Chapter 1
The sun’s light brings life back into the temporary visitors of the realm of sleep, and like most, Dylan was not immune to the power of the orb of life as a direct beam of sunlight covered his eyes like a blinding blanket. Dylan, now stirring from the demand from earth’s provider, lulled back and forth before revealing his bloodshot eyes to the world. With a grunt, he reached over to check the time on the mini alarm clock that lay dormant until its master gave it permission to fulfill its duty by bringing about an ungodly noise that shakes both the floor of the heavens and the roof of hell. The face on the clock showed it was a little past eight. Heaving a sigh of both relief and frustration, he set the alarm clock down, glad for days off but annoyed about the lack of sleep from an eventful night, now even more annoyed that he would have to deliver the corpse in the freezer to the lab for analysis on his day off.
Now fully awake, despite his want for more sleep, Dylan tried to count what he had to do today only to find that he couldn’t move his right arm. In a mild panic, he looked over to see if his arm was still attached to him. To his satisfaction, it was; his arm merely asleep caused by the weight of Stryker using his arm as a pillow. Stryker, being the big lug that he was, laid curled up against Dylan with one of his massive wings tucked under himself while the other lay extended over Dylan’s chest. The long, lightweight, dark silvery feathers were fanned out as if Stryker were about to take flight. His short fur seamlessly blended feather to wings, and wings to body. His mane and tail the color of a rich red wine with small divides of black within. Stryker’s slow and steady breathing was a tell that Dylan hadn’t disturbed him in his panic. As gently and carefully as he could, he slid the dead arm out from under him as to not to wake him. The German Shepard sized creature wasn’t an easy task to move with only one arm, but Dylan managed to be freed from his slumbering captor and ungracefully fell onto the floor still trying not to disturb Stryker as he slipped into the living room of his home while successful in his clumsy escape.
In the medium sized kitchen, Dylan started to make coffee while glaring at the mess that was last nights dinner. The dishes piled high in the sink, the table almost completely covered in batter, syrup, chocolate chips, and a fluffy pony, who’s neon pink fluff and flashy orange main were matted with the unholy sins of stank, held prisoner in a pet carrier. The mesh door had batter, partly eaten waffles, and eggs blocking a random number of holes as if someone were trying to clog the door to suffocate its occupant.
“Holy shit… I need to stop drinking when I make waffles. This is going to take forever to clean,” Dylan muttered to himself finally realizing what took place last night while admiring the fact that he had no hangover.
“huuhuuhuuuuu… why meanie mistah and munstah yeww at fwuffy? Why fwuffy in sowwy boxie? Am gud fwuffy. Nu kno wat do bu neba do again. Pwomise. Pweez wet out noa,” came the whispered pleads from the pet carrier’s sole occupant.
Rubbing his temples, Dylan knew this was not good. Not only did he traumatize the fluffy he picked up last night, but he could only imagine what hells he’d have to clean in cage.
Dylan let out a sigh, “I’m going to need a freaking holy water pressure washer to clean the hells from that thing. Why do I drink when I make waffles?” Dylan slapped the counter to punctuate each word with frustration.
Tying to find the motivation and the will, Dylan weighing his option on what to clean first. With a sign and piercing glare at the cage, Dylan made his decision.
“Fuck it.”
Dylan went to retrieve the pet carrier not daring to look at what awaits him. He picks it up with a slight tilt so whatever was in there moved to the back to avoid spilling any raw sewage on the tile floor. The fluffy and her filth gently slide to the back, hitting the wall with a dull thump.
“Why so many poopies? Huuhuuhuuu nu smeww pwetty,” the fluffy whines in a three-inch pool of her own filth and whatever carnage Dylan and Stryker unleashed on the poor thing.
Dylan already wrenching from the smell, opens the back door and deposits the carrier on the grass before stepping a few feet back to get some fresh air. The crisp autumn air rejuvenated Dylan in the way the effect of what his coffee could do, well almost anyway. The sweet air of the morning was swiftly overtaken by fluffy sewage, rotting eggs, and an odd sweetness of syrup that really added a potency factor to the volatile concoction. Dylan retreated away further before he lost his forgotten waffles from the night before. In his retreat, he grabbed the end of a garden hose and attached a spray nozzle on the end of it. He turned it to the ‘jet’ setting and cranked the water as high as it could go. With a whine and a hiss, the garden hose expanded with the current and pressure giving rise to the angry demon that Dylan would use in his fight for cleanliness.
Dylan, now armed to take on the monstrosity of a horridness, took a deep breath and raced over to the pet carrier. In a swift and fluid motion, Dylan opened the cage door, and yanked the fluffy out by the scruff and tossed it gently into the slightly overgrown grass causing the fluffy to huff on impact. Dylan locked to cage door back, now that the occupant had be evicted, and raise the nozzle with malicious intent. Releasing a torrent of water from the hose against the tyranny of smell, the clean, clear water that entered, exited the cage in a brown sludgy goop onto the grass. Still holding his breath, Dylan fought the urge to propel last nights feast across the yard. Holding fast and targeting all the nasties that clung to the walls for dear life, fighting a war against a maniac with a water hose. With most of the putrid, rancid muck out of the cage and the water coming out as clear as it went in, Dylan finally released his held breath and placed the pet carrier upside down to let the excess water run out of the diagonal air vents. He flipped the nozzle from ‘jet’ to ‘horizontal’ and proceed to push the mass of nasal atrocity further away from his back door until it was a reasonable distance away where he couldn’t smell it from his back porch. Sighing with one major victory under his belt, Dylan turned his attention to the fluffy who was, in a vain attempt, trying to escape into the woods.
Dylan watched as the fluffy, as fast as its stubby legs could carry her, only get about fifteen feet away with the horrific stench as a remind of the battle yet to come. In a swift show of action, Dylan covered the distance the fluffy had traveled in mere seconds and grabbed the fluffy by the scruff which may have been the cleanest part of her. Dylan swiftly jogged back into range and grabbed the garden hose and flipped to the ‘shower’ setting. The fluffy whined as she was pinned down by Dylan’s left hand.
“HEWP! HEWP! PWEEZ SABE FWUFFY! WAWA BAD FOW FWUFFY!” But the cries went unanswered while the nozzle was lined up to its target, Dylan squeezed the trigger, firing a cold blast of water against the fluffy.
“SCREEEEEEEEEEE!!! COWD! COWD! TUU COWD!”
“Hold still, or I swear, I’ll drown you in your own filth,” Dylan trying to stop the splashing of the disgusting water that was pooling under the thrashing fluffy. This didn’t help at all as one would imagine.
“Nuuu. Wawa bad fow fwuffy! Mammeh! Sabe bab gurgle, gurble, gurgle,” the fluffy could only make noise and hack up some water that Dylan had deliberately sprayed in the fluffy’s face to shut it up.
“Shut! Up!” Dylan, now fuming, was holding the fluffy’s muzzle to keep it from shattering the window with its high-pitched squealing.
Dylan managed to finish cleaning the fluffy and shoved it back into the damp pet carrier. The fluffy was too tired to fight or complain about being back in its, now clean, prison once more. Dylan placed the carrier on the table and went to wash his hand in the bathroom since the kitchen sink was stacked like a jenga tower just waiting to come down at any moment. After rubbing his hands almost raw to make sure he got the filth out, he headed back to the kitchen to finish making his coffee.
The warm aroma of strong coffee wafted through the air, erasing all that happened in the last forty minutes. Dylan, now calmer and more awake from the caffeine now coursing through his veins, finishes his second cup when he hears the bedroom door open. Stryker, awaken from the rich smell of coffee and not the carnage that happened less than an hour ago, saunters in looking at the remaining destruction that was a great waffle night. Dylan looked at Stryker, after loading the last dish possible into the dish washer, greeted Stryker with a nod as he turned on the dish washer for its second load of dishes. Stryker jumps up on a swivel chair at the bar causing it to do a full rotation before stopping short of being perfectly perpendicular to the bar’s counter. With a sigh of defeat, Stryker places his hooves on the counter and corrects himself to face Dylan.
“So… I was going to do the dishes, but uh, you know, no opposable thumb, or fingers, or hands for that matter,” Stryker mocked with a smirk, waving his hooves to indicate the lack of appropriate appendages.
“Oh, I know. That’s why I’m tripling your rent for the next four year,” Dylan remarked with a smirk of his own and rubbing his index and middle fingers against his thumb.
“Oh my. Did they teach you in math class that it’s impossible to divide by zero? I feel sorry for who ever was your math teacher.”
“Wow. I would have been bested, but its multiplying by zero is still zero. I feel sorry for who ever was your math teacher,” Dylan correcting while setting himself up for defeat.
“That was you that taught me. I guess we are both bad at math then, huh?” Both share a laugh at the absurdity of their argument.
“So new rule then. When I make waffles next time, don’t let me drink myself into a stupor. Sober me hates cleaning up after drunk me,” Dylan shaking his head in disappointment at himself for letting go that much.
“But those are the funniest nights we have. Not to mention, we did have the thrill of scaring the unwanted guest half to death. I think at one point, it pasted out due to fright,” Stryker quipped while looking over at the now clean pet carrier resting on the table.
“Yeah. I had the misfortune of clearing up the aftermath. Can you tell me when I made eggs? I never make eggs with waffles. And were we trying to suffocate the fluffy in the cage because there was a LOT of stuff shoved in the holes of the door,” Dylan now concerned that his drunk self may cause harm to Stryker if the mood struck him right.
“Oh no. That was your trying to shut it up after asking for ‘nummies’ constantly. I think the eggs were to wake it up after it passed out for the fifteenth time,” Stryker, now giggling at the escapades of drunk Dylan, recalls to the now sober Dylan who share in the laughter; relieved that it wasn’t done with violent intent. “That reminds me, what are you going to do with this thing? It’s not like you need a fluffy. You do have me after all.” Stryker now pretending to be hurt by a not so potential replacement.
“Nah. There is no way I’m getting rid of your sassy ass. There is someone who was looking for neon pink fluffy for breeding. Something about trying to get a perfect replica of…… something. I’m not one hundred percent on the detail. She just asked for an absurdly pink fluffy,” Dylan taps the top of the carrier causing a peep in fright to escape the cage.
“Ah. Breeders are, uh, quite… interesting,” Stryker trying to hide his disgust with the idea of breeding his inferior counterpart.
Dylan picking up on Stryker’s discomfort, “I’m with you actually. I don’t know why someone would want to breed these things after all that’s happened. Sure, we have them at an equilibrium now. They aren’t spreading as fast now, but it’s not where I would like to be. We’ve already lost too much due to them being forcefully released by a bunch of wannabe heroes.” There was a long silence between them only the soft huuhuuing from the carrier disturbed the somber moment.
“I should be going to the lab. They should be expecting the specimen for analysis by now. Do you want to tag along? I could use the company for the journey to the land of the eggheads,” Dylan offered.
“Sure, why not. It’s not like I have anything to do here anyway, right,” Stryker agreed halfheartedly. “I think your drunk self hid some waffles in the fridge for your sober self. I’m not sure what it is, but your drunk self is so considerate to you,” Stryker commented with a snicker.
“Yeah. He’s been that way since college. Oh well. Let me take a shower and heat up some of the more edible waffles, and we will be on our way,” Dylan looking indifferent at the fridge, only guessing the possible different states those waffles were in.
After a quick shower and finding more than enough ‘editable’ waffles, Dylan, Stryker, and distress fluffy made their way towards the lab to find out what this thing is made of, and who set it loose.
Chapter 3