By this chapter, I've passed my word goal by almost 2 thousand words! I think that one chapter with 25 hundred words really helped with that. Anyway, thanks for reading this far and I'm gonna shut up now so you can read this! :D

XIII

It took hours and hours, but we were finally in position. "Equipe Dois and Três, are you in position?" I called the teams angrily over our earpieces that Afanasai had generously let all the team leaders borrow.

"Waitin' for your call, John" Connor replied.

"Ready" Afanasai uttered.

"Good" I said, still blinded by my own anger. "Equipe Céu, are you ready for your task?"

"Anytime" Spitfire responded.

"Equipe Magia and Asas?"

"Waiting for your mark!" Shining Armor chimed in.

"Me too!" Rainbow Dash added.

"Okay" I thought, remembering the last team. "Equipe Escavadeira?"

"Eeyup." I think you can guess who that is.

"Alright, Operation Ground and Pound is all set up" I told everypony, cracking a viciously evil smile. "Let's get this bitch rollin'!" Connor and I moved (along with our teams) through the crack in the wall me and the CMC found and we all moved onto our separate sides of the building, readying ourselves for whatever might happen.

Connor beeped in on my earpiece. "Hey, do you have your FB?"

"You think I'm that fucking stupid?"

"No, I'm just making sure" he withdrew hastily.

"Get your FB ready" I commanded. "Céu! How many soldiers are guarding the entrance?"

"Uh… a lot" Spitfire hesitated.

"Okay…" I pulled the pin on my FB. "THROW IT NOW!" I barked into the earpiece. Me and Connor let both of our FBs fly to the front of the castle and we covered our ears, closed our eyes and turned away from the blast. BANG!

"SHIT!" we heard come from the soldiers.

"The Flashbangs worked!" I informed everypony. "Plan is in motion. Connor, get your lazy ass up and open fire! Três, you come in in about 3 to 5 minutes." Me and Connor got up and opened fire on the soldiers as well as our team joining us with their rifles. At least 4 or 5 dropped down, but the rest of them remained standing, but still a little disoriented from the unexpected Flashbang. It wasn't long before they had regained their full orientation and we all had to reload. Connor and I managed to reload quickly, but about half of each of our teams got shot, most of them dying. "FUCK! We've got multiple dead already! Três, where the fuck are you?!"

"Right here" Afanasai interrupted, opening fire with his AK103 from in one of the bushes, while the rest of his team fired from other bushes around the courtyard. They took out another 2 or 3, but most of them were behind good cover now. All gunfire ceased for a moment, but before long another 2 soldiers popped out and managed to shoot down a few of Afanasai's team before both got wounded. The drawbridge lowered to let out more soldiers. All was going right as I had hoped.

"Céu! Solar rain! Now!" I yelled. The Wonderbolts flew overhead, dropping numerous Flashbangs onto the bridge the soldiers were on while everyone else changed to a full magazine along with dodging the effects of the Flashbangs the best we could. 4 of the Wonderbolts got wounded and began falling out of the air. Lucky for us, they made it over to the other side of the wall. We all came out of cover and opened fire on the stumbling and blinded soldiers. The majority of them went down, but 2 managed to get behind cover. Once again, we had luck on our side, as Afanasai was a dead-eye shot and took out both of them quickly. "Let's move" I demanded. "The longer we wait, the better chance that fucker's gonna get away!"

We all rushed into the castle, which is when Equipes Magia, Asas and Escavadeira were all supposed to come into the castle courtyard. I heard an explosion from the back wall, which was a little IED of our own, only being used by Equipe Magia to breach the thick wall. Asas could fly over and Escavadeira would just go through where Magia did. Inside the castle, dozens of soldiers were waiting for us, all behind cover and waiting for the time to catch us of guard.

We waltzed right in, making us all a little skeptical and right when we thought the coast was clear, one of the royal guards on Connor's team's head exploded, spraying grey matter all over his other team members. We all dove into the best cover we could find, but when Connor dove, he hurt his leg and wasn't able to get back up. I knew it was going to be a problem. "Escavadeira! Come in!" I growled. "Get your stupid asses in here and mow these fuckers down!"

There was a short silence and then from the door came a deep and familiar "Eeyup." Big Mac and the rest of Equipe Escavadeira popped out, all armed with their LMGs. They let out a huge stream of bullets as if they were all carrying garden hoses that spewed bullets instead of water. The majority of the soldiers dropped dead, but several of them were still standing and managed to shoot down one of the ponies on Big Mac's team. I dove over and got the dropped pony's LMG and went and gave it to Connor for his M4A1 and its ammo which I kept just in case. We moved up again, but this time, the throne room doors were locked.

It looked like we would have to go through the vents or something… I kept thinking. We had no explosives, no lock-picking equipment, nothing that could help us with this. "Fuck it" I snorted. "I'm goin through the vents."

"Are you sure?" Connor asked doubtingly.

"Shut up and wait for me to open the doors." I found no ventilation (not a surprise if you think about it) but I did remember my Assassin's Creed-style climbing. "Wait here" I demanded. I ran out the door and dashed over to the side of the building, proceeding to climb upwards towards the window I was at before. This time, it only took me about 3 or 4 minutes to get to the window, considering I was kind of in a hurry. As soon as I reached the right window, I held on the best I could and grabbed out my M1911, which I had put a silencer on because you never know, and then blew the glass out of the window frame. Dropping to the floor, I noticed that no one had noticed my entry. They probably thought it was a window on another floor or a stray bullet hit the window or something.

As quietly as possible, I unlocked the door from the outside and let everypony in. We all marched inside as we raised our weapons at the unsuspecting soldiers along with a few officers, one of which was McMarland. "Do not shoot any of the officers" I whispered. "Get ready to fire… now!" Sound waves resonated across the room as bullets flew from all of our guns. Some of the soldiers had already taken cover behind 2 wooden tables that they tipped over and so had all the officers. The only soldiers that went down were the ones standing up.

We all stopped not to reload, but to trick the soldiers into standing up. A few of us DID reload though, like me because I was using my M1, so I had to reload every 8 shots. Sure enough, the soldiers stood up and those of us who weren't reloading shot the standing soldiers. All of them were down. I looked around us, only seeing a few ponies wounded and 1 or 2 dead. We all approached the covered officers with caution, knowing that these guys didn't get to be officers because they paid for it.

We got only close enough so that we were about a foot or 2 away from the legs of the two wooden tables they were using as cover. I had just come down from my fantastic rage, so I said in a much calmer tone "get up with your hands up and empty and we won't shoot you." They all stayed where they were. I spoke up again, "we only want Ltc. McMarland. He's a traitor." They then stood up with empty hands in the air as asked. "Thank you, gentlemen. Now if you would kindly tell me which one of you is Ltc. McMarland so I can blow his brains out, this would end much faster. They all started quietly talking among each other. I thought I could hear them doubting if McMarland was really a traitor.

Twilight suddenly burst racing into the room holding a rolled up piece of parchment. "STOP! John! The war is over! They verified the evidence!" All of the officers looked a little confused. "We sent the handwritten letter that McMarland wrote to the United States' government telling them of the situation. They've verified the evidence and declared that the war is over."

"Is it still okay if I shoot him?" I asked.

"Yeah, probably" Spike said, who had been riding on Twilight's back when she ran inside.

"Good, 'cuz I would've done it anyway!" I turned back to the officers. I spotted one who had something in his hand… oh shit…

He began casually walking forward until he was only a few inches away from me. "EAT MY CORNBREAD! ALLAH!" the officer screamed as he clicked a C4 detonator. The explosion blew off the back of the castle and sent everyone in the room flying.

Chapter name based off of the song "Operation Ground and Pound" by Dragonforce

I'd like to thank my friend Raven for giving me the idea of what McMarland should say when he detonated the C4.