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// Camper Buster 
// Story: Happy Campers 
// by Okhlahoma Beat-Down 
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"Well," Spy coughed, waving a gloved hand in front of his face and spitting out his cigarette to clear smoke from his lungs after the blast, "That certainly was NOT something the repulsive Bushman and Cowboy would do." The 15 Mercenaries gathered, both RED and BLU, were having their usual discussion of matters to hand when the RED Sniper and RED Engineer decided to yell loudly, spin their heads around, and explode in mighty balls of flame and smoke. Needless to say, that caused reasonable distress to both teams, and lowered both Spies, Scouts, the BLU Sniper, and both Medics to around half their normal 'I'm OK' levels of feeling. 
"It was unexpected, and that will not be tolerated from those two!" BLU Soldier yelled, stepping forward agressively and pointing at the pile of clearly human parts lying around piles of what was clearly not metal bolts and oil. "YOU ARE FOR DEFENSE OF YOUR INTELLIGENCE! YOU ARE NOT FOR SURPRISING PEOPLE! STOP BEING UNIQUE IN YOUR ROLES!" The response was absolute silence from the two human corpses that were not on fire nor were they leaking oil. BLU Engineer wiped the soot from his goggles, and stepped forward.
"Solly," he asked, "Y'all mind if I take a quick peek at these fellas? I kinda wanna check somethin'." Soldier just made an ambiguous grunt sound, still trying to force twenty-one shotgun shells into his weapon. "Thanks, mister." Engineer muttered, before crouching in front of the RED Engineer's recently exploded head. He picked it up in his crouched position, rotating it slightly to check it from all angles. Then he picked it up and went over to RED Medic, who was still trying to comfort Archimedes. The white dove was looking around the room frantically, still suffering PTSD from the one time Heavy's left ventricle slammed into him and chucked him into the scalpel drawer. "Doc, y'all're the expert on injuries, right?" Engie asked him. The German looked back, still stroking Archimedes.
"Ja, I am ze Medic, after all." Medic chuckled. "Why? Is zere a problem wiz ze corpses?"
"Isn't there a damn problem?" Engie replied. "Why the sam hell is Engie's ear full of microphones and his teeth? In fact, why does he have teeth in his ear in the first place?" Medic seemed to be considering this, with Archimedes moving to his shoulder, his finger moving to his chin and resting on his elbow.
"Well," Medic began. "I suppose I should enlighten you about my...'experiment' with Mr. Conagher here when I was fitting him with Übercharge capability. It all began when we both decided that the human ear could do with some improvement and zat Wisdom teeth were a pointless idea..." Suddenly, Spy spoke up from across the room.
"Would someone CARE to tell me where the hell Soldier is?!" he cried. Everybody then went absolute stark silent in the horror that nobody was watching where RED Soldier was, and that he was going to try thinking for himself.



Soldier was as quiet as can be as he infiltrated the huge palace. It was about 8 o' clock in the evening, so all of the robots must be refueling and recharging. Nobody else could make such an advanced structure without human help. This was uncharted territory, and by God, Soldier was going to take it all in the name of Uncle Sam! He would shove so many American flags up robot asses it would be uncountable and he would probably run out of flags! For the mission at hand, he had put on the stealthiest clothes he could; the mass of wires he taped to his helmet that Mann Co. called the 'Cross-Comm Crash Helmet Addition' was sat on his normal helmet for maximum skill boosts, a pair of Mantreads so he could stomp some robot maggots were weightily weighing down his legs, his obligatory Buff Banner so he could break everything was strapped to his back, and his trusty Market Gardener had its head folded down and it was hung from his Buff pack. In his hands, he was carrying one of Mann Co's deadliest weapons; The Direct Hit.
Given to him when he first fired two of the glowy rockets in a row, he found it lying on a table in his apartment with a letter saying 'Go get him - Helen''. Soldier had no idea who 'Helen' was, but he greatly enjoyed the use of his new rocket launcher. The projectiles went much faster, but with a smaller explosion, and pretty much anything that was hit directly with it was thrown backwards into a wall and pelted with shrapnel. Unfortunately, the BLU Soldier was given one as well, which meant he was evenly matched, but it was surprisingly rare to see BLU Soldier actually using a real rocket launcher. Most of the time he had his Rocket Jumper, Market Gardener, and Shotgun instead of the usual weapons RED Soldier carried. This eventually became a surpringly effective tactic, considering how many times BLU Soldier had managed to land on Medic when he was healing Scout after an explosion, smashed his German teeth down his throat with a ludicrous amount of force, before whipping out his shotgun and blasting a hole in Scout's chest. It was funny the first few times, then it got serious when Soldier himself was swatted out of the sky by the Mighty Market.
Keeping his memories out of the way for the matter at hand, Soldier got outside the castle wall, made sure nobody was looking, and launched himself up the wall in an amazing show of stealth that involved a few explosives. Once secure, the castle wall was completely clear. Nobody there, not a guard, not a knight. "What kind of military is this?" Soldier muttered. He knew all about the military because he read a lot of books about it and had to buy his own ticket to Europe because they wouldn't let him in he was a grizzled old war dog. He'd trained young girls in the needless art of shovel combat to be used on Nazis fresh-faced recruits to become the greatest soldiers in the world, for God's sake, he knew EXACTLY how easily this monarchy could topple! All it took was an undefended wall!
Suddenly, he realised that he should have been moving along a few minutes ago rather than playing his inner monologue to himself accompanied by triumphant and totally not generic military music for the past 7 minutes. Groaning, Soldier got up from his one knee, keeping his launcher hefted and loaded, and began to run in the direction of the one room in the palace where there was a massive window with light coming from it.



The celebratory party was in full swing. The band, lead by the famed Octavia, played some of the finest celebration music Equestria had ever written, and nobles, regular street citizens, and even the Elements were having the time of their lives, dancing, laughing, talking, all kinds of celebratory things. Engineer was right in the middle of it, talking with Twilight and a few other mares about whatever they asked for. And Sniper...was being Sniper. He was stood in the corner with a bottle of beer, completely against the doctor's reccomendations, and quietly muttering things to himself. He didn't really want to be here. 
As if that wasn't obvious.
If a normal person goes to a party, they relinquish all weapons, they put on their finest clothes, they do their best to look like they care! Engineer had done just that; h'd put on his 70's Chapeau cap, sunglasses on, and put on a clean white shit with a bow tie underneath his overalls. He left his shotgun, Luger, and wrench in his room, and was having a great time, meeting new ponies and talking to those he knew. Sniper did the exact opposite; he was wearing exactly what he wore since the Tank attacked, with his beloved red Trophy Belt and red Tooth Kickers still bearing some blackening from the blast, his vest was slightly ripped and frayed in places, his sunglasses still had the smallest of cracks in them, and since he couldn't get hold of his rifle just yet, he had his Kukri, SMG, and the Shotgun Engie gave him. Nopony really wanted to risk talking to him, since they assumed he was a mass murderer with a fine eye for people a few miles away, but if they actually broke through the hard exterior they might realise he was a good guy overall.
Princess Luna had succeeded in that; both had spent a few hours earlier grumbling about quite a lot of things. Hospital food, and how bad it was, Castle food, and how that always took forever, how their closest companions were cheerful all the time and had slept together, everything. In fact, they both wondered, quietly, if they were the versions of each other in different dimensions. Same personality, but one was red and the other blue, one was royalty and the other was...well, not, one was a talking horse and the other was a quiet man (sometimes), and most noticeably, both were always scowling.
But since Princess Luna was late for the party or whatever it was supposed to be, nobody believed their head was worth trying to speak to Sniper. Finally, after a few minutes of mumbling to himself, Celestia rolled her eyes, still smiling, and extended a hoof. Sniper just stared at this strange gesture. What could it mean? Was she showing him something? Was she showing someone else him? Wha-?
"Come on, Sniper, enjoy yourself!" she called over. "It is a party celebrating your act of valor!" Sniper responded with a head shake. He didn't think it was right to celebrate himself. It just seemed...gloaty. Plus, nobody ever celebrated Mercenaries. It was stupid. They killed, they blew things up, they killed by blowing things up, and usually the thing exploding was something very important to people since it was normally a fuel line, food supply, or orphanage. The 18 RED and BLU Mercenaries were some of the most hated and feared people in America, specifically Teufort. Celebrating them was like celebrating General Rommel, famous for his job of personally punching down every single expensive art gallery in France, or it was like celebrating Tom Jones, whose singing had busted open more ears than any other.
Celestia just looked at Sniper and sighed sadly. She then turned to Engineer. "He really isn't one for having fun, is he?" she asked. Engineer just shook his head.
"Well, no, not really." the Texan replied. "Personally, I think it's just because he likes keeping an eye on everything, and doesn't want to be distracted. He has really good eyesight, y'know."
"Example?" Celestia asked, raising a brow. Engineer, quite calmly, leaned slightly in the direction of Sniper.
"Sniper, how many robot Spies are in this room?" Engie asked.
Within a half second, he had his reply. "8. There's 9 of the same mare walkin' around, and all within a 7 foot radius of the original. Spies, bloody useless." grunted the Australian. Engineer turned back to Celestia, who was rather impressed.
"Hmm. He does have good eyes." she murmured. She was considering asking him how many glasses of wine were there at the start of the party, but she suddenly noticed him looking at the large window at the back of the room and frowning. He out his bottle down, held his SMG in his right hand, and was drawing his Kukri. "He's getting weapons out. I think something's wrong." Engineer's ears almost pricked up.
"Sniper's probably right." he said quickly. "Listen. The floor's shakin'." Celestia noticed he was right; there was a faint, but booming sound reverberating through the ground. A few ponies noticed it at first, then it gradually became much worse as everybody, even the band, stopped. Panic began setting in through the room, and Celestia knew ponies would eventually turn to either her, Sniper, the robots, or Engineer to see if they knew what was happening. Engineer was already dashing out of the room to get weapons and equipment, the robots didn't seem to really be doing much outside of continuously making ridiculous statements including 'The Medic is a Medic', and she had no clue what was going on.
For once, it seemed as though Sniper was the best option for looking to for guidance. The Australian was walking slowly through the crowd, SMG pointed up as though he were ready for something, and his Kukri was held at his hip in a ready position. He was still glaring at the window, as though there were something there. And suddenly, the shaking stopped. The whole room went deathly silent.
Then, two bright blue lights appeared outside of the window, and a massive metallic fist plowed through the glass, sending the room into panic as ponies ran from the metal monster. As the room emptied, the robots quickly grasped what was happening and got ready for it; The Robo-Medic began quickly healing all of the other robots and Sniper, getting an Übercharge prepared, Demopan pulled out a Grenade Launcher (Which surprised everybody except him), the remaining Pyro-bot lit up his flamethrower, and Sniper readied himself. 
Finally, the giant robot retracted its arm, and smashed the wall beneath the window down. Rubble flew everywhere, and a thick dust cloud filled the air. And in through that cloud, a Giant Heavy stomped into the room, wearing a massive metal shield on one shoulder and a horned iron helmet. It had a huge pair of steel fists, and a strap of leather over its chest that held a hulking shotgun in place on its back. And beneath the iron helmet, there was the face of a beast, bearing the Steel Jaw of Summer Fun. Slowly, it grated its mouth open, and held it there as it spoke. "HEAVY IS MADE OF SUGAR PLUMS." it boomed loudly, shaking the room. "DO YOU WISH FOR HEAVY TO KILL YOU? WISH GRANTED."
And with that, it began to advance forward, openly accepting every bullet that it received.