February 3, 1989. Around nine in the evening.
Back in his small apartment in East Gotham, Gordon returns home after another workday. He's happy, because at home his wife and child await him, and the long day hasn't made them miss him any less. Entering the apartment with a call of "Honey, I'm home!", Gordon takes off his street clothes, hangs up his bag, and after changing into his home clothes—a red, green, and white short-sleeved shirt and black sweatpants—he heads to the kitchen, where pea soup is already waiting for him.
Barbara Gordon: "It's cooled off a bit. I'll make you some tea now, was waiting for you to get back."
James Gordon, sitting at the table and starting on his dinner: "Junior is asleep already?"
Barbara Gordon: "Put him down earlier today. He's had a fever since lunch. Not a criminal one, but if he's not better by tomorrow, I'll take him to the clinic," she says, setting a cup of black tea in front of her husband.
James Gordon: "Well, best wishes to him."
Barbara Gordon, sitting across from him at the table: "I wish. How your day was anyway? Did they really take you off that Bat-Man hunt?"
James Gordon: "Just moved to backup duty."
Barbara Gordon: "Sad. Imagine the fame if you were the one to turned him down."
James Gordon: "Well, life goes on. I'll have time for fame yet, with or without Bat-Man."
Barbara Gordon: "Jim, you're forty-one. At your age, cops are already coasting toward retirement after a glorious career. And you're a lieutenant with nothing of accolades at that age. No offense."
James Gordon: "No, no, you're right. But things are looking up. Everything will sort itself out soon—my job, us. I promise, honey."
Barbara Gordon: "You promised me the same when you said Gotham wasn't so bad. You didn't see the conditions I was in at that maternity ward. In Chicago, a place like that would've been shut down."
James Gordon: "Still, that doesn't change what I said. Everything will work out for us, I promise. Just give me a little time."
Barbara Gordon: "It's not about time, Jim. In fifteen years on the force, you haven't exactly grabbed any stars. And now you think in the next five years your pockets will burst from fame? I'm sorry, dear, but you'd need a miracle to save you. And you already had one, before they took you off the lead."
James Gordon: "Honey, there's still time ahead. I'll get another miracle for sure, you have my word."
Barbara Gordon: "It's not even about a miracle, dear. … Listen, one thing. If your miracle does happen, the first thing we do is go back to Chicago, okay?"
James Gordon: "Barbara, I'd love to, but you know how it is. I have a job progressing here. Future friends and colleagues are waiting for me."
Barbara Gordon: "You already have all that in Chicago. Listen, you don't owe these people anything, Jim. Just don't get too attached to them if you don't want to end up as messed up as they are."
James Gordon, after a small pause: "Thanks, honey. … You know, sorry I missed Junior's birthday."
Barbara Gordon: "Oh, forget it. You were held up at work, it wasn't your fault."
James Gordon: "You know, I actually wanted to say…"
The sound of a telephone ringing echoes through the house. Gordon starts to get up to answer it, but Barbara beats him to it.
Barbara Gordon: "Sit and eat. I'll see who it is." Picking up the phone, Barbara talks for about twenty seconds, then calls to the kitchen. "Jim, it's for you! Work!"
Gordon gets up from the chair, leaving his unfinished soup and tea on the table, and goes to the phone.
James Gordon, on the phone: "Yeah? … What,now? … Oh, damn. … Where? … Got it. Yeah, I'll be there soon." Then he hangs up.
Barbara Gordon: "What is it?"
James Gordon: "Heist at the port, they're calling everyone in urgently. Stole some very valuable cargo."
Barbara Gordon: "Couldn't they have picked a better time for a robbery?"
James Gordon, starting to get ready: "You know how it is, dear. All the Gotham scum wakes up at night."
Barbara Gordon: "Guess I'm waiting up for you till morning again."
James Gordon: "Not tonight. It's only about a ten-minute to the port, and it's all small-time work there. Cordon, evidence, the usual stuff."
Barbara Gordon: "Keep in mind, I'm not reheating your soup and tea again."
James Gordon: "Don't worry, they sure won't have time to get cold."
Barbara Gordon: "Did you want to say something about missing our son's birthday?"
James Gordon: "Nothing important, just wanted to apologize. Okay, I'm off." He says, kissing his wife on the cheek and leaving the house.
A little later, around midnight. About three miles west of Gotham Port. From this distance, you could see the police flashers coming from the port—they were especially noticeable from the rooftops where nothing blocked the view. Watching the cluster of police cars from this distance, Bat-Man was just waiting for at least the majority of them to disperse so he could examine the crime scene himself.
Getting ready to move closer for a better look, he heard a man's cry for help from a neighboring abandoned building. Descending to the ground, he entered the building through a first-floor window, but inside was empty, just a vacant lobby with a stairwell, one side leading to upper floors with empty apartments, the other to the basement.
Walking up the stairs to the second floor and stopping halfway, he hears a sound coming from the basement, a faint creak. A second later, an entire squad—four men of armed SWAT—spills out from the basement. A police ambush.
After the stairs shield him from the first shots, he retreats to the second floor, then fires his grapple between the stairwells, quickly ascending from the second floor to the fourth. Seemingly having shaken the SWAT team, another squad of SWAT—again four men—spills out from an empty apartment.
His first move is to jump down a floor and hang from the underside of the stairwell. He looks at a window on this floor, but seeing the frame is metal, the glass panes are too small for him, and it's boarded up, his plan changes by necessity. Hearing the SWAT team approaching from both floors above and below, he takes a smoke grenade from a compartment on his belt and tosses it into the gap between the stairwells, letting the smoke fill both floors at once, obscuring the view for both SWAT squads. Next, he draws four of his bat-shaped throwing weapons at once and, throwing all four simultaneously, each hits its mark, striking precisely the barrels of the assault rifles belonging to the SWAT team coming from the lower floors. Seizing the moment, he drops between the stairs to the first floor, emerging onto the street in a small alley.
Inside the building, the SWAT squad drops their rifles and draws their backup pistols, pursuing him. Outside, realizing he has little time, he decides to grapple onto the building's façade to reach the roof, but the moment he draws the grapple, his plan changes again. Knowing the second SWAT squad with functional weapons has already gone to the roof to intercept him, he glances at the nearest sewer grate at the other end of the alley. Realizing he won't have time to reach it, he takes another smoke grenade and tosses it directly onto the grate. As the SWAT team reaches the street, they open fire with their pistols into the smoke, unaware their target is now clinging to the building façade behind them. Hearing footsteps and realizing the SWAT team is descending from the roof to the first floor, he climbs onto the now-empty roof, where there's no one left to intercept him.