Gotham 1987 (Part 2)

By afternoon, just as the weather forecast in the newspaper had said, a light rain began to fall over Gotham.

Schiller sat in the manor’s study, the sound of rain outside the window like the finest sleeping draught.

On the somewhat cluttered desk, stacks of books cast rippling shadows beneath the wall lamp. Reflections from the ink bottle and Schiller’s lenses seemed especially bright in the dim room as he held a fountain pen and wrote invitations in elaborate, ornate English script.

Customs were nearly the same everywhere in the world. When you moved house, you always had to invite friends and relatives over for a visit. Schiller planned to invite the few friends he had in Gotham over for dinner that weekend.

The rain outside grew heavier. Damp air seeped through the gaps in the windows, and in the lamplight, tiny wisps of moisture could be seen drifting down onto the desk. Before long, many tiny droplets had formed on the section near the windowsill, reflecting the fireplace behind them like little rubies.

The sky gradually darkened. Colder mist than during the day frosted the glass white. Schiller put down his pen, rubbed his wrist, and looked up.

From this angle, Gotham as a whole did not look particularly different. Yet Gotham in the rain was not only gloomier, but quieter as well, carrying an oddly rare sense of leisure.

No matter what, cities in the 1980s moved far more slowly than they would in the later information age. Schiller wrote letters all afternoon and did not leave the study until the servant came to remind him that dinner was ready.

After dinner, Schiller dressed, took an umbrella, and left the house. By then, the rain that had fallen over Gotham all afternoon had stopped, leaving only cold, damp air that stung the lungs and still hung over the city.

Puddles on the ground looked like mercury mirrors in the darkness, reflecting streetlamp light into golden fragments like fallen leaves left behind by last autumn. When Schiller’s heel stepped into one, that gleam vanished amid faint ripples and splashing droplets.

And just like everywhere else in the world, when you moved house, you had to pay your neighbors a visit.

Security here was fairly good, because anyone who could afford to live in and maintain a manor like this was either rich or noble. Though it was no longer as prosperous as the southern Affluent Area, the declining old district had its own slow-paced, old-fashioned charm.

A street away from Schiller’s manor stood an opera house. Few troupes came here to perform anymore, so it had become a club for the residents of the district.

Schiller reached the theater entrance. The attendants here were clearly not very professional; they only came forward to open the doors after Schiller had already climbed the steps. He removed his hat and walked inside.

Though it was a cold, rainy night outside, the theater was warm. A layer of mist clouded Schiller’s glasses. He took them off, walked to the front desk, and lightly tapped the counter.

The supervisor, who had been dozing, startled awake. Seeing someone before him, he sat up straight and asked, "Do you have a reservation?"

"I’m the new resident who bought Viscount Manor. Put all drink purchases here tonight on my tab. God bless everyone."

The supervisor immediately became enthusiastic. "So it’s you. I only received word yesterday that the largest Viscount Manor had a new owner. Your taste is truly exceptional. Only such a luxurious manor is worthy of a generous gentleman like you."

"Don’t worry. Once everyone comes out later, they’ll all know you’re an approachable gentleman."

Listening to the endless stream of flattery from the supervisor, Schiller quietly placed a roll of dollar bills beneath the bell. The supervisor immediately said, "Please don’t mind this building’s appearance. After all, this is Gotham’s oldest theater. A little wear and tear is only natural, but our service is guaranteed to be the very best…"

As Schiller descended the theater steps, he looked back at what might have been Gotham’s oldest theater. It was covered in the marks of time. Many years ago, one famous troupe after another had performed here, and countless actors had taken its stage, one after another.

But now, it had become utterly deserted. Its aged facade was like a stone monument recording Gotham’s history, carved with the marks left by wind, frost, rain, and snow. Perhaps those marks were more wonderful than all those fabricated dramas, yet few were willing to look at them anymore.

By the time Schiller returned to the manor, it was already late, but there were still things he had not finished writing the previous night.

Thanks to this still relatively slow-paced era, Schiller did not need to guard against barrages of text messages or phone calls. He had ample time to read slowly, search through paper materials for the knowledge he needed, and then write it down on paper with his fountain pen.

Suddenly, there was a soft sound behind him. Without turning around, Schiller said, "When Gordon came to visit, at least he brought a gift. What about you, uninvited bat?"

Batman’s shadow was cast into layers by the wall lamp. He said, "I’ll bring one during the day."

"Gordon is getting married soon. Aren’t you going to give him a gift as that spandex freak? He is your partner, after all."

"I have no gift to give." Batman’s tone was always deep and level. In the late-night room, it made people feel drowsy.

"Then what did you come here for?"

"To congratulate you on moving into your new home."

"I imagine you toured every room in this manor before I did. If nothing unexpected happened, you probably even got hold of the architectural blueprints through some means."

Batman did not answer. He seemed to have tacitly admitted it. He never avoided displaying this excessively cautious, suspicious-of-the-whole-world personality in front of Schiller.

"Did you read today’s paper? Did you see the news about the Iron Curtain?"

"That has nothing to do with me."

"This concerns the whole world."

"It won’t make Gotham any better, and it won’t make it any worse."

Then both of them fell silent. Only the scratch of Schiller’s fountain pen on paper echoed through the quiet room late at night. After a while, Batman said, "Those people from Metropolis should have come to kill you."

"Then let them come. Or do you think Gotham people would be afraid of Metropolis people?"

Batman fell silent again.

"I’m guessing you argued with your butler, didn’t you?"

Batman did not answer, but Schiller continued on his own. "There was once someone like that, who went racing in the middle of the night because he’d argued with his dear ‘butler.’"

"What were they arguing about?"

"Because that person had not decided whether he wanted to marry his butler."

Batman fell silent once more.

"I’m guessing your butler felt terrible about you being injured, but he also did not want to stop you from continuing the work you loved. So he could only swallow those emotions himself."

"But you noticed that he seemed sad. You did not want to stop your work, but you also did not want him to be sad."

"All that extraordinary intelligence and meticulous logic of yours were useless at a time like this, so you could only come racing out in the middle of the night."

"Let me guess. That new Batmobile you built is parked outside my house, and even now, its overheated engine has not cooled down."

"Does telepathy really exist in this world?"

"Stop asking stupid questions."

"If it does, can you tell me what Alfred is thinking?"

"You’re much more straightforward than that person. Though that makes sense. What troubled him was not only family affection, but love as well."

"Love… the most unfathomable thing. I offered to tell him the answer, but he refused."

Batman’s gaze fell on the ring on Schiller’s ring finger. He asked, "You’re married? Your wife did not come to Gotham with you?"

"Looks like you don’t really want that answer either."

Schiller said, "Then leave. You might as well go ask Gordon to take you in. If you stay here, you’ll only get answers you don’t want to hear."

Batman said, "This manor is indeed very nice. It has thirty-six rooms. You sleep in the east master bedroom upstairs. That leaves thirty-five rooms."

"I’m not giving you a key."

"I don’t need a key."

Schiller pressed a finger to his brow and said, "But what if you stay out all night and your butler comes looking for me?"

"Why do you seem more afraid of him than you are of me?"

"It’s hard to explain, but I really am worried about your butler coming to my door."

Seeing that Batman still refused to give up, Schiller could only say helplessly, "Fine. If you want to stay the night, I need your guardian’s permission. Go call him now. I have to hear him agree before I can let you stay here."

Batman: "…"

"The phone is downstairs. Either go dial it or get out."

In the end, Batman compromised. Whenever matters involving his butler came up, he always acted like a child, much like Stark when he dealt with Pepper.

Schiller did not mind Batman staying the night. He did not really mind Batman investigating his new home from top to bottom either. It was bound to happen sooner or later. If eighteen-year-old Batman did not investigate, then twenty-eight-year-old or thirty-eight-year-old Batman certainly would. Nothing in Gotham could escape the bat’s eyes. Schiller was not Joker; he had no time to play hide-and-seek with Batman every day.

After a while, Schiller finished writing his paper. It was already deep into the night. Outside, the darkness was impenetrable, with only puddles gathered from rainwater reflecting distant lights.

Soon, the servant informed him that the phone was ringing. Schiller picked up the receiver. Batman stood in the darkest corner of the living room, listening to him speak.

"Yes, that’s right… It’s no trouble. Yes, I understand. They’re always like this. I’ve seen quite a few before…"

"Is that so? Then it is rather serious… I have a professional First Aid Kit here… Oh, is that so? You truly are a responsible butler…"

"I don’t think it matters…" Schiller looked up at Batman. For some reason, Batman suddenly felt his heart rise and fall, like a student trembling after the school called for his guardian, desperately trying to infer from the teacher’s scattered words just how angry that guardian would be.

"Very well, please rest assured… No problem. Then that’s settled… Tomorrow morning, is it?… I think so. All right… Goodbye."

Schiller saw Batman open his mouth as if he wanted to ask something, but in the end, he asked nothing.

Schiller said, "Your butler said you were injured, though he should have already treated you."

Then he glanced at the grandfather clock beside him and said, "It’s too late now. Your butler said you should be asleep before nine. You’re already more than three hours late. Take the key and go upstairs."

"I don’t need a key."

With those final words, Batman disappeared. Schiller shook his head and went upstairs as well.

Schiller already knew Batman’s true identity, so Batman did not do something like sleep in that Bat-armor. When Schiller knocked on his door, Bruce was wearing pajamas.

Normally, when Batman was serious, all anyone could see was his chin. But now, Bruce’s temperament was completely different from usual. This was Batman with his entire face exposed.

But it did not help much. When he heard Schiller warn him that Alfred hoped he would return in time for breakfast the next morning, he still showed a rather conflicted and complicated expression.

"I advise you to go back. If he comes looking for you, I absolutely will not help you. You should know that teachers always stand on the same side as guardians."

Seeing that Bruce still seemed reluctant, Schiller had to threaten him further. "If I really see Alfred tomorrow, I’ll have no choice but to discuss your academic performance with him. You barely passed this semester’s final exams, but your ranking was below the middle. More importantly, you failed to submit your assignments six times in a single semester, and more than half of them did not even meet the word count."

"I kept every assignment you handed in. If you don’t want your butler to see your incomprehensible essays and academic garbage that serves no purpose except polluting other people’s brains, you’d better go to sleep immediately. Then get up early tomorrow morning and return to Wayne Manor."

Before Bruce could say anything, Schiller slammed his bedroom door shut with a bang.

That night, Bruce lay in bed, thinking over everything that had happened recently.

Thanks to Schiller’s brilliantly inventive industrial chain, gang conflicts had become frequent lately, and Batman’s work had started growing more difficult.

During the day, he was busy conducting all kinds of investigations at the hospital, trying to unravel the tangled relationships between the gangs. At night, he had to keep watch over the sites of their various shootouts to prevent them from going too far and causing widespread collateral damage.

The police had grown considerably stronger after obtaining heavy weapons, but that did not mean the gangs had no ways to counter them. If the police used heavy firepower to suppress them, the gangs naturally sought even fiercer firepower to resist. Back and forth, the scale of the conflict kept escalating. This meant Batman had been dragged into increasingly violent firefights before he had time to upgrade his equipment.

As a result, the Bat-armor originally designed to withstand handgun bullets and bladed weapons could not protect him from the machine-gun fire and grenades of gang shootouts.

Several nights ago, Batman had been struck by a machine-gun round. This kind of damage could not compare to that of a handgun bullet. Each machine-gun bullet was as long as a palm. Fortunately, Batman had only been grazed in the shoulder. If that round had struck him solidly, half his lung might have been completely destroyed.

Even so, it had caused him an extremely serious injury. It could be said that it was the worst injury he had suffered since beginning his career as Batman.

By the time he returned to Wayne Manor, he was already barely conscious. The fact that he could still make it back to Wayne Manor on his own awareness had been enough for his superhuman willpower to save his life.

Bruce had long known that he was not very sensitive to certain painkillers and anesthetics. He often woke up in the middle of being anesthetized, and this time had been no different. Half asleep and half awake during the operation, he saw Alfred sitting alone beside the operating table.

He found it difficult to describe Alfred’s expression at that moment. It clenched the heart that had scarcely beaten violently in so many years.

He suddenly realized that Alfred had become different from the man in his memories. He had aged greatly, and compared to when Bruce’s parents had still been alive, he seemed much more despondent.

Only then did he realize something: the deaths of Mr. and Mrs. Wayne had not hurt him alone.

And perhaps when Alfred realized that he might have to endure the same pain once again, he had aged even more.

Bruce lay in bed, tossing and turning. His mind was filled with the image of Alfred that he had seen through his haze.

What saddened him even more was that after he woke from the operation, Alfred had said nothing. He had not stopped Bruce from doing anything. He had simply prepared breakfast as usual, just like on the countless mornings when Bruce had awakened from nightmares.

Sitting at the dining table, Bruce could barely swallow anything. He was Batman, but he was still human. Few people could calmly eat after facing such an overwhelming emotional impact.

So he only took a few hurried bites before fleeing Wayne Manor as though he were running away.

In fact, Gordon’s place had been the first place he went. He had simply arrived just as Gordon was driving to Schiller’s house.

He followed Gordon the entire way. Batman had even watched the whole conversation they had in the restaurant from outside the window.

He had also seen Schiller sit alone in a chair and smoke an entire cigar.

That version of the professor felt unfamiliar to him. He had never seen Schiller like that before. He looked relaxed, yet also cold and sharp. Though Schiller often appeared stern at school, this was entirely different.

It was like another person, a stranger.

He thought that perhaps the professor he had known before had merely been a disguise as well, just like his own.

Two madmen in this mad city played their respective roles, taking the stage in the most ordinary social identities imaginable and playing a teacher and student troubled by the trivialities of daily life.

Perhaps this was not Pride and Prejudice, but An Actor Prepares.

In Gotham’s ruined, decaying theater, corroded by time, and on Gotham University’s stage, the first act of this absurd drama seemed strange and ridiculous.

The first teacher Batman met on his first day of school was a teacher who seemed strict and old-fashioned, someone who looked as though he did not want to trouble himself at all. Yet during a psychological consultation with no apparent motive, he gave Batman the answer he wanted most.

And after one drama after another had drawn to a close, the two actors themselves had finally met beneath the stage.

Setting aside their social identities, the stories that made up these absurd dramas were no coincidence. Madmen always attracted madmen, and strange people often encountered strange people. It was merely another manifestation of birds of a feather flocking together.

Bruce lay in bed as heavy drowsiness overtook him. Half asleep and half awake, he heard the dull sound of the pendulum downstairs in the manor, permeating every corner of his dream.

And apart from that, on this cold night in Gotham, 1987, all that could be heard was the nearly imperceptible sound of wind and the fireplace burning without rest through the night.

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