Something seemed off about Anon's gait as he approached me that morning- his hesitant stride broke my heart before he got close enough to utter a single word.
"Lyra." He gasped for air, unable to hide the weight on his chest.
"Anon." I hung my head as though I already knew what he was going to say.
"I have to go back." He cried and shuddered. "I just can't explain it."
"I know." I replied with a sigh. "I, too, feel like this place- Equestria, just isn't as comfortable as it used to be." The part of me that should have wanted to cry was absent in that moment.
"We've both changed." Anon said with a sigh. "And so has Equestria."
"It's not just you and I that feel this way." I assured him. "We've had so many good times together. Of everypony who came through the portal to Equestria, wearing that very same mask of anonymity, you have been most special to me. I just feel like you get me like nopony else does. We both blend into the background by our very nature and yet we are driven by an overwhelming desire to matter to everypony around us. Our time together wasn't just the result of some novel perversion. It would devastate me to never speak to you again and yet unlike that other time you left and I went chasing after you I can feel it in my heart that this time it would be the wrong thing to do- to ask you to stay. I know Equestria can be a big old bucket of crabs sometimes."
"A bucket of crabs? I can't say that I've heard that one before." Anon seemed confused.
"Well there's an old folk-pony tale that you can put a bunch of crabs in a bucket of water and you don't need to put a lid on it. Because if one of them tries to climb out the others will grab it and pull it back down to the bottom." I explained with a sigh. "To the denizens of Equestria- this is just the best place they all know and perhaps will ever know. It's not that they don't want you to find something bigger and better. They just aren't aware that you can and so in their minds they are protecting you."
"To tell you the truth I don't even know what comes after this. I just know it will be better." Anon sighed.
"When you say this place has changed, I assume you really mean that it refuses to change and yet continues to escalate?" I quizzed. "Equestria changes so little and as new things to talk about become scarce the dialogue becomes contorted from talk of adventure to indulging increasingly bizarre and perverse fantasy. Perhaps not out of an excess of bizarre perversion but out of a lack of topical evolution."
"It's really hard to explain." Anon answered tearfully.
"And yet when you look away long enough." I began.
"It's very plain to see." He finished for me. We both sobbed silently for a moment.
"You're no longer the boy you came to Equestria as- but everypony is afraid to step back and allow you to become the man you now seek to be. They do everything in their power to make you comfortable just the way you are- to shelter you from the pain and discomfort of growth; but you can feel it, deep within your heart, that you need to become so much more than that and that in order to grow into the man you want to become you have to face those pains and discomforts; and so the innocuous nature of Equestria in all of its endless feelings of comfort, passion, love, brotherhood and camaraderie become something insidious that stands in the way of being who and what you really want to be." I explained.
Anon simply looked at me and sighed with eyes full of tears and a demeanor of shame.
"I just hope you don't feel like your time here was wasted. I imagine when you go back and forth from Equestria, knowing that you can't take any of this back with you (even some of your own kind that are in too deep to leave) that you must question how real any of it really is and perhaps you feel ashamed of falling in love with a mare that you can't bring home to your mother and friends you just can't talk about much of anything else with. But even on your side of existence the adventures we have shared together, the conversations that everypony have shared- it's the idea behind them that is real. There is no shame falling in love with an idea because that idea is born from the heart and mind of somepony else and in that- every moment of excitement, every moment of joy, every moment of passion, every moment of lust is just as real as the ideas and inspiration that have imagined them into being. Just as the good times were real though so are the hard times. The sorrows, the regrets, times you wish you spent differently, projects that have been abandoned, personal goals that you failed to achieve."
Anon replied with a meek nod.
"I can't blame you for wanting to leave- for needing to leave. I can't ask you to stay and I won't. I know that it seems like everypony here would rather shelter you and keep you from becoming anything other than the boy that you first arrived as- for they are worried that they would lose you in the man that you are becoming. Perhaps you worry that when you finish becoming that man you will not be able to be a good friend to everypony you are leaving behind. Just understand that with all the lives you have touched a familial sense of love for you has arisen. Whether you end up better or worse, whether you decide Equestria is right for you or not we would all one day like to see the man that you become. By all means if leaving Equestria is what you need to do then do it. But know that once you find what you are looking for there is no shame in coming back to visit us. Everypony here loves you and cares about you deeply and will be supportive of the man that you become. Whether you succeed or not. Whether you grow proud or whether you grow meek."
We exchanged a hug as a brilliant portal opened up nearby. I strained my eyes at the wonders that lay on the other side but couldn't even begin to guess as to what I was looking at. It wasn't until after all was said and he was gone that my eyes began to well up with tears.
