Stirring Up the Asylum, Prelude to Chaos!

The air in Arkham Asylum's cafeteria always carried a strange smell of overcooked cabbage, sweat, and despair.

Hundreds of inmates in blue-and-white striped uniforms lined up to receive a grayish mush whose ingredients were impossible to identify. Muttered curses, mad ramblings, and the scrape of plastic cutlery against metal trays filled the room.

Link found a seat in a corner, away from the center of the crowd.

He was now the library cleaner, a ghost in the system. But this ghost needed to gather data.

His gaze swept calmly across the cafeteria, detached as a biologist observing a cage of raging baboons. His mind, sharpened by Mastery of Psychology, automatically sorted the inmates into categories: predators, prey, and those who were truly beyond saving.

He needed a spark.

His gaze settled on two groups.

One clustered around a lanky man with a crude spider tattoo on his neck. The other followed a bald brute with a neck as thick as a bull's and old scars across his knuckles. According to the asylum grapevine, the two groups had been feuding over control of the laundry room.

Now they were arguing over a table that was slightly cleaner than the others.

Perfect.

Link focused. Chaos Force extended toward them like an invisible tendril, silent and unseen.

He did not create anger from nothing. He merely found the embers of resentment already inside them and poured on a little oil.

To the bald brute, the faint sneer on the spider-tattooed man's face instantly became more than an irritation. It was unbearable contempt, a complete denial of his very existence.

And to the spider-tattooed man, the brute's glance was no longer ordinary. It was a naked provocation, an open challenge to his authority in this part of the cafeteria.

A tiny, insignificant shift in perception.

But in Arkham, that was enough.

"What are you looking at, baldy?" the spider-tattooed man hissed, leaning forward.

"Your face pisses me off. Get out of my sight," the bald brute growled, his massive hand closing into a fist.

The spider-tattooed man gave a short, ugly laugh. He lifted his tray and flicked his wrist, sending it flying.

The gray mush struck the bald brute square in the face.

For a moment, the cafeteria fell silent.

Then came a roar that barely sounded human.

The bald brute lunged across the table, smashing the flimsy thing to pieces. The spider-tattooed man charged to meet him, and their followers immediately piled into the fight.

A petty argument had become an all-out gang brawl in the blink of an eye.

The dull thuds of fists striking flesh mingled with men's screams and the clatter of trays and bodies hitting the floor. One corner of the cafeteria erupted into chaos.

The other inmates screamed and jeered as they backed away, forming a ring to watch the bloody spectacle.

Link remained in his seat.

He slowly spooned up another mouthful of the barely edible food, wearing just the right look of panic and confusion. He looked like a deer caught in headlights, an ordinary inmate frozen with fear.

But his eyes were cold and sharp, bright with calculation.

The stopwatch in his head had already started.

At last, a shrill alarm cut through the uproar.

The iron doors at the far end of the cafeteria slammed open.

Link narrowed his eyes slightly.

One, two, three... Eight guards in all.

Forty-three seconds had passed between the first punch and their arrival.

The guards rushed into the brawl with heavy black batons, forming a clumsy wedge.

"Stop! Down on the floor! Now!"

Their shouts were drowned out by the inmates' roars.

Link watched their every move. The guards focused entirely on the two dozen inmates locked in combat. Their formation was tight at the front and loose at the rear, leaving their flanks completely exposed. Three carried stun guns, but with everyone tangled together, they hesitated to use them.

Their attention was a spotlight. Everything outside its beam vanished into darkness.

Link looked past the struggling guards and roaring inmates toward a distant corridor. A "No Entry" sign hung there, marking the way to the central control room.

No one was watching it.

Not a single guard.

A cold, precise plan took shape in Link's mind.

This was only one small flare-up, yet it had drawn eight guards, who had taken nearly a minute to respond ineffectively.

What if two flare-ups started at once? Or three?

What if the entire asylum went up in flames?

The guards would be scattered and run ragged, and the whole command system would grind to a halt. Then the central control room—the asylum's brain, monitoring every camera and controlling every electronic lock—would be left wide open.

The faintest smile touched Link's lips, then disappeared.

He had the data he wanted.

The brawl was eventually put down. Cursing, the guards dragged away several bloodied ringleaders.

The cafeteria was a wreck.

A burly guard stalked toward Link's corner, his face twisted with anger. Link kept his stunned expression in place.

"You! Library guy! What are you staring at?" Spittle flew from the guard's mouth. "Grab a broom and clean up this damn mess! Now!"

Link flinched and nodded fearfully. "Yes, sir. Right away, sir."

He scrambled off to get the cleaning supplies, looking utterly servile.

The guard snorted as he watched Link go. Another useless coward.

At the other end of the cafeteria, the old man who had warned Link on his first day had seen everything. He had watched the fight, the guards, and the young man pretending to be afraid.

But he had also seen the cold, predatory glint that flashed through the young man's eyes at the height of the chaos. Those were not the eyes of a sheep.

He was a hungry wolf, patiently watching the sheepdogs wear themselves out.

The old man shivered, lowered his head, and went back to his food. He resolved to stay away from the new librarian from now on—as far away as possible.

The overture had begun.

The real storm was about to break.