As the weeks of training went on, Claes began to think her decision to agree to a normal training regimen was a mistake. She found the constant drilling and training boring and repetitive and she missed the freedom her original routine had provided her. She often found herself tired and a bit sore by the end of each day's training, which served as a de-motivating influence towards doing anything else. Her fellow cyborgs now felt comfortable in bringing her into their discussions about missions and such, which became another distraction from reading, music, painting or gardening.
Michele was also having second thoughts. He quickly discovered that having two cyborgs did not just double the workload, but more like tripled it. His felt his own focus start to drift and as it did, so did the focus and performance of Kara and Claes. While never at the top of her class, Kara's marksmanship skills had started to stumble and Claes, having reached a sort of plateau, now seemed to be stuck in neutral and was not improving, even with more practice.
The two had performed quite poorly at the Carabinieri urban combat course training session at Frosinone, their entrance sloppy and their teamwork ragged. Claes had almost followed the flash-bang she threw into a room, Triela having to pull her back. Kara failed to use sufficient force to knock a door off it's hinges and it recoiled off the wall, slamming back into her and knocking her back on her ass in the hall. She'd then become entangled in the bandolier of her XM8 and it took her a full ten seconds to square it away and get back on her feet, by which time she'd been declared "combat ineffective" by the silhouette in the room wielding a plastic HK33 who would have had plenty of time to empty his 30-round magazine into her.
A few days after the Frosinone training session, Claes walked into the dining room for breakfast. She helped herself at the chafing dishes and then sought out a seat. As she walked by Kara's table, she noticed her reading a book on freshwater fish species.
"Looking for new dinner ideas?" Claes asked as she set her tray down across from her.
Kara shook her head. "Michele is taking me fishing this weekend. Marco said the northern lakes are starting to thaw so the fish are ready to bite."
"Depends on the fish. Pike, for example, cannot be fished prior to April, yet the prohibition on common perch begins in April and lasts through the end of May. And at that point, black bass is prohibited until mid-June," Claes noted.
"You sound like an expert on fresh-water fish. Can I get some pointers?" Kara asked.
"I've never fished," Claes replied. "That time off the French Riviera with Michele was my first time."
"Seriously? Then how do you know all these rules and regulations?"
Claes shrugged. "I read a great deal. I must have read it sometime."
"You read a fishing rulebook? For enjoyment? You have got to get out more."
Claes responded with a sour expression.
"Anyway, Michele has decreed that we're going with Marco up to Veneto this weekend."
"Decreed?"
"He's really disappointed in how the training went. More in himself then us," Kara replied. "I think he wants to take some time to let us all relax and re-focus."
"You said 'we're', so I guess that means I'm coming as well," Claes said.
"I don't know, but if you are, I can put in a good word to try and get you out of it," Kara offered.
"No. I probably could benefit from getting out a bit. And if I can pry that camera out of Henrietta's hands, I could take some background shots to use for future paintings."
Friday night after practice Kara and Claes showered and changed. They grabbed their overnight bags and headed down to the courtyard where a black Range Rover was parked. Kara handed her bag to Michele to load into the back and settled into the back passenger seat, admiring the beige leather and burled walnut trim. Marco slipped behind the driver's seat and started the car. He plugged in the coordinates to the SatNav and pulled out.
"So where are we going?" Kara asked.
"Lake Ghirla," Michele replied.
"Ghirla has pike, rudd and tenches," Claes noted to Kara. "Tench can be tough to hook and when you do get one on the line, they put up a heck of a fight."
Kara and Claes settled down with books for the long drive north. It was close to midnight when they finally pulled into the Villa Castiglioni hotel. Marco and Michele each had their own rooms while Kara and Claes shared a room. They all settled in to bed and were asleep in moments.
They awoke with the sun on Saturday morning and showered and dressed in shirts, jeans and hiking boots. They loaded the Range Rover and drove to the shore of Lake Ghirla, a very small lake and primarily a tourist attraction in summer and fall, filled with families. Those families didn't view the last weekend of March as a desirable time to visit so fishing could still be successfully undertaken. They set up near the mouth of the Margorabbia Brook and Marco and Michele showed the girls how to prepare and use the rods and tackle they had brought for them.
Claes took to it like a natural and Kara soon became comfortable, as well. The first few bites were quite small so they released them back into the lake, but soon Claes successfully hooked and landed a nice 20cm trout. Over the next few hours everyone had successfully landed a fish worth keeping, which they kept in a poly mesh livewell immersed in the lake bank.
Claes removed her hiking boots and pulled off her socks before rolling up her pant legs.
"Claes, that water is likely barely into the double digits (Celsius)," Marco warned.
Claes nodded and carefully put her foot in. It was quite cold, but she gritted her teeth and waded out a little bit. Fortunately, CFRP muscles didn't cramp, but after a few minutes she came out and toweled off, pulling her wool socks back on, but choosing a pair of Wellington boots so she could wade out a bit with her pole. Around 13:00 they stopped to prepare their catch for lunch. Claes reached into her bag and removed a plastic case with two steel rods. She screwed the two rods together.
"What's that?" Kara asked.
"It's called a 'Wunder Boner'," Claes replied.
Marco and Michele both made strangling sounds.
Claes ignored them and grabbed one of the gutted trout. "You put the tip in the mouth of the fish…"
More strangled sounds came from Marco and Michele.
"…and press down on the fish." As she did so, the tail and spine were left attached to the top of the pole.
"Hey, that's pretty neat!" Kara said. Claes removed the bones and Kara proceeded to "wunder bone" her trout, as well.
Claes deboned the remaining fish, Marco sliced them open and Michele seasoned them and then coated them in flour before he put them in a hot cast iron skillet with some butter. He opened a German Riesling since the Italian product was both not very common and not very good. He poured a glass for everyone and they sat back and listened to the trout sizzle in the pan. Michele pulled out some disposable plates and served the fish after squeezing some fresh lemon on it.
"We probably should have cooked a side," Michele suggested.
"This is fine," Claes noted, using a plastic fork to flake off the meat. As she ate, the taste seemed very familiar to her, though she could not remember a time when she'd ever had it before.
After lunch, the men continued fishing (though they released everything) and the girls walked around the lake, snapping pictures with a camera. Henrietta had not wanted to give up her camera lest Giuseppe take her some place new to shoot pictures, so Kara brought along her compact digital camera for Claes to use to snap some background panoramas.
As night fell, Michele and Marco created a fire ring and built a campfire with wood they had brought with them. By 21:00 they decided to have dinner so they doused the flames and drove to the town that shared the name with the lake and had dinner. Afterwards, they returned to the hotel and went to sleep.
The following morning, they drove south back down SS233 to Varese, then west on SS394 to the commune of Gavirate on Lake Varese. Thanks to efforts to reduce and remove pollution in the lake, the local fish population was starting to recover. However, all three anglers released everything they caught since they were not in a position to consume them anytime soon.
Kara's interest gravitated more towards the castles around the area, so she went off exploring the edge of the lake, which at under 9km, she could do at a nice leisurely pace. They reassembled and had lunch in town and then started back for the compound in Rome.
The weather remained nice the entire last week of March and Claes took advantage of it the following "float day" when Michele let her and Kara do what they wanted. She printed out the panoramic photos of Lake Ghirla and she used them to provide inspiration for a landscape, setting up her easel outside.
Around lunchtime she headed for the main cafeteria. She saw Michele and took a seat next to him.
"Everything going well?" Michele asked.
"Yes," Claes replied. "Anything interesting on your end?"
"It's such a nice day I thought I'd take the Lambo up into the Gran Sasso National Park," Michele noted.
"Kara should like that," Claes noted.
"She and Triela are off doing something," Michele replied.
"So you have an open seat?" Claes asked.
"It just so happens…" Michele noted with a smile.
Claes reveled in the drive along Italian State Highway 80. With the open top, she could feel the warmth of the sun on her face and smell the forest and flowers all around her as they wound their way through the mountains and past Lake Compotosto. Michele extracted all the performance from the car he safely could and the kilometers flashed by. All too soon in her eyes, they were turning onto the A24 to return to Rome. However, west of L'Aquila the Autostrade wound its way through the verdant hills and the V10 engine's roar echoed off the walls though the 10km tunnel bored through the Gran Sasso Massi and they emerged into the sun again and enjoyed still more green until crossing the A1.
At that point, they started entering the edges of the Rome metropolitan area and it was here that Claes informed Michele that she had dreamed of Mister Raballo again.
As she explained the dream, they passed the GRA and entered Rome proper. Without warning, she felt a sharp pain in her temples, her eyes closing tight reflexively.
Like a wall tumbling down or a dam bursting, a flood of images and memories cascaded into her Mind's Eye. With a sharp and loud intake of breath, Claes went rigid in the seat.
Michele heard Claes' inhalation and turned to see her stiff as a board.
"Claes?" he called, but there was no response. He could see her inhaling and exhaling deeply and rapidly, her eyes looking straight ahead and her body tense in the seat.
"Claes!" he yelled, but again there was no response.
Michele hit the emergency flashers and moved into the right lane. As they passed under a bridge, the SatNav showed an unused onramp so he pulled into the shoulder and slowed to a stop on the ramp, outside of the flow of traffic.
He turned in his seat and put his hand on her shoulder, shaking her.
"Claes! Can you hear me?"
She grabbed his wrist, but not with great force. She moved it off her shoulder and placed it on the center console of the car. She then turned and looked at him, and her face was joyous.
"I remember!" she breathed. "All of it! Mr. Raballo was my handler and I was his cyborg. He's the person I saw in my dreams, Michele! It was him! I see his face so clearly now. He couldn't move very fast, so he trained me to be able to work without him by my side, though we never went on a mission together."
Again, she suddenly sucked in her breath as still more memories broke free.
"His room! Mr. Raballo's room is my library! The books on the shelves are his! The bed I'd lay on to read them is his! All this time, and I didn't know… He used to take me fishing on the lakes up north. We'd talk for hours about so many subjects. It was our private time. Where we could talk without worry.
"And I remember the firing range. Henrietta's pistol had jammed, and she pointed the muzzle at her face. Mr. Raballo had grabbed the gun from her and knocked her against a wall. Giuseppe was furious, but Mr. Raballo struck him with his cane, berating him for his lack of proper instruction. Henrietta grabbed a bench. She was going to smash Mr. Raballo with it. I drew my VP on her, but Mr. Raballo knocked my gun away. It went off, but the bullets hit the ceiling. I went to the hospital then. So did Henrietta. I think they changed our conditioning. I can no longer harm a handler or a fellow cyborg."
Her face fell a bit. She removed her glasses and looked at them in her lap.
"Soon after that incident he said he had to go away for awhile. He gave me these glasses and the key to his room. And we made the promise. The promise that I wouldn't use force unless on a mission. That when I had on the glasses, I'd be good."
"Then you didn't break your promise, Claes," Michele said. "You were on a mission when you pulled the trigger. You may have been wearing your glasses, but you didn't fire out of malice, but necessity. You were still the 'good Claes' Captain Raballo asked you to be."
"I know," she said, softly.
On a warm March day, in the passenger seat of a Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder, parked on the side of the Autostrada 24 in a suburb east of Rome, Fleda Claes Johansson started to cry.
And this time, the tears did come…
The End