A brightly colored and crudely decorated amalgamation of plastic, glass, and metal idled quietly on the darkened corner of the 7-11, silent save for a soft, electrical hum. Its internals were dimly lit, gently displaying row after row of canned fluffy foals to the evening chill.
Before it, a prospective customer peered inside. They were interested in replacing their late fluffy companion at little cost, but the foals presented to him were uninspiring. He squinted into the darkness beyond the first cans, hoping the second and third rows were more appealing than the fragile and innocent lives immediately available.
An excited gasp fled him as one foal in particular caught his eye, and he readied all the money he would need to reach it.
He punched in the alphanumeric sequence required and waited. As the internal door of the gaudy incubator slid open, the corresponding foal was spun from its place, and fell harmlessly into the receptacle below.
Though padded, the purchase bin at the bottom of the machine was neither heated nor lit, and the experience was something like being dropped into an ice bath. The little baby fluffy, who had been sleeping quite soundly, began to hysterically chirp for comfort it would not receive.
The crying foal was joined by another, and another, and another. At last, the man pushed aside the flap and reached into the darkness of the machine’s shuttered maw, roughly shoving his way past can after can as he grasped for the sole fluffy he wanted. With it secured, he pulled away, leaving the helpless foals he did not need in the chill and gloom of the machine’s dirty receptacle.
He did not care for nor consider their fate; he had the fluffy he had sought to purchase. With his business concluded, the man left with his new friend to the warmth and safety of their home.
Irrespective of the muffled suffering within it, the vending machine stood at its corner with passive disinterest. It quietly hummed its sole, discordant note into the evening light.
