Batgirl # 4 2024

 By Mark Rodriguez

An ancient group of ninjas called The Unburied have returned in modern day to kill Lady Shiva and by extension her daughter, Cassandra Cain. After a dangerous fight against Kalden The Unseen, Shiva and Batgirl escaped on a train leaving Gotham. There, Batgirl discovers that her mother has allied herself with Nyssa al Ghul and the League of Shadows! 

"Mother Part 4 of 6" opens with Batgirl scanning the room. Jayesh is the high priest but she's no longer sure he's a friend. She recognizes Nyssa Al Ghul and Angel Breaker as enemies but doesn't know third woman that's with them. She is also surprised that Nyssa is alive. Then there's Lady Shiva, her mother, who isn't exactly trustworthy either.

 

Nyssa says it feels correct to see her again since she considers Cassie to be the one that killed her years ago, as per the events of Robin # 148. Nyssa asks Cassie if she blames her hits on being brainwashed again. Lady Shiva says they don't have time to waste as they board the train to refuge. Nyssa mutters that she came back to life with a sense of humor but no one laughs at her jokes. Nyssa tells Batgirl that the explanation of her return will have to wait, though the Al Ghuls beating death is what they do.

Batgirl flat out says no to whatever it is Nyssa wants, before she can even make an offer. Lady Shiva tells her to listen since they have to put their differences aside for the time being. Cassie says she has listened and this led them to working alongside their enemies including the third woman she doesn't know. The woman, named Bloodmaster, steps up to Cassie. Nyssa tells Batgirl to stand down since she is surrounded. Batgirl tells her to go to hell. Nyssa says since she is the daughter of the demon, hell is where she was forged.

Angel Breaker aims her sword at Batgirl, telling her to watch it. Lady Shiva tells Angel Breaker to put her sword away since she was the one that trained her and knows how to break her. Batgirl reads the room and visualizes way she can take down all the enemies at once. Jayesh tells everyone to lower their weapons. He reminds them that they have enemies after them and yet here they are, doing the work for them. Jayesh tells Batgirl that she has seen all the work the Order of Shiva has done and that cannot be lost. He tells her to forget the others and asks if she will leave, or will she join him. Batgirl asks herself what Batman would do in this situation.

Nyssa says the enemy has attacked her strongholds, killing her people from Gotham to Beijing. She tells Shiva, who she refers to as Wu Lin, that they forced her blood out of the shadows after years of peace in East Asia. She says these long-dead enemies have suddenly returned out of nowhere with unknown numbers with extensive details on how and where to hit them, all for a war they didn't commit. All of this is over sins of their ancestors long passed. Batgirl asks how past. Nyssa pauses and says her father. Batgirl asks what sins.

Nyssa explains that Ra's Al Ghul killed a legion of Blue Monks centuries ago. It was from their graves that the Blue Poppies first grew. Ra's Al Ghul started the bloody war but his sins are his alone. Nyssa says she is not her father and she runs the League of Shadows now. She knows the good they can do without resorting to bloodshed and genocide. As Shiva tells Batgirl to trust them, Cassie notices something odd about one of the masked men in the room. She recognizes the man as one of the Unburied and tosses several throwing stars at him. The projectiles knock the weapon out of the man's hand. His eyes start to glow as he recites 'What is buried always comes to light' and Shiva tells Batgirl to move. Light bursts from the man's eyes and mouth... and he explodes.

 

The explosion is big enough to topple the train car and several of the Unburied come in to attack the League of Shadows. Lady Shiva starts to fight them off and tells Batgirl to get back on her feet. Two new enemies appear, and one of them grabs Bloodmaster by the head and tosses her off the top of the train car as if she were nothing. Shiva recognizes them as Chodak The Unbowed and Nergui the Unknown. She remarks that she would have known that Kalden would have sent two more of the Unburied Grand Masters after them. It seems they have fought sometime before since Shiva asks them if they want to settle their previous contest.

Nyssa and Angel Breaker step up, and Nyssa says they have pissed off the wrong Al Ghul. The Unburied ninjas say they hate the Al Ghuls. Bloodmaster also gets up, angry that she was treated that way. She says their vengeance does not come cheap. As everyone on Shiva's side prepare to fight, Chodak says to serve them their vengeance and let them eat. 

An all-out brawl breaks out between Bagirl, Lady Shiva, Nyssa, Angel Breaker, Bloodmaster, the League of Shadows going up against Chodak, Nergui and the Unburied ninjas. During the fight, Shiva grabs Batgirl's wrist and tells her to follow. Meanwhile Chodak is laughing as he asks for more fighting.

Hiding in one of the train cars, Lady Shiva looks over the wound she got from an earlier fight against Kalden (issue 2 of this series), and says it's not healing fast enough and is holding her back. Batgirl points outside the train car and says everyone is dead, and there is death everywhere Shiva goes. Shiva says she is what she is, and she wishes Cassandra could say the same. Shiva says Cassie has gone by Kasumi, the Black Bat and Orphan while resisting her very nature.

Cassandra says she resists death. Lady Shiva says death might have been her first teacher but it is not her nature. She says even now, as Batgirl, she is wasting her energy, power and chi aspiring to be someone else. She asks who is Cassandra. As she speaks, Shiva pulls out something blue. She chews it up and spits it out, rubbing it on her wound, which heals immediately. Cassandra realizes it's the Blue Poppy from the Unburied Monks. 

Cassandra asks her where she found it. Shiva says they don't have much time. Ba' Bao told her there is hard and there is soft, and somewhere along the way, Shiva lost her soft. She realized she lost it when she had Cassandra. When she held her in her arms, she saw her sister and she hated her for it. She wanted to hate her to make it easier for her to leave her with 'that man', but she never forgot her. That life that came after so much death was not forgotten. Shiva says she had never forgotten that soft, and says she's sorry. Cassandra can sense she's not lying and tries to find the words. Just then Chodak steps into the train car and says he found them.

Cassandra and Shiva give each other a look. Cassie tosses Shiva forward and she lands atop of Chodak's shoulders. Batgirl whips out a rope that ties around Chodak's legs and she makes him fall on his back. Cassie tosses her mother a knife. Just then Nergui zig-zags across the train car and lunges at Cassie with a huge pair of golden scissors. Shiva holds the knife up to Chodak's throat and warns Nergui that if he kills her daughter he will only know pain.

Kalden shows up and knocks Shiva back with a double palm strike that emanates a strong concussive force. Kalden remarks 'perhaps a little more pain' right back at Shiva, which was said to him in their last encounter at Ba' Bao's kitchen. Chodak says Kalden is late. Kalden apologizes and tells him to grab Shiva, who is now unconscious, and tell everyone to regroup. He says the rest will be dealt with eventually. 

 

Cassandra tosses a Batarang but it misses the mark and Kalden socks her with a palm strike across the jaw. As Cass starts to black out, Kalden tells her that her mother is payment enough. He says she should accept those terms and return to her city and perhaps live a long life rather than experience a worse death.

Sometime later, Cassie wakes up and sees her mother is gone. As she sees the multi-train car pile up, she monologues that this is the worst case scenario and wonders what Batman would do. Just then, Jayesh shows up on a motorcycle. He tells her that her mother needs rescue. He tells her to forget the others, and once again asks if she will stay or join him. Nyssa shows up, sword drawn and barely able to stand. She calls Cassie 'the one who is all, the one who was promised'. Cassie ignored her and, gets on the bike, telling Jayesh to go. As they drive off, Cassandra forgets about Batman and instead asks what would her mother do.

 

My Thoughts- 

This issue gave me a lot to look up as I discovered new info and new characters. Batgirl faced Angel Breaker when she served as Talia's right hand woman during the Shadow War event in 2022. She's also in love with Nyssa and has a somewhat flirty relationship with Ghost-Maker. I also found out that Cassie used to go as an undercover assassin named Kasumi. Whenever Shiva mentioned 'leaving Cassie with that man', I'm assuming she meant David Cain.

Bloodmaster was all-new and I was glad that Chodak didn't kill the character almost as soon as she was introduced. Unfortunately with everyone fighting everyone, and Shiva pulling Batgirl away from the fight, we didn't get to see all that much of Bloodmaster in action. I was confused a bit when Nyssa kept calling Lady Shiva 'Wu Lin' but then Bloodmaster also called herself Wu Lin. With Cassie driving off with Jayesh, I wonder if we'll see Nyssa and her buddies again through the rest of the story.

 

We get more clarification on exactly why the Unburied is going after the Al Ghuls and Lady Shiva. Ra's Al Ghul himself waged war upon the monks centuries ago, and now Nyssa, the current head of the League of Shadows is who they will pay their retribution upon. As for Lady Shiva, while it's clear she stole some of those blue flowers for herself, it's still unknown if anyone other than Cassie knows that. I'm curious if Talia will also get involved because if they're after the Al Ghuls, they should be trying to kill her as well.

Due to Lady Shiva's dubious nature, it's hard to say just how heartfelt she was when she was opening up to Cassie. When Ba' Bao talked to her in issue 2, it seemed to have struck something in Shiva, and she had no reason to bring that conversation up to Cassie unless she meant it. She raises an interesting point in Cassandra finding out who she really is. She listed all her previous aliases, and yes even as Batgirl she's modeling herself after Batman. Not only that, but the Batgirl identity itself was already based on what Barbara Gordon started. Of course, the other side of this is that Cassandra knows exactly what she is and what she wants to be, but it's not what Shiva is willing to accept. I did like the similarity in how Nyssa said 'she is not her father' just like Cass spend most of this story saying she is not her mother.

I had a feeling that Kalden wouldn't be the only member of the Unburied that stands out among all the mooks and foot soldiers.  We get introduced to Chodak and Nergui. Chodak loves to fight and speaks in food metaphors, while Nergui is smaller and more agile and had a giant pair of scissors. Kalden is just the huge wall the heroes will have to overcome. This is the second time he took down Batgirl without any trouble whatsoever. With two chapters left to go, I wonder if we'll see any more Grand Masters or if all three of them serve an even higher Grand Master.

We'll see what happens next as we have two more issues left in this particular story. The plot had shifted to Cass and Jayesh teaming up to rescue Lady Shiva. What's going to happen next?