DAY 2 – 5:30PM

It been a good long while since Rumble and Rez started walking around the main base. After searching around the main floor of the base for a good long while, they finally stumble upon the main elevators of the base.

“So that's where the other rooms are at?”
“Those prison room floors, maybe the Cutie Mark Crusaders are in them”

The two closes the main elevator door as they get ready to start searching by each room. “If your friends are literately in bigger trouble from any escape attempts, let's start with the prisoner rooms 3, and 2” With Rez hitting the Room 2 button, the elevator proceeds down. “If you ever feel ill in these rooms, you can borrow my gas mask” “How so” “These red marked floors 3, 2, 1, and 0 don't have clean air, they're entirely using the dirty air from the caves. Despite this caution, Rumble is still excited to see his filly friends again once they locate them.

Arriving in Room 2, they arrive in a hallway of nothing but prison cells. The air smelled like a mixture of indoor air and oil. There's like 2 pathways left and right which lead to other prison cells as each wall side has over 50 prison cells since there are cells at the end of the long walls too, there's a total of 300 prison cells.

“Rumble you check that side and I'll check the other side, we'll meet up back at the other end to check the middle,” Rez said to Rumble as they both pick sides. Rumble walks to the left to check the cells that are on that side while Rez walks to the right. As Rez passes by, she sees some prisoners who she recognized as once being mercs who actually did dirty work for Raden and Alyx. They call her name out as she walks pass them begging to be set free but she didn't have time to talk to them nor did she trust them, she had one goal in mind and that's to locate the Cutie Mark Crusaders.

Eventually, they finally meet up on the other side of the room where they check the middle cells before eventually heading back into the elevator.

“Damn, they're not in here, guess it's time to check room 3” Both being disappointed, Rumble pushes the 3rd number button and they're taken to the next prison cell room.

As soon as they stepped out of the elevator, they noticed that someone else called for it as it was going up. “Rumble, we gotta hide now, I think someone's on to us” The 2 ponies climbed up to the nearest air vent and hid there till the elevator came back down. By surprise, the elevator seems to actually be going up to Floor 8 after stopping at Floor 4.
“That was a close call” Rumble said to Rez. They get back out to continue searching the cells.

Room 8 was a room that was basically like a shopping mall for Mercs. It was probably the 2nd biggest room in the base aside from the storage room in Room 9 and Room 4 with the biggest room actually being Room 1. Room 8 had small fast food restaurants of popular chains (Of course unlicensed as the food for the actual brands were acquired through 2nd market means since they don't wanna risk having the base caught if they had an actual license from the companies) also some local home made food restaurants, one of which is a sushi place that serves the deadly puffer-fish delight which the sign on the place says “No poison deaths since 3 months with a 10 months crossed out and 5 days before it crossed out and of course even one of them being since 20 hours crossed out”

There are ATM machines and video rental markets and a small theater that plays mostly arthouse movies, finally there's a stand that not only sells the local Ponyville and Cantelot newspapers but also a stand for the Local Blank Panther Merc's news which is actually news being reported going on throughout the base. Dox emerges from the elevator that he just came back from as he has a pulley containing 2 huge cardboard boxes full of Vol 1 of the new Gabby Gums. He picked the right spot right next to the newspaper stand and proceeds to make an announcement using the intercom that is said to everyone clearly in Rooms 10-4.
“Attention everypony, I would like to announce that Gabby Gums, the number 1 magazine for Gossip is now available for purchase! Only 2 bits!”

Although it was heard clearly in those rooms, it can still be heard muffled a bit in Rooms 3 and 2. Rumble and Rez are both shocked to hear the voice. “Oh no, please don't tell me they're making them write Gabby Gums again?”
“Gabby Gums? That's Dox speaking Rumble looks like we know what he's making the girls do now”

“How did he know that they used to write those articles”
“Tell me all about it Rumble”
“A while back the Cutie Mark Crusaders got a task at writing for the Foal Free Press. Diamond Tiara wanted the girls to write about gossip on innocent ponies and their private lives and well... it didn't end well.”

“You should tell me about Diamond Tiara some other time, right now, you gotta find out where the girls are at. Dox is on the 8th floor in the Black Merc Market”
“He's making my Sweetie Belle do this?, I'm gonna hit him so hard he'll...”
“I want you to just find Dox and see if you can get info on where the girls could possibly be at, but whatever you do, don't use your real name! He may be easy to take out but if he gets suspicious, he can call security at any time”

“Got it Rez”

“Alright Rumble, I'll continue searching this cell and I'll start looking into Floor 4. When you get enough information, meet me in this air vent shaft” Rez gives Rumble a drawing of how he can get to Floor 4's air shaft quickly from Floor 8 as it requires taking a path that Rumble can climb down at and then there's a spot that he's supposed to meet at that is right next to the Monitoring Station

While Rez continues her search, Rumble takes the Elevator from Floor 3 all the way to Floor 8. It's a huge relief for Rumble now when the elevator doors closed since he didn't have to smell the bad air in the prison rooms anymore. The elevator arrives at the 8th floor as he's greeted by a bunch of Merc's in a huge crowd while he struggles to get through.

Once through the crowds, Rumble realizes that he's at their shopping and entertainment center. Rumble looks at one shop called the “Bonds Book Store” and seeing a copy of a racy book, Rumble jokes about It being “More like Bondage and Plots bookstore” before turning around to see a gun shop where he noticed a sign saying all Gas Grenades and Shotgun ammo is out of stock. Rumble continues moving forwards till he reaches a spot where there's a line of Mercs, including some with their own foals giggling while reading articles of both Merc News and Gabby Gums, Rumble finds a copy of the new Gabby Gums on the floor which someone has dropped and Rumble takes a good look at the article.

The 1st page has a headline which showed an image of Raden being really ticked off at a few mercs while there's a line made at the expense of Raden a bit. Rumble couldn't stop laughing as it seems like the Crusaders are writing about the more serious looking and bad Mercs including a picture which showed Alyx falling Asleep while sitting on a toilet and of course an image of a prisoner guard sucking his hoof. Rumble recognized Alyx and Raden as the ones who kidnapped the CMC but still laughed at the images of them along with the prison guard pony.

Rumble followed the line to see where the issues are being sold at. After a few minutes, he finally reached face to face with a white unicorn colt who can only be described as Dox.

“You wouldn't happen to be Dox right?”

“Hello my fine merc and yes it's me, what's your name?”
Rumble needed to make up a fake name fast since it is possible that the CMC might have been forced to tell Dox about their classmates. “My name is Thunder, and I came here to talk about this funny issue I just read of Gabby Gums” Rumble stares at Dox for a bit waiting for a response. Rumble can already figure out the features of Dox as being kinda tough and being around Button Mash's age.

“Hehe, glad you like my 1st issue, but you can thank Gabby Gums for these reports. Of course, I hadn't read through these but it seems like everyone likes them”

“Hahaha, Gabby Gums sure knows her stuff. Say, do you know where I can meet Gabby Gums?”

“I'm sorry, but Gabby Gums isn't available at the moment but maybe in the next few days they will be available to chat with”

“They' you mean more than 1 Gabby Gums?, Do you know where they're at now?”
Dox starts getting suspicious but didn't want to disappoint the nice looking pegasus merc that he hasn't seen before. “Gabby Gums crew is in their place in a locked monitoring station on the 4th floor, but they shouldn't be bothered right now. I got a special surprise for a certain unicorn” Rumble is shocked where he noticed that he's, in fact, talking about doing something with Sweetie Belle now, Dox actually seen his shocked face and gotten even more suspicious and wondered if that merc is one of the colts the CMC talked about earlier. “Say Thunder, how old are you?”

“Two years younger then you look” Rumble replied.

As Rumble starts walking away and stood near a air vent, Dox realized that the Merc outfit looked too similar to one that he wore many months ago prior to losing it. He starts remembering how the CMC mentioned about Rumble being slightly younger than Apple Bloom but around her age, but before Dox even realized it and made the connection, he was interrupted by a familiar voice.

“Telling others about your merchandise I see” Dox suddenly looked up and of course, a proud standing Unicorn merc in a business suit is in front of him, he has a brown coat, black hair, and blue eyes. “Uh, hello dad?” It was sudden, Trench Bloodhoof is back in the base now and went to go see his son 1st.

“My son, what is this your selling here” Trench Bloodhoof picked up an issue of Gabby Gums and started giggling at an article about a Merc who fell asleep drooling while in his Hovercar, he started laughing even more at a few more pages till he got exhausted. “Why Dox, this has got to be the most entertaining magazine I ever read”

“And it's all thanks to the Cutie Mark Crusaders”

“Well son, I kinda want to talk to you about that. I really wished you didn't beg Alyx and Raden to kidnap foals your age. We don't wanna take the risk of grabbing attention for kidnapping kids just like you, which is why it's against our policy, However, since we beefed up security with turrets now, I'll give you a pass for once”

“Why thanks, dad, you're the best” Dox runs up to Trench Bloodhoof and hugs him while Trench returns the hugs.

“There's just one thing though Dox, I wish you didn't have them write about my prized officer Raden, he's too important for us”

“Wait a sec I didn't say they co.... “ Dox flips through the pages of the article and recognized that most of the articles are about Mercs that are actually friends with Dox and respects him. He also realized that none of the certain merc targets he picked for them to write about are on the issue.

“Uh dad, can you get someone to take over selling the issues for me, I gotta take a long break for a sec”

“Sure thing Dox, besides I gotta discuss things with Raden and Alyx”

Dox suddenly ran towards one of the posters near the arthouse theater and punched the area of the poster of a pony's chest, the whole poster turned around to reveal a hidden elevator for instant access to any room in the building. “Stupid Mules, they think they can cheat out that easily, well I'm about to give them a taste of my own medicine” Immediately pushing one of the numbers for a spot in Floor 4, it had immediately started dropping fast. Rumble had witnessed the hidden elevator but decides to immediately climb down the air vent to reach Rez.

6:10PM
Rez is still standing by the air vent wondering what's taking Rumble so long. She suddenly sees the Monitoring Station open up to reveal the Cutie Mark Crusaders.

“So Sweetie Belle, which floor is the soda machine at again? The apple filly responded. “Floor 5, now follow me.

Rez watches as the girls run around the hallway looking for the elevator before eventually bumping into it. “Girls, I think we found it” the orange filly replied before they all walked into the elevator and closed the doors.
Rumble suddenly slides down the vent bumping into Rez. She made a small grunt before Rumble said an apology.

“Sorry if I bumped into you, I got important news to tell yo..” Rez covers Rumble's hoof to explain what she see. “I just saw the Cutie Mark Crusaders, they actually walked out of the Monitoring station and into the elevator for Room 5”

“Really! That Is amazing but we better distract.....” Suddenly they heard a loud slam next to the wall with a painting they can see from looking out of the vents. The painting flipped over to reveal Dox who is very mad. “Rez, you get into the monitoring room and monitor me and the crusaders while I try to distract Dox in Room 5” “Got It” Rumble climbs up the air vent so he can reach the 5th floor.

“Alright ladies, lietime is over! Dox approaches the Monitoring Station's door and opens it up. Rez can only know what's gonna happen next.

“Celestia Peeving Damnit!!” Dox swore up a loud slur of S, P, and B bombs as he starts throwing a huge tantrum. The anger only got worse as he witnessed a pre-written report for the next issue which shows Dox playing with his Dolls. “Those bastards are gonna wish they never tricked me like this! I'm going!!! to!!!” His anger is silenced as Rez fired a silencer gun at all the camera's monitoring around where the monitoring station is at.

Before Dox can even leave the monitoring station to investigate, Rez took huge action, jumped out of the vents and closed the doors on him, but not before throwing an EMP Grenade in the monitoring room that completely screwed up the monitors preventing Dox from even viewing through the camera's while he's locked inside for a while. Pulling a huge statue next to the wall where the air vent is at, she blocks the door enough with it so that Dox is temporally unable to escape for a while. She runs to the painting while she tries to figure out how to make it engage as there's no overwrite button like with any other doors.

Back in room 5, The Cutie Mark Crusaders had just found the opened soda machine that they had seen. “Well girls, time to cram ourselves in” the apple pony responds as she removes the support things for holding the soda so that they can easily fit in and also throwing them through an incinerator dispenser next to one of the walls. By the time Rumble finally reached the air vent of Floor 5, the Crusaders have successfully locked themselves in the soda machine and Rumble sees no trace of them aside from some hoof marks that picked up dust on the floor. Rumble realized that the girls are hidden inside of the soda machine.

Rumble turned around and noticed that one of the panels in the air vent has lowered down to reveal an elevator like light. He sees Rez's hoofies as she proceeds to duck down and climb near Rumble to tell him what happened so far.

“Good news Rumble, I locked Dox In the monitoring station, the bad news is that he might be able to escape”

“See those clear faint marks, it looks like the CMC locked themselves in that soft drink machine” Rumble points his hoof at the machine in question.

“Well I can see the girls are resourceful, but they will never get pass the bio detector that we passed through”

“Bio-what”

“Well Rumble, when we went inside, there was a red ball on the sides of the door, it is capable of checking for living things through inanimate objects like metal boxes and cardboard boxes. Every time it senses something blocking the scanners from clearly scanning a whole part of someone's body, it'll automatically trigger an alarm”

“So that means the girls are still in danger!”

“Not unless I can help, Rumble, I want you to stay in this air vent and watch for Dox or the soda delivery pony. If it's the soda pony, watch him and try to distract him a bit while I'm gone, it'll buy us some time, and also, if Dox does escape, be warned he knows how to use a tracking spell. If he tracks the CMC's tracks, they'll get busted earlier too. Stall Dox or the delivery pony in any way you can until I shut off the bio-scanners”

“Got it Rez, but how will I” Rez gives Rumble a watch that has no numbers on it. “Now Rumble, this watch is designed to let
me send you silent flashes, press that button once and it'll let me know to alert you if finished the job yet, if it blinks once, I'm not there yet, if twice, then I'm almost there, I'll blink it 3 times suddenly once I get the scanners shut off.

“Rez....... thanks for helping me”

“No problem Rumble, that's what friends are for”
Rez leaves through the secret elevator to Room 10 which happens to be where the control panels for disabling entrance security will be at.

“I hope Rez knows what she's doing”

DAY 2 – 6:30PM

It has been a few minutes since the Crusaders locked themselves inside of a soft drink machine. Scootaloo is staring at Apple Blooms face while Sweetie Belle is right underneath them seeing their flanks.
Suddenly, they hear a door open with the sound of something on rollers. They can hear a muffled voice that is almost audible through the thick doors of the soda machine.

“Hmm let's see, Serial Number is #071119, Date of Purchase is just a few months back, yep, this is the one they told me about. Ice Cooler motor has short-circuited. Well, guess it's time I start packing this baby up”

The Crusaders can feel as the machine they're inside of being pushed around as the unidentified stallion is struggling to get the machine onto a wheelie for easy transport. Rumble can easily see the stallion struggling to carry the machine which thankfully for him, he doesn't have to do much.

“Well, looks like either I'm not exercising properly or they still left some drinks in the machine, guess I'll open it up.......Once I get back to base”

Rumble was almost in shock that it almost seemed like he was gonna open it up but relieved to hear the last sentence from him.

“Guess I'll call in my 2nd helper to come help me with this” Rumble sits down and waits to see how long it takes, but suddenly decided to hop out of the vent once he heard climbing noises. Silently opening the air vent, Rumble decides to risk a crash into the next one and attempted to fly to the next air vent despite having the feather flu. Surprisingly Rumble has recovered enough to fly but his wings still acted up a bit almost making Rumble crash on the floor instead of the next air vent on the other side while one of his feathers fell. Once in that air vent, Rumble decides to pay attention to the other air vent that he just heard climbing noises from.

Sure enough, he sees a colt climbing out of the air vent. It was indeed Dox, and it seems like Dox is pretty mad. Rumble noticed that Dox was looking around the room with the soda stallion and when he looked at the soda machine, Dox got really suspicious. Thankfully, before he could even use his tracking spell, Rumble fired a slingshot rock directly at Dox's horn. Not only did this let out a huge ouch from Dox, but it caused him to bleed a little which made it painful to cast any kind of magic for a while. Unable to try his magic tracking spell or any other spells, Dox decides to give up and headed to the elevator presumingly back to Floor 4.

“That was a close call” The pegasi whispered to himself”

Back on Floor 10, Trench Bloodhoof arrived to have a chat with Raden who was waiting to speak with him, unfortunately, he's curious why Alyx is not here yet and Raden has some scuff marks and blood on his hooves.

“Ouch, what happen to you, Raden?” “Well Trench, 3 hours ago there's been a huge riot in the mines, everyone's refusing to work and they're beating each other up. I was containing it for most of the time till I forgot about telling the guards outside about the new code and well... Currently, Alyx is still handling the problem. Though I think he's breaking my rule of not killing anyone since I only fire my gun in the air to get their attention to shutting up or if they tried attacking, shooting at their hooves. I knocked so many rioters out with Gas Grenades with the intent of teaching them how to not fight”

“So you just left Alyx to your own dirty work, not that it matters cause..” Before Trench can even finish his sentence, Alyx arrives from the elevator all covered in dust and some dried up blood on his face.

“Hey Raden, Trench, guess what, I managed to teach all of those traitors a lesson and now they're working again.”

“But how!” Trench said in a voice.

“Well its simple, I just beat the crap out of them and shot everyone in the hoof and their chests, regardless if they're attacking or not”

“So you just went on a shooting spree!” Before Raden could even ask the next question, Tench had a new thing to say.

“Alyx, as ruthless as your violent actions are, You actually got those turds listening.”

“But Trench...” “Hold it, Raden. For that Alyx, I'm giving you the same rank as Raden, you can start your new job immediately, tomorrow you will be getting your own office but for right now, you may use my private office in Room 8”

“Got it” Alyx receives a key to Trenches office in Room 8 and proceeds to head there. “Now as for you Raden, I'm sorry what I'm about to say, but considering your failure to controlling that situation, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to demote you to your previous ranking as a regular Merc for both security and mining”

“It's because of the CMC thing right?” “Actually I was going to reward you for that actually before I heard about Alyx's success, Just feel lucky I still consider you trust enough to not make you a slave in the mines. You have about a few hours to clean out your office and desk. But hey, you may still use our secret elevators if you want”

“You have my word” Raden then headed back into the elevator where there's a Mare dressed in a soda machine uniform standing there. “Sorry sir but are you heading to Floor 5 to” Just go to your destination, I already had a crappy day”

Author's Notes:

Looks like Raden has been demoted.

But will our heros still succeed