"Mister Richard."

"Excuse me, Mister Richard, sir."

"Mister Richard!"

"Huh?! What?" Richard said, jolting awake and nearly falling out of his swivel chair. Wait a minute.

"I apologize for waking you sir, are you alright?" A cold, feminine voice questioned.

Locating the voice almost instantly, Richard had to tilt his head a bit in order to meet the icy gaze of a tall, slim woman, with blonde hair cut short at the shoulders and adorned in a snow-white blouse, tight black dress pants and a tablet held squarely at her supple chest.

"Uhh, yes, I-I'm quite alright. Ahem, was there something you needed from me, Miss Winter?" Richard asked, suddenly using that authoritative "business only" kind of tone, that only seemed to elicit a slight twitch from the woman before she continued.

"Hmm. Well, I just came to inform you that you have a meeting scheduled in a few minutes, followed by a- ." As the secretary listed off the do's of the day, her ice blue eyes skimming over the tablet's screen while perfectly manicured fingers taped away at its surface, Richard meanwhile just stared down at himself. He was his normal self again. He still was his normal self, with same old human hands, expensive-ass suit and same old drool on the side of his face. Quickly wiping it away with his sleeve before Miss Winter saw, He then took a look around room he was now currently in. It was his office after all. With same big desk, same comfy chair, same steel cabinets, computer, and mini bar. And as her turned his chair, he saw that just outside his transparent wall of a window was the same city he had called home for years.

"All of that really was just a dream, wasn't it?"

"I'm sorry sir, did you say something?" Miss Winter said, to which Richard quickly swiveled back to face her, albeit looking as though he'd just been held at gunpoint.

"No no, I was just thinking out loud to myself. Everything's fine." Richard said, more so of a reassurance to himself than an actual response.

"Are you sure, sir?"

Richard nodded.

"Positive."

"Well alright sir. Would you care for me to at least escort you to the meeting room?" Miss Winter asked, brow raised while she clutched her tablet just a bit tighter.

Now before Richard was about to decline her offer, seeing as how he had been working at this company for more than ten years and definitely knew his way around, he suddenly hesitated. Then after thinking it over, he smiled.

"Actually, yes. Could you please?"

The secretary stood emotionless, nodded, then turned to leave, albeit with the tiniest bit of added sway in her hips. And just as she stepped outside his office, Richard swore he saw his ever-icy secretary do the fainest of a happy dance while making one of the quietest squees he was just barely able to hear before the door closed.

Still sitting at his desk, Richard leaned back in his chair, sighing away images of blood, destruction, and deathclaws.

"Man, I bet Diablo will get a kick out all this once I get home." Richard said, chuckling as he got out of his chair and approached the door, but not before sparing one last glance around the room.

"What a hell of a dream."

And with that, Richard opened his door into the open hall of a busy office floor, to the chorus of typing keyboards and shuffling papers that came from the rows and rows of cubicles that made up the accounting department of MILTEC.

"Are you ready, sir?"

Richard stood for a few seconds, just taking in everything, before he turned to his secretary and smiled.

"Lead on Miss Winter."

Giving a quick smile of her own, she turned on her gleaming black high heels and proceeded down the hall, clicking away as Richard matched her pace from behind.

Several minutes later of turning this way and that, passing cubicle after identical cubicle, Miss Winter continued on without hesitation, while Richard nervously tapped his fingers against his pants leg.

"Something's not right, we should've been at the boardroom by now."

Looking up at Miss Winter's back, he pondered the idea that maybe she had just gotten herself lost after taking one too many turns. Or maybe she probably knew they were both lost and just decided to save face and try to find the meeting room without making here mistake known. Sadly, Richard knew when enough was enough and decided to stop this little diversion before it went on any longer. But just as he was about to tell her to stop, there came a sudden buzzing sound that stopped him dead in his verbal tracks. Shaking his head, he made for another attempt, when the buzzing persisted, even louder and more irritating than before.

Now convinced that a swarm of flies probably had it out for him all of a sudden, he began to swat furiously at the air, first with one hand and then with both soon after. And for several seconds did Richard stand in that hallway swatting only at air until all at once, it suddenly went dead quiet. Looking around, he realized that not only were there were no flies, and despite being a packed office floor not a second ago, there was also nobody else around him save for Miss Winter standing just a few feet in front of him.

"We-where did everyone go? Miss Winter?" Richard asked, looking around while leaving his arms still hovering in mid-swatting pose. Yet Miss Winter still remained silently standing, and before Richard could once again question her, there came a quieter buzzing sound that drew his attention down to his arm, and there, resting upon his hand was something that Richard couldn't believe was real.

A cazador. A tiny cazador no bigger than your average mosquito.

And how could Richard tell it was a tiny cazador?

Well, was it natural for mosquitoes to have four large yellow wings, massive red eyes and tiny but very noticeable spikes protruding from its back?

Didn't think so. And neither did Richard as he stood there, staring at it as it crawled about on his hand before taking flight just as a blinding light encompassed all of the nearby windows around him and the building was suddenly and violently shook at the accompaniment of a deafening explosion.

Blinded, Richard could only cover his face as glass shattered and pieces of the building crumbled around him. Then as soon as it had began, it quickly stopped and Richard spared a glance at what revealed to be a scene right out of Hell itself.

All around him, bodies laid twisted and deformed, with most burned to black husks, and either stacked in piles or pinned beneath fallen slabs of ceiling and walls.

Turning to a what used to be a transparent wall encompassed in large glass panes, now nothing more than open space and jagged shards, he blankly stared out at a world set ablaze. Every Building for as far as Richard could see was reduced to either crumbling ruin, stripped steel frame, or simply a massive pile of rock and steel beams. Massive fires burned across the landscape,either throughout the floors of some towers still left relatively intact, or across whole city blocks where the only things that remained were the scorched frames of many cars, buses and trucks that laid scattered and abandoned, or at least most of them were abandoned. And past all of that and reaching miles into the orange horizon, a monstrous mushroom-shaped cloud still remained just beyond the city limits, ever rolling and ever roaring.

Forcing his gaze away from the utter hellscape that was the outside world, Richard turned to the one other person that seemed to still remain upright and alive besides himself. Though just as Richard went to grab the hand of his secretary, he suddenly realized just how wrong he was on that whole alive assumption. For as Richard stared through the hazy smoke at Miss Winter, who at that point finally decided to turn around and fully face him, he was met with a sight which far exceeded his previous reaction upon seeing the shrunken cazador.

What stood facing Richard was no Miss Winter. Where there had once been flawless tan skin was now nothing but burned, rotting red flesh and exposed bone. what had once been a stunning office dress was nothing more than a few shards of torn rags and loose threads. And what had at once been a face of composure and beauty was now nothing but a sickly, diseased, nose-less husk that stared ahead with empty white eyes, growled through broken and jagged teeth, and was covered from bald head to bare feet in a number of bulbous sores that emitted a sickly green glow.

"She's a fucking reaver." Richard swore under his breath before taking a shaky step back. Which seemed to be the wrong move as the feral ghoul before him broke from its stupor, released a guttural shriek and promptly charged at him.

With composure thrown out the broken window, Richard turned tail and booked it down the crumbling hallway, skidding around collapsed cubicles and vaulting over fallen debris all while the reaver behind him continued to close the distance between them. Then just as Richard was about to be caught in the ghoul's grasp, he suddenly yelled as the floor collapsed beneath him. Down he went maybe two floors before his fall was cut short by landing on a long wooden table surrounded by chairs. Well looks like he made it to the meeting room.

"Fuuuccckkk." Richard groaned, rolling over the table's surface before ending up in a heap on the carpeted floor. Slowly picking himself up, Richard then winced when pain suddenly flared through his right arm, and after experimentally poking at it and wincing, he concluded that it was most likely broken.

"Well that's just fucking dandy."

Now standing, Richard hobbled his bruised and bloodied ass over to the room's entrance. But just as he clutched the door's handle, there came a loud thud from behind and Richard didn't need to turn around in order to guess that his pursuer had finally decided to join him. Looking over his shoulder, his assumption was right as the reaver stood atop the table, chest heaving and white solid eyes locked on its pissed-off prey.

"Seriously?"

With another guttural shriek, the creature made to jump at Richard, but just as it was about to there came a noise from above, causing the creature to pause and look up before seemingly regretting that decision a second later.

After all, It seemed almost instant as one moment the creature stood there still, then the next moment it was lying crushed and twitching underneath a large steel refrigerator.

"Huh, well that was convenient." Richard said as he opened the door and proceeded down the empty hall. Course that little easy brake wouldn't last for long as yet another shriek rang through the crumbling hall.

"Oh now what?!"

With yet another sigh, Richard turned to the other far end of the hall just as a another person-turned-reaver came shambling around the corner. The reaver then turned its rotting head and regarded Richard for a moment before shrieking yet again and slowly limped its way towards him.

Richard couldn't help but actually chuckle at the ghoul as it rushed him.

"Heh. Well at least I can out-walk this one." Richard joked before he instantly wished he didn't.

At the accompaniment of a thunderous chorus of footfalls, the one reaver was soon pushed to the side, and by side that meant out the damn window, by about twenty-one other reavers who came skidding around the corner and running towards the much less cocky and now definitely scared shit-less human who now broke into a full sprint down the hall.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Shit. Fuck!" Richard swore furiously as pain and tiredness was ignored on account of the horde hot on his tail. Sparing a glance back, Richard eyed a few reavers at the front of the pack steadily draw closer, forcing him to push past the burning in his legs for a bit more speed.

"Augh, can this shitty fucking nightmare get any worse?!"

It most certainly could, to Richard's immediate regret. For just as he was halfway down the insanely-long hallway, his level of despair rose exponentially at the sight of another dozen or so reavers barreling down the front end of the hall towards him.

Oh, now that's just fucking unfair!"

Continuing to run forward, despite having reavers close in on him from both sides, Richard waited until the very last second before suddenly falling to a slide around the corner of a three-hallway intersection, much to the dismay of his chasers as the sounds of bodies slamming against one another echoed behind Richard as he quickly ran towards his apparent salvation, which in this case lay behind a set of double doors below a sign marked "Cafeteria." With one final burst of speed, Richard burst through the doors and quickly shut them just as a few of his faster pursuers slammed into them, shrieking and growling behind the doors as he braced his back against them in an attempt to assure that the closed doors stayed closed.

Taking a moment to catch his breath, Richard had then realized that he had made two grave mistakes.

The first mistake was that by bracing himself against the only thing separating him and his flesh-craving friends, he knew that the second he made a brake for it, they would most definitely be on top of his ass in one second and happily tearing into it the next.

And the other grave mistake which he made? Well, he simply just didn't check if the cafeteria was occupied.

With the sounds of buzzing permeating in the air, Richard could only raise his head dejectedly passed overturned tables, broken metal chairs and the bodies of his deceased coworkers to meet the red, bug-eyed stares of two dozen or so human-sized cazadors.

"You guys wouldn't mind letting me pass through without making a snack outta my ass, right?" Richard asked with just the faintest of hope in mind. That hope was then quickly dashed as all the cazadors present took to the air and slowly buzzed towards Richard's sighing form.

"Fine. If that's the case, then you fuckers are gonna have to get in line!" Richard yelled and just as one cazador made to skewer him on its massive stinger, he quickly dove to the side just as the doors behind him were blasted open and a ghoul was unluckily stabbed clean through in his place. And that's when shit got crazy.

Hiding behind an overturned table, Richard watched in stunned silence as the two masses of cazador and reaver collided with one another, spilling brown blood for green as rotten torsos were stabbed or slashed while bug limbs were scratched, bitten out of or torn off completely. The cacophony of ghoulish shrieks and frenzied buzzing only added to the visual carnage that raged before Richard's eyes.

"Damn." Richard quietly swore before having to forcibly look away from the absolute chaos in order to thankfully spot a glowing green "EXIT" sign at the far end of the room. Just passed the mosh pit of murder.

"Diablo give me strength." Richard said before beginning to crawl as best as someone with a broken arm could towards salvation. He stayed as low as he could to the floor and as close as he could to the nearby wall in order to remain mostly out of sight of those currently killing eachother in the middle of the large open room. The only times Richard had to stop were either when a cazador passed over his head or when a reaver was thrown onto the floor near him or onto a nearby table and he had to play dead amongst all the actual dead before continuing on when the reaver returned to the fighting.

This little game of hide and sneak went on for maybe a few tense, heart-racing minutes before Richard finally made it to the door which, after checking through its broken window, lead to a somewhat-intact stairwell.

"Perfect." Richard said relieved as he pulled open th-...tried to-...to open-

"Why the hell isn't this damn door opening?!" Richard growled, pulling on the door as hard as he could. He even went as far as to plant one foot on the wall as he again pulled with all his might, but sadly to no avail.

Cursing up a storm, Richard stepped away from the door to catch his breath. But just as he was about to try again, he felt a sudden chill go down his spine, and hesitantly sparing a glance over his shoulder, he noticed one reaver that, despite all the carnage happening around it as well as missing both its arms, had stopped gnawing on the torn off leg of a cazador when it had noticed Richard.

For a few seconds, the two stared at one another before Richard broke eye contact in favor of desperately yanking on the door handle as the reaver ran towards him with the leg still in its mouth. With the realization of dying due to a fucking closed door, Richard sighed as he leaned against the door handle, fully prepared to welcome death.

Well, that is until there came a soft click and the door opened into the stairwell.

...

"Huh, so it was a push, not a pull...yeah death can suck my ass."

And with that little proclamation, Richard literally dove into the stairwell, and not a moment too soon as the arm-less reaver was just a few inches from reaching him before it violently bounced off the door frame and fell backwards due to the leg that was still in its mouth.

Looking at the downed and struggling reaver, Richard spared a second to chuckle before slamming the door closed. Now free from that little shred of Hell, Richard took this moment of peace to really catch his breath. After his breathing relaxed, he poked to confirm that his arm was still broken. Great.

Looking over to the side, Richard also noticed that the only direction he could go was up, seeing as how the stairs leading down proceeded for a few steps before they broke off into a drop fifty floors down.

"Well that's fine, I didn't want to leave anyway." Richard sighed as he looked over at the wall, noting the large number fifty-one painted on it. With another sigh, Richard began to ascend the stairs, one tired step after another. A few minutes later, Richard was opening the stairwell door of floor fifty-three. Then, after some brief time spent retracing his steps, he now was opening the door to his surprisingly intact office. And after closing the door with a soft click, he made his way over to his desk and sat down in his still-cozy chair, all the while the world continued to burn just outside his windows.

"Things just can't be easy for me can they?" Richard said to no-one in particular. And after spinning around in his chair a few times, Richard suddenly stopped. Then after opening one of his desk drawers and briefly rummaging around in it, he acquired a silver key which he then used to unlock the left bottom drawer and retrieve from it a bottle of hard hooch.

"Was going to save this for a rainy day, but I guess a fiery one sorta counts."

Shrugging, Richard popped off the cap with is teeth, and after spitting it into the nearby waste bin with pinpoint accuracy, downed a third of the bottle in one breath before pulling it away and sighing blissfully as its burning contents dulled both his senses and the pain in his arm.

"Ahhh. Now that's some good shit." Richard said, smiling as he took another swig. Sighing once again, he looked over to the little intercom on his desk and smiled cheekily. Then after setting his bottle down, pressed the little red button and uttered the following in what he thought was his best serious voice despite being semi-shitfaced.

"Ahem. Miss Winter? Could you please send down Mister Satan to my office, cause I'd like to have a few choice words with him...oh, and if you can't, you know on account of being dead and all, I completely understand. Thank you."

Releasing his finger from the button, Richard chuckled drunkenly as he grabbed the bottle, swirled the brown liquor once, then tipped his head back and chugged while he kicked his feet up on the desk. There he sat, ignorant to the minutes that ticked away while he merrily drank away, without a single fuck to be had.

Well...until there actually came a few knocks from outside his door.

Stopping instantly, Richard blinked before looking over to the door with the bottle still in his mouth. There the knocks came once again, and Richard knew then that he wasn't imagining it. Setting down the bottle, Richard got up from his desk and slowly shuffled over to the door.

There he stood, staring at the door as the knocking persisted, this time with a bit more urgency added in. Finding himself frozen, he just couldn't find the will to actually open the door, despite all that cheeky shit he had said earlier.

"H-hello?" Richard asked, just the slightest hint of fear in his voice.

"Hello? We have arrived just as thee asked. Could thee please open the door?"

Blinking, Richard didn't actually expect a response, nonetheless one that sounded so quiet and...feminine?

"S-Satan?" Richard stuttered as she reached for the handle, but just as he laid his hand on it, there came a sudden smashing noise behind him, and before he knew it, a massive clawed hand had surrounded his entire body and with a great blast of wind, pulled Richard from his now very much destroyed office.

Struggle as he might, Richard could do nothing as he was suddenly brought face to giant toothy maw. Looking up, Richard stared slack-jawed at a deathclaw, with scales as black as tar and size dwarfing that of the skyscraper that he had been yanked from.

"Well, this fucking sucks!" Richard yelled as the monstrous deathclaw growled deeply, as if seemingly to regard him for a moment before it suddenly raised him above its head and with bone-chilling slowness, opened its massive mouth. "Oh cool, it get's worse!"

Then, as if to confirm that it does get worse, the deathclaw simply opened its hand and Richard was sent into a spinning, screaming free-fall straight down into the awaiting maw of this demonic-looking deathclaw-of-the-damned. Following a fall that lasted maybe ten or twenty seconds, Richard was finally met with complete darkness following the crocodile-like snap of the deathclaw's teeth.

Blinking, Richard was once again met with absolute darkness in all directions. Save for the sudden igniting of a fire from behind him, prompting him to quickly turn around just as the fire seemingly began to spread by itself, forming a large ring around himself. Taking a step back, Richard was also aware of another presence, and after spinning back around, Richard stood shocked before the glare of a pair of massive red eyes.

The eyes hovered ominously above Richard. Cold, unblinking, and if Richard didn't know any better, almost familiar.

"What?! What do you want, huh?! Who are you?!" Richard yelled, pointing at the eyes, which to Richard's rising anger and confusion and also besides the obvious, they remained silent. But just before Richard was about to fire off some other question or choice string of expletives. There came a soft buzzing that froze Richard as soon as he heard it. And as if he already knew ahead of time, his eyes slowly fell to his outstretched arm, to where the same mosquito-sized cazador that he had seen not long ago once again landed on his hand. But rather than crawl about, it too just sat there on his hand, staring at him while occasionally twitching its wings.

Then it raised it back and stung him.

With a yelp, Richard grabbed the bug and after giving the pain in his right arm the finger, hurled it into the ring of fire before tightly clutching his hand, which now sported a prominent hole the size of a thumbtack. If only that were the end of it.

It first began with a searing pain that ignited from the tips of his fingers to fully encompassing his entire left arm. Then the veins in his hand and across his arm took on a oil-black appearance, doubling in size as they throbbed at the pace of his ever quickening heartbeat. Then the real shit started.

Richard was at a loss for words as his fingers began to violently twitch, his hand shaking before it suddenly snapped to the side, forcing Richard to his knees as he vainly tried to hold down his suddenly possessed arm. The horror further continued when the black veins slowly began spreading throughout his entire body, sprouting about his legs, rooting about across his chest, and soon traveling up the sides of his neck before, in one sudden rush of molten pain, he puked out a large helping of oil-colored blood. Richard then fell completely to the floor, his body rocked by violent convulsions as all he could really do at that point was utter a brief yell or scream before he resumed coughing up copious amounts of blood that he vaguely wondered if it was actually his own or that of whatever creature was now tearing him apart from within. And it only got worse from there.

After one excruciatingly-long convulsion, Richard's body suddenly went limp for a few moments before, all at once, his body erupted in a pain unlike anything Richard had ever felt.

He screamed.

He screamed as if his body was set ablaze from within. As if he were being slowly torn in half, inch by blood-curdling-screaming-induced inch. As if- As if his body were being reshaped from the inside-out. And in that instant, it most certainly was.

Bones cracked, snapped and splintered, and then slowly reorganized themselves, either sliding up or down or having to push passed one another while simultaneously doubling or even tripling in size.

Organs, arteries, veins and blood vessels all simultaneously popping open before stretching and expanding, then resealed and replaced in altered arrangements or switch to completely different places.

Even the skin and muscles weren't spared as both were promptly torn open or ripped apart, stretched, pulled, twisted, expanded or contracted. Then they were reshaped, molded, smoothed or hardened in certain places while being completely remade from scratch in other places. Additional parts where then either added or discarded entirely.

And throughout all of this happening, Richard remained awake and oh so painfully aware. He remained awake when his arms and legs literally broke themselves, and in many places spearing shattered bone through skin. He also remained awake when his torso burst open due to a shattered but steadily growing rib cage. And he even somehow remained conscious when his heart burst open, his blood vessels popped and pooled, and when his muscles began to increased in size, ignorant to the tearing of his skin as it was pushed past its limits from below and in pieces or whole layers, were discarded onto the floor, much like how a reptile would shed its old skin, except in this case with the inclusion of copious amounts of blood and silent screaming due to already burst lungs.

This horrid process of bodily-reorganization went on for minutes, maybe hours. The seconds are rather difficult to count when the one thing on a bleeding mind is pain. Though it only became more unbearable, if that was even possible at this point, when after Richard's body had decided that all its little pieces were in their new places, the body now began to sew itself back together. And that meant even more agonizing pain as a new layer of skin was added on, and with that new thicker layer of skin, came the added features.

Large razor sharp claws burst forth from Richards bigger and less broken fingers and toes, though a few had been discarded in the process earlier before. Dark brown plates and scales materialized all throughout Richard's body, head, and newly formed tail that had been only recently introduced to the rest of himself. A pair of horns sprouted from Richard's now reformed head as each molar or canine in his mouth was simultaneously and individually ousted from its bleeding gums as a new set of larger, sharper, meat-atomizing teeth began to take root. And finally, the icing on the bloody cake, the spikes. Those were in a whole new ballpark of misery for Richard as he laid across the floor, now fully-orange eyes welling with tears as he gritted his now fully grown teeth at the red eyes that still had not once ceased in their staring at Richard throughout the entire process of his transformation. But as the spikes continued to break all throughout his skin, his only saving grace was when he felt that his voice box was finally coming back to him, for when it was finally finished as was the rest of his body after the last spikes joined their counterparts, Richard growled, now able to fully see himself in the reflection of the dark blood which pooled around his knees.

This was him, the new him, the deathclaw him.

Picking himself up, he raised his head to glare at the eyes, which as he did for the first time since he saw them, had actually showed the faintest flicker of emotion through its black slitted pupils, though whether that emotion was supposed to either be disgust or even pity, Richard didn't care, because all he really cared about was the pain, that those eyes were likely the cause of his pain, and whoever they belonged to would soon feel the same pain he had just suffered except times a hundred, maybe even a thousand.

"Whoever the fuck you are," Richard said coldly, though whether the eyes understood Richard's incoherent growls and hisses didn't matter at that point. "I hope you're ready. Cause when I find you, I am going to make you pay for this. You hear me?! I. Will. MAKE. YOU. FUCKING PAAAAYY!!!"

And with that proclamation made into a promise, Richard sealed it with a monstrous roar that, if coincidental or not, shook the foundations of reality to the brink of collapse as the empty blackness around Richard suddenly cracked before completely exploding into a bright blinding light that engulfed Richard in an instant.

He then promptly woke up on the cold castle floor with half his face practically submerged in a pool of his own drool while the sun's morning rays shined warmly onto him. Raising his head, he blinked away the last bits of sleep from his eyes before uttering a deep growling yawn.

"The fuck did I just dream about?"

There came a content sigh from Princess Luna, alicorn co-ruler of Equestria and equine-embodiment of the moon, as she trotted along the countless doors floating side by side eachother in a space completely separate from reality known simply as the realm of dreams. It was here in this colorful void that Princess Luna felt calm and happy. After all. In the past five or so months since she had been rid of the evil that was Nightmare Moon, thanks to the elements, she had made it her goal to prove to her subjects that she was to be feared no longer. And in this realm that only she had near-complete control over, she was able to prove that and then some.

Each night, after her sister lowered the sun and she raised the moon, Princess Luna would set forth for the dream realm. And while she did have other matters to attend to, like night court for example, she found the whole ordeal simply boring since nothing was ever brought up during night court. Most ponies where after all either asleep or tended to wait until day court so they could pile their issues onto her sister. But that was okay. Because where her sister saw to the issues of her subjects during the day, Princess Luna sought the safety of her subjects while they slept. And did she ever.

Night after night, the Princess of the Night would see to it that most of, if not all, of her subjects' dreams remained free from vile nightmares. That if their dream suddenly turned dark or twisted, she would see to it that all wickedness was purged and the pony was comforted before she moved on to the next. And after just a few weeks of doing this, Princess Luna soon began to receive wagon-loads of letters, filled with all manners of praise and appreciation from her subjects, especially from many foals and colts alike, for her diligence in providing every one of them with a good night's sleep. It was also because of this diligence that Luna was sometimes addressed as being the "Defender of Dreams," a name that Luna wore with blushing honor.

It was after remembering that little title that Luna currently found herself once again happily blushing as she continued to walk past door after door of happily sleeping ponies, until she suddenly stopped.

Blinking, Luna turned her head to a door she had definitely never seen before. And how was she sure of this? Well seeing as most of the doors that belonged to the subjects were made from wood, this door that she now stood in front off was made seemingly of polished metal, and upon running a hoof across, she had confirmed it so. it also appeared double or even triple the height of the doors that flanked its sides, further proving that this door was definitely new, that Luna was sure of.

"How strange." Luna said, rubbing a hoof up and down the tall metal door. "How would we open thee?"

Looking up and down, Luna could see no door handle or knob. There were also no levers or pulleys in sight, which definitely threw the ancient alicorn for a loop. That is until she looked to the side and saw what looked to be a white, shiny button next to the door. Looking up at it, Luna smiled as her horn glowed a deep blue and so too did the button as it was pressed. A few moments of silence later and Luna could not help but pout at the door's unwillingness to work with her. The royal pouting soon ceased when Luna's ears twitched at the sound of a low humming which steadily grew louder until a soft ding sounded and the tall metal doors suddenly opened from the sides, causing the alicorn to do a small jump before she slowly entered the room within.

Though in her opinion, Luna considered it more along the lines of a bright metal closet, and with a quick scan around the metal closet, confirmed it as such seeing as there was no pony in sight.

"Most strange indeed." Luna said, stepping into the closet before doing a little spin so that she faced the opening. Looking again to the side of the opening, Luna stumbled upon a panel full of the shiny buttons, each with a little number painted on its surface.

Looking at all the buttons, Luna wondered what each did before one button in particular caught her attention besides all the others, a button with the number "fifty-one" brightly flickered just at the very top of the panel, and since all the others didn't flicker as brightly, or at all really as this one did, Luna believed it to be special and magically pushed it.

After a moment, the doors slid closed, and to Luna's surprise, the metal closet suddenly shook before it began to ascend at a moderate pace which made Luna's hooves vibrate ever slightly.

"Ah, so this metal closet is actually a sky chariot of sorts, how interesting." Luna said, looking up to actually see a thin glass panel above the doors actually count up in bright red digits, making a little beep noise every time the digits increased. "And it even displays a magical counter, most interesting."

But just as the magical numbers were nearing her desired numbered button, there came a sudden muffled explosion and before Luna could even question the noise, the entire metal box violently shook, throwing the alicorn princess to the floor as the light overhead flickered once, then went out completely and plunged the room in utter darkness.

Blinking, Luna looked about in confusion, and despite pouring some magic into her horn, the dark blue glow it gave off did little to save her from the encompassing darkness. But that was soon rendered useless as with another shake, the light above flickered back to life, and with it, the closet continued its ascent, much to Luna's relief. That wouldn't last for long.

After a time, Luna began to cough as the room became hazy from smoke. And not a moment after that, the doors opened and Luna was met with a site that froze her almost completely. Just passed the metal doors, lay a room of fire and destruction.

Luna, in all her elegance and maturity, took on a look of absolute terror and shock, for never in the many months she journeyed into the dreams of her subjects had she ever seen such a more horrific sight than that which lay just a outside the metal closet.

"B-By the creator." Luna shakily whispered. Taking a hesitant hoof forward. Then before Luna could even reconsider retreating back into the confines of the metal closet, there came a slight tearing noise from above and on instinct, she dove onto the cracked floor, just barely clearing the frame of the metal doors as the entire metal box fell a few feet, before plummeting down to the darkness below in a screeching and sparking mess.

Looking down the chasm which had swallowed her beloved metal closet, Luna gulped before turning to face the horrors ahead. At a slow, creeping trot, Luna braved the burning unknown before her, and despite her features appearing stoic on the outside, her shaking hooves and inner innocent filly betrayed her true feelings. After all, as Luna continued further down the scorched, crumbling, and blood-stained halls of a building that appeared to be similar in architecture to the modern glass towers of Manehattan, Luna faintly wondered if she may have somehow stumbled into a portal to Tartarus. And what she soon saw next only seemed to confirm it.

It was after a bit of walking that Luna soon came across the first bodies. She had just rounded a corner after passing several open rooms filled with long tables and chairs before her hoof hit something, and looking down, she all but jumped out of her skin at the sight of a corpse, though of what, she did not know as its identifiable features were burned beyond belief. The smell of cooked and rotting flesh then hit her snout like a tidal wave and she gagged heavily, raising a hoof to cover her nose as she quickly backpedaled, to her increasing horror, into another corpse. Looking about with teary eyes she couldn't help but whimper foalishly as she had somehow become surrounded by dozens of burned and deformed bodies which lay at her shaking hooves.

"What is the meaning of all of this! Who could be responsible for all of this!?" Luna said, taking to the air with a beat of her wings before she rocketed down hallway after horror-filled hallway of death and destruction, searching for the source of this nightmare and ready to put a swift end to it. Or so she thought.

For as Luna made another sharp turn around one especially blood-streaked corner, she came to just as sharp and sudden a stop when a small number of tall, horrid creatures stood blocking her path. Falling to her hooves with a soft clop, Luna starred at the things as they turned to meet her gaze. They were as tall as a minotaur, but lacked horns or hooves. They also seemed to lack any muscles as most of them appeared sickly thin if the visible ribs were anything to go off of. And to add to the appearance of sickly, these creatures definitely fit the bill as the solid white eyes and glowing green sores dotted about their fur-less flesh confirmed to Luna's worry that these abominations had likely been brought to life by some manner of dark magic, with necromancy being a definite.

"If thee monsters believe thee can halt us from putting an end to all of this madness, then thee are severely mistaken." Luna said, slipping into older Equish as she took a defensive stance while powering up her horn. One of the creatures in front of her shrieked and began to rush at her before it stumbled back when Luna fired a bolt of pure magical energy into its chest. Luna smirked as the creature uttered a pained grunt before to her horror, the creature shrugged off the blast, that which Luna was absolutely sure should have vaporized it or disabled it at the very least, and just stared at her. "Or not."

Releasing another shriek, the creature charged at Luna, joined by other shrieks from its feral companions before they too added to the chase, and soon enough Luna was now beating a hasty retreat down hallways and over debris as the monsters kept pace despite their weak appearances. And despite firing off as many powerful blasts as she could over her shoulder, Luna could only run or fly ever faster as the creatures remained unaffected by her attacks.

Minutes of this persisted before Luna was finally able to lose the creatures, though now she found herself hiding in the corner of one of those large meeting rooms, praying to higher powers that her seemingly unstoppable pursuers did not find her.

"How can this be? Why doesn't my magic affect these creatures?" Luna quietly wondered, covering her muzzle when one of those things came shuffling near her hiding spot, growled, then shuffled away, leaving Luna to once again shutter in fear. It was truly pitiful, she had to admit to herself. To hide rather than fight. To cower in a corner and hope for a miracle.

'Yeah, like that was going to happen.' The alicorn thought bitterly.

And somehow it actually did, more or less.

From somewhere nearby, there came a shriek from one of the creatures and like moths drawn to a flame, the rest of the creatures ran passed Luna's spot, leaving her to quietly thank the powers above and to also wonder what had caught the attention of these abominations.

"Perhaps the pony whom this nightmare belongs to?"

Luna blinked when the realization hit her, when it reminded her what she still had a job to do. She still had a nightmare to vanquish and a poor pony to comfort, and that's exactly what she was going to do! After a few more minutes of waiting to catch her breath and replenish her magical reserves of course.

Once those minutes were up and Luna couldn't hear any of the creatures nearby, she chanced a peek and after seeing that the coast was clear, she slowly pressed on. Throughout her journey, she made sure to look around every corner she passed and stopped if she heard a noise, waiting a few moments before further continuing on. Peeking around another corner, she found herself staring down a super long hallway. Looking about, she saw no creatures, which was good...for them that is!

Gulping, Luna proceeded down the hallway, passing by a few more of those large meeting rooms before she stopped to peer into one room in particular. Though this one looked similar to the others, she couldn't help but wince at the sight of one of those creatures having met an unlucky demise under a steel fridge larger than the one in the castle's kitchen. Looking from the room to the hall, Luna then turned her head to the side and froze at the sight which lay just beyond the large broken windows.

It was a world, much like her own yet seemingly different somehow, plunged in flames. The landscape laid cracked and burning, with many towers much like the one she stood in reduced to some degree of ruin while the streets below were barren of any life save for a number of odd melted steel boxes that littered the broken asphalt.

"All this destruction and devastation seems...familiar." Luna said before her ears suddenly perked up at a number of strange sounds that came from further down the hall. And as she slowly moved closer, Luna could just faintly make out a few shrieks and growls from those creatures as well as something else, something...buzzing?

Moving ever closer, Luna concluded that the sounds were coming from around a corner on her left, but just as she neared it she suddenly jumped back as something large buzzed in front of her. It looked like a bug, but bigger and nastier than any insect she'd ever seen before. It also looked heavily wounded, and judging from having one of its four orange wings torn off, countless wounds and scratches adorning its body, and two of those bipedal creatures still hanging off of it and still biting away, Luna figured that the massive bug just didn't care about her as it attempted to take off with its extra biting baggage through the broken windows, staying airborne for maybe a few seconds, before plummeting to the fiery floor below. Looking from the window that the bug had left through to where it had come from, Luna's heart threatened to leap out from her chest as she was met with a sight of absolute carnage. With a short trip down a light-flickering hallway, Luna stood wide-eyed just below a sign marked "Cafeteria," before a scene that emphasized every letter of the word "bloody."

From where she stood, almost to the other end of the spacious room, there was barely a tile of floor that didn't have a body or bits of a body currently covering it. In fact there was so much blood and guts strewn about that Luna had to actually stop and wonder whether or not a pony could actually puke in their sleep.

The stench also didn't help as it practically locked up all of Luna's other senses, causing her wings to beat on their own in an attempt to fend off the stank while her face went into full-on scrunch mode. And seeing as she didn't want to chance the possibility of falling into any of that if her wings were to suddenly lock up, she decided to hop along the tops of the tables until after one last hop she managed to clear most of the gore and still twitching bodies, to thankfully land on white tiles. After one last shiver upon looking over dead creatures and massive bugs alike, Luna turned her attention to a door with a glowing green "EXIT" sign above it, or more so to the only abomination that still remained alive despite having both its arms absent.

Luckily, it didn't seem to pay Luna much mind as it continued to repeatedly bump into the door, caring not for the fact that the door was closed or that the leg in its mouth would hinder its ability to pass through.

Now seeing as this creature wasn't worth the magical energy, and that she needed to find whoever this nightmare belonged to ASAP, she decided to just whistle, which immediately catching the creature's attention as it began to move towards her, before she took to the air, flew around it, pushed open the door, and closed it behind her, much to the muffled disappointment of the creature on the other side. Once that was over with, Luna peered up at an ascending stairwell, where after taking a few breaths to steady her nerves, ascended the stairs in the hopes of finally putting an end to all of this.

And soon enough, Luna now found herself pushing open the door to "floor fifty-three" as was boldly labeled on the wall. Looking around, Luna noted that it appeared relatively quiet and calm on this floor, which was definitely a major improvement from what she had experienced two floors below. Keeping at a relatively brisk pace, Luna looked about the large open office floor, forcing herself to pay little attention to the bodies laying about while she peeked around corners or flew over those strange little walled-off desks until she came to a stop at the sound of a sharp beep which came from one end of the room where a large desk stood near a set of those same metal doors that had brought Luna to this horrid place. Quickly flying over to it, Luna was actually surprised when a stallion's voice came from a small black box located on top of the desk.

"Miss Winter, could you please send down Mister Satan to my office, cause I'd like to have a few choice words with him...oh, and if you can't, you know on account of being dead and all, I completely understand. Thank you."

Now, whoever these "Miss Winter" or "Mister Satan" were, Luna didn't know. What she did know however was that the pony whose nightmare this belonged to was definitely nearby, and if Luna had to hazard a guess...

"He's in his office."

Turning to the far end of the room, Luna saw that there were several smaller rooms along its side, and one of those rooms in particular had its lights on.

"There he is."

One quick glide later and Luna now stood facing a tall wooden door labeled "Department Manager" in black and gold lettering. And though the windows which flanked its sides were covered by blinds, she still noticed that the lights were on and, if here ears weren't fooling her, the sounds of laughter and drinking definitely tipped her off to the presence of somepony just beyond that door.

Now while she could have blown the door clean off its hinges, Luna decided on the more subtle approach of knocking so as to not to startle the poor pony behind it which, for if she didn't know any better, had most likely retreated to the confines of this room so as to escape the same horrors that she had encountered not long ago.

Taking a deep breath, Luna knocked thrice on the door and waited. But aside from hearing the pony on the other side cease their actions, and maybe shuffle around inside, she heard nothing else. She decided to knock once again, this time with just a bit more force to it, and yet the door still remained closed.

'Surely they must have heard me, right?' Luna mentally pondered, to which she was finally rewarded with a response.

"H-hello?" the pony on the other side of the door asked, with just the slightest hint of fear in their voice that made the alicorn princess wince before offering a quiet, hopefully-relaxing response of her own.

"Hello? We have arrived just as thee asked. Could thee please open the door?"

'Please just open the door."

Hoping that her tactics payed off, Luna waited with bated breathe as the stallion behind the door seemed to consider her words, and whatever the stallion had said after was left to the imagination as there suddenly came a loud crashing noise from within the room, followed by the sounds of somepony in distress.

Quickly throwing subtly aside, Luna charged her horn and blasted the door off its hinges and into the burning streets bellow as she took in the sight of a destroyed room and...

"A-A tartarian!?" Luna gasped, staring up at the giant horned beast. "But, but how-"

Blinking, Luna was suddenly brought out of her stunned stupor when she heard the distant yell of somepony, but when she saw where it was coming from, she found that it wasn't from some pony, but from some thing. And while it did look like those bipedal creatures from before, it was by no means the same as she could see and hear that the creature was in obvious distress. And that distress only seemed to double as the creature was lifted above the massive demon's opening maw and, without warning, dropped into it.

"NO!"

Taking to the air, Luna flew as fast as her wings could propel her in an attempt to save the creature from its screaming demise. Faster and faster she flew, and just when she thought she could actually reach out and catch the creature, there came a loud snapping noise and before she knew it, Luna was engulfed in darkness.

Several seconds ticked by as Luna stood silent in the darkness. Then blinking, she turned her head this way and that to no change in scenery.

"Hello?"

...

"HELLO?"

...

Hearing only silence, Luna made to call out again when she spotted something out of the corner of her eye. Turning, she instantly spotted the creature, who to her shock as well as its own, had been encompassed by a ring of fire which burned brightly around it. Huffing with relief nevertheless, Luna quickly dashed towards the creature, but just before she could reach it, she suddenly found herself bouncing to the floor after her muzzle collided with something. But as she rubbed it, she saw that nothing could have stopped her. That observation would sadly be proven wrong when, after getting up, she proceeded forward a bit before her muzzle once again collided with nothing. Blinking, Luna stood on her back hooves as she now pressed her front hooves onto some invisible barrier which rippled like water at the touch.

"What magic is this?" Luna said, tapping her hooves onto the invisible wall which separated her and the suited creature which now stared intently at something above itself, and as Luna paused in her taping, she too looked up and froze.

For just above the creature's head hovered a giant pair of red eyes with black slitted pupils, eyes which in all honesty, frightened Luna to no end as their emotionless gaze sent a shiver down her back.

"What is that?" Luna wondered, before her ears suddenly splayed back at the creature's sudden outburst.

"What?! What do you want, huh?! Who are you?!"

Looking from the creature to the eyes, Luna heard no response from them and when she looked back at the creature, it had switched its focus on something else. Stepping to the side, Luna soon saw that the creature was staring at what appeared to be a small bug , similar to the larger ones she saw not long ago, which rested on its strange paw.

The same strange paw which the bug then stung without warning.

Flinching, Luna heard the creature yelp before she watched as it grabbed the insect and, without warning, throw it at her, but just when she was about to dodge it, the bug suddenly vanished in the flames of the burning ring.

Shaking her head, she looked up at the creature, rather lividly-

"Why would you throw that at me you-!"

and went immediately silent when she saw the creature fall to its knees while clutching at its shaking arm. Blinking, she stared at the creature as a look of pain flickered over its face before she went pale at what happened next. In a matter of seconds, Luna watched as dark lines appeared all over the creature's left arm, which began to jerk about erratically, before spreading across the rest of its body like a parasite, traveling all the way up to the creature's neck before without warning the creature suddenly puked a large quantity of ink-dark blood.

"No."

The creature then fell to the floor as its body violently began to twist and convulse, all the while the creature painfully cried out and coughed up even more of the ebony liquid.

"NO. NO. NO!" Luna cried, now furiously bashing her hooves against the barrier. And when she still could not breach it, she soon began to fire shot after shot of magical energy into it, to which each shot was reduced to harmless sparks. Teary eyed and desperate, Luna charged her horn and, after a few seconds followed by a pained cry, released a mighty beam of magic which, while in theory could have pierced clean through the moon, did absolutely nothing to the invisible barrier besides leaving only a smoking and shimmering spot where the beam had made contact. staring through the undamaged barrier, Luna looked to the creature to find it now lying limp and silent on the ground.

Blinking, she was nonetheless shocked when the creature suddenly screamed in shear agony.

Backing up a few steps, Luna watched in stunned, quivering silence as the creature continued to let out that bone-chilling scream for several more seconds before it was reduced to quiet gasps and raspy whimpers, which were then drowned out by even more horrific sounds.

The tearing of muscle and skin, the breaking or snapping of bone, and the splashes and popping which all came from within the creature brought Luna to a state of absolute terror and shock. This kind of torment, this heartless and evil form of torture was something that Luna had never, in her entire lifetime, had ever thought possible, nonetheless thought that she would ever bare witness to that which even Nightmare Moon herself would surely shutter at.

"Please stop this! Stop this right now!" Luna pleaded, to whom she did not know, but to which silence was her only response as she watched the poor creature continue to be mercilessly ripped apart from the inside out, tears now streaming down her eyes and matting her fur as she also soon realized that throughout this whole ordeal, she could still see the creature's eyes open and aware. Oh, by the creator, how they seemed to beg for it all to just stop, despite its voice only coming out as gurgles and shaky inhales. "Please."

Without an end to the creature's misery in sight, Luna simply fell to the ground, covered her eyes, and wept. She cried for herself, for her uselessness and for her failure to save the soul of another. She also cried for the creature, for the torture it was going through to just stop and for its suffering to end.

Yet it did not end for the creature, for as each minute that passed which Luna spent crying, another minute went by where the creature's body continued to undergo the horrific changes to itself. It was also the noises which kept Luna from raising her head, for with each pop, crack, or hiss, she only remained buried in her hooves, repeatedly wishing for the sounds to just stop, as that was all she could really do at that point.

And after a while, they did stop. For several moments, Luna strained her ears for the noises, but all she could now hear was a low growl.

Slowly looking up, Luna was shocked to see that where there had once laid a suffering creature of flesh and bone, now stood a towering abomination of brown scales and razor sharp claws.

It had become a demon.

She further stood in silent horror as the now fully-transformed demon now regarded itself before once again looking up at the massive red eyes. It then began to utter a series of low growls and sharp hisses that Luna couldn't actually understand, but was nonetheless sure that they carried some deep meaning as the creature directed them to its red-eyed spectator.

Then, just after the creature seemed to get more heated at the end of its incoherent speech, the demon then fiercely roared, causing Luna to cover her ears while she watched the void around her and the demon begin to crack and waver, before suddenly shattering altogether and engulfing it, Luna, and the rest of the void in blinding white light.

Luna awoke in the early hours of morning, gasping loudly while she clutched her blanket tightly, despite her shaking hooves. She quickly looked about, and after confirming that she was indeed in her room, she breathed a deep, shaky sigh.

"By the creator."

Author's Note

Well... that was a hell and a half of a lot of writing for me. Just damn.

Now, before some of you folks even start, let me just say a few things first.

Firstly, I would like to give a little shout-out to a mate by the name of Mocha Star who, in my opinion, I owe nearly this entire chapter to in terms of the wicked idea he requested of pitting cazadors against feral ghoul reavers (pretty much the whole nightmare actually). I hoped you enjoyed this chapter, Mocha mate.

Next, I would like to apologize to those of you who were hoping for six certain ponies to be thoroughly scarred this chapter, and while there was none of that, I hope what I delivered instead was sufficient enough to act as an alternative.

Let me be clear. The main six WILL most certainly be in for one hell of a shocker come the next chapter. I Pinkie-promise on that.

Now there are a few reasons for this. The first being that I felt like rather than adding that little bit in at the end of this whole thing, I decided on just leaving it for its own climactic chapter where the ponies hunt for and soon encounter our scaly friend.

The second reason was that due to having several ideas on how I want the next chapter to go, I wanted to spend a bit more time in hashing everything out.

And the third reason was that while I was planning on holding off the good shit till the next chapter, I had also come to a startling realization...I got too much shit in my head!

Yes, I had found that while I was cooking up ideas for this story, I had been completely ignoring all the other ideas for stories I had left sitting on the back-burner.

So, after much consideration (i.e. sleeping and daydreaming), I decided on a solution to remedy this issue. I decided that while I would take a "little" break from writing this story, I would then focus on getting out a few more stories (mainly a few one-shots) onto the site.

So with that being said, fret not my deathclaw-loving deviants! For I will return to this story, just got to unload some things is all. This deathclaw-powered fever dream ain't done just yet. So until next time folks, stay casual.