The Death of Fluffies waddles across the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, his black cloak billowing around him.
Water may be bad for fluffies, but it’s not bad for the Death of Fluffies. He doesn’t need to breathe.
And he can see in the dark, too.
But the Death of Fluffies is still the fluffomorphic personification of fluffy death, and a fluffy-shaped body comes with certain habits.
So the Death of Fluffies isn’t happy to be here, and hates jobs like this.
But he doesn’t get to decide where he does his job. It’s not up to him to decide where and when he reaps his clients.
It’s up to the living now. Fate no longer decrees when mortals die.
The Death of Fluffies reaches his quarry, a ghostly pegasus stallion, bound to his waterlogged former residence by a silvery thread.
This stallion suffered from the unshakable belief that having wings meant he could fly.
Sure, we’ve seen fluffies with wings that can fly, and even fluffies without wings that can fly.
But this fluffy was not one of them.
So, when he squirmed out of his owner’s arms, and jumped off the cruise ship they were on, he met his doom.
That’s how a fluffy got all the way out here.
The ghostly fluffy is thinking very pleased as he hovers above his own corpse. He can’t feel anymore. He left all the glands for feeling emotions behind.
This strikes the Death of Fluffies as unusual. Most fluffies aren’t very happy when they realize that they’ve just died.
But the stallion quickly declares the reason for his happiness.
“Wook! Icawus am fine-awwy fwyin! Icawus towd mummah dat Icawus cud du it!”
The Death of Fluffies sighs.
WAI DU HOOMINS KEEP BWING-IN DEY FWUFFIES WIF DEM AWN KWOO-SES?
Manifesting his scythe, clutching the handle in his teeth, the Death of Fluffies cuts the silvery thread, sending Icarus on his way.
Then, the Death of Fluffies departs.
In Germany’s Black Forest, the Death of Fluffies stalks towards a warren.
This warren was abandoned by the rabbits who dug it out, and claimed by a feral herd. It’s a common practice among ferals. A lot of fluffies shy away from hard labor like digging, on the grounds that it’s not fun, and digging hurts their marshmallow hooves.
Of course, some herds, like the Fluffy Cartel, have figured out that more fluffies digging means less owwies.
The Death of Fluffies watches the herd, giving sorry hoofsies and sorry poopies to the corpse of their smarty, even worse than the puke green smarty who used to rule Blueberry’s herd.
They had put up with a lot, but when he started raping foals, the herd finally had enough, and revolted.
The smarty made the mistake of raping his toughies’ foals too, so he couldn’t expect any help from them.
The ghost of the fat, arrogant, stupid smarty, who checked every box on the Bad Smarty Checklist, and then tried to find all-new ways of being a bad smarty, watches his former subjects desecrate his earthly remains, which he is still bound to.
“Hey! Dummehs! Stawp dat! Smawty say stawp! Wai yu dummehs nu wissen tu smawty?”
The Death of Fluffies shakes his head in disbelief at the smarty’s stupidity.
Then he clears his nonexistent throat, to get the smarty’s attention.
And when a Death wants your attention, he gets it. They have a way of making a point.
As the smarty’s ghost turns, the Death of Fluffies waddles up, passing through the living fluffies, still unleashing many forevers of pent-up anger upon their former leader.
The Death of Fluffies grins up at the smarty’s ghost, his pinprick eyes glowing red.
AWN BWITE TIMES WIKE DEEZ, FWUFFIES WIKE YU…
He manifests his scythe, cutting the thread.
…SHUD BE BUWNIN IN HEWW.
“Wut am Heww?”
YU WIWW SEE.
As the ghostly smarty fades, on a one-way trip Down There, the Death of Fluffies leaves, his eyes fading back to blue.
The Death of Fluffies emerges in an alleyway in Detroit.
The corpses of two feral stallions, one a blue and white earthie, the other a yellow and orange unicorn, lie dead on the ground, bullet holes in each of their corpses.
Above the corpses, the ghosts of the stallions hover, sharing a spectral hug, connected to their bodies by silvery threads.
These two stallions were lifelong best friends, and, despite not being siblings, were basically brothers in every other way.
They died trying to protect each other from an abuser. Each of them insisted that the abuser shoot them and spare the other.
The abuser just shot both of them.
The Death of Fluffies smiles. There’ll be special circumstances for these two. They’ll be reincarnated together, in the same herd.
Theirs is a friendship that endures beyond death. Even Azrael couldn’t bear the thought of separating them.
And the Death of Fluffies knows that one of his colleagues is in Detroit too, reaping the duo’s killer.
He got stabbed by a crack addict, and bled out on the sidewalk. And that abuser’s going the same way as that foal-raping smarty in Germany.
Adding insult to injury, the crack addict stole his wallet.
Guess what he’ll be spending the money on.
The Death of Fluffies cuts the threads, sending the best friends on, to their next life.
Then, he departs again.
In Blueberry’s Forest, the Death of Fluffies takes a break.
And watches Blueberry, in his Blaukörper, scaring off several Dutch sailors.
“How manee times du Bwuebewwy gutta du dis, yong-uns?”
The Death of Fluffies grins. He’s proud of Blueberry. He’s come so far since he ran away from Judy Blaze in his first life.
Of course, Blueberry’s second life will eventually come to an end.
Not for a long time yet, the Death of Fluffies hopes. Since Fate stopped doing his duty, the Deaths can’t be certain about these kind of things.
They know all the ways their clients could die. But, again, when the living will die is up to the living now.
But when Blueberry does eventually die, there’s always that job offer the Death of Fluffies has for him.
The Death of Fluffies departs, sensing others who need to be shown the way.
Who need someone to take their pain away.
