The Federal Bureau of Investigation's West Coast College was not established in recent years. During the climax of the Cold War in the 1960s, both sides' counter-infiltration efforts became increasingly extreme. Against this backdrop, the Federal Bureau of Investigation established over 20 training institutes in 14 states.
However, in the following decades, such actions were criticized as being largely ineffective. The more dispersed they were, the easier it was to be infiltrated. Therefore, the vast majority of these institutes were transformed into specialized technical training schools and local police academies. However, the West Coast College was retained due to its unique geographical location and was only recently put back into use.
In recent years, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been expanding its recruitment and there is no shortage of students. Since the reopening, the West Coast College has welcomed over 300 active agents and more than 600 students for study.
Since the college was established early, its location is not remote. To its east is the largest park in Seaside City, Tourist Pier Park, and to the south is the school concentrated area led by Seaside City University.
The college's building area is not large, but its surroundings are obscured by layers of woods, making it difficult to see the whole view. The internal facilities are almost identical to those of Seaside City University, making it hard to identify as an agent training school.
The spacious, tiered classrooms are overall fan-shaped, with dozens of rows of seats extending upwards at an angle of about 120 degrees in front, while in the middle there is a circular area with a long arched podium.
Behind the podium, there is no blackboard, but there is a projector. The projected image is larger than a movie screen, and what is frightening is that corpses and blood occupy the main position on this screen.
The figure of the professor in a black suit appears somewhat insignificant against the backdrop of the pictures. A low but clear voice is heard from behind the podium.
"The psychological profiling of criminals can serve as an important basis for inferring their logic of committing crimes, and can also facilitate subsequent capture work..."
Shearer walks back and forth in front of the podium. The seats in the tiered classroom are crowded with students. Everyone is attentively listening to the professor's analysis. At this moment, a Latino male in the middle raises his hand.
Shearer stands in place and nods at him. The male student then speaks: "Professor, I understand psychological profiling, which can infer the criminal's previous methods of committing crimes, but how can it be convenient for subsequent capture work?"
"Talking about this, we must refer to the relationship between psychological activities and personality. Usually, a person's personality determines what he will think and do when encountering certain things, which is the psychological habit and behavior habit we have discussed before..."
"Since he committed murder in such a psychological and behavioral manner before, he will not change his habits in a short time. Psychological profiling naturally can infer what measures he will take to evade punishment after committing a crime, and we have to target this habit..."
The classroom is very quiet, other than the sound of Shearer's lecture, there is just the "scratching" sound of note taking. At this moment, a series of hurried footsteps from outside the door suddenly sounded particularly harsh.
Two people dressed in agents' uniforms walk in. Shearer steps back, turns around and looks at them. An agent steps forward and whispers in Shearer's ear: "Ms. Waller called, please answer the phone."
"I'm in class now. Is she in a hurry?"
"She insists that you go now."
Shearer sighed, turned around and pointed to a student in the first row: "Miss, can you please help me distribute the lesson plans on the podium? You can start looking at the contents of the next lesson, I'll be back soon."
After finishing speaking, Shearer follows the agents out. In the communication room, the phone keeps ringing. After Shearer picks up the receiver, Amanda's somewhat anxious voice comes from the other side:
"Professor, bad news. Director Fry praised the teaching level of West Coast College and recommended a professor to participate in the teaching of the West Coast College, supposedly to contribute to the educational cause of fresh blood."
"He wants to insert his own people. Director Fry quietly arranged this matter, and the person should have arrived now. I can't stop him."
"Amanda." Shearer called Amanda's name to interrupt her, and then said: "Your stupidity has exceeded my understanding. You knew full well that it was the right-wingers who caused the explosion in World Trade Center just to get Louis Fry to the top. You just sat there waiting for him to safely send the person over?"
"I...wait a minute, they're not right-wingers!"
"They're right-wingers, and you're extreme right-wingers."
Amanda took a deep breath and said, "Sorry, professor, but I can't get back to the headquarters now. I came over to tell you that Davis tried to deal with that mysterious professor, but it had no effect. Therefore, we infer that he might be a tough character."
"What does he teach?"
"Modern history."
Shearer, who was frowning, relaxed. He confirmed: "Not physics, chemistry, biology, medicine or similar subjects?"
"No, agent training schools don't teach that."
"So how many PhDs does he have?"
"We couldn't find any educational background for him in the education system."
Shearer's heart slowly relaxed, but he said: "It seems he doesn't come from Gotham... Well, leave it to me. You'd better think about getting yourself out of Denver. Don't refresh my understanding of the word stupid."
Just as Shearer was about to hang up, it seemed as if he remembered something and asked: "What's his name?"
"Albert Swan."
Soon, Shiller met Professor Swan at West Coast College. He had flaxen, short hair, downward drooping eyelids, thin lips, and an ordinary appearance with no distinctive aura. He looked very ordinary.
If there was a unique quality about him, it was the intensity of his gaze when he looked at people, which often gave others a feeling of excessive concentration, even bordering on obsession.
Shiller knew that Albert Swan was the infamous villain "Reverse Flash," also known as "Professor Zoom" from The Flash series. He was apparently the one who brought Thomas Wayne to this universe. Looking at the situation, the victims of this cosmic travel accident were not just limited to Thomas—Swan was also stuck here.
Compared to the other villains, Professor Zoom had a unique backstory. He was a person from the future, the 25th century to be exact. During his studies of history, he became obsessed with The Flash, Barry Allen, who was a superhero. Hence, he began investigating divine speed.
He was The Flash's number one fan, and also his arch-enemy. Using divine speed, he even traveled back in time to ruthlessly murder Barry's mother.
Unlike The Flash, Professor Zoom controlled negative divine speed, a power that could disconnect a user of divine speed from the divine speed itself, corrupt the divine speed, and even be used to hypnotize or control others.
After shaking hands with Swan, Shiller could clearly feel that Swan's attention was not on him.
If one were to infer logically, the fact that Director Fry of the Federal Bureau of Investigation learned that the new lead lecturer for psychology at West Coast College was possibly a KGB spy, based on his McCarthyist behavior, he would certainly target Shiller.
At this juncture, the primary target of the person he had planted in the college would definitely be Shiller, but Swan didn't show any interest in Shiller. This implied that his cooperation with Fry wasn't solid, and he probably had his own plans.
With this conclusion, Shiller had his suspicions, but he didn't take any actions. He simply acted as if he knew nothing, meanwhile observing Swan's behavior in secret.
In the afternoon of the second day, following Shiller's psychology class was Swan's modern history class. The curriculum and grading system of West Coast College were similar to any other university—after one professor finishes teaching three classes, another professor takes over to teach the remaining ones.
During the process of Shiller and the students from three classes exiting the classroom, a young man brushed past him.
However, after passing by, Shiller frowned. He was confident he had met all the students and staff of this college and remembered their faces. Yet, this young man wasn't among them.
Back in his office, Shiller casually asked the teaching staff: "Have any new students transferred here recently?"
"New students?" The teacher laughed and looked back at Shiller: "Professor, this isn't an ordinary university. Even if this place seems similar to the university you used to work at, the nature is completely different."
"After all, we are training secret agents here. This isn't a casual place. The student admissions are all predetermined, as are the institutions they will be assigned to after graduation. If we let students transfer in and out casually, how can we guarantee confidentiality?"
Shiller nodded and said with a smile, "I see, it was wrong of me to apply the rules of a regular university here. It seems I still need to get used to this job."
After work, Shiller returned to his apartment to find a tired Lucifer lying on the sofa. Jason and Harley were also there, pouting angrily with the dog sitting right in the middle.
Upon seeing Shiller, Lucifer looked as if he had spotted a savior. He practically rushed to the door with teary eyes, grabbed Shiller's arm, and begged: "Oh, good Shiller! Please take these three away from me! Have mercy on your Lord!"
Shiller chuckled and said: "You came to the human world from hell in search of excitement, didn't you? So, is it exciting enough?"
Angry and upset, Lucifer pointed and exclaimed: "These two kids are fine. They are just children who can't do much damage even if they fight. But this dog, this damn Krypton dog, is very strong and has a strong sense of justice!"
"What's so surprising about kids fighting? Just separate them and it'll be fine. However, when it breaks up fights, it causes the kind of commotion equivalent to a missile explosion! My newly renovated bar was nearly destroyed by it!"
Determined, Lucifer said: "Either you take the kids away, or you take the dog away. They cannot coexist!"
Shiller turned to look at Little Kryptonite. He slightly frowned because, in his opinion, Clark wouldn't have trained his dog to be so destructive. Little Kryptonite might be more intelligent than humans. As a dog carrying a sense of justice, it wouldn't have caused such havoc when breaking up fights that it would give Lucifer a headache.
Shiller bent down to caress Little Kryptonite's face. Although it was hard to read a dog's micro-expressions, Shiller could still discern a jittery emotion.
So, he patted Little Kryptonite on its back, led it to the balcony, and brought a bottle of wine from his luggage. After securing the balcony door, he poured a small cap of Mad Liquor and placed it under Little Kryptonite's nose.
Attracted instinctively by the aroma, Little Kryptonite stretched out its red tongue and tasted the wine. After a moment, it fell asleep on the balcony recliner.
Once in the Dreamworld, Shiller quickly located Little Kryptonite near the Dream Tower. Just as Shiller was about to pet it, Little Kryptonite began to talk:
"You're Professor Shiller, right? Clark and Bat Cat have mentioned you. You must help me. Lately, someone has been causing chaos in the city of the Dreamworld, but I can never catch him."
"Why?" Shiller asked, a little surprised.
"He's too fast!"