Stu had no idea who, or what, he might encounter, as he crept through the dimly-lit hallways of this haunted hospital. Having gone up two levels after defeating the cyborg-zombie in the morgue, his fatigue had vanished -- he always felt a little better after going up a level -- but he was still on edge, breathing hard and sweating profusely. Even worse, his Zombie Radar was a constant crackle in his brain. There didn't appear to be any zombies in his immediate vicinity, but the Radar's range extended fifty feet -- enough to pick up any zombies who might be wandering around on the floors above and below, or in the rooms he passed by as he stole through the hallways.

  Although this particular corridor was empty -- there were no robots or zombies on the loose here -- it did contain several security cameras. He tried to avoid them, by sticking to the walls and shadows, but these were sophisticated cameras, and at least one of them swiveled around, tracking him as he tried to sneak past it. Shit.

  Where were Lucky and Luna? Where had the Researcher hidden them? Were they even here? He had no evidence, after all, that they had been brought here; he had simply taken Millie at her word. That might have been a mistake.

  He continued down the corridor, wishing for the umpteenth time that he hadn't wasted his Night Vision. It was hard to see in here.

  There were dozens of little rooms and intersecting corridors on these floors, and after spending a few minutes wandering around he realized he was getting lost. This was a major hospital, and all of the rooms and hallways looked more or less the same.

  He started opening the doors and peeking into the rooms, hoping against hope that he might find Lucky and Luna in one of them. Most of the rooms were completely empty, having been stripped of tools and furnishings, and were otherwise unremarkable, but a few of them looked like abattoirs, with bloodstained floors and buzzing flies. One large room, a former operating theater, had evidently been converted into some kind of torture chamber -- the dismembered body of a young man, his wrists still strapped to the operating table, was just visible in the gloom. Stu shivered. What kinds of monsters inhabited this place?

  He made his way up a set of stairs, to the second floor. The lighting was better on this floor, and there were bipedal robots prowling around, their heads swiveling about whenever they heard a noise. Some of them were carrying guns. Stu had never seen a robot holding a gun before; he wondered how well they could use them.

  The fact that this floor was being actively patrolled made him think that he was getting close, however. If Lucky and Luna were anywhere, they were here.

  Peeking around a corner, he spotted an armed robot guarding a door with a heavy-looking latch on it. The robot, standing perfectly still, was facing away from him.

  He couldn't proceed without the robot seeing him anyway, so he decided to take it out, and to find out what it was guarding besides. He started creeping up behind it, slowly at first. When he got within about ten feet of it, he suddenly sprinted forward and threw an arm around its neck, just as it had started to notice him. It struggled to free itself -- and it was surprisingly strong -- but Stu merely pulled back on its head until the cable connections in its neck sparked and snapped, rendering it lifeless. He took the gun out of its hands -- it had been carrying a beat-up old rifle -- dragged it into the shadows, and turned his attention to the door with the latch on it. He could have used his bat to break it open, but he didn't want to make any more noise than he already had, so instead he used his raw strength to snap the door handle off, just as he done down in the morgue. Then, opening the door a crack, he poked his head inside.

  The room beyond was dark, but he still had his flashlight. Flipping it on, he shone it into the room...and started.

  "Stu?"

  His flashlight beam had fallen on a familiar face: Lucky. He, along with Luna, had been imprisoned in a kind of cage, which looked like it had been made out of a chain-link fence. They weren't alone, either -- there was another man in the cage with them. He was an older man, maybe in his fifties, wearing an old trench coat. He had propped himself up against a wall, and appeared to be asleep.

  Stu breathed a sigh of relief -- finally, a lucky break. He closed the door behind them and immediately approached the cage, but before he had taken two steps Lucky whispered urgently to him: "Don't touch the cage!"

  He stopped, blinking. "Don't touch it?"

  "It's electrified," he explained. Looking closer, Stu saw that he was right; set of wires, which ran up into the ceiling and out of the room, had been attached to the cage.

  "Ah."

  "How did you find us?" Luna asked. She looked totally amazed, as though she was finding it hard to believe that Stu was actually standing in front of her.

  "Long story."

  "I told you he'd come looking for us," Lucky told Luna proudly. "I told you there wasn't anything to worry about."

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  "I wouldn't go that far," Stu said. There was still a hell of a lot to worry about, as far as he was concerned. "Are you all right? Are you hurt?"

  "No," Luna said quickly. "We're fine."

  Stu glanced at the man who was sharing the cage with them. "Who's he?"

  They both turned to look at him. "Don't know. He was already in here when the big guy locked us up with him."

  "The big guy?"

  "A real freak," Lucky said. "Huge guy. He was the one who captured us. At least seven feet tall. His face was all messed up -- I thought he was a zombie at first, or some kind of mutate."

  "He had metal arms," Luna added.

  "That must have been the Lab Rat," Stu muttered.

  "He took our weapons," Lucky said glumly. "My hatchet, my railgun."

  "Did he talk to you? Did he tell you anything?"

  "He didn't say a word. What's going on here? Do you have any idea?"

  Stu quickly explained the situation to them: "He's called the Lab Rat, and he works for a brainy called the Researcher. She controls the whole town, apparently. She's got an army of robots running around, and she can control zombies. She kidnaps people, and...experiments on them."

  Lucky paled. "Experiments?"

  Luna looked stricken, too. "A brainy? How do you did find out about all this?"

  "I ran into a local. She was the one who helped me sneak into the hospital." He studied the electrified cage. There didn't appear to be an off switch anywhere in the room; the power cables simply ran straight up into the ceiling. He was going to have to go looking for their source.

  "I have to find a way to shut this thing off," he told them. Assuming he could get them out of this cage, they shouldn't have too much trouble escaping the hospital -- it was just a matter of retracing his steps back down to the morgue and out of the building. Granted, they would have to sneak past the robots, and Stu still worried about those security cameras that may have seen him, but if they moved quickly...

  "Hang tight," he said. "I'll be back."

  "Wait!" Lucky said, stopping him. "There's another problem."

  "What is it?"

  The kid jerked a thumb at the sleeping man. "He's been bitten."

  "Bitten?"

  "There's a bite mark on his arm. He's already turning. He could wake up any minute."

  "And you're locked in there with him," Stu sighed. He drew the Midnighter out of its holster and slid it under the cage, which was elevated about six inches off the floor. And then, after a moment's thought, he slid the robot's old rifle under it as well.

  Luna picked up the Midnighter, while Lucky reached for the rifle. "Are you sure?" he asked. "What if you run into trouble?"

  "I still have this," he said, holding up Excalibur, although privately he did have doubts about giving up his firearms. "Anyway, I won't be long. I'll find the switch, shut off the power, and run back here as fast as I can. Then all three of us will make our escape."

  "If you say so," Lucky said doubtfully.

  "Thanks for this," Luna said. "Thanks for...for coming to our rescue."

  "I haven't rescued you yet," he said gruffly. "Save it until we get out of here." And with that, he turned and left the room, peeking his head out into the hall before proceeding.

  Where did those cables go? Looking up, he saw some conduit running along the edge of the ceiling, and decided to follow it, all while taking care not to be seen by the security cameras nor spotted by any of the robots. The robots, at least, were predictable in their movements, their patterns easy to follow -- most of them either stood completely still, except for their swiveling heads, while the rest simply marched back and forth down the hospital's long corridors. All Stu had to do was wait until they turned at an intersection, and slip past them.

  He followed the conduit through various hallways and waiting areas, and finally down a short flight of steps, which brought him to a set of doors that looked like they might have led into basement storage area. It was unguarded, and the doors were unlocked, so he pushed them open slowly and looked inside.

  The room was full of piping, cables, and complicated-looking machinery; it was evidently a utility room of some sort. Shining his flashlight into it, he spotted an electrical panel on the other side of the room, with conduit coming out of it. It was hooked up to a portable generator, presumably a dynamo engine.

  He chewed on his lower lip, thinking. He had come here to shut off the power to Lucky and Luna's cage, of course, but if he could shut off the power to the whole building as well...

  The confusion might help them escape. But it might also put the Researcher and the Lab Rat on high alert, and make their escape more difficult.

  The presence of the dynamo engine started him thinking, too -- if the Researcher was using a dynamo engine to power the hospital, she must have had a supply of dynamo fluid on hand somewhere. If they could get their hands on just a couple of canisters...

  He started poking around the room, looking for anything that might be useful, including dynamo fluid. The room was large, though, and it was full of stuff -- medical supplies, cleaning supplies, robot parts, ladders, tools, boxes of lightbulbs, and so on. Realizing that he didn't have time to sort through all the junk, he gave up looking for dynamo fluid canisters and headed for the electrical panel. He spent a few seconds studying it, then reached for the circuit breakers.

  "I wouldn't touch those if I were you," an exceptionally deep voice suddenly warned him.

  Stu whirled around just in time to get hit by a pair of electrodes -- one hit him in the neck, and the other in the chest. More surprised than hurt, he looked down at the electrodes, which were connected to a pair of thin wires. The wires, in turn, were connected to a gun, held by a huge, hulking man with long hair and a burned face. Both of his eyes were artificial, like Millie's -- they glowed red, just like hers -- and he had a pair of oversized robotic arms.

  He also had an ICON designation, but there was something weird about it. It read "Level 41 Zombie (Enhanced)," but the words -- indeed, the designation itself -- was staticky, and it kept flickering out of existence, as though the system couldn't quite make up its mind about whether to apply it to this monster or not.

  Stu grabbed the darts and tried to pull them out, but he wasn't fast enough. A surging blast of electric current suddenly shot through him, locking up his muscles, causing him to fall backward and crash to the floor. He tried to get up, but his body refused to obey him.

  The huge man -- he could only be the Lab Rat -- walked up to him. The man, or zombie, or cyborg, or whatever he was, approached him, towering over him. The monster grinned down at him, then pulled the trigger on his gun again, sending even more voltage into Stu.

  It was too much. He fought it for as long as he could, but eventually, he passed out.