When Shiller climbed the hillside again, Pamela was already waiting there; she seemed to be in much better spirits than before, proving once again that debt ages people.
Shiller looked out over the forest and noticed that its growth had improved considerably from before; apparently, Pamela had adjusted the plant ratio here during the fire prevention process, making the forest healthier.
Without waiting any longer, Shiller said directly, "Help me find a special flower pot in that high school."
"A flower pot?" Pamela said with some confusion, "What's special about a flower pot? Does it have a special pattern?"
Shiller shook his head and said, "It has a drainage hole at the bottom."
Pamela somewhat speechlessly said, "Which flower pot doesn't have a drainage hole at the bottom? Without one, the roots would rot... Alright, alright, I'll try."
After saying that, she began to manipulate all the plants inside the boarding high school located not far from the forest, making them bow to peer at the flower pots beneath them.
After a long look, Pamela said, "The flower pots in this school seem to be uniformly purchased; they look pretty much the same, just those ordinary white plastic gardening pots with a hole at the bottom."
"Can you sense if there's anything unusual in the soil inside any of the flower pots?"
This time, Pamela concentrated longer than ever before; she was clearly using the Exhaustion Method to eliminate possibilities. However, this was not easy because plant roots lack sensory cells. To determine if there was something unusual, the roots needed to be stimulated rapidly until they filled the entire flower pot. Any obstruction to the growth of the roots would indicate the presence of foreign objects.
However, this required considerable energy. After finishing, Pamela sat down heavily on the ground and said, "There are about seven or eight suspicious pots, pretty much one on every floor."
"Can you dig out the foreign objects?"
"Even if I could dig them out, I couldn't bring them here," Pamela said. "Those delicate gardening plants cannot withstand too much force, and there are also security guards in the school; we would be discovered."
"Alright, follow me."
"What are you going to do?"
"Of course, to check the flower pots."
"Oh, Lord." Pamela stood up, hands on her hips. It was already deep into the night, and she clearly wanted to go back to sleep. However, considering the previous shoddy work on Gotham's landscaping, she had to put forth the effort now, or she would really be in trouble.
The two of them sneaked into the school, which wasn't difficult for Shiller; he was just concerned that digging around in the soil on-site would take too much time and leave traces. So they decided to simply take the flower pots with them. In such a large school, a few missing flower pots would go unnoticed.
Shiller got a handcuff from Warehouse Street, and Pamela loaded the flower pots onto it, then they placed them in the trunk of Shiller's car, and both went back to Arkham Asylum.
By then, daylight had already broken, but Shiller had no intention of sleeping. He started to check the flower pots one by one, first removing the plants, then breaking apart the soil to see what the foreign objects were.
In most of the flower pots, the foreign objects were just cigarette butts, stones, wood fragments, etc., likely accidentally mixed in when the garden soil was turned. But in one somewhat yellowed pot, Shiller found a small bone fragment.
This bone was very identifiable—it was the pisiform bone, found in the human palm at the base of the hand, almost unique to humans, marking a distinction between the hand structures of humans and other primates.
Shiller examined the pisiform bone carefully; he determined that this bone did not belong to an adult but likely to a child about seven or eight years old because the palm itself was very small, so the bone truly was as small as a pea. If Pamela hadn't inspected it carefully, it would surely have been missed.
However, because the bone was so small and uniquely positioned in the hand, the lack of this bone made the rest of the bones in the hand when reconstructed look reasonable. This is why only a professional serial killer would notice there was an issue, so there was a chance it had been secretly hidden,
Next was finding the owner of the bone; as expected, the owner had likely been dead for a long time, but as long as they had once lived, they couldn't have left without a trace.
After a brief nap in the morning, Shiller took the bone to the Gotham Police Department. He didn't alert many people, only saying that he needed to see the chief on urgent business, and went to Gordon's office.
He handed over the bone, now in a transparent sealed bag, to Gordon and then said, "Find a way to help me identify the owner of this bone."
"You want a DNA comparison?"
"I'm not sure if you would have his DNA, but it would be great if you could get a match. If not, try to investigate the missing children in the Bolokin Community over the past ten years; I think you'll find something."
Gordon immediately realized something and his expression turned serious. He said, "I'll work on both fronts. I should have news for you by tonight."
"No, you better not make a big deal out of the investigation," Shiller shook his head and said, "Someone has been watching me since yesterday, it seems they wanted to use a commotion involving the mentally ill to shoot me..."
Gordon gasped, quickly walked up to Shiller and said, "Are you alright?"
Shiller shook his head and said, "You underestimate me. They couldn't find any professional hitmen; they're just a bunch of desperados doing it for money."
"So you still boldly came here today, isn't that blatantly telling them what you've found?" Gordon, always keenly intuitive in these matters, said, "Are you trying to draw their attention here?"
"Exactly, Chief, I'm just an ordinary psychology professor. Even if I suspect something about some cases, the most appropriate thing to do is to inform the police, and you are the ones who really have the capability to find out something."
Gordon slowly walked back and sat down, saying, "Yes, you should indeed do that, because if you're the only one with evidence, they will try to silence you by any means necessary, but if you hand over the evidence to the police, they might hold back, as everyone knows I'm tough. I never gave up even when Gotham was in such bad shape; now, there's even less reason to compromise."
"But they will definitely try," Shiller said. "They'll try to discreetly find out exactly how much you know, find ways to hinder the investigation, and they might even act desperately to solve the problem once and for all."
Gordon sneered and said, "There have been too many people thinking that way, and where are those people now? The Gotham Gang couldn't bring me down before, let alone now!"
"I diverted their attention here also so that I could investigate more," Shiller said as he sat down on a nearby chair. "They must think I just happened upon some clues but don't know the whole story, lack the energy, and lack the capability to investigate, so I become less important."
"When they focus all their energy on hindering your investigation, their defenses elsewhere become weaker, and then maybe I'll have a chance to find out more."
"Regardless, I still want to remind you to be careful," Gordon said. "The Gotham Police Department is energetic and well-equipped, and I never act alone. I'm experienced in guarding against these villains, but you're different, you always work alone, and now that you've lost your superpower, it's even easier for you to capsize in the gutter."
"Do you really think I hadn't considered that?" Shiller smiled and said, "I brought Amanda over, not just to keep her clinging to Williams, you know, this silly girl is always only interested in me."
Gordon sighed and said, "Have you ever thought that she isn't foolish, but simply too obsessed, never able to let go of her family?"
"I'm just saying by my standards, in my view, even Batman is foolish, those who can't let go are always foolish, but if they choose to be fools, what can I do about it?"
Gordon stood in front of the office window watching Shiller get into the car, and when his gaze fell on the transparent plastic bag in his hand, he and Shiller realized the same problem—the bone didn't belong to an adult, but rather to a child.
Gordon's mind flashed with his daughter's face, so innocent and adorable, from her first cries in swaddling, to crawling, walking, talking, recognizing letters...
Years hadn't left many marks on the face of this police chief; he seemed to have conquered everything in this world, looking more like a winner than any Batman, and now a fiery spark ignited in his eyes, his long-absent heart of justice began to beat fervently again.
Back at Arkham Asylum, sure enough, there were two figures like statues at the entrance of the office, both dressed in uniforms similar to those of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but with a purple shield emblem on their chests.
The door opened, and standing there was a grim-looking Amanda, who seemed to treat this as her own house, saying to Shiller, "Come in."
Shiller didn't quibble with her and entered leisurely, then asked, "You didn't touch that umbrella, did you? Or did you touch it out of curiosity and get knocked out by it?"
"Why would you have such dangerous items in your office, my two subordinates passed out because of it!" Amanda roared at him. "They didn't even touch it, just looked at it!"
"Then you should have told them, when dealing with mysterious objects, to look less at what should not be seen," Shiller said. "Now that the so-called Federation Shield has been established, didn't you consider hiring some real magicians?"
After being momentarily obstructed, Amanda said, "How could a magician possibly want to work here, how much money would I have to pay them to make up for the organs they traded away?"
"The latter part is the key, isn't it? After all, money can grind the millstone; if you're willing to pay, there are still people who will sell their lives to you."
"I use clones for that purpose," Amanda said, crossing her arms and sitting across the desk, then added, "I don't believe devils are flawless. One day, I'll also be able to trick them out of funds."
"Very ambitious," Shiller rarely complimented her, saying that if Amanda could really achieve the level of Nick, then she ought to head this DC version of S.H.I.E.L.D.
But right now, she still seemed naïve, thinking of using clones to deceive the devils, rather than actually making questionable deals with them. However, at least she wouldn't kneel to the devils, which was already diligent and responsible enough, considering that if devils suddenly appeared in Congress one day, few could keep their knees off the ground.
"So what did you come to find me for?" Shiller asked.
Amanda pursed her lips and said, "That Williams... my subordinates got some intelligence from him, I think you might be interested, should we make a deal?"
Shiller slowly squinted his eyes, and Amanda didn't intend to keep him guessing, but instead said, "I know, Gotham City Government recently received a fund for upgrading urban greening, Williams knows as well."
"What does he want to do?"
"He believes investing that money in finance would bring greater benefits to the city. He has allied with several real-estate companies and is trying to lobby the city council."
"Although your current mayor is still in power, everyone knows he's bound to move up sooner or later. This might be his last term or second last, and the next candidate has not yet been determined."
"The mayoral candidate wouldn't happen to be a financial expert, would they?" Shiller asked.
Amanda pulled out a document from beside and handed it to Shiller, saying, "Take a look at this and you'll know."