Attack!

The gate to the factory yard was secured with a heavy iron chain, but the rust-covered chain failed to seal it off completely. A crooked gap about half a foot wide remained underneath, just large enough for someone lean to squeeze through sideways. Li Jie crouched down and gave it a try...

That route clearly hadn't been made for him. Fortunately, businesses in America didn't have a habit of embedding broken glass in cement along the tops of their walls. He took a short running start and vaulted over.

The yard was pitch-black. Li Jie looked up at the factory and office building, where faint traces of light seemed to seep out. He switched on his high-powered flashlight and waved it around like a Jedi. Wherever the beam reached, it revealed waist-high weeds and scattered industrial waste.

The beam swept past the office entrance, suddenly wavered, and stopped on two motionless figures. They almost blended into the surrounding shadows. The moment the bright light hit them, they charged forward, shouting bullshit like "Off with his head!" and "By order of the queen!"

Judging by their appearance and clothes, they seemed to be street thugs, possibly even Cobblepot's men. But as far as Li Jie was concerned, even Cobblepot himself would get a beating if he dared cause trouble. He stepped forward and drove an uppercut into the first man's chin. Then he sidestepped the second man's swinging axe and smashed the flashlight into his temple.

Neither thug made much of a sound before dropping stiffly into unconsciousness.

"It's dark already. You should hurry up and get some sleep."

The quality of a police flashlight really was something else. Even after that blow, its light hadn't so much as flickered. He shoved open the office building's rust-covered entrance, its hinges giving an ear-splitting screech. A stench of heavy mildew, rotting wood, and chemicals hit him square in the face, nearly making him throw up all the coffee he'd drunk that afternoon.

Fuck, I rarely side with environmental groups, but this disgusting smell alone...

Grumbling inwardly, he pulled a mask from his pocket and slapped it over his face. As he walked inside, he raised the flashlight and inspected his surroundings. Its beam pierced the darkness like a blade, revealing nothing but decay and desolation. Faded, blistered cartoon wallpaper still clung to the walls. As the light swept over them, the distorted smiling faces seemed to grin at him, looking exceptionally eerie. Rotting brochures and toy catalogs littered the floor, their colorful pages ruined beyond recognition by water stains and mold. They made soft, sodden rustling sounds beneath his feet.

It was as though some sudden disaster had struck this place and forcibly stopped time. In the open workshop to his left, unfinished plastic doll parts still hung from an injection-molding machine's conveyor belt. He opened an unsealed cardboard box and found it filled with palm-sized transforming robots.

"Hey! Optimus Prime, and Starscream too!"

Li Jie picked one up and deftly fiddled with it until it transformed from a plane into a humanoid robot. This was something he'd dreamed of having ten years ago. Unfortunately, his parents had spent all their time arguing back then, and that wish had never come true.

He slipped a few little robots into his pockets, then looked at the nearby workbench. Tools and unfinished toys still sat on it. Multicolored plastic shavings, broken gears, rusted springs, and countless fragments of unidentifiable parts lay buried beneath thick dust.

A plush Teddy Bear lay slumped in a work chair. One of its button eyes had fallen off, leaving a thread dangling limply, while the other stared vacantly at the ceiling. Synthetic stuffing spilled from a tear in its side, stained gray-black by dust.

"Tsk, tsk. You've had a rough life."

But the place wasn't quiet. From somewhere came intermittent dripping, drumbeats, and the humming hiss of white noise.

"Workplace safety: switch off the power when you leave. You couldn't even manage that. No wonder you went bankrupt."

Li Jie softened his footsteps and passed through the aisle between the machines. Treading over the packaging area's floor of sodden cardboard boxes and plastic wrapping, he approached a half-open iron door at the far end of the workshop.

He raised his flashlight to illuminate the words "Research and testing" on the door. Inside was what looked like a laboratory or sample room. Several mannequin dolls in blue puffed skirts and white aprons had been arranged in a seated circle, with an old, batteryless teapot in the middle. Exaggerated, crooked smiles had been painted on their faces, looking sinister and unnerving in the flashlight's beam.

The workbench against the wall held no toy parts, only an assortment of strange objects. Charts from an old brainwave monitor, hand-drawn sketches of complicated circuits, and several thoroughly worn copies of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland lay piled nearby. The faint chemical smell in the air grew much stronger here.

Li Jie's heartbeat quickened slightly. He had found the right place.

"You bastard, just wait until I get my hands on you... Aaaaaaah!!!"

As he muttered, his flashlight swept over a small enclosed room at the very back, something like a soundproof booth. A small observation window was set into its heavy metal door. Right behind that window, a pallid, contorted face wearing enormous round glasses stared motionlessly at him. In the powerful flashlight's glare, those eyes reflected an inhuman, fanatical gleam.

The shock nearly scared him to death. He sprang three feet into the air with a howl, almost flinging the flashlight out of his hand.

"Holy fucking shit! Are you trying to scare me to death?!"

Unexpectedly, the room's microphone crackled to life, and the face screamed in fury, "Why? Why won't you obey my commands?!"

"Obey your fucking mother!"

Rage instantly surged through Li Jie. He lunged forward and smashed his fist into the observation window. But the glass was thicker than a battleship's porthole and didn't budge under the blow. The face recoiled and pulled down the window's sheet-metal shutter, disappearing from view.

"Don't fucking run, you coward!"

Shaking out his hand, he turned and rushed out of the research room. He stumbled through the factory, holding up his flashlight as he searched for the stairs. Between swings of the beam, he thought he saw a cloaked figure flash through the air, but when he took a closer look, there was nothing.

Li Jie stopped and pulled out his phone. If I don't call for backup, I don't deserve this uniform.

The man on the other end agreed readily enough. After all, James Gordon wouldn't hold him back on something like this. Whether Li Jie asked him to get isolation chips from Nygma or to have the officers leave their firearms behind to avoid serious friendly-fire casualties if they were controlled, he accepted every request and said he would bring backup immediately.

"Phew... If he weren't so damn rigid, he'd actually be a reliable teammate."

He circled the first floor several times and found that almost all the iron doors connecting the workshops were securely locked. Unless he'd brought explosives, shooting a lock open with a handgun was just a movie trick-fine to watch, but believe it for real and a ricochet would probably punch through his thigh.

"This is a pain..."

He found the stairs and pounded his way up. Although the office entrance was a heavy wooden door, its lock was clearly less sturdy than those downstairs. After several kicks, it finally swung unsteadily inward with a crash.

Li Jie stood in the doorway and looked inside. The corridor was covered in red and green bulbs that flashed continuously in a strange pattern, making his eyes swim. A mixture of scorched fat and industrial thinner hung in the air. Speakers seemed to be hidden above the ceiling, constantly playing music with a chaotic rhythm.

"Did this guy used to work at a nightclub or something?"

With all those colorful bulbs, the lighting was actually much better than downstairs. He cautiously made his way along the corridor, but aside from the floor being uneven from years of neglect, there were no spring-loaded blades or enormous pendulums suddenly dropping from the ceiling.

"Doesn't seem all that dangerous..."

At the end of the long corridor was a large conference room. He stood outside and listened. Sounds of fighting and laughter drifted out from within.

Crash!

Li Jie kicked the door open. It slammed into the wall inside with a tremendous bang, but the sight beyond it instantly rooted him to the spot.

"What the fuck is this..."

In the middle of the conference room, a dozen or so tables had been pushed together into an enormous tea table, covered with a black-and-white checkered tablecloth. Dozens of cups and teapots sat on top, ranging from exquisite porcelain and silverware to rusty tin cans and plastic children's toys, with no two alike. Many cups still held suspiciously colored, half-dried liquids that gave off a sickeningly sweet mixture of odors.

Seven or eight young girls sat around the table, all wearing the signature bright blue puffed skirts and white aprons, along with blond wigs and black hairbands. Expressionless and empty-eyed, they resembled exquisite dolls. They took turns picking up utterly empty teapots to pour nonexistent tea for one another, then repeated in faint, unreal voices:

"Would you like sugar? It's time for afternoon tea!"

"No, thanks..." Li Jie flexed his hand, then clenched it into a fist again.

"Kids, I hate to spoil the fun, but it's time you went home and did your homework!"