All was blurry, the lenses in the mask were opening; allowing Apple Bloom to see her surroundings. She then remembered what had happened; Zavok attacked her and The Cyber-Knight in the Underground lair. Ground Breaker tried to get free, but her arms were restrained to the chair she was sitting in.

“I must say, I’m very disappointed with you.” A voice said.

"Hailey?" She asked seeing Amanda sitting in a chair.

"Yeah, see, Mr. Wright, I kinda knew she was going to be handful I guess I was kind of hoping you and me would see eye to eye.”

"Where are we?"

“You're behind the curtain; our most secure facility in the entire city. This is where the magic happens.”

"You're a prick, you know that?" A voice belonging to Alex.

"You know his sister and I were developing Nuform..."

"All you did, was sign your name on the patent."

“Well, at least I’m still breathing!” Amanda snapped at him before turning back to Apple Bloom. “But let’s not dwell."

“The first thing I’m gonna do is…” Amanda reached for her mask, but the hero moved her head out of the way. The CEO chuckled again, enjoying this too much, “Let me tell you what’s going to happen, freak; I’m gonna get that mask off you, then I’ll find out what makes you tick.”

Amanda stood up and began stroking the side of Apple Bloom’s head, “Because you smell exactly like next-level biology. And do you know what that smells like to me?”

She looked up to find out the answer.

“Money; like a lot of money,” Amanda replied before walking out. "Okay, well I have some business to deal with; board meetings, can’t miss them.” The door opened, revealing the TAS Corp upgraded Zavok behind it. Two TAS Corp soldiers walked in as she walked out, “Get the tin can to tell you where my Nuform is. Oh and hurt the brawler.”

The door closed, leaving Ground Breaker and Cyber-Knight in the room with two soldiers; they seemed like they were holding a grudge. “We're going to enjoy beating the crap out of you!” One soldier said as they both activated their electric clubs.

All Apple Bloom could do was sit there whilst the two of them began beating her with their clubs, and they got a good laugh while they did it. Cyber Breaker was just watching; even if she wanted to do something to help, she couldn’t.

Bash after bash was more and more painful until Ground Breaker had decided she’d had enough; she channeled all her strength to her arms and pulled the restraints apart.

Once she was free before the guards could attack, she leaped onto one of them and flipped them over, so would hit their head on the chair. She then shot a shard at the face of the other, pulling him into her knee, where she kneed him in the chin.

With both guards knocked out, Ground Breaker walked over to Alex and broke her free; Alex’ looked at the two unconscious soldiers and muttered, “Holy shit.”

“I’m tougher than I look," Ground Breaker said holding herself. "Look, I know we’re enemies; but if we want to get out of here, we’re going to have to work together.”

"Agree, we can use the floor vents to move around.” Cyber-Knight then opened up a panel on the floor and crawled down, Apple Bloom quickly followed her.

"TAS Corp kept Zavok, instead letting the police get him."

"Nothing about TAS Corp surprises me anymore."

Just as they were coming up to a turn, Ground Breaker heard a voice she recognized.

“You promised you’d leave her out of this!" She looked up through the floor grate and saw Amanda and Zavok talking to the Phantom. “We had a deal!”

"Look, I know I went back on my word, but I needed to get Cyber-Knight here, and she got in the way.” She then turned away as to walk away, “Besides, it was because of your information that we found them.”

"Let Ground Breaker go, I'll get you Nuform," He said to her. "Whatever else you need. Here's why. I've seen things, like Nuform making people sick, and what you did to Maya Wright. If I go public-"

"Yeah, but you won't, thing is you're half of what TAS Corp’s been involved with, has your name on it,” Amanda explained. “And as a wanted criminal, you’d be parked right into the cell next to me.”

Zavok followed her as she walked away from Phantom, she explained, “Anyway, we need to check up on our guests; I would invite you along, but three’s a crowd. Bye.” She then turned away from him and her muscle followed.

With nothing left to say, Phantom just walked away; he left for the exit.

"Is everything okay, who was he?"

"The Phantom, he must somehow found out where was I going, but how unless..."

"He overheard one of your friends, then sell out."

"He wouldn't do that?"

"Sorry, that's the reality for you, you thought he was a friend but in the end, he left you for dead."

When they heard no more footsteps, they both left the vent system; they crawled out into a large open room, Roxxon tanks were parked up against the wall. The coast was clear, they made their way across the room; right up until a door opened in front of them.

"There's think exit," Ground Breaker said and saw Cyber-Knight’s nano-tech device; she grab it and toss it back to Alex, “Here. It’s better in your hands anyway.”

"Thanks," Alex said as the mask came on then Apple Bloom walked to a computer and found something inspiring.

"All the current Nuform Project data's on here. Toxicity reports, Failed health inspections, safety reviews, and Hailey's name on everything. This would destroy TAS Corp, the right way." As Alex joins her. "If we give to the police, TAS Corp goes out business, and Hailey goes jail for years."

Just as the files were downloading, both heard a noise, Ground Breaker grabbed him just as Zavok smashed through the wall and destroyed the computer.

As the two recovered from the attack, Zavok walked towards them, followed by TAS Corp soldiers. The brute asked them, “Like my new armor? It protects me from your attacks, and makes me ten times stronger.”

The soldiers surrounded them; Cyber-Knight turned to Ground Breaker and said, “I’ll handle the guards, you get the big guy.” A large sword materialized in his hand, he then began attacking the guards.

Ground Breaker headed towards, she knew could take him head as Sweetie Belle did. She needed a new approach. She got on Zavok's back and rode like a mechanical bull and send him to a tank. When the tank exploded from the impact, the energy fuelling the vehicle electrocuted him leaving him vulnerable. Ground Breaker punching and kicking him.

As a finisher, she pulled him forward and slammed his face onto the ground; but after that, he got back up and knocked her away.

"That hurt him, keep doing that,” Cyber Knight said as he kicked down one of the soldiers.

Ground Breaker saw four of the tanks and use them to her advantage.

The brute of a villain got down on his knees and was ready to charge again, he then charged forward towards Ground Breaker; she pulled the same trick as before, jumping over him and sticking to his back. She steered him towards another tank and like before, it exploded when he crashed into it.

“Ouch!” Zavok cried.

She paid no attention to his wine of pain, she just webbed herself towards him and began punching and kicking the air out of him. This time, the finisher was her jumping over him again and pulling herself down with force; her feet slammed into the back of his head and pushed his face down to the ground, slamming it onto the floor.

During the fighting, Apple Bloom heard what Alex say to her, “We need to put him down, permanently.”

“I’m not going to kill the guy," Ground Breaker said.

Now Zavok was tired of this, instead of charging toward Apple Bloom, he ran for one of the tanks; using his strength, he lifted the vehicle above his head. Cyber-Knight figured out what he was going to do with that.

“Oh shit, he’s throwing a tank.”

He did exactly that, Zavok threw the tanks towards them; they both jumped out of the way and watched the tank explode. Ground Breaker noticed that from the wreckage of the tank, was the energized engine; this gave her an idea.

Ground Breaker grab the engine and throw it at Zavok; when it hit him, the energy electrocuted his body, and he once again fell to his knees. Apple Bloom jumped forward and started punching and kicking him again.

Once she was sure Zavok was weak enough, Cyber-Knight jumped toward him and slashed his armor with her large sword. This disabled his armor, leaving him open to regular attacks.

“His armor is down, finish him!” Alex shouted.

Zaovk ran over to another tank, he picked it up and attempted to throw it, Apple Bloom jumped out of the way again and watched it explode. She then grab the engine and throw it at the brute; without his armor, the attack was way more effective.

Apple Bloom began punching and kicking him, a lot harder this time; and this finisher was the last to be done. She jumped onto his back again and steered him towards the last tank; when it exploded from the impact, Zavok was thrown to the ground, unable to get back up.

Coincidently, at this time, Cyber-Knight had finished the soldiers.

She saw that he was down, she walked over to him, wanting to finish this; but Apple Bloom stopped her and explained, “Make sure he doesn’t do anything, I’ll be right back.” She ran over to the lab to try and find something though the monitor of the computer was destroyed, the hard drive remained intact; she unplugged it from the PC, and now she had the evidence she needed to stop TAS Corp. Before she could walk back over to Jupiter’, another computer caught her eye; this one showed the energy results and blue prints for the Nuform reactor.

“According to this, Hailey supercharged the reactor to make her deadline. If Alex goes through with her plan…” Apple Bloom ran a simulation of what would happen if an overcharged Nuform canister was loaded into the reactor; the blast radius covered the entire city. “Ponyville would be destroyed.”

Meanwhile, Cyber-Knight was doing as instructed, keeping an eye on Zavok until he started talking to her.

"You know," Zavok talked exhaustingly. "Amanda told how your brother died, I have to admit it was amusing.

"Shut up," Alex said to him.

But he didn’t, he continued, “She also told me, it was your fault. You could have saved him, but you chose to save yourself and run like a coward."

"Go to hell," Cyber-Knight said as he drew his sword and trusted right into Zavok's chest making him bleed a little. Ground Breaker kicks him from behind stopping it.

Both crashed through the wall and fell into an old subway tunnel that was next to the underground TAS Corp base.

Alex Wright got up and walked towards Apple Bloom; Spider-Girl got up as well and said to Tinkerer, “What in the hell…” before she could finish, Alex ’ whacked her down with his gauntlets.

Like she was doing with Zavok, she started beating the life out of her; all while she was saying, “You broke into my lair! Stole my secrets! Got me kidnapped!” She eventually stopped, she kneeled down and said to her enemy, “If you come near me, or try and stop me again; I’ll kill you, and that goes for the others."

"But..." Ground Breaker weakly said before she pass out.

"My family's dead."

Alex leaped out of the tunnel, leaving her. She got up and tried to follow but she collapsed not as long as she radioed for help and to her surprise, Arctic Ace arrived to help out and carry her.

---

Hours later, at Sweet Apple Acres, Arctic Ace was carrying her to her room through the backway and put her on her bed, among them, was Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, who had their mask down and ran to her.

"Oh my god," Sweetie Belle gasped in horror. "Who did this to her?"

"Cyber-Knight did given the slash marks," the icy hero explained. "Both he and Apple Bloom were taken to hidden TAS Corp facility by Zavok."

"How did he wind up with them? And more importantly, how did TAS Corp find out about the theater?" Scootaloo asked.

"Talk to your uncle, he told them where she was going."

"I can't believe he sells out one of my lifelong friends to TAS Corp of all people. Is she going to be okay?"

"Yeah, she will I got some antibiotics in my car, I'll be back," He left them out of the window but before they heard Applejack's voice.

"Apple Bloom?" Applejack said before entering with Rainbow and Rarity. "Where have been-

All three of them saw them being banged up.

"What the hell happened to you?" Rainbow asked.

"And what are you wearing?" Rarity added.

"We have to tell you something," Apple Bloom as everyone sits down.

---

"So, let's get this straight, Alex is the Cyber-Knight, and he using the Underground to attack the plaza," Rainbow tried and put the pieces together.

"Yes that's the story," Scoootaloo said. "But no matter what we do, we always make this worse, and now this."

"Scoots, I'll be blunt with you," Rainbow sat down with her. "There will be no amount of screwing up from being an idol to you, including this."

"Rainbow's right," Rarity agreed. "We'll always love, no matter what, all is what gives our strength."

"That's all a hero really is, someone who's brave enough for the people they care about," Applejack said as they did a group hug. "But we got important things to do, we get the evacuation started."

"Pinkie just texted me, she used the app to warn everyone in Ponyville to evacuate before we go door to door. This leaves the question of where the Nuform that Cyber-Knight has."

"Got his location, the Science research center that been close for renovations," Trevor said looking at his screen. "Holy--. The energy converter that Alex, Tyler, and I worked on got first place. That's how he's gonna finish making the Nuform unstable enough to blow TAS Corp Plaza."

"Not, only that, Hailey changed the specs, it would only not blow the plaza, we're talking full-on meltdown in Ponyville."

"Oh, dear, it's like he picked it to get back to you," Fluttershy said.

"It's was," Sctooaloo as she headed out. "But first things first I need to take care of something."

---

"Okay, I need to set things with Ridley, tell that I'm done with, no one sells my friends, and walk with it." She said himself trying to find him. "If was able to hide like a ghost where would I be?"

She continued to swing around the city when something unexpected happened; out of nowhere, a blast of energy was shot at Scootaloo, stunning her. The hero rolled onto a rooftop before she came to a stop at someone’s feet.

Her vision was blurry from the blast, she couldn’t make out who this figure was; all she heard him say was, “I’m sorry, but this is for your own good.”

After that was said, Scootaloo passed out.

Next Chapter: Episode 17-Underground Part 8-Light and Shadow Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 18 Minutes