Party and Umbrella (2)

By then, dusk was approaching. In Living Hell’s narrow corridors, the long, thin windows let through only a sliver of light, like a brush dipped in golden paint drawing a streak across the hall.

The light pierced sharply into the dark building, golden lines sweeping across Batman’s body as he moved through Living Hell’s corridors until he reached the scene of the crime.

When he first discovered the scene, his immediate reaction naturally had not been to call the police. No matter whether Gordon was a good cop or not, Batman did not trust the police at heart.

The reason he had done so was that there had been more than one person there: Fish, who was dead, and Oswald Cobblepot, who was alive. Batman was no illiterate. Seeing Cobblepot unconscious, muttering incoherently and twitching, he had guessed that he might have been suffering from a mental episode.

Batman had called Gordon to save him and had Gordon bring in the psychology expert Schiller. In all of Gotham, only Schiller’s expertise fit the case.

But now, it seemed he had saved the wrong person. Batman thought that Cobblepot was not an innocent bystander who had stumbled into the crime scene. He was very likely the mastermind behind Fish.

Batman had easily investigated Cobblepot’s background and learned that he was the minor boss who had risen to power after Kevin’s death. It was not hard to find out. In all of Living Hell, there were fewer people who could read a water meter than could be counted on one hand. Cobblepot had excelled at vocational school, so naturally he was one of them. And he had happened to appear at the scene of Fish’s death. Living Hell was so large; it could not possibly have been a coincidence.

As he entered the crime scene again, Batman examined his surroundings more carefully.

This was a small room in Living Hell’s North District. Like every room here, it was cramped and bizarrely laid out. Its only window faced west, and the setting sun now hung outside its frame.

This small room with the window served as the entire apartment’s living room. In a place this small, there was no need to worry about an entryway. Pushing open the door brought one straight into the living room.

A sofa stood against the wall on the left side of the living room, stained with a pool of blood. Batman did not care that the crime scene had been disturbed. His exceptional memory had preserved every detail from before, and in his vision, Fish’s corpse returned to the sofa.

Her body lay on the side of the sofa closer to the door, her head resting against the backrest. She had been shot in the left temple. Blood had spattered across the right side of the sofa, with some drops on the floor to the right as well. Her entire body leaned to the right, clearly showing that she had been killed by a single shot while seated on the sofa.

Batman turned and looked to his right. Cobblepot also appeared in the room, collapsed beneath the windowsill, his teeth chattering incessantly and his limbs still twitching.

Batman moved farther inside and stood in the center of the room. Then, within his vision, time in the room began to flow backward. The bloodstains on the floor and sofa rose into the air and returned to Fish’s head. A bullet spun backward out of Fish’s skull. Fish sat upright and returned to the state of being alive, while the bullet stopped beside her left temple.

Cobblepot also rose like a puppet on strings, standing hunched before the window and facing Fish.

Batman stepped over the coffee table and approached Fish, then leaned close to the left side of her face and stared at the bullet.

When he had examined Fish’s body in the morgue, Batman had discovered that the bullet had entered her temple with remarkable precision. Judging from the wound, the angle of entry had been perpendicular to her temple.

In an instant, Fish vanished. Batman sat on the sofa, and the bullet that had killed Fish stopped beside his head.

Time began to flow. The bullet spun into Batman’s temple, blood spraying over the sofa and floor.

Another Batman rose from the sofa and knelt on one knee to inspect the bloodstains. He found that this truly was Fish’s primary death scene. Her body had not been moved, and the pattern and range of the blood spatter were both reasonable.

Having confirmed that this was the scene of death, Batman turned, and time returned to one second before Fish was shot. Fish appeared on the sofa again.

Batman walked behind her. From his angle, Cobblepot in front of the window disappeared.

Suddenly, Batman turned his head to the left and saw Cobblepot standing beside Fish, before the door leading from the living room to the bedroom. He held a gun with a vicious expression and aimed it at Fish.

In an instant, Batman appeared in Cobblepot’s place and grabbed the gun floating in midair after Cobblepot disappeared. He muttered to himself, "No."

At that moment, Fish turned her head, looking shocked and furious.

"With only two people in the room, Cobblepot couldn’t possibly hide his movements from Fish. The moment he raised the gun, Fish would definitely look at him."

Batman pulled the trigger. The bullet struck Fish in the center of her forehead rather than her left temple.

He let go, returned to the middle of the living room, and Cobblepot appeared again. As time rewound, the bullet returned to Cobblepot’s gun.

Then Cobblepot’s figure backed up several steps like a film playing in reverse, retreating into the bedroom. The bedroom door slammed shut with a bang.

Batman walked over and opened the door again. He found that it opened inward into the bedroom, with its hinges on the left.

Batman entered and stood where Cobblepot had stood. With his left hand, he pulled the doorknob and, the instant the door opened, raised his gun with his right hand and fired. Fish noticed nothing and did not turn her head. In an instant, the bullet entered her temple.

But Batman shook his head again.

The only reason this deduction worked was because the shooter was him—Batman.

The door opened inward. To open it, one had to grip the handle and pull it inward. To open the door and fire at the same instant, it was impossible to hold the gun with both hands.

If the shooter were Batman, he could indeed pull open the door instantly, then hold the gun in one hand and fire a bullet precisely into Fish’s temple. But that was because he was Batman.

If the shooter had been anyone but Batman, firing one-handed while ignoring recoil, then completing the sequence of aiming, firing, and hitting accurately in an instant would already have been extremely difficult.

Moreover, the hinges were on the left side of the door, which opened first from the right. Thus, the fastest motion would be to pull the handle with the left hand and fire with the right the instant the door opened. But Batman had already examined Cobblepot and found that his right arm was fractured, and it was not a recent injury.

For someone so slight, with no professional training and a fractured dominant arm, it would be difficult to complete the actions of opening the door, raising the gun, aiming, and firing within two seconds.

Even if he could do it, he could not possibly avoid attracting Fish’s attention completely. At the very least, he could not have denied Fish even the chance to turn her head.

One Batman stood in Cobblepot’s position, aiming a gun. Another sat on the sofa. A third stood in the middle of the room. A fourth stood on the windowsill. A fifth surveyed the bedroom, while a sixth stood at the doorway, staring at everything…

Countless Batmans crowded the tiny crime scene. At times, they stood motionless; at others, they moved along different timelines.

Bullets flew from guns, rippling the air, then quickly retreated into their barrels. The room’s light shifted from bright to dark, then dark to bright. Muzzle flashes flickered and flickered again. Dark figures left countless afterimages throughout the room. In this quiet dusk, the solitary Batman threw himself a lively party.

Before long, Batman had investigated nearly every trace of activity in the small room. He tested every possibility, then ruled out most methods of murder: Cobblepot launching a surprise attack from every possible angle, Fish being drugged unconscious, tied up, and restricted from moving, and so on.

From all the evidence, one thing could be confirmed: Fish had entered this room completely unharmed, then sat on the sofa. Cobblepot had entered behind her, and he could not have attacked her without drawing her attention.

But that did not mean Cobblepot was not the murderer.

Batman returned everything to the beginning and stood in the middle of the living room, looking around.

The entire scene became a model room sitting on a tabletop. A giant hand pinched the model of a black figure and placed it in the bedroom.

Above the room model, Batman lowered his head and stared down at the entire scene with intense concentration. Under his gaze, the room gradually enlarged again. The Batman standing in the middle of the living room walked into the bedroom and looked at the black figure model.

If a third party were added to this murder, everything became perfectly logical.

Time began to rewind again. The bedroom door closed, and Cobblepot stood opposite Fish, before the window.

Fish still sat on the sofa, waving her arms as though furiously berating Cobblepot. Cobblepot craned his neck and retorted hysterically, thoroughly enraging Fish.

With all her attention fixed on Cobblepot, Fish did not notice the bedroom door, which had not been shut completely, quietly opening. Then came a gunshot. Blood splattered, and Fish collapsed onto the sofa.

No, that still was not perfect, Batman thought. Even if Cobblepot had drawn Fish’s attention, she was vigilant enough that she might still have noticed the bedroom door opening.

Batman changed his approach. He thought that if he were the murderer, he would not make a plan like this—hoping Fish would fail to notice the Assassin and would not resist. It was not reliable.

Fish had not reached her current position by luck. She was a capable fighter, quick to react, and an accurate shot. That was why she had survived one gunfight after another and become a boss.

If she fought back, even a professional Assassin might come out worse for it. Anyone who knew Fish would not devise such a plan.

That left only one possibility. Batman said quietly, "An acquaintance working with an accomplice."

Batman stood at one side of the room and saw two figures inside, talking with Fish. At first, both stood directly in front of Fish, and neither carried a weapon.

Soon, Cobblepot drew Fish’s attention with a few words, while the other black figure used the excuse of getting something to move to Fish’s side.

Cobblepot began arguing with Fish, and Fish’s attention was completely drawn to him.

In an instant, time stopped. Batman replaced the black figure standing beside Fish. He reached into his coat pocket, found the pistol, drew it, raised his hand, and fired. With a bang, blood sprayed out, and Fish fell at once.

The distance was close and the firearm was suitable, making the shot extremely accurate.

In an instant, everything returned to reality. Only blood, dried black on the sofa, remained, and Batman was the only person left in the room.

He was alone, but he did not feel lonely at all. He looked utterly relaxed as he sat on the sofa, leaned back against it, and even closed his eyes, like a happy drunk who had just returned from a party.

Only when the sun’s final ray sank beneath the horizon did the entire room fall completely dark. Darkness swallowed Batman’s figure, and at some unknown moment, the bat who had thrown a party for himself disappeared from the room.