5A/N: This is my final chapter, concluding this miniseries. Here is Miller facing his fate at last.
Miller returned to his house in town during the morning. He took Ocelot's advise at heart, sleeping most of the morning and then after a brief breakfast, visit to friends, began shopping for an old typewriter, ink, ribbons and paper. He started writing as the blizzard began, writing a few initial drafts by hand on yellow paper before organizing his thoughts. Everything he knew, everything he had been told, everything he remembered, he put into writing. Organizing the drafts and giving titles can wait. It was all the more amazing that he did everything with just one hand, a skill acquired from performing Diamond Dogs' paperwork. He was pouring his soul into this, typing, correcting, crumpling, until he reached the desired edit.
He put on Bob Dylan's Knockin' on Heaven's Door.
My name is Kazuhira Miller, former Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force, right-hand to Big Boss, co-founder of one of the world's first private military contractors... He introduced himself that way as he began with his life's story, his military career, his meeting with Big Boss, how he envisioned his concept of privatized warfare. How he had stopped the end of the world twice - and helped handing it to the Patriots in a silver platter.
I lost my leg and arm in the Caribbean in 1975. That's only the icing in the cake I have and ate too called my loss and by God how large it was. Only by confessing would I fully explain what I have lost... The memories of the burned brightly in his mind, alive and vivid, all his his hopes, his fears, his experience, his sins where brought to the fore as he typed away for a good portion of the afternoon. He never felt so revitalized, so driven. His thoughts seem to put his hands on autopilot.
At the time me and Big Boss were like of mind and what we did in Central America was nothing less of extraordinary... It was the best time of my life before everything went to hell. Old wounds resurfaced, singeing him with pain that was forgotten. Paz... Chico... Venom... The act of recalling at times put a crippling inhibition on him, helped only by alcohol to calm his nerves and rein in the demons emerging from his memories.
Then came that day they brought down Mother Base. The comrades we lost as the raging sea took them... He sometimes stopped to reorder his mind as each memento was played his head, wiping a tear or drawing breath occasionally. And force himself to go on. He can't to afford to cry right now. There was plenty of time for that when he finished giving himself and his lost comrades their voice.
At being bedridden I thought I lost everything... Then that phone call that lead me to him... Thinking back to his own intrigues disgust him now, as it was his consorting with Zero that brought Skull Face to their doorstep. Recovering from the hospital left him a wreck, and it was only the beginning for his journey through hell.
I met him but I did not know who he really is at the time... Venom... After Afghanistan he and Venom pursued their dream and went after Skull Face before he can unleash his plague in the world. They were obsessed, compelled by their pain and vengeance to bring him down. What a time it was, nothing ever so terrible yet the best time of my life.
Then I learned the truth. That he wasn't the man I thought I served - yet he was greater than him, the legend himself. His arms trembled as how he recalled the truth with bitter clarity. He was abandoned, Venom used. There was no greater betrayal than this.
I vowed vengeance against him. I left Diamond Dogs so I can train another man, one of the Sons... A good man. He recalled how training Solid Snake helped him coped with the wounds inflamed at Big Boss's presence during his tenure with FOXHOUND. Yet it could not make up for having condemned Venom to die in Africa.
The time came. His reckoning has come. I brought Big Boss's vision crashing down on him... Yet he remembered who paid the price for his vengeance. David. He tries to find peace in the wilderness like himself.
Then a ghost from the past came forth. Telling me that something else was brewing... And my part in it. He won't on to detail his encounter with Ocelot and what he revealed to him. The terrifying implications of his information was analyzed at length as well as he could manage.
By nightfall he had over four hundred pages worth of drafts ready. Not bad for a day's work. It still needed some fine-tuning but he can keep the drafts as proof of writing. He concluded, I've made into the 21st century. Big Boss is an ice cube and had yet to see the world today. As for me I've seen the state of the world and how it remains aflame, the culmination of a titanic struggle in the shadows between Big Boss and Zero - and my part in it. I made everything today possible, made it an even worse place than when I joined up with him back in the 70's. I leave to you who read this to judge my actions and it makes of me. I do not ask for forgiveness from you, I only want you to understand, my sins and their consequences, and that hopefully there is time to undo what I did, stop this from reaching its final phase. To any who want to take action against, I pray you make the right choices, the right decisions, and not become the monsters we made ourselves to be and spawn more. The break the cycle of hate and retaliation, create a lasting peace. Call me corny and call me naive but I know that state sublimity can never be achieved, yet it never hurts to try to at least, put down the gun forever. This is my confession of what I have lost and destroyed. It will be my warning so the folly we created will never be repeated. It will be my legacy so you can understand my part in it.
He folded them and put them away as he prepared a tape recording for his verbal confession.
Turn out vocal narration was harder than print. They were two different things entirely as confessions "on the record" required him to be more intimate with his memories, bare his soul, relive the pain, joy, sins, regrets in no way typing a manuscript can ever muster. Running the gauntlet through memory lane made the memories sharper, clearer, more bitter and every fiber of his being singe with remembrance, the touch of his finger tips of items and people years past, the smells sea salt, gasoline, curry, sweat, and desert, his ears echoing words uttered by everyone around him. His eyes went heavy and the tears roll down slowly. He wiped them and continued on, feeling the weight he carried around all these years digging into his soul.
"And now I made it the 21st century, the dawn of a new age that I helped shaped," he began to wind down his confession. "What I time it was and what excellent warrior I made of Snake. I hope this makes it to you, Snake. I really do. Only then can I rest." He stopped recording and turned off the magnetic recorder.
He began organizing his drafts to Taiji no Yume by Sai Yoshiko. This began a medley of Japanese songs as he made copies of the drafts which he intends to distribute as well letters that come with them, stating they are to be distributed in the event of his death. He placed his magnetic tape recording in his hidden safe while gathering ammo for his .45.
He sat at down to relax and reminisce, strong coffee in hand, gun lap and his faithful husky by his side, ready for anything. He dozed off a bit, then he woke and went to the surveillance set in tucked in a hidden space in his room. He knew he faced death the moment Ocelot strode in but he needed to carry on just a bit more, long enough to complete his mission of sending his confession throughout the world, his own lasting legacy. His vigil, he hoped, last him enough to see tomorrow's dawn. He watched through monitors presenting him the feeds from his CCTV cameras and motion sensors in and out of the house. No way anybody's gonna try to take him out easily. They're gonna have to work for it.
The doors were locked and secured and any attempt to force entry will immediately alert him, giving him time and his dog to escape or at least hold out till the authorities arrive. However, he knew that anything tied with the authorities is bound to involved the Patriots, who'll try to confiscate his damning drafts and tape recording. Fortunately, the sheriff of the town was someone he knew and trust so he'll make sure that the drafts were the first things he recovered from his house in the aftermath of a shootout.
His vigil was tense, lonely, and downright boring. He had to avert his eyes once in a while from the monitors or burns his concentration away looking for something that wasn't there and overlooking what was there.
Coffee and lively music was what kept him awake. The clock struck 4 in the morning and 4:00 AM began playing.
His microphones picked up some strange audio downstairs. His cameras were set to automatically turn to the source of the noise. It was coming from the kitchen. He switched to infrared to see who was hiding behind-
"Damn!" It went offline, revealing only static but the audio was unmistakably that of hard impact on the lens. That can only mean a gun!
His monitors flashed away and loud bangs were heard, obviously coming from stun grenades. Miller immediately activated the security lock on his door, reinforcing it further from forced entry. Pressure plates hidden under the floor boards leading to his room would alert him to foot movement going for his direction. Johnny barked loudly in reaction to the noise. Miller flicked off the safety. He tried to phone the sheriff's department but the line was off. Smart, he thought in bitter admiration of the enemy attacking him from within. How did he get past outside security?
The clock struck 4 in the morning and 4:00 AM began playing.
A loud bang occurred from the basement and his house was plunged into darkness briefly when emergency lights went on. Some went after the fusebox. No matter, his surveillance system had its own emergency power and it fed the cameras, microphones, and motion sensors. But for some reason, his entertainment system was still playing 4:00 AM.
Johnny growled at the direction of the closet. He spun around in his swivel chair and-
The world exploded before him before a brilliant, sparkly white flash and high-pitched buzzing assailed his ears. He felt a hot, searing pain on his shoulders when he tumbled on his side on the floor. He gripped his shoulder tightly with his good hand and when his eyes readjusted to back to ambient light and his hearing returned, he noticed he was shot but more chillingly was a furry form lying on his side trailing red.
"JOHNNY!" Miller screamed as he crept to the Husky and pulled him close in a desperate embrace. His dog was still alive, whining heartrendingly as he felt for the hole and tried to stop the bleeding. "Johnny, just hold on, I'll get you outta here boy."
He did not noticed the now wide-open closet door to see his assailant step out. "How touching it is that you cared for your dog."
That voice. There's mistaking it. "Eli!"
"Don't you dare called me that!" The voice switched from haughty mockery of his consoling of Johnny to red-hot anger instantly. He strode forward. "I hate it."
"So what do I call you now? Liquid Snake, I presume?" he asked bitterly through his teeth.
"So Ocelot did tell you," He hovered above the Hell Master condescendingly. "It seems the Russian spy has a soft spot for you."
"Did he sent you so you can finish the job?" He cursed himself for letting Ocelot sucker him into this. He should have known that he used his confession to lure him into a false sense of security before disposing of him.
"No, Miller," he replied coolly. "I'm here on my own accord. You know you should have secured the crawlspace behind your closet. I've managed to make my way in there."
"And what brings you here?" he asked defiantly, he held on Johnny tighter, desperate for him to hold on longer despite his life ebbing away from his arms.
"I haven't forgotten about you, Miller." He knelt down with his SOCOM still aimed at him. "You think you can just live happily ever after, forgetting 1984?"
"Still bearing a grudge, huh, Eli-"
It earned him a pistol whip to the cheek. "Enough with 'Eli.'"
Miller spat out blood on the floor. "Just finish the damned job."
"Why are you in a hurry, Miller? You think I'll just waste you after you stole from me?"
"Stole from you?" He was puzzled.
"Zanzibarland. You and your disciple wasting Big Boss robbed me of the honor of having to put him away. You robbed me of the opportunity to pit myself against him, surpass in him single combat and take his title as the greatest soldier who ever lived."
"He told me you needed him to cure a little of your DNA problems. You must want his dead ass so badly."
Liquid smirked. "What good is there from beating a hunk of meat? Yes, I need his DNA but I crave a challenge even more." The smirk grew wider. "That lesser sprog of his, Solid Snake, will have to do."
The mention of Snake got Miller looking up to him. "Snake... He's been through enough. Put him out of this."
"Not according to the Pentagon, Ocelot tells me," he mused. "Sooner or later they'll drag him of whatever hole his dug himself into and get him back to action."
"Those bastards..." he said, seething.
"Well, it's obvious considering that he defeated Father twice in the most extreme circumstances, he's more than qualified to handle us or so he thinks."
"But don't you think about how much hell he's been through doing so?" he retorted in outrage on how he could view Snake as a challenge, not the shell he had become.
"It's a pity, really. He, made of entirely of the Soldier Genes, rejects his heritage, telling himself he can return to civilian life. He should have embraced the warrior inside him, take up the sword; there's no place in civilian life for him. He's created to be the perfect soldier, not like me, the expendable scrapping of a substitute."
"He's not just a fighting machine," he shot back, "he's a man. A broken man, to be sure but one who deserves a chance at peace."
"So you tell yourself."
The dog let out a long low moan. NO! his mind screamed. Johnny!
Liquid finished off the dog with one shot to the head.
"JOHNNY!" Miller screamed. His hand was filled with blood.
"The dog's dying anyway, you can't focus when you have your hands full on dying animal meat."
"Bastard!" Miller lunged forward, almost grabbing Liquid, he shot backward and kicked Miller back to the floor.
"My point exactly," he said while Kaz writhed on the floor. "Just like back in 1984, when you share with Father a soft spot for animals. He would fulton those species of interest back in Seychelles."
"He had a heart, he gave you a chance, which you threw back at him." He was close to tears as his beloved pet lay with him.
Liquid's eyes shot up in anger. He spat out, "You think I like charity? That I should be grateful he held out his hand for me to grab on, so he can have a chance to make up for what he did to me?"
"You think this is about your shitty abandonment and authority issues? You don't know the whole truth!"
"Ah, but there's two truths I learned in the Congo: you don't wait for something, you take it; what you can't take, you earn. The boys I lead where scared, confused, and without a clue how to survive out on their own after escaping that hellish compound. In order to get their acknowledgement as leader, I showed them how live off the land, how to stake out a settlement, how to patrol a perimeter, how to work as a team. They would have died otherwise or worse. Much of life since then was based on seizing opportunities and earning others. That's how you survive.
"You get the Metal Gear and if Washington acquiesces, the money and Big Boss's corpse, and you're still dead set in drawing Solid Snake to your little fistfight?"
"To truly surpass my father I need to be the man who defeated him twice. There can only be one Snake, Miller, and by winning I will revive my father's dream, my birthright: Outer Heaven."
"Outer Heaven...? That's just a pipe dream now. What Big Boss wants would plunge the world into chaos."
"Like your mercenary business hasn't," he quipped sarcastically. "No, Miller, the world has gone soft and will want to remain that way. Only by reviving Outer Heaven will the world find its legs. War will make men strong again, by fighting he truly expresses himself. A man who fights does not whine about the inconveniences or state of the world. In war he becomes part of the natural order in its purest form."
Madness indeed! All he could think of was Paz and how much he should've listened while he had the chance, however fake a facade she put up. "Don't be so cocky there, boy." It earned from Liquid a glare that expressed his distaste for this affront. "Snake will eat your ass again. If he can take on Big Boss twice, he most certainly can do away with you."
"We'll see about that," he answered. He checked his watch. "You know, besides to tie up loose ends, I thought killing you would make it work my way. You're one of the few people Snake trusts."
What Miller had in mind hit him hard. "No..."
"Yes." He smirked. "He may have been the one man who defeated the legendary soldier twice but is he truly the sharpest tool in the shed? If he's a bit of a dullard if he's file is correct I may make use of him."
"Snake will find out! He'll see through your bullshit. He won't be somebody's pawn, certainly not yours."
"That remains to be seen as well." He checked his watch. "It's been lovely chatting but I have an revolt to plan, a CEO to interrogate, and a weapon to fine tune."
"And oh, before you leave," Miller said. "I have something in my safe. You're gonna love it. My confessions to say the least."
"Oh, dear Miller," he said condescendingly. "I'm not interest in the drafts of your memoirs. I supposed I should end this house call."
You're not sharp yourself, he thought about Liquid throwing away an opportunity to expand his perspective. You haven't really learned at all since '84. He smiled. "I win, Ocelot." The ending solo of 4:00 AM began to herald the inevitable.
So the life of Kazuhira Miller ended with a suppressed shot from a SOCOM pistol at 5:00 AM. No one noticed the figure emerging from the backdoor, wearing sunglasses, taking a walk to the woods to get to a hidden snowmobile, which he took to a cove with a waiting seaplane. It would take him back to Shadow Moses island, weather conditions permitting, flying low in the water to avoid radar until he arrives.
A/N: Enjoy the fic, don't forget a review. The best (MGS1) is yet to come.
