Tonight's rain.
Fell heavier and heavier.
Tonight's wind.
Blew harder and harder.
A luxurious extended sedan was parked outside a plain-looking apartment building. The person inside the car was gazing at one of the lit windows in this sparsely populated apartment building.
The busy figure inside the window clearly hadn't noticed this.
"Finally done!"
The scientist Leonard looked as if he had fought a beautiful woman for three hundred rounds, drenched in sweat. In reality, he had only tidied up his room and returned his previously messed-up comic collection to their proper places.
This might not be high-intensity exercise for most people, but this was Leonard, a squishy scientist, and he had nearly worked himself to death just tidying up.
"Sheldon won't be able to find fault with me now." The reason Leonard spent so much time tidying up was, naturally, because he had an extremely obsessive-compulsive roommate.
He walked out of his room.
Just as he was about to show off to Sheldon, he saw a girl sitting cross-legged on the carpet eating chips, while Sheldon on the sofa was weighing the takeout food with an electronic scale.
"Hi, Penny."
Leonard immediately contained some of his proud rooster demeanor.
"Hi, Leonard."
The girl was eating chips while watching TV without turning around. This gave Leonard a chance to rush to the bathroom, quickly tidy up his appearance, and then walk out again.
"The person you were talking to earlier was that genius comic artist, right? And that's why you messed up your room." Sheldon spoke with a firm tone while recording his food intake.
"I've already tidied the room."
Leonard immediately tried to save face for his image.
He sounded slightly proud.
However, the girl didn't seem to be paying attention to him, instead, she was surprised by Sheldon's hearing.
"You were clearly playing a video game in front of the TV just now. How could you possibly eavesdrop on Leonard's phone call? You didn't install surveillance software on his phone, did you?" The girl named Penny was quite good-looking. She was the neighbor of the two freak scientists and Leonard's dream girl.
"Hmm?"
Sheldon straightened his head like a groundhog.
"Good idea! Penny, I didn't expect you to have a flash of inspiration. Perhaps you really won't have to be a waitress forever." Sheldon's tone was full of emotion—he wasn't looking down on his friend, he just enjoyed equally discriminating against everyone's intelligence. Theoretical physicists tend to have a slight sense of superiority.
Hearing this.
Penny expressionlessly put down the chips in her hand.
"If you're really that smart, don't you know you shouldn't offend the girl who serves your food?" She turned to look at Sheldon, the threat in her voice thick.
"..."
Sheldon dared not argue. He seemed to fix his gaze on Leonard, trying to change the subject. "What did the genius comic artist want with you? Let me guess, don't tell me yet... Hmm! He must have seen the 1,000 pages of suggestions I implanted into his computer after hacking it, and specifically called you to thank me on his behalf!"
The thirty-something theoretical physicist's beautiful blue eyes were filled with childlike anticipation. However, Leonard's head-shake shattered the beautiful fantasy in the man's heart.
"No, he didn't mention you, or your thousand pages of comic suggestions. Actually, the kid just consulted me about superhero comics."
Leonard adopted the proud posture of someone who thought he was a comic book expert.
But it didn't capture the girl's attention.
He was a little discouraged but continued, "I think our genius comic artist must be looking for inspiration... Also, perhaps because I questioned his abilities at the beginning, he eventually told me that he has an angel investor who is the closest person to Mr. Bruce Wayne."
"He gave him a full ten million dollars in non-repayable investment." At this point, Leonard couldn't help but be amazed, such a fortune was definitely a massive sum of money he could hardly imagine in his lifetime.
"And you believed that?"
The girl Penny rolled her eyes.
She always felt that her neighbor had simply encountered a boastful middle schooler.
"He said he doesn't like to lie... I think it's quite credible." Leonard held the phone, feeling a bit guilty. He just wanted to use being noticed as a way to exude masculine charm.
"Then you're definitely hopeless."
Penny assessed sincerely.
"What do you think?"
She even looked at Sheldon.
But the eccentric geek Sheldon didn't care about that.
"He didn't mention me! Not a single mention?" Sheldon's voice rose by eight octaves. "Not even a name like 'that annoying tall physicist'?"
The big boy was very upset.
"No, he didn't."
Leonard gave a helpless reply. He couldn't lie, because if he lied, Sheldon would grab him by the throat. No one knew better than him how annoying this roommate was.
"Fine, I get it. It seems he isn't as much of a genius as we thought!" Sheldon abused the food in his takeout box with a fork, as if the innocent pieces of meat were the comic artist who had failed his expectations.
He shoved a piece of meat fiercely into his mouth.
Sheldon's cheeks puffed out as he chewed hard.
"Listen to me, you guys have to believe me..." Penny was about to say something, but her words were interrupted because Sheldon suddenly jumped up like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.
"Cherry pit! Cherry pit!"
His face flushed crimson, his fingers clutching his throat.
"Damn it, you're only eating the cherry pork! The Chinese restaurant didn't put real cherries in there!" Despite his complaining, Leonard rushed over immediately to save his roommate.
Penny also quickly helped out.
After a very familiar flurry of activity, Sheldon was finally rescued.
"I swear, the fact that this guy is still alive is the best proof that I should believe there's a God in this world." Penny said to Leonard while patting Sheldon's back to help him catch his breath.
"It's not my fault. It's the cherry pit. I can't handle it. It's like Kryptonite to Superman for me." The recovering Sheldon weakly protested.
But all he got in return were two perfectly synchronized eye rolls.
"You're dragging superheroes into this? They don't choke on cherry pits!" Penny tried to use the cruel reality to wake up her friend, who was lost in a false analogy.
"Penny's right, and besides, that wasn't a cherry pit. It was just a pea." Leonard, who had just washed his hands, found Sheldon recoiling from the water stains on his hands.
"I ordered cherry pork, there won't be peas in it." Sheldon corrected him earnestly. However, neither Penny nor Leonard was willing to believe his sophistry.
"But that was a pea!"
Leonard emphasized again.
So, Sheldon thought for a moment.
"No, that's not a pea. I ordered cherry pork." Sheldon continued to insist. Even after Leonard pulled out the pea he had spat up, Sheldon merely glanced at it.
"It just looks like a pea. I won't admit it's a pea, anyway." Sheldon lowered his head and started fiddling with the takeout box again, but he didn't dare put any food into his mouth.
"That's self-deception!"
Leonard gnashed his teeth.
"Who collects food their roommate spits out? You two are truly eccentric." The girl Penny couldn't help but sigh while standing up and smoothing the wrinkles on her clothes.
She moved her mouth as if she had an ulcer. "You know what? Before, I thought it was crazy enough that you obsess over superheroes in comics but dare not pursue the real-life ones."
Penny hadn't finished her sentence.
"And now?"
Sheldon instinctively interrupted.
"Now?" Penny grabbed her jacket and casually scooped something off the table. "Either I'm crazy, or you two are crazy. It certainly can't be that the world has gone mad."
"Honestly, putting aside what just happened."
"Just believing that some fourteen or fifteen-year-old kid has ten million and knows the billionaire Bruce Wayne... If I were a scammer, I could trick you two out of your underwear."
"I'd sooner believe I'll walk out the door right now and bump into Bruce Wayne looking to flirt with me."
Penny was genuinely trying to advise her two friends not to fall for the scam of some billionaire showing up at their door. However, she noticed her two friends were both silently staring and not responding.
"Oh well, sooner or later you'll be sleeping on the streets, but I'll definitely adopt you... Who doesn't like having pets?" Penny said, opening the apartment door, ready to return to her own apartment.
*Slam*
The door closed.
The two geeks exchanged glances.
A moment later.
"It's incredible that Penny can even realize she's crazy." Sheldon sincerely exclaimed, withdrawing his gaze from the door.
"Tell me about it. Actually, she wouldn't need to trick me, I'd take off my own underwear for her." Leonard withdrew his lovesick gaze and lowered his head, preparing to enjoy his late-night meal.
However.
Seeing the empty table, his expression instantly froze.
"Where's my takeout?"
Leonard recalled Penny's casual scoop from before.
His voice was astonished.
"Leonard, Leonard, I told you before you need to order three takeout meals. You can choose not to trust math or me, but you really should trust that our neighbor will perform consistently as always." Sheldon stirred the takeout box with his fork, not taking a bite, his voice laced with pity.
Leonard was helpless.
But he still insisted stubbornly, "This is all part of my plan. Penny will eventually become so dependent on my takeout that she won't be able to leave me, and she'll finally marry me."
Truly a geek's fantasy.
Leonard was excited.
"Look, this is the chance she left me." He noticed Penny's forgotten phone on the table. He quickly grabbed the phone and rushed towards the apartment door with pride.
Just reaching the hallway.
Leonard saw Penny, who was still standing at the door for some reason.
Was she waiting for me?
Harboring this thought, Leonard hurried forward.
"B-B-Bru..."
Penny was frozen in place as if she had been stared at by Medusa, her lips trembling, continuously repeating the same syllable.
"Bru-what?"
Leonard walked up to Penny, confused.
And so.
"B-B-Bru..."
He also became a repeater.
Their stuttering tones were perfectly synchronized.
And just at that moment.
"Leonard!"
Sheldon also rushed out in a panic.
"Bad news! My computer is completely fried! That comic artist's computer was full of viruses! He might truly be a genius! He predicted my prediction, and it completely broke my computer!"
Sheldon sounded dejected.
He noticed his two friends standing rigidly in the hallway.
Before Sheldon could ask.
"Which comic artist are you talking about?" Bruce Wayne, impeccably dressed in a suit, looking like a successful man with an extremely dignified aura, moved from in front of the two to the side.
Sheldon's eyes immediately widened.
"Bruce Wayne!"
He managed a complete gasp of astonishment.
However.
That might have used up all his strength.
"Oh~ my God~"
Sheldon, an atheist, rolled his eyes and fell straight backward. Perhaps this was why the ship of friendship was so fragile. Leonard and Penny quickly scrambled to catch the theoretical physicist. Then, all three capsized together, sitting in an odd posture in the hallway.
"Sorry."
Leonard didn't know why he was apologizing to Bruce.
"Uh, sorry."
Penny didn't know why she was apologizing either. Mainly because both their minds were still blank, they couldn't believe they were seeing a global billionaire in this kind of low-rent apartment building.
"Aren't you going to invite me in for a seat?"
Bruce was internally speechless, but maintained his smile. Hearing this, Leonard and Penny quickly nodded, scrambling to their feet and carrying Sheldon toward the apartment door like they were carrying a patient.
"Please come in!"
Penny didn't forget to poke her head out and speak to Bruce.
In the living room, Bruce elegantly avoided the Star Wars action figures scattered on the floor, his gaze lingering on the walls covered with comic book posters. Leonard was so nervous he looked like a student facing the principal.
His hand shook as he held the coffee.
"So, Ian Kent, my nephew, is planning to hire you two?" Bruce politely accepted the coffee, placed it on the table, and got straight to the point.
His gaze shifted from Leonard to the unconscious Sheldon on the sofa.
"Am I not in on this?"
Penny couldn't help but interject. It was the first time she had seen a live, top-tier financial magnate, so she was completely flustered and tried to use some humor to ease the tense atmosphere.
"No."
Bruce looked at the girl and replied seriously.
"Uh..."
Penny felt the pressure and retreated a few steps. "Really... I'm actually very good at cleaning. Even the fanciest companies need excellent janitors, right?"
She gave an awkward laugh.
"No need."
Bruce responded concisely.
He didn't know why he thought of the sterile female janitor in Ian's other novel. He felt that he might truly be a little mentally unstable because of that stuff recently.
"Okay."
Penny scratched her intensely itchy scalp and awkwardly retreated to the corner. She felt a bit humiliated, her emotions complex, feeling like she was the odd one out, like a clown in the room.
Thinking this.
When she noticed Bruce looking at her a few more times, Penny didn't think it was her charm working. She just felt that this world was so crazy it was unreal.
Who could have thought?
The boastful little boy her neighbor met actually wasn't bragging. The billionaire Bruce Wayne really showed up for him. That probability was comparable to being hit by a meteorite while walking down the street.
The more Penny thought about it, the more surreal it felt.
And Leonard felt the same.
"Yes... Mr. Kent did say he would offer me and Sheldon a new job, but..." The stunned Leonard hadn't finished his sentence.
"Excellent."
Bruce nodded, interrupting him.
"Accept the offer from my nephew."
The old-money magnate's words were extremely serious.
"So, is this an official Wayne Enterprises employment?" Leonard cautiously tested the waters. Like Penny, he thought the whole thing was surreal, even secretly pinching his own thigh.
"You can view this as my personal, additional employment." Bruce corrected his statement. He needed someone to constantly keep an eye on Ian and ensure that any potential hidden alien technology was safe.
"Additional employment?"
Leonard's mind immediately played out a full Mission: Impossible scenario. "Are we commercial spies? That's probably quite different from our university jobs, isn't it?"
He started to hesitate. Regardless, Leonard really didn't want to give up his university job. After all, scientific research wasn't just for a career, it was for the benefit of all humanity.
Just as a sense of pride swelled in Leonard's heart.
"The average annual salary for an American university professor is $200,000. I will give you an annual salary of $500,000, and that's not even counting the salary Ian Kent will be offering you."
Bruce activated his most powerful and unanswerable money ability on this planet.
With just a slight effort.
The impoverished Leonard was struck dumb.
"$500,000!?"
The scientist with scientific aspirations was hit by a shockwave of money—his and Sheldon's salaries were actually not low, but their student loans were definitely not a small amount either.
In America.
The higher the degree, the more money had to be invested. This was the capitalist market of the free United States, where most high-earning professionals spent most of their first twenty years of income paying off student loans.
"This... this..."
Leonard's inner resolve began to waver.
And Penny, hearing the salary promise, offered an assist.
"Oh my God! Leonard, you guys are going to be rich! You'll be the richest... nerds I know!" Penny's timely exclamation was like a shot in the arm.
"The richest nerds, huh?"
Leonard seemed to feel his masculine competitiveness surge. Forget scientific ideals, forget the future of humanity—that was all nonsense. The most fundamental mission of humans was to reproduce!
"Don't worry, Mr. Wayne. Sheldon and I are excellent commercial spies!" Leonard immediately took off his glasses and gave Bruce his solemn assurance.
And at that moment.
"Leonard! Leonard!" Sheldon suddenly sprang up from the sofa like an electrocuted frog. "I had a dream! I dreamed I met Bruce Wayne!"
"And then I fainted from all the excitement!" He first looked at his roommate, then, following his roommate's gaze, he saw Bruce sitting in his side blind spot.
"It wasn't a dream after all. My Groundhog Day nightmare has come true~" With that, Sheldon passed out again, collapsing backward. His ridiculous behavior made Leonard extremely embarrassed.
"Perhaps only I am truly skilled..."
Leonard coughed nervously, touching his slightly humiliated face. To this, Bruce internally grumbled, of course, the abnormal Ian would only seek out abnormal scientists.
"You won't be commercial spies."
Of course, Bruce maintained his elegance on the surface, pretending to ignore the farce. He carefully chose his words. "I am more like looking for two guardians for my nephew."
This was the truth.
After all, Batman couldn't constantly monitor a little boy in Metropolis. Because of this, Bruce needed these two scientists, whom Ian had set his sights on, to watch Ian for him, to prevent certain situations that neither he nor Clark wanted to see occur.
Bruce would, of course, also arrange for other, more reliable scientists to be assigned to Ian.
However.
Two more people wouldn't hurt.
"Guardians?"
Leonard was a bit slow to react.
"Meaning nannies."
Penny explained quietly from the side. She thought the world was truly too ridiculous. Who would spend a million dollars a year just to hire playdate nannies for a kid?
"But Mr. Wayne, Sheldon and I are people with scientific aspirations..." The recovered Leonard began to struggle; his last bit of stubbornness was dying hard.
To this.
Bruce calmly pulled two checks from his inner suit pocket and lightly placed them on the coffee table covered with comic books.
"This is your relocation bonus."
Bruce stood up and smoothed his suit. The sound of the fabric friction exuded the texture of money. "Besides, who said you won't be able to continue conducting cutting-edge scientific research?"
He gave Leonard a mysterious smile.
What was more cutting-edge than technology that could blow up the Earth?
"There really is research?"
Leonard's eyes widened.
"Oh! Oh my God, Leonard, you guys can move into a huge villa... That's the life I only dream of." The numbers on the checks made Penny gasp.
She was simply expressing her genuine internal shock.
But the lovestruck Leonard felt he had detected the crucial element.
"I'll do it! I'll be the nanny!"
He became resolute again.
"Your assist was appreciated."
This was Bruce pulling out a few bills and slipping them into Penny's hand as a thank you. He smiled back and glanced at Sheldon, who was still passed out on the sofa.
"Someone will convince him."
Leaving those words.
Bruce put down the untouched coffee and turned to leave.
"Are you leaving?"
Leonard and Penny hurried to see him off.
They were extremely enthusiastic.
The image of Einstein on the living room wall silently witnessed the scene.
Another scientist corrupted by capitalism.
Just like him.
...
The rain in Gotham always carried a smell of rust.
The rain in Metropolis smelled like diluted lemon cleaning agent.
Alfred stood under the apartment building holding a black umbrella.
The tilt of the umbrella was just enough for the rainwater to flow off the folds of the Gotham billionaire's custom-made suit without dampening the fastidious man's immaculate hairstyle.
"Back to Gotham, Master Bruce?"
The old butler asked as he opened the car door, his voice calm and knowing.
Even though he was old and Bruce was well into middle age and a father, his form of address for Bruce remained unchanged.
"Not tonight." Bruce loosened his tie and casually tossed the remaining four pounds of the ten-pound monitoring equipment he had secretly brought into the apartment building aside.
"Ian Kent is still a student, he cannot fly, and he has only just begun awakening his abilities, so his secret base must be somewhere in Metropolis."
Bruce conducted a logical analysis. Yes, his moment of enlightenment at Ian's house was because he felt he had grasped an important clue.
The Omnimachine God of the Universe—wasn't that just an Artificial Intelligence?
That was a situation incredibly similar to Clark's childhood experience!
Before.
Bruce thought he had everything figured out.
It was because he had made an association with the information about Clark.
It was too similar.
This was also the reason he suddenly returned everything to Ian because he had realized that Ian, like Clark, might have a Fortress of Solitude that didn't belong to Earth!
"I can tell you are very concerned about young Mr. Kent."
Alfred saw the light flickering in his master's eyes through the rearview mirror—that excitement he was all too familiar with when discovering a new mystery.
"So, will young Mr. Kent be going to Arkham?" The Butler Knight was also curious, as he had read Batman's psychological evaluation report on Ian.
"Why would I reward him? Arkham doesn't need to welcome its second King." Bruce didn't look up, his fingers quickly slid across the car's computer screen.
The neon lights outside the car window cast flowing colors across Bruce's face.
"Could young Mr. Kent also be from Krypton?" Alfred drove the car steadily. He always chatted with Bruce, seizing any opportunity to engage in conversation.
As someone close to Bruce.
No one was more aware that his master was Gotham's greatest psychopath.
"If that were the only situation, I would be happy to see it. But the situation might be more bizarre and complex." Bruce kept his head down, scrolling through his tablet.
"What exactly are the abilities he's awakening... Soon, perhaps we will know the answer." The tablet on Bruce's lap showed the Sentry comic strips he had secretly photographed, and surprisingly, the Homelander comic as well.
The Sentry's tattered golden suit, Homelander's twisted smile—Bruce felt that Ian's passion for creating such works couldn't simply be about the love of money or creation.
He believed he had grasped the key to the problem.
And.
He was close to the covered truth about Ian Kent.
"Drawing power from fantasy—is this truly possible?" Bruce felt he had grasped the critical information, but even he found this speculation too absurd.
Of course.
Absurdity did not mean impossibility.
Therefore, it required verification over time.
And before that.
"Let's start looking for his secret base near his school."
The sedan rolled over a puddle.
Bruce formulated his nighttime "operational" plan.
He was very cautious.
But no one could say for sure.
Whether he was making an excuse for himself to temporarily escape the nightmare he would continue to experience upon returning to Gotham.
***
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