With Zappa having discovered his little secret, Josef had to work fast to get the rest of the Fluffies set up, he’d rather have had a day or two more to prepare but beggars can’t be choosers. He left Zappa in a secure location and went back upstairs and set out their kibble breakfast, sprinkling a little sleeping powder over each of their bowls. He then went through to the bedroom just in time to find the Fluffies waking up.
“Good morning, how’s everyone doing?”
Rex looked around, barely hearing Josef’s question. “Wex gud, whewe Zappa? Wex nu see babbeh.”
The other Fluffies immediately starting looking around for their lost brother, Josef had to run in quickly to calm them down.
“It’s ok, it’s ok, Zappa woke up early, he’s currently out in the garden playing in the grass, it’s perfectly safe, you can all join him after breakfast.
Allison did find it odd that her son would leave without telling her, but she trusted Josef and offered herself to be lifted down. Once all Fluffies were on the ground they waddled through to the kitchen where their breakfast was waiting for them, leaving nothing to chance Josef had put some crumbs into Zappa’s bowl as visual proof he had already ate.
“I’ll go out and get Zappa, you all dig in to your nummies ok?”
As worried as Rex and Allison were about their son, their programmed love of food overrode that fear and the whole family dug into their meal, not noticing Josef had left in the wrong direction for the garden.
The best thing Josef had found about Fluffy Sleeping Powder, was that it was completely tasteless, didn’t matter how much he covered the food in, the Fluffy would never realise they’d been drugged until they were already unconscious. It was also fast-acting so all he had to do was wait until…
“Oooh, Cwem so sweepy mummah, gonna…”
The sound of six soft bodies falling over gave him his cue, they’d be out cold for several hours which gave Josef just enough time to get his plans in place.
It was time to experiment.
Allison woke groggily, she had no idea where she was, all she remembered was eating breakfast and then feeling sleepy. She tried to stand up only to find that her legs weren’t moving, confused she looked over and saw, with horror, that she was face down on a table, her four legs splayed out and tied down to the table she’d been left on, all four starting to go numb from constricted blood flow. Frantically she started looking around for some way to free herself, then she looked in front of her and couldn’t help but cry out.
“BABBEHS!”
In a semi-circle around her, four of her children were also tied down, their legs spread in a similar style to her, all chirping and crying for their mother’s help, in the middle of them facing Allison was Zappa, his face streaked with tears, his body splashed with blood and shit and his back two legs long since cut off his little body.
“Mummah, Zappa nu can wawkies nu mowe. So scawed, wan huggies.” Zappa tried to crawl towards his mother, his fresh wounds scraping along the ground anytime he moved.
Josef smirked, cutting any limbs off a Fluffy is devastating to them but he knew Zappa was getting close to that age where he’d start wanting ‘enfies’ and without back legs he’d never be able to mount a mare, it was twice the pain for half the effort.
He made a mental note to introduce an enfie-toy once Zappa started showing signs of puberty and walked forward towards the Fluffies.
“Well now, I see you’ve all seen what’s happened to Zappa, I trust that’s a good indication fo what to expect.”
Casually he picked Zappa up as he crawled towards his mother and put him back in the centre of the table, undoing all the hard work he’d done in under a second.
Allison looked up as Josef, confused as to what was happening. “Wha Joesep du? Whe Wex?”
“Rex is in the other room, I have other plans for him. Right now though, my focus is on you Allison. In the couple days you’ve spent here it’s clear to me that you care for your kids, even the brown and the Alicorn.”
“Allason an Wex twy hawd fow famiwy, wub aww babbehs we can hab.”
“I see, well no I’m going to put that to the test. In front of you there are four children, Zappa’s been punished already for snooping so he’s not included in this. So four children, and you have four legs, am I right?”
Alison nodded, wondering where Josef was going with this.
“Ok, four children, four legs, and four choices. I’m going to make you choose what’s more important, your health, or your children’s, with each of your babies you’re going to choose what do I cut off, one of their legs, or all of yours.”
“Wha, nu cut off weggies, need weggies for huggies and wuv, babbehs need mummah hugs.”
“If you don’t want to lose any legs then by all means say so, each of your kids will only lose one limb of my choosing so they can all still live long, reasonably happy lives if you’re too scared to do it yourself. But understand you will watch me cut them you will hear their screams and you will know you chose yourself over them, if it gets too much you can change your mind, but with you it’s all or nothing, no half-measures. Am I understood?”
Alison nodded, a little too frightened at the prospect of becoming a pillow fluffy to really let the words sink in. Josef grabbed a pair of cutting pliers, the foals were a little too big to make it a clean cut but the pain and screaming would send the right message, he turned and stood next to the first child, little Wallace who was just over his bout of pneumonia and starting to feel better, he placed the pliers over his front left leg.
“What’s it going to be Alison, you or your son?”
Alison’s mouth quivered, then she shut her eyes and looked away. “Mummah sowwy Wawwace, nu can sabe yu.”
“Wha?”
Wallace didn’t even have time to react to his mother’s choice when he felt a sudden jolt in his leg where Josef had cut into him, the bone was crushed instantly from the force and most of the skin torn away, but the leg stayed on, held in place with blood vessals and nerve endings…
Which meant the second cut was even more agonising than the first.
“AHHH, MUMMAH HEWP, WAWWACE WEGGIES TUU SOWE, NU WAN, HU HU HU, NU WANNNN!”
Wallace let out an almighty blast of ‘sorry poopies’ onto the table, drenching himself in his own filth, as Josef finished removing his leg. To make sure the little guy didn’t bleed out, Josef heated a nail file and used that to cauterise the wound.
Wallace promptly passed out from the pain.
“Little fucker lasted longer than I thought, what do you say Alison?”
Alison said nothing, silently berating herself for putting her son through that.
Josef ignored her silence, moving next to Clementine, while her limbs were tied down her wings were still free and she was flapping them as much as she could, trying to find some leverage to free herself. Josef saw an idea and grabbed her left wing, placing the pliers at the base.
“Choice number 2 Alison, how would your ‘wingie’ daughter fare with only one wing?”
Clem screeched. “NU, Mummah pwease, wuv wingies, need wingies tu be wingie babbeh, Cwem speciaw.”
Alison knew her daughter was right, that she was a Pegasus, a special fluffy and would be resigned to being a monster if she lost a wing. But images flashed in Alison’s head of legless monster Fluffies and she couldn’t do that, it wasn’t vanity, it was fear. Again she dropped her head in shame and said nothing, Clem’s face showed the shock and horror of her mother’s inaction.
“Mummah?!
SNIP
Due to the thinner bone and ligaments of the wing, Josef was able to cut through in one try, Clem almost didn’t realise what had happened until she saw her wing fall in front of her and the adrenaline wore off.
“AHHH, CWEM WOST WINGIE, AM WINGIE BABBAH NU MOWE, MUMMAH! MUMMAH HEWP!”
Alison closed her eyes, trying to block out her daughter’s cries for help, she felt like the worst mother ever, a feeling that got even worse when she opened her eyes and saw Josef standing next to Janis. The terrified little filly had already pissed herself in fear when Josef placed the pliers over her back right leg.
“Your choice again Alison, does Janis get the cut, or will you save her?”
“Mummah, mummah pwease, Janis am onwy widdew babbeh, nu wan wose weggie. Babbeh stiww wub mummah wiv nu weggies, nu wan, nu wan.”
Josef applied a little pressure so Janis could feel the pliers pushing in on her.
“NUUU, MUMMAH, MUMMAH HU, HU, NU, HU, WAN WOSE… HU HU, WEGGIE, TU SCAWED, HAB WOWSTEST HUWTIES, MUMMAH”
“NU.”
Josef released the pressure on Janis’ legs and looked over at Alison, tears and snot running down her face but she looked right back at Josef regardless.
“Nu mowe, take Allason weggies.”
“You sure about that, once I start I won’t stop.”
“Allason know, nu wan mowe babbehs huwt cause of hew.”
Josef smirked, two out of four wasn’t bad, most parents cave about the two or three mark, depending on which child gets the cut. He dropped the pliers and picked up a clever, wanting to make quick work of the mare’s limbs.
“Your kids might want to close their eyes for this, it’s gonna get messy.”
“Cwose see-pwaces, mummah so sowwy she nu hewp soona, wan make up tu aww babbehs an…”
Josef didn’t let her finish as he dropped the clever onto her right arm.
The screams didn’t affect him, but the stench of four lots of scardie-poops would infect that room for months.
Rise and shine Mr Rex, rise and shine.
Rex woke slowly, unsure of what had happened to him. As his senses returned to him he realised he was in some kind of circular arena, a fairly large one by Fluffy standards, other than him there was only a box with a sheet over the top sat in the middle.
“Wha happen?”
Ah, you’re awake, good.
Rex jumped, looking around to see where the voice had come from.
“Who tawkin, show self.”
I can’t do that Rex, I’m your conscience.
“Consense? Wha consense?”
Your conscience is the voice in your head that tells you right from wrong, I’m here to help you get your family back.
“How consense du dat?”
Take the sheet off the box behind you.
As Rex turned and walked towards the box, Josef had to fight back his laughter from the other room, he had implanted a small microphone and earpiece in Rex’s head while he was unconscious and was now talking to him though it. He had considered the usual options for Rex, amputation, castration, annihilation, but none of them spoke out to him, no he needed a subtler approach to him.
He wanted to completely break Rex down into nothing.
Rex reached the centre of the arena, grabbed the sheet with his teeth and pulled it away. There was no lid on the box so Rex was able to see inside, there was a very weak, very sickly Fluffy with black and white fur and a nasty red scar on the front of his torso, he was too busy crying to notice Rex.
This is Edgar, he was a bad Fluffy who didn’t listen to daddy’s rules, now you must punish him.
“Puness how?”
You have to kill him.