I do not own Ghost in the Shell or any of its characters.
A.N.: I've watched the original movie and Innocence and am working my way through the manga. Never watched the series or any of the other OVAs and such. Please bear with me.
Run of the Mill
Cane crouched down, tugging his visor down and watching the scene before him. Most of the others were dealing with other jobs, leaving him to have to deal with this problem on his own. He sighed. He hated solo work. It was boring when there was no one there to talk to.
Below him, several different criminals were gathered, the heads of the two small-time gangs negotiating the price of an experimental new hacking software. It was a dud, of course, as Can had personally designed it and lacked any form of knowledge or skill in hacking, but as he sat there, the audio system in his visor recorded them discussing the intended target, the Chief of Section Nine, Cane's commander, Aramaki.
"You hearing this, Chief?" Cane asked, using what he personally, and uniquely within Section Nine, referred to as telepathy.
Unlike the rest of the world, he was terrible with terminology and remembering how things worked. He knew that he could project his voice and thoughts to the others by focusing on one or more of them, and that it worked like telepathy in old manga. So, that was what he called it. The world may have progressed until basically all of humanity were partly machines, but he was terrible with technical words and numbers, so he used terms that were much easier to explain without adding a manufacturing number to it.
"I hear it," Aramaki responded in kind. "We have enough. You're cleared to engage."
Cane nodded and silently picked up his rifle. Thirty-two targets. He focused, feeling his one other cybernetic augmentation, a cybernetic Adrenal Gland, activate, flooding his system with adrenaline, and dropped off of the ledge, opening fire in short bursts. Thirty-one. Thirty. Twenty-nine. As he hit the ground and rolled to disperse his momentum, the returning fire struck three in friendly fire. Twenty-six. He rolled to his feet next to a steel table and used his adrenaline-augmented strength to hurl it into the air, hurling a grenade past it as it blocked bullets for him. He stepped out, firing quickly. Twenty-five. Twenty-four. Twenty-three. The grenade exploded in the center of a group just as someone was about to throw it back. Fifteen. He dove to the side, avoiding several shots and rolling back to his feet behind a pillar. The criminals began to reload, and he stepped out, firing again. Fourteen, thirteen, twelve. His rifle ran dry, and he dropped it, drawing a pair of pistols. Ten. Eight. Nine. Seven. A criminal pulled the pin on a grenade, and Cane shot him. Six. The grenade exploded. Four. Three. Two. He stepped into cover, checking his magazines. Two shots a piece. Bullets slammed into the pillar he was standing behind as he felt his adrenaline begin to run thin. He'd only used a small burst, so it was to be expected, but he'd hoped it would last longer.
"Should have gone for a bigger dose," Cane said.
As the bullets stopped, he stepped out, firing the two bullets in his left gun into one of the two remaining criminal's chest and head. The others stepped out of a gap between storage containers to his right, knocking the other pistol out of his hand. Cane spun. He had just enough adrenaline left. The criminal threw a punch, and Cane swatted it aside, then drilled the webbing between his thumb and index finger into the man's Adam's Apple. The man crumpled. Cane picked up the man's own gun off the ground and fired into the man's face, then tossed it aside. He quickly collected his own guns, then left the warehouse through the back, grabbing the trench coat filled with cloaking tech he'd stashed there and pulling it on, vanishing from sight seconds before police arrived to surround the warehouse, Cane escaping the perimeter by inches and leaving the scene. He walked a few blocks before taking off the trench coat before climbing into his car, tossing the coat into the back seat. Then, he headed back to headquarters to file his report.
Kusanagi watched their destination in silence. As was more usual than Cane's solo op before, Cane was paired with Major Motoko Kusanagi for this one. She was a fully cybernetic member of their section, and their most effective member. On most missions, she was paired with Cane, because despite his very few augments, his ability to control his Adrenal Gland made him a skilled combatant, at least for a maximum of fourteen minutes, and therefore one of the most compatible with her.
"It's time," Kusanagi said.
"Right," Cane nodded. "Shall we?"
Kusanagi nodded, and Cane drove down the street to their destination, a factory for cybernetic bodies and parts. Their job was less mission than chore, as they were simply there to ensure the first fully cybernetic body they made for someone actually included that person's ghost, and it was more of a check-in-the-box assignment anyway, but they were still told to do it.
"Hello!" the blonde doctor overseeing the process greeted them. "You two must be the ones sent to check on our work!"
"That's right," Kusanagi nodded.
"Right this way!" the doctor said brightly, eyeing Kusanagi's body before walking away.
Cane smirked internally, though remained outwardly stoic. He couldn't blame her for finding Kusanagi attractive. Kusanagi's body had been exceptionally well-made, and there wasn't a single person in their division that didn't find Kusanagi attractive. However, Kusanagi had a policy of never mixing business with pleasure, and as such, Cane had never been able to take her to dinner or make any kind of attempt at moving past being her friend. He refocused on the present as the doctor was explaining the process of making a cybernetic body, performing each step as she explained it. Cane understood why they needed to be here for the assembly and the awakening process, but he still hated this mission. It was boring. One of the downsides of controlling his Adrenaline was that Adrenaline was addictive. He needed more excitement than just this. Than just watching a body being assembled. Besides the fact that he got confused and lost track of what was being explained every time the doctor used an acronym, said a specific piece of technology, and when she named half of the processes she was doing.
"Hey," Kusanagi said, Cane having stopped bothering to try and listen a while ago. "We're leaving. We have to be back in thirty-two hours."
Cane nodded. "What are we going to do until then?"
Kusanagi shrugged. "Let's go get something to eat. We'll figure it out from there."
Can nodded and they headed out to his car. "Why do they insist on putting me on assignments where everyone's talking about very technical things?"
"She was literally using the simplest words possible," Kusanagi said. "Micromachines, Sensory Element Film, Nerve Net Terminals."
"You lost me," Cane said. "See, this is why I call our brain communications thing telepathy."
Kusanagi rolled her eyes but smiled. "You're hopeless, Cane. Under normal circumstances I could chalk it up to you being American and not understanding the words, but you're bilingual between English and Japanese, so you don't even have that excuse."
"Former American," Cane corrected her.
"Yes, I know," Kusanagi said. "How did you get into paramilitary security, anyway?"
"Strong connections in all the wrong places," Cane said. "Thank you again for recruiting me into Section Nine."
Kusanagi shrugged. "You were skilled, useful, and mostly human, so you'll react differently than those of us with more extensive augmentation, and then you'll also act differently than Togusa, on account of your Fight-or-Flight response being completely controlled."
"Not completely," Cane said. "I still have Fight-or-Flight instincts, I can just control the Adrenaline the instincts would otherwise tell my adrenal gland to release."
Kusanagi waved him off. "Same thing."
"Not really," Cane said. "If I didn't have any Fight-or-Flight instincts, I wouldn't be capable of feeling fear, and without fear, I wouldn't be able to differentiate whether something is a threat or not, and then I would be useless in a fight, because nothing would appear as a threat."
Kusanagi smirked. "You can understand all of that, and reason it out, but you can't understand what Sensory Element Film is?"
"Hey, what I said was basic psychology and physiology," Cane said.
"Two of the more advanced branches of biological science," Kusanagi said.
"Humans are easy," Cane shrugged. "In the end, what a human will or won't do boils down to basic instincts and stimuli, and how much those affect them boils down to their personality type. Once you know their personality type, you can make someone do whatever you want. It wasn't for nothing that my private security organization was on several country's watch list."
Kusanagi nodded. "When it comes to flesh-and-blood humans, you're a pro. As long as there's no cyberbrain involved, you can make them do almost anything."
"Even with a cyberbrain, most people are still the same," Cane said. "At base, anyone with a ghost is still human, and therefore is still susceptible to old-fashioned brainwashing and manipulation. If anyone cared to study old-fashioned methods, things like cyberbrain-hacks, while faster, wouldn't be necessary."
Kusanagi laughed. "You're too much of a pro at old-fashioned manipulation for your own good. If I ever find out you've been manipulating me, I'm killing you."
Cane chuckled. "I'd never manipulate you, Motoko."
Kusanagi smiled over at him at his use of her first name, something which not even Batou, her other best friend, was allowed to do. After a few minutes, they'd chosen a restaurant by the water and were seated, eating their food in silence.
"I've been thinking recently," Kusanagi said.
"Uh-oh," Cane said. "How much of your cyberbrain did you fry?"
Kusanagi kicked him under the table, grinning. "Shut up and listen."
"Yes, ma'am," Cane said, throwing up a mock-salute.
Kusanagi rolled her eyes. "Anyway, I was thinking that, how do I really know I'm me? What even makes me 'me'? Like, I've been told I still have bits of my old brain, but what if that's a lie, and I'm just a very high-tech robot? I mean, I'm treated as human, and I'm told I have bits of my old brain, and I have memories, but what if my memories are false, and I don't have a brain? People would just be treating me like I'm human over a misunderstanding. And yet, it's people treating me like I'm human that makes me feel human."
"You know what I think?" Cane asked.
"I'm sure you're going to tell me," Kusanagi smirked.
Cane shared her smirk. "I think that you're you because you choose to be. Regardless of your retention of your old brain, or lack there-of, you're still you, because that's your choice."
"This from the guy who says everything boils down to stimuli and a personality type?" Kusanagi smirked.
"You're the only person I've never been able to get an accurate read on, Motoko," Cane said. "You're special."
Kusanagi's smirk curled into a small, albeit genuine, smile. "Special, huh?"
"Yes," Cane nodded. "You're one of the strongest people I've ever met, but you have different personalities that you wear as masks dependent on your company and what you're doing. I've been trying to catch a glimpse of the face behind those masks, but it's hard with you."
"It sounds like you're trying to dive in and touch my ghost," Kusanagi said.
"Nothing so invasive, of your body, your mind, or your privacy," Cane said. "Just trying to learn your personality type."
Kusanagi smiled at her glass before drinking it. "Maybe someday, I'll let you." She stood, leaving money on the table for the meal. "Come on."
Cane nodded, also leaving money on the table before they left the restaurant, Kusanagi driving this time. After a while later, they reached a small scenic viewing area and sat on the bench together to watch the sunset. Cane remained silent, staring at the horizon and wishing it was as much a date as it felt like.
Leave a review.