24 Chapter 24: A magical Birthday (2)
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"The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper."
— W.B. Yeats
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"What the fuck?" Bruce couldn't help but curse in surprise.
"Language young master. Your parents would be rolling in their graves if they heard you using that sort of language." Alfred said with some amount of strictness in his voice.
"Sorry," Bruce said a little sheepishly. He had tried to stop cursing as much as he could but moments like these forced his inner angry teenager out of him.
"What I meant to say was what type of name is Zatara? I mean it sounds really corny, also I never heard about them. Are they from a business family or some influential politicians?" Bruce tried to fish for information about anything Alfred might know about the most famous sorcerer family of dc.
"They are not in traditional business or politics. As much as I have heard, they are in the entertainment industry. They do magic shows all over the world. They are quite famous in the craft too." Alfred informed Bruce.
"Oh, I see." Bruce didn't stretch the conversation more and just silently continued to walk with Alfred toward the room where the Zatana members were waiting.
As the duo entered the room, Bruce finally saw the man who is supposed to be a legendary magician of dc and his daughter, an equally legendary sorceress with reality-defying magic powers.
"Ah Bruce, you have grown bigger than the last time I saw you." The middle-aged magician sporting a well-groomed mustache and wearing a suit got up from his seat and approached Bruce to shake his hands.
"Uh, sorry but I got amnesia after my accident. Please do forgive me but I can't seem to remember you or anyone else for that reason." Bruce used his go-to excuse as he showed a confused expression on his face.
"Yeah, I heard. But you don't have to worry about it now. I believe I can help you with that. By the way just to remind you, I am Giovanni Zatara and that is my daughter Zatanna Zatara." Giovanni said as he took a peek at his daughter.
"Wayne, Bruce Wayne. But I think you already knew that. As for helping me, can I ask how and why you would help me?" Bruce asked, with a doubtful expression.
"One simple word, magic." Giovanni wiggled his fingers in the air like he was trying to make a two-year-old believe in magic.
'Shit.' Bruce thought in his mind since he knew that if Giovanni were to use his magic on him, there was a very good chance that he would find out that he was not the real Bruce Wayne but a different soul in Bruce's body. Hell, the magician might even try to exorcise him thinking of him as a body-possessing demon or something.
So he could not let him use any sort of mind or soul magic on him until and unless he is sure that he got the mandatory security against mind and soul attacks that all other transmigrators receive, or at least until he made something to protect his mind from outside influence.
'All those inventions and I never bothered to make some sort of mind shield. I really don't deserve to be a transmigrator.' He thought as he quickly began to search for some possible and believable excuses in his mind to stop Zatara from using any sort of magic on him.
"I am joking of course. I actually received some training in physical therapy from a spiritual guru when I went to Bali for one of my shows. I think I can use that knowledge to try and get your memories back through hypnotism and relaxing meditation." Zatara smiled and gave him a reason that Bruce didn't believe for even a single second.
"Mr. Zatara, the truth is, I actually don't want to remember what I have already forgotten. If it comes to me naturally, it's okay but if it doesn't, I don't want to force it. I have left that part of my life behind and moved on from my parents' deaths. I think that's what they would have wanted from me." Bruce gave a very mature speech as an excuse to try to explain why he did not want to take Giovanni's help.
Normally that would have been enough for any other person to agree with him but what Bruce forgot was that those came from him, a nine-year-old boy. So, it sounded really weird.
"Really? Fine but if you do change your decision, do tell me. I will do my very best to help you get your memories back. I am very capable in stuff like that." Giovanni said with a kind smile after looking at Bruce's eyes for a couple of seconds, even though Zatanna looked sad all of a sudden for some reason.
Bruce somehow felt a little weird, being in Giovanni's line of sight. It was like the magician could look at what he truly was like Bruce's very soul was laid bare in front of him. But it only lasted a fraction of a second. As soon as Giovanni smiled, Bruce inwardly released a sigh of relief. He was sure that his secrets weren't revealed. If they were, then Giovanni wouldn't have smiled at him. He would have bound him in a spell and started torturing him already.
Bruce didn't want to fight mages and sorcerers so soon. He knew that even with his op cheat and his continuous inventions, he could still lose. Why? Because magic was op. Science could do anything within its own rules. But magic disregarded all rules. Magic was total b.s and someone who doesn't know magic should never fight a master of it.
'I wish the Wizard would summon me to the rock of eternity. I could use some Shazam powers for myself.' He thought as he remembered how easily one could gain god-level powers in this world. All one had to do was just have a heart as pure as gold.
But, Bruce knew he would never be selected or even short-listed for it simply because he didn't have a single bit of purity in his heart. The only gold the wizard would find in there were entire libraries of high-quality doujinshi, manga, and anime.
'By the way, I heard that you were a good friend of my parents but I didn't see you two at the funeral. Alfred mentioned that you couldn't attend due to your own personal problems. Is it something that I can help with?" Bruce asked. He wanted to get a position of superiority in their conversation whether it was through showing compassion or making the middle-aged wizard feel guilty.
"You can't help even if you wanted to Bruce. Sadly no one can. You see, my wife, Zatanna's mother passed away some time ago and I wasn't able to get over it. I locked myself at home grieving her, even neglecting my own daughter. Zatanna had lost her mother too but I guess I was too self-absorbed to think about her. Shows what type of a father I am, doesn't it?" Giovanni said with an expression that screamed that he genuinely felt guilty.
"No Dad, stop blaming yourself. What happened to Mom and... what happened after wasn't your fault at all. You tried your best, and you still are. That's why I love you, Dad." Little Zatanna spoke up for the first time with tears held up in her eyes.
Giovanni too looked emotional at his daughter's outburst and looked at her with a complicated expression and proceeded to hug her tightly, showing how much he loved her and cared for her.
While all this was happening, Bruce just continued to look at the father-daughter pair with interest. He hadn't ever seen such family drama in real life before so this was all very interesting to him. He was glad this was happening in his home because this way he was not only able to get some details about their past but also get a rough idea about their psyches.
Bruce had already started keeping a mental journal of sorts where he recorded the personalities, goals, ambitions, strengths, and weaknesses of all the 'important' people he came across in his life. He was sure that this would help him immensely in the future. He could write them up too but he didn't want to risk someone seeing that data or stealing it from him somehow.
"I am sorry you had to see all this. It seems we still have to work on our relationship more to avoid awkward situations like these," Giovanni said as he stopped hugging his little daughter and cleared his throat.
"It's okay. Truthfully, I am glad that you could sort out your differences and mend your relationship. I just hope that you two don't drift apart again. Our friends and family are the very things that define us. Without them, we are nothing." Bruce smiled somewhat sadly.
"You have grown much wiser than the last time I met you, Bruce. I guess losing one's parents does force one to mature quicker. Anyways, as I was saying, I was here to actually help you regain your memories, but since you don't want them back, I won't force you." Giovanni said.
"Thanks for that. By the way, can I ask how your wife passed away? Was it a disease or was it an accident like my parents?" Bruce asked curiously.
Both the husband and wife of the Zatara family were supposed to be powerful sorcerers. So his wife dying just like that seemed a little unbelievable.
"She died while battling the armies of hell and forcing back a demon general back into his realm." Mr. Zatara said with a straight face.
"..." Bruce didn't know how to answer back. Should he accept that reason since it was most probably true, or should he act like he didn't believe it like any normal person wouldn't?
"It was a joke. My wife died... in an accident. She was too kind for her own good... But I am not here today to talk about her. She is in a better place now, wherever it might be. I am here because of you and my daughter." Giovanni said as his posture suddenly became straight and his face turned stern.
"Huh?" Bruce was confused.
"After my wife passed away, I realized that my daughter has been suffering a lot emotionally. Due to our constant traveling, she doesn't have a lot of friends so to speak. So I thought she could spend some time with you since you are the only friend she ever made..."
"That's enough Dad. You are embarrassing me now." Zatanna interrupted with a flushed red face in an attempt to stop her dad from continuing to talk and further embarrass her.
Bruce really wanted to laugh at this. It was truly hilarious. Their personalities were in no way similar to the serious characters portrayed in some of the shows Bruce had watched before in his previous life. They appeared just like a normal father and daughter trying to mend their relationship and get back to their normal lives after the death of the mother.
"Yeah, sure. I'll be glad to be friends with her again. Even though I might not remember our friendship from before I lost my memories, I am sure that we can always make some new ones." He said.
He hadn't only said that because he really liked the two but also because this might be his chance to get closer to the hidden world of magic and learn more about the world of mysticism.
All he had to do was just win their trust and voila, he would get a magical friend as well as a free magic teacher for himself.
'I guess my 'parents' did leave something useful for me besides their huge wealth. They left their contacts with some very important 'canon' characters.' He thought as he wondered who else the original Bruce and his parents might have known before their deaths.
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