The Hubris of Flight
Part 1
“I hate that they think they can fly…”
His voice startled him. He hadn’t meant to speak aloud, and the sudden breaking of the silence inadvertently roused him from his trance.
He was closer to the store than he realized. He had been driving for nearly thirty minutes.
I don’t even remember getting into the car, he said to himself, internally this time. He had become more cognizant about how often he spoke to himself.
Maybe they’re right about me-
He shook his head and blinked his eyes rapidly. Couldn’t let that thought process continue.
He arrived at the FluffMart and parked in the lot. He had never been here before, outside of his dreams anyways. He had rehearsed this. He had wanted this for so long.
He walked across the parking lot towards the front facade of the store. Concrete blocks painted childish shades of pastels. The front windows were festooned with cartoonish fluffies accompanied by comicbook style speech bubbles;“fwuffy wub nu mummah and daddah!”. Shit like that.
He had actually done it. He stepped foot inside of FluffMart. He was here. He was inside. This was it.
“It’s just like a PetCo, but for fluffies…”
Fuck, I said that out loud, didn’t I? What a fucking retard. Let me look and see if anyone noticed.
He glanced around and saw a disinterested FluffMart employee stocking a nearby shelf. She was staring at him, but did not seem alarmed. Clearly she had seen some weirdos in this store before.
He met her gaze and smiled. In hindsight, the smile was too much. She cringed and looked back at the shelf in front of her, continuing to stack brightly colored plastic shit. Feeling foolish, he reflexively muttered a nonsensical slur under his breath and got back to the task at hand.
He walked the perimeter of the store, where the caged fluffies resided. Teddy bear sized horse-hamsters of every color imaginable. He took out his phone and began taking pictures of the ones who interested him.
“Be nu daddeh?”
“Nu daddeh take pictuwe of nu fwuffy?”
“huu huu wai nu daddeh nu tawk tu fwuffy?”
After a lengthy period of consideration, he had chosen. He went to the front register to begin the checkout process.
Two chirpeh babbehs. One male, one female. Both pegasi.
Two adolescents. One male, one female. Both pegasi.
Two adults. One male, one female. Both pegasi.
He waited patiently at the front counter while the wary employee placed his new fluffies into flimsy folding cardboard containers. He insisted each fluffy be placed into a seperate container, much to the huu huu of the fluffies themselves. Before long, all six fluffies were packaged and ready to go.
Just as he was about to pay, he noticed a small display of “poopeh” fluffs, all of which were heavily discounted. He glanced into the display pen, the assorted brown horselets wandering and whinnying retardedly, save for one calm fluff sitting in a corner. It was staring up at him, but did not beg for a home. It didn’t speak at all. He felt as if it was looking into his soul. He noticed it’s horn and wings, a combination of features that would have gotten it killed in any other pen. Perhaps the downtrodden brown fluffs were more empathetic to their alicorn kin? He locked eyes with the fluffy and decided it would be his seventh. A short wait and one more folding cardboard container was added to his cart.
As he exited the store, pushing has cart full of winged monstrosities, the alicorn called out to him, saying “nice mistuh… tank ou fow saving munstah babbeh. Pwomise to be gud munstah an nu num uddah fwuffs”. He paused and opened the alicorns container. He picked up the creature with one hand and let it stand on his palm. He brought it up to his face, to the level of his eye, to truly examine the bizarre little creature.
“I really don’t see the appeal of the brown ones” he said, aloud.
The alicorn looked deflated, its head lowered and its wings dropped. He tightened his fingers around the creature and turned to face the store. He lifted his leg and put all of his body weight into a fastball throw, towards the pastel colored concrete exterior walls of the FluffMart. The screeeee of the alicorn was brief, and ceased immediately upon impact with the storefront.
The creature didn’t exactly pop like a water balloon, but it certainly didn’t remain intact. He thought it was going to pop, like a water balloon. A respectable amount of fresh gore ushered forth from the ruined critter, coating the wall and sidewalk in a sickening shade of Roadkill Red.
“THAT WAS FOR CLEEEVELAND, YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!” He said, a bit too loud, his voice cracking with the long-e sound in Cleveland. He didn’t actually know anyone in Cleveland. He wasn’t from there. He didn’t even know what happened in Cleveland, truth be told, but he felt cool saying it.
The female employee from the earlier awkward interaction walked out to the parking lot to see what the yelling was about. She saw him and stopped. She looked to where he was looking, and saw the splattered remains of the brown alicorn.
“C’mon man, really…?” She said with a sigh, going back into the store to get cleaning supplies.
He hurried to his car. He popped the trunk and moved several objects aside. Slingshots. Water balloon launchers. A potato cannon. Model rockets. He hurriedly began to move the cardboard containers from his shopping cart into the trunk.
“huu huuu fwuffy no wike bawks”
“p-peep!”
“tu dawk, nu can see whewe fwuffy am!”
“chirp! peep!”
“pwese no huwt wingeh babbeh, am onwy wittwe babbeh!”
He slammed the trunk lid closed and returned his attention to his empty shopping cart. He began to sprint, pushing it towards the nearest cart corral.
“I need to get the fuck out of here!” he screamed to the empty parking lot as he pushed the rickety cart at speeds far greater than it was designed to go. The noise was jarring, like putting a drawer full of silverware in the dryer. His eyes wild, his mouth open and gasping for air, he jumped onto the cart and rode it like a child would, with both feet on the crossbar. He rode the cart into the corral at high speed. The cart stopped abruptly and the push bar slammed into his abdomen. He yelped in pain and barked out an antiquated slur as he limped back towards his vehicle. Getting into the driver seat, he looked nervously at the front of the FluffMart.
She was staring at him, mouth agape, eyes wide. She was probably no more than twenty feet from him during that entire ordeal. He fear farted and started his car, his eyes locked on hers as he put his car in drive, accelerating forward over the concrete parking block. He maintained eye contact with her as he drove over a small grass partition, then a sidewalk, before careening onto the busy roadway, cars slamming on their brakes and honking their horns.
He swerved and sped away, heart racing.
“well, THAT could have gone better!” He said to himself, grinning cheekily at his reflection in the rear view mirror.
The protests of the fluffies in the trunk were muted by the virtue of their being in the trunk. He could hear complaints of “scardeh poopehs” and other cutesy terms for anxious diarrhea.
He turned over his shoulder, once again completely diverting his attention from the roadway, and screamed:
“I HATE THAT YOU THINK YOU CAN FLY!”