Who Was the Real Me?

As his medical records were read aloud, Harvey's mental state deteriorated further. He drove without a word and soon arrived beside an unremarkable villa in the suburbs.

"We're here." Jason parked in an inconspicuous corner nearby.

"Wait down here. If anything seems wrong, drive away immediately," Roland said. "I'm going up first."

"Okay."

Roland scaled the wall by the villa's back entrance, then climbed all the way up to a second-floor window.

With Kamaitachi's help, Roland avoided every guard and slipped inside unnoticed.

"District Attorney Harvey, you wouldn't want your medical records made public, would you?" Hearing the voices inside, Roland quietly used the Cross Knife hanging around his neck to cut a hole in the window and peek into the room.

Several Mob members had surrounded Harvey, threatening him into cooperating. Otherwise, they would make a million copies of his medical records and distribute them free for everyone in Gotham City to enjoy.

Sweat poured down Harvey's face, and his muscles trembled. Faced with the Mob members' jeering and the immense pressure, he finally snapped.

In an instant, Harvey grew calm. His facial muscles stopped twitching, and a meaningful smile appeared.

"I think we can discuss this." Harvey walked forward calmly and said in an even voice, "Give me back those medical records, and I might consider sparing your lives."

"Sparing our lives?" The Mob members burst out laughing together, filling the room with merriment.

Harvey calmly drew his pistol and fired at everyone in the room with incredible speed.

The American iaido came without warning. Harvey emptied his magazine in seconds. The Mob members tried to draw their guns and return fire, but it was already too late.

Harvey tossed the empty gun aside, then grabbed a corpse from the floor and hurled it at the man trying to flee with his medical records.

"Fuck!" Roland kicked through the window and entered the room, knocking aside a Mob member trying to escape through it. He picked up a chair from the floor and swung it, flooring the few people nearby who were still standing.

Harvey looked at Roland with a complicated expression, but his hands never stopped moving. He picked up a Thompson submachine gun from the floor and shot every Mob member there dead.

"You're not going to stop me?" Harvey siphoned some gasoline from his car and poured it around the room, then set his medical records alight and tossed them inside.

"A district attorney executing criminals? As a public-spirited citizen, of course I'm on the side of justice. Why would I stop you?" Roland lit a cigarette and watched the fire inside. "Though this might be a bit of a big deal. I wonder if we can pass it off as a gas leak."

"The side of justice?" Harvey shook his head. "Forget it. I'm going to find a bar and unwind. Want to come?"

"Sure." Roland told Jason to go buy groceries on his own, then got into Harvey's car and headed for a bar.

The two arrived at a bar in the suburbs. There were few customers at this hour. Harvey sat down at the counter and told the bartender, "One Bloody Mary."

"One Pure Shen Teng," Roland said.

"What the hell is that?" The bartender stared.

"Never mind. Give me a Mizuwari whiskey, a Ramos Gin Fizz, and a Dry Martini."

The bartender's expression changed at once, like a northeastern Chinese cook hearing a customer order Su Huang Cai, Xue Mian Dou Sha, and San Bu Zhan all at once.

It took several dozen minutes before Roland finally got his drinks. By then, Harvey was already drunk.

"Roland, look at that." Harvey pointed at the bar's sign. "See the symbol in the bottom-right corner?"

The purple sign bore a black hand and a skull-and-crossbones symbol.

"What is that? A trademark?" Roland asked.

"No, it's the Mafia's symbol. It means this bar belongs to a Mob outfit." Harvey took a drink. "Restaurants, bars, dance halls, taxis... too many industries are already inseparable from the Mob."

"Tch. The Mob's that cocky? If they're so cocky, let them try collecting protection money from Gotham Bank." Roland drained his Mizuwari whiskey and slammed the glass down on the counter. "Besides, didn't we just kill a whole bunch of them?"

"Those were all small fry. Killing more of them only treats the symptoms, not the cause. It's useless. This city is beyond saving. It's like a rotten tree, decayed from the outside all the way down to its roots." Harvey's voice was low. "Rather than save it, we should try another approach..."

"Don't do anything reckless." Roland heard something dangerous in Harvey's words.

"From now on, I'll replace that weakling and face this rotten city my own way." Harvey drank as he flipped a coin.

Roland felt a headache coming on. "Once we finish drinking, let's go see a psychiatrist."

"No! If I'm cured, won't I disappear?" Furious, Harvey smashed his glass, only for Roland to easily restrain him.

Then Roland forced two glasses of hard liquor down his throat, putting Harvey to sleep.

Roland called a taxi, loaded the unconscious Harvey into it, and took him to his fiancée Gilda's Psychology Clinic.

"Doctor, I have a friend..." A bashful woman was haltingly explaining her condition to Gilda when the consulting-room door suddenly opened and two drunks barged in. She screamed.

"Sorry to interrupt, Ms. Gilda. I have something urgent here," Roland said awkwardly.

"Harvey? What happened to him?" Gilda was shocked to see her unconscious fiancé on Roland's back.

"It's complicated. Let's wait until your patient leaves," Roland said. This whole incident had started because the Mob stole Harvey Dent's medical records. He had to be cautious.

"Ms. Penny, something's come up. Could you come back another day? I'm terribly sorry," Gilda told her patient.

"All right. I'll get in touch later." Penny glanced at Harvey, then turned and left.

"Here's what happened. Harvey was threatened..." Roland released Kamaitachi and only told Gilda what had happened that day after confirming no one was eavesdropping.

"This is... terrible." Gilda rested her hand against Harvey's face, a trace of sadness in her eyes. "His Dark Side has already suppressed his normal side."

"Do you have any professional advice as a psychiatrist?" Roland asked.

"I don't know..." Gilda sighed, tears streaming down her face.

"Don't panic. I'll call someone over." Seeing that Gilda's mental state was also rather unstable, Roland took out his phone and called someone else.

A few minutes later.

"Wait, explain that..." Even Roland's hand holding the phone was trembling. "What do you mean Bruce's been kidnapped?"