Chapter 2066: Knight

Jason never thought in his life that he would feel fear because someone's moral level was too high.

Admittedly, in the eyes of ordinary people, a child running away from home without a phone leading to being kidnapped, the responsibility of parents and children is probably half and half, with parents slightly higher, but also need to refer to daily performance.

Batman and Jason's performance on weekdays wasn't good enough; not fatherly, not sonly, arguing small things every three days and big things every five days, so if this matter really had to be talked about, both sides had responsibility.

And Jason asked himself, what he resented more was that Batman controlled the whole of Cat Getan, but didn't find him for a year.

This actually made it hard not to suspect that Batman didn't look for him at all.

Jason thought so too. You installed surveillance on every street and every corner of Cat Getan. There wasn't a time you couldn't grasp the whereabouts of criminals clearly, but you just happened not to find him this time. How could there be such a coincidental thing?

What made people even more angry was that even if you didn't find him, it didn't matter. Not long after, a new Robin appeared. Didn't this confirm even more that Batman didn't look for him at all?

People always drill into a dead end when they drill into a dead end, and pain will make thinking run wildly in a paranoid direction. A problem is thought about too many times, so there is no rational solution, which is why the Arkham Knight was born.

But after experiencing that long night, and experiencing an even longer night at Schiller's, Jason's reason had recovered, and naturally, he could find more solutions for this problem.

For example, the one who kidnapped him wasn't another criminal, but the Joker. Robins all admitted that the person in this world who understood Batman best was the Joker. Since he understood best, there were many ways to make Batman never find something.

And if one thought optimistically, perhaps it was precisely because Batman was fighting crime while looking for him, and was too busy to handle it, that he found a new assistant.

Perhaps it could also be thought that the guy named Tim Drake wasn't a fuel-efficient lamp; even if he hadn't been kidnapped, he would have squeezed in anyway.

Before this, Jason didn't know if this kind of thinking of his was self-comfort, but after seeing the extremely deep and long wound on Batman's arm that was clearly cut by himself, Jason had to believe it even if he didn't want to.

At least this showed that Batman definitely tried to find him, and even regarding the fact that he didn't find him, Batman was more incredulous than himself. What's more, this matter might already have nothing to do with Jason. Batman, who was always prepared and planned, had already begun to doubt his own abilities.

So Jason began to feel shaken, but the conversion of human emotions needed a buffer period. It was impossible for him to forgive him nimbly just because he learned about Batman's self-harm. They didn't have differences on this matter, which didn't mean their long-standing conflicts didn't exist.

Now it was good. Jason knew he had to speak even if he didn't want to, because looking at this posture, it was impossible for Clark to let him go, and based on the understanding of Clark's strength just now, Jason felt that running away was also a dead end.

"Do me a favor." He said to the symbiote in his heart: "Don't let him read my brain waves and heart rate. You can help me control it, right?"

"Really? Are you really going to do this?"

The symbiote's question made Jason stunned for a moment, but he quickly understood the symbiote's meaning.

If this mysterious alien creature was indeed thinking for the host, then he might indeed raise an objection, because Jason's resentment toward Batman wasn't fake.

To a certain extent, the situation was really as Clark said. Compared to Batman, Jason counted as a vulnerable group. Jason couldn't do anything to Batman. Even if he put on the Arkham Knight's armor, didn't he also fail to cause any harm to him?

If it was said this way, telling his situation to a fair, objective, and powerful existence might be able to get the justice he wanted, which fit Jason's demands all along.

But obviously, Jason wasn't willing to do so.

Then he began to think about why he wasn't willing. The person in front of him wouldn't kill Batman anyway. Wouldn't it be good to give him a little bit of color?

Jason thought about it, and the only thing left lingering in his smart and bright little brain was one sentence—I'm not willing.

But his posture of hesitation and silence made Clark's face heavier and heavier. In the end, his fists were clenched, as if the injury he suffered was more serious than Jason's.

"I'll ask you one more question." Clark took a deep breath and said: "You only need to answer yes or no. Jason Todd, you know you must answer."

"Ask away." Jason said absent-mindedly, as long as he wasn't asked to talk about his and Batman's affairs in front of a lie detector.

"Have you ever received any sealing threats regarding your relationship with Batman or similar topics?"

This time Jason learned to be smart. He said to the symbiote in his heart in advance: "Quick, quick, quick, adjust my heart rate and brain waves, and whatever else should be adjusted, adjust it quickly!"

The symbiote promised, and then did so. Jason cleared his throat and said: "Of course not."

Clark was just about to breathe a sigh of relief, when immediately after, it was as if he felt something, staring at Jason with suspicion.

As the surprised look on his face became thicker and thicker, Clark's expression gradually became one of disbelief. He stood up with a "whoosh," stared dead at Jason's face, and said: "He wouldn't have installed any equipment to resist lie detection in your body, would he?!!"

Jason was somewhat bewildered.

Clark, however, maintained that posture of disbelief, standing in place in a daze, looking like he was repeatedly confirming something.

But Jason didn't know at all what he was confirming, nor did he know how he was confirming it, so he also couldn't guide the symbiote to do anything to resist this confirmation.

Clark's face became colder and colder. He took a deep breath, sat down again, looked at Jason, and said: "I know humans can't notice the changes in their own brain waves and heart rate, but I confirm whether they told the truth precisely through these changes."

"In fact, I can even directly see how your heart and brain work. Any slight change in them cannot escape my eyes."

"But do you know? Jason, when I asked this question, and you gave a negative answer, your heart rate and brain waves didn't have any change at all, as if they were some kind of rigorous machine, but the human body doesn't work like this."

Bad, Jason immediately realized that he was smart but was harmed by his own cleverness. In fact, he might have been able to speak the negative answer without control, and still let Clark believe it.

After all, although Batman expressed an attitude of not being very willing to let outsiders know about the Bat-family's affairs, he indeed hadn't emphasized to any Robin that they couldn't talk about their relationship with Batman.

Then if Jason denied it, he was actually telling the truth. If this lie detector had a way to judge, this pass would be passed.

But he didn't. The random thoughts before interfered with his rational judgment, or perhaps he also inherited some of Batman's suspicious character, very much disliked others lie-detecting him, so he recklessly adjusted his physiological state with the symbiote without understanding Clark's lie detection principle.

It was probably very unnatural, Jason thought. Unlike before, in the basement of the island cabin, Jason had touched a living, beating heart with his own hands. Human heart rate wasn't an average beat counter. It would have some irregularities more or less. It would be strange if changing it to all even wasn't discovered.

Jason didn't realize a true meaning, and that was when a matter developed to the stage of "you don't have to explain," don't try to explain anymore, and once it developed to the stage of "we all understand," don't say any more words. Playing dead was the best choice.

It was a pity he didn't often experience such things, and mistakenly thought the reporter opposite was still relatively understanding, so he opened his mouth and said: "This matter isn't what you think. An accidental accident did indeed happen before, but that..."

"Do you know what the recusal system is?" Clark interrupted him and asked.

Jason shook his head blankly. He was a genuine Cat Getan local, and his relationship with the law was like the most familiar stranger. Familiar meant wandering on the bottom line of the law every day, and stranger meant he didn't understand the law at all.

Clark stretched out two hands and gestured, saying: "In many kidnapping cases, judges and juries don't believe the testimony of the kidnapped person. That is because the victim might be in long-term mental abuse or brainwashing, and has no clear understanding of the criminal behavior imposed on them by the perpetrator, subjectively lowering the description of the harm."

"Of course, I know if I let you continue speaking, you might say, you just argued."

Jason opened his mouth. He wanted to say that was exactly it. It was a pity that even if his pre-opening time for speaking was among the best in the Bat-family, he still didn't possess any ability to interrupt others, let alone a reporter, and a Metropolis reporter at that.

"Yes, you might have just argued. Then what's with the injury on your eye? Are you going to say 'fighting is also normal, who hasn't fought before?'?"

Clark was simply heartbroken. He said: "This is the manifestation of subjectively lowering the description of harm, rationalizing and normalizing certain bullying or even abusive behaviors."

"Indeed, everyone has had conflicts with others to a greater or lesser extent during the growth process, and some also developed into physical conflicts, but that mostly happened between people of the same age or the same power level."

"I'll give an example. If you and your classmate argued and finally developed into a fight, then I don't think this needs legal trial, because your physiological and psychological development status, actual age, and social status are relatively equal."

"The consequences you both have to bear for hitting someone are almost the same: you might be injured, you might be scolded by the teacher, you might be expelled."

"But if the above conditions are unequal, and the consequences borne for the fight are different—he won't suffer physiological and psychological harm because of this, can get better care after being injured, his reputation in front of people won't be affected by this, and only you unilaterally bear the injury, then this is abuse."

Jason opened his mouth. He found he couldn't refute.

Thinking carefully, on the matter of arguing with Batman, the consequences he bore were indeed more than Batman's. Of course, the most recent one was him being kidnapped by the Joker.

Admittedly, he was kidnapped because he ran away from home, but the place where they argued was the Batcave. Listening to it, one knew it was Batman's territory. Then if he didn't leave, could he still hang on?

Jason felt a bit frustrated, but he couldn't say where this frustration came from. Perhaps it was because his mental state had recovered slightly, and some emotions were revealed.

Just at this moment, a hand pressed on his shoulder. Jason looked up and found Clark looking at him intently.

"Don't be sad, Jason. I'm not here to criticize you. The wrong one is someone else. I just hope you can realize that perhaps for a very long time, certain things you have believed to be true are unreasonable and abnormal."

"Or after I remind you, you can at least be diligent in thinking about whether certain things are normal, rather than numbly letting them happen, and then you passively accept... that will make you very hurt."

Jason turned his head away from looking at Clark's azure eyes. He definitely said the word "help" in his heart.

Damn, the sun came out before dawn. This was Jason's last thought before being knocked unconscious. ===== CHAPTER 2067 =====