To Cure Deception

by LegionPothIX

Act 2 | With Painted Faces

Author's Note:

What is ignorance?

The rising peaks and milky white walls of the spa were topped in royal purples. Gold was the color of its fixtures, and its form was that of a tent of tinctures. Everything about the structure implied the regality with which the spa ponies took pride in treating their guests to. He was met inside by the blue opal sister, the word Lotus embroidered on her collar, and was seen on her hair wrap peaking out from just behind her ears. Her thick accent was oddly soothing as she asked: “How can I help you?”

Next to her perfectly primped coat, Lacus couldn't help but feel self-consciously gruff if not a bit world weary; even if neither were truly the case. “I would like to schedule an appointment,” he said while looking around to assess how busy they were.

“Your name?” she asked politely as she looked through their availability.

Lacus Sceleratus replied with: “Lucas Greymane.”

Lotus looked up in slight surprise, “Ah. Mr. Greymane, we ‘ave been expecting you.”

The stress that was visible on his face barely came close to expressing his immeasurable frustration. Even here he was known and expected. Though, it was not the fault of the spa attendant whom he was on the edge of exploding at. Lacus swallowed his pride he asked: “Oh? For how long?” He hadn't realize how poorly phrased the question was until it had been answered.

Lotus checked the book then responded in her sumptuous accent, “Oh... for about fifteen minutes, but you ‘ave several hours booked, and ‘ave prepaid for some very luxurious treatments.”

Fifteen minutes, the time repeated in Lacus’s head. For all the preordained turns his life had taken—for all the ponies whom he met that knew him in the absence of his identity over the last thirty hours or so—he only managed to carve out fifteen minutes himself, and only just now. Though, as she showed him to his room, he wondered if those minutes could be attributed to Kadabré’s visit, or Mrs. Cake’s special dish.

“Right zis way, please,” Lotus said as she led him deeper into the spa.

Lacus questioned the entire situation, calling it to the attention of Lotus Blossom “Um... What exactly is going on?”

She turned and offered him an inviting smile while she held the door to the mud baths opened. “Ja. Zis is your first time to ze spa, no?” Lacus nodded. Upon inspection of the room he found Aloe measuring the temperatures of the bath, and Lotus continued. “Vell. She said zat you vanted to cleanse your body to open your mind, und ve zought zat vas just marvelous.”

This time Lacus noted the pronoun and interjected, “Who said that? When?”

Lotus looked to Aloe in consideration, before responding, “About a veek ago?”

To which Aloe joined the conversation, “Ja. Vas about a veek ago. A frazzled mare said somezing about a couple of rough days zat you had planned. Ve offered same day service but she said today vas ze earliest zat you vould be free.”

To which Lotus elbowed her sister lightly and reminded, "Ja, she was a wreck too. So much stress herself. Poor girl."

Recalling the warnings of the lengths that this mysterious mare would go to, Lacus was hesitant about accepting the spa ponies help. However, the Changelings and the Norse Ponies did not have the troubled history they did with the Zebra, so these spa attendants wouldn't have any reason to lie to him. Even if they somehow knew he was a changeling, he couldn't believe they would harm him at somepony else's request.

After that Lacus couldn't deny the level of stress he had been and was under even then. So it took little convincing for him to let these sisters do their job. After sliding into the mineral rich soil, Lacus felt a bit of claustrophobia as his sense of touch was being inundated.

Seeing the growing discomfort on his face Lotus piped up, “Zis normal, let ze earth settle about you.”

Aloe joined in, explaining “Ze mud vill draw ze sick und oil from your skin.”

Slowly, and steadily, Lacus drew in and released deep breaths, and the sensation of being buried alive soon left him. This had been the first time that he had ever really taken care of his body. In the moments to come, he realized that this was the first time he had associated the form of Lucas Greymane as his form, and not the changeling lying beneath.

“I was hoping…” Lacus started with hesitation in his voice, “that you could teach me how to meditate while we do this.”

Aloe seemed keen to the notion, and nodded as her sister spoke, “Oh, ja, meditation is very relaxing.”

Aloe then added to the idea with a more practical exercise: “Close your eyes.” Lacus did so and asked if he should count, but she shook her head as she directed him, “No dear. Let ze zoughts in your mind simply be pulled away into ze mud wiz ze stress.”

Nodding, Lacus slid a little deeper into the bath as his hips, shoulders, and spine relaxed.

Lotus continued as Aloe left to check on the other guests accommodations.

The emptier his mind became the more preoccupied he felt with the thoughts that remained, as if he was afraid to be left alone in his head. However Lotus’s voice was soothing as she reassured him “Zis natural to be difficult in ze letting go.” Her echoing his feelings made him feel safe in her care, she continued as she began to apply a facial scrub, “Zey must be broken down as not to clog ze drain. Tell me, vat are you zinking?” As the question was asked, he could feel her breath on his cheek and the sensitive skin of his ear. The situation was uncomfortably intimate.

This, and other such thoughts crowding the space of his mind were only a small portion of what Lacus let go of. He let as many thoughts slip away as he could manage before answering. “I was wondering when this all started. I mean, really started.”

It was clear by her tone that Lotus did not have any context to the question, but also didn't require any to issue her advice: “Zis good. Clear your mind. Let zis zought pull ze answers to it.” She paused briefly for Lacus to comply. “Now vat do you see?”

Lacus cleared his throat as to match the presence of mind he hoped to achieve. “I’m standing in my own reflection, watching helplessly as some pony I don’t recognize talks about herself as though she were me.” Lacus was unnerved by the experience and uncomfortably joked: “She’s gorgeous though, I should be so lucky, I’m sure you could do a lot with her.”

Though Lacus could not see through the cucumber slices on his eyelids, he could hear the flattered smile that shaped Lotus’s voice, “Is good. Vat do zey say?” The question caused Lacus’s brow to crease as he struggled to hear the the details.

“I can’t make it out, it’s murky.” he said, “like I’m not in a mirror, but a pool of water.” Lacus was beginning more and more to identify with the feeling of being a hollow reflection of his former self. To him a mirror indicated a level of clarity that a pond could not emulate.

Lotus responded with a hint of disapproval, “Do not force it. Clear your mind, and let ze memory speak to you.” Aloe reentered the room and whispered into her sister’s ear, causing Lotus to dismiss herself. Before she left she suggested: “Perhaps you jould describe ze lovely lady to my sister so she can guide you furzer.”

Lacus was silent for a moment as to inspect the mare in his mind before elaborating further, “Her coat is dust brown, light, and well groomed,” he said. It had reminded him of the meticulous maintenance of the spa sisters, but couldn't find a way to articulate that in a positive light. Instead he simply continued, “Her mane is wheat-gold and grows out thick with the same tenacity. It has to be held down by a gold hairband that is tucked tightly behind her ears.”

The more he spoke of this memory the less he heard the world his physical body was in. He barely noticed Aloe adjusting the settings of his bath. It was good to know that he wasn't as alone in this as he felt.

“All in all, she seems very down-to-earth. But there is someone else there too. A stallion I think,” Lacus said as the contrast between the two ponies became more clear. “But it sounds like it could be a mare.”

Aloe encouraged him to go on, citing “Vat does ze mare-allion look like?”

Lacus could only see one word. “Unfettered,” he said, “Like he, or she, is completely free.” It was even more so than he could scarcely imagine. He continued describing the look that lent him to that feeling. “Its mane is gigantic and wild. An airy sky-blue with tufts of cloud-white. His coat is patchy, and grey... like a storm cloud during a mid-summer’s rain, and his wings are just as downy and soft.”

As he conveyed to her the experience he could feel that a hoof-a-cure began when Aloe added: “Vat is ze sound of ze voice?”

Lacus tried desperately to make out the words but still could not. “Wispy,” he said, “Distinctly feminine, and happy. Like it hasn't a care in the world. But…” Lacus paused to listen a little longer before continuing. “They’re also somehow weighted... like what it's saying is important.”

Aloe replied: “Let ze vords carry you deeper.”

A moment of tension passed as two little words that could be made out. “It…” Lacus began to explain, “Called her Latere Vesco.” With the surprise Lacus lost control and fell into total immersion.

***

“What do you think?” The effeminate voice asked as a transgendered pegasus approached Latere. Though she thought to herself that, with their transcendental physiology, such things as gender were mere identifications and constructs particularly for which monoforms could make associations to.

“Is that me?” she asked while looking into a reflection of Lucas Greymane. Her fine coat, the color of dust suspended in a ray of sunshine, was reflected in coarse strands of a light dirt-brown. Her wheat locks and golden hairband grew in green-as-grass in the reflection. They too were still swept back but allowed to flow freely therein. Most notably, however, she was reflected as a he.

The stallion with feminine features stepped forth to the mare’s side. “That which holds us together, is as much a part of what I have to teach, as that which would tear us apart,” he said in a voice of cumulus experience, while gracefully adding: “Just as a lie is a deception, but a deception is not just a lie, so too do these things take strange forms.”

As they stood over the mirror-still pool, the haunting rhyme of Laughter’s Elementalist occasionally echoed about the cave walls as though it were slipping through space, and lost in time. The principles of look-but-don’t-touch applied doubly in this place so as to prevent curiosity from ending up multi-mare-ing them.

“But, if I’m me…” the silty soft voice of the mare began, “but that is also me…” She didn't even make it to the end of the sentence before realizing to whom she was directing her question.

A wispy laugh resonated from her companion and mentor. “Oh, LäTēər, it will help our understanding of each other if you were to realize something very important,” his whimsical tone carried with it the stylized accent of the impression of a Prench-impressionist, while his matted mane was seemingly caught up in his breezy disposition. “Sanity is the ghostly reflection of societal expectations. The haunting by a group of which we have no part.”

Latere gave consideration to his words, and what they could mean, before turning to ask of him a question about herself. “So… How is this arrangement supposed to work? Aren’t I to be your mentor?”

It seemed unlike the stallion to be so careful as he pondered how to address her questions. “To better understand our own elements, we must see how they fit together into the larger whole,” his words gingerly danced around the subject as he continued, “There are things which I understand that you can not yet imagine. Likewise, there are things you know to be true that I could make no sense of without your insight.”

Latere turned her gaze back to pond and inspected the reflection that seemed to be inspecting her. “And… what about him?” She asked, “What does he mean?”

The second changeling approached to the lip of the pool to get a closer look. “Why does he have to mean anything?” he asked with a playful flutter of his wings. As the pegasus approached, Latere Vesco noticed something from the corner of her eye, something that she really wished that she hadn't. A nightmarish visage reflected in the pool. The reflection of Madness itself.

***

Lacus was so startled he sprang out of the nearly solid sludge that bound him. Once upon the stone floor, he scrambled to an upright position, and looked around in confusion as a hot towel fell from his face. While a coincidence, it was a lucky one that all the liquids in this room were opaque. The boon being that it meant that they did not easily bear reflections; as Lacus could not stand to see another just yet. The spa sisters—who had apparently stepped out as he was entranced—came rushing back in to see what all the commotion was about.

While Aloe checked the bath tub for possible faults, Lotus sounded off with notable concern: “Vat is ze matter?”

It was a question that had an answer that was hard to explain.

“Sorry! Sorry! I didn't mean to cause a ruckus,” Lacus said as he tried to calm himself. He couldn't very well expect them to understand something that he was still trying to make sense of himself. That, not only was he a shadow puppet, but he was one that wasn't even real. He was starting to give up on the idea that his destiny was his own to command. And, in an attempt to break away from it he inadvertently lead himself directly to it; but now was a moment of choice. He decided to seize the opportunity. “I think I just fell asleep and swallowed some mud,” he sheepishly added to his explanation.

This helped the sisters to also calm down. As Lotus sighed in relief, Aloe suggested that he try a relaxing steam instead; after a shower of course. Lacus agreed, since the sauna would certainly leave him to himself to explore this new ability and, of all the things he feared, it was the not knowing that drove him. He was certain that there were more answers to be had from this alternate version of himself, and if he was going to be able to hold on to his sanity, then he needed at least one more chance to dictate the course of his mind.

Throughout his shower and entry to the sauna, Lacus cleared his mind of distractions, picturing clearly the face of Latere Vesco. Trying to observe rather than to relive as the mists in the sauna cleared away the reality his body inhabited. Though the memories the face evoked were not that of listening, but rather commanding.