Light shone upward through the Batcave, casting the Batplane's outline onto the jagged rock walls.
"I need to go check. If he's been..."
Batman's voice echoed across the empty hangar. He looked toward Li Jie. They both knew whom he meant.
"He... he's a good man." Li Jie made a token attempt to argue, but he knew Bruce Wayne was right. Superman had been mind-controlled more than once or twice.
Batman ignored him. There was no room for explanation or debate. He had already changed into his backup armor.
It wasn't his usual black Kevlar, but dark gray composite armor, with hydraulic boosters at the joints and a ring of dull silver metal set around the bat emblem on his chest.
Dick recognized it-a lead coating, an alloy mixed with Kryptonite powder, and three layers of electromagnetic shielding.
This was his gear for meeting Superman.
"Bruce," Dick said, stepping forward, "you can't go alone. If he really is being controlled..."
"Then it's even more important that I go alone," Bruce cut him off. "Every extra person is another risk. If he loses control, I need to give him everything I've got, not divide my attention protecting someone."
"I can help!"
"Your assignment is in Gotham."
Bruce turned to face Dick. Dick couldn't see his eyes behind the white lenses, but he could feel that familiar stubbornness.
"Those starfish might not amount to much. But if the water supply stays down for more than twelve hours, the power goes out, hospital blood banks run low, and riots break out at food distribution points..." He brought up a map of Gotham. "This city will collapse. Once panic spreads, hunger, thirst, and rioting will kill ten times as many people as the aliens."
The projection displayed the real-time status of Gotham's infrastructure. Pumping