>Twilight Sparkle looked up.
>"Anon’s Private Investigations & Used Electronics" was painted haphazardly on the side of the building.
>The only thing making this warehouse stand out from all the others was the light illuminating a rusted door, directly under the sign.
>Twilight glanced around, taking note of how empty the streets were now that her cab had left.
>She started as a nearby street lamp flickered on, lighting up a small section of road in artificial orange light.
>Looking up she realized just how dark it had gotten, the simulated sky a deep blue with numerous stars beginning to shine.
"Wish they were open earlier," Twilight muttered. "Is this place run by bat ponies?"
>She gave another look at the run down buildings surrounding her.
"It would be nice if they weren’t in the middle of the industrial district, too…"
>When she returned her gaze to the door, she saw a previously dim sign now brightly proclaimed OPEN in neon red.
>Twilight approached the door, but felt a wave of apprehension as she went to open it.
>Her hoof stalled, half raised, she wondered if she really wanted to speak to the pony inside.
>Her wings twitched as the door opened by itself, swinging inwards to reveal a small lobby.
>The theme seemed to be "yellowed by age". The tiled ceiling, the carpet, the wallpaper, all had clearly once been white, probably before Twilight was born.
>On one wall was a sad looking gray sofa, and across from it were two doors.
>A counter divided the room, and behind it sat a green human.
>He was staring directly at her.
>Twilight opened her mouth, unsure of what to say.
>The man cut her off.
>"Oh shit, a customer! Been a couple weeks since we had one! Come on in, welcome to Anon’s Private Inves–"
"I-I read the sign," Twilight awkwardly injected, stepping into the lobby.
>"Oh. Of course you did, I made sure it was big enough to notice."
>His hand reached behind the counter and the door swung closed behind her.
>The man clapped his hands, startling Twilight.
>"So, are you here for our sale on CRTs? We have some really nice Trinitrons in stock, fully refurbished with low hours on the tubes. We also have a wide selection of consoles and games, so if you’re new in town we can hook you up with a complete retro gaming system. If you’re looking for old computers–"
"Sorry, those sound really interesting, but I’m here for, um, a private investigation?" Twilight tried to smile, but couldn’t quite curl her mouth all the way. Something about the man was making her uncomfortable.
>Said man stopped talking and stared at her with his mouth open for a few seconds.
>"You’re… actually here for an investigation? It’s been months since…"
>He stepped around the counter, causing Twilight to take a step back. Instead of walking towards her he stopped in front of one of the doors.
>"Hope she’s in a good mood…" The man muttered to himself.

>He knocked on the door, and looked back at Twilight.
>"Boss, there’s a Twilight Sparkle here looking to talk to you. I think she has a case…"
>>"Come in," a muffled voice replied. It sounded female.
>As the man entered and shut the door behind him, Twilight realized she hadn’t told him her name.
>She looked back at the exit, considering leaving. Something felt very wrong.
>She whipped her head around as she heard the door opening, the man stepping out and holding it open for her.
>"Boss’ll see you now."
>Swallowing, Twilight slowly walked into a small office. The door shut behind her.
>A high wooden desk was the main feature of the room, chipped yet intricately detailed.
>Atop it sat several boxy beige monitors, which were covered in colorful scraps of paper. Trays holding tall piles of larger sheets sat on the tops of the monitors.
>A bookshelf was against the wall next to the door, every shelf packed with books. On the very top was a silver radio, playing quietly.
>>>"I'm gettin' stoned... and what's wrong with that? The president seems to be just fine…"
>Twilight heard the squeak of a chair, and the sound of somepony walking on carpet.
>To her surprise, the pony who appeared around the side of the desk wasn’t a mare.
>She was a filly, maybe twelve or thirteen years old.
>Her coat was the color of grass and her mane was coal black.
>She was wearing a brown detective’s cap, and had a pink hair clip in the shape of a four leaf clover, a logo Twilight had been seeing quite often lately. It was the first time she had seen it colored pink instead of green or purple, though.
>The filly’s cutie mark was another familiar symbol, a simple black question mark.
>All in all, she was adorable, despite her glare.
>Her voice was high from youth, yet she spoke like she was one of the many guardsmares Twilight had known while staying at Canterlot Castle. 
>>"You have thirty seconds to convince me to not throw you out of my warehouse."
>Twilight, stressed out from the strange location and the scary man, blurted out the reason she had come to the City for help in the first place.
"I saw the Anonicorn when I was a-ascending!"
>The filly’s eyes widened.

>Then they narrowed.
>>”Get the fuck out, faggot.”
>Twilight was shocked.
“E-excuse me?”
>>”You heard me. Anon! Door!”
>The door opened, and the filly pointed at it.
>>”Don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya!”
“But I–“
>>”Nope, don’t care. Fuck off and die.”
>Twilight, oddly enough, felt relived that this filly wanted nothing to do with her.
>She began to move to the door.
>As she stood halfway through it, she turned around.
>Her anxiety had melted into anger.
>She spun around, intent on giving the foul-mouthed child a piece of her mind.
“No, actually, I won’t “buck off and die”. I came all this way, talked to your creepy human, and I’m not leaving without telling you why I came here!”
>”Ouch, my feelings.”
>>”Shut up, you’re creepy as hell. And Twilight, I don’t care if you’re just an acolyte or if you’re the second hand mare of the archbishop herself. Get out of my office, you stupid fucking nigger, or I will have Anon drag you out by the horn.”
>’Oh, right.’
“I’m not a member of the Church of the One True Autist, but I did speak with the archbishop earlier. She was the one who sent me here. Actually, she gave me a note to show you!”
>’I probably should have led with that,’ Twilight chides herself. ‘This place really did spook me out, didn’t it?’
>With more exertion than she would have had to use in Equestria, Twilight summoned the note out of hammerspace.
>She resisted the urge to shiver at the unnatural sensation of the City’s artificial magic field.
>It doesn’t feel evil, like Sombra’s dark magic, or like the scratching feeling of Discord’s Chaos magic, just… off.
>Like it’s nervous, and doesn’t want to be used, so she had to force it.
>From the look on the filly’s face, she seems to recognize what you’re feeling.
>>”It’s like that for every horned newfag we get. You’ll get used to it, if you stick around long enough. I recommend you don’t, we have enough people crammed in here as it is.”
>She snatches the paper out of your levitation and reads it over.
>Her face is carefully blank, but you see a quick frown before she catches herself.
>>”Right. Fuck off into the lobby for a bit, I need to make a phone call.”
>With that she turns back to her desk, and you hear her hop back up on her chair.
>Satisfied, Twilight left the office and almost ran into the human.
>He shut the door as she sat on the couch, watching her with an odd look on his face.
>”Haven't seen her like that in a long time. Surprised, I mean. Talk about a fucking bombshell. Did you really see the OTA?”
>She rubbed her leg and looked down at the floor.
“I did, although I didn’t know it was her at the time. I thought I was just hallucinating, seeing Anon – a little filly I’ve been fostering – during a mana-exhaustion induced coma.”
>She looked back up at him.
“She… she was crying, begging me for help, but when I tried to touch her she faded away into smoke. Then Princess Celestia appeared, and, well, stuff happened.”

>Twilight shuffled her wings.
“I got these, there was a ceremony, I was crowned princess. The whole time, I couldn’t stop thinking about that filly. I checked on Anon, of course, and she was just fine. She’d been playing with her friends, like a normal foal. But then…”
>Anon seems to know where she’s going with it.
>”You became an alicorn, so she asked you to meet with her all by yourself. And when you did, she introduced you to the Anonymous Consortium.”
“I thought I was hallucinating again when she pulled out her portal device and opened a worldgate right in front of me. She led me down Main Street, and the whole time I was thinking I was going to wake up any moment. Instead, she took me to the town hall, and I was given an orientation on what this place is and how it works. It’s been a week and it still feels like a dream…”
>”Culture shock always goes away pretty fast. You tell the other princesses about us yet?”
“I couldn’t even start writing the letter. I’m planning to bring them all here next time they have a day off, the Sunday after next. In the meantime, I came back here after I told Anon about what I saw. She insisted I talk to the Church, apparently she’s a devout believer. The priest I spoke too got me an audience with the archbishop, who told me I should come here and talk to the Anon in charge. Apparently they have a history, and she assumed your boss would be able to help me.”
>Anon frowned.
>”History is one way of putting it. Anon is… pretty outspoken about how the Anonicorn is made up and the Church is all bullshit. I think she was an acolyte as a newfag, but something soured her experience so much she left. She still used to hang out with the archbishop, though. That’s how I met her; I used to be an accountant for the Church. When I was fired, well, let’s just say I wasn’t in a position to refuse her “offer” of employment.”
>Twilight wondered why he put an odd emphasis on offer.
>And why the leader of the Church of the One True Autist would send her to a nonbeliever.
>She’s interrupted from her musings by a muffled shout.
>>”Anon! Door!”
>The human quickly opened the door, and Twilight realized that the filly was too small to reach the door handle.
>The filly, who looked almost identical to her foster daughter, looked less annoyed then she had when Twilight first entered her office.
>>”Start the car, and lock up.”
>”Got it.”
>The human named Anon left through the second interior door, as the filly named Anon looked at Twilight.
>On second glance, she clearly looked different from her foster daughter.
>Her coat, mane, and eyes were different colors, her mane was shorter and styled differently, she was a bit shorter, and her cutie mark was slightly different.
>Still, she was the first pony Twilight had interacted with in the City. Twilight had seen a few green fillies during her trip to Main Street, but apparently most of them lived in a district called Pony Town.
##