That's the oft-unspoken problem with Bruce: no matter how much he might like to do otherwise, no matter how much easier it would make things, how much more expedient they would be, he can't stop caring about his fellow man. It's a hell of a thing that he's tried so hard to cover up with bat-shaped armor and strangle with rage and grief, but it always comes back.

All of this bothers him. More for the others dragged here than for himself, though he's got plenty of feelings about that too.

"Indirect contact? How do they do that? Notes? Signals?"