Enter the Janitor (The Cleaners) (Volume 1) (15 page)
Read Enter the Janitor (The Cleaners) (Volume 1) Online
Authors: Josh Vogt
Chapter Twenty
Ben staggered beneath the sudden burden of a weeping goddess. He tried to hold her upright, but she weighed far heavier than she looked. He resorted to squatting and then a quick drop onto his butt where he could brace her without throwing his back out.
He patted his pockets. “You want, I might got some tissues.”
She curled up like an overgrown child, arms around his neck, legs across his thighs. The kittens sat on their haunches and joined in with howls and screeches that turned Ben’s bones to jelly, heightened by relieved trembling. The notion of Filth being a mother sure seemed crazy when he first thought it, but it made some twisted sense. The newcomer was a child, and every child had to come from somewhere, didn’t it? While some folks were known to spontaneously combust, there had never been a report of spontaneous conception.
Well, ’cept for that one time …
Filth’s oily tears stained his suit, and he prayed they wouldn’t eat through the material. He tried patting her back and rocking a bit, a halting lullaby or two, but realized how ridiculous it was. So he sat still and let Filth weep until her sobs turned to breathless hiccups. Her hair pulsed in time with her breaths as words broke through the cries.
“That … wasn’t … funny…”
Ben cleared his throat as strands of her hair kept knotting around his knuckles. “Ahum. I ain’t never been great at this whole consolin’ thing.”
“Do you know what it’s like,” she said between sniffles, “to have to stand back and do nothing as your child is hunted down like a wild animal? How scared he must be …”
“He?”
She raised her face to his, eyes rimmed red, looking ancient and afraid. “I didn’t even have time to give him a name. I had to hide him the moment his powers manifested, and even then it wasn’t enough, was it? That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”
“So we’re really talkin’ ‘bout a kid here. A babe in the Pantheon.”
“You couldn’t have guessed,” she said. “You must have known all along. Which means many others know, and he’s still in danger. They all want him.”
“There’s been a lil’ news runnin’ around, yeah. I was gonna try a summoning on my end, but Sydney beat me to it.”
Sighing, Filth pushed away and stood with her back to him. A wave of an arm dissolved the kittens into puddles that soaked into the ground, leaving the surface covered in mossy scum.
“It wouldn’t have worked, either way,” she said.
Ben rose. “What I don’t get is why it … he mighta targeted Dani or m’self. Seems like lightnin’ strikin’ the same place twice.”
“Oh, that’s simple. Your apprentice recently discovered her powers, yes?”
Ben nodded.
“So she’s a newborn, similar to my offspring. My guess is the manifestations have happened to those who’ve most recently come into their abilities. And you,” a glance at his decaying arm, “you wield Purity, yet are infected with the Ravishing. Your body contains some traces of each Pantheon and possesses enough dual-affinity to draw his attention. You must understand, he is like us,” she drew her hands to her chest, indicating the rest of the Petties. “Powerful. An incarnation of the battle between Purity and Corruption. Yet he is alone. Afraid. Reacting through pure instinct. I’d thought him contained enough to avoid detection, but he has somehow pushed past the barriers I erected, and is reaching for anything that might provide an anchor, or lashing out at perceived threats.”
“Er … hope this ain’t too much me pryin’ into business that ain’t my own, but … how’d he pop into existence, anyhoo?”
“I birthed him.”
“A’ight, that sounds way too simple, what with you all being … what’s the word? Multi-differential beings?”
“Multi-dimensional.”
He snapped his fingers. “Right. That. So, by birthin’, are we talkin’ like a magical photocopy of yourself? Cuttin’ off an arm and lettin’ it grow into its own self? Doesn’t some kinda sea creature pull that trick?”
She mimed a rounded tummy. “I conceived him. I and another mingled essences much as you fleshlings do.”
“You can make more of yourselves?”
“Of course.” Her eyes rolled. “Where do you think we Petties came from? You think we just popped out of the aether? We are the Primals’ spawn. Their children.”
Ben found himself chewing on his thumb, recalled what his hands had been recently slimed with, and yanked it out.
“Then I ain’t quite gettin’ it,” he said after a bit of spitting. “If you can add to your Pantheon just by a little supernatural hokey-pokey, why ain’t the realms stuffed full of godling wannabes?”
“The Primals forbid it. A ban was enacted and enforced by the leaders of both Pantheons. Perhaps the one time they’ve ever worked in concert.”
Ben’s brow furrowed. “Why? I figure it’d be the easiest way to get the upper hand over each other.”
“That’s just it. The Primals have come to love the balance too much. The constant war.” Her body swelled as she spoke, eyes flashing black, fingers curling into claws. “The endless supply of supplicants and devotees you fleshlings provide. It has defined them for so long that they’ve forgotten what it means to conquer. To truly subjugate the world.” She shrank back to normal and sighed. “It’s also a matter of power distribution. With each birth, each addition to the Pantheon, the realms fracture further. Power is divided and effort must be turned inward simply to keep the newborns from causing too much chaos until they are established.”
He squinted an eye at her. “So you get it on with your own siblings? That just ain’t right.”
“We are not human, janitor. There is no such thing as blood relations here.” Filth fluttered her fingers. “But those activities are no longer allowed. The last time any offspring joined the Pantheons was in 1346, when Plague was incarnated. Tempestuous times.”
It surprised Ben when he knew what she referred to. He’d never paid much attention to his history lessons, but the date stuck out nonetheless.
“The Black Death.”
“Mm.”
“But this ain’t just a new Corrupt Petty we’re talkin’ about. It’s Pure
and
Corrupt. Which means you …” He stuttered as his guts clenched. Another impossible addition got tossed into the insane lump sum. “Oh, cleanse my colon. You got it on with a Pure Petty, didn’t you? You pulled a regular Romeo and Juliet, but without the whole poison and dyin’ part.”
Filth scowled and tugged at her snarled hair. “It was unintended. A mistake. Neither of us thought it possible.”
“You’re tellin’ me you had unprotected supernatural sex?”
“Shut up.”
Shaking his head, he took a deep breath, then regretted it as it provided a deep whiff of this realm’s miasma of rotten odors, which would be spoiling his appetite for days to come.
“Who’s the proud daddy-o?” he asked.
“I removed that knowledge from myself. It was a most … disturbing coupling.”
“Gotta say, I ain’t believin’ you let yourself forget that juicy tidbit.”
“I don’t care what you believe.”
They glared at each other for a few seconds, until Filth surprised Ben by averting her eyes first.
“What now?” he asked.
“Now we decide what part you’ll play in this.”
Ben crossed his arms and planted his feet. “Naw. Now you gotta decide whether you want my help or not. ’Cause if you do, you’re gonna help me get Dani back first.”
Wrinkles gouged her face. “I’ve shown you a large mercy by not reducing you to a slopping heap. You already owe me much. Don’t be fooled into thinking you’re entitled to make demands.”
“I ain’t gonna do this without Dani. She needs me. And I need her.” Seeing the stubborn set of Filth’s chin, he held out both hands, trying to appeal to her mothering side. “Look, we’ve both got a kid out there about to get steamrolled by people who hardly have their best interests in mind. I ain’t gonna be able to do this without her help, and you can’t do this without mine.”
Filth held unnaturally still, as if her body had been put on standby while her mind went into processing mode. Finally, she reached behind her back and drew his mop and spray bottle out from nowhere.
“Carl,” Ben cried, overjoyed to see his partner unharmed. “They been givin’ you the VIP treatment?”
Carl sloshed in the bottle and sprayed Filth’s way.
“Yeah, well, don’t forget to leave a tip.”
Filth handed his items over, but kept her grip on them, forcing him to look at her. “I’ll send you back to your apprentice,” she said. “But you must swear you’ll do everything you can to keep my child safe.”
“I gotta ask, why me?” Ben asked. “I mean, c’mon. You could have your pick of servants the world over.”
Her hungry smile returned. “Consider me a secret admirer of your past work. Plus, you are one of few who don’t compare us to gods. Not even in the core of yourself. We’re just very powerful bosses in a metaphysical office complex. I respect a man who doesn’t bow, no matter how many heels press on his back.”
“Should I think differently?” He waved away her glare. “Fine. I’ll do it, even if I can’t imagine how right now. It’d help if I knew how to actually find it … him.”
She released his tools to rub her temples. “I removed that knowledge from myself as well. Too much risk. Too many seeking. I am being summoned by a dozen others at this very moment, wishing to have my blessing in the hunt. I’m ignoring them, of course.”
“Guess we do it the hard way. I’ll figure something out.”
Filth closed her eyes for a moment. Then a gasp escaped her. “Janitor, she’s much closer to the flames than I anticipated.”
That stiffened his spine. “Who? Dani?”
She nodded. “You must hurry. If they succeed in the purging ceremony, it will drive her mad. The Cleansers have never had someone of her power in their grasp before. Not even they realize what she’ll unleash should she fall under their sway. The air itself could catch fire across the globe.”
“I kinda think that’s what they’ve been hopin’ for.”
Her eyes opened, having lost all the humanity that once sparked within them. Her voice also fell flat, as if part of herself had departed.
“You will need strength to oppose them all. Are you prepared to accept the cost this task will demand from you?”
“If you haven’t noticed, lady, we ain’t playin’ for the same team. I don’t get my power from you.”
“Part of you knows our touch. I shall use it.”
“Hey, now, I ain’t never said you could—”
Her hand clamped onto his infected arm. Icy pain shot up it. A hiss exploded past his lips as her barbed rings carved into the rotting skin, drawing dark blood.
“There is one who I sense draws closest to exposing my child,” she said. “Stay close to him, and you might yet find the chance to do as you’ve promised.”
“Who? Sydney?”
A shake of her head. “Destin.”
The puddle they stood in swirled up and into a waterspout with them at the center. The foul waters of the realm crashed onto his head and swept him away.
***
Chapter Twenty-one
Ben splashed down onto a hard surface. His nose mashed against stone, and sharp pain jabbed into his side, making him fear a few cracked ribs. He lay there panting, bruised all over from the buffeting current that had washed him here. Normally, he did the flushing.
Not as fun to be on the flipside, no sirree.
He rolled onto his back and waited until the ache in his side eased. A light touch confirmed his nose wasn’t broken; this small relief inspired him to sit up and get his bearings.
He’d arrived in one of the sterile corridors of the Cleanser compound. Silver doors lined the hall. There were no sounds other than water dripping from his clothes and hair. His mop and spray bottle lay a few feet away. Filth had vanished, and he guessed she remained in her realm, waiting to see the results of her gamble.
Groaning, he got to his feet and retrieved his tools. The residue of Filth’s realm clung to him, making him squish and squelch. However, as he stood gathering his wits, the oily water drained off him and his suit and gathered into a puddle around his feet. This separated into rivulets that snaked away into the nearest cracks in the stone and grates.
A look at his bared right arm didn’t reassure him. The puncture wounds from Filth’s nails and rings remained. They oozed and puckered with a life of their own. He felt no pain for the first time in years, but that didn’t comfort him either. Pain let him know something was wrong, and the absence of it made him worry and wonder what Filth had done to him before she booted him back to this reality.
Gurgling drew his attention to the water sprite within the bottle. He lifted it and watched as the water formed hollow geometric shapes, flowing from inverted triangles to dizzying Celtic knots between blinks.
“Rough ride, eh, buddy?”
Carl slapped the sides of the bottle. Each impact pinged Ben’s fingers in reprimand.
“Missed you too,” he said. “But ain’t you been moanin’ about needin’ a vacation for a while?”
A whirlpool of denial collapsed into another sullen gurgle. Ben smiled despite the grim circumstances. Then Carl flowed through another barrage of splashes.
Ben grunted. “I’m worried about her too. Ready to go kick some fire-lickin’ butt?”
An affirmative spritz tickled his palm. He sighed and looked up and down the hall.
“Problem is, we’re back where I started, no more knowin’ where to go than before.” He looked at the ceiling. “Fat lotta help this is, Filth, you ol’ witch. Coulda at last stuck me back—”
The door nearest to him opened, and a Cleanser in a white robe strode out. He stumbled and stared at Ben with wide eyes.
Ben rushed and shoved him back into the room, an arm against the man’s thin throat. A glimpse showed the room bare of everything but the necessities—washbasin, wooden slab for a bed, a locker for what few personal belongings the Cleansers allowed themselves.
He pinned the Cleanser against the wall. A burning aura flickered around him, but he rapped the man’s head against the stone and the flames puffed away.
A second look revealed his hostage was little more than a boy. A fresh recruit. Probably one of the street kids they lured in with promises of food and shelter, and then brainwashed into being preachers of their fiery gospel.
Ben thrust his grizzled face at the boy’s. “Lookee here. You know who I am?”
Brown eyes glistened with barely contained tears. The boy trembled as he nodded.
“Good. Then you know I make geezers sittin’ on their porches with shotguns look like cuddly kittens. Now, I’m gonna ask you a simple question. If you ain’t inclined to answer honest-like …” he squeezed the trigger of the spray bottle. Water flowed out into a six inch blade that shimmered along its razor edge. “This is Carl. He don’t like bein’ lied to. The first lie gets an eye cut out. The second’ll cost you a few jiggly bits. We’ll keep going down the list until we get to your tongue, which we’re gonna wash out with lots and lotsa soap before dicin’ it up into chewy nibbles. Comprendify?”
A fervent nod.
“Where’ve they taken Dani? My apprentice. The Catalyst.”
“She …” The boy licked dry lips and rasped, his throat bumping under Ben’s hand. “Taken to t-the womb. Holy rebirth.”
“Where’s that?”
The boy rambled off a series of directions through the halls. Ben had him repeat it three times, making sure he said the same thing each go.
“Thank ya kindly,” he said, after deciding the boy spoke true. “Word to the wise. These people are real violent whackjobs. Get outta here while you have a choice, eh?”
Another crack of skull to stone sent the boy sliding into a heap. Ben scowled and looked around for anything that might help. Slipping into a white robe wouldn’t provide any useful disguise unless he shaved bald. And any costume would only get him so close. Best to take a frontal assault and hope the element of surprise lasted long enough.
But Dani’s purging ceremony would be heavily attended, likely by some of the most powerful Cleansers in the compound. Before the Ravishing, he might’ve been able to subdue them all, but now … working alone … he didn’t feel so confident.
His gaze went to the washbasin, and the plain faucet curving over it. He brought the spray bottle up to eye level.
“Buddy? We gotta talk.”
O O O
Dani’s eyes opened in another series of heavy blinks. She was being jostled, yet felt as if she floated along, arms dangling in midair. As the numbness withdrew and her blurred vision cleared, she realized she lay in Marcus’ arms as he carried her down a long, torch-lit hall. Granite columns supported an arched ceiling, with swaths of red and orange light sweeping aside the shadows.
She tried to roll out of his hold. Even though sleeves covered his arms, who knew how long it’d been since he’d washed his robe? And he breathed heavily with each step, huffing over her face as he exhaled. It was enough to get her stomach roiling again.
They hadn’t restrained her in any way, but her body refused to respond to her brain’s commands to escape. She might as well have been a hay-filled scarecrow.
She stared past Marcus’ chin at the ceiling, which had been painted with saintly figures, reminiscent of the Sistine Chapel. Except here, the people writhed in fiery torment—or perhaps they danced. Blue skies were clouded with ash and rivers of flame swept along the landscape. Like a church devoted to bringing about the fiery apocalypse the street-corner prophets always warned about. One that wanted to plunge its followers into Hell, rather than rescue them from it.
After mustering up the scraps of her strength, she forced a single word out, paper-thin.
“Where …”
Marcus kept his eyes forward, looking peaceful, though Dani sensed excitement in the way his jaw kept flexing and the tensing of his arms. In any other situation, he might have been handsome, a reassuring presence. Now he trod along with the inevitable gait of one carrying a garbage bag to the curb.
“This is the hall of rebirth,” he said in a hushed voice. “Here, your old life will be burned away, allowing your true self to rise from the ashes and claim the glory you are meant to have.”
“Don’t … want … glory, you … idiot…”
His thick forehead rumpled. “You’d rather remain the enslaved minion of a feeble old janitor?”
She tried to respond, but he drew her closer, pressing her mouth against his broad chest.
“You will see. You will be our goddess, and bless us.”
“Doubt … that …”
A thrumming sensation crept into Dani’s awareness. Not so much a sound, but a vibration infusing everything around her, even the Cleanser who carried her along. The robe stuck to her sweaty body in the heat of the chapel. The temperature increased with each step Marcus took, as did the thrumming until she could barely think past the vibrations.
Marcus swung her around, so she got her first look at her destination. The end of the chapel was taken up by an enormous metal wall. Pipes jutted from this and fed into the ceiling. Near the ground, numerous levers, wheels, and dials covered the metal barrier.
Other Cleansers stood around a long marble slab which jutted up against the center of the gleaming wall. A wheeled tray rested on the slab, set into tracks.
Dani’s breaths quickened. The tray looked large enough for someone to lie down on.
A female Cleanser pulled a lever and a door rattled upward at the far end of the slab, revealing the machine’s interior. A ball of flame roared out. Dani tried to cringe back, but her traitorous body wouldn’t even twitch in self-preservation. None of the others flinched as the fiery spout receded, revealing the hellscape within what she now recognized as an enormous furnace.
“No …” Her denial puffed away.
Marcus stopped beside the trolley and laid her upon it. The others stepped up on either side and crossed her arms over her chest, straightened her legs, and fanned her hair out, as if preparing her for a burial ritual.
In some sense, Dani realized, they were. Her thoughts and heart raced, the two things not numbed by the soporific. They wanted a fire goddess. They wanted her to become like them, except exponentially more powerful. She would be shoved into the furnace, forced to be transformed into whatever vengeful creature they craved to worship.
Her tears dried the instant they leaked free.
If not, she would be burned alive.
O O O
Ben crouched behind a pillar at the end of the hall, trying to ignore his achy knees. As feared, he knew these Cleansers, especially Marcus. All of them were infamous for acts of arson the world over, often blamed on terrorist groups or ecological activists. They’d created plenty of messes the Cleaners had been brought in to mop up.
Wincing, he pressed a hand to his stomach, swollen near to bursting.
The muscled leader of the cult smoothed Dani’s hair and bent to whisper something in her ear, like a father comforting a frightened child. Ben bristled, seeing her weak movements which subsided a second later. Drugged, most likely. He couldn’t believe she’d go along willingly with this madness. Of course, his hiding the Ravishing from her hadn’t helped. If he’d told her from the start, maybe none of this would’ve happened. She might not have felt betrayed and gone with Sydney. He hoped she could forgive him, but for that to happen, she needed to be rescued first.
Ben swallowed against the increasing urge to vomit.
Not yet. Hold it together, bucko. Almost time.
He took a steadying breath, fully believing he might be racing to his death. But he’d made a promise.
“Ready?” he asked, tapping the spray bottle at his hip.
Carl’s responding splish-splash didn’t instill him with the bravado he craved. His mop lay by his feet, discarded for this fight in exchange for another weapon.
Squeaking jerked his attention back to the ceremony. A Cleanser turned one of the wheels along the furnace wall. One of the pipes shuddered as fuel swept through it, feeding the flames so they roared higher. Renewed heat washed out the open door, strong enough for Ben to feel it where he squatted.
There were no prayers. No chanting or calling upon the Pantheon. The Cleansers were, if anything, efficient. Realizing the moment had come, Ben rose and charged toward the gathering just as they pushed Dani into the furnace.
“No!”
His shout was drowned out as the door slammed shut behind her.
While the rest of the Cleansers stared at the furnace, Marcus looked Ben’s way. With an impassive expression, he gestured to the others. The Cleansers turned as one. Their fiery auras erupted into being and burning lances soared from upraised hands straight for him.
***
