Kelowna, BC - November 15, 20XX
“H-hewwo nicest mistah…” said the pink and green fluffy as kindest as she could. “Hab nummies fo’ mummeh an’ widdwest babbeh?”
She knew desperation could work on some humans, and it wasnt far from the truth. She had eaten the night before but it had been a couple of days before that. Her young brown and green foal was gorged on her milk, making it look fat for the moment, but it wouldn’t last. Every calorie counted for his survival. She held the foal to her chest, hoping to use him for sympathy. Some humans liked brown fluffies. More than many of the “pretty” fluffies.
The man she was talking to was a teenage boy, dressed in a varsity jacket with an indifferent look on his face. She could have picked a more sympathetic target, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.
“Why don’t you eat that turd you got there? SCRAM, SHITRAT!” said the boy.
Her foal peeped in distress at his yelling. She gave him a comforting lick and dropped down from her upsie position to put him on her back. As the boy turned she gave him a sharp glare. She was a good mummah, and her babbeh was no turd. Unlike that human.
She began to limp back to her box to rest. Her leg, having been injured in an escape from a feral cat a few weeks ago, had never healed fully. She was tired. Rest, yes, rest. She needed it. Her leg would heal and she would hunt for nummies in the limited time before the cowd times came. What she didn’t know, was that boy wasn’t the only human who was watching her.
His name was Chris, and he was travelling back to Vancouver from his parents’ house in Toronto by car. He had stopped in Kelowna for gas, food, and just the chance to get out and walk around a bit. Vancouver was only a few hours west, over the Cascades, but he had been in that car for days and needed the stretch to make it the rest of the way. He had just finished his lunch and started to walk down Bernard Ave when he saw the interaction between the fluffy and the teenage boy.
While visiting his parents he had seen this interplay play out a fair amount, but there was a difference. Most of the time, back east, the “mummah” fluffy would hold up a more colorful one and dismiss or even abuse her “poopie” baby. This one was trying hard to feed her brown foal. That already invoked sympathy from him. But her injured leg, and the fact she didn’t try some desperate begging after the fact, but resigned to what happened instead of acting out told him she was well-behaved.
“Nick could help her,” he thought.
His buddy Nick ran a fluffy sanctuary and research facility. He always told him a well-behaved, loving fluffy could be a good friend and companion. Well, she deserved one, he thought. Chris took the chance, and walked over to the box the fluffy had walked into.
“Hey, girl,” he said softly. “Is this your baby?”
The fluffy exited her box, still tired. She looked like she’d been through hell, but it hadn’t broken her.
“Yes. Dis is Wawamewon’s babbeh,” she said.
So her name was Watermelon. Her fluffy speak was better than most fluffies, he noted. They would have said “dis am” and it did sound like she was genuinely trying to work through the lisp to say “this.”
“Do ye’s have nummies for Wawamewon and babbeh?” she asked cautiously.
Chris pulled out a granola bar he had bought at the convenience store down the street, unwrapped it and put it on the ground for her.
“Dank you, nicest mistah,” she said. “Dis make good miwkies for babbeh.”
She picked up the bar with her mouth and took it back inside her box.
“I know somewhere you could have a warm home, Watermelon,” Chris said.
Watermelon turned around. “You wanna be Wawamewon’s nu daddeh?” she said with a look that you guessed was the fluffy equivalent of an eyebrow raised.
“I can see you’re suspicious, but no. Not me. I have a friend. He has a sanctuary for fluffies. Takes good care of them. You would be safe, warm, and well-fed there,” Chris said.
“Where dat?” she asked. “Wawamewon walk dere after napsie.”
“Its too far to walk, but I can take you. Just give me a minute to grab a few things,” Chris said.
Watermelon gave a disbelieving look. In her head she could hear Oldest Mummah saying “Aw-ways wigilent” to the herd she was raised in. Before that breeder had taken her in, her herd had lasted many cowd times by being cautious and wary, especially of humans. While she needed them now that she was living in a city away from her herd, wherever they were, she knew better than to just trust humans.
“Wawmewon take napsies now. If hoomin is friend and no liesies to Wawamewon, fluffy will be here,” she said. She wouldn’t get her hopes up.
“I’m not lying,” said Chris. “I promise, I’ll be back.”
Watermelon laid down in her box, her baby peeped before snuggling back into her fluff. Chris looked down the street to a nearby department store. He did need a few items before he could safely transport her in his car. He walked in and came out with a pet carrier, a fluffy-friendly water bottle to hook on the door, some bandages, and a couple of blankets to wrap her up in.
“Watermelon,” Chris said into the alleyway. “I’m back.”
Watermelon stirred from her sleep. “Hoomin actually came backsie?”
“Yes,” he said. “I brought you a new box to sleep in on the trip.”
Watermelon recognized the carrier. It wasn’t a sorry-box but a moving-box. One humans used to carry their fluffies from place to place. She saw it had water and a blankie inside.
“You is good hoo-min,” Watermelon said.
“I try,” Chris said, honestly. “Before you get in let’s get you cleaned up a bit first.”
Chris wiped down her fluffy. He had seen the brown on her hooves and had wondered if she had soiled her own fur, he was relieved to learn it was mostly mud. It had been raining alot, she probably couldn’t help getting dirty when she foraged. He also took the moment to wrap up her injured leg.
“Don’t touch owies!” she said.
“Relax, Watermelon, this is to help your owie not get dirty,” he responded.
She smiled and let him do so. Once he was done, he opened the pet carrier and gestured for her to enter. Watermelon looked back at her damp alleyway home one last time and entered slowly. She hoped she wasn’t making a mistake. Chris closed the door on the carrier and brought it to his car, placing it in the backseat. When he closed the back door, he pulled out his phone and made a call.
“Hey, Nick. It’s Chris. Listen, I just found a fluffy. One that’s well behaved and surprisingly cautious. Think you have room?”
Coquitlam, BC - Fluffy Haven Research Facility.
Nick loved animals and he had been involved in protecting endangered species even in high school. While the first fluffies were being created, he was spending the summer of his freshman year of college protecting the Pacific Northwest’s natural wildlife. When the first fluffies had been released into the wild, he had originally been on the side of “they’re an invasive species, wipe them out.”
It was his first year of research on their effect on the ecosystem that had changed his view. Now he was more sympathetic, and regretted that view. So many herds had failed to survive that first winter, not helped by human intervention that had killed many, many more. Plus their own internal strife took many more. Now his view was more nuanced.
“We played God. Now we better act like one for our creations. Its the responsible thing,” he said often. It had become a motto of sort of the facility. Half-sanctuary, half-research facility. He had made an unexpected niche for himself. No one wanted to study fluffies. They were unnatural so real environmental scientists viewed them as pests, and biologists viewed them as genetic chimeras to be studied only for their DNA. He had been the first to propose a site to study the fluffies, their effects on local ecosystems, and their own biology. The demand had been surprising.
First, the local government wanted to keep the local populations of feral furries under control or eliminated. Farmers wanted the same thing. Businesses too. Then came the fact HasBio had never considered disease and its affect on fluffies or how it would affect other lifeforms. In some cases they were carriers, in others they could pass diseases to humans that couldn’t have prior due to their chimeric nature. Some were just kids who wanted their pet fluffy to be ok. There wasn’t just a demand. There was a need. In a few years he went from a small lab and one fluffy in his garage to 200 researchers, a herd of 50 living on site, and a state of the art facility with a 50 acre open air grounds for the fluffies out back surrounded by an electrical fence with a dedicated back up power supply (more to keep out ferals than the facility herd in).
But for Nick, it had never stopped being about the well-being of the creatures humanity had created. He hadn’t stayed in British Columbia for no reason. His reason to start the facility had been caused by the region’s weather patterns: how he met his herd’s elder, his right hand furry, Silver. The Northwest had never had the same problems with ferals that other regions had. While it was more temperate than say, the Eastern Seaboard, the Northwest had something the other regions didn’t. It rained. Alot. And fluffies hated the water.
When he had met Silver, the fluffy was standing in the rain, next to the Fraser River.
“Aw-ways wet. Aw-ways wawa. Wan die. Need die.” Silver had said.
Nick had barely managed to grab the furry before a literal suicidal plunge into the river, where he would have surely drowned. He took Silver home and he became his first research partner. It was known the PNW’s rainfall had a tendency to make humans depressed, but for furries it was a literal hell on Earth. Most of grasses were unpalatable to them on the west side of the Cascades, and the rain of the wet season lasted so long it drove them to suicide because they couldn’t escape the “wawa is bad fo’ fluffies” mentality. To top it all off, local mosses and mold were very happy to live in fluffy fur, which would either cause them to rip out their own fur (and thus die from exposure) or die of parasitic infection. The only food locally they liked to eat were blackberries and it turned out that blackberry bushes gave them severe allergic reactions on their skin, causing them to lose their fur.
On the east side of the mountains, things weren’t any better. Summer was better, being a warmer climate with many edible grasses for fluffies (plus the various agriculture), the winters were even worse. Cold enough to kill fluffies even in sheltered environs, of which there were fewer due to the nature of trees over there. And both sides of the mountains had predators who thought fluffies were downright delicious. Indeed, local bear populations had started to gain an obesity problem.
Needless to say, Nick’s home had proven to be an ideal location to study the fluffies without worrying about negatively affecting the local environment. None of the fluffies in the enclosure ever tried to escape, and local ferals were more interested in getting inside (and often finding a very strong shock when they touched the electric fence).
Now, Nick was stroking Silver, now over 8 years old, when Chris entered with the carrier containing Watermelon.
“Hey Chris,” he said with a smile, putting his old friend down on the desk. “This must Watermelon and her baby.”
“Hewwo nyu hoomin,” said Watermelon from the cage, along with a peep from her baby.
“Its great to see you, Nick,” Chris said. “Hope you can give this girl a good home.”
“Well, let’s see how she’s doing,” Nick replied while opening the carrier and gently extracting Watermelon. He frowned when he saw the state of her leg. “Oh dear.” He hit the intercom on the wall with his elbow. “Dr. Sanchez, we got an injured fluffy who needs examination. Watermelon, how long has your leg had hurties?”
“'Bouts a few foe-evahs,” Watermelon replied.
Nick resisted the urge to curse. A few days and this wound should have healed, she needed surgery.
“Watermelon, a friend of mine is gonna take care of that leg. Do you mind if we watch over your baby while you’re treated?” He asked.
“Babeh?!” Watermelon got scared. “Nu take babeh! Dat Wawamewon’s babeh! Pwease don’ takes babeh!”
She was panicking. Nick knew a panicking mother mare was a disaster waiting to happen, especially when injured. She clearly had trust issues so this needed to be resolved ASAP. He grabbed a syringe from a case near his desk. Silver covered his ears, tired of hearing a mummah’s wrath from a lifetime of doing so.
“LIE-AH! YOUS TOOK WAWAMEWON FWOM HOME TO TAKES BABEH!” She screeched at Chris. “WAWAMEWON WUVS BABEH. DON’ TAKE BABEH!!!”
Nick swiftly injected Watermelon and she fell asleep.
“Don’t think too harshly of her. Plenty of fluffies have bad experiences with humans stealing their babies or killing them. She’s trying to be a good mother,” Nick explained as Dr. Sanchez took her out on a stretcher.
Nick turned around and picked up the small brown foal. He was a boy, with brown fur and emerald green mane. He had been “lick-y cleaned” by his mother but not properly cleaned. Nick took the young foal to a sink and cleaned him properly. He was still pretty dirty, after all. Once he was cleaned and dried, Nick and Chris had a better idea of his real fur colours. His brown coat was more of a redwood brown and his emerald mane was actually quite striking despite his young age.
“Oh he’s gonna age up beautifully,” said Nick.
“Yeah?” asked Chris. He had no idea about fluffy fur colors.
“Oh yes. He’ll be quite handsome for a brown fluffy. He’ll have similar colors to an evergreen tree.”
“Like a douglas fir?”
“Yeah. I think that should be his name. ‘Douglas.’”
Chris smiled at the foal as Nick brought a small bottle of formula to his mouth. “Hello, Douglas.”
Watermelon woke up several hours later. Her leg was sore from the surgery and she could feel the splint holding it in place. She struggled at first to remember where she was and then…
“BABEH!” She remembered being taken from her foal. In response she heard a familiar “Peep! Peep!”
Nuzzled in her belly fluff was her foal. It smelt like him, but nicer. He coat was shiny and looked like he had been fed.
“I promised,” said Chris.
Watermelon looked up, tears in her eyes. She felt awful.
“Sowwy, nicest hoomin,” she said. “Yous took care of babeh?”
“Yes, we took good care of little Douglas here.”
“Gave babeh namesie? Dougwas. Wawamewon likes it.”
Meanwhile, Nick was finishing reading Watermelon’s chart. He frowned.
“Chris, I’m sorry, but Watermelon can’t stay here,” he said.
“What? But you said she’d be good for the herd,” Chris retorted.
“Yeah, well her leg injury requires someone to take care of her. A human hand. And the herd, while smart, aren’t able to do it. My researchers are too busy, plus someone would need to be here overnight besides our security force.” Nick shook his head. “Chris, you should take her home with you.”
“What!?” Chris was stunned. He never had had a pet in his life, and taking care of an injured one at that. “I-I’m not-”
Nick cut him off. “Yes, you are. You own your own house with a backyard, you work from home, you make plenty of money. You can absolutely take care of Watermelon and Douglas. But an injured mare with a “peepie” foal is too much for us, right now. We got 50 other fluffies to watch out for. You’ll be a great dad to them both, I know it.”
Chris looked at Watermelon. He had grown fond of her and her foal. They were so cute. But he wasn’t sure what to do, but he knew what he needed to.
“Alright, but I need help,” he finally said.
“The aides will hook you up with everything you need. We got more than enough spare equipment around here. They’ll also teach you how to set up a safe room and how to care for her injury.”
Watermelon looked up at Chris. “Nicest hoomin is nyu daddeh?”
Chris smiled back. “For now, at least. When you’re better we can see about you joining the herd.”
“Wawamelon is so happeh,” she said smiling through tears.
Chris started crying too. He never cried. And yet he had already grown to care about this pink fluff before him. She was a good mummah and a good fluffy. He would give her the love and care she and her foal needed.
Based on toofymunstah’s Watermelon
For the record about my own headcanon of this verse, its more grounded, based on reality than the very stupid human and even stupider fluffies one most people have. Animals and people are stupid enough as is to not need to be flanderized into dumber folks.
If you’re wondering why Watermelon seems so wary and aware/smart about things, I have a mental backstory. Most fluffies are closer to what you expect, I just have an idea I want to explore in possibly more stories.
