Ghost Prototype IS
Disclaimer: I do not own Halo or IS Infinite Stratos
Chapter 3: A Day with a Bunny
Ghost yawned as he woke up quite early once again as it was common for a solider like him to wake up earlier due to being sent on missions for the UNSC. He could also wake up in the case of an enemy as well as he could be a light sleeper if he was on the field, during war, enemy territory, etc.
In a safe location with no war going on and no threat of death looming over at any second allowed him to sleep a bit more peacefully and not wake up to the sound of something falling over or something else.
After Tabane showed him around her 'Super-Secret Hidden Base' and of course his room despite her wanting to have a sleepover in her room which he politely declined…for now as she was pretty persistent in having one, he stretched and started walking to the kitchen.
The scientist's hideaway had many rooms and was pretty big, there was a few guests room which were pretty bland but now that Tabane had a guest living here with her who didn't really care for her information or secrets on her technology was pretty happy and allowed him to decorate it if he wanted to or she could help with it.
Ghost was currently wearing long black pants and a long sleeved black shirt, he kind of felt naked when he wasn't wearing his marine uniform and armour as well as not having his gun. Apparently Tabane had some male clothes just his size on her, Ghost briefly wondered why she had guy clothes and it was either a just in case of male guest scenarios or she had made them herself without him knowing.
It was very hard to tell with that woman.
Ghost passed Tabane's room which the door was slightly open for him to see into which he didn't really seem interested in looking in. He was brought to her room before and it was bunny themed and a combination of blue and pink colours with of course white rabbits.
It was quite cute and definitely suited her but also didn't due to her age depending on who you ask. While her age was a bit too old for the room's theme, Ghost had to admit it suited her very well. Speaking of the genius herself she was wearing a white bunny onesie with a hood and rabbit ears as she slept, it made her look very cute.
Ghost decided to close the door as he moved on and with closing the door he did have a look inside despite having no real interest. Privacy was important.
Ghost entered the kitchen and made a bee line for the coffee machine. He grabbed himself a mug and proceeded to make himself a cup of coffee. Tabane did say he was free to help himself to nearly everything, the only things she didn't allow him to help himself to where the things he had no interest in, which caused her to pout knowing that he had no interest in them.
She was given the same thing with his prototype armour when they first met at the small little island. She was free to add those upgrades and have a look and compare it (if she wished) but not to dig into the files within the suit.
Ghost pulled out a seat as he grabbed his cup of coffee and sat at the table, he took a sip of the mug as he noticed a newspaper on the table, this was one of the newspapers Tabane had collected and he wondered if she was a hoarder of them as she told him she had quite a few of them for him to read but then again if you couldn't go out in public without the world wanting you for your secrets on the very same invention you made then buying books would be pretty hard to do.
"Male IS pilot?" He read out loud as he took another sip. "So this is the person Tabane was talking about"
Ghost was welled informed of this Ichika person as he was the younger brother of his female counterpart. He was brought up to date with the dates and times after being in a different dimension and in space for so long before, Tabane had a lot of stories to tell.
Chifuyu, Ichika, Houki, these were the main people she really told him about the most before going off into her own little world. The date of the paper wasn't new nor was it too old put he read it anyway.
Tabane really helped him a lot with his adjustment in only a day and he was truly thankful to her. Ghost stood up and walked over to the toaster and prepared some breakfast, his stomach couldn't only be fuelled with coffee.
He didn't really need to eat a lot due to being a soldier as meals could be limited at times due to numbers of people that needed to eat, in the field or back at base, how much food there was for sometimes small or medium portions and etc.
As Ghost waited patiently for his toast, he drank his coffee and read the paper. Ghost looked up not only at the sound of his toast popping up but at the sight of Tabane walking into the kitchen wearing her bunny onesie.
"Good morning" Ghost greeted as he took another sip.
"Good morning Ghosty~" Tabane waved in her onesie making her look even more adorable in it.
She was very cheery this morning it seems. "You seem to be in a good mood" He said as he buttered his toast.
"Hm hm" She hummed in agreement. "It's a shame we couldn't stay up late and talk and have a sleepover"
She was really keen on that sleepover. "Wouldn't I being here for a night count as a sleepover?"
"Nope, you have to be in the same room and tell stories and talk about stuff and stuff like that~" She said.
Ghost started to eat his toast as he sat back down as Tabane seemingly bounced around the room to get her own breakfast. No matter what she did in that bunny onesie pyjama made her look cute as a bunny.
"So what are we going to do today Ghosty?"
"I thought you had something…and my existence here…"
"Oh yeah, stay here" Tabane said before cutely waddling over to the door and leaving for a brief second. Once she returned she handed Ghost some documents and a license. "You official have some background in this world Ghosty~"
"Thank you Ta-chan" Ghost said but was then hugged by Tabane, the hug was a bit to strong but at the same time very soft probably due to fabric of her onesie.
"You called me by my nickname~" Tabane said happily.
"You told me to call you that" Ghost said a little confused.
"I thought you may have forgotten or refused to call me that again but since you did you are much nicer than Chi-chan!" Tabane said. "But you are still the same though…"
"Doesn't your sister call you that?"
"She used to when we were little by now she doesn't" Tabane said looking sad in her bunny onesie before brightening up. "But you called me that so it's all good!"
Ghost then looked down at the papers. "You got everything down, career as a former soldier" Ghost said a she read the papers and looked at the license. "I should thank you again for this"
"No then to thank the great Tabane~" Tabane said as she tried to sneakily steal one of Ghost's piece of toast. However the genius was so smart she got caught and while retreating was given said toast from Ghost.
The license was based on his UNSC ID Card and even then said Ghost. The UNSC ID card had the UNSCDF symbol in the top left corner with the service number beneath it and a headshot photo next to it, a signature and affiliation under it with a name and authorized patronage under that. Next to the headshot picture were the expiration date, personnel service/status, personnel rank/pay grade, date of birth and blood type.
The license or rather licenses he was given now that he noticed how many were bundled together looked more like the normal licenses used by civilians. Car, boat, plane, helicopter and many other vehicles that he could drive were put down on these licenses he could get.
The information on his UNSC ID were put on both the license and the documents in his hands such as his birth certificate with his birth name being classified and parentage classified and other things that were classified.
Tabane put a lot of work into this to make it so he existed here however the year had to be changed but it looked real and that was what was important.
It did have his soldier career on it as well as having a new job under it or rather new jobs. IS Core Engineer Assistant, Scientist Assistant, Right Hand Man of Tabane Shinonono, Bodyguard, Prototype Tester/Pilot, IS Pilot, Combat and Weaponry Specialist, Security/Head of Security, and the list went on with creating weapons, defence systems and what not even programming with some of them under skills and a part of his previous soldier career as a marine and the different branches he had been under.
"This…is too much…" Ghost said as he started putting them all back into the folder she handed him.
"Huh?"
"I'm not a genius like you I'm a solider" He said. "Sure I can assist you but some of the later ones one this list, that you made more pages for, I cannot do. I can do the bodyguard, security and use my suit but the others are not going to work"
He placed the folder down as he drank his coffee while Tabane was nibbling on the piece of toast e gave her. "Plus then there is the fact you put me down as the prototype tester which I understand as you said that I would have done it and helped with some other IS but putting me as your right hand man? Wouldn't that just make me the second most wanted person in the world?"
"Oh…I never thought of that" She admitted. "But we I did say that you are the prototype tester and helped with some others, so it had to be expected as you to be my right hand man"
"Oh and don't worry about the other stuff" She said. "I'll teach you everything you need to know and soon you'll be able to do that stuff and be smart like me~"
Tabane's eyes then widened quickly after saying that as she waved her arms frantically. "N-Not that you're not smart already" She said. "Just IS smart"
"I understood what you meant" Ghost said before he decided to mess with her as he placed a hand over his heart. "But you really hurt my feelings Ta-chan but I guess I should call you Shinonono now…"
"No, no, no, no, no!" She repeated. "I'm sowwy! Please forgive me!"
"Hmm" Ghost crossed his arms as he looked away. "…Alright"
"Yay" She said as she pretty much pounced him from other the table, luckily he had already put his coffee down or else it would have poured all other them. Tabane rubbed her cheek against his. "Thanks for forgiving me Ghosty~"
Ghost then decided to pat her head. "Its fine" He said even though his facial expression didn't change.
"Hey you did engineering and vehicles in the UNSC right?" She asked as she sat up.
"That's right, I did work and repair on some of the vehicles there" It was true as he was in the Hades Corp of the UNSC Corps of Engineers. However the Engineering Corps was mainly devoted to surveying viable planets for colonization or terraforming.
Engineers visit these planets and make field reports documenting the planet's features, suitability for colonization and other details for colonization. However they were still engineers and did fix up some vehicles.
"Then you should catch up to speed right away!"
Ghost then remembered how much 'jobs' and 'skills' were on that list and how much he needed to learn or catch up to speed with. Some things on the list were fine and he should be okay with some of them but he was a soldier through and through and duties of a soldier would clearly be shown during Tabane's IS knowledge session.
Most of the stuff was mainly IS related so it would be killing two birds with one stone as he would learn about these IS machines and also learn the knowledge that Tabane knew of her creations. She still pouted as he showed he didn't really care about learning her secrets or her IS creations.
But she was still a persistent girl who wanted him to learn and help him become human.
"Hmm Ta-chan"
"Yes Ghosty-kun?"
"Can you get off me please?"
"Sorry~" She replied as she got off the former UNSC marine.
Soon after they ate breakfast with Tabane being a little too lazy to make her own, they soon got dressed as Ghost was now following behind Tabane.
Ghost instead of being dressed in his UNSC marine uniform was wearing a pair of military grade black boots, a sleeveless black shirt and dark green coloured long pants.
It had been some time since Ghost wore clothes like this and he once again wondered where she got these clothes. From now he would become a human who was once a ghost. He would live a civilian life outside of the war with the covenant.
Ghost's mind wandered back to a time before he became known as Ghost.
Flashback
A younger Ghost was next to an older man with a short beard as they were on a shuttle heading back to a Halberd-class destroyer spaceship.
The bearded man looked at the stars as he started to talk to Ghost. "Private" The man said in a gruff tone.
"Yes Sergeant?" The younger future Ghost asked.
"You know that I'm retiring soon right?" He asked. "My body is getting to old and my moves are getting quite sluggish"
"Yes sir, I know"
"…I just want to tell you that when you retire, enjoy it while it lasts, every single second"
Ghost raised an eyebrow at what the sergeant was saying. "What do you mean?"
"…" The sergeant stayed silent for a while as he watched the stars. "When you've been fighting for a long time in war as a soldier it gets harder to fit in with a normal day to day life as a civilian. The life of a soldier stays with you until eventually you'll go back into the military after seeing things in today's society as potential harms and threats"
"…Sir?"
The older man looked away from the stars and looked at the younger Ghost. "I know this to well, this isn't the first time I retired from a military force" He said. "I started to thing parcels and garbage bags as bombs even though I knew they weren't my brain couldn't trust them"
"I'm a soldier through and through and even in society it shows and I came back, I was too used to the life style of a soldier" He said. "…One day it might happen to you and I hope it doesn't private"
The man returned to looking at space. "…I just hope that this time…I'll be able to grow back into a civilian lifestyle…"
The younger Ghost sat in silence as he looked down at his own hands and in a whisper he replied, mainly to himself. "…I hope it doesn't either sir…but I'm afraid it will happen regardless…"
Flashback End
The now former Sergeant clenched his fists, the sergeant when he was a private was right. A soldier through and through, Ghost knew that he would have trouble fitting back into society and would probably go back into the military if he didn't grow back into society.
He just hoped he will regrow accustomed to the life of a civilian but the chances weren't that high or low either. Okay they were probably low but he had some hope as he then glanced at Tabane, she would probably be the reason for him to regrow accustom to this life and be human, she helped him this far and she didn't seem like the type or person not to help.
Ghost was glad that he had meet Tabane, this carefree happy girl would be the one to help him and in return he would be her 'assistant' in a way.
Soon the two came before a room. "We're here!" Tabane said. "Welcome to the lab Ghosty~"
Ghost had to admit this lab looked really professional. "And what are we doing here?"
Tabane just smiled. "We are going to make your Prototype Powered Exoskeleton portable!"
I might add Clarissa to the pairing as well seeing as they are both soldiers and in military roles. I hope you enjoyed this chapter (even though it's been a while) and I do think Clarissa would fit well with Ghost so there might be some interactions with each other in the future.