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Current Location: 7th Floor

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[Otacon did frequent the bars of the Nexus just to drink casually. He had taken a liking to some of the odd beers the Nexus was supplied with. This particular bar, however, wanted its visitors to drink a little more heavy. Emmerich looked up and noticed - ]

Shots Drank : 0/3

[ - above his head. The doctor looked at all the gin, vodka, rum, sake, and all other types of hard liquers that were available. He figured this effect room was the same as the other ones he had been in. He had to fill his counter to leave because the room would be inescapable otherwise. The man grabbed a spiced rum bottle and began to pour himself his first shot in a glass.]

Here goes nothing.

((OOC: There's only one little twist - People with nanomachines, cyborgs, machines, and others can get drunk in this room even if normally they couldn't. Drink 3 or more to leave.))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[drapes himself over the couch]

I missed your monosyllables and your pretty face.

[Snake stays stubbornly standing, though he does wander slowly away from the door. There's a low noise that might be a laugh.]

Funny.

[Look, that's two whole syllables. He glances at the man relaxing on the couch, apparently having disregarded Snake as a threat.]

Still. Awfully hospitable of you.

[Snake's body language tells that he's ready to be attacked at any moment.] Will you relax? I'm not in a mood to lunge at anyone's throat. [Except maybe that alternate's.] If it will make you feel better, I'll try to murder you later.

I've fought enough of you enough times that it's out of my system for now. I can hold a civil conversation.

[He relaxes only a fraction.]

No, thanks.

[Though it might, actually. You're just weirding him out a little. He leans on a nearby wall.]

...Fine. You want to talk? Talk.

Charming and conversational as always.

[It's almost strange to meet a Snake who regards him as a proper enemy again.]

What matters right now is Hal.

[he leans forward, clasping his hands between his knees.] I don't know how to help him, Brother. Look what I've done to him. Merely promising not to kill anyone with REX made him pathetically grateful.

[Snake is particularly stubborn that way. Old enemies can become allies all the time in war, but things with Liquid had a way of being personal. He's somehow been upgraded to an enemy with a common interest, at least.]

Hnnngh. Hell if I know.

[He scrubs his face with his hands and looks for somewhere to sit that isn't the couch that Liquid is currently hogging.]

Otacon doesn't like to see people hurt. Even without Outer Heaven, he blamed himself for the way people used his designs. Difference is, he decided he could do something about it.

[Liquid would find that flattering in a way.]

[Liquid gestures to a chair. There are a few around. If you're going to conjure an apartment from thin air, give it some amenities.]

I see. He's idiotically brave that way, isn't he.

His friend and the only hope of the world, killed by his creation and me. I'm surprised he never tried sabotage, or to simply assassinate me.

Braver than he looks, even back then. Once he found out what REX was meant to be used for he wanted to help me stop it. Wouldn't leave.

[Taking the invitation, he sits. Looks like he's decided to stay. For a while, at least. Not like he has anywhere else to go, anyway.]

Hn. No. Otacon isn't the type for assassinations. Sabotage, maybe. He's smart enough to find a way, if he wants to. But he's also smart enough not to do it if it'll get him caught.

[He grits his teeth as he considers the consequences of his failure in that world, one hand curling into a fist around the arm of his chair. Outer Heaven and the miserably nervous, stuttering wreck that could have been his best friend.]

I'm not surprised. He isn't the sort for a straightforward fight, but he also isn't the sort to run away.

[Liquid is, for some reason, glad for that. He doesn't feel like being alone.]

[bitterly] And I'm smart enough to convince him that staying on my side is his only chance. With you dead, what hope does the world have except my mercy?

[Snake was the only one who could stop him.]

[He's quiet for a while.]

[abruptly] Snake. Are you familiar with the Grand Inquisitor?

[The silence startles him more than the question.]

Grand Inquisitor?

[Ahh, now it feels like talking to Brother.]

A concept invented by Dostoyevsky. The idea is that man is offered freedom, but that is not what he wants. It's too much for him. People can't handle their own choice, and so are doomed to suffering and damnation. The truly wise thing to do is take that choice away. Feed them, impress them, and rule them without mercy; that is the purest kindness.

The interesting part is that these were the very things Dostoyevsky was arguing against. It was, in effect, a finely crafted strawman - one even he was unable to rebut.

[Liquid remembers turning those pages over and over in fascination.]

There is another idea tucked away in the Inquisitor's shadow.

If there could be a perfect world, at the price that one person had to suffer - could you accept it?

[He shakes his head firmly.]

Doesn't matter. No such thing as a perfect world.

You're murder to philosophy, do you know that?

[He rolls his head back and stares at the ceiling.] my point is that I've gone soft.

A world exactly as I wanted, at the price of Hal's misery...is not worth it.

[He leans back in his chair and follows Liquid's gaze. That is one interesting ceiling.]

You sure you're Liquid?

[laughs shortly without humor]

Some semblance of him.

Pretty different from any Liquid I knew. Either you're him or you're you. Can't be both.

I am Liquid Snake. But I'm not his [he nods toward the room where Hal is sleeping] Liquid Snake.

[He closed his eyes. This place really is insane.]

So you're not a complete bastard. Good. Most people think that's a plus.

The one who seeks true power must be unencumbered by others' idea of bastardry.

[leans back and sighs] I already tried to explain Dostoyevsky to you. Don't make me start on Nietzsche.

[It would be a losing battle. There might be an actual laugh in response to that last part.]

And what about your own ideas?

[It's been a long time since Liquid's heard that gruff laugh. It makes him smile despite himself.]

Of bastardry? That being liked doesn't matter as long as you're respected and feared.

But with Hal it's different.

[And despite himself, Snake might actually be relaxing a bit.]

[Now that sounds more like the Liquid he knows. Save for that last part. He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it.]

Otacon's a hard guy not to like.

[groans] I know. What is it that makes it practically impossible not to care about him?

[frowns] Somehow that other self of mine was immune.

[He falls silent, looking blankly up at Liquid's ceiling, his fingers tapping restlessly against his thigh.]

[Because for all he's dismissed the philosophy, the hypotheticals; for all he's trying to keep up a calm front, the thought of that other world makes something deep and primitive and protective inside him so very angry.]

[Not so much because Liquid had killed him, exactly. (Sure, it wasn't exactly a point in his favor, but Snake had no delusions of immortality, and he remembered that fight all too well.) But that Liquid had taken one of the few people who had ever given a damn about him and broken him down.]

[Liquid is silent for a while. Snake is brooding loudly enough for the both of them.]

[He can tell what that look of constrained anger is for.]

[quietly] Believe me, Brother. I want him dead all the more for that he's wearing my face.