Dick seemed to be stunned. He felt that the person opposite was lying, because the black figure that appeared in front of him was completely different from the Batman he knew.
But he couldn't refute it, because except for Batman, no one would be so in tune with Gotham's night.
In other words, the weirdo calling himself Batman in front of him is more suitable for the darkness of this city than the Batman Dick knew.
When he stood in the slightly humid Gotham night air, every trace of moisture from the tips of his hair to the ends of his skin was like a black wave coming toward his face.
Dick had never seen Batman like this.
He knew that Batman was the Dark Knight of Gotham, and that Batman was not the kind of bright and great hero written in fairy tale books, but it was this dark charm that deeply attracted Dick, and at this time, he
Seems even more fascinated.
"Who are you?" Dick took a step forward slightly confused and looked at the figure and asked.
"I am Batman." The other party replied again, but looking at Dick's immature face, he seemed to have a little more patience, so he added: "Batman from another world."
"Another world?" Dick muttered to himself and repeated these words. He felt that he should not accept such a bizarre explanation. Do other worlds really exist? There is also Gotham there? There is also Batman?
"You know the Batman of this world." The black shadow on the opposite side said something. This was supposed to be a question, but he said it in an affirmative tone, and it was natural.
Dick sobered up a little. He took a step back, bared his teeth like a cat, and said warily: "What do you want to do? You faker, I won't tell you information about Batman!"
"He shouldn't be Batman." The black shadow opposite said in an extremely slow tone, and every word echoed clearly in Dick's ears, with an inexplicable attraction.
"What did you say?" Dick asked in surprise.
"Batman is Bruce Wayne." The deep voice sounded again, but before Dick could wonder why he knew so much, he heard the person on the other side say.
"He should be Bruce more than Batman."
Dick opened his mouth wide. He suddenly felt a little guilty and instinctively glanced left and right. He stared blankly at the person in front of him, wondering if he had the ability to read minds.
Just now, when he was standing upstairs, the scene of Batman taking him for a ride on the rooftop of Gotham, and the scene of Bruce sitting in front of the bed to comfort him, alternated, which made his spirit not completely stable.
, becomes more chaotic.
And when a stranger suddenly appeared and exposed his thoughts, Dick felt scared, but he couldn't help but think that everyone thought so, and it was normal for me to think so.
Just when Dick was stunned, the black shadow in front of him disappeared. Dick didn't notice at all how and when he disappeared. But this made him believe that the other party was indeed Batman, because there was only Batman.
, that’s why it comes and goes without a trace.
A child's thoughts are always clearly written on his face. When Dick returned to Wayne Manor, Alfred brought a towel to help him dry the moisture on his hair, and Bruce just walked out of his bedroom.
Dick saw Bruce's actions, but suddenly felt a little angry. He turned his head to the side, not looking at Bruce. Bruce walked to the sofa with some confusion and asked him: "What's wrong? Dick? Where did you just go?"
"Why did you come into my room?!" Dick stared at Bruce's face. When he saw Bruce's slightly confused expression, he became even more angry. He raised his voice and said, "There are no secrets in my room!
Great detective!"
"No, Dick, it's not that I want to pry into your secret. It's Elsa who went to your room to ask you to tell her a story. When she found you weren't there, she started to scream and messed up your quilt. Me and
Alfred just took her out." Bruce explained very patiently.
Dick was speechless, but the anger and irritability did not disappear at all. He gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, I'm just ignorant. Batman is always right."
After saying that, he threw away the towel, and Alfred's hand holding the other end of the towel was also thrown away.
Bruce frowned immediately. He blocked Dick's way back to his room and said, "Dick, don't do this. You almost hit Alfred. You have to apologize to him."
Dick turned around and glanced at the old butler's old face. He lowered his head and said in a low voice, "I'm sorry, Alfred, I'm going back to bed."
After saying that, Dick rushed into his bedroom without looking back and closed the door. Bruce looked at his back, shook his head helplessly and said, "Sometimes, I really don't understand what he is thinking."
There was a trace of hesitation on Bruce's face. After a while, he nodded and said, "Maybe I've paid too much attention to Jason and Tim recently. Dick is a sensitive child. I adopted Tim.
, it may indeed make him feel unhappy. If I show that I like Jason and the two of them too much, he will definitely be hurt."
"Have you ever asked about his study status?" Alfred reminded him while folding the towel: "Master, you have just transferred Jason to another school, and you have been paying more attention to their homework recently. Maybe you should pay more attention to it.
Let me know about the eldest young master’s study situation.”
Bruce touched his chin and nodded, feeling that what Alfred said made sense. He thought for a moment and said, "Before, I frequently changed schools for him, which also caused him to be bullied. I think I should go to school."
Look at him, but I can't just rush in with my Batman uniform on, that would be too scary."
"How about you pick him up from school tomorrow?" Alfred suggested: "You can go early, meet his teacher, observe his classmates, and understand his life in school."
Bruce raised his eyebrows, nodded and said: "I have to say, Alfred, you can always provide me with valuable inspiration. It is really time for me to talk to his teacher about things about him, including
His academic performance, future development direction, and talent course arrangements, etc."
After returning to the bedroom, Bruce fell into sleep while thinking about the content of his conversation with the teacher tomorrow.
It was a night with everyone's own thoughts. Bruce didn't sleep well. For some reason, he felt nervous.
He knew that almost no one in this city could blame him, but when he thought about facing Dick's teacher and learning about his school life, Bruce still felt a little overwhelmed.
The next morning, Bruce got up early like every student facing an important exam, and went to the cafeteria of Gotham University to find Victor who was having breakfast.
Victor was a little surprised that he would come to see him. He put down his knife and fork and said to Bruce: "Did you remember the time of the group meeting wrong? I said it was next Tuesday, not today."
"No." Bruce sat opposite Victor, but for some reason he seemed a little reserved. He put his hands on both sides of his windbreaker and shook his head at the waiter who was about to come over, signaling him not to order.
"I'm going to Dick's school today to ask about...his study situation." Bruce's words were a bit dry, and his swaying eyes could tell that he was a little nervous now.
Before Victor could speak, Bruce put his hands on the table and said quickly: "I made a mistake before. I asked Dick to change schools frequently, which resulted in him always being in a strange environment.
I was once bullied, and if Tim hadn’t mentioned it, I wouldn’t have known about it.”
"I'm a little worried..." Bruce said, pinching his fingers.
"What are you worried about?" Victor asked.
"What if Dick doesn't do well in school? Can I continue to transfer him to another school? When will the transfer end? He doesn't do well in one environment and wants to change it, but if he is not familiar with a new one,
Environment, what should we do?”
Victor smiled and said: "Don't worry, Bruce, Dick is a big boy. He has his own ideas and will choose a way to live that feels comfortable to him."
Victor lowered his head and cut the food on the plate and said: I don't have children, but I have taught children of junior high school age. Children of this age have many ideas. Although adults may not believe it, they can actually handle things.
A lot more than you think."
"Children of this age are not as fragile as you think, and Dick is exceptionally smart and strong, so don't worry too much."
Although Bruce nodded, even though his reason told him that Victor had tried his best to comfort him, he could feel in his heart that Victor's comfort was not the answer he wanted.
Bruce didn't eat breakfast at all, but he didn't feel hungry either. He just felt empty in his stomach and his heart dropped. This feeling became more obvious after taking a bus to Dick's school.
The principal of the school warmly received Bruce. Dick's counselor was an older woman who looked very experienced. She sat with Bruce in the reception area of the principal's office and talked about Dick's school life.
But there is actually nothing to talk about. In front of the principal, it is impossible for the counselor to say that Dick was bullied or injured, let alone that Dick is not a good student.
When talking about the real results, the counselor said tactfully that Dick might have better development in ballet and rhythmic gymnastics, and Bruce immediately understood what she meant.
"Dick's grades are not good?" Bruce asked.
The female counselor hesitated for a moment, but still said: "We do not encourage putting too much academic pressure on children at this age. There are many parents in the class who are eager for their children to succeed and pay too much attention to their grades, which makes their children feel a lot of pressure.
.”
Bruce understood her hint again. The counselor couldn't just say, "Dick doesn't study well because his parents don't pay attention to him."
Bruce actually does not have that high emotional intelligence to understand the counselor's euphemistic words. He can only forcefully use his high IQ to decipher the secrets behind these social cues, but this is actually very tiring.
"What do you think I should do? I mean, let his grades improve without putting too much pressure on him." Bruce considered for a moment before speaking, but then he added:
"I'm not asking him to enter a prestigious university, but I feel that such results are a waste of his talent. If it's because I didn't ask him to do it and he slacked off, I think something should change."
The female counselor took a few notebooks from the bag next to her. She put them on the table and pushed them to Bruce, and then said: "These are the exercises left by the math teacher yesterday. The questions are a little difficult. With his performance level, is it possible?"
It’s normal to meet somewhere.”
Bruce opened his notebook while listening to her, and the counselor then added: "We also allow children to write their calculation processes next to the questions, so that the teacher can better understand their problem-solving ideas and help them.
Correct the mistake."
"But what makes me a little worried is that Dick's calculation process seems a bit sloppy. He wrote the first half well, but for some reason, the second half always got stuck on one number. After calculating it over and over again, even
Some were so irritable that they crossed out all the previous steps."
The counselor gently shook his head and said: "We will emphasize to the children that if there is a question that cannot be solved, then put it aside for a while, or even hand it in blank, and then come to us to ask the question.
Every teacher will tell him what to do."
"But there was no answer in the homework he handed in today. The calculation process was sloppy and he also drew in his notebook. During the day, he did not find the teacher to ask about the real problem-solving process."
"Mr. Wayne, if you hope that he can achieve better results, I think you can start with study habits and patience. Dick does not only have this phenomenon in mathematics. If you accompany him, you can
Let him reduce the number of times he is impetuous, and I think it will greatly improve his performance."
Bruce looked down at Dick's notes on the notebook, and his brows furrowed deeply. He could feel that he was angry, because Dick's exercises were really scrawled, and it looked like they were not written properly on the table.
Yes, there are thin ink traces at the end of some gestures, like many small insects crawling on the paper.
Obviously, this is not a problem of ability, but of attitude. Last night, Dick didn't do his homework well at all. He made two mistakes. After finding that he couldn't calculate, he also painted over the previous calculation process, as if he was afraid of others.
I found that he had calculated a lot, but all of them were wrong.
This is sending a bad signal, Bruce thought. Dick's teacher was a bit too tactful. This kind of impatient and attempt to cover up mistakes will make any teacher who sees this assignment have a blood pressure spike.
So, when picking Dick up after school in the evening, Bruce seemed a little silent.