Startled guards shouted and cursed, the sound muffled by the water. Automatic weapons blared loudly. Bullets slammed into Gordon’s body, tearing through flesh and bone. Searing jolts of pain rocked him from head to toe. He screamed beneath the water.

No! Gordon thought. I have to get away…sound the alarm.

Crimson foam spread atop the water. The current cleared it away.

Bane gazed down into the flowing river. His unworthy minion, who had been imprudent enough to bring Gordon into their base of operations in the first place, stared at the channel, as well.

“He’s dead,” the fool insisted, as though that might somehow excuse his poor judgment. The smell of gunfire hung in the air. The body of his comrade still rested on the ground, just a few feet away. “He has to be.”

Bane tucked Gordon’s papers into his belt, so that he could examine them at his leisure. His mind raced with ways he might put these revelations to use.

He spoke to the terrified man.

“Then show me his body.”

“That water flows to any one of outflows,” the man protested. “We’d never find him.”

Bane considered the problem. He turned to his lieutenant, Barsad. The loyal soldier had fought beside him in so many conflicts over the years, all around the world. He owed Bane his life a dozen times over.

“Give me your GPS,” the masked leader demanded.

Barsad handed over the unit, and Bane tucked it into the terrified stooge’s leather jacket. He zipped the jacket up like a doting mother sending a child off to school. He patted the jacket to make sure the GPS unit was secure.

“Follow him,” he said.

The worthless fool stared at him with an utter lack of comprehension.

“Follow?”

Bane drew his gun and shot the man between the eyes.

The body dropped to the floor. Bane kicked it over the edge of the platform and into the turbulent water, then watched as the current carried the corpse in the same direction as Gordon. He turned and again addressed Barsad.

“Track him,” Bane instructed him. “Make sure both bodies will not be found. Then brick up the south tunnel.”

Barsad hurried to carry out his orders. Bane took out Gordon’s papers and leafed through them again. If the pages were to be believed, they were easily worth the lives of any number of men. He welcomed the fortuitous turn of events that had brought them into his possession.

Fate, it appeared, was on his side.

* * *

The sewage treatment plant looked uglier by night. Blake pulled up to the gate and flashed his badge at the puzzled security guard, who let him through. Ross was off-duty, at home with wife and kids, but Blake was putting in some unpaid overtime. Playing a hunch, he parked his vehicle and raced for the basin where Jimmy’s body had washed up earlier.

This was a long shot, Blake knew, and he was already dreading the prospect of finding Gordon’s body in the same state as Jimmy’s, but anything was better than standing around wondering if the commissioner was still alive. He had to believe that Gordon had survived the underground explosion. Gotham still needed him.