Clean-Up On Anchor Lane

The morning after a battle in the city was always a devastating time.

It was a time of mourning and counting losses, both human and not, by officials and citizens alike. Some city battles were worse than others, but it was rarely a pleasant sight the morning after regardless of how big or bad, small or quick said battle had been. No matter the size of the battle, the beloved city was always left in destruction. It was left a wreck to be rebuild once again.

It was no different on this particular morning.

There was destruction everywhere, as far as the eye could see. Buildings had collapsed. So many buildings, offices and apartments and stores, newly-build as well as old, and a few with giant ships from beyond lying crashed in the rubble that had once formed said buildings. Furniture and various possessions laid strewn all over Anchor Lane and every street beyond it.

Fallen trees, smashed cars and bikes and other transportation vehicles, garbage cans, torn-apart fences, and many other things had been thrown around and put in places they didn’t belong, all things as if carelessly discarded.

Above it all hung a blanket of smoke, rising from the fires that were still burning despite the crew from the Fire Department doing their utmost to put them all out. But the Department was understaffed and there were so many fires. So many, and the flames rose high and clawed their ways up and around anything dry and wooden.

The smoke traveled far and up, blocking out the orange light from the morning sun. Bob could feel it travel into his lungs too. He tried not to cough as he stood there, staring ahead at the disaster, but it was hard not to. It burned him, almost, choked him.

“What a disaster,” said someone to his right with a heavy sigh.

Bob tore his gaze away and looked at Pat. She stood beside him with her hands on her hips and a tight-lipped expression on her face. She didn’t look sad, not like Bob himself felt. Sad for the losses and for the injured, for the city. Instead, she looked annoyed, almost. She sounded it too, as if the destruction of the city was merely a mud smear on white walls done by a child.

For those who didn’t know her, one might think her an asshole. But Bob knew that she was as heartbroken as him and everyone else. She always was, though she never said it and never let it show to others. Bob had caught the little looks she would hide and heard her sob in the breakroom afterward enough times to know that she did care. She was just merely the boss and needed to keep her cool.

She had to make herself numb in the face of disaster. She had to.

The battles had grown more frequent in the city, and they had gotten worse over the last year, ever since a hero had torn the fabric of the universe and invited villains from beyond into theirs. That first initial battle had been the worst of them all, and Bob couldn’t bare even think about it. People had been angry afterward, and rightly so, but the government had kept which hero had done it a secret and so, the public had had no one to blame.

There had been hatred for all heroes for a time because of it. It had been a rough time, full of distrust and destruction not caused by villains. Bob’s Department, the Clean-Up Department, had never had so much work to do than then, constant and daily.

The hatred for heroes had eventually vanished for the most part because the heroes were saving people again, doing good, killing the villains from beyond, saving the day.

Leaving streets and whole cities in destruction, again and again.

The hatred vanished for the majority, but some still held onto it.

“No bodies though,” Pat continued beside him. “Morgue must’ve gotten here before us.”

“Or there were no casualties,” Bob countered, though he knew that was delusional with a battle of this destruction.

Pat laughed. It was a hollow laugh. She said, “There always is.”

Bob said nothing to that, because he knew she was right, and it broke his heart.

“Come on,” said Pat and patted his shoulder. “Let’s gear up. We’ve got work to do.”

Bob turned and watched Pat rejoin the rest of the crew as they emerged from the van. There weren’t many of them, only a few handfuls in different shapes and sizes and colors, different backgrounds and accents, but all the same once they put on their gear.

There was a crew from the Clean-Up Department for each street in the city, all called on after a battle. Anchor Lane was their responsibility. It was Pat’s, most of all.

Bob joined them too and went to gear up. Their gear was heavy and airtight. It had to be, when one worked in a disaster zone. The uniform, gray coveralls specially made to be airtight, came with a belt that carried their rolls upon rolls of bags for contaminated material, for body parts and bodily fluids, for trash and whatever else they found along the way.

The containers for the bigger pieces, such as car pieces and wheels and rubble, were set up further down the street by their biggest worker, the quiet Jet, who had already left to start.

No one said a thing as they geared up. There was no chatter as they grabbed their uniforms and tools. Some, like Caroline and Rob, had their heads bowed in silent prayer, while others, like Tim and Jim, had their backs turned to the disaster beyond their van. They were all putting aside their feelings, Bob could tell. He was too, in his own way.

It was a horrible disaster, one that would shake anyone, but it was their job to be here.

They were hired to clean, not feel.

No one said a thing but when there was a sudden shriek followed by an uproar, they all flinched in unison.

Bob felt himself go cold all over at the sound. When he had signed on for the job, desperate for work because he was starving and no one else would hire someone with so little formal education, the company had made him sign a document agreeing to the potential dangers the job came with, agreeing to take full responsibility for any injuries and/or death.

It was always possible that the fight wasn’t quite over by the time they showed up to clean. It had never happened so far, not in his time, but he had always feared that one day it would.

And for a moment, he thought the time was now.

But then he realized that this uproar wasn’t one of distress. It was a cheer, a cheer of celebration.

And it grew louder and louder, as if more voices joined in by the second.

With a heavy broom in hand, Bob turned toward the sound. Beyond the streets upon streets of collapsed buildings and through the dark smoke and the tall flames, he could see a beam of sunlight shining down on a floating platform. Around it was a crowd of people, bigger than that of a stadium audience, so big that all he could see was a dark mass with raised, waving arms that moved almost like a wave.

And on the platform stood five colorful figures, each with their arms raised as well.

Bob didn’t need to be closer to know who they were. The Guards was the public’s favorite hero team. It consisted of five heroes whose names Bob could never remember, nor did he care to know. All he knew was that they were powerful individuals and, together, they could bring down armies.

The Guards was this battle’s victors, he knew. The crew responsible for on-sight news and battle updates had interviewed the victorious heroes earlier. It had played on the radio as him and his Clean-Up crew drove in with various degrees of upset and annoyance and even joy, though he hadn’t listened to much of it. He had looked at Pat’s face, set in tight stone.

A few streets over, the people were happy. They were cheering and clapping loud enough to waken the dead. Their happiness was infectious, and Bob smiled despite the hard labor that laid ahead for him and the horrors he was bound to find beneath the ruins, horrors that the Morgue Crew undoubtedly hadn’t found.

The Disaster Crews all had many hours of work ahead of them before they too could celebrate. The battle was over for the heroes and for the people, but it had only just begun for them. And no one would sing their praises when they were done, but Bob couldn’t stop himself from smiling anyway. He could pretend those cheers were for them too.

Bob turned to look at Pat, wondering if she too wanted to be celebrated, but Pat wasn’t looking toward the celebration. He knew she wouldn’t be. She never looked and was never celebrated or thanked by the public, despite doing this work for decades now. She had once told him that she didn’t do it to be celebrated, not like some of the heroes did. The city would shine for them, she’d said, and people would keep smiling and living. And that had to be reward enough.

Bob understood and reminded himself of her words often.

But still, he couldn’t help but think the public should celebrate Pat too, the way they did the heroes. She deserved it as much as them, for entirely different reasons but deserving, nonetheless.