Mardock Scramble полностью

He spoke as an indulgent teacher might gently encourage a pupil to revise his answer.

“There’s a possibility that a material witness for a case is hiding in this facility. I need you to open the gate for me.”

–There’s no need to force your way in using a gun. Come over to the November Forest.

Even as he faded from the monitor, Faceman’s tone was gentle.

Boiled stopped the car and headed for the white wall of chalk, placing his hand on a small door that was etched into the wall.

The door gave a little electronic buzz and opened inward.

He stepped into a long, dazzlingly white corridor, and the door shut behind him.

Everything around him was a clear white, and it radiated calmness, like a first-class airport lounge.

Boiled walked on. Calm footfalls—this was a place he was comfortable with, at home. It was as if his body wanted these homely, nostalgic feelings in spite of himself, in spite of his resistance and disgust toward the very idea.

Boiled continued down the corridor and arrived at the end without passing a soul. He came to a giant wall again. He touched the electronic pad on the wall, and the thick walls parted to either side to reveal trees and plants not dissimilar to the ones on the outside.

Boiled entered the forest.

There was a white table and chairs in a clearing surrounded by white birch trees. A young man stood by the table, and he smiled as Boiled drew near. Or so it seemed, but then the young man’s expression turned sour.

“I took my telecom out of my head a long time ago. No use in snarcing me to communicate, Tweedledee,” Boiled said.

Tweedledee looked more disappointed than anything else. He jerked his chin toward the table.

There was a cup on the table, and the aroma of warm coffee drifted about the glade.

Tweedledee signaled with his eyes that the coffee had been prepared specially for Boiled.

Boiled ignored it and stood in front of the table. “Professor Faceman.”

The old man’s head on the other side of the coffee—Faceman—raised his eyes from within his cage. “This forest is where many a war-weary soldier came to recuperate—and it’s also the final resting place for many. When you finally return, it should be to here.”

Boiled shook his head slowly. “I came here ten years ago because I was ordered to by the army. Now that the war’s over I have no intention of becoming a victim of your experiments.”

“So that’s your postwar experience, is it? Many soldiers still drag around a victim complex with them. How about you?”

“I’m neither the victim nor the perpetrator,” said Boiled.

Tweedledee looked blankly on.

The conversation was going straight over his head.

Faceman turned to Tweedledee and smiled. “We won’t be needing you here any longer, Tweedledee. Why not head over to the West Forest?”

Tweedledee shrugged his shoulders and approached Boiled, then tapped on the man’s burly arms. Playfully, pleading. Then he disappeared deep into the forest.

“The only care he has in the world is that there are no active subjects around, so to speak.” Faceman watched Tweedledee’s back as he departed, then looked up at Boiled. “He was delighted about the fact that he thought he could get to know the new girl, though.”

Without changing his expression, Boiled dipped his hand into his jacket pocket and spoke. “I have three questions. Number one, where are Oeufcoque, his client, and Dr. Easter? If they are here, I need you to tell me where you are sheltering them.”

“We don’t shelter anyone here. We receive them as guests,” said Faceman.

“They’re here, then?”

“I believe I have the right of refusal when it comes to answering questions?”

“The right, perhaps, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you get to exercise that right,” said Boiled.

“Hmm. What are you suggesting?”

“I’m suggesting that this diseased facility, steeped in lies as it is, may soon be coming to terms with the reality of your death.”

Faceman just smiled gently. “So, death is your only true reality. How like you. Not that humans are capable of simultaneously experiencing alternative realities—but killing me isn’t going to change anything. Nor do I think that taking my life is going to be of much use to you. Unless that’s what you’re looking for, and it will give you closure? Is that how you feel right now?”

Boiled slowly drew his hand out of his chest pocket.

But he wasn’t wielding a gun. Instead, he let his arm flop down and started speaking again. “There’s another person of interest in this case who has already penetrated the facility.”

“I presume you mean the oil-soaked man who’s currently trying to gain access from the loading dock in the western ward? I see—if I don’t answer your questions then he goes off on a little destructive rampage, is that it? And this is how you choose to make yourself useful to society?” Faceman asked with absolute serenity.