Exodus parts 12-15 by Dildofarmer

[Dildofarmer]

*****12*****

In the end, he decided that they should turn upstream for no other reason than the sun had begun to set in that direction and he felt better with the meager warmth of it playing on his face and the ground in front of him. He could not have known that he had turned towards the city, and that as the little herd chugged along, the streets and buildings would rise in front of them in greater and greater congestion.

The fluffies found themselves standing on a steep riverbank next to a street and a bridge, perpendicular to their path, appearing to the fluffies like a mountain that had been cut and stomped by titanic forces. They couldn’t keep following the river without crossing the road, and they knew there was no shelter behind them. South of their perch, they saw a long, low stretch of buildings and distant shapes of humans - more than they had ever seen at the garden center - popping in and out of doors and cars in a bewildering pattern. That way was closed to them, too. They had to cross the road, and waiting only allowed the day to grow darker and more chill.

Soon, they were hiding in an evergreen hedge up against the bridge embankment. The fluffies ducked and hid whenever a car came near, being unsure of their powers. Rusty was doing his best to bolster their courage.

“Otay, fwuffies… haff tu wun acwoss fwat wocky pwace. When Wusty see dat nu metaw munstas come, wiww say ‘Wun wun wun!’ an’ fwuffies hafta wun.”

“Scawwy…. nu wike metaw munstas…”

“Babbesh stay in mummah’s fwuff! Nu faww! Nu faww!”

“Otay, fwuffies! Wun wun wun! Wun acwoss!” he blared.

The little creatures waddled into the road across a gap in the traffic. Jumper planted his broad head in Bridget’s rump, as it was obvious she would take twice as long to cross the road as any other fluffy under her own power. She squalled and cried, chugging along with her belly grazing the asphalt, rocking from side to side as she tried to maintain some kind of footing. Just as they hit the shoulder, a pickup truck crested the bridge and rumbled by, and the driver gave a long, loud blast on his horn at the sight of the colorful little biotoys diving for cover.

The noise was incredible, rattling the fluffies’ teeth inside their skulls and whipping them into a momentary panic. Bridget planted all four feet solidly in the dirt at the edge of the road, bugged her eyes out and howled in fear as she cut loose a spray of runny shit directly into Jumper’s face. The other fluffies threw themselves on the ground with their paws over their eyes or ears, and two of Cupid’s foals soiled her navy blue fluff while the third one was so scared he fell off his mother’s pudgy back and smacked into the soil. Feather ran blindly away from the noise, making it about five feet before she fell down the riverbank towards the icy stream.

Rusty felt like his head had exploded. It was the loudest thing he had ever experienced, and it seemed to knock the thoughts clean out of his head. All his hair stood on end. Without knowing it, he opened his mouth and howled in response to the noise.

When he came back to his senses, he saw that his herd was scattered around the immediate area. His mate, Wendy, was chugging down the steep slope after their wayward foal. Nibbles and Cricket were hugging each other under the hedge, sobbing in terror. Cupid was cradling her foals. To his left, however, he saw something that startled him.

Bridget was laying on her back, her gravid belly flopped over to one side, and Jumper was half reared up over her, his face a snarling mask of anger under its fresh coating of dripping fluffy shit. He was hammering down at the prostrate mare with both front hooves as she moaned, rolled feebly left and right and held her own stubby limbs up to ward off the blows. Occasionally she would rock or cringe as Jumper would slip one through and bludgeon her muzzle or belly. He was growling through clenched teeth, and she was moaning and crying, alternately rolling her eyes or squeezing them shut in fear.

“Dummeh mawe! Nu gif poopies! Nu wike! Gif yu owwies! Poopies dummeh mawe! Hate yu!” cursed the enraged stallion.

“Nuuu! Huuuu! Stahhhp! Nu gif huwties! Nu gif huwties! Bwiget sowwy!” squalled the mare, then “Hukk! Hukkk! Nuuu!” as Jumper planted one of his front hooves squarely on her chest and used the other to deliver three rapid downward jabs to her cheek and ear.

Rusty, with his head still throbbing, had impulsively stumbled over and plowed into the angry stallion shoulder-first. The three of them rolled on the cold turf, coming to their hooves at about the same time. Bridget’s shit was now smeared fairly equally among both combatants and their reluctant referee.

“Stahp! Stahp! Nu huwt! Pwease stahp!” begged Rusty, trying to stay between Bridget and Jumper.

“Buuu huu huu, nu gif owwies! Nu wan’ owwies!” complained the mare, as sobs wracked her body.

“Dummeh mawe gif poopies to Jumpa! Hate dummeh mawe!” raged the green earth pony. He was unwilling to push past his friend, and so he contented himself with turning about and kicking cold dirt at the pink pegasus. He walked off in a huff to rub his face in the dry grass and rejoin his family.

“Hate poopies Jumpa! Bwiget make scawedy poopies! Dummeh Jumpa nu gif owwies fo’ scawedy poopies!” She stuck her tongue out at the stallion’s hindquarters, then broke down sobbing again as the pain from her bruises made itself known. “Nu wan’ wawkies nu moaw! Bad fo’ Babbehs! Wan’ go home! Wan’ go home!”

Rusty panted and tried to offer comfort to the battered, angry pink unicorn, and when she seemed calmer he likewise tried to scrape off the smears of shit from his chest and shoulder. He looked across the road, flinching as cars rolled past at a steady pace, boggling at the short distance they had come and how difficult it had been. His stomach growled and he felt so tired and lost that it nearly made him cry. The last golden light from the sun vanished from the top edges of the nearby buildings and the air started to steal the warmth from his body.

*****13*****

Jumper and Bridget calmed down but would puff their cheeks and huff whenever they got close enough to smell each other. Climbing back up the bank with her foal gripped in her teeth took a lot out of Wendy, though they were lucky not to have slid into the river. The fluffies trudged along the riverbank towards the vanishing light of the sun, but didn’t make it more than a few hundred yards before young Cricket plopped down on her hindquarters and started crying.

“Haf cowdies! Haf cowdies and tiewedies! Weggies huwt! Pwease, wan’ westies an’ wawmies!”

Nibbles, who had begun hanging around the little mare since Elsie met her maker, harmonized.

“Nibbews widdle hoofies nu feaw gud! Pwease nu gif owwies, widdle hoofies! Nibbews wan’ nummies and sweepies!”

The cold stone settled back into Rusty’s chest. Trying to tune out his whining herdmates, he looked around the nearby area for any place that might serve as shelter. He was interrupted by Bridget.

“Bwiget haf hooman daddeh. Daddeh gif gud nummies an’ bwankies an’ wawmies. Fwuffies get num-nums an’ wawmies fwom hoomans! Hoomans dewe!” She raised a shivering hoof and pointed down at an alley between two nearby buildings, where the tall shadows of humans could be seen flitting back and forth.

When Rusty looked at the humans, he didn’t see food or warmth. He saw metal wires biting into fluffy’s legs and Elsie being dragged out of the den, screaming about her foals all being dead.

“Hoomans nu wike fwuffies. Hoomans make fwuffies go wongest sweepies.” he said quietly but with utter conviction.

Bridget’s voice went up an octave and grew a ragged, harsh edge to it. “Wan’ nummies! Haf tummeh owwies! Wan’ wawmies and snuggews! Nu wike cowdies an’ dummeh wawkies aww time!” she stopped to pant and shiver. “Tummy owwies! Weggie owwies! Nosie owwies! Nu gud fo’ Babbehs!” she screeched at him.

Jumper had been lurking nearby, and as soon as he heard the pregnant pink mare screech, he bounced up with a snarl on his teddy-bear snout and sideswiped her.

“Yu shut up! Yu stupit mawe, hatechu!” The third fluffy brawl in two days broke out.

Rusty turned away from the ensuing noise, drooping like a dark red version of Eeyore from Winnie-The-Pooh. Part of him thought about how nice it would be if Jumper made Bridget go away somehow. He was brought up short when he almost walked into the side of a nearby dumpster pen, squatting twenty yards behind a gas station’s desolate back wall.

Upon scouting, the great brown door had a fluffy-sized gap, and inside was a great green box that stank like rotting food, vomit and feces. However, there were spaces to either side that were just big enough for a group of fluffies to lay, and he even spied a sheet of cardboard to keep their bodies off the cold asphalt. There was even a pool of fairly clean water nearby, alongside a patch of dead grass. In short, it looked like heaven.

Soon, the colorful nomads were sharing complaints about the smell, but once Jumper and Rusty pulled down the flattened box, they flopped down together and nodded off one by one.

Rusty was awakened in weird blue dawn light by a worried fluffy for the second time running. It was Jumper this time, instead of his mate, who was nuzzling him awake.

“Speshul fwiend nu haf miwkies. Babbehs nu haf miwkies, an’ haf tummeh owwies.”

“Wha…? Wha do?” mumbled the pegasus, trying to focus. His most dependable herdmate was standing over him, shivering a little in the cold, with his eyes full of worry.

“Jumpa sowwy, buh… Kewpid twy gif miwkies to Babbehs… an’ nu haf nuff. Babbehs onwy haf widdle miwkies, an’ one babee nu num, an’… babee haf tummeh owwies. Jumpa can heaw tummeh make noisies wif owwies. Babbehs cwy an’ nu haf happies. Nee’ find nummies for mummah, su mummah can make miwkies.”

Rusty closed his eyes, feeling the sweet embrace of sleep pulling down on his mind and stealing energy from his limbs. He looked up and saw that cloud cover had crept in, there would be no feeble sunshine today. Jumper nodded to Rusty’s left, where Cupid lay curled up around her brood. The navy blue dam looked black in the weak light, but Rusty could see shiny patches and mats in her coat from their journey. She was trying to hold all four foals with her front hooves, but as Rusty spoke to her, they were obstinately trying to slip her grasp and clamber down to her teats. She burst out crying and had to calm down before she spoke.

“N-n-n-nu haf miwkies since dawk time… Babbehs hungwy, bu huu huuu… Kewpid am wowstest mummah evew… Babbehs haf huwties…” she blubbered and sniffled, and lowered her head to nuzzle her offspring as they chirped and peeped off-rhythm. Up until three days ago, Cupid was a well-fed brood mare par excellence. She had birthed four foals and all had survived, growing fat and fast on the bounty from the garden center.

“Miwk!” squeaked one of them.

“Tummy owwies!” squeaked another.

“Mummah haf fin’ nummies fow make miwkies. Pwease hewp?”

Rusty knew she was hungry. They all were. They had walked farther and eaten less over the past three days than any of them ever had. He could feel a dull ache from his own stomach and feel a heaviness in his limbs even as his body fought to stay warm. He had hoped that they little herd could keep walking until they found a place to live, but he also knew that Jumper could not ignore his family’s demands.

Rusty and his sturdy friend nudged the other fluffies awake - Wendy and her filly, Cricket and Nibbles. Jumper and Bridget seem to have forgotten their spat - the stallion was gentle, and the pregnant unicorn only whined and didn’t snarl.

“Haf to fin’ nummies. Fwuffies go aww ways, wook fo’ num-nums. Bwing num-nums back. Good fwuffies shawe nummies wif aww fwuffies. Nu get wost! Safe pwace haf big cowd wa-was one side, big hooman pwaces on da ofver. If yu get wost ow scawed, wawk next to big cowd wa-was.” said Rusty to his sleepy herdmates. To his surprise, none of them complained. Rather, at the mention of food, some of them gulped a little and rubbed their bellies.

“Wusty go dis way. Jumpa an’ Nibbews go dis way. Wook how you go to sky-baww fo’ nummies, come back fwom sky-baww to Safe Pwace. Cwicket and Wendy go dis way. If hooman twy to get yu, wun to Safe Pwace.” It felt strange to be reciting The Rules again, especially when their Safe Place was a smelly, roofless set of walls, but there it was. The fluffies ranged out, some searching the riverbank for greenery that was still edible this late in the season, some timidly plodding over to the brick buildings and sniffing in the alleys and crevices.

Before departing, Jumper helped Cupid plant three of her four foals on her broad back, where they kept peeping for food but instinctively held on tight. The last was the biggest and boldest, an earthie foal in his father’s image, and could walk beside his mother if they weren’t going too far.

“Jumpa wiww fin’ num-nums an’ bwing back fo’ speshul fwiend” promised the stout stallion. His mate beamed at him and burbled her affection, and they briefly touched noses before he waddled off.

*****14*****

“Come wif mummah, widdle babbehs,” said Cupid, her optimism returning, “Mummah an’ babbehs fin’ nummies, an’ mummah make miwkies su babbehs nu haf tummeh owwies evah!” Her foals cheered, and she lumbered around the walls of their shelter, striking out towards the river. It was slim pickings. The turf was mostly gone to dry stubble. Some moss caught her eye, a fuzzy patch nestled against a rock at the waterline.

“Dese nummies nu gud,” she whined, spitting mud out of her mouth, “Hafta fin’ betta num-nums fo’ make bestest miwkies.” Steadying her two young, she clambered upstream a short way, until she found herself near the crossing-place where her tribe had been so scared the previous evening. At first, the recollection made her huff fearfully and look about with wide eyes, but the road was quiet. Growing calmer, she bumbled forward, stripping a fern that still clung to its chlorophyll and grubbing in the dirt for seeds, stems, anything. Her big foal mimicked her behavior but stopped every once in a while to hug its own belly and cry.

“Miwk! Hungwy!”

“Twy fo’ miwkies soon, babee, sowwy. Mummah twy fin’ nummies, buh..” Suddenly, she stopped short, nearly upsetting her brood. “Smeww… Mummah smeww gooooood nummies!”

Eyes wide, the mother fluffy smacked her lips and sought the source of the smell. It was unfamiliar, yet so delicious that it made her stomach gurgle in anticipation. She drifted forward until finally she spied a bright smudge in the roadway, rattling in the breeze somehow. This was resolved as a plastic bag, like the one she had seen her herdmates play with in the old den. Only this bag wasn’t drifting in the breeze, it was weighed down by a cake box, the kind with a cellophane lid, and it had been partially smashed. Inside, and somewhat spread around on the road, was a two-layer sheet cake with coconut icing.

“Ooooohhhh… nummiest num-nums!” Even from ten yards away, the sweetness of the cake called to the fluffy like a siren’s song.

“Babbehs… mummah num dose nummies, wiww make bestest miwkies eva! Bestest miwkies fo’ babbehs!” She bounced a little on her hooves in excitement, nearly bucking her three riders off. They chirped in fear, but the big one on the ground cheered.

“Bes’ miwkies! Bes’ miwkies!” it squeaked.

As Cupid was watching, she heard a familiar rumbling sound and a rush of air. Whinnying in fear, she cowered and looked about, until a burgundy car appeared from the nearby corner and rolled with incredible heaviness and speed right across her field of vision. Its tires seemed to brush the little bag with the cake inside, making Cupid’s heart lurch with fear. What if the metal monster stole the food? What if one tried to hurt her while she was getting it? She was savvy enough to know that metal monsters only went on the rocky places, but suddenly the distance to her goal seemed dangerously far.

Yet, as she stood there, the foals on her back started crying for food again, and the one at her feet wandered over to mouth her hanging teat. All four were so hungry, and they were so greedy for milk. She could tell that her body was not producing enough to nurse them with. Her biggest foal tried both of her teats, and finding only dribbles there, plopped down on his hindquarters and started to cry.

“Tummy owwies!” it squeaked.

“Hungwy!” squeaked one of her riders.

“Otay, Babbehs. Mumma get nummies an’ make miwkies.” She bobbled around in the awkward u-turn of her short-necked kind and flopped down on her side under a hedge marking some kind of division along the road. She tilted to slide her foals off her broad, fluffy back and gently pushed them together. “Babbehs make fwuffpiwe! Babbehs haf wawmies an’ huggies! Mummah get num-nums an’ come back fo’ huggies and wuv!” she bleated at them. She couldn’t tell how much they understood. They hugged each other, but chirped to be deprived of her scent and squeaked uncertainly.

“Wuv huggies! Wan’ huggies! Wan’ Mumma!”

“Nu! Nu be bad Babbehs! Haf’ fwuffpiwe an’ nu weave fwuffpiwe!” she scolded.

Cupid turned peremptorily around, her dewy eyes focusing on the bag sitting in the opposite lane, and with determination began to waddle over to it. The air seemed to grow still as her scuffed hooves tapped on the asphalt up to the bag, and without delay

she fastened her flat teeth on the fluttering plastic. She pulled. It was a heavier load than she expected, but the whispers of the scent of coconut drove her to put her back into it.

She was halfway across the far lane of the road when the plastic bag began to slip off the box as the harried mother inexpertly pulled at a corner. “Nuuu, nummies pwease hewp!” she complained as she let go of the bag and tried to nose the cake box back into the sleeve. It was then, with her body turned, that she caught the suspiciously clear squeaking of one of her foals. She looked up, and saw her second-largest foal, a willful brown unicorn, skitter towards the road, sobbing and squeaking. “NUU! BABBEH NU WEAVE FWUFFPIWE!”

Fear and alarm caused her to react strongly. With an angry expression, she charged her wayward tadpole, scaring it so badly that it stopped in its tracks and covered its eyes with its tiny front hooves.

“Scawy! Nu! Gud babbeh!” it squeaked.

“Nu! Nu weave fwuffpiwe! Nu wawkies on wocky pwace!” snapped Cupid, panting in fear and prodding at her foal with her front hoof, trying to induce it to turn and flee. All four of her foals were now chirping in fear, rattling her nerves. The one in the road was loudest and its pitch rose sharply when she shoved it.

“Mummah owies? Bad babbeh?”

Desperately, Cupid gummed her foal by the nape and hauled it to its feet, and then more-or-less kicked it with enough force that it half-skidded and half-jogged off the road and onto the gravel shoulder. The disoriented fluffy mare bobbled back around to re-acquire the cake, and then chugged towards it while twisting her stubby neck to keep one eye on the unicornlet. She snagged the bag again and started to pull.

As soon as she did, a tan Toyota slid around the corner with a rumble of engine and whoosh of air. Panicky tears sprang up in Cupid’s eyes as she pulled harder on the bag, but she didn’t get it out of the lane before the great black tires slashed past her at mind-numbing speed, inches in front of her snout. The bag was torn from her mouth and the cake was blasted into oblivion twice in one heartbeat – Smash-Smash! Fragments and smithereens and gobbets burst and splattered all over the road, the tires, the hull of the car, and the stunned fluffy pony.

“Guh… buh…” Shock gripped Cupid’s mind. Her mouth and fuzzy blue chest heaved as she came to grips with having survived a whisker-close encounter with a car. She started shaking in every limb.

“Hahh.. hahh… whu…” She looked down at the wild white splatter in the road, realizing that it was the food she was trying to recover. It was now several square yards of paste and several heartbeats passed as she tried to figure out if collecting it was even possible.

“Nummies… nummies gone… b-b-b-Babbehs?” Recovering faster and faster now, her brain retraced its steps to the clutch of foals for whom she had taken such a risk in the first place. With a coating of dirty coconut slime on her forequarters, she chugged around to look back at her offspring. It that moment a great boxy brown UPS van crested the hill to her right, bellowing as its driver accelerated downhill towards the embankment.

Cupid had just enough survival instinct to begin staggering off the road right on time. Unfortunately, her instincts as a doting mother brought her to a fateful hesitation. She saw then that the fussy second-best foal had once again defied her and toddled up to the hard pavement. For just a moment, her brain stopped being concerned about saving itself and worried about the crying unicorn foal.

By the time Cupid’s attention was torn back on the golden glare of the van’s headlights, it was too late. She bobbled a few clumsy steps, raised her tail, and squeezed out a few blobs of shit before she was struck.

The UPS van’s rumbling front tire laid down the law on the navy blue mare, from the tip of her right rear hoof and across her pelvis. In a fragment of a second, flesh and bone and gauzy fluff were mashed to bloody slurry and forcefully mingled with the stony surface. Cupid’s guts burst and her belly split, ejecting ropy, glistening coils of her intestines out onto the cold hardball.

She horked out her last lungful of air out followed by a foot-long splash of blood and bile as the flotsam of her wrecked body spewed out both ends.

“Huuuu!! Buuuuuughhhhh! Bbbbbllluuuuuphhhh!” she honked as the momentary pressure made her eyes bulge outwards and the world spun. Mortal cold and terror gripped her mind, and her consciousness split into fragments. One was helplessly scrabbling at the pavement with her front hooves, but all she managed to do was scuff her worn-out pads. She had no strength or leverage to separate herself from the sheet of gore that used to be her rump.

Another grain of her mind watched in horror as her naughty foal bounded into the street, its face a mask of grief, followed by the tiny bobbing spots of color that must be the other two. She could see the pink spots of tiny mouths going peep and chirp, but all she could hear was a dull roaring noise that seemed to come from inside her skull. It grew quieter.

“Muuuuuhhhhhh,” she groaned, her head jerking helplessly left and right and her vision flickering on and off. A curtain of blood poured out of her mouth and nose. Some final impulse was trying to warn her foals off the road, but somehow understood that she was merely gargling as they tried to hug her twitching front limbs. The last thing she could make out was a white, pointy-nosed Dodge Neon in her peripheral vision between the struts of the bridge.

The big brave foal was, perhaps, saved by its more developed intellect it stayed huddled under the hedge, obeying its mother even as it saw her squashed to tissue by the van. It squalled at its nestmates when they bounced forth, but was too afraid to move.

“Nu! Nu bad! Nu weave!”

“Mummah! Scawy!” said the tiny one, darting like a mouse onto the pavement.

And so the big foal huddled there and watched blood and strings of mucus gush from its half-a-mother’s face, and heard her awful sounds, and it saw the Dodge’s rear end shimmy as the car accelerated and wiggled towards the shoulder of the road. Then came the splatter of its mother and siblings’ final liquefaction on the silver hubcap and trailing fender. The Neon mashed the foal’s family and whisked off down the road, returning the scene to silence. The foal closed its eyes against t he pottage of guts, blood, brains, multicolored fluff and cake and chirped plaintively.

*****15*****

“Whewe Kewpid? Wan’ speshul fwiend!” said Jumper for the fourth or fifth time. The herd had set out to forage for badly-needed food, and shortly past a chilly noon, even the strongest and most able had either given up from fatigue or returned to the dumpster shed with their take. It was odd to them that Cupid, laden with four foals and fairly timid on the best of days, would have strayed farther or longer than young, vital Cricket or strong Jumper.

It surprised none of them that swollen and pregnant Bridget had not made a token effort. Driven by a strong thirst, she had waddled down to the riverbank to drink and become smeared with mud, which marked the end of her get-up-and-go. She retired to the dumpster shed.

The next fluffy to return to home base was Wendy, accompanied by her little filly foal Feather. The little one’s slight frame had been of a benefit, for she had been able to squeeze under a nearby dumpster and pull out a banana that was only half-rotten.

“Gif nummies! Wan’ nummies!” pealed the pregnant pink fluffy, chugging forwards and reaching out a hoof to stiff-arm Wendy while standing on the end of the banana to hold it down.

Making rude little noises in her throat, Bridget stripped away the skin from the fresher end and began eating in great bites. Wendy and the filly eased closer, their stomachs aching at the sight of the starchy food, but Bridget saw them and whipped her muzzle around threateningly.

“Yikky num-nums!” she said, spitting a glob of spoiled plant-flesh down onto the cardboard. “Bwiget nu wike muddy wa-was! Yu make Bwiget cwean an’ pwetty wif wickies!” She rolled slightly, showing the mother and daughter pair her mud-caked lower flanks.

“Buh..” started Wendy

“MAKE BWIGET CWEAN AN’ PWETTY WIF WICKIES!” snarled the pregnant mare. Wendy scowled at her, but the pliant little yellow filly skittered timidly closer and reached out gingerly to try to clean out some of the mud. She gave up after a few tries and sat down to cry.

Wendy became angry to see her foal so despondent. She confronted Bridget nose-to-nose.

“Gud fwuffies shawe nummies. Gif nummies to babbeh.”

“Bwiget hungwy! Nee’ num-nums fo’ haf babbehs!”

“Fiwwy nee’ nummies fo’ gwow big an’ stwong! Meany mawe shawe nummies!” Wendy puffed her cheeks out and stamped on the cardboard.

Bridget stuck one hoof out protectively and humped about a bit, trying to turn away from the angry mare, but she was crippled by her bloat. Wendy dodged around the extended limb and shoved Bridget’s face away from the banana just as the pink fluffy had finished taking another wide bites. The pregnant mare half-snarled and half-whined at the earth pony, but was unable to keep a grip on the heel of the banana. She sat and fumed and watched the mother and filly gobble down the last crumbs, then started crying and holding her belly.

“Bwiget hungwy! Bwiget hate dummeh muddy wa-was! Buuu huu huu!”

The early afternoon was the warmest it was going to get all day, and the cold was still so harsh that the fluffies relented and huddled together, whining whenever a gust sliced down into the narrow space beside the dumpster. Wendy got up at one point and shuffled around the great stenching green box, backing into the corner of the opposite space and hunching over to empty her bowels.

Jumper and Nibbles returned next, bearing only four bundles of tough crabgrasses and green-ish twigs tucked into their cheek pouches. They plopped them down and shared them out, except one on which Jumper planted his stocky hoof and refused to budge as the other fluffies chewed and gnawed, trying to extract some nourishment from the poor fodder.

“Dese nummies fo’ speshul fwiend an’ Wusty an’ otha fwuffies.”

“Mummah? How time bwudda?” said Feather, sniffling a little.

“Mummah.. nu know, babbeh. Mummah sowwy. Suuu sowwy.” Wendy had almost forgotten about her dead foal, buried in a shallow grave and then torn to shreds by a pair of dogs.

Cricket came back dragging a can half-full of lightly molded, gelatinous soup. She had cut her muzzle several times on the jagged metal, and something had pierced a star-shaped, bloody wound in the suede of her hoof. The normally ebullient little mare was tired and shaken, but she beamed and wiggled her rump happily when the other fluffies cheered her arrival. Jumper became anxious and started asking after his mate, but none of his herdmates had a guess. That left only Rusty, and when he arrived, he appeared to be slumped under a heavy burden but was bearing no food.

“Jumpa, pwease fowwow… nee’ hewp. Yu babee nee’ hewp.” The fluff under his eyes was damp with fresh tears. Jumper, puzzled, rose to follow him, but then turned around and spoke sharply to Nibbles while pointing at the last remaining clump of grasses and leaves they had scrounged.

“Dese nummies fo’ speshul fwiend an’ Wusty. Nu wet anyfwuffy ewse num.” The two stallions plodded out into the cold.

“Wha… wha… wha happen…?” gibbered the green earth pony scant minutes later, slumped onto his rump at the crossing-place. Rusty had led him up the little rise and shown him the gruesome wreckage of his family. His mate and children’s scents were still vivid, and the smashed, soiled wads of offal in the road still bore shreds of fluff in their colors.

“Nu! Nu! NUUUU! NUUUUU!” howled Jumper, alternately beating his hooves into the ground and running in circles “Babbehs! Babbehs AN’ SPESHUL FWIEND! NU! PWEASE! PWEEEEASE! NU BE DEAD!” The fluffy wailed and moaned, and by perverse timing a great black SUV chose that moment to rumble by and smash Cupid’s sodden remains down for the twentieth time. “Huuuuu! Huuuuu! Wan’ die! Wan’ die!” Jumper hunched over and spewed a pitiful splatter of diarrhea out of his haunches, and then whipped around and plowed into it facefirst.

Rusty flinched in sympathy and tried to break into his herdmate’s fugue. “Jumpa! Yu stiww haf babee! Wook! I hewd babee cwy an’ fin’ him hewe!” Red pushed under the dry hedge at the side of the road and prodded the surviving foal from Cupid’s litter. Sobbing Jumper flung himself on the shivering little foal, gripping him with both front hooves as he flopped in the mulch.

“Oh - oh - oh - babee… wha happen tu mummah? Wha-wha-wha… Nuuuu, huu huuu….” was all the bereaved fluffy could manage. The foal, despite being nearly a weanling, just chirped and squeaked like a newborn. It’s eyes were shut and its limbs were limp.

“I twy, buh babbeh nu wawk, nu tawk. Make widdle babee noisies. Nu know. Twy to cawwy babbeh, buh it cwy an’ cwy.” Rusty bit his lip and hung his head while his friend frantically nuzzled and licked the smears of his own shit off his last remaining foal between wracking sobs. He sat in the cold and watched his normally-resolute friend blubber and weep. Eventually, he had to help hoist the eerily mute and stubbornly unseeing creature onto his friend’s back so they could waddle back to the dumpster shed. It continued to squeak and chirp and waggle its little hooves, and would not exert the slightest effort to keep from falling off its father’s rump.

Back at the dumpster, the rest of the fluffies had shared out the near-spoiled cold minestrone as best they could, and collected themselves into a pile, struggling to stay warm on at least one side. Rusty and Jumper trudged back in the door laden with the catatonic foal, and their appearance was so haggard and careworn that the other fluffies just watched in silence as Jumper slid the foal down onto the cardboard and wrapped himself around it and sobbed.

“Nuuu, huu huuu… awww dead… awww dead…” he still had his own feces smeared on his face but made no move to clean it off.

“Kewpid an’ twee babbehs… took wongest sweepies.” Rusty reported to his shrinking herd. He didn’t know what else to say. His hunger and grief settled on him like a wet blanket and he sat down to gnaw on the tough wad of half-dried leaves and blades of grass that was left over from the herd’s forage. The fluffy ponies huddled together for warmth and listened to Jumper cry and moan while his foal would only helplessly squeak and chirp with its eyes shut.