October 19 1901 when I first caught a glimpse of that other world the world on

the dark side mother mother it's me I brought you

something to eat please I think you should try to eat some of this

when I became aware of the significance of the beetle as a symbol of rebirth I

realized that she was simply trying to protect herself

from something but even I understood that mother had been born again into

that other world the world of fatherless signs and portents

and mysterious symbols

sorry I'm late commissioner problems out of town

what's up there's been a riot that orchim asylum that's what's up

it makes seized control of the building early this morning we don't know how it

happened they're holding the asylum staff hostage they came all kinds of

crazy demands we've had to send in furniture store dummies food clothing

and they say there's only one final demand thank God they've been waiting to

talk to you personally I see it's the Joker Joker are you there

this is Batman what do you want don't waste my time Joker just tell me what it

is you want oh I think you can guess we want you in here with us in the madhouse

where you belong and and what if I say no well we have many friends in here she

just drew me a beautiful house she drew it with this pencil the one I just

sharpened open your eyes wiper beautiful blue

this is low you have half an hour and bring the white stick can we talk you

okay you know you don't have to go in there let me organize house watching or

something no this is something I do have to do listen I can understand it even if

you're afraid I mean Arkham has a reputation afraid

Batman is not afraid of anything it's me I'm afraid I'm afraid that the Joker may

be right about me sometimes I may question the rationality of my actions

then I'm afraid that when I walked through those asylum gates when I walk

into Arkham and those doors close behind me it'll be just like coming home

in the end it was for the best I have to believe that as the child I

dedicate myself to the prevention of suffering the first time

for some time I'm working at the Mad Dog

I listen as he tells me how it was it was emergent Mary's an idea she she has

just a Bosch way to stop the dirty slut spreading their disease just a feel

it's a facility of the

by the way

it's salt why don't you sprinkle some on me honey anti just good enough to eat

I'm here release the hostages you heard him folks hit the trail typo

let's do it again sometime but what about her eyes

you said honey pie listen how many brittle bone babies just tension at home

- mr. t goe loosen up tight ass take your filthy hands off me what's the

matter have I touched a nerve how is the Boy

Wonder started shaving yet if they degenerate

flattery will get you nowhere

you're in the real world now and the lunatics have taken over the asylum

April sweet is coming in

God is being man

well I'm a boy's best friend is his mother

let the Feast of Fools begin Joker I've had enough of this madness enough

madness enough and how do you measure madness not with rods in the wheels and

clocks surely you know you look so pretty when you're mad

kiss me Charlie knavish me but no tongues you here not on our first date

you're in no position to be secret now sit down and stay down before I think of

something funny to do with you who are these people Joker you told me you to

release all the hostages well we insisted on staying Batman I'm

Ruth Adams I'm a psychotherapist here and this is dear old doc Cavendish our

current administrator a man who just loves to administer current to ect

patients I have a duty to the state I will not leave the asylum in the hands

off of madmen and while we are discussing Duty it looks like someone's

done this on the floor oh Jesus Harvey is it you again you trying to ruin my

heels I'm sorry I I couldn't help it it takes so long to decide so many options

I'm really sorry I think please miss two-face has pissed

himself again to face excuse me Batman but would really prefer it if you would

call Harvey Dent by he's a real name what have you done a woman dumb he's

being cured this place is a hospital Batman and we're here to treat people in

case you'd forgotten as a matter of fact we've successfully tackled Harvey's

obsession with duality I'm sure you're familiar with his feel of a dollar scar

on one side unmarked on the other he used to make all his decisions with it

as though it somehow represented the contradictory halves of his personality

what we did was we named off the coin and onto a dye that it gave him six

decision options instead of the former two he did so well with the dye that

we've been able to move him onto a pack of tarot cards that's 78 options open to

him now Batman next we plan to introduce him to be I

Ching soon he'll have a completely functional judgemental facility that

doesn't rely so much on black and white absolutes but right now he can't even

make a simple decision like going to the bathroom without consulting the cards

seems to me you effectively destroyed the man's personality doctor sometimes

we have to pull down in order to reveal the Batman psychiatry's like that you

must admit it's hard to imagine this place being conducive to anyone's mental

health you're going to hit me with all that local folklore now right secret

passages of the ghost of Mad Emma Diaz Arkham the door that's supposed to bleed

gothic crap well you'll pardon me for saying so but

your techniques don't seem to have had much effect on the Joker the Joker is a

special case some of us feel he may be beyond treatment in fact we're not even

sure if he can be properly defined as insane his latest claim is that he's

possessed by Baron Geddy the voodoo Laura we're beginning to think it may be

a neurological disorder similar to Tourette's syndrome it's quite possible

we may actually be looking at some kind of super sanity here a brilliant

new modification of the human perception more suited to urban life at the end of

the 20th century tell that to its victims unlike you and I that Joker

seems to have no control of the sensory information he's receiving from the

outside world he can only cope with that chaotic

barrage of input by going with the flow that's why some days he's a mischievous

clown others a psychopathic killer he has no real personality he creates

himself each day he sees himself as the lord of misrule and the world as a

theater of the absurd odd games doctor you know me I just adore card games well

I see two angels screwing in the stratosphere a constellation of black

holes a biological process beyond the conception of man a Jewish ventriloquist

act locked in the trunk of a red Chevrolet what about you Batman

what do you see nothing I don't see anything not even a cute little

long-legged boy in swimming trunks stop wasting time you ugly transom bastard

well his hair's too you know that's if you don't mind I say we take off his

mask I want to see his real face oh don't be so predictable for Christ's

sakes that's his his real face and I want to

go much deeper than that I want him to know what it's like to

have sticky fingers pick through the dirty corners of his mind so let's start

with a word association test shall we Ruthie I don't really want to do this go

ahead dr. Adams I'm not afraid it's just words

that's the spirit Batman sticks and stones I like a man who can

take the pressure

I end this house to my will I will bring light to those dismal

corridors of my childhood

and empty rooms

mother pearl handle revolver gun father father death and of 1920 I am invited to

here I finally meet you in Switzerland I am introduced

Aleister Crowley I find him charming and highly educated we discussed the

symbolism of the Egyptian talent and he beats me at chess to be well underway

constant surprises me with a wonderful addition to my aquarium Japanese when a

dominant female dies one of the males in her entourage will actually change sexes

and assume her for some reason

for the victim of an April Fool's prank

poisoned April April fish I experienced an inexplicable Friesian of danger in

transpires that Barton Hawkins has escaped from the penitentiary and the

police would like my considered opinion as to his State of Mind

I tell them he may be highly dangerous

it's not

not tonight is something wrong no it's nothing nothing

it's getting late time to begin the evenings entertainment

I think if you're feeling up to it oh what a nice little game of hide-and-seek

you have one hour sweetheart and there's no way out of the building

there's the Scarecrow and mr. Clayface and the strange dr. destiny of course he

seems so frail in that wheelchair but all he has to do is look at you and you

stop being real he does so want to look at you darling oh and don't let's forget

the croc he came up out of that damp dark cellar this morning dragging his

chains behind him they all want to see you so why don't you just run along now

I don't think well this guy goes into the hospital okay his wife's just had a

baby and he can't wait to see them both so he meets the doctor and he says oh oh

duck I've been so worried how are they and the doctor smiles and says they're

fine just fine your wife's been delivered to the healthy baby boy and

they're both me tipped up full so the guy rushes into

the maternity wood with his flowers but it's empty what bed is empty look he

says and turns around and the doctor and all the nurses wave their arms and

scream in his face all the wife's dead and the babies are specific get it what

a senseless a waste of human life now Batman

run the game ends at midnight run run

how dare you embarrass me that way Bruce it's a movie

for God's sake it's

first I've ordered you you don't stop crying and ACTA control I'm leaving you

right here understand I'm leaving you yeah

yes

ooh

wait

listen we promised him an hour he's only been gone 10 minutes this is ridiculous

what do you think Dan the moon is so beautiful

whoa it's big silver dollar flipped by God and it landed scarred side up see so

I made the world heaters garaged can I get a decent conversation in this boys

who long insane joke we're bored oh alright then let's just pretend it's

been an hour

21 is count and lastly count Kali

did you know the front door was a white

my dear Constance body is in Jesus Harriett lies nearby undescribable

violated almost idly I wonder where her head is and then I look at the dolls

house slowly I put on my mother's wedding dress and I kneel down

I kneel down in that nursery abattoir it all seems perfectly rational perfectly

perfectly rational later I find myself sobbing choking is this what it all

comes down to all our dreams and hopes and aspirations nothing but from it Oh

God I'm afraid I'm so afraid I think I may

be ill

don't touch me

I wonder what I'm so glad you could make it

I have so many things to tell you you must be feeling quite fragile by now I

expect this house it does things to the mind now where was I

where am I where is the apparent disorder of the universe is simply a

higher order an implicit order beyond our comprehension that's why children

interest me their home mad you see but in each of them I see an implicit adult

order out of chaos or is it the other way around to know them is to know

myself little girls especially shameless

Oh God god help us all sometimes sometimes I think the asylum

is ahead we're inside a huge dreams

I raised my college

the secret that I'm white my journal up-to-date routine is important

divergence sometimes seizes and I returned to my ritual perambulations my

movements through the house and I feel the traffic on an essential part of some

incomprehensible biological process is an organism hungry from madness it is

the maze

my friend voltage current the fire I've saved it there's power in it

okay screw up charge is like

yeah

shocked by my enhance some friends take me to the Opera

Wagner's Parsifal don't they understand can't they see I'm breaking a thousand

pieces time time becomes strange forty minutes

have passed since I ingested three portions

of the Amanita mushroom so far no effect abruptly I become convinced that the

house is alive and trying to communicate with me a pressure at the back of my

head makes meet her in their tiny contained universe two

vast and shimmering clownfish glide toward one another and make the sign of

Pisces Pisces the astrological attribution of the moon card in the

Tarot pack the symbol of trial and initiation

what

my flight a choir children sing my name over and

over again

Oh

I must have fainted there for it is morning when next I am no longer able to

tell where the dragon ended and I begin yet I'm I'm not destiny have

I got to confront it the great dragon

good evening bad dr. Cavendish George come nerium Batman he'll cost me just

keep back you freed the inmates you allow this to

happen why Cavendish now listen I only did what

had to be done you read the book on the table beside you and you'll see Diwan

it's Emma days Arkham's journal go on I've marked the place for you

wings begin to beat

I

you see now you understand you who've kept this place supplied with poor mad

souls for years you who fed the hungry house do you see you are the bat no I'm

just a man I'm not fooled by that cheap disguise you know what you are Arkham

tried to kill his stockbroker in 1929 that's what they finally locked him away

for did you know that it didn't stop him here at the golden bow he studied the

shamanistic practices and he knew that only ritual only magic could contain the

bat so do you know what he did he scratched a binding spell into the floor

of his cell he used his fingernails can you imagine that his fingernails

I see now this country things are possible and me oh who is this man

doctor but it still wasn't enough two years ago I found this hidden room read