A simple diagram of an E-Block Fluffy Cage as it restrains a mare during Liquidation Day. note
Soylent Brown is a Fluffy Pony story by Jackie22
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A feral herd is cornered and decimated by exterminators. The stallions are killed, and the mares and foals are rounded up, with a number of them being sold to a fluffy mill.
Here, the ferals are culled further so that only fillies with popular color combinations are spared.
The nameless protagonist (who will come to be known as Forty-Nine) is one of those survivors. Which is truly awful luck for her, because this particular fluffy mill is where “Soylent Brown” is made.
While many of the usual tropes of fluffy abuse stories can be found in abundance, Soylent Brown distinguishes itself from its fellows with its unrelentingly thorough examination of the way a fluffy mill would realistically operate, how much (and little) a fluffy’s life is worth, and even deigns to offer an answer as to why.
The story is divided up into nine chapters (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, and Part 9). There are also two associated epilogue tales called Soylent Brown Afterstory: Sandy and Soylent Brown Afterstory: Rarity which detail what became of some of the protagonist’s fellow fluffies, as well as Making a difference, a short fluffy shelter medical drama set in the same universe.
- All for Nothing: Taking in Forty-Nine goes poorly for both her and the mill. She lives an astoundingly painful and miserable short existence in it. The potential profit of the few promising foals they manage to get out of her is swiftly offset by her captors having to execute several of their stock to suppress knowledge of “sowwie poopies” from spreading after she used them in the breeding pens. The only one who got anything meaningful from her involvement in the story was the man who had her foals killed, a privilege he bought for himself with a measly five dollars.
- An Arm and a Leg: For killing one of her children for being a “dummeh”, Forty-Nine is punished by having one of her hind legs sawed off. Rarity is introduced in the story having already been pillowed for killing alicorn foals, a fate that Sandy and Brandy share in the final chapters.
- And Now for Someone Completely Different: The first six chapters of the story are centered around Forty-Nine. The last three chapters change perspective to Katz, the owner of the mill, as he makes his rounds.
- Anti-Climax: There’s a mild mystery subplot in the final act of the story where Katz tries to figure out why otherwise well-behaved mares allowed into the alicorn pens and A-Block like Rarity and Sandy suddenly exhibit extremely aggressive behavior towards alicorns. He’s loathe to discover that it’s because a lot of the staff in these parts of the mill have been rather lax in reporting and disciplining mares for infractions that would’ve barred them from being even remotely near a alicorn if not bumped down to B-Block or lower.
- Asshole Victim: Though extremely pitiable, Forty-Nine and her E-Block neighbors Sandy and Rarity all have foal blood on their hands. Hercules is a much more straightforward example, as even those who thought he was a useful stud viewed him as a detestable horndog.
- Benevolent Boss: Katz is the grumpy yet professional and very involved owner of the fluffy mill. He is very patient with his employees, oftentimes affording them more slack than he’d like and personally giving them help even when he’d rather be doing something else, who in turn regard him with genuine respect. Attacking his workers in any way is usually enough reason for him to immediately approve a fluffy being sent to D-Block or E-Block.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: As Burgundy explains to Katz, a recurring problem with the alicorn pens is that their existence can cause fluffies in the know to feign obedience and affability to get promoted to that part of the mill, and then they start doing whatever they please believing that they can never be punished ever again, with some even arrogantly attacking alicorns under that assumption.
- Cerebus Syndrome: The story starts off as an elaborate set-up to have Forty-Nine realize the true nature of the slop she’s being forced to eat. After she says the expected referential line, the story keeps going to explore how a fluffy mill could conceivably function, and to study why fluffies can generate so much hostility from people.
- Create Your Own Villain: Seth and Katz end the story deciding that if abusers are willing to pay so much money to torture them, they ought to start breeding smarties in E-Block to drum up more business.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: A lot of this happens to fluffies in D-Block and E-Block, including flaying, dismemberment, and being stung by bullet ants.
- Epic Fail: After giving birth to her first litter, Forty-Nine manages to accrue several major offenses to the mill (killing her foals, attacking other fluffies, attempted escape, etc) in just ten days, and sells so poorly in E-Block that by the time that Katz wheels her out to the incinerator, we discover that this happened so quickly that the promising foals that were taken away from her are still nursing from milkbags.
- Even Evil Has Standards: The outright abusers on D-Block and E-Block’s staff might taunt and sneer at the suffering of fluffies (Seth even records such for his social media platforms), but they do not betray Katz’s trust, and do their jobs without causing any mischief for the more reputable parts of the mill.
- Everyone Has Standards: Carl runs a tight ship on C-Block, sometimes personally beating down disobedient denizens therein, but he shares the sentiment that there’s something really evil about E-Block, and greatly distrusts the abusers who frequent it. And despite how he doles out harsh punishments to fluffies who break the rules, he is genuinely disgusted by mares who are fine with him hurting their “wowst” babbeh over their “bestest”.
- Fantastic Caste System: The mill operates under a (well, it would if Katz had his way) strict caste system based on several criteria. While a fluffy can go down it in several ways due to bad behavior or poor litters, there are pitifully few opportunities to advance up it.
- Given that they’re very rare and have high monetary value, alicorns are given the best lodgings in the mill, with plenty of toys, food, and space. Before Rarity caused Katz to repeal such transitions, A-Block fluffies that proved well-behaved and showed tolerance if not genuine friendliness towards alicorns would be allowed in this section to act as playmates.
- A-Block is reserved for regular fluffies who are well-behaved and have appealing colors that managed to advance from B-Block. They and their foals are afforded a pleasant safe room, and sleep in kennels. Occasionally, they’re fed extremely cheap spaghetti.
- B-Block is a series of simple rooms filled with cages. A vast majority of freshly weaned fluffies wind up here. The cages are pointed at a single television screen to keep their inhabitants occupied outside of the few hours of play they get outside of them. They are given regular food, and are disciplined harsher than they would be in A-Block. It is a “stress test” crucible of sorts. Fluffies that keep good manners despite the harsh conditions and produce well are sent up to A-Block. Those that let the conditions negatively affect them are sent down to C-Block. Otherwise, they live out their days here. Fluffies who start out at or demoted to C-Block can work their way up to B-Block, but they can never go further as the mill doesn’t want them whining about the harsher conditions there to A-Block denizens, or worse, alicorns.
- C-Block is the last “real” block in the mill. It is virtually identical to B-Block, but there’s no television, no playtime, and they’re mostly fed the titular recycled substance. Workers are allowed to more harshly discipline the fluffies here.
- D-Block is not a real block. There is no going up from it. Rather it’s located in a separate building, and is structured more like a small warehouse. Fluffies here aren’t even regularly fed as they’re not expected to last that long. How a fluffy winds up in D-Block is rather arbitrary, as lapses and transgressions that would get them sent to the incinerator or another means of disposal instead funnel them here. Probably to pad out its population for the sake of its customer base. As such, mares, stallions, and even foals can be found here. This is one of the two areas in the mill devoted chiefly for abusers, who can rent time with a fluffy (killing optional) on a first-come-first-serve basis through a single file line at set prices. They can use the implements available, opt to simply rely on their bare hands, or bring their own tools of torture within reason. D-Block is arguably the very worst outcome for all mill fluffies, and it would objectively be that, if not for the fact that E-Block exists.
- E-Block is the very worst place for a specific sort of fluffy mare (and their foals). While D-Block chiefly exists for the sake of extra profit, E-Block is more concerned with punishment. A mare does not merely have to produce bad litters or act poorly, but she must also have “a defiant attitude, strong maternal instinct, good foal management,” and a “talkative” disposition. This is because research shows that this is a combination of elements that the abusers that frequent E-Block find the most entertaining. However, mares who are otherwise ideal breeders can be doomed to E-Block if they tick staff off severely, such as by killing an alicorn. Mares are strapped to a multifunctional harness that limits their movements, can retract them to the back wall of their cage, and delivers disciplinary electrical shocks as needed. They are exclusively fed “soylent brown”. Interestingly, while an E-Block mare can be shocked, struck, or pillowed for disciplinary purposes by staff, abusers are strictly prohibited from even touching them. Their foals, and whatever psychological damage seeing them tortured to death would inflict on the mares, are free game though provided the abuser manages to win the auction for the opportunity. Worse, even if a mare loses all her foals to an abuser, the mill will have them impregnated again to produce more for future auctions. This cycle continues until a mare enters the “wan die” loop which can take a while as the joys of producing a new litter tends to supersede their grief over losing the last one, which is how Sandy managed to keep her sanity for over a month in E-Block.
- Stallions that the mill keeps rather than sells or euthanizes are kept in the breeding pens. Living conditions for them are utilitarian but they know nothing else, and can be treated politely by staff, sometimes even establishing rapports with them.
- Mares that prove difficult but still possess excellent lactation and genetics can be maimed into becoming milkbags, enfie mares, or immobile breeding stock.
- Foals with poor colors from the outset or with birth defects are “rejected”, euthanized, and occasionally sent to D-Block. Though some of the former have been allowed to stay with their mothers in C-Block and above to lessen the emotional anguish a mare feels when workers inevitably have to take away their more marketable children for sale.
- Smarties, regardless of breed, coloration, or age, are killed as soon as possible to prevent their behavior from leaking into the general population.
- Ferals lie somewhere perpendicular to the bottom of the system. The mill won’t even take any in unless they get them extremely discounted in bulk, and they’ll just incinerate most of them unless they have really good colors like Forty-Nine. If they get through that juncture, they’ll be relegated to C-Block by default where they’ll face discrimination by the staff under the presumption that they’re diseased, not even fit to be ground up into soylent brown for fear of poisoning the filthy elixir. Stores don’t want to buy them, and abusers wouldn’t waste money on them, since they can potentially just find a feral in the wild for free if they wanted to do something with one.
- Given Name Reveal: Through Katz’s thoughts, it’s casually revealed that Red Four’s real name is “Ewan”.
- Going Native: To his self-disgust, Katz has been running the mill for so long and so closely that he can easily understand fluffy speak even if the biotoy is speaking through a gag.
- Hate Sink: Rarity, who is unrelentingly nasty to everyone around her to the point that Forty-Nine can’t really bring herself to pity her fellow prisoner. Her one redeeming trait is a genuine love for her foals, and even then she’d sell dozens of them out to protect her current “bestes babbeh”.
- Hobbes Was Right: Years of working with and observing fluffies have caused Katz to conclude that for as cute as fluffies act by default, truly instinctual good behavior needs training to be ingrained, and right and wrong have to be taught. Which he explains to Theo, one of his workers, when he’s horrified that a mare would kill her own foals out of jealousy of them getting adopted without her.“Well the concept of a creature that loves ‘huggies an wub’ is a pretty spotty idea at the best of times. Their programming causes an instinctual want to be nice, but it only includes certain basic drives. Once the situation becomes complicated, and they become conflicted in their emotions, they tend to show their true colors. What a lot of people see as ‘brattyness’ is actually the initial joy of getting an owner wearing off, and being replaced with underlying ingratitude and selfishness. Hence why a creature that purports to be all about ‘huggies an wub’ can become a monster like this. It actually makes it worse, since the programming can cause aberrant behavior to go unnoticed and be left to fester. Basically, there’s a big difference between being nice, and having certain biological drives that cause you to adopt outwardly ‘nice’ behaviors.”
- How We Got Here: The story’s Cold Open has Forty-Nine already in E-Block with her remaining foals before jumping back to her childhood, and then working its way forward from there until it catches up to the present.
- Noodle Incident: As the mill is barred from B2C fluffy transactions, it’s unknown how Red 33 manages to take Rarity home for his own personal plans in her epilogue story.
- Nothing Personal: When they’re used up or commit grievous enough mistakes, fluffies are fed to a mill grinder. Employees are ordered to feed them into the machines bottom first, not because it would cause them the most pain, but because it reduces the chance of them getting splashed with feces as the fluffy loses control of their bowels as they perish.
- Pet the Dog: Katz treats his employees quite well, remembering all their names, coming to forgive Marcus and Paul for their indirect involvement with Rarity’s rampage that cost the business $2100, and taking a moment out of his busy, miserable day to help Mike onboard Theo.
- Punch-Clock Villain: Breeding stallions like Azure Sky and Karl, bordering on Obliviously Evil. They’ve been trained from a young age to consider giving babies to mares as a good thing, and are guilted into performing with the promise that mares that don’t breed with them will instead be put in a pen with their more aggressive and malign brethren like Hercules.
- Pyrrhic Victory: Red Four is under no illusions that anything he does will get rid of fluffies for good, and is even bitterly aware that to enter E-Block, he regularly gives money to a fluffy mill, which will surely use it to make even more of the biotoys he hates."Look, I like torturing fluffies. And I don’t think I’m some kind of fucking hero for it, It’s fucking weird. I mean, I just paid 250 bucks to kill a single fucking foal. I probably care way too much about this, and my anger probably doesn’t even make sense, but you creatures just fucking irk me."
- Rasputinian Death: Sandy's final foal has already been horrifically disfigured by Red Four when he's introduced in the story. He's missing his eyes, all his limbs have been dismembered, his mane's been scalped, his tail's been ripped off, his teeth have all been torn out, he's missing the front part of his snout, and his flesh in general looks raw and melted. During Liquidation Day, Red Four finishes him off by suspending him on a hooked fishing line, immolating him with burning fuel, skinning him with an orbital sander, and then dousing his half-cooked and bleeding body with acid. The foal is alive, screaming, and very much in pain through all of this, as even the acid doesn't kill him instantly.
- Revenge by Proxy: Frustrated by his flippant attitude and overt sympathy for fluffies despite choosing to work in a mill, Katz has Paul deliver Cherry to E-Block to give him a harsh dose of reality as to what happens to mares who misbehave. It goes a bit off the rails when Paul accidentally causes one of the inmates there to kill her own foals due to a misunderstanding, and when he sees that Paul has learned his lesson, perhaps even a bit more than he expected, Katz has him sent back to his station with no more fuss.
- Sincerity Mode: Upon being asked by Sandy why humans seem to hate fluffies so much (and love "munstahs" like alicorns), Red Four drops the facetious sadistic supervillain act and gives a thorough and organically disdainful explanation as to why her kind draws so much ire from people.
- Spotting the Thread: Savvy readers can tell that Sandy isn't being truthful when she claims that she feels sorry about killing her alicorn child, as all her begging for the foal she actually likes is written in uppercase while her phony apology is written in lowercase.
- Stupid Evil: One E-Block abuser brought in fluoroantimonic acid to kill fluffies, which released a lot of toxic gas that almost poisoned everyone in the building, human and fluffy alike.
- Tragic Monster: As viewed from Forty-Nine's perspective when she killed one of her foals, there's something intrinsically flawed in the very programming of fluffies (if it wasn't an outright intentional feature for planned obsolescence) that makes them instinctively react towards brown, "dummeh", and alicorn fluffies with disgust and hostility to the point that even if severely and explicitly punished for doing so, they seem incapable of showing any iota of remorse for killing one.
- The Unapologetic: Even as they're horribly punished explicitly for doing so, Forty-Nine, Sandy, Rarity, and Brandy are unrepentant over having committed infanticide towards bad-smelling and alicorn foals, seeing nothing wrong with what they did. When Sandy tries to apologize for the act in an effort to dissuade Red Four from torturing her last foal to death, he sees that she's lying.
- Undignified Death: For all her attempts at rebellion, Forty-Nine ends the story pleading for Katz not to throw her into the incinerator, wretchedly begging the very owner of the mill where she was imprisoned and tortured for a long and unsightly list of “daddeh…housie…sketties…huggies” and of course “wub”. She gets none from him, and he punches her in the face to force her into the flames.
- Unknown Rival: Mike, a mill worker who helps manage the incinerator, doesn’t remember throwing Forty-Nine’s mother and brother into it, even though she remembers him very vividly and hates him for it. He has no strong feelings about the matter, and isn’t even the one who kills her with it in the end.
- Would Hurt a Child: The abusers, the staff, and even a lot of mares (including Forty-Nine) would hurt foals for various reasons.
- You Are Number 6: Fluffies in C-Block aren’t given any names, just numbers. Forty-Nine isn’t even what the protagonist is listed on in forms, that’s her cell code. Her real designation is C-233.
