Q: Who was the ultimate mood killer?
A: Gotham's dark and brooding Batman.
After so long in the darkness, suspicion and vigilance had seeped into Batman's bones and become instinct.
It was hardly what Bruce intended, but this habit of his really did kill the mood more often than not. Getting sweet nothings out of Brucie baby was easy, but getting Batman to praise you when you were happy and excited, or even just express his approval...
Ha. Maybe in your next life.
This alone had caused no shortage of friction between Bruce and his children.
His second son, Jason Todd, was still wearing that red helmet, roaming around bashing other people's heads, with absolutely no intention of coming home. Whenever the two met, they put on a classic Bat Family performance of "fatherly love and filial devotion"-
At best, a barrage of profanity; at worst, fists and feet flying.
The old butler, Alfred, had practically worried his hair white over it.
My dear Master Bruce, that silver tongue of yours has charmed every beauty in Gotham. Never mind that you haven't charmed a lady of the house back to Wayne Manor-how can you fail to win over even your own son? →_→
And now that habit had extended to their newest member, the little merfolk Miaomiao.
Tim pressed a hand to his forehead, almost speechless. He could practically see sweet, well-behaved Miaomiao hiding in a corner, quietly feeling hurt...
No, considering the little merfolk's combat prowess and the personality she had shown in her earlier conversation with Damian, perhaps... she might leap up and smack Bruce with her tail instead?
Now that would be...
A delight to watch. (•‾̑⌣‾̑•)✧
Under everyone's resigned or expectant(?) gazes, Miaomiao's happily swishing tail slowly came to a stop.
The smile faded from the little merfolk's face. She tilted her head and thought for a moment, then... smiled again.
"Bruce, you're worried that bad people will trick me, right? Just like our Elders said."
Miaomiao slowly waved her tail, putting on a grim, deeply aggrieved expression as her voice grew low and solemn.
"You little ones are always thinking about how wonderful the outside world is, longing to experience its so-called 'twists and turns.' Yet you have no idea that our kin who were deceived and harmed by the humans on land wished to their dying breath that they had never left the deep sea!"
Miaomiao's imitation was uncannily lifelike. Even her voice sounded almost exactly like a middle-aged person weathered by life. Paired with her youthful face, it made for a strangely unsettling sight.
The next second, the little merfolk's familiar sweet smile returned. "Don't worry, Bruce. I understand. You want what's best for me. But I won't just trust anyone. You're my anchor in this world-that's why I trust you."
"Your anchor in this world?"
That phrase caught everyone's attention. This was the second time they had heard Miaomiao use it.
Bruce recalled what the girl had said earlier about her Elders and siblings. Since she wasn't the product of illegal human experimentation, the Elders naturally weren't the researchers he had imagined, either. But her remark that her siblings "weren't in this world" still bothered him a little.
Bruce had been busy with work before, and he had also worried about hurting the girl, so he had kept putting off the question. Now was a good opportunity to get some clarity.
"You said before that your siblings weren't in this world anymore. What did you mean?"
"Exactly what I said. They aren't in this world." Miaomiao thought for a moment and rephrased it. "Actually, I should say that I left our world."
Oho, a new discovery.
Tim immediately perked up. "So, Miaomiao, you're from another world?"
Miaomiao nodded.
"Wow, a parallel world? That's interesting."
Parallel worlds were nothing new to the Bat-themed heroes. In fact, parallel universes were something the Bat Family had been researching all along.
For some reason, the Bat-themed heroes seemed especially prone to running into incidents involving parallel timelines or universes. Bruce had once accidentally entered a rift in spacetime and met versions of himself from different parallel universes; Jason had also briefly entered another parallel universe and held that world's Batman in extremely high regard; Wayne Manor had even hosted Bruce's daughter from a parallel universe, Helena Wayne.
So when Miaomiao said she came from another world, no one thought there was anything wrong with that. If asked, their answer would have been, "You get used to it."
"Does your universe have a Batman, too?"
"I don't know," Miaomiao answered honestly. "I'm not an adult yet. For safety reasons, underage little merfolk aren't allowed to go ashore on their own. Everything I know about land and humans comes from stories told by the Elders and the rest of our kin."
"You said I was your 'anchor' in this world."
"Yes." At the mention of it, Miaomiao's eyes lit up. "Among us Merfolk, sometimes one of us forms a 'connection' with someone else. That 'someone' might be another of our kin, a human on land, or a member of another race. It could be someone we know, someone we've only passed by, or even a complete stranger we've never met."
"Once that 'connection' forms, it means those two people are certain to share a deep bond. Even if they don't have one now, they definitely will in the future. But a case like mine, where the other person in the 'connection' is actually in another world, has never happened before. Even the Elders were startled when they found out."
Tim looked at the little merfolk as though she were his own little kid who would happily wander off with a stranger. "So you were a whole world apart, and you just came over like that?"
"Follow heaven's will, and let nature take its course." Miaomiao looked as though this were perfectly obvious. "If fate has already foretold it, then it's bound to happen. Why would I defy heaven?"
"..." Tim had no answer to that.
Damian, however, couldn't help commenting, "If someone told you heaven's will decreed that you'd die by his hand, would you just stand there and let him kill you?"
Heaven's will, fate-Damian believed only in the blade in his hand, and nothing pleased him more than challenging that so-called "will of heaven"! If Miaomiao really treated "heaven's will" as a rule she had to obey, Damian would honestly want to crack open the little merfolk's skull and see what was going on inside.
Miaomiao gave Damian a puzzled look, as though she found his question absurd. "Why would you think that? I'm so well-behaved. If someone really said that, I'd definitely send him on his way so he could ask heaven whether there'd been a mistake."
"..."
Silence reigned over Gotham that night.
After a brief silence, Damian burst out laughing and gave Miaomiao a thumbs-up. "Now that's the Miaomiao I know!"
Meanwhile, Bruce, Tim, and Alfred watched Damian and Miaomiao jump up for a high five and felt their heads begin to ache.
Oh dear. They had thought they'd found a sweet little blueberry cupcake, but it seemed the filling was dark chocolate...
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