The story brought tears to Batgirl's eyes.
I'm so sorry, Raph...I wish I could've saved you. I should've stayed in touch… Barbara would say.
But Batgirl was here right now, and Batgirl had to stay. Her father's justice depended on it.
"Where is Khan now?" She said, as softly as she could manage.
"I'm sorry, Batgirl, I don't know. I'm just the hired gun, asked to take you out...but I don't want to do that...but Khan? I've seen his rap sheet. He'll kill me! Please, you have to protect me!" Raph's eyes were pleading even harder than his voice.
"I will. I promise." She said with a renewed determination.
"Don't make promise you can't keep, Batgirl." A deep voice said behind her.
Batgirl turned to face Genghis Khan, and took the Conqueror's sword from her belt. "You want this, Khan? You can just come and get it." She dared him.
Khan drew his own sword, and leveled it to point its tip at Batgirl.
Batgirl held the sword in front of her.
She pretended to be fully confident, on occasion smirking at Khan.
Bruce's words still rang in her head.
25 years of experience.
That was even before The Batman had made his first appearance in Gotham, which had felt like such a long time ago. It had only been 8 years, and Batgirl had been around far less than that.
But in her time under Batman, she'd learned to use so many different weapons. Baton, bo staff, stun gun, knives, shuriken...though rarely had Batgirl wielded a sword. Now was as good a time as any to learn.
Khan thrusted his blade at her, and she parried it, almost effortlessly. For a moment, she was proud, but it was clear that Khan was playing with her. As they spun into another exchange, she could see Raph silently cheering for her.
Khan's blows were starting to come quicker, and Batgirl put forth more effort.
Soon enough it was almost a waltz. Khan swung, Batgirl blocked. Khan stabbed, Batgirl spun away. Batgirl kicked, Khan dodged. Batgirl slashed, and Khan parried. Khan slashed, Batgirl cartwheeled backward.
Batgirl slashed twice, and Khan shuffled to the side. Next Batgirl knew, a part of her cowl had been slashed away. She was missing part of her bat-ear, and a piece of the armor around her eye.
Khan kicked her to the ground, knocking Khan's prize away, and leveled the sword at her face.
"Give up, Batgirl. Surrender to Khan."
"You don't know me very well yet." Batgirl snarled as she kicked the sword away from Khan, then threw a smoke pellet at him.
In the smoke, she activated the only optic sensor in her cowl that was still functional, and readied three batarangs to launch into what bits of Khan's skin was vulnerable.
But as she scanned the room, Khan was nowhere to be found.
"Khan! Come out and let's finish this!" Batgirl demanded.
"Keaton, do you see him?"
Silence.
"Keaton?"
Nothing.
"Batgirl, do you copy?" Black Canary's voice rang over the comms.
"I'm here...is Gordon being tended to?" Batgirl asked.
"Yeah, I was about to tell you that. Did you get the scumbag that shot him?"
"Kind of." Batgirl answered, still studying the room, batarangs at the ready.
"Kind of? What does that mean?" The concern was growing in Canary's voice.
In an instant, an explosion shattered the wall behind Batgirl, knocking her off her feet. When her vision refocused, she could see a helicopter through the smoke and dust, the wind of the rotors blowing her hair, and what remained of her cape behind her.
"Canary, I'm going to have to call you back." Batgirl finished, grabbing the grapple gun from her belt.
"BG, what was that? Bats?" Canary called out in vain.
In the flick of her wrist, the air propelled line shot from the gun, and wrapped around the skids of the helicopter, pulling Batgirl with it.