"I don't remember ghosts in the movie," I said simply, looking at the confusing scene before me. As I stood there, trying to puzzle out what was happening here, the ghosts suddenly turned their attention towards me, their empty eyes glaring at me and seeming to not be happy at my precense.
"Maybe we disturbed a ghost reunion?" Misty said.
"Why would ghosts have reunions?" I asked.
"Why wouldn't that?" Misty answered in return, with a question. "Does being a ghost prevent you from being able to have a social life?"
That's a fair point, actually. Was there anything in particular about ghosthood which prevented you from socializing or doing other things? I imagine that when you're not off scaring people out of old houses that you'd probably not have a lot to fill your time with, so you probably get up to other things.
The ghosts continued looking at us, still annoyed. So we had intruded on a social event! Oops!
"We'll just be going," I said, and turned back- before suddenly walking into a wall that wasn't there. "OW! That wasn't there a moment ago!"
Misty tapped it with her hoof. "Invisible walls?" she said. "I thought that was only something in video games trying to stop you going to a place in the game too early!"
"You could say that," said a voice, that soundly oddly nasally and yet familiar at the same time. We turned around to see a very fat man in striped clothing standing there, his greasy fingers pointing at us. "Movie characters reappearing where they don't belong, but Make your Mark characters now! Honestly, I thought I'd dealt with that possibility when I attacked the castle! It wasn't enough for her to be causing me trouble, now Opaline is getting in my way!"
I had kinda figured that Opaline was around given that Misty was wandering across Equestria and had the locket from Tell your Tale around her neck. But what did he mean about attacking the castle? "Who are you, and what do you want?"
"I want nothing but this world to be gone!" he bellowed. "Friendship is Magic deserves its five more seasons, and you existing is preventing that from being the case!"
Oh dear. I recognized the rhetoric. How had he gotten here. "Look, I know trying to get Season 9 remade didn't work, but what do you hope to achieve by trying to get Hasbro to cancel G5?"
"You have me confused for somebody else," he said. "I shall destroy this world and ensure the perfect utopia of old Equestria never dies! And I shall keep fighting onwards and removing the roadblocks no matter how many times she keeps bringing them back!"
If he was implying what I think he's implying, he was trying to get the G5 world to fall apart by removing key characters from the narrative and causing the world to destroy itself! That's silly, even for a G5 hater.
But something, or somepony perhaps, kept bringing the ponies back? Was that how I got here? I mean, this whole scenario had begun when I had been told to take his place. His place being Sprout, I assume, but that would explain Misty too. Maybe this guy killed Misty and another person from my world was selected to replace her?
This was beginning to feel like a very confusing anime.
But before anything else could be said, the figure laughed. "But know now that you are finished! The world cannot stand as it is! Even know the tribes prepare to obliterate one another in a firestorm of devastation and death- one that you partly made possible, Sprout. Know that in trying to save your pathetic world you damned it forever. But I shan't give you that pleasure." He turned away and stormed towards a nearby exit. "Now, my army of ghosts! Avenge the fallen world! Preserve the honour of Generation 4!"
What a nutter. Just because I enjoy G5 doesn't mean I hate G4! True, there were things G4 could have done better, but that's not a way of saying I dislike it as a setting, because I don't. I wouldn't be a brony without it, after all!
Suddenly, the ghosts seemed to come to life, and charged at us. "Split up!" I shouted. Misty and I suddenly ran in different directions and began to circle around the arena. "Hopefully they'll get dizzy and lose track of us!"
Misty nodded, and dashed off in another direction. I glanced over my shoulder to see a ghost looking behind him. Damn! I'd forgotten constraints of biology don't apply to ghosts! How else would the headless horseman be able to move about despite the head being very important for bodily functions?
I dashed round the side and spotted something interesting. The ghosts seemed to be circling in the center, and a series of energy blasts thundered from there. "Jump over them until they stop!" I called.
Misty and I engaged in frantic jumping until the mess was well and truly over, and then we started on the circling move once again. This was getting tiring, but it seemed to be working. Two ghosts flew at her, but Misty pulled off quite the backflip to dodge them, before running into a spinning leap to make two others collide with one another. Hey, she's certainly very agile out here, which makes sense.
We closed in on the side of the arena, the ghosts still going despite having run round and round in circles for several minutes with no signs of the battle coming to an end. Usually these sorts of boss encounters keep going until either you or the enemy run out of health, but I couldn't see any health bars anywhere.
Wait a moment. That video game analogy gave me an idea. We already had an invisible wall, and what seemed like some sort of cage boss fight in an arena with enemies who swarmed you. I wonder if this striped guy had played a lot of fighting games?
I suddenly spotted a torch at the side of the field which had fallen over and was poking into something, as there was intense energy sparking. I suddenly had an idea, and glanced over to Misty. "See the torch?" I asked.
"Yes!" she said, puffing and panting from all the galloping around. She did look really tired out.
"It's cutting through the invisible wall!" I said. "What if we use them to cut our way out and escape?"
"It's worth a try!" she called, and dashed over to grip another. She pulled it free using her mouth and hooves, and I grabbed the existing one and dashed over to the same section of wall. We slammed them into the wall and began cutting. It was extremely slow progress, but we soon had a hole the size of a pony cut into the invisible wall. I indicated for Misty to jump through first, and I then followed her out of the hole and moved onwards into the arena.
The ghosts seemed annoyed at what had happened, and attempted to give chase, but were halted when they crashed into the invisible wall. It seemed they couldn't detect the hole and use it, so it was a relief that we could engage in boundary clipping and they could not.
Whomever said all programming mistakes were bad, eh?
As we made our way further down the mountain (following a sign that told us Bridlewood led that way), I reflected on our experience together. Truth be told, I'd only known this world from the screen and sound system I had at home. The characters existed in another place, another time, another world. Even though I'd been here for so long now, I still felt like I didn't know it all too well. Hitch had left so suddenly, and I hadn't met another character from the film or TV show.
I'd only known Misty for a short while, and yet we had worked together to save each other's lives from chaos and those ghosts. A debt I knew I could never truly repay. I smiled as I looked at her. "You did great out there."
"Thanks!" Misty said, blushing as she did so. She's so adorable when she does that.
Wait a second. We hadn't known each other for that long, and yet I felt something between us. Was I really falling for a fictional character?
Well, I suppose she's technically not fictional here, but that's something of an academic point I guess. I had to keep moving and figure out my emotions later on, as the state of the world didn't really give me time to be frolicking about with mares. Besides, our destination was in sight. It was surreal seeing everypony else. Pipp and Hitch, Sunny and Izzy. They were equally surprised to see me!
But Zipp was conspicuous by her absence. Where was she?
That could wait. Our destination lay ahead. Hopefully here I could catch my bearings and finally find out what in the world was going on these days in Equestria.