"Gaspode the Wonder Fluffy" by NobodyAtAll

Note: read “If You’re Going To San Francisco” first.


Wotcher, mates. The name’s Gaspode.

I was born and raised on the streets of Manhattan.

Now, y’might not deem this to be particularly unusual. Lotta homeless people on the streets, after all, and 'ardly a few of 'em use a rubber.

But see, 'ere’s the unusual thing about me, mates:

I ain’t exactly a people.

I’m a fluffy.

Now mates, I know what yer finkin’. “Whaaaat? You’re a fluffy, mate? Pull the other one, it’s got bells on!”

But nah, really, I’m a fluffy.

C’mon, 'ear me out.

Lemme tell ya me life story.


Me youth started out rough. Born in an alley to a couple o’ ferals who got frisky and did a runner, lotta siblings, y’know the drill.

Me first memory was the day I opened me eyes.

I went to sleep the night before, snuggled up in me mum’s warm, soft, filthy fluff with me siblings, and woke up finkin’ somefing along the lines of “Ooh, Mum, you ain’t half cold and hard and oblongy this mornin’.”

Then I opened up me eyes for the first time in me life, and realised that we was hugging a brick.

Me bloody parents went and did a runner again, an’ left us behind. Or maybe some abuser twat got to ‘em, an’ didn’t fink foals was worth killin’. I’m buggered if I know, I never saw 'em again.

O’course, you’re probably wonderin’ ‘ow me an’ the other foals survived after that.

First of all, you’re makin’ a lotta assumptions.

Only little ol’ Gaspode survived. Me siblings? All died.

I got lucky, an’ escaped the same fate, ‘coz I ran into some folks willin’ to look after me.

“Nice mistahs be nyu daddehs fow babbeh? Chirp.

“Bugrit! Millennium hand and shrimp!”

“Um. Wut du dat meen?”

“He cough hack cough said we’d be cough cough happy to take you cough in.”

“You’ll need a name, though. How about… Gaspode? I used to have a dog called Gaspode, he was very faithful.”

“Babbeh wub nyu namesie! But, um… Gaspode haf kwest-yun.”

“What is it?”

“Wai du mistah haf duckie awn head? Peep.

“Quack!”

“What duck?”


So, for a while, me life was happy. Filthy, but happy.

By now, you’re probably wonderin’ how I went from “Huggies an sketties!” to, well… this.

I was just getting to that part, mates.

The good times diddin last. Typical, really, shoulda seen it comin’.

See, the point everything went tits-up is the day I decided to help meself to trash from the wrong trash can.

“Gaspode! You don’t cough cough want to eat that, they cough hack wheeze say a wizard lives here! You don’t know cough what kind of magical garbage he throws out!”

“Nonsense. Magic’s not real.

“Quack!”

“Bugrit!”

Yeah, this was before that whole Demonic Invasion fing.

Which I only learned about a few months after, while I was widdlin’ on a newspaper.

Unfortunately for both me and me owners, I disregarded their warnings.

um num num num num

That’s when it happened, mates. I got this, this fizzy feelin’ in me noggin, buildin’ up, an’ up, an’ up, an’ then…

“Cor, this tastes bloody terrible, I’ll tell you that, maybe I shoulda listened to ya.”

My owners stared blankly at me for a full minute before I realized what happened.

“Ah, bloody hell.

They ran off, told someone about their fluffy who talks like a human…

An’ then the three o’ them wound up in an institution.

It was before Umbra, too. Nobody believed a trio of crazy hobos.

It’s a damn disgrace how the homeless an’ mentally ill are treated in this country, ain’t it?


Since then, I’ve been roughing it solo.

I’ve got every disease known to fluffykind, and licky end, which only pregnant sheep get, and there ain’t a mare in town up for a bit o’ ‘ow’s-yer-daddeh with ol’ Gaspode…

But there’s perks, too.

Like bein’ able to read, for one.

An’ here’s somefing I discovered.

When most people ‘ear me talkin’ like a human, their brains simply refuse to accept that they’re ‘earin’ a fluffy talkin’ like a human.

So whatever I say, they just fink it’s their own thoughts, 'coz that makes more sense to 'em.

The daft wankers.

Nat’rlly, I quickly figured out 'ow to abuse this.

“Give the nice fluffy a sausage.”

“…Hey little guy, you want a sausage?”

Heh heh. Works nine times outta ten, mates.


But about a year or so ago, I made me a new mate.

Lemme paint ya a word picture.

So there I was, in an alleyway, squatting over an ol’ newspaper to drop the kids off at the pool, if y’know what I mean, that’s how me owners taught me to do it, and while I was readin’ a very interestin’ article about some blond ladyboy who made electric cars for 'is fluffies, I 'eard someone speak up.

“Bloody 'ell, fink I’m constipated again–”

“Oh! Sorry, I didn’t know you were, ah, busy. Shall I come back later?”

“Nah mate, is alright, come on in guv, I ain’t going nowhere 'til this turd comes out-- wait, ‘ol’ on.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen plenty of weird stuff in my time, this is nothing. Gaspode, right? My name’s–”

“Calvin bloody Korkea. Shoulda known I’d run into ya sooner or later, every unusual fluffy does. So, lemme guess, yer 'ere to recruit me into yer team, eh?”

“Actually, I have another offer to make you.”

“An’ wot’s in it for ol’ Gaspode, eh?”

“Well, my friend Vic makes some excellent sausages…”

“Go on…”


So, since then, I’ve been Cal’s eyes an’ ears in the Big Rotten Apple, trading information for sausages.

You’d be surprised by what people’ll say when they fink there’s only fluffies listenin’.

Or when they fink nobody’s listenin’. Stealth ain’t usually a fluffy’s forte, but then, I ain’t a usual fluffy.

An’ when I find a juicy piece o’ intel? I gotta way to contact Cal, trade it for a juicy sausage.

That, an’ big tough chums who can come to me defence when an abuser decides to 'ave some fun with the mangy street fluffy.

Yeah, I ain’t stupid. I can fink like a human, but I got the body of a fluffy, Umbra was makin’ a good point there, not a good combination.

Bloody hell, if only I could turn human like Marley. I’d be running shit in this dump in a month.

O’course, with me luck, humans would like human Gaspode as much as fluffies like fluffy Gaspode.

Not a lot, I can’t lie.


Right now, I’m prowling the streets, on a mission for Cal.

See, the last few weeks or so, there’s been a monster fluffy prowling the streets too, eatin’ abusers, an’ I’ve been trying to track him down for Cal.

Yeah, I know, it’s bloody suicide, Gaspode the mangy street fluffy looking forra monster fluffy who can eat humans, gosh, I wonder how that story ends, but I was promised a whole pack o’ sausages for this, it’s worth the risk.

Plus, maybe he trusts fluffies more th’n humans, an’ ‘e’ll be willin’ t’trust me.

Or maybe the bugger will just bite me 'ead off.

As I reach a warehouse, I see a lotta blokes with a bad case of builder’s bum loadin’ stuff into a truck.

I can read, so I know it’s a Flufftopia truck, and I ‘ear one o’ them say it’s 'eaded to San Francisco.

Maybe I should go to San Francisco. Never been, 'eard the weather’s a lot better than New York.

Then I see something black and fluffy-sized sneak into the truck. None of those daft lads see it.

Humans.

And they say fluffies are dense.

I dunno why the monster fluffy wants to go to San Francisco.

Probably for the weather, like me, I’d sneak onto that truck too, if I knew I could get away with it.

But I do know one fing.

As I waddle away, before one of those lads spots me and decides to give me a good hard kick, trust me, met plenty o’ people who fink playin’ Kick The Fluffy is a good time, I fink out loud.

“Cal’s gotta know about this.”

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