Dynasty: A Batman Tale

NOW

The Gotham Skyline was a magnificent view against both the early morning dawn and fading light of dusk. Commissioner Jim Gordon liked those times best. In fact, while other police commissioners preferred working in daylight, Gordon, the night owl, preferred the dark. That’s when he did his best work. The horizon was painted with sky-scrappers dressed in mirror windowed gowns reflecting the purple and pink hues melting from the darkness of space. In the distance, a fleet of Gotham Police helicopters were circling different areas of the city, shining spotlights up and down the alleyways that made up the labyrinth of Gotham.

Gordon stood at his office window gazing at the city with a coffee steaming in one hand and his nightly reports in the other. In a few minutes, after what photographers called the “blue hour” faded into complete black, he would climb to the roof and turn on The Signal. I can’t recall the last time I saw him, but if it reminds those scum-bags out there that he’s watching, perhaps they’ll refrain from their nightly exploits.

Making his way onto the roof, Gordon stepped over to the massive search light with it’s blacked-out bat silhouette in the center. He flipped the switch turning it on and headed back down to his office.

At midnight Gordon headed back up to the roof to enjoy some fresh air and a cup of coffee. It was getting late and still not too much trouble on the radar. Sometimes just turning this light on still works.

“Excuse me Commissioner.” Well, perhaps not. A patrolman had come out onto the roof as Jim was about to turn off the bulky spotlight.

“Yes?”

“Sir, there’s been an incident at Freeze.”

“The Nightclub?”

“Yes sir, they’re asking for you down there.”

When the commissioner arrived at the scene, the patrons were being questioned by GPD’s finest, most of them repeating the same story. Sgt. Mills was coming out the front door of the club as Gordon approached.

“Its pretty messy inside boss - looks like we got an abduction and five dead women,” relayed Mills.

“Did anybody see anything? Anyone possibly sober enough to know what happened?” Asked the commissioner.

“As a matter of fact we’re getting similar details. Allegedly the five victims were sitting around a table about ten feet from the bar. At about 10:30 a sixth woman dressed in what some of the male witnesses are calling a catholic schoolgirl outfit got up from the table, took a seat at the bar next to our male abductee, somehow subdued him then...” Mills paused reluctant to continue with the witness accounts.

“Yes, Sgt. Then?”

“Well, Commissioner, most of the witnesses say the girl then did a series of cartwheels around the table with the ladies and in a blur she slashed all their throats.”

“Cartwheels?”

“Yeah, and at the same time an unknown male emptied a thirty round clip into the ceiling with a fully automatic machine gun. He picked up the unconscious male and exited the club. We’re downloading their security footage to our servers at Central. It should be ready for us when we wrap up here. I tell ya boss it’s nights like this I remember why I can’t give up these damn smokes.” Mills finished as he lit up a Lucky.

“All right, has anything been moved yet? I want to survey the scene myself.” Gordon asked as he headed through the entrance not waiting for Mills’ answer.

“Coroner just got here, ya know boss you don’t need to first hand every crime scene like a detective. It’s not like the old days. This is a one off, probably some rich kid heist or something like that.”

“Really Sgt. I wonder why you’re not a detective, does this feel like ‘some rich kid heist’? There’s no such thing as ‘old days.” The commissioner stepped into the night club. The stench of death was in the air. The round table was shrouded in a tablecloth soaked in blood bordered by what just a few short hours ago were five vibrant young ladies full of life, out having a good time with each other. Now each of them fixed in a seated position with their heads face down lifeless in a pool of blood. All five of their throats were cleanly sliced from ear to ear. Christ that must have been a sharp blade, those look deep. Cartwheels and still, such precision. Slowly, Gordon’s eyes moved from body to body, always the detective looking for clues. He noticed each victim’s hair interwoven through the blood soaking it up. A devil’s spaghetti, thought the Commissioner. Then he noticed, ever so slowly the blood was filling a void in the middle of the table. The suspect, the girl in the outfit was sitting at this table with the five victims. Did she kill her friends? I have to see that video. The commissioner walked out of Freeze and headed back to the square block known as Central. A square quarter mile block that housed Gotham’s City Hall, Police Headquarters, and Courthouse.

THEN

Gordon arrived in Gotham with his pregnant wife, Emily. He had been transferred from his native Philadelphia where he spent his first eight years walking a beat, until working his way up to Detective.

It had rained almost every day since his arrival. It was four months before Jim was able to see Gotham on a sunny day. He was intoxicated by the city’s beauty and architecture, cathedral like buildings street after street, you couldn’t travel one block without seeing a gargoyle or weeping angel. The city sung to him; the percussion from the underground subway vibrating the pavement, the steam caps whistling and the traffic filling each avenue with horns and screeching tires. He was a good cop, a clean cop, never once thought about accepting a bribe even when Gotham offered up so many. He fought, trying to lead by example, but so many others had tasted greed and found it hard to pass up. He felt if he respected Gotham, the city would render to his will. Unfortunately, it had the opposite effect, and in his first year in Gotham City, he was witness to true horror.

Gordon was one of the first to respond to the gruesome scene at the Robinson Foster home. Having no idea what to expect, he was shocked when he found a young ten year old boy with milky white skin standing in a puddle of what appeared to have once been William Robinson’s head. The little boy’s mouth kept twitching into a momentary smile, Gordon noted it as an uncontrollable tick. He wrapped the boy; born John Doe - reared as John Robinson - with a trauma blanket and brought him outside as the last remnants of daylight disappeared under the western horizon. In the light Jim was able to zero in on the boy’s body and saw the mosaic of bruises. The boy had yet to utter a sound.

Gordon noticed the child’s eyes did not appear to be red. Did the boy cry? Tears or not, the boy had been on the business end of multiple beatings, that much was obvious. Gordon placed John in the back of a squad car and knelt down securing the blanket around him. “It’s all right son, the bad man’s gone.” Still mute, but at the mention of the bad man, without turning his head, John’s eyes focused on Jim. “It’s gonna be all right.” Jim whispered one more time as he shut the door and watched the police unit drive off towards Arkham.

Not a week had gone by and again Gordon found himself arriving first on a murder scene. This time it was downtown in the theater district, the beat cops had roped off the alley behind the Gotham Theater of Arts. A couple lay dead both shot to death. The man was wearing a tuxedo; the woman was draped in a black sequenced gown with a slit running down the length of her leg. Blood was still dripping down her skin from the fatal bullet wound in her chest. The officer handed Jim the man’s wallet. “This was on the ground beside them. Get a load of the name.”

Gordon took the wallet from the officer opened it up and read the name out loud. “Thomas Wayne,” Oh no, I’ve read about this man. His family built this city.

“Detective, we have witnesses.”

Thank God. “Who and where are they?”

The patrolman pointed toward the other end of the alley where an older well dressed gentleman in a long coat was embracing a child wearing a tuxedo. “It’s a miracle he wasn’t killed, it looks like a robbery gone bad, the gunmen could’ve panicked for any number of reasons. The kid is Bruce Wayne, ten years old, son of the deceased and now heir to the Wayne Empire. Older British fellow is…,” the officer referred to his note pad, “…Alfred Pennyworth, apparently he’s the Wayne family butler, he heard the shots from where he was parked on the other side of Main Street. He said he saw a man in a jumpsuit wearing possibly a rain jacket or some kind of blazer run out of the alley then saw young Bruce standing over the bodies. Another child trapped in the middle of tragedy, Christ! Where am I?

Twenty-four hours later the city answered him. The news had dropped like a bomb that morning with the story of Gotham’s first couple slain and Gordon was feeling the pressure to get the killer locked up. He was hard at work chasing down leads for the Wayne Murder. He had been out most of the night with half the police force canvasing the entire theater district searching for clues. It was mid-afternoon by the time he arrived back at Central to file his report. The receptionist in the lobby of the Gotham Police department waved Gordon down as he entered the building.

“Detective, we just got a call from Gotham General...it’s your wife...”

Without waiting for the receptionist to finish, Jim exited and rushed to the hospital to be by his wife’s side. What felt like hours was only minutes while Jim paced back and forth up and down the hallway. On the other side of the double doors in front of him, his wife was fighting to deliver their child. I should have been there, I should be in there. What’s happened? Why won’t anybody tell me anything? Finally as if hearing his thoughts the door opened. The surgeon’s green tunic was smeared with blood and as he removed his mouth covering, Jim being the detective he was noticed the doctor’s stance, eyes focused on the ground while taking a deep breath. NO! God no!

“Mr. Gordon, I am terribly sorry, your wife...” The doctor paused, sighed and continued. “She had a bleed we didn’t know about until it was too late. I’m sorry, she didn’t make it.”

The baby! “What about the baby?” Gordon cried.

“Your daughter is fine, she’s perfect in fact. Would you like to meet her?”

Unable to hold back the tears, he blurted “Yes Please.” The doctor led Jim into the nursery and introduced him to his daughter. Wiping his tears away he looked at the little red haired angel staring up at him from her temporary crib.

“Hi, Barbara, I‘m your daddy.” He whispered.

NOW

The commissioner arrived back at Central and quickly made his way to the video lab. The Gotham resident A/V tech was waiting for him. Hank Collins loved his job, he felt like Big Brother watching over all the live feeds coming in from all the strategically placed security cameras throughout the city. Morbidly overweight, he considered his job entertainment and could always be found with some kind of snack staining his fingertips enough that a pattern of smudges could be seen on the monitors. He had the video cued up for the commissioner. “Oh you got a live one here Commish. I had to slow it down... way down to see this femme fatale in action. She’s fast and horrifyingly efficient.”

Gordon signaled Hank to start the tape. The monitor divided into four squares, four different cameras were zoned in on different areas, luckily two of them overlapped. In the bottom right square was a view of the bar, the bottom left showed the table where the girls were in the middle of toasting one another. The top right square was an area near the entrance and the top left was the space between the tables and the bar. Six women were sitting around drinking and laughing, Jim’s detective skills kicked in right away. “That one, she’s there but not really paying attention to any of the ladies she’s with.”

“Bingo!” Said Hank. “Now watch, she’s about to get up.”

Jim watched, but then noticed a young man cross the top screen onto the lower right square. “Wait.” Gordon said while clutching Hanks shoulder. “Wait, bring it back. Let me see the guy who just walked in.”

“How do you do that boss?”

“Do what?”

“How did you know that was the guy?”

“What guy?” Gordon asked

“What guy? Watch. He walks in and ‘bam!’ she gets up. Look here, she’s walking fine, 3...2...1 then abracadabra she’s mastered a drunk walk and smashes right into him.” It was as Hank described, between the squares the girl in the tiny skirt and top had gone from walking with a perfect stride to a drunk stumble. The man she bumped into caught her and helped her sit. They appeared to exchange a few words. Then with lightning quick motion she stabbed the man in the neck with a syringe, jumped up on the bar, did a backflip toward the table where her former companions were still lost in drink and laughter.

“OK, now watch this. I had to slow this down. I’ve never seen anything like this.” Sgt. Mills had been correct, the witnesses said cartwheels and that’s exactly what the commissioner was seeing. The woman landed her backflip and rolled into a series of cartwheels around the table slicing the innocent young ladies throats as she passed each one. At the same time a man in a fedora near the entrance revealed a machine gun from under his coat. He aimed at the ceiling and emptied an entire magazine within seconds. He then draped the now unconscious man over his shoulder and followed the woman out.

“Rewind it back to when the male victim walks in.” Gordon ordered. Hank did as he was told. He brought the tape back to the moment the man walked in and froze the image. The commissioner leaned in toward the monitor.

“Oh my GOD!” The man abducted is Tim Drake.