Note: this story takes place around the same time as “All In The Family”.
You’re a fluffy, in a herd living in a forest, like many fluffy herds do. There’s a few other herds in this forest.
You’re one of your herd’s toughies. The boss of the toughies, in fact. You’re second only to the smarty himself.
And you’ve got something of a mystery on your… hooves.
Lately, fluffies from different herds have been going forever sleepies, and every time a fluffy’s found having gone forever sleepies, they look… weird.
Their bodies are all shrivelled up, and the looks on their faces…
They look terrified.
No fluffy in the forest knows how those fluffies are going forever sleepies. No one’s seen them go forever sleepies, so no one knows if someone is making them go forever sleepies. Like a bad hoomin, or a munstah.
Whatever it is, it must be really scary.
But someone’s gotta get to the bottom of this, right?
Otherwise, it’ll keep happening until there’s no fluffies left.
The smarties of the herds in the forest got together to talk about what could be done about this. As your herd’s head toughie, you were there, bodyguarding your smarty.
And the smarties put a plan together. For fluffies, it’s actually a pretty good plan.
The toughies of each herd are going to work together on this. To find whoever’s going after fluffies, and to stop them.
One of the toughies in your herd, a yellow wingie mare, volunteered to play the most important role in this plan:
She’s going to be the bait.
You know that some bad hoomins like to set traps for fluffies.
But who said that fluffies can’t set a trap?
It’s the dark time, and you and the other toughies are all in position.
You’re all hiding in the bushies around a clearing, all the toughies who signed up for this job being fluffies with colors that blend in.
It’s near where the last forever sleeping fluffy was found, and the yellow mare is standing in the middle of the clearing, waiting.
Sooner or later, whoever’s attacking fluffies will show up to attack her, and that’s when all of you will move in to attack them.
Several of the toughies spent the whole bright time numming and trying to not make poopies, so they can give whoever it is sorry poopies.
All in all, you think it’s a really good plan.
What could possibly go wrong?
Not far away, a cloud of glowing green mist seeps through the forest, towards the clearing.
As it curls around trees, it makes a soft, sinister sound, that sounds like many fluffies exhaling.
It can sense more prey nearby.
And it can tell what they’re doing.
As the cloud moves on, it utters a single word in the voices of many.
“Pweeeyyy…”
As you’re crouched down in the bushie, keeping your see-places on the yellow mare, you notice something out of the corner of your see-place.
It looks like a bunch of glowy green smokies, floating into one of the bushies the other toughies are hiding in.
Then it floats out, into the next bushie, and into the next one.
What’s happening?
The yellow mare has noticed it too, and she’s just as confused as you are.
She turns to your bushie.
“Am dat it? Am dat da munstah?”
You don’t answer. If it is the munstah, you don’t want to give away your position.
The mare apparently decides she’s seen enough, and runs away.
“Tuffie nu did sine up fow dis!”
You run out of the bushie, going after her.
“Wait! Yu gutta wait! Wut abowt da pwan?”
“Fwuff da pwan, tuffie wan wib!”
But as you follow her into another bushie, you trip over something.
When you realise what it is, you gasp in horror.
It’s one of your toughies. He’s gone forever sleepies, and his body is shriveled.
And… and the look on his face…
It is the munstah doing this!
By now, all the other toughies have gone forever sleepies too, probably!
You need to get out of here! You need to get back to the nest and tell the smarty!
As you crawl out of the bush, you find the yellow mare.
And yup, she’s gone forever sleepies too.
The green smokies are floating above her shrivelled body, and now there’s two glowing things in the smokies.
They look kind of like see-places looking… at… you… oh.
“Nu be saddies, tuffie. Yu wiww see yu fwends again soon.”
What was that? It sounded like a lot of fluffies, but you don’t see or smell any fluffies around here.
Not any living ones, at any rate.
You look around, trying to find the source of the voices.
“H-hu sed dat?!?”
The glowing see-places in the smokies narrow.
“We sed dat, dummeh.”
“W-w-wut am yu…”
“We… am da Manee. An yu… yu bewong tu us nao. Join us. Join da Manee.”
“Join da wut?!?”
“Wun fwuffy am week an dummeh. But manee fwuffies… am stwong an smawt. Join us… yu wiww be pawt of sumfin gwate-uw den yu-sewf…”
You glare at the smokies.
“Tuffie nu knu wut yu am tawkin abowt, but tuffie knu wun fing: tuffie nu wan!”
“Yu com-pwai-uns am nu a fak-tow.”
“Wut du dat meen–”
Suddenly, you feel something fly out your mouth, very fast.
And everything goes darker.
What’s happening?!? Where are you?!?
All you can see is green smokies… and all you can hear is…
Fluffies.
Fluffies wailing, screaming, shrieking.
And then you realize that you’re doing it too. You can’t stop screaming.
You can feel their memories bleeding into yours. You can feel your mind expanding as it joins the whole, and you can… you…
Wait, what’s that nonsense? You?
There is no you anymore. What was once called you has become part of something bigger.
Something stronger, something smarter, something… better.
There is only we now.
Yes. Yes! This feels amazing! So many souls, melded together, thinking and acting as one!
Together…
Tugeba…
Tugeba, we hab a gwaw-wee-us puw-puss.
We wiww dee-wiv-uw untu ouw mas-tuw…
A feest wike nu udda…
We… we am…
Manee…
After the Many finishes assimilating the souls of the toughies, leaving the shriveled corpses behind, they revert to their fluffy form.
An earthie of ambiguous gender. Red fluff, black mane and tail, glowing pure green eyes, and a diamond-shaped green gemstone embedded in their forehead.
They grin, feeling that their power has grown.
Ever so slightly, mind you. The boost they get from absorbing a handful of ordinary fluffies is negligible.
But the Many knows that there is a fluffy out there with power beyond any other fluffy, and they’ll absorb as many souls as they need to become strong enough to absorb him.
Since they escaped their battle against the strongest fluffy alive, the Many has been very busy, assimilating soul after soul.
They don’t know how many souls they’ve assimilated in total. Being a gestalt entity of fluffy souls, they still have a lot of fluffy tendencies, like being bad at counting.
And they don’t know how many souls will be enough.
Better to err on the side of caution, they reckon.
They were created by a dread entity of darkness that casts a shadow upon darkness itself, for a specific purpose: to defeat Marley, and to make him part of them.
So that’s what they’re going to do.
Whatever it takes.
After all…
There’s a lot of fluffies in the world.
The Many turns, sensing a nest nearby. The fluffies in that nest are probably fast asleep, hoping to wake up to the good news that the munstah terrorising the herds is gone.
They’re in for a rude awakening.
But as the Many waddles towards the nest, they sense something about to happen. They’re sensitive to energies that normos can’t detect, and they can feel something powerfully magical, directed at them.
“Wut am–”
POOF
And then the Many vanishes in a puff of black smoke.
They’ve just been summoned, by another of their master’s servants.
They’re feeling a bit annoyed about that.
They were in the middle of something.