The heavy iron gate of the factory yard was secured with a thick chain, yet the rusty lock couldn't completely seal the entrance.
Below, there was a crooked gap, about half a foot wide, just enough for a lean person to squeeze through sideways.
Jay squatted down and tried it…
Well, that path clearly wasn't meant for him.
Jay looked at the height of the wall. He took a short run-up, leaped sharply, and flipped over the top.
The yard was pitch black. Jay looked up at the factory and office buildings, where faint lights seemed to be shining through.
He turned on his powerful flashlight, holding and waving it like a Jedi Knight. Wherever the beam struck, it illuminated waist-high weeds and scattered industrial waste.
The light swept across the front of the office building, then suddenly twitched, fixing on two stationary figures. The two figures were nearly indistinguishable from the environment in the shadows.
Blasted by the flashlight, they immediately rushed forward, shouting nonsense like, "Off with his head!" and "The Queen's command!"
Judging by their looks and clothes, they seemed to be street thugs, possibly Cobblepot's men. But for Jay, even if Cobblepot himself dared to cause trouble, he'd still beat him.
He rushed forward and delivered a hook to the first man's jaw. Then, he dodged the axe swing from the second man, and slammed his flashlight onto the side of the man's temple.
Neither thug made much noise and dropped straight to the ground, fast asleep.
"Young people sure have great sleep quality," he quipped.
The quality of the police flashlight was truly outstanding; the light beam was barely affected after that impact.
He forcefully pushed open the rusty main door of the office building, the hinges screeching loudly. A smell combining heavy mold, decaying wood, and chemical reagents crashed into his face, nearly making him throw up the coffee he'd had that afternoon.
"Damn it, I rarely side with environmental groups, but just for this disgusting smell…"
He muttered to himself, pulled a mask from his pocket, slapped it on his face, and walked inside, raising the flashlight to look around.
The beam pierced the darkness like a sharp sword, revealing nothing but decay and desolation.
Faded, bubbling cartoon wallpaper was still pasted on the walls. The distorted smiling faces on them seemed to grin at him as the light swept past, looking extremely sinister.
Rotten brochures and toy catalogs were scattered on the floor; the colorful pages had long been unrecognizable due to water stains and mold, crunching with a soft, squishy rustle when stepped on.
The place looked as if it had suffered a sudden disaster, with time forcibly brought to a halt. In the open workshop on the left, the conveyor belt of the injection molding machine still held semi-finished plastic doll parts.
He opened an unsealed cardboard box, filled with palm-sized, foldable robot toys.
"Hey! Optimus Prime, and Starscream!"
Jay picked one up and skillfully fiddled with it a few times until the robot transformed from plane mode into a human figure. This was something he had desperately wanted ten years ago, but his parents were busy arguing all the time and never fulfilled the wish.
He put a few small robots into his pocket and looked at the workbench next to him. Tools and unassembled toys were still laid out.
Multicolored plastic debris, broken gears, rusty springs, and countless unrecognizable remnants of parts were covered under a thick layer of dust.
A fluffy teddy bear lay half-reclining on the office chair. One of its button eyes had fallen off, the thread dangling limply, while the other stared blankly at the ceiling. The artificial cotton stuffing leaked from a tear on the side, stained gray-black by dust.
"Tsk tsk, you've had a rough life."
But the place wasn't silent. Intermittent sounds of dripping water, drumming, and a humming white noise came from somewhere.
"Safety first, power off when leaving. Couldn't even manage that; no wonder you went bankrupt."
Jay quieted his steps, walked through the aisles between the machines, stepping over sodden cardboard boxes and plastic wrap in the packaging area, heading towards a half-open iron door at the other end of the workshop.
He raised his flashlight. The door read "R&D and Testing." Inside looked like a laboratory or sample room. Several mannequin dolls wearing blue puffy dresses and white aprons were arranged in a circle, with an old teapot without batteries placed in the center.
Exaggerated, distorted smiles were painted on the dolls' faces, looking eerie and chilling under the flashlight's beam.
On the workbench against the wall, there were no more toy parts, but strange things scattered about: old-fashioned brainwave monitoring charts, complex hand-drawn circuit diagrams, and several worn copies of Alice in Wonderland piled up.
The faint chemical reagent smell in the air grew stronger here.
Jay's heartbeat quickened slightly. He found the right place.
"Bastard, hiding in such a scary place, wait until I catch you…"
As he muttered, the flashlight beam swept across a small, sealed room at the far end of the space, looking like a soundproof booth.
On that heavy metal door, there was a small observation window. And right behind that window, a pale, distorted face wearing huge round glasses was staring motionless at him.
Under the strong light of the flashlight, those eyes reflected an inhuman, frenzied gleam.
Shit!
The shock almost killed him, making him jump three feet high and let out a howl. He nearly dropped the flashlight.
"I swear, are you trying to scare people to death?!"
Unexpectedly, a microphone in the room suddenly turned on, and the face screamed furiously, "Why? Why won't you obey my command!!!"
"Obey your mom!"
Jay was instantly filled with rage. He darted forward and slammed his fist onto the observation window glass.
But the glass was thicker than a battleship's porthole and didn't budge under the heavy impact.
The face quickly retreated, pulling down the metal shutter over the window, then disappeared.
"You better not run, you bastard!"
Jay, shaking his hand in pain like Jackie Chan, turned and rushed out of the R&D room.
He stumbled around the factory floor, flashlight in hand, searching for the stairs leading upstairs.
In the flickering light, he thought he saw a cloaked figure flash across the air, but a closer look revealed nothing.
Jay stopped, pulled out his phone. I wouldn't be worthy of this uniform if I didn't call for backup now!
The other end of the phone readily agreed. After all, James Gordon wouldn't drag his feet on this kind of thing.
Whether it was Jay asking him to get the isolation chips from Nygma or requesting that officers refrain from bringing firearms to avoid serious friendly fire if controlled, he agreed to all requests and stated he would bring backup immediately.
"Phew… If this guy weren't so rigid, he'd actually be a reliable teammate."
He circled the first floor several times, finding that the iron doors connecting the various workshops were mostly securely locked.
Unless you brought explosives, shooting the locks with a pistol was just a movie trope. If Jay tried it for real, a ricochet would likely pierce his leg.
"Tough to get through…"
He found the stairs, stomped up loudly. The door to the office area was thick wood, but the lock was clearly less robust than the ones downstairs. After a few hard kicks, the door finally swung open with a bang.
Jay stood at the doorway and looked inside. The corridor was strewn with red and green light bulbs, flashing rhythmically in a strange pattern that was dizzying to look at.
He walked in and gradually began to hear music.
Speakers seemed to be hidden in the ceiling, playing music with a chaotic, confusing rhythm. The air was filled with a scent of burnt fat mixed with industrial thinner.
"This guy isn't a nightclub reject, is he!"
With all these colored light bulbs, the illumination was actually better than downstairs.
He moved cautiously down the corridor, but aside from the floor being uneven from years of neglect, there were no suddenly springing blades or giant pendulums dropping from the ceiling.
"Doesn't seem that dangerous, after all…"
At the end of the long corridor was a large conference room. He listened at the door and heard sounds of fighting and laughter inside.
BANG!
Jay kicked the door open. The panel slammed against the inner wall with a huge noise, but the scene inside instantly froze him in place.
"What the hell is this…"
In the center of the conference room, about a dozen tables were joined to form one massive tea table, covered with a black and white checkered tablecloth.
Dozens of teacups and teapots were placed on the table, none of them alike, ranging from exquisite porcelain and silver to rusty iron cans and plastic children's toys.
Many cups contained suspicious-colored, semi-dried liquid, giving off a sickly sweet, nauseating mixed odor.
Seated around the table were seven or eight young girls, all wearing the iconic bright blue puffy dresses and white aprons, with blonde wigs and black headbands.
Their faces were expressionless, their eyes vacant, like finely crafted dolls.
They took turns picking up the empty teapots on the table, pouring non-existent tea for each other, and then repeated in ethereal, illusory voices:
"Sugar? It's time for afternoon tea!"
"No, thank you…" Jay stretched out his fist, then clenched it again. "Kids, I don't want to spoil the fun, but it's time for you to go home and do your homework!"
——————
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