GOTHAM GENERAL HOSPITAL

News had spread like wildfire that Harvey Dent, Jr. had awakened from his coma. It was also quickly spreading that he had a psychotic breakdown and was now claiming to be called Two-Face.

The hospital was still a madhouse of activity as dozens of reporters were trying to get in to see the District Attorney to get an interview and even more importantly, to get a good look at his now deformed visage.

Damian Kyle, dressed in blue jeans and a plaid shirt, managed to make his way through the bustling crowd up to Officer Renee Montoya who was one of several officers trying to keep the crowd at bay.

"Kyle," she exclaimed. "What are you doing here? Suit up and help us keep control of this crazy mob." Someone bumped into her and she nearly fell to the ground.

Damian caught her before she fell and glared at the individual who had bumped into her. The reporter smiled and mouthed "Sorry" apologetically as he disappeared into the crowd.

"Thanks," Montoya said stiffly.

"Don't mention it," Damian said. "I'm not on duty for another ten hours. That's if Yindel actually let's me come back to work tonight."

"You've gotta stop butting heads with her, Kyle. You're still new in town and have to learn how things are done around here."

Damian nodded, "I understand that but she keeps making stupid decisions that's gonna get somebody hurt."

Montoya said quietly. "Look, Damian… I agree with you but you're going about it all the wrong way. If she's incompetent then it needs to be proven and then she can get axed out of her job. A beat cop can't go toe to toe with a commissioner and expect to win."

Damian thought on her words a moment. "Who would I go to about that?"

"The Mayor is a good start."

Damian chuckled. "Christ, Montoya! You know who that is now, right? Falcone will cherish having an idiot like her running things at GCPD."

Montoya shrugged. "True. Guess we're all screwed then."

Damian left her to do her job while he made his way inside the hospital. He went to the Intensive Care unit where only one cop was posted at the door to Harvey Dent, Jr.'s room. The officer looked haggard and started bobbing his head up and down as if he was about to pass out right there.

"Bullock," Damian said to the officer. "You look like shit, buddy."

Officer Bullock yawned. "Well, Kyle we've been working long hours around here. Hope you've enjoyed your little reprieve, courtesy of The Commish, herself."

Damian chuckled, "Why don't you go get some coffee and I'll keep an eye out here till you get back."

Bullock thought on it a moment. "Yindel would have a coronary if I did that. Especially with how she's feeling about you these days."

Damian shrugged, "I won't tell if you don't."

Bullock chuckled, "I'll be right back."

Damian waited for Officer Bullock to disappear out of sight before he entered the room. What he saw lying restrained in the bed left him speechless.

Harvey Dent, Jr. was strapped down to the bed and staring straight ahead, fuming with fury. Damian didn't know how the man could remain conscious with his face so horribly maimed like that. It had to hurt like hell.

The whole left side of his face was burnt beyond repair. It was charred black with little veiny red streaks. His eyeball had been burned to the point that now it was only a bloodshot white ball.

"Come to gawk at the freak, kid?" He fumed.

Damian snapped out of his shock and said. "No, Mr. Dent…

"Don't call me that!" He shouted. "My name is Two-Face!"

Damian looked around quickly. He didn't want the doctors to get aroused by Dent's outbursts. He stepped closer, "Look, my name's Kyle. I'm an Officer of the GCPD and I just wanted to ask you about the explosion. Who blew up your car? Was it Falcone?"

Two-Face glared at him, "Do you think you're the first one to ask me that question? I'll tell you what I told them. GO TO HELL!"

"The son of a bitch already had your parents killed, tried to kill you, and now he took the election from you as well. Help me take him down."

Two-Face smiled sadistically. Only the unburnt side of his face could make a smile. "Oh, don't worry about that, cop. I will have my revenge on the one who did this to me. Now get the hell out of my sight."

Damian sighed. "I'm sorry for what's been done to you, Mr. Dent."

He shouted at Damian as he exited the room, "TWO-FACE! My name is Two-Face!"

Bullock just came back with a steaming cup of coffee. "What the hell did you just do?"

"Sorry," Damian apologized. "I had to try to get through to him."

"Damn it, Kyle!" Bullock exclaimed. "You trying to get me fired? Get the hell outta here!"

Damian nodded and left the Intensive Care unit.

On the way out he noticed Bruce Wayne at the front desk of the lobby talking with the clerk. He thought a moment and almost continued out the front door. He made a different decision and found himself approaching his father.

When Bruce noticed him approach, he stopped what he was doing and gave Damian his full attention. "Did you just go see, Junior?"

Damian nodded solemnly. "He's gone. The man he had once been was blown away, leaving only Two-Face in his place."

Bruce looked crestfallen. "All the things that kid had to endure in his life and now this. He didn't deserve this nor did his parents. They were good people. One of the last few remaining good people in this city."

A moment of silence passed between them and then Damian asked. "Why are you here?"

"Just making sure the hospital has all my information," Bruce explained. "I don't want Junior to want for anything. He's going to get the best help money can buy."

"Money can't fix everything, Bruce. It can't bring his parents back and it can't fix his fractured mind." He started to lose control of his emotions as tears formed in his eyes, "And it can't fix…"

Bruce nodded his understanding as he placed a hand to Damian's shoulder, "… It can't fix this rift between us. It can't fix all the years I missed in your life. I wish I could have been there to watch you grow up to become the good man you are today. If I had known…"

Damian shook his head, "My whole reason for coming here in the first place wasn't to taunt you as a negligent father. Hell, mom didn't even tell me you were my father till I was a teenager and I made her tell me. I came here to finally bring justice to Carmine Falcone. Now he's the goddamned Mayor of Gotham City."

Bruce was taken aback. "What do you have against Falcone?"

Damian burst out angrily, "Because he's my grandfather! He killed my mother… His daughter!"

Bruce couldn't process everything he'd just heard clearly. He was so stunned that he had to take a seat. All that information in one gut wrenching sentence. Selina Kyle was Falcone's daughter and she was… dead!

Bruce blinked back tears as Damian took a seat next to him.

"Did you love her?" Damian asked.

Bruce fought for words, "I..I don't know. We knew each other only so briefly. I tracked her down in Rome shortly after she was believed to have died alongside Max Shreck."

"That's where Falcone was living at the time," Damian explained. "She tracked him there. She knew he was an evil man just like Max Shreck and wanted to bring him down."

"What happened?"

Damian shrugged. "I guess you happened, Bruce. You two met up and nine months later I popped out. Guess her priorities changed when she had a kid to take care of. Eliminating Carmine Falcone was no longer on the top of her to do list."

"Why wouldn't she tell me?" Bruce implored.

Damian shrugged, "Guess we'll never know." He then asked, "You left her after y'all hooked up?"

Bruce shook his head, "No. After our brief but passionate reunion she disappeared again. I could never find her after that. I took it as a sign that she didn't want to stay involved with me."

Damian nodded. "I may have judged you too harshly, Bruce. You don't seem like that bad of a guy, after all. My mom was a force to be reckoned with. Nobody every could handle her."

"How did she die?"

Damian explained, "After I grew up and joined the Police Force in Central City she called me up one day. She said she was heading back to Gotham City to confront Carmine Falcone once and for all. She felt she'd allowed him to grow too powerful after all these years and that she had to stop him. I tried to talk her out of it but of course she wouldn't listen.

"About a week later she was found in her apartment dead. Allegedly from an overdose which is total bull. Mom never did drugs. She confronted her father and he had her killed."

Bruce gravely took all this information in. He realized that while he'd been moping around in his mansion all that time, somewhere in his city, Selina Kyle, the mother of his child, had been murdered. Falcone would pay for that.

"Say something," Damian said.

Bruce looked into his son's eyes sharply and said. "Don't give up on hope, son." He stood up from the chair, "Falcone will get what's coming to him. Believe me."

AXIS CHEMICALS

The Joker sat back in a large fluffy chair and threw some raw meat down to two hyenas he'd recently acquired. His gang had raided a zoo the previous night and had gifted him with the two hyenas that morning. He'd decided to name them Jekyll and Hyde.

"I see you've been busy in the midst of your rehabilitation."

The Joker looked up to see that Hugo Strange had made his way inside.

Hugo approached him, "You should keep some of your goons around on guard duty so that no unwanted visitors comes prancing in unannounced."

"I don't need them," The Joker said. "I can take care of myself."

"Of course," Hugo agreed. "You were trained by one of the best in self defense."

"Why are you here?" The Joker asked, aggravated.

"Why? To check on my most prized patient, of course. Look how far you've come from being that lost and catatonic young man that your adoptive father brought to my doorstep all those years ago."

The Joker studied Hugo quietly for a few moments before pointing at his two hyenas. "Meet Jekyll and Hyde. I'm strongly debating feeding you to them right now."

"Why would you want to do that?"

The Joker shrugged. "No reason, really. Just because I can."

"Well, before you do that, let's talk about the promise you made me. You do remember what you said you'd do for me on the condition of me letting you out of Arkham, don't you?"

The Joker nodded, "Of course I remember."

Hugo shrugged, "And you haven't delivered yet. The Batman has come out of retirement as I predicted he would and yet you still haven't reached out to me."

"I've been kinda busy," The Joker argued.

"Yes, you have." Hugo agreed. "You've made an alliance with the new Mayor of Gotham City, blown up a District Attorney, and adopted an entire gang. All in the span of a week. I'm impressed. What's your next move?"

The Joker shrugged, "Kill Falcone and take over his entire empire."

"Very bold," Hugo stated. "But first you need to deliver on your promise to me."

"And why am I not just feeding you to Jekyll and Hyde right now?" The Joker asked.

Hugo smiled, "Because your promise to me also benefits you. So basically feeding me to your new pets would ultimately be a boring result as opposed to what I have planned."

"And what is that again?"

"I'm going to peel through the mind of a most extraordinary patient but before I do that you get to have something which you have craved for a long time."

"Which is?"

"A rematch with Batman."

The Joker stared at him long and hard before smiling maniacally. "I always liked you, Professor Strange. Your crazy matches my crazy."

FALCONE ESTATE

"Falcone!"

Damian Kyle burst into Carmine Falcone's office, still dressed in his civilian attire. After his conversation with his father he had decided to confront Falcone himself. An entourage of bodyguard's followed in behind him.

One the guards apologized. "Sorry, sir. He's a cop and demanded to see you."

Carmine Falcone chuckled. "And you took it upon yourselves to march him right on up into my office, did you?"

"He had a badge and everything, sir!"

"So does she," Falcone motioned to the female sitting in a chair in front of his desk.

Commissioner Ellen Yindel stood up from the desk and eyed Damian coldly. "What the hell do you think you're doing, Kyle?"

"I'm here to confront that bastard!" Damian exclaimed.

"We've talked about this, Kyle…"

"And you never seem to listen, Commissioner." Damian interrupted. "He's a criminal and a murderer and I'm gonna bring him down."

"Who have I murdered?" Falcone asked incredulously.

"The Dent's, every victim of the Mutant Gang, and most importantly… my mother, you son of a bitch! That's just to name a few."

Falcone laughed. "You sure are an impetuous young lad, that's for sure. My hands are clean and so is my conscience. And I have no idea who your mother even is."

"Selina Kyle!" Damian blurted. "Your daughter!"

Falcone looked shocked, "My daughter? I think you're mistaken, young man. I do seem to remember a Kyle in the past. She was a vigorous and tenacious young thing but I don't recall her ever giving birth to a daughter."

Ellen Yindel sighed. "Kyle, I don't know what to do with you. You storm in here making baseless accusations against the Mayor."

"Commissioner, they're not baseless accusations," Damian argued. "He's been a criminal all his life. Surely you have to know this."

"What I know is that you have no proof of anything you're accusing him of." Yindel declared. "What I know is that the good cop I thought you were has been disproved in the course of the last day. What I know is that you're relieved of duty until further notice. Hand me your gun and badge."

Damian stared at her incredulously. "You can't be serious, Commissioner."

"Dead serious, Kyle. Hand them over." She held out her hand and he reluctantly handed her his gun and badge. "Now go home before you get yourself into anymore trouble."

He backed up toward the exit without taking his eyes off of either of them. He said to Yindel. "You're a damn fool, Ellen."

"Excuse me!?"

"I said you're a damn fool. You're in the the lion's den right now and don't even know it. You can keep that badge and gun indefinitely because I won't work for a department where cops align themselves with two bit thug's like Falcone." He then addressed Falcone, "And you… I'm taking you down one way or another. The only difference now is that I'm no longer held back by the code of the law. If I don't get you, then Batman will."

Yindel said through clenched teeth, "I accept your resignation and if you come within a hundred yards of Mayor Falcone again then I'll have you arrested for conspiring with Batman to cause undo harm to our Mayor."

Damian stormed out and left them there. Once she was sure Damian was gone, she turned around sharply:

"Is any of what he said about Selina Kyle being your daughter true?"

Falcone shrugged, "Maybe. Maybe not. I never cared enough to find out."

Yindel rubbed her temples. "Dad, if Damian Kyle digs much deeper into Selina's death then he could end up being a serious thorn in our side. I set up the crime scene for Christ's sake. Not only would you be finished but so would I."

Falcone consoled his daughter. "Listen, sweet Ellie, we have nothing to worry about from that boy. He is nothing but a small thorn in our side The thing about thorns in the side is that they can so easily be plucked out."