//------------------------------// // A Job Well Done Is It's Own Reward // Story: Zephyr's Job Interview // by Knackerman //------------------------------// It took Zephyr's eyes some time to adjust to the gloom inside. He found himself standing alone in what looked like a waiting room. Chairs with peeling laminate revealed the yellowing stuffing that had long since spilled out on the floor here and there. The ceiling was thick with what Zephyr hoped were cobwebs. The only light was the fluorescent glow of a bulb that was clearly on its last legs behind what looked to be a reception desk. The bulb tinkled and sizzled, giving a harsh buzz as it flared brighter and faded in a flickering strobe. If Zephyr didn't know better, he would have thought he'd stumbled into an abandoned waiting room for a doctor or dentist. Stacks of moldering magazines, their covers too old and worn to properly be made out in the fitful light, were spread haphazardly across low tables and the floor. There was a large brown water stain on the ceiling, and more than one hole that exposed the rotting timbers of the rafters above. Shattered pieces of the tile below these holes made Zephyr's eyes nervously dart between the floor and the ceiling as he walked through the room. He tried his best not to slip on the rotting magazines, but he also kept a wary eye out to make sure a falling tile didn't shatter itself against his skull. There was no sign of 'Pa'. Zephyr wasn't sure that was a good thing. He'd rather have the masked pony where he could see him. At the end of a hall were a pair of plastic double doors that were swinging gently as if they had just been passed through. Zephyr didn't want to stay here, alone in the dark, so he made his way down the hall being careful to avoid not just the magazines but the puddles of brown liquid that had pooled here and there in the hallway. As he reached the reception desk, the fluorescent light at last gave out with an audible 'pop', plunging the room into absolute darkness. The only light now was a fiery glow that came from the double doors, and Zephyr hastened his steps towards the exit. As he drew closer, however, he heard something that made him freeze in his tracks. What was it? He strained his ears, but he thought he heard... singing. It was high and cheerful, like a song you'd expect to hear a pair of filly's singing on the playground as they skipped rope. Only it was breathy and soft, barely more than a whisper, but absolutely the last thing you'd want to hear in a place like this. Zephyr felt a chill run down his spine. He couldn't tell where the singing was coming from. Feeling a bead of cold sweat trickle down his forehead, Zephyr slowly turned to the darkened waiting room he had just passed through. It was too dark to see much of anything, but the darkness didn't seem to be as populated with the ghosts of dead fillies as Zephyr's imagination had suggested. If the singing wasn't coming from the waiting room, was it coming from some where ahead then? Truly, it seemed to be all around him now, enveloping him in an aura of sickly sweet sound and the smell of damp and decay. He couldn't make out the words, but each verse seemed to be punctuated by peels of girlish laughter. The ghoulish sound made Zephyr's blood run cold. He turned back towards the door at the end of the hall, but that was all he could bring himself to do. He couldn't move. It was as if the song had stuck his hooves to the floor. His heart raced, and a part of him whispered frantically that this was exactly the effect that the song was meant to have! The double doors exploded open and a monstrously fanged shape was silhouetted against the hellish light beyond, crouched low to pounce! Without warning, it leaped up and screamed "Trick or Treat!" and laughed dementedly as Zephyr collapsed into a whimpering heap, covering his head with his hooves. Zephyr expected to be gobbled up at any moment, but when he didn't feel sharp teeth tearing into his hide, he dared open one eye and look up at his attacker. She was just a little thing, a filly barely older than five or six years old if he had to make a bet. Her eyes were pink and blue swirls, and her hair was a rats nest of red and black curls. Her face was hidden behind a delicate china mask that was broken around her muzzle, allowing a manic grin to show through. It was the jagged parts of the mask that had given the illusion of sharp fangs. She wore a dress that looked like it had been made from old bags and candy wrappers, and she capered and twirled around in it as if she were a professional ballerina. "Candy!" thundered the familiar scolding voice of 'Pa' as his shadow fell across the filly from the open doors. "Candy you go play yer tricks somewhere else! This fella here is our guest!" Zephyr was actually relieved when the older masked pony stomped through the door frame. 'Candy', for her part, only giggled and danced on... Twirling around Zephyr's prostrate form as if she didn't have a care in the world. "Go on! Get on out of here! Go terrorize your brothers if you must, ya little heathen! You'd best skedaddle a'fore Ah take it in mah mind ta break your backside with mah bare hooves!" Candy laughed and sang, "Nightmare Night, what a fright, give me something sweet to bite!" into Zephyr's ear, before she danced off into the gloom. she disappeared as quickly as she had arrived... Laughing all the while. "Ingrates all of ya! Ah raised you better than this!" Pa howled after his daughter. He bent down and picked Zephyr up with one hoof and dusted him off. "Ah am so sorry about that mister. Candy there is the apple of mah eye, but she's an unholy terror when she has a mind to be. Ah swear she must take after her mothers side of the family. Do you know she ain't taken off that costume of hers since last Nightmare Night? Ah don't even get what she's supposed to be. Some kind of ballerina, fairy princess, monster or something. Ah love her to pieces, but sometimes she just takes things too far." He paused for a moment, before adding, "And don't even get me started on her table manners. Eats like a full grown horse, but it's a miracle if any of the food makes it into her mouth. And a sweet tooth? Ah has to fight her, literally fight her to get her to eat properly instead of snacking morning, noon, and night!" "Th-that was your daughter?" stammered Zephyr, dazed and still trembling in shock. "Why, yes sir, that's what Ah said. Kind of slow, ain't ya boy?" replied Pa, not unkindly. Zephyr suspected that there was a grin, much like his daughters somewhere behind that mask. Zephyr realized that Pa reminded him of a used wagon salesman that used to live down the street from his parents. He had exactly that same kind of bombastic personality and tendency to to hold long and meandering one sided conversations. If Zephyr wasn't careful, he'd find himself overwhelmed by the endless torrent of muffled words that spilled from behind the stallions mask. "Though Ah wasn't planning on introducing you to the whole Knacker clan like this. That comes later! Though Ah hardly see the point to it now." Pa shook his head morosely. "Eh well, lets get on. The factory is in this way. Mind yer step though. We're in the middle of a little bit of renovatin' and Ah'd just kick mahself if'n ya were to come all this way and wound up hurtijn' yerself, accidental like." Zephyr got a hold of himself and followed the verbose Pa Knacker through the double doors and into a cavernous room that was much better lit. The fiery glow Zephyr had noticed earlier seemed to emanate from several furnaces that belched flames and smoke into the air. That was frightening enough, but about the room several massive vats had been arrayed, that sat atop them spat and hissed. In one nearby vat a thick white bubble ballooned into the air, before popping and letting loose a noxious chemical scent that made Zephyr almost retch. Indeed, a wave of heat and stench washed over and through him, and he felt as if he would pass out. "Ugh. What are you cooking in here? It smells awful!" Zephyr gagged, coughing. "Smells awful? Oh the smell, right!" exclaimed Pa, as if he hadn't noticed the foul stink. "You get used to it after awhile. But that's what the masks are for. Ah don't know if ya noticed, but we all wear them here for the work. Why, Ah've been wearing this mask so long it's like it's become a part of me. Ah probably don't even need the thing anymore, but Ah wouldn't dream of showin' up ta work without it. Force of habit Ah guess." Pa handed Zephyr a cloth mask, "Here ya go son, you just take this here and put it on." The mask was nowhere near as elaborate as the one that the members of the 'Knacker' family seemed to wear, though Zephyr was privately thankful of that. It was newer, and a lot cleaner too. It smelled as if it might even have been laundered in the last century! If it resembled anything, it was a surgeons mask, and as soon as Zephyr tied it on he was grateful for it. Tying it in place around his muzzle, it did seem to help drown out the reeking stench, though it didn't do anything for the heat. His eyes watered a little, but he managed to keep from crying. "So, what exactly is all of this?" he finally asked once he could breath again. "This here? This is the glue room," Pa replied, practically beaming. "We keeps it bubbling and brewing all day and all night, turning the waste of Equestria into somethin' useful! We're big on that around here. Reduce, reuse, recycle; all that green energy and environmental stability business. The Knacker clan moto is 'Waste Not, Want Not' and we live by it! Why we been in business since before the foundin' of Ponyville," the stallion wittered on. "Used to do work way back in the days when the Castle of the Pony Sisters was still the castle of the pony sisters. Course this place has fallen down and been rebuilt a time or two since then. Honestly it's about time we tear the place down and rebuild it again. But Ah'm sure you know how it is, lad your age, raising a family and trying to hold down a job. Makes it hard to find the time to do everythin' that needs doing. That's why Ah'm so glad ya came out here son! Saves us a lot of time and effort goin' out and lookin' for somepony, let me tell ya!" Zephyr had mostly tuned the old earth pony out. So they made glue here, huh? Well, maybe they weren't a group of cut throat bandits after all. He had no idea what all went into the process, but it couldn't be too hard to learn. It looked like the vats pretty much minded themselves, and he could see how one connected to another, and all lead to an assembly line where bottles slid along a conveyor belt to be filled by an overhead nozzle. There was even a little machine that screwed on the lids of the pots of glue, plastered on a sticker of a smiling cow, and loaded several jars at a time into a nearby box. The worst he might have to do would be to move a few pallets of the stuff, or maybe keep the furnaces fed, but he didn't doubt he could dupe one of Pa Knacker's sons into doing most of the heavy lifting for him. If they were as dumb as Pa seemed to think they were, it would be a breeze. A Zephyr Breeze! "So you're looking for someone to work in here then?" he asked. "In here? And put Luda May out of a job?" Pa asked, almost offended. As he said this, Zephyr saw a huge unicorn mare in a cloth mask and a hair net moving from vat to vat with a large wooden spoon. She'd give the contents a stir in each bubbling receptacle before moving on. Zephyr could have sworn she actually licked the spoon once or twice, though the fat mare never actually removed her mask. "Nah, she's got things pretty much sorted out in here. Ah'd have to hire somepony just to train somepony else to take over from Luda May, all the things she knows. It'll be like losin' a member of the family when she finally decides to retire, but the greater loss will be all the tips and tricks she knows but will never tell another soul. A lot of that stuff ya just can't teach. Just comes with on the job experience. No sir, we're good in this department. Come on though, no point hanging around here all day. Don't want to give Luda May a chance to start getting ideas about a young buck like you. Lets head into the next room." Zephyr followed, though he stole a glance back at Luda May. The over sized mare gave him a seductive wink, so he quickened his step and followed swiftly after Pa. They came to a 'door' made out of semi-opaque PVC strips that divided the heat of the glue room from a much cooler but no less foul smelling room. It was a strange mixture of chemical scents that seeped through the thin material between Zephyr's nose and the air in the room, and he gagged afresh as he had to adjust to the new and strange scents. It was like something part way between the salty scent of the sea and the acrid stench of cat piss. There seemed to be a lot more activity in this room, and more vats, though only a few of these seemed to be heated. There were also barrels of what looked like white sand. Several average sized ponies scuttled to and fro, each wearing a full gas mask with respirator much like Zephyr had seen Nuke wearing outside. "This here is the tannery. Might want to be careful in here as there are more than a few harsh chemicals that get used in the tanning process," warned Pa. Zephyr took a step back from the harsh smelling liquid he had been inspecting. "Here's where we take skins and turn them into that soft, comfortable leather for your chairs, or the sturdy binding of magic books. Ah'm a well read fellow, if Ah do say so mahself, and there ain't nothing quiet like the feel of that soft leather in your hoofs And that smell! Fresh parchment and ink are heavenly unto themselves, but with that rich tang of fresh crushed leather? There just ain't nothin' quite like it. Though, to be honest, even Ah'm surprised it comes out like that given a wiff of this place." Squinting his eyes in the smokey gloom, Zephyr could see large sheets of 'skin' being stretch on drying racks as they were moved from the soaking vats. It seemed that the barrels of sand were actually some kind of salt, probably some means of preserving the skins, and they would be soaked in water before being stretched out to dry. The other ponies in this room busied themselves taking the skins from one vat to another, immersing them with rubber sleeves over their hooves so as not to touch the liquids directly. Zephyr's flesh crawled just thinking about what all the harsh chemicals in the air were doing to his own skin, not to mention his delicate mane. As a certified graduate of Mane Therapy School, just being in a room like this made Zephyr want to run screaming for the hills. That alone would have been enough to put him off any job prospects in the tannery, but he didn't even want to consider where all the 'skins' had come from. Like most ponies, Zephyr was and always had been a strict vegetarian. While he didn't share his sisters love of animals, and he wasn't so naive as to think that leather just grew on trees, the idea of handling dead animal hides all day held no appeal for him. It took all his will power to ask with an audible gulp "So I suppose it's here that you're a little short on ponies?" Pa didn't respond to the question at first, instead cocking his head to one side, before looking around the room. "What exactly gives ya that idea boy? Ah mean we can always use an extra set of hooves, sure, but as ya can see we got two full shifts and a third shift keeping this place hopping twenty four hours a day. Why, we got more ponies than we have work for them to do as it is! Ah really only keep this many around for when we get bulk orders. Never know when the Sofa and Quill store in Ponyville will put in an emergency rush order. Or heck, even them fancy ponies up in Canterlot!" Here Pa leaned in conspiratorially and whispered into Zephyr's ear. "Between you and me, son, Ah don't judge them fancy ponies for what they get up to in their spare time, but it involves a lot of black leather. A bit of information to squirrel away for a rainy day, I say. Never know when knowing something like that about a customer might come in handy." He raised his voice before adding, "Not that we're anything but discrete here! Let it never be said that the Knacker family doesn't know how to keep a skeleton or two safely in the closet!" Pa laughed uproariously at what must have been a private joke, because Zephyr sure didn't see what was so funny. He was relieved to find out that they wouldn't be needing him to work in this room, but he was put off by the fact that something like this went on here in the first place. No matter how good the job they actually wanted him to do turned out to pay, nor how easy it was, he wouldn't want to set hoof in here again if he could keep from it. This whole process just gave him the creeps, even if the harsh chemicals weren't involved, he wouldn't want anything to do with it. "So, where to next?" he asked, trying to move things along. "Right, right! Gotta keep the mind on the task in front of ya. You've got a keen mind for business there son. Right this way... oh but first," Pa walked over to a rack of coats. No coat looked exactly like the other, though all were splattered with irregular red stains. The larger stallion proffered one to Zephyr, and when he hesitated to put it on, Pa helped him get it on anyways mistaking his reluctance for ignorance on how to don such a garment. "It's a might cold in the next room, and it can get a bit messy. Sorry we ain't got any coats with wing slits. We mostly employee earth ponies and the occasional unicorn, so there's never been much point in ruining a good coat by putting a pair of slits up the back. Ah reckon it's a bit uncomfortable, but you'll be even more uncomfortable if ya was to go on without it, mark mah words!" Saying that, Pa led the way through another set of PVC curtains. This time the temperature dropped sharply, before they moved through a second, and third set of PVC curtains. The second was covered with frost, while the third one they passed through was actually encrusted with ice, the PVC itself frozen solid. The cold of the next massive room they entered would have been enough to steal Zephyr's breath away, but his eyes grew wide at what he saw, smelled, and, to his regret, tasted. The air was thick with the scent of blood. Indeed, as Zephyr watched in horror, it sprayed from several machines that hung over his head. The droplets splattering his already stained coat and the mask he wore, soaking through the fibers of his thin mask and into his uncovered mane. High above, the whirring sound of saw blades whined low as bits and pieces of meat fell through a grate in the roof and into a vat below. Though the vat was heated red hot, Zephyr couldn't feel any warmth in the freezing room. From there, the meat sluiced through a series of tubes and onto a conveyor belt that passed beneath several serrated grinding gears. It was these that sent up the obscene gush of blood, causing a steady rain of viscera. The meat slid on and into waiting ovens, that cooked the meat at high heat as it passed through. After that it fell into another large vat that had whirring blades that chopped and ground up the flesh even more, sending up a cloud of greasy moist droplets. Further down the production line, Zephyr could see ponies of all shapes and sizes that were each wearing masks and coats much like Pa's, working and shaping the meat. They were blending it with other ingredients, cooking it, tinning it, or bagging the final product. Everything was done with a precision and care that left Zephyr speechless. "And finally we have the pet food processing plant," announced Pa, wrapping Zephyr in a side hug as his other hoof sweeped over the room. "Our pride and joy! We keep it nice and cold in here to keep any nasty bacteria from growing. We wouldn't want our meat to make any critters that eat it sick. We take a lot of pride here at the Knacker Yard, especially in the quality and care we put into every bite of our pet food, be it kibble or them fancy tinned feasts. Ah imagine ya got the impression from how old and run down this place looks on the outside that we don't actually fool around with keeping up high standards, but we don't mess around when it comes to the merit of our meat! Yahave to use prime meat, and nothin' less! You should just ask yer sister Fluttershy. She's one of our best customers!" "F-Fluttershy knows about this place?" asked Zephyr, disbelief in his voice. How could Fluttershy even know about a place like this, let alone condone what went on here? The very idea made Zephyr's spirit curl up inside itself. Up until now he'd been harboring hope that this had all been some kind of mistake. But if Pa Knacker considered Fluttershy one of his best customers, and he knew she was his sister, then that meant... That meant maybe she really did expect him to work here in this mechanized hell. "Why sure! What do you think all of those carnivorous critters she keeps eat? She's not gonna butcher her own meat in a shed somewhere, or something silly like that," said the stallion, his face scrunching up beneath his mask. "Why, that'd just be unsanitary. Nah son, ya gotta have places like this if yer gonna keep dogs and cats in peek condition, let alone more exotic critters like baby alligators, birds of prey, and bears. Ah can see by the shade of green yer face is turnin' that our work here has turned yer stomach a bit, but rest assured, what we do here is necessary! We got plenty of pony folk who count on us to do our best, and we ain't about to let them down if we can keep from it! No sir!" This was all too much for Zephyr to take in. The sound of bones grinding, flesh ripping and tearing, the sizzle and spit of roasting meat. And everypony here seemed to be okay with it. It was just a job to them. More than that, the pony standing next to him actually took pride in all of this. If Zephyr had any doubts before, then there was no question now. There was no way he could work here, no matter how much money they were offering, or how good the hours. "I'm sorry but, I just can't see myself working here. I don't care that Fluttershy is one of your best customers, or that what you do here is necessary. I could never do this, even if my sister did put in a good word for me." Pa just looked at him without saying a word. For the first time, Zephyr really looked the larger stallion in the eyes. He noticed that the right socket was completely empty. The ruined hole where an eye should be looked blankly back at Zephyr, unseeing, and only barely seen. Only the left eye, a tiny crimson point that seemed to glow in the glare of the factory lights, stared back frighteningly from the gloom shrouded depths behind his blood splattered mask. Pa started to laugh. It wasn't a friendly laugh. "You? Haha! You thought that I! Hahahah! You thought that I wanted you to work here!?" He sputtered, his laughter carrying on for some time. Zephyr thought he was going to fall into the bloody slurry on the floor. The chilling temperatures had caused all the flecks of blood to freeze and turn into a kind of reddish-black snow that clung to the sides of the machines and the tiled floor. Pa Knacker put one hoof out and steadied himself against one of his bloody machines. He shook so hard with laughter that more of the scarlet slop started to shower down from above. "Oh my, ain't that a trip! Nah son, Ah'd never dream of given you a job! Whoo! Ya gotta warn me a'fore ya make a joke like that boy. Ah ain't as spry as Ah used ta be. Liable to give me a heart attack carryin' on like that!" With a final harsh bark of laughter, he seemed to regain his composure. He wiped a bloody tear from his one good eye, before he said, "Come on then. The boys have probably got everything set up by now. Let me show ya why yer really here!"