The planet Earth is currently home to roughly over eight-billion unique species of plants and animals, inhabiting every corner of it from its lush tropical rainforests to the deepest depths of the ocean. However, the land beneath our own feet is seldom spoken of as the creatures that call the land below home are seldom seen.
For today however, we will be focusing on a rather rare and unique subset of creatures whom call the underground their home, creating elaborate burrows and cultivating massive colonies that are dissolved nearly as quickly as they are formed. This is the story of wild microfluffies and how their unique anatomy gets them into trouble just as often as it helps them avoid it.
We begin in a small forest in Japan where a family of microfluffies can be seen wandering about, consisting of a blue stallion with a black mane, a pink female unicorn with a bright green mane, and six newborn foals split between the two of them⌠It is unknown where they have come from, but we can speculate based off of their colors and how clean their fur is that they have just been released into the wild by their owner
In Japan, microfluffies are extremely popular as due to their small size and minimal requirements to be taken care of whilst still being cute and talkative has made them the ideal pets for most people in the country. However, microfluffies have become a serious problem in places such as apartments or motels as they unintentionally cause damage by gnawing through wires mistaking them for âskettiesâ and their droppings leaving a foul smell in addition to doing damage to the building.
Most joint living spaces have outright banned microfluffies from being kept as they fear that they may escape and cause problems with these poor souls having been evicted as our suspicions are proven correct by their cries for their father.
Despite their former owner now being long gone, the two do not get long to grieve for long as a chilling wind reminds them of their situation and they quickly begin tunneling out a basic burrow for them and their foals to reside in and keep warm.
Unlike the common household fluffy, the hooves of a microfluffy are much denser and are U-Shaped instead of being completely flat which allows them to easily burrow through loose sediment and soft earth with ease.
Slowly but surely, the two microfluffies work together in creating a small burrow for themselves and begin the process of gathering materials for a nest, which due to their size is a much quicker process as five fallen leaf from a nearby tree is all that is required so that they do not have to lay in the mud and can remain clean and dry.
With their foals now safe from the elements, the parents continue to expand the burrow by digging out a small tunnel leading to a chamber where they can safely deposit their waste and keep their nest clean and immediately put it to good use by making âgood poopiesâ down the chute after a quick meal. For a fluffy colony of their size, they have everything that they could possibly need for their survival, and without any hesitation they begin the process of bolstering their numbers through mating.
Unlike any other breed of fluffy, microfluffies grow and mature at a rapid rate, their adolescents lasting only a mere week before they enter adulthood and are ready to mate, oftentimes breeding with their own parents or siblings due to not having the time or survivability to venture out and find a mate.
While for many species, inbreeding can cause a series of health issues for future generations, increasing the risk of genetic defects and weakening their immune systems but for microfluffies they do not have to worry about the risks of inbreeding or genepool stagnation as the consequences of such things are negligible thanks to their short lifespan of only three months on average.
In the span of only a month, the colonyâs numbers have exploded from eight to nearly 50 fluffies and to compensate, the simple burrow has been expanded with several new rooms and older ones being expanded upon to suit the needs of the colony.
The once simple pit where their waste is disposed has been turned into a large chasm full of the bodies of both bodily waste and the corpses of brown, gray, and black colored fluffies whom were used to make it larger and often ate the waste in order to survive.
In a microfluffy colony, every fluffy has their role to play with even the off-colored fluffies playing a vital part in the survival of those fortunate enough to be born with a brighter coat unlike themselves. Whilst brightly colored fluffies are given more attention and love, the dull colored foals are given the bare minimum to reach adulthood before being forced into the waste pit where they will spend the remainder of their lives attempting to tunnel away from their abusive home whilst feeding off of the waste that their brighter colored family produces, leading to a slow and agonizing death for them.
The storage area has also undergone a major overhaul with leaves, grass, and other bits of organic material are kept for fluffies around the colony. Of course, what is in the storage area is simply leftovers as the majority of high-quality foods such as flower petals and bits of fruit are given to the broodmares in the nursing area further down in the colony.
The last of the original rooms, the playroom, has received very little change outside of being expanded to accommodate the larger population. Here, microfluffies are free to run and play as much as they like. Note how despite it being pitch black, the fluffies are able to maneuver around fairly easily thanks to their amazing sense of sight.
Due to spending nearly two-thirds of their life underground, microfluffies are capable of seeing perfectly well in areas with minimal if not any lighting but comes at the cost of being easily blinded by the surface whenever scouting parties are sent out to hunt for food. So much as a camera flash is enough to render a microfluffy completely blind for the rest of their life, which is why they usually make nests near the base of trees or shubs as they provide food and shade from the elements.
Of course, with their larger numbers more living space must be constructed with mares taking the highest priority due to them giving birth and nursing young microfluffs for their first few days of life. In every colony, there is a nursery or âbaby roomâ for the mares to breed and raise their young with the mothers consisting of willing participants or those whom are crippled and can no longer serve as diggers or scouts.
Another month passes and the colonyâs numbers continue to rise into the estimated low hundreds as scouting parties are sent out more frequently and in greater numbers with each being led by a unicorn with not a single one in their ranks being a smarty.
In fact, smarty syndrome in microfluffies is actually quite rare as due to their constant breeding and feeding, most mothers do not get to choose a favorite, only a least favorite in the event that they have a âpoopie coloredâ foal. However, for those that do develop âSmartie Syndromeâ or its close cousin âBitch Mare Syndromeâ, they are often thrown into the waste area where much like the off colors they will perish of malnutrition, drowning, or infection.
While this colony has done an outstanding job of curbing the population of smarties, other dangers still lurk in the depths of this luscious green paradise which they call home.
Overhead, a scout for a nearby Asian Giant Hornet nest spots the dozen or so multicolored balls of fuzz emerging from a hole near the base of a Japanese Laurel and trotting cautiously under the roots and mossy rocks that dot the forest. A particularly brave microfluffy given the rank of âtoughieâ leads his herd forward to scavenge for food.
Much like the microfluffies, these large winged insects are an invasive species to the land and regularly threaten the hives of japanese honeybees whom have little to no defense against these foreign invaders. However, honey bees are not the only ones to be targeted by these giant hornets as several species of beetles, worms, and in this case, microfluffies, are all reliable sources of protein for them and their queen.
Knowing that they have hit the jackpot, the hornet marks one of the leaves with a powerful pheromone to alert other scouts whom manage to catch its scent on the wind with three more coming to its aid, though the added numbers would also alert the toughie and his group of their presence as they quickly scramble back to their home to alert the rest of the colony of the âbuzzy monstersâ as they refer to them as.
Soon, the entrance is swarmed as the four large insects make their way into the colony and begin their massacre. The front line of defense for the microfluffies are their toughies whom are slightly larger than average and are much, much braver, though even that is not enough to stop the hornet scouts whom make short work of the toughies by biting through their tender flesh using their powerful mandibles and injecting them with lethal venom from their stingers. In the end, the only thing that the toughies managed to do was give the hornets a hearty meal so that they could continue their invasion.
The sacrifice of the toughies was not entirely in vain however as the colony is now fully aware of the wasps that are invading their home and in response they begin to panic. Some begin creating tunnels to try and escape the invaders whilst others migrate to the lower sections of their home to try and hide away or jump in the waste pit thinking that the wasps will not want to eat them due to their smell. The only ones who decide to stay are some particularly brave stallions that clog the tunnels leading to the nurseries, broodmares whom are unable to move thanks to physical disabilities, and newborn foals whose lives are quickly cut short by the scouts.
In the end, the scouts get their fill and leave behind a trail of death and carnage, half-eaten bodies littering the tunnels whilst those whom remain cower in fear for hours until hunger takes over and one by one they re-enter the upper levels of the nest to see if their attackers have left. The one thriving colony of well over 200 microfluffies has been reduced down to only 20 or so survivors with that number being cut down even more by microofluffies whom deem the nest no longer safe and set out to start their own empire far away.
Still, those whom stay remain resilient as after they woefully take the remains of their dead friends and family to the waste pit, they begin the process of repopulating once more.
Yet another month passes and the population slowly but surely begins to recover, with the incident quickly being forgotten by the newer generations and life returning to normal. However, the colony will soon face new hardships as the warm summer season transitions into the much cooler Autumn months.
Plants begin to die off, and the protection and camouflage the laurel once provided now proves useless as it readies itself for a long deserved rest. Scouting parties come back with less and less food, resulting in scouting parties becoming smaller as they usually die off during the searches. But, the final nail in this colonyâs coffin would come during the first rain of the season.
While Japan is used to rain, most of it comes during late spring to mid summer whilst the fall remains fairly dry. As for today however, it is far from a particularly sunny day as slate gray rain clouds roll in overhead and begin pelting the earth during the early hours of the morning.
The heavy drops of rain alert those in the upper sections of the nest, the toughies go out to assess the situation only to be struck with a few drops of âbad sky wawaâ. Due to their innate hydrophobia, they along with a few others begin to barricade the area where the original nest was dug, though the only thing they managed to accomplish was seal their fate
Due to how expansive nests can get, the lower levels of the colony will begin to suffer from a lack of oxygen. To counter this, microfluffies dig out narrow tunnels to help circulate air and provide more direct routes to certain rooms with the only exception being the nursery which only has one entry and exit point.
With the main nest now blocked off, the rainwater begins to trickle through the ventilation tunnels and into the play area and food storage. In a matter of days, the food inside will begin to mold and become inedible whilst the playroom is now a muddy mess that also becomes abandoned due to the water with foals, mothers, and their mates running back to the nursery for safety whilst others head for higher ground.
Within only 30 minutes, the playroom is completely evacuated and ruined and the water begins to seep down into the nursery. Mothers let out terrified âSCREEsâ and adolescent foals cling onto their parents for protection while the males that sought refuge there begin digging upwards towards the surface in order to escape the rising tide.
The males make good progress on their escape tunnel, but in their desperation they failed to realize just where they were digging and soon they would be forced down by a slippery tsunami of their own waste. Down below, the nursery is halfway filled with water but with the added feces and urine it is quickly filled up to the brim and the poor souls quickly drown in the slurry.
The only safe haven left in the colony is the central hub which all main areas connect to, and by far they have it worse than anyone else as the smell of rotting flesh and their own biological waste fills the caves and assaults their nostrils. The remaining fluffies can do nothing but sit there and wait for death as they know that they cannot go to the surface and the screams from deep within indicate that they cannot go down either.
Fortunately, their release comes sooner than later as the blockade that had been created erodes away and a deluge of water washes the remaining microfluffies down to the lower levels where they will surely drown to death in thick brown slop.
In total, the colony managed to last nearly five months before its inevitable collapse, though for many they only manage to survive half that time as colonies are quickly broken up by either the wildlife of the region or mother nature herself as we saw here. With that, we end yet another story of woe, hardship, and perseverance and we here at Fluffy Planet would like to thank you for exploring with us and showing your continued support. For our next episode, we will be celebrating nearly five years of being on the air and plan to return to our roots by covering the story of the humble domestic house fluffy.
Heavy inspiration from - The Boreal Forest (TG-89)
Our Previous Episode - The Journey and Differences of Seafluffies
