Author’s Note: Takes place between chapters 8 and 9. Ever wondered why Sophia seemed so languid the first time we met her? You’re about to find out.
Chapter……8.5?
You are Sophia Clarke, Fluffy technician.
And you are passed out, sleeping.
Memories swim before your dreaming mind.
A house, in a field, a windmill creaking in the breeze. A barn, with you in it, standing opposite a man. You can’t be more than 15 in this memory.
“I DON’T CARE what you think, they’re goddamned vermin, child!” a man shouts.
You sob. “But they’re my friends! They’re the only ones who will play with me……”
“You’ll make new friends, REAL ones, these are……wrong. They’re not really alive. Now step aside….” he said, a boning knife in hand. “They’re a danger to my farm, to my business.”
You refuse to budge. “No! They won’t eat your crops, and they haven’t been. I’ve fed them piece of my own food! You can ask them!”
“It twuwe, wittwe mummah has given bestest nummies to mummah and speciaw fw-“ the man throws the knife, it whirls through the air like a buzzsaw just barely missing the pink mare. A cacophony of peeping and chirping erupts from her back as her newborn foals react in terror to the loud thunk of the knife striking the wooden barn wall.
“Shut. Up. You HIDEOUS abomination. You’re not alive, you’re not a real thing, neither was your….whatever the hell you calledl it, or those ugly things you call babies. Sophia, you have to move, I am your father, I am ordering you to-“
You’ve had enough. He tried to kill Bubblegum! Picking up a bucket, you throw it at him. Your father falls, yelling in pain, nose broken, 2 teeth knocked free. You open the pen you’d kept the fluffies in.
“Run.” you tell them.
“Wuv you fowevew, wittew mummah!” The mare says, running, her babies clung to her back.
On the ground, lays the broken necked body of a beautiful, indigo stallion.
His name was Inkspot, and he was your first friend.
“You……brat! You picked those……THINGS over me? I am your FATHER!”
“I don’t care. You never listened to me, I told you they were my friends, and you KILLED Inkspot……he was the only person who was ever nice to me since mom died! You tried to kill Bubblegum! You were going to kill her and her babies!”
He stared at you. “They’re just pests, Sophia.” He said, utterly uncaring for anything you’ve just said. “How dare you hit me over some ugly, talking rats.”
Nothing you said or felt mattered to him. Not anymore. Once, certainly, but not for at least 6 years.
There’s nothing for you here now.
You run.
You don’t even know where you’re going, you just run until it all vanishes. The farm, the field, the barn, the house, the road itself running into white like watercolors being washed off.
As you fall through the ground, you snap awake. Chest heaving, cold sweat covering you. You sit upright violently, your dirty blonde hair tangled and messy.
“Great. That one again.” you mutter, holding your head. You never got back to sleep after that dream. You’d had enough times to know not even to try.
It was going to be a long night.
“Coffee.” you mutter.
Caffeine fixes everything. Enough of it, at least, will keep you functioning throughout the next day, with nobody the wiser.
And failing that, there’s always the ironclad fallback of working at Fluffmart: You only had to PRETEND to work, most of the time, and they’d pay you for acting like you gave a shit.
If you were lucky, perhaps you actually would. Maybe you’d get to see those feral fluffs again.
You’d taken a liking to them. Some things made the job worthwhile, every now and then.