Friendship cant save you

By the time the mares had all had the chance to process what had happened, Cadence had already begun the next game.
Twilight and the others jolted in surprise as they heard a loud whirring noise, that echoed and bounced off of the walls.
The mares all looked around until they spotted 4 large cubicles rising out of the ground. There were 4 of them.
Pinkie Pie walked closer to one of them, patting her hoof on the side and walking to the front of it, opening the door.

The inside of the cubicle was plain, except for some kind of screen on the wall opposing the door.
Closing the door, the mares all looked at each other in confusion, unsure of what harm could come from these.

Cadence then came over the loudspeaker once more.
“There is a cubicle for each of you, if you could please go inside, I will explain the game from there.”

The girls all looked at each other, looking worried.
Before twilight walked over to Applejack, Pinkie, and Rainbow Dash and hugged them all tightly.
“Whatever happens in there, we’ll make it through. I believe, in all of you.”
Twilight reassured them before they all went inside their cubicles.

Once Twilight was inside, the door slammed shut behind her and locked tightly.
A small speaker, that was secured on the ceiling above Twilight, began playing Cadence’s voice, explaining the terms of the game.

“This game is called Hangman. A fairly simple game young ponies play at sleepovers or even at school. For this game, a set of lines will appear on your screens, it's your job to guess the words before everyone else. If you succeed, you will be let out of the cubical, if you fail, you will lose the game.”
The moment the instructions finished, Twilight’s screen lit up, with a set of 9 lines.
But before Twilight could begin guessing, a thick, tight noose suddenly wrapped around Twilight’s grip. It was made with a thick and scratchy rope.

The purple alicorn began to panic, trying to spread her wings and barge out of the box’s door, but because of how claustrophobic the box was, she couldnt open her wings fully or begin to get out.

“You may begin”
The speaker says once more, and Twilight looks at the screen. There was no timer on the screen, but as she inspected the screen for anything, she felt the noose begin to tighten slightly. Looking up at the noose’s rope, the hole it came out of was pulling the noose upward slowly.

Twilight’s eyes widened in panic as she began to frantically guess letters, beginning with the vowels, as any player of this game would, even without their lives being at risk.

Twilight called out each vowel, and a couple of the lines began to fill in.
_ a _ _ i _ i _ e

For the last two vowels, the noose was suddenly yanked up by 2 inches.
Causing the alicorn to flinch and her breathing to quicken in panic.

A couple of minutes passed and Twilight had guessed 3 more letters.
Those being H, P, and S.

The screen lit up, only the S was correct…
The noose raised another 2 inches, Twilight’s front hooves were now dangling off of the ground and she was getting short of breath.

S a _ _ i _ i _ e

“H-how am I supposed to get this?!”
Twilight shouted hoarsely into the box, the screen lit up and showed a box on the top of the screen saying ‘Give up?’
Underneath in brackets, it read ‘Giving up means you will automatically be eliminated from the game’

Twilight’s eyes widened and she shouted no again while trying to use her front hooves to get the rope off of her neck. But it was too thick to break, and it was too tight around her neck to make a gap.

She knew that this next guess would be her last, and she looked at the screen, staring at it.
Her eyes slowly got watery, she could feel her windpipe getting thinner, and her body was involuntarily moving in an attempt to get air into her lungs.
She felt pressure build up in her head, she had to guess! But what was it?!

Twilight finally managed to realize what the word was and called it out.
“S-sacrifice! The w-word is sacrifice!”

The moment the word was guessed, the rest of the empty lines filled in to spell the word ‘sacrifice’
The screen then lit up green with a large checkmark and the rope around the noose was cut by something, letting the alicorn down. She let out a gasp as he pulled the noose off of her neck, a red line all around her neck like a collar, as she stumbled out of the box, coughing wildly.

Twilight slowly wiped her eyes as she took in greedy lungfuls of air, before looking at the other boxes. Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash were standing there, their eyes filled with tears as they stared at the 4th box, the box containing Applejack. The door was glowing red. She didnt make it.

“APPLEJACK!”
Twilight shouted, banging on the door of the box, but Rainbow stopped her, shaking her head.

Before they could respond, the boxes all lowered into the ground, including Applejack’s, and Cadence spoke up again.
“We’re going to be taking a break for now… You girls can relax for a moment and talk. If you want to… I will be joining you soon.”

Cadence then pressed a button on the side of the window, causing a curtain to lower over the window.

The 3 remaining mares looked at each other and decided to wait for cadence to come into the room with them. It could be their way out…