The cleaning tuk-tuk with its soap bubbles and secrets seems almost prestigious now.

The cleaning tuk-tuk with its soap bubbles and secrets seems almost prestigious now.

What kind of cleaning service is this?

Evidently the expensive kind.

Sterile, discreet, professional. This is who you call in when you're paranoid that 'regular help' might molest the contents of your apartment.

When the things you're cleaning up after are especially sensitive in nature.

Look inside the cab.

The leather-upholstered bench is barely big enough for two people to share. A half-eaten lunch wrapped in paper leaks grease onto the passenger side.

The window is rolled down just a crack.

A whiff of fried shrimp layered under a pervasive antiseptic odour.

What kind of lunch are we talking about, here?

You can see the contents nestled between two flattened plantains: fried shrimp covered in melted cheese.

El Dolor de Viudas. Extremely popular at pelota matches and the main cause of Portofiro's looming epidemic of atherosclerosis.

No one abandons shrimp like that for long.

A gastronomic monstrosity.

Anything else of note?

Someone has jammed a half-empty spray bottle of disinfectant and a damp rag into the shallow well on the dashboard, and there's a parking permit for 422 Calle Espinas taped to the inner windshield...

The only other touch of the personal is a copper medallion hanging from the rearview mirror.

What sort of medallion?

The cheap metal has oxidised, a green patina on an embossed eight-pointed star.

El signo del Vega. Angel of ancestors and bringer of the new year.

The city used to be littered with shops that sold these medals: a thousand chains on a hundred hooks, icons clattering against each other like windchimes -- one for every star and angel.

Some astrological thing -- who can keep track of it all?

Moving on.

The cleaners, wherever they are, have left little trace of themselves or their equipment inside of the vehicle.

Examine the trailer.

The roll-up door has bowed in, half-crushed. The aluminium edges are misaligned, leaving an awkward gap that's desperately bridged by a worn padlock.

This tuk-tuk has recently suffered a rear-end collision.

That padlock is under sustained physical pressure. Its collapse is not far.

Force our way in.

The old padlock, under stresses it could not possibly endure, shudders and pops open.

The small space is tightly packed: in the corner is a selection of buckets, a rack of brooms and mops mounted on the wall above them. Bottles of cleaning solution are tucked into every free space, with names like Zyfrox, X-Tra Klean, Shine and Shimmer.

Your eyes land on a shapeless garment in a disconcertingly meaty shade of pink. There's a zipper on the back and a large tinted window at the front, a viewport out but not in.

The cleaner's face obscured from clients who'd rather not have to acknowledge the humanity of their janitorial staff.

Fig. 1452: a linocut of an early diving suit, so primitive that the explorer had to be sewn into it before he went under — and cut free after surfacing.

This could be useful.

Anything that obscures your face is good — and this suit has the advantage of obscuring your humanity completely.

Prepare to submerge. (Take the suit.)

Most early abyssonauts succumbed not to drowning, but to the ocean's crushing pressures.

The suit slides off the rack and into your hands.

Yum-yum. (Take the suit.)

The call of the meat cannot be denied.

Take the suit.

Leave it for now.

You slide the aluminium door shut.

It vaguely resembles a giant sausage, an organ stuffed with flesh, processed and squeezed into shape.

The padlock quivers with an audible groan, already struggling from your last assault — but doesn't give up.

The padlock squeaks, metal-on-metal, but holds. The door doesn't budge.

Simple and clean. [Leave.]

The tuk-tuk remains in its place.

A name is emblazoned across the side of the tuk-tuk, in a cool blue font partly obscured by diaphanous hand-painted soap bubbles: 'Limpadores Azuis' -- Cleaners for Hire.

Around the back, an aluminium roll-up door shields the contents of the trailer.