Batman Porn Story: Arkham – Chapter 1

Arkham Institution. No
asylum anymore. The sign blares brown and dull, emanating the cool
light of professional apathy, no dramatics. The place seemed
determined to combat its gothic-horror exterior and colorful
inhabitants by being as boring as possible inside. 11:00 in the
morning. Not the most interesting time to enter any sort of
confinement, walking in quietly in the middle of the morning. Better
to be dragged through darkness, eerily glowing lamps casting green
light on the sharp angles of your face, grimacing or grinning,
doesnt matter which, as long as the eyes are right – pupils
darting like a caught insect, listening to your own sounds and
basking in the barely masked fright-mist in the voices of the guards.

That was how it should
be. That was how the Joker always came inno, he wasnt the one.
The Joker entered proudly, madly, shoulders square even in his
straitjacket, lending the piece of rough cloth the vibrant feel of
his own outlandish attire. Wing-green hair plastered in a single
shaft, mouth stretched in the permanent upside-down triangle.
Interesting how the Jokers main instrument of terror was not his
hands, not even his eyes or voice but his smile.

That was how the Joker
entered Arkham.

Maybe it had been
Jonathan Crane. The last entrance of the Scarecrow had been
interesting… he had still had a hint of fear toxin on his clothes.
They left his burlap mask on none of the guards would take it.
Even if they had been able to remove it, it would have been no less
frightening lying empty, shapeless on the floor or in a file. It
seemed infused with terror and only a madman would willingly reach
for his worst fear.

The bit that was left
seemed to create ethereal glimpses of terrors, like a perfumed veil,
drifting over the senses and then gone, with only a hint still in the
air. These shadows were almost more frightening then the fully formed
nemeses that the Scarecrow could createthese, barely-materialized
and then swept away, leaving threads continued by the imagination.
Looming expectation meeting the lips of hollow realization in a brief
kiss, subliminal harbinger of everything the Scarecrow inspired.

Someone had seen boxes
then, inside the fear coursing through the hall not spiders,
snakes, hungry flames of fire, flashes of torturing scenes, but
boxessimply empty, pale tan boxes. Half-open.

The door swings open,
narrowly. Dull like the rest. Black letters printed in a rectangle, a
shape of a name that sometimes seems strange, sometimes not. Today it
seems normal.

I have a window this
time, small and high, dusty frame letting in lethargic beams of
half-waned light. Ordinary days again. I stand there, the guards
loosen their grip a fraction. They say Ive behaved myself the past
month, point inside.

I let a bit of madness
into my eyes as they scan to the corner of the room, then freeze.
Something there that I know I had asked for, but I never, never
wanted.

I look back at the
guards, and then

Then I remember who had
entered Arkham before.