ORACLE DD Ch 6

GCPD is in an uproar. The holding facility is on lockdown, and the lobby is pure chaos. A lot of sergeants and lieutenants run around in a state of panic, while uniformed officers just look confused. Chief Green is visibly upset, and a handful of majors cower in their offices as she storms toward the elevators.

Commissioner Viti Saxena, with a sheen of sweat on her forehead, stands with her arms crossed across her belly outside the elevators. A wary Kate Kane is beside her in a dark GCPD patrol uniform. The elevator opens, and Kate stops Chief Green. “Sorry, ma’am.”

“Kid, the mayor’s here unannounced. I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but move that hand,” she says tightly.

“Step back, Ellen. You were not invited,” Viti says.

“Excuse me?”

Viti pulls Kate into the elevator. “I’ll brief you later,” she tells the Chief.

The doors shut. “What the hell is she thinking?” Kate mutters, looking up as the elevator rises.

“She’s going to give us an unreasonable ultimatum about the bombing,” Viti predicts. “She has to.”

“No. It won’t be that.”

“How do you know?” Viti swipes her card for roof access.

“Call it a hunch.”

The doors open, and the Gotham sunset paints the GCPD roof in a deep, bloody red—but clouds are gathering.

Mayor Barbara Gordon is out there by the old searchlight that was once the signal used to summon the Batman. He is back in Gotham, but Viti has not ordered her people to put the symbol back on the light, let alone to use it. She has no intention of fostering the sort of relationship that her predecessor had with caped vigilantes.

Two women stand with Mayor Barbara Gordon’s wheelchair, and her GCPD security detail is present as well, keeping a perimeter at the edges of the roof. Absent is the mayor’s pretty little personal assistant. Viti’s never seen Mayor Gordon without her.

The mayor’s hair is in a sensible ponytail; everyone else suffers in the freezing wind.

A stout, severe Black woman stands on the mayor’s right. On the left is perhaps the most beautiful blonde that Viti has ever seen, and she’s conscious of how Kate is momentarily distracted by her. There’s a little jealousy—although nothing has happened between the two them—and Viti also understands. She’s looking as well. Viti doesn’t have a type, but being separated from her wife and under **** pressure while also being surrounded by attractive women is not easy.

Kate follows her to the mayor.

“Commissioner,” Barbara greets her.

“Madame Mayor.”

“This is Amanda Waller and Valentina Vostok. They work for the U.S. government as consultants with the Department of Homeland Security.”

Viti folds her arms; she doesn’t understand, and that puts her on the defensive. She says nothing.

“Ms. Vostok has a number of notable people under surveillance, and those include local sources of explosives. What happened to the Thompson HQ is terrorism, and that brings this into the jurisdiction of the federal government.” Barbara points with either index finger at the women flanking her. “There’s compelling evidence pointing to Aria Falcone as being behind the bombing. I’m going to make an example of her. I’m declaring open season on her organization. You’re going to pick up and prosecute everyone you can get your hands on. You have promising leads, and now that Ms. Waller and Ms. Vostok have cause to assist, they have the resources to support you in making arrests and gathering admissible evidence that will solidify your cases. We are not looking for big convictions. We’re going to pick up everyone we can at every level, all at once.”

“That sounds good,” Viti says, cutting in. “But all it does is set the stage for a gang war.”

“That’s where I come in, Commissioner. There won’t be a war,” Waller says confidently. “Only a smooth transition of power.”

Barbara doesn’t blink. “We don’t need to put Aria’s people away for life. We just need to take a big enough bite out of her that she falls down. The landscape will change radically before she can get back up.”

“What if I don’t like the idea of handing half the city on a platter to, I assume, the Japanese? The Russians don’t have enough manpower, and the Maronis are too busy with their own problems. You want Gotham in the hands of the Yakuza?”

“What I want doesn’t matter. Aria Falcone just blew up a four-story building less than twenty-four hours after she walked uninvited into my office and pressured me to start doing her favors. Gotham’s mayor has always been, to one degree or another, in bed with the mob, and that’s not going to change because right now, I don’t have the means to get rid of organized crime. It’s going to be here, and we are going to have to deal with it, but this is our city, not theirs, and whatever happens is going to happen on our terms, Viti. So get to work. Ms. Vostok will be providing security for key personnel that Aria’s going to target as soon as she realizes what’s happening. Officer Kane, you’re on Commissioner Saxena 24/7, and you’ll both be sleeping at my place where there’s enough security infrastructure to keep you alive without wasting more resources. Shut the hell up,” Barbara snaps, pointing a warning finger. “With a little luck, this’ll be the only time I have to be this pushy, but god help me, I’m not asking. I’m giving orders. This isn’t a meeting. It’s not a negotiation. Commissioner Saxena, you can do your job or find another one, there’s no third option. Ms. Waller is going to give you the muscle that you’ll need for some of the warrants that you’ll need to serve; it’s likely that the Falcone family has metahuman resources. This operation will be ugly, and I’m not naïve enough to think we can swing it without fatalities, but we are going to try, and I’m trying to make sure GCPD has more than a fighting chance. Ms. Waller also has a list of GCPD personnel compromised by the Falcone family. We are going to openly announce this operation and name some of those individuals as the ones running it, particularly Chief Green. She’s been taking money from that organization and the others for the past ten years. You will be making that announcement later tonight. Those cops will then have the option of being killed by Aria or flipping. We will have warrants, we will have witnesses, we will have strong cases that will only get stronger as Aria starts to panic. As soon as there’s blood in the water, the other families will step in with knives out, and they will do it carefully because I will give them an explicit warning when I appear on Gotham Insider later tonight. Viti, I planned this operation, but you are going to be the one running it. Yes or no?”

“I’m not comfortable with this.”

“Why the hell would you expect to be comfortable at any time as police commissioner in Gotham City? Were you born fucking yesterday?”

Viti swallows.

“What do you propose? I’m listening,” Barbara says. “How do you want to handle this bombing? When your lab techs get done forty-eight hours from now and tell you the same thing Valentina told me? What, exactly, will you do? Go looking for a bomb-maker? That’ll help. I have exercised agonizing restraint in ensuring that everything we do here is in accordance with the law. I’m willing to take responsibility for the fact that it may not be very nice. Is that what you want to tell Gotham? You want the mayor to be nicer?”

“All right!” Viti puts up a hand, shooting Barbara a glare. “Remember, Madame. Mayor. I’m not the one you’re angry at.”

Barbara deflates. “Fair. Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I’m not executing anything I haven’t read. But I’m willing to proceed with making these arrests if what you have is really so compelling. I’ll need to review it with Major Crimes. It has to hold up. I’m not going to enable a knee-jerk, authoritarian police state.”

“Then we’re on the same page. Get to it.”

ORACLE: DEAL WITH THE DEVIL

Thunder rumbles as Kate follows Viti back to the elevator. Valentina Vostok slips in with them, and the doors close.

“Then we have a deal?” Amanda Waller asks.

“I’ll hold up my end when the Falcone organization is effectively erased from Gotham. And no dead cops.”

“What about the crooked ones?”

“I don’t want any bodies at all. I want these people prosecuted, not dead.”

“Blackgate’s full.”

“I’ll figure something out.”

Waller snorts. “All right, Ms. Gordon.”

They shake hands. Waller heads for the elevator as the first raindrops fall. Barbara takes a deep breath and thinks about the next hurdle: Summer Gleeson and the announcement that Barbara will make to Gotham. It’s outrageous to be so sudden and transparent, but if this works, it will be popular. Popularity isn’t as important as justice, but in politics, showmanship is more important than policy.

But there will have to be policy, specifically on caped vigilantes. Gotham’s criminal underworld has a lot of moving parts, and Batman and his allies are among them. GCPD attacking the Falcones will set off a chain of events that will shake every corner of the city. Should Mayor Barbara Gordon tell the capes to stand down? Or to merely stay out of GCPD’s way? If left to their own devices, they will inevitably cross paths with Checkmate and Task **** X, and even Barbara’s brain cannot account for those uncontrolled variables. She cannot have that.

Order the Family to temporarily suspend their operations?

Or to just stay out of GCPD’s way?