Newsletter 184, October 14th

Kaze no Stigma
Glass Fleet
(History’s Strongest Disciple) Kenichi
Black Cat
Gunslinger Girl II
Tsukikage Ran
Pumpkin Scissors

Kaze no Stigma 10- Ren continues to spend with Ayame, basically giving her a good time in order to keep her from going back home (as she says she doesn’t want to return home). However, despite the good times, all good things must come to an end… and this happens when a girl who looks like an older version of Ayame comes to take her off Ren’s hands. Ren manages to fend off her butler, but ultimately loses when he finds out the truth about Ayame: she is but a clone to be used in a sealing ceremony, and destined to die one way or another (as she would still only live for another month anyways). Things only get deeper when Ayame is taken back, and it seems that the treasure of the pixies is what brought her into existence… not only that, but the eldest sister takes the other two girl somewhere, and the butler notices this… and it turns out that the original has now been encased in some sort of stone, and may need to be used in the ceremony anyways. The butler is quite dedicated to her, though, and takes the bait when the eldest offers him power to fend off Kazuma…

Glass Fleet 5- After dealing with another of the Empire’s lackeys, we learn about the various paths that the crew of Cleo’s ship came from, and what they all once were before they met Cleo. Elsewhere, Vetti is making a plan to finally get Michel, and the plan turns out to be having Cleo’s crew rescue a ship… and Michel’[s brother appears to be among the injured crew.

Kenichi 2- With his match that will determine who stays and leaves in the karate club, Kenichi asks the masters to train him… and this turns out to be something like a mistake, as he ends up not learning any moves but goes through hell training to build up his muscles. Fortunately, Miu is around to teach Kenichi a “simple” move… which he fails at first, but keeps practicing it, even on his way to school. However, even with all the training b he’s gone through, Kenichi still is unable to gain the upper hand in the match… until he finds that he’s actually able to do the move Miu taught him, even though it just means that he’s doing a bunch of dodging. But even this pays off, as his opponent gets weary, and then Kenichi manages to win with a strike… or rather, a throw. Even though his opponent fell, Kenichi says he lost the match because he used an illegal move, and decides that he will leave the club. However, making this move in turn makes him the real winner.

Black Cat 24- With Eden on the rampage and absorbing people, the group is all inside, facing down the monsters of Eden and the Zero numbers as the scientist awaits for Eve to merge with Adam and complete the program. The only problem: he gets unwanted visitors who tell him that his plan will never work. Not only that, but Train and Sven are told to go get Eve while the rest handle what’s left of the Taoists. Unfortunately, this proves to be slightly problematic, since as Train and Sven heads towards where Eve is, they end up running into Mason and his Taoist power, which takes out both Train and Sven. Backup arrives in the unlikely form of Creed (who is still crazy about Train), and they’re able to move on while Creed handles Mason. As tey continue, they separate, and Sven ends p getting only inches away from Eve, but is unable to do anything… while Train must face his past in the form of Zangane, who taunts him about his life as an assassin. Still, Train is able to overcome it, and manages to fire a bullet through Zangane and all the way into the heart of Eden, setting Eve frre. From there, the epilogue shows how things are going, from Eve being in school now to the lives of the rest… and it seems Train has once again vanished, to wander around the world.

Gunslinger Girl II 5- Triela continues to lament on her loss to Pinocchio, with the shock of a cyborg like her being beaten by a human like him. Meanwhile, Angela’s handler Roberto runs into the problem of people from his past digging into his current life, including an ex-girlfriend. She talks with an undercover reporter on the time she spent with him, and why they went their separate ways, which leads him to wanting to know more about Roberto’s employer, especially since it sounds like he went from being gung-ho to sitting behind a desk. The Agency gets word on this, and the two find out about Roberto’s current life, something he never wanted, as Angela shoots and injures the reporter as Roberto asks them both to leave the place.

Ran 3- Lady Meow unexpectedly finds herself as a temporary mother, as someone drops off a baby by her and she gets stuck taking care of the baby boy. Whether due to motherly instincts or not, she ends up getting quite attached to him, and Ran ends up finding out the truth about this mess: the boy is the son of the local lord, but the mother is one of his concubines and not his actual wife, who was scheming to get rid of the baby… however, both mother and the wife die, and Meow literally pounds into the lord’s head that he is to take good care of his son, since the lord is the only family the boy has now. And later, Ran teases Meow about how she’ll never find a man to make her into a mother…

Pumpkin Scissors 12- Due to a report on the Invisible Nine having been written up, a certain sleezeball reporter decides to try and make a few dollars off of it, and Section 3 has to get it back before it causes any harm. As they track down the leads, they end up having to deal with a new threat: the report itself vanishes, and two who helped get the report out find themselves dead, as an assassin goes out to silence anyone who gets involved with the report, including the first sleezeball. And of course, before anything can be gathered about the assassin, he kills himself after he gets captured.

Rollcall:
Jeff
Dave
Erin
Tom
Nick
Andy