Mardock Scramble

watched. The gallery was growing in number, one by one. Music played, passing through the rhythm of the cards before disappearing again.

The ties continued. Not just once or twice. Balot trudged through the dark desert. But this time there were morning stars twinkling in the sky. She could see them. They were fellow travelers, walking beside her. Cold tension and anxiety. Impatience and fatigue. Their footsteps in time as they marched in the same direction. The same direction as her. This wasn’t as foolish and simple as when she was worried about averting her eyes.

After a time, the twentieth hand passed in a tie, and with the twenty-first hand’s tie, the cards began to unravel, and with the twenty-second hand’s tie, like a wave cresting against the cliffside and shattering into pieces, an inevitability started to form.

Ashley placed his upcard for the twenty-third hand. A king.

Balot’s hand was filled with a 3-5.

Balot hit and received a 2. She hit again and the 4 came to her heavy. She steadied her breath, preparing herself for whatever was to come, and said,

–Hit.

She willed her eyes not to turn away. A 5. Nineteen. Stay.

Ashley turned over his hole card. It was an ace.

Ashley won. Balot’s chips were wiped from her pot.

Balot watched it happen. The empty space where her chips had been seemed to whisper to her. Now is the time. Your lost chips were your high ground. Now you must jump as it vanishes out from under you. You’re jumping from the high ground you’ve built up.

If you miss your landing, you’re dead by the very height you built.

Balot prayed for courage. It wasn’t that hard. If what she had gained was everything, and it was being tested, all she had to do was open her hand and show it.

She opened her left hand. She pulled out her first golden chip and placed it softly on the empty table. The crowd suddenly began to boil.

–Next hand.

Ashley nodded.

The cards came. His upcard, an ace. Balot’s cards, 7-7.

The red card appeared in the shoe.

Ashley removed the red card. Balot inhaled and exhaled. She touched her hand to the second gold chip. She could sense that its contents had been extracted.

She set the second chip on top of the first.

–Double down.

All sound vanished from the room.

It only took two chips to freeze the entire casino. Two million-dollar chips.

Amid the stinging silence, Ashley solemnly touched his hand to the card shoe.

The card came vividly, the burning red suit striking Balot’s gaze.

A 7.

A red 7.

This was a clear sign: this would be Balot and Ashley’s final round.

Two sevens and an even number of eights remained in the deck: a card order designed to prevent an instant victory for the player. The third seven only appeared due to the skill of the dealer and the judgment of the player, both of them exceptional. The three cards known as the “Glory Sevens” sat before Balot’s eyes. Between diamonds on the left and on the right pulsed the seven of hearts.

Their suits as red as blood. In truth, the three cards were blood. Not spilled blood, tragic and bereft of hope. But blood shed in spirit during their long battle.

To properly respond—to give her one-hundred-percent answer—was not only her own personal goal, it was merited.

–Even money.

Ashley gulped. His hand, prepared to reveal his hole card as soon as she stayed, trembled in midair.

It was the choice to throw away the blackjack payout. And the path to the minimum guaranteed winnings.

“You want to throw away a six-million-dollar payout? You know that’s a difference of four million dollars!”

Balot sat motionless.

The Doctor’s hands shook on the back of her chair.

Next to him, Bell Wing closed her eyes, then opened them again when the moment of silence had passed.

“I never thought you’d be able to throw away a chance of winning six million dollars. I miscalculated. I am utterly defeated. Now I’ve seen courage. I’ve seen humility. For the first time, I’ve seen somebody beat me completely.”

He slowly lowered his hovering hand to the table.

Suddenly, Balot’s vision clouded, and she could no longer see.

Tears filled her eyes. They wouldn’t stop. Their warmth flowed down her cheeks and, mixed with the thin layer of silver powder on her skin, fell to the table. As it all spilled, her only thought was, I did this. She had climbed the last step of the stairway to heaven and jumped into space. There she set foot on a new stairway—one entirely her own.

She was frightened. Her body shook. She summoned the courage to take one step forward.

Only later did she realize she had been crying endless tears. And from her trance, she spoke to her rival. How she had won. Why she had been able to win.

–I was trapped in a car when people came to save me. Like your brother, I too have died.

Ashley sighed.

“You’re like a mermaid.” He shrugged. “You remind me of the story of the fish who exchanged her voice for a pair of legs to walk on land. Even if she did end up dissolving into foam, she was a brave woman. Even though each step felt like a sword passing through her, she walked the land because she wanted to know the truth.”

He turned the hole card. Balot couldn’t see anything through her tears.

“I didn’t think this card would be defeated.”

–I can’t see it.

“It doesn’t matter. You won. A perfect victory.”

Two cards rose through the haze, symbolic of the man before her.

The ace and the jack of spades. The strongest blackjack—the one-eyed jack.

Chapter 11

CONNECTING ROD

01

Everyone waited patiently for Balot to finish wiping her face with the cloth.

Ashley didn’t even ask what she intended to do for the next game. Neither did he collect the cards in preparation for the shuffle. He just waited for her.

When Balot eventually finished wiping the tears from her face and looked up, there was Ashley, holding out the box. The box full of golden chips.