Deep in the forest, under the big hollow tree, in the repurposed rabbit warren the herd calls home, the cry rings out.
“BIGGEST POOPIES!”
Blueberry runs to his special friend’s side as fast as his little weggies will carry him.
A lot of time, for a fluffy, has passed since the old red mare’s burial. And Blueberry has been very busy.
First, he had decided that it was time to name his entire herd. He had gotten tired of the “Fwuffy!” “Yus?” “Nu, udda fwuffy!” “Yus?” “Nuuu, udda udda fwuffy!” routine. And he didn’t think it was very fair that he was the only fluffy in the herd with a namesie. Though he was very grateful to his good friend the Bone Fluff, who has been checking in on him, for telling him about his namesie and how Blueberry used to be another fluffy. Just checking in, mostly. Only a couple of other fluffies have gone forever sleepies since the red mare.
Blueberry had gotten some help with this from some friendly hoomins passing through in their caw. It was a big caw, squarish roundish caw, covered in lots of pretty colors, and a funny smell drifted from both the caw and the hoomins who apparently lived in it like a housie. They had a fluffy of their own, Woodstock, a fluffy with a hornie and wingies and fluff that was lots of colors like the caw-housie. Blueberry thought the fluffy was pretty, but he also thought it was odd, seeing so many colors on one fluffy. Woodstock was a smart fluffy, too. He helped Blueberry and the hoomins name the herd.
The hoomins themselves were pretty odd looking, too. One of them had long messy brown and grey not-fluff on his head and face, and the other one was a darkie-hoomin, and her black not-fluff on her head looked a bit like a spidey-munstah’s weggies. She said they were called “dwead-wocks”.
Blueberry was grateful for their help, because he didn’t know a lot of names, and they did. And he was pretty sure that hoomins are supposed to be the ones giving fluffies namesies in the first place. They even gave the herd some nummies after helping Blueberry name the herd, though they had some brown block nummies that they said were only for hoomins and Woodstock to num, because they were made from pots. They left in their housie-caw after that, but they promised to come back and check in.
It was easy to keep track of all the new names, thanks to the fluffy tendency to speak in the third person, and the one thing no fluffy will ever forget is their name.
After that, Blueberry met his special friend. Muffin.
Muffin had been abandoned in the fowest by her hoomin mummah for reasons Muffin still doesn’t understand.
By a stroke of luck, her mummah had dumped her in a spot not far from the herd’s tree, and she was warmly welcomed into the herd. They were awed by tales of Muffin’s former life in the “sitty”, of hoomins and their magic, of the saferoom, full of toysies and a beddie and a wittewbox.
The herd knew deep in their hearts about good poopies and bad poopies, and already had a designated spot for good poopies, but none of them had ever heard of a special box just for making good poopies in before.
Blueberry was intrigued, though that’s not the word he would have used. After hearing Muffin’s stories, his sleepy pictures changed.
The old sleepy picture about the fluffies on sticks was replaced with new ones, about a woman Blueberry couldn’t quite recognise, but knew was his hoomin mummah, even though he didn’t have a hoomin mummah, and having his own saferoom, with his own bed and toysies.
Blueberry wonders if maybe these sleepy pictures he has are actually things that happened to him when he was the other fluffy.
Blueberry and Muffin quickly fell in wub, though fluffies don’t tend to waste time courting.
One vigorous round of special huggies later, Muffin was with babbehs.
Blueberry has lots of experience with babbehs at this point. He’s overseen a few births, by now, unlike his predecessor, who could just barely care about his own babbehs, and even then, his youngest daughter, now a healthy young mare named Cocoa by the friendly hoomins, could attest that even that tolerance was limited.
Blueberry has stressed to all expectant mothers that there are no bad babbehs. No poopie babbehs, no munstah babbehs, just gud babbehs, and he expects the new mummahs to love them all the same.
For the most part, his decree is obeyed. Food is abundant in these parts, both growing in the wild and being dumped by hoomins with no respect for the environment (cue the crying Indian), so runts are few and far between. And Blueberry feels deep sorrow when he has to take a runt away and put it down, but he knows runts won’t live long anyway. He does it, so nobody else has to. Judging by the look on the Death of Fluffies’ bony face, he doesn’t enjoy taking the ghost runts away either. But he said that WE BOF GUT TU DU WUT WE GUT TU DU. Blueberry hopes that at least some of the runts get the same second chance he got.
Incidentally, the herd is still avoiding the dreaded chikken nummies. Even if the younger fluffies, born after the last smarty’s time, don’t really understand why, Blueberry says to not num them, and they trust him.
The warren is full of little roomsies, long abandoned by the rabbits who first dug it out. The old smarty wasn’t entirely stupid, and some of the rooms were designated for specific purposes.
There is the den, where the herd sleeps in a big fluffpile, on leaves and any soft hoomin-made objects the fluffies are lucky enough to scavenge, where fluffies keep their few personal effects, like Blueberry’s most cherished possession, a little sandie thing he can use to tell time. The other fluffies were impressed when he demonstrated how it works.
There are storerooms for food, usually fully stocked. As has been said, food is abundant in this neck of the woods, and the weather is decent year round, so the herd doesn’t need to worry about stocking up the larder before winter comes.
There is also, though Blueberry doesn’t know this word, either, a makeshift maternity ward that the really-soon-mummahs are rolled into, so they can have some space when they give birth. The older mares, with as much experience in giving birth as any feral fluffy can have, act as midwives, guiding the new mothers and hugging them when possible to keep them calm. They know it’s important for the dam to stay as calm as she can, even though it’s hard to stay calm when you’re pushing a litter of babbehs out of your no-nos. Then, after the birth, they assist the new mother with feeding her babbehs, then send another fluffy to the stockroom to get some nummies for the new mummah.
The only male fluffies allowed in the maternity ward are the smarty and the dams’ special friends.
As narrative causality demands at a time like this, when the expectant daddeh sees the first of his babbehs coming out, he usually faints. If fluffies had hands, the mummah would be gripping the daddeh’s hand very hard, and if they were more eloquent, screaming something like “YOU DID THIS TO ME!” at him.
Blueberry, as both the smarty and the father, is guaranteed entry.
As Blueberry gets to the makeshift maternity ward, one of the two toughies posted outside, Blueberry’s bestest friend, nods and allows him through.
Yin-Yang, as the friendly male hoomin named him, after the pretty symbol the hoomin had on a shiny stringie around his neck, has been best friends with Blueberry since they were walkie-talkie babbehs.
They’ve actually known each other since before they were born. Blueberry knows this now, thanks to the Death of Fluffies. Yin-Yang does not know this, because Blueberry doesn’t know how to tell him, and because Blueberry is the only member of the herd allowed to see the Death of Fluffies, so he can’t explain either.
Blueberry trusts Yin-Yang with not just his life, but the lives of his special friend and their babbehs too. One of the first things he did when he became smarty was promote Yin-Yang from the graveyard shift. He’s now, essentially, Captain of the Guard, keeping the other toughies in line, training the new recruits, and, when a birth is imminent, guarding the maternity ward. Blueberry knows that he is trusting Yin-Yang with the future of the herd, and that there is no better fluffy for the job. If none of his babbehs are up to inherit the position of smarty, should something happen to Blueberry, he knows who he can trust.
Just as Blueberry enters the maternity ward, the first babbeh starts to come out.
He’s right on time.