Categories > Anime/Manga > Digimon > Masks and Monsters
Chapter Five: Familiar Faces
Wayne Manor was busy today; Takato noticed with interest, Alfred had mentioned that Bruce had some guests coming, all the way over from Japan. He was surprised, just a little, but Bruce normally didn't have people who were coming over for business with Wayne Enterprises stay in the Manor, with his Batman persona and all, Takato thought it would be hard for Bruce to make excuses to get out to go on patrol.
Alfred said that Master Bruce was able to come up with all kinds of excuses to go, but he would have to stay there since he had not been officially made Batman's partner, and it would be best if he didn't think about his training for awhile. Takato went back to the things he loved best, Digimon and anime, it wasn't nearly as large as it was in Japan but he'd been able to find a few friends who liked it and started an anime club at school. He thought it was amusing and strange how much they loved it, even more than he did, they were boarding on Otaku territory, and not the American definition of Otaku, but the Japanese definition, which meant a creepy shut in who did nothing but watch anime.
But he did connect to them and they were fascinated by the fact that he spoke fluent Japanese and wanted him to teach them, and he could watch the DVDs without subtitles but enjoyed the English dubs because they were very good, he especially liked the Fullmetal Alchemist dub and Cowboy Bebop and Trigun dub.
"Hey guys, the Bristol Middle School Anime Club weekend meeting is now in session, putting in the first Volume of Fullmetal Alchemist!" He held up the DVD in triumph.
"Man, I can't believe you paid $25.00 for that thing!" Barbara said, "it's only four episodes!"
"Back home, we pay about $60.00 American dollars for two episodes, if we had these prices over there, I'd buy tons of stuff in a heartbeat! One season of Digimon is about $400.00."
Mouths fell open. "Enough of that, let's get this show on the road!" Takato smiled, he put the DVD in and hit play. Just as it was about to start, Alfred came in.
"Master Takato, our Japanese guests have arrived, I think you should go greet them," Alfred said.
"Me, why me?" Takato asked. He wasn't a translator.
"I think you should say hi to them sir," Alfred said in a voice that Takato couldn't refuse.
"Okay," Takato said, standing up, he headed toward the door. He came to a dead stop, standing in Wayne Manor, was Rika Nonaka, who had been greatly confused upon arrival being greeted by Alfred, who said her Father couldn't come himself but sent him instead. Henry Wong was also there; equally confounded that he was being taken to Wayne Manor to see Mr. Wayne with Janyu whenever the billionaire came back from work.
"R—Rika, what are you doing here?" he asked after an awkward bow.
"I'm here to see my Father," she said stiffly, irritated that he hadn't ever contacted her, and irate that her father had never told her the truth about being a rich millionaire, she's only learned from Alfred that his name was not Chiaki Nonaka but Bruce Wayne.
"Your Father…Wait, Bruce Wayne is your…No way, he never told /me /that!" Takato stammered. "I don't know what to say."
"Hey, what about me, Takato? I'm still here too you know," Henry spoke up.
"Oh, hi Henry," Takato smiled. "What are you doing here?"
"My dad wanted me to come along, to help him show somebody at Wayne Tech how the Digimon online game works."
"Your dad must be meeting with Bruce then, or you guys wouldn't be staying here," Takato looked over at Alfred, "That's Alfred, he'll help you with whatever you need."
"I've got some of my friends in the other room, I'd like to introduce you to, and they're members of my school's anime club."
"Anime club huh?" Henry smiled, "interesting, why didn't you ever tell me your father was Bruce Wayne, Rika?"
"He didn't use that name when he married my mom." Rika replied. "It makes sense since he's such a famous person over here, but I still don't like the fact that he lied to me. I'm going to sock him one when I see him."
"Come on in," Takato said, "You don't have to take off your shoes or anything." Takato's friends looked up as he showed them in.
"Hey guys, these are my friends, they came to see me all the way from Japan, this is Henry Wong and Rika Nonaka," he gestured to them and they smiled.
"It's nice to meet you all," Henry said, "What are you watching?"
"Fullmetal Alchemist," Babs answered, "I like it a lot."
"Yeah, me too," Henry answered. "So you go to school with Takato?"
"Yes," she replied. "He's the one who got me into anime. I didn't know that they had such cool stories over there."
"Gee, I'm glad you think so," Henry said, smiling. They both sat down and started watching Fullmetal Alchemist. He was impressed with the English dub and that they actually used a little boy named Aaron Dismuke to play Alphonse, and some guy named Vic with a funny sounding last name that played Ed, he was pretty good too. Takato said that there was a video on YouTube of him meeting Romi Paku. He'd have to check that out later. They watched the rest of the episodes on the disc and talked about them until Alfred came in and told Takato that his school friends had to leave because it was time for dinner. Babs left saying she'd come over sometime to hang out more and then they were finally alone, just the three of them.
"Takato, why didn't you tell me you were living with my dad?" Rika demanded. "I'd think you'd let me know something important like that."
"Well, as I told you, he never told me he/ was/ your dad and I didn't want you to worry," Takato answered, knowing she was nowhere near satisfied with what he'd come up with.
"That's a lame excuse; you've never called, emailed me or even tried to let me know that you were okay."
"Do I have to keep repeating myself?" Takato asked, exasperated, "I didn't want you to worry about me."
"Yeah right, you were just being a chicken and running away from your problems," Rika scowled.
"Rika, it's not that—" he tried to explain, but he was interrupted.
""Hello Rika," a voice said. She stopped and turned around.
"Poppa?" she asked, feeling like a six-year-old again.
"Yes, Rika?" he asked, it was as if the years melted away and everything was just like it was before he left.
"I promised myself I'd slug you one!" she shouted, sprinting over to him and slamming her fist into his face. Takato was scared, surprised that he hadn't used any of his skills as Batman to avoid it, then he remembered that he wasn't Batman right now, he was just plain old Bruce Wayne, bachelor billionaire, who had a daughter no one knew about, except for him and Henry, and Ms. Rumiko, but he hadn't seen Rika's mother with her, so she might be somewhere else, but Rika had told him that her mother didn't know her father's real identity either.
"I suppose I deserved that," Bruce said, rubbing his sore face. "You're just like your mother," he laughed. "I didn't want to tell you because it would cause too much of a scandal with the press in either countries, after all your mother is a famous model and I am Bruce Wayne, the richest man in the world and I wouldn't want you caught up in all that mess."
"Like I care," Rika scoffed. "Why'd you ask me to come here?"
"I wanted to see you, is that wrong?" Bruce asked, a little hurt by her words, but he didn't show it.
"Well you sure waited a long time to do it."
"I'm sorry about that and…" he began to try to apologize to her.
"Save it, Poppa," Rika said, "I'm going to bed." She had Alfred show her where her room was and she left.
"She's really mad at you, isn't she, Mr. Wayne?" Henry asked.
"Please, call me Bruce, Henry, you don't need to be so formal, and yes, she's really mad at me, but I deserve it after all, I left her when she was six."
"Bruce, why didn't you tell me about Rika?" Takato demanded.
"It wasn't that important," Bruce replied.
"Yes it is, she's my friend, and you're my guardian so I'd think you'd let me know something like that. But why'd you leave her?"
"It's something you can't understand, Takato," Bruce said, trying to get off the subject, his reasons for leaving Rika and Rumiko had to do with what he was doing with his life now, and he didn't want them in that kind of danger.
"I think I deserve to know," Takato wanted the truth from him and he wouldn't be satisfied otherwise.
"This conversation's over, I'm going to bed, good night Henry, Alfred will show you to your room." With that, Bruce turned and left. He had business to discuss with Janyu.
Henry and Takato headed back to their rooms. Henry stopped and turned to his friend. "What's with Bruce? Why's he…like that?"
"I don't really know, I don't understand him," Takato sighed as he stared over at his friend Henry. "He makes the lamest excuses for leaving Rika and Ms. Rumiko and doesn't even bother to tell me that they're related. "
"Like I'm supposed to understand what's going on here? I'm just as confused as you are," Henry replied. "I don't get it either. I'm sure one day he'll tell you why."
"Yeah, when the Joker's sane and Guilmon doesn't eat bread," Takato smirked.
"Her snarky attitude is rubbing off on you," Henry sighed. "You're getting to be cynical like Rika."
"You can come out, Terriermon," Henry called to his small rabbit-dog hybrid Digimon, "Mr. Wayne's gone now."
"Good thing, he would freak if he saw me," Terrirmon said, popping out of Henry's backpack. "It was really stuffy in there."
/Actually, with all the stories he'd told me, you wouldn't even faze him/, Takato thought. Batman had faced so many deranged criminals that Terriermon would be rather bland in comparison.
"Yeah he probably would," Takato laughed. "But it's nice that you tagged along too, Terrirmon, it's nice for your to be here."
"I gotta say, Takato, you sure got lucky," Terrirmon said, "I could get lost in this place."
"Nice to see you think so," Takato said, "we can say up late tonight, it's the weekend after all."
"All right, what kind of stuff do you have to watch?" Henry asked.
"Let me see, Generator Gawl, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo, " Takako replied, holding them up. "Oh and Serial Experiments Lain."
"I thought that was Ani-American."
"They kinda made it less obvious."
"All right, I want to see Trigun, it's been awhile since I've watched it."
"All right, you wanna hear the dub?"
"Why not, they never put the English version on ours, and I wanna see how it sounds."
"All right!" Takato put it into the DVD player.
Rika had used her excuse of going to bed to be able to explore Wayne Manor, her father's house. He had all kinds of stuff in there, paintings, antiques, artifacts, stuff that didn't interest her one bit.
"Why does he keep all this junk?" she asked herself. "All this stuff is boring."
She turned down a hall, and came to a stop. There on the wall was a beautiful portrait of a middle-aged married couple. She had never seen them before and wondered who they were.
"They were your grandparents, Rika," Bruce said, she spun around, he'd apparently come out of nowhere. "They died when I was seven years old, shot down in front of me in Crime Alley."
"You told me they died, once, a long time ago," Rika said, "But there's only one thing I want to know, why did you leave us?"
"Because I had to, there are some things that I have to do, and you and your mother can't be a part of that," Bruce said. His life was far too dangerous and he wouldn't want them to be caught in the middle of it, potential hostages for his vast rogues' gallery.
"That's a bunch of crap, why can't we be a part of your life, what's so important that you left me right when I—" she stopped herself.
"Never mind, it's not important," she stalked off, this time she really would go to bed.
Bruce watched her go, "Rika, I'm sorry…" he turned and left, he had finished talking to Janyu Wong and he needed to go out on patrol, with his daughter headed to bed and Takato entertaining Henry, no one would notice him going out, if they asked, Alfred would just say he went to bed. He had work to do and pretty soon, Takato would be joining him. He would wait until after Takato's friends returned to Japan, and then the final test would be ready.
Wayne Manor was busy today; Takato noticed with interest, Alfred had mentioned that Bruce had some guests coming, all the way over from Japan. He was surprised, just a little, but Bruce normally didn't have people who were coming over for business with Wayne Enterprises stay in the Manor, with his Batman persona and all, Takato thought it would be hard for Bruce to make excuses to get out to go on patrol.
Alfred said that Master Bruce was able to come up with all kinds of excuses to go, but he would have to stay there since he had not been officially made Batman's partner, and it would be best if he didn't think about his training for awhile. Takato went back to the things he loved best, Digimon and anime, it wasn't nearly as large as it was in Japan but he'd been able to find a few friends who liked it and started an anime club at school. He thought it was amusing and strange how much they loved it, even more than he did, they were boarding on Otaku territory, and not the American definition of Otaku, but the Japanese definition, which meant a creepy shut in who did nothing but watch anime.
But he did connect to them and they were fascinated by the fact that he spoke fluent Japanese and wanted him to teach them, and he could watch the DVDs without subtitles but enjoyed the English dubs because they were very good, he especially liked the Fullmetal Alchemist dub and Cowboy Bebop and Trigun dub.
"Hey guys, the Bristol Middle School Anime Club weekend meeting is now in session, putting in the first Volume of Fullmetal Alchemist!" He held up the DVD in triumph.
"Man, I can't believe you paid $25.00 for that thing!" Barbara said, "it's only four episodes!"
"Back home, we pay about $60.00 American dollars for two episodes, if we had these prices over there, I'd buy tons of stuff in a heartbeat! One season of Digimon is about $400.00."
Mouths fell open. "Enough of that, let's get this show on the road!" Takato smiled, he put the DVD in and hit play. Just as it was about to start, Alfred came in.
"Master Takato, our Japanese guests have arrived, I think you should go greet them," Alfred said.
"Me, why me?" Takato asked. He wasn't a translator.
"I think you should say hi to them sir," Alfred said in a voice that Takato couldn't refuse.
"Okay," Takato said, standing up, he headed toward the door. He came to a dead stop, standing in Wayne Manor, was Rika Nonaka, who had been greatly confused upon arrival being greeted by Alfred, who said her Father couldn't come himself but sent him instead. Henry Wong was also there; equally confounded that he was being taken to Wayne Manor to see Mr. Wayne with Janyu whenever the billionaire came back from work.
"R—Rika, what are you doing here?" he asked after an awkward bow.
"I'm here to see my Father," she said stiffly, irritated that he hadn't ever contacted her, and irate that her father had never told her the truth about being a rich millionaire, she's only learned from Alfred that his name was not Chiaki Nonaka but Bruce Wayne.
"Your Father…Wait, Bruce Wayne is your…No way, he never told /me /that!" Takato stammered. "I don't know what to say."
"Hey, what about me, Takato? I'm still here too you know," Henry spoke up.
"Oh, hi Henry," Takato smiled. "What are you doing here?"
"My dad wanted me to come along, to help him show somebody at Wayne Tech how the Digimon online game works."
"Your dad must be meeting with Bruce then, or you guys wouldn't be staying here," Takato looked over at Alfred, "That's Alfred, he'll help you with whatever you need."
"I've got some of my friends in the other room, I'd like to introduce you to, and they're members of my school's anime club."
"Anime club huh?" Henry smiled, "interesting, why didn't you ever tell me your father was Bruce Wayne, Rika?"
"He didn't use that name when he married my mom." Rika replied. "It makes sense since he's such a famous person over here, but I still don't like the fact that he lied to me. I'm going to sock him one when I see him."
"Come on in," Takato said, "You don't have to take off your shoes or anything." Takato's friends looked up as he showed them in.
"Hey guys, these are my friends, they came to see me all the way from Japan, this is Henry Wong and Rika Nonaka," he gestured to them and they smiled.
"It's nice to meet you all," Henry said, "What are you watching?"
"Fullmetal Alchemist," Babs answered, "I like it a lot."
"Yeah, me too," Henry answered. "So you go to school with Takato?"
"Yes," she replied. "He's the one who got me into anime. I didn't know that they had such cool stories over there."
"Gee, I'm glad you think so," Henry said, smiling. They both sat down and started watching Fullmetal Alchemist. He was impressed with the English dub and that they actually used a little boy named Aaron Dismuke to play Alphonse, and some guy named Vic with a funny sounding last name that played Ed, he was pretty good too. Takato said that there was a video on YouTube of him meeting Romi Paku. He'd have to check that out later. They watched the rest of the episodes on the disc and talked about them until Alfred came in and told Takato that his school friends had to leave because it was time for dinner. Babs left saying she'd come over sometime to hang out more and then they were finally alone, just the three of them.
"Takato, why didn't you tell me you were living with my dad?" Rika demanded. "I'd think you'd let me know something important like that."
"Well, as I told you, he never told me he/ was/ your dad and I didn't want you to worry," Takato answered, knowing she was nowhere near satisfied with what he'd come up with.
"That's a lame excuse; you've never called, emailed me or even tried to let me know that you were okay."
"Do I have to keep repeating myself?" Takato asked, exasperated, "I didn't want you to worry about me."
"Yeah right, you were just being a chicken and running away from your problems," Rika scowled.
"Rika, it's not that—" he tried to explain, but he was interrupted.
""Hello Rika," a voice said. She stopped and turned around.
"Poppa?" she asked, feeling like a six-year-old again.
"Yes, Rika?" he asked, it was as if the years melted away and everything was just like it was before he left.
"I promised myself I'd slug you one!" she shouted, sprinting over to him and slamming her fist into his face. Takato was scared, surprised that he hadn't used any of his skills as Batman to avoid it, then he remembered that he wasn't Batman right now, he was just plain old Bruce Wayne, bachelor billionaire, who had a daughter no one knew about, except for him and Henry, and Ms. Rumiko, but he hadn't seen Rika's mother with her, so she might be somewhere else, but Rika had told him that her mother didn't know her father's real identity either.
"I suppose I deserved that," Bruce said, rubbing his sore face. "You're just like your mother," he laughed. "I didn't want to tell you because it would cause too much of a scandal with the press in either countries, after all your mother is a famous model and I am Bruce Wayne, the richest man in the world and I wouldn't want you caught up in all that mess."
"Like I care," Rika scoffed. "Why'd you ask me to come here?"
"I wanted to see you, is that wrong?" Bruce asked, a little hurt by her words, but he didn't show it.
"Well you sure waited a long time to do it."
"I'm sorry about that and…" he began to try to apologize to her.
"Save it, Poppa," Rika said, "I'm going to bed." She had Alfred show her where her room was and she left.
"She's really mad at you, isn't she, Mr. Wayne?" Henry asked.
"Please, call me Bruce, Henry, you don't need to be so formal, and yes, she's really mad at me, but I deserve it after all, I left her when she was six."
"Bruce, why didn't you tell me about Rika?" Takato demanded.
"It wasn't that important," Bruce replied.
"Yes it is, she's my friend, and you're my guardian so I'd think you'd let me know something like that. But why'd you leave her?"
"It's something you can't understand, Takato," Bruce said, trying to get off the subject, his reasons for leaving Rika and Rumiko had to do with what he was doing with his life now, and he didn't want them in that kind of danger.
"I think I deserve to know," Takato wanted the truth from him and he wouldn't be satisfied otherwise.
"This conversation's over, I'm going to bed, good night Henry, Alfred will show you to your room." With that, Bruce turned and left. He had business to discuss with Janyu.
Henry and Takato headed back to their rooms. Henry stopped and turned to his friend. "What's with Bruce? Why's he…like that?"
"I don't really know, I don't understand him," Takato sighed as he stared over at his friend Henry. "He makes the lamest excuses for leaving Rika and Ms. Rumiko and doesn't even bother to tell me that they're related. "
"Like I'm supposed to understand what's going on here? I'm just as confused as you are," Henry replied. "I don't get it either. I'm sure one day he'll tell you why."
"Yeah, when the Joker's sane and Guilmon doesn't eat bread," Takato smirked.
"Her snarky attitude is rubbing off on you," Henry sighed. "You're getting to be cynical like Rika."
"You can come out, Terriermon," Henry called to his small rabbit-dog hybrid Digimon, "Mr. Wayne's gone now."
"Good thing, he would freak if he saw me," Terrirmon said, popping out of Henry's backpack. "It was really stuffy in there."
/Actually, with all the stories he'd told me, you wouldn't even faze him/, Takato thought. Batman had faced so many deranged criminals that Terriermon would be rather bland in comparison.
"Yeah he probably would," Takato laughed. "But it's nice that you tagged along too, Terrirmon, it's nice for your to be here."
"I gotta say, Takato, you sure got lucky," Terrirmon said, "I could get lost in this place."
"Nice to see you think so," Takato said, "we can say up late tonight, it's the weekend after all."
"All right, what kind of stuff do you have to watch?" Henry asked.
"Let me see, Generator Gawl, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo, " Takako replied, holding them up. "Oh and Serial Experiments Lain."
"I thought that was Ani-American."
"They kinda made it less obvious."
"All right, I want to see Trigun, it's been awhile since I've watched it."
"All right, you wanna hear the dub?"
"Why not, they never put the English version on ours, and I wanna see how it sounds."
"All right!" Takato put it into the DVD player.
Rika had used her excuse of going to bed to be able to explore Wayne Manor, her father's house. He had all kinds of stuff in there, paintings, antiques, artifacts, stuff that didn't interest her one bit.
"Why does he keep all this junk?" she asked herself. "All this stuff is boring."
She turned down a hall, and came to a stop. There on the wall was a beautiful portrait of a middle-aged married couple. She had never seen them before and wondered who they were.
"They were your grandparents, Rika," Bruce said, she spun around, he'd apparently come out of nowhere. "They died when I was seven years old, shot down in front of me in Crime Alley."
"You told me they died, once, a long time ago," Rika said, "But there's only one thing I want to know, why did you leave us?"
"Because I had to, there are some things that I have to do, and you and your mother can't be a part of that," Bruce said. His life was far too dangerous and he wouldn't want them to be caught in the middle of it, potential hostages for his vast rogues' gallery.
"That's a bunch of crap, why can't we be a part of your life, what's so important that you left me right when I—" she stopped herself.
"Never mind, it's not important," she stalked off, this time she really would go to bed.
Bruce watched her go, "Rika, I'm sorry…" he turned and left, he had finished talking to Janyu Wong and he needed to go out on patrol, with his daughter headed to bed and Takato entertaining Henry, no one would notice him going out, if they asked, Alfred would just say he went to bed. He had work to do and pretty soon, Takato would be joining him. He would wait until after Takato's friends returned to Japan, and then the final test would be ready.
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