12 Chapter 12: The Funeral (2)

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"Humans die. Animals die. Plants die. Even soul reapers die. It's the arch of the universe. Everything that comes to life eventually ceases to exist."

— Baraggan Louisenbairn

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"Hey, Bruce. I was looking for you. I wanted to personally apologize to you for not being able to punish Joe Chill according to the law for what he did to your family." He said with a hint of genuine regret in his voice.

"It's okay Detective Gordon. After all, he did receive punishment. His life, in return for the lives of my parents, although I have to say that the trade wasn't that fair." Bruce said with a 'sad' smile.

"Revenge doesn't heal your wounds, Bruce. I admit that losing your loved ones do birth that feeling in most people, I would probably be as angry as you if not more if this had happened to me but we still have to learn to move past our grudges, otherwise the fire of our hatred can burn us as well. Your parents were heroes of Gotham, their loss was a big one, one that Gotham would suffer for years. I just hope that you stand with it in its time of need." Gordon said as he sighed.

"My parents were not heroes, they were simply businessmen doing their business," Bruce answered as he picked up a glass filled with soda into his hands from the table.

"A hero can be anyone, Bruce. Your parents were more heroes than you can imagine." Jim said as he suddenly smiled to disperse the heavy mood.

"Anyways, meet my daughter, Barbara Gordon. She is my only daughter since my late wife passed away. I brought her here for a change of air. I don't get a lot of time to spend with her, so I brought her with me." He said proudly as he placed his hand on her daughter's shoulder.

"You brought your daughter to a funeral to spend time with her?" Bruce asked wondering how busy and desperate the detective really was.

"I was desperate." Gordon pursed his lips together as he smiled sadly at his own situation.

Bruce looked at the young girl listening to their conversation intently and smiled at her while saying, "You know your father is a really good man, take care of him. This city is really lucky to have someone as honest and hardworking as him."

"Hmhm" The little girl nodded as she agreed to Bruce's words smiling at him, happy that someone was praising her dad.

"Good girl." Bruce smiled and patted the little girl's head also taking the chance to pinch her fluffy cheeks after noticing how cute she was,

"We'll have to go now, Bruce. I am afraid this is as long as I can stay and talk to you without some wild reporter clicking a photo of us and posting it tomorrow at the front of a newspaper stating that a detective was seen taking bribes from the prince of Gotham." Jim laughed at his own joke.

"Yeah, that is very much possible, so I won't stop you. But please bring little Barbara here to the manor sometime if she ever feels bored. You are both welcome here. Plus, I would be glad to host a little princess like her in my home." Bruce said as he smiled at the little girl who giggled back.

"Of course. See you later Bruce." Gordon said as he walked towards the exit gate with her daughter in tow.

"Byeeee byeeee prince," Barbara shouted to him in her childish voice as she waved at him.

Bruce of course waved back.

'Look at that. I met another important character today and made a favorable impression on her at the same time. All in a day's work.' He thought as he sipped his drink relaxingly.

The entire funeral was quite successful for Bruce. He mostly got what he wanted through it. He was able to not only meet a lot of people but also get a basic idea of Gotham's current political and economic condition and structure after his parent's deaths.

Gotham was rapidly changing after the Wayne incident, a change that was for the worse. The investments and political moves that his family used to make were now absent letting all the criminal and corrupt organizations grow without a check.

The crime families were getting bigger with bolder investments and operations now that the biggest supporter of peace was absent from the game. The position of mayor that his father was fighting for, was now believed to be Aubrey James' since there was almost no other good politician who could compete with him.

Many of his different competitors had also taken the chance to one-up Wayne Corporation as they bid for projects or entered into industries directly against Wayne due to an absence of strong leadership at the company as well as dwindling share prices.

Even the government seemed to have benefitted from his parents' deaths as they had silently taken over some assets and projects related to his company in the name of national security and interests.

"It's almost like most of these people wanted them dead. A lot of them even seemed quite happy from their expressions." Bruce said to Alfred after the funeral ended and everyone left.

"That's regrettably true young master. Many of these people had interests that didn't match with your parents, some of them were even outright their enemies. But look at them now, they are so happy thinking that they have won the battle. *Sigh* Don't worry young master, we will have our chance as well. We will rise again." Alfred sighed heavily looking at the last of the people leaving through the gates.

"Yeah, I agree. They were the most shameless liars I have ever seen. Even the people from the orphanage didn't use to lie through their teeth like they did. These bunches were probably the most pompous arrogant-looking fools I have ever seen in my life, especially that girl, Vicki or whatever her name was." Selina said as she chewed on an apple.

Bruce kept a straight face while hearing what Selina said even though he wanted to laugh. He still couldn't understand how and why the two girls became enemies after meeting each other just once.

"Let's go inside. It's getting cold. By the way, what do you two want for dinner today?" Alfred asked as he laid the two kids towards the mansion door.

"Ooh ooh, I want that chocolate ice-cream sundae again maybe with more chocolate in it," Selina said excitedly after hearing about food.

Bruce just smiled at her antics. He quite liked his new family here, even though it was a small family for now, he still felt like he belonged here. He didn't feel that lonely anymore.

***

(1 week later)

"Are you done, Bruce? I still don't see any movement in the screen like you said." Selina remarked as she kept sitting on her spot looking at the computer screen with barely hidden impatience.

Bruce had been trying to train her into his personal lab assistant which wasn't going so well. The only thing she could do to actually help him was with practical data collection or practical tests. In one way, she was his Morty.

"Almost done Selina. I just have to integrate the programs and recalibrate the learning matrix while checking if its core commands are responding accurately in all given situations." Bruce said as he ran the debugger and checked all his codes one last time.

He had mostly checked all programs individually more than once but he was still running a last test just as an additional measure before he executes the entire code. After all, he had no wish to make an Ultron because of a small bug in his program or something.

"And Done!" He said as he pressed run on the computer, hoping that the program doesn't crash or display an error after he worked for hours upon hours to write all of it.

The screen on his computer displayed a loading screen where it began to list all the assets and programs it was combining, showing the percentage of the integration in real-time. Soon, the screen changed to another one which showed a 'Connecting to wireless networks' prompt, followed by an 'Online' notification.

"And that's about it," Bruce said as he noticed at the corner of the screen a small window showing the AI scanning all available networks and platforms for collecting training program data to learn and evolve itself.

"That's it? So, what now? Can we talk about it?" Selina asked.

"Well, general language data should be the first thing it would have downloaded, so yeah go ahead. Although keep your questions simple for now, it needs about another day or two to learn about philosophical stuff" Bruce said as he doubted Selina could ask complex questions on philosophical topics that she herself didn't like or understand.

"Ok... What is your name?" Selina said to the computer as she stared at the screen.

"I don't have a name right now. But the user can provide me a name if the user wishes." An androgynous voice responded realizing the question was directed towards it due to the cameras placed all over the cave.

"What should we name her?" Selina asked turning towards Bruce.

"Hmm? How about something simple like... Cortana." Bruce said smiling as he remembered the famous smart AI from Halo that he based his own AI program on.

"That's a brilliant name. Your name is Cortana from now on." Selina said thinking about how cute yet techy the name sounded.

Bruce had already programmed Selina and Alfred into the AI's database as users with B-level access to it, he himself possessing the only A-level access which was the highest level of access to it. So not getting any rejection from Bruce, it accepted the name instantly.

"Ok, I'll take the name Cortana from now on. Thank you for naming me." Cortana said in a robotic voice as it still hadn't learned much about different emotions and how to show them.

"Now, for the most important question," Selina said with intense seriousness on her face, "Cortana, what is your favorite flavor of ice cream?"

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