//------------------------------// // My Last Words (The Tragedy, and Loneliness) // Story: Goodbye, Everypony... // by UniqueSKD //------------------------------// I will never forget that night. Never. Hopefully, I'll be free of that memory once I lay down this quill and end my time in this world. It hurts to even write about it, but I must, for how else am I to make you understand why you have found me the way I am? As I had said before, I was flying on my way home, worried about what my parents were going to think once I told them the news; that I had become, basically, a janitor for a packaging company located in what must be the most unsanitary place in the whole of Equestria. I have always tried to do my best, to be something, somepony, whom my parents would be proud of. They always told me that they were already proud of me, but that didn't stop me from trying harder. But my worrying what they would think of my new job would quickly become the least of my concerns. It was getting dark outside by the time I arrived home. I landed in front of my house and folded in my wings. I recall purposely taking my time walking towards the front door, as I tried to plan out how I was going to explain the situation to my parents, and how I was going to answer whatever questions they were likely to ask. I must have devised a hundred scenarios through my head by the time I was actually standing before the white wooden door, before I sighed and gave up. I would just have to come out and tell them the truth. Simple as that. Oh, if only it was... I raised my hoof to knock on the door, but the moment my hoof touched the wood, the door creaked open a bit, which I found odd since my parents would not simply leave the door unlocked. Unless they were expecting visitors perhaps? No, that couldn't be right. Why would they expect visitors at this time? I reached out for the handle to open the door some more, and that's when I noticed it. The door handle was damaged, as if something - or somepony - had hit it with enough force to break the lock within. That's when I began to fear the worst. I pushed the door open some more. Although it wasn't that dark yet, the street lamps nevertheless came on some time before I had arrived, and as there is one right outside my house, the main hallway was illuminated just enough for me to see inside. It was a mess. Next to the front door, there was a little table and a set of drawers with a vase of flowers on top that my mother had insisted was placed there. They were now scattered around the floor, the vase smashed and the flowers lying in a puddle, the small table broken and the set of drawers disassembled. The wallpaper was also slightly torn and ripped here and there. My heart was racing now, and I was panicking. What had happened here? Were my parents alright? I slowly entered the house, quietly and discreetly, as though I feared to awaken some shadowy entity. I closed the front door behind me, and searched the rooms of the lower floor for my parents. Every room was a complete mess, in disarray and looking as though a hurricane had been magically summoned indoors and laid waste to everything. The dining room, the kitchen, and the living room - all showed signs of damage and destruction., objects torn and broken, thrown aside carelessly as though somepony was - had - been looking for something. Since my parents wouldn't have done this to their own home, there was only one other thought that came to mind. And that thought was what really sent me into a panic. I took my search upstairs, silently praying to Celestia, and Luna, hell even Discord himself, that my parents were alright. The rooms upstairs were in no better condition than the ones downstairs. My room barely resembled the bedroom it used to be, and the bathroom was in complete ruin as well, the medicine cabinet apparently had been ransacked, and what pills and items weren't taken were scattered everywhere. And my parents room - well, right away I noticed that a number of valuable items, family heirlooms that were dear to my parents, were gone, stolen by whoever targeted my home. But where were my parents? I got my answer when I looked out of my parent's bedroom window, which faced the backyard of our house. My answer came in the form of two pegasi ponies lying on ground next to each other. Lying very still. Not breathing. A pool of red beneath them... I...I...can't even begin to tell you how broken I was at that point. I don't recall much after discovering my parents, but I do remember falling onto my haunches next to them. I remember a loud roar of anguish and grief escaping my throat and piercing the darkened heavens. And the last thing I remember is the sound of an ambulance blaring away its sirens before I felt dizzy, and blacked out. When the police eventually informed me of what transpired that night, I had already managed to piece together the whole thing myself. To hear it being repeated again to me just meant reliving the awful events again, but from my parent's perspective. Some low-life scum gang had ventured into the neighbourhood looking for a place to raid. They had settled on my house, thinking it abandoned. It was assumed that my parents were upstairs asleep, awakened by the thieves breaking the door lock. My parents must have went downstairs to confront the intruders, not thinking that there could have been more than one. They were taken by surprise, though there was evidence later found that suggested my parents at least managed to put up a fight, which eased the pain a little, knowing they at least didn't die straight away and so easily. It also helped to explain most of the damage around the house. My parents must have really given those murdering bastards something to remember them by. I took a small comfort in that. But in the end, two ponies against how-ever-many intruders inevitably led to the obvious outcome, and my parents were overpowered. The thieves then quickly finished their raid, fearing that the neighbors had heard the struggle. The police believed it was only after they had finished searching the house for valuables and anything worth selling that they had...my parents... The police think the thieves might not have been wearing masks or anything to obscure their identities, or that my parents had been able to remove whatever they used to conceal themselves, and knowing sparing the lives of my parents would mean allowing two witness to inform the authorities, and describe the culprits to aid in their arrest... I..I don't want to write about it anymore. It's hard enough as it is to bring those memories back, even as I prepare myself for the forthcoming end. Torment and loneliness at school. A poor and under-paying job despite my competence and possible potential. And now the loss of my beloved family...What more could life do to me? What more misfortune could I be put through? I didn't have to wait long to found out. I spent the whole night at the police station in Downtown Manehatten. I never got a single second of sleep. How could i? My parents had been robbed and murdered. Nopony would be able to sleep with that on their minds. Of course, there was a lot going on in my mind in that time. So many thoughts raced through my head. Mostly, they were ones of regret. Why did i go to that interview? The interview had turned out to be a humiliating and degrading position in the end. If i hadn't gone out that day, if i had just decided to give up on looking for a job, i could have been there when those bastards came. I could have done something at least to help my family. And even if i couldn't, if i had died with my parents that night...well, at least those scumbags would have saved me the trouble of ending my misery early for me, i suppose. But those thoughts quickly disappeared when an officer stallion approached me and spoke to me. I recall him being quite large, with a moustache the same shade of brown as his mane. He informed me that there was somepony on the phone demanding to speak to me. I was puzzled at first as to who it was that would have wanted to speak to me, since the police had not released any information regarding the...'incident'...to the public yet. Also, i had no friends, and any relatives of the family lived a long way away from Manehatten, from what my parents had always told me. He led me to a small phone booth and left me alone with the phone. I picked it up and asked who it was. It was Serious Business, the pony who had given me my job just yesterday. He did not sound at all pleasant. In fact, to say he sound angry would have been an understatement. He was furiously demanding where i was, and why i hadn't shown up for work. After what i had gone through just hours ago, i was in no mood for this shit. I angrily told him what had happened, about my parents and my home being burgled. At the very least, i expected him to show me a little sympathy, and apologize. I guess i never learned anything from my misfortunes, did i? He told me that the death of my parents was no excuse for me not showing up. That he had a business to run, and that he did not tolerate workers who didn't show up on time. He then told me to show up to work within the hour, or else I was going to be fired. The tragedy of my situation meant nothing to that, that prick! He dared to believe that I should come to work when i had lost the only two ponies in my life who had cared about me, who treated me like i was a somepony! There had been a long silence between us, before i politely told him to 'go fuck yourself'. And then i slammed the phone back in its place. In that moment, i felt strangle a little better, having exerted my anguish and grief into that little act, even though i knew that right there and then, i had just lost myself a job. But it was a small loss - no, correction. It wasn't even a loss at all. It was more of a relief, because it meant i didn't have to go back to the filth-ridden part of Manehatten again, and i would not have to degrade myself to cleaning up after everypony in that Luna-be-damned factory. But that small relief did nothing to lift my mood. I was jobless once more, and this time, I would have nopony to go home to. To greet me with a heartwarming smile and a loving hug. To make me feel like I mattered to anypony. To give me that small bit of hope for tomorrow to be a little brighter. The reality was clear. Transparently clear. And when it hit me, it struck with the force of a tidal wave. Until now, i had felt alone in the world. Only my parents had been there for me, to be the friends i never made back in my school days. The motivation for getting up in the morning, and going out into the world. They were the only ponies in my life who had made me feel...well, no so lonely. But now? Now i was well and truly all alone. I lost it there and then. I fell to the cold hard floor, curled up into a tight little ball, and i cried. Each tear that ran down my face fell to the floor, slowly forming a small puddle of emotions, those being of fear, loneliness, and grief. And i continued to lie there, and i continued to cry, not caring how pathetic i would have looked had there been anypony around. Even as my throat grew sore, and my chest assaulted with aching pain, the floor - along with my mane and fur - became ever more dampened with the tears of a broken spirit so ironically named. When one of the officer ponies came looking for me about an hour later, he found instead a pegasus shivering on the floor next to the phone booths, his bright once-blue eyes now reddened and sore, his mane an untidy mess, his fur soaked with sorrow, and with his face contorted into that dead emotionless expression. I did not fear Hell anymore. No, it had been replaced with a new fear. What I now feared was a fate more terrifying than Death itself. And that was waking up tomorrow.