Chapter I: The Serpent's Summons
In the bleeding wound of sky, a Britannian vessel—small, steel-born, sinister—carved through clouds like a knife through silk. Within its belly, a nobleman named Bartley Asprius sat sweating, his collar damp with dread, his hands trembling like autumn leaves before the storm. He was bound for judgment, summoned to stand before a prince whose very name men whispered in darkness. Prince Clovis lay cold now, bullet-blessed by the phantom called Zero, and Bartley—Bartley had left him to die.
The engines groaned, a mechanical dirge. Through the intercom, the pilot's voice crackled: "Approaching Area 12. Prepare for landing." The words fell like an executioner's pronouncement.
Bartley pressed his face against the window, watching the world below transform. What was once the Australian desert—golden, vast, eternal—had been devoured. In its place: a military maw of concrete and steel, a testing ground where weapons were birthed, and death was refined. The base sprawled like a cancer across the sand, and beyond it, where the land surrendered to the ocean's edge, stood the fortress. His fortress.
The plane descended. Touched earth. The doors hissed open like a serpent's warning.
Soldiers waited—rigid, robotic, their faces carved from stone. Among them stood a figure in black, his suit pristine, his expression predatory. Upon his chest: the emblem. Not the crowned lion of Britannia, but something older, darker—a diamond divided, four sections framing a skull, the mark of Outer Heaven stamped across his heart like a brand.
"Asprius." The bodyguard's voice was flint striking steel. "He awaits. Follow."
He awaits. He awaits. He awaits.
The words echoed in Bartley's skull as they walked through corridors that stank of oil and ozone, past barracks where soldiers trained with mechanical precision, their movements synchronized, their eyes empty. They passed laboratories—glass-walled chambers of horror where prisoners, chained and screaming, became test subjects for weapons that burned brighter than the sun. Bartley witnessed a man vaporized, saw his shadow seared onto the wall, and heard his final scream swallowed by the weapon's thunder.
Boom. Gone. Nothing left but smoke and silence.
The throne room doors loomed ahead—massive, metallic, merciless. They opened with a groan that sounded almost human, almost alive.
And there, enthroned in shadow and steel, sat Bartholomew Britannia.
The prince who called himself something else. Something savage. Something earned.
Big Boss.
He sat like a statue of war itself—eye patch covering the wound where the world had taken half his sight, his remaining eye burning cold and blue as winter ice. His uniform was military, practical, stripped of royal pretension: olive drab and combat leather, a bandana wrapped around his skull like a crown of thorns. Scars mapped his visible skin—stories written in suffering, chronicles carved in combat. He was no longer merely a prince. He was a soldier. A legend. A ghost made flesh.
"Ah, Bartley Asprius." The voice rolled forth like distant thunder, low and lethal, each syllable weighted with threat. "You must be exhausted. Your journey was long. Your conscience... longer still." He clapped once—sharp, singular, commanding. A soldier materialized, placed a chair before the throne. "Sit."
Bartley's legs nearly failed him. "T-thank you, my lord." He bowed—too deep, too desperate—and collapsed into the chair.
Big Boss rose. Circled. Predator orbiting prey.
"Tell me, Asprius," he murmured, producing a remote with practiced ease, "what did you think of my father's... performance?" He pressed a button. The screen descended—smooth, silent, inevitable. The Emperor's face filled it, grief-stricken and theatrical. "Such sorrow. Such spectacle. I saved this recording. Memories, after all, are all we have when brothers bleed, and politicians preen."
The speech played. The Emperor's voice droned platitudes.
Big Boss stopped circling. Stood behind Bartley like death itself.
"A beautiful eulogy," he whispered, venom dripping from every word. "Moving. Magnificent. He praised Clovis's vision, his virtue, his valor." His voice rose. "But he never mentioned the brother you left bleeding in the dirt!"
His boot lashed out—crack—and Bartley tumbled from the chair, sprawling across cold stone. He stared up, gasping, watching as Big Boss loomed above him, silhouetted against harsh light.
"My father knows nothing of inequality!" Big Boss roared, his voice filling the chamber like artillery fire. "He sits on his golden throne, looking down, always down, crushing those below beneath imperial boots!" He paced now, arms gesturing, his words a sermon of rage. "And because of his blindness, our enemies multiply. We give them numbers—numbers!—like cattle, like things, while ignoring their culture, their cunning, their capacity for revenge!"
He stopped. Turned. Fixed Bartley with that single, searing eye.
"Zero exists because we were arrogant. Because men like you—men like Clovis—believed superiority was birthright rather than burden." His voice dropped to a whisper, somehow more terrifying than his shout. "Now my brother has a bullet where his brain once resided. Now you kneel before me, trembling, terrified, begging without words for mercy you don't deserve."
Big Boss returned to his throne. Sat. Leaned back with fingers steepled, eye narrowed.
"Now," he said softly, dangerously, "tell me: what was Clovis doing in Shinjuku? And Asprius—look at me when I speak—if you lie, if you hesitate, if you breathe dishonestly, I will kill you. I will cut you into pieces. I will feed what remains to dogs that are more honorable than you."
Bartley's throat worked. Words struggled forth. "Y-yes, my lord! Prince Clovis... he was conducting experiments! On a test subject—a woman! She escaped! He tried to cover it up, tried to—"
"Poison gas," Big Boss interjected, almost amused. "That was his story, wasn't it? Poison gas in the ghetto." He chuckled—dark, mirthless, the sound of stones grinding. "It explains much. It explains everything." He leaned forward. "Do you have proof, Asprius? Or do you merely expect me to accept the word of a man who abandons princes to die?"
Bartley's hands fumbled, shaking, pulling photographs from inside his jacket. He thrust them upward like offerings to an angry god.
Big Boss snatched them. Studied one closely—a woman, pale, unconscious, wires trailing from her skull like mechanical veins.
Silence stretched. Seconds became centuries.
"Where," Big Boss said slowly, "is this woman now?"
"I... I don't know, my lord! We lost her in Shinjuku, but—but given time, I'm certain we can—"
The blade sang.
Shing.
It was beautiful, that sound—steel sliding from sheath, a warrior's whisper, a death song in a single note. The katana flashed silver in the harsh light, and Bartley's words dissolved into a wet gurgle. His throat opened. Blood fountained—hot, red, honest—pooling across stone like spilled wine.
He fell.
Big Boss stood over him, katana dripping crimson, his expression unchanged. Not angry. Not satisfied. Simply done.
"Guards." His voice was tired now, weary. "Remove this garbage."
Later: The War Room
The doors opened. Big Boss entered.
As one, his staff rose—soldiers, strategists, scientists—their voices unified in terrible harmony: "Hail, Big Boss!"
He acknowledged them with the slightest nod, moving past salutes and adoration toward the central display. Screens flickered with footage from Shinjuku—bodies piled like cordwood, rubble where homes had stood, civilians caught in crossfire they never deserved. Waste. All of it, waste.
"Who," he asked, voice cutting through the room's tension, "will govern Japan now?"
Japan. Not Area 11. Not some numbered territory stripped of identity and dignity. Japan—its name older than empires, more resilient than thrones.
An officer stepped forward, crisp and correct. "Princess Euphemia has been assigned administrative authority, sir. Intelligence indicates her older sister, Cornelia, will join her shortly."
Big Boss's eye closed briefly. When it opened again, something like exhaustion flickered there. "Establish communication. Both sisters. Now."
The technicians worked swiftly. Screens shifted. Static resolved into faces—two women, sisters, princesses, each beautiful in their way.
Euphemia appeared first, her face brightening instantly. "Brother! Bartholomew! It's been so long! I've been worried about you—are you well? Are you eating enough? Are—"
"Spare me." His voice was a scalpel, precise and cutting. Euphemia's smile faltered, wounded. "This isn't a social call, Euphemia. This is a strategy."
Cornelia's image solidified beside her sister's—stern, military, her expression already hardening into disapproval. She knew what was coming. She always knew.
"I'm claiming joint authority over Japan," Big Boss stated flatly, no preamble, no politics. "I believe I'm better suited to govern it than anyone our father would appoint."
Cornelia's patience shattered instantly. "Watch yourself, brother!" Her voice cracked like a whip. "Your views may differ from ours, but you're still Britannian! And stop calling it Japan—it's Area 11! That's its designation, its—"
"It's a cage," Big Boss finished coldly. "It's prison. It's a gravestone." He leaned toward the camera, his scarred face filling the screen. "I am Britannian by birth, Cornelia, not by choice. I'm part of an empire built on arrogance and sustained by subjugation, and I'll call Japan by its name—the name its people gave it, the name it earned—and I don't require your permission or approval."
Cornelia's fists clenched. Euphemia looked between them, panic rising.
"Please!" Euphemia's voice broke through their standoff. "Please, both of you, stop! Bartholomew—" She swallowed, steadied herself. "I understand what you're asking. It will take time, it will require negotiation, but—" Her face brightened with desperate hope. "What if you worked with me? Alongside me? We could collaborate, combine our strengths, and achieve something meaningful together!"
Big Boss paused. Considered. His eye narrowed thoughtfully.
"Acceptable," he said finally, and Euphemia's expression flooded with relief. Cornelia's eyes narrowed with suspicion. "But understand this clearly: any operations in Japan will be Outer Heaven operations. My methods. My soldiers. My authority." He paused, letting the words settle like ash. "And if either of you—either one—interferes with my mission..."
The silence stretched.
"I will kill you both."
Not a threat. A promise. A guarantee delivered without emotion, without hesitation, without doubt.
Cornelia's face flushed with fury. Euphemia crumbled with sorrow.
"Transmission ends." Big Boss severed the connection.
Alone in her chambers, Euphemia stood before a painting—old, treasured, irreplaceable. It depicted the royal family in happier times: children smiling, parents proud, siblings united. And there, among them, stood Bartholomew. Young. Whole. Both eyes are bright with life.
Before the wars. Before the betrayal. Before he became Big Boss.
A tear traced down her cheek, silent and silver.
"Why?" she whispered to the painted ghost of her brother. "Why do you hate us so deeply? What did we do... what did I do... to lose you?"
The painting, like the past, offered no answer.
Outside, thunder rolled across Outer Heaven's walls, and somewhere in the darkness, a soldier stood guard, and a legend sharpened his blade, and war—patient, inevitable, eternal—waited for morning.