Batter

Count Down

Disclaimer: Property of: Warner Bros, DC Comics, Legendary Films, Chris Nolan, Christian Bale and Heath Ledger. If I did own it, believe you me...the gay would blow your mind.

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Chapter 7: What is In a Name

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"Tell me something, Commissioner..."

Overcast City. Empty parks and playgrounds. Barely a passing car. No one wanders the streets, unless they have nowhere else to go. Too unsafe to walk them now. Windows shut and bolted. Lights turned low. Televisions flickering in the bluish day, the watchers hoping, praying, that their terror will end soon. Businesses close. Schools shut down. Steadily, loudly, the City starts to die. Lights go out, one by one-the glittering buildings snuffing out, becoming nothing more than tall, black tombstones in the graveyard that is Gotham.

"Just...how guilty do you feel when...civilians die."

A woman sits on a park bench. Before her is a pile of twisted, searing metal. Broken glass litters the concrete, and flashing lights flicker across her pale face. There is a long spill of blood near her corner, where the tall traffic light is planted into the street. Steadily, it flashes from red to green. Red to green. Red to green. She turns her eyes to watch it. A blue, tattered leash clutched in her hands.

"Do you cry yourself to sleep some nights, Jim?"

Four wives and mothers of the same last name sit in a crowded waiting room. Every so often, they shift to glance at a tall, cream-colored door. It's smooth metal sign reads, "Morgue". All are missing their husbands-who worked at the same water treatment plant. All were contacted to identify a body, with a matching last name. It's far too mangled otherwise. And it's teeth are missing.

"Do you cry at all."

A child crawls through the wreckage of her school. Her classmates stumble nearby, none of them stopping to check if their teacher is alive. She lies, mangled, under the rubble. Quietly, they huddle together near the flagpole. The stars and stripes lay tattered by their tiny bodies. Muted thuds quake the listing pole above their heads, as their hanging Principal twists in the wind.

"And if your family were the bodies under the debris...would you feel more responsible. Or...would you...blame...everyone...else..."

The televisions are never off now. Every person in Gotham, holding onto the smoke of hope. Someone will come. Someone will stop him. Someone...someone will save them...

"Do you know what loss feels like, Jim? Should I show you..?"

Click.

James Gordon stared at the tape recorder in his hand. The force was crowded around him, silent, tense. It was the fifth of its kind since the explosion. No clues. No bomb taunts. Just words. Words, and then...something unspeakable would happen. There was no pattern. No punch line, only carnage and tears. Bullock took the liberty of sending a few squad cars to Gordon's home-all hand-picked, people they could trust. That was all they could do.

Gordon sent the tape to forensics to see what they could dig up. He was less than optimistic. He called his wife, talked to his children. Barbara asked how he was holding up. If the clean-up was going well at the station. Their temporary location wasn't much-a vacant floor in a neighboring building. He stood by his bare desk and watched the rush of the room. He knew what they were thinking. He could see it in their faces.

Nearly a full week.

Two more days to the Joker's deadline. More street sweeps. Poorly planned raids and searches. Tearing up Gotham sewers and slums. And they were always thirty seconds too late. His arm ached.