The Midnight Cleaning Company

Chapter 24

Chapter 24

Finally the Cleaners arrived. The first I saw of them was a ripple in the crowd as they pushed their way through what they believed to be partying patrons, who obediently followed their orders to ignore the intruders. At the head of the column of black uniformed Cleaners who swaggered through the middle of the club, was Michael, Charles, and a few men I had not seen since we had survived the last days of The War together. As my old colleagues pushed their way to the VIP lounge, more stone faced Cleaners poured into the club behind them. They moved slowly but purposefully, with the quiet unstoppable menace of a river bursting its banks.

George, Vincent, Josephine, and I rose calmly from our seats and waited at the top of the stairs to the VIP lounge, with crossed arms and inhospitable expressions. Charles, Michael, and the column of Cleaners reached the foot of the stairs. Emboldened by the number of uniformed men and women at their rear and flank, they ascended half the steps into a tactically compromised position to meet us.

"We warned you", Michael said in a smug told-you-so sing-song voice, addressing George and me. We both ignored him.

"Gregory...Keith", I greeted the two men on the steps behind Charles and Michael with a polite nod. "It has been a while. How is Edinburgh?

"It's a lot quieter than down here", Gregory replied with a flicker of a friendly smile.

"You remember George and Josephine", I continued.

"I thought you were dead", Keith said flatly.

"I get z'at a lot", said Josephine, brushing her long red hair away from the scarred cheek it covered and narrowing her eyes at the men who looked up at her from the stairs.

"Why are you here gentlemen?" asked Vincent, who almost vibrated with excitement and was keen to move things along.

"We are here to put you dogs down", Michael spat.

Vincent smiled gleefully.

"And why is that?" he teased.

"Enough of this shit", shouted Michael, drawing his gun.

Before he could fire, Josephine screamed like a banshee and pounced down the stairs, latching onto Michael's chest and sinking her sharp teeth into his throat. He toppled backwards and knocked the others down the stairs. Her war cry had been so loud and piercing that it reverberated around the club over the noise of the thumping music. Hearing their cue the Rogues that surrounded the Cleaners suddenly ceased dancing and turned as one to face them, brandished concealed knives and charged inwards from both sides.

The column of Cleaners was knocked from side to side upon impact like a flimsy boat in stormy waters. The previously confident rank of two hundred or so black uniformed Cleaners, was taken by surprise and overwhelmed by the ambush.
The Cleaners could not fight back. The knives of the front ranks of Rogues glinted in the neon lights as they repeatedly plunged into the line of Cleaners like rows of teeth ripping apart meat.

I leapt down the stairs after Josephine and the tumbling enemy leaders, pulling my knife from its sheath before reaching the ground. Keith rolled to a bruised and angry stop at the foot of the stairs just before me. I plunged my knife down into his throat as I landed, and wrenched it from side to side, severing his spine. His blood spurted up into my face, blinding me in a scarlet haze. It had the saltiness of Human blood but with a harsh acrid taste that made me gag. I wiped my eyes and spat out the blood that had splashed into my open and screaming mouth. I had never liked Keith anyway.

George had clambered down the steps behind me and was engaged in a struggle with Gregory. Vincent stood halfway up the stairs, firing with his huge gun into the column of Cleaners as it shrank under the pressure of the jaws of the Rogue army.