The Cleaner

Oakley tried every single hiding place the house seemed to offer yet had to admit defeat as he returned to the office empty-handed. He slumped against the ottoman. He took a deep breath out and contemplated the situation of the day. After a few moments of thought, he stretched his arm above his head to reach for the folder that was sitting on the leather cushion of the ottoman.

Taking another deep breath he pulled it down and unzipped it on his lap. The folder contained streams of profiles of people. Photos, addresses, occupations and even family sizes were listed. There were hundreds that Oakley flicked through, but he did notice one thing, a number replaced where he was sure a name would be. It struck him as odd as he was thumbing through the profiles, he reached the end of the zip folder and there was a little pouch in the covering. He felt through the fabric and could make out something hard in the pouch, he pulled open the flap and fingered the contents inside. He could feel the sharp metallic edges, it was a key. Pulling it out he stared at it for a minute, his eyes wandered from the key to the locked drawer. Oakley leapt to his feet, it had to be.

The drawer slid open revealing a laptop, Oakley lifted it and placed it on the desk in front of him. The screen flashed in front of him requesting a password, a slight rise of frustration brewed within Oakley.

"Why did everything have to be a mission?" he thought.

One of the greatest things about modern technology is its ability to predict human behavior and offer solutions to inevitable issues, like forgetting your password. Oakley hovered over the password hint button; the hint was codeword. Oakley grinned, where had he heard and seen that before?

He tapped in the word he had spoken to the guardians earlier that day and sure enough the desktop appeared in front of him. Video files filled the background screen, the picture behind barely visible to him but a symbol he had started to recognise, nevertheless. Plugging in the accompanying charger, he got himself comfy in the office chair and clicked on one of the videos. The screen showed a full conference room, he pressed play.

Staines assistant handed him a coffee, and she was muttering through the list of things on her clipboard she was gripping tightly. It was early and Staines was not in the mood for today's order of proceedings. He rounded off the corner and entered the big glass conference room doors, taking his seat near the Head of the Order. The room filled up. All the seats around the conference table were facing the large screen that almost covered the whole of the wall opposite. A box which read the word disconnected flashed repetitively in the middle. It was odd, Staines thought, that on a day in which they were due to discuss what they were about to, nice freshly baked Danish's, croissants and cinnamon rolls were on offer. Casual conversation could be overheard, how's the wife and how's the kids, being exchanged between a multitude of bodies.

It did not thrill Staines about what they were there to discuss, the guy they were sweetly nicknaming The Cleaner was about to receive his role responsibilities for when The Drop had hit. The whole thing didn't sit well with Staines. The Cleaner, whoever he was, was going to report to him, yet he wasn't allowed to know anything about him. Nobody was. He was anonymous and had free jurisdiction in the new regime after The Drop, which was only a mere two weeks away.

The meeting came to a natural silence as the lights dipped slightly and the screen flashed from disconnected to a blacked-out figure appearing on the screen. The Head of the Order, who sat at the head of the table, who was the engineer of the whole thing, spoke.

"Good morning, can you hear me clearly?" he asked the figure on the screen.

"I can," the figure said, somewhat distorted.

"Fantastic, then we can begin" he directed his attention to the rest of the people sat around the table. "Let's go from the top."

Staines let out a frustrated sigh and turned over the first page of the proceedings that lay in front of him. This was going to be a long couple of hours, and he would have to overcome his discomfort.

Staines was right. The briefing was long, but ultimately productive. This was The Cleaner's one chance to understand his requirements and ask questions they may have had. They went through The Register page by page, discussing every single citizen that will remain and ensuring The Cleaner understood that if they were not in the register than they should not be alive. It engulfed Staines in discomfort that the figure on the screen hadn't spoken once throughout, and when the time came to ask questions he had stayed silent still.

The Cleaner only finished his connection by saying, "Yes Sir" and signing off.

The feeling that The Cleaner evoked within Staines, the one of discomfort and incredulity, was exactly the thing that made him believe they had got the right guy.

Oakley slumped back in the office chair once the video in front of him had ended. The god-awful wretch reflex struck him once more. He felt sick again. Though this time it was the kind that runs throughout you, makes you shiver and really, truly fear. The kind that you shake off much like dogs do. The kind you don't want to think too much about because the truths within it are horrifying. The kind that in a former life, he had made millions throughout the world feel. This was a first for him, and that was the scariest outcome of all.

He sat stunned in silence for a moment considering the position he was in and ultimately realising that had he not taken the former Oakley by surprise, there was no way he would have taken that man alive. It was a swift bout of good fortunate that now seemed to be nothing but misery and anxiety for him. The revelations he had just become privy to made him wish he had just died how he was supposed to.

Part of him couldn't help but feel that maybe this was his karma. Would death by the lethal injection have been too convenient, too easy for him?

His prison sentence wasn't even that taxing, he spent the majority in isolation on death row. The thing they don't tell you about death row is that the end goal is horrible. That goes without saying. But while living on it, you receive an elevated level of treatment. The one thing about good, normal people is they feel and have emotions, the sympathy is rife.

All Oakley knew, in a mystery of the universe way, was that he had been gifted a second chance, perhaps one in impossible circumstances, but a second chance all the same. How he was going to use it was now the big question. A lot of things now made more sense to him, thankfully. The black leather case containing the endless pages of people he now knew to be The Register.