Chapter Text
The first day of retirement came to David unannounced. It was not formal, it was no military fanfare. It came in the form of a regular Sunday morning.
The very word “retirement” had always brought a strange feeling to those in David’s line of work: it was something you wished you could long for, but accepted to be unattainable at some point.
David had participated in an official send-off only once in his life, during his Foxhound service: on that day, all soldiers, instructors and officials had been gathered to bid farewell to their Weapons & Firearms instructor, a former Army ballistic expert. They all stood in line, while the greyed official gazed upon them with gratitude in his eyes.
“Retirement comes to those who survive.” Had been the succinct comment the disgraced Foxhound CO had for the troops that day, while vigorously shaking the hand of the now former subordinate. David remembered to this day the silence that had fallen among the recruits at those words. On an occasion like that, the only thought that occupied the minds of the witnesses was: who would live to retire next? He had looked at Frank standing in front of all of them: Foxhound’s very own pride, whose internal turmoils never once betrayed the stern exterior. He appeared too infallible to retire, so much that David himself would often forget about the man behind the legendary Gray Fox, or about picture of the ice skating princess he kept in his locker, away from the malicious eyes of men. He had then turned to his survival instructor next, standing on the side: somber, distant, present but not involved; unreadable behind his ever-worn shades. If he had scowled him for getting distracted during the ceremony, David could not see nor remember.
In the end, neither of those men survived to see the life beyond.
The first day of David’s retirement started calmly at 9 am, the latest David had ever slept in since he could remember and it started with muffled clanking coming from downstairs.
Oh yes, they had a “downstairs” now. They, who were used to “barely room for one”.
He slowly made his way down the stairs, while his vision adapted to the unusual October sunlight and the wave of sadness he woke up with slowly washed away.
“These days even coffee machines run softwares can you believe it?” A frustrated sigh left his partner, who was trying to get their new, hi-tech coffee machine to work (came with the house, government provided and with many thanks for their service).
“The nerd I know would be having it launch short-range missiles by noon.”
David received a sharp look through thick corrective lenses. “I could…if I wanted! But now I really just want my coffee.” The man turned back to the machine. “Goodmorning by the way!” His voice softer.
“Morning.” David replied in a murmur after approaching the man to leave a kiss on his cheek.
A beep came from the machine and suddenly the sound of coffee beans being ground filled the air.
“Victory!” Hal celebrated with a clap of his hands, while David reached up to the cabinet to grab mugs.
“Congratulations on being the second-best engineer in this house!”. David turned to catch a very active Sunny entering the room with heavy stomps.
“Are those my rain-boots?” Asked Hal, voice just so slightly tinged with reprimand.
The pre-teen looked down to her feet, then back at the two men with a mischevious smile “Needed something isolating, I’m working on MK.II! It needed some…refreshing!”
“Ouch.” David turned to Hal, who just shook his head, but couldn’t contain a fond smile. “Well this guy here just successfully turned on the coffee machine!”
“As I said, second-best engineer!” Retorted Sunny. The girl got out of the thick rubber boots and padded her way up to the dining table, which had already been readied with milk and cookies for her.
“And if it will ever start acting crazy, Solid Snake will take care of it!”
“Well I won’t be answering that call. Solid Snake is retired!” He ruffled Sunny’s silver hair and got an annoyed scowl out of her.
“Well, that sounds official.” said Hal, gently bumping his shoulder on him.
“‘Cause it is.”
~
The phone rang at around 3:40 pm. David heard it from the bathroom upstairs where he was fixing a brand new mirror on the wall (way too large for his liking and sense of utility, but they had an almost teen-girl in the house now), and when he didn’t hear footsteps anticipating him to the living room, he went picking up himself.
“Hello?”
“Uh hello?” An uncertain female voice replied.
“Can I help you?”
“Am I talking to David?”
“Who’s asking?”
The person on the other side took a deep breath through the static before speaking “I am Catherine Miller, I’m looking for David…I was given this number and-“
David’s brain went totally blank the moment he heard that name. A million images and memories flashing in fast sequence before his eyes.
“H-hello? Are you still there?”
“Yeah…yeah I’m here.” He squeezed his eyes shut to make the sudden light-headedness ride away “yes, I am David.”
“Oh…hi! I don’t know if you remember me…”
“I do.”
In that moment, he spotted Hal in the corner of his eye coming up from their bedroom - homeoffice if needed - where he had been working most of the morning. He walked past him with a questioning look, ‘who is it?’ he mouthed at him and Dave just raised his palm in return.
“Thank you.” Catherine spoke “and sorry to be contacting you like this, I didn’t know how else to approach you after all this time…I am calling you because…uhm…I don’t really know how else to circle it: the government finally declassified my father’s office and unsealed all his…stuff.”
Catherine paused right there, waiting maybe for David to say something, but she was met with uncharacteristic uncertainty on the man’s side.
“…so yeah uhm…it’s a lot of stuff you know…mostly documents…and you’re the only person from dad’s…work that I know. I wanted to ask you if you would like to come by the office and…I don’t know, sort through some of it and take what you want.”
David processed her words “yeah, I can do that.”His hesitant tone further caught Hal’s attention, who came to stand beside him. “Is the office still at…” dumb fucking question, soldier! He thought to himself, and somehow it sounded in his mind exactly in Master’s voice “…at the headquarters?”
“Yeah, I’ll be there tomorrow. If you…well I’d be glad to see you again. I’m planning on staying for a while anyway.”
Upon hearing Catherine’s voice soften a bit, David realized how frozen in his own thoughts he’d been throughout the conversation and how cold and rude he must have sounded to her. “Catherine, I’m glad you called me…really. I will come and take a look, tomorrow…’s that okay?”
He heard a sigh of relief coming from the other side of the line “Thank you, David. Cannot wait. I’ll leave you now, thank you again!”
“See you.”
And that was it.
“Who is this Catherine who cannot wait to see you?” His nosey partner asked with a slightly biting tone.
“Don’t even!” He passed a hand through his hair trying to relief some tension “it was Catherine. Master Miller’s daughter.”
“Oh.” Hal’s entire countenance changed in a second upon hearing that.
“Yeah.” David flopped onto the couch and his partner followed him, taking the spot next to him “Master Miller’s office has been declassified. She’ll be there tomorrow and asked me if I wanted to join her and see if…” he gestured vaguely with his hands “take a look at his stuff and maybe take something. They’re gonna burn it all anyway. I know how military disclosure really works, none of that will ever be public.”
“Mhmm, nonetheless it was declassified pretty soon, maybe a little too soon? And they let Catherine see it right away?”
David shrugged “I don’t know what to think right now.”
“You really wanna go?”
He turned to Hal and found him looking at him lovingly, already aware of his own doubts on this whole matter, aware of how deep that old rabbit hole reached within.
David shook it off. He nodded “I wanna do it for her, she’s a good kid. And I’d be happy to see her again I think.”
Hal smiled.
David had told his partner many years back about his survival instructor “Hellmaster” Miller. He’d started by recounting the excruciating drills he put him and the other rookies at Foxhound through, the 3 am excursions in a chopper to be dropped in the middle of nowhere with nothing but a torch and a partial map.
He had told him about ZanzibarLand, about how Master pushed him through that whole hell via radio and spoke to him with a rage in his voice he’d never experienced in an otherwise controlled man.
It had sounded like it was personal.
He had told him about the fallout of that mission, how Foxhound was left compromised by its former CO’s ultimate betrayal, completely abandoned and panicked: the high-ranking officials furiously fretted over the impending treason accusations and the other soldiers looked at Snake like they would a ghoul who just crawled up from the underworld: the man who had eliminated both Grey Fox and Big Boss.
In those chaotic hours, Miller had taken him aside and begged him to do one thing: get his daughter Catherine to safety, far away from Foxhound’s, or anyone’s, reach. David was exhausted physically and mentally at the time, betrayed and angry. But before his old instructor and mentor he could only say yes, without questioning why would any retorsion from Big Boss’ surviving cells or allies would target him and his family.
He had just obeyed, like a good soldier always does and soon found himself in a stolen jeep with a rifle, a couple of guns and terrified 14-year-old girl with a lot of questions he couldn’t answer.
The girl was scared but disciplined, maybe too much. She hadn’t asked when she would see her father again, if she would at all. She followed Snake’s instructions as best as she could and after three sleepless days on the run, Snake had been able to drop her off to her mother and ensure they would all be flying away from the country soon.
“Want me to come with you? I don’t wanna leave you alone in this.” Hal’s voice broke through the fog of memories in Dave’s mind, dragging him back to the reality of his living room.
“Sunny’s got school. And you’re not leaving me alone.” Dave patted his partner’s thigh.
“Could ask Miss Molly to keep her for one day.”
“And I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t complain to spend a whole day with the neighbor who makes glazed donuts! But you’re a father now, Hal. Left the military stuff behind.”
“So did you.” Hal leaned in to leave a kiss to David’s cheek “make sure to remember that.”
“I will.”