Those Left Behind

Mascarpone, May 18, 2015; 06:26 / FB 31616
=======================================================================================================================================
Those Left Behind

The countryside was a bit more merciful than the urban neighbourhoods, but still dangerous; she died without a whisper, with tire marks in her tired body. Just like her special friend.

And now, they were alone. Left behind, the six of them.

The four one week-old "babbehs" had no names; their older siblings (who, luckily, had the babies on their backs at the moment) were Rose and Sky, named as homages to the things their mother found pretty in the city where she gave them birth two months ago. However, in the countryside, the sky was never a serene light grey like the unicorn foal; and there were no red roses like the earth filly but only corn, soy, roads and woods. They clearly didn't belong there.

They had their sorrows and their tears... and they had to leave the road and their mother's body if they wanted to survive. No human would stop by and send them home, because there was no home to speak of - their hide holes were always temporary and, unlike their mother, the foals never had an owner. The fields could provide plenty food for the older ones, but the younger needed milk. The horizon was beginning to eat the Sun, but no building or soap box or even a garbage bin could be seen nearby... just the yellow sea of corn.

Sky and Rose never saw a burrow in their lives, but instinct is a wonderful thing when it kicks in - they just knew what to do. And they dug with increasingly sore hooves through the sunset and the roots, through the night and the soil. Tearing down pieces of their own fluffs to make a bed for their siblings. Chewing corn and spitting it to the younger ones to heal their "tummy owwies" (it was no milk, but better than nothing). Children taking care of children.

When they barely had a nest and filled stomachs, six formed a fluffpile and slept. And, when the scorching heat made sure they knew it was already day, five woke up. The runt died without a name.

The others did manage to survive, though. Enough to find a pond with decent water to drink of, woods filled with dangerous munstas to avoid, and even other fluffies - a small herd who accepted the five foals as "new friends".

--Wose is no mawe, Wose is fiwwy... no miwkies to gib to chiwpeh babbehs, but babbehs nee' miwkies! Pwease hewp bwudda and sissie and sissie?

Sure, why not. It's easy to be generous when the winds are favourable, so the two nursing mares saw no problem in give some leftover milk to the smaller ones. Unlike in the city, lack of food wasn't a problem - and plentiful food for the mares meant plenty milk for foals, maybe one or two besides your own.

Now that the milk problem was solved, they could do a decent, non-rushed and less painful job; they decided to live near the rest of the herd. And again they dug, but now through three days, under the blue sky, with enough time and patience and without the younger siblings complaining about food. The resulting burrow was larger, deeper and more comfortable; with three small mounts of straw as beds. The runt was left resting his eternal sleep in the old burrow.

It has been a week since the matriarch was dead, and life was surprisingly good for the orphans. The babies were named Leaf (the bright green unicorn male), Corn (the yellow earth filly) and Flower (a pink pegasus filly). And now they were able to eat solid food. Leaf and Flower would still be grateful to their wet nurse, but she wasn't a mother - just a good, cherished friend. Their family was Rose and Sky, they knew that; they were the ones who would hug them and play with them, who cleaned them and taught about the life with songs.

The other filly went the reverse way. Sunflower wasn't just a wet nurse, she raised Corn as her "bestest babbeh"; irony made the only child to inherit her colour to be the one she didn't give birth to. It was no surprise, then, when Corn simply stopped to come to the family's burrow to sleep with her brothers and sisters, instead spending all her time with Sunflower.

It was no surprise either, when the following conversation between Leaf and Corn (already big babies) happened three weeks later...

--Sissa, Weaf and bwudda and othah sissies go.
--Why bwudda? Cown nu go!
--Wosie nu wuv hewe... Sky nu wuv hewe... Wosie and Sky go, so Weaf and Fwowah go. Cown nu go?
--Cown wuv Sky und Wosie, but Cown wuv Sunfwowah and fwiends and cown nummies and ewwything. Cown nu go.

It was true that four of them didn't belong to those lands; but the filly named after the fields did. She had a home, a mother and a herd. She belonged there.

Strange how those countryside lands managed to keep a scorching blue sky even in May, when the Minuano wind already announces the coming winter. Not knowing which direction to take, Sky and Rose lead Leaf and Flower against the wind, southeast, unaware they would travel the reverse direction their mother did a month ago.

Once, a mare arrived in the fields with two foals and four nameless babies. A month later, two young adults lead two foals, and they leave behind the fields, a herd, a happy sister, a resting runt and a deceased mother.

Those left behind would live in their memoirs.