Warning

This fic will feature canon characters acting out of character and imply sexually suggestive overtures between minors. Also beware of the Author childishly indulging in power-tripping.

Now, on with the play!


Part Six

The Great Big Final Battle


"Prince Luke, Princess Claes, Hunter Giuseppe and the Sprites charged the evil Queen's castle…"


Luke kicked down the cardboard cutout gate. "Triela!" he yelled aloud.

"I'm sorry," Clarice, who stood in his way, announced in the deadpan manner of Agent Smith. "This is a dead end."

From Stage Left emerged a small army of girls. Every other original character mechanical body that had graced a Gunslinger Girl fan fic appeared.

"For Triela!" they yelled.

"For Claes!" the Sprites yelled back in challenge.

"For me!" Terra loudly appended.

A royal rumble ensued. Cyborg girls went at it like blood-crazed prizefighters, swinging fists and makeshift weapons at each other.


"They're not really fighting, are they?" an alarmed Mireille asked Jean as mechanical bodies went down hard or were catapulted into the air like rag dolls. "I mean, they're just acting, right?"

"(Kind of reminds me of that old Zoids commercial,)" Rolito mused. "(Turn the Zoids against each other! It's our only hope! Zoid against Zoid…)"

"Rolito," Mireille scolded over the radio.

"(What? So I'm that old already…)"

"That wasn't what I meant!"

"(Oh, I know what you meant. Yet another point against using little girls as weapons…)"

"…"


Terra swung her rubber sledgehammer at Clarice. But Clarice grabbed the nearest girl– who happened to be Angelica– and used her as a human shield.

Despite that, Terra kept swinging.

"Eeek! Terra! Stop attacking! It's me!" the hapless Angie wailed. "I'm on your side!"

"Ask me if I care!"

WHAPWHAPWHAP

And then both Terra and Clarice found themselves floating a few inches off the Stage floor, the backs of their collars gripped by mighty hands that seemed made of steel.

"What the–"

"LEAVE ANGELICA ALONE!!"

Marco threw Terra and Clarice towards the back of the stage. The two cyborgs smashed through the wood paneling and into the escaping form of Clarice's handler, knocking the irresponsible man out before he could abandon Clarice for the heinous act.

Everyone froze.

"Marco can do that?" Mireille and Jean simultaneously exclaimed.

"(Don't make him angry,)" Rolito advised from above. "(You don't want to make him angry…)"

"Marco…" Angelica's eyes shone in admiration. She hugged her handler around his neck and snuggled upon his broad chest. "You're my hero!"

Marco grinned like some young buck that had just scored big time.

"(Okay,)" the bemused Rolito commented over the radio, "(That is slightly disturbing…)"

In the audience, Patricia stood up and cheered for her boyfriend.

"(And that is even more disturbing…)"


Henrietta found herself facing a furious dagger-wielding Elena.

"You!" The slightly smaller girl shook her weapon at her Section Two rival. "You took my big brother away from me! I won't forgive you!"


"(So that's where that knife of mine went,)" Rolito noted to himself almost absently.

"That's a real knife?" Mireille gasped in alarm.

"(Don't worry. It's not one of my poisoned ones.)"

"Rolito! That's not what I meant!"


Giuseppe got in between the two girls. "Elena! That's dangerous! Give me that!"

"No! If I can't have you–" Elena aimed the needle point at her throat. "Oh, happy dagger!"

"Elena!"

"Don't!"

Both Giuseppe and Henrietta leapt. Too late.

BOINK

'Seppe and 'Etta stared at the blade bent double away from Elena's skin.

"A rubber knife?"

Elena stuck her tongue out at them. "What, you really think I would kill myself? Papa will never forgive me."

"ELENA!!"


"Elena needs to work on her humor," Rolito muttered. He suddenly realized something. "Wait. If that's not my knife, where is it?" Then: "(CHLOE!!)"


Outside, Chloe's shrugged shoulders said she didn't take the blade because it struck her as ugly.


"(Ugly? And who took my knife?)"


Jeremy Colt laughed like a psychotic ninny as he stuck the knife he stole off Rouge into Gates' shoulder. Gates convulsed and then dropped dead.


"(Oh. It was one of my poisoned knives.)"


Rico blinked upon seeing her opponent. "Meir!"

Meir frantically gestured for his friend to correct herself.

"I mean, Magic Meir-ror!"

"No," Panzer loudly offered, "It's Myrrh! Or Steyr! Or something!"

The former Emilio's head drooped. "I have lost all my dignity…"

Rico patted him on the back.


"'Etta!" a small and familiar voice called out.

"Danni?"

Danielle landed near her sister. "I'm going to help you!" she declared.

"Me, too!" May agreed.

Yuki, her face partly obscured by the copy of Lolita that she had borrowed from Claes, nodded in agreement.

On their heels came the rest of the Handsome Men cyborgs. Their arrival proved to be the turning point of the battle. Triela's supporters were swamped by superior numbers of fresh cyborgs who had no qualms about pistol-whaling their way into the melee.

"Did we go here for this?" Vincent asked Leon.

"Obviously not…"

"Enough of this!" Luke's shout easily carried over the diminishing ruckus of the Sprites-Handsome Men alliance suppressing their opponents. "Evil Stepmother Triela! Come out and fight for yourself!"

Evil laughter drifted across the stage. Triela emerged dragging a trussed-up Pinocchio behind her.

"Go, Triela!" Marc yelled from his place in the audience.

THWACK

Marc's eyes rolled up to show their whites. He bonelessly slipped to the floor with a thud.

Frederick used Marc's unconscious body as a footstool and began yelling cheers in German.

"Prepare yourself, evil Queen!" Luke challenged.

Triela sneered. "Oh, but I will." She took hold of her dress' front and then threw it into the air, where it gently fluttered down until it fell on Hilshire's face.

"It still smells like Triela," her dazed handler mumbled.

Priscilla, Ferro and Elenora carefully stepped away from Hilshire.

Everyone gasped. The men and boys loudest of all, who stared so hard their huge eyes nearly popped out of their sockets, at the world-shaking sight they beheld.

Revealed was a tight-fitting backless leotard made of black leather, fishnet stockings and killer high heel boots. The costume did wonders for the few parts of Triela's body that the dress had failed to address. Like her now-unveiled sleek thighs, spankable buttocks, long sexy legs and a bust that was surprisingly bigger than what everyone expected from a thirteen-year-old girl.

Luke gulped audibly.

In the audience, Marc resurrected from half-death to drool for about half a second before an even more aroused Frederick reflexively nailed him again with his gun– that is, he used his Luger.

Behind Triela, Pinocchio's face exploded into a fountain of red as the biggest nosebleed in the world hit home. Oh, and his other head throbbed, too.

Hilshire sobbed outright into his hands. "I'M SORRY, RATIEL!! LEONI'S TURNED INTO THE WORST THING POSSIBLE FOR A GIRL HER AGE: A DOMINATRIX!! AND I LET THIS HAPPEN TO HER!! WORST OF ALL, SHE'S ACTUALLY TURNING ME ON!! I'M A TERRIBLE FATHER!!"

Bianchi, Gino, Amadeo and the other men carefully stepped away from him as well.

"Now, Luke," Triela purred, "You prepare."

And her whip flicked out with a smart crack that nearly took off Luke's nose, it was so accurately placed and strongly launched.

"Hey!" Luke yelped.

"Careful there," the wincing Giuseppe advised a bit too late.

"Triela!" Claes hissed. "If Luke comes back to me less handsome than he is now…"

Triela laughed like a madwoman as her whip sadistically licked at Luke again and again. "What's the matter, Prince Luke? As the Marquis le Sade once said: 'There is no pleasure without pain'! So–"

The black length wrapped around Luke's sword. A strong tug snatched it from the startled boy's grip and sent it flying into the audience– where it nailed the just-recovering Marc across the face.

"Urgh…" Marc toppled like the cherry tree a young George Washington axed.

"Nice shot, Triela!" Frederick cheered. "You saved me a lot of trouble!"

Triela gave him a flying kiss as acknowledgement.

Pino somehow resented that.

Luke found himself stumbling for both words and breathing space from Triela's relentless attacks. "Why are you doing this?" he demanded.

"I like Claes."

Luke fell on his butt, he was so surprised. "WHAT?" he and the similarly shocked Claes demanded.

"You heard me." Tanned cheeks showed a bit of red. "I like Claes."

"That isn't in the script!"

"I did hate her at first," Triela admitted in a distracted tone. "I hated her because she was everything I wasn't: well-read, well-meant and well-loved. I wanted to discredit her. To take what she had for my own self. To make her feel the same feelings of jealousy and hatred I felt."

"You're not listening to me," Luke muttered.

"And then," here the angry voice tapered off into that of a small and lonely girl, "And then I realized that I didn't really hate her. I didn't understand at first, but what I really felt for her was… love. I loved her. I wanted to be with her. I wanted her to love me."

The audience was sobbing. Well, the parts of them that was partial to lesbians, or who could appreciate romance for romance's sake, similar gender aside.

A suddenly depressed Frederick put his Luger pistol to his temple. Then he thought better and just beat the barely alive Marc to a bloody pulp with it, the better to feel better and stay alive just in case...

"But then you came, Luke." Triela's face twisted anew. "If you hadn't come along… You and Claes in Paris!" she screamed. "It was supposed to be me!"

Mireille choked at that all-too-familiar line.


Outside, Chloe sneezed.

"Bless you," Kirika, Yu Fang and Yu Lang told her.

"Thank you. Someone must be quoting me."


Triela aimed her whip at her enemy's face. "Luke! Die!" She leapt into the air for her final attack.

"Luke!" Giuseppe tossed his friend his kukri. "Catch!"

He did. Luke swung. As he struck, he yelled back: "Claes… is… mine!"

The whip was no match for finely-honed steel. Its black length fell apart into several small, useless pieces.

"Surrender now," Luke grimly ordered.

"Triela!" It was Frederick's turn to intervene. He tossed Triela her shotgun's slim bayonet. "Stick him real good!"

"Oh, I'll skewer him, all right!" Triela promised.

"Hey!" Luke protested. "And why are we still fighting? I mean… I have a bigger sword than she does!"

A long pall of silence descended upon the theater. Everyone stared.

"I mean," Luke hastily corrected. "It's Giuseppe's sword! I'm only borrowing it!"

More silence. Then Giuseppe said, "Luke. You made that sound so wrong."

"What?"

"Is Luke gay?" Elena asked Henrietta.


Ironic one-man applause sundered the dramatic silence like a thunderbolt would shatter stillness. Everyone looked up in reflex.

A man floated twenty feet above their heads, held there by an invisible giant's hand.

"Rolito!" Mireille exclaimed.

"Correction." No longer the man in black, for he wore an impeccably white business suit. He smirked down at everyone. "I am the Scriptwriter."

"The what?" almost everyone exclaimed.

"This wasn't in my script!" Director Mireille complained.

"You bastard!" Triela yelled. "You put me up to all this crap!"

"Initially, yes, it was me. But everything else was you." Rolito gestured at Triela. "And you. And you." With each additional 'you', he acknowledged key actors and actresses who had taken it into their heads to perform independently of the script: Terra, Petrushka, the whole bunch. "I decided to let you exert and enjoy yourselves. It all worked out fine, did it not? You troubled yourselves, and I profited."

Claes suddenly rose to the fore of the confused mob. "Why have you revealed yourself, Scriptwriter?" she demanded.

"Because you, Princess Claes, have revealed yourself."

"Me?"

"Yes. You, Claes, are the eventuality of an anomaly, which despite my sincerest efforts I have been unable to eliminate from what is otherwise a harmony of mathematical precision."

"…the what?" a perplexed Triela asked. Rolito chuckled.

"Claes is here because the script calls for her appearance, despite my efforts otherwise."

"Oh."

"Claes," Rolito informed the star of the play. "The problem is choice. There are two choices. To your left is the fanon hetero pairing, Luke, the Happily Ever After Ending." He gestured at Luke, who frowned at him.

"To your right is the unorthodox but popular lesbian pairing, Triela, which will be–" Rolito eyed the diced-up whip scattered across the stage floor "–interesting, to say the least."

Triela blushed.

"Why?" Claes coolly asked.

"Hmm?"

"Why are you doing this to me? Why are you forcing me to decide between–" she gestured to both Luke and Triela "–Two people I care for?"

Luke choked. Triela blushed even more.

"Why? The answer is simple." Rolito sneered a la G.D. Wallez. "Money."

"What?" everyone exclaimed.

"That's right. Money. Controversy creates cash." He produced a can of Pepsi Max from thin air. "And I need money." Rolito popped the can open and took a deep swill from it. He grimaced. "Bah. Coke tastes better."

The flippant admission enraged Claes. "You are a monster!" A finger stabbed accusingly at the Scriptwriter. "You do not belong to this world!"

"I didn't come here on my own will. I was called here by GSG fan readers, who wished to read fan fiction."

"Fan fiction? You pirate canon characters and use them for yourself!"

"Canon? What is canon?" Rolito tossed the half-empty Pepsi can away. It landed on Marc's head, knocking the Frenchie out again. "Stuff only the Japanese and the Canadians have access to due to licensing and distribution issues! But enough talk!" His katana, Masakari, appeared in his right hand. "Have at thee!"

Rolito leapt off the invisible Venom and descended upon Claes like Lucifer cast down from Heaven.

"Claes!" Luke and Triela tossed their blades towards their friend. "Catch!"

Metal rang upon metal. An epic sword fight like no other commenced. Everyone knew Claes was fast. Few thought she could actually double wield a kukri and a bayonet, and with great skill, at that. Even fewer expected Rolito to be just as fast, and he showed himself undoubtedly far more skilled, swordsman that he was.

Furious combat surged this way and that. The fighters ran this way and leapt that way, hacking and slashing and stabbing at each other's guard in an attempt to reduce the other party into bloody chopsuey.

"Sensei is scary," Giuseppe mumbled.

"Papa is so cool," Elena sighed.

Her brother gave her a weird look.

The kukri made a loud racket as it hit the floor. Luke gasped.

Claes stared at her reflection in the katana's curved length. She held herself completely still.

Rolito grinned. He moved his katana away from Claes, stepped back and kicked the kukri into the air so that Claes could catch it. "One more," he purred.

Claes grimly nodded. They fenced again, Claes slashing with the kukri and defending with the bayonet, Rolito a whirlwind of steel. In two minutes, it was Rolito's turn to be disarmed, his katana burying itself into the wooden stage floor, the bayonet at his throat.

Claes reached for the katana and pulled it out of the floor. She flipped it so that she held it by the flat of the blade and offered its handle to Rolito. "One more," she returned almost mischievously.

Rolito grinned and accepted.

Luke strangled a curse. "Why are they getting along so well?" he demanded of Giuseppe.

"Sensei always told me that if he could have one of the girls as his cyborg, he wanted Claes."

"What? Why?"

"He says Henrietta's too cute, Rico's too happy, Triela's too headstrong, Angelica is bad for his health–"

Angelica looked quizzical.

"–he says Angie's too sweet for him, and since the paternal side of his family has a history of hereditary diabetes…"

"…what?"

"Anyway, Beatrice is too quiet and Petrushka too disturbing," Giuseppe finished.

"Me?" Petrushka growled. "Disturbing?"

"He mentioned something in passing about crazy Americans, homemade movies and I-Pods…"

To everyone's surprise, Petra blushed. "Damn American," she muttered.


Somewhere unspecified, J.M. sneezed.


Rolito disarmed Claes yet again, this time of both her weapons. "It was fun, Princess Claes," he breathed. "Yet all good things must end. But first–"

The katana's sharp tip expertly sliced off Claes' gown's left sleeve. The cloth fell away, revealing a round white shoulder.

Despite knowing this was going to happen beforehand and the relatively small amount of skin revealed, Claes blushed.


In his grave, Raballo rolled about.


Henrietta and Elena covered Giuseppe's eyes, Mireille covered Jean's, Priscilla covered Jose's, Patricia and Angelica covered Marco's, and Elenora covered Fermi's. Triela kicked Marc in the face, knocking him out again, before covering Frederick's eyes.

Hilshire screamed like a sissy and ran out of the theater.

BOOM!

Lauro toppled. The wailing Elsa put her still-smoking pistol to her eye. The weapon promptly transformed into Megatron.

"I've waited a long time for this, Prime," Hugo Weaving's voice quavered.

"Why won't you let me die?" Elsa wailed.


Luke howled. "ROLITO! YOU PEDOPHILING BASTARD!!"

Giuseppe, Meir and Alpha (with their respective girlfriends also clinging to their faces) barely managed to hold the irate Israeli down. "LET ME GO!! HE'S STRIPPING CLAES!!"

"Not if I can help it." Triela pulled out a small silver tube. She aimed it at Rolito and pressed a small button on it. A little red dot appeared on the man's white pants leg.

A few feet away, a certain small white fluff ball spotted the red dot. Its china doll blue eyes narrowed even as its tail swished. It approached, silent as thought, steady as trickling water.

Claes's left sleeve fell off as well. All that was keeping her gown on were two spaghetti straps.

"Rolito…"

"I know what I'm doing. And if Triela does what we planned–"

Liora bit.

CHOMP

"OW! PUTANG-"

Rolito hopped around on one foot. The frightened Liora ran off.

Claes pulled out a familiar-looking golden comb. "You want to penetrate me?" She stabbed Rolito in the back with the ornament.

"Ah! Et tu, Brutus?"

Rolito staggered away from Claes. He stared at the audience, then at the distance, his hand futilely clawing at an invisible thing.

"Mamamatay akong hindi man makikita ang pagbubukang-liwayway ng aking Inang Bayan…"

He sung in an alien language, his tone soft and depressing, his voice and his body's motions getting weaker with each word, the lights around him dimming as a lone spotlight followed his erratic movement.

"Sa inyong makakakita, batiin ninyo Siya… at huwag kalimutan… ang mga naluklok... sa dilim… ng gabi…

So murmuring, Rolito fell backwards into Claes' arms. The two settled into a pose similar to the Pieta, a seated Claes carrying the "dead" Rolito, the spotlight shining down on them for a brief moment before flicking out, dropping the whole stage into darkness.

After a long moment of silence, the whole audience (that is, those who were still alive or conscious) rose on their feet and applauded.

"That was beautiful," Zangief whispered. His seatmates gave him long sideways looks.

"Do we kill him now," Vincent asked Leon, "Or do we wait for the play to end?"

"Pass me the silencer."


"Rolito?" was the whisper.

"Yeah, Claes?"

"Did you have to nearly strip me?"

"It's called fan service. Every anime has it."

"So it was all just to titillate the audience? No self-enjoyment involved?"

"Yeah."

"Good."

"Though I have to admit, Claes, I was rather disappointed that you'd never grow up. You could have been quite the hottie…"

"Uh… thanks… I think…"

"Not that I mind your current age right now…"

BONK

"Ow."

"Pedo."


NOT YET OVER!! WAIT FOR THE WRAP-UP!!