The blonde woman intently watched Maria's Heavenly Brewery. Her two companions– one an eleven-year-old girl, the other a year older– waited alongside her. Gone were the days when it was only her and Kirika against the world.
"So this is the place they picked." She watched a young woman in a white dress enter the bar. Her flesh-toned earpiece chirped. "Mireille here," she told the air. "Go ahead, Jean."
"They have a Fratello team seated on that bench across the street. Rico has them in her sight."
"What about our own teams?"
"Almost done setting up." Ferro, in charge of the support teams, was efficient as ever. "Hilshire and Triela are already sweeping the rear. You can proceed with first contact."
"Thanks for the head's up, Jean. On my way."
"Be careful."
"I will." The woman gave the girls a knowing look. "'Etta, Claes. I'm going to enter the bar. Go greet the American support team. Remember not to provoke them. They're not our enemies."
"Yes, Miss Mireille."
"Roger."
Life Goes On
Note: Text in "" are said over the radio. Italicized text denotes thought. Bold text emphasizes certain words.
Disclaimer: Gunslinger Girl, Noir, Full Metal Panic! The Second Raid, Metal Slug and Saikano are owned by their respective owners. I 'own' Giuseppe, Elena and Rolito. The Handsome Men and Jeremy Colt are courtesy Person With Many Aliases, who gave me permission to use them. I highly recommend you read up his work with the same title to get a better feel out of them.
Revamped Chronology: This story happens past Volume Six of Gunslinger Girl, several years after Noir, sometime after Full Metal Panic: The Second Raid and five years or so before the events of Saikano (manga).
Eighteen
Incontro
(Encounter)
"Hello," the dazzling blonde affably greeted. Her English was flawless as her teeth and looks.
Vincent blinked but recovered instantly by smiling back. "Hello. Do we know each other?"
"We do now. My name's Mireille."
"I'm Vincent. Pleased to meet you, Mireille."
"The same here. May I sit next to you?"
"Please."
Mireille ordered two glasses of sparkling water. She spoke fluent Italian. Her brilliant smile made Vincent forget about his planned conference with Lazarus.
"Are you a tourist?" she asked as their drinks arrived. Her eyes told Vincent to help himself. He obliged.
"Yes. I'm traveling with my daughter," he automatically added– and realized his error. Why did I say that to a pretty woman's who's prospecting me?
But she seemed impervious to the admission. "Ah. Visiting Rome?"
"Yes. We also have relatives here." Leastways Danielle does. "We might visit them if we have time." Not if I can help it, though. "You?"
"I originally lived in Paris. I wanted a change of scenery, so I toured Europe and even America for a while. Italy suited me, so I rented an apartment in Rome, got a job and stayed. Best decision I've ever made in my life."
"I'm glad to hear that. What's your line of work?"
"I work with handicapped and abused children." Her smile turned foxy. "We rehabilitate their bodies and give them new lives."
Vincent barely kept his smiling composure. Mireille's answer sounded a bit too much like the Handsome Men's own euphemism for their cyborg program.
It couldn't be…
Maybe he was being too suspicious. God knew there were more than enough orphanages and welfare centers in this country. But he couldn't get rid of that gnawing uncertainty at the back of his head.
"What's the name of the place you work in?" Vincent cautiously asked.
"It's called the Social Welfare Service."
And there it was. This woman was telling him who she was, who she worked for. In effect, she was saying: you know who we are. We know who you are.
But his mission orders were clear. And maybe she was just casting about and got a lucky guess. A shot in the dark, yes, but any chance he could get–
"What's that?" Vincent asked.
"Let's be frank." Those emerald eyes were penetratingly bright and beginning to be unfriendly. "You are Vincent of the Americans' Handsome Men. I'm Mireille Bouquet of Section Two of the Political Warfare Division, your organization's Italian counterpart."
"I'm afraid I don't understand." This while slowly reaching for the M9 Beretta in his clothing, just in case.
"You don't have to. But–" Vincent felt something hard press into his rib cage. He knew it was a gun. The woman had it aimed on him all along.
"You don't have the luxury of disbelief," Mireille told him matter-of-factly.
Claes found her orders a font of delicious irony. She makes it sound like putting a gun to a man's head isn't provocative. Well, Mireille is my commander. A good soldier follows orders and protects her commander in any way she can.
"Please do not move," she politely ordered both the American and his cyborg. Her VP-70's muzzle rested upon Lazarus' foramen magnum, the hole where the spinal cord slotted into the skull. A bullet there would instantly kill. Claes hoped, as did Mireille, that it wouldn't have to come to that, that the mere suggestion was enough.
The Japanese girl froze. So Mireille had guessed it right. A cyborg could be distracted given the proper bait– and dissuaded with the right proposal.
"Move your hand away from your gun," Claes ordered her American-built counterpart. Her spectacles were tucked away in a side pocket. If they only knew what this means…
The girl did as ordered. Claes suppressed a sigh of relief– and a smile.
Sunlight glinted off glass and metal from the rooftop of a five-story apartment building two hundred feet down the street. That would be Rico drawing a bead on the American-employed, Japanese cyborg's forehead. At this range the Dragunov's big 7.62mm slugs could punch through even the durable material encasing a mechanical body's skull. And Rico was a dead shot.
Henrietta was apologizing in melodious Italian and broken English. Not a good liar, that innate honesty made her all the more convincing– a fact that seemed to distress 'Etta all the more.
Claes paused in mid-consideration. Mireille is starting to affect me as well.
The American cyborg watched both Italian junior agents for an opening she could use. Her handler stopped her with a glance, though.
"You are from Section Two?" he asked in English.
Claes nodded.
"Stand down, Yuki," the man told his cyborg. "They aren't enemies. Return to your current mission."
Yuki obediently did as ordered, sitting herself very rigidly and fixing her gaze anew upon Maria's– but not before glancing rather coldly at Henrietta.
'Etta looked downcast.
"My name," the man said, "Is Lazarus. This is Yuki."
"I am Claes. My friend is Henrietta. Secure your gun, 'Etta." She hid her own gun and passed Lazarus a handheld radio. "My superior, Jean, wishes to talk to you."
"Understood. Your English is excellent."
"I have a good teacher."
Hillshire sneezed.
Ignoring him, Triela swept the litter-strewn alley with her eyes and shotgun. She took good care to keep her weapon pointed at the ground. Their orders were explicit. Do not provoke the American cyborg. Convince her that they were allies.
She's somewhere here. I'm sure of it. I can feel it.
Come out, come out, wherever you are…
Danielle hunkered deeper into her hiding place. It was all she could do not to drop her weapon and hold her hands to her ears in an attempt to block out her hunters' words.
"We're with Section Two," the man said aloud in English. His accent was British, refined and cultured. "We're Italy's counterpart to your organization. We don't mean you any harm. We want to help."
His partner remained silent and watchful.
Danielle tried not to shudder. Not since that dark and stormy night years ago had she felt this– helpless? No. More like futile. Her family– for that was what Vincent was to her, was he not? The same with Yuki and all the other girls who were her friends– was in danger once more. And here she was, cybernetically enhanced, magnificently trained and heavily armed– but completely unable to do anything about the threat.
She felt the dark side of her, the berserker within, rousing speedily. She shivered. Her fingers tightened around the pistol grip of her customized P90. Her whole body tethered on the precipice of violent rage.
And then Vincent's words came back to her in a rush.
"Stand by and watch out. Keep yourself hidden until I give the word or you spot Colt attempting to escape."
Vincent…
She trusted his judgment. She believed in him. She loved him. For his sake, furiously but silently, she fought down her darker self.
Go away, go away, go away, go away, just go away and leave me alone…
The Italian Team passed her hiding place without giving it a second glance. In minutes their footsteps slowly faded away into the distance.
Still Danielle did not dare breathe in relief.
Who are they? What's happening?
Vincent? Are you all right?
"Is this any way to treat a friend and ally?" Vincent testily asked, Mireille's Walther nuzzling a spot between his fifth and sixth floating ribs.
"You illegally entered Italy with faked passports. You brought unregistered deadly weapons– your guns and girls– with you. You are conducting a secret mission on Italian soil without the knowledge of, and permission from, the Italian government, military and police forces." Mireille's eyes and tone were bleak. "Is that the way a friend and ally acts?"
"I have my orders." He noted, though, that she called the Handsome Men cyborgs 'girls'. She sees them as children, too?
"So do I. Four Fratello teams and a support team are emplaced around this bar." Vincent whistled in admiration at the massed firepower. Rare and big was the op that saw a comparable number of Handsome Men Teams. Then he realized that the bear the Italians were loaded for was him and his teammates. That dampened his amusement.
"We can lock this area down and eliminate all threats once I give the signal. The question is," Mireille stated without any hint of rancor, "Are we going to have to take you down as well, or will you cooperate with us?"
One of the first lessons Vincent learned as a leader is that he was always alone. Responsibility for his teammates' lives and his mission's success completely rested on his shoulders. If he agreed to Mireille's "offer", this would become Section Two's victory. Refusing–
No. He couldn't gamble with Danielle's life for the sake of pride. He wasn't Leon. He did not risk his ward unnecessarily. He loved her too much for both their good.
He looked into Mireille's eyes and discovered a protective sentiment similar to his own. She's a handler, too. She knows. She cares.
"All right, we'll do it your way."
Vincent felt the steely muzzle move away from his ribs. Feeling the need for a display of aplomb, he took up his untouched glass. "Cheers on that?"
Mireille toasted him. Her smile's warmth became honest. "You should have told us from the beginning." She sipped her drink.
"No arguing that. But would you have let us?"
"That is for my superiors to decide."
"Same here." Same all over the world.
"So who are you after?"
"See the American in the back? The man wearing a trench coat in the middle of summer?"
Very casually, Mireille looked over her shoulder.
Colt felt no anxiety at being eyeballed by the sexy blonde beside the American handler. (Though he thought she looked a tad bit familiar.) In fact he felt rather pleased and sort of hoped his companion noticed the attention. Jealousy was always a nice way to spice up a relationship– though the girl in question proved pretty lethal when it came to such emotions.
His partner, however, went cold upon meeting those painfully familiar green eyes.
Mireille stood up in shock at seeing the apparition seated not fifteen feet away.
No. It can't be.
Yet there stood the girl with the red hair and green eyes, similarly astonished, also half-poised to flee. The girl she and Kirika fought several times up until the final battle in The Manor– a bloody climax cut short by the very same man who stood beside her. The girl who called herself True Noir.
"Chloe?"
"Fuck!"
Colt only now recognized the blonde as one of those Noir women he'd run into at the Manor back when he came for Chloe. I thought she was in France or something.
Shit had just hit the fan. Time for Escape Plan C.
He stood up, pointed at the blonde and the American, and yelled in badly accented Italian: "Polizei!"
Everyone inside the bar stared at him, and then at his two startled suspects, who stared back.
"Polizia!" Colt hoped he got the Italian word for 'police' right. "Polizai! Cops! Carbine or something! You hear me!" He mimicked a siren's sound. "Here to shoot you!"
Eyebrows rose. Heads shook in confusion and derision. Chloe was no help, her attention locked on the blonde.
Ah, fuck, Colt decided, I think they all think I'm the typical crazy American…
Speaking of Americans, the handler at the bar turned with his hands held up. "Hey, I don't know what this is, but I'm sure this is all a big misunderstanding–"
And then Colt saw the familiar shape sticking partway out of the bag of the woman beside his enemy, and found his opening.
"GUN!"
It didn't matter that he yelled the English word and not the Italian word. Someone looked. Someone always did. Not all the wolves Peter yelled about were imaginary.
Four dozen eyes widened upon sighting the Walther. That it was partly inside the bag failed to register in panicked or threatened minds.
"Pistoli!"
Note to self, Colt mentally indulged: Gun equals pistoli here.
Half the bar's patrons made to bolt. The other half pulled out an assortment of semiautomatics and a few machine pistols.
The blonde woman snapped out of her trance and athletically vaulted over the countertop in a flash of red and black, firing over her shoulder. The American hurried after her as every Mafia button man and three minor Padania agents in the bar opened fire.
The bartender, polishing a glass to mirror sheen, stood his ground, unmindful of the lethal hail of steel flying around him.
Meanwhile Colt hauled the unresponsive Chloe to the nearest double-paned window. "Come on, woman! We're getting out of here!"
"She's here," was all the cryptically uninformative babble he got from her. Colt slung her unresisting body onto his right shoulder as if she were a sack of potatoes. He kicked the windows open. Maybe three feet down to the street below, he judged. Safe enough.
Colt jumped.
Corsica's daughter– here? Then– is she here, too, then? That child? Noir?
Chloe smiled dreamily.
Kirika…
Vincent fired blindly over the counter with his Beretta. "What the hell," he demanded of Mireille, "Was that all about?"
"I should be asking that question!" The blonde quickly reloaded. "Why didn't you warn me about his partner?"
"His partner? We were after Crazy Horse! The man! We don't know who the woman with him is!"
"Does the name True Noir ring a bell?"
"True What? What's that?"
"I'll tell you later! Now!"
Mireille and Vincent popped out of hiding, sighted and fired in near synch. Their targets went down.
A double-paned window at the far end was open. Neither Chloe nor Colt was in sight.
Swearing at their marks' escape, the two handlers ducked behind the counter. The wall behind them burst apart a second later. Chips of stone and wood peppered them.
"Shit!" Vincent snarled.
Incredibly, the bartender was still working on a new set of glasses despite the gunfight raging about him.
Mireille hit her earplug. "Jean! My cover's blown! We're under fire! Send 'Etta in!"
"Danny!" Vincent barked into his own handheld radio over the gunfire. "I need back-up! I'm pinned down behind the counter!"
The gunfight raging inside the building overpowered the sound of the stampeding crowd fleeing Maria's. Panicking people shoved aside the startled guards at the entrance. The two men cursed and turned to look inside.
Rather, one succeeded in turning. The other was about to do so when an eight-millimeter-wide hollow point bullet traveling at a substantial fraction of the speed of sound hit the side of his head with a wet smack.
The bullet's soft lead tip expanded upon impacting the man's skull before fragmenting. Shards of bone and lead tore through grey matter. The shot had enough power to twist his neck the wrong way, spinning him as he fell, already dead.
It was her first kill with her new VSS Vintorez precision marksman rifle. Rico did not bother celebrating. She emotionlessly tracked the second hostile and squeezed the trigger.
Second kill.
Jean confirmed the death of the second guard through the scope of Rico's Dragunov, which he manned as a failsafe. And here I wondered how useful an 8mm rifle round is. The Dragunov's high-powered bullet could have easily punched through their targets with enough force to injure or kill noncombatants.
He just barely caught the small form darting through fleeing patrons, past the dead men and into Maria's.
Hold on, Mireille. The cavalry's there.
An empty Amati case clattered behind her. The P90 was out, armed and searching for targets. One thought dominated Henrietta's mind: her handler was in danger.
Miss Mireille!
Danielle threw her small, tough body against the rickety door. Termite-infested hardwood shattered. The girl hurtled into the kitchen, teeth gritted, submachine gun up and searching for targets.
The chef was big, well over six feet and not five steps away. He wielded a huge butcher knife with expertise. Hesitating only slightly, he swung at Danielle's head with the cleaver. The girl ducked and then dropped him with a ten-round burst in his broad chest.
The rest of the kitchen crew ran for their lives. Danielle followed them through the twin swinging doors leading into the bar. Ahead were heavy gunfire, hoarse yelling and Vincent.
Twenty feet directly forward of the main entrance was the embattled, bullet-marked counter. Henrietta spotted Mireille dragging a man down with her behind it. To her left and right, a score of gunmen busily blasted away. No one noticed the new, lethal arrival.
It was a rare position salivated upon by many a battlefield tactician: a powerful force poised at the rear area of an unsuspecting enemy.
Cold, deadly fury seized Henrietta. You're not going to hurt Miss Mireille! She flicked her P90 to full automatic and raked the left side of the room. She ripped apart five men. The survivors turned on her.
"Also, don't block. Dodge. Don't stop moving. Use the terrain. Keep nice big things between you and your enemy."
Yes, Miss Mireille. Henrietta dove to her left. Behind the battered table she picked as a hiding place, a startled Mafia man was halfway in his turn. She exploded his face with a two-second burst and shoved his corpse aside.
The P90's transparent ammo clip showed five bullets remaining. She slammed home a new clip. Shots thudded against her wooden shelter.
Automatic fire kicked off screams of pain and death. The long burst sounded suspiciously like her P90. Who's that?
She didn't know it, but Danielle was lucky. Her charge had herded the kitchen crew ahead into their deaths. Soon as the half dozen or so panicked men came through the swinging doors, they drew heavy fire from a host of machine pistols and semiautomatics, itchy trigger-fingers deciding it was better safe than sorry.
The defenders were still reloading when Danielle, having hesitated in her headlong rush, what with the way blocked by the fleeing men, finally tore through the shattered doors. She cut down three surprised gunmen, dropped on one knee and killed a fourth. Gun muzzles hastily aimed at her.
A second P90 snarled. Men died or wavered, unable to decide which target to engage.
Danielle rolled behind a table, only to pop out and let loose again.
Vincent and a blonde woman Danielle didn't recognize rose from behind the counter, pistols blazing.
Bullets from three different directions killed Mafia gunmen where they stood or hid. In seconds the room was clear of hostiles.
Something metallic rolled from a dying man's hand. The blond woman spotted it.
"Grenade!" Followed by the Italian equivalent: "Granata!"
Everyone still alive ducked behind something solid and held on for their lives.
A terrible roar shook their small corner of the world. The concussion shattered windows and sent chairs flying.
A deathly stillness of cordite powder settled across Maria's.
"Everyone all right?" a woman's voice stridently inquired. She added something in Italian that ended with "Henrietta?"
"Si, Miss Mireille!" a small voice piped up as reply.
Danielle blinked. Who are they? And that voice– it sounds familiar…
"Danielle?" a familiar voice called out.
Her heart leapt. Vincent is all right! "I'm okay, Vincent!"
"Good. All enemies down?"
She swept the room with both eyes and gun. "Yes!"
"Everyone, secure your weapons." The woman switched to Italian. The hidden girl acknowledged her order in the same language.
"Do what she says," Vincent added aloud for Danielle's benefit, knowing his ward wouldn't follow anyone else's orders.
Danielle immediately safed her P90. "I'm safed, Vincent." She noticed movement, turned to look at the emerging, fellow gunslinger girl.
Henrietta, crouched against the heavy table, listened to Mireille say something in a foreign language, probably English. "You okay, Henrietta?" her handler asked her in Italian.
"Yes, Miss Mireille! Are you all right?"
"Wasn't even scratched, would you believe it? Are there any enemies left?"
She closed her eyes and listened for any breathing or heartbeat aside from hers and Mireille's. Henrietta detected three. Two of them right next to her handler. The other's heartbeat thumped rather like a cyborg's– like Henrietta, for example. Or, on a grimmer note that made her grip her P90 tight, Giuseppe's.
"There are three people. Two are beside you. The third is a cyborg–"
"The cyborg is on our side. She's your American equivalent."
Meanwhile a man and a girl conversed in emotional English. Henrietta wondered who they were.
Mireille said something in English to the man, who replied in the same language. Henrietta felt left out and quite envious. When we get home, I'm going to ask Mr. Hillshire to really teach me English.
"Henrietta," her handler finally said, "Secure your weapon."
"Yes, Miss Mireille." Done, she stood up.
Danielle gasped.
Henrietta caught her breath.
They looked exactly alike.
In anime, the family relationships devolved into bloodthirsty rivalry most of the time. In real life… well.
Next on Life Goes On: Familia (Family).