“Summer…one of the worst, yet best times to deal with fluffies…” Douglass muttered to himself. Standing in his kitchen, the big man gingerly mixed himself a tall, cold glass of iced tea, one he decided to flavor with some sweetener packets instead or regular sugar. See how it impacted the taste. He wasn’t a big fan of the stuff when the tea was warm, so he hoped it was a lot better when iced instead. Of course, as he stirred and readied the tea, his eyes drifted to the thermostat, as the house was kept at a nice seventy-five, as opposed to the ninety-degree temperature outside.
Indeed, summer was one of the worst, yet best times to deal with fluffies, because it’s when they either died in droves, or got exceedingly clever. They either adapted to the heat and became even more of a headache to people, or they died by the dozens and people could be rid of ferals. Just for a while. Of course, like everything about them, that itself came with its own share of consequences.
He didn’t envy those who had to clean up fluffy corpses left in the sun too long, after all.
Douglas finished stirring his tea and took a sip. The taste was…acceptable; but it came nowhere close to honey in his tea. Regardless, the cup was done, and he wasn’t wasting good tea. With that, the big man plucked up the cup and took another sip, starting for the saferoom. Upon drawing close, he was thankfully met with little to no sounds of chirpies or foals going about their little lives. Douglas poked his head in, and was met with the same sight as yesterday: nothing.
Aside from some chirpies nursing from the auto-feeder, there were no foals in the saferoom for once. Most were either sold to adoring clients or washed out and had to be disposed of, and sadly he noticed the number of washouts increase as time went on. Seemed some were stubborn to change, and he refused to try a passive approach when it came to instilling his usual doctrines in each fluffy.
Still, it meant it was about time to take some of the barn fluffies and make a batch or two more. Enough to get started on the usual program at least, and see if he could prevent any washouts. Did mean he’d need to try some eugenics; source from parents with ideal colors—
His phone rang. Douglas stepped away from the near-empty saferoom and moved to his office. The door was shut behind him, and the phone quickly answered. “Hello?”
“Douglas? I-It’s me, Todd.” Ah, Jen’s boyfriend. “Listen, I might have a problem, a-and I didn’t really know who else to turn to.” And already, Douglas heard concern and alarm in Todd’s voice. Not panic, no, but something definitely shook him up.
“Settle down, Todd,” Douglas plopped down in his office chair. “and tell me what’s going on. What happened?”
“W-Well, I went to leave for work today, and Rena was acting real…fidgety. I asked her what’s wrong, and she said some fluffies were in the backyard. A whole herd! I went to check and…w-well she wasn’t kidding! There’s at least fifteen of them out there, and they’re making a mess of the place!”
Douglas frowned. A feral herd must’ve snuck in overnight. A seasoned one, considering most fluffies fear the dark, yet these ones were smart enough to make a move during the cover of night. “Alarming, but nothing an exterminator can’t fix.”
“I-I don’t think I can afford an exterminator right now,” Todd sighed. “I don’t get paid until next week, and I already spent a lot on a birthday dinner for Jen. So…is there any chance you could come out here and have a look? S-Scare them off? I-I can pay for that, at least!”
Douglas’ frown persisted, and he silently weighed his options. Todd was essentially asking him to play exterminator, and while that wasn’t his forte, it was also something he was exceptionally gifted at. Then again, it meant coming all the way out there, and working for less than he normally saw.
But, on that same note, a herd meant chirpies and foals. Instead of having to wait a month or so for the barn fluffies to produce some, he could get some early on and work out the kinks from there.
“I’ll be there soon, Todd,” Douglas stood up. “text me the address, and keep Rena away from the windows. If I have to start cracking heads, I’d rather her not see me do it.”
“Right, yeah. And thanks again, Douglas. Really.”
“Thank me once they’re gone. And once I make sure they don’t come back.”
And with that, he moved to get dressed properly. Killing fluffies in house shoes was just gonna mean he’d need to buy another set.
~
“…welp, that’s a herd, alright…” Douglas muttered, staring out of the window to the backyard. Todd’s backyard reminded him a lot of his ma’s. It wasn’t too spacious, and nearly every spot had something: a trampoline close to the edge, an outdoor table set for relaxing on nice days, and even a garden for growing lovely plants.
Unfortunately, it also had fluffies. About fifteen of the damn things. Already, they had made a mess of the place: grass was torn up and being used to pad out nesting spots, the garden was trampled over by playful foals or hungry adults, a pregnant dam was already resting under the trampoline, and a handful more gathered around the furniture set, seeking shade under the parasol. The parents had an assortment of colors, but what drew his attention was, indeed, the abundance of chirpies in the makeshift nests with their mothers, nursing from their crotch tits. He counted about twenty; more than what he needed, and young enough to where he probably wouldn’t even need the regiment. Most still had their eyes closed, blindly feeling for their mother’s milk.
“Just…” Todd sighed. “Jen and I worked for weeks to get those flowers to grow…I even bought high quality fertilizer too…”
“Sorry to hear that,” the big man uncrossed his arms. “this your first lawn invasion?”
“I…yeah. I’ve heard stories about this happening, but never thought it’d happen to me. I mean,” he shook his head. “I know you’re supposed to exterminate or scare ‘em off, but I don’t have it in me to just bludgeon them all to death.”
“Few really do. Most people, honestly, would rather not kill a fluffy if they have to. Most are content to just frighten them off. And believe me, that ain’t hard.” Douglas shook his head. “Then you get some that refuse to take the hint and back off. And that’s sadly when it’s time for the hurting to begin.”
“Are…there painless ways to do it?” Todd asked.
“Few, but it’s usually tedious as all hell, and not worth it. Why go through the efforts of setting up an elaborate way of dispatching a herd, when you can take a shovel and take care of the problem yourself?” He asked the scrawny man. “It’s gruesome, sure, but it’s quick, cheap, and you really only need to kill one or two before the rest get the message and decide whatever it is they want isn’t worth it.” He hid a few details from Todd on that. Not every herd was that easy to frighten off, of course.
“Right…well…I suppose that’s why you’ve brought that, right?” Todd pointed to the baseball bat Douglas leaned against the wall.
He nodded. “Unfortunately. I’ll stick around to clean up, though. Hopefully, I won’t need to use it. Need to maximize my time, after all.” Douglas looked towards Todd. “Speaking of, you got a laundry basket or something you won’t be needing, along with a blanket?”
“Yes…?” He raised a brow. “For what?”
“The chirpies,” Douglas gestured to them. “I’ll be snatching those. I’m outta stock back at the farm, and instead of going through the process and making a mare pop out some more, I can just take theirs. Saves me a month of work, and considering most’ve those chirpies don’t even have their eyes open yet, they won’t be hard to get on the regiment. Make into the sort of fluffies I can actually sell.”
“Ah, so that explains why you accepted this, despite the commute.” Todd noted. “I-I’m not judging, of course. It’s smart, from a business standpoint, and saves you plenty of time.”
“Yeah. Might even get a use outta those foals, but I don’t got my hopes up. Still, the stuff?” Todd nodded and walked off. Douglas used that time to eye the herd some more, taking silent notes over them. They were brazen, for one, so that had to mean they hadn’t survived a year at least. Herds that survived longer than that were smart enough to be far from human stuff; they knew humans needed next to no reason to kill them, so they did well to be as far from them as physically possible: forests, storm drains, and even abandoned buildings. For them to brazenly claim someone’s backyard as their home, it still meant they had no distrust towards humans. Or the expectation that Todd or whoever owned the place would accept them all with welcoming arms.
Unfortunately, he was here to shatter that delusion. And he was gonna have to be as mean as possible with it, too.
“Here,” He looked over, just as Todd brought him a white laundry basket, with a blanket already unfurled within. “don’t worry about bringing it back. Jen and I were just about to toss this one out for a new one we just bought.”
“Much appreciated,” Douglas accepted the basket and tucked it under his arm. “but do me a favor and keep Rena away from the windows. All of them. And put on something loud.” With that, he tucked his baseball bat under an arm as well, and finally unlocked the backdoor. The big man stepped through it a moment later to the usual miasma fluffies made.
The herd was in a world of their own. A few mares sat in the makeshift nests made, singing their “mummah songs” and feeding their broods, while a few others sat around with their stallions, enjoying what they thought to be their new home. Foals eagerly played about in Todd’s garden, munching and ruining the plants he and Jen spent so long cultivating, as a few others idled about, babbling to one another in their inane voices.
A foal finally saw him, and promptly stopped dead in her tracks. “Nyu daddeh?” She asked. Her words caught the others attention, and before long, their myriad of activities halted, as all laid eyes on him. “Mistah! Dis yur housie?!”
“It’s not, neither is it yours.” He firmly stated. The basket was set on an outdoor table, and he eyed the nursing chirpies. Acceptable colors.
“Buh, wiww ou be nyu daddeh—”
“Absolutely not.” He cut the filly off and approached a nursing mare. She was so lost in her own song, she didn’t even bat an eye as he knelt to pluck up one of her chirpies, examining the technicolored fluff. A bright green color. Should be worth something to someone. Of course, once it was separated from the crotchtit, it began giving warning cheeps and peeps to get its mother’s attention. The mare stirred, and her eyes widened when she saw him holding her baby.
“NU! PUT BABBEH DOWN!” She cried, flipping up so fast she almost knocked a few away.
“Sure.” He tossed the chirpie into the basket, with the blanket lining the bottom cushioning its fall. “So, just to make sure there’s no confusion, I ain’t adopting any of you. And this ain’t your home either. You came right into my friend’s lawn and made a mess of the place. Like a bunch of bad fluffies.” The very statement caused panic to wash over the herd. Seemed they knew that was the worst thing to be called.
“Buh, we hav nu housie,” a stallion plead. “babbehs nee sumewhewe tu gwow! An’ pway!”
“And it isn’t here. So, I’m being polite about this. Get out.” He firmly said. Already, some were crying, with pleading foals begging their parents to let them stay in the yard. Naturally, they tried to assure their brood that he was gonna let them stay regardless. That he was just playing. So, time to raise the stakes.
“Nuuu! Babbeh!” Another foal was taken and tossed into the basket. “Gib back babbehs!” The same mare cried! She uselessly beat her hooves against his pants leg, and her best attempt at hurting him felt like soft taps to his leg, really.
“I will, once you get out,” he brushed his hand against the table. “otherwise, I’m taking all your babies. Call it payment for staying here. You can either hand over all your foals, except those ones,” he motioned to the crying colts and fillies. “or you can have them all back, but get out. Honestly, I’m being generous here with this. So, I expect you to be the same.” He wasn’t being generous, and he was lying through his teeth. Any collected foals were going straight to the program. The parents wouldn’t be alive enough to see that, though. “And please, no struggling.” He tapped the baseball bat. “Otherwise, we’re going to have some issues.”
“NU! BABBEHS! WITE NAO—” In a flash, the first mare was gone. Douglas, in the blink of an eye, grabbed the bat and brought it down upon her head. Naturally, given the strength of the bat and the flimsiness of her head, it was like smashing a cardboard box, and her head caved from the force, with copious gray matter oozing from her eyes, and her eyes dangling from their sockets as she slumped over to the ground, dead as could be.
That got the herd properly panicking, as Douglas stooped down to collect the remaining chirpies, tossing them into the basket. “Just so you know I’m not messing around,” he reminded them, as the last chirpie was tossed in. “those are the terms. Hand over your chirpies without a fight, you get to stay. Otherwise, you can leave with them. Choice is yours.” He left them with quite a conundrum, and already he could hear panicked foals begging and pleading not to leave the nice yard. That they wanted to stay in the nice yard, with one colt even threatening him with ‘sowwy hoofies’ if he tried to force them out the yard. That one was visiting Gabby.
But, as expected, a sobbing mare waddled over, displaying her brood upon her back. “Huu…bai babbehs…mummah miss yu…” Surrendering them without a fight. It told him a lot. Douglas reached down to swipe them all and deposit them with the other panicked chirpies. She waddled away, still steady sobbing, as another approached. And another. In a few moments, most of the mares with chirpies had surrendered them, leading to them being tossed into the basket with the other chirpies, desperately chirping and crying out for their mothers who had abandoned them without so much as a fight. Gutless, sure, but it told him how the herd saw their broods. After all, they could always make more. Their logic was sad, but few things fluffies found logical didn’t veer into the sad or maddening, after all.
Finally, the last mare tearfully gave over her brood, leading to the final few falling into the mildly packed basket. Already, some had released some shit out of panic, another reason he asked for a blanket Todd wouldn’t need back. He wasn’t even planning on washing it; it was getting burned outside. Easiest disposal method for both garbage and dead fluffies, after all.
So, now that left him with fifteen sad, depressed fluffies, with six useless foals. He considered taking the ones who could move, yes, but they would need to be in their own basket, and with the trauma he planned to inflict, their resale value would sadly shoot down. Treating fluffy PTSD was rather experimental, and he wasn’t about to unwittingly put forth those findings on fluffies. So, they were marked as unneeded, which meant it was time to get creative.
“There, was that so hard?” he asked the last, sobbing mare. She waddled back to the others. “And…oh, hang on my phone’s ringing.” He pulled his clearly-not ringing phone out and mimed a phone call, speaking audibly enough to give the impression he was having a chat with someone. To a human or even a kid, they could clearly tell he was lying through his teeth.
For a fluffy, though, they were so dumb one could tell them they were made of water and there was a significantly high chance they would drown from the very idea.
“Mhm…uh-huh…oh dear…well, that’s bad news…okay, I’ll tell them.” He tucked away the phone. “Bad news, fluffies. The ‘daddeh’ who owns this backyard said you all have to go. And he told me to use plenty of hurties if you don’t want to listen.” Insidious, yes, and while he took no pleasure in it, he understood it needed to be done. Give them zero choice in the matter: either leave with nothing or die with nothing. And straight away, the herd’s waterworks turned to full blown hysteria at the idea of being culled if they refused to comply.
“NU! OU MAK US GIB BABBEHS!” A mare shouted, fed up with things at last. “WE STAY! OU GO!”
“Oh, that’s not happening.” A swing of the bat, and a sickening crunch filled the yard, as she was sent flying towards the fence. She hit it like an overstuffed backpack, and the screaming began as she feebly crawled around. Even a dullard could tell the hit severed her spine, paralyzing her from the waist down. Of course…
“SCREEE!!! WEGGIES NU WOWK! WEGGIES NU WOWK!!!” She cried pathetically, crawling towards the terrified others. That only fed their hysteria.
“Start running.” He politely warned them, and the herd broke into a panicked stampede away from him, even abandoning their paralyzed cohort. Douglas followed them, making “swings” at some of them to further scare them into running, even if it often led to several releasing jets of “scaredy poopies” on the grass as they fled. It was another reason he opted to wear boots.
Douglas followed them to the edge of the fence, with a wooden shed next to it. There, he found how they were getting in; the soil underneath the back part of the shed had eroded away, forming a small “trench” in the soil. Something most creatures couldn’t worm their way through, but a determined fluffy could easily widen it enough to get through; evident when he watched a pregnant dam wedge herself in the hole, desperately flailing her limbs to squeeze herself through. “HEWP! HEWP SOON MUMMAH!” She called to the others, but it was no use. They had already fled back into the woods not too far from the backyard, hopefully to get picked off by woodland predators. It’d do little to solve the rampant feral population, but it could at least put a temporary dent into it.
Still, that left the sobbing, frantic mare, desperate to escape from him. He almost considered letting her go. Letting her escape with the others to the woods. But considering she was a pregnant mare, that would just replenish the lost ferals from the predators picking them off. Not to mention, she served a use none the less. Considering she could still move, she wasn’t that close to popping just yet. Which meant she could be used once the chirpies were indoctrinated.
“Looks like your friends left.” He knelt next to her. The dam’s frantic efforts to free herself died down, replaced with forlorn, quiet sobs. As if she resigned herself to the fate of being killed. Instead, he dug into the soil with his hand, pulling dirt away enough to easily pull her back into the backyard, much to her fearful chagrin. Easily, he grabbed her by the scruff and lifted her, and he didn’t even hear so much as a peep from her. She was that shaken by fear. “So, I’m cutting you a deal. You want a ‘housie’, correct?”
She sniffled. “Huuu…soon mummah wike housie…”
“Good. Because I’m offering the chance to stay in mine, but,” he quickly stated, before she got her hopes up. “there’s a few ground rules and catch. Catch being, once the foals in you are out, they stop being yours.”
“Buh…wut happen tu babbehs?” She asked, almost as if her brain couldn’t comprehend the idea.
“They become mine. I’ll take care of them, shelter them, and when the time is right, see them go off to good homes, with good parents.”
“Huuu…buh mummah wub babbehs…babbehs nee’ mummah…” She pleaded.
“Not always. Besides, think about it. You get everything you want, and I can promise they’ll all being going to good homes. Where they can have families of their own. Sure, you’ll never see them again, but you can at least sleep easy with the knowledge that your brood’s alive and well out there. Safe and with a human who loves them; something you all really want, deep down. Or,” he turned her towards the forest, making sure she had a crystal clear look of it. “would you rather them try to grow up there? Where the ‘munstahs’ hide?” A colt came running out the woods, almost on cue, screaming and crying. The same blue colt who threatened to attack him if he forced them out the yard, ironically. A coyote dove from the underbrush and tackled it, ripping the foal to shreds in front of the terrified mother’s face. Its cries for help soon turned into disgusting death rattles, as the coyote gorged itself on its latest catch, no matter how fatty it might be. It was immaculate timing all the same.
“Huuu…mummah wiww miss babbehs…buh mummah gu wiff scawy mistah…” She made her choice.
“Good.” Douglas brought her over to the table and set her down next to it. In the shade, preferably, along with the basket full of peeping, panicked foals. “Stay here while I clean up, then. Then we can get you and those foals sent where they need to be.” He did briefly walk over to crush the head of the paralyzed mare. He was getting tired of her screaming.
“Buh…wha happen tu mummah after babbehs?” She finally asked a genuine smart question. A rarity for a feral.
Douglas paused mid-reach for the door. “…let’s address that after your babies are born. Just in case.” With that, he knocked on the door, to signal to Todd that it was over. The ferals made a mess of things, but at least he didn’t need to massacre the entire herd. Just a few. And he even found where they were coming in from too. So, he could put some rocks there to block the hole, and to make sure Todd didn’t see another feral herd. Because honestly, he got lucky. The herd was easy to antagonize into backing off. Some weren’t so easy to scare into running, after all.
But it was fine. He got a net gain from the arrangement, and he could run some experiments with the pregnant dam once she burst and delivered the foals. Because there was good reason that he didn’t plan on telling the mare her fate once things were done.
Her options were shitty either way: straight to the barn to make more fluffies to sell or being used to test new processes for the regiment until she caved or broke from them. Like conquering a fluffy’s fear of water through exposure therapy or forcing her to become more agile by letting Gabby chase her. Horrible, yes, but no one said business was humane.
Especially fluffy businesses. Mills, despite it all, weren’t the worst when it came to fluffies.
Like all things, there was always worse.
~
[Another chapter, one I had planned for a long time, but I ultimately forgot about as work swamped me. Someone gave me a poke, so I wanted to put something out, both to show I’m still kicking and that I come by here every so often to see what new stuff’s been going on. So, here’s my contribution to said new stuff, in other words.
I’m truly touched by the amount of support this story series has seen. It’s one of my favorite to write when it comes to fluffies, and I suppose I’ll keep going with it until I reach a decent stopping point, then I’ll branch into other stories. I still wanna have a crack at that exterminator idea, after all. But in due time.
For now, thanks for reading, and stay safe!]
