DC: I am Bruce Wayne

Chapter 39: Kryptonite & Preparations

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"Every journey begins with a single step. We just have to have patience."

-Milly Thompson, (Trigun)

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<(Bruce Wayne POV)>

"Hey, Bruce. How is the little stupid dog doing? Still alive?" Slade asked while munching on some popcorn.

"Yeah, I gave him some proper treatment after administering first aid back in Kansas, even took him to one of the best vets in Gotham to get advice on his diet and stuff. He should be alright in a couple of days." I answered with an annoyed scowl on my face while carefully and slowly petting the sleeping puppy lying beside me.

Ace as was his name was a high-pedigree puppy of the German Shepherd breed also known as an Alsatian. What I had deduced from its blood, whoever had bred him had done so in an effort to make him some form of combat dog instead of a normal working dog or just a fancy pet. According to the vet's expert opinion, one of his parents was probably an East European Shepherd which was mostly a Russian military version of the German Shepherd breed. So Ace was definitely not some run-of-the-mill mutt.

But the thing was despite his amazing praiseworthy lineage, he was a severely abused puppy who had somehow escaped its fate by running away. He had bite and scratch marks everywhere, even wounds on his legs caused by a whip of some kind. Presumably, his last owner was some kind of dog breeder for an illegal dog-fighting ring according to the veterinarian's hypothesis. But he wasn't sure, he could only guess since we didn't find any sort of information on the owner from Ace's collar.

Regardless, the little puppy was much better now and had even regained consciousness. At first, he was a little hostile toward us due to trust issues because of his rough history after waking up but after doing some trust-building exercises for a few days and giving him proper treatment and nourishment, he has been slowly warming up to us, especially me and Alfred since we look after him the most because Selina according to her own admission was more of a cat person and Vicki could only be present for a few hours in the mansion since she had her own home and family.

"That's good. Maybe I could train him as a military dog for you. I know most of the methods that the current various military organizations use to train expert combat dogs. Also, I always wanted to train a dog to bite someone's balls off, maybe he could finally fulfill that long-standing dream of mine." Slade said with a dreamy expression on his face like he was imagining the puppy trying to chew on a pair of balls.

"That's not happening Mr. Wilson. I have already decided to train Ace in the ethics of a proper and gentle dog with perfect manners as what would be expected from a pet belonging to the only Wayne heir. There will be NO ball biting in my presence, at least not those attached to any living being." Alfred said as he walked in with a big fancy plate in his hands that had a single large bone on it for Ace to chew and play with when he woke up.

"Oh come on, you lovable English bastard, you suck the fun out of everything in my life. It's only because of you that I realized my wife is not the ultimate evil, you are." Wilson grunted and huffed like an annoyed teenager.

"A gentleman dog or a combat dog biting off balls. It sounds to me like you would have to live a double life like me due to all the expectations. I wonder if I could train you to be a Bat-dog to put even Clark and Krypto to shame. Although I might have to work on that name a little. Bat-dog doesn't exactly seem to roll off the tongue or sound all that threatening or cool, does it?" I smiled and rubbed the head of the sleeping puppy as it released a happy sound of contentment from its mouth like it was having a beautiful dream.

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*Boom* Another explosion rattled my laboratory as a bunch of kryptonite samples blew out everywhere with so much force that some of them even got stuck on the walls.