Free Cannibal Dwarf Detective: An Ephemeral Beardening by Hunter Wiseman, Hayden Wiseman Page A

of this tower had any idea of what it
is that we do to maintain this world… Well, even you would wish to be kept in
the dark.”
    “Hm,” Mu says and moves around behind
the duo. He begins massaging their necks. “Perhaps we can make a deal. If you
tell me everything-“
    “We all know that if we tell you our
plans, you’ll tell every one of your men and who knows where the information
will go from there,” Alfonzo interrupts. “You said it yourself, Mu.
Transparency and honesty go hand in hand with honor. Well, it’s beginning to
seem obvious to me that this isn’t a situation we can deal with you on. Honor
is a dated concept. Secrecy and privacy are crucial to maintaining
civilization. I think we’ll be taking our leave now.”
    “If that is your wish I will not stop
you,” Mu says. He stands and points them to a door in the rear of the room.
“I’m certain I’ll find out whatever secrets the two of you are keeping from the
people of this tower someday.”
    “And I’m certain you won’t, Mu,”
Alfonzo says as he passes through the door behind his son. “One last thing,
Mu…”
    “Yes?”
    “If you happen to see a velociraptor,
give us a call.”
    “Kay thanks bye.”
     

Part
XII: Janitorial Space Wizard
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 16
    “One day a hamster exploded in a
hallway and I had naught to clean that shit up but a bottle of ammonia and my
tongue,” the Janitor grumbles to no one in particular. In fact he grumbles to
no one at all because he’s alone on the highest point of the highest
sky-scraper at the top of the C.D.P.D tower. He’s the only janitor in the
entire tower. Under funded and underappreciated. Stuck on window washing duty.
    “So after I ate the hamster and drank
the ammonia I puked my guts out for like four hours straight and fell down two
flights of stairs. I shit myself. And not because of the ammonia or the impact
wounds. I mean regularly. Hell, I’m doing it right now. It’s cold at night.
They turn the heat off. It keeps my ass warm. You know what else keeps me warm?
Me neither.”
    The old Janitor continues spouting
nonsense as he sprays water onto a window and then punches it. Glass shatters
all over.
    “No one ever said a broken window
wasn’t a clean window. Har.”
    He reaches down and starts picking up
pieces of glass and putting them into his mouth. His cheeks puffed up like a
squirrel packing nuts, he punches his cheeks together with his bum-gloved fists
in an attempt to spray the glass like one might with water. It doesn’t work.
All manner of jagged edges pierce his skin and blood pours down his face.
    “Damn it. You’d think I’d have
learned from the last time. Least this time I used my face.”
    He stumbles about and starts waving
his hands in the air. See, this homeless unpaid janitor is also a wizard,
because why the hell not?
    Thin blue lines manifest in the air
between his hands as he chants, “Man ram ho so. Man ram ho so.”
    He places the tangled blue web over
his face and his wounds vanish.
    He attempts to teleport down into
Larston for a crayon, but his molecules restructure around a chair and his
hands and feet are made of wood.
    “Dammit.”
    He fumbles around at his waist, trying
to open a pouch filled with alchemical solutions and cleaning supplies until he
finds what he’s looking for. He carefully draws his wooden hand from the pouch,
holding a small vial filled with green ooze. He glances around at the patrons
in the crayon bar.
    “If any of y’all are vampires, you
might want to leave now,” he says. “This is about to get messy.”
    He wraps his short, messy gray beard
around his neck and then uncorks the vial with his teeth and downs the liquid
in a single shot. He winces and everyone in the room can hear a noise not
dissimilar to that of a tea kettle at a boil. His stomach bulges and he holds
it, clearly in pain.
    “Last chance vampires,” he says.
“Leave.”
    His lips quiver