Chapter 2497: The Battle for the Cloak (16)

This fog was unforeseen by anyone.

At that time, Robin's team had already found the master switch for the protective devices left behind by Batman. Once activated, the energy system of the protective devices would start operating.

But as mentioned before, the protective system is divided into zones. That is to say, there are separate switches to activate the protective systems of each zone. This means that merely flipping the circuit breaker is not enough; one also had to go to each distribution room to turn on the switches.

Now, not just Dick but everyone started complaining about who Batman was guarding against after all. Jason had begun to see the reason, but he thought it was best to keep quiet.

As far as he knew, the Arkham Batman had interacted with the Primary Universe Batman, and he might have already learnt from the Primary Universe Batman about the situation in Main Universe Gotham—Would the Primary Universe Batman be wandering the streets like a vagrant if Main Universe Gotham hadn't flown away?

So how did Main Universe Gotham fly? The lunatics of Arkham did exert considerable effort, but you, Robin, can't claim to be an uninvolved onlooker, can you?

This energy absorbing device sounded like a reliable big fellow. If you all were allowed to just flip a switch and turn them all on, would there still be a home to come back to when I return from being president?

In summary, Jason could understand why the Batman of this universe had designed such a complicated control system. It indeed was a bit troublesome when it truly mattered, but now that they were in this situation, it still had to be resolved. Luckily, they had enough people to split up and take action.

Considering the current unsafe conditions in the town, they decided to go in groups of three to several potential switch locations they had deduced based on geography to activate the switches of the protective devices.

Red Hood had already rushed back, and everyone had learned of Batman's disappearance from him, which made the atmosphere within the team somewhat delicate.

If you say that Batman was seriously injured, awaiting their rescue, they would be in a desperate hurry, wishing they could immediately traverse through time and space to extract Batman from danger.

But if you say that Batman has gotten out of the trouble, yet is nowhere to be seen, the members of the Batman Family can't help but wonder if this might be another of Batman's plans, and feel a sense of loss for not being included in Batman's schemes.

This wasn't just them being petty; Batman's track record was notable. Whenever there was a major incident, Batman never discussed plans with them but opted to act on his own. At such times, they would start complaining about what the purpose of the Batman Family really was.

But complaints aside, they were still holding their breath. Batman was not in Gotham, and there was danger in Gotham City; they had to protect Gotham on behalf of Batman.

Most importantly, they had to protect it better than anyone else in the Batman Family, at least.

The Batman Family was always like this. When Batman was around, the topics of conversation revolved around him. When he was not, they covertly still centered around him—on the first day without the Bat at home, missing him, and on the second, questioning who was Batman's favorite Robin?

Now, all members of the Batman Family were secretly competing with each other. It wasn't too bad usually, but this time was different; with counterparts from three universes together, the sample size was fuller than usual. If someone's counterpart team won, wouldn't it prove that in most universes, they were the stronger ones?

Therefore, when dividing into teams, they did not hesitate to form teams with their counterparts; two Nightwings from different universes joined up with a Dick, Arkham Knight was injured, so Red Hood teamed up with Jason, followed by Red Robin, Robin, and Tim.

Barbara helplessly observed this, for in her view, there were similarities in the abilities of counterparts, and organizing them by universe could allow for complementation. But they insisted on sticking with their counterparts.

Although Barbara was a member of the Batman Family, she clearly wasn't interested in contending for the title of the coolest Robin, nor could she dissuade the enthusiastic Robins. Thus, it had to be this way.

The atmosphere wasn't too serious when they set off; they were each eager and ready to go, having noticed that Batman had already been prepared for this attack. Besides, King Robin seemed like an old-school villain from a glance. Wasn't this a perfect opportunity to host a "Batman's Favorite Robin Competition" for the entire cosmos?

So, they spontaneously reached a verbal agreement: whoever caught that boastful little troublemaker King Robin first before Batman returned would naturally win the first competition.

But what they didn't realize was that King Robin was not the chief examiner of this contest. Quite the contrary, he was one of the contestants too.

About 10 minutes after Robin's team left, they had approximately reached halfway to their respective destinations, with some distance still to go. Both Dick's and Tim's groups were traveling in Batmobiles, while Jason, due to fewer people, was in a small Batplane.

It was at this moment that they noticed some signs of fog forming on the ground, so they immediately stopped their vehicles, closed the windows, and waited silently in their place.

Indeed, it didn't take long before the fog attacked once more.

As soon as the fog appeared, Jason had found a tall building to park the plane on its rooftop, activating the airtight and filter systems. The two Batmobiles stopped in an alley, with their windows also closed.

However, because Dick's entire group had been discussing the customs of Brude Haven in different universes at the time, they were slow to park, and naturally, slow to close the windows too. It was only after they finished their last topic that they remembered to press the buttons for the airtight and filter devices, by which time the fog had already become so dense that visibility dropped below three meters.

Then they were the first to notice that the fog had invaded the interior of the car, and although it was much thinner than outside, there was still an uncomfortable feeling lingering.

"I think the situation is a bit awkward now," Dick looked around, even had the mood to make a polite comment, "I guess I really shouldn't have chatted about fishing for so long; then we could have spotted the anomaly the moment it appeared."

"No, it has nothing to do with what we were discussing," said Nightwing from the primary universe, frowning slightly and looking at the window glass. "If, as you describe, this is a phenomenon that happens simultaneously in many universes, then its frequent occurrence in our universe might have a special reason."

"That's what I'm thinking too," said the Nightwing from the Arkham universe. "What do we do now? I don't think staying here is a good choice."

"Indeed," Dick agreed with him, saying, "Since our filtration system didn't succeed in filtering it out and should the enemy appear inside the car, it would be too late to run. Maybe we should get out?"

"You said before that staying in one place would prevent us from being affected by spatial confusion, right?" Nightwing from the primary universe contemplated, "So if we get out, we'll just stay by the car. If the enemy comes from outside, we'll drive away; if they appear inside, we can deal with them straightaway."

The three of them thought about it and agreed the plan was sound. The Batmobile they were driving was not the kind that Batman drives; although it was equipped with some weapons and had protective features on the exterior, it wasn't designed to combat threats from the inside. Now that the fog had invaded, any actual anomaly would trap them like sitting ducks. It might be better to move to a more open area where they could run if they couldn't fight.

In such a mood, they pushed the car door open to get out, but the moment their feet stepped down, they didn't feel solid ground beneath. They felt as if they were falling straight down.

The sensation of weightlessness jolted all three awake. They took a deep breath and realized they were still seated.

They exchanged glances and could see the frightened look on each other's faces, understanding that they had evidently all had the same dream.

After discussing it once more, while they still rationally concluded they should leave the car, emotionally, none of them were willing to open the door again.

"I think we should think in reverse," Dick said. "The mysterious fog caused us to have such a dream. Could its purpose be to scare us into thinking that opening the car door might be dangerous, making us cower inside the car, where the real trap is hidden?"

"That makes some sense," said Nightwing from the primary universe. "But we can't be sure whether this is some kind of omen; we know nothing about it."

"So what do we do?" they looked at each other, each somewhat undecided.

Nightwing wasn't without decisiveness; it was just that sometimes he was too concerned about others' reactions, worried about the impact of his actions on others, while deeply respecting their opinions, even if that other was himself.

He overestimated the responsibility of each of his decisions, which made him increasingly cautious. In a team with a hotheaded big guy like a ticking clock and a Little Batman who trusted his judgment 100%, this trait would seem quite excellent.

But if all three members of a team were like this, the first thing they thought of when a problem arose was how their current decision might affect others' life and death, leading to timidity and indecision.

"How about this, one of us goes down to check; that way, if something happens, we won't lose everyone," someone suggested.

"But there are three of us, and if we divide our forces, someone will be left alone," Nightwing from the primary universe said. "Facing such a situation, fighting solo isn't a good thing."

"We can't risk everyone either," said the Nightwing from the Arkham universe. "If things go south, we'd all be done for."

"I'll go and take a look," said Dick. "I've brought Holy Water from the Fountain of Paradise, which works wonders against mysterious properties and demonic beings. I suspect the fog might be of that nature too; at least I can protect myself."

As soon as he finished speaking, he pushed open the car door and stepped out, but in that instant, the dense fog completely swallowed his figure. The Nightwing from the primary universe, sitting in the driver's seat, reached out to grab him but ended up grasping only a wisp of fog.

Dick stepped down and the scene in front of his eyes changed dramatically. He found himself in a brightly lit office with no trace of the heavy fog, leading him to conclude he was in an illusion.

He walked over to the office window and looked down to see a car. It was the Batmobile they had been riding. Strangely, there were three people inside the car.

Dick moved closer to the window for a better look and saw that all three people had their eyes closed, brows tightly furrowed, as if in the midst of a dream.

Space within the fog was chaotic. Could it be that the current moment was when they had previously fallen into the illusion of plummeting?

No, Dick thought, the fall was but an instant, yet he had been watching for over ten seconds and the three had not awakened.

Wait, although the fall felt instantaneous to them, the time in the dream was not consistent with reality. Was it possible that the seemingly brief moment of falling had actually lasted an unknown length of time?