The confusion, fear, utter disgust at the row of murdered foals and their blood coating his sisters hooves lasted until the door shut behind Daddeh sir and Razzle— and then replaced itself with an even more sickening stomach drop as the look on his sisters face before she was picked up returned to him. ….What had he done? he’d called her a MONSTER. He’d hurt her, badly, he’d seen it in her face. He tried to focus on the dead foals again, the sound of the crunch as she’d eaten the one, killed the others- but he could recognize the look on her face, the utter misery. She hadn’t wanted to do it, she……Daddeh Sir had given an order. She’d obeyed, as they had to. Obeying, at once, was a rule…and she’d pushed it farther than would usually be wise with that hesitation alone. …She’d done what she was told, doing what Daddeh Sir said was…was what good fluffies did.
All Razzle had done was follow the rules. She was being good. It wasn’t……she wasn’t the monster. The one that made her do it was the monster. ….The monster there had been Cloudy! ……There was the tiniest flicker of doubt in his mind regarding a different option of who the monster was, but he shook it off and latched to the more logical thoughts he’d managed.
It was Cloudy’s fault. Cloudy had broken so many rules. She’d tried to hide a baby, had a bestest, had shouted at Daddeh sir. Razzle had done her best, and Cloudy had forced Daddeh sir to use Razzle to punish her. Cloudy was a monster who’d made her babies worstest babies that needed to be stomped. Razzleberry was the same good sister, good fluffy, that she’d always been. Another thought tumbled on that, and if he’d had any nummies yet they’d have come back up.
Jason stepped back outside after leaving the overwhelmed Razzleberry with Jolly. It had worked fine- she’d passed that last test of what orders she’d follow, and in a way that left her not blaming him for any of it. Left him as her rescuer, in fact, which would reinforce the loyalty. So, while she slept off the meal and settled in, time to clean up the mess and get the others fed. Load of kibble in one arm and a pressure hose in the other, he stepped back into his main kennel guard pen. If it wasn’t Ryan’s damn day off….
There was a cherry chocolate alicorn sniffling at his feet. “Daddeh siw, Dazza am sowwy, am bad fwuffy, am munsta. Sissy did wat towd, fowwowed wule, was GOOD fwuffy. Was good fwuffy tu du wat Daddeh Siw towd Sissy wen Cwoudy was dummeh munsta fwuffy and made babbehs aww bad babbehs. An’ Dazza yeww’d. An’ gab heart huwties, an’ wing huwties….Wazza did wat Daddeh siw said, an’ Dazza am bad fwuffy an’ wong an’…Am sowwy! Dazza jus’ see’ wittw babbeh’s aww ….kiwwed, an’ booboo juice ebewywewe, an’… an’ tinky pwace was bad an’ made’ Dazza bad.” The alicorn flattened himself to his belly on the still bloody concrete, tail tucked and wings tucked tight against his sides. “Dazza weady fow punis’huwties. Desewe foweba huwties.”
Well. Okay, not what he’d expected. “You don’t get forever hurties. You fuc- you did a bad thing, yes. Razzle was being good, and you made her feel bad for it.” He waited for Cherrydazzle to look up and meet his gaze through overhanging mane. “But. You realized you did bad, without being told, and you came to apologize to me the moment you could. Which is why you get to live, and more- I have a job for you. A way to prove that your little stunt will never happen again, and you might be worth letting inside like I did her.” Somehow, the sudden hope in his eyes made Jason want to just tell the stallion to kill his pregnant mate. See what he’d do to get back with his twin and the human’s good graces. ….Nah, not yet. “But not now. You have a special friend who’s going to have your foals, remember? So, you need to be on your best behavior, and maybe when the foals go to the other pen, you’ll be ready to come inside. Cloudy was….a problem, but I know others occasionally say things against the rules…or against me. Keep everyone in line. If someone says that Razzle was a monster or bad or that following my rules wasn’t the good thing- they get hurties. If they say it again, bring them to me at breakfast. Tell me what they said- and if they don’t say enough sorries, you’ll kill them. Am I understood?”
Cherrydazzle straightened. “Yes, daddeh siw. Dazza gon’ teww aww fwuffies dat wat daddeh siw said am awways wite. Tank ou fow secon’ chance, Daddeh siw.”
“Good. Don’t fail me again. You aren’t as stupid as some of them, but that shit this morning was something I’d expect out of the lesser stock.” ….Or like any fluffy, even a hunting friend, reacting to foals he’d helped to raise being murdered in front of him over nothing. Emotional little shits- but some were better than others. With that, he walked back to cleaning the concrete and filling the food troughs.
It started with a small whimper, then more, wings flicking under the blanket and hooves kicking, until she tried to launch herself clear of the blanket tangled around her legs and hit face first into the floor. “Wazza am otay? Nu huwt?”
She stared frantically around her, eyes flitting from the bed, blankets….the painted walls and boxes of toys. “Wazza am…” her breathing steadied as she took everything in, picking up each of her front hooves and staring at them as if she expected them to be a different color. Once convinced they weren’t, she carefully stepped the rest of the way out of the blankets. “Wazza am otay, Jowwy. Jus…bad sweepy picture.” Her voice even stopped shaking by the end of the statement. “Am wawa boww in woom?”
“Wawa bowl am oba hewe, acwoss fwom wawa ting.” He watched her for a long moment as she gulped at water. “Wazza hab wong nappies, weady tu heaw bout woom wules nyao?”
“Wite afta Wazza use wittabox.” She did her business, then looked at him again. “Wawa ting afta, wite?” He nodded, and she awkwardly stepped up like he had.
“Hoofies a wiittw….wite dat, yup. Cawful, am cowd an’ icky fewwing” He sat by the edge of the tile, waiting out her yelp and flinch, the “cowd, cowd, cowd…” then her careful step back into it. “Jowwy towd Wazza.”
A few more muttered yelps later, she shifted her rear, pushing back just a bit before she stepped down. “Nu… icky feewing, jus….wiewd-funny. Bewy funny. And bewy cowd.” She shook, hard, then joined him. “Hab udda wules?”
“If nu-wibe-hewe fwuffies in woom, gotta be extwa nicey. Jolly waited for her to rejoin him out in the main room, and finished the tour with her seeming far less distracted. The treadmill. The “Climby ting”- Something between a simplified cat tower and an indoor childs playset, full of tunnels, ramps, bridges, stairs, and hunting friend scaled jump points, padded in foam and complete with the wheels, levers, and other bits they could play with, that took up a good portion of one wall. “Wike da testy cowses outsides, but fow funsies. An’ fow stay’in good at jumpin;”
The toy chests with an assortment of balls, wooden blocks, and toddler safe toys. “Gotta put aww toysies back afta pwayin’… An’ dat mean afowe beddie time, eben if stiww pwayin’.” The wall mounted tv in front of a low, squashy ottoman, currently just a black screen. “An’ daddeh gib us wessons tu watch on teebee sometime. Gotta watch caweful an’ memba”. And the low window seat in front of the only window, just reachable with a good jump, and providing a view of the yard and the outer pens.
Razzle was up there in a quick leap, hoof softly against the glass as her eyes followed a small blur of chocolate and cherry red. “An’ we hab wookie waww ting? Kennew out dewe.”
“That’s called a window, and yes, you can see the kennel through it.” Jason was leaning against the small gate between the room and his office. “Everyone have nice naps?”
Jolly was already racing over to him, a few limping steps visible before he got himself more limbered up. Razzle was a few steps behind, feathers a little ruffled as she slunk up to her owner. “Had nicey nap, Daddeh. Tank ‘ou fow wettin’ Wazza be housie fwuff.”
“Oh, you earned it.” He crouched down to her. “Jolly Rancher went over the rules for this room, right?” Both of them nodded, and he patted them. “Part of living in the house is helping me. Like watching the kennels for bad behavior, but more. Why do the kennel guards need to sort out bad behavior out there?” Jolly arched a wing slightly over Razzle, encouragingly, but relaxed back onto his haunches. He knew this talk. He’d been given it himself once, and listened through Laffy-Taffy and Skittles’ versions as well.
Razzle sat back as well, but her wings pulled tight and her front hooves did tiny taps on the floor as she focused hard to give the right answer. “Fwuffies dat bweak wuwes awe bad fwuffies. Bad fwuffies make daddeh an’ mista Wyan mowe wowkies. Bad mummah fwuffs make bad babbehs, an’ bad babbehs nu get… homes?”
“Close. Bad bab- foals don’t get good homes. Good homes with nice moms and dads give me …well, money, which lets me get food and toys and things to take care of all of you. Bad homes still give me money, but not as much.” Foals sold. And if they didn’t, there was still a market for meat fluffies ready to process. “The nice moms and dads who come to the house to buy foals give me even more money. So it’s really important that the fluffies here are good all the time, and that the foals are extra polite and nice to the people that come. Which is where you two come in.”
“House fwuffies hewp Daddeh. Make suwe nu ob da speciew fluffies awe meanie, or dummeh, an’ aww babbehs awe gud babbehs. Can gib huwties, bu’ nu foweba sweepies eba. If fwuffy dat bad, den teww Daddeh. An’ nu gib huwties when nyu mista’s an’ wadies can see. When dey hewe, den gotta wook wike AWW fwuffies am happies an’ fwiends.” Jolly added, and the younger alicorn tipped her head to think about that.
“Jolly can introduce you later. In the meantime, do you remember the little squares on the doors we went past?”
“Wazza saw. Am fwappy doows? Wike metaw ones outsidies.” her ears flicked back, a sad and confused look crossing her face before she caught herself. “Wazza nu hab cowwa tu open doow tings anymowe.”
“Oh? Then what’s this I have here?” He pulled a collar out of his pocket, holding it out as her eyes widened. It was braided out of ribbon that matched her mane, with the same sort of tags that Jolly’s had. “You’re my Razzleberry Blue, with a tag and everything.” At the excited squeal, he patted her again and buckled the collar before he picked up the grey bed from the hallway and set it next to Jolly’s. “Good girl, come along now. We can finish the house rules.”