"How could this happen?" Cadence asked Celestia as the troops struggled to defend the city from the changelings, all the while more drones swarmed in from the air.

"We weren't prepared for an onslaught like this," Celestia replied grimly as they watched the city burn beneath the castle balcony.

Despite their efforts to create a shield, it was no longer an effective tactic against their foes, and every time one was forged it was perhaps a minute before it was torn down again. Chrysalis had yet to be spotted, but Shining Armor and Luna had not made contact since the outbreak of the battle half an hour ago. There was no word on Snape's whereabouts.

The Equestrian Guard was outnumbered and outgunned, and despite the city's defenses, the changelings were all too familiar with the military's devices and strategies. At this point, the plan was to stall and await reinforcements from other realms of Equestria; it was a difficult choice, but in order to outlast the changelings, the Princesses had to make the call to play defense. They would hold out for as long as they could.

The citizens had begun evacuating the city through the Canterlot Caves, led by Twilight through the perilous tunnels through the darkness and out of the other side of the mountain. By now, the city was comprised of invaders and defenders alone. Luna was operating out of the city square, hindering Changeling advancements on all sides, but at the cost of suffering heavy fire. The soldiers fighting with her were the ones falling the fastest. Shining Armor was taking an elite squad through the alleys and cutting off changeling reinforcement lines on the ground, while his aunt Celestia concentrated the airborne troops, and the Wonderbolts, who had volunteered for the duty, against the changeling fliers.

Cadence, though unable to fight on the front lines, had managed to keep the morale of the Royal Guard up, and was focused on inspiring her own soldiers while demoralizing the enemy, the latter job having been far less successfully executed. The strain of the mental spell on her, however, was pushing her into exhaustion, and she had nearly fainted twice already. Celestia had to do her most not to show too much concern over Cadence's condition.

"Snape..." Cadence whispered as she panted.

"Cadence! Take a minute to rest!"

"He's coming!"

"Who?"

"Snape! He's on his way!"

"Well, that almost makes up for leaving us, doesn't it?" She replied, unconvinced, "You need to pace yourself, niece, don't overdo things. None of us can afford that, please take a minute to rest."

"I'll be okay," Cadence said as she sat back and looked out into the savagery below.

Not long after entering the proximity of the mountain, Snape felt the spell affecting the airwaves, disorientating fliers, though someone, likely a Princess, was using a counter spell, the execution was not on par with the changelings'. Due to this as well as the lasting effects of his recent ordeal, he decided to trek into the city on foot; it would likely be quicker if he apparated through the streets.

It did not take long for the enemy to respond, and with the might of the changeling armies concentrated almost entirely on the city and surrounding area, the challenge was no less brutal than it had been in Ponyville. Thankfully, the normal drones were nothing special, not like Malum and his personal guards at all. He was able to dispatch the fodder with a simple spell, but the sheer amount of them was making it hard to keep up, and he was moving quickly through the streets, looking for opportunities to fight them with as he ran and attacked.

As usual, ice worked well to slow them down and incapacitate them, but he soon found himself in need of new tricks, and soon found they began to read his patterns. Just as he rounded the corner two changelings swooped down from the air above and knocked him back in front of his many other pursuers. Their blasts came flying at him just after he activated a protection charm. A warrior of Malum's might could bash right through, but their attacks did little to weaken his charm and they found themselves puzzled and perplexed on how to actually hit Snape.

As usual, their answer was simply to throw more drones at him, but a quick anti-gravity spell turned them all on their heads and he froze the entire street to bind them in place. The roads leading towards the town plaza were too far entrenched with drones, but he was able to break open a barber shop door with a fast spell, and was soon cutting through the buildings and alleys to escape their wrath. He still met resistance and had to move quickly from battle to battle or risk another swarming, but he didn't have much of a problem, thanks to apparation.

However, he found himself in a conundrum when he spotted Shining Armor and his men being mauled by a changeling group. On the one hand, he knew that it was a Princess, not a Prince, that would be killed to throw Equestria into anarchy. To waste too much time here was a surefire way to let that Princess die, but without a leading figure in the streets, the morale of the ponies would drop faster than a first year beside a dementor, and that would do the Princess no good either.

Snape watched as the soldier's were clawed, bitten, entranced by different spells, and trampled by the eager changeling swarm all around them. He tightened his grip on his wand. It was the time for the ultimate decision. Was he going to let Shining Armor die in the chance that his wife or one of the other Princesses might not? It was more logical to attend to the matter of the assassination by himself and be done with the cursed mission to the pony's land, but the practical choice might not always be the right one.

As he brought up is wand, he acknowledged that convenience did not stop someone from saving him once upon a time long gone.

"It's been an honor!" Shining Armor cried out to his men as the changeling above him prepared to bite right into his heart.

But as the enemy drone threw down his head, it toppled right off and rolled to the ground with an attention grabbing thud, prompting all who still lived to see Snape emerge from the building across the way with his wand in hand, aiming at the changelings on top of the soldiers. Shining Armor was among the most shocked, but he did not waste the given opportunity, and used a quick spell to activate a repelling shield, throwing the changelings off of himself and his men. They couldn't put up a shield around the city as they did at the wedding, but miniature attempts were a guaranteed protection.

Bleeding and panting for air, Shining Armor and those among his soldiers that still drew breath huddled together as half of the swarm attacked their dome and the other half attacked their savior. Snape opted for an incinerating spell this time, and though several escaped it, he managed to take away several more. He rolled to his side in order to avoid the swooping attack from the air, but he was still knocked on his chest by the blast that came from behind.

He rolled over and decapitated his latest attacker, and managed to get back on his feet before several more blasts came at him. He parried the first two away, and redirected the third to strike down one of the opponents wailing away at Shining Armor's shield. A wave of invaders flew at him, but Snape apparated behind their charge and blew most of them into a nearby building, crushing them into its structure and nearly collapsing it. As it threatened to topple over, Snape sent out an arc of lightning from his wand that jumped from drone to drone upon his command, stunning them all long enough for Snape to take them out of the battle.

He could hear their telepathic cries to one another.

'He's too strong!'

'Why has Lord Malum not dispatched him?'

'Will he let us alone if he flee now!?'

Snape looked over to the soldiers, some barely clinging to life under the shield dome, and commanded Shining Armor to strengthen it as much as possible as Snape took command of a blazing fire across the street, directing it to engulf the changelings still bent on killing Shining Armor and his subordinates. Most of them were fried into defeat, if not death.

Snape quelled the flames before the shield gave out, and directed the wounded soldiers to run into the nearest ally, but most of them could do more than limp to that sanctuary, prompting Snape to defend them as another swarm and a half came his way. There were definitely too many to stop. Ice only did so much before it shattered, fire could only burn so many before it was snuffed out, each spell was the bargaining chip for only a moment more of safety. Shining Armor himself was almost through the door, but several other soldiers were still en route. It was now or never, and Shining Armor would be vengeful if not enraged.

Snape apparated to the wounded Captain of the Guard and threw him into the building before sealing the doorway from the attackers, saving the troops inside, but forsaking those who had not yet made it inside to absolute and certain death. Shining Armor looked as though he could hardly perceive what had happened.

Snape used two other spells to keep the room sealed, but it seemed the changelings were content for the moment to simply devour the forsaken men. The Princes, Half-Blood and of the Crystal Empire, stared each other down as the other soldiers attempted to stop their bleeding wounds and bind what damage they could.

"You're a real piece of work, you know that? Their deaths are on your shoulders as much as they are mine!"

"I know!" Snape scolded, "But if I chose not to act as I did, we'd all be dead. I assume a soldier would understand the sacrifices of duty."

"I do understand sacrifices! But I would never let my men perish while I was hidden and safe...."

"I am not you, and I have my own worries to attend to," Snape dismissed as he began to walk away.

"Where are you going?"

"To end the war, stay here if you can't keep up with the battle; you're less good to your soldiers dead than wounded."

"Don't just walk away! I can't stand that attitude of yours! Snape! Don't count me out because I'm wounded, you can't do whatever you plan to do alone!"

"I excel at performing alone, and it's clear that if I have trouble with these armies, you surely cannot withstand them," Snape countered, still walking towards the front door.

"You're trying to help.....I know you are," Shining Armor admitted with his head bowed, "But by Celestia! It's my land too. I can do my part to defend it. Tell me what you're doing and let me go with you."

"You've done your part. I will handle the rest."

"What, you still don't trust me? Is that it?" The guard captain asked, finally making Snape turn to face him.

"I trust myself more than anyone, as it should be. I am capable of ending this conflict, I know exactly how to proceed. You'd only hold me back."

"You can heal these wounds, can't you? Aren't you a great wizard!? No sense in leaving things to chance, I can help you end it, just tell me how and let me back you up."

Snape almost smiled at the irony, "To think you'd be willing to support me....your gesture has been noted, but I do not require your assistance."

Shining Armor could only sigh as Snape apparated out the building, leaving the soldiers to lick their wounds and pray that they would not be discovered. He bit his tongue as he glanced through the window on the far side of the room, observing the drones as they crawled through the streets and buzzed through the air. Canterlot was in the gravest of dangers.

"Luna is not doing well," Celestia told her niece as they watched opposite sides of the city, "I can't say how much longer before she's pushed out of the plaza. Our numbers are falling too fast. I'm still weakened, and you can't fight. They struck at our darkest hour."

"We can't give up hope," Cadence said amid heaving breathing, "Shining Armor is....reaching out.....I can tell that he's alive....he's doing his part too."

"Even he cannot sway the tide of battle. Worse still, I haven't heard from Twilight in some time. We haven't got the strength to hold out much longer. I fear this is the last day of Equestria's sovereignty."

"We can't...give in..." Cadence repeated, weaker still.

In her heart, Celestia thought that she may have already done so, and did not notice Cadence moving over to throw up.

Luna shut her eyes for a split second, a moment frozen in time to remember the member of her personal guard who had just taken a blast aimed right for her head. A second to recall in later years of the sacrifice of this guardsman, among many others he and his kin had made for her. She returned the favor thereafter with a spell that blew a hole in the changeling wave surrounding the airspace over the plaza.

"Princess!" Another guard called from nearby, "The enemy commander! It's Queen Chrysalis!"

That same warrior was also shot down, but his message caught Luna's attention. She indeed spotted the Changeling Queen, eyes filled with chaotic rage and the fiercest of malice, eyes that struck a familiar, and particularly dark cord within Luna. If she could defeat their Queen, the changelings would flee in panic. Doing so, however, especially in this battlefield, was as good as a suicide mission.

"Face me, Chrysalis, and let us see who is the stronger warrior!"

The Queen scoffed and bellowed out a toxic laugh. Luna flew up higher to meet her hovering form, despite the dangers flying through the air with them. Once again she challenged Chrysalis, but the Queen laughed on, undaunted, even unaware of Luna's presence. Then the Lunar Princess realized what she had fallen into as a spell struck her from behind as she fell. The image of Chrysalis faded away, a mere illusion, and the real Queen stepped out of the sea of drones attacking the plaza.

"You shall fall as well," Chrysalid taunted, licking her lips at the enticing thought of killing Luna, "just as all those before you have. Even the most spirited among you have felt my scorn and whittled away under my wrath!"

They fired blasts of magic at each other in the same moment, and the collision of their magic created an eruption that sent many Equestrian soldiers flying back, as it did to Luna, who was dazed and vulnerable. Chrysalis' attack was fast and fierce, and Luna was amazed that she was able to move in time, but could hardly marvel at her feat when another came hurling towards her.

She was able to create a shield that absorbed the Queen's blasts, but it was ruptured after six or seven hits, and she had to fall back. The plaza was strictly chaos now, and more ponies and changelings alike were dying than before. It was so far out of Luna's element, but probably well within Chrysalis'.

Luna's blasts slowed Chrysalis down, but did little to deter her, and the Queen kept on the pressure chasing Luna through the mess of the plaza, and then out into the streets, where the chase was tighter and the room for error decreased. It was not long before Luna had misjudged a weave, and crashed into the ground. In the blink of an eye, Chrysalis was already standing over her, but Luna's time was not over.

Snape's spell intercepted Chrysalis' shot mere inches away from Luna's face, distracting the Queen enough for Luna to push her off and blast her into the wall. As the changeling leader crawled out, she laughed heartily at the sight of Luna together with Snape. Both the Princess and the wizard bore faces of steel, unwavering in the face of the taunting laughter.

"At last, the game ends once and for all!" Chrysalis exclaimed with joy.

Luna teleported behind the Queen, who repulsed her with a shockwave spell, throwing her into a scarred storefront. By the time she recovered, Snape and Chrysalis were gone. She searched the area, but quickly saw that the Equestrian forces were dwindling by the second. Those few that had been taken prisoner were lucky, paralyzed under changeling excretion while their brothers lay in their own blood. The war was not going to last much longer.

She flew up to see if she could find someone else to save, but she was soon forced onto the balcony with Celestia and Cadence as the changelings took all sides and conquered the city.

"Luna....have we failed?" Celestia questioned with heartbreaking uneasiness.

"I'm afraid so..." Luna replied with a bowed head.

"Princesses! Princesses!" Twilight called as she ran through the hall and onto the balcony, her bright face soon fading into horror, "Oh no...."

Cadence was nearly lying on the floor.

"Let us finally see if your magic is a match for my power!" Chrysalis taunted, her voice echoing throughout the Canterlot Caverns, "When I kill you, I'll march right out of these caves after those fleeing ponies, helpless to save themselves. You've failed, wizard!"

Snape did not give reply. He crept along in the shadows, examining the arena and watching Chrysalis as she moved slowly, hunting for him eagerly. This battle would decide Equestria's future. Immediately, he sent off a wave of light that pulsed out of his wand, erupting in all directions to draw his foe towards him.

Chains shot out as magical constructs, flying at Snape like homing missiles, with a movement of his wand, the chains found their mark, latching onto their target and pulling him to the ground in front of the Queen. She bellowed with laughter as he blew a hole in Snape's chest, but was angered to see that it was an illusion.

Another pulse of light erupted from another area, and Chrysalis herself went to chase down the elusive wizard, but he was already gone. A third pulse emanated from another hall of the cavern, but once again, Chrysalis fell short of Snape, still unaware as to his location. Unable to get a hold of him, her options became limited to waiting or resuming her taunts.

"You delay what is only inevitable, at the end of the day, you can't change what has been set into motion."

As before, he did not answer.

"You think lights can scare me? Show me your best wiza-"

A blast of ice froze her face before she could end her sentence, but the ice was blasted away as little more than an annoyance. She darted forward, flying straight to him, knocking herself through the shield charm he put forward, unsettling the entire cavern system. Snape landed on his back, but still held his wand, and attempted a levicorpus spell, but the Queen shook it off more easily than the ice.

She laughed as she jumped at him, driving her deadly hooves down into the rock where his torso lay seconds ago. A quick sectumsempra spell from beside her made a fine cut on her leg, but not a deep one, and she shrugged the wound off easily. She ran at him to spear him through with her horns, but he activated a repulsion spell, taking all the momentum she mustered into the charge and repelling her with it. This was a blow she felt, despite her quick recovery.

Snape set the Queen ablaze with a fiery blast, but the fire did not hurt her much, and she extinguished it quickly.

"A pity you decided to side with the ponies...now you die painfully."

She teleported behind Snape with speed he could not match, and he was knocked away with a fine strike that also cut open his side. She continued to teleport, and arrived on top of him as he moved his hand push himself off the ground; she bit into it and drew out more blood, but she left herself vulnerable to Snape's next move.

Figuring it worked on Malum, he decided the Cruciatus curse was well suited, and Chrysalis backed off immediately. He had the option to attack further, but reckless behavior was a surefire way to fail. He opted to quickly heal the wound in his side, and do what he could to the bite, hurrying along as Chrysalis began to work to rid herself of the torment. She had become strong indeed if that curse was barely enough to put her on her knees.

Fortunately it appeared that Malum's work had left him in a much more fortified position against changeling venom. He was almost as good as before, wen Chrysalis was once again ready to attack. He raised his wand and fired a spell into the ceiling, causing a great rock to fall, almost on top of Chrysalis, who had the wherewithal to evade the falling stone. She seized Snape by the throat and began to choke him as she held him above the ground.

"Good try, wizard! Try dying next!"

Snape summoned a burst of raging water from the end of his wand, repulsing Chrysalis and forcing her to drop him. He continued the stream, beginning to flood the cavern with water. Her wings, sopping wet, no longer had the ability to fly, and the water was spewing out with enough force to deter her advances, but she was able to use a shield. Having diverted the waters into the ceiling and the walls, Chrysalis made another mad dash at Snape.

She seized him by the chest and threw him into the air, despite his attempts to evade the tackle, a magical blast sent him through a wall of crystal and laid him flat on his back. She walked towards him undaunted as he attempted to cope with the pain. He made one last gambit, raising his wand at the crystals and causing them to grow outwards like spikes, but Chrysalis blasted them away faster than they could attack her.

"Do you see my power? Snape!? Do you acknowledge me as your better now!?"

Panting, Snape crawled away, inching slowly farther, but in futility, for Chrysalis' every step took her closer than Snape could crawl away. Her power was greater than his own, and she haunted the caverns with her venomous laughter, almost having made it through the hole she made by hurling Snape through the crystal. He turned to see her standing there, watching him struggle. He gripped his wand tightly, and began to slowly move it forward.

As Chrysalis took her first step beyond the shattered wall, Snape flung his wand forward and three bright pulses of light rushed at her from all sides, blinding her and leaving her open to Snape's next spell, which pushed her back a few feet. As she recovered from the blinding flash Snape had set up at the opening of the fight, he enacted the final phase of his plan, and she noticed that something was weighing her down.

She soon realized the water from earlier was beginning to grow exponentially in mass, and the ceiling above her was rumbling. Snape's power was not on par with her own, so he fought smartly. She found herself flat on her stomach in an instant, her wings nearly broken, feeling as though they had been cemented completely to her back. The rumbling above her grew louder, and she gasped as the stones began to fall like dying dragons from the skies. Horror controlled her face as she was buried under the stones, being crushed and flattened by each one.

Snape waited until it was over, then went to confront the fallen Queen.

To his own unsettling horror, he found not the Queen of the changelings, but three different drones, each one wounded beyond the ability to stand up. He went silent for a moment, reviewing everything that he knew to be true in an attempt to determine his next course of action. He needed answers, and he could readily get them now.

He walked over to the first changeling, a drone that could barely mutter out words, and he killed it swiftly with a spell. The second changeling, also a nameless drone, met the same fate. The third fake was a Lieutenant changeling, a warrior of enough skill to serve beside Malum; it appeared this one had defected to Chrysalis' side, and that was now his undoing. Snape pressed his foot on its faintly rising and falling chest, leaning down over it as it squirmed in pain.

"What has Chrysalis done?" Snape demanded of the only changeling he left alive.

"She's won the war for us....the era of ponykind is over."

"Why did she kill Malum?"

"To gain the power to defeat all the Princesses. His defeat led to our Queen's ultimate ascension! She is beyond any of your side's champions now!"

Snape stared numbly into the changeling's cold eyes, finally having his ever-growing suspicions confirmed. He had been a fool to be baited so easily. He quickly killed the changeling under his foot and apparated out of the caves. If he hurried, he would not be too late.

The balcony of the castle was the very last stronghold of all Canterlot. Everywhere in the city below, the changeling had won. The soldiers were massacred, the citizens that had escaped with Twilight were being hunted down, and the Princesses were all that was left of the Equestrian army.

They all stood in silence, side by side, unable to accept their defeat. It was a sad hour, and a sadder still moment in their hearts, especially for Celestia and Luna. Twilight was openly crying, and received little comfort from her former teacher. Luna stared down below and watched the hordes do as they pleased with the town and the liters of corpses lying on the streets. Cadence looked down at herself, trembling and on the verge of fainting it seemed, but she seemed to experience a revival before she could lose consciousness. She turned her eyes to Celestia beside her.

But that was when Snape appeared, having flown up in his nebulous form and landed on the edge of the balcony. They all seemed shocked at his appearance, but none of them could possibly react when he raised his wand on Cadence without a word of explanation.

"What is the meaning of this!?" Celestia demanded.

Snape did not take his eyes of off Cadence's silent and shaking form. He held his wand surely, aiming to kill, and ready to let loose a spell at a second's notice. Cadence slowly backed away towards the doors as the other three tired to block him, but he too pushed forward, and would let his wand's aim leave Cadence.

"What are you doing? Snape!?" Luna cried out.

"I regret," Snape finally began to explain, "that I did not do a better job here. I was played like an idiot for not seeing this sooner."

Tired of his actions of rebellion, Celestia was the first to light her horn ablaze with magic power. Even weakened, in her state of fury, one magic blast was enough to rip right through any organic being. Unsure of what exactly to do, Twilight joined in and had her horn ready to unleash a spell. Luna seemed near crying, but did not yet ready her magic as Snape continued on.

"It was not my intention, but if it must end this way, so be it. She will die."

"What has Cadence done to warrant this?" Celestia shouted.

"Nothing..." Snape replied, ever numb and unfeeling as he slowly paced forward.

"Don't be a fool, Snape!" Luna screamed as she at last lit up her horn, prepared to kill Snape with one blow, "I believed in you!"

"Snape...why!? Didn't you trust us? Weren't you our friend?!" Twilight asked as her heart raced in her chest.

"Trust......no matter how genuine...can always be misplaced."

Snape said nothing else as he at last readied himself to fire a spell from his wand, all the while three more magic blasts were a hair's width away from flying off of their respective horns. Twilight could've imagined it, but through her own teary eyes, she could have sworn that Snape too shed a tear as he flung his wand forward, and the Princesses retaliated in spades.

"Avada Kedavra!"

Author's Notes:

Hehehehehehe.....I'm evil, huh?