Strike of the Sweepers Read online

  Janitors Book 4

  Strike of the Sweepers

  Tyler Whitesides

  © 2014 Tyler Whitesides.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher, Shadow Mountain®. The views expressed herein are the responsibility of the author and do not necessarily represent the position of Shadow Mountain.

  Illustrations © 2014 Brandon Dorman

  Visit us at ShadowMountain.com

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Whitesides, Tyler, author.

  Strike of the sweepers / Tyler Whitesides.

  pages cm. — (Janitors ; book 1)

  Summary: Spencer, Daisy, and their team witness a Sweeper warlock eat Professor DeFleur whole and they must once again launch into a fight against evil.

  ISBN 978-1-60907-907-9 (hardbound : alk. paper)

  [1. Monsters—Fiction. 2. School custodians—Fiction. 3. Schools—Fiction. 4. Friendship—Fiction. 5. Magic--Fiction.] I. Title. II. Series: Whitesides, Tyler. Janitors ; bk. 4.

  PZ7.W58793St 2014

  [Fic]—dc232014012932

  Printed in the United States of America

  R. R. Donnelley, Harrisonburg, VA

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For readers who like to build their imagination—

  And for Aubrey and Lance, who helped build mine.

  Table of Contents

  “Pink is not stealthy.”

  “I call it Gloppish.”

  “Like a potion?”

  “It will keep you safer.”

  “Maybe he’s homesick.”

  “Holga.”

  “I don’t even have a whistle.”

  “Can I have it now?”

  “I’m not even in the band!”

  “No whiff from me.”

  “All aboard!”

  “What’s next?”

  “What more can you lose?”

  “Speaking of garbage . . .â€*

  “Did you say Port-a-Potty?”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  “I look totally awesome!”

  “She’ll never see me coming.”

  “Let’s just see what happens.”

  “A classic American chocolate.”

  “Keep your head down!”

  “It’s a bit cramped.”

  “Who’s it going to be?”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “I can work with that.”

  “Piece of cake.”

  “We’re doomed.”

  “Good times, good times.”

  “You guys are going to get an F.”

  “Where’d she get it?”

  “His head’s empty.”

  “That’s a lame power.”

  “Those are your biceps.”

  “Did we die?”

  “It’s bugging me.”

  “He said it.”

  “Built it.”

  “They’re quilted, like Charmin.”

  “I got a strike once.”

  “Open up!”

  “Where are your companions?”

  “Just flip the switch!”

  “He deserves to die.”

  “Where are the Rebels?”

  “I’m not wearing this.”

  “We need more weapons!”

  “You . . .â€*

  “I don’t believe you will.”

  “Tonight we turn the tables.”

  “What if someone gets thirsty?”

  “Leave?”

  “This is final, Spencer.”

  “That is incorrect.”

  “There’s work to be done.”

  “Give me the nails!”

  “Retreat!”

  Acknowledgments

  Reading Guide

  Chapter 1

  “Pink is not stealthy.”

  It was raining. And cold. The parking lot of Welcher Elementary School was a giant puddle, with light from the nearby streetlamps glinting white against the slick blacktop.

  “April showers bring May flowers,” Alan Zumbro whispered, a poor attempt to lighten the mood.

  Spencer scanned the empty parking lot, but there was still no sign of Walter’s janitorial van. He turned to Daisy, whose teeth were chattering so loudly it sounded like a machine gun.

  “We should get somewhere out of the rain,” Spencer said. “We’ll be soaked and frozen by the time we get inside.”

  Daisy’s shaking hand reached into a pouch on her janitorial belt. “I have this,” she said, withdrawing something and handing it to Spencer.

  “You had an umbrella?” Spencer said. “Why didn’t you use it?”

  “It’s pink,” answered Daisy, tugging at her sopping black beanie. “Walter said we should wear dark clothes so we could be stealthy.”

  “Good point,” Spencer said. A hot pink umbrella against the dark wall of the school would be like a lighthouse to anyone watching. He handed the umbrella back. “Pink is not stealthy.”

  The thought of shelter from the rain vanished as headlights flashed across the wet parking lot. Walter’s janitorial van careened into view, stopping a few feet from the school’s rear doors.

  The old warlock stepped out of the vehicle, his bald head instantly shiny from the rain. Alan led Spencer and Daisy from their hiding place against the wall. The four of them ran the short distance to the school doors, and Walter fumbled with some keys. A moment later, they were inside.

  “Where’s Penny?” Spencer asked. He found it strange she wasn’t there, since the warlock rarely went anywhere without his janitor gymnast niece.

  “That’s Nicole to you,” Walter said with a wink. Spencer would never get used to calling his friends by false names. But it was important now. Two weeks ago, Walter Jamison had been rehired as head janitor at Welcher Elementary School. Of course, he was going under his old alias of John Campbell. And Penny was his new assistant janitor, Nicole Jones.

  It was by far the best thing that had happened to Spencer and Daisy since Walter had been fired earlier that year. The kids had spent the last several months working around Mr. Joe, a simple custodian who didn’t even know Toxites existed. Now Walter was back at Welcher full-time, hunting the brainwave-sucking creatures and protecting Spencer and Daisy.

  “Penny’s not coming tonight,” Walter said. “This is a matter for the four of us.”

  Spencer knew there was only one thing that Walter would keep a secret from Penny. It was something that had happened at the Aurans’ hidden landfill after Penny and Bernard Weizmann had left. Walter hadn’t been there either, but Alan, Spencer, and Daisy had quietly brought him into the secret.

  “This is about the Manualis Custodem,” Walter said, striding off toward the janitorial closet, the Rebels’ secret base.

  Spencer felt his breath catch in his chest. If the Manualis Custodem was the reason for their late-night gathering, then big things were on the horizon. The book had been a gift from the Dark Auran boys. Its pages held a secret that would change everything in the war against the BEM. The Manualis Custodem would tell them how to find the Founding Witches and bring them back. Spencer had given the first edition Janitor Handbook to Walter almost two months ago. It was written in a foreign language, so the warlock had set out immediately to find a trusted translator. Then came the long, anxious weeks of waiting.

  Now, at last, something was happening.

  Spencer’s wet footsteps left little puddles in the hallway. Walter led them down the stairs and into the cluttered janitorial storage area. Spencer al
most slipped on the stairs, but he didn’t grab the handrail. There was no telling what kind of germs clung to a public handrail.

  Walter grabbed a stack of boxes and slid them aside to reveal a secret door. On the other side, a bare lightbulb flickered on, and the four Rebels moved into the hidden room.

  “I received word from our translator last night,” Walter said. “Professor DeFleur has finished.”

  Spencer shared an excited look with his dad. If the translation was complete, then they were one step closer to finding the Founding Witches.

  “Such important information cannot be trusted in the mail,” Walter said, “so Professor DeFleur arranged to give us the translated manuscript in person.”

  “He’s coming here?” Daisy asked, a residual shiver shaking her voice a bit.

  Walter shook his head. “We’re going to him.”

  The old warlock lifted a long-handled squeegee from a rack on the wall. Spencer had seen people use them to clean windows, but he’d never encountered one that was Glopified.

  “My latest invention.” Walter held the squeegee out for examination. It looked ordinary enough.

  “You plan on cleaning some windows?” Daisy asked.

  Walter shook his head. “It’s for traveling,” he said. “Remember the Glopified garbage trucks that the Aurans drive? The backs of their trucks are portals to the dumpsters at the landfill.”

  Spencer remembered perfectly. They’d escaped from the hidden landfill by jumping into a dumpster. As they had fallen through, they had come out in the back of Rho’s garbage truck. The Dark Aurans had destroyed the dumpster behind the Rebels so nobody could follow. Last thing Spencer had heard, Bernard had adopted Rho’s garbage truck and was driving it around.

  “I was able to figure out a Glop formula that was similar to the garbage truck portal,” Walter explained. “I used it on this squeegee.”

  “We’re supposed to jump into a squeegee?” Daisy raised an eyebrow.

  “Not exactly,” said Walter. “There’s a set of two Glopified squeegees. When I run mine across a piece of glass, it creates a magical opening. When the other squeegee is used on a different piece of glass, it creates a portal between the two. We step through our squeegeed glass, and we come out wherever the other squeegee was used.”

  Alan clapped his hands together, a smile across his bearded face. “Brilliant!” he said. “Why didn’t we try something like this sooner?”

  “I needed to use the garbage truck as a model to get the right Glop formula,” Walter said.

  “I could have helped,” Spencer said, suddenly feeling left out.

  More than two months had passed since he’d discovered his full powers as an Auran. He could Glopify anything with his right hand and de-Glopify with his left. It was as simple as spitting. Literally.

  When Spencer became an Auran, Glop was introduced into his bodily systems. Rubbing spit between his hands would activate the Glop and access his powers. It was gross, yes. But Spencer wanted to experiment with it. Walter had forbidden him, talking about a bunch of unknown dangers. Spencer’s only experience had been to de-Glopify the Aurans’ pump house. And that had left him drained.

  “So, who has the second squeegee?” Alan asked.

  “Professor Dustin DeFleur,” answered Walter.

  “A professor dusting the floor?” Daisy said.

  Walter looked puzzled. “What? No. Why would he be dusting the floor?”

  “That’s what you said,” Daisy insisted. “Professor dusting the floor.”

  Walter smiled, finally understanding the confusion. “That’s his name. Dustin DeFleur.”

  “That’s got to be a fake name,” Spencer said. “Who would name their child Dustin DeFleur?”

  “His parents were French,” Walter defended. “And don’t say anything about his name. He’s very sensitive.”

  “So how is this going to work?” Alan broke in.

  Walter stepped over to a rack and retrieved a spray bottle of Glopified window cleaner. In a moment, he had misted the door. It shimmered blue and turned to glass. “The squeegee portal only lasts about fifteen minutes,” he said. “One of us should stay here to make sure it doesn’t close.”

  It was quiet for a moment. Then Daisy raised her hand. “Fine, I’ll stay.”

  Walter nodded. “If the portal starts to close, just swipe the squeegee across the glass again.”

  Spencer checked his janitorial belt. It was loaded with supplies he probably wouldn’t need, but it always felt better to be armed when stepping into the unknown. Walter handed the squeegee to Daisy and strapped on his own belt.

  “Ready to find out how to bring the Founding Witches back?” Alan said. There were anxious smiles around the room. Then Daisy Gates swiped the Glopified squeegee down the glass door.

  Chapter 2

  “I call it Gloppish.”

  It didn’t happen like Spencer expected. A wake of visible magic flowed in the squeegee’s path. The glass turned fizzy and bubbly, glowing an eerie green. It stayed like that, a stripe of roiling magic down the door.

  “I’m not stepping into that,” Spencer muttered.

  “Professor DeFleur must be late.” Walter checked his watch. “Any minute now.”

  As the warlock spoke, something happened to the squeegee mark. It changed color, growing darker and then fizzling out. In a flash, everything was different. The squeegee mark was now an open passageway, only a line of magic sizzling around it like a narrow door frame. The view showed a dim library, obviously closed to the public at this time of night.

  Spencer jumped with fright when the face of a wizened old man popped into sudden view. He had some serious mad-scientist hair, all white and frizzy. A pair of round glasses slipped down his nose, and when he smiled, some of his teeth twinkled with gold fillings.

  “Quickly!” he whispered hoarsely. “Come in!”

  Through the squeegeed opening, Spencer saw Professor DeFleur hobble across the library, a thin wooden cane in hand.

  Wordlessly, Walter stepped through the portal, Alan close behind. Daisy caught Spencer’s arm as he put a foot through.

  “Do you think we can trust that guy?” she whispered. “He looks like he might be . . .” She twirled a finger around her ear, making the universal sign for “crazy.”

  “He’s the leading expert on a made-up language,” Spencer said. “He’s got to be a little crazy.”

  “He has nice hair, though,” Daisy said. “Same color as yours.”

  Spencer rolled his eyes and ran his fingers through his own hair, whitened from the shock of using his Auran powers. He followed his dad through the portal.

  From the title, everyone assumed that the Manualis Custodem was written in Latin. But as soon as Walter had used his bronze nail to open the latch sealing the book, the Rebels realized they were up against something entirely different.

  Walter had found a Rebel linguist who specialized in archaic tongues and made-up language variations. Until now, Spencer hadn’t learned much about the translator. He knew Professor DeFleur had worked his entire career for the BEM before they turned evil. Now the old man was a member of a retired janitors’ group who called themselves the Silver Swiffers.

  Spencer had heard Walter mention the group before. Most were too old to help the Rebels. Many of them didn’t even know that there was a problem with the BEM. They were so nonthreatening that the BEM left them alone. Walter had known Professor DeFleur for decades, so when it came time to find a translator for the Manualis Custodem, the warlock knew just where to turn.

  The retired professor stood before them now, hunched over a table in the dim library, beckoning the Rebels to come closer.

  Spencer scanned the area, curious to find out where Professor DeFleur had used the squeegee. One end of the library was made up of side-by-side picture windows. The view through the glass showed a lawn lit by a streetlamp—except for one swatch the width of a squeegee. Spencer could still see into the Rebel janitor closet, Daisy standin
g only feet away, though they might have traveled several states in a matter of inches.

  “Here we are,” muttered Professor DeFleur. Spencer hurried over to the table, immediately recognizing the leather-bound Manualis Custodem. Beside it was a blue three-ring binder, thick from the pages inside.

  “This is the translation?” Alan asked, touching the binder.

  Professor DeFleur nodded, his crazy white hair bouncing. “It was the trickiest of translations,” he said. “You see, the original was written in a language that never really existed. A complex, made-up variation on Latin.”

  “Like Pig Latin?” Daisy shouted through the portal.

  Professor DeFleur chuckled. “Something like that. Maybe more like Glop Latin.” He leaned his cane against the edge of the table and flipped open the Manualis Custodem. “I call it Gloppish. The base language was definitely Latin, but the Witches added these almost hieroglyphic symbols that—”

  The terrible sound of shattering glass caused Spencer to double over in fright. He twisted around to see what had happened and realized with a pang of dread that the squeegee portal was gone! The picture window, where Daisy had stood only seconds ago, was broken into a thousand shards.

  But far worse than the shattered window was the thing that had broken it. Spencer stared at it for a moment, unable to decide if it was a man or a Toxite. Then the sickening truth struck him.