Elrod paused, pulling his collar up to his neck against the cold as he looked through a slit in the concrete out at the landscape before him. It had taken a long time to get this far; several days at least had passed. Almost all of that time consisted of trying to manage the ridiculously complex public transportation system, or in finding money to use it. Numerous hours were spent doubling back either intentionally or because of the faulty, bootleg version of navigation software that Elrod was running on what was left of his visor. He had actually used it so extensively that it had been depleted entirely of power.

The continuous effort of trying to evade potential pursuit was not especially tiring. Elrod had not slept because he did not sleep, nor did he grow tired from physical exhaustion. That had allowed him to continue onward, hopefully beyond the reach of whoever it was who wanted him dead. As much as he would have liked to put his hope in the fact that he had outrun them by sheer endurance, though, he knew that his advantage was not as great as he would have liked it to be. Humans and zoonei did need to sleep, but they could take drugs or use certain enhancements to overcome it. Drones and secgens never slept at all. Elrod was not sure if ponies did or not, but that was not of great consequence to him. He had seen the shadowy figures, and they had definitely not been ponies.

This left him in an awkward state. The situation was still poor, and he was certainly not safe- -not really, anyway- -but he was also sure that he was not going to be killed in the immediate future. There had been no third attempt on his life that he was aware of, meaning they had either lost him in his confused rambling or decided that they would let him live a little longer. This is what gave him the peace of mind- -as small as it was- -to pause for a moment to at least attempt to enjoy the view.

There was not much view to enjoy. This particular system of structures was built into the side of a vast chasm. Overhead was a bridge, and the sound of cars and trucks- -as distant as they were- -rumbled and echoed through the gap that the bridge crossed over. Elrod knew where he was, at least in a general sense: the one hundred fifty-lane highway was Route 8. It had once been the main artery stretching through Bridgeport. If one were to take it north, they would eventually reach Pittsfeild. Following it further- -if one could get through the numerous armed checkpoints- -would lead to the forests of Vermont. In the southern direction, the highway continued to the ocean and crossed to Long Island, and from there to what remained of the Transatlantic Bridge.

The highway did not interest Elrod especially much. It was loud, with the noise of the automobiles only being punctuated by the roar of near-supersonic freight trains that traveled on numerous smaller bridges. Instead, Elrod was more focused on what lie below. The terraces of the city that had clustered under the bridge seemed to go on forever, but in truth they eventually faded to the point where exactly what was at the bottom of the chasm was invisible. Elrod supposed it was a river, maybe, although what was flowing through any river that deep was surely horrifying.

He did not pause for long. Time was still of the essence, and he hoped to be able to go back home soon. Tearing himself away from the windy concrete slits, he proceeded down the hall of the structure he currently found himself in.

Where he had ended up had not been his choice. It had really just been a matter of how much he wanted to spend on public transportation. If it had been up to him, he would have gone all the way to New Jersey and back just to shake whoever was after them. Without a car, though, such a long trip was prohibitively expensive.

The building where he had ended up was not pleasant. It was old and aging badly, but not quite decaying. The architecture- - if it could even be called that- -had clearly been designed by a computer: the layout consisted of tortuous, strange hallways and oddly shaped rooms that had been laid out solely with the intention of maximizing space and heating flow. There was no doubt in Elrod’s mind that this place had always seemed cheap, even from the start.

It mostly served as a low-rent office building now. Elrod passed many of them on his way. Few were labeled, and they did not need to be. These were not businesses that were meant to serve clients, apart from perhaps an occasional dentist’s office. They were instead various small companies that would never rise out of absolute obscurity. Their purpose was to handle the few but various aspects of business that still needed human talent, the sort of generic and incomprehensible firms with names like “Paradigm”, “Logicex”, or “Swift”.

As Elrod moved deeper into the building and farther from the windows, though, the renters of the office building seemed to change. They seemed to follow the warmer air of the poor heating system, growing well in hot damp places with little light. There were pyramid markers, small and clearly unregistered medical supplement companies, call centers built in what should have been boiler rooms, and so on. It had been a long time since Elrod had found himself this out of his element.

A figure suddenly turned around a corner ahead of Elrod, seeming to materialize out of nothing. Elrod nearly cried out and jumped. This place, despite its number of offices, had virtually no one wandering through the halls. Elrod had not seen another being since he had gotten off the rather Spartan stairwell to this floor. That had been part of why he felt so secure.

His fear abated, though, when he saw that the mysterious figure was a pony. She was a unicorn type, with a turquoise coat and deep orange eyes. Elrod did not know the name of her series, but he saw that her rump was printed with the insignia of a harp. He also noted that she smelled surprisingly minty.

“Oh,” she said, looking up at him with a strangely neutral expression. “Hello. I didn’t mean to scare me.”

“You didn’t scare me,” replied Elrod, even though he knew he was lying. “You just startled me a little.”

“Why would I startle you? And are you okay? You don’t look so good.”

“I’m fine,” said Elrod, also lying. Although he did not tire physically, the idea of being pursued by an unseen lethal force was causing great strain to his mental status. He supposed that was apparent on his face. “I just can’t grow eyebrows, so I always look kind of surprised.”

The pony just stared at him for a long moment. She did not seem to blink. “Well,” she said. “You don’t seem like you belong in this building. Not normally, anyway. Are you looking for someone?”

“I am.” Elrod produced a small piece of paper. This normally would have elicited surprise from anyone who saw it; after all, the days when people wrote down addresses on paper had passed centuries ago. “Floor three forty-nine, quadrant six, office space G26-H127.”

A look of recognition seemed to cross the pony’s eyes, and she did not seem pleased. “I’ll never understand why they’re called quadrants if there are more than four of them,” she said to herself. Then she sighed, which was an odd behavior considering Elrod had been sure that ponies did not actually have lungs. “I know where that is. If you follow this hall down the next curve past the mechanical room, it’s in the hallway on the third left. But are you sure you really want to go there?”

Elrod paused for a moment. He considered that question very strange. “Yes,” he said, slowly. “I do.”

The pony shrugged. “If that’s what you want. But I’ve got to say, I’d really recommend against it.”

Elrod was about to ask what she meant, but the conversation was clearly over. She walked past him, her long mint-scented tail brushing his leg as she moved. Within seconds, she had turned a corner and was gone. What bothered Elrod the most was that despite the carpet on the floor being worn down to the concrete below, the pony’s hooves had not once made a sound.

Still, she had been helpful. The paths in the building were convoluted, and the way the suites were numbered clearly would make no sense to anyone short of a secgen synth. The office he was looking for was not distant, but the route was more complex than the pony had made it seem. If she had not given him a general sense of where to go, he probably would have been wandering for hours.

Instead of hours, he came to the door in a matter of minutes. When he saw it, he paused, because it was not what he was expecting. It was the same type of metal door as was present in the rest of the building, but the large and normally transparent window in the center had been replaced with opaque, reddish glass. A symbol had been inlaid, which resembled a star with an eye in the center. At first, Elrod thought that he might have come to a church. The eye in the center had a round pupil, though, and the star had six points instead of five. It was a symbol that he did not recognize, but he could gather the meaning. This was the office of a private investigator.

Elrod grasped the handle of the door and opened it. As it moved, a small bell tinkled at the top. As simple as such a device was, Elrod had never actually seen one before. It was considered an anachronism.

Stepping into the small space beyond, Elrod was immediately struck by the smell of the place. It reeked of black mold mixed with stale coffee and cigarette smoke. The air was several degrees warmer than the chilly halls outside, but somehow it still did not feel pleasant exactly.

The entryway was narrow, leading past a small close and into the front part of a narrow office. The light was subdued, coming from just a few diode fixtures in the ceiling, and the walls appeared to be made from wood paneling that had been varnished by age alone. Several filing cabinets were placed against the back of the room, and on one wall hung a massive and highly intricate map of Bridgeport.

Offset from the hallway slightly and facing the door was a small desk, its surface covered with several tiny potted plants. It was the kind of miniature desk that might be owned by a child. In this case, however, the being sitting behind it was, in fact, a pony.

She was a Pegasus type, with her fluffy white wings extending out two holes in the rear of the pastel-colored blazer she was wearing. It had been tied with a large bow around her neck, and none of her clothing at all matched the pure white color of her coat. Even worse, though, was her hair: garish pink and green. Elrod was barely able to see color, and even he could tell that this pony’s fashion sense was poor.

Her enormous pale-blue eyes swiveled, locking on to Elrod without blinking. As they turned, Elrod caught sight of the way the light reflected off them. He had grown experienced in quickly recognizing materials, and the surfaces of those lenses were not polymer or even glass. Her eyes were coated in solid monocrystalline diamond.

“A client!” she said, nearly squeaking with joy. She lifted her hoof and tapped at the air. A hologram appeared in front of it. As she did, Elrod noticed that there were a number of nearly imperceptible black lines underneath her coat that ran down her hooves, legs, and even up onto her face. “Do you have a scheduled appointment or are you a walk-in?”

“Um…a walk in?”

“Of course. We do not have any scheduled appointments today anyway.”

“Are you the detective?”

The pony continued to stare without blinking. “No. I am her secretary. My name is Forth. What is your name?”

“Elrod. Elrod Jameson.”

“Were you recommended to us by a friend?”

“No. I ran out of money, and you were the closest to where I ended up.”

“Well then.” The pony slid out of her chair. “Right this way, Mr. Jameson.”

The pony walked across the room and down a narrow hall in the rear. Elrod could not help but notice the fact that she was not wearing any pants. In fact, when she had gotten out of her chair he was pretty sure that he had been able to see that she also had no genitals.

This was actually the first time Elrod had been able to see a pony up close without being exceedingly nervous or outright terrified. In his opinion, they were horrifying. Elrod understood- -in the most basic sense- -what they were, and that they had originally been designed to resemble the characters from a children’s show. An animated children’s show.

No doubt, ponies had been quite adorable when rendered with lines and digital paint. When they were produced in the real world, though, the very things that made them cute as images made them uncanny and frightful as machines. Their eyes were disproportionally massive in a way that no organic being would be able to sustain, and the way their horse-like mouths moved when they spoke was disturbing. Their entire bodies were covered in a fine fuzz, and Elrod was not sure if their hair grew somehow or if it had to be replaced whenever they wanted it changed. They were ubiquitous in the modern world- -and yet they looked so horribly wrong in it.

“Would you like anything to drink?” Forth looked up at Elrod through her long bangs. She had still not blinked. Elrod doubted if she had eyelids.

“No,” said Elrod. “The Bridgeport water, it tastes like garlic.”

“I would not know,” said Forth. She led Elrod around a sharp turn in the extremely narrow hallway and past a very tiny area that contained a couch and a chair that did not match it. At the end of this small hallway was a door. Forth approached it and pushed it open, poking her head in. “Mr. Jameson is here to see you,” she said. “He’s here about a case.”

Forth pulled her head back and smiled at Elrod. “She will see you now.” She motioned for Elrod to enter, and he hesitantly did so. The door was almost immediately shut behind him.

The room was tiny. What little space it had was filled with bookshelves on the ends and a desk in the center. Elrod was not entirely sure who he had expected to be sitting at the desk, but he now found himself staring into the violet eyes of a pony.

Her resemblance to Forth was uncanny. They had the same eye shape and hairstyle, but in the case of the detective hers was violet with a red stripe. Likewise, her coat was violet instead of white. A horn protruded through her hair, but she also had long and heavy looking wings that were partially extended with the back of her chair between them. There was a term for this type of pony, but Elrod had forgotten it.

This pony’s clothing was much more simple than that of her secretary. She wore a sleeveless white blouse that ruffled at the neckline. It was fastened by a smooth red gemstone.

“You’re a pony.”

“I know. Twilight Sparkle. What do you want?”

Elrod blinked. This seemed more sudden than he was expecting.

“Well?” said the pony.

“Is that your real name, or the series?”

Twilight’s eyes narrowed and she leaned forward. “It’s a series,” she said. “Like your surname. You don’t need to know my first name and I don’t intend to tell it to you. Now is that all you came to ask, or did you want something other than to waste my time?”

“No,” said Elrod, stiffening. “I don’t want to waste your time. I need your help.”

“With what, exactly, or are you going to take the next hour to explain it?”

“Someone is trying to kill me.”

“Then get out.”

Elrod paused again, still confused and taken aback. “Excuse me?”

“I said get out. I don’t do murders. That’s stuff for the police. I’m a private detective, not a crime lab.”

“Look at me,” said Elrod, spreading his arms. “Do I look like I have enough relevance for Aetna-Cross to even remotely care about what happens to me?”

“Of course not. If some’s trying to off you, they’re going to succeed. And I’m not going down with you.”

“But I need help,” said Elrod. “Please- -”

Twilight sprang up suddenly, spreading her wings. Elrod took a step back; he had not realized that she was slightly larger than a normal pony. “I’m not going to tell you a third time, trench. You walk into my office with a Nitro Express pistol- -a gun for killing PONIES- -and then you start demanding I do shit that I don’t do? That you expect me to make an exception? Who do you think you are?”

“How did you- -”

“Because you didn’t turn off the ID beacon. And based on the fact that you don’t look like a Fluttershy unit, I’m doing to guess you stole that piece. And recently, too. You have no idea how to walk with it without looking like you have a barbed stick shoved up your ass.” Twilight leaned back in her chair, but her eyes never left Elrod. “You know, there are only four types of people who carry a .700. Arrogant sons-of-bitches who think it makes them look impressive, abject morons, the paranoid, and pony hunters.” She leaned forward. “You don’t dress or talk like an arrogant bastard, and you’re not wearing enough body armor to be a paranoid. So that begs the question. Hunter, or idiot?”

“It’s not loaded.”

“Of course it’s not loaded. Blossomforth wouldn’t have let you in if it was.” She paused. “And, by the way, that does answer my question. Now, are you going to leave like a man or am I going to have to metaphorically castrate you by having Forth throw you out on your ass?”

“A pony was killed.”

Twilight looked up at Elrod and shrugged. “Ponies get killed all the time. It happens. It doesn’t bother me.”

“But it does bother me!” cried Elrod, suddenly losing his temper. He reached into his coat and produced the piece of implant that he had taken from the pony’s corpse and slammed it down on Twilight’s desk. “Do you know what that was like?! She was there, in front of me, alive- -and then they shot her! I saw her head explode! Blood, brains, it went…” Elrod choked slightly “…it went everywhere. On me, in the gutter. Damn it, I saw someone die! And now they’re coming after me too!”

Twilight looked at the implant, and then at him. “You’re lying.”

“I’m not lying!”

“Then you’re insane. Ponies are machines. We don’t have blood or brains, just metal and robotics. And that thing?” Twilight pointed. “That’s not part of a pony. I can see it from here. It’s a neuromeshing preamplifier. They’re used to let cybernetic operators use heavy machinery.”

“But it DID come from a pony,” protested Elrod.

“And that’s where we have an issue,” said Twilight, leaning forward again and propping her head on one hoof. “Because you have to know how this looks. You come into my office holding a fresh spinal implant, having bloodstains on your clothes, carrying a pony-hunting pistol, and claiming you saw somebody get offed. Either you’re pulling yarn out of your ass, or…”

“You think I did it.”

“I think there’s a strong possibility that you murdered someone.”

“I didn’t.”

“And I don’t care. It’s not my job to care. I’m a private investigator. My job is to find evidence that makes my client right. The more they pay me, the more right I can make them.”

Elrod gasped. “You’re dirty, then.”

“I’m private. By definition I can’t be dirty. Like I said. My job is my job. Speaking hypothetically: if you did off someone and want to find proof that you weren’t the one who did it, I could do that. For extra I could even find out that someone you had certain ‘suspicions’ about had a hand in it. I’m not a cop. Tell me what you want and show me the money, and I’ll see if I can make it happen.”

“That’s not what I want,” said Elrod, collecting his thoughts. He took a breath and paused. “I have a problem. And I want to make it go away.”

“Now you’re making me start to get flustered again.”

“Let me finish! Someone’s trying to kill me. Twice. And they already killed a pony. One of your kind.”

“My ‘kind’. I get it. You’re not helping yourself, kid.”

“I want it to stop. I don’t want to die.”

“And you want me to be protection?”

“Only for a little while. Until you can find who did it.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean ‘why?’”

“Because it doesn’t matter who’s holding the gun in the end. Dead is dead.”

“I don’t intend to die. But if we could just figure out who, then I can take the case to the police.”

“Ha!” laughed Twilight. “And you think Aetna-Cross will do a thing about it?”

“I can try, can’t I?”

“Yeah, or you could try shoving your arm up your rear. Neither’s much help to you.”

“I don’t care. That’s what I want.”

Twilight paused for a moment. “So…find out who a murderer is, but not stop them? I don’t know. I don’t like doing murders…”

“But by your own logic, there is not murder,” said Elrod. “I’m still alive. I could not pursue the case even if I wanted to.”

Twilight paused for a long moment. “Eh, what the hell. It will cost extra, though.”

Elrod removed his wallet from his pocket. It resembled a square U-shaped piece of machinery that held an ampule of pale golden fluid that glowed slightly in the dim light of the office.

“Here,” he said. “This is all I have- -”

“Are you joking?” Twilight let out a cruel and insincere laugh. “You little fuck, that’s not even sixty vod!”

“It’s all I have,” reiterated Elrod.

“My base rate is five hundred vod an hour! Damn, and I thought we had something. Go home. That’s not even worth my incidental- -”

“Now just a minute!”

Elrod jumped as Forth entered the room. “How did you- -”

“She was listening on the other side of the door,” sighed Twilight, rolling her eyes.

“And it is good that I was,” said Forth. “You actually planning on turning down a case? Ms. Twilight Sparkle, might I remind you that we have not had a case in three months? Might I also remind you that rent in this area is not at all cheap?”

“We’re not going to be able to pay the rent with sixty vod.”

“But every little bit helps! And it’s not like you are doing anything anyway, apart from sitting on your flank!”

“And if I don’t want to take this one?”

“Then we can start packing our things in advance of the eviction.”

Twilight let out a groan. “Fine,” she said, “but I’m not doing this for sixty vod. There are other conditions.”

“Name them,” said Elrod. “I’m desperate.”

“Well crap, you’re a bad negotiator, then.” Twilight flipped up a small package on her desk and reached down. Her robotic lips dexterously removed a single cigarette from the pack, and as she lifted it she flicked it. The end ignited automatically and she took a long drag before passing the smoke out her nose. “Alright. First, the total cost is five thousand.”

“I don’t have that much.”

“I know. We went over that. That’s how much you’ll owe me in the end. Paid out with fifteen percent interest.”

“Fifteen- -”

“AND, I get to take one kidney, one liver lobe, and five units of bone marrow. I’ll even be nice and pay for the surgery. That’s if you live. If I can’t help you and you get offed, I get all of it. Every piece of you is going to wake up in some old dying geezer’s body.”

“My organs are not fit for transplantation.”

“Don’t care. This is Bridgeport, I could give take a liver made of malaria and gunshot wholes and people would still gut each other for a slot in line.”

“If you can find my organs, you can have as many as you want. Take five kidneys for all I care.”

Twilight eyed him. “You really are a bad negotiator. You’re lucky I didn’t ask you to work for me as a prostitute. But it’ll do. I’ll take the case.”

Forth clapped her front hooves together excitedly. Twilight stood up and approached a coat rack. With several dexterous motions, she put an armored vest around her torso and then donned a long coat.

“Right,” she said, putting on a hat. “Let’s get started.”