Pixel Maniac in the Comic World

Chapter 144 Inside and outside Gotham

into the night.

On the edge of Gotham City, on the roof of an inconspicuous low building on the left side of the main road, two figures stood quietly.

Both were wearing pitch-black cloaks, but their backs looked larger and smaller, the larger one was strong and the small one was slender and uneven.

Batgirl Barbara moved her shoulders and hips uncomfortably. She hadn't put on this uniform for a long time. In other words, she seemed to have gained some weight during this time.

Maybe he's not that much fatter, Batman shouldn't have noticed, right?

Maybe he didn't bother to say anything after seeing it, because his external behavior was always so indifferent.

She was always a few steps behind the man standing silently in front of her, looking at Batman's broad shoulders in trance.

Barbara's lips suddenly moved.

"Did Dick still choose to leave?"

Batman did not answer immediately, but looked at the distance on the main road leading to Gotham City as if in a daze. It was not until Barbara was about to put the question aside that the voice suddenly sounded.

"He should have left a long time ago."

"He mistook Terry for me."

This sentence was like a key to the door in the dark, causing Barbara to wake up suddenly, and then thought of a rather abstract concept.

Because he proved to Bruce that certain mistakes can be clearly corrected.

Just when Barbara thought she would not get a serious and clear answer from Batman today, Batman suddenly spoke more words than usual.

"But suddenly he saw Terry's file."

At least I don't plan to leave so soon.

So Dick suddenly didn't intend to leave.

An idea occurred to him.

Or rather, Bruce.

In short, Dick seemed to suddenly sense something at that time. What he saw in his eyes was not just Terry Pickles, but more like seeing another Batman in a worse situation.

Um? What does it mean?

What do you mean he should have left long ago?

Barbara was a little confused, lowered her head and thought for a while.

Barbara was confused and didn't understand what the connection was.

It's just that this similarity is really vague.

A complete, seemingly naked Bruce who grew up in extremely difficult circumstances after facing Gotham's most direct evil.

"You mean, Dick actually prepared to say goodbye to us on the first day he came back?"

After all, from the beginning, her instinct as a woman had always felt that Terry Pickles and Batman had some similarities.

This time Batman didn't make a sound, but he could see the pair of pointed bat ears shaking, as if he was nodding.

After losing his parents on a rainy night, he didn't even have Alfred the butler, he didn't inherit a huge inheritance, and he didn't have a spiritual haven - the Wayne family castle.

It's not just the so-called similar experiences, but something even more indescribable.

If he can get Terry Pickles back on track, then it won't be Dick but Bruce Wayne who should leave Gotham from now on.

"Terry's file?"

Under the protection of the bat, the pair of young wings, also born in the night, can stand alone in Gotham City in their own way.

And what about Batman?

Of course he can't leave Gotham. Whether Dick proves it or not, Batman is destined to be inseparable from Gotham.

But for the first time, he actually acquiesced to Dick's actions.

When Dick said he wanted to communicate with Terry in his own way, although Batman still didn't stop observing and monitoring Terry, he let Dick do his best.

He did not take the initiative to arrest Terry, nor did he stop Dick from introducing new superheroes to Terry. He even knew full well about Dick's behavior of taking Terry out of Gotham and sending him to the Midtown Laboratory.

It's like an old father watching his son's willfulness.

But he wasn't expecting anything. He was just waiting quietly for Dick to lead to doomed failure.

Then, he completely admitted defeat and sent Terry back to Gotham.

This man stayed in the small Batcave, in the endless darkness, looking at Dick through the monitor, watching this 'son' who was almost equivalent to his own raising, doing something for 'him' some last-ditch efforts.

Barbara trembled, she folded her arms unconsciously, and then rubbed them up and down a few times.

In fact, her bat suit is very warm, and the current weather has not yet reached the coldest period.

But Barbara still felt a chill.

She didn't know whether the sudden series of associations she had made as if inspired by a burst of inspiration were accurate, but it could indeed explain why Bruce took her to the edge of Gotham after receiving Dick's heartbreaking phone call.

This man was not trying to capture Terry back in Gotham through this seemingly stupid and clumsy method.

It was more like he was waiting for a ritual.

When Terry came back, the deeper meaning was that the pair of young wings in the dark night that had been protected by that cold man finally spread their wings and flew in their own direction.

The opposite direction from Gotham.

Finally, on the distant horizon, a slow taxi drove over.

The driver in the car seemed extremely reluctant, but he still had to drive the vehicle in this direction.

But Barbara's eyes suddenly flashed. Batman, who had always been quite patient, actually jumped off the roof of the building.

A pair of bat-shaped hang gliders that Barbara was quite familiar with opened up in the dark night and slid towards the awkward taxi.

"Boom!"

As a heavy figure fell on the roof of the car, the driver in the main driving position was shaken and subconsciously stepped on the brakes. After a harsh sound of burning tires, the car stopped crookedly on the side of the road.

Batman dropped from the roof of the car and opened the door almost roughly. His deep eyes stared at the poor driver who was already frightened and trembling all over.

"I...I have no choice. I actually don't plan to come to Gotham, but that Oriental man said that if I don't come, he will activate the time bomb placed under the seat!"

The driver seemed to have not drank water for a day, and his mouth was dry. The cold wind that suddenly blew into the car after the door was opened lifted up the pale and dry cuticles on his lips.

The whole person was also in a state of high tension. He had obviously cried in the car, and he continued to talk tremblingly.

"He said I had to keep moving at a slow and even pace, otherwise the bomb would, the bomb would, go off—"

Batman didn't say anything, but dragged the driver out more roughly and pushed him to the side of the road brutishly.

Then he directly leaned half of his body into the car and began to look for the so-called bomb in the car.

Fortunately, it wasn't hidden deeply. Within four or five seconds, Batman pulled out a package from under the car seat.

After a few clicks to open it, there was no detonating device inside, just two relatively square stones that Terry picked up on the roadside, and a mobile phone fixed to the stone with tape.

There is a recording program preset on the phone, which continuously makes a beeping countdown sound.

When the program was stopped, a pale interface popped up.

There was only a short line in it: "No need to search, I am already in Gotham."

This is Terry's message to Batman.

At this time, Barbara, who jumped down the stairs, controlled the Batwing to slowly land, and stood directly not far from Batman.

Whether it was an illusion or not, she seemed to hear Batman say something.

Things that Bruce Wayne should never have said given his character.

"Goodbye, Dick Grayson."

Don't worry, my heart is out of Gotham.

(End of this chapter)