| “ | But if looks could kill, there's a man there who's marked down as dead. | ” |
–Joe Jackson | ||
The Security Guards at the Diclonius Research Institute are armed security officers who by definition are often the chief targets of the ire of the captive Diclonius. Their casualty rate is high, and they often seem disposable to their employer, Chief Kakuzawa.
Save for a comment by one of the Kamakura Police Department detectives that a guard killed there by Lucy had been his friend, there is nothing known about the guards' recruitment pool. Being armed security and in a top-secret facility, the odds of them coming from police and military service seems rather high. Whether there were any special forces among them is unknown. Also unknown is whether they were government employees or contractors. In any event, Chief Kakuzawa and his top staff seemed to have complete control over them. While the Chief had overall control over the guards, day-to-day operations fell under the aegis of people like Kurama and Shirakawa, and that to a certain extent, the scientists and other researchers also had some authority over them. Presumably, as many of these officials died or defected from the Chief, he assumed direct control of all personnel for the remainder of the island's existence.
Given the island facility's relative isolation and the need for constant surveillance of their charges, it is likely that the guards and perhaps much of the staff had quarters right on the island itself.
While heavy weaponry was ready and available for use, most guards depicted were equipped with the New Nambu Model 60, a revolver capable enough against non-horned Humans, but seemingly of little consequence to Diclonius, particularly Lucy.
It seems that, like many another security force, always working within proximity to a threat meant eventually losing due diligence in their day to day procedures. One guard lost his life to the savvy and patient Number 3 in this manner. The very fact that the guards transporting Lucy in the start to both the anime and manga had any small usable objects in their possession bespeaks an overconfidence in their ability to keep even the most dangerous of their charges in check. While the result is the same for the first-story sniper in the anime and the manga, the anime version's choice to fire through glass may have given Lucy further time to save herself from the sniper's shell. Their tactical training may also be in question since Lucy's simple tactic of crouching down in an elevator's rear section increased her range to turn back their bullets, something for which they had no counter. Given that far more experienced and savvy soldiers also failed in this, how much tactical training would have indeed aided them is also in question. Also unknown is what happened to guards who attempted to leave the Institute's employ.
In the end, these men (no female guards depicted) sum up better than any group in this series the sorry TV Land label of the Red Shirt, since they didn't know the cause they served was evil. Sadly, it seems Chief Kakuzawa had the utter disregard for these employees that the character of Star Trek's Captain Kirk only shows in parodies.
Near the end of the manga series, all guards still present on the island were slaughtered along with the rest of the staff by the uprising of the Clone Diclonii or drowned when the island sank.
Notable Security Guards In-Series[]
Elevator Guards[]
In both versions of the series, these are depicted as being Lucy's first victims, though the manga goes a step further and relates the prior fate of a guard who ignored Lucy's then-effective vector range to his final peril. They are transporting Lucy from one restraining chamber to one even more restrictive. They seemed to exhibit some laxity, as small personal possessions kept on them help bring about their deaths, and puzzlingly, the keys needed to unlock Lucy's restraints are held on them, and not transported separately. In both versions, one guard places his arm inside the vector field, only to lose that arm and then his life, while Lucy takes the keys and frees herself entirely. The other guard pointlessly shoots until Lucy can turn her full attention to him. Depending on the version, other guards wait as she exits the elevator, who fare no better.
Corridor and Exit Guards[]
Security guards suiting up for battle. Not that it'll help them...
When the first ten minutes of the first episode of the series are called to account for their over-the-top use of violence, it is typically the gory fates of these guards that embody this view, perhaps even more so than that of Kisaragi. The ones in the corridor seem to be merely there for a holding action, and though they attempt to stay well outside Lucy's range, this perhaps also decreases the already limited effectiveness of their weapons. To boot, Lucy's vicious cleverness in using small objects against them makes their efforts to keep back utterly pointless. Vanishing in plumes of blood and bone, even those armed with machine guns find themselves outwitted before being slaughtered. While it is unclear how long Lucy used Kisaragi's headless body as a shield, the guards' training again comes into question when they only fire straight ahead with no other effort to overcome Lucy's advantages. Their struggle became moot when a then-unknown party opens the door to the outside. The sight of the death around them is shown to unnerve this set of guards visibly.
Snipers[]
Only a few appear in the series, in keeping with the real-world notion that a sniper is a highly trained individual whose job is to deliver one critical shot at a carefully chosen moment. The questions of competence and training for the guards not in this line of work do not come up here. But perhaps another element may restrain their effectiveness, however operationally necessary it may be. When the sniper who wounds the escaping Lucy fires, he does so only when Kurama gives the go-ahead. While most snipers in a unit situation only proceed with sanction from superiors, it seems possible that having to check against this permission took the attempted kill-shot from one purely chosen by the sniper's sense of the moment to one delayed by Kurama's choice. With that said, Kurama did not hesitate to authorize the shot, so it seems unlikely that the sniper could have stopped or killed Lucy absent his superior's presence. The second primary sniper appears when he attempts to shoot Lucy as she is nearing finishing off the wounded Nana. By this point, Lucy's bloody escape from the island is well known, and the guards/soldiers present are unnerved, which is indicated to have perhaps thrown off the sniper's aim. This shot does, however, distract Lucy and allow Nana to disable her vectors, likely saving Kurama and the entire force with him. See also AW50F and Accuracy International Arctic Warfare for their weapons.
Number 3's attendants[]
Set before the start of the series, these guards lived and died before Lucy even arrived at the DRI. It is, therefore, difficult to tell if they were a more professional group than was later seen, or if lessons learned here carried forward. Assigned to watch over Sileplits like Number 3. Also at issue is whether they failed to take Number 3 seriously, or if, told her vector power was limited by the research staff, they acted with the information provided, which proved to be faulty. In any event, a staff member delivering her food and the guard assigned to escort him were killed by Number 3 as she sought to meet Kurama, who she infected with the Diclonius virus along with Oomori. Perhaps tellingly, she was killed not by a guard but by Professor Kakuzawa, indicating senior staff like himself possessed access to the kind of weaponry that could contain their powerful and bitter charges.
Uprising Guards[]
The time finally came that the much-abused Clone Diclonii came up from their prison in the island's underground grotto, excited into activity either by the presence of Lucy, their Queen or by the creation of Arakawa's Anti-Diclonius Birth Vaccine, which they sensed as an existential threat. Furthering the gap in the island's base created by Lucy's fight with Anna Kakuzawa, they came into the main facility, many for the first time, and began a wholesale slaughter of any and all staff they encountered. Some guards packed hurriedly into a transport copter and got away, only for the clones to target and destroy the chopper. To the best check of the narrative, no one, either research staff or guards, got off the island.
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