November 30th
Wayne Manor
10:34 am

The funeral is an extravagant and somber affair. Jim shouldn't be surprised. The United States did not boast a royal family, but the Waynes are as good as, especially for Gotham and Bludhaven and any other fanatics residing in the state of New Jersey. Thomas and Martha Wayne have been Gotham's royalty, the crème de la crème, both rich and good-looking and charitable. Believed to be untouchable.

Until now.

Now, Gotham’s top elite couple are being buried under an oak tree, a yard off from the Manor, upon their special request to not be put in the Wayne mausoleum in the Gotham Cemetery.

"Look at this mess," Bullock snorts, but Jim is not fooled. Despite his sarcastic tone, his senior partner supports eyebags as black as the funeral colors around them, and he appears even more ungroomed than usual, which is a feat in and of itself. Jim already suspected the man has never touched a razor in his life but he’s sure he hasn’t brushed his hair since the call from Park Row. Luckily that he’s hiding that rat’s nest underneath his fedora.

Bullock continues, sounding more bitter with every word. "The upper crust, the underworld, and the dirt poor, assembled here in one giant orgy of-"

Jim snaps, "Harvey." They are standing a ways from the crowd, far enough to have a good sight over the whole assembly, but close enough that words can be carried on the windy November wind.

"What?" Bullock spits, digging his hands deeper in his pockets, "You know it's true! There are those creepy Sionis bastards over there. The Goldens and the Kanes over there. Didn't they have a blood feud going on? Look, the Elliots deigned to give Zahir a second of their precious fucking time. And Zahir's a janitor at W.E. A fucking janitor, Jim. I know this because I used to work-"

"As Wayne Security," Jim says dryly, "Yes, you've already told me that tidbit of your life a dozen times already."

Bullock is silent for a long while. Jim winces. Too soon. They resume watching the funeral in silence: two men in trenchcoats, one mourning, the other trying to solve what will soon become one of the greatest mysteries of the twentieth century.

Bruce Wayne looks incredibly small and fragile next to the tall frame of Alfred Pennyworth, the family's butler. Jim studies the man. He doesn’t know what he’s looking for, exactly. What could a man possibly hide in his black penguin suit and side-part haircut, that a week of intensive and thorough police search hasn’t revealed?

Still, he asks, “Pennyworth. He’s got a strong alibi?”

Bullock’s answer is immediate. “Iron-clad. He answered the landline ten minutes after we arrived on the scene. It’s an hour-long drive between here and there. Why- ah, I know what you’re gonna say,” Bullock grimaces. "Alfred's innocent, Jim. He fought alongside Wayne in the war. Wayne is- was- He was a field medic and Alfred received an honorable discharge. They were a tight unit. Saved each other's asses plenty of times. Don’t see why Alfred would kill his friend.”

"They come back from the front," Jim muses out loud, "And suddenly nosy medic Wayne's a billionaire living in a huge mansion, with a beautiful wife and all the fame and respect most of us can only dream of. Meanwhile, purple star Pennyworth is relegated to being a nanny for his pampered kid. Not like the country’s known for its good care of veterans, is it? Having to depend on someone like Wayne for a living, that’s a lot of pride to swallow back," Jim straightens the collar of his coat, feeling the chill. "No reason to make a grab at all that fortune?”

Bullock has turned grey.

"You're talking outta your ass, Gordon," he growls.

Jim wisely drops the subject.

They resume watching the funeral in silence. Jim never understood rich people's compulsion to be buried in their backyards—whether those backyards span forty-two hectares of land is a moot point. Personally, when he dies, he’d rather not inconvenience anyone.

He's not one to judge, usually, but just the thought of a kid like Bruce seeing his parents' grave every time he looked out the window… A shiver runs up his spine. Yeah, just seems in bad taste, to haunt the home you lived in, your ghost waving at those still breathing.

Jesus, all this depressing stuff is making him think like an old man. Jim’s just hit his twenty-fourth birthday, thank you very much.

They should get to work; the Wayne case is going to be arduous, and there haven't been any real leads so far. The media, in absence of anyone to blame, have set their glares on the GCPD. Inept, incapable, useless—they've become both the scapegoat and the laughing stock.

Not that the GCPD had much to boast about before this, Jim thinks nastily. The police force is full of drunkards, wife-beaters, assholes who love throwing their weight around, no better than the dangerous raffle they deal with on the streets. There are a few good ones, brave men and women take their oaths seriously, but they’re a shocking minority compared to the den of crooks that is the Gotham City Police Department.

It’s not long before the silence becomes too awkward for Bullock, who Jim has learned is always quick to anger but quicker to forgive. The older man scratches the stubble on his jaw and says, “Heh, kinda reminds me of our first case. Remember Gator Boy?”

Jim grins, “The scales are hard to forget.”

When Jim transferred from Chicago to Gotham. They assigned him to Harvey Bullock, more than a decade his senior and probably the grungiest man Jim will ever meet. Assigned to, Jim thinks amusedly, when dumped him with the detective would be more accurate, because the man had made his thoughts pretty clear on having a partner. Jim was unwanted, unneeded, a “wet-between-the-ears, bright-eyed punk from chi-town” that needed babysitting.

Not that he should take it personally, they’d assured Jim. Harvey Bullock’s got unresolved issues. Something to do with his past partner.

Nevertheless, orders are orders, and Jim wasn’t going anywhere, so Bullock had to deal with it.

The Jones case was a domestic violence that had turned into a third-degree murder. One night, Mr. Jones had drunk a little too much and tried to kill his son. While trying to protect him, Mrs. Jones had hit her husband with a frying pan. The first blow hadn’t killed the man, merely knocked him out. The second blow had, when his head hit the counter of the dinner table.

The case was already wrapping up-Mrs. Jones won the court hearing on account of self-defense and involuntary manslaughter. He guessed Mr. Jones' long history of leaving bruises on wife and son helped hurry the case-when Bullock and Jim were tasked with their first mission: To find the Jones kid, who’d disappeared the night of his father’s death.

The search didn’t take long. Bullock suggested waiting at the cemetery, but not before letting Jim run around in circles looking for clues and coming up empty-handed. “Now, ya know how tight-lipped Gothamites are,” was all he said. “Information is a form of currency, here. Money for money, Chi-town. You want them to spill their guts, you need to empty your wallet.”

So, they set up watch at the Gotham Cemetery, lurking around Mr. Jones’ grave disguised as visitors. The Jones kid showed up on the second day. Jim had wondered why a father would want to kill his own flesh and blood. Seeing the kid’s face gave him a clue as to why.

Half the kid’s face was overtaken by scales, like an alligator’s. Hence Bullock's clever nickname. Jim had never seen a skin disease like that before.

They’d brought him back to his mother and witnessing her embrace her only child, Jim had had the silent grace to feel a little ashamed thinking that the Jones kid had a face only a mother could love.

(“Sometimes you just wanna make sure,” Bullock shrugged when Jim had asked him how he knew to wait there, taking a swig from a metal flask he carried everywhere.

Jim’s brows furrowed. “Make sure of what?”

“That everything’s buried, for real.” Bullock wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Trust me, Chi-town, you don’t want dead shit coming back to bite you in the arse.”)

"Yeah, the scales," Bullock chuckles, "But I've seen weirder at the circus, and that wasn't make-up either! Ever been to Haley's, Chi-town?"

"Haley's?"

"Haley's Circus. Comes to town every two years. They've got quite a few crazy acts, though you can always trust the Flying Graysons to steal the show. It's a trio of brothers who do these insane trapeze stunts..."

As Bullock launches into a descriptive retelling of Haley's best acts, Jim's gaze involuntarily wanders back to the star of this show: Bruce Wayne. The sight of the little figure in black keeps getting overlaid by the scene in Park Row, that of a little kid holding his baby brother in his arms, in-between their parents' cooling corpses. He remembers the paramedics cleaning the blood (and the tears) on their faces with a wet wipe.

He also remembers passing a tombstone with an epitaph that had caught his eye and refused to leave his mind ever since.

You get to live after us, but not in peace.

...

Afterword: Proud to say that every name mentioned till now is a canon, with the exception of my oc Zahir. Jim Gordon and Harvey Bullock are heavily inspired by their show counterparts (I'm on episode 11 of Gotham, and I'm loving it!)

Umm, I feel like I'm forgetting to mention something... Maybe I'll come back later to edit the afterword when I remember what it was.

As always: only constructive criticism, please, no hate because I don't care.