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"Is there really such a thing? Real friends who last forever?"
– Kodaka Hasegawa, (Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai)
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<(Bruce Wayne POV)>
"What do you mean you are going away, Bruce? We are still in school. You can't travel alone. That's not even legal. Also, don't you remember all the people who had tried to get inside the estate to hurt you or steal from you?" Selina asked hastily with her eyes already reddening due to the intense emotions she was feeling.
"Having money makes doing a lot of illegal things really simple kitty. I taught you that, remember? Also, I won't be going away for long. Maybe four to five years max. So you don't need to..."
"FOUR TO FIVE YEARS? Then take me with you as well. I'll train too. I am only a little less good at martial arts than you, so I should be able to accompany you and not hold you back. Alfred will be able to take care of everything here. He will have the company of Ace even if Deathstroke decides to leave." Selina tried to convince me.
"I can't Selina. Not here, not where I am going. And, that's not in for debate. Also, if you were to go away, even if Alfred and Ace could live alone, what about Vicki? Despite being an extrovert, she still only considers me, you, Helena, and Cortana as her true friends. And if you leave as well, she will be heartbroken." I reasoned.
"But, but..."
"Selina, do you think I want to go away from my own home, away from you guys just so that I can train myself? I don't, but I need to so that I'll never have to go away again. One needs power so that one can never get oppressed by it. That's the logic of the world. It's stupid but that's how it works. And I swear when I return from my trip, I won't just be stronger, no, in fact, I will be powerful enough to never go away again." I promised.
"... Bruce, may I ask you something?"
"Yeah sure go ahead kitty." I
"Why did you let me live with you that day? Why didn't you just send me back to the orphanage the next day? Why go through all the trouble?" She asked as she turned around and sat on the bed with a complicated expression.
"What do you think?"
"Some of the kids from the school said that a lot of rich people like to groom and train orphans from a young age to become their mistresses and stuff... I am not judging you or anything. I mean it doesn't matter why you did it. What matters is that you changed my life that day when you took me in. That's the only thing that matters. And I will gladly agree to be your mistress if that's what you want me to do. But you don't touch me even when I am the one who tries to you know court you. Hell, you haven't even kissed me on the lips yet everyone at school says that you banged Silver St Cloud in the locker room." She said in a single breath.
"*Sigh* First, you are watching too much Korean drama. Second, no, I didn't bang Silver in the locker room. It's a rumor she spread to get some attention from both me and other people after I rejected her. And third, really kitty? You will believe the words of complete strangers rather than those of the person you have known for years. Do you truly believe that I have been 'grooming you? That night, I took you in not because you were the most beautiful girl I had ever seen which you were by the way. No, I took you in because you were you.
You were Selina Kyle, this amazing girl who needed my help. And I gave you my help albeit in return for something precious from you. I made you my family, the only thing I was lacking at the time. So, yeah, I had ulterior motives I guess. Sue me. And yes, I also have feelings for you. I always did. Anyone who gets to live with someone as extraordinary as you will get them unless they are some sort of unemotional eunuch. And I am not ashamed of my feelings at all." I said, the intensity of my voice lessening by the second as I went towards her, my lips closing hers.
"And the only reason I have not claimed you despite the fact that you have made my life a living hell by teasing my life out of me is because I respect you and I wished t get your verbal consent before we do anything. After all, billionaires do get sued quite often by their pretty little assistants especially if they are a hot little minx like you." I said getting my full rizz mode on.
I didn't care if my lines were cringe or not but the thing was that they were the only lines I knew when it came to flirting. Maybe I should tell Cortana to simulate some different romance scenarios and come up with better pick-up lines.
Selina had shut up at this point, only blankly staring at my lips which were dangerously close to her own. She gulped a little timidly and bent slightly forward joining my moth with hers as we kissed.
It was a... unique experience to be sure. I had kissed before in my last life but for some reason, this was heaven compared to that. Maybe the fact that I was kissing a girl who was supposed to be one of the top ten hottest girls in this particular universe helped a lot. As the kiss advanced, we began to exchange our saliva with each other and play with each other's tongues, turning the kiss excessively more lewd than I initially meant it to be.
"I love you, tiger... So, do you want to do it? I think we are old enough to maybe, you know, try it out. Also, what's that hard thing on my thigh?" She asked a little shyly with some confusion on her face as she stopped the kiss which I was more than glad for.
"I love you too but we can't. We are not old 'enough'. We are just teens. We need to be at least eighteen before we do anything sexual, old enough to make our own decisions, you know. But, we can make out as much as you want till then. However, I think we will be old enough to do a lot of naughty things when I come back from my training trip." I gave a Bullshit reason with a sad heart as I cursed myself.
"As for the hard thing, it seems my 'bat rod' is malfunctioning. I'll probably need to treat it in the lab before it 'explodes'. So bye. I'll meet you later." I said and quickly made my escape with gritted teeth before she could protest.
As much as I want to get in her pants, I can't do it, not right now. And, there is an actual valid reason for that by the way and it's not because I am walking the Issei path of just satisfying myself with seeing and touching some 'Oppai' while having nosebleeds. No, it is because I am still not sure if my 'manly juices' can negatively affect the people I am sexually in contact with.
After all, I used Kryptonite radiation along with a lot of other radioactive stuff to make my special Ultimate Soldier serum. And, I really don't want anybody I love to suffer from the same fate as Mary Jane did in one of the ultimate universe timelines where she died of cancer after being in sexual contact with Peter Parker and continuously ingesting his radioactive sperm.
So, I have to run a lot of tests as well as give some time for the serum to completely get integrated into my body before I start pleasing my little kitty, pun very much intended.
Although I should also make some anti-NTR drones and droids just to make sure that I don't get, as they say in Chinese, green hatted, during my absence from Gotham in case I am in a more twisted comics universe of DC.
"Maybe, a small stealth-type droid with instant castrating abilities should be enough." I wondered aloud to myself.
***
"So, I am not getting the contract extension am I?" Deathstroke asked with a sad expression on his face after learning that I was going away and he might lose his high-paying job.
"Actually, that's what I was here to talk about. I'll be going away and you have taught us almost everything you were ready to teach. But that doesn't mean, I don't have any use for you anymore. You can still be an important member of my... group." I said while doing full-body pushups using only the little finger of my left hand.
"And what do you have in mind?" He asked not reacting much to my showing off my newfound strength and balance.
"Huh, you are not at all sad that you won't be able to see me for the next half a decade, are you? Well I guess, cold hard assassins will always be cold hard assassins. Anyway, what I want you under this new contract to do is simple. Besides protecting the Wayne manor, Alfred, Vicki, and Selina as well as making sure that there is no foul play in any of the Wayne properties and projects including my new company, you will also be responsible for training a new force for me consisting of strictly Gotham locals that have no clear future except for in the underworld."
"Not anything I can't do but pray tell me boy genius, how do I recognize and recruit such people for training? There aren't exactly any talent agencies for stuff like that." Slade smirked as he tried to juggle three ten-pound weights in a bid to show off his own skills.
"Remember I have the largest number of orphanages in the city, about eighty percent of the total number of orphanages that is. They have VERY good living conditions currently, even better than the average household in Gotham. A few years ago, I started a scholarship program there where every orphan kid was tested on their overall intellect, talent, potential, and physical abilities. They would get more benefits like high-tier private schools, tuition classes, training in skills of their own wish, and even professional advice for anything they wanted to do as long as they ranked high in some aspect of the test.
These rankers would have an extremely high chance according to my simulations to be very successful in their lives later on, ensuring more connections and influence for the Wayne Foundation in the future. Even if they didn't become extremely successful elsewhere, they can still be loyal employees for Wayne Solutions. But, what about the unlucky ones who didn't get born with exceptional talent? We can't just forget them or throw them away. So, what can we do for them that will not only benefit them in the long run but also us... ?" I began to explain.
"You decided to get them trained as professional mercenaries under the best one out there as your private force. Your loyal army, filled with orphans whom you had fed and taken care of their entire childhood, and then when they still could not achieve anything, you swept in like an angel and gave them arms and training to enable them to make their own fortune. HAHAHA. My god, you are darker than I thought." Slade interrupted while laughing like he was having the time of his life.
"You have no idea. And truthfully, it doesn't matter what I am doing as long as everyone involved doesn't suffer right? I'll make sure the people working for me never regret it including the orphans, especially the orphans. So, I won't exactly be a hypocrite like many other actually evil manipulating bastards that exist in this world." I tried to justify myself, probably because I wasn't sure if what I was planning was right or not.
Wow, I wasn't this confused even while killing those gang members back at Helena's house that night, was I? Morality is seriously a twisted little thing. You don't feel that bad while killing off adult male criminals but you hesitate when you even try to hurt little children, cute females, or innocent animals like puppies and kittens.
"Yeah, whatever let's you sleep at night pal. I don't judge stuff like this. There's plenty of other darker shit I have seen or have done to judge something as 'normal' as manipulating orphans, no offense by the way... Believe me, what you are doing can almost be considered 'pure' when compared to some of the things I saw back in Afghanistan during my military career." Deathstroke shrugged like he didn't care.
"By the way, how much are you going to pay me for this anyway? I mean I expect some hefty compensation under the new contract since I am required to train so many young blood and all as well as give so much protection and stuff." He asked while rubbing his hands reminding me of a famous money-loving shinobi from one of my favorite anime in my last world.
"A hundred and fifty million dollars for a five-year contract plus fifty million dollars more if you want to hire additional people. It's already written up. Just sign it after reading." I fished out the contract scroll from my pocket and tossed it to him."
"I thought you were in short of liquid cash. Did you sell your properties to pay me or something? Because don't believe for a second that I am going to give the money back." He quickly caught the contract and kept it away in his pocket.
"Nah, my cloud computing venture just took off. We had made a lot of investments in there and recently won a really big military contract to securely store their data and give them the services they require. Dozens of companies began to flock to us after that as they thought we were the best company in cloud computing since we were the first ever business to win a government contract in that sector." I explained lazily knowing that I had just completely ruined Amazon's and Microsoft's future cloud-computing businesses with our way ahead-of-time patented and black-boxed cloud technology.
"Anyways, are you in or not?" I asked.
"Hundred and fifty million? I am in Boss. I am definitely in. I am in as much as you want me to be. Hell, even you can be in for that much money. I'll even take Alfred in..."
"Okay, I get it. You loved the amount. Just stop making this awkward... Goddamn it, you ruined my gym time. Now, I can't even work out in peace in front of you without having a mental image of Alfred inside you. *Blegh*" I almost puked as I gathered my things and went towards the Batcave to delete that cursed memory forever from my mind using the NerveGear.
"Huh? What did I do? I was talking about teamwork and collaboration, of course! Getting Alfred involved in the project and stuff... Truly kids these days, they have such dirty minds." Deathstroke shook his head disappointed like he was dissatisfied with Bruce.
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(AN: Yep, finally going to the League in the next chapter. I told you guys it would happen by the time it's chapter 50 and look I kept my word although personally, I would have preferred to flesh out his relationship with Deathstroke and Vicki a bit more, well there's still plenty of time for that in the future after he returns. And yeah, by the way, Selina Kyle is a confirmed love interest along with Wonder Woman and Talia Al Ghul for now.)
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