He worked at a recycling plant. His job at the recycling plant was to feed scrap metal through the crusher. The crusher was a machine that ground up pretty much anything into small chunks.

An example of the kind of thing he would feed through the crusher would be an old car engine. Once the car engine had been fed through the crusher, it was easier and quicker to separate the different types of metal, plastic, or rubber. Once something had been fed through the crusher, it would go along a conveyor belt, and then powerful magnets would separate the iron and steel. What was left would be dumped into a hot water bath, and the plastics and rubber skimmed off as they floated. The aluminum would then be collected from the bottom of the tank and then everything would be separated and ready for recycling.

He worked on the crusher with a Mexican guy who everyone called Chapo, and a black guy who everyone called Cream. The shift started at 6AM and would go on until 4PM. They had two 15-minute breaks, and a 30-minute lunch break.

The recycling plant was owned by a company called Greener Tomorrows Inc.

It was 5:50 AM, and he was drinking a coffee and smoking a cigarette with Chapo and Cream. They were getting ready to start the crusher up, and to get through the huge pile of scrap metal sitting beside the machine.

The plant manager walked up, followed closely by a young man wearing khaki chinos, with a dark blue polo shirt with a small green crocodile embroidered on the chest. The young man was carrying a notepad, and had a white hardhat and yellow high-visibility vest on, with black framed glasses.

‘You three’ - said the plant manager firmly.

The three of them turned towards the manager.

‘This is Todd’ - he said - ‘Todd is a consultant hired by HQ to get this place running more efficiently.’

‘Hey guys’ - said Todd, smiling and holding a hand up in a wave.

The three workers stared blankly at the manager.

‘Todd is going to be with you today, watching how you run the crusher’ - said the manager.

The three workers stared at Todd.

‘Now no fucking around - you understand?’ - The manager barked.

Chapo, Cream, and he nodded.

‘Good luck’ - the manager said to Todd, and then he walked off.

The three workers carried on smoking and drinking their coffees.

Todd stood.

‘Hey guys, I’m Todd Poulsen - I’m an associate consultant from McBain Consulting’ - he said.

The three workers ignored him.

‘I’m super excited to see how you guys work, and to see if we can get this operation really humming’ - Todd smiled.

The three workers continued to smoke and sip their coffee.

‘What time do you fire things up?’ - Todd asked.

Cream turned to Todd.

‘We fire things up when we start getting fucking paid to fire things up’ - Cream spat.

Cream flicked his cigarette away, and finished his coffee, throwing the cup on the pile of scrap metal.

The other two did the same.

Chapo went around the side of the crusher and pulled a lever, and a siren sounded. He pushed two buttons, and the huge crusher rumbled and then came to life. The jagged wheels inside of the machine began to rotate.

Cream went up on the platform and stood, waiting.

Chapo climbed into the cab of a crane that had metal claws attached.

He went round the back of the crusher and stood with a long rake by the conveyor belt.

Todd stood watching as the crane picked up a pile of metal and dropped it into the crusher. Cream stood and watched. The metal was ground up as it went through the crusher, and then he raked the conveyor belt to make sure that the lumps of metal and plastic were spread out evenly.

Todd tentatively and slowly made his way up on the platform, standing behind Cream who was watching the loads being dumped into the crusher. Todd peered over the side of the platform, and looked at the machine crushing the metal.

‘What are you doing?’ - Todd asked Cream.

Cream looked at him.

‘I’m working on a manuscript - and I was just thinking about one of the characters.’

Todd stared at Cream.

‘Sorry, what?’

‘I’m writing a book - about a serial killer. I want to introduce some humor into a very dark storyline - and I’m struggling to find a way to do it that doesn’t seem too contrived to the reader’ - said Cream.

Todd sighed. ‘That’s what you’re doing?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Are you not supposed to be working?’

Cream turned to Todd.

‘Todd, I know the only reason I’m here right now - is because Greener Tomorrows Inc haven’t found a way to hire illegal immigrants to do this job for half the money they pay me without getting caught, and there isn’t a robot that won't take two coffee breaks and stop for lunch invented yet’ - said Cream.

He turned his attention back to the crusher.

‘But what is your job here?’ - Todd asked.

‘I watch the crusher.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I am motherfucking told to watch the crusher, Todd!’ - Cream yelled.

Todd took some notes in his pad.

‘What are you watching for?’ - Todd

‘Most of the shit we put through this crusher goes through it like spicy street tacos through a white girl’s ass’ - said Cream - ‘But every once in a while, there's a piece of real metal in that pile that this baby just cannot handle. Like an old furnace - from the 50s and 60s. Those things are made like German tiger tanks, Todd. And when we drop some of that good metal in, we have to be real careful, or else the teeth of the crusher will shatter. So I watch - and if I see any good bits of metal dropping in I stop the machine and we lift the metal out, and it gets put in another pile.’

Todd peered into the crusher again.

‘What happens to it then?’ - He asked.

Cream turned towards him.

‘I asked that question once, and do you know what they told me?’

‘No.’

‘They told me to mind my own fucking business and carry on watching the crusher.’

Cream turned his attention back to the crusher.

Todd continued to watch Cream as he watched the crusher for the next hour.

‘Excuse me’ - Todd called to Cream.

Cream sighed and rolled his eyes. ‘What?’

‘Where do we go to the bathroom?’ - Todd asked.

‘We don’t’ - said Cream.

‘Sorry?’ - Todd said.

‘We don’t stop, Todd’ - said Cream - ‘I guess you can do whatever the fuck you like, but if we want a piss, we have to wait until break time.’

Working on the crusher was loud and hot. The air was thick with the smell of engine oil, gasoline, and hundreds of other chemicals mixed together.

After another two hours passed by before Chapo dropped a load of metal in the crusher, and then climbed out of the cab and walked to the side of the machine. Once the last bits of metal had dropped through, he shut down the crusher.

Cream walked off the platform, and a woman with a trolley arrived with an urn of hot coffee and polystyrene cups.

All three workers took a coffee and sat down on the large lumps of scrap metal and all lit cigarettes.

‘You want anything?’ - The woman asked Todd.

‘Do you have decaf?’ - Todd said.

‘Just coffee sweetie’ - said the woman.

‘Decaf coffee?’

‘You want a coffee?’ - Asked the woman.

‘Yes, decaf please’ - said Todd.

‘I told you, we only got coffee.’

Todd took a coffee and stood in front of the three workers.

‘So how did it go so far today?’ - Todd asked.

‘Fucking amazing baby!’ - Chapo whooped.

Todd smiled. ‘Yes, it did seem pretty exciting to me.’

The three workers stared at him.

‘Hey Todd’ - said Chapo - ‘You want to hear a joke?’

Todd took a sip of the coffee, and pulled a face - ‘Yes, sure. That sounds like fun.’

‘Okay - so there’s this koala up a tree in the jungle in Australia’ - said Chapo - ‘You know what a koala is Todd?’

‘Yes, I visited Australia when I was in university’ - said Todd.

‘Okay, good. So this koala is up a tree and is smoking a joint. And this little lizard walks by and the koala says “hey lizard, do you want to get high?”, so the little lizard climbs up the tree and they start smoking together. After about five joints, the koala and the lizard are pretty fucked up, and the little lizard says to the koala “I am going to head down to the river and get a drink of water, my throat is so fucking dry”, so the little lizard climbs down the tree and makes his way down to the river and the koala keeps on smoking the weed. Now as the little lizard is leaning over the river bank, he falls in - and this huge crocodile swims past and saves him. The crocodile says “What happened, why did you fall in the river?”, and the little lizard says to the crocodile that he was smoking weed with a koala up in a tree, and his throat got dry and he came down to the river to get a drink, and he fell in. So the crocodile says “where is this koala with the weed?”, and the little lizard tells him. So the crocodile pulls himself out of the river and goes into the jungle and sees the koala up the tree smoking a joint. The crocodile calls out “hey, can I have some of that?”, and the koala looks down and says “how much fucking water did you drink?”’

The three workers laughed. Todd stood and smiled.

‘Ha ha - yes - that’s a pretty funny joke’ - said Todd.

The four of them reverted to silence.

‘So when do we start work again?’ - Todd asked.

Cream looked at his watch - ‘We got 3 minutes and 12 seconds left, Todd.’

All three workers lit another cigarette. Todd stood and smiled.

The coffee break finished, and Chapo started the crusher again.

Todd went round to the conveyor belt and stood next to him. As the first bits of metal dropped out of the crusher, he started raking the pieces so that they were evenly spread out.

‘Why are you doing that?’ - Asked Todd

He continued to rake the pieces of metal.

‘The magnet is very powerful’ - he said - ‘so we spread out the pieces so no bits of plastic are dragged up onto the magnets by the bits of metal.’

Todd continued to stare. After about an hour, Todd left him. Staring at pieces of metal being raked was even too much for Todd to watch for too long. He walked around to the crane. Todd waved at Chapo, and Chapo opened the cab of the crane.

‘You want to come up?’ - Chapo asked him.

‘Yes please.’

Todd climbed the ladder and climbed into the cab behind Chapo.

‘So Todd, you got any jokes for me homie?’ - Chapo asked, working the controls of the crane.

‘I don’t know any jokes, I am afraid’ - said Todd.

Chapo continued to move lumps of metal from the pile and into the crusher.

‘So tell me what Australia was like”

Todd stared at the back of Chapo’s head.

‘It was...it was fun.’

‘I bet it was homie - did you get some good Australian pussy my home boy?’ - Chapo asked with a sly grin.

‘I...I….er...I was working when I was there.’

‘You telling me, Todd - that you flew all the way to the other side of the world and you didn’t get no pussy?’ - Said Chapo.

‘I had a girlfriend at university.’

‘That’s an even better reason to fuck some Australian bitches, Todd. Yo girlfriend cannot see what’s going on unless she got eyeballs that can stretch 10,000 miles’ - said Chapo - ‘You can fuck them bitches in Australia, and then head home to some pussy all excited to see you and get fucked again!’

Todd didn’t say anything.

‘Hey Todd - I got another joke for you my brother. You want to hear it?’ - Chapo said.

‘Well - I don’t want to distract you from your work.’

‘Fuck the work Todd’ - said Chapo - ‘You wanna hear the joke or not?’

‘Well, okay I guess’ - said Todd.

‘Okay - now there's this bitch who’s been in a coma for about 10 years. And one day, when the nurses are washing her - and they start washing around her pussy, she makes a groaning sound. So the nurses tell the doctor, and the doctor calls this bitch’s husband. So the husband comes in - and the doctor tells him what happened, and the doctor says to the husband, “would you mind performing oral sex on your wife to see if it helps wake her up?” And the husband says of course - so the nurses set them up in a private room, and they dim the lights and they go back to the nurses' station and wait. About 10 minutes later, an alarm goes off saying that the bitch has stopped breathing - so the nurses run to the room and open the door, and the husband got his dick in the bitch’s mouth and says, “I think she choked!”’

Chapo howled with laughter. Todd sat silently.

Chapo continued to dump bits of metal into the crusher while Cream watched it, raking the bits of metal and plastic.

‘Hey Todd - you wanna hear a pretty fucked up story?’ - Chapo asked.

‘What is the story about?’ - said Todd.

‘About my cousin, down in Juarez in Mexico.’

‘What is the story?’ - Todd asked.

‘So my cousin, Emile, he works for the railways down in Juarez. His job is to check the things that change the directions the trains go in’ - said Chapo.

‘The signals?’ - Todd said.

‘I don’t know what the fuck they’re called - anyways, one morning he was heading out and he stopped at the side of the railways - and he has to walk along the track and check that everything is okay. So he starts walking down the track, and in the distance, he can see a load of dogs - all barking and going crazy and shit. So he was a bit freaked out - but he keeps walking down the track and he gets a bit closer and there are about 10 dogs, like wild dogs all going crazy and shit. So he crosses over the side of the tracks to get a bit of space, and there are like 8 human heads by the side of the tracks. And the dogs are biting them and ripping off the flesh. So my cousin - he is like what the actual fuck! So he keeps walking past and just does his job, and then comes back and the dogs are ripping these fucking heads apart man - trying to get the tongue out of the mouth. And I guess they fucking like the taste of the human flesh, because one of the dogs tries to attack my cousin. So he is running up the train track and these fucking man-eating dogs are chasing him and trying to bite him and fucking eat him. So he gets back to his car and the dogs are snarling and snapping and trying to get his motherfucking tongue out of his mother fucking mouth. And he gets in the car, and he manages to get the fuck out of there.’

Todd sat in silence for a moment.

‘Did he call the police?’ - Todd asked.

‘Who?’ - Said Chapo.

‘Your cousin.’

‘Why?’

‘Because of the heads. The human heads. There had been a serious crime’ - said Todd.

Chapo stopped lifting metal for a moment and turned to look at Todd.

‘Motherfucking cops cut those fucking heads off Todd - you wanna call up the cops to tell them that you discovered where they dumped the bodies? That’s how you end up with your head cut off at the side of the railway tracks and a motherfucking dog ripping your tongue out of your head’ - Chapo boomed.

‘Oh’ - said Todd.

Chapo checked his watch, and dumped a final load in the crusher before climbing out of the cab. Chapo walked over to the crusher, and waited for the last bits of metal to fall out the bottom and then shut down the machine.

Cream climbed down off the platform and stretched. Chapo lit a cigarette. He wandered over and lit a cigarette too.

‘What are you guys doing for lunch?’ - Todd asked.

‘Sitting amongst this shit and filth and eating cold leftover macaroni’ - said Cream.

‘Same’ - said Chapo - ‘But I have pork tamales.’

‘Tuna sandwich’ - he said.

‘I think they have some sushi ordered for me in the office’ - said Todd.

The three workers sat down on lumps of metal. Todd wandered off to the office.

‘I would bet $100 that Todd is going to find a way to get rid of one of us motherfuckers’ - said Cream.

‘Why you say that homes?’ - Chapo asked him.

Cream lit a cigarette.

‘Mother fucker has too. He cannot stand here all day amongst this filth and shit and walk back up to the office saying everything is running great. One of us motherfuckers is a dead man walking’ - said Cream.

Chapo finished his cigarette, and opened his lunch bag. He pulled out a tamale and unwrapped it.

He ate his sandwich.

‘Motherfuckers like Todd do this shit all over this plant. Look at three people and tell management to get rid of one. Company saves money, Todd’s company gets paid. Life goes on’ - said Cream. He opened his lunch bag and pulled out a Tupperware with cold macaroni and cheese.

They finished their lunches, and smoked more cigarettes. They fired up the crusher, and Chapo loaded metal into the crusher. Cream watched the crusher, raking the bits of metal.

About 40 minutes later Todd wandered back over drinking a bottle of sparkling water. He waved at Chapo in the crane. Chapo ignored him.

Todd climbed up on the platform and stood behind Cream. Cream continued to watch the teeth of the crusher.

Chapo dropped a load of metal into the crusher, and amongst it was a length of cable covered in black rubber insulation. Some of the cable missed the crusher, and fell down on the platform. Cream leaned forward to grab the cable, but the end of it was caught by the teeth of the crusher and was dragged into it. Todd stepped backwards, but the cable snared itself around his ankle, whipping him into the crusher.

Cream looked over the edge and saw Todd going through the teeth of the crusher. Cream hit the emergency stop button, and just Todd’s head and shoulders remained. His eyes were open, and he was looking up at Cream.

Under the crusher he saw the blood and bits of bone dropping through - and then the machine stopped.

Chapo climbed out of the crane cab - and shouted at Cream - ‘Did Todd go in?’

Cream just stared at Todd’s head.

‘Todd?!’ - He yelled in horror.

Chapo and the man joined Cream on the platform.

‘Man that is some fucked up shit’ - said Chapo, taking out his phone and taking a photo.

‘We better call someone’ - said Cream.

Chapo and Cream left the platform. Chapo called the office, and Cream lit a cigarette.

The man stared at Todd’s head stuck in the teeth of the crusher.

‘This is a sign’ - said Todd.

‘What?’ - He said.

‘This is a sign - you must start killing’ - said Todd.

People were running over to the crusher from the office. Other workers were coming over.

‘Kill!’ - Todd whispered.

‘Okay’ - he said.

The manager climbed up onto the platform.

‘Oh my fucking god!’ - Said the manager.

The police came. He had to give a statement. Cream and Chapo gave statements too. The three of them were sent home early, and given the rest of the week off - Chapo said that Todd was a legend for getting them paid time off work.

He went home. He masturbated with Jesse and they planned his 6th killing.