The life and times of Lafayette Ryder

Warning: Violent and sad but vital to the plot. Just remember this: Everything works out... Sort of.

A burst of adrenaline and a few strong flaps of my powerful wings send me hurdling into the enemy ranks. I spin around at the last second before I collide with an unfazed Orc grunt and I draw Jeffery and Slendy from their usual mounts on my armor, just as I turn to face the Orcs again my weapons crash down onto their targets; Jeffery crushing a grunt’s skull and Slendy rending another’s flesh and sending him to the ground howling in pain. Primal instincts and years of training kick in and my weapons soon become no more than extensions of my limbs, swinging and lashing out as I will them to, tearing and smashing my enemies until nothing but blood and bone remain.

My magic seeps into the steel of my sword and the iron of my hammer and I begin to feel the damage and pain I’m causing as I bestow it. The lacerations and blunt force trauma inflicted by my semi-sentient tools of destruction reverberate throughout my own body; with every hack and slash, with every pounding and mauling I scream alongside my victims because I can both feel my sword as it slices and the flesh as it splits at my hands.

I scream and yell until my throat burns and my voice turns horse, I dodge Orcish blades and duck away from falling hammers, I twist and turn, killing and maiming as I do, until I’ve cleared a sizeable hole in the legions of bastard creatures and have shown them just what I’m capable of. I charge the nearest soldier and prepare to decapitate him but a piecing scream distracts me and I lose my focus at a most inopportune moment; as I turn my head to see just what has happened behind me a meaty hand covered in cracked leather and rusty chain mail brings the hilt of a sword down upon my head. While my helmet dampers the blow and allows me to survive, the impact is still great enough to jar me and cause my grip on both my sword and hammer to loosen. I crumble to the ground dazed and disarmed just in time to look to my left and watch as a horrid scene plays out before me.

The numerous kicks and punches, stabbing and poundings the Orcs deal to me are ignored completely as I watch more of the ugly bastards swarm towards my family and my friends. I scream and try to crawl away from my surrounding attackers but fail and am forced to lie in the dirt and watch as my family is slain.

Celestia and Discord try to fight back but are soon overwhelmed by the sheer number of assaulting troops; she is stabbed through the chest and falls to the ground and he is trampled by the rampaging Orcs as he tries to help is lover back up. I hear his pained screams as a hundred heavy Hobgoblins crush him underfoot.

Luna and Dulcie attempt to flee by means of flight but the Orcs can jump high enough to catch them and bring them back down. I wince as I hear wings crunching and the soon-to-be-wed couple screams in unison. I watch, unable to assist either of them, as they are picked up and tossed about by the Orcs; Luna is beaten against the ground and has her limbs torn off one by one while her fiancé is dragged, kicking and screaming, away from the fight.

The Orcs have captured the first of the Human women they came here for.

Twilight… I scream louder than what should be humanly possible as a big, burly bastard covered in tribal tattoos and towering over his Orcish brethren grabs her. The sick fuck smiles at her and licks his lips and then turns and smiles at me. Both he and my wife look at me as he snaps her neck with a single hand. The fucking brute tosses my love aside as if she were nothing more than trash to him. I scream.

Every single part of my being hurts when I watch my love killed so cruelly, every molecule of my body sears in anger, every bit of me yearns for revenge, and I scream.

My magic seeps into my lungs, my throat, and onto my tongue amplifying my mournful cries ten, twenty, fifty, and then a hundred times louder and higher pitched than any human or machine could ever hope to achieve. The Orcs surrounding me drop their weapons and clamp their hands to their sensitive ears. I ignore the pain, the fear, the hurt and I stand up. Jeffery and Slendy return to my hands when I reach for them, they too beg for the chance to avenge my fallen family and I plan to give them that chance very, very soon.

I knock back the few Orc still standing close to me and spear them each with my sword. I turn slowly, looking in each and every Orcs eyes, and howl at them. All my rampant emotions leak into my tortured screams and I force the bastards to cover their ears once more.

My hate and fury reach a boiling point as a larger grunt shrugs off my verbal assault and charges me. I sidestep him and swing Slendy with all my might cleaving his torso as I do. His comrades stare in horror as his body splits into two halves and separate from one another.

“ALL OF YOU,” I scream at them, “AREGOING TO DIE NOW!!!” before any of the poor fucks can even react to my threat I start mowing them down; spinning and slashing at them until everyone near me is either dead or dying.

“ALL OF YOU!” I shriek again as more charge at me. I ignore the multiple wounds I’ve accumulated, despite the fact that several may well be fatal, and continue my onslaught; killing every single goddamn Orc I that approaches me.

A few cowardly cunts try to escape but I won’t let them.

“NONE OF YOU WILL LEAVE HERE ALIVE!!!” I scream again as I pull the Honey Pot from my armor and start firing into the crowd around me and at the would-be deserters. I laugh as the stench of burning flesh wafts to me.

“I TOLD YOU!” I sing song while spinning and drenching more Orcs with the golden acidic nectar. I smile as their dying howls reach my ears and I begin to dance over the fallen corpses that riddle the battlefield.

All logic and reasoning abandons my mind as I skip from Orc to Orc and bash their ugly heads in. I giggle as I skewer the fuckers on my sword and burn them to death with my gun. I cackle and summon my old favorite weapon; my Desert Eagle to finish of the last of the now retreating cowards.

I don’t stop or even slow my slaughter until the last of the Orcs fall beneath my feet.

“ONE MILLION AND SEVEN MOTHERFUCKING ORCS,” I scream as loud as I can, “AND I KILLED EVERY GODDAMN ONE!” I cease shouting and fall to my knees. “One million,” I remember my family and start to crawl towards them, “and seven,” I pull my exhausted body past hundreds on slain Orcs, “goddamn,” I near the spot where they all fell to the horde of Orcs, “motherfucking,” I shove dead warriors aside until I uncover my deceased loved ones, “Orcs.” I pick up Twilight’s lifeless body and hold her close to me. “I killed them all,” I pull Luna’s broken body to my side, “but I couldn’t even,” I drag Celestia and Discord nearby as well, “save any of them.” I bury my face into the blood soaked lavender fur of my wives corpse and weep.

Seconds stretch into minutes and then into hours but I pay them no mind. It won’t get dark anytime soon, it can’t now that the mistress of the night is dead, and I have nowhere to go and nothing to do. I’d have sat here forever had it not been for a faint noise from the furthest reaches of the battlefield. What I at first mistake to be the dying cries of a mortally wounded Orc soon becomes apparent to be something else entirely. I gently set aside the bodies of my wife and my friends and stand up. I can feel the broken bones within me and I’m weak from the massive amount of blood I’ve lost but I push on regardless. When I can’t walk any further I crawl and by the time I can crawl no longer I’ve already found the source of the pained shouts.

“Daddy.” Dulcie says weakly.

“Baby girl.” I whisper as I drag my torn body close to her.

“What happened?” she asks quietly.

“I fucked up,” I tell her, “I failed.”

“Daddy.” She cries faintly.

“I’m here,” I tell her as I pull her close to me, “Daddy’s here.”

“I love you daddy.” She says.

“I love you to sweet heart.” I say back.

I hold my dying daughter to my chest as she takes her last breathes.

“Fix this daddy,” she whispers, “I know you can.”

“I’ll try.” I tell her.

“Pinkie promise.”

““Cross my heart and close my eyes,

Hope to die but pray to live,

So long as I’m here on earth,

To you all my love I’ll give.”

“I know you can do it daddy.” She says with her last breath.

I lower my head and weep as my angelic daughter passes away.

“I’m so sorry baby girl,” I whisper, “but I don’t think I can fix this one.”

‘Do it.’ A voice tells me. ‘Do it now!’

My right hand tingles and I look down at it. Resting in my shaking hand is my old Desert Eagle.

‘DO IT!’

I wrap my fingers around the gun.

‘DO IT NOW!’

I raise the pistol up until the cold metal of the end of the barrel is just barely touching my jaw.

‘DO IT! DO IT NOW!’

I close my eyes.

‘NOW!!’

And I pull the trigger.

Author's note: The end is near but not yet here.