"Stop. Stay alert."
Li Jie's voice came over the radios in every vehicle. The convoy braked to an orderly halt at the entrance to the Narrow Island bridge. He rolled down his window, letting in the wind, laden with rust and the rank smell of river water.
Why? Why had I come here?
It wasn't just because he was cranky from being woken up.
In theory, having Floyd Lawton and Mark Desmond taken away-by anyone-was good news for him.
A lone wolf and a mentally disabled man. They could be sent anywhere-South America, the Middle East, or Equatorial Guinea-as long as they were out of Gotham, out of his jurisdiction, and no longer causing him trouble. He wouldn't have to worry about Lawton losing his mind over his daughter one day, or some even crazier bastard using Mark to demolish half a city block.
But... Amanda Waller...
Just hearing that name made Li Jie feel sick and irritated. As a less intelligent version of Nick Fury, she was every bit as shameless, if not more so.
Today, they could take Lawton and Mark away in the name of national security. Tomorrow, they could use the same excuse to take Harleen, take Nygma, or even classify him as a special asset.
People like her saw no city boundaries, no local laws, only what was useful and what wasn't. Once she discovered that Gotham was a warehouse where special assets were easy to obtain, she would keep coming back like a shark scenting blood, demanding more and more until she had stripped the place bare.
Showing weakness in Gotham was an invitation to be plundered. If he gave an inch today, tomorrow he'd have to retreat clear across the Pacific.
But this was different from the situations he'd faced before. If he