Part 5
His name was Brownie, like a nummie he didn’t know anything about besides it was the same color as him, but to his mummah and meany siblings he was just Poopie, or Poopie Babbeh. His daddeh was the bestest fluffy in the whole herd! In all of fluffy land! Smarty. His daddeh was so cool, so smart, and was the only parent that cared about him. The only reason he had a name was because daddeh told mummah she had to give him one, and he shot down Poopie or Poopie Babbeh.
“Is poopie babbeh buh he am ouw poopie babbeh. Smawty no can hab babbeh wib nameies be poopie! Smawty wook wike dummeh! Dummeh mawe gib poopie babbeh namesies wike odda babbehs, ow Smawty takey babbehs away!” His daddeh had said, and Brownie had been so happy. All his siblings had names by then, and he was just poopie babbeh.
There was a lot of whining from his mummah but she finally agreed and tried a lot of ‘stiww dummeh name!’ as his daddeh put it, before finally agreeing on his name. But only his favorite sissy, and Daddeh, used his name. All his other siblings refused to call him anything but poopies, poopie, or poopie babbeh, and it gave him a lot of heart hurties.
But that wasn’t the worst part about his mummah. His mummah was making him eat poopies! He hated getting to eat food. He missed getting milkies, even if he was always hungry still. He was smaller than his siblings, and his teeth were still trying to come in, but as soon as his siblings weren’t having anymore milkies, he wasn’t allowed any more either. He loved the kibble, but he could barely eat any. He had to eat any poopies his bestest brother made because mummah said so. Even daddeh, his smarty daddeh, said that he had to too.
“Hab to num poopies fow brudda Bewwy untiw he big an stwong wike daddeh, dummeh Bwownie. He am bestest babbeh. Is you job as widdle poopie babbeh.”
He must have been a dummeh if daddeh said so. That made him really sad. He hated to num poopies. But daddeh was the bestest daddeh, and if he said that was his job, he would do it. Even if he really really didn’t want to.
But mummah was worstest mummah! She made him num any poopies that were in the nestie from any of his siblings! A good thing was that they didn’t do it too much, but they still had accidents, and then she’d yell at him and threaten to give him stompies if he didn’t clean the poopies. She was so meanies…
But so was his brother the bestest babbeh, Berry. He would never use the litter box ever never ever! He would yell at Brownie and tell him he had his bestest nummies for him. He didn’t fall for that anymore, though at least a few times he thought that meant he finally got to try sketties. It was just poopies, and poopies were the worstest nummies.
He wandered out into the big room that all the fluffies went into to eat, and that had the screen with all the pretty lights and funny shows! His siblings weren’t allowed to go out here without mummah, but mummah didn’t care what he did besides eating poopies, so he snuck out here for the third time now!
He was hungry, and he still could taste the not pretty poopies from earlier. Drinking water didn’t help, either. So he went to get kibble. There was always lots of kibble left, and all it took was him asking a nice big fluffy to give him some since the feeding trough was too high. He asked this nice yellow fluffy, and he got him some before saying he was a good babbeh for asking nicely! That gave him the best heart feels, and then he even got to num on kibble! It tasted so good! So so good! But he could only eat a little before he was full, and it really hurt his mouth to chew it. His teeth still weren’t in all the way, and it really roughed up his gums to chew.
He wandered around more, enjoyed the pretty screen with a lot of other bigger fluffies, all who ignored him, and then wandered back into the room, his tummy making weird noises again. He had to run to the litter box, and got sickies again in there. He was always getting sickies, but his siblings weren’t. Was it because he was a bad babbeh?
His mummah shouted his not name again, and he was forced to walk back to the nestie. He knew what he’d find there. He always did. The only good thing was he got to hug his best nicest sissy named Cherry, a bright red foal, after he was done. She was still nice to him. She still played with him and called him his name.
But he still missed being a little no teeth babbeh. When he couldn’t num poopies and they all drank delicious milkies, no matter how little he got. He really missed it.
Now that the foals had grown more, they were eating kibble too. It was a gradual shift, and some mothers seemed to keep their foals on milk for longer than others, but by now none of them were doing that. The baby boom was freshly into Juvenile stage, as it was described. Already halfway through their childhood, roughly speaking, and already these foals were looking really healthy and with much better coats than their parents.
There was little down in Steven’s mind that this was the result of abundant food supply and safe conditions. Less stress on parents in pregnancy, less stress in general, safe, warm, and the atmosphere in fluffy land was happy contentment, especially when a fluffy managed to get the slowly becoming harder to get sketties in their meal. That wasn’t on Steven, that was on them, his feeding was completely consistent now.
Fluffies were stupid and greedy at the best of times, especially ones like their Smarty, but some of the fluffies just smart enough to think about it had realized that, with all the Sketties on top of the food, they could go down the line and get even more sketties until someone got in their way or the feeding trough got crowded. The Smarty did this the most, eating four times more, if not occasionally more, sketties than if he just stood in one place and ate. In one way he was smarter than other fluffies, in knowing how to be a greedy glutton.
Some other fluffies followed his example, and it had become something of a roll of the dice whether you’d get any Sketties even if you were eagerly awaiting food time. On the positive for those less fortunate, the sauce would often still be stuck on the kibble’s top layer, so they did get something, but they were still missing out.
Most fluffies though, while they would occasionally get really upset based on his observations of them for being denied sketties, were more than happy just to know there was plenty of food to go around, and wouldn’t rush to eat. It didn’t help that, any of them unlucky enough to start eating no at the top layer of kibble was more likely to find a rogue piece of punishment bitter flavored kibble in their mouth, ruining their eating experience. Why rush to eat when you knew, as good as your food was, you might get a taste of shit in one bite?
So far his hypothesis was holding up, speaking of feeding them punishment kibble. Over the last few days since he’d written it up, he’d not only seen fluffies visually be repulsed by getting a bite of punishment kibble and then just try to play it off, he was also seeing an interesting behavior develop with the mummahs and their foals. He watched as it was happening again now.
He expanded the screen and made a point to write down the time and date and which camera it was to be sure this was catalogued specifically. There was a pink mare with several juvenile foals following her. If he didn’t already recognize this one he would have been reminded by the fact the mare’s special friend was shadowing a bit away, watching any fluffies near them suspiciously, the Red tuffie. This was his mare, and he was a very protective fluffy, even if he was just protecting them from other fluffies.
The pink mare walked up to the feeding trough, already ravaged for any hint of sketties, and after taking a few bites for herself, got onto her hind legs and started scooping kibble out by the hoof. It wasn’t the most effective method of scooping, but for a fluffy it just might be the best they could do. A shower of kibble hit the not so clean floor, covered with drips of sauce, and many crumbs of kibble, and let her foals have at it. Even the brown colored foal, which unlike the other examples he’d seen, was as well nourished as its siblings.
They all happily ate at the kibble, not caring about anything like the cleanliness of their eating surface, though Steven did wonder if his occasional rinsing the floor down with a hose was enough. It was a classic, changing a variable could hurt the integrity of the experiment, but also fluffies are so dumb they may make all their offspring sick, problem. For now, he leaned on not getting involved. They’d learn or suffer trying.
They all happily ate, that is, until one was unlucky enough to get a bite of punishment kibble. In fact, all their mummah’s haphazard scooping had mixed up the layers and introduced even more punishment kibble than they would run into just eating from the trough themselves. Oh, to see an act of care be punished by ignorance.
One poor foal’s first bite was punishment kibble. He was immediately spitting it out. “Nu taste pwetty! Is bad nummies…”
The mare gasped, “Nu babbeh! Is yummy yummy nummies! Nu say is bad nummies!” she said in a hushed tone, before nervously looking around to make sure no one heard. No fluffy seemed to.
“Bu no taste pwetty mummah…”
Before the mare could continue, a foal got a bite itself from its second piece of kibble, spitting it right out. “Yuckies!”
The mare gasped again, “Nu babbehs! You nu can say nummies is yuckies! Nummies is bestest nummies!”
The other foals looked confused by the entire event, “Nummies is bestest yummies! Wha bwudda an sissy sayin?” The brown foal asked, his other brother and sister that had been spared any punishment kibble so far nodding and adding their two cents.
The first foal, a light red but not quite pink filly with orange mane and tail, seemed utterly convinced by their disagreements that she’d somehow tasted the kibble wrong and gave it another go. She took another bite of the piece of kibble she’d started, and as expected, she spit that up too. “Yuckies! Nu! Taste! Pwetty!” she shouted.
That was enough to get fluffies looking, and not just looking, but glaring. At least 5 fluffies around nearby, and a few foals in their late juvenile stage, looked over and were affronted by the words they’d heard. Yucky nummies? Who would dare say such a thing?
The mare gasped and quickly moved to the filly to cover her mouth as she tried to keep shouting. “Nu babbeh!” she said in a not so hushed tone now, more panicked, “Nu can say dis! Hab to say is yummy nummies! There no is yucky nummies in Fwuffy wand! See?” she put down her hoof, and ate up the kibble, then did the same to the piece the other foal had taken a bite of. She even, in a panic, licked up the spit out pieces and with a grimace on her face swallowed it all down. “M-mm~ See? Is-” she gagged a moment then went right back to trying to look happy, “I-is…so yummies nummies…!”
The scene confused all the foals, but seemed to make the surrounding watching fluffies calm down. Red staring them all down daring them to try something did help with that, and while Steven thought the tuffie was just kinda funny to watch, he seemed to be a pretty intimidating figure to his own kind.
The foal, gradually, went back to eating, and when no more punishment kibble ended up in their mouths, the two that had been unlucky enough just looked confused by the whole thing.
“See babbehs? Nu nummies is yuckies.” The mare explained to them, clearly putting on an act but the juveniles were still too young to notice.
“Bu…firstest nummie was yuckies…nu was wyin…” The filly protested softly, trying to convince itself now.
“Nu! Babbeh nu is wyar. Babbeh just num nummies wong!” the mare reassured her, and in real time the filly was gaslit into believing this lesson from her mummah. The other foal that had also eaten punishment kibble seemed to look at his siblings, and they all nodded and agreed wholeheartedly with their mummah, even if they didn’t really follow either.
“Fwuffy Wand onwy hab bestest nummies. You nummed aww da odda nummies afta cause you nummed da wight way.”
A collective, ‘ooooooh’ spread over all their spawn and a series of bobbing heads in nods, taking this lesson to heart. By then the foals had all eaten their fill, and, quite happy to get them away from the scene of their wrongthink, guided them over to watch fluffy tv on the big screen with other fluffies, Red of course shadowing them along.
Steven couldn’t believe it. Well, he could, he just couldn’t believe he’d seen it happen so soon and live. It was a classic learned behavior being taught, and now he was wondering just how long it would take for the fluffies to admit some of their food tasted just truly terrible. If this learned behavior was being taught to all current foals, he had little doubt they would teach the same to their own offsping. How long could it really last? Until some fluffies were forced only to eat the bottom layer?
He switched the screen over to look at the poor mare that had been ostracized for her wrongthink, really for her being unlucky enough to get the first bite of punishment kibble. She was trying to be reintegrated back into the group, but was now branded as ‘a wyin dummeh mawe’ not to be trusted or believed. But she did anything and everything ordered of her by the Smarty in order to be allowed to see her babbehs.
She was a babbling mess, and still not completely clean from getting ‘sorry poopies’ multiple times now. Sent for the slightest thing to sleep in the big room that Steven was specifically trying to keep them from sleeping in. The only thing was, she wasn’t sleeping. Steven had seen a fluffy’s psyche begin to break down before, he’d looked at boards with examples that weren’t exactly the type of thing you talked about reading to friends. But he was filming the complete, slow breakdown of this fluffy and had to admit, he was tempted to keep the focus on her just to see if he might be able to sell the footage to those that liked this sort of thing. He really wasn’t interested in examining Fluffy psychology outside of the group, so his only real interest in her was that she was being made an example of, not what happened to her.
So, this fluffy had been sent away every night now to sleep in the big monster room. At first it was a given, she just wasn’t allowed into any rooms for what she’d done. But after they let her in to finally see her babbehs again after two nights, she was soon thrown back out for trying to tell her babbehs she wasn’t a, ‘wyin dummeh mummah’. She begged and pleaded, but was dragged out by the tail into the big room, and kept out until the door shut in her face, nearly getting a hood caught in the closing door.
She didn’t sleep in the room. She cowered in fear and kept trying to look around, only to again see it was too dark to see, hear more monster noises, and cover her eyes. Sure, she may have passed out a few moments here and there just from pure exhaustion, but with her heart going nuts and waking up her at the next monster noise, and the chill air of the fan blowing through the room the entire night, she was not having a good time.
Now, even when she tried to sleep in the day with plenty of fluffies around her and the light of day there to keep her feeling safe, she couldn’t sleep a wink. Maybe if they were nice enough to let her sleep in one of the rooms she could find a bare cubby and pass out to finally get some rest, but they didn’t.
Today he saw her extremely baggy, dark eyes, struggling as they darted wildly around. She kept trying to get up, only for her legs to buckle and give out. She was barely eating or drinking, and almost never getting sleep. She tried to crawl instead, hoping she may get to see her babbehs again today, but first she had to go ask the Smarty for permission.
It took her a solid twenty minutes to crawl herself across the big room, having to stop multiple times to catch her breath. When finally she got to the Smarty watching fluffy tv with a smile on his face, Steven noted the Smarty was becoming something of a TV addict, she tapped on his back and with a hoarse voice begged, “P-pwease Smawty…w-wyin dummeh mawe c-can…see babbehs now?”
He turned his head and glared down at her, puffing his cheeks. “Is Smawty Teebee time! Go way Dummeh mawe!”
“B-b-bu…p-pwease. Babbehs nee mummah…” she sobbed to herself quietly as the Smarty went back to watching. But she made the mistake to keep sobbing, and that distracted his tv time.
He glared down at her and got up, puffing up his cheeks even further, “Dummeh wyan mawe nu get see babbehs! Su noyin! Stop cwyin ow Smawty give wowstest sowwy poopies!”
“H-hu huuuuuuuu! N-nu wan sowwy poopieeeeees! Huuuuuuuuu!” she cried, just completely breaking down at the denial of the one thing she wanted more than anything, even sleep, and the threat of yet more gross smelling sorry poopies. It was the wrong move in front of the very unsympathetic smarty.
The Smarty turned around, raised his tail, and gave her sorry poopies right in her face. The hu huing was silenced for a moment, and then just became a broken series of sobs, too tired and broken down to know what to do now that she was covered in the vile liquidy substance. He gave her a disgusted look, then moved off a ways to continue enjoying his fluffy tv in peace, being joined by the various other fluffies around to get away from the ‘poopie dummeh’ as they now started to call her.
She stayed like that, fluffies making a point to steer wide around her, and even Steven stopped paying her any mind. He left a camera focused on her for any developments, but moved on to making any other observations he could for that day, and really found himself quickly getting back to watching his lawyer show he was now three seasons into.
But before he could finish his episode, he heard her started to freak out, even if that wasn’t what she was trying to do. He looked and saw that she could see her babbehs being guided by their daddeh.
“B-Ba-ba…b-babbehs! Is mummah! Hewe is!” she shouted progressively louder, forcing herself onto her feet for this, the vile liquid shit dried onto her face now. He was surprised to see her get up, but she was extremely shaky as she forced herself to walk closer.
He was guiding the babbehs to get some kibble, or to watch fluffy tv, but either way they passed in front of her, closer to the trough than to her though. They all stopped and looked, and looked confused, except the daddeh who quickly walked in front of his foals.
“Gu way! Yu nu get wye to babbeh again, poopie dummeh!” He stomped his hoof, and looked to have no sympathy at all for his once special friend.
“B-bu…d-dey is…mummah babbehs…!” She tried to come closer, the foals quickly started to join in with their daddeh.
“Mummah is wowstest mummah!” “Nu wike mummah!” “Mummah is poopie fwuffy!” “Nu wike wyan!” Their voices all came together, chiding their mummah.
The daddeh stood his ground, staring her down, until she finally couldn’t keep it up and collapsed, her legs giving out from under her. “O-owwies…hu huu…” she sobbed.
Their daddeh quickly led them all away, and the mare hu hued quietly. “H-hab wowstest heawt huwties…b-babbehs pwease…mummah huggies…”
No one interacted with her for the rest of the day, and she spent her night in that same spot. Hu huing to herself quietly.