Ernestina, Eris, Aequitas: to obtain that which is just we must ask that which is unjust.
August 23rd
21:47 EST
…I've been here before.
In this same damn room, with this same damn gun. Always drinking, always alone. But tonight will be different.
Tonight, it's my turn.
Art Jamison used to carry this gun. He was my first captain, back in the dark days. Before Fear Night, before Batman, when the Roman's stranglehold on organized crime made Al Capone's years of terror in Chicago seem like a child's playground… Back when I used to work with Gordon. Art was killed. Gordon lived. I got his Beretta. Gordon got his position.
Art had given me what no one else would: a chance. And Gordon? Gordon gave me shit.
No, Gordon gave me hell.
There's not a councilman or a judge in this fucking city with a record better than mine. The dirty politicians bought by the mob, corrupting justice for their own sick pleasure surround us. Gotham's heart is rotting. Even now after the Dent Statute there's not a councilman or hardly a cop even in WATCHDOG dragging around less shit than me. Yet I was the one sacrificed. The fucking scapegoat—the purge.
But I only did what any other cop would have done. Hell, what anyone would have done. I can still remember it so vividly I wonder that it has been thirteen years, that Barbara Gordon can't stand to speak to me, that her husband is no longer neither my partner nor my friend, that he climbed the political ladder to become Commissioner, and yet I am still sitting alone in this damn apartment, thirteen years after that godawful night. I wonder whether Heaven is open to me after all I've done, yet how even with this doubt that Hell can seem better than another moment of this miserable life…
Yet mostly I wonder that Angel never wrote. Not once. Not even to thank me…
And now he never will.
CPS should have handled it.
Homicide. Gordon and I were closest when they called it in. She's 23 or 24, lying sprawled on the linoleum, only a thin trickle of blood across the top of her head, running like a red scar between her open, bloodshot eyes. A broken piece of the acrylic counter top lies next to her. A spatula rests across from her open, outstretched hand—she must've been holding it when she fell. We snap some pictures, then sit in the living room and wait.
Evidence will be here soon. And an ambulance with a body bag. I find the thought to be strangely perverse.
"You doing okay?" Gordon asks me, kindness in his eyes.
"Yeah, fine." Her face is visible, and she continues her restless, eternal vigil.
"Paltron," He begins again, "It's alright if you don't want to do this-"
"I said I'm fine." I was in Pakistan for 18 months, fresh out of high school. I'd seen dead bodies before. Plenty of them. Gordon's aware of my military record, but even then he doesn't understand. So I take his pity for what it is, heartfelt, but misplaced.
CSI shows up. They snap more pictures, sweep surfaces. The ambulance arrives nearly an hour later. The roads are goddamned awful, the paramedics apologize. Most of the side streets are closed. Only the main thoroughfares are still being plowed. Did you know they shut down the interstate…
I don't hear them. My eyes are the only things working, and they are drawn again and again to that dead girl. She's maybe four years younger than me…Her dull green eyes are open, staring across the filthy room to the pantry. They lift her body, still lukewarm to the touch, and her head dangles obscenely from her wobbly, rubber neck.
They close her eyes, but they spring back open. She continues to stare at the pantry, as though even in death she is drawn to it. The lids are lowered once again, with a gentle squelching click they shut. Her head lolls as they slide her into the black body bag. They zip her from the feet up, and her head bobs again. I taste bile. Her dead eyes have opened yet again.
…She stares at me. This sudden feeling in the pit of my stomach. Nerves. That bitch could've easily been you, I tell myself. What the hell. She probably just slipped. She must've fell.
Yeah fucking right. Acrylic doesn't snap under an underweight, scrawny little bitch like that. Someone had to throw her, slam her, slap her into the counter top. Which blow was nearly enough to knock her head from her shoulders only forensics will tell.
I stare out the kitchen window, and a church bell rings. But this is no Silent Night, there is no Heavenly Peace in Gotham. GCPD and Social Services are always busiest around the holidays, the supposed time of family and peace. And that should tell you something right there. Most families are anything but peace. Most victims are hurt by people they know. People they trust. People, they think, who love them.
There are too many hurt, trusting, naïve people in Gotham. Too many, I turn back to tell the dead girl as the black bag engulfs her satin and lace clad chest. She must have been one of them. Her eyes are still staring into mine, demanding. The zipper closes, and their glazed glare is finally lost.
She's dead, gone. My warning comes too late. Sooner or later, Gotham's women get roughed, raped, or killed. There's nothing I can do but wait for my turn.
Then we find him.
She had been looking at the pantry, and following her stare with a nervous glance I can't fail to notice the puddle of urine forming dusty and dark against the dirty floor. Guns at the ready, we open the slatted door.
A chirp. A child. Eight, maybe nine. Small, fragile, delicate.
The guns are lowered. Through the black plastic of the body bag, I feel her dead eyes boring through me.
CPS should have handled it. But CPS was busy. It was late, it was cold, it was Friday, it was goddamn Christmas-time and every fucking child abuser had been going to town. It had poured sleet and hail and rain and snow until even the salt trucks got off the road.
He doesn' t say a word. When Gordon reaches for him he flinches and shuts his dark eyes tight, leaking hot, weak tears. Without thinking I put Art's beretta down on the broken counter. I walk slowly forward, hazy and stumbling in a trance. My hands find him of their own accord, and he shudders at their touch and surrenders to my embrace.
I'm a woman. Like his goddamned murdered mom. And he trusted me for it. He'd never trust a man again.
He came back to base with us. With me.
He's wrapped in my jacket, one hand and his face pressed against my breasts. He lays sleeping in my arms, his elfin, angel's face laid light and warm against me. Even now, if I close my eyes, I can still feel his breath and body against mine.
He was safe. This kid had just watched his mother die, but he slept in my arms. I was an angel, a goddess, a guardian…
But that was thirteen years ago. And if only that could have been the end. My last sight of Angel. But no. I wept when I watched him die, still feeling him sleeping in my arms, head on my breasts, his warm breath on my skin, knowing it would have been kinder, it would have been more forgivable, had I smothered him there in his sleep.
Art's gun. Beautiful beretta 92F semiautomatic. She is bitter on my tongue, her powder acrid. I feel her cold steel against the roof of my mouth. As an officer I've seen this death a thousand times. It's not poetic, not romantic, neither painless nor pretty. But there are no accidents, no mistakes…no second chances.
The bullet will rip into my brain stem. I will be dead before the back of my skull can mushroom onto the wall behind me.
A mechanical click as I cock the gun. I close my eyes, Angel's face before mine. My hand doesn't tremble as I pull the trigger.
August 23rd
21:57 EST
My courage didn't fail me. But that old beretta did. She had sent twenty-seven to their final rests…but she couldn't send me to mine. The 9mm parabellum lies cold in my palm. I roll it between my fingers, staring. I had cleaned the gun. The round was chambered…
There has to be an explanation. I pick up my phone and dial. My eyes never leave this strange, cylindrical enigma.
"Lawless."
"Hey, Paltron," his voice is shaky.
"Had a question."
"Yeah, shoot." I try to laugh, but can't.
"The old Beretta's-the 92F's. You ever heard of one misfire?"
"Christ, Paltron. They stopped using those years ago…what's this about?"
"I just had one not work for me."
Silence. Lawless is shrewd. Even in his pain he guesses more than I would have him know.
"You okay?"
"You never had a problem with one?"
"No." He sighs, his voice catching. "They're good guns. We just switched to the Westons in the '90's for bigger caliber bullets. You sure you chambered it right?"
I am silent, remembering. The bullet was in. I shut the chamber, twisting it tight. It clicked.
"Positive."
"She's old though. Take her in and get her cleaned."
"Yeah, thanks."
There is an awkward pause.
"You sure you're fine?"
"Yeah." I breathe, unbelieving. "And you?"
His voice breaks. "He was, he was my partner, you know? And um, Amy always makes spaghetti on Fridays you know, and its, its his favorite meal. I couldn't-I tried…I had, I had to tell her that Jimmy…that, that he was dead." The last word is a sob.
I never thought I would hear Aaron Lawless cry. I find my own eyes are hot with tears as I roll the forgiven bullet in my palm. Two impossible things have happened tonight. Two constants, utterly changed: Art's Beretta failed me, and Lawless cried. There must be a purpose, a reason, a deeper, hidden meaning…
And it lies here, heavy in my hand.
My fingers curl around the bullet in a trembling fist. I press them to my lips. Angels should never die. Good, grown men should never have to weep. Not even in Gotham.
"Don't worry." I whisper, both to Lawless and Angel. "We'll get the Bastard."
The line goes dead.
August 23rd
22:53 EST
I cough and check my watch. It's nearly eleven…In little more than an hour, Angel will have been dead for three days. I've only known it for seven hours, but already I've wasted so much time-
Fuck. Angel dead…For thirteen years I've dreamed of finding him, of holding him again, and to have finally found him, finally touched him, to have come so fucking far-
I cough again. Over the last three days, it's gotten progressively worse. Upper respiratory infections are one of the more common side effects of inhaling large amounts of plaster dust, asbestos, paint ships and powdered glass. But even dying slowly I'm still lucky. They've pulled more than four thousand bodies out of the Legacy so far, and they'll still be sifting through the rubble for weeks to come.
This time I can't make the coughing stop. My lungs begin to burn. the lack of oxygen driving me to my knees. My vision begins to tunnel, slowly blackening. Angel's cherubic face flits across my eyelids, he stands in front of me, holding out his tiny hand, beckoning me to peace and rest. I want nothing more than to feel that warm hand in mine, to lay down and surrender to its promise…
I need antibiotics. I need to slow down. I need to rest.
But that Bastard isn't resting. He's still out there. And only when I've sent him to his last and final rest-only when he dies so terrified that Angel's murder looks like child's play-only then will I surrender to something as weak and as human as pain or sleep.
Get up. Be strong. I grit my teeth and stand.
I spit to the side, releasing my frustration like venom on the cracked, splattered pavement. For thirteen years I've found Angel's life my sole reason to live…in death, he has given me another calling: to kill.
I have to find the Joker.
So here I am, in the Narrows, after dark, alone. Even in the daylight, a woman walking alone here is asking for trouble.
But I'm not just asking. I am lusting, burning, aching for someone to cross me. With the Legacy bombing and the declaration of martial law, no one but national guardsmen and Gotham's worst will be patrolling the streets tonight. The simple thugs, the addicts…they're all holed up, terrified, petty playthings for the Joker like the rest of us. No, tonight, under Gotham's Military Order and the Joker's Reign of Chaos, only his tools will be brave enough—or foolish enough—to be out on the streets.
The night is lusty and young, her demons howl as the wind whips my hair and sweatshirt hood back, sending chills down my spine. Perhaps she knows why I am here…and she is as hungry as I am for blood.
"Hey, baby." A low voice drones, its master stepping out of the shadows. I continue walking, increasing my pace-like a good little girl. I'm alone and helpless, I think, come and get me, you bastard. He saunters around the light pole, eying me slowly up from my feet to my face. He's well muscled and brutish looking, and he's got three friends with him, equally as big, as droll…and as dead.
"You're out awful late, there, baby." He says. "Do you need a ride?" His friends snicker.
"Piss off." I work hard to put a quaver in my voice.
"Oh, ho, not a very friendly little thing, are you? What are you doing out on a night like this? Isn't it about time for you to be home…in bed?" His friends snicker again, flanking me.
"Please don't hurt me." They drink it in, predators stalking their prey, the powerful feeding on the powerless. They worship anarchy, adore cruelty. Subhuman animals drinking the life blood of their weaker cousins with conscience, cousins rendered helpless, too ruled by that weakness and naivety to cull the herd. It's no wonder they work for the Joker. He's their god.
My hands are still tucked in the front pocket of the sweatshirt, the extra bulge concealing the tasers gripped tightly in my palms. This was going to be easy. This was going to be fun.
They exchange glances, and with sinister grins they close on me. Only one is intelligent enough to reach for a weapon. He brings his knife up and kisses it suggestively, staring into my eyes. There he suddenly freezes, like an animal, with some innate sense that something was terribly and horribly wrong…
August 23rd
23:07 EST
Ugly and his cronies are all bound with slip ties. I prefer slip ties to duct tape-they're cheaper, for one, and a hell of a lot less annoying. The only downside is you can't use them as a form of torture as well as a binder.
But I brought better toys for that.
"Wake up, motherfucker." I slap Ugly across the face, hard. Bound to my wrist and across my knuckles is a leather strap, decorated with two bronze, serpentine fangs that extend down the back of my hand past my curled fingers. Serrated on the front, cold, hard and smooth on the back. Change the angle, change the pain… It's a relic from my wilder days, before the GCPD re-hired me and I had to clean up my act.
"Where's the Joker?"
He spits teeth and blood, gazing at me defiantly. He knows can't lose face in front of his friends. But he will.
"Where's the Joker?"
I strike him again, spinning into the blow so my entire weight comes crashing down across his mandible. I hear a rewarding crack as the jaw breaks. The sound is musical.
"Bitch!" He shouts, the muscles in his face straining to hold the injury still.
"Where's the Joker?" This time the blow falls on the broken bone and he screams in pain.
"Go fuck yourse—" A sickening crunch and the other side of his jaw is shattered. He screams again, and this time there are molars in the blood. Molars and chunks of pinkish flesh.
His friends are all awake now…and giving me their undivided attention.
I back away from Ugly, staring into each of their eyes in silence. For a while the only sound is Ugly's heavy, labored breathing.
"I'll make this easier for all of us. I. Want. The. Joker." I state evenly. "Anyone who can give me information….dies quickly. Any questions?"
Silence.
"Are you out of your fucking mind, lady!"
"Nobody knows where the Joker is!" Someone blurts. It's the goon who had the knife. His eyes are wide, his mouth hanging in disbelief. He has more instinct than his friends. He's the one. He'll think to pass on information about his rivals, his higher ups…anything. I can tell from their eyes that he is the only one intelligent enough to realize I am deadly, deadly serious. "He's a criminal mastermind, for god's sake! You think he tells fuckin' anybody where he is?"
I say nothing. I don't have to. I simply raise my hand and shave slivers off the plumbing as the leather tightens around my wrist. The sound is like nails on a chalkboard, a hacksaw on a violin string…They all cringe. They're an imaginative bunch. They all wonder what these fanged, sharp talons could do to flesh…but no one wants to know.
"One more time." I hiss. "Where is the Joker?"
"Lady, we don't know anything about the damn Joker! We're just, just ordinary criminals, okay?"
"You know nothing. Nothing at all?" I ask, flicking my hand impatiently. The smart one shuts his eyes.
"No, I don't know nuthin' about the fucking Joker, okay? What do you take us for, a bunch of sickos? The Joker's fucked up, fucked up crazy, okay? We don't know nothing about him."
"Yeah. Nothing! We're not mob or anything. We're just normal guys, lady. Jesus, you've got the wrong guys-"
It's the wrong answer. Smart-boy knows it, too.
I remember Angel's gagging screams, watching the light in his horrified eyes slowly dying, the feeble sound of his slick, scrabbling fingers slapping on the Joker's wrists as he drowned in his own blood…There is a plunging noise as I punch deep into their chests, pulling my hand back cleanly, leaving nothing more than two small, deep holes in their right breasts, even with their hearts. Air rushes into the body cavity, the right lung collapses instantly, the pleural layers sticking together, sealing off the bronchial tubes completely. With every breath, more air will enter that pleural space, and the left lung will slowly crumple.
My Angel was drowned… I let them suffocate.
August 23rd
23: 56 EST
I was right. Smart-boy had a friend upriver, Stalton, who dealt arms. He didn't know for certain if he was involved in the Legacy attack…but he might be able to tell me the name of the vendor who was. It was a half-truth. He did know someone, but judging from his nervousness, this Stalton was a small-time dealer and probably wouldn't have considered himself 'a friend.' But it was information. And this Stalton could give me more…
He died messily, but well. True to my word, I slit his throat. His companions were still gasping like fish long after his weakened heart had stopped. One was still making small, arrhythmic croaking noises when I left the place.
Ugly I left to the rats.
I go back to the apartment. This will be my last night here. I can't go after Stalton yet—I'll have to have cash just to get in. It never ceases to amaze me what sort of doors will open with the mention of a mutual friend like Benjamin Franklin. I'll have to empty my bank accounts. Once Ugly and his friends are found, all my assets will be frozen.
So I have to wait until 9 AM, when the banks open. I couldn't do anything more until I visited a joint like Stalton's, anyways. All I have now is Art's old Beretta 92. I need more firepower. And I don't want standard issue GCPD toys. I want SWAT material. I want military hardware. The AK 47 might be outdated, but she's still a good gun. What's better, she's more available. Buying current military is so damn expensive and dangerous…you get caught with an AK 47, you're going to jail for a really, really long time. Toting current military makes you a terrorist…and it won't be jail where you spend the rest of your very short, miserable life. Former President Obama may have closed down Guantanamo Bay back when I was in high school, but that just means no one knows where it is now. Tried and true institutions like torture don't disappear with a new millennium. They just get better.
I shower, the hot water scalding my skin. But I can bear the pain with pleasure. It will make me stronger—I can't be soft. I can't be weak. Pain must become my friend. I will know her intimately before this is over.
I climb into bed, curling up, willing a deep, dreamless sleep to come. I breathe in and out, rhythmically and regularly, forcing my clenched muscles to relax. Even my body doesn't like to be patient.
But it needs sleep. It needs rest. If I am going after the Joker, it will have to learn to wait.
I'm sorry Angel. I have to sleep. This will take so long…there has to be waiting. Hiding. I have to be strong. I have to be prepared…I have to be ready.
I shut my eyes, and I feel his breath.