Re: Hannibal Lecture: Otacon
The glittering blade is gone, vanished into the darkness before Hal even knows what's happening. At first, he glares at Snake with resentment smoldering in his pale, blue-grey eyes...
...then Dave says three words Otacon never would have imagined coming from his mouth.
He...he what? Needs me? No one needs me...I just get in the way, or mess things up, or...
But the force of the hands on his shoulders, the intensity in those green eyes...
He does need me. And he's not just talking about the mission either...
Hal feels profoundly stupid at that point. Not only had he nearly jeopardized their best chance at getting this place back to normal, playing right into their cybernetic tormentor's clutches...but he'd almost abandoned Snake, just like he abandoned Emma.
I want to be there for him, like I couldn't be for the others I cared about. Dad, Wolf, Emma...I'll never be able to undo what happened to you. But Dave...he just saved my life. Because I have a chance to do some real good here.
And I'll be damned if I let this man I love down.
...Where did that come from?
Yet even as Hal Emmerich ponders the consequences of his sudden, unbidden thought, he hears a thunderous commotion in the corridor to his left. The sharp report of a pair of metal boots on the metal floor, dashing alongside the clump of hard-soled leather and what sounds like someone running along the walls...and a voice, sulfurous and guttural, tossing off a thunderstorm of curses even as he approaches.