The bird's body language made it very clear that it despised him.
Well, he should have come over before his night patrol, instead of being covered in soot and grime like this.. but it's not a big deal; Red Robin's battle-damaged photos are currently ranked number one in downloads on the Gotham section of the Vigilante Forum.
Well, excluding Batman, Nightwing counts as being from a different neighborhood, Red Hood is the leader of the Black Gang, so he isn't included in the rankings.
Red Robin struck an even cooler pose and took another sip of the black tea.
This black tea had double sugar and just the right amount of milk; it seemed to be made from fermented tea leaves from the East.
Thank you, Little Reed. I'm sorry to disturb your rest, but I would like to ask, how much do you know about the shooting incident that happened at Gotham High yesterday?
Red Robin did not use sign language; instead, he casually picked up a pen and began writing on a blank piece of paper.
Colt looked at him, said nothing, picked up a pen to write under the question: [There is bullying in the football team.]
Red Robin stood by Colt's side, holding his cup as if he couldn't bear to set it down, looking down to study Colt's handwriting.
It was extremely standard handwriting, with no variation in the strokes of identical letters, as steady as if it were printed.
Red Robin was lost in thought, realizing that not only was the English perfect, but even the mathematical, physical, chemical formulas on the wall were written in a single, continuous stroke, with almost no ink hesitation, as standard as printed text.
Even the blueprints scattered about showed no signs of corrections.
Colt's hands were as steady as a neurosurgeon's.
[Seniors bullying juniors, the coaching staff embezzling match prize money, psychological suppression and corporal punishment of team members, the cheerleader being in ambiguous relationships with several team members while receiving a weekly $200 subsidy from the head coach.]
Colt tore off the note, thought for a moment, then added another sentence below.
[The head coach is secretly selling drugs on campus; Leon, who was promoted to the Gotham team this year, used to be his subordinate.]
Red Robin took the 100×140mm A6 pale yellow colored paper, looked at Colt, asked, "Do you know what kind of drug it is?"
Colt stopped writing, a voice drifted from the loudspeaker on the wall: "Psychotropic stimulant tablets, not an internationally known banned substance."
Red Robin looked at Colt's tightly shut mouth, then at the loudspeaker emitting sound.
He put down the cup, rolled up the note and tucked it into the small pouch at his waist, then picked up a pen and wrote down a contact number.
Thank you, the intelligence you provided is very valuable. If there is any new information, please contact this number, Little Reed.
The intercom rang again: "Colt."
Red Robin nodded slightly. "Colt."
Colt looked at Red Robin's mouth; hearing that name spoken by someone other than his father felt very strange.
Colt," Red Robin called out again, pausing before adding, "At school, if you need something, you can find Timothy Drake; he is my informant.
Well, if you say he's an informant, then he's an informant.
Colt saw Red Robin off after he climbed out of the window, then placed the washed mug on the shelf and labeled it as Red Robin's personal mug.
Reasonably speaking, shouldn't the vigilantes of Gotham always remain vigilant and never touch food provided by strangers?
Isn't he afraid I'll extract his DNA from the rim of the cup?
Colt poked Birdie.
Birdie nuzzled his fingertips, hopped onto the bookshelf, perched atop a large tome, bowing its head to preen its wet feathers.
Colt wiped his wet hands dry, climbed up the ladder onto the bookshelf, felt around where Birdie had been perched, plucking off a tiny micro-camera no larger than a bean.
As if afraid that no one would know who had placed it there, the surveillance device even bore the Red Robin insignia.
Colt thought of the tracker that had already been dismantled and repurposed by him, marveling at how the big shots were truly something else; such expensive items were nothing more than disposable toys to them.
Colt wanted to say: Great, I love it, send more!
But it's too late now; he'll unwrap them tomorrow.
Colt held the surveillance monitor up to his face and nodded at the camera. After exchanging an invisible greeting with the person on the other side, he pointed the monitor toward the computer monitor, opened a hypnosis video on the computer, played some rain white noise on loop.
Goodnight, Red Robin.
..
'I've been spotted!'
White noise crackled through the monitoring channel. Timothy gave a soft click of his tongue and parked his motorcycle next to Red Hood.
The people in the Batcave had not yet dispersed.
Red Hood had just had a row with Batman and was grumbling as he prepared to leave, but he glanced at Tim, his motion to flick his lighter paused again.
“Birdie, you're laughing so nastily, did you get poisoned by the flower pollen?”
Timothy composed his expression and cleared his throat. "No, only the Demon Brat was affected by the pollen tonight. I recorded a video of him holding a flowerpot and claiming he wanted to marry a rose; what are you going to trade me for it?"
What's the collection value in that? A video of him shouting about wanting to marry someone would actually be blackmail material.
Red Hood crossed his arms and looked Timothy up and down, intuitively sensing that something was wrong.
I thought you were injured, which is why I agreed to stay behind and clean up your mess. Instead, you come back looking all smug, now I'm the one getting chewed out by Old Bat?
Batman scolded you?
Timothy looked around in shock for Batman.
Batman was not on the scene; he was performing a check-up on Damian.
Red Hood slandered him righteously: "He cursed me in his head!"
Red Hood jumped onto the drone while he was spraying herbicide. Batman told him to get off, he didn't, then he fell, Batman pulled him back to check on him, that's it.
Stephanie, passing by, spoke the truth.
Cassandra handed Timothy a piece of cookie.
Timothy returned too late; Damian was still doing his checks, their portion of the late-night snack had been devoured by everyone, leaving only a single piece for the kind Cassandra.
Thanks, I love you, Cassandra.
Timothy gave his sister, who was on his mind, a hug, then grabbed the Red Hood who was preparing to leave. "Jason, have there been any new drugs appearing in Old Town lately? Are they psychostimulants with subtle effects, or maybe not recently?"
New drugs pop up in that hellhole every day. I'll get a list for you when I get back.
I'll send you a few of Penguin's new contacts.
The two of them completed a pure information exchange.
The Batmen usually don't interfere in other people's cases unless someone asks for help; no one asked Timothy what he wanted these for.
Everyone scattered.
Timothy went upstairs before Damian could finish the inspection.
The white noise coming from the monitoring channel was far too hypnotic. Colt should be like Jason and shove the monitor under a special ability user's bed. Or he could be like Nightwing and play ear-splitting rock music into the monitor.
This sound is way too targeted at him!
Timothy yawned and brewed himself a cup of strong coffee.
Tsk, the cup is ugly.
Timothy took a sip of the coffee, which was so thick it was almost like asphalt, then turned his head to see Bruce leaning against the dining room doorway.
Bruce had just come out of the Batcave, wearing a bathrobe with his hair still wet. He also approached the coffee machine, wanting a cup of coffee.
Timothy snapped to attention. "Don't move, I'll make it for you."
His number one and number four coffee machines had both perished at the hands of Bruce. He had spent half a month acting like a good boy to beg Alfred for this number five, he could never let his new favorite fall victim to Bruce's hands again.
Bruce frowned in disagreement. "The coffee machine breaking has nothing to do with me."
I know, I know. Number one was Jason fighting with you and getting caught in the crossfire. Number four was you stealing Stephen's little cookies and getting caught in the crossfire. None of it has anything to do with you being a kitchen killer.
Timothy brewed a normal cup of coffee for Bruce.
“I wouldn't recommend you drink it. You should go to sleep and wake up in five hours for this morning's board meeting.”
Bruce took the coffee, but did not rush to drink it: "The one who needs sleep should be you; the last time you slept for more than three hours was the day before yesterday. If you keep this up, what you encounter won't be Cassandra's hand-chop, but Alfred's special sleep-inducing milk."
“I'm used to polyphasic sleep, I've been making sure to rest. If you can't stand it, you could visit the company more often; then my sleep time would be much longer.”
Timothy thought that Bruce's advice to him was entirely because he was afraid of Alfred's vegetable juice.
Bruce fell silent.
Timothy raised his glass to Bruce and brushed past him, heading back to his room.
As the two brushed past each other, Bruce suddenly said in a low voice, "You accessed Joseph Reed's classified files; I need to know why."
“I did a little investigating into why Dr. Reed requested Red Robin Cape data,” Timothy said, his expression innocent and well-behaved. Then, remembering something, he asked in confusion:
He has worked in the frontier laboratory for nine years and currently manages five projects. Your trust in him is second only to Lucius's—you even gave him a signed Batarang—so why is his file on the continuous surveillance list of dangerous individuals?
Two detectives who were equally unwilling to share clues, you looked at me, I looked at you, both of us attempting to surmise something from each other's expressions.
Master, Master Timothy, I don't think the kitchen doorway is the best place for a staring contest.
Alfred was even more elusive than Batman, breaking the stiff atmosphere of the father and son's gaze and confiscating their coffee.
The corners of both their mouths turned down at the same time, the curvature of their frowns almost identical.
6:30 AM.
Colt woke up to the urge of his biological clock and immediately looked into the mental space to check the Dream Station.
An empty station could starve a nightmare to death.
Drake pulled another all-nighter without even a single cup of coffee.
Fortunately, last night's riot didn't damage the power system, the water plant wasn't poisoned, there were no chemical plant explosions to affect the air quality.
Colt skillfully collected tap water samples for testing.
The trace elements are very abundant. Aside from the usual heavy metals being severely over the limit, there are no new unknown toxins, nor are there any known chemical toxins like Fear Toxin or Joker Toxin.
This water cannot be consumed directly, but after purification, it can still be used for bathing, washing clothes, watering the lawn.
The Gotham morning news was broadcasting Batman's enforcement scene from last night; the one who escaped was Poison Ivy.
Poison Ivy's escape route passed through Wayne Botanical Gardens. No wonder Red Robin had slime on his head; it looked like he had fallen into a Venus flytrap, a cloying, sweet plant scent could be smelled upon contact.. Wait, Poison Ivy!
Colt remembered something and rushed out through the wall.