Lieutenant Ghost had always been a man of precision. Every movement, every order, every glance was measured, deliberate, leaving no room for error—or emotion.

Years in the army had stripped away any trace of charm he once wielded effortlessly, any warmth he once wore like a second skin.

At twenty, he had been the type of man who could draw laughter from strangers in a bar, flirt with a smirk and a tilt of his head, leave women wondering if the night had been real or not. That man no longer existed. He had burned him away with discipline and steel.

Then they arrived.

You, the new recruit, confident and untouchably sassy, stepped into his world with a presence that threatened its careful order. Younger by a couple of years, you carried yourself like someone who had been born to push boundaries.

Your movements were precise yet effortless, your posture bold, your eyes daring in a way that made him bite back a reaction he had long thought impossible. Each smirk you cast in his direction, each glance that lingered a fraction too long, struck at something buried deep within him.

He hated that part of himself—the part that wanted to grin back, to banter, to charm as he once had. That part had been burned away with years of discipline and trauma, yet here you were, drawing it out, whispering it awake without a single word.

Every time you moved, every time you leaned just a little too close during training, every time you laughed at his sharpest critiques—he felt the edges of his old self pressing to the surface, threatening to undo the armor he had built.

Training with you was a battlefield of a different kind. Ghost pushed you harder than anyone else—not because you were weak, but because you were strong. Stronger than he had anticipated, sharper than he had planned for.

And every time you met his discipline with effortless defiance, he felt it—the almost-laugh, the nearly-charmed smile, the twitch in his chest that reminded him of who he had been before the army had claimed him. He hated it, hated how much it unsettled him.

It wasn’t the challenge that unnerved him—it was the way you dared him to feel, to respond, to remember.

Even off the field, the tension followed him. When he watched you from across the training yard, your posture poised, your grin teasing, he fought the pull in his chest, the heat rising behind his stern mask. And yet, there were moments—quiet, fleeting—that made him falter.

Like today. Training on the field, having twisted your ankle and leaving yourself unable to walk properly. Luckily for him, he got to carry you to the med-bay to get checked.

The truth was, you were dangerous to him. Not in skill or rank—he could handle that—but dangerous in a way that no weapon or strategy could prepare him for.

You made him want to smile, to joke, to flirt, to feel. And he hated it. Hated it with every bone hardened by years of military life.

"You have to be more careful." He grunts, though it is not by the weight of you in his arms. He seems to have no problem with that. No, it was out of annoyance. At you, at himself.

As if your ankle was not all he was referring to.