Work Text:
Hello Signora Maria.
Please, do not open this door and call the police.
There’s been an unread notification on the Batcomputer for days.
To be fair, it’s been a very busy few days, with the holidays in full swing and half the Bats on one mission or another outside the country—or even off the planet.
I am very sorry for the smell, but I was afraid of drowning in the port and I'm scared of very dark places. The other things didn't really work out, and I really liked this house, the bathtub is big and comfortable.
The notification wasn’t even anything too special; it’s buried among other non-urgent notifications about possible connections that popped up in the automated system. This particular one alerted of a DNA sample that had been identified as having been entered into the GCPD’s systems for a case and subsequently archived.
Bruce finally has some time to himself, so he’s decided to check out some old cases where new potential leads have emerged through the GCPD’s investigations.
I already paid for someone to clean the whole bathroom and to change the bathtub and the plumbing if damaged, for someone to take my body (if it’s anything left at the time I get found), cremate it (I don't want to have anything left, just in case) and dump it in the gotham bay.
There isn’t much. It was expected—rarely do small, old crimes have enough evidence to go on—so for now he’s limited himself to filing away the evidence. Tim loves solving small crimes with no evidence in his spare time, and it’ll be great practice for everyone else—or a fun competition between brothers, just like his kids enjoy doing.
It’s unusual for the GCPD to investigate a clear-cut suicide case; usually, the victim tells you everything—who they are and why they did it—in their letter. This one, though, is different.
The rest of the money I have has been donated, as well as every furniture and thing I owned, it wasn't much, but I won't need anything anyway.
In the manila folder on the kitchen counter there is all the info on who to contact for the services i already paid for.
The victim paid for all the postmortem services and even for the cleanup and renovation of the crime scene, this is unusual per se.
The victim used names of people who do not exist to pay for those services, and the GCPD was unable to identify them after a week of investigation.
The body was not found until 9 weeks after the victim’s death, and there was not much left of the body to properly identify.
To the officer that will read this, there is no meaning in searching for who I am, I never went to the dentist, my fingerprints have been burned and scratched years ago and my DNA isn't in any of your systems. It's been years since I had a real identity, I don't even remember the last time someone called me by my name. Sometimes I have to call myself when I'm alone just to remind myself that I have a name. For many, I don't even exist. Legally, I don't exist. I forgot how old I was years ago.
The autopsy revealed that the skeleton had many bones that were fractured and had healed in a “clearly abnormal manner and time,” and the medical examiner speculates that prior to death, the victim suffered from severe chronic pain and had a slight limp. The medical examiner also identified the victim as a man between the ages of 20 and 35, with a stocky build but who had lost a significant amount of weight in a short period of time, likely in the weeks leading up to his death.
I don't have a family, I don't have friends, I don't have coworkers, no one will search for me and no one will notice I'm gone. I haven't talked to any living person in the last 6 weeks other than the cashier two weeks ago. I'm not a good person, I did many bad things in my life, many say I've never done anything good. I have to agree with them. Still, I don't regret even half of what I did.
The cause of death was attributed to a gunshot wound fired from just below the chin; the direction and number of fractures suggest that death was not instantaneous—by a matter of just a few centimeters—but that the victim remained alive, if not conscious, for at least half an hour.
I have wanted to do this for years now, I feel like I have wanted to do this since I was born.
This isn’t the first—and it won’t be the last—suicide case Bruce has dealt with. Unfortunately, that’s just how life is in Gotham. Still, reading the letter gave him a strange sense of unease. The poor man clearly didn’t have a good life; he was likely trapped in some criminal gang or mafia family, given how detached his entire identity seemed from him. Maybe even ended up in some fighting ring, considering the amount of fracture the forensic found.
Cases like this make Bruce feel as if being Batman will never be enough and Gotham will never get better.
All the documents in that manila folder are under different names, all fake. I don't have a real identity.
I wish I had.
Among the evidence on file, in addition to the blood sample, there are the letter left on the bathroom door by the victim; copies of receipts for the services paid for before his death, mentioned in the letter; the body camera footage of the officers who went to the scene after receiving a call from a woman—the victim’s neighbor—and her son, who, after entering the home to make sure everything was okay, thinking the smell was coming from moldy food or a dead animal that went in through an open window, opened the door using a spare key after the insistence of the other residents of the building; several photos of the crime scene and the nearly empty apartment and the test results.
Apparently, the victim barely spent any time at home, and when he did he was always alone, so it wasn’t unusual not to see him for weeks; plus, the house was old, so strong odors were almost the norm, that’s why no one called until so many weeks later.
And this is exactly where Bruce plans to start. Apparently, the victim’s blood has been identified in the Batcomputer’s system; he’s likely a petty criminal who’d already served his jail time and faced subsequent problems, or, as Bruce thought, a victim of a previous case.
And truly, I am no one special, I didn't do anything worthy in my life and my death won't affect anything at all.
You can try, but I doubt you'll find someone that doesn't exist, and frankly, it's just a waste of time.
Bruce launches the DNA recognition program and decides to take a shower in the meantime; maybe he’ll also call Tim, who will surely be interested in identifying the victim and solving this unusual case. Bruce congratulates himself on the idea of some quality time with one of his son and turns away.
Fifteen minutes later,while Bruce is still under the shower, the program finishes the scan and opens a window with the results.
I'll always be nothing but a soldier anyway
Match found: 100% Jason Peter Todd.