The life and times of Lafayette Ryder

Warning: Violence, murder, and some gore.

‘Left, breathe, right, breathe, left.’ My mind falls into a steady rhythm with the furious pumping of my legs; I force every breath and push myself harder as I see Canterlot on the horizon. I’ve never ran this fast before, not when racing Dash, not when running from Pinkie’s fireworks, not even after I killed that boy my senior year. I did run from that accident, I ran pretty damn far, from Illinois all the way to Massachusetts, but at nowhere near this speed. These unpleasant thoughts float away as a surge of pain sweeps through me, Jeff isn’t happy, he won’t be happy until I’ve done every last thing he wants me to.

I follow the winding, uphill path to the city’s main entrance, where I knock over a guard and climb the closed gates. The wrought iron burns my skin and I can already see blisters and welts forming, I don’t know how or why that happened but I don’t have time to think or even care about it. I run.

I sprint though deserted streets and abandoned alleyways, I feel the rough cobblestones beneath my boots, and I taste blood in my mouth but I keep going. I take an exceedingly complex route towards the castle gardens as directed by Jeff.

‘Left.’ Here.

‘Right.’ There.

‘Turn.’ Now.

And finally ‘Jump.’

I crouch while running, not as easy as I sounds, and take a flying leap over a tall stone wall bordering the gardens. I catch the wall with a foot and biff the landing, dropping face first onto the ground and narrowly recovering with a forward roll into a kneeling position.

“Stop criminal scum!” a guard shouts as he draws his spear and advances at me. The unintentional meme slips my mind as I’m a bit preoccupied at the moment. I stand and hold my left hand out to grab a hold of Jeff as he materializes. The guard sees the weapon and charges me. I extend Jeff fully and slam him into the ground so he stands upright and face the guard. I catch his spear and stop it as its tip pieces my abdomen. A fine trickle of blood escapes the wound and I pull the spear out of the guardsmen’s hooves and thrust it deeply into my gut.

“Are you happy now?” I ask calmly, the guard cowers. “I thought not.” I scowl and twist the spear breaking off the tip and leaving it buried in my stomach. I spin the shattered wooden shaft and swing low, the stallion’s leg crumple beneath him and he lands on the ground with a solid thud. “Ssh, go to sleep.” I whisper to him as I bring my foot down onto his head.

I turn away from the unconscious white Pegasus, retrieve Jeff, and start to meander through the gardens, it’s a bit like a labyrinth and I get lost once or twice, fortunately Jeff is muttering where to go and what to do in my ear.

“Thank you Jeffery.” I say as I enter an open area where Discord’s statue stands in a ridiculous pose.

‘What a drama queen.’ I think as I approach the marble likeness of the chaos god. I raise Jeff above my head and prepare to strike the stone and release the master of havoc. I swing hard and Jeff hits his mark, the stone face of the statue cracks and shatters.

“Fucking finally.” Discords newly freed mouth gripes. “Do you have any idea how bad my nose itches, and my ass too! The nerve of these mortals turning me to…” his words are cut short by a second swing of Jeff; I hit Discord squarely in the chest and leave him gasping for breath. One limb after another I smash and free until the Draconequus’ entire body is loose from its earthen prison. I hit Discord once more and knock him from his pedestal, I stand over him and gently place one foot on his neck.

“Kill.” Jeff says with my mouth and his own voice, Discord’s eyes grow to the size of saucers and blubbers out a plea for his life, evidently the memory of what I did to his last body just clicked. As he begs for mercy I frown and push down on to his throat. I open my mouth to speak, to insult him, to degrade him as much as I possibly can before I rid this world of his chaos and insanity.

“Stop!”

I look up and see Celestia, Luna, and squadron of Royal Guards led by my brother-in-law.

“By the order of the Astral Diarchy I order you to cease and desist immediately or I shall be forced to stop you by use of force!” Captain Armor states clearly and firmly, just how they taught him to at whatever academy he attended I’m sure. I move my foot and raise my hand, Jeff along with it, at the group and snarl. In Jeffery’s voice I rebuke their futile attempts to stop me.

“He brought us here, he killed us, and he took EVERYTHING from us. Now we will kill him and any who stand in our way, that means you Celestia!” I wave my arm and a wall of fire bursts from the ground and halts the sun goddess in her tracks.

“Please,” She begs. “Please don’t kill him.” Luna and the guards look at her confused and curious, Celly and I are the only two that know of the relationship between Discord and her.

“Why? Why not kill him? He’s not insane Tia, not in the least. An asshole, a trickster and prankster, a lover, a brother, and a chaos inducer he may well be but crazy he most certainly is not. He just wanted to usurp your power and when that failed he pled insanity to get away from you. he doesn’t love you, at one time he may have but after failing to defeat you and then being imprisoned by you, if anything he hates you more now than we do, and that’s a whole hell of a lot of hate. I’m doing you a favor by killing him. Don’t you see? This way he’ll never hurt you or anyone else ever again, this way chaos will die out, this way things work out how they should.” I laugh manically and place my foot on Discord again, this time on his chest.

I raise Jeffery high and drop him down onto Discord’s face. Blood splatters me and I swing again. And again. And again. Celestia screams and Luna orders the ‘ShadowBolts’ and the guards to attack a moment to slow. I bring Jeff down one more time and then feel something crash into my side. I keel over and stare at the black Pegasus in black armor that had just stabbed me. I grab his sword by the blade and tear it from his grasp, losing a finger on my good hand as I do. I kick hard and knock him back into one of his comrades; I knock another ShadowBolt into the crowd of surrounding guards.

I scream.

As I scream my body glows and then dims and a magical shield covers both my body and Discord’s. I stand slowly as magic ripples through my body and changes me, mutates me, perfects me.

I scream again as pain burns at every nerve in my being, as my bones grow and my flesh stretches and rips, tearing apart at every joint and muscle group. A searing heat licks at my shoulder blades and I glow brightly all over. Every scar, every wound, and all the pain I’ve accumulated over the years shows now. The guards flinch and look away, Luna gasps and shields he eyes, and Celestia just falls to the ground and weeps. I walk over to a nearby pond and look at my reflection, I’m both terrified and pleased at what I see in the water; wings reminiscent of a Changelings, black, insectoid, and covered in holes, have sprouted from my back, I’ve grown two feet at least and packed on a hundred pounds of meat, my BDU has burnt away and is half replaced by the armor Jeff gave me, now it only covers parts of my body. I flex my arms and roar, the muscles in my body have doubled and doubled again, the skin covering them has torn away and not the bare cords of my muscles can be seen. They shift and strain as I move my body, I can see them tear in bundles and wrap themselves back together larger and stronger than before. My hands have changed too; my left hand has become a spear head, magic covering sharpened steel, I pass it over the my bulging thigh and grin at the wide gash it leaves behind, I also grin at how quickly the wound heals. My right hand has formed a claw of sorts with six fingers ending in talons that would make a velociraptor jelly. My palm is now flat against my wrist and the fingers are placed in three groups of two, forming a triangle and lacing together if I squeeze them inwards. Anything caught in this hand will soon be no more.

A shout distracts me and I look back at the princesses. Celly is still weeping and Luna is chanting in tongues, Armor is the only one actually doing anything, even if all he’s doing is trying, and failing, to keep his men from deserting their posts. A lone unicorn is yelling and sending flames at me. I pick him up in my clawed hand and fling him towards the castle, I can’t see where he lands but I can hear the shattering of glass and screams of agony. I smile and giggle, which comes out as a throaty gurgle, at the sounds. I push my way through the disorganized troops, throwing several more, and stop at Discord’s lifeless body.

‘Feast.’ Jeff commands me as he did before. I plop down with a mighty thunk and start caving flesh off of the body.

‘Mmm, tastes like chicken, and snake, and beef, and human.’ I lick my lips and start shoveling more meat into my mouth. In less than a minute there is nothing left save the bone which I pick my teeth with. Even the chewy wings have traveled down my gullet to their ultimate demise in my intestines. I smile and feel satisfied for a moment. I doesn’t last.

I lift myself to my feet, a difficult task as my weight has just increased even more from ingesting the dead Draconequus, and look for my next meal.

‘I wonder what pony meat tastes like.’ My inquisition is ended before it even has a chance to begin by a blast of black magic that knocks me onto my back. Jeff screams in my head and then the next thing I know I’m back to normal. I look around and see a still weeping Celestia, an exhausted Luna, and a dutiful Shining Armor. In front of me are two glowing orbs, one of blood red and one of dark green.

‘The red one.’ A gentle voice instructs me. I spear it with my left hand which is still pointed.

‘Place it to your heart and pray to God, the real God, the one who sent me to you and you to here.’ I do as I’m told and recite my favorite plea to the lord. “God, please don’t let me fuck this up.” I open my eyes and I’m no longer in Canterlot gardens. I'm not in Equestria either.

So far as I can tell, I’m in hell.

“Well shit.”