by Ubukata, Tow
“The application to the Broilerhouse for your social security compensation has already gone in, but it takes a bit of time for the approval to come through. So, in the meantime, this is your property. Ask Oeufcoque for the PIN, I don’t know it.”
No man had ever given her money in this way before. Balot stared at the Doctor’s face with trepidation. The Doctor suddenly turned serious.
“Indeed. So. Looks like this is going to be the first test of your abilities. It’s certainly worth doing before we go to the courtroom, I suppose. I’m praying that you’ll be able to use Oeufcoque well without abusing him.”
Balot didn’t understand the Doctor’s words. She just looked at Oeufcoque, still perched on her shoulder. This mouse had listened to her heart in a way no one ever had before. And with a precision that no counselor could ever hope to match. There were still loads of things she wanted to talk about and countless things she wanted him to understand.
Right now, that was everything to Balot.
Balot returned to the room she had been allocated—the old morgue—and opened up the packages one by one, laying their contents out on the bed. She lifted up black leather and placed it against her skin. It was a rather snug little outfit. No skirt, but shorts.
Oeufcoque stared at the outfit, nonplussed.
“Ah…” he exclaimed, rather unenthusiastically.
Balot shrugged her shoulders and showed him the next outfit. This time they were normal pants, the blouse sleeveless, and Balot indicated by gesturing that she would add arm-warmers to it.
“Um, yeah… You know what, Balot, I’ll wait in the Doctor’s room. Come and get me when you’re finished.”
After speaking Oeufcoque jumped off the desk and walked to the door on his two feet.
When he was directly below the doorknob he leapt up—quite a jump for a mouse—and turned the knob, opening the door. He landed and was about to walk out of the room when Balot pinched the suspenders holding up his pants and hoisted him into the air.
“I’m not really one to ask for advice on feminine aesthetics, you know. And I’m not too keen on being called a Peeping Tom again…” Oeufcoque said somewhat miserably.
Balot pursed her lips and closed the door, putting Oeufcoque onto the bed.
She then took some clothes and ran into the bathroom with them. After a while Oeufcoque stood up and got off the bed, and just then the bathroom door opened. Still in her underwear she gestured at Oeufcoque to stay put. Her face showed unease rather than anger. Like when she said she was afraid at the display on the Doctor’s desk.
“Fine, fine. I’ll wait—no, stand guard—here. Don’t you worry.”
Balot still looked a little anxious, but she carried on and closed the bathroom door anyway.
“You’d be able to sense what was happening on this side of the door, you know. You’re still very insecure because you’re uncomfortable with your new powers, I suppose. Or no, maybe that’s why you’re so anxious—it’s your new powers that bring home the fact that no one is there,” Oeufcoque muttered, grumbling, and flopped down on his side. He gazed at the ceiling for a while, and then Balot was staring down at him.
Balot was wearing a black outfit. Her neckline—and just below it—were exposed, and her hair hung straight down. Her hair was newly grown—regenerated by the Doctor from the remnants of her old hair—so she didn’t tie her hair up or else a lot of it would have fallen out. The sleeves extended to her fingertips, covering the backs of her hands with triangular pieces of cloth, her middle fingers jutting through holes in the fabric. Underneath the shorts the stockings covered her legs perfectly, and she staggered unsteadily in her knee-high boots toward an abruptly rising Oeufcoque, twisting her body from left to right. Oeufcoque searched for the right words, but all he could come up with was, “I think it’s nice.”
Then, craning his neck: “Not too tight?”
When Balot heard this, she squeezed both arms together. Her attitude suggested that she preferred a snug fit. She looked like someone was hugging her, warmly. She took some fashion belts from the packages and fastened a few tightly around her hips and stomach and also her legs. Over this she put on a leather jacket. She looked like she was bound from head to toe. As if she would be snatched away if she didn’t wrap up tight.
She dropped in on the Doctor before leaving the building.
“Hmm… I like to think that my own doctor’s whites are something special, but I think I may have met my match with your outfit.”
Balot scowled a little at the Doctor’s honesty.
“It looks like we’re in for a chilly night tonight. Don’t get caught out just because spring’s begun. And make sure you take your medicine with you. There are still a few places where your cortex hasn’t completely stabilized.”
Balot made a gesture in front of her outfit. I’m plenty warm enough, she seemed to say. Then she patted her pockets. Like a child wordlessly answers a nagging parent.
“Well then, shall we head off?”
Oeufcoque, on Balot’s shoulder, changed his shape with a squelch. He turned into a velvet choker and wrapped himself around Balot’s neck, then extruded the shape of a piece of metal.
Not so much a pendant as a dog tag.
Balot touched this, entwined it in her fingers as if she were meditating on it. When she let go the piece of metal had become an egg-shaped piece of crystal, and from inside it a gold-colored mouse winked.
The Doctor looked at the pendant with a complex expression.
“Our current client seems to be very good at telling us how things should be, doesn’t she?”
“Well, it’s good that we’re flexible enough to offer a variety of different services…”
Oeufcoque’s voice, serious to the last.
“Can we reconfirm that we have all our necessary documents, Doctor? And can you let the public prosecutor know about our deferred court appearance? There’s always the possibility of doing it by proxy, but the question is whether that would be enough to get the Broilerhouse moving.”
“The court doesn’t move according to an individual’s convenience, you know. It’s a power game—and a money game—run by the letter of the law.”
“Yes, and I’m not about to start playing a game that goes against the interests of the Concerned Party in this case.”
“Sure, sure. Well, I’ll look for something constructive to do.”
“Sorry about earlier.” The voice sounded a bit different now. In tone, if not timbre.
“Uh, in what way?”
“I hurt your feelings. But thank you. And I’ll be sure to pay you back your money.”
“Um…more importantly than that, would you mind not using Oeufcoque’s voice when you’re speaking? It’s pretty disconcerting.”
Balot touched the crystal with her hand.
–I can’t remember what my own voice sounds like.
She made a sound much more high-pitched than Oeufcoque’s voice. She opened her mouth and took a wheezy breath. Like a draft in a wind tunnel.
“She’ll get it back one step at a time, you’ll see. Step by step.” This time it was the real Oeufcoque who spoke, in his real voice.
02
Balot took one step out of the doorway and stood still. She looked petrified.
She closed her eyes and felt the sunlight, read her surroundings with her body. There were no disruptions in the surrounding air.
No men appeared to be waiting at the bend in the road, ready to ambush her.
From beyond the buildings in the distance that intersected like a chess board, she heard the noise of a gasoline-powered car.
Everything was different from anything Balot had ever before experienced.
It was different from the time she’d lived in the industrial quarter of the harbor town where she grew up, and different again from when she’d arrived in Mardock City 170 miles to the north. The time in her life she was allowed to receive money, and the time when she wasn’t.
“Let’
s go straight to the main street. We can hire an electric car,” Oeufcoque said from her neckline.
Balot opened her eyes. She started walking, head bowed at first, but soon she lifted her chin. The sidewalk was clean and tidy, with manicured lawns on either side of the street. It really didn’t look like the sort of place in which you’d expect to find a morgue.
After a short walk she came to a small shopping mall. A hardware store, a computer shop, a dressmaker, a café, and a vegetable market—all were immaculately kept.
She arrived at a large intersection and was assaulted by dizziness. Her attention had been focused on the insides of the buildings, and she hadn’t realized that she was in such a big place. She stopped on the sidewalk for a while, considering what the best thing was to do. She soon decided. She set her own personal boundary. A field of recognition.
A circle of roughly fifteen meters in diameter. That was Balot’s personal space.
“That’s it. You can hire cars from the kiosk in front of you.”
There was a car kiosk on the other side of the intersection. Balot crossed at the green light—walk—and halted underneath the red light—stop. Without looking at them she could feel the inner workings of the traffic lights. She comprehended them fully, down to the fact that they moved like clockwork, never missing a beat.
Balot gently brushed against the pillar supporting the traffic lights. She gently interfered—snarced the signals.
The signals on the traffic lights quickened. Seeing the light had started flashing, pedestrians sped up, flustered. The gas-powered car stopped with a loud noise, and the driver looked up at the light with a surprised expression.
Balot crossed the road. Oeufcoque said nothing.
There was a billboard for eCar Rentals. Just below was a sign: MINIMUM AGE 14 YEARS. Balot stared at the phrase. MINIMUM AGE 14 YEARS. She was a little surprised at the fact that she indeed qualified. Fifteen had snuck up on her. And she was still fifteen.
“What is it?” Oeufcoque asked. Not knowing what to answer she just shook her head.
On the other side of a thick layer of bulletproof glass, the shopkeeper sat reading a magazine.
“How can I help?”
He looked at her carefully. Balot pointed at the rental sign and touched the crystal at her neck.
–A red car, please. I’m fifteen.
Balot spoke like a machine, lips tightly sealed, and the shopkeeper watched her with a vague expression before speaking.
“We also have a car suitable for the disabled. What do you think? You get free parking with those too.”
Balot gave a small nod and stuck her cash card in the window.
“Your signature.”
Rune-Balot, she wrote on the blank form that she was given. Oeufcoque secretly whispered the address in Balot’s ear. It was obviously not the address of their hideaway. It’s a decoy address, Oeufcoque said.
“If anything happens, press the emergency button. You can use a telephone?”
–Yes, I’ll be fine.
This time her voice was unnaturally high. The shopkeeper looked a little concerned.
“It’d be swell if it didn’t come back broken, that car. And if you encounter any trouble I’d appreciate it if the blame didn’t come back to—”
–I’ll be fine.
She adjusted the voice so that it had as calming an effect as possible. The shopkeeper gave her the obligatory lecture about fastening her seat belt as he handed over the keys.
The car was a two-seater, with space for luggage in the back. As she turned the keys the Nav, the in-car navigation system, started up and offered a list of possible routes to take.
It was touch-screen activated, but Balot didn’t touch anywhere.
She sensed the car’s structure and applied her will. There was no steering wheel or mirrors, and the only things that were adjustable were the destination and the speed—and even the speed was limited by the eCar regulations. There was a stereo and TV, and the TV started up automatically with a sightseeing guide. She turned it off and put the stereo on.
The car pulled out into the intersection, accompanied by an uplifting tune. Warm rays of sun filled the car, and having commandeered the Nav, she traveled down the road for a while before pulling up at a red light.
Balot looked through the windshield at the traffic lights. She could easily snarc them from here…
“Stop it, Balot.”
Balot stiffened under Oeufcoque’s sudden words of restraint.
“Are you being threatened by the traffic lights at the moment? To the extent that you feel your life is in danger?”
His voice was strict. Balot gnawed on her lips. Cheerful music was still playing.
–Why didn’t you stop me earlier?
She asked directly through the car speakers without using Oeufcoque’s body. She sounded somewhat vexed.
“I was observing your self-restraint. Ideally your powers should be used purely for self-defense. One of the reasons I gave the go-ahead for this little excursion was in order to have you learn this for yourself.”
Balot looked sullen. The lights changed and Balot raised the speed. Right up to the limit.
She tried to lift the electronic restraint on the car, and found she could, increasing the speed further and further.
“What about your seat belt? You want to drive the car at full speed, have some fun? Then let’s set our course for a theme park. There’s this fighter plane game where you can experience Mach 2.”
–Why are you suddenly being nice to me again?
“Because I want you to obey the rules—and to learn to choose for yourself which rules are worth obeying.”
Obey the rules—those words again. Balot swung her head back. She really didn’t want Oeufcoque to be telling her this.
–But you lied when you gave a false address. Is it right to lie?
“It’s a perfectly legitimate forwarding address. There’s an apartment and a postal address there. It’s just set up so that no one can tell who lives there.”
–Are you angry with me? Because I tampered with the traffic lights?
“No, not angry. It’d take more than fiddling with some lights to make me angry. Even if we’d been hit by a car, it’d be you who was hurt, not me. Even if someone died as a result of your actions I’m sure no one would be able to work out the cause of the accident, and I wouldn’t turn you in. And even if there was then another similar accident, well, I’d give you a good cross-examining, but I still wouldn’t be angry. Just sad.”
–I just got a bit carried away. Don’t get so mad at me. I was enjoying our shopping trip.
“I just want you to promise. About using your abilities in ways that could hurt innocent bystanders. You don’t want to throw away your rights to use your Scramble 09 powers, right?”
–I won’t do it again. I’ll think before I do anything. Don’t be mad at me.
“I’m not mad at you. You’ve got such incredible aptitude. I was surprised by your manipulation of the traffic lights. They’re specifically designed so that they can’t be controlled remotely, at least not easily. You’re full of surprises.”
–Don’t put it like that.
“Okay, okay, sorry.”
–I’ll promise.
“Sure. And for my part, I’ve no desire to make you obey any arbitrary rules.”
Oeufcoque spoke in a soothing voice.
“In other words, when I’m telling you no, I’m talking about a fairly basic precept when it comes to using your powers. It’s also something that will protect you. And, similarly, if I tell you not to do something then I won’t be doing it either. Absolutely not. As a basic precondition for my being with you. This is the deal between us—do you understand?”
At that moment, out of nowhere, she remembered the Doctor’s words. Balot had chosen her current body, chosen her circumstances. This was part of the answer to the question—Why me?—it was, she thought, an established fact.
Balot gripped
the crystal. Not to snarc it. She just held it tight.
After that she put on her seat belt and reduced the speed of the car.
The car now entered a district filled with clusters of tourist shops and was about to settle at the base of the imposing Trump Tower. Balot snarced the car and changed its destination to the East Side.
The harbor drew near, and both the sidewalks and the roads started to grow more congested. All around her were gasoline-powered cars, and among the proliferating shopping malls of the Cheap Branchers—the middle classes—she found the flea market.
Now and then men would wolf-whistle at Balot, seeing her in the car alone, but they showed no signs of advancing on her, guns in hand, grinning maniacally.
Balot opened the window and sniffed the air, which carried a hint of brine.
Eventually the car came to a stop in a designated car park for rental cars.
As she got out of the car and started walking, she came across a gathering of obviously able-bodied teenagers who had parked their gas-powered cars in the free spaces designated for vehicles with placards for the handicapped.
As she walked past Balot snarced the gate of the parking lot. The teenagers looked on in horror as the gate slammed shut. As one, their faces turned to the emergency aid button. Faces that were silently calculating the fines they would have to pay for being caught using the handicapped spaces without a permit.
–Well, you’ve got to obey the rules, right? Balot asked through the crystal, using a silent, electronic signal.
“Uh, yeah.”
Oeufcoque seemed about to say something else, but in the end that was all he said.
The mall was bustling, and a fresh breeze blew through the arcade.
The people were coming and going purposefully, and the occasional pair of Hunters—the city police—walked past on patrol, but they showed no sign of looking for an easy target to beat up. Rather, they too walked with a sense of purpose, and there was no particular scent of anyone on this street looking to find any sort of warped pleasure.
Responding to her surroundings, Balot put on a purposeful expression and started walking. Her heels clicked along as if she were testing them out, feeling their sensation, and Oeufcoque called out to her, “Let’s get some papers. It’s hard to keep track of what you’ve spent when you’re using a card.”