by Ubukata, Tow
“I think that would be a pretty astute diagnosis, though I do say so myself.”
“What’s the cure?”
“Patience. You just wait to see how events unfold.”
Oeufcoque looked the other way and exhaled silently. “That’s a tough one.”
“Well, it’s a problem that’s been plaguing us since the beginning of history, so you’re in good company. Just do your best.”
The Doctor poked Oeufcoque’s shoulder. He wasn’t particularly encouraging.
02
Dawn was just about to break when the giant silver egg landed on the rooftop of the Broilerhouse.
Bathed in the purple glow of sunrise, the Floating Residence known as the Humpty-Dumpty stopped in midair at a point precisely one meter above the rooftop, and a crack opened up on one side. The crack turned into a number of symmetric hexagonal openings, and part of the shell that had opened up now transformed into a ramp that extended down to the roof.
The Doctor and Balot stepped out onto the ramp.
The wind was strong, and the three-ply metal fencing that surrounded the rooftop was rattling.
Balot headed into the building and called up an elevator. Not by snarcing it, but by pressing the call button.
The Doctor sent the Humpty back up into the sky, then followed after Balot in great strides. “Right, let’s go.” He leapt into the elevator. “We have to be low-profile from here on out. Well, relatively speaking.”
He was in a sprightly mood. The cheeriest Balot had ever seen. He was dragging a large trunk behind him, and Balot had a bag hanging from her shoulder.
“You’re in high spirits, Doc,” Oeufcoque observed, as a choker around Balot’s neck. His tone of voice was, unusually for him, relaxed—lazy, even.
“Bring it on! Literally and metaphorically, I mean. I’m not about to pass up the opportunity to make some noise—it’s taken long enough to talk you into gambling. Let’s head on in with the mindset that we’re going to break the bank.”
“Sure, but our aim isn’t actually to bankrupt Shell, you know.” As Oeufcoque spoke, the fabric of the choker warped around the edges. He seemed to be yawning. This tickled Balot’s neck, and she gave an involuntary squirm of the shoulders.
“I’m not a morning person. It brings out my true nature,” Oeufcoque blurted out, and the elevator had arrived.
They were in the first-floor lobby, where they could see various justice department officials heading this way and that. Many of them stayed in the building overnight, and a large group of people had congregated in the cafeteria for their morning dose of coffee. Balot and the Doctor left the building through the lobby and hailed a taxi.
The taxi drove off and headed uptown. During the ride, the Doctor referred to his PDA incessantly, humming a jaunty tune as he did so. A list of numbers was scrolling across the display, and these caused the Doctor to smile, as if he were looking at the figures of a particularly healthy bank balance.
Before long the taxi pulled up at a motel. An airport motel.
They entered the lobby to find that their rooms were ready, rooms that the Doctor had reserved using the Humpty’s NetService. The Doctor and Balot went into their adjoining rooms, as if they had just arrived by air and were about to head into the big city later. Well, they had just been flying, of course, but not in the manner that a casual observer would have assumed.
Their bags contained mostly clothes. Once she was in her room, Balot took a dress from her bag. She’d had Oeufcoque make it for her based on pictures from an online catalog. She brushed it down and hung it up neatly on a hanger before taking some shoes and accessories out of the bag and lining them up on the motel desk.
As she was making her preparations, the choker undid itself. It turned inside out in midair, then settled on the shape of a golden mouse, who landed on the desk on two feet before yawning properly.
“We’ve still got plenty of time yet. I’d like to take a nap.” Not waiting for an answer from Balot, Oeufcoque jumped off the desk. He headed straight for the bed, jumped onto the pillow, and rolled over.
Balot followed him to the bed and poked him in his tummy.
–I’ve never seen you act so slovenly before.
She snarced him and laughed.
Oeufcoque shrugged his shoulders. Whatever, he seemed to say. He rolled over, face-up like a human, crossed his arms over his stomach, and stretched his legs out leisurely. Before long he was snoring gently.
Balot gazed at him and thought that he probably did need the sleep—he hadn’t yet recovered completely from his injuries. She decided to leave him alone and took a shower. Then she lay down to study the game rules the Doctor had given her, and before long she found herself feeling sleepy too. The time was just then six thirty. Balot snuggled under the covers next to Oeufcoque, whom she could sense beside her, scratching his belly. She was asleep in no time.
It was almost noon when she was awoken by a call from the Doctor. Oeufcoque was already awake and watching television. On mute—picture only. When she asked him if he could follow what was going on, he replied, “I’m practicing my lip reading.”
What a strange hobby, she thought for a moment, but of course he wasn’t doing it for fun. “It’s a good warm-up exercise for the job we’re about to go on,” Oeufcoque said, and he stepped down on the remote with a tiny foot to turn the picture off.
The two of them headed down to the motel restaurant, where the Doctor was waiting for them. There they had a meal and made their final arrangements. They reconfirmed their next course of action. Then there was a little test. Did Balot understand all the rules for all the main games? The rules themselves were fairly simple. They hadn’t targeted any of the more complicated games in the first place. The problem was that rules always ended up producing winners and losers.
–How much do we need to win? Balot asked, snarcing her Oeufcoque-choker.
The Doctor pursed his lips and pushed his glasses up. “We need to turn two thousand dollars into four million.”
It sounded like a wild dream. But the Doctor just shrugged his shoulders. “Well, I think you’ll understand once you actually start playing. The question is, how to find a way of winning for sure. If we can’t work one out then we’ll have to abandon the plan.”
–Do you really think we have a chance?
“So, uh, it’s not impossible, at least. It’s not as if we’re actually trying to make the money. All you have to do is make contact with the chips while sticking to the rules of the casino—do that and we’ve won. The regular punters are there to try and win themselves some money and experience the thrills of the casino, that’s why they handle the chips. What we want to handle is the golden yoke that’s hidden inside the chips. Without necessarily having to get the shell or egg white in the process…”
–How much money is a million dollars?
The Doctor paused to think. “Let’s see…”
“Don’t think of it as money.” Oeufcoque interrupted them in a small voice that only Balot and the Doctor could hear.
–What do you mean?
“He means that the chips we’re going after just happen to be worth four million dollars, and that’s what we’re calling them, but they’re really just chips to us. It’s not as if we’re actually going in there to try and win their cash from them. That’s why we might be able to breach their defenses, and it’s also why I feel that I can help with this plan. Also, even if our plan fails, as long as you’ve worked out the location of the chips, we could always try stealing them at a later date—although if Shell figures out what we’re up to we’ll struggle to find them before the trial is over. So we’re taking a big gamble before we even set foot in the casino. In other words, the time is now. This is our last real chance, and also our best,” said the Doctor.
Balot looked at the Doctor’s face as she answered,
–I understand. If the two of you think that we can do it, then I do too.
She was speaking the truth.
> The Doctor smiled affectionately and opened up his PDA. “Right, time to get this plan on the road.” Much to Balot’s surprise he erased the memory on his PDA as he spoke. It was supposed to have contained all sorts of vital data. Who worked where, what they did, how the money came in, everything. Balot was shocked to see that all this had now been reduced to a blank screen.
“If we have all the info on us at the point that the casino starts taking an interest in us, we’d be thrown out the moment they discovered it. Not only that, they’d contact all the other casinos in the city on the spot. With our photographs. We’d never be able to set foot inside a casino again.” The Doctor’s face revealed that he considered this to be a fate worse than death.
–Will we be all right without it?
“If it comes to the crunch, all the data is still inside Oeufcoque. There’s no cause for concern.”
Suddenly the Doctor’s brow creased. “By the way, have you decided what you’ll call me?” he asked.
Balot looked a little troubled and shook her head.
“Well, why not try something out.”
–Brother?
She burst out laughing even before she finished the word.
“No good, I suppose,” the Doctor said, his face most serious. “How about Daddy?”
This time it was Balot who furrowed her brow.
–That doesn’t feel natural. No good.
“Hmm.”
–Uncle.
“You mean…?”
–It’ll be fine. I don’t thing there will be any misunderstandings.
“Fine. Henceforth I shall be known as your Uncle Easter.”
Balot couldn’t stop herself from bursting out laughing again, her shoulders shaking. She saw the Doctor looking discouraged and nodded her assent through her wordless laughter.
–Uncle Easter.
She repeated. The Doctor nodded too.
“It’s decided, then.”
Balot laughed again. But actually the term didn’t feel all that out of place. She looked at the Doctor and mimed combing her hair down. As if to say Sort yourself out.
–Could you at least dye all your hair the same color?
The Doctor shrugged, but he seemed to acquiesce.
–I’ve wanted to ask you for a long time, actually. Why do you dye your hair like that, anyway?
“One of the Three Magi—the professor whose brainchild Mardock Scramble was—seemed to favor that sort of hairstyle,” Oeufcoque butted in to explain.
“A complex layer of different hues. A hairstyle based authentically on chaos theory,” the Doctor explained, brushing his hair back.
–You must have really respected him.
“He was the one and only master I ever recognized, and he was also responsible for designing Oeufcoque. I would have liked you to meet him.”
Balot gave a small nod. She didn’t press them for the details of how this person that they held in such high regard was killed by OctoberCorp. It would be an impudent intrusion into a sacred place in their hearts. But something did suddenly occur to her, and she asked it.
–Did your professor like to gamble?
“He was invincible!” the Doctor replied without hesitation.
That’s what I thought. Balot nodded.
≡
After Balot returned to her room she took another, thorough, shower, then dressed up.
This time the choker was still a Made by Oeufcoque, but it was just an ordinary electronic voice box. Lastly, Balot took Oeufcoque in her hands and brought an image to mind. A soft pair of gloves to cover both my hands. Oeufcoque’s body distorted with a squish, and in a flash he was wrapped around her fingers. The gloves extended up her arms and met behind her shoulders.
A gap opened where the two gloves met, and Balot slowly pulled her hands apart. The gloves separated neatly, and at the same time an Oeufcoque-style design rose to the fore. He must have been paying attention to the eCatalogue, as Balot only needed to make two or three minor alterations to the design before she was satisfied with her look.
She waited in the lobby for the Doctor, and when he emerged he was the very embodiment of someone who has lived in the amusement world for far too long and forgotten what normalcy was.
He wore a long cowboy-style coat topped by a mafioso scarf. His hair was dyed a glossy silver, and it was slicked back. His heels clicked as he swaggered toward reception to deposit his key, and he really did look as if he were ready to head on out for a proper night on the town.
The two of them stepped out of the motel to wait out front. Before long the limousine arrived to pick them up, right on time.
It was hardly her first time in a limousine, but Balot suddenly felt tense nonetheless.
“Right, let’s go. Balot?” The Doctor tapped her shoulder lightly. It’s time to put on your act, he was saying.
–Okay.
Balot nodded as she touched the electronic voice box on her choker. The limousine driver had a pleasant smile underneath his short-brimmed hat as he opened the back door for her. Balot climbed in and called out to the Doctor.
–Aren’t you getting in, Uncle?
If Balot found it funny to refer to him in this way, she did a good job of keeping it secret.
The Doctor got in the car and the driver closed the door behind him. Then the driver sat down in his seat, and the car drove off.
The Doctor’s voice echoed around the car for the duration of the ride to the casino. As if to say I’m going to show you both just what sort of player I am. Balot added little to the conversation and mostly nodded. She played the part of the niece who had come to the big city to experience the bright lights and was being well looked after by her uncle. She exuded the easy confidence that came with having relatives living in the high-class Senorita District, at the foot of the rolling hills.
Before long the limousine stopped outside the casino entrance. Right next door was a large hotel. Beyond that were other large and impressive buildings: conference facilities, the headquarters of a number of prominent organizations. There were also TV and radio stations. The pleasure quarter spread all around.
The Doctor handed the driver a hundred-dollar bill and told him that he’d call the office to order their return limousine when they were ready.
The truth was different. The Doctor pointed toward the casino parking lot, a mischievous grin on his face. A familiar red convertible was waiting there. “I asked one of the Broilerhouse staff to have it ready for us there last night.”
Balot was genuinely impressed. The Doctor always planned these things down to the last detail.
“Now, let’s go and have some fun.” The Doctor accompanied Balot to the entrance.
The tension that Balot had felt while she was waiting for the limousine to arrive seemed to disappear.
Above the grand entranceway that faced the strip was a sign in the shape of a giant egg, inscribed with the casino’s name: EGGNOG BLUE.
The egg was split down the middle, with a 3-D digital display of chips pouring forth.
As they passed under the entrance, they felt an unusual sensation. They realized immediately what it was.
They’d had their possessions scanned in an instant. Infrared, surveillance cameras, X-ray imaging—had they been carrying anything undesirable, it would have been spotted immediately and they would have been intercepted.
The casino didn’t let anything slip through. Not that this seemed to bother the Doctor, who walked straight in with easy assurance.
It was a large casino. There was a long corridor that led to the hotel next door and a winding pathway that led to a children’s amusement park. There was also an indoor shopping court, its walls lined with giant television screens that showed the entertainment—boxing matches and magic shows.
Balot had been inside this casino a number of times before, but always on Shell’s arm, and with the Doctor by her side pointing out this and that, it was almost as if she were visiting it for the first time.
&nbs
p; From the gaudy entrance to its décor, the casino was clearly designed to be welcoming to the masses, a family-friendly joint rather than one that catered to a minority of shadowy, elite big spenders. The theory, with legal casinos at least, was that those that catered toward ten thousand customers each spending a hundred dollars were more likely to thrive than those who went after the one high roller who spent a million. Eggnog Blue was a case in point: the joint was buzzing.
The Doctor walked briskly through the hall that was kitted out for the out-of-towners and their offspring, paying only the slightest attention. This was the Doctor, after all, and he knew exactly where he was going without having to refer to a map.
The clamor grew. Any illusions that the casino would be experiencing some sort of early-afternoon lull were dispelled by the roar of activity.
There was a dazzling array of slot machines as far as the eye could see.
The room they were now in was filled neatly with rows upon rows of machines that covered the whole gamut: from five-cent cheapies to machines for the high rollers that only accepted hundred-dollar coins.
–Amazing… Balot said—there was such an uproar that she almost forgot why she was here.
“You fancy a go, do you?” the Doctor asked.
Balot nodded, true feelings to the fore.
Balot followed the Doctor through the gaps between the slot machines, as varied in size, shape, and color as the ammonites that she was so fond of. Electronic noises buzzed all around, and here and there wailed the sound of a siren—a bit like a fire engine—accompanied by the shouts of joy of men and women of all ages as they hit pay dirt. Whenever there was a major payout, a light on top of the winning machine would flare up like a police siren light, and a throng of people would congregate around the winner to offer conspicuous congratulations. Balot thought that the wave of excitement caused by the electronic sounds and the jangling of coins as they poured out of the machines were enough to give anyone a headache.
The Doctor collected a number of different types of chips at the reception counter and passed some of them to Balot.
Then he took his twenty-dollar bills and bundled them up.