The burnished light ran down the edges of the metal, as sharp as a blade, in thin, distinct lines that wrapped around the form of the bat. Gordon fingered the beveled edges lightly, his gloved finger feeling the steel cold through the thick material. The spotlight behind the sign had yet to be turned on, the glass pane dark and reflecting the cityscape behind him.

He huffed as his finger drew to the end of the tapered wing, and he spun about face to face the city. His boots scraped against the heavy coat of frost on the rooftop as he paced, his caramel hair spinning lazily about his wrinkled brow in the frigid wind.

He should switch the light on.

He needed to speak to the Batman, didn't he?

He grumbled as he ran a hand through his formerly neat, now thoroughly mussed hair.

When had he come to rely so much on the Batman?

It was... Sometimes... To be regretted, how far they had come. Police used to be respected. Needing no masked vigilante crutch. No... Man-dressed-as-a-bat.

A puff from the pipe in his other hand did nothing to prevent the scowl that overtook his features.

Why should he need a man like that? Parading around in nought but... Spandex? Armor? (What was that stuff, anyway?)

What ever happened to good ole detective skills?

Gordon sighed. The world had come so far from that... Now here he was, signaling a bat-man on a rooftop with a spotlight, to fight men and women dressed from clowns to plants to green question marks.

The fact that the light was even on this roof proved how the force had turned. How far they had dropped.

Or... Risen? Was this such a bad thing?

What if a man had risen from this? Batman. Surely he was a man somewhere, with problems and trials like the rest of us. (Probably more, actually. Really... Something had to convince him to wear a frickan' bat-suit.)

But...surely a man rose from this, right? There must be a reason he does this.

Why couldn't Gotham rise with him?

Gordon thought for a moment, the smoke curling around his face, trailing into the view of the city. As the smoke rose into the dark expanse of the sky, he spun resolutely around.

He fingered a metal bulb, it's lines smooth and sophisticated, but with an underlying strength as if it had always belonged to this city.

The beam of light pierced the sky, it's strength standing resolutely amidst the stormy winter clouds.

Gordon smiled.

And he waited.