Ariella was in the kitchen staring at the cooked Fluffy meat that filled up multiple metal bowls. An assortment of grayish-brown meat, diced up into bite sized meat chunks. Zeri had not wasted anything. Flesh and organs all cooked and cut up for consumption. Ariella wasn’t really sure how to feel about this. On one hand, Rocket was beyond redemption. He wasn’t a Fluffy, he was a Shit Rat. A very shitty kind of Shit Rat. A spoiled foal fucker who was honestly beyond help, but at the same time, she never thought she would ever be placed in a situation like this, feeding Shit Rats each other. What worried her was how okay she was with this. Perhaps she wasn’t really a Hugboxer?
She had thought about an alternative. Not feeding the Shit Rats at all and killing twenty a week to meet government quota, but it didn’t really help, not in the long run at least. Starving them was basically just delaying killing them all, and with how quick it was for the government to free up spaces, the problems would easily arise. Technically she had the option to misdeclare free spaces available. The Fluffy Shelter allocation system did work on a declaration basis, but the problem was that the government did do secret inspections and misdeclaration of free spaces did incur penalties. Penalties, she could not really afford to incur.
Plus which was crueler, starving them to death or feeding them their own kind? Shit Rats didn’t seem to have issue hurting and killing each other, so was cannibalization honestly that much worse in their eyes? Maybe, maybe not, but either way they didn’t have much a choice.
Honestly, though, was she even doing the right thing. Trying to a run a shelter without the assistant of the Hugbox fund. What was she even doing? What did she hope to accomplish? Was it better if she just shut down the shelter. The Fluffies and Shit Rats would be transferred to new shelters. Maybe abuse. Maybe Hugbox. Maybe the government would have just order her to get rid of all them, given that all exceeded the two weeks mandatory stay. The Shit Rats, she didn’t care about, but the Fluffies. There weren’t many in Entepott Fluffy Shelter, but for the few that were still here, she did want them to have as a good life as possible, so perhaps she was doing the right thing?
One matter at a time. The whole thing about cannibalization versus starvation and whether this was the right action were pointless debates and she knew it. She had already made up her mind on what she was doing and there was no point in doubting what already been decided. She needed to focus on doing her job now, and right now her priority was on controlling the flow of Bad stock departing her shelter, to limit free space available without resorting to misdecleration.
Feeding Bad stock themselves allowed her to save the decent food for Good stock, and to be fair, the Bad stock had been living far too good. There were good Fluffies suffering in abuse shelters, whilst these Shit Rats got to live a very good life in Entepott. Sure life wasn’t fair, but that applied to them too and they had already used up all good will, so now they were only getting Fluffy meat and only one meal a day. They were gonna spend the rest of their short lives miserable.
Right now, Ariella’s only goal was providing at least 20 free spaces per week for the next three months.
She looked back at the bowl of cooked Fluffy meat and had Zeri distribute them into separate feeding bowls. The meat had managed to fill up ten bowls. Enough for ten cages, so twenty Fluffies fed for today, but she had 133 bad stock in total, or rather 132 now that Rocket was gone. She thought about it and did some quick calculations.
132 = 20 fed
131 = 40 fed
130 = 60 fed
129 = 80 fed
128 = 100 fed
127 = 120 fed
126 = 140 fed (126 fed + 14 excess for tomorrow)
7 bad stock, would need to be killed today to feed 126 bad stock with enough to feed 14 bad stock tomorrow. So they needed to kill 6 more bad stock today. Shit Rats were bad, but it still did not fill her with joy knowing what needed to be done, but life didn’t care, so Ariella quickly reminded herself to grow a pair and stop moaning like a needy, entitled Shit Rat. The job needed to be done and it needed to be done quickly. Time was a limited resource and right now there was 199 Fluffies / Shit Rats under the care of 3 staff, so there was very little time to waste.
“Zeri, I need six more adults processed for consumption. Oh and no more sadistic shits, you took 45 minutes to kill Rocket. I’ll allow that, but I need this done as soon as possible, so you can help me with other shite”.
“Aye boss!” Zeri said with a wide grin.
The two entered the safe room. Ariella with a cart loaded with Rocket’s meat, while Zeri had her an empty cart to collect the six Fluffies.
“Uh… Which cages are should I get from?” Zeri asked.
“The six cages with the sole bad stock mares… Uh… Cage 95 to 100” Ariella responded “I want to start emptying cages so we have less work later on”.
Zeri nodded and did as ordered, and Ariella focused on Emilia at the far end of the hall. Ariella had assigned cages 1 to 21 for Good stock Fluffies. 67 Fluffies in total, but 46 were foals who could be left under the care of the mares, and there were only 21 adults. It was decided that the only change for the Good stock was a reduction of food from 3 meals to 2 meals, but they would still receive good living conditions with daily time in the communal play area, time to socialize and cleaning of cages. Emilia was in charge of them, and Ariella knew she could depend on Emilia to handle them on her own, after all, the girl loved Fluffies as much as she did, or at least as much as she used to loved them.
Meanwhile, she had to serve ten cages their new meal. So she served ten random cages. 5 that had a bad stock mare with a bad stock foal, and 5 cages with two adult bad stocks each. As expected, the Shit Rats did not take it well.
“This smeww wike foebah sweepy Fwuffy! Nu wan!” Exclaimed the mare from cage 92
“Wonny nu wan dis nummies. Wan sketties!” Demanded one of the stallion from cage 25
“Nu wike! Nu wike!” Wailed the foal from cage 88
Ariella would provide the same response every time “That’s all you’re getting”.
It would take two hours to serve all 62 bad stock cages, during that time Ariella dealt with an assortment of protest. Some Shit Rats would break down and throw a tantrum, other would kick the bowl away in disgust and shit on the wall, some would beg her for proper food. Honestly, they were all justifiable reactions, so Ariella held nothing against them, but it didn’t matter. Like she had said, this was all they were getting, and as far as she was concerned, they had food in their cages.
Whether they ate it or not was up to them, but Ariella suspected that they would all eat it. Shit Rats didn’t exactly have the willpower to starve themselves, especially the ones in here, who all felt like hedonistic hellgremlins. Absolute slaves to their desire. Plus she no longer had an obligation to remove them for their cages, so all they had was hunger and boredom, and from now on, this was all the kindness they were getting. Entepott Fluffy Shelter might have been a Hugbox shelter, but that was only for Fluffies, for bad stock this was pretty much a waiting room before the chopping block.
Ariella focused her attention on her staff. After cooking, Zeri had been assigned to reception duty. She did some basic paperwork, but her focus was keeping an eye on the front desk and making sure that potential owners were welcomed, meanwhile Emilia had started moving the good stock to the communal playpen. Ariella knew she could trust them both to handle their duties on their own. Both were very reliable workers with strong initiative, but that only made Ariella feel all the more guilty that their talents were being wasted her, especially without any pay.
Part of her had to wonder how long this would last. Good will was nice and all, but it hardly put the food on the table. She could imagine a point where these two would need to leave for good, then what? How was she gonna run this place? Those were thoughts for another day, right now she needed to focus on work and she had a lot of it.
Whilst Emilia dealt with the Good stock in the communal play pen, Ariella went to work cleaning their cages. Then she started cleaning and organizing the other parts of the shelter. Followed by a routine shelter inspection and inventory stock take. More cleaning and organizing. Zeri had made a complaint that no one was coming and that she was being wasted, so they set up some door bell, then had Zeri did some cleaning work. Meanwhile, Emilia went back to putting the Good stock in their cages and start off the third round of feeding.
Today would be the last day that the Good stock got three meals a day and fortunately, Emilia was diligent in informing them of this. There was some complaints, but the Good stock were all pretty well mannered and they all seemed to be aware that their situation was far better than the Bad stock, so there was not too much resistance thankfully.
Before Ariella realized, it was already 18:30 and it was time for the shelter to close for the day. By this time, most of the Bad stock had given into the hunger and eaten the Fluffy meat, though they were quick to highlight how much they hated it, when Ariella came to check on them. There were five that had announced that they didn’t eat the Fluffy meat, saying that they would only eat sketti or kibbles, but the Fluffy meat was still devoured. It was just a case of their cage mate having double the shares.
It really was so easy to be cruel to Shit Rats. It didn’t matter if they complained, they would be served Fluffy meat the next day, and it didn’t matter if they protested. If they ate it today with just a few hours of hunger to persuade them, they would eat it tomorrow too, no matter how much they hated it. It honestly felt disgusting, how weak willed they were, but then again if they had a decent amount of self-control, then they most likely wouldn’t be here in the first place. As for the five Bad stock that refused to eat the Fluffy meat. There was no medal or praise for them, they did not move up in the shelter system or any such crap. They were simply on the menu for tomorrow. It was a simple as that.
More cleaning followed after. Just removing some of the feces from the Bad stock cages and all the washing of feeding bowls. Even with three of them, it still took an hour, and it was only 19:30 when all three gathered into the office for an end of day group meeting. Ariella was recline on her seat, staring up at the ceiling, as she felt every single one of her muscles ache and groan.
“God I’m too old for this” Ariella said with a groan.
She stared at Zeri and Emilia. Emilia was slouched on her seat, looking a bit tired, but Zeri looked perfectly fine.
“You two okay?” Ariella asked
Emilia nodded slightly “Just a bit tired”
Zeri shrugged “I really didn’t do that much physical work, boss. I think we should have the door bell from now on. I mean, no one came in the whole time”.
Ariella nodded and continued staring at the ceiling.
“Emilia anything to report?”
Emilia sat up straight with a small nod.
“The Fluffies… Er… Good stock had some questions about what was going on. They seemed to realize that we were feeding the bad stock… Uh… Bad stock”.
“What did you tell them?” Ariella asked
“I just told them the truth. Bad Fluffies eat bad Fluffies from now on”
Ariella nodded in agreement “How did they react?”
“Well, as expected they were quite horrified. Some of them cried, the others were just left in disbelief. I mean it’s expected, right?”
“Hey, it’s a good scare tactics though” Zeri added “Be a good Fluffy or you eat other Fluffies, right?”
Emilia shot Zeri a disapproving look, but Ariella smirked.
“Em, How did they take the food cut from three meals to two meals. I heard complaints, but not that much. So we good, right?”
Emilia nodded, but she had quite a frown.
“It’s honestly hard to tell. I mean yeah I told them, but they were also processing the information that bad Fluffies eat bad Fluffies from now on, so better two meals than Fluffy meat, plus they’re Fluffies. You can say this stuff but it wouldn’t process, until the actual scenario happens, so… I really don’t know if they really are okay with this or not”.
“I mean if they complain we could always just serve them Fluffy meat, right?” Zeri asked with a grin.
Emilia looked annoyed by that statement and was practically giving Zeri the death glare, but Zeri didn’t seem to mind, she just had a big grin. Sensing the possibility of an argument arising, Ariella stood up straight and raised her hand with a small smile.
“Chill Ze, we are moving in an abuse direction, but I am still trying to keep us Hugbox shelter in some aspects and keeping Good Fluffies content is one of them”.
Zeri nodded with a grin, and laid back on her seat. Meanwhile, Emilia had raised her hand.
“What exactly is our goal here, Ella?” Emilia asked curiously.
“Well… Right now, we… I need a boost in government funding and the only way I can think to do it, is by providing at least twenty free spaces a week for the next three months”.
“I get that, but like what about the Fluffies… Uh… The good batch, like what are we doing with them?”
“Same as always, we try to get them adopted”
“But we won’t be listed on the Hugbox shelter program anymore, so are we just gonna keep them here until they die of natural causes?”
“Yeah exactly that”
Ariella looked at Emilia, and notice the young woman looking slightly uncomfortable.
“Okay what’s up with that question?” Ariella asked “What’s got you worried”
Emilia shrugged, then sighed.
“It’s just… The system. It works now… Kind of, but what about later?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I mean think about it. Right now it works, because we have way more bad stock that good stock. Like we have an excess of… Shitty Fluffies to feed our other shitty Fluffies, but like what about in the future? Like maybe not in the next few months, but right now our system is keeping good Fluffies and killing bad Fluffies, and eventually our shelter is going to land in a situation where we only have good Fluffies, but if no adopts them, then we are back to a situation where we have no space available and high food cost, so we don’t actually solve anything”.
Ariella looked at Emilia with surprise, but nodded in agreement. She was right. Adoption was always the main problem. It didn’t matter if they got rid of only bad stock right now, eventually they would be in a position where they only had good stock, and then they would be back to square one, and now they were not an offical Hugbox shelter, so no more free advertising and no more steady stream of potential Hugbox owners, not they had many to begin within.
Ariella laid back on her chair and made a frustrated sigh, and from the corner of her eye, she noticed Emilia with a guilty look on her face, looking down with unease.
“No” Ariella said calmly “Don’t make that guilty face, you raised an excellent point. This is something that we definitely need to figure out and the earlier we think of it the easier it makes it for all of us”.
Emilia gave her a thankful nod and Ariella noticed Zeri looking out the window deep in thought. Ariella couldn’t help but feel a little thankful. She really did have two such wonderful staff, both working free of charge, and right now it was getting late.
“For now. We rest. Yes this situation is one that needs to be addressed, but let’s be honest, we’re all tired. We brainstorm tomorrow morning, after we all had a good rest” Ariella declared.
Emilia and Zeri offered no protest. Both said brief goodbyes and soon they were gone, leaving Ariella alone in the office. She looked at the clock, it was almost 20:00. She thought about going home to rest, but she realize she still had work to do and she was kind of hungry. Eating some cup noodles from her cabinet, she began doing paperwork and ordering supplies, spending time scouring Hugbox forums for answers on the adoption problem, and before she knew it, it was already 00:30.
She massaged her forehead in frustration and prepared to leave, but she just felt so tired, so she plopped onto the couch and fell asleep.
Ariella awoke to the sound of her phone alarm ringing. Her body was aching and her muscles felt sore. She looked out the window and noticed it was morning. Looking out the clock, she realized that it was already 07:30 and she quickly turned off the alarm.
“Fuck” she groaned, as she massaged her muscles.
Sitting up with a groan, there was a knock on the door. Who the hell was here this early morning?
“Come in” she said with another groan.
Much to her surprise, Zeri came in with a bright smile. Ariella stared at her with a dead look.
“How the fuck do you have so much energy, Ze?”
Zeri giggled and sat down “Fluffy abuse always brings the best out of me” she said with a grin.
Ariella rolled her eyes and grinned slightly.
“What time did you get back, boss?” Zeri asked
“I never left. Fell asleep on the couch and well now you’re here… You’ve eaten breakfast yet?”
“Yeah, and now I’m ready to work. Want me to do clean up?”
Ariella nodded, as she thought about what to have for breakfast.
“Oh boss. I might have an answer to your adoption problem”.
Ariella raised an eyebrow and smirked.
“Please remember we are supposed to be a Hugbox shelter, before you provide your suggestion”
Zeri grinned.
“Nothing abusive. It’s just… What’s the number 1 thing most Fluffy owners complain about?”
“Uh… That they shit everywhere and anywhere?”
Zeri laughed “Okay. What’s the next thing they complain about?”
“Cut to the point, Ze. We ain’t playing fifty questions”.
Zeri laughed again “Well it’s the main reason we have bad stock. Owners hate whiny ass brats and entitled little shits with poor house training and self control, so what if we counter that. What if we start advertising and selling good stock with guaranteed good behavior and proper house training?”
“Ze, if I could guarantee those kind of Fluffies. I would have done that from the start, also that kind of training takes a lot of manpower and time”.
“Yeah, but like the situation has changed. In the past there was no consequence of being a good Fluffy or a Shit Rat here, but now it’s different. If you’re a Shit Rat you basically live in a prison and eat other Shit Rats with one meal a day, while Good Fluffies continue eating good food twice a day, and get to play and socialize like normal. Like now there is incentive to be a good Fluffy”.
Ariella thought about it, and she was impressed. There was logic to what Zeri was saying.
“Also, we technically do have the manpower. Let’s be honest. Hardly anyone is going to buy the adult good stock, because most have shi… Uh… Unappealing colors, but the foals have potential. Some have actually okay colors, so what if we have the adult good stock act like teachers, guiding the foals on what is ideal Fluffy behavior. Like good self control, not too needy, well behaved. That kind of stuff, plus we can use the communal play pen like a classroom, where we have the adult Fluffies teaching the foals everything and they can make sure that the good foals all behave well. Heck maybe we can teach these Fluffies how to do stuff like sweeping or cleaning. Plus you and Emilia, like actually Hugboxers, so you guys can help the teachers and say what actually Hugboxers would like to see with a Fluffy”.
Once Ariella found herself impressed, but she was confused.
“I’m sorry, but how does an abuser like you suddenly come up with ideas like this?!”
Zeri shrugged with a small grin.
“I don’t know. I was just thinking of this from a more business standpoint. Our target customers base would be Hugboxers who want to keep Fluffies long-term. I was just thinking about what made Fluffies appealing in the first place, so I started watching Hugbox videos…”
“Wait! You actually started watching Hugbox videos?!”
“Yeah… I realized that they all had one thing in common. The Fluffies actually had… Uh… Good manners and likable personalities, so you could just focus on their cuteness”.
Ariella looked at Zeri impressed and nod approvingly.
“Holy shit. If Entepott managed to convince you to step into the Hugbox world, then maybe we can make this work”.
Zeri smirked and gave Ariella the middle finger, much to Ariella’s amusement.
“Don’t count on it boss. A couple were okay, but so many of them made me want to puke with their fake ass cutesy bullshit. I actually felt unclean watching that crap”.
Ariella burst out laughing, as Zeri raised her hand.
“Yeah?” Ariella asked with a grin.
“Also… Why don’t we take advantage of what the general public like to do when referring to Fluffies?”
“Huh? What’d ya mean?”
“Like the naming… Good Fluffies are called Fluffies, but Bad Fluffies are called Shit Rats”
“I don’t get it”
“Like… A way to highlight the divide. I dunno maybe a tier system. Good Fluffies get good lives and Shit Rats lives in hell or something like that”
Ariella pondered on the concept for a little bit and nodded in agreement.
“Yeah yeah… We can brainstorm on it. Let’s wait for Em”.
As if by cue, there was a knock on the door. Emilia had also come in, with a warm smile.
“Perfect!” Ariella said with a grin “Everyone’s here. Let’s figure this out”
Hi, MEY here and I need your help
I need (10) Fluffy names for the next chapter, and I figured I could make it a community interaction thing. (Exploiting the creativity of my readers for my own personal gain) They are going to be the Fluffy helpers of Entepott, so you ain’t gonna seem them die.
Edit: I got (10) names already, but you can still suggest your name and idea if you want. It won’t be a Helper Fluffies, and no guarantee I’ll use it. Just a case of, if I feel you idea can fit in a certain scenario. I’ll use it
Rules:
Name needs to be something simple and cutesy, so no Ozymandias the Fifth or Turd Bucket or XxxSlayerxxX-69, etc. It needs to be a simple, cute name that a Hugboxer would give their Fluffies, like Oakley or Coco (Those two names are gonna be in the series)
One name per user. You can give me multiple names, but I’ll only choose one.
You can also give me details like:
Fluffy Tribe (Earthie, Unicorn, Pegasus, NO Alicorns).
Fur colors (Has to be VERY UNAPPEALING color combos)
Unfortunately I can’t pay you. Like Ariella, this is basically a case of I need your help but the only benefit is that you might see your Fluffy name in the Entepott Fluffy Shelter series
Leave your name suggestion in the comments