Remember when I said I'd have this done "next week?" Yeah, that was funny, huh.

This is the SECOND PART of chapter 9 - I recommend returning to the previous chapter and rereading before continuing. But to each their own.

More notes at the bottom, as usual. Enjoy!

Back on Earth, Marco was going room-to-room grabbing the half-full garbage bags and bringing them to the dumpster. The school day was over, but he still had a couple more hours of detention to serve for the day. He was finding the transition from student to janitor… oddly relaxing. The Janitor himself (who only referred to himself as "The Janitor") was a relaxed, if somewhat irritable man who sort of reminded Marco of his Karate sensei. It felt like he was learning the keys: there was a peace to be found in cleaning, even when your work was undone… almost immediately.

Setting the bags into the school's back dumpster, he returned to his new mentor and found that the remaining supplies had been packed up. The janitor was lounging, now in a T-shirt and jeans (and out of his jumpsuit uniform), and greeted Marco by gesturing for his presence.

"Look." He said, pulling out a small notepad. "Tomorrow's work."

Opening it up, he revealed a pages-long list of student names, many of them listed multiple times. Some were crossed out, others were circled, and near the top of the list was Janna's name, circled and underlined.

"The List," he explained. "Of the students who have wronged."

Marco perused it, mildly impressed that the Janitor actually knew everyone's names. Then his eyes flicked back to Janna's name, at the top. "Uh… what'd Janna do?"

"Ah." The Janitor's eyes darkened, and he put the notebook away. "I… try not to remember. A thousand cuts demand a thousand in return." Stepping away, he withdrew a bicycle from the Janitor's closet behind him. and began pedalling off. "Until tomorrow, Marco Diaz." He said before disappearing around a corner.

Leaning on the wall outside Tom's room, Janna was growing increasingly impatient. She'd been waiting for like, an hour! When she was (rudely) kicked out of his room, Janna went out to explore the rest of this giant mansion, but she found that almost everything and everybody here was prone to impale, incinerate, or crush her. That wouldn't normally have been a problem with Marco here, who seemed to have a sixth sense for that sort of thing, but as he wasn't, she'd probably peaked her mortal-perilometer about three times already. That, and she'd left her phone at the camp as per River's instruction (apparently Glossaryck had some kind of thing against Tom's mom), and was stripped of her spellcasting abilities, minus what she'd memorized. As much as it pained her to do so, she decided it was safer (ugh) to stay put.

"Geez, what is taking them so long?" She groaned out loud. She'd tried to open the door a few minutes ago, but found that she'd been locked out.

Looking around at the occasional demon, zombie or skeleton that passed by, she suddenly recognized a familiar face… sorta.

Two college-age looking demon girls were walking by, with a mixture of disgust and annoyance written across their faces, and it wasn't hard to see why. Behind them was the demon Ishkilthul, wearing a set of thick-rim specs and a t-shirt that said "gender is not your identity". Combined with his khaki shorts and socks-with-sandals get up, and he was just about as stereotypically unappealing as could be.

"I'm just saying," he boomed out. "If you girls haven't tried going on the all-kale cleanse, it will change your afterlife. Sure, it'll be a little bit runny for a few days, but -"

"Hey, Ishkilthul!" Janna shouted from across the hall as she ran towards him. The two demon ladies took this as an opportunity to quickly accelerate, doing all but sprinting as they fled the demon's feeble attempts at small-talk.

The demon sighed. "Janna, you have to learn to be polite. I was in the middle of something."

"The demon girls?" Janna asked. "I don't wanna judge, but they didn't look like they were into it."

The demon snorted (fire) and sighed. "Yeah. Probably dating a couple of chads. Nice guys like me don't have a shot." As he turned around to walk off, Janna stopped him.

Stifling her momentary revulsion at the pathetic giant she was talking to, she explained: "Woahwoahwoah, hang on a sec. Can I ask you something?"

"Uh, I suppose," the demon replied. "But I'm not really into being defined by titles anymore, and I'm on a kale cleanse, so I don't really consume information to do the whole "demon of knowledge" thing."

"Uh… okay?"

The demon pondered for a minute. "How 'bout a riddle instead?" He asked. "That's what the new-age demons are doing, right?"

"...sure." Janna shrugged. "I'm looking for King River's… daughter, I guess. Star?"

"Hmm." The demon pondered again, a moment longer. "That is a tricky one… coming up with riddles is hard. Let me think…"

Janna tapped her foot, and noticed that as soon as anyone entered their hall, they immediately turned the opposite direction after seeing Ishkilthul.

"Ooh, I've got it!" Ishkilthul exclaimed. Clearing his throat, he prefaced: "Listen, this is the first time I've done this, so gimme some feedback, okay?"

"A worm to an apple, a butterfly to a flower, a journey to save her will surely devour… you…" he paused at this and cleared his throat again. "Hmm. That's not right."

"Yeahyeah whatever, keep going," Janna hurried him, trying to memorize the riddle to recite to Marco, later.

"Hidden in the unseen, and cast out of time, stopping the clocks will surely divine,"

"The fate of the world, through eons, through age, and through infinite misery, the one you shall… save...dang it!"

"Be warned of the perils of waking the beast, for falling to Earth, she shall… break… things." He finished.

"Uh…" Janna's brain was saturated. There was no way she was going to remember that. "Can I get that on, like, a piece of paper or something?"

"C'mon, girl, it wasn't that good, don't make me write it down." The demon blushed slightly, which had an amusing effect on his skin, being a coal-black hue.

"It was waaay too long," Janna clarified. "Try and simplify it next time."

"But other than that it was cool?" Ishkilthul asked.

"Uh… it was okay I guess." Janna shrugged.

"It was my first one!" The demon said indignantly.

"Well yeah, and it wasn't bad, just… like, okay…" Janna muttered. Jeez. Some people just couldn't take criticism.

"Yeah, well, we can't all be perfect." Ishkilthul replied sourly. "Here's your stupid riddle," he snapped his fingers and a crumpled up ball of parchment bounced off of Janna's head. "I'm gonna go do something else."

As the demon stomped off, Janna unravelled the paper and took a glance at the riddle. It was exactly as he'd stated it, errors and all.

As if on cue, the door behind her sprung open, and out stepped Prince Tom and King River. "Is he gone?" The demon boy asked, before looking around and stepping the rest of the way out of his room. "Man. That guy used to be cool, but he went to Earth and now he's a total poser!"

He cast a sour look at Janna. "Figures you'd know him."

Ignoring this, though also mentally cataloging that her chances with the hot demon prince were now probably less than optimal, Janna instead gave the riddle to King River to examine.

"Asked him about Star," she said. "He gave me this."

The king quickly scanned it. "Aha!" He exclaimed, and handed it back. "I have no idea what that means."

Janna shrugged and folded up the paper. "Me neither. But I know a guy who might."

"Well, River, I'll keep my eyes open." Tom promised, winking his forehead-eye. "But if I were Star… I wouldn't want to be found." He finished darkly.

At this moment, Janna took the opportunity to try and casually walk back into Tom's room, and he blocked the door. "You need to leave." He told her.

Before she knew it, they were back out in front of the fortress, the gate sliding shut with a bang, in front of them. "Waste of time…" River mumbled. Janna didn't think so - feeling around for the piece of folded-up riddle in her pocket, she suspected that they'd just found the only lead they were going to get.

By the time Janna and the king returned from their little task, the soldiers at camp had already prepared a feast. Laid out on the massive table in front of them were a few larger-than-normal turkeys, corn on the cob, baked potatoes, kernel corn, fancy-looking hams, grilled corn, creamed corn, a couple fruit baskets, cornbread… you get the idea. There was lots of corn.

"Ah, excellent work, warriors! This will do for a fine pre-battle feast!" King River laughed. Waving Janna over, he invited her to sit and eat with the rest of them. Sitting awkwardly at the table and surrounded by the giant forms of Mewni's soldiers, she picked a few things in front of her to put on her plate. Normally she would be thrilled to take part in a "pre-battle feast," but she couldn't help but feel more than a little out of place here. She was surrounded by a couple dozen grown men and women who she didn't know and were three times her size, and although she didn't typically struggle with her self-image, she couldn't help but feel like she was a little… small.

"Oh don't be shy lass, here!" River exclaimed as he dumped a stack of corn onto her plate. "Some of the best corn the kingdom has to offer!"

"You guys sure love your corn, don't you?" Janna asked, giving the plate a tentative sniff. It smelled like butter.

"Well what's not to love?" The king began, clearly passionate about the subject. "Mewnian corn is the best thing to grace the tastebuds of this dimension since fried neptune flytrap flesh!"

"Is it any different from earth corn?" She asked.

"There's corn on Earth?!" River coughed, nearly choking on his turkey leg. Turning to his warriors beside him, he pointed an accusing finger. "Why was I never informed of this?!" He nearly yelled, eyes pointed in opposite directions.

"Woah, calm down man, it's just a vegetable." She quickly said, putting her hands in the air. "Well technically it's a fruit, but…" She paused to take a bite of her food. As soon as she began to chew, her pupils dilated and she froze, appearing to be in a trance-like state.

"Eh, Janna?" River spoke through a full mouth, waving his hand in front of her face. When he got no response, he just shrugged and continued eating.

Mewnian feasts were something of a spectacle, just as the rest of their culture was - King River's doubly so. Food and drink were strewn about by the end, crumbs of corn and spatters of the soldiers' fruity drinks adorning the soil around the table, the men themselves all sighing in contentment as their patted their full bellies.

Sitting between them, Janna was absentmindedly munching on her eighth cob, gnawing at it as she finished stripping it. It joined the seven others on the plate in front of her, and she let out a loud burp, which drew polite, lazy applause from the warriors beside her.

King River, at the end of the table, stood. Due to his short stature, this made little difference and no one noticed.

Clearing his throat, he stepped up onto the table.

"Knights of Mewni!" He roared. "We have feasted a meal fit for our last!"

The warriors shouted their approval, some of them raising their goblets.

"Now, we will fight for our lives!" River shouted.

The knights roared in response. "Hruzzah!"

"For our families!"

"Hruzzah!"

"FOR CORN!"

"HRUZZAH!"

"TOMORROW!"

This earned only silence.

"NOW, TO BED!" The king roared.

There was a mighty scramble as the soldiers quickly departed the table, scurrying into their various tents. Within moments, the camp echoed with the mighty sound of snoring.

Janna stood up slower, approaching the king, who in attempting to dismount the table, had fallen on his face.

"Oh, no, I'm fine m'dear." He brushed away her hand when she offered to help him up.

"You give your motivational speech before bedtime?" Janna asked with a raised eyebrow.

"But of course!" River puffed out his chest. "A tired army is a lost army, after all!"

"Uh… I guess so." Janna shrugged.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off as well! A king must be as awake and wary as his warriors!"

Janna returned to her own tent, a more modern model that she'd packed from Earth. Just large enough to fit two teenagers.

As she laid down on her sleeping bag, still fully clothed, she processed the day. And quite a day it had been.

There'd been the feast, and Tom, and school, and Marco…

Her thoughts drifted back to her friend, and she wondered if he was okay. There was a twinge of regret when she realized she'd left him just when he'd essentially screamed "HEY! Insecure! Need someone to talk to, here!"

She looked at the empty space next to her and felt another twinge of guilt, which she frowned and quickly squashed. She couldn't help but think: Marco should be here!

Sighing, she went for her phone by reflex (she'd left it in the tent) only to find that the battery was dead. She absently wondered where Glossaryck went when that happened.

Then her thoughts turned to the battle that she'd apparently agreed to fight tomorrow morning. The part of her that thought it would be a good idea had gone silent, leaving her to wonder why she'd agreed in the first place. Magic was cool and all, but a full-scale battle, with weapons and people trying to really hurt her? Decidedly less so.

She couldn't help but think that she'd feel better if she'd brought along someone to talk to about it. Marco was the safe kid. He always kept her from getting too in over her head. She'd actually have to watch out for herself, for once.

Turning over and shutting her eyes, she suppressed the creeping feeling of loneliness that had suddenly appeared, and did her best to fall asleep.

The following morning, Marco's head popped off his pillow bright and early, two minutes before his alarm went off. His muscles were loose, and his mind clear. As bizarre as it was, yesterday's janitorial detention actually seemed to have done wonders for a steady hand and a clear head.

He bounced downstairs and greeted his mom with a jovial smile, sharing with excitement that he had another day of "detention" today. His mom just shook her head. He'd already told her what was going on, the previous day. It wasn't really detention.

His dad wandered in some minutes later, dreary-eyed and sleepy. He could only admire Marco's energy before the teen disappeared out the door, a few minutes ahead of schedule, rather than rigorously adhering to his down-to-the-minute protocol like he usually did.

Looking after him, both his parents looked at each other, curious at what had gotten into their son.

Stepping through the front doors of the school, Marco's good mood immediately turned sour. Looking through the halls before him, he found that all the work he had done the previous day to get this place spotless had been for nothing. Is this how the Janitor felt every day? Shaking off his discontent with the school's current state, he leaned on the wall by the front doors to wait for Janna. After a few seconds of waiting, Marco suddenly remembered that Janna wasn't going to be at school today. He slapped his forehead and made his way to class.

On Mewni, Janna was preparing for the coming fight. Or rather, watching the soldiers in front of her prepare. She had woken up around an hour ago to the sound of clanking metal and shuffling feet, and left her tent to find River and his soldiers gearing up for battle. Here and there she could see someone sharpening a spear, fitting armor, or tacking up the most bloodthirsty looking unicorns she could've ever imagined.

Janna never imagined that putting on armor would take up so much time. She'd always figured that you could just slip it on like regular clothes, and be ready just like that. It gave Janna unwelcome time to think about her situation. Yesterday she was excited to be a part of something as cool as a royal interdimensional prison break. She knew what that would involve, but it wasn't really until this morning that the full weight of what she agreed to hit her. She was about to head into a warzone with actual monsters. Monsters that are probably going to be out to harm her for real, unlike the ones she fought a few weeks ago.

"Ah, Janna! How are you doing this fine morning?" The king asked, giving her a cheerful slap on the back. "Ready to test your might in a bout of mortal combat?"

"Well, I'm kinda-"

"Bah, what am I saying?! Of course you are!" He laughed. "Joffrey, come get this girl fitted for a suit of armor!"

"Wait, I get armor?!" Janna immediately asked, all of her lost excitement seemingly found again.

"Well it can't be custom made, given our lack of time," He told her, as if it mattered. "but we can't have you out there unprotected, can we?"

Before she could respond, she was ushered away into a tent which she assumed was some sort of makeshift armory, with a bunch of weapons and stray pieces of armor lying around.

"Ooh, do I get that?" She asked, pointing at a full polished suit of armor, standing up on a post. It was about twice her height.

"Not quite." The little man answered, sorting through a pile of metal.

"This one looks cool." She said, picking up a scaled shirt. "Woah, this stuff is heavier than I thought."

"Aha!" Joffrey shouted, pulling something out. Holding it up, it resembled a dress, made entirely out of steel chains.

"A small chestpiece," he held it up to her to compare, finding that it reached down to her ankles. "Rather large, but…"

He threw it over her head and shoulders with a deft hand, one that had done the same actions hundreds of times previously. It slapped lightly against Janna's legs before he drew it up, bundling it at her waist until it looked less like an oversized metal dress, and more like an oversized metal shirt. He then did up the sides, until Janna found her chest encased by metal links.

"Cool…" she muttered. The armor was heavy, but not uncomfortably so. At least, not for the moment.

"And…" rummaging through a chest at the edge of the tent, the steward also produced a metal helmet, which surprisingly slid over Janna's head perfectly. "Mewnian warriors have small heads," he explained. "They don't need big ones for… well, anyway. Do you want leggings?"

Janna looked down at herself, deciding that it was already going to be a pain to be carrying the extra ten kilograms of armor she already had. She shook her head, causing the helmet to shift.

"Ah, well then I'll be attending to the others, if you'll excuse me." Jeoffrey exited the tent, leaving Janna to her thoughts.

She reached for her phone, wishing that she had some way to charge it. She'd have to rely on what she knew for this… and there was no way to take a picture.

She caught a sight of her reflection in her phone - same ol' her, but wearing a helmet made for a warrior three times her size. A wave of nerves crashed over her suddenly, without warning, and her legs wobbled as she nearly threw up last night's corn.

"Warriors!" She turned and faced the tent flap with dread as she realized that River had just summoned the camp. Her battle awaited.

Homeroom proved uneventful for Marco, as Skullnick did her best to pretend that there was not a classroom full of students in front of her. Likewise, desperate not to invoke her ire, the students were doing their best to pretend they didn't have vocal cords.

The monotone toll of the bell rang out through the corridors, and Marco was first out the door. He hadn't even brought a bag today, since he'd be spending the rest of it cleaning.

At the end of the hall, the Janitor was waiting for him. He had the door to his closet open, revealing neatly stacked and organized shelves against the left side of the room, while the right side was an utterly unorganized disaster of supplies.

"Marco." The Janitor greeted him.

"Janitor." Marco replied. "Hey, what is your real name, anyways?"

"It's unimportant." The Janitor replied. "My title will suffice."

He extracted a tool kit, and a half-sized uniform with "student" stitched onto the name area. "Put this on," he said. "Dirty work to do, today."

As the students cleared the corridor, the Janitor closed and locked his closet, surprising Marco. There were no mops, no supplies - just a tool kit.

"So what are we doing today?" Marco asked. He'd been somewhat looking forward to the simple methodology of the Janitor's hours of mopping.

The Janitor hefted the toolkit with a blank expression. "Cosmic justice."

Marco had gotten used to the empty corridors of the school during his tenure as hall monitor, but the Janitor allowed him access to the blank areas he didn't know existed - twisting maintenance rooms full of boilers, empty classrooms stacked with desks, the teacher's lounge and the PhysEd supply rooms. In one such stacked classroom they found themselves, the Janitor setting his toolkit down and extracting a pair of wrenches, one of which he handed to his student assistant.

"So… what are we doing with these?" Marco hefted the wrench in his hand, feeling the weight.

"Observe." The Janitor explained, gesturing to the room. Like the supply closet, Marco noticed, exactly half of it was neatly organized - the other half a jumbled mess of desks, tables and chairs.

The desks on the left, neatly stacked atop one another, were impeccably clean and polished. Their surfaces were wiped clean, scratches and eraser-graffiti were polished off, and the undersides were gum-free. The same could not be said for the right side of the room, the desks utterly filthy by comparison.

Surprisingly, the Janitor headed to the left side of the room and extracted a pair of desks from the pile. One for him, and one for Marco.

"Loosen here." He explained, demonstrating with the wrench as he loosened a bolt that connected the desk and chair.

"And here. Here." He finished, standing up. The desk looked exactly the same, but it was now rigged to fall apart as soon as someone put weight on it.

Marco quizzically did the same on his desk, and the Janitor dragged them to the side before extracting two more.

As they stepped into the rhythm of their sabotage, the Janitor explained: "Soap is the justice for a dirty hall. A loose bolt is the justice for a defaced desk."

Marco nodded. Before long, they'd finished the classroom, and the Janitor put his tools away before gesturing to Marco to follow him out.

"Next is the bathroom." He deadpanned as he locked the door. "You may not experience the horrors of a brown sink, but…" His face drifted off. "There are some things that will never be acceptable to clean."

Leading Marco towards the largest bathroom of the school, he unlocked a small, dark side room nearby, which contained a hot water tank, electric panels and a set of pipes.

Extracting a pipe wrench from the toolkit, the Janitor began rigging the pipes, bypassing the cold water taps and ensuring that the sinks in the bathroom beyond only dispensed jets of scalding water. Marco, feeling merciful, did the opposite - his sinks would only allow for ice-cold water straight from the central plumbing system.

The Janitor looked at him passively. "You're merciful." He said. "That will change, someday."

As they locked the door to the maintenance room, the bell for the next class rang. Students swarmed to the bathroom. "Observe," the Janitor paused.

After a few moments, there were yelps of surprise as their sabotaged sinks began to flow. Marco frowned.

"The heater doesn't get hot enough to burn," the Janitor explained as they walked off. "It's just… uncomfortable." A small smile graced his lips as grumbling students exited the bathroom.

"Soldiers of Mewni!" King River bellowed as they mounted the final hill to their destination. Below them, a small monster town was bustling with activity, creepie-crawlies of all sizes and types moving between their houses, the outlying fields and the marketplace.

"These fiends have stolen our fellow Mewmans! They have sacked our homes, stolen our food!" He continued. Janna tensed as the warriors around her growled and mashed their teeth. This wasn't a brawl. Something was about to happen. Something… bad.

"Leave nothing standing!" River roared.

With a collective howl, the Mewmans charged towards the village, where there was a claxon of alarms and a scramble for arms.

Janna tensed, prepared to follow. She was already tired from lugging her armor - a mile-plus-long hike from camp would do that. Although it had at least helped her nerves. Exhaustion left little room for other emotion.

King River stopped her. He wore a scowl. Janna was adjusted to seeing him as a goofy, somewhat eccentric man - this was the first time she'd ever seen him and felt afraid.

"Stay here," he said. "The next town is behind us. Stop them from sending for reinforcements."

With a war cry, he ran after his men.

As the Mewmans sacked the monster village below, Janna only watched. Her relief at not being a part of the fighting was matched only by the disappointment of her being considered a child and left out. But as she watched the fighting, doubts were gnawing at her.

The fields of crops around the village were burning, and the fire was spreading towards the homes in the center. Monsters were being routed, fleeing the village in all directions as the warriors chased them.

A small group broke off - soldiers, battered and bruised, but wearing scaled armor and carrying weapons all the same. They made a beeline for Janna. She tensed. Whether or not it was right… they were enemies.

"Corpus Levitus - Levitato." She incited. Summoning her magic, something was different then when she'd done it on Earth - maybe her attitude. Maybe magic was just stronger on Mewni. Her fingers crackled with thin barbs of purple energy, and a moment later, she was floating off of the ground, one foot, then three feet, then ten feet.

"Halt!" She raised a hand and tried to sound commanding. The squeak that came out of her mouth most certainly wasn't. The warriors continued running. She cleared her throat. "HALT!"

Pebbles around the monsters' feet began to rise, and soon they were off their feet, Janna feeling the sudden strain of lifting several hundred kilograms of enemy soldiers.

She managed to hold them in place for about fifteen seconds before releasing her magic. They dropped to the ground, dazed, but not hurt. Janna was still floating, but she could feel the magic around her fading, too.

"Move!" One of the monsters shouted in a garbled Russian accent. Janna wasn't sure where they'd picked it up, but looking close, they were indeed the same frog-creatures that Ludo's lieutenant had been. What had his name been. Gene?

As the group ran beneath Janna, several of them pounced up, Janna only barely managing to dodge as they flew past. Something wet whapped against her armor, and she grunted as her magic was taxed. Looking down at herself, she realized that a tongue had wrapped itself around her waist, and that the owner was climbing hand-over-hand on it towards her.

"Ugh… gross." Janna shivered, and made to try and force the tongue off of her before having second thoughts about touching it.

"Levitato!" She incited, reaching out to the ground. Several head-sized rocks rose up, and shot towards her assailant. The first few bounced off without harm, but a gut shot loosened the tongue enough for him to fall.

There was a sigh of relief from the girl, before she realized just how high up she was - in her panic she'd floated up another fifty feet, at least, since she'd been grabbed!

The monster was plunging to the ground, and Janna reached out, her gut lurching as she caught him with her levitation spell. It was only barely enough, and she dropped him to the ground just as she started to fall.

She plummeted ten, twenty, thirty feet before she caught herself, weakly holding herself in the air.

Through dimming vision, she saw as the monsters ran off, away in the direction of the King's predicted reinforcements.

"...anna…" the voice was only barely at the edge of her hearing, as the young girl slowly woke up. She was surrounded by River's men, the king himself bearing some new scorch marks and dents in his armor while he kneeled in front of her. "Janna, my girl!" He beamed. "We did it!"

Janna sat up, still groggy. A plume of black smoke was rising up from the burning village, behind her. She noticed that there were several more Mewnians than there had been previously, most of them in various states of undress, none of them wearing armor.

"Some got past…" she murmured.

"Oh, those frogs?" The king snorted. "Farmers, m'dear! They'll be back, but we'll be gone by the time they are. Victory!" He shouted, and his soldiers roared in agreement. Those who they'd rescued were particularly loud.

As she was picked up by one of the king's men, Janna noticed that she'd lost her helmet in the dirt. "...farmers?" She muttered.

The school day was over, the students having all left and the faculty retreating to the teacher's lounge for a weekly meeting. As the door clicked shut, the Janitor put his hand on Marco's shoulder. "Still work to do." Marco nodded.

Together, they swapped in the faulty desks, gingerly handling them so as to avoid toppling the delicate construction. The replaced desks joined the mish mashed pile of jank that had begun to take over the abandoned classroom, just as filthy as their counterparts.

"I cleaned those last week," the Janitor explained.

"Oh."

Marco unzipped his jumpsuit, preparing to step out of it before the Janitor stopped him. "One moment, Marco."

He stepped towards a locker. "Can you keep a secret?" He asked.

Marco nodded.

Twiddling the dial, the Janitor opened a locker at random, revealing a pile of mismatched school supplies and textbooks. Marco stared, wide-eyed.

"You just… know all the combinations?" He asked.

The Janitor shook his head. "The lockers use a numeric code based on their number," he explained.

"The first, is the number of the locker, divided by the number of lockers in the row, rounded up."

"The second, is the number of the locker, plus the number of lockers it is from the left, counting itself."

"The third, is the number of the locker, minus the number below it and to the left. Try it."

Marco stepped up to a locker, and after some quick math, spun the dial. Sure enough, it clicked open. "Wow."

"Marco, look at me." Marco turned to find the Janitor staring him in his face. "Do not abuse this power. Not unless I say it's okay."

Marco nodded.

Extracting his notebook, the Janitor began running through names, and they began a walk. Every so often, he'd stop and open a locker, before hiding something. Stealing a solitary pen. Removing a bookmark. Swapping the contents with the neighboring locker.

Before long, they'd arrived at Janna's locker. As the Janitor reached for it, Marco stopped him. "No use," he said. "She uses mine."

The Janitor spun the dial anyways, opening the locker to a blindingly pink landscape of color. Marco's eyes widened. He'd never actually seen the inside of her locker. This was definitely why.

The Janitor arranged a book so that, the next time the locker was opened, it would fall on the occupant if they were standing in front of it. He quickly closed it before it could fall on him.

"Secret." He nodded at Marco, before putting his notebook back in his jacket pocket. "That's all for today."

The next morning, Marco's head popped off of his pillow for an entirely different reason than it had yesterday - the incoming satisfaction of righting the wrongs of the Janitorial position.

He was off to school earlier than usual, just like yesterday. He stopped only to give his customary nod-exchange to Jackie, who stopped to ask him where Janna was. He managed to stammer through that she was on a vacation with her family, and Jackie frowned in concern before riding off.

As the first bell rang, Marco lingered next to the sabotaged classroom, just long enough to see the first students sit down. Everything seemed fine at first, but then, one at a time, desks began collapsing to the bewilderment of both the students and the teacher, leaving students sprawled on the floor, wide-eyed and confused.

He snickered quietly as he headed to his own homeroom, and passed the Janitor with a nod as he headed back to retighten the bolts of the desks.

He'd have more work soon enough.

First period passed without delay, and Marco bounded to the Janitor's closet to get his assignment, only to be greeted by the same stoically-faced man that he usually was. Marco rubbed his hands together.

"Did you see those desks?" He asked, grinning. Loosening desks, sabotaging lockers (a minor quarrel had broken out down the hall after two of the swapped students discovered the ruse) - these were all things that he'd never be doing by himself, but, well, if the Janitor said it was okay… he couldn't help but enjoy it. "So, what are we doing today? More sabotage? Lock all the bathrooms? Hide people's backpacks?"

He had a bit of a crazed look in his eye, and the Janitor sighed before handing him a mop. Marco looked at it in confusion. "But -"

"The key is balance." The Janitor said, before he began swabbing the floor. Marco followed suit, his bloodlust still not quite gone. Mopping was nice and all, but what he really wanted to be doing…

"This school could crumble beneath me," the Janitor explained. "But I choose to keep going. The mop, the desks, the cleaning, the chaos… it keeps things interesting. Keeps me from destroying it all or leaving. But the key is balance."

Marco thought on this in the following silence, but still had a spark of annoyance for every new piece of trash that appeared beneath his mop, every dirty footprint. Before long, the hallway was done, and Marco was seething. He felt a heavy hand drop on his shoulder, and looked up at the Janitor, angry. "There's just… no respect!" He raised his voice.

The Janitor nodded. "Marco, that will never change. Hold onto that passion. Remember it. Use it to fulfill yourself, to drive yourself to something you care about. But remember the mop. Enjoy the moment. Take pride in your work, even if no one else does."

He gestured to the hall behind him, which was gleaming and spotless.

"And take your vengeance as a cosmic justice, not as personal fulfillment."

Marco nodded, and breathed deeply, focusing on the hallway in front of him. It was clean and shiny, and that's all he could enjoy. And when it was soaped up, tomorrow, or the following week, it would be a righteous justice, not revenge.

The Janitor then thrust a rag and a scraper into Marco's hands, along with a spray-wax solution that he used to keep things clear. "Now, go clean the opossum statue. I'll attend to some desks."

Janna didn't arrive back on Earth until after midnight, and was too tired to do anything but plug in her phone, fall on her bed and drop out of consciousness. The walk back to camp had been… challenging, but she'd insisted on going under her own power for the latter half. Though she had taken off her chainmail, letting it drag behind her like a rag.

The rest of the soldiers had still been celebrating when she'd left, but to Janna, there was nothing to celebrate. She was a mixed up vat of emotions, slowly stirring itself through the thick, sticky honey of exhaustion. But on the other hand, the experience had definitely been exciting.

When she woke up twelve hours later, she was disappointed to find that not only was she still drained, she was still unsettled as well. Glossaryck rose up out of her phone to greet her, in his typical meditative pose.

"So, kid, how was it?" He asked.

"Exhausting." Janna deadpanned, taking a glimpse of herself in her phone and noting the disheveled clothes and bags under her eyes. She'd never felt as drained as she had after casting that spell, and it showed on her face. But there were other things to attend to.

There was about an hour of school left, meaning that by the time she got there, tired as she was, there'd be about twenty minutes. But her family wasn't home (nor did she think that her mom would've had the time to talk), and school was where Marco was. Something inside of her was craving a familiar comfort of a friend.

Dragging herself to her feet, she headed towards the door, leaving her phone and mentor behind. Glossaryck frowned at her. He recognized the signs of spell exhaustion, even if it'd been hundreds of years since he'd taught a student without a wand. He'd made the right choice, being away while she fought, that he was sure. She'd needed to see what a pointless, brutal fight it all was without his intervention, but… she didn't realize just how close she'd come to not waking up.

He drifted back into the phone and opened up Gem Crush, and dwelled on these thoughts as the front door to Janna's home slammed shut behind her.

Marco stood back as he looked proudly at his handiwork. It'd taken most of the day, but the opossum statue in front of him was now gleaming. Every nick and scratch buffed away, every speck of dirt and water damage scraped and scrubbed off, with a fresh coating of the Janitor's wax solution to keep it looking pretty, at least until the next storm.

He'd given a lot of thought to why the Janitor had sent him outside, and amidst his deep soul-searching, realized that none of the damage done to the statue had been from students. It was just the weather - Mother Nature reminding him that the natural order was chaos.

Or something. At least the statue looked good.

It was with a pang of regret that he realized today would be his last day of Janitorial duty. At this rate, it was more fulfilling than his classes had been! But then he thought to himself… the Janitor was calm, at peace with his life - or at least it seemed like it. But did Marco really want to spend the rest of his life cleaning up after others? Because without good grades, he may as well start looking forward to a position as the head janitor of Garbage Island.

This train of thought was interrupted as he spied a student walking up the front path of the school. He had to do a double-take, at first thinking that somehow one of the zombies from weeks ago had reappeared in front of him. But it was just… Janna?

"Janna!" He called, running towards her. She lifted her head, dark bags and deep-set eyes brightening just a bit as she spotted her bestie. A wan smile graced her lips.

Marco put a hand on her shoulder and looked into her eyes. She looked like death warmed over, and after the nearly-apocalyptic zombie episode, he had a pretty good idea of what that looked like.

To his surprise, she fell into a hug, which quickly turned into a slump against him, Janna letting out a noise of contentment at being reunited with with her friend. Marco felt a pang of guilt - he'd barely thought about her while she'd been gone, so caught up by his janitorial duties.

"Are you okay?" Marco asked.

Janna mumbled a response from the front of his janitorial jumpsuit. "You're a janitor now?"

"Long story," Marco explained. "Are you okay? Let me walk you home."

As they set off back towards the Russo residence, Janna still leaning against Marco for support, the Janitor watched from the front window of the school. He flipped open his notebook, and struck a check next to Janna's name. She looked like she'd been through enough for a little while, so he'd show some mercy - just this once.

Deciding it was best to let Janna focus on putting one foot in front of the other (he was impressed that she'd made it to school at all, exhausted as she was acting), Marco rambled on about his experience with the Janitor.

"...so then we started mopping, and I realized: balance is the key!" He shared his revelation excitedly. "Talk about an experience, right? I almost wish I had another week with him!"

Janna smiled warmly, a little color returning to her face. She was still hanging onto Marco for support, an arm around his shoulders as he helped her walk along.

"Sounds neat," she yawned. "I got to fight monsters."

She left it at that, and they walked in silence for a few minutes before she finally continued.

"Sorry you couldn't come," she mumbled. "I was really worried. That whole thing with the trampoline, and leaving without talking to you… I wish you'd been there."

Marco chuckled as he recalled his stunt, a few days earlier. It seemed so silly in retrospect. He wasn't exactly okay with being the safe-kid now, but… it wasn't bothering him nearly as much.

"Nah," he said, picking at his clothes. "How else would I've gotten this uniform?"

They arrived at the front door to Janna's home, and Joleen quietly snuck past them, without a word for once. It seemed that they'd walked so slow, school had let out and she'd gotten home at the same time.

Janna stepped inside as well, leaving Marco on the doorstep.

"I'd invite you over this weekend, but I think I'm just gonna sleep through most of it." She yawned again, with another tired smile. "See you on Monday?"

"Yeah." Marco replied. "Monday."

The door shut with a click, and Janna turned in to face the living room, in shambles as usual. Joleen had already helped herself to a traditional after-school cereal bowl, and turned to face her. "Not your boyfriend, huh?" She mocked.

Too tired to respond, Janna just made her way to her room and fell asleep.

Another week, another chapter. This one sure turned out long, but I liked the duality of it. Jumping back and forth between the two stories was a great way for me to keep refreshed while we wrote. (As always, thanks to Sirkylelenn for the help.)

It's finally spring! Out here in California, anyways. It's nice. Perfect weather to sit inside and write.

Does anyone else suddenly want to slap Ishkilthul across the face? Cuz I do. Janna channeled my feelings at the time of writing.

Oh, and we recently shot past 10,000 views! Thanks guys! Means the world to me.

Comment responses!

Roguefoxx: Originally I was going to blatantly reference Harry Potter. The "Levitato" spell was originally "Wingardium Leviosa", with the accompanying "It's leviosaaaaaa" from Glossaryck. But then the actual spell came out. So yeah. Random latin is magic, that's scientific fact.

Guest: Thanks for the positive review! Not gonna lie, we were originally intending to do a lot more with Tom, but it just didn't really work out that way. I think he'll probably pop up again later, so we'll see s'more of that interaction.

Thanks to everyone for the continual positive reception! Now that we're back on hiatus (yaaaay...), I'll be spending more time writing again, since I do that whenever I get the urge for new content and the show doesn't provide.

ON THE NEXT EPISODE OF JVTFOE: When Marco's emergency cash stash runs out (due in no small part to Janna's mishaps), they're forced to find a way to make some new money. But you know what they say about money and friendship... Will they succeed? Fail? Argue incessantly about the best way to run a virtually inconsequential business? Who knows! Definitely not me, I haven't decided yet. Find out next week, on the next episode: Penny for a Pound!