"Ready, my ass!"
Li Jie stood with his arms crossed, his back against the cold wall, his brows knotted tightly.
"Ed, have you fucking lost it? You just have to use yourself as a guinea pig?" His voice simmered with suppressed anger. "We could easily find a few death row inmates, or get a few from Blackgate Penitentiary... volunteers..."
"In Gotham, those volunteers are either lies born of desperation or calculations with ulterior motives."
Nygma spoke evenly. "Jay, data can lie, especially data from compromised samples. Only I can record every second of my experience, every shift in my thinking, with absolute precision. I am the most direct, purest source of data."
He put down the alcohol swab, picked up a notebook and pen from the table, and quickly wrote a line: "Pre-experiment baseline cognition: clear, logically consistent, emotionally stable."
"But..."
"No buts." Nygma raised his head to look at Li Jie, his eyes sharp and eager behind his lenses. "Krain proved that this compound can bypass higher cognition and directly attack the brain's most primitive fear center. What if we could understand it, or even... control it?"
"Imagine it, Jay. On an operation, you could plunge the most vicious thugs into their own nightmares and leave them unable to fight.
When facing those assassins, or something worse, a controlled dose of concentrated fear would be more effective than any bullet. It would no longer be a toxin, but... a key. A key that could unlock anyone's mental defenses."
"I don't need a key! I can smash my way in!"
Li Jie had no idea what argument he could use to dissuade him. Just then, the door opened, and Harleen Quinzel hurried in with Doctor Leslie Thompkins.
"Mr. Nygma, I came as soon as I got the Sheriff's call."
Thompkins