Last Chance
"Otacon, get out of the way!" Snake shouted, diving on top of Otacon and shielding him.
The giant Metal Gear exploded and lurched towards them, falling in a path of death. If it had been human, its sentiment may have been "If I'm going to die, I'll take you all with me!" but it was just a soulless machine, lurching towards them too quickly to move out of its path of destruction.
Snake's final thought was Otacon beneath him as his world went black. Just a wish, a fleeting thought, for in that final second there was no time for words.
~
"Snake... C'mon Snake, don't leave me alone! It's so cold down here..." Otacon shivered, and pulled his white lab coat tighter to him. Cold it was, for the Metal Gear facility had been built under the Antarctic ice sheet, and when the Metal Gear had been destroyed, all the researchers had evacuated.
They'd obviously turned the heating off on the way out, if there had been any. Otacon didn't remember it being this cold. But then before, he hadn't been trapped under tons of scrap metal.
It had been a wonder they hadn't been killed, but they'd luckily been spared by a stroke of luck. Still, the remains of the Metal Gear looked precarious and Otacon knew that it could collapse and crush them at any time. They were also trapped in their "cave" in the rubble. Tons of twisted metal and potential radiation leakage lie between them and freedom. The darkness was absolute; Otacon was glad they'd brought a flashlight with them. He hoped it would last until they were rescued.
"Wake up, Snake!" Otacon cried again, feeling desperate at his thoughts. Snake would have a plan, if only he would wake up. Otacon held him close and worked on rubbing warmth into his limbs. His sneaking suit offered better cold protection than what Otacon was wearing, but Otacon knew that if Snake didn't wake soon, he would die. He didn't relish the thought of dying alone, without Snake by his side. Maybe he'd even try one of his cigarettes, after all, he didn't need to worry about the health effects any more.
Otacon felt his mind drifting, and stood up, investigating the area with the torch. There was space enough to exercise without knocking any of the scrap, and so Otacon gently moved around, getting the blood flowing through his body. He made sure not to work up a sweat, because he knew it would chill him more. After a little while, he heard moans from where Snake was lying, and rushed to his side.
"Snake, are you okay?" Wrong question, but what else could he say? Otacon had never been good at this stuff.
"Cold..." Snake whispered, and Otacon instinctively held the big man close to him, rubbing his body to encourage the blood to flow.
"Come on, Snake, don't give up. We should be dead now, by all the odds, but we're still alive... so hang on just a little longer?" Otacon felt uncertain and scared, and pulled Snake closer to him, letting his head rest on his chest, and cradling him, partly for his own comfort.
After a few minutes, Snake seemed to regain some strength and was sitting up of his own will. He finally asked the question Otacon had been dreading: "Where are we?"
"We're... we're under the Metal Gear, Snake. We're trapped." Otacon said, nervously playing around with his ear where the codec was situated. Under miles of thick sheet ice, it was unable to communicate anything to the surface, and the only reason he had it set up had been to communicate with Snake, should they have gotten separated. They'd had no help from the outside world on this mission. He knew no rescue team would come for them.
"...Shit," was the only answer he got. It was not what he'd been expecting, and brought fearful butterflies to his stomach. He always trusted Snake to have a plan, some way out, even just some positive thought on survival, but this time, nothing.
Snake must have seen Otacon's head lower and his eyes fill with fear, because his hand went straight to his shoulder, "There'll be some way out. We can survive for a while, if no radiation has leaked from the missiles. Someone might come for us, I mean, Philanthropy knows we're here." Otacon looked up into Snake's eyes, and recognized a sad glimmer there. Snake was lying, saying words he wanted to hear. In return, he managed a brave smile as he shivered.
Snake embraced Otacon and kept him close, "Stay close to me, we'll conserve body heat this way. I have three rations, so we can last a little while here. Snake looked down at his partner's face, blissfully falling into oblivion. Snake slapped him.
"Ow!" Otacon started, but then realized why Snake had slapped him. If he fell asleep, the chances were that he'd never wake up, "Thanks," he muttered, nursing the soreness on his face, "You could have just yelled..."
"And bring this lot down on us? No thanks," Snake explained, and Otacon realized he'd been so busy trying to keep warm he hadn't thought about keeping the volume down.
"My body just wants to fall asleep," Otacon complained, shivering fiercely. Snake rubbed his body, and Otacon giggled.
"What's so funny?" Snake said, pretending to sound irritated. In fact, the girly laughter was like music to his ears in this place of little hope.
"I'm ticklish, Snake!" Otacon giggled.
Snake pondered for a second, weighing up the risks, and turned his rubbing into full-scale tickling. Otacon bit his lip to keep from screaming.
Snake stopped, "Feel warmer now?" he asked, a wicked smile in his eyes. Otacon smiled, having forgotten about the situation they were in for a few minutes.
"Yeah..." Otacon replied, red in the face, but the mirth faded as the gravity of the situation weighed down upon him again. Beginning to shiver once more, he curled up close to Snake again.
"Keep talking," Otacon said, "I hate silence."
"What do you want to talk about?" Snake asked, knowing that it was a good idea, even though he wondered what topics Otacon would want to talk about.
"Well... tell me more about you. About Dave." Otacon said hopefully.
"Why does everybody ask that?" Snake sighed, "There's no big secret, no special life that I've hidden from you. If you don't know who I am now, then you'll never know."
Otacon probed deeper, "But, who did you grow up with? Any parents?"
Snake shrugged, as if surrendering to telling his life story.
"I grew up with army officers, and scientists. I can't say I remember much about when I was young, but I don't have any nightmares about it, like Raiden does. I joined the army, moved up the ranks, here I am. I really don't care about the way I was born or not having any parents to raise me... Or that the first time I saw my father was on the battlefield." Snake shrugged, as if dismissing it, "What's blood, anyway? People always say birth parents are so important, but it's the people who you care about that matter, not who contributed your genetic material."
"Otacon nodded, "I guess that's true, but I never forgot about E.E. So there must be some attachment to our relatives, because I hadn't seen her for years..."
"Or maybe it was just the fact that you had a close relationship with her that made you not forget her. There must be other people that you wouldn't forget about if you were away from them for a long time." Snake argued.
"Yeah, when you put it that way..." Otacon agreed, thinking of Snake. He knew that forgetting him would be hard. He pushed the thoughts away, knowing that they reminded him too much of the current situation. He didn't want Snake to die, not here... not ever. That's why he always came on these risky missions... He sighed, and Snake could see he wanted to talk about something else.
"Hey, want a smoke?" Snake asked.
"Do you want to light it in here? The place will probably go up!" Otacon exclaimed.
Snake shrugged, "One way or another, we're screwed. I'd rather go out with a bang."
Otacon reluctantly nodded, and took a cigarette. He held his breath when Snake lit them, but nothing exploded. Snake chuckled and took a drag, watching Otacon uncomfortably hold the cigarette.
"Are you going to actually smoke it, or just pose with it?" Snake teased.
Otacon took a deep drag, and burst into a coughing and spluttering fit.
"How can you like these sticks of death?" Otacon asked, a smile on his face.
"Well, if you weren't acting like you were trying to make up for 30 years of non-smoking..." Snake said, grinning, "Take it easy, just small puffs... Damn, haven't you ever smoked a cigarette, Hal?"
"No..." Otacon confessed, "I always thought they were nasty." He took a small drag, and smiled, "But they're really not so bad... When we get out of here this might just become a regular habit..." He looked up to the ceiling of scrap and the smile left his face as he remembered how little their odds of getting out were.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, puffing away until they reached the ends. They both stood up and stamped out the stubs carefully, hoping not to ignite anything flammable in the "cave".
They sat down again, huddled close to one another. Otacon felt safe and warm in Snake's arms, and wished they were back at Philanthropy, or in their own apartment. In bed, yes... close to each other...
Otacon swallowed a lump in his throat, wishing he'd thought about this sooner. It was too late now to be wishing. Besides, he was pretty damn sure Snake liked women. Snake wasn't even aware that Otacon was bisexual, and had never asked. And Otacon hadn't realized before that he had these feelings for his friend...
"Snake?" Otacon asked.
"Yeah?" Snake answered.
"You'll stay with me... until the end, won't you?" Otacon whispered.
"There's not exactly anywhere I can go, and if I found a way out I wouldn't be going alone." Snake smiled, warmed by his friend's affection. There was no use hiding behind a soldier's cold mask; Otacon knew him better than that.
"Don't die on me, will you?" Otacon asked, "Promise me?"
"Hey, I can't promise anything. Chances are in this sneaking suit I'll survive longer anyway... But..." He cut himself short. He'd just been about to say he didn't want to survive without Otacon. It had to be the cold and the thought of impending death making him get all mushy.
"But?" Otacon probed.
Snake pulled out a ration, "You hungry?"
Otacon knew that once Snake decided to change the subject, there was no going back. He took a ration and ate it hungrily, while Snake ate one more slowly. He seemed lost in thought, but Otacon wasn't going to pursue it. Snake's mind was his alone, and if he didn't want to share his thoughts, no amount of probing would force him to talk about it. He finished the ration and curled up close to Snake, who absentmindedly began to rub him again. He finished his ration and tossed the packet aside, then set to work on warming Otacon up. He rubbed heat back into his hands, then his face, then his back, giving him a slap on the ass as he reached it, which made Otacon jump.
"Hey, you're getting some meat on you under all those baggy clothes," Snake grinned, and Otacon blushed. Snake continued, and rubbed the back of his thighs. Otacon bit his lip to suppress a gasp; despite the cold, he was enjoying this in ways he wished he didn't. Snake finally got down to the feet and rubbed some warmth into his numb toes. Otacon giggled again as Snake tickled his feet.
Snake lay back, job finished, "Now it's my turn," he said, and Otacon gulped. That sneaking suit accentuated every contour of Snake's body, and he was aware that he was seeing it in a new light, a light that he had long pushed from his thoughts, buried under piles of paperwork and computer science for Philanthropy.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" Snake said, "Are you going to let me freeze to death?"
Otacon moved forward and began to frantically rub Snake, willing him to keep warm, knowing he didn't want to lose him. Concentrating on this, he pushed all other thoughts from his mind. He rubbed and rubbed, feeling Snake below him, and then those subconscious wishes began to surface...
The flashlight flickered and died.
"Snake!" Otacon held him tightly, like a child afraid of the dark.
"The battery's ran out.," Snake explained, as if an explanation were needed.
But to Otacon, it was as if all hope had been extinguished with the light. Snake heard him begin to sob and pulled him close protectively. Perhaps this really was their final mission.
"Pull yourself together, Otacon!" he said, "If you don't, we have no chance of getting out of here. Don't expend energy by crying..." He rubbed Otacon's shoulders and back to let him know he was there.
"I... I'm scared, Snake. I want to be back in our apartment, I want us to be planning some mission, and you bring me coffee, and... and... anything, anything but this!" Otacon said hysterically.
Snake knew he had to calm him down, before he tried something desperate. In the darkness, they had no chance of getting out, unless someone came here with the ability to move tons of trash. He felt his own fears rise, and the grim knowledge that they wouldn't make it descended in his gut. He accepted it, knowing that his luck had finally run out. He thanked fate for letting him survive this long, all the time cursing it for letting Otacon be buried with him. Otacon had so much to live for, so much to do, and so much to offer the world. He didn't deserve to die here. He'd never killed, never taken anything from anyone. He found himself cursing the world's unfairness.
Otacon sniveled in his arms, and he felt Otacon's face in the darkness, wiping his tears away. Death was perhaps hours away, and he wanted to die with no regrets. He drew his calloused fingers down Otacon's face until he located his mouth, and put a finger over his lips, silencing him. Bringing his head down to where his finger was, he let his lips meet Otacon's, gently brushing them and then kissing him, wildly and passionately with all of the life he had left. It took him a second to realize that Otacon was returning the kiss, and he wrapped his arms around Otacon, losing himself in that moment.
He knew it wasn't the cold. A fire burned within him, a fire he had only heard tales of. Love wasn't for him, a man who had killed so many, or so he had thought. Until he had faced death itself, he hadn't realized just how much the gentle scientist meant to him.
They parted the kiss for air, and then kissed again. Snake felt Otacon's tears renew themselves and tumble down his face, and he broke the kiss to wipe them away with his lips.
"Snake..." was the only word Otacon could manage.
Snake kissed him again, and again. They were soon lying on the floor in each other's arms, fighting back the cold with the warmth of their love. Otacon dared to touch Snake in places he could only have dreamed of earlier, and was amazed to find Snake and himself growing hard, despite the freezing cold. They threw caution to the winds and kissed wildly, rolling around in the darkness, not caring if they hit a wall and brought the whole lot tumbling down upon them.
"How long... have you felt like this?" Otacon asked, as they lie in each other's arms.
"Longer than I realized. I wish I'd sat down and thought about it sooner." Snake replied honestly.
"Same here," Otacon thought, "Now... we hardly have much time left. I'm so... tired, Snake..."
"Don't give up," Snake said, rubbing Otacon again to bring warmth back to him, "Here, have this," he added, pulling out the ration and struggling to open it in the dark. He crudely split it open and slipped it into Otacon's hands.
Otacon split it in half and gave half to Snake, "You too," he said, and Snake ate the ration as a kind of strange promise between them that they wouldn't give up.
Soon, they were too cold to even contemplate their desires, only the warmth of their love.
"I wish... we'd had more time," Snake said, his teeth chattering even though he tried desperately to make them stop, "There's so much I would have liked to have done..."
"Me too..." Otacon said, "This is... it, isn't it?"
"Seems like it." Snake replied. The coldness was invading his brain, beginning to interfere with his thought processes. He soon realized he couldn't move, even if he wanted to, but realized it was okay... Otacon was in his arms, where he wanted him to be.
"We won, though, we defeated the Metal Gear..." Otacon said.
"Yeah," Snake said, "We did."
Over the next hour the coldness took over every part of them. There were moments of knowledge, moments of insanity, but most of all, moments of nothingness. Finally, Otacon broke the silence.
"...Snake?" Otacon asked, finding it hard to speak. Frost covered his hair, and everything was so numb, so distant... He really had to concentrate to shape a thought.
"...Yeah?" Snake replied.
"What did... you mean to say... earlier...?" He wondered if Snake would remember, he could barely remember himself, but...
"Ah... yeah... just thought then... that I didn't want to... survive without you..." Snake murmured.
Otacon began to hum a tune slowly as his brain shut down... "Love... you..." he managed, "tired... now."
Snake didn't respond; his mind was off somewhere far away, damaged by the hypothermia. Otacon closed his eyes, and drifted away into an endless sleep. A short while later, Snake followed, and together they left a world of fighting and warfare, of nuclear weapons and unnecessary death behind. Perhaps somewhere, they would find peace together...
"Otacon, get out of the way!" Snake shouted, diving on top of Otacon and shielding him.
The giant Metal Gear exploded and lurched towards them, falling in a path of death. If it had been human, its sentiment may have been "If I'm going to die, I'll take you all with me!" but it was just a soulless machine, lurching towards them too quickly to move out of its path of destruction.
Snake's final thought was Otacon beneath him as his world went black. Just a wish, a fleeting thought, for in that final second there was no time for words.
~
"Snake... C'mon Snake, don't leave me alone! It's so cold down here..." Otacon shivered, and pulled his white lab coat tighter to him. Cold it was, for the Metal Gear facility had been built under the Antarctic ice sheet, and when the Metal Gear had been destroyed, all the researchers had evacuated.
They'd obviously turned the heating off on the way out, if there had been any. Otacon didn't remember it being this cold. But then before, he hadn't been trapped under tons of scrap metal.
It had been a wonder they hadn't been killed, but they'd luckily been spared by a stroke of luck. Still, the remains of the Metal Gear looked precarious and Otacon knew that it could collapse and crush them at any time. They were also trapped in their "cave" in the rubble. Tons of twisted metal and potential radiation leakage lie between them and freedom. The darkness was absolute; Otacon was glad they'd brought a flashlight with them. He hoped it would last until they were rescued.
"Wake up, Snake!" Otacon cried again, feeling desperate at his thoughts. Snake would have a plan, if only he would wake up. Otacon held him close and worked on rubbing warmth into his limbs. His sneaking suit offered better cold protection than what Otacon was wearing, but Otacon knew that if Snake didn't wake soon, he would die. He didn't relish the thought of dying alone, without Snake by his side. Maybe he'd even try one of his cigarettes, after all, he didn't need to worry about the health effects any more.
Otacon felt his mind drifting, and stood up, investigating the area with the torch. There was space enough to exercise without knocking any of the scrap, and so Otacon gently moved around, getting the blood flowing through his body. He made sure not to work up a sweat, because he knew it would chill him more. After a little while, he heard moans from where Snake was lying, and rushed to his side.
"Snake, are you okay?" Wrong question, but what else could he say? Otacon had never been good at this stuff.
"Cold..." Snake whispered, and Otacon instinctively held the big man close to him, rubbing his body to encourage the blood to flow.
"Come on, Snake, don't give up. We should be dead now, by all the odds, but we're still alive... so hang on just a little longer?" Otacon felt uncertain and scared, and pulled Snake closer to him, letting his head rest on his chest, and cradling him, partly for his own comfort.
After a few minutes, Snake seemed to regain some strength and was sitting up of his own will. He finally asked the question Otacon had been dreading: "Where are we?"
"We're... we're under the Metal Gear, Snake. We're trapped." Otacon said, nervously playing around with his ear where the codec was situated. Under miles of thick sheet ice, it was unable to communicate anything to the surface, and the only reason he had it set up had been to communicate with Snake, should they have gotten separated. They'd had no help from the outside world on this mission. He knew no rescue team would come for them.
"...Shit," was the only answer he got. It was not what he'd been expecting, and brought fearful butterflies to his stomach. He always trusted Snake to have a plan, some way out, even just some positive thought on survival, but this time, nothing.
Snake must have seen Otacon's head lower and his eyes fill with fear, because his hand went straight to his shoulder, "There'll be some way out. We can survive for a while, if no radiation has leaked from the missiles. Someone might come for us, I mean, Philanthropy knows we're here." Otacon looked up into Snake's eyes, and recognized a sad glimmer there. Snake was lying, saying words he wanted to hear. In return, he managed a brave smile as he shivered.
Snake embraced Otacon and kept him close, "Stay close to me, we'll conserve body heat this way. I have three rations, so we can last a little while here. Snake looked down at his partner's face, blissfully falling into oblivion. Snake slapped him.
"Ow!" Otacon started, but then realized why Snake had slapped him. If he fell asleep, the chances were that he'd never wake up, "Thanks," he muttered, nursing the soreness on his face, "You could have just yelled..."
"And bring this lot down on us? No thanks," Snake explained, and Otacon realized he'd been so busy trying to keep warm he hadn't thought about keeping the volume down.
"My body just wants to fall asleep," Otacon complained, shivering fiercely. Snake rubbed his body, and Otacon giggled.
"What's so funny?" Snake said, pretending to sound irritated. In fact, the girly laughter was like music to his ears in this place of little hope.
"I'm ticklish, Snake!" Otacon giggled.
Snake pondered for a second, weighing up the risks, and turned his rubbing into full-scale tickling. Otacon bit his lip to keep from screaming.
Snake stopped, "Feel warmer now?" he asked, a wicked smile in his eyes. Otacon smiled, having forgotten about the situation they were in for a few minutes.
"Yeah..." Otacon replied, red in the face, but the mirth faded as the gravity of the situation weighed down upon him again. Beginning to shiver once more, he curled up close to Snake again.
"Keep talking," Otacon said, "I hate silence."
"What do you want to talk about?" Snake asked, knowing that it was a good idea, even though he wondered what topics Otacon would want to talk about.
"Well... tell me more about you. About Dave." Otacon said hopefully.
"Why does everybody ask that?" Snake sighed, "There's no big secret, no special life that I've hidden from you. If you don't know who I am now, then you'll never know."
Otacon probed deeper, "But, who did you grow up with? Any parents?"
Snake shrugged, as if surrendering to telling his life story.
"I grew up with army officers, and scientists. I can't say I remember much about when I was young, but I don't have any nightmares about it, like Raiden does. I joined the army, moved up the ranks, here I am. I really don't care about the way I was born or not having any parents to raise me... Or that the first time I saw my father was on the battlefield." Snake shrugged, as if dismissing it, "What's blood, anyway? People always say birth parents are so important, but it's the people who you care about that matter, not who contributed your genetic material."
"Otacon nodded, "I guess that's true, but I never forgot about E.E. So there must be some attachment to our relatives, because I hadn't seen her for years..."
"Or maybe it was just the fact that you had a close relationship with her that made you not forget her. There must be other people that you wouldn't forget about if you were away from them for a long time." Snake argued.
"Yeah, when you put it that way..." Otacon agreed, thinking of Snake. He knew that forgetting him would be hard. He pushed the thoughts away, knowing that they reminded him too much of the current situation. He didn't want Snake to die, not here... not ever. That's why he always came on these risky missions... He sighed, and Snake could see he wanted to talk about something else.
"Hey, want a smoke?" Snake asked.
"Do you want to light it in here? The place will probably go up!" Otacon exclaimed.
Snake shrugged, "One way or another, we're screwed. I'd rather go out with a bang."
Otacon reluctantly nodded, and took a cigarette. He held his breath when Snake lit them, but nothing exploded. Snake chuckled and took a drag, watching Otacon uncomfortably hold the cigarette.
"Are you going to actually smoke it, or just pose with it?" Snake teased.
Otacon took a deep drag, and burst into a coughing and spluttering fit.
"How can you like these sticks of death?" Otacon asked, a smile on his face.
"Well, if you weren't acting like you were trying to make up for 30 years of non-smoking..." Snake said, grinning, "Take it easy, just small puffs... Damn, haven't you ever smoked a cigarette, Hal?"
"No..." Otacon confessed, "I always thought they were nasty." He took a small drag, and smiled, "But they're really not so bad... When we get out of here this might just become a regular habit..." He looked up to the ceiling of scrap and the smile left his face as he remembered how little their odds of getting out were.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, puffing away until they reached the ends. They both stood up and stamped out the stubs carefully, hoping not to ignite anything flammable in the "cave".
They sat down again, huddled close to one another. Otacon felt safe and warm in Snake's arms, and wished they were back at Philanthropy, or in their own apartment. In bed, yes... close to each other...
Otacon swallowed a lump in his throat, wishing he'd thought about this sooner. It was too late now to be wishing. Besides, he was pretty damn sure Snake liked women. Snake wasn't even aware that Otacon was bisexual, and had never asked. And Otacon hadn't realized before that he had these feelings for his friend...
"Snake?" Otacon asked.
"Yeah?" Snake answered.
"You'll stay with me... until the end, won't you?" Otacon whispered.
"There's not exactly anywhere I can go, and if I found a way out I wouldn't be going alone." Snake smiled, warmed by his friend's affection. There was no use hiding behind a soldier's cold mask; Otacon knew him better than that.
"Don't die on me, will you?" Otacon asked, "Promise me?"
"Hey, I can't promise anything. Chances are in this sneaking suit I'll survive longer anyway... But..." He cut himself short. He'd just been about to say he didn't want to survive without Otacon. It had to be the cold and the thought of impending death making him get all mushy.
"But?" Otacon probed.
Snake pulled out a ration, "You hungry?"
Otacon knew that once Snake decided to change the subject, there was no going back. He took a ration and ate it hungrily, while Snake ate one more slowly. He seemed lost in thought, but Otacon wasn't going to pursue it. Snake's mind was his alone, and if he didn't want to share his thoughts, no amount of probing would force him to talk about it. He finished the ration and curled up close to Snake, who absentmindedly began to rub him again. He finished his ration and tossed the packet aside, then set to work on warming Otacon up. He rubbed heat back into his hands, then his face, then his back, giving him a slap on the ass as he reached it, which made Otacon jump.
"Hey, you're getting some meat on you under all those baggy clothes," Snake grinned, and Otacon blushed. Snake continued, and rubbed the back of his thighs. Otacon bit his lip to suppress a gasp; despite the cold, he was enjoying this in ways he wished he didn't. Snake finally got down to the feet and rubbed some warmth into his numb toes. Otacon giggled again as Snake tickled his feet.
Snake lay back, job finished, "Now it's my turn," he said, and Otacon gulped. That sneaking suit accentuated every contour of Snake's body, and he was aware that he was seeing it in a new light, a light that he had long pushed from his thoughts, buried under piles of paperwork and computer science for Philanthropy.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" Snake said, "Are you going to let me freeze to death?"
Otacon moved forward and began to frantically rub Snake, willing him to keep warm, knowing he didn't want to lose him. Concentrating on this, he pushed all other thoughts from his mind. He rubbed and rubbed, feeling Snake below him, and then those subconscious wishes began to surface...
The flashlight flickered and died.
"Snake!" Otacon held him tightly, like a child afraid of the dark.
"The battery's ran out.," Snake explained, as if an explanation were needed.
But to Otacon, it was as if all hope had been extinguished with the light. Snake heard him begin to sob and pulled him close protectively. Perhaps this really was their final mission.
"Pull yourself together, Otacon!" he said, "If you don't, we have no chance of getting out of here. Don't expend energy by crying..." He rubbed Otacon's shoulders and back to let him know he was there.
"I... I'm scared, Snake. I want to be back in our apartment, I want us to be planning some mission, and you bring me coffee, and... and... anything, anything but this!" Otacon said hysterically.
Snake knew he had to calm him down, before he tried something desperate. In the darkness, they had no chance of getting out, unless someone came here with the ability to move tons of trash. He felt his own fears rise, and the grim knowledge that they wouldn't make it descended in his gut. He accepted it, knowing that his luck had finally run out. He thanked fate for letting him survive this long, all the time cursing it for letting Otacon be buried with him. Otacon had so much to live for, so much to do, and so much to offer the world. He didn't deserve to die here. He'd never killed, never taken anything from anyone. He found himself cursing the world's unfairness.
Otacon sniveled in his arms, and he felt Otacon's face in the darkness, wiping his tears away. Death was perhaps hours away, and he wanted to die with no regrets. He drew his calloused fingers down Otacon's face until he located his mouth, and put a finger over his lips, silencing him. Bringing his head down to where his finger was, he let his lips meet Otacon's, gently brushing them and then kissing him, wildly and passionately with all of the life he had left. It took him a second to realize that Otacon was returning the kiss, and he wrapped his arms around Otacon, losing himself in that moment.
He knew it wasn't the cold. A fire burned within him, a fire he had only heard tales of. Love wasn't for him, a man who had killed so many, or so he had thought. Until he had faced death itself, he hadn't realized just how much the gentle scientist meant to him.
They parted the kiss for air, and then kissed again. Snake felt Otacon's tears renew themselves and tumble down his face, and he broke the kiss to wipe them away with his lips.
"Snake..." was the only word Otacon could manage.
Snake kissed him again, and again. They were soon lying on the floor in each other's arms, fighting back the cold with the warmth of their love. Otacon dared to touch Snake in places he could only have dreamed of earlier, and was amazed to find Snake and himself growing hard, despite the freezing cold. They threw caution to the winds and kissed wildly, rolling around in the darkness, not caring if they hit a wall and brought the whole lot tumbling down upon them.
"How long... have you felt like this?" Otacon asked, as they lie in each other's arms.
"Longer than I realized. I wish I'd sat down and thought about it sooner." Snake replied honestly.
"Same here," Otacon thought, "Now... we hardly have much time left. I'm so... tired, Snake..."
"Don't give up," Snake said, rubbing Otacon again to bring warmth back to him, "Here, have this," he added, pulling out the ration and struggling to open it in the dark. He crudely split it open and slipped it into Otacon's hands.
Otacon split it in half and gave half to Snake, "You too," he said, and Snake ate the ration as a kind of strange promise between them that they wouldn't give up.
Soon, they were too cold to even contemplate their desires, only the warmth of their love.
"I wish... we'd had more time," Snake said, his teeth chattering even though he tried desperately to make them stop, "There's so much I would have liked to have done..."
"Me too..." Otacon said, "This is... it, isn't it?"
"Seems like it." Snake replied. The coldness was invading his brain, beginning to interfere with his thought processes. He soon realized he couldn't move, even if he wanted to, but realized it was okay... Otacon was in his arms, where he wanted him to be.
"We won, though, we defeated the Metal Gear..." Otacon said.
"Yeah," Snake said, "We did."
Over the next hour the coldness took over every part of them. There were moments of knowledge, moments of insanity, but most of all, moments of nothingness. Finally, Otacon broke the silence.
"...Snake?" Otacon asked, finding it hard to speak. Frost covered his hair, and everything was so numb, so distant... He really had to concentrate to shape a thought.
"...Yeah?" Snake replied.
"What did... you mean to say... earlier...?" He wondered if Snake would remember, he could barely remember himself, but...
"Ah... yeah... just thought then... that I didn't want to... survive without you..." Snake murmured.
Otacon began to hum a tune slowly as his brain shut down... "Love... you..." he managed, "tired... now."
Snake didn't respond; his mind was off somewhere far away, damaged by the hypothermia. Otacon closed his eyes, and drifted away into an endless sleep. A short while later, Snake followed, and together they left a world of fighting and warfare, of nuclear weapons and unnecessary death behind. Perhaps somewhere, they would find peace together...