“Smawty! Smawty!” hissed Cabbage.
It was still dark times, and Jade laid still, eyes bleary. She hated Smarty. She hated what Smarty had to do.
“Smawty!” Cabbage nudged her with a hoof.
“Wha… What?”
“Cum see!” the Earthy pleaded.
“Bawk, stay hewe.”
Jade got up, shaking herself to wake up. Wordlessly the pair descended the hill into the forest. Through bushes and brush, past trees and logs.
“Hewp Smawty, pwease,” Cabbage moaned. But his weren’t the only ones.
The two entered a small clearing where a red and white fluff lay, twitching, whimpering, chirping like a foal. As they got closer the Earthie broke into a sprint, falling over himself to get to the stallion.
“Vaniwwa… pwease… no gu… Cabbage bwing Smawty! Smawty knu what to du!”
Vanilla cheeped, quivering amongst his entrails, piss and shit.
Smarty blanched at the sight. “Kitteh munstah.”
The cat got him, played with him like they always do when they’re bored instead of hungry. Worse than a barkie monster, worse than a snake or birdy monster. The only thing worse than the kitty monsters were the human monsters.
Jade paused.
“Dis yu house-fwuffy fwen? Da one wif da bad daddeh?”
“Munstah daddeh,” Cabbage cried.
She came to Vanilla’s side, hugging his neck. Jade had seen so many of her herd die like this, each time making her heart hurt worse than the last. Nuzzling his head, licking his face clean, there was nothing to do but to try and comfort him. Cabbage joined her silently.
“Chirp… chirp… mummah… chirp… chirp… mummah… wub… cheep…”
Jade breathed in the smell of his fluff deeply as he breathed his last.
A forever passed, her eyes sore and red from crying with Cabbage.
After a moment, Smarty got up, clearing her throat.
“Cabbage hewp smawty.”
The weanlings rushed around in a panic, the roof over their heads being taken away bit by bit. Their tiredness and hunger superseded by the light pouring in.
“Hewwo babbehs! Yu wonewy in dewe?” Smarty sang.
“Yesh,” they meekly replied.
“Hewe den…” she said, disappearing again.
The weanlings looked around confused, wondering what she meant. An unfamiliar snout appeared.
“Hewwo?”
“Nyu fwen?”
It moved forward as they heard grunting. Slowly a head revealed itself, then leggies. But the fluffy’s head hung down over the edge loosely, its eyes dead and lifeless. Blue and Yellow scree’d in horror while Red puffed up, trying to act braver than his bowels.
With a thud Vanilla’s body landed in hole, Smarty looking over at her work. She nodded to another fluff they couldn’t see, telling them to go, before looking back at the three.
“Smawty bring babbehs a nyu fwen,” she said. “Dis bad fwuffy wan away from his nestie. T’ought his daddeh was meanie. Nebah gib him ebewyt’ing he t’ought he desewb’d.”
Vanilla’s tongue hung out of mouth, blood still fresh on his legs and chest.
“Wha’ dat, fwuffy?” Smarty asked, mockingly. “Any bad babbehs hewe? Yu no wike go fowebah sweepies awone?”
Blue screamed as Yellow tried desperately to scramble out of the hole away from the white stallion’s corpse. Red couldn’t move, unsure if Vanilla was looking straight at him or not.
“Nu fowget dis, babbehs. Now, Smawty bowed… maybe go fin’ sum nummies fow Smawtie…”
((I just want you all to know that the first half of this was pictured while I was trying to drive this morning. Nothing like getting gut punched by your own imagination while trying to pay attention to the road. It was quite hard to write, and I had to take a couple of breaks to compose myself and wipe my own eyes. Sorry Vanilla.))