Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Eva just managed to guide the bike to rest under the fluorescent lights of the gas station overhang before the poor, overworked machine coughed and sputtered to a stop. She patted the thing’s fuel tank with a fond smile like a cowboy stroking his trusty steed’s flank; for riding since early evening without stopping for longer than an hour, it had done pretty well. So had the two newborns strapped tightly to her chest and back– they’d fussed every now and again, but surprisingly hadn’t made their getaway too much of a hassle. They were sleeping soundly now, but who knows how long that would last.

Eva wasted as little time as possible hooking up her motorcycle to some much needed fuel, and as she went inside the gas station’s store she listened above the obnoxiously pleasant jingling bell– it had been long enough, no doubt her former friends had already cooked up some news story about a crazy woman kidnapping two babies and making a mad dash out of there on her motorcycle.

She smirked; the best lies really were just half-truths.

The clerk had fallen asleep at his post, so Eva took her time looking through the aisles of the little rest stop for supplies. She worried her bottom lip with her teeth; there were slim pickings in the way of things she needed for the twins. She’d need to take a detour to a proper town and a proper convenience store. Was she far away enough that she could get away with that?

Was there even such thing as “far away enough” anymore?

Eva nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard the word “motorcycle” from the television; her eyes (carefully hidden behind large, dark sunglasses) whipped to the screen– a wave of morbid relief washed over her; it was just a broadcast on an accident further down the highway.

But despite that, she couldn’t tear her eyes from the screen. The camera lingered on the wreckage and panned so slowly over the mangled bodies of the cyclist and their passenger that she was certain someone was getting off to this. The EMTs struggled to separate machine from man without damaging the corpses even more, and the two bodies were so badly maimed Eva could scarcely imagine they were human.

The bundles on her chest and back suddenly felt like they were holding cinderblocks.

Eva shook the feeling off best she could; she grabbed a couple candy bars to keep her own energy up and tossed a couple twenties on the counter by the sleeping clerk’s head. She didn’t have the time to count out how much would cover her. Her tank was nearly full when she got back to it, and the remaining minute or so Eva spent putting her helmet on and checking to see if the boys were secure. When she was full up, she kicked up the kickstand and–

The baby on her chest started crying.

Eva’s whole body sagged as she let out a loud sigh; every time without fail he’d started crying just when she was about to start the bike. And if she let him go for too long, that just set the other one off, and she’d lose up to an hour getting them to calm down again. This, the news… If someone was trying to give her a signal, they weren’t being particularly subtle. Eva methodically did all the steps in reverse, then took the baby off her chest so she could better rock him– or more accurately sort of jiggle him awkwardly with one arm.

“Come on, Sweetie– We’ve still got a ways to go…” She sighed into his few wisps of white-blonde hair. He didn’t smell like he needed changing, and when she went to feed him he didn’t take to it, so Eva was stuck there jiggling him and muttering frustrated nonsense as she stared into the dark emptiness that was the New Mexico desert. It was all too easy to imagine some semi-truck hitting the three of them head on and turning them all into a red smear in the center of the road. Nobody would find them ’til morning, and that would be the end of the elusive Eva and the two Les Enfants Terribles.

She scowled– she wasn’t used to this, worrying for someone other than herself. But she’d made her bed; she’d taken her children back and burned that bridge. Eva smirked slightly. Her children. What a surreal thought that was. She hadn’t wanted them to be hers, not really. They were supposed to be John’s. But after… she swallowed down the memory. What he’d said still burned.

“Christ,” she whispered turning her eyes back down to the wailing child in her arms, “Why did I think I could do this? I can barely get one kid to stop crying…”

It took her a second to catch it– not what she heard, but what she didn’t hear. Crying. The baby had stopped. She slowly looked down; he was still awake and playing with her hair, but he wasn’t letting out that horrible earsplitting noise, and that was like a revelation to Eva’s tired ears.

She grinned; “Hey… thanks for that…” Eva made a face, “Eli. Who decided to call you that? I mean– David’s okay, but… No. You’re not an Eli.”

Eva pursed her lips in thought, then wondered, “James is a nice name. Do you like that? James?”

The infant boy giggled.

She snickered in turn; “Guess you do.”

She sighed as she carefully took David off her back; “Who knows what they’ll do to us three… But what they had planned for you…” She closed her eyes and saw the white walls of her charm school, the stern faces of the instructors, felt the pain of a task performed less than perfect, “No. Not again.”

Eva took a moment to just stare down at the twins, at David with his dark hair fast asleep while newly rechristened James pawed at his brother, eyes shining inquisitively under the too-bright lights.

She pulled them in close and whispered, “I’m not gonna lie to you– This is gonna be tough for all of us. But I promise I’m not gonna let anything happen to you. Nobody’s gonna hurt you. Not Zero, not Adam… Not even John. We’re in this together now, okay?”

She looked down again and couldn’t hold in a laugh– James had finally gone back to sleep.

Eva shook her head; she said she’d only get off her bike if she fell in love or fell dead. Despite the fact that she felt more alone than ever, here in the one circle of light in a vast dark ocean and running from four people who were well on their way to running the world with two fragile lives in her hands, Eva had never felt more free, more alive than she did right now…

It was time to get a car.

Chapter Text

“Mommy?” David asked, turning from the window to look at the top of Eva’s head in the stationwagon’s rear-view mirror.

“Yes?” Eva answered without a thought. It still amazed her how quickly she got used to being called that. It was so much different than just changing her name or slipping into a new role for a job– after all, she’d never played a part for five years straight.

David swung his legs back and forth as he simply, innocently asked, “Why isn’t Daddy with us?”

It took a lot of Eva’s willpower and self-control not to accidentally floor it. Her grip on the steering wheel tightened and she pursed her lips– she’d told the boys the bare minimum about John: he was their father, he was a soldier, he was alive, and he wasn’t here. She’d considered lying, telling them he was dead, but they would have lived a life defined by lies if she hadn’t taken them. She was supposed to be better than that.

For a time, the bare minimum had been enough. She should have known it wouldn’t have been enough forever. She’d just thought she’d have a few more years, at least. She glanced at James in the rearview mirror; the blond twin was staring out the window still, but she could catch him looking over every now and again, waiting for her to answer.

She took a deep breath in before she replied in a careful, measured voice, “Your father is fighting against the bad people we’re running from. It would be even more dangerous for us to be with him, so we’re on our own.”

It wasn’t a lie. That was the kindest thing she could say about it.

“Is he gonna come live with us when he beats the bad guys?” James asked, finally turning to look at Eva with that light in his eyes he always got when she told them about John. Her throat ached– so young and already enchanted by the idea of his father. Just like everyone else. Why did everyone keep falling for him?

Her hands shook on the steering wheel.

“John please, you have to help me!” 

“Tell me why the Hell I have to help you– you’re just as guilty as Zero!” 

“They’re your sons!” 

“Don’t you dare call those things my sons!”

She couldn’t lie to them. She was better than that. She needed to be better than that.

“Maybe,” she sighed, her voice almost a whisper, “I don’t know just yet.”

James took after her; a part of her would stay enchanted with John until the day she died. The three of them drove on in silence.

“Mommy?” James asked as he kicked his legs back and forth on the edge of the motel bed.

“Yes?” Eva answered, not missing a beat as she touched up her mascara.

James paused for a second, glanced at his brother sleeping beside him, looked down at his little feet in thought, then looked back up and wondered, “Am I your favorite twin?”

Eva immediately closed her compact, brows drawing together in a concerned frown as she turned to him; “What brought this on?” 

James’ mouth drew into a tight line and he shrugged; genetic coincidence allowed him to take after her in many ways, but he didn’t have her gift for lying. She only had to frown just that bit harder to get him to slump his shoulders and give up the act.

“There were some other kids here earlier,” James admitted, “David didn’t wanna talk to them but I did.” That didn’t surpise Eva at all– David was quiet, preferring the company of her and James to anyone else who tried to talk to them. James was too friendly for his own good.

“The one girl talked about how her dad likes her brother more because he’s more like him,” James continued, “I dunno… I thought you might like me more because I’ve got yellow hair like you?”

Eva shook her head, crossing the distance between the two beds to sit next to James; “Well, I’m not like that girl’s dad, James. I love you and David the same.” James deflated a little bit, and Eva couldn’t help sighing.

“Now James, look at me,” she said, doing her best to sound stern but not so much that it’d scare her son, “You love David, right?”

James nodded.

“And you’d feel pretty bad if I loved you less than I love David, right?”

James nodded again.

“So why would you want David to feel bad?”

James looked down at his feet again; “I’unno…” This time, Eva believed him, even though she could guess why. He and David were twins– better yet, they were twins who had barely been apart for their entire lives. She saw everything that was unique about them, even beyond the simple things like hair and eye color. But little James was probably feeling lost, feeling like he wanted something to make him feel special and different than David.

She didn’t know if she could help with that. But she knew one thing– they’d been designed as opposites, to be pitted against each other in experiments and in nature. And she was going to be better than that.

“Listen to me James, this is important,” Eva said, turning to sit crosslegged and face James completely, “You and David are twins. Do you know what that means?”

James looked up at her, brows furrowed; “We’ve gotta share our birthday?”

Eva couldn’t help a snicker; “Well, yeah. But more important than that is that you got something special. Everyone in the world has a special partner, someone who’s there for them through everything. For some people, that’s someone they marry. For others it’s a best friend. You were born with yours– David’s your special partner. You have to stick together and support each other. Promise me you can do that.”

James cocked his head to the side with a little frown; “Yeah I promise… Why do I gotta promise?” 

“Because I promised you I’d always protect you, but…” she tried to push down the lump in her throat that always rose up when she came too close to that possibility, “I might not always be able to. You and David have to keep each other safe and be there for each other if something happens to me.”

James vaulted forward and wrapped his little arms around her as far as they could go; “Nuh-uh! We’ll keep you safe too! Nothing’s gonna happen to you. I promise.”

She smiled through the tears pricking at her eyes and held James tight; “That’s right. We’re family. And family sticks together. So no more talk about playing favorites, okay?” James nodded and she squeezed him tighter.

It wasn’t long before James was fast asleep too. When he was, Eva softly walked back over to her own bed and picked up her discarded compact. She opened it and looked hard at the mirror.

Blonde hair. Green eyes. Same as James.

She frowned; had she been favoring him because he took after her? Because she saw more of herself in him than John? She remembered seeing them put in little tubs like specimens, with labels that read “recessive” and “dominant”, “superior” and “inferior”.

“I’m going to be better,” she whispered. “I have to be better.”

Otherwise all of this would be for nothing.

They had to check out that next morning– they’d been in this town too long and she’d made arrangements to stay in an actual safehouse in the next one over (one of the few that would still let her stay now that she was an enemy of the most powerful people in the country). Eva couldn’t help but smile at the idea; maybe they could stay longer than a couple weeks. Maybe she could finally start homeschooling the boys. Maybe she could use all this extra timeto finally arrange a way out of the country and find them somewhere stable.

Her teachers at charm school always did chastise her for daydreaming. But it gave her something to hope for.

David and James were sluggish in the morning like any five year old boys woken up at seven would be, but managed to help her pack well enough. They were adjusting, and so was she. This wasn’t a mad dash out in the middle of the night, so they had time in the morning to stop at a diner nearby for breakfast. She got bacon and eggs, the boys shared a stack of chocolate chip pancakes. David complained a little bit about having to share again but James just quietly drew in crayon all over his paper napkins. Eva gently reminded David that when he could eat a whole burger by himself without getting too full he wouldn’t have to share with James anymore. David pouted but stopped complaining.

The twins ignored the actual activities on the kids menu and used the crayons to draw whatever they wanted on the napkins. She smirked into her coffee– all this running was teaching them how to be rebels. David drew lots and lots of dogs. James drew himself and David fighting a very simple stick figure with an angry face just labeled “Bad Guy”.

Eva beamed with a kind of pride she couldn’t quite describe as she carefully placed the drawings in the glove compartment with all the rest.

Chapter Text

James frowned down at his brother; “What are you doing?” 

David just kept scowling and shoving things into his suitcase as he answered, “Packing.”

“I know that,” James said with an exaggerated eye-roll, flopping down on the motel bed nearby, “Why? Mom said we’re gonna be here a couple more days.”

“Mom’s not back yet,” David snapped, turning and glaring at James, “She always comes back before midnight. When she’s not back before midnight, she ends up coming in here saying that we’re in trouble and we gotta go now. I’m getting ready.”

James fell backwards with another groan; “Come on Dave, chill out! Maybe she’s just late!”

“She calls when she’s late,” David replied, “She hasn’t called.”

James just stared at the ceiling for a moment, then simply muttered, “Still think you’re being a drama queen.”

“Won’t be thinkin’ that when I’m all packed when we gotta leave and you’re shovin’ stuff in your suitcase,” the dark-haired twin muttered back with a grin. James kept staring at the ceiling, absently kicking his legs, while David rearranged his things so that the suitcase would actually close.

Then, there was a knock on the door.

Both boys’ eyes leapt to the door and didn’t leave it until they heard their mother’s voice, just too loud; “Dave, James! Could you open the door?”

James shot up, sitting ramrod straight as he locked eyes with David. Mom had told them since they were old enough to understand that when she asked them to open the door, it meant one thing. She wasn’t alone. 

James and David scrambled to slide under the motel’s bed, James pulling David under as they heard their mother call, “Come on boys, I lost my key! This isn’t funny!”

That meant she wasn’t just not alone, but there were two people with her. And one of them had a gun.

David and James huddled close together under the bed, James’ eyes squeezed shut and David clutching his brother’s hand tight– they’d since ruled when they turned ten that holding hands was “totally lame”, but they still did it whenever they were scared. It was an unwritten rule.

They could faintly hear a man growl, “Stop playing games, lady. Open the damn door.”

Mom’s voice was at that measured pitch she took whenever one of them was being difficult; “It’s like I said, I lost my key. I don’t know why the boys aren’t–“

The sound of a hammer cocking; “Fuck it. Stand back, I’m shooting the lock.”

David squeezed his eyes shut and gripped James’ hand tighter. He’d ignore James’ whimper– any other time he’d make fun of his brother for crying. Not right now. All he had was sound.

David heard a whack, something clattering to the ground that got drowned out halfway through by a shout of FUCK! and a loud, wet crunch. Something hit the ground with a loud thud, a couple thumps, the sound of a man gasping and choking while Mom grunted from some sort of effort. Then, a long wheeze, and another loud thud. 

A key unlocking the motel door, and Mom saying in a quiet voice, “David? James? It’s over. I promise.”

Before David could pull him back, James peeked out from under the bed. David followed him and let out a sigh of relief– Mom was standing in the doorway, blonde hair mussed and makeup smudged but no one was holding a gun to her head. He could only see the legs of the two men and a gun just barely on the edge of the motel balcony. 

The two crawled all the way out and Mom met them halfway, pulling them into a hug as she murmured, “I’m sorry about this, Boys, but we’re gonna have to leave tonight.”

“Told you so,” David muttered to James across Mom’s shoulders. James just rolled his bloodshot, tear-rimmed eyes.

Mom and James had to pack their things in a hurry, but David was ready. Mom ruffled his hair with a light smile when he told her he’d started packing at eleven when she hadn’t gotten home yet, but her eyes were sad.

It always took David hours to fall asleep in the motel and safe house beds. In the car, falling asleep on James’ shoulder was as natural as breathing, the rhythm of the car on the road and the passing streetlights in the dark better than any bedtime story Mom could ever tell them.

Eva was losing count of the times David had come back with a split lip or black eye, and that was troubling her more than anything else in this chaotic life she’d chosen. James stumbled in behind him looking frazzled, eyes wildly darting around as he tried to explain all at once how he tried to stop David and how the fight started and how David really wasn’t all that hurt just bleeding a little bit okay a lot please don’t freak out Mom. 

Eva just shook her head and brought her Stern Mom Voice up as she said, “David, come with me. James, stay here and try to calm down.” James kept babbling to himself, hands raking through his blond hair, but stayed put. David nodded and followed her to the bathroom with his same slight frown he’d had since he came inside.

She lead him to the safe house’s bathroom, opening up the medicine cabinet to take out their first-aid kit, and set about cleaning up his split lip in silence. David just stared past her, silently and stoically letting her clean, disinfect, and put a bandage on the wound. She frowned– where James let every emotion he felt fly clear as day and just as bright, when David felt things too deeply, he shut down.

Eva sighed, “So, what started it this time?”

It took David a bit to answer, and he did so through clenched teeth; “Some boys who live on the street were talking bad about you.”

Eva tried very hard not to smile, forcing herself to sigh again; “David, I’m an adult. My reputation is my business, and it’s in no danger from the word of some boys.”

David scowled and exclaimed, “You don’t get it! Because you don’t work during the day and disappear at night they were saying– They called you–!” David couldn’t finish, the anger bubbling up again and making him tremble as she tried to steady him with her hands on his shoulders.

“Sweetheart, you can’t go starting fights with everyone who tries to talk trash about us,” Eva said gently, bringing up one hand to smooth down his brown hair, “If you do that, you’ll never stop fighting. All I care about is that you two are safe. That’s all that matters– that we’re all safe.”

David was still shaking, muttering under his breath, “I hate it. I hate hearing it. It makes me feel sick. I hate it.”

She brought him into a hug; “I know you do, baby. I know.” 

Eva stroked David’s hair as he clung to her, shaking slowly going down to a simple shiver. He wasn’t as open, but his heart was just as soft as his brother’s. He cared too much. He was destined to get hurt, and there was nothing she could do about it.

That hurt her the most.

David and James had agreed when they’d turned ten that holding hands was “totally lame”, but they always did it when they were scared.

And now they were holding hands with a grip tight enough to turn their knuckles white as they sat silently across from the man with the revolver.

Mom had prepared for just about everything when setting them up at the safe house, and had drilled them on just about every scenario for someone breaking in to take them or finding them in the open to take them. She, apparently, hadn’t accounted for him. James and David both didn’t remember when it had happened– they just knew Mom had come back at midnight, put them to bed, locked down the house and left. They’d gone to sleep, just like normal. When the two of them woke up again, they were in the back of a van with no windows being taken who knows where.

And the man with the revolver had been there, gun spinning and spinning and spinning until the second James inched even slightly towards the door, at which point it had stopped and aimed dead center with his forehead.

The man had raised a nearly-white eyebrow and said in a harsh, gravelly voice, “If I know anything about your mom, she’s taught you that this gun isn’t an empty threat. You’d better get right back next to your brother if you’d like to live through this car ride.” James instantly scooted back into place, taking hold of David’s hand. He hadn’t let go yet.

David gulped and in a shivering voice asked, “H-how did you find us?”

The kidnapper smiled, but it was a cold, masklike expression that didn’t reach his eyes; “You see, your mom’s been so good at keeping the two of you safe because she had training. She was drilled seven days a week for years on how to run away and cover your tracks if something went south, and keep running for as long as you needed– even if that was forever.”

He locked eyes with the dark-haired twin; “I was trained the exact same way.”

David’s eyes sunk to the floor; James could tell, his twin wanted to know more. But he was scared to ask. Scared to know how their mother and this strange, dangerous man could possibly be connected. James wanted to know, too. And he wasn’t nearly as thoughtful as David.

So he asked, “Are you who’s been chasing us?”

The gunman let out a cold, flat chuckle; “In a manner of speaking, yes. My my, your mom didn’t tell you anything did she? I wonder…”

His fake smile fell and he looked James right in the eye; “What do you know about your father?”

Both twins’ eyes went wide and they looked to each other; David furiously shook his head, squeezing James’ hand so tight he could feel it going numb. James frowned hard, looking back and forth between his brother and their kidnapper.

He squared his shoulders, met the gunman’s gaze head on and said, “He’s out there fighting the people chasing us. He’s going to beat them, and he’s going to beat you.” 

For a moment, the gunman just stared right back at James, eyebrows raised and eyes wide. Then, he let out a small chuckle. Then a louder one. Then he leaned back and let out a long, almost manic cackle. James’ confidence withered away as their kidnapper laughed and laughed, the blond twin shrinking back and huddling even closer to his brother’s side. David just frowned at him– he told him so.

The gunman’s laughter tapered out into a sigh, and when he looked at James again he was shocked to see that his smile reached his eyes; “Oh, I certainly hope he does.”

The van briefly stopped, then went slowly down an incline. James and David exchanged puzzled looks as the van gradually slowed to a stop. The gunman got up from his seat and opened the back doors of the van– the twins winced, flinching and squinting at the sudden light before their eyes could adjust. When they could see, the both of them got a good look at the area; the first things they noticed were the high ceilings, fluorescent lights, and concrete walls. There were very few other people running about, but there were plenty of aircrafts in the massive building, ranging anywhere from helicopters to small passenger planes.

The gunman hopped out and turned to the twins, extending an arm out toward the hanger; “We’re here. Come on out.”

James and David hesitated, looking from the gunman to each other and back, but David finally nudged James forward and the two of them crept carefully out of the van. They never let go of the other’s hand. James kept close to David’s side, eyes darting around the hangar, but David kept a steady eye on the gunman.

David’s voice broke the relative silence; “Do you know where Dad is?”

The twins had grown observant over the years, so in that moment they caught something no one else could have. In that moment the gunman’s eyes went just that bit wider, his mouth opened very slightly, his grip on his revolver went a tiny bit slack. Coming from a man as guarded as him, a man constantly in control of how he presented himself, that was the same as eyes wide as saucers and a jaw on the floor.

His mask was back on in an instant, but not a mask of a smile. A cold, emotionless mask stared back at David.

“I do,” he said in an even, measured tone, “And trust me, kids. You don’t want to see him. You’re better off–”

An earsplitting scream drew every eye and ear in the place to the West end of the hangar.

James and David drew close to the other’s side as the scream was followed up by several gunshots in a row. The gunman stepped in front of them, blocking their vision more than the multitude of aircraft already did. The three of them didn’t move as the footsteps, gunshots, screams, and the wet thuds of bodies hitting the ground drew nearer. Another sound got louder and louder as it got closer– someone’s voice, grunting and panting with effort.

The gunman didn’t tremble or flinch. When they were a couple feet away, the footsteps stopped.

The voice growled, “Give me back my sons, Adam.”

The twins didn’t have time to gasp before “Adam” stepped to the side with a lilt in his voice as he said, “My pleasure, Eva.”

James and David could scarcely believe it, but there she was. Their mother was standing in the middle of the hangar, a gun in one hand and the other balled up in a white-knuckled fist at her side. Her hair was disheveled, her clothes and skin were spattered with blood, and her mouth was hanging open in confusion as she looked between her sons and their kidnapper.

“MOM!!” the twins broke down, scrambling over to Eva who in that moment stopped being an agent trained for combat and started being their mother again, running to meet them halfway and falling to her knees to embrace them. She really was losing her edge, because it took her a full minute to push through the relief and look back up at Adam with furrowed eyebrows. Her sons just kept clinging to her, burying their faces in her blood-soaked shirt and wild hair.

Eva opened her mouth to speak, but Adam interrupted her; “Well, now that you’re here that makes everyone. I can finally give you these.”

He fished around in his long brown duster and pulled out three little blue booklets, holding them out for Eva to take. The twins pulled away so they could look at them with her. Three perfectly forged US passports looked back at them, with photos of the three of them and fake information inside.

“What…?” Eva couldn’t even finish her sentence, opting to just stand up and stare at Adam with her mouth hanging open.

Adam’s smirk never fell as he smoothly said, “There’s a plane out on the runway, with more documentation,” he looked Eva up and down with a small snicker, “and a change of clothes inside. You’ll be going to England. The people that’ll meet you there will get you set up in the country, but from there you’ll be on your own.”

Without waiting to hear from Eva, Adam started walking out of the hangar to the runway. Eva followed him closely with the boys beside her, the three of them staying close together just in case. The sun was just barely lighting the horizon when they stepped out onto the tarmac. A small white passenger plane sat alone on the runway, an even smaller crew prepping it for takeoff.

Adam turned back to Eva with a raised eyebrow; “Any particular reason you’re still standing here and not getting on that plane?”

Eva narrowed her eyes; “Two questions.”

“I might have two answers.” Eva rolled her eyes and Adam let out another snicker. The twins exchanged baffled looks– he was still guarded, still carefully managed, but the minute their mother had showed up this Adam had turned into almost a completely different person.

Eva crossed her arms over her chest; “How do I know this isn’t a Patriot trap?”

Adam put a hand on his hip as he explained, “If this was a Patriot trap, the three of you would already be dead and buried in shallow graves,” the twins shrunk closer to Eva on instinct, “The government gave up on you as a lost cause, and that takes away a significant resource Zero can use to find you. And besides, he’s losing more and more of his mind every day. He’s more concerned with making sure no one can take the Patriots from him. And Para-Medic and Sigint gave up on all of this years ago.”

Eva couldn’t help a small, mirthless chuckle; “Bang-up job we all did of carrying out her will.”

Adam just shrugged; “That’s never why I was in this. But as I was saying, now’s just about the perfect time to escape.”

Eva frowned, staring at Adam for a long time before she asked, “Second question… Why are you helping us?”

Adam’s face smoothed over into the expressionless mask, and for a few moments he was quiet, staring just past Eva at the horizon as it turned from deep dark blue to a soft lilac gray.

He locked eyes with Eva; “Because no children should go through what we did.”

For a long, loaded moment the two of them just stood there, staring into each other’s eyes and trying to unpack the layers of training and deception they would always carry with them. 

Eva smiled and put her hands on James and David’s heads; “Alright, come on boys. Let’s get on the plane.” 

Hesitantly, the twins walked ahead of her towards the plane. Eva followed behind, but paused next to Adam; “If this is a trap, sleep with one eye open.”

Adam just gave her a two-fingered salute as she passed; “I already do.”

The inside of the plane was cushy first class accommodations, all the decor in white to match the outside of the plane. A manila folder and set of folded clothes sat on one of the seats, and Eva gratefully flopped down into the cushy leather next to it. She was already well into looking through the documentation Adam had provided when she realized David and James weren’t darting around the cabin, drinking in likely the nicest environment they’d been in yet.

She looked up to see her sons just staring at her with their eyebrows furrowed, hovering close to each other and looking intently at the door to the plane as if Adam would come through and take them back any second.

Eva pulled out a tray table, set the documents and fresh clothes on it and turned to the boys with a tired smile; “I’m betting you’re more than a little confused.”

“He… he said he knew where Dad was…” James murmured.

“He said a lot of things about Dad,” David muttered back, “And you… know him, Mom? Who was he?”

Eva sighed; “There is a lot I haven’t told you. I thought it’d be for the best if you didn’t know about everything until you were older. But after all this…” Eva patted the chair next to her, “We’re in for a long flight, and this is a long story. Get cozy.”

The boys ambled over, David hopping into the seat next to Eva and James crawling into her lap; “Alright. So. I guess to start I should tell you about someone we all called The Boss…”

Chapter Text

“Why do you let this happen?!” James hissed, pressing down a bit too hard as he dabbed the alcohol wipes on David’s forehead. David didn’t even wince, holding the ice pack steadily to his black eye.

James and David were crouched in the corner of the handicapped stall in the boy’s bathroom, David with a face that looked like he’d just come out on the losing end of a bout for the world heavyweight boxing championship and James with all the medical supplies he could steal from the nurse’s office scattered around him. He’d manage to at least bring some of the swelling down and mop up all the places where he’d broken the skin, but that was hardly saying much.

“At least back in America you’d fight back,” James muttered, “Now you’re just lying down like a bloody coward-“

David rolled his eyes, half at James being so quick to adopt the English accent David was still being quite contrarian about, and muttered, “I would start fights back home. That’s a lot different than fighting back.”

“And it’s also a lot different than what you’re doing, which is rolling over like a dog,” James snapped, trying his best to aggressively apply a bandaid and halfway succeeding.

James leaned back on the heels of his hands with a deep sigh; “Mum’s not gonna believe you got in another accident… You’re stronger than everyone who tries to screw with you, Dave– why don’t you just fight back?”

David’s voice came out in that shivering monotone it always dropped into when he was angry; “Because if I fight back the bullies will run with their tails between their legs to the teachers and they’ll take their side. We’ll have to change schools, and it’ll start all over again, and that’ll just be trouble for mom because it’ll be harder to keep our cover if we keep moving around like we used to. We’re safer here but we’re not completely safe.”

It was very difficult to render James speechless, but that did the trick. For a moment, the blond twin just stared past David at the tiled wall, a faraway look in his eyes as his brows slowly unfurrowed. Then he quietly picked up another alcohol wipe and got back to work. David checked his watch- it was time to take the ice pack off. He set it down on the tile floor and just watched James as best he could as he finished up. His green eyes were soft now, but they were far away. James applied the last bandaid, but paused before even thinking of cleaning up. He just spent a moment staring into David’s eyes, trying to think of the right thing to say.

Finally, he murmured, “Do you think it’ll ever… not be like this?”

David was a fine liar, but not where James was concerned; “I don’t know.”

“But,” David added, smiling as best he could despite how much it hurt his face and fishing around in his jacket pocket, “That doesn’t mean we can’t adapt.”

And from the pocket of his windbreaker he produced the bully's heavy, overstuffed wallet.

James’ eyes lit up and he’d snatched the bully’s wallet out of David’s hands in an instant, already poring through it to separate cash, change, and cards with a grin like the sun; “Bloody Hell, this arsehole was loaded! And that’s just the cash, if we’re quick about these cards–”

“Don’t sweat those too much,” David snorted, “He’s an idiot, I give him a couple days before he realizes his wallet’s missing and tells mummy and daddy so they can cancel them.”

“And this’ll put us…” James murmured as he did the math in his head before beaming up at David, “Halfway there with six months to go.”

David grinned a near-identical grin right back at his brother; James’ plan had seemed impossible when he’d brought it up last year, but with every wallet he snuck out of the pockets of someone trying to cave his face in it started to look less like one of James’ impossible pipe dreams and more like a tangible reality. The twins dropped the picked-clean wallet in the lost and found and left through a classroom window, beaming and laughing all the way home.  

James turned on his heel and took the girl’s hands in his; “I love nothing in the world so well as you–“ He cocked his head to the side with a soft, boyish smile, “Is not that strange?”

Allison gaped at him for a couple seconds, dark cheeks flushing even darker, before letting her eyes dart to her script as she tried to collect herself and remember what her line was. She failed miserably and burst into a fit of giggles. 

James rolled his eyes and stepped back with a good-natured sigh, “Come on Allison, if you can’t stop corpsing at that line with me there’s no way you’ll be able to get through it with Andrew in time for opening night.”

Allison pushed some of her long black hair over her shoulder as she walked to the edge of the stage and sat down with her legs dangling over the side; “I’d definitely be able to do it on opening night if you were playing Benedict.”

“And I’ve told you that it’s not going to happen,” James said as he walked over to sit next to her, staring out over the auditorium as only a handful of drama students milled about the aisles without taking a second glance at them. “It’s a miracle your teacher even lets me hang around and practice with you– I’m not even in the class.”

“It’s not a miracle,” she snorted, “It’s because he knows you’re better than all the boys in the class!” 

“And because someone keeps begging him to cast me in this production,” James drawled, leaning back on his hands and smirking over at Allison. She just shoved his chest with a roll of her eyes and James let out his easy, infectious laugh. 

“But really,” Allison remarked as she turned her whole body to face him, “Why don’t you want to be in the class? You’re so good, and you love acting.”

James’ shrug was stiff; “I wouldn’t say I love it–“

She fixed him with a pointed glare; “Don’t you dare. I’ve seen your face when you practice with me, you practically glow.”

James made a face; “Isn’t glowing just a thing that pregnant women do? Allison I’m not ready to be a father.”

Allison just kept glaring at him.

“Alright, sorry, bad joke,” James muttered, eyes drifting down to the boards of the stage, “I just don’t want all that attention on me.”

Allison blinked slowly as she tried to process that; “You don’t want attention.”

“Okay maybe saying I don’t want it is poor phrasing,” James remarked, shifting to face her more fully, “Let’s just say I’d rather my audience was just you and not a million people who I can’t trust.”

She narrowed her eyes; “What does it matter that you trust them?”

James opened his mouth slightly, but no sound came out. His mouth flattened out into a line as he stared just past her and he remained silent for a moment longer. Then he looked Allison in the eyes and simply smiled. It was a weak, apologetic thing that didn’t reach his eyes. 

“That’s an answer for another day,” he said around a pale, anemic laugh. Allison pursed her lips; this wasn’t the first time James had said something strange then dodged around explaining it and she had a feeling it wouldn’t be the last. Every time he evaded her like this the future ahead of them shrunk by anywhere from a week to a year.

“More to the point,” he said, bringing Allison out of her thoughts as he grabbed her script and put it on her lap, “We need to get back to memorizing these lines.”

“I have them memorized perfectly,” she shot back with a slight smile, “I just can’t deliver them.”

James leaned in with a wolfish grin; “Oh really? Then show me– From where we left off.”

Allison’s voice caught in her throat and all she could do was nod.

James reached out and ran his hand gently through her hair as he whispered, “I do love nothing in the world so well as you. Is not that strange?”

Allison’s face was already flushed, but she found her voice; “As strange as the thing I know not. It were as possible for me to say I loved nothing so well as you, but believe me not, and yet I lie not, I confess nothing, nor I deny nothing. I am sorry for my cousin.”

James’ face lit up, a wide grin cutting across it from ear to ear; “By my sword, Beatrice, thou lovest me.”

She looked away, taking his hand from her hair; “Do not swear, and eat it.”

James emphatically shook his head; “I will swear by it that you love me, and I will make him eat it that says I love not you.”

Allison looked tentatively back at him from the corner of her eye; “Will you not eat your word?”

“With no sauce that can be devised to it. I protest I love thee,” James replied as he took her hands in his. Oh he was determined to make it difficult for her to say these lines, wasn’t he? Either that or he was the most oblivious boy on the planet. It was probably both.

Nevertheless she smiled; “Why then, God forgive me.”

James cocked his head to the side in that odd canine way he had; “What offense, sweet Beatrice?”

“You have stayed me in a happy hour. I was about to protest I love you,” she giggled, leaning in closer.

“And do it with all thy heart,” James murmured, leaning in until they were nose to nose.

“I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest,” Allison whispered before leaning in for her first and last kiss with James.

In a few more lines, James’ twin brother would show up in the side door and clear his throat loudly. James would spare her another apologetic smile before leaping off the stage and landing gracefully on his feet, grabbing his backpack off a chair and starting up the aisle to the rear of the theater. He and his brother wouldn’t realize how well sound carried in the auditorium and talk about how the brother had taken another wallet from one of the many kids in school that bullied him and had learned about a place that sold ‘what they were looking for’ (whatever the Hell it was) for cheap. Before they left, the brother had stopped to look over his shoulder, almost making direct eye contact with Allison.

Then he’d turned back to James and said in what was supposed to be a whisper, “You know you’re gonna have to break up with her.”

And James had just said, “Yeah, I know. But not now.”

Allison had sat there, numb and mute, for five minutes before deciding she would break up with James first. He’d already broken her heart, but she could at least get the last word. 

To this day, Eva had no idea how the boys had managed to pull it off without her noticing. She was their mother– Anything they did, she knew about. But instead she’d just been sipping her morning coffee when they all but ran to sit down across the kitchen table from her with matching grins on their faces. 

Eva stared at them over her coffee, eyes drifting over to the hands on the wall clock that pointed to six in the morning, before setting it down slowly and commenting, “You two are remarkably… Awake. What’s the occasion?”

“Happy birthday, Mum!” James chirped, almost bouncing in his seat at this point.

“We got something special for you,” David said, grinning so wide his face was liable to split.

Eva smirked at them as she folded up the newspaper; “You’re both a little late for breakfast in bed– What am I in for?”

They turned their grins to each other before James turned back and said, “You’ll see. You gotta come outside, though. And close your eyes! We worked very hard to make it a surprise.” 

Eva rolled her eyes, but stood up and closed them anyway. Her sons flanked either side of her as they guided her out towards the driveway– they were almost taller than her now, and not a day went by that she didn’t marvel at that. They were starting to look more and more like John, David in particular with his dark hair and serious manner. That was something she still didn’t know how to handle, especially considering how long it’d been since she’d seen the man himself.

They took her out into the chill of the early morning and stepped back before James said, “Alright, open your eyes!”

She did. And her jaw dropped open at the exact same time.

Sitting in the driveway was a motorcycle– not just any motorcycle, but a beautiful Triumph Bonneville T140. It wasn’t brand new, but it was in good condition with hardly any rust, with keys sitting in the ignition and a big red bow sat lopsided on its handles. And it was hers. She could already feel the wind blowing through her hair–

No, wait. Eva, you’re a mother now. Ask questions first.

She turned to face the boys, trying her best to choke down a smile as she put her hands on her hips; “Before I can properly get excited about this, I have to ask how you got it.”

“We bought it with money, Mom,” David laughed, crossing his arms over his chest, “We’re dumb but not dumb enough to steal a motorcycle.”

She let a little bit of her smile leak through; “And the money? Where did that come from?”

“Our part-time jobs,” James replied smoothly, “Why do you think we haven’t been spending any of our paychecks?”

A lie. James was getting better at it– after all, they’d been taught by one of the best. And that was a pretty good one, it was partially true like all the best lies were, but there was more she wasn’t getting. So she just leveled them both with an even and burning Mom Stare. In seconds James was nervously elbowing David, muttering under his breath to his calmer brother.

So David sighed, “And when guys have been beating me up at school I’ve been picking their pockets while they do it.”

“They’ve been what?!” Eva closed the distance between her and David in seconds, taking his face in her hands; “Why haven’t you said anything?!” 

“Because if I do we’ll have to change schools,” David muttered, looking at the ground, “And I didn’t want you to worry about that or blow our cover if it kept happening and we had to keep changing schools.”

“He only stole from guys who bullied him,” James jumped in, futzing nervously with his hands, “And we made sure they didn’t figure out it was us, we were careful–“

“The official response I have to give is that I can’t condone stealing,” Eva sighed, patting David’s cheek, “You’re both grounded for two weeks… but I will be keeping the bike.”

The boys were surprisingly alright with that; in fact, they let out sighs of relief and smiled over at each other. That wasn’t right. So she decided to dig deeper.

“I guess you’ll have to go call Allison and cancel some dates,” Eva remarked, looking from the corner of her eye at James.

James winced; “No, not really… She broke up with me three weeks ago.”

So that’s why he’d been moping around the house for a solid week back then; “I’m sorry to hear that.”

James shrugged; “It’s not so bad– I’d have to break up with her eventually. We can’t really drag anyone into our lives without risking their safety. It was just a matter of time.”

Oh.

“Alright, come on in, both of you– we’re having a talk,” Eva sighed, ushering James to stand closer to David so she could put a hand on each of their shoulders. Their eyes darted frantically between her and each other, but they said nothing and waited for her to speak. For a moment, she just looked at her sons. She knew without a doubt they were happier like this than they would’ve been in whatever plan the Patriots had for them. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t have regrets. 

“Listen,” she said, squeezing their shoulders gently, “You know I’m proud of you for being cautious and cognizant of our situation. But there’s a limit. You don’t have to let yourselves get hurt just to keep our family safe, and you don’t have to deny yourselves things that make you happy. You’re growing up faster than most, I know, and I’m sorry it has to be like that. But you’re still young. You’re still kids– more importantly, you’re still my kids. I’m always going to worry, it’s my job. And I’m always going to look out for you. So I don’t want to find out that you’ve been letting yourselves get hurt just so I won’t be worried. It’ll just end up with me worrying more in the end.”

“Sorry,” they mumbled in almost perfect unison, eyes trained on their feet. 

“Apology accepted,” Eva replied as she pulled them into a hug, “And I’m bumping that two week grounding up to a month.”

“That’s fair,” James murmured into her shoulder. 

Eva didn’t take the bike out until the boys’ month of grounding was up, half to prove a point, and half because she couldn’t look at it without remembering when she’d mentioned giving up her motorcycle-riding days for the boys. She’d only meant it as an embarrassing ‘your mom used to be so wild back in the day’ story, and a testament to how much she loved them. But they’d seen it as her giving up a part of herself for them. And they were trying so hard not to be burdens on her anymore. 

She wasn’t sure how to tell them that they’d never been burdens in a way they’d accept.

Chapter Text

YEAR 18

Eva stared at her hands, clasped tight in front of her on the kitchen table; “And you’re both sure about this.”

James nodded; “It’s our best way to get their attention… And his.”

David reached across the table and took his mother’s hands in his; “You told us one day we’d have to stop running and start fighting back. This is how we do it.”

“You don’t have to do it alone,” Eva said, squeezing David’s hands tightly to keep her own from trembling, “There’s things I’ve been working on, there’s a place for you there with me, you both don’t have to go alone into their hands–“

James grinned at her and laughed, “Who said we’d be alone?”

David smiled as James elbowed him gently; “It’s like you always told us– We’re sticking together. They’ll have to use a crowbar to pry us apart.”

“Don’t put it past them,” she laughed around the tears in her eyes, “If you do this, you know it’ll be much more difficult for me to reach you. We might not see each other again for years…”

We may never see each other again.

It hung in the air between them all, unspoken, but understood. James swallowed hard and looked over to David, biting down on the inside of his lower lip. David stared at Eva’s hands in silence, face all but blank.

He looked up, meeting his mother’s eyes; “We won’t let that happen. I promise.”

Eva wondered if this is how all mothers felt when they sent their children off to war, like a piece of their soul was being carved out by a rusted scythe. She supposed not– All the ways they could die on the battlefield were only a fraction of what she feared. Her fear was as vast and deep as the ocean, and their future looked just as dark. But regardless, her sons went deep into the desert storm and she went to Prague. Adam greeted her on the front steps of the church, eating a bright red apple and staring off towards the street.

“So,” he asked around a bite of the fruit, “Wanna tell me what the Hell your boys are thinking joining the army?”

Eva shrugged; “Making a statement to Them, I suppose. Essentially saying, ‘here we are, come get us jackasses’.”

“That’s idiotic,” Ocelot remarked, taking a big bite of the apple and chewing it for a long while before swallowing; “They really are his sons.”

YEAR 19

James and David had known how real the possibility of them getting separated, either by Patriot machinations or the simple fact of their different skills, could be. After spending most of their lives together, they had also known there was no way they could ever prepare for it.

David realized he didn’t know how to talk to people without James there to break the ice. James realized people liked him a lot more when David was there to be a counterbalance to his intensity. James’ high-flying nature became quite literal and David stayed on the ground. They found a use for James’ charisma and David’s stability. All the while, the brothers looked for each other. They found ways to stay in contact, to ferret messages even as short as “still alive” back and forth to each other even as both were sent into Iraq.

Until David stopped receiving any word at all.

In another time, another place, after James’ cover was blown on his first ever assignment for the SIS he would’ve spent four long years alone in the dark being tortured for information he would never give. He would grow bitter. He would grow cold. He would curse the world and when he was rescued live only to tear it down around himself and burn it until nothing but ashes remained.

But in that time, in that place, James had no one who would’ve burned down the world for him.

So in this time, this place, after only a scant few months the first hands that touch his face after tearing the burlap sack off his head are familiar and the voice he hears could be his own if not for the American accent clinging stubbornly to it.

“James, can you hear me? James, it’s me– I’m here to get you out,” David’s voice came in a panicked rush as James’ eyes learned how to focus again, and through his haze of shock all he could do was give his brother’s face an appraising once-over.

The first words he physically said to his brother in ages were, “When was the last time you shaved?”

David tried very, very hard not to burst out laughing. He mostly succeeded.

“You’re not so smooth either anymore, jackass,” David shot back as he cut James’ bindings, hoisting him up onto one shoulder, “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

And it was just the two of them once again as they broke out– the price for his very personal mission had been that David would have no support, no backup, not even any weapons other than what he could find and carry himself. He didn’t need any. Anyone he couldn’t sneak past on the way in he’d dispatched quickly and quietly, and everyone that caught them on the way out he took down with savage efficiency– he fought like a man possessed, with that same quiet rage James was used to burning terrifyingly bright in his eyes.

Even dehydrated and starved and unable to support all of his own weight James would never sit by and let David have the whole spotlight to himself. The second a gun clattered his way across the ground he got to providing cover fire and rasping directions through the base between gunshots. David was afforded one concession from the SIS– a helicopter ride home if he made it to the rendezvous point in time and launched a flare. When the flare went up from the rendezvous point the pilot found at it’s source two young men absolutely covered in blood, looking like scarlet phantoms in the night.

Once back to civilization James hardly had time to recover in peace between David hovering over him and everyone from their superior officers to random soldiers they’d never met asking them how they’d manage to break in and out of a secure Iraqi base with no help. Word spread, first to all the other British soldiers in Iraq and out to the other nations taking part in the Gulf War, of two brothers strong enough to rival the man they shared a strange, uncanny resemblance to…

The war had ended when each of their commanding officers came to the brothers and told them the news– they were being specifically requested by FOXHOUND, and when Big Boss told you he wanted your soldiers for himself, you replied “how soon do you need them”.

The night before they left for America James was pacing the room in big, anxious circles, a hand covering his mouth and another running through his long hair. David sat still as stone, hands steepled in front of his mouth as his elbows dug painfully into his knees.

James muttered under his breath so fast and so soft David almost couldn’t catch it; “Christ I knew we were aiming for this but why does it have to be now? I wanted more time before we had to do this, time to plan time to process but there’s no way to stall–“

“This is what we were working towards,” David said, voice deceptively even, “We just have to face it.”

“I know but,” James tugged at his hair as his pacing picked up speed, “We’re… We’re going to meet him, David! We’re going to see him and–“ James turned to his brother, eyes lit up with panic, “What do we say?! What do we do, do we just pretend nothing’s wrong and that we don’t know him or– God in heaven he might not even recognize us– David. He’s our father.”

“You were there when Mom told us the truth about him,” David growled, eyes two shards of sharp, freezing ice, “He’s our father but we are not his sons. He thinks we’re things. He doesn’t give a damn about us so we don’t have to give a damn about him.”

“I know… I know…” James let out a long, shuddering sigh as he slowly ambled over to David and settled heavily down beside him, “I just…”

He looked David in the eye, melancholy green meeting impassive blue; “Do you remember? How we’d talk about him late at night when Mum wasn’t with us? How we’d dream up all the ways he’d swoop in on a white horse and rescue us and we wouldn’t have to run anymore?”

David’s eyes softened and he couldn’t keep down a smirk; “I remember you really wanting to play Catch with him.”

James coughed out a weak laugh; “Right, I did… I never stopped thinking like that, I suppose. Even when Mum told us what he really thought of us, why he really wasn’t there… I just kept imagining all the ways he’d save us. I remember dreaming that he’d come into our lives, apologize to us and say he learned his lesson, we’d be together and we’d be normal and we’d be happy…”

James leaned on David’s shoulder; “I just wish things didn’t have to be like this.”

David put an arm around his brother, who he still couldn’t lie to no matter how hard he tried; “Yeah, me too.”

YEAR 20

The day Kazuhira McDonnell Miller meets the two sons of Big Boss starts out quite ordinary for him. He has his breakfast, his morning coffee, calls his wife and daughter to let them know training the lunatics Big Boss picked up off the side of the road hasn’t gotten him killed yet, and sets off for another day of doing just that. It stops being ordinary when Big Boss himself actually meets him at the gate.

“Uh oh, should I be preparing to beg for my job?” Miller snorts, quirking an eyebrow as he walks to stand even with his old friend.

The years are eroding Big Boss’s sense of humor, so he doesn’t even blink at that question, instead wagging his head towards the training camp; “There’s something I have to show you.”

Miller scowls at the back of Big Boss’s head as he turns to lead the way, but follows regardless. He’s just starting to come to terms with how that in a nutshell is what their relationship has become, and how much he doesn’t like that.

They weave through and around the FOXHOUND recruits, the more ordinary and green among them pausing in whatever they’re doing to salute while the more unhinged and specialized don’t even spare him a second glance. There’s a reason Miller prefers teaching the fundamentals when he has to help with FOXHOUND, everyone who’d already learned that much is too rich for his blood– even that Kurdish sharpshooter Big Boss had plucked out of Iraq is a creepy little thing, and far younger than he should be bothering with.

They weren’t rebels without a cause out in the middle of the water anymore, taking whatever they could get and throwing up a middle finger to The Man at every opportunity– they’re respectable now, and it’s getting suspicious how Big Boss refuses to act like it.

Big Boss stopping on a dime shakes Miller out of his thoughts, a few yards away from a training field where two young men are sparring and had somehow drawn a crowd. He wonders why until the blond fakes left to draw the brunette closer before grabbing him by the scruff like a kitten and pulling off a picture perfect judo flip with just enough flourish to make it look pretty as well as knock all the wind out of his opponent’s lungs.

It takes him a minute to put the pieces together as he watches them go back and forth, evenly matched, but as he focuses on the one with darker hair as he dodges around the blond’s flashier moves he can’t help but think of watching Big Boss train with MSF in the rain. When he does, it’s hard not to look at the boy’s face and think that in twenty years’ time he’ll look just like the man he met in Colombia, and the blond won’t be far behind. Aside from hair, eyes, and slight differences in build due to slight differences in training the two of them look too similar to even just be fraternal twins.

It hits him with the force of a truck and he turns to Big Boss, eyes wide, mouth agape; “These are–?!”

Big Boss’ eye narrows into a cruel glare as he replies, “Zero’s experiments. I found these things in Iraq, working with the SAS and MI6. They just passed the test to get into FOXHOUND yesterday. Wanna guess what codenames they earned?”

Miller doesn’t guess.

Big Boss brings out a cigar and a lighter, and before lighting it he uses the cigar to point to the brunette, “Solid Snake,” then the blond, “Liquid Snake.”

“Christ… So why are they here?” Miller asks, brows furrowing as he watches Big Boss light his cigar.

“I brought them here,” Big Boss replies around the cigar clenched tightly between his teeth, “Best case, I get some use out of them. Worst case, I can snuff them out before they do what Zero or Eva or whoever the Hell’s been training them to do. I want you to focus on Liquid, but leave Solid to me. I’ll be training him myself.”

Miller frowns; “Just met them and you’re already playing favorites?”

Big Boss scoffs, “Please, I flipped a coin. Call this an experiment of my own– I wanna see how it reacts.”

Miller can taste something sour on the back of his tongue. He’d heard Big Boss refer to the Les Enfants Terribles as ‘it’s and ‘thing’s before, years ago. He’d thought nothing of it at the time. But he’d been young back then. He hadn’t been a father himself. He thinks of Catherine back home and he can’t even imagine looking at her the way Big Boss is staring down his sons. In the back of his mind he knows it’s not the same, that one way or another he’d chosen this while Big Boss had it forced upon him, but in his gut this is just another crack in the foundation that’s slowly crumbling to pieces.

So Miller says nothing, waiting until the twins have finally run themselves ragged and their fight has come to a draw with both of them on the ground panting like hunting hounds after chasing a persistent quarry, before strolling up to them.

“Not bad, you two,” he calls, drawing their attention as he offers each a hand, “But this is FOXHOUND– We need way better than ‘not bad’. Thankfully, getting you there’s what I’m here for. On your feet, soldiers.”

Solid and Liquid look cautiously to each other before they take his hands and he pulls them up. Solid is focused on him, looking him over with curiosity, while Liquid is staring just past his head at Big Boss with uncertain stars in his eyes. Oh Christ, the poor kid knows.

Miller forces a grin onto his face like they’re any other promising recruits; “The name’s Miller, but you’d best be calling me Master if you don’t want your asses kicked harder than they have to be– Now, no more standing around! You don’t get a rest on the battlefield and you don’t get one here, I’m gonna make you wish you were dead!”

Miller can feel Big Boss’ eye burning a hole in his skull. He absolutely cannot bring himself to give a shit.

YEAR 21

“How did you meet Big Boss?”

Snake’s question makes Gray Fox pause in cleaning his gun and he turns to the rookie with a quirked eyebrow; “Why do you ask?”

Snake just shrugs, not meeting his eye; “Call it curiosity.”

Fox takes a moment before he answers, just looking the boy up and down. He was trying very hard to look relaxed, and anyone less skilled in espionage might’ve thought he was. But Fox had years on Snake, and it would be years before the kid could put one over on him. He was carrying tension in his shoulders, his jaw, gripping his arms just a bit too tight as he folded them over his chest. Talking about their commander always made him tense, even when he was the one bringing him up. It wasn’t nerves. It was too complicated to be nerves.

But Fox answers all the same, “It’s pretty simple. I fought in the Mozambican Civil War, for the RENAMO. I was younger then, didn’t have as much experience as I do now, so I got captured by the opposition. The torture went on for nearly a month before Big Boss sprung me loose. Took me and my sister back to the states, got us set up in the West, and I went back with him to keep fighting. That’s the long and short of it.”

Snake finally meets his eyes, a kind of angry shock on his face as he asks, “Why did you go back?”

Fox just stares back at him; “What do you mean?”

“You were out,” he replies, leaning forward, “You and your sister could finally live in peace, everything was over but you left her and went back in to the fight! Why?! Was that Big Boss’ condition for helping you?!”

Fox shakes his head and returns to cleaning his gun; “Not at all. I went back because I wanted to, Big Boss even asked me three times to see if I was sure. I was.”

“Why?” Solid presses, eyes narrowing as he tries to take Fox apart with those alone.

Fox sets his gun down and meets Snake’s gaze, unflinching; “Solid, I’m not some kid from Who the Hell Knows-shire, England who enlisted because he had no other prospects after graduating high school. I’ve been fighting since I was old enough to hold a gun. My nose and ears got cut off and these,” he pinches one of his ears for emphasis, “are obvious fakes. No one’s giving me a desk job. This is what I’m good at. This is what I’ve got. And if you stick with this for any longer, it’ll be all you’ve got, too. That’s the way our world works. We fight in whatever war will take us because we can’t handle the normal world anymore.”

Snake’s eyes drop, he clenches his fist, and Fox has to pause to look him over once again. Now that hadn’t been the reaction he expected. His body language is odd, these cues aren’t lining up… Does he understand? He shouldn’t, he’s read his classified file, the kid had an ordinary life and he’d seen combat– intense combat if the after-mission cleanup report on Liquid’s rescue during the Gulf War was any indication– but not a lifetime of it…

Fox’s eyes narrow. Someone is lying, but he doesn’t know who.

“Maybe that is how the world works,” Snake mutters, voice trembling, “But it doesn’t have to be.”

Fox thinks of the scaffolds over the skeleton of Outer Heaven, and replies, “We can agree on that much.”

YEAR 22

In the moment Liquid’s question comes out of nowhere, but Miller’s been expecting it for a while now; “What was… What was Big Boss like? When you were younger, I mean.”

Miller just snorts around a smile; “Younger in this case means ‘nearly forty’, I hope you know,” he leans back on his heels with a sigh, looking up at the sky as it slowly turns from dusk to night, “But for a while there, he was different. Used to actually like his men, treat ‘em like human beings instead of cogs in a machine. But along the way… He forgot how to hope.”

Liquid frowns, concern loud as a siren on his face– the kid feels so much it pours off him in waves, they had to give up entirely on getting him to keep his feelings down and train him to instead cover them with different emotions. It’s a good thing he’s a decent actor, if he wasn’t he’d be useless as a spy.

“How did he forget how to hope?”

Miller says nothing. He just looks at the kid for a long time, until the sun is nearly behind the horizon.

“Look, kid, I know who you are,” Miller replies, “So I’m gonna assume your mom got you up to speed on how your dad became Big Boss.”

Liquid freezes like a deer in headlights. Miller read him right– like that was any sort of accomplishment.

He looks out toward the fading sunlight; “Everyone’s real tied up over what The Boss really wanted. They all think it’s their job to make her dream a reality– but none of them care about what it really was. Big Boss and everyone who fought with us down in Central America, we saw what it was. She wanted peace. She would, and did, die for peace. And Big Boss couldn’t handle it. There’s a world elsewhere, outside of peace, and he chose that world. He can’t go back.”

Liquid stares past him, towards the first stars that wink in to view, as he wonders, “What world did you choose?”

Miller smirks; “Now that’s one Hell of a question. On the one hand, I’m not out there in the shit anymore. But I’m still training kids like you to go out there in my place. I haven’t left Big Boss’ world behind, I’m part of what keeps it kicking… But, I think, the answer comes at the end of it all. Big Boss, Gray Fox, they’re gonna die on the battlefield. Me, God willing I’ll die with my daughter at my bedside and if she even thinks of getting near a battlefield I’m whooping her ass harder than I’ve ever whooped any of yours.”

That finally draws a laugh out of the kid, and Miller’s smirk turns to a real smile.

“Point is, Liquid,” Miller says, reaching out to put a hand on Liquid’s shoulder, “You don’t have to be your father. You shouldn’t be. You have his codename but he’ll never have your heart. Your stupid, stupid, soft little heart.”

Liquid laughs again, this one full and rich; “Thank you? I think?”

Miller just pats his shoulder; “You’re welcome.”

YEAR 23

Gray Fox had told Snake that his mission into Outer Heaven would be quick– just recon, simple as breathing– and he’d be home before he knew it.

It was only three days before Operation Intrude N312 was designated a failure.

Big Boss called Snake personally into the briefing room, sat him down and went through Fox’s last transmission with him, personally detailed Fox’s infiltration to him. And all Snake can think as his commander, his father, assures him with the kindest smile he can fake that Snake is perfect for a job this big, is that this is a massive trap. He doesn’t know who’s setting it, he’s honestly not even sure who it’s meant to catch, but something is wrong.

But he’s made it this far by playing the loyal soldier who follows orders. So after one weak play at being unsure, he accepts the mission.

Snake gets lost in his own thoughts as he makes preparations, decides what meager supplies he’s to take with him, and behind and above all of that tries to draft a plan for how he’s going to get out if it turns out he’s the rat in this trap. Mom taught him how to run away, how to disappear, but she never taught him how to do that when you’re in a mercenary stronghold full of trained soldiers who absolutely cannot let you escape.

The dull ache of missing her turns sharp. More than he ever has since they left five years ago he wishes she were here.

All of these weighty matters flying around in his mind are enough for Snake to completely miss Liquid stowing away on the transport plane to Africa until his brother finally comes popping out of one of the cardboard boxes of miscellaneous cargo once they’re in the clouds.

Snake, to his credit, keeps his voice down as he hisses, “Liquid what the HELL are you doing here?! How did you even get on the plane?!”

“Not letting you go alone into something that looks all kids of shifty,” Liquid replies as he discards the box and sits resolutely down on the bench next to Snake, “And I’ll just say flirting with pilots will get you absolutely everywhere.”

Snake can’t help a snicker; “Is that the real reason you ended up in the SAS?”

“I’ll never tell,” Liquid replies with a grin.

Snake shakes himself back to the moment, forcing himself to frown at Liquid; “Look, if I am the one who’s supposed to get trapped here then it’s gonna look real bad if I show up and there’s two of me instead of one. Not to mention this is way above someone at our rank, two rookies might not be better than one in this situation.”

Liquid just stares at him, and says in an even voice, “David, you charged into an enemy stronghold armed with nothing but the clothes on your back to rescue me. You have absolutely no leg to stand on in this argument. If you think I’m abandoning you to all but certain death for any reason you are absolutely mental.”

Snake bites down hard on the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling.

He forces out a sigh; “If I get caught or killed, promise me you’ll run.”

“Oh I’ll have to do that anyway,” Liquid drawls, leaning back as comfortably as one can on a military transport plane, “I’m disobeying orders– They’ll have me court martialed for this if I stick around.”

Snake can’t lie to Liquid, and Liquid can never get anything past Snake. He knows he didn’t actually promise. But Snake knows his brother too well to think he’d keep that promise even if he did.

So he just shakes his head and says, “Good enough.”

Two rookies are better than one in a very specific situation– putting explosives on Metal Gear TX-55’s feet goes a lot faster when you have two sets of hands to do it with.

Upon destroying the Metal Gear and hearing wailing klaxons and a pre-recorded warning of “EMERGENCY!! EMERGENCY!! Outer Heaven Destruction Switch activated! Evacuate now!”, it’s also a lot easier to do that when your twin brother grabs you by the arm and starts sprinting out the nearest door like a man possessed.

So there’s quite a bit of time on the clock and not a lot of distance between them and the exit when the twins are stopped in their tracks by a voice they expected, but weren’t hoping to hear.

“You know, it didn’t have to be like this,” their father’s voice rumbles from behind them, “Snake was supposed to come in here, get some false information, and go back home.”

Snake slowly turns to face Big Boss first, staring down the barrel of his father’s Patriot carbine assault pistol; “We’re your sons, Sir. You should’ve known we wouldn’t leave it at that.”

A flicker of something like recognition passes through his eye and Big Boss actually smirks; “True, David, you’re quite a lot like I was at your age– naiive and arrogant. Now James, sneaking in where you’re not supposed to be and messing things up… You’re your mother’s son, through and through.”

James takes a deep breath, in through his nose, out through his mouth, before turning and looking Big Boss in the eye; “This isn’t how things have to be, Father.”

Big Boss simply scowls; “You know damn well they do. If I live I’m not stopping here, what I’m doing is too important. And the two of you will keep coming after me if I let you live, loyal soldiers dedicated to your mission–“

“I don’t give a damn about any mission!” Liquid shouts, taking a step forward despite the gun trained on the center of his chest, “Do you think that’s why we came here?! Because Eva or Zero or whoever the Hell wanted us to, to kill you like any other warlord destabilizing a region?! Is that the only thing you understand anymore, just this endless cycle of everyone trying to make each other’s lives miserable because you don’t want to admit a woman died thirty years ago for the sake of peace?!”

For just a second, a fraction of a breath, Big Boss’ grip on the Patriot falters, and he whispers, “How do you know about her?”

“Our mother told us everything,” Snake replies, drawing his sidearm and shifting to the left, “About The Boss, the Patriots, and your dream of never ending war. She didn’t need to tell us about how you plucked people out of war zones just to throw them back in again to keep that cycle going forever– We saw that for ourselves.”

Big Boss takes a moment they don’t have to just look at them, staring deep into his sons’ eyes.

“Then you know Liquid’s right,” he says, voice lower now, “This is all I understand anymore. I’m a warlord, plain and simple. I want no part of what Zero’s made of the outside world.”

“If you admit I’m right about you then you know I’m right about there being another way,” Liquid pleads, continuing his slow march forward.

“James we’re out of time,” David snaps, lining his pistol up with Big Boss’ head as he keeps slowing strafing left, “He’s an old man stuck in the past, if we keep trying to make him change his mind all three of us will die when this place blows up!”

“No,” Liquid snaps, eyes burning as he walks unflinchingly towards the barrel of the Patriot, “He doesn’t get off that easy. He doesn’t get to just run away, he has to face this. He has to face us. Look at me, Father, look at us. Zero made us as your copies but that’s not what we became, not what we chose to be– Our mother raised us to be free. We’re not snakes. We’re men, men who can make our own fate,” and Liquid stops, the barrel of the Patriot jabbing into his chest, “You can make yours. We can end the Patriots, we can stop running, we can create the peace The Boss wanted… We can do that together, Father. But only you can make that choice.”

The father and son stare into each other’s eyes, waiting to see who will blink first.

Big Boss smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes, as he starts to gently squeeze the trigger; “Sorry, son– I made my choice twenty years ago.”

A shot rings out.

For a moment, within the chaos of Outer Heaven’s fall as the seconds to its destruction count down, everything is silent.

Everything is still.

Big Boss collapses to the ground, bleeding from a perfect shot right through the left side of his head.

Liquid can only stare ahead, dimly aware that the warm blood painting his face belongs to his father. He can’t even feel the pain from where his father’s shot was forced to go wide and grazed his ribs. Snake’s hands are shaking so violently he can no longer hold the smoking gun and it clatters to the ground.

He shambles up to Liquid and murmurs, “W-we only… We’ve got a few minutes left to get out of range, we… we gotta go…”

“We should take his body,” Liquid says, voice almost ethereal in how calm it is, “Mum will want to bury him.”

Snake is in too much shock to disagree, and they carry the corpse with them as they run from the fortress. They feel the heat at their backs but none of the force as Outer Heaven collapses like a dying star.

They keep running. It’s all they know how to do.

Eva sits on the steps of the church as the dawn casts soft lavender light over Prague. She’s been sitting there since midnight– since she got their call.

The message was short, hard to hear, and scrambled through so many signals she could never hope to trace it. But she heard everything important.

“Dad’s dead. We’re coming home.”

Distantly, through frosted glass, she thinks of how Adam will take this. To suddenly have his purpose, his anchor, his entire reason for living taken from him… He won’t handle it well. Zero will be worse.

It’s been quite a long time since she’s felt this adrift, since she’s been this unsure of what to do, what comes next. The last time, she’d had two babies who had clear and present needs that had to be met. That had been enough to get her from point A to point B until she’d had time to think her next move through.

Her babies are all grown up now. There’s no one left to tell her what to do.

She hears footsteps coming down the street and immediately looks up; two shadows in the morning mist are coming her way. She doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe. She stays tense, ready to run if it’s anyone else.

The light shifts, they draw closer, the mist moves with the light breeze.

The two men coming down the road are carrying a coffin between them, the only two pallbearers for a funeral much humbler than its inhabitant deserves. She recognizes them– she could recognize them in the dark– but when they left her they were so much younger. There’s a dark line forming between James’ eyebrows, the bags under David’s eyes are heavy and dark, the lines around their mouths aren’t from laughter, and their eyes…

They get close enough to meet hers and James’ heart is still soft enough that he stumbles, nearly drops the coffin, looks like it’s all he can do not to drop it just so he can run to her.

She stands up and walks to meet them halfway.

For so long, too long, nearly a lifetime, the three of them just stand in front of the church in silence. Her sons set the coffin down between her and them. They avoid looking her in the eye. She kneels down and it takes all the strength she has to lift the lid even a fraction of an inch.

It’s enough. It’s too much. She sees the eyepatch and drops the lid, shutting her eyes tight.

“He was going to kill James,” David mutters, and it sounds like he’s been turning this over in his head since the moment he pulled the trigger, “I– … I made a choice. I don’t know if it was right.”

She lets out a long breath. It’s not enough to stop tears from forming.

“S-sometimes… Sometimes there isn’t a right choice,” she chokes out around a forming sob.

Her sons are around the coffin and at her side in an instant. Both of them fall to their knees and she reaches blindly for them, pulling them in tight.

It’s only now that the two of them finally start to cry.

And she finds herself murmuring as she strokes their hair, “It’s okay, it’s okay… I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”