//------------------------------//
// Rarity Delivers 
// Story: Anon Is Missing: The Mystery of the Enormous Ladybug (Or, the Mystery of the Hotel Maid Who Danced on Flowers) 
// by Mockingbirb 
//------------------------------//

The next time room 505's door opened, in came four ponies: Rarity, Miss Plumeau, and two unicorns: Trixie Lulamoon and Starlight Glimmer. 

"Starlight!" Spike said. "I didn't know you were in Trottawa."

Rarity smiled. "Where Trixie Lulamoon is, her marefriend Starlight--"

Starlight and Trixie exchanged bemused looks.

Rarity continued, "As I was saying, when Trixie goes someplace for weeks, her GOOD FRIEND Starlight is likely to show up there too."

"I suppose that's true," Starlight admitted. "But that still doesn't explain why you've asked me and Trixie to come up here."

Rarity pulled out her stack of photographs...and looked around for a clean place to put them. She settled for levitating them in front of herself. 

"Fact one," she said, "Anon is missing from his hotel room. At approximately half past five this morning he was already missing, and nocreature I've spoken to admits having seen him since."

"What do you mean, missing?" Trixie whined. "Anon can come and go as he pleases. You're not his keeper."

"Anon was supposed to meet with me and Spike early this morning, in his room." Rarity sniffed. "He's normally a very trustworthy and reliable creature."

"Anon is annoying," Trixie said.

"Immaterial." Rarity narrowed her eyes at Trixie. "Unless YOU did something to him. If you dislike him so much, that might be a motive."

"Trixie has nothing to say. Because Trixie respects Anon's right to privacy."

Rarity snorted in frustration. "What is it with all these ponies who don't want to talk about what they do with Anon?" 

Starlight shrugged.

"In any case," Rarity continued, "Both you and Starlight are ponies of interest in this investigation."

"Why?" Trixie demanded.

"Because..." Rarity smiled. "...you are the greatest and most powerful magician in Equestria. All your posters say so. You were personally instructed by Princess Twilight Sparkle herself. Unless your posters are LYING. False advertising?"

Trixie said, "Trixie's posters are no lies! Princess Twilight personally instructed Trixie to stop telling tall stories about Ursa Majors to impress ponies. Also, Princess Twilight instructed Trixie not to wear any more cursed artifacts that brainwash their wearer into enslaving a town. If you doubt my word, ask Twilight yourself!"

Starlight laughed. "She's got you there, Rarity."

Rarity pointed a foreleg. "You're another pony of special interest, Starlight. You're one of the most skilled and powerful unicorn mages I've ever met. And another reason: both you and Trixie are ponies from Ponyville, and so far as I know, you're both associates of Lyra and Bonnie."

"I prefer to call them friends," Lyra chimed in.

"Friends, then," Rarity agreed. "But another reason Trixie is of such interest is...she is a professional magician, right?"

"Of course Trixie is!"

"And one thing magicians do is...make things disappear! In a magic show, even ponies and other creatures may vanish!"

Trixie sighed.

"What's wrong, Lulu?" Starlight asked.

Trixie skulked into the corner of the room farthest from Lyra and Bonnie. She gestured for Rarity and Starlight to follow her. Spike followed along too. Trixie whispered, "Trixie isn't any good at making creatures disappear."

"What?" Rarity said.

"Trixie said, she can't make creatures disappear. Even the one trick like that you might have seen Trixie perform in Ponyville, when Trixie cannons herself down the throat of a giant manticore?"

"I did see that show," Rarity recalled.

"Trixie is ashamed to say, Trixie cheated. Trixie begged Starlight to secretly teleport Trixie out of the manticore. That's the only way Trixie was able to escape from the manticore's stomach, without asking the manticore to do something that would be really icky for an audience to watch."

Rarity pursed her lips, her eyes narrowing. "Ohhh-KAY then." 

Starlight whispered, "It's true. Trixie can't disappear creatures at all."

"Well, then..." Rarity asked, "who DID disappear Anon? Or what happened to him? Because there is ONE thing I have good evidence of..." Rarity led the other two unicorns back towards the center of the room. "Look at those dirty cup marks on the table!"

"Um..." Starlight said.

Lyra complained, "Yes, I'm a slob! But that's not a crime!"

"I know about Trixie's little stint in a porcelain factory last year," Rarity revealed. "The one advanced magic spell Trixie DOES know is how to turn anything into a teacup. Pebbles, garbage, whatever. But she only knows how to make exactly one kind of teacup, which is why after two days the factory fired her."

Trixie blushed. 

"And one of these cup marks on the table," Rarity announced, "EXACTLY matches the ONE kind of cup Trixie knows how to make."

"Trixie may have visited Lyra and Bonnie's room last night," Trixie admitted. "But just like being messy, visiting friends isn't a crime."

"On the contrary!" Rarity announced. "Your presence here is the missing piece that explains almost everything about Anon's disappearance!"

"Speaking of where missing things are," Trixie remarked, "would anypony happen to know where my teacup is? I think I left it in this room."

"I searched this room very thoroughly, at about six o'clock this morning," Rarity said. "It isn't here."

"Oh, no." Trixie's face paled. "That's very bad news."

"Tell us why!" Rarity demanded.

"Because...that teacup is my biggest piece of luggage. A traveling case is so much easier to carry, if Trixie turns it into a teacup until she reaches her destination. THAT is why the teacup is so important to Trixie. No other reason."

"Really?" Rarity eyed Trixie skeptically. "No other reason?"

"Really truly. Would Trixie ever lie to you?"

Rarity snorted.

Trixie whined, "But, Rarity, you were about to tell us almost everything about Anon's disappearance. Won't you please do that? Maybe you'll even be able to explain where Trixie's missing teacup is."

"Yes!" Rarity agreed. "I'll tell you about Anon's disappearance. Clue one: when I was supposed to meet Anon in his hotel room, I found Lyra and Bonnie arguing outside his door. Bonnie was acting jealous, saying she didn't want to let Lyra see Anon without Bonnie coming along. Bonnie called Anon a homewrecker. If that isn't jealousy, I don't know what is."

"But Bonnie! You should trust me!" Lyra argued. "When I was in the same hotel room with Anon, we had a chaperone! That proves I didn't cheat on you!"

"Aha!" Rarity said. "And who would you trust to be a chaperone? Somepony you both know, I suppose?"

Lyra pointed at Trixie. "When Anon came up here, Trixie followed him up. For some reason."

"Trixie doesn't even LIKE Anon. Trixie merely wanted to make sure Anon didn't misbehave. Since you and he were going to..." Trixie gestured at the inflatable pony doll and massage supplies on the floor next to the bed. "...to do whatever THAT is."

"When I thought about where Anon might have gone last night," Rarity said, "I considered that according to the luggage tags and the hotel's check-in records, it appeared Lyra arrived here early yesterday morning, and Bonnie arrived late last night. When we consider that early THIS morning I found Bonnie making jealous accusations against Lyra and Anon, the answer is clear: when Bonnie arrived, possibly earlier than Lyra had expected, she found Anon and Lyra doing something that made Bonnie jealous. Possibly something completely inappropriate for a married mare."

Bonnie blinked. "I'll admit I was jealous," she admitted. "But that wasn't because I saw them doing anything together."

"Then why?" Rarity asked.

"Because before I opened our hotel room's door, I heard voices from inside the room: Anon saying something about the ways he likes to touch a mare, and Lyra...well...she was making these...SOUNDS..."

Lyra blushed. "It was only a massage lesson! It wasn't cheating!"

Bonnie accused, "If you didn't have anything to hide, then why didn't I see Anon when I walked into the room? What happened to him?"

Rarity stared at Trixie. "Yes, Trixie. I wonder what happened to him? Perhaps you saw, since you were right here."

Trixie stammered, "T-t-teacup!"

Rarity sighed. "Of course. The one advanced magical spell you actually know, that isn't a fake or a fraud." She glared at the performer. "You turned him into a teacup? How could you do such a thing?"

Trixie whimpered shamefacedly, "When Bonnie was at the door, and Anon was in here with Lyra, Lyra asked Trixie: 'Use your magic to disappear Anon.' But Trixie can't truly disappear creatures! So Trixie threw a smoke bomb, and under cover of the smoke, Trixie turned Anon into a teacup."

"But why is there an inflatable pony doll?" Spike wondered. 

"The life size doll was to demonstrate and practice massage techniques on," Lyra explained. "Anon knows how to give a massage with hands. I thought I could learn how to use my unicorn magic to do the same thing, since I like to form my magic into hand shapes. I wanted to learn how to do a massage like that for Bonnie." Lyra pleaded, "It was supposed to be a surprise! I was planning to give Bonnie a 'hands style' massage as a special anniversary gift!"

Bonnie shook her head, but smiled. "You little weirdo."

Lyra's muzzle nudged Bonnie. "YOUR little weirdo."

Bonnie sighed. "Now I see how wrong I was. When I found Lyra and Trixie in the room together, AND I knew I'd heard Anon, BUT nopony would admit he'd been here...I got upset about my own marefriend lying to me. I felt angry. But I didn't really start shouting and screaming until a bit later, after Trixie had left."

"Trixie's career as a traveling showpony has given Trixie a sense of when she should run away for her own safety."

"But then our 'discussion' was interrupted by another visitor," Bonnie said. "Starlight let herself in."

"The door wasn't locked!" Starlight said. "And I was worried about you two. Trixie said you seemed really angry, Bonnie."

"That's when I started throwing dishes," Bonnie admitted. "I even threw a cup so hard it flew out the open Prench door and off the balcony."

"NOOOOOOOO!" Trixie screamed. 

After a moment, Lyra blanched. "Was that teacup ANON?"

Starlight tried to comfort Trixie and Lyra. "Don't worry, Trixie! I was here when that happened, and I protected the teacup. I turned it into something that's really, really hard to destroy by just throwing it off a balcony. Something with wings."

Rarity blinked. "A pegasus? So was THAT who the maid was fighting with down by the patio?  But why would Anon turned pegasus get into a fight with the maid?"

"Not a pegasus. Something even harder to kill."

Rarity blinked. "What?"

"A giant beetle, with the proportionate strength of a beetle." Starlight shrugged. "I was kind of trying for a giant cockroach, but at the last moment I chickened out. So I got a ladybug, which is good enough I guess?"

Rarity gasped. "YOU turned ANON into the giant ladybug I saw downstairs this morning?"

"I wouldn't turn the teacup into a LITTLE TINY bug. A LITTLE bug would be too hard to find." Starlight's shoulders slumped. "Not that I was able to find him anyway. By the time I ran down five flights of stairs and went outside, he was gone. I have no idea what happened to him."

Plumeau's mouth worked nervously. "I...might have un idea where he went. I was outside, cleaning zee patio. When I saw a giant insect, trying to crawl inside zee Grand Vienneighse, I could not take zis. I was so angry, at giant insect trying to go inside our hotel. If ponies saw the bug, he would ruin our reputation for being clean! So I attacked him, and tried to pull him away from zee building." Tears ran down her face. "But he was too strong! I am small, and he was very, very big. I grabbed him, but he simply dragged me inside zee hotel and along zee hallway. When we arrived at a room where he seemed to want to go inside..." Plumeau sobbed. "I couldn't simply leave him in zee hall, where any guest might walk and see him! Also, he had a key to zat exact room, hanging on a string around his neck. So I opened zee room's door, and let Monsieur Insect inside, where he lay down on zee bed. I did not want him to escape and crawl around zee hotel again, so I got more string and tied him up very much."

Rarity sighed. "Starlight. Trixie. Everypony else too. Let us go downstairs, to Anon's hotel room, and try to change him back."

***

Bonnie picked room 113's lock again, letting the group inside. The ponies untied Anon and magically transformed him: first into a teacup, and finally back to his real human self. Instead of getting angry, he laughed at everypony's mistakes and misadventures. "I can't really blame any of you. We all meant well, we just...had a few misunderstandings, that's all."

"Trixie is so sorry!" the showpony said. 

"There, there." Anon stroked her mane. "It's ok. I know you didn't mean any harm."

"To show how sorry Trixie is, she would like to give you a very special ticket to her magic show. The best seat in the house!"

"Where IS the best seat in the house?"

Trixie smiled. "On stage, of course! Where better to see Trixie's amazing magic, than by volunteering to be PART of it? Has Anon ever been sawed in half before?"

Anon worked to keep a straight face. "That's very generous of you, Trixie. But I think I might want the rest of my visit to Trottawa to be more...relaxing. Being a magician's assistant sounds like too much work."

Trixie said cheerfully, "Your loss!"


Addendum



With Gratitude and/or Apologies to Franz Kafka and David Wyllie