Blunderball

Squinter Cell: Pandora Whenever

Challenge #12: Write a story that includes a powerful janitor, incompetent guards, and a substance with miraculous properties. One of these elements must be inverted.

"Intruder is in air vents. Please advise."

"Do not deviate from patrol route. I repeat: do not deviate from patrol route."

"But he's banging around in there and it's super obvious and the boss is just down the hall."

"Look. Which of these sounds better? 'Gee, the Pandora Virus is missing! The guy who took it must have been a total ghost because literally nobody noticed him,' or 'Hey, about that dude who got all the way into the bioweapons lab before anyone raised the alarm. He must have been super quiet right up until he started trying to cram his entire body through a flimsy metal duct.' Because—"

"Oh God," the guard whispered into his collar mic. "He's stopped. I think he knows I can hear him!"

"Okay," said Tim. "Stay calm and repeat after me: 'Man, I can't believe that creaky old vent's acting up again.'"

"Man. I can't believe that creaky old vent is acting up again."

From the safety of the broom closet, Tim heard the unmistakable sound of knees mangling sheet metal start up once more. It really was loud: like RoboCop trying to hump a wobble board.

"Thanks, Tim." The guard sighed. "I don't know what we'd do without you."

"Don't worry about it: times like these, we stick together. Nobody has to fight whatever Snake Plissken wannabe they've sent in this time, and nobody gets fired. Trust me: I've been doing this for a long, long time. We've just gotta wait for him to find that phial and—"

The closet door opened. Standing in the hallway, hand on the handle, was a guy in a latex suit wearing an eyepatch.

Tim stared at the guy.

The guy stared back.

Tim wasn't certain whether he'd thought the closet was for storing weapons or if he'd just been planning to hide for a bit, but either way the guy didn't seem to have expected there to be a janitor in there. He looked from Tim's equally surprised face to the radio in his hand, then back again.

Tim knew he'd have to think quickly.

"About time!" he said. "I've been in here for hours! I know security's tight around here but clearance to get someone out of a cupboard? Really?"

"Uhhh..." said the guy. Clearly he wasn't the sort of infiltration specialist who did witty one-liners.

"Yeah, yeah. I know," Tim added, quickly. "How about instead of pointing out how hilarious this all is, you let me get back to changing the filters in the shark tank, and I'll let you get back to guarding that virus that gives people psychic powers. Which is over there." He gestured. "Second on the left."

Just like that, they went their separate ways and nobody got hurt.

It was kind of funny, really: the boss always complained his staff were incompetent. Little did he know just how good at this job they were getting.