I Ain't Afraid of No Ghosts
Halloween wasn't exactly a new concept for Twilight, but actually having friends to spend the holiday with was. Usually she'd stay in with her brother and Cadence, carving pumpkins and watching scary movies.
This year she was doing the same, just with different people. Right now she was at Applejack's house, hanging out with the girls.
"Did you really carve a dick into your pumpkin?" Sunset asked Rainbow Dash, face palming.
"What? It's not like were gonna put these on the porch." Dash shrugged, putting a candle in her pumpkin.
Twilight giggled. That was Rainbow. Inappropriate at all times.
"I drew a bunny!" Fluttershy announced, turning her pumpkin to the rest of the table.
Applejack turned hers around too. "Eh, Ah just made a few apples."
"It's too bad we can't go trick or treating. I would kill for some candy!" Pinkie said, stabbing at her pumpkin.
"We could just go to the store and get some. There's no need to go begging," Rarity responded, rolling her eyes at Dash's pumpkin.
"It's raining cats and dogs outside! I'm not going anywhere!" Dash said, sitting at the kitchen table.
Fluttershy started crying. "Those poor animals!"
Rainbow smacked her forehead. "It's an expression!"
"Something sweet would be nice though," Twilight said, pushing her glasses up on her face.
"I've got an idea just as sweet!" Pinkie said. "Let's tell scary stories! It is Halloween night after all. Anything can happen!"
"You say that like it's a good thing," Sunset said, sitting down next to Dash. "But I guess that'd be pretty fun."
"A-Are you sure?" Fluttershy stuttered.
"C'mon, Shy!" Pinkie told her, putting an arm around the meek girl. "We won't tell any stories too scary. Right, everybody?"
The other girls nodded in silent agreement.
"Who wants to go first?"
"Me!" Rainbow shouted. "Once upon a time..."
"There was a magical princess who lived in the forest in a really tall tower with really long hair that had a pet lizard and beat people up with a frying pan?" Pinkie guessed.
"That's the plot of Rapunzel," Twilight told her, eyebrows furrowed.
"Oooh! No wonder I thought I'd heard that before!" Pinkie giggled.
"Anyway," Rainbow continued. "A long time ago there used to be a family that lived in the woods. One day, the father asked his two children to go collect fire wood for the evening fire," She said, her voice becoming a shallow whisper.
"He would normally do it himself, but he had broken his leg fixing the roof. So just this once he asked the kids to do it. He told them that they had to stick together the entire time, or else they'd get lost. There were all sorts of things in the woods that loved to eat little children up."
"L-Like what?" Fluttershy asked, already starting to shake.
"They used to say the woods were haunted. Inhabited by lost souls who got lost in there and couldn't find their way out. And if you were all alone, one of them would reach out and snatch you, dooming you to a lifetime of roaming," Dash explained solemnly.
When no one said anything, she continued. "At first, the children were fine. They listened to their father. Stayed close to each other and never let each other fall behind. That is, until the sister saw something shining in the distance."
Strangely, and frighteningly, the room suddenly felt cold to all of them.
"She asked her brother if he was seeing what she was seeing. He said he wasn't, but she insisted something was out there. She said it looked like a woman dressed in white."
Applejack swallowed hard.
"Ignoring their father's prior warning, she walked away from her brother, following the path to the shining light. And when she reached it, she reached out to touch it. And then...."
"And then w-what?" Pinkie asked, teeth chattering.
"Bam!" Dash said, smacking her hands together. Before she could continue with her story though, the lights had went out around the same time she had clapped her hands, making the girls around her shriek in fear.
"How'd you do that?!" Sunset demanded.
"I-I didn't do anything!" Dash stammered, starting to become freaked out too.
"Is she here?! Is the lady in white here to take us to the after life?!" Fluttershy shouted, shaking so much that in the dark she looked like she was vibrating.
"Relax ya'll, the power just went out." Applejack informed everyone, switching the light switch on the wall to show them how ridiculous they were being. "That story is getting to ya'll."
There was a collective sigh of relief and then another round of screams as thunder rolled outside.
"Fuck you, thunder!" Pinkie shouted, shaking her fist at the window.
"A-Applejack, dearie, not to be a bother but how do you suggest we deal with the situation?" Rarity asked, clutching on to her.
Applejack rubbed her chin. "Hmmm. There's a generator in the barn and a few flashlights around the house. Maybe we can all take one and head to the barn."
"T-The barn? I-In this weather?!" Rarity asked, flabbergasted.
"You got any better ideas? Unless you wanna stay in a dark old house with no heat. Be my guest." The farm girl told her shrugging.
"N-N-No! The barn, the barn is good!" Rarity hastily told her. She clapped her hands to get everyone's attentions. "Girls, we're heading to the barn! Chop chop!" She ordered, already bending down to pick up her things.
"Jeez you'd think Rarity was more afraid of the dark than Fluttershy," Sunset said, making Dash and Twilight giggle.
Once everyone was ready and had a flashlight in their hand, the girls set out for their warmer place of rest.
The rain had just about stopped. Nothing but a thick, heavy mist remained, making it very hard for anyone to see.
Of course, this didn't help the paranoia from Dash's story earlier that had settled in, causing even the bravest girl out of the group to jump ten feet in the air when an owl hooted or a twig snapped.
"Why'd you have to go and tell that story, Dashie?!" Pinkie demanded.
"Me? You're the one who wanted to have a scary story time!" Rainbow shouted back.
"Well you guys should know by now not to listen to my ideas!" The party planner blurted. Somewhere another twig snapped and Pinkie shouted at the top of her lungs.
Twilight put a hand over her mouth. "Sweet pony tits are you trying to wake up the entire neighborhood?!"
"Pony tits?" Pinkie asked, tilting her head.
"Uh..." Twilight looked at Sunset who crossed her arms over her chest and kept walking. "Well that came out wrong."
A few minutes after that they finally reached the barn, illuminated by the outside flood light that turned on when they approached.
Fluttershy sighed. "Finally. I can rest in peace."
"Ah wouldn't say that just yet," Applejack said, banging on the door in frustration. "Gosh darn it! Ah left the keys in the house. There's a spare pair in the shed by the opening of the orchards. If someone goes and gets it, then we can be in our cozy sleeping bags in warm heat in no time."
There seemed to be an unspoken one, two, three between the group because the next thing Twilight knew everyone except her was screaming, "Not it!"
She stomped her foot. "Oh c'mon! How is that fair?!"
"Life ain't fair, toots!" Pinkie responded, sticking her tongue out.
Twilight stared into the foggy distance horrified. She wasn't about to go on this mission alone. If she was going down, someone else was going down with her. "Sunset, come with me please?!" she begged, giving the older girl her best impression of Spike's puppy dog eyes.
Sunset couldn't say no to that look. She didn't think anyone could. She sighed. "Yeah, fine. Let's go." she said, waving her flashlight in the direction of the shed.
"We'll be waitin' right here for ya!" Applejack called after them, her voice echoing eerily in the quite night.
When they were so far away from the group that the only lights they could see were their own, Twilight decided to strike up a conversation. "So...is this your first Halloween with friends too?"
Sunset shook her head. "Not really. Back in Equestria we have something similar called Nightmare Night. It's pretty fun. We go bobbing for apples, play games, and eat candy. It's pretty much the same."
Twilight shivered from the cold. "Interesting. What did you dress up as when you were little?"
"All sorts of things. Starswirl the Bearded, Celestia herself, heck I even dressed up as a royal guard once. Princess Celestia thought it was so cute that she had me be her personal guard all night. You should have seen the look on everyone's faces when they realized they had to get through a filly to get to her." she chuckled.
Twilight laughed too, Sunset's story taking off a bit of edge. Though it came right back when she saw something move out of the corner of her eye. It was very faint, thanks to the dense fog, but she still could have sworn she saw something. "Hey...did you see that?" she asked, pointing a few feet in front of them.
"See what?" Sunset asked, flashing her light in the direction where Twilight was pointing. She saw nothing but fog and grass. "Are you okay?" She asked. "Did Rainbow's story scare you that much?"
Twilight shook her head. "No. I'm a scientist. I've seen scarier things than that," she responded, pushing her glasses up on her face. "But I did just see something move. I can't just be hallucinating that."
Again Sunset shone her light in the direction Twilight had pointed.
Nothing.
That is, until she saw a flash of white.
Immediately she froze. "Y-You see that too, right?" she asked, clutching on to Twilight's arm.
Twilight nodded robotically. "R-Run!"
The girls ran screaming all the way back to the barn where their friends were leaned up against the doors.
"Didja get it?" Applejack asked.
Sunset gasped as she tried to catch her breath. "Forget the key! Something is out there!"
The other girls shared a look.
"What do you mean something's out there?" Dash asked.
"We saw white! It's her! It's the lady in white!" Twilight said, waving her arms wildly.
"Oh c'mon, that was just a dumb story I made up on the spot. You're gonna tell me the lady in white actually exists?" Rainbow gave them both a skeptical look.
Just then, in the distance a faint sound of hacking and moaning could be heard.
"Okay, I know that's not any of us," Rarity said, her eyes saucers.
"It's the lady!" Fluttershy shrieked.
"Hold on now, Ah'm sure there's a logical explication for all this!" Applejack said, trying to calm everyone down.
"Applejack...." a voice in the distant called. "Applejack...."
Applejack's legs started to shake. "On second thought let's high tail it out of here!" She took off running, the girls following behind her in haste.
In the distance, Granny Smith wheezed as she slowed to a stop. Her white nightgown was drenched in rain. "Gosh darn it! Ah was tryna tell them Ah got the lights back on!"
Author's Note
And they're back! Yes ladies and gentlemen I have written something for you all to wish you all a Happy Halloween. This would normally be the part where I say something will be updated, but meeeh. We'll see.
