The nurse nodded, and Shiller stood up, straightened the hem of his suit, gently dusted off his cuffs, and said, "Lead the way."
Two minutes later, Rhomann sat emotionless across from Shiller. He scoffed and said, "Didn't you say you were referring me to Doctor Brand? Weren't you supposed to have said goodbye yesterday?"
"Yesterday indeed marked the last time you would see him," Shiller leaned back in his chair, resting his hands on the armrests, "But I hope today won't be your last time seeing me."
"What do you mean?" Rhomann got up irritably, "Are you trying to hand me off to another doctor? Are you here to insult me?!"
"What I mean is, if you do not sit back down right now, this might be the last time you see the world."
Rhomann felt as if he'd been doused with ice water. Meeting Shiller's gaze, he saw only coldness and mockery. Shiller said calmly, "Even in the most professional psychiatric hospitals, it is inevitable that patients will have violent episodes and hurt themselves, isn't it?"
"You want to kill me?!"
"Not me." Shiller remained seated, hands folded in front of him, looking at Rhomann, "Haven't you noticed your security guard often reading the newspaper?"
Rhomann, frozen in the middle of the room, clueless about where Shiller was going with this, listened as Shiller lowered his gaze, "Your security guard was once a notorious Ripper in Nevada. The nurse who brought me in is known as the Heart-Digging Demon in her hometown of Ontario. The cleaner lost his last job because he violated a corpse in the morgue. The gardener who passes by your window every day and greets you has beheaded at least twenty people with his gardening shears."
Rhomann's mouth opened slightly, corners of his lips turned down. His eyes bulged as if ready to pop out of their sockets. As he met Shiller's serious gaze and focused expression, his face pallor began to deepen.
"Serial killers with less academic aptitude have been locked away in Florence ADX Supermax Prison. Those who manage to evade capture and find their way here face quite a crowd. The pickings are rich here, sir"
Shiller sighed softly, shifted slightly in his seat, and asked, "When the nurse asked me yesterday if she should grant you some 'privileges', did you think she meant giving you more medication to keep you calm?"
"She was just asking if, before keeping you permanently quiet, she should give you a bit more medication to ease your suffering."
Rhomann's jaw began to tremble as he thought back to more details. His cellmate had disappeared last week, and he'd smelled something bloody during his sleep, but saw nothing by morning. The nurse and security guard told him that his neighbor had just been discharged.
"This place is a hunting ground," Shiller's voice carried an echo of emptiness, as if coming from a great distance.
"Batman has established a hunting ground for all serial killers. This is the supreme court for all serial killers. Every player who can escape and find a way, gets a ticket to the Hall of Fame."
"There are only hunters here, no prey. All of us, myself included, follow a rule of killing that only we understand. What we need to do is survive or start a hunt of slaughter for our own interest."
"Now tell me, Mr. Sionis, what is your rule of killing?"
Rhomann was shaking all over. He fell back into the chair, hugged his arms, and shaking his head said, "I don't know what you're talking about. What on earth is going on?"
When he looked into Shiller's eyes, the cold calm there somehow sobered him up a bit, and so he stammered out a question, "What, what is the rule of killing?"
"Under what circumstances would you kill someone?"
"I..." Rhomann took a few deep breaths in an attempt to quiet his scattered thoughts, but he found the question impossible to answer.
"Let me rephrase it, under what circumstances would you be angry enough to want to kill someone?"
Rhomann looked at Shiller. It took him about ten seconds before he answered, "When someone ignores me."
Shiller nodded and said, "Okay, remember this, when someone ignores you, you go and kill them."
"Are you inciting me to kill?" Rhomann asked incredulously.
"I'm just telling you the rules here. If you don't comply, then others will recognize you as prey rather than a hunter."
"How will they know what rules I follow?"
"Never let them know."
Shiller stood up, and as he approached the door, Rhomann rushed over and grabbed the railing, watching his retreating figure and asking, "What are your rules? Under what circumstances would you kill?"
"I am just an ordinary person. I don't kill."
With that, Shiller pushed the door open and walked out. He glanced left and right down the corridor, and upon hearing a series of familiar footsteps belonging to Mrs. Miller, he reentered the room until the footsteps faded away before exiting once more.
In Victor's lab, Bruce looked at Victor's face and said, "You want me to crack this... equation?"
Bruce continued to stare at the string of symbols, an incredulous expression on his face. Victor's eyes gleamed as he said, "Of course, one week should be enough time, right?"
"I..."
At this point, there was a knock on the door. Victor turned to see his wife Nora standing at the door. Before he could say anything, Nora walked in and put a stack of papers on the desk and smiled at Bruce.
"I've read the paper you submitted last week. Oh, Victor, you don't mind, right? There are a few points I'd like to discuss with Bruce, especially his views on the space applications of dense ice. I think it's very forward-looking."
After speaking, Nora turned to Bruce and said, "I think you should delve deeper into that area, submit a paper to the Nature Journal first, and then I will help you get in touch with NASA engineers."
"I don't have time to write papers," Bruce said, frowning.
"What are you going to do then?" Nora asked somewhat curiously. Victor gently tugged his wife and said, "Aisha is starting elementary school, he hasn't checked out schools yet."
"Oh, I see. I won't take up any more of your time then. You can take the kids to look at schools now. Can the drafts of the paper be handed in tomorrow afternoon, will that be okay?"
Bruce sat there, looking at the expressions of the Friess couple, feeling rather absurd and somewhat lost.
Bugged by the kids, scolded by dad, bank card frozen, being forced into overtime, and now being chased for papers by his professor.
Is this the life of Batman he had been dreaming of???