Objective: Return to the security office

"No shit," he grumbled under his breath, and broke into a loping jog. Wonder of wonders, this doorknob turned, and Mac found himself in a mirror of the cleaning closet, except this one was empty of cleaning agents—or corpses. As soon as his phone screen cleared of the obvious new objective, Mac swiped over to the map, looking at the various paths. Much like the level above, there was a version of the same central loop in the basement, but there were also entrances to each of the four wings. Good to know, but Mac didn't want to get distracted—or worse trapped—in another section of the facility.

Power was back on. That meant he could get a visual on Riley, and better yet, see what that cell control module could do.

The primary basement lights were hardly better than their flickering emergency counterparts. When Mac stepped warily into the new hallway, the steam still made it hard to see more than fifteen yards in any direction. Mac counted on surprise, hurrying down the noticeably less bloody corridor towards a connector, and a chain link security gate loomed out of the mist.

Again, no panel to enter a code or use a badge. Mac rattled it—quietly—but it didn't budge. He could go back and get that mop, then break a leverage point into the drywall and pry it open—

Or he could just cut a hole.

Mac snatched up his SAK and selected the wire cutters, and the same game show buzzer from earlier screeched out of his wrist.

Once again the crafting icon was flashing, a red X superimposed on it. This time, however, neither of the options were greyed out. He could tap CANCEL or PASS.

Murdoc's instructions had been clear. He only got two passes, and even using a pass would still result in some kind of penalty. He was running out of time, this was the most direct path back to the security office and getting eyes on Riley. But the game wouldn't end once he found her; that was when it was probably going to really get started. If he only had two passes, was this obstacle worth one of them?

Mac hesitated, glancing between the phone and the chain link fence blocking his path, and the soundtrack in his ear shifted to something highly suspenseful.

What would the hero choose.

MacGyver gave the chain link one last glare, then tapped CANCEL and swiped back to the map. If he couldn't take this route, his next best option took him into the north wing. Not one of the violent offenders wings—though that probably didn't mean much now since the power outage had unlocked a lot of the doors—but he'd pop up relatively close to that central hub, and hopefully he was the only one running around with a security badge.

He memorized the route quickly, then tucked his SAK into his pocket and cautiously jogged back the way he came.

For the first time, the soundtrack was actually useful. It gave him the jumpscare timed with a door wrenching itself open as he passed it, but whoever was in the room wasn't as on point. Mac leapt away from the doorway and the moment he got the impression of the relative size of the two people inside the surprisingly well-lit room, he took off at a dead sprint.

Whether patients or actors, they weren't as fast out of the gate, and Mac established a good twenty yard lead. There was supposed to be a side corridor—there!—and Mac didn't slow, taking a hard right and using his left leg to bounce off the connector hallway wall. The steam was dissipating a little, showing him murky shapes throughout the narrower hall.

The square ones were laundry carts, and he snagged the second one as he passed it and dragged it into the middle of the hall behind him even as he heard shouting and feet sliding on tile as his pursuers also reached the connecting hall. He couldn't worry about them, because the next shadow to pop out of the mist was definitely a person, dead ahead.

Mac didn't even slow down. A body in motion tended to stay in motion, and actor or patient, Mac aimed his left shoulder at his opponent's left side and leveled the guy without shedding much inertia. He had another right turn coming up, and then he should reach the stairwell.

There was some confused shouting—almost howling—behind him and Mac ignored it, barely slowing as he found the alcove with the stairwell door. He crashed against the bar but it didn't give, and Mac couldn't help a grunt when his body collided with the clearly locked door. His lungs were burning from the sprint, and Mac tried to suck down a few deeper breaths, searching his pockets frantically for—

The security badge. Back pocket, not to be confused with the driver's license. Mac slapped the plastic against an aged card reader, and the red LED blinked to green. He shoved his way through the door and whipped around, shoving it closed as fast as the weight on top of the door would let him. His pursuers had been slowed by both the obstacles he'd left them; he was actually able to get up the first half of the stairs before he heard bodies hitting the door, same as he had, and angry hammering.

"Too slow," he muttered, and took the stairs two at a time up to the first floor.

This door was more like the kind he'd expect to find in a school, wooden with a tall, narrow glass window taking up about half of it. Mac could see immediately that he wasn't going through; furniture and junk had been piled against it, and even though it opened into the stairwell, Mac wasn't about to try to crawl over or shove it all out of the way. He headed immediately for the second floor, still trying to catch his breath.

Same style of door, same window, no pile of trash to move. Mac eyed as much of the hallway as he could with the door closed, keeping an ear tuned to the pounding on the basement door, which told him he'd at least stopped those guys. They'd been waiting in a lit room, they were probably actors, but he wasn't going to take any chances.

There was no sign of anyone, actor or otherwise, in the hallway in front of him, and Mac sucked down two more deep breaths, then waved his badge at the card reader, and eased open the door.

He'd left the steam behind in the basement; this air was cooler, smelling slightly of old urine. The patients had clearly taken advantage of the doors unlocking, with many clearly labeled patient rooms gaping open and empty. There were remains of a piece of wooden furniture—maybe a side table?—strewn around the halls, and a few bloody smears here and there, but even though Mac could see the entire length of the wing, there wasn't a soul around.

He held his breath a moment, listening intently, but the only sound was the soundtrack in his ear. Also eerily quiet and calm.

He held his breath a moment, listening intently, but the only sound was the soundtrack in his ear. Also eerily quiet and calm. It almost sounded like 'travel' music—the soundtrack that played with a character was merely moving from one area of the game world to another.

Mac didn't trust it for a second.

He crept into the hallway, well aware of the timer ticking away in his head, and briefly consulted the map again. Literally down the hallway to the big double doors, and he'd be right back in the central hub.

There was no way he could just walk down this hallway unmolested. There had to be a trap, or a 'patient' just waiting to attack him. There was no way it was just that easy.

Mac took a page from Jack's book, breaking into a slow lope with his shoulder against the left wall, glancing into the rooms across from him to clear them before peering into the doorframe right next to him, then moving to the next, then the next. Basically clearing every room in the hall, but from one side of the hallway and without a gun, so if he tripped a 'monster' his only options were going to be hand to hand or running.

Which was stupid; there had to be a good melee weapon in one of these rooms.

And it was easy to see which rooms were asking for investigation; one had all the bedclothes wadded up in a pile at the foot of a metal bedframe—and he had to remind himself this was one of the nonviolent wings, so he supposed it might make sense that honest to god metal bedframes would be in use—and it occurred to him, almost absently, like the otter; a bedframe was easy enough to take apart, and had plenty of good crowbar-length metal parts to help him get from point A to point B.

So Mac chose a room that wasn't 'obviously' marked. Door was cracked open, but the room seemed tidy inside, nothing indicating it was anything more than a set. He paused at the jamb but there was no sound of motion within, and the EOD in him couldn't help but follow the frame with his eye.

No visible traps.

Mac pushed the door gently, and it opened with a barely audible creak.

And nothing happened.

The floorplans were almost exactly those of a normal motel. Door opened into a narrow hall, bathroom door off to the right, then opened up into the room proper, with a bed and even complete with a little desk and a regular-sized window, though this window was barred. As he stepped into the small but neat room, it occurred to Mac that Murdoc hadn't said he couldn't leave, and there was nothing stopping him from making a rope and climbing down outside to access other areas of the compound. He was visualizing the entire map in his head when he felt light pressure fold his denim jeans against his right shin.

Again, his EOD training kicked in. Mac threw himself backwards, back towards the hallway, and a battering ram made from a bedframe swung soundlessly out of the dark bathroom doorway and punched a hole in the opposite wall, precisely where his head had been less than a second ago.

Mac stumbled back another step before he regained his balance, staring wide-eyed at the homemade contraption, which had planted itself heavily in the wall and showed no signs of swinging free anytime soon. It had been weighted, too; parts of a bedframe had been placed strategically to give it the most inertia for the limited fulcrum. Once he was certain the trap was well and truly sprung, MacGyver dared to take a slightly deeper breath, quickly scanning the hallway again before warily approaching the trap.

It was tied with strips of bedding to the sprinkler head in the bathroom. The tripwire was plain white dental floss, nearly the same color as the tile floor. Upon closer inspection, Mac realized that sharpened wood had been attached to the area that had punctured the drywall.

Without question this boobytrap would have killed him. Instantly.

Cautiously Mac ducked under it, scanning the room and finding the bed beyond completely intact. The parts had come from another patient's room, and despite the fact that he'd clearly been meant to think this was a safe room to explore, he didn't find anything useful inside it but the trap itself. It had been wrapped together with the mattress springs, too tightly to easily get anything off it, and he abandoned the idea of trying to scavenge a weapon and opted to keep going.

That turned out to be a mistake.

There were two patients in the hallway, waiting for him.

The first was a shorter, stout man with about three days' beard growth on his craggy face. His eyes were small and cold. Beside him was what looked like a walking scarecrow, with straight, flyaway blond hair sticking out in every direction and long, gangly limbs. He was younger, Mac put him in his mid twenties, and his patient pajamas were a little short on him. Neither were wearing shoes.

Both were sporting blood spatter, small droplets in discernable lines.

Mac tensed, one foot in the hallway, and the shorter, older man gave him a slow, sarcastic clap.

"Looks like we got us a live one." The voice, the cadence and drawl of it, were familiar. He'd heard this man speak before.

The other gave a quite whine of annoyance. "I swear that one usually works."

His companion looked up at him, his mouth twisting contemptuously. "On what, the walking dead?" Without any other apparent signal, both men started towards him, and Mac found himself backing up, hands raised placatingly.

"I don't want any trouble," he started, and the tall one gave him a cheeky smile.

"Well then stand still and let's get a good look atcha."

He had the entirety of the hall behind him, but he knew he was essentially cornered. There was the staircase, blocked at both exits, and there were patient rooms, but that was all. The hallway terminated in a cinderblock wall. He was going to have to deal with them, one way or another, so Mac flashed what he hoped was a sincere-looking smile at the tall one and sauntered to a stop. "You make that trap in there?" He nodded his chin back at the room, but neither man took their eyes off him.

"Maybe," the tall one drawled, as if he hadn't admitted to doing so only seconds before.

"It's good work," Mac complimented him, dropping his hands a little as if he was letting down his guard. "Where'd you get the floss?"

"Got a little somethin'-somethin' stuck in your teeth?" the shorter one bantered back, moving confidently forward as if he had nothing to fear. "Hope it's not lettuce, for your sake."

"Ooooh snap," the taller one crowed, leaping into the air with a skip with the same energy as a small child. "That'd make him a sheep!"

And then he realized where he'd heard that voice.

Mac tilted his head a little, keeping the faux friendly look on his face. The shorter one, at least, had been one of the voices up in the chapel. Talking about lambs and shepherds.

These were not actors.

Meaning he didn't need to pull his punches. Mac gave the taller one a modest shrug, using it to widen his stance a little and raise his hands, and then they were within striking distance.

He sucker punched the shorter one, dancing left to put the staggering man between himself and his taller opponent. The scarecrow looked legitimately surprised, but only for a moment; he leapt at Mac with a shout of—

Glee?

He was over-exuberant and his center of gravity was too high; Mac went low and let the man's attempted tackle sail overhead into the wall behind him. The shorter of the men charged him with a roar, and Mac was already too close to the ground to recover, so he caught the man's charge and rolled with it, sending the shorter man tumbling into the sprawled body of his partner. Neither was incapacitated, only tangled up in the other, and Mac slapped the flats of his hands on the tile floor, pulling himself up and sprinting for the double doors at the end. He had a fifteen yard lead, easy, and he moved to fish the security badge out of his pocket when the double doors opened, and two more patients hurried into the hall.

One was carrying a boning knife that had to have come from the kitchen. It was bloodied.

Mac put on the brakes, the soles of his shoes actually squeaking as he slid a few inches, and the newcomers stared at him in open surprise. Then the man with the knife shifted his grip, in a way Mac had seen many times before.

Had seen Jack shift a knife, many times before. Right before he used it.

The hallway was empty of anything useful for blocking a knife, so Mac whipped off the backpack before he realized what he was risking. Stop the attack, but maybe damage the contents. Including the cell control module.

"Joe, thought you cleared this wing," the man with the knife purred, knowing he had Mac's undivided attention as he weaved the sharp blade between his hands. "He's not a patient..."

Mac didn't need to turn to hear that Mutt and Jeff had gotten untangled and were on their way. "Hoo, man, your nose is bloody!" the scarecrow stage-whispered, sounding ecstatic about it, even as the man with the knife advanced, and Mac grudgingly gave ground.

Well, if mechanical and chemical engineering were out, there was always social engineering.

After giving the man with a knife another wary look, Mac carefully slipped the backpack over his left shoulder. "Listen, guys, I don't have time for this. We're all in danger—you wouldn't understand even if I tried to explain it, so just let me pass."

Knife Guy took an aggressive step forward, and Mac refused to react. After a tense few seconds, while Mutt and Jeff took up positions behind him, the guy next to Knife Guy broke out in a relieved grin.

"You think maybe...?" His tone was almost hopeful.

The cellphone strapped to Mac's forearm vibrated, and the two guys in front of him were close enough to actually hear it. They glanced curiously at his arm, and Mac smoothed away any frown and glanced surreptitiously at the screen.

Objective: Go to the chapel.

Just what he needed. Another objective, and one taking him even further from that security room.

And Riley.

But of course the chapel had to contain some object or clue he'd need later in the 'game.' There'd be no reason to have put that giant hole in the floor if it was just meant to be background. And there was a chance he could talk them into letting him head there, maybe get them all in the room and find a way to incapacitate them.

How, he had no clue, but he was wasting time Riley didn't have. "Look, I'm headed to the chapel. You can come with, but we need to go now."

And without waiting for permission, he simply stepped around the man who wasn't holding a knife. He kept a firm hold of the backpack, calculating the angle he'd use if the guy made a grab for it, but he didn't; instead, he stared at Mac almost adoringly, and while the guy with the knife was still scowling skeptically, no one stopped him when he grabbed the double doors.

And for whatever reason, these doors weren't locked. He was able to simply walk out of the wing, back into the main hub.

The urge to try to ditch them and make a play for the security office was strong; that door was most certainly locked, he'd be safe while he got eyes and downloaded the feed on Riley. The downside was after. If they really were patients, they were as much a danger to her as they were to him. And the 'game' would most certainly not end when he got to her.

So Mac headed east—which was helpfully marked by the second floor signage—and found the chapel doors. They were wooden, but a deeper stain than the others, shaped like traditional abbey doors. The pulls were ornate but not ostentatiously so. They looked sticky.

Struggling not to change his expression in the slightest, Mac hooked two fingers around one and pulled. The door was heavily, and poorly oiled; it squealed an echoey announcement of their arrival into the larger space beyond.

"That was sooner than I..." The voice trailed off, and it took Mac a second to locate the speaker.

From below, the chapel hadn't appeared to be that spacious. Like many other hospitals build during the time, the chapel was important, but not as important as treatment space. This room was a bit more generous with space; there were two lines of pews with a wide center aisle, and the stained glass and altar at the end appeared to honestly face an exterior light source. There was another door on either side of the room, likely leading into each of the two wings it bridged—south and east. The hole, which would drop him into the library, took up two pews' worth of space, but left plenty of room to walk around and reach the altar itself. The edge was artificially made to look ragged, but as the proximity of his entourage forced him to enter the room, Mac could see that the exposed joists had been cleanly cut.

Towards the back of the room, seated in a chair near the altar, sat an unmoving figure in the clothes of a priest.

"...expected," the man finished, with the hint of a southern drawl. "Welcome, son. Mind your step."

Since he'd been the one to suggest they all enter, Mac accepted the invitation, choosing the longer of the two paths around the large hole. Nothing immediately useful leapt out. There was the three-tiered candelabra on the altar itself—with all its candles lit—and plenty of wood, old cushions, and bibles around. However, with the library below him, linked to two of the wings, a fire could get quickly out of hand.

Besides the wiry, greying priest, complete with collar and frock, there were a few freestanding floor lamps and another chair. There was also the naked, disemboweled body that had been dumped in the far corner of the room, which Mac could only assume had been the actual ordained priest. This time his stomach only flip-flopped half-heartedly, and he wasn't sure if that was a good sign or a bad one.

All too soon he was drawing close to the priest. The man had to be in his late forties, but he rose smoothly from the seat without a trace of stiffness or discomfort, his face smoothed into serene welcome. "I've been waiting for you."

"That's odd. I wasn't expecting to be here," Mac told him honestly, casting a significant look over his shoulder to get a quick bead on the rest of the patients. Knife Guy was in the lead, which was no surprise, followed by the other three, all loosely grouped and clearly jockeying for position.

The pecking order wasn't fully established yet.

"You all need to come with me. None of you are safe here."

"You don't need to tell me that, son." The drawl was a little thicker, now, dry and amused. "The Day of Reckoning is upon us."

Wonderful. "Day of Reckoning or not, I need you to follow me, and gather as many of the...others as you can." If he thought he was a priest, there was no telling if he knew he—and the handful of other people in the room—were patients. "I'll take you someplace safe until this is over."

The man before him adopted a pious look, folding his hands in his stolen robes. They were large on his thin frame, allowing him to act the part of a monk along with a traditional Catholic father, and there was no telling what he'd concealed inside them. "There is no safe place," he corrected patiently, as if he'd already said the same a hundred times today. "Not until the focus is destroyed and the gates of our salvation are revealed."

Rather than continue trying to reason with crazy, Mac sidestepped the priest and surveyed the area around the altar, making note of everything he saw. If there was an objective in this room, it wasn't as obvious as the others, like the cell control module. What the hell did Murdoc expect him to do, agree to another 'quest'? He'd already wasted too much time negotiating with Benny.

"A great evil is among us—"

"You don't know how right you are," Mac agreed, almost absently, running his fingers beneath the edge of the altar and trying to ignore the fact it was still sticky from recently wiped blood. It had to be this, the centerpiece of this macabre display, but it was just a hunk of bloodied granite with a bloodstained silken sash and candelabra—

And on the base of the gilded thing, a photograph was propped. It wasn't posed, or at least it was made to look as if it was a candid shot. A candid shot of Riley, again in the too-revealing nurse outfit, apparently holding court while three completely captivated orderlies drooled over her.

"The focus," the priest confirmed, directly across from him, and Mac nearly flinched at the proximity. The guy's footsteps were absolutely silent on the thick pile carpeting, despite the sickly squish it had to it, telling of the total volume of fluid it had absorbed.

"Such an appealing package for so much darkness," the man purred, making no move to circle the altar. He didn't need to; his acolytes were spreading out on either side, trying to corner Mac. "I knew who the demon was immediately. Preying on the poor and helpless here, unable to protect themselves from its wiles."

His brain was unable to stop itself from rhyming 'wiles' with 'Riles' and Mac tore his eyes off the photograph to glare at the would-be priest. "She's not the evil I was referring to," he said curtly. "You have bigger problems." Hell, at this point they might believe him if he told them an obsessed assassin was toying with them. "Like how you ended up here in the first place."

Surprise flashed in the patient's eyes, but only for a second; it was replaced with a beatific but clearly calculated smile. "In purgatory, you mean. The power of the focus, no doubt. Her presence concentrates the demons here, but destroy the vessel and they will spiral into chaos. Their power will be undone," and this was directed more towards the other patients than Mac, almost like a reassurance. "And the gates to our salvation will be opened."

It was a trope Mac had little patience for in general; when directed at someone he cared about by a lunatic, it was completely unacceptable. Fortunately conspiracy theorists were simple to control—all you had to do was offer them something even more outlandish. "Yeah, that's not how this works," he contradicted flatly, focusing on the priest in front of him but raising his voice so the other patients milling ever closer could hear. "She's not the demon here—she's the misdirect. The demon is the one that told you I was coming." Without missing a beat, he waved his hand along the candelabra, plucking the longest candle and holding it up as if it was exactly what he'd been looking for. "You're right about the gates of salvation, though," he allowed, and gave the narrow-eyed priest a confident smirk. "I am here to vanquish a demon, and I will lead you out of purgatory."

With any luck, straight into a paddywagon and back to the mental hospital from which they'd been collected.

It was enough for some of the patients, who outright cheered. But not the priest; he was not about to relinquish his newfound control over others. Though his smile was wide, it didn't touch his eyes.

"Our savior," he praised, making a pious if unrecognizable gesture before the altar. Then he paused theatrically, his head cocked to the side. "Though...if what you say is true, if the demon is in fact the one who foretold your arrival...then what does that make you?"

"That's just another misdirect," Mac dismissed, blowing out the candle and waving it in the air to speed the cooling of the hot wax. "They want us to doubt each other. If we work together we'll beat them and they know it." He stuffed the perfectly normal taper candle into an exterior pocket on the backpack, then shouldered it again. "I've got what we need from here. Follow me."

In truth, he had no clue what the objective in this room was supposed to be. The altar didn't open, and there was nothing he could see on the pews that would be useful. Since these patients had an actual photograph of Riley, and clearly intended to add her body to the pile in the library, maybe the objective was simply to neutralize them.

And even if that wasn't the objective, Mac was going to do it anyway.

A quick glance at the inside of his forearm revealed no additional information—nor any flashing X's over the crafting icon—and Mac started purposefully towards the wooden abbey doors. He was going to have to bluff his way past the priest and through three men—including Knife Guy—so he made eye contact with each of them, acknowledging them with a nod and projecting nothing but confidence.

And for a split second, it worked.

As he passed the priest, however, the man reached out and wrapped a surprisingly iron-like hand around his right bicep, and Mac couldn't help a reflexive twist, yanking himself away. The priest then held up his hands in a universal gesture of peace and de-escalation, but his eyes were sharp. "We want to believe in you, but this...is not a matter that can be left up to chance."

"You think this is chance?" Mac shot back, letting his fully real impatience bleed through. "You wake up in this place without knowing how you came to be here. You're told she's a vessel of great evil—but by who? And that same person announces that I will arrive to save you. Who was that person? Where are they now? We're all locked in this facility. If that person wasn't the demon, then where the hell are they?"

It was too much to hope that these men might actually know where Murdoc was orchestrating and running this entire thing from, but since they'd been scouring it and bringing anyone they found to this room, maybe he could get the kind of clue Murdoc didn't want them to pass along.

But instead of trying to reason his way out of the logic trap, the priest merely gestured—to the hole in the chapel floor.

His meaning was crystal clear.

"He too was tested. He may have been acting on the behest of the vessel, but he was no demon," the priest assured the room.

Mac didn't believe for a second that Murdoc might have actually been killed in his own scenario, and he didn't even look towards the pile of bodies. It must have been an actor, then, who'd passed on the photograph. Another life senselessly lost.

Mac tried logic one more time. "But why would you believe them? Why do you think the demon would send someone to tell you who to kill? Or for that matter, allow anyone to tell you who the real focus was?" He waved an impatient arm, gesturing at the chapel. "I don't know if you noticed, but the odds are not in our favor. The demons aren't here to help us. They're here to hinder us. I know who's behind this, and I promise you, I will deal with him. But right now all we're doing is wasting time."

"If that man wasn't telling us the truth about the focus, then he wasn't telling us the truth about you," the priest pointed out, almost mildly. "It's a simple test. Why do you fear it so?"

A simple test. Like the whole stupid 'exam.'

"Yes—the holy flame will not burn him!" one of the patients chirped, and was jostled by the man beside him.

Great.

Mac thought about that for a split second, and then he gave them an irritated shrug. "Fine." He slipped the backpack off, reaching into the exterior pocket for the candle he'd stolen. The top of it was still pliable, near the wick, and as he turned in annoyance to light it from the candelabra, he passed the body of the candle through his right hand, smearing a small amount of half-hardened wax across his palm.

Once the wick caught, Mac turned back to his audience. He faced the smirking priest, and without the slightest hesitation he laid his right palm directly over the wick of the candle. He held it there for a two count, then waved his palm through the candle, so close that his skin was touching the wick. Then Mac drew his hand back and displayed his palm.

It was a little red, and a lot warm, but it wasn't burned.

The men in front of him gasped, and Mac couldn't help a little smirk of his own when the priest's smile drooped in dismay.

The reason a person could pass their finger through a candle without getting burned was mostly due to convection; heat rises. The flame of a candle also isn't particularly hot. As the flame burns, it gathers cold air from around the base of the wick and sends it upwards as it gathers heat. At the top of a candle, the air temperature is almost six hundred degrees fahrenheit.

But at the base, near the wick, the blue flame was much cooler. The thin layer of wax he'd put on his palm—and a little nervous sweat—gave him just enough additional protection to pull off what otherwise looked impossible.

It was undoubtedly how the 'priest' had faked not getting burned, and may have been how he'd protected his 'followers', by directing their fingers or hands closer to the wick, but he couldn't call MacGyver out without giving away his own trick.

And he knew it. The priest's face twisted up into a barely disguised snarl, though his voice was smooth. "The holy flame did not burn his flesh. He is a true believer," he decreed, and then made the same weird gesture at the altar. The other patients clumsily followed suit.

Mac simply blew out the candle—for the second time—and gestured towards the back of the chapel with it. "Let's go."

And there was no protest the priest could make to stop him.

Once the gathered patients meekly began following him, Mac glanced at his forearm again, tapping the map icon. For whatever reason, Murdoc had allowed the little improvisation, and the map of the second floor showed that the chapel area was indeed a link between two wings. If he was going to lock these men in a room, he wanted it to be a room that was designed to keep them in.

Meaning a normal patient room. With the power back on, certain locks were once again working by default. Once he got the cell control module—still safe in his backpack—installed and working, he could lock down entire wings. Then again, there was no guarantee Murdoc wouldn't override anything he did. So wherever he tucked these patients away, he couldn't count on the magnetic locks alone.

But at the head of each wing, where it connected back to the central hub, there was a block of rooms that were larger, and had no exterior windows. Their design seemed more secure, and they were isolated from the other patient rooms. And since these guys had been boobytrapping the east wing, he turned to the south.

A few mutters started floating back to him, even as the soundtrack in his earwig started to grow more suspenseful.

"—he is the shepherd, he really is—"

"—the high priest is right, though, if a demon foretold his coming...?"

"But he must wield the Key!"

The last whisper attracted his attention, and Mac cleared his throat and turned his head a little. "What's this about a Key?"

The priest, who had reluctantly taken the position directly behind Mac, gave him a dark look and didn't answer. After a few seconds of silence, however, his flock couldn't keep it to themselves. "The Key unlocks the gates of our salvation!"

Apparently not a metaphorical gate. That was good to know. Mac again focused on the patient-turned-priest, who gave him a steely-eyed glare. "...and the Key is with the high priest, I presume?"

The man's eyes narrowed further. "As it is ordained," he confirmed in a tone that brooked no argument.

Mac felt the phone on his forearm vibrate, but this time he didn't even look. That was the objective of the chapel room.

The actual priest had been a larger man than the patient who had killed him, and as a result the priest robes were generous, giving him all manner of places to stash a key. He was clearly much stronger than he looked, and getting into a fistfight with him was not likely to impress his small collection of adoring believers.

"I'm gonna need that key to open the gates," he reminded the man as they entered the south wing—with the door also conveniently unlocked—and Mac made a mental note to correct that once he was able.

"When the times comes," the priest said piously. He then shot Mac a highly suspicious look as he held open a door to what appeared to be an abandoned patient room. "Why have you led us here?"

"I told you. I need you somewhere safe," Mac repeated, mimicking the patient's tone. "This room is fortified against detection. If the demon comes searching for you, it won't find you here."

"—but the chapel was safe," one of the priest's flock protested. "The holy flame protects us."

An idea finally popped into his head, and Mac nodded to the man. "Exactly right," he agreed, and then he held up the candle that was still in his left hand. The mentally ill man grinned brightly at him, and then surprised Mac by snatching it from him.

"That's why you took it!" he exclaimed happily, and held it up to show the others. "To protect us!"

The patient room was largely tile and concrete, and the bed, as long as it was following code, was flame retardant. Giving mental patients a candle was probably a bad idea, but they'd had the whole candelabra all this time and managed not to set the building on fire, and frankly there were so many other ways they could endanger themselves and others—since at least one of them had a knife from the kitchen—a candle seemed relatively minor on the risk index.

The only problem was lighting it. Mac reached into his pocket for his swiss army knife, looking for anything metal that could provide some sparks, when he heard the sharp grind of metal on metal.

The patient that had taken the candle from him was holding a bright yellow Bic lighter to the wick.

Of course. That was how they'd gotten the other candles lit.

"Can I borrow that?" Mac asked casually, and after the candle was lit the man agreeably passed it to him, his eyes never leaving the wick. As soon as he'd handed Mac the lighter, his empty hand went to cup around the flame, his entire being focused on it.

"Everyone, stay with him. I'll be back before the candle burns down."

Though a few of the patients were highly skeptical, the others hurried into the space, leaving the bed as a place of prestige for their high priest. He was the last to go inside, giving Mac a piercing look. "I don't know what this is," he snarled under his breath, "but I will skin you alive if you betray us."

Unwanted, the mental image of the pile of corpses stacked in the library came to his mind's eye, and Mac jerked his chin at the room. "And if you fail to keep these men safe, I will ensure that you spend the rest of your life in a purgatory far worse than this."

The priest gave a little huff, but turned to walk fully into the room. Before he could make it more than a step or two, Mac reached out and grabbed his arm, releasing him as soon as he turned back although his expression remained stony.

"I'm gonna need that key," he stated quietly. The other patients in the room were talking amongst themselves in hushed tones, watching them intently. The priest glared at him.

"As I said," he replied icily, "when the time comes."

Mac blinked at him, then took a small step closer to him. When he spoke, his expression remained calm, but his voice, while barely above a whisper, was venomous.

"Either you give me that key, or you'll be the next sacrifice. And before you say that your followers won't let that happen, I think we both know that in their eyes, I outrank you."

The priest stared at him for a second, eyes sparking with rage, before he cast a quick glance at the other patients. Yes, Knife Guy was still a bit apprehensive about the newcomer, but the majority were in awe, fully believing that Mac was there to save them. Knife Guy was armed, but Mac had the numbers. And the priest knew it.

With one last glare, the priest finally plucked a chain out from around his neck, revealing a silver key, and handed it over. Mac took it with a smile.

"Thank you," he said, hoping he sounded sincere. "Now stay put. I'll be back soon."

As soon as the priest started stiffly to take his seat on the bed, Mac closed the door, listening for the magnetic lock to catch. It did, but that wasn't good enough for Mac. His eyes roamed the somewhat trashed hallway for anything useful, and then he jogged a few dozen yards and picked through the detritus of a supply cart before he found some spare patient gowns.

These too got cut into strips with his SAK, and he used them to lash the door lever to the room beside it. Even if Murdoc messed with the locks, at least there was a second, physical impediment. The phone vibrated on his forearm, and Mac glared at it with irritation.

The only thing on the screen was a winking smiley emoji.

Mac yanked his boat knots as tight as he could, then he broke into a sprint for the main hub, at this point if anything else leapt out at him the plan was to outrun it.

If any of the other patients had been given photos of Riley, or otherwise primed to want to do her harm—

Maybe it was a 'reward' for whatever he'd done to please Murdoc, but when he waved the security badge and entered the central hub, already on the second floor, it looked exactly the way he'd left it. Same bodies, same blood puddles, and no one else in sight.

He didn't relax, even after he badged himself into the security office to find that the monitors were once again working. Even as he slipped off the backpack, unzipping it to grab the cell control module, his eyes were on the monitor low on the camera bank, currently showing him—

The screen switched, and there was Riley. Still attached to her gurney. Still pristinely white in her costume. Mac watched the feed closely, trying to make out whether she was breathing, she was awake, but the fifteen second cycle moved on before he could be sure of it.

"Hang in there, Riles," he muttered softly, and only realized it was out loud when the music in his ear switched from suspenseful to sappy sweet. It made his next decision much easier.

There was no doubt in his mind that plugging in the cell control module was going to kick off another challenge or obstacle. Before he installed it, he needed to get that feed of her on his phone.

The mini USB cable connected beneath the monitor without issue, and once the feed had switched back to her, Mac quickly plugged in the phone.

Once again, the phone's screen lit up with a notification.

Sync Feed?

Mac impatiently tapped OK.

And as before, the activity bar appeared and filled rapidly. Unlike last time, the lights didn't go out. Instead, the phone vibrated on his forearm.

Sync Complete

When the notification disappeared back to his home screen, he noticed a new icon, a tiny little camera. When he tapped it, the phone switched to a full-screen view of the room Riley was in. Mac glanced between it and the full-sized monitor, and when the fifteen second cycle was up—the main monitor switched to the other view, but his phone stayed fixed on Riley's feed.

Even though it didn't actually bring him any closer to getting her out of that gurney, he finally felt a little rush of relief. "Gotcha," he told her, and immediately started on the cell control module.

It fit perfectly into the slot on the board, as he'd known it would, and Mac made short work of reaching blindly into it to find the other end of the torn-off cable. It was plugged into a series of network jacks, hidden behind the cabinet, but they were all filled, so it would be easy to find the empty one. He unplugged it and tossed it over his shoulder, already reaching for the cable he'd purchased from Benny. It was only when he was already plugging it back in that he realized the problem.

The new cable was about six inches shorter than the one that had been cut. It wasn't long enough to reach.

Mac couldn't help the curse that left his lips, glancing desperately around the room. The cabinet that housed all the control modules and monitors was screwed into the floor, so he couldn't move it. Nor could he disassemble the cabinet to move things around, he'd just have the same problem. Not to mention he couldn't just start unplugging things if he expected the cell control module to work like designed.

"You gotta be kidding me," he growled impatiently, staring at the cable in his hands. Of course, he could find something shiny to trade with Benny, go back down to the basement – and all the patients in there, including the ones he'd pissed off when he'd stopped them from following him earlier.

Too much time, too much risk.

Mac shoved his arm back into the slot, following the second, intact cable down to its network port. It was closer than the other one, and a longer cable to boot, maybe if he swapped it with the one he'd gotten from Benny...?

He unplugged it and pulled it out of the hole, then connected it to cell control module, and a game show buzzer blared through the room, startling him enough that he banged his still sore right arm into the console.

The crafting icon was flashing, with a red X superimposed over it. He had the same two options, CANCEL or PASS, and this time the Pass button wasn't greyed out.

Murdoc knew what he was up to. He wanted to force him to go back into the basement. Burn more time Riley didn't have.

And he was done. Done with endless side quests, done with lunatics, done with being chased. He didn't care what kind of game Murdoc wanted him to play. He needed to get to Riley, and get them out of this hellish facility. Taking a deep breath and bracing himself for the 'penalty', Mac tapped PASS.

He expected some kind of shock from the phone, but the PASS button flashed twice, then his home screen reappeared. There was no indication that anything had happened, and after waiting a few more tense seconds, Mac moved to continue swapping the cables.

A scream ripped through his earwig. Female.

Riley.

Mac shot to his feet, his eyes flying up to the big monitor rather than the phone just as the feed switched back to Riley. She was writhing on the gurney, and the scream in his ear choked off in perfect sync with Riley forcing her jaw closed. Her eyes were screwed shut, her back, arms, and legs unnaturally arched, and Mac realized what was happening.

The electroshock equipment strapped to her had been activated.

"No—NO!" he shouted, knowing Murdoc could hear him, was watching. "Stop! I'll find another way! Stop!"

It didn't. The 'treatment' lasted about fifteen seconds, just enough time for the monitor to switch to the other feed, and Mac forced his fingers to uncurl from their tight fist, forced them to tap the correct icon, popping up her feed on his phone. She was sagging against the mattress, her cries now more like stifled sobs, and a thin line of blood trickled from the corner of her mouth to the pillow.

Mac clenched his jaw in tandem with her, unwilling to look away until he saw her take at least one deep breath. "You son of a bitch," he managed, then swallowed hard.

That was the penalty for using a pass.

The phone didn't display anything else, innocently showing him nothing more than the feed and his normal icons, and patients didn't suddenly appear on Riley's feed, drawn to the noise, but it was still several moments before he could bring himself to continue working.

Otherwise he'd put her through that for nothing.

The soundtrack in his ear was now a tragic version of the sappy love theme, it didn't register that it was anything more than noise until he realized that beneath the music, someone cleared their throat.

"Mac?"

He froze, arm still deep in the cabinet. "...Riley?"

And for whatever reason, Murdoc took pity on him, and lowered the music volume. Low enough that he could hear her painful exhale as she shifted on the gurney. Hear the fabric sliding against the vinyl mattress. He'd never toggled off her feed, but he twisted his left arm around, and saw her blink, saw her eyebrows bunch as she scanned the room. Her eyes passed right over the camera without pausing, so Mac assumed it was well camouflaged. "I can'ear you, but I can'find th'speaker."

"I have eyes, too. Your eleven o'clock." He couldn't keep the relief from his voice. "I'm in the building, I'll be there soon." He saw Riley's eyes look back at the camera, then forced himself to focus, and redoubled his efforts to get the cell control module up.

"Took you...a minnid." Her voice was a little slurred, and he wondered if she was drugged, still woozy from the shock, or it was the result of biting her tongue. Maybe all three.

He unclenched his jaw with effort. "I know. I'm sorry." The sappy music started up again, even as Mac managed to connect the shorter cable, grateful to find that it was indeed just barely long enough, and he wasn't going to have to make the trip to the basement after all.

"Issa video game," she said suddenly, and he connected the power cord and carefully slid the cell control module into place.

"Yeah, I figured that part out." Murdoc hadn't given them audio as a reward; it was very clearly so that he could hear it every time she was hurt. The sociopath could and would take it away at any moment. "I'm working my way to you. Just got control of the cell locks, but it probably means something else will get triggered."

He glanced at the board, in time to see the big monitor had flipped back to her, and Riley was trying to take deep breaths. Her eyes blinked open a few times. "Issat...what jus'appened?"

A series of new LEDs popped up on the panel below the monitors, that had previously looked completely blank, and Mac took his own steadying breath. "No," he admitted, then purposefully strengthened his voice. "That was me. I made a mistake."

Of course the penalty was going to fall on Riley. He'd been a complete idiot to think otherwise.

He heard Riley cough, once. "Jus'eard a...a thud."

"What kind of thud?" he asked quickly, scanning the new array of LEDs. It didn't seem complicated; the design looked generally like the layout of the facility. One central hub, with four lines of LEDs stacked on top of each other, but clearly meant to represent the four wings of the hospital. They seemed to have three settings: green, amber, and red.

However, there were no buttons on the LED panel. Mac glanced down at the keyboard, which was sitting next to the stale cup of coffee, still with something grey-ish white floating in it.

"Like someone slam'd'door."

"How close?" Mac pulled the keyboard toward himself, unwilling to take the one empty seat that someone had bled on.

"...nod'close."

Not that it didn't mean they weren't on their way to her. He had to figure out how to lock these doors, and fast.

Mac focused back on the monitors. They had a two letter, two number designation in the corner of each monitor, and it was pretty clear he was going to have to figure out what it meant – and where they were—so he could type those into the keyboard and start intelligently locking down the facility.

And yet...

EC-04. It was a large room, with tables spread out in rows, though some had been upended. It actually looked exactly like the cafeteria he'd sprinted through after temporarily locking Generator Guy in the kitchen. So EC could be...east cafeteria?

SP-07 seemed to be an empty patient's cell. South wing patient room?

But a quick run-down of the displayed codes showed him more than N, E, S, and W. There was also a CH, but that was easy to determine—it was the chapel, and the view artfully hid the hole leading into the library and its pile of dead. There was a GY-05 as well, and that was the monitor that showed the patient still roaming the gymnasium, looking every bit as incensed as he had an hour ago. BT-06 was just a black screen, so wherever it was pointing had no lights – probably basement.

Riley's monitor was labeled ET-08. East something, camera or room 8. Maybe treatment room, since it looked more like a normal hospital room than the patient cells?

So she was east wing. That meant he could safely lock down all the other wings.

Mac pulled up the map on his phone, remembering well that it was one of the violent patient wings, and had been designed with physical security in mind. The first floor was not a single, wide hallway like the second floor had been. Beyond the cafeteria and gymnasium, there were several offshoots from the main hall that housed scores of smaller rooms. They weren't numbered, just like the rooms in the basement hadn't been, and there were several smaller hallways with at least eight rooms.

Though he had the map up, his audio to Riley hadn't been cut yet, and he heard her swallow. "I c'n'ear voices."

His eyes instantly shot back to the cameras, and he searched for any others that started with E. "How do you feel? Are you drugged, any injuries I don't know about?"

He was truly surprised when Murdoc didn't cut the audio right there, and actually let her answer. "Can'tell. Feel...sluggith. Heavy. Bit muh tongue."

Mac finally found a camera with a EH-01 label. It was a hallway, and he didn't see any motion. "Any trouble breathing?" Heavy reminded him uneasily of the paralytic Murdoc had given him back in the warehouse, but sluggish—

Sluggish sounded more like whatever sedative cocktail Murdoc had used the day he kidnapped him to kick off their apprehension of Henry Fletcher for Murdoc's collective. And this was supposed to be as much a 'message' to them as it was to Phoenix. As it was to Mac himself.

He heard fabric shift as she shook her head. "Throat's a li'l tight," she admitted after a second, and he watched her test her bonds with no discernable success. "Whoever's oud there, they're yellin'."

While the mic seemed primed to pick up even the smallest sound from Riley, he couldn't hear the background noise from her room—the piped in music might be covering it. Potentially on purpose. "Okay, Riley, I have a keyboard here and four character designators for cells. No computer screen. How do I use this?"

The Riley on the big monitor stared at the ceiling a moment. "Uh," she offered unhelpfully, and he frowned, trying to determine exactly how affected she might be. "If issa real system it won'be combligaded. Look for'manual."

A little slurring aside, that was a good idea, and Mac quickly recovered the operations manual off the floor. She was right; this ought to be straightforward. It wasn't like security guards were known for their personal computer skills.

Then again, it was supposed to be a video game, and beyond that an exam Murdoc meant him to fail. And since the two letter two number designation seemed simple enough, there had to be a catch.

But as he scanned the laminated pages of the manual, he couldn't find that catch. It was pretty basic. Just to test it, he slid the keyboard over, then used the 'lock all' command on the north wing.

/lock all N*.*

And though he heard nothing, nearly every LED indicator along one of the four rows turned green. A quick glance at the security monitors showed him at least one visible confirmation; a doorway in view of the camera labeled NH-02 now showed a red LED on the badge reader beside it, meaning it was secured.

But not every LED on the panel turned green. Those that hadn't flipped displayed red, which Mac could assume meant the doors were unable, for one reason or another, to lock.

There was nothing he could about that from the security office, so Mac made quick work of battening down the South and West wings as well, proving by process of elimination which line of LEDs represented the East wing. It was a veritable Christmas tree of green, amber and red, and there was no way to know which LED lined up with which doorway or lock in the wing.

Suspecting that his security badge would give him access to most of those locks—and the three sets of keys he had in his pocket the rest—Mac made a quick decision. "Riley, I'm going to lock down your wing. Tell me if you hear anything."

/lock all E*.*

Many of the LEDs flipped from amber to green, but several of the red LEDs remained. The music in his ear switched to an urgent beat, with low undertones that were designed to promote unease, and there on the feed on his phone, Riley picked up her head.

"I—I heard 'em," she confirmed, her lips drawing down in a scowl, and again, he heard her swallow. "Mac, iz'omethin' aroun'muh neck?"

The phone wouldn't let him pinch the image bigger, so Mac waited impatiently for the larger monitor to switch back to Riley's feed. The video was larger but the resolution wasn't as fine, and he really couldn't tell.

"Can you tilt your chin up?" he asked, and once Riley complied, he saw that she was correct. There was a black choker on her neck, the only thing that didn't look like part of the nursing costume. In fact, it looked a lot like all her other chokers. For all he knew, it actually was one of Riley's own chokers. Murdoc had spent more than enough time in her apartment to snag one, and putting it on her now would only be a reminder of that violation.

This wasn't just designed to make Mac lose, to fail to save a life. It was designed to scare the victim to death. Riley was every bit the target that he was.

Mac chose his words carefully. "Looks like you're wearing a black choker. Is it too tight?" Limiting the blood flow through her carotid and jugular could account for the wooziness, but if that was the case, blood was being choked off from her brain and had been since he'd gotten eyes on her. Which was almost an hour ago—

She swallowed again, loudly enough that he could hear it even over the suspenseful music. "Nah, iz'jus...I c'n'def feel it."

"Okay. Hang on, Riles," and he tried to make it sound more confident than he felt. "I'm headed to you, I don't know if we'll lose audio when I leave here. I'm coming."

Right before the larger monitor flipped back to the other feed, he saw Riley squeeze her eyes shut. "Hurry," was all she said.

Unfortunately that was easier said than done.

The music was an audio cue that he'd triggered something, and since the monitors didn't show him every camera, just because he didn't see people racing down hallways didn't mean they weren't out there. As soon as he put his ear to the security room door, he heard the slap of patient shoes on the tile outside.

His two buddies from earlier had apparently come back out again. And since he had no idea what the designation for the central hub was, if it wasn't 'CH,' he had no idea what command to input to lock down the middle.

Fortunately he already knew exactly how to get to the east wing from here, so he simply waited for the footsteps to head away from him, then he eased open the door to find the coast appeared clear.

He hadn't forgotten about the east stairwell door on the first floor being blocked, so Mac knew he was going to have to back down to the main floor first, and he was almost certain that something would be waiting for him. Still, as he crept down the stairwell, he didn't hear anything but the soundtrack. This time he was expecting the violins, timed with when he put a wary hand on the door lever, and it didn't make him jump quite so much.

There was no movement visible through the window, and the lever didn't shock him, so Mac took a deep breath, depressed the lever, and pushed it open.

It wasn't open more than an inch before there was another explosion of sound—metal and coins slamming into the ground and scattering every which way, followed by what sounded like an economy size coffee tin rolling jauntily across the spreading mess. It was a simple boobytrap, the kind he and Boze had set up a million times in school when Mac wanted prior warning before a teacher appeared. Just a noisemaker.

A noisemaker that a human had put there sometime in the past hour.

There was no benefit to sneaking, not now, and Mac launched himself through the doorway and straight for the east side of the main lobby.

Even as his body cleared the doorway he saw that he'd been right. Someone was waiting for him.

Three of them.

Two had been leaning casually on a desk, and they looked almost as startled as he did. The third was between him and the east wing entrance, dressed like a patient, and the guy planted his feet and threw Mac a smirk. Actors, he guessed, but they were probably instructed to make it as hard for him as possible, to make the 'scene' look 'real,' and even if they weren't going to kill him, they were still an obstacle between him and Riley.

Mac didn't even hesitate. He ran straight at the guy and made it look for all the world like he was going to put a shoulder into the guy's stomach. When his opponent hunkered down and tensed up, Mac spun to the right like a quarterback, barely breaking stride and pushing off his opponent with his hip to throw him off balance. He made it to the door with a multiple yard lead and waved his badge at the door. A click and then he pulled open the door only as far as he needed to to get in before yanking it shut behind him.

As soon as it closed the magnetic lock re-engaged, and Mac used the badge to salute the surprised-looking man before he focused on whatever threats were waiting for him in the East wing.

The first one was big. Much bigger. From the stairwell window, it hadn't been apparent, but it wasn't just the side stairwell door that was blocked.

It was the entire hallway. Floor to ceiling, crammed with possibly every stick of furniture in the wing. He picked out the bent frames of beds, chairs, sheets, desks—and the ceiling wasn't a drop ceiling, so it wasn't like he could just hop up into the utility space and go over.

"Crap," he muttered, walking up to the enormous barricade and grabbing a few pieces to get a measure for how tightly it was packed. He could tear it apart, but it would take time. More than he wanted to spend, and he couldn't see daylight out the other side. Suppressing a curse, Mac flipped over his wrist and pulled up the map on his phone.

"...wuz'rong?"

For a split second he completely forgot that it wasn't a mission, and she wasn't perfectly fine sitting in the War Room, talking to him through his earpiece. "Uh—roadblock. Literally. Think Les Mis. I need to route around it and find..." He trailed off, scanning the map. He could backtrack, take out the three actors, head up the North wing and use a cut-over—

"Look for'a crawl through."

He couldn't help an impatient huff. "It's floor to ceiling, Riles, there's no—there's no crawl through—" though he did crouch low, checking, because she was right, that was a standard video game trope.

"Check th'side room. Closet."

"Yeah—yeah," he agreed quickly, taking them both in. Much like the story above it, there were rooms near the door to the central hub, probably holding cells for anyone who needed to be transferred out of the wing to another for treatment or visitors. The one on his right was locked, and Mac fumbled in his pocket for the multiple sets of keys. Neither the janitor's keys nor Suit Guy's keys fit, and there was no way this door fit the 'gates of our salvation' description.

But the other doorknob opened easily in his hand, revealing a perfectly normal patient room.


Anyone else getting anxious? No? Just me? Cool.

So just a couple things before you guys go: first of all, this exam is almost solely authored by Haven126 and I would be an asshole if I didn't mention that. I think by the end of the exam itself, I'm only going to have written about 5% of it. So big round of applause for her; she is the backbone of this series!

Second, I hope you guys are having as much fun reading this as we are writing it! We're almost done with this exam, then we'll be on to the final (and boy is that gonna be fun!) Hope to see you soon, and don't forget to review!