A Good Filly's Nightmare [by Maple]

Been thinking about Tar lately and needed to play with her again. All of this is non-cannon to @ThatsWhy’s work.




Tar sat on the thread bare carpet, nose resting in the thin pool of light the crack under the door allowed into her tiny room. It was the closest thing she had to a toy since Master took away her crinkly paper bag. She didn’t deserve such a toy if she couldn’t play with it quietly, so it was good he took it from her. Good fillies are quiet.

She lifted her nose slowly, watching the way the light seemed to peel a glowing layer from her muzzle. If only she could glow on her own, then she would never be in the darkness ever again. Maybe Master would think it was pretty! Maybe he would tell her she was pretty! But that was a bad thought. Master was the only one who got to decide that. If he decided she was pretty she would be pretty, and if he decided she wasn’t then she wasn’t. Good fillies didn’t tell Master how things were.

There was a rumbling from her stomach, Tar pressed a hoof into her gut firmly. She was out of food and had been for a while but that was okay. She had gone much, much longer without eating. Master always brought her nummies before she went forever sleepies from it. Good fillies were grateful for what they had.

Tar’s ears pricked up at a noise somewhere else in the house. Her heart pounded in her chest, was that him? Was he home to play with her?? She quickly sat up, giving her scar-riddled coat a once over to be sure she didn’t have anything stuck to her. There was a carpet fiber stuck to her leg, Tar quickly licked it away and swallowed it so there was no evidence at all. Good fillies were presentable for Master.

Her anticipation built as steps slowly made their way down the hallway. Something was off, though. These didn’t feel like Master’s footsteps. They were cautious, slow, and much lighter sounding than Master.

Home defense was not something Tar was trained in. Her breath started to come faster and faster. What if this person was here to hurt her Master? Could she warn him? What if they found her first??

The jiggling of the doorknob sent a heavy ball of despair dropping into the scarred biotoy’s stomach. Tar readied herself for a stranger, just in case. She didn’t change her submissive pose just in case it was Master but she tensed her muscles in case she had to defend her home. How do you even defend a home? Tar wasn’t sure. Maybe she could bite? Her teeth were rotten and painful but maybe her jaw had healed up enough for that.

The door opened slowly. Tar kept her eyes locked on the spot on the floor where Master’s shoes would be, just in case it was him. No amount of fear or uncertainty would excuse her looking at him. Tar didn’t deserve to look at him.

The door opened wider and Tar was confused. She had never seen shoes like this, they certainly weren’t something her master would wear. They were sparkly and Tar’s eyes wandered upwards. She saw loose fabric just below the person’s knees that her brain told her was a skirt. A purple bag rested against their hip and above it Tar could see the person wearing a white shirt.

Against her better judgement, Tar made eye contact with the figure. The woman. She hadn’t seen anyone but her Master since The Sirs at The Company, and she didn’t remember seeing any women with them but… there she was, hand over her mouth, staring down at Tar.

“What happened to you…?” The woman asked, voice shaking.

“…”

Tar didn’t know how to answer. Tar didn’t know if she should answer. Master never let her meet anyone but he never told Tar she wasn’t allowed to speak to anyone…

“How… How long have you been in here?” The woman asked.

Something else she didn’t know how to reply to. The two of them stared at each other for what felt like an eternity.

“…Whewwrrre am Mastewr??” Tar asked softly, using her best pronunciation.

“Uhm…” The woman looked away, down the hall.

Tar stood on shaking hooves, stumbling to the door. The woman stepped back as she approached. Tar stuck her head out of her closet and peeked down the hallway, careful to keep her eyes on the floor so she didn’t see Master’s face.

She saw piles of garbage and dirty clothes but nothing else.

“Your… master… uh…” The woman cleared her throat. “He was in an accident and… he’s not coming back. I’m sorry.”

“Mastewr… fo’ebah sweepies??” You asked.

“…Yes.”

Tar stared down the empty hallway as a hollow numbness started spreading through her chest.

“I can help you.” The woman knelt down next to you, resting a gentle hand on your shoulder. “I can take you to someone who can fix your hurties. I can get you some food and a nice place to sleep. Does that sound okay?”

“…”

Tar leaned into the soft hand on her side, the first kind touch she’d felt in a very, very long time. Her skin felt warm under the woman’s touch.

“Otay. Taw gu wif’ nice wady.”

Tar’s heart felt like it would pound out of her chest as she jolted awake, scrambling to her hooves. She spun around wildly in the dark space, trying to figure out where she was.

There was threadbare carpet under her hooves, one connected with the chipped bowl she ate her meager kibble rations from.

She calmed slightly, feeling the familiar object. She had her food bowl and her water bottle next to it. There was the ratty towel she slept on and the crack under the door releasing the thin pool of golden light.

Tar was still in the tiny closet. Still home.

She slowly crumpled to the carpet, a thin wail worming its way out of her chest at the thought of her beloved Master being dead and gone.

“SHUT THE FUCK UP, RAT!” he yelled from down the hall.

Tar quickly bit her lip, folding her hooves over her nose. The relief of his voice mixed with the guilt of earning his ire, making a confusing assortment of feelings to bounce around the biotoy’s head.

“Sowwrry. Tawr su sowwrry…” she whispered, barely more than a breath. “Tawr wan’ be guud fiwwy… wub Mastewr… Tawr be guud…”

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Do you think in a normal environment that Tar would just completely shut down and be unable to actually do anything in it? Like maybe that shitbag who owns her made it impossible for her mind to comprehend actually doing things others enjoy so she simply won’t.

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This is the first fluffy story that actually made me cry wow

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I like that you included this.

Tar is kind of obsessed with that sliver of light, and it comes up in the narration over and over again in her stories. She also dwells on the towels that make up her nest in Tar at the End of All Things to the point that they start to invade other thoughts and she gets mixed up regarding what she’s even thinking about.

She’s clearly under-stimulated to an extreme degree and very bored. It’s even worse because she’s a lot more intelligent than an ordinary fluffy, but she has nowhere to direct any of that intelligence. All she can do is ruminate on her surroundings and her absolutely obsessive bond with her owner. That lack of any meaningful stimulation is probably part of why Tar is so unable to even question the insane circumstances in which she lives: all she ever does is spiral deeper into the same thought patterns, with nothing to distract her.

This is one of the best lines about Tar and I wish I’d come up with it. It’s so sad.

I know I made this man, but I just hate him so much. Everything about him disgusts me. Ugh…

That’s an interesting question.

Something that’s brought up in Tar at the End of All Things is that Tar has been trained to be pathologically selfless: her owner, the shitbag (I like this nickname, thank you Ace very cool), has actually forced her to give up belongings rather than taking them away, by teaching her that everything she owns is something that another fluffy can’t have.

So Tar believes that by having a toy she’s depriving a more deserving fluffy of that toy. The idea that the shitbag isn’t going to give it to a fluffy when she gives it up doesn’t occur to her (or, rather, she actively ignores the obvious truth, more likely).

She’s also intensely driven by the idea of pleasing/being useful to others. Playing is not useful to others and is a waste of time, and good fillies are useful to others and do not waste time. If you gave her a ball, she’d play with it; but she’s probably going to do that because she realizes you want her to play with it and she wants to please you.

That doesn’t mean she doesn’t want to play or do fun things, but she’s likely to indefinitely shunt that stuff into the future because there’s always some excuse to defer her own happiness. I think it’ll take a lot of therapy to get Tar to even understand that she doesn’t have to go through this infinite loop of self-improvement to be allowed to enjoy something she wants to do.

There’s also the problem that she’s kind of stuck in her own head at this point. She has a pretty severe dissociative disorder as a result of both long-term trauma and an extreme lack of stimulation. Tar is going to have days where she just doesn’t engage with anything or anyone because even mild stress makes her disappear into the ether and go on automatic.

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I had a… Not so great childhood. I remember fondly playing with beams of sunlight when everything else had been taken from me, so I figured that Tar would feel the same way.

My goal for this was to imply that rescue and the idea of recovery and a normal life is a straight up nightmare for Tar. I think its possible that she could be rehabilitated but… Let’s be honest. No one would think she was worth it. If she did get brought to a shelter they would probably decare her a lost cause.

I think even if she did end up in the hands of someone with the funds and means and will to help her she’d always be kinda fucked up. She’s going to freak out constantly, she’s probably going to beg her caretakers to do things to her (sexually, violently, all that) and i dont think theres any way for her, at this point, to be “normal”. Maybe she could still be happy, though.

but we all know that’s not how this story will end.

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never say never…

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