The Dawn Will Come
Jim Gordon hadn't seen the Batman for going on three weeks the first time he caught himself thinking of the man in the past tense.
(It wasn't just that he hadn't seen him. He hadn't seen any trace of him: no concussed criminals dumped in alleyways, no mobsters tied to the police station steps, no flash of black caught out the corner of his eye, nothing.)
The first time, he shook off the feeling of unease that descended as soon as he realized the tense he was using and reminded himself that Batman couldn't just disappear. Gotham still needed him as their silent hero.
But no matter how much he anticipated it, he didn't get the crawling feeling that someone was watching him and turn around to see Batman standing behind him, silent and foreboding. So it happened again. And again. And again. It happened until he was consistently thinking "Batman was" and "Batman did" and "Batman used to."
And then he wasn't thinking about him at all.
Still, when he stayed late at the station, he would sometimes find himself heading to the back stairs for no reason. He always attributed the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach when he abruptly turned away to a spot of vertigo, and left it at that.
#
"Gee, you sure do have a lot of plants, Red."
Pam didn't pause as she dragged a potted Agave americana through the small apartment's living room to the south-facing window.
"I told you I'm a biochem student. What did you expect?"
"I dunno. Animals?"
Her roommate, a fellow grad student at the uni, was sitting on the counter, kicking her feet against the cabinet below. A Chlorophytum comosum hung above her, its long tendrils dangling down into her bushy yellow pigtails.
"What part of 'botanical biochemistry' says animals to you?" She pushed the pot a few inches tot he right and then stepped back to survey the placement. Perfect.
"I had a Chia pet once," her roommate said. "But it died while I was on vacation. Poor Barney."
Pam glanced over at her — what was her name again? — To see her mouth turned down over the loss of her plant. She could overlook that it was clearly her fault the Salvia hispanica died when the sadness was clearly genuine.
They were going to be friends.
#
Barbara Gordon closed her laptop and leaned back against the cushioned seat. Almost home. The train just passed the Wayne Enterprise 'scraper, where she'd be working this summer on an internship her dad managed to get for her. Like she needed his help finding a job; she was the top of her class. When she graduated, companies would be calling her.
Still, it was nice to have something to do over the summer that didn't involve listening to her dad grumbling about what the city turned into now that Batman was gone or nodding along while her mom talked about moving, knowing it would never happen.
She pushed up her glasses and peered out the window, trying to see if the city looked different after the Joker's rampage and Batman's subsequent turn to villainry. She thought she should be able to see the darkness that clung to her city like a cloak, even this far above on the train trestle. With the pallor that had settled over the people, there must be some outward sign that it was rotting from within.
But no matter how hard she looked, all she could see was the bright city streets of her youth and the sun reflected back at her off hundreds of mirrored windows.
#
Bruce Wayne sat near the end of a long table, surrounded by members of the board. At the head of the table stood some businessman from some company pitching some idea that he didn't really care about.
His eyes kept drifting to the window across from him. The view over Gotham City was breathtaking, unless you saw it on a daily basis. Now, all he noticed was the grime of the streets and the bank robbery in progress on Fifth. Two things he could do nothing about.
He was the hero Gotham deserved.
tbc