Pull the Lever, Kronk — Wrong Lever!
Kronk Resigns from
Working for Yzma
After years of pulling levers (the wrong ones, always), serving as henchman, personal chef, and emotional punching bag, Kronk is leaving to follow his true calling: spinach puffs.
Dear Yzma,
I'm writing to tell you that I'm leaving. This is hard for me because I don't like conflict — my shoulder angel and my shoulder devil have been arguing about this for weeks, and honestly, the shoulder angel won pretty easily because the shoulder devil got distracted by a cheese platter I was imagining.
I'm leaving to pursue my passion for cooking. Specifically, spinach puffs. You once described my spinach puffs as "adequate." Yzma, those spinach puffs were made from scratch with hand-pulled pastry dough, fresh baby spinach from the palace garden, three types of artisan cheese, and a hint of nutmeg that I personally ground using a mortar and pestle that I carved myself from a single piece of Incan marble. "Adequate" is what you call a bridge. My spinach puffs are a REVELATION. Gordon Ramsay would weep.
The Lever Situation:
Let's talk about the levers. There are two levers in your secret laboratory. One opens the door to your evil lair. The other drops you into an alligator pit. I have LABELED them. With PICTURES. The one on the left has a picture of a door on it. The one on the right has a picture of an alligator with a big red X through it. You still pull the wrong one. Every. Single. Time.
I have been dropped into the alligator pit fourteen times. FOURTEEN. The alligators know me by name now. We have a rapport. Carlos (the big one) saved me a seat last time. I should not have a reserved spot in an alligator pit. That is not normal workplace hazard. That is a PATTERN.
I installed a sign. I installed ARROWS. I put up a banner that said "THIS LEVER = ALLIGATORS. DO NOT PULL." You pulled it, fell in, and then blamed me for "confusing signage." The signage was not confusing. It literally said the word "ALLIGATORS."
The Poison Situation:
The poison for Kuzco. Kuzco's poison. The poison chosen specifically to kill Kuzco. Kuzco's poison. That poison. — Look, I get confused sometimes. I'm a big guy with a lot on his plate (literally — I was also cooking dinner that night). But I need to say this: when you told me to poison the Emperor, my shoulder angel said no. And then you yelled at me and the shoulder devil said "she has a point, she IS your boss," and everything got very complicated very fast.
Then I mixed up the poison with the extract of llama. And Kuzco turned into a llama. And you were furious. But honestly? Turning an emperor into a llama is a pretty reasonable mistake when your boss keeps ALL HER POTIONS in IDENTICAL VIALS with NO LABELS. I am a chef. In MY kitchen, everything is labeled. The paprika says PAPRIKA. The cumin says CUMIN. Your lab has 400 unlabeled vials of mysterious liquids. That is a workplace safety violation and also just bad organizational practice.
The Squirrel Thing:
I speak squirrel. I know this is unusual for a henchman. The squirrels in the palace garden and I have developed a deep and meaningful friendship. They warned me about Yzma's Plan B (the one where she was going to turn me into a flea, put me in a box, put that box inside another box, and mail it to herself). The squirrels were the ones who told me I deserved better. Bucky — the one with the scar — specifically said (in squirrel): "Kronk, you are a good man who makes excellent pastry, and you should not be working for a woman who has been struck by lightning more times than she has said something nice to you."
Bucky is right. Bucky is always right. Bucky is a better life coach than you are a boss.
My spinach puffs are better than your plans for world domination. Your plans have a 0% success rate. My puffs have been described by the palace guards as "life-changing." I know what I'm good at now, and it's not pulling levers or confusing poisons. It's cooking. It's always been cooking.
Kronk out.
Kronk
Chef. Squirrel whisperer. Former henchman. Current free man.
P.S. I left a batch of spinach puffs in the oven for you. Because despite everything, I'm not the kind of guy who leaves without making sure there's food. Timer's set for 12 minutes. Don't pull the oven lever. It's not a lever. It's a door. It opens normally. Please don't confuse it.
Yzma's Response
[This response arrived crumpled, stained with an unidentified purple liquid, and singed at the edges. It had been pulled from a pile of mail that had also fallen into the alligator pit.]
KRONK.
You CANNOT quit. You are MY henchman. I MADE you. Who will pull my levers? Who will carry me on that stupid little seat? Who will get the poison — THE POISON FOR KUZCO, KUZCO'S POISON — when I need it?
Your spinach puffs are... [long scribble of crossed-out words]... fine. They are fine. I may have said "adequate" but I meant "the best thing I have eaten in forty years" and you KNOW I don't give compliments because compliments are for people who aren't me.
The levers are NOT confusing. The signs are too small. Make bigger signs. Come back. I will pay you slightly more than nothing, which is more than nothing.
— Yzma
(She was a cat when she wrote this. The handwriting suggests tiny paws.)
Exit Interview Transcript
Conducted by Emperor Kuzco, who insisted on being present because "this is the best drama since me."
KUZCO: So, big guy, you're really leaving the scary lady?
KRONK: Yeah. It's time. I've been thinking about it a lot. Well, as much as I think about anything. Mostly I think about recipes. But this was in there too.
KUZCO: She DID try to kill me. Multiple times. Including the llama thing.
KRONK: In my defense, I mixed up the vials. In her defense — actually, I don't have a defense for her. She definitely wanted you dead.
KUZCO: What's next for Kronk?
KRONK: I'm opening a restaurant. Kronk's Kitchen. The menu is mostly spinach puffs but I'm branching out. I'm working on a llama-shaped bread. In your honor.
KUZCO: ...I'm oddly touched.
KRONK: Also, Bucky says hi.
KUZCO: Who's Bucky?
KRONK: The squirrel. The one with the scar? He's my business partner. He handles operations. He's very organized for a squirrel.
[Kuzco stared at Kronk for a full thirty seconds and then said, "I believe every word of that."]
What Happened Next
Kronk's Kitchen opened three months later. It was packed on opening night. The spinach puffs sold out in forty-five minutes. Kronk cried tears of joy and made another batch.
Yzma showed up on the third night, disguised as a different old woman. Kronk recognized her immediately. He served her spinach puffs anyway. She ate four and said, "These are adequate." Kronk smiled, because he now understood that "adequate" was the closest thing to love she could express.
Bucky the squirrel runs front-of-house operations. He is the most efficient maitre d' in the empire. He seats guests by scent, which sounds wrong but works perfectly.
The restaurant has zero levers. This was a deliberate design choice.
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