AN: Sorry this isn't the final chapter for Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? I'm stuck about halfway through that but I promise, I'll post it as soon as it's finished.
Inspired by every story where the inmates take over the asylum or there is a mass breakout, there seem to have been several. My first real attempt at less fluffy.
FYI: Jason = Wingman; Steph = Skylark; HelenaW = Rook; Damian = Scion; Alex = Nightingale; Terry = Redwing; Matt = Robin; Isa = Query; Sin = Blackbird; Nell = Batgirl: Everyone else is as expected.
Also, Alex's gift from Hermes is teleportation. I think this is the first time it's been mentioned.
Disclaimer: The AU and OCs are mine; the rest belongs to DC Comics.
As Police Commissioner, he could work nice, sane, 9 to 5 days, but that just wasn't his style. When he was just a cop, he was never afraid to get in the middle of it, to stand alone against the flood of lawlessness that existed here and that hadn't changed. So, he was a hands-on Commissioner and he worked longer, more stressful, days than he would allow anyone under his command.
So when the call came in at 10 pm he was still at MCU, on his, God only knew what, cup of coffee.
"Commissioner, there's something going on at Arkham." Blake said walking into his office with a worried expression.
"What?" Gordon demanded looking up from the open file on his desk in front of him.
"Don't know, but it can't be good." Blake replied.
Jim glanced at the ceiling and then minutely shook his head. He gulped the last of the cold coffee and stood. "Let's go." He grabbed his trademark trench coat on his way out the door and made sure his phone was in his pocket.
.
"What the hell's going on?" He yelled at Commander Maggie Sawyer as he climbed out of Blake's unmarked cop car.
"The inmates seem to have taken over the asylum." She replied.
"Who's inside?" Jim asked referring to Gotham's colorful costumed criminals.
Maggie handed him a piece of paper she had only gotten a few minutes ago herself.
Jim read through the names. The short answer was almost everybody.
He pulled his smartphone out of his pocket and activated the new, Batman installed, Batwave app. There really was an app for everything these days.
The signal securely traveled across the city to a secret room, where an information powerhouse was sitting behind a massive computer. The Batwave lit up the place like a red alert on the starship Enterprise. The alert also found its way to a speeding car, where Gotham's original Caped Crusader was in between beating up gang members and interrogating mobsters.
"Oracle, I need a location for Jim." Batman said into the comm unit in the ear of his cowl.
"Just outside Arkham." The former Batgirl replied.
"What's going on?" Batman asked while he made an abrupt, illegal, U-turn in the middle of the street.
"Just a minute." She said before falling silent.
The silence would have consumed the Batmobile if it weren't for the roar of the enormous engine.
"Sounds like the inmates have taken over the Asylum." She replied after a minute. "Don't have much else yet but I'm working on it."
"Understood." Batman replied and disconnected.
Barbara sent a brief message back to her dad through the secure Batwave network. Help is on the way. – O
Back across town the Commissioner smirked.
"Was that a text message from Batman?" Sawyer inquired.
"Modern technology." Gordon shrugged.
.
Oracle quickly hacked past the villains' new firewall on the asylum system and tapped into surveillance and recent activity to piece together what happened. By the time the Batmobile came to a screeching halt, just feet from her father, she knew more than he did.
Oracle quickly fed the information to Batman as he climbed out of the beyond state of the art car.
"Call for backup." Maggie and Jim heard him say into his comm as he quickly came into hearing distance.
There was a second's pause before he added. "All of it."
Sawyer and Gordon could tell he had ended his call because he was suddenly looking directly at them.
"Last night, Hugo Strange was brought in by Nightwing and Scion. With the help of a, yet unknown, ally, he avoided actual imprisonment. Able to roam Arkham freely, he released several of the more pliable inmates. Once free, they were easily convinced to liberate some of their more dangerous compatriots. Strange quickly lost control." Batman explained.
"How do you know that?" Maggie asked, surprised by the Dark Knight's long "greeting".
"Information is power, Commander. And Oracle is a friend of mine." Batman replied, completely hiding his smirk.
Maggie shook her head and yelled for a map of the island and a cup of coffee. The map was handed over less than a minute later and Sawyer spread it across the hood of her unmarked SUV. "Can I get some light?" She yelled and the headlights of a nearby cop car were switched on illuminating the paper in front of the trio.
"This map is incomplete." Batman said after quickly looking it over.
"It's the only map we have." Sawyer replied. Despite a large donation every year from the Wayne family the GCPD still wasn't funded well enough.
Batman activated his comm. "O, send the holo-map of the island with Nightwing."
"Already done." Barbara replied over the connection.
Batman glanced at the SWAT team guarding the raised bridge to Arkham Island and the dozen cops around him. "ETA on the response team?"
"Between 2 and 12 minutes." Oracle replied.
"Understood." Batman said and disconnected.
"I have the other SWAT team on the way." Maggie told him.
"Not enough." Batman replied. Harsh but true.
"Reese!" Sawyer yelled. "Any luck reaching Arkham Security?"
"Not yet, Commander." The detective yelled back.
Sawyer sighed. That wasn't good.
The roar of a vigilante biker gang caught their attention. Red Robin was leading the pack and five of the younger members of the batclan followed him: Redwing, Nightingale, Scion, Batgirl, and Abuse.
While the Commander and Commissioner were distracted by the arrivals on the ground, a woman dressed in black appeared next to them as if she had fallen from the sky.
"Batman." She nodded.
Maggie started. The new comer had black hair that was pulled back into a high messy ponytail and like many members of the batclan she wore versions of a utility belt and a domino mask.
Maggie didn't recognize her but the voice sounded familiar. Gordon on the other hand knew exactly who she was. Not knowing how they wanted to play this, he didn't say anything.
"Diana." Batman nodded.
"A first name?" Maggie was even more surprised.
Batman almost smirked but no one noticed.
"Diana was the Roman moon goddess." Diana replied leading Maggie to believe it was her masked ID without actually lying.
"Ah." Maggie nodded, slightly disappointed but unsurprised.
Meanwhile, the motorcyclists had parked their bikes on the edge of the road nearby and were making their way towards them. Before they reach them however, there was the whirring of an approaching helicopter.
The helicopter slowed, almost to a hover, as close to their heads as it dared get and Nightwing jumped out, landing only feet away. The black and blue clad vigilante headed straight for Batman while the copter moved on to land.
It only took seconds for the, now veteran, crime fighter to reach his mentor. Nightwing handed Batman a palm sized rectangular box about an inch thick before greeting them each of them with a nod and a smirk.
"Could you make a bigger spectacle of yourself?" Scion asked sardonically as the biker gang reached them.
Nightwing only grinned at the younger man.
Batman placed the box on the center of the map and pushed a button on the side. Much to Maggie and Jim's surprise, the small device projected a 3D hologram of Arkham Island. The hologram was much more detailed than the map.
.
Meanwhile, the helicopter had landed on a section of the road the GCPD had cordoned off earlier. The passengers quickly climbed out and Black Canary led Huntress, Misfit, Blackbird, and Query to Maggie's car, which had become an impromptu command center, the pilot, Lady Blackhawk, caught up with them halfway.
"How many more are you expecting?" Maggie asked Batman, looking at the growing group of vigilantes.
Batman quickly scanned the crowd. "Half a dozen." He replied without counting.
Jim looked up and took in everyone. "Think it will be enough?" He asked.
"Yes." Batman replied succinctly.
The group shifted so Black Canary could stand next to Diana and Maggie realized there was more structure in the batclan than she had thought. Many of the vigilantes hadn't even tried to get to the "command center" and waited nearby, ready for orders. The group around the car acted as if each new comer were expected. These were Batman's lieutenants. Though Maggie did notice Diana got an occasional look of surprise but was then easily accepted too.
Batman activated the comm in his cowl again. "Sit rep."
He listened for a moment before saying "Light it up," to whomever was on the other side.
A second later several sections of the holo-map changed colors.
"All inmates have been released from their cells and are free on the island." Batman said. This was pretty much expected from the information they already had.
Maggie was surprised none of the Batlings moved closer to hear the sit-rep; Batman had said it himself: knowledge is power. Then she realized that Batman had also said there were several more on the way and it clicked into place, they were all probably listening to him over their comms. Her theory was pretty much confirmed when several people nodded.
"Black Mask, Maxie Zeus, Penguin, Professor Pyg, Two-Face, and Joker have formed small gangs and claimed territory on the island. Several others are completely unaccounted for including Bane, Clayface, Hush, Killer Croc, and Riddler."
One of the older Batmobiles pulled up and Wingman, Skylark and Black Bat hopped out. They each nodded to Batman but stood back with the other Batlings.
"Poison Ivy has predictably sequestered herself in the greenhouse and Mr. Freeze hasn't left his cell, most likely because his suit is being held at Blackgate and he is unable to." Batman continued.
"Several others notable inmates have been periodically spotted since their release but their exact location and alliances are unknown, most notably Mad Hatter, Ventriloquist, Scarecrow and Strange himself. Reasonable assumptions can be made for some such as Harley Quinn and there are complete wildcards such as Zsasz."
The smallest of the Batplanes, The Bat, arrived and landed near The Birds of Prey's helicopter, Aerie Four. The cockpit of the unique aircraft opened and Rook climbed out with more grace than should be possible. She nodded at Batman and joined the growing crowd.
"Oracle and Detective Reese have been unable to contact anyone from the Arkham staff including security and there are still sections of the Arkham network O has been unable to access." Batman continued.
"That shouldn't be possible." Red Robin said.
"No, it shouldn't. O believes these sections were purposely isolated and taken offline." Batman said.
"The only way to access them is on the ground then." Red Robin replied.
Batman nodded. "Also, the gray sections on the map indicate blind areas, if there are cameras, they've been deactivated."
"Great." Nightwing said sarcastically.
"An eye in the sky would be helpful." Jim joked.
"We can handle that." Batman said.
Batman looked at the assembled group of vigilantes and tapped the comm in his ear again.
"ETA on the rest of the response team?" He asked trying to not worry.
"Less than a minute. They're just coming up to the blockade now." Oracle replied so only he could hear.
Sure enough, just seconds later, the familiar roar of high performance motorcycle engines preceded the arrival of three more bikes. They parked near the other bikes and dismounted. Robin was driving the first bike with Nightstar riding behind him and the other two bikes belonged to Batwoman and Hawkfire.
While the general public considered Batwoman a member of the batclan, what with her name being BATwoman and all, Maggie knew Kate wasn't really. They only worked together when the occasion called for it, like today.
Batman turned to face the crowd and address them directly.
"Diana, Nightstar, and Scion. We need aerial surveillance to cover those blind spots. Don't get to close."
Much to Maggie's surprise Diana and Nightstar took off under their own power and headed for the nearby island. The former Robin wordlessly sprinted to The Bat and had it in the air faster than Maggie thought possible.
"Nightingale, Misfit, Query, and Black Bat, teleport in here." Batman pointed to a spot on the map. "Misfit and Black Bat scout this area, our aerial team won't be able to see it. Query, get us access to the computer here." Batman said pointing to a guard post. "Nightingale, you're defense for Query and emergency exit." All four women nodded and vanished before everyone's eyes.
While Batman had been issuing orders to the first ground team, the gray areas of the map started to change as the air team fed information to Oracle.
"Ha! Commander Sawyer, I got it." Detective Jesse Reese shouted from nearby. "Aaron Cash, Head of Security."
Sawyer ran over to Reese and Batman nodded for Red Robin to follow her. He would set it up so Oracle would get the feed too.
Batman was studying the holo-map when his comm got a new incoming transmission.
"Question… See if you can find out how this happened… who is he working with or for." Batman disconnected.
"You've got everyone on tonight don't you?" Jim asked.
Batman nodded and the ground team reappeared. "Everything go ok?"
The younger two girls gave stern looks to their older sisters.
"We ran into a small problem but it was easily taken care of." Misfit replied.
"Black Bat needs minor medical attention but won't let me do it." Nightingale said testily.
"You need to save strength." Black Bat replied.
"It's a bruise, it's not a big deal." Nightingale argued.
"Exactly. I'll be fine."
"Hestia, give me strength. It's not a big deal for me to heal but it's going to make your job a lot harder."
"Explain." Batman demanded. DaddyBats barely coming through.
"Black Bat was hit in the ribs with a baseball bat." Nightingale replied.
"You didn't see it coming?" Batman asked surprised.
"Visibility is almost nonexistent in that area and he came up from behind us." Misfit answered for her.
"I suspect she has bruised ribs." Nightingale said.
"But you don't know for sure." Query pointed out.
"True." Nightingale admitted. "But she's definitely sustained some kind of injury."
"Let her do it." Batman said to Black Bat.
Black Bat let out an inaudible sigh and pulled off her glove so her little sister could heal her. Skin to skin contact sped up the process.
.
With everyone, up to speed, healed, and connected via secure commlink, Batman was ready to disseminate his plan. He started by breaking them up into tactical units and assigning appropriate tasks to each unit.
Sawyer and Gordon watched as Batman gave orders to his legion. He was the general and while the batclan had its factions, when the chips were down and Gotham was on the line, all differences were put aside and everyone respected one fact: Gotham belonged to Batman.
While Maggie was hardly new to the force she hadn't had nearly as many opportunities to observe the batclan as Gordon. Sometimes she couldn't believe their efficiency. It had only been about 30 minutes since they first learned something was up at Arkham and now two dozen vigilantes were getting ready to move in.
If she was honest, it had taken her awhile to warm up to the batclan. In Metropolis she had worked with Superman, but Batman wasn't Superman. He was just a man and the vast majority of the batclan was only human. It had taken her awhile to finally get it, but one day the light bulb went off. Gotham made these people. It had thrown its worst at them: tragedy, violence, corruption, apathy, fear, and hate. But instead of it knocking them to their knees, they found a reason to stand up. She just wished they had gone about it in a different way; she could definitely use a few more good cops.
.
With all the assignments handed out and a warning to stay away from Joker issued, they were ready to move out. Batman looked at each of them before finishing. "Keep Oracle apprised of your progress and stay alert."
Batman to Human dictionary: "Be careful."
PLEASE REVIEW!
This is a one-shot for now but if people really like it I may be convinced to turn it into a multi-chapter fic with a chapter for each tactical unit (which is why I didn't post it in FFL).
Bonus Points to anyone who can guess why I featured Maggie Sawyer so heavily in this chapter.