The Man Who Falls (2/10)
Title: The Man Who Falls (2/10)
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, James Gordon
Rating: PG
Warnings: None needed
Continuity: The Dark Knight/Superman Returns crossover; a continuation of Leap of Faith.
Word Count: 3200Summary: Clark Kent arrives in Gotham after the events of The Dark Knight and adds up the facts surrounding Bruce Wayne and Batman. Unfortunately, he reaches all the wrong conclusions.
Notes: For the World's Finest Gift Exchange, Prompt F8: Superman strongly disapproves of Batman's methods. Clark Kent, on the other hand, has a very obvious (and not quite so secret) crush on Bruce Wayne. What happens when Clark suddenly finds out that Bruce is also Batman?
A secretary opened the door and gave Clark Kent a winsome smile. "Mr. Wayne will see you now, sir." Clark glanced at his watch; Wayne had only kept him waiting forty minutes. That was practically polite for a billionaire.
As he walked through the door, it was clear what had kept the man; he was still rubbing at his eyes and yawning. "Sorry. Late night," Wayne said apologetically, holding out his hand. He looked, if possible, even more tired and dissolute than the last time Clark had met him.
"It's a pleasure to meet you again, Mr. Wayne," Clark said, shaking his hand.
"Oh please, call me Bruce," Wayne said easily. He sat down behind the long mahogany table and gestured Clark to a seat, steepling his hands and giving the reporter a long, hard look. "You say it's a pleasure, but you don't seem very pleased with me."
The bluntness startled Clark into an equally brusque retort: "I was just trying to be polite, Mr. Wayne--"
"Please. Bruce," murmured the man behind the desk, but Clark ignored him.
"--But if we're being honest here today, then no, I'm not very pleased with you." Wayne face was shuttered and blank, all his facile charm locked away and hidden, and Clark felt his anger growing. "You purchased a newspaper to stop a story from coming out--a story which happens to be true! That's a pretty extravagant way to control information, don't you think? And not a very efficient one, in the age of the Internet."
Wayne was frowning. Without the quick and ingratiating smile, he looked downright haggard. "You say the story 'happens to be true.' You're so quick to know what truth is." The words were confrontational, but his voice was more musing than anything. He stood up, pushing back the extremely expensive ergonomic chair. "Let's talk about truths." Wayne turned to the window to look out over Gotham; his handsome face turned brooding, almost closed. "Let's talk about the Batman. Did you know, Mr. Kent, that I was going to ask Rachel Dawes to marry me?"
Clark blinked. "No."
"She was...my hope for a better life. A happy life. She was going to...save me." His face was drawn and haunted. "And then he failed to save her. He let her die." He swiveled to glare at Clark. "Batman is responsible for her death as surely as if he caused the explosion himself."
Clark blinked. "I don't think that's very reasonable. He did everything--"
"He should have been strong enough, smart enough, to save her," Wayne said, his mouth twisting. "And then, as if that weren't enough of a betrayal of his city, he killed off Harvey Dent as well." Wayne touched the window again, looking out over the city. "She would save me and Harvey would save Gotham, that was the deal. But thanks to Batman, nothing's been saved at all." He closed his eyes, leaned forward and touched his forehead to the glass. "Write a story about that, Mr. Kent. About how Batman failed everyone who ever believed in him."
His voice was hoarse; he looked down at the city as though at a vast abyss, and Clark's righteous anger seemed to dissolve at the pain in his eyes. "But he didn't kill Dent," Clark pointed out gently. "Dent fell while threatening to kill Jim Gordon's family. It's all in my story."
Wayne didn't turn from looking at the city. "Your story isn't the truth." He closed his eyes. "Maybe it has some facts in it. But it doesn't have the truth. And the truth is that Batman is to blame for all of this. All the death, the chaos, the destruction--he could have prevented it all. I personally believe he deserves every bit of scorn and shame that is heaped upon him." His voice was flat, unrelenting.
"You're letting an innocent man be hunted for crimes he didn't commit."
Wayne chuckled bitterly. "Innocent," he muttered, as if sharing a cruel jest with the city below him.
"Harvey Dent was a madman," Clark said, less gently, trying to break through that veneer of blank and unreasoning hatred. "He killed--"
Wayne's fist slammed into the glass. "--Harvey Dent was a good man and a hero, and I will not hear you slandering his name. He brought a hope to Gotham that hadn't been here in years. He brought in most of Gotham's mafia in one day. One day." His sunken eyes bored into Clark's as if willing him to see Dent through his vision. "He was more effective at cleaning up Gotham than that masked freak ever was, or ever will be," he said, the brief spark dying into bitterness once more. "Batman inspired nutcases with Uzis to 'follow his example'; Harvey inspired real people, normal citizens, to be their best."
"Normal citizens like you?"
Wayne looked surprised for a second. "Yes. I suppose Harvey did inspire me." He looked at Clark thoughtfully. "Your colleague, Lois Lane, just wrote an article about why Metropolis needs Superman after all. Maybe every city needs a white knight, a symbol of incorruptibility to rally around. Harvey was our Superman, the best we had."
"Dent wasn't that perfect, and Superman isn't either.".
"Oh come now, Mr. Kent. Superman is more than human, after all: above our petty desires and sordid needs."
Against his will, Clark remembered his desperate need for Lois, his willingness to throw away his heritage, his responsibility, to have her. His shamed flight in the aftermath of his failure. "No one is that untouchable, Mr. Wayne."
"Well," Wayne said, his face bleak in the indirect winter's light streaming through the windows, "People need to believe someone is. They need someone who stands in the light, someone who they can trust to never fall, never fail them." He shook his head. "Batman will never be that." Vitriol laced his voice. "This city deserves her white knight."
"Deserves it enough to lie to them about it?"
Bruce Wayne's eyes blazed, the same sharp look Clark remembered from the party. "I'll do anything it takes to give the people of Gotham hope, do you hear me? Anything."
Clark heard once more his voice at the party: "I'd give my heart's blood."
"You mean all that," he said without thinking. "You really love Gotham that much."
Bruce blinked, and the bright, feverish fervor seemed to slip from him, leaving him tired and weary once more. "It's Gotham," he said quietly, simply, as if that explained everything. "But you probably wouldn't understand." There was no accusation in his voice, only resignation.
"I want to," said Clark, and found to his surprise he meant it. He wanted to know what sparked such passion in a man like Bruce Wayne, wanted to know what created that kind of loyalty. "Show me."
Bruce was looking at him, long and steady. "A bargain, then. You put off posting that expose on the blog, or the Internet, or wherever those things get put, and I'll show you Gotham. Give me a month, and I'll give you the most in-depth story about Gotham ever." He flashed a blinding smile. "As a bonus, you even get to keep your job."
Clark gritted his teeth and reminded himself that the full story wasn't even finished yet. Gotham was an increasingly baffling puzzle, and if he could get some extra information out of this infuriating man... "And if at the end of the month I decide the truth about Batman still must be told?"
"Then you get to pit your wits against Wayne Enterprises' best hackers. But let's not worry about that until the end of the month," he said cheerfully. "Do we have a deal?"
Surely, given a month, Clark could convince Wayne that the story needed to be published. "Okay, it's a deal."
Bruce clapped him on the back, ushering him toward the door. "Meet me back here at nine tomorrow. I promise I won't be late next time," he added with a rakish wink.
Behind the playfulness, Clark could see exhaustion and something close to desperation. This was important to Wayne, important in a visceral way. There was a story there, Clark's instincts told him. Something vital, something about the shadowy heart of Gotham.
A story Clark wanted to tell.
: : :
Back in his hotel room, Clark started his computer and opened the video file marked "Gordon Press Conference Post Joker," dated six months ago.
On the screen, the new police commissioner, Jim Gordon, was standing in front of a forest of microphones, looking pale, grim, and shaken. "I want to reiterate at this time," he said, "That we have no evidence linking the Batman to these murders. None at all," he added forcefully.
"With all due respect, sir," said a reporter, and Gordon flinched a little, as if preparing himself, "Doesn't the Gotham City police department have something of a...vested interest in clearing Batman's name? Since you've been working with him so closely for the last year?"
Gordon's jaw tightened. "There's no evidence that we've been working with the Batman," he said stolidly, ignoring the ripple of incredulous laughter that went around the room. "You keep insisting the Batman is linked to these murders, but I am telling you--" His voice was haggard, "--We have no evidence at all that he killed either Maroni or those two officers."
An immediate uproar broke out at his last words. "Batman is responsible for murdering police officers? Why haven't you mentioned this before?" Gordon held up his hand in an imploring gesture, but the reporters continued to shout questions. "It's out there! You can't unsay it now, Gordon!"
A woman with smooth blond curls raised her hand; her calm voice sliced through the babble. "The GCPD released the names of five officers killed in action yesterday. Which ones precisely are you talking about?"
Gordon's hands were shaking. "Now listen. I cannot stress this strongly enough. We have no evidence linking Batman with the death of Detective Henry Wuertz or the disappearance of Detective Anna Ramirez."
A reporter snapped out, "Wuertz and Ramirez? Wasn't Dent's Internal Affairs Division investigating both those officers for alleged mob ties? Were they crooked? Is that why the Batman killed them?"
"We have no evidence the Batman was involved in any of this," Gordon repeated doggedly. "But...yes, they were both under investigation." For a moment, his face was very bleak. "If they were indeed corrupt, the blame for this lies with me. I hired them. I trusted them."
"And that's why the Batman kidnapped your family, isn't it?" another reporter crowed. "Oh, don't try to cover this up, Gordon. We've talked to your men and they admit when they arrived on the scene you told them to find and apprehend Batman. He kidnapped your family to punish you for hiring those corrupt cops, and Harvey Dent tried to save them and fell to his death, didn't he? Stop trying to protect your precious vigilante!"
Gordon bowed his head for a long moment; when he looked up again the room fell silent at whatever they saw in his eyes. "What happened with my family is...very private and not at issue here. Harvey Dent was...a hero. And his fall--" His voice shook and he stopped and collected himself, tried again, "--His fall cannot be blamed on Batman."
But Clark could hear it in the crowd's murmurs, see it in their avid smiles. In his attempt to shield the Batman from accusation, Gordon had managed to make the vigilante look guiltier than ever.
It had been, Clark reflected, a singularly inept performance on the new commissioner's part.
He closed the file and stared at the empty desktop for a while, with its photo of a rippling corn field. Commissioner Gordon was resolutely not returning Clark Kent's calls. It was a total stonewall. Another chunk of the story locked up in a man's mind, a man who wasn't speaking to nosy reporters.
Fortunately, Clark reflected wryly, he had a few tools at his disposal that your average nosy reporter didn't have.
: : :
Somewhere in the distance sirens wailed in the night. Jim Gordon grimaced to himself and signed another piece of paperwork. Another Gotham night. Another night where he had to wonder if the hounds he'd helped sic on Gotham's protector would bring him to bay at last. Every night he waited for the call to come in, the call telling him they'd finally brought down the Batman. He'd go to the scene and pull the cowl from sightless eyes to see at last the secret face of the man he'd condemned to death. The face of his friend.
He'd take his thirty pieces of silver and go back to work protecting the city, just like the Dark Knight would want him to.
He smiled to himself very slightly when he heard it: the sound of a cape stirring slightly, a silken whisper. The Batman hadn't appeared at his office window for two months now--security was high and they risked everything by meeting in person. His communications with Jim were usually by computer, terse and coded, untraceable. And yet...now and then there would be a voice at his window, or a shadow out of place in an alley near an investigation, a moment where they could stand together, each tangible and actual to the other. As if the vigilante needed the reassurance of the Commissioner's reality as well. Two men with a heavy secret, almost close enough to touch, if Jim were so presumptuous as to do so.
The liquid hiss of cloth came again and Jim swung around suddenly to confront it. "You're getting careless--" he began triumphantly, then broke off in shock and horror as his eyes lit on red and blue, on unearthly azure eyes hovering outside his office.
"Were you...expecting someone?" Superman asked politely.
Jim's heart was pounding; the alien's eyes were sharp as cobalt daggers, looking at his soul. "Training exercises," Jim said. "Infiltration maneuvers for our SWAT team. They try to use that as an excuse to sneak up on the boss sometimes." He cocked an eyebrow at the Kryptonian. "Would you care to come in?"
Superman lowered himself into the open window. "I wanted to talk to you about the Batman," he said. The alien face was expressionless, perfect, flawlessly just. Nothing in the angles of that face would ever be interested in the murky web of lies and half-truths that Jim had spun to cover Gotham, to veil it in protective darkness.
For a moment Jim imagined this angel of righteousness descending from the sky upon the Batman, a thunderbolt of brightness crashing upon that dark human frame. His heart twisted, and he took that pain and used it to harden his voice, turn it caustic. He'd gotten good at that. "Unless you've got that costumed freak trussed up and waiting outside my window, you're not of much use to me." He looked away from the vivid primary colors, took a long sip of his coffee. "Um, no offense."
Superman looked at him for a long, silent moment. Jim waited for him to abuse Batman, to chastise Gordon for the corruption and ineptitude of his police force--this time true anger clenched Jim's jaw and tightened his grip on the coffee mug. If Superman thought he could walk--well, float--in here and insult people who put their life on the line in one of the most dangerous cities in the world, then he--
"Batman didn't murder anyone."
Jim's fingers went numb; he stared at Superman, aghast. The truth seemed to echo in the cramped and cluttered office.
Superman stepped forward and caught the mug from Jim's hand as it slipped.
"I--I never claimed he did," Jim managed after a moment as Superman placed the mug gently on the desk.
"He's accused of kidnapping your family. You were there."
"There was a struggle between Batman and Dent. I was focused on getting my family to safety. When it was over, Dent was dead and Batman was gone. Maybe it was an accident."
"The entire police force is not hunting him down over an accident."
"For questioning, as a person of interest."
"Questioning?" Superman's eyes narrowed. "The man is assumed to be a cop-killer. You know perfectly well the police will shoot to kill."
Jim looked into his mug, at the rusty stains against the china. "There have been a string of murders since that night. Police, criminals. These aren't necessarily isolated incidents."
Superman shook his head. "He gets blamed every time a thug trips and falls to his death from a rooftop, every time a police officer gets stabbed by a mobster and left to die. But he isn't responsible for them."
"I never claimed he was--"
Superman put his hands down on the desk hard enough to make coffee slosh over the mug's rim. "You're telling the truth, but you're lying," he said. There was anger tightly leashed in his voice, and he looked suddenly less like an avenging angel than a tired and frustrated man. "For all your carefully-phrased denials, you're letting someone be hunted down for crimes he did not commit." His shoulders sagged and his expression shifted to imploring. "You don't seem like a liar to me," he said. "So why are you lying?"
"I'm a terrible liar," rasped Jim. That at least was certainly true. "So believe me when I tell you that Batman is a wanted fugitive and the Gotham police department will not rest until he is caught." Also true. He forced vehemence into his voice. "Whatever you or I may think, he will pay for the choices he made that night."
God help them all, that was true already.
Superman straightened. The frustration and the shadow of pity was gone from his brilliant blue eyes once more, leaving only merciless truth and justice. "I just hope you can live with what you've done, Commissioner Gordon," he said, and he was gone.
Gordon sat for a moment in the silence, afterimages of piercing blue eyes against his retinas. "I have to," he said to the empty room.
Then he put his face in his hands and listened to the sirens howling in the night, hounds after Gotham's black fox.
(Chapter Three)
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, James Gordon
Rating: PG
Warnings: None needed
Continuity: The Dark Knight/Superman Returns crossover; a continuation of Leap of Faith.
Word Count: 3200Summary: Clark Kent arrives in Gotham after the events of The Dark Knight and adds up the facts surrounding Bruce Wayne and Batman. Unfortunately, he reaches all the wrong conclusions.
Notes: For the World's Finest Gift Exchange, Prompt F8: Superman strongly disapproves of Batman's methods. Clark Kent, on the other hand, has a very obvious (and not quite so secret) crush on Bruce Wayne. What happens when Clark suddenly finds out that Bruce is also Batman?
A secretary opened the door and gave Clark Kent a winsome smile. "Mr. Wayne will see you now, sir." Clark glanced at his watch; Wayne had only kept him waiting forty minutes. That was practically polite for a billionaire.
As he walked through the door, it was clear what had kept the man; he was still rubbing at his eyes and yawning. "Sorry. Late night," Wayne said apologetically, holding out his hand. He looked, if possible, even more tired and dissolute than the last time Clark had met him.
"It's a pleasure to meet you again, Mr. Wayne," Clark said, shaking his hand.
"Oh please, call me Bruce," Wayne said easily. He sat down behind the long mahogany table and gestured Clark to a seat, steepling his hands and giving the reporter a long, hard look. "You say it's a pleasure, but you don't seem very pleased with me."
The bluntness startled Clark into an equally brusque retort: "I was just trying to be polite, Mr. Wayne--"
"Please. Bruce," murmured the man behind the desk, but Clark ignored him.
"--But if we're being honest here today, then no, I'm not very pleased with you." Wayne face was shuttered and blank, all his facile charm locked away and hidden, and Clark felt his anger growing. "You purchased a newspaper to stop a story from coming out--a story which happens to be true! That's a pretty extravagant way to control information, don't you think? And not a very efficient one, in the age of the Internet."
Wayne was frowning. Without the quick and ingratiating smile, he looked downright haggard. "You say the story 'happens to be true.' You're so quick to know what truth is." The words were confrontational, but his voice was more musing than anything. He stood up, pushing back the extremely expensive ergonomic chair. "Let's talk about truths." Wayne turned to the window to look out over Gotham; his handsome face turned brooding, almost closed. "Let's talk about the Batman. Did you know, Mr. Kent, that I was going to ask Rachel Dawes to marry me?"
Clark blinked. "No."
"She was...my hope for a better life. A happy life. She was going to...save me." His face was drawn and haunted. "And then he failed to save her. He let her die." He swiveled to glare at Clark. "Batman is responsible for her death as surely as if he caused the explosion himself."
Clark blinked. "I don't think that's very reasonable. He did everything--"
"He should have been strong enough, smart enough, to save her," Wayne said, his mouth twisting. "And then, as if that weren't enough of a betrayal of his city, he killed off Harvey Dent as well." Wayne touched the window again, looking out over the city. "She would save me and Harvey would save Gotham, that was the deal. But thanks to Batman, nothing's been saved at all." He closed his eyes, leaned forward and touched his forehead to the glass. "Write a story about that, Mr. Kent. About how Batman failed everyone who ever believed in him."
His voice was hoarse; he looked down at the city as though at a vast abyss, and Clark's righteous anger seemed to dissolve at the pain in his eyes. "But he didn't kill Dent," Clark pointed out gently. "Dent fell while threatening to kill Jim Gordon's family. It's all in my story."
Wayne didn't turn from looking at the city. "Your story isn't the truth." He closed his eyes. "Maybe it has some facts in it. But it doesn't have the truth. And the truth is that Batman is to blame for all of this. All the death, the chaos, the destruction--he could have prevented it all. I personally believe he deserves every bit of scorn and shame that is heaped upon him." His voice was flat, unrelenting.
"You're letting an innocent man be hunted for crimes he didn't commit."
Wayne chuckled bitterly. "Innocent," he muttered, as if sharing a cruel jest with the city below him.
"Harvey Dent was a madman," Clark said, less gently, trying to break through that veneer of blank and unreasoning hatred. "He killed--"
Wayne's fist slammed into the glass. "--Harvey Dent was a good man and a hero, and I will not hear you slandering his name. He brought a hope to Gotham that hadn't been here in years. He brought in most of Gotham's mafia in one day. One day." His sunken eyes bored into Clark's as if willing him to see Dent through his vision. "He was more effective at cleaning up Gotham than that masked freak ever was, or ever will be," he said, the brief spark dying into bitterness once more. "Batman inspired nutcases with Uzis to 'follow his example'; Harvey inspired real people, normal citizens, to be their best."
"Normal citizens like you?"
Wayne looked surprised for a second. "Yes. I suppose Harvey did inspire me." He looked at Clark thoughtfully. "Your colleague, Lois Lane, just wrote an article about why Metropolis needs Superman after all. Maybe every city needs a white knight, a symbol of incorruptibility to rally around. Harvey was our Superman, the best we had."
"Dent wasn't that perfect, and Superman isn't either.".
"Oh come now, Mr. Kent. Superman is more than human, after all: above our petty desires and sordid needs."
Against his will, Clark remembered his desperate need for Lois, his willingness to throw away his heritage, his responsibility, to have her. His shamed flight in the aftermath of his failure. "No one is that untouchable, Mr. Wayne."
"Well," Wayne said, his face bleak in the indirect winter's light streaming through the windows, "People need to believe someone is. They need someone who stands in the light, someone who they can trust to never fall, never fail them." He shook his head. "Batman will never be that." Vitriol laced his voice. "This city deserves her white knight."
"Deserves it enough to lie to them about it?"
Bruce Wayne's eyes blazed, the same sharp look Clark remembered from the party. "I'll do anything it takes to give the people of Gotham hope, do you hear me? Anything."
Clark heard once more his voice at the party: "I'd give my heart's blood."
"You mean all that," he said without thinking. "You really love Gotham that much."
Bruce blinked, and the bright, feverish fervor seemed to slip from him, leaving him tired and weary once more. "It's Gotham," he said quietly, simply, as if that explained everything. "But you probably wouldn't understand." There was no accusation in his voice, only resignation.
"I want to," said Clark, and found to his surprise he meant it. He wanted to know what sparked such passion in a man like Bruce Wayne, wanted to know what created that kind of loyalty. "Show me."
Bruce was looking at him, long and steady. "A bargain, then. You put off posting that expose on the blog, or the Internet, or wherever those things get put, and I'll show you Gotham. Give me a month, and I'll give you the most in-depth story about Gotham ever." He flashed a blinding smile. "As a bonus, you even get to keep your job."
Clark gritted his teeth and reminded himself that the full story wasn't even finished yet. Gotham was an increasingly baffling puzzle, and if he could get some extra information out of this infuriating man... "And if at the end of the month I decide the truth about Batman still must be told?"
"Then you get to pit your wits against Wayne Enterprises' best hackers. But let's not worry about that until the end of the month," he said cheerfully. "Do we have a deal?"
Surely, given a month, Clark could convince Wayne that the story needed to be published. "Okay, it's a deal."
Bruce clapped him on the back, ushering him toward the door. "Meet me back here at nine tomorrow. I promise I won't be late next time," he added with a rakish wink.
Behind the playfulness, Clark could see exhaustion and something close to desperation. This was important to Wayne, important in a visceral way. There was a story there, Clark's instincts told him. Something vital, something about the shadowy heart of Gotham.
A story Clark wanted to tell.
: : :
Back in his hotel room, Clark started his computer and opened the video file marked "Gordon Press Conference Post Joker," dated six months ago.
On the screen, the new police commissioner, Jim Gordon, was standing in front of a forest of microphones, looking pale, grim, and shaken. "I want to reiterate at this time," he said, "That we have no evidence linking the Batman to these murders. None at all," he added forcefully.
"With all due respect, sir," said a reporter, and Gordon flinched a little, as if preparing himself, "Doesn't the Gotham City police department have something of a...vested interest in clearing Batman's name? Since you've been working with him so closely for the last year?"
Gordon's jaw tightened. "There's no evidence that we've been working with the Batman," he said stolidly, ignoring the ripple of incredulous laughter that went around the room. "You keep insisting the Batman is linked to these murders, but I am telling you--" His voice was haggard, "--We have no evidence at all that he killed either Maroni or those two officers."
An immediate uproar broke out at his last words. "Batman is responsible for murdering police officers? Why haven't you mentioned this before?" Gordon held up his hand in an imploring gesture, but the reporters continued to shout questions. "It's out there! You can't unsay it now, Gordon!"
A woman with smooth blond curls raised her hand; her calm voice sliced through the babble. "The GCPD released the names of five officers killed in action yesterday. Which ones precisely are you talking about?"
Gordon's hands were shaking. "Now listen. I cannot stress this strongly enough. We have no evidence linking Batman with the death of Detective Henry Wuertz or the disappearance of Detective Anna Ramirez."
A reporter snapped out, "Wuertz and Ramirez? Wasn't Dent's Internal Affairs Division investigating both those officers for alleged mob ties? Were they crooked? Is that why the Batman killed them?"
"We have no evidence the Batman was involved in any of this," Gordon repeated doggedly. "But...yes, they were both under investigation." For a moment, his face was very bleak. "If they were indeed corrupt, the blame for this lies with me. I hired them. I trusted them."
"And that's why the Batman kidnapped your family, isn't it?" another reporter crowed. "Oh, don't try to cover this up, Gordon. We've talked to your men and they admit when they arrived on the scene you told them to find and apprehend Batman. He kidnapped your family to punish you for hiring those corrupt cops, and Harvey Dent tried to save them and fell to his death, didn't he? Stop trying to protect your precious vigilante!"
Gordon bowed his head for a long moment; when he looked up again the room fell silent at whatever they saw in his eyes. "What happened with my family is...very private and not at issue here. Harvey Dent was...a hero. And his fall--" His voice shook and he stopped and collected himself, tried again, "--His fall cannot be blamed on Batman."
But Clark could hear it in the crowd's murmurs, see it in their avid smiles. In his attempt to shield the Batman from accusation, Gordon had managed to make the vigilante look guiltier than ever.
It had been, Clark reflected, a singularly inept performance on the new commissioner's part.
He closed the file and stared at the empty desktop for a while, with its photo of a rippling corn field. Commissioner Gordon was resolutely not returning Clark Kent's calls. It was a total stonewall. Another chunk of the story locked up in a man's mind, a man who wasn't speaking to nosy reporters.
Fortunately, Clark reflected wryly, he had a few tools at his disposal that your average nosy reporter didn't have.
: : :
Somewhere in the distance sirens wailed in the night. Jim Gordon grimaced to himself and signed another piece of paperwork. Another Gotham night. Another night where he had to wonder if the hounds he'd helped sic on Gotham's protector would bring him to bay at last. Every night he waited for the call to come in, the call telling him they'd finally brought down the Batman. He'd go to the scene and pull the cowl from sightless eyes to see at last the secret face of the man he'd condemned to death. The face of his friend.
He'd take his thirty pieces of silver and go back to work protecting the city, just like the Dark Knight would want him to.
He smiled to himself very slightly when he heard it: the sound of a cape stirring slightly, a silken whisper. The Batman hadn't appeared at his office window for two months now--security was high and they risked everything by meeting in person. His communications with Jim were usually by computer, terse and coded, untraceable. And yet...now and then there would be a voice at his window, or a shadow out of place in an alley near an investigation, a moment where they could stand together, each tangible and actual to the other. As if the vigilante needed the reassurance of the Commissioner's reality as well. Two men with a heavy secret, almost close enough to touch, if Jim were so presumptuous as to do so.
The liquid hiss of cloth came again and Jim swung around suddenly to confront it. "You're getting careless--" he began triumphantly, then broke off in shock and horror as his eyes lit on red and blue, on unearthly azure eyes hovering outside his office.
"Were you...expecting someone?" Superman asked politely.
Jim's heart was pounding; the alien's eyes were sharp as cobalt daggers, looking at his soul. "Training exercises," Jim said. "Infiltration maneuvers for our SWAT team. They try to use that as an excuse to sneak up on the boss sometimes." He cocked an eyebrow at the Kryptonian. "Would you care to come in?"
Superman lowered himself into the open window. "I wanted to talk to you about the Batman," he said. The alien face was expressionless, perfect, flawlessly just. Nothing in the angles of that face would ever be interested in the murky web of lies and half-truths that Jim had spun to cover Gotham, to veil it in protective darkness.
For a moment Jim imagined this angel of righteousness descending from the sky upon the Batman, a thunderbolt of brightness crashing upon that dark human frame. His heart twisted, and he took that pain and used it to harden his voice, turn it caustic. He'd gotten good at that. "Unless you've got that costumed freak trussed up and waiting outside my window, you're not of much use to me." He looked away from the vivid primary colors, took a long sip of his coffee. "Um, no offense."
Superman looked at him for a long, silent moment. Jim waited for him to abuse Batman, to chastise Gordon for the corruption and ineptitude of his police force--this time true anger clenched Jim's jaw and tightened his grip on the coffee mug. If Superman thought he could walk--well, float--in here and insult people who put their life on the line in one of the most dangerous cities in the world, then he--
"Batman didn't murder anyone."
Jim's fingers went numb; he stared at Superman, aghast. The truth seemed to echo in the cramped and cluttered office.
Superman stepped forward and caught the mug from Jim's hand as it slipped.
"I--I never claimed he did," Jim managed after a moment as Superman placed the mug gently on the desk.
"He's accused of kidnapping your family. You were there."
"There was a struggle between Batman and Dent. I was focused on getting my family to safety. When it was over, Dent was dead and Batman was gone. Maybe it was an accident."
"The entire police force is not hunting him down over an accident."
"For questioning, as a person of interest."
"Questioning?" Superman's eyes narrowed. "The man is assumed to be a cop-killer. You know perfectly well the police will shoot to kill."
Jim looked into his mug, at the rusty stains against the china. "There have been a string of murders since that night. Police, criminals. These aren't necessarily isolated incidents."
Superman shook his head. "He gets blamed every time a thug trips and falls to his death from a rooftop, every time a police officer gets stabbed by a mobster and left to die. But he isn't responsible for them."
"I never claimed he was--"
Superman put his hands down on the desk hard enough to make coffee slosh over the mug's rim. "You're telling the truth, but you're lying," he said. There was anger tightly leashed in his voice, and he looked suddenly less like an avenging angel than a tired and frustrated man. "For all your carefully-phrased denials, you're letting someone be hunted down for crimes he did not commit." His shoulders sagged and his expression shifted to imploring. "You don't seem like a liar to me," he said. "So why are you lying?"
"I'm a terrible liar," rasped Jim. That at least was certainly true. "So believe me when I tell you that Batman is a wanted fugitive and the Gotham police department will not rest until he is caught." Also true. He forced vehemence into his voice. "Whatever you or I may think, he will pay for the choices he made that night."
God help them all, that was true already.
Superman straightened. The frustration and the shadow of pity was gone from his brilliant blue eyes once more, leaving only merciless truth and justice. "I just hope you can live with what you've done, Commissioner Gordon," he said, and he was gone.
Gordon sat for a moment in the silence, afterimages of piercing blue eyes against his retinas. "I have to," he said to the empty room.
Then he put his face in his hands and listened to the sirens howling in the night, hounds after Gotham's black fox.
(Chapter Three)