After the afternoon tea had ended, everyone else had left, leaving only Batman and Shiller sitting at the table. Batman gazed at the leftover food on the table, silent and motionless.
"I don't want to say anything like 'I told you so,' but if you think that sprinkling Holy Water into the food without detecting any abnormality means you can rest easy, then I will not spend any more energy on your safety."
"What did you tell Barbara?" Batman asked, looking at Shiller. "And why provoke Tim to cause trouble for Barbara and Dick?"
"I thought you heard it."
"I just didn't understand it."
Shiller seemed somewhat surprised by his bluntness but still tapped his fingertip lightly against the rim of his teacup before saying, "I will adopt an even simpler security measure."
He dipped his finger into the tea and began writing on the tabletop.
"Assuming that vampires naturally stand on the same side, let's divide everyone here into two factions and set them against each other. If we take one side…"
"Then there's a fifty percent chance that our side doesn't have any vampires, and a fifty percent chance that all the vampires are with us."
Batman's brow furrowed slightly, as if he had guessed something.
"If there are no vampires on our side, then the vampires would have to confront half of the Batman Family plus us. If all the vampires are on our side, then, to win our trust and to confront the other half of the Batman Family, the vampires would at least temporarily stand with us."
"This is a matter of influence," Batman said. "When they start fighting each other, they will both try to secure our support, regardless of whether they are vampires or not."
"Exactly," Shiller said. "The fact that the vampires haven't resorted to violence immediately means that they still need to stay undercover."
"Without enemies and with everyone united, they can stay quiet, only influencing events at critical moments and then cleanly shifting the blame afterward."
"But once there's a faction that constantly opposes them, they need to gain the upper echelons' trust to increase their influence. Otherwise, if the higher-ups trust the other faction, their influence decreases, making it impossible to lead the team at critical moments, and thus, staying undercover becomes meaningless."
"So you deliberately split the Batman Family," Batman said. "You look less like a surgeon and more like a sociologist."
"Everything I've done is to force the traitor to act," Shiller said. "Exposing your weaknesses naturally provides them with a target, making them believe they don't need to hide for much longer and that an opportunity to act will arise soon."
"Having the Robins split into factions is to make the traitor feel insecure about their position, thinking they might lose your trust and, subsequently, their chance to act, prompting them to find other ways to win you over."
"Once he takes the initiative to contact you, as the one who knows his children the best, wouldn't you be able to see who is the dry biscuit?"
Shiller suddenly leaned forward, staring into Batman's eyes and said, "Or are you actually prepared to make a decision but unwilling to admit that your most beloved child has betrayed you and want to give him a chance?"
The teacup hit the floor. Batman turned his head away to call for Alfred. Shiller resumed a relaxed posture, sighed softly, and said, "You know there will be one, hoping this one will repent, you are destined to lose a second, a third…"
"Enough." There wasn't much anger in Batman's tone, but rather a warning. He said, "Do not try to interfere with the Batman Family's affairs. Just prepare for the surgery."
After Batman had left, Shiller quietly sat in his chair for a while, pretending not to notice the figure eavesdropping behind the porch. After retrieving the ironed clothes from Alfred, he went upstairs.
Returning to his room, it wasn't five minutes before there was a knock on the door.
Shiller smiled slightly. The Robins were clever, just not yet mature enough. If one of them were turned into a vampire, aiming to deal a lethal blow to Batman, then it likely was just betting that Batman would be softhearted.
In a head-to-head confrontation, they had no chance of winning.
Shiller sighed lightly, but the person standing outside the door was somewhat unexpected—it was Dick.
Shiller dropped his eyelids as fast as possible, concealing the surprise in his eyes, and invited Dick inside.
"I didn't expect you to come," Shiller said cryptically. Meanwhile, he subtly touched the Cross in his pocket as he turned around but didn't actually take it out.
He turned to pour Dick some tea.
"I'm very worried about Batman," Dick said. "And at this very moment, he has a surgery that cannot be delayed."
"Are you also worried about a vampire infiltration?"
"I do not believe any external force could breach the Batcave."
"Do you think you could be breached from the inside?"
"The Batman Family has always been united."
"Until I came along?"
Dick stood up, reached into his chest, and handed a small, forearm-length cross to Shiller.
"You suspect that I'm a vampire?" Shiller asked, looking at Dick.
"I'm giving you a chance to prove yourself, after all, you didn't touch anything at the tea this afternoon."
"It seems you already know what was put in the food."
"Yes, and I ate half a piece of cake and drank an entire cup of tea."
"That still doesn't prove you're not one, kid. You want me to prove it to you, but the assurances you're making for me may not be that credible either."
"I'm not here to vouch for you; I'm just making sure Batman's safe. That's what I should do as his assistant."
"His assistant is Robin, and you are Nightwing." Shiller walked over to his opposite side, bent down unhurriedly to set down the teacup, then stood straight to look at Dick, saying, "On the night you were determined to head for Brude Haven, did you think about what you were supposed to do?"
The hand holding the cross tightened instantly as Dick furrowed his brow deeply and his chest began to heave, feeling a knife stabbing at his own heart.
This was a topic the Batman Family had tacitly agreed not to mention, regarding his departure, Jason's return, and Tim's existence.
And Shiller evidently had no intention of letting him off the hook either. He slowly took steps towards Dick's side, grasped the wrist of the hand holding the cross, gently pushed it downward, and said, "In your opinion, which poses a greater threat, a strong vampire or an ordinary person well-versed in the history of the Batman Family and deeply trusted by Batman?"
"Can't you be both?"
Shiller bowed his head and chuckled deeply, "If I were both, could you still stand here all right?"
Dick had no response.
But the grip on his arm loosened, the cross was pressed down, Shiller let go, and then walked behind him to say, "The vampire's target must be Batman. If I were one and since I have the ability to persuade Batman to reveal his true identity to me and even bring me back to Wayne Manor, I would not wait until tomorrow night to make my move. The longer the night, the more dreams."
Shiller paused before continuing.
"This means, the real vampire might even be less trusted by Batman than I am, at least that's what he himself thinks. Otherwise, he would have acted long ago."
"The fact that he has not acted proves that he believes Batman is wary of him—think about it, when he finally reveals his grotesque true face and extends his Magic Claw towards Batman, what he sees is not Batman's shock and sorrow, but an unchanging calmness, as if he had already guessed everything."
Shiller then circled around to Dick's flank and said, "That indifferent expression as though saying, 'I've known what kind of person you are all along, known that you'd betray me, so I've been prepared.'"
"That would negate the purpose of his entire existence... As Batman's assistant, as the person who should be the most trusted by Batman, yet never be sincerely accepted for even a moment, never be confided with honesty, never see him completely unguarded."
"Knowing full well that eliminating Batman is a major step in their grand scheme of dominating Earth, this coward hesitates to act because he dares not gamble on whether Batman truly trusts him."
"A single expression from Batman is more haunting and unsettling to him than the throne that reigns supreme over the human race."
Shiller's tone took on a hint of amusement as he directly took the cross from Dick's hand, gently tapping Dick's shoulder and saying:
"So tell me, boy, who is this coward?"
"Enough."
The voice was not Dick's. It was Batman's voice echoing in the room, saying, "Doctor Schiller, I've warned you not to get involved in the affairs of the Batman Family."
"How could I forget, there's an even bigger coward here." Shiller was not the least bit inclined to stop. He tapped the cross in his hand, then said, "Knowing full well that his beloved child is already sharpening the knife to kill him, he still harbors naive fantasies, unwilling to cut off his wrongdoing until the very moment before action."
The moment Shiller suddenly turned around, Dick knew something was wrong, the red glow in his eyes extinguishing too late.
Shiller suddenly raised the cross. Dick reached out his arms to block—only shadows came.
The sound of the cross cutting through the air vanished, halting mid-air, elegantly turning, and coming to rest in front of Dick.
"What's wrong, Dick?"
The sound of Shiller's amused voice reached him, and Dick felt his jaw nearly unable to clench.
"I don't think this thing will protect me from a vampire, you keep it." Shiller said, "What Batman has prepared for me is far more exquisite than this."
Shiller took the cross pendant from his pocket, swung it in front of Dick, and then said, "He seems very concerned about me getting bitten, thinking that putting this around my neck could block a vampire's fangs just once. This item is special, isn't it?"
Dick looked at the pendant. He had seen this necklace in Batman's possession before, seemingly obtained from a Father when the vampire rumors first spread, but it was never hung around the neck of any Robin.
Unique, right before his eyes.
Shiller's gaze remained steady, but his tone became piercing.
"Dick, that perfect disguise you've meticulously prepared, unafraid of sunlight and Holy Water, was it truly to deceive Batman, or are you just too afraid to see his disappointment in front of everyone?"
"Even at a moment of life and death, would you only dare strike from behind where you cannot see his face?"
With a flick of his wrist, Shiller suddenly threw the cross pendant away. The silver light traced a beautiful arc in the air, and just before it was about to hit the ground, Nightwing instinctively bent down and reached out to catch it.
Startled at his own action, he looked at his hand, overwhelmed by unspeakable humiliation that made it impossible to contain the red glow in his eyes any longer.
"Nightwing... is this what you're supposed to do? Act like a dog fetching a frisbee?"