AN: Sorry about double posting ch 15 but I glitched in editing the story so... Anyways, I do like reviews you know, and I don't mean to sound demanding, but they make me feel appreciated. I also do do better with criticism and appreciation. School is started for me and combine that with my job makes updates maybe a monthly thing if I am lucky. Just thought I should let you all know that. I also may have lost some of the oc's that I have accepted due to a massive series of pm's with a certain brony that have taken over more that 1/3 of my inbox. If its in a review, its good but the two that were sent to be Steel Paladins(Applejacks Rangers)Need them again, sorry. NOW ON WITH THE STORY(The last chapter is as smexy as it is going to get, I think). Also, the Damn won the poll so that will be the end of this arch of the story. Vote in the next poll to have a say about what happens after the damn.

"Brutal." Is Twilight's only word to me as I leave the arena, my Couriers vest more bloodstained than normal.

"I need to get this thing cleaned or get new armor or something." I say to myself. "Benny deserved what he got. He killed me for Celestia sake."

"I know that, but did you have to be so brutal. Just snap his neck, stab him through the heart, dont stab him through the neck then snap his neck off." Twilight replies. "Though it is to late for that now."

"Heh, well at least we get to leave." I say.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?"

I look towards the voice and see two black ponies, one, a unicorn with a silver mane and tail wearing an elegant black prewar suit and a hat with a bloodwing feather. The other, a Pegasus, was nearly a full foot taller than me and looked to be brutal, with black fur and a spiked black mane and tail. The Unicorn had a voodoo doll with two needles as a cutie mark and the Pegasus had a violet claw ripping at a heat. 'Don't even want to think about how he got that as a cutie mark, not what it means.' I think to myself.

"Hello sweet thing." the Pegasus says to Twilight.

"Easy now Plea." The unicorn says to the Pegasus. "I can sense the love flowing from Twilight, and it is not flowing towards you."

"Chrystal." Twilight says in response.

"Good to see that you remember you old family doctor." The unicorn replies.

"Mind introducing us Twi." I ask.

"Flare, meat Dr. Chystal Horn and his body guard, Plea Night."

"The pleasure is all mine." Chrystal says. "Allow me to heal you up, free of charge."

"Thanks but no, Twilight is my medic and i will have her heal me later." I reply.

"OK then, Plea, go on, it is your time of day after all, have your pick of the slaves."

"Thanks boss." Plea says before flying away.

"What was that about?" I ask.

"You do not want to know, I assure you." Chrystal replies.

I turn around and as we start walking out, I feel a faint prick of my neck. I turn around to see that Chyrstal's horn is glowing and is holding a doll that looks strangely like me. I shove the thoughts aside for now and move on. We get back to the entrance to the camp and the same legionare that brought us here takes us back. After another 5 hour ride down the river and a few minutes back through to Hawkens and Stardust, Hawkens and I get hooked up to the skycarriage and everypony else gets inside. As the sun goes down, Hawkens and I take off and angle back toward New Pegasus. As we fly over the Cottontail Wood Grove, Hawkens drops a few of his higher powered grenades. I look at him with a disappointment look but he has a look of insane happiness.

"Will you get that smug look off of your face. As much as I hate them, you could have at least waited until we were out of range of their artillery." I say to him.

He looses the smug look on his face and says, "Then we had better pick up the pace."

"WHAT THE HAY DID YOU DO HAWKENS?" Stardust yells. "WHY THE BUCK ARE THEY SHOOTING MAGIC AND ARTILLERY ROUNDS AT US?"

A few moments later, her lighting gun, aka. sparky, lights up the sky. Explosions soon follow as she shoots down magic and artillery.

"Damn it feather brain. Why could you not wait just a little bit before basically blowing them up."Twilight asks.

"I wasn't thinking damn it"

"Well there's a surprise." I say.

"Shut up Flare. Lets just get the buck out of here."

"Agreed." I say as I put more effort into flying this carriage out of here.

After we are well out of range, I tune into the radio.

"GOOD EVENING MIDDLE GROUND! This is DJ Pon-3 here with your latest news and best music. One of my news scouts tells me that somepony just blew up one of the Legions bases on the river. YAY for them. The NCR should also be happy about this, seeing as one of the only ways to get to fortification hill is through that base. Meanwhile, Hellhounds continue to control the limestone quarry north of Goodsprings. Lastly in the headlines, reports of a massive earthquake emanating from Fortification Hill worry NCR and locals. That's all for today, so tune in tomorrow for an update of what happened tonight. For now, listen to some music that I made with a good friend a long while ago and didn't even know still existed, as my good friend used to call them, the Tavi and Scratch songs."(Actually by YourEnigma)

For the rest of the flight back to New Pegasus, the Tavi and Scratch songs play, filling our ears with a mix between pre-war classical music and electronic music.

Once we arrive back at the Ultra Luxe, we immediately head to the tops, where Yes-stallion is waiting outside.

"HEEEELLLO there, did you get the chip from Benny?"

"Yes we did, but first I need to go and take care of Mr. Stable."

"OK then. I will be waiting right here."

We walk over to the Lucky 38 and see Appletracks outside again. We walk past him and I see him inside near the elevator and think, 'The hell, is he just a floating AI or something?' We go to the elevator and I think to Twilight, 'When we get in the elevator, E.M.P. them.' She nods her head in recognition. We proceed into the elevator and when I hit the switch before Appletracks rolls in, Twilight sends an electromagnetic beam through Appletracks and into the rest of the securitrons in the lobby. They all fall down while shorting out.

"Well, there is no going back now, we are taking Mr. Stables absolutarian rule of New Pegasus down."

"Ya don't say." Hawkens replies sarcastically.

I look around and see that Shiara is getting her ceremonial dagger out, Stardust is prepping sparky, attaching both of the lightining, Twilight is detaching her barrel, the 4 blades springing out of the end, and Hawkens brings out his double barrel, 12 gauge pistol, that he is now calling boomer. I let Stardust in front of me so she can take any of the securitrons waiting for us. When the door opens, there are twelve securitrons, all with their weapons pointed at us. Stardust lets a bolt of lightning out at the bots and fry's all of them.

"Impressive." Hawkens says.

"Let's go, who knows how many more are coming and are already in here." I order. "Search the place for a computer of some sort. That will likely be how we get to him."

Hawkens goes to the kitchen, probably to get all of the food, Twilight searches the bedroom, Stardust, the living room, and Shiara sticks with me as I search the room with the giant monitor where Mr. Stables face is supposed to be. I try to hack into the computer system below the monitors but that doesn't work, so I search the rest of the room. Over on the wall, I see a computer monitor. I go over to it and there is no security on it so I can simply open the way to Mr. Stable. When I do, the wall next to me slides over, allowing two more securitrons to roll out and start attacking. At least, they would have attacked if Shiara hadn't thrown her dagger into the face of one and cutting the other one down with her machete.

"How the buck are you that good with blades?" I ask in amazement.

"Well when I was a little filly and the sun was going down, the darkness and the shadows scared me every time the sun went down. My daddy told me to face my fears, and cut them down without tears. So I trained with blades to kill anything that scared me. Worked well enough so I just kept practicing and I can sleep just fine and nothing can't get cut down by my blades, and it sometimes makes me happy."

"Well ok then." I reply. "COME ON TEAM!"

Once everybody in my team gets to Shiara and me, we move through the new opening and Twilight E.M.P.s two more securitrons outside an elevator. We all go in and the elevator goes down quite a bit. When it opens, I walk out onto a catwalk that is over a massive chasm. At the end of the catwalk is what looks like a pre-war cryo-pod and it has enough wires running through the head of it for there to be a neural up-link. I walk up to a computer system in front of it and activate it. I activate the function that opens the pod. With a hiss and lots of air release from the pod, the lid comes off and it lifts out a unicorn with extremely wrinkled skin, no hair, and a barely visible cutie mark of a shield with one star in the middle of it and three stars above it. It also has a lot of wires going into a helmet of sorts.

"What are you doing?" He asks.

"I am putting a stop to your absolutarian rule of New Pegasus." I tell him. "And I am going to do that by disconnecting you from the securitons. Your going to live, but you wont be in control of your army."

"You would throw away 350 years of work. All of my work and effort to make this wasteland an ideal place for civilization. I would rather die than live through your attempt to do better." He replies.

With that, I go back to the computer consul and disconnect the neural up-link and walk back to the elevator and, with the rest of the team, go back up to the penthouse.

Now that Yes-stallion is up in the penthouse in front of the computer where I first saw Mr. Stable, I hoof him the Platinum Chip.

"Now if all goes as planned, I will be able to upload my Neurocomputational matrix into the mainframe and be able to control all of Mr. Stables assets, including his securitron army."

"Good, then we can start with the unification and restoration of the Middle Ground."

"Whatever you say." Yes-stallion says before inserting the Platinum Chip into the computer. He falls over and his face shows up in the monitor. "WOW, this is amazing. So that is what the Chip does. Mr. Stable had a presentation set up for you in the basement. Go see it, it is impressive."

We all go into the elevator and it takes us to the basement of the 38. We step out of the elevator to what looks like a firing range of sorts, but blocked off by a field that is probably to protect the observers. In the firing range are two securitrons.

"OK." Yes-stallions voice says over the intercom system. "All securitrons are outfitted with two weapons, as you know. A 9mm machine gun and a Magic Gatling gun. Turns out that these are only our secondary weapons."

"Are you serious?" Hawkens asks. "Secondary?"

"Yes I am serious Hawkens. The Platinum Chip, as it turns out, has the operating system required for securitrons to use our primary weapons." Yes-stallion replies. "Now, these two securitrons have had the Mark 2 OS installed. Now they can use the primary weapons that they have had since manufacturing. First we have access to shoulder mounted missile launchers, allowing us to now deal with airborne and armored enemies. We also now have access fully automatic grenade machine guns. Finally, the Mark 2 OS allows us securitrons to use our auto repair systems. Try taking us on now. All together, the Mark 2 OS give a 245% increase in combat efficiency, per unit."

"Dayum." Stardust says in response. "Flare, you are basically in control of a reputable army."

"While that may be true, I do not wish to take control as Mr. Stable had. What I want to do, is find the Elements of Leadership that Pinkie Pie IV was talking about and put them in control of the army."

"How noble of you." Twilight says to me.

"Well, now that the presentation is over, how about you all come upstairs and we can discuss further actions." Yes-stallion says over the intercom.

"Well, Flare, now it is time for you to shape the Middle Ground you want. Pick your neighbors, remove your enemies, do what you want." Yes-stallion says to me, now that we are face to monitor.

"What I want to do is get rid of the raiders and other bad gangs, and keep the good. If this is going to be a place free from evil, tyranny, or any one creature in command, then the Iron Wills, all raiders, the NCR, Black Mountain Mutants, and LOZ will have to go."

"Well then you will want to stop the legion from taking the Damn, because that is the largest source of non-magically generated electricity this side of the Octavian Mountains." Yes-stallion suggests. "It may be a good idea to ally yourself with the NCR for the time so as to make it easier to take on the LOZ. Then, once you have united the Middle Ground as you like, you can go into the damn, activate the securitron army that you upgraded under Fortification Hill, and then boot the NCR back to wherever they came from."

"Sounds like a plan. How do you suppose I get allied with the NCR?" I ask.

"Try camp MacMaren. It's close and has a lot of important ponies for the NCR. You could probably get some good fame with the NCR from that place."

"Thanks for that." I reply. To the rest of the group, I say. "Come on, we've got some assisting to do."

Now outside the 38, I ask Twilight, "Where is camp MacMaren?"

"It's on the ground, a bit south of the city."

"Well then let's get to the carraige and get down there."

Now outside Camp MacMaren, I head inside and leave the team with the carraige for now. I look for sompony important inside and ask him, "Would it be ok if I landed my skycarraige in here? I don't want to leave it abandoned outside."

"Sure, just land it over near the wall" he replies.

"Thanks, what's you name by the way?"

"Major Dhatri."

I leave the camp, hook back in with Hawkens, and fly over the wall into the camp and land where the Major told me to. After unhooking myself, I notice that nearly everypony is looking my way. I also notice the Major Dhatri is walking our way.

"You wouldn't happen to be that flaming courier that Pon-3 has been raving on about are you?" He asks as he gets closer to us.

"I am. Is there something you need help with?"

"Well I have been having trouble with a group of raider who call themselves the Fiends. Largest organized group of drug addicts I have ever seen."

"Go on." Hawkens says.

"Well we have a bounty on them and I was wondering if maybe you wanted to have a go at them."

"Sure. Who are the targets and where are they?" I ask.

"Well, the Fiends have 4 leader, Cook-Cook, Violet, Driver Nephi, and Moto-Runner. I wouldn't have you go after any of them unless you want to and I would suggest against going for Moto-Runner unless you really want to."

"I'll take them all." I tell him.

"Very well. Cook-Cook is a pyro, rapist and acording to some of the Fiends we captured, the best damn cook there is. Violet, well we don't know much of anything about her except that she is a unicorn and is always with her pack of dogs that she practically raised from birth. Driver Nephi is a pegasus who is faster than a legionare and just as lethal with his driver club. Lastly is Moto-Runner, a unicorn with a chainsaw. He is in Stable 3 in near the ruins of Las Pegasus."

"Sound like fun." Hawkens says.

"Whatever it is to you, there are a few things that need to be considered. I need the head fully intact in order to give you full bounty, so no headshots. Other than that, you can bring me their heads in any order or all at once, but you will have made friends with the NCR."

"Will do, and the next time you see me, I will be giving you 4 heads."

We all head out of Camp MacMaren and my E.F.S. has 4 new arrows, probably where the targets are. After walking into the Middle Ground towards one of the arrows, I hear somepony saying. "You have been marked for death by the Caesar, and we act on his words. Prepare yourself."

I turn around and see 5 LOZ members, all with their weapons out. Twilight shoots one of them in the head, Stardust cuts 2 of them down, and Stardust char grills another. The last one manages to lob a grenade at me before Hawkens manages to turn him into swiss cheese. As the grenade gets closer, my Taintmeter starts to go off. I pick the grenade up with my grapples and launch myself into the air. After three seconds, I throw the grenade into the air and it explodes a second later. I am far enough away that the shockwave misses me but the taint inside the grenade manages to get all over me.

"Go figure."

Level Up - LV.16

Flare's Taint Rank 6.

You now generate Pyre-Magic and your mane and tail are always lit.