#gcpd

Gordon is on the roof with Batman, discussing some case and the other cops are gathered around to watch the CCTV footage like it's some nature documentary.

Montoya: Bullock you're missing it.

Gage: shhh, look, he's there. Bullock come on!

Bullock: Jeez, kid, I'm comin'. What did I miss?

Sawyer: It's about the Cooper case

Bullock: The hell you doing here, Day Shift?

Harper: shhhhhhh, look.

Sawyer: oh so that's where those case files went.

Montoya: Look he's taking them right out of his hand

Bullock: Tried that once. Robin bit me.

And the cops get so into this that when the Bat Signal gets broken while Gordon is on leave, they get an intern to make a trail of empty case files to roof of the GCPD to lure Batman. Montoya takes Gordon's place, tells Bats about the case and hands him the case file. He, of course, vanishes into the night while the usual stoic and reserved Montoya turns the camera, like "he took them right out of my hand" and the entire precinct is like:

But Gordon is a good detective, so he makes sure to do his research and realizes hey, crime has actually gone down under Red Hood’s rule, and figures “fuck it” and approaches him like “hey, you’re doing a decent job, also here’s a list of cops I’m pretty sure are involved in the mob but I can’t prove it, have fun” and Jason is just like “thank you for the enrichment :)” and two days later half of the people on the list are dead, a quarter have had their personal files leaked to the FBI, and the others have all been given the all-clear via a folder left on the roof of the GCPD headquarters.

Anyway, Jason ends up putting the red bat on his armor not to piss Bruce off (even though that was the original plan), but because he’s become the same symbol of hope as the light shining in the sky, just focused specifically on the long-forgotten East End, specifically Crime Alley. The people love him, Gordon doesn’t really give a shit that he sometimes kills people (he’s been praying for the Joker’s downfall for years now), and it’s the most peaceful the city has been without Batman literally ever.

Bruce comes back full of anxiety and expecting the city to have imploded or sunk into the sea, only to find that… it’s fine. In fact, it’s doing better than average. No rogues are running rampant, crime is down, and when the Bat Signal turns on, instead of the yellow that it’s been for years, it’s glowing blood red (one of the rookies put a filter on it since the normal Bat was still out of town).

He gets to the roof of the GCPD to find Gordon already talking to someone, a man his size with a red bat on his chest and practically dripping in guns. He takes one glance at Batman and leaves, taking a folder with him.

Take Dick, for example. He’s already naturally at home in a police station, so he’ll regularly waltz into GCPD headquarters to give pointers on cases, act as a translator, and will occasionally bring donuts for the night officers. But he’s also been trying to get them to unionize since 2009 and will also unabashedly steal things from the evidence locker. (He always returns it, usually with the adjacent case completed, but it’s a lot of red tape and that’s very annoying.) He also fucks up the coffee machine every time he uses it.

As for Jason… On one hand he is excellent at tracking down perps that have escaped custody or gone to ground. It’s not uncommon for him to pull up with a van full of criminals on the wanted list, which is great… expect for the fact that Jason is also on the wanted list. So whenever he shows up the GCPD cops have to put in effort (minimal as it may be) to try and “capture” the Red Hood so that they don’t get audited by Homeland Security. So now like once a month they have to chase the Red Hood across Gotham proper, because he handed the Penguin into their custody or something, and they have to look good for their bosses—it’s a waste of resources and really fucking annoying, but, hey, they got the Penguin?

Surprisingly, Tim and Stephanie are the most frequent visitors of the GCPD—and they are also the most dreaded. Because Tim is a plucky little know-it-all, but also he can and will update their entire database in a single night and will, at random, solve a cold case they’ve been sitting on for 20 years. The problem is that he’s just fucking annoying about it, and every other week he’ll break into the vending machine to steal the energy drinks—that shit is impossible to get replaced. And Steph? She’ll talk the ears off the night shift and get everyone off task, because they’re busy gossiping about the accounting department in the Manor’s office and planning a prank war on the fire department.

You would think Cassandra would be everyone’s favorite because she’s quiet and much less destructive then her siblings, but you’d be wrong—Cassandra is an absolute menace and the night shift workers have spent years trying to prove it. She will sneak up behind people, leave random pebbles in people’s shoes, and will put googly eyes on anything she touches. The day shift thinks the night officers need to chill because, “isn’t she the chill one?” (No. No she is not. None of the Bats are chill.)

And then there’s Damian. As Robin, the closest he usually gets to the GCPD is through Batman, via his consultations with Commissioner Gordon. But on the rare occasions he’s permitted inside the GCPD, he is dotted on extensively by the officers. He’s deadly and abrasive but they love him. They give him candy and head pats and let him use the sketch-artist supplies to do drawings, which they religiously pin to the break room refrigerator. Damian will pretend to despise this despite the fact that he so clearly loves it.

Side Story One

Summary: A day in the life of one of Gotham's most reliable journalists.

Word Count: 1k

Warnings: Language

A/N: Not one of my usual chapters. Working on world building right now. The Jim Gordon I imagine for this chapter is the one from the Gotham TV show. If you've seen Ben McKenzie, you get it. This side story takes place before chapter ten. Anyways, let me know what you think. I'll get back to my regularly scheduled programming soon. I love y'all so much! Remember to drink water and eat some food. And take your medicine if you've forgotten. Take care of yourselves!

Batman: *silently produces a tampon*

Montoya: ?

Montoya: "Uh thanks, but I think it was just the weird hotdog I ate for lunch."

Batman: *nods*

Later, Montoya, bored: "I think Batman's a woman."

Words truly cannot describe the cold panic that must have come over the entire GCPD one night when a beat cop turned a blind alley corner and found him there. A young man, between 15-20, short dark hair, dressed in a distinctive costume of red and green.

And dead as a doornail.

(The cover of a trashy tell all I had to read through for most of this info, courtesy of Gotham Gazette reporter Simon Lippman)

The instant thought that spread through the department was, of course, the worst case scenario: What if this really WAS the then most recent Robin. If the body had simply been left for a police officer to stumble over it meant that at that point Batman didn't know. Officers who had been present for the aftermath of the second Robin's death were in a state of panic, wondering how they could possibly prepare the city for a Batman who might be on the warpath inside a couple of hours. This one going even further than the first time where he very nearly invaded the United Nations building for the sake of murdering the Joker in cold blood.

Some officers saw it as some perverse leverage they might be able to use against the Bat. Unmasking the corpse and attempting to quickly identify it hoping that it would hold some clue to Batman's unmasked identity. A very small and fringe party within the GCPD even theorized about "ransoming" the corpse to gain "concessions" from the Batman. Though in both cases it was pointed out just how stupid an idea it was to either try to use the death of his young ward against him OR to try and RANSOM HIS BODY which almost certainly would have seen the GCPD infiltrated, if not violently assaulted by Batman and his allies for the sake of retrieving their friend and comrade.

It was soon after the first body was identified with teenage actor Roger Baumbach that batman truly enters the scene, "working" his way through the residents of Blackgate, Arkham Asylum and the patrons at the Iceberg Lounge leading to a confrontation with the GCPD that soured the police's relationship with the hero, leaving them into the dark as to whether he was working the same case they were and from what angle.

All of this only further complicated by the case leaking to the press. As you can imagine, the possibility of the 3rd Robin not only turning up dead, but being seemingly unmasked on the autopsy table sent them into a feeding frenzy. Baumbach's grieving parents being harassed into the wee hours of the freezing morning as the police attempted to contain the crowds. And then the case broke or escalated in four distinct but related ways.

The escalations included a member of the GCPD taking a shot at Batman during the altercation at the Iceberg Lounge, further dividing their ability to work together on the case. And the Teen Titans were asked to come in for questioning. While none of them were able to directly comment on events (they had all been very publicly out of the country fighting some villainous plot having to do with perennial headache Brother Blood) their lack of visible shock or worry led into the two breaks in the case.

The 3rd Robin showed up alive and well on the roof of the GCPD.

And a second body was discovered.

This one laying face down in Gotham Harbor, evidently suffocated BEFORE being placed in the water near a busy path where he was intended to be quickly discovered by the killer. This body was much more quickly identified as young commercial star Scott Benjamin. Again the scene was leaked to the press, this time showing up so quickly the police had to fight just to secure the crime scene. This intentional need for attention fit together with another piece of evidence when it was noticed the photograph of the crime scene used on the front page of the Gazette was NOT the same picture that had been given to the public, meaning the photograph had to have been taken by the killer themselves. Leading to the arrest of Gazette reporter Simon Lippman.

It was only after this that a man named Jack Dunning walked into the GCPD headquarters and openly confessed to the crimes, presenting the school IDs of both young men as evidence for the deed and rambling that he would only explain himself to Batman personally while mumbling about finally existing in "their world". When Batman did indeed arrive, the entire sordid story came out at least.

Dunning had also been a reporter for the Gotham Gazette, slowly becoming unbalanced and obsessed with Gotham's costumed crime fighters. Focused on the idea of becoming part of "their world" by becoming a villain through the murder of Robin. Posing as a talent agent for the two young actors, he tricked them into situations where one could be tossed from a lethal height and the other could be suffocated. Leaving their bodies intentionally to be found and spreading the leaks through his press connections in order to summon a media circus around the possible identity of said "new villain"

Dunning is currently serving two consecutive life sentences at Blackgate Penitentiary, although media fascination with him and his psychosis was thankfully short lived. If anything the take away from this fiasco is a lesson that has very little to do with the Boy Wonder himself.

When we dehumanize our protectors. See "their" world as so much higher than "our" world, we leave ourselves open to obsession. An obsession that is like blood in the water for a news media cycle that is more obsessed with fear mongering and spectacle than awaiting the truth and providing an objective lens on events. Within hours of the leak, theories were being proposed in otherwise "respectable" outlets that ranged from it being another product of the Joker to some kind of torrid love affair between Robin and Catwoman (that particular reporter got basically everything in their office stolen, with a gently written reminder that Catwoman is more protective of the Robins than you would think).

Thankfully the 3rd Robin, now Red Robin is alive and well.

I LOVE RENEE SO MUCHHHHH