I knew Batman

Chapter 8 -- Emergency

After a terrible sleep, I woke up late in the afternoon. I had an awful headache. Probably, I had some mild smoke poisoning but I didn't care. I checked my phone. I had several unanswered calls and messages. My brother, my colleagues, and even the police were looking for me. They wanted to know whether I am alive. I called my brother.

"Thank God, sis! I was afraid you didn't make it... "

We chatted a bit, he was transferred to another hospital yesterday before the last explosion. He was alright. I told him what happened but left out Batman from the story. I promised John to visit him soon.

I needed to get myself together. I took a shower and started to answer the phone calls. In my rational mind, I knew that the responsible person is Fries. But I couldn't shake off the feeling that I'm responsible too.

Days went by, and I did everything I could to put this tragedy right. I helped to organise the ceremony at the City Hall for the victims of the fire. I organised the relocation of the emergency department to another building. It was a temporary relocation until the hospital finds the money to rebuild the original one. I also moved in with my brother temporarily. He was allowed to leave the hospital but still couldn't walk on his own and needed physiotherapy. I intended to stay with him until he fully recovered. And, in truth, I also needed the company and the distraction from my own grief.

I didn't allow myself to think too much about Batman. My secured phone remained silent and I didn't call him either. Fries was at Arkham Asylum in strict custody. I intended to look through his files but didn't really had the time between my work and my brother.

But sometimes I caught myself thinking about our kiss. What did it mean? Does he have feelings for me? Or it was just the heat of the moment? Or he just took advantage of my vulnerable state? And more importantly, do I have feelings for him? I was just as surprised about me kissing him as him kissing me. I am not the kind of woman who falls for a stranger. He could have a wife and six kids somewhere...  That was unlikely but still... I was ashamed of the whole situation. That I let my guard down and let him see me in that state. Nobody has seen me crying for a very long time.

It was my night shift at the hospital when my secured phone rang and I heard Batman's voice.

"I got an injured woman with me. I will be at the emergency entrance in three minutes."

Right away, I got a gurney and called a nurse. She was surprised how do I know that someone is coming but didn't ask any questions.

The rain was pouring heavily. We hardly could see anything on the street. In a minute, a black car braked in front of the entrance splashing rainwater everywhere. I recognised Batman's black military car. He jumped out of it and lifted an unconscious woman out of the car. I run over there to help and became wet as well. Batman put the young, red-haired woman - or more like a teenage girl - on the gurney. I could see right away that she was beaten quite heavily, and most likely had internal bleeding. At the emergency department, we see lots of terrible things. But seeing children, and teenagers as victims of Gotham's violence is always the worst.

We pushed her into one of the exam rooms prepared for trauma and started to work on her with the nurse. The girl was lucky. We managed to stop the internal bleeding and stabilize her condition. After giving her over to the intensive care unit, I went back to my office to change and get dry because I was still wet from the rain.

When I stepped into my dark office, I saw Batman in my chair. He was still all wet from the rain. I wasn't surprised that he stayed and wanted to know how everything went. To be honest, I felt embarrassed to meet him after our kiss. He stood up.

"How is she?"

"She will be fine. We stopped the bleeding. She is still unconscious because of the concussion but should be awake soon. It is good that you brought her here, she could have easily bleed out without immediate medical help."

"She is the daughter of Jim Gordon. She got into some bad company and run away from home. Gordon asked me to track her down."

I nodded. "Ok, I let her father know that her daughter is here." I added bitterly: "What a nice place Gotham is... teenagers got beaten up on the streets and the police detective doesn't trust in his own colleagues to bring her to safety..."

I always had good eyes to recognise someone's illness or injury even if the person wanted to hide it. So suddenly, I realized that Batman's left wrist was twisted, he held it carefully with his other hand. Like in cases like this always, the doctor came out of me.

"Let me take a look at your wrist."

"There is no need. It's nothing."

"I assume you know that if you put back a dislocated joint wrong, you can gain permanent damage. I also assume that you want a functioning wrist in the future."  I folded my arms in front of my chest. "So, are you afraid of doctors, or just playing the tough guy?" My words were more reproachful than I wanted to be.

"Fine." He took off his left glove and forearm guard. I was right. His wrist was dislocated quite severely. I admired his pain threshold in myself, dislocation like this hurts like hell. I examined his forearm and wrist.

"I don't think that it is broken. Normally, I would take an X-ray, but given the circumstances, I will just put it back in its place. I will be right back with some of the things I need."

I brought some medical stuff and local pain relief. Of course, he rejected the latter one. I had to admit, his self-control was impressive. Other people scream during a procedure like this, but he only groaned a bit when I put the joint back. I bandaged his wrist.

"Your wrist will be weak for a few days. You should take it easy with it. My guess is that you won't do that but it is my obligation to tell you. It will hurt for a longer period of time if you don't give it a rest."

"Thank you." He put back his glove and forearm guard. "There is something else." He continued. "There was a new hypothermia victim yesterday."

"What? But how? Fries is still in Arkham, right?" I was shocked.

"Yes. I have the autopsy report here."

I turned on my computer and opened the files. It was definitely the same type of hypothermia as caused by Fries's weapon. And the victim was a high-ranked city counsellor, rumoured to be corrupt and paid by the mafia.

"It is not the same pattern. This is not a random victim." I said.

"I agree. Probably someone was puppetting Fries, using him to achieve some hidden agenda."

This new mystery sounded very interesting. And I was really curious about who was it and what is behind all this. But my guilt about the hospital, and the explosions kicked in.

"Look. I'm not sure I want to be involved in this anymore. The explosions at the hospital... are partly my fault. I insisted to bring Fries's wife here."

"You are not to blame for this," Batman emphasized every word. "But I understand how you feel... And you have every right to stay out of this... However, I'm not sure you can do that anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"Look at the report, on the margin of the paper."

I looked at the scanned document again on the computer. And there it was, besides the pathological results, someone wrote my initials on the margin: JN. I looked at the name of the coroner and it was Ed Nygma.

Batman continued. "Nygma probably knew you would see this report... and wanted to draw your attention. And this was also in the report." He showed me a photo of a Joker card. "Does this mean anything to you?"

"It is one of his games. I think he tries to tell me something. But what and why?"

"We will find out."

We agreed to take a look at the files from Fries' computer and inform each other.

When we finished our conversation about Fries, there was an awkward silent moment, when we stared at each other. He seemed hesitant to leave but didn't say a word either. And I also couldn't decide whether or not to mention the night of the hospital fire. So I just turned around and went back to work. At least I proved that he is not the only one, who can leave without saying 'bye'.