“IT HAS BEGUN!” - Shang Tsung, Mortal Kombat, 1995 “Escape, escape From your heart-wrenching fate You’re not a Flower of Hell Don’t bloom in such a place Don’t bloom, don’t take root Don’t become ensnared Shards of time fly by without a sound.” Eiko Shimamiya, Flower of Hell, Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni Kai soundtrack, 2006-2007 “Starting books or chapters with quotes is the height or pretentious douchebaggery.” Anonymous, 4chan’s /lit/ board > You are Sticky, the blue earth fluffy with a grey mane. > And you are afraid. > You’re currently hiding in the bushes, your hoofs over your eyes. > A monster if after you. > A monster with yellow teeth, all green and blue, with a single hateful, burning eye. > It gave your wingie mate, Snowflake, biggest owwies. It also gave your new baby biggest owwies. > It didn’t bite. It didn’t buck or kick or butt. > It stomped. > Booboo juice was everywhere. > You ran as fast as you could. > Why is this happening? You just wanted to take your baby and Snowflake the Nummie Place to eat something other than grassies. > On your way there, you encountered a group of fluffies. > They were all Unicorns, lead by a red fluffy with a yellow mane: his horn had grey-black stuff on it. > Then, out of nowhere, the Monster came. > The lead Unicorn was yelling something, but you couldn’t hear over the screams of Snowflake and the cries of your baby. > “Finawwy! Tiem fow stompin’!” the Monster roared as it…crushed your baby. > You sniffle. You’re about to cry until you hear something. > A rustling noise. > “Stompy smeww yoo, eawthie.” > It’s the Monster! > “Yoo make wots of poopies. Can smeww poopies on yoo. Gun find yoo. Heheh…gun find yoo…” > You whimper. It can smell the fresh poopies hanging from your fluff. > “Gun stomp yoo. Gun stomp yoo wike babbeh and wingie.” The Monster says. > You curl into a ball. Rustling noise gets closer. > “Stompy gun stomp yoo guud…gon stomp yoo wike…” > It called itself ‘Stompy’. > The rustling stops abruptly. > You remove your hoofs from your face. Is it gone- > “DIS!” > Your mouth hurts. You can taste booboo juice. > “OWWIES!” you scream. > “Heheh, dummy eawrthie can’t hide fwom Stompy!” the Monster says. It raises its leggie, and you cover your eyes again. > “NU! Stompy yoo stop wight naow!” says another, differnet voice. > You’re too scared to look. > “Wha? Why!? Stompy jus havin’ fun!” > “dun cawe. Peppew say yoo stop wight naow! We come to Big Fiewd fow gwassies, and swaves, not to give owwies!” > A good fluffy has saved you! > You drop your hoofs again. That other red Unicorn fluffy with the yellow mane and funny grey-black horn stands beside the Stompy Monster. > “Bah. Fine. Yoo wucky, eawthie.” Says the Stompy Monster. “Yoo get to be swave…” > Seeing the Monster up close now makes you have fear poopies again. It has no lower lip, but when it smiles at you, its upper lip curls upwards, making its mouth and teeth look bigger. The right half of its face is a ruin, as if it had burny owwies that never went away. Its right eye, white like milkies, never blinks. > But what’s scariest is that this Monster, you realize, used to be a fluffy. > “ow maybe not wucky. Get up!” > “Peppew is Ash Hown. Eawthie do wat Peppew says, not Stompy!” says the other Unicorn, his cheeks puffing up. “Peppew in chawge! Peppew wead gwoup fow gwassies!” > “Wat gwoup, huh?” says Stompy. “Whewe Cuddwes? Scout? Bwownie? Sunny? Stoopid Spawks, huh?” Says the Stompy Monster. > Pepper looks around. “Huh? Whewe fwends go?” > You try to scramble away, but the Stompy Monster puts his hoof on your neck. > “Yoo dummy, Peppew. Yoo wost gwoup. But Stompy find swave.” > “We find fwends!” Pepper says, his voice fearful. > “Nu. Poopies on dem. Stompy goin back to Wink with swave. Get guud nummies. Not Stompy’s pwobwem.” > He leers down on you and lifts his hoof. > “We weave now. Yoo wun, Stompy find yoo. Dis time no Peppew to save yoo. Now…move dem weggies!” ---------- > You are Sparks. > And you are running as fast as your leggies can take you. > Behind you are Brownie, then Sunny, then Scout. At the back is Cuddles. > You’ve been planning this ever since Snowtime. > You’re going to lead them along the Metal-Monster path, past The Pipe, and, you hope, down into Dark Forest. > The Bright Sky Ball is going sleepies soon. But this was your chance. So you took it. > Maroon always lets a few groups of fluffies out at a time, usually lead by an Ash Horn, to find nummies and eat grassies. > And maybe find slaves. > Your plan was to escape during one of these Nummie-runs. > But you would always be separated from one of your friends, or your wifey. > And you swore you would never leave them behind. > This was your only chance- as Stompy ran after an escaping earthie, and Pepper ran after Stompy, you led them away. > The sky gets angry and booms out its anger, causing you to stop abruptly. Brownie bumps into you, then Sunny into Brownie and so on. You all stop a moment and hug each other. > “be bwave.” Cuddles says to Scout, who begins to sob a little. > “otay. Scout be bwave wike daddeh.” > You hug Brownie, then Sunny. “We be thewe soon.” You promise. > It’s actually a half-hearted promise, as you have no idea where you’re going. > After hugs are exchanged, you continue to lead them. > After a little while, the sky starts to cry. > And so are you, but none of your friends know it. > Soon you come to The Pipe. > You think The Pipe has sickies- it’s spewing water into Little River in a great torrent, much like you did when you ate some bad nummies once. > You know that Dark Forest is somewhere after it. But where? You can’t see very far. > You pass above The Pipe. > You wish you could simply go down around it, but there is a very high drop, and you know that if you or your friends jumped, you would have really big owwies. > So you push on a little farther. > Thankfully, there is a small hill that leads downwards. > Suddenly, you’re blinded. > What’s… > Oh no. > “METAW-MUNSTA!” > Coming down the Metal-Monster path, the giant thing rushes towards you. Its eyes shine brightly, angrily, at you, as if it is angry to see fluffies on its land. > Water splashes up from its leggies as it rolls its way towards you, like a giant, angry fluffy mumma made of metal, light and fury. > “HUWWY!” you yell to your friends as you take off towards the hill. > You can hear the Metal-Monster growl as you scamper both forward. > You know that if you get down the hill, you and your friends will be safe- you say a Metal-Monster that decided to go off its path before. It had really big owwies, and its human daddy was really mad with it. > But you’ve also seen how a mad Metal-Monster can give a fluffy biggest owwies. > The Metal-Monster gets closer. It leans to one side. > You get to the hill, as the Metal-Monster roars. > Brownie bumps into you, Sunny bumps into Brownie, Scout bumps into Sunny, and Cuddles bumps into Scout. > You all fall down the hill, rolling. > You land in a small muddy ditch. You are covered in the not-pretty stuff, but at least you avoided the Metal-Monster. > You get up and shake yourself off, and then help Cuddles up out of the muddy hole. Scout and Brownie help their mumma. > They’re good fluffies. > The sky still cries, but now, straight ahead of you, is Dark Forest. > “We hewe!” yells Cuddles. > “We go in, hav sweepy in fwuffpiwe, get wawm?” asks Brownie. > “Yus” you reply. > You lead your friends under a tree, and then snuggle with them in a big fluffpile, near the entrance of Dark Forest. > You did it. You led them away. > After getting comfortable, you shut your eyes and try your best to sleep, though the sky is still mad and crying. ---------- > You are Sticky. > And not only are you afraid, but you’re in pain. > The Stompy-Monster made you go into this place called ‘The Rink’. > When you tried to resist, he gave you owwies and laughed at you when you cried. > He was so mean. > You were brought before the smarty, who was scary and mean. > He was all dark red, with a shiny thing around his horn. It was pretty but when you said so, he jabbed your leggy with his horn, which hurt a lot and made it leak booboo juice. > He told you to be quiet, and then he started yelling at Pepper. > “WHEWE DEY GO!? WHY YOO NU WATCH DEM!?” > His sniffer leaked booboo juice then aswell, and Pepper got scared. > “NU MOWE PWETTY MAWES AN GUUD NUMMIES FOW YOO, DUMMY PEPPEW!” > “Peppew sowwy!” > The smarty hit Pepper in the sniffer. Pepper held it and cried a little. > “Mawoon dun cawe! Yoo wose hewd membews, yoo wet Stompy be dummy! Yoo sweep in Poopie Woom untiw bwight time. Now weave ow get big owwies!” > Pepper left, sobbing. > He then turned to you, booboo juice dripping from his sniffer and smiled. > “Ash Howns!” he called out, and two big, mean looking Unicorn fluffies with the same blac-grey stuff on their horns arrived. > “Yoo know wat to do. Mawoon go get nummies and speciaw huggies. Put dumb eawthie in swave woom afta.” > He walked away. > Then the Ash Horns set upon you. > They bit your ears off, kicked your special lumps over and over again, made sorry poopies on your face, went peepee where your ears used to be and made you eat their poopies. If you tried to resist, they would hurt your no-nos. You cried and cried for them to stop, but they just laughed. > Then they made you go into a room with many other fluffies, all earthies and wingies missing ears and wingies. All crying and huddling together. Some mummas held their sleeping babies and sobbed quietly. Others cried for their babies to wake up and not sleep forever. > Some had hurties which smelled really bad and oozed white water. > Some had no eyes, or special lumps: they kept asking why the mean fluffies bit them off. > That was the same question you heard all night, from yourself and the other fluffies. > Why? ---------- > You are Maroon, Best Smarty of the Best Herd. > And you’re kind of mad, but mostly happy. > Pepper was a dummy and lost a group of fluffies from Best Herd, all because dummy Stompy wanted to give owwies to some earthie. > You think you’ll send Stompy to The Home. Far away, where he can’t cause trouble and be a dummy fluffy. > But, you’re also happy. > Special Hug time is almost here. > Which means you and Queenie will have lots and lots of Special Huggies. > Maybe she’ll even have more babies! > Still…it’s not quite the same as Special Hugs with Silky. Queenie’s fluffy doesn’t feel as good against your happy thing. > Prince’s mane kind of reminds you of Silky’s… > You shake your head, and walk into the Smarty Room to go sleepy with Queenie, Prince and Princess. > Maybe when Bright time comes you can have chippies! > You’re such a happy smarty fluffy.