Work Text:
With the expansion of Mother Base, an increasing number of seabirds begin to rest on the platforms. Having just finished his shower, Venom leans against the upper level railing, flipping through the mission list on his iDROID. The occasional static from his earpiece sounds like another form of ocean tide.
As a flock of birds take flight, a message from Ocelot pops up on the iDROID. It is brief, containing nothing but: "Boss, please come to the archive room when you have a moment." Venom closes the message. Yesterday when he caught a gerbil, Ocelot's supplementary notes were longer than this. This single sentence gives him an ominous premonition of trouble.
Pushing open the door to the archive room, Venom finds that the only light in the room comes from the faint glow of two CRT monitors of different sizes. The duty officer's seat is vacant. What is supposed to be a constantly manned station is now occupied only by Ocelot. The man has his boots propped up on a low stool, leaning back in his chair while reading a stack of reports. Seeing Venom enter, he stops twirling his pencil and gestures toward the empty swivel chair next to him.
Venom drags the chair over and sits down. As he looks around, Ocelot adds, "He's not coming."
There are a few video tapes taken out. Venom wonders how Ocelot can distinguish them in the dim room. Ocelot pulls one from the unlabeled stack and pushes it into the projector. "Boss, a few days ago I caught some soldiers playing cards while they were on duty. I took away their cards and cigarettes, and found this in their room. I figured you should take a look at it."
Static flickers across the screen, the floor in the viewfinder is shaking like crazy. As the camera angle raised, the shot finally steadies. It’s a low-res, black-and-white image of someone sitting at a desk, working away in sunglasses.
It was Kaz. He was leafing through a stack of documents, occasionally using the back of his pen to tap on the data printed on the paper, casually conversing with someone off-screen. Judging by the stuff on the desk and in the background, that’s the familiar command room. It’s been a while since I was last there, I should really stop by more often, Venom thinks.
The recording equipment is poor, with a constant buzz of static throughout, making the voices muffled and indistinct. The person filming seems consciously trying to keep the faces of others out of the frame. You can only tell there is more than one person in the room from the shadows passing over the desk. Nothing seems particularly out of the ordinary.
Venom watches for a moment, then looks up and asks, "Information leak?" Unauthorized personnel are strictly forbidden from filming in the command room.
"If it were an information leak, I know the drill. I`d do everything by the book and report back to you. This is something else."
As they speak, Kaz suddenly looked up from his files toward the right side of the screen. Venom brings his attention back to the monitor.
The audio quality of the recording is so poor that, even after listening for a minute, it's still hard to make out what they were saying. Above the rim of his sunglasses, Kaz was frowning deeply, his thoughts unreadable. When the soldier pressed in close, unzipped his pants, and exposed his penis, Kaz visibly tensed up. Surprisingly, he didn't fly into a rage or try to stop it. Venom could easily picture him smashing a cup into the guy's face and grabbing his crutch to drive everyone out. Yet, through the heavy static of the tape, Kaz merely shrank stiffly against the back of his chair, remaining inexplicably silent.
Perhaps because Kaz finally started to react, his wandering gaze swept across the area near the lens. The camera suddenly jerked, as if the person filming quickly hid the equipment. After a few seconds, the screen went black, leaving only Venom’s speechless reflection.
"...What did Kaz say?"
"He probably doesn't know he was recorded yet."
"Names?"
"If you want to know, I'll give you a list."As if discussing something trivial, Ocelot nonchalantly ejects the tape, slips it into a plastic evidence bag, and tosses it to Venom. "However, I've already properly dealt with the guy filming and those in the video, so you don't need to worry about that. Just cut to the chase: Miller needs psychological counseling. You should probably talk to him when you have time."
Catching the cassette Ocelot tosses over, Venom glances around for a place to put it, and eventually just sets it back on the desk. "Hmm. I'll talk to him. You haven't spoken to him about it yet?"
"I'm not a doctor. And you know, he doesn't like me. If I went to talk to him about this he probably wouldn't listen to a single word."
"Haven't you two worked together for nine years?"
Across the desk, Ocelot turns his head slightly. "...Yeah. Nine years."
Ocelot had told a minor lie. He had been investigating this matter for a while, and the tape wasn't just "coincidentally" found.
From the moment Boss brought Kazuhira Miller back to Mother Base, Ocelot caught the scent of a paranoia in Miller that bordered on the pathological. After 1975, it only took a short time for him and Miller to transition from occasional information exchanges to fighting side by side, followed by a long, grueling process of friction and adaptation. They could murder and pillage then go for a drive in a bullet-riddled car, or sit on the same bed in a hotel in Herat eating junk food. They could trust each other in any sudden crisis, but were they actually on good terms? Hard to say. Over the past few years, Miller had been an absolute nightmare whenever he tried to dig up dirt on Snake. The guy spent nearly all his free time trying to pump Ocelot for answers. Where is Snake, What's his medical condition, Has anyone else contacted him? The sheer volume of leading conversations laced with this kind of subtext was overwhelming. The number of these pointless interrogations in a single month probably outnumbered the times Ocelot took a shit, inevitably making him want to put a bullet in Miller's temple on occasion.
But outside of that, the guy was hardly stubborn.
The annoying man in sunglasses was adept at strategic analysis, able to deduce the whole picture from minimal information, and he didn't mind making concessions. Though Miller would frequently complain with a foul mouth, functionally speaking, he was reasonable to work with—whether he was giving orders or taking them. He organized things methodically. Ocelot thought that if Miller could just stop scribbling analyses on random pieces of toilet paper, he would look a lot more professional.
Sometimes he would weigh the leverage in his hands, wondering just how much compliance it could buy from Miller. If he asked him for support, for trust, or for his life, would he give it?
When he received the news that "V" had awakened, he paid a rare visit. That day he answered more of Miller's questions than he had in the entire past nine years. He watched the man spring up from his stool, listening in silence to the answers he had never managed to pry from Ocelot's mouth before. Evacuation routes, available factions, risks to eliminate—there were simply too many things to predict and arrange beforehand. They talked from midday into the night, discussing until the skyline began to turn a hazy grey, leaving only one final question:
"I need someone with a strong enough connection to handle this."
Tossing the Cipher files onto the desk, Ocelot fell silent and glanced at the man across from him. The guy opposite him surrounded by topographical maps and political situation reports of the mission area, was comparing the sandbox with the physical documents. After a brief pause, he spoke without looking up: "You want a live bait."
"You know the risks. But I won't deny this is the fastest, most effective method."
"I don't mind. But can you pull him out on your own?"
"Naturally," Ocelot replied without hesitation.
So Miller nodded in agreement and said, "Alright."
Time was tight. Leaning back in his chair, Ocelot watched Miller immediately get up to arrange transport and personnel. For some reason he found it slightly amusing. Miller would verbally question his every word, yet when it came to Snake, he trusted him to a laughable degree.
Hah, John, you always manage to find people willing to walk through fire for you, don't you.
They parted ways there. Afterward, in the borderlands of Afghanistan where sandstorms howled year-round, there was nothing on the other end of the earpiece except intermittent location broadcasts. Aside from mission-critical exchanges, Miller was uncharacteristically quiet, that guy always grew reticent when he was overthinking. To avoid dragging Ocelot into the enemy's sights, before returning to the tribal areas in Pakistan, they began severing all communications to prevent complications, leaving only the continuous ping of Miller's one-way tracking signal. Right before cutting the comms during their final check, Ocelot paused and added, "Don't make that man come to collect your corpse. Die a little later."
A short sharp laugh came through the earpiece. "Thanks for the blessing, asshole."
Miller's signal cut out faster than anticipated.
When the broadcast abruptly ceased, he knew he had hooked the right target. With the enemy profile completely unknown, how much time could the guy buy them? Over nine years of working together they had both learned to let the other handle their respective domains entirely. Yet, amidst the dead silence of the disconnected signal, Ocelot found himself unconsciously rubbing the corner of a page in his notepad.
Bad habit. He inhaled deeply, consigning both the scrapped paper and pointless overthinking to the fire.
The next time he saw him was on the helipad at the Command Platform. Boss, who hadn't executed an infiltration mission in nine years, had successfully brought him back to Mother Base, exactly as planned. After taking off his headset and calling the medical staff he'd prepped to receive Boss, he saw him helping Miller off the chopper.
Ocelot frowned slightly.
Miller had lost a significant amount of weight, smelled like rancid, bug-infested meat forgotten in a damp basement. His knotted empty pant leg and sleeve were covered in dried blood, swaying stiffly in the sea breeze.
It's nothing, At least he's alive. This was a foreseeable price to pay. Though a bit worse than expected, he should have mentally prepared for this when he took the mission. Ocelot told himself this, knowing full well Miller was probably doing the exact same thing. When it came to self-deception, the two of them were practically identical.
After returning, Miller became irrefutable. He grew dictatorial, tyrannical, inexplicably paranoid and irritable. Every decision on Mother Base had to pass through his hands, as if he wanted to tightly grip everything within his reach.
With Boss away on missions most of the time, the responsibility of monitoring Miller’s well-being naturally falls to Ocelot. He frequently hauls Miller—who left medical care prematurely—back to the infirmary for check-ups, making their bickering a daily routine.
So that night after finishing an interrogation, he stepped outside and saw the lights still on at the top of the Command Platform. Almost out of habit, his feet turned toward the Command Center. He pressed the intercom, dead silence on the other end. Just in case a certain crippled workaholic wearing sunglasses at night had collapsed and couldn't get up, he felt it necessary to check on him.
Despite the mild temperature drop, the windy night still carried a chill. Through the white mist of his breath, Ocelot saw someone stumble out of the Command Center, pause against the railing by the door, and then turn toward the stairs. Blond hair, beret, it was obvious who it was. Guess there was no need to go up, Ocelot thought, stopping at the foot of the stairs and preparing to turn away.
However, from the corner of his eye, he noticed that when Miller saw him, his crutch jerked back half a step as if out of a trauma response, though the man himself didn't retreat, just froze in place.
"Good evening." Ocelot gave a small nod.
No response.
The slight hint of panic on the guy's face made Ocelot frown. It was strange. This flustered demeanor was different from Miller's usual irritation with him, and unlike how he reacted when Ocelot caught him struggling with his physical limitations.
"Miller."
The crutch that was about to bypass him stopped. Miller looked down at the arm blocking his path: "What?"
The first thing that felt off was the smell of smoke. He hadn't seen Miller smoke since he returned to Mother Base. Boss was out on a mission, and the scent of his phantom cigar was vastly different from this. Ocelot quickly scanned the uneasy man in front of him: his hair under the beret was messy, no tie, his shirt wasn't fully buttoned, and his gun holster was missing. Several hypotheses formed in his mind, some of which were rather grim.
"Who were you just with?"
"Who else but the base personnel?"
"At this hour? In the Command Center?"
"Yes. Move."
"Do you know it's 2 AM now? And regular soldiers are only allowed in there for a quick briefing; they can't linger. Who went in?"
"Right, just a briefing. I'm going back to—"
"A briefing about what?"
"……"
The man leaning against the wall made a very soft clicking sound with his tongue, but Ocelot heard it.
"Miller, it's just a simple question. After all, when a certain workaholic pulls back-to-back shifts like that, the brain is bound to get a little foggy. It's perfectly normal to miss something, and there's still time to fix it. So, let me ask again: Who were you with, and what exactly were you doing in the Command Center just now?"
"When the fuck are you going to shut up?!"
When the crutch was violently shoved against Ocelot's chest, he went silent. Even though the push lacked real force, the near-hysterical edge in Miller's voice stopped him cold. After a few seconds of hesitation, Ocelot merely took a barely audible breath, stepped aside, and watched the man hobble away.
What the hell is he doing?
Forget it, as long as Miller does his job, it's fine. Glancing around, he noted one security camera outside the Command Center and another at the stairwell landing. How convenient. Even if he couldn't see inside, as long as he could identify the people, Ocelot had ways to make anything with a mouth spill the truth.
Scanning the surroundings, he noticed cameras positioned in front of the command room and at the stair bend—convenient. Although the interiors remained hidden, just locating the target would be enough. Ocelot had his ways of making anyone with a voice spill the truth.
Forget it, Miller isn't a toddler, he can take care of himself. Ocelot ordered personnel to pull the footage, cross-referenced the staff, and names began populating a newly created list.
Forget it, if Miller could survive a place like that, he can handle his current situation.
Investigation was certainly his forte. It took little effort to uncover the full picture, including the parties involved, the timing, the locations, and exactly what had transpired. Just as suspected, Miller had been intimate with the soldiers on base, and it hadn't been limited to the single occasion he’d originally discovered.
The two ringleaders looked familiar, they were the garrisoned soldiers Boss had picked up while passing through Da Ghwandai Khar. In the early days of the base, Ocelot and Miller handled recruit interrogations in shifts. Noticing the extraction point, Ocelot offered a subtle reminder: "Boss was the one who brought this person in." Miller's response was to look at him like he was an absolute moron.
True enough, during that interrogation, aside from mildly threatening the guy, Miller's tone and content were entirely standard, with no out-of-line behavior. After that remarkably normal recruitment session ended, Ocelot just sat back down, tilting his head to watch Miller routinely organize the transcripts and files, until Miller turned around, tapped his chair leg with his crutch and snapped, "Are you planning on living here?"
Miller had been angry. Ocelot knew the man's habits; the most troublesome phase was when he avoided communication and pretended everything was fine. Even if he self-regulated most of the time, estimating when his accumulated negativity would lead to a total meltdown was also part of Ocelot's job. At least that's what Ocelot believed.
Yet, when Miller's embarrassing expression from the tape was projected onto the screen, he heard the deafening sound of a crumbling foundation with piercing clarity.
While those idiots kept clamoring about Miller’s sexual consent, Ocelot shut the door to Room 101 without a backward glance. He rubbed the space between his eyebrows and found it all rather laughable. It seemed everyone had forgotten that Kazuhira Miller was still a patient, including Miller himself. Bundling up tightly to hide those permanent scars didn't mean they had healed.
He cleaned up the four ringleaders and instigators, grounding the rest temporarily so they wouldn't be unaccounted for if asked. All that remained was organizing the evidence to present to Boss. He had already done far too much meddling. He only did it because he worried it would affect Miller's workflow and the operation of Mother Base , nothing more.
Fortunately the video he showed Boss was edited, and the current footage was enough to explain the situation. Otherwise, seeing his Vice Commander pressed against a wall and fucked by subordinates whose names he didn't even know would have made Boss's expression far uglier than it was now.
This was the correct course of action. Unlike the years when they were forced to work together, Boss was back now. It was best that he and Kazuhira Miller interact strictly for work, leaving the rest to Boss.
That guy was no longer his problem.
Before leaving the office, Ocelot holds the doorframe and turns back to say: "That earlier one... I mean the one from Afghanistan. There was a tape of that too. Did you watch it?"
Venom frowns.
Yes, he had seen it.
He remembered that tape: sealed in a plastic bag, labeled, clipped to the back of that mission's report, and delivered to his office along with a massive pile of base briefings and statistics. At the time, Ocelot had specifically pulled it out, waved it in front of him, and said, "The mission report and some other files were supposed to be handled by Miller, but you know, he still needs some time before he gets out of the infirmary. So it's better if you take this one. Take a look when you have time."
During that period, Venom spent quite a bit of time on extra paperwork outside of missions, so naturally he watched that videotape. The moment it began playing, he suddenly understood the subtle expression that had flashed across Ocelot's face when he suggested giving the report to him instead of Kaz.
He still had that tape. Frankly, he didn't know what to do with it; he felt unauthorized destruction of mission records was inappropriate, but he also didn't want anyone else to see it. The Diamond Dogs' missions piled up one after another, always bringing new issues to the schedule, then the specifics of that operation were never brought up again.
However, the tape's contents did surface in his dreams. As the video begins, the soldiers with their backs to the camera part like a curtain, making way for the shot to reveal the lead actor. Pinned against the table behind a wall of bodies, Kaz was forced to lean back as someone yanked on his blonde hair. The gold cravat that usually rested at his chest now served as a blindfold. His left hand scrambled across the surface, searching for anything to steady himself. but the desk was entirely bare. His entire body skidding across the tabletop with the violent thrusts of the copulation below.
Venom's mind went blank.
Averting the gaze, the first thing he noticed was Kaz's severed right arm. Based on the missing limb, the interrogation had dragged on long before the camera started rolling. A piece of rope was knotted tightly around the short stump near the shoulder, acting as a tourniquet. The ragged edge of the wound proved it wasn't the work of a sharp tool. Venom preferred not to imagine how they managed to mangle it like that.
It wasn't a proper interrogation room. From the items caught on camera, it looked like a makeshift space cleared out in a former meeting room. Whether they had conducted the actual interrogation elsewhere and brought him here for transfer, or just interrogated him on the spot, this room was currently only serving as a place for the men to find some entertainment.
Blood and bodily fluids slicked the tabletop, making it difficult for Kaz to steady himself with a single hand. The moment the grip on his hair loosened, he slumped back against the surface. His bare back was a map of overlapping bruises and wounds making Venom's brow knit tight. Beyond the camera the room echoed with cheerful chatter, leaving Kaz’s ragged breathing and whimpers all but lost in the laughter of the crowd.
After several brutal thrusts, a hand entered the frame, untying the cloth over his eyes just as semen and harsh light struck his face simultaneously. Unshielded by sunglasses, Kaz’s reddened eyes were half-lidded, stinging from either tears or semen. He seemed to squint for several seconds before finally registering the camera lens hovering inches away, turning his face aside in a flash of panic.
A mixture of fluids coated his groin, and marker scribbles trailed down from his inner thigh. His groin was already bruised from being repeatedly slammed against the edge of the desk from behind. Even when no one was touching him, his body continued to tremble faintly.
The tape had no timestamp, making it hard to tell when it was filmed, but Kaz's sluggish reactions suggested it had been going on for a long time. Even in the recorded footage, Kaz's eyes were closed more often than they were open. In the background, someone rummaged for a syringe. Judging by the standard meds stocked at that base later on, it was likely amphetamines. When they yanked Kaz's arm, bruising was visible on the inner elbow. The soldier holding the needle opted to wrench Kaz's head to the side and jammed it into his neck.
The injection was taking hold fast enough, yet some were too impatient to wait. A red-hot iron rod was pressed against the stump of Kaz’s right limb, supposedly to staunch the bleeding, though the real aim was simply to keep him conscious. It worked. The man on the table bucked with more violence than at any point since the filming began.
Perhaps sensing the camera panning down to settle on a specific spot, Kaz instinctively tried to pull his legs together. But the cameraman sensing the movement, immediately pinned his left knee against the edge of the table. Another person then stepped forward to force the other leg open, handcuffing his right ankle to the table leg.
Like filming a commercial product showcase, the camera circled the prey on the desk. Every detail was laid bare: Kaz’s expression, the bruised neck, a torso crisscrossed with wounds and semen, and even the reddened, violated entrance.
For a fleeting second, Kaz’s gaze swept across the lens, catching Venom off guard as their eyes met through the screen. It was an expression he struggled to define—one that the man in his memories, the one who used to lean against the base railings with a self-assured smile, would never, ever show.
Someone picked something off the floor and tossed it onto Kaz's face. When Kaz realized it was his own sawed-off right hand, his wildly heaving chest nearly stopped. He made no sound, just shuddered, his breathing all but vanishing. The joints on the severed limb were mangled, the cross-section looking as if it had been forcibly twisted off. Venom couldn't help but vividly imagine how those fingers had been ripped from the palm, feeling a phantom ache in his own right hand.
By the time the man on the desk registered it and violently shook off the severed limb, the soldier who had pinned his left leg lifted it, shoved his fingers into the exposed entrance, and churned them around, asking in broken English: "You want this leg turn like that too?"
That leg is gone now. Venom thought.
In the footage, Kaz violently shuddered at the threat, his lower half clenching tightly around the calloused fingers out of pure tension. This reaction clearly pleased the soldiers immensely, drawing laughter and jeers from the crowd. Venom could roughly guess what their words meant from the way they nudged and snickered at each other.
After a simple clean-up with a finger, the clogged milky fluid mixed with blood gushed out, streaming down Kaz's thigh and dripping onto the floor. The man violating him pulled his hand out in mild disgust, shook it off, grabbed a glove from nearby, put it on and shoved his fingers right back in. This time, Kaz, who had long since stopped resisting, suddenly begins to struggle violently. The overwhelming foreign texture of the leather, combined with the agonizing pain of a torn intestinal tract, hit him all at once, making the handcuffs securing his ankle rattle furiously. The outburst lasts only a few seconds before being cut short by a strike across the face. Kaz's instinctive block came a moment too late, throwing off his balance and sending him tumbling over the edge of the table.
On the floor, he huddled, cradling what was left of his right arm. His messy blond hair hung down, making his expression hard to read on the low-quality screen, but the bruises and lacerations littering his bare skin were glaringly clear.
That soldier crouched down, looked back at the camera, roughly slapped Kaz's inner thigh, then other man stepped into the frame to push him against the filthy carpet. Compared to the soldiers leisurely unbuckling their pants, Kaz was visibly far more terrified of what was about to happen again. The approaching man casually plucked the cigarette from his mouth, stubbed it out on Kaz's lower stomach, grabbed his hips, and forcefully rammed his erect penis inside.
The slapping of flesh, the sneers, the beatings Kaz earned through unconscious struggling, his breath shattered by the relentless thrusting, and the obscene, wet sounds of their coupling all forced their way into Venom's ears. Venom didn't know how to react for almost two minutes. Even long after he hit the pause button, the nausea churning in his stomach lingered.
Everyone in the video knew this was no longer an interrogation. Kaz wasn't going to say anything; if he was going to break, it wouldn't have escalated to this point. Based on the relaxed alert level near Ghwandai, they didn't even truly believe "Big Boss" was coming to rescue him. These men simply wanted to utilize their prisoner before he took his last breath.
Venom genuinely wished Kaz didn't remember any of this. He wished Kaz only remembered getting injured in the line of duty, nothing more. He wished all those bruises—the bite marks, the bruises—along with the horrific memories, would vanish overnight.
But clearly, Kaz had vivid memories of that ordeal, and they haunted his nightmares. When Kaz first returned to Mother Base, it took multiple debridement procedures before the stench of rotting flesh from the infection finally faded. Despite barely being able to walk post-surgery, he lashed out at anyone who tried to help him. After getting whipped by his crutch a few times, the soldiers knew better. Whenever the Deputy Commander came tottering out, they simply trailed behind in nervous silence, waiting for Ocelot to show up and cart him back to the ward.
Aside from the amputations, the stab wounds healed the fastest. The subcutaneous bruising, however, took nearly two months to fade into obscurity. The real problem was the lacerations from the whippings; though they healed quickly, every single one formed a raised, white, ridged scar, remaining as permanently etched into his skin as the burn marks.
During the period when Kaz was strictly ordered to stay in the infirmary by the medical staff, Venom often visited him after missions. Sometimes in the dead of night, he would see Kaz jolt awake from a light sleep, covered in cold sweat, struggling frantically to sit up, only managing to steady his breathing when he recognized the familiar face entering the room. Their conversations at these times always went exactly the same way:
"Sorry, did I wake you?"
"No, just sleeping poorly. Mission accomplished?"
"Mhm."
Kaz always steered the topic toward work, never discussing his own issues. Eventually, he abandoned his sleeping pills altogether, leaving a bottle of Tramadol on his desk and keeping the radio on all night to review paperwork. After collapsing face-first onto his desk for the second time, the medical staff couldn't take it anymore and called Ocelot. The two men had another screaming match in the infirmary. When Venom arrived, Ocelot was still cracking terrible jokes: "What, did Boss rescue a humanoid Metal Gear that only knows how to work and name it Kazuhira Miller?"
The man who was shoved back onto the bed just raised his left hand high and flipped him off.
How long would the fallout from this last? Although Kaz was discharged much faster than anyone anticipated, no one dared say he was truly "recovered." What Ocelot reports today is something Venom never imagined would happen. It is incredibly difficult to articulate that sense of jarring deviation.
Months ago, on the boat to Afghanistan, his memories were still hazy. The name 'Kazuhira' in the files only formed a blurry silhouette in his mind, filled solely by a deep sense of tranquillity when interacting with "this person." Kazuhira, it seemed, was a guy who always had a smug smile. He fixated on the strange things and consistently managed to make the wrong bets. That man always stood by his side. In the warm sunlight of the ocean base... in the seasonal downpours of Colombia, over the radio, and plunging into the ocean inside a falling chopper, he was always right there beside him.
Until the moment he pulled the hood off the prisoner at Ghwandai, Even in the pitch-black room, everything about Kazuhira had never felt so tangible.
He had salvaged a piece of wreckage from the past.
Compared to the present, the memories of nine years ago were like shrapnel embedded in his brain. Every time he tried to think, they scraped against his mind, causing a fine, persistent ache. Phantom pain is involuntary, but he doesn't expect Kaz to actively choose to grind himself down as a means of feeling alive.
Now the question is what to do about it.
He asks Ocelot about the soldiers involved, who just shrugs, stating they are temporarily confined in the interrogation room.
"You're the Boss. Everyone's waiting for your orders," Ocelot says as he opens the heavy iron door of the interrogation room for him.
The room looks the same as always: stainless steel table and chairs bolted to the floor, the one-way mirror reflecting blurry silhouettes. Upon seeing who walks in, the soldiers immediately scramble up from the floor, form a line, and salute the Boss. None of them look particularly good.
Dust motes settle slowly in the stagnant air. Venom walks to the opposite side and stands there in silence.
Truth be told, he hasn't figured out what to say. If Kaz were in a normal state of mind, this would just be a matter of personal indiscretion. But factoring in Kaz's trauma, the impact on the base, and his own standing to intervene, the necessary words fall far outside his usual vocabulary.
The silence stretches far longer than expected, making it agonizing, especially since their tactical instructor hasn't given them a shred of context before bringing them here. Before Boss arrives, even though a few have a guilty conscience, the less involved ones exchange confused, blank stares. It isn't as if Mother Base lacks veterans from the old MSF days; Kaz's reputation for sleeping around nine years ago was well-known among the troops. Weren't they just hooking up now like he did back then? What's the difference?
The soldiers nervously exchange glances. Although no one voices their confusion, Ocelot, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, simply raises an index finger to his lips. Seconds later, the restless dies down.
"Boss, you can fire them if you want," Ocelot offers.
"What do I put under the reason?"
"Just write 'Insufficient etiquette training.'"
The soldiers freeze, terrified gazes fixed on Venom. Their Boss thinks for a few seconds, then lowers his head and shakes it.
Under the dim lights, the horned man lowers his eyes and says quietly, "No more promiscuous behavior amongst yourselves," "No non-work related contact with the Vice Commander," and "This is your only warning." Finishing his sentence, he takes a step closer to them, repeating slowly, emphasizing every word: "Don't do it again."
After receiving clear, affirmative responses from everyone, Venom watches them file out of Room 101, the ocean breeze pouring in through the rectangular window.
Next up is the massive problem of Kaz.
How had he handled it before? Searching his brain, he seems to find a memory of two naked men brawling bare-assed from the sauna all the way to the base deck. It's so absurd that he hardly feels it truly happens to him.
As Venom hesitates over Kaz's comms channel, a message from the man pops up first. A mission update: a technician and equipment blueprints have been moved to two different temporary strongholds. After a lengthy intelligence briefing, Kaz adds, "Can you head out now?"
He wants to say more, but all he replies is: "Yes."
The mission goes smoothly. Third garrison, second piece of intel. Evasion, infiltration, retrieval, extraction—muscle memory is indeed far more reliable than the brain. Everything progresses perfectly; only the mental draft he agonizes over remains completely stalled.
Sitting in the returning chopper, his iDROID beeps twice. He opens it to find a short text from Ocelot.
"Caught too many Nubian goats. Good news is, the animal enclosure is pretty much cleared out, so we can temporarily keep them at the base. Feel free to drop by and check on them when you’re back.
And Miller. "
He has no idea why Ocelot tacks Miller's name onto the end of that. but having said that, if he invites Kaz to look at goats, he might actually agree. But if he points at the pen and says, "Kaz, this is a Nubian goat, this is a Kashmir goat. They got caught because they weren't alert to their surroundings. Kaz, you need to be more vigilant against danger too." he can probably see the words "WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU?" etched in Kaz’s eyes, even through those sunglasses.
Tossing the absurd scenario out of his head, Venom presses the comms button for Kaz.
"Kaz, are you free?"
"I'm still at the R&D platform auditing supplies. What's wrong?" Kaz's response via iDROID is rapid, as always.
"Do you have a moment to talk? Um... where are you right now?"
Kaz sounds a bit confused but relays his coordinates anyway. Venom glances at the location on his iDROID, reaches forward, and taps the pilot's seat, signaling Pequod to change the LZ to the R&D platform. It may be easier to go directly to him rather than wait for him to come over.
Minutes later, the sea fog dissipates, and Mother Base comes into sharp focus.
The two expansion platforms for the R&D department were newly constructed; the trusses and cranes gleamed with cold metal. Leaning out the open side door, Venom's gaze tracked a transport vehicle weaving between containers and structures, eventually settling near the edge of a distant platform. In the shadow of a building, a man on a crutch is crossing a temporary supply dump, his empty sleeve fluttering in the wind.
...Not good. The feeling like heading into a mission underprepared had Venom on edge. He still hadn't figured out what to say. But on second thought, Kaz isn't an unreasonable man; if he made a logical argument, Kaz would listen. ...Maybe.
The thought alone gives him a headache. Venom buries his head in his arms, lets out a long sigh, and looks up just in time to see Kaz stopped in the middle of the road by someone.
They are about to land. Through the gap between the structures, he sees Kaz turn slightly, tilting his head to look at the soldier talking to him. The chopper is deafening, all other noise is drowned out like a pantomime. Suddenly, through the rectangular frame of the door, he sees Kaz draw his sidearm from beneath his coat and point it dead at the man. A split second later a gunshot rings out, momentarily shattering the roar of the rotors.
"Boss! R&D Platform! Miller just shot a soldier!"
It is Ocelot's voice; god knows where he is watching from. Before Venom can respond, a second shot fired.
"Kaz!"
Venom leaps from the chopper. There is still about seventy meters to go. The shot soldier is slumping against the railing, teetering on the edge, when Kaz steps up and slams the butt of his pistol straight into the man's face.
He is one step too late. Venom vaults over the clutter blocking his path and lunges, but his hand grasps nothing but air. The falling man screams soundlessly, bloody froth trailing from the bullet hole through his throat.
"Hey, careful you don't fall off!" Kaz shifts toward Venom, barely finishing his sentence before Venom grabs him, twists his wrist and disarms him. When Venom turns back to look down, all he sees is the usual surface of the ocean. There is no saving him now. In a few days, when the soldier surfaces, he will be nothing more than fish food dragged dozens of kilometers away by the current. Venom takes a deep breath: "What the hell are you doing?!"
After a momentary hesitation, Kaz stares right back:
"Apologies. I'd received reports from other soldiers that this guy had a history of violence and repeatedly attacked people. So when I saw him attempting to make an aggressive move just now, I acted in self-defense. Naturally, the regs require two-man approval for executions in non-combat situations, but we can call this a 'case of necessity,' right, Boss?"
Venom felt the wrist he was holding go entirely slack. The man just let his remaining arm be gripped, his crutch having rolled away unnoticed.
Once Kaz adopts that uncompromising officialese tone, effective communication on the spot becomes impossible. Nearby soldiers have already started approaching in response to the sound. Further away, several figures in berets are rushing in this direction, gesturing as they run for the crowd to disperse.
Venom sighs, releases his grip, and tucks the gun into the back of his waistband. Then he picks up the cane and hands it to Kaz:
"Let's go talk somewhere else."
For a man missing a leg, Kaz walks surprisingly fast. Venom follows three paces behind, the two of them heading toward the nearest office in tandem. The rapid, rhythmic tapping of the crutch against the floor is steady; Kaz didn't look back once. Venom opens his iDROID:
"Ocelot, that guy looked familiar. Was he in the interrogation room the day before yesterday?"
He realizes belatedly that he hadn't specified who "that guy" was, but before he could finish typing the addendum, Ocelot's reply pops up on the screen: "Yes."
So that's it. Stowing the communicator, Venom quickens his pace, moving past Kaz to open the door. The crutch taps against the floor in sharp, rhythmic clicks, followed by the dull thud of a sound leg. It is a vacant office on the R&D platform, and aside from the usual desks and chairs, a corner has been piled with clutter and coats to form a makeshift bunk, the sort of place where a soldier might sneak away for a midday nap.
The noisy chatter from outside has ceased. With the door shut, they can't hear anything else. Venom pulls over two chairs, then draws the confiscated gun and hands it back. Kaz doesn't sit. He takes the weapon, glances up at Venom, then back down at the gun, before silently sliding it into the holster beneath his coat.
"Kaz. Explain."
"I've been getting reports of soldiers with bad habits disrupting order on the base. The guy from just now had violent tendencies. For the safety of others, I think it's necessary to deal with him. "
"You mentioned that earlier. Don't you think you were a bit rash?"
"I also counted to three."
"You could have reported it to..." Venom thought about Kaz's title, pausing for a moment, "...me."
"Right. Yes. Sorry, Boss. Making a unilateral decision like that in public affects morale, I'll admit that's on me. If you want, I will draft a public statement. If you need a written apology, I can write one of those too."
The man on the crutch shifts his weight, his tone deadpan. The fluorescent light overhead buzzes annoyingly. Venom rubs his forehead. He really isn't good at this.
"Umm…Ok. Besides that, I received reports that some soldiers have been coming to see you outside normal hours, and that you looked extremely unhappy about it." Venom carefully picked his words. "Kaz, is someone threatening you?"
"No."
"But—"
"I'm telling the truth."
No, no, this kind of conversation is useless.
"Were those sexual encounters consensual?"
For a fraction of a second, Kaz looks utterly stunned, unable to find an answer. After a brief moment of panic, he swiftly forced his expression back to neutral: "What? You're policing that now?"
"Because it's bad for you."
"Well, THANK YOU, Boss. Is that what you want to hear? And? What’s it to you? Should I be grateful? Because you pity me? Or do you think I put a bullet in that guy just because I slept with him?"
"I want you to stop."
"The last time you brought this up we got into a fight. If you think I'm too crippled to throw down now, try me—"
"Please don't do this. It makes me sad."
Silence hung in the air. "...You what?"
"Kaz, it makes me sad."
The room is surprisingly quiet. Kaz leans against the desk, his back to the light spilling from the window. He is completely still, his expression unreadable behind the dark shades.
"A while back, when Ocelot caught the soldier who helped torture you, you threatened him. You told him you were going to snap his fingers off one by one right in front of his face, and then mash his hands into pulp with a hammer. Before you even finished, the guy was sobbing, begging you not to do it, saying he was just following orders. When asked, 'Why did you do that to someone else?', his only answer was, 'Because everyone else was doing it.' When hyenas gather in a pack, they can find the courage to do anything despicable as long as they have each other. Back then, Kaz, you faced them completely alone. But the thing is... I can feel that even now, you're still facing all those things on your own."
Perhaps unused to speaking so much in one breath, Venom stopped and took a deep pull of air:
"But… but I'm right here too."
"I'm here too, Kaz. The strange thing is, even though you still tell me 'You know I'm on your side, right?' just like you did nine years ago... you act like you haven't realized that I am on your side, too. Kaz, I don't think living a life where you replace breathing with working is right. You can let me help... and I need you to let me help."
"It's like a fracture that wasn't set right, leaving someone with an agonizing ache from the malunion for the rest of his life. People often ignore that same principle when the wound is invisible. Even though I can't magically fix your mental state overnight, and you've never once asked me to 'save' you,I still hope that one day, you'll be able to see this place as 'home.' Since that's what you called Mother Base the first day I arrived, I want it to be true—not just some empty recruitment slogan. The base that sank to the bottom of the ocean in '75 belonged to you, and me. The phantom pain of limbs we no longer have... I feel it too. Even if you want to take revenge on someone... I can pull the trigger right alongside you."
He is done.
Just blabbing whatever comes to mind. Venom sits there quite rigidly, looking up at the person across from him, a little nervous while waiting for a reply.
He thinks Kaz would get angry, much like the scent of gunpowder that seems to permanently cling to him, but right now, he just looks tired. Venom taps his crossed fingers lightly against the back of his hand. He feels like he should add something else, but his tongue can't assemble the right words. The tungsten lamp buzzes and crackles. The top rim of Kaz's sunglasses reflects faint spots of light from the overhead bulb, flickering with his almost imperceptible movements.
After a long while, Kaz leans back against the desk. He pulls his glove off with his teeth, pushes up the sunglasses and rubs the bridge of his nose.
"Ok... I can't take this. It's so mushy to me."
The tension in the air dissolves. Like a frozen lake finally beginning to thaw, the ice cracks around Kaz.
"Stop looking like you did something wrong. You weren't incorrect."
"Kaz..."
"Alright, I apologize. For what you just talked about, and for my attitude toward you earlier." Kaz ducks his head, throwing his hand up in a mock surrender. "I promise there won't be a next time. "
"The first time someone came to my quarters, they talked a good game, but I knew exactly what those bastards were scheming the second they opened their mouths. But right before I kicked them out... I hesitated. Whether it was to desensitize myself, or just to file sex under the category of 'acceptable sacrifices,' I suddenly thought—'let's just roll with it for now.' You know the rest. And honestly, sleeping with them was far too disgusting anyway."
He tilts his head, looking at Venom, and pauses for a moment.
"Besides, I used to think you... uh, weren't SNAKE. Your personality is just too different from nine years ago. But thinking about it now, I'm practically a different person myself, so I'm not really in a position to judge." Kaz leans askew against the desk, looking up. "And, who knows... maybe you being like this isn't so bad."
After he finishes speaking, he clears his throat with an awkward little cough.
" Well then," Kaz pushes himself up and accepts the crutch offered to him. "I'll scavenge a good bottle of booze from Ocelot's stash later. We can share it when we have the time. He definitely won't mind."
When Kaz smiles, he looks a bit like his old self again, and even Venom feels a spark of joy in his chest.
Venom steps forward. "Do you want a hug?"
The desk is a mess. Kaz is trying to flatten out a document he has accidentally creased, casually replies, "No need," just as he looks up to see Venom awkwardly lowering his open arms.
"Forget it."
Neither of them is good at hugging. He feels Kaz's single hand gripping the back of his shirt tightly. He doesn't move, only his warm body heat seeps steadily through the fabric. Venom naturally brings up his right hand and gently pats his back.
"Kaz, I can hear you sniffing."
"This is not the time to point that out."