Mardock Scramble

crime! There are official channels we need to go through for this sort of thing. Don’t you start running off the rails too!”

Balot stared at the television, tears suddenly filling her eyes. Her face crumpled and she sat down. She cried without making a sound, lifting her gun in her hand as she did so.

–Let me kill Shell.

Her face was painfully sad as she snarced Oeufcoque.

–Let me kill that man Cleanwill too.

“Balot, it’s no good thinking like—”

–Please. Let me. I don’t even care if I die afterward.

“Balot…are you angry? Or sad?”

Balot shook her head. Neither. Both. She felt her destiny swirling about her. Her terrible, terrible destiny. Why did Shell have to kill that woman in the bathroom? I’m going to make you clean. I’m going to clean you up. The words echoed around Balot’s mind.

–I think that woman in there was the same as me.

Balot managed to snarc the words to Oeufcoque through the terrible memories that were resurfacing inside her.

“The same…? You mean, that is to say…” Oeufcoque started, but he didn’t need to finish. He’d understood perfectly. The woman in the bathroom had things done to her by her father. Or perhaps other men and women had done things to her.

–Please, let me kill them all. I don’t care if I die myself. I don’t care if I die.

“Calm down. This has nothing to do with you. Don’t get sucked in. Take a deep breath and calm down.”

Balot held on to her gun. Her whole body shook as she cried. Quietly, her breathing a mess.

Every possible horrible fate seemed to be in this room. For the first time ever, Balot experienced the feeling of seeing her sorrow transform not into anger but into sheer murderous intent. She wanted to kill Shell. She wanted to kill everyone who worked for OctoberCorp. She wanted to kill the others caught up in this case, Boiled and even the Doctor. Then, after she had done all that, she wanted to save the last bullet for herself.

–I can’t bear it. Help me. Save me.

Balot felt a soft warmth in her left hand. She realized that Oeufcoque was trying to materialize.

Balot clasped her hands together in prayer, and Oeufcoque’s upper body emerged. She almost smothered him completely, so desperate was her desire to have him comfort her.

Oeufcoque’s piercing red eyes stared straight at her.

Tears dripped from Balot’s face and splashed onto his little head, and he lifted his head toward the warm shower and said, “It’s a good smell.”

Balot’s eyes narrowed as she looked at the mouse, the ultimate weapon and the last word in morality.

“Your soul—it smells good. Pure. It’s telling me that if there’s one thing I should believe in, it’s you. I want to make myself believe in you. Shell and Boiled—they can’t find it in themselves to believe in anything, so they’re doomed to stay on the other side of the mirror forever. That place where Cleanwill was hiding. A place with no doubts or regrets to trouble you, but no hope either. I don’t want to go to such a place.”

Then Oeufcoque spread his arms out in a broad gesture, just like when the two of them had been introduced. “I entrust myself to you.”

Droplets of tears welled up in Balot’s eyes. She realized that he was indeed telling the truth.

He really was trusting everything to Balot. If Balot so wanted, she would have been able to snarc Oeufcoque away in an instant. Any abuse she wanted—she’d meet no further resistance. And yet it was this very lack of resistance that would prove to be the final restraint. It was the very fact that Oeufcoque was surrendering himself completely that would stop her.

Balot nodded. The sound of the water overflowing in the bathroom echoed all around.

Balot sniffed. She turned around where she sat so that she now faced in the direction of the bathroom.

As she did so, Oeufcoque turned back into a gun without saying anything.

She hadn’t promised him anything. Even so, Oeufcoque had slipped back into her palm, ready.

Balot took a deep breath so that she could feel her entire bodysuit the better—the suit Made by Oeufcoque. Her chest swelled and she exhaled calmly. She stood up silently, went to the bathroom, and turned off the hot water.

She turned her back to the floating corpse of the woman and headed for the underground parking lot.

She climbed into the car, snarced the monitor next to the steering wheel, and the car took off.

Outside the sun had just gone down, and a cold night was closing in.

Balot wiped the last of her tears away and focused on the road ahead. There was still a lot she had to learn. There really was.

?

“Don’t tell the police yet! Do you want OctoberCorp to get wind of what’s happened?” Oeufcoque was speaking into the cell phone in Balot’s grip. “That’s right. Look up Shell’s file. Right away.”

There was a moment’s silence, then the Doctor’s voice, clearly surprised.

–Shell has a number of large outstanding debts that will be paid off by the woman’s life insurance policy. As ever, he’s made money out of the woman. Her death certificate reads two hours ago exactly. What sort of doctor would issue a certificate just like that?

The convertible was heading straight toward the Doctor at the Broilerhouse, but they were ready to change their course at a second’s notice should new information arise. New information being Shell’s whereabouts.

Balot stared ahead in a daze, thinking about the dead woman’s face.

“Cleanwill must have been expecting Shell to kill that woman. That’s what he meant by Shell losing his rights as a Concerned Party in the case. If the murder is made public, there’s nothing to stop Boiled from officially being hired as Trustee for OctoberCorp and apprehending Shell.”

–That’s incredible… Whatever else has happened, imagine sacrificing your own daughter…

“This is no time to start dissecting our opponent’s motives. It’s only a matter of time now before OctoberCorp brings their case against Shell. We have to track him down by whatever means necessary. Quickly and discreetly.”

–We have no idea of Boiled’s whereabouts either. What if he’s already with Shell?

“Use whatever pretext you can to track them down. The police are of no use at this stage. The one thing we have going for us is the fact that there are still negotiations that need to take place before OctoberCorp brings its case against Shell.”

–Are you planning on having Balot secure Shell’s person?

Balot’s eyes narrowed. Secure Shell—the words reminded Balot of something. What was it the Doctor had said this morning, just before the trial had started?

“Once we have him in our care, use the police or special forces or whatever necessary to cordon off the area.”

–If Shell had his memories back, Shell would stop killing people.

–Roger that. Wait, what was that? Shell’s memories? Balot, is that you speaking?

–You said so yourself before the trial started, Doctor. Shell can’t restrain his own urges because he has no memories.

–Ah…yes, that’s right. Shell’s amnesia means that his urges grow and grow and have nowhere to go, no escape, that’s what we were—