Silent Night

Sunrise came over Washington DC, David slowly woke up now feeling the effects of the drug wearing off. He thought everything that happened last night was a dream, just a bad dream but David knew how to separate nightmares from his reality. He then sat up to see Kaz Miller and Meryl sitting near his bed,

"Oh thank god, you're ok." Kaz said,

"Where's Fox?" demanded David. Kaz and Meryl were all too familiar with that tone in David's voice, that determination, something he needed to prove.

"You don't need to go after him, David. You're too personally attached to this situation." Kaz replied,

"I do! Everything I saw last night was because I was too weak to stop him, I need to do this." replied David, Meryl stepped towards him and placed a hand on his chest to prevent him from getting up.

"David, you've been through enough last night. You shouldn't blame yourself for what he did, we will get him soon but not today." Meryl replied back.

"Actually we do." chimed in Campbell as he stood outside the door, the three looked at Campbell as he walked in but right behind him was Kasler, Holly,an older gentleman and a woman slightly older than himself. David raised an eyebrow on why Holly was here,

"Miss White?" called out David,

"Actually Agent White, I work for the CIA, David." she informed,

"So you were investigating me to get to Frank?" asked David,

"Yes, the CIA has been spying on his activity but we didn't expect him to do something like this." Holly replied, David stood up and faced the older gentleman,

"And you are?" Asked David,

"Jim Houseman, I work for the Pentagon. Right now, we're in a dire situation and you're the only operative skilled enough to stop Gray Fox." informed Houseman, Kaz stood up and went up to Jim,

"Wait, you can't just send him on a mission like that? He's hardly recovered-"

"I'll do it." David interrupted, Meryl and Kaz gave David a look, knowing he's not thoroughly thinking this through.

"Excellent, come to the briefing room and we'll fill you in." Jim replied, David and the others made their way to the briefing room which had a large monitor with a bunch of intel of the mission on the screen.

"About a couple of hours ago after the attacks ended, Gray Fox sent this." Jim explained, David and the others were confused once they noticed what he said,

"Attacks? There were more?" asked David,

"Yes, Washington wasn't the only city struck. New York was hit, so was Philly. I expanded the search to see this was an international assault, England lost their parliament and many politicians around the world were all killed by the Outer Heaven Army." explained Houseman. He tapped on the screen to show multiple images and videos from the attacks around the world,

"After the attacks were done, Gray Fox sent this broadcast from Zanzibar Lands." continued Jim as he played the video of Gray Fox,

"To all the nations of the world, consider these attacks a warning of things to come. For years, we hid in the cracks of history, through each conflict and tragedies, we were there. We are those you all deemed as too weak, useless and broken after you forced us into your petty wars over land, over greed and over pride. While you all benefited, we suffered without a cause, with nightmares of what you've done to us, not anymore. We have removed ourselves from your nations, from your religions and became one with the absolute truth and now we are going to give you all a war that will never stop. With the might of our forces, all nations will crumble and finally give us what they owe us. This is your only warning, at midnight on New Year's Eve, we will fire all our nuclear weapons onto each nation. I recommend for everyone to pray to whatever pagan god you believe in because there will be no God on the battlefield." The broadcast ended and David simply stared at the screen into Gray Fox's empty face, he couldn't help but wonder if everything Gray Fox showed him was just a lie. From the corner of his eye, he could see the woman from before look at the image of Gray Fox in a deep sadness, she was grasping onto her locket for some odd reason.

"So what exactly are you going to do, Houseman?" asked Kaz,

"We're going to send Solid Snake in, he's the only one that can stop this before we enter a World War." Jim replied, Kaz looked very worried once he said that and so did Meryl, Kaz stepped forward to Houseman,

"Is this the best idea? He's too personally involved in this mission-"

"I'll do it." interrupted David, everyone turned to him,

"Are you sure? You don't have to do this, David?" asked Meryl,

"I have to, somebody needs to stop him." David replied, Kaz couldn't help but begin to feel angry,

"You're not going, this is too much for you, do you even have what it takes to kill Frank?!"

"I'll find a way, all of this is my responsibility." David replied,

"Goddamnit, David! You're going into this fight not because of what Frank did but because of what you think your father did to him!" Kaz snapped back, David clenched his fists as the others were confused about what he just said,

"You have no right to mention him, that man is not my father and neither are you. You don't get to talk to me about what I'm fighting for, you think I don't remember that day but I do and I'll be damned if I'm just going to sit here and let Frank accomplish Big Boss's insane fucking mission!" snapped back David. Silence, the entire room was staring at both David and Kaz once they heard the revelation about Big Boss,

"Wait…David, Big Boss is your father?" asked Campbell to confirm, David simply nodded,

"It doesn't mean anything, I'm going on this mission and I'm going to stop Frank." David stated,

"David, you're not alone here. We all don't want the world to end but you don't need to face this alone. Your cause is our cause now, you don't have to do this." chimed in Meryl,

"This is my fight, my destiny, my war. He's expecting me, Frank wants this and I'll give it to him." David said.

"Right well, glad to have you back." Houseman said to regain the attention, he showed a map of Zanzibar Lands,

"This is Zanzibar Lands. Snake, your mission is to find the kidnapped scientists Dr Madnar, Dr Marv and Dr Jacobsen. After you find them, exterminate Gray Fox and from there, we'll get the green light to bomb this place to kingdom come." explained Houseman,

"You also won't be going alone, I'll be infiltrating from another point as well." chimed in Holly,

"Me too." The woman said in her Czech accent,

"My name is Gustava Heffner, I worked for Dr Marv prior to his capture as his bodyguard." explained Gustava, she stepped forward and took a flash drive out of her pocket then placed it in the slit on the side of the monitor,

"The Outer Heaven Army captured Dr Marv due to his recent scientific breakthrough, have any of you heard of OILIX?" asked Gustava, most of them shook their head,

"I've heard of that, it's that new thing that can be converted into gasoline, right?" Holly said,

"It's more than just that, OILIX is a modified algae that can be used as a reusable source of energy. During his experiments, The altered algae thrived in warm, arid environments, and used photosynthesis to consume biological materials, producing a substance indistinguishable from naturally occurring high-quality petroleum as a by-product. OILIX thus enabled commonly available biomass to be processed into massive quantities of oil in any suitable environment as this permitted 96 octane gasoline and even aviation fuel to be produced at relatively little cost, as well as little use of machinery and manpower."

"Essentially reducing the need for oil in other countries." David added on,

"Right, Each kilogram of algae yields 800 grams of crude oil. About 70% of this crude can be converted to gasoline, and about 25% into aviation fuel. The resulting gasoline has an octane rating of 96. For each hectare, 85 kilograms of OILIX can be produced per day. It was thus seen as a more economic alternative to other substitutes for mineral oil such as automobile methanol, sand oil, shale oil, and biomass rectification. The Outer Heaven Army captured him in order to have the entire nation run on OILIX, all their machines and weapons are fueled by OILIX and that's why they need Marv, to give them their fuel." Gustava tapped on the map of Zanzibar Lands to show two beeping signals on different sides of the country.

"Since I was his bodyguard, I put a micro transmitter on Marv and I also did the same with Madnar."

"Perfect, Snake you go look for Dr Marv as White and Heffner look for Jacobsen and Madnar."

"I believe I should say something as a warning." Kasler spoke,

"What?" asked David,

"I used to be a mercenary in Zanzibar Lands, their army has the world's deadliest mercenaries. Genuinely scared the piss out of me." Kasler said. He then walked to the computer and typed for a while until photos of random very oddly dressed mercenaries appeared.

"They call themselves the Zanzibar Cobras, the special ops group that have been known to be the most frightening for any soldier to face. The first is known as the Painmaker, the Black Ninja. The Black Ninja was originally used for NASA's Extraterrestrial Environment Special Forces, enhanced with advanced drugs and nanomachines. His reflexes are uncanny as he could even dodge a bullet at point blank range, furthermore his aim can accurately hit a person's arteries and pressure points, this man is no joke." Kasler then went to the next mercenary,

"Next is a man called The Sudden Fear of Death, The Running Man, the name says it all, he can run 100 meters in under 6 seconds and was responsible for many bombings throughout Europe. His suit cools his body at a natural temperature and is resistant enough to sustain friction build up." continued Kasler,

"After him is The Explosive Fury, the Red Blaster. An expert in explosives, he uses a variety of grenades in battle. He can even throw grenades like it were a baseball, no man has ever escaped the Red Blaster in one piece. Following him is marksman, Jungle Evil, he can perfectly adapt and camouflage into any environment to snipe his enemies from any position. Finally, it's the Silent End, Night Fright. No one has seen their real face but anyone who has faced them doesn't live to tell the tale. Night Fright uses a cloaking sneaking suit to be completely invisible, these mercenaries all are the best Zanzibar has to offer, going against them would be suicide." Kasler finished,

"Well now that we know what we're going against, you three have to be ready by 1800." Houseman informed them, they nodded and began walking to the locker room to prepare themselves for the upcoming battle in Zanzibar Lands.