Author: Phil @ TCP Hair Systems
Last saved by: Peter

The Call Out By Phil Ryan

He liked the name. His new van shining after its wash. His newly stencilled logo. Red and bold. Rapid Kill Solutions. Pest Control. Kevin smiled at his reflection. The logo on his jacket matching the van. It had been June’s idea really. Her encouraging him. He’d been at Fast Kill for six years up until last month. They’d been a good employer. Fair. Generous. But he’d felt he wasn’t developing. Not really. Then June’s Gran had passed and she’d been left a little money and that’s when they’d started talking. She’d been so brilliant. Encouraging him. Telling him he could do it. He had married the right girl and he knew it. Fast KiIl had been brilliant about it, his boss, the old man Mr Ghanish saying he’d been a good employee and wishing him well. But now Kevin had to make a go of it. His own company. He’d put leaflets through hundreds of letter boxes last week and it had paid off. Three jobs. The last one being here at 35 Shawcross Avenue. Mrs Blakely. Cockroaches she’d said. An infestation she’d added. Kevin nodded as he checked the back of the van. He had everything on board. He’d sort it out before you could say Jack Robinson. His years of training standing him in good stead to complete the task. You had to follow the three stages. Quantify. Identify. Nullify.
 
It wasn’t enough to find the pests old Mr Ghanish said, you need to find what’s attracting them. Once you’ve established that then you can make a plan, set your traps, lay your bait and establish a kill zone. Quantify. Identify. Nullify. Kevin knew the old man was an expert. Never underestimate the enemy he’d say. They’ve been around a lot longer than we have and they’ll still be here once we’ve destroyed the planet. He’d set up Fast Kill over thirty years before. What he didn’t know about pest eradication wasn’t worth knowing. The house stood on a corner plot. Three roads merging in front of it. The woman that opened the front door looked to be in her fifties. Slender and tall. Very dark skinned. Striking too. A full black headscarf. Her hair completely covered. A long thin black dress. Clearly a religious lady of some kind. Slightly anxious. 

Her face was hidden by a surgical face mask, but he knew the look though. That posture. People weren’t used to pests. It did something to them. Their faces. The fear he could read. The concern. He held up his ID card on its lanyard around his neck. It was just like the ones Fast Kill used. Showing his picture and his qualifications. Always re-assured clients. He smiled and stepped inside. She thanked him for coming so quickly and started talking immediately. Kevin now calming her down. Reassuring her. Her tone still anxious. 
 
It's cockroaches she said. Shuddering. Her voice high and emotional. I came downstairs last night to get some milk. I heard a kind of whispering noise. And as soon as I turned the light on, there they were. Everywhere. Scuttling around. She looked around nervously. Lots of them. How many he ventured. She pulled a face. Fifty at least, more probably. She grimaced, I screamed and grabbed a broom and tried to hit them, and they all just scurried off. I’m afraid I just closed the door and ran back upstairs. It was just awful, I didn’t sleep a wink. When I came down this morning they’d gone but they must be somewhere. Hiding. I just know it. He listened putting on his concerned face. Fifty? More like five. He’d heard this before. People always exaggerated. He looked at the hard marble floor. The crisp white walls. The smell of cleaning polish heavy in the air. This was not a place any self respecting pest would want to call home. Clean. Hard. No dirt or food waste anywhere. Not cockroach territory, if indeed it was cockroaches.
 
He started his inspection. Looking for the usual clues. Droppings. Shell casings. The house was immaculate. In fact it was so clean it was a wonder she had any problems at all. Most pest incursion’s needed a food source. This place was almost surgically clean. Warm too. He looked puzzled. Was there anywhere he hadn’t seen he said. The woman looked troubled briefly. Oh I forgot about the cellar she said. I don’t use it, not since my poor husband well….she trailed off. He passed some years ago. Her eyes filled with sadness. He used to deal with things like this you see. He looked away embarrassed by her grief. He didn’t know what to say, but she turned and opened a small door under the stairs. He peered inside. The cellar was dark and unused. Empty apart from one small wooden crate. His bright torch lighting the gloom. 

He went down a few steps shining his beam around. Her following him halfway. Very tidy although a little dusty unlike the rest of the house. He could see a metal drain cover. Sunk into the floor. He stood and closed his eyes. Look. Listen. Sense. Mr Ghanish very keen on them using all their senses. Yes. There. The smell was very slight but unmistakeable. Almost sweet. His nose a finely tuned instrument. Rotting meat. He’d encountered it before. Drains. Probably backed up. Potentially even blocked. Standard stuff really. He wrote onto his note pad and gestured they should return upstairs. 
 
I’d like to just do a wider perimeter search he said, his manner calm and reassuring. It won’t take more than ten minutes. It’s just standard procedure really. She nodded and he went out through the front door and after circling the house inspecting the walls, no cracks or holes, no food sources, he went down the short driveway. He looked right and left. A small row of shops some fifty yards up along the way. He nodded to himself and slowly wandered up towards them, now noting their generally poor appearance. All a little run down. A little Shabby. Bingo. He thought. There. In the middle of them. A small butchers shop. Obviously one that had seen better days. Its windows not too clean. Badly written cardboard signs with offers on. Cheap meat. He looked down the street. Then at a manhole cover following its line to the next one he’d passed on his way up the street. The sewer drains. Probably aligned. He’d seen it before with shops. Fast Food ones usually. Just dumping stuff straight into the drains. Clogging the sewers . The famous fatbergs of clumps of oil and food waste. Massive and greasy plugs in effect. This was probably that. It would explain the odour. And a food source. Yes that was it. He’d clean out the drain section in the cellar. Use the hot jet wash. Spray some acid disinfectant and poison powder in there. Drop a note to the local compliance department. Get the butcher shop looked at by trading and standards and the health and safety people. Job done. Problem solved. 

She was waiting for him when he knocked. He lifted his two gear bags inside. She offered him tea which he accepted. Always good to give the anxious client something to do. Kept them away from under your feet old Mr Ghanish used to say. He pulled the small door open and went down the stairs. They creaked with his weight and that of his gear. No-one had been here in a while he thought. He paused as he heard a kind of whispering noise. It stopped, as he remembered Mrs Blakely’s description. Probably just the wind under the door frame. He stepped onto the dusty concrete floor and scanned the area. Slowly he pulled on his gear. His heavy gloves. Kneepads. Face shield and helmet. His helmet torch now coming into play. Nothing. Though that wasn’t necessarily a sign. Cockroaches were clever. Incredible insects. Intelligent. Old Mr Ghanish said they were smarter than half the planet. One day they’d adapt, organise and identify their enemy. He’d laughed and said then there’d be trouble. Finding food was their main preoccupation. Give them enough of it and they’d take over. He was a wonderful man, full of useful information and interesting opinions. A true mentor.  

Grunting slightly, he pulled the drain cover up and back. The smell now a little stronger. He peered into the void. His head torch illuminating it instantly. It was wide. Around three feet across he guessed. A section of dark water pooled at the bottom of its curve. Still it looked very clean. Unusually so he thought. The water pressure was probably strong enough to wash everything through, slightly blowing his theory about the butcher shop up the road. He peered inside again, the smell slightly stronger. Behind him he heard Mrs Blakely. Can you see anything? She said her voice now oddly muffled. Probably her surgical face mask. Kevin reached out his gloved hand and touched the thick concrete wall. It was warm. He glanced over his shoulder. That was strange. Mrs Blakely looked taller. He began to wriggle forwards. Reaching into the pool of water with his thick gloves. He began to feel around.  He thought he’d found something and lifted it up. It was a human arm bone and hand. White and gleaming. He stared at it. In its skeletal hand were a bunch of ID cards on nylon lanyards. Fast KiIl. Pest Death. Rat Away. Bug Killers. Various smiling faces.  What the hell?

Still holding the arm, he desperately tried to push himself back out the drain, when to his surprise he felt himself being pushed downwards, something now gripping his legs. A searing pain cutting through him. He gasped out loud. His helmet now dropping from his head. Then the loud hissing started. The torch bouncing off the concrete bottom, illuminating the heaving dark wall of thousands of cockroaches streaming in a black river towards him. Their scuttling legs fast on the concrete. He struggled to move back, twisting his neck and head painfully. His ID dropping into the water. He shouted for help, fear giving him strength and somehow he managed to almost pull himself up and out. Still twisting, he saw Mrs Blakely’s face seeming to expand in front of his eyes, her head dress and surgical face mask tearing away, as she revealed her dark carapace, her pin black multiple eyes, gleaming antenna and a set of huge serrated jaws that snapped back and forth, puncturing his lungs in a savage arc. The rushing insects soon reaching him and dragging him into the sewer in a biting twisting swirling mass. His screams muffled as they agonisingly filled his mouth in a spiky, cutting, biting torrent.
Old Mr Ghanish’s words the last thought he had. 
They’d finally identified their enemy and now they’d adapted and organised. 
Quantify. 
Identify.
Nullify.