Chapter XIII: Priscilla
Previous Chapter: Chapter XII
‘What does she want now?’ Stephane had no patience for the brat’s constant demands. He relented for his daughter, but only because he loved her so much. The only reason he even had a fluffy in his house was because his daughter insisted.
‘Well, she’s asking to have babies. She saw them on FluffTV and now can’t get her mind off it.’ Claire talked into her hand, hoping the muffled words would moderate her father’s reaction.
‘Claire! Seriously? You know she’s fixed. She can’t have babies. And there’s no way we’re taking in any more either. That brat is the most annoying pet I’ve ever seen.’ He tossed silverware into the dishwasher with a rough flourish on that last word.
‘Dad, don’t call her that. She doesn’t mean it.’ She paused for a moment, her dad still focused on his dishes, clearly in a sour mood. ‘What should we do, then?’ she finally asked.
‘You tell her.’ Her dad wasn’t interested in appeasing the bratty mare.
‘What? I can’t… she’ll just get upset.’ Claire took a sip of her juice, before slumping her head onto the cold kitchen countertop.
‘I’m only telling her once, Claire. She’s obviously not getting any babies.’ Stephane closed the dishwasher, turning it on before turning and facing his daughter, arms crossed.
‘Thanks dad. I just can’t… I never want her to be mad at me.’
‘That’s exactly why she misbehaves, you know’ her dad quipped, before walking back into the living room. Sitting on the plush leather sofa, he glanced as Claire made her way back to her room. Not long after, Priscilla trotted up to him, trying to act cute, as though he didn’t know it was all an act.
‘Daddeh, fwuffy wuv daddeh su muchies.’ There it was—fluffy.
Priscilla was a unicorn, just like her mummah and daddeh, born after they were captured from a city park raid and placed into a shelter. Prior to her being adopted, and her mother’s subsequent disposal, Priscilla’s mummah filled her head with tales of the herd—how great it was, how she was the smarty’s bestest speshul friend. That, she said, meant that Priscilla and her two bestest sisters would be bestest smarty friends too. She told her about the herd, the toughies, the dummehs, the poopies, the munstahs and munstah babbehs. She had a lot to pass on to make sure when her fillies left the dummeh human not-housie they’d be ready for their life at the top of a new herd!
Obviously the dummeh humans would let them out, and she reminded her fillies that when the humans are around, always be careful. They’d tell them dummeh human things like ‘aww babbehs aww gud babbehs’. That was so stoopeh! Smarties didn’t like bad babbehs, so smarties don’t get bad babbehs! Looking at her brightly coloured fillies, Priscilla’s mother knew she was the best in the herd. She only ever had one dummeh and one poopie babbeh, and each of those were thrown into the bad park wawa by her speshul friend, the smarty herd leader. He was so smart! He didn’t want them taking any nummies away from the good fluffies in the herd.
Every night, Priscilla cooed as her mother nursed her, telling her how precious she was, how she was a smarty babbeh, and a bestest babbeh. It wasn’t long before she became a talkie babbeh, and then her nyu mummah, little mummah came!
‘Nyu mummah? Nyu mummah? Gib huggies an wuv fow bestest babbeh?’ she beamed, expectantly and proudly at Claire, placing herself in an assured huggies pose.
‘Aww, you’re so cute’ Claire said as she picked her up, petting her as she cooed in her arms.
Priscilla’s mother watched, calling out to her. ‘Bestest babbeh am gud babbeh. Nyu mummah wiww wub bestest babbeh! Pwease take bestest babbeh fow bestest mummah!’
‘Dad, can we get this one, she’s so pretty with her pink fluff. And those little blue eyes, she’s adorable!’
Her dad looked on, taking his glance away from his phone, as he heard the foal peep and coo at Claire. ‘Bestest babbeh wub gud upsies!’ He frowned. ‘That one doesn’t seem like a good one.’
‘But dad, please? I really want her.’ She began to pout, holding the foal in presentation hoping that he would be swayed.
He sighed loudly, and rolled his eyes. ‘Fine, fine. But she’s gotta get fixed, and all the stuff this place requires. You know we can’t just take her home as is.’
‘Yay!’ Claire exclaimed, holding the little foal close.
In this distance Priscilla’s mummah chuckled. ‘Heh, dummeh hoomin, babbeh am bestest, nu dummeh. Nu need fixies.’ She had no idea what he meant.
After some strange dark time, Priscilla opened her eyes. She felt really strange, sleepy but not like when she went to sleep during the normal dark times. Searching with her eyes, she saw that she was looking at her nyu mummah in… a different human housie!
‘Mummah? Am wid nyu mummah nao?’ She looked around nervously, checking to see if she could see her mummah, but she wasn’t there.
‘That’s right! I’m your new mummah. We’re at your new housie, and I have lots of toys for you. You’re going to have so much fun here!’ Claire talked to her in her sweetest voice she could.
'Tank ‘ou nyu mummah. Smawtie babbeh get bestest toysies an nummies.’ As she said this, however, she noticed she felt a cold sensation near her special place. Looking down, she saw her fluff had been taken away, a very slight line barely discernible.
‘Nyu mummah, wai take fwuff fwum bestest babbeh? Am nu bad babbeh.’
‘Oh, don’t worry sweetie, it’ll grow back. The nice people at the vet just made you better. Now you’ll be a happy fluffy who gets lots of love and happies!’ Pausing for a moment, noticing the confused expression on the foal’s face, she thought of a way to distract her. ‘I know! How about we give you a pretty name?’
‘Weewy? Bestest babbeh get bestest namesies. Wuv nyu mummah! Wan!’ the little foal peeped and wiggled her legs at the thought.
‘You’ll be… Priscilla!’ Claire revealed.
The filly gasped at the sound of her new name. ‘Pwissy wub bestest namesies! Wuv mummah! Wuv!’ Priscilla clamoured to get huggies from her new mummah, overjoyed by the name. She had no idea the part of her special place that could make babies was no longer there. Thus, throughout her time with Stephane and Claire, she never believed anything was missing.
As the months went by, she began to forget her mummah. She never forgot the feelings she had, though. She had a strong sense that she was meant for the bestest things, for all the huggies and love. She got so many toys, but grew tired of them quickly. She got sketti, but nowhere near as often as she deserved. Her mummah made sure to make dummeh daddeh give her sketties more often, but it wasn’t enough. Why didn’t he know she should always have sketties?
Dummeh daddeh didn’t like it when she puffed her cheeks or made poopies. They were good poopies, not bad poopies. He was dummeh because he didn’t understand that bestest babbehs never make bad poopies. They’re good babies, the bestest babbehs! She was so glad little mummah sided with her, but it didn’t make sense that she would listen to this dummeh human as much as she did. Nonetheless, Priscilla learned to pretend with daddeh. She’d make ‘good’ poopies, and learned to ask mummah to get her things from daddeh, so he didn’t say meanie words to her. Giving her heart hurties was so mean! Heart hurties weren’t for good babbehs like her.
Time continued to march on, and now, Priscilla was more than a year old. She’d gotten tired of the toys she had, and was always looking for more. More and more she began to watch FluffTV because the showsies on there were so fun! It was a shame so many of the fluffies on there were dummehs. Sometimes she got scared because they showed munstahs! The fluffies on there even said they weren’t munstahs, some dummeh ‘awicown’ or something. Little mummah made her feel better, though, telling her that the fluffies on the TV aren’t actually there. It was human magic to show pictures of places far away.
The Babies! show was the best show, of course. As she grew up she heard the mares on the show talk about how much they loved babbehs and how they were the bestest things ever! Now she knew why her mummah loved her so much, she was a babbeh too, the bestest! That’s when she remembered it—of course, she was supposed to lead a herd! She realised then she needed to get babies so she could have the bestest smarty friend and be a nyu smarty mummah with bestest babbehs.
This leads us back to the present day.
‘What is it, Priscilla?’ Stephane asked through gritted teeth.
‘Daddeh, Pwissy wan babbehs. Can pwease hab babbehs? Nee’ stawwion fow make bestest smawtie babbehs!’ she quickly spewed out the long, annoying babbling with a confident air.
With a sigh, he looked at her sternly. ‘You can’t have babies, Priscilla.’
She immediately puffed her cheeks. ‘Wai daddeh say meanie tings. Pwissy nee’ babbehs.’
‘You apparently don’t get it. You can’t have them. You don’t have your “special place”, you’ve been fixed.’ Stephane turned his gaze to the TV, flipping through sports channels. ‘Daddy’s going to watch rugby, sod off.’
‘Wuh? Am daddeh dummeh?’ She looked down and saw the special place still there. ‘Hab speshul pwace, am mawe, Pwissy can hab babbehs!’
‘Don’t call me dumb, you fucking brat. You’re not getting any babies. It’s not my problem you don’t get it. Now go back to Claire, I don’t have time for this.’ Stephane opened a beer as Priscilla began to huff and tap her hooves.
‘Daddeh am su meanies! Fwuffy haetchu! HAETCHU!’ she shouted, quickly running away to cry to her little mummah.
‘Whatever’ Stephane said, taking a gulp from the bottle.
Priscilla cried to Claire all night, but Claire wouldn’t help her! She told her she couldn’t have babies too! Why was her mummah being mean? She wasn’t supposed to be mean to her, she was a good fluffy, the bestest fluffy.
Over the subsequent days, she began to throw tantrums constantly, begging for babies from Stephane and Claire both. Finally, she threatened daddeh.
‘Dummeh daddeh! Gib stawwion fow Pwissy! Pwissy get babbehs ow get wowstest sowwie hoofsies and poopies!’ She puffed her cheeks, and stomped her soft hooves on Stephane’s boot, wincing at the pain from the hard leather. Turning around, her arse held high, she lifted her tail and exclaimed ‘take sowwie poopies dum…eeeeeEEEEE!’
Within seconds, Stephane had her by the tail, the shit falling all over her body, plopping on the floor as she dangled in the air. ‘That’s it you little shit, you’re going in the closet. I’ve had it with your constant whining and tantrums.’
‘Daddeh, nu! Bad upsies! Nu smeww pwetty, poopies nu fow gud fwuffy, am bestest smawtie! Wet smawtie down!’ Wriggling, she couldn’t break free, the strain of her plump weight stretching her tail and giving her more pain than she’d ever experienced.
Tears streaming from her eyes, she turned to little mummah, who just looked on. ‘Mummah hewp! Hewp bestest babbeh Pwissy!’
‘Babbeh? Fuck.’ Stephane couldn’t believe it. She was acting as though she were still a foal, and didn’t know any better. If she didn’t get it together soon, it didn’t matter what Claire wanted. He was through.
Claire just looked on. That whole episode with the shit spewing everywhere made her sick to her stomach. Maybe she didn’t want to deal with this thing any more either. She wasn’t sure, but she couldn’t forget the times she’d had with her, and decided to give it a chance for a bit longer. As Stephane carried the pink, shit-stained fluff down the hallway, he violently opened the door, tossing her onto the floor inside, and slammed it shut.
‘Wowstest owwies! Huuuuuuuuu! Wai huwt gud fwuffy? Su much huwties, smeww nu pwetty, am dawkies! Mummah! Daddeh, fwuffy am sowwy, pwease wet out!’
Nope. Stephane knew she never apologised truthfully. He’d leave her in there till the next day. Maybe by then she’d pretend to be good, and at least he could get some peace for a while. If it didn’t stick he could take her to a shelter. He had lost all patience.
Priscilla cried and scratched at the door for hours. Finally she grew exhausted. Her mummah wasn’t saving her, daddeh wouldn’t let her out. What had she done wrong? She just asked for babies! If she wanted babies, why wouldn’t they give her babies? The sadness and despair filled her mind for what seemed like forever. But then, after realising the house was quiet, she began to think.
Nu un’stan. Pwissy am bestest fwuffy. Nee’ bestest babbehs. Mummah an daddeh nu wan gib bestest fwuffy babbehs, den dem aww dummehs. Dummeh hoomins nu keep Pwissy fwum babbehs! Wiww get stawwion an aww bestest babbehs! Dummehs wiww see!
She began to realise all she had to do was leave! Of course. Her mummah had a herd, why couldn’t she leave and get one of her own? It was all so simple. Sure, her housie was nice and warm, but her mummah had told her how amazing a herd was and how happy she was being the bestest smarty friend. It was all so clear. She’d leave the dummeh humans behind and get a herd and a smarty stallion, and then they’d give her babbehs and all the best nummies and wuv. Then she’d have no heart hurties, and only heart happies. That was what she was made for, after all. Confident in her plan, she drifted off to sleep.
When morning came, she woke up, hearing little mummah talking with daddeh. It was muffled, but she could tell they were arguing. They talked for many forevers before little mummah opened the closet door.
‘Priscilla, are you ready to behave? Mommy can get you cleaned up if you’re a good girl.’
‘Yus mummah, Pwissy am sowwy, wiww be gud. Nu wan babbehs, jus’ huggies an wuv…’ she lied, trying to feign contrition.
‘Okay, little one. Let’s get you cleaned up.’ Claire grabbed Priscilla carefully, trying to keep as much shit off of her as possible, and placed her in the bathroom, running bathwater.
Priscilla scrunched her face at the thought of a bath. Bad wawa wasn’t good for good fluffies. But she had to keep her composure to not let on. As Claire lowered her into the waist high warm water, she winced and squirmed, instinctively trying to get away.
‘Just get in, Priscilla. Then you can be clean and smell pretty.’ Claire barked at her a bit, annoyed at her constant squirming.
‘Pwissy smeww pwetty? Smawtie awways smeww pwetty.’ Priscilla smiled as she said this, now enjoying being scrubbed by Claire.
‘Not right now you don’t. And you’ve gotta stop calling yourself smarty. Dad doesn’t like that.’
Priscilla’s ears perked up at the information. Weewy? Daddeh dun wike smawtie wowds? Den easy, can pway dummeh game, pway wike am dummeh fwuffy.
‘Otay mummah, Pwissy un’stan.’ She gave a strange smile as she said it, giving Claire an uneasy feeling she’d not had with her before. After she finished cleaning her up, she plopped her on her bed. Stephane took the moment to come in. He glared at Priscilla, fully expecting her to fail her test.
‘Priscilla, have you learned your lesson yet?’ he asked, gruffly.
Hearing her name, and his tone, Priscilla turned to him, her instincts telling her to charge at him and puff her cheeks to scare him away. He was challenging her, and not giving her what she wanted. But her plan calmed her long enough for her to respond in a different way. ‘…Yus. Am sowwy daddeh. Wuv daddeh, nu be bad fwuffy no mowe.’ Muffled through partially puffed cheeks, she got it out.
‘What was that? Who’s sorry?’ Stephane needed to hear it. Once more, she spoke, letting out the air from her cheeks with protest.
‘Pwissy. Pwissy am sowwy daddeh!’
‘There’s a good girl. Claire, keep an eye on her. That’s your job now.’ With that, he shut the door, leaving Claire to stare at Priscilla with tired, apathetic eyes.
Mere minutes went by before Priscilla was back to her begging, though this time for something different.
'Mummah!’
‘Mummah! Wissen to gud Pwissy!’
‘What? What is it?’ Claire took off her headphones, waiting for Priscilla to say whatever it was she had to say.
‘Pwissy wuv mummah, pwease, wiww be gud fwuffy, gud fwuffy gu outsies fow pway in gwassies?’
Claire realised she was asking to play in the backyard. She liked to run in the grass on rare occasions, and there was a sandbox where she would make ‘sand castles’ which looked more like deformed mounds than anything else. But, whatever she liked. Claire didn’t care.
‘Yeah, yeah. Sure, fine. I’ll take you outside.’
‘Yay! Wuv mummah!’ Priscilla exclaimed. Pwan am wowk, am bestest smawtie!
Claire opened the back door, Priscilla trotting close behind. Her dad called out. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Just out back, Priscilla said she wanted to play in the backyard.’ She watched as Priscilla bounded over to the sandbox, and began pushing the sand around.
‘Whatever, just keep an eye on her.’ Stephane went back to watching TV, unconcerned.
‘Yeah, yeah. I will…’ Claire replied, whipping out her phone. She sat at the table on the back patio, absorbed in music while she browsed pictures on her phone. As she was distracted, Priscilla crept slowly towards the fence and out of view. She had found a loose board in the fence weeks ago, and didn’t think anything of it. She was at that time, too afraid to leave the yard. But now, she had to get out. Besides, being so smart, she would definitely be fine!
She touched the board, and it moved easily. Pushing a bit harder, a gap opened up and she wedged herself through. She gasped in surprise and celebration.
‘Am outies! Nu moww dummeh daddeh ow mummah!’ She made a little dance, gleeful at her clever escape. She trotted down the alleyway, but it wasn’t long before after many times later, she realised she was lost!
Priscilla may have considered herself a smarty, but she was far from smart. Her naïveté was boundless, viewing the outside world as a place where herds roamed free, and sketties and nummies were given to bestest soon mummahs by smarty stawwions. After walking half a block, a straight path down the alley, she had no idea how to return. She began to get scared, and had no idea where she was.
‘Wuh? Wai am pwaces wook diffwent? Wewe am fwuffies? Wewe aww sketties an hewd?’ Her mummah told her if she got out of the bad human not-housie, she’d get a herd of her own. Where was it?
Again she began to get angry. She puffed her cheeks and tapped all over the alley. ‘Dummeh outies, gib smawty hewd! Nee’ babbehs!’ Exasperated by the outside world not listening to her, she kept walking, realising maybe she just needed to keep walking. She’d find it eventually. But now her leggies were getting very tired and sore. She’d walked a whole block from the house, the farthest she’d ever walked in her whole life! Now she was getting hungry.
‘Huu… am hungies, wewe am nummies? Mummah! Nee’ nummies!’ She collapsed on her hind quarters, pouting and sobbing. She remembered she left her mummah and daddeh, and now she wanted them to find her. But she didn’t know where she was.
It was then she heard a rustling sound from one of the big metal trashie things. She turned her head and anxiously watched to see what it could be. Holding her breath for a few seconds before gasping for air, she panted and looked up to see a yellow fluffy—a wingie fluffy—dragging something from one of the trashie baggies. Maybe the fluffy had nummies!
She shook off her depressed, forlorn demeanour and began puffing herself up—she had to look imposing. Making her way over to the yellow fluffy, she pranced up, noticing the yellow fluffy was a mare.
‘Bwightie ting cowwa mawe, smawtie am hewe. Wuh am dummeh mawe doin? Nee’ nummies!’ She sat down, letting the other mare get a look at her while showing off her horn.
‘Wuh?’ the yellow mare looked at her, dumbfounded.
‘Dummeh! Am smawtie! Am Pwissy, smawtie nee’ nummies fow make bestest babbehs an miwkies!’
‘ou am smawtie? Tawk to fwuffy?’ Again the yellow mare was confused.
Why was this mare having trouble understanding, she seemed like such a dummeh. Maybe she needed a name. It took her a minute or so to consider what a name could even be. She was the colour of the bright sky thing, but she didn’t know what it was called. Finally, she remembered mummah talking about wemmons, they were the same colour!
‘Smawtie am su smawt, fwuffy wan nice namesies fwum gud smawtie?’ she grinned, waiting for the yellow fluffy to reply.
She opened her eyes to see the yellow mare chewing on a rotting banana peel. Annoyed by being ignored, she grabbed it from her and held it close to her chest. ‘Gib smawtie nummies!’ she barked. ‘ou am Wemmon nao, be smawtie’s tuffie, gu find mowe nummies!’ Priscilla barked her orders out, and began to chew on the peel. It tasted very not pretty, and she almost spit it out, but was too hungry. Begrudgingly she decided she’d have to try to eat it.
The yellow mare took a few moments to process, finally responding ‘Am Wemmon? Tuffie? Otay… nee nummies.’ Still in her fog and confusion from the encounter, she waddled behind the trash can again, looking through the black plastic bag to see if she could find more food, sniffing for anything that she could pick up.
Priscilla began to feel better. She was starting her herd already! She knew she was the smartest, and this just proved it. Now she had a herd, all she had to do was find another smarty, a stallion, and they’d have the bestest babbehs. That led to the question… where to look.
As Lemon began eating the last bits of an apple and some expired yoghurt, she sat entranced by the pink unicorn before her. She didn’t know who she was, didn’t know what she was talking about, but she seemed smart.
Again, Priscilla grabbed the yoghurt container from Lemon, and after licking the rest of the contents, she began to speak. ‘ou, tuffie Wemmon, wewe find nummies an stawwions fow hewd?’
Nummies? Stawwion? Hewd? She knew the word nummies, that was familiar! ‘Fwuffy find nummies? Uh… nummies am find in twashie tings?’ Again she didn’t really know.
Priscilla was beginning to be very confused at this fluffy’s lack of response to her commands. She must have really been a dummeh. Well, no matter, she was going to be a tuffie anyway, so no need for her to be smart. Better, too, because she was the smarty.
‘Neba mind dummeh, smawtie wiww find stawwion an fwuffies fow hewd.’ She got up, walking further down the alley. Turning around, she expected to see Lemon following her, but she was just sitting there looking at her walk away.
‘Dummeh Wemmon! Fowwow smawtie!’ Priscilla shouted at her, as she tapped her foot, pointing where she was supposed to go. Pulled out of her daze, Lemon figured she meant to follow her, so she did what she was told. Seemed like a good thing to do.
The two mares made their way down the alley, rummaging food as they went. Soon, Priscilla noticed a scent she recognised. It smelled like fluffies, but not like her or Lemon. It must be… somewhere nearby, a stallion!
Next Chapter: Chapter XIV
No worries. Chapter 15 will be the debut chapter on here before Reddit for the first time.