Not a lot of Fluffy work in here, but I wanted to give a quick peek in Victoria’s backstory
“Why are you so sticky?”
Isabella Montero looked up towards her girlfriend Victoria Harkness, the two of them were taking a lazy afternoon on the hottest day of the summer so far. Victoria lay in a hammock at the edge of her garden, a thin white vest-top and bright red cut-off shorts were all she dared to wear in this heat, with a faux cow-boy hat draped over her eyes to block out the sun.
And Isabella was laying on top of Victoria, her head resting on her partner’s chest, her arm lazily lain across Victoria’s stomach, her black hair slowly entangling with her lover’s blonde mane as sweat fused the pair together. Isabella wore grass green bikini top and Daisy Duke Jean Shorts, taking advantage of Victoria’s privacy to let her body breathe a little in this heat.
“You say something?” Isabella asked.
“I said why are you so sticky?” Victoria replied, her eyes still covered by her hat.
“S’what happens when you get nice and sweaty hermosa.” She giggled, dancing her fingers along Victoria’s exposed abs.
“Allow me to rephrase. Why did you think it was a good idea to ruin my relaxation with your hot ass.”
Isabella giggled again, dancing her fingers upwards until they were just grazing the bottom of Victoria’s braless chest. “And here I thought you liked mi culo caliente. Would you rather be alone and comfortable or hot and sticky with me.”
“… … … … I plead the fifth.”
“Puta! No sé por qué te aguanté.”
“Hey, hey, hey. I’m just joking around. Of course I’d rather spend time with you. I was just… I don’t know, lying for fun I guess.”
“You know you do that a lot hermosa. Lying. I thought it was just something you did with Fluffies to mess with their heads, but I’ve caught you doing it a few times to me and Vincent. Sometimes it’s like you don’t even realise you’re doing it, it just comes naturally to you. I like you Tori, but I don’t want to question everything you say to me if we’re going to be serious about us.”
Victoria was silent for several seconds as she took in what Isabella was saying.
“What do you want me to do?”
“I… don’t know. Tell me something true I guess, something I can believe so I can trust you.”
Isabella slumped down, her head resting on Victoria’s heartbeat and her arms wrapping tighter around her partner.
“Perdon hermosa. I didn’t mean to ruin this, let’s forget it and go back to relaxing.”
The two women tried to let it go, but it was clear a can of worms had been spilled and needed to be addressed quickly. After several moments of awkward silence, Victoria cleared her throat and spoke up.
“Did I ever tell you about the first time I hurt a Fluffy?”
“Que? Where did this…?”
“It’s related trust me.”
“Um… maybe, you told me about Apricot I mean.”
“Apricot was the first Fluffy I owned, she wasn’t the first one I hurt. It’s a long story but it might help shed some light on… on some of the things I do and how I am, so please, just indulge me for a second and let me share this with you.”
Isabella shifted to get more comfortable and readied herself for Victoria’s story.
“Whenever you’re ready.”
“Ok, it was back during my first week of Uni, and I was invited to a freshers party….”
8 years earlier, on a brisk mid-September evening, a mid 20s year old Victoria held her jacket tight as she rushed into the student halls, the flashing lights and sound of pounding electronic music told her this was the place to be.
She was surprised at how lively the place was, she had expected the typical house-party bullshit; cramped halls filled with drunken idiots trying to suck each others faces off, but somehow the students had organised an entire gym-sized hall to let loose in, with music, booze and more. It was impressive, but then again, this was one of the premier Universities in the country, the student could afford to be impressive.
Now inside the building, Victoria made a show of revealing herself, she wore a backless silver-halter-top which was cut just an inch lower than it should’ve been, a pair of dark blue jeans so tight she could hardly breath in them, and black strappy high-heels that were just high enough to show off her legs without being impossible to walk in. She’d even topped off the ensemble with a light spray of glitter in her hair to make her long blonde locks sparkle.
She hadn’t committed to going to this school or not yet, but she wanted people to notice her all the same.
With a wry smile, she handed her coat to the poor sober boy at the reception desk, his jaw swinging open at the sight of her.
She chuckled. “Don’t I get a ticket?”
“What? Oh, yes, sorry, I was… Here you go.”
The nervous teenager handed Victoria a dark green stub with the number 144 written on it, she slowly and carefully tucked it into her back pocket.
“I don’t recognise you, which class are you in?” The boy asked, probing for information to start a conversation.
“Oh I don’t go here, not yet anyway, still feeling my way around. But maybe you’ll be seeing more of me soon.”
The boy gulped so hard he started a coughing fit, Victoria smirked and walked away before the teen died of embarrassment. She had attention to sate herself for the moment.
Walking into the hall she was greeted by the stench of sweat and cheap liquor, disco light flashed from red to blue to green to red again in vague rhythm with the music which was currently playing Delirious by Steve Aoki just a little bit too loud. Victoria scoffed at how easily she’d been duped, all the bells and whistles from outside had distracted her from the fact that this was just another shitty house party. And she put in so much effort for her outfit as well.
Not wanting to waste another minute sober, Victoria made her way to the bar, which unfortunately was heaving but with only one place to buy booze it was either wait or be sober, Victoria chose to wait. She slide her slender body forward through the crowd until she was able to find purchase at the bar, unfortunately it didn’t do her much good as the three staff on shift seemed to be entirely focused on the other end of the bar.
“Excuse… s’cuse me… hello I… motherfucker.”
“Don’t get your hopes up.”
Victoria turned to the pretty redhead standing beside her, she was wearing a doctors coat, a head-mirror and a stethoscope, but also a tight red camisole, lacy but not low-cut like her own top.
“They’ve been ignoring this side of the bar for 10 minutes now, they just focus on whoever they can see first and they’re all on that side.”
“Fuck, do they expect me to make it through this thing sober. I expected more from this place so I didn’t pre-drink.”
“Here, try some of this.”
The redhead lifted her stethoscope to reveal a straw hidden in the chest-piece. Victoria took a sip and was hit was a very sweet, very strong flavoured drink that almost immediately went to her head.
“Jesus fuck that’s strong. What the hell have you got in there?”
“Cherry liquor and cola, the good shit as well. I knew the moment the planning committee ordered one bar this kinda shit would happen. I was hoping to nurse a cider to keep things interesting but that’s clearly not going to happen.”
Victoria looked round at the bar, the bartenders all still on the otherside, and then she noticed the bottle of vodka left precariously unattended just over the counter on their side.
“I got an idea.”
Victoria spilled her plan to the redhead so fast she didn’t have time to object before Victoria threw it into motion. Standing up on her tiptoes, she reached over the bar and started reaching for a few cans of cola in an ice-bath just in front of her. Almost immediately, one of the barmen rushed over towards her.
“Hey, hey, hey, what do you think you’re doing?”
“What? Oh, is this not a free bar?” Victoria asked in a ditzy, high-pitched voice.
“No, it’s not.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I just saw the drinks and I thought they were free to take. There wasn’t anyone over here to ask. Teehee.”
Behind the barman, Victoria watched as her new redheaded friend reached over the counter and nicked the vodka bottle, slipping it into her doctor’s coat.
“I have money.” She turned her attention back to the barman. “Can I pay for them now?”
“Listen miss I’ve got… yeah sure, whatever.”
The barman was clearly not in the mood to deal with airheaded bimbos today, he took a fiver from Victoria and let her take the cans so the whole mess was over with. Victoria noted that he had overcharged her but considering what she just pulled she figured they were even. Taking her cans, she ran over to where the redhead was waiting on the other side of the hall, far away from prying eyes of suspicious bartenders.
The two women giggled at the success of their ploy. “Holy shit, that was so much fun.”
“I know, and so easy, you took it right out from under them.”
“And you. Where did that sexy baby voice come from?”
“Years of practise.”
The redhead chuckled and pulled out the vodka bottle whilst Victoria grabbed a table and cracked open two of the cola cans. The redhead then poured a generous amount of the vodka into each can until both were topped up and overflowing.
Victoria raised her can. “Cheers.”
“Cheers.”
The women ‘clinked’ their cups and each took a big swig, gulping down a decent amount in one go. After the first swallow, the Redhead topped them both up with more vodka.
Liking her new friends’ style of thinking, Victoria took the opportunity to learn a little more about her partner in crime.
“I’m Victoria, Victoria Harkness.”
“Katherine Townsend. Did you say Harkness?”
“Yeah.”
“There was a Professor Harkness that worked here about 10, 12 years back, he died on a school trip and they named a library after him. Don’t usually hear the name so thought it was funny.”
Victoria chuckled. “You want to know the funniest part? That was my dad.”
Katherine’s face dropped. “Oh shit, fuck I’m so sorry I didn’t…”
“Don’t worry about it, like you said it was a long time ago. I’ve come to terms with it. Plus the University basically admitted his death was their fault since there should’ve been a second chaperone on that bus so they gave me and my brother full scholarships so we wouldn’t sue. That’s why I’m here now, checking the place out before I pick a major.”
“You haven’t decided yet.”
Victoria shook her head. “No, not sure if I’m indecisive or just looking to keep my options open. Just so long as I’m not stuck in a fucking office cubical answering fucking emails for 8 hours a day. What about yourself, you studying medicine or is the sexy doctor look just for special occasions?”
Katherine giggled. “The dress-up was supposed to be for my boyfriend, he’s the doctor, I’m studying to be a vet. But he couldn’t make it tonight, something about an early meeting with Professor Deckard tomorrow morning, I probably should’ve changed but fuck it, I look good, might as well flaunt it while I got it.”
“Oh you definitely got it.” Victoria said with a snarl, her eyeballs blatantly licking Katherine’s form right up.
Unfortunately Katherine was too tipsy and the music too loud for her to catch Victoria’s predatory tone. Rather her attention was on one of the doors near the back of the hall that a couple other students had already gone through.
“Hey…” She said, turning back to Victoria. “…You know anything about Fluffies?”
“Fluffies? Small, cute, annoying. Do nothing all day but shit and fuck. I know them, not had much to do with them but I’ve seen them around. Why?”
“Come with me.”
Katherine led Victoria across the hall, into a back corridor, and through a conspicuous wooden door that led to a set of stairs heading down. Even with the deafening noise of the music, as soon as the door shut behind them, Victoria could barely hear it through the solid stone walls that surrounded them.
“The vet class have been working on Fluffies for the last few months.” Katherine explained as she climbed down the stairs, holding onto the bannister to keep her tipsy self steady. “But to keep the funding right we need to dispose of the old lot before the new batch arrives at the start of the year. So we figured we’d have a little fun with them.”
At the bottom of the stairs was a room almost as large as the dance-hall upstairs, only this one had a selection of 6 cubicles in the centre, each completely sealed off from each other and with glass walls looking out into the rest of the hall. Inside each cubicle, Victoria could see students hurting Fluffies in all manner of ways, ripping off their limbs, smashing them against the wall, sticking pins into their testicles.
It was very Lord of the Flies, and Victoria felt her creative juices flowing.
Katherine walked down one of the sides, beckoning for Victoria to follow her. “We let folks get the stress and anxiety of the new year out by pummelling the fuck out the old stock, it’s either this or the incinerator, might as well put them to some use before they die. Man I really wish Josef was here, he’d fucking love this.”
Katherine stopped in front of another student, slightly older with a stocky but muscular frame and a hard jawline. He glanced over to Katherine and took a long sip of his beer.
“What can I do you for Townsend?”
“Well a Good fucking evening to you Langford, I was hoping you’d have a spot open for my new friend here.”
Langford turned and eyed Victoria, she saw the predatory look in his eyes as he leered at her outfit, she wasn’t scared, but she knew the type of guy he was.
“Got enough for the wank-bank?” She smirked at him.
“Maybe a little more.”
Katherine smacked Langford on his arm. “Pete, for fuck sake, stop perving on my friend. We’re here for the tournament.”
“Tournament?” Victoria asked.
“Contest to see who can cause the most damage to a Fluffy before it dies. Josef was supposed to take part but since he’s busy I figured you could take his spot.”
Pete took another drink of his beer and looked over at Victoria. “You ever hurt a Fluffy before?”
“No, but I’m a fast learner.”
Pete paused for a moment before picking up a clipboard and passing it to her. “This here’s all the stock with got left, anything without an X is still available, it’s first come, first serve so don’t waste any time.”
Victoria took the clipboard and eyed the stock, out of 40 Fluffies, there was less than 15 still available. She scanned the page, checking age, type, colour, anything that stood out to her.
Then she saw it.
“I want her.”
Pete checked the list at where Victoria was pointing. “Decent choice, you’ll we’ll give you a call when there’s a free space, just mingle about until then.”
With that, Pete went off to plan ahead for Victoria’s run, Katherine eyed her new friend with intrigue.
“So, who’d you’d go for?”
“I’ll tell you in a second, first I need a favour from you.”
“What?”
“I need to borrow your coat.”
Peaches sang happily to herself as she sat in this slightly cold, slightly small white room, she could smell faint scents of other Fluffies but couldn’t see any around her. There were people outside of the room she could see them through the big glass wall but she couldn’t hear them, still, she happily waved to the nice people all the same.
Maybe one of them would like to be mummah or daddeh to her and her tummeh-babbehs. That would be so lovely.
Just then the door opened, there was a cacophony of shouting for a moment before the soundproofing shut it out again. Peaches saw a very pretty blonde woman in a white coat and holding a clipboard walk over to her.
“Hello there, I’m Doctor Harkness, I’m here to help with your pregnancy.”
“Hewwo nice doktoh, Peechees am soon-mummah, tummeh-babbehs feew gud dis bwite-time.”
“I’m glad to hear that, but I’m afraid I have some bad news.”
Victoria grabbed a nearby chair, flicking away a piece of brain matter from the seat, and st down in front of Peaches.
“I’m not sure how best to say this, but… our tests show you have bad babies.”
“Bad babbehs? Bu… bu babbehs am jus tummeh-babbehs, nu du aneefing yet.”
“We know but our tests show they will become bad babies, it’s not your fault, it’s just that some babies are born bad and you can’t change that.”
“Wha… wha nice doktoh gun du tu tummeh-babbehs?”
“I’m afraid our only option is to abort them. Give them forever sleepies before they become too bad.”
“NU! Nu wan gib tummeh-babbehs foweba sweepies, am onwy wittew babbehs. Mummah gib dem wots of huggies an wub tiww dey nu bad babbehs aneemowe.”
Victoria reached out and softly petted Peaches on her head. “I know it’s hard to hear, but this is the best option, what if you don’t give them enough love, what if they still become bad babies anyway? Do you know what bad babies love to do?”
“Wha?”
“Hurt good babies, and if you’re can’t stop them from being bad, how many good babies will be hurt because you were only thinking about yourself?”
“Dat… sniff, Peechees neba fink bout it wike dat befowe.”
“And look at this way, bad babies are quite rare, so we can stop these ones but you’ll still be able to have other babies and chances are they’ll be good, maybe even great.”
“Nice doktoh weawwy fink su?”
“I’m sure of it.”
Peaches sat and thought for several seconds, before finally taking a deep breath and nodding.
“Ok, if nice doktoh fink it am bestesh tu gib bad babbehs foweba sweepies, den Peechees agwee, nu wan bad babbehs tu huwt gud babbehs.”
“You’re very brave, not all mothers would be as kind and lovely as you.”
Victoria reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a foil tray of Plan B pills, she didn’t actually know if this would work, but she was interested to see how it work. She popped out one pill and placed it in front of Peaches.
“Just swallow that pill and it’ll do all the work, it’ll be painless. Mostly.”
Not catching the last part from under Victoria’s breath, Peaches dutifully bit the pill off of the table and swallowed it. At first nothing seemed to happen, but after about 30 seconds, Peaches started to look unwell.
“Oooh, nice doktoh, Peechees tummeh feew wiewd.”
“That’s normal dear, it’ll be uncomfortable for a bit but that’s…”
“WOWSTESH POOPIES!!!”
A volcanic eruption of blood and shit blasted out of Peaches backend, a torrent of red and brown was just hosed out of her utterly drenching the glass wall for the viewing students. Victoria could see one of the girls turn away to vomit at the sight.
Amidst the screaming and the shitting, Victoria heard a soft, ‘thump’, ‘thump’, ‘thump’ as five barely formed foetuses knocked onto the glass wall. After the last one was shot out of their mother, the bleeding and the shitting stopped, some-fucking-how, Peaches was still alive, but she looked awful, her soft orange coat was limp and dulled, her eyes were nearly glazed over in her half-dead state, and her special-place looked like it had been hacked away by an axe murderer.
Victoria would be good money on Peaches being completely infertile now, if nothing else she looked like she’d blasted her uterus all over the wall.
“Haff… haff… haff. Am dat it… haff… haff… oba?”
“Yes dear, that’s it over. I must say that was quite a reaction.”
“Peeches feew… haff… da wowstesh… eba. Nu wan… haff… haff… du dat eba… haff… gain.”
“It’s over now dearie, and you did such a good job, I’ll talk with the other doctors and… hold on a moment, there’s only five foals here.”
Victoria pointed to the floor, Peaches raised her head slightly but the gruesome sight of her five dead babbehs, even if they were bad, all smooshed and squished hurt her too much to see.
“Are you sure you don’t have another one in there, our chart says you should have six foals?”
“Peechees… nu hab… aneemowe… tummeh-babbehs.” The mare weezed between deep breaths.
“But the chart said there was definitely six, I don’t…Hold on, you’re name is PeachES, with an S?”
“Yeh?”
“Not PeachY with a Y?”
“Nu.” A tremor in Peaches voice indicated a fear – whether she recognised it or not – of where Victoria was going with this line of thinking.
Victoria played her part and examine her clipboard again. “Well this is embarrassing, we seem to have the wrong patient. I’m so terribly sorry about that.”
“Bu… bu… bu doktoh say babbehs am bad babbehs.”
“Peachy has bad babies, you… well they were probably good. Look accidents happen, what can I say?”
“Bab… babbehs gu fow… foweba sweepies. Babbehs nu need gud foweba sweepies?”
Victoria stood up and shrugged. “I guess not, guess it sucks to be you then.”
With a condescending pat on the head, Victoria hummed a little tune to herself and walked out of the room, leaving Peaches to wail and howl over her pointlessly dead children.
Out of the room, Victoria took off Katherine’s coat, took a cigarette out of her jeans pocket and lit it up, basking in the glow of a job well done. She returned to Pete and Katherine, Pete looked impressed but Katherine had a concerning look on her face.
“Nice work.” Pete grinned at her. “Did you know the pill would have that reaction?”
“Not a fucking clue, but I assumed something fun would happen.”
“Well I must say, it was damn fine work. The emotional pain isn’t something we see much of, but you wielded it like a fucking samurai, ain’t that right Townsend?”
“Yeah, good one.”
Victoria eyed Katherine suspiciously but ignored it and turned back to Pete. “So, first place?”
Pete laughed. “Nah, that’s going to Mr Guerra over there…”
Pete pointed to a man wearing a butcher’s apron covered in blood, casually chatting away to other students.
“…Ricky managed to skin a Fluffy and keep it alive, that’s first place work. But still, you’re bound to crack the top 10 and for a first timer that’s impressive fucking work. Keep up your craft and next year you could go all the way. Now if you excuse me ladies, I need to grab Gus and get Ricky his prize.”
Pete finished his beer and ran off, leaving the empty bottle on nearby shelf. With just the tow of them left, Victoria turned to Katherine who still hadn’t perked up.
“What’s wrong with you?” Victoria asked, her tone indicating an offense taken to Katherine’s awkward stance.
“That was… Victoria that was quite frightening.”
“I should fucking hope so.”
“No I mean… you came up with that so quickly and were able to fool her so easily.”
“It’s Fluffy, they’re fairly easy to fool.”
“That’s not what I’m getting at. How can I put this, I’ve been doing a minor in psychology and we’ve been studying a group of people who specialise in faking emotions, in being manipulative and can hide their true nature with ease.”
Victoria dropped her cigarette and stubbed it out with her shoe. “Katherine, what the fuck are you getting at?”
“Vic? Have you ever been tested for psychopathy?”
Back in the present, Victoria continued her story, Isabella laying beside her, taking in every word.
“Katherine introduced me to some other psyche students the next day, we took a few tests and while none of it was ever a 100% guarantee, they and their teacher agreed that I showed enough characteristics that they believed I could be officially classed as a psychopath.”
“Santa mierda hermosa. This is… this is a lot.”
“I know, but I wanted you to know this about me because it’s why I’m so weird around you sometimes. Why lying is so easy to me, why I appear as though I don’t care, why it’s hard for me to empathise. I am a genuine, Grade A, psychopath. And one of the traits of being a psychopath is how easy it is to pretend to care about others when I really don’t give a fuck at all.”
“Are you talking about me?”
“You, my brother, my mum. I can lay here with your hot ass in my lap and tell you, to your face, that I love you, and I wouldn’t be able to say if I was lying or not. Our relationship is beneficial but I can’t say if I actually like having you around or if I just like the benefits our relationship has. It’s fucked up, which is why I’m letting you know this now, so if it’s too fucked up for you, you can leave now and that’ll be it. You don’t have to get involved with a nutcase like me.”
A heavy silence passed between the women for several seconds, before Isabella pulled herself out from under Victoria, lay down on top of her, and gave her blonde girlfriend a very soft but very deep kiss.
“You felt brave enough to tell me this, that maybe you don’t care. That tells me that somewhere in you, you do care, care enough to give me the chance to leave and take all my… benefits, with me.”
Isabella shook her denim covered derriere, eliciting a laugh from Victoria.
“So if you’re fucked up hermosa, I want to be fucked up with you.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Loco por ti.”
The two women kissed again as Victoria’s hands started to run their way down Isabella’s body, their hot summer afternoon was about to get a little bit hotter.
Man even in her college days she showed much already of her “skill”.