>"Anon?" "Hmm?" >You look up at the butter-yellow pegasus in your arms, her beautiful teal eyes meeting yours. You were relaxing on her couch in her cottage, so comfy with her weight and warmth on your chest that you were on the verge of falling asleep. "What's up?" >She looked a little nervous, which admittedly wasn't too unusual. She'd been getting a little better lately though, after the two of you had gotten together. >"Well I was, um, wondering. About your name. Not that there's anything wrong with it, but, it's just..." >She was getting redder and redder, shrinking back behind her hair with embarrasmant. >Well that won't do at all >You run a hand over and around her ear, clearing the hair from her face as you give her some light scritches >Aww yeah, ponies love ear scritches >She gives a tiny moan and begins to relax again, her eyes starting to lid "So, what about my name?" >Her eyes widen again, "Oh, right. Well, I was wondering, is Anonymous really your real name?" >Oh. >Your surprise must have shown, because she immediately follows with >"I-if you don't mind me asking, that is! It's just that, all the humans I've heard of have only had the same handful of names. Is it in your culture to not have them?" >You sigh, and think back on the "Great Human Migration" as the ponies call it "Well, it wasn't always like that." >"Oh?" "Yeah, every human that came here from Earth once had a name, even me." >"W-what was it? If you don't mind telling me, that is..." >You smile a slightly sad smile "I don't know." >She looked worried now >"You... didn't forget it, did you?" "Not in the traditional sense, no." >This only made her confused "Let me explain. We, the humans who were given the chance to come here, couldn't do it for free. We had to give something up first." >"Your name?" "More than that; our identity. You've noticed that all the humans here have a green face with a question mark on it?" >"Yeah...?" "That was a part of it. We had to lose our names, faces and some of our memories if we were to come here. That was our choice, given to us by some...thing, whatever it was. I don't remember my name, or what I used to look like, or the names of my old family, or friends, or co-workers." >She looked more and more sad, as you kept going. "We adopted the pseudonyms that are our current names because there's was nothing else we could really call ourselves. That's why you have so many Incognitos, and Untitleds, and Anonymouses." >"That... that sounds terrible." "It kind of is in a way, but it's the price all of us were willing to pay for a chance of a better life here." >You brush away the tears beginning to form in here eyes, and give her a hug and a loving smile "That's why we so badly want love here, even moreso than we did on Earth. Just being another "Anonymous", another blank face in the crowd, it awful. But..." >You pause as you feel your face heat up "If I could be "Fluttershy's Anonymous", well..." >You hear an almost inaudible gasp as her face turns just as red, and you hug her even tighter "I think I'd be alright with that." And then they cuddled forever.