Shiller still chose to go downstairs, trudging through the messy living room in his pajamas to the front door, where he took a look through the peephole.
Outside stood that old policeman, along with a familiar face to Shiller, Gordon's old partner at the police station, Harvey Block, still with his portly figure.
Shiller opened the door, looked at them, and said, "I'm afraid I don't have time for questioning right now, there's a whole lot of trouble waiting for me to deal with."
"We're not here to question you, Professor," said Block with a squint and a smile. He casually threw his extinguished cigarette butt into the nearby bin and pointed backwards with his hand.
Behind them, Shiller saw a strange large machine about half the height of a person, with a flexible hose extending from one intake and an attached vacuum cleaner head in the front.
"I've emphasized many times to those kids to wear shoe covers when entering someone else's house, but there's always some who don't listen," the old policeman said with an undertone: "Especially those new ones, they barge in carelessly."
"We can't let them make a mess like this," Block leaned against the porch pillar and said, "Otherwise, all the good image we've worked to build up will be wasted. But for now, we don't have much choice, we can only try our best to clean up after them."
Block patted the machine and introduced, "This is an industrial cleaning device, and we happen to have someone who can operate it. It can be used as a vacuum cleaner, a mop, and it seems it can also level soil and tidy up lawns."
"I know those newcomers have made a mess of things," the old policeman said. "We'll take care of cleaning your porch, Professor. The chaos inside your house is also our responsibility, but considering some of your collectibles may be of high value, it's not convenient for us to tidy it up, so you'll have to find a way yourself."
"We've got to stop by Principal Xi Wana's house later," Block said with a wink. "Those guys only took away the body, didn't even deal with the blood or the plastic sheeting that touched the body. If we don't clean it, his house is going to turn into the biggest source of stench on this street."
"Please step back, Professor." A head popped out from behind the machine, apparently ready to start working.
Shiller stepped back, Block relit a cigarette and said, "This machine is a bit noisy, so if it bothers you, just close the door and go upstairs."
"That won't be necessary," Shiller replied.
Once the machine started, the two circular brushes in the front began to spin wildly, and the dried footprints, mixed with blood and dirt, disappeared in an instant as the machine passed by, leaving the porch floor clean and tidy.
One person pushed the machine while another held the vacuum. The brushes underneath dealt with stubborn stains, while the vacuum sucked up dust and debris.
The efficiency of the machine was very high. A single pass left the porch floor spotless, and then they moved on to clean up the lawn.
About five or six minutes later, one of them came back to report, "We've cleaned up all the dirt and footprints on the lawn but some of the grass got trampled and seems it won't survive. Perhaps you could buy some grass seed..."
"There's a plant store in the community, once we finish cleaning up the principal's house we'll buy some and bring it over," Block said as he pushed off from the wall, extinguished his cigarette, and tossed it away, waving goodbye to Shiller, "Goodbye, Professor."
After they left, Shiller stood at the door for a while, seemingly unable to believe that a third of his big trouble had just been solved so easily; technology truly is power.
And before he tackled his main issue, he had one more thing to do, which was to write the invitations quickly and get them to everyone's home before dark, trying to ensure the guests wouldn't make the trip for nothing.
Shiller riffled through his drawers only to find that the remaining stationery and envelopes were not enough to send another batch of invitations; he picked up his pen, thought for a moment, put it down again, and took out his phone.
He would call Raven and ask her to take a detour on her way back from dinner, to stop at the post office and buy some envelopes, paper, and stamps. This way, he wouldn't hold her accountable for the mess she'd made in his house.
"Hello? Raven? It's like this, I..."
Raven didn't wait to reply, and another cluster of noise came through on the other end, it sounded like several kids were having a blast, Shiller shook his head lightly, sighed, and eventually hung up the phone.
He went upstairs to change clothes, preparing to take a trip to the post office himself if he didn't make it in time; otherwise, he would have to use Gray mist to deliver the letters.
The reason he didn't opt for the Gray mist approach first was that although it's efficient for doing work, it didn't allow for communication with others. Even in Gotham, a talking cloud of Fog would be quite the Shocker, not to mention engaging in pleasantries and small talk.
If he sent the mail via a postman, he could have the postman convey an apology to the guests; if he delivered it himself, he could explain what happened at his house to solicit the guests' understanding.
But with Gray mist, all he could do was throw the letters in the mailbox. After all, with all the surveillance cameras in Gotham, if he turned back into a human at someone's doorstep, he might give himself away.
While Shiller was changing clothes in the bedroom, he heard more commotion at the door followed by a series of knocks.
From the chattering noises downstairs, Shiller could tell it must be the Robins who had arrived, but there was clearly no time to put on a suit; if he didn't get down soon, they might just kick the door in.
So Shiller continued wearing his pajamas and went down the stairs, opened the door, and the Robins flooded in like a tide, starting to exclaim at everything they could lay their eyes on.
"Wow, Professor, is this the venue you're planning to use for the party? Is this some sort of disaster theme? It's so cool!" Jason began to take out his phone to take pictures.
"Oh, is that sculpture a Maori sculpture? I've heard of this style; they're indigenous people from Australia and New Zealand, I even saw a recent news report about their living conditions," Tim picked up the wooden carving and said.
Dick picked up the Batman puppet, his eyes filled with concern as he examined the large slash on its back and said, "What happened here? What scratched it?... Oh my, this thing is huge, my back aches."
Just as he finished speaking, he fell backward, and Raven hurried over to support him, only to end up with both of them collapsing onto the couch together.
Aisha was decidedly unapologetic as she sprinted and jumped into Shiller's arms, having grown quite a bit, almost too much for Shiller to catch her.
"Professor! The goodies!" Aisha began to shout.
Jason immediately rushed over and yanked her off Shiller, vigorously rubbing her head and saying, "I knew you were a blabbermouth! Didn't we agree to surprise the Professor?!"
"We brought some food," said Dick. "Packed from that restaurant, it'll surely be the star dish of tonight's party!"
"Yes, Professor, that restaurant is amazing," Tim said. "Their roast beef tendon and black vinyl ribs are just to die for! We made sure not to eat too much and packed a portion of their signature dish."
"I'm sorry, but today's housewarming party is canceled," Shiller said.
The atmosphere inside the room suddenly fell silent, and Dick cautiously asked, "What happened? Why is it canceled?"
"There was an accident," Shiller said, unsure how to explain.
"Actually, we still have some time before the evening party, so the best thing to do is to tidy up the house as quickly as possible. Even if we can't use the backyard, we can eat together inside or have a barbecue in the front yard."
The crux of the matter was that Shiller didn't feel he could clean up all the mess in such a short period.
The main reason Shiller had always been so lenient toward Merkel was that he knew just how hard these tasks were.
It wasn't that Alfred, like a Superman, could manage a huge manor alone without any flaws, so all butlers should be like him. In reality, keeping any area consistently clean and tidy is arduous work.
Some people think they are very tidy, but in truth, they only care about cleanliness by their own standards. If you asked them to clean up for someone else, many would not do a good job.
To achieve cleanliness that satisfies the objective sense and even some discerning employers, one must be constantly busy, cleaning over and over again.
Moreover, one must possess a special kind of labor wisdom, knowing what to do first and what next, what tasks can be combined for the highest efficiency, or else end up exhausted and still unable to clean properly.
So even though Merkel was not proficient at gardening, with everything he touched dying and occasionally damaging the manor's artworks, Shiller didn't fuss because essentially, he knew he wouldn't be any better himself. Anyone else might not do better than Merkel; Merkel seemed inadequate primarily because Alfred was exceptional.
But Alfred belonged to a class of his own, a cheat code for Batman, and couldn't be compared to ordinary people. Objectively, Merkel was already doing well.
Now without Merkel, Shiller was quite self-aware. He had hands and feet and could work; you could give him a whole day to tidy up slowly, but if you demanded the efficiency of life and death, the party didn't necessarily have to be held today.
But that reason was really hard to explain to Robin. After all, it looked like they were so hopeful, and for Shiller to say he couldn't tidy up the house, it would be too easy to be interpreted as just being lazy, which was so disappointing.
"Sorry, actually it's my fault," Raven said, retracting her head a bit, "I told you before, my powers are uncontrollable because of some things, I had an outbreak in this house, and I messed everything up."
"Then we just need to clean it up, right?" Dick looked around and said, "It doesn't seem too messy, not even as messy as Tim's room."
"What are you talking about?! My room is very clean, thank you very much! Jason's room is the messiest!" Tim said, raising his voice.
"My room is messy because I have a lot of stuff," Jason defended himself with conviction. "Plus, Alfred complimented me on being tidy before. To arrange a room with three large bookshelves to that extent is pretty good, okay?"
"Then it must be Aisha's room that's the messiest; I know I'm not the messiest one!"
"Aisha is not messy!" Aisha insisted, "Mum's room is the messiest, she never tidies up her jewelry! She's the messiest!"
"You can't talk about Selina like that," Dick immediately covered Aisha's mouth and said, "Be careful, or Bruce will give you trouble."
"Dad is messy, too! They are messy together! One morning I saw both their clothes on the floor..."
The three people rushed over quickly, all covering Aisha's mouth at once.
Raven tugged on the corner of her dress and spoke, "You bought me clothes and I still messed up your house, I'm really sorry. I can help clean up with telekinesis, but it might take some time."
Shiller began to ponder. With Raven's help, maybe they could be in time. But just then, Aisha suddenly wrinkled her nose and said, "What's that smell?"