Hynavian

***Warning: Mature content that’s unsuitable for minor or the sensitive***

I feel for the girls in Gunslinger Girl. They come from a range of tragic backgrounds¹ and were trained to be human killing machines by the organization that took them in. Likewise, I also feel for Aiko from Variante. Her family was ripped to bits by a Chimera² right before her and she had to become an anti-Chimera tool when an organization took her in for experimentation. If you sympathize the characters in both Gunslinger and Variante, you’ll also feel for Cat from Confidential Assassination Troop (C.A.T) as her plight is really pitiful.

The first thing that struck me was the art; it’s not the usual style that I see in manga. It’s rather sketchy and it relies heavily on black and white shades to portray both figures and sceneries. Features of characters remind me of my portrait sketching lessons where I have to sketch the face of a live model. The art, perhaps, add on to the realistically of Cat’s plight and makes me all the more sympathize with a character who looks so real.

The Third World War is coming, everyone is panicking and the world is in chaos with crooks running amok. Countries try to gather top secret information and they dispatch agents to retrieve them. After a series of experimentation and trials, we have the genetically enhanced Cat from the US. She’s flesh and blood, unlike the mechanical girls from Gunslinger Girl. Cat uses weapons and does not has a biomedical arm like Aiko has in Variante. However, she’s genetically enhanced with inhuman reflexes, flexibility and perception.

Cat does a variation of jobs, from stealing information to assassination. She assassinates not only n00b characters³ but also other genetically enhanced agents in order to survive. There’ll be a mix of action along with gore, since weapons and death are involved, and Cat will be in the midst of conspiracies between countries. So where’s the sympathy? Why do I sympathize Cat?

Damn those teenager raping FUCKERS!!!

The thing with Gunslinger Girl and Variante is that despite their tragic past, they have nice big brothers who take care of them when they’re minors. Cat is a loner, she made it to adulthood but her everyday was hell. When she was 6, she return home only to find a gory scene with both parents dead⁴. She then lived a sickly life with stray cats for 6 years until people from some organization took her in. There, she was experimented, abused and repeatedly raped. She managed to escape but met other misfortunes⁵. Though traumatized, she makes it to adulthood and the plot revolves round a 20 year old Cat in action.

If you’re looking for her bacon of light, Joe Yee would be the one. He found an unconscious Cat bleeding profusely after a battle to death match and he took her in. He befriend Cat, gave her a better impression of man and taught her joy in simplicity. Though as ridiculous as it sounds, he even got her a job in a maid cafe so that she can try living a normal life. In a pre-war world, it’s comforting to know that Cat at least meet a person who cares for her.

Cat tries to fit back into society with the help of Joe Yee but she threatens to slit the throat of any guys who dares to take liberties with her.

Love blooming between Cat and Joe Yee?

However, in such a panicky world where war seems unavoidable, I can’t help but feel that everything is bleak for Cat. The peacefulness that she’s experiencing now is but temporal and all hell will break out later. For Gunslinger Girl and Variante, the characters are living in not so bad environment after all. As for Cat, her life has been down the drain throughout and things will get messier. Fung Ching Pang, heard of the mangaka before? I haven’t but I gave Confidential Assassination Troop (C.A.T) a try. The manga is available in traditional chinese and is published by Tong Li under the title 密殺戰群. If you’re looking for a dark series, give this a try but be warned though, certain issues are hard to stomach.

1. Rico’s parents sold her away. Henrietta’s family was murdered, she was raped and left to die. Angelica parent’s tried to murder her so as to claim insurance, etc [↩]
2. Monsters found in Variante are known as “Chimeras” [↩]
3. Weak characters that die easily [↩]
4. Cat’s father emptied half a magazine of bullets into her mother before shooting himself [↩]
5. Mafia ring leader took her in and tried to rape her at age 15 but she killed him in self defense. Since then, both governmental agencies and the mafia have been after her. She then met “boss” who assigns assassination jobs to her after surviving a last man standing battle royal death match [↩]