//------------------------------//
// The Job 
// Story: The Rain, the Poison, and the Job 
// by HapHazred 
//------------------------------//

Days like these, it makes sense it's raining. You don't get stripped of your job and your life on a pleasant, sunny afternoon, after all. No, it's always the storms, the wind, and the lightning that make up the chorus of disgrace. 

She looks at me with eyes filled with venom... and not the kind you drink after hours. No, this is the venom that kills. She didn't expect this from me. She's one of a kind, but bless her, she isn't that smart. She doesn't get the lesson. The other one, the white one... She's more like me, I guess. She has a mind like the yarn she sews with: tangled and twisted. 

Not nearly as twisted as mine. I've had years to become as toxic as I am. Decades to lose what little dignity I had when I started the Job, when I took to the skies and didn't look back.

It's days like these, with rain and thunder making a racket outside, that you wonder what kind of pony you are. And I don't really know myself any more. If you asked Spitfire, she'd tell you I'm a traitorous villain, a mockery of all that's respectable about her kind. If you asked her, she'd tell you I'm little more than a disappointment that tried to kick her dream in the teeth. You can tell by the way she can't look me in the eye. I'm not what she wanted from a hero, from a Wonderbolt.

Nopony would say I was ever uncaring, or that I was always absent from the lives of those I loved. Nopony would say I'm the villain I was, and that's what gets me each and every time. They don't know just how broken a pony I really am, and how much I wasted.

It's the Job. It's the Job she doesn't get that I can't bring myself to be honest about. If I tell her what a viper's den it is... or maybe was... It won't change anything. I know her type. She'll either struggle on regardless or think I'm patronizing her. And maybe, just maybe, she'll know me for what I really am. And I can't face that, not like this.

A disappointment. Not a disappointing hero... but a disappointment nonetheless.

Her sky blue coat really is something special. Sometimes I think it's all I have left of her. All I have in common.

She doesn't know what kind of a Job she's getting into. She doesn't know how it'll eat away at your life and become all that's important to your eyes. The fame, the wealth... It's like a disease. A drug. Her eyes are filled with venom, but also naivety. She can't see what she's losing. What I lost, and didn't even realize.

Maybe we have more in common than the colour of our coats. Maybe it's our lives that we have in common.

I'm a disappointment to her. I can tell. But I'm not the disappointment I want to be. The only pony I've really disappointed is myself. I'm disappointed all she recognized me as was some bigshot flyer from years ago, not the pony who gave her her first Wonderbolts doll. By the Sun above, where have I been all these years? How can you have messed up so bad you don't even get recognized for what you are? That's what ticks me off.

But I failed her in more ways than one. I couldn't even keep her from the Job. That's what I wanted, right? For her to give this cancer of money and glory up for something more wholesome? More fulfilling, away from the rain, and the poison. Even if she did hate me, hate the Job?

Or maybe I really am the villain they see in me. I can't tell any more. And... doesn't that make me even worse? Is this all just some elaborate justification to explain what I'm doing, what I am? Maybe I did want my name to remain intact. Maybe I am as spiteful as they think I am. If that's true, then I'm a real head-case, cause I can't tell. I just can't tell.

I could be the villain. You never can tell, until it's too late. And when that moment comes... Well, you've just got to keep on dancing. Dance forever, and try to enjoy the masquerade. Tango with the good, and the bad.

And who knows? Maybe the kids, the captain and the young colt, were right. Maybe they do stick together these days. I'm old. I'm tired.

I think I've had enough thinking for one day. I shut my brain down for the last time, make myself numb. Their faces are all bitter towards me, but even though she's still heading towards a life I know she'll regret, she's smiling. I take what pleasure I can from that. I might as well: it's all I have left. It's more than I deserve.

I say my lines. I act all angry and disgruntled, like I wasn't expecting this. It's what I would have done if I was the villain. I guess it's what I am, now. My lines feel real to me. I've been playing the part for a long, long time.

She isn't even looking at me any more. She's doing some dance, up near the ceiling. She's already forgotten me. I doubt we'll even meet again. I'm just another villain she's met, and stored away in the back of her head like a bad dream.

Her sky blue coat reminds me of home. Maybe I should go back there. Say hi to my brother. Tell him he has an exceptional kid.

That'd be nice. I'm tired of the rain. Of the poison all around me.

Of the Job.

See you, kid. It was fun being your villain for today. I just wish I didn't lose, although I'm not sure why. Questions for another day.