AN: Starting this on my birthday. The mane team is now complete but I will still take antagonist OC's. Not all of them will be used but I will see what I can do. To all who have accounts on FimFiction. A friend of mine and I have started the Harmonic Council. It is the best leadership for Equestria. It follows the bearers of the Elements of Harmony. I used to be part of the Lunar Republic and he, the Solar Empire.

"...than you think. The Elements that are in this desert are the Elements of Leadership. They are a little bit less powerful than the Elements of Harmony but they are powerful none the less. I have to get going now but I will keep in touch with you when I can." The Robo-Pinkie says and then teleports off to who knows where.

"Well that was weird. So what exactly are these Elements?"

"Well, they are similar to the Elements of Harmony, just like she said, except that these ones originate from the Middle Ground. They are why the Protostables are so hard to find. Hawkens, remember how you said the Megaspell in Protostable six was one of Mass Destruction. According to Pinkie Pie IV, it's a Megaspell of restoration." I tell them.

"Well OK then. Does that mean that we need to get all of the Elements from the Stables?" Twilight asks.

"No. All of the Elements should be with Littlepip. We still need to get the access codes though in order to access Protostable 6." I respond.

"Well no use standing around here. How about we get going in high gear."

After Shiara says that, we all nod our heads and gallop off to the north, in the direction of Novac. We run into a few irradiated mutant mole rats and the occasional raider but nothing we can't handle. After maybe an hour or two, we reach Novac. It's a quaint little town. The most recognizable feature is the giant Unicorn with a pale purple coat and a blond mane that is on the outskirts of the town facing the west. I look at its face when I notice a Sniper Rifle barrel sticking out of its nose. As we enter the town, the sun is going down so we go to what looks like the inn. I open the door to the inn and to my right, behind a desk is an older mare with a graying blond mane and an almost lavender coat.

"Well. Welcome to you. Why don't you take a rest here at my inn, The Dinky Doo Deluxe." She says.

"Um, we have never met before." I respond.

"Oh, what manners of mine. I forgot to tell you my name. I am Jeannie Mane and I run this here inn. Now that that is out of the way, would you like to rent a few rooms for the night?" she asks us.

"Sure, how much?" I respond

"Hundred caps a room. You can stay for as long as you like, until the busy season comes at least."

"Twilight, you still got the caps?" Hawkens asks.

"Yeah, here you go, two hundred caps."

"Well then, here are your keys. You have the adjoining rooms on the top floor, closest to the lobby entrance. Don't worry, nopony is going to cause you trouble. After all, we have our wonderful sniper duo keeping our town safe from the slavers. Have a good night." She tells us as she hooves us two keys.

"Thanks."

We go out of the main room and go through a chain link fence to our left, then up some stairs and into our new rooms, for the night at least. They are a little run down, but what can you expect from the middle ground.

"Alright guys, I am going to radio in to DJ Pon-3, so just do whatever you would do if I weren't here." Stardust says.

"Um, ok then." Hawkens says

"I am going to hit the hay." I say as I go to bed at nearly 11 at night.

"Night." Everyone tells me.

Hawkens goes to the bed next to mine and the girls go to the adjoining room.

The next morning, I wake up before Hawkens and go out the front door and I see the giant Dinky Doo overlooking the desert. The Flutterpeak Mountains are a shade of yellow and the caps of the mountains are a light pink.

"Beautiful isn't it?"

I look to my left to see Twilight with her hooves over the railing looking at me.

"Yeah, it is. So how did you sleep?"

"Not bad. You?"

"Certainly wasn't like sleeping on a cloud but it is better than the ground. I wonder what Chef Hawkens will make for us this morning."

"I was thinking something along the lines of grilled cactus fruit and various roots." Hawkens says as he walks out of his and my room. "I am going to put some beans in mine so that I can still get the meat texture."

After he says that, he takes off for the roof, probably to bask in the sunlight and to cook breakfast.

"So what do you think of Stardust?" Twilight asks me.

"She's interesting. Definitely not one to be messed with. Whoever she decides to hook up with is going to have their hooves full. I really hope it's not me, she is not my type." I say and I swear I see a glimmer in her eyes.

In the next 30 minutes, Shiara and then Stardust come out to join us in the daylight streaming from behind the Inn. A few minutes later, Hawkens calls, "Who's Hungry?" as he flies down to us with a pan of delicious looking food.

"Smells scrumptious Hawkens." Stardust comments.

"Obviously you haven't had his cooking before. He could probably turn a meat eater into an herbivore."

"While we eat, I am going to tune into DJ Pon-3, ok." I say

With no objections I turn on my Pip-Bucks' radio.

"ONCE AGAIN, GOOD MORNING MIDDLE GROUND. Remember the crater that we all thought consumed our friendly neighborhood flaming pegasus and his compatriots. Well, it's been filled nearly three quarters of the way up with a mysterious pink substance. The rad-meters are off the charts near it so I would highly suggest staying at least 50 feet or more away from the edge. On the bright side, HE IS ALIVE. My informant helped him out of the pit while the mysterious pink substance was still flowing up. Also, if you want informant, you can travel with him as your next assignment. I have a good feeling about stories that will follow him. In further news, Dr. Noise has moved into New Pegasus and has taken the place of Dr. Horn. The whereabouts of Dr. Horn are unknown but a massive number of rumors suggest he has moved to the headquarters of the Legion. This last bit of news is for any of the fans of the ever famous Ditzy Doo. Her next stop is in fact New Pegasus. She will be staying here for a few weeks so anypony out there who wants to meet the legend, she will be here soon. With that, I am signing off until next hour, don't let the desert consume you."

I switch off the radio and by this point we are all done eating and plenty filled.

"Dang Hawkens, how do you manage to do it?" I ask.

"I learned from the best." He said sadly.

"Something wrong?" Twilight asks him.

"It's nothing."

"If you ever need to talk, I'm here." She says in a comforting tone.

"I'll keep that in mind."

"So that's what that delicious smell was. It's making my mouth water." Jeannie Mane says as she comes up the stairs onto the balcony outside our front doors.

"You want some. We have one serving left." I tell her.

"Why thank you. Flare, was it?"

"That is correct. Oh, did you per chance see a stallion in a checkered jacket pass through here? He has a few Iron Wills with him."

"As a matter of fact, he passed through here just last week. The Wills went to see Manny, one of our snipers, while they were here. You could probably get more info out of him than you could out of me."

"Thanks for the info. Where can I find this Manny?"

"Oh, he should be in Dinky Doo's nose right now. That's where they stay to protect our town from the slavers. They do an amazing job considering that there is a slaver enclave a day's trot to the west. Oh, when you get in there, be sure to visit the gift shop."

After she says that, we store what we don't need in our rooms and go up to the giant Dinky Doo. There is an old metal door in the side, next to the hip. I open the door and I see what looks like an old run down gift shop. There is an old stallion with a gray coat and mane is behind the counter and when he notices us, he looks a lot happier.

"Howdy ya'll, my name Cliff Briscoat. Welcome to the Dinky Doo Gift shop. Ya know, most people hear 'gift shop' and think that it's too good to be true. What can I do you for?"

"Hey, I'm Flare and these are my traveling companions. Do you have any supplies we could buy?"

"Yeah. Dang it, nopony ever goes for the souvenirs." He says kind of disappointedly.

"Sorry about it. See, we are not sightseeing. I am on a mission. Is Manny here?" I ask.

"Yeah, just take the stairs."

"OK, I am going to go talk to Manny; you guys buy what we need."

I walk up the stairs and open another old metal door. Looking out one of the nostrils with a sniper in both hooves is a crimson stallion with a black mane. He is wearing a NCR vest and hat. He turns his head around to look at me and is has a look in his eyes that says shock while the rest of his face is unchanged.

"It can't be. They said you were shot in the head. I guess Pon-3 was talking about you then. I'm guessing you want info on Benny right? Well, I need something to. How about we make a deal, if you take care of my problem, I'll tell you where Benny was headed."

"Deal." I say as I spit on my hoof and hold it out.

He does the same and then says. "OK, my problem is that Ghouls have moved into the Repcon test site over to the east. Now, this town's economy runs off of the junk we get out of that place. If the town's economy goes the bad, then this town goes away. I like living here and want to settle down. Now, what I want you to do is get those Ghouls out. I don't care how you do it, just git er done."

"That's all. No problem. Consider them gone." I tell him.

I leave the nose and go collect my compatriots. They had bought a lot of food so we would be set for at least a month. We left the giant Dinky and set out east. A few minutes on the road up to the site, I see the body of a Ghoul. Its body is glowing and my Pip-Buck starts ticking the closer we get to it.

"Must be one of the Glowing Ones. Best steer clear." Hawkens says.

After another 10 minutes, we come across what seems like an abandoned security checkpoint. Inside it are a few locked boxes that are easy pickings for me. One of them has 8 grenades, which makes Hawkens very happy. We move on from there but not before Twilight gets all of the medicine and drugs from the place. We walk through a tunnel afterwards and find ourselves looking at a building with the Repcon rocket on the front. I hear a moaning that turns to groaning that becomes roaring. My E.F.S. lights up with about 20 red blips.

"Ferals!" I shout.

I slip into S.A.T.S. with my pyre gun and lock onto a small hoard of 8 Ferals that are rushing towards us. I only have enough AP for one shot with the Pyremagic so I target the center of the hoard. FWOOOM! I fire off three quick burst of pyre and hit every single feral thanks to splash. They are all charred by the time they are halfway to us. Hawkens decides to fly up over another pack of 4 Ferals, dive-bomb them, and then fire off his shotguns. The recoil is enough to launch him 20 feet up in the air. Shiara vanishes but I can tell what she is doing because a few of the Ferals that are getting past Hawkens and Twilight are getting randomly cut in half. I see another 15 Ferals coming out of the main entrance to the building a good 100 feet away. BOOOOOOOOM! Stardust fires off her lightning gun and a stream of blue lightning instantly vaporizes all 15 Ferals.

"Remind me not to piss of Stardust." I say to Twilight.

"Noted." She says as she gets a double headshot

Now that all of the Ferals are dead we start up towards the facility. When we open the doors, there is the body of a dark blue Alicorn on the ground to great us.

"Hey. You there, smooth skin. Come to the top of the tower. Go to the back and take the stairs, and hurry." A raspy voice says over an intercom on the wall next to us.

"Um. Why?" Hawkens asks.

"Just do it. Ditzy Doo and her husband are up here and we are all trapped by Alicorns."

"On our way." I say. "We have to save them. I mean, especially Ditzy."

The group all nod their heads in agreement as we head off. Hawkens loads his shotguns and takes the rearguard position. Shiara takes the front since she can do a lot with her machete. I am behind her with Spike's Rage and my magic pistol out and fully loaded. Twilight is behind Hawkens with a levitation field just in case he shoots his guns since I have yet to enchant them to be without recoil. Stardust is in the middle since her thunder gun will just kill us all if she uses it in these close quarters. We walk through the building with little violence, just the occasional feral. When we get to the back room, we see three Ferals eating an Alicorn. I pop their heads clean off. We then go up the stairs and I press the intercom button outside a big reinforced metal door.

"Bout time furred, I am letting you in now." The same condescendingly raspy voice says as the door clicks open.

We all enter the room and find ourselves face to face with a perfectly normal looking stallion with a black mane and a tan coat. He was wearing a white lab coat.

"You'll want to go talk to Jason. He is the one in charge of this operation and is probably with Ditzy Doo and Lionheart. They're upstairs."

"Why are you calling us those names? You're not a Ghoul."

"Flare is right, why are you calling us those derogatory terms. You are a not a Ghoul either." Twilight says and backs me up.

"What are you talking about? Of course I am a Ghoul." He insisted.

'There is no reasoning with this one.' I think to myself.

We go straight up the stairs that are in front of us and turn around when we get to the top and see three Ghouls. Two of them are pegasi and the other is a unicorn. One of them is obviously Ditzy because of her eyes, and the fact that she is a girl. The one standing next to her is a Ghoul who could simply scare you senseless just by staring at you, who must be Lionheart. The last Ghoul is wearing a lab coat and is glowing just like the Ghoul we saw on the way here.

"You must be Jason." I say to the glowing one.

"Praise the creator, for he has sent not one, but 5 to help us." He says in a weird voice. "You will help us right?"

"Sure. What's the problem?" I ask.

"Demons have invaded the grounds of our passage. They appeared out of nowhere and attacked us. We managed to get a few but they killed more than half of my herd. Beware though, they are invisible and all you see is a wavering in the air before they get to you."

"Um, ok. Where are they?" Hawkens asks.

"They are in the basement. One of them was raving at us over the intercoms for easily an entire day."

"Don't worry; they'll be out of your way in a jiffy." Twilight says.

We head out, back down the stair, out the door, down the stairs, again, until we reach the door that leads to the basement. It's locked but Hawkens simply cuts it down. The place is dark so I turn on my Pip-Buck's flashlight. Nothing much, just a door to our right. I open it and it splits off in three directions.

"Ok, Hawkens, you come with me to the left, Shiara and Twilight, you go straight ahead, Stardust, you go right. This way, Stardust can use her lighting as much as she wants. Twilight, would you kindly link our thoughts?" I ask

'Done.'

'Alright, move out!' I think as Hawkens and I take off galloping.

We don't run into any Alicorns yet but we come across a reinforced steel door that even Hawkens claws can't cut through, so I have to resort to picking the lock. I notice while I am doing it, my grapples are forming to the shape of the lock and it is hurting what feels like muscles. I decide to see if, by tensing and relaxing certain muscles, if I can get the grapples into a more key like shape. It works and the lock becomes unlocked.

"THAT'S IT YOU DEMONS! COME AND MEET YOUR END! Wait a minute, you aint no Alicorns." An earth pony Ghoul who was armed with a hunting rifle that was aimed right above our heads says.

"That's right. We were sent by Jason to clear out the Alicorns." I respond.

"Good luck. As you can tell by the bodies getting closer and closer to me, they are a pain to kill. Remember this, they learn. I thought that their mental connection was severed when Trixie was killed. Turns out, I was wrong. Before I killed the last one, I heard him say 'That trick won't work this time.' Hey, if you're headed out there, can you look out for a Ghoul friend of mine. She ran off further into the basement when the Alicorns attacked and I am not leaving without her."

"We'll look out for her." I say

I turn around and we are on our way back through the basement. We turn left into a side corridor and there is an open door to an office and inside is an Alicorn. This one is a noticeably lighter shade of blue than all of the others.

"WHO ARE YOU?" It asks in a very loud and masculine voice. "NEVER MIND! YOUR ALLIES HAS JUST KILLED ONE OF MY UNDERLINGS! YOU MUST DIE!"

It turns invisible but luckily there is enough light for us to see the wavering in the air. It also shows up on my E.F.S. so I know where it is.

'Aim at that filing cabinet Hawkens!' I think to him.

BAANG! His shotguns fire off directly into the body of the burly Alicorn and it causes it to falter. I take this opportunity to fire off a few bursts of magic in the direction of the red blip on my E.F.S. and it ignites like paper. He screams for a few seconds and then finally is silenced. I go and search the now dead Alicorn and the only noticeable loot is a key. I also find that where it's cutie mark should have been, is a circular onyx plate with a golden SS with 3 gold bars underneath it.

"Crap. These guys were sent by Tabitha." Hawkens says

"You mean that crazed Alicorn that I heard over at the flutterstable?"

"The one and only." He responds. 'Hey guys, the Alicorns are Tabithian.' He thinks to the rest of the group.

'F*ck.' Everyone thinks back at the same time.

"Hey Hawkens, why was the Alicorn we just killed light blue? I thought that they only came in three colors." I ask.

A huge boom echoes throughout the basement.

'It's just me guys.' Stardust thinks to us.

Hawkens shakes his head and answers my question. "Rumor has it that Tabitha managed to re-engineer taint to make Alicorns with even more abilities that the normal ones. The light blue one here must be one of the Blue Telepaths. They have the same invisibility spell as the dark blue ones, but they can also control the darker blue ones. They are beyond rare as you can see, only one has ever been confirmed, and that was just now."

"Well that isn't good."

"Ya don't say. Look, we need to get rid of all of the Alicorns and we need to do it fast." 'How goes the hunt?' Hawkens asks the rest of our group.

'We've gotten two of them, thanks to Shiara and her sword skills.'

'Sparky and I have gotten another pair and found what seems to be a prisoner block that they made.'

'Anypony alive down there?' I ask Stardust.

'No, there are a few dead Ghouls but nothing more.'

'Dang it. Well, nothing we can do about that.'

Hawkens and I go back to the Ghoul we met earlier.

"Well, did you find her?" He asks.

"Sorry but one if my partners found the bodies. I'm sorry." I tell him.

"Damn it. Well, no use standing around here anymore. I'll get going back to Jason." He says in his raspy voice.

With that, he comes down from his little snipers nest and goes out the way that we came in. Hawkens and I go back to the place where we killed the lead Alicorn.

'All clear on our side. How goes it on yours?' I ask to the rest of the group.

'All clear on my end.' Stardust responds.

'Same goes for us. Shiara shish-kebabed a pair just now.'

'Good. Let's meet up at the place where we split up. I just found something that you want to see.' I think.

We meet up and I lead the group to the room where the light blue Alicorn was. I open the door that was at the end of the room and we are in a storage room. I go to the back of the room and press a button on the back wall and a secret stairway opens up in the middle of the floor.

"Where does this go?" Stardust asks.

"Don't know. Hawkens just found it a second ago."

"Well, I say we search it, and then go back to Jason. You know, to make sure it's safe." She says sarcastically.

"Good enough for me." I say. "Let's go."

We head down the stairs and the room is very dark. I turn on my Pip-Buck's light and the place is filled with twisted metal. Hawkens rolls some of it up and puts it in his packs. We move on through a door in the back of the room and we are in what looks like an old world sewage pipe. The next room we find is filled with all sorts of drugs, Dash, Mint-als, and Steady. Twilight goes in and when she comes out she is levitating some Stimpacks and healing potions into her saddle packs. Now after a little bit more wandering, we reach the end of the pipeline or whatever it is and come across a reinforced metal door. I pick the lock with ease and we find ourselves in some sort of rocket control room. I know it's a control room for rockets because I see three rockets with the Repcon logo on the sides through a glass pane. I look around and see a workbench with a few pieces of scrap metal and wonder glue. There are some super Stimpacks which Twilight picks up. Lastly is a space suit that was defiantly pre-war. Since there is nothing else, we head back up to Jason and the rest of the Ghouls. On our way back up, we run into some more Ferals but they are not even a problem for us. A minute or two later, we are back with Jason, Ditzy, and Lionheart.

"The Alicorns are all dead. You do know that they were Tabithian right?" I ask him

"Yes, but seeing as you are the one who was revived from death a few weeks ago, I believed that you could handle them. And handle them you did. Now my flock can finally finish the preparations for the Great Journey."

"The what now?" Hawkens asks.

"It's a trip their trying to make to someplace that is overly irradiated."Ditzy Doo writes on her chalkboard.

"YES. THEY WANTED US TO JOIN THEM. SINCE MY DITZY WOULD NOT GO WITH THEM, NEITHER WOULD I!" Lionheart yells.

"Yes. But now that you have cleared out the demons, we can finish our great journey. I would like to show you the means of our travel." Jason says as he starts off out of the room.

We walk back down through the facility and into the basement.

"Wait a minute, you aren't planning on taking those rockets down there are you? That's suicide." Hawkens says with slight desperation. "Those rockets are so old that they'll explode before your 10 feet off the ground."

"I appreciate your concern. We will be fine with the help of Rocket. As a regular pony he is more tactile than we Ghouls."

"Is he the buck who thinks he's a Ghoul? Why have you let him think that and not tell him the truth?" Hawkens asks slightly angrily.

"Trust me, we tried for a few days to convince him but to no avail. So we just went along with it. Anyways, we need a little more help before we leave on the last league of our journey. If you will help us, just talk to him. He is in charge of the final stages of the rocket construction."

"Will do." I say.

I turn around and see Rocket walking through the door to the control room.

"Jason has told me that you are going to help me get these rockets flying."

" Yeah. What do ya need?" I ask.

"Well we has a bunch of isotope 128 igniting agent but it was ruined when the demons attacked so we need some of that. It's very potent so we won't need more than a few ounces. We also need a control module so the rockets know the trajectory their supposed to follow." Rocket says in his raspy voice. "You should be able to find the igniting agent near an old radioactive ruin to the southwest. It glows so you should be able to find it easily. The module may be in a scrap yard because hardly anypony knows its value."

"Is this the igniting agent?" Twilight asks while levitating out a glowing rocket that has the Repcon logo on it.

"That's perfect. Where did you find it?" Rocket asks.

"I bought it off an old stallion in Novac. I could tell he was sad so I bought one to make him feel better."

"Well than that means that all we need now is the module." I say.

"I saw a junkyard a few minutes trot from Novac when I was cooking breakfast this morning."

"How convenient. I'll bet you anything that there is one there." Stardust says with lacking enthusiasm.

We then leave the control room and go out through a hatch in the ceiling to the left. I am first out and decide to try to fly now that my wings are lighter. I simply flare my wings, flap with all my might, and shoot up like a Phoenix. I manage to get very high in a few flaps, just like the old days. I get within 500 feet of the clouds, so high I can barely see the Octavian Mountains, which are the border between eastern Equestria and the middle ground, and are named after Octavia since the mountains are so cavernous the wind sounds like her cello. Anyhow I start to stall at this point and my wings are already very tired so I naturally start to plummet to my death.

'I'm f*cked if I can't pull up soon.' I think to myself.

I'm spinning around in circles headfirst towards the ground. I extend my wings and try to angle them to the point where I level out but I can't.

"I. Will. Not. GIVE UP!" I yell.

I notice a bright flash of light where my Pip-Buck is and feel a huge rush of energy. I smile and flap my wings to get me going faster. At the last minute where I am about 50 feet off the ground I pull up with my wings and zoom off and up.

BOOOOM.

I notice that there is a lot of heat behind me and look back to see that I am on fire.

"BOYAH!" I yell when I realize that I am performing my Sonic Flare. "SO MUCH WIN!"

I now feel incredibly tired and black out.

I wake up with a bandage around my head and pretty much the rest of my body except my wings. I see that I'm in my room and the Dinky Doo Deluxe. Twilight is pacing around the room with her horns glowing. I now notice that my head is encased in a midnight blue glow.

"Thanks for the pain relief Twilight." I say weakly.

"Thank Celestia your ok." She says with extreme relief in her voice as she practically jumps and hugs me.

Her middle horn gains a light a light blue glow and so does the rest of my body.

"Well, somehow your body has healed from that brutal crash you had a few hours ago. I'm afraid that there's some bad news. First is that your mane and tail burned off completely. Second us that your Pip-Buck has fused with your leg."

"WHAT!" I yell as I jump out of my bed.

"Whoa there. You may want to calm down before you burn the whole place down."

"Huh." I say.

I look behind me and see that I have my flowing mane and tail, they're just made if fire.

'Wait, FIRE!'. "DAF*Q!"

"You need to calm down. I can tell from what I have just seen that the intensity of your mane and tail have a direct relationship with your emotions."

"I'm BAAAAaaaack. Daf*q us going on with Flare?" Hawkens asks Twilight.

"Well, I would have to guess that he is in stage 5 taint, like me. Though I have only heard of one other case of an elemental taint transformation."

"Well, now that your awake, we can get going back to the Repcon site and launch those rockets because I got the command module."

Level Up-Lv.12

Perk Added-Flares Taint Rank 5

You are now immune to the negative effects of fire.

Companion Perk Added-Thunderhead

You now use half the ammo for energy weapons shots than normal while still doing the same amount of damage per shot.