(So this is actually the first thing I wrote for this site, but never felt like posting until now. This is why the fluffy pony is named ‘fluffy’, I really didn’t care enough to name it. The story itself is surprisingly long, so I’ve split it into two ‘parts’ to make the reading easier. I’ve included a link at the end of this part to the second half.)
“And your little darling is clocking in at… oh… oh my.” The veterinarian said, taking off their glasses to make sure they were reading the weight right.
“Is everything alright, dear?” Mrs Pribble asked, as confused as one would expect a 90 year old to be.
“Fwuffeh wan tweats.” Her cream yellow fluffy pony sulked.
“Well, mostly yes, but… Mrs Pribble, how often do you feed your fluffy pony?”
“Oh, only at meal times! Well, that’s when he has his MEALS. But every now and then I allow him a snack or a treat, if he behaves, or if he asks… I just can’t resist his cute little face when he gets all huffy!”
“Tweats! Fwuffeh wan tweats!” The pony huffed. The vet turned Mrs Pribble away from the snorting ball of fur on the table to speak to her confidentially.
“Ma’am, I appreciate that, but this fluffy is, well, for a fluffy pony… he’s OBESE.”
“What?!”
“Yes, most fluffy ponies only weight about 5 kilograms at their absolute heaviest, if they’re waterlogged or pregnant. Your dry, male pony is neither, and he’s clocking in at 10 kilograms!”
“But… but he doesn’t LOOK obese!”
“With all due respect, ma’am, that’s because all fluffy ponies look fat regardless. It’s all the fluff, you see. It makes it impossible to really tell how heavy they are at a glance. Fortunately the fluff is so light and soft that it doesn’t really add any weight unless it gets wet. The only way to be sure is to weigh them, and…”
She turned back, gesturing at the digital scale that the imaginatively-named Fluffy was unhappily perched on, his tiny legs wiggling in frustration.
“Fwuffeh wan tweat! TWEAT!” He snapped, wriggling in impotent fury.
“Oh, I… I had no idea it was that bad.” Mrs Pribble said, looking genuinely ashamed. “I had no intention of hurting the little mite, I just thought he was hungry!”
“The little things are ALWAYS hungry, ma’am. It’s how they’re designed.”
“Is being that overweight dangerous for him?”
“I’m afraid it can be, it can even be lethal. But don’t worry, I’ve already got a solution. See, I have a friend, he’s a personal trainer, and he LOVES fluffy ponies. He’s helped me out before, he’ll take little Fluffy off your hands for only a few days, then he’ll be whipped into a healthier shape before you know it.”
“Really? And how muc-”
“Ma’am, that’s the best part. He does it for free. He just loves the little creatures so much, he’s more than happy to help.”
“Oh, that’s so kind of him!” Mrs Pribble cooed, turning to where Fluffy was sitting, miserable and furious. “Do you hear that, Fluffy?”
“Wan tweat!”
“You’re going to get thin and healthy!”
“WAN TWEAT!!!”
The vet reached into a drawer and pulled out a small gummy candy, specifically designed to keep fluffy ponies quiet. It had very little actual sugar content, it was just a chewy little lump that tasted vaguely like sweet fruit, but was particularly rubbery and chewy, enough so that it’d shut the thing up for a while.
While Fluffy busied himself gnawing at his rubbery treat, the vet ushered Mrs Pribble to the door.
“And he won’t be hurt?” She asked nervously.
“Absolutely not, Mrs Pribble. He might be unhappy about it, but it’ll just be good old fashioned exercise, nothing else. No chemicals, no abuse, nothing like that.”
“Oh, good. And you’ll call me as soon as he’s ready?”
“Of course! Just check with the receptionist before you leave, to make sure that your home phone number is up to date…”
Mrs Pribble headed out, and the vet closed the door behind her, turning to look at the fluffy pony perched on the scale. What she’d said was true, it was hard to tell if a fluffy pony was fat or not at a glance, but even then, there were some telltale signs that the half-blind half-deaf half-mad Mrs Pribble wouldn’t have ever noticed.
The way the eyes were barely able to open due to the way the bulbous cheeks and forehead around them squished them closed. The way the head didn’t protrude from the body but more tapered out of it. The way that, if the fluffy looked directly upright, the face would appear to be simply growing from the round bulk that was the rest of it.
The vet loved animals, and tolerated fluffy ponies at best. They were a cheap gimmick, perfect for old people who wouldn’t be around long or for people who didn’t care enough about an animal’s needs to get a real pet. The vet didn’t HATE fluffies, but they were definitely not her favourite thing to work with. They were loud, obnoxious, either too happy or too arrogant, often covered in their own shit, and almost always had some kind of health defect that couldn’t be fixed by the time they were brought to her.
They were physically wretched creatures, no two ways about it.
Fortunately, she hadn’t been lying about her friend either. At least, not TOTALLY lying.
He did offer a service to get fat fluffies thinner… but it was only offered to her, as they were old friends. It was free… but not because he loved fluffies. It was free because he loved making them exercise.
In brief… he loved to make them suffer.
And of course, there would be no abuse. None whatsoever. No blood, no burns, no broken bones. Just good old fashioned exercise, just like the vet had promised.
She looked at the obese little mistake sitting on the scale, glaring at her as it continued to chew on the gummy candy, as if it expected her to try and steal it out of it’s fat little mouth.
She smirked, and took out her phone, dialing the first contact on her list.
“Leonid? Yeah, it’s me, I’ve got another one for you. Oh you’ll love him, he’s an absolute pig.”
“FWUFFEH NO PIG!” The fat fluffy pony yelled around a soggy mouthful of half-chewed gummy candy. “FWUFFEH AM FWUFFEH!”
“Yeah, that was him. When can yo- …now? Oh thank god, I want this thing out of here as soon as possible. Great, can’t wait, see you soon!”
The vet dug into their drawer and took out another, very special gummy candy… one that was loaded with a very light sleeping drug, just enough to knock a fluffy out cold for at least an hour.
Which would be more than enough time for Leonid to pick the thing up.
Leonid stepped out of his car, parked quietly behind the veterinarian’s cllinic, and headed to the back door, his black boots crunching loudly on the gravel with every step.
Leonid was a sight to behold. A flat 6-feet tall, thin as a rail, with ghostly white skin, sunken eyes and a face peppered with old scars. He wore mostly black, which offset his pale complexion. His head was shaved, not because he was a skinhead, but because he simply didn’t care what people thought, and letting them THINK he was a skinead guaranteed they wouldn’t talk to him.
And that was how he liked it.
Leonid rapped his scraped knuckles against the backdoor, and a moment later the vet opened it. She smiled at him, and quickly passed him a grubby cat carrier with an old blanket draped over it.
“He’s in there.” She said. “Gave him a special gummy to put him to sleep, should last until he gets to your place.”
Leonid took the carrier and peeked inside, lifting the blanket just enough to see a scruff of cream yellow fur with a powder blue mane. He smiled. He considered himself even better than the vet at telling when a fluffy was fat.
“Thanks.” He said, his deep Russian accent punctuating every letter. “I’ll bring it back when I’m done.”
“Sure thing. What are you planning?”
“The full works.” He said, heading back to his car. “My manager was a shit today. Gonna have some fun.”
Only a few hours later, Fluffy opened his eyes as best he could, squinting through the layers of fat that surrounded it’s face.
He felt funny. He’d been at the stupid vet’s stupid office, she said a bunch of stupid things about numbers and words (SO STUPID!!!) and then stupid mama went away. She always went away though, then she’d come back with treats. So Fluffy wasn’t upset mama was gone, mama going away meant more treats for Fluffy!
But Fluffy looked around, and felt strange. Mama was nowhere in sight. Stupid mama. But then Fluffy realised… he didn’t know where he was. This wasn’t the stupid vet’s stupid office, but it wasn’t stupid mama’s stupid home.
The room he was in was big, but all very grey. Bare concrete walls and floors, not much light, and although it was hard to tell through Fluffy’s many thick layers of skin and fur, it was cold too.
Fluffy was confused. And when Fluffy was confused, he fell back on the only thing that he knew always worked.
“FWUFFEH WAN TWEAT!” He squeaked into the room, briefly startled at the sound of his own voice bouncing back at him so harshly. “FWUFFEH WAN TWEAT! FWUFFEH WAN TWEAT NOW! TWEAT NOW! NOW!”
Fluffy heard footsteps. Then a man appeared. He was big, and scary, with a white face and black clothes, and a cigarette in his mouth. He looked down at the fluffy pony, and the look on his face filled Fluffy with dread.
This was not stupid mama. This was something else.
“WAN TWEAT!” He squeaked, trying to sound brave. “FWUFFEH WAN TWEAT! TWEAT NOW!”
“No.” Leonid replied sharply, his own voice echoing around the room and beating Fluffy’s brain with repetition.
“YES! TWEAT!”
“NO!” Leonid roared suddenly, the noise alone frightening Fluffy, but the echoes frightening it again and again with every reverb.
Finally, Fluffy was quiet, terrified into silence.
“Do you know why you’re here?” He asked.
“Tweat.” Fluffy replied. Leonid briefly wondered if it was genuinely the only thing the worthless sack of shit could actually say.
“Actually, yes.” He said. Fluffy’s eyes lit up for a moment, then Leonid continued. “You’re here because you had TOO MANY treats. You’ve gotten fat, and that’s made your mama very sad.”
Fluffy paused. Mama was sad? …well, who cares? That’s mama’s problem, stupid mama. She should have brought Fluffy more treats, that would’ve stopped her from being sad! Stupid stupid mama!
“Wan tweat!” Fluffy said. Leonid stamped his booted foot against the floor, his thick sole banging loudly against the hard concrete, startling the pony back into silence.
“Shut up. You’re not here to eat treats. You’re here to lose weight. You’re fat, and disgusting, and that makes your mama sad. So you’re not going to see her again, you’re not going to get treats again, until you lose weight!”
Fluffy couldn’t process the thought. No more treats? Never? Until he… ‘lost weight’? But Fluffy didn’t know what ‘weight’ was! He couldn’t lose it if he didn’t even know where to find it!
“W… wan twe-”
“SHUT UP!” Leonid barked. “No more treats! No more treats EVER! Not until you exercise, you fat little freak!”
Fluffy was about to cry. Stupid mama was stupid and stupid and stupid, but she never talked to Fluffy like this! Even stupid vet was stupid and stupid and stupid, but not like THIS!
“Wan… wan t-”
That was as far as Fluffy got before Leonid’s vice-like grip snatched him up by the throat, squeezing him just hard enough to stop him speaking, but not hard enough to completely suffocate him.
This wasn’t Leonid’s first rodeo.
Fluffy almost passed out several times, but then he was let go, gulping down great lungfuls of air… but then his vision began to clear, and suddenly Fluffy felt something pinching at his belly. He snorted and looked around, barely able to turn his head due to the mountain of fat around his neck, but he was just barely able to see Leonid tying a length of string around the fluffy pony’s fat belly.
“Wha’ doin’?!” Fluffy snorted. Leonid ignored him, and led the other length of the string in front of Fluffy. It was only now that Fluffy realised it was in a new place. The room was still grey and cold, but the ‘floor’ was strange, kind of hard but smooth. He looked up, and saw a set of metal bars in front of it, two rising vertically before meeting in the middle, and forming some funny shapes on either side. Leonid was tying the length of string around one of them. Fluffy snorted again.
“Wan tweat!” He howled. “Wan tweat, ohw… ohw will gib poopies!” He said. It had been a very long time (in a fluffy’s lifespan) since Fluffy had needed to threaten anyone like that, he’d almost forgotten how to do it!
“No you won’t.” Leonid replied calmly. Fluffy huffed, and squinched his face up, determined to show the stupid man that he WOULD give poopies… by doing exactly that!
But a minute later, nothing had happened, and Fluffy let out a gasp as he finally had to relax his sphincter muscles.
“Poopies! Come owt now!” He ordered, stamping his fat hooves on the ground. What the fat shit hadn’t known was that, while he was asleep from the special gummy candy, the vet had made sure he wouldn’t make a mess on the trip to Leonid’s place. A very brief enema and he was good to go. In basic terms, the fluffy pony didn’t have a single ounce of shit left inside it. He could try and try until he was blue in the face, he wouldn’t be able to let out a single nugget.
Meanwhile, as Fluffy had been desperately trying to shit himself, Leonid had finished with the string.
He’d bought the treadmill on Ebay for $50. It was old but it worked, at least a little, and that’s all Leonid needed from it. The string was tied to where the handlebars met in the middle, where the very basic over-10-years-old digital display was sitting. He pressed one of the buttons to turn it on, eliciting a ‘beep’ from it.
The electronic squawk sound got Fluffy’s attention.
“What stoopid hooman doin?! Gib tweat!” Fluffy snapped. Leonid smiled down at it.
“No. Now listen up you fat little fuck.” He said. “You’re going to start running. And you don’t stop until I say so.”
“No! No wan wunnin! WAN TWEAT!” Fluffy retorted.
“Too bad.” Leonid said, pressing the digital display again. Suddenly the floor under Fluffy’s feet began to MOVE! Fluffy was moving AWAY from the mean human! At last, the stupid floor had decided to listen to it’s better! Fluffy was about to celebrate with another attempt at making poopies, when suddenly the string was pulled taut, and Fluffy let out a yelp.
The string was keeping him in place, but the floor was still moving. It was only smooth, shiny plastic, but it was tacky enough to grip at Fluffy’s fur and hooves, just enough to tug at them, making it VERY uncomfortable for the sensitive little fatso to be try and stay still.
Instincts took over, and Fluffy began walking, stumbling at first but eventually manging to step properly at a normal pace (well, normal for a fluffy pony). Leonid looked down at him, it had only been 30 seconds since the treadmill started moving, and already the fatass was huffing and panting.
“How’s the running?!” Leonid shouted at it. The fat fluffy pony seemed to remember he was there, and frowned.
“NO WIKE WUNNIN!” He squealed between gasps for breath. “WIKE TWEATS! WAN TWEATS!”
“Too bad.” Leonid said again, pressing the display once again. Suddenly the treadmill started to move faster. For an adult, this would be barely above walking speed. For a fat fluffy pony, this was a hard sprint. Fluffy was suddenly forced to run as fast as it’s fat little legs could go, practically galloping on the ever-moving plastic floor.
“NO! WIKE! WUNNIN!” He gasped, his cream yellow fur soaked with sweat, making it harder and harder to move with the added weight.
“Keep running!” Leonid shouted. “Keep running and you might get a treat!”
At the sound of that golden word, Fluffy woke up as if from a daze. A treat! A TREAT! Finally the stupid man was listening! He must have grown a brain at last! Fluffy had been asking politely for treats, and finally the stupid man was going to give him one!
“TWEAT!” Fluffy shouted. “TWEAT! TWEAT! TWEAT! TWEAT!”
“Only if you keep running!” Leonid replied, watching the fluffy pony with quiet delight.
Truth be told, Leonid didn’t hate fluffy ponies alone. He hated a lot of things. But most of all, he hated fat people. He had grown up in a very poor area of Russia, his entire family had been thin, his own father had actually died of malnutrition. They never had enough for everyone to eat, but the family looked out for each other, and always tried to provide what they could for the youngest… for young Leonid.
And so it was that by the age of 15, Leonid was the only one of his family still alive.
Ten years later and he had made it to America, and harbored nothing but hatred for fat people. Their disgusting excessitude, their lack of hygiene, their drought of compassion for others less fortunate… it made Leonid sick to his stomach to see them wobbling around the streets and squeezing themselves into taxis and buses.
But of course, you can’t torture fat people. Not unless you want to be the villain in a 90s movie starring Anthony Hopkins, anyway. No, you can’t torture fat people… but you can torture fat fluffy ponies.
Hell you can torture tham any way you want, there’s no laws against it. Most people don’t even consider it that surprising when people do. People who like them, like them. People who don’t like them, don’t like them. Everyone else falls into a middleground of not being willing to hurt them themselves, but not worrying about them getting hurt either.
And thus, Leonid found his hobby. His newfound way of feeling joy after his flinty heart had felt so hard and cold for so many years.
He was going to make fat fluffies thinner. He was going to punish them for their greed. He was going to make them grateful for every morsel of food they could get their stubby little hooves onto. And then, when they were good and fucking grateful for what they had, he’d send them back home as reformed animals.
Obedient and healthy, as all pets ought to be.
Leonid came out of his musings to realise a full 5 minutes had passed. He looked down, and smiled. Fluffy was an absolute wreck. He was drenched with sweat, his stubby feet were constantly tripping on the moving floor from the sheer lack of energy left to lift them anymore. His eyes were oozing tears, his nose oozing snot, which was mixing with the sweat to create a disgusting dampness all over the front of the fat beast’s face and body. If he listened carefully, Leonid could hear the worthless thing’s ‘huu-huu-huu’s. The sound made him smile. It told him he was doing a good job.
Without saying anything, he stopped the treadmill. The fat slob didn’t notice and kept galloping along, stumbling and tripping the entire way, until it launched itself off the treadmill. Fluffy let out a sudden sound, like a cross between a yelp and a squawk, as the string was pulled taut again, halting it before it hit the ground, but also suspending it just above the floor in a very uncomfortable way.
Leonid reached into his leather jacket and took out a switchblade, popping the knife open and slicing the string off. Fluffy hit the ground with a damp ‘thud’ and let out a pathetic ‘waaah…’ before falling silent. Leonid checked it briefly, he’d be in deep shit if it was dead… but it was still breathing. The breaths were short, ragged and wheezing, but it was still breathing, and that’s all that mattered.
Leonid picked up the string, not wanting to touch the fat sweaty shit with his bare hands, and carried it away from the treadmill towards his designated kitchen area. His entire home was a basement apartment he rented from a guy who was definitely either a crackhead or a crackdealer… but HE probably suspected Leonid of the same, so neither one of them bothered the other, and they were happy with that. As long as Leonid slipped his rent under the guy’s door every month, they didn’t even need to speak to each other.
Leonid got to the small set of counters and opened the fridge, taking out a metal bowl full of the fluffy’s food. Raw vegetables, cold as hell and slightly slimy with moisture, but it’d do. It was good, healthy food, exactly what a fluffy should be eating… but exactly what a fat disgusting spoiled-rotten fluffy like Fluffy had probably NEVER eaten.
Leonid dropped the fluffy on the ground, earning another ‘wah!’ from it, then gave it a quick tap with his foot to wake it up.
“How did you like running?” He asked. Fluffy, still gasping for breath, glared up at him.
“No… wike… wunnin…” Then, Fluffy remembered something Leonid had said. “Wunnin done… wan tweat… yoo say… have tweat… when wunnin… wunnin done…”
Fluffy lapsed back into laboured breaths, clearly too exhausted to keep talking. Leonid nodded.
“You’re right. I said that, and you’ve earned your treat.” He knelt down and put the metal bowl on the floor in front of it. “There.” He said. “There’s your treat. Good, healthy, nutritious food.”
Fluffy looked at the metal bowl. His mind was still hazy from the awful, awful, stupid, awful, stupid, stupid, STUPID exercising it had just had to endure… but it looked, to Fluffy, like the ‘treat’ was a big bowl of green things and orange things and purple things and white things!
“Dat… dat no tweats!” Fluffy gasped.
Back with stupid mama, Fluffy had only ever been given the BEST of treats! Soft brown chocolates and gooey toffees and salty crunchy crackers and… and CAKE! Cake was the best treat! It came in so many colours and so many tastes! No cake was ever like the last cake! But cake was ALWAYS good! It was like MAGIC!!!
And now… now Fluffy had been given a bowl of… of STUFF! Green bits that looked like grass, orange bits that were little circles, purple leafys and white strings… it wasn’t treats at all!
“STOOPID HOOMAN!” Fluffy yelled, throwing a full-blown tantrum. “THIS NO TWEATS! THIS BAD! FWUFFY NO WAN DIS! FWUFFY WAN TWEATS! TUH-WEE-EATS!!! GIB WEAL TWEATS NOW STOOPID HOOMAN!!!”
“No.” Leonid said. Fluffy did NOT like that!
“WAAAAAAN TWEAAAAATS!!!” He bawled, stamping his hooves against the hard concrete floor (which he very quickly stopped doing, because the hard floor hurt his gentle little hoofsies).
“No.” Leonid said again. “This is all you have to eat.”
"Buh… buh don’ wan it!" Fluffy said, at a loss for what else there was to be done.
“Well either you eat the vegetables… or you STARVE!!!” Leonid said, ending with a shout so fearsome it would make Odin think twice. It stunned Fluffy for a good few seconds, during which Leonid got up and went to sit down on the couch that doubled as his bed.
Fluffy spent the next hour doing everything in his power to avoid the vegetables. He was certain the stupid human had SOME treats SOMEWHERE! Stupid mama ALWAYS had treats! Most of the time she brought them right to Fluffy’s awaiting mouth, but sometimes when she was asleep, Fluffy would have to help himself, which he would do with gusto! After all, finding treats was no easy task! It took a really smart, strong, special fluffy pony to pull it off! And Fluffy ALWYAS found treats! Even in the stupid vet’s stupid office, Fluffy had found a treat eventually! …by shouting for one! Clearly, Fluffy was ALWAYS able to find treats!
At least… until he met Leonid. Because Fluffy spent an hour dragging his exhausted, worked-to-breaking-point body around Leonid’s small, grimy apartment, and found absolutely nothing that resembled a treat. No chocolates, no cakes, no candies, no nothing! Not even a tiny crumb! Not a thing!
It was impossible! There were ALWAYS treats if you looked for them! You just had to look HARD enough! But Fluffy had circled Leonid’s apartment at least three times already (and three is a REALLY big number!), but had found nothing!
Finally, sulking, Fluffy returned to the kitchen. Surely by now the stupid human must have realised his stupid mistake and taken away the stupid ‘veh-guh-tuh-bolls’ and replaced them with tre-
NO!!!
It was impossible!
The nasty, gross, smelly VEGGY-TUBBLES were still there!
Fluffy wanted to cry. This just wasn’t fair! He was a GOOD fluffy! He always demanded treats when he wanted them, and he always ate them when he got them! He never made a mess unless someone stupid was being stupid and he needed to make them understand how stupid they were, and he always showed stupid mama how much he loved her by calling her stupid to her face!
What more could a fluffy pony do?!
Fluffy slumped down in front of the cold metal bowl of glistening, damp, now room temperature vegetables, and sulked. It wasn’t fair. It just was not fair at all!
His tummy let out a rumbley. It wasn’t a small rumbley either, it was a BIG rumbley! So big it HURT! Fluffy needed to eat! It had been… he wasn’t even sure anymore, but it had been a LOOONG time since he last ate! He was VERY hungry now!
He looked again at the bowl of vegetables, shining wetly in the dim light of the apartment, and, cursing himself for being so pathetic, inched forwards to take a tiny bite of one…
Leonid had watched the entire thing. The pathetic little rat had slumped and stumbled and dragged itself around the apartment, looking everywhere it could for something nice to eat, but finding nothing. Then it looked again. Then it looked AGAIN. It was so pathetic he almost wanted to laugh.
Leonid had dealt with some fat fluffies before, but this was a fucking legendary one! It’s like it’s entire life had been spent gorging itself on sweet treats and candies whenever it felt the slightest pang of hunger, and now suddenly that had vanished, and it simply couldn’t cope. Like it’s brain had been hard-wired from the moment of birth to be spoiled and selfish and pathetic, and now it was at a loss on what to do once that lifestyle had gone. It couldn’t just eat the food in front of it for the sake of survival, it outright refused, because it was convinced there must still be SOME way of getting a treat.
Leonid was almost IMPRESSED at how stupid it was. Maybe some of the fat had gone to it’s brain too.
At long last, the fat bitch had dragged itself weakly back to the vegetable bowl, staring at it for a few minutes, before finally giving in. It pulled itself closer and bit into a piece of carrot. It chewed it for a moment, then swallowed.
Leonid had decided to be nice. At least, for the food. The vegetables had all been boiled to remove as much taste as possible. As far as the fluffy shithead was concerned, it was eating a bunch of watery mush without any taste at all. Nothing good… but nothing bad either. Neutral enough that it could eat it without needing to vomit it back up later.
Before Fluffy even know what had happened, he had eaten more than half the vegetables, and actually let out a belch, before going back to eating more. Leonid watched, and smiled. The first day’s work was almost done with. There was only a few things left to do, although they would be the most important parts.
(Part 2)
