Who could have expected Constantine to roll his eyes in disdain?
"Don't think I don't know what you're doing."
"Both sides of that coin are identical. No matter which side you call, you'll always get the same result!"
"I used to see scams like that all the time on the streets of London. That trick went out of fashion ages ago."
With that, Constantine stepped forward and took the coin from Harvey Dent.
He pulled out a pocketknife and carved several deep scratches across the side bearing the Queen's portrait.
Then he tossed the coin back to Harvey.
"There."
"That's how you make a coin toss fair."
"Try it now and see what result you get."
Harvey Dent stared silently at the scratched coin in his hand.
For a moment, he didn't know what to say.
Then an entirely unfamiliar feeling surged through him.
Something that had been suppressed deep inside him for a very long time seemed to begin stirring.
"I'm doing this for justice in Gotham City."
Harvey spoke to himself without expression.
His hand trembled as he tossed the newly altered coin into the air.
The coin spun upward before dropping back down.
Harvey slowly covered it in his palm.
Five minutes later, Constantine led several police inspectors into Loeb's office.
After searching for a while, they opened the hidden door, removed everything they could find inside, and hurried away.
Once that was done, Constantine entered the restroom.
He elegantly lit a cigarette, placed it between his lips, and adjusted his appearance in the mirror above the sink.
At the same time, he mobilized members of the Police Inspectorate to keep watch on Karl's movements.
The moment Karl's people left the city, the inspectors would secretly follow them.
There was a good chance Karl's men were heading toward another one of Loeb's hidden caches.
After all, the secret compartment inside Loeb's office had contained relatively little information.
Compared with the compromising material needed to control tens of thousands of police officers across Gotham, what they had found there was barely a drop in the ocean.
As Constantine wiped his face and looked into the mirror, however, he suddenly noticed something strange.
His reflection wasn't moving.
Instead, the Constantine inside the mirror was staring back at him with an unusually serious expression.
"Hey."
Constantine grinned.
"So you finally decided to come see me."
"Zee, I've been waiting for you in Gotham for quite a while."
The reflection still looked like Constantine.
But the voice coming from its mouth was distinctly female—and remarkably pleasant.
"Constantine, what exactly are you trying to do?"
"Why did you suddenly start manipulating Harvey Dent?"
"Can't you see that his path has already begun to change?"
"What you're doing now is clearly pushing him back toward the darkness!"
"Destiny?"
Constantine's tone became firm.
"I'm not pretending to be some grand expert on divination."
"But you're a sorcerer too."
"You should know that when someone suddenly deviates from the path they were originally supposed to follow, something is wrong."
"And abnormalities like that are rarely good news for people like us."
The woman in the mirror rolled her eyes at him.
"Oh, please."
"Anyone who follows you long enough eventually gets dragged into misery."
"Stop pretending you're doing this for some noble reason."
"Oh?"
Constantine immediately perked up.
"So that's why you've been deliberately avoiding me, Zee?"
"Do you know how long I've been in Gotham?"
"You haven't shown yourself even once."
"You'd rather go all the way to Boston than come back to Gotham and see an old friend."
"That hurts."
At last, the image inside the mirror changed.
The familiar face of Constantine disappeared.
In its place was Zatanna, the same woman Karl had previously encountered at the circus.
This time she was dressed in a striking stage outfit, complete with fishnet stockings and a fitted black dress.
She looked effortlessly captivating.
"You came to Gotham because you wanted to borrow money from me again, didn't you?"
Zatanna replied sourly.
"If I lend you everything I have, what am I supposed to use for my wedding someday?"
"That's easy."
Constantine grinned mischievously.
"Just marry me."
"Then we won't have to worry about any of those old debts anymore."
In truth, Constantine and Zatanna had known each other for a long time.
They had met long before Karl ever entered Zatanna's life.
The magical world wasn't particularly large.
When Zatanna had begun traveling from place to place seeking help from different sorcerers in her search for her father, it was only natural that she eventually encountered Constantine, a man renowned for his mastery of the dark arts.
At first, Constantine had assumed she was simply a young woman looking for excitement.
He had even considered tricking some money out of her.
But after watching Zatanna perform magic for forty minutes, his opinion of her changed considerably.
According to Constantine himself, during those first forty minutes, he hadn't even blinked.
After that, things became much easier between them.
The two gradually became friends.
They remained friends for a long time.
There had always been only a single step separating them from becoming something more.
And then Karl appeared in Zatanna's life.
Apparently unwilling to respond to Constantine's teasing, Zatanna pulled the conversation back to where it had started.
"You still haven't told me why you decided to interfere with Harvey Dent."
"There was no reason for you to do that."
"Maybe I'm simply tired of this entire police game."
Constantine's expression became unreadable.
"Or maybe Harvey isn't the person you're actually worried about."
"Maybe the person you really care about is Karl."
Zatanna's expression changed slightly.
"I should've realized it when I saw the way that guy used magic."
"Only someone as ridiculously proper as you would teach another person a huge collection of basic spells without giving him anything particularly lethal."
"And on the night I captured Bane, I sensed a familiar magical signature."
"That proved you were somewhere in Gotham and had cast a spell."
"So naturally, I figured you did it to help him."
Constantine's voice gradually became more serious.
"That night, something finally occurred to me."
"Maybe there's a third person standing between the two of us now."
Constantine turned around and stared directly into the mirror.
Zatanna remained silent for a moment.
Apparently, she hadn't expected him to say something like that.
"What is there to think about?"
"There's nothing like that going on!"
"Neither Karl nor you should be thinking about me that way!"
"And until I find my father, I'm not going to think about relationships at all."
"So stop worrying…"
Before she could finish, Constantine flicked open his lighter.
A torrent of magical energy instantly surged outward.
The image within the mirror vanished completely.
The restroom returned to normal as though nothing had ever happened.
Constantine stared at his ordinary reflection and smiled.
"What an adorable woman."
"She's never learned how to lie."
"That rushed denial proves Karl holds about the same place in her heart that I do."
"Otherwise, why would she compare him specifically to me?"
His smile slowly became more dangerous.
"And Karl…"
"You went and got involved with Zatanna without even saying a word?"
"If you want her, you're going to have to get past me first."
"Arkham's Karl…"
Constantine sighed.
"I really miss the days when Zee used magic to light my cigarettes."
"Feels like that was a lifetime ago."
With those words, Constantine turned and walked out of the restroom.
Only his receding silhouette remained as he disappeared into the darkness of the corridor.
(End of Chapter)
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