At first, Edward Nygma—the man who would one day be known across Gotham as The Riddler—was only joking. A throwaway line. A stab in the dark.
But as soon as the words left his mouth, sothing in his analytical brain shifted. The data rearranged. The dots started connecting themselves.
Adam had said he'd make Flass pay for flirting with the woman he adored.
Flass was ambushed during the exact ti Adam had co to visit.
And that strange rumor—about soone flinging an open drink that blinded Flass right before he got his ass handed to him? Adam's clothes still bore the sa stains.
Nygma blinked.
Wait a minute.
His voice cracked a little. "Adam… don't tell … was that really you?"
He wasn't sure if he wanted the answer. This was Flass they were talking about—forr Navy SEAL, captain of the Special Operations Team, a man built like a linebacker and twice as brutal. Even Loeb treated him like a blunt instrunt wrapped in a badge.
And yet… Flass had been left stripped and broken on the parking garage floor.
The thought that the man who did it was now sitting calmly in front of him—smiling, even—was almost surreal.
But Adam didn't flinch. His smile remained unchanged, his posture relaxed, almost amused.
"Believe what you want, Ed," he said casually. "If you think I did it, then maybe I did. If not, no harm done. But there's one thing you should know…"
He leaned forward, the light catching his eyes just right.
"You're my friend. And for my friends? I'm willing to do dangerous things. If anyone crosses them—insults them, threatens them—they'll pay the price."
The room fell into a heavy silence.
Edward Nygma stood there, stunned. The words hit harder than he expected. No one had ever said anything like that to him before.
For all his intelligence, all his riddles and cleverness, Edward had always been on the outside looking in. A solitary mind. A loner in a sea of brutes and braggarts. But now…
He swallowed hard.
"…Thanks," he managed to say.
Adam clapped him on the shoulder, charmingly, "Don't get mushy on , Ed. We're friends. No need for thank-yous."
In truth, the whole Flass incident hadn't really been Adam's doing at all.
Gordon had delivered the beatdown. Gordon had stripped Flass and left him cuffed to a dumpster. And Gordon, bless him, had earned every bruise in the process. Adam had only helped by lobbing a conveniently open can of tea to distract the guy.
But Ed didn't need to know all that.
Let the world think it was Adam.
If Flass ca looking for revenge, he'd find Gordon.
If Gordon wanted to thank soone, he'd thank Adam.
Three birds. One can.
Now that was efficiency.
"You've had a lot of heat on you lately," Ed said, his expression growing thoughtful. "I heard so folks are filing complaints about how you've been confiscating their equipnt. Even Weaver's apparently demanding an explanation."
Adam let out a dry laugh and crossed his legs. "Oh, that. Yeah, I've got a few people stirred up."
He wasn't exactly innocent. When he'd launched his little underground disc operation, he had no real funding. So he'd taken a cue from the system: he beca the system.
Under the guise of "cracking down on piracy," he and his boys raided every back alley burner and bootlegger in the district—confiscating blank discs, duplicate machines, and studio-grade equipnt. Of course, most of it ended up right back in his production lines.
Were all those people guilty? Who knew.
This was Gotham.
If a billboard fell and killed ten people, chances were nine of them were criminals, and the tenth had it coming.
"I already told them they could co claim their gear," Adam said with a smirk. "They just have to pay a storage fee. We've been housing their crap at the station, after all. Gotta pay the warehouse guards, right?"
Nygma raised an eyebrow. "You know Weaver's behind this, don't you?"
"Obviously."
Weaver had overplayed his hand. He'd run straight to Commissioner Loeb, hoping to curry favor, and even dropped a five-figure "favor" to get Loeb to sign a warrant authorizing seizure of contraband.
What Weaver didn't realize was that the move legitimized Adam's whole operation. Now the seizures were sanctioned. Legal. Official.
If Weaver tried to undo it, he'd be undermining Loeb himself. A political suicide note.
And just to be safe, Adam had added a second line of defense: storage fees. If Weaver tried to return the goods without collecting the money, he'd piss off every officer guarding that equipnt—officers who now saw those fees as their bonuses.
Weaver couldn't win.
He couldn't appease the victims.
He couldn't challenge Adam.
And he sure as hell couldn't admit to Loeb that he'd been played.
"The only downside," Adam mused aloud, "is I'll probably need a new warehouse. Can't use the precinct's storage room forever."
"You could just let it go, you know," Nygma said seriously. "You don't have to fight them on this. It's not worth it. The gear's all secondhand junk anyway. I could build you better stuff in two days, tops."
Adam blinked. "Wait, you'd do that?"
"Of course. Most of that gear was garbage—defective, outdated, held together with duct tape. Let them scream about losing their trash. I'll build you sothing cleaner. Smarter."
Adam grinned, genuinely touched. "Ed, you're a damn lifesaver. Really. I an it."
He stood, fished a thick roll of bills from his coat, and shoved it into Nygma's jacket pocket before the man could protest.
"Gotham's expensive, brother. Take this. Cover the parts. And if there's any extra, use it for whatever nerdy stuff you're into. Chemistry kits, ani statues, whatever."
Nygma's face turned bright red. "I—I can't take this. You already… you already helped with…"
He trailed off, flustered. His heart wasn't built to handle this much emotional overload in one day.
But Adam was relentless. He clapped Nygma on the back again and strolled toward the door.
"You will take it. I insist."
And just like that, he was gone.
Leaving Nygma alone in the evidence room, one hand on the wad of cash in his coat, the other resting over his chest where Adam had patted him.
The future Riddler stood there for a long mont, overwheld by sothing alien and unfamiliar.
Friendship.
Real, inconvenient, infuriating, genuine friendship.
"…What the hell is wrong with ," he whispered, blinking rapidly. "Why does this feel like the best day of my life?"
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