October 21st, 2024

An adaptation of issue 1 of DC’s “Absolute Batman” series.

Intelligence agent Penford Dyme is abruptly pulled from his five-year pursuit of a high-profile target and sent to Goodnight City after a long absence from the city. He returns to an old safehouse and attempts to call his estranged daughter Julia, who lives in Goodnight, but only gets her voicemail. He opens a secure video call with his handlers, who tell him that he is there to surveil and gather information on a new terrorist group known as the "Party Animals" whose horrific crimes are responsible for a 700 percent increase in the murder rate. Dyme is ordered to observe only and not engage under any circumstances. His superiors also tell him that a vigilante has been operating in the city recently, who he has permission to engage if it proves necessary. Dyme leaves his hideout and sees that his motorcycle has been stolen. The next morning in Crime Alley, blue collar civil engineer Brick Redmond trains on a punching bag at Croc's Gym, the only building still standing on a ruined street. He gets carried away punching the bag as he remembers the day his father died and destroys it. He apologises to the owner of the gym, his childhood friend Keith Croc (a human Vector the Crocodile), and says he'll pay for it the next time he gets paid.

Keith asks him to come to a regular poker game with their old schoolfriends, which Brick hasn't been to in months, but he refuses. Keith then asks if he's at least coming to a town meeting about the Party Animals that night, but Brick ignores him and walks out. The leaders of Goodnight’s crime families meet an adult Fred Jones from Mindy Kaling’s “Velma” (Black Mask), the leader of the Party Animals, on his yacht. They tell Fred to leave town by dawn or they will kill him and his gang, but the villain reveals he has already murdered their soldiers and the gruesomely kills them too. That evening at a town meeting, the people of Goodnight blame Mayor Stanford Pines (Jim Gordon) and the police for their failure to stop the Party Animals, demanding that Stan step down. Dyme watches City Hall from a vantage point and sees the Party Animals approaching. He asks his superiors for permission to engage but they tell him his mission is to observe only, even when Dyme points out that mass casualties are likely. Inside the Hall, Scarlet Redmond (Martha Wayne) tries to calm the people, telling them that this kind of conflict is exactly what the Party Animals want. Suddenly the gang burst in, throwing a smoke grenade. The people dive for cover and Stan tells them that whatever they want, to only deal with him.