4.6.2014
The Doctor came for a visit today. His real name is Koloman Faust, but he likes to be referred to as Khal.
Dr. Khal has been Retia's doctor ever since her birth. When she was born, Retia had abnormally high levels of bilirubin in her body, so we were warned that the jaundice she had been born with may end up causing kernicterus, so Gernot and I hired the skills of Dr. Khal to help us monitor Retia's condition around the clock. Dr. Khal has been quite a godsend for us. Because Gernot and I are frequently quite busy with work, Dr. Khal has sometimes been the only person available to look after Retia at all, besides his duties in monitoring Retia's bilirubin levels. Eventually he concluded that Retia's danger of contracting kernicterus was gone by the time she was eight weeks old, but by that time, Gernot and I had gotten to know him to the point where he could have been our lifelong friend. Since then, he has paid the occasional visit here at our home for checkups, since Gernot, ever since Retia's close call with kerniceterus, is prone to paranoia when it comes to our daughter's health. It is much more convenient than taking her to a hospital, even with our connections to all the best medical facilities in Germany because of our status. I believe the English phrase here is "friends with benefits".
The Wunderwaffe girls have also taken a liking to Dr. Khal. Prior to today, they had seen him only once, but that last time he had paid a visit he stayed to talk to the girls quite late into the night, so much so that he had took up our offer of staying the night in our home. Because we trust him as a close friend, Gernot and I had told him about the Wunderwaffe girls and their true nature, and upon learning this, Dr. Khal had been, to put it lightly, mesmerized. "It appears that history is mocking us!" he had remarked with quite the tone of sarcastic irony. Despite that, he gave his concessions to the American team who shared their technology with us, saying that they had done quite the marvelous job recreating German warships as perfect human beings. He had conversed with the girls for a long time, testing their cognitive abilities and their interactive capabilities to determine that if Gernot and I had never informed him of the girls' true nature, he could have never told them apart from normal people.
"If current technology allows for this, then the possibilities of advancements in all fields of medical science are limitless," Dr. Khal had concluded happily before he went on to discuss the ethics of the same technology that allowed the existence of the ship girls with those same girls.
The girls were all quite happy to see the doctor pay another visit, for they remember him well. Lebe and Max baked a cup of their finest creme brulee and served it to Dr. Khal, who felt honored to be served such a fine dessert by the likes of those girls. I informed him that I had been teaching the basics of cooking to them, and they had learned all of this on their own, and Lebe and Max looked quite proud of their achievement when the doctor gave it his official seal of approval.
"Your girls treat me better than my wife does, and here I was thinking that I was blessed with such a loving family to begin with," he told me. "I hope you don't mind if I tell my family that we're all coming to stay here for winter vacation." That made us all laugh, but me especially.
After that, he gave Retia the usual checkup and found nothing concerning. At first, like any baby meeting people other than her own parents for the first time, Retia did not take to Dr. Khal very nicely. But because Retia is a sharp girl, she quickly grasped that the doctor wasn't someone bad, so soon she saw him as an uncle figure, a good friend of her parents who always gave her little gifts like a small bear doll or a tiny Rubik's Cube that she managed to solve within two weeks without anyone telling her how to solve it.
At the girls' insistence, the doctor stayed awhile with us, but only for a few hours because of another appointment later this evening. During then, Prinz Eugen and Bismarck discussed medical and technological ethics with him in the living room while Retia sat on his lap rubbing his chin like a magic lamp while Lebe, Max, and U helped me prepare some dinner for the doctor packed in some tupperware - berliner with strawberry filling, for to my knowledge, Dr. Khal loves himself some pastries. For some reason, Retia finds herself easily captivated by the sight of Dr. Khal's bald head.
After Dr. Khal departed for his next appointment, I headed back to my office, since I had come home specifically to receive the doctor as our guest and left Retia in the care of the girls. Because of the double round-trip, I am a bit more tired than I usually am tonight, but that is quite alright. Seeing the doctor again is a special treat that I am finding myself appreciating more and more. Not because he has been visiting less frequently, but because the burden of work and the lack of people I like to call real friends at work are taking their toll on this thirty-eight-year-old body.
Hmmm...because I am still in the writing mood and I don't have anything else on my mind at the moment, I'd like to put my thoughts down on paper about Prinz Eugen, since I started with Bismarck.
I have already mentioned the motherliness that Prinz Eugen has exuded, but I feel a need to elaborate it further, for this tenderness of hers is special. Ordinarily, a distant onlooker would observe Prinz Eugen's affection for those around her as exceptional caregiving, perhaps even as motherliness itself if the onlooker is to be quite observational. But she shows and maintains this care for everyone she meets. It does not matter who: whether the person she takes care of is Dr. Khal visiting to give Retia her checkup, my husband when he returns from work late at night, her fellow sisters-at-arms chasing Retia around the house, or me, Prinz Eugen always devotes 120% of herself to making sure she can make us as happy as can be. She has limitless energy, and she never tires. (If she ever does, she has certainly yet to show it.) She has an infinite amount of patience, and for the sake of anyone she cares about, Prinz Eugen can move mountains if she so wished. I swear to God, Prinz Eugen is well on her way to becoming the world's greatest mother. If the day should ever come that these girls become decommissioned and released to civilian life, I should like to meet Prinz Eugen's prospective husband simply to tell him, "You are the world's luckiest groom". Especially at the wedding reception. That ought to leave an impression on him. Heh.
Why the world's best mother? Well...let us consider the qualities a prospective mother ought to have to be a good one. She should be willing to put her family above all else. She should be nurturing, caring, and loving. Is there anything I am forgetting? If I am, it doesn't matter - Prinz Eugen has all such qualities. She is not even a mother herself right now and yet she is already the world's best mother. Should Retia consider her a better mother figure when she grows up, I will not even be mad about it. Prinz Eugen is an angel - an angel among men. Should I be any more religious, I would be ashamed that lowly figures such as men should have to marry an angel like her.
I mean...especially when I think about the times when she handles my daughter. She treats Retia like she is her own daughter. She sings lullabies to her, she changes her diapers, she feeds her, she reads to her, she plays with her...Prinz Eugen is single-handedly making me truly regret my career choice in politics. When Prinz Eugen first began taking care of my daughter, I sometimes felt a little jealous, I must admit, when I realized just how much affection she was giving my daughter, and how Retia was accepting all of it. I was afraid that Retia would gravitate towards Prinz Eugen as her mother than myself, but thankfully I realized that this was definitely not the case. Now, I just simply feel thankful that there is someone like her to take care of my family when I am away or if something happens to either me or my husband. I have all the confidence in the world that Prinz Eugen alone can protect my daughter if her parents are not able to.
Perhaps her only flaw is her obsession with Bismarck. And yes, as much as I want to go easy on Prinz Eugen's only visible character flaw, I must deliver the honest truth. Prinz Eugen's obsession with Bismarck is so bizarre that at first, I thought perhaps Prinz Eugen had been constructed with some sort of mental glitch or programming error until I confirmed with the Wunderwaffe team that it was in fact not an error, but instead a character feature of hers. Eventually I did become accustomed to Prinz Eugen's infatuation with Bismarck, especially when I realized that Bismarck rather liked to feed off Prinz Eugen's obsession with her, but it still does not sit very well with me even to this day. I just cannot help but feel that such infatuation cannot be healthy. I suppose it is nice that the cruiser is so affectionate towards her battleship sister, but even then. I think perhaps this is because it is strange for normal people like me to come across someone these days who is not hesitant in gushing their love for their siblings all the time. Certainly such behavior can be seen as strange in the eye of the modern public.
But more than that, could this simply be an act? That Prinz Eugen is only behaving like this because of the particular reason? But if that is the case, what should that reason be? I cannot understand it if Prinz Eugen indeed does have an ulterior motive for such infatuated behavior towards Bismarck. And she does so with such vigor and enthusiasm! One cannot look into the eyes, the heart and soul of that girl when she acts like how she does whenever she interacts with Bismarck and claim that Prinz Eugen is motivated by secondary reasons for her behavior. Like it or not, that is Prinz Eugen's true nature. How do I know this? Besides the months that I have spent living with her under the same roof, because of my assertion earlier that she is the world's most perfect mother, by way of logical deduction, she cannot simultaneously be the world's greatest actor. Such professions are too different to be packaged together in one body, no matter how talented. If such is the case, I can safely say that my life is a complete and utter lie.
After writing this, I feel like the biggest hypocrite. A mother myself, working in politics as the wife of Germany's chancellor? Hmph, if only there were a way to eat my own words. I disgust even myself.
But I suppose it is alright for Prinz Eugen to show such crazed passion for her battleship sister. Should she not have had this flaw, Prinz Eugen would have literally been the most perfect human being in the world. If she didn't have this flaw, the world would not be able to handle the purity of this angel. It is a heartbreaking shame that some day, this angel is most likely going to nurture the seas with fire and metallic brimstone.