Mardock Scramble - Volume 1 - Chapter 3

Chapter 3
CRANK-UP
01
The Stairway to Heaven shone, dazzling, beautiful in the morning sun. The spiral stairway—the
unofficial symbol of Mardock City—wound round in three circles before stopping cleanly in midair, an
unfinished monument that was designed to be just so.
Symbols of Jupiter—the planet of the king of gods—were carved into its outer edge, and every part of
the handrail and supporting pillar was ornamented with scenes fromthe myths.
The monument that migrants had built long ago to express their hope and their faith.
Mardock—the Stairway to Heaven—was now seen by the steady influx of people into the city as a
symbol of their own dreams and ambitions. This epitomized life in the city: to climb to the top, to arrive,
was the ultimate virtue.
Under the stairway that soared up over the municipal offices of the Broilerhouse, Balot waited,
Oeufcoque wrapped round her neck as a choker and the newly besuited Doctor beside her.
–Everytime I look at this staircase I can almost see the phantoms of people falling from the top.
Balot snarced Oeufcoque, and he replied, “It’s the system that people devised long ago, sorting the
world into winners and losers. But it doesn’t necessarily have to be that way—there’s more to mankind
than that. We’re just talking about part of a system. Try not to let it get to you.”
–If I fell from the top, I’d die, wouldn’t I?
“I’d turn into whatever tool I needed in order to prevent that.” Oeufcoque’s voice may have been
small, but it was wonderfully reassuring to Balot.
Balot readied herself, then entered the Broilerhouse with the Doctor.
The court hearing started at nine thirty precisely and later broke for a thirty-minute lunch recess.
After everyone was seated they waited another two minutes for the judge to return fromthe restroom.
Twenty minutes later Balot decided on absolute silence, and before long the time was 15:32 and the
judge lowered his gavel, signifying the end of the proceedings.
The six hours of deliberations produced results that were entirely satisfactory as far as the Doctor,
Oeufcoque, and the district attorney were concerned. For Balot though, it was all one long humiliation.
“The fact that you can’t speak may well turn out to work in our favor. Consider the impression it
makes,” said the DA just before the discussions started.
“It might only be a grand jury, but there’s no better way of demonstrating the suffering you’ve been
through,” said the senior assistant district attorney, a man in his early thirties—the DA assigned to their
case. He was welcoming the Doctor and Balot who had joined the throng of court personnel congregating
on the eleventh floor of the Broilerhouse on Central Street and was treating them like royalty. He wasn’t
the only one—DAs who were supposed to be busy with other cases were finding reasons to drop by the
waiting roomto catch a glimpse of Balot.
Hey, is that the survivor that everyone’s talking about? She seems in pretty good shape to me,
what’s she going to accuse them of?—they could hear these sorts of snippets of conversation from the
other side of the door.
“Some of the veteran DAs like to make fun of this sort of case,” said their DA apologetically. “They
still don’t think prostitution or rape is anything to get worked up about.”
Their DA seemed different, though. He said so himself, and the Doctor introduced him as a different
sort of man. A man who was sympathetic toward innocent victims, women who were the victims of
violence, and those of a low social standing.
“The counsel for the defense will probably follow the same line of thinking. Are you sure you’re ready
for that? Just try and compose yourself as much as you can. Remember, the counsel for the defense doesn’t
really care whether their client is guilty or not.”
The DA smiled brightly as he gave Balot her instructions. As if that was part of the plan to ensure that
Balot would be nice and relaxed.
“Remember, the truth means nothing to these people. No matter what sort of criminal their client is,
they’ll use every sort of legal trick up their sleeve to try and get them off the hook, and in return they’re
rewarded in the region of sixty thousand dollars a year, a pretty damn good salary these days…” The DA
shrugged his shoulders at this point, as if to say he was troubled by it, but what could you do?
“And it’s our job to face these people, specifying which of the material witnesses should be treated as
suspects,” he continued with a shake of his head. “The counsel for the defense we’re up against in this
case is quite a formidable opponent, I have to admit. Even as we’re bringing the lawsuit against them,
there’s no sign of the defendant, Shell-Septinos—he’s not in jail, and he’s not even been named a formal
suspect. He hasn’t even denied the charges—just called to have the deposition denied. Well, to make up
for it we left everything right till the last minute ourselves, as well, I suppose, not letting them see the
charges before we absolutely had to.”
The DA giggled, as if he’d told a particularly witty joke.
“I bet there was some discussion among the other side’s camp when it came to tactics—they would
have been wondering right till the last minute what we were going to hit themwith.”
Balot just sat there, still.
In the waiting room. And later, at the DA’s table in the courtroom. She sat still, making no noise or
sound of movement, just enduring words such as She seems fine to me or Well, it stands to reason, I’m
not surprised.
“So I’m sure the defense will be unnecessarily—well, they’ll say all sorts of things about you and
won’t pull any punches. If he could get a not-guilty verdict for his client by appealing to the court’s latent
misogyny, he’d do it, make no mistake. At any rate, all you need to do is stay calm—even more so this
time given your injuries—and all you need to do is to press the yes, no, or no answer button.”
At this point Balot nodded for the first time. That was all it took for most men to take the lead, tell her
what to do. The DA was no exception.
“Well then, let’s go,” said the DA, heading toward the courtroom with the petitioner and Concerned
Party, Balot, and the Doctor, who was the Trustee in charge of the case.
In the elevator the DA spoke to the Doctor. “I have to say, you’re looking good, Mr. Easter! I wish you
were always dressed like this—you’d put my mind at rest no end.”
The Doctor’s hair had been dyed back to its original black and was combed down and slick.
His suit looked good on him—it made him look gentlemanly, like a man of distinction. The Doctor
gave a shrug and a little smile. The DA relaxed a little and then whispered in the Doctor’s ear.
“But for next time let’s rethink the girl’s outfit. We’re trying to show that she was a poor girl from the
West Side preyed on by one of the East Side rich, and she’s a little too—elegant—for that.”
Balot could hear that too. Not the precise words, but a general sense of what they were talking about,
by sensing the atmosphere. Unconsciously she folded her arms and wished for something to wrap around
her tights. Her dress was dark, of course, just as the DA had specified, with the skirt hem coming down
past her knees. She dealt with his request as she did with any of her clients who were fixated on her
clothes.
Oeufcoque, still a choker, said nothing.
His existence was a secret to all other people, of course, but even if it hadn’t been, Balot wouldn’t
have wanted him to say anything at this moment. There was still an egg-shaped crystal hanging from the
choker, but this time there was a simple geometric pattern at its core, not a picture of a golden mouse.
09:25 hours. Balot sat at the plaintiff ’s desk.
On the defense side was the counsel, the accused man himself, and the Trustee for the defense.
Balot was very conscious of her own abilities. She didn’t have to look that way, but she knew where
everyone was and what they were doing. The defendant was calm, composed. There was a very faint sign
of fear, but it wouldn’t be this man doing the fighting in any case. And he wasn’t the one who was going to
be hurt. That was the counsel and the Trustee’s job. And Balot’s job. The accused didn’t even look at
Balot.
A number of reporters from the press—with their tags dangling from their necks—had firmly
ensconced themselves in the front row of the spectators’ gallery, and all eyes were on Balot. They were
here with a very different set of aims fromBalot and the Doctor.
They were here, inevitably, to write up events as scandalously as they could.
They wanted to write about Balot as a modern-day Lolita. Someone who was all too aware of her sex
appeal though still a girl, a girl who had seduced an important man from the amusements company,
bringing himto ruin; that was how they were looking to make the story play out.
How had she become the lover of this important man? And how was the girl connected to the Trustee
of her case? The girl must have known what she was doing, must have been well aware of her abilities.
This senior executive, Shell, was a foolish man too. Not only had he been deceived by this girl, he
was now being forced to spend hours and hours in this place, time he should have been spending on
important business.
Deceived. By a little girl. By anyone. Never mind what actually happened, the details were trivial—if
the defense could twist the facts to this conclusion then they’d have it made, the perfect story. The best
sort of copy.
The trial began, and the district attorney started off by stating in detail the injuries done to Balot. He
explained how premeditated and how deliberate Shell was in inflicting these injuries. And what his aims
were in doing so—what was he hiding?
At each stage the counsel for the defense interrupted with objections such as “Irrelevant!” and
“Conjecture!” He rebutted the DA’s arguments, claiming that the whole story was a fabrication by the
plaintiff, designed to steal Shell’s assets by improper means.
The defense counsel then pressed his case further, explaining in minute, piercing detail the track
record of Balot’s dissolute and slovenly lifestyle, diligently arguing that Shell merely wanted to rescue
Balot from her struggles. After all, Balot wasn’t forced to live with Shell in the first place—she’d gone
there voluntarily, or would it be more accurate still to say that she’d forced herself upon him?
As he did this the DA resisted in turn with strong objections of his own: “Counsel is deliberately
trying to shift the focus” or “Counsel is appealing to the emotions, not the facts!”
Now and then Balot was called on to testify, and at such times she pressed the buttons marked yes or
no, or occasionally the no answer button. Whenever a more detailed answer was required of her she
wrote her answer on a designated sheet of paper and handed it to the clerk.
The courtroom was not set up to be particularly sympathetic to those who couldn’t speak. Instead,
everything was rather awkward, stilted. As if to say, What do you mean, someone who can’t speak is
appearing at the trial? An uncomfortable atmosphere pervaded the courtroom.
And it was toward such a person—Balot—that the counsel for the defense would use phrases such as
“You reap what you sow” or “The defendant can’t be held responsible for the plaintiff ’s choices.” At the
same time the DA emphasized the enormity of the suffering that Balot had been subjected to.
The grand jury craned their necks from left to right following each of these exchanges, as if they were
following the volleys in a tennis match. Good? Evil? Like a rally. As if they were playing a game,
climbing a flight of stairs, muttering guilty, not guilty, guilty, not guilty alternately with every step, and
whichever foot they ended up on at the top of the steps would be the decider.
“So, at the beginning, why didn’t you resist?” asked the defense counsel. “If Shell really manipulated
details of your status, or forcefully raped you, or trapped you in a car, there must have been some point at
which you actually tried to resist him?”
While the DA was objecting, Balot thought back to her time in the institute.
Back to the time when she was told, year in and year out, by the social workers what a bad girl she
was.
Some of the volunteer workers weren’t like that, of course. But some were, and they were the ones
who had more clout when it came to the everyday management of the children’s lives.
And so it was that when, for example, a male volunteer would rape a child on a lower bunk bed, the
child on the upper bunk could only tremble in dread and pretend to be asleep. They had fear drummed into
themas a way of life, each child deep in their personal hell.
Once, a girl from the institute dropped a kitchen knife on her foot when she was on kitchen duty. Balot
watched as the girl’s foot was skewered through her slipper. Balot remembered seeing the tip of the knife
protruding from the sole of the girl’s foot. And, of course, the girl had dropped the knife—thrown it at her
own foot, actually—on purpose, knowing that if she hadn’t then something even worse would have been
lying in wait for her that night.
The girl was taken to the institute’s medical wing, but she had to return two days later. Hobbling on
crutches. Three of the workers gang raped her on the night she came back.
“Why didn’t you resist?” the defense counsel asked Balot, bringing her back to reality. If Shell was
deliberately trying to hurt Balot then surely there would have been some sign of resistance, no?
The DA objected. Speaking rapidly, in a loud voice.
Why hadn’t she resisted? Everyone tried to escape. Some of the children did manage to adapt to life in
the institute the best they could. Those who’d worked themselves into positions of influence, of authority.
But for the vast majority of the children, all they could think about was escape.
And after surviving under conditions that felt like you had a knife to your throat every minute of every
day, after having every aspect of your life regulated by those in charge—food, drink, shelter, leisure time,
friendships—at the end of it all they asked you why you didn’t resist. The same adults that never gave you
the slightest chance to do so in the first place.
Balot’s reply to that question was no answer.
Eventually they arrived at the recess for lunch, and the DA conferred with the Doctor regarding the
points where they were losing ground.
Balot and Oeufcoque ate lunch while the others talked in elaborate detail about possible strategies to
ensure the case progressed from the provisional jury to indictment. She could barely eat anything, and he
hardly spoke.
–I want you to understand that I’m doing this for your sake, Balot explained to Oeufcoque.
After a short pause Oeufcoque responded. “These are just procedural formalities. They’re not for my
sake or for your sake. The real battle comes later.” He seemed somewhat apologetic on one level, but at
the same time was deliberately keeping these feelings in check. In order to prevent himself from
accidentally letting slip any words of apology, such as I’m sorry or This is inexcusable of me.
Balot gripped the crystal on her choker and squeezed hard.
“At this point I will need to disclose some shocking facts,” said the counsel for the defense. Brightly.
As if he were relishing his duty—as, indeed, he was.
“This girl had sexual relations with her father. Starting from when she was even younger than she is
now. Isn’t that right, Miss Rune-Balot?”
The courtroomrustled. A hesitant, low rumble.
The DA jumped up. “Objection! Irrelevant, a meaningless question.” But the court’s interest had been
piqued. The jury was curious, and who was a mere senior assistant district attorney to stand in the way of
a jury’s curiosity? He gritted his teeth and took a seat.
Balot stared right back at the counsel. Coldly. Coldly enough to freeze the poison solid in her heart.
Slowly, calmly, she pressed the button.
–Yes.
The courtroom erupted. The judge banged his gavel. The counsel pressed further questions. Pointless,
stupid questions.
“Was it your father who initiated this?”
–Yes.
“Did you resist him?”
–No.
The courtroomheld its breath, not even daring to swallow.
“Why didn’t you resist?”
Balot scribbled an answer on the paper she was given and handed it to the clerk.
The clerk then passed the paper to the judge, who read it aloud: “Because I loved my father.”
The courtroom erupted in noise, like a kettle overflowing. The judge banged his gavel wildly,
repeatedly.
“You mean, as a man?” continued the defense counsel.
–No.
“Then you loved himas a father?”
–Yes.
“You had sexual intercourse with himmore than once?”
–Yes.
“Many times?”
–No.
“Can you remember precisely? The number of times?”
Balot raised her hand and lifted three fingers.
“Three times?”
–Yes.
“Your older brother attacked your father violently when he learned of your relationship, yes?”
–Yes.
“Do you know why your brother felt so angry at your father?”
–Yes.
“Why?”
Balot was given more paper. She scribbled on it again, passed it to the clerk again, and again the
judge read it out: “Because he loved me.”
Further excitement in the courtroom. A number of the reporters rose from their seats, running to pass
on the news.
“Did he look at you as a woman?”
–No.
“Then as a younger sister?”
–Yes.
“Now, as a result of his injuries, your father was admitted to a hospital in the capital as a severely
disabled patient, yes?”
–Yes.
“Did you ever see your father again after that?”
–Yes.
“How did that make you feel?”
Balot, head bowed, didn’t answer. The DA leaped up and shouted, “Objection, an irrelevant
question.” The judge banged his gavel. The counsel continued down a different line of questioning.
“Do you still love your father? As a father?”
–No answer.
“Why can’t you answer?”
Balot remained silent.
“Do you love your father as a man?”
Balot shook her head emphatically. The DA objected, screaming. As if to intercede, Balot raised her
hand to call the clerk over for some paper. On it she wrote: “I don’t know how I should feel about my
family anymore.”
“Not just your father?”
–No answer.
“Your brother is still in the penitentiary, isn’t he?”
–No answer.
“After that, your mother entered an ADSOM facility—that is to say a rehabilitation center for alcohol
and drug addicts—and still lives there to this day? Is that right?”
–No answer.
“Did your mother know about your relations with your father?”
–No answer.
“Do you believe that what’s happened to your family is your fault?”
It was a reflex action. Balot didn’t press the button. But she did snarc it.
–Yes.
No one saw that Balot had actually not pressed the button, but then, no one was about to pay any
attention to that now. Apart from the Doctor. The defense counsel then asked her a succession of
additional questions. Balot just stared at the one button, fixated, snarced it, and made sure her will was
unwavering.
Balot’s answers to all the additional questions were the same: No answer.
02
Balot’s father was a mild man. He had a beard but didn’t make a frightening impression. He had a
healthy physique and was a sound blue-collar worker. He was somewhat rustic—burly—but had a gentle
grip. Even when his motor neuron disease started taking a turn for the worse and he was down to three
fingers on his right hand, he still gave off an aura of gentleness. On his left hand he only had his thumb.
His four working fingers undid Balot’s uniformwhen she returned fromschool one day.
That was when she learned to project her consciousness into space. As Balot’s father’s fingers and
tongue tentatively caressed her body, she felt an unknown feeling well up inside her. Desperately trying to
suppress this feeling, she launched it into the air. There were the unbearable feelings of guilt, and then
there was her clear, calm consciousness. With half-shut eyes she looked at the room, looked at the
furniture, and tried to project her consciousness onto something else.
But she hadn’t yet perfected her technique of losing herself.
Sometimes her voice leaked out. Naturally. Like in the movies, when a woman was embraced by her
lover. She fought it. Biting down on her lips, frantically averting her eyes. Trying not to look at her
father’s face.
How long had she been doing this? Then, all of a sudden, a feeling to extinguish any lukewarm waves
of pleasure. A red-hot scalding sense of bitterness. It was penetrating her. She heard her father’s voice,
apologizing. She heard her own voice asking him to stop, please. But the pain intensified, and her father
started moving his body.
She tried forcing her father back with both arms. Her father was crying. He gripped her arms tightly
with his hand with three fingers. His tears dripped down onto her arms and breasts. As if he were
vomiting up blood. Eventually, the waves of pain subsided into silence, and a lukewarm liquid—different
fromtears—trickled down her thighs.
This was the “lucky guy” that the Hunter spoke of. This was why she had no answer when the defense
counsel asked her why she didn’t resist.
She could recall her father’s face from then—full of sorrow—anytime. She could barely remember
himlooking any other way.
She’d wanted to do something about this sadness. Balot didn’t really understand that her father had just
made love to his own twelve-year-old daughter as he would a woman, and in any case she wasn’t really
in a position to refuse.
After the last time they had relations, Balot was taking a shower, mind blank, when she heard shouting
and screaming. And then—a burst of gunfire.
Balot wrapped a bath towel around her body and came out of the shower to look on the scene. Her
older brother, screaming like a mad dog. At his feet was her father, writhing in agony from a gunshot
wound.
When her brother saw his little sister, steamrising fromher half-naked body, he cried out maniacally.
Her brother was a volunteer at ADSOM. The reason he worked there could be traced back to
childhood, when his mother shouted at him for not properly holding the end of the tube she was using to
bind her armas she was shooting up.
Balot’s brother was as neurotic as their mother. He was trying to save her from herself, but despite his
good intentions, his irritation and hatred grew violently. And her brother was pretty much the only one in
the family who could do a proper day’s work to earn a living wage.
So her brother was always on the lookout for opportunities to earn money more ef iciently.
Before long he got mixed up in bad company and became a gunrunner. This all came out in the
investigation into his father’s shooting, and her brother was consigned to the penitentiary.
“It was all for nothing,” her brother said to her at their last meeting.
Balot wasn’t able to say a word and just watched her brother’s back as he was led away. Then she
herself was put into the institute, which was just as bad as prison. For a long time she thought of the
institute as her punishment. That she was the one who broke her family up, so she was the one who
deserved to be punished. Words that were said to her at the institute—bad girl, you’re a bad girl—still
resounded in her ears.
The counsel for the defense unceasingly pressed his line of argument: the explosion was a complete
accident and Shell had absolutely no murderous intentions. Indeed, Shell had been trying to rescue her, but
she wouldn’t trust him and started violently clawing at the door handle—and that had made the whole
situation worse. He pointed to several scratch marks on the inside of the AirCar door as proof. As if the
whole thing was Balot’s fault.
The defense counsel spared no effort in his exertions trying to persuade the jury of this.
Balot seduced her father without hesitation, wrecked her own family, plunged wildly into the
uninhibited lifestyle of the dropout, and did whatever took her fancy—a Teen Harlot such as we’ve never
seen.
So the counsel continued. Should we really abandon Shell-Septinos to his unfortunate circumstances,
this man who had gone through trouble upon trouble to reach his position, working hard, motivated by his
healthy ambition? Rather, shouldn’t we be supporting such a man, who showed such kindness toward a
girl such as Balot?
Right now, Shell-Septinos is worried—frightened that he might have committed murder. Because he
can’t remember the details of the day in question, due to his memory disorder. Of course, the girl knows
all about his condition, and she’s trying to take advantage of it.
This was how the defense counsel argued.
The DA hit back with all he had. He summoned to the witness stand the Hunters who were
investigating the case and the Doctor as an independent PI. He explained exactly how the girl had become
an innocent victim, a sacrifice to one man’s vaulting ambition.
After it had all finished, the DA said to Balot’s team, “That counsel overplayed his hand, I think.
However you look at it, our girl here was calm and composed, and she was obviously hurt. That’s all
going to make an excellent impression on the jury. Not a single one of these jurors is a university
graduate. That’s in our favor too. Because Shell has manipulated his own status records, passing himself
off as a member of the elite, a university graduate. I have to admit I was a little worried at first, though—
our girl is beautiful and elegantly done up, after all. There are some jurors who refuse to believe that a
defendant can be guilty unless they see a victimat death’s door, shredded to pieces.”
Ultimately, though, there was one word that emerged from the proceedings that interested Balot above
anything else: ambition.
A regular man, motivated by his healthy ambition.
No: he was a pathetic man, who had found a way of climbing up society’s greasy pole—or stairway—
and was prepared to discard everything else in order to achieve this, just so he could lord it over other
men and women, as if he were some sort of a hero.
Balot could see this clearly now. I’ve been a fool, she thought, and at the very same moment she felt a
burden—the cursed voice that told her that she was a bad girl—lift cleanly fromher shoulders.
That was the one ray of sunshine that she’d gleaned from the whole experience—the silver lining to
the gray clouds of humiliation.
If she quit now there was nothing left. This was now a matter of life or death.
She understood this clearly. That was why she could stay so calm.
Why me?—she imagined yet another answer to this question.
Beyond that answer lay Balot’s personal stairway, the one that she was destined to climb.
Balot left the courtroomwith the Doctor.
The DA was in an excellent mood. He said that the next time they returned to the court it would
definitely be in the form of an official trial—he was so enthusiastic that it wouldn’t have been surprising
if he’d broken out into a cheerleading routine for Balot. The DA bid farewell to the pair for the time
being, and Balot and the Doctor were just at the Broilerhouse entrance and about to leave when they
noticed a man silently approaching them. A man so solidly built that even the shadow that he cast seemed
enough to swallow themup.
“Boiled…” Taken aback, the Doctor spoke his name out loud without meaning to. The man who had
sat at the table on the defendant’s side. The man who had threatened Balot. The Trustee supervising the
case on Shell’s side—Dimsdale-Boiled.
For the first time Balot was within spitting distance of the man and faced himdirectly.
He seemed even more humorless, even more lacking in emotion, than ever. Violent, dusky eyes stared
out fromunder his wide brow, gaze fixed on Balot. Or at the choker that Balot was wearing.
“The full details of the lawsuit will be made available to the defense from now on. It’ll mean that I get
to start my operations in earnest.” Boiled, heartless as ever, clearly directed his words toward his former
partner Oeufcoque. The former partner he had fallen out with spectacularly over some obscure incident.
Balot stared right back at him, head-on.
“I’ll find it. Withdraw your case.” Boiled was undoubtedly talking about their hideaway. His voice
was light and indifferent, but it carried the impact of a thunderbolt.
Balot’s knees quivered. Acid rose in her stomach.
The man looked at Balot. As if he had noticed her existence for the first time.
“When you have the time, be sure to ask Oeufcoque about my MO for solving cases,” Boiled said, then
turned his back. His footfalls made almost no sound at all as he glided away. In the distance they saw
Shell-Septinos appear, and the two men climbed into a car.
Balot stood glaring at themfromthe entrance of the building. She watched where they were going. And
the building, and all the people around her.
The fear inside her was being pushed aside by a feeling she had never experienced before: fury.
It was the first time this had ever happened. When she came to, she noticed that her knees were no
longer shaking.
She breathed out quietly. It was like blue fire pouring fromher lips.
It was live or die. And now her whole body was making its choice.
Still glaring at the world, she put her fingers on the crystal hanging down fromher choker.
–Show me your way of doing battle.
03
“That was a weird scene we just witnessed. And I’m experiencing weird emotions too,” Shell
muttered. His Chameleon Sunglasses gave off a dull glint the color of zinc. “I don’t have a single
recollection of ever being nervous or frightened. All that vanishes whenever I have my Clapping, my
memory preservation operation. But…it’s weird.”
At this point he looked at Boiled. “I’mfrightened,” Shell said, shivering. He wore a forced smile.
Boiled gave no answer. He just nodded ever so slightly and drove on in silence.
“I can understand that I’m experiencing fear. I can even understand why this situation is making me
afraid. What I don’t get is, why her?” Shell stretched his neck forward as if he were looking for an
answer fromthe sky beyond the window. “We’re talking about a girl that I, in my current state, have never
met—never even heard of her. A puny, powerless little girl. And yet I’m afraid of this. Just thinking about
the fact that the girl is still alive makes me choke on my breath.”
He loosened his tie as if he were indeed having trouble breathing and took a flask fromhis pocket.
“Business is business. Sacrifices need to be made—things, people. And the most important sacrifices
have the honor of shining on as precious jewels on my fingers. Nevertheless, this time I’m surprised. I’m
afraid fromthe bottomof my heart. Because that girl isn’t on my finger yet. Why is that? Why?” he moaned
as he opened the flask with trembling hands, taking a violent gulp of its contents.
“What on earth was it that made me want to kill that girl?” He was speaking to himself now, between
gasps. Behind his sunglasses his eyes were bloodshot. Alongside the scotch he downed a large handful of
the Heroic Pills that he’d bought cheaply at insider rates.
He stared pointedly at Boiled with his eyes that were now bright red and inflamed. “Tell me now,
when exactly did you say this girl was going to disappear forever fromthe face of this earth?”
“Soon enough…” Boiled spoke quietly, and this was all he would say. He controlled the steering
wheel without the slightest hint of wavering and directed the AirCar toward the foot of the high-class
Senorita district in the east.
Shell’s lips suddenly twisted into a crooked smile, and he laughed an unsteady laugh. “That man who
was at the trial today—he seemed very flaky for a former partner of yours.”
“That was the maintenance staff.”
“What?”
“In other words, that one’s a tricky enough customer all right, but he’s not the one we really need to
worry about.”
“He’s not this Oeufcoque you keep talking about, then?” Shell’s lips were again distorted. He was
frantically trying to conquer his gnawing fear, turn it into hatred and murderous intent.
“No, Oeufcoque never shows himself in public. He’s always teamed up with someone else.” Boiled
spoke in a low voice, cold and machinelike.
“But you’ve got his number, right? You know his MO, his special skills,” Shell insisted, staring
unblinkingly at Boiled frombehind his lead-colored sunglasses.
“And the same goes for him. He knows me well—my MO, and my special skills.”
“In short…” Shell started. Silence reigned, then eventually he found the words to continue. “He’s
going to be a tough nut to crack.”
Boiled nodded.
“But who are you saying he’s partnered with? That lanky guy we saw today? What’s he hoping to
achieve by standing behind someone like that?”
“Perhaps it’s not that man,” said Boiled.
“Then who?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out. That’s why I need to hire some people. Starting tonight—from a
place that you don’t know about.”
“Well, feel free to use the hidden stash of money as you need. Do as you please. Just be thorough and
show no mercy,” said Shell.
“As you say.”
“I’m…terrified. Even though I’ve never once been frightened gambling at a Show, even with hundreds
of thousands of dollars at stake. No job is supposed to faze me. And yet…” Shell’s teeth had suddenly
begun chattering, and his limbs were shaking.
The truth was that Shell was wavering. From a place so deep within himself that even he didn’t know
what was happening right at that moment. Accordingly he was panicking about all sorts of things.
“Flashbacks!” Shell spat the word out under his breath. Then he shook his head stubbornly. “That’s
absurd. There’s no way I could be having such things. How can my past be coming back to haunt me…”
He trailed off into a faint moan—this man who was always wiping his mind’s slate clean—and then he
leaned over toward the driver’s seat.
“So, what are we talking about? What sort of people are you planning on using, for example?” Shell
asked like a rabid dog, drooling and baring his teeth.
“The sort of person who works not just for the money but also for the satisfaction they get out of their
target.” Boiled’s voice was low and calm. “I’m talking about the type who enjoy treating people like
objects, slicing themto pieces and using their remains as ornaments.”
The meaning of these words gradually dawned on Shell.
Behind his sunglasses his eyes narrowed before gradually widening.
“That’s…fine,” he said with a smile. A gruesome smile that twisted across his face. “That’s excellent.
And while you’re doing that, I’ll continue with my business. My deal, a huge deal, a deal for my benefit.
That’s what I’mgoing to use to run farther up the stairway. The stairway to heaven—Mardock. I’ll run far
enough, high enough, higher, higher still, that my past will never be able to reach me. Far enough that my
past will vanish forever.”
Shell continued his feverish mutterings as if he were speaking in a nightmare.
Boiled dropped Shell off at his luxury apartment and sped off in another direction.
He headed toward the riverbank, stopping at a car park in a mall along the way.
There he switched cars. From the AirCar to a normal gasoline-powered car. A car that he had left
there beforehand.
Before setting off again he opened the trunk of the new car. There were two attaché cases within.
He checked their contents, first one, then the other. Then he got into the car and headed straight for the
harbor.
The evening sun was painting the sea a bright scarlet as he reached the gates that marked the
checkpoint to the harbor.
Boiled handed over his ID card at the gatehouse.
The security guard, a young man, stuck the card into his machine to confirm that Boiled’s jurisdiction
was active and asked with a whistle, “An incident at the harbor, eh?”
Boiled took the card as it was returned to him, shaking his head. “Not a big one.”
The young security guard was clearly thrilled as he opened the gate. “Call me if it looks like
anything’s about to go down. I train every day at the shooting range, you know.”
“Guns won’t be needed.” Boiled cut him down instantly, but this only impressed the young security
guard even more.
“Just as I thought—a true PI.” He nodded in agreement.
The car entered the harbor, where heavy machinery was lined up all around. He drove past a giant
mechanical crane that looked like a mutant crab, which was unloading a multicolored convoy. He passed
the part of the convoy that had been stripped of its load before turning around and returning, skeletal now,
via the overland route fromwhich it had come.
Boiled parked his car in the car park where the trailers were lined up, took the attaché cases from the
trunk, and carried one in either hand as he walked toward the boats. He soon spotted the crane that he was
looking for.
BANDERSNATCH: ANIMAL HUSBANDRY EXPORT AND IMPORT
The billboard was written in large letters above the crane house. Boiled looked up at the person in the
cockpit. He slowly approached the workplace videophone and pressed the call button.
–Whassup?
A crude-sounding voice answered. Then an image. A man in fatigues.
He had a broad face partially hidden under a mass of dread-locks. His skin was brown like a
scorpion.
“Where’s the company?”
–You gotta say which company you talkin’ about.
The man maneuvered his body uncomfortably in the tight cockpit so that his ear was on the earpiece.
“I’m bringing payment. For the company that’s said to be involved in animal husbandry import and
export,” Boiled informed him, and in return received a shrill laugh fromthe video phone.
–What’s your name?
“Dimsdale-Boiled.”
–Heard aboutcha from the boss. That’s us. Import and export of livestock. Wait a sec, I’ll just get
everythin’ sorted. Come on to the weir. Yeah, come inside the white line.
Boiled did as he was told. Before long a giant shipping container was lowered down from the sky. A
rectangular box big enough to fit a whole house. It was an impressive sight to behold as it hit the ground
with a thump.
The electronic lock on the door lifted, and the door slid open sideways. Boiled entered the container,
and as he stepped in, the door closed behind his back automatically.
It was dark inside, but not for long. Pale fluorescent lights illuminated a number of workspaces
divided by partitions as well as filing cabinets and sofas. There were even monitors on the desks. It was
like being in an office somewhere.
An unexpectedly high-pitched giggle emerged frombehind one of the partitions.
“Are you surprised at the contents of our trailer? Welcome to our offices.”
Judging by voice alone, it was a young girl who spoke. But when the speaker emerged from behind the
partition he was clearly a man, probably in his late thirties. He had evidently had an operation of some
sort on his vocal cords. He was very small—short—and had long hair. His hair was all one length, with
parts of it blond, others streaked red, all of it random.
Boiled took one look at the little man, then continued to scour his surroundings.
“It seems we’re moving.”
There was a sensation of gradual elevation. The whole container was being lifted up again.
“Don’t you worry. Little Minty is a veteran crane operator.” “The man in the cockpit?”
“The very same. Mincemeat the Wink. Used to be a bomber helicopter pilot. A famous pilot in the
Commonwealth Forces, he was a proper macho little angel of death, raining down his showers of fire on
the Continent.”
“Where are you planning on taking me?” asked Boiled.
“We’re just taking you aboard our ship. That’s our home base, you see.”
Boiled didn’t ask any more questions. He made no move to put down the attaché cases in his hands but
just stood there in silence, facing the little man.
“You’re a real hunk, Mr. Boiled. Little Minty is quite the tough guy, but you’re not bad yourself.” The
little man seemed fascinated by him. “I’m Rare the Hair, by the way. That’s my registered trademark
within the company.”
He combed his hair upward with a flourish. His multicolored hair flowed like water through his
fingers.
“Isn’t my hair lovely?” Rare asked, tilting his thirty-odd-year-old face toward Boiled. His skin was
abnormally smooth. It was white and appeared slippery, and when you looked closely it seemed to be
composed of various different types. You couldn’t quite see the patchwork, but there was no doubt that
Rare was a modern-day Frankenstein’s monster, born of the latest technology.
Boiled looked at Rare’s eccentric person with an expression devoid of emotion.
“We’re almost there. While we’re waiting, I think I’m just going to go ahead and keep on gazing at
your cute little poker face,” Rare said in the clear voice of a little girl. The giant box they were in was
slowly being lowered. There was almost no swaying now, but Boiled could tell that they were now atop a
much bigger object.
“Oopsie, here we are. What a shame! I could have stared at your face all day long.”
The door opened and another man entered. Blond hair, blue eyes, and gave the appearance of a
successful businessman.
“I am sorry about this. Having to go through this rather elaborate charade. Do please take a seat, make
yourself comfortable,” the blond-haired man said.
“Ooh! And I’ll sit next to him! That’s okay, isn’t it, Medi?” asked Rare.
The blond-haired man shooed Rare out of the way with a wave of his hand, as you would a dog.
Rare gave a cackle and leaped around the sofa in a circle like a little child at play.
“Welcome, Mr. Boiled. Given our respective professions, shall we dispense with the formalities of a
handshake?”
The man went to sit on the sofa opposite Boiled, fluttering his hands as if to show themoff. His fingers
were unusually pristine. Each finger was prepared meticulously, nails well-manicured so that they were
squeaky clean and sparkling, and then covered with a blue nail polish. But when you looked at them as a
whole they seemed oddly mismatched.
“Medium the Fingernail is how I’m commonly known in this line of work. It’s a nickname. Like the
aliases university students use when they’re looking for playmates online.”
“I need confirmation of the results before I tender your remuneration,” Boiled said. His hands were
resting casually on the attaché cases.
Mediumdropped his banter and undid his tie before unbuttoning his dress shirt.
Rare, now standing diagonally behind Boiled, gave an affected yelp and then mock-shyly covered his
face with his hands.
Despite his squirming he was looking through his fingers, getting a good peek at Medium’s rippling
torso.
Boiled watched the scene play out, expressionless as ever. He looked at the pendants that adorned
Medium’s chest. Medium took these off and placed them on the table. Carefully, one by one, so that they
didn’t rest atop one another.
“Still alive,” Medium said. “The metal cylinders used as the basis were for exchanging bodily fluids,
and the metabolism is still there—they still regenerate. You can use them as decorations straight away.
Even the nails grow properly and the skin flakes off as it should.”
“Fromhow many people?”
“Five right thumbs—Uncle Toms, I call them. If you take their prints you should find they fit exactly.
Five brain surgeons—three male, two female. Just like you ordered, right?” Medium laughed amiably.
Like a black marketeer boasting how scrupulously fair he was in his business dealings.
“Doctors’ fingers are pretty rare and valuable, as far as they go. So I’ve taken the liberty of keeping
one for myself. See—the pinky fromthis left hand. Fromone of the two female doctors’ hands. Absolutely
beautiful.”
“Just the fingers?” asked Boiled disinterestedly. Mediumlaughed and shook his head.
Just then the man who had been operating the crane entered the container.
“Hey, Medi, I’ve finished loading the crates. The other guys hit our container and damaged it again, so
I’ve sent the idiots a demand for compensation while I was at it.”
He was suddenly at the side of the sofa. He was both bigger and taller than Boiled.
“Thanks for your hard work, Mincemeat. This is Mr. Boiled,” said Medium.
“Yeah, we just met. How was my driving, not bad, eh?”
“Mincemeat, Rare, you two show Mr. Boiled your shares of the loot too,” continued Medium.
“Ooh, even mine?” asked Rare.
“So, uh, you’re interested in our collections, are you?”
Boiled stared at themquietly and said, “Just for confirmation.”
“You mean from those doctors, don’t you? Wait a sec, I’ll fetch them for you right away.” Rare
slipped by Mincemeat and hopped away.
Mincemeat stood still and unzipped his fatigues. “Kayleigh and Linda. Girls should be kept close to
your heart, don’t you think? And on my right breast, Daniel. Last, these guys on my left arm are Rick and
Steve. These two seemed to be good buddies, so I planted them together. See, they’re looking at each
other.”
It was as he said. The two eyes embedded in his left arm started blinking, as if they were staring at
each other.
“I thought that doctors’ eyes might have been cold and unfeeling, but as it turns out they’re quite
romantic. In particular this Linda—she seems to have taken quite a shine to this guy in my stomach, Rock,
a big-shot lawyer.”
“Ah, little Minty, that’s just because of how your muscles developed after the transplants,” said
Medium.
“Don’t be a spoilsport, Medi. Here, everyone, let me introduce you all to Mr. Boiled.” Mincemeat
flexed his muscles, squeezing tightly. The eyes, which had been winking away all over his body, opened
their lids as one and turned to look at Boiled simultaneously.
Boiled stared back grimly. The eyes were neatly lined up in pairs, complete with lids, eyelashes, and
tear ducts. A number of the eyes were red and swollen, as if they were crying for someone to release
them.
“Sorry for keeping you all waiting—Gosh, little Minty! What a naughty boy you are!” Rare had
bounded back into the room and was blushing bright red. “Here you go, here’s mine! Five people’s
worth.” Rare showed Boiled some pieces of skin and hair pressed between plates of glass, folded up
neatly and soaked in liquid.
“None of them really take my fancy, to tell you the truth. The hectic lives they lived meant they didn’t
have much time to look after their hair, I suppose,” continued Rare.
Boiled ignored himand turned to Medium. “And are there any of their parts that you discarded?”
“When they catch a whale on the continent they use up all the parts. I mean all—skin, bones, nothing
goes to waste. The only part they discard is the nothingness left after the whale is gone, so to speak.”
“And what do you use the parts for?” asked Boiled.
“The flesh is used for transplants, scientific research, as decoration—or as a delicacy,” said Medium.
Rare giggled. “We sell themto people who really get of on the idea of eating human flesh.”
Medium pointed at Rare as if to silence him. Pointing with a finger that could have come from
anybody. “We get a good price for the bones, for marrow transplants, or to medical students. And the
internal organs have long since been reserved. Even parts like appendixes,” said Medium.
“And the parts that you’ve taken for personal use?” asked Boiled.
“We’d agreed that these were to be part of our payment…”
“That’s fine, I just need confirmation.”
“Well, it’s all safe, everything’s okay. They’ve all vanished. Not a single drop of blood left.
Transplant technology advanced in leaps and bounds as a result of the war. There aren’t going to be any
leftovers. Three cheers all round,” said Medium.
“And the data the doctors were working on?”
“We’ll show you to our analysis department straightaway. Follow me, sir,” Mediumbeckoned.
Boiled stood up and followed Mediumdeeper into the container, an attaché case in either hand.
“Ooh, that back—manly, but in a very different way than yours. And what smooth skin for a man!”
Rare whispered to Mincemeat as they followed behind.
It was a giant container with a series of joints where it could be dismantled. Medium unlocked the
electric lock on a door that divided two of these joints and headed in.
“Please do come in. This is the information HQ for our company. One of our members is a specialist
in data management. In the war he was a distinguished Comms soldier—hey, Flesh! We have a guest!”
Inside were various computing and communication devices strewn all over the place. They walked
through the gaps, tracing a route to a place surrounded by even more equipment, when some flabby mass
wobbled round at them.
“Hey,” said a sweet voice. His eyes were black and wet.
He had no hair and gave the impression of a young boy’s head protruding froma mass of flesh.
“I’ve been watching you since you entered the port. Using the harbor cameras. Now that’s probably
the man we’ve been waiting for, I thought to myself. He’s that sort of person, I thought,” the mass of flesh
croaked. He sounded like a precocious schoolboy.
“Indeed, Flesh. This is the iron man himself, Mr. Boiled. Be sure to treat our valued client with all the
respect he deserves,” said Medium.
“Welcome, sir. I’m Flesh the Pike. In charge of information ops.” He pointed at himself with his right
hand as he spoke. His hand was like a pale baby’s hand that had been grotesquely overinflated. Boiled
watched Flesh—and his hand—in silence.
Flesh was wearing something that at first glance looked like a gown, but on closer inspection turned
out to be more like a giant sheet that covered his fleshy mass. There was an incredible amount of fat there
—the word obese wasn’t enough to describe it accurately.
The sheet was swollen into a bizarre shape. From the outside it was impossible to tell even whether
he was sitting on a chair or was just sprawled out on the floor. He could have been standing.
Boiled put his attaché cases down and took a step toward Flesh. He stood in a position so that he
could see a number of monitors all at once, then spoke.
“Show me the data. The neurotreatment reports that the five doctors were collaborating on.”
“Just a moment.” Flesh’s whole body started trembling under the gown. As he stared at the screen his
fat hands plugged something into the port that was embedded in the back of his neck at the top of his spinal
column, his fingers moving with surprising agility. It didn’t seem to be the sort of device that plugged into
his brain tissue directly—rather it was a simple output device fromhis brain.
“It’ll be a little while. We’re covering our tracks as we go, you see, falsifying the University
Hospital’s data at the other end as we download them for ourselves. Wanna have some fun while we
wait?” asked Flesh.
Boiled didn’t say yes and he didn’t say no.
Still, Flesh continued, looking up at Boiled with a drowsy expression. “I don’t mind this man touching
them. This man knows about our little hobbies, right, Medi?”
“Mr. Iron Man didn’t seemto find anything too objectionable when I showed himmine—or when Rare
or Mincemeat did,” said Medium.
“That’s what I thought, most probably.” Flesh grinned. He fiddled around for a while loosening his
gown with his chunky fingers. The gown fell to the floor, slowly, nonchalantly.
“Go on then, just a little. I don’t mind if you feel up my collection.” Flesh’s voice cracked as he made
his mound of flesh wobble. A mountain of white meat swayed as one. Boiled could now see that they
were women’s breasts. Hundreds of them.
Pairs of breasts protruded from his whole body—particularly his chest and stomach—clustered
together like bunches of grapes.
Flesh wasn’t wearing any clothes under the gown. But he couldn’t really be described as naked, as
there was no way of telling where his skin ended and where the stolen flesh began. His feet could just
about be seen protruding, dangling, fromunder the mass, and it seemed that he was resting on some sort of
easy chair. Breasts ran down both sides of his thighs and calves.
“Not interested. Just give me the data,” Boiled said. Flesh gave a creased smile and put his gown back
on, nodding knowingly, glancing fleetingly at Medium.
“I like people who are honest about their tastes. To each his own, that’s what I always say,” said
Flesh.
“We’re talking about Mr. Iron Man here, Fleshie. He’s not interested in your Oedipal complex. He
likes his fetishes a little more hard-boiled, like me,” said Medium.
“So it seems.” The plug in Flesh’s back started flickering and making a chattering sound.
Flesh scanned the surrounding monitors with a quick flash of his eyes. As with breasts, he had
hundreds of monitors, and they too were quivering, this time with lists of seemingly randomnumbers.
“Okay. All done.” Flesh reached out to one of the monitors. A machine that was evidently designated
for writing data started whirring, and a disc popped out into Flesh’s portly fingers.
“Here you go. This is now the only copy of this data in the entire world.”
Boiled took the disc, lifted it up as if to look closer, and squeezed. Until the disc was no more than
crumbs of plastic and magnetism.
The data—once the contents of Shell’s memory—was now oblivion.
“And the rest is silence,” said Medium. Boiled glanced at him.
Then, for the first time since entering the harbor, Boiled nodded.
04
“You must be growing weary of carrying those heavy bags around with you, sir. Won’t you let us
lighten your load?” Medium asked Boiled as they left the room, as if he were sharing a particularly witty
joke.
“I was told that there were five members of this company. I’d like to hand it directly to your boss.
Judging by the size of the exterior of the container, there should still be other rooms here. Where are
they?” asked Boiled.
“Ah, our boss is not at home just this—”
“There’s someone else inside this container right now. In the Comms Room just now I saw a record of
the changes in mass aboard the container. There is someone I haven’t met moving around inside.”
“Well…it’s not that we’re trying to hide the boss exactly. It’s just that he’s in the middle of sorting
through his collection, you see…” But Medium had accepted the inevitable and was leading Boiled
toward another wall.
“You’ve got telecommunications equipment embedded in your heads, haven’t you?” Boiled asked, and
Medium turned around, startled. “And those eyes seem mechanized too. You’re constantly circulating
information between yourselves, are you?”
“Well, that’s how we do business,” Mediumexplained, and pressed the intercombuzzer on the wall.
–Have him enter.
The reply came immediately. There was suppressed laughter. A voice that evidently knew all about
the exchange that had just passed between Boiled and Medium.
A section of the wall slid across, revealing the entrance to another room.
In the middle of the room was a man reclining on a leather chair, facing away from them. The chair
turned.
“You’re a proper pedigree hunting hound to have seen through our gang’s little secret, Mr. Boiled,”
the man said, flashing his white teeth that contrasted beautifully with his dark skin. He was of the same
race as Shell, but he had an almost inhuman air about him. He straightened up with a snap. His hair was
short and he had a tattoo on his temple. He stared at Boiled with piercing eyes that belied the usually soft
features particular to his race.
“To be able to identify the leader of a pack immediately—that’s an important quality in a hunting
hound. Looks like the Bandersnatch Company has found itself a worthy partner.” As he spoke, he swung
his left hand from the floor to the wall. He wore a single black glove on this hand. There was a golden
chain on the back of his hand that jingled as he moved.
It was the sort of glove that could be used in bondage. It covered the pinky and ring finger, but the
remaining fingers were exposed. These seemed to be the important fingers. He flicked themrapidly.
In response to this movement a table rose up from the floor, a sofa appeared, and a cocktail bar folded
open from the wall. The hitherto empty room was now the very picture of a prosperous merchant’s
drawing room.
“Do sit.”
Boiled did so. The two men now sat opposite each other. Medium headed toward the bar to assemble
some glasses.
“I’m Welldone. My friends call me Well. A nickname, of course. Everyone here likes his nickname.
One of the tricks for getting ahead in the underworld. By creating your own alias you make it easier to
meet other like-minded people.”
Welldone brought his hands together, the one with the glove and the one without, and grinned.
“The alias that I chose for myself is Welldone the Pussyhand.”
“There’s one set of parts that I’ve not seen yet. What does your gang do with them?” Boiled asked
under his breath.
Still grinning, Welldone snapped his fingers. “Two dry martinis, Medi. Plenty of kick.”
Then he showed Boiled the palm of his gloved hand. “I collect them all for myself. Male and female.
But I sometimes sell them. I don’t often transplant my collection onto myself. Reason being that I’m only
looking for the one, and it’s only the rare and exquisite pearl that interests me.”
There was a silver zipper on the palmof his glove, and he unzipped it slowly.
Boiled watched with his unflinching poker face.
Behind the zipper, splitting his palm from top to bottom, was a vulva, lips ever-so-slightly apart. It
was pink, and no pubic hair seemed to have been transplanted along with it.
Welldone took a finger from his right hand and slid it down the slippery crease, opening it up. Like
another zipper.
A clitoris emerged fromthe top.
He tickled the red slit some more and it started giving off a shiny liquid.
“I’ve even got a proper vagina grafted into a crack in my flesh, so to speak. The urethra is, sadly, just
for decoration. The owner—now, that’s a secret, but suffice it to say that everything about her was like a
rare jewel. I traveled around the world for her, to obtain her, and the technology needed to transplant her.
And now I have her in my hands. Or should that be in my hand?” He grinned.
The sort of grin a ferocious beast might grin, one that concealed a razor-sharp bite.
“My pretty little pussy cat, so tight and so sensitive.”
Welldone zipped his glove up again and received a cocktail from Medium, beckoning to Boiled to do
the same. Boiled too took a glass in his hand, and looked back at Welldone.
“We don’t shake hands in our line of work. Nevertheless, we can raise a glass and drink to the demise
of our mutual enemies,” Welldone said, and clinked glasses with Boiled before downing his drink in one
gulp and placing his glass on the table. “Let’s take this opportunity to seal a deal—we’ll make your future
contracts a priority fromnow on.”
Boiled finished his drink in silence. He then placed one of the attaché cases on the table. “Your
reward.”
Mediumcollected it stealthily and took a step back fromthe table. He checked its contents and glanced
at Welldone’s back. Welldone nodded without turning. Welldone went on to explain that all five of the
company members, not just he and Medium, were linked by communication devices planted in their heads.
“We’re each other’s eyes, ears, and weapons. That’s what gives us our strength.”
Boiled placed the other case on the table and opened it himself. “An advance payment and to cover
your costs for your next target.”
Welldone leaned forward to sniff the case like a dog. “How many people?”
“One—although there are two PIs as Trustees, and the civilian police force will do their bit to
interfere,” said Boiled.
“So why are you offering us so little?”
“Because you’ll find the target to your taste. Dispose of the target’s body as you like.”
Welldone lifted a disc out of the case between two fingers, suspiciously.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“A video featuring the target.” Boiled stared at Welldone, unflinching.
Medium moved to his side and received the video. “We’ll check now, all five of us.” He snapped his
fingers. This time a different wall opened up, revealing a large TV screen.
Rare and Mincemeat entered the room and sat down on the sofa as Medium stuck the disc into the
player. Flesh was able to watch the same video fromhis own room.
Nobody spoke, but the sense of excitement was palpable. They were about to acquire a new target.
Soon the video began. The picture was noticeably grainy; it was obviously a cheap flick. As a movie
it was barely watchable, but when the girl appeared the gang were glued to their seats.
They watched the girl as she lay still and was used every which way, and suddenly the room was full
of the most unbearable tension.
“Nice fingers she has on her.” Medium was the first to speak once the first scene was over. “Innocent
and yet…supple. I’ve wanted a better pinky on my right hand for some time…”
Rare was next to speak. “Magnificent hair. Her skin looks wonderful too. I want her. I want her
badly.” His voice was shrill.
“Want her eyes for my arm. Such sharp, clear pupils. Like an angel,” Mincemeat said. He was
breathing heavily. “I’ll say good morning to themevery day when I wake. Then I’ll kiss those eyelids.”
Cute, aren’t they? came Flesh’s voice over some hidden speakers. A wonderful pair. I’d like them on
my inner thighs. I’d give them a little shot of hormones every day, so that they press up more and more
against my bits…
“Hmm…” Welldone surveyed the rest of the gang, but he too was drawn back into the video when the
second man clambered on top of the girl to enter her.
“See here…can we get a closeup? That’s it, right there. Now let’s see what she’s like inside. This
pussycat might even be good enough to be part of my right hand. I’ve been looking for a scissor sister for
my left hand for some time now, she needs her sweet loving… What’s this? I see, I see…”
This was how they all spoke to each other for some time. Admiring their new target and talking in
graphic detail about what they wanted to do with her. They were all incredibly excited.
After some time, Welldone turned to Boiled. “When did you say this video was taken?”
“About half a year ago.”
“What do we have on her at the moment?”
“We have footage from the courtroom and photos,” said Boiled. Welldone took out a pile of photos
fromthe case and passed themaround.
“Wonderful! So—what is it exactly that you want?” asked Welldone. Boiled didn’t answer, and
Welldone looked back at himsilently.
“This was the real target all along, wasn’t it? The five doctors were just the amuse-bouche, and this is
the main course. So what is it that you want with this girl?”
“Nothing. To have the target annihilated completely. Give me the nothingness that’s left after her life
has disappeared.”
When Welldone heard these words his face turned into a broad smile. “Thus spake the ultimate
fetishist! It looks like in Mr. Boiled we’ve happened across our ideal partner.”
“The time limit is three days. We can’t wait any longer than that. The moment it looks like you’re not
going to complete your mission in time, we’ll terminate the contract on the spot.”
“Don’t you worry, Mr. Boiled. The pack of hounds that you’ve chosen—Bandersnatch—are the best
hunting dogs in the business.” Welldone was now a bundle of pure desire.
Boiled rose fromhis seat.
When he left the ship he headed straight for the car park without looking back.
The new moon was sharp as a razor, shining down its blue light over the gatehouse.
“Any luck, sir?” It was still the same young security guard on duty. He ran Boiled’s card through the
systemagain. “Anyhow, good luck with the case, sir.”
Boiled nodded in silence.
He set a course for the East Side.
05
“It’s completely unacceptable! Beyond the pale!” Oeufcoque was pointing his finger and—unusually
for him—yelling furiously. “An absolute ‘no way’! No questions asked. Have you got that, Balot?”
–I’m sorry, don’t get mad at me! I’ll never lift you up byyour tail again.
“I don’t even like discussing it! It’s like my whole person is being judged and found wanting. Just
leave my tail alone in every way, please.”
–I’m sorry. I’ll do that. So please stop being so angry?
Oeufcoque lowered the finger he was pointing at her, and eventually his hips followed suit with a
thump.
He was on the palmof Balot’s hand. She was using her other hand to hold a bath towel to her chest.
“As long as you understand, it’s okay.”
–I didn’t realize it would upset you so much.
“I don’t know why I got so angry myself.”
–You’re still angry.
“Yes, but it’s fine. I’ll stop taking it out on you.”
–Why don’t you just keep it hidden in your pants? Why do you have a hole on purpose so that you
can stick your tail out?
“I think I just asked you to drop it!”
–You also said you’d stop taking it out on me.
“You need a full account, is that it? Very well, then. Out of the many designs of pants that there are, my
favorite design happens to have a hole in the—” Oeufcoque cut himself off for a second, throwing his
arms in the air out of frustration. “That bloody Doctor, saying things like Don’t you think those pants
make your backside look big, or Be careful where you park that thing, it needs warning lights—he’s
given me such a complex about my magnificent tail!”
Balot did her best to stop herself, but in the end she couldn’t help bursting out into silent laughter.
“Don’t laugh at me, I’mbegging you…” Oeufcoque pleaded with a pathetic expression.
This only made her laugh even more. She doubled over, holding her towel to her stomach now.
“Anyway, shouldn’t you be thinking about your own clothes rather than worrying about my pants?
Unlike me you don’t even have any proper hair on your body. You’ll catch a cold if all you wear is a
single towel.”
Balot’s whole body was shaking along with her laughter, but she managed a small nod.
“And the Doctor’s waiting for us too.”
–Can you wait for me, though? I’m in pain. I’m laughing too much.
“Still laughing? Well, I’mso delighted that I could be of service in this way—I’mglad I amuse you.”
–Stop sulking.
“I’mnot sulking!”
–Of course you aren’t. Sorry.
Balot wiped the tears of laughter fromher eyes and kissed Oeufcoque on his tail.
“Was that a peace offering? Very well, I accept. Now, considering the real and present danger facing
your health, let’s move on to a mission to acquire appropriate clothing for you.”
–Thank you.
Balot stood up and let her towel fall to the floor. She lifted Oeufcoque up carefully with both hands
and snarced himwith feeling. Oeufcoque, with his usual squelch, melted in Balot’s hand and widened and
slithered to cover her whole body.
Oeufcoque wrapped the stark naked Balot from top to toe. A black bodysuit covered her from her
fingertips to the ends of her toes. Both of her palms were stuck together, as Oeufcoque couldn’t turn into
two things at once.
Balot peeled her hands apart with the gentlest of motions. Savoring the sensation of the bodysuit—
comfortable, flexible, tight—she went to take a peek at herself in the mirror.
She was a little disappointed.
–It’s not verystylish.
“Maybe not, but it is heatproof, coldproof, shockproof, pressure-resistant—and can magnify your
snarc. Oh, and there’s a zipper at the back, so please use that to take me off when I’mturned out.”
–Doesn’t it come in any other designs?
“You can modify the design as you like, all you have to do is think about it—but let’s not get bogged
down with the trivial stuff just now.”
–You get bogged down with trivial stuf like your pants, Balot answered back as she put on her
boots.
She left her room and headed toward the elevator. The giant building, the former mortuary, was in fact
full of rooms that were formerly used as morgues—and, therefore, despite the size of the place, not much
of it was serviceable as living quarters.
Balot used the elevator used for goods arrivals to head down and got off at the underground garage,
where she noticed a number of gasoline-fueled cars.
The red convertible was there too.
–Did you make these cars yourself, Oeufcoque?
“Yup, apart from the license plates, the gas, and a couple specialist patented parts. Took me the best
part of the month to make a single vehicle. I’mvery meticulous about my designs—it’s the artist in me.”
–I wish the artist in you was meticulous about the designs for myclothes.
“Uh…sure, well, let’s focus on our training for now, that’s our first priority.”
They entered into the garage proper, and by one of the walls they saw the Doctor, piling up some
complicated-looking machinery.
He smiled as he saw Balot come toward him.
“Isn’t it great? Using the funds we requested for your Life Preservation Program I was able to source
some first-class diagnostic equipment, tinker around with it, and polish it up into these. These beauties
knock the training equipment used in the Major Leagues right out of the water!”
Balot snarced the throat of her suit, producing a crystalline sound.
–Looks like everyone’s an artist.
She looked around at the machinery, somewhat nonplussed.
“It’s important to be artistic now and then if you’re going to enjoy your life—the trick is to stop just
before you end up on the wrong side of autistic.” The Doctor was in his element, able to fiddle with his
machines to his heart’s content. “Are those clothes Oeufcoque?”
“That’s right, Doc. And I was told off by Balot for not being artistic enough in my own designs,” said
Oeufcoque.
The Doctor nodded in agreement. “Get her to teach you some style, then. Now, Balot, I’m going to
stick these on you, okay?”
The Doctor showed her some circular stickers. Balot nodded, and the Doctor started placing them all
over her—knees, elbows, back.
–What are these things?
“Designed to send your biorhythmic data straight to this machine. They’ll capture your movements
with a margin of error of less than 0.1 millimeters. Now, could you move around a bit? Do some
stretches, that sort of thing.”
The Doctor took a seat in a pipe chair and balanced a laptop on his knees. Multicolored cords
extended fromthe back of the monitor and plugged into the sprawling machinery.
Balot moved as requested. Some warm-ups. She snarced the suit here and there as she limbered up. A
few patterns started appearing on the suit and eventually formed themselves into what could be described
as a rough design, complete with colors.
Balot still didn’t seemsatisfied, exactly, but at least she was getting there.
“You’re pretty limber,” Oeufcoque said as Balot performed a split, backside now on the floor. He
seemed impressed.
Balot smiled and, from the same position on the floor, leaned forward until her chest touched the
ground. Fromthat position she spread her arms toward her feet, deftly touching the tips of her toes.
“Well, that’s one skill I don’t have. We have ourselves a bona fide gymnast!”
–I just like physical activity. It makes me feel like I’m in charge of my body.
She spoke without the electronic voice box, communicating with Oeufcoque directly.
“The Doctor calls me unfit because I can’t run twenty meters in less than a minute.”
Balot chuckled as she got back up.
–Would you like me to keep moving around?
The Doctor shook his head as he pounded on the keys, relentlessly entering new data. “No, we’re
okay. Now, could you just stand on that platformthere? Yeah, the one in front of those contraptions.”
Balot did as she was asked and stepped up onto the silver platform.
It too had a number of wires running fromit. It turned out it was some sort of scale. A small display on
one of the corners of the platform revealed some numbers, with the numerals to the right of the decimal
blinking and changing rapidly.
A number of other displays could be seen, each flashing up different sets of numerals.
Balot looked somewhat sullen and turned to the Doctor with a puzzled scowl.
“I’ve taken some scales that they use to weigh baggage in an airport and modified themso that they can
display biorhythmic indices as well. This thing’s accurate down to the last milligram and can pick up
everything fromyour circulation to body fat percentages.”
–That’s the sort of thing you should have told me before I got on!
“Huh?”
–It’s indecent.
The Doctor looked suitably chastened.
Oeufcoque’s laughter could be heard emanating fromBalot’s left hand.
“Don’t be like that, please. Any sort of proper training needs an observer on the sidelines to measure
the progress.”
–In that case, Doctor, I’ll just have to think of you as part of the furniture.
“That’s not much better…” the Doctor grumbled.
–Very nice furniture, of course.
Balot was teasing himnow.
–I’ll let you tell me whatever you need to say.
The Doctor shrugged his shoulders, but Balot could tell he was playing along now. She laughed and
looked at the numbers on the indices.
The numbers to the right of the decimals whirled around when she shifted her balance from foot to
foot. When she stabilized, the numbers started changing much more slowly, but she still couldn’t get them
to stand completely still.
“Ahem,” the Doctor coughed, ready to start. “Your skin was originally developed to withstand the
weightlessness of space vacuum, to allow you to move freely without losing your equilibrioception.”
Balot nodded and watched the figures on the displays.
“Parts of your brain—in particular your cerebellum—work by receiving these electronic impulses,
which are constantly processed and updated. Your sensory nerves act as neural pathways, as in a normal
person, but as a result of your new abilities the time it takes to transfer this information is drastically
reduced—or, to put it another way, your brain is accelerated many times over. So, theoretically you can
use your snarc both outwardly and from the outside in.”
Balot nodded. She was keen to know the as-yet-undiscovered areas of the abilities she had acquired.
“Should be a piece of cake, considering the incredible aptitude you’ve shown so far.”
–What should be?
“Achieving equilibrium. You need to be able to grasp—precisely and evenly—the details of your
interior workings, just as much as what’s going on outside your body. In other words, the definition of
‘training’ for you is not so much a case of building up your muscles but instead to cultivate your sense of
internal balance.”
–So what is it exactlyyou want me to do?
“Make those scales stop still on a single number.”
Balot looked at the digits again. The numbers that were spinning round and round.
She could easily snarc themin order to give the Doctor what he asked for.
But that wasn’t quite what the Doctor was after.
“You need to let go in order to get go,” Oeufcoque interrupted. “Try and get a grasp of how your body
ought to be in the context of its environment. You should be able to feel exactly what your body needs to
do in order to adapt to its maximumeffectiveness.”
–Is that what you do when you turn?
“Exactly. Your genetic makeup is very different frommine, but the basic principles are the same.”
–Genetic makeup?
“Look, you don’t need to think too hard about it. All you need to do is feel it.”
Balot looked away fromthe numbers on the scales and stared into space.
She thought about how she felt when she first woke up inside this building. How she could sleep
without feeling uneasy about her surroundings for the first time ever. How that was what she wanted—
what she needed—with all her heart.
Balot closed her eyes.
She focused on her consciousness—until now only ever used to explore her surroundings—and turned
part of it inward.
She felt her own rhythm, the pulse running through her whole body. She felt the sensation of
understanding her inner workings at the most fundamental level. This was something that didn’t belong to
anyone else—it was hers.
The external and internal gently connected in her consciousness. She could feel changes in her body
and changes on the weighing scales with equal precision. Through Oeufcoque she could feel the flow of
the air, and she grasped the layout of the entire garage. She could feel the shapes of the parked cars, the
thickness of the supporting pillars and the walls, and even the electricity in the air as it flowed through her
body.
She grasped her own tiniest movements, fractions of a millimeter.
Behind Balot’s back the Doctor kept his eyes glued to the screen—and she could sense him growing
more and more excited. The Doctor was astonished and delighted in equal measure.
“Amazing—how wonderful to have my own inventions brought properly to life by a genius such as
you!” But even as the Doctor spoke, she sensed a faint echo of remorse.
It suddenly occurred to Balot that she had never really given much thought to the question of what all
these inventions were originally intended for.
–Don’t you like wars, Doctor?
She spoke with her eyes still closed.
Behind her the Doctor lifted his head.
“Well, no, of course not… Although, ironically, we’re talking about technology that was originally
developed under a remit from high command in order to help soldiers fight in space more effectively, so
that they could engage in hand-to-hand combat even when they were wearing their bulky space suits.”
–So why did you make all this?
“You know, I really had convinced myself that I was contributing to human progress, even to world
peace. Although my wife and relatives all just thought I was a nut job obsessed with my quest to
restructure the human body…”
–But you’re going to save me.
Balot’s eyes were still shut.
The Doctor chuckled. “Let’s hope so. Now, on to the next step!”
Balot opened her eyes.
The numbers were no longer moving, not even slightly.
She could now see exactly how they did move, and what she needed to do with her body to make them
move—or stay still.
She spread her legs apart.
Still the numbers stayed the same.
Balot felt confident now—if the scales were fifty meters long and she was told to run from one end to
the other, she knew she’d be able to do so and the numbers would barely flicker.
“Are you right-handed?” Oeufcoque asked.
–I am now, although I was born left-handed.
And then, after answering, she snarced just to Oeufcoque:
–I was told I needed to make myself right-handed, as some customers might feel uncomfortable
around a southpaw.
“So, is it safe to say you could be ambidextrous when it came to handling weapons?”
–I guess I could get used to it, after a little practice.
“Then let’s start with the left. Let’s get a gun in your hand.”
Balot snarced Oeufcoque via her left hand.
Even though she’d never handled a gun before, she could tell that Oeufcoque was turning into the
ideal model for her, the one that suited her grip the best out of all the models he had programmed into him.
The fabric on her palmturned with a squelch and she felt cold steel—and gripped it.
It was heavier than she’d expected—but her body soon adjusted to the extra weight.
Oeufcoque gave her some tips. “Parts of this are made from vulcanized plastic and some electronics,
but basically this is just an automatic pistol. You pull the trigger, the gunpowder explodes, and the bullet
goes flying out the end at high velocity.”
Balot nodded and leveled the gun. The grip was fused into the palmof her suit.
She tried letting go, twiddling her fingers, and it still didn’t fall. It felt like it was almost a part of her.
“The target’s set up over on that wall.” The Doctor pointed at it. A black cardboard cutout, the shape
of a man, about 170 centimeters in height.
“We have pressure sensors set up all around the target, so we’ll be able to tell immediately where
your shots land. You watched the video on how to fire a gun? Well, go ahead and try it for yourself.”
The gun was empty of bullets. Balot snarced it. She felt a click, and she knew that the steel chamber
was now loaded with a bullet. She could grasp the addition of the extra weight in the chamber, down to
the last milligram.
Click, click, and one by one the magazine filled with bullets.
Eleven shots total—with an extra one in the chamber for good measure.
She thrust her left armforward, used her right armto steady it, and readied her gun.
She leaned in to compensate for the force, maneuvering herself into prime firing position, just as she
had seen in the instructional video.
She brought her finger to rest on the trigger.
A little electronic gimmick on the trigger saw to it that all she needed to do was to grip gently rather
than pull the trigger hard—she hardly needed to put any strength into it at all.
Bang, a hollow explosive sound.
A bullet flew out of the muzzle, and a spent casing flew sideways out of the chamber. A piercing
sound could be heard on the other side of the wall. A metallic clang on the floor followed.
She fired more shots.
One shot, two shots, three shots.
She could have pushed the sound of the gunshots inside Oeufcoque, silencing them completely, but that
would have dulled the visceral sensations of the whole experience.
Yes, for the real marksmanship experience, you really needed to have noise echoing all around you.
She fired six shots to gain her bearings. The next five she fired with her eyes completely closed. The
car park reverberated with the sound of gunfire, and the empty cartridge shells played a merry jangling
tune as they clattered across the ground.
She could even feel the sensation that the bullets themselves felt, that of being shot out of the barrel of
the gun. Wrenched out of place, jumping out of the barrel, rotating with tremendous speed.
The numbers on the scales that Balot was standing on twitched slightly, but in a moment they settled
and became virtually still.
Balot had finished firing her first load. The breechblock slid back and stopped in place.
“Don’t reload it right away—drop the magazine to release some of the heat that’s built up.”
Balot did as Oeufcoque said and snarced the grip of the gun into ejecting the magazine.
Balot relaxed as the magazine hit the scales. The subtlest of movements. The spent magazine hit the
silver platformand rolled across it.
The numbers on the display didn’t change in the slightest.
Balot snarced the gun again.
A new magazine appeared inside the grip, a perfect fit.
The gun loaded with bullets as she moved herself back into position, and at the same time the
breechblock snapped back into place.
She relaxed her shoulders and fired again. Settling into a regular rhythm. From the first to the last shot,
like a pulse.
She felt the incandescent bullets piercing the air.
After she had fired all the bullets she ejected the magazine again and turned around to look at the
Doctor.
The Doctor was glued to the monitor.
His fingers covered his mouth as if he were in deep thought, and then he suddenly exhaled, letting out
the huge breath that he had been holding in.
“Perfect. You’ve really studied the videos closely, haven’t you?”
–Yes, both the ones where you stand still and where you fire while moving. Also the ones with
moving targets, as well as stationary ones.
“Great. Moving targets next, then. Some balls will start flying across randomly from beyond that pillar
over there. A bit like a pitching machine, the sort kids use for baseball practice. Shoot those balls down.
Same distance as before.”
–Got it.
Balot quickly—and smoothly—equipped herself with a new magazine and bullets and got into
position.
The Doctor started tapping his keyboard.
Balot realized that these actions controlled the machine on the other side of the pillar.
Boing, and a rubber ball flew out.
Balot shot it.
In a little less than four seconds, that one ball had taken all twelve of the bullets.
The rubber ball performed a whirling dance in midair, and the fragments flew off every which way.
The scales barely flickered, and the golden cartridges gleamed as they scattered across the floor.
Again Balot dropped the magazine and turned to the Doctor. His eyes were like saucers as he watched
the distant particles fromthe ball fragment further.
“Er…the idea was that you try to shoot down each ball—that’s to say shoot, singular, just the once.”
Yet again the Doctor was dumfounded.
Just then another ball bounced out of the machine.
Balot’s attention was still half focused on the Doctor as she raised her hand. Just her left this time—
her right hand dangling by her side.
She snarced Oeufcoque in an instant, re-equipping herself with a magazine and bullets.
She fired a single shot, just as she was told.
The ball bounced against the wall and came bounding back toward them, then rolled another twenty
meters or so before stopping at the Doctor’s shoes.
There were eight balls total, including the one that Balot had obliterated earlier.
Before long seven of those balls rolled into position right at the Doctor’s feet. Balls that had been shot
through their cores with deadly accuracy.
The Doctor picked one of them up and looked at it, jaws trembling. “We’re talking about spherical
targets here. To pierce the cores with one hundred percent accuracy, and fromthis distance too…”
He sounded as if he were ready to raise the white flag of surrender, but then laughed and said at a high
pitch, “How absolutely thrilling !”
He shut his mouth as soon as he opened it, very aware that he was getting carried away.
Balot frowned.
–I thought you didn’t like war?
“Yes, but this is something completely different,” Oeufcoque interjected.
The Doctor nodded. “I’ve never actually been at the front lines, you see. I might seem a little warlike,
but in my heart I know I’mnot about to go to war anytime soon.”
Balot pursed her lips. An expression that was somewhere between sympathy and disapproval.
“Right, let’s have you moving now. Try walking toward that target. There are some more pitching
machines positioned behind those pillars. They’ll sense your movements and fire balls directly at you—
shoot themdown. Consider the balls to be an attack on your person.”
–Got it.
Balot stepped off the silver scale. Without missing a beat she walked toward the wall at the far end.
She perceived the machines operating to her left and right. Her concentration levels were rising. She
looked inside herself to manipulate her internal workings—so that her pulse wouldn’t start racing—all the
while keeping a close check on her surroundings.
The moment she sensed movement in the shadows Balot pointed her gun in that direction without
looking. By the time the ball had left the machine Balot had already fired.
The ball hurtled toward the flight path of the bullet as if it were being sucked in and was skewered
perfectly.
Balot felt the other machines firing up but walked on steadily. A volley of balls converged on her from
all directions. She shot them all down, having found her target before the balls even left the pitching
machines.
The Doctor cranked up the speed. Balot held her steady pace, unabated. She took her right hand off the
gun and snarced that hand too.
Another gun appeared, just like the one in her left hand. She used this to fire at the balls too. Left and
right. Whichever she could use to aim—and fire—the quicker.
She arrived at the far wall, turned around, and began her return.
The sound of gunfire echoed all around, balls and spent cartridges littered the floor, and the acrid
smell of gunpowder filled the air. Her vision was clouded by the gun smoke.
Balot closed her eyes. She looked as if she were about to go into a trance. She fired her gun, playfully
now, almost as if she were dancing.
Balot’s eyes were closed, and she never missed a shot.
The Doctor, on the other hand, grew paler and paler, the blood draining fromhis face.
“I know what ought to be done, I just don’t know what the right thing to do is… I never imagined in a
million years that the girl would mesh so well with the abilities we gave her…” A shiver ran down his
spine as he spoke, and his voice was drowned out by the echoing gunfire.
The Doctor gulped, and as he did so there was a ping—a message had arrived.
“We’ve just had a newsflash from the DA. I set him to gather information on Shell—anything on the
net or frominternal police reports,” the Doctor said.
Balot took a seat, listening. She had already detached both guns from her sleeves and handed them
over to the Doctor, and when she did so his expression lifted ever so slightly in relief.
“He’s come up with something, has he?” Oeufcoque asked, sticking his torso out of one of Balot’s
hands.
“The five neurosurgeons who were looking after Shell have all disappeared. Every single one of them,
simultaneously. One of the surgeons had even just prepared dinner. No signs of a struggle. And no
witnesses…” The Doctor’s eyes flicked over to Balot.
She understood the significance of this glance straightaway.
–Don’t worry. I won’t be afraid. Carry on.
“Okay. Well, it’s strange. All five of them have these large sums of money deposited into their
accounts by an unidentified source. But considering the salaries they’re on from the state, it’d hardly be
worthwhile for any of them to abscond with the sorts of sums we’re talking about—not with all they have
to lose.”
“The deposits are obviously a red herring, Doc. Boiled doesn’t do things by halves. Once his mind is
set on an effective course of action, he carries it through to the bitter end. I imagine he hired professionals
to do the job. Whenever we find something that looks like a lead, it’s safe to assume that it’s more likely
to be a decoy, or a deliberate bluff,” said Oeufcoque.
“I think you’re right. Well, I’m going to use these mysterious disappearances to press our case further,
try and crank up the Life Preservation Program to the highest level. We strike a blow inside the
courtroom, they go on the offensive on the outside. We’ll need to shore up our escape routes—and we
may need to start scouting for a new hideaway. I’d better go and negotiate with the Broilerhouse directly.”
Even as he spoke his fingers were tapping away at the keyboard furiously. He was evidently in
communication with the DA.
There was another ping, and the Doctor’s expression brightened.
“Marvelous, our man at the Broilerhouse has given the go-ahead to open negotiations. I’d better head
straight there…hope we don’t get attacked while I’m out. Mind you, even if I was here, I doubt I’d be
much help in battle.”
“Well, we’ve vetted the police protection that we were assigned after the trial, and their histories all
check out. We trawled through the files for all eight of them, spanning the last twenty years—spotless.
They should be able to protect us for long enough for you to have your Life Preservation Program
discussions, at least,” said Oeufcoque.
“Let’s hope so. Still, let’s not discount the possibility that the enemy will see my absence as a window
of opportunity to attack. Be careful.” The Doctor flicked a switch on the machine, pulled the cord out, and
headed over to the red convertible in giant, lanky strides.
“Right, I’m off. Make sure you lock all the doors. And listen to what Oeufcoque tells you.” He called
out to Balot and the car left the parking lot, letting in the crimson light of the evening sun from beyond the
shutters.
Balot snarced the shutters closed, and then made the pitching machines set themselves up to fire
automatically. She was about to recommence her training.
“Best not tire yourself out,” Oeufcoque advised.
–Let me go on a little while longer, please? It takes the edge off mymood.
“Fine, but don’t overexert yourself.”
–Just a bit of stationarytarget practice, then.
Balot stepped back on top of the silver platformand gripped the gun with both hands. She fired in time
with the balls as they flew toward her.
She fired with her right, she fired with her left.
As she did so, she snarced Oeufcoque to ask himsome questions.
–Who’s going to attack us? Your former partner?
“I don’t know. And we don’t know for sure that anyone’s going to attack us.”
–Did Shell have those surgeons rubbed out? Why?
“Something to do with the business deal he’s involved in at the moment, no doubt. It’s probably safe
for us to assume that Shell’s memories are being recorded and preserved in physical form somehow.
That’s given us a useful clue, anyway.”
–Who do you think actually killed the surgeons?
“A gang of professionals, I imagine. The sort who work as a team, kidnappers-for-hire.”
–Do you think they’ll come and attack us?
“It’s highly probable.”
–And if they do attack?
“Then our police protection should send thempacking.”
–But what if the kidnappers get them too?
“Then it’ll be up to us to finish the job.”
–We kill them? Balot asked as she pulled the trigger.
–I should shoot the people who attack me, like this, is that what you want? Like I shoot that ball
over there?
“If it becomes necessary then yes, you shoot your assailant in self-defense. But that’s not the same
thing as shooting themin order to kill them.” Oeufcoque was in full-blown lecture mode now.
–Okay.
“Let’s take a rest now.”
–No, I’m still good. Just a little longer, please?
Balot was firing away on complete autopilot now, mind completely blank and free from obstructive
thoughts.
Slowly, at the back of her mind, the question posed by the counsel for the defense re-emerged.
Why didn’t you resist?
That was what the attorney had asked her. Just as so many men had asked her before.
The answer was silence.
There had never been any answer other than silence.
Ever.
Except that now there was sound to rip apart that silence—the sound of gunfire.
Balot continued firing the gun.
06
The gasoline-powered van cruised around the neighborhood, the airline logo on the front and Meet and
Greet plastered in large lettering on the window.
By and by it arrived at its destination. It parked, and two tall men emerged fromit.
Both men wore sunglasses and thick coats.
“Five minutes, Medium. Let’s secure the area,” one said.
The other nodded. “Roger that, Welldone. Moving into position now.” As he spoke he walked directly
toward the entrance of the residence.
Left hand in his jacket, he pressed the intercom buzzer with his right hand and whispered, “I’ll tidy up
here as Well prepares the radar. You’ve finished hacking the telephone line?” Medium pressed his
forehead with his hand, tilting his head, listening to a voice meant only for him.
A noise came frominside the house, and he smiled.
And so it was that Boiled’s hounds—the Bandersnatch Gang—were released.
A sound over the intercom:
–What do you want?
“This is your transport shuttle fromthe airline company, sir. Sorry to have kept you waiting.”
–We never ordered any…
But the hand that had been inside Medium’s coat was out now. It held a card-shaped device.
He stuck the card into the electronic lock on the door.
An electromagnetic Hutchinson Knife appeared fromhis other sleeve, as if by magic.
It all happened in an instant.
The door opened with a click. A thick security chain dangled across the door, but the knife sliced
through it like butter, its magnetized blade causing a link in the chain to fuse and shatter.
The door opened and Mediumentered. The man who had been speaking into the intercomwas standing
there in the entrance hall, his face blank with astonishment and terror.
Yo—he started to say, but Medium threw a knife at him, and it plunged into his open mouth. The
magnetized blade sliced through the back of his head, causing all the moisture in his mouth to evaporate in
an instant.
Medium caught the already-dead man by his lapel and propped him up to stop his fall. He pulled the
knife out and carefully laid the man’s body down. Not a drop of blood was spilled, but instead the whole
area was filled with the pungent smell of burnt flesh.
There was the tinkle of a bell, and a red light glinted off his eyes behind his sunglasses.
“What is it? What’s that car? And that smell…” A voice.
Medium’s eyes, now vermilion, glanced at the wall and saw another figure emerge.
Left hand still gripping the knife, Mediumlet his right armhang loose by his hips.
“I wonder which one of us is the faster draw,” Medium said aloud. He smirked and stood deliberately
in the middle of the corridor. The other man appeared from beyond the door and was immediately taken
aback by the figure confronting him—and the two red eyes behind the sunglasses.
The man, frenetic, reached for the gun at his side. He was too slow.
Medium unsheathed his gun and fired a shot that left the barrel almost noiselessly. A hole opened in
the man’s chest. The electric charge from the bullet fried his wound—and his lungs—and he collapsed in
a heap before a sound could pass his lips.
Again, no blood, and again the smell of fried flesh hung in the air.
“That’ll be me, then.” Medium leaned over the corpse and lectured the dead body in jest, waggling his
index finger.
Medium put his gun away and lifted up the man’s wrist, staring fixedly at it. “Tough, professional
fingers,” he said, taking his sunglasses off with his knife-wielding hand. “Just not really sexy enough.
Let’s sell themoff, Well.”
He was speaking now to Welldone, who emerged fromthe opposite end of the corridor.
Well was dragging yet another dead body by the scruff of its neck.
He took his sunglasses off, exposing his computerized red pupils, and spoke. “Three people exactly.
We’ve cleaned up over here. How’s it going over there, Rare, Mincemeat?” Welldone spoke out loud,
hand to his temple. The reply came:
–All done. Easy peasy! I’m just brewing myself some nice cof ee in the kitchen. Rare’s girly voice
sounded in Welldone’s and Medium’s ears and continued:
–It was a little boring, actually. The pigs were stationed exactly where we knew they’d be when we
hacked their Ham & Egg system.
“Good…standby on alert.”
–All finished over here too. Looks like our tracking system’s working. When should I bring this pig
out?
It was Mincemeat’s voice that now arrived on the scene, and Welldone responded. “Wait for
darkness. We’re going to scramble all the Ham & Egg circuits in the area, along with all communications
to and fromthe target house.”
–Am I good to soil them a bit, then?
“Why,
what’s happened, little Minty?” Mediumasked, amused.
–There was a woman here too. They were trying to pass themselves of as a couple, but they’re both
Ham & Eggers. Still, might have been a real-life couple, I suppose.
“Are they still alive, Mincemeat?” asked Welldone. He left the house and moved toward the car.
–Er…should they be?
“Not really. Do as you please. Just be sure you factor in enough time to tidy up afterwards.”
“Twenty minutes till sunset, little Minty. The sun’s almost down. Time for dinner.” Medium spoke
now, standing in the hallway. He heard Mincemeat’s laughter echoing deep in his ear.
–More of a snack. I’ll leave the front parts for Well. Can’t imagine they’ll be to your taste, though.
I’m going to do the rear parts myself, now, husband and wife in turn.
Mincemeat carried on cheerfully, and Mediumburst out laughing. “Rare’s going to be all jealous…”
–Ooh, Medi, no, you know how loud I get! I just can’t keep it in. If I did anything now our target
would know we were coming! I don’t like it unless I can scream real loud.
“Just don’t forget we need some time to load the pigs,” Welldone said as he returned with a suitcase in
either hand. “Consume the prey without leaving a single drop of blood. That’s the secret of our success,
after all.”
“That’s right, business is business, Rare, little Minty. Don’t let the pigs rot.” Medium took a suitcase
from Welldone and knelt down by one of the corpses.
Welldone extracted the Lockbuster Card fromthe door and reset the lock. “Just don’t forget that you’re
on the battlefield, Rare and Mincemeat.”
–That’s what makes it feel so good, though! Isn’t that right, little Minty?
–Yeah, it’s good. It’s really good!
Medium shook his head, laughing, and cut off his transmission from Mincemeat. “Looks like being on
the battlefield just increases the thrill factor for them. Give us a hand, will you, Well? Let’s slice this pig
up with our two-hundred-thousand-dollar butter knives.”
Welldone kneeled beside the corpse and took his Hutchinson Knife out, applying it to the corpse’s
wrists. Flesh, skin, and bone were all sliced off together, but not a single drop of blood escaped.
“Easy does it. You know that red convertible we just passed—do you think he’s one of the PIs too?”
Mediumspoke cheerfully, and Well grinned back.
“He is. I had Flesh confirm it. So all we’ve got to do now is give the other PI a little scratch with our
butter knives and then put the girl to sleep and bring her back with us.”
“My chest is pounding. It’s been a while. I’m almost as excited as that first time we ever set out as a
gang.”
Welldone laughed. The two men cheerfully dissected the body and packed it away in the suitcases.
≡
“Looks like the operation will commence in twenty minutes.” Inside the container on the trailer, Flesh
wobbled his gelatinous body around toward Boiled as he spoke to him.
“Perfect timing.”
Boiled nodded his approval.
The container was full of machinery. Mincemeat was the trailer’s driver, and it was currently parked
some distance away fromthe residential district.
“I’ll finish my work on the Ham & Egg circuits in a couple of minutes. Each of the three residences
are set up so that if they don’t successfully send and receive a transmission from each of the others every
forty-five minutes, the emergency alarm is sounded automatically. So I’ve had to fix it so that each one
relays a message on to the next one every fifteen minutes.”
Boiled nodded again. His eyes were fixed on a monitor that showed a detailed image of the
neighborhood. A number of flashing lights showed where Welldone and the rest of the gang were at that
precise moment.
The next monitor along showed a building in 3-D. With perfect marking—radar devices set in three
places around the building—they were able to triangulate and get a precise scan of its contents.
“It’s built just as it says on the blueprints. Have you ever been inside the building yourself?”
Boiled glanced at Flesh, unspeaking.
“We ran some background checks on you ourselves, you know. You’re amazing. All those cases you
solved with that other PI called Oeufcoque, and every single one of them designated an Official License.
You’re a real celebrity within the industry, aren’t you? And I hear you’ve got a lot of clout with the DA’s
office too.”
“That’s all stuff that my former partner engineered after he dissolved our partnership.”
“Hmm…I would have thought you were the sort of person who didn’t worry too much about history,
what someone might or might not have done. I was hoping you wouldn’t mind discussing the past?” Flesh
asked.
Boiled continued staring at the monitor, but nodded slightly.
“We were all in the Forces. Well, Medi and I were all in the Experimental Mechanized Division of
the Marine Corps—the Guinea Pigs, we were known as—and we met Rare and Mincemeat at the front
when we were all thrown together in the same company of the Southern Division on the Continent. I was
up for military discharge after getting shell-shocked and developing paranoia, but then loads of enemies
came and surrounded us. We had to hole up in the forest for over ninety days before the helicopters were
finally dispatched to evacuate us. Even today, whenever I see an oak tree it takes me back, brings back
vivid memories.”
Boiled ignored Flesh, but he carried on speaking. “Everyone looked after me, a mere commspecialist.
A lot of soldiers ended up regressing to a childlike state, though. Some grew paranoid, or started
developing abnormally aggressive tendencies. Some units had a lot of these sorts of soldiers concentrated
in one place, and I somehow found myself in one of them. At first we were the exception, but before we
knew it our sort of unit became quite common, especially on the front lines. Then, as the battle intensified,
it became completely normal. These are the only sorts of people who can really adapt to the front lines,
after all. We fought hard and received plenty of medals. We killed a lot of people. A lot of enemies, a lot
of allies. Guns, gas, bombs, electricity—we used all sorts of weapons. All day long I survived on
tranquilizers washed down with scotch, firing away from inside my armored vehicle. Eating and shitting
where I sat firing my guns. In a vehicle not unlike this one, actually, for three months, with no sunlight, in a
place like a subway toilet. As a result of that I started suffering fromwhite wax disease in my legs…”
Flesh stopped talking at this point and smiled at Boiled. “And what about you, sir? Have you been
involved in experimental warfare?”
“I was in the P7 Experimental Corps.”
“P7…oh, so an Airborne Division? I know about all of them up to P6, in charge of the twenty- to
sixty-thousand-meter altitude zones, right? I didn’t realize there was anything higher than that.”
“Strategic Space Corps. There were three of us, including me, who enlisted—volunteers from the
Airborne Division.”
Flesh clapped his pudgy hands together. “Amazing! Just like a sci-fi movie!”
Boiled’s eyes caught Flesh’s again. After a second he nodded silently, facial expression immutable as
ever. A movement like the cylinder of a revolver spinning in place.
Then a murmur. “The whole unit was a sham, a concoction. Objectives and results, all fabricated. It
was only there as a smokescreen to develop pointless technology.”
And with that, he turned his eyes—devoid of sentiment as ever—back to the monitor.

Chapter 3CRANK-UP01The Stairway to Heaven shone, dazzling, beautiful in the morning sun. The spiral stairwaytheunofficial symbol of Mardock Citywound round in three circles before stopping cleanly in midair, anunfinished monument that was designed to be just so.Symbols of Jupiterthe planet of the king of godswere carved into its outer edge, and every part ofthe handrail and supporting pillar was ornamented with scenes fromthe myths.The monument that migrants had built long ago to express their hope and their faith.Mardockthe Stairway to Heavenwas now seen by the steady influx of people into the city as asymbol of their own dreams and ambitions. This epitomized life in the city: to climb to the top, to arrive,was the ultimate virtue.Under the stairway that soared up over the municipal offices of the Broilerhouse, Balot waited,Oeufcoque wrapped round her neck as a choker and the newly besuited Doctor beside her.Everytime I look at this staircase I can almost see the phantoms of people falling from the top.Balot snarced Oeufcoque, and he replied, It's the system that people devised long ago, sorting theworld into winners and losers. But it doesn't necessarily have to be that waythere's more to mankindthan that. We're just talking about part of a system. Try not to let it get to you.If I fell from the top, I'd die, wouldn't I?I'd turn into whatever tool I needed in order to prevent that. Oeufcoque's voice may have beensmall, but it was wonderfully reassuring to Balot.Balot readied herself, then entered the Broilerhouse with the Doctor.The court hearing started at nine thirty precisely and later broke for a thirty-minute lunch recess.After everyone was seated they waited another two minutes for the judge to return fromthe restroom.Twenty minutes later Balot decided on absolute silence, and before long the time was 15:32 and thejudge lowered his gavel, signifying the end of the proceedings.The six hours of deliberations produced results that were entirely satisfactory as far as the Doctor,Oeufcoque, and the district attorney were concerned. For Balot though, it was all one long humiliation.The fact that you can't speak may well turn out to work in our favor. Consider the impression itmakes, said the DA just before the discussions started.It might only be a grand jury, but there's no better way of demonstrating the suffering you've beenthrough, said the senior assistant district attorney, a man in his early thirtiesthe DA assigned to theircase. He was welcoming the Doctor and Balot who had joined the throng of court personnel congregatingon the eleventh floor of the Broilerhouse on Central Street and was treating them like royalty. He wasn'tthe only oneDAs who were supposed to be busy with other cases were finding reasons to drop by thewaiting roomto catch a glimpse of Balot.Hey, is that the survivor that everyone's talking about? She seems in pretty good shape to me,what's she going to accuse them of?they could hear these sorts of snippets of conversation from theother side of the door.Some of the veteran DAs like to make fun of this sort of case, said their DA apologetically. Theystill don't think prostitution or rape is anything to get worked up about.Their DA seemed different, though. He said so himself, and the Doctor introduced him as a differentsort of man. A man who was sympathetic toward innocent victims, women who were the victims ofviolence, and those of a low social standing.The counsel for the defense will probably follow the same line of thinking. Are you sure you're readyfor that? Just try and compose yourself as much as you can. Remember, the counsel for the defense doesn'treally care whether their client is guilty or not.The DA smiled brightly as he gave Balot her instructions. As if that was part of the plan to ensure thatBalot would be nice and relaxed.Remember, the truth means nothing to these people. No matter what sort of criminal their client is,they'll use every sort of legal trick up their sleeve to try and get them off the hook, and in return they'rerewarded in the region of sixty thousand dollars a year, a pretty damn good salary these days The DAshrugged his shoulders at this point, as if to say he was troubled by it, but what could you do?And it's our job to face these people, specifying which of the material witnesses should be treated assuspects, he continued with a shake of his head. The counsel for the defense we're up against in thiscase is quite a formidable opponent, I have to admit. Even as we're bringing the lawsuit against them,there's no sign of the defendant, Shell-Septinoshe's not in jail, and he's not even been named a formalsuspect. He hasn't even denied the chargesjust called to have the deposition denied. Well, to make upfor it we left everything right till the last minute ourselves, as well, I suppose, not letting them see thecharges before we absolutely had to.The DA giggled, as if he'd told a particularly witty joke.I bet there was some discussion among the other side's camp when it came to tacticsthey wouldhave been wondering right till the last minute what we were going to hit themwith.Balot just sat there, still.In the waiting room. And later, at the DA's table in the courtroom. She sat still, making no noise orsound of movement, just enduring words such as She seems fine to me or Well, it stands to reason, I'mnot surprised.So I'm sure the defense will be unnecessarilywell, they'll say all sorts of things about you andwon't pull any punches. If he could get a not-guilty verdict for his client by appealing to the court's latentmisogyny, he'd do it, make no mistake. At any rate, all you need to do is stay calmeven more so thistime given your injuriesand all you need to do is to press the yes, no, or no answer button.At this point Balot nodded for the first time. That was all it took for most men to take the lead, tell herwhat to do. The DA was no exception.Well then, let's go, said the DA, heading toward the courtroom with the petitioner and ConcernedParty, Balot, and the Doctor, who was the Trustee in charge of the case.In the elevator the DA spoke to the Doctor. I have to say, you're looking good, Mr. Easter! I wish youwere always dressed like thisyou'd put my mind at rest no end.The Doctor's hair had been dyed back to its original black and was combed down and slick.His suit looked good on himit made him look gentlemanly, like a man of distinction. The Doctorgave a shrug and a little smile. The DA relaxed a little and then whispered in the Doctor's ear.But for next time let's rethink the girl's outfit. We're trying to show that she was a poor girl from theWest Side preyed on by one of the East Side rich, and she's a little tooelegantfor that.Balot could hear that too. Not the precise words, but a general sense of what they were talking about,by sensing the atmosphere. Unconsciously she folded her arms and wished for something to wrap aroundher tights. Her dress was dark, of course, just as the DA had specified, with the skirt hem coming downpast her knees. She dealt with his request as she did with any of her clients who were fixated on herclothes.Oeufcoque, still a choker, said nothing.His existence was a secret to all other people, of course, but even if it hadn't been, Balot wouldn'thave wanted him to say anything at this moment. There was still an egg-shaped crystal hanging from thechoker, but this time there was a simple geometric pattern at its core, not a picture of a golden mouse.09:25 hours. Balot sat at the plaintiff 's desk.On the defense side was the counsel, the accused man himself, and the Trustee for the defense.Balot was very conscious of her own abilities. She didn't have to look that way, but she knew whereeveryone was and what they were doing. The defendant was calm, composed. There was a very faint signof fear, but it wouldn't be this man doing the fighting in any case. And he wasn't the one who was going tobe hurt. That was the counsel and the Trustee's job. And Balot's job. The accused didn't even look atBalot.A number of reporters from the presswith their tags dangling from their neckshad firmlyensconced themselves in the front row of the spectators' gallery, and all eyes were on Balot. They werehere with a very different set of aims fromBalot and the Doctor.They were here, inevitably, to write up events as scandalously as they could.They wanted to write about Balot as a modern-day Lolita. Someone who was all too aware of her sexappeal though still a girl, a girl who had seduced an important man from the amusements company,bringing himto ruin; that was how they were looking to make the story play out.How had she become the lover of this important man? And how was the girl connected to the Trusteeof her case? The girl must have known what she was doing, must have been well aware of her abilities.This senior executive, Shell, was a foolish man too. Not only had he been deceived by this girl, hewas now being forced to spend hours and hours in this place, time he should have been spending onimportant business.Deceived. By a little girl. By anyone. Never mind what actually happened, the details were trivialifthe defense could twist the facts to this conclusion then they'd have it made, the perfect story. The bestsort of copy.The trial began, and the district attorney started off by stating in detail the injuries done to Balot. Heexplained how premeditated and how deliberate Shell was in inflicting these injuries. And what his aimswere in doing sowhat was he hiding?At each stage the counsel for the defense interrupted with objections such as Irrelevant! andConjecture! He rebutted the DA's arguments, claiming that the whole story was a fabrication by theplaintiff, designed to steal Shell's assets by improper means.The defense counsel then pressed his case further, explaining in minute, piercing detail the trackrecord of Balot's dissolute and slovenly lifestyle, diligently arguing that Shell merely wanted to rescueBalot from her struggles. After all, Balot wasn't forced to live with Shell in the first placeshe'd gonethere voluntarily, or would it be more accurate still to say that she'd forced herself upon him?As he did this the DA resisted in turn with strong objections of his own: Counsel is deliberatelytrying to shift the focus or Counsel is appealing to the emotions, not the facts!Now and then Balot was called on to testify, and at such times she pressed the buttons marked yes orno, or occasionally the no answer button. Whenever a more detailed answer was required of her shewrote her answer on a designated sheet of paper and handed it to the clerk.The courtroom was not set up to be particularly sympathetic to those who couldn't speak. Instead,everything was rather awkward, stilted. As if to say, What do you mean, someone who can't speak isappearing at the trial? An uncomfortable atmosphere pervaded the courtroom.And it was toward such a personBalotthat the counsel for the defense would use phrases such asYou reap what you sow or The defendant can't be held responsible for the plaintiff 's choices. At thesame time the DA emphasized the enormity of the suffering that Balot had been subjected to.The grand jury craned their necks from left to right following each of these exchanges, as if they werefollowing the volleys in a tennis match. Good? Evil? Like a rally. As if they were playing a game,climbing a flight of stairs, muttering guilty, not guilty, guilty, not guilty alternately with every step, andwhichever foot they ended up on at the top of the steps would be the decider.So, at the beginning, why didn't you resist? asked the defense counsel. If Shell really manipulateddetails of your status, or forcefully raped you, or trapped you in a car, there must have been some point atwhich you actually tried to resist him?While the DA was objecting, Balot thought back to her time in the institute.Back to the time when she was told, year in and year out, by the social workers what a bad girl shewas.Some of the volunteer workers weren't like that, of course. But some were, and they were the oneswho had more clout when it came to the everyday management of the children's lives.And so it was that when, for example, a male volunteer would rape a child on a lower bunk bed, thechild on the upper bunk could only tremble in dread and pretend to be asleep. They had fear drummed intothemas a way of life, each child deep in their personal hell.Once, a girl from the institute dropped a kitchen knife on her foot when she was on kitchen duty. Balotwatched as the girl's foot was skewered through her slipper. Balot remembered seeing the tip of the knifeprotruding from the sole of the girl's foot. And, of course, the girl had dropped the knifethrown it at herown foot, actuallyon purpose, knowing that if she hadn't then something even worse would have beenlying in wait for her that night.The girl was taken to the institute's medical wing, but she had to return two days later. Hobbling oncrutches. Three of the workers gang raped her on the night she came back.Why didn't you resist? the defense counsel asked Balot, bringing her back to reality. If Shell wasdeliberately trying to hurt Balot then surely there would have been some sign of resistance, no?The DA objected. Speaking rapidly, in a loud voice.Why hadn't she resisted? Everyone tried to escape. Some of the children did manage to adapt to life inthe institute the best they could. Those who'd worked themselves into positions of influence, of authority.But for the vast majority of the children, all they could think about was escape.And after surviving under conditions that felt like you had a knife to your throat every minute of everyday, after having every aspect of your life regulated by those in chargefood, drink, shelter, leisure time,friendshipsat the end of it all they asked you why you didn't resist. The same adults that never gave youthe slightest chance to do so in the first place.Balot's reply to that question was no answer.Eventually they arrived at the recess for lunch, and the DA conferred with the Doctor regarding thepoints where they were losing ground.Balot and Oeufcoque ate lunch while the others talked in elaborate detail about possible strategies toensure the case progressed from the provisional jury to indictment. She could barely eat anything, and hehardly spoke.I want you to understand that I'm doing this for your sake, Balot explained to Oeufcoque.After a short pause Oeufcoque responded. These are just procedural formalities. They're not for mysake or for your sake. The real battle comes later. He seemed somewhat apologetic on one level, but atthe same time was deliberately keeping these feelings in check. In order to prevent himself fromaccidentally letting slip any words of apology, such as I'm sorry or This is inexcusable of me.Balot gripped the crystal on her choker and squeezed hard.At this point I will need to disclose some shocking facts, said the counsel for the defense. Brightly.As if he were relishing his dutyas, indeed, he was.This girl had sexual relations with her father. Starting from when she was even younger than she isnow. Isn't that right, Miss Rune-Balot?The courtroomrustled. A hesitant, low rumble.The DA jumped up. Objection! Irrelevant, a meaningless question. But the court's interest had beenpiqued. The jury was curious, and who was a mere senior assistant district attorney to stand in the way ofa jury's curiosity? He gritted his teeth and took a seat.Balot stared right back at the counsel. Coldly. Coldly enough to freeze the poison solid in her heart.Slowly, calmly, she pressed the button.Yes.The courtroom erupted. The judge banged his gavel. The counsel pressed further questions. Pointless,stupid questions.Was it your father who initiated this?Yes.Did you resist him?No.The courtroomheld its breath, not even daring to swallow.Why didn't you resist?Balot scribbled an answer on the paper she was given and handed it to the clerk.The clerk then passed the paper to the judge, who read it aloud: Because I loved my father.The courtroom erupted in noise, like a kettle overflowing. The judge banged his gavel wildly,repeatedly.You mean, as a man? continued the defense counsel.No.Then you loved himas a father?Yes.You had sexual intercourse with himmore than once?Yes.Many times?No.Can you remember precisely? The number of times?Balot raised her hand and lifted three fingers.Three times?Yes.Your older brother attacked your father violently when he learned of your relationship, yes?Yes.Do you know why your brother felt so angry at your father?Yes.Why?Balot was given more paper. She scribbled on it again, passed it to the clerk again, and again thejudge read it out: Because he loved me.Further excitement in the courtroom. A number of the reporters rose from their seats, running to passon the news.Did he look at you as a woman?No.Then as a younger sister?Yes.Now, as a result of his injuries, your father was admitted to a hospital in the capital as a severelydisabled patient, yes?Yes.Did you ever see your father again after that?Yes.How did that make you feel?Balot, head bowed, didn't answer. The DA leaped up and shouted, Objection, an irrelevantquestion. The judge banged his gavel. The counsel continued down a different line of questioning.Do you still love your father? As a father?No answer.Why can't you answer?Balot remained silent.Do you love your father as a man?Balot shook her head emphatically. The DA objected, screaming. As if to intercede, Balot raised herhand to call the clerk over for some paper. On it she wrote: I don't know how I should feel about myfamily anymore.Not just your father?No answer.Your brother is still in the penitentiary, isn't he?No answer.After that, your mother entered an ADSOM facilitythat is to say a rehabilitation center for alcoholand drug addictsand still lives there to this day? Is that right?No answer.Did your mother know about your relations with your father?No answer.Do you believe that what's happened to your family is your fault?It was a reflex action. Balot didn't press the button. But she did snarc it.Yes.No one saw that Balot had actually not pressed the button, but then, no one was about to pay anyattention to that now. Apart from the Doctor. The defense counsel then asked her a succession ofadditional questions. Balot just stared at the one button, fixated, snarced it, and made sure her will wasunwavering.Balot's answers to all the additional questions were the same: No answer.02Balot's father was a mild man. He had a beard but didn't make a frightening impression. He had ahealthy physique and was a sound blue-collar worker. He was somewhat rusticburlybut had a gentlegrip. Even when his motor neuron disease started taking a turn for the worse and he was down to threefingers on his right hand, he still gave off an aura of gentleness. On his left hand he only had his thumb.His four working fingers undid Balot's uniformwhen she returned fromschool one day.That was when she learned to project her consciousness into space. As Balot's father's fingers andtongue tentatively caressed her body, she felt an unknown feeling well up inside her. Desperately trying tosuppress this feeling, she launched it into the air. There were the unbearable feelings of guilt, and thenthere was her clear, calm consciousness. With half-shut eyes she looked at the room, looked at thefurniture, and tried to project her consciousness onto something else.But she hadn't yet perfected her technique of losing herself.Sometimes her voice leaked out. Naturally. Like in the movies, when a woman was embraced by herlover. She fought it. Biting down on her lips, frantically averting her eyes. Trying not to look at herfather's face.How long had she been doing this? Then, all of a sudden, a feeling to extinguish any lukewarm wavesof pleasure. A red-hot scalding sense of bitterness. It was penetrating her. She heard her father's voice,apologizing. She heard her own voice asking him to stop, please. But the pain intensified, and her fatherstarted moving his body.She tried forcing her father back with both arms. Her father was crying. He gripped her arms tightlywith his hand with three fingers. His tears dripped down onto her arms and breasts. As if he werevomiting up blood. Eventually, the waves of pain subsided into silence, and a lukewarm liquiddifferentfromtearstrickled down her thighs.This was the lucky guy that the Hunter spoke of. This was why she had no answer when the defensecounsel asked her why she didn't resist.She could recall her father's face from thenfull of sorrowanytime. She could barely rememberhimlooking any other way.She'd wanted to do something about this sadness. Balot didn't really understand that her father had justmade love to his own twelve-year-old daughter as he would a woman, and in any case she wasn't reallyin a position to refuse.After the last time they had relations, Balot was taking a shower, mind blank, when she heard shoutingand screaming. And thena burst of gunfire.Balot wrapped a bath towel around her body and came out of the shower to look on the scene. Herolder brother, screaming like a mad dog. At his feet was her father, writhing in agony from a gunshotwound.When her brother saw his little sister, steamrising fromher half-naked body, he cried out maniacally.Her brother was a volunteer at ADSOM. The reason he worked there could be traced back tochildhood, when his mother shouted at him for not properly holding the end of the tube she was using tobind her armas she was shooting up.Balot's brother was as neurotic as their mother. He was trying to save her from herself, but despite hisgood intentions, his irritation and hatred grew violently. And her brother was pretty much the only one inthe family who could do a proper day's work to earn a living wage.So her brother was always on the lookout for opportunities to earn money more ef iciently.Before long he got mixed up in bad company and became a gunrunner. This all came out in theinvestigation into his father's shooting, and her brother was consigned to the penitentiary.It was all for nothing, her brother said to her at their last meeting.Balot wasn't able to say a word and just watched her brother's back as he was led away. Then sheherself was put into the institute, which was just as bad as prison. For a long time she thought of theinstitute as her punishment. That she was the one who broke her family up, so she was the one whodeserved to be punished. Words that were said to her at the institutebad girl, you're a bad girlstillresounded in her ears.The counsel for the defense unceasingly pressed his line of argument: the explosion was a completeaccident and Shell had absolutely no murderous intentions. Indeed, Shell had been trying to rescue her, butshe wouldn't trust him and started violently clawing at the door handleand that had made the wholesituation worse. He pointed to several scratch marks on the inside of the AirCar door as proof. As if thewhole thing was Balot's fault.The defense counsel spared no effort in his exertions trying to persuade the jury of this.Balot seduced her father without hesitation, wrecked her own family, plunged wildly into theuninhibited lifestyle of the dropout, and did whatever took her fancya Teen Harlot such as we've neverseen.So the counsel continued. Should we really abandon Shell-Septinos to his unfortunate circumstances,this man who had gone through trouble upon trouble to reach his position, working hard, motivated by hishealthy ambition? Rather, shouldn't we be supporting such a man, who showed such kindness toward agirl such as Balot?Right now, Shell-Septinos is worriedfrightened that he might have committed murder. Because hecan't remember the details of the day in question, due to his memory disorder. Of course, the girl knowsall about his condition, and she's trying to take advantage of it.This was how the defense counsel argued.The DA hit back with all he had. He summoned to the witness stand the Hunters who wereinvestigating the case and the Doctor as an independent PI. He explained exactly how the girl had becomean innocent victim, a sacrifice to one man's vaulting ambition.After it had all finished, the DA said to Balot's team, That counsel overplayed his hand, I think.However you look at it, our girl here was calm and composed, and she was obviously hurt. That's allgoing to make an excellent impression on the jury. Not a single one of these jurors is a universitygraduate. That's in our favor too. Because Shell has manipulated his own status records, passing himselfoff as a member of the elite, a university graduate. I have to admit I was a little worried at first, thoughour girl is beautiful and elegantly done up, after all. There are some jurors who refuse to believe that adefendant can be guilty unless they see a victimat death's door, shredded to pieces.Ultimately, though, there was one word that emerged from the proceedings that interested Balot aboveanything else: ambition.A regular man, motivated by his healthy ambition.No: he was a pathetic man, who had found a way of climbing up society's greasy poleor stairwayand was prepared to discard everything else in order to achieve this, just so he could lord it over othermen and women, as if he were some sort of a hero.Balot could see this clearly now. I've been a fool, she thought, and at the very same moment she felt aburdenthe cursed voice that told her that she was a bad girllift cleanly fromher shoulders.That was the one ray of sunshine that she'd gleaned from the whole experiencethe silver lining tothe gray clouds of humiliation.If she quit now there was nothing left. This was now a matter of life or death.She understood this clearly. That was why she could stay so calm.Why me?she imagined yet another answer to this question.Beyond that answer lay Balot's personal stairway, the one that she was destined to climb.Balot left the courtroomwith the Doctor.The DA was in an excellent mood. He said that the next time they returned to the court it woulddefinitely be in the form of an official trialhe was so enthusiastic that it wouldn't have been surprisingif he'd broken out into a cheerleading routine for Balot. The DA bid farewell to the pair for the timebeing, and Balot and the Doctor were just at the Broilerhouse entrance and about to leave when theynoticed a man silently approaching them. A man so solidly built that even the shadow that he cast seemedenough to swallow themup.Boiled Taken aback, the Doctor spoke his name out loud without meaning to. The man who hadsat at the table on the defendant's side. The man who had threatened Balot. The Trustee supervising thecase on Shell's sideDimsdale-Boiled.For the first time Balot was within spitting distance of the man and faced himdirectly.He seemed even more humorless, even more lacking in emotion, than ever. Violent, dusky eyes staredout fromunder his wide brow, gaze fixed on Balot. Or at the choker that Balot was wearing.The full details of the lawsuit will be made available to the defense from now on. It'll mean that I getto start my operations in earnest. Boiled, heartless as ever, clearly directed his words toward his formerpartner Oeufcoque. The former partner he had fallen out with spectacularly over some obscure incident.Balot stared right back at him, head-on.I'll find it. Withdraw your case. Boiled was undoubtedly talking about their hideaway. His voicewas light and indifferent, but it carried the impact of a thunderbolt.Balot's knees quivered. Acid rose in her stomach.The man looked at Balot. As if he had noticed her existence for the first time.When you have the time, be sure to ask Oeufcoque about my MO for solving cases, Boiled said, thenturned his back. His footfalls made almost no sound at all as he glided away. In the distance they sawShell-Septinos appear, and the two men climbed into a car.Balot stood glaring at themfromthe entrance of the building. She watched where they were going. Andthe building, and all the people around her.The fear inside her was being pushed aside by a feeling she had never experienced before: fury.It was the first time this had ever happened. When she came to, she noticed that her knees were nolonger shaking.She breathed out quietly. It was like blue fire pouring fromher lips.It was live or die. And now her whole body was making its choice.Still glaring at the world, she put her fingers on the crystal hanging down fromher choker.Show me your way of doing battle.03That was a weird scene we just witnessed. And I'm experiencing weird emotions too, Shellmuttered. His Chameleon Sunglasses gave off a dull glint the color of zinc. I don't have a singlerecollection of ever being nervous or frightened. All that vanishes whenever I have my Clapping, mymemory preservation operation. Butit's weird.At this point he looked at Boiled. I'mfrightened, Shell said, shivering. He wore a forced smile.Boiled gave no answer. He just nodded ever so slightly and drove on in silence.I can understand that I'm experiencing fear. I can even understand why this situation is making meafraid. What I don't get is, why her? Shell stretched his neck forward as if he were looking for ananswer fromthe sky beyond the window. We're talking about a girl that I, in my current state, have nevermetnever even heard of her. A puny, powerless little girl. And yet I'm afraid of this. Just thinking aboutthe fact that the girl is still alive makes me choke on my breath.He loosened his tie as if he were indeed having trouble breathing and took a flask fromhis pocket.Business is business. Sacrifices need to be madethings, people. And the most important sacrificeshave the honor of shining on as precious jewels on my fingers. Nevertheless, this time I'm surprised. I'mafraid fromthe bottomof my heart. Because that girl isn't on my finger yet. Why is that? Why? he moanedas he opened the flask with trembling hands, taking a violent gulp of its contents.What on earth was it that made me want to kill that girl? He was speaking to himself now, betweengasps. Behind his sunglasses his eyes were bloodshot. Alongside the scotch he downed a large handful ofthe Heroic Pills that he'd bought cheaply at insider rates.He stared pointedly at Boiled with his eyes that were now bright red and inflamed. Tell me now,when exactly did you say this girl was going to disappear forever fromthe face of this earth?Soon enough Boiled spoke quietly, and this was all he would say. He controlled the steeringwheel without the slightest hint of wavering and directed the AirCar toward the foot of the high-classSenorita district in the east.Shell's lips suddenly twisted into a crooked smile, and he laughed an unsteady laugh. That man whowas at the trial todayhe seemed very flaky for a former partner of yours.That was the maintenance staff.What?In other words, that one's a tricky enough customer all right, but he's not the one we really need toworry about.He's not this Oeufcoque you keep talking about, then? Shell's lips were again distorted. He wasfrantically trying to conquer his gnawing fear, turn it into hatred and murderous intent.No, Oeufcoque never shows himself in public. He's always teamed up with someone else. Boiledspoke in a low voice, cold and machinelike.But you've got his number, right? You know his MO, his special skills, Shell insisted, staringunblinkingly at Boiled frombehind his lead-colored sunglasses.And the same goes for him. He knows me wellmy MO, and my special skills.In short Shell started. Silence reigned, then eventually he found the words to continue. He'sgoing to be a tough nut to crack.Boiled nodded.But who are you saying he's partnered with? That lanky guy we saw today? What's he hoping toachieve by standing behind someone like that?Perhaps it's not that man, said Boiled.Then who?That's what we're going to find out. That's why I need to hire some people. Starting tonightfrom aplace that you don't know about.Well, feel free to use the hidden stash of money as you need. Do as you please. Just be thorough andshow no mercy, said Shell.As you say.I'mterrified. Even though I've never once been frightened gambling at a Show, even with hundredsof thousands of dollars at stake. No job is supposed to faze me. And yet Shell's teeth had suddenlybegun chattering, and his limbs were shaking.The truth was that Shell was wavering. From a place so deep within himself that even he didn't knowwhat was happening right at that moment. Accordingly he was panicking about all sorts of things.Flashbacks! Shell spat the word out under his breath. Then he shook his head stubbornly. That'sabsurd. There's no way I could be having such things. How can my past be coming back to haunt meHe trailed off into a faint moanthis man who was always wiping his mind's slate cleanand then heleaned over toward the driver's seat.So, what are we talking about? What sort of people are you planning on using, for example? Shellasked like a rabid dog, drooling and baring his teeth.The sort of person who works not just for the money but also for the satisfaction they get out of theirtarget. Boiled's voice was low and calm. I'm talking about the type who enjoy treating people likeobjects, slicing themto pieces and using their remains as ornaments.The meaning of these words gradually dawned on Shell.Behind his sunglasses his eyes narrowed before gradually widening.That'sfine, he said with a smile. A gruesome smile that twisted across his face. That's excellent.And while you're doing that, I'll continue with my business. My deal, a huge deal, a deal for my benefit.That's what I'mgoing to use to run farther up the stairway. The stairway to heavenMardock. I'll run farenough, high enough, higher, higher still, that my past will never be able to reach me. Far enough that mypast will vanish forever.Shell continued his feverish mutterings as if he were speaking in a nightmare.Boiled dropped Shell off at his luxury apartment and sped off in another direction.He headed toward the riverbank, stopping at a car park in a mall along the way.There he switched cars. From the AirCar to a normal gasoline-powered car. A car that he had leftthere beforehand.Before setting off again he opened the trunk of the new car. There were two attach cases within.He checked their contents, first one, then the other. Then he got into the car and headed straight for theharbor.The evening sun was painting the sea a bright scarlet as he reached the gates that marked thecheckpoint to the harbor.Boiled handed over his ID card at the gatehouse.The security guard, a young man, stuck the card into his machine to confirm that Boiled's jurisdictionwas active and asked with a whistle, An incident at the harbor, eh?Boiled took the card as it was returned to him, shaking his head. Not a big one.The young security guard was clearly thrilled as he opened the gate. Call me if it looks likeanything's about to go down. I train every day at the shooting range, you know.Guns won't be needed. Boiled cut him down instantly, but this only impressed the young securityguard even more.Just as I thoughta true PI. He nodded in agreement.The car entered the harbor, where heavy machinery was lined up all around. He drove past a giantmechanical crane that looked like a mutant crab, which was unloading a multicolored convoy. He passedthe part of the convoy that had been stripped of its load before turning around and returning, skeletal now,via the overland route fromwhich it had come.Boiled parked his car in the car park where the trailers were lined up, took the attach cases from thetrunk, and carried one in either hand as he walked toward the boats. He soon spotted the crane that he waslooking for.BANDERSNATCH: ANIMAL HUSBANDRY EXPORT AND IMPORTThe billboard was written in large letters above the crane house. Boiled looked up at the person in thecockpit. He slowly approached the workplace videophone and pressed the call button.Whassup?A crude-sounding voice answered. Then an image. A man in fatigues.He had a broad face partially hidden under a mass of dread-locks. His skin was brown like ascorpion.Where's the company?You gotta say which company you talkin' about.The man maneuvered his body uncomfortably in the tight cockpit so that his ear was on the earpiece.I'm bringing payment. For the company that's said to be involved in animal husbandry import andexport, Boiled informed him, and in return received a shrill laugh fromthe video phone.What's your name?Dimsdale-Boiled.Heard aboutcha from the boss. That's us. Import and export of livestock. Wait a sec, I'll just geteverythin' sorted. Come on to the weir. Yeah, come inside the white line.Boiled did as he was told. Before long a giant shipping container was lowered down from the sky. Arectangular box big enough to fit a whole house. It was an impressive sight to behold as it hit the groundwith a thump.The electronic lock on the door lifted, and the door slid open sideways. Boiled entered the container,and as he stepped in, the door closed behind his back automatically.It was dark inside, but not for long. Pale fluorescent lights illuminated a number of workspacesdivided by partitions as well as filing cabinets and sofas. There were even monitors on the desks. It waslike being in an office somewhere.An unexpectedly high-pitched giggle emerged frombehind one of the partitions.Are you surprised at the contents of our trailer? Welcome to our offices.Judging by voice alone, it was a young girl who spoke. But when the speaker emerged from behind thepartition he was clearly a man, probably in his late thirties. He had evidently had an operation of somesort on his vocal cords. He was very smallshortand had long hair. His hair was all one length, withparts of it blond, others streaked red, all of it random.Boiled took one look at the little man, then continued to scour his surroundings.It seems we're moving.There was a sensation of gradual elevation. The whole container was being lifted up again.Don't you worry. Little Minty is a veteran crane operator. The man in the cockpit?The very same. Mincemeat the Wink. Used to be a bomber helicopter pilot. A famous pilot in theCommonwealth Forces, he was a proper macho little angel of death, raining down his showers of fire onthe Continent.Where are you planning on taking me? asked Boiled.We're just taking you aboard our ship. That's our home base, you see.Boiled didn't ask any more questions. He made no move to put down the attach cases in his hands butjust stood there in silence, facing the little man.You're a real hunk, Mr. Boiled. Little Minty is quite the tough guy, but you're not bad yourself. Thelittle man seemed fascinated by him. I'm Rare the Hair, by the way. That's my registered trademarkwithin the company.He combed his hair upward with a flourish. His multicolored hair flowed like water through hisfingers.Isn't my hair lovely? Rare asked, tilting his thirty-odd-year-old face toward Boiled. His skin wasabnormally smooth. It was white and appeared slippery, and when you looked closely it seemed to becomposed of various different types. You couldn't quite see the patchwork, but there was no doubt thatRare was a modern-day Frankenstein's monster, born of the latest technology.Boiled looked at Rare's eccentric person with an expression devoid of emotion.We're almost there. While we're waiting, I think I'm just going to go ahead and keep on gazing atyour cute little poker face, Rare said in the clear voice of a little girl. The giant box they were in wasslowly being lowered. There was almost no swaying now, but Boiled could tell that they were now atop amuch bigger object.Oopsie, here we are. What a shame! I could have stared at your face all day long.The door opened and another man entered. Blond hair, blue eyes, and gave the appearance of asuccessful businessman.I am sorry about this. Having to go through this rather elaborate charade. Do please take a seat, makeyourself comfortable, the blond-haired man said.Ooh! And I'll sit next to him! That's okay, isn't it, Medi? asked Rare.The blond-haired man shooed Rare out of the way with a wave of his hand, as you would a dog.Rare gave a cackle and leaped around the sofa in a circle like a little child at play.Welcome, Mr. Boiled. Given our respective professions, shall we dispense with the formalities of ahandshake?The man went to sit on the sofa opposite Boiled, fluttering his hands as if to show themoff. His fingerswere unusually pristine. Each finger was prepared meticulously, nails well-manicured so that they weresqueaky clean and sparkling, and then covered with a blue nail polish. But when you looked at them as awhole they seemed oddly mismatched.Medium the Fingernail is how I'm commonly known in this line of work. It's a nickname. Like thealiases university students use when they're looking for playmates online.I need confirmation of the results before I tender your remuneration, Boiled said. His hands wereresting casually on the attach cases.Mediumdropped his banter and undid his tie before unbuttoning his dress shirt.Rare, now standing diagonally behind Boiled, gave an affected yelp and then mock-shyly covered hisface with his hands.Despite his squirming he was looking through his fingers, getting a good peek at Medium's ripplingtorso.Boiled watched the scene play out, expressionless as ever. He looked at the pendants that adornedMedium's chest. Medium took these off and placed them on the table. Carefully, one by one, so that theydidn't rest atop one another.Still alive, Medium said. The metal cylinders used as the basis were for exchanging bodily fluids,and the metabolism is still therethey still regenerate. You can use them as decorations straight away.Even the nails grow properly and the skin flakes off as it should.Fromhow many people?Five right thumbsUncle Toms, I call them. If you take their prints you should find they fit exactly.Five brain surgeonsthree male, two female. Just like you ordered, right? Medium laughed amiably.Like a black marketeer boasting how scrupulously fair he was in his business dealings.Doctors' fingers are pretty rare and valuable, as far as they go. So I've taken the liberty of keepingone for myself. Seethe pinky fromthis left hand. Fromone of the two female doctors' hands. Absolutelybeautiful.Just the fingers? asked Boiled disinterestedly. Mediumlaughed and shook his head.Just then the man who had been operating the crane entered the container.Hey, Medi, I've finished loading the crates. The other guys hit our container and damaged it again, soI've sent the idiots a demand for compensation while I was at it.He was suddenly at the side of the sofa. He was both bigger and taller than Boiled.Thanks for your hard work, Mincemeat. This is Mr. Boiled, said Medium.Yeah, we just met. How was my driving, not bad, eh?Mincemeat, Rare, you two show Mr. Boiled your shares of the loot too, continued Medium.Ooh, even mine? asked Rare.So, uh, you're interested in our collections, are you?Boiled stared at themquietly and said, Just for confirmation.You mean from those doctors, don't you? Wait a sec, I'll fetch them for you right away. Rareslipped by Mincemeat and hopped away.Mincemeat stood still and unzipped his fatigues. Kayleigh and Linda. Girls should be kept close toyour heart, don't you think? And on my right breast, Daniel. Last, these guys on my left arm are Rick andSteve. These two seemed to be good buddies, so I planted them together. See, they're looking at eachother.It was as he said. The two eyes embedded in his left arm started blinking, as if they were staring ateach other.I thought that doctors' eyes might have been cold and unfeeling, but as it turns out they're quiteromantic. In particular this Lindashe seems to have taken quite a shine to this guy in my stomach, Rock,a big-shot lawyer.Ah, little Minty, that's just because of how your muscles developed after the transplants, saidMedium.Don't be a spoilsport, Medi. Here, everyone, let me introduce you all to Mr. Boiled. Mincemeatflexed his muscles, squeezing tightly. The eyes, which had been winking away all over his body, openedtheir lids as one and turned to look at Boiled simultaneously.Boiled stared back grimly. The eyes were neatly lined up in pairs, complete with lids, eyelashes, andtear ducts. A number of the eyes were red and swollen, as if they were crying for someone to releasethem.Sorry for keeping you all waitingGosh, little Minty! What a naughty boy you are! Rare hadbounded back into the room and was blushing bright red. Here you go, here's mine! Five people'sworth. Rare showed Boiled some pieces of skin and hair pressed between plates of glass, folded upneatly and soaked in liquid.None of them really take my fancy, to tell you the truth. The hectic lives they lived meant they didn'thave much time to look after their hair, I suppose, continued Rare.Boiled ignored himand turned to Medium. And are there any of their parts that you discarded?When they catch a whale on the continent they use up all the parts. I mean allskin, bones, nothinggoes to waste. The only part they discard is the nothingness left after the whale is gone, so to speak.And what do you use the parts for? asked Boiled.The flesh is used for transplants, scientific research, as decorationor as a delicacy, said Medium.Rare giggled. We sell themto people who really get of on the idea of eating human flesh.Medium pointed at Rare as if to silence him. Pointing with a finger that could have come fromanybody. We get a good price for the bones, for marrow transplants, or to medical students. And theinternal organs have long since been reserved. Even parts like appendixes, said Medium.And the parts that you've taken for personal use? asked Boiled.We'd agreed that these were to be part of our paymentThat's fine, I just need confirmation.Well, it's all safe, everything's okay. They've all vanished. Not a single drop of blood left.Transplant technology advanced in leaps and bounds as a result of the war. There aren't going to be anyleftovers. Three cheers all round, said Medium.And the data the doctors were working on?We'll show you to our analysis department straightaway. Follow me, sir, Mediumbeckoned.Boiled stood up and followed Mediumdeeper into the container, an attach case in either hand.Ooh, that backmanly, but in a very different way than yours. And what smooth skin for a man!Rare whispered to Mincemeat as they followed behind.It was a giant container with a series of joints where it could be dismantled. Medium unlocked theelectric lock on a door that divided two of these joints and headed in.Please do come in. This is the information HQ for our company. One of our members is a specialistin data management. In the war he was a distinguished Comms soldierhey, Flesh! We have a guest!Inside were various computing and communication devices strewn all over the place. They walkedthrough the gaps, tracing a route to a place surrounded by even more equipment, when some flabby masswobbled round at them.Hey, said a sweet voice. His eyes were black and wet.He had no hair and gave the impression of a young boy's head protruding froma mass of flesh.I've been watching you since you entered the port. Using the harbor cameras. Now that's probablythe man we've been waiting for, I thought to myself. He's that sort of person, I thought, the mass of fleshcroaked. He sounded like a precocious schoolboy.Indeed, Flesh. This is the iron man himself, Mr. Boiled. Be sure to treat our valued client with all therespect he deserves, said Medium.Welcome, sir. I'm Flesh the Pike. In charge of information ops. He pointed at himself with his righthand as he spoke. His hand was like a pale baby's hand that had been grotesquely overinflated. Boiledwatched Fleshand his handin silence.Flesh was wearing something that at first glance looked like a gown, but on closer inspection turnedout to be more like a giant sheet that covered his fleshy mass. There was an incredible amount of fat therethe word obese wasn't enough to describe it accurately.The sheet was swollen into a bizarre shape. From the outside it was impossible to tell even whetherhe was sitting on a chair or was just sprawled out on the floor. He could have been standing.Boiled put his attach cases down and took a step toward Flesh. He stood in a position so that hecould see a number of monitors all at once, then spoke.Show me the data. The neurotreatment reports that the five doctors were collaborating on.Just a moment. Flesh's whole body started trembling under the gown. As he stared at the screen hisfat hands plugged something into the port that was embedded in the back of his neck at the top of his spinalcolumn, his fingers moving with surprising agility. It didn't seem to be the sort of device that plugged intohis brain tissue directlyrather it was a simple output device fromhis brain.It'll be a little while. We're covering our tracks as we go, you see, falsifying the UniversityHospital's data at the other end as we download them for ourselves. Wanna have some fun while wewait? asked Flesh.Boiled didn't say yes and he didn't say no.Still, Flesh continued, looking up at Boiled with a drowsy expression. I don't mind this man touchingthem. This man knows about our little hobbies, right, Medi?Mr. Iron Man didn't seemto find anything too objectionable when I showed himmineor when Rareor Mincemeat did, said Medium.That's what I thought, most probably. Flesh grinned. He fiddled around for a while loosening hisgown with his chunky fingers. The gown fell to the floor, slowly, nonchalantly.Go on then, just a little. I don't mind if you feel up my collection. Flesh's voice cracked as he madehis mound of flesh wobble. A mountain of white meat swayed as one. Boiled could now see that theywere women's breasts. Hundreds of them.Pairs of breasts protruded from his whole bodyparticularly his chest and stomachclusteredtogether like bunches of grapes.Flesh wasn't wearing any clothes under the gown. But he couldn't really be described as naked, asthere was no way of telling where his skin ended and where the stolen flesh began. His feet could justabout be seen protruding, dangling, fromunder the mass, and it seemed that he was resting on some sort ofeasy chair. Breasts ran down both sides of his thighs and calves.Not interested. Just give me the data, Boiled said. Flesh gave a creased smile and put his gown backon, nodding knowingly, glancing fleetingly at Medium.I like people who are honest about their tastes. To each his own, that's what I always say, saidFlesh.We're talking about Mr. Iron Man here, Fleshie. He's not interested in your Oedipal complex. Helikes his fetishes a little more hard-boiled, like me, said Medium.So it seems. The plug in Flesh's back started flickering and making a chattering sound.Flesh scanned the surrounding monitors with a quick flash of his eyes. As with breasts, he hadhundreds of monitors, and they too were quivering, this time with lists of seemingly randomnumbers.Okay. All done. Flesh reached out to one of the monitors. A machine that was evidently designatedfor writing data started whirring, and a disc popped out into Flesh's portly fingers.Here you go. This is now the only copy of this data in the entire world.Boiled took the disc, lifted it up as if to look closer, and squeezed. Until the disc was no more thancrumbs of plastic and magnetism.The dataonce the contents of Shell's memorywas now oblivion.And the rest is silence, said Medium. Boiled glanced at him.Then, for the first time since entering the harbor, Boiled nodded.04You must be growing weary of carrying those heavy bags around with you, sir. Won't you let uslighten your load? Medium asked Boiled as they left the room, as if he were sharing a particularly wittyjoke.I was told that there were five members of this company. I'd like to hand it directly to your boss.Judging by the size of the exterior of the container, there should still be other rooms here. Where arethey? asked Boiled.Ah, our boss is not at home just thisThere's someone else inside this container right now. In the Comms Room just now I saw a record ofthe changes in mass aboard the container. There is someone I haven't met moving around inside.Wellit's not that we're trying to hide the boss exactly. It's just that he's in the middle of sortingthrough his collection, you see But Medium had accepted the inevitable and was leading Boiledtoward another wall.You've got telecommunications equipment embedded in your heads, haven't you? Boiled asked, andMedium turned around, startled. And those eyes seem mechanized too. You're constantly circulatinginformation between yourselves, are you?Well, that's how we do business, Mediumexplained, and pressed the intercombuzzer on the wall.Have him enter.The reply came immediately. There was suppressed laughter. A voice that evidently knew all aboutthe exchange that had just passed between Boiled and Medium.A section of the wall slid across, revealing the entrance to another room.In the middle of the room was a man reclining on a leather chair, facing away from them. The chairturned.You're a proper pedigree hunting hound to have seen through our gang's little secret, Mr. Boiled,the man said, flashing his white teeth that contrasted beautifully with his dark skin. He was of the samerace as Shell, but he had an almost inhuman air about him. He straightened up with a snap. His hair wasshort and he had a tattoo on his temple. He stared at Boiled with piercing eyes that belied the usually softfeatures particular to his race.To be able to identify the leader of a pack immediatelythat's an important quality in a huntinghound. Looks like the Bandersnatch Company has found itself a worthy partner. As he spoke, he swunghis left hand from the floor to the wall. He wore a single black glove on this hand. There was a goldenchain on the back of his hand that jingled as he moved.It was the sort of glove that could be used in bondage. It covered the pinky and ring finger, but theremaining fingers were exposed. These seemed to be the important fingers. He flicked themrapidly.In response to this movement a table rose up from the floor, a sofa appeared, and a cocktail bar foldedopen from the wall. The hitherto empty room was now the very picture of a prosperous merchant'sdrawing room.Do sit.Boiled did so. The two men now sat opposite each other. Medium headed toward the bar to assemblesome glasses.I'm Welldone. My friends call me Well. A nickname, of course. Everyone here likes his nickname.One of the tricks for getting ahead in the underworld. By creating your own alias you make it easier tomeet other like-minded people.Welldone brought his hands together, the one with the glove and the one without, and grinned.The alias that I chose for myself is Welldone the Pussyhand.There's one set of parts that I've not seen yet. What does your gang do with them? Boiled askedunder his breath.Still grinning, Welldone snapped his fingers. Two dry martinis, Medi. Plenty of kick.Then he showed Boiled the palm of his gloved hand. I collect them all for myself. Male and female.But I sometimes sell them. I don't often transplant my collection onto myself. Reason being that I'm onlylooking for the one, and it's only the rare and exquisite pearl that interests me.There was a silver zipper on the palmof his glove, and he unzipped it slowly.Boiled watched with his unflinching poker face.Behind the zipper, splitting his palm from top to bottom, was a vulva, lips ever-so-slightly apart. Itwas pink, and no pubic hair seemed to have been transplanted along with it.Welldone took a finger from his right hand and slid it down the slippery crease, opening it up. Likeanother zipper.A clitoris emerged fromthe top.He tickled the red slit some more and it started giving off a shiny liquid.I've even got a proper vagina grafted into a crack in my flesh, so to speak. The urethra is, sadly, justfor decoration. The ownernow, that's a secret, but suffice it to say that everything about her was like arare jewel. I traveled around the world for her, to obtain her, and the technology needed to transplant her.And now I have her in my hands. Or should that be in my hand? He grinned.The sort of grin a ferocious beast might grin, one that concealed a razor-sharp bite.My pretty little pussy cat, so tight and so sensitive.Welldone zipped his glove up again and received a cocktail from Medium, beckoning to Boiled to dothe same. Boiled too took a glass in his hand, and looked back at Welldone.We don't shake hands in our line of work. Nevertheless, we can raise a glass and drink to the demiseof our mutual enemies, Welldone said, and clinked glasses with Boiled before downing his drink in onegulp and placing his glass on the table. Let's take this opportunity to seal a dealwe'll make your futurecontracts a priority fromnow on.Boiled finished his drink in silence. He then placed one of the attach cases on the table. Yourreward.Mediumcollected it stealthily and took a step back fromthe table. He checked its contents and glancedat Welldone's back. Welldone nodded without turning. Welldone went on to explain that all five of thecompany members, not just he and Medium, were linked by communication devices planted in their heads.We're each other's eyes, ears, and weapons. That's what gives us our strength.Boiled placed the other case on the table and opened it himself. An advance payment and to coveryour costs for your next target.Welldone leaned forward to sniff the case like a dog. How many people?Onealthough there are two PIs as Trustees, and the civilian police force will do their bit tointerfere, said Boiled.So why are you offering us so little?Because you'll find the target to your taste. Dispose of the target's body as you like.Welldone lifted a disc out of the case between two fingers, suspiciously.What's this? he asked.A video featuring the target. Boiled stared at Welldone, unflinching.Medium moved to his side and received the video. We'll check now, all five of us. He snapped hisfingers. This time a different wall opened up, revealing a large TV screen.Rare and Mincemeat entered the room and sat down on the sofa as Medium stuck the disc into theplayer. Flesh was able to watch the same video fromhis own room.Nobody spoke, but the sense of excitement was palpable. They were about to acquire a new target.Soon the video began. The picture was noticeably grainy; it was obviously a cheap flick. As a movieit was barely watchable, but when the girl appeared the gang were glued to their seats.They watched the girl as she lay still and was used every which way, and suddenly the room was fullof the most unbearable tension.Nice fingers she has on her. Medium was the first to speak once the first scene was over. Innocentand yetsupple. I've wanted a better pinky on my right hand for some timeRare was next to speak. Magnificent hair. Her skin looks wonderful too. I want her. I want herbadly. His voice was shrill.Want her eyes for my arm. Such sharp, clear pupils. Like an angel, Mincemeat said. He wasbreathing heavily. I'll say good morning to themevery day when I wake. Then I'll kiss those eyelids.Cute, aren't they? came Flesh's voice over some hidden speakers. A wonderful pair. I'd like them onmy inner thighs. I'd give them a little shot of hormones every day, so that they press up more and moreagainst my bitsHmm Welldone surveyed the rest of the gang, but he too was drawn back into the video when thesecond man clambered on top of the girl to enter her.See herecan we get a closeup? That's it, right there. Now let's see what she's like inside. Thispussycat might even be good enough to be part of my right hand. I've been looking for a scissor sister formy left hand for some time now, she needs her sweet loving What's this? I see, I seeThis was how they all spoke to each other for some time. Admiring their new target and talking ingraphic detail about what they wanted to do with her. They were all incredibly excited.After some time, Welldone turned to Boiled. When did you say this video was taken?About half a year ago.What do we have on her at the moment?We have footage from the courtroom and photos, said Boiled. Welldone took out a pile of photosfromthe case and passed themaround.Wonderful! Sowhat is it exactly that you want? asked Welldone. Boiled didn't answer, andWelldone looked back at himsilently.This was the real target all along, wasn't it? The five doctors were just the amuse-bouche, and this isthe main course. So what is it that you want with this girl?Nothing. To have the target annihilated completely. Give me the nothingness that's left after her lifehas disappeared.When Welldone heard these words his face turned into a broad smile. Thus spake the ultimatefetishist! It looks like in Mr. Boiled we've happened across our ideal partner.The time limit is three days. We can't wait any longer than that. The moment it looks like you're notgoing to complete your mission in time, we'll terminate the contract on the spot.Don't you worry, Mr. Boiled. The pack of hounds that you've chosenBandersnatchare the besthunting dogs in the business. Welldone was now a bundle of pure desire.Boiled rose fromhis seat.When he left the ship he headed straight for the car park without looking back.The new moon was sharp as a razor, shining down its blue light over the gatehouse.Any luck, sir? It was still the same young security guard on duty. He ran Boiled's card through thesystemagain. Anyhow, good luck with the case, sir.Boiled nodded in silence.He set a course for the East Side.05It's completely unacceptable! Beyond the pale! Oeufcoque was pointing his finger andunusuallyfor himyelling furiously. An absolute no way'! No questions asked. Have you got that, Balot?I'm sorry, don't get mad at me! I'll never lift you up byyour tail again.I don't even like discussing it! It's like my whole person is being judged and found wanting. Justleave my tail alone in every way, please.I'm sorry. I'll do that. So please stop being so angry?Oeufcoque lowered the finger he was pointing at her, and eventually his hips followed suit with athump.He was on the palmof Balot's hand. She was using her other hand to hold a bath towel to her chest.As long as you understand, it's okay.I didn't realize it would upset you so much.I don't know why I got so angry myself.You're still angry.Yes, but it's fine. I'll stop taking it out on you.Why don't you just keep it hidden in your pants? Why do you have a hole on purpose so that youcan stick your tail out?I think I just asked you to drop it!You also said you'd stop taking it out on me.You need a full account, is that it? Very well, then. Out of the many designs of pants that there are, myfavorite design happens to have a hole in the Oeufcoque cut himself off for a second, throwing hisarms in the air out of frustration. That bloody Doctor, saying things like Don't you think those pantsmake your backside look big, or Be careful where you park that thing, it needs warning lightshe'sgiven me such a complex about my magnificent tail!Balot did her best to stop herself, but in the end she couldn't help bursting out into silent laughter.Don't laugh at me, I'mbegging you Oeufcoque pleaded with a pathetic expression.This only made her laugh even more. She doubled over, holding her towel to her stomach now.Anyway, shouldn't you be thinking about your own clothes rather than worrying about my pants?Unlike me you don't even have any proper hair on your body. You'll catch a cold if all you wear is asingle towel.Balot's whole body was shaking along with her laughter, but she managed a small nod.And the Doctor's waiting for us too.Can you wait for me, though? I'm in pain. I'm laughing too much.Still laughing? Well, I'mso delighted that I could be of service in this wayI'mglad I amuse you.Stop sulking.I'mnot sulking!Of course you aren't. Sorry.Balot wiped the tears of laughter fromher eyes and kissed Oeufcoque on his tail.Was that a peace offering? Very well, I accept. Now, considering the real and present danger facingyour health, let's move on to a mission to acquire appropriate clothing for you.Thank you.Balot stood up and let her towel fall to the floor. She lifted Oeufcoque up carefully with both handsand snarced himwith feeling. Oeufcoque, with his usual squelch, melted in Balot's hand and widened andslithered to cover her whole body.Oeufcoque wrapped the stark naked Balot from top to toe. A black bodysuit covered her from herfingertips to the ends of her toes. Both of her palms were stuck together, as Oeufcoque couldn't turn intotwo things at once.Balot peeled her hands apart with the gentlest of motions. Savoring the sensation of the bodysuitcomfortable, flexible, tightshe went to take a peek at herself in the mirror.She was a little disappointed.It's not verystylish.Maybe not, but it is heatproof, coldproof, shockproof, pressure-resistantand can magnify yoursnarc. Oh, and there's a zipper at the back, so please use that to take me off when I'mturned out.Doesn't it come in any other designs?You can modify the design as you like, all you have to do is think about itbut let's not get boggeddown with the trivial stuff just now.You get bogged down with trivial stuf like your pants, Balot answered back as she put on herboots.She left her room and headed toward the elevator. The giant building, the former mortuary, was in factfull of rooms that were formerly used as morguesand, therefore, despite the size of the place, not muchof it was serviceable as living quarters.Balot used the elevator used for goods arrivals to head down and got off at the underground garage,where she noticed a number of gasoline-fueled cars.The red convertible was there too.Did you make these cars yourself, Oeufcoque?Yup, apart from the license plates, the gas, and a couple specialist patented parts. Took me the bestpart of the month to make a single vehicle. I'mvery meticulous about my designsit's the artist in me.I wish the artist in you was meticulous about the designs for myclothes.Uhsure, well, let's focus on our training for now, that's our first priority.They entered into the garage proper, and by one of the walls they saw the Doctor, piling up somecomplicated-looking machinery.He smiled as he saw Balot come toward him.Isn't it great? Using the funds we requested for your Life Preservation Program I was able to sourcesome first-class diagnostic equipment, tinker around with it, and polish it up into these. These beautiesknock the training equipment used in the Major Leagues right out of the water!Balot snarced the throat of her suit, producing a crystalline sound.Looks like everyone's an artist.She looked around at the machinery, somewhat nonplussed.It's important to be artistic now and then if you're going to enjoy your lifethe trick is to stop justbefore you end up on the wrong side of autistic. The Doctor was in his element, able to fiddle with hismachines to his heart's content. Are those clothes Oeufcoque?That's right, Doc. And I was told off by Balot for not being artistic enough in my own designs, saidOeufcoque.The Doctor nodded in agreement. Get her to teach you some style, then. Now, Balot, I'm going tostick these on you, okay?The Doctor showed her some circular stickers. Balot nodded, and the Doctor started placing them allover herknees, elbows, back.What are these things?Designed to send your biorhythmic data straight to this machine. They'll capture your movementswith a margin of error of less than 0.1 millimeters. Now, could you move around a bit? Do somestretches, that sort of thing.The Doctor took a seat in a pipe chair and balanced a laptop on his knees. Multicolored cordsextended fromthe back of the monitor and plugged into the sprawling machinery.Balot moved as requested. Some warm-ups. She snarced the suit here and there as she limbered up. Afew patterns started appearing on the suit and eventually formed themselves into what could be describedas a rough design, complete with colors.Balot still didn't seemsatisfied, exactly, but at least she was getting there.You're pretty limber, Oeufcoque said as Balot performed a split, backside now on the floor. Heseemed impressed.Balot smiled and, from the same position on the floor, leaned forward until her chest touched theground. Fromthat position she spread her arms toward her feet, deftly touching the tips of her toes.Well, that's one skill I don't have. We have ourselves a bona fide gymnast!I just like physical activity. It makes me feel like I'm in charge of my body.She spoke without the electronic voice box, communicating with Oeufcoque directly.The Doctor calls me unfit because I can't run twenty meters in less than a minute.Balot chuckled as she got back up.Would you like me to keep moving around?The Doctor shook his head as he pounded on the keys, relentlessly entering new data. No, we'reokay. Now, could you just stand on that platformthere? Yeah, the one in front of those contraptions.Balot did as she was asked and stepped up onto the silver platform.It too had a number of wires running fromit. It turned out it was some sort of scale. A small display onone of the corners of the platform revealed some numbers, with the numerals to the right of the decimalblinking and changing rapidly.A number of other displays could be seen, each flashing up different sets of numerals.Balot looked somewhat sullen and turned to the Doctor with a puzzled scowl.I've taken some scales that they use to weigh baggage in an airport and modified themso that they candisplay biorhythmic indices as well. This thing's accurate down to the last milligram and can pick upeverything fromyour circulation to body fat percentages.That's the sort of thing you should have told me before I got on!Huh?It's indecent.The Doctor looked suitably chastened.Oeufcoque's laughter could be heard emanating fromBalot's left hand.Don't be like that, please. Any sort of proper training needs an observer on the sidelines to measurethe progress.In that case, Doctor, I'll just have to think of you as part of the furniture.That's not much better the Doctor grumbled.Very nice furniture, of course.Balot was teasing himnow.I'll let you tell me whatever you need to say.The Doctor shrugged his shoulders, but Balot could tell he was playing along now. She laughed andlooked at the numbers on the indices.The numbers to the right of the decimals whirled around when she shifted her balance from foot tofoot. When she stabilized, the numbers started changing much more slowly, but she still couldn't get themto stand completely still.Ahem, the Doctor coughed, ready to start. Your skin was originally developed to withstand theweightlessness of space vacuum, to allow you to move freely without losing your equilibrioception.Balot nodded and watched the figures on the displays.Parts of your brainin particular your cerebellumwork by receiving these electronic impulses,which are constantly processed and updated. Your sensory nerves act as neural pathways, as in a normalperson, but as a result of your new abilities the time it takes to transfer this information is drasticallyreducedor, to put it another way, your brain is accelerated many times over. So, theoretically you canuse your snarc both outwardly and from the outside in.Balot nodded. She was keen to know the as-yet-undiscovered areas of the abilities she had acquired.Should be a piece of cake, considering the incredible aptitude you've shown so far.What should be?Achieving equilibrium. You need to be able to graspprecisely and evenlythe details of yourinterior workings, just as much as what's going on outside your body. In other words, the definition oftraining' for you is not so much a case of building up your muscles but instead to cultivate your sense ofinternal balance.So what is it exactlyyou want me to do?Make those scales stop still on a single number.Balot looked at the digits again. The numbers that were spinning round and round.She could easily snarc themin order to give the Doctor what he asked for.But that wasn't quite what the Doctor was after.You need to let go in order to get go, Oeufcoque interrupted. Try and get a grasp of how your bodyought to be in the context of its environment. You should be able to feel exactly what your body needs todo in order to adapt to its maximumeffectiveness.Is that what you do when you turn?Exactly. Your genetic makeup is very different frommine, but the basic principles are the same.Genetic makeup?Look, you don't need to think too hard about it. All you need to do is feel it.Balot looked away fromthe numbers on the scales and stared into space.She thought about how she felt when she first woke up inside this building. How she could sleepwithout feeling uneasy about her surroundings for the first time ever. How that was what she wantedwhat she neededwith all her heart.Balot closed her eyes.She focused on her consciousnessuntil now only ever used to explore her surroundingsand turnedpart of it inward.She felt her own rhythm, the pulse running through her whole body. She felt the sensation ofunderstanding her inner workings at the most fundamental level. This was something that didn't belong toanyone elseit was hers.The external and internal gently connected in her consciousness. She could feel changes in her bodyand changes on the weighing scales with equal precision. Through Oeufcoque she could feel the flow ofthe air, and she grasped the layout of the entire garage. She could feel the shapes of the parked cars, thethickness of the supporting pillars and the walls, and even the electricity in the air as it flowed through herbody.She grasped her own tiniest movements, fractions of a millimeter.Behind Balot's back the Doctor kept his eyes glued to the screenand she could sense him growingmore and more excited. The Doctor was astonished and delighted in equal measure.Amazinghow wonderful to have my own inventions brought properly to life by a genius such asyou! But even as the Doctor spoke, she sensed a faint echo of remorse.It suddenly occurred to Balot that she had never really given much thought to the question of what allthese inventions were originally intended for.Don't you like wars, Doctor?She spoke with her eyes still closed.Behind her the Doctor lifted his head.Well, no, of course not Although, ironically, we're talking about technology that was originallydeveloped under a remit from high command in order to help soldiers fight in space more effectively, sothat they could engage in hand-to-hand combat even when they were wearing their bulky space suits.So why did you make all this?You know, I really had convinced myself that I was contributing to human progress, even to worldpeace. Although my wife and relatives all just thought I was a nut job obsessed with my quest torestructure the human bodyBut you're going to save me.Balot's eyes were still shut.The Doctor chuckled. Let's hope so. Now, on to the next step!Balot opened her eyes.The numbers were no longer moving, not even slightly.She could now see exactly how they did move, and what she needed to do with her body to make themmoveor stay still.She spread her legs apart.Still the numbers stayed the same.Balot felt confident nowif the scales were fifty meters long and she was told to run from one end tothe other, she knew she'd be able to do so and the numbers would barely flicker.Are you right-handed? Oeufcoque asked.I am now, although I was born left-handed.And then, after answering, she snarced just to Oeufcoque:I was told I needed to make myself right-handed, as some customers might feel uncomfortablearound a southpaw.So, is it safe to say you could be ambidextrous when it came to handling weapons?I guess I could get used to it, after a little practice.Then let's start with the left. Let's get a gun in your hand.Balot snarced Oeufcoque via her left hand.Even though she'd never handled a gun before, she could tell that Oeufcoque was turning into theideal model for her, the one that suited her grip the best out of all the models he had programmed into him.The fabric on her palmturned with a squelch and she felt cold steeland gripped it.It was heavier than she'd expectedbut her body soon adjusted to the extra weight.Oeufcoque gave her some tips. Parts of this are made from vulcanized plastic and some electronics,but basically this is just an automatic pistol. You pull the trigger, the gunpowder explodes, and the bulletgoes flying out the end at high velocity.Balot nodded and leveled the gun. The grip was fused into the palmof her suit.She tried letting go, twiddling her fingers, and it still didn't fall. It felt like it was almost a part of her.The target's set up over on that wall. The Doctor pointed at it. A black cardboard cutout, the shapeof a man, about 170 centimeters in height.We have pressure sensors set up all around the target, so we'll be able to tell immediately whereyour shots land. You watched the video on how to fire a gun? Well, go ahead and try it for yourself.The gun was empty of bullets. Balot snarced it. She felt a click, and she knew that the steel chamberwas now loaded with a bullet. She could grasp the addition of the extra weight in the chamber, down tothe last milligram.Click, click, and one by one the magazine filled with bullets.Eleven shots totalwith an extra one in the chamber for good measure.She thrust her left armforward, used her right armto steady it, and readied her gun.She leaned in to compensate for the force, maneuvering herself into prime firing position, just as shehad seen in the instructional video.She brought her finger to rest on the trigger.A little electronic gimmick on the trigger saw to it that all she needed to do was to grip gently ratherthan pull the trigger hardshe hardly needed to put any strength into it at all.Bang, a hollow explosive sound.A bullet flew out of the muzzle, and a spent casing flew sideways out of the chamber. A piercingsound could be heard on the other side of the wall. A metallic clang on the floor followed.She fired more shots.One shot, two shots, three shots.She could have pushed the sound of the gunshots inside Oeufcoque, silencing them completely, but thatwould have dulled the visceral sensations of the whole experience.Yes, for the real marksmanship experience, you really needed to have noise echoing all around you.She fired six shots to gain her bearings. The next five she fired with her eyes completely closed. Thecar park reverberated with the sound of gunfire, and the empty cartridge shells played a merry janglingtune as they clattered across the ground.She could even feel the sensation that the bullets themselves felt, that of being shot out of the barrel ofthe gun. Wrenched out of place, jumping out of the barrel, rotating with tremendous speed.The numbers on the scales that Balot was standing on twitched slightly, but in a moment they settledand became virtually still.Balot had finished firing her first load. The breechblock slid back and stopped in place.Don't reload it right awaydrop the magazine to release some of the heat that's built up.Balot did as Oeufcoque said and snarced the grip of the gun into ejecting the magazine.Balot relaxed as the magazine hit the scales. The subtlest of movements. The spent magazine hit thesilver platformand rolled across it.The numbers on the display didn't change in the slightest.Balot snarced the gun again.A new magazine appeared inside the grip, a perfect fit.The gun loaded with bullets as she moved herself back into position, and at the same time thebreechblock snapped back into place.She relaxed her shoulders and fired again. Settling into a regular rhythm. From the first to the last shot,like a pulse.She felt the incandescent bullets piercing the air.After she had fired all the bullets she ejected the magazine again and turned around to look at theDoctor.The Doctor was glued to the monitor.His fingers covered his mouth as if he were in deep thought, and then he suddenly exhaled, letting outthe huge breath that he had been holding in.Perfect. You've really studied the videos closely, haven't you?Yes, both the ones where you stand still and where you fire while moving. Also the ones withmoving targets, as well as stationary ones.Great. Moving targets next, then. Some balls will start flying across randomly from beyond that pillarover there. A bit like a pitching machine, the sort kids use for baseball practice. Shoot those balls down.Same distance as before.Got it.Balot quicklyand smoothlyequipped herself with a new magazine and bullets and got intoposition.The Doctor started tapping his keyboard.Balot realized that these actions controlled the machine on the other side of the pillar.Boing, and a rubber ball flew out.Balot shot it.In a little less than four seconds, that one ball had taken all twelve of the bullets.The rubber ball performed a whirling dance in midair, and the fragments flew off every which way.The scales barely flickered, and the golden cartridges gleamed as they scattered across the floor.Again Balot dropped the magazine and turned to the Doctor. His eyes were like saucers as he watchedthe distant particles fromthe ball fragment further.Erthe idea was that you try to shoot down each ballthat's to say shoot, singular, just the once.Yet again the Doctor was dumfounded.Just then another ball bounced out of the machine.Balot's attention was still half focused on the Doctor as she raised her hand. Just her left this timeher right hand dangling by her side.She snarced Oeufcoque in an instant, re-equipping herself with a magazine and bullets.She fired a single shot, just as she was told.The ball bounced against the wall and came bounding back toward them, then rolled another twentymeters or so before stopping at the Doctor's shoes.There were eight balls total, including the one that Balot had obliterated earlier.Before long seven of those balls rolled into position right at the Doctor's feet. Balls that had been shotthrough their cores with deadly accuracy.The Doctor picked one of them up and looked at it, jaws trembling. We're talking about sphericaltargets here. To pierce the cores with one hundred percent accuracy, and fromthis distance tooHe sounded as if he were ready to raise the white flag of surrender, but then laughed and said at a highpitch, How absolutely thrilling !He shut his mouth as soon as he opened it, very aware that he was getting carried away.Balot frowned.I thought you didn't like war?Yes, but this is something completely different, Oeufcoque interjected.The Doctor nodded. I've never actually been at the front lines, you see. I might seem a little warlike,but in my heart I know I'mnot about to go to war anytime soon.Balot pursed her lips. An expression that was somewhere between sympathy and disapproval.Right, let's have you moving now. Try walking toward that target. There are some more pitchingmachines positioned behind those pillars. They'll sense your movements and fire balls directly at youshoot themdown. Consider the balls to be an attack on your person.Got it.Balot stepped off the silver scale. Without missing a beat she walked toward the wall at the far end.She perceived the machines operating to her left and right. Her concentration levels were rising. Shelooked inside herself to manipulate her internal workingsso that her pulse wouldn't start racingall thewhile keeping a close check on her surroundings.The moment she sensed movement in the shadows Balot pointed her gun in that direction withoutlooking. By the time the ball had left the machine Balot had already fired.The ball hurtled toward the flight path of the bullet as if it were being sucked in and was skeweredperfectly.Balot felt the other machines firing up but walked on steadily. A volley of balls converged on her fromall directions. She shot them all down, having found her target before the balls even left the pitchingmachines.The Doctor cranked up the speed. Balot held her steady pace, unabated. She took her right hand off thegun and snarced that hand too.Another gun appeared, just like the one in her left hand. She used this to fire at the balls too. Left andright. Whichever she could use to aimand firethe quicker.She arrived at the far wall, turned around, and began her return.The sound of gunfire echoed all around, balls and spent cartridges littered the floor, and the acridsmell of gunpowder filled the air. Her vision was clouded by the gun smoke.Balot closed her eyes. She looked as if she were about to go into a trance. She fired her gun, playfullynow, almost as if she were dancing.Balot's eyes were closed, and she never missed a shot.The Doctor, on the other hand, grew paler and paler, the blood draining fromhis face.I know what ought to be done, I just don't know what the right thing to do is I never imagined in amillion years that the girl would mesh so well with the abilities we gave her A shiver ran down hisspine as he spoke, and his voice was drowned out by the echoing gunfire.The Doctor gulped, and as he did so there was a pinga message had arrived.We've just had a newsflash from the DA. I set him to gather information on Shellanything on thenet or frominternal police reports, the Doctor said.Balot took a seat, listening. She had already detached both guns from her sleeves and handed themover to the Doctor, and when she did so his expression lifted ever so slightly in relief.He's come up with something, has he? Oeufcoque asked, sticking his torso out of one of Balot'shands.The five neurosurgeons who were looking after Shell have all disappeared. Every single one of them,simultaneously. One of the surgeons had even just prepared dinner. No signs of a struggle. And nowitnesses The Doctor's eyes flicked over to Balot.She understood the significance of this glance straightaway.Don't worry. I won't be afraid. Carry on.Okay. Well, it's strange. All five of them have these large sums of money deposited into theiraccounts by an unidentified source. But considering the salaries they're on from the state, it'd hardly beworthwhile for any of them to abscond with the sorts of sums we're talking aboutnot with all they haveto lose.The deposits are obviously a red herring, Doc. Boiled doesn't do things by halves. Once his mind isset on an effective course of action, he carries it through to the bitter end. I imagine he hired professionalsto do the job. Whenever we find something that looks like a lead, it's safe to assume that it's more likelyto be a decoy, or a deliberate bluff, said Oeufcoque.I think you're right. Well, I'm going to use these mysterious disappearances to press our case further,try and crank up the Life Preservation Program to the highest level. We strike a blow inside thecourtroom, they go on the offensive on the outside. We'll need to shore up our escape routesand wemay need to start scouting for a new hideaway. I'd better go and negotiate with the Broilerhouse directly.Even as he spoke his fingers were tapping away at the keyboard furiously. He was evidently incommunication with the DA.There was another ping, and the Doctor's expression brightened.Marvelous, our man at the Broilerhouse has given the go-ahead to open negotiations. I'd better headstraight therehope we don't get attacked while I'm out. Mind you, even if I was here, I doubt I'd bemuch help in battle.Well, we've vetted the police protection that we were assigned after the trial, and their histories allcheck out. We trawled through the files for all eight of them, spanning the last twenty yearsspotless.They should be able to protect us for long enough for you to have your Life Preservation Programdiscussions, at least, said Oeufcoque.Let's hope so. Still, let's not discount the possibility that the enemy will see my absence as a windowof opportunity to attack. Be careful. The Doctor flicked a switch on the machine, pulled the cord out, andheaded over to the red convertible in giant, lanky strides.Right, I'm off. Make sure you lock all the doors. And listen to what Oeufcoque tells you. He calledout to Balot and the car left the parking lot, letting in the crimson light of the evening sun from beyond theshutters.Balot snarced the shutters closed, and then made the pitching machines set themselves up to fireautomatically. She was about to recommence her training.Best not tire yourself out, Oeufcoque advised.Let me go on a little while longer, please? It takes the edge off mymood.Fine, but don't overexert yourself.Just a bit of stationarytarget practice, then.Balot stepped back on top of the silver platformand gripped the gun with both hands. She fired in timewith the balls as they flew toward her.She fired with her right, she fired with her left.As she did so, she snarced Oeufcoque to ask himsome questions.Who's going to attack us? Your former partner?I don't know. And we don't know for sure that anyone's going to attack us.Did Shell have those surgeons rubbed out? Why?Something to do with the business deal he's involved in at the moment, no doubt. It's probably safefor us to assume that Shell's memories are being recorded and preserved in physical form somehow.That's given us a useful clue, anyway.Who do you think actually killed the surgeons?A gang of professionals, I imagine. The sort who work as a team, kidnappers-for-hire.Do you think they'll come and attack us?It's highly probable.And if they do attack?Then our police protection should send thempacking.But what if the kidnappers get them too?Then it'll be up to us to finish the job.We kill them? Balot asked as she pulled the trigger.I should shoot the people who attack me, like this, is that what you want? Like I shoot that ballover there?If it becomes necessary then yes, you shoot your assailant in self-defense. But that's not the samething as shooting themin order to kill them. Oeufcoque was in full-blown lecture mode now.Okay.Let's take a rest now.No, I'm still good. Just a little longer, please?Balot was firing away on complete autopilot now, mind completely blank and free from obstructivethoughts.Slowly, at the back of her mind, the question posed by the counsel for the defense re-emerged.Why didn't you resist?That was what the attorney had asked her. Just as so many men had asked her before.The answer was silence.There had never been any answer other than silence.Ever.Except that now there was sound to rip apart that silencethe sound of gunfire.Balot continued firing the gun.06The gasoline-powered van cruised around the neighborhood, the airline logo on the front and Meet andGreet plastered in large lettering on the window.By and by it arrived at its destination. It parked, and two tall men emerged fromit.Both men wore sunglasses and thick coats.Five minutes, Medium. Let's secure the area, one said.The other nodded. Roger that, Welldone. Moving into position now. As he spoke he walked directlytoward the entrance of the residence.Left hand in his jacket, he pressed the intercom buzzer with his right hand and whispered, I'll tidy uphere as Well prepares the radar. You've finished hacking the telephone line? Medium pressed hisforehead with his hand, tilting his head, listening to a voice meant only for him.A noise came frominside the house, and he smiled.And so it was that Boiled's houndsthe Bandersnatch Gangwere released.A sound over the intercom:What do you want?This is your transport shuttle fromthe airline company, sir. Sorry to have kept you waiting.We never ordered anyBut the hand that had been inside Medium's coat was out now. It held a card-shaped device.He stuck the card into the electronic lock on the door.An electromagnetic Hutchinson Knife appeared fromhis other sleeve, as if by magic.It all happened in an instant.The door opened with a click. A thick security chain dangled across the door, but the knife slicedthrough it like butter, its magnetized blade causing a link in the chain to fuse and shatter.The door opened and Mediumentered. The man who had been speaking into the intercomwas standingthere in the entrance hall, his face blank with astonishment and terror.Yohe started to say, but Medium threw a knife at him, and it plunged into his open mouth. Themagnetized blade sliced through the back of his head, causing all the moisture in his mouth to evaporate inan instant.Medium caught the already-dead man by his lapel and propped him up to stop his fall. He pulled theknife out and carefully laid the man's body down. Not a drop of blood was spilled, but instead the wholearea was filled with the pungent smell of burnt flesh.There was the tinkle of a bell, and a red light glinted off his eyes behind his sunglasses.What is it? What's that car? And that smell A voice.Medium's eyes, now vermilion, glanced at the wall and saw another figure emerge.Left hand still gripping the knife, Mediumlet his right armhang loose by his hips.I wonder which one of us is the faster draw, Medium said aloud. He smirked and stood deliberatelyin the middle of the corridor. The other man appeared from beyond the door and was immediately takenaback by the figure confronting himand the two red eyes behind the sunglasses.The man, frenetic, reached for the gun at his side. He was too slow.Medium unsheathed his gun and fired a shot that left the barrel almost noiselessly. A hole opened inthe man's chest. The electric charge from the bullet fried his woundand his lungsand he collapsed ina heap before a sound could pass his lips.Again, no blood, and again the smell of fried flesh hung in the air.That'll be me, then. Medium leaned over the corpse and lectured the dead body in jest, waggling hisindex finger.Medium put his gun away and lifted up the man's wrist, staring fixedly at it. Tough, professionalfingers, he said, taking his sunglasses off with his knife-wielding hand. Just not really sexy enough.Let's sell themoff, Well.He was speaking now to Welldone, who emerged fromthe opposite end of the corridor.Well was dragging yet another dead body by the scruff of its neck.He took his sunglasses off, exposing his computerized red pupils, and spoke. Three people exactly.We've cleaned up over here. How's it going over there, Rare, Mincemeat? Welldone spoke out loud,hand to his temple. The reply came:All done. Easy peasy! I'm just brewing myself some nice cof ee in the kitchen. Rare's girly voicesounded in Welldone's and Medium's ears and continued:It was a little boring, actually. The pigs were stationed exactly where we knew they'd be when wehacked their Ham & Egg system.Goodstandby on alert.All finished over here too. Looks like our tracking system's working. When should I bring this pigout?It was Mincemeat's voice that now arrived on the scene, and Welldone responded. Wait fordarkness. We're going to scramble all the Ham & Egg circuits in the area, along with all communicationsto and fromthe target house.Am I good to soil them a bit, then?Why,what's happened, little Minty? Mediumasked, amused.There was a woman here too. They were trying to pass themselves of as a couple, but they're bothHam & Eggers. Still, might have been a real-life couple, I suppose.Are they still alive, Mincemeat? asked Welldone. He left the house and moved toward the car.Ershould they be?Not really. Do as you please. Just be sure you factor in enough time to tidy up afterwards.Twenty minutes till sunset, little Minty. The sun's almost down. Time for dinner. Medium spokenow, standing in the hallway. He heard Mincemeat's laughter echoing deep in his ear.More of a snack. I'll leave the front parts for Well. Can't imagine they'll be to your taste, though.I'm going to do the rear parts myself, now, husband and wife in turn.Mincemeat carried on cheerfully, and Mediumburst out laughing. Rare's going to be all jealousOoh, Medi, no, you know how loud I get! I just can't keep it in. If I did anything now our targetwould know we were coming! I don't like it unless I can scream real loud.Just don't forget we need some time to load the pigs, Welldone said as he returned with a suitcase ineither hand. Consume the prey without leaving a single drop of blood. That's the secret of our success,after all.That's right, business is business, Rare, little Minty. Don't let the pigs rot. Medium took a suitcasefrom Welldone and knelt down by one of the corpses.Welldone extracted the Lockbuster Card fromthe door and reset the lock. Just don't forget that you'reon the battlefield, Rare and Mincemeat.That's what makes it feel so good, though! Isn't that right, little Minty?Yeah, it's good. It's really good!Medium shook his head, laughing, and cut off his transmission from Mincemeat. Looks like being onthe battlefield just increases the thrill factor for them. Give us a hand, will you, Well? Let's slice this pigup with our two-hundred-thousand-dollar butter knives.Welldone kneeled beside the corpse and took his Hutchinson Knife out, applying it to the corpse'swrists. Flesh, skin, and bone were all sliced off together, but not a single drop of blood escaped.Easy does it. You know that red convertible we just passeddo you think he's one of the PIs too?Mediumspoke cheerfully, and Well grinned back.He is. I had Flesh confirm it. So all we've got to do now is give the other PI a little scratch with ourbutter knives and then put the girl to sleep and bring her back with us.My chest is pounding. It's been a while. I'm almost as excited as that first time we ever set out as agang.Welldone laughed. The two men cheerfully dissected the body and packed it away in the suitcases.Looks like the operation will commence in twenty minutes. Inside the container on the trailer, Fleshwobbled his gelatinous body around toward Boiled as he spoke to him.Perfect timing.Boiled nodded his approval.The container was full of machinery. Mincemeat was the trailer's driver, and it was currently parkedsome distance away fromthe residential district.I'll finish my work on the Ham & Egg circuits in a couple of minutes. Each of the three residencesare set up so that if they don't successfully send and receive a transmission from each of the others everyforty-five minutes, the emergency alarm is sounded automatically. So I've had to fix it so that each onerelays a message on to the next one every fifteen minutes.Boiled nodded again. His eyes were fixed on a monitor that showed a detailed image of theneighborhood. A number of flashing lights showed where Welldone and the rest of the gang were at thatprecise moment.The next monitor along showed a building in 3-D. With perfect markingradar devices set in threeplaces around the buildingthey were able to triangulate and get a precise scan of its contents.It's built just as it says on the blueprints. Have you ever been inside the building yourself?Boiled glanced at Flesh, unspeaking.We ran some background checks on you ourselves, you know. You're amazing. All those cases yousolved with that other PI called Oeufcoque, and every single one of them designated an Official License.You're a real celebrity within the industry, aren't you? And I hear you've got a lot of clout with the DA'soffice too.That's all stuff that my former partner engineered after he dissolved our partnership.HmmI would have thought you were the sort of person who didn't worry too much about history,what someone might or might not have done. I was hoping you wouldn't mind discussing the past? Fleshasked.Boiled continued staring at the monitor, but nodded slightly.We were all in the Forces. Well, Medi and I were all in the Experimental Mechanized Division ofthe Marine Corpsthe Guinea Pigs, we were known asand we met Rare and Mincemeat at the frontwhen we were all thrown together in the same company of the Southern Division on the Continent. I wasup for military discharge after getting shell-shocked and developing paranoia, but then loads of enemiescame and surrounded us. We had to hole up in the forest for over ninety days before the helicopters werefinally dispatched to evacuate us. Even today, whenever I see an oak tree it takes me back, brings backvivid memories.Boiled ignored Flesh, but he carried on speaking. Everyone looked after me, a mere commspecialist.A lot of soldiers ended up regressing to a childlike state, though. Some grew paranoid, or starteddeveloping abnormally aggressive tendencies. Some units had a lot of these sorts of soldiers concentratedin one place, and I somehow found myself in one of them. At first we were the exception, but before weknew it our sort of unit became quite common, especially on the front lines. Then, as the battle intensified,it became completely normal. These are the only sorts of people who can really adapt to the front lines,after all. We fought hard and received plenty of medals. We killed a lot of people. A lot of enemies, a lotof allies. Guns, gas, bombs, electricitywe used all sorts of weapons. All day long I survived ontranquilizers washed down with scotch, firing away from inside my armored vehicle. Eating and shittingwhere I sat firing my guns. In a vehicle not unlike this one, actually, for three months, with no sunlight, in aplace like a subway toilet. As a result of that I started suffering fromwhite wax disease in my legsFlesh stopped talking at this point and smiled at Boiled. And what about you, sir? Have you beeninvolved in experimental warfare?I was in the P7 Experimental Corps.P7oh, so an Airborne Division? I know about all of them up to P6, in charge of the twenty- tosixty-thousand-meter altitude zones, right? I didn't realize there was anything higher than that.Strategic Space Corps. There were three of us, including me, who enlistedvolunteers from theAirborne Division.Flesh clapped his pudgy hands together. Amazing! Just like a sci-fi movie!Boiled's eyes caught Flesh's again. After a second he nodded silently, facial expression immutable asever. A movement like the cylinder of a revolver spinning in place.Then a murmur. The whole unit was a sham, a concoction. Objectives and results, all fabricated. Itwas only there as a smokescreen to develop pointless technology.And with that, he turned his eyesdevoid of sentiment as everback to the monitor.