The drive to Ricky’s ranch didn’t take too long. Down the highway for a few minutes, a right down a dirt road, then into the man’s driveway. It wasn’t the largest ranch, but Ricky didn’t deal in quantity. His horses were prime breeding stock and born racehorses, mostly American ponies. The old man had been raising the animals his entire life, and he’d earned a reputation across three states. Richard didn’t go anywhere near the horses most of the time. He wasn’t stupid or clumsy, but he was extremely worried he’d somehow fuck up and cost his friend hundreds of thousands of dollars he’d never be able to repay.
Ricky was already waiting in the driveway, his wrinkled, sun-dried face a constant scowl. His wattle jiggled as he drew on a cigarillo in one corner of his mouth and spat from the other. He raised a hand in greeting and gave what passed for a smile, stepping over to the driver side window. “'ere’s the man. I’d ask you how the fuck you’re doing but time matters here. The longer they’re in my feed the more of it they eat and shit on.” The old rancher pointed across one pasture to an old, somewhat extravagant goat hutch he’d converted to a storage shed. “You know where it is. Pit’s on the southern acre.” He threw an arthritic thumb aggressively over his shoulder. “I ain’t burning that trash near the graveyard. My ponies deserve better than that.”
“Fair enough.” Replied Richard. “I’m gonna need you to open the gates, though. I’m not hauling a herd across three acres by hand. Get my truck to the problem first, then worry about corralling the horses. By the time I’m done, you’ll be done, and it’ll be a straight shot to the burn pit.”
“I always did like how your mind works, boy. Efficient-like. I’ll pop the lock and get to it. And thank ye much for the help. Us old folks gotta rely on you younger ones, and you always come through. Damn respectable, that is.” Ricky scratched his chin thoughtfully, starting out into the distance at nothing. “Come to think of it… Tell you what. If you also clean up the hutch, I’ll give you another fifty, and I’ll buy come saturday.”
Richard laughed and extended his right hand. “Deal. Got a shovel in my bed already,” Ricky shook the offered hand. “Do you know how many there are?”
“Naw,” went Ricky. “I’m old. I can’t tell the fuckers apart from a distance. Most I’ve seen at one time was… six?”
Richard nodded thoughtfully. Those six were probably tuffies – the nummie finders would be currently inactive, given the fluffs would be surrounded by food. Six of those meant at least twenty in the herd, not including foals. “Got it. Pop the gate and I’ll get to work.”
Ricky opened the gate, and Richard pulled through. He went slowly, mostly to preserve his truck’s suspension on the rough terrain. He parked about a hundred yards from the hutch and left the engine running. He loaded the hopper of the paintball gun with the frozen paint balls, then attached the CO2 tank. The paint had thawed a little, but it was still plenty hard to fuck up a fluffy, especially at 450fps. He had 200 shots, which he figured would be more than enough.
The goat hutch was rather large, tall enough for a man Richard’s size to stand under most of the sloped roof. From his guess, it had been designed to comfortably accommodate about twenty-five goats. It was old, but had been made from quality lumber and built far sturdier than it needed to be, so it was in good condition.
He saw a yellow fluffy with a pink mane milling about in one of the longer patches of grass near the hutch. It was larger than the average fluffy, and seemed to be male. A toughie. No sense even trying with this one, but it could serve another purpose. He got out of the car and took aim. A twitch of his finger lobbed a paintball towards his target. Richard watched it sail through the air and strike the fluffy in the shoulder.
There was a thwack, and the fluffy dropped from sight. A split second later, a shrill “SCREEEEEEEEeEEEEEEEEE!” sounded through the pasture. “Huu huu HUWTIES! HEWD HEWP TUFFIE!”
Richard watched as several fluffies crept out of the hutch and then ran to their friend. With their attention fully occupied, he walked around behind the hutch. He had a suspicion, one proven correct as he came around into the untrimmed brush. There had been a little bit of dry rot on a few of the planks, allowing the fluffies to dig their way under. From there, it would have been easy for even a fluffy to open the door, as it was only secured by a simple wooden lift-latch. He could hear the crying of foals and the squeaky voices of at least five different adult fluffies inside. He grabbed a rusty old water bucket half-buried in the brush, yanked it free, and set it gently in front of the opening. It was about thirty pounds, but to make sure it stayed put, he found a rock about the size of a football and set it inside.
Then he walked around to the front of the hutch. The fluffy patrol had just arrived at their friend’s side. He closed the door of the hutch quietly, then wrapped his key lanyard around the handle, preventing the lift-latch from moving. He raised his weapon, and advanced on the collection of fluffies, none of whom had noticed him yet.
He fired indiscriminately. It wasn’t worth taking careful shots to put them down quickly, he didn’t want to have to chase them down. With two fingers he feathered his trigger, and the fluffies fell screaming under the barrage. They scattered and shit themselves in terror, and he simply swept his gun across them. He saw paintballs bounce off of limbs, leaving them bent and bloody as they crushed fragile bones and tore apart skin and muscle through sheer blunt force. His shots caved ribs and punctured abdomens. One fluffy caught a barrage in his ass and a paintball hit his testicles, which burst apart in a bloody, chunky mess. He fell over with a wheeze and curled into a trembling ball, sucking air and unable to make a sound. One fluffy got hit in the temple, launching an eye several feet and causing a spray of bone fragments and brain matter to fly out the other side. Another took a paintball to the back of the skull, and faceplanted into the grass. It lay there motionless, occasionally giving a loud, agonized groan, but no other sound. A third had one of its legs severed at the knee and two others broken, and rolled around wildly while shrieking.
He approached rapidly and steadily. He had plenty of practice, between captaining a paintball team and his time on the range. He kept his weapon up, switching targets. Anything that moved got sprayed. A fluffy tried to crawl away with its two front legs, the back ones horrifically mangled, chirping and peeing and calling for its mummah. A half-dozen paintballs riddled its back, breaking its spine and neck and sending bone fragments into its heart and lungs. It dropped, slowly convulsing as it died.
He stalked through the field of carnage and put a single shot into every skull. One of them looked up at him with tears streaming into its cheek fluff, saying “Nu wan dieeeee huu huu hu-” He silenced its begging with a marballizer between its eyes. None of them escaped. Richard examined his handiwork, trying not to breathe too deeply of the stink of gore and shit. Satisfied they were all dead, he shook his hopper and went back to the hutch.
The fluffies inside had heard the screaming of their friends, and were terrified. Many of them had emptied their bowels too, judging from the smell. He unwrapped the lanyard and lifted the latch, ducking inside.
Just inside the doorway was another larger earth stallion. It was trembling in fear, but had itself in an aggressive posture. As aggressive as a fluffy could come across, at least. It was crying. “Huu huu… Wastest tuffie nu wan foweba sweepies, but gon’ pwotec’ hewd! G-g-gu way!”
Richard stared at the tuffie thoughtfully. The fluffy was brave, wasn’t being disrespectful… So he got a shot. He bent down and took hold of the fluffy by the scruff. “SCREEEEEE NU WAN BAD UPSIES! NU WAN FOWEBA SWEEPIES!” it screamed, flailing its legs and sobbing.
Richard turned around and set it down just outside the door and gave him a light rap on the nose. The tuffie recoiled with an “Owie!” and a few ‘huu huus’, but was otherwise quiet.
“Just stay put. I’m your new daddy, and when we get home, you’ll get sketties. But you have to stay right there, no matter what.”
The tuffie’s eyes went wide, and it searched his face for a moment. Richard smiled at him. The fluffy smiled back, and nodded. Richard then closed and latched the door. He was about to turn around, when he felt a series of small, clumsy impacts against his left calf.
He turned and frowned at the chunky purple unicorn trying its best to pummel him. “Dummeh hooman, tek wowstest sowwy hoofsies fwom smawty! Yu gon gib smawty sketties NAO!”
Richard’s response was to lift his paintball gun, nudge its barrel directly against the fluffy’s face below an eye, and fire twice. The smarty fell over backward and began to seize, frothing pink at the mouth as blood ran from its ears, eyes, and nose. The chrome barrel of his marker was misted with blood, and a few chunks of wet bone clung to the vents.
The fluffies screamed and shrank away from him. He appraised the herd. There were ten stallions of roughly even distribution of types. Twelve mares – two were younger, and most were pregnant. Many of the pregnant ones already had foals on their back or gathered around them and doing their best to hide in their mothers’ fluff. Some of the foals were juveniles, about the size of a football, but most were younger than that.
Richard drew a circle in the dirt, crouched beside it, and pointed. “Put all the babies there. Anyone who doesn’t do as I say is a bad fluffy, and bad fluffies get hurties.” He pointed at the still-convulsing and gargling corpse of their leader with his gun.
One of the foals huffed and stepped forward, a green unicorn. “Nu! Smawty babbeh am nyu smawty, gu way dummeh!”
Richard raised his gun and splattered the foal across its mother and siblings.
“BESTES’ BABBEH! NUUUU!” the mare shrieked as its foals shit themselves and cried even harder.
Richard adjusted his aim upward and silenced her with another puff of compressed gas. The corpse fell backwards, crushing the foals that had been on her back into paste. “Anyone else?” He asked calmly but pointedly.
Most of the foals came running without any further input from Richard or the other fluffies. They came crying and shitting and formed a cluster in the circle, hugging each other for comfort. The rest only came at urging from their terrified mothers. The mares that could brought their chirpies themselves, murmuring teary-eyed apologies to the cheeping jelly beans. He waved them back once they were finished.
He counted. Twenty seven foals in total. Twelve chirpies, four juveniles, and the rest a mixture of talky babies in various stages of weaning. But something was clearly missing.
“…I don’t think that’s all of them,” he announced. “Where are the poopies?” Not a single foal was anything a fluffy would consider a bad color, and there was a likely explanation for that.
One of the stallions spoke up. “Dey-Dey-Dey am in da poopies,” he stammered, and pointed over to the darkest corner of the hutch, opposite the door. Richard nodded and rose, walking over to examine the area. He fired his paintball gun behind him, and the fluffies all cowered and screamed as the frozen ball hit the wall with a loud crack and bounced around them. That should keep them in place.
Richard covered his nose as he reached the pile of feces. He pulled out his penlight and shined it over the mess. His heart sank at the sight of the unfortunate creatures trapped in it. One of the foals was a chirpy, eyes not even open, half-buried in shit and too weak to make a sound. Two others looked up at him hopelessly, and he located the corpses of three more. He shined his light a little further back, and took an ill-advised gasp.
After he finished gagging, he pulled his shirt over his nose and bent down. In the back, hiding in a corner between a pallet of feed and the shit-pile, was a lavender and white alicorn with a broken wing. Its fluff was dappled, primarily purple with a spray of white. It was blind in one infected eye. It was clearly a talky baby, old enough to eat proper food. Somehow, it was in better condition than the other poopies. Still all skin and bones, but more aware, more energetic. It was amazing that it was even alive. Most fluffies wouldn’t have even been so kind as to relegate a ‘munstah babbeh’ to latrine duty, let alone give it the actual food it had clearly received, if rarely.
“It’s alright, guys.” he said in his most soothing voice. The alicorn tried to stuff itself further into the corner and trembled. “I’ve got you. You’ll be okay.”
Richard reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small pack of tissues. Using them, he retrieved the living brown foals from their hell and wrapped them up. Then came the alicorn. It didn’t make a sound as he reached for it, but flapped its wings anxiously and tried to push him away. Once he got his fingers under its belly and lifted it, it went limp. He checked its rear before wrapping it up, too. A female.
He cradled them against his chest and went back to the circle, carefully setting them down a good distance away from the other foals.
One of the pregnant mares got indignant. “Dat am no’ babbeh! Dat am Munstah!”
“Nu! Dat am babbeh! Am gud babbeh! Yu am meanie to babbehs!” Shouted one of the younger mares, the one that wasn’t pregnant.
Richard shot the first mare in the chest. She wheezed and fell over. “T-Tummeh babbehs…” She gasped, then coughed up blood. He left her to drown as he turned his attention to the other mare.
“You don’t think she’s a monster? Are you the one that has been bringing her nummies?”
The mare looked shocked, more shocked by his deduction than the death of her ‘fwend’, even though she couldn’t take her eyes off the dying soon-mummah. She gave a dry swallow and nodded.
There were a few cries of indignation among the fluffies. “YU STEAW NUMMIES FOW MUNSTAH?!” Yelled one of the stallions. He started towards the mare, clearly intending violence. Richard shot his legs out from under him, winging another one of the stallions behind him. Fortunately, it was one of those who had been upset by the revelation. He stepped forward and finished them both off, silencing their screams with the ‘thunk’ of his paintball gun and the shattering of skulls.
The mare finally looked away from the pregnant mare and noticed him moving towards her. She scrabbled backwards, but wasn’t fast enough. He scooped her under his arm and took her to the door. She was hyperventilating, but didn’t say a word, nor did she try to fight him. He lifted the latch with his barrel, and set her outside. The tuffie was hiding against the ground, covering his eyes. She set her next to him.
“Stay here. You’re getting a new house and daddy today.”
The mare stared at him in shock, then began to bawl. She remained where she was. He closed the door again.
“Nu faiw!” whined one of the other mares. “Wai nu taek mummah? Am good fwuffy!”
“Are you?” Richard asked in a scathing tone. “Tell me, what would you do if a baby came out like this?” He pointed to one of the poopies.
The mare smiled smugly. “Dat am poopie babbeh. Am fow num poopies.”
He shot her too. And he kept shooting her. He spent about a third of his remaining ammunition pummeling her skull and chest into an unrecognizable mess of gore and fluff. The fluffies got away from his target as quickly as they could, trampling each other. A few sustained injuries in the process. The only one that didn’t move was the soon-mummah next to her, who was too far into her pregnancy to move.
He let the panic subside somewhat, then cleared his throat loudly. “Let’s continue. Mummahs, I want you to point out your bestest babies. Then can come back over to you.”
The rest of the pregnant mares pointed out the obvious candidates. The ones larger and fatter than the foals their same age. One of the ones chosen was one of the juveniles. He let them go to their mothers. Let them have their brief moment of joyful reunion. He turned to the other foals.
“Since I’ve given some of your mummahs forever sleepies, they obviously can’t answer my question. So, are there any bestest babies here?”
One of the other juveniles and two of the talky babies cheerfully, proudly announced themselves. That accounted for every single mummah in the group. He pointed to the edge of the circle, and they gathered where he indicated, hugging each other and assuring each other that, because they were the best, everything would be okay.
He lifted his boot and brought it down upon them. All three were flattened, not even getting the chance to scream. Without lifting his foot, he opened fire on the remainder of the mummahs and their favorite foals. They tried to hide behind each other, but they weren’t fast enough. They all died, torn apart and battered by the hard rounds. Then, he paused, considering the stallions. He decided they weren’t worth the bother.
He turned his aim to them and cut them down. Halfway through, he ran out of ammunition. He laughed and set his gun down. “Bad day for you guys, huh?” He said, cracking his knuckles. He grabbed a shovel leaning next to the door, and advanced.
They tried to flee, but there was nowhere to go. A few of them tried to go for the hole in the back, only to find it blocked. He swung the shovel into one’s spine, following through to smash another directly in the nose. The one with the broken back screamed and flailed its two functional legs. He left it be and moved on. Another was decapitated by a savage downward strike as Richard brought the blade directly down on the back of its neck. Another was kicked against the wall, cratering its chest and shattering the back of its skull.
He swung and swung, and soon it was over. Anything living was hopelessly crippled. He walked around and delivered the finishing strikes. Then, he sighed and closed his eyes, turning his face upward. There was something… purifying about the ultraviolence. It wasn’t something he really allowed himself to enjoy or dabble in. He was just doing something necessary. But he couldn’t deny the sense of satisfaction.
When the moment was over, he dropped the shovel and went back to the foals. They were still in the circle, and terrified as he approached them splattered in the viscera of their friends and family. He crouched down and looked them over, letting the situation settle in. The only thing that made a good fluffy was suffering.
“Those were all bad fluffies,” he explained sternly. “But you guys are not. YET. If you’re good, I’ll be your daddy. If you’re not…” he turned his head pointedly towards the carnage behind him. “I’m not going to ask if you understand. I know you do. Stay exactly where you are, and everything will be fine.”
They were too terrified to respond, so he didn’t wait for them to. If they left the circle, they’d be bad fluffies, so it suited him just fine to leave them for now. He opened the door, where the tuffie and mare were hugging each other and crying softly.
“It’s over. Time to go home.” He told them.
“T-T-T-T-T-Tank yu, daddeh…” Sobbed the mare.
He left them there while he went to his truck and retrieved the carriers. He brought them back, and set the largest carrier down for the tuffie. “Get in, little guy,” he said gently, holding the door open. “It’s not a sorry box, I promise. I know it’s not nice but it won’t be for very long.”
The tuffie was obviously scared, but he was also too scared to disobey. He kept his head down and flicked his eyes nervously between the crate and Richard. But he went inside.
The larger crate was set in front of the mare. She didn’t have to be told. She was a good girl, Richard though. She deserved something good today.
He went inside and picked up the trembling alicorn, bringing it outside. He reached into her carrier and held the foal out for her. “This is your baby now. Take good care of him.”
“Fwuffy… Fwuffy hab babbeh?” She asked timidly, her voice full of hope. She took the foal into her legs and cooed. “Fwuffy am mummah nao!” She nuzzled the alicorn, who wasn’t sure how to react to finally receiving hugs and love. He closed the door as she began to hum the mummah song.
The padded fluffy carrier was taken into the hutch itself. He didn’t give the foals any sort of choice, simply picking them up two at a time and placing them in a fluffpile atop the soft towel inside. Many of them chirped and peeped in distress, despite being able to talk. The chirpies got gentler treatment – he took them one at a time, as carefully as he could, and got added to the outer part of the pile. Only the poopies were left out. They couldn’t be grouped with the rest yet, not until he appraised their health and made sure they wouldn’t spread disease. It could take weeks. It was an issue with the alicorn too, but there was no question that she’d survive. Richard would just have to keep the two away from the rest until he was certain it was safe. He latched the door, then moved all three carriers around behind the hutch, where it was shaded and the fluffies wouldn’t witness the cleanup. He dropped a few sketty treats into each carrier, to help pacify them.
Richard pulled his truck up to the hutch and got to work. He had long dishwashing gloves for this sort of work, which he regretted not wearing the entire time. He also should have brought his rubber apron, but there was no sense complaining now. It took about an hour to pile all the corpses into the bed and shovel all the viscera and shit in behind. But soon it was done. He took the truck to the burn pit, where Ricky had already filled the bottom with gasoline and random brush.
He backed the truck up to the pit, and the two men set about pushing the refuse into the pit with shovels. Ricky threw up at one point. Then, it was time to burn. Ricky lit a match and tossed it in, and then they vacated the area as quickly as possible. They went to the barn and hosed the bed down. Then with a few terse words and a handing over of a benjamin, they shook hands and Richard returned to the hutch.
The fluffies whimpered as he loaded them into the bed. It was going to be an unpleasant trip for them, but there wasn’t anything to be done. It was the only way he had to get them home. He applied ratchet straps to hold the crates in place. He gave them some kind words to reassure them, then went back into the hutch.
The brown foals had fallen asleep snuggled against each other. It was probably the only time they’d ever been out of the poopies in their entire life. They stirred as he lifted them, and he carefully unwrapped them to get a good look. It took everything in him not to drop them immediately. They had obvious worms moving under their skin. Richard’s heart sank. There was no saving these poor souls. They were too weak to survive a deworming of that intensity.
“Oh, you poor babies…” He crooned. Ignoring his revulsion, he stroked them. He cast away the tissues and accepted that his hands were going to get utterly filthy. It wasn’t right for them to spend their last moments without a warm touch. It’s all they really wanted.
They piled in his palm and hugged his fingers, and he stroked them the whole way back to the truck. He laid out a shop rag on the passenger seat and set them on it. “Hey,” he said softly as he popped open the glove compartment. “I have some nummies for you. The best nummies.
He popped open the bottle, and the scent of cheap, largely-synthetic spaghetti came out. ‘Skettie Forever Sleepies’, said the label. Definitely the most expensive piece of fluffy gear he had. Fluffy-specific pharmaceuticals would never be anything but proprietary, so Hasbio could charge whatever they wanted. They were soft gummies, so soft he had to be careful not to crush them as he fished a few out. They had to be. They were designed to give an easy, peaceful death to old and sick fluffies. He gave one to each of the dying foals.
He sat with them and kept giving the best pets he could as they wolfed down their last meals. It was practically ambrosia to the traumatized, doomed creatures. They were too weak to thank him, but he could tell they were grateful.
He sang to them. His voice wasn’t much better than a fluffy’s, but that wouldn’t matter to them. “Daddy loves babies, babies love daddy, eat tasty nummies, grow up big and strong…”
He repeated it over and over, as soothingly as possible, as the drug took hold. When they stopped moving, his voice broke, but he kept going. He kept his eyes dry, but his chest ached. He kept singing until he felt them stop breathing and go still under his fingers.
'I’m so sorry…” he told the tiny bodies. He took a shaky breath, started the truck, and went home.
Part 1: Good Fluffies Only
Part 2: The Family Comes Home
I meant to have this done a couple days ago but I’ve been too busy during the day and too tired at night. Sorry about that.
