Gotham Playing House (Part Two)

When Selene took Aisha from Bruce, she was already having some difficulty. Aisha was no longer a baby; carrying a three- or four-year-old child was somewhat strenuous. Selene was not as large as Bruce, so naturally, controlling an excited Aisha was even harder.

But at that very moment, the aerialist performance, after a brief pause, reached another climax. The dazzling maneuvers in the air thoroughly excited Aisha. She lunged forward with all her strength, and Selene could not hold on to her at all.

Aisha darted directly onto the front-row seats, then climbed down the chairs to the floor and crawled beneath the row ahead. Selene pursued her along the same route.

But who would have thought that Aisha seemed to have awakened some superpower? She was unbelievably fast, vanishing almost instantly among the densely packed audience seats.

Selene had completely lost her and could only search row by row.

At the same time, backstage, a small black shadow darted past. The circus boss sensed something moving and spun around, but found nothing.

The circus boss was holding a saw as he approached the wooden stake securing the ropes for the aerialist act.

In an aerialist performance, the ropes used for swinging were suspended from a higher rope. The circus boss approached the stake securing that highest rope with a saw and a vicious grin.

The circus boss gripped the saw and began cutting through the thick rope, cursing bitterly as he did. But just as the rope was about to be severed, a small figure suddenly appeared and bit down on his arm.

Aisha had not come to uphold justice. She was simply interested in things that moved. As the circus boss sawed, his arm moved up and down, and in the dark backstage area, his arm was the only thing moving. Of course, Aisha bit it without a second thought.

Unfortunately, Aisha was too light, and her bite was not hard. Just like when she usually bit Bruce and Selene’s arms, she left only a row of teeth marks and caused no actual injury. It merely delayed the circus boss’s arm for an instant.

That thick rope, already sawed to its limit, was held together by only the last thin connection. But in the end, it still snapped.

Yet those few seconds of delay allowed Bruce, who had just emerged from the restroom, to get closer to the stage.

The instant the rope snapped taut, the two people hanging from it began to fall. But for such a long rope to be completely pulled free from the other end would still take several seconds. Those few seconds added to the previous few seconds, and Bruce rushed onto the stage in an instant, grabbing the flying rope from within the shadow of the curtain.

But he was only one person, while two people hung from the other end of the rope. His weight alone was not enough to stop them from falling. Bruce had considered that before grabbing it, so he held the rope in one hand, wrapped it twice around his arm, then swiftly seized the nearby curtain with his other hand.

With a fixed point, the rope stopped pulling free, and the Grayson couple came to a stop in midair.

Suddenly, Bruce heard someone suck in a breath. Turning around, he saw the little boy behind the curtain who claimed to be the heir to the Grayson Family.

The boy’s eyes were wide and his mouth hung open as he stared at Bruce in shock.

There was still some distance between the audience and the stage, with several rows of seats in front of Bruce. The stage was also higher than the seating area, with three steps to one side. Yet in just a few seconds, Bruce had vaulted over the seats, rushed up the steps, grabbed the rope, and caught the curtain.

His rapid reactions, fluid movements, and precise handling made it seem less like a heroic rescue and more like an artistic performance. To little Grayson, watching from the side, Bruce seemed to be glowing.

Bruce sighed and said, "Don’t just stand there. Come help me pull the rope."

Only after little Grayson recovered from his shock did he realize his parents had nearly fallen to their deaths. The shock on his face turned to rage as he helped Bruce pull the rope down. "It had to be that circus boss! He’s hated my father for a long time!!"

After a while, the rope was pulled back into place, and the two performers returned to the platform. They came down and thanked Bruce.

Mrs. Grayson was already in tears. Little Grayson said furiously, "It was definitely him! Let’s go settle the score with him!"

"Don’t go! Dick! Come back!" Mrs. Grayson called out. The boy named Dick had already charged off, but his mother ultimately called him back.

"Can you tell me what exactly happened?"

At that moment, Mrs. Grayson was on the verge of a breakdown. She clung to her husband and wept continuously, while Mr. Grayson looked equally despondent. They were only ordinary people. The life-or-death crisis they had just experienced—the terror of hanging in midair without knowing when they might fall—had completely crushed them.

As though searching for an outlet for his emotions, Mr. Grayson said to Bruce, "…I know he did it. That circus boss. We don’t want to work here either, but we have no choice."

"There should be plenty of circuses on the East Coast. Why not go there?"

Mr. Grayson sighed. "You probably don’t follow this sort of thing, do you? My father, Old Grayson, the previous generation’s aerialist, made a serious mistake during a performance. Not only did he fall from the air, but he happened to strike the edge of a stage prop. He…"

"Enough. I understand. You don’t need to go into detail. My condolences."

"It was a performance at a high-profile charity banquet. Many of the guests were powerful and influential people. They had never seen blood before, and such a bloody death terrified many of them. The Grayson Family’s reputation was ruined after that. The major circuses no longer wanted to hire us, afraid we would cause another incident like that…"

"Only this circus was willing to take us in, because this is Gotham. People here aren’t afraid of seeing us fall to our deaths…"

The reason was both absurd and understandable. Bruce could not think of anything to argue against it. He asked the Graysons, "You aren’t Gotham natives, are you?"

"Actually, we’ve been here for a long time and even bought our own house, so we’re half locals now. But our hometown is Bludhaven."

"Let’s go back, back to Bludhaven!" Mrs. Grayson said through sobs. "Give it up. We can’t let little Dick keep living in an environment where he has to be on edge every day…"

Mr. Grayson pressed his lips together, his face utterly haggard. Mrs. Grayson continued crying as she spoke. "I know, I know you’ve always wanted to revive the family business, but this can’t go on. Think about it—if we die, what will happen to poor little Dick? In Gotham, orphans without parents could very well be sent to that terrible foster school, and then…"

Mrs. Grayson began crying again. Bruce picked up some information from her words, but it was not a good time to press further. Little Grayson went over to comfort his mother, and the family of three embraced.

When Bruce entered backstage, Selene had just tied the final knot. The one she had bound was the circus boss, while Aisha was still clamped onto his arm and refused to let go.

When Bruce went to pick up Aisha, he thought he would have to wrestle with her again. To his surprise, Aisha released her bite easily.

Seeing the saw beside them, Bruce understood what had happened. He called Gordon, then left the circus with Aisha in his arms and Selene beside him.

Just as they got into the sports car and prepared to drive home, a figure appeared in front of the car. Bruce released the steering wheel, turned his head toward the figure, and asked, "…Dick? What’s wrong? What are you doing?"

Dick walked around the front of the car and stopped beside the driver’s door. "My parents are planning to go back to Bludhaven."

"Then you should congratulate them. It’s much better than Gotham. You should be able to live peaceful lives there."

"But I don’t want to go back…"

"Why not?"

Dick pressed his lips together. Though he was young, his expression held a resolute determination. "My grandfather’s death wasn’t an accident at all."

"How do you know?"

"I investigated." Dick said with great certainty, "The horizontal bar in his final curtain-call move had been tampered with. I examined that rope. The marks on it showed it was the wrong knot. The knot securing the horizontal bar should never have been tied that way…"

Bruce narrowed his eyes and asked, "So?"

"You’re not an ordinary person, are you?" Dick grabbed Bruce’s car door with one hand and said, "I’ve been learning acrobatic techniques from my father for a long time. I know exactly how difficult those movements of yours were. Those muscle-control techniques couldn’t possibly have been improvised. You must have practiced for a long time…"

Dick kept his lips pressed together as he said to Bruce, "My parents have given up, but I won’t. I want to stay here, restore the Grayson Family’s reputation, and avenge my grandfather."

"More importantly, if I can’t uncover the truth behind my grandfather’s death and find the murderer who killed him, then my parents won’t be safe either."

"But…" Dick showed a helpless expression. "I know what Gotham is like. The skills I learned from my father aren’t enough to keep me alive here, and I can’t convince my parents to let me stay, so…"

Dick took a deep breath. A melancholy far beyond his age appeared on his face as he looked at Bruce. "If you would allow me to learn from you, then I think that one day, I’ll be able to fulfill my wish. And you saved my parents. If I followed you, I don’t think they would object…"

Before Bruce could answer, Dick said, "…All right, I know that sounds ridiculous. Why would I expect some rich guy…"

Dick released the car door, sighed, then waved his arm, signaling for Bruce to drive away.

He knew it himself. He was merely acting on impulse. Not leaving with his parents, staying alone in Gotham, and even wanting to learn from the richest man in the world? It was simply a fantasy.

But as Bruce looked at Dick, he had a strange feeling. People always saw themselves in someone else at certain moments. Dick did not look anything like him, and he was only a seven- or eight-year-old boy, too young to speak of much character. Yet the tone in which he spoke made Bruce feel that he was special.

Perhaps there really were two people in this world whose temperaments naturally harmonized. In any case, Dick found Bruce very agreeable, and Bruce found Dick very agreeable as well.

But agreeable or not, Bruce had no plans to adopt a son. One daughter had already driven both him and Selene nearly insane.

Wait, a daughter…

Bruce turned to look at Aisha, fully secured in her child safety seat yet still restless, then glanced at Dick, who seemed far more mature than other children his age. Just as Dick turned to leave, Bruce called out to him.

Half an hour later, at Wayne Manor, Bruce held Aisha under her arms and presented her to Dick as though showing off a pet dog. "This is your sister."

"Wait, are you planning to adopt me? I…"

Before he could finish, Aisha split her mouth into a grin. Her mouthful of sharp teeth startled Dick so badly that he jumped. He asked in shock, "What is going on??? Why are her teeth…"

"Congenital dental deformity. She’s too young, so we haven’t had time to correct it yet." Bruce answered without hesitation.

"Uh, all right… Wait, her eyes seem to…" Dick pointed at Aisha’s eyes.

"Heterochromia. She got it from her mother." Bruce replied naturally.

"Is… is that so? But… why can’t she talk?"

"Childhood autism. We’ve already made an appointment with a Psychiatry Department Doctor." Bruce answered smoothly.

"But…"

At that moment, Alfred came downstairs. With a hopeful look on his face, he asked Bruce, "Master, this must be the Young Master, correct? Have the legal matters been handled? I think we can…"

There should be another ten thousand words later today, but there will be none on the 16th.