Emperor Joker: Hal, Your Daddy's Here!

"Barbatos is a person's name, not a code word?"

Bang!

Prime Universe, Arkham Asylum.

Batman Bruce Wayne grabbed Riddler by the collar, hoisted him up, and slammed him hard against the wall. "I don't believe you."

"I swear to God, no matter where you got this information, there's nothing of value hidden in this Chinese sentence. It's just an emotional outburst, nothing more—done in the form of a homophonic pun."

The moment Riddler finished speaking, Batman punched him.

Blood streamed from his nose. Batman knocked him to the ground, then immediately hauled him back up against the wall. "Don't put on that act in front of me, pretending you know everything, Nygma. You and I both know you simply don't want to tell me the truth. But I can tolerate this verbal tic."

Riddler held up three fingers. "At least, that's the only conclusion I can reach. If you don't believe what I'm saying, then why did you come to me?"

With that one sentence, he ended Batman's doubts. This was the tacit understanding between Gotham's villains and him. Bruce could easily tell whether Riddler was telling the truth.

He fell silent and stood there, not knowing what he was thinking about. Then he heard Riddler say:

"A meaningless string of gibberish from a dream, and you took it as a harbinger of some kind of cosmic crisis? In fact, if you told your friends about this conclusion of yours, they'd definitely think you were under too much pressure. But for me, it's different."

Riddler said, "There's no riddle I can't solve. And without a doubt, this is a riddle. Its answer might be nothing more than one of Batman's psychotic episodes, but it could just as easily be the beginning of some dangerous incident."

He said, "Mind if I