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Snake never liked holding hands.
It was always challenging to get him to be romantic, unprompted, in the first place. He almost never made the first move, and when he did, it was never something as personal as holding Hal’s hand. At first, back when they were still bunking in Snake’s cabin, when Hal had gone to entwine their hands and Snake had pulled away in what appeared to be discomfort, Hal was genuinely worried that he’d come on too strong. Holding hands was comforting, at least to Hal, and he had wanted his partner to feel the same way. That was back when a simple miscommunication could leave the vague, still forming couple at loss of words for days, both unsure what to make of the new development. Hal knew better, now, that Snake - David - just didn't like that sort of thing. It was disappointing at first, but of course, Hal would have never sacrificed David’s comfort for what he wanted - especially after what David had sacrificed for him. And for everyone.
Sometimes, in the early morning hours when Hal was sure Snake was asleep, he’d catch the soldier’s glossy eyes flickering, their whites reflecting the light of the engineer’s laptop screen, and their blue-gray irises buried in the deep texture of his own, worn hands. They faced palms up, as if he was reading some invisible book - an autobiography. Hal guessed Dave never liked what he saw - and really, it’s not like he had to; with those parted lips, and that almost pained expression Dave would make during those moments of reflection, Hal was certain.
Perhaps David could only see his fingers wound around the trigger of a gun, across a neck, bloodied and dirtied. They were a part of himself he would never detach from his “job” - like his faded bandanna, but permanent. Like him, they were tools of destruction - of an icon - of Solid Snake. Not David.
But he wasn't always Snake. He was David.
David would creep out, slowly but surely, sitting by the warm fireplace in the cool cabin, wrapping an arm around Hal’s back, trying to blow off the gesture as, “just keeping him warm.” He’d make an appearance when Hal would somehow convince him into watching some Japanese romcom cartoon - and he’d actually end up liking it. He’d come about in cramped hotel rooms on the run, a wanted criminal, sharing a bed with Hal out of necessity, but almost completely sure he’d rather sleep beside his partner than alone, given the opportunity. He was gentler - he laughed wholeheartedly at Hal’s jokes, he smiled when the scientist would lean his head against his chest to rest his eyes away from the pale monitor they were always lost in, he took the edge off of things. He would press his lips against Hal’s forehead, mumbling something about how cold Hal’s hands always were, before wrapping both arms around his partner’s waist, blanketed up to their necks in solemn but homely darkness.
Solid Snake did not hold hands - he held rifles and grenades. David was different.
Hal had learned that. He’d learned to deal with never knowing, truly, if his partner would be more receptive to him or not. They had a job to do, after all; a damn complicated, time consuming one, at that. Anything that took time away from their task, besides eating, sleeping, and moving locations was considered frivolous. When David was Snake, things streamlined - information was gathered - missions were completed. During breaks, if time allowed any at all, was when David would come about, caressing and embracing and pressing-his-forehead-against-Hal’s-with-such-a-smitten-look-before-pulling-him-into-a-kiss. Hal feared falling in love with him - with Snake - before, but there was no way he could have prevented his fall when David came about.
Everything changed after Big Shell.
Snake never quite looked at himself the same way after his “death”, but neither did Hal, so they jointly decided to not talk about the two week gap in Snake’s memory that filled itself with pneumonia and full body bruises. David wasn't around during that time - things were muddled and murky, like oil floating atop a night sea. Events hit like waves. Raiden. Ocelot. Pliskin. The Patriots. Emma.
Emma.
Water in their ears and in their eyes made their hearts swell, attempting to keep afloat, but the waves kept crashing into them - uncontrollable, unavoidable, and headed to places unknown. It was Shadow Moses all over again - literally, Hal realized with a gut wrenching choke, one evening - but this time, the situational scientist was not saved. The waves of destruction had chosen her, swallowing everything into opaque, dark waters. Hal “died” with her. His home had been destroyed once again by those inescapable tides, sweeping back to allow him to rebuild himself only to come crashing in again, demolishing everything. What was the point of continuing if this were to keep happening, he thought. Nothing was going to change but the factors - the X’s - but it functioned the same. First his father, then his creation, his partner, then his sister.
Finding Olga’s kid was the last thing Hal had found the strength to do - it was for Snake, or what was left of him, so he willed himself through the process. A final mission before a quiet retreat. He decided it was too much. It was better to go out when things were relatively “okay” before things became too awful, again. When Snake arrived with the wailing infant, Hal had planned to give it to someone they could trust before he ended everything. One more night, he repeated. It was surprisingly calming to know it was coming.
The baby slept in his room, that evening before the end. Since she had arrived, she’d not stopped crying. Hal lay in his empty bed, as sleeping even in the same room with Snake was beyond awkward at this point, staring pointedly awake at the patterns in the ceiling. Neither Snake nor him knew what to do with the baby, as neither had ever had experienced infant care during their childhoods, so she currently laid in a sort of nest made out of old sweatshirts and a throw pillow found under the hotel’s couch at the foot of Hal’s bed. Hal felt nothing. Tears didn’t come anymore. The girl cried out for her lost mother.
2am rolled around. The girl had not yet sobbed herself to sleep; Hal just needed sleep. By his altruistic nature, he pulled the baby up from the floor into and into his lap, disinterested in her anguished expression, as if trying to turn off an unfamiliar alarm clock. Actually observing her up close, she was so tiny, little curls of silvery hair stuck slick to her forehead. Hal vaguely remembered it had been raining outside when Snake had come in. Absentmindedly, he brushed the girl’s forehead and face dry with a nearby tissue - if anything, Hal didn’t want to break Snake’s promise and have the kid get sick and die from a cold, or something, after everything she’d been through. Even if he was to part tomorrow, Hal decided, he might as well keep someone alive while he still could.
The baby finally stopped crying once dried off, still donning a distressed, fussy manor. It was enough for Hal to sleep, at least, but every time he attempted to put her back down, she’d kick up a fresh set up wails. She wasn’t cold, Hal reasoned, as she was wrapped tightly in the wool blanket she arrived in. She hadn’t soiled herself - God, does Snake even know how to change a diaper? - nor had she looked sick outwardly - Does Snake know how to take a temperature? - so Hal was at loss. Maybe she was just scared.
He held her closer to himself, wrapping his frame around the vulnerable, whining bundle, until she appeared content - it appeared to do the trick. Her eyes eventually shut and her breathing slowed, so still compared to her earlier actions that she looked doll like. Hal didn’t dare to move like he did last time. Sleep pulled at the edges of his vision, quickly blurring the world around him and taking him under, the baby in his arms, sitting upright in his bed. He didn’t wake until the sunlight filtered in through the vertical blinds the next morning.
The clouds parted before Hal, illuminating the sea below, watching the baby slowly rouse herself in his arms the that morning. She squirmed an arm free of it’s previous place within her blanket, in a surprisingly happy manner for a baby waking herself up, fingers flexing and grabbing at Hal’s jaw. The waves stopped. Reflexively, the scientist smiled at the gesture - the girl reflected back a toothless grin, along with a giddy squeak of excitement. She had the world ahead of her, Hal thought, the soft brush of pink finger tips against his scruff. It would be hard, considering her beginnings, but someone would step up to love her and raise her - something Hal barely got any of himself. Her silvery, tiny, gem-like eyes caught Hal’s a moment too long for just a glance. Hal was suddenly aware he had tears rolling down his face.
Something was changing. Perhaps the waves would continue another time, or maybe they’d grow weaker with progress. In that moment, Hal was only focused on the absolute glow radiating from the baby girl he so preciously held. It came like a warm ocean breeze when he’d realized what was going on; like his fall for David.
The ocean may become tumultuous, knocking over everything in it’s path. It may throw the strongest of steal boats against the rocks, shattering them to scraps. But the ocean, he realized, was not the only endless cycle out there - there was more than swirling destruction. There were new, reflective beginnings. There were tiny, shimmering glimpses along the horizon. Just as the ocean remained hueless and unchanging, the sky above would always turn it’s yellows, reds, and oranges. The Sun, sure as day, would always shine.
Hal decided he wouldn't kill himself that day.
Things changed, again. They were better, but equally as hard. Hal and Snake both learned how to change a diaper, learned how to take the baby’s temperature, and learned how to bottle feed a crying infant at 3am in a motel lobby, trying to get the faulty microwave to warm up her formula just right. Snake vehemently refused at first, and Hal understood - their lifestyle, if you could call it that, had no room for a baby, much less a toddler, much less an eventual child. After some painful discussions about the possibility of the Patriots finding her again, and the importance of Snake’s promise, he agreed. Deep down, Hal knew there was a part of his partner that was scared more than anything about raising her. Both never wanted families. Then again, they weren't a family, of course, just two wanted terrorists raising an orphaned child to honor her mother giving up her life for a super solider. Keeping down a kid while continuing the world wide monitoring for Metal Gear activity wouldn't be so hard, would it? If single parents could do it, Hal decided, they could, too.
Snake named her over breakfast a week after deciding to keep her. “Sunny,” He mumbled, Hal thought facetiously at first, as he dunked a piece of his toast into the eggs from that hotel’s continental breakfast. Hal had been refusing Snake’s previous proposals - among them names like Lily and Mary and Holly. Although she wasn't their child, Hal only saw it fit that she receive some kind of meaningful name. Not like none of the previous suggestions weren't meaningful, just something... different. However, after hearing Snake muse to himself that option, Hal was soon filled with content. It took him a bit to voice his humble agreement, to which Snake cocked a brow, “I was joking, you know. Who names their kid Sunny?” Hal shrugged, eyeing the peacefully sleeping bundle from her spot across the room.
“Well,” He began, “we could.”
Snake looked up from his plate, something so palpable in his expression that Hal could almost make out what - rather, who - it was.
David.
Technology changed and war changed. Before long the trio lived skyward aboard the Nomad. It beat having to move every few weeks, or even days. Sunny, like her name suggested, would live among those clouds. The two watched the tiny, curious little baby turn into an equally as curious, slightly bigger toddler. The first time she used the computer, sitting propped against Hal’s lap, she learned how to click at less than a year old. Her first word was, “dada,” something that sprung Hal and Dave to have a very serious but equally as embarrassing conversation about who the “Dad” would be - in the end, they both decided they’d be uncles.
The little rascal started walking, her first steps in the sky.
Hal remembered sitting at his desk, typing away, David just to the side of him, sitting against the cool metal floor of the Nomad with Sunny bouncing excitedly in his lap. Hal felt a tug on his pant leg, first assuming it was Sunny, but turning to realize it was Snake in an attempt to be as silent as possible. The whites of his eyes were visible, mouth slightly agape, pointing with his free hand to just a few feet away. Hal turned to see that Sunny, in all her glory, was standing upright, taking tentative steps towards the wall of the ship - her first. It was his turn to look shocked - it’s not like he should have been, most babies learned how to walk around this time, anyways - but actually seeing the girl do so was an entirely different experience. His heart swelled with pride; a similar feeling, he recounted ironically, to watching Rex move for the first time.
Just as Sunny had almost made it a good three feet to the wall, it looked as if she’d fall over soon, her first record coming to a tumbling end. Dave reacted faster than Hal could ever imagine, bolting over like a flash to the wobbling toddler, catching her hand in his before she could succumb to gravity’s force. She was safe. Both sighed in tandem, relieved she’d been prevented from hitting the metal floor - mental note, he thought, no more play time in the non-carpeted areas.
Solid Snake didn't like holding hands, but he wasn't always Snake. He was David. He was Uncle Snake. He was the official boo-boo kisser. He was the hide and seek master, the here-comes-the-train conductor, and at the end of the day, should the stars align just right, Hal’s partner. He was a love maker - he kissed, he held, he touched and he entwined his fingers with Hal’s when it got too close. He was a fighter. Maybe he was a hero, but that didn't matter.
In one hand Hal could hold the Sun, and the in other, his world.
Finally, he was home.