A chaotic first day (2)

Fuck, running into this shit first thing in the morning.

What a way to drop dead bright and early!

He watched the battered Ford turn the corner trailing black smoke and let out a small sigh of relief. Just then, someone slapped him hard on the shoulder, startling him into jumping straight up. He looked back to find a dark-skinned guy standing there, grinning at him.

"I was here for the eight o'clock shift... why are you only getting here now?"

Darnell Wilson was the African American rookie the precinct had assigned as his partner. He was only twenty and seemed to have been planted in the police department by a gang. Just like in a classic Hollywood blockbuster, there always had to be a black guy to take the blame and die at the crucial moment. And not only could he sing, dance, play basketball, and rap, most importantly, he didn't do drugs.

What more could you ask for? The Eastern Division qualifying for the World Cup?

"What else, brother? A little over a thousand bucks a month, and you want me risking my life?" Wilson showed him his wristwatch. "We've still got twenty minutes before our shift starts." He craned his neck toward the body inside the police tape. The unlucky bastard was still lying naked on the ground, covered only by a cheap body bag.

"What the hell is that?"

"What's so strange about it? Gotham's got plenty of these local specialties." Li Jie took his thermos out of the car, slowly unscrewed the lid, and took a sip. Steam rose from the tea, easing the stiffness in his skin a little, but when the cold wind swept past, he felt even colder.

He rubbed his face and walked toward the body transport van that had just pulled up beside them, its blue police lights flashing. A belligerent, average-sized man with a full beard jumped out.

"We're from the Eastern District Precinct..."

"I'm the medical examiner from Central Headquarters. You two! Has either of you seen that lunatic Nygma? Did he touch the body over there?"

Fuck.

Li Jie sneered inwardly. You don't fucking have authority over us. What's with the attitude?

"He left ages ago, after finishing his examination of the scene. Why would he mess with the body?" Li Jie turned and called behind him, "Wilson, did you see the forensic technician from Central Headquarters playing with the corpse?"

"Of course not. Haven't seen him since I got here. He must've left already." Wilson pulled a burger out of his jacket and stuffed it into his mouth, mumbling, "Mr. Medical Examiner, would you mind letting us watch while you play with the corpse?"

Gora glared at them, eyes wide with fury, but the two patrol officers stared back with utterly apathetic expressions. After a few seconds, apparently unwilling to make a spectacle of himself in front of the van's body transport crew, the medical examiner finally abandoned the standoff. He ducked under the police tape, pulled on his gloves, and got to work.

"Hey, what's going on?" Wilson edged over to Li Jie and lowered his voice to a whisper. "Is this guy trying to start shit? I've got your back, brother."

"Don't ask," Li Jie replied expressionlessly. "Once he's finished, we're done here."

He had no interest in Gora's furious threats to file a complaint with the precinct after the body was loaded into the van. The name Nygma kept circling through his mind.

Although Li Jie wasn't particularly familiar with American comics, he did know the supervillain Riddler. When the "Riddler, get out of Gotham" meme had flooded the forums, he'd actually looked up what it meant. He'd never imagined that he would turn out to be an old acquaintance of the man.

...Not that they were particularly close.

But what point in the timeline is this? It looks like Nygma hasn't put on his green hat and become a villain yet.

He rubbed his stiff face and fingers, then ducked into the car. With the cold wind shut outside, he immediately felt much warmer. He grabbed the old newspaper from earlier and found the front-page news.

"...Mr. Bruce Wayne, the young heir to Wayne Enterprises, has not attended a board meeting in person for several consecutive years, participating only via video conference. This has sparked widespread speculation both within the company and among the public..."

Li Jie went through the newspaper several times. There was no Midnight Fighter, no urban legend, no black silhouette overlooking the masses from a towering gargoyle.

No Batman. There were, however, plenty of articles about the great philanthropist Falcone in the entertainment and society sections.

Bruce Wayne probably hadn't made his debut as an idol yet. Gotham was likely still in the hands of the Roman, which also meant that all those world-shattering events and villains hadn't appeared yet.

Maybe that counts as good news?

But what am I supposed to do? The mortality rate for Gotham cops was absurdly high. Apart from the compensation arrangement, the reason he'd managed to get into the police department was that the GCPD's recent list of officers killed or disabled in the line of duty had been alarmingly long, forcing them to lower their recruitment standards again and again.

He rubbed his temples and instinctively checked his useless cheat again. The instant his consciousness sank into the darkness, a tiny but extraordinarily bright point of light appeared without warning above the four lifeless cards, shining softly like a firefly on a summer night.

His heart lurched, nearly leaping into his throat. He immediately held his breath and cautiously tried to touch the light with his mind. The moment the thought formed, the light seemed to respond to his will, sliding left and right above the four dull gray cards as he directed it!

"Holy fucking shit, my cheat's alive! I'm gonna be a badass!" Li Jie clenched his fist hard in excitement, his knuckles turning a little white. "Then I'll pick the first... no, the first lucky envelope usually has crap in it. Hehehehe, I'll see what's in the last one first!"

He focused his mind and guided the point of light precisely onto the card with the stick figure background.

A faint electrical hum seemed to sound inside his head. The selected card suddenly shuddered, and its dull gray shell gave off a series of tiny cracking sounds. Weblike fissures instantly spread across its entire surface. As the shell crumbled and vanished, the card took on a completely new appearance, emitting a faint metallic glow. The selection light disappeared without a trace the instant the card lit up, as though it had fulfilled its purpose.

"Huh? Huh? Wasn't I just clicking to take a look? Why can't I undo it? Fuck..."

Shit. Did I pick the wrong one...?

Li Jie stared in stunned disbelief and sighed, then hurriedly grabbed his thermos and took a sip. What was done was done. First, some hot tea to settle his nerves.

He enlarged the card with his mind, and several lines of text appeared on it.

[*Higher-Dimensional Creation: Your birth was shaped by a higher dimension. This world's will has no effect on you. All conceptual, causal, soul-based, reality-warping, and memory-altering skills have no effect on you.]

[*Coordinate Anchor: You are watched by a higher-dimensional gaze. As long as you exist, this world cannot be incorporated or rebooted.]

[*Eternal Nature of All Things: You are a variable, and also a constant. Worldlines occur randomly around you.]

[*V1.0 trial version!]

Tch... looks like I really did pick wrong. This system doesn't seem remotely legit... wait, why the hell did I get the trial version?!

He tried clicking the card again, and it suddenly flipped over to reveal its back. There was an intricate star chart that seemed shrouded in thick fog, its outlines completely impossible to make out. As for the other three inactive cards, no matter how hard he concentrated on poking them, his attempts sank without a trace. There was no response at all.

So that light wasn't a mouse cursor. It was a skill point, and the kind you can't refund... But he had no clue how to get one, or why he'd suddenly received it.

As he was tugging at his hair in frustration, Wilson opened the passenger door and climbed in.

"You're not yourself today. Is it because of that big flood back in your hometown this summer? God, I saw it on the news. Absolutely horrific. But it wasn't your fault. Didn't you already donate?" He poured half a cup of tea from Li Jie's thermos into his own disposable paper cup. "For the sake of our friendship, I can donate a hundred too. Cover me for now, and I'll pay you back next month."

"Uh... that was ages ago. How'd your mind even go there? Besides, I donated essential supplies. Cash donations never make it into the victims' hands."

The corner of Li Jie's mouth twitched. He turned the key, started the engine, and nudged the car forward a little, stopping beneath a patch of sunlight breaking through the gloom. He stared absently at the spot of light on the dashboard. "I just didn't like the way that medical examiner talked to us."

"Don't worry about that idiot. His complaint won't do shit." Wilson noisily slurped his tea. "Come to think of it, I thought that only happened in America. Fuck, when that hurricane hit Kansas last time, those sons of bitches at the foundations were grinning so hard they couldn't close their mouths. One day, someone's gonna hang them from lampposts."

"Huh? You're a commu..."

A sudden burst of crackling static from the car radio cut off his nonsense. "...zzzt... Officer Li... respond if you copy."

Li Jie lazily reached over and unhooked the radio handset. "Copy. Go ahead."

"...zzzt... 331 Fifteenth Street. Someone called in. Sounds like a domestic dispute or domestic violence." The dispatcher sighed. "You'd better check it out."

"Regulations say you're supposed to contact the nearest officers, don't they?" Li Jie frowned. "Why assign it straight to me? I'm not a pizza delivery boy."

"But the domestic violence case you handled last week in... zzzt... satisfactory. You guys ought to start a domestic violence response unit, ha." The dispatcher chuckled. "Quit complaining. Maybe there's a hot housewife waiting for you to rescue her."

"Oh, please. I'm betting all we'll find there is a Tiger Tank weighing over five hundred pounds." Li Jie hung up the handset, turned to his partner, and sighed. "We've got a job. Buckle up. Let's go."