Gordon floated in the gray world that existed between awake and asleep. He knew that the combination of the searing pain attacking every inch of his body and the drugs being pumped into his horribly grateful system were causing him to hallucinate. Hell, it wasn't like he really cared that he was hallucinating. The drug/pain induced vision he was having was his most favorite one ever. He allowed himself to drift into the land of dreams with a small sigh.

The silence of his house was a comfort after the nightmare of that evening. Crime never slept. Especially in a city like Gotham where being a criminal was the most profitable job to have. It was a familiar he had become accustomed to, that he embraced with every fiber of his being and that he accepted simply because there wasn't any other damn choice.

That night, however, Firefly had decided to entrap a bridge full of people in order to lure out Batman. It'd taken the combined efforts of the dark knight, as well as a battalion of his best police officers in order to stop the pyrotechnic lunatic before any more innocent Gothamites got hurt.

Even with all the manpower standing against him, it still took several hours before Garfield Lynns was subdued, and several more after that before he'd been taken to the precinct for processing. The first hints of dawn were only just turning the twilight sky crimson when he opened his front door.

The first thing he did - that he always did when he got home - was go and check on his children. His children were, after all, his reminder about why he remained a police officer despite his ever-growing disgust with the corruption that was infesting the department with its corrosive disease. His children were his reason for getting up every day.

They were why he put on his suit and tie, for sticking his badge in his pocket, his gun in its holster.

His kids were the determination in his step as he walked out his front door to face whatever it was that the city, and her new breed of criminals, was gonna toss at him that day. They were the fire in his eye and the song in his heart. His kids were why he'd continue doing what he did until he was either too old or too dead to still be doing it.

His kids were also why he tentatively chose to work alongside a costumed vigilante that most of the city of Gotham considered no better than the filth he helped bring to justice. Batman had become an ally despite Gordon's better judgment. None of that mattered much to James Gordon at that moment, though.

No, the only thing that mattered to him right then was checking upon his kids. Morning, afternoon or night, his routine remained the same. It would always remain the same. He'd unlock the door, step inside, drop off his coat, and go down the hall to check upon his kids. His kids were his coping mechanism, his way of handling the stress of his job and all of its regular demands.

Nobody at the station knew that this was how he dealt with the nightly traumas, the daily horrors, the senseless bloodshed, and violence.

Not even Harvey knew about his routine.

Not that the man wouldn't have understood had he known.

He glanced into his bedroom on his way down the hall and could just barely make out the top of his wife's head poking out from the top of the covers. His lips curved before he turned to glance into his son, James Jr.'s room. His son had made a cave out of his blankets and was snoring blissfully from somewhere in the middle of his cottony fortress.

Finally, he turned to walk into his daughter, Barbara's bedroom. He was just finishing tucking her in, when his eight-year-old niece, who he thought was sleeping, spoke from the other bed in the room.

"Did Batman help you save Gotham tonight, Uncle Jim?"

"Actually, pumpkin," he said with a small smile. "I helped him save Gotham tonight."

Raya gazed at him, her eyes these huge green saucers in the twilight. "You did?"

He settled on the bed beside her. "I helped him stop the Firefly from hurting a lot of innocent people."

"Really?" she breathed out in an awed voice. "How'd you and Batman stop him, Uncle Jim?" she asked, curling against him and cradling her head on his stomach. "Did you shoot him? Or did Batman use one of his gadgets to stop him?"

Gordon felt his throat tighten at her simple and sweet showing of trust and affection. Neither of her parents seemed inclined to think that their daughter, their only child, required more than just their basic care and attention. Until nine months ago, they left her day-to-day upbringing to the score of tutors and nanny they had on retainer. What nurturing Raya had received came from either him or from her aunt and cousins.

Raya had started to blossom since she had come live with them. The sad and solemn look had faded from her eyes. She no longer jumped at every little sound, nor spent every moment glancing fearfully over her shoulder. It gave him hope that the emotional damage her parents had inflicted upon her with their negligence could be reversed with time, love and patience.

"That story can wait until another night..." he told her gruffly. "It's time for bed, kiddo."

"Aw, but Uncle Jim..." she complained with a small pout that made her look even more like a fairy princess. "I'm not sleepy."

Jim chuckled as he brushed her soft curls from her face. "Don't you aw, Uncle Jim, me, young lady," he said. "If you want a bedtime story, it is going to be about something other than me recounting yet another of mine and Batman's exploits to you."

Exploits, he added silently, that you already know much too much about as it is.

"I like listening about your exploits with Batman."

"Yes," he said with a chuckle. "I know that you do."

And I encourage you because I like indulging you.

Raya was silent for all of thirty seconds. "Will you tell me 'Twas the Night Before Christmas?" she asked while darting a look at his face. "Please?"

He should have guessed that that would be her story request. Raya was not a whimsical or fanciful child. She didn't believe in things like the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. She only started to accept that heroes existed when Batman came onto the scene just a little over a year and a half ago. He didn't know why she selected this particular poem as a bedtime story, and it didn't matter.

She asked him to tell it to her, and tell it to her he would.

He settled back against the headboard before beginning his recitation.

"'Twas the night before Christmas," he began...

...

"...and all through the house..."

He's mumbling that Christmas poem again, Erin Tate thought with a pang. Gordon had been mumbling that Christmas poem for the better part of the last hour. Erin figured it was somehow related to whatever it was Gordon was dreaming about in his unconscious state. She assumed his thoughts, like any rational persons would be in this situation, were on his family.

Anyone would prefer being with family for Christmas over being stuck here in a hospital bed.

But the bad guys don't care about things like Christmas, she thought with just a shade of the familiar bitterness.

Erin drew in a ragged breath and finished adding notes to his chart. She hung the chart on the hook at the front of his bed but didn't move so much as an inch from that spot. Ethan had told her about how Gordon had been trapped in the tunnels that ran beneath the city.

It was a miracle that after he got shot that he'd managed to find his way to that basin at the nuclear power plant. His bulletproof vest, coupled with whatever had slowed the speed of the bullets, was the only thing that prevented his injuries from being fatal. Even still, Gordon was in for a very long, daunting, and intense recovery process.

That's if he manages to survive the next few days.

Sighing, Erin turned and walked over to the window. She was in need of a change in scenery. For a change in perspective. There were thoughts in her head, whirling faster than that roller coaster she'd loved riding as a kid. She found she couldn't concentrate on much of anything at the moment. She was far too consumed by the terrifying prospect that the man in that hospital bed was going to fall into a coma and die.

He will not die, she told herself sternly. His children need him. This city needs him.

She rest her forehead against the cool windowpane and stared out at the world just beginning to stir. The people of Gotham were rousing themselves from their beds, many lured by the gleaming lights hanging upon a tree under which scores of colorfully wrapped items had been left.

Most were woefully and willfully unaware about how they were getting to celebrate Christmas because of a good man risking his life to stop some rifle-toting jack ass from ruining it.

She heard a soft exhalation of air come from behind her, and then heard Gordon muttering, "Twas the night before Christmas..."

Erin turned and walked back to the bed. She laid her fingers against his cheek, and whispered nonsensical words to soothe him. A voice, that belonging to her twin brother, Ethan, spoke from the doorway.

"How is he?"

She glanced over at him. Even in the dim light, she could see the exhaustion, as well as the swirls of grief ghosting his face. It's been a long night for them all, she realized. "Captain Gordon's condition is the same as before."

"And Bullock?"

"Bullock hasn't regained consciousness just yet, but his condition has been upgraded from critical to stable."

Ethan sighed and leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb. "Do doctors think that Gordon is, at least, gonna make it?"

"He stands a good chance of making it, yes," she said with a nod. "But it'll definitely take time before he's back on his feet, or ready to return to work."

Ethan let out a soft curse and slammed a fist against the wood paneling. "I just wish I knew who it was that shot him and Bullock. I'd go and arrest the man," he paused to blow out a breath. "Or men responsible if I knew who they were."

"Well, if I had to hazard a guess?" Erin scooped her hair into a messy bun she secured with a pencil. "I would say Gordon has been telling you the entire time about who it is that shot him."

Ethan cocked an eyebrow. "You think it is Matthew Berkeley who shot Gordon?"

"Yes." She nodded. "I do."

"Why?"

"Well," she spoke slowly, thoughtfully. "You said Gordon was going on about you needing to find Batman and ask him to become the guardian of his niece, right?" At his nod, she said. "You've been assuming that Captain Gordon was telling you that Raya Berkeley needed a guardian from some unknown assailant. What if he was actually trying to tell you that who she needs protecting from is her own Da?"

A/N: Hello, all! Hope the week has been good to you!