Christopher "Chris" Nakano is an officer for the Gotham City Police Department and a close ally of James Gordon during his early years in Gotham.
Biography[]
Arkham Origins Incident[]
Christopher Nakano was one of the few honest police officers in the GCPD at the time of their corruption, and was a family man. James Gordon would consider him an ally due to his by-the-book honesty, and would trust him implicitly. During the Christmas Eve incident, at the Royal Hotel, Nakano would be among those accompanying Gordon during the Police raid during Batman's pursuit of the Joker. Unfortunately, he was caught in the resulting explosion, resulting in him being blinded in his right eye. He would start wearing an eyepatch as a result. Soon after, he would be placed on extended medical leave.
Arkham Shadow Incident[]
Sometime during his medical leave, Gordon and D.A. Harvey Dent would help Nakano go undercover to infiltrate Blackgate Prison as the shifty Ex-Yakuza thug Takeo Yamashiro and look for clues to the identity of the Rat King, but before Gordon is able to let Batman know the name and whereabouts of the undercover cop he narrowly avoids getting killed from a sniper shot fired by Shrike, a member of the Rat King's cult.
During his undercover work in Blackgate, Nakano would meet the new inmate Irving Malone, who had been thrown into the prison for arson after setting the Bat-Signal on fire. Giving him the nickname "Matches", and unaware Malone was actually Batman also undercover, Nakano would initially aid him in eavesdropping on Carmine Falcone and the new Blackgate warden and TYGER captain Lyle Bolton by way of a path through a vent Malone could sneak into and hide. However, in order to keep his cover from getting blown, Nakano would eventually rat out Malone's eavesdropping which resulted in a fight breaking out between Malone and Nakano along with the other inmates with them. The fight ends and results in Malone getting stabbed in the left hand by Nakano, breaking one of his ribs and getting shocked to unconsciousness by Bolton and sent to Leslie Thompkins for medical treatment.
Not long after this incident Nakano would mysteriously vanish from Blackgate, something that is only discovered by Gordon and Dent when they don't hear back from him. On the penultimate day before the Day of Wrath, Gordon would go to Blackgate and ask Jonathan Crane on the whereabouts of the inmate Yamashiro without giving away his real identity, though would find out nothing as Crane would claim not to know any inmate by that name. By the time the Rat King's Day of Wrath arrives, and with Nakano still missing, Gordon and Dent go to Blackgate to interrogate Malone, as his fight with Nakano would give him a reason to get pay back, making him a prime suspect in the cop's disappearance. Malone would find out Nakano's real identity during the interrogation and insist he was innocent for Nakano vanishing after being accused by Gordon of killing him with no real evidence, but from Gordon's point of view, as anger and grief at the possible death of a good cop clouded his reasoning to the point he even physically harmed Malone, he believes Malone had Nakano killed due to him actually being the Rat King, and because of this hasty judgement he would have Malone get ready for a pre-trial for a crime he hadn't committed.
In reality Nakano was still very much alive, captured by the Rats at some point after his fight with Malone and kept in a ship underneath Blackgate with other members of the cult. He would be found by Batman on the Day of Wrath in a cell after tracking down the Rat King's location to the underground ship, where Nakano would reveal his sudden disappearance was caused when he was caught snooping around for clues by TYGER guards loyal to the Rat King, and was dragged away to the ship. Despite Nakano insisting to be let out Batman refused, reasoning it was safer for him to stay in his cell until he stopped the Rat King. Nakano agrees to stay in the cell, albeit reluctantly, and is presumably rescued from the ship after it crashes into the Gotham harbour.