Eerie, Indiana fic: Cheese, Chapter Two: Fluffy

[froodle]

Fluffy shouldered his way through the tumbled piles of black plastic trash bags that were strewn across the alley, ignoring the delicious smells that came from within them.

He was worried. This was a recent sensation for him, and he found he didn't care for it. A good Beta upheld his Alpha's will in public, disagreed in private when appropriate, and ensured the rest of the Pack towed the line at all times. Fluffy was a loyal and concientious second-in-command; it was a position he excelled at, and this was where he was happiest. But now Fifi was missing, and the rest of the Pack were...

"I'm a dog too, you know," he muttered resentfully. In his mind, the memory of his Pack members stared back at him, unresponsive. "It's not like I don't understand where you're coming from, but you can't just..."

He came to the mouth of the alley, stopped, looked around cautiously before emerging onto the street.

Of course he understood. Like so many that had joined their movement, he had had a human family once, until one day, suddenly, he was too big, and it was off to the pound for the adolescent Fluffy. So he knew all to well the urge to fawn, roll over, expose his belly, leap up and lick the hated human faces when he should have been tearing out their trecherous lying monkey-throats.

When he was a young dog, newly betrayed and bitter from being delivered into the monster Dither's murderous clutches, he might have found it in himself to turn on those dogs who had turned on their cause, to enforce the Pack's will through tooth and claw. That was how it had been when dogs were wild and free, or so Fifi said, and those were the days they were trying to return to.

But those dogs were as distant to Fluffy and his comrades as the Dog Star himself; massive and looming and gobbling up suns and moons just because they felt like it, and Fluffy wasn't going to bite a little Chow in order to get his way, because maybe the giant sky dogs that birthed them all could have taken it in stride, but he didn't think a Chow could.

In the here and now, the murderer Dithers had been slain, and the dogs had claimed the Canine Arrest Team headquarters as their own and turned it into the Canine Liberation Society, a doggy paradise of pilfered treats and ragged couch cushions salvaged from the town dump under cover of night and dragged inside, the whole building carrying a proud Canid reek that made even their most servile brothers and sisters turn their heads and strain against their leashes as they walked by, close to the heels of their human oppressors.

Killing the fat human pup with the metallic teeth had been necessary, but when it was over, and Fifi had wanted the other two gone as well, Fluffy had pushed for simply securing their silence with threats instead. Scaring the little red-furred puppy by promising to eat him was funny, and would help build the pup's character besides; but actually doing it would have crossed a line.

"We're not cats, for the Dog Star's sake!" he had argued, in private, of course, and eventually Fifi had relented. She would never have puppies of her own - neither would Fluffy, or that mouthy Henry Chow, or the majority of the Pack - but if she had, she had reluctantly allowed that she wouldn't want them to get caught up in their mother's battles before they were fully-grown and able to decide for themselves.

Fluffy reached the barbed-wire fence that surrounded his then-prison, now-home, and slipped inside. He could tell at once that the building was empty - the comforting dog smell was everywhere, but stale; no fresh bursts of exuberent doggy-breath stirred the air.

He climbed onto a tattered sofa, wriggling his butt against the rough fabric and feeling his claws snag and and tear at the worn tartan upholstery, and began absent-mindedly chewing the arm-rest. It would all work out, he told himself. Once he managed to track Fifi down, it would be fine. She would know what do do about this latest threat, and they would do it together, and everything would be good again.

He yawned hugely, stretching with the pure animal enjoyment of the motion that human children know by instinct, and human adults lose and regain only through effort. He rolled onto his back, feeling the familiar rush of transgressive pleasure that he always associated with being on the couch.

"Take that, humans," he thought, rolling over again and curling up with his nose tucked warmly beneath his tail. He closed his eyes and sighed.

The sly reek of cheese stole into the room with him, tainting all the beloved dogly smells with the underlying stink of fermented dairy. Fluffy lept from the sofa, ears flattened against his skull, lips drawn back to display long yellow teeth and pink, healthy gums.

As he fled, tail between his legs, he heard a terrified whining, and knew it was coming from him.

Comments

[eviinsanemonkey.livejournal.com]

duuuude

you're amazing

[froodle]

thanks :) I always wanted to see more about the dogs in eerie - they didnt just stop being a threat just coz mars and steve couldnt hear them! investigation fail, marshall.

[eviinsanemonkey.livejournal.com]

well he is 13

when I was planning Eerie all grown up I was going to have a dog revolution thing happen while Mars was at college and then Simon and Dash are like...in charge of the defences and all that and Mars comes back and they're all "JUST BECAUSE YOU LEFT DOESN'T MEAN IT STOPPED BEING WEIRD".

OR OMFG WHAT IF IT DID?! What if it isn't that Eerie is the weirdness capital, WHAT IF IT'S MARS?

[froodle]

Well, I guess I can let him off - that escapade did end with a kid ebing chased down and eaten by the same dogs Mars was investigating...

I soooooo need this older grownup Mars returning to Eerie fic - the more ideas you throw out, the more desperately I want it!

I love the idea of Dash and Simon being the guardians of Eerie in Marshalls stead; I also love the idea that Mars is now a weirdness magnet in the outside world.

I kind of see the three of them as a trifecta - Mars is the outsider, the onlooker who sees most of the game; Simon is the insider, the child born and raised in Eerie; and Dash is a manifestation of Eerie itself, literally the child OF Eerie. So the three of them are ideally suited to work together, but kind of unbalanced and scrambling when one side of their triangle goes off to uni.

[eviinsanemonkey.livejournal.com]

yeah ok so that last bit right there? the trifecta? you gotta write them figuring it out! PLS

[froodle]

I kind of think that idea needs to be part of a bigger ongoing fic - like, say, marshall coming home as an adult? HINT.

[eviinsanemonkey.livejournal.com]

I'll see what I can do...