There was no time for Batman to respond or mourn, because an instant later, his gauntlet beeped. "Batman, I can't get in touch with Nightwing – do you know how the stopping the Riddler plan is coming?" demanded Robin. "Because the robots are breaking through here!"
"Hang on, Robin," retorted Batman, racing out of the orphanage. "I'll be right there."
"You can't stop them on your own!" exclaimed Robin. "We've tried that! Where's Riddler?"
"Dead," retorted Batman. "He's not controlling them anymore. The Arkham Night is."
"Who the hell is the Arkham Night?" demanded Robin.
"He's the mastermind behind all of this," said Batman.
"Ok, but who is he?" demanded Robin.
"I'm…not sure," said Batman, glancing at Joker. "Just try to hold the robots back, Robin. Don't get overwhelmed until I get there."
"Batman? Batman!" shouted Robin, but there was no response.
"Is he coming?" demanded Commissioner Gordon.
"Yeah, but not even Batman can single-handedly destroy a robot army!" exclaimed Robin. "He says there's somebody masterminding this called the Arkham Night. But unless this Arkham Night strolls into GCPD leading the robot army, I don't think Batman will be able to end this here!"
"I think we're all about to end this here, kid," said Gordon, as the metal doors to GCPD began to give way. He pointed a gun at the door, surrounded by Aaron Cash and several other offices who were hiding behind a table turned over into a makeshift barricade. Robin primed his batarangs, taking a deep breath and waiting for the robots to burst through the doors.
They did, metal shattering against metal, and swarmed into the building like a mass of cockroaches. The police officers shot desperately at them, downing a few, but Robin was surprised to see that the robots didn't appear to want to kill the officers – they merely subdued those they approached, trapping them between metal arms and holding them prisoner. Which relieved Robin at first, but in the back of his mind was the realization that they were probably being kept alive for some worse fate.
And his instincts were right. When everyone in the building was subdued, Two-Face entered the room, flanked by several henchmen. "Line 'em up," he said, gesturing at the robots holding the officers. "Since they all got their names on their uniforms, you might as well do it alphabetically, just for order's sake. We can do this thing the way fate intended."
"What about the Bat brat?" asked one of the henchmen, nodding at Robin.
"Leave him for last," said Two-Face, smiling at Robin. "Ok, who have we got first?" he asked.
"Officer Anderson," said the henchman, shoving the officer and the robot forward.
Two-Face took out his coin and flipped it into the air. It landed in his hand, and he opened it to reveal that it had landed bad side up. Without a moment's pause, Two-Face raised his gun and fired a bullet straight into the officer's brain. "Next," he said.
"Officer Boulden," said the henchman, repeating the process with another officer. Two-Face flipped the coin again. It again landed bad side up, and Two-Face again shot the officer through the head without hesitation.
"Next," he said.
"Officer Cash," said the henchman, shoving Cash forward. Two-Face flipped the coin, which landed good side up this time. "Ok, lock him up," said Two-Face, gesturing toward the cell block. "Next."
"Detective Cottell," said the henchman, repeating the process. Robin looked around desperately for some way to stop the slaughter, but struggling against the robot was useless. He could only watch helplessly as the officers were locked up or shot, depending on how the coin came up.
"Commissioner Gordon," said the henchman at last, chuckling as he shoved Gordon forward.
"Leave him, Harvey," said a filtered voice, and they turned to see the Arkham Night striding into the building. "I've got something special planned for him and Robin."
"You should give me the same chance you gave all these other fine people," growled Gordon, glaring at him. "I'm no more special than they are."
"But you are!" exclaimed the Arkham Night. "You're related to the Bat-family by blood! That makes you super special to me!"
"What the hell are you talking about?" demanded Gordon. "I don't even know who Batman is!"
"Your daughter does," said the Arkham Night, bringing up a video on his gauntlet and projecting it onto the wall. It was footage taken from the Clocktower, of Oracle wheeling herself over to a grandfather clock and activating a panel, to reveal her old Batgirl costume hidden in a secret room.
"Barbara?" repeated Gordon, staring at the footage in astonishment. "No…that's impossible!"
"Not very impossible, when you think about it," chuckled the Arkham Night. "Didn't you notice that Batgirl disappeared from the crime fighting scene at the exact time your daughter was crippled? Not a very good detective if you can't put two and two together like that. And bearing that in mind, I bet you can figure out who this kid is," he added, gesturing at Robin. "Say hello to your son-in-law, Tim Drake!"
Gordon glanced at him. "Tim?" he whispered. "Is it true?"
"Yes," said Robin. "But Jim, I promise you, Barbara is safe…"
"Liar, liar, pants on fire!" laughed the Arkham Night, shifting the projected footage to live feed of Barbara Gordon, screaming and struggling against the ropes that bound her, as she apparently hallucinated horrific visions. "How's the patient, Dr. Crane?" asked the Arkham Night.
"We've upped her dosage to 400 milliliters, which has had a most striking effect," said Scarecrow, appearing on screen. "Before she could articulate some of the terrors she was hallucinating, but she appears to have now lost the power of speech. We're preparing a 600 milliliter dosage next."
"This takes me back to when Mr. J and I experimented on Bane with Titan," sighed Harley, appearing on screen and handing Scarecrow a syringe. "Good times!"
"No, that…that isn't real!" exclaimed Tim. "It's a fear gas hallucination somehow! Barbara is safe – Batman told me…"
"Batman lied," interrupted the Arkham Night. "For not the first time in his life. You really need to pick better friends, and that goes out to everyone here," he said, addressing the room. "Batman will always let you down in the end. He always lets everybody down when it matters most. Just ask the late Dick Grayson."
"No, Dick's not dead!" shouted Tim. "I don't believe you! Batman would have told me, and he would have told me if anything had happened to Barbara!"
"Did he tell you about Jason Todd?" asked the Arkham Night. "The Robin he couldn't save? Or I should say, the first Robin he couldn't save, now that Dick has joined him in the afterlife. Jason Todd spent months in captivity, being tortured by the Joker before he granted him the release of death. But by that time, there wasn't anything left of poor Jason mentally. The Joker was good at that, breaking people's minds as well as their bodies. But I aim to be even better, and I think I'm off to a pretty good start."
"Let Barbara go!" shouted Gordon.
"We will, Commissioner, I promise," said the Arkham Night. "We would never kill her, not when the only hope for the Bat-legacy sleeps in her stomach."
"What are you talking about?" demanded Gordon.
"Oh my God, you didn't tell him?" laughed the Arkham Night. "Well, this is awkward! Your daughter is pregnant, Comish. But don't worry – I checked with Dr. Crane, and this toxin isn't gonna hurt the baby. We want that to be nice and safe."
"Tim?" gasped Gordon, turning to him. "Is it true? Is Barbara pregnant?"
Robin nodded. "We were going to tell you tomorrow night," he murmured. "I definitely didn't want you to find out like this."
"Better buy the boy a cigar!" chuckled the Arkham Night. "Anybody got one handy?" he asked, looking around. "Smoke 'em if you got 'em – there's a fifty-fifty chance most of you won't last much longer!"
"Why are you doing this?" demanded Robin. "What did these people ever do to you?"
"Them?" asked the Arkham Night, gesturing to the cops. "Nothing. I just know how much the deaths of these fine law and order aficionados will affect your boss. This is all for him."
"Why?" repeated Robin.
"He destroyed my family," replied the Arkham Night. "So I'm going to destroy his, and anyone who sympathizes with them. Nobody ever sympathized with us when my father died. People just said he was evil, that he deserved it, and they didn't care how much they upset Mommy. I couldn't bear to see her cry, so I made them stop talking about my father that way. People can't upset Mommy when they're dead."
"Your father?" asked Robin. "Who are you?"
The Arkham Night sighed. "Well, I was sorta hoping Batsy would be here for the reveal, but I'm betting he will be soon enough…"
"Stop this right now," growled a voice, and the Arkham Night turned to see Batman standing behind him.
"Speak of the devil!" chuckled the Arkham Night. "And that's my cue," he added, reaching for his helmet and removing it.
Everyone stared aghast at the face that was revealed. "Well, that explains a lot," said Two-Face at last.
"Harley…was really pregnant?" gasped Robin.
"Yes," growled Batman, glaring at J.J. "And that's her son. The Joker's son."
"You can call me J.J.," said J.J., holding out his hand and beaming at Batman. "That stands for Joker Junior. It's nice to meet you face to face at last. I've heard so much about you, after all."
"Look at him!" squealed Joker. "He's the spitting image of me! Oh, I'm so proud of him! He's done so well – look at all these dead cops!" he chuckled, gesturing around.
"I'm ending this now," said Batman, glaring at J.J. "I'm not playing another one of your sadistic games. I'm putting a stop to them the only way I know how," he said, kneeling down and picking up a gun from a dead officer, and then putting the barrel to his neck.
"What are you doing?!" exclaimed Joker. "You can't kill us! I haven't been properly introduced to my son! You can't end the game already!"
"If I die, your fun in tormenting me is over," said Batman, ignoring him and focusing on J.J. "You have no reason to hurt anyone here anymore. You're doing this all as vengeance against me, but I'm taking away the opportunity for vengeance right now."
"No, you're not!" shouted Joker, trying to prise the gun out of Batman's hands. "Not yet!"
J.J. said nothing, watching closely as Batman struggled with himself, his fingers tightening on the trigger only to wrench themselves away. "You won't kill yourself," he murmured at last. "You don't have the guts."
"That's right, he doesn't!" agreed Joker, desperately trying to push the gun away. "Don't do it, Brucie! You can't do it! I won't let you!"
"I will do it, unless you release them all now," said Batman to J.J. "We'll make a trade. Me for all these other people. Let them go, and do what you want with me. Otherwise I'll deprive you of your fun."
J.J. smiled slowly. "Go ahead," he said, folding his arms across his chest. "Shoot. I'm not letting anyone go, and I'm calling your bluff. Psychological tricks don't work on me, Batsy – my mother was a shrink, and she taught me well."
"There, y'see? He knows you won't go through with it," said Joker, still fighting to grab the gun. "And I know you won't go through with it either, Brucie. I'm here in your mind, and I know you can't kill yourself without cleaning up this mess that you created. You can't quit when there are bad guys still out there. Batman doesn't quit when his city and his friends are in danger, even if quitting is the only way to save them."
Batman said nothing, gripping the gun tighter as his heart pounded. He shut his eyes, willing himself to pull the trigger…
But he suddenly found himself throwing away the gun to the far end of the room. "I hate guns – I always have," he sighed. "And a quick suicide with one is just so vulgar, and an unworthy death for the hero of Gotham. He deserves something much more epic."
"Now you're speaking my language, Batsy!" laughed J.J. "But what game is this? Trying to trick me into thinking you've suddenly found a sense of humor?"
"It's no trick, sonny boy," said Batman, a strange smile lighting up his face. "You've done a great job carrying on the Joker legacy, but I can take it from here."
"That's funny!" laughed J.J. "I never took you for a Joker, Bats!"
"Oh, I am a Joker," murmured Batman, grinning at him. "It's taken me a long time to become one, but here I am. And this is the kinda game you gotta leave to the grown-ups, kid. You've done well taking out another Robin, which is good practice for a boy. But you gotta leave the final destruction of Gotham to me. Trust me, it's the better joke – not Joker's son destroying Gotham, but Batman."
"It's a good trick, Batsy," said J.J., nodding. "But I don't believe you would ever destroy your precious city. Certainly not for a joke. That's something my father would have done, but not you."
"Oooh, I've always wanted to do the Star Wars quote!" laughed Batman. "Here's a newsflash for you, kid – I am your father."
"You wish!" laughed J.J. "Trust me, I know my mother, and she never slept with Batman. Heroes have never been her type. She was a one man loon, and completely loyal to her Joker. "
"That's right, she was," agreed Batman, nodding. "But I am the Joker. When he was dying in Arkham City, he injected me with his infected blood, and he's remained alive inside me all this time. And now he's in control, and I'm seeing things much more clearly than I ever did before. Of course this is all one big, huge joke – all death, destruction, and violence is. I was a fool to have been so serious about it for so long. Joker was always right, I see that now. And I see that the best joke of all was his lifelong dream of turning Batman to his way of thinking. Now that he's finally succeeded, I want to finish his joke, and have Batman destroy Gotham."
J.J. burst out laughing again. "Wow, it didn't take much for you to snap, did it?" he chuckled. "Gone nuts already, and only one of your little family has been killed! I never expected you to be so weak, Bats! No, it's a fun little act you've put on, and I appreciate you want to play the game back at me, but I'm still in control here, and what I say goes. And I say take Robin to join his sweetheart," he said, gesturing to the henchmen. "And Harvey, give Gordon the coin flip."
Batman regained control of himself just in time to see Two-Face's coin land bad side up. He raced forward to take Gordon's bullet, but was too late. Batman saw Gordon's body drop, and instantly lost control of himself again.
"Harvey, you son of a bitch!" roared Batman, grabbing the gun from his hand and whirling around. He pulled the trigger suddenly, shooting Two-Face between the eyes. As his body fell to the ground, there was dead silence from everyone surrounding him, staring aghast at Batman.
"Good," murmured J.J. "You crossed the line again. Finally man enough to admit you're a killer, just like you killed my father. We'll make something of you yet," he murmured, heading for the door.
"I'll shoot you too, you bastard!" shouted Batman, aiming the gun at his back.
"Do it," said J.J., not even turning around. "Go ahead. Take it from me, once you get a taste for blood, it gets easier the more you do it. And if you have the ability to kill a child, you're the monster my father always wanted you to be. At least if I can't destroy Gotham, I will have finished that work for him."
Batman's hand shook, but he didn't fire the gun. J.J. left the building, with Robin being dragged after him, staring at Batman in absolute horror. Batman just stared back at him, knowing there was nothing he could say, uselessly and impotently holding the gun.