"Captain Gordon of the GCPD officially entered the war zone today to negotiate with those two lunatics. I'm truly happy to see him return unharmed. He's a true warrior."
"Bill, it's been half a month now, and the GCPD hasn't even finished rebuilding. I admit they've tried, but their efforts are as useless as the Batman they support—those two monsters offered to end the war if the Bat was handed over, and he flatly refused."
"Damn it, Frank, those are two psychopaths! Can you really trust the word of a criminal?"
"Batman isn't even legal! And this 'Kite Man' popping up lately—my God, Bill, you're practically painting them as heroes."
"Frank, they've saved hundreds of people in the past few days. If you pulled that off, I'd call you a hero too."
"What about the war? The Joker and the Riddler are locked in a stalemate; someone has to break the deadlock!"
The Riddler sighed, bored by the anchors' pointless bickering, and clicked the TV off.
At that moment, the communicator in his pocket buzzed.
"Boss, the Bike Stripper is back."
Two minutes later, in the grand meeting hall.
The Riddler turned his gaze to Jude, who stood squarely in the center of the room. "I'm thrilled to see you back," Riddler began, his voice dripping with dangerous sarcasm. "But where is Kite Man?"
"Kite Man ran away."
The surrounding super-criminals exchanged expressions of pure contempt. Jude delivered this utterly shameful combat report with absolute, unshakable confidence. Kite Man was a nobody—a D-lister with zero special abilities beyond a glorified glider. How could he report such a failure so casually? Had Gotham's underworld really fallen so far that they were relying on this level of incompetence?
The Riddler stared at him in profound silence for a long moment. Finally, he spoke. "Thor."
"Present."
"I am... curious," Riddler said, his fingers tightening around his cane. "Did Kite Man shoot at you?"
"No. He probably didn't even have a gun."
"Did he never land?"
"No, he was standing right on the ground. Next to a woman and a child."
"Was he moving too fast for you to shoot?"
"No. He took long enough to launch that I definitely could have hit him."
"Were you entirely alone? No support?"
"I had a full patrol with automatic rifles."
The Riddler's expression darkened, the facade of polite curiosity shattering into volatile irritation. He gritted his teeth, enunciating every single word. "Then. How. Did you let him get away?"
"Batman showed up."
The atmosphere in the room instantly shifted. The contempt on the other villains' faces vanished, replaced by a collective, silent nod of understanding. Ah. Well, that makes sense.
"Why didn't you lead with that?" Riddler hissed.
"You didn't ask."
The Riddler took a slow, deep breath, wrestling down the violent urge to kill him on the spot. You can't kill him, he reminded himself. At least, not without a good reason. The alliance was fragile enough as it was; executing his own men over a technicality would only fracture it further.
"Fine. You encountered the Bat and managed to escape. But where is the patrol?"
Jude blinked. "How do you think I escaped?"
"..."
The Riddler's hand twitched involuntarily toward his waist. He wanted nothing more than to shoot this utterly useless, infuriating man who caused more trouble than he was worth. But after a tense second, his hand retreated to the brass head of his cane.
Forget it, he soothed his own fractured ego. There's no point in getting angry. He had finally realized one undeniable truth: there was absolutely no reason to waste mental energy on the Bike Stripper. No matter how spectacularly the man failed, he was just an idiot. A blunt instrument with zero intelligence. Why let it raise his blood pressure? The money was already spent, so he might as well just use him as cannon fodder.
"Forget it," Riddler repeated aloud, waving a dismissive hand. "If Batman helped Kite Man, they've likely formed an alliance. Kite Man won't be joining us, and there's no need to waste resources hunting him down. He's just a minor character anyway."
He swept his gaze across the room. "Aside from him, every villain in Gotham has already chosen a side. Either ours, or the Joker's. Speaking of which... Slade. Have you dealt with the holdouts?"
"Everyone except Catwoman is taken care of."
A man stepped forward from the shadows. He wore tactical armor and a mask split evenly down the middle—half black, half orange. He was a walking armory, equipped with an assault rifle, a sidearm, a heavily loaded tactical belt, two long swords strapped across his back, and a collapsible staff at his waist. To say he was armed to the teeth was an understatement.
Slade Wilson. The world's deadliest mercenary. A biologically enhanced super-soldier who operated strictly for the highest bidder. Unmatched in tactics, hand-to-hand combat, and weaponry, the military experiments that saved his life had forged him into an even deadlier apex predator: the super-villain "Deathstroke."
"Is Catwoman proving difficult?" Riddler asked.
"She's an exceptional escape artist, and she has Batman's protection. Killing her will cost you extra."
"How much?"
"Five times my usual rate."
"Forget it." The Riddler scoffed, shaking his head. "She's just a cat. She won't affect the overall situation, and she certainly isn't worth my money. We'll deal with her after we break the Bat."
Having said that, he looked at Jude again.
"Thor. You and Deathstroke are going on a mission tomorrow."
Jude stared blankly at the Riddler, internally marveling at the man's sheer audacity. Riddler had just witnessed the absolute depths of his incompetence, yet he still dared to pair him with Deathstroke?
"Gordon refused my terms, and he refused the Joker's," Riddler explained, pacing slowly. "But luckily, my contacts inside the GCPD provided a useful piece of news. Starting tomorrow, Batman will personally patrol the war zone. We can pinpoint his exact location."
He pointed his cane at the two of them. "You two will go to the West Side and set up an ambush. Snipe that pesky Bat from a distance. If you can do it, great. If not, pivot. Locate the Joker's henchmen in the area—Mr. Freeze, Deadshot, the Penguin, or even Solomon Grundy."
"Eliminate them."
Deathstroke gave a single, curt nod, turned on his heel, and walked out without a word.
Jude nodded as well. With the combined might of Deathstroke's lethal efficiency and his own active sabotage, they were guaranteed to achieve a net negative result. The outcome of this assassination was already sealed.
It had absolutely no chance of succeeding.
Meanwhile, on the Upper West Side.
The Joker, sitting comfortably behind a scarred desk, picked up a buzzing communicator.
"Joker. The Riddler is making a move."
"Oh?"
"He sent Deathstroke to intercept Batman in the West End tomorrow."
"Mmm..."
The Joker hummed thoughtfully, picking up a pen. He scrawled the address spoken through the communicator onto a scrap of paper.
"Oswald!" he folded the paper and shouted out the door.
"Send Deadshot to see me."
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