The Arkham Approach
Arkham was habitually noisy, however, on one particular day, there was something that had triggered the inmates of Arkham to go completely out of control.
They all knew something was going on, their doctors had been acting strangely the past few days, and had been checking on their cells more than usual. There had even been visits from big, fancy politicians, who must have been there to look at what "progress" the patients were making.
Sensing something was wrong, and after conferring their thoughts over meals at the cafeteria, rumours spread around (who had started them was something unknown) about what the doctors had in store for them. One theory was that they were going to transfer them all to different states because the hospital had ran out of funding. Another theory was that the recreation rooms would be banned, and so the patients would never see another soul.
They were all desperate to know what lay in wait for them.
And they were sick of waiting.
All of them cried, or slammed their heads against the walls, grabbing attention wherever they could. Others sang or danced, or happily rambled to themselves. Some just shouted, laughing hysterically when they heard that someone else had heard, and yelled back.
Everyone knew something knew was going on, and everyone wanted to know what it was.
Well - everyone apart from the supercriminals in the Maximum Security unit.
Calendar Man had been the first to hear the raucous cries from the lower wings, halting his rambling rhymes which caught the other villains' attention.
"What the heavens is that racket?!" the Mad Hatter said to himself, placing his novel down onto his crumpled cot, standing on his tiptoes to peer out of his door's eye slit.
He could just see a pair of eyes meeting his from the cell across from him. It was Crane, clearly, he'd had the same idea as his friend, Tetch.
"Jervis!" Jonathan shouted over to the shorter man, smacking his hand against his dense metal door. "I cannot read due to this infernal noise from these damned imbeciles!"
"Me either Jonathan!" Tetch replied, having to yell even louder as the ambience grew in volume.
"We ought to do something about it!"
"Yes! But first friend, we must find out what the source of the sudden liveliness is!"
"I agree Jervis!"
As the riot continued around them, armed guards marched down the walkway between the cells. A line of them passed the Mad Hatter and Scarecrow's view, beady eyes peeping out of the small oblong boxes.
"Perhaps someone is escaping!" Tetch yelled again, waiting longer than he liked for Crane's reply.
"No Jervis! I think, from what I've seen, that Arkham has a new form of... care they would like to offer!" Before he could ask his friend to elaborate, a slow, shallow snigger came from a few cells down, already reverberating out and into the corridor.
Both Scarecrow and Hatter immediately sunk below eye level so they were out of sight, and kept to their beds. Soon the snigger grew into a little chuckle, already the asylum's patient ambience had lessened slightly.
"Jesus Christ!" a nearby guard murmured, close to Jervis' cell door, referring to the now deafening rumble of unmistakable laughter. An instant hush fell because of it, the only other sound was the ragged breaths from each patient.
The Joker was up to something.
Or rather - he knew something everyone else didn't.