Batman and Robin #25

Issue Details

Synopsis

THE BIG BURN  PART TWO: SPARKS Having put Erin McKillen in jail, Commissioner Jim Gordon is obliged to give her a phone call. Rather than call her lawyer, though, McKillen intends to call Bruce Wayne. Before he can ask her to explain why, he begins to notice that a highly corrosive substance is leaking through the ceiling. Worried that lives might have been endangered, Jim leaves McKillen in her cell and rushes to the roof. There, he is disturbed to find that half of the Bat-Signal has been corroded away by acid. Harvey Dent has made his opening statement.   From a vantage point nearby, Two-Face observes his handiwork, waiting for the Batman to show up. Grumpily, Bruce warns that while Harvey might want McKillen dead, she must go through the system that the former DA used to believe in. That way, she can pay for what she did to his wife Gilda, and what she did to him. Harvey responds that these days, he only believes in himself, and everyone pays, eventually. He had planned to go in with guns blazing and take McKillen, but he had a change of mind. Before Batman can take any action against him, Two-Face tosses him a bomb, forcing him to deal with it, rather than come after him.   Some time ago, Erin had attempted to escape prison with the help of her cousin Kieron, but the Batman had interfered. As they sped away in a high-speed chase, Erin ensured that Kieron had brought the acid she'd asked for. The time had come for her to get her revenge, despite Kieron's warnings that they should just get out of town. Grabbing a shotgun, she knocked Batman off his feet, and she demanded to be taken to Harvey Dent's address.   Harvey and his wife Gilda had been preparing to go to a concert that night when Erin and her thugs burst into his office. Since her twin sister Shannon had died, she had lost the person with whom she shared the strongest possible bond, and now she hoped to take the same away from the man who had seen them both convicted. Turning to Gilda, Erin asked the woman if she would die for her husband, and she responded that she would. Putting that to the test, Erin thrust a letter opener into Gilda's chest, prompting Harvey to retaliate. Eventually, though, he ran out of bullets wasted on Erin's mooks, and was knocked unconscious.   Having received Erin's call, Bruce Wayne is unsure of why he was called at all, in lieu of an attorney. Erin responds that she had wanted to reach out to one of her oldest friends. The two of them had spent time in school together, and occasionally romanced, despite the fact that her father had been a mobster, and his a prominent doctor. Bruce rebuffs her attempts to play on their past, and so she explains that she called him because she needs someone to protect her from Harvey Dent, given that the police can't. Bruce Wayne is one of the last, powerful but untainted men in Gotham City, and his connection to Batman Incorporated might afford him the ability to contract her a "dark knight" for protection. Bruce refuses, reminding that Batman Incorporated was dissolved, and angrily, Erin reminds of how he had come to her for help, once. He had wanted help finding Joe Chill, the man who had killed his parents. As their exchange grows more vitriolic, Jim Gordon is forced to rush in and pull them apart, ordering that McKillen be placed at Blackgate Penitentiary until her trial.   There, Erin is soon set upon by the other inmates who have been tasked by Two-Face with killing her, and giving him proof. Though she fights back, they soon overwhelm her. Fortunately for her, the arrival of Matches Malone signals that McKillen is protected, and they'd best leave her alone. Naturally, they decide it would be best to kill him too. This is an unfortunate choice for them. Fighting their way out together, Matches and McKillen leave the inmates to fight with the prison's riot squad while they escape to an empty cell where he has prepared some C-4 to blast through the wall. Confused, McKillen demands to know who hired him, but he chooses not to reply, instead injecting her with a sedative, and leaping into the river surrounding the prison. From there, Alfred collects them in the Bat-Sub.   Erin McKillen wakes from her sleep in an unfamiliar home, which Bruce Wayne explains is Wayne Manor.