Benjamin had mopped up vomit before. It came with working at a fast food joint which had a parking lot that moonlighted as a hangout for drunks and junkies. So when Pottermass informed him that he would be spending an entire day cleaning up sick, the cheetah considered it as getting off lightly
Apparently some drunkards came into the Tundratown Bug-Burga and caused a massive scene the night before. By the time Precinct Three came by, the restaurant was a mess. Chairs had been overturned, windows had been broken, and food, trays and vomit were everywhere. The awful mess had yet to be cleaned, and after his blunder in inadvertently assisting in a plot to con Pottermass out of expensive medical equipment, the task had been given to Benjamin. Benjamin had accepted the punishment without so much as a grimace, being just happy that Pottermass was letting him keep his job.
Benjamin had slept little that night, partly because of the lingering pain in his stitched up arm and mostly because he couldn't stop thinking about Nick. The news that the fox had escaped and was now on the run had left the cheetah with mixed feelings. Nick had lied to him for months. He'd used him to con his own boss. He'd put his job and even his life at risk. Despite it all, Benjamin worried about him. Nick could have been hurt in that crash, perhaps badly. For all he knew Nick might be dying right now, and there was no telling what the ZPD would do when they inevitably caught up to him. Then there was Finnick and Honey. Finnick had gone completely AWOL, even taking his distinctively painted van with him. He was likely with Honey in her bunker, but Benjamin had been unable to bring himself to go there. What would he do when he saw Finnick? The little fox had to have known about the con, too.
Benjamin gave up on sleep when he opened his eyes, spied the alarm clock and saw that it was ten to four. He downed a mug of coffee and a small box of donuts for energy, put on his only coat, grabbed an umbrella and then set out for Tundratown.
He reached the frigid district at approximately four-twenty, just as the black sky started to brighten, turned a deep dark blue. The streetlamps were still lit, and Benjamin followed the path of bright yellow circles on the pavement to the stretch of tarmac where Bug-Burga was located. The constant rain had reduced what was normally a winter wonderland into a filthy grey wasteland. The snow had turned to muddy water and slush, and Benjamin was finding it almost impossible to avoid the puddles in the darkness. Even with the umbrella, the feline found his legs almost completely drenched by the time he reached the length of pavement before Bug-Burga. The water was absolutely freezing. A couple of times Benjamin turned his head to see a completely empty street.
He had a strange feeling that he wasn't alone out here.
The honk of a car horn made Benjamin jump and turn.
Behind him was a pink limo, rainwater streaming down its black windows like rivers. The middle window slid down with a hum, revealing Pottermass's smug face.
"Sir!" Benjamin gasped. "What are you doing here? It's not even six!"
"I'm just making sure you haven't done a runner like your foxy little fraud friends." Pottermass replied casually.
Benjamin's ears lowered. "No, sir. I haven't."
"That's good, good." The hippo smiled, but his eyes were hard. "I hope today teaches you a jolly good lesson."
"It already has, sir." Benjamin shivered both from cold and the memory of that rhino officer's words.
"The mess has been contained to the front area, so there's no need to go in back other than getting cleaning supplies. I just thought that you should know."
"Thank you, sir. I appreciate that you're not firing me."
Pottermass leaned his arm on the window frame. "There are worse things than a pink slip, Benjamin, I can assure you."
The cheetah nodded quickly. Satisfied, Pottermass closed the window. The limo drove off and disappeared around the Bug Burga building.
Benjamin shifted the umbrella on his shoulder and walked the rest of the way to the building. Even from outside he could see the damage. Two windows had been smashed, and one was cracked and covered in tape. Jagged glass balls were scattered all over the outdoors eating area, glinting in the rainwater. Benjamin decided he would take care of that first as he folded the umbrella, wincing as every movement he made aggravated his arm. He pushed open the door and went inside.
It was even worse than he'd imagined. He hadn't expected all of the chairs to be toppled, or the condiment sauces covering almost every surface like a three-dimensional abstract painting. Drinks had been spilled along with stomach contents. The cheetah's shoulders slumped at the sight. It was going to be a long, long, long day. He leaned his umbrella against the wall, figuring he could save the dripping puddle forming beneath the umbrella for last, and looked for the closet. Luckily for him the layout of Bug Burga was identical to that of the place where he used to work, and the closet was in the kitchen, right where he had expected it to be. The black metal door to the staff washrooms and the manager's office was shut, but he'd been told not to worry about cleaning in there. He took out a brush and dustpan and returned outside, where he spent the next few minutes sweeping up all the bits of glass he could find, doing his best to ignore the chilly raindrops pounding on his head and shoulders. It was raining so hard that it almost hurt. When the exterior mess was in the trash, Benjamin checked his watch. It was still over an hour until ZNN gave the morning news. He would check it out on his phone soon; see if there was any news on Nick or the others. The sky had turned a shade lighter, but it was still far too dark to see much. With the glass outside cleaned up so far as he knew, Benjamin went back inside. He would have to check the outdoors area again when the sun rose and make sure he hadn't missed anything.
Benjamin tugged at his collar as he reentered the dark room. He wasn't used to being in a Bug-Burga on his own in the dark. There were seemingly impenetrable shadows everywhere he looked, and the pale grey glint he could make out on the shinier surfaces looked sinister. Benjamin found the light switches in the kitchen area, but the electricity had been cut. Even the heating was off, which was no help at all for the dampness of his clothes chilling his legs and arms. If he'd known that Pottermass wouldn't have even had the power turned on, the cheetah would have brought a flashlight. His phone would have to do. Benjamin left his coat beside his umbrella and with his lit phone in the breast pocket of his shirt he began to sweep up the glass and fries. Every thrust of the brush made him grit his teeth. The painkillers were only doing so much for his arm.
A shadow passed by the window, but he paid it no mind. He couldn't say for sure but this was the time that mammals usually started coming home from their night jobs. Benjamin hoped the streets would fill up soon. He didn't like it here. He wasn't used to Bug Burga being so dark and quiet. Even a clicking sound he just heard coming from the back made his heart skip a beat. Stuff this, he was putting on his ear phones.
The flawless tunes of the Angel with Horns made him feel better, and he sped up his work while avoiding the spilled drinks and sick. That was something else that bothered him; Bug Burga smelling of vomit. It was freezing in here, only slightly less cold than it was outside in the rain. His teeth were chattering lightly as he swept, and his stitches were seriously hurting. This was officially the most miserable cleaning assignment of his life, and he was sure that this was exactly what Pottermass had intended.
"Nick, you jerk." He muttered bitterly as he emptied the dustpan into the trashcan.
With most of the mess cleaned he started picking up chairs and stacking them on the tables so he could clean the rest of the floor. He just had to sweep up a burger and fries in the corner and then he could switch to a mop and bucket. Once the last of the spilled food was scooped up and dumped with the rest, he started back to the closet for a mop and bucket. On his way through the kitchen he hesitated by the walk in fridge.
The door to the private area had been shut when he'd last been there… hadn't it?
Benjamin looked through open door at the short hallway, but saw nothing but shrinking shadows. The ambient light that came with the coming dawn was just enough by this point to see without a flashlight. Maybe he'd misremembered. The door itself was black anyway. The cheetah stepped away from the doorway and started to turn back to the storeroom.
Before he knew it he was toppling backwards. His stomach leapt into his chest. His bandaged arm slammed into the edge of the counter on the way down. Benjamin hit the tiles with a soft thud that knocked the air out of his lungs.
The cheetah lay there on his back on the freezing cold floor, trying not to black out. His arm felt like it had been slashed with a red-hot knife. At one point his collar beeped and zapped him. When he could breathe again, he slowly pushed himself up and looked around what he had tripped on.
He felt another chill when he saw that it was a gun. It wasn't a true handgun, like the Berettas and Glocks Honey kept locked in a safe far out of Sherry's reach. No, this looked more like a dart gun. Benjamin tentatively picked it up with his good arm while holding the other to his chest. The dart guns he'd seen the ZPD use at the rain on Wild Times were blue, white and orange. This one was coal black with yellow stripes on the sides, like a hornet in reverse. Also unlike the ZPD guns it had a thick nozzle that resembled a silencer. It must be a new model. The ZPD had come here last night to deal with the rowdy rioters, and perhaps had left one of their weapons behind in the chaos. A silly thing to do, for sure, especially for a cop, but Benjamin didn't find it funny. It had been a dart gun that had nearly killed him.
His arm was still on fire. He held it out, and his heart sank. There was a red stain forming on his sleeve. He sniffed it, but his hopes that it was only ketchup were dashed. He pulled the sleeve down to find that the stain was even bigger on his bandages.
His stitches had popped. Great. Just freaking great! The sun hadn't even risen yet! Could this day get any worse?
That jerk of a manager kept a first aid kit in his office back in the Bug Burga where he used to work. Benjamin hoped this one did the same. He had no idea what to do with popped stitches, but some extra dressings could stem the bleeding until he got to the emergency room. With the dart gun still in his good paw the cheetah got to his feet and entered the dark hallway. If the layout of the two Bug Burgas were identical, the manager's office was on the right hand side. He saw the doorway immediately and held his bleeding arm to his chest as he walked to it. He reached the threshold just as he pulled out his earphones, and then he froze.
There were shadows here too, formed by the filing cabinets and cheap wooden desk. But there was one shadow in particular that caught his eye, a big black shadow in the middle of the small room that was alive and breathing.
Benjamin frowned, his ears filling with a strange, squelching, crunching sound as the living shadow jerked its head. His breath stilled when he realized that the shadow was a mammal, a massive, breathing mammal dressed in a robe-like coat and a wide brimmed hat, both as black as death. It was crouched low on the floor, kneeling with its back to the puzzled cheetah as it held something in its thick arms. Benjamin stared at the intruder in silence as he tried to work out what it was doing. In the blackness close by, something the color of bone stood out to him. It resembled a mask like the ones everyone had been wearing at the party where he'd first met Captain Bogo, but this mask looked like a child would draw the skull of a crow, with round black lenses for eyes. Another crunch drew the cheetah's stare back to the dark shadow. The shadow jerked its head with a vicious motion, and something red sprayed on the floor and one of the filing cabinets. Benjamin flinched, and then tilted his head so he could see what it was holding.
It was another, smaller mammal, their tan coat soaked in blood. The coat had been torn open, half the buttons gone, the clothes and flesh beneath torn to shreds. Benjamin tilted his head further and saw the head of the smaller mammal. It was a wolf, lifeless eyes staring at the ceiling as the big shadowy mammal lowered its head back down to his ragged throat. There was another crunch, and the wolf's head tilted back. He was still alive!
Then Benjamin realized the falsehood of his realization when the head tilted all the way to an impossible angle over the big mammal's wrist. The neck connecting the head to the shoulders was a glistening mess of pale skin, frayed muscle, and fragments of vertebrae, everything that made up the back of the neck. Benjamin couldn't think of anything else but the sudden, horrible realization of what he was seeing. He stood there, frozen in the doorway, unable to move, speak or scream, as he watched the shadow feed. The wolf's head, almost completely upside down, began to lose the skin of his face. The grey fur gave way in a manner that was nothing like skin, then the snout and upper row of teeth, a mask, came away and hit the puddle with a soft splat. The head tilted slightly, the blank eyes of what was now Assistant Mayor Woolton with a wolf's body staring straight into Benjamin's soul.
The shadow stopped chewing. Slowly, a low growl spewing from its maw, the shadow turned its head. Benjamin saw the left side of the face of a dark furred grizzly, dripping bloody jaws, and a black, shark-like eye.
He dropped the dart gun and ran.