8
SECONDS

Dick Grayson pulled up to the Gordon house in his Prius. He had tried Barbara's cell phone twice more while driving over. At this point he was getting worried. It wasn't like Barbara to be late. It certainly wasn't like her to be late without a phone call. Could Jim have had a stroke? Heart attack? he thought. If so she might have rushed him to Gotham Presbyterian, the nearest hospital. She could have forgotten her phone during an emergency like that. It was the only explanation he could think of.

He got out of his car, set the alarm and walked up the stone steps to the front door and rang the doorbell. Dick glanced over the front porch of the brownstone. On the welcome mat in front of the door he noticed a few tiny white shards. He bent down and picked a sliver up. Something broken. Ceramic maybe? He looked up and inspected the door. There was a small reddish brown smudge on the brass door handle. Blood? Barbara could handle any intruder, no sign of forced entry. This doesn't make sense. Dick stood up and tried the door handle. To his surprise it was unlocked. Another bad sign. The Gordons didn't leave their house unlocked. He gingerly opened the door, peering in.

"Hello?" he said loudly. Dick looked down and immediately took in the scene. The vase that had rested on the small table next to the door lay shattered in the entry way. Dick stepped through cautiously, his senses on high alert now. He took in every sight, smell and sound instantaneously. He walked a few steps further into the house and was horrified at what he saw. The living room was in shambles. The coffee table was flipped over, broken glass was all over the floor. In the middle of the room Barbara Gordon lay unconscious, nude, and surrounded by a pool of blood.

"Barbara!" Dick gasped as he ran to her bleeding body. Her entire body was pale and blood was slowly coming out of a gunshot wound on her stomach. He could tell her nose had been broken, leaving her entire face covered in blood. Dick took off his tuxedo jacket and used it to stem the flow of bleeding from the wound. Okay, she's bleeding. Good. That means she's alive. Oh God baby, what the fuck happened here? Please hold on! He held the shirt over her stomach with his left hand and used his right hand to call 911 on Alfred's cell phone.

Jim Gordon could feel the rhythm of the rental truck as it bounced down the freeway. He was rolled up in a section of carpet Billy and Rick had cut from the floor of his home. He could barely hear anything and couldn't see at all. Breathing was even difficult like this. He was still reeling from what he had just been forced to witness. His own daughter had been raped and murdered in front of him. Men he had known had assaulted her. It was inconceivable to him. Flass and his crew had been dirty and corrupt, but he had no idea they were capable of this type of violence. What they had done to Barbara while she lay there helpless... he felt a fresh flow of warm tears fall down his cheeks. And yet, somehow that wasn't the worst part. The Joker had killed her. He had mercilessly shot her in cold blood, and made sure she died slowly and in horrible pain. I'm going to kill you, he thought. I'm going to kill all of you. No matter what it takes. If it's the last thing I do I will kill you all.

After a while the truck finally stopped. Gordon heard the back door to the van roll up. He felt himself being picked up by one of the crooked cops, but couldn't tell which one. They walked for a minute and went up a flight of stairs. He felt himself being dropped and landed with a thud on the ground, knocking the air out of him.

"Be careful!" he heard a muffled female voice say. "He's no good if he has a concussion."

Gordon felt himself being unrolled. He squinted his eyes at the bright lights burning his eyes as he lay on his back. A woman leaned over him and shone a penlight into his eyes as she felt the pulse on his wrist.

"Hiya, Commissioner!" Harley said. "Ya feelin' okay? Nevermind, you can't say shit right now. Flass, put him on the bed."

Arnie walked over and picked up Gordon's paralyzed body. He took him over to a bed in the corner of the room and dropped him onto it. Flass grabbed Gordon by the face and looked into his eyes.

"Bet you wish you had never fucked with me now, huh Jimmy? Never thought you'd see my dick in your little girl." Flass used zip-ties to cuff Gordon's hands and feet to the bed. "I'm gettin' hard again just thinkin' about it."

The Joker came over and sat down on the bed next to Gordon. "You need some rest, Commissioner. You seem a little frazzled. That was a hell of a shoot, right? Get it? 'Shoot'? But I gotta say, your daughter has no future in porn. She just laid there! Hahahahahahaha! Harley, get this man some rest."

Harley Quinn walked over to Gordon's side. She rolled up his sleeve on his right arm. She took an alcohol wipe from the doctor's bag she had next to her and swabbed his arm right at the elbow. She dropped the used pad, reached into the bag and held up a needle filled with a clear liquid. Harley looked at the needle as she thumped it to remove any dangerous air bubbles. She stuck the needle into his arm and depressed the plunger. Immediately Gordon's vision became blurry. Sounds started to distort. Within a few seconds James Gordon mercifully passed out.

GOTHAM PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL

Dick sat in the waiting area of the emergency room of the hospital. He was a horrible mess. His tuxedo shirt was almost completely red from blood and the jacket he had used to stop the bleeding was still with Barbara when she had been put into the ambulance. The room was filled dozens of police both in and out of uniform. They had come as soon as they heard their commissioner and his daughter were attacked. Nothing mobilized the blue community as much as an attack on their own.

There were also a few civilian patients scattered about. Mothers held their fevered children. Two boys sat with their father. The boys each had long gashes on their foreheads yet were laughing and playing with each other. Dick assumed the brothers had just gotten hurt playing. Their father looked more worried than they did. In the corner of the waiting room a young woman sat curled up in a ball, moaning in pain.

Dick looked at two police officers in the corner that he had come in with. Officers Head and Montoya had been the first responders to the Gordon house after his 911 call. They had stayed with Dick as he watched the EMTs work on Barbara before they loaded her into the ambulance. The officers let Dick ride in the back of their unit as they followed the ambulance to the hospital. They had asked him a few cursory questions along the way, but all he could tell them was he found her like this and the commissioner wasn't anywhere inside the house.

Dick heard the automatic doors open and looked up. Bruce, Alfred, Tommy, and Leslie all walked in together. Dick stood and walked towards them. Leslie came up to Dick and put her arms around him.

"Oh God, sweetheart," she said as she hugged him. "I am so sorry. I don't know what to say."

"Thanks for coming, guys," Dick said quietly.

"Of course, sir," Alfred said. "Is there any word on her condition?"

"Nothing. They won't tell me anything except that she's in surgery and they're doing everything they can."

"Tommy, you used to work here," Bruce said. "Think you can find out what's going on?"

"On it. Dick, trust me. I was here for years. This hospital has some of the best doctors around. I trained half of them." He put his hand on Dick's shoulder reassuringly. "She's in good hands. I'll be back." Tommy headed off to the nurse's station to find out more about Barbara's status.

Once Tommy was out of earshot Bruce addressed the group. "Okay, give me an assessment. What happened?"

"Not sure," Dick said. "No sign of forced entry, but there was blood on the door handle. There was some sort of struggle inside. A vase was smashed, coffee table was turned over, broken glass everywhere. I found her nude, GSW to the abdomen. No sign of Jim. There was a section of carpet missing. Big enough to roll up a body. Looks like a snatch. She wasn't the target. They left her to die and took him." Dick relayed the information in a cold, tactical manner. He had been trained to shut down his emotions during times of stress in order to analyze the information to solve the problem.

"Alfred, Leslie, can you give us a minute?" Bruce said to them. He waited until they had stepped away and turned to Dick. "She was nude, do you suspect sexual assault?"

Dick took a long breath in and slowly let it out. He had been focused on saving Barbara and evaluating the crime scene in the little time he had before the emergency responders arrived. He had avoided contemplating the other observations about Barbara.

"Yeah, I do. Clothing was ripped off, lying next to her. There was... bruising along the thighs." Now that he had said it out loud the thought finally hit him. It was an onslaught of emotion he wasn't prepared for. Dick slumped into a chair behind him. "Oh, God..." He breathed in and out steadily, trying to calm himself.

Bruce sat next to him. "Dick, all eyes are on you right now. Your training is working against you. Robin is trained to handle extreme duress. Dick Grayson is not. You're the grieving boyfriend. Play the part."

"Jesus..." Dick said as he looked at Bruce. "Play the part? She was raped and nearly killed, Bruce. It's not a 'part' for me."

"You understand my intent here. Don't risk exposure of training." They both noticed Tommy heading towards them. Dick and Bruce stood up as he approached.

"Okay guys, some good news," Tommy told them. "I talked to Sandy, one of our nurses. Barbara is still in surgery, but they think she's going to pull through. I can't tell you how lucky she is. The bullet went straight through, didn't hit any vital organs, didn't even hit an artery. If it had she'd be dead. There was no hydrostatic shock - sorry, that's where the energy from the projectile ruptures the organs. Anyway, none of that. That's a miracle in and of itself." He looked down at the floor and sighed, sadness on his face.

"There's bad news too, isn't there?" Dick asked Tommy.

"Look, nothing is certain right now. They haven't been in there that long. There might be some spinal trauma but they're going to have to do some tests. Their on-call neuro is Dr. Sharpe. She's as good as it gets. Once she's had more time with Barbara we'll know more."

"Can't you do it?" Bruce asked.

"Bruce, I had alcohol at the hospital opening. I can't do surgery." Tommy looked towards Dick. "I would if I could. But Dr. Sharpe is a great surgeon."

"Excuse me," a voice behind the trio said. They turned around to see a disheveled, overweight man wearing a Gotham Rogues jersey and baseball cap. "I'm Detective Bullock. I'm sorry, Mr. Grayson. I need you to come with me. We need to get a witness statement and an interview."

"Right now? Can't it wait until she's out of surgery?"

"There's nothing you can do for her right now, son. We need to talk to you while everything is fresh in your head. The longer we wait, the less accurate your memory can be. We want to catch the bastard that did this. You can help with that."

"Yeah, okay..." Dick relented. He knew Bullock was right. Time at the hospital was time that could be spent tracking down the Gordon's attackers. "Give me a second, sir. I need to talk to my dad."

"Make it fast, kid. Seconds count right now," Bullock replied. He turned and walked over towards the exit.

"Tommy, call me if anything changes," Dick said.

"Of course."

"Bruce, I'll call you after I'm done with the cops."

"I'm heading back to the penthouse, Dick. I'll have Alfred stay here and wait for any word. Come back to the penthouse after you're done. You need some rest."

Dick nodded and walked off to join Detective Bullock. He knew Bruce didn't want him to come back to sleep. As soon as he was done with the police he would head to the Bunker to change into his uniform. Batman and Robin had a manhunt to start. There would be no rest until Gordon was found.