#17:The Two Faces of Harvey Dent,Pt 1 (Burchette/Villalobos)

Alfred Pennyworth walked the empty halls of Wayne Manor, an unusual look of concern on his face. His employer was not in the cave, not in his chambers, nor in the den. Yet, he was somewhere in the mansion. Alfred always knew when Master Bruce left, even if he wasn’t told personally.

He made his way up the third floor flight of stairs and into a section of the mansion that hadn’t been used since… well since much happier days. It had been Martha Wayne’s floor, for her many talents and charities that she worked on. Each room had been used for a particular hobby, craft, or an office. Since that tragic night, this floor had only been frequented twice, both by Alfred himself. Very little was left up here, Master Bruce had never stepped foot up here, as far as he had known.

He walked quietly down the long hallway, noticing that the entire floor was due for a good cleaning, when he heard a slight noise from the room at the end of the hall. He stopped, puzzled for a second, and then preceded down to the end of the hall. He picked up a rather expensive antique vase that was sitting on a corner table and raised it over his head as he peered into the room.

Bruce Wayne sat on the floor of his mothers study going through an old trunk that Alfred had remembered leaving there. It was full of memorabilia, but he hadn’t been aware that Bruce had known about it. Of course, it was Bruce Wayne, he should have known better.

“Come in Alfred,” Bruce said without turning around. “I’ve been meaning to go through this stuff for some time now, just hadn’t gotten around to it.”

“I don’t want to disturb you, Sir.”

“There’s a lot of stuff here that goes back on both sides of the family, you know.” He was still not looking at his friend, but his voice was low and husky, something that did not go unnoticed by Mr. Pennyworth.

“Yes Sir. I am aware.” Alfred moved into the room and stood behind him. He could count on one hand, the times that he ever felt uncomfortable around his employer. This would probably be added to them. Yet, he knew Bruce wanted him here, so here was where he would be.

“Did you know my Great Great Grandmother was part of the women’s movement in Gotham to allow women to vote?” Bruce let out a short laugh. “Of course you did. Ironic, isn’t it?”

“What’s that, Master Bruce?”

“I spent my entire life learning all I could about everything that’s out there in the world. To make my job easier for me, and harder for those I hunt. Yet, you know more about me and where I come from, then I probably ever will.”

There was a silence. Alfred Pennyworth was caught off guard and not sure what to say. Finally he cleared his throat, “May I ask what brought you up here to begin with, Sir?”

“Yes, I had remembered that my mother had kept a good luck token up here, for me, when I got older. I was searching for it to give as a gift, at dinner tonight.”

“You and Ms. Vale are going out?”

“We’re double dating with the Dent’s. Kind of surprising since Boss Maroni’s trial begins tomorrow, but Harvey was insistent that we do it. He said his wife doesn’t get out much since they came to Gotham.”

“Very good, Sir. I shall have the limo gassed and ready to go.”

Bruce nodded, but had yet to turn around. After another couple of moments of silence, Alfred turned to leave, when he felt Bruce’s hand on his arm. He turned back to see a very somber face staring directly into his.

“Alfred… you know I could never… I mean… without you…”

“Without me, Sir, you would have no clean cloths, hot food, and you would probably stink up to high heaven if I didn’t drag you out of the cave once in a while.”

They looked at each other and Bruce broke out into a grin. Alfred arched his eyebrow at him, feigning disgust, and then as he turned to leave, a small smile crept over his face.

“So tell me, Gilda, what’s your story?” Vicki Vale asked the wife of Gotham’s D.A., as they sipped champagne.

The young woman smiled shyly, “I don’t understand…”

“Well, we’ve heard about Harvey’s rise to fame tonight, and everyone knows about Bruce, over here, but you’re so quiet and shy, I was just wondering where you came from, your background and all that. Chalk it up to professional curiosity.”

Gilda let out a slight giggle. “Well my life isn’t very interesting, Vicki. I was orphaned as a child and spent most of my years going from one orphanage to the next. Eventually I was out on my own, moved away from Gotham, found and fell in love with Harvey, and moved back when he got the job here. That’s about it.”

“That’s it? Actually sounds like there’s a ton of interesting stuff you may be leaving out. Where did you meet Harvey? What cities have you lived in? What did you do for a living?”

Bruce Wayne wrapped his arm around his girl. “Perhaps, darling, Gilda isn’t found of being given the third degree.”

“What?! I was just trying to learn a little more about our newest friend.”

“Some people like to keep their lives to themselves,” Bruce said smiling, but quickly squeezing Vicki’s shoulder.

The reporter got the message and smiled at the Dents. “I suppose they do. Sorry about that.”

Gilda waved her hand in the air. “Really, it’s no big deal. I’m just not that exciting of a person. However, I do need to use the little girl’s room, and would hate to go alone.”

“Then I am right there with you. We ladies have to keep up the tradition that our mothers passed down to us, you know.” She laughed as she stood up, gave Bruce a wink and walked away with Gilda Dent.

“She is a beautiful woman,” Harvey said of Vicki Vale.

“As is your wife,” Bruce replied. “So, are you ready for tomorrow?”

Harvey leaned back in his chair. “This one is going to be so easy; a ten year old could do it. Thanks in part to Batman’s help finding the assassin and getting him to confess.”

“Hope you have him hidden somewhere safe.”

Harvey nodded, “Only two people know where he is, Gordon and myself… well, and Batman. I was wrong about him when I first got here. I might not approve of his methods all the time, but he’s trying to do right by this city, I can see that now. And thanks to him, this is going to be an open and shut case.”

“Well, just in case, I wanted to give you this,” Bruce said as he pulled a coin out of his pocket. “My mother gave it to me a year before she died. It’s a very rare, two headed coin. She said it would bring me luck. I thought it couldn’t hurt to have it on you.”

“I never took you as a superstitious person?”

“I like to surprise people once in a while,” Bruce said with a slight grin.

Five minutes later the place was swarming with cops. Commissioner Gordon had been woken and was giving orders, when he saw the movement that he was meant to see. After barking out a few more commands he began to make his way past the police and into a side alley. He stood there for less then thirty seconds when he heard the voice behind him.

“Maroni’s got someone on the inside.”

Gordon turned to see just the white eyes in the shadow, “Can’t figure out how. You, me, Dent and the four guys we hand picked knew where he was. All four of the officers seemed spotless, but I’ll put them through the ringer.”

“This is the second time Maroni knew what was going on. He also knew about Thorne’s transfer. And that time, only the three of us knew. The officers had no idea until it was going down.”

“I’ll be watching our witness myself, for the rest of the night. Nobody is going to get to him. He’ll be in court, tomorrow.”

“I know.” Came the short reply, and then the eyes disappeared.

When the recess finished, Harvey Dent called Commissioner James Gordon to the stand. Still using his cane, Gordon walked up and swore the oath, before seating himself into the witness chair.

Harvey Dent’s examination was short and to the point. He gave Gordon the right questions to explain exactly what had happened the night Thorne was murdered. At best, the examination lasted maybe fifteen minutes.

When Russell Smith stepped up, he quickly went over what Gordon had already said, but then out of no where, turned the questioning in a totally different direction.

“How well do you know D.A. Harvey Dent?”

“Objection your honor!”

Russell put his hands up in the air, “You’re honor, if you give me a bit of leeway here, I promise you, I shall make my point rather quickly.”


“I’ll allow it, but do it very quickly, Mr. Smith.”

“Thank you, your honor. Please, Commissioner, answer the question.”

“Harvey and I have a very close professional relationship. We’re both driven to see that Gotham City is cleaned up from the filth that has infected this…”

“Thank you Commissioner. On the night you were moving Rupert Thorne, from his home, to the hotel room, you stated that you kept it quiet, and avoided telling any of the proper authorities, is that correct?”

“That’s what I said, yes.”

“So you and Mr. Dent were the only one’s who knew about this move?”

“Objection again, your honor,” Harvey said jumping up from his table. “We have established all of this.”

The judge caught the look that had passed between Harvey and James Gordon. “Objection, over ruled. You will answer the question, Commissioner.”

He hesitated for a moment and Smith was about to ask the question again when Gordon let out a sigh, “No, there was one other.”

“Who was that? A superior officer, by any chance?”

“No… it was… it was The Batman.”

There was a murmur from the crowd and the judge banged his gavel for silence.

“So you are telling the jury that you chose not to inform your superior officers of the midnight change, to make sure that Thorne was protected, but you did inform a known vigilante?”

Another pause. “Yes.” Came the reply.

“No further questions, your honor.”

“Re-direct?” The judge asked, looking at Dent.

“No further questions at this time,” Harvey said quietly.

After Gordon had stepped down, Harvey took a moment to steel himself and then stood up. “The prosecution calls Gerald Devin to the stand.”

Ten minutes earlier, high up in the rafters of the oldest courtroom in Gotham City, Batman was watching the proceedings closely. Something was amiss, but he wasn’t sure what. It was that feeling that he got, his gut telling him that something was in the air. It was the way Boss Maroni had been acting since they had come back from recess. His right hand was constantly in his suit pocket. Fiddling with something.

When Devin entered the courtroom, Maroni’s demeanor became even more agitated. His instincts kicking in, Batman was now crouched on the rafter, his eyes focused on nothing but the crime boss. So when Devin agreed to unbury every body that Maroni had ever buried and the courtroom erupted into noisy chaos, he was prepared, and saw it happening seconds before anyone else.

Harvey Dent had made his way to the defense table, just as Boss Maroni jumped up, his hand coming out of his suit coat, a jar clasped firmly in his fist; the top was already off as Batman dived toward the defendant. He realized though, that his timing was off, he was going to be too late to stop Maroni from doing whatever it was he was about to do.

His mind racing, Batman grabbed his batarang in mid-air and flung it towards Harvey Dent, allowing it to wrap around the D.A., as Batman held onto the rope at the other end. He gave a quick jerk and Harvey went flying backwards just as the liquid from the jar was thrown at him.

The acid missed its mark and Dent fell to the floor. Batman landed on the defense table and gave Maroni a swift kick that sent him flying backward and over his chair. The courtroom erupted into chaos as people jumped up and began to run out of the room. The two Bailiffs were heading towards the table, but Batman had already swung around and with a giant leap, had taken back to the air and crashed through one of the large windows along the side of the courtroom. He disappeared as quickly as he had entered the room.

The Bailiffs had grabbed Maroni as the judge was screaming for order in the court. It would be twenty minutes, before order would be restored…

Alfred found Batman in the cave, every computer screen on and faces of many of Gotham’s crime bosses appearing in each of them. He was leaning back in his chair, brooding. The pose was one he had seen many times. There was that one last piece of the puzzle missing, that he could not reach, yet.

“Coffee, sir?” He offered.

Bruce said nothing, but nodded. He looked at all the players on the screen, but none of them were making sense. That was when he noticed the silent alarm flashing on the counsel to his right.

He shot up fast, “We’ve got an intruder on the grounds, Alfred. Stay here and I’ll…”

“Not necessary, Sir,” Alfred sighed as he put down the coffee. “That would be our new neighbor’s somewhat precocious thirteen year old son. It seems that he has a keen interest in your fishing pond, as well as most of our grounds. I’ve discussed his ‘dropping in’ with him already, but I shall go have another chat with the young man. I may have to speak to his parents.”

Bruce relaxed a bit. “Just what we need, a junior detective living next door.”

“Still can’t figure it out?” Alfred asked, diverting the discussion back to the problem at hand.

“It’s someone I’m missing, Alfred. Someone who’s had first hand knowledge of everything we’ve been doing. Penguin was my first guess, but there’s no way he would have known about Thorne’s transfer. Nobody knew about that except Jim, Harvey, and myself.”

“… and me, Sir.”

“What?”

Harvey Dent had stopped to by Gilda a dozen roses. What she had witnessed was going to haunt her for a long time, and he needed to reassure her that what had happened was a fluke, not a daily occurrence.

When he walked into the house he was struck by how dark it was. Gilda had always been the kind to leave lights on as she walked through the house, but the only light coming from inside, this night, was in the kitchen.

A light, and voices…

“You’ve got to leave now; it’s not safe for you to be here. You remember what I told you to tell father, though. He was an idiot to try and use that acid on Harvey. It wasn’t meant as a weapon, but as a means of escape. Now it’s going to be harder to break him out.”

Harvey slowed down as he walked through the hall; that was Gilda’s voice.

“I’ll tell him, miss, but he ain’t gonna like hearing it.”

“Too bad, father never liked hearing the truth; stubborn old goat.”

Harvey heard the back door close, but not before he peaked around and saw the guys face who his wife had been talking too. He recognized that face… it was one of Maroni’s goons. Harvey’s world began to turn upside down.

He stepped into the door frame just as his wife turned around. Her eye’s widened, and the phone began to ring.

“What the hell is going on, Gilda?” He asked in a half whisper.

“Harvey… I didn’t expect you to be home… oh dear.”

The phone continued to ring, but neither of them answered it; the machine did, however.

This is the Dent’s residence. We are unable to come to the phone…

“Your father?” Harvey asked, still trying to wrap his head around what he had just heard.

Please leave your name, number, and a brief message, and we will get back to you as soon as possible.

Gilda’s eyes flared, “This is not the way I wanted you to find out, Harvey. Sorry, dear husband.”

”Harvey, this is Commissioner Gordon, are you there? Harvey, pick up, it’s urgent.”

Harvey felt the rage, the anger, the betrayal all flood into him at once. “You! You’ve been the leak this whole time.”

Harvey, we need to talk immediately. I’ve just received information from a mutual friend of ours. Harvey, we need you to come back to the office. I’m sending a car for you.

“You could say that,” Gilda said as she began to slowly move toward the back door. “Or you could really say that you have, now couldn’t you. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to go, Harvey. Daddy and I just wanted you in our pocket, in case we needed you. It would have made Daddy a real big player, to have his own D.A. in his back pocket. And in time you would have, cause we love each other, baby…”

“SHUT UP!” Harvey screamed. “You used me! YOU!!! You lied to me from day one!”

Gilda shrugged. “Well you do mean a lot to me, Harvey, but daddy set this up years ago. Picking just the right guy. Someone we knew would go far, and make it to the top. You think it was a coincidence that you were picked to come here to Gotham? Daddy had to pull a lot of stings, not that your own credentials didn’t help… they did. You’re a smart, smart man, Harvey. You could help daddy make it to the top. You could run this city when he passed on. This could all be yours.”

She had reached the door, but in one quick motion, Harvey was on top of her and tossed her to the side, making sure the door was shut and locked.

“Nobody uses me, anymore. Nobody abuses my trust, ANYMORE!”

Gilda went to get up and he slapped her across the face, hard. She stumbled back, a look of horror covering her face. She was looking into the eyes of a man who had finally snapped, and she knew she was in terrible trouble.

He lunged for her, but she grabbed the door to the basement and swung it open, striking him in the face. As he stumbled back, she ran down the steps. She needed something to protect herself… anything.

Harvey shook off the blow and heard her small sobs as she fled to the basement. He sneered, knowing that there was no way out. Gilda was the final straw. He was done with this life, with this charade. The only woman he had ever truly loved had been playing him, just like all the others. There were no winners when you played the game by the rules that society laid out before you. He was done playing with those rules.

He walked down the steps slowly, deliberately. He wanted her to know he was coming. He wanted her to know that Boss Maroni’s daughter was not going to be saved from this. Her daddy could not protect her.

When he reached the bottom of the steps, he heard a slight movement to his right. He grinned as he turned, his arm raised, but he was not expecting what he saw.

Gilda was standing there, a smug look on her face. In her hand was a jar, not unlike that of which her father had had just hours ago. His eyes widened in realization, but it was too late. He turned to get out of the way, but the acid was already in the air. He felt it hit the side of his face, and he screamed in agony.

“If you can’t join us, baby, then you’ve got to pay. Sorry, daddy’s rules.”

Harvey felt the flesh on the side of his face begin to melt away. The pain as agony, but his rage was stronger. He reached out blindly and found an errant screwdriver that had been lying on his work bench.

The screwdriver flew up in his hand and then came down in her skull. She shook once, and then fell to the ground, dead.

He was gasping from the pain. His one eye was blinded. He was beginning to feel week. He stumbled towards the steps, but before he did, he kicked the body of his dead wife.

“Sorry, Gilda. Harvey Dent doesn’t play by ‘daddy’s rules’. He plays by his own rules from now on.”