Hugo Strange sat behind his desk, watching a replay of the cafeteria surveillance footage.
He pressed pause, freezing the image at the moment Oswald climbed off the floor. That hollow look in his eyes already showed he was close to breaking.
He reached for his coffee cup and turned it around.
Oswald's willpower was a little stronger than he had expected...
But that was all right. Under the relentless pressure of electric shocks and torture, day and night, even the strongest will would eventually buckle.
Then he would easily coax everything related to Ririko out of Oswald.
The phone on his desk rang.
He pressed the intercom button, and a guard's voice came through:
"Professor, Diana Prince, a representative from the Superhuman Joint Research Group, is here to see you."
He frowned and switched the screen's feed.
On the entrance surveillance feed, a woman in a light-colored suit stood outside the doors, waiting calmly and elegantly to be received.
Hugo watched the screen for a moment, then spoke into the receiver. "Let her in. Check her credentials thoroughly."
He had never dealt with this so-called "Superhuman Affairs Management Department."
But he felt there was something unusual about this woman. She did not seem to be from Gotham.
Once Miss Prince entered Arkham, the scanning equipment would automatically cross-reference her information with Arkham's Supercomputer, and he would find out exactly who she was.
Outside the entrance, Diana was directed into the screening passage.
She stood beneath the sensor-covered doorframe with a smile, quietly waiting.
But the machine soon gave a short, strange noise. Its indicator lights flashed several times, then a thin wisp of smoke rose from it as it failed completely.
The screen displayed a string of garbled characters. There was no data, no useful information at all.
Several guards