After hanging up on the president, a cold glint flashed in Schiller's eyes. He pulled the soaking-wet Natasha aboard and said, "I'll make a few more trips and take all of you to the nearby island. To avoid alerting the enemy, there probably won't be any large-scale rescue operation. Tomorrow, you can leave with those partygoers."
The agents did not complain. On field assignments, any absurd situation was possible. This time was not so bad—at least Schiller had arrived quickly and had not left them soaking for too long.
Schiller first drove the speedboat back to the shore of Metropolis with Natasha. The others could wait until morning, but she could not. The CIA had a mission here.
"So it shot down my plane just to use me to hold you back, so you couldn't get in touch with Doom and Stark?"
"Yes. Those two scientists are important, but they're in the Batcave, so they're safe for now. You're different. The president would choose to rescue you first. Nobody else was reliable enough; it had to be me. That meant I definitely couldn't get back to Gotham tonight to find those two scientists."
"But why tonight? What happened in the Batcave?"
"It's unclear for now. Batman may be in contact with them, but I suspect those two took the initiative to contact Electronic Life. They may even have done something to it."
"But what does that have to do with you?"
"I'm the only one in contact with them. Whatever they need, I have to buy it and deliver it. If I'm held up, I can't bring them anything tonight, which delays their research by a night. Electronic Life might use that gap to iterate away some of the weaknesses they discovered."
"They're really that good?" Natasha frowned. "They caught