When the wet invitation landed in Batman's hand, water was still dripping from its edges.
Batman did not speak immediately. He pinched a corner between two long fingers and turned it over.
The Mad Hatter's calligraphy had blurred a little in the water. Words like tea party, gentlemen, ladies, and late lay crooked across the paper, like fairy-tale scenery someone had trampled to pieces.
But the string of numbers on the back remained.
Scratched, missing a few strokes, barely concealed.
Batman opened an evidence bag from his belt and slipped the invitation inside. A cold light on the inside of his glove swept across the paper.
Chen Mo stood beside him, looking at the numbers. His voice came through his mask, still in Spider-Man's seemingly breezy but actually watchful tone.
"I know Gotham's lunatics put a lot of thought into decorating their crime scenes. Teacups arranged just so, nursery rhymes playing, kids lined up on the left and right. The service procedures are more elaborate than a school cafeteria's."
He raised a hand and pointed at the evidence bag.
"But who puts batch numbers on a fairy-tale tea party? That goes beyond lunatic aesthetics and straight into somebody filling out forms in an office. And whoever filled them out was considerate enough to hide the number on the back, really banking on everyone being too busy catching the lunatic to do anything but toss the paper in a garbage bag."
Batman glanced at him.
"Unless the number was confirmed first. Someone was planning things for the Mad Hatter."
Chen Mo paused.
Batgirl had already approached, the little device in her hand glowing blue.
Batman held the evidence bag up to the light.
The paper fibers had absorbed water, and the calligraphic ink had bled across the surface. But the numbers