Chapter 308: The Three Detectives (7)

Under the night sky, the Gotham Police Department office glowed with dim light; Gordon stood by the window, lighting a cigarette.

Behind him, Batman was organizing his gear at the desk; Gordon exhaled a plume of smoke and said, "To be honest, after all this time in Gotham, I've seen every kind of scumbag—robbers, murderers, drug addicts, traitors to friends, betrayers of family… but someone like Constantine? I've never seen anything like him."

"I admit, trying to save him is hard, but we can't just let him destroy himself—I can't stand by and watch a man kill himself."

"Even if you didn't say it, I'd be watching him."

Gordon turned his head, raised an eyebrow, and studied Batman. "True, you've been watching him closely. Why? Just because he's on probation?"

"Do you know why Schiller let him go?" Batman lowered his head, wiping the edge of his bat-thrower.

"He had full power to trap Constantine in a dream. Even if he didn't do that, he could've knocked him out and handed him to you, then let him face trial."

"Trial? With all due respect, even if he got a perfectly fair trial, the end result would just be a psychiatric ward. Look at him—do you really believe he's sane?"

"But I'm also confused—I don't think Schiller is the type who seeks trouble. He let such a big problem loose in Gotham—didn't he consider how much chaos he'd unleash?" Gordon said, puzzled.

"Clearly, he considered it—and knew it well. Do you think Constantine told the truth?"

"Hmm… he told most of it, at least about Lawrence. As for his part with the Dream God… forget it, I'll just assume he's insane…"

Batman's voice was as deep as the night outside the window; his hand paused slightly as he said, "His story holds together: Mrs. Sanchez, afraid she couldn't meet Cooper's demands, had him cover the shift. He sacrificed Cooper to a demon to create a doppelgänger. The doppelgänger then went to the boarding school and staged another murder, luring us there…"

"But he's hiding something important. Perhaps Schiller is waiting for him to slip up."

Gordon drew in smoke, exhaled slowly, and stared into Gotham's black night. "Now magic and demons have shown up—what's next? Angels and God?"

"Oh God!" Jason exclaimed. "What the hell happened? Where's Dick???"

He leapt down from the cellar door and stared at the wreckage inside his base. The lab table had been overturned, debris scattered across the floor. The new tool kit on the side workbench had fallen, spilling its contents. Worse still, two pools of blood lay in the center of the floor.

Jason turned to the little sneak who had just come down. "Someone broke in here! Dick's been kidnapped—we have to save him!!!"

Jason's eyes burned red. In these past days, he and Dick and the kids from the vocational school had become close friends. Now his friend had been kidnapped in his own base—Jason was frantic.

At that moment, the others waiting outside also jumped down, stunned by the brutal scene. Rocket spoke first: "This is clearly a kidnapping. Dick bled—he needs to be found fast."

Tire scanned the room, then said, "No—we're not good at this. Call Cobblepot. He's better at this kind of thing than all of us combined."

"I know his number—I'll call him!" Rocket climbed out of the cellar, mounted his motorcycle, and rode off to find a phone.

Night hung low; inside Cobblepot's gloomy old mansion, an unusual calm reigned. Since Mrs. Cobblepot's hospitalization, Cobblepot had lived alone in the old house. Though his new apartment was nicer, the old mansion's location near downtown was more convenient for moving between key sites.

Cobblepot slept soundly on his bed when the shrill phone rang. He awoke groggy—this phone hadn't rung in years. Since his father's death, no one had called this number.

Still, Cobblepot wiped his face, got out of bed, and went downstairs to answer. Jason's anxious voice came through: "Cobblepot! Come quick! Dick's been kidnapped!"

"Dick? Isn't he at boarding school? How could he get kidnapped?"

"Just come now—the situation is urgent!!"

When Cobblepot arrived at Jason's underground base and saw the chaos, he frowned. Jason told him: "Earlier, something happened at the boarding school where Dick stayed. We went to look for him and ran into danger—but reinforcements arrived in time, and we all made it out safe."

"Batman took us to one of his safehouses, but we felt uncomfortable there, so we left. By then we were exhausted. Dick didn't go back to his family's mansion in the southern rich district—he stayed here and slept with us."

"When we woke up, it was late. We decided to get something to eat. Since Dick didn't know the area, we left him here to guard the base while me and the little sneak went out to buy food."

"At the shop we usually go to, we ran into the others having late snacks. We bought food and planned to come back and eat together—but when we returned, Dick was gone. The place was wrecked like this… and there was blood on the floor."