Tickle had grown much over the last week, though he was still rather small. Thanks to Oddment’s care he was at least healthy looking, and his vocabulary had improved significantly too.
He had spent all of his time inside their modest nest either snuggled into her fluff while she told him stories and nursed him, or when she wasn’t around he instead hid himself beneath their newspaper and loose-fluff bedding, patiently (and worriedly) awaiting her return as he suckled on his hooves.
Oddment, for her part, was doing a fine job caring for Tickle, by Fluffy standards anyway. Even as her belly grew larger and heavier with pregnancy, she still scavenged for food and nest materials each day.
However, on this particular overcast and cool autumnal afternoon, Oddment’s pregnancy had finally reached its final stage wherein a mare is so heavy and rotund that she becomes effectively immobile, usually within 2 or 3 days of birth.
Over the last few days, in spite of her slowing gait, she had accrued a fair pile of food- namely old fruit and vegetable peels, though there were a few half-empty and quite stale packets of biscuits and a plastic tub of tomato sauce with a few greasy chips left in it.
This food pile would probably not last even up to her impending birth, though, close as it was.
In a more conventional pregnancy, the stallion ‘Daddeh’ would do the scavenging and scouting for the mare, but Oddment had only little Tickle to help.
“M-mummah wan T-tickwe tu weabe nestie?” Tickle asked with despair cracking through his squeaky voice, “n-nu wub Tickwe nu mowe?”
He had misunderstood Oddment’s request, who met his pitifully tearful expression with a kind and reassuring voice, “nu siwwy- Mummah’s othah babbehs maekin’ Mummah tuu heaby su nu can movises! Dat mean Tickwe haf gu find nummies,”
“Su s-stiww wub Tickwe?”
“Yuss, wub wots an’ wots!” She poked her head down and booped her snout onto his, “Mummah nee’ Tickwe tu du wook an’ seekies owtsidies an’ findie nummies dat Humans nu wan,”
Tickle peered backwards towards the little entrance to their cubby hole.
The afternoon light streamed in between the slats of the old wooden pallet that covered the nest, illuminating the scant dust particles in the air. He could make out the big, tall bins that Oddment wanted him to investigate… but even just the sight of their monolithic shapes made his legs wobble and his head all scrambled.
He did not want to leave the nest. He did not want to be away from his new mother. The nest was safe, warm; in here, Humans could not hurt him.
“Pweez Tickwe, du fo’ Mummah an’ nyu Tummeh Babbehs?” Oddment urged, “Only haf tu gu jus’ owtsidies, Mummah am stiww be hewe!” she ended with an encouraging nudge.
“N-n-nu wan… tuu scawy,” Tickle mumbled, returning his gaze back to Oddment’s own bemused face. Behind his his teary eyes, flashes of his original family came and went. The image of his sibling’s bloodied and broken pile came into particular focus.
He sat back and reached his forehooves up, pleading for comfort. Oddment was more than happy to oblige, but as she slipped one of her own forelegs around him, she tenderly whispered “Mummah wub yu vewwy muchies Tickwe, but if nu can movsies den nu hab nummies fo’ maek miwkies…”
Of course, Tickle knew what that meant, though it didn’t improve his opinion of his task. He pressed down into her soft fluff, wrapping his body over her hoof. He closed his eyes and relaxed, expecting to be lifted up into a snug sleeping place.
Instead, Oddment lightly shook him off, leaving him plopped on the floor with his hooves awkwardly held up. She was going to have to be assertive with him, even though she didn’t want to, “Tickwe- pweez gu owtsidies fo’ seekies fo’ nummies: yu nu can hab any huggies if nu git nummies fo’ Mummah…” she said.
Tickle’s hooves flopped down, and he sat dumbfounded for a few seconds, unblinking, mouth ajar. For a moment, Oddment thought she might have gone too far, until-
“O-otay m-mummah, T-tickwe d-du seekies fo’ n-nummies…” he murmured sullenly, with a sniffle.
“Yu am such bestes’ babbeh, Tickwe! Mummah wub vewy vewy supah muchies!” Oddment exclaimed proudly. Happy that she hadn’t hurt his feelings, she tapped her front hooves on the ground because she couldn’t reach them over her inflated body to tap them together, “Siwwy Humans weabe tasty nummies on gwound nex’ tu binnie fwiends jus’ owtsidies! Du seekies fo’ da pwetty smeww nummies an’ bwing tu nestie!” she instructed.
Tickle nodded slowly, then rose up and inched over to the nest’s entrance. With extreme care, he poked his head out- only for a moment- and let his eyes quickly survey the area beyond before he pulled himself back in.
He couldn’t really count, but to him there seemed to be at least… two Fluffies’ hooves’ worth of binnie-fwiends, with about one Soon-Mummah’s worth of width between most of them.
He couldn’t see any immediate dangers out there, and certainly no Humans, plus he thought that the binnie-fwiends would probably be enough to hide him with their size. There certainly wasn’t enough room for any Humans to come back here anyway, even the babbeh ones…
Tickle glanced back. Oddment smiled at him, which gave him a little boost to bravery.
He once again popped his head out, but this time he didn’t retract it back immediately. He allowed the sights and sounds of the surroundings to wash over him, during which his tension eased somewhat. Beyond the enclosure, he could hear a few cars passing by, even a few faraway voices, but otherwise it was quiet, and aside from what he had already seen, there wasn’t much else to look at either.
With his nerves a little calmer, he finally climbed the wooden pallet, his hooves cutely scrambling around for stability and his body flopping forward. He kept his eyes up the entire time though, watchful for potential danger.
There was a slight slope of mud leading up to the entry hole of the nest which Tickle slid down before coming to a stop on the ground. Now fully outside, his tiny size was all the more apparent to him.
“Huuu~” he gently whined, “binnie-fwiends nu wook wike fwiends…”
The wheelie bins seemed to loom all the more, and the array of strange sounds and smells began to surround him on all sides. Cautiously, he crawled along the dirt towards the nearest bin, his belly and chest dragging on the ground while he used his back legs to scoot himself forward.
Once safely pressed up against the bin, he paused to analyze the surroundings, checking carefully again if any Humans had somehow spotted him. When he was sure that there was nothing, he turned his attention to nummie-seeking.
Remembering Oddment’s instructions, he took a big whiff of the air- and there was much to smell. Mostly, things that made him feel unwell.
The smell of poopies, or something close to it.
The smell of discarded plastics and papers.
The smell of car exhausts from further beyond the bin enclosure.
The smell of rot and decay… he was quite familiar with those ones.
He also caught a whiff of Oddment’s scent too. To him, she smelled of… flowers and trees, or at least like the handful of ones he had seen.
As he sniffled away more, he eventually smelled something else underneath the rest- something… pwetty?
His hooves followed his upturned nose a little ways around the left side of the bin, and sure enough, tucked underneath a piece of cardboard near one of the bin’s wheels, there was the something-that-smelled-pretty.
He stood over it, analyzing it with small turns of his head and prods of his hooves: it was an old chunk of apple. It had a lot of give when he pressed down on it, and it quickly turned to mush. Indeed, now over it, his nose could detect the rot underlying the sweetness. This wouldn’t do for Mummah, not at all.
He sniffed again at the air, raising his head up and away from the apple slop further towards the left side of the bin enclosure. He couldn’t smell anything of note, and so decided to just wander around and let his eyes do some nummie-seeking for a bit.
He started by investigating a pile of nearby trash. Mostly, it was just stained paper towels and scraps of snack packaging. After fruitlessly sifting through it, he waddled a bit closer to the entrance of the enclosure- though careful not to get too close- and rifled around a group of white, plastic bags. He couldn’t quite climb into the first few, but he found one of them that had tipped over enough that he was able to clamber in and rifle around.
He was in luck, for inside of this bag was a sausage roll still in its greasy paper package, just a little bigger than he was. Why, this could feed Mummah’s tummeh babbehs for at least a bwight time or two, he thought.
If he could read, he might’ve noticed that it was a week out of date, though it smelled tasty to him regardless.
For a time, he attempted to open the paper packaging, pawing at it with his hooves, hopping on top of it to try and pop it open, but to no avail. He settled on simply trying to drag it by clamping his teeth, which were little more than nubs, around a corner of the pack and heaving backwards with all his might.
The whole thing did indeed begin to shift, and after several minutes Tickle had succeeded in barely pulling it out of the plastic bag. He had to stop and breathlessly rest after; baby Fluffies were designed to lift toy blocks, hug stuffed toys, and beg for cuddles and milk. They were for pampering and caring for, not doing manual labor! Not that Tickle consciously knew that, though his body certainly did.
His jaw and legs hurt, his hooves stung from stepping on the dirty concrete below, and he was already feeling cold from the lack of hugs and kind words.
When he had caught his breath, he latched back on to the sausage roll pack and began the long (but not really) journey back towards the nest. What was only a few steps for a Human was a full and arduous 30 minute trek for the blue foal, who whimpered quietly to himself the whole way.
When he finally arrived back at the entrance to his nest, from inside, he could hear Oddment singing a little Mummah song, and paused to listen as he rested in preparation to drag the sausage roll up the small incline and through the wooden pallet.
“Mummah wub Tummeh Babbehs, Tummeh Babbehs wub Mummah~ Gon gib wotsa snuggie huggies, gon gib wotsa tasty miwkies~ Tickwe bwing nummies, nummies maek miwkies, miwkies maek stwonges’ Babbehs~ hee hee~ Mummah wub Tummeh Babbehs, Tummeh Babbehs wub Mummah~”
She sang in that characteristically Fluffy fashion, with no particular tone or melody, or even thought out lyrics. It was the meaning of the song that mattered to Fluffies, not really the skill with which it was constructed or sung.
The song soothed much of Tickle’s aches, and he pictured the pride on her face when he hauled the sausage roll in as he got up and once again gripped the greasy paper pack with his mouth.
With all the effort his tired legs could muster, he pulled the sausage roll up the dirt slope towards the nest. His hooves slid at points, almost tripping him, his jaw began to shake, nearly letting go, but he kept at it as best he could, reaching the pallet at the top in decent time considering his relative strength and size.
Alas, the hardest part had now come- there was a slight lip to the top of the mound where the pallet jutted out maybe an inch upwards. Not too hard for him to climb over- but pulling his bounty through?
He stepped his rear into the nest, and leveraged his front hooves onto the jutting piece of the pallet. The dirt slope was not steep enough for the sausage roll to slip back down, but it was steep enough that he struggled to reach the paper pack from his position. Tugging on it strained painfully on his already strained neck and hooves.
“Tickwe am backsies wif nummies?” Oddment asked from behind, noticing his return.
He could only moan in response. The sausage roll had began to peak over the pallet, balancing against it, which left his front hooves narrowly touching the ground. So close was he to victory, and with his Mummah watching, he wanted to make a display of his strength- no, of his love- for her. He was going to get the biggest warmest hug ever!
He gave a muffled “hmmmmmmrg,” and exacted all of his energy through his back legs and neck into pulling the sausage roll over the pallet and into the nest.
The bad news was that such exertion on the bottom half of his body caused him to release a short stream of waste from both the front and back- urine streaked up his belly and soaked his legs, while chunky diarrhea sploshed across his rear and burgeoning tail.
The good news, other the hand, was that he had just enough strength and weight to tip the scales in his favor, and the sausage roll dropped down into the nest next to him.
He sat in disbelief for a second, and then cheered in triumph with a dumb smile, “Yay! Tickwe git biggie nummies fo’ Mummah!”
Oddment was a little stunned too- she had expected some scraps of old fruit or even a couple clumps of grass or weeds from outside. Yet, he had somehow found and dragged in quite a meal! One larger than he was, and that would last for at least a day- or even two!
“Tickwe,” she began, flabbergasted but proud, “yu am bestes’ nummie findah Babbeh ebah!” She outstretched her hooves towards him, beckoning him in, “Mummah wan gib yu da bigges’ snuggies an’ miwkies!”
Tickle shakily staggered off the ground, his adventure having taken their toll on his miniature muscles, and stumbled over and into her embrace, giggling as he did. She pulled him deep into her chest fluff, and gently kissed his forehead and they both exchanged little whispers of “wub”. Oddment then picked him up and licked him clean all over, spending extra time on his hooves which were beginning to swell, not being used to doing much walking.
When he was all clean, she popped him down on her teats to suckle from, and then bent her head over to the sausage roll, dragging it closer. She chewed through the paper, and ate a few mouthfuls of the expired pastry which helped to remove the taste of wickie-cweanies.
Now both satisfied and full, the pair snuggled up close. Oddment delicately rocked Tickle back and forth as he burped and farted himself slowly to sleep.
“Mmmm-mummah du sweepie-time stowyyyy?” he uttered drowsily.
“Hee hee, otay Tickwe-” Oddment said, adoring his sleepy voice. She tapped a hoof on her chin as she pondered what story to tell him.
Maybe one about her time outside of Da Big Nestie? Or maybe she could tell him about the different parts of the city she’d seen? Oh, she could tell him about all of the best and tasty nummies that the nice Humans have to offer!
Ultimately, she settled on telling him her own favorite story.
“Da Big Nestie hab wotsa Humans, Tickwe… wotsa dem am nu gud fo’ be mummahs an’ daddehs, bu’ dewe am wotsa nicie Humans fo’ Fwuffies tuu!”
“W-weawwy?” Tickle asked, his eyes closed and body limp with fatigue.
“Yuss, weawwy! An’ da nices’ Daddeh ebah am Mistah Skettihead! He am da big Daddeh of Da Big Nestie! His headie-pwace am hab skettis wif wotsa tasty saucies fo’ nummin’! An’ he hab big Human weggies fo’ gib bigges’ huggies tu aww Fwuffies! He gon’ maek sweepie pwacies fo’ ebwy Fwuffy tu hab nyu homsie, su nebah hab cowdies again!”
“Ooooh~” Tickle cooed as he passed into the realm of dreams. Oddment finished her little story even as he began snore away.
“Mistah Skettihead gib wotsa wubs tuu gud Fwuffies wike Tickwe, an’ Tummeh Babbehs… Nu Fwuffy ebah am haf tu be wonwy, jus’ nee’ du thinkies ‘bout Mistah Skettihead an’ he am dewe…”
With a little sigh, she rested her head onto her hooves, and closed her eyes. She hoped stories like that were true, for the sake of her foals.
