Original Link:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ut_DSKImIicXIF0epgr3XvdcmjJt9DZp7UPCf0cezsY/edit?usp=sharing

Pound and Pumpkin screamed as loudly as they could. Even Babs, who was significantly older and more experienced than the twins, was panicking. The red magic held them all firmly in place, but still allowed communicating, it seemed. Twilight realized that it wasn’t Despair casting the spell, as her horn was not glowing. The sinister magic radiated in from outside, from Malice. The purple mare could hear muffled sounds all around the shack. What good is the presence of every last reaper if the demon commander can mute and immobilize them from so far away that they couldn’t even see him approach? She should have assumed as much, Twilight thought to herself. There is next to nothing Malice is incapable of doing now with all that power. Maybe he could also cloud Amber’s future predicting ability, because even she didn’t see this coming. But mostly, Twilight could only blame herself for all of them getting ambushed and captured like this. She was so distracted with her loss and thoughts that she did not feel the demon commander approach.

Toxica remained hovering in the air, rapidly flapping her small wings, chuckling and wiggling her hind legs in anticipation. The Right Hand of Nightmare Moon himself remained outdoors, not even watching, seemingly leaving the work to his subordinates. Despair, too, remained still. Grinning, watching, waiting. She was waiting for Twilight to react, that much the purple mare knew. Twilight was shocked at first as this situation could easily be the end of all of them. She already had huge trouble fighting Malice before, so she had no idea if she even stood a chance against him now. But as the purple mare realized the demons were hesitant to act, she relaxed quickly, sighed and regained her exhausted expression.“I may be at my end, but I will still keep up a fight if you try to take even a single more friend away from me. If you really must kill one of us, just kill me and be done with it. Without me, the last embers of the rebellion will die off,” Twilight suggested, once again shocking her friends that she was so willing to give up her own life without even the slightest intention of fighting back.

Contrary to what the purple mare just suggested, Despair stopped smiling. Everyone, including Twilight, was in firm believe that she would instantly jump at the opportunity.

“If I wanted you dead, you would have died years ago. Trust me, I toyed with the idea many times. There were quite a few situations where I was so close, you wouldn’t even have had the time to react and during the instances when we were fighting, I always had to hold myself back. But truth is: We need you. Now more than ever,” Despair explained.

These words seemed highly unusual for a demon, the Guillotine of Hope in particular. Hadn’t it been her prime objective to completely destroy Twilight all this time? Eventually, Babs was the one speaking out what everyone was thinking.

“What kind of trick are you trying to pull on us this time?” the teenage filly wondered in a tense tone.

“This, my little ponies! This is what I have been planning all along. This exact situation is what all my efforts were centered around. You, Twilight, at your limit. Having nothing left to lose. Willing to do anything for even the faintest chance. All your friends are depending on you so much, they are doomed without you. I have pushed and pulled on your rebellion since the day of its founding. I have used you all like marionettes, only to get you to the very edge. Now, finally, you all are completely at my disposal,” the demoness with multiple voices replied, regaining her confident, evil grin.“No matter what you do to us. No matter how well you planned things. We will never obey you!” Luna protested.“I’m not so naive as to think I could bring you to serve me. But you will cooperate! I’m leaving you no other option. And I can prove it,” Despair countered, turning her head around and giving a glance outside. “Why is it that I always must clean up after you, Twilight? You really have a thing for abandoning those dear to you. Which one of us is truly the demoness here?”

Slow steps could be heard approaching the door to the shack. It sounded like hoof steps, very reluctant, even rebelling to move forward. Then the face of this pony became visible.

“Shining!” Cadence shouted out instantly, tears filling her eyes yet again.

Most of the others could not believe their eyes, either. Shining Armor was unharmed and simply had a blindfold wrapped around his head. He was struggling, resisting. Only Twilight kept the same depressed expression. She wasn’t believing this for even a second.

“N… No! I’m not Shining Armor! He is dead. I’m a Skin-Walker! This is just a trick!” the stallion denied.

While that response confirmed Twilight’s thoughts, it put the others into uncertainty. If this really was Shining Armor, then this is how he would act, they figured. His wife, however, had the hardest time handling all that had transpired so far. She was stuck on an emotional rollercoaster, constantly crying out of either desperation or relief, unable to figure out what she should believe in. What kind of mind game was Despair trying to pull on them? Said demoness reacted to the stallion’s proclamation right away, turning around and shape-shifting her right front leg. The fanged maw disappeared and instead turned into a bladeless claw, holding him by the jaw.

“You will play along, or your precious Cadence dies. Twilight may be irreplaceable, but she is not,” Despair threatened.

The stallion gave off noises of displeasure, moving his head to free his chin. His head lowered slightly, signalling that he was submitting. Still, Twilight remained unfazed.

“We’ve been in this kind of setup before, haven’t we?” the purple mare recalled.

“You insult me, Twilight. With all my intellect and skill, you seriously think I would pull off the same trick twice?” Despair retorted, her expression more smug than upset.

“You are a demon. You never act out of good intentions. No matter what things may look like, there is always a catch to it,” Twilight replied, looking to the ground again.“True, I am not doing this out of kindness of my non-existent heart,” the Guillotine of Hope answered with a smirk while pointing at the bleeding hole in her chest. “But it should be pretty easy for you to figure out if this is your brother or not, shouldn’t it?”

Twilight gave off a frustrated sigh and looked up again. She wasn’t exactly in the position to argue. If this was the game Despair wanted to play, Twilight would play along, just to protect her friends.

“Breeze,” she spoke out.

“Kite…” the stallion replied.

The purple mare rolled her eyes. Lucky guess, she thought to herself. There could be a number of ways the demons figured that one out.

“What kind of pet did you have when you were a teenage colt?” Twilight asked.

“Ants… I owned an ant farm,” the stallion answered.

Now, Twilight’s eyes widened and her ears perked up again. In contrast to the kite lessons Shining Armor gave her, that was something he never brought out into the public. Only she, their parents and Cadence even knew about this. There was only one way to be absolutely sure. She had to make him recite a painful memory.

“When I confronted you about the fake Cadence’s behavior, one day before your wedding when you all still believed she was the real one and thought I was just trying to bully her out of the ceremony, what did you say to me after you finished justifying the situation?” she wanted to know.

“I said you could forget about being my best mare and if I were you, I wouldn't show up to the wedding at all…” the stallion replied with a bit of hesitation.As Twilight’s mouth slightly fell open in realization, the shine of life returned to her eyes. There was no doubt now. If this was an imposter, he would have gotten at least one of these checks wrong. The purple mare quickly looked over to Cadence, who now also was in firm believe that this truly was her husband. Never before did Twilight see this much relief in a single expression. Her light from the candle, reflecting in her eyes, was floating around on the tears in her eyes. Her smile was shaky and unstable, having to press her lips together to not shout out. Cadence was squirming and struggling against the magical hold. She wanted to get to him so badly, crying so much in joy, it was heartbreaking. But Twilight kept her emotions in place. Her focus soon returned to Despair, now giving her a serious look.

“Why? What are you getting out of this?” she wanted to know.

“Your cooperation, of course! He is the key to make you act. You are useless without your hope, so assuming direct control of it in turn gives me full control over you,” the demoness replied, lowering her head slightly and grinning sinisterly.

“You really honor your name, hm?” Twilight noted. “Fine. I’m biting. What do you want?”

Toxica began to chuckle again, seemingly getting very excited now. This seems to have been the part she had been waiting for. Despair’s expression also shifted into a more serious one.

“You would not believe how closely our goal align at times. You want to take down Blueblood? So do we! I want you and your friends to go straight to Canterlot Castle and tear Nightmare’s Eye from his neck,” she spoke in an ordering tone.

“Wait, what?!” Luna shouted out suddenly, deeply astonished to hear that request.

“He is your ally! Why are you turning on him now, all the sudden?” Celestia wanted to know.

“He was our ally. For a long time now, he stopped seeing us as what we are and only uses us as his servants. He served his purpose. But now, he is nothing more than a nuisance,” the Guillotine of Hope explained.

“So tearing down the rebellion was nothing more than for your own sick pleasure? If you hadn’t made it so hard for us, we would be there by now,” Twilight analyzed with a growl in her voice.“If Blueblood is to fall, he will fall on our terms, not yours! Due to the necklace, we can’t harm him while also being forced to follow his every command. Also, why would we allow the entire world to unite against us? What we have here, right now, is what we wanted all along. A small group of powerful individuals, just enough to defeat him. You will not get the pleasure to execute him. For the way he has been treating us, that will fall to us!” Despair clarified.

“And how can we be sure we aren’t getting killed next, as soon as we have ‘fulfilled our purposes’, too?” Fluttershy wondered.

“I guess you can’t,” Despair spoke with a wide, evil grin, causing Toxica to giggle again. “You won’t be able to argue about any of the conditions we give you. Either you all do exactly as we tell you, or you die. Simple as that. But knowing you all as well as I do, you wouldn’t just throw away your lives like that if you even get the smallest of chances to achieve your goal. It would go against your morals to let him reign forever.”

“Then what should stop us from just finishing him off? Why should we give you anything?” Derpy wondered, looking at the demoness angrily.

The answer came not in words, but in actions. Despair turned around again and undid the blindfold. Instantly, black tears started flowing out of Shining Armor’s eyes. They now realized what he was fighting against this whole time.

“Slendermane volunteered to possess your dear brother. This way, we will all be able to keep a close eye on you while also letting him join the battle. If you displease us, he will be choked to death. If you go too far, Slendermane will disable all of you, making you easy prey. Don’t forget: Our stronghold Hades is directly in the crystal mine below Canterlot. You will be swarmed in seconds if you sheer from our plans,” Despair explained.

No arguments followed anymore. They really were trapped. Despair had them. Angry or scared glances from the rebels were responded to by confident and excited looks from the demons.

“We aren’t seriously considering working with them, are we?” Babs wanted to know.

The circle did not reply. Like before, it seemed like everything was up to Twilight now. She spent a few more moments thinking about this before looking straight back to her arch nemesis.

“What about those here who won’t be able to contribute to the attack? Are you really expecting parents, foals and my handicapped friend to join in?” Twilight needed to clarify.“We could just kill them. Right here, right now. But that would damage your resolve. In the end, we can only succeed if we cooperate on this. The Cake family, Babs Seed, Applejack, Caramel and, because I really want to stay in good terms with you so this succeeds, Amber as well will be left alone. You are free to hide, run away or do whatever you want. We will open every gate for you, kill every cultist trying to alarm Blueblood and mysteriously disappear when you get close, so he can’t order us to protect him. It was his great vision to see ponies and demons cooperate. Now, he is finally getting what he wanted. Only if we join forces, he will fall,” Despair stated.

“And what about after?” Applejack wanted to know. “What’s gonna become of Equestria once he’s a goner?”“I guess we will see, won’t we?” the demoness replied, grinning sinisterly. “You can’t deny that we are clearly in advantage right now. Perhaps this will be the end of Equestria and the rest of the world will have to fight for survival. Perhaps one of your allies decides to return and help you reclaim Equestria. In that case, things would be just the way you wanted them. Exactly like before the BloodClaw Cult. Whatever the outcome may be, you know yourself that this war is long from being over.”

“I guess that is the best we can get out of you and this ‘deal’,” Twilight commented disdainfully.

“Come on, stupid ponies!” Toxica suddenly started speaking, apparently getting impatient. “We are offering you Blueblood on a silver platter and you are arguing!”“Let them decide,” the deep, powerful voice of Malice spoke from outside.

The little demoness made a pouty face, then turned away while still hovering. A second time, what was left of the rebellion spent a few moments considering. If they do this and the demons are telling the truth about their intentions, they could finally end Blueblood’s reign of terror and corruption. The exact thing they wanted this whole time. But the cost would be enormous. Cooperating with the demons… the enemy… They would be submitting to their methods, their standards, their judgement. Is achieving their ultimate goal really worth throwing away everything they believed to be the right thing to do?

At last, Malice canceled his spell. Cadence rushed over to Shining Armor straight away and embraced him, crying happily one final time. He embraced her back by wrapping his left front leg around her back. The reapers were allowed to move freely again as well, but they did not attack. They heard every word, now waiting for their mistress to make the choice.

“What will it be, Twilight Sparkle? Do we have a deal?” Despair wondered, reaching out her right front leg again and shifting it into a claw, offering a handshake.

The purple mare stared at the claw. She might be getting blackmailed into this, but she still had to give it her agreement. If she accepted, she would betray everything.

“This is a mistake, Twily…” her brother commented.

“She is not giving us any other choice…” the purple mare concluded.

As she raised her front leg, her focus was lowered to the ground. This was the most humiliating thing she had ever done. Twilight couldn’t even bring herself to look up as she shook Despair’s claw. But the others saw just how wide the grins of both the Guillotine of Hope and the Cloud of Disaster slowly became.

“Wooo! Wooo! Finally! Blueblood is gonna die now! Yes!” the little green demoness started celebrating, raising her front hooves into the air, followed by her landing on the wooden floor so she could start jumping around in sheer excitement.

“You made the right decision,” Despair assured with her usual cocky smile.Twilight, though, wasn’t so sure about that when her hoof finally parted away and lowered to the ground. She wouldn’t even be able to look at herself in the mirror anymore, she thought to herself. What was Celestia thinking of her now? What about Luna? Or all of her friends, for that matter? The rebellion had reached its lowest possible point now.