The Cleaner

A/N: YUMMY


My job is to clean up.

I have been given a list of names and this one is the third down. The others I have dealt with already.

This one I will get a lot of pleasure out of because I know by doing this I will cause someone else a lot of pain and in doing so that person will pass the pain onwards to the next person who will try to take it all. Brave fool that he is. I slipped a tiny slither of my mind into his and I can feel the madness in his mind. Maybe he's not a fool, but he is certainly insane. Anyway…back to here and now. I sit at under a tree at the side of the road. I listen and I smile and wait and here he comes. I can smell him. I can almost taste him, but his mind is elsewhere and he is not expecting me. Which is good. I don't want to spoil the surprise.

He is young and not very experienced which will make the job easier. I have lured him here. He thinks he is hunting down the others but he's not. Again the youth is easy to trick. I wonder that it hasn't yet sunk into his tiny depraved mine that he has no control over anything. That he is finished. A mistake.

I need to take him back with me. Well parts of him. They will try again but he really is a worse fuck up than who he is spawned from. I know – you wouldn't think it possible.

Now he is close and so I stand and brush the leaves from my clothing and step back into the shadows. I pull my blades and call him to me. Come on little boy, come to Taki.

The vehicle pulls up and still I stand and wait. I watch as the boy gets out of the car and he is looking around. He is confused, I see he is looking almost directly at me. A smaller version of his father. A weaker version of his father and I wonder about something briefly and then my mind is pulled back to now. I mustn't be distracted by other thoughts. This is my job.

I am a cleaner.

I get rid of the trash.

And I can smell the decay from here.

He walks to the back of the car but he is still looking in my general direction. He knows something is wrong but he doesn't know what it is.

Leave the car. Leave it and come here. I smile at him as he does what I want, I watch his fingers brushing over the metal of the car and now he is walking towards me. There is blood on him. His blood. He has a nasty mess on the side of his face. His leg has been bleeding, but here he is, not far now and so I step out to great him.

'Hello Sam.' I say and I'm delighted to see his dark eyes widen in fear.

'What do you want?'

He talks to me but his voice is nervous. He knows what I want.

'Your head.' I tell him and he turns to run. I really don't know where he thinks he is going to go. I swipe at the side of his neck when his back is to me and take the head in one skilled well practiced swing. The two parts fall to the floor and surprisingly there isn't too much blood. Kicking him over onto his back I now use my blade to cut through his clothing and skin and muscle and bone and I bend down and remove the heart. 'Sorry kid. But your time was up.' The head I take and attach to my belt. The heart goes into a small belt pouch. I flick the blades to remove the demon spawn's blood and re-sheath them.

My hands I wipe on the side of my long dark blue hakama and I pull the list from my pocket and see who is next.

-o-o-o-

I'm telling him.

'We need to leave.' I rub my hand across my eyes and look at the mess on the floor again. 'Spence, get up. We have to go. They will come looking for him eventually. You know? He will be missed.'

And he is lying on the floor where he fell and is groaning slightly and I can tell something has gone wrong. Gone wrong in his mind. Something has snapped or there is something there on his brain confusing him. 'Babes we need to get out of here.' And I am bending down to drag him to his feet when it happens.

It feels like, well nothing you would know about. It feels like a bucket of emotions and hate and envy and lust has been tipped over my head. A sudden huge surge of every thought and deed that Sam has ever done. All his inner thoughts and loves and hates and his jealousy is suddenly given to me.

I know immediately what has happened but it doesn't help this sudden feeling I have and I am lying on the floor with Spencer; slightly across him when the pain starts. Slightly at first, across my brow, but it increases and I feel the little blood vessels in my brain popping and I feel whatever this thing is pushing forward and trying to take over.

Finally it explodes from my body…it tears its way out via my nose and my ears. From behind my fingernails and out of my mouth. I feel every orifice in my body push this thing out of me and the pain ………….the pain as clots of blood force their way out of me………..this pain, it takes me somewhere else for a while.

-o-o-o-

I can hear Floyd talking to me. He is saying we have to leave, but I'm confused. I don't really know what is going on. I don't even know if I am awake. It all feels like it is still a nightmare, but Floyd is here so maybe it's not.

Then something happens.

I hear him make a funny gagging noise. I feel him fall and lay partly over me and I hear him scream and then his body stiffens and twists and a convulsion starts. I know now that this is a nightmare. The only reason Floyd would be here would be to help and he cant. Something has gone very wrong. This isn't how it is meant to be. I turn on my side and push him away from me and I can see that he is covered in blood. I don't know at first where it is coming from and then I realise it is from him. Now he is on his back in the dirt and he has his head tipped right back and his mouth is open in a long silent howl. The blood I can see is foaming and pink between his lips and so I move him quickly and pull him towards me so he is on his side. There is thick dark blood coming out of his nose and from his ears and now I see it red and fresh bubbling around in the corners of his eyes.

'Floyd.' I say quietly and move my hands over him. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to stop this. I have no idea what has happened.

Why I decided to do what I did I don't know. It just seemed the right thing to do. I pull a blanket off the cot and lay it on the floor next to Floyd and then roll him over onto it. He said that we had to leave and so we will. I slip the straps from the rangers rucksack over my bare shoulders and snatch up my shirt which for now I tie around my waist. I then grab the corners of the blanket and start to drag it from the hut. We have to get away. We have to escape. I'm still not sure how this happened to the ranger. I can sort of remember bits of a nightmare but that is all it was. How he came to be here I don't know.

It's pretty obvious Spencer. You did it.

And the voice I push away from me. I don't want it there distracting me. Not now. Later I will listen to it. Not now…

My decision is to return to the river. I'm not sure what I am going to do when I get there but for now that is where I am going to go. I can hear him groaning and making odd noises as I drag him along and so I talk to him in hushed comforting tones. 'It's going to be alright Floyd. I'll fix it. I'll take care of it. Just stay with me. I'm here.' And I keep this up though in reality I have no idea what I am going to do when I reach the river, let alone what am going to do with Floyd.

Nightmares become real. I don't know at which point I accepted this but for now as I stand by the river with this indestructible man I love groaning in pain and spouting blood from everywhere I realise that he nightmare is real.

'I don't know what to do. Help me. I don't know what to do.' I say it to the river. I wonder if my words will get taken downstream and end up in the ears of an old man sitting with his pipe and whittling on a bit of wood.

Wash him.

Yes I need to wash him. So I turn back and pull the blanket away from him and look down at him twisting and squirming and how his hands are pressed hard against his eyes. I need to get all these layers of clothing off and so I start unbuttoning his shirt. The long coat and the demin jacket thing are already open. I am quick and when I pull the shirt apart I can see the how he is sweating and how the sweat seems to be reddish pink and bubbling through his skin. I am going to have to be quick. I move down and pull off his boots and throw them to one side. His feet are bare inside those old boots and blood soaked. His jeans I also undo quickly and pull from him. They are wet too. His whole body seems to be leaking blood.

I manage to pull him around until I have all his clothes off and now I don't know what to do. I don't think I have the strength to hold him all the time he is squirming like he is. I need him to calm down a bit first. I can do without drowning him accidentally in the river. I know he gets headaches and I know he has a powder he snorts when they get bad…or does the powder give him the bad head? I'm not sure now but never the less I rummage through his pockets until I find a twist of cellophane with his grey powder inside.

'Floyd. You need this.' I tell him and I pull his face to mine and try to hold it still. 'Can you hear me?' But I don't get a response to let me know if he did or not and so I tip some onto my finger tips and put them to his nose. 'Inhale.' I tell him and his hand moves quickly and grips hold of my skinny wrist and he does. He snorts in the mixture and then he talks.

'Smokes.'

Is all he manages, but it's enough. One shaky muttered word and I am so relieved. I search again through his pockets and find what I need. The smoke I place between his lips and then I light it. I watch again as his hand reaches out; one to the smoke and one just in front of him. 'Spence?' again the word is barely audible but I would always know my name being said by him. I reach my fingers forward and take his hand in mine and I squeeze it tightly.

'Just tell me what I need to do. I'll get you in the river.'

But he just squishes his eyes shut and I watch blood ooze between his eyelids and his back arches and leaves the floor and he drags down more smoke into his lungs.

'More.'

So I grab at the twist and do what I have seen him do hundreds of times before and I make a mound of poweder on the back of my thumb nail and offer it to him.

'Inhale.' I tell him and he moves a hand to my wrist and holds it firmly and takes in the powder.

He starts shuddering and shaking horribly on the blanket but the bleeding seems to have stopped. He smokes without letting the cheroot thing leave his lips and then he spits out the butt along with some blood. I have another ready for him and he opens his eyes and looks up at me.

'Wash me.'

He tells me. So I pull the sticky nasty mess that he is off the blanket and with his arm over my shoulder I take him slowly to the water's edge. I sit him down and now I quickly strip down to my boxers again and throw my clothes to one side. Then I stand in the water and face him wrap my arms securely around him and guide him into the icy water.

Floyds arms are over my shoulders and around my neck now and his head is resting on my shoulder. I can feel him shivering from the cold water and I can hear his heavy breaths in my ear. Very slowly and carefully I lower us both down until we are kneeling on the river bed. I can feel little stones digging into my knees and the tops of my feet but it doesn't matter. I don't mind the small amount of discomfort now because slowly I can feel Floyd relax against me. The breathing is steadier and the vice like grip he had on me lessens slightly and then his hands are on my shoulders and gently he is pushing me back away from him.

'I need to clean my face.'

He is still talking softly. It doesn't sound like him. The self assured air seems to have gone and it scares me. Something has shocked him but I don't want to ask yet. I move back slightly to give him room to dip his face into the water and wash the mess away. When he comes up for air he is looking more like the Floyd I know.

'What happened?' I ask him, but he shakes his head and smirks.

'I'll tell you later.' And his hands are now one on either side of my face and his mouth is on mine and his lips are tasting mine. I move in close again and put my arms tightly around him and pull him close.

'You scared me.' I whisper across his mouth and he licks me back as an answer and sucks on my bottom lip as his hands move from my face and his fingers go across my chest and over my hard cold nipples and then around touching my ribs – now occasionally pinching me and biting down harder on my bottom lip and then sucking it and playing his tongue over my teeth and then finally letting my tongue join in. I feel him now run hands over my back and a finger draws around the knobbles of my spine.

When the kisses are deep and it feels as though my lips will be bruised and never recover, when I forget where we are kneeling in a river and I forget the blood I had been so afraid of, then I feel his hands on my hips and he is manoeuvring me slowly and pulling at my boxers.

'I want you.' His words are sucked in by my mouth just before he pulls away and his kisses are over my neck and across my jaw and still moving me and slowly moving him self the kisses turn to nibbles and soft bites on my shoulders and his arms have moved up so they are wrapped tightly around me securing me in place and holding me to him. As I push back for him he moves forwards. He takes me with no preparation. He rips into me and I tip my head back and howl in glorious pain.

It doesn't take long. He is over quickly and I think more blood has joined that which Floyd had washed off himself. He stays though holding me. I am shaking with the pleasure he just gave me and he is biting down on the back of my neck groaning softly. 'We have to go.' And he releases me. 'We have to get away from this place and we have to get away quickly.' Now he pulls back and still holding me in his arms he stands pulling me to my feet with him.

'Thank you.' And he kisses the back of my neck and then walks away to the river bank leaving me pulling my underwear back up and wondering how so much pain can be also be so much wondrous pleasure.

-o-o-o-

I wake up in darkness. My head hurts and I am lying in a cramped position. I try to think what happened and I suddenly remember the girl I was lying in the trunk of the car and then I remember Sam hitting me. I feel slowly and with trepidation around and realise I am lying on the body of the poor girl. The car has stopped but I don't know how long for. I can't hear that click click click sound of a cooling engine. I cant smell the fumes from the fuel.

'Sam!' I shout out and try to push open the lid of the trunk, but it wont move. 'Hey! Anyone!' and I am now kicking at the metal and shouting for help as a small panic that Sam might have abandoned the car somewhere and gone on alone. 'Hey!'

And I kick until the muscles in my legs ache and start to shake and I shout until I am hoarse and I can hear nothing. Just a horrible silence and now I can smell the death I am lying with.