Gotham 1987 (Part 1)

The cool morning breeze rustled the branches outside the window, and the orange morning light shone through the layers of heavy curtains, illuminating the dim room.

There was a knock on the bedroom door. Schiller turned over, and the valet outside said, "Sir, a gentleman named Gordon called you ten minutes ago. I told him to call him back after you get up."

Schiller said slowly, his voice a little hoarse, "... I understand."

He sat up in bed, waking up from his drowsy state, and walked to the window. He pulled back one of the curtains with One Hand and saw the milkman on his bicycle ring his bell at the door. Soon someone came out and took the milk jug from him.

This is an estate in the West End of Gotham, and it was Schiller's new home in Gotham.

Although the faculty housing at Gotham University is decent, he really should buy his own house.

This is the old town of Gotham City. Unlike the Affluent Area, this area was established by a group of British nobles when Europe immigrants arrived in America. Therefore, most of the buildings here are traditional English manors. Later, due to the bias in urban planning and the more advantageous geographical location of the south, the Affluent Area moved from the west to the south.

Most of the old manor houses remaining here retain a classic English style. However, since few of the descendants of those nobles continued to live here, most of these manor houses are now uninhabited. Schiller bought one of them at a very good price, the one that was best maintained and had the decoration style he liked the most.

He didn't buy a house in the Affluent Area, not because he couldn't afford it, but for a very practical reason—his estate in the west was closer to Gotham University, where he worked.

To commute to work in the Affluent Area, he had to drive long distances, crossing most of Gotham City.

The worst part is that you have to pass through the most congested Central City during peak hours.

Therefore, no matter how luxurious the villas in the Affluent Area are, they are definitely not within Schiller's range of choices. He is not Bruce Wayne, who would simply take a helicopter if there is a traffic jam. He does not want to spend most of the day on the road.

Choosing an old-fashioned manor in the West End has another advantage: it's less crowded and relatively quiet, and there's less traffic early in the morning, allowing Schiller to get a good night's sleep on his days off.

Most importantly, this place is far from the Wayne Manor and also far from the mountain where Bruce wants to build the Batcave in the future. If Batman were to be attacked by the Joker in the future, the area-of-effect attack would not reach him.

After a while, the valet came in, opened and tied the curtains, and then said, "Breakfast is ready, sir."

Schiller nodded, took the glasses case from him, put on his glasses, glanced at his watch, and asked, "When did Gordon call?"

"About 25 minutes ago."

Schiller glanced out the window again, then went downstairs to have breakfast.

Descending the wooden staircase and passing through a somewhat dimly lit corridor, the dining room is located at the westernmost part of the manor building. Walking into the corridor, you'll find a semi-circular dining room with tall arched windows. Dark green silk curtains hang on both sides of the windows, and silver cutlery on the peach wood dining table gleams mysteriously in the dim morning light.

The morning light streaming through the arched window fell on the dining table, the squares and round cutlery projected by the window creating a play of light and shadow. Schiller picked up the ironed newspaper from his right.

The ink on the printed newspaper was slightly smudged, and the top line read, "January 25, 1987, cloudy, rain in the afternoon, Gotham Daily."

While eating breakfast, Schiller searched for the information he needed in the newspaper. The font of the newspapers in this era was often printed very small, and the ink was easy to smudge, so he had to use a magnifying glass.

After a while, the valet came in and said, "Mr. Gordon has arrived."

Schiller put down his magnifying glass and looked up. Gordon, wearing a brown trench coat and a beret, still carried the chill of the night when he entered the restaurant. Seeing Schiller reading the newspaper, Gordon said, "Did you see today's news? The Godfather is furious. He won't allow Metropolis ships to dock at the eastern docks anymore."

"I'm on that page right now," Schiller said, adjusting his glasses. "I stayed up all night writing my paper and missed your call this morning."

Gordon took off his trench coat as he said, "It's nothing important, you know, I'm not busy at work lately. I just wanted to call and congratulate you on moving to your new house. Oh, and by the way, my gift is still in the car..."

"No rush. Have you had breakfast yet? Why don't we sit down and have something to eat together?"

Gordon handed his coat to the valet as he said, "I went to the station this morning and have already eaten. I brought you the information you asked me to find."

As he spoke, he placed a black briefcase on the table and began rummaging through it, then took out a document and handed it to Schiller.

Schiller said, "You've worked hard. Even if you've eaten, have a glass of hot milk."

Gordon did not refuse. He sat down at the table and said, "At first, I was a little surprised when you said you wanted to take over Bernard's estate. After all, there aren't many people who like this kind of old-fashioned estate these days."

"Rich people in Gotham still prefer those detached houses, preferably with a large garage so they can park all their luxury cars."

Gordon looked around. The decor here was typical of English style: silk curtains, knitted carpets, wooden furniture, and a stone fireplace with crackling flames. Even without getting close, you could feel the warmth.

The old manor's restaurant wasn't very big, and the corridors were quite narrow. There were even extremely retro metal wall hangings and candlesticks on the walls, making the whole building feel like a trip back to the Victorian era.

Gordon looked away and said, "But now it seems like this place suits you well."

"It's not that I have a particular fondness for the English estate, it's just that if I buy a house in the south, it will be too far from my workplace. Gotham's terrible traffic might make me miss all my morning classes."

Gordon picked up his glass, took a sip of milk, and said, "Who isn't? Every time I go to work at the Police Department, I get blocked by those damn people at the central roundabout. You know, I got first place in my driving class at the police academy!"

"This damn place is full of desperados. They never consider that flooring the gas pedal in a roundabout with hundreds of cars moving at the same time could suffocate them with the airbags that pop out!" Gordon said angrily.

"I can tell you were stuck for a while too," Schiller said with a laugh.

"I've seen at least ten Champion F1 drivers on my way here," Gordon said, somewhat frustrated.

"Speaking of which, this is also the fault of our new Director. The Police Department is short-staffed, and we can't just transfer all the traffic police, can we? In the past few days, several new people have been transferred to my team. They don't know anything, and they just want to rush in with guns."

Gordon shook his head and said, "We might as well go back and direct their traffic!"

"The police have had an easier time, and that's all thanks to this Director. Just bear with it."

Gordon put down his cup, rubbed his hands together, and said excitedly, "But I'll soon be able to buy an apartment next to the Police Department too."

"Have you saved enough money?"

"It'll be soon, can you imagine? Last week I earned $80,000. Even if I don't earn that much next week, as long as I save up a little more, I can buy an apartment outright."

"How come there are so many? There shouldn't have been that many cases last week, maybe only $50,000 at most?" Schiller asked, turning to him as he ate.

Gordon raised an eyebrow and said, "Oh, I forgot, you're not a local. In Gotham, you have to pay protection money no matter where you go, including the police. I'm the head of the Field Operations Team now, and all the police officers under me have to give me 15% of their income."

"So you just accepted it? Like a mob boss?" Schiller joked.

"You don't understand this place. They'll be scared if you don't take their money, because in Gotham, if you take their money, it means you're willing to keep working with them. If you don't take their money, they'll worry that the business will be gone tomorrow."

"I heard you're getting married to your fiancée? Is she in Gotham right now? When are you planning to have the wedding?"

Gordon coughed and said, "She's going through the job transfer procedures. The handover at the company in Metropolis is particularly troublesome, it will take at least a week. But that's good, it gives me some time to buy the apartment I've got my eye on and give her a surprise."

Schiller shook the newspaper in his hand, then said while reading it, "Have you decided what kind of wedding gift you want? I'm very rich now."

"Really? Richer than Wayne?"

Schiller rolled his eyes and said, "If I were richer than him, you wouldn't be here with me."

"Actually, if I hadn't made so much money, I wouldn't have wanted to get engaged so soon. I would probably be on vacation in Hawaii right now."

"I thought you worked all year round."

"Come on, I'd go crazy. I need to be healthy and in a good mood to survive in this damn city for long."

Schiller took a cigar from the cigar box on the table, cut it open with scissors, and handed it to Gordon. Gordon took it, and Schiller took a match from the valet, lit it, and gave Gordon a cigarette.

Then he took one and lit it himself. He exhaled a puff of smoke and said, "The Godfather has been in a bad mood lately. Some audacious people are trying to cause trouble on his turf."

Gordon stretched out his hand holding the cigar, shifted his posture, leaned back on the armrest of his chair, and sighed comfortably. He said, "Why did you ask me to check Gotham's transient population data? Is there something wrong with Metropolis? I heard that those fiery Godfathers' men came from Metropolis."

"Would you be surprised if I told you this trouble came along with me?"

"Of course not." Gordon denied it almost without thinking.

"When I first met you, I had a feeling that you were going to get into Big Trouble."

"Why?"

"You can see it as a detective's intuition."

"Interesting, could you tell me more about it?"

"I've seen a lot of criminals, and they're different..." Gordon straightened up, resting his wrists on the table, and said, "...completely different. Those bumbling thieves are completely different from real serious criminals."

"I have never heard of a serial killer yelling at a judge or using foul language; they have a kind of aura that is different from ordinary people..."

"When you're facing Batman, I always feel like you're looking in a mirror."

"You think I look a lot like him? Are you serious?"

"Some places are completely different, but some places are surprisingly similar."

Schiller looked at Gordon and said, "Keep this sharpness, and you'll be the savior of Gotham."

Gordon tapped his cigarette ash on the silver plate and said, "Godfather, this is going to be tough. The group that infiltrated seems to have some connections. They killed two of the Falcone family's bartenders. If you don't catch them soon, you'll lose face in Gotham, which is worse than anything else."

"The gangsters probably won't dare to provoke the Godfather anytime soon, right?" Schiller put down his newspaper and leaned back in his chair.

"It's hard to say. Don't underestimate those people. Don't forget, Maroney is still alive. He made a fortune in the East End conflict and may be planning to challenge the Godfather."

"He's courting death." The smoke trailed off as he finished speaking. Schiller reached out and flicked his cigar with his fingertips, the fine dust slowly drifting down.

"Not necessarily. Somehow, the Godfather bypassed him and had the old Director Victor killed. I heard that he also wanted to get involved in Arkham Hospital, but the Godfather kicked him out. Maroney couldn't stand it."

"The East District is not peaceful. Maroney is eager to subdue the forces he has recruited. He needs a victory to establish his authority and to completely consolidate the new blood he has just absorbed."

"He dares to use the Godfather to establish his authority; Falcone will teach him a lesson." Schiller leaned back in his chair, tugging at his sweater collar, appearing relaxed.

Gordon coughed twice more, squinting at the reflection on the silver plate through the smoke from the top of his cigar, and said, "Maroney is a formidable man, and the Godfather is getting old."

"You think he's more promising?"

"No, I actually hope the Old Godfather wins. As long as Falcone, Gotham won't be in too much chaos, but once he's gone, it's hard to say."

Gordon left quickly, as he had work to do. It was his peak season, and with another month of hard work, buying a villa wouldn't be a problem.

After Gordon left, Schiller leaned back in his chair and finished his cigar, the smoke swirling around his fingertips. He hadn't been able to think so relaxedly in a long time.

In this city fraught with danger, he doesn't even have time to rest, let alone smoke a cigarette, unless he's certain of his safety.

Before this, Schiller had never thought about buying a house, nor did he need a home, because he was not a Gotham; he came from one of the safest and most orderly countries in the world.

As the cigar burned, the smoke, several times thicker than that of cigarettes, drifted into various elusive and abstract shapes, evoking countless associations. In that psychedelic and sweet aroma, Schiller began to reminisce.

He couldn't quite recall whether his first reaction to the shooting in Chicago after leaving his hometown was shock or excitement.

All he remembered was that as the plane plummeted, the memories of his life, accompanied by weightlessness and lack of oxygen, blurred into a fog of the bizarre and turbulent events he had been involved in throughout his life. Just as they had hoped, when these memories dissipated with death, countless secrets were also buried forever.

If there truly is a God in this world, Schiller thought, then this great being who can give people a second life must really know him well.

Gotham is the world's sewer of evil, and good people are not flushed down the sewer.

Schiller looked at the tip of the cigar between his fingers, where the flame gradually died down, the smoke began to thin, and the patterns that had formed slowly faded away.

He knew that when he regained consciousness and learned from the original owner's memories that this was Gotham City, the excitement that filled his mind at first would eventually destroy all his ambitions for a peaceful life.

Or rather, the enjoyment of the mundane and ordinary daily life was, from beginning to end, just a self-deception of a madman who was skilled in self-hypnosis, until he saw the appearance of Batman.

As the smoke dissipated, Schiller recalled the feeling when he first used his rudimentary mind-reading ability to access Batman's inner thoughts.

As Gordon said, he felt like he was looking in a mirror.

So he gave Batman the answer he most wanted to hear, and then, almost impatiently, put an end to that dull, despairing life.

And now, he has finally become a Gotham City, on the first birthday of his second life in the winter of 1987 in Gotham.