Chapter 13
Of course, it had to be JUST as he started not hating the microfluffies. He got a message on his pager. ‘Emergency in micro fluffy room’. Adam muttered profanities under his breath as he rushed back. Brushing the angora fluffs had relaxed him. He was intending to buy an angora fluff. Caring for one was good stress relief. Adam wasn’t an abuser so he genuinely wanted to care for one. It was more like raising a rabbit. He could even do braids, thanks to having little sisters and nieces.
Adam quickly got back into the microfoal room. It was too late.
“Huuhuu…Babbehs sabe nao. Mean mistahs nu get babbehs.” A sparkly blue microfoal sobbed. She’d just had her foals, only to eat them. She looked up at the two workers, and whimpered.
“Adam, you get the other mothers safe and calm.” Brian said, his voice barely controlling his rage. “Then come join me to see how we punish foal eating fluffies. Microfluffies are a bit…special with how we punish them.”
Adam nodded, and watched Brian pinch the new not mother up by the tail, casually swinging her as he went into what was labeled as the ‘Owies room’. Although the microfluffs were certainly small enough to have a punishment section, the separate room was part of the psychological part of the punishment. Plus it would stress out the expecting mothers.
Adam lightly lifted the microfluff mothers out of the cage, letting them rest in his hands. He’d have to clean them after, as many had voided themselves in fear earlier. “Hey, it’s okay.” He said gently to them. “That mother wasn’t a good mother at all. No good mummah would ever eat her foals. You’re all good mothers. She won’t be joining you again.”
The mothers were stressed and crying, especially the mother who’d birthed her own babbehs earlier. She was hugging the little jelly bean sized babbehs to her, crying. “Mummah nebah num babbehs! Babbehs am fo huggies and wuv. Nu for nummin!” She had been the farthest away, afraid of her babbehs being next. She might have been next.
Another first time pregnant fluffy looked up at Adam. She was a Twilight Sparkle micro fluff. “Mista? Wha did meanie mummah mean? Wai she tink babbehs huwt?”
Adam shook his head. “I don’t know. We don’t hurt fluffies here unless you’re being punished.” He said, lying through his teeth. They used a soft hand with micros, and hadn’t culled any unless they had a birth defect. They were boosting up the numbers for now. They had very few ‘poopie babbehs’ as of now. Bad colors had been included in the breeding pool, and given one chance. If they did not have good colors, they were removed from it. Sometimes they got very good combinations.
The microfluffy nodded, apparently satisfied with that. She wanted to believe it. She patted her very pregnant belly. “Mummah twy to nu wowwy. Bad fo tummeh babbehs.” She said. This was her first pregnancy, so she was nervous.
Adam nodded. “Indeed. It’s good to be calm. You ladies lay here, and I’ll clean out your safe room.” Calling it a ‘safe room’ felt odd, considering it was little more than a hamster cage. He took out the paper towel flooring, tossing it out. He washed his hands after, glad to have the piss and shit off his hands before he put down new toweling for them, telling the mummahs their home was ‘nice and clean’. Okay, so the microfluffs weren’t too bad either. Maybe because they were happier. They had the childlike excitement fluffies were meant to have, but couldn’t go running around. They were mummahs, and not too mobile.
Adam was just replacing the mothers when one mother on her second pregnancy was shaking. “Bi-biggest poopies!” She screamed. She wasn’t due for another two weeks.
Adam quickly put some soft toweling behind her after she voided her bowels on the counter. “Alright, stay calm. Breathe and we’ll get through this.” He said. He worried about her losing the litter. It was too early. There wasn’t exactly a large market for micro fluffs. Mostly toys and food. They didn’t even sell official beds for microfluffies. If these foals were sickly, they were doomed.
The mother was a pure white monocolor pegasus. She sobbed through the pain, pushing the foals out.
Adam’s heart sank. They were too small. Hairless. They didn’t chirp as they came out, and more blood than was normal also came out with them. Luckily micro births were quick, and the six foals all came out silently.
“Babbehs? Nu heaw chiwpies…” she said worriedly.
“I’m sorry…” Adam said, but didn’t have to say anything else.
The microfluffy had turned around, and started sobbing. “NUUUUU! BABBEHS!” She flailed her front hooves on the toweling. “WAI BABBEHS GU FOWEVAH SWEEPIES!?” She flinched initially as she felt a finger on her head, but it was only Adam, stroking her for comfort. “You were too stressed. But it’s not your fault. You saw something horrible today.” He carefully brought her over to an isolation cell. It sounded oppressive, but it was made clear to the fluffies it was not a sorry box. It was a place to rest. They even had mesh windows to talk to each other and a stuffie friend…which was actually a stuffie friend jr. meant for regular sized fluffy foals. “You’ll rest here until the doctor says you’re okay. Then we’ll go about you getting foals again. It cheered up the mother a little, but she still sobbed over her least foals.
Adam disposed of those in the biowaste, and checked on the other soon-mummahs. Luckily they were fine.
He went into the punishment room, where the other microfluff had already soiled herself.
“What took so long?” Brian asked, getting out a container of thumbtacks. He had tied some string around the fluffy’s tail and a hook from the ceiling.
“One of the mothers miscarried. Seeing a foal eater stressed her out too much.” Adam said.
Brian growled. “So now she’s destroyed more product.” He said. “She’s never going back into that mother room. We’re giving her the rougher studs and we’ll have a cage built like we use for regular fluffies. We’ll let the other micros see what happens to foal eaters.
Adam nodded. “What do we do until then?” He asked. “We can’t delay punishment or she won’t understand why she’s being punished.”
“Glad you asked. That’s why I got the thumbtacks. They work best for foals and microfluffs are about the same size. Brian gave the microfluff a push, sending her swinging.
“NUUU! Nu wike swingies! Pwease stahp!” The fluffy pleaded.
“You want to stop?” Brian asked, taking a pin out, and holding it out. The fluffy was going to swing right into it. She noticed at the last second, but was powerless as it was pushed into her flank.
“SCREEEEEEEE! POIWNTIE OWIES!” She screamed. The thumbtack had stopped her though.
“But you’re stopped.” Brian said with an evil grin. “You want to keep swinging?” He pushed the fluffy, letting her slide off the thumbtack. He laughed as the microfluffy puked, the not yet digested foals plopping on the table. “Oh, there’s your foals.” He pointed out. “A shame. They were really pretty babbehs.” He said. He stuck her a few more times, always sure to aim for her flank or back. He didn’t want to cripple her, but he wasn’t going to let her get off easy for eating her babies. That was one of the things that got him really pissed off. It was suspected Brian had some sort of parental or abandonment issues with how he volunteered to punish bad mothers, and did so with relish.
This game went on a few more times, the fluffy getting what she wanted, but not in the way she expected. Brian eventually lowered her down, letting her fall the last few inches.
“Owies!”
“You think I give a shit about your ‘owies’? Break a leg for all I f*cking care.” He growled.
“B-bad wowdsies…” the microfluff cowered. Brian put her in a cage, which was nothing more than a toy cage, but it was too strong for a fluffy to break as well as too small for it to escape. “Nu wike sowwy box! Fwuffy am sowwy! Nu wan be in sowwy box!” Her pleas went ignored as both Brian and Adam walked out. Well, Brian walked out. Adam had to clean the table first. Then he got to leave.
He had to check on an even more new development of the Mill. Sea fluffies. Or rather, aquatic fluffies since they could be in salt water or fresh water. Adam knew that their gills worked fifrently in nature, hence the reason there were salt water and fresh water fish…but fluffies didn’t exist naturally, so f*ck the laws of nature, he guessed. He had to go to one of the newer facilities at the edge. It was less than a mile from a river, but they still kept the fluffies indoors. The river was partially dammed so the fluffies could be ‘tested’ in a way in an actual marine environment. It was intended for use for outdoor ponds, but Adam could see this as a disaster in the making. Teaching the aquatic fluffs how to survive in nature was asking for trouble when little Timmy got bored of them and decided to flush them or release them into a river. The fluffy would be able to survive and know what to eat…then reproduce and make more of their wretched kind.
Adam did NOT like the aquatic fluffs. He could just wrap his head around fluffy ponies. They were mammals. They worked like mammals, which he could deal with. What he could not deal with was already slapped together animals having gills put on them and being tossed into the water. He barely knew how to deal with fish, now he had to deal with a fluffy version of a fish.
The newer building had rows of fishtanks. They were long but narrow. It was so they could easily be caught by fishnets. There was no place a handler cold not reach. The tanks had a sandy substrate at the bottom. There were rows of fake plastic plants drying. Some had bite marks on them. Evidently sea fluffies were too stupid to be trusted with plastic plants. Adam went closer to the sign posted above, and sure enough it was a notice to not replace the plastic plants, as the sea fluffies tried to eat them, thinking they were nummies. Dumbasses. They were fed once a day with sea fluff fish food. It had to be an official brand since these things weren’t purely fluffy or purely fish. So their diet was even more special. Everything about these things were new. Adam hated it.
At least the mothers were kept isolated. They were in single tanks that left a little room for them to float around. He sighed as he heard the call “Biggest poopies!” Time to get to work.