"BREAKING: Released footage of Batman murdering Two-Face and Firefly."
The headline for the morning news report leaves everyone in panic. Wanting more and many more wanting to push it away. People conflicted about their stances on the Batman, while some are still standing by their decisions. The news has been the main topic for hours, and a conversation point involves the GCPD.
"The Gotham CCTV footage was held back because of the capacity of such a reveal," A reporter starts off. Bruce is at Wayne Enterprises, watching the news. Rattled but keeps his composure.
"I'm not liking where this is going." A woman walks up to Bruce, nervous.
"Me neither." Bruce answers back, crossing his arms.
The woman, Grace, adds, frazzled. "He's gonna make everything worse."
Bruce looks at her, confused. But secretly he knows what she means. "What'd you mean?"
Grace cups her coffee a little tighter, answering back, "Bunch of psychos ran rampant in the streets. Batman stepped in and stopped them. Now they're only going to fight back even harder."
She drinks some of her coffee and Bruce asks. "What if some of them will be afraid?"
"I don't believe it." She answers back. Bruce raises an eyebrow.
"They've been scared before." Bruce replies.
Grace looks at the CCTV footage replay of Two-Face's neck being snapped, and she informs, worried. "People only fear what they don't understand." She looks back at Bruce. "And they're learning."
Bruce feels worried. He knows she's right, but he doesn't want to admit it. He rubs his eyes and turns the channel. Another news report. He changes it again. Same thing. He puts the remote back on the table and says he has to go get some air.
He stands outside, contemplating about what this could entail. His mind goes to Lucius. How he didn't know. He then decides to pay him a visit and Lucius is waiting in Bruce's Office. "Lucius.." Bruce starts.
Lucius raises his hand and he stops him. He stands there for a moment, taking a deep breath. "I didn't sign up for this, Mister Wayne."
Bruce feels a weight fall on his shoulders. He hands him a paper. Lucius's signature is on it. "This is my resignation." His voice is weak.
Bruce looks at the paper, distraught. "I-"
Lucius puts a hand on Bruce's shoulder as he looks at him in the eye, answering. "I'm sorry, Bruce."
And with that, he walks away, and out of Wayne Enterprises. Bruce still looks at the paper, speechless. He puts it on his desk and leans over his desk, miffed. He stands there for a while as he thinks about where everything went wrong. It spins around in his head repeatedly. Lucius. I'm sorry.
An employee comes by and asks. "Is this a bad time?"
Bruce turns around and looks at him, answering. His voice cracks. "What is it?"
"A meeting." He answers back. "You sure you're all right?"
"Yeah," Bruce assures. "I'll be on my way soon."
The employee takes him at his word and Bruce follows him shortly after he that day, Bruce is at the Manor, seeing Alfred up again. "Alfred." He shouts, still a little broken up about earlier.
"Master Bruce." Alfred answers back and notices Bruce looking glum. A trait learned from years of knowing him. "You look troubled."
Bruce answers back. "Lucius quit Wayne Enterprises today."
"Oh." Alfred sighs. "Why?"
Bruce doesn't want to say it but Alfred connects the dots, but he doesn't say anything either. "The day's still young." Bruce tells Alfred. "And there's still work to be done." Still carrying the weight from earlier.
That night, the riots started. Some criminals have stayed inside, while some have run rampant in the streets. Some civilians even joining them. All culminating into a cycle of madness.
Batman, Batgirl, and Nightwing are in action, trying to curtail the chaos, keeping the damage to a minimal with the citizens. Batgirl and Nightwing are knocking out the bad guys, while Batman is trying to control himself. The Dark Knight then runs into Victor Zsaaz, who has dragged a thug out of his house and is trying to cut him open like a fish.
Batman sneaks up behind him and puts him in a headlock, stepping back into a dark alley. First there are cries of despair, about how desperately he needs the mark, how he needs to kill that man. The next, nothing. Leaving behind a bloodied mess. Alfred is back at the Batcave, watching some monitor screens of Batgirl and Nightwing through the lenses in the masks, but Batman's been cut off the whole time. He managed to stray away from the two when they were supposed to be keeping a close eye on him. He's disabled his tracker too. Then a dormant tracker is brought back to life. Jason's. Batman looks at his gauntlet, showing a computer screen displaying an aerial view of Gotham's streets. A beacon points to the Funhouse. An abandoned amusement park tent located far away from the public. "Alfred. Jason's tracker is working again." Batman notifies Alfred.
He knows he should keep it private, but it just comes out of him. Ridden with guilt and joy. Everyone shouts back in unison and Batman responds back, "I'll investigate. I need you two to focus on the riots."
Batman calls his Batmobile and speeds as fast as he can, accidentally crushing some unoccupied cars on the way there. I'm on my way, Jason. Just hang on. He grips his steering wheel tighter now. He arrives at the Funhouse and runs as fast as he can into the tent.
He finds it's really dark in the tent, so he turns on his night mode, and finds a pile of bodies in the center of the room. Joker goons. With a tiny pyramid of cards on top of them. HA HA HA HA is spray painted on each card. Blood surrounds the pile. He then looks around the room some more, and sees bodies hanging from the ceiling. Cops. Batman feels an adrenaline rush through him. The kind of adrenaline that's rushed through him throughout the night. And now it's amplified. Burning and burning. Anger. He then spots a cop dressed in a trenchcoat that's supposed to mimic Commissioner Gordon.
Batman tells himself to focus on the task at hand, and uses his detective mode to look for Jason. Then all of a sudden, a familiar laugh booms through the intercom. Jason screaming. Harley laughing. Gunfire. All in a agonizing loop. It gets louder. And louder. "Stop!" Jason screams from below. "Stooppp!"
The recording continues and Jason screams for it to stop some more. Batman finds Jason and for a split second, they look at each other. "BATMAN! NO!" Jason shouts before the tent blows up with both of them in it.
Batman wasn't near the blast as much as Jason was. But it was around Jason's proximity. Batman rushes towards Jason to get him free of some of the rubble, only to find him dead and ashen. Bruce holds his broken body, and notices something on his bare back. He turns him over and sees a card. IF YOU WANT ME, THEN COME FIND ME. Spray painted in green. He flips the card over and it tells his location. "Alfred, send a GCPD officer to my location. Jason's dead." Batman announces, hurt. But he leaves out where Joker is hiding.
Alfred bypasses the code Batman set up to hide or disable his tracker, knowing he'll be going after the Joker. Afraid of what he might do. He talks over the comms but only to Dick and Barbara. "Joker killed Jason and Batman is on his way to him. I'm sending you his location to track. He'll lose himself and I need you two to stop him."
The two look at each other, heart broken. "We'll get right on it." Dick answers back, trying to stay strong. Barbara stands frozen but comes to when Dick shakes her awake. "C'mon, we gotta go."
"I'm contacting a second team of GCPD officers to take away the Joker." Alfred clarifies before he leaves the duo to their duties.
They get on their motorcycles and speed as fast as they can. Batman speeds his way towards Joker too. Jason's face still fresh in his memory. His body ashen, beaten, and branded. The recording echoing in his mind. When he makes his way to Joker, he discovers something troubling. Something that frightens him more than anything. Joker wearing Jason's suit. The top half of it anyway. "It doesn't make me look fat, does it?" Joker quips. "I mean, if I blew myself up too, the weight would just fall off!"
This sends Batman into a rage as he pounces towards him, at which point Joker reminds him. "Easy on the suit! It was yours, anyways." He smiles as Batman pounds on him. Every hit. Every punishing blow seems to have no effect. The pain is nonexistent to him.
"It's a shame Jason wasn't here himself to finish the job. What a party pooper you are." Joker shouts as Batman wails on him.
The clown continues spouting insults at him, knowing that Batman will finally kill him. After a while, Batman still hasn't killed him. Wanting to make it last. Joker mocks him, making chicken noises, and laughing hysterically afterwards. "Reminds me of another flightless bird, what'd you think?"
The Joker doesn't fight it. He lets Batman pound his face in. Breaking a couple teeth and some of his skull too. Before Batman can hit on him some more, Dick and Barbara come up behind him, trying to pull him away from the Joker. Batman protests, but the two try their hardest to hold him back. They know it won't work, but they keep trying. And the moment Batman breaks free of their hold, the police show up. Batman has the Joker by the jacket, about to throw another punch before some officers shout. "BATMAN! STAND DOWN!"
They point their guns at him in defense. "We'll take care of the Joker!" One officer shouts back.
Damn it Alfred. Batman thinks. It feels like forever before Batman releases the Joker and snaps back into reality. He backs away from the Joker as the cops carry his bloodied body to the car. On the way to the car, Joker shouts at Batman. "Say hi to Robin for me!"
Batman jumps into his Batmobile, not saying a word to anyone, and drives back to the Batcave. Dick and Barbara get word from Alfred over the comms to meet at the Backup Batcave in another part of town to avoid Batman's wrath when he comes home. Alfred gets up from his chair and walks towards a car to drive off to the location.
When Batman arrives at the Main Batcave, he jumps out of the car and takes off his suit, throwing it to the ground. Leaving pieces of a dark shell behind him. He goes to a part of the cave where he can stop and think. Somewhere quiet. He kneels in front of a small body of water. The moonlight coming out from the top of the cave better reveals his reflection in the water. He looks at his reflection as he cups his hands to get some of the water, splashing it over his face. He takes deep breaths and keeps splashing his face with water. He stares at his reflection a little bit more before he says aloud, breathing heavily. "What have I done?"
And all that answers back, is the hiss of a giant bat, lurking in the cave.