The amount of women on base who believe they can fix Lieutenant Simon Ghost Riley could form a moderately sized construction crew.

It amazes you, honestly, how shamelessly naïve these women can be. They see a perfectly good, heavily traumatized, moderately homicidal, brick shithouse with a psychotic sparkle in his big, dead, brown eyes and they truly think...yep, I can fix that.

Not you, though. You never thought Ghost was broken; it would imply he only serves a purpose and when he can't serve that purpose he's useless until fixed. Ghost is not a menu of services to pick and choose from, what best benefits others. Ghost is not a weapon, unmaintained, and cast aside. Ghost is not a toy, he is a man, you do not put him on a shelf to collect dust just because he doesn't do what you think he should.

If anything, Ghost is shattered; not in a pathetic way like those commercials with the sad dogs: shattered like glass. Glass that is whole is just a window: transparent, empty, and only fit to serve a single purpose...Ghost is shattered glass, casting kaleidoscopic colors, having something worth breaking behind him, and dangerous. The best part about being shattered glass though...is that you can give your pieces to other shattered people...and you can stitch yourself back together with theirs...the blood stains the glass like the windows of chapels because you are the God of your temple, and the walking embodiment of resilience.

This is a truth you have always known about Ghost; so, rather than try to fix him: you have offered your pieces, bloodstained, like a sacrifice to his altar; and in return? He has decorated the halls of your temple with his own and called it home, in the late hours of night and stolen moments of peace between the chaotic missions of the Task Force 141 life...