and keeping America and other dominant nations from using their nuclear arsenals with absolute impunity. Skullface thought that by utilizing both, he would keep the world in a delicate state of balance. One where the world was forced to quote "respect their neighbors" and where one single nation, ideology, or language could not supersede any other.

However, one thing was missing with this plan. Skullface knew that in order to market the necessity for developing nations to develop nuclear weapons, they would need some kind of external threat to scare them into doing so. To accomplish this, he partnered with the Soviet Union, offering to oversee the production of a new Metal Gear, provided the Soviets supplied them with funding, resources, and land to construct it.

Sometime after the agreement was made, Skullface commanded Huey to develop the Metal Gear under two conditions. It had to have man controls and walk completely upright, unlike Zeke, which was hunched over to achieve balance. Given the latter requirement and Cipher's discovery sometime prior, the Metal Gear would come to be known as Sahalanthropus.

When production of Sahalanthropus began sometime around the mid to late 1970s, Huey used everything he learned from the Peace Walker project to design his new Metal Gear. As such, his grand vision was to combine the practicality of an AI system with the requirement for man controls. The result was a hybrid system which would use PA's water-filled cockpit design to achieve man controls while the AI would manage the posture control to achieve the balance necessary for fully upright bi-pedal movement. Compromising on Skullface's insistence for a fully manned system, Huey planned to place the AI pod inside the machine itself, as the exterior placement proved to be a critical design flaw for Peace Walker.

While the exact timing is unknown, it's likely that while developing Sahalanthropus, Huey made himself a pair of metallic Archa-ed exoskeleton legs. Using the same technology, he later developed plans for mass-produced bipedal weapons called walker gears, which were meant to be used primarily by the Soviets. However, at some point, Skullface opted to monopolize the technology as he saw promise in equipping them with nuclear warheads and selling them to developing nations. However, as a means of control, Skullface opted to place metallic Archa inside the detonator itself, which would allow him to stop any nuclear launch by destroying the detonator if the target happened to be one he disagreed with.

On November 11th, 1975, the African nation of Angola finally gained independence from Portugal after centuries of colonial rule. In the wake of this, three rival nationalist groups rose to take power: the MPLA, UNITA, and the FNLA. The conflict quickly escalated into a full-scale civil war, with the MPLA receiving support from the East, such as the Soviet Union, while UNITA and the FNLA were backed by the United States, South Africa, and other Western nations.

In 1976, Leonib was scrapped when the ATGC closed their accounts with DARPA. While this seemingly had no effect on David, who continued to live his life in America, jumping from one foster home to another, his brother Eli was taken to England. While it is ultimately unknown, it's presumably around this period that Eli, the dominant clone, would begin to understand his true nature as Big Boss's clone. In the process, he would be led to believe that his brother David was knowingly given the superior genes and that he was given what was left over. While entirely untrue, Eli believed that this destined him to a life of inferiority. As such, he dedicated his life to surpassing the legacy of his father.

That same year, Miller, using the funds given to him by Zero, began building his mercenary network in Rhodesia to capitalize on the civil wars in the region. By that same point, Skullface had successfully developed an unnamed parasite strain that left its hosts brain dead. Seeing an opportunity to break free from Zero's grasp, Skullface made an exact replica of the Boss's winged dagger pin that he had procured sometime prior, laced it with the mysterious parasite, and shipped it to a certain safe house in Hell's Kitchen. Upon its arrival, Zero, believing it to be a gift, gave Skullface a call to thank him for returning it. While examining it, however, Zero accidentally pricked his finger with it, infecting him with the parasite. Minutes later, Zero began to feel the effects of the parasite, forcing him to confront the reality of Skullface's betrayal. As Zero began to fall prey to the parasite, Skullface told him that his and Big Boss's interpretation of the Boss's will were incorrect and that he would continue the work. True to his word, by the late 1970s, Skullface would usurp control of Cipher.

Following Skullface's betrayal, Zero used his remaining resources to buy him as much time as he could. As his health deteriorated, he collaborated with Donald Anderson to create an AI network designed to carry on his will after his passing. Determined to avoid another incident like Peace Walker, they stripped the system of the ability to act autonomously. Instead, they designed a specialized framework in which the AI, bound by strict rules, would filter vast amounts of data before passing it on to human operators, subtly guiding their decision-making. Envisioned as a system of the people, by the people, and for the people, it was dubbed the Patriots.

After the Patriots AI was initially envisioned, they began intensive research to bring the idea to life. To do so, they enlisted DARPA's support and brought Strange Love onto the project. However, sometime later, she was forcibly removed, and all evidence of her presence at DARPA, including the reason for her removal, were wiped from the record.

The following year, Zero's condition had gotten much worse. Wanting to make one last trip before he went into permanent hiding, Zero used his government contacts to cause a blackout in New York to aid in his escape. Afterwards, he acquired assistance from his old colleagues at the SAS to plan a trip to a certain hospital in Cyprus. There, he met with a comatose Big Boss, explaining that by the time he woke up, he would no longer be the same man he knew, and that it was unlikely they would ever meet again, as his location was hidden within the code of a machine. When Zero finally made his peace, he practically disappeared off the face of the Earth, only leaving behind detailed instructions for Donald Anderson on how to operate the Patriots AI. Not long after, Zero fell into a permanent vegetative state, leaving the Patriots AI to carry on his will.

On April 27th, 1978, the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan, or the PDPA, successfully overthrew the government of Afghanistan, immediately establishing a communist government in place of their previous monarchy.

In 1979, Eli escaped his handlers in England and subsequently fled to Africa. That same year, in the tail end of the Rhodesian Civil War, a man named Frank Joerger killed the parents of a little girl who would later take the name of Naomi Hunter. Struck by guilt, Frank decided to take Naomi in as his own sister, allowing her to live out a semi-normal life, all the while unaware that her older brother was responsible for her parents' death.

Around the same time, a young child burdened with telepathic and telekinetic abilities unintentionally dove into the mind of his father. Viewing the hatred his father held for him because his mother had died giving birth to him, the child's subconscious lashed out in self-defense. When the child came to, he found his entire village engulfed in flames. Left without a past or future, the child was later taken into custody by the Soviet Union.

In July of 1979, Amanda finally led the Sandinistas to victory in Nicaragua by successfully pressuring President Somoza to resign by surrounding the capital, Managua. The following day, Somoza was exiled by the Sandinistas, where he then fled to America. With definitive rule over the nation, the Sandinistas established a socialist government and attempted to rebuild what little was left of their nation.

About 6 months later, on Christmas Eve of 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan to support the struggling communist government established by the PDPA the year prior. However, both Soviet forces and the PDPA were met with fierce resistance from the Mujahedeen, a loose alliance of Islamist and nationalist guerrilla factions.

Sometime after the war started, Ocelot, wanting to divert attention away from Cyprus and swept up in old Russian pride, began dedicating a portion of his time to help with the invasion efforts. In doing so, the Mujahedeen gave him the alias Shalashshaska, a combination of the words Sharashka, meaning "hastily thrown together organization," and Shashka, a type of sword.

Around this same period, Huey successfully shrunk the size of Sahalanthropus' AI pod to about a tenth of the size of those used in the Peace Walker project without compromising on computational speed. Despite this, the pod still left no room in the cockpit for a proper pilot, forcing Huey to abandon the idea for man controls in favor of a fully AI system, likely hoping that Skullface wouldn't much care how the weapon was controlled as long as it was functional. After struggling to accomplish this goal himself, however, Huey recruited Strange Love, who suggested they recover parts of Peace Walker, most notably the Mammal Pod from Lake Nicaragua. To accomplish this, Strange Love got into contact with Amanda, simply telling her that she needed the parts of Peace Walker to continue her research and that the rest was a secret. Following the chain of command, Amanda passed the request on to the new Nicaraguan administration, who approved of the recovery. Not long after, Lake Nicaragua was dredged and Soviet military aircraft were used to transfer parts of Peace Walker back to Afghanistan.

Finally reunited with the mammal pod, Strange Love got to work developing Sahalanthropus' AI alongside Huey. It was during this time that Huey and Strange Love conceived a child. Nine months later, Strange Love gave birth to a boy. Drawing from their shared love of science fiction and pop culture, they named the boy Hal. It was likely around that same time that Huey finally managed to get Sahalanthropus to stand upright by lowering its center of gravity. Yet, the problem of how to retain this posture in addition to bi-pedal locomotion would prove to be their greatest challenge yet.

In the years after the attack on Mother Base, the world's major powers found themselves once again craving the flexibility and strategic edge private militaries like that of MSF gave to them. In reaction to this surge in demand, dozens of private forces, or PFs, emerged across the globe. Nowhere was this more evident than in Central Africa, which became a petri dish for PFs in the early 80s due to the wars in the region. Eventually resulting in the emergence of three major players: the Contract Forces of Africa, the largest of the African PFs; Zerorisk Security, who mainly focused on corporate security; and Rogue Coyote, who, while the smallest of the three, were highly skilled given their special forces backgrounds. Yet, this shift was in no way confined exclusively to Africa. In fact, some of the most extreme PFs were founded and run by former MSF members, many of which held a romanticized view of Big Boss's ideals. As such, many of them sought vengeance on Cipher, desiring to grow their PFs as large or even larger than MSF with the ultimate goal of taking down Cipher. Similar to how Big Boss misinterpreted the original will of the Boss, these PFs misinterpreted the original intention of MSF, the fabled Outer Heaven that Big Boss worked so hard to build. The only one that even managed to come close was Miller's own Diamond Dogs, the PF he built using Zero's funding and the spiritual successor to MSF.

In 1981, South African mercenaries orchestrated a coup in the Seychelles, a French-occupied island nation east of mainland Africa. While the mercenary group was no larger than a platoon, the coup was too much for the Seychelles' government to handle, forcing them to accept help from the Tanzanian army to quell the coup. Not long after, the Seychelles' government contracted Diamond Dogs to train their military to prevent a similar attack in the future. In exchange for their help, the government offered Diamond Dogs an offshore plant, with the caveat that the Force defend them in the event of another attack. A new Mother Base established, Diamond Dogs slowly began to grow over the coming years, eventually attracting the attention of the Mujahedeen, who at some point in the early 1980s hired Diamond Dogs to train their soldiers to fight against the Soviets. Miller, however, had a secondary reason for accepting the job, as he had heard of rumors that a certain American scientist was working with the Soviets in Afghanistan.

It's likely that around the early 1980s, Skullface began testing the Kakongo strain of the vocal cord parasite in Central Africa. When the experiment got out of hand, they resorted to burning entire villages to stop the spread of the parasite. To get rid of the bodies, Cipher acquired a company called South African Natural Resources, or SER, to gain full access over the dormant Mafinda oil field, which they used as the primary dumping grounds for the infected bodies. However, before they could properly dispose of them, the region's dry season ended, leaving the bodies waterlogged in the river. When the villages downriver from these bodies, such as Masa Village, began showing symptoms of the parasite, they elected to burn the villages again. Cipher then restarted oil production to intentionally pollute the river and stop the spread of the infection. They then blamed this act on use SER as a front to hire CFA to guard the facility. Not long after, Cipher began gutting SER via a series of mergers and sell-offs until the company only existed on paper to make it as difficult as possible to trace the incident back to them.

By 1983, Huey and Strange Love had hit a bit of a roadblock with the Sahalanthropus AI, which even in its miniaturized state, wasn't small enough to fit inside the hole alongside a pilot. Given this reality and pressure to display results, Huey planned to outfit Sahalanthropus with an external AI pod similar to Peace Walker. Skullface, however, dismissed this idea, forcing Huey to revert to the original plan for manned controls. Pressed for immediate results, Huey resorted to using his own son, Hal, as the test subject for Sahalanthropus, given that his small size would allow him to fit inside the cockpit alongside the AI pod. Of course, Strange Love opposed using their own son as a guinea pig for developing a weapon, prompting her to send Hal away for his own safety. The argument that followed resulted in Huey locking Strange Love inside the mammal pod. Over the next 10 minutes or so, Strange Love talked to the unresponsive mammal pod as she slowly ran out of oxygen.

Around early 1984, Skullface began testing the vocal cord parasite on the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan, as the mountainous terrain and population density made the risk of an uncontrollable outbreak far less pronounced than it was in Africa. The first of these tests was located at Dasamasi Lman, which was hastily wiped out. In the wake of this, XOF swooped in to retrieve the bodies before the Soviets took control of the site. In the process, stranding a CIA-developed homing launcher called the Honeybee at the fort. Afterwards, Skullface targeted another unnamed village, which was burnt to the ground shortly after the test. The only remaining survivor was a Mujahedeen soldier named Malik, who at the time was on mission.

It was during the same fairly nebulous period that Code Talker created multiple strains of the parasite that he had originally procured from the end. One strain altered the host's skin pigmentation to blend seamlessly with the environment, granting near invisibility. Another, infused with metallic Archa, gave its host the ability to unleash metallic Archa at will to corrode metal and generate hardened armor. Common to all these strains was a mist effect, which was the result of the parasite releasing salt microparticles to draw moisture from the air, an adaptation to counteract dehydration in the user's skin. Once the effectiveness of these strains became apparent, Skullface had them assimilate with certain XOF soldiers, creating the Parasite unit, also known as the Skulls, an umbrella term for the mist, camouflage, and armor units, which were each named for their respective abilities.

Around mid-February 1984, Big Boss finally awoke from his coma after nine long years. Likely using Cipher's extensive network of spies, Skullface learned of Big Boss's awakening as well. Taking this into account, Ocelot informed Big Boss that they planned to use his Phantom as a diversion to allow Big Boss to escape. To this end, on February 26th, the Phantom was awoken, where he nearly immediately caught the attention of a nurse who frantically ran to get the doctor.

[Music] "V has come too." [Music]

The very instant Big Boss's Phantom awoke, the young telepathic boy was being transported via Soviet jumbo jet over a certain hospital in Cyprus. While the specifics are unknown, it is suggested that the vengeful and overwhelming emotions of the Phantom overpowered the boy's will, becoming a sort of parasite that first catalyzed, then took command of the boy's telepathic and telekinetic abilities. As a result, the boy once again erupted in flames, destroying the plane he was being transported in. Following the plane crash, the boy was taken by Soviet soldiers to the supernatural research ward in Moscow. It was there that the soldiers gave him the name "Third Child." It was after that point the Third Child was once again parasitized, this time by Vulgan and his subconscious determination to get revenge on Naked Snake. At that very moment, Vulgan was no more. He had been reborn, or rather reforged, as the Man on Fire, a being whose sole purpose was that of revenge. Using his immense power, he laid waste to the research ward and made his way to the hospital in Cyprus.

It was around that same time Miller received word of Big Boss's awakening through a series of proxy informants. Already occupied with the conflict in Afghanistan and anticipating that Cipher would learn of Big Boss's return just as he did, Miller devised a plan that would use his position to his advantage. His goal was to stir up enough chaos in the region to draw Cipher's attention, forcing them to split their focus and resources across multiple fronts. Knowing that such a risky move would almost certainly lead to his own death or capture, Miller had the informants relay a message to Ocelot, who he tasked with securing Big Boss, then returning to rescue him.

3 days after waking up, the Phantom underwent numerous tests to regain his senses and strength. Afterwards, the doctor informed him of the length of his coma, which sent him into a panic before he was sedated. A few days later, and one week after waking up, the Phantom was informed of his current state, including the shrapnel lodged near his heart and head, as well as his missing left hand. During the same time, Skullface learned of Miller's ax on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, prompting him to send the Skulls to take out his squad. On March 8th, Miller and a squad of Diamond Dogs were ambushed by the Parasite Unit on their way back to Pakistan. Left as the lone survivor, Miller was then handed off to the Soviets.

2 weeks after waking up, the Phantom was given the alias Ahab to conceal his identity. 2 days later, an XOF assassin infiltrated the hospital, killing the nurse and doctor before attacking Ahab. As the assassin held a gun to Ahab's head, Big Boss jumped in to rescue him. After an initial struggle, the assassin managed to throw Big Boss onto the floor. He then frantically began throwing objects at her, including a bottle of isopropyl alcohol. Completely unfazed by this, the assassin threw a knife into Big Boss's shoulder before choking out Ahab. As Ahab slipped into unconsciousness, Big Boss ignited the alcohol, sending the assassin stumbling out the window. Still dazed by the attack, Ahab asked Big Boss who he was. Wanting to keep his identity a secret, Big Boss told Ahab to call him Ishmael.

As XOF forces began their raid on the hospital, Big Boss escorted Ahab to the elevator where they encountered the Third Child and the Man on Fire. As they continued through the hospital, dodging XOF forces and the Man on Fire, Ahab slowly regained his strength. When they eventually reached the hospital's entrance, Big Boss went to procure a vehicle while Ahab confronted the Man on Fire. Just as Ahab was about to be overpowered, Big Boss rammed an ambulance into the Man on Fire, giving Big Boss and Ahab just enough time to make their escape. As the two of them made their way to safety, an XOF chopper fired on their vehicle, causing Big Boss to fall unconscious. Soon after, their vehicle encountered an XOF blockade, knocking Ahab out as well.

At 2:32 a.m., Big Boss awoke inside the ambulance where he was pulled out by Ocelot and taken to safety. When Ahab awoke 30 minutes later, Ocelot arrived to save him from the Man on Fire. When they eventually reached safety, Ocelot explained Miller's situation, predicting that they had just two short weeks to reach Afghanistan to rescue him.

About 3 hours later, while Ahab presumably rested, Ocelot regrouped with Big Boss, giving him a motorcycle and a new identity. Afterwards, he ensured him that his phantom was unknowingly preparing to fulfill his part of the plan, giving Big Boss the freedom to establish Outer Heaven. With that, Ocelot and Big Boss would part ways. And while Ocelot assured Big Boss that they would eventually meet again, this moment, as far as we know, at least, is the last time that the two of them would speak face to face.

After parting ways with Big Boss, Ocelot, to reinforce the ruse he had worked so hard to build, used self-hypnosis to make him believe that the Phantom was the one and only true Big Boss. Not long after, the two of them set sail for Port Said, Egypt. Upon arriving in Port Said, they took a container ship through the Suez Canal, eventually arriving in Port Qasim, Pakistan. During the voyage, Ocelot pointed out that the world had changed a lot in 9 years. That the days of being unprepared were long gone, and with it, the name Naked Snake had to go as well. Instead, he would be referred to as Venom Snake. Alongside this new name came a highly advanced bionic arm to replace his missing hand.

During the same period, Skullface discovered the Third Child as well as the Man on Fire. While their exact interaction is unknown, it's likely that Skullface's vengeance allowed him to parasitize the Third Child and by extension the Man on Fire. It was at that point he no doubt saw potential in using the incredible telekinetic powers of the child to control Sahalanthropus, the primary roadblock that kept him from enacting his ultimate plan.

Meanwhile, the XOF assassin was given a strain of parasites similar to that of the end Code Talker, giving her photosynthetic skin, incredible speed and reflexes, the ability to camouflage her skin, and absolute mastery over every one of her enhanced senses. Afterward, the assassin was infected with the English strain of the vocal cord parasite and deployed to Afghanistan, where she was ordered to assassinate Soviet officers that opposed Sahalanthropus' construction. Hoping that with time she would catch the attention of Snake. Given that these assassinations were done with extreme precision and left absolutely no trace, the Soviets named the sniper Quiet.

On March 21st, just 10 days after their escape from Cyprus, Snake and Ocelot arrived at Spugme Keep, Afghanistan in the midst of a sandstorm. After showing Snake the basics of reconnaissance, Ocelot handed Snake Miller sunglasses and inspired him to bring the legend of Big Boss back to life. Equipped with the basics as well as Diamond Horse, Snake eventually found Miller. With Miller secure, Snake made his way to the LZ, where P-Squad, the Diamond Dog support helicopter, had to relocate due to the sudden appearance of the Parasite Unit. When the two of them eventually extracted, Miller reminisced about MSF, about the home they had made for those few short months. Diamond Dogs, Miller noted, was the new MSF, the Outer Heaven they had always envisioned.

Hours later, they regrouped at Mother Base, where Miller was taken to recover, while Snake was given a walkthrough of Diamond Dog's operational capabilities. Afterwards, Snake was tasked with completing three operations, including the elimination of a Soviet commander, the destruction of Soviet communications relays, and securing the biomechanical engineer who designed Snake's bionic arm. Along the way, Snake found a small wolf pup who he fueled back to Mother Base.

Shortly afterward, Diamond Dogs was contracted by the CIA to retrieve the Honeybee, which had been stranded in Dosamasi Lemon since the Soviets took command of it. One survivor, however, fell into Soviet custody, giving Snake the clear goal of rescuing the survivor to learn of the Honeybee's precise location. Just as planned, Snake made contact with the survivor and eventually secured the Honeybee. While he made his exit, however, Snake encountered the Third Child and was grabbed by Sahalanthropus. Skullface then revealed his existence to Snake just before releasing him to be killed by the Parasite Unit.

Following Snake's escape, Miller questioned the identity of the Grim Reaper lookalike and Cipher's objective in Afghanistan. Unable to answer these questions, they then continued to carry out more operations, including the elimination of three Soviet commanders, destroying a convoy of armored vehicles, and supporting the Mujahedeen in their fight against the Soviets. By that point, Cipher contracted Diamond Dogs to retrieve the Mujahedeen soldier, Malik. Posing as Malik's family, Cipher ordered them to return Malik to them, as it was his father's dying wish after their village was destroyed by the Soviets. Following the mission, however, Malik was questioned by Miller, who learned that his village was not destroyed by the Soviets, but by XOF. Unwilling to do Cipher's dirty work by turning Malik over to them, Miller allowed him to join Diamond Dogs and told Cipher that he had been killed shortly before they got to him.

Meanwhile, Huey, wishing to defect from Cipher to save his own skin, shared his location with Diamond Dogs. Just after Miller informed Snake of this, Ocelot introduced Snake to Diamond, who had fully matured and was ready for the field. Alongside DD, Snake traveled to Sra Power Plant to secure Huey. Along the way, however, Snake was ambushed by Quiet. After taking her down, Snake was presented with the opportunity to either kill Quiet or take her prisoner. Ultimately, Snake decided to spare her life and take her to Mother Base for questioning. As they ascended, Quiet faked an escape and camouflaged herself to sneak aboard Mother Base. Assuming she had gotten away, Snake and Peekquad returned to Mother Base.

About 2,000 miles from their final destination, Peekquad was intercepted by a fighter jet. Just before they were taken out, Quiet revealed her presence. Aware of her remarkable marksmanship skills, Snake handed her a rifle, which she used to take down the jet. While it is ultimately unknown, this act of trust seemingly changed Quiet's motives. As from this point forward, she made a solemn vow of silence to keep her vocal cord parasites from infecting anyone else. Despite Quiet's earlier actions, when Peekquad arrived on Mother Base, Ocelot and Miller stood ready to take her in. After demonstrating how dangerous she was, Quiet surrendered to Diamond Dogs.

With Quiet secure, Snake traveled to Sra Power Plant, where he witnessed Skullface first berate Huey for attempting to use an AI pod for Sahalanthropus, then pushed him down a set of stairs, breaking his mechanical legs. Skullface then took him as a prisoner to the Afghanistan central base camp. Following after them, Snake eventually secured Huey and attempted to extract him before he was stopped by Skullface and Sahalanthropus. By avoiding Sahalanthropus, Snake eventually extracted Huey. Meanwhile, Skullface made preparations to return to Africa, where he planned to tie up some loose ends before enacting his grand plan.

When Huey arrived on Mother Base, Ocelot, Miller, and Snake interrogated him in Room 101 on the command platform. Over the next 6 hours, Miller and Ocelot specifically came no closer to finding out if Huey was Cipher's mole 9 years prior. However, Huey did mention that they should set their sights on Africa, as it was there that Skullface was developing his weapon to surpass Metal Gear.

When Snake arrived in Africa, he was immediately tasked by Miller to restore the region's freshwater supply by shutting down the Mafinda oil field. However, by doing so, Snake had unintentionally reversed Cipher's previous efforts to stop the spread of the parasites, allowing them to spread downriver to places such as Masa Village. Simultaneously, Eli used the chaos of Snake's arrival to begin recruiting the region's child soldiers, eventually garnering the infamous title of the White Mamba.

When Snake returned to Mother Base, Huey contacted him about his most recent development, that being a personalized Walker Gear that Huey dubbed D-Walker. Afterwards, Snake underwent a mission involving securing a high-level CFA official called the Viscount, who had hired Diamond Dogs himself to rescue him. After doing so, they learned that he was actually attempting to flip the CFA's alliances for his own gain and hired Diamond Dogs to rescue him after he was caught.

By this point, Cipher had begun distributing Walker Gears throughout Central Africa. Noticing this, Miller had Snake neutralize a handful of them belonging to the CFA. With their Walker Gears destroyed, the CFA made a call to SER for a resupply, a call that the Diamond Dogs intel team intercepted. In doing so, they learned that SER was using the Nova Braa airfield as a distribution center for the weapons.

It was around the same point Snake met with Ocelot outside of Quiet's cell to discuss her abilities and potential utility in Snake's operations. As Snake left, Quiet attempted to sneak aboard Peekquad. When Miller spotted her, he believed the act to be evidence that she could not be trusted. Ocelot, meanwhile, believed that Snake should be the one to make that call. Ultimately, Snake decided that even though they didn't know much about her, her actions proved that they could trust her.

With Quiet providing support, Snake was then tasked with intercepting a SER resupply truck on its way to Nova Braga. However, when he approached it, he was ambushed by the Skulls, proving Cipher's involvement. When the Skulls were neutralized and the transport truck was extracted, Miller discovered that the contents of the truck were malachite and copper ore, as well as yellow cake, all of which were used in nuclear weapons development. However, given that they were just raw materials, they didn't pose much of a risk. What they didn't know at the time was that within the container of yellow cake was metallic Archa and that the shipment was one of Cipher's do-it-yourself uranium enrichment kits.

As the intel team investigated the contents of the truck, Snake carried out a mission involving rescuing two undercover Diamond Dog soldiers posing as members of the CFA. Afterwards, Diamond Dogs were hired by an African commander to eliminate a rival squad. When Snake eventually found the squad, he discovered that it was entirely composed of child soldiers. To trick the commander into believing they had carried out the mission, Snake was recorded firing his weapon. He then escorted them out of the mine. They were then taken to Mother Base where they were taught basic skills such as literacy, math, and history to reintegrate them to society.

Afterwards, Snake carried out an operation involving capturing a rogue coyote commander called the Major. When he returned to Mother Base, the Major revealed that a mysterious cutout, Cipher, had paid him to spread rumors that he was involved with the nuclear arms business and that Zerorisk Security was after an old man, or Code Talker.

Shortly afterward, Snake was called back to Mother Base to meet with Huey, who had been developing a Metal Gear spin-off project called Battle Gear, a Metal Gear tank hybrid that was stated to be fully customizable, allowing Diamond Dogs to properly fight back against Cipher's Walker Gears. Snake, seeing straight through Huey's veil of enthusiasm, knew that this was nothing more than a stunt to gain their favor. Yet, he accepted the offer, knowing that Huey wasn't developing it out of loyalty, though he was right in that it would be a useful tool.

Directly afterward, one of the child soldiers aboard Mother Base requested Diamond Dogs rescue their leader, a boy named Shabani, from the Devil's House. When Snake eventually reached the facility, he found the bodies of those who were experimented on.

With the vocal cord parasites, including Shabani. Just then, Skullface executed a patient in the room adjacent to his, startling Shabbani and revealing Snake's presence. In response, Skullface commanded the third child to kill Snake. To do so, the third child summoned the man on fire, who pinned Snake to the ground. As Snake fought for his life, Shabbani was engulfed in flames, an act that captivated the third child as he had always felt a strong connection to other children. Using this as his opportunity to escape, Snake made a mad dash for the exit. Outside, he managed to stun the man on fire, giving him just enough time to escape using Pequad.

When Snake returned to Mother Base, he handed Shabbani's necklace back to the child soldier who gave them the mission in the first place. While Diamond Dogs performed an investigation into the experiments inside the Devil's House, Snake was tasked with eliminating a CFA official who was rumored to be working with Cipher. Meanwhile, a former MSF member named Mosquito led his PF, Mosquito Stinger Force, or MSF, in a raid on Mother Base. He did so as an act of revenge, as he was led to believe that Big Boss himself orchestrated the attack on the original MSF. When Snake learned of the takeover, he returned to Mother Base and quickly subdued Mosquito. Afterwards, Miller cleared things up with Mosquito, prompting his recruitment into Diamond Dogs, while Snake resumed the operation that Mosquito interrupted.

By this point, the parasites from the Mfindo oil field had killed off most of the CFA soldiers living down river, giving Eli and the children an opportunity to take control of Masa Village. Under their control, most of the children were unknowingly infected by the Kakongo strain of the vocal cord parasite. However, as they were still prepubescent, the parasite remained dormant. When the children then began raiding surrounding villages for supplies, many of the residents contacted Diamond Dogs to deal with the situation. Following suit, Snake traveled to Masa Village where he confronted Eli. While Eli made it frustratingly difficult, Snake eventually took him down and brought him back to Mother Base.

With him came the Kacongo strain of the vocal cord parasite which then began to infect any Kakongo speaking diamond dog soldiers. As the parasite spread, Snake underwent a mission to secure two disease specialists who worked at the devil's house who eventually revealed the English was not a part of the experiments at the devil's house. Around that same time, Quiet discovered a man on Mother Base was infected with the Kakongo strain of the vocal cord parasite. Hoping to save his life and stop the spread of the infection, she attempted to cut out his tongue before she was subdued by snake and ocelot. Shortly afterward, Miller, suspecting Eli to be a product of Leison Fontib due to his age and appearance, conducted a test that compared his DNA with that of snakes. While it took some time, the results of the test found there to be a 0% DNA match between him and Snake despite the clear signs. As this took place, Snake underwent a mission involving rescuing two soldiers, both of which turned out to be victims of an ethnic conflict. By this point, Diamond Dogs could no longer ignore the sickness spreading throughout Mother Base, forcing them to construct the quarantine platform. Still unsure of what exactly the pattern of infection was or how to treat it, Diamond Dogs had Snake secure a human trafficker with ties to Cipher's Devil's House. In the end, the trafficker pointed Diamond Dogs toward a place deep in the forest.

Meanwhile, Eli, unable to accept his defeat at Masa Village, challenged Snake to a rematch at the R&D platform. Around the same period, Skullface met with Code Talker at a mansion in Lufa Valley, where he threatened to infect the Navajo people with the English vocal cord parasite if Code Talker did not reveal a way to cure him of the numerous vocal cord parasites that he had gradually collected over the years. Under this threat, Code Talker withholding the true cure revealed that radiation could disrupt the reproduction of the parasites. However, the precise dosage was unclear. With this knowledge, Skullface returned to Afghanistan where he released the Russian strain of the vocal cord parasite to take command of OKB0, an old Soviet philosopher lab, where he planned to unleash Sahalanthropus, kickstarting his master plan.

After putting Eli in his place, Snake was tasked with rescuing a captured intel team member who had crucial intel about the infection at Mother Base. Following the rescue, the intel team member revealed in his dying breaths cotalker's name, location, and ability to treat the infection. Hoping to cure Mother Base, Snake traveled to Lufa Valley, which was guarded by the all female camo unit. Once they were dealt with, Snake made his way to the basement of the mansion where Cotalker was being kept. Upon Snake's arrival, Cottoer ordered him to stay silent, then offered him a herb that stifled the parasites reproduction. Snake then asked him to help cure his men, which Code Talker ultimately agreed to as penance for weaponizing the parasite in the first place.

During their return trip to Mother Base, Code Talker offered Snake the true cure to the vocal cord parasite, a parasitic bacteria called Wbakia that could stop the parasites from reproducing by turning the male parasites female. The primary side effect being that it also rendered its hosts infertile. He then questioned if they had gotten their hands on Metallic Archa just as Pquad was attacked by the armored unit. Following a crash landing at Nova Braga, Snake took down the armored unit and rescued Code Talker. When they arrived back at Mother Base, Code Talker gave Diamond Dogs access to Wbakia, which they reproduced and used to vaccinate those who were in the early stages of the infection. Those who were already symptomatic, however, were forced to be incinerated. Just two days after gaining access to Wbakia, Mother Base was officially cured of the vocal cord parasite.

Not long after, Miller and Ocelot interrogated Huie about the location of Sahalanthropus and Skullface. Learning that he resided at OKB0. With no time to spare, a convoy of Diamond Dog choppers were deployed to OKB0 to provide backup for Snake's initial infiltration. Using the chaos to escape, Eli snuck aboard one of the choppers. At OKB0, Snake eventually confronted Skullface just before he got away. Surrounded by XOF, Skullface invited Snake to follow him to SRAK power plant. On the way, revealing his motivations to who he believed was Big Boss.

When they arrived at the power plant, Skullface had the third child demonstrate his abilities to snake. As he did so, however, the third child's mind became tethered to Eli's as a result of their shared youth and Eli's unbridled rage. While the specifics are unclear, it's likely that this more symbiotic relationship somehow overrode Skullface's parasitic control over the third child, giving Eli priority command over Sahalanthropus. As Eli attempted to kill Snake, Skullface ordered a convoy of tanks to take down Sahalanthropus. When this almost immediately failed, Eli pinned Skullface beneath a pylon. Snake, meanwhile, attempted to flee using a vehicle, which was quickly decommissioned. Left with no other options, Snake faced Sahalanthropus, eventually crippling it with support from Diamond Dogs.

Following the battle, Miller joined Snake in confronting Skullface, questioning him about the missing English parasite strain, which Skullface noted was very close. Of course, alluding to Quiet. Without hesitation, Snake disposed of the other two parasite strains by tossing them into a fire. However, unknown to Snake, one of them was saved by the third child. Afterwards, Snake used Skullface's own weapon to shoot off his leg and arm as payment for taking Miller's. When Skullface begged for Snake to simply kill him, Snake dropped the gun and Miller told him to do it himself. Before he could do so, however, Huey took the opportunity for himself.

Though Skullface was dead, his act of releasing Sahalanthropus still had the outcome he desired in partially reinvigorating the Cold War. albeit not to the extent at which it could have, as in the years following his death, Skullface was practically wiped from public memory thanks to the Patriots AI. In the aftermath of Skullface's death, Diamond Dogs secured Sahalanthropist for themselves, with Snakeing that he couldn't allow it to fall into Soviet hands and that he wanted to keep it as a reminder that Diamond Dogs had done the world a service. Afterwards, Snake was sent on a handful of missions primarily related to tying up loose ends involving various informants, as well as securing some containers containing code talker's research, making mother base the only location in the world with vocal cord parasites. Simultaneously, Huey finished construction of battle gear, which Ocelot suggested they deploy on dispatch missions to test its capabilities.

Directly afterwards, Snake was given the task of obtaining the mammal pod from the hangar in the Soviet central base camp. When the mammal pod arrived at Mother Base, Miller and Ocelot analyzed its contents, discovering the skeleton of strange love. Without hesitation, Miller and Ocelot interrogated Huey to learn how it had gotten there, eventually coming to the conclusion that Huey had murdered her. Around that same time, the intel team discovered that the man on fire was found dead in Afghanistan. Of course, Snake was tasked with securing the body before the Soviets could study it further. However, as Snake fuled him, the man on fire came back to life, pinning Snake to the ground. While the exact reasons are unclear, it's theorized that while looking at Snake, the man on fire realized that the man he was after was not the real naked Snake, causing Bulgan to lose his lust for revenge and therefore his will to live.

While the timing is nebulous, at some point during his time on Mother Base, Snake Hallucinated the return of Pause. While it is not known what exactly caused this, it is theorized that it was the manifestation of his overwhelming grief as he had been burdened by both Big Boss's memories of failure and his own subconscious memories as the medic. The result was a powerful subconscious state of denial in which he believed that it was a rocket that destroyed their helicopter, not the explosives inside pause. However, as Snake continually visited her, the hallucinations slowly began to unravel, eventually forcing Snake to accept the reality of P's death, and that his own memories were not as reliable as he once thought.

Around the time Snake recovered Vulgan's body, Eli utilizing the power of the third child, swed chaos amongst the child soldiers aboard Mother Base, resulting in the death of a child named Ralph and the loss of Shabbani's necklace, which Eli threw into a chlorine tank. When Snake learned of this, Miller made it clear that there was no way to retrieve the necklace. Just then, Quiet jumped into the tank, eventually emerging with both the necklace and chemically burned to skin. Immediately following these events, Quiet was taken to the medical platform where they discovered that her larynx carried a strain of the vocal cord parasite and that her lungs had the burnt remnants of a petal from the Star of Bethlehem flower that was present in Snake's hospital room in Cyprus. Identified as the XOF assassin, Quiet was interrogated in room 101. By the end, however, Snake and Ocelot came to the conclusion that Quiet had plenty of opportunities to kill Snake. Yet, she refrained from doing so. When Quiet and Code Talker were all that remained in the room, Quiet spoke to him in Navajo, where she revealed her parasite strain, former goal to kill Snake, and Vow of Silence.

During this period, Code Talker challenged Miller to create a hamburger that superseded the ones he used to eat back home. At first, Miller attempted to create a burger of extremely high quality. However, even this, Code Talker noted, was not the mark of a good burger. Seeking to understand what truly made a burger great, Miller created Miller's Maxi Buns, a Diamond Dogs funded burger chain aboard Mother Base, which served as R&D for the ultimate burger. Soon enough, Miller created the perfect burger. not by using quality ingredients or fresh food, but by pumping it full of chemicals. Thus, Miller dubbed it the chemical burger. Finally, Miller created something that satisfied Code Talker's craving. But that was not the end of it. Miller had opened his eyes to the purpose of a good meal, the power of food. A power he would thrust upon the world to finally solve hunger in Africa and inspire world peace.

Not long after, five of the child soldiers escaped from Mother Base to Africa and Afghanistan with the assistance of Eli, who planned the escapes as a way to harden them as soldiers and buy time for Huie to repair Sahalanthropus. When the children were eventually rescued, Miller and Ocelot began to suspect Eli of trying to spark a rebellion. To understand why, they interrogated him in room 101. Meanwhile, the third child used his powers in accordance with Eli to steal Sahalanthropus and rescue Eli. Additionally, while this was going on, the rest of the child soldiers hijacked a Diamond Dog's helicopter by holding the pilot hostage. The children then fled to a secluded Salt Lake Island in Africa, where Eli infected himself and the children with the English strain of the vocal cord parasite.

By this point, Huie, knowing that his time on Mother Base was coming to an end, contacted ATGC to try and train Mother Base's vocal cord parasites in exchange for a way off Mother Base. Afterwards, in an attempt to discern whether or not radiation could neutralize the parasites, Huey modified the quarantine platform X-ray scanners with betaarray emitters. Rather than killing the parasites, however, the radiation mutated them to resist the effects of the walbakia in the soldiers systems, causing yet another outbreak. When administering more Walbakia proved to be ineffective, Snake was sent to investigate the situation himself. Meanwhile, a Diamond Dog soldier inside the quarantine discovered that his mind was being tempted by the parasite to escape the quarantine, the result of a mutation to propagate the spread of the parasite. Yet, when the soldier realized this, he opted to kill himself rather than succumb to the temptation. Moments later, Snake arrived to find the soldier just seconds from death. After his passing, other soldiers began pouring into the room in an attempt to escape outside. While at first Snake tried to subdue them, he was eventually forced to kill his own soldiers to stop the spread of the infection. When the situation was under control, Snake had the bodies cremated to eliminate the parasites once and for all. Snake then honored the soldiers by spreading the ashes on his face and ordering the rest of the ashes to be fabricated into diamonds so they may live on forever.

When Miller and Ocelot eventually discover that Huey was responsible for the mutation, they decided to conduct a trial, eventually finding Huey to be guilty of multiple murder charges as well as treason. While most of the soldiers called for his execution, Snake instead opted to exile Huie. Sometime after Huie was placed onto a life raft packed with supplies and sent to drift into the ocean, forced to bear the weight of his decisions, without anyone else to blame them on.

Following Huie's exile, Quiet, fearful that her English vocal cord parasites could mutate at any time, snuck aboard a helicopter bound for Afghanistan. There, she was captured and taken prisoner by the Soviets. When Snake learned about this, he traveled to her last known location where he found a prisoner transport log. After Ocelot analyzed the log, he told Snake that Quiet was transferred to Lamarate Palace. At the palace, Snake found Quiet being tortured by the Soviets, who had kept her covered to nullify her abilities. When they then attempted to drown her, she absorbed the necessary minerals through her skin to rejuvenate her strength, allowing her to fight back. When the blood bath ended, Quiet provided Snake cover during a lengthy Soviet assault on the palace. When the battle concluded, Quiet was knocked out by a tank round, forcing Snake to carry her through a sandstorm to their planned extraction point. Huddled together, they narrowly avoided being caught by Soviet troops, but not before Snake was bitten by a cobra. Sometime later, Snake, barely managing to cling on to consciousness, watched as Quiet broke her solemn vow of silence to pinpoint their location for Peekquad. Her vocal cord parasites activated, Quiet recorded a final message for Snake, in which she stated that the love they shared transcended language and that while it could no longer continue, the gratitude she felt would remain with her, even in her silence.

Following Quiet's exit, Diamond Dogs tracked Eli's child soldiers to Africa, where he had completely eradicated the island of adults, many of which were XOF soldiers, attempting to reclaim Sahilanthropus. Nearing puberty, Eli demanded a confrontation with Big Boss in exchange for Sahalanthropus's nuke. When Snake eventually arrived on the island, he found XOF had already beaten him to Eli, who used Sahalanthropus to destroy them, then battled Snake. In the wake of Eli's defeat, XOF soldiers swarmed Eli. As Snake took them down, a grenade was tossed at his feet. Dazed by the explosion, Snake was unable to distinguish between Eli and the XOF soldiers, resulting in him accidentally shooting Eli. Shielded by a bulletproof vest, Eli proclaimed that he would kill Snake for cursing him with his jeans. Snake then left Eli with a gun, which Eli positioned at his own head. Believing that he was destined to die by the approaching napalm strike or the vocal cord parasites. Just then, the third child appeared before him, removed the vocal cord parasites from his system, and lifted Eli to the air just as the air strike wiped the island clean. Sometime later, the two of them would return to civilization, where Eli would set his sights on joining the British SAS, while the third child would eventually join the KGB psychic intelligence unit.

Sometime following Eli's disappearance, Snake would begin to fully understand his true nature. While this may have begun when he realized he was hallucinating pause, the truth was made far more transparent when the hypnotherapy began to wear off, revealing memories he couldn't understand. All this came to a head when Big Boss sent Snake a cassette tape in which he alluded to Snake's true identity as the medic and stated that while they were each their own man, they were both Big Boss. While it is once again unclear, it's likely that around the same time, Ocelot's hypnosis was also fractured. Finally aware of the truth, Ocelot contacted Miller to share the news with him as well. Likely assuming the sooner he learned, the easier it would be for him to move past it. Miller, however, couldn't find it within him to forgive Big Boss for both lying to him and establishing Outer Heaven alone. Instead, Miller condemned his former friend and vowed to work in opposition to him by helping out his son David eventually usurp him. Ocelot then warned Miller if he were to follow through with this plan, it would force himself to side with Eli, positioning the two of them as enemies in the long run. Miller accepted this as an inevitability, though he agreed to play fair for the time being.

Following the death of Skullface, Donald Anderson eventually managed to regain control of Cipher, the resources of which he used to continue establishing the Patriots AI network, which consisted of four core AIs. Those being GW, TJ, TR, and AL, each named after one of the presidents depicted on Mount Rushmore. Overseeing the four of them was a fifth central AI known as JD or John Doe, which was later placed in orbit disguised as space debris. Despite Zer's objection, at some point during the AI's development, Anderson was ultimately forced to remove the human element from the system, allowing the network to operate and learn independently. At first, the broad instructions given to the network kept it relatively aligned with Zero's original vision. However, over time, the Patriots AI gradually began to deviate from that vision. Much like how Zero himself had deviated greatly from the original intent of the boss's will. It was sometime after the Patriots Network was initially established, the organization, once known as Cipher, was renamed to the Patriots, also known as the Liule Lo, seemingly as a way to distance it from Skullface's actions and unify it with the AI.

Around the mid 1980s, while fighting in the Mosamb beek civil war, Frank Joger was captured and tortured. Sometime later, Big Boss rescued him, then brought both him and Naomi back to America. It was at that point Naomi would become interested in pursuing a career in genetics, as she saw them as the key to understanding her true nature. On April 26th, 1986, during a late night safety test within the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, a combination of design flaws and operator errors caused a sudden and uncontrollable power surge, leading to a massive explosion that released large quantities of radioactive materials into the atmosphere. Her family covered in the nuclear fallout. A young girl named Nastasha Romanenko vowed to rid the world of nuclear weaponry. The following year, a US Army soldier named Roy Campbell had a secret affair with his younger brother's wife. Nine months later, she gave birth had a secret affair with his younger brother's wife. 9 months later, she gave birth to a baby girl named Merrill, who would be led to believe the Campbell was nothing more than her uncle. In 198, who would be led to believe the Campbell was nothing more than her uncle. In 1988, a professional ice skater named Gustava Hefner, nicknamed Ice Princess, participated in the Calgary Winter Olympics. There she met Frankie Joerger, who she quickly fell in love with. Desiring to be with him, she planned to seek asylum in America. However, her request was denied due to the tension of the Cold War. As a result, she was sent back to her country where she and her family were stripped of competing in professional ice skating for her attempted defection. Her passion squandered, Gustava decided to become an undercover agent. Later joining the Czech state security, hoping to find another opportunity to defect. Following Gustava's disappearance, Frank began to despise the politics of war. However, at the same time, he couldn't imagine himself living a life beyond it.

Around the 1980s, Big Boss achieved legendary status thanks to his military career and the exploits of Venom Snake. It was around the same period Big Boss worked as a combat instructor where he helped to reintegrate child soldiers back into society. Despite this, one of these children, a young girl later known as Sniper Wolf, would be raised by Big Boss as a soldier, where she would eventually become an outstanding marksman. On November 9th, 1989, East Germany unexpectedly announced that its citizens could freely cross into West Berlin, prompting thousands to gather at the Berlin Wall. When border guards opened the checkpoints, crowds began tearing down the wall in celebration. A powerful moment that symbolized the collapse of communist rule in Eastern Europe and effectively marked the end of the Cold war. [Music] [Music]

On December 24th, 1989, the National Patriotic Front of Liberia invaded Liberia from the Ivory Coast, initiating the first Liberian civil war. It was during this conflict that Solidus Snake, the so-called perfect clone of Big Boss, murdered the parents of a young boy. After taking the boy in, Solidus would give him the name Jack and force him to join his unit of child soldiers. Under Solidus' watch, the children's food was laced with gunpowder, giving it hallucinogenic properties that clouded their memory and made them controllable. It was in this malleable state, Jack became a highly skilled and deadly child soldier, earning him aliases such as the White Devil and Jack the Ripper.

On August 2nd, 1990, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein launched a sudden invasion of Kuwait, kickstarting the Gulf War. That same year, Eli, driven to surpass the status of his father, became the youngest person to join the ranks of the British SAS, and shortly afterward, the Secret Intelligence Service, or MI6. In January of 1991, the US-led coalition launched Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces from Kuwait. It was at that point Eli was sent as a sleeper agent to the Middle East where he was captured and declared missing in action. Likewise, the following year David enlisted in the US Army, becoming one of the youngest soldiers to join the army's special forces. As a Green Beret, David was sent to western Iraq to take part in his first ever infiltration mission.

During the Gulf War, many veterans developed a number of chronic illnesses known as Gulf War syndrome, which ranged from minor fatigue, diarrhea, and even memory problems. While at the time it was believed to be caused by PTSD, biological weapons, or exposure to depleted uranium tank rounds, in reality, the illness was a result of the Pentagon's genome soldier project. This project had a wide variety of soldiers injected with the DNA of Big Boss in an effort to create soldiers with enhanced genetic capabilities on a mass scale. However, the project was seemingly shelved when the soldiers and later their children began to show signs of chronic illness and life-threatening defects. Additionally, it was during the Gulf War that Matt Campbell, Merryill's father, passed away. Burdened by guilt, Roy vowed to watch over Merrill, who herself dreamed of becoming a soldier just like her father.

In 1991, the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania officially seceded from the Soviet Union, becoming the first republics to regain independence since the formation of the USSR. Inspired by their neighbors, a littleknown province known as Zanzibar began a full-fledged independence campaign that was later accelerated when in 1991, the Soviet Union officially dissolved. Despite this, Zanzibar would fail to gain independence for some time, mostly due to the Commonwealth of Independent States's intervention, which forced Zanzibar to rely on mercenaries and private militaries to fight on their behalf. Thus began the Mercenary War, which would go on to last about half a decade or longer. It was during this period that a man named George Castler fought in the war, resulting in him getting wounded in the right thigh. Unable to work as a soldier, Castler would later go on to support Foxhound as a weapons adviser around the turn of the century.

Immediately following the fall of the Soviet Union, a grew colonel named Sergey Gerukovic was forced to watch as his hometown was outright purchased by the United States. Viewing this as a disgrace to his once great nation, Gerukovich formed a mercenary army with the intention of using it to empower and revitalize his motherland. Around that same time, following the KGB's disillusion, the third child traveled to America, where he briefly worked at the FBI as a psychometricist, a job that required him to dive into the psyche of a serial killer, warping his own mind into that of a killer in the process. After committing murder himself, he left the FBI to pursue freelance intelligence work.

While the exact timing is unknown, it's probable that by the early 1990s, Big Boss, using the lessons he learned from both MSF and Venom Snakes Diamond Dogs, successfully brought his adaptation of the boss's will to fruition by establishing the nation of Outer Heaven in South Africa. However, sometime after its establishment, Big Boss left Outer Heaven, likely to draw attention away from the nation, as he didn't want to repeat the same mistakes he did while in MSF. In his place, he left Venom Snake, who worked to further expand Outer Heaven while Big Boss returned to America to once again take command of Foxhound. Similarly, it was around the same point that Miller and Frank Joerger joined Foxhound as well, with Miller becoming a survival instructor under the name Master Miller and Frank joining as a standard operative of the unit under the name Gray Fox, as he was the only member of Foxhound to earn the prestigious title of Fox.

In 1992, Nostasha Romanenko joined the Defense Intelligence Agency. It was there she met her future husband, Richard Ames. Though shortly after getting married sometime later, the two of them would go their separate ways. On March 31st, the USS Missouri, the ship where Japan formally surrendered during World War II, was decommissioned for a second time, where it then served as a museum ship at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. In October 1993, Russian President Boris Yelten attempted to dissolve the Russian Parliament when they opposed his reforms. In response, the Parliament attempted to impeach him. However, this ultimately failed when Yelten used military intervention to place him back in power. In the aftermath of this event, a soldier that would later become known as Vulcan Raven was demoted from the Russian special forces unit Vimple. Immediately afterward, Raven fled from Russia, where he would eventually go on to join Outer Heaven as a standard mercenary.

Around the early to mid 1990s, the United States Navy, using funding from DARPA, initiated research on the Arsenal ship project. Envisioned as the next evolution of naval warfare, the concept had a central information gathering command ship, coordinating aworked fleet of weaponized combat vessels. Altogether, the fleet was designed to be highly coordinated, mostly unmanned, and above all else, extremely destructive.

In 1994, 3 years after being taken prisoner in the Middle East, Eli was rescued by the US government and brought back to America. It's likely that by that same year, Venom Snake recruited numerous elite mercenaries for Outer Heaven. These include a shot maker, a former member of Spetnaz and riot gun expert. Machine gun kid, formerly SAS, who as his name suggests operated a machine gun. Firetrooper, a former member of the German counterterrorism police unit who utilized a flamethrower. And finally, Dirty Duck, a former member of the terrorist group Eggplant, who utilized a boomerang and wasn't afraid to play dirty.

Sometime later, Outer Heaven operatives captured robotics expert Dr. Drago Petrovich Madnar alongside his daughter Ellen. Using Ellen as a hostage, Dr. Madnar was forced to construct two weapons, a pair of AI powered autonomous cybernetic androids, also known as a TX11 model Cyberoid, and a new Metal Gear. While ultimately unknown, it's likely that the two TX11s were created first, where they then acted as automated security drones within building 2 of Outer Heaven under the nickname Bloody Brad. Using some of the same technology, Madnar then created a new Metal Gear, simply labeled TX5. It was around that point an architectural engineer working in the Outer Heaven design staff named Kyle Schneider lost his wife and child during a mysterious conflict involving Outer Heaven. Following their deaths, Schneider sought to take down Outer Heaven from the inside by inciting underground operations, which eventually grew into a full-scale revolution against Outer Heaven.

Sometime after the revolt began, a woman named Jennifer covertly infiltrated Outer Heaven as a member of its medical staff in an attempt to free her brother, who was captured by Outer Heaven sometime prior. As a result, she eventually joined the Revolution to help free her brother. Likewise, Diane, a former member of the punk rock band named Thin Wall, joined the Revolution as well. Her older brother Steve followed suit, albeit with much less enthusiasm than his sister.

Around 1995, David, surpassing his fellow Green Beretss, officially joined Foxhound. There, David was introduced to his primary instructor as well as his commander. Those being Master Miller and Big Boss, who personally gave him the code name Solid Snake. While Miller taught Snakes standard Foxhound survival skills such as high alitude skydiving, linguistics, closed and open combat diving and free climbing, Big Boss taught him highly specialized aspects of his training such as CQC and the importance of survival on the battlefield.

Shortly after Snake joined Foxhound, the United States government received intelligence that Outer Heaven was plotting to use a mysterious ultimate weapon to flip the global power structure and undermine the Patriots. This scheme, which would later be dubbed the Outer Heaven Uprising, prompted the US government to command Foxhound to infiltrate Outer Heaven with the goal of destroying the ultimate weapon. Assuming the task to be too insurmountable, Big Boss sent Gray Fox to infiltrate the nation under the operation name Intrude N312. However, during the operation, Gray Fox was captured by Outer Heaven forces shortly after discovering intel related to the ultimate weapon, his final transmission simply being Metal Gear. [Music]

In response to Operation Intrude and 312's failure, Big Boss planned to send rookie operative Solid Snake on Operation Intrude and 313, which had similar goals as its predecessor with the addition of rescuing Gray Fox. It was around that point Big Boss, content on upholding his identity as a Foxhound commander, sent his Phantom a tape outlining the details behind Operation Injured and 313. Fully committed to his role as Big Boss, Venom Snake prepared Outer Heaven for Solid Snake's infiltration. Assuming like Big Boss, there was no chance he would succeed.

Sometime later, Solid Snake arrived just outside Outer Heaven, where Big Boss commanded him to find Gray Fox to learn more about the mysterious Metal Gear. Alongside Big Boss was Schneider, who was there to assist Snake with locating any equipment he may need, as the mission called for on-site procurement. With nothing but a radio and the clothes on his back, Snake infiltrated Outer Heaven, unaware that the odds had been heavily stacked against him. After collecting the first of many key cards, Snake made his way to the third floor, where he encountered a prisoner and his first obstacle, a gas chamber. After contacting Schneider for assistance, Snake found the gas mask and traversed past the gas chamber. There, he found a second prisoner who assured Snake that Gray Fox was being held captive. No time to waste, Snake collected a second key card and a remotec controlled missile, which he used to pass a high voltage floor. Snake then found a prisoner who gave him the frequency of Diane, who they noted could give him information about Outer Heaven's rank and file. When Snake attempted to contact her, however, Steve was the one who answered, noting that Diane had gone shopping and hadn't returned. With no way to contact Diane, Snake continued collecting more equipment, like the suppressor, a few weapons, and a cardboard box before going back down to the first floor. There he found another prisoner who informed him that the best way to find who he was looking for was to intentionally get himself caught by the guards. After doing as instructed, Snake was stripped of his items and placed into a cell in the basement. Breaking through a false wall, Snake finally made contact with Gray Fox, who told him that Metal Gear was a nuclear equipped bipeedal tank and that the only way to take it down was to contact Dr. Madnar, who resided nearby. After breaking a second false wall, Snake was confronted by Shot Maker. After collecting his items, Snake took down Shotmaker and made his way to the second floor where he collected a few more items and eventually learned that Madnar resided in the courtyard. Shortly afterward, Snake confronted Machine Gun Kid. Once he was defeated, Snake traversed to the roof where he used a bomb blast suit to increase his weight, allowing him to traverse all the way to the center of the building where he used a parachute to make it down to the courtyard. There he found a prisoner who told him that Madnar was moved approximately 10 km north to building 2 of Outer Heaven. After a long trek north, Snake entered building 2 disguised as an Outer Heaven officer. He then made his way to the roof where he learned that Dr. Madnar resided in the basement. However, Snake would quickly discover that this was actually a fake Dr. Madnar meant to lure him into a trap and that the real one was on the second floor. After defeating Firetrooper, Snake made contact with Madnar, who shared that he would only reveal Metal Gear's location and weakness when Snake rescued his daughter Ellen, who was confined in the basement of building 1. On the way back, Snake encountered a prisoner who gave him the frequency of Jennifer, noting that she would offer aid if Snake continued to help their cause. When Snake made it to the basement of building 1, he found Ellen trapped behind a false wall. When Ellen was safe, Snake returned to Madnar, who shared that Metal Gear was housed 100 floors below ground of building 3, which itself was 20 km north. He also shared that the way to destroy it was to target its legs using a total of 16 plastic bombs in a specific sequence. That sequence being right, right, left, right, left, left, right, left, left, right, right, left, right, and the rest he forgot. Last but not least, he informs Snake that to enter building three, he would have to destroy Bloody Brad using a rocket launcher and take their key card. Following suit, Snake contacted Jennifer to obtain the rocket launcher and destroyed Bloody Brad. By the time Snake reached building three, Big Boss, worried that Snake would actually succeed at his mission, tried to lure him into multiple traps. Suspicious of his commander by this point, Snake continued forward to the basement where the door to Metal Gear was locked behind a high clearance key card. However, this key card resided within a detached room only accessible via a deep water channel. To help Snake reach it, Jennifer guided him to a spare oxygen tank that he used to reach the north end of the channel. Meanwhile, Dirty Duck took three hostages, one of which was Jennifer's brother, to the north end of the channel. His hope was that Snake would either kill Jennifer's brother, therefore losing Jennifer's assistance or hesitate enough that he could kill Snake. When Snake arrived, however, he managed to take down Dirty Duck without harming a single hostage. With the final key card in hand, Snake returned to the basement of building 3, where he found a prisoner that revealed Big Boss was the leader of Outer Heaven. His true identity revealed. Big Boss ordered Snake to turn back and end the mission. Unwilling to do so, Snake continued onward, eventually confronting Metal Gear TX55. Avoiding the added security measures, Snake followed Dr. Madnar's sequence, successfully guessing the final two placements. By the end, luck proved to be on Snake's side when he successfully destroyed the Metal Gear.

With the Outer Heaven Uprising stifled thanks to Solid Snake, Venom Snake took one last look at the demon in the mirror before facing his final mission. Embracing his truth, Venom Snake announced to Solid Snake that he was Big Boss and that he himself gave Snake his mission with the intention that he would report false information. He then demanded a fight just as Diane called Solid Snake to reveal her adoration for him. Maintaining his composure, the two snakes fought to the death under the threat of the base's destruction. While Venom Snake put up a good fight, Solid Snake ultimately ended up victorious, proving Zero correct in his concern that Big Boss did indeed need that contingency plan.

Following the death of Venom Snake, Solid Snake escaped from Outer Heaven just as NATO launched a pinpoint strike on Outer Heaven's nuclear weapons facility. In the immediate aftermath of Outer Heaven's destruction, Big Boss fled from America to reinforce his death and salvage what little he could from Outer Heaven. While the vast majority of soldiers and refugees died, some like Dr. Madnar, Vulcan Raven, Kyle Schneider, and Gray Fox survived the incident. Schneider specifically was rescued by Big Boss himself, a fact that would play a major role in driving him to ally with Big Boss not long after. Greyfox, meanwhile, would disappear without a trace. It wasn't until Big Boss made his way to Zanzibar to take part in the ongoing mercenary war that Grey Fox would reemerge to fight alongside him as he felt he had no place in the civilian world in America. Meanwhile, Big Boss's supposed death led Foxhound's vice commander, Roy Campbell, to fill the role of commanderin-chief. Despite the change in leadership, the severe trauma Snake had endured at Outer Heaven led him to retire from Foxhound and abstained from using CQC, both of which were closely associated with Big Boss.

Not long after, Dr. Madden immigrated to America where he was pressured by the US government to make high-tech weaponry related to the Strategic Defense Initiative, NEDW, and brain bombs. something Madnar found little fulfillment in as he only wanted to work on Metal Gear, believing it to be the culmination of his life's work. As a result, Madnar was ostracized by both the government as well as the scientific community, both of which eventually drove him into isolation. It was around this point Kyle Schneider joined NASA's clandestine extraterrestrial special forces, which was created in preparation for the possibility of space warfare. When Schneider was selected to join the Force, he was given an experimental one-of-a-kind suit of armor that resembled the attire of a black ninja and was subjected to a number of drugs that gave him greatly enhanced physical attributes. Yet, the Force was shut down by NASA not long after out of fear of public backlash. In response, a number of the force's members defected to fight in the mercenary war, including Schneider himself, who was equipped with the Black Ninja suit. As a result, he became known as the Black Ninja and allied himself with Big Boss.

Around 1996, failure to secure contracts related to the strategic defense initiative and next generation fighter jets in tandem with military cutbacks dealt a large blow to defense contractor Arms Tech's profits. Facing bankruptcy and in a desperate attempt to recover its losses, Arms Techch proposed the Metal Gear project to DARPA, who was otherwise occupied with the Arsenal Ship Project. That is until May of 1996 when the chief of naval operations in charge of the Arsenal ship project reportedly committed suicide before phase 2 of the tests could begin. However, nearly a decade later, this suicide would be called into question. As directly after the CNO's death, Arms Techch swooped in to secure what would have been the Arsenal ship project's funding to begin construction of a new Metal Gear that would later become known as Rex.

After about half a decade of conflict, the mercenary war finally came to a close in 1997 with Zanzibar Land gaining true independence. In the aftermath, Big Boss, likely using his world-renowned reputation, usurped control of the country and shaped it into a heavily fortified military state, not unlike outer heaven. In March of that same year, the United States and Russia began negotiations for Start 3, which had the goal to reduce their nuclear arsenals by as much as 75%. Similar to its predecessors, these negotiations would go on to last for years. 5 months later, the first Liberian civil war came to a close. It was after that point Jack was placed inside a relief center. However, before Solidus could find him, Jack was picked up by an NGO who gave him a new life in the United States. In America, Jack was sought out by the Patriots who found that unlike his fellow child soldiers, Jack was in active denial about his past. As such, they injected him with nano machines, which the Patriots would use to primarily alter his memory over the next decade.

Following his exile from Mother Base in 1984, Huey Emer returned to America where he eventually gained custody of his and strange love son, Hal. It was after that point around the early to mid 1990s, Huie married a woman named Julie Danzinger, who herself had a child named Emma, who would adopt the surname Emerick. Despite Hal being over twice Emma's age, the two would become close siblings, as they were both highly intelligent and would frequently play together. This dynamic changed, however, when around 1997, Julie took advantage of Howal's youth and innocence to sexually exploit him. When Hueie eventually learned of this, he attempted to get revenge by drowning both him and Emma in their family swimming pool. Trusting her brother to save her, Emma called out for Hal. However, at the time, Hal was being seduced by Julie. Without the use of his legs, Huie ended up drowning while Emma narrowly swam to safety, burdening her with a fear of water and disdain for her brother, who she felt had abandoned her. In the aftermath of this event, Hal, overwhelmed by guilt and confusion, ran away from home, unable to cope with what had happened. In his isolation, Hal turned to Japanese anime as a means of escape, eventually becoming a self-proclaimed otaku. As such, Hal pursued a future in robotics, eventually gaining acceptance into MIT, hoping to one day build the kinds of machines that had brought him comfort during the most difficult period of his life.

In 1998, Dr. Madnar's tenuous relationship with the scientific community led him to defect to Zanzibar Land, where he volunteered to help design a mass-produced Metal Gear simply named D. Shortly after Metal Gear D's development, Zanzibarland used it to raid nuclear disposal sites in both Russia and the United States, transforming Zanzibarland into a nuclear superpower. It's likely that by that point in the late 1990s, Big Boss began recruiting a handful of infamous mercenaries into Zanzibar Land's army. These included Running Man, a former Olympic track runner turned terrorist, Red Blaster, a former Spettznaz demolitions expert, Jungle Evil, a Vietnamese and Souymen guerilla fighter specialist, Nightfright, a former member of the legendary Whisperers Guerilla Unit and a master of stealth. And last but not least, the Four Horsemen, an elite group of former special forces soldiers.

In 1999, the world began facing a major energy crisis as the supply of purified petroleum dried up faster than expected with alternate sources of energy like renewables and nuclear underdeveloped. The price of petroleum skyrocketed, only compounding the issue. That same year, Dr. Madden developed another Metal Gear known as Metal Gear G, which was based on Metal Gear D's design with a few notable exceptions like the removal of its nuclear launch module. This was done in an effort to reduce weight, increase mobility, and simplify the production process, as Metal Gear G was designed to be marketed as a mobile control tower that could analyze battlefield data in real time for the infantry it was paired alongside. Meanwhile, the increase in public access to the internet prompted the Patriots to lay the groundwork for the GWAI by using a computer program that could filter out information they believed to be harmful to the organization. This program was then distributed to both military and civilian operating systems under the guise that it would help counteract the Y2K issue. the concern that computers would interpret the year 2000 as 1900, causing primarily global financial collapse.

In late 1999, two notable individuals traveled to Zanzibar land. Those being the vice chairman of the International Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Yoan Jacobson, who traveled to the desert region of Zanzibar in order to study wildlife, as well as an undercover CIA agent named Holly White, who covertly infiltrated Zanzibar land, disguised as a freelance international journalist. Simultaneously, a Czech biologist by the name of Dr.

Komarv created Oilix, a microorganism capable of purifying petroleum at a fraction of the cost when compared to the traditional refinement process.

When Dr. Madnar learned of this development, he tried to convince Marv to share the innovation with him. Marv, however, refused, forcing Madnar to alter his plan. Backed by the resources of Zanzibar land, Madnar maintained a close relationship with Marv in hopes that he would eventually reveal the secret of Olex.

It was around that point the Czech state security assigned Gustava Hefner as Marv's personal bodyguard and had her implant both Marv and Madnar with transmitters in their mers. Not long after, Madnar, frustrated at Marv's refusal to share the secret of Olix with him, had Zanzibar Land forces kidnapped the both of them while they were on their way to the International Energy Crisis Summit in America.

Following their disappearance, the Czech government sent Gustava to infiltrate Zanzibar land. Likewise, the US government tasked Foxhound with once more infiltrating a highly militarized nation that threatened to disturb the global power structure. In late December 1999, Solid Snake was pulled from retirement to conduct Operation Intrude F-014, the search and rescue of Dr. Marv.

On Christmas Eve, Solid Snake arrived at the entrance of Zanzibar Land. Guided by Roy Campbell, Master Miller, George Castler, and Holly White, Snake made his way inside the Zanzibar building, where he collected some basic equipment before finding Dr. Marv on the third floor. In reality, however, this turned out to be Black Ninja, who had removed the transmitter from Marv to lure Snake into his trap. After a tough battle, Snake bested Black Ninja, leading him to reveal his true identity, as well as the reason for Outer Heaven's destruction, that being the NATO strikes. Black Ninja finished by stating that Dr. Marv was being guarded by a man wearing a green beret on the first floor. He then exploded, leaving behind a key card that gave Snake more access to the building.

After collecting more equipment, Snake found the man in the green beret. Following him through the jungle, he eventually came across the prison facility. Inside, Snake found no trace of Marv. However, he did recognize a series of tapping noises that corresponded with the number 14082 in tap code. Entering this into his radio, Snake was able to contact Dr. from Madnar, who revealed that Marv was moved to the tower building a few kilometers north and that Zanzibar Land was in possession of another metal gear.

Around the same period, Grey Fox, second-guessing his selfish decision to side with Big Boss, began periodically and anonymously contacting Snake to offer his assistance, stating that he was just a fan of his. Traveling east from Madnarell, Snake eventually confronted Running Man. After Snake beat him at his own game, he collected his key card and returned to the Zanzibar building to collect more equipment. He then moved north, destroying a helicopter before entering the tower building using a cardboard box.

Meanwhile, Dr. Marv attached clues of his whereabouts to a carrier pigeon. When Holly discovered this, she attempted to collect it. However, she was taken prisoner by the guards, who took everything but her wireless radio. By the time Snake entered the tower building, she managed to contact him to share her situation and give him clues of her whereabouts. Soon enough, Snake managed to break Holly free, who shared that Marv's carrier pigeon traveled to the roof and gave him a copy of another key card.

On his way to the roof, Snake was ambushed by Red Blaster. When he was dealt with, Snake made his way to the roof where he found a note attached to Marv's carrier pigeon. On it were the letters W I S O H IO. By rotating the message 180 degrees, Snake was able to make out that the message read 140.51, alluding to Marv's radio frequency. However, given that Marv only spoke Czech and Slovakian, Madnar had Snake locate Gustava Hefner, who is disguised as a guard. to find her.

Snake traveled to the women's restroom on the third floor of the Zanzibar building. After Gustava and Marv conversed, Gustava shared that Marv was located in a prison complex north of the tower building. To reach it, Snake followed Gustava down an elevator in the women's restroom that led them to the sewers and then another elevator that took them straight inside Madnar's cell. Madnar gave Snake another key card, then followed the two of them back through the sewers.

Traveling north, Madnar stated that he was getting tired, forcing the group to sit still, while Madnar contacted Gray Fox. When the group eventually escaped the sewers, Madnar was the first to cross the bridge over to the prison building. When Gustava and Snake followed, Gray Fox used Metal Gear D to destroy the bridge, fatally wounding Gustava in the process. As she bled out in Snake's arms, she told Snake to press on without her, then gave him another key card and her brooch. Before she could explain how to use it, Gustava drew her final breath. Grreyfox then revealed his identity, stating that he would let Snake live if he left Zanzibar Land.

When Gray Fox departed, Holly contacted Snake to tell him that he could use the veranda on the tower building in combination with a hang glider to reach the prison building. After collecting the necessary equipment, Snake was ambushed by the four horsemen. When they were dealt with, Snake traveled to the Ver where he used a hang glider to travel to the prison building. Moving west, Snake was ambushed by Jungle Evil. Once he was dealt with, Snake moved below ground where he battled Night Fright.

Meanwhile, Dr. Madnar interrogated Dr. Marv for the location of the Oilix plans. When Marv revealed that he had hidden them inside an MSX video game cartridge inside his locker and that the locker could only be unlocked using Gustava's Brooch, Madnar strangled him to death out of frustration. Moments later, Snake entered the room. At first, Madnar stated that Marv had succumbed to a heart attack. However, the bruises on his neck suggested otherwise. Reinforcing Snake's suspicions, Holly contacted Snake to inform him that she had done some research into Madnar and learned about his defection to Zanzibar Land.

The truth revealed, Madnar put Snake in a chokeold in an attempt to secure Gustava's Brooch. After Snake knocked Madnar unconscious, he traveled all the way back to the Zanzibar building to change the Buch's shape using the low temperature of the freezer. Using this, he unlocked Marv's locker and collected the game cartridge. But just as he was about to leave, Madnar caught Snake's attention to share one last piece of information with him. For Ellen's sake, Madnar shared that Metal Gear D could only be destroyed by throwing grenades at its feet.

Just then, the floor under Snake opened, dropping him down to confront Metal Gear D, piloted by Gray Fox. Using Madnar's tip, Snake quickly destroyed Metal Gear D. In the process, however, Snake's equipment was enveloped in flames, and Gray Fox managed to get his hands on Marv's game cartridge. After ditching his equipment, Snake chased Fox into a minefield. Using nothing but his bare hands, Snake eventually took down Gray Fox, who revealed that he was his fan all along, and that he always knew he would die in battle. This was just his way of accelerating the process. In a final attempt to console the broken man before him, Snake told Gray Fox that Gustava was waiting for him on the other side. The bomb within Gray Fox then detonated, giving him peace in death.

Shortly after Gray Fox's death, Snake collected the game cartridge and was lured into the next room where he was confronted by Big Boss. Big Boss, of course, attempted to rationalize his reasoning for creating Zanzibar Land and by extension outer heaven. He stated that war was inevitable, a flame that could either rage uncontrollably or be carefully stoked, but never fully extinguished. So by having him at the forefront of war, steadily fanning the flames of conflict, it would at least provide a home for people like them, soldiers who were only seen as dead weight off the battlefield.

When Snake tried to oppose this reasoning, Big Boss simply challenged Snake to a final battle, one that he surely thought he would win given Snake's lack of equipment. But it was this very underestimation that would spell doom for the legendary big boss. For he of all people should have understood that when a snake is cornered, left naked and vulnerable, it has no choice but to strike. As Big Boss desperately tried to eliminate Snake, Snake, using the very techniques taught to him by Big Boss, did all he could to survive. Given enough time, Snake managed to find a lighter and flammable spray. Using this as a makeshift flamethrower, Snake engulfed Big Boss in flames, leaving his mentor to die as he made his escape.

Along the way, Snake was confronted by Holly, who handed him a gun and followed him to their planned extraction point. There, they made their final stand until they were eventually successfully extracted, just in time for Christmas.

When Snake returned to America, Campbell offered him an opportunity to return to Foxhound for good. When Snake declined, Campbell switched topics to Marv's cartridge, which he and Holly inserted inside an MSX, while Snake fled to Alaska to live in seclusion as a dog musher. Despite the cartridges authenticity and Campbell's assumption that it would help humanity, the secret of Olix was seemingly lost to history after this point. as over the next decade and a half, high-grade oil would never become as abundant as it would have given Olex's efficiency.

In the aftermath of the Zanzibar land disturbance, many of Big Boss's mercenaries had their contracts purchased by the US government and were later integrated into the army's VR training unit, Force 21. Dr. Madnar, meanwhile, escaped to Eastern Europe, where he would abandon his obsession with Metal Gear to begin working in medical cybernetics. Simultaneously, Campbell and Miller retired from Foxhound.

It was around that point the Patriots collected both Greyfox and Big Boss's bodies, seeing an opportunity to use the both of them to revive their genome soldier project. Grey Fox specifically was returned to Foxhound's medical staff, where Dr. Clark would first revive him, then experiment on him over the next four years. Big Boss, meanwhile, was placed into a medicallyinduced coma with the use of nanom machines, which was done for two primary reasons. They wished to use his DNA for their genome soldier project, and possibly more importantly, Clark believed that, like Zero, it was in their best interest to protect and preserve Big Boss at all cost.

When Eva and Ocelot discovered this sometime later, the two of them finally decided that the Patriots needed to be wiped out. If not for the world, they would do it to rescue Big Boss.

Over the past decade and a half, Naomi Hunter had become a world-class geneticist, primarily known for practically pioneering nanomachine technology. Everything seemed to be going well until the day she learned of her brother's death at the hands of Solid Snake. The loss of her only family shattered her, and from that moment on, her focus shifted. Driven by vengeance, Naomi set her sights on joining Foxhound, if only to get close to the one man she believed had taken her brother from her.

Likewise, it was around the same point Eli grew increasingly resentful towards Snake, whom he believed had stolen his birthright by killing Big Boss. Given that he viewed the world through the lens of genetics, Eli shifted his focus from surpassing his father to surpassing his brother. an act that in his mind at least meant he would have beat nature at its own game.

[Music]

Around the turn of the millennium, Hal, just a few years removed from his father's death, graduated with a PhD in robotics from MIT and a master's degree from Princeton. Clearly a progedy, Hal was then recruited by the FBI's engineering research facility before being fired for hacking into their central database. Not long after he was hired by Arms Techch, where he developed a number of new technologies. Most notably was stealth camouflage, which was officially adopted by the US Army and subsequently Foxhound.

On January 24th, 2000, Emma Emer, acting on a tip from a senior government official, led a hacking group that hacked into an NSA facility in Fort Me. In response to the attack, intelligence agencies from around the world attempted to recruit Emma despite being just 9 years old. The NSA, meanwhile, knew that these attacks were far from over and that the only way to remain secure was to totally isolate their data and intelligence gathering. This very initiative is what gave birth to Arsenal Gear, an enormous Arsenal ship inspired submersible metal gear that on the surface would serve as a mobile operation center for every intelligence agency and military branch of the United States. Although Arsenal Gear would not even begin construction for another 7 years, the Patriots saw its potential to maintain control in a world flooded with free information. They feared that the constant stream of knowledge from the internet would overwhelm society, leading people to withdraw into isolated communities and abandon critical thinking. Believing that humans could not be trusted to think for themselves, the patriots saw Arsenal gear as a way to manipulate society. Through it, they would control and categorize information, erasing what they deemed unnecessary or harmful and preserving only what they considered to be truth.

Later that same year, Eli was recruited into Foxhound, where he was given the code name Liquid Snake and promoted to squad leader. It was at that point he was reunited with Revolver Ocelot, and the third child, who was given the code name Psycho Mantis. Following these three were Vulcan Raven, who became the team's heavy weapons expert under Ocelot's recommendation, Sniperwolf, their primary scout, and Decoy Octopus, a master of disguise.

After his time spent in Liberia, Solidus Snake returned to America, where he began pursuing a political career. This culminated around the year 2000 when he was elected as the 43rd president of the United States under the name George Sears. Following his inauguration, Sears formed Dead Cell, an anti-terrorism training unit composed of Colonel Jackson, the team's strategic leader, Fat Man, the team's demolitions expert, Old Boy, an experienced soldier, China man, an expert in martial arts, and finally, Vamp, a master of blades whose nanomachine ridden body made him practically immortal.

In 2002, Donald Anderson officially became the chief of DARPA. nearly 40 years after joining the organization. Not long after the promotion, Anderson began accepting bribes from Arms Tech's president, Kenneth Baker, in exchange for DARPA's continued backing of the Metal Gear Rex project. Backed by DARPA, Armssteech, or rather a small shell company owned by Armssteech, constructed a nuclear weapons disposal facility on Shadow Moses, a small island within Alaska's Fox Archipelago. In reality, however, the nuclear disposal element was mostly a facade for the facility's primary purpose, which was to construct Metal Gear Rex. Heading this construction was Hal Emmer, who poured his love for robotics into the project, as he was led to believe that Rex was a fully defensive weapon. After construction began, Arms Techch equipped Rex with a number of conventional and advanced weapons, such as a Vulcan cannon, missile module, and laser. However, Rex's primary selling point was its state-of-the-art miniaturized rail gun, which Arms Techch developed in tandem with another weapons manufacturer called Rivermore National Labs, who helped miniaturaturize and develop projectiles for the rail gun over the next 2 years. While Howal was told that these projectiles would allow Rex to destroy highaltitude ICBMs, in reality, Rivermore was working on a first strike capable nuclear warhead that would be invisible to all modern detection technology as it was propelled by the rail gun rather than a traditional thruster.

In the years after the Zansbar land disturbance, Grey Fox was steadily modified by Dr. Clark, who used drugs, genetic therapy, and nanomachine technology to transform him into the perfect soldier. In the process, depriving him of the very things that made him human. This process began with his mind, which was stripped of its emotion by the nanom machines to make him as rational as possible. Next were his very genetics, which were altered with the use of advanced genetic therapy to give him increased speed, strength, and intelligence. Last was his body, which was physically grafted to a prototype exoskeleton. Of course, Frank had always been a man trapped in the body of a soldier. But now, that body wasn't even his own.

In 2003, Naomi Hunter, who at this point was working for the ATGC, was sent to Foxhound to oversee genetic therapy for the genome soldiers. It was there Naomi discovered that her brother, Gray Fox, was still alive and that Clark was using his body as a guinea pig for the genome soldier project. Not long after, Naomi was contacted by Ocelot and Eva, who offered to assist her in freeing her brother, knowing that he would kill Clark. Naomi agreed and carried out with the plan, resulting in Clark's death at the hands of Gray Fox. To cover up the murder and fake Fox's death, they rigged the laboratory to explode. Though physically free, Fox's mind still remained a prison, a purgatory, where he was forced to live out a tortured existence, scarcely bound to reality. It was in this state his subconscious desire became to break free of his torment by once again facing Solid Snake.

Following Clark's untimely death, Naomi was promoted to the head of Foxhound's medical staff and chief geneticist, where she inherited all of Clark's previous projects. Most notably, was a virus that served as a spiritual successor to the vocal cord parasite. Unlike the parasite, however, this virus did not target languages, but rather specific genetic profiles. Yet, Clark was never able to perfect the weapon. Instead, it was Naomi who eventually finished it, as well as the genome soldier project following a breakthrough she coined gene targeting. As its name suggests, this method allowed Naomi to target specific parts of an individual's genetic makeup. for the virus, which she would later dub fox dye. This allowed her to identify specific genes that were unique to an individual or group, then genetically programmed fox dye to target that gene or even multiple others as well. For the genome soldiers, gene targeting allowed Naomi to target the specific soldier genes responsible for Big Boss's enhanced physical and mental capabilities. By using genetic therapy, they were then able to transfer those genes into regular soldiers, giving them the very traits that made Big Boss such an efficient soldier. Thus, the next generation special forces unit or genome soldiers were born. While initially composed of soldiers drawn from various specialized anti-terrorist units, the unit would forever change with the integration of Force 21, the army's VR unit, primarily consisting of former Outer Heaven mercenaries. Bound by shared trauma, identical VR training, and at this point, genetic similarities, the Next Generation Special Forces Unit became something akin to a family.

In 2004, an unknown individual or group planted a bomb inside a famous church in New York City. Given the sensitivity of the situation, the NYPD called in the world's foremost explosives expert, Peter Stillman, the former mentor of Dead Cell's Fat Man. However, the threat proved to be too daunting for Stillman, who fled the premises shortly before the bomb detonated, destroying the church and a nearby playground. Unable to bear the reality that so many had lost so much, yet he was still left untouched, Stillman selfishly made everyone believe that he had lost the use of his leg and retired shortly thereafter.

That same year, a man named Johnny Sasaki, the grandson of the Johnny who guarded Naked Snake during Operation Snake Eater, joined the military and was then quickly recruited as a genome soldier.

In January of 2005, members of the Next Generation Special Forces unit likely began exhibiting side effects of the genetic therapy. It's presumed that in an attempt to solve this problem themselves, the soldiers went behind the government's back to obtain classified intel related to the soldier gene. Afterwards, they took advantage of the mostly automated genetic therapy process to modify themselves in a desperate attempt to eliminate the mutations. While ultimately unsuccessful, this proved to be the first hint that the genome soldiers were not as patriotic or obedient as their psychological reports suggested.

By mid to late February 2005, Metal Gear Rex was nearing completion. All that was left was to test the experimental nuclear projectile, which had only seen success in simulations. To confirm these results, Arms Techch and DARPA planned a realworld test using a dummy warhead. If all went according to plan, Rex would begin full production and be formally adopted by the US military. Given what was at stake, Anderson and Baker traveled to Shadow Moses to oversee the test. Providing an extra layer of security, the next generation special forces unit as well as Foxhound were tasked with guarding the island. However, come the day of their arrival, a portion of the Gino soldiers didn't show up, prompting the patriots to send in replacement troops, one of which was Merrill.

By this same period, President Sears, about half a decade into his presidency, had come to understand that his position was not as all powerful as he once believed, as the presidency was primarily a figurehead, and that the real power lay in the hands of the patriots. As such, Sears allied with Ocelot, who he ordered to obtain the data of Metal Gear Rex by coaxing Liquid Snake into inciting a rebellion on Shadow Moses. While it is unknown what exactly Ocelot said to convince Liquid into following through with this plan, it is likely that Ocelot used Liquid's own insecurity against him by subtly suggesting that he use Rex to incite an international incident, reigniting the Cold War. From the ashes of this conflict, Liquid planned to reestablish Outer Heaven, therefore cementing his legacy as having surpassed Big Boss himself.

Following through with his plan, on February 25th, Kazuhiro Miller, just half a decade into his retirement, was killed within his own home in Alaska. While the exact asalent is unknown, theories suggest that it was either Liquid Snake himself or Ocelot at Liquid's request. A day or two later, Rex successfully launched a dummy warhead, proving Rex's capabilities to all parties involved. Seizing the opportunity, Liquid and by extension, Foxhound initiated an insurrection on Shadow Moses by rallying the next generation special forces unit, who Liquid viewed as his siblings. As such, Liquid's new army was dubbed the sons of Big Boss. Refusing to go along with the rebellion, Merryill was imprisoned alongside Anderson and Baker. Observing Merryill's loyalty, Baker entrusted her with his emergency override key card. However, he did not instruct her on how to use it. Meanwhile, Ocelot put Liquid into contact with Sergovic, who offered to supply Liquid's rebellion with weapons and a Hind helicopter in exchange for Rex's launch data, which he planned to use to revitalize Russia.

Around the same period, the sons of Big Boss were ordered to kill all dogs on the base. However, Sniperwolf prevented them from doing so. The only other person who shared in this affection was Hal Emmer, who frequently asked to assist her in feeding the dogs. As a result, Sniperwolf grew to respect Hal, and Hal in turn developed a crush on Sniperwolf. Not long after, Liquid ordered Psycho Mantis to probe into Anderson's mind to uncover his half of the nuclear access code or PAL code. When this failed due to Anderson's psychic resistance implants, Ocelot tortured and killed him. While the death was made to look accidental, in reality, Ocelot planned it from the very start. As by eliminating Anderson, he could both conceal his relation to the Patriots and kill one of their greatest assets. While Liquid believed that Anderson's death would ruin his plans, Mantis was quick to propose that they use this to their advantage by having Octopus adopt Anderson's identity. Once that was accomplished, they threw Anderson's body in a nearby cell where he was left to rot, while Psycho Mantis attempted to probe into Baker's mind. Yet, similar to Anderson, the attempt was unsuccessful, forcing Liquid to resort to a backup plan that involved manipulating the government into sending in Solid Snake. When his brother arrived, Liquid planned to orchestrate a grand plot that would use Snake's own determination against him.

On February 28th, the Sons of Big Boss contacted the US government to demand that they turn over the remains of Big Boss, more specifically his genetic profile, which Liquid planned to use to correct the mutations within the genome solders's DNA. Alongside the data, the group demanded $1 billion, stating that if their demands were not met within 24 hours, they would launch a nuclear strike using Metal Gear Rex. unwilling to hand over something as priceless as Big Boss's body and unable to allow Fox to launch a nuke, which would force them to delay the upcoming START 3 negotiations. US Secretary of Defense Jim Houseman formulated a plan that utilized their two remaining assets, those being Fox Dye and Solid Snake. The former provided a means to discreetly eliminate the next generation special forces Foxhound and Kenneth Baker to keep them from using Rex, while the latter would be used to transmit the virus itself. Setting the plan into motion, Housemen ordered Naomi Hunter to oversee the foxy injection. Seeing this as an opportunity to get her revenge, Naomi altered the parameters of the virus to make Snake a target as well. Houseman then commanded Roy Campbell to reunite with Snake. With no choice but to cooperate as Merryill's life was on the line, Campbell ultimately agreed. Likewise, Nastasha Romanenko was forced to participate remotely by her ex-husband Richard Ames to serve as the eyes and ears for the Patriots. Last but not least was May Ling, a young MIT student who was tasked with providing her intel gathering and data analysis expertise as well as her in-depth knowledge of the cuttingedge codec communications device and Solaton radar system, both of which she invented.

Within a handful of hours, Snake was pulled from his home in Twin Lakes, Alaska, and transferred to the USS Discovery. there. He was stripped of his belongings and debriefed on his two primary objectives. Those being rescue Anderson and Baker, as well as determined Foxhound's nuclear launch capabilities. During the debrief, Naomi injected Snake with first generation nano machines that would allow the team to monitor him more precisely and increase his capabilities. However, this injection also contained trace amounts of fox dye which Naomi altered to kill Snake at a random point in time. Over the next 20 minutes, Snake was debriefed on the genome soldiers Foxhound and Liquid Snake. It was at that point Snake refused to participate in the mission, stating that he was finished doing the government's dirty work. But when Campbell stated that his niece Merrill was present on the island, Snake accepted the mission under two conditions. That he was to be given full disclosure and that he would only follow orders directly from Campbell. After Campbell agreed to these conditions, Snake cut his hair, swallowed a pack of cigarettes, equipped his gear, and climbed into a swimmer delivery vehicle bound for Shadow Moses Island.

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About 6 hours after he was contacted by Campbell, Solid Snake infiltrated Shadow Moses's loading dock. Tailing Liquid, Snake ascended the elevator to the facility's entrance, where he watched Liquid take off in a hind D. While Snake scouted the facility, Liquid used the helicopter to destroy both US military F-16s that were attempting to discern Foxhound's defensive capabilities. With no possibility of backup, Snake entered the facility via an air duct, where he was contacted by Liquid, disguised as Miller, who stated that he would be there to provide Snake any assistance he needed.

When Snake eventually made it to Anderson's cell, Decoy Octopus revealed the existence of Metal Gear Rex. He then began manipulating Snake by sharing the existence of Baker's three emergency override key cards, making him believe that they were his last hope. This was all in accordance with Liquid's plan, which was designed to make Snake believe that Foxhound had already activated Rex, when in reality, using the emergency override during Rex's dormant state would have the reverse effect. To this end, Octopus shared Baker's location with Snake and attempted to learn if the Pentagon planned to give in to Foxhound's demands. Just then, Octopus suffered what seemed to be a fatal heart attack as a result of his exposure to Foxy, which Snake had unknowingly transmitted to him. Seizing the opportunity, Merryill escaped her cell, knocked out Johnny, stole his codec, and ambushed Snake just as he left Anderson's cell. While Snake and Merryill questioned each other's decisions, Genome soldiers flooded into the room. Forced to take action, Merryill opened fire on the soldiers, earning her first ever kill. When the room was clear, Merryill made a break for the elevator. Just then, Mantis dove into Snake's mind.

By the time Snake found Baker, Ocelot had already tortured the PAL code out of him. While this was of little use to Foxhound, seeing as Anderson's code was also needed to activate Rex, the real utility in doing this was that Baker would share this knowledge with Snake, making him believe that Foxhound were in possession of both halves of the code. To maintain appearances, Ocelot then battled Snake. However, they were interrupted when Grey Fox arrived to cut off Ocelot's right hand and free Baker. After Fox fled, Baker revealed that he gave his emergency override key to Merrill, whose codec frequency Snake could find on the back of the CD case. He then noted that if override wasn't an option, Snake needed to go to the nuclear warhead storage building to get into contact with a scientist named Hal Emerch, who would either find a way to shut down or destroy Rex. He then handed Snake Rex's launch data for safekeeping before succumbing to Fox Dye.

Hoping to get some answers, Snake contacted Campbell, who feigned ignorance and suggested he contact Merrill. When Snake contacted her, she shared all she knew about the launch test and Howal's precise location. As Snake traveled north, he was contacted by Gray Fox, who warned him that a tank planned to ambush him ahead. When Snake questioned the stranger's identity, Fox simply stated that he was his fan and that Snake should call him [ __ ] Directly afterward, Snake was confronted by Vulcan Raven, who remained within the tank to gauge Snake's combat abilities. Snake, of course, managed to disable the tank, leaving Raven with a desire to rematch Snake.

By the time Snake made it to the third floor basement of the nuclear warhead storage building, the elusive cyborg ninja had already killed the soldiers guarding Hal's lab. Before he could do the same to Hal, Snake confronted him inside the lab. When the fight concluded, the cyborg ninja alluded to his real identity before his body began seizing. After Fox fled the scene, Snake met with Hal, who explained his belief that Rex was a purely defensive weapon. when Snake proved him wrong, Hal committed to helping Snake take down Rex by any means necessary, but that if they were going to be in contact, Snake should call him Otacon, short for Otaku Convention.

With Oticon on his side, Snake's next step was finding Merryill, who he was led to believe had all three of Baker's key cards. When he met with her in the women's restroom, however, she only gave him the single one that Baker had given her. With Merryill as point man, the two of them then made their way to the commander's room where Psycho Mantis took control of Merryill's body. After Snake subdued her, he doubted Psycho Mantis' abilities. In an attempt to prove how truly powerful he was, Mantis first read Snake's mind, sharing the methods he used up until this point. He then probed into Snake's soul to see what other activities he had been up to. Finally, he had Snake put his controller on the floor to demonstrate his powerful telekinetic abilities. When all these demonstrations failed to impress or intimidate Snake, Mantis was forced to battle him the old-fashioned way.

After Psycho Mantis was defeated, he probed into Snake's mind, finding that unlike everyone else, Snake was not obsessed with legacy, with the desire to pass on his genes. To Mantis, this desire was the root cause of humanity's suffering. Because people could not simply live in the moment. They always had to look beyond themselves in an attempt to alter a world they could not inhabit themselves. Every selfish desire, every meaningless war could all be traced back to this one purpose that was encoded into humans. But because Snake did not harbor this desire, because he felt that life was about more than passing on his genes, Mantis opened the path forward. The first time he had ever used his powers to harmlessly help someone, and the last thing he ever did before he died.

Continuing onward, Snake and Merryill eventually reached the underground passage where Sniper Wolf shot Merryill twice. Unable to save her without a sniper, Snake returned to the tank hangar to collect the PSG1 sniper rifle. As he did so, Merrill was captured by Foxhound. When Snake returned to the underground passage, he used the sniper to nearly kill Sniperwolf. When he went to confirm the kill, however, she ambushed him and took him hostage.

By the time Snake awoke, it had been about 8 hours since his initial infiltration. Given that the government was seemingly no closer to giving in to their demands, Foxhound reinforced their intention to follow through with Liquid's plan. Outside of that, however, they were about as clueless as Snake was in regards to the cyborg ninja's intentions and the sudden deaths of Octopus and Baker. Believing Snake held some answers of his own, Ocula interrogated Snake under the threat of Merrill's life. Refusing to submit, Snake was thrown into the same cell as Anderson's corpse, which once again was guarded by Johnny.

After a second round of questioning, Snake got into contact with Campbell and Naomi. Campbell informed Snake that the government decided to not give in to Foxhound's demands, hoping that Snake would follow through with his mission. He then talked to Naomi, who questioned him about Gray Fox. Snake noted that he viewed Fox as a friend despite what happened in Zanzibar. This forever changed Naomi's perspective of Snake, who she assumed mercilessly killed her brother out of apathy, not duty.

When Snake eventually escaped from his cell, he made his way back to where Merrill was shot. Struck with grief, Snake apologized to Campbell for pushing his niece so hard before Miller chimed in to note that he couldn't let those regrets drive him mad. Following this piece of advice, Campbell shared a story that Naomi had fabricated about her grandfather, which made Liquid suspicious about her place on the team. Unable to shake the suspicion, Liquid ordered a spy of his within the Pentagon to look into Naomi's past.

Not long after, Snake made it to the top of the communications tower, where Liquid used the Hind D to destroy the satellite dish connecting towers one and two. Unable to battle him directly, Snake repelled down the building where he eventually found a Stinger missile launcher. At the roof of the second tower, Snake used his Stinger launcher to take down the Hind. Assuming Liquid had died, Snake made his way down the elevator where he was ambushed by four genome soldiers equipped with stealth camouflage. When they were dealt with, he traveled north toward the snowfield where Sniper Wolf lay in wait. When Snake inevitably took her down, she told him that she had always felt like she was a dog of war. But Snake assured her that she was no dog. Untamed and solitary, she was a wolf. Believing it was her time to die, she told Snake to end her life. But just as he was about to do so, Otacon gave her one last act of love by handing her her sniper before Snake ended her life.

Believing there were only a few hours until the nuke was launched. Snake told Aon to leave the base. Oticon, however, was adamant that he wanted to help, if only to learn what Snake, or rather what he should be fighting for.

Around the time Snake arrived in the blast furnace, Liquid Spy reported back with knowledge of Naomi's work with Fox Dye, as well as Houseman's use of Snake as a vector for Fox Dye. Aware that this knowledge was kept from Snake, Liquid contacted him to sew seeds of doubt about Naomi's true intentions. Directly afterward, Snake was ambushed by Vulcan Raven. When Snake proved his superiority in battle, Raven told him that the Donald Anderson he saw die was in fact Decoy Octopus. Liquid then contacted Snake to share the truth about Naomi's identity and pressured Campbell to put her under arrest.

As Campbell interrogated Naomi, Snake made his way to the underground base where Rex was being stored. When Snake finally reached the control room, Liquid had Ocelot set the target for the nuclear projectile to a nuclear test site in Lnor, China, which he reasoned was isolated enough that it would show the world what they were capable of without causing civilian casualties. This was not out of concern for the well-being of others, but rather it was a strategic choice, as the public outcry of a populated target would only spell doom for their plan. targeting military infrastructure, however, would both prove that the projectile was undetectable and devastating, making it the ultimate sales pitch for when they eventually sold Rex.

During the same period, Oticon hacked into Baker's personal files, eventually discovering that Baker's key card was not one of three cards, but instead a single key that used a shape memory alloy to morph into different keys when exposed to different temperatures. As he shared this information with Snake, Ocelot spotted Snake in the doorway and shot the key card out of his hand. After collecting it, Snake took the room temperature key card back to the control room to insert it, then repeated the same process two more times after cooling it down in the warehouse and heating it up in the blast furnace.

On his way back from the furnace, Snake was contacted by Naomi, who shared her true relation to Gray Fox, as well as the truth about Fox died. Before she could reveal everything, however, Naomi was taken into Campbell's custody. Regardless of Campbell's true allegiances, Snake returned to the control room where he initiated the emergency override, activating Rex just as Liquid had planned. His plan fulfilled. Liquid revealed that he had been Miller all along before trapping Snake in the control room and filling it with gas. Not long after, Oticon managed to hack into the bas's systems and unlock the door, allowing Snake to confront Liquid.

In this confrontation, Liquid revealed the truth behind Foxy Leon for Tarib and his plan to break free of his genetic legacy. Wasting no time, Liquid jumped inside Rex, forcing Snake to take it down single-handedly. By the end, when Rex was nearly destroyed, Liquid tried to use it to crush Snake. In the final moments, however, Gray Fox saved Snake from the attack. Not so he could battle Snake himself, but so Snake could tell Naomi the truth behind her parents' deaths. Leaping into the air, Fox used everything he had to destroy Rex, crippling his own body in the process. Faced with the choice to kill his greatest enemy at the cost of his friend's life, Snake couldn't bring himself to pull the trigger. As Frank was laid out on the ground, Rex's leg positioned directly above him. His final farewell to Snake was a demand for him to keep fighting for what he believed in. Fueled by determination, Snake battled Rex once again, this time crippling it for good. The explosion following its destruction violently pinned Snake against a wall, knocking Snake out cold.

As Snake lay unconscious, Liquid took the codec from his ear, using it to speak directly to the Patriots, whom he confidently proclaimed would not kill him using Foxy and that when he was done with Snake, they would be his next target. Moments later, Snake awoke to find he, Liquid, and Merrill at top Rex's cockpit. There, Liquid stated that he sought to build a world where warriors like them were honored for their strength, where he was not seen as a villain for partaking in the very thing he was created to do. As Liquid made this proclamation, Housemen ordered Shadow Moses's destruction to cover up the existence of Foxy. Minutes later, two nuclear bomb equipped B2 bombers departed for Shadow Moses, followed shortly by Houseman himself. Likely informed of this by his Pentagon spy, Liquid shared this information with Snake, who then confirmed it with Campbell. Trusting Snake to save Merrill, Campbell stated that he would do all he could to delay the strike, regardless of the consequences. Just then, Houseman had Campbell arrested and contacted Snake to demand he turn in Rex's data in exchange for his life. Unable to do so as it was in Ocelot's possession, Snake's last hope was to escape before the bombers arrived. Believing they were faded to die, Liquid challenged Snake to a final battle. To force him into accepting, he planted a bomb that would detonate upon Merrill's death, which was just three short minutes away. Stripped of everything but their will, the Twin Snakes gave it everything they had. One fighting to save what he loved, the other to quell his insecurity. In the end, Snake prevailed, shoving Liquid off Rex. With just minutes to spare, Snake reunited with Merrill before he was contacted by Odicon, who had finally realized what he was fighting for. While not directly stated, it is implied that the reason was Snake himself. As such, he offered to stay behind to ensure Snake and Merryill could escape safely.

Just 10 short minutes until the airirst strike arrived, Snake and Merryill made their escape where they were eventually confronted by Liquid. When they reached the end of the tunnel, both Jeeps flipped, pinning Snake and Merrill to the ground. As Liquid approached the two of them, the fox dye finally kicked in. Liquid's last word being fox. To which Snake responded, "Die."

In the moments before Liquid's death, Campbell informed President Sears of Houseman's actions. In response, the Patriots ordered Richard Ames to arrest Houseman, stopping the air strike. After sharing this news with Snake, Campbell thanked him for all he had done, despite the countless lies. He then pointed Snake to a nearby snowmobile, which he and Merryill could use to extract. Afterwards, he was put into contact with Naomi, who was left broken in the wake of her brother's death. Hearing the pain in Naomi's voice, Snake refused to honor her brother's final wish for Naomi to learn the truth about her parents. Instead, he offered her words of optimism and closure, believing that with the fox dy in his system, he was already a dead man walking. Naomi, however, chose to believe that while he could die at any moment, there was no reason that that should stop him from living. When Snake and Merryill made it to the snowmobile, Snake, inspired by Naomi's words, stated that he was no longer going to let his life be dictated by survival. Instead, he would dedicate the time he had left to pursuing a new path in life. Whether that be with Merrill or in pursuit of another philanthropic purpose, Snake would give it his all.

[Music]

In the wake of the Shadow Moses incident, Ocelot sold Arex's launch data on the black market, sparking a global frenzy as nearly every powerful nation and organization began constructing their own Metal Gear prototypes. Directly afterward, Sears had Liquid's body collected and preserved for future use. Simultaneously, Foxhound was permanently disbanded by the US Army, and the remaining genome soldiers, excluding Johnny, were taken to Peace Air Force Base in Portsouth and New Hampshire, where they were experimented on further. Meanwhile, Naomi was sentenced to a maximum security prison for her hand at Shadow Moses. Days later, Jim Houseman was found dead by what was reported to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. However, this would later be called into question by Nastasha, who believed that Houseman was murdered for refusing to take the fall for the Shadow Moses incident.

Just under 3 weeks later, Naomi was broken out of prison. While it was believed by many that it was Solid Snake's doing, in reality, Ocelot was the one responsible for it. Over the next few weeks or months, Snake and Merryill attempted to forge a relationship following their commitment to lead a life of their own design. But when Snake learned that the world was entering a new age dominated by Metal Gear, he chose to abandon Merrill. Not long after, he and Oddon founded Philanthropy, a UN recognized NGO dedicated to ridding the world of Metal Gear.

Abandoned by Snake, Merryill returned to the military with the help of her uncle, who offered to help as he felt people like her and Ming had been wrongfully ignored due to their involvement with Shadow Moses. It's likely that around the same period, Nastasha Romanenko, believing the events of Shadow Moses needed to be preserved, wrote a book titled In the Darkness of Shadow Moses. In it, Nastasha shared everything, including Solid Snake's heroic actions, Arms Tech's bribes to Anderson, the existence of Metal Gear Rex, the Fox die weapon and how the government used it during the event, Jim Houseman's arrest and suspicious death, her own relationship with Richard Ames, and finally, the involvement of a shadow organization called the Patriots. Yet, when she attempted to get the book published, her publishers, Global Elements, Inc., heavily edited her work, leaving out much of what she originally intended to shed a light on. Perhaps one of the few things that remained at least vaguely similar with Solid Snake's involvement, resulting in him becoming somewhat of a celebrity. Additionally, the book's mere existence prompted the Patriots to force President Sears to resign, replacing him with another politician named James Johnson. Believing that Solidus knew too much about the organization, the patriots planned to kill him. Yet, Solidus managed to avoid this grim fate by going underground.

Sometime after this, Ocelot traveled to Leon, France, where Solidus obtained the assistance of the world's finest transplant surgery team to replace Ocelot's missing hand with none other than Liquid Snake's arm. What followed is best described as a convoluted plot with three distinct parts. The first had Ocelot masquerading as an agent of the Patriots to learn as much as he could about their organization and their future plans. Once he had gained their trust, the second part of his plan involved using nanom machines and psychotherapy to quite literally become Liquid Snake. All the while making it seem like it was supernatural possession. Long term, Ocelot planned to use this to game the system, as he knew that the AIS were solely derivative programs and that their actions were primarily based on how prior events unfolded. So, by becoming Liquid, he would be able to manipulate the Patriots into following a set script, making them predictable. Additionally, he knew that Liquid was notoriously adverse to authority, meaning that when

The opportunity presented itself. He would do whatever it took to end the Patriots. If all the pieces fell into place, Eva would then enact the third part of the plan, which involved securing and repairing Big Boss's body, only to wake him when the Patriots' reign had ended.

In 2007, Mailing was transferred to the US Army's Natic Soldier Center, where she helped develop weapons and equipment, allowing her to supply Philanthropy with whatever supplies that the Army deemed unfit for use. Around that same period, Jack was recruited into Force 21, where he performed VR training exercises based on the Shadow Moses incident.

Meanwhile, a former Pentagon data analyst named Rosemary was recruited by the Patriots, who ordered her to keep an eye on Jack by kindling a romantic relationship with him. To accomplish this, Rose transformed herself to fit Jack's ideal romantic candidate by completely altering her looks, preferences, and interests.

Sometime later, Jack and Rose were both transferred to a military base in New York City. On April 30th, 2007, Rose staged a meeting with Jack in front of Federal Hall. There, a group of middle-aged Japanese women asked Rose which building King Kong famously climbed. Fully aware that Jack was nearby, Rose responded by claiming that it was the Chrysler building. Knowing Jack would correct her by stating that it was in fact the Empire State Building.

What followed was a carefully fabricated act that began with playful arguing and eventually morphed into a low-stakes bet that had the two of them traveled to the skyscraper museum in Battery Park to confirm who was correct. As planned, the museum was closed and the two of them seemingly went their separate ways. When they later coincidentally encountered each other back at the military base, Jack took the opportunity to ask Rose on a date at the top of the Empire State Building. Following the date, the two of them went to Rose's apartment where they watched King Kong on repeat until dawn. Their relationship established, Rose, as per her orders, documented everything about Jack, in the process developing a legitimate affection for him.

Around late spring of 2007, an eccentric conspiracy theorist named Gary McGolden was sent a package from his friend Max Smithson, the chief editor of the magazine company Mega Surprise. While at first Gary suspected the suspicious package was a bomb, he would quickly learn that it was actually an optical disc containing "In the Darkness of Shadow Moses, the Unofficial Truth," an unabridged version of the published book. Using a neighbor's computer to read its contents, Gary was compelled to investigate the book himself, leading him to travel to Alaska.

On June 24th, Gary's cousin, John D, dropped Gary 20 meters from Shadow Moses. Disguising himself using the corpse of a tuna fish, Gary plunged into the icy water. As Gary swam to shore, John D was spotted by a Patriots-operated helicopter and was later captured just as Gary reached the shore of Shadow Moses. Not long after, Gary was captured as well and later interrogated on the contents of the disc that was in his possession. Refusing to submit, Gary accused the agents of being involved in a secret society that controlled the nation and the president himself. Just as he was about to be executed for his uncooperation, a mysterious stranger veiled in stealth camo arrived to rescue him. While the exact identity of the stranger is not stated, it is heavily implied to be Solid Snake. Though Gary chose to believe that it was a little gray alien.

When Gary eventually returned to his apartment, he documented his entire experience under the title "The Shocking Conspiracy Behind Shadow Moses," which he then sent to Max Smithson shortly before he disappeared forever. Given Gary's lack of accountability and the story's humorous contents, the book was largely ignored by the public. Max, however, found the book to be quite compelling. As in the editor's note, he stated that he hoped Gary was working on a follow-up book, hopefully one that investigated the individual who actually sent him the disc, as he couldn't recall doing so.

While Gary's book had little impact on the public, it did pave the way for the original unabridged version of Nastasha's book to be officially published. Unlike its abridged counterpart, this version became an instant bestseller, revealing numerous conspiracies to the public, most notably the existence of the Patriots. Hoping to do some good with the book's success, Nastasha donated her share of the profits to Philanthropy to help in their seemingly never-ending fight to rid the world of Metal Gear.

Around early to mid-2007, the United States Marine Corps, alarmed by the growing number of Rex knockoffs appearing worldwide and desiring to one-up their army rivals, initiated the development of a new amphibious Metal Gear known as Ray. Unlike previous Metal Gear models, Ray was never intended to carry nuclear weapons. Instead, its primary function was to neutralize other Metal Gears and had a major emphasis on mass producability. After Ray was envisioned, the project was passed on to Marine Commander Scott Dolph, who oversaw the construction of the first unmanned prototype. In early August of 2007, the US Marines finished development of the Ray prototype. In an attempt to secure the funding necessary for the mass production of the unmanned variants for the Marines, Scott Dolph scheduled a live test in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

Wanting to secure Ray for themselves for their Arsenal Gear project, the Patriots orchestrated a grand plot that would result in them gaining possession of Ray, initiating Arsenal Gear's construction, and putting an end to Philanthropy. When Ocelot learned of this plan, he knew that the Patriots intended to use Arsenal Gear to finalize the GW AI, further tightening their firm grip on humanity. From his position within the organization, he saw this as an opportunity to gain access to the otherwise impenetrable AI network. As such, Ocelot planned to support their efforts to construct GW, only to destroy it once it was finished, preserving a copy for himself in the process. At that point, he would fully embrace the role of Liquid Snake, predicting that Liquid would rebuild GW, use it to infiltrate the AI network, and put an end to the era of the Patriots.

Around early August, Philanthropy was sent an anonymous tip from Ocelot labeled as being sent by "E.E." that detailed the existence of an amphibious Metal Gear under US Marine jurisdiction. Believing the lead to be from Emma herself, Otacon planned a trip to New York City. Meanwhile, Ocelot got into contact with Sergey Gurlukovich, stating that he wished to acquire his assistance in stealing Ray to revitalize Russia. However, his true intentions were to use Sergey's army in accordance with his orders by the Patriots to help him hijack Ray and frame Philanthropy for the chaos.

On August 8th, 2007, Philanthropy traveled to New York City to investigate and reveal the existence of a new Metal Gear aboard the USS Discovery. Shrouded in stealth camo, Snake used the George Washington Bridge to infiltrate the tanker as it passed underneath the bridge. Tasked by Otacon with uncovering the tanker's destination, Snake made his way to the apex of the tanker. Simultaneously, Ocelot, alongside Gurlukovich and his mercenaries, infiltrated the ship to rig it with explosives and hijack Ray. When Snake arrived at the bridge, he shared that the ship's destination was in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Extrapolating from this, Otacon concluded that the Metal Gear was combat-worthy and that Snake needed to make contact with the actual Metal Gear.

Meanwhile, Sergey contacted his daughter Olga, commanding her to extract immediately due to her pregnancy. Eavesdropping on their conversation, Snake held Olga at gunpoint in an attempt to discern their intentions. Looking for a fight, Olga shot at Snake, initiating a standoff. When Snake eventually tranquilized Olga, a Cipher UAV operated by Ocelot took a photograph of Snake. Racing to beat the mercenaries, Snake then traveled to the ship's cargo hold. There, he was instructed by Otacon to take photos of the Metal Gear and send them back to him using one of the workstation computers. Following suit, Snake snuck past the attentive Marines until he eventually reached Ray. After taking a handful of images from a variety of angles, Snake uploaded them to Otacon using the workstation.

Directly afterward, Ocelot and Gurlukovich took Marine Commander Scott Dolph hostage. It was then Ocelot revealed his alliance to Solidus and killed both Gurlukovich and Scott Dolph. As the Marines surrounded him, Ocelot blew the ship's explosives. Planning to use Ray as a method of escape. Before he could do so, Snake confronted him. It was then Ocelot, willingly or otherwise, was overtaken by Liquid's consciousness, making the Patriots believe that this was only possible when Ocelot was around Snake. As the tanker split in two, Ocelot used Ray to escape while Snake nearly drowned in the wreckage. Directly afterward, the Patriots deliberately destroyed a second oil-filled tanker at the scene of the incident, causing an environmental crisis.

Not long after, the image Ocelot took of Snake was used to frame Philanthropy as a terrorist organization. Hoping to lose some of the heat, Snake and Otacon devised a plan that had them retrieve the rest of Liquid's body, which they then planted among the tanker's wreckage. When DNA analysis was conducted on the body, it was found to be an exact match. Solid Snake had officially died during the attack.

Shortly following the oil spill, the Patriots initiated construction of the Big Shell. While publicly the Big Shell looked and operated as a decontamination facility, in actuality, it served as a research and development center for the construction of Arsenal Gear and the mass production of Metal Gear Ray, which the Patriots had stolen to defend Arsenal Gear. Shortly after Arsenal Gear began construction, Emma Emmerich was brought in by the Patriots as a system programmer for Arsenal Gear and, more importantly, to finalize the creation of the GW AI using the framework of the Y2K computer program. In addition to this, Emma was ordered to create a worm cluster program to destroy GW and wipe it of all Patriots-related information in case GW ever fell into the wrong hands.

Following the so-called tanker incident, Olga took command of her father's mercenary army and later allied with an illegal Russian organization controlled by the Patriots. Then in late 2007 or early 2008, Olga gave birth to a baby girl later named Sunny in a Patriots-run hospital. Before she could even hold her child, the Patriots took Sunny hostage. Her only proof that the child was alive came in the form of a single photo sent each month to keep her under their control.

Around this same period, Dead Cell leader Colonel Jackson was convicted of corruption and embezzlement of federal funds. While serving out his prison sentence, Jackson supposedly died from exhaustion. In the wake of this, Helena Dolph Jackson, Jackson's wife and the daughter of Scott Dolph, miscarried her child. Left without a family, Helena joined the US military where at some point she was unknowingly equipped with an electromagnetic device that could deflect bullets, making her believe that she was extraordinarily lucky. As a result, she was eventually sent to Dead Cell, where she was given the code name Fortune and quickly rose to become their leader.

In early 2008, Rose, suspicious of Jack's distant behavior, broke into his room, only to find it was completely empty, aside from a bed and a desk. Furious over her invasion of privacy and struggling with his own deep-rooted insecurities, Jack raised a hand against Rose. While this act shook Rose, what truly terrified her was the cold, lifeless state of Jack's room.

Following Colonel Jackson's death, the Patriots framed Dead Cell as the perpetrators of a mass murder. Viewed as terrorists, the US military ambushed Dead Cell in October of 2008, resulting in the deaths of Chinaman and Old Boy. Absolutely devastated by this, Fortune and Vamp specifically sought vengeance against the Patriots.

By early 2009, Arsenal Gear, or rather GW, entered its final phase of development, marked by its capability to categorize and read information. However, it still lacked critical reasoning capabilities necessary to alter individuals, a skill that could only be developed by testing GW's capabilities in the harshest and most dire of environments. The ultimate solution was the Selection for Societal Sanity plan, or the S3 plan, which was a program in which GW would manage a real-world simulation to test its ability to manipulate individuals in complex situations. Seeing as the Shadow Moses incident was the textbook example of high stakes and complexity, the Patriots selected it as the model for GW's final exercise.

Around April of 2009, the S3 plan was initiated when Solidus learned of Arsenal Gear and the Patriots's plan for complete information control. While ultimately unknown, it is heavily implied that the Patriots themselves were responsible for sharing this information with Solidus, knowing that he would conclude that if the Patriots were planning on filtering information they wished to wipe from history, it must have meant that within Arsenal Gear was a blacklist of that very information that they wanted deleted. Seeing a clear opportunity to unveil the faces behind the Patriots and cement his legacy by freeing America from their tyrannical rule, Solidus planned to infiltrate Arsenal Gear, expose the Patriots, and kill every last one of them.

Around late April 2009, Solidus discovered that a government-sponsored inspection tour of the Big Shell was set to take place on the morning of April 29th. The crew was made up of around three dozen individuals, the most noteworthy of which was President Johnson, whose biometric data Solidus needed to access Arsenal Gear. Seizing his opportunity, Solidus acquired the assistance of Ocelot, Dead Cell, and the Gurlukovich mercenaries, who the Patriots had manipulated into participating using Olga, seeing as Solidus viewed himself as something akin to a modern-day founding father of America. He dubbed their group the Sons of Liberty.

Shortly after allying with Dead Cell, Solidus led the group to believe that his plan for Arsenal Gear was to use its nuclear arsenal to detonate an EMP above Manhattan, disrupting the Patriots's influence over the city to establish his own version of Outer Heaven. However, his true intention in sharing this plan was that it would cause Dead Cell to turn against him and hijack Arsenal Gear for themselves, therefore drawing the attention of the Patriots away from himself so he could eliminate the heads of their organization. What he didn't expect was that Fatman never intended to go along with this plan. Instead, he seemingly allied with the Patriots, who likely agreed to lure his former mentor, Peter Stillman, to the scene so that Fatman could kill him. All in exchange for Fatman's assistance in rigging the Big Shell to explode.

On the morning of April 29th, Solidus, posing as Solid Snake, seized control of the Big Shell using his Sons of Liberty. Taking the inspection team, including the president, hostage in the process. To maintain control over the situation, the Patriots had Richard Ames pose as one of Johnson's Secret Service agents, correctly predicting that Johnson would eventually betray them to garner more power. After the Big Shell was seized, Emma sent a distress message to Otacon in which she stated that the Big Shell was being used to develop a Metal Gear. Meanwhile, Fatman rigged the Big Shell with C4.

Tensions rising, Seal Team 10 was sent in by the Patriots as a means of transporting Peter Stillman to the scene. When Otacon learned about the infiltration, he posed as Big Shell security systems architect to piggyback on the SEAL team's insertion. Snake, on the other hand, planned to infiltrate the old-fashioned way. Of course, nearly all of this was in accordance with the Patriots's plan to mirror the events of Shadow Moses, which had Solidus playing the part of Liquid Snake, the Sons of Liberty being the sons of Big Boss, Dead Cell acting as Foxhound, the mercenaries representing the Genome Army, the President and Ames being stand-ins for Baker and Anderson, Emma's worm cluster substituting the Fox Eye virus, and Johnny being present during both events, this time as a Gurlukovich mercenary. The only exceptions to these numerous parallels were Snake and Otacon, as well as Fatman. Snake and Otacon because the Patriots were led to believe that Snake had died, meaning that they had not been factored into the simulation. And Fatman because his role in the simulation was to quite simply test the capabilities of the plan's primary subject before he moved on to the real trial.

With the S3 plan properly established, GW was given the task of analyzing the scenario until it was capable of properly manipulating individuals through complex situations. To accomplish just that, GW sought out Jack, whose vulnerability and arrogance made him the perfect representation of the masses the Patriots would one day have to manage. After Jack was selected, GW drew from his memories and expectations to carefully fabricate the perfect narrative to manipulate him into going along with its plan. For Jack, a seasoned VR veteran who had completed the Shadow Moses and Tanker scenario hundreds of times. This story became that he was a member of Foxhound led by Roy Campbell. His mission, given to him by GW, posing as Campbell, was to infiltrate the Big Shell to rescue the hostages and disarm the Sons of Liberty. If he could not, Jack was led to believe that the terrorists would destroy the Big Shell, killing the hostages and releasing large quantities of deadly toxins into the surrounding environment. This not only gave Jack an immediate and urgent goal, but also acted as a sort of test run for the larger simulation. If GW was unable to manipulate Jack into disarming the bombs, the larger S3 plan would end then and there, destroying all evidence and anyone involved in the process.

6 hours after the Sons of Liberty took command of the Big Shell, Solid Snake infiltrated the facility, followed closely by Jack. Simultaneously, Seal Team 10, including Otacon and Stillman, arrived via helicopters. Inside Big Shell, Jack was given the code name Raiden by GW, posing as Roy Campbell, and reminded him of his mission objectives. Moving forward, Raiden gained access to the elevator using a nearby Node. Directly afterward, GW put Raiden into contact with Rose, who was forced to participate to motivate Raiden, one way or another.

While Raiden made his way to the surface of Strut A, Seal Team 10's Alpha team managed to secure the president over at Strut B before they were quickly slaughtered by Vamp and Fortune. Hoping to provide backup, Raiden traveled to Strut B, while Fortune escorted the president to the core of Shell 1, in addition to securing the football, a briefcase that acted as a sort of key to unlock Arsenal Gear. On Strut B, Raiden found Vamp killing the last of the SEALs. Snake, meanwhile, took one of the dead SEAL's outfits before confronting Vamp, who was ordered to regroup with Fortune before the confrontation escalated. When Raiden questioned Snake's identity, Snake claimed to be a Navy SEAL named Iroquois Pliskin. As the two of them debriefed, Seal Team 10's Bravo team attempted to rescue the president from Fortune and Vamp. Overhearing this on Snake's radio, Raiden traveled to the scene where he saw Fortune eliminate the entirety of the Bravo team.

Not long after, Raiden was tasked with regrouping with Stillman, who showed Snake and Raiden how to identify and decommission Fatman's C4. While Stillman hid inside a pantry, Raiden dealt with the C4 on Shell 1, and Snake did the same for Shell 2. During the same period, Olga, who had been ordered by the Patriots to protect Raiden under the threat of her child's life, made contact with Raiden using the Cyborg Ninja suit, yet another reference to Shadow Moses.

Snake, meanwhile, was tasked by Stillman with finding a hidden C4 at the bottom of Strut H, as he couldn't shake the feeling that Fatman was deceiving them using easily identifiable bombs. When Snake confirmed Stillman's hunch, Stillman took it upon himself to personally diffuse them, which he saw as retribution for the lie he had lived over the past 5 years. When Snake finished freezing the final bomb on Shell 2, he unintentionally activated a second hidden bomb. With only 400 seconds until detonation, Raiden rushed to Strut 8. As Raiden descended the elevator, Stillman accidentally tripped the proximity trigger on the Strut H bomb, causing it to detonate, killing himself and flooding the lower levels of Shell 2's core. Shortly following Stillman's death, Raiden disarmed the final bomb.

On his return trip to the surface, Raiden was confronted by Fortune. Meanwhile, Fatman planted a bomb at the top of Strut E, declaring that he wished to challenge Raiden specifically. When Vamp went to inform Fortune of this, Raiden used the distraction to fire a bullet that ricocheted into Vamp's head, incapacitating him long enough for Raiden to make an escape. When he reached Strut E, Raiden learned that Fatman had little in common with the other members of Dead Cell. Regardless, the perceived risk of an environmental disaster forced Raiden to take him down.

Meanwhile, Snake and Otacon managed to uncover the truth about Arsenal Gear, and that the Big Shell was a facade to construct it. With the bomb crisis finally behind them, Raiden was tasked with reverting to his original goal of securing the president. Assisting him in this effort, Olga met with Raiden to point him to the core of Shell 1, where he would find a person by the last name Ames, who would share the location of the president and could be identified by listening for their pacemaker. She then gave him one of the Gurlukovich mercenary outfits, which he would need alongside a retinal scan to reach Ames.

Following the ninja's instructions, Raiden made his way to the core. Meanwhile, Ocelot coerced the president into bypassing the first of two Arsenal Gear unlock procedures, the second of which was set to a 1-hour delay. Moments later, Raiden reached the conference room where he identified Richard Ames. Recognizing the Patriots's handiwork, Ames revealed as much as he could to Raiden before they were interrupted by a meeting between Ocelot, Solidus, and Olga in the room opposite of them. After the three parted ways, Ocelot went to confront Ames, who suffered a genuine heart attack after the Patriots disabled his pacemaker. Ocelot then forced Raiden to reveal his identity before he was saved by Olga.

As Raiden made his way to Shell 2, Snake and Otacon secured a helicopter. After sharing this with Raiden, Snake introduced him to Otacon, which all but confirmed Raiden's suspicions that this person was in fact Solid Snake. Minutes later, Snake and Otacon used the chopper to make contact with Raiden just before he and Solidus met face to face, 12 years after they parted ways. Despite this, neither of them fully recognized the other. Raiden because he had suppressed his memories and Solidus because Raiden was much older.

Following their brief reintroduction, Solidus joined Vamp in the Harrier, which Raiden eventually destroyed in the process, injuring Solidus' left eye. Just as the Harrier was about to crash, Ray burst out of the water to catch them. It then launched a volley of rockets that destroyed much of the surrounding infrastructure, giving Vamp an opportunity to escape to Shell 2, while Ray took Solidus back to safety.

When the dust settled, Raiden finally confronted Snake about his true identity. The truth revealed, Snake explained how they faked his death and why they were at Big Shell to begin with. Raiden was then given orders to continue to Shell 2 to make contact with the president as soon as possible. When he eventually did so, President Johnson immediately grabbed Raiden's groin to confirm that he was in fact a man. He then revealed the truth behind the Patriots's power, Big Shell's facade for Arsenal Gear, and pointed him toward Emma Emmerich. After sharing everything he knew, he gave Raiden Emma's worm cluster to use against GW and ordered Raiden to eliminate him to keep Solidus from accessing Arsenal Gear. But before Raiden even got the chance, Ocelot shot Johnson himself.

Following the president's death, Raiden made his way to the flooded levels of the core where Vamp was waiting for him. After taking him down, Raiden made contact with Emma, who eventually trusted Raiden enough to lead her through the water. As Raiden and Emma traveled to Strut L, Olga confronted Snake about her father's death 2 years prior. In the end, she learned that Ocelot was the one responsible and ultimately decided to ally with Snake. Outside of Strut L, Emma used the oil fence to reach Strut E. At the tail end of her journey, Vamp leapt out of the water and grabbed hold of Emma. While Raiden did manage to fire a shot at Vamp, it wasn't before Vamp managed to stab her in the abdomen. Mortally wounded, Emma was taken by Snake to hack into GW's defenses in preparation for the virus. With just minutes until she bled out, Raiden made his way to the computer room. Inside, their hopes were shattered when GW managed to delay the virus just before it was complete. Made worse when Emma drew her final breath just as the sun began to set.

In the wake of Emma's death, Snake and Raiden went to infiltrate Arsenal Gear while Otacon used the helicopter to save the remainder of the hostages. Shortly after Otacon left, Snake revealed his alliance with Olga to Raiden, then used him as bait to gain access to Arsenal Gear, planning to have Olga free him once they were all inside.

When Raiden awoke inside Arsenal Gear, Solidus finally recognized him from their time in Liberia, reminding Raiden of his true past. When everyone else departed and Olga eventually walked into the room, she shared the truth behind her and Snake's alliance and the child the Patriots took from her. Following Olga's departure, Raiden shared his story with Rose. Finally willing to confront the fact that he had been turned into a weapon. Believing he was incapable of more, he admitted to Rose that while they loved each other, their relationship was doomed to fail.

When their conversation ended, Raiden traveled deeper into the bowels of Arsenal Gear, where GW, corrupted by the worm cluster, began spouting nonsense. Not long after, Rose finally told Raiden the truth behind how and why they met, but that her love for him was nonetheless real. Absolutely heartbroken, Raiden questioned if he could even trust his own feelings before Rose was cut off by the Patriots. Her final words to him were a confession that she was pregnant.

Following Raiden's conversation with Rose, Snake returned his gear and gifted him with Olga's sword. Continuing onward, Raiden questioned how he remained determined. To which Snake simply responded that he had to find something worth fighting for. When Otacon eventually reached out to the two of them, Raiden told him about Campbell's strange messages. Looking into it, Otacon discovered that the origins of the transmission were exactly the same as GW's encryption protocol, meaning that Raiden had been talking to GW the entire time.

When Snake and Raiden eventually reached the guts of Arsenal Gear, they were ambushed by a group of soldiers. After taking them out, Fortune confronted the two of them. Snake chose to stay back and fight while Raiden continued up a ladder. When Raiden emerged, Solidus explained his interpretation of the S3 plan as told to him by Ocelot, falsely claiming that it stood for "Solid Snake Simulation" and that its purpose was to manufacture soldiers like Solid Snake. After revealing this supposed truth, Solidus released Arsenal Gear's Rays to battle Raiden. Overwhelmed by their sheer numbers, Raiden fell to his knees before he was rescued by Olga. Willing to sacrifice herself to save her child, she ordered Raiden to continue forward directly before Solidus shot Olga in the head.

Following Olga's death, GW began going haywire, a manifestation of its final moments, forcing Solidus to take out the Rays himself. Afterwards, Solidus began choking out Raiden just as Fortune escorted a restrained Snake to their location. Solidus then revealed that his true plan was to uncover the names of the Patriots, to which Ocelot responded by revealing that the Patriots had orchestrated this entire thing in the first place. He then shot Fortune, revealing that her powers were simply the result of technology. Demonstrating this himself, he activated his own device before hijacking the prototype Ray model. Using Ray, Ocelot unleashed a volley of rockets, which Fortune inexplicably deflected. Just then, Liquid overtook Ocelot's mind, declaring to his brothers that there could only be one Big Boss and one Snake. Taking the bait, Snake went after Liquid as he dove into the ocean.

Meanwhile, Arsenal Gear crashed into lower Manhattan, stopping directly next to Federal Hall. There, Solidus asked Raiden if he knew what day it was. Raiden revealed that it was April 30th, which Solidus noted was the exact day George Washington took office over 200 years prior. A fitting parallel, as he believed that this day would be remembered in a similar light: the day he, like his forebears did before him, freed America from the clutches of tyranny.

Following this declaration of independence, the Patriots contacted Raiden, revealing the truth behind their purpose and the S3 plan, which they noted was a resounding success. From this moment on, they would dictate the fate of humanity. His spirit shattered, Raiden was ready to throw in the towel. However, the Patriots reminded him that Olga's child's life was on the line. With that, a fight for freedom ensued. Raiden wishing to free himself to amend his haunted past and Solidus wishing to free the world to preserve his place in history. After a tough battle, Raiden, just as the Patriots had planned, came out on top, sending Solidus to his death at the foot of freedom itself.

Following Solidus' death, Raiden was left aimless. His life had always been manipulated by another: first by Solidus, then by the Patriots. At this point, with no one left to pull the strings, Raiden didn't really know who he was. But Snake reminded him that with this uncertainty was also freedom. Without a script to follow, Raiden could finally choose his own path.

As Raiden stood in quiet reflection, Rose appeared behind him. Reunited at the same place where they had first met exactly two years earlier, Raiden realized that in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to be with her. However, to do that, he would first have to break free from the Patriots.

Following the Big Shell incident, Otacon uncovered the Patriots's information blacklist using Emma's worm cluster, revealing that the origins of the Patriots dated back just under 100 years and that all of its founding members were long dead. Around the same period, the Patriots recovered Solidus' body. Likewise, Ocelot recovered the damaged remains of GW. It was at that point he fully embraced his role as Liquid's doppelganger, leaving Eva to finish her part of their master plan by rescuing Big Boss from the clutches of the Patriots. To do just that, she took the identity of Big Mama and established a network of orphaned mercenaries and spies known as the Paradise Lost Army in Eastern Europe.

Around mid to late 2009, Raiden was placed under the command of the real Roy Campbell. But as time went on, Raiden's childhood memories would resurface, and he would turn to alcohol to mask the pain. Seeing Raiden withdraw from her life just as she was about to introduce their child into the world, Rose decided to seek Campbell's aid. Under Campbell's watch, Rose gave birth to a healthy baby boy named John. Hoping to protect him from the Patriots, Rose and Campbell devised a plan that involved reporting that Rose had tragically miscarried the child and that in her sorrow, she turned to Campbell for companionship, providing the Patriots with a believable story as to why the two of them were always together. Unable to share the truth with anyone so as to not risk the baby's safety, Campbell was forced to play as a heartless womanizer, a story that Meryl in particular found easy to believe.

After unearthing the details behind his affair with her mother, it was around that point the Paradise Lost Army discovered that Olga's daughter Sunny was being held captive in Area 51. When Big Mama shared this information with Raiden, she proposed that they would assist in the rescue if Raiden did the same when it came time to recover Big Boss's body. Agreeing to the proposal, Raiden, alongside the Paradise Lost Army, infiltrated Area 51. During this mission, Raiden was told of Rose's supposed miscarriage, which only further strained their damaged relationship. After Sunny was rescued, Raiden anonymously left her with Oticon and Snake, who raised her aboard the Nomad, a cargo aircraft that served as their mobile operation center and home following the events in Manhattan.

Sometime around the early 2010s, a handful of key events took place. First was the rise of private military companies, or PMCs, the direct successors to the Private Forces that dominated the previous decades. Following their initial rise in popularity, governments around the world began adopting PMC forces to fight on their behalf. In response, the United Nations created the PMC Oversight and Inspection Committee, to which Roy Campbell was eventually assigned. Likewise, Meryl was given command of a team under the United States Army's Criminal Investigation Department known as Rat Patrol 1. The team was tasked with investigating PMC activity throughout the early 2010s and included members such as Jonathan, the team's heavy weapons expert, Ed, the team scout, and Johnny, who was also on the team. Unknown to Rat Patrol themselves, the team was actually in direct command of the Patriots, evident by their name, which was an anagram for Patriot.

Next was the expiration of the USS Missouri's museum contract, prompting the US Navy to utilize it as a seamanship training vessel under the command of Ming. Last but not least was the Army's complete abandonment of Shadow Moses, which was at risk of sinking into the ocean due to rising sea levels and increased geological activity. It's likely that directly following this abandonment, the Patriots initiated construction of a new Arsenal Gear-class battleship in the sea next to Shadow Moses.

Around the same period, the success of the S3 plan gave the Patriots the ability to manipulate practically anyone into conforming to their will. While at one point this may have allowed them to fulfill Zero's original vision of a unified world, by 2011 the Patriots had crafted a will of their own. Using their immense influence, the Patriots demanded nothing short of absolute dominance, complete control over every aspect of the world for no reason greater than the simple fact that they could. To accomplish this, the Patriots analyzed the trends of the time. Quickly discovering that the most efficient, frictionless method to achieve their goal was warfare. More specifically, to create a global war economy, where conflicts would be created, intensified, and multiplied to no end. It was this very intention that led to the creation of the Sons of Patriot System, or SOP.

Created by AT Security, formerly known as Armstech. SOP was a Patriots-operated real-time battlefield control network marketed as a means to create a cleaner, safer battlefield by meticulously controlling every aspect of warfare. Implemented into small arms such as guns, tanks, or later the unmanned bipedal geckos that would replace tanks. SOP allowed militaries to effortlessly monitor and control every projectile that left every weapon, assuring their investments would not be used against them, as well as making it impossible for soldiers to commit friendly fire or break international conventions. Implemented into soldiers with the use of third-generation nanomachines. SOP turned every army into a well-oiled machine, giving soldiers the ability to see and sense what their fellow soldiers did, as well as refine their combat abilities by using chemicals to induce on-demand combat highs and numb their emotions, making what used to be a horrific cancer to society nothing more than a game.

Sometime in 2012, Raiden was captured by the Patriots in an attempt to secure Big Boss's body. While captive, he was subjected to exoskeletal enhancement surgeries, completely replacing his body from the neck down with cyborg augments. That same year, America's entire nuclear arsenal was replaced by Reliable Replacement Warheads, which used a system similar to SOP to ID lock nuclear weapons behind JD's authority, giving the Patriots complete control over America's nukes. The following year, Raiden escaped captivity with the aid of the Paradise Lost Army. Afterwards, he obtained the assistance of the world's foremost expert in medical cybernetics, Dr. Madnar, to rid his body of the Patriots's nanomachines. Not long after, he tracked down Big Boss's body, who he then returned to Big Mama. Big Boss's comatose body finally in her custody, Big Mama did all she could to hide him from the Patriots and prepare his body for his eventual awakening. Accomplishing both of these, she at some point secured the bodies of Solidus and Liquid Snake, whose bodies were used to reconstruct Big Boss. It was after that point Solidus' body in particular was hooked up to life support equipment to keep him technically alive in order to fool the Patriots into believing that his body was Big Boss's, as unlike his brothers, their DNA was an exact match.

Around the same point, Solid Snake could no longer ignore the effects of his rapid aging, which had caused decades of physical aging over just the past few years. Unknown to Snake, the accelerated aging also caused the FoxDie in his system to slowly mutate, making it so that in just a few short years, the FoxDie would no longer target just him, effectively turning Snake into a walking biological weapon. Around the same period, Naomi Hunter was diagnosed with terminal cancer, prompting her to inject herself with nanomachines similar to Vamp's to delay her inevitable death.

By 2014, SOP had become the gold standard in warfare. Utilized by nearly every state military and PMC across the globe. Yet, as is true with any new innovation or economy, the Patriots knew that a black market was bound to sprout up. To corner this market themselves, the Patriots created the weapons laundering network, Drebin, which positioned hundreds of agents around the world to maintain control over the war economy. However, not even this level of control was enough for the Patriots, who sought to tighten their grip on humanity by creating a system similar to SOP for the civilian population. This very intention was what led Liquid to take action to once and for all destroy the Patriots.

Initially, this began when Liquid, at some point over the past few years, commandeered the Patriots's Arsenal Gear-class ship, using it to repair and house GW, giving him direct access to the Patriots's AI. In turn, the ship became a sort of haven outside of the Patriots's control. As such, he dubbed the ship Outer Haven. Sometime after this, Liquid, likely using GW, discovered that when SOP was created, it had unintentionally inherited the structure of FoxDie, meaning that the third-generation nanomachines used for SOP were likely directly related to Snake's own first-generation nanomachines. Naturally, this prompted Liquid to kidnap Naomi, whose expertise on the virus he hoped would allow them to destroy the system.

Over time, Naomi developed a computer virus she dubbed FoxAlive, which was meant to use GW as a gateway to destroy the entire AI network. However, she was unable to perfect the virus. And in fact, the only person Naomi believed could was Otacon. With this information, Liquid formulated yet another grand plan that would use the determination of his greatest enemy against themselves. This time, however, that person was not Solid Snake, but the Patriots themselves. To do just that, Liquid planned to fabricate a scenario that heavily paralleled the events of Shadow Moses, knowing that the Patriots would pick up on all the similarities, giving them no choice but to send in Solid Snake just as they did previously. He would then lead both Snake and the Patriots to believe that he wished to incite an insurrection by taking command of SOP, which, likely using GW, he discovered could only be accessed using the DNA of Big Boss. He would then have Naomi hand the virus off to Otacon, who would eventually perfect it. When he later gained complete control of SOP using the DNA of Big Boss, he would then feign that he wished to control the entirety of the AI network by destroying JD using a nuke. However, given that all of America's nukes could only be accessed by JD, Liquid had to resort to using Rex's railgun to deliver the warhead. In the end, this would trick the Patriots into believing that the only way to stop Liquid from usurping control was to destroy their network themselves using Solid Snake.

Following through with this plan, Liquid used Ocelot's vast wealth from his sale of Rex's launch data to form Outer Heaven, a parent company that he used to eventually gain control of the five largest PMCs in the world. Those being Praying Mantis, Raven Sword, Werewolf, Pura Armman, and Ocelot Kavatka. Around that point, Vamp joined Outer Heaven as Liquid's right-hand man. In addition to the rank-and-file PMC forces, Liquid formed two elite all-female units under his command. Those being the Beauty and the Beast Unit and the Frogs. The B&B Corps was composed of four extremely traumatized women who were each designated specialized suits and codenames that hearken back to the old Foxhound members of Shadow Moses. Those being Laughing Octopus, Screaming Mantis, Crying Wolf, and Raging Raven. Far more plentiful were the Frogs, specialized in nanomachines-induced emotionless soldiers who acted as somewhat of a middle ground between the standard PMC soldier and the B&B Corps.

Around 2014, when the Army Special Operations Command discovered Liquid was gaining control of the PMCs, they sent a total of six C inspection teams, including Rat Patrol 1, to infiltrate the Outer Heaven PMCs to investigate his intentions and uncover his location. Over the next few months, five of the inspection teams that were sent to investigate Liquid were eventually killed. Left as the last remaining team, Rat Patrol eventually tracked Liquid to the Middle East. When they reported this information to their superiors, the Patriots then manipulated them into relaying the information to the UN investigators. Knowing that the information would be seen by Campbell, exactly as the Patriots predicted and almost exactly like Shadow Moses, Campbell concluded that the only way to ensure Meryl's safety was to contact Solid Snake.

[Music]

About 18 hours after Liquid's arrival in the Middle East, Campbell and Otacon met with Snake at the empty grave of Big Boss. When they regrouped aboard the Nomad, Campbell explained the state of the growing war economy and Liquid's mounting insurrection. Over the next 3 days, Otacon, assisted by Sunny, developed three pieces of technology to assist Snake in his mission. Those being Metal Gear Mk. II, a remote operational support terminal, the Solid Eye, an all-purpose augmented reality goggle, and a fresh stealth suit that utilized a state-of-the-art smart camouflage material called Octo Camo, which Otacon conveniently borrowed from DARPA.

During the same period, the Patriots tasked one of their Drebin weapons launderers, Drebin 893, with assisting Solid Snake throughout his journey by supplying him with weapons and equipment. Additionally, he was ordered to inject Snake with a FoxDie-laced nanomachines suppressant that would once again turn Snake into a vector for FoxDie, which they had altered to eliminate their greatest threats: those being Ocelot, Eva, and Big Boss. However, unintentionally or not, it would also keep Snake's mutated FoxDie from reproducing.

4 days after Liquid's arrival in the Middle East, Solid Snake infiltrated the area, disguised as a local rebel operator. Tasked with making contact with Rat Patrol 1, Snake eventually made his way to the city where Otacon introduced him to the Mk. II and gave him other equipment Snake couldn't bring in himself. Not long after, Snake encountered Drebin, who did exactly as the Patriots required of him by offering his services to Snake and injecting him with the FoxDie-laced nanomachines suppressant. Following Drebin's departure, Snake stumbled upon Johnny, who was in the process of defecating inside of a barrel. When Johnny was chased off by a mercenary, Snake took the barrel, then continued to Advent Palace, where he was ambushed by Rat Patrol 1. After Snake and Meryl's brief reunion, Meryl explained the inner workings of SOP and noted her disgust for Campbell. Not long after, the Frogs were dispatched to Advent Palace. Battling through the unit, Snake and Rat Patrol eventually reached safety. Snake then split from the group where he encountered the B&B Corps before continuing forward.

When Snake reached Liquid's encampment, Liquid used a DNA chip encoded with Liquid Snake's genome as well as his access to the Patriots via GW to break the surrounding soldiers free of SOP. However, just as Liquid and Naomi had suspected, the moment the soldiers were cut free, their minds were flooded with the memories and emotions the system had suppressed, causing each and every one of them to seize. The only reason Snake was affected is presumably due to the fact that SOP itself was based on his nanomachines. And the only one who was unaffected was Johnny, who would always manage to avoid his mandatory nanomachines injections. As such, he assisted Snake in returning to the Nomad.

While Snake slept over the next day, Liquid and Naomi traveled to South America, where Liquid tasked Naomi with luring Snake to her location to secure his DNA and eventually be rescued by him. Following through with this plan, Naomi sent Otacon a series of files that detailed her importance to Liquid and precise location in South America. Additionally, it was around this same time that Big Mama learned of Snake's actions in the Middle East, prompting her to instruct Raiden to assist Snake, then task him with finding her in Eastern Europe.

When Snake awoke, Otacon informed him of Naomi's message, then made contact with Campbell to lay out their method of insertion. 20 hours later, the Nomad arrived in El Dorado International Airport. Using a 4x4, Snake made his way to the PMC security perimeter where he spotted Vamp and Laughing Octopus. Following their departure, Snake was introduced to Rose, who was designated as his personal counselor and psychological expert. Putting two and two together, Snake realized that Rose was the woman Campbell had married, which he couldn't help but note made him disgusted as well.

Continuing toward Naomi's lab, Snake was contacted by Raiden, who helped guide him through the battlefield. Not long after, Drebin met with Snake to share more about the B&B Corps as well as the SOP system. When Snake eventually reached Naomi's lab, she shared all she knew about SOP before performing tests on his DNA. In doing so, she uncovered the truth behind his rapid aging and FoxDie mutation. During this process, she managed to obtain a copy of Snake's genetic profile. Afterward, she handed Snake a case of nanomachines suppressant injections, then explained Liquid's intention of taking control of SOP. Before she could explain more, Naomi was taken by PMC soldiers while Laughing Octopus confronted Snake. When Octopus was eventually dealt with, Snake tracked Naomi to a helipad where Vamp used the copy of Snake's genetic profile to cut off the soldiers' access to SOP.

Just like in the Middle East, the soldiers began to seize, forcing Liquid to steal Big Boss's body like he had originally planned. Not long after, Dreban arrived to save both Snake and Naomi.

By the time they reached the city, Ryden had arrived to assist Snake with the extraction by destroying a handful of geckos, then fending off against Vamp. Despite being mortally wounded, Ryden managed to relay Big Mama's orders to find her in Europe.

On the Nomad, Naomi explained Liquid's purpose for using Liquid and Snake's DNA and that his next target was Big Boss, who was still technically alive somewhere in Europe. Meanwhile, Ryden shared that the only way they could save his life was to contact Dr. Madnar, who was also located in Europe.

As the nomad made its way to Europe, Naomi attempted to seduce Oticon with the ultimate goal of coaxing him into finishing the Fox Alive virus. But when Oticon unintentionally revealed that Sunny was the true genius aboard the Nomad, Naomi decided that she would instead task Sunny with finishing it sometime later.

Over this same period, Liquid tasked Raven Sword with flushing out the Paradise Lost Army to uncover the location of Big Boss's body. Overseeing the PMC's presence in Europe was Rap Patrol 1, who were given additional troops by the Patriots to keep Liquid in check.

When the Nomad arrived in Europe, Snake gained access to the city with the help of Merrill, while Sunny, Naomi, and Ryden made contact with Dr. Madnar. Inside the city, Snake was instructed by Oticon to intercept Paradise Lost Army transmissions to identify one of its members.

As he tailed them throughout the city, Naomi returned Sunny to the Nomad. It's likely around that point Naomi trusted Sunny with the Fox Alive virus. When Sunny fully understood what was required of her, Naomi left the Nomad to reunite with Liquid and Vamp.

When Snake eventually made contact with Big Mama, she quickly revealed herself as Eva, Snake's mother. Feeling as if Snake was owed an explanation, she then explained the history behind the Patriots, including Operation Snake Eater, Leison Fontarib, Big Boss in Zero's falling out and the establishment of the Patriots AI. She concluded this story by revealing Solidus's near lifeless corpse, stating that it was Big Boss's.

As soon as Big Boss's body was identified, Raven Sword converged on their location. Riding on the back of Eva's motorcycle, Snake defended her as they made their escape from the city. Just before they reached safety, Snake, Eva, and one of the decoy vans were struck by a rocket.

Afterwards, Snake battled the raging raven while Liquid secured Solidus's body, believing it to be big bosses. Snake then escorted Eva to the river where they were ambushed by Liquid, Vamp, Naomi, and the Frogs. Knowing he was just moments from securing SOP, Liquid revealed his plan to destroy JD and take control of the Patriots AI using GW.

Leaving Snake to watch as he cemented his legacy, Liquid made his way down a river where he was surrounded by the US military. Confident that Liquid was cornered, Merryill ordered him to stand down before picking up Snake and Eva.

Shortly afterward, Liquid used the DNA of Big Boss to gain full access to SOP, which he then dubbed Guns of the Patriots. Using this newfound power, Liquid effortlessly neutralized the surrounding soldiers. No longer needing Big Boss's DNA, Liquid ordered the corpse to be burnt in front of Eva and Snake's eyes. Absolutely distraught, Eva attempted to save the corpse, forcing Snake to pull her from the flames, severely burning the both of them.

Just before Liquid got away, Oticon stowed the Mark 2 on their boat using stealth mode. When Liquid departed, Eva succumbed to foxy as she rested in the arms of her last remaining child. Meanwhile, the Mark 2 recorded a conversation between Liquid, Vamp, and Naomi in which they discussed their plans to destroy JD using Rex's rail gun.

Shortly after the Mark 2 captured this footage, the group spotted and destroyed it. Sometime later, Oticon shared the data from the Mark 2 with May Ling, hoping she could pinpoint Liquid's destination. Snake, Oticon, and Campbell then deduced Liquid's plan to use Rex's rail gun to destroy JD.

Given what was at stake, Ryden attempted to tag along for the mission. However, Snake refused to let him sacrifice his life. Just then, Mingling contacted Oticon to confirm Liquid was on a route to Alaska, making it clear what they had to do. Snake would return to that forsaken island to once again put an end to Liquid's rebellion.

On the way to Shadow Moses, Oticon finished developing the successor to the Mark 2, fittingly named the Mark III. Meanwhile, May Ling planned to use the USS Missouri, quite possibly the only operable American battleship as it was completely analog, to rendevous with Merrill and Johnny. Then Snake and Oticon at Shadow Moses.

Sometime later, Liquid, Naomi, and Vamp arrived at Shadow Moses, where Liquid finished outfitting Outer Haven with Rex's rail gun, while Naomi recorded a message that would only play once Fox Alive had successfully wiped the Patriots from the world.

As all of this was happening, Sunny continued working on Fox Alive, eventually stumbling upon Emma's worm cluster. Using it, she managed to complete Fox Alive and even surpass what Naomi or Liquid intended for it. Originally, Liquid's plan called for the AIS to be completely wiped from the world. While this would do some good by freeing humanity, it would also have some horrific outcomes, as humanity had unknowingly come to rely on the Patriots to operate basic modern necessities.

Fully aware of this, Sunny managed to alter Fox Alive to only target the control systems of the network, completely preserving the parts that regulated important infrastructure like water, food, communication, transportation, and all the other countless systems the world would need if they were to survive in a postatriots era.

Hours later, Snake arrived on Shadow Moses, where he followed in his former self's footsteps, all the while reminiscing about what took place there 9 years prior. Eventually, Snake made his way to the snowfield, where Crying Wolf lay in wait. Following her defeat, Snake collected her rail gun, then traversed down to the warehouse.

Inside, he found a rail gunless Rex as well as Vamp. As the two of them battled vigilantly, Ryden, cleared for combat by Sunny, departed the Nomad to assist Snake. By the time Ryden reached the warehouse, Snake cleverly deduced that by injecting Vamp with his nanomachine suppressant, he was incapable of self-healing, making Vamp just as mortal as the rest of them.

Completely vulnerable, Vamp challenged Ryden to a battle at top Rex while Snake fended off an army of geckos. In the end, Ryden threw Vamp from Rex's cockpit, where Naomi offered Odicon the opportunity to inject him with another suppressant, permanently ending his life. Faced with the opportunity to die, Vamp injected himself with it, finally putting him out of his misery.

Not long after, Naomi revealed that she had terminal cancer and that the only thing keeping her alive were the nano machines in her blood. Hoping to find her own version of peace, Naomi injected herself with the syringe, allowing the cancer to take its course. With little time, Oticon used the Mark III to hack into Rex, which they then used to escape the facility.

Nearing the exit, Ryden jumped off of Rex, allowing Snake to escape with ease. In doing so, however, Ryden was pinned beneath a pile of debris. Before they could get to him, Snake saw Ray, piloted by Liquid, leap out of the water. Each piloting their own Metal Gear, the two brothers fought until both weapons were decommissioned.

Liquid then made a run for the ocean as Outer Haven emerged from the depths. After declaring his victory, Liquid repositioned Outer Haven, sending it on a direct collision course with Snake. Determined to save his mentor, Ryden sliced off his own arm to free himself from the debris, then used the last of his strength to halt Outer Haven.

As Ryden sank to the bottom of the ocean, barely clinging onto life, Ming opened fire on Outer Haven to force Liquid into retreating, allowing them to save Snake and Ryden. As the Missouri tailed outer haven to the Bearing Sea, Sunny shared the Fox Alive virus and everything else Naomi left with her with Oticon and the others.

Believing it to be their only chance of success, Mailing used Naomi's information to devise a plan involving manually uploading Fox Alive to GW when Outer Haven resurfaced. The biggest problem with this plan, though far from the only one, was that the only corridor leading to GW was constantly bombarded with microwaves, meaning that whoever did manage to take out GW would also be cooked alive in the process. Nearing death, Snake volunteered for the part.

Following the debrief, Oticon confronted Snake about his sacrificial tendencies as of late, stating in essence that he had greater things to do than die. Over the next 4 hours, Dreban, as per the Patriots's orders, supplied the Missouri with as many arms as they needed, as well as catapults, which they planned to use to infiltrate Outer Haven.

Just after dawn, Outer Haven was made vulnerable, giving Snake, Merrill, and Johnny a chance to infiltrate. When they eventually made it to the interior of the ship, they were encountered by Screaming Mantis. Following her defeat, Psycho Mantis took control of her exoskeleton, attempting to once again demonstrate his power. However, his efforts were in vain due to the supreme hardware of the PlayStation 3 system.

As Frog swarmed the room, Merryill instructed Snake to leave her behind, trusting her to protect him like he did for her nine years prior, Snake made his way to GW. Meanwhile, Johnny attempted to ask Merryill out on a date as the two of them fended off endless swarms of frogs. Always one to take initiative, Merryill rejected Johnny's advance to make a proposal of her own that the two of them get married.

When Snake reached the microwave corridor, he collapsed due to his growing tolerance to the nanom machine suppressant. As he lay on the floor, Ryden emerged to save him from the squad of frogs between him and his destiny. As Ryden guided Snake to the door, he suggested that he be the one to sacrifice himself. Snake, however, was unwilling to let him throw away his life, as he believed that it had barely begun.

Using every last bit of strength he had left, Snake staggered, then trudged, and finally crawled through the microwave corridor. By the end, Snake barely had enough in him to reach GW, where Oticon narrowly managed to input Fox Alive before the rail gun fired and their friends were overwhelmed.

In the moments before Fox Alive completely annihilated the Patriots, Zero's location, which had been encoded into the network itself, was revealed. When the network was destroyed, and the guns of the Patriots finally fell silent, Naomi's message was distributed throughout Outer Haven. At the same time, Big Boss was awoken from his coma. He was then informed about everything he had missed before departing to find a longlost friend of his.

When Naomi's message ended, Snake passed out from exhaustion. When he came too, he found himself a top outer haven alongside a liquid, who revealed that what Snake managed to accomplish was exactly what he intended to happen. Nine long years ago, he intended to free himself from control. Control from the Patriots and of his very genetics. On this day, Liquid managed to accomplish one of those things. Yet the other remained to be seen. [Music]

When the battle concluded, Snake had cemented his legacy once again. Liquid, unaware that Sunny had altered the Fox Alive virus, stated his belief that the world would descend into chaos, and that from it, people would once again understand the purpose of war, the fulfillment of battle. At long last, their father's will, his outer heaven, was finally complete. His plan fulfilled, Liquid's mind gave way, allowing Ocelot to address Snake one final time. Viewing him as the spitting image of his father, Ocelot told Snake he was pretty good before passing away.

Just as Sunny had planned, her alterations to Fox die kept the world from falling into complete anarchy. While things weren't perfect and there was still much work to be done, the end of the Patriots's reign still called for celebration. Following suit, Johnny and Merrill were wed just outside the nomad. Everyone in attendance apart from Ryden and Snake.

Ryden at this time was recovering in a hospital where his cyborg body was replaced and updated by a far more natural looking counterpart. While he sulked in the dark, Rose introduced him to their son, revealing that she did not suffer a miscarriage and that her marriage to Roy was a smokec screen to protect Jon. Reunited with his family, Ryden proclaimed that he would never abandon them ever again.

Snake, meanwhile, found himself once again at the foot of Big Boss's tombstone. Believing that he himself was soon to become a walking biological weapon due to the mutated fox dye, Snake positioned a gun directly in his mouth. Just as he pulled the trigger, he reflexively ripped the gun from his mouth, dropping to the ground in distress.

Viewing this from afar, Big Boss finally revealed his presence. His first act, a gesture of love for his last remaining son. Following his introduction, Big Boss explained everything to Snake, how he was taken by the Patriots, Ocelot's plan to become Liquid, and the Patriots's bastardization of the boss's will. He ended these revelations by presenting Snake with the man who was responsible for it all, the Zero from which the Patriots were born.

Being the last two original members, Big Boss felt it was his responsibility to end the man's life to bring the world back to Zero before he himself met his own fate. Holding on to his old friend, Big Boss shot off Zero's oxygen supply. When Zero was finally gone, Big Boss finally allowed himself to succumb to the fox dye in his system.

Losing strength by the second, Big Boss explained to Snake that he was not destined to become a threat to the world. That thanks to the Patriots's meddling, he could live out the remainder of his life as he wished, however long that may be, due to his accelerated aging. As Snake dropped him off at the boss's grave, Big Boss admitted that Snake was a better man than he ever was. Snake never wished to change the world. He simply wanted to be a part of it.

In doing so, Snake was closer to understanding the boss's will than either him or Zero. He understood that her will was never about control, nor was it about freedom. The boss's will was about respect, about the empathetic understanding that nobody gets to define the world for anyone else. Finally at peace, Big Boss drew his final breath, joining the rest of his compatriots in that place beyond the mortal plane. A borderless world free of burden, a true outer heaven.

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The Complete Story & Lore of Metal Gear Solid | Timeline EXPLAINED!

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