"Winter is Coming" By fluffstory (https://pastebin.com/u/fluffstory) URL: https://pastebin.com/Fkfz5jxN Created on: Sunday 24th of May 2020 11:09:27 PM CDT Retrieved on: Friday 30 of October 2020 11:19:15 AM UTC Swindle, October 8, 2014; 20:39 / FB 26571 ======================================================================================================================================= Winter is Coming [Author's note: just listen to this shit while reading the story. It's even better if you've seen Heavy Metal before. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO6uBQJ35N0 ] You're Shitface. You don't like your name since a hoomin explained it to you, but none of the fluffies in your herd know what it means, so you're ok with keeping it. You're a smartie. It's your job to take care of your herd. You're not sure how you became smarty; you just escaped from the horrible meanie who did awful things to you (and named you Shitface) one day, found some other fluffies who were runaways, ferals, or in one case just terribly lost (though you did help Flower find her hoomin mumma again, eventually. Too bad she didn't want the rest of you too.), and somehow you ended up in charge. You've done a pretty good job so far, but it's been really stressful. You had to find a safe place for the herd, figure out how to find nummies, resolve disputes amongst the herd (like when Petunia's chirpy babbeh drowned in the sky-wawa and she tried to steal one of Yellow Mare's babbehs as a replacement. That got ugly.), and more. But you think you've done a good job. Your herd has a safe place in the park with lots of grassies, the hoomins throw nummies in the big bucket things that you tip over, and you've had a bumper crop of babbehs. Your herd is growing rapidly. Unfortunately, all is not well. You shiver as the cold wind ruffles your fluff and kisses your skin underneath, looking up at the leaves on the trees. Why are they turning brown and red and falling off? At first, you thought the leaves changing color were very pretty, but as they began falling off the trees and leaving them bare, it started to make you nervous. Did the trees have sickies? The grassies weren't as plentiful either. They turned yellow and brown, and didn't grow back after the herd ate them. Worse still, the bare patches without grassies told the hoomins that fluffies were nearby, and several had come looking for you. Someone who called himself the "animaw contwoww" man had taken away several fluffies when he coaxed them out with nummies, then when the trick didn't work anymore he attacked the herd and took more fluffies away. Fortunately, he didn't know where your safe place was, so the herd escaped. You never saw those fluffies again. And it was getting chilly every day. You could even swear the bright times were going by faster. It was all you could do to stay warm during the dark times in the great fluff pile the herd made. It hadn't happened yet, but some of the older fluffies had been through "cowd times" before and said it wouldn't be long before chirpy babbehs and fluffies with sickies started to take forever sleepies every dark time. They agreed that it was getting harder to find nummies and said it had happened before. You shiver again as the cold breeze blows again, sending leaves flying; even your thick fluff is no defense against the meanie wind! You survey the safe place, wondering what to do. You have a vague sense that the herd is in danger somehow, but you don't know enough about the danger to even know what it is, much less how to protect the herd. What should you do? That was when you heard the first scream. "SCREEEEEEEEEEEE!" "Nu huwt fwuffy! Am gud fwuffy!" Oh no! Did a hoomin find the safe place?! You run as fast as your stubby legs can carry you, wincing as you stub a hoofsie against a rock, and race back to the safe place. It's chaos. Pandemonium. Fluffies are running everywhere, hiding their eyes with their hoofsies, screaming, making scaredy poopies. Foals are chirping in terror and crying for their mummahs. Your toughies try to rally a defense against this sudden threat, but you don't see any hoomins, just... ... more fluffies? "ATTACK! KIWW DA WEAKWINGS!" A large blue-and-grey unicorn stallion directs a group of stallions as they charge into the safe place, shouting, puffing their cheeks, stomping, kicking, and biting. Your toughies are outnumbered, the bad fluffies are much bigger and better fed, and they're soon overwhelmed. Your first (and last) line of defense breaks down huuhuuing and begging the bad fluffies to stop giving them owies and hurties. Gritting your teeth in irritation at the pathetic show of force, you try to get your herd organized, but they're too scattered, too scared, and you only get a handful of stallions and one mare. The rest are running, hiding, or getting sorry hoofsies from the bad fluffies attacking your herd. With one last look at your troops, you puff your cheeks, stomp a hoofsie on the ground, and lead the charge. As charges go, it's less inspiring than the Light Brigade, but with about the same results. Your fluffies are overwhelmed and stomped into submission even faster than your toughies were, and soon you're huddled on the ground, hiding your face with your hoofsies and huuhuuing as a rain of kicks and bites pounds at you from all sides. Eventually, the bad fluffies stop giving you worstest owies and you look up, trying to keep your sore and swollen eyes open so you can see. Most of your herd has fled, scattered in all directions. You'll spend the rest of the bright time trying to find them all and lead them back to the safe place, and you don't think you'll get them all. Some of them are going to get lost and never return to the herd. The rest of the herd is quickly herded into the center of the safe place with kicks, nips, and headbutts, and they all gather into a fluff pile, crying and giving each other huggies. You smile a little; huggies will make it better. Huggies always make the saddies and owies go away. The bad fluffies then raid all the dens, dragging out any fluffies hiding inside and adding them to the fluff pile. Babbehs, chirpy and talkie babbehs alike, are separated from the herd, much to the dismay of the mummah's. Then the big blue unicorn snorts and walks through the safe place, surveying it arrogantly. "Paffetic! Wook at dis 'safe pwace'! Dewe nu gud hidey howes, nu wawws, nu twaps! How dey tink dey keep hoomins an munstas out? Stoopie fwuffies!" Turning to the equally big, brown earthie stallion and the smaller purple pegasus trailing him, the blue unicorn demands, "Tor, Woki, whewe awe dey nummies?" "We nu fine much nummies, Odin. Onwy dese hoomin twashies an sum nut nummies. Vewy widdwe. Nu enuff fow da whowe hewd." "Sewiouswy?! How paffetic awe dese weakwings?! Dey nu even haf enuff nummies tu num? How dey eat?!" You speak up for the first time, frightened to talk but somehow compelled to do so. "We nu fine nummies. Awways hungwy. Dunno whewe nummies gu." The unicorn called Odin snorts and puffs his cheeks in disgust. "Yoo nu even gathew nummies fow da cowd times? You aww dummehs!" Despite yourself, you stand up and puff your cheeks and stomp in indignation. "Nu am dummeh! Am bestest hewd!" Odin knocks you down with one kick and keeps you there by pressing a hoofsie against your throat. "Nu. Yoo poopies hewd. We nee nummies fow da cowd times, an yoo nu haf nummies. Nu enuff, anyway." Turning to the other bad fluffies, Odin loudly announces, "Hewd! Dey nu haff nummies fow us tu take! If we weave dem awone, dey keep wooking fow mowe nummies aww cowd time! Aww da nummies dey num awe nummies we nu can num!" Changing to a more sly tone of voice and looking his stallions in the eye, Odin continues. "Su wut we du wif dese dummehs if dey nummin aww ouw nummies?" "KIWW DEM! KIWW DEM AWW!" Several fluffies, including the earthie called Thor, trot over to the fluff pile your herd's babbehs have formed in a vain attempt to stay warm without their mummah's fluff. What- what are they doing?! POP. CRUNCH. SQUISH. "Chirp! Chirp! Chi-" SQUINCH. "SPEEEEEEEEP! SPEEEEEEEEEP!" SQUELCH! "Nu wan! Nu wan! Mummah! Safe babb-" CRNCH! "NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!" Mummahs begin screaming and crying as their helpless babbehs are squished under merciless hoofsies. A couple of your stallions try to charge to their rescue, but go down under a flurry of kicks and stomps. Neither of them moves again when the stomping subsides; they're just piles of disheveled fluff and booboo juice, just like the babbehs. The last babbeh, hind weggies broken, tries dragging himself toward his mummah, reaching out for huggies. "SCREEEEEEEEE!" Odin, casually, contemptuously, reaches out and stomps the little babbeh, grinding him into the dirt under his hoofsie. You feel warm booboo juice splatter onto your face and stare in horror. The babbehs! All the babbehs are gone! The future of the herd... "Now da uddas." Stallions scream and try to fight back, but being outnumbered are quickly stomped and bitten to death. The soon-mummahs fare no better. The other mares try to run or hide, but are also beaten until they stop moving, taking the forever sleepies. The prettiest ones don't go so quickly; the bad fluffies take turns giving them bad special huggies before stomping them too. The last surviving member of your herd is you. You stare, shocked, unable to comprehend the horror of it all, as your herd lies all around you, sleeping forever. Your toughies. Your mares. Your babbehs. They're all... gone. You look up at Odin, tears blurring your vision, lip trembling, voice cracking, and ask... "Why? Why du dis?" "Du yoo know wut am best in wife?" asks Odin as he turns to plop a steaming pile of sorry poopies on your head. You've lived up to your name, Shitface. Struggling to answer, you reply, "Huggies?" "Nu." "Speshow fwen?" "Nu." "Wawm babbehs an gud nummies?" "Nu, dummeh." You're out of ideas. "Den wut am best in wife?" Odin lowers his face so it's only inches from yours and grins. "Tu cwush yoo enemies, see dem dwiven befowe yoo, an tu heaw da wamentations of da mawes." You're only just beginning to process the meaning of this statement when his hoofsie comes down and sends you to sleep forever. *** You're Jacob. It's been weeks since you set your experiment loose on the world, and you wonder how it's doing. Capturing an entire feral herd had been easy enough, leaving your gate open, putting bowls of spaghetti out, and playing a recording of happy fluffies playing. Once captured, you forced them all into your basement, set up the projector and stereo... ... and subjected them to a daily movie viewing. The ones you played most were Valhalla Rising, The 13th Warrior, The Vikings, and the original Conan the Barbarian, but there were others. When it wasn't movie time, you had the Skyrim theme playing at 96 decibels on endless loop. You gave all the fluffies Nordic names and encouraged certain behaviors in them. You taught them how to build ramshackle little huts from sticks, long grass, and various bits of trash like paper and cardboard; the result was better shelter than any cardboard box could provide, and could be camouflaged. Once you believed them suitably conditioned and trained, you released them back into the wild. You wonder how your horde of Viking fluffies is faring with the coming winter...