CHAPTER 22

Riding down Feynbrook Ridge Road that night, Walden thought the night was unseasonably cool. His wife, sitting beside him, was obviously thinking the same thing. Kat usually liked to ride with the windows down, but now rolled hers up. The mayor did the same.

Aaron, his driver for tonight, glanced at his rearview mirrors constantly. Walden hadn’t mentioned it yet, but he’d noticed the heightened alertness of his E.P. team. His wife probably had noticed, too, since Aaron and the others were now insisting on going almost anywhere the kids went, even to sleepovers. With a powerful man like Bruce Wayne targeted, every security professional in the city had upped their game.

The limousine pulled up to the front of the Iceberg Lounge. Walden had been told that it was the best club and restaurant in the city, with great jazz and great food. A couple of his colleagues in city council had recommended the place, but he’d never had the time to get away. Well, he’d finally found the time, but unfortunately he was here for business, not all pleasure. The call from Seth Blair’s people had told him that they needed to speak with him, but that nothing important should be said over the phone or in e-mail. They wanted to meet with him in person. They told him to bring his wife, and that all expenses would be taken care of.

Walden had been reluctant to invite Katherine along, he didn’t want to potentially expose her to the kind of people Blair hung out with, but once she heard from his bodyguards where he was going she had been unstoppable. Kat loved jazz, and yearned to get out from the house whenever she could these days.

We should be safe, he kept telling himself. It’s a very public place, and Aaron and his people are all around it. We’ll be fine.

Aaron dropped them off at the front door, but the mayor and his wife were escorted inside by Jacob and Robert, who were the advance scouting team tonight. If anything had been off in their initial sweep of the Lounge, they would’ve called Aaron and told him to drive the mayor directly back to his house.

The music was lively, and Kat squealed with delight when she saw the hipsters dancing barefoot on a rotating floor of indoor ice. Jacob and Robert carefully navigated them upstairs to a booth that had been reserved just for them. Here, they linked up with Lyle and Joel, the other half of the advance team.

The upstairs area was positively frigid. Kat had brought her fur coat because she had heard how cold the upstairs of the Iceberg Lounge could be. Giant emperor penguins and large seals splashed in a plush area off to themselves, around islands and a clear wall that kept the two groups of animals separated. The children of rich guests were invited to feed the animals fish.

Down on the first level, the music suddenly halted, and a man announced from somewhere over a mic, “All right, you cooooooool hepcats, we’re gonna clear the floor right now for just a moment. Yesssssss, everybody off the floor. We’re gonna spice it up just a notch and let one couple—just one hip couple—take the floor. We do this every night here at the Iceberg. It can be anyone, any volunteers who think they’re cooooooool enough to mesmerize us all with their grooves and moves.”

The floor did indeed clear out, and for a moment no one was bold enough to step forward and be the center of attention. Then, finally, a cute, barefoot young couple walked out into the middle of the rotating ice floor and started grooving to the next beat, which was a little faster than the previous melody.

The E.P. team spread out and melded with the crowd as Mayor Walden and his wife took their seats, but Robert, Jacob, and the others were never too far away. The booth they were in overlooked the dance floor. Tonight, The Hurlihees were playing, the same group that had played at the Policeman’s Ball, if Walden wasn’t mistaken.

They had no more than taken a look at their menus than a waiter appeared and said, “Mr. Mayor, I am instructed to tell you and your wife that you may have your pick of anything on the menu tonight, it’s been covered. May I start you off with a bottle of Bordeaux?”

“That’ll be fine,” he said, winking at his wife. When the waiter left, he said, “People may want us dead, but there are still advantages to being the wife of the mayor.”

“I always knew you wanted to get elected just to impress me,” Kat said, smiling. She looked down at the dance floor, and shivered. “It’s so cold I can see my breath. They say they keep it like this so that you have to dance all night long and stay close to your mate to keep yourself warm. It’s fantastic!”

“You didn’t seem to like the cold on the drive up here,” he said.

“This is different. The music, the atmosphere, the animals over there and the overall aesthetic…I love it!”

“I’m glad,” Walden said, smiling at her. His wife had always been the one to enjoy trendy new things, from art galleries to grand openings. Walden preferred to either be at home or at the office, and nowhere in between. “I hope this makes up for that unpleasantness at the Policeman’s Ball, sweetie.” He was referring to both the interruption by FBI as well as the rude interruption from James Gordon. They hadn’t talked much about what the commissioner had said or done after they left Wayne Manor, so alarming had the Riddle Killer’s possible presence been.

Kat reached out and touched his hand. Her hands were cold. “It’s fine, dear. And—oh, look at that!” One of the penguins was honking loudly, and one of the club’s animal trainers was taunting them with some fish and making one of them perform some tricks in the water. “This place is wonderful!”

“So glad you like it, my fair lady,” someone said. A short, round fellow came waddling up to them, looking much like a penguin himself in a tux that seemed to barely contain him. He wore a top hat, which he removed in a very ostentatious bow, and plucked a cigarette out of his mouth by the quellazaire that held it. Around his wrist, he had an umbrella hanging by a cane handle. There’s no rain tonight, Walden thought. Very eccentric. “You won’t believe how much it cost me to create this ambiance, and to ensure that the atmosphere would not merely be painted on the walls, but would exist in the closeness and camaraderie that we forced onto our patrons.”

“Oh! You’re the owner then?”

“I have the honor of being the owner, yes,” he said, putting the top hat back on. “My name is Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot. My friends call me Oswald. I hope that you’ll be my friends.” He shook their hands.

Walden said, “I understand you were very accommodating to my security team. I thank you for helping us coordinate this outing.”

“Not at all, friends. It’s no trouble. I was happy to give you our most coveted seat in the house,” the little man said. “I hope you won’t think me too forward, but, in repayment for my hospitality, will you afford me the rudeness of inviting myself to join you both for a moment?”

Walden looked at his wife, who smiled and nodded. “Of course, Mr. Cobb—Oswald.”

“Thank you, sir,” he said, snapping a finger. A large man appeared from someplace with an extra chair, one of Oswald’s own security people, no doubt. He grunted as he took a seat, just as the waiter showed up with the Bordeaux. The waiter, Walden noticed, had three glasses ready.

This was all staged, he thought. But that’s fine. No doubt a guy like this is a shameless name-dropper, and will spill to his friends tomorrow about how he dined with the mayor of Gotham City. Walden was used to this kind of behavior from others, and didn’t find it annoying at all. Indeed, he was flattered.

“So, is this your first time coming to the Lounge?”

“It is!” Kat said. “It’s gorgeous! You’ve really got a lot going on here. It’s almost manic.”

“I believe in all things done in moderation,” Oswald said. “Including moderation.” Kat seemed to think that was clever, and laughed. “Yes, I prefer the subtleties on the floor below, but I thought I’d keep the truly exciting things up here on the top. This is only our first stage for the club. In the coming months, we’ll probably buy the lot behind this one and expand. We’ll change things up a bit, while still keeping the place cool. Even the foods we serve here are those that are best served chilled.”

“An interesting theme,” Walden said.

Oswald looked at him. “If you’ll permit me to disagree with you, sir, I prefer not to think of it as a theme, but a way. As in, this is a way of life for me. People are so caught up in showing more and more skin in most modern clubs, they leave nothing to the imagination. I’ve always preferred bundling up in your best clothing. Or, if you are going to be a bit more bare-skinned,” he said, gesturing to a shivering woman on the other side of the room who was wearing a skirt and blouse that left her very exposed, “then at least be risking something.”

Again, Katherine smiled at this, as though the little man spoke with great profundity. Walden kept a smile on his face, even though privately he wished Oswald Cobblepot would vanish so that he could meet with Blair’s people in secret. Will they approach if they see me chatting all night long with this vain little man?

“Oh, and I love the music here!” Kat said. “Are those The Hurlihees? Weren’t they playing at the Policeman’s Ball, sweetie?” she asked her husband.

“I believe so, yes.”

Oswald took a sip of his wine, and said, “Mmmmm, yes, we’re glad to be hosting them. They’re a great jazz band. They play totally original music every time they play. Complete improvisation, just as jazz was always meant to be played. You never know when they’ll completely change tempo or direction. And they have lots and lots of stamina—they can play well into the morning and we practically have to drag them off stage even then,” he laughed.

“They were fantastic at the Ball,” Kat put in.

Oswald smiled briefly at her, and then looked at the mayor. “Are you all right, Mr. Mayor? I have to say, you look a little preoccupied.”

Walden gave his best politician’s smile. “Well, I’m just looking for someone.”

“Oh? Perhaps I know them.”

He shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I’m not actually sure who it is. A, uh, business associate of mine told me I’d be meeting a friend of his here.”

“Oh, yes? Then it could be anyone.”

Walden shrugged and looked down at the dance floor filled with young, barefoot couples dancing on the slippery ice floor. One girl had fallen, and was being helped up by her boyfriend. “I suppose it could be.”

“It could even be me,” Oswald Cobblepot said. Walden looked at the nightclub owner, who was just taking a puff of his cigarette. The little man plucked the quellazaire from his mouth, and blew the smoke out. “Couldn’t it?” he asked.

The mayor of Gotham City glanced around at Jacob, Robert, and the rest of the E.P. team. Then, he looked around a bit more, taking the long view. Just behind Jacob, there stood a large man who was chatting up two young ladies, only most of his focus was on watching Jacob. Another man sat at a table near Robert, eyeing him. All at once, a sense of dread fell slowly over Marcellus Walden. He thought, We’re surrounded. A man downstairs at the bar was looking up at them, and two men sitting at a table by the dance floor were also being not quite surreptitious as they spied on their booth, half pretending to read their menus.

Walden turned back to the nightclub owner. “What is this?”

Kat looked between them, confused.

The nightclub owner blew out more smoke, and smiled amiably. “This, Mr. Mayor, is your intervention.”

“My…?” He stopped when he saw the big man who had brought Oswald a chair suddenly appear again. The big man stood just behind Kat, and put his hands in his pockets, leaning against the banister and casually looking down at the dance floor.

“Remain calm, Mr. Mayor. This will all be over soon. All you have to do is listen to me.”

“Marcellus…what’s going on?” Kat asked, her love for the club’s atmosphere evaporating quickly.

“Kat…please go downstairs for a moment. I need to talk to Mr. Cobblepot alone.”

“Marcellus?” she said.

“Kat, for God’s sakes, just do as I say!” he said just below a shout. Katherine jumped back in her seat. “Just go over and ask Jacob to take you to the bathroom. And stay there for a few minutes.” She didn’t understand, but eventually did as asked.

Once she was gone, the little man reached into his pocket, and for a terrible, terrible instant, Walden feared…well, he feared the worst. But Oswald Cobblepot only pulled out a smartphone, one with a large screen. He placed it on the table and slid it over for the mayor’s inspection. “I want you to take a look at that, Mr. Mayor.”

Walden eyed him suspiciously for a moment, and then looked down at the phone. He picked it up, and looked down at it. For a moment, he felt like he was having an out-of-body experience. He saw a set of familiar faces. Four of them, actually. They were all nestled in their separate beds, and Amber with her favorite teddy bear, which she had named Joojoo.

“Martin turns twelve next month, doesn’t he?” Oswald said. He sounded about as casual as a refined gentleman asking what another gentleman thought about the prospects of certain stocks in the market.

“What…are you?” Walden asked slowly, feeling his gut sink and rot. He glanced over to the stairs, where Jacob was escorting Kat down.

Oswald locked eyes with the mayor. “If you value your children’s lives, Mr. Mayor, you will control any impulses you have and listen to me very carefully.” The little fat man removed his quellazaire and flicked the ash from his cigarette into an ashtray. “You walked in here, and practically gave us everything we need to completely annihilate you. You brought us your wife, and you left your kids at home with a scant three men to guard them. But, more importantly, you brought us you, the mayor of the whole damn city,” he chortled.

Walden couldn’t believe this was happening, even though he didn’t know what this was. “What do you want?” he said at once. “I have money…I have lots of money—”

“We know, we gave a lot of it to you.”

“You…what?”

“We gave a lot of that money to you,” Cobblepot said.

“Who’s we?”

“We, the collective alternative businessmen of Gotham City. We. Us. We’ve been investing in you for a long, long time now Marcellus. We saw your potential years ago, when you were still dealing with city council. We saw potential in you even before you did. You’re that rare kind of politician who really can be manipulated without you believing you’ve been manipulated. Kat’s husband told us that. He’s the one we got to first, the one we encouraged to waste his time on you.” He took another toke from the quellazaire. “That one fault that you have—the ability to not know when you’ve been manipulated—allowed you to infiltrate without even knowing you were infiltrating. Best kind of politician. That’s what I told them, anyway.”

“Told who?”

“Carmine Falcone and his friends,” Cobblepot said. “Please do try and use that brain of yours from time to time, Mr. Mayor. Our policy has always been to keep friends in high places, and we are exceedingly good at doing that. We evolve with the times, as all creatures should.”

Walden was staring at the smartphone and feeling numb. The look on his son Rodney’s sleeping face…it took the mayor a thousand light-years away. He reached out with one hand to touch the face on the screen. To Cobblepot, he said, “What do you want from me?”

“Like I said, this is an intervention. You were meant to do exactly as you’ve done, but Mr. Blair tells us that here recently you’ve developed a streak of independence. It’s one thing to deny that you’re corrupt, Mr. Mayor. If it helps you sleep at night, do whatever you want. But it’s never good to start forgetting your friends.”

“I gave Blair the tape, and you people obviously put it to use—”

“The tape’s a little nugget,” said Cobblepot. “But clients of mine are going down fast, the way I hear it through the ether. And it all started happening a few nights ago when the Batman took down a Mr. Calabria and a Mr. Hughes. The problems went up another notch when Batman suddenly showed up in my club, unannounced, and threatened me with great bodily harm until I gave him something he could work with.” He shrugged, taking another puff of his cigarette, and blew the smoke into his wineglass, watching it rise out like mist from a sulfur pit. “Luckily, the information I handed him was exactly what one of my clients wanted me to give him—as strange as it sounds, this particular client predicted Batman would arrive, and wanted me to divulge what I divulged. People are sometimes weird that way. But this has obviously brought more problems down on me. My security teams are now finding small microphones hidden all over my club. Are we being spied on, Mr. Mayor?”

“How would I know that?”

“You mean you don’t know? How is that possible? Is Commissioner James Gordon really keeping you that out of the loop?”

“On many things, yes. He’s working very closely with the FBI, in particularly with Sarah Essen. They’ve got carte blanche on this, not me.” He held up the smartphone. “If you touch my children…if you harm a hair on any of their heads—”

“If you can’t rein Gordon in, then what good are you to us, Marcellus?”

Walden looked downstairs at his wife. On her way to the restroom, Kat glanced over her shoulder. He started to fear what would happen if Jacob or Robert noticed her distress. Would something happen to their children if Cobblepot felt endangered? The little man certainly held all the aces. Whoever had these cameras on his children at the moment could kill them before anything could be done to stop them.

And we’re in his club. Could he kill us all here and now? Could me and Kat just disappear? Walden now finally understood what sorts of monsters he’d climbed into bed with, and it was too late.

Walden said, “Blair mentioned…he mentioned…”

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“Yes?”

“He mentioned…Nate’s name.”

“Did he?”

“Yes.” Walden lowered his voice. “He said he worked for Nate. I want to talk to him.”

“To Nate?”

“Yes.”

“Go right ahead, then.” The little man splayed his hands open in front of his voluminous belly in the sign of an open invitation.

Walden looked at Cobblepot at length. His mouth opened and closed as he tried to articulate the processes going on in his mind. All at once, he felt so stupid. Years of concessions and wrong turns suddenly seemed so obvious to him, as well as the manipulations that Cobblepot had just mentioned. How could I have been so stupid? “Nate?” he said. “Stewart-Paulson?”

“How do you do, sir?” Cobblepot said.

Walden sat up straight. “This is a joke.”

“I think you’ll find that I am not given to humor when it comes to business discussions.”

“I don’t…I don’t understand…why?”

“Why the alternate identity, or why reveal myself to you now? Which do you mean to ask? Or do you mean both?”

Walden shook his head. “What do you want from me?”

“I want you to know how serious we are, Mr. Mayor. I want you to see how much control we actually have, how much effort we’ve put into all this. E-mails and phone calls weren’t safe anymore, so we had to bring you in for something a bit more personal.” He took another toke, and exhaled slowly. “As for the Nate persona, it gives us all a warm, soft, comfortable blanket of anonymity. He’s manifested by many of us, like a mask we can all slip on and off before handing it off to someone else. Like a relay race. Though his name, I confess, is the conjuration of another associate of mine.”

Walden couldn’t have been more confused if he’d woken up tied to the roof of his house. He still had so many questions. “I…”

“Dismiss James Gordon by the end of the week. You can do that, can’t you? You’ve enough friends in many different places to do that—that’s why we chose you.”

“But…there’s still the FBI. There’s still Sarah Essen. I can’t do anything about them.”

“Dismiss Gordon, and you’ll have dismissed the Batman. That’s all you need to be concerned about right now. We’ll handle with the rest.” He took a sip of his wine, then looked down at the dance floor, and smiled. “That’s a nice couple,” he said conversationally.

You’ll “handle” the rest? Walden thought. The mayor didn’t like the sound of that. “How?”

“What?” Cobblepot said, looking back at him as though stirred from a dream.

“How will you ‘handle’ it?”

“Look at the faces of your children on the phone there one more time, Marcellus. Now see if you want to ask me that question again.”

Walden did, and he didn’t.

* * *

DISPATCH HAD CALLED in for backup on a 187 on Seventh Avenue, around Hennigan Trawl. That was just six blocks outside of the Bowery, and very close to Park Empire. He had landed the Bat Hawk quietly on top of a four-storey building that had been condemned and scheduled for demolition within the year. From there, he had taken flight using only his cape and occasionally his GTEM gun, navigating his way in the direction the suspect would have fled.

The places the killer could be hiding were many. Koltche’s Pharmacy on Barnsby Road was closed this time of night, but it had a large, expansive parking lot that was commonly filled with young people cruising throughout the night. Butting up against Koltche’s was a small mobile home park, and on the other side of that was an RV sales business called Truman’s RV.

The buildings weren’t tall in this area of the city, rarely did one get above three stories, and those that did were cheap office buildings with numerous empty lots where no business would ever rent again—at least, not until something was done about the Bowery, Park Empire, and the overspill coming from both.

Batman swooped over the kids driving circles around Koltche’s parking lot. His HUD’s altimeter said he was 72.8 feet in the air. He rolled his body slightly to the left, banking slowly. The suspect had been reported running towards this area on foot. If he had any brains at all he’d go to where there was activity and try to blend in. It was either that, or he would hide in the ditch. If the suspect had opted for ditches, the best place for him to run and hide would be Bailey Park, which saw virtually no use besides what the homeless gave it.

The psyche of a criminal on the run had been something he had studied for many years. Though it was smarter to flee to crowds where one could blend in, the guilty conscience and resultant paranoia that came with committing a crime usually caused a fleeing criminal to first seek solace, to hide away from anyone who could condemn them, and then to go to familiar places only once they’re certain the heat has died off. Only true psychopaths could think clearly enough under tense situations such as being chased by law enforcement, and few enough of them existed to safely bet that the suspect wasn’t so relaxed.

Batman descended slowly, and came to a halt in what had once been Bailey’s baseball park. Overgrown with weeds, briars, and vines, it stood as testament to how the neglect of the Bowery and Parkinson Avenue had started seeping into other areas. Like a disease, it was slowly spreading. Bailey Park’s close proximity to both the Bowery and Park Empire had pushed wholesome families away from hanging out there, thus fewer businesses had opened up around it, thus the emptiness meant fewer police needed to come by and preserve the peace, thus it was ignored for too long. And thus and thus and thus, Batman thought. Until now we have yet another haven for scum.

He stalked around the park for thirty minutes. It wasn’t very large; including the baseball field it was barely four acres. It was surrounded on all sides by streets, including Seventh Avenue, where the 187 had been called in. The sirens were just now converging near Koltche’s Pharmacy. The response time is horrible, he thought.

The sirens would mean that the suspect, described as a young, brown-skinned male in his late teens, would be even more likely to remain in whatever hiding spot he had found. Even on four acres of land finding a starting place could be difficult, but not impossible.

Batman started by going to the area in the woods where the suspect would’ve entered if he had been coming directly from Seventh. A head-height wooden fence would prevent most people from needlessly hopping over it, so if the suspect had been in a hurry, maybe he leapt over and made some hasty tracks. IR scanning revealed nothing for the moment, but a switch to NV gave him a greater look at the small patch of woods. He knelt to the ground, examining the earth. The hard-packed soil didn’t keep footprints well.

In lieu of footprints, the best thing to search for was what trackers simply called “sign”. His first sign came in the form of a sweet gum bur. When the spiked bur of a sweet gum tree was trampled, the sharp needles of the bur often punctured the leaves beneath it and stuck to it. This did not occur naturally, therefore it was an excellent indicator that someone had stepped on it.

Batman started there, examining the dents and bends in the crushed leaves to determine if it was recent. A quick inspection of a broken twig on the ground revealed that the inner core was light in color—it hadn’t been exposed long, which meant the break was very recent. He looked for the next bur to be trampled, since sweet gum trees were all around him. Once he found the next two signs, he was able to get an idea of the suspect’s gait. This helped him find the next track, and the next, and the next, simply by measuring distance from the last known track.

A bent sapling was his next sign—it wasn’t broken, only trampled, so if the sapling had been bent more than a few hours ago, it would have already straightened itself back out. He’s here.

Batman came to a ditch and knelt to examine a patch of scuffed earth. With his night-vision setting, he was able to take in the rest of the woods. Step by careful step, he followed the suspect’s path, making sure he didn’t lose it. If he made the wrong assessment of a track, he could get started completely in the wrong direction.

Movement to his left. Batman switched to infrared, but it was only a squirrel scuttling up the side of a tree about twenty feet to his right. His time studying wilderness survival and tracking had taught him to listen to the concentric rings of nature, or the concept of the butterfly effect. One helpful tip was that small animals, such as squirrels and chipmunks, often leapt to the opposite side of a tree from a perceived threat. It seemed the squirrel had sensed something worth fleeing, yet was on the same side as Batman stood. It doesn’t know I’m here. It’s running from someone else.

He stayed in IR for a second, and moved in a low crouch. Unconsciously, his right hand had gone to his thigh holster, and the GTEM gun was in his hand. Batman moved quietly around the tree where the squirrel had gone to hide. There, through a collection of leaves and branches, was the heat signature of a desperate young man. He’d tried to camouflage himself by tossing forest debris all over himself.

A night-vision scan revealed the pocket pistol in the suspect’s left hand.

Batman moved carefully. The road was about fifty yards behind him, so the sound of cars swishing by masked the sound of his approach. When he was two feet away from the suspect, he quickly knelt and pressed his left knee on the man’s gun hand while simultaneously placing the GTEM gun at the base of his skull. “Don’t move,” he whispered.

“DON’T SHOOT! DON’T SHOOT!” he shouted in a strange accent. It sounded Middle Eastern.

Batman pried the pistol out of his hand, then tucked it into his utility belt. The cops would want that later as evidence, no doubt.

After a quick pat-down, he wrenched the young man’s hands behind his back and cuffed him. It wasn’t until the punk was pulled up by his collar that he realized he hadn’t been captured by the police. His eyes went wide when he made out the Dark Knight by moonlight. “Allah be merciful, it’s you!”

“It’s me,” he said. Batman checked him for any recognizable gang signs on him, such as the blazing sun tattoo of Dreaded Sun or any of the prison tattoos the Molehill Mob or the Juarez cartel had been known to have. There was no sign that this young man belonged to any of those gangs.

But every criminal he took in always had knowledge of the underworld worth knowing, and Batman preferred to get some of it out of them before they vanished into the justice system. “What’s your name?” he asked.

A moment of hesitation. “Hammad.”

“Hammad. Are you a Shukur?”

The young man was surprisingly honest. “Yes…yes, I am.”

“And you killed a man tonight?”

“Yes, I did.” Again, such surprising frankness. Batman rarely ever heard such from the punks he trounced.

“You’re very young. What’s the deal? Was it an initiation, or were you just out looking for a good time?”

“The punk insulted my mother last week,” Hammad said.

“So you saw fit to kill him?”

“He killed one of my brothers a year ago!”

Batman figured he probably meant a “blood brother” from his gang, or else just another man who shared his faith. The Shukurs were from all over the Golden Triangle, a hodgepodge of Muslims who weren’t extremists, but were part of the illicit drug trade stemming from parts of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran. Being a Muslim was a requirement in their vetting process, along with the solemn vows they took that ensured that they considered each other brothers-in-arms.

Batman pushed Hammad in a direction and told him to start walking. After they came out of the woods, he asked, “What was your brother doing that upset the man you killed?”

“My brother was one of the first of us here,” Hammad said proudly, staggering through the dark with his hands still cuffed behind his back. “We came to Gotham because nowhere else would accept us. Everywhere we went, we were mocked for our dress, or for the fact that we pray towards Mecca every day. We lived in Atlanta for a time, but some Baptists thought it would serve us good to have them come out and erect crosses all around us while we prayed—your freedom of assembly allows them to do this, but somehow didn’t protect our right to assemble in peace, despite the fact that my brother and I were both sworn citizens by then.”

It occurred to Batman that Hammad was actually talking about a true, familial brother. “That doesn’t explain why you killed a man.” He grabbed Hammad by the shoulder and shoved him towards Koltche’s Pharmacy. They could see the flashing lights of police cars a hundred yards away, they were gathered around the pharmacy.

“It doesn’t?” Hammad said. “I don’t know what would, then. The Shukurs were willing to help me and my brother, to challenge these close-minded fools—we never showed up at their churches. Well, not until the Shukurs encouraged that we do so. Perhaps we went too far, I concede to that now. We burned a church. No one was in it, but still, I knew it was wrong as soon as we were done. After that…I don’t know, we moved around a lot. We helped trade heroin in and out of the country, and then my brother and I got selected to be part of a kind of scouting party for Gotham City—we helped find the most vulnerable docks for importing the goods, out at Rogers Yacht Basin, with the help of Tony Zucco and his people. I guess we felt obligated to help the Shukurs, since they helped us push back in Atlanta.”

There’s Tony Zucco’s name cropping up again, Batman thought. “You’re very honest, Hammad. Very forthcoming.”

“Allah tells us we should never lie.”

“What does he say about killing other people?”

“There is some debate about that,” he said, pulling up short. He turned around, and faced the vigilante. “What you’re doing…I think it is good work. Don’t ever stop. There is a disease among us now, we all have it. It doesn’t matter what faith, or if you’re atheist or agnostic…we’ve all got it. I don’t know what it’s called, but it needs healing.”

There was little that could surprise the bat anymore, but having a criminal encourage him to continue on his journey of fighting crime had him taken aback.

“It’s all coming apart, isn’t it?” Hammad said. Then, before the bat could answer, he turned away and said, “I can walk the rest of the way alone. Anyway, it looks like somebody else needs you.” Hammad looked up to the sky, and Batman followed his gaze. The bat signal was beaming into the sky several miles off, on the northeast side of town.

“As-Salamu Alaykum, my brother. Stay strong. We need you. I don’t think the problems we’ve got can be solved by conventional methods anymore.” Hammad started walking towards the flashing blue lights. Batman started to follow him, but instead remained behind to watch him go. He zoomed in with his HUD and watched until Hammad had gone all the way up to one of the patrol cars at Koltche’s Pharmacy, and turned himself in. Befuddled at first by the handcuffs he already had on, the officers eventually placed him in the back seat, and drove away.

Batman realized he still had the pocket pistol. Later, he’d go to the crime scene and plant it so the GCPD could find the murder weapon.

He skulked the Bowery another forty-five minutes. He prevented a mugging in an alley a block away from the old Laddmann building, and nearly interceded on a fight between a pair of random punks and three Suns out at a car park where they all sat around getting drunk with their girlfriends, but the argument simmered down on its own, and Batman returned to where the Bat Hawk was parked.

As he stalked around the alleys and slinked from rooftop to rooftop, he couldn’t get Hammad’s words out of his head. There is a disease among us now, we all have it.

He returned to the chopper, wondering if Gordon would still be waiting on him. As the Bat Hawk slipped silently across the city towards Grant Park, the words of the Shukur thug followed him.

* * *

“WE’RE GOING TO set up a sting operation, and we want you in on it,” said Sarah, walking over to the apparition that had materialized at the other end of the alley behind Glen’s Bakery.

Gordon walked beside her, hoping that Sarah didn’t sound too forward for the bat. He and Batman still hadn’t had time to discuss this new arrangement with Sarah and the feds, or how it was going to affect what they had going on before the FBI had shown up. Gordon felt that Batman understood how desperate times called for desperate measures. It was, after all, desperate times that had created him.

“When and where?” the bat asked in his low, husky voice. He glanced towards the mouth of the alley and then cast his gaze up at the rooftops, no doubt searching for systems of surveillance that Sarah might have on him even then.

“Vincefinkel Bridge, two nights from now,” she said. “One of the guys from Parasyte is arranging it.” Sarah smiled and gave him one of her signature winks of confidence. “Nygma writes most of the virus and worm codes, but he used Parasyte to be a buffer between himself and the actual crime. That information you gave us was as solid as it gets. Thanks.”

“Here’s some more. The Shukurs have a presence out at Rogers Yacht Basin. I don’t know the extent of it yet, I only just found out about it tonight, but it sounds like they’re getting some help from Tony Zucco.”

“Good to know,” Gordon said. “We can set some undercovers on it. We’ve been looking for a way to make a case against Zucco, the docks might give us a good place to start.”

“First things first though,” Sarah said. “Nygma. We’re this close to tying a bow around the Riddle Killer, and I want him bad.”

“You and me both,” Batman said. He looked at Gordon. “What did you find at the silo at Parnes Industries? Any idea how he got in and used the system?”

“CCD seems to think that it was an infected USB key that somehow got switched for a real one,” Gordon said. “Who knows who brought it in, or where it started? Parnes’s tech guys are going through the system right now, trying to analyze the codes that allowed him access to the air mixers. They’re also going through the files of recently fired employees; maybe someone upset with Parnes uploaded the virus themselves.”

“What about the printer serial number I gave you?”

“Yeah, it came from a printer in X-Press Shipping, that copying and shipping business on Elanore Road,” the commissioner said. “Their security footage goes back for the last month, and Sarah’s people are scanning it now for anyone matching the description of Nygma we got from Oswald Cobblepot and Bruce Wayne.”

Sarah nodded. “And you won’t believe this, but they think they’ve already found a hit. In the footage, there’s an image of a guy fitting Nygma’s description and entering with a dark-green suit, just like the one Wayne said he saw him in at the Ball when he bumped into him, and just like Cobblepot described Nygma when he first met him.”

Batman didn’t say anything for a moment. Gordon had come to know the different kinds of silences the bat held, the way he knew the different kinds of silences his wife gave him whenever she was upset about something. “What is it?” he asked.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Batman said. “Why wear the same clothes? He’d only be drawing attention to himself. He’s been so cautious up until now.”

“Every criminal makes a mistake,” Sarah offered.

“Of course, they do,” Batman agreed. “But this is pretty blatant for Nygma. Cobblepot described him with a green jacket, and so did Wayne, and now he’s wearing it on security footage? That’s not like him. It isn’t careful. It isn’t smart.”

“Then what’re you thinking?”

Batman turned away from them, and walked off a few paces. He turned back around, but was facing the ground, as if answers lay there. After a minute he finally said, “It’s a ruse.”

“A ruse?”

He nodded. “You said he used Parasyte as a buffer between himself and the actual doing of his crimes. If he’s that careful on the Internet, wouldn’t he be just as careful—probably more so—whenever he was dealing with any physical transactions?”

Gordon nodded. “Perhaps.”

“Does that change much if it’s true?” Sarah asked.

“A little. I’d say it’s a good bet that whoever shows up at Vincefinkel Bridge in two days will not be Edward Nygma, just like the man wearing the green jacket in the security footage at X-Press Shipping probably wasn’t him, either.” Batman looked up at Gordon, then at Sarah. “The man we’re looking for separates himself from almost everything, he won’t be cozened by a standard law enforcement set-up or trick—he contacted Cobblepot to connect him to Calabria and Gutierrez, so he could hire them to do his work on the Tralleys. He arranged for Patrick Tralley to walk into the Muslim Center and blow himself up, but not before he delivered a riddle. He hired Parasyte to set up his hacker attacks. The only thing this man maybe does himself is set up these deathtraps.”

“So, who do you think will be at Vincefinkel Bridge for the dead drop?”

“Another middle man,” Batman said. “It’s how he works. Like any good hacker or criminal, he needs to keep his anonymity. But he likes taunting us with maybes, almosts, and possibilities. Still, it’s worth going through with, and I’ll be there if I can make it.” He looked at Sarah. “How’s the surveillance on the Iceberg Lounge going?”

She sighed. “Not so hot. We think Cobblepot’s security team does regular sweeps throughout the club and gets rid of the mics. Also, we think he keeps radio saturation tech in his walls—that’s not illegal technology to have, just expensive. Anyways, directional microphones don’t work on it from outside.”

“He must’ve added that after my visit, because I had no trouble when I went in there.”

“Yeah, well, tough luck for us, then. Our undercovers aren’t finding out much, either. Cobblepot stays upstairs on his own, and only people who are invited upstairs by him personally are allowed up there.” Sarah glanced at Gordon. “Which brings me to a very interesting subject. Mayor Walden was spotted going into his club about three hours ago. That’s the first time he’s ever been to the Lounge. One of our undercovers said that the rumor in the club tonight was that Walden got a personal invitation to go upstairs with Cobblepot. They saw him chatting up the mayor. They said Walden and his wife both came out looking like they’d seen a ghost.”

“This isn’t good,” Batman said. “If Walden really is as corrupt as you say, and if he’d somehow connected to the Penguin now, then why would Cobblepot risk bringing the mayor in there now? If your undercovers are right about Cobblepot’s security team sweeping the club for the microphones your people planted, then Cobblepot must know he’s being watched. Why risk it…unless he really needed to relay an important message to the mayor?”

Gordon ran a finger over his mustache. “Sarah just brought me up to speed on this,” he said. “There’s something going on here. Somebody’s making a move against…against all of us, I think. I know that sounds crazy, but there’s too many things now converging. The story about me in the news was a little timely, if you ask me, like a classic smear campaign, only it came at a time when a lot of dots are getting connected, like they know how close we are to nailing them all. Like I said, I know it sounds crazy, but…”

“That doesn’t sound crazy to me, Jimbo,” Sarah said. She looked at Batman. “You?”

“No. Too many coincidences. The Penguin helped Nygma and Calabria hook up. Cobblepot also connected Nygma to Parasyte. Cobblepot’s obviously dirty, and now he’s talking to the mayor of Gotham City, a man the feds already suspect of corruption.” He shook his head. “A major play is happening all around us. I’m starting to think Nygma and Cobblepot aren’t just acquaintances, and that Cobblepot didn’t just happen to have his contact information.”

Gordon thought he saw where this was going. “You think the Penguin and the Riddler are one and the same?”

“No,” he said. “Someone skilled definitely infiltrated Bruce Wayne’s home, and it wasn’t a short, overweight fellow.”

“They’re partners, then.”

“I think so.”

“But…Cobblepot gave us a description, one that fit the guy who bumped into Bruce Wayne at the Policeman’s Ball.”

“Another taunt. The Riddler is saying, ‘Come and get me, you’re not smart enough.’ It’s how he works; I’m really starting to understand that about him.”

Sarah nodded. “We’ll see how this dead drop at Vincefinkel Bridge goes, and then we’ll see about getting warrants to raid the Iceberg Lounge.”

“Not a bad idea,” Batman said. “But you said that your people saw Walden coming out of the nightclub looking shaken, so I’d move on this fast if I were you, Agent Essen. If they’re getting close to finishing their play, then it’s a race between us and them. We may have—” He paused in midsentence, and touched two fingers to his left ear. He looked up at both of them sharply. “Is there anything else urgent you need to tell me?”

Sarah looked at Gordon, and they both shrugged. “I guess that’s it for now. Why, are you getting—?”

The bat turned on his heels and walked away quickly. Within a few seconds, his dark-blue-and-gray gear caused him to melt into the shadows. He was gone as quickly and as quietly as he had arrived.

Sarah looked back at Gordon, puzzled. Gordon shrugged, though he had a pretty good idea what was going on. He had a police radio on his hip, and he’d turned the volume way down, but he could still hear the faint sound of dispatch calling all cars in the area. He took the radio off his hip, and turned the radio up so that he and Sarah could listen. “—repeat, a two-eleven in progress on the corner of Wilshire and Claire Eakes Road. Shots fired, at least one civilian reported down. Suspect vehicle is an armored van. Cars eighty-four and seventy-three are in pursuit. Suspects are heavily armed and considered extremely dangerous!”