Gene

Gene, also known as Viper, was a member of the CIA special forces unit FOX during the takeover on the San Hieronymo Peninsula.

Early life and career
Sometime after 1964, Gene joined the FOX unit where he received the "Viper" codename. In his career, he had studied political science outside of the military as well as being a rather prominent medical doctor. In one mission, Viper rescued Dr. Nikolai Sokolov from Russia and reunited him with his family. In another mission during 1966, Viper rescued a psychic East German girl from a research laboratory who had developed a split personality as a result of having her powers artificially augmented. Gene later served as the girl's mentor, teaching "Elisa" her skills in medicine and chemistry while training "Ursula" as a soldier. Some time later, Gene underwent experimentation during the Successor Project to create the "ultimate battlefield commander" modelled after The Boss and was given superhuman abilities as a result. He eventually subverted Major Zero's authority and established his own. During this time, Gene developed CQC Enhancer, an enhanced and destructive form of CQC. While he served as a FOX operative, Gene discovered the identity of the man who was behind The Boss's death.

In 1970, Gene usurped command of the FOX unit and led the takeover of a Soviet missile base on the San Hieronymo Peninsula, Colombia. He also framed former FOX operative Big Boss (Naked Snake) for instigating the rebellion due to his skills heavily resembling Snake's. Gene and Ursula accompanied Lt. Cunningham while they searched the peninsula for Snake and Roy Campbell on board a Hind A gunship. Afterwards, they arrived at the research lab, where Ursula and Gene both successfully predicted that sections of a scaffolding were about to collapse, and warning Cunningham to remain still. Afterwards, when a soldier apologized for the accident, he forgave the soldier, and then demonstrated his hypnotic speech ability to the rest of the gathered soldiers. He himself apologized for making the work seem more important than the soldiers' well-being, and promised that the days when soldiers were used as political tools would be ended.

After Snake was again captured, Gene remarked that intel extracted by physical torture is unreliable, and questioned Cunningham's abilities as an interrogation specialist. When Cunningham suggested that he use truth serum, he mentioned that it wasn't reliable since Snake was a former FOX agent. He ultimately let Cunningham prepare the truth serum, but under the condition that he would speak to Snake first. He explained to Snake, who was awake throughout the whole conversation, that the entire "rebellion" was actually staged by the CIA in order to prolong the Cold War.

Shortly thereafter, Gene had a telephone conversation with his conspirator Ocelot as well as reporting the success of his negotiations with the Kremlin in order to ensure they don't interfere with their plan. After the call, Gene stopped Null's rampage, using his inhumanly fast reflexes and ESP abilities.

After Snake was rescued by his allies and Elisa, Gene anticipated that Snake and his allies would learn from Elisa where Metal Gear was located and would try to destroy it. He then secretly replaced the Metal Gear with Metal Gear RAXA as a decoy at the assembly plant. As Snake infiltrated the facility, Gene arrived with a large platoon of his soldiers, accompanied by Hind A helicopters, in order to apprehend him. However, an event that not even Gene anticipated occurred where Colonel Skowronski hijacked RAXA. When Snake held Gene at gunpoint, Gene then unleashed his true trump card of awakening Ursula (the twin personality of Elisa). Gene had Ursula commandeer RAXA using her powerful psychokinesis, and giving it abilities far beyond its potential. After Snake destroyed RAXA, Gene commented Snake for his effort and saw why Ocelot respected Snake. But the battle still bought more than enough time for Gene's men to finish loading the real Metal Gear with nuclear weapons and transport it out of the plant to the missile silo. He also discovered that the person leaking information to Snake's resistance about Metal Gear was actually Sokolov, something that surprised even him. Then, Gene gave another one of his suggestive speeches, inspiring fear in both his and Big Boss's soldiers, causing a mass riot that resulted in many casualties, including Jonathan's death. Gene then left for the missile silo.

When Snake eventually confronted Gene, Gene revealed that not only was he aware of Cunningham's betrayal, but that he had actually planned to launch Metal Gear into Virginia, USA (aka the American Philosophers' "twin lairs") instead of Russia as the Russian Philosophers had previously believed. Since he had deduced that the Red Army would be negotiating with the DoD and that no war would commence should he launch at Russia, an attack on America would convince the international community that the Soviets had fired on America, causing the Warsaw Pact to crumble and possibly enter into armed conflict with NATO. Gene then revealed his Army's Heaven concept for soldiers but Big Boss countered by saying that Gene was a dictator and that soldiers were looking for somewhere outside Gene's heaven. He then taunted Snake with information regarding a deviously cunning strategist that orchestrated The Boss's death six years earlier.

Elisa and Ursula, revealing her survival of RAXA's destruction, destroyed the launch control panel and attempted to stop Gene's plans. However, Gene, with his much quicker physical abilities, murdered her, exemplifying his hypocritical, two-faced nature and proceeded to launch the nuclear missile via a backup launch control room. This resulted in a fight to the death with Snake to determine who the true successor of The Boss was. During the battle, Gene attempted to use his powers of suggestion to break Snake's will, even quoting one of The Boss's statements to Snake from six years earlier, but was ultimately unable to subdue him. Snake eventually triumphed, forcing Gene to admit that Big Boss was indeed the true successor after all, and that "soldier genes" may have played a part. On his deathbed, he relinquished the funds and resources he had amassed for Army's Heaven to Snake. His last words were reminiscent of those given by The Boss, and he pleaded with Snake to go find his calling.

After death
After the events of San Hieronymo, Ocelot and "the man with the same codename as Null" had intended for Gene to only point Metal Gear towards Langley to lure the DCI with the Philosophers' "documents" over to Ocelot. However, they were unaware that Gene was serious about launching Metal Gear.

Personality and abilities
Gene's intense charisma gave him the power to win people's hearts and minds. His voice was given a special manipulative mind-altering power where he feigned loyalty and strength to those who followed him but secretly despised the human race in general, exhibiting qualities of deeply pathological, tyrannical behavior. Despite this, however, he reacted with some surprise when Snake pointed out that his viewpoints make him nothing more than a dictator. During Gene's speech-making, he could swell up loyalty and powerful, trusting emotions in his soldiers, but also used it to instill fear in mobs and cause riots to break out, laughing cruelly while his men killed each other as he did so. Gene also used his gifted voice to release Elisa's dark and powerful second personality, Ursula. His charisma and-speech making was also powerful enough to subvert even soldiers of the highest morale to his command. In addition, Gene genuinely believed that the point of people's existence was to sacrifice their free will and even their own lives for a cause and a higher belief or being, and implied that The Boss's sacrifice, and especially her allegedly being deliberately set up to die, was instrumental in his belief.

There were hints that Gene had a deep amount of respect for Naked Snake, as he was impressed by the fact that Snake managed to remain conscious after enduring Cunningham's torture, as well as instilling Null with strong emotions. Some statements during the final battle seemed to imply that he also wanted to have a challenging fight against Snake.

Genes reflexes were said to be even faster than the Perfect Soldier Null, due to being a product of the Successor Project, along with his abilities of ESP. This was because the project of which Gene was the byproduct, the Successor Project, was intended to lead those supersoldiers created as part of the Perfect Soldier Project, of which Null was a byproduct. His enhanced speed was also fast enough to evade bullets from a high-powered gun while making it seem as though he was standing still, as evidenced when Colonel Skowronski tried to kill Gene with RAXA's gatling gun only to hit some of the soldiers. He also seemed to possess some limited telekinesis that gave him the power to defeat Null with a single direct mental blast. Furthermore, Gene was also a master of "Zero Shift", an ability much like teleportation, which allowed him to kill Elisa and Ursula before she had a chance to react. He also used this ability during his battle with Big Boss, though employing the technique too often left him physically exhausted, giving Snake an opening in which to defeat him. He is also capable of generating mental shielding powerful enough to render even Ursula incapable of reading his mind/predicting his next move, removing it only when he believed that Ursula died in her battle against Snake. He presumably did this to ensure that Ursula didn't rebel against him so he wouldn't have to kill her.

In combination with his supernatural speed and reflexes, Gene was also extremely skilled with knife throwing and knife fighting in general. Beneath his military coat, the would-be-dicatator hid a large amount of finely sharpened knives which he could throw with deadly accuracy, his aim being so perfect that he could even incapacitate the superhumanly fast Perfect Soldier by impaling his hands and limbs. Gene's reflexes were so finely tuned that he was able to throw his knives with the rapidness of a machine gun, enabling him to tear even a well armored foe apart in seconds.

Behind the scenes
Gene serves as the main antagonist of Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. His character shares many similarities to that which Big Boss would become in the original Metal Gear games; a charismatic leader attempting to establish a nation of soldiers in opposition to the current world order, who even wears the same style of trench coat associated with the older incarnation of Big Boss. Gene's reference to himself and Big Boss as "like brothers" also mirrors the relationship between Solid Snake and Liquid Snake in Metal Gear Solid. While other members of FOX have unique colors on their Sneaking Suits in Portable Ops, Gene's own is not revealed due to his wearing of the trench coat.

It is possible that through the "Successor Project", Gene was a predecessor to the Genome Soldiers and Les Enfants Terribles. On a slightly related note, Gene's English voice actor (Steven Blum) also voiced some of the Genome Soldiers in Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes.

Gene's "Zero Shift" ability is a reference to that of the same name used by the Orbital Frame Jehuty from Zone of the Enders, another game produced by Hideo Kojima. Like the one used by Gene, the process of charging the attack before teleporting in front of an enemy is the same as the one used by Jehuty.

Portable Ops recruitment
Gene can be unlocked as a playable character by not only defeating him non-lethally, but by also recruiting over 200 soldiers within the same save file. However, the 200 recruits can be accumulated through multiple playthroughs. A soldier is officially recruited in this context after they make it past the prisoner stage, and then can be discharged at any point. In the EU version of Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, Gene can only be unlocked by completing the Boss Rush mode. A radio call to Sigint will allude to the method of unlocking Gene.

Gene comes equipped with a Bowie Knife; it is more powerful than a regular knife, swipes more times in succession, is not CQC compatible and 3 are thrown when the lockon button is held.

"Member of the CIA Special Forces unit FOX, he combines superior combat and tactical capabilities with an intense aura of charismatic leadership. The mastermind behind the San Hieronymo rebellion, he assumed the role of the heart of FOX after Snake quit the unit."

- Official description in Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops Plus

Appearances

 * Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops
 * Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops Plus (non-canon)
 * Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (flashbacks)