Morpho

Morpho was a helicopter pilot in the Militaires Sans Frontières, who flew one of the group's Mil Mi-24 gunships during the 1970s. He and a co-pilot were dispatched to retrieve MSF commander Big Boss, along with any VIPs and prisoners that had been rescued, from a United States prison facility in Cuba, during MSF's operations there.

On December 7, 1974, Morpho was dispatched to retrieve an MSF Intel Team agent that requested emergency extraction. He attempted to hail the agent, although the agent did not respond. Eventually, the agent hailed the chopper. After Morpho was given the go-ahead by the MSF deputy commander Kazuhira Miller, he attempted to make contact with the agent. However, static interference with the communications resulted in Morpho being unable to decipher the agent's location. He eventually followed the trail from a flare to the agent's location, with Big Boss covering the chopper from the base personnel. After clearing out any enemy resistance in the way of the agent, Morpho proceeded to escort the agent, who had hijacked a jeep, to the heliport. However, the jeep ended up hit with a portable missile, forcing him to land so Big Boss could recover the agent and place him on board the chopper. He was later forced to ascend into the air when an APC burst into the helipad, as the APC would have destroyed the chopper otherwise. After both Big Boss and the agent were secure aboard the chopper, Morpho then left, with Big Boss also taking care of a Blackhawk chopper that was pursuing them. He then proceeded to return to base.

On January 9, 1975, Morpho extracted Big Boss from the base after it became apparent that the base was going to be bombed by two unidentified aircraft, rescuing him just in time.

On March 16, 1975, Morpho was assigned to recover Big Boss, Chico and Paz from the base in Cuba, once the former had rescued the latter two. After recovering them, Morpho then headed back to Mother Base, but was unable to make contact due to the base having fallen under heavy attack by the military group XOF. With Big Boss's help, he then extracted Miller and another surviving MSF soldier, before one of the struts collapsed due to C4 being rigged on its legs. Morpho then lost control of the Hind, when a bomb planted inside Paz's body detonated outside the cabin, causing it to collide with an XOF chopper in mid-flight.

Behind the scenes
Morpho is the callsign used by the MSF helicopter pilot in Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes. If Morpho's chopper is shot down, his role is replaced by an identical pilot of the same name and voice, making it unclear whether he is a unique character, or one of many. As such, it is also unclear whether the Morpho that will return in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, as revealed in the E3 2014 demo, is the same character who fell victim to the helicopter crash in the ending of Ground Zeroes. For now, this article assumes that Morpho is a single character.

Morpho was first identified in the TGS Daytime demo, as well as two later gameplay videos posted by the Spanish video gaming site Hobby Consolas. The first was nearing the end, where they show the player what happens when a player shoots down one of their own choppers in friendly fire. The second was midway through, where they show Big Boss delivering a prisoner to the chopper.

If the player has Morpho perform an attack run on the base in "Destroy the Anti-Air Emplacements," just as Miller reports the incoming aircraft attack, Morpho will break off and demand that the player hurry and board to escape.

Appearances

 * Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes