Original Link:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FyklBxXLkf-lZgjP6BnHv1WvICV-sYQcaUU9uNlCCJY/edit?usp=sharing

It had been long since the group of friends could last see the moon rise over their homeland. Yet, this night, five days after their devastatingly failed attempt to assassinate King Sombra, it was unusually dark and gloomy. None of the ponies could remember having seen Equestria this colorless at night before. Was the true, black darkness running out of strength? Or was this just their imagination? Whatever the reason may be, it was this particularly dreary night when the last survivors returned from the outskirts of the Crystal Empire. To find out that barely any more than the assault troop survived on that end was an even bigger blow. After having rebuilt the rebellion to an impressive force, they were thrown right back to the edge of nonexistence. The sheer number of beast men casualties, who made up most of the army, was so high that they were now close to extinction.

Applejack, Babs, Caramel and the Cake family managed to find a long abandoned shack close to the forest near Smokey Mountain before the rebels split up. There was no furniture left inside and the wood was dilapidated to the point of breaking when stepped on the wrong way. It was this shack that had been chosen by the rebellion as a meeting point after the attack would be over. This insignificant rotten structure of wood would become another historic landmark to this age as what was left of the rebellion slowly gathered up at it. Immediately, the couple came to understand something went horribly wrong when they saw Twilight, Rarity, Derpy, Celestia, Luna, Cadence, Fluttershy and only a few other rebels walk towards them slowly and with lowered heads, covered in bruises and small wounds. If the plan would have worked out well, they would be looking way more enthusiastic. Instead, especially Twilight and Cadence seemed to be completely emotionally wrecked. When they realized Shining Armor was not among them and Fluttershy explained what had happened, Applejack fell into speechless consternation.

Over time, hardly any more rebels returned from the Crystal Empire, but all were injured. Some so badly even that they had lost body parts in the battle, bloody bandages covering their wounds. Never would Applejack have imagined things could go this wrong. They were so many! And then there was Scorpan… They only just met him a while back and now he is gone? The oldest living beast man? The strongest there ever was who survived absolutely everything up until this point? How could they have been decimated like that, despite all their careful planning? It just didn’t make any sense!

As soon as the remains of the assault troop returned, Twilight went indoors and stood there for hours, sitting on the floor at the opposite end, facing a wall. Fluttershy accompanied her the whole time, trying to comfort her friend. Cadence, on the other hoof, prefered to stick with Celestia and Luna. She looked just as miserable and broken as her sister-in-law, even though she seemed to handle her loss differently. This became especially obvious when she saw Maud Pie return, almost completely unharmed. The former princess of love instantly gained an expression of pure hate. She jumped up and ran straight to the cannibal mare. The others reacted too slowly to stop her. Maud was easily strong enough to kill Cadence if she wanted to. But she didn’t. When Cadence pounced her, Maud didn’t even flinch. Her expression remained completely blank as always while the pink fallen alicorn pinned her to the ground.

“This is your fault! All of this is your fault! We should have never even given you the chance to prove yourself as a friend and ally! You, a pony-eater! You have been with the BloodClaw Cult this whole time, haven’t you?!” Cadence shouted in mindless rage.

The eyes of both Celestia and Luna went wide, quickly wandering around the other rebels. Their expressions of shock were very noticeable and for the first time, Maud as well showed a form of expression. She was frowning, clearly displeased to be exposed like that. In Cadence’s emotional state, she didn’t even care about keeping secrets only the circle knew anymore. Both Luna and Celestia instantly started running towards Cadence.

“I never worked for the cult and I never betrayed you. It isn’t my fault the plan failed. I did everything I could,” Maud replied, still far too calm for the situation she was in.

“Then how do you explain any of this? You were in the Crystal Empire troop and you got hardly any more than a few scratches while nearly everyone else died! You set us all up, feeding us false information so we all get killed! You informed them about our plans and you made sure we would get crushed!” Cadence continued, her expression shifting to a more and more extreme state.

“I did not. I also firmly believed that the evidence I brought you was real. I fought for you, all this time. I’m not even resisting you right now. The only reason I got out of there the way I am is because of my skills and that I knew when the battle was lost. If you want to punish me for a crime I didn’t even commit, I will have to defend myself. Don’t push me to that,” Maud explained.

“The only reason you are not resisting is because you know you are guilty!” Cadence screamed, tears running down her cheeks while she still made the most furious face imaginable.

When Celestia and Luna finally reached her and pulled her away from Maud, they came to realize that her eyes were starting to get bloodshot and her pupils had already shrunken. The loss of her husband took such a heavy toll on Cadence that she was close to falling to Maledictum Insania.

“Cadence, please! Control yourself!” Celestia pleaded in an ordering tone, creating a small mirror with her magic to show Cadence her own expression.

Immediately, the fallen princess became shocked at the sight. She knew the symptoms just all too well, but never would she have imagined seeing her own face with them. It happened so suddenly and so fluently. She didn’t even realize she was slipping. As quickly as her face of rage changed to one of shock, it changed again to one of endless sorrow. Cadence embraced Celestia, crying loudly once again.

Celestia and Luna both felt her agony, bringing them close to tears as well. But they also had to watch the rebels with the information that had just slipped. As Maud stood back up, the other rebels were still staring at her in shock, distrust or both. Maud’s own eyes kept jumping left to right with her usual expression, seemingly anticipating to be attacked any moment. Or perhaps this deeply humiliated her. Still, she did not move while the rebels started whispering to each other.

“The real culprits are here!” a voice announced suddenly.

At last, the eyes moved away from Maud and switched over to the new source. Another small group of rebels returned, all of them injured just like the others. But the only griffon in the group, forced to stay on the ground because he had lost a wing, was walking closely behind two ponies with chains around their necks. Even though their heads were lowered, the leaders immediately understood who they were. Again, one of them reacted far heavier than the others. This time, it was Rarity.

“No! Impossible!” was all she could exclaim as her own parents were brought up to them.

“We weren’t expecting the whole Crystal Empire to be on the alert. Somepony must have warned them. We were waiting for the crystal ponies to start rebelling, as planned, when within our own rows, these two revealed our position. All this time, we had traitors among us. They lit up a firework when no one was looking. Next we knew, every last demon in the empire came right at us. They tried to surround us… It was a slaughter,” the griffon summarized, giving both of Rarity’s parents very disgusted glances.

While all were in shock yet again, Rarity still could not believe what she was hearing. She ran straight up to her parents and forcefully analyzed the backside of their ears, keeping them both immobile with her magic. A gasp followed when she realized they both had the claw mark symbol carved in underneath their fur. The undead mare started to shake, backing off slowly while canceling her spell.

“I… I can’t believe it. You two, of all ponies? My own parents? How… Just how could you?!” Rarity wondered, still not able to wrap her head around this.

Simultaneously, both her parents raised their heads. At last, their dropped their masquerade and showed what they really thought of their daughter. Their eyes were burning with hate and disgust.

“When we were first caught by the BloodClaw Cult, they gave us the same options as everypony else. Join… or die. Originally, we thought of you when we joined the cult. You wouldn’t have been able to handle it is what we thought,” the mother started.

“But the more we learned, the more we realized that we had been living under an unacceptable tyranny all this time. Celestia knew what was going to happen to Sweetie Belle, yet she couldn’t even be bothered to prevent her from being brutally murdered by her own best friend! How could we support a princess this heartless? That makes her just as bad as the killer herself!” the father continued, almost shouting by the end.

“But the greatest insult of all was when we heard that you teamed up with her. You! We never would have thought you would ever end up working for the wrong side. We always thought we would end up seeing you again in the cult. We are not the traitors here! You are! All of you are! You all support a child-killer, you idiots!” Rarity’s mother finished, shouting out in anger.

A moment of silence followed. Eyes started wandering again, this time to Celestia. Having this much guilt and shame on her face as she did at that moment was exactly the opposite of what she should have done. That only confirmed it to the other rebels that these two were telling the truth.

Rarity had her head lowered. If she could still cry, she would be right now. But slowly, her expression shifted again. As her head rose, she returned the same expression of hate and disgust to her parents she received from them.

“And you two think that justifies killing this many people? You really think all the cruelty of the cult is better than what we had before? You two should have chosen to die back then. You are hurting me far more right now than you would have by being killed,” she returned, now shifting her focus to Derpy. “But I will correct that mistake now.”

The gray reaper mare was confused at first, but then became wide-eyed as she came to understand what that look meant.

“You sure about this?” Derpy wanted to make sure as she approached, still remembering Rarity telling her how she reacted when Twilight killed a cultist for the first time.

Rarity simply gave a nod. Twilight already set the standards, she thought to herself. Her own parents betrayed everything Rarity believed in. They needed to die. Not only as punishment, but also to make sure they could never hurt anypony like that ever again. As soon as Derpy summoned her scythe, Rarity grabbed it with her teeth, showing no hesitation. As she reached out for the strike, she looked at them both one last time. Their eyes suddenly went wide and their mouths opened slightly. They genuinely seemed surprised she was about to do this. But just before the strike, her father gained the most sadistic smile she had ever seen.

“I hope you stay undead for a long, long time, my daughter. You deserve every bit of suffering you get from this,” he finished.

This did not change Rarity’s resolve. Compared to what she was going through herself, killing them was merciful. So she swung, the unnaturally sharp blade effortlessly removing their heads from their necks.

As their blood washed over Rarity’s hooves and she watched their souls leave the bodies and disappear, the zombie mare let go of the scythe, which also disappeared immediately. One last time, she showed grief in her eyes and let her ears hang down. She did not regret what she just did. Her only regret was that it even came to this. Rarity turned around and walked inside the shack to join Twilight, Fluttershy and the Cakes. She had had enough. She just couldn’t believe it were her own parents which caused so many of their plans to fail miserably.

But it seemed that this improvised court was not closed yet. The rebels kept on mumbling to each other, their faces becoming more and more serious. Then they started walking towards the shack as well, walking past both Celestia and Luna without even looking at them. Again, Celestia hung her head in shame. But Luna knew that this situation meant trouble.

“Twilight Sparkle! We need to talk!” a donkey at the very front shouted into the shack.

For the first time in hours, the purple mare started moving again. Followed by Fluttershy, she slowly got up and walked out of the door, facing her rebels. Her ears were constantly hanging down now and her eyes nearly lost any shine. She seemed very drained, emotionally tired.

“We saw what you did. You tried to make it look like you lost control, but there was just too clear of a pattern in how you let go of the rebels to have it be an accident. You sacrificed more than half of your own troop to get away! People who trusted you with their lives!” the donkey accused, struggling to keep it together.

Twilight did not respond. So not even that plan worked out, she thought to herself. Instead of justifying herself, her focus shifted away from the small crowd of angry faces. In her stead, Fluttershy spoke up.

“Even if that’s true, we would all be dead if she hadn’t done that! You saw it yourself! There was no escaping from that spell!” the yellow reaper mare argued.

“If only I could believe that. Trust me, I want to. I really, really want to. But after all we just heard, I’m sad to say I can no longer trust the judgement of the leadership circle. And not just me! All of us here!” the donkey rebel continued.

Twilight still kept her focus away from the crowd. She didn’t even want to know if Celestia, Luna, Cadence, Rarity and Derpy had turned around to watch.

“Your sense of morality has decayed far too much over the course of this rebellion! You despise cannibals, yet let them walk between us without notifying any of us! You hate cultists, yet you fail to analyze those properly who are dear to you, simply assuming they cannot possibly be the enemy! This begs the question if the entire assault on Sombra and the Crystal Empire was even anywhere close to being properly planned! Do you even grasp how many lives were lost because of your decision?” the donkey proceeded.

Twilight still didn’t react in the slightest. Her friends were starting to get very worried now. She already was going through a heavy loss and now this? Just what was going on in her head right now?

“Aren’t you going to say anything? You are being accused of betraying your own allies and making terrible miscalculations that not only severely hit all species, but also hit the beast men particularly hard! There are barely any left now and your assault even got Scorpan killed! Aren’t you going to justify yourself?” the donkey wanted to know.

“No…” Twilight replied instantly.

One more time, eyes went wide open. Despite her condition, that was the least expected response from her. Twilight took a deep slow breath, but still refused to even look at any of them.

“It is true… Everything you just said is true… I thought I would be able to make this rebellion succeed. I gave it everything I got, but it wasn’t good enough… Even worse is, by trying so hard, I let my own sense of moral slip more and more. Anything I ever did was because I thought it was the right thing to do… but I was wrong… I’m not worthy of leading this rebellion…” the purple mare spoke, her voice full of sadness, yet sounding like she didn’t actually care about anything anymore.

The rebels started looking at each other again. A few whispers followed, but they soon made up their minds.

“And neither do we think any of the other members of the circle are worthy of that honor. But without anyone qualified to plan this rebellion, it is over. Our only choice now is to disband and go our own ways. Some may continue the fight on their own. Some may switch sides. Some may try to run and hide. But whatever anyone here ends up deciding is their own choice now. I deeply regret that it has come to this, but this is the end. We will no longer support you,” the donkey finalized.

As the rebels turned around and started walking away, some of Twilight’s friends tried to argue with them, trying to make them rethink their decision. But it was pointless. When Twilight finally looked up again, just a few minutes later, only her friends, the reapers, the bodies of Rarity’s parents, the Cakes, Babs and Maud remained. Twilight ended up focusing on the cannibal mare the most.

“Why aren’t you leaving?” she wondered.

“Most of them won’t even make it out of Equestria alive and even if they do, there still is no place left to hide. You all still are my last resort,” Maud explained.

Twilight nodded, showing that she understood. Then she turned around, looking inside the shack where the Cake family and Applejack’s cousin had been watching everything going on.

“And what about you? Why aren’t you leaving? I can’t even protect any of you anymore…” Twilight wondered.

“We have nowhere to go. Like Maud said, it is either you girls or nothing,” Cupcake replied, Babs agreeing with a silent nod.

Twilight did not respond. She didn’t even have to ask any of the reapers why they remained, because she already knew the answer. They had to obey her, no matter the circumstances. She also knew that no matter what she said, her friends would never abandon Twilight, even if she wanted them to. The purple mare just hung her head again and walked back inside. This time, everyone still left followed her, except for the reapers. Only Derpy and Fluttershy also went inside. The rest remained outdoors, guarding the shack.

---

A single candle was all that filled the shack with light, casting the silhouettes of the ponies and reapers sitting around it on the walls. It had become slightly crowded with all those people inside. The wood creaked every now and then, giving away that the floor was struggling to handle the weight. But since the planks were laid directly on the ground, none of them had to fear falling through.

But also did none of them know what to say. All their efforts were in vain. They had come this far, only to fail. So they just kept silent, minute after minute. All eyes were glued to the flame of the candle. It felt like this was the only light left in the entire world. But eventually, Cadence couldn’t stay quiet anymore. She once again broke out in tears, immediately getting comforted by all close to her.

“You know… I was actually glad when Blueblood took my immortality. For such a long time, I secretly dreaded the day I would outlive Shining Armor. Having to watch him die and never being able to join him… It was a thought I hated more than anything. My biggest fear. I was so relieved when I got my chance to grow old with Shining and die in his embrace… But now…” Cadence spoke, starting to cry heavily again. “Now I outlived him after all…”

“I’m so sorry, Cadence… I’m so sorry…” Twilight apologized in a nearly whispering tone, looking away again with still hanging ears as she spoke.

“Shining Armor meant at least as much to you as he meant to Cadence, Twilight. This is not your fault,” Luna responded.

Muteness returned. It seemed like their whole world had been reduced to this shack, the light of the candle and the crying of Cadence. There was nothing else left. Nothing to say, nothing to think, nothing to believe in. But still, Carrot Cake broke the silence a second time after a while.

“Well… what are we going to do now?” he wondered.

“I don’t know… The rebellion was our only chance to at least try to return things to the way they were. Without the help, we can forget about continuing the fight,” Twilight stated.

“But… Twilight! What about your determination? What about ‘so long as this heart keeps on beating, I will continue the fight’?” Fluttershy wondered.

“That died along with my brother…” the purple mare replied quickly, now turning her entire head away from her friends. “In my nightmare, when I spoke to the demon queen, she said that no matter what I do, I only make things worse. Now I see that she is right. Every single step I ever took only led me to this point… The more I struggled, the more I lost… Moondancer, Spike, Rainbow Dash, Obsidian Shards, Crystal Blossom, Scorpan… and now Shining Armor… I will continue to lose one friend at a time until all of you are dead… Maybe this really is how it is meant to be… Letting Blueblood and the cult have their way…”

“You can’t be serious, Twilight…” Babs Seed responded.

She didn’t even say anything to that anymore. Everyone expected of her to snap out of it any moment now. Any second, she would give an epic, motivating speech and buckle up her ideas. But she just stayed silent. This really was it. She had really given up.

“So this is it, then?” Caramel wondered.

Twilight nodded. The one with the strongest resolve of all of them had surrendered. What were they going to do now? Where would they go? Would they even have a chance to survive? It were either these thoughts filling the minds of all present or none at all. As they started to sink into their own minds now, the crying of the cake twins could be heard as even they now came to realize that it was hopeless, fear bringing them to tears.

“Finally,” another voice spoke directly at the door.

This unexpected comment caught their attention. A reaper stood in the open frame, smirking at Twilight… A smirking reaper?

“You have finally given up,” the cursed stallion repeated, a sinister grin growing on his face.

As it clicked to all that this was actually Despair, they jumped up. But before they could get ready to fight, a red magical aura paralyzed them. A huge earthquake followed as Malice stopped flying and landed on the ground. Toxica flew through the broken window as well, giving her typical playful giggle. Finally, Despair dropped her disguise and started walking towards Twilight.

“Now, we can really get to business,” she stated.