Chapter 1210 The Cry of the Lamb (Twenty-Two)

Chapter 1203 The Scream of the Lamb (22)

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 was 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 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 slightly confused step forward and looked at the figure and asked.

"I am Batman." The other person 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? Is there Gotham there too? And Batman too?

"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 woke 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 on the opposite side 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's more Bruce than Batman."

Dick's mouth opened 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, making his spirit not completely stable yet. , becomes more confusing.

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 somewhat believe that the other party was indeed Batman, because only Batman , that’s why he 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 go just now?"

"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 was Elsa who went to your room to ask you to tell her a story. When she found that you were not 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 annoyance didn't disappear at all. He gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, I'm not sensible anymore. 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 the room and said, "Dick, don't do this. You almost hit Alfred. You have to apologize to him."

Dick turned back 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 sleep."

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 staring at 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 go in there in Batman's uniform, that's 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's really time for me to talk to his teacher about him, including His academic performance, future development direction, and talent course arrangements, etc. "

Bruce returned to the bedroom and fell into sleep while thinking about the content of his conversation with the teacher tomorrow.

It was a night with everyone having their own concerns. Bruce didn't sleep well. For some reason, he felt nervous.

He knew that almost no one in this city could blame him, but Bruce still felt a little overwhelmed when he thought of facing Dick's teacher and learning about his school life.

The next morning, Bruce got up early like every student facing an important exam. He went to the cafeteria of Gotham University and found 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 across from 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 eyes swaying from side to side also showed 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 also bullied. 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's 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, in fact, they can handle things. Much 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 the bus to Dick's school.

The principal of the school received Bruce warmly. 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, the counselor cannot say that Dick has been bullied or injured in any way, 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 performance improve without putting too much pressure on him." Bruce said after considering it, 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, 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 angry that they crossed out all the previous steps.”

The counselor gently shook his head and said: "We will always emphasize to the children that if there is a question that cannot be solved, then let it go for a while. He can 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 scrawled 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 when he is impetuous, 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 the mistake would make any teacher who sees this assignment have their blood pressure soar.

So, when picking Dick up after school in the evening, Bruce seemed a little silent.