Mardock Scramble

A lull fell over the game, and Balot was inching toward defeat. Every hand was either a narrow loss or a push. She was honing her senses, separating out the things she should be sensing from the things that didn’t matter. Ashley’s fingers, for example. On both his hands, his pinkies and pointer fingers weren’t relevant. They only transported the cards. The movements of his middle fingers and thumbs, however, were essential to his manipulation of the deck, and his ring fingers kept everything in balance.

And the most crucial supports to the structure of the card order were the upcards, from jack to king. Jacks were lined with odd-numbered cards, kings higher-ranked even numbers, and queens lower-ranked even numbers. Their relations with each other subtly shifted through the deck. But why? Because the game was focused around aces. Depending on the circumstances, the natural rules of the game and the rules of his shuffle joined and separated like a pair of dancers.

As a result of this, Ashley’s most important cards were the aces, the fives, and the jacks so tightly bound to the other two. Even more crucial to defend against the player’s most profitable victory—the ace and jack of spades.

Balot, utilizing Oeufcoque’s precise calculations and her own senses, modified the numerical readings, whose form had become a seemingly incoherent jumble of letters and numbers just on the edge of what Balot could understand.

As the chips kept up their one-sided movement across the table, Oeufcoque and Balot felt more unified than they ever had before. They weren’t the protector and the protected. They were one united, leading and following in turn. She felt it in her heart—they were a team. Might those words lead her in a better direction. In her game. In their game.

At the end of the fifteenth hand, Oeufcoque’s display was a simmering stew of numbers. Letters large and small aligned with countless numbers, winding and swirling together. It was Oeufcoque and Balot’s combined technique, and it was a singular breach in Ashley’s iron wall.

Transfixed by the weaving of the dizzying patchwork array of numbers, Balot was unaware of her own change. A change in her body.

The first to notice was the wall, Ashley.

“Do you need to refresh your makeup?”

At first, Balot failed to grasp his meaning.

She thought it was another ploy, but it wasn’t. Balot’s brow and palms were caked with cold sweat. She had apparently been unconsciously wiping it off. When she saw that the fingers on her right hand were covered with glittering silver powder, she didn’t know what it was at first.

Ashley snapped his fingers. A passing staffer came to the table.

The dealer ordered a damp towel. When the man asked who it was for, Ashley turned to Bell Wing and shrugged, as if to say, What’s with this guy? and A battle is a battle, but one must be considerate of a lady. Bell took one glance at Balot and nodded. Then the man understood. It was for Balot.

And Balot, too, finally understood her own state.

Glittering stuff was all over her hands and her arms, her cheeks and her forehead.

It was silver powder. Her skin was emitting glittering silver powder. That was the only explanation. She brushed her hand across her face, and tiny fibrous flecks rubbed off. It felt like temporary hair dye washing out, but she couldn’t remember putting that much in her hair.

Balot became aware of a faint itchiness all over her body, like a thinly peeling sunburn over freshly healed skin.

“You’re growing…” the Doctor whispered from over her shoulder. “Your metal fibers are autonomously growing to meet your body’s requirements.”

A waiter came and handed her a wet cloth. Balot waited for Oeufcoque to erase his display before lifting her arm and applying the cool cloth to her face.

The cloth was pleasantly scented. She wiped her arms and cheeks with it, clearing away the mixture of silver powder and sweat. The itchiness across her hands and cheeks faded. She was refreshed.

She wiped her arms and her face as though she were polishing a blade.

The Doctor took the towel from her hands before the waiter had the chance, and said, “If you feel anything abnormal, please inform me right away. Don’t overdo it. Just do what you can.”

He made Balot feel like a boxer facing the next round.

The girl nodded. She didn’t feel anything abnormal. She placed her left arm on top of Oeufcoque, and the numbers swirled against it. In an instant, she had returned to the game. Balot steadied her breath and stretched out her right hand. She placed her chips.

–Thank you for your kindness.

“You’re welcome.”

Ashley put his hand to the card shoe. The game began.

≡

Over the course of the next ten games, Oeufcoque’s display grew even more dizzying.

The numbers swirled, flowing and recrystallizing again under Balot’s heightened abilities and Oeufcoque’s new technique.