AN:- Because I hate myself, I have another ridiculously over ambitious project.
Chapter One: Gotham City
Gotham City in January is cold.
A lot of people think that Gotham is cold all year round. They picture our city and they think of rain pouring down between the buildings, men running huddled under tan overcoats and women with fur lined jackets and butlers holding umbrellas. They picture prostitutes shivering on street corners and little children in oversized sweaters.
The truth is that Gotham's weather, like every other part of it, is a matter of extremes. In the summer months the towering skyscrapers trap the heat down with us and let us roast on the streets in heatwaves like an Arizona desert. In winter the snow piles up so thick you sometimes wade knee deep in it. The seasons shift from one to another with all the grace and elegance of a semi changing gears.
But Gotham in January is cold.
I'm in the station house watching a news report about a prodigal son returning. No one expected it, in fact the rumour circulating was that he had been dead for years. But Bruce Wayne was finally coming back to Gotham. As he stepped through the gates to the Arrival Lounge at Gotham International a thousand cameras were there to meet him, the broad smile on his face putting to rest all those reports of a troubled childhood, a childhood stolen.
I sighed and turned away from the report. We'd known about Bruce Wayne's return for a while now. Commissioner Loeb had been riding all of us to get our act together and start cleaning up the streets for when the golden boy returned. Of course he didn't really mean for us to clean anything up, just for the evidence of the department's corruption to be swept away so that if Mister Wayne was to make good on his promise to help clean up Gotham then the police would be unaffected.
There's already trouble on that front, and it's aimed at me. Schell's on probation. I put him there. I knew I shouldn't have, and I definitely shouldn't have given the entire bullpen a rant about taking bribes. Only one who paid any attention to me was Bullock, and that was mostly just to laugh. Now I've got Flass watching my every move, and I know he's reporting to the commissioner as well.
A folder lands on my desk and I look up to see Sarah standing there, giving me her patented smile. "You're gonna love this one Gordon," she says. "Guy in a giant red mask. Dresses like he's going to a Victorian dinner."
"You always give me the weird ones," I say it with mock indignation. We've been dancing around one another for a month or so now. Not much more than banter between coworkers.
"You like the weird ones."
"The weird ones are the best way to prove yourself." In actual fact the 'weird ones' are the only chance I ever have of putting someone away. The bangers give their money to the underbosses, the underbosses pay off the bosses, the bosses pay off the cops and the only convictions which stick are the ones Carmine Falcone or Sal Maroni personally chooses. Sarah's look tells me she knows all of this.
As I rise to grab my coat and get out there Grogan steps out of his office and fixes me from across the bullpen. "You going somewhere Jimmy?"
I hate being called Jimmy. He knows that. "Got a new case. Some nut in a mask and hood."
"Sounds like you'll need backup. Take Flass with you."
I'm sure he can hear my teeth grinding. "Yes sir."
"Jimmy G!" Flass takes his sweet time getting out of his chair while I stand there waiting for him. "Looks like you and me are back on the beat, how's about that?"
"I'm lead on this Flass, alright with you?"
"For sure!" He claps me on the back hard enough to knock me forwards. I let the impact stager me more than it needed to. I've been doing that since the end of my first week, when it first occurred to me that someday I might have to take Flass down. Every inch of leverage I can have on him when the time comes will help. I know he won't let me take lead. He'll claim he's doing what he can to lighten my load, he'll claim it's all in favour of getting me back home to Barbara, pregnant with baby number two. And then he'll report anything I say and do right back to Loeb.
I shrug the collar of my coat up to protect against the wind and shoulder open the door to the precinct, Flass hovering at my shoulder. I hate this city. But I'm not leaving it again. Someone's got to try and do good work here before the whole city falls apart.
/|\
Brick shatters before my hands. I don't feel it. I spin at once and kick the tree stump behind me. The movements are instinctive in every way. I move from object to object. Different strengths, different weights, different give, different heights. I have the skills. I've had the skills for years now. But still something is missing. Alfred stands to one side, giving me that slightly disapproving look I've grown so used to.
I've only been back three days and already I can feel the shroud of the city falling over me, covering me in its smothering embrace. The cold is oppressive. It begs you to stay indoors, to curl up safe away from the realities of the city. I shut that out and continue through my routines. At last I finish, holding out my hand for the towel Alfred has provided. I wipe my torso off, trying to pretend I can't feel the cold on my bare skin.
The decision almost makes itself. I need to go into town. I need to see it for myself. Feel it. Understand the pulse and the hum of the streets and the people. It was the ten-eyed men who taught me to see in every way I could, to understand how my eyes could always deceive me, my other senses would be the ones to protect me, guide me.
"I'm going out tonight Alfred."
"Yes sir. Will you be requiring a driver?"
"Not tonight. I'll take the Olds." Inconspicuous. No one would ever suspect Bruce Wayne to be behind the wheel.
"As you wish Master Bruce."
Ever since I've returned it's been nearly impossible to gauge his reaction to me. We had remained in correspondence of course. I could never abandon Alfred. But in all my letters I had remained guarded as to my full plans. To sit him down that first night and tell him what I intended. I believe the expression he avoided was 'insane.'
I have no more time to think about Alfred. The night is drawing in fast and I want to be there when it hits. I need to see, to understand. I head back towards my father's house, my mind already turning over the plan for the evening.
/|\
I hit the streets by ten. The car is within a two minute sprint. I'm dressed in a jacket two sizes too big, jeans two sizes too small. My boots are old and worn almost beyond use, the sole coming clean off one of them. My shirt is dirty, stained with sweat and tobacco and garden variety mud. I've done everything I can beyond even that to conceal myself. A beanie cap hides my hair entirely. A fake scar applied across one cheek and stretching down my jaw should distract further from the important features.
My heart is pounding in my chest as I hit the East End. This is where everything goes. Where the city narrows. Where everything and anything goes for the right price. Bruce Wayne would stand out here as though the Wayne Enterprises skyscraper was dropped alongside the run down tenements. I struggle to find who I am supposed to be, to act the part as though I have lived it my entire life. There is a world of difference, I quickly realise, between discovering a part on a stage or in the confines of my own mind, and projecting it when I am on the streets.
Shoulders slumped, trudging footsteps. Conceal my height, conceal my build as much as I can. Thankfully I am not so tall as to be distinct. I pass the prostitutes, remembering at the last moment to give them the appraising leer. I see a girl who can't be fourteen, a woman maybe sixty, and every age in between. Every race, though predominantly Asian, but all with the same look in their eyes, caught between desperation and hopelessness. Already I feel I have made a mistake. I have no business being here.
One of the girls is bolder than the others, coming up to me and standing before me.
"Cheer you up?"
Her voice cracks. My mask slips a moment and I'm sure she can read the heartbreak in my eyes. I fight for the character. "Not likely. How old are you?"
"How old d'ya want?"
A man approaches from my periphery. He grabs her and throws her back to the line of girls. I straighten a little on instinct. "Excuse me?"
He glares at me, giving me a once over that clearly dismisses me. "I run a legitimate business cop. This girl's just one of my advertisers."
"I'm not a cop."
He sneers and turns to go back.
"I'm not done negotiating." I'm needling him. I don't know why. Anger is beginning to course beneath my skin, accompanied my adrenaline, preparing me for the inevitable.
"You're done," he says, turning back and sliding a hand into his pocket. It could be an innocent gesture but I see the change in his stance. Knife.
"I think you're done." It's childish. Petty. His sneer becomes a frown.
A glance to his girls, and then he moves, with a speed that surprises me, but doesn't take me entirely off guard. I saw his eyes slide to my gut. A step backwards takes me away from danger, another clears me away from the girls, so his wild swings won't catch one of them. He comes for me and I take my hands out of my pockets. I catch his next jab easily, deflecting it away and wrenching his wrist for good measure, a twist and I've thrown him into a light pole. He crumples at the bottom of it.
"Freeze!"
I do as instructed, more through shock. Flashing lights of a different sort, red and blue. Two police officers, both with guns drawn on me. I curse silently and raise my hands.
My arm burns a moment and someone shoves me hard on the shoulder. I prepare myself for the inevitable roughing up I am about to endure but my legs seem to have betrayed me. I fall to my knees and the world swims before me. Then the pain catches up with me.
My arm is on fire. More than that. My arm must have come clean off, and someone pressed a road flare to the stump. I collapse in a heap on the floor, incapable of movement. Above me the cops talk, something about 'he moved.' I go inside, calling on the training, struggling once more to remember it when it counts the most. They manhandle me, shove cuffs on me, throw me into the back of the car.
I open my eyes to see we are already driving out of the East End. I must have blacked out. Not good. The cops are on the radio now, talking about the 'crazy vet' they've picked up. The pain has subsided in my arm, not nearly as much as I would like. I twist my arms, forcing myself through another near-blackout, and the cuffs come undone, just like I was shown.
Bracing myself on the backseat I kick hard at the dividing partition, putting as much as I can into the blow. The metal grid crashes out of the frame and hits both officers hard on the backs of their heads. The car swerves and slams into a brick wall, throwing my forwards with it.
I open my eyes to hear groaning from the officers. More blackouts. The wound must be deeper than I realised. The door is open so I roll myself out and force myself up on unsteady legs, cradling my arm and trying desperately to run.
The two minute sprint takes me ten agonising minutes, leaking a trail of blood a blind man could follow. I don't know how I'm standing, I don't know what gets me back into the car. My eyes sink closed again.
/|\
I'm following up on a lead on the elusive 'Red Hood.' It's long past my shift end. It's long past time I should have kissed Barbara 2 goodnight. It's long long past the time I should have been crawling into bed and holding Barbara 1 close against me. No one reasonable is out at this hour.
The lead was a bust, as I should have guessed. The infuriating thing about the Red Hood is his complete lack of a pattern. He would pull off a bank heist that was poetry in motion, then the very next week have a shootout in a drug store that left half his own crew dead. There wasn't a sense of reason or rhyme to his actions.
And that was another thing. His crew changed every single time. And the few we caught gave such wild descriptions. According to them the Red Hood was a slight six-footer with immense muscles, too fat for the dinner jacket he wore, with a typical Texas Brooklyn accent and a mild stutter that went well with his impeccable diction. Either the Red Hood had the criminals who worked for him too scared to ever give a serious answer, or there were multiple people under that hood. And an organised crime gang meant a whole different world of work.
As I was still turning over the details an Oldsmobile tore past me going nearly twenty over the limit. I swerved to avoid it, the driver was all over the road, and stepped on the gas to try and catch it. The Crown Vic I was driving had once been the pride of the Gotham interceptor fleet, but it was about twenty years past its best, and despite that giving it a ten-year edge on the Oldsmobile the beige car ahead of me ran like it had a rocket engine strapped to the back.
I gave up the pursuit as hopeless on the roads out of Gotham, slowing back down to the speed limit and making a note to register the chase and try to find the owner of the Oldsmobile. I hadn't even been able to catch the plate it blasted past me so quick. Of course if I had had my mind on anything other than the Red Hood…
I heaved out a sigh and turned the car back round, heading in to Gotham and home.
Barbara is still awake when I open the door as softly as I can. She gives me a long suffering glare as I creep into the kitchen, cradling her belly as she stands up and waddles over. We exchange cheek kisses and she whispers, "dinner's in the fridge."
She heads right past me to bed. I suppress another sigh. This one is absolutely on me; I can't blame her for being short. I check the fridge and find meatloaf with a plate of vegetables. I hate greens, and Barbara knows it. But I'm fast heading to forty and I need to start watching what I eat. I keep myself in shape but even I've noticed the donut and beer gut starting to form.
I turn the oven on and slide the plate in to warm it quickly, shrugging out of my coat and hanging it up by the front door. Our apartment is practically so small I can reach the front door from the kitchen. I pad down the hall to Barbara 2's room, easing the door open to see her half under her covers, a book right next to her head. The sight makes me smile. She's seventeen and she's already moved on to college level textbooks. One day I'm sure she'll make better than Barbara or I ever could.
She doesn't even stir as I tiptoe across to the bed, easing the book out and marking the place carefully with the bookmark she has on the bedside table. She hates it when I fold over the pages of my own books, she'd never forgive me doing it to hers. Easing her glasses off I add them to the pile, leaning down to kiss her on the forehead and pull the covers up slightly. Barbara 2. It started as a joke when we realised the problems with naming our daughter after her mother, and then of course it stuck. I'm sure some day she's going to insist on another nickname, or possibly change her name completely, but for now I think she likes being compared to her mother, which is fine by me.
Feeling invigorated, if only slightly, I head back for my meatloaf.
/|\
I don't know why, but I always expected my death to be more impressive.
Chalk it up to the arrogance of the young, or maybe the years of training I endured. Maybe it was simply my wealth, or the manner of my parent's death, and the shockwaves it sent rippling through Gotham. Once my mission had resolved itself I perhaps envisioned glorious martyrdom. The death of the final Wayne inducing real change.
Bleeding to death in my father's armchair did not feature into my plans.
I'm almost certain an artery has been nicked. If I could call out for Alfred, if I could ring the bell by my hand, he would come and I am saved. A trained army medic. Service in the British Regiment. Another gift my father left for me when he died. Only I'm struggling to think of reasons I should be allowed to live. What have I achieved? A rich billionaire who went into the East End intending what exactly? How would I have stopped crime there? By beating up the prostitutes? By beating up that thirteen year old runaway?
I need to do more. I need to be more. More than a vigilante beating up thugs. I need to scare them into never daring to hurt another living soul. I can't help Gotham as a man. I remember my lessons in theatricality. My instruction in deception, and misdirection. I need to be a symbol. Something to be feared by the underworld of this city.
A window in the study was left open. Through it a black shape swoops suddenly, flitting around the room a moment before coming to a rest on a bust of an old ancestor of mine. In the fog of blood loss I focus on it and what I see chills me to my core. A bat perches on the head of my antecedent and stares at me. I have always been afraid of bats, no matter how I tried to confront and address the fear. Childhood trauma has left an indelible mark on my psyche.
My hand finds the bell. A smile curls my lip as it rings. It is time for me to leave some marks of my own.
AN:- I'm rewriting Batman! Starting from Year One, and continuing as long as I can possibly keep it up.
Most of this first story is an adaptation of Frank Miller's Year One story, hopefully updating some things, making some things a bit better, and adding in new technologies etc that might just be reasonable to expect. But more than that I'm trying to combine different comics and tellings of Batman. So some of the Telltale Games might creep in, some of the old Animated Series, and some of the different non-canon types of stories that have shown up in the Dark Knight's long history.
This entire first year will switch viewpoints between Gordon and Bruce Wayne as the two begin this mad quest and find their footing in the new Gotham. As the story progresses I might introduce more characters as viewpoint characters, or I may not. I may even phase out Gordon or Wayne every once in a while to tell different stories.
A big aspect of all these stories is going to be writing Batman/Bruce Wayne as an actual human being. He's not a superman with every answer to every conceivable problem, he's a very smart man, he's a very dedicated and very physically fit man, but he's not invincible. He can be beaten, he can be outsmarted, and especially this early in his career, he can be taken out by simple inexperience.
One of the most fascinating things right out of the gate has been the ages of certain cast members. Barbara Gordon in order to become Batgirl at the age she is stated to in the comics must be about 15-17 when Batman makes his first appearance in Gotham. But from Year One through to Dark Victory and even later she doesn't show up. So somehow Jim Gordon hasn't had his daughter with him for years? This comes down to other issues in canon, whether Barbara is his biological daughter or niece and then adopted daughter. So I changed some bits, to make her his biological daughter and introduce her as a supporting character much earlier.
Which leads eventually into another problem. Just how much of canon do I stick to? I have always considered certain events to be fixed for Batman's continuity. His first adventures as Year One, Long Halloween, Dark Victory. He first meets the Joker in a situation like Man Who Laughs. He loses Jason Todd in Death in the Family, Gotham experiences Knightfall and No Man's Land, then War games etc. Big events which chart the course of Batman's career in Gotham. But there are definite missteps along all the years of different publications. Do I adapt Killing Joke as is? Do I change it completely? The crippling of Barbara Gordon was badly handled, even Alan Moore admits that, but it set her up to become Oracle, a massively important character, and a very important representation of disabled characters in comics. Obviously questions like that are years away from this story, but decisions I make now may well influence them later.
That's about it for now. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and the next one will be up shortly.