“So, yeah, that’s been the long and short of things, mom. Things are going okay for me, and I’m thinking of visiting an expo that’s an hour or two away. Something fun.” Douglas stood in the kitchen, mixing himself another tea. His phone sat on the counter, left on speaker, so he could keep his hands freed up and carefully mix his tea. Two spoonfuls of sugar and a spritz of milk and his earl grey was ready to go. Wasn’t perfect, but it was his.
“Well, it’s good to hear you’re doing okay. How’s work?”
Douglas scowled, then sighed. “…work’s good. I’m still working with Reggie at his dealership. Today’s an off day.”
“Good. Just be sure to come by and visit for Sunday dinner, okay? You know how much I love it when my boys are all together.”
His scowl faded, replaced with a hesitant smirk. “I’ll be sure to bring the cards, and make sure Byron doesn’t cheat again. You know how he gets. Til then, talk to you later, mom. Love you.” He ended the call…and let out a weary sigh. He could’ve told her. He could’ve fucking told her about his business but…he was still worried about how she’d feel about it. About him profiting off the sale of well-trained fluffies. He worried she’d consider it worthless, then make him feel like a shithead for even trying the idea. She did it before when he wanted to be a music producer; called it a “fleeting dream”…well at least he could fund those dreams down the road, with a little bloody work first.
Clearing his mind, Douglas took a deep breath and headed for the saferoom, holding his mug. After taking a sip, he poked his head into the room. One of the mares from outside was in the makeshift nest, on her side. Her crotchtits were on display and a liter of six foals fed from her. Said mare had the name of ‘Grape’, a name she earned because of her dark purple fluff and stem-green mane. She was one of the more well-behaved ones, though he figured that came from crippling fear of him. The foals she produced were “meh” colors: green, red, blue, purple, silver, and brown. They were all earthies, save for the silver, who was a pegasus, and the brown, who was a unicorn. The brown foal was a subject of worry, but he figured she accepted and loved it because, again, she feared what he’d do to her. Grape was a feral, after all, and ferals were commonly known to discard and dislike bad colored foals, only for those to be the ones to outlive them when a street predator came walking around.
Still, she earned at least a week in the saferoom until the foals grew enough to be put in the program. He made sure to caution her against talking about “sketti” and other things; if she poisoned the well, she’d make the entire batch useless, and that meant he’d need to kill them all, or add them to the barn outside.
Speaking of the barn fluffies, he needed to replenish them. He was down to only four. The ones who died either were killed by him when he learned some had special huggies without his say so or died to their own stupidity. A standout example of that was a pegasus, snuck out when he left the door open and made a break for it. Stupid fuck didn’t know there was a heatwave rolling by and died of heatstroke in less than an hour. Didn’t even make it past the fence.
Fluffies really weren’t designed to survive in the elements, yet they did. He blamed that on them being “smart” enough to plant themselves by resources, then squander those by seeking out humans who either felt sympathetic enough to adopt them or straight up killed them.
In any case, was probably time to take a visit to the mart, or even the shelter. See what he could find. Maybe put some more unwanted fluffies through the regiment he cooked up with those foals. Or something so much better.
He did buy a BB gun online. Good price, too. He just wished it was a different color.
Douglas stepped into the Fluff-mart once more. The same, static sights greeted him as the big man waded through the isles, heading for the front counter only to see neither of the folks he knew were there. Just some middle-aged looking man. He wasn’t perturbed by that, but he did wish he could ask Sam if some new unwanted came in.
He shrugged and went for it anyhow. “Excuse me,” The worker glanced up and flinched at the sight of him. A reaction he got used to. “sorry to bother you, but didja get a shipment of some unwanted fluffies again?”
“Un…wanted? Didn’t think anyone would look for those.” He stroked his chin in thought. “Yeah check the bargain bin. A handful of fluffies got taken out their bins and moved there after an incident.”
“Incident?” Douglas inquired curiously.
The man shrugged. “I got the tail end of it, but one of the new girls thought it’d be a good idea to put two smarties together in the same pen. She probably didn’t know they were, but when she came back one had basically beaten the other half to death in front of a little girl wanting a fluffy, and then tried to ‘enf’ two mares before being relocated. Management gave her a warning and disposed of the dying fluffy through the incinerator.”
Douglas let out a tsk. He wasn’t surprised she couldn’t tell. Smarty Syndrome could sometimes be mistaken for general bratty behavior. The only main indicator was a fluffy referring to itself as smarty, then yeah get the baseball bat. Still, he thanked the man for the information and moved to bargain bin. Like every time he came, there were a handful of fairly young fluffies there, just beginning to get their manes. Most were shitty colors, but he could easily pick out the would-be smarty; a bright purple one with a horn, in the process of beating a green one with his hooves. “Dummeh fwuffy! 'ou wet smawty pway wiff toysies fiwst!” Right on the money. Judging from their sizes, he figured the smarty, and a few others, had a few days before they hit stallion status and would be relocated to the appropriate pens…or, for the smarty, taken to the incinerator. Most Fluff-marts euthanized smarties when they were noticed, as they were very bad for business.
No one wants to buy a fluffy that’s likely to shit on their kid if they don’t get their way, after all.
Still, they were what he needed, and after a quick talk with the clerk he got a larger carrier ready and had six fluffies scooped into it, all of them complaining and crying as he walked out the store. Some of them didn’t deserve what came next but, as always, it needed to be done. Besides, if they made it through, they got to enjoy the barn, and all the kibble they could want.
And, if any of them had an issue with that, the woods were always a good place this time of year, if one could get past the snakes hiding under every rock…reminded Douglas of that rattlesnake he spooked. Cute little thing.
“So, welcome to the testing grounds.” Douglas stood in the garage with the six fluffies he brought home. Gabby wasn’t using it at the time; she was staying overnight at the vet. She was fine, just needed some antibiotics, though he promised her a smarty foal to mutilate when she got back. The six fluffies he brought were, by all means, nothing special: two were shit brown, one puke green, and another piss yellow. The only two standout ones were a bubblegum pink mare, who he could tell briefly had Bitch Mare Syndrome, and the purple smarty. Little chance for quality foals, but eh, he wanted to try a new test. “Don’t get cozy. We’re not gonna be here for very long.”
“Dummeh hooman! whewe’s dah sketties?” The smarty demanded, puffing his cheeks and stomping his hooves. Douglas was half tempted to just bash the little bastard’s brains out but decided against it. He did need to make sure the test ran smoothy, and he only had six fluffies.
“Right here,” All the same, he set down a wide tin of reheated spaghetti. “but there’s a catch.” He reached to the shelf nearby and grabbed a lengthy, blue and translucent BB gun. It was styled to look like a shotgun, even with a pump to simply “pump it” to load BBs in. “If you eat the ‘sketti’ I shoot you with this.” Naturally, this put the fear of God in the fluffies, all except the smarty and bitch mare. The former of the two puffed his cheeks out and waddled towards the bowl. The second he got close, Douglas raised the gun and shot the smarty’s flank. He specifically went with a low-yield BB gun, one where the BBs themselves felt like getting flicked. Mildly annoying for a human, but for a fluffy…
“SCREEEE!!! Worstest hurties!!!” The smarty projectile shat on the floor, which prompted the bad colored fluffies to start sobbing in terror. The idea for the test came after he killed those foals in his other one; was it possible to condition fluffies into associating their favorite things with pain? He did some research online and it’s been done before on rodents, poor things, but with fluffies it remained to be documented. Guess he’d be the first to attempt it and not have abuse be the focus, apparently.
“However,” He set down a bowl of bland, store-bought kibble. “Eat this and nothing happens. So, making sure you know, eat the ‘sketti’ and be in pain. Eat the kibble and get no pain. We clear?” He racked the BB gun and loaded in another shot. The smarty tried again and was promptly shot in the side, resulting in him screaming and crying again. The bitch mare sat there, staring at the smarty, not even bothering to go for the kibble. The rest of the fluffies…well they were already at the kibble bowl, begrudgingly eating it, though they still stole glances at the teasing tin of spaghetti. He could tell they wanted it but feared getting shot more.
He glanced at the bitch mare who remained where she was. “Well, ain’t you hungry?”
She puffed her cheeks and turned her head. “Nu. Nu wan’ kibbwe.” She said defiantly. “Angewica gud fwuffy, an’ gud fwuffie desewbe sketties.”
“Then go get it.” He shot the smarty a third time, this time pelting the little bastard in the side of the head, intensifying his ear-splitting screams of pain.
She didn’t move. “Angewica smawt! she nu faww fo’ dummeh daddeh’s twick!” He was half tempted to pop her in the mouth for that, but the goal was to reiterate that “sketti” meant pain.
The bad colored fluffies were done eating, and the smarty was still sobbing. “D-dumb hooman…smawty gib sowwy poopies—”
“Do it and I shoot your special lumps next.” The mere instant he saw the smarty turn around and raise his tail, Douglas shoved him over with his foot and open fired at his nuts. The smarty’s wails turned into damn near glass-shattering shrieks as his sack was struck with the plastic BBs until he was reduced to quiet sobs, even chirping here and there too. The big man stepped away from the downed smarty…and caught the bitch mare with her face in the tin.
He raised the gun. She turned to run. “Nu! nu gib owwies tu fwuffie—SKREEEEEE!!!” He shot her in the ass, sending her scurrying across the garage, streaming liquid shit as she fled. She even slammed into the basking rock, which just intensified her panicked, agonized cries.
With that, Douglas reloaded from a small tin of BBs, and the test continued. Over the course of an hour, he popped the smarty at least thirty times and the bitch mare little under half of that. He quickly picked up she only went for the tin whenever she thought he wasn’t looking, which led Douglas to believe, were she to get an owner, she’d be the sort to sneak food. He needed to devise a way to break foals of that; kill a problem before it became one. As for the bad colored ones? They ate the kibble and didn’t even bother going for the spaghetti. They fully understood that it meant pain and were willing to go without it if it meant not being hurt. Good. Another useful step he could add in the program for misbehaved foals.
“Well, seems one of you’s too stupid to get the memo.” The smarty had an assortment of welts on his skin, visible through his fluff, from where he’d been shot. He was still sobbing and crying, laying on his side and staring at the tin with an utterly broken look. Douglas heard the little shit’s stomach gurgle, and it just led to him crying even more. “Go eat the kibble.”
“Nu…nu wan…”
“Then try and get the ‘sketti’ and get shot. I got another tin of BBs in my pocket. They’re made of copper, which’ll give you some nice and bloody owies.” That just sent him into more waterworks. He watched on with a stone-faced glare. The bitch mare hid behind Gabby’s kiddie pool, too scared to eat the spaghetti, but also too stubborn to eat the kibble. So, it was a fun paradox for her, and fun results to jot down.
Douglas cocked the BB gun again and set it to the side. “Alright, test’s about done. You four,” He flicked a finger at the poor colored fluffies. “get to live outside with the rest. I’ll probably see if I can get some good colored foals from you all, but it’s unlikely.”
“Buh…wan’ housie…” One complained.
“What?”
“F-fwuffy be quiet…”
“That’s what I thought. Outside. As for you,” He glanced to the bitch mare and, promptly, shot her with the gun when he saw she had “sketti” around her mouth. Like all the other times, it sent her tearing across the garage, hollering and screaming. “Barn as well. Hopefully, some time out there will cure you of that attitude. And, if not, the woods are there.” That left the smarty…Douglas knew what needed to be done but held out faint hope. Damn thing had some alright colors so, hopefully, he wouldn’t need to take it out back and smash his head like a ripe pumpkin.
He knelt and nudged the smarty with the butt of the BB gun, earning a panicked chirp. “Still want the ‘sketti’?”
“Nu…smawty nu wan…” He whimpered, fluff damp from sobbing. Douglas huffed in amusement and stood up. He broke a smarty of something he wanted. Well, at least it seemed that way. Knowing how fluffy brains worked, he’d probably be demanding the shit again tomorrow and be back to his old self, completely forgetting the earlier pain. That’s fine.
Douglas bought BBs in bulk for a reason.
[So, another chapter, while also teasing some aspects to Douglas’ life that’s…not so grand. Give him some humanizing traits while, also, showing his methodical approach to things. But yeah I’ll keep going with this series til it ends; it’s a fun experiment and helps me to get the sort of abuse I want to see, but in a creative sense. So, I hope you enjoy.]