"A search bar," Robin said.
"Ah yes," Alfed said. "If you go looking for this bar, you'll find no drinks, but plenty of results. A search bar. Brilliant, young Sir…but what are we searching for exactly?"
Robin paced back and forth behind Batman who was seated at the Bat-Computer. A video replay of the Riddler's broadcast interruption was on the screen with various programs analyzing different aspects of it all at once.
"Each number and letter is part of a larger code that corresponds with the alphabet," Batman said. The flickering letters and numbers were now playing and blinking on the screen in slow motion. "When you isolate the different patterns at which the characters are blinking, there is a message revealed."
The green matrix stopped flickering. Portions of it started disappearing into the black background until one strain of characters was left.
"When solved," Batman said. The numbers and letters rotated on the screen one more time into a coherent phrase. "Riddle me this dot who."
Batman typedaddress into the browser. A web page loaded with the same black backdrop and green letters as the video. Four green boxes were stacked vertically and labeled A, B, C and D. Each box had a different timer inside of it that was counting down. Another box in the lower left corner was labeled VIEWERS and had the number 1 next to it; but as the page loaded the number 1 moved up to 2.
"A, B, C, D," Alfred said. "Like keys from the previous riddle."
"A snow, B midnight, C golden, and D posies," Robin said.
"And what do those mean?" Alfred said.
"It means we're running out of time," Batman said. "Whatever A is, its timer runs out in three hours. Then B runs out ten minutes after that one, and C ten minutes after that, and another ten minutes for D.
"11:30 to midnight," Robin said.
"A is the first one," Alfred said. "That's snow. But Snow…what exactly?"
A new green box popped up in the bottom right corner of the screen. It was labeled CHAT. There was a message in the box that read: ADMIN: Is that you, Batman?
"The Admin would be the Riddler, I assume," Alfred said.
"We'll go to the Iceberg Lounge and keep watch," Batman said. "Whatever is going to happen is going to involve the Penguin and the stolen Freeze Tech. The rest, we'll just have to play it by ear."
"Hey, look," Robin said. "Did you see that?"
He pointed to the box labeled VIEWERS. The number in the box went from 2 to 3. A second later it went from 3 to 8. And then 8 to 26, and continued growing.
"It looks like you're not the only one who solved the riddle, Sir," said alfred.
"And word is probably spreading all over social media," Robin said.
Batman leaned back in his chair and thought about the earlier riddle that the Mad Hatter had said: When Rome's pillars fell, who cried loudest? And who cheered even louder?
"And who cheers even louder…the people of Gotham," Batman said. "Whatever the Riddler is planning he just got his audience for it."
The Batcomputer chirped with a notification. A text message from Jim Gordon. Batman pulled it up on the screen. It read: Cobblepot and Thorne are meeting tonight. Don't know where or when yet.
"I'm gonna take a wild guess and say they're meeting sometime between 11:30 and midnight," Robin said.