Erik took stock of the bottles on his right starting with the clorocks bleach, then the wax-based floor polish, and finally a horribly pungent pumpkin spice air freshener he’d picked up last fall that seemed to permeate every inch of the apartment no matter where he plugged it in. He reached into the back and pulled out some expired ear medicine, withdrawing the dropper before throwing the box away.
Closing the cabinet and making his way back to the table, he Lined up the 3 bottles next to the enclosure and popped the top off, looking down into the Enclosure as kernel appeared to be squeezing out even more sprinkle sized foals much to her distress and Eriks annoyance.
The thing about micros is they have no concept of life going on outside of their 4 walls, you could literally jam your face into the opening and blow hot breath onto their faces and they wouldn’t perceive you as anything but the ceiling. With the downsizing of micros they lost what little brain power a fluffy would normally possess. That combined with the incredibly small size meant that the fluffy resembled a guinea pig more than anything to support its own bodyweight.
Taking the dropper, Erik filled it with bleach before lowering it over corn who was busy dropping a squat in one of the nutrigel corners, Erik smiled in smug satisfaction as he pressed on the rubber end, dousing the creature in room temperature bleach before removing his hand and observing.
After 3 seconds or so right as the vapors reached Eriks nose, corn began screaming as loud as a micro is able “SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!SPEEEE!BUWNIES!WOWSTEST BUWNIES!SPEEEEE!!” It shook itself about like a wet dog, then began bucking end over end like a horse trying to throw its rider. Zigzagging around the enclosure and crushing some of the newborns that kernel had given birth to that morning due to corns bad huggies.
Eventually, corn made its way blindly in front of the magnifying window pawing at the plastic wall as its melting features were stuck in absolute agony,much to Eriks delight. Snapping a pic with his phone, he watched as corn made slower and slower circles in place. Its remaining eye a pure white as its other dripped from the socket and its fur lay in clumps around its badly burned body.
“Thats what you fuckin get…” Erik muttered before reaching in with his left hand and squashing corn flat with his thumb, twisting it back and forth to really grind it into the litter. Taking his hand back, he was greeted by the sight of a flattened, bloody micro. “Less pain than you deserve you litt-” Erik sighed and shook his head before scattering a handfull of litter over the corpse and closing the lid.
Sure, the micros were a seasonal pest around here. Erik was just so goddamn sick of the fluctuating food prices every time some little Bob or Sally released their fair prizes into the woods. Having to waste 3x the normal spray on their jobs because the little creatures lungs were too small to soak in the poison unless it was thick as tear gas. no matter how SURE you were you’d gotten them all there was always a handfull of rice sized micros under a crop to rebuild the population in a week.
Angrily, Erik grabbed the container with both hands and gave it a sharp spin on the table. The sand-nutrigel mix getting tossed about as the small bodies inside THUMPED and BONKED against the walls of the enclosure.
Removing the lid to check his handywork, Erik was met with pop sitting upside down against the glass on the nutrigel side, its back left leg looking like a crinkle-cut fry as he searched around for kernel. Finding her in the litter corner having been hand-tossed in her own poopies, sobbing and holding some of the rice grain-sized foals on her abdomen for comfort.
Feeling proud of his damage, Erik snapped the lid on with a smile and walked over to the kitchen window above the sink, placing the enclosure on the ledge in the direct sunlight as began singing to himself "Love, is a burnin thing…