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Victor Hathorne is usually pretty content with his job.
It’s not exactly a fun job, or a particularly exciting job; but it pays the bills, and it pays pretty well. The hours are shit— 10 at night to 6 in the morning—but Axiom Labs makes up for it in generous benefits, including dental!
Victor hadn’t been to the dentist in seven years before snagging this position at Axiom Labs, and it’s a miracle he only had three cavities since.
The work is simple, janitorial duties. With most of the Axiom Lab staff leaving before Victor even arrives for his shift, it leaves most of the building to himself to clean. Four stories, technically, but he doesn’t have access to most of it. There are some higher-ups in the janitorial team that deal with the restricted areas. And they’re a team, of janitors—not something Victor ever imagined being a thing before starting at Axiom—so he’s not technically the only one working late hours, but he’s still usually alone.
Which is fine with him. He brings headphones and an old, busted MP3 player with him to work at night and he listens to music. Occasionally he’s able to find an audiobook to (not-so-legally) download to the MP3, so he isn’t just blaring loud rock/techno music for his entire eight hour shift, and he’s been actually reading books, surprisingly.
It’s a simple, easy job. Something that has helped him get a slightly less shitty apartment and a marginally better life. Not the best job, but it does what it needs to be done.
One night changes that for Victor.
The Head Custodian (what stupidly official name for just their manager) is in their break room already when Victor arrives one night. He’s not late. It’s about nine-forty, the usual time he clocks in, but the appearance of Ravenna Jones is only slightly alarming. Slightly intimidating. He doesn’t interact with her often. She’s usually in her office and doesn’t work the graveyard shift, only staying to eleven or midnight at most.
She’s sat at the table in the breakroom, looking over a clipboard. There’s a lot of numbers and things listed on the papers, but it isn’t something Victor can easily read. Not just with his dyslexia, mind you, but it’s also upside-down to him. Not to mention—not really any of his business.
“Mr. Hathorne?”
His head snaps up as he sets his bag in the locker. He stiffens. “…Yes?”
A million thoughts go through his mind. Is she going to fire me? Am I going to be fired? Did I forget to clean something last night? Sure, he occasionally came in a little buzzed, not like any of the other janitors are much better than Victor. He’s usually the only sober one of the normal staff.
“Alexa James is not going to be in today.” Ravenna starts. “Well, for a while, actually.”
“Is-- is she alright?”
“Yes, she is fine. Maternity leave.”
Oh. Oh! He remembers, faintly, Alexa saying something in passing to him the other night. They’d been successful with IVF treatments a while ago, and her wife was due soon. The baby must have come. “Oh, that’s… Great. Good for them, I mean.”
Ravenna looks up at him from her clipboard, nodding quietly. “Yes. She will be gone for a while, and we will need someone to take over her position temporarily. You’re the only other staff member in our department who can fill in for her while she’s gone.”
“M-Me?” He hadn’t even been there for a whole year yet. The entire situation is very surprising. “I mean, Bill’s been here for years, can’t he…?”
Ravenna shakes her head, pushing her chair back to stand up. As Head Custodian, Ravenna never has to dress in clothes that are meant to get dirty (like Victor), so her pencil skirt and blouse are clean, tidy, and professional, and she brushes off the dust on her skirt. “Bill has a criminal record. I know that Jefferson comes in too high every night for his shift. And Kallie, well…” She shakes her head, trailing off. “Your background check came up the cleanest.”
That’s not surprising. For such a refutable company, Axiom Labs does tend to… take their chances on some people with sketchier backgrounds, mostly for the grunt work like graveyard shift custodian.
Still. It’s a lot more responsibility to be suddenly thrust into.
“Um, I’m, uh, not sure—”
Ravenna pays him no mind, continuing. “George usually arrives about eleven-thirty, according to his time-clocks. He’ll be the one to show you around tonight on B-1. I’ve got a new ID badge for you so you can access the floors you need to. Pay attention with what you do tonight, because George won’t show you anything tomorrow.” She explains, pulling a new ID badge and lanyard out from under the pile of papers on her clipboard. How that worked, Victor really had no idea. “Alexa is on maternity leave for the next eight weeks. If you do well during this time, there may be a permanent position open for you in the meanwhile.” Ravenna finally looks at Victor for the first time, her brown eyes staring directly into his. “That is, if you’re up for it, Mr. Hathorne.”
Up for it. Well—to be honest, it doesn’t feel like Victor’s being given a choice in whether he wants to do this or not. He takes the new ID badge—it’s the same as his current one, but less faded, at least he didn’t have to re-take the picture—and tries to force out a smile. It feels like he bares too many teeth with it. He nods, too. It feels weird and awkward. “Uh, I guess, I guess so.”
“Perfect. And like I said, George usually arrives around eleven-thirty, so in the meanwhile, work on your usual areas.”
Of course. Unfortunate that he doesn’t even get a break for this.
Ravenna makes her way to the door out of the break room, but she stops, her hand resting on the door knob. “Have a great night, Mr. Hathorne. And, oh—I suppose this goes without saying, but that NDA you signed when you first worked with us applies especially so on the basement levels.”
Right, right. It’d made sense that he had to sign an NDA, especially given the fact that Axiom Labs tends to work with experimental technology, but Victor had thought he wouldn’t be dealing with those floors, like, ever. But despite everything, fate somehow still finds a way to kick him in the butt, doesn’t it?
It’s night three of his new “job”, and it doesn’t feel any less unsettling to swipe his ID in the elevator to get access to the basement floors. Floors. The building was bigger than he was ever told—three different basement floors, specifically for research and development with secret projects and technologies up the wazoo.
Most of it dealing with ghosts.
Victor isn’t a religious man. He’s probably closest to some sort of pantheistic agnostic at this point, after all the ghost nonsense had started the same year he’d dropped out of college and moved back to what was supposed to be just a small city in the middle of nowhere, Ohio. It’d changed a lot, not just with Victor’s own personal beliefs, but the entire city had been literally uprooted and thrown into hell? At some point? He’s not even quite sure what happened, he’d been a little too high that day and also slept through half of it, but apparently the ghost boy, Phantom, had beaten some guy and saved the day.
But it’s safe to say he’s pretty indifferent to ghosts, at this point. They tended to leave most of his life alone, attacking through the city at night while Victor is scrubbing away at floor tiles and bathroom mirrors and chilling (mostly) during the day when he’s sound asleep in his apartment. They tended to stick to the downtown areas more; they’d attacked Axiom Labs before, too, but that had only ever been during the day.
He sighs, listening to the rock music crescendo on his MP3 player as the elevator finally dings for B2. George had gotten off at B1 already, and B2 was Kallie’s area. Now it’s Victor’s area.
It’s a lot more than he’d expected. He still doesn’t have access to all the rooms in the building. A few are locked off with “Authorized Personnel Only” signs in big letters on the door. He’d tried swiping his card through them once, just out of curiosity, but it didn’t work. Whatever. Victor doesn’t want to know what’s going on behind those doors. Possibly clandestine deals with the U.S. Government, those weird people always running around in white suits. Ghost Investigation Ward, or whatever?
Victor wished he didn’t have to care about those idiots but they’re worse than the Fentons. They keep sending people—living, breathing, human people—to the hospital from either their reckless driving or their horrible aims. At least with the Fentons, their inventions didn’t do more than stain clothes or leave nothing worse than a carpet burn, but those government pricks have more powerful weaponry that hurts. Victor remembers when Bill had to call off after he’d been caught in the crossfire of a GIW agent and Phantom on his way home. He was stuck in the hospital for a week, and the government wouldn’t pay him anything.
Taking out his ID again, Victor swipes it at the main janitorial closet on B2. Thanks to the government funding, at least, there’s a cleaning supply closet on every single floor. He doesn’t have to lug his usual mop and bucket setup from his usual floor all the way down to B2. Supplies are neatly color-coded and organized in this closet, and Victor tries to keep up with it as best as he can. Kallie’s incredibly neat and detail-oriented. He doesn’t want to mess with whatever system she’s got going here, especially since Kallie will be back from maternity leave, of all things, and will be a little more stressed than normal as schedules shift and fix themselves.
His MP3 player plays a Humpty Dumpty song next as he grabs a mop and a bucket, looking for the right concoction of chemicals to make the sudsy potion that leaves the floors sparkling clean. He knows what to mix and what not to mix—no accidental mustard gas creation here, folks— but Axiom Labs gets high quality stuff and they want it all used, all the time. Floor polish, soap, sanitation—everything. He grabs the soap first, pouring a bottlecap worth of the fluid before mixing it into the bucket until it starts to sud up. Once it does, it’s pretty easy. He hooks the mop handle under the bucket and rolls it out into the hallway, ready to start his shift.
Halfway through mopping, though, a crash echoes through the hallway, and Victor jumps.
His MP3 player stops working. There’s a fog in the air as he breathes. The temperature plummets, and the light fixtures flicker.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.”
Of course there’s a ghost on his floor. Actually, wait, no, it’s not even his floor, it’s Kallie’s floor, and with how Axiom Labs and the government are working together, why should he even be surprised that a ghost is down here, at this point? Victor groans as he pushes the bucket out from the center of the floor, digging into his pocket for his phone.
Protocol, protocol, protocol…! He remembers the training. B.O.O., or whatever they’d called it. Something cheesy. Back out, organize, and what was that last thing…?
His phone turns on, but there’s no signal. Or Wi-Fi.
Of course.
He’s barely able to pocket his phone before he hears another bang behind him, and a loud curse from around the corner.
Victor freezes. He knows he should get out of there. Ghosts never really meant anything good, in his experience. Especially in a building like this, which was armed with anti-ghost technology developed by Axiom Labs, some by FentonTech, and all paid for with government funds. The building had been incredibly tricked out since the first ghost attack, so Victor didn’t think he really had to worry.
But. But. Curiosity killed the cat, and Victor nervously pokes his head around the corner to see who’s there.
Is that… Phantom?
The ghost is floating a few inches off the ground, one gloved hand sizzling from something. He’s not dressed in his usual garb. His white boot are gone, replaced with steel-toed combat boots, and it looks like a black hoodie was thrown over him to try to hide some of his glow. But with his floating, it’s still obvious he’s a ghost.
“No, Tuck, that didn’t work either.” Phantom says, holding one hand up to his ear. Probably to a phone, or communicator. Hopefully not to a ghost that Victor can’t see. He laughs at something. “Oh, yeah, sure, like an ID card is just going to appear out of the blue for me.”
What is he even doing here?
“I can try to go under, but I bet they’ve made sure to ghost-proof the floors and ceilings of that room, too.” Phantom adds, sighing. He pauses for a beat. “No, you guys wait outside, I don’t want you getting too involved with this. Yeah, I know, but I don’t want your faces plastered on wanted posters all across the city! It’s bad enough with me—" It devolves into an argument.
Phantom is here. That’s not normal. Phantom tends to avoid the Axiom Lab building like the plague. Most ghosts do. Maybe they can sense something that humans can’t. Maybe they just don’t want to deal with the ghost-hunters that are often in the place during the daytime, and they don’t have a use for it. But Phantom is here. Why is that?
Victor does believe Phantom is a good guy. Er, ghost. He died young, too young—even though photos can’t show ghosts that well, this isn’t the first time Victor has seen Phantom in the non-corporeal flesh. The way that baby fat still clings to his cheeks is obvious. Phantom died young. Everyone in Amity Park knows that. Most think he’s trying to do good, at the very least; be the hero for everybody else that he never had. It’s noble.
But Axiom Labs isn’t the bad guy.
… Right?
“Yeah, yeah, Tuck. I get it. Give me some time to think. I might be able to—” Phantom glances around, before he locks eyes with Victor, and stops. “—Um. Lemme get back to you.”
Shit, shit shit. Victor jumps back from the corner. Maybe he didn’t actually see him?
But a cold tap on the shoulder from behind gives it away. Victor tries to hide the shock as best as he can, but he still jumps a bit at Phantom’s sudden appearance behind him. How did you even…?
“Hi! You’re not gonna kill me, right?”
“U-uh, no, I’m just a janitor.” Plus, you’re a ghost, aren’t you already dead? Victor wants to add, but death always seems like an inappropriate topic to discuss with a ghost.
“Great! Good. You’re not going to call any back-up, either, are you?”
“I—um—” If he could, he probably would. But also, it’s just Phantom. And also, he can’t, probably because of Phantom. He does feel himself pale a bit, though, and he nervously pockets his phone again. “N-No.”
Phantom nods, floating back a bit. Victor’s a little jealous of that. He’d love to float whenever he wanted. But he’s quite content with the beat of his heart and his feet on the ground right now.
“Awesome. Cool. Do you have an ID that could get me into the central room, there?”
“I don’t think I have the clearance for it.”
“Hm. One sec.” Phantom taps at his ear again. “Tuck, you still there?”
A beat of silence. Victor can almost hear a response, but it’s too quiet and muffled to make any specific words out.
“Yeah, I got an ID, but it doesn’t have clearance. Can you…? Okay, yeah.” Suddenly, Phantom is holding Victor’s ID. He doesn’t even remember giving it to Victor. “Good now? Cool! Thanks.” Phantom starts floating back into the direction, with Victor’s ID in hand. “Just need to borrow this quickly, concerned citizen!”
“I—I will, uh, need that back—" Victor starts to follow him. There’s an odd, calming aura around Phantom. Or maybe he’s been hypnotized. He doesn’t know. The older folk of Amity Park always say Phantom is manipulating and hypnotizing the younger people. Are they right? Probably not. They can’t even figure out how to print a document properly. But they might have a grain of truth to it.
“Sure, right after—” Phantom swipes Victor’s ID on the card reader. The card reader immediately explodes into flames, which Phantom quickly freezes over. The door does, somehow, slide open. He sheepishly passes Victor’s ID back. “Uh. Sorry. You might need a new one.”
It’s singed. The printed picture of Victor’s face is completely covered in ash and soot, and one corner of it is melted, now.
Victor shakes his head, pocketing it. He watches Phantom enter the center room. It is the one room he’d been the most curious about. No windows to try to peer through, a steel door, state-of-the-art security clearance… What could be hiding there? He opens his mouth, not hesitating to ask his questions. “Phantom, what are you—what are you even doing here?”
Silence. Victor hesitates, before stepping through the doorframe.
There’s a lot of anti-ghost technology scattered about. It definitely looks like a laboratory in there, but more like a mad scientist lab than what Victor had been cleaning on the higher levels. Vials of glowing green liquids lined the walls. Ectoplasm, by the look and smell of it. It’s radioactive, am I even safe to be in here?
With Phantom’s nonchalant attitude in the room, Victor assumes he’ll be okay for now. The ghost has some wild protective instincts over anyone living in Amity Park, which does rarely come in handy sometimes (like the time the town had been taken to hell. Yeah, that thing Victor somehow slept through most of).
“Ah. There you are!” Phantom grabs something from one of the tables gently, pulling the thermos off of his belt loop. It’s a small orb, about the size of his palm, and it’s pulsating with a faint turquoise glow. He uncaps the thermos, and doesn’t even press the button on the side, just sliding the orb into the tube and closing it tightly. “Sorry I took a bit, Ember, I’ll get you back to the zone pronto.”
Ember? Like, the singer?
“Phantom, what…?” Victor trails off, before getting another look at the room. There are vials of ectoplasm, but there’s also a faint trace of it on the walls. Like something had been fought in the room. It had been violent. Eventually subdued, but the glow on the walls, barely visible under the glow of the left-on computer and the ghost in front of him, looked like blood splatters. It’d been violent. Too violent.
And that orb—it’d been the only thing to survive.
Phantom doesn’t respond.
“Phantom?”
“I should go, before you get fired.”
“But wait—what—who was that? What… what happened in here?” Victor might be dyslexic, he might’ve dropped out of college, but he had a deep, sinking feeling in his gut that something was wrong. Very, very wrong. The air felt like it’d been sucked out of the room, and replaced with imprints of what had happened. It was almost… painful.
Eventually, Phantom speaks. “Under the Federal Anti-Ecto Control Acts, any creature found to have traces of ectoplasm in their blood is legally seen as a non-sentient entity that needs to be captured, studied, and destroyed. The Guys in White don’t have any lab set up in Amity, so they take advantage of Axiom during the day.”
Captured.
Studied.
Destroyed.
“Look, uh, mister.” Phantom breaks the silence again. His voice cracks a bit. “I should get going. Um, if anyone asks, I possessed you for this, okay? Then, at least, you won’t get fired for this.” He laughs, nervously. “Thanks for the help, though.”
I didn’t really help much, Victor thought. He hadn’t even really handed Phantom his ID card. But, then again, Victor didn’t really stop him, either.
“S-Sure.” Victor eventually stutters out.
And, just like he’d appeared without warning, Phantom disappeared, leaving Victor alone in the lab with his thoughts.
Victor's resignation papers were on Ravenna’s desk by the morning.