The throne room was deathly silent. Violet, Sunset, Tempest, and Starlight stared at Snow Diamond with wide shock-filled eyes.
“You remember me, don’t you my diamond?” Torment asked tauntingly.
“Your diamond?” Spade whispered; he still couldn’t believe what he was seeing or hearing, even if it was standing right in front of him.
“No. No, no, no, no! It can’t be! It can’t be you! It CAN’T!” Snow Diamond stuttered, backing away. “I saw you! You were knocked out! You were taken to prison for murdering that colt! You attacked Jack!”
“MURDER?!” Violet, Sunset, Starlight, and Tempest cried out in shock.
Torment roared at the mention of Spade. “I can’t believe it! I just don’t believe it! Even after all these years, you still choose HIM over ME! You unfaithful SHREW!”
“Hey, hey, hey, HEY!” Starlight yelled, stomping her hooves down on the floor as Snow Diamond conjured up a force field around her and her three friends. “How can YOU be Death Wish? He was an Earth pony if I recall, and you are no Earth pony.”
“Oh, you really hadn’t figured it out yet?” Torment asked before bursting into laughter. “That Death Wish pony was just a silly disguise I used for the past thousand years so I could fit in with pony society. I easily blended into crowds as Death Wish; I made my way to Canterlot, easily got a job shining the armor for the guards, and I was practically “living the dream” as you would say. I admit it was difficult adjusting to life without chaos at my disposal, but I had everything. Then about twenty or thirty years ago SHE came into my life.” He pointed a finger at the white mare. “She was in Canterlot looking for a place to stay and when I introduced myself, I opened my doors. I practically gave her everything she could ever want; a home, a future, and even love, the one thing she never really had even from her own family.”
“You never loved me!” Snow Diamond yelled, trying to fight back tears.
“But if you really are Death Wish, then… why did you abuse her?” Tempest asked.
“Yeah!” Sunset, Violet, and Starlight added.
“Wait, ABUSED her?” Spade asked in disbelief; he looked at the mare he had lost so long ago. He didn’t know what to think now.
“Was it just because of the “rules” you made that she “broke” or was it something else?” Violet questioned.
“Nopony asked you!” Torment screamed in the young unicorn’s face before he looked back at the other mares within the green force field. “Well… at first it was the broken rules, but after a while… I beat her and called her names pretty much every single day just for the heck of it! It’s called tough love, look it up. I’ve always liked watching others suffer from my own hand and Snow here was practically my own personal toy… until she left me.”
“You drove her away, you creep!” Applejack yelled from across the room.
“That’s not tough love!” Rarity shrieked.
“Yeah, it’s abuse!” Spike called out.
“You’re sick!” Rainbow Dash screamed.
“Be quiet!” Torment snapped his fingers and taped the mouths of Twilight and her friends shut as well as chain them to their thrones.
“Leave them alone!” Violet stepped forward and furrowed her brow; Spade put his wing in front of her to stop her, but he didn’t say a word.
“I still don’t understand why you left me, though.” The draconequus continued. “I had everything a pony could want: a career that involved the royalty, an extraordinary home, the unbelievable luxury, the rare social status… A mare would have to be a complete idiot to not want me. Nopony can deny the fact that when we first met… there were sparks. I recall the look in your eyes when she first saw me, the want… the lust. You wanted it just as badly as I did. So I gave it to you… I gave you all of myself.”
A soft sob escaped Snow Diamond’s lips and a few tears streamed down her pale cheeks; she put a hoof over her eyes as her magic faltered slightly. Tempest frowned and put a tender hoof on her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. Torment chortled at the sight.
“Just to hear her like that again? Oooooh, it’s so intoxicating… exquisite, don’t you think so?”
“What?! No! It’s awful to even think about her like this! You’re CRAZY!” Sunset yelled.
“I may be crazy, but it’s the craziness that works. I mean, come on! How could she try to replace me… with something like you, Jackpot Spade?” Torment glared down at the Pegasus at his side. “A common, filthy Pegasus with such an ill-behaved, ignorant, and unrefined demeanor… A pony who uses his own sorrow and pain as a crutch to justify his unforgivable doings… I think after all’s accounted, you are by far the greatest insult. Even after all these years, she still does not understand what she really lost.”
Spade’s eyes widened in fear and he took a step back as Torment leaned in closer to him, his breath that smelled of old fish and rotting fruit wafting through the Pegasus’s nostrils. Spade gagged and coughed at the horrid smell.
“I’m the one who belongs with Snow Diamond. That’s why I sent you away.” Torment went on. “While I was in prison, I quickly broke out and framed you of drowning that colt that night; I also hypnotized those guards into taking you away from Snow and your little filly and throwing you onto that prison ship heading south… I even sunk the ship halfway through its voyage! But I never expected you to SURVIVE. So in the end while you were on that deserted island… I cursed you.”
Everypony gasped.
“You cursed Spade with the Muddled Mind Spell?” Starlight asked.
“And Snow Diamond too.” The draconequus answered. “Heck, I was the one who created the spell in the first place!”
“You did all of this? Cursed Spade and Snow Diamond? But… why?” Violet asked.
“So I could finally get my paws on YOU!” Torment wailed, turning to look at Violet. “The only pony in this world who was able to wield the Blue Flower! You are the ticket to my goals, my success, my VICTORY! While you were alone with your mother, I sent those ponies to take you away, but before they could even touch you, you poofed away and found yourself at your grandparents’ place where they took care of you for all that time.”
“Yes, yes, yes! We get it, Torment; you got what you wanted!” Spade interjected. “Now I think it’s time for you to give me what I want.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Give me back my family.”
Torment paused before letting out a maniacal laugh.
“Even after all of this, you STILL haven’t put 2 and 2 together? You’re already reunited with your family! Your wife… and your daughter.”
Everypony gasped again. Snow Diamond stood up straight and gazed at Violet in shock; Violet was looking at her the same way. Spade’s mouth fell open.
“You mean… all this time… YOU TORE MY LIFE APART?!” Spade yelled, flapping his wings.
“Yes and as of right now, I’m going to finish the job.” Torment said, pushing Spade away.
“Oh, it is ON!”
Torment’s horn ignited and proceeded to blast Spade with a beam of magic, but Spade was too quick and the draconequus kept missing. Violet stared in shock; was she really Spade and Snow Diamond’s daughter? She suddenly gasped; Spade had been hit in the wing with a blast of magic and he was hurled over the balcony. Thinking fast, she ran over and grabbed his hoof in her own before he could fall.
“Hold on!” She cried.
“After everything… why are you saving me?” Spade asked.
“…Because this is what family does.”
Spade’s face softened at the mention of family. Violet tugged on the stallion’s hoof and pulled him back onto the balcony.
“Wait here.” Violet said before directing her attention to Torment.
“Now for you.” Torment said as he approached Snow Diamond’s force field.
“STOP!” Violet yelled as she slammed her hooves down on the floor.
The draconequus turned around to see Violet Rose glaring daggers at him.
“You hurt my mother, stole my father, cursed both of my parents, chased me around all over Equestria… you have messed with THE WRONG PONY!!!” She screamed as she charged at him with her horn glowing.
“Wait, what?! You still have your magic?! But how?” Torment asked before a beam of magic blasted him in the face.
“I’m a lot stronger than you think, PUNK.”
She jumped onto his back, grabbed the Alicorn Amulet with her teeth, and tried to pull it off of him. Torment thrashed around as he tried to pry the young mare off of him.
“Let go of me! Get off of me!”
“Not until you give in and turn everything back to normal!”
“Fat chance!”
“Then you’re about to face some powerful hurt!”
“Let her go!” Snow Diamond’s voice yelled as she pounced onto him too.
“My diamond? What do you think you’re doing? Get off!”
The two mares jumped off of the enraged draconequus. Tall and proud, Snow Diamond radiated with green brilliance; Violet standing right beside her.
“She is not your diamond!” Violet retorted.
“Yes, she is. You will always be my—”
“I’m not a play thing; I’m not an object you can toy with and control!” Snow snapped, stomping her hoof. “All of the horrible things you did to me, every punishment you put me through… Did you honestly expect me to come back to you… to ‘love’ you again?” Snow’s aura shined brighter with each word she spoke.
“You are such a brat, Snow! You never knew what was best for you, for us!”
“For us? Really? This has always been about you, Death! If that even is your real name. It was never about what I wanted, what I really needed, what I felt! It was always about you and what you wanted from me! All you ever did was hurt me; you tried to break me! Newsflash, diamonds NEVER break no matter how hard you hit them! But do you even know how bad you hurt me… how scarred I was after I left? I couldn’t trust anypony! Because of you, I honestly thought I wasn’t good enough for anyone, not worth anyone’s time. It was all because of you! Jack was the one who saved me!”
“Why do you still put your faith in this filthy, pathetic excuse of a Pegasus!?” Torment growled.
“Because I know he isn’t evil! He was under your control this entire time; he obeyed you no matter what because he was afraid of you! You treated him like a marionette; you played with his emotions, toying with him and torturing him until he joined you to make you stop. He is TWICE the pony you will ever be! You’ve always had a darkness inside you from the beginning. You feel nothing. No remorse, no love, no regret, no ANYTHING; only a sick twisted pleasure for the pain and misery you cause others! No matter how much you toy with my husband, hurt my daughter… torture us, our love will always be stronger; stronger than anything you throw at us! I’ve been afraid of you for far too long. This ends now, Torment; once and for all. I am not your doll, your puppet, your punching bag, or your diamond. I am Snow Diamond, and I will always—”
“Shut up!”
Torment suddenly picked up Snow Diamond with his magic and he threw her across the room until she collided into a wall in another corner, which caused a large fragment of crystal to fall from the ceiling and strike her right leg. She screamed in pain.
“Snow!” Jack cried out.
“No!” Violet gasped.
“Ow, my leg.” She whimpered, trying to stop the bleeding from her hoof.
Violet snarled in anger at the draconequus.
“The King and his crew
Stole the Queen from her bed” She sang.
“And bound her in her bones
The seas be ours and by the powers
Where we will we'll roam
Yo ho, all hooves
Hoist the colors high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die”
Tempest, Starlight, and Sunset looked at each other in confusion before they began to join in, along with Spade.
“The King and his crew
Stole the Queen from her bed” They sang.
“And bound her in her bones
The seas be ours and by the powers
Where we will we'll roam
Yo ho, haul together
Hoist the colors high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die
Yo ho, haul together
Hoist the colors high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die
Yo ho, haul together
Hoist the colors high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die”
“Rrrrrrr! I’ll have you ALL in my teeth!” Torment roared before charging at Violet.
“Not if I can help it!”
Before he could do anything, Violet suddenly charged at the creature and jumped onto his back again, trying to get the Alicorn Amulet off of his neck. This struggle went on for a minute or two before Violet covered Torment’s eyes with a tapestry from the wall. He cried out in surprise and he stumbled back towards the balcony, until finally he stepped in the wrong spot and he fell… along with Violet.
“Violet! NO!” Snow Diamond wailed.