Gunslinger Girl is not (c) to me; it is (c) Yu Aida

This story uses characters and locations based on Gunslinger Girl, additional story elements and characters are (c) to me- ElfenMagix.

Solution's Resolution

Chapter 21: Creamy Delicious Custard With Caramel On Top… Tell Me The Name of Your Sweetheart!

After everyone had their fill of brunch, Claes returns from the kitchen with the tray of custard cups. She places the cup and saucers in front everyone, slapping the hand that dared raise a spoon to it. The she slides one on the center of the table to demonstrate.

Claes (doing as she explains): Lightly take your fingers and press the edge of the dessert from the cup so it breaks away from it. Spin the cup a bit and press again, and continue until you have gone all the way around and the edge is completely broken. Now the hard part, put the saucer down side up on the cup, grab both the cup and saucer and flip it so that the saucer is right side up and the cup is up side down on it. Take your spoon and tap the cup a couple of times and slowly lift the cup off the saucer.

And there it was, a lovely shaped dark colored topped custard mound with liquid caramel drooling down the sides. Everyone stares at it before diving into their cups to do as Claes described. Triela was first, then Henrietta, Angelica and then Ricco. With the cups placed at the center of the table, the girls dove into their desserts, with much praises to Claes after the first couple of spoonfuls. All but Rachel.

Claes: What's wrong, Rachel?

Rachel: Its not right, having to enjoy this with without him.

Claes: It is for you and him. You for completing your first mission.

Rachel: And for him?

Claes: Everything else.

Triela: Ooo… I think I smell Love in the air…

Claes: Triela, that's not funny. Take it back!

Triela: Then if you don't love him, then why you made one 'for' him? Hmmm?

Claes: I made one for him because he is nice and does good things for us.

Henrietta: Sounds like you bonded to him.

Claes: Hey, Happy girl, I am not bonded to him or to anyone else!

Triela: Its either you bonded or are in love with him. Now, which one is it?

Ricco: Sounds like bonded to me.

Angelica: She could not have, cyborgs only bond once to a handler and after that they cant bond to no one else.

Triela: Then it must be love then.

Claes: Stop It! Stop it!

Triela: First comes love. Then Comes Marriage. Here Comes Claes…

Claes: STOP IT!!!

Triela: …With the baby carriage!

Claes runs away from the girls at the table.

Rachel: Now you done it.

Triela: Done what?

Rachel: You hurt her feelings.

Triela: We were only playing.

Rachel: You went past playing. Now you done hurt her feelings. She's probably crying right now.

Triela: Claes, cry? She's too strong to cry.

Rachel: Cyborgs have feelings too… Or at least I still do.

Triela: You sure you are not confusing them with conditioning?

Rachel: I know that my feelings are real. As is hers, and I bet Henrietta too. How about you, Triela? Your conditioning is set low, cant you tell the difference between your feelings and the conditioned mental response?

Triela: Err…

Rachel: Claes meant well, and you had to go mess it up.

Rachel gets up and walks out of the cafeteria, looking for Claes.

Angelica: I think you should apologize to Claes when she gets better.

Ricco (grabbing Rachel's cup): She did not touch hers.

With a large head start Claes reaches her room before Rachel could run the hall that connects to the cafeteria. She slams the door shut loud enough for Fernando to hear it from his end of the hall. Once on her bed, she starts to cry on her pillow, gathering her wits together as she does. From being upset, sad and embarrassed to anger, Claes goes through the gauntlet of emotions that she hardly experienced since she became a cyborg. From anger, back to calm, cool and collected in the few seconds she has before Rachel is knocking on the door.

After a few seconds of no answer, Rachel tries the door handle, finding the door locked. She knocks on the door again, and Claes answers it immediately, showing no sign of having gone through what she has a few moments before.

Rachel: Are you OK, Claes?

Claes: Of course I'm OK. Why would make you ask that?

Rachel: Because you left the cafeteria crying.

Claes: Oh, that. I'm over it now.

Rachel You sure?

Claes: More than sure.

Rachel: OK then… Uhm… you going back to the cafeteria?

Claes: No.

Rachel: What about Fernando?

Claes: What about him?

Rachel: Don't you want to make sure he gets his cup?

Claes: I can always make more.

Rachel: I see.

Unsure how to continue, Rachel steps away from the door, looking down the hall to his room but can not tell if his door was open or not.

Claes: I am not in love nor have I bonded with him. I was just being nice to him for being nice to me.

Rachel: You don't have to explain it to me. I already know.

Claes: Then why cant the others understand that?

Rachel: Because they are not in love with their handlers, or at least aware of it. I know I am, have been for a long time.

Claes grabs Rachel by the arm and haul her into the room, closing the door behind them.

Claes: We should not be having that kind of conversation out in the open.

Rachel: I don't care, I know what I feel for him and it is not the conditioning drug telling me to do so.

Claes: For how long have you had these feelings?

Rachel takes a seat at the table before answering.

Rachel: Since I first met him, when he saved my from that gang who was trying to rape me.

Claes (to herself): …Florence Nightingale Syndrome?

Rachel: What?

Claes: I'm not exactly sure that is it, but in Stockholm Syndrome, a victim bonds with their captor. But you would have identified with your rapists for that. In Florence Nightingale Syndrome, a victim bonds with their rescuer or care provider. Fernando rescued you and you bonded with him.

Rachel: I would rather not have it explained away like that.

Claes: Why not?

Rachel: It sort of takes away what little magic there is for those feelings.

Claes: Oh. You still love him though, right?

Rachel: Right.

A few seconds of silence later.

Rachel: Don't get me wrong though.

Claes: What do you mean?

Rachel: There are many kinds of Love.

Claes: I think I know where you are getting at with this.

Rachel: The love siblings have is not the same as a husband or wife, or a father for his daughter, or some friends may have for each other. I just want to say that with us it is that of father and daughter, but sometimes I want more.

Claes: Do you know what you're saying?

Rachel: I do. Maybe I'm selfish for wanting more, I just wont say anymore.

Claes What about him, how does he feel about you?

Rachel: The same thing.

Claes gasps.

Rachel: No! Not that way- He loves me as a father would his little girl, and that's it. And I would not have it no other way.

Claes: At least its returned. Looking at the others, only Henrietta gets anything back from her handler.

Rachel: What about Triela? She has all these teddy bears.

Claes: Triela and Hillshire? They are like a true brother and sister can be. They love each other, but they rub each other the wrong way most of the time. I think the only time when they actually showed each other some form of affection was when she killed Pinocchio; Pinocchio damaged her heavily and would have killed her if she was not lucky enough to reach into his throat and tear out his wind pipe. It took weeks for her to heal from her injuries and much of her cyborg implants had to be replaced.

Rachel: I see.

Claes: Triela has changed a lot since then.

Rachel: How so?

Claes: Triela was more serious then. More of a leader to the rest of us, as I was the mother hen who watched over everyone. Since she left the infirmary, she's turn into the class clown. She is still capable of leading, but, like you saw today, she plays around and takes it too far at times. She never did that before.

A knock on the door breaks their silence. Claes gets up and open.

Claes: Hello, Ferro. What can we do for you?

Ferro: Where are the other cyborgs?

Claes: They should be in the cafeteria. Everything OK?

Ferro: Cyborg meeting, today, 3pm, my office.

Claes: Will the handlers be there?

Ferro: I already had a meeting with the handlers. Some maybe there, others may not be.

Claes: I see. We'll be there.

Ferro: Cafeteria you said?

Claes: That is where I last saw them.

Ferro: See you later then.

Ferro walks away from the room, and Claes closes the door once Ferro has made some considerable distance away from the door. She closes the door slowly, and walks back to the table.

Rachel: What was that about?

Claes: I don't know. We only have cyborg meetings if a mission is so big it involves us all, but the handlers would be there too. And we would not be having it in her office.

Rachel: How many of those were there?

Claes: Just one.

Rachel: One?

Claes: One mission, where I had to be a decoy for a senator's daughter and be kidnapped by terrorists. All the other cyborg teams had to find and rescue me.

Rachel: I see.

Claes: I wonder what it could be?

Rachel: She said 3 o'clock… that's a bit more than 3 hours from now. I'll go ask Fernando if he knows anything about it.

Claes: No, wait.

Rachel: Why?

Claes: I still have his custard in the cafeteria… Lets bring it to him, then we can ask.

In the outdoor target range, Jean, Jose, Hillshire and Marco look over the bullets that Fernando gave Ferro.

Hillshire: Interesting. Never saw anything like this before.

Jean: I have heard of them. Its supposed to make live training with real people non-lethal. But I never thought we would be using them.

Marco looks at it intently.

Jose: Maybe it would be better to use live targets, since these mechanical ones are so predictable. You can only do but so much with a moving dummy.

Hillshire: Plus, they don't shoot back.

Marco: Gives a whole new level on this. Do the other handlers know about this yet?

Jean: They will by the afternoon. In fact, I set up a meeting for 3pm with Ferro - we are all to be there.

Hillshire: Good.

Marco takes out his gun and drops the magazine from it, placing the paint bullet in its place and evacuating the live round from the chamber. He aims at a near by target and shots. The target gets a bight green smear where he hits it. He then empties the gun again and looks at it closely.

Marco: Hmmm…

Hillshire: What is it?

Marco: It uses a very slow burning powder… see all that residue inside?

Hillshire: That should not be a problem.

Marco: No, but it's a big cleanup job after the training mission. The gun also cycled slower to advance the next round, I've noticed. Much less kick…

Jean: Interesting… I wonder how they would act in a machine gun?

Marco: Very poorly for what I can tell.

Hillshire: Still, it would bring an education to the cyborgs that they really need; live rounds and moving dummies are no substitutes for the real thing.

Ferro finally finds the cyborg girls at the cafeteria, and informs them of the 3 o'clock meeting.

Fernando goes back to bed, not know what is transpiring outside his room. In fact, he does not really care. His work for the day is done, and he feels tired, more than usual. Once his head hits the pillow, his brain basically shuts itself down for the next couple of hours. That is until the girls interupt him from his sleep.