"Batman turned around, and the little light seeping through the towering warehouse door was almost completely obscured by his tall figure.
Lord Superman only saw him resolutely turning his back, but Bruce noticed the stiffness of his ankle as he took that step.
Batman still left, and Lord Superman followed. Wonder Woman sighed deeply behind them.
'This isn't the solution, no one can replace his position.' Wonder Woman picked up her tools again, starting to repair the broken car in the warehouse.
Bruce quietly stood watching their retreating figures, then turned to Wonder Woman and said: 'His coming to find me is not to replace your universe's Batman.'
Wonder Woman paused in her work. She lightly tapped the ground with her wrench and said: 'Perhaps he saw another possibility in your younger self, but Clark has never believed, nor wanted to believe that Batman shaped himself.'
'He has no regrets, no remorse, never thought about starting over, or about if, from the beginning, he was not a mistake to be redeemed, but Superman never realized this.'
Bruce walked over to Wonder Woman, squatted next to her, and said: 'Perhaps he came to find me because he has come to understand.'
Wonder Woman finally showed some puzzlement in her eyes. She slightly moved her body to the side, further away from Bruce, inspecting this young Batman.
From this perspective, there was quite a difference between Bruce and Batman. As his body had not fully recovered, he was thinner, which naturally made him look younger, with a stronger sense of youth.
Europeans and Americans mature faster and pursue mature sexiness, so many twenty-somethings already look like they're in their forties, but Bruce was clean-shaven and not as muscular, seeming more naive than the American young men in Wonder Woman's memory, just like a child.
Furthermore, his gaze was completely different from the Batman she knew. Although they both had blue eyes, Batman's eyebrows appeared higher for some reason; the shadows under his brows were heavier, and his pupils were always half-covered, revealing no expression.
Yet, Bruce looked her in the eye under the light, his blues whitening in the direct illumination. She could see every detail in his irises, and when he focused on Wonder Woman, she felt he had no secrets from her.
And most importantly, wasn't this Batman unusually talkative?
In the past, for Batman to speak so much in such a short time, it must have been due to a major alien invasion of Earth, or they must not have seen each other for at least three months – including hellos and goodbyes , even coughs and sighs, would hit this same word count.
'Do you believe me if I say I can instantly bring them back?'
Under Wonder Woman's shocked gaze, Bruce presented a sincere smile.
Elsewhere, Batman had already passed through the dense bushes, reaching behind the house, on the vast green lawn.
The clouds were low, the wind sweeping over the wilderness lifting Batman's cloak. The air gave off a grey, dreary hue, reminiscent of the cold rain in November in the Scottish Highlands.
'Batman.' Lord Superman landed. Batman halted, but not because Lord Superman had called him, but because he had one last thing to say to him.
'This is your solution.'
With that said, he no longer hesitated and strode forward. Although Lord Superman was faster and had landed in front of him after flying over his head, he said: 'You have misunderstood. I did not bring him here to replace you.'
Batman silently watched him, his face saying 'you got it all wrong,' but he remained silent even in defense.
'Listen, Bruce, we will always be a team, you, me, and Diana, I brought another Bruce here just to change our current situation.'
'You just want to change me.'
'I just want to understand you.'
Batman's head moved slightly, as if he were shaking his head, but it wasn't so dramatic.
Suddenly, he stepped forward. This aggressive action scared Lord Superman, and Batman stared him in the eye and said, 'You have corrected the world's mistakes, and now, you think it's time to correct mine.'
As I said, I just want to understand you.'
'You think I am not normal, so you found a Batman who you think is normal in order to understand why I am not normal.' Batman took a light breath, and continued: 'You think I'm a broken machine, so you bought a new one to see which part had problems.'
Lord Superman opened his mouth, unable to refute Batman's words, because he used to think in the same way.
No matter how powerful Batman was, how prophetic, how much of a genius, how much people tolerated his quiet nature, Lord Superman always felt he was problematic.
It was not because Batman was different from others, but Lord Superman's super intuition always made him feel Batman was like a machine with issues.
The machine didn't have any operational issues, it didn't make strange noises, the appearance was still new, but Lord Superman always felt that there was chaos inside the machine, in areas they had not noticed.
But this was just an intuition, even a delusion. Lord Superman had no evidence, nor could he convince anyone to prove this with him.
But after encountering the other Batmans in the game, Lord Superman found out that it wasn't his Batman who had problems, it was all the Batmans in all the worlds. His own was a relatively minor case.
Although in the last round, Bruce was closer to him, and Beihan was more active, Lord Superman did not forget to pay attention to the other Batman, that is, the Batman of the Prime Universe.
Lord Superman thought of him as a coffin.
A corpse could not describe the feeling this Batman gave him. He was like a coffin placed at a funeral, only for people to pay their respects. No matter how strong he was, he couldn't shake a single screw on top.
This sparked a surprising despair in Lord Superman. He didn't know how the Superman from that cosmos would've dealt with a Batman like this. All he knew was that he couldn't let the Batman he knew turn into this.
Having resorted to violence, Lord Superman finally cast aside his pointless sentimentality. He became more extreme but also more resolute. He vowed that even if he died today and was buried, he would still manage to stretch out a hand from his coffin to throw the Batman next door out of the ground and up into the sky.
"You can't leave here," Lord Superman's eyes started to glow red. "Come back with me, Batman. We will solve all the problems. Just the two of us."
"There's no 'us' anymore," Batman turned away again.
Lord Superman finally exhausted all his patience. He once again soared into the sky, flying diagonally above Batman. Between his breaths, an chilling coldness surged within, and the frightening red glow in his eyes intensified.
Batman bent his body, ready to attack.
The fight was about to start.
"Bang!"
The loud noise did not come from the grass.
Lord Superman and Batman jerked around just in time to see the...roof?! It had abruptly lifted into the sky and then crashed back down with a bang!
Immediately afterwards, there was another "Boom!" The warehouse windows shattered into pieces. One silhouette burst out of the warehouse, promptly followed by another.
Wonder Woman held the Lasso of Truth in her hand and yelled at Bruce who was running in front of her, "Stop right there! You good for nothing rascal!! Stop!!!"
The Lasso of Truth flew out from Wonder Woman and traced a fluid arc in the air, heading to bind Bruce.
From their angle, Superman and Batman couldn't see what was happening below at all. The warehouse blocked their view of the fight, they could only hear Wonder Woman's angry roar followed by a series of crashes and thumps.
The two had no time to talk. Like a low-flying bird, Lord Superman zoomed back to the house at the fastest speed, followed closely by Batman.
Bruce was already pinned down by Wonder Woman. Lord Superman hurriedly shouted, "Diana, stop!"
Then he turned to Bruce, "What did you do?!"
"I didn't do anything!" Bruce countered.
"He kissed me!" Wonder Woman roared in indignation.
Lord Superman and Batman were stunned.
"I only kissed her on the cheek!" Bruce argued. "Besides, you dodged it!"
"That doesn't hide the fact that you're a pervert!"
"It was a polite kiss! You're misunderstanding!"
Furious, Wonder Woman reached for the Lasso of Truth to tie up Bruce. She lifted a hand and the lasso that had just been sent flying returned to her. But just as she lifted her hand to bind him, Bruce took advantage of the moment to flip over, knocking Wonder Woman down and scrambling away.
"Clark, save me!" As he called out, Bruce darted behind Lord Superman.
Neither Lord Superman nor Batman had time to react. Just as Lord Superman was about to look over his shoulder at the retreating Bruce, the incoming Lasso of Truth had already bound him and Batman together.
After dusting off his hands, Bruce came out from behind them, high-fived Wonder Woman and said, "You see? That wasn't so hard, was it?"
"What on earth are you doing?!" Lord Superman cried in disbelief.
"Didn't you want to hear Batman's truth?" Bruce shrugged and said, "Surely your original plan wasn't to make me a translator? Is your brain tangled up or something?"
Lord Superman was stunned speechless.
"Moreover, you're not implying that Batman is the only one with a problem, right?" Wonder Woman stood with her hands on her hips, flicked her wind-blown hair and said, "Bringing in another Batman to translate, is that something a normal person would do? Clark? You're hardly any better than him!"
Having finished, she went and stood to their side, watching them from another angle.
No matter how prescient Batman might have been, he could never have anticipated the existence of such a trendy Batman in the universe. Much less that this Batman would persuade Wonder Woman to cooperate with him in less than ten minutes of his arrival.
Thus, the armor he was wearing couldn't counteract the Lasso of Truth, nor did he have any equipment to resist it.
Lord Superman could attempt to use brute force to break free. But the problem was that now he and Batman were tied together.
The Lasso of Truth could withstand tugging, but Batman could not withstand squeezing. The body strength of Batman was that of a normal person. The armor he was wearing today did not seem like heavy armor. Even if it was, if Superman were to exert his real strength, Batman would be turned into mush.
Consequently, Lord Superman couldn't escape either.
The two just stood there, bound together. With a wave of Wonder Woman's hand, the rope was pulled tight, and they were forced to sit back-to-back on the ground.
A brilliant smile lit up Bruce's face.