A Good Fluffle Goes to War
A Good Fluffle Goes to War
Fluffle Puff had had committed many atrocities in her time (as a Pony from such a peaceful kingdom would think), all in service of Equestria, but the Princess had never asked her to do something like this before. If she like all her lineage did not owe their unique existence (beauty as she liked to think of it) to the Celestia she would never consider it. But consider and accomplish it she must, Genocide.
Her target was the Diamond Dog tribe that inhabited Equestria’s caverns. It was one thing to be constantly stealing from the Royal Treasury, but to kidnap one of the Elements of Harmony and put the entire Kingdom in danger was another thing altogether. So Celestia had personally dispatched one of her secret Enforcers to end yet another in a long list of annoyances that threatened PAX CELESTIA.
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This was the first mission Fluffle Puff ever had to carry out alone, but her older sister would be of no help now and the rest of her family was busy undertaking other… operations. She told herself she was ready, after all had not her sister spilled blood on her fur, she was sure that this would be the last time she would leave her village with a white coat, she would return as an adult, with her clan’s traditional battle markings, pink.
Travelling by night she infiltrated deep into the Evergreen forest in search of the abandoned Pit Pony Incorporated mine works. A known entrance into the Diamond Dog network where scores of ponies had been enslaved after the shafts had been overrun by the hounds, it wasn’t soon after that many more ponies started to disappear down tunnels all across the Kingdom.
Princess Celestia was forced to give an eighth of Equestria’s annual income in Jewels to free her captured subjects and prevent further kidnappings, but the pact had been broken. With the matter long consigned to the history books she now felt it was time to extract justice. But ever since Princess Luna had come back Fluffle Puff’s family had been five times as busy as usually isolating Equestria’s few radical dissenter with defriending operations, recovering ancient artefacts and information gathering missions, all to make sure Luna’s return goes as smoothly as possible. Such is a sister’s love, a love Fluffle Puff understood all too well.
Once she had found the shaft clearing the obstructions was easy, hiding her passage was harder and involved carefully repositioning of the debris to fool any observer into believing a minor cave in had taken place. You had to be careful these days, any of the wild animals in the Evergreen woods could be an informant of some sort and hers was a secret mission with dire consequences for Equestria if anypony found out.
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Navigating the labyrinth that the Diamond Dogs called home for most ponies would have been impossible, but not for those of the Huffle Puff Clan. Her training allowed her to use her wondrously long fur to her advantage; sensing tunnel airflows, increased hair vibration sensitivity giving her echolocation/seismic senses and her coats ability to anchor her body to any surface using but the minutest of cracks allowing her to overcome any obstacle. With these abilities and a keen intellect, she created a three-dimensional subconscious map of the vast underground system that would no doubt be useful to the Sun Princess at a later date.
Finding traces of the Diamond dogs was easy, but her senses told her there were more than her mother had estimated. The rest of her data proved correct, they traveled in loose packs, but due to their varying speeds the weakest and strongest members were often separated for days from the main pack, a place to start…
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Fluffle Puff reared her hooves to strike the last of the stragglers, crushing another skull she looked over the carnage she had inflicted. It was strange she thought to herself that this was the eighth group she had annihilated, she was surprised by how effective her families training had been. A few weeks ago she had never killed anypony but it almost seemed to be getting easier, the thought sickened her but if not this then what had she been training for?
The loneliness gives the mind time to wonder as she buried the dead, not a single gem and only one way traffic. The movements caused her great concern but it was heading away from Equestria so she deemed it to be something investigate once she was done with this enclave. Judging by the lack of concern at the disappearance of whole packs their journey must take some time, though Fluffle Puff wanted a rest from the violence she knew she must strike soon, the waiting would only make it worse for her.
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After Fluffle Puff had “waylaid” a few more conveys from her first target she decided that she might as well eliminate those few that remained. In the enclosed space of the tunnels the Dogs were no match for her high speed death ball often crushing entire groups in a single pass, but in the open of the central cavern that her foes inhabited the element of surprise would be lost and they could escape.
Fluffle Puff had to approach with care, luckily all the diamond dogs in this cave where adults, it bought little relief as she knew what one day must be done. Soundlessly she approach the few remaining guards, the first watchdog was strangled with her dextrous tongue, she impaled the second with her hoof and the third struggled for a few seconds until her fur finally chocked it victims last breath. Disentangling herself from the unfortunate trio she edged towards the precipice, she saw what remained of the Diamond Dogs.
She was shocked to see that the Dogs where mostly bound in chains with a few guards, it didn’t take Fluffle Puffs adorable eye’s to see how emancipated the captives where, she brandished her binoculars to get a better view. She counted a score dead chained to the still living eighty odd, among which she could clearly see captive Pups and weeping parents. She nearly squealed in surprise at what she was seeing but subconscious training kicked in as her fur sprang to muffled the sound. She didn’t understand want was going on something was wrong, very wrong… then a word she had heard only in the least favorite of her grandfather’s fables popped into her mind, Slavery.