Illusiveone - Chapter 338: Redoing My Life

I will leave this chapter up but i plan to rewrite it and post it along with other updates this weekend.

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“We have to move forward with this as soon as possible, Daniel,” Ted Sarandos said.

We had left T-Mobile Arena after the fight and ended up at the Bellagio with several Netflix executives. Heath walked beside me on the other side while Ted continued talking about Red Dead Redemption.

“I even picked out the main guy for you,” I said, gesturing toward Heath. “I think we’re already pretty far ahead.”

Ted laughed. “I suppose we are.”

Getting Heath interested had been easier than I expected. I had sent him the complete treatment, and he called me after reading it to say he wanted the role. Arthur appealed to him for more than the obvious reasons. Heath loved playing the Joker, but the character was what he was known for now, and the Joker fandom was quite large. Between The Dark Knight, Batman Part III, and now Suicide Squad, there were millions of people who simply saw Heath Ledger and immediately thought of the Joker.

Arthur Morgan would give him something completely different, and I was convinced Heath could make it extraordinary.

Honestly, if we did the entire series properly, Red Dead Redemption could become one of the best television shows ever made.

Judging by the Netflix executives surrounding us, they thought so too.

They were practically salivating over it.

“I think we can talk actual business next week,” I said as we entered one of the Bellagio restaurants. “I’m glad you and everyone else liked the treatment.”

“Liked is understating it.”

We were shown to a private table, and as everyone settled in, another idea came back to me.

“Actually, Ted, I have something else you might like eventually. I got the idea after buying Arsenal.”

Ted looked interested.

“It’s a comedy about an American football coach who gets hired to manage a Premier League club despite knowing almost nothing about soccer. He’s in the wrong sport, in the wrong country, and everyone expects him to fail. The joke at first is that he’s hilariously unqualified, but he’s genuinely good with people, so over time he starts holding the team together even though he still barely understands what half the rules mean.”

“That actually sounds fun. I didn’t know you were interested in writing comedy.”

“Oh, I’m not saying I should write it.”

He laughed.

“It’s an idea. We put better comedy writers on it and let them build something around the concept.”

Heath nodded. “Probably wise.”

“But let’s focus on Red Dead first.”

Dinner stretched on for another hour. Most of the conversation remained centered on Red Dead Redemption, although Ted also spent a considerable amount of time trying to convince Heath to do a Netflix film.

Heath eventually laughed and raised his hands.

“You’re already getting three seasons of television out of me.”

“I’m thinking long term,” Ted said. “I’m getting ahead of the competition.”

We also talked about The Penguin, which had premiered four weeks earlier and was performing better than Netflix had initially projected. Audience response had been strong, completion rates were excellent, and the discussion had already shifted toward awards prospects.

Eventually, we were done and getting ready to leave.

We hugged, shook hands, and the Netflix group gradually peeled away until Heath and I were alone, walking through the hotel.

“I still don’t really like Netflix,” Heath said. “They would happily get rid of cinemas tomorrow if they could.”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

“I would.”

I smiled. “Well, as long as I’m around, anything that deserves a theatrical release is getting one. I’ve been trying to change the culture there on that for years.”

Heath shoved his hands into his pockets. “Everyone is starting one of these things now.”

“Sure, but Netflix is the biggest. If they prove streaming and theatres can coexist instead of pretending one has to murder the other, that helps.”

We spent another half hour together before Heath finally had to leave. He was in the middle of the Suicide Squad promotional tour and had a flight ahead of him, with Margot joining him in Australia in two days.

I was preparing to leave as well when I heard someone call my name.

“Daniel!”

I turned.

Vincent Moretti, an acquaintance of mine, was making his way toward me through the casino floor.

Stan and Jacob, two of my bodyguards, immediately shifted closer. Vincent noticed them but kept approaching, and I gave both men a small wave to let them know it was fine.

“Vince.”

“Danny, old boy.” Vincent grinned and embraced me briefly. “I didn’t know you were here. If I had known, I would’ve invited you earlier.”

“Oh?”

“There’s a private game upstairs.”

That explained the enthusiasm.

Vincent lowered his voice slightly.

“Good table. Very good table. You want in?”

Stan gave me a look.

I checked the time.

I had nowhere particularly urgent to be until morning.

“Sure. Why not?”

Vincent slapped me on the shoulder.

“That’s what I like to hear.”

He led me away from the main casino and toward a private section of the hotel. Stan and Jacob remained close behind me as we reached the room.

The poker table inside was already occupied.

I recognized Dana White immediately. Jerry Bruckheimer was there too, sitting with a drink beside his chips and talking to a man I didn’t know. A couple of the others looked vaguely familiar, though I couldn’t place their names.

Then there was the most Russian-looking man I had ever seen in my life.

I knew him.

Or at least I had played poker with him once before in New York sometime last year.

Dmitri?

Dimitri?

Something like that.

I walked over and sat down after greeting everyone.

Dana White was two seats to my left, already talking with the man beside him while a drink sat untouched near his elbow. Jerry Bruckheimer sat across from me, looking far more relaxed than I expected, and beside him was Dmitri Volkov.

A man named Raymond Kessler sat beside Dmitri. The last three were Marcus White, founder of a private-equity firm based in New York; Steven Gerald, who had made most of his fortune in software; and Howard Levinson, a hotel and property developer who owned enough real estate throughout Nevada and Arizona to make me wonder if he was trying to collect the entire Southwest.

Eight players.

Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars each to buy in.

Two million dollars on the table before the first card was dealt.

Dana looked toward my stack of chips.

“Not having second thoughts, are you, Adler?”

I glanced at him. “About what?”

He pointed toward the chips.

“That’s a lot of money for your first serious game.”

I laughed. “Dana, I’ve played with more money than you’ve ever seen.”

That earned a few laughs around the table.

The dealer announced the opening blinds.

One thousand.

Two thousand.

I looked down at my first hand.

Seven-four offsuit.

I folded.

The next hand wasn't much better.

Fold.

Then another.

Fold.

For the first twenty minutes, I barely participated beyond putting in the blinds and occasionally staying around long enough to see the next cards.

That did not go unnoticed.

Raymond glanced toward me after I folded yet another hand.

"Adler, are you planning on actually playing tonight?"

"What do you think I've been doing?"

"You've folded six hands in a row."

I thought about it.

"Well... seven."

He laughed.

Dana shook his head. "Jesus Christ. You own half of Hollywood and you're afraid to lose a hundred grand."

"That's why I own half of Hollywood."

Dana was apparently one of the biggest whales in Vegas, and several of the others were seasoned high-stakes poker players.

I focused on the thing I was good at, which was reading people.

It did not take long to notice a few things.

Marcus talked constantly whenever he was uncertain about a hand, filling the silence with stories about business, money, or whatever else happened to enter his head. When he had something strong, he became quieter.

Dana was aggressive regardless of what he held and seemed to enjoy forcing everyone else to make uncomfortable decisions.

Raymond was worse in a different way. He hated backing down. Once somebody challenged him, pride started mattering almost as much as the cards.

Dmitri gave me absolutely nothing.

That was irritating.

I continued playing carefully. I won a couple of decent pots, lost around forty thousand on another hand, and after the first hour found myself up roughly twenty thousand dollars.

Essentially nothing at this table.

Dana looked at my stack.

"All this waiting for twenty grand?"

"Just warming up, Dana."

"You're boring, Adler."

The dealer began another hand.

I looked down.

Ace of spades.

Eight of spades.

Good enough to stay in.

Marcus raised to ten thousand.

Everyone else gradually folded until it came back to me.

I called.

The next three cards appeared.

King.

Ten.

Four.

Nothing useful.

I checked.

Marcus pushed twenty-five thousand forward.

"...so this idiot calls me last week and tells me we need to completely restructure the financing because apparently somebody suddenly discovered interest rates exist."

I almost smiled.

Still talking.

I called.

The next card gave me a chance at a flush.

Marcus bet fifty thousand.

And kept telling his story.

I called again.

Dana looked between us.

"Oh, now he's playing."

Marcus smiled.

The final card came down.

Nothing.

I had missed the flush completely.

Marcus glanced at the table and continued talking as though the card barely interested him.

Then he checked.

Interesting.

I looked at him for several seconds.

He wasn't strong.

At least, I didn't think he was.

The problem was that I wasn't either.

I had ace-high and absolutely nothing else.

So there were two choices.

Give up.

Or lie.

I counted out the chips.

"One twenty-five."

That finally shut Marcus up.

The room became noticeably quieter.

Marcus stared at the chips, then at me.

Dana leaned back in his chair.

Jerry looked amused.

Marcus reached toward his stack.

Stopped.

Then reached again.

He wanted to fold.

I could see that much.

The question was whether he could convince himself I was bluffing. 

Marcus picked up several chips and held them for a few seconds.

"Fuck."

He dropped them back onto his stack.

"Fold."

I waited a moment.

Then I turned over my cards.

Ace-eight.

Nothing.

Dana's eyes widened.

"You motherfucker."

I laughed.

Jerry shook his head. "That's dirty."

Marcus stared at my cards as though I had personally insulted him.

Dana pointed toward me.

"That's bullshit. You've been sitting there playing like a fucking accountant for an hour, and then you pull that?"

I gathered the chips toward me.

"Like I said, just warming up."

The game continued, and Lady Luck seemed determined to stay on my side. The cards started coming my way often enough that the table’s attitude toward me changed almost as quickly as my chip stack. The jokes about me folding everything disappeared, Dana stopped announcing whenever I finally entered a hand, and even Jerry began watching me more carefully whenever I pushed money into the middle.

That also made things harder.

A few hours later, the stacks looked very different from when we had started. Dana and Marcus had both bought back in at least once, while Raymond and I had taken most of the biggest pots and i was thinking of leaving.

Raymond and I had been building the pot for several minutes.

I looked down at the board.

Queen of clubs. Nine of diamonds. Four of spades. Six of hearts.

The river came.

Two of clubs.

Nothing particularly threatening.

Raymond checked.

I looked at him, then at the enormous pile of chips already sitting between us. He had stayed with me through every bet, and judging by the way he was watching me now, he still had something he liked.

More importantly, he remembered Marcus.

I counted out the rest of my stack and pushed it forward.

“All in.”

Raymond’s expression changed.

Dana leaned back in his chair.

“Oh, shit.”

Raymond stared at me. “How much?”

The dealer counted it.

“A little over seven hundred thousand.”

For the first time all night, Raymond looked genuinely uncomfortable. He leaned back and studied me for several seconds, and I could almost see him replaying the bluff against Marcus in his head.

He looked down at his cards again, then at the board, then back toward me.

I said nothing.

Raymond finally exhaled through his nose and pushed the chips forward.

“Call.”

I turned over my cards.

Pocket aces.

Raymond stared at them.

His expression went completely blank before he very slowly turned over his own hand.

Pocket kings.

For half a second, nobody said anything.

Then Dana exploded out of his chair.

“Jesus fucking Christ!”

The dealer pushed the enormous pile toward me.

I watched the stacks build in front of my seat while Raymond sat there staring at the table.

Dana shook his head.

“You lucky bastard.”

I started pulling the chips toward me.

“It’s what I keep telling people. Midas touch.”

“Fuck off.”

I laughed and looked at the time.

“Actually, gentlemen, I think that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

Dana stared at me.

“You’re leaving now?”

“Absolutely.”

“After that hand?”

“Especially after that hand.”

I stood and signaled for someone to arrange the cash-out.

I shook a few hands before leaving the private room. Raymond accepted mine with considerably less enthusiasm than everyone else.

“At least you won this time, boss,” Stan said as we moved away from the table.

I glanced at him.

“This time? When was the last time I lost?”

He gave me a look.

“The last three times back home, remember?”

I frowned.

“What last three times?”

“The three times you lost more than a hundred grand.”

“Oh.”

There had been those.

“Right. Yeah.”

Stan remained quiet for several steps.

I looked at him.

“What?”

“Daniel, I’ve been working for you for nearly six years now.”

“I know.”

“And I like you. You’re a good kid.”

He looked directly at me.

“I think you’re starting to have a gambling problem.”

I frowned.

“No, I don’t.”

“Yes, you do.”

“Stan, I play poker sometimes. That doesn’t mean I have a problem.”

“You play a lot more than you did two years ago.”

“So?”

“And the games keep getting bigger.”

“I can afford them.”

“That’s not the point.”

“It seems like a pretty important point when we’re discussing gambling.”

Stan shook his head.

“No. It makes it easier for you to ignore the problem.”

I started walking again, and he followed.

“You’re not missing rent because you lose a hundred thousand dollars. You’re not selling your car. You’re not borrowing money from people. You could lose half a million tonight and wake up tomorrow richer than almost everyone you’ll ever meet.”

“Exactly.”

“That’s why it can get worse before you even notice.”

That made me glance at him.

Stan continued.

“I’ve watched people fall into this before. A hundred thousand becomes normal. Then half a million becomes normal. Then one night they’re sitting somewhere wondering why winning two million doesn’t feel as good as it used to.”

I didn’t particularly like how specific that sounded.

“I don’t gamble that much.”

Stan pointed toward the bar in the room.

“See that guy at the bar?”

I followed his finger toward a well-dressed man speaking quietly with two others.

“Who is he?”

“One of the people who runs private games all around the country. Not this one specifically, but others like it.”

“So?”

“They invite athletes, actors, foreign businessmen, hedge-fund guys, tech guys. People who can lose two or three million dollars and barely notice the difference.”

I looked back toward the man.

“They’re looking for whales.”

“Exactly.”

Stan lowered his voice.

“Some games are clean. Some aren’t. Some are designed to keep the right person drinking and playing until they make stupid decisions. Some have people working together at the table. Sometimes it’s less complicated than that.”

I stared at him.

“I’m not telling you never to gamble again. I’m telling you to slow down and actually think about how much you’re doing it.”

“I have it under control.”

“If you don’t slow down, boss, I’m telling the missus.”

“Whoa, whoa. Let’s not go that far, Stan.”

Stan’s expression remained perfectly serious.

“And maybe the big missus too.”

It took me half a second.

“Mom?”

Jacob looked away, clearly trying not to laugh.

“Come on, Stan. You can’t threaten me with my mother.”

“Just think about it, boss. That’s all I’m asking. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong. But I’ve known you long enough to notice when something changes.”

I looked between the two of them.

Jacob nodded.

“Dammit.”

Neither said anything.

“Fine. I’ll keep it in mind.”

Stan seemed satisfied.

“Thank you.”

I pointed back toward the private gaming area.

“Jacob, make sure they wire the winnings properly.”

We started toward the exit.

Gambling problem.

Me?

Playing poker occasionally didn’t mean I had a gambling problem.

Sure, I had played more over the last couple of years.

And the stakes had gotten larger.

And apparently I had lost more than a hundred thousand dollars three separate times recently without even immediately remembering all of them.

I frowned.

Did I?

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The Penguin

(The plot is the same, but changes have been made to fit it into this DCU.) 

The first episode of The Penguin began in the aftermath of The Batman Part III. Riddler's campaign had destabilized Gotham on almost every level. The Dent Act had fallen, corruption investigations were spreading through the city's government and police department, Batman had publicly returned after years away, and the assassination of crime lord Rex Calabrese had left much of Gotham's underworld without a clear leader.

Oswald Cobblepot was already wealthy through the Iceberg Lounge and several other criminal businesses, but he had spent most of his life working beneath men from Gotham's old families. Rex's death presented Oz with the opportunity he had always wanted to become something more than another useful employee.

Oz met Alberto Falcone, one of the last prominent members of the old Falcone organization, who intended to exploit Rex's death and restore his family's position in Gotham. During a drunken argument, Alberto mocked Oz's ambitions and reminded him that, regardless of how much money he had accumulated, he remained little more than a nightclub owner who had spent his life serving more important men. Oz lost his temper and impulsively shot him dead.

Once the anger passed, Oz immediately understood what he had done. Killing Alberto could bring the remaining Falcones down on him, so he disposed of the body and began constructing a plan to make the murder appear connected to the Maronis. While moving Alberto's body, he caught Victor Aguilar, an impoverished young criminal, attempting to steal from him. Rather than killing Victor, Oz recognized the same desperation and ambition he had possessed when he was younger and recruited the boy as his driver.

At the same time, Sofia Falcone returned to Gotham after being released from Arkham. The collapse of several cases connected to corrupt city officials had opened the door for her release, and almost immediately, she began searching for her missing brother. She encountered Oz at the Iceberg Lounge, where he pretended to know nothing about Alberto's disappearance despite the uncomfortable history between them.

Victor eventually helped Oz complete the framing operation. Alberto's body was discovered with evidence deliberately pointing toward Maroni-connected criminals, and the murder triggered the first serious retaliatory violence between Gotham's remaining factions.

The second episode followed that violence as former Calabrese crews, Falcone loyalists, and Maroni-connected gangs began attacking one another. Oz quietly played all sides while Victor became increasingly involved in his operations and learned how Gotham's criminal economy actually functioned.

Sofia, meanwhile, began rebuilding what remained of the Falcone organization. Former family captains, soldiers, and businessmen returned to her, although many were reluctant to accept a woman who had spent years in Arkham as the new head of the family. Oz offered to help her reclaim the businesses that had been lost after Carmine's death. Sofia clearly distrusted him, but she also understood his value.

Flashbacks revealed the history between them. Years earlier, Sofia had begun investigating evidence suggesting that her father, Carmine Falcone, had murdered several women, including her own mother. Oz discovered what she was doing and informed Carmine, believing he was protecting his position within the organization. Carmine responded by framing his daughter and having her committed to Arkham, where she remained for years.

In the present, Sofia confronted Oz about what he had done. Oz insisted he had never imagined Carmine would go that far and argued that her father would eventually have discovered the investigation regardless of whether he had spoken. Sofia did not forgive him, but she agreed that working together remained useful.

The episode ended with Sofia revealing something she had learned during her imprisonment. Arkham inmates and doctors had experimented extensively with fear toxins and other psychoactive compounds, and she believed Scarecrow's toxin could be altered into something very different.

A drug.

Episode Three followed the creation of what they eventually named Bliss.

Sofia could arrange production through contacts she had retained from Arkham and the Falcone family's chemical operations, while Oz possessed everything required to actually sell it.

The partnership became enormously profitable.

While Sofia concentrated on restoring the prestige and political influence of the Falcone name, Oz quietly ensured that many of the dealers, distributors, and criminal intermediaries involved in Bliss answered directly to him rather than to her. Sofia believed they were rebuilding the Falcone empire together, while Oz was slowly constructing an organization that could survive without the Falcones at all.

At the same time, the Maronis finally discovered that Oz had manipulated them into a war and moved against the Bliss operation. Oz and Sofia were captured during an ambush, only for Victor to arrive and create an opportunity for escape. Oz reached the vehicle first and had enough time to return for Sofia.

He did not.

He ordered Victor to keep driving.

Sofia watched them disappear while Maroni gunmen closed in around her.

The following episode shifted primarily into Sofia's perspective and showed the events that had led to her imprisonment in Arkham. She had endured years of isolation, forced medication, psychological abuse, and experimental treatments, while most of her family either abandoned her or actively supported Carmine's version of events. Alberto had been one of the few people who continued to believe her, visiting whenever he could and refusing to accept that his sister had simply gone insane.

By the time Sofia was released, almost everyone responsible for destroying her life had either died, disappeared, or moved on.

In the present, she survived her captivity with the Maronis and discovered evidence suggesting that the conflict surrounding Alberto's death had been deliberately manufactured. Rather than simply accepting that the Maronis had killed her brother, Sofia began tracing his movements on the night he disappeared.

The trail eventually led back to Oz.

For Sofia, the betrayal was worse because Alberto had been the one member of her family who had remained loyal throughout her years in Arkham.

She did not confront Oz immediately.

Instead, Sofia returned to the remaining Falcone leadership and quietly began preparing for war.

Episode Five opened with that war already underway. Sofia launched coordinated attacks across Oz's organization, sending Falcone soldiers against Bliss laboratories, warehouses, distribution points, and shipments while simultaneously pressuring politicians, police officers, dock officials, and businessmen who had been working with him. Oz attempted to retaliate by manipulating the Maronis and several smaller gangs, only to discover that Sofia had anticipated many of his responses.

Batman and Robin complicated the conflict further when they attacked one of Oz's last major Bliss warehouses. The sequence largely played from the criminals' perspective, with guards disappearing one by one into the darkness before Batman and Robin moved through the facility. By the time Oz arrived, the drugs were gone, the operation had been dismantled, and most of his men were unconscious or tied up for the police.

One terrified survivor told Oz that Batman had been asking questions about Bliss, the Falcones, the Maronis, and whoever was supplying Gotham's gangs.

Batman was not specifically targeting Oz.

Oz immediately realized he could use that.

He began anonymously feeding Batman and the Gotham police carefully selected information about Sofia's operations, using both law enforcement and Gotham's vigilantes as weapons.

With his empire shrinking, Oz moved what remained of Bliss production into abandoned underground railway tunnels beneath Gotham. Victor had become considerably more capable by then and was beginning to manage lower-level crews himself, essentially becoming Oz's first genuine lieutenant rather than merely his driver.

Sofia, unable to destroy Oz through business alone, began searching for something personal she could use against him.

She found Francis Cobblepot.

Oz had carefully hidden his elderly mother's worsening dementia from almost everyone in his criminal organization, visiting her privately and paying for her care while ensuring nobody could connect her directly to him. Through Francis and other people from Oz's childhood, Sofia began learning where his obsession with power truly came from. Oz had spent his entire life terrified of being poor, overlooked, or humiliated again, and much of his ambition came from the promise he had made to himself that one day nobody would ever be able to look down on either him or his mother.

The episode ended with Victor arriving at Francis's home and immediately realizing something was wrong. The front door stood open, furniture had been overturned inside, and there was no response when he called her name.

Victor moved through the house until he reached the empty living room.

Francis was gone.

The final three episodes began with Oz rebuilding faster than anyone expected. Within weeks, drugs were moving through neighborhoods he had supposedly lost, and money began flowing back into his organization.

This time, however, Oz stopped trying to fight every rival directly.

Instead, he began meeting with Gotham's smaller criminal organizations and the people who had spent their lives working beneath the city's more powerful families. Street gangs, smugglers, dock crews, bookmakers, protection outfits, and independent dealers were invited into rooms where Oz gave them essentially the same argument.

The Falcones had used them.

The Maronis had used them.

Rex Calabrese had used them.

Oz told them that Gotham was changing too quickly for that system to survive much longer. Carmine Falcone was dead. Harvey Dent was gone. Rex Calabrese was dead. Alberto Falcone was dead. The old families were weakened, while men such as the Joker and Scarecrow were loose after the Arkham breakout, making the entire city more unstable by the month.

Someone was going to build whatever came next.

Oz argued that it might as well be them.

While Oz rebuilt his empire, Sofia kept Francis Cobblepot captive and continued digging into the man she intended to destroy. Through Francis, surviving neighbors, old records, and flashbacks to Oz's childhood, the episode revealed the truth about his brothers.

Oz had grown deeply resentful of the attention Francis gave them. He wanted to be the child she depended upon and the one she believed would eventually rescue them from poverty, but his brothers constantly occupied space in the life he wanted for himself.

During a childhood game, Oz deliberately locked them inside an underground tunnel while heavy rain caused the passage to flood. He knew they could not escape.

Both boys drowned.

Francis eventually came to understand what her surviving son had done. She could never prove it, and by the time she truly accepted the truth, Oz was all she had left. She hated part of him for what had happened but could never bring herself to abandon the son who remained.

Sofia finally confronted Oz privately and used that knowledge against him.

For years, Oz had convinced himself that Gotham had made him cruel, that humiliation had shaped him, and that everything he had done was ultimately about giving his mother the life she deserved.

Sofia told him that was bullshit.

He had betrayed Carmine after serving him, betrayed Rex's organization when it became useful, betrayed Sofia after pretending to help her, murdered Alberto, manipulated the Maronis, and abandoned anyone the moment loyalty became inconvenient.

She told him that Francis was not the justification for everything he had done. She was simply the excuse he preferred.

Then Sofia mentioned Victor.

She warned him that Victor trusted him completely now, which meant the boy would eventually discover what everyone else who loved Oz learned sooner or later.

Oz would betray him too.

Before leaving, Sofia gave Oz an ultimatum.

His entire Bliss operation in exchange for Francis.

Oz accepted.

He arrived at his underground base expecting to surrender the operation and recover his mother, only to discover that Sofia had never intended to honor the exchange. Explosives detonated throughout the tunnels, ripping through production areas, storage rooms, and access passages while Oz's men desperately attempted to escape.

A large portion of his organization was destroyed in minutes. Soldiers were killed, surviving crews scattered, equipment disappeared beneath the rubble, and political contacts who had been quietly supporting him began distancing themselves once it appeared Sofia had finally won the war.

She then forced Oz and Francis into the confrontation she had been preparing for.

Francis acknowledged the truth about Oz's brothers and condemned him for what he had done. Oz refused to admit it even then, continuing to insist that he had loved his brothers and that their deaths had been an accident.

Francis knew better.

The emotional strain became too much for her. She suffered a severe medical crisis before Oz could get her proper help, and while she survived, the damage left her almost completely incapacitated.

The final episode began with Oz striking back with the support he had cultivated beforehand.

Within hours, Gotham's traditional criminal structure collapsed.

The people at the top were dead, arrested, missing, or fleeing.

The people beneath them inherited everything.

And almost all of them owed Oz.

Sofia was eventually captured after discovering too late that several of the people protecting her had already defected. She expected Oz to kill her, especially after everything she had done to Francis.

Instead, he chose something worse.

Oz used corrupt officials, manipulated evidence, cooperating witnesses, and Gotham's psychiatric system to construct a case placing much of the gang war on Sofia. Alberto's death, the Bliss operation, several murders, and numerous acts committed by competing organizations were gradually attached to her name.

Her history in Arkham made the story easier to sell.

The same system Carmine Falcone had once used to destroy his daughter was turned against her again.

Sofia was returned to Arkham.

Afterward, Victor and Oz stood together overlooking the city they had effectively conquered. Victor could barely believe how far they had come from the night he had tried stealing from Oz and ended up helping dispose of Alberto Falcone's body.

He told Oz that he had never really had anyone before all of this.

Now he considered Oz family.

For a moment, Oz appeared genuinely moved.

He told Victor that he felt the same way.

Then he killed him.

Oz had learned from Francis that loving someone created a weakness an enemy could exploit, and he refused to allow anyone to use Victor against him the way Sofia had used his mother.

Months later, the Iceberg Lounge had been rebuilt into one of the most prestigious establishments in Gotham. Politicians, wealthy businessmen, celebrities, judges, police officials, and criminals filled its tables every night, many of them unaware that the man moving between them now controlled gambling, narcotics, smuggling, protection rackets, political bribery, and much of the city's organized crime.

Oz was no longer somebody else's lieutenant.

There was nobody above him anymore.

Francis lived in an enormous penthouse overlooking Gotham, surrounded by everything Oz had once promised he would give her.

She was almost completely unresponsive.

Oz sat beside her and talked as though nothing had changed.

Then he looked toward the skyline.

"I did it, Ma."

Francis did not respond.

Oz smiled anyway.

Outside, a light suddenly cut through the clouds.

The Bat-Signal appeared above Gotham.

Oz stared at it.

For years, that symbol would have represented something to fear.

Now it looked more like a challenge.

Oz raised his glass toward it and smiled.

After the credits, the screen faded back in.

Oz sat alone on the upper level of the Iceberg Lounge with a glass in one hand, watching several televisions mounted across the wall.

The news was showing something considerably less normal.

Footage from downtown Gotham played across the largest screen. Police cars had blocked several intersections while frightened civilians ran in the opposite direction.

Oz frowned.

“What the fuck is happening?”

“Authorities are urging residents to remain indoors following another series of violent incidents linked to the Joker. Nightwing and Robin were reportedly seen engaging members of his gang less than twenty minutes ago near Gotham Square...”

The broadcast suddenly changed again.

A helicopter camera showed several vehicles racing through the streets, pursued by police.

Then Harley Quinn appeared.

Harley leaned out of the side of a speeding vehicle with a weapon in her hands while Bloodsport stood through the roof of the car and fired toward something off-screen, while several other members of the team tore through the intersection behind them.

A bus exploded.

Oz stared at the screen.

One of his employees approached cautiously.

“Boss?”

Oz said nothing.

Another explosion flashed across the television.

The employee swallowed.

“What do you want us to do?”

Oz remained silent for several seconds.

Then he put down his drink.

“Close the fucking club.”

Cut to black.

.

.

.Reactions to this and the buildup to Suicide Squad next in Chapter 339, with the movie covered in Chapters 340 and 341.