FROM THE JOURNALS OF ORACLE…

One of the toughest nights of my life, was the one where they finally found the bodies of Dick, Jason, Tim, and Damian...in an underwater bunker, just off the coast of Star City. It was decommissioned by ARGUS, and left to rot and decay. Joker had bought it from the Broker, and set it up to be the tomb of everyone Batman loved. It had been about two weeks before they were able to zero in on where they were, and by then the gas and the water that Joker let pour in rendered them all hardly recognizable.

The bodies were cremated, the suits were taken by the Crows for examination, reverse engineering, and research. Nightwing's shuriken, Red Hood's visor, virtually all of Red Robin's utility belt, and Robin's sword was taken for a cultural study into the League of Assassins.

And the next few years after that? The Birds of Prey and the Crows? It was hectic. My father had never seen a Gotham quite like this. Not even before there was a Batman. Gangs rose and fell, super criminals were removed from Gotham as they were captured...transferred to Stryker's Island in Metropolis, to be safeguarded by Superman.

We could've used a lot more of Clark's help, of course, but...Gotham didn't want him. After word got around that Batman went crazy and killed The Joker, Gotham didn't trust any "capes", as people liked to call them. That's one of the reasons Canary and Huntress only ever got to participate in special ops missions, dealing with super criminals. The Riddler, Two Face, Black Mask, Poison Ivy, all dealt with and sent to Stryker's.

Street crime and homicides were taken care of by Harvey Bullock and the remainder of the GCPD, whom I helped as much as I could between Crows ops. All from the top of Crow HQ. It was known as the Oracle's perch. Just like the Clock Tower, I could see everything, hear everything...know everything…

But one thing I never knew...whatever happened to Batman? Did he leave Gotham altogether? Honestly, I was never convinced he had. I just knew he was still somewhere, in the slums maybe, haunting the Gotham shadows...but now like an urban legend, closer to his earlier days.

Tales were spun and told of thugs vanishing from sight in a swarm of bats, never seen again...others told of corrupt GCPD officers being strung up, with their badges stabbed into their hearts.

Echoes of screams heard through puffs of smoke, bones crunching under midnight rain…

There was no way in hell you'd convince me that Batman was gone. Bruce Wayne may have been gone, of course, but never Batman.

As infinite as my knowledge seemed, I could never find Alfred when they put him in witness protection. He never reached out to anybody from his old life in Gotham...and I can't say I blame him. Hell, with my dad gone, the only thing that kept me here in this city was this...I don't know how else to say it...this burden of a city Batman gave us.

I could've left, so many times over, in the last seven years. But Batman soiled Gotham in dad and Joker's blood, and I felt it was my job to help the Crows, the GCPD, and the Birds clean it up. To redeem what's left of the legacy of the Bat, and salvage what was left of civilization in Gotham.

Sometimes though, I start to wonder if there's anything left of Gotham to rebuild. It's a living hell now, worse than I've ever seen.

Every day I'd wake up, and hope that all of this time, it was all just a dream. Years worth of nightmares, traced back to a vial of Scarecrow's fear toxin, and I'd look to my side and see Bruce there, stoic as always, but caring...or see Dick, rushing to wrap his arms around me...or Jason, rambling incessantly about the idea of putting a bullet through Scarecrow's brain...or Tim, breaking down the chemical formula of Scarecrow's toxin...or Damian, pretending not to care about anything that happened to me…

But it just isn't so...instead I wake the same way I have for all these years, feeling empty, with a picture of my dad that seems like it was taken an eternity ago, and as I roll my wheelchair out of my room, I always pass by more of those ancient photos.

And I could never shake the feeling that it was only a matter of time before it all burned with the rest of Gotham City.

And when Harley Quinn reappeared after all this time? After she helped the Joker kill the boys? That feeling is stronger than ever…