Around a day later, the mood was quiet at Seigon Hill, a slaver fortification about four days' journey from Paradise Falls. The main slaver had been having a rough time lately. Like all those in the trade, he was under pressure from the forces of the Capital Wasteland. More of the territory to the east and south had become too high-risk due to the increased military presence, and their raid parties had been intercepted more and more frequently. The Pitt was demanding supplies that couldn't be delivered. This had made Paradise Falls angry, and just recently, there had been a mass execution of a raid party that returned without even a single slave. Morale had taken a dip, no doubt.

However, if they could deliver this batch back to Paradise Falls, it might turn things around. He had 25 slaves, all women and children, holed up inside the ruins of what had once been a factory, with 20 slavers to watch them. They had stopped at Seigon Hill on the way, as it was a well-known rest stop for raid parties and slaver-owned property. That meant at least five slavers were keeping the place running. He smiled as he took a sip of beer. The last raid had been tough. The men had put up a fight, costing him four of his own, but in the end, he had killed all the men from the nameless village, burned their houses, and salted the earth. He had ordered his men to leave the merchandise alone, but he knew from the distant cries that at least one of them hadn't obeyed. Well, he'd let it slide for now. His men needed a morale boost.

As night began to fall, the main slaver decided to take a stroll around the camp. Small barricades surrounded the factory, but they weren't expecting company. They were there to keep radscorpions out of the camp and away from the men. It was as he walked out of the former foreman's office that he noticed something was wrong. There were no noises—no crying, no laughter, no snoring—nothing. Something wasn't right.

Before he could react, he felt a sharp pain in his shoulder. An arrow had struck him. He fell to his knees, unable to speak, his body feeling paralyzed. He then collapsed backward, landing on his back, unable to feel anything, barely able to move his eyes. What he saw were two men dressed in black, walking towards him. Both were armed with crossbows and handguns with silencers. Upon closer inspection, he saw they wore full-body armor, including helmets. Where their faces should have been, there was only a black visor.

Before he could process anything further, one of the men drew a canister and sprayed it into his face. It turned black.

TLW landed with the Vertibird 2 hours later. Right now, Seigon Hills had two Vertibirds flying around it illuminating the area with the floodlights install on their tip. Another three had landed and now stood in a row right next to the abandoned factory. As TLW walked out and steeped on solid ground he saw Reilly who stood with a smile bigger than the Capitol.
"So how did it go?" he asked.
" We fucking aced it! She smiled.

The project first field testing had been a success. A top-secret project already starting the days when they needed to secure the Capital Wasteland. 30 men, steels, rangers and Rivet City guards had been selected to train for a top-secret military group. It had all been possible due to the reverse engineering of the fabled Hei Gui stealth uniform. The engineers at the brotherhood managed to produce 30 of them from the one TLW had acquired after an simulation event that he was tricked into in the earlier days.

The soldiers had trained intensely, and every aspect of their weapons had been modified for stealth. The group had adopted the crossbow and started lacing the arrows with the paralyzing venom of radscorpions. After a year with training their first test was taking over Seigon Hills. And they had succeeded. The result spoke for itself. 2 casualties, both the slavers, rest taken captive with all the slaves freed. One overdosed on the poison, the second one killed by the sniper of the team after he had unexpected turned around from his patrol route. Now as they were injected with the antivenom and bunded with slave collars around their neck they understood the scenario they were in.

Some ordinary rangers patrolled the perimeter and the captives while some few medics trained by the followers checked the freed slaves who were crying and in shock. As soon as they were cleared the Vertibirds would take them back to the Capital. TLW looked at the leader of the Special unit of the Rangers, Harkness. It was not a difficult choice to select him as the teamleader. His job as chief officer at the Rivet City was superb and he was in top physical shape and was best in class in all practices. He had a secret even he did not know about, but TLW had decided against doing anything with it and only Reilly and he knew about his true origins.

There was, of course, some risk associated with Harkness's past, but both TLW and Reilly had concluded that the benefits far outweighed the potential danger. After all, they had a top-class soldier with unparalleled decision-making skills as their team leader. Additionally, TLW kept the codes locked away in a safe that only he and Reilly knew about.

Harkness spoke with his squad. All of them had removed their helmets, smiling and laughing as the adrenaline began to wear off. Their Hei Gui armor was outfitted with knee and elbow pads for better mobility, and some soldiers had even painted skulls on their chests. It didn't matter. The armor's primary function was stealth, made to silence their every movement with a nanolayer that made them nearly invincible. The tech behind the stealth boy was embedded in the suit.

Harkness approached TLW and Reilly. "Full success, I'd say," he reported. "We had a few minor issues with the sound from the heels, but I think better gear will fix that. Also, the venom's potency might need to be dialed back. The overdose could've been avoided."

"Noted," TLW nodded. "But overall, you did a fantastic job. I think I speak for both of us when I say we recommend your group for full incorporation into the Armed Forces of the Wasteland."

"I agree," Reilly added. "We need to come up with a name for your group, Harkness. Now that it's official."

"Me and my men have actually talked about it," Harkness replied. "We were thinking of calling ourselves the Diablo Reapers."

"Why's that?" Reilly asked, intrigued.

"Because it sounds scary as hell," Harkness answered with a grin.

"Can't argue with that," TLW replied. "We'll give it some thought."

TLW patted Harkness on the back as the man began issuing commands to his soldiers, ordering them to clean up and move out. TLW and Reilly watched as the captives were loaded onto the Vertibirds. Within 10 minutes, only one Vertibird remained, carrying TLW, Reilly, Harkness, and five of his men. They hadn't yet decided what to do with Seigon Hill. They could blow it up, station a contingent there, or leave it be. They decided on the latter—but not before one of the walls was painted with the words:

"The Reapers were here. Sleep with one eye open, slavers!"

The following week, two more outposts were raided with similar success. Over 100 slaves were saved, and 50 slavers were arrested and interrogated. The information they gathered was a goldmine. Lists of slavers, trade routes, and outposts were uncovered, along with the identities of some of their customers. Many of these customers were heading to the Pit, though there was one individual—or group—called Maximus that began drawing the Third Link's attention. This person had been purchasing large quantities of men in working condition, seemingly for some unknown purpose.

The Pit, however, was far away. For now, the priority was still Paradise Falls. The simple fact was, the slavers of the Capital Wasteland were getting their asses kicked.

By the end, the Third Link had an almost perfectly scaled replica of Paradise Falls, complete with detailed intelligence on its inhabitants. Every area had been meticulously mapped out, and the landscape had been captured with precision. The time had come to end the campaign.