Jake was looking forward for his first night on the job. He'd left college with a barely a qualification to his name and struggled to find decent employment since. His last position was working in a fast-food restaurant which he'd hated. But he'd finally lucked out a couple of days ago when he'd seen the "help wanted" notice at the old catering warehouse. So dressed in his light blue shirt, navy tie, matching trousers and black loafers he waited for everyone to leave before starting his shift.

Night watchman might not be to everyone's taste, but it seemed a pretty sweet deal to him. Jake got to patrol the empty warehouse and pretend it was his domain. Unfortunately, the company wouldn't supply him with a gun, taser or even a baton although they did present him with an impressive collection of keys to hang from his belt which made a reassuring jingle as he walked.

The warehouse itself was huge. It had offices at the front and docking bays round the rear. The majority of the building however was dedicated to storing and packaging goods. Years ago, it had required hundreds of people to undertake this but today it was all automated and only required a handful of people to maintain the machinery. Not that Jake got on well with technology.

He started his shift by checking the offices. As expected, they were completely empty although he did discover a twenty-pound note on the floor in one of them. He was very tempted to pocket the money but didn't just in case it had been left there deliberately as a test of his trustworthiness. So, instead he picked up the twenty and left it on the nearby desk hoping that was the right thing and he hadn't just done himself out of some free money.

Jake then went into the back area to check over the stores. He was drawn over to one section that was still under development judging by the black and yellow tape which separated it off from the rest. It seems that the company was expanding its range of products to include freshly filled cream doughnuts. Jake was partial to the odd pastry or two and so looked around for any free samples.

Unfortunately for Jake there didn't seem to be any open boxes with the creamy treats on offer. So, after reassuring himself that there was no one else present he opened one of the boxes to reveal six doughnuts. Unlike the picture on the box these pastries weren't covered in icing and when he bit into them there was no jam or cream inside.

Disappointed by the lack of sweet filling, Jake began to look around for something to fill the doughnut. There were some large metal cylinders with pipes attached which led to what appeared to be robotic arms that were in turn connected to a conveyor belt. Jake knew not to mess with the equipment but surely giving it a closer look couldn't do any harm.

"Can't have an empty doughnut" Jake said to himself.

The cylinders were labelled, some marked jam, some cream, some custard and others chocolate sauce. They question was how Jake was to get the filling from out of the cylinders. Picking on the strawberry jam filling he traced the pipe from the pertinent cylinder to the arm it was attached to. The arm ended in a nozzle which was pointing towards the conveyor belt.

Jake stuck one of the empty doughnuts on the nozzle and then tried to figure out how to trigger the jam. There didn't seem to be a trigger on or near the arm. In fact, other than a matching pair of green and red buttons at the end of the machinery there didn't seem to be any control panels at all. So, without no other options Jake walked over and pressed the green button. Initially nothing happened and so Jake hit the button a couple of more times.

A low rumbling sound erupted from the equipment and slowly the conveyor belt began to move. At the same time the robotic arms started to rise up and the pipes connecting them to the cylinders developed a slight judder. Jake returned over to his doughnut and was just reaching for it when it began to tremble. Suddenly it shot off the nozzle and struck him on the top of his head.

"What the?" Jake uttered.

The rumbling sounds from the machine started to get louder and louder, and the pipes from the cylinders began to shake violently. Jake knew he had to switch the bloody thing off but as he made his way over to the buttons his keys got caught on the conveyor belt. He tried pulled them free, but it did no good and as the equipment went into overdrive he was pulled up on top of the belt.

Jake struggled to free his keys, but it did no good as they were jammed into the equipment too tightly. So instead, he looked to detach the stuck keys from his collection, but he couldn't work out which was which. And whilst he tried, one of the robotic arms lifted up and turned its nozzle towards him. Before he was even aware of what was going on he was struck in the face with a blast of cream.

Blinded by the cream he flailed around uselessly as the conveyor belt moved him along, so he was between two more of the arms. These proceeded to spray him up and down with strawberry jam. His shirt was the first to be decorated in the red substance followed by his trousers. Then his head came under attack from the liquidised fruit before the arms targeted his new shoes. And oddly that was probably the worst part as he felt the gooey liquid penetrate all the way to his socks.

Looking down at himself, Jake felt a complete fool but see his jam-soaked trousers did give him an idea. Whilst the keys might be stuck to the machine and the keys to his belt, there was no reason he couldn't remove his belt and the process free himself from this infernal contraption. So, he reached down and began to undo his belt when somewhat unexpectedly his trousers fell down.

Without thought he bent over and attempted to pull his trousers back up again. Unfortunately, that meant Jake didn't notice as the conveyor belt transported him along to the next pair of arms which immediately thrust themselves towards him. One of the nozzles found its way down the front of his underpants, whilst the second setup home in the back.

"No!" Jake screamed in horror.

Suddenly the most private regions of Jake's anatomy were invaded by custard as his underpants struggled to contain the yellow substance. The feeling was almost indescribable, and he couldn't quite decide whether to laugh or cry. Instead of either, he just stood there dumbfounded as the conveyor delivered him to the next set of arms.

These sprayed chocolate sauce all over him until he looked like something dragged out of a mud pit. Jake found it almost impossible to move with this sticky coating on him so was helpless as he approached more of the robotic arms, these spraying a fine white powder. Within moments he was transformed from a bog monster into a snowman as the powder stuck to him.

The conveyor belt moved him along towards the end of the machinery where the penultimate set of arms awaited him. These began to dance around him as they struggled to pump their contents from the cylinders below. Just when Jake thought he might escape another messy coating they erupted with pinking icing. It ran down his face, over his once clean shirt, down his bare legs and pooled around his smart shoes. The flow of icing stopped, and Jake continued on his unwanted trip.

The final pair of robotic arms rained down hundreds and thousands of tiny multicoloured sugar strands over him. Then as a final insult, the conveyor belt deposited him on the ground. Jake took a couple of minutes to collect himself, both mentally and physically, before he picked himself of the floor and staggered off looking for somewhere to get cleaned up.

* * *

Despite managing to not only get himself cleaned up but also hiding the evidence of his messy occurrence, Jake handed in his notice the following day. And rather than looking for another job he enrolled at the local college to study engineering and IT because there was no way he wanted to be at the mercy of technology again, instead he would be its master.

The End.