Boutique De Moelleux
Part 2: Crime & Punishment
Be Zenobius, the best fluffy breeder in the tri-state area. You are in your private express elevator that goes from your penthouse to the ground floor of the building you live and work in. You have finished your morning routine of dressing in your fine black slacks, button up shirt and silk purple vest. Your hair is groomed into your signature ‘Michael Score-esq’ hairstyle. You are reviewing the footage of three of your signature fluffy ponies that was collected from yesterday. Carl, your overnight care-taker, reviews the footage of the day as part of his duties and reports any, abnormalities, to you. Today you have been presented with footage of two fluffies, Cinnamon, a crimson Pegasus with a white mane and Spearmint, a soft green earthie with a forest green mane, apparently bullying a third, pecan colored Unicorn with a black mane, Buttercup. You cannot hear what is happening as there is no audio with the video but it is clear that the two colorful fluffies are intimidating the third, who is cowering near the edge of the enclosure.
This was absolutely unacceptable.
The educational courses your fluffies go through should have instilled in them the fact that any conflict between themselves would result in harsh disciplinary action. You demand perfection with your flock as they reflect upon you. Such a breach of protocol, especially on the sales floor, could do lasting damage to your reputation. Therefore, harsher than normal punishments were required to rectify the situation.
The elevator doors opened to a hallway in the back area of your boutique. You walk down a ways to a door labeled “Veterinarian” and enter as silently as you can. The lights are off and you hear quiet sobbing coming from opposite ends of the white tiled room. You stealthily walk to one end of the room and roughly pick up a pet carrier causing the creature inside to scream out “WAA! BAD UPSIES!”
You take the carrier over to a metal examination table in the center of the room and have it hover three inches above the surface before you let it go to clatter on the table. “NU WIKE! PWEASE BE GUD TO FWUFFY!” the green fluffy inside shouts, Spearmint.
You perform a similar process to the fluffy at the other end of the room this time forgoing stealth. The red fluffy, Cinnamon, only sobs with the rough treatment. You grab a chair from the corner and drag it slowly across the floor purposefully causing it to elicit a high pitched screeching noise. “HEAW PWACE HURTIES” Spearmint cries out. Cinnamon’s sobs audibly become louder. You place the chair in front of the two carriers on the examination table and turn on the large spotlight that is directly above them. You sit down, crossing your legs and interlacing your fingers.
Both fluffies gasp and say “Mista Zenobwius!”
“Hello Cinnamon, Spearmint” you say with an edge of anger to your voice. “Tell me, why are good fluffies such as yourselves come to be in this predicament?”
Spearmint looks at you with a confused look on your face and says “Speawmint nu knu why he am in sowwy box”
You continue to stare at both fluffies. Cinnamon Sniffs a few more times and says, hesitantly “Fwuffies, w-wewe” SNIFF “M-meanies to Bwuttacup,”
“Good,” you say, nodding to the crimson fluffy “Very good.”
Spearmint’s face becomes a shocked expression as he looks back and forth between Cinnamon and you. “Bwuttacup?!” he shouts “We in sowwy box cuz of poopie dummeh mawe?!”
Instantly rage explodes from you and without thinking about it you grab the crate with Spearmint in it and push it off the examination table where it lands upside down on the floor.
“POOPIE?!?” you scream, “DUMMY?!” You stomp over to the opposite side of the examination table and look down at the crate “HOW DARE YOU USE SUCH WORDS TO DESCRIBE ANOTHER FLUFFY! WHERE DID YOU LEARN THESE ABHORRENT TERMS?!” Your fists clench and unclench, your breathing ragged.
“SCREEE!” Wails Spearmint “WOWSTY HUWTIES! PWEASE MISTA ZENOBWIUS, SPEAWMINT AM GUD FWUFFY!”
“GOOD!?” you shout, “YOU? A GOOD FLUFFY?!” you catch yourself and take a few seconds to slow your breathing and try to calm down. “No,” you say coolly after a bit “No Spearmint I’m afraid that this incident was unforgivable.” You grab the carrier and put it back on the table right side up. You take your seat again and say “I’d say that this incident may have irreversibly placed you in the ‘Bad fluffy’ category.”
Spearmint gasps and shouts “NU! SPEAWMINT AM GUD FWUFF! SPEAWMINT PWOMISE!” you rip open the grated carrier door and clamp your hand over Spearmints muzzle, silencing the hysterical fluffy.
“Cinnamon?” you say, addressing the other pony. “Did you call Buttercup poopie? Called her a dummy?”
Cinnamon looks at the floor of his carrier, his eyes streaming with tears “Yus, Swinnamon caww Bwuttacup a-a d-d-dummeh p-poopie fwuffy.”
“Why?” you ask, your hand still gripping tightly to the struggling green fluffy. “What, after all I’ve taught you, made you think it was a good idea to call her that?”
“A wittew missy,” Cinnamon replies, meaning a young girl, you train your fluffies to call your customers miss and mister at all times. “A wittew missy came in wit anodda fwuffy. De wittew missy was pwaying wiff Bwuttacup and the odda fwuffy cawwed Bwuttacup a ‘p-p-poopie Dummeh baby’ Da wittew missy den weft wif a big mistuh. Speawmint taut it wus funny, stawted laffin and cawwing Bwuttacup the bad wordsies. Swinnamon taut it wus not as funny but wub brudda and wanted to hab fun pwaytime wiff bwudda.” At this the fluffy breaks down into full sobs again “s-s-s-Swinnamon nu dat wordies was bad, b-b-b-but Swinnamon s-s-still goed awong wiff it! SWINNAMON AM BAD FWUFFY!”
You open up the door to Cinnamons carrier and stroke his mane. “There there, it isn’t going to be the end of the world.” You say in a soothing voice. “I know you didn’t mean those bad words you said to her right?”
Cinnamon nods, his sobs subsiding considerably. “Swinnamon sowwy mistah. Swinnamon knus he did a bad ting.”
You turn your attention back to the other fluffy. Spearmint is still struggling under your grip. You release his muzzle and he sputters “Why Zenobwius gib meannie hewties to Speawmint?”
Ignoring him you ask “You know those words are bad words to call another fluffly right?”
“Yus,” he replies, “Speawmint nu see why it mattah dough, Bwuttacup am poopie fluffy, nu knu why it wong tu caww poopie mare wut poopie mare is!”
You stare at the fluffy, a look of absolute shock on your face. Cinnamon seems to know this was the wrong answer and his sobbing renews. Spearmint just looks back at you, as defiant looking as a fluffy pony can get.
“but… your lessons, the courses they all instilled in you that all colors of fluffy were equal and important!” you temper rising you grip each side of the carrier opening with your hands and say, “You should know better! You know that bad fluffies go to the farm! Why would you disregard the lessons! YOU SHOULD BE BETTER THAN THIS!”
Spearmint recoils at the loud noises but with the stubbornness bordering on smarty syndrome the fluffy shouts back “SPEAWMINT NU CAWE BOUT WESSONS, SPEAWMINT NEBBA WISTEN ANYWAY! SPEAWMINT JUS DU WAT SWINNAMON DU!”
A revelation strikes you. You lean back in your chair, thumbs pressed into your temples. This was unheard of, a fluffy, cheat? It all made sense now, how Spearmint could possibly have passed his courses and still behave in such a manner. Spearmint was far cleverer then you gave him credit. Maybe not smart, but clever all the same. It was something you had never accounted for in the past as it was never something that crossed your mind. This would require a lot of restructuring of the classes in order to combat such practices. Perhaps barriers set in place during test; or moving the classrooms to a larger area to allow the fluffies to be spread out more.
Your thoughts snap back to the present and you look back at Cinnamon, who just stares back at you meekly his eyes wet and trembling. “Were you aware that Spearmint was copying you?” Cinnamon looks at the floor of his carrier and nods weakly; his sobs growing in intensity again.
“S-s-s-swinnamon wub brudda, nu w-wanted Speawmint to w-weave Swinnamon aww awone. Hab biggest h-heawt huwties jus’ thinking a-abowt it.”
This was heartbreaking. Cinnamon had the makings of a fluffy he could be proud of; however, his familial attachment to his sibling was a great weakness. Your foals were raised communally in an effort to curtail such strong emotions though sometimes the bonds survived somehow. This was normally caught during the process of selecting foals that would go into the program, though somehow this was missed in Cinnamon’s case. You would have to review the process and find a better way of detecting bonds this strong.
“I’m sorry to do this.” You say looking from one fluffy to the other. “But both of you are going to have to be sent to the farm.”
Immediately Cinnamon elicited a wail of utter misery and Spearmint began screaming. “SPEAWMINT NU GOWING TU FAWM! SPEAWMINT AM GUD FWUFFIE! SEND POOPIE DUMMEH MAWE TU FAWM!”
“AND!!” You shout at the top of your lungs, quieting the two fluffies instantly. “You will both have your special lumps removed.”
“NUUUU! NU TAKE SPECIAW WUMPS! PWEASE MISTAH ZENOBWIUS! SPEAWMINT NEBBA BE BAD FLUFFIE AGAIN!”
You slam the front of Spearmints carrier door closed, catching him in the face and shutting him up. You carefully close Cinnamon’s door, lift both carriers and exit the examination room. The farm, contrary to the fluffies beliefs, was an actual farm, or more accurately a ranch. It was where you sent all the fluffies that weren’t up to scratch either by washing out of the program or not being selected for it in the first place. It was kept mysterious to the fluffies that were in the program as to let their imaginations turn it into the worst place they could imagine however it was in actual fact a very nice location in comparison to a shelter; plenty of food and open space to run and play. No time limit placed on their lives besides what is naturally given to them. A veritable paradise with weekly spaghetti dinners and all the hugs they could want. The only drawback to you was that the fluffies there were not worth nearly as much as the ones you sold in the boutique. Spearmint and Cinnamon could have easily gone for thousands of dollars each if they were sold here, however at the farm he would be lucky to get a couple hundred for the pair of them at most.
You step into the back loading bay of the boutique and place the two carriers in a square made of tape on the floor marked as ‘To the Farm.’ Cinnamon’s still crying and Spearmint now bashing his hooves on the carrier door; repeatedly screaming that he was a good fluffie and that he did not want his special lumps taken. Without talking to them you leave the room, turning off the lights and closing the door behind you. The last trace of Spearmint’s now hysterical screams cut off as the door latched.
“What a waste,” you say, your eye twitching slightly. Feeling slightly guilty in spite of yourself.