It had been 11 years. 11 years since the PETA raid on the Hasbio labs that had cost you your job as a security guard there. 11 years that allowed fluffies to boom in population size and become as widespread as normal household pets.
You never felt animosity towards the “biotoys”. Although their release ended your comfy gig watching cameras and walking hallways for a living, you just thought of them as “victims of circumstance”, at least that’s what you told people if they asked, the truth was you didn’t care.
Starting tonight though that would change, it would have to for you to do your job effectively. You had lucked out and after 10 years of executive security, you had managed to get hired on guarding a nuclear research facility in the south. As you rolled up to the gate in your shitbox of a car, a man in the same uniform as you checked under your vehicle with a mirror. As he was doing this you swore you heard a fluffy say what sounded like “it cwean”. This is why you would be working with fluffies. Under the National safety initiative, Technology and Energy (NSITE) fluffies were incorporated into all federal security teams to deal specifically with national security threats posed by ferals or fluffies trained for terrorist activities. At first you thought that was an excuse to inflate some government budgets, until during training there was an example video where a fluffy was told to approach a guard post after being fed an explosive device, talk about “wowstest poopies”. Of course the training mentioned Cleveland, the event that finally spurred the government to acknowledge fluffies could pose a real threat. The events of that day were burned into your mind since you were supposed to make the drive to Cleveland to interview for a park security position the day after the disaster.
You needed this job, after 11 years of guarding state congressmen and judges Ohio was starting to look pretty dull, the food riots of '33 just helped you make the decision to leave sooner.
As you parked your car the man from the gate approached you “Evenin’, names Chuck, I’m the site supervisor and day shift here, you must be the night shift guy, this here’s one of our fluffies, Smokey”. Looking up at you was a dark grey fluffy, that somehow looked middle aged, standing as close as a fluffy could to attention. “I’m Federal Security officer Anon, it’s my first night and I look forward to working with you”. You shook your supervisor’s hand and walked with him to the small building that served as your office.
Once you were in the guard station smokey turned to Dwayne “Secewity officew Smokey am wewieved, weady to weave powst.” Dwayne nodded to smokey and he began to waddle to Dwayne’s car. "Here’s the keys, radio, and access control badge, you have your service weapon and the rifles are in the safe. The older man sighed as he looked at you “It’s not what it used to be here, we had 5 guards a shift all rolling around in armored SUVs. It looked like Fort Knox, unfortunately the last 15 years have gutted the security budget, now what was our little private army is now one guy and a fluffy”. He shook his head and patted you on the shoulder “I’ll see you in 12 hours, your fluffy doesn’t have a name yet, but after this shift you’ll be expected to take him home and care for him, think of it like a police dog except capable of human speech and the vilest shits imaginable, anyway, I’m out of here”.
Chuck’s silhouette faded as he walked to his car, a light fog was beginning to form over the parking lot. After you let him through the security gate you went over to the pet carrier that had your fluffy inside. You peaked in and the fluffy’s face lit up with joy “Nyu daddeh?”. You opened the carrier and he trotted out, his coat was the same color as dirt with some darker coloration mixed in. “Yep, ‘nyu daddeh’, from now on your name is Mocha.” The fluffy smiled and did a little dance in place “wuv nyu namsies, am dancie mocha!”. You smiled, you had never interacted with a fluffy like this before, only passing by ferals in the streets of Cincinnati, Mocha seemed entirely like an entirely different animal. “Alright Mocha, I need to put your security harness on, will you let me do that?”. Mocha looked like he was thinking for a moment, then got in front of you “Otay, Mocha nu like how hawness feew but do it for daddeh”. You put the vest like harness on and attached a saftey cable, which was a glorified leash, on and made sure it was secure. It had an ingenious fluffy defense system on it, the fluffy wearing the harness had the ability to use a radio if he pulled a cord with his teeth, or a pepper spray would deploy in all directions except for the wearers head if the fluffy said a certain command into the radio. This system was designed to allow a single fluffy to defend itself if it was surrounded by a feral herd, or report security issues in spots their human handlers couldn’t reach.
Mocha had been trained by the feds already, all national security animals were, you’d even heard of dolphins trained for mine detecting. It gave you peace of mind that at least Mocha had some sort of training, you had heard that fluffies were fragile due to being released early, but in the back of your mind you knew it was partly your fault. You made sure you had your equipment before you and mocha began your first patrol of the night as a heavier fog began to roll in.