Like a lot of other stuff in my life, my plans fell completely to pieces shortly after I had formulated them. My brain buzzed with a billion different ideas and scenarios on how I was gonna take control of this situation and lay down the whup on demon derriere, and after I punched in at work it was hard to concentrate on sorting my mail for delivery.
The mood in the station was almost festive, with jovial banter flying back and forth through the air in a lively stream of merriment, but I was too pensive and keyed up to join in. My morning break was spent with Leah and we made plans to see a movie on the weekend, but I was way too focused on my next encounter with Satan’s siblings, and at the end of the break I kicked myself for probably seeming emotionally distant.
Outside, rain lashed the city with large, heavy drops that quickly turned to hail the size of golf balls. Relentlessly, they pummeled the roof of the station, and the staccato drumbeat became almost deafening. With a grunt, I heaved a full tub of mail up onto the ledge in front of my case and methodically began to case up the catalogs. After putting up not more than a dozen pieces of mail, the lights began to flicker on and off.
“Idiots probably forgot to pay the electric bill!” someone joked.
“No, the storm’s taking down power lines in the area.” I heard another voice chime in.
One of the supervisors, I think it was Ken, told everybody to settle down, the emergency generators would kick in if the power went out completely. Immediately following his comment, the power did go out completely amidst dozens of cheers, but the backup generators didn’t come online.
What did come online instantly were my tattoos, which blazed like neon flares, illuminating the inky blackness that enveloped the station. The temperature dropped low enough that I could see my breath in the light of my tattoos, and an eerie silence had fallen over the once cheerful carriers.
“Crap on a cracker!” I swore as I slowly turned around and tried to adjust my eyes to the darkness. A dozen pairs of glowing eyes were focused on me from all over the station and it only took a split second to piece together what was happening.
A demon lord, presumably more powerful than Grawlnar, the first demon to dimensionally shift the station, had used the same trick to pull not only the building but all of the furniture and about half of the workers with it. Just a guess, but I’d wager that this prince of the Abyss was also able to possess the carriers still present.
The nearest set of red eyes rapidly approached me. It was Carson. He was a tool anyway, so it felt good to grab the full tub of mail sitting on the ledge behind me and swing it sideways into his head. He hit the ground and before he could regain his feet I followed up by grabbing the stool from under my ledge, flipping it upside down and repeatedly pounding his head with it until he was nothing but mush from the neck up. I opened the drawer at my case and scooped up a couple pairs of scissors, stuffing them in my belt. Grabbing the stool, I ran at two pairs of eyes off in the darkness to my left.
When I got close enough, I planted the stool in front of me, kicked my legs up so that I was doing a handstand on it, then executed a front handspring while retaining my grip on the stool. My feet hit the ground while my arms came forward over my head as I flung the stool hard into the face of Alex, a complete douchebag who deserved nothing less than the messy death I was about to deliver. The stool caught him square in the face and he was sent backward to the ground.
Meanwhile, I grabbed both pairs of scissors and jammed them into the throat of the person to my left who was clawing at my face. Oh hey, it’s Glenda! I really hate Glenda, she’s one of the whiniest do-nothing clerks at our station, and it was truly a pleasure to watch her clutch at the scissors sticking out of her neck before she crumpled to the ground and choked to death on her own blood.
Alex was back up and in the fight, and I couldn’t figure out exactly how he knew where I was. His face was a broken, ruined mess; both of his eyes were swollen shut and even though I’m no doctor, judging by how oddly shaped his head looked I’m pretty sure his skull was cracked in a couple different places. Arms outstretched and screaming through a broken jaw, he blindly charged me. I stood motionless until he was almost on top of me and then dropped to the ground in a split, punching upward as hard as I could into his crotch with both fists. My tattoos added a little bit of ‘Oomph’ to my attack, and even I winced as I felt his babymaker and both of his McNuggets explode under the torque of my hammer-fists. I hit him so hard I swear I also felt his colon gel. Alex let out a feeble whimper and his body seemed to deflate, slumping to the floor in a lifeless pile of flesh.
With the grace of a swimming otter, I rolled sideways to the left and positioned myself next to a shelf full of supplies. A couple rolls of packing tape and a fire extinguisher found their way into my hands before I ran toward the break room, praying that in my rush I wouldn’t trip over anything. My tattoos illuminated a small circle of light around me, and although I couldn’t make out exactly where all of the remaining demon-possessed carriers were situated around the room, it was easy enough to pick out the four or five pairs of eyes grouped together which moved toward me with alarming speed.
I managed to get inside the break room, and slammed the door behind me hard enough to rattle the door frame. After the lock was turned, I pushed a shelf unit over on its side in front of it, just to be sure. The locked door and shelf wouldn’t keep them out for very long so I acted quickly. A microwave sat on a table nearby, and I placed it on the counter so that it faced the door. An examination of a couple of drawers netted me a bunch of silverware and metal cooking utensils which I shoved into the microwave, throwing in four heavy, ceramic coffee mugs as well. Almost every square inch of the microwave interior was full. I set the timer for 15 minutes and let the microwave do its thing, keeping an eye on the display that was counting down.
Next, I used the packing tape to attach a bunch of forks and knives to the fire extinguisher so that they were all taped pointing out from the bottom. I kicked a table over on its side and dragged it to a corner of the room farthest away from the microwave, and placed a crescent wrench that I had found in one of the drawers behind the table with the fire extinguisher, where I hunkered down and waited.
It wasn’t long before the door was practically torn off of its hinges and the shelf was kicked away from the entrance. Five possessed, angry carriers came through the door, eyes glowing a feral red as they growled and hissed. Crowded in the center of the room, it didn’t take them long to see where I was crouched behind the table in the corner. I smiled and waved as five sets of eyes turned in my direction and I could feel an almost palpable wave of evil emanating from their bodies. Let’s see, Steve, Jeff, Sheila, Annie and Cody. Yup, they all sucked, big-time, crappy carriers one and all, and at the moment they turned and saw me smile and wave, a loud beeping sound blared from the counter to their left. In unison, their heads turned and their jaws dropped as the microwave counted down to “0” then exploded, sending jagged shards of metal and ceramic hurtling through the air in all directions at high speed. The shrapnel tore through their bodies, shredding their torsos and perforating their skulls while I dove behind the safety of the table listening to the shrapnel ricochet wildly around the room.
Afterward, when I poked my head up to see if anyone was left standing, all I saw were gobs of wet, red meat coating almost every surface of the break room. Damn, it would really suck to be the janitor at this station right now.
Okay, get your head back in the game Joe! Eight down, four to go if my count was accurate. Taking the wrench and fire extinguisher with me, I leapt over the shattered remains of the break room door and scanned the main room for the telltale glowing red eyes. They were out there, scattered around the room and from their rapid bobbing movements I could tell that they were coming for me. Where to go though? I needed a place that I could easily defend, and besides the break room there weren’t many options. On top of it all, I had to pee really bad, and ultimately that helped me decide where I would make my next stand.
Running toward the bathroom, I could see that the trajectories of three of the possessed carriers would allow them to intercept me long before I made it to the bathroom. To slow them down, I grabbed a couple of full mail tubs from the ground and slid them fast and hard like bowling balls towards two of the pairs of glowing eyes. Back in the day, when I first started at the post office, I was an awesome mail handler, and my mad skillz had not diminished over time, carrying over nicely to my current position with the USCS. Both tubs slid into the feet of the oncoming demon pawns and sent them face first to the ground.
The third carrier set on an intercept course was close enough for me to identify. It was Eugene, a dour old dude who did nothing but complain about how he had already “paid his dues” and shouldn’t have to do anything even closely resembling work anymore. Holding the fire extinguisher I had taped up with silverware under one arm, I aimed the end with the pointy stuff at Eugene, then waited until he was only a few steps from me before using the wrench to smack the valve off the top. With a loud ‘Whoosh!’ the extinguisher rocketed forward, and the makeshift torpedo thumped the old codger in the chest. Eugene was lifted off his feet and flew backward, his saggy wrinkled body completing a full rotation before it slammed into the floor. The silverware taped to the end pierced his chest cavity and perforated his heart in a half dozen places, and if that hadn’t killed him, the six shattered ribs that splintered from the impact and used his lungs for a pincushion would have surely done the trick. In addition to taking out Eugene, the powdery contents of the fire extinguisher provided a functional smokescreen that billowed outward in a giant cloud as the extinguisher delivered its payload of death.
Not one to waste a perfectly good opportunity, I sprinted the remaining distance to the men’s room and once again piled crap in front of the door to slow down whoever or whatever was still out there. Now I could pee and think of my next move; this was multitasking at its finest. By the time I heard the door splintering and the lockers I had shoved in front of the door being torn in half, I was all set up and ready to rock.
Two feral-looking carriers burst into the restroom; their eyes glowed with an unholy light and drool trickled from twisted lips that growled a melody of evil. Felicia and Rex, two more employees on my list of ‘people I wouldn’t pull from a burning car even if their children begged me and offered me money’. They both stood there stupidly looking around, trying to figure out where I had magically disappeared to.
“He’s not by the urinals and sinks, where else could he be? Ah, I know,” I imagined them telling themselves, “he’s hiding in one of the stalls with his feet pulled up so we can’t see them!” Triumphantly they both simultaneously threw open the only two stall doors in the restroom and rushed inside.
Their bewilderment at finding the stalls empty almost made me feel bad for them. Felicia’s head was cocked to one side as she glanced down into the toilet in front of her, wondering why on Earth it was filled to the rim with glass shards from the three large mirrors that had once graced the walls of this fine abode. Her question was answered when I dropped on top of her from above, toilet tank lid clenched my hands. I was hiding above the stall behind a ceiling tile and watched everything by moving the tile a little to one side. Like a snowboarder hitting a berm at high speed, I came down on Felicia hard and fast. The ceramic toilet tank cover, aided by 190 pounds of my body, smacked onto the back of her head, forcing it down into the toilet bowl filled with broken glass. Her head instantly peeled like an orange, and the impact also crushed her throat on the rim of the toilet.
“Bye Felicia!” Her twitching corpse slithered to the floor with the help of my boot.
Since I had used the tank cover from the next stall, figuring it would break, my next move was to grab the one from the stall I was currently in to use against Rex. I kicked open the stall door and rushed out with the makeshift weapon held high over my head, intending to catch him still inside the stall with his back to me. It was somewhat of a surprise then, when the door I had just kicked open came flying back into my face and I fell backward with a fat lip and bloody nose. The tank cover I had been holding broke in four different pieces and dropped to the floor as Rex came roaring into the stall, grabbed the front of my shirt with both hands, and lifted me completely off the ground. My aerial acrobatics were far from graceful when Rex threw me against the far wall of the bathroom.
While I’m glad the tattoos give me some measure of physical protection and allow me to withstand incredible amounts of pain, I still wonder after all this time--if it hurts this bad with the tattoos, how bad would it hurt without them? ‘Cuz I gotta tell you, being thrown around like a ragdoll into stationary objects hurts really, really bad. At this point I was exhausted and quickly running out of options. Having the magic spoon made things a lot easier. I didn’t have to think a lot about how I was going to handle things, I could just tap into Grammy’s infinite wisdom and summon a sweet Native American weapon that suited the situation. Now I was forced to improvise, and although I had made it this far, I was out of ideas.
In all fairness to me, I have to say that Rex was a big, and I mean really big dude. This guy worked out at the gym daily, played on numerous local sports teams and was a physically imposing specimen of masculinity. Obviously, he was compensating for something, what with being all ripped and stuff; six packs are a dime-a-dozen in this day and age, hell, I could buy one if I wanted to.
Anyway, I bounced back to my feet, and went toe-to-toe with the big meathead. I hit him with a throat strike, my hand moving with the speed of a cobra amped on Jolt cola, and Rex just cleared his throat and spit a wad of phlegm off to the side. My follow up was a kick to the nads with a steel-toed boot. The behemoth didn’t even flinch, he merely cracked his knuckles and smiled. Okay, time for El Cartero to pull out some truly legendary moves. Leaping high into the air, I executed a perfect roundhouse kick that connected with Rex’s face and I swear, not one hair on his head moved out of place. Spinning backfist to the face? Rex yawned and scratched the side of his neck. I dished out a flurry of vicious blows, bone breaking chops and lightning kicks, which bludgeoned every square inch of his body over and over again with a speed and brutality I hadn’t even realized I possessed. Rex stood motionless, quietly smiling the entire time. When I finally stopped, he calmly stood nearby and watched as I doubled over panting like I had just run a triple marathon. My hands and feet were bruised from the abuse I had put them through, but Rex looked like he had just stepped out of a photo shoot for GQ magazine. There wasn’t a mark on him, and I had hit him with everything in my arsenal.
“Okay big guy, I’ve taken it easy on you up until this point,” I panted. “But having seen my incredible speed and the enormous range of combat skills I possess, it would probably be in your best interests to give up now, before I decide to take the kid gloves off and beat you down.”
Rex finally moved, with a speed that belied one of his impressive stature. He lunged forward and pulled me hard against his chest in a bone-crushing bear hug that immediately forced all of the air from my lungs. A serene smile was on his face, and his glowing red eyes bored into mine. My right arm was pinned down against my side while my left arm was loose and flailed wildly in an attempt to break Rex’s vice-like grip. It was impossible to draw a breath as Rex tightened his grip, refusing my lungs the air they so desperately needed. During its spastic travels, my left hand happened to brush the scanner holster strapped to my hip. Unconsciousness loomed near, it was now or never. I grasped the scanner and pulled it from the holster, mashing the SCAN button down while I dragged the scanner back and forth across Rex’s eyes over and over again. Although, the beam from the scanner probably wouldn’t cause any immediate physical damage, it would at the very least temporarily blind Rex and maybe get him to relax his grip.
After the third or fourth pass of the scanner over his eyes, Rex let out a yelp and jerked his head backward, and I felt his grip loosen by a fraction. That was the opening I needed. I smashed the scanner into Rex’s temple twice; the crushing bearhug lessened even more, which allowed me to push backward with all my strength. I managed to plant both feet on Rex’s chest and somersaulted backward out of his grip, knocking him away from me and into the stall wall. The big lug was wobbly on his feet, and shook his head side to side trying to clear his vision and regain his senses. At this point I was filled with rage. As much as I disliked my job sometimes, (okay, most of the time), I would prefer delivering mail any day of the week over having to fight demons on a daily basis. This was way too much work, and I’m just not that motivated! The tattoos coupled with my anger lent me the strength to tear one of the sinks off the bathroom wall and heave it into Rex’s teetering body. The sink caught him on the shoulder and knocked him to the ground. Damn--I was aiming for his head, and that only made me angrier! With a guttural roar, I tore the two remaining sinks from the wall. Rex had regained his feet but not his senses as I spun around to face him.
“If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands!” I shouted, then smashed both of the sinks together with his head between them.
A loud ‘BOOM!’ echoed through the restroom, followed by a shower of chunky crimson gibs that once sat atop Rex’s broad shoulders in a much more aesthetically pleasing way. Quite a few of those chunks of brain and bone now coated me from head to toe, I brushed them off as quickly as I could, noticing the lumps of broken white porcelain and the decapitated torso that lay motionless at my feet. Sagging against a nearby wall, I did some basic math, doing my best not to blow the contents of my stomach all over the bathroom. 11 down, there should only be one more out there in addition to whatever had summoned them and dimensionally shifted the building. Exhaustion overtook me and the adrenaline fled my veins, I was left with nothing but limbs that quivered and shook as if I were palsied. So close, yet so far. There wasn’t enough gas left in my tank to finish this job and I knew it. The M240b was back in my apartment; the boys from Project 109 still had their undies in a twist from the last time I used it so I figured I’d save it for a really special occasion. In my book, this would have qualified as a special occasion, but hindsight is 20/20, or so they say.
I rifled the lockers in the bathroom to see if I could find anything even remotely helpful. John’s locker had a Holy Bible and a set of rosary beads both of which I stuffed in my pockets along with a crucifix that was hanging inside the locker door. To my surprise I found two energy drinks courtesy of Oliver in my own locker along with my iPod and earbuds. Oliver was the sub who worked my route on my days off, and often times we’d leave energy drinks for each other. Next time I saw him I was gonna have to plant a big wet kiss on his cheek assuming I lived to see him again or didn’t have to kill him should he be possessed.
With the earbuds in, the iPod playing and the tops on both cans popped, I guzzled the pair of energy drinks simultaneously and closed my eyes. The beginning notes of Ronnie James Dio’s “The Last in Line” flowed into my ears, a meandering stream of melody that beckoned me slowly into an adrenaline-fueled frenzy. A rush of liquid heat boiled through my veins shortly thereafter, and as the opening words to the song were sung, I threw myself out of the bathroom door to face whatever waited for me, singing at the top of my lungs:
“We’re the ship without a storm,
The cold without the warm
Light inside the darkness
That it needs, yeah
We’re a laugh without tear
The hope without the fear
We are coming, HOME!”
Overly dramatic? Heck yeah, but the way I figured, I had nothing to be embarrassed about, either I was gonna be dead in the next few minutes or whatever was out there would be dead, there’d be no witnesses to my awful karaoke attempt. Plus, Ronnie James Dio is just plain awesome, RIP buddy. The room was dark save for the glow of my tattoos and a single fluorescent bulb that was lit directly over the center of the main room.
One figure was illuminated in the glow of that single bulb, a carrier named Adam. He was a quiet dude, pretty much kept to himself and never really gave any input or opinions in any conversations that the other carriers had amongst themselves. Adam was tall and thin, with short dark hair, not a bad looking guy, but not attractive enough that you’d take a second look. Forgettable, like countless other people in this world. I never would have pegged him as being a bad guy or someone who would be susceptible to evil’s pull, but they always tell you to watch out for the quiet ones. A thick, roiling fog shrouded the ground at Adam’s feet, covering about half of the floor area in the main room. Only a fool would believe it to be a cheap theatrical effect intended to unsettle the viewer; the fog snaked along the ground, undulating with a malevolent life of its own. Pure unadulterated hatred radiated from that fog, and when a tendril of the stuff snaked out to touch my forearm, I recoiled in absolute disgust at the ice cold oily feel. The contact hadn’t caused any physical pain, moreover it felt as if my soul had been soiled and violated by that touch. The tattoos flared even brighter where the fog brushed them, and it almost felt like they repulsed the fog tendril, pushing it away from my skin.
Adam stood with his feet together, arms held straight out to either side of his body. Instead of glowing red like all the other carriers, I noticed his eyes had rolled back into his head so that only the whites showed. Briefly I wondered if the guy was already dead, until he threw his head back and looked straight up at the ceiling, mouth opened unnaturally wide as if he had unhinged his lower jaw. The fog seemed to contract, gathering itself into a tight cloud at his feet and then to my utter disgust, it streamed upward into his open mouth and nostrils until not a trace of it remained to be seen! This was getting freaky even for me! Adam lowered one arm to his side and pointed the other one straight at me, eyes locked on mine. They were no longer white, now they burned with a green, hellish flame that spilled out onto his cheeks and face.
He spoke, and the deep bass voice that boomed from his throat echoed with an otherworldly tone. “I HERALD THE ARRIVAL OF THE TRINITY OF TERROR. KNOW THIS, MORTAL--WHEN ONCE AGAIN YOU LOOK UPON THE DAY THAT YOU RETURNED THE NAMELESS ONE TO HIS THRONE, THEN WILL YOU LOOK UPON THE FACE OF YOUR DOOM. THREE TIMES THE HORN WILL SOUND, AND THREE WILL HEED THE CALL, TO REND THE SOUL FROM THY FLESH AND DRAG IT BOUND IN FIERY CHAINS TO THE FEET OF THE MASTER, WHERE YOU WILL SUFFER FOR ALL ETERNITY.”
It would be nice to think that our interaction would end here and that the herald, whoever or whatever he was would return to Hell having successfully dispatched his message. A message that wasn’t as cryptic as this herald thought it was, by the way. Yeah, I get it. A year from now on the day that I ran over the Dark One the last three demon lords are gonna come to collect. Great, hopefully I’d be able to get together with agents Higgins and Franklin before then and come up with something resembling a plan to stop them.
In true demon form though, the herald couldn’t just up and leave without trying to push my buttons one last time. I shook my head in pity and disgust when I saw Adam’s body levitate off the ground, arms outstretched. He resembled a gaunt, skeletal bat, hurtling toward me with blazing green eyes. And, just who did this herald think he was anyway? Come on, I’m El Cartero, slayer of six demon lords, etc., etc., as well as countless abyssal minions. This dude was like, Hell’s busboy, a total nobody, and he thought he could take me out? This was a total insult to my legend! Every chiseled muscle and steely sinew in my body tensed like iron coils as the flying demon closed the gap between us. I didn’t just stand there looking heroically awesome though, my brain was feverishly considering how I was going to smack this wannabe from Tartarus down and make him cry like a little waah baby.
I will admit though, that the lush, dark hair cascading over my shoulders like an ebony waterfall as my taut, rippling musculature stood alone against a herald from the Abyss must have painted quite a sexy picture. My mind went into overdrive and I looked down at my empty hands and tattered clothes, and realization dawned on me: I got zip. Nada. Nuthin’. Well ain’t that just grand? Mentally I repeated the silent mantra ‘Discretion is the better part of valor’ to myself as I turned on my heel and ran as fast as I could in the opposite direction. That mantra actually translates into the more commonly understood: ‘Chicken out and run away, live to fight another day’ and you know what? I’m okay with that so I felt no shame when my lightning sprint landed me in front of the maintenance closet.
With no other options in sight, I threw myself inside, slammed the door behind me and leaned against the wall, short of breath and panting hard. My tattoos illuminated the interior of the closet which was pretty large and well stocked with all sorts of janitorial type stuff. I emptied my pockets to see what I had in my arsenal and came up with John’s Bible, rosary beads and crucifix. Somewhat helpful, but probably not enough to guarantee me a prolonged lifespan. I quickly took stock of the storeroom and felt a wave of relief sweep over me when I gazed upon what I hoped would be my salvation.
“This is what awesome looks like!” I said triumphantly as I pulled it off of the shelf, opened the canister and stuffed the Bible, rosary beads and crucifix inside. Closing the unit up, I slung the object on my back, steeled my nerves and opened the door. The Adam/herald hybrid was floating a few inches off the ground fifteen feet away from where I was standing, eyes darting to and fro while it attempted to piece together where I had disappeared to.
“Hey chowderhead!” I yelled.
I could almost feel the heat burning into me from the angry look in the herald’s flaming eye sockets as it voiced an unholy scream and moved toward me.
“Back off or I’ll use this thing,” I called out, pointing a thumb back over my shoulder.
The demon stopped advancing and looked me up and down. I could see one of its eyes almost twitching as it tried to connect the dots.
“How could you possibly hope to stop me with a-is that a vacuum cleaner?” It asked quizzically. I smiled and nodded.
“Yes, my friend, but not just any old vacuum cleaner. This model is the Pro Team Megavac Backpack Vacuum. Normally these ship with around 1200 watts of power and some pretty awesome suction, but I gotta tell ya, I was here the day that Buster, our maintenance dude decided to tweak the settings a little bit. This thing can now suck the chrome off of a Harley and is ultraportable to boot!” As I spoke I pulled the hose and nozzle from over my shoulder and held them like I was cradling a rifle.
In addition to boosting the suction power, Buster had put a wider sized hose on the Megavac, and the standard nozzle had been replaced with a cone the size of a dinner plate that made the whole thing look like a cross between a blunderbuss and a Ghostbuster’s Proton Pack.
“You should run along like a good little lackey and tell your masters that I’ll be waiting for them. I’m not sure if only three of them will be able to do the trick, I mean, jeez, I just mowed through a dozen of your boys and I’m just getting warmed up!”
There was an evil smile on the herald’s face as he spoke. “I think you’ve forgotten something,” he hissed pointing to the ground at my feet.
Looking down, I saw the cord and plug for the vacuum lying next to my foot.
“Huh. You’re right, I forgot to do this!” As soon as the words left my mouth, I kicked the plug sideways toward the wall on my right. It rocketed off into the darkness as I solemnly said, “It’s plugged in now, you should leave.”
The demon looked at the cord stretching off into the distance, then looked at me. “No way. You’re bluffing. There is absolutely no way a pathetic mortal such as yourself could have kicked that plug into a wall socket hidden by total darkness. No ordinary man could do such a thing. And hypothetically speaking, even if by some random twist of fate, it is plugged in, what do you really hope to accomplish with a vacuum cleaner? Your stupidity reigns supreme, I’ll be doing the world a favor by killing you. Time for you to die!” With a shriek Adam flew at me, arms outstretched.
Reaching over my shoulder I flicked the power selection lever to Black Hole Suction Mode and told the demon, “You forgot something as well hellspawn--I’m no ordinary mortal. I am El Cartero, Scourge of the ‘04, Destroyer of Routes, Slayer of Demons and Deliverer of Justice and Primary Packages. Cleanup on aisle three!”
The Pro Team Megavac roared to life with a sound resembling a jet engine. There was so much power I could barely control the hose and nozzle, wrestling a pissed-off twenty-foot python would have been easier. Through supreme willpower and raw strength, I finally got the hose under control by the time the herald got close. Lunging forward I shoved the nozzle over its face and forced it backward step by step until it was pinned up against the wall. Although the creature struggled mightily to break the suction grip of the Megavac, even its considerable strength was no match for an industrial powered vacuum that had been modified by a technogeek. All the herald managed to accomplish was to fall to the ground on its back, which helped me out quite a bit as I was able to step on his chest to pin him down. The Megavac sucked the demon-herald completely out of Adam’s body; I could tell because Adam’s eyes changed from burning green to their normal appearance once I pulled the cone from his face. I couldn’t risk having the demon somehow possess him from inside the vacuum cleaner, and although I’m not sure that would even be possible, I powered down the vacuum just to be safe and smacked Adam hard in the temple with the toe of my boot, rendering him unconscious. I took the canister off my back and capped off the hose with a large rubber plug I had found on a shelf in the janitor’s closet.
“I gave you a chance to run and you blew it. Now you can stay in there and enjoy the stuff I left in there for you!” I said to the vacuum canister.
No response was forthcoming, but I hadn’t really expected one. My work here was done, and I needed some fresh air. Heading towards the nearest exit to the parking lot, I wondered when and if the station was going to warp back to my reality. And how was I going to explain all of the carnage splattered across most of the surface area of the building’s interior? Would I even need to? Maybe I could just play dumb and pretend I was as clueless as everybody else, or maybe the gore wouldn’t return with the building.
A strange rumbling sound was emanating from the room behind me when I reached the exit. I turned to locate the source of the noise and realized that my hesitation was a grave mistake. The Megavac violently bucked and vibrated, and from where I was standing the canister appeared to twist and warp. The rumbling turned into a shrill noise that rose in crescendo not unlike a boiling teapot and I threw myself sideways through the door just as an enormous explosion tore through the building. The force assisted my flight across the parking lot and into the side of a nearby LLV, and while the world around me blurred and shifted I wondered: Is this due to the concussion I just sustained, or was this place shifting back to the dimension I call home? My musings were cut short when a toilet seat that had been jettisoned by the explosion smacked me square in the face and knocked me out cold. It’s a good thing I was unconscious, or I would have seen what a terrible janitor Buster was.