At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst. -Aristotle

•••

Bird sat up with a slight struggle on the side of her bed with squinted eyes as she clutched onto her side and struggled for a breath through the intense pain she was feeling all over her body.
It felt her someone was trying to dig their way out of her head from the inside out with an ice pick.

Her bare feet touched the wooden floor and though it took a fair amount of struggling she managed to get herself stood up.

It was only then that she realized exactly where she was.
She was in her room at Wayne Manor.

The confused expression on her face grew as her wandering gaze stopped on the sight of an empty fish take on the top of her dresser where she once had a pet fish.
The first and last pet her parents had ever let her have –she'd accidentally killed it when she'd poured glitter into the water to make the tank prettier.

Bird couldn't remember what happened to the tank; whether it was put into storage in the basement or if they'd thrown it away, but it had been years since she'd seen or even thought of it.

Her usually sure footing fumbled from beneath her as she tried to leave her room and had to grip onto the open door frame to keep from falling over.

Once she was out in the hallway it was quickly becoming more apparent that something was wrong with her. Her eyesight was fuzzy around the edges and completely black in her peripheral.

The pain in her side was so intense that she could barely even walk.

Perhaps most unsettling of all was that she couldn't remember how she'd even gotten there.
She couldn't remember much of anything, but with the way her head was currently feeling as though it was in a vice grip, she figured she must have the spent the prior night drinking and was having the worst hangover on earth.

Coming to a stop at the top of the stairs she lifted her shirt to look at her side where the pain was intensely radiating from, but there didn't appear to be a visible injury.

Maybe she'd fell on something when she was drunk?

Letting her shirt fall back down, she tightly clung to the railing and lowered herself cautiously from step to step until she made it to the first floor.

"Bruce?" Bird yelled out, her words turning to coughing and sputtering before she managed to choke out, "Alfred?"

Groaning she leaned against the wall and pinned her eyes shut, sweat beaded across her forehead and the pain from her side nearly crippled her.

"Hello?" She cried out, doing her best to keep herself standing though she wasn't sure how long she'd be able to.

She'd never been one for hospitals, but with as bad as she was hurting she knew something had to be wrong.

As the current wave of pain faded and she was finally able to take a breath of reprieve and she utilized the chance to go towards the door.
She needed to get out of that house and go to the hospital or call someone for help, she wasn't sure where exactly she was headed –but she had an overwhelming feeling that she couldn't stay in that house for a second longer.

"Hello..." Bird repeated as she came to a stop when she saw the front door was standing wide open; only instead of the usual view –anything and everything beyond the door frame was obstructed by a blinding light.

Her gazed was pulled down to where her hands were trembling down at her sides.
All she wanted to do was turn and run back in the other direction; take shelter in her old room and wait until someone showed up to tell her what was going on.

But she couldn't.

Even though the fear coursing through her veins was nearly paralyzing, she had to get out of that house and she didn't know if she could make it to another door.

Slowly, she advanced forward, calling out again to see if someone was there but no one answered her.

The closer she got to the door filled with white light, the less her side hurt.
Her breathing was starting to return to normal and she was able to stand up straighter.

Maybe she was going to be okay.
If she could just get out of the house then things would be okay.

Bird came to an abrupt stop and spun around when she heard someone crying –quickly coming to the realization that it was Bruce's cries echoing throughout the house.
With furrowed brows she wondered why he'd have ignored her when she yelled his name –maybe they were in a fight she couldn't remember, or he had been out of ear shot.

With every step she took in the opposite direction of the front door that had felt so inviting caused the pain to flare back up in her side, but she couldn't stop.

She didn't know what was wrong with her, but she was hurt and maybe her brother was hurt too. If that was the case she had to find him and get them both out the house to safety.

Tears stung her eyes as she passed by the staircase and yelled out her brothers name.
Bird slowed to a stop when she rounded the corner of a hallway and saw a large painting on the wall that she couldn't remember having ever seen before.

Dark crimsons and ethereal browns sprawled messily across the canvas with designs of shadowed black thorn covered vines.

The searing pain flared up in her side again and she was brought down to her knees from the jolt. Her panic only grew when the entire mansion started to shake and rumble.

She opened her mouth to scream out for her brother again, but her voice came out muffled as something covered her mouth and when she looked up she saw the vines were creeping down the wall from the painting and steadily wrapping around her.

Her legs were completely bound and buried under the vines that just kept wrapping around her over and over again –trying to bury her from head-to-toe until there would surely be nothing left.

She was sure her ribs were cracking from the pressure and her ability to pull in any sort of air had been brought to a stop.

Somehow she managed to free one of her arms from the entangling darkness and waved it around frantically, trying desperately to grip onto anything she could use to start to pull herself to freedom.

Just when all hope had started to fade and she felt herself beginning to drift into a suffocating state of nothingness, her hand found something to hold onto –more so, she felt someone else grip onto her hand with an iron tight grasp.

As quickly as the vines had started to swallow her up and leave her body feeling broken and weighed down, they started to retract and climb back up the wall until they were all back in the painting and Bird was left on the hardwood floor, down on all fours violently coughing and trying to catch her breath.

A warm hand landed on her back and gently rubbed in circles until she was able to catch her breath and muster the strength to up and see who'd saved her from a certain death.

"Dad..." She breathed.

"Come on." Thomas Wayne smiled as he extended a hand and promised, "It's okay. You're going to be fine."

With a nearly dazed expression, Bird accepted his help and he pulled her up to her feet, wrapped an arm around her shoulders and led her towards the set of patio doors to get outside.

Bird kept staring at him while she allowed him to lead her out of the house –never noticing how just inches behind their footsteps a thick darkness was swallowing up the house and seeming to gain on them with every step until they reached the doors and went outside.

Once they were outside, he led her over to a bench and helped her get sat down before he took a seat beside her and let out a heavy breath.

"What's going on?" Bird questioned, her eyes never left his face. It was as if she were afraid if she looked away that he'd disappear.

"Try to remember." He answered with a sad smile on his lips, "You have to remember."

"I..." Bird breathed, shaking her head, "Galavan."
The name left her lips as her face twisted up in rage and she hissed, "He was drugging me. The hallucinations..."

Tears welled up in her eyes as she stared at her father and whispered, "None of this is real."

Finally bringing herself to look around, she spotted her mother sitting out on a blanket with a picnic basket beside her and a book in her hands.

Usually her hallucinations were horrific, filled with demons and her worst fears.
Yet, somehow this felt more painful.

It hurt worse to see something that she'd taken for granted so many times when she was growing up.
To feel like she was truly in the presence of her deceased parents and know it wasn't real.

"You're certain?" Thomas asked his daughter, watching her closely as she looked all around the side yard outside of the house she'd grown up in.

"You're not real." She repeated, grabbing onto the side of her head and getting back up tp her feet.

But before she could walk away he stopped her and warned, "You can't go back in there."

Jerking away from his touch she recoiled with her arms crossed over her chest and her chin quivering as she frantically looked away trying to see what nightmare was going to creep up on her next.

Thomas' eyes kept cutting over towards the house where he could clearly see all of the windows were entirely blacked out from the darkness that had swelled up inside to fill every single inch of space.

He held his arms up trying not to startle her as he said, "If this isn't real... then where's the harm in just sitting here with me?"

"Because I've probably got about two seconds until your face melts off and gets all demonic looking." She answered honestly.

Her words earned a small smile from him and he thought of how he'd learned a long time ago to not ask questions unless he wanted a brutally honest answer from her.

"I know you were never too keen on taking my advice, but you can't go back in there. I'm afraid I won't be able to reach you again."

Bird's eyebrows furrowed and she whipped her head back to look at him, "What are you talking about? What's in there?"

A somber expression fell over his face and she saw his jaw tense as if her wanted to give her answer but was unable to speak it.

"Dad?" Bird's voice shook as she staggered forward, "What's in the house?"

"You have to remember." Was all he could say, "Remember."

"I did-" Her argument was cut short when she became painfully aware of the sharp jolts of pain from her side.
Looking down, her mouth hung open when she saw she was now wearing a long dress that was stained red from blood.

Pulling apart the shredded fabric on her side, she saw a bullet hole in her skin and nearly lost her balance as everything came flooding back.

Just as quickly as her legs gave out, her father was there to catch her and led her back over the bench they'd been sitting on.

Maybe this wasn't a hallucination after all.
Maybe the light out of the front door of the house she wanted to go to was really something calling her from the living world –maybe the vines she'd nearly been swallowed in were trying to drag her somewhere else.

"I'm dead." She finally said it out loud.

"No." Thomas shook his head, "Not exactly."

"Not exactly?" Bird repeated back to him with an expectant look, but he didn't offer up any more information.

Still not entirely sure if anything was real or if she was simply still under the effects of hallucinogenic drugs, Bird guessed again, "Am I going to die?"

Reaching out he gently cupped her cheek in his hand, catching her off guard by how warm and real his skin felt to hers when she was still half sure he wasn't real.

"You could have." Thomas finally said as he glanced back towards the house before pointing out, "You were fighting for your life –you still are."

Bird thought back to how as she neared the front door of the house the searing pain in her side had dulled with every step closer to the radiating white light she'd witnessed.

"What if..." She cleared her throat, "What if I don't want to fight anymore?"

"Don't say that-" He started to argue, but she cut him off.
Even in death she still didn't seem ready to head his advice.

"I jumped in the way of a bullet headed towards my best friend." She remembered, "Dying for someone I love? Come on, Dad. That's about the closest thing to a heroic ending someone like me can hope for."

"When you're willing to take a bullet just to say you died for something –that's proof you were living for nothing, Starling." Thomas sternly said.

Bird's eyes met her dads and deep down she knew he was right.

Which really came as no surprise, he always was and it was apparently a trait that even her hallucination of him carried to a fault.

"You've found things to die for." He continued to speak, "But I think it's past time you find things that are worth living for, don't you?"

"Like what?" Bird's arm fell weakly at her sides and her shoulders slouched.

"I can't answer that." There was a smile on his lips when he spoke, "Those are the answers you have to seek out for yourself."

"My entire life imploded." Bird stammered, "I got out of my life of crime and I thought I'd found the right person to spend the rest of my life with. I was doing the things that everyone wanted me to do and it didn't matter-"

"I'm sorry." He earnestly interrupted her, "My daughter, I am so sorry for all you've lost and had to endure. You'd think after all of this that I've have some sage advice to pass on –something to say that would explain why the universe worked against you in ways that we can't begin to understand, but..."

Stepping closer, he rested his hands on her shoulders and fought to smile, "That's life. Sometimes you can do everything in your power and still lose. It's not right and it sure as hell isn't fair, but it is what it is and sometimes all you can do is pick yourself back up and try again. Maybe certain things fell apart so greater things could fall into place."

He watched as her face scrunched up into an expression he knew all too well –she was gearing up for an argument.

And as much as he'd come to dread fighting with her, he'd have willingly stayed around and argued with her for days on end just to see her for a moment longer, but the sun in the sky was getting brighter. Turning from a yellow light into a blinding white ball and the sands of time wouldn't stop for anyone –not even a Wayne.

"We don't have much time. So please, for once in your life just listen to me." He pleaded as he took her face in his hands and made sure her full attention was focused on him before continuing, "You can't live your life breaking yourself apart for everyone around you. You have to live for yourself –when your time really does come, it will come for you alone ."

His eyes burned as he watched the tears starting to run down her cheeks.

He cleared his throat and started to squint in the bright light beginning to surround them, "You have to accept who you are... hold onto that. Even on the darkest nights, the times when you feel painfully alone –you have to hold onto who you are, you've spent enough time lost."

"I love you." Thomas finished as he leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of her head.

Bird's eyes pinned shut, though it did little to stop the tears from running down her cheeks.

••• weeks later •••

Carmine Falcone came to a stop outside of the room Bird had been staying in since she'd began her recovery from the wound that had nearly killed her.

Raising his hand, he knocked on the open door frame, but let out a sigh when he spotted her across the room doing pull-ups by gripping onto the door frame above the bathroom door.

When it was clear she had no idea he was there, Falcone walked in further and switched off the power on the stereo she'd had music blaring from.

Letting go of the frame she landed on her feet and questioned, "Was the music too loud?" As she turned around to face him.

"What are you doing?" He sighed, his eyes following her as she crossed the room and picked a towel up from the top of her dresser to dry sweat dampened face on.

"I'm weak." She complained, "I'm weak as hell."

"You almost died." He reminded her in a stern voice, "Your doctor says you need to be taking it easy. You're on a long road of recovery here... pushing yourself past your limits will do more harm than good."

"What are you training for anyways?" He pushed, pausing for a breath before asking, "Remember the offer I made you?"

"Yeah." She nodded, "Leave everything and everyone I know behind."

"You're dead." Falcone said while he stepped further into the room, "Your friends... your enemies –every single person in Gotham thinks you're dead. There will never be a more perfect situation to leave the city and all of the pain it caused you behind."

Bird broke eye contact and looked down to the floor.

She couldn't deny how appealing it sounded. After all, he was right.

Everyone believed she was dead. She'd seen pictures of the grand turnout of her funeral service on the front page of the Gotham Gazette.

In the time that had passed since the night she'd been shot and everyone thought she'd died, she was sure that her brother was probably already dealing with the loss and trying to move on from it.

In many ways she'd done the best she could to be the sister to him that he deserved. She'd watched out for him and always had his best interest in mind –even when he was morally opposed to her methods.

It was a struggle to not fall prey to the voices in the back of her mind that were constantly reminding her of how she seemed to carry the effect of poison into the lives of everyone she cared about.

Maybe everyone was really better off with her being a memory of the past.

In fact, when Falcone had first given her the offer to start over somewhere else –she nearly accepted it.

But so much had happened since she'd woke up with a tube down her throat that had been helping her breathe and the doctor hovering over her instructing her to cough as he pulled the tube out.

For the first few days she'd barely been able to get out of bed and had mainly caught glimpses of the news and had small take with Falcone before drifting back off to sleep.

Once she was finally able to stay awake for hours at a time she'd been following the news in Gotham closely.

Barbara Kean had tried to Jim and Lee –she hadn't been successful and the news reported she'd fell out of a high window and had been in a coma since. Her unconscious body was taken to the medical wing in Arkham.

GCPD had managed to find the city's missing former mayor, albeit a terrified, but a very much alive Aubrey James, who'd instantly pointed the finger at the Galavans for being his abductors and tormentors.

Falcone still had sources inside the police and they'd reported that a cult of warrior monks had descended on Gotham, calling themselves the Order of St. Dumas.

Apparently Jim had somehow gotten information out of one of the members that they were there to fulfill a prophecy about how the blood of nine would cleanse the city.
So far GCPD had tied eight murders back to the religious cult –which meant they still needed one more.

Every day the stories on news seemed to be stranger than the day before and that made Bird more apprehensive about leaving the only city she'd ever called home behind and everyone she cared about in it.

The one bit of good news she'd learned among all of the bad was that Theo Galavan had been arrested. When Mayor James had given Galavan's name to the police it was enough to arrest him and he'd since been held in Blackgate without bail.

Victory wouldn't be felt until he was no longer walking among the living, but she could at least take a small bit of peace from knowing he was behind bars for the time being.

"Why don't you get changed for breakfast?" Falcone finally said, bringing her from her thoughts and she managed a small smile and nod in response.

Bird watched as he left her room at the estate they were staying in and then dropped down into the chair at the vanity next to her dresser.

Falcone had told her that when Lily had stolen her as a baby and fled from him –only to then leave her on the steps of a church, that she'd forever altered the course of Bird's life.
This was his way of trying to make up for that now and let her decide her own path in a world where it seemed like every decision had been made for her.

It was nearly forty minutes later that Bird had showered and changed clothes before heading into the kitchen where she found Falcone already sitting at the table eating his breakfast and drinking his coffee.

Bird sat down at the other end of the large table and looked down to her own plate of food.
Plucking up the blueberry muffin from the small side plate, she proceeded to pull pieces off and pop them into her mouth as she looked around the room.

There was now a comfort around her biological father that she couldn't remember ever feeling before.
Maybe it was because of the time that had passed since she'd been working with Oswald to bring his empire down –or maybe it was that she'd been through enough now to understand that for all of his wrongs, that he truly had tried to do right by her.

Or maybe it was simply a growing bond forged out of her desperation.
She had nothing left of her old life left.

Her apartment and car were gone, her assets would have been doled out according to the will she'd left behind.

Aside from the doctors who'd worked to save her life and Falcone's guards and henchman there at the house –no one else knew she was alive.

Taking a drink of her tea, Bird looked across the table to Falcone and was getting ready to ask him what the paper said about Galavan's trial. It had just started the day before and had been expected to carry on for possibly weeks, but she saw the picture on the front page was of Galavan smiling ear to ear on the front steps of the courthouse.

"What happened?" She gasped, getting up out of her chair and walking over to Falcone.

"Prosecution's star witness changed his story on the stand." Falcone admitted to her.
He relayed the article he'd just read detailing how Aubrey James had testified under oath that Cobblepot had been the one who'd kidnapped him and not Galavan.

The judge then immediately tossed the case out and let Galavan go with the courts sincerest apologies.

Pulling the paper from his hands, Bird dropped down into a seat at the closet chair to read the article for herself.

"This is madness..." She breathed, quickly thumbing through the pages to get to page number where it said the article was continued.

The story reported that after the judge declared Galavan a free man -that in an outburst of anger, Jim Gordon, had lept from his seat and assaulted Theo Galavan right in the middle of the courtroom.

Her eyes widened as she sped through the rest of the piece where she learned that Jim hadn't been seen since he was escorted from the courtroom and that Captain Barnes had declared him a fugitive and had since been organizing efforts to find and bring him in.

"Something's wrong..." Bird thought out loud, "Galavan must have somehow taken Jim."

"Or..." Falcone interrupted, "He's really on the run from GCPD."

Bird bit down on the side of her tongue but didn't see a point in voicing her own argument.
She knew Jim, she knew him better than she'd probably ever admitted out loud and something was off about this entire situation.

The dark printed words blurred against the gray paper and her breathing grew labored.

What if Galavan knew she was still alive? What if this was some ploy to draw her out?

"I have to..." Bird's voice trailed off once she looked up and saw one of Falcone's trusted mean speaking lowly to him, before glancing over at Bird and then quickly exiting the room.

"What is it?" She demanded to know as every ounce of peace she'd managed to gain over the last several weeks wilted and dropped like the petals on a dying flower.
Piece by piece, she could feel herself starting to come undone again.

"My contact inside the GCPD." Falcone cleared his throat and took another drink of his morning coffee, "He says your butler was arrested this morning –brought into the station wounded and claiming that Theo Galavan abducted Bruce."

Falcone watched as all the concern and worry on her face transformed into a hardened expression of someone with an all bets off mission coming to life behind their eyes.

"I know that your first instinct is-"

"To save my little brother." Bird finished for him, "And kill Galavan."

"Think about this, my dear." He pleaded as he followed back towards her room, but Bird didn't even look over her shoulder as she said, "I appreciate everything that you've done for me... but I'm not about to sit idly by and let him kill Bruce."

Her loyalty was one of the traits he admired most –even if that loyalty didn't always side with him.
But it was that very devotion she had for Oswald that had nearly gotten her killed and he was sure it ran even deeper for her brother.

"I'm not saying we let them kill him." Falcone clarified, "I'm suggesting that we get a group together –send them in to save Bruce Wayne and dispose of Galavan. You're in no condition to do this on your own."

"We?" Bird caught as she looked around the side of her closet door from where she'd thrown a pair of black pants out on her bed to change into.

"You are my daughter." He reminded her.

"I know." Bird nodded, "And I don't need anyone to fight my battles for me, not even you. I have to do this."

"The second that any of them find out you're alive... that opportunity to truly disappear; the chance to make a life entirely your own somewhere else will vanish." Falcone explained, watching as a long sleeved black shirt went flying from her closet onto the bed next to where the pants had landed.

Bird walked over to her dresser and opened the second drawer where she pulled out a loaded handgun and dropped it onto her bed.

"The last time you went up against Galavan-"

"I was nearly killed." Bird repeated his favorite phrase as of late.

"But this time it's different." She added.

Walking into the room he'd provided her with, Falcone questioned, "What makes you so sure of that this time around?"

Bird stopped gathering up the supplies and clothes she was going to wear that night and looked up at his face.

It was an honest question on his part.
Not spoken in a condescending tone or made to cause her to feel helpless.

"Because the last time I went up against him... I expected to die. I think I wanted to die." She admitted.
An honest question deserved nothing short of an honest reply.

Thinking back to the strange dream she'd had involving her adoptive father just before she'd woken up weeks prior, Bird added, "The way my life was..."
With a shrug she simply added, "Living for nothing makes it easy to take a bullet as proof that you died for something."

She wasn't sure how much of her deteriorated mental state at that time could be attributed to the drugs she'd been repeatedly dosed with to make her feel like she was losing her mind or how much of it was the result of her life being completely dismantled while she stood there helplessly and watched everything she'd worked for fall apart around her.

Either way, she felt like a different person now.

Her system was clean and her mind clear.

"And what are you living for now?" He asked, his eyes narrowed inquisitively at her.

"I'm not sure." She admitted with a small smile toying at the corner of her mouth, "But I'll figure it out eventually. Someone told me that I need to find something bigger than myself –and I'm not sure if that's something I can find in Gotham or if I'll find it somewhere outside of the city. But I do know that I can't begin to fully move on from this chapter of my life as long as Galavan is still breathing the same air as the rest of us."

Falcone lingered to watch her for a few moments longer before he turned and left the room, pulling the doors shut behind him to give her privacy.

He'd hoped to convinced her to leave Gotham by now.

She was his daughter; his strong, beautiful and courageous, Carmina.
The only one of his children to be named in his likeness.

Despite her having been raised by the Waynes for most of her life and having no knowledge of her his being her biological father until she'd entered her twenties, he could recognize so much of himself in her –both the good and the bad.

There was still so much about the family she had blood ties to that Bird didn't know yet.
So much that he wanted to show her and family members that she'd yet to meet, but now wasn't the time.

Her heart was very much still bound to Gotham and until she tied up the loose ends she'd expressed the fear of leaving behind and many more she didn't speak of –he knew she would keep running back to where she came from.

For now, he'd have to hold out hope that she would one day be ready to learn about the family she was from and try to find a life for herself outside of the city that had brought her nothing but heartache and loss.

•••

"Death to the son of Gotham.
Death to the son of Gotham.
Death to the son of Gotham."

The combined voices of the monks from the Order of St. Dumas echoed throughout the room as they chanted the same phrase over and over again.

Bird stealthily moved behind a few of the hooded monks making a circle around where Bruce Wayne was tied to a column in the middle of the room, before she tucked herself out of sight in a small alcove in the wall.

There were far more people in the room than she'd intended on.

She'd expected to face off against Galavan and Tabitha along with probably a few of their followers –but she'd never imaged a room full of warrior monks at the ready to witness her brother's execution.

Suddenly, she found herself regretting the choice to turn down Falcone's offer of sending some of his men with her.

Pulling in a deep breath, she tried to calm herself despite the dire circumstances and formulate a new plan.

While the monks continued to chant, Theo Galavan entered the room, carefully cradling the ancient knife embellished with the Wayne family crest in his hands.

Bird's eyes darted around the room from behind open eye section in the black balaclava she was wearing to hide her identity and she watched as Theo offered the knife to Silver St. Cloud.

Bird's brows furrowed, for a moment she thought Theo was expecting Silver to step up and be the one to kill Bruce, but perhaps even more surprising were the tears that started to roll down the blonde teenager's face.

The leader of the monks, rose from the throne he'd been sitting at in the head of the room and took the knife from Galavan. The chanting and all other sounds of room cut into a deafening silence when he thrust the ancient dagger up into the air.

"Prepare yourself, boy." The head monk instructed as he walked closer to where Bruce was tied up.

Bird opened and closed her hands down at her sides, readying herself to jump in and intervene at any second.

She was still healing from the gunshot wound that had nearly claimed her life; now with a clear mind and new lease on life, the last thing she wanted was to feel that close to death again –being consumed by dark emptiness as her life faded; but she'd risk it all over again to save him.

"You're a deluded old fool..." Bruce swallowed hard as he spoke, "And you'll pay for this."

Bird slowly nodded along with her brother's words from where she was standing.

He was going to pay for this. Pay with his very life –and so would everyone else in that room.

"Ancestors, be our witness. The prophecy is fulfilled!" The monk yelled out into the room.
He then started to raise the hand he was holding the knife in and Bird stepped out of where she'd was hiding.

But before either of them could make a move, Silver stepped forward from where she'd been standing and screamed out, "STOP!"

As the sole focus of every person in the room landed on her and her tear streaked, flushed face, her expression wavered and her trembling chin barely let her choke out, "Please?"

Pulling her gun from its holster, Bird pulled in another breath, taking advantage of the distraction Silver had pulled over the room.

With a new focus and feeling of confidence, Bird took aim and brought the monks directly in front of her down with bullets through their heads.

Having clear aim and with the way the monks were standing beside each other lined up; she'd gotten four shots off and dropped four of the monks before the room started to descend into chaos.

The doors to the room were kicked in as Bird was bringing one of the monks down to the ground and stabbing them through the heart with their own knife, Bird stole a few seconds to look in the directions of the doors.

A small smile appeared on her lips when she saw Oswald entering the room behind of a few of his armed men.

She knew he'd survived his injuries from the last night she'd seen him –she'd just known it.
But still, seeing him in person again was a much needed moment to fully assure her that her friend was alive and well.

"SACRILEGE!"
The head monk screamed out, brandishing the ancient knife through the air in front of him and signaling the rest of them to fight back; not only against Bird, but also against Oswald and his men.

The other set of double doors leading into the room was also kicked open as Jim and Alfred raced in and immediately opened fire on the hooded army that started to swarm them with battle cries on their tongues.

Bird thought she'd even caught a glimpse of Selina, before she had to focus her attention back on her own fight.

One of the hooded men, came up from behind Bird and wrapped their arms around her upper body, trying to pin her arms and bring her down. But she took advantage of their close proximity to the wall and quickly placed her boots against it as she walked her legs far enough up that she was able to push off and not only break free, but flip over him in the air.

Before he could even get turned around to see where she'd went, Bird jumped up, wrapping her legs around the man's torso and used her upper body strength to snap his neck.

Landing on the ground with the lifeless corpse, Bird started to stand back up when she spotted someone else on the floor just mere feet away from where she was.
It was Oswald, who'd been overpowered by on the monks and when he'd been knocked down his gun had slid out of his reach.

Standing up, Bird jerked a knife out of the one the slain bodies and headed for her best friend.

In a panic and fighting for his life, Oswald used his good leg to leg to kick his approaching threat back, before scrambling to the side to try and retrieve his gun.

However, when something warm and wet sprayed across the side of his face he abruptly wiped his effected cheek and then looked down his blood stained hand with wide eyes.

For a split second he thought it might have been himself that was injured –that was until the monk's body landed on the floor and revealed the man's neck had been splayed wide open.

With a gasp, Oswald looked up to see a masked woman standing in front of him, dressed in all black with their face shielded by a mask.

His wide eyes, traveled over their body and then down to where they'd extended a hand to him –dark purple painted nails were visible from the ends of their finger-less gloves.

Slowly, he took her hand and Bird helped him get back to his feet.

Oswald's mouth hung open, unable to find or begin to form words of any kind.

Not that he was given much a chance to voice his suspicions on who his savior's identity was.

She turned to fight off another threat and he had to get to his own weapon and join back in the fight as well.

Jim looked down his bloody knuckles and then back around the room.
Only a few of the monks were left standing now.

Bruce looked over to the detective and then over to where he saw someone in a black mask bring one of the cult members down and knock them out with a kick to the side of the head.

His fingers fumbled with the ropes binding his wrists as he tried to break free.

With a battle cry on his lips, one of the monks threw a dagger through the air right in Bruce's direction. Alfred fired a shot that brought the man down, but not before he was able to launch the knife through the air.

His eyes pinned shut as his head involuntarily jerked to the side in an attempt to avoid the knife that was flying through the air at him.

Bird had just enough time to jump in the way and place herself in front of where her brother was still tied to the wooden pole.

With her lightening fast reflexes, she brought her arms up and clasped her hands on each flat side of the blade –stopping it with the blade tip just centimeters from the center of her face.

With her breath rapidly rushing in and our of her lungs and legs trembling from beneath her, she stayed in that same position for the next several seconds –her eyes focused in on the sharp blade still clasped between her palms.

"Whoa..."
She could hear Selina quietly say from where she was standing.

"Drop the knife, old man. It's over." Jim ordered to the very last of the monks still standing.

The cult leader who was still holding the Wayne family crest stamped knife.

"So it would seem." The monk agreed, before screaming out as he lept up into the air and seemed to nearly be flying towards where Bird was still standing protectively in front of Bruce.

Several gunshots rang out and brought the monk to a bloody crash on the floor.

Bullock lowered his gun and leaned against the door frame as he fought for his breath.
He may have arrived several minutes after everyone else, but it seemed he showed up in the nick of time.

"That was a lot of stairs." Bullock breathlessly answered to all the sets of eyes that had turned to greet him.

Bruce finally exhaled the breath he'd been clinging to and looked back to see who'd literally just jumped in front of a knife for him, but they were gone.

Straining against the rope bindings, his eyes searched the entire room, but aside from the dead or unconscious cult members –the only other people left were Alfred, Jim, Bullock and Selina.

"Where..." He breathed, "Where did she go?"

"Are you alright?" Alfred breathed out as he rushed to Bruce and cupped his face in his hands.

Selina sprung into action and quickly got the ropes cut from his hands.

"The one who caught the knife..." Bruce stammered, "Where... where did she go?"

"I haven't the slightest..." Alfred answered, arms at the ready to catch Master Bruce as he slumped forward once his restraints were gone, "Are you alright?" He repeated.

Unable to speak anymore, Bruce managed a weak nod with tear filled eyes as he clutched onto Alfred who wrapped him in a warm embrace that served as even more proof that he was safe again.

•••

Once she knew her brother would be safe, Bird followed through the doorway she'd watched the Galavans disappear through when the room was raided.

She followed the sounds of voices down a hallway and stopped just outside of the entrance to a room that she could hear Silver's continued cries echoing out of.

"There's only one way out now." Galavan said as he opened a trap door on the wall and revealed a set of parachuting packs, "Out of the window and straight down."

"But there's only two of them." Tabitha noticed as she started to pull on the pack he'd handed to her.

"Oh, yeah..." Theo said as he let the other pack fall to the floor and started towards his young niece, "Silver isn't coming. I just wanted to take a moment, sweetheart, to express my deep disappointment in you."

"Theo, leave her be." Tabitha ordered, but Theo wasn't listening to anyone anymore.

"Silence!" He screamed at her, causing Silver to jump and cry harder with her entire body trembling in fear.

But the young blonde didn't back away when her uncle started towards her with hands out stretched towards her throat.

Using the gun in her hand, Tabitha hit her brother in the back of the head and brought him down.

Bird's eyes widened and she couldn't help but find a sense of poetic justice in it all now as she watched Tabitha help Silver pull on the other parachute pack, while Theo lay on the floor.

The same man who'd used family as a means to subdue and threaten Oswald into to working for him –was now being left for behind; left for dead by his own family.

Bird looked down to the knife clutched in her hand and then back around the corner of the doorway into the room.

Sure, she could charge in there and bring them down.
But Tabitha seemed to be doing most of the work for her.

So, instead, Bird stood in place and watched as Theo struggled to sit up and seemed genuinely confused as he watched his sister help their niece with the straps of the parachute.

"What are you doing?" He hazily questioned.

"I don't even know who you are anymore." Tabitha spat in his direction.

This man wasn't her brother. The Order of St. Dumas had taken the brother she'd grown up with and twisted him up into a man she didn't recognize any longer –and she was done taking orders.
Finished with trying to watch out for him when all he cared about was himself.

"Please." He complained with a roll of the eyes as she raised up further, "That is such a ridiculous cliché-"

His complaints were cut short when Tabitha kicked him in the side of the head and knocked him back to the floor.

"Forget it, brother." She hissed as she leaned over him, "You lost! It's time for me to look out for number one."

With that she turned and pushed Silver out of the window, where the teenager screamed until she managed to locate the pull plug for the parachute and save herself during the free-fall from the penthouse window.

Bird stepped out of sight from the doorway and Tabitha stopped when she spotted her.

The pair stared at each other for several fleeting seconds and even though she was still keeping her face concealed, Bird had a feeling that Tabitha knew exactly who she was.

Adjusting the shoulders straps of the parachute pack, Tabitha pulled her eyes away from Bird and gave once last glance to her brother before she seized her opportunity to escape and climbed up on the windows ledge.

Struggling to get to his feet, Theo's shoes squeaked against the floor in his scramble to make it to the window, but his sister had already jumped from the ledge by the time he made it there.

"Tabitha!" He shouted out into the night air; watching with a helpless expression as he saw the two parachutes open several stories below and knew he was trapped.

Reaching out and pulling the windows shut, he staggered away from them while his fuzzy head tried to come up with a new escape plan.

With a cry of pain, his knees nearly buckled when a knife was plunged into his back.

The second the blade was ripped back out of his skin, he was away of the sickening feeling of his own blood started to saturate his clothes.

Just as he spun around to see who'd sneaked up on him, his legs were kicked out from under him and he was brought down to the floor so fast that it took a few seconds of staring at the ceiling before he'd realized what happened.

"Tabitha..." Bird tauntingly echoed out from behind her mask. Mimicking the panicked way in which he'd yelled out for his sister just moments before.

"What..." Theo groaned out with his head still pounding from where he'd been hit and then kicked. He was having trouble focusing on his surroundings.

"Pathetic." Bird continued to taunt as she looked down to where he lay, "You're pathetic. You're nothing."

He tried to get up, but Bird stopped him with a boot to the center of his chest that left him gasping for air as she applied pressure.

She held her stance until he stopped fighting back.
Then she dropped to the floor on top of him, straddling him so he couldn't move or try to get up.

Leaning forward, her face was just inches above him as she slowly pushed the already crimson stained blade into his side.

He cried out in pain and for the first time since she'd met him, she could see real fear in his eyes.

Her lips curved into a smile behind her mask as she watched his agonized expression twist up eve tighter when she buried the blade deeper in his skin.

"Your own family –your sister abandoned you." Bird whispered as she started to turn the knife inside the wound.
He squirmed and tried to fight her off, but she near effortlessly knocked his hands away.

With a small laugh that sent chills down his spine, Bird continued to turn the blade in his wound as she reminded him, "You're a dead man, Theo Galavan."

His eyes that had been clenched shut slowly started to open as he started to recognize the voice behind the mask –as impossible as it seemed, his mind recalled the day in the warehouse when Bird had looked him in the eyes and told him the exact same thing.

"No..." He hissed in pain, "You... you're...no, you're dead."

"More alive than you are." She countered, as she pulled the knife from the deep, gaping wound and raised it up intending to continue causing him as much pain as possible.

But the door the room opened and Jim's voice called out, "Drop the knife!"

With a heavy sigh, she did as she was told and tossed the knife to the side before she slowly raised up and got off of where Theo was laying wounded on the floor.

"Detective Gordon." Galavan choked out.

"You're under arrest." Jim cut him off.

With a relieved expression, Theo admitted, "I thought you were going to shoot me. Well, thank goodness for simple men of principal... who believe in the system-"

His words were broken by a pained gasp when Bird kicked him hard in the side.

"Hey!" Jim angrily yelled at the masked woman as he turned his gun on her.

Silently, she held her hands up in surrender and took a few steps away from where Galavan was on the floor.

"Take me in." Theo groaned as he manged to get to his feet, "Get me out of here, Detective Gordon."

"Cuff yourself." Jim argued, as he kept aim with his gun in one hand and pulled a pair of cuffs off his belt and threw them to Galavan, "You'll get the chair this time."

Knowing that this was his only way safely out of the building, Galavan did as he was told but smugly commented, "Wanna bet?"

"Maybe you're right." Jim admitted out loud.

Theo looked up from where he was now standing to see Jim had his gun pointed at him and seemed unhinged enough to really take the shot.

Regretting his choice of words, Theo backtracked, " Steady now, Jim. I was just talking big, as they say. You caught me fair and square..."

"Had you that way the last time. You turned it around." Jim pointed out.

"Jim! Back up. I got him." Barnes yelled as he made his way into the room with one of the strike-force officers on his heels, "Back up, I said."

Bird cursed under her breath, wishing she'd just killed Galavan when she had the chance, before the police captain showed up.

"On your knees. I have a warrant to search these premises." Barnes said to Galavan.
Who gave him a pained look and pointed out, "I'm injured."

"You'll receive medical care as soon as you're taken into custody." Barnes countered, before his gaze went back to where Jim was standing with his gun still drawn, "Jim, now, you put your gun on the ground and put your hands on top of your head."

"Hands up!" Barnes yelled when he saw movement from the corner of his eye and caught sight of a masked female, "Keep 'em up." He instructed when she did was she was told.

His attention went back to the detective and he explained, "You heard me. You're still a fugitive."

"Captain, I've done nothing wrong." Jim tried to argue, but it did little to his defense.

"I want to believe you, Jim. So we're gonna do this by the book. Put your gun on the ground and let's handle this the right way."

"You're making a mistake." Jim argued.
But being the good cop that he was, he held his hands up in the air and slowly got down on his knees before laying the gun on the ground to the side.

"You too." Barnes instructed as he looked past Jim to where the masked female was still standing, "And remove the mask."

Bird heavily side and slowly got on the floor, but made no attempt to remove her mask, she peered through the eye cutout in her mask at Jim when he looked over his shoulder at her, but it was clear he didn't recognize her.

"Theo Galavan. You're under arrest-" Barnes started to read him his rights, but didn't get the chance when Oswald and Gabe entered the room and immediately knocked the strike-force officer out.

Before Barnes could respond, Oswald grabbed a heavy vase from a nearby table and broke it over his head.

When the police captain went down, Jim jumped to his feet with his gun back in hand.

"Whoa. Whoa. Whoa!" Oswald stammered, holding his leather gloved hands up, "Nobody shoot. We're all friends here-"

"Like hell we are." Jim muttered.

"I apologize for that." Oswald was quick to say as he motioned to the two unconscious officers on the floor, "But here we are. Done now. They're still alive. That's something."

Jim opened his mouth to argue, but didn't get the chance when his legs were swept out from under him and he was disarmed on his way down.

Quickly scrambling back up to his feet, Jim backed away to the side where he could keep both Oswald and the masked woman in his line of sight.

Oswald let out a deep breath, seemingly to entirely clear his lungs of all traces of air while he looked her over.

He knew her.
Knew everything about her from the way her clothes fit to the moves she'd used when fighting off the monks. Even with her face masked –he knew her.

"Hello, old friend." Oswald greeted with soft smile when he was finally able to take a breath.

"Oswald." Bird greeted back, as she used the gun-free hand to reached up and pull the mask off, "It's good to see you again.

A soft but sad smile was on her own lips when she added, "I've missed you –I've missed seeing your face."

"Not nearly as much as I've missed yours." He replied, before the smile fell from his lips and a more serious expression took over.

Looking back to Jim, Oswald said, "Look forward now, Jim. What now? I will kill you to get to him if I have to."

"No." Bird argued, "Enough people have died because of this monster." Looking back to where Galavan was growing more unnerved by the second, she said, "Galavan is the only one who needs to die."

Jim swallowed hard, unable to tear his eyes from where Bird was standing in front of him.

The last time he'd seen her, she'd been bleeding out in his arms, fighting for every single rattling breath of air. He'd been there at the hospital when the doctor said they'd lost her.

She was dead.

He'd sat with Bruce as he cried for what seemed like hours that night.
Saw the heartbroken expression on Alfred's face.

The guilt of not doing more to save her had been tearing him apart cell-by-cell for weeks on end.
Nearly every night he'd dreamed of her –nightmares of how her face looked as she lay dying under the moon and streetlights. Her last words to him playing over and over like a broken record through his mind.

She was dead. He'd felt her loss every single day –yet now here she still in front of him.

He had so many questions that he knew only she could answer.
There was so much he needed to know in order to wrap his head around how this was even possible, but now wasn't the time.

Now he had to focus on the situation at hand and the fact that he was now unarmed in a room of criminals who were hungry for Galavan's blood.

"He has to die, Jim." Bird pleaded as she looked over at him and their eyes locked.

"You know I can't let this happen." He argued as he walked up to her despite the fact that she was still armed with the gun she'd taken from him.

His eyes roamed over her face and the room fell into silence before Oswald grew tired of them staring at one another and hastily stomped his foot against the floor.

"Come on, Jim." Oswald strained, not understanding why the detective wasn't on board with the fact that Galavan had to die. He decided to try a different approach.

"Okay, let's forget revenge all together then. Forget how he orchestrated the Arkham breakout and sicced Barbara Kean on your. Forget the fact that he held my mother captive and was ultimately behind her death." His eyes darted around as he continued, "Let's even forget how you stood protecting him while Bird and I were shot –forget that you held her while she bled out from that very wound. Forget all of it. Forget revenge and think of Gotham. Think of the greater good."

"Jim." Bird continued where her friend had left off, "He has the courts in his pocket and billions of dollars at his command. If you let him go, how can you be one-hundred percent sure that he won't walk away free... again? You said yourself that he should get the chair. We all know he deserves to fry –every breath he takes is one too many."

"Think of Gotham." Oswald repeated.

Reaching out and laying her hand on Jim's arm, Bird asked, "How many more people are we going to have to watch die because of him?"

Jim's eyes fell to where her hand was on his sleeve and he swallowed hard as his mind pulled back to the night he'd thought Bird had died.

"Captain, Bravo Team in the vicinity of the penthouse."

Jim's eyes opened and looked over to where the voice crackled through the speaker of the radio on the officer's vest who lay next to Captain Barnes on the floor.

"He is never going to stop, Jim." Bird hastily spoke, "I know it sounds insane, but there is a centuries old blood feud between my family and his and he is never going to stop coming after Bruce and I. Until he's dead... none of us are going to be safe."

"You know she's right."
Oswald's voice mirrored the desperation in Bird's tone and Jim glanced between them before letting his sight finally fall on Theo Galavan.

They were right and he knew it.

The only real solution out of this situation -out of all the danger they'd faced down was for Galavan to die.

Only this wasn't the way he wanted it to happen.

Every fiber of his moral being was against it.
There should be a trial where he'd be found guilty and then sentenced to death –that would be justice.

But this... this was something else.

This was murder.

•••