Infinite Stratos: Ichika Quest – Fuck Status Quo is an Infinite Stratos fanfiction.
What happens if a jackass ROB and fellow Spacebattlers took care of Ichika's action? This result in total trainwreck that is Ichika Quest. Played like a Text RPG combined with Visual Novel and Dating Sim elements (presented like Mass Effect interruptions), the game become a total chaos in itself by repeatedly poking fun at canon, despite following The Stations of the Canon.
You can find the main discussion thread, and the compiled story thread online. It's not an epic tale like that of Strike Witches Quest but still a fun thing to waste time with.
Has a spinoff (Sidestory) featuring Ichika's clone adventure with main members of the Philantrophy.
Infinite Stratos: Ichika Quest – Fuck Status Quo provides examples of the following tropes:
- Ace Custom: Reed and Zin ride customized, Black and White F-22 raptor, considered almost obsolete in universe.
- Adults Are Useless: Averted, those that either missing or dead aside, they are very competent when they do their job properly. And there are times where Adult feel tired being useless and join the fray.
- Amicable Exes: Ichika and Eika has no problem (coincidentally) meeting each other and work together again, with zero UST following their interaction.
- Ascended Fanboy: Dan also got scouted by Iguchi.
- The Atoner: Orimura seniors seriously regret leaving their child behind, out of their fear for Tabane
- Author Avatar: Double subverted, SB voter has control of Ichika as 'player character', but Honne is tailored to fit typical Spacebattlers in verbal style. Picture worth thousands words.
- Ace Pilot:
- Ichika and Houki eventually. Cecilia, as well as Yamada-sensei when they're serious.
- As of Arc 9, Reed and Orimura Zin. Reed is such an ace that he singlehandedly mothballed a project intended to mass produce top of the line soldiers. This is indirectly stated in the clone story.
- Action Girl: Many, but Kanzashi made almost everyone in and OUT of universe surprised.
- Badass Bookworm: Most I.S.A. student is expected to understood engineering, and know how to pilot.
- Kanzashi and Honne takes the biggest cake and ate it, repeatedly in case of the former.
- Sunny apparently been taught CQC, the original version to boot. Thankfully, she's a very kind hearted girl
- Big Damn Heroes:
- Apparently, Kanzashi's main shtick is to appear and help. Justified, since she's from different class AND work with the rival corporation, Kuromachi.
- Reed proved that his fame being 'the best pilot of Luftwaffe' is not a BS during the battle of Kyushuu.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Honne the loony is heavy machinery specialist, Dan the laid back guy is engineering prodigy, you won't get it from the get go. And of course, there are Tabane. Honne also revealed to be fairly adept pilot herself, though far less than the main battle party.
- Chekhov's Skill: Houki's Ultimate Defense comes pivotal when she tanked Golem's desperation attack, which can blow most I.S. with ease
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Kuromachi Engineering
- Curbstomp Battle: In a strange inversion to canon, Ichika and Cecilia curbstomped Laura instead. Justified, both of them are vastly stronger than they are in the beginning of the quest, and Lingyin already fought Laura to a standstill before Laura decided to play it rough.
- Disease Bleach:
- It's stated that Orimura 'father' Zin used to have naturally black hair, similar to Chifuyu, and the hair turned white after White Knight Incident mostly due to the stress and guilt of leaving his children behind.
- Likewise, Jack aka Raiden has his blond hair started to turn white.
- Elite Mook: Terrorist and Military I.S. Pilot in general are portrayed as skilled and competent, as opposed to usual portrayal of Red Shirt.
- Explosive Overclocking: Overcharging parts or weapons are common technique for trained pilot, and posses great risk. White Knight lost one of it's thruster, and Cecilia's I.S. is burnt out.
- Faux Yay: Violet is hellbent on invoking the Twincest vibe between her and Ichika in front of other people, whether it's real or not, Ichika is not amused.
- For Science!: Invoked, one of the reason why Ichika introduced Honne to Dan.
- Full-Name Basis: While normally Ichika has no problem calling girls by their first name (Except with Laura), he always call Eika by her full name, ditto with Eika herself.
- Fusion Fic: The quest took place in Metal Gear verse, with divergence happened after White Knight Incident.
- Ham-to-Ham Combat:
- Both fight between Ichika against Cecilia and Ichika against Lingyin involves at least one session.
- Averted in the mock battle with Charles.
- Good Parents: Orimura seniors to Madoka, ironically. They HAVE a very good reason for leaving their child though.
- Happiness in Slavery: White Knight claimed that Infinite Stratos have little regards about who they serve and what their goal is. It notes that Ichika is exceptionally sympathetic and respectful to his I.S. and White Knight rewarded him for it.
- Honest Corporate Executive: Dr. Gould from Iguchi corp, and the reason why the corporation is a bottom tier player in Japan. He is not exactly incompetent though, just somewhat hotheaded and reckless. Eventually his work paid off, considering that his honest-to-God joint project with Dunois (of all corporation) went smoothly.
- Invincible Hero: Played with, Ichika never lose 'official' fight, but even then because Training from Hell he undego everytime and the fact that all his opponents are 'not in the right mind'. He's a JRPG-slash-Dating Sim Protagonist stuck in shonen mecha story, so it's justified.
- The Mole: Charles, of course.
- Meaningful Name: Rayleigh, which means valiant. And the nickname, Rei, is a direct reference to Ayanami Rei.
- The Mole: Mildly played with Houki, she team up with Laura to fight Ichika and to protect Laura, as well as finding what made her tick.
- My Little Panzer: Little Knight... made as toys, it's still possess 1/3 of the original unit's offensive power.
- Nerds Are Sexy: Running theme, well, more like Nerds are Cute.
- Nice Girl: A lot, thanks to Character Development. But Sunny deserve special mention.
- Not Blood Siblings:
- Violet is revealed to be Ichika's cousin, Madoka. Adopted by his parents, and undergo plastic surgery due to emergency situation. Really savvy about it too.
- Likewise, Rayleigh and Sunny is adopted by Otacon
- The Paragon Always Rebels: Ichika flat out refused to work with Government to keep his freedom absolute, at all cost.
- Plot Armor: Played with, all his accomplishment is caused by domino effect from each choices he picked and things that he spend effort in, but he's still considered extremely lucky.
- Power of Friendship: Heavily featured, however down to earth it is. Friendship itself is not a means to a goal, but the driving force that push people beyond their supposed limit on attaining such goal.
- Real Men Wear Pink: Ichika is a Supreme Chef, while Dan is a good Patisserie on his own.
- Super Prototype: White Knight, justified that every other I.S. are reverse engineered from it.
- The Tease:
- Ichika to Yamada-sensei, her actions scream "asking for it".
- Violet and Tatenashi to Ichika.
- Themed Harem: Battle Harem for Ichika, Nerd Girls for Dan.
- Thereis No Kill Like Overkill: In case of Golem, simply overkill it is not enough.
- Troll:
- Ichika is hell bent on trolling the government, as well as Kuromachi.
- Violet to Ichika, at first anyway
- Unskilled, but Strong: Golems, due to their limited AI and massive size, can be dealt by skilled pilot with vastly inferior unit.
- Unstoppable Rage: Cecilia, when she saw how badly Lingyin getting beaten up.
- Unwanted Harem: Subverted, it's not so much Ichika's not wanting the harem. It's DAN who is bothered by his own harem.
- The War Sequence: After spending 8 arc with occasional duel confined inside arena, arc 9 has open skirmish on top of a massive school facility.
- Weak, but Skilled: Ichika, though more like weak but talented.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Government figures, Ichika even said he'd praise them for their accomplishment.
- Wham Episode: Arc 9 has battles that actually cost people's lives. And it only got worse with the sidequest revealing more information about the world's situation and the potential crisis it faced.
- What a Piece of Junk:
- White Knight after reactivation especially.
- Averted by Gen-5 Jet Fighters, it's flat out stated that without Ace Pilot sitting in the cockpit, the fight against Vic Vipers will be moot.
- World of Badass: Everyone, their sister, dad, mom, and their grandpa is kicking ass, this is set on Metal Gear verse after all.
- Working with the Ex:
- Ichika unwittingly working with his past (and possibly only) girlfriend during the latest mission, however their realization actually avert the usual awkwardness aspect, much to Lingyin's ire.
- Also averted with his parents partly due to the circumstances of their divorce, not out of animosity or real conflict.
- Wrench Wench: Honne, and Kanzashi to a lesser extent.
- You Are Already Dead: Ichika's "execution" of first golem is to cut it on all sides, causing total failure seconds later.
- Your Mom: Violet's joke at the end of her reply mail is "Yo momma is a pool junkie".