You’re James. You’re almost three years old. Mommy and daddy tucked you in, said night-night, and turned out the light, but something is keeping you awake. You keep hearing a scary loud noise, and there are bright flashes of light through the window that light up your whole room. You pull the blanket over your head and whimper, trying to lay as still as possible so the monsters don’t see you.
What is that? There’s a loud rumble, like the scary noises, but even louder, and it doesn’t go away, and-
Suddenly your room is gone, you’re ripped out of your bed, and the noise is so loud you can’t even hear yourself scream in terror as the monster takes you away into the sky.
You’re Bob, a feral fluffy. You used to have a hoomin daddeh, but he said you were boring and never played with you. One day he took you for a fun drive out into “the cuntwy” and set you in the grass. Then he drove away in his vroom-vroom and you never saw him again. You waited and waited and waited, for many bright times and scary dark times spent all alone, but your daddeh never came back. He didn’t love you anymore. Eventually you stopped waiting and went looking for a new daddeh.
You never found one. But you found a herd, and eventually a special friend.
Your herd lives in a nice area with lots of grassies and trees that sometimes drop apple nummies for you to eat. It’s a large herd, and every pair has their own den they dug under a bush or small tree.
You’re snuggled up in your den, which is lined with fluff you and your special friend pulled out to make a nestie with, cuddled in a fluff pile with her and your babies. You have such pretty babies, two earthies, a pointy baby, and a wingie baby. They’re just little chirpy babies, not big enough to talk yet, but you’re very proud of them.
Right now, though, you’re trying to be brave for your family. Bright lights are flashing across the sky, and loud, scary noises are making the ground tremble in fear, they’re so loud and scary! Two of your babies make scaredy peepees in their mummah’s fluff, but she doesn’t notice; she’s scared too.
There’s a sudden flash, brighter than the rest, and then a SNAP that’s so loud your ears ring and your entire body shakes with the noise. You’re blind! All you see is purple!
You make scaredy poopies in your nestie, blinking rapidly and shaking your head around blindly. Finally, some vision comes back and you muster the courage to poke your head out of the den and see if the monster is close by.
You stare in awe and terror as you see one of the big trees has fallen over and is burning, producing an orange glow that gives the familiar surroundings a haunted, surreal appearance. One of the fluffies who built a den under the tree is burning too, screaming and writhing in the grassies as several other fluffies run in all directions, screaming in terror out into the night.
You go back inside the den and hug your family tightly, crying. What is happening? Why is everything so scary?
You hear another loud, scary noise, even louder than before, and it gets louder and louder and louder and then you’re screaming as you and family are ripped out of your warm, safe den and thrown higher and higher into the dark sky. You try to hold on to your family as tightly as you can, but one by one all of your chirpy babies are torn away from you, then you lose your grip on your special friend, and then you’re all alone, surrounded by terrifying noise, battered by invisible blows from all sides, and you make scaredy poopies again.
You awaken with a groan and blink at the bright sky-baww shining in your eyes. You hurt everywhere. You raise your head and see that you’re in a grassy field not far from the herd’s safe place; you recognize a couple of the landmarks, like the big rock where some of the fluffies like to sun themselves.
You pick yourself up, trembling, and look around. How did you get here? What happened? Where is your family?
You set out in a frantic search for your loved ones, calling to them.
“Speshow fwend! Babbehs! Whewe awe yoo? Baaaabbeeeeehs! Speshow fwend! Bob am hewe! Hewwo?”
After searching for a long, long time (fifteen minutes) you finally come across one of your chirpy babies! It’s the blue wingy baby; he’s chirping in fright, he’s probably hungry, and he’s covered in mud and bits of grass, but he seems ok otherwise. You hug him to you, clean some of the mud off of him, and, unable to give him miwkies, you set him on your back and resume your search.
A short time later, you come across a red earthie baby.
“Mummah! Mummah! Hewp! Safe babbeh! Mummah! Whewe awe yoo?”
“Babbeh! Yoo nu fine yoo mummah?”
“N-nu! Chirp! Whewe mummah?”
It’s not your baby, but it doesn’t seem right to leave her all alone, so you let her climb onto your back, where she hugs your wingy baby while you continue searching.
More and more fluffies are appearing, many of them stumbling around in a daze, some crying, others calling out for friends or loved ones. Many of them are hurt. One is stuck high up in a tree, calling for help. How did he get up there? He’s not a wingy friend, he can’t fly! Where is the smarty? You also come across two big fluffies and a little chirpy baby (not yours, thankfully) who are taking forever sleepies.
Eventually, lacking other leadership, one of the toughies takes charge. He leads the herd back to the safe place (abandoning the poor stallion stuck up in the tree), and has all the mares and babies stay. A few couples poke their heads out of their dens, groggy and wondering what the noise is, but it looks like almost all of the herd got taken away by the monster during the night and scattered. One mummah who can’t find any of her babies offers to give miwkies to your wingy baby and the talkie baby you found and you leave them with her while you accompany the toughie and other stallions in an organized search for the others.
After a long time, you find your special friend; she hurt her weggie and was trapped under a tree branch, but the toughie led the stallions in a concerted effort to push the branch away and she wiggled out from underneath. After the stallions searched high and low for other survivors, finding mostly fluffies taking forever sleepies, it eventually became obvious that you weren’t going to find any other fluffies. You help your special friend limp back to the safe place and she hugs your wingy baby while crying.
You never found your other babies.
You left her with your baby and walked back into the trees to help the stallions rescue the one stuck in the tree; you stare in amazement at the scars in the ground, the fallen and broken trees, and all of the debris scattered everywhere, mixed with the sodden, motionless bodies of fluffies and one of the bambi-friends who liked to eat the same grassies as the herd.
You had just stopped to rest when you hear someone crying. Oh no! It sounds like a hurt fluffy!
You trot into the trees quickly, looking high and low for the crying fluffy, checking a mare with her head twisted the wrong way (she wasn’t crying, she was taking forever sleepies), and then looking under a big bush.
You squeak in surprise when something looks back at you.
It’s a hoomin! A baby hoomin!
He seems scared of YOU.
“Babbeh? It otay! Fwuffy nu huwt yoo!”
“sob sniffle Fwuffy?”
“Yeh! It otay! Nu wowwies, am fwend! Fwuffy name Bob, whu yoo name?”
“J… James.”
He crawls out from under the bush and rubs his eyes and nose with his not-hooves. You look at him, mystified.
“Whu yoo doin out hewe?”
“Dunno. Scawy munsta come an take me. Wake up hewe.”
The monster was big and scary enough to steal a hoomin too?! Your eyes get big.
“Munsta take fwuffy away too! Bu fwuffy fine hewd agin. Yoo wan cum wif Bob?”
“sniffle O-ok.”
He picks you up and hugs you and you hug him back. Then it takes a while to convince him that he needs to put you down if you’re going to lead him back to the safe place. You have to go slowly, he doesn’t seem like he walks very well. Why do hoomins only walk on two weggies anyway? That seems silly. You could fall over any time!
You come across the toughie and several stallions surrounding the tree the fluffy is stuck in. He’s crying. The stallions are variously trying to form a fluffy pyramid tall enough to reach him, kicking the tree and threatening to give it sorry poopies if it doesn’t give their friend back, or in the case of a couple wingy friends, are jumping and fluttering their wings, begging their wingies to “pwease wowk”.
James points at the fluffy stuck up in the tree and giggles, then stands under him and holds his arms out.
“Jump, fwuffy! Jump!”
“Nuuu! Scawy!”
“Jump!”
The stallions, surprised to see the small hoomin but instantly accepting that he had some sort of master plan, begin encouraging their comrade to jump from the tree. He bites his lip, dangles out onto the branch, scrunches his eyes shut, and jumps.
He screams the entire way down and lands with an OOF in Jame’s outstretched arms.
“I catched you!”
He did! He caught the fluffy! James gives the fluffy a big hug and the fluffy hugs him back, then the toughie leads all the stallions, James included, back to the safe place.
The mares are surprised to see a hoomin, and some of them who have had bad experiences with hoomins in the past are scared, but the toughie quickly explains that James is nice and saved the poor fluffy trapped in the tree. You add in that he is just a baby, too. Most of the herd comes to accept James, who is absolutely tickled to take part in a group hug from more than a dozen fluffies, though a few mares and one or two stallions keep their distance, worried he might be a monster in disguise. With the horrible disaster that has befallen the herd and the sneaky behavior of some hoomins, anything is possible.
Eventually, James announces that he’s hungry. With a gurgle, you realize you’re hungry too. Your special friend is hungry, and that’s even more important; she’s giving your baby miwkies right now, but she needs nummies to keep doing so.
You lead an expedition to find nummies; fortunately, this is easy, as the monster seems to have knocked most of the apples from the trees when it attacked the safe place and stole most of the herd away. You carefully balance a couple of apples on your back, pick up a third in your mouth, and carefully make your way across the torn up earth and uprooted trees back to James and what’s left of your family.
Your poor babies. If they’re not taking forever sleepies already, they must be alone, scared, and have the worstest tummy owies. You cry a little for them, then try to forget about them; they’re already gone.
James like the apple nummies, and a couple other fluffies share apples with him too. Soon his belly is fall, as is every belly in the herd, but now he’s thirsty. So are you, come to think of it. So you lead him to the wawa place and most of the herd follows, having not had any wawa today.
Fortunately, the wawa place is still intact, unharmed by the monster’s rampage. A fresh trickle of clear, refreshing wawa splishing and splashing over the rocks. You all drink your fill, James scooping up wawa in his not-hoofsies and slurping it (you’ve never seen that before!), then return to the safe place.
The bright sky-baww is going down. Already?! You must have been asleep longer than you thought when you first woke up and started looking for the others.
With most of the dens compromised or missing entirely, the herd lays down in one big fluff pile, with James in the middle, hugging three fluffies and using a fourth as a pillow.
“Nigh-nigh, fwuffies!”
“Night-night, hoomin! Fwuffy wuv yoo!”
You settle down with your special friend and sole surviving chirpy baby, everyone managing to stay warm despite the chill, and quickly fall asleep. It’s been a long, harrowing day, and you’re exhausted.
“In spite of the disaster that unexpectedly fell on this sleepy little town, when a thunderstorm developed into a tornado that devastated dozens of homes and businesses, there is some good news.”
The spunky young reporter, a blonde with a decent rack and pretty face that the higher-ups thought would sell well to the mostly male audience watching the news, turns and points to a small family, father and mother tearfully hugging a little boy of two or three years in age.
“Little James Matherty, just days away from his third birthday, was snatched from his bed by the tornado. Their home destroyed and their son missing, his parents were devastated. But, miracles do happen. James was found nearly a mile from home, bruised, scratched, but otherwise unharmed by the tornado that had just previously torn his home apart and carried him away. James spent three days alone in the woods before authorities found him, mostly by accident. How did a little boy survive for three days with no food, water, or shelter despite temperatures in the low forties at night? He had a little help, from some little friends.”
The view switches to a fluffy family, two adults and a small pegasus foal. They seem wary of the camera, and the foal chirps at the light shining in his eyes.
“This fluffy, named Bob, discovered young James alone in the woods and led him to safety. For the next three days, Bob and his herd of feral fluffy ponies helped James find water, brought him food, and kept him warm at night with their own bodies.”
The view switches again to a uniformed man, who the bottom of the screen helpfully states is Adam Orlowsky, chief of the local volunteer fire department.
“It is very unlikely that such a small child could have survived that long for three days, particularly with the night time temperatures as low as they were. I would absolutely say that those fluffies saved him and kept him alive, absolutely.” He chuckles before continuing. “You might even call them fuzzy little heroes.”
The view reverts to the reporter again.
“You might say all’s well that ends well, as this small town comes together to heal from this awful tragedy. Volunteer organizations from all over the state, including a small local militia, are handing out emergency supplies of food and water, cots, blankets, and clothing to those who have lost their homes, and search and rescue efforts continue to look for more survivors in the debris.”
Behind the reporter, a group of people mans a set of tables, with some firefighters, police officers, and a couple overweight men in camouflage passing out supplies to people.
“Even the fluffies, who last week would have been chased off or killed for being ferals, are receiving a little charity, with many of them receiving new homes as thanks for their own heroic efforts to help one little boy. I’m Emily Jasper, and this has been-”
You’re Bob. This is so exciting! You have a new home! A new hoomin mummah and daddeh! Your special friend and your baby have never had a housie before, they’ll love it!
You’re trotting along, following your new family to their vroom-vroom, when you hear someone call your name. That voice sounds familiar…
“BOB!”
You turn around and instantly perk your ears up in excitement.
“DADDEH!”
It’s him! It’s really him! You waited so long to see him again and… and… you waited. You waited for him. He abandoned you, all on your own. He said you were ‘boring’ and he didn’t love you anymore. You waited for him.
“I saw you on tv! I couldn’t believe it!”
You sit down and droop your ears. You thought you’d gotten over it, but the heart hurties have come back.
“Well? Aren’t you going to say anything? C’mon buddy, let’s go home!”
“Yeh. Wet’s gu home.”
Then you turn your back to him and join your family as they get into the vroom-vroom. James is buckled in tight and leans over to scratch your ears, grinning, and you hug your special friend, who hugs your baby in turn. The vroom-vroom drives away and the last you see of your old daddeh is a look of shock and betrayal on his face as he watches you drive away.
Probably the same look you had when he left you.
You settle down for the drive to “ant mawy’s pwace”, where the family is staying until their home gets rebuilt.
There’s been a lot of sorrow and change lately, but not all of it has been bad. Maybe… maybe the future holds some promise after all.
