Amethyst Star Isn't Prepared For This

by MagicS

Amethyst Star and the Simple Job

“So what you need to do is pick the cherries from every one of these trees, take em to the barn, wash em, remove the pits, cut and mash em up, and then put them in the jars. Got that?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, and then what you do is put those jars in the right boxes, make sure not to mix any with the strawberry or other kinds of jam, and then tape those boxes up for me. Simple enough, right?”

“Also yes.”

“Good. That’s about it. Thanks for coming to help us out.”

Amethyst Star’s next job took her to a fruit farm that lied inside the city walls, one of the bigger ones that wasn’t left to the fertile lands around the city. It was kind of weird seeing how it was boxed in by other buildings and roads right around it but the farmer still owned a large plot of land that he filled up with trees and other fruit plants. All of it centered around a large house, barn and processing facility. In the north section of the farm there were the cherry trees, south had the strawberry fields, west had an apricot orchard, and to the east was raspberries. Amethyst Star was only one of several workers on the various farms right now, she was given purvey over the entire expanse of cherry trees in front of her. It would take a long time just to pick them all but she was eager to do this job. And confident that it was impossible to screw up after hearing how simple it was.

Every step was simple and easy. Tedious, but easy. Good. And there was no fire involved in any way, shape, or form. Also good.

She had been made to arrive at the farm before sunrise so they could make the absolute most of the day. Apparently that’s just how farms operated. It was now slightly after sunrise and Amethyst Star was still more than a bit tired but her sleep schedule was so messed up and random from her traveling that it wasn’t as big a deal as it would have been. It was only slightly more troublesome that she was going to have to do so much physical labor, but maybe that would just wake her up instead? After all she was in much better shape than when she had started. At least she hoped she was.

“I won’t let you down, Mr. Pitchfork!” Amethyst Star replied.

The farmer smiled and waved goodbye as he turned around and headed towards the processing facility. All the bottles of jam would end up in there when the day was over. The boxes would be inspected and then either stored up or shipped off depending on if there were any outstanding orders. She figured most would probably be going off today, otherwise why would Mr. Pitchfork pay for her services when he could’ve just waited? That was irrelevant to her though, she should just focus on her own job and nothing else.

That was definitely the best idea she had had recently.

Amethyst Star looked around at what she had to work with. Besides just the many cherry trees she’d be picking she had a lot of baskets and a large wagon for storing them all in and then taking to the barn when she had finished stripping the last tree. The unicorn frowned as she looked up at the nearest tree. There were a lot of cherries growing from it. It would take her even longer than she had first thought to get all of those cherries down.

“Really tedious,” Amethyst Star sighed and climbed the ladder that led up the trunk of the first tree. “Ugh, this is just the first step, I can’t let myself get discouraged already!” The unicorn tried to get herself into gear as she stood up on top of the ladder and reached for the nearest branch of cherries. Plucking them off with no problem she levitated up her first basket and safely plopped the cherries inside. “There! One dozen down and only ten million dozen more to go!”

It was surprisingly exhausting work since she had to keep moving the ladder, going back down and up it, to get to every area of the tree where cherries were growing. And to hold the basket in her magic while she picked them all. And the basket got heavier and heavier as more cherries filled it up. More than once Amethyst Star again wished she had the strength and stamina of an earth pony. Her meager gains were hardly enough to compare to natural strength or a body built from years of this kind of work.

One basket was filled up before she even finished the first tree. Mr. Pitchfork never said by when she needed to have all this done but she assumed it was well before sundown.

“I’ve gotta pick up the pace if I’m finishing this job all in one day,” Amethyst Star began to double her efforts. She’d just have to ignore any fatigue. What was this compared to walking through a desert with no water? Nothing, that’s what.

She wiped the sweat off her brow when she climbed down the ladder for the last time on this first tree. It was stripped bare of cherries and they were all neatly and carefully packed into several baskets. A job well done. She hadn’t accidentally broken any branches, or dropped some cherries or the basket, or fallen off the ladder and hurt herself. It went perfectly. Aside from how long it took her. Looking out across the rest of the cherry trees, Amethyst Star knew she would have to move even quicker than she already was to get through them all. Which was a problem since she had long already realized that and was pushing herself as hard as she could go.

Was this normally a job just for one pony? Am I doing something wrong? She thought to herself. It didn’t seem like there was any way for her to do it faster and she didn’t know how to “buck” cherries. Maybe she could try using her magic to pull them off quicker? But she wasn’t sure if her magic was precise enough for that. And she was definitely sure over-taxing her magic like that would tire her out before she finished with the trees.

“Oh well, just gotta keep moving I guess.”

Amethyst Star folded up the ladder and carried it over to the next cherry tree. Her work only just beginning.

As she walked up to start plucking more cherries she paused for a second. I feel like I’ve gotten sidetracked in some way.

The unicorn kept picking cherries as fast as she could but the tedium and monotony of the work was starting to get to her even more than the physical strain and her mind was beginning to wander. Definitely not something good for her. But how easy would it be if she could fly? That would make getting to every cherry so much simpler. Or if she could just yank them all off their stems at once with her magic? That’d be something that would impress any pony.

“If I could go back in time I’d ask Cherry Berry all about picking cherries,” Amethyst Star frowned at the thought of how she had a friend that would be the absolute perfect helper for this and yet she was weeks travel away. Even Strawberry Sunrise and half the other ponies in Ponyville would probably be helpful or at least have good advice for work like this. “Like they say, hindsight is—does that saying even apply here?” She scratched her head.

Amethyst Star absentmindedly popped one of the cherries she had picked into her mouth, chewing it and spitting out the seed before swallowing the sweet fruit and licking her lips. “Mm, tasty!”

With the sudden realization of what she had just done her eyes went wide and she looked at the ground, where the spat out seed lied. A warm blush of embarrassment crawled up her face.

“Oops,” she swiftly looked around to make sure no one had seen her. “Better bury that seed. Time to refocus, Amethyst.”

Morning turned to late morning and that turned to noon as Amethyst Star tirelessly worked to remove every cherry from its tree. Dozens of buckets were filled to the brim and then some before she was finished with the trees. The unicorn was exhausted and her limbs shook as she stepped down the ladder for the very last time but at least the picking was done. She had had a couple mishaps from her increasing weariness as the morning went on, such as accidentally dropping a full basket of cherries, slipping on the ladder and being forced to hang onto a branch for dear life, and then hurting her flank when that branch broke and dropped her on the ground.

But it was done.

The picking was done. She knew she still had everything else to do but at least none of that would be as tiring as this, right? Removing pits and washing cherries was next, still sounded tedious but at least she didn’t need to worry about hurting herself or breaking anything else. Speaking of that, she wondered if Mr. Pitchfork would notice the broken branch. Amethyst Star hoped he wouldn’t be upset.

Unfortunately Amethyst Star did at this point need to actually load all the cherries onto the cart and pull it to the barn. Not something she was built for but there was nothing she could do about it. The even worse news was though was that her legs felt like absolute lead after doing that and she was still only halfway done with her duties. And it added onto her already excessive amount of time that it took to get through the trees. Maybe she wasn’t last though? Maybe she’d arrive at the barn and the ones taking care of the other fruits wouldn’t be there yet?

“Ughhh!” Amethyst Star groaned as she slowly pulled the wagon towards the barn after hitching herself to it. Full of cherries like it was the thing weighed a ton and the wheels dug into the ground to make the journey even harder.

It’s not like the barn was far away though but Amethyst Star was still close to passing out from exertion by the time she wheeled her wagon inside.

And to her dismay she was most certainly the last one here. By a long time it seemed, everyone else was working hard on cleaning and preparing their fruit for the jars. They didn’t even bother to glance her way. Well that was fine with her, she preferred not to have to see any eyebrows raised at her. Soon enough she’d be just as consumed in her work trying to make up for lost time. Amethyst Star had a lot of cherries to get through.

She lugged her wagon the last few feet needed to take it over to a long wooden table that had a single metal sink built into the end and a few tools like some knives and cutting boards set up for her when she was done washing the cherries. Everyone had their own table and sink to work at so at least she had plenty of space and didn’t have to fight for control over the sink. The barn itself was also quite huge, it would’ve easily dwarfed the Sweet Apple Acres barn in size. The four different tables took up the middle of the barn’s space while a massive amount of crates, glass jars, and shelves lined the walls and back of it. With Amethyst Star by her sink she was pretty close to the back wall.

Amethyst Star grabbed her first basket of cherries and put it up on the table right next to the sink. The sink had a big drain and disposal at the bottom of it, she figured she was supposed to just throw the cherry pits down it when she was done with them.

As it turned out though she wasn’t very dexterous with her hooves when it came to small things like these cherries and removing even one pit without destroying the cherry turned out to be a pain. The unicorn frowned as she used her magic to hold the first cherry up while cutting it down the middle with a knife and essentially tried to pull the pit out with her magic.

“If I didn’t need to wash them after it wouldn’t matter how much I destroy the cherries,” Amethyst Star scowled. “Er, wait.” She looked down at the sink and back at her many baskets of cherries. “I should be washing them first, shouldn’t I?” That definitely seemed like the better option. Wash them first, cut them in half, pull out the pits. Yes, much better.

It was still a hassle washing that many cherries, if the baskets drained she could just hold them under the faucet but since they didn’t she had to just grab cherries by the hooffull or bushel and wash them all like that with the cold water running over her hooves too. The water made the cherries slippery and she dropped more than a few into the sink on accident, some even that fell into the drain, but there was nothing she could do about that.

While she washed all of her cherries she started to notice how the other workers were already filling up boxes and putting them on the shelves. She was seriously that far behind? The back shelves she was nearest to were already starting to fill up with boxes full of jarred strawberries, apricots, and raspberries, making the wooden boards creak with stress. That was annoying, by the time she was ready to put her boxes up she’d have to take them to the farthest shelves. Ugh!

She wasn’t even halfway done with washing while all that was going on either. Would she be reprimanded for taking too long? She really didn’t want to fail another job. Forget about it reflecting poorly on Guru’s Internship she just didn’t want to be confronted by an angry boss. Or confronted by her own feelings of inadequacy and the other annoying thoughts she kept trying to keep out of her head. Which she had been doing a decent job of until now.

Amethyst Star shook her head. “I’m awesome. That’s a fact.”

Washing and cutting out the pits took a while longer and her hooves were shaking by the time she was done with them but at least that part was done. And despite her lack of knife skills she could take pride in the fact that she hadn’t accidentally cut her hoof at any point. Now there were just thousands of cherries to cut and mash up further before scooping them into jars. Something she had to do while she also happened to be totally alone in this barn now.

“I am not that slow. Everyone else is just too fast,” Amethyst Star pouted.

At least this was by far the easiest part of anything she had to do. The cutting boards were clean and pristine for her so really all she had to do was grab some of the jars and then slide the cherry goop in after she was done. It was impossible for her to tell how many jars it would take to collect it all but looking at what the others had done she expected at least a dozen full boxes.

The sweet smell of the cherries also wafted into her nose the more she worked, filling the barn with a pleasant aroma but also making her kind of hungry again at the same time.

But she was not going to eat anymore cherries. Definitely not.

It really looked tasty as she poured it into those glass jars though… no! No, stop right there!

“I probably should just stop working with food after today,” Amethyst Star said to herself. “Whatever I do I’m gonna treat myself to a big, hearty, meal after all this work.” She filled up one of the jars and twisted its brass lid on tight. Pulling one of the empty boxes over with her magic she gently set the jar in it and got started on the next one.

Turn the cherries into jam, put them in the jar, put jars in the boxes. Repetitive as with everything else.

“Considering this has nothing to do with my Cutie Mark or what I do for a living I think it’s pretty impressive how good of a job I’ve done,” the unicorn tried boosting her own confidence. “Time? Who cares about time? It’s getting done and that’s the important part.”

Of course by the time she finished jarring and boxing up every last bit of cherry it was quite close to sunset and even Amethyst Star now was thinking she better finish up as quickly as possible. Only one last thing to do, put every box on the shelves. Now, even though she had been usurped in her organizing duties back in Ponyville she was still fully assured in how great of an organizer she was. The only problem was she was tired and she would have to carry all the boxes to the empty shelves by the barn’s entrance.

Or she could double load the shelves right next to her and save some time.

Decisions, decisions.

“I’m pretty sure I can find a way to make space for my boxes on these shelves,” Amethyst Star said as she looked over the already full shelves right next to her.

This would save her a ton of time and be way easier on her sore body. Win, win!

Amethyst Star chewed on her tongue as she inspected the back shelves to find where the best place to put all of her boxes would be. The top shelves had more room on them while the bottom ones were almost completely full, even the middle shelves were sagging slightly from all the weight put on them. She’d need to use either a ladder (which she didn’t see) or her magic to get the cherry boxes to the top and since Amethyst Star was tired and her magic tank empty for now she would just have to put them in the small amount of space left on the middle shelves. She could stack hers up and squeeze them in there no problem, she was pretty sure.

“Let’s do this!” She foisted the first box up and stood on her hindlegs so she could reach it to one of the middle shelves.

The cherry-picker temp squeezed her first box in-between two boxes of strawberry jars. The wood groaned slightly from the extra box but Amethyst Star ignored it and looked for more spaces. She pushed, stacked, and shoved until she had half a dozen boxes on the one shelf. That was gonna be the most for that one though, she’d have to reach up one higher for the rest of her boxes. She didn’t have the magical strength to lift this heavy of a box though even if she wasn’t running on empty in the first place.

Amethyst Star stood back from the creaking shelves and rubbed her chin, deep in thought, as she looked at the remaining boxes she needed to stack up. “I guess I could just take these to the other shelves… but should I separate them like that? No, I shouldn’t. Is there a chair or anything for me to stand on?”

She spotted the boxes of strawberries on the very bottom shelf and a great idea came to her.

“Hey! I can just stand on top of some of those and put them right back!”

As if in response to her corner-cutting, lack of foresight, and general carelessness with that statement and everything else she had just done, reality decided to come crashing down. A loud crack reached her ears and the boards holding up the shelves she had just overburdened split right down the middle, the entire series of shelves along the back of the barn was shaken as box after box of jarred up fruit tumbled onto the ground. The boxes practically exploded on contact with the jars in them shattering and spilling their fruit and juice everywhere. The shaking even caused a lot of boxes on the top shelves that hadn’t outright broken to come falling down and similarly explode.

Amethyst Star, covered in the viscera of various pulverized fruits, stood back and watched that go on for about two minutes until everything came to a full and complete stop. The last sound she heard was a small piece of glass clinking onto the ground.

She dragged a hoof across her face to get it clean of the slop and sighed. “In my defense they probably should’ve taken better care of these shelves.”

Comments

[Dashie04]

Amethyst was so close.