[Janitors 04] Strike of the Sweepers (3 page)

“Spencer!” Walter’s voice pierced through the danger. The Rebel warlock had overturned a table and misted it with Glopified Windex. The surface was shimmering blue and already turning to glass. During the chaos of Professor DeFleur’s death, Walter must have retrieved the squeegee. He held it now, ready to swipe down the glass tabletop.

There was a moment, certainly enough time for Mr. Clean to strike. But he didn’t. He seemed to pause in introspection, the green spray bottle still in his outstretched hand.

Spencer wasted no time, tucking the books under his arm and unclipping a Glopified toilet plunger from his janitorial belt. He pulled up his dad’s shirt and slammed the rubber cup against Alan’s back. The Glopified plunger worked its magic, and Spencer easily hoisted his dad from the floor.

He sprinted across the library, Alan’s legs dragging despite Spencer’s effort to hold him aloft. He saw Ted, the Sweeper, facedown and motionless at Walter’s feet. There was something different about him now. In the urgency of the moment, Spencer managed to realize that the Rubbish wings were gone, leaving only tattered shreds across the back of his tan coveralls.

“Quickly!” Walter shouted. The squeegee portal was complete. Spencer could see Daisy standing only feet away, her eyes the size of dinner plates. Then Spencer leapt through the opening, his unconscious father clipping a shoulder on the edge of the portal as Spencer dragged him through.

“What happened?” Daisy asked. “Did I do something wrong?”

Spencer lowered Alan to the floor. “It wasn’t you, Daisy,” Spencer answered. “We were ambushed.”

Walter stepped through the portal, tossing the squeegee aside and dragging Ted’s motionless form.

“What are you doing?” Spencer cried. Bringing the enemy into a Rebel base didn’t seem like a good idea. Not only was Ted a BEM worker, he was also a Glopified Sweeper!

“Step back!” Walter shouted once Ted’s legs had cleared the portal doorway. In the Rebel janitorial closet, Spencer had a limited view of the library. But what he could see was not comforting.

Mr. Clean was racing forward with unbelievable speed. He was lowering his body, preparing to leap through the portal, when a Glopified razorblade flashed in Walter’s hand.

The Rebel warlock thrust his blade into the glass door, shattering the surface and closing the portal.

A heavy silence filled the Rebel closet. Spencer set the
Manualis Custodem
and translated manuscript on the table. Walter gave a deep sigh of relief when he saw them.

Daisy was treating Alan with a light mist of orange healing spray. He gasped and sat up, blinking hard.

“Looks like you got plunged,” Daisy said, plucking the toilet plunger from Alan’s back.

“Where are we?” Alan asked. “What happened back there?” He shook his head. Green spray had the power to erase a minute or two of recent memory, blocking any knowledge of the person who had used the spray. Spencer knew how disorienting it was to wake up with a gap in his memory. Now it was happening to Alan. And he clearly had no recollection of meeting Mr. Clean.

“Last thing I remember,” Alan said, “I was killing that Rubbish guy.”

“The Rubbish Sweeper isn’t dead,” Walter said, nudging Ted with his foot. “We should try to revive him and see what he can tell us.”

“Won’t it be dangerous?” Spencer said. “The guy was half Rubbish!”

“
Was,
” emphasized Walter. “He seems perfectly human now.” Walter rolled Ted onto his back. The talons were gone from his hands, and the man’s face looked pale but ordinary.

Daisy handed Walter the orange spray, and he misted it over Ted’s face. He revived, though not as quickly as Alan.

“Where am I?” Ted scrambled backward until he came against the wall. “What’s happening?” His eyes were wide, but the pupils seemed glazed over. He touched his face in panic. “Don’t hurt me, please! Who are you people?” Ted’s eyes darted around the room but failed to focus on the Rebels standing before him.

“We are members of the Rebel Underground,” Walter said. “We want answers about the Sweepers.”

Ted’s hands continued roving over his own face, an expression of fear growing as he seemed to realize that all his features were plainly human. “You can’t send me back, please!”

“What do you mean?” Walter asked.

“Clean shows no mercy to Sweepers who fail him,” Ted blabbed.

Alan crouched to look the man in the face. “I drove a razorblade through your chest,” he said. “How are you still alive?”

“It’s the Glop formula,” Ted explained, his unblinking eyes darting nervously around the room. “Mr. Clean developed it.”

“How does it work?” Walter asked.

“You have to drink it,” he answered.

“Like a potion?” Daisy said.

Ted nodded, but Alan looked skeptical. “You can’t drink Glop. Even the smallest amount would kill you.”

“Normally, yes,” Ted muttered. “But Clean developed a Sweeper Potion. According to the rules of Glopification, anything janitorial can be Glopified. There is nothing more janitorial than the janitor himself.”

Alan looked at Walter. The old warlock nodded. “In that context, it may be possible,” he confirmed.

“Sweepers take on Toxite characteristics,” Ted went on. “We have to be killed twice. The first death only takes the Toxite out of us. And Mr. Clean wanted to make sure we were useless without our Toxite parts.” He touched his eyes again.

“You’re blind?” Walter asked.

Ted nodded. “When the Toxite half dies, our eyesight goes with it. Some kind of cruel punishment.”

Alan stood up. He stepped over to Walter, his voice low. “What now?”

“Don’t take me back to the BEM!” Ted cried. “Please!”

“It’s all right,” Walter said. “We are not your enemy. We’ll put you somewhere safe. Somewhere Clean won’t find you.”

Spencer was surprised by Walter’s mercy. But Ted looked frightened and helpless. He was hardly a threat to them now that he’d failed as a Sweeper.

Alan glanced around the closet, seeming suddenly to notice something. “Where’s Professor DeFleur?”

It was silent for a moment, and Spencer knew he had to answer. “Clean got him.”

Alan reached out a hand to steady himself. “Mr. Clean? He was there?”

Spencer thought back to Alan’s petrified reaction when he had seen the Sweeper warlock. Spencer had seen something in his father’s eyes. Perhaps a glimmer of recognition? But that wasn’t possible. Mr. Clean had never shown himself before tonight.

“Clean hit you with the green spray,” Spencer explained. “Sure you don’t remember him?”

Alan shook his head. “What did he look like?”

Spencer shrugged. He didn’t know how to explain it. “Big black guy. When he first stepped into the library, he was human. But he drank a Sweeper Potion and turned half Grime right in front of me.” He shuddered at the memory of it.

“Did he say anything?” Alan asked.

“He just said your name. Then you were down,” Spencer said.

Alan’s eyes narrowed. “That coward. He still doesn’t have the courage to face me. We will meet again.”

“Do not wish that!” Ted said, trembling in the corner. “There is no man more ruthless than Mr. Reginald McClean.”

“Who?” Daisy asked. But Ted was done speaking. He lowered his head in shame and defeat.

“Reginald McClean,” Walter muttered. “So that’s his real name.”

“Ever heard it before tonight?” Alan asked.

Walter shook his head.

“Me neither.”

Walter glanced at Spencer and Daisy. “You need to take the kids home,” he said to Alan. “They’ve been through enough tonight. I’ll stay with Ted, but I want you to come back immediately.”

Alan nodded. He stared at the sightless Ted for a moment. Then he took Spencer softly by the shoulder and led him and Daisy up the stairs.

Chapter 4

“It will keep you safer.”

Mrs. Natcher had come to represent the irony in Spencer’s life. Last night, he was fighting evil Sweepers in some far-off library, watching Professor DeFleur get swallowed whole. Now he was taking a spelling test, writing down words like
amphibious, hygienic,
and
malevolent.

Spencer was a good speller, and Mrs. Natcher gave enough time between words that he found his mind wandering all over the place. Spencer hadn’t seen his dad or Walter since being dropped off at home last night. He wondered what had become of Ted, the blind Sweeper. Was he still being held in the basement of Welcher Elementary?

But above all, Spencer’s mind was swimming with thoughts of what the translated
Manualis Custodem
might say.

He thought of Sach, Aryl, and Olin, the three boys who had been named Dark Aurans. They had saved him from the curse of the Broomstaff—of forever wandering the landfill with a bronze dustpan strapped around his neck. V and the other Auran girls would be angry about the Rebels’ escape. Spencer wanted to go back to the landfill and fulfill his promise. He could use his powers to de-Glopify the Pan around the Dark Aurans. He could set them free.

But Sach had said to wait for Rho.

The thought of Rho sent a shiver down Spencer’s neck. He had met her at New Forest Academy as Jenna, seemingly helpless and innocent. The truth had come out at the landfill when Rho had admitted to spying on Spencer and leading him to the Broomstaff to be Panned.

Spencer had come frighteningly close to wearing one of those cursed Pans, just like the three Dark Auran boys. The Pan suppressed their magical abilities, only allowing them to Glopify and de-Glopify at the bidding of the Auran girls. They’d been trapped for 198 years in that horrible landfill, and Spencer had almost joined them with a Pan of his own.

But Rho had helped him escape. In the midst of the conflict at the Broomstaff, she’d suddenly changed. Something about Spencer had sparked her to forgive the Dark Auran boys and put the feud behind her. Spencer had expected to hear from Rho by now. But 198 years’ worth of bad feelings weren’t likely to be resolved in two months.

It was better to focus on the task at hand. The translated pages of the
Manualis Custodem
would tell them how to find the source of all Glop. Alan had given years of his life to find it, and his partner, Rod Grush, had literally given his life. The Dark Aurans explained that the Founding Witches had been trapped in the source, waiting for mortals to rescue them. If the Witches were set free, they could help the Rebels in their fight against the Bureau of Educational Maintenance.

They were nearing the end. Spencer could feel it.

Mrs. Natcher was in the middle of saying the word
deceive
when Mrs. Hamp’s voice crackled through the intercom speaker.

“Spencer Zumbro and Daisy Gates, please report immediately to Mr. Campbell in the janitorial office.”

For once, Spencer was pleasantly surprised by the secretary’s announcement. If Walter wanted to see them, then he would finally get some answers.

Mrs. Natcher looked far less enthusiastic about the announcement. The sixth-grade teacher peered over the rims of her glasses, daring anyone to move during her spelling test.

“Shouldn’t we go?” Spencer finally asked.

Mrs. Natcher sighed. “You can make up the test during afternoon recess.”

Spencer leapt to his feet, maybe looking a little too excited. Daisy joined him at the door right as Mrs. Natcher called out her usual line.

“Take the hall pass!”

Spencer grabbed the blackened piece of plastic that was once Baybee’s leg. The doll had given its life in a Texas high school, exploding like a chalk bomb and buying the Rebels time to get away from the huge Extension Toxites and the Pluggers who rode them.

The two kids moved silently down the hallway. They were almost to the steps that led into the janitorial storage area when a familiar voice squeaked out.

“And where do you think you’re going?”

It was Principal Poach. He was leaning against a drinking fountain, breathing as heavily as though he had just run a marathon. His walrus mustache still had droplets of water clinging to it from a drink he must have just taken.

It was indeed a rare occurrence to see Principal Poach standing, instead of spilling over the arms of his office chair. Rarer still to see him outside his office, wandering the hallway like a responsible administrator.

“The janitor wants to see us,” Spencer explained.

“Don’t worry,” Daisy offered. “We have a hall pass!” She grabbed Spencer’s arm and made him display the blackened chunk of doll leg that had belonged to Baybee. It was hardly a hall pass anymore. Now it looked more like a piece of shrapnel.

Principal Poach narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “I’m sure you’re up to no good. If I weren’t so busy, I’d follow you.”

He didn’t look busy, leaning for support on the drinking fountain. Principal Poach wiped his brow. “I’ve been down to the school gym,” he said, but Spencer was sure he wasn’t exercising. “I got word this morning that the P.E. teacher quit. She moved to Mexico with hardly a moment’s notice.” He shook his head. “Now I’ve got to hire someone new to finish out the year. And good help is hard to find.”

“Good luck with that,” Spencer said, not seeing what it had to do with Daisy and him.

Principal Poach studied them over. “You didn’t scare off the P.E. teacher, did you?”

“What?” Spencer said. “No way!” Whenever anything bad happened in the school, Spencer and Daisy were Poach’s prime suspects.

“Maybe she got tired of running laps,” Daisy said. “I know I do.”

Principal Poach gestured for the kids to move along. Then he bent over the drinking fountain to take another sip, rallying his strength to make it back to the comfort of his office chair.

Spencer and Daisy moved quickly down the steps into the janitorial storage area. The stack of boxes was already slid aside. Chunks of wood were lying on the floor, remnants of last night’s shattered portal that were no longer glass after the Windex wore off.

Walter welcomed them into the hidden room, and Spencer immediately noticed the open binder on the table, showing the translation of the
Manualis Custodem.
Other than that, the closet was empty.