This is very good story. Even after more than a decade there are people that enjoy your story, thank you for writing this it.

I've jus discovered your stories and am completely in love with them! I'm actually writing a few of own fics and they were inspired by this. Thank you so much for the gift that is Snakehead!

I love it. The confrontation with luciela was really intense!

Oh... ;.; it was good! :D I enjoyed it! But I do feel sort of bad for Ermita...

I love this. You write really well, and stuck to the original personality of Galatea, though I'm not sure if Ermita ever had a temper as foul as that.

Great, great fic. Really touching at the end and with a good characher development.

We barely saw anything of Ermita in the manga so I guess you let your imagination run wild and gave us a Ermita who had a sad backstory and was above everyone else in the Org when it came to moral.

A good detail was Galatea's backstory. We have the idea that every Claymore is taken to the Organization as a child but giving a son to Galatea and making her the only adult to go to the Org on her own free will extablished in my opinion an interesting connection between her and the series main characther.

Chapter 3 was the best. Loved the way you portrayed Luciela, as a evil and sadistic monster intead of the weak Abyssal most people make her for.

Bad things? The only one I can think of is that sounds a little strange that Ermita stopped being Galatea's handler and still, we see him with her on the Slasher's arc and he is the one that Rimuto asks to contact Galatea

O.M.G. So. Freaking. Good. It did make me cry.

Btw God bless! Cool to find a fellow Christian into Claymore.:D

Ah, two new chapters posted in rapid succession and I've finally been able to find some time to sit down and read them with the attention they deserve.

Ermita got himself in a terrible mess, no hasn't he? It was nice to see Luciela in a fanfic. Of all the Abyssals, I have to say she's the nuttiest. Isley is the most sane and can be reasoned with, Riful is dangerous yet playful if amused enough, but Luciela... she's what you get when you roll Bender, Hannibal Lector and lady Bathory into one person. She's scary enough in the manga, but downright frightening in your story. I get the image of a cat playing with a captured mouse during her 'negotiations' with Ermita.

Galatea's view of this whole mess, especially at the end, is decidedly black and white, which is fitting: Galatea is the soldier, where Ermita is the politician, of a sort.

The epilogue was short but very powerful. From the drumhead trial... obviously internal politics of the Organization... to the confrontation at the end where Galatea asked to remove his mask. Loved that scene, as I did the sniping towards Rubel. Disgusting little rat. I was surprised to learn that Rubel is in fact a double agent... if he's telling the truth, which is dubious at best.

Shame to see you taking a break from Claymore fic. But in any case, congratulations on finishing this story.

It is the first time I've come across with a Claymore fan fiction centered around the relationship between an MiB and a warrior of the organization. All the more kudos to you for delivering such a good story to an area of the fandom not too much challenged as of yet. :)

There is not much I can say about the first chapter. You presented a good setting for the rest of the story as well as gave some hints as to what it would be about. Perhaps it would've been better if you had snipped it shorter here and there, for example made Ermita's wandering at the marketplace a bit more brief, and gone sooner to the point. Also, I found Ermita's line at the beginning in the job interview, "..if they can survive me" quite out of place. An extremely minor detail, but such theatrical words did momentarily kind of lessen the credibility of his character in my eyes.

Moving along, the second chapter was the one that really got the story going. The scene at the campfire was marvellous, full of fine and subtle descriptions about the atmosphere looming over the two, like the metaphor of the wine bottle as a territory divider. Ermita's smoothness with the baby was an exciting detail; both in contrast with the harsh nature of his work and plausible for he indeed has most probably come to know the way with even little children from his previous experiences.

The fact that Ermita went ahead and provoked Galatea for her past, however, did confuse me a bit. Especially when you revealed his own tragic past with its similarities to that of Galatea's, I imagined that he'd sympathize with her rather than mock her for it. Perhaps it would have made more sense it Galatea was the one to make inquiries about Ermita's past, then I would've understood his urgency to cover a sore spot by turning the topic against her.

In the second chapter, you also brought the plotline with the infant to a close. Good thing you don't let the story drag, but instead of moving on to another quick recruiting mission, I think it could've served better to just make the storyline with the baby last the entire chapter. The scene with Adnen & co. seemed a bit random, for it was again mostly about recruiting another member for the org. I understand you needed to cook up some trouble for them to have them sent to their penalty in the final chapter, but I'm sure this could've been done with the baby alone. Perhaps have the infant stolen by other slave traders during a lack of focus on Ermita's part, or something along those lines.

Ah, and the final chapter, then. It was altogether a fitting climax for a well written story, not much place for complaints there. The pair's inconvenient confrontation with the bandits, having it resulting to a punishment of sending them practically on a suicide mission, and finally the ordeal with Luciela and the painful price Ermita had to pay in order to survive it was all executed with good care and skill. However, in the ensuing quarrel between Galatea and Ermita stood out something I had noticed since the first chapter as a bit lame detail. I see that you use the act of spitting as a way to express the disrespect and despise of your characters, and it does work sometimes. But still I see it as something I'd not expect Galatea to do. I think it would've suited the dignity of her character more if she had shown her disdain for Ermita in some less aggressive yet just as powerful ways, such as ignoring the man completely without a single word, giving him a look of hatred like he'd never seen, and so on. I was even more stunned when you had her actually repeat the act in the epilogue against Rubel. Other than that, I think there was nothing wrong with the conclusion and you depicted a beautiful, just enough romantic moment between the two to bring the story to its conclusion.

Thanks for sharing,

Moonlith

MASTERPIECE!

:)

Oh, I really love it.

I like your kind of writing, it gives me a warm feeling.

Galatea is my favorite character of Claymore, so I was happy to read a fanfic about her.

I'm looking forward to the other chapter!

You did an excellent job! )

Yikes, I'm late with my reply. Actually, I owe you an apology, because I thought I already did reply and, to my dismay, I found out that I actually did not.

Well, better late than never I suppose. (hides underneath the desk in shame). Ahum, let's get to the review then.

First of all, I love the interplay between these two characters. Despite their hostility, they know each other quite well and depend on each other... and so a love-hate relationship is born. They certainly know how to push each other's buttons. :)

Interesting revelations in this story. So in this story, Galatae came into the Claymore game at I suppose a later age than most girls do. It'd interesting to see how Galatea sees her place within the Organization as a result of that. Two possible roads: either she's resistant to their indoctrination because she has some extra years of life experience under her belt or she could be twice as susceptible to it because she could be blinded by her loss.

And Ermita... lost his face and his family to Youma, yet somehow I can't shake the feeling that he could possibly be lying through his teeth. You've given us more questions than answers, and I like that. :)

As for Rubel, yeah, he's damn creepy. That scene in the Anime, where he orders Clare to strip down and inspect her body. That was just... so wrong on so many levels. I wouldn't be surprised if Rubel has a taste for young girls, as implied here.

The part of the story I liked the most is the confrontation with the bandits. A tense situation that goes sour and ends in tragedy and a right amount of tension... and a reassurance that their relationship doesn't contain an ounce of glamour.

Well done, keep it up! :)

Been lurking for some time but i had to say this, WOW! I absolutely love this fic, all in char etc. Galatea is my most fav Claymore before Helen, and its always good to see some fics about her and of course Ermita . Keep up!

Very interesting. There aren't many stories about the men in black, and this was very well written. You've kept both Ermita and Galatea in character, well Galatea at least since there hasn't really been much development on Ermita's part anyway in the original series. But you have fleshed him out into what I imagined the MiB to be like; cold and despicable with a very dark sense of humor. You also raise the question as to if the MiB really do have a sense of morality.

The opening scene was very effective in drawing me in. I liked how you started it out with Ermita's past. You also were effective in creating a sense of chaos and confusion in the market scene. It was very jumbled and confusing making it feel like I was in the scene myself.

Overall it was a very interesting start. It seems that their relationship is more of a parent-daughter relationship now, at least from Galatea's POV. Ermita seems to want to take it further though. I look forward to more.

I like this a lot. The relationship between Ermita and Galatea seems to me as if they're two people who are more or less condemned to each other. They don't particularly like each other, but they don't particularly hate each other either. Though Galatea probably hates Ermita a bit more than he does her. :)

The men in black... interesting lot and there's a lot of questions surrounding them. Seeing there are 47 claymores, it stands to reason there are 47 MiB in the field as well. Are the MiB recruited in the same way the Claymores are? Or are they simply members by diaspora of this secret society? Plenty of room in the sandbox to play around in.

And then there's the nature of the Claymore-MiB relationship. Cold and distant? Parent-daughter? Or maybe even a circumstance under which an MiB gets a bit more attached to his charge than he should be.

Interesting as Ermita, as a human, could pick a Youma out of the crowd with a single glance. Special training, perhaps? Or something else.

Lots of opportunities in this story. I'd love to see what route you decide to take.