Early in the morning, Karen entered the lab and looked around for the doctor. The lab was unusually quiet, and the doctor wasn't around.

"Ah fuck, don't tell me he's been captured AGAIN! This shit's gettin old!" she said.

She began to look around the lab for signs of a struggle. As she was thinking about who could possibly have abducted him this time around, the doctor came in through the front door. His nose was running, and she could hear him sniffling.

"There you are. Thought you got captured...again." she said.

"Nah, just have a bit of a cold." he said.

He sneezed, and a jet of green smoke shot out of his nose. Karen saw this and blinked in surprise.

"I've never seen a cold do that to somebody before." she said.

"Nevermind that right now. I have a customer whose a bodybuilder, and he wants a female slave who is also a bodybuilder. Go out and find a suitable female. " he said.

He sneezed again, and more green smoke came out of his nose. Slightly freaked out, Karen left the lab in a hurry.

Several hours later, Karen pushed open the lab door and hobbled inside. One of her legs was in a cast, as was one of her arms. She was wearing a neckbrace, and her face was swollen and bruised.

"What the hell happened?!" the doctor asked.

"I went to the gym to find a strong female bodybuilder. I found one, and I knocked her out with the baseball bat, but she woke up before I could get her to the car... Um, I don't remember much after that, but the hospital room I woke up in was very nice."

"Eh, you're all right. Get back out there and get that woman!" the doctor said.

He sneezed again, and this time purple smoke came out of his nose.

"No... I quit. I need to go back to the hospital to have surgery..." Karen said. She turned around and hobbled out of the laboratory.

The doctor sat down at a table and began to grumble. "Hmph. Good assistants are so hard to find! Geez, she gets a tiny scratch or two, and she just up and quits?! Now what the hell am I gonna do? It's not like I can just go out and capture victims myself, even though I've done it before! I'm a mad scientist! Not a lackey!"

The doctor heard a faint rustling sound. He ignored it. He heard the same sound again, but louder. He got up to investigate, and felt a sharp pain in his neck. He whipped around to see a tall pale woman with a disgusted look on her face.

"Yech! Blech! Your blood is nasty!" the woman said as she spat on the floor. She wiped her pointy teeth with her finger and looked at it.

"Your blood is...green?! How in the hell did that happen?" she asked.

"Eh, that happens when I get a cold." the doctor said. He then sneezed, and more purple smoke came out of his nose.

The pale woman blinked in surprise, then took a step backward.

"Hey wait! Before you freak out and flee, I'm currently looking for an assistant. You wouldn't happen to be interested, would you?" he said.

She looked at him and raised an eyebrow. "How'd you know I'm looking for a job?" she asked.

"The economy's in terrible shape. Everybody's looking for a job." the doctor replied.

Carol was once again on the hunt. This hunt was a bit different from her usual hunts though. She was to hunt down a well muscled female, and in return, she would receive money. She took a bottle of special SPF 4500 sunblock out of her purse and smeared some of it on her exposed skin. Being a vampire, even Irish people could tolerate the sun better then she could.

She zeroed in on her target, who happened to be leaving the gym. The woman had a large lump on her head, indicating that she had been attacked before. Quick as a cat, Carol lept in front of the woman and locked her eyes onto the other woman's eyes. Her hypnotic gaze soon did the rest.

"Do tell me about yourself, won't you?" Carol said.

"My name's Beverly, and I lift weights and strength train because I'm very insecure and I have more emotional issues then most asylum inmates do." she replied.

"You're going to come with me. There's a doctor who wants to meet you." Carol transformed into a large bat like creature and grabbed the woman with her feet. She then took off into the air.

Back at the lab, the woman obediantly got into the brainwashing machine. The doctor restrained her to the machine and lowered the helmet over her head.

"Okay, now go over to that console and start pressing buttons and moving levers. I'll be at the console that actually operates the machine." the doctor said.

Carol raised an eyebrow and tilted her head. "So, if your console controls the machine... What does mine do?" she asked.

"Eh, sometimes it makes cool beeping sounds." the doctor replied.

"Can't I do something more, you know, useful?" she asked.

"Every mad scientist needs a machine that makes cool beeping noises!" he said.

Carol sighed and sat down at the console and started pulling various levers and tapping buttons, and seriously questioning the sanity of the man she was now working for. Eh, $8.50 an hour would buy her a lot of sunblock though...

The brainwashing machine activated, and began to shake violently as the woman struggled and tried to buck her well muscled hips against the restraints. Nothing broke, and the process soon completed. The doctor got up, walked over to her and removed the helmet.

"Who do you obey?" he asked.

"I obey Countess Carol..." she replied.

"Oh! Shit, forgot about that." Carol said. She snapped her fingers. "Try it now, Doc."

"Who do you obey?" the doctor asked again.

"I obey Doctor Nechetohontoquatl..." the woman replied.

"Bonus points for getting my name right." the doctor said.

Later on, the woman was picked up by an equally muscled man and taken away. The doctor began to count his money.

"Let me get this straight. You make thousands of dollars per slave, yet your laboratory is housed inside a rundown building that was built sometime in the early 20th century. On top of that, everything except your brainwashing machine, and one computer, is at least 50 years old and runs on vacuum tubes..." Carol said.

The doctor nodded, and put the money in his pocket.

"So, you make thousands of dollars a day, yet you are only paying me $8.50 an hour, which translates to about $300.00 a week before taxes..." Carol said.

"Instead of standing there running numbers through your head, why not go out and find another victim? There's still a couple hours before quitting time." the doctor replied.

Once again, Carol was on the hunt. As she flew overhead, scanning the ground with her eyes, she thought about the man she was working for. The doctor was a goldmine just begging to be tapped, but he was also the most miserly and insane person she had ever met. She began to wonder if it was all just an act. Perhaps all that money the doctor made went towards paying off some oversized house located in a fancy neighborhood. She'd find out later, after quitting time...

She swooped down and landed next to a young woman. She changed back to human form and locked her hypnotic gaze on the woman.

"Do be a good girl and tell me about yourself." Carol said.

"My name's Becky, and I'm a deranged mess and my husband cheats on me with my sister." she replied.

At that point, Carol began to wonder if there was a single sane person left in the city. She changed back into her winged form, grabbed the woman and headed back to the lab.

5 PM and quitting time. Carol hid on the roof of the laboratory. She used her vampire senses to track the doctor as he left the building. As stealthy as a cat, she followed him. The doctor walked down the sidewalk. He didn't stop to talk to anyone. He went off the sidewalk and onto a path. The path led to an old Chevrolet Corvair that was resting on cinder blocks. Carol watched intrigued as the doctor opened the door, removed his labcoat, crawled into the back seat, and soon fell asleep.

Carol couldn't believe what she was seeing. There was no way that old car could be his home. She soon spotted a mailbox with his name written on it. She had heard of people being frugal, but this was taking it to a ridiculously extreme level. Also, it was only a little after 5 PM, why was he already going to sleep? She reminded herself that he had a cold and probably didn't feel too well. Finding herself thirsty, she decided to go on a real hunt.