Guess who back!? Sorry it has taken me so long to update. College and work have been a pain in my ass. And don't even get me started on writers block. Anyway, I think that's enough of an introduction for this chapter. As always, I don't own anything except my characters and their IS. Please enjoy this chapter of Infinite Stratos: Burning Star.

The ringing of a cell phone slowly caused Connor to open his eyes. With a loud groan he sat up, yawned, and answered his phone. "Hello?" He said as he yawned.

"Hope I didn't wake you up Blue." A man voice said from the other end of the line. This voice caused Connor to smirk and shake his head.

"You always did have the worst damn timing White." He said with a chuckled as he stood up.

"Yeah yeah. You near a computer?" The man, now known as White, said.

"Yeah, why?" Connor said as he walked towards the computer in the room.

"Just get on it and open up your skype." He said with a chukle.

"You do realize that software is seriously outdated right?" Connor said with a grin as he logged on to it.

"Shut up, it's a great program and it's nearly untraceable!" The man said and Connor chuckled.

"Whatever you say man." He said with a smile as he got on and saw a window pop up and clicked answer on it.

When he clicked answer on the window, four other faces popped up on the screen. The names above them identifying them as White, Black, Jade, and Yellow. A large grin crossed Connors face as he shook his head and put a hand to his face. "You guys. So, I guess you saw my little debut the other day?" HE asked his old teammates.

With a nod they all grinned. The five of them talked for nearly an hour about the times that they played games together and what all of them had been doing. Turns out, Black was now the head of IS development in his home country of Ireland. Yellow was doing some archeological digs in southern Africa and was quite happy. Jade was now married and had a kid of his own, they all promised to meet up so they could let the kid see her unofficial 'uncles'. White is still in the gaming business it turns out, but instead of playing them, he's designing them.

"Anyone her from Red?" Connor asked, hoping that the only member, besides his sister, that was close to his age was doing okay.

"Apparently Red went back to Canada to spend more time with his family. Or something like that." Jade said. "We haven't heard from him in years sadly." Jade said with a sigh.

"Dang. Well, it was fun catching up with you guys. I'll try and get back on here after school today. White don't you dare say what you're about to." He said as he saw White opening his mouth to make some sort of joke, to witch White just grumbled and logged off. This caused the rest of them to laugh.

After saying their goodbyes Black stayed on. "Hey, Connor." He said in a serious tone. Black never used real names unless it was important.

"Yeah Gen?" He asked as he stared at the screen, a bit concerned as to why Gen would use his real name.

"You've got an IS now right?" He asked and Connor nods. "Good, I'm going to be sending something your way then. Consider it a gift from old times. Should be there at the end of the day, and it should bring back some old memories." He said and logged off.

With his screen now blank Connor stood up and stretched. He then looked at the time and saw that he had thirty minutes before class. Looking over at Ichika he smiled. "Payback's a bitch dude." He whispered as he got ready for class silently and then left with Ichika still asleep. Little did he know that karma, is also a bitch.

Class

Connor sat in his room as he waited for it to start, almost everyone else had already entered the class except for Ichika. Looking at Connor, who had a small grin on his face, Houki walked over to him.

"Hey Connor, do you know where Ichika is?" She asked as the bell rang.

With a smile he held up three fingers. "Three…. Two….. One…" He said and pointed at the door as Ichika rushed in and ran to his chair.

As Ichika sat up, he looked over at Connor with an evil glare, to witch Connor only looked away and begin to whistle innocently before looking at Ichika and smiling. Houki looked between the two boys and tilted her head confused. After Ichika looked away Connor began to chuckle a bit as Miss Orimura walked in and glared at Connor.

"Care to share with the rest of the class what you find so funny Rain?" She asked him sternly and Connor immediately shut up and shook his head.

"Nope, all good here Miss Orimura." He said quickly and the rest of the class giggled a bit at that.

"Good." She says with a nod and then looks at her brother. "Ichika, care to explain to me why I saw you run into the classroom after the bell rang?" She asked him with a slight glare.

"I um….. I may have over slept a bit." He said as he shrunk into his seat to get away from her glare.

"I'll let you off for now, don't let it happen again got it." She said and he nods quickly. "Now, everyone get out your textbooks and turn to page 306 and begin reading." She said as she went behind the desk and stood there.

After a few minutes of reading Connor got bored and silently sighed to himself. "Flare? You've been awfully quiet today. You okay?" He asks his AI partner.

"Of course I'm alright. I've just been thinking." Flare said and this caused Connor to smirk.

"Thinking? You hardly ever to that." He said and Flare mentally smacked him up side the head and made Connor wince. "Okay okay, calm down sheesh. What's on your mind Flare?"

The AI sighed and took a deep breath. "I've been thinking of how thinks have taken a drastic turn here recently. Also, heads up." She said and Connor leaned his head to the left, nearly dodging a book sent at him.

Looking ahead he saw that it was his teacher and he immediately paled. After that Connor stopped talking to Flare out of fear of the eldest Orimura and what she would do to him. After sitting there reading for some time, Miss Orimura decided to give the students a break and end class early so that those in the tournament can train. Noticing class was getting dismissed Connor walked up to his teacher.

"Miss Orimura, I believe that there was supposed to be a package from the U.S. for me." He said as she stared him down.

After a good few minutes of silence she nodded. "It's down in the repair bay, follow me." She said and the two of them walked off.

Repair Bay

As the two of them walked into the repair bay he saw several crates being opened and the contents of them placed onto a near by holding rack by standard IS units. Miss Orimura then directed his attention towards a set of boxes that had just finished being emptied and their contents nearby. Taking a deep breath Connor walked towards the parts and saw his name on the crate and inwardly sighed in relief.

His eyes then caught on to two very large guns. He walked up to them while rubbing his hands together. "Does my eyes deceive me? Are these GAU-12s? No, they aren't. They're the GAU-12 Equalizer." He said in awe. "Capable of a maximum output of 4,200 rounds per minute."

He then looked over at another storage rack and ran over to it and began inspecting the weapon. "Is this a….. No way. It's a freaking M68A1 105mm rifled tank gun." His smile widened and he began to chuckle. "Oh, this is going to be fun." He then looked back. "Miss Orimura, how do I get them transferred to my IS?" He asked her.

The woman then beckoned him over and pulled out a cord from the desk she was next to. "Give me your arm." She said and held it out and she plugged the cord into his IS in its standby mode.

After a few minutes the transfer was completed and she removed the cord. He looked back at the weapons and armor that came out of the crates and he saw them vanish in a burst of particles. "That's cool." He said and nodded to his teacher. "Thank you, Miss Orimura." He said and gave her a bow before leaving the room to head to the arena to train.

Chifuyu only sighed and shook her head as the boy left. "Better go and get the nurses office ready just in case." She said and walked off.

Arena 2

Connor walked onto the filed in his IS suit and quickly summoned LoneWolf. "Ready Flare?" He asked and his AI nodded on the HUD that appeared on his machine. "Good, now initiate secondary shift!" He yelled and his IS began to glow and rise off the ground. "Hold it, we're almost there." He said as he could feel the armor beginning to change.

After a few minutes he opened his eyes and only saw black, blinking a few times his HUD finally appeared and he saw the outside of the darkness. Now while he could only see what was on his HUD, anyone from the outside of the unit could see a massive metal black and red wolf. Luckily for Connor, there was a few other people in the arena and their jaws were dropped at the sight.

"Flare? Was it successful?" He asked his AI on the comm link he shared with her.

"Yep, you're good to go Connor. Welcome to the LoneWolf's secondary shift, LoneWolf-Omega." She said and Connor grinned.

"Well then, lets go for a spin!" He said as he activated his thrusters and began to hover off the ground. "Okay, this is different. Flare, give me an outside view from one of the nearby cameras." He said and the video feed appeared on his HUD. "So, I'm a literal giant metal wolf. Alright, I can that." He said and sighed. "Let's try this one more time." He said and activated his thrusters again.

As Connor activated his thrusters once more, he actually managed to hover off the ground, without crashing to the ground, before he started to go forward. After getting used to this for a few more minutes he began flying faster. After an hour of flying, he was flying like that as if it wasn't different than how he usually flew.

"This is awesome!" He yelled as he flew around. "Now, lets check out these new weapons." He said as the tank barrel materialized on the back on the IS, a group of targets appearing at the other end of the arena and he fired the gun. When he fired it, his IS actually moved back a few feet from the blowback of the gun. When the shell the gun fired hit the ground, a large cloud of dust formed and Connor looked around. "Whoops! Had the wrong ammo equipped." He said with a chuckle.

"Alright, lets check out those other guns." He said as the cannon vanished and the two miniguns from earlier appeared on the hips of the IS, though to where they could fire in all directions. He took off running with the IS using its now four legs instead of two. The barrels of the gun began to spin up as he took off into the air and they began to mow down the targets below him as he was upside down.

After that he landed and his IS went back into storage mode. "Hell yeah!" He yelled as he pumped his fist in the air. Since he was busy celebrating his success he didn't hear someone walking up behind him.

"Good job Connor." Ichika said as he walked up behind Connor.

Connor froze and turned around to face his friend. "Hey buddy, you saw all that didn't you." He said and Ichika nods. "Well, shit."

"Don't worry man, I won't tell anyone about that crazy firepower you got now." Ichika said and Connor sighed in relief.

"Thanks man and listen, no hard feelings about this right?" He said hopefully.

"Nope, all's good." He replied with a smile.

Connor sighs in relief and pats Ichika on the shoulder. "Thanks man. I'll catch up with you later, I'm starving." And with that he left the arena, and he didn't see the evil grin Ichika had on his face.

Hallway

As Connor walked to halls he began to feel as though he was being watched. Quickly looking over his shoulder he saw no one. Scanning the hallway one more time he turned his head back around and began to walk a much faster rate. When he rounded the next corner he stopped in his tracks. In front of him, that hallway was filled with girls holding various items and not the dangerous kind. Most of them had pictures, others had posters, and some even had games in their hands.

"Fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffuck." He said as the girls noticed him.

"There he is, get him!" One of them in the back shouted and the girls began to run at him.

"Oh shit!" Connor said and began to run the way he came quickly. "Fangirls! Of course it had to be fangirls!" He cried out as he continued to run from the mob of girls.

The Boys Room

After running away from the girls for hours without stopping Connor finally made it to the room and locked the door behind. Panting he went to his bed and collapsed face first one it. He heard the door unlock and Ichika walked in.

"What's wrong man? Had a rough day?" He asked with a smug grin.

Connor rose up and looked at Ichika. "Ichika, if you don't get rid of the grin on your face, I'll get rid of it for you. And trust me, my way won't be nice." He said as he clenched his fists.

"Okay sheesh, calm down man." Ichika said as he raised his hands.

With a growl Connor laid back on his bed and sighed. "I hate fangirls so much." He groaned to himself as he closed his eyes.

"Planning on going to sleep already?" Ichika asked his friend as he looked at him.

"Yes, now go away before I toss you out the window." He said angrily as he rolled over and laid on his back.

Ichika then slowly backed out of the room and went to the cafeteria. Taking a moment to finally Connor looked at his IS in standby form. He finally got the second shift unlocked, now if only he could the one-off ability unlocked.

"Flare, any luck on the one-off ability yet?" He asked and Flare responded with a sigh.

"Even with your secondary shift unlocked, I can't seem to get access to the one-off ability. It's extremely weird because I should be able to access it." Flare said in his head.

"Are you going through the second shifts code to get to it?" He asked, figuring that she was.

"No, but that might just….. Aha! Connor you're a genius!" She exclaimed as she finally managed to get the code for the one-off ability unlocked.

"I wouldn't say that." He said humbly as he scratched his cheek with a small smile. "What does it say?" He asked her curiously.

"Let's just say, you're going to get a lot faster when you use it" She said cryptically.

"That leaves so much to the imagination Flare. Hey, see if you can do anything with that extra armor we got in those crates. I feel like the second form could be a lot stronger with more armor." He said and Flare immediately got to work on making designs and code for that.

"We are going to be a fucking powerhouse." He said to himself with a small laugh as he closed his eyes, only for them to shoot back open at the sound of his phone buzzing. Looking over at it he sighed when it was a blank number. "Hello?" He said as he answered the phone.

"Hey Blue, just checking to see if that shipment I sent got there yet." The recognizable deep voice of Black came through on the line.

"I don't know Black, been on the run from fangirls for the past three hours." He replied with a sigh.

Black laughs. "I see, well, I know how much you hate fangirls. I personally think you should just embrace the fact that there are girls out there who will follow you till you die." He said with a bit of a joking tone in his voice.

"Don't jinx me dammit." Connor said as he sat up. "Anyway, I'll go and see if the package came in. It should be in the mail office." He said and stood up.

"Actually, you might want to go to the repair bay, it's a big package." He said and hung up.

Connor looked at his phone and sighed. "What is with people and being cryptic today?" He asked no one but himself as he walked out of the room and towards the repair bay. "This better be fucking worth it." He mumbled.

Repair Bay (again)

As Connor walked into the repair bay he saw a box that wasn't there earlier and he went to it. He saw that his name was on it and opened the box. What he saw inside made him smile widely and went inside the large box and dragged out a large sword that had golden sheath on it. He then went back in came back out with a normal sized sword that was exactly like the one he had dragged out. Going over to the desk he saw Miss Orimura get the cable from, he plugged into his IS and began the transfer of the weapon. When it was done both sword disappeared, and he smiled.

"I owe you one Black." He said and left the Repair bay and headed for his room, ready to call it a night.

Boy's Dorm

As Connor walked in he quickly changed into a pair of shorts and fell onto his bed and yawned. "I'll have to get Ichika back for what he did today." He said as he yawned and closed his eyes. "Or maybe that can wait." He said softly as he drifted off to sleep.

And that ends the newest chapter of Burning Star, hope you guys don't mind a quick filler episode before stuff starts to get real.

Also, I'm hoping everyone will see some of the newest clues that I put in this chapter regarding the alias' that Connor's old gaming team uses. First five people who can message me with the correct answer gets a shout-out at the beginning of the next chapter.

Hope you all have a great day, this is CrimsonTheKing signing off for now.