> To Cure Deception
>  by LegionPothIX
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Act 0 | Forward
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I don't fucking know, sir," a changeling once more growled in response to her superior's inquiry, "I was just asked to deliver it to you when I made my own report."

"Sit down, H.K.," the handler ordered his agent, "We're going to go over this once more from the top." The handler read aloud the unedited cover letter, hoof-delivered by the changeling in question, which topped off a stack of papers bearing the red stamp of 'Classified: Queen’s Executive Directive' over a black stamp of 'Field Report'.



Evolution Institute
CC: Director of Internal Affairs, Watchlist Management, HSB Oversight Committee

To whom it may concern,
I understand that by the time you receive this there, you will have more questions than answers, given the events that have unfolded in the past weeks, and the subsequent injunctions. Though I've been declared dead, and have been assigned Q.E.D. watchlist status; I still feel it my duty to clear up any questions that remained unanswered by your investigations. As you've no doubt already discovered the seemingly disconnected events that led us to this position, and you must be wondering how exactly they fit together to cause a changeling such as myself to do what I did.

I can only explain it to you the way I remember it, and this will be my final mission report. Do bear in mind you know my squad better than anyling, the propensity that one member has for profanity, and the many sanctions she has on file for it. Note that I no longer feel any obligation to curtail her for your sake.

Regards,
Lucas Greymane




> Act 1 | Hospital Dance Party
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The quiet, rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor set the tempo for the busy pace that the hospital’s corridors maintained. Medical practitioners rushed about and a near-choir of hoof-beats that were tapped out on the tile floors. A sudden spike in blood pressure caused a corresponding surge in beats as a shout rang out from a bedridden stallion, “Lucas!”

It was an echo into the waking world. The word came with a sudden lurch from the changeling, as his eyes burst open wider than the glass-paned oculus that let the morning light filter into the room. The taunts from the mare in his dreams couldn't be heard in this small room, but that didn't stop the changeling from scanning it just to be sure.

His eyes made a quick pass over his fore-legs, as he sat up, while his mane grazed his forehead. After which he flopped back onto the bed with a sigh of relief. No holes: he was solid. No jagged horn disrupted the movements of his mane. Nor did he feel his insect wings crunch beneath him. His coat wasn't the tell-tale Canterlot Black but instead a muddy brackish-brown, with blue splotches, that he could deal with later. Finally, he was relieved that he saw no sign of other changelings, but for what reason he couldn't readily identify.

A clipboard came levitating into view, enshrouded by a faint aura. The magic was a shade of dark blue that matched the eyes of the caramel colored doctor standing at the foot of his bed. “Lucas?” he asked, “Is that somepony you know?”

The changeling quickly pulled the covers up to his shoulders before replying, “Uhm… that’s how I pronounced my name when I was a ha-foal!” The changeling found himself sweating bullets, at having almost blown his cover with the word hatchling, while trying to explain away the identity crisis. “How did I get here?” he counter-queried.

A few pages magically flipped on the chart before a dry recitation was given, “A yellow pegasus found you near a pond that her chickens frequently play in.” He peered over the chart before continuing, “You’re quite lucky; you nearly drowned. When you’re fit to do so, you should express your gratitude to the mare who brought you in.”

After forcing a weak smile the changeling replied: “I don’t really remember any of that.” He thought that drowning is not the kind of thing that anypony should feel thankful for, but those thoughts were interrupted by the grinding pain of hunger.

“Huh. Nothing at all?” the doctor asked. He was seemingly oblivious to the changeling’s plight as he continued flipping through the file, and added: “She’s down in the lobby now; filling out paperwork.” The doctor paused to add a note regarding the patient's improved condition to the chart. “You said your name was Lucas? We didn't have one to put on your chart.”

Two names rattled about in his head. He couldn't be sure which was the alias, and which was real. When he heard one of the two from his attending physician, the changeling grimaced at the filly-phonetic-foul, and committed to the other. Though, he was unsure as to why neither name sat right with him.

“It’s Lacus, actually,” he matter-of-factly corrected.

“Pools?” The doctor raised his eyebrow with the question.

“What?” Lacus responded. He was both irritated and slightly relieved that this was what his attending physician decided to focus on, rather than the gross discoloration in his coat.

The unicorn doctor magically pulled a quill from his jacket to amend the chart. “Your name, it’s Latin, it means pools. Your parents must have been either very clever, or very cruel, to name an infant pools–” Doctor Horse stopped briefly before thoughtfully adding, “or puddles, if you prefer. Is it a first or last name?”

Trying to find an answer for even himself, Lacus’s mind raced through the question of how a changeling could get into Ponyville without there being a record of it, but the names Lucas Greymane and Lacus Sceleratus were all he could retrieve.

“First,” Lacus replied in a succinctly annoyed tone despite, or perhaps because of, an attachment to frank and hurtful things.

“Cruel then. What is your last name, if any?” the doctor quipped as he amended the chart again.

“I can’t really recall,” Lacus lied. Until he knew what was going on, he thought it best not to fully commit to either one or the other.

"Does 'HoH&HD' or 'HSB:HK' mean anything to you? They were scrawled on a note found in your possession." The final question before the doctor launched into his diagnosis was met with a vacant stare from the apparent earth-stallion, so the doctor shrugged and went on, “The amnesia is likely a side effect of the drowning so it should be temporary.”

At the statement of amnesia, Lacus felt inexplicably compelled to try to salvage his dignity. “No. It’s not that,” he blurted out. “I know that I know who I am, but I just can’t seem to... get at those memories…” His train of thought drifted off the rails as he realized what he was describing.

The embarrassment of the realization was compounded when the doctor interjected with, “Interesting...” while he added 'confusion' to the clipboard. “Since this is the second case this week of Poison Joke related amnesia, we need to notify the authorities for safety reasons; there may be a new strain.”

The delivery of the statement was as sterile as the hospital they were in but it still perturbed Lacus. Something about the phrase "notify the authorities" triggered a primal fear in the changeling. He had to get out before they did, but he needed an opening. His apprehension was impossible to hide completely so he attempted to mask it with a question. “You think my memory problems are related to this… Poison Joke?”

In a tone that suggested what he was about to say was common knowledge, he explained: “If it is a side effect of the Poison Joke, then there is a remedy. However– we don’t carry it. For some reason being poisoned is not something that the ponies of this town feel they need to see a doctor about.”

This exasperated Lacus, and it took all his focus to limit his response to mere aggravation rather than directed rage as he asked: “You don’t carry an antitoxin for—oh just using my imagination here—this exact type of scenario?”

With a stiff upper lip the doctor revealed the struck nerve but resisted responding in kind, “It isn't life threatening and, as I have told you, nopony comes to us for the cure. So even if we had some it would simply expire on the shelves.” He ended with a sigh, rather than a scowl, and it was apparent that the frustration in his voice was due to his inability to provide any more aid.

Great, Lacus thought, H.K. would have a field day if she ever found out, though I really should try to get a sample for her anyway. Well later– his mind stopped dead on the rails. He wanted to ask himself who, what, and how, but it would have to wait until he wasn't under the threat of going under knife since he couldn't afford to be distracted just yet.

Trying not to sound too eager he took a breath to calm himself before attempting to create a reason to leave. “If I have Poison Joke, something you don’t normally treat—and something that isn't life threatening—then why am I here?” Lacus asked with genuine confusion.

The way the doctor’s eyes narrowed suggested that he was starting to suspect that Lacus had suffered brain damage after all. “Apart from the almost dying in a pool of your own filth;” the doctor explained, “you have other symptoms we can’t yet identify.”

Lacus returned to an agitated state at again being so nearly discovered. Changelings have a very different anatomy than regular ponies, and he didn't want be the one to give up those ghosts. His nervousness transformed back to embarrassment when the precocious rumbling of his stomach drowned out the other sounds of life in the hospital.

Acknowledging the biological need the doctor turned to leave while ending with: “I’ll send an orderly to fetch you some food.”

Deciding to play along till he could make his escape Lacus waited a moment or two for the doctor to get down the hallway before quietly cantering out of his room. Whereupon he was comedically tackled by a very large dog. No. Wait, he questioned his senses, that’s a pony. Is… is it barking?

Before he could think on it any further she scrambled up and dashed off in a two-tone blur of blues with an orderly, and guard, hot on her tail. This is it! he thought, while recognizing that the distraction that he needed was galloping away. He stared intently at her jostling hindquarters as her gown whipped back and forth—obscuring the treasure he so desperately desired to see.

Cutiemark-cutiemark-cutiemark-CUTIEMARK! he chanted in his mind and as she rounded the corner it came into view for but a moment. A screw? He thought to himself how strange that was as if her special talent was some form of clinical insanity; as if that was somehow acceptable in pony society. Regardless, he reasoned while mentally shrugging, it shouldn't be difficult to duplicate her to get out of this hospital more-or-less undetected. 

He scrambled up and bolted after them full tilt. After rounding the corner he slid to a stop near the first door that was left ajar in the confusion: a maintenance storage closet. Inside the light was on so he figured that it should be able to transform without attracting too much attention since the green flair would diffuse in the soft yellow glow.

"Fwoosh!"

It was convenient that he was now blue, since the poison joke now blended in with his new coat. "She was barking," he asked himself, "how did it sound?"

“Bark. Bark. Bark!”

Yeah, like that—wait a minute, that came from… Lacus’s about-face turn put the doppelganger mirror to the genuine article and he knew that this was the biggest kind of screw-up possible for a changeling.

She happily barked again, and quickly followed up the strange “statement” by dragging the broad flat of her tongue across his face.

But… she’s crazy right? He desperately tried to rationalize the mistake, Who’d believe her? He could tell that her barking had given them away and that he had to come up with a plan; and fast. Everyone was treating her like a crazy pony, even though she seemed to identify as canine. He could relate to being treated as something that he’s not and considered that it might be best to oblige her.

In what could only be a best approximation of what should be her mannerisms he begged the question: “Who’s a good dog? You are. You are!”

She cocked her head to the side and panted happily.

Lacus could barely believe this was working. “Now sit,” he pleadingly whispered with her voice, which she did without hesitation. Lacus grinned anxiously. She may be crazy but at least she’s crazy good at what she’s crazy for. His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of trotting coming toward them from down the hall. “If you be a good girl, and stay here, you’ll get a treat! You’d like that wouldn't you? Yes you would! Because you’re a good girl!” he, now she, hurriedly whispered. She licked his, being her, face again and smiled warmly before resuming her panting.

Lacus pulled some towels off a shelf and draped them over her– the real her. The sound of the twisting doorknob indicated that he was not a moment too soon. In response he reared up on his hind legs and brung his fore hooves down on the door; which allowed him to burst out of the closet in a full gallop.

While barking madly he bull-rush past the orderly at its handle. Then, after leaping over the guard, he dashed down the hall. To round a corner without losing momentum, he kicked off the wall, where a sign engraved with ‘Psychiatric Ward’ hung.

He wasn't familiar enough with the hospital’s layout to find an easy exit and, from the windows he passed while running about like a loon, he gauged that he was on the second floor. A strategy came to him in a flash when he considered what that meant. It wasn't inconceivable that the pony he was pretending to be might jump from one of these windows, and he figured that he should be okay if he tucked in his legs, and rolled with the fall.

He knew that his room would be empty, but he didn't want to draw attention to that fact. Seeing another empty room at the end of the hall, he pushed himself into a high sprint and hit the empty bed like the Friendship Express. Bouncing into a spin, he grabbed a pillow with her teeth and hurled it at the window.

A crack in the frame spread from where his hind hooves came down, as he shoulder tackled through the pane while using the pillow as a shield to deflect broken glass. Having damaged the frame with his hooves before the full impact of her body caused the shards to fly out at an angle. As to not risk landing in any sharp fragments, he pushed off the windowsill into a rolling dive in the opposite direction, and when he tumbled out of the bushes two guards stormed out of the lobby in pursuit.

It would seem this wasn't the first time this pony had tried to break out of the hospital. In the midst of the commotion the only other thing on the changeling’s mind was how hungry he was. He knew that he had to find a new face before he could lose his tail and, while there were plenty to choose from on the way, he was also certain that the guards would also see them in the pursuit. Out of sight, in one of the many coming alleyways, he heard a conversation playing out.

“Doctor, look! It’s glowing! Is it supposed to do that!?” a mare frantically questioned.

“Well don’t touch it!” shouted the stallion in a thick accent.

“Doctor, come quick! It’s making the noise,” the mare exclaimed in a panic.

It was at this point that Lacus passed the alley they were in and his eyes darted over his form’s feminine shoulder to assess the events therein. He saw a tan stallion poking his head into a large blue box labeled: Pony Public Call Box. His nut-brown hair slightly occluded by a sign that read “PULL TO OPEN” further detailing instructions to distant to read.

Lacus also took note of the stallion’s hourglass cutiemark.

The ruckus outside of the box briefly caught the stallion’s attention. His big brown eyes locked with the magenta eyes of the Screwy-formed changeling for the last fleeting moment that she passed by the alleyways mouth. That was, before the impending catastrophe inside the box reclaimed the stallion’s attention.

Though now out of sight to him Lacus figured that, if the duo were drawn inside before they were observed by his pursuers, then that form would be as good as any to take. Though he didn't know the stallion’s name he could simply insist on being called “doctor” if necessary.

As to not risk exposing their presence, the apparently barking-mad mare continued on for a short while longer before hearing the distinctive wail of a dying engine whirring behind him. He wasn't sure what it meant, but the conversation stopped in-spite of the panic they were in, so he reasoned that they were also out of sight.

Lacus found herself power-sliding through the turn into an adjacent alleyway. Rather than the traditional “hooves up” lateral transformation, since the circumstances could not accommodate its ease, a shimmer moved vertically about his feminine form; as if he had passed through a magical barrier that lie just out of sight to those pursuant to him.

A cramp in his left foreleg sent the renewed stallion headlong into some refuse bins, which spilled garbage out everywhere, and made quite a racket. Panic was all that he could feel as he lay in the leftover party decorations; his light-brown coat smeared with frosting. He was just struggling to stand up again when the guards rushed in.

Immediately he blurted out: “Thank Luna you’re here!” The estranged sentiment rusted his silver tongue, which forced the subsequent truths as he stumbled over the idea. “Some crazy pony just knocked me into the trash!” The exasperating exclamation came whilst he tried to hide just how out of breath that he was. “She’s a danger to herself, and everypony around her, you should get after her right now!” he added in a huff.

They reached down to offer him a helping hoof but Lacus waved them off to signify the bigger danger was getting away. With no reason to suspect him the guards resumed their pursuit of what was now an even more imaginary mare. While the changeling limped back out of the alleyway he remained oblivious to the prophetic nature of his statements; as it was masked in the dialectical ambiguity of the word “she”.

Though exhausted, but uplifted by the scent of love in the air, he still managed a smirk on his way to the entrance to Sugarcube Corner. In hindsight it was a kiss of serendipity that he fell into the garbage. The assorted colors of the unfavored party-favors had masked the blue spots that surely should have given him away. He shook from his mane what confetti and confections that he could before trotting into the bakery. While he needed to figure out who he was, he couldn't do that on an empty stomach.

He held the door for a sandy-tan unicorn who was exiting as he entered. A look of recognition despoiled the tranquility of her expression, and a single letter slipped from her lips, "...D?"

Before Lacus could make introductions as 'the doctor' she grimaced and quickly brushed past him with a tear in her eye. A strange case of mistaken identity? Lacus noted as his hoof hesitantly wavered. After quick consideration of his present priorities the stallion stepped into the establishment.
> Act 1 | Lunch at Sugarcube Corner
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Good morning,” the changeling announced with the Doctor’s face and accent to the proprietor. 

“Good morning, Doctor. I’m sorry we don’t have any gummy fillies today,” Mrs. Cake sweetly responded with an apologetic smile as she loaded a fresh batch of bran muffins into the display case. “Can I get you something else? A puddle of soup perhaps?” The gracious offer came with a hoof directing the eye to a newly expanded “tooth friendly” menu that added to what the sign assured was their classic repertoire.

After a quick inspection of the bubbly pink font, offset by an equally pink bubbly mare holding on high a comically large tooth, Lacus shook his head. “Pinkie Pie sure does look happy though,” he noted, referencing the adage scrawled across the bottom that began with You’ll love it or my name isn’t.

“Yep! So, what can I getcha?” Mrs. Cake inquired as she leaned on the display case.

Knowing she couldn’t give him what he needed, Lacus took the opportunity to dismiss himself from the conversation. “I’m sorry, I’m just meeting someone here today.” 

Mrs. Cake nodded and Lacus forced a friendly chuckle at the sign, before turning to find a booth by a loving couple celebrating some special occasion. Was it an anniversary? Perhaps a birthday? He assessed, while trying to gauge the vintage of the love that was all but visibly hanging in the air.

Mrs. Cake added from the counter when he left, “That’s alright, it’ll still be here later if you change your mind.”

In sitting down behind the loving couple, it took every ounce of restraint not to just drain them dry. Instinct, or intuition, either way it was easy to imagine how easily feeding covertly, in public, and as a third party could go wrong if not handled with discretion. 

He focused intently on the pang of hunger striking through his being, and let it serve as a void to draw in their ambient love. The process was delicate, because if he didn't draw from each equally, steadily, and slowly, they would become suspicious. Though they may not be able to link it to him directly, that suspicion could very well alter their mood thereby causing the well to be capped, and he would have to try again elsewhere.

Even though this earth pony’s form had no horn, he could still feel that it was a part of him. He closed his eyes and imagined his horn serving as both a lightning rod and anchor. The positive energy of love moved invisibly through the air, channeling into it, and filtered down into the void, slowly sating it– if only temporarily. During the minutes that rolled on as he fed, the conversation took a slow and sour turn. It was becoming one of those moments that simply ruins an entire day, and one such day that strings into an entire week of misfortune.

Everyone has had at least one of those moments. A moment where all the joy from their very being was drained away, from what they thought was a negative situation, and it was Lacus who was at the center of this one. As the couple began quarreling, he considered simply slipping out unnoticed. However, before he could get up to leave the vision of that crazy pony whose form he borrowed filled his mind. With the image came the realization that she was probably still waiting in that closet for the treat he promised her. If I am going to be a changeling then I had better be the best that I can. He resolutely stood up to confront what he had done and found himself rationalizing that, After all, if their relationship ends, food will just become all that much harder to come by.

Lacus slid into their booth, sitting across the table from the unhappy couple, and said nothing while waiting to be acknowledged. The conversation quickly ground to a halt at his appearance. Awkward was the silence accompanying mental-gears grinding against the spanner that was this stallion. A stallion who clearly hadn't an ounce of shame in his body.

“Who do you–” began the candy cutiemarked mare as her sapphire eyes fixed on interloper.

To which Lacus quickly cut her off with a fictitious introduction. “I am a professor of history from Canterlot,” Lacus began; mirroring the accent he heard in the alley. “But you may call me Doctor,” he curtly offered. He wasn't sure why the "Doctor" it was just what he had heard.

“What do you want? We’re trying to have a conversation here!” interrupted the mare, her magenta and purple hair bobbed with frustration.

Lacus smiled as he put his fore-hooves on the table and anxiously clicked his hooves together. He could feel in his bones that he had a knack for this sort of thing, even if why was still a mystery. After clearing his throat he narrowed his gaze at the pair.

“I’m glad you asked!” he said. Giving no pause for interruption he explained, “You see, as a historian, it is my job to point out the relevant bits of history that can help future generations so they do not repeat the mistakes of the past.” As he spoke, his gaze became less intense and turned to a look of introspection. “This may seem like ancient history to you right now, but not more than ten minutes ago a loving couple walked into this place to celebrate a special day,” Lacus added as he thoughtfully tapped a free hoof on his chin.

As for the other mare: her mint colored coat flushed red with rage that she was so visibly bursting with, and was quite dying to express. She had no sooner opened her mouth to do so when it was filled with a caramel colored hoof of the impostor.

“Your anger is certainly understandable, and don’t let anyone tell you that you’re wrong for having such feelings… just try to remember why you came here in the first place.” Lacus finished his lecture while eyeing her intently, and doing his best to offer a warm, fatherly smile. Smiles were something he felt was the most draining part of the whole song and dance, but the finale was the most important bit.

“But she–” stammered the mint mare mouth still full of hoof.

Lacus flatly said: “I would hate to see you relive my mistakes.” His eyes narrowed sharply as if to communicate an underlying threat. A threat, not of physical harm, but the regret associated with the inability to unring a bell. Though it felt right, or ‘wrong’ as it troubled his soul, it felt natural to say.

Embarrassment filled their eyes, and the ‘Doctor’ withdrew his hooves to allow them to perform their respective walks of shame unhindered. Lacus expected this type of thing wouldn't normally work if they weren't stunned by the sheer audacity of his actions and the dominating way in which they were executed.

“Aww~ That was so sweet and kinda sad!” The words were delivered in a candy-coated voice that was as pink as the blob that bounded over the barrier and landed in the recently-vacated seat.

Lacus was so startled he nearly lost form. After regaining his composure, he thought about how foolish he was to walk into the lion’s den and not expect to be confronted by the queen of the pride. He was left no alternative when he spoke, other than to trust his gut.

“Hello, Pinkie… You heard that huh?” he asked, while hoping that he didn't sound too shocked.

“I didn't know you came back! I heard your box go vorp vorp vorp woosh~ and thought that you had left with your friend and I got all sad because I didn't get to say hello but I was on my way to the hospital to cheer up this new pony but he wasn't there and the doctors didn't know what happened and…”

The more Pinkie talked, the faster her words ran together, and the more unbearable her pitch became. It was good that she needed to take this deep breath since, if she wasn't talking about him, then he would have been completely lost by this random outburst.

“Ahh!” She continued breathing in before an odd hesitation. “Wait did you sort-of-say that you and your special somepony had a fight?” she asked with genuine concern.

The more she spoke the more he was able to get a sense of whom she was, but was caught off guard by the question, because he didn't peg concern as the mainstay of this air-headed mare. Lacus had simply assumed she would be willfully oblivious to such depressing things.

“Yeah, I guess I kind of implied that, didn't I?” Lacus sheepishly admitted. He considered blowing her off, but thought that may attract even more unwanted attention. He figured that if he could placate her interest with a story, then she may leave him be.  He gave some consideration to the mares in his life that he could craft a believable narrative about, but the list was incredibly short. Just one and he felt guilty for even going there.

“What happened?” The question came with a once-over visual inspection. “And why do you have Poison Joke?”

Lacus grimaced uncomfortably and glanced to the blue spots on his caramel coat. He hadn't realized, or considered, what he implied with what he said and because of this it was plain to see that Pinkie Pie’s powers of perception were dangerous. He could tell right away that she had unprecedented social aptitude, despite her eccentricities, which would make her exceedingly difficult to fool. Without a doubt if anyone could spot an impostor it would be her. 

Blowing her off would be too dangerous because it would arouse further suspicion. He would have to rely on context to twist her interpretations while trusting his gut to deliver something convincing. Only that would only be enough to get past her. “It’s a sad kind of story. You sure you’re up for it?” he asked hoping that she’d take the bait and opt out.

Clearly he was mistaken as she responded: “Anything to turn that frown upside down!”

Lacus thought carefully about which details he could embellish, which needed trivializing, and which he could emphasize as to keep Pinkie from getting too suspicious; but he needed more time to think so he suggested the irresistible. “Pinkie, why don’t you get yourself a milkshake while I clear this table?”

A shrill squeal with delight preceded her response. “That sounds great! A milkshake is sure to make you feel better!”

Lacus nearly hemorrhaged at the sound and could only offer a weak, “No, that’s alright, I've already had one.” It was a bald-faced lie that he immediately regretted because Pinkie pressed the issue.

“Really? What flavor?” she asked.

He didn't think that she was suspicious, just curious, but he still considered it strike one. He hesitantly responded choosing his words very carefully: “I think that, deep down, they’re all really just sugar flavored–”

Another shriek as Pinkie exclaimed: “Sugar flavored? That’s my favorite!”

Lacus cleared the dishes left by the previous occupants as Pinkie returned with what would be—for any other pony—a comically large portion, generously described as a barrel, of ice cream blend. Sadly, Lacus suspected that Pinkie was showing restraint in view of the perceived severity of circumstances.

Though one might accuse the changeling of irony, he felt it best to let his heart do the talking since his mind wasn't exactly up to the task. Talking about himself with other ponies felt difficult, no matter how honest he might want to be, he could never connect with another pony so long as he was forced to live a lie. Now more than ever, since he knew so little about himself due to the Poison Joke. One thing he did know was that every believable lie had a kernel of truth, even if he couldn't exactly say how he knew it.

“I don’t remember all of the details,” he began as they sat down and verbally underlined that part as attention to these little details was important, “Because it happened a while ago.”

Pinkie pulled the spoon from her mouth, having only shoveled in a few bites worth of whipped cream, so she could speak. “I don’t understand,” she began, “I didn't even know you had a special somepony and I know just about everypony in Ponyville. Who’d keep such party-worthy news like that from me?”

A short pause of masked frustration knowing that if she was stuck here then there was no way he could get her to the end of the story in the way he wanted. “It happened before I came to Ponyville, and she didn't come with me, so there’d have been no way you could have…" an awkward pause preceded the awkward conclusion, "helped us celebrate our togetherness...” His statement ended in a tone that said it’s complicated on social media.

“Ohhh…” Pinkie responded acknowledging but not interrupting.

“You see. We weren't exactly together anyway,” Lacus began again but quickly continued anticipating Pinkie’s confusion, “but I worshiped her. There wasn't anything that I wouldn't do for her, and that made her a special somepony to me—even if I wasn't special to her.” To that, Pinkie’s eyes widened between spoonfuls, or was that a ladle?

Between mouthfuls of ice cream she asked: “So what happened? Did she shoot you down?”

Lacus grinned. Intentional or not, he felt that this was a trap; that the easy answer would be yes and let it be. But his gut told a different story, and Pinkie might unwittingly call him in the obvious paradox of personality vs history. His personality, or at the very least the "Doctor’s" personality, probably didn't lend well to self-pity given that others could count on him in an emergency.

Wryly he continued, “It really is tempting to say yes, but no, I never got up the nerve to talk to her about it.” He tapped his hooves nervously trying to decide how to proceed in the story. There was no way he could tell Pinkie Pie he was actually talking about Queen Chrysalis, and it was almost too strange putting his nebulous feelings into words without knowing for certain what was real.

Pinkie saw the nonverbal cues, and interpreted them appropriately for the context she was in: talking to her earth pony friend about a special somepony. “It’s alright, Doctor, not everyone is good at talking to mares, especially not ones like–” she started to say.

Lacus cut her off with gusto. He knew she was going to reference the female companion, and the nature of their relationship; both of which he knew literally nothing about. “No,” his voice was authoritative in the singularly short word before returning to a more peaceable tone, “For once, this kind of story isn't about the mare.”

Pinkie was shocked, but intrigued. The kind of look filled her face that said If I had a mustache I’d be twirling it right now!

Hurriedly, Lacus explained: “Well this is kind of about her. You see, I haven’t always been the stallion you witnessed today.” Lacus mentally cringed at the multiple-entendre combo points that statement was sure to have racked up. Thanks to the Poison Joke, he couldn't even clearly remember the stallion he was this morning, let alone the one he really was, and thought not to dwell on it. Impersonating an impression of himself impersonating others was almost too much to bear; let alone questioning his own reality.

The question that he had inadvertently unleashed upon himself inevitably came as Pinkie cleared her throat. “Who... Doctor, who were you?”

Lacus narrowed his eyes as every façade, with exception of his appearance and accent, simply evaporated. “Not was, Pinkie. Am. A pony carries their mistakes with them forever. The memory of what we were defines what we are. What we are drives what we will become.”

Pinkie was on the edge of her seat, her dairy-filled belly flush against the table; her eyes wide as if he had just struck a chord deep inside her. An accord that plays a dull note she is still coming to terms with. Similarly the absence of his memory raised a quandary in his own heart. Lacus took the opportunity to lean in close in preparation. He felt, in his gut, the most adequate term to use was "monster" but felt that would be extremely melodramatic for being so far out of context as a disguised changeling.

With a gentle rotation of his hoof he beckoned for her to lean closer before whispering into her ear.

“Cold.”

A chill visibly went through Pinkie's spine as she realized that she too was cold, while not realizing at first that it was in a fantastically different way. She issued another shriek, and with it spilled what remained of her milkshake on the floor, before realizing it was a practical joke.

Lacus continued while giving her a coy look. “Like I said: I don’t remember much about the details,” he confessed, “But I know her, and I don’t know if she is somepony I want to be like.” To any ears of his own brood even the mentioning the concept would be treason; let alone trying to convince another that it were true.

Pinkie’s confusion was again written all over her face. Lacus didn't need to hear the question though he knew she had to ask. “But you said you love her…” she stammered.

His retort must have seemed absolutely vapid. “I still do,” he said while reminding Pinkie that tenses are irrelevant to a constant being. “But I, as a pony who can change, recognize a pony who can’t when I see one, and I feel guilty for even wanting her to.” Sorrow filled his eyes as he delivered another entendre combo. He then leaned back in his bitter-sweet victory, knowing how dangerously close his statements came to exposing him. He didn't care. He now knew at least one thing about himself and that was that he missed his Queen.

Pinkie muttered frustrated confusions since he clearly was smiling despite the sad story. Part of him wanted to thank her for forcing him to tell her, and another part wanted to drain her to an empty husk, then stage a baking accident with Pie flavored cupcakes.

“But… how’d you get the poison joke? You had to know that stuff's dangerous!” Pinkie’s exclamation was one of exasperation as that detail was conspicuously missing from his story.

Lacus’s reply was almost whimsical. “The usual way,” he said knowing full well that it didn't explain anything, but he behaved as if it explained everything. To which Pinkie’s head looked as if it were going to explode. Even though Lacus wanted to clarify, he didn't have anything further to add to that story, so instead he appended the conversation with a simple: “Where would I go to get this cured anyway?”

Similar to that of a theatrical performer, Pinkie’s countenance changed in but only a moment before she took a deep breath in preparation for another hyper-explanation that Lacus wasn't having any of. He popped his hoof in her mouth at the start of her exhalation, he added: “I seem to be the victim of time here. I know I’m supposed to be doing something important, but I can’t remember exactly what, so please keep this one a least a little shorter okay?”

Pinkie nodded in compliance. “Zecora,” she said as she deflated.

“What?” Lacus’s confusion was evident.

“Zecora’s the only pony in town with the skill to brew an antidote for poison joke,” Pinkie clarified, “I tried to get some at Lotus and Aloe’s spa but they’re all out. I was going to go to the Everfree Forest to get some when I–”

The changeling was shocked by the abridged nature of the explanation, and in an attempt to keep it as such, he cut off the pink mare once more. “Thanks, Miss Pie.” His curt civility was offered with a nod as he made his way to the exit.

Pinkie perked up and called after him, “Wait! I’ll come with you!”

To which Lacus paused grasping for an excuse—any excuse—for that to not happen. He locked eyes with Mrs. Cake who was putting out another batch of muffins; lemon this time. Though left unspoken her face immediately read Oh no you don’t! Lacus responded by flashing a brief devious grin that gleamed, Oh, yes. I do. He turned to Pinkie Pie and announced: “Pinkie! Don’t you think it is unfair that Mrs. Cake should have to clean up that mess?”

A sigh of relief could be heard coming from Mrs. Cake at the unexpected turn of events.

Lacus let his grin re-emerge briefly, though slightly wider than before, as to say But wait, there's more! before continuing to Pinkie, “What if some poor scared pony comes in while you’re out?” That wasn't going to happen but it was no longer his concern. Mrs. Cake’s eyes narrowed shooting him daggers forged of buck-yous, smelted in the hell fires that he so rightly deserved, as Pinkie’s excitement cranked up to eleven.

“Oh my gosh you’re right! What if he thinks Ponyville is full of jerks? I’m like Ponyville's unofficial ambassador and that would make me a jerk–” Pinkie began as Lacus made his exit.
> Act 1 | A Trip in the Library
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The door to Sugarcube Corner closed behind Lacus and with it what was certain to be a ten minute rant was locked away, safely out of earshot. A rant that was sure to end in either Cake or Pie breaking down into tears. A sigh of relief slipped past his lips as they carved a wicked smile into his face. He rhetorically wondered, What could be more satisfying than a job well done? Though he felt bad for sticking Mrs. Cake with Pinkie, he also knew it bought him some time to be himself; whomever that was. He stepped into the alleyway for a moment to think.

He found it so strange that he couldn't remember the personal details of his life, but there were hints at deeper connections that were locked away by petals of blue. He began to question why this affliction was the outcome of his exposure, and if it worked that way for everypony. “Poison Joke huh…” he muttered to himself. The name implied that something about it was supposed to be funny. Perhaps some subtle irony he was failing to see. The more he thought about it the more his smile turned grim, until it faded entirely, and left only his fangs exposed. He just couldn't see the humor in being personally attacked to the extent of having his personality stripped away; by a plant none the less. He was left with almost nothing.

He briefly entertained the idea of finding this Zecora right away but not for the "almost" qualifier. He knew he had something that he couldn't remember finishing; a fact that ate at him too much to put off any longer. The note he was found with identified two things, one he suspected was a pony, perhaps a handler or contact, but the other he was unsure about. The fact that was all he had on him when found was an important one he couldn't overlook. Since he was presumably on assignment to Ponyville, it was reasonable to assume that the Ponyville library may have more information about this mysterious HoH&HD.

No sooner did he choose his destination, then he heard the noise that Pinkie Pie imitated with surprising aptitude—the one that she called the box noise—coming from the next alley over. Lacus was quickly reminded of which face he was wearing when a familiar voice trailed out into the street.

“Well how was I supposed to know that they–” And, as quickly as it began so too it ended with an interruption.

“Oh hello, Doctor! We’re glad we ran into you again. Aren't we Lyra?” Bon Bon said with moderate hesitation.

Lacus heart skipped a beat as he tried to imagine the original's face, which he was also wearing, twisting in confusion of the situation. The instant familiarity these two mares were addressing the real article about a situation played out by a duplicate defines paradox for a changeling. To be and be forgotten is the nature of infiltration, and Lacus felt some small irony on that note. His instinct told him that for an original to be confronted for an event it had no part would breed suspicion– especially so soon after the event. He could barely hear The Doctor over the sound of his own violently pumping pulse.

The short pause ended with the confusion, that Lacus had imagined would be present, audibly clinging to the words as the Doctor said: “Hello, Sweetie Drops, is it?”

Lucas knew it was time to save face, since the real one was only a few paces away, and if someone spotted the two together there would be big trouble. Lacus shifted forms in the pause between the obvious lead in and the minty mare’s response. He could only think to shift back into the form he was committed to the hospital in. Though this time he cleared up the particulars. With a flash of green light a cutiemark now adorned the hyper-tense flank of the dirt-brown changeling with the grass-green mane. It was only then that Lacus could be free to leave the alleyway whilst trying to seem as casual as possible.

As he turned toward the library an audio queue from Lyra suggested that Bon Bon may have nodded as Lyra reluctantly added: “Yeah, you were right…” Her tone was filled with remorse as she followed up, “We’re sorry for how we treated you.” The bashful apology concluded with hooves scraping against the gravel.

The urge for Lacus to stop and watch was almost irresistible. Though, as he passed by he knew that doing so would only be flirting with disaster. Just another pony, the phrase tumbled over and over again in his mind, just stay in the background.

As he trotted past he saw the real Doctor standing next to that big blue box of his. The Doctor who—without missing a beat—cheerfully responded: “Okay then! As long as you've learned your lesson, all is forgiven!” The line was delivered with a big cheesy smile that hinted at his uncertainty in the situation, though the mares then made their graceful exits by trotting in the other direction.

“What was that about?” a third feminine voice questioned. A question that was accompanied by the rickety squeak of closing the box’s door.

Lacus was nearly out of earshot when the puzzled voice of The Doctor addressed her unanswerable question with a chuckle. “I have no idea—maybe it hasn't happened yet!”


***


As he approached the library, Lacus was still wrestling with the conundrum at Sugarcube Corner. It was difficult, if not impossible, for him to believe that a stallion could chalk up a continuity error in his reality as precognition, or… possibly post-cognition? He couldn't put his hoof on it because it was more reasonable for the stallion just to reject the notion entirely, and to think the girls were mistaking him for some other pony because they actually were. Lacus hung his head at the paradox; unbeknownst to him there was an object in its path.

A thud resonated through his skull and the through door to the Library itself. He cupped his face with his hooves he rubbed his eyes. It really hurt, and he thought about how he had better start paying more attention to the environment as it changed around him. His eyes were still a bit hazy as a purple blob opened the door and addressed him. Though the address was drowned out by the ringing in his ears.

As it came into focus a baby dragon echoed the sentiment; seemingly repeating himself. “Twilight’s not here,” Spike said.

Lacus looked down to Spike, who was wearing an apron and holding a feather duster, then past him to a large stack of books, then overhead to the sign outside that read “Golden Oak Library”, before finally returning his gaze to the dragon.

“This is Ponyville’s public library, isn't it?” Lacus asked in a confused tone that he hoped didn't sound too forced, knowing full well that it was, and that he did. “Are you the librarian?” Lacus continued, looking to the minion of Magic with a raised eyebrow.

Spike folded his arms in annoyance while responding: “No, I’m not a librarian, I’m a dragon, and like I said Twilight isn't here right now.”

Lacus motioned to the stack of books behind Spike, and then conspicuously eyed the odd attire before begging the question in the most pleasant tone he could muster: “You’re not the librarian? You just clean and organize the place, make sure all the books get back where they belong, and ensure every word is accounted for?” After a momentary pause he smiled warmly, and added: “I don’t think you give yourself enough credit, Mr…?”

The sentence was an invitation for the dragon to introduce himself to this persona that he probably hadn't met yet as well as do a bit of boasting to put his mind at ease. A look of recognition filled Spike’s eyes as he put forth his claw at the shameless flattery he was receiving. This gesture in turn caused Lacus to wonder how accurate his statements had actually been.

“My name’s Spike!” the dragon proudly proclaimed as they shook on it, “And you’re right.” Continuing on in a boastful tone, he added: “I do run this place.” Spike turned to walk back inside while eyeing an empty bird-stand.

Lacus followed him in while offering a greeting of his own, “Pleasure to meet you Spike. My name is Lucas Greymane."

Spike turned to Lacus with narrowed scrutiny. “Your mane is green,” he noted as Lacus brushed past him.

Turning to offer a retort, Lacus patted Spike on the head. “These are fins.”

He made his way to the nearest shelf while Spike closed the door. Sitting before it he scanned the titles, hoping that something would jog his memory, when Spike spoke up. “Hey, you’re that new pony in town who got poison joke.” Spike couldn't help but end the sentence in a snicker. Lacus frowned but didn't acknowledge it any further until Spike persisted, “Don’tcha know that stuff is bad news? What were you doing with it anyway?”

Both were valid questions, which he didn't know the answer to either of, so he responded the only way he could, “Can’t really know something you've never experienced...” The statement was so painfully vague, grey even, that Lacus was curious if it changed the color of his mane or tongue when he uttered it. Thankfully it was also a statement sufficiently pseudo-intellectual that a baby dragon might just believe it to be profound enough not to question it. “Speaking of…” Lacus began by craning his neck to address Spike directly, “ I am looking for a text on H and HD.” Lacus worked in a more subtle pseudo-intellectual tone: “You see, our library didn't have it.” The explanation was as purposefully vacant as the stare that accompanied it.

The library grew silent, but not in a reverent way, as Spike fidgeted with a response that he clearly didn't want to deliver. “Hearts and Hooves Day?” he uncomfortably questioned, “Why would you want to read that dusty old book?”

Why indeed? Lacus thought as he turned back to the book case. He would be furious with his time being wasted on this ridiculous pony celebration if he wasn't soaking in the sheer audacity that comes with successfully stealing one’s own pants. For a reminder, he glanced down at his cover cutiemark to be sure he wasn't about to say something outlandish. Observing the speech bubble with two interlocked gears caused him to sigh internally. Great. That could mean anything, the words railed quickly through his head a he looked back to Spike.

“Well you see, Spike,” he began shortly before pausing to indicate his flank, “I’m something of an analyst and our past is is as much a part of who we are as our present. It is the past, after all, that decides the future.” It was beginning to dawn on him how multipurpose the sentiment he found himself echoing for the second time today was.

Lacus was pretty sure that wasn't what the mark was supposed to mean and, though Spike did not seem entirely convinced, he was apparently less hesitant. A single moment turned to a long pause that Lacus made as uncomfortable as possible with his posture alone. He was trying not to intimidate—only to unnerve—Spike; who eventually blurted out:  “Oh. Okay I guess… but you gotta promise me you won’t try to make that love poison.”

Lacus was beside himself. There was a love potion? Did he know about it before his amnesia? He tried to set aside his disbelief for a moment to inquire about it. “There’s a love poison?” he asked Spike. 

The baby dragon nodded cautiously while responding: “Yeah, and some fillies thought it was a love potion, and tried to play matchmaker… Poor Rarity…”

“What?” Lacus didn't so much speak the word as much as he became it.

“Yeah, Carousel Boutique was a complete mess after Cheerilee and Big Mac left!” Spike said with a child-like empathy for Generosity that quickly turned to misty eyed fantasy. Lacus hung his head in his hoof and rubbed the bridge of his muzzle while Spike daydreamed of what was so obviously Rarity by his quiet mutterings.

Before interrupting what he was certain to be fantasies no more erotic than marshmallow eskimo-kisses, Lacus cleared his throat while indicating his blue spots. “I've had quite enough poison to last me a good long while so, trust me, that potion wasn't even on my mind when I asked,” a technical truth delivered with a misleading qualifier. For some reason he just couldn't bring himself to flat out lie to the baby dragon who already seemed so dangerously deluded.

After a moment of visibly shaking the fantasy from his mind Spike replied with a dismissive, “Fine, whatever, I've got to get back to work anyway.” The statement ended with the production of a manual pulled seemingly at random from the main pile of books. Seeing that “Greymane” had neither horn nor saddlebags to carry the book, Spike secured it to the stallion with a short length of rope; so that its pages would not be filled with saliva.

Lacus smiled again and as he did so he found each passing smile got easier than the last. He voiced an exuberant “Thank you!” before guessing that it was probably customary to complement a dragon on their horde upon leaving it with a treasure. Though it might seem odd that he would even do so, it cost him nothing, and Lacus could see the little guy could really use the encouragement.

“May your horde overflow evermore with a bounty of knowledge!” The words came in a voice that Lacus had intended to be charming as he made his way to the door. Spike seemed confused at first but began musing about the manuscripts being treasures in his horde. Lacus glanced over his shoulder to see Spike thoughtfully returning the books to their proper shelves when he walked shoulder first into trouble.

Twilight had returned, and not only that he had bumped right into her.

It would seem that he was as unexpected to her, as she was to him, at least such was the tone of her voice. “What are you doing in my house!?” Twilight excitedly exclaimed with ruffled feathers. “Spike, who is this!?”  she hastily shouted past Lacus to the resident dragon.

Before Spike could make the introductions, Lacus stepped around her defensively explaining: “I was checking out a book from Ponyville’s public library.” He raised his knee to signify checking an imaginary watch. “Oh, would you just look at the time. I mean Poison Joke. I’d better go see Zecora!” he added sardonically.

From behind him Spike piped up, “Ah, Twilight relax, you worry too much. That’s just Lucas and he’s a historian or something.”

Lacus offered a slight bow before the princess which, in conjunction to Spikes word’s, caused her to blush a little; though it was over before she could protest. On his way back up, however, something caught his eye that made the whole world stand still and the heart of the swarm pulsed through his very being. The magnitude of the discovery was enough to draw him into the moment where something clicked inside of him. It was business time.

“Princess, what a lovely necklace! May I inquire where you got it?” Lacus asked while channeling all of his genuine sincerity and also peppering in a bit of a flirtatious tone as to not sound too eager about the item itself. Twilight responded with raised hoof to fidget with the perfectly cut crystalline cardioid.

“Why, thank you!” Her response was one filled with ever present self-consciousness of a nerd who has become popular overnight. “It was a gift from Princess Cadence...” she finished by letting her voice trail off in insecurity, and in the instant her zeal returned as she had been distracted more than enough today. "Spike! Grab your things, we're off to the Crystal Empire to find out what makes a royal pony tick!" 

"Well, don't let me get in your way," Lacus laughed with a nod. He he could feel the amulet pull at him, and he had to get away before he exposed himself. “I just wanted to say it is quite fetching,” the complement was offered as he struggled to tear himself away, “and I hope it treats you well,” he concluded with a knowing nod to her body language meant to signify that he was aware any more attention would make her even more uncomfortable. He was now on course to the Everfree Forest with one thought: This changed everything.
> Act 1 | In Medias Res-olution
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A haunting chill crept into Lacus as he, similarly, crept toward the Everfree Forest. Though unsure as to where he was going the small hoof-worn path through the brush served as his guide. On his approach to the woods, the buildings thinned, as did the path, which indicated not many ponies came by this way. This path then, he thought, must lead to Zecora's residence.

He did not think much about the palette he was found in—save for its blue splotches—but the deeper into to the forest he strode the deeper in him it grew; until he could not tell himself from the forest or the forest from its trees. His soil brown coat, that of deep earth, and his grass green mane seemed to be pulled from beneath these branches as they were only a shade darker than the world outside. He contemplated if it was the darkness, or perhaps the unspoiled nature of it that he felt at home in, while he followed the path that laid sprawled out before him. As he walked it, it wound near a lone cottage on the outer edge of the treeline.

When Lacus passed by, he found that the forest had an anxiety about it. From the road he could see a mare matching the description the physician had given him of his rescuer. He thought the proper thing to do would be to show some gratitude, but even the thought of approaching her rattled him. It was an ominous feeling—difficult to shake, or pin down, as he watched the gentle pegasus give small kindnesses to beasts and fowl alike.

He couldn't quite put his hoof on the source of the disquieting feeling that had taken hold, but the symbolism that the cottage evoked was not lost on him. Here, this isolated structure stood at the precipice of disaster; its confined space shared between a delicate pegasus mare and, from what he could glance at through the window, an amalgamation of many monsters. It spoke to him as a metaphor: that these ponies of Ponyville were not towering statues of morality standing apart from the world they lived in. Rather, small sparks of innocence hovelled at the edge of a treacherous world. Even the ancient castle of their altruistic princesses, that could be seen peaking over the treeline, was overrun by this world’s cruelty. That it lay broken somewhere beyond those ominous branches—buried beneath their shriveled leaves—stood as a testament to that fact.

She called to it by name, Discord, and Lacus thought it best to get moving, least he be spotted and forced into something he ought not be. Once at the edge of the treeline, Lacus hesitated only slightly to observe his shadow intersect that of the trees as one became part of the other. Stepping into the woods was also a bit unsettling at first but, unlike with the mare, this feeling was clear and distinct. The atmosphere was saturated with melancholy, as if it respirated from the trees themselves, and he took it in with his last breath before soldiering on.

His thoughts turned to his task as he continued down the path to Zecora’s home. He wondered if the book he was plotting about actually contained some secret to the changeling condition. From what he gathered from Spike, the concoction therein certainly wasn't intended for pony consumption. Several questions of logistics must be addressed as he considered the situation. Like a puzzle, he turned over all the pieces in his mind, which included the recently discovered pendant of Twilight Sparkle's. He instinctively knew it was a fragment of the Crystal Heart, and he couldn't be sure when he could have come in contact with that mythical artifact, but he could feel its impression still left on him.

It was a funny thing, that heart, that even with his amnesia he could feel its draw as a changeling. Something with the potential to overflow with boundless love does not easily go unnoticed. Nor, should the tables turn, could infinite misery be so easily escaped. And, neither of the two could be so easily forgotten.

As curious as he was about finding himself, he couldn't help but note the equally curious circumstances falling in place around him. There was something strange about this business, but his thoughts were quickly interrupted by the sounds of several wild and violent creatures called out their territorial claim in the distance... and one not so distant.

"You mother-fucker!"

The volatile, verbal outburst was equally matched by a corresponding physical one, as a sandy-tan shape blurred out from the treeline, and into Lacus' peripherals. He was wrestled to the ground as a series of accusations rained down with hammering blows.

"I was out, you fucking asshole!" A mare’s voice could be heard between the fury of blows. "We are not fucking doing this again!"

Lacus struggled to fight back, and to figure out what was going on, but the unicorn's magic made even the token gesture a colossal feat. Through the constricting magic that enveloped his throat he could barely meep out the word: "What?"

"Don't you fuck with me, D! I am not in the fucking mood!" The words poured out of tear stained cheeks, like so much fury, as her shale-rock mane crashed against the shore of her embittered muzzle.

With a raw burst of adrenal strength, Lacus Sceleratus bucked the unicorn off; whereupon she was sent sprawling into the grass. One of his hooves—he couldn't be sure which—struck her horn as he did so, which disrupted the telekinetic field. The rasping reprieve was short lived, however, as the magician glanced a vector spell off his coat. Casting through her tumble, as she rose once again to her hooves to stare him down. He was clearly dealing with no amateur.

"What have you done with my mentor you face-stealing fuck?"

The complete question came with came with a barrage of magic missiles that Lacus was scarcely able to avoid by rolling behind a tree, and scrambling up its trunk. The arrow array punched more holes in it than in all the legs of Canterlot, and ripped through the hemp binding the book to its plot.

"I won't ask again!" she bellowed.

The mare's ultimatum was handed down, while Lacus slid down the trunk of the tree, and reached out for the book. He peered through a hole to inspect the unicorn, and in a voice shakier than the leaves above, he called out "I don't know!" Perhaps the truth wasn't his best plan, but it did manage to take some of the wind out of her sails as she skimmed the red river of eventide. As she calmed, he called out again, "Uh, how did you know I was a changeling?"

"The usual way," she quoted him back to himself. As she rounded the tree to look to the pitiful puddle that Lacus had become, her forehoof came down on the cover, whereupon she pressed all her weight to keep it from his grasp. "Chryst! Fucking pull yourself together," she barked with horn lit, before her eyes caught its title.

The odd sacrosanctity of the first word reverberated through his hollows as repeated her, "Chryst? Are– are you a changeling too?"
It was not the first time today that somepony looked at him in a way that suggested he had suffered massive brain damage, and as the assumed unicorn mare kicked open the book's cover her tone soured.

"The fuck is this?"

"A book?" Lacus raised the question with the same self-evident tone as if the tome had announced it itself.

The historical text was hoisted up by an olive green glow that matched the other changeling's horn. "Not the book, jackass," she growled as she unceremoniously tossed it into his lap after pulling a folded piece of paper from its pages.

Throughout his conversation with Spike, Lacus hadn't thought to check the book for himself. Nor, throughout the struggle did he get so clear an opportunity to observe the mare's mark. A mark that was accurately depicted on the side of the letter he was now able to see. A broken wand locked in a chevron. Her antagonistic stance had made its way to one of mere aggression and standoffishness as she read a single line over and over.

A line that visibly made her uncomfortable and she began to pace while muttering, "Don't fucking get involved. I tried to fucking tell myself," the unicorn went on, "it's not my fucking fight—but you... you just had to fucking come back here."

The stallion watched the unstable mare with the rambunctious mane work herself into a different kind of tizzy, less violent. Though the situation remained precarious, he gave careful consideration to how to proceed. He thought it best to let her make the first move while he thought just how the book really came into his possession.

Everything stopped abruptly, the pacing, the muttering, and the downward spiral all to give passage to a question. "D, do you know who I am?" she cautiously questioned in a tone that suggested the answer held more significance than a name could hope to impart.

Had he thought the two items placed together on the note were meant to find their way to each other he certainly would have asked earlier. "Are you... HSB:H.K.?"

H.K. frowned as if she was expecting to hear another name, but she did not refute the one given. Such was the nature of the changeling condition. Her look of disappointed confusion changed into recognition. She crumpled up the note and discarded it before answering him. "Yep, that's me: squad-mate Habré 'fuckin' Kadabré." She leaned against the tree she that so riddled with holes it could be mistaken for a fellow changeling, or Lacus's memory.

Though she seemed to relax, Lacus could not find himself doing so. In a tone similar to her own momentary caution, Lacus raised the first obvious question. "Who is D?" He had expected some response akin to "my mentor" but he was finding this mare would do anything but what was expected.

"That's not fucking important," she offered with a shrug.

This did not sit well with the stallion, the idea of being accosted and beaten over something that wasn't important. Mistaken identity perhaps? But he refused to let it lie there. "You punched me in the face for her," he said as his own hoof drew attention to a growing bruise. The more they spoke the more her brazen attitude infected, and twisted, what he thought was his normal demure. He gave pause to consider what he was really like.

"What's the fucking deal with that book anyway?" Habré counter-queried, "Seriously? You and her both..."

"I'm not sure, but more important is what I saw when I picked it up." It was a difficult subject to broach, as it meant showing some of his cards, but—to downplay the love potion—he had to offer up something of equal importance. He was about to mention Twilight's Crystal Heart pendant when they heard a rustle of leaves and snapping of twigs in the distance.

"It'll fucking have to wait." H.K. quickly cut him off and her demeanor shifted from familiar to professional. Recognizing a distant voice, the unicorn shifted into a magenta earth mare, after which she hastily brought the conversation to a close. "Look, bitch, I'm sorry about before," A sentiment interrupted by a brief frown with the delivery, "Well, I'm not– but that's what I'm supposed fuckin' to say, ya'know?"

Lacus nodded in understanding while the sudden school teacher turned to the interloping ponies, impatiently rolled her shoulders and popped her neck while she waited for her cue line. After doing so, she whispered a final word of advice to him.

"If you fuck this up, I will kill you."
> Act 1 | Pots and ToTS
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sweet words of a simple filly could be heard through the trees that the path to Zecora’s home wound through. “Oh, hi Ms. Cheerilee! Ah didn't expect to see you here!” The gleeful ignorance in Applebloom’s voice was met by a subtle, false sincerity appropriate to the situation.

“Hello Applebloom. Hello Zecora." Habré Kadabré greeted the pair in the distance, while approaching them with the school teacher's form and voice, "I think it’s just wonderful how one of my most promising students is seeking out extracurricular education, but I just came by to remind Applebloom not to forget about her regular studies.”

“Applebloom, your teacher is very kind, the venture here would take much time!” remarked Zecora with underpinnings of suspicion that were not reflected in the filly's response.

“Ah, thanks Ms Cheerilee, you didn't have to do that. Ah’m all caught up on my homework. Honest!” Applebloom’s childish naiveté indicated their changeling conspiracy was not suspected.

Through the idle chatter, Lacus recognized the need not to make an overly hasty exit when being caught where you’re not supposed to be. After all, having failed to do so himself this morning had caused nothing but trouble, and her giving herself a good reason to be there lent credibility to his own presence. When their conversation drew to a close, he thought it odd to be protected by her, since he could scarcely trust her, and wondered if  the hive was greater than the sum of its drones regardless.

While Habré Kadabré made her exit, Lacus retrieved the crumpled note and only briefly considered not reading it. From their previous encounter, however, one word stood out among all the rest. One word shaped how he understood what just happened, and teased meaning to the 'chance' encounter. That word was: again. With any luck this note may hold some clue to the volatile changeling's rapid change in disposition, provided it was not in some incomprehensible code. He grimaced after a cursory glance at the note that H.K. read several times just moments before. "Just be yourself," he mumbled in confusion.

"Yes. Sound advice indeed, some that everypony should heed," Zecora called over to him, while she and Applebloom walked up the path, and in each step the zebra carried herself with a subtle nervous edge. An edge that was carefully masked in her voice.

Embarrassed at being caught reading a note meant for someone else, and flustered for knowing full well how useless such advice was for him, Lacus crammed the note back into the book that it came from, and quickly bound it in the broken rope. As he flung the book over his shoulder, he caught an odd hesitation in the zebra’s demeanor, where she forced her body not to slow its pace.

The posturing only lasted for just a moment, but it was long enough for Lacus to become uncomfortable himself. It was a primal thing. A predator-prey relationship, and he couldn't be sure which side he was on. He imagined that he must have flinched, because the zebra's body language indicated total control.

He let the rope fall from his mouth, as to free it for introductions, but Zecora cut loose her own silver tongue. "What remedy do you seek, that to me you would speak?"

Surprised, Lacus checked his coat for the blue splotches that should render the question self-evident, while Applebloom raised an eyebrow to her mentor to voice the sentiment.

"Zecora, it looks like he's got Poison Joke," she said, and in-so-doing earned her captain’s stripes, before she continued with a laugh, "Though, Ah didn't think anypony was still fool enough to go messin' around with that stuff after last time."

The zebra met her pupil's questioning gaze with a grin, but did not speak until she was finished. "Yes dear filly, it is good, you see... but something more there may be. Though, perhaps the dangers he knew well, but could not help where he fell? Or, if he was pushed in, whose blame is it then?"

With a welcoming smile, Zecora motioned for the stallion to join them on their return trip to her cottage as to talk business on the way. Both her and the filly's saddle bags were filled to bursting with new ingredients, but the weight did not seem to bother either of them. Lacus chalked it up to the strength of a real earth pony. "Forgive me. Where are my manners?" he said as he fell in line with the mares, "My name is Lucas–"

"Greymane, yes we've met before, when your health was quite poor," Zecora interrupted while glancing to him over her shoulder. "How time flies! Do you not recall? I've known you since you were this tall."

Though such a statement was generally reserved for referencing fillies and colts, as well as hatchlings among the changelings, Zecora's hoof indicated only a mere half-a-hoof of difference in height.

Applebloom whispered to her mentor in the least offensive tone she could muster, "Ah didn't know you had friends, Zecora." While Lacus apologized again.

"Sorry, I seem to have amnesia," Lacus shrugged as he offered a weak explanation, which also addressed why he had come, "The doctor said it could be related to my Posion Joke, though he couldn't really say how."

In less than a whisper, Zecora offered her cajoling reassurances to Applebloom, "Put that worry out of your head, because that is not what I had said!" Then she turned to Lacus Sceleratus directly and added, "Mr. Greymane only came to me, for an escape from his misery."

The changeling could not help but feel a resurgence of the pack struggle, and again felt like prey while Zecora led on, this time not looking back to confirm her claims, though Applebloom was more than curious enough for the pair of them. He sheepishly smiled and admitted, "I can't honestly say that she's wrong, Applebloom. I can't exactly remember any other circumstances that we've met in."

The trio of groundlings stood at a crossroads, both metaphorical and literal, as the path diverged to two deep roads with one less traveled than the other. The admission disrupted Zecora's poise and for a moment, the mare who had demonstrated a pattern of letting others come to her of their own accord, uncharacteristically approached him. She spoke as plainly as a sphinx when she said: "The Poison Joke is simple enough to remove, but the other affliction more difficult will prove." She turned to Applebloom and motioned down the more favorable path, "Child, go mix the brew, for we still have more to do."

"Oh, alright then, Zecora." Applebloom nodded as she hoofed it down the path to the ancient and mighty oak that the zebra called home. Once on her way, Zecora motioned that Lacus should take the lead down the darker path.

"You were given a clean slate, but did it stay in that state? I would ask what's on you mind, if you don't think the question unkind."

The manner in which Zecora asked the question seemed innocent enough, but in that moment, with her behind him, Lacus would give anything to be being hounded by a timberwolf instead. This fear. This doubt. It wasn't him. It was something else. "No, it's fine," Lacus said whilst trying to get a grip. "I've been on edge lately, the not knowing has been getting to me."

Though the nod was out of sight, the clink of jewelry and the snap of the saddlebags caught Lacus's attention. He caught a look of preponderance and uncertainty from Zecora, as her head cocked up to meet the sky. 

"I see. That sounds fair, I thought it was the other mare," she said with a sigh of relief, "But when I saw you I knew instantly, the one you were with was not Cheerilee."

With that statement, the last thing that went through Lacus's mind was the first letter of H.K.'s favorite word.


*** 


Pain, the kind of which no changeling should ever know, was what Lacus Sceleratus woke to. Not in severity, but permeation, as every cell in his body ached. Huddled in the embryonic position he would love nothing more than to be swallowed up in a cocoon at that instant, but that would require him to remain still– and he was moving.

After a few minutes of acclimating to this new sensation, he managed to open his eyes, and attempted to gather his bearings. The first thing he noticed was that his hooves—bound in rope—were black and had holes in them. He could feel his wings pressed against him similarly bound and, as he looked up to the zebra dragging him through the woods, he felt the movement of his mane be disrupted by his jagged horn. He had lost his form, so he reflexively tried to find himself in it again, but what should have been a gentle green shimmer burned through his whole being like wildfire.

In the last fleeting moments of consciousness he could hear Zecora chuckle, and chastise: "The pain will eventually subside, if you don't keep trying to hide."


***



There was a sharpness to the air that indicated it should be cold, but as the gentle breeze rolled across the changeling, it couldn't feel a thing. There was a stone floor beneath him, and the evening sun somewhere above him, but he could not feel it’s rough texture, nor the ray’s warming embrace. Nothing… nothing at first, anyway, because no matter how disconnected one is from their body, they can always feel when another is lording over them.

"So, this is the infamous Canterlot Black. We were expecting an earlier attack. What, with Twilight’s coronation, but who knows the mind of the Changeling Nation?" The dismissive missive was delivered shortly after Zecora dropped her rope. Wherever she had taken him, they had just arrived.

The changeling opened its eyes to an expansive view that the zebra dominated most of. "What? Where?" Lacus could only mutter the basics in his disoriented state, as several flights of stairs were beginning to catch up with his rattled soul.

After offering only a slight glance of acknowledgement, Zecora wandered up to a broken-down rampart, and leaned against its crumbling parapets. "I imagine there were more important things, than frustrating the newest pair of royal wings." With a sharp turn of her head, Zecora flung a flint knife to the changeling, "And so her claims were true, that event was not besmirched by you."

The knife slid to a stop near Lacus's pounding head.  He cautiously accepted it, and began cutting at the ropes that bound his body. However, Zecora's behavior, and knowledge of his situation was quickly binding his mind at attention. "Who?" he asked through a mouth full of flint, to the pony with steel resolve, the pair of which sparked his interest.

The zebra cast her gaze across the sea of Everfree trees once more while Lacus fumbled with the knife. The pain had subsided, as Zecora had promised, but now he was completely numb. Through sheer force of will, and on muscle memory alone, he brought the blade to bare against his restraints.

While he did so, Zecora answered his question in her usual cryptic manner. "I guess it wouldn't hurt to say, since you will find out anyway. D. The mare who pulls your strings, a treacherous female changeling."

"D? That's the name of H.K.'s mentor..." said the changeling as he fought to keep the dagger in his mouth.

"Huh, is that so? Well, I guess you would know." The zebra's sad smile could be heard in her voiced contemplations. "Though, I did not drag you out here just so I could bend your ear... but I have had time to think, while resting at this brink. To wonder what had happened here, that would cause the elements to reappear? It must have been quite drastic, to turn the pale Moon's light chromatic."

"I'm sorry," the changeling found himself apologizing to his captor as he finally freed himself from her ropes, "I don't really know anything about that." The changeling found himself unable to stand on account of the effectiveness of the zebra's drugs. So he instead lay on the rough-hewn stone, on his belly, and ‘swam’ to the edge of the Tower of Two Sisters. "Why did you bring me here?" he asked, while hoping that if he could just see what she saw from the ledge, then maybe he could understand what he had gotten himself involved in. However, all he saw was genuine shock on Zecora's face as he approached her.

"So then, you really do not know? To introduce you to the devil down below." Zecora offered a swooping gesture with both forelegs as she added: "To throw you from this height, and bury your body out of sight."

What was the pony paddle quickly turned into the backstroke as Lacus frantically tried to distance himself from his captor. In his current state, there would be no way he could gain any lift out of his wings if she tossed him over the edge as she suggested.

Zecora sighed, "The war is long lost, to fight on is not worth the cost," and paused for a moment in which she pulled up the book she had confiscated from the changeling to flip through its pages. "To cause your life to now cease, would bring an end to my uncertain peace."

"So... you'll help me then?" The confounded changeling inquired as Zecora flipped through the bitter reminder of their species ancient war.

"The poison joke is no trouble, but anything extra will cost double," she said as her hoof came to rest on the recipe for the love poison.

The changeling could only manage to create an inquiring inference regarding a cure for his species’ addiction, as to say any more may be taboo, "So... Is it possible then?"

Zecora closed the book and shook her head. "No, the potion is not what you think, and is one no changeling would willingly drink." Her words effectively crushed all hope and she produced the recently un-crumpled note from the book's pages and inspected it. "But still, it is something she wants you to imbibe, so as to never again be a thorn in her side."

Speaking before thinking Lacus asked, "H.K.? Why didn't she just kill me then, like you were... going... to?" but Zecora just shook her head, and Lacus clarified his question. "The mentor? D."

"That she can not do, much suffering she has planned for you," and anticipation of his next question she continued on uninterrupted, "She approached me for a potion to inhibit volition, but has since worked around my refusing her commission. Now go, be on your way, I have nothing more to say."

With the buzzing of sleeping limbs leaving Lacus's system he resumed his earth stallion form that he simply felt naked without. "No. I don't buy it. Some crazy changeling is out to get me? You couldn't do better? Why'd you really bring me here?" Lacus barked with the return of his balls.

Zecora summarized, slid the book into her pack, and made her way to the stairs. "To kill you, yes, but I've had a change of heart, that you should accept and disembark. I don't expect you to trust the source, and doubt is a matter of due course; but one thing you need to know, is that there is no length to which she won't go."
> Act 2 | Bed, Bath, and Beyond a Single Sunrise
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The eyes of the changeling drifted open in the face of the morning sun with its light, in turn, in his face. His eyelids fluttered as he tried in vain to scrub the nightmarish images from them. Though the dream itself was fleeting from his mind in the warm rays he still couldn't help but feel that he'd had it before. It was the same feeling he had yesterday morning in the hospital. He could remember an explosion preceding a long fall, and that he wasn't afraid in the dream, just… very sad. The emotion  lingered for minutes more as Lacus looked around.

Home.

A place he couldn't even remember existing yesterday. The experience as a whole felt like another terrible dream, and he relegated himself to believing it was, until he saw Zecora’s borrowed saddle bags on the floor next to his nightstand, where an empty ceramic jar sat for the herbal bath he'd had. His mattress, the one he was now struggling to crawl off of, was itself encased in changeling gel that he slept atop of, rather than inside.

His mind raced with all that he had seen upon arriving home last night. His mailbox read Lucas Greymane and Habré Kadabré. He, or rather they, had a welcome mat in front of their little house. On which rested two newspapers, both Sunday editions, and under it a key to the door. There had been a framed quote by the door that reminded, "She who loves is loved in return." and Lacus attributed it to Habré's odd sense of humor.

She had claimed the day before that they were in a squad together, and all evidence seemed to support that claim. There were two open envelopes on his nightstand, and he moved the jar aside to get at them. Renewed, and refreshed from a good night's sleep, and cured of his Poison Joke, he could finally try to tackle this curious evidence.

The first piece of evidence, invitation to the coronation of Princess Twilight Sparkle that had past a few days ago. Though it was addressed to Habré Kadabré, and not him specifically, he was sure that every pony in Ponyville likely received such an invitation. The other was an order indicating that H.K. was going to be reassigned to cover the event in its entirety. Though he was sure she visited him in the Everfree Forest, he was also certain Twilight Sparkle was in town at the time too, but he couldn't be sure if that was still true as of now. Additionally, according to the invitation, the celebrations were still ongoing in Canterlot, which would indicate Twilight’s return would have been temporary.

As he rummaged through them, a small note fell from the orders’ envelope. Confused, as he thought that the envelope had been empty,  he picked it up and read it aloud. “The most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves. - HSB L.V.” Lacus wondered to whom the attribution was dedicated to, and no sooner did the thought cross his mind, than he heard a crash in the house.


***


“How the hell could you know?” The feminine words were a whimper in the dark of night.

Lacus offered a sad smile as he tried to comfort the wounded changeling. “Because the first lesson cannot be taught. It must be learned by each pony in their own way,” Lacus’s recitation came in frightened whispers that fell to Habré’s bloodied ears. He had never seen her so vulnerable, and her situation was a delicate one; both in mind and body.

He had once asked her to teach him first aid, in the event that he should hurt himself during her lessons, but now it was his instructor who was in need. Lacus cauterized her wounds, unable to truly offer proper healing, while Habré looked to him, bearing with it for the truth. Even the pain of searing her skin shut couldn't deter her. The attentive intentness of her stare told all: that, for the first time, it would seem Lacus knew something that even she hadn't figured out. She was visibly waiting with baited breath for even a hint at what that thing was.

Rather than keep her in suspense, he tried to explain: “I know that you really believed this spell would work, and I wanted it to be true, but…” his voice trailed off as his focus on the magical repairs became more intense. Even he knew the treatment was insultingly basic compared to what she could accomplish were it not for her injuries.

Habré’s grit her teeth so hard that her gums bled; in addition to the blood already coming from everywhere else. “But what?” she returned in a low growl.

The blood in her spittle flew into his face as she spoke, but he paid it no mind as he desperately tried knitting bone and mending muscles. “The most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves.” The mentor's quotation was followed by a brief pause with intense eye contact. Lacus had to know that she understood this painful lesson before her hubris could kill her. The moment ended with a cringe brought on by surging agony of the preceding events. All while knowing that if he could just get her stabilized then she could do the rest.


***


Shell-shocked by the experience, Lacus inspected the reverse side of the note, and read it aloud. “Don’t be a fucking idiot. - HSB H.K.” He found himself somewhat relieved, as if it couldn't have said anything else. With that, he pulled open the drawer and placed the note inside for posterity. Inside, another file already lay, the title read HSB-D:LS/G. Lacus slowly withdrew the folder, intent on finding the meaning, or perhaps even his own assignment history, to refresh his memory. He reasoned the LS/G was his initials, and that of his alias, both having the first initial L for Lacus Sceleratus and Lucas Greymane respectively. He opened the folder to find that the contents were surprisingly disappointing.

“Deferred,” he read aloud from a solitary square of sticky note, the quillmanship faded to the point of near illegibility. It was decidedly different than that of H.K. and his own, but matched the other note perfectly. It was as if somepony had gone out of their way to mess with him.

Lacus stuffed the empty folder back into the night stand and slammed the drawer shut. He was constantly being reminded that not everything was what it seemed, and that fact was beginning to get under his skin. With Habré tailing Twilight, he wondered if another changeling had been sent to fill his partner’s horseshoess. If so: they had a sick sense of humor. With this in mind Lacus proceeded to search the house for any indications of a replacement, but the only clues he found were that certain effects were conspicuously missing– such as a painting, and any indication of the incident between Habré and himself. 

He gave thought to Zecora's own cautions, and with heightened apprehensions he instead took to the street to clear his mind, preferring not to entertain such outlandish claims.  The cool morning air was refreshing, and the sun’s light was glinting off the mail box, its morning east-born rays traced out a westward shadow.


***


As the door closed behind Lacus, Habré’s voice could be heard over his shoulder as they stood together on the porch. “Bitch morning?” Her concern seemed genuine as she asked, but it was growing increasingly difficult for Lacus to tell anymore, and that alone was progress in his eyes.

“You could say that,” he replied, while adding “I think I found the catalyst, but I’ll need you to do some further research on it.”

“Wait,” Habré asked with a stilted pause, “You mean that shitty weed?”

As Lacus nodded, a lock of hair swept back behind a metallic hairband broke loose. The wheat-gold mane'd earth pony and her unicorn roommate had just disembarked from their home as mail was arriving. A walleyed mailmare was struggling to fit an extra large envelope into their regular-sized box.

“I’ll just…” Habré began a sentence that finished itself as the envelope began floating away from the letter carrier, and with it came a regal invitation.

A gracious “Thanks!” was offered by the bubbly grey pegasus as she took to the air, her satchel filled to bursting with similarly celestially-stamped envelopes. The sandy-tan unicorn demonstrated a visible change in countenance as she read the correspondence. After the mailmare was safely out of earshot, Habré began cursing under her breath, and her shattered-shale mane bristled with each syllable of sarcasm.

“Oh, for fucks sake,” her mutterance was issued in irreverence toward the invitation. What she in turn discarded was an invitation to the coronation of Princess Twilight Sparkle. It was followed by the tearing of manila and another groan that put a smile on Lacus’s face. “You are fucking kidding me,” her gripe was drawn out as to create the implied connection with the invitation. “The Evolution Institute, in their fucking infinite wisdom, have chosen me to shadow Twilight with a DNE recon mission during this dumbass event.”

The sour tone was more than enough for Lacus to know why this was a problem. A prestigious assignment for any other changeling, would prove most difficult for H.K. due to the level of formality implied by an envelope containing the words ‘cordially invited’. But, here was more to it than that. There was also the do-not-engage part, because she had become more impulsive from her previous mentor’s teachings. “So we’re going?” Lacus asked. They both knew that shadowing Twilight had been a large portion of Habré’s past assignments.

“Fuck no. Not ‘we’. Me.” Her voice resounded with a childish level of exasperation. “Fucking Canterlot,” she groaned as she opened the door again to take the news inside. The word was less of a place, as it was a time in the Changeling vernacular. “Just sit tight, and for fucks sake while I’m gone don’t be a fucking idiot, or get yourself fucking killed, or any other stupid shit like that.”

The implication that Habré was less than subtle about making was that she didn’t want to come back to find her hurt. This brought a smile to Lacus’s face, before she offered a cajoling: “Oh you know me.”

Habré paused in the doorway to consider the implications of the statement, leading up to her jesting response, “I’ll go write you a goddamn reminder then.” As she trailed off to do so the door closed in her wake.


***


Lacus bolted headlong into the closed door of his own home, before wrestling it open again in a frenzy. It was too early for mail to arrive, and Habré was nowhere to be found when he searched the house earlier. Searching the house a second time would prove to reinforce these findings, and Lacus stood in the living room flabbergasted. Twice, in twice as many minutes, she had simply arrived and departed without any explanation. 

Unless… Lacus debated the nature of his amnesia, were they memories of the events that transpired here? These events from his past were different from mere recollections, rather it was as if he was reliving them with no control over when or how they played out. Each choice therein felt as natural as when he made them initially.

He thought it would be nice to be finally remembering things, but this wasn't remembering. Being forced to recall such a wretched day, and for what? His mind turned back to his the zebra's tale, and wondered if his fate was etched into the mind of another. Was the future as predictable as the past was reviewable? To what end would doing this serve, and what would cluing him in on the process achieve?

These questions troubled him greatly. So much so that he was nearly able to forget what was staring him in the face. He no longer had the luxury of setting aside the zebra's warnings, and though it sickened him to think it, he wondered if Habré Kadabré was being used by her mentor to get at him. The sickness was compounded by the final note in the third party handwriting left on his do-to board for today.

“The painting holds the truth?” Lacus cryptically read to himself as he left the house for the second time this morning. One thing was certain: he knew that he did not have the expertise to find out what was truly going on. Not alone, anyway. Seeking out a second opinion, he made his way to the hospital, and so long as he didn't let them run any tests that may reveal his anatomy, he figured that he should be fine. That is, if his mind would hold together long enough to make sense of it.
> Act 2 |  l’Hôpital's Rule
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A form growing all too familiar to Lacus, such that he couldn't see himself without it, could be seen in his reflection outside Ponyville Hospital. With the colors of the Everfree Forest and a sharply defined cutiemark of two interlocking gears in a speech bubble, he was once again Lucas Greymane. He had paused to inspect this reflection in the glass windows outside of the non-emergency entrance. Noting how he looked so different from the brackish brown-black tone of the partial transformation that he had been admitted with yesterday morning, and he was certain no one would recognize him from his previous escapade. After a deep breath, he walked into the lobby and made his approach to the front desk.

The sinuous voice of Nurse Redheart resonated through the lobby, “Ah, Mr. Greymane, are you here to reschedule your follow-up?” The greeting to the changeling made him wonder how bad of a changeling must he be that everyone already knew who he was.

“A follow-up?” Lacus queried as he assessed the situation.

The nurse could evidently detect the confusion in his voice as she herself voiced: “For the poison?” Lacus allowed a brief pause to pass before she added somewhat hesitantly, “When we couldn't get ahold of you we feared the worst...”

He was unsure what she was implying, since his most recent death threats had been by lasers and gravity, but began to suspect that the drowning was no coincidence either, so poison didn't seem too far fetched. His lack of input left Nurse Redheart to ramble uncomfortably. At least that was something that he could use to find out just what was going on.

“You were quite insistent that it was an accident, but we pumped over a pint of it out of your stomach…” she said uneasily, as she pulled his file for review.

Poison joke, memory loss, confusion, and the ingestion of large quantities of unknown toxins. Wait! he stopped himself and read the diagnosis again, Two cases of poison joke related amnesia, that’s what the doctor said yesterday, right? He couldn't help but wonder how he got out of the hospital afterward, instead of ending up as committed as his blue friend, before remembering exactly what floor he awoke on. 

He also wasn't sure whether an implication of suspected suicide made what he came to ask easier or harder. That was because he knew that he was admitted yesterday after being found by himself, drowned, and could see how they might see a pattern building. But there was no way that she could know that was also him.

“Yes, I remember now,” Lacus lied, whilst looking up to the nurse with a heart-freezing stare. “There was a labeling mix-up in our lab.” It was a fabrication that he felt would have been the most obvious to use at the original time that the event occurred, a suspicion that was instantly confirmed by the nurse’s facial expression. “Habré has since been reassigned by the Institute, but I'm still having trouble with my memory,” he added dryly, showing a lack of appreciation for her empathy as it was growing inconvenient.

Nurse Redheart sighed in relief at the news, almost as if she had met the illustrious Habré Kadabré. “Oh, well yes, let’s see what we can do.” Redheart’s voice was filled with a bevy of emotions that reflected the range of her relief in seeing him return alive, to the frustration inherent to having her concerns so casually dismissed. As she rooted through the schedule Lacus heard a familiar voice that drew away his attention.


***


“Get your fucking plot-holes over here!” The shale-fracked voice spewing poison was more than enough to put some gas in the emergency room attendants’ tanks. Several nurses and a caramel-coated doctor met the call and rushed to the duo’s aid. Lacus had fallen from her back and collapsed on the ground in a crippled heap and, as Habré grilled Redheart with all of her most intense vernacular, there was a genuine concern in her voice as Lacus was being lifted onto a stretcher. 

It was the sincerity of her fear that allowed fear to creep into his heart as well. He had not seen such a look since she had nearly disintegrated herself. If this was something that she was afraid of, then what chance did he really stand? He wanted to call out to her but, before he could will a reaction from his body, the isolation doors slammed shut and he was carted off to the operating room.



***


The voice of the doctor called Lacus back to the present, “Mr. Greymane. I was the attending physician on your case.”

A bit of shock could be seen on Lacus’s face. No kidding, he thought to himself, this guy treated me twice? The doctor from yesterday morning seemed ambivalent to the connection the changeling had just made.

“Nurse Redheart tells me that foul mouthed monster has been removed from your lab,” he said with a note of superiority before adding, “I’m happy to hear it. There's no place for the likes of her in science.”

Lacus could feel a sprocket break in his mind as his mettle gears came grinding to a full stop. His neck twisted as mechanically as the hands of time, till they were face-to-face. “That foul-mouthed monster is my partner…” Lacus began in a tone of iniquitous absolution, “and if you ever talk about her like that again…” he paused while eyeing the doctor’s implements, “I will shove that stethoscope so far up your butt, that you will literally be able to hear your own shriveled heart call out for the same level of care that she has shown me.”

It was an impulsive moment for him, and by the looks he was getting, an effective one for communicating his dissatisfaction with the situation. On Nurse Redheart’s face alone was an expression that suggested the doctor was, at this moment, levitating himself with all four hooves, a restraining order and a lawsuit for slander stuffed in his mouth. Even the doctor himself was taken aback by the sudden outburst of the incognito Lacus Sceleratus.

“I… I didn't mean to offend,” he offered as he stumbled over his own proverbial hooves. “Perhaps we could move to the subject at hoof, then?” the doctor deflected. He was slowly regaining his composure at a rate equal to that of the post eruption Lucas Greymane. Moments of silent contemplation passed allowing the tension in the air to release normally from the environment, thereby facilitating the natural winding down of all parties involved.

“I came to talk to you about the present, so let’s leave the past in the past.” This statement felt a bit ironic to Lacus, even while making it, as the exact problem he was having was that the past was not content to remain where it belonged.

The doctor nodded and motioned to the halls. “Of course, let’s speak in my office.”

As they moved in that direction, Lacus couldn't help but wonder, of the two of them, which felt more that a knife was at their backs. The professional who was the target of his outburst, or himself, for having such hitherto undiscovered darkness hiding inside that he had to work diligently to keep in check. A darkness not present when his mind was still bound by Poison Joke.

After a short walk down a long hall, Lacus and his attending physician took seats across a desk from one another in a small, private office. “Tell me what seems to be bothering you.” Lacus was asked, and he took a moment to consider how to respond.

He wanted to start slowly, so he warmed up with: “My chart indicated that I had many things wrong with me when I was admitted, is that right?” The medical practitioner nodded but did not interject. “And the nurse said that a bunch of poison was pumped out of my body, but did you get it all?”

The doctor raised an eyebrow before answering in layman’s legalese, “Any toxin metabolized by your system before you were admitted would have been beyond  the reach of, and liability of, this institution. Without being able to properly identify it, we could offer no course of treatment for it.” He swiveled the file around so that Lacus could read it clearly. “I'm sorry, we did the best we could, but the symptoms you displayed could be derived from a toxin entering your blood and brain. It is possible for any such damage to be permanent.” This explanation was delivered with a tap on the chart. “We couldn't identify all of the components, but there were several breeds of floral compounds. Pedals, pollens, et cetera.” The doctor continued after sliding the chart to Lacus’s edge of the desk, “The effect on your muscles was consistent with a massive dose of an all natural herbicide.” With the explanation concluded he leaned forward in his chair.

Lacus nodded in acknowledgement of the doctor's precarious position, as a representative of an institution with a behind to cover, but also as a caregiver who genuinely wanted to provide assistance. As he inspected the file in greater detail he found a complex range of emotions bubbling inside of him. Confusion, suspicion, and betrayal were among the top to surface.

Zecora!

He considered how it only made sense. She had admitted to treating him, and even knew his name, but Lacus couldn't afford to let himself be distracted just now. If he was to find out the truth about her he needed to be in the now, to get more information, and his anger would have to wait. So with a concerted effort Lacus pushed those feelings back deep down inside before returning his attention to the present situation. 

He also knew there was no way that Doctor Horse didn't see it, and tried not to direct it at the good doctor as he asked, “So... if I were still having some of these symptoms, what could be done?”

The stallion furrowed his brow in concern. “Still having symptoms? What type of symptoms?” he queried.

Lacus spun the chart back around, and pushed it back to the good doctor, before tapping confusion and memory loss with his hoof. “I think that my memories have been coming back to me in a strange way,” Lacus said before regaling the story of this morning’s confusing interactions with Habré Kadabré, all while carefully controlling which details the professional was privy to. Nothing interpersonal, and definitely nothing relating to his changeling nature. Though he did explain that he had been in a fog for all of yesterday, just in-case that wasn't entirely the fault of the Poison Joke. It was a matter-of-factual exposition about reliving memories rather than recalling them, while still omitting the one that just occurred in the lobby.

Doctor Horse nodded, confirming Lacus’s own self-diagnosis, and gave careful consideration to his response before speaking, “Without a proper diagnosis I couldn't really say, but I suppose that if you were re-dosed with a smaller quantity of the toxin, then it could have caused a relapse," there was a slight pause from the medical professional, "But, really, that would have been impossible, because it would have landed you right back out there.” The doctor ended with a hoof pointed to the lobby, that drew Lacus’s gaze, before returning to a more comfortable position for considering alternatives.

Lacus had come for a second opinion and wasn't about to interrupt when it was offered, so he let the doctor explain: “Or, it could simply be wearing off normally, and your mind may be trying to reconstruct events. As it confuses present stimuli with past experiences, the memories you relive may be recollected with such vibrancy that they feel like the present.” The doctor shrugged as he offered the conclusion, “Since we don’t really know anything about the toxin, it could be anything. I’m sorry we can’t be of more help.”

Lacus nodded and offered his gratitude for the information that was able to be provided to him. His mind returned to the only pony in Ponyville with the skill to mix up suck a drink before asking a final question: “How long should it last?”

To which the doctor frowned, and responded: “There’s no way to know for certain, but my estimate would be at longest three days or so, and, if you'll recall, you were admitted five days ago.” The supposition certainly narrowed his options, and Lacus offered a second thanks as he turned to leave.

On his way back to the lobby, he spied the familiar barking-mad mare queuing up to receive her medications.


***


“Oh, you’re awake!” the attending physician excitedly uttered with a sigh of relief.

A bark in the hall and the rattle of pills indicated the time, while the changeling questioned the date. Lacus found himself in a medical bed looking up to a caramel-coated doctor standing over him, and outside his room a blue mare walked away with a stomach full of chemical corrections. Not unlike what had just been taken out of him.

"You should thank your lucky stars—and the mare who moves them—that you have an assistant as attentive as the one who brought you in," the doctor said as he amended his patient's status on a chart, then placed it at the hoof of the bed.

“No,” Lacus said as his eyes drifted heavenward, "I will not."

Though his gaze was locked onto the ceiling, through his peripherals Lacus could still see the doctor nod to the nurse, who dismissed herself, only to return moments later.

"Oh?" the doctor asked before acknowledging his own assistant, "Regardless of her demeanor, without her you certainly would not be here right now. Alive."

The more he struggled against his fate, the more it enveloped him. Weighed him down. It was for this reason he soldiered on. "No," he repeated to the implied advice, "I've far to many plans to waste another moment here."

The doctor glanced at his guest before offering his own humble dismissal. "Ordinarily," he began, "we'd refer your case to a specialist, but it seems there may only be one mare who can reason with you."

"The fuck were you thinking!?" The outburst made its way in from the hall before the staff had even left, and motivated them to move faster, as to not cross the jaded unicorn. A heavy-hoofed kick to the door threatened to slam across their backsides should they dawdle any longer. "...playing with my fucking toys like that."

"I was thinking how improbable it all is," Lacus offered with a vain attempt to sit up to meet Habré Kadabré's condescending gaze.

A crack appeared in the mare whom could break any stallion. "Impossible. It's fucking impossible!" Habré shouted in Lacus's face. Her horn flickered erratically before snuffing itself out. The violent response normal for this situation was conspicuously absent and, as the pressure built beneath the surface, the waterworks threatened to spring a leak when she finally found the nerve to speak. "Your heart stopped."

As if to heighten the vulnerability the statement engendered in Lacus, she stepped out of sight and rested her head on the plate-glass window. "Your heart gave out, D. It took all of my magic—all of your juice with me—just to keep you alive. Long enough to get you here, anyway."

Too weak to move his head, the changeling demonstrated a strength of will that was his defining characteristic. "If my heart hasn't the strength to match my will, then what good is it?" The thinly veiled euphemism epitomized all Lacus knew of loyalty and drew the fullness of nature's wrath from the learned unicorn.

A singular calamitous crash befell the room in which two helpless changelings were locked as everything not bolted down, and much of what was, was magically rent asunder.

"Fuck you." Habré’s whispers grew into a cacophony of mixed emotions, where the source of each was indistinguishable from the next. "Fuck your dreams!" The tirade was interrupted by an irreducible conclusion. "And fuck hers too."


***


Lacus shuddered as he returned to the front desk to sign out. If that was the past, he pensively considered, I best not repeat it. He shook his head. The volatility of this mare was turning out to be a pattern. One that he questioned what the nature of their relationship must be to earn such heightened emotions. Her toys... the grave implications stuck to him like the grave he had one hoof in to begin with, I'll need to ask her about that.

With past and future so occupying his mind, stealing his peace thereof, Lacus stopped cold in search of a solitary moment; of now. It was again, or rather still, feeding time at the medicine cart and, as if a moment of stolen time had been returned to him, he thought it wise to make the best of this gift called the present.

Among the participants, one blue mare with a solid steel cutiemark recognized him through his disguise. Her hooves scrambled on the linoleum as she rushed forward to tackle him. Her nose had been everywhere by the time the orderlies were able to pull her off of him. He could feel the animal’s unconditional love turn to disappointed heart-ache when she discovered that he, in fact, did not have a treat for her that he had promised.

The nurse in charge of the pills gasped in shock at the behavior of this crazy pony. Her purple coat flushed a dark red up to the roots of her two toned hair as she apologized, “I’m so sorry sir, she thinks she’s a dog!”

Lacus smiled to the blue-on-blue mare as he rose up. “Really, what breed?” he quizzically inquired. It was a bittersweet distraction he was happy to have after the news he had been given.

Nurse Sweetheart seemed confused only offering a simple: "What?”

Lacus glanced at her then back to the mad mare, then back to the large nurse once more. “There are a lot of kinds of dogs. What kind is she?”

The question did not seem to clear up anything, rather, it served only to further confound. Her response marked her opinion as a medical professional. “But she’s not a dog. She’s a pony. A very sick pony that needs help.”

Lacus motioned to the orderlies that restraining her was unnecessary, that he had no fear from her, and that she would bring him no harm. In doing so he approached her to get a good look into her eyes for the spark of recognition that lie therein intrigued him. “Have you ever wonder what it’s like?” he asked those present without directing the question to any one pony in particular, “To have everypony else be so insistent that you’re something that you’re not.” Turning his attention to the nurse on staff, he added: “I couldn't imagine how painful it must be... to be so wronged.”

It was with vindication that Lacus returned to the lobby. Nurse Redheart was still at the front desk when he reached for the quill to sign out and, as he did so, she sweetly asked: “So, were you able to get everything sorted out?”

Lacus nodded before looking back over his shoulder. “I think so. When I am well, would it be possible to visit that mare?”

Redheart matched Lacus’s gaze before inquiring, “Screwy?”

It was true that her cutiemark was a screw, and that even he thought that she was a bit screwy when he met her yesterday, but he wondered how they didn't get her real name. “Is that her name?” he inquired while looking down at his own flank. “That’d be like calling me Sawtooth Speakeasy.”

Redheart blushed in embarrassment, or was visibly frustrated, it was difficult to distinguish the two emotions as both were present in her voice when she spoke, “We didn't get admittance paperwork. She was left outside as a filly.”

All Lacus could do was nod; realizing that he brought out the worst in other ponies. The shame in his voice carried through clearly as he apologized: “I’m sorry. Perhaps we should discuss this at other time.”


***


As the hospital faded from his rear-view, Lacus gave consideration to confronting Zecora directly about the herbicide. However, with no evidence to substantiate his claims he would only alienate a potential asset. To carefully plan his next move would be the more prudent option. With that in mind he knew it would be best to feed now, before he became as dangerously unstable as yesterday. The advantage of a full time cover identity was that it reduced the number of required shifts, and thus wasted energy. However it did not eliminate the need entirely, and inaction now would lead to disaster later.
> Act 2 | Obfuscation, Half-Truths, and Lies
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The street outside of the famous shop was filled with the aroma of pastries since the breakfast rush was coming to a close. The propped-open door implied that it had been busier than whatever was normal for this establishment. Lacus strode inside whereupon he found Mr. Cake slumped over an empty display case; completely exhausted by the ordeal. To the side of which a sign read free coronation (mini)cakes. The words were distinctly written in Pinkie Pie’s large, flamboyant font. The Cakes had then added the phrase, one per customer with accompanying order, also in parenthesis. This explained the expression of Mr. Cake. With a beatific smirk, and in a comforting tone Lacus offered: “I guess that I’m not the only one having a rough morning.”

He wanted to put the mornings events with Habré at the hospital far from his mind. To know others were also suffering made him feel less isolated, though he didn't want to take pleasure in their misfortune. He thought that perhaps Mr. Cake may also feel the same solace if given a chance to vent.

Mr. Cake wearily replied, “We’re out of coronation cakes,” and it was quite apparent he had no intention of making more.

Lacus laughed, “That’s alright, I haven’t quite decided what I want yet. Why don’t you come take a break with me?”

Carrot welcomed the opportunity to get off his hooves and have a sit down. After arriving at the booth Lacus asked: “So, Pinkie is not here to help you with this promotion?” The question was a coy attempt at ferreting out the Element of Laughter.

A long drawn out sigh escaped from Carrot Cake and he looked about to deflate entirely. “Well, she was, but then she went to pack for the festivities in Canterlot. Her best friend is going to be crowned as a real princess now, you know.”

Lacus folded his hooves on the table. With furrowed brow he asked: “Aren't you going?”

To which Mr. Cake nodded, and added: “Yes. But as guests, not as caterers throwing a party or an after party.”

Lacus was beginning to see the problem. He took a thoughtful moment to mull before suggesting: “If you can’t get compensated for the services Pinkie is providing, perhaps there may be another way to recount those losses.”

Intrigued, but skeptical, Mr. Cake asked: “What do you mean?” His words were ones of caution as to avoid his hopes rising too high at the idea.

“What is it that Pinkie Pie does?” Lacus raised the question while motioning for Carrot Cake to provide an answer. An answer that came without hesitation.

“Throw parties I guess.” Mr. Cake’s voice was firm until Lacus motioned to go on. “To, um, make ponies smile?” he added with uncertainty.

It was as good as a reason as any, Lacus thought, and he nodded along. “How does that work?”

Mr. Cake looked almost insulted at the childish line of questions, but Lacus gave no appearance that he was yanking the Cake’s chain. “When ponies are happy they smile,” was all that Mr. Cake could add.

Lacus stroked his chin before stoking the fire. “And when they don’t smile?”

“Then, they’re not happy!” Mr. Cake nearly shouted in response in exasperation. After he did so it slowly began to dawn on him just what he had said, “They’re not happy…”

Lacus spread his forearms at the notion, as if to signify that they had arrived at the destination of his leading questions. “A form of therapy,” Lacus surmised, “Outreach therapy, if not subliminal marketing.”

With a raised eyebrow Mr. Cake asked: “Marketing?”

Lacus rested his hooves on his stomach in preparation to animate his statement. “If Pinkie spreads happiness with your food, then the association is that Sugarcube Corner fills the heart as well as the belly.” Lacus did not notice the irony of that statement coming from a changeling until after he had finished making it. He couldn't help but smile at it, and hoped that such a smile would simply be associated with just the idea itself.

Mr. Cake quietly took time to reflect on the implications, “So… How do we…” he started to ask on behalf of his business.

Lacus signified with a wave of his hoof that the proprietor needn't finish the sentence if he felt profiting from the misery of others was distasteful. “Perhaps you can donate these ingredients to the cause they are already being used for, officially that is. Maybe start a charity to back Pinkie with, and even collect donations from others on her behalf.” It sounded almost like a scheme when Lacus said it aloud, though he knew it would allow the Cakes to facilitate a great deal of good, instead of being ruined by it.

Mr. Cake was quiet for an even longer time while assessing the idea until the bell over the entrance called him back to work. “I should talk to my wife about this,” he said in his escape back to his post.


***


Lacus broke from the daze of his past life, to the omnipresent poison barbs from the shale haired unicorn with sandy skin. Her voice rattled him as she asked: “Are you fucking ignoring me?”

He looked up from the empty place at his table, in his window-side booth, at Sugarcube Corner to see Habré Kadabré sitting across from him. His confusion was could be heard in his furtive whisper: “I thought you were on assignment!”

Her brow wrinkled in annoyance at her time being wasted with things she already knew. “No fucking shit. FlashLight came back from the Crystal Empire to pow-wow with her dumbass friends–” she explained.

Lacus cut in with a jeering: “Nothing like what we are doing, I assume.”

Habré’s mouth scrunched together as her face took an angular tilt best for giving the evil eye, and Lacus fell silent to the look that said Bitch, I will fucking cut you. “This is serious,” Habré denoted with an absence of expletives. She let the words hanging in the air to pull themselves down onto Lacus’s mind by their own considerable weight. “After Twibrary’s coronation Cadence gave her an artifact similar to the Crystal Heart.”

Habré was visually perturbed to see that Lacus wasn't as surprised as he was supposed to be.

“Dammit, D!” Habré’s voice was growing harder to keep at an inconspicuous volume, as even Mrs. Cake was giving her looks. With hushed hostility she went on “If we knew she had this during Canterlot, we could have won, and gone on to get the real deal.”

Now Lacus really was shocked. He hadn't even considered the greater implications of the necklace from yesterday beyond his own selfish ends. With grave concern he looked to Habré, “But, I don’t remember being put on recon during Canterlot.”

This brought a glowering glow from H.K. who muttered: “No one likes a smart-ass, D.” Her complexion lightened as she analyzed him. “Goddammit, you really still don’t remember?” Lacus quietly shook his head as she went on. “Look bitch, while I was playing Paige the fuckin’ Page, you were on another assignment. What it was, I can’t say, but it wasn't your fuckin’ ball to drop... so it’s not going to your balls that get fucking curb-stomped.”

Lacus nodded with a sigh of relief, but there was still something eating at him, and he had learned that Habré was not the type of pony to dance around an issue with. An issue of her toys. With resolve in his quest for the truth he asked: “Did you try to kill me? I mean, with poison?”

Habré turned stark white for a moment as the accusation trickled down through her ears, like herbicide, to the soil that her flowery vocabulary took root in. Her voice betrayed the betrayal, and her pain erupted forth: “Is that how you remember it?” The words came in an unsettling primal tone.

It was clear to Lacus that she thought he was looking for someone to blame. He felt like trash but pressed on: “That's just it Habré, I don’t remember, but the doctor said it couldn't have been an accident.”

Habré Kadabré was unmoved by the assertions of monoforms, to whom transformation would also seem an impossibility, but still she did not deny the accusations. Despite being on the brink of coming unhinged, her words were selected with the utmost care, “I didn't try to kill you. I was there to save you from–” Her sentence was cut short in frustration, before she restarted again “Look, the poison wasn't my idea. I was just following instructions.”

As the words tumbled from her mouth, so too did her anger and disappointment. Both freed with or, perhaps, by the statements. For whatever she wasn't telling him it was plain to see that she wanted to. Lacus thought the truth could use a little push. “Instructions? From your mentor? What does that mean?”

The problem with a little push, though, is that sometimes it’s enough to push someone away. A fact that he was made aware of by her crestfallen response: “It means I don’t want to be late for the train that will take me very far away from you.”

With that Habré Kadabré slid out of the booth and walked out on Lacus Sceleratus.


***


Though a bell rings when the door is open, it cannot unring as it is shut, but instead simply rings again. A definitive black and white form approached the counter as Mr. Cake was clearing the coronation mini-cake sign. “Oh. Hello Zecora. What can I getcha?” he asked as the zebra hummed her indecision while skimming the barren shelves.

“Not much you have I see, in the way of pastries,” Zecora cooed to Cake senior.

As he blushed about his wares, he responded: “Me and the Mrs. are working hard to get restocked for lunch.”

It was at this time she noticed Lacus’s unflinching gaze upon her. Her necklaces clinked together as she cocked her head to meet it head on, “I encourage you to take your time, another subject is now on my mind. I bid you have a good day, for I must to speak with Lateré.”

The Zebra turned her authoritative gait to approach the changeling. There was no impatience in her step, and with each hoof-fall the jingle of her adornments further built tension in the heart of Lacus Sceleratus.

She stood next to his table, refusing to be seen seated with him, as she made her address: “It is still Latere Vesco? Or by another name do you now go?”

Lacus met Zecora’s derisive glare with confusion. “What?” he asked, not actually expecting a clear answer.

Zecora repeated her question: “Did you come in to feed; and lie in wait? Or was there something else you need to abate?”

Lacus was stunned the public reference to his true changeling nature, and admitted to himself that it shouldn't be a surprise that she knew what he was. After all, if she poisoned him, there would be no way that she wouldn't know. Though what did surprise him was that her body language was limited to smug superiority and, in her words, shallow accusations. It might be what he would do in her position to flush him out. He thought that he maybe able to bait her into using questions that revealed more of her than him.

“No. Well yes. It’s Lucas Greymane now,” he responded on rays of a sarcastic sunny disposition. “And my tummy hurts so I can’t eat anything. My doctor said I had a very interesting mixed drink this morning,” he added, while playing up the sarcasm even harder, this time with a great big grin that helped to reveal his changeling fangs.

For a moment her demeanor gave way to a slight glimpse of surprise, before her reply: “Well so you say, but you live with Kadabré. And now you are on the mend, because she cannot brew a simple blend.”

As scoffing as the statement sounded, Lacus was certain that it was actually a question that begged for confirmation. He was starting to get a little freaked out at the despondent way that they were conversing in the happiest place in Equestria. “Perhaps,” he began, “If you don’t feel comfortable talking here we can…” he addressed the statement before he finished making it by rising to his hooves while he spoke.

Zecora popped her chin up and to the right, as if to say come, follow me, to where we may speak peaceably, as she led Lacus to the door.

While leaving Sugarcube Corner, Lacus tried to hide his irritation at the implication that Habré was the poisoner. “What were you trying to say?” he asked Zecora while trotting along behind her. Though she wasn't facing him as to see the recognition in her eyes, he could hear it in her voice.

“So they did it anyway? With leaves and ledes mares do play?” she asked with grim amusement.

They trotted their way toward the Everfree Forest, while Lacus gave thought to her question, as he observed the citizens of Ponyville preparing for their respective celebrations of the new Princess of Friendship. Apparently, not everyone could make the trip to Canterlot for the coronation. He turned his attention to the zebra he was trailing behind to ask “I don’t understand how do you know this?” It seemed Zecora knew all too well what it was that Lacus was suffering from, and was torn by the idea of even humoring him.

Slowly, as she thoughtfully considered how much to say, Zecora began to explain: “We've met twice before, when you were felled at my door. The first you dropped broken and charred, straight into a pond in my backyard. If I knew then the trouble you would bring around, surely I would have left you there to drown.”

A quiet, uncomfortable cough could be heard from the changeling as he swallowed the fear that he was feeling, though Zecora continued undeterred: “Instead I dredged you out of that drink, and left you for the mare of yellow and pink. It was days before they returned from Canterlot, and by then of you I had all but forgot.” Zecora paused in the path so that Lacus could catch up to her. When he did, she gave him a deep long look, with such intensity that Lacus couldn't help but question it. With the animosity that she expressed their initial meeting in Sugarcube Corner he had to wonder why she was helping him now.

After the uncomfortable silence Zecora resumed the lead toward the Everfree Forest, as well as her story. “The second, you came into my tree, with that unicorn wannabe.  In her mangled sense of grace, she spit venom in my face!” Even now it was clear that Zecora still was offended by the duo. “Then she asked me to brew that swill, what would be your memory pill. I declined then of course, but did it deter her from this course?”

Lacus stopped in his tracks. Was she implicating H.K. or somepony else? Though he hadn't scarcely considered the third mare—HK's mentor—before it became apparent that Zecora would give him no reprieve to do so.

She was steadily adding to her story, “Though both seemed a bit deranged, my time here has shown me things most strange. While one was cruel the other was no lout, and advised that I hold on to my doubt.” Her inflection reflected that the situation was humorous, but Lacus could not identify why it should be.

Her steps slowed as they reached the forest's edge, once there she stopped, and went on to say: “So I agreed to play my part, when you came with dreams in your heart. Until you can remember that day, I have nothing left to say. Though I will ask what it means to see, life through the lens of H.S.B.”

The dusk and disturbing atmosphere of the woods no longer sat well with Lacus though Zecora, however, disappeared seamlessly into it.


***


Lacus frowned. “I. Have had. Enough.” Each word was punctuated with ever increasing frustration. The outburst garnered strange looks from the other patrons of Sugarcube Corner. He could feel his world slipping into a frayed mess, as past and present blended so seamlessly together to create what he might call reality. He was tired of being lead around by the nose, like a horse being lead to water, and he refused to drink. He needed to take the reins, if he could guide these slips, perhaps then he could have the answers he sought.

Lacus’s stewing was interrupted by the pleasant Mrs. Cup Cake who inquired: “Are you alright, deary? You look like that foul-mouthed girl just ripped your heart out.” Being where they were the comforting words were, of course, escorted by comfort food.

A bowl of noodle soup. For his soul, Lacus assumed as he looked up to see Mrs Cake’s uncomfortable yet reassuring smile. “She’ll…” Lacus started but couldn't finish. He didn't know if she would be coming back, since she was more hurt than he had ever seen her. Even more so than when she was dying in his arms.

“Well. There’s plenty of other ladies out there for a smart lad like you. I know it may not seem like it now, but you've got a lot to offer.” Her sincerity made Lacus feel uneasy. Never mind that she had just assumed they were a couple. Two changelings? It’d never happen.

Mrs. Cake bashfully looked to the ground while fiddling with her hooves. “I just wanted to say, I really appreciate what you did for my husband the other day.” The reference of time solidified that Lacus was in the present again as she further explained, “We’re working with Minuette, the dentist, to make the Smile Foundation a reality. This is our first dish in a newly expanded teeth friendly menu,” she added with a pause, “it seems as though you could really use it, and it’s on the house as a thank you.”

Dumbfounded, Lacus nodded to Mrs. Cake, and sipped at the soup. Though it did not give him the power that changelings typically associate with feeding, he found that it was nourishing in its own way. It eased his mind, and allowed him to return to productive thinking. As Mrs. Cake left him to eat in peace he said with a smirk, “Pool’s stew.”

Mrs. Cake stopped and asked “What was that, deary?”

The smirk grew into a smile. “Nothing,” he said. For a moment he forgot that he was still Lucas Greymane, and nearly outed himself as Lacus Sceleratus, when it dawned on him that he wasn't distinguishing between the two anymore.  “I think...” he added with the corresponding thoughtful expression, “That I need some time to meditate.”

Mrs. Cake stood in preponderance for a moment before suggesting that he see Zecora, as Twilight had spoken highly of her for such things. Lacus could only grimace at the idea. Though, her second suggestion was more palatable, as for clearing the mind was the profession of Lotus and Aloe. Lacus thanked her for the suggestion but didn't leave until after finishing his soup.
> Act 2 | With Painted Faces
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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.
> Act 2 | The Time and Place
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Canterlot.

The deep, rich tone of cathedral bells that rang across the courtyard signified the time. Not the specific hour, as it was still more than fifteen till, but rather that the ceremony had begun. Guests were being shown to their seats, or at least so the itinerary indicated, and the royal wedding would soon begin.

Two ponesonas of changelings stood on a sidewalk, the sandy, plain coat of the unicorn with the shale-colored mane was mostly occluded in shadows cast by an archway. “Deception?” she asked, addressing the mare with a pillowy soft, yet soiled complexion. The dusty coat and gold arrested mane of which were a dead giveaway. The unicorn continued upon visual confirmation, “You really think this’ll fucking work?”

The earth mare looked up to the wedding chapel and, as she did, her sharp thistle mane fought against her hairband. “It is awfully ambitious.” She whistled a high-to-low tone. “It is our duty to make sure no one interferes,” she added with an afterthought, before turning to the unicorn to say: “I just hope that Mom’s thought of everything.” The sentence was punctuated with the sound of hoof-beats crossing toward them on the cobblestone street.

“Fuckin’ finally M&M. What the fuck took you so long?” Habré’s jeer was sent over Deception’s shoulder, and she also turned to acknowledge the approaching duo.

The reply came in a pant as one earth pony and one pegasus, who were visibly out of breath, completed the quartet. “Not all of us are as proficient with spacial magic as you, Dissolution.” The matter-of-fact nature of the sarcasm seemed to do little to improve the mood of the earth pony speaker. He possessed pale skin and a jet black mane that flipped apathetically as he spoke, revealing a thick layer of mascara around his sleep-deprived eyes. Though his rigid stature towered over the two mares, it was only in lanky height, lacking the bulk of some similarly sized stallions.

The pegasus nodded in agreeance as it tucked away its wings. Its gentle sky colored features were offset by a hunk of cavern crystal that was now interwoven into his mane. "We would have just popped up here if we could." Everything about this changeling seemed undecided, even his fake accent, and it was the only changeling they knew who could pull off heterochromia.

“Melancholy, Madness, you’re both right on time,” Deception said as she motioned for them to come closer by leading with her jaw into an turnabout march toward a nearby alleyway. “We need to get into position,” she continued. “Any questions on the plan so far?”

Dissolution spoke up with gusto, “Explain to me why I have the fucking shitty job.”

It was clear that, since they were beyond the prying purview of pedestrians, the unicorn had no qualms about speaking plainly. Deception addressed her concerns with pandering: “Shield duty? For as good as Atrophy is, he’s no Dissolution. The two of you have to work together—one inside, and one out—to counter this spell.”

Clearly unimpressed Habré devised another iteration of the question: “What I fucking meant was, if that bitch Nature and a hundred interns are just gonna bang on it anyway, can’t I just do whatever the fuck you guys are doing?”

The answer to her whine was abruptly addressed by Melancholy's monotone retort: “You mean, be quiet for two minutes while you infiltrate an enemy stronghold? No. I don’t think that you can do that.”

Dissolution barked a quick “Shut the fuck up, tool. No one’s fucking talking to you.” and immediately thereafter fell into a grumbling stew, as she had inadvertently proven him right.

Madness, queen of pronouns, had been eerily silent as its large wide eyes took in every detail. As though the confrontation was going to lead to kissing and, only until after it was quite obvious that it would not, was there room for it to speak. “Ah, La’Te Air, you tease,” the wispy words danced from his mouth through a fake Prench accent: a sharp contrast to Melancholy's stilted style of speech. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want me to try to tell what is real from what is not?”

The home-grown earth mare nodded before issuing the correction: “This is a Harmony Spell Breakers operation. Let’s stick to our elemental designations and maybe, if we’re lucky, they’ll manifest while we keep the Night Princess at bay.” After a brief pause to inspect Madness's rising giddiness levels, measurable in prancing and wing-flutters, Deception added the answer to the question,  “While you're drawing the guards away, we can’t very well have them guessing who the real threat is by watching who is getting ignored.”

The conformation of Madness’s orders made it squee with girlish delight, the happier she got, the more her overall form physically shifted down the gender-continuum toward that end.

Deception turned her attention toward Dissolution, who seemed to be done sulking, for now at least. “Revisions are as follows:” she recited, “Given the news that the Elements of Harmony are being protected by powerful magic cast by Celestia herself…” This news caused the sandy ears to perk up, as sharply as stalagmites from the rocky grove of her jagged mane, while Deception addressed her directly: “you’ll need to follow the battalion being lead by Nature’s Wrath as she engages the Element Bearers, until Atrophy can report back that the location of the Elements is secure. Then slip in and work your magic–”  

Dissolution was so astonished that she interrupted Deception on the spot. “You want me to crack a fucking sun code?”

To which Deception only shook her head and continued from where she was interrupted, “You are not to engage the enemy. If by some miracle they manage to fight through both Nature’s and Atrophy's forces, then I still want it to be for naught,” she paused as to allow the vile one’s imagination to run wild before continuing, “Melt the vault into the floor if you have to. They must not get at those weapons.”

Dissolution grinned. “Fuck yeah!” she shouted, adding: “Anything else I need to know, bitch?”

Deception knew that though she may not see any direct action, rumor had it that the implications of by any means necessary has always done wonders to improve Dissolution's mood. Though it was a bit jarring to Latere that these terms of endearment and terms of insult, were one and the same, and relied on inflection alone to distinguish them. 

Considering the alternate possibilities, she added: “If things go inconceivably sideways, use Nature's Wrath to cover your escape.” She looked to the other three while debating what would be the worst of the worst case scenarios when Madness interrupted her train of thought with a whisper.

In an unusually chipper inflection it inquired: “And if things go full Nightmare?”

Deception dug in deep. “Then we kill the Moon. Equestria has survived without her in the past, and can do so again. I won’t be the one who lets the greatest dream of the Changelings bring about eternal nightmares to the Swarm.”

An organ could be heard from the wedding above and Madness hummed along with the matrimonial melodies. Though it was Dissolution who kicked things off with a crack of her neck and a confident: “Show time, mother fuckers!” 

The four present, of the would-be Elements of Dissonance, nodded and broke for their respective positions. In so doing Deception mentally noted that, according to the plan, Celestia would now be taking center stage while they set forth for their respective side theaters.


***


Even in the sweltering heat of the sauna Lacus could distinguish his sweat from his tears. Aloe had just reentered to pour water on the heated rocks when Lacus returned to the present. “I… I think I made a huge mistake,” he said while sadly looking to the ponies who had been nothing but supportive to him. “I need to go. I can’t do this right now,” he quickly added as he got up and rushed through the door.

The floodgates had been opened, and now Lacus found his present living in tandem with his past. As Latere ran toward the midnight tower of Princess Luna, Lacus in turn ran to the Everfree Forest to the spot that Zecora claimed she found him. If there was any truth to her story, he believed he would know it by the time both of his counterparts arrived there. As Lacus weaved through the side streets of Ponyville to the treeline, Deception was weaving through the side streets of Canterlot with her companions.


***


Latere turned to Madness and asked. “Your previous mentor was Anti-magic, and she is to become my student after this mission. What is she like under all that obscenity?”

A laugh accompanied more of Madness’s faulty Prench, “More obscenities I assume, her last mentor was Nature’s Wrath after all.” The pegasus shook his head and glanced up to the sky as if it could spot Wrath’s army just beyond the barrier before returning its gaze, and attention, to the earth pony. “The Anti-magic I enjoyed was a different beast altogether.”

Melancholy indicated that he was going to go on ahead to scout the defenses and, after giving him the go-ahead, Deception asked Madness: “Oh? How so?”

Madness enlightened in light tone: “I think that the most distinct difference is that Arcanicus is dead now.”

Deception was shocked at idea that she survived his training when the previous Dissolution could not.

The listless voice of Madness continued: “We really could have found your first lesson helpful.” He hinted at the nature of their self-deception, and a serious matter it indeed must have been to change his gender when he addressed it, “We were absolutely convinced that there was no limit to what was achievable with magic, that we had not considered that the limitations were innate to our own ability.”

A somber moment of silence passed between the two before Deception asked: “So, how’d it happen?”

Madness laughed. “Well, we found that we are creatures of magic, nearly alicorns in our own right.” The statement came with visual cues indicating their changeling horn and wings. “But, we’re not so capable at harnessing that level of evocation, due to our own transmutative nature. Well, my previous mentor thought to change that, his specialty being alteration, and I aimed to help with my divinations.”

Latere blinked at the jargon before objecting, “That’s not possible.”

In turn Madness countered instantly, “With magic it is impossible for something to be impossible,” before taking a moment's concession with a jovial head bob, “Though, given our track record, it may still be highly improbable.”

Latere sharpened her tone, and asked: “You’re going to make me ask aren't you?”

Though Madness simply replied: “That counts,” before continuing, “He blew himself up. The influx in energy was too much for him, and he just cracked under the strain. The same way any other focusing crystal does when you pour too much magic into it.” Another solemn moment passed for Madness. “We thought that our adaptable nature would let us compensate.”

The imagery was more than a little too vivid for Latere, who complained: “Why tell me this?”

Madness smirked uncontrollably. “Because you asked.” His tone rapidly shifted once more to serious, “And more importantly, because you will be training with the new pony of unmaking after this mission. One all too aware what the implications of unmaking her own limitations are.” The statement didn't require a follow up but Madness gave one anyway, “She will try it, and it will break her too. It's what we do. What other cells won't..." Madness's head bobbed with their gallop, and he turned his two-tone eyes over his shoulder in the direction that Dissolution went.

"The impossible,” he reiterated after a long pause. He offered a smile and a happy glance in Deception's direction.

Latere arrived at the tower as Lacus was arriving the treeline to the Everfree Forest. With nothing to distract him from this memory he sallied forth into the breach.

Madness broke off from Latere’s wing position, to fly solo through the halls, as Deception came to a gentle canter and ducked behind a column. “The end of the world is near!” Madness screamed at the top of his lungs whilst crashing against every delicate looking thing that could possibly be put in his path. His rant continued as he trailed down the corridor, “Alien monsters will fall from the sky and all life will be subjugated by the might of faceless hordes from the blackness!” His end of the world prophecies cannily resembled the Changeling’s attack strategy, but was carefully masked in the presentation of his ludicrous ludibrium.

It did not take long for his antics to attract the attention of the patrol, and even the standing guards for Luna’s chambers. A transformed Latere also joined the fray yelling: “Seize him, his insane rantings must not disturb the princess's slumbers!” 

What was promising to turn into an all out brawl quickly petered itself out as guard turned on guard, when Melancholy and Deception aided Madness in the incapacitation of those dumb enough gather in the hall. Meanwhile, Lacus found himself battling any creature fool enough to think him a meal. As Latere approached the door to Luna’s chamber, Lacus approached the clearing that Kindness discovered him in.

“I’ll take it from here,” Deception said to Melancholy and Madness, “You two cover me.”

M&M saluted as they transformed into the two guards who had manned the post, and began cleaning up the bodies in the hall. All of them were still alive, if only just, as killing them may have made too much a mess. After a deep breath, and a three count, the doors to Luna’s private chambers were opened before the intruders. The Princess of Dreams stirred at the intrusion but did not wake. What seemed to be a pleasant dream quickly soured her countenance as nightmares invaded.

In a rousing regal voice Luna spoke from her sleeping state, “We are in the presence of much darkness.”

The statement made Latere nervous, as the situation was strenuous at best, in an attempt to disassociate herself with the situation, she transformed... into the form found in the reflection of her own unmaking. Desperately trying to hold herself together Latere, now Lacus, stood in the doorway and charged a destructive spell that she prayed she would not to be forced to use.

While Lacus’s body stood in the Everfree Forest looking up to the evening sky and staring at the stars while waiting for his fall, his soul stood locked in the doorway; eyes transfixed on the mare who moved them. 

After a few moments of tense contemplation Lacus looked over his shoulder to Madness and Melancholy, who were at full military attention in the hall, before the door closed between them. He wasn't sure if they closed it to give him privacy, or if he did to prevent them from seeing that which falls upon a leader to do. 

He had heard of the horrors that the Nightmare of the Moon was capable of. A visage blacker than shadows cast in total darkness, who once preyed on the souls of Equestrian fillies and colts. But this magnificent creature so full of grace, even while suffering in silence, could not be the same monster… could it? In that moment he found that his faith in purpose was wavering, and he nearly lost his spell whilst under hers.

It was a deception.

Lacus knew of only one truth, of his mission, and of his devotion to the swarm. As he struggled to regain his composure he forced himself to approach Luna’s bedside. Her own fretting became more visible as though she were lost in a nightmare. One that she had entered to rescue the inhabitant. He feared that she was changing and had to put a stop to it.

He stealthily crept toward her until he was mere inches from the hem of her bedding, where he could see her eyes squeeze closed even tighter as the green glow from his horn cast a light of ill intent over her covers.

Luna spoke suddenly in her sleep “'Tis all a lie! Thou art being deceived!”

The sudden outburst caused Lacus to discharge the spell into the sleeping goddess.

Luna's eyes opened shortly after the dark magic lanced through her ribs. It was not the violent reaction that Lacus expected, nor did it come with the sudden realizations that he thought appropriate. Lacus stood, locked in horror, as a gentle flutter of eyelids and wings led to the painfully slow waking of the slumberer. Her voice was weak as she looked up to her accidental assassin.

“Why...” she whispered, “when even thou art mine subject to protect?”

The events following were a blur of unadulterated panic as Lacus really and truly freaked out. “We need to get help!” He shouted out to his compatriots as he burst through the door to meet them directly.

“No,” the dry recitation was issued by Melancholy. “She’s the enemy. We’ll tell the others she was changing. They won’t question it.” 

The effort at which this gothic pony put into disregarding the value of life sickened Lacus; life that had plenty of love to give still. Deep within him something just snapped and a wellspring of carcinogenic power flowed through him. His eyes burned a brilliant emerald green and his horn caught fire as he blasted his ally out the window. 

A final gasp of air escaped his burned body with a hiss. Melancholy was dead before his flash-cooked carcass even hit the stained-glass panes, after which his lifeless form fell several stories before crumpling on the city streets below. 

Simultaneously, the pink light from the shield outside danced across Lacus's face, as it  crashed down around the city’s walls. As the barriers dropped so too did the realization of what he had just done. He had taken a life. Not just any life either– the life of his comrade. He turned to Madness to try to explain himself, to explain why he did it, but Madness seemed to be already aware since she was smiling.

Lacus lost all nerve when he shouted his accusation: “You knew! You knew this whole time! About all of it!” He glanced back out the window then back to Madness as he motioned toward it. "Even this!?"

A sly grin slowly crept across the face of Madness. “What type of friend would I be, if prevented you from awakening the truest depths of your lessons?” 

It wasn't an insult, and there was no hint of any type of superiority in her voice. Madness was just being what she thought a friend was. She couldn't distinguish between suffering and support if the end result was the same. Even though suffering often begets more suffering, it still might lead to growth, and that was enough for her. It was this twisted sense of loyalty, and motivation to help her friends achieve their very best, that landed her with the Harmony Spell Breakers in the first place. And, it would seem, that Melancholy was simply not her friend.

Lacus knew deep down that to Madness, whether or not Luna survived, the end result was the same. Not only could the princess now not interfere with Chrysalis’s plans as they unfolded in the cathedral, but more importantly Deception would suffer for the part he played. So too would he suffer for the death of his fellow brood-mate. In a panic Lacus rushed back to Luna’s side as he decried his own actions, screaming: “We have to get her help!”

Madness shrugged. “The only way I know to help you, is to not hinder you further. Go, if you must, your lessons truly have concluded,” and with in a congratulatory note in its sing-song voice it added: “You pass.”

Deception wrapped Luna in her blanket, that was quickly filling with blood, and slung her over his shoulders. He dashed past the Dissonant of Loyalty who remained in the hall, smiling confidently at the fruition of all it had to teach, while Deception desperately tried to find someone to undo the damage that he had done. From his approach to the exit, he could hear Madness call after him.

“Just as my previous student accomplished true antimagic, you have accomplished true deception, and I see greater things still in your future.”

A shiver was sent down his spine that was warmed by the blood of the princess on his back. Whatever insanity was being spoken of was not something he wanted any part in. He had to get out.

As the pair flowed onto the street, Deception was confronted by the forces of Nature. They were rounding up civilians and guards alike. Lacus’s eyes shown a telling green glow as he barked “This one is mine!” at a lowly peon who skittered backward before moving on. It would not take long for the others to learn of his treachery, and soon he would be on the run from the entire swarm. All he could do was try to find a corner to hide in, and let the events play out as they would. Even now, as the seat of power uprooted itself all around him, but he still clung to the hopes that things could go back to the way the were.

A disquieting voice came from beneath the cover of night as Lacus found a place to lay the princess to rest. “Thou art brave,” she said, “To battle the darkness harbored in your heart. 'Tis no easy task we assure you.”

Lacus was confounded by the sympathies of his victim, and at the same time nearly in tears at his actions. “Why are you being so nice to me?” he cried at her, “I’m a changeling. Your enemy!”

Being the redeemed light that she was Luna could only smile. “All whom canst be seen under that pale moon's light are our subjects. Though thou swearest fealty to another, this fact does not change,” she stated weakly which reflected the state of her grievous wounds, “And we love them all very deeply. Once, we too suffered from the lies that our fears whisper to us. Once, we too succame to the dark temptations of taking that which was not not ours.” Her voice grew hoarse and but she managed to rasp: “But we have since learned that we are loved. For she who loves is loved in return.”

Luna took a moment to struggle into a sitting position, and reached out her fore-hoof to pull in Lacus. “We shall impart upon you our greatest secret. One that has taken us a thousand years to learn.” Lacus’s eyes burned at the notion of forbidden knowledge as the princess continued uninterrupted. “All ponies require love. It sustains them. To go so many years without it...” The conciliation of the statement could be heard in her voice. “Thou art loved, Lucas Greymane. All thou needst do is let that love into thy heart.” 

With that, all facades that created Lacus dropped in shambles to the ground at their hooves. As he rushed into the hug, he inadvertently applied a great deal of pressure to the wound with his embrace, but there was no pain reflected in the princess’s kind eyes. Eyes that only faded slightly as they began losing their light.

Between tears and sobs he whispered: “I will give you all that I have. Just don’t die.” His gnarled changeling horn began to glow with a swirl of green and pink as he transferred everything within him to her, but the moment was cut short by an emanation that erupted from the tower overlooking the whole of Canterlot. He desperately tried to tighten his grasp on Luna as the power of Shining’s and Cadence’s loving protection spell forced them apart.

His entire world was spinning wildly out of control and so too was his mind caught in a dizzying disarray. His final glimpse of the princess was of the loving light from the barrier flowing into her wound, sealing it, and rejuvenating the glimmer in her eyes. 

As he sailed through the skies, riding the shockwave, he was faced with a new crisis. He had betrayed everything he believed. He was not fit to be called a changeling, nor was he worthy of being called an earth pony. His wings broke from his body, and his horn disintegrated. His outer army blacks and inner earth tones mixed together as a fight began within his soul between heart and blood.

The memory of the events were so vivid that Lacus physically was beside himself as he crashed to the ground reflexively encased in the primordial goo of a changeling hibernation pod. The friction of the event burned it away, just as the magical explosion in Canterlot had pushed clouds together in the sky above the Everfree Forest. Lacus came to realize he did not land in a pond, but one formed around him. The present him was in the wrong place. To find his past self, Lacus ventured deeper into the woods.
> Act 3 | Death of the Author
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Far deeper in the Everfree Forest than he had cause to venture before, Lacus came to the long, but shallow, grave dug by the force of his impact. At the head of which was a poetic pair of headstones, and he read the first engraving aloud while trying to wrap his head around their message. “Latere Vesco, may she lie in wait forever, never again to feed upon the innocent.” Turning to the other “Lacus Sceleratus, a lie told corrupts the waters of knowledge. May he drown in the truth.” 

Placed between the two, as if shared by both, was the painting missing from his home. The black silhouette of a single changeling-shaped shooting star with a fiery-pink trail, was shown to be falling over the equally black silhouette of Canterlot’s skyline, such that the burning was the only color in the painting. The title read Make a Wish.

Plucking the painting from the dirt, where it seemed that it had lay in the open exposure for at least a month, revealed a thin plastic bag. It was semi-transparent, showing that the contents were undamaged by the weather. Lacus began to feel butterflies in his stomach as one of the only two questions he had left was about to be answered. After several minutes of using the spa sisters breathing technique to calm his mind, he opened the bag, and the envelope contained therein.

It was a copy of the mission report. The one that was "deferred" from his home the day before. It also happened to be the one that Madness had filed. Skimming past mission number, date, and code-name, Lacus quickly got to the meat of the report: the detailed account of events from the HSB team.

Latere Vesco, mission commander, successfully completed the objective of detaining Princess Luna through the ongoing operation. Though one of our own was brutally cut down by the enemy, she was undeterred from her objectives. The events of this mission brought about a change in Latere, to a more decisive identity, and as such I offer conformation so that her file may be updated to accommodate this change. She indicated the name Lacus Sceleratus as the new persona that she identifies with, and Lucas Greymane his new preferred cover.

After flipping through the file, Lucas found his own submitted paperwork for that change as well as a Writ of Personal Pronouns regarding his gender, before returning to the front page of Madness’s report.

Due to circumstances beyond the control of the HSB group, the greater mission ended in failure; though all members filled their roles admirably. Lacus, name pending approval, has shown a surprising pension for creating operating assets, and turning double agents. There may exist in Ponyville such potential assets that will allow him to continue his mission. I advise some additional operational licence to be added to his pending reconnaissance mission to further develop these assets.

That was it. After that the report simply concludes, with M of M&M, in homage to the fallen compatriot. Lacus turned the page over to see if he had missed anything. Madness hadn't outed him as the traitor he was, which explained how he was even given this assignment to Ponyville in the first place.

“Lucas.”

The quiet voice came from over his shoulder disturbing his peace. He turned to find Habré Kadabré standing solemnly at the gates to his graves.

“You saved me,” her voice was low and wary. Nothing like the violently carefree Dissolution he had come to know.

“What?” was all Lucas could think to respond with.

Her reply came after a disheartening silence, and the question of his memory came across her face. “When I questioned the Changeling condition. You were there. With the healing magic that you insisted that I teach you,” she laughed uncomfortably while adding: “I didn't even fucking know any before you brought it up.”

Her voice had trailed off, and Lacus responded in a reverent tone: “I remember, but she saved your life, not me.”

To which Habré offered a brief smile of relief at the recognition before shaking her head at the half-truth, “Because of you. That's what she told me. She honestly couldn't care." Habré hesitated at the implication that Lucas didn't care, and cringed at what followed. "She said that you would care, and that was the point. If it were not for you... well, I'm just glad you were on her mind."

"You can understand then, why I was concerned…” she started to explain, “when she asked me to use my magic to do it again.”

The understanding drained from Lacus’s mind, and with it the tint of his skin as she elaborated: “And again, and again, and again. ‘Until you can call me Lucas.' That’s what you told me.” The memory visibly depressed her to recount, and her head lowered to the ground as she continued, “With each failure, she became more  convinced—obsessed—that a changeling’s true nature is determined not by the choices of their life, but by the context those choices were given. That the memories we use to make new decisions—to build new content—could be used to reshape that context.”

Lacus was shaken to his core by the revelation, and left totally speechless. As Habré continued there was hesitation in her voice as she admitted the truth that she was most afraid of speaking: “And… And I just couldn't watch you do it to yourself anymore. I couldn't have you beg me to do it to you anymore. I couldn't erase you again, but you... you did it anyway. I was so pissed I just quit.” 

After a pause, punctuated by the a long sigh that longed for a response, Habré made a slow approach to Lacus. “But, then I saw this on my to the train station,” she said and handed him a ‘Coming soon!’ advertisement for Sugarcube Corner’s new menu, before adding: “Now I truly believe as you did, Lucas.” 

Lacus questioningly read the title “Miles of Smiles?” as he inspected the picture featured on the parchment. Pinkie Pie was bursting out of a cake holding an exorbitantly large tube of toothpaste, sporting a massive smile, while Mr. and Mrs. Cake shook hooves with Minuette. It had been the same picture he saw yesterday morning but thought little of.

Habré laughed nervously. “It seemed so completely fucking absurd I just had to ask them more.” Her tone returned to a somber one, “Imagine my surprise when Mr. Cake recounted the story of his conversation with you as the source of this inspiration. Then I ran into you immediately afterward, outside Sugarcube Corner, and I just didn’t know what the to think.”

Lucas looked to the grave of his changeling identities, before turning back to Habré. “But it’s all a lie,” he said while thinking back to his first lesson. A lesson that claimed the most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves.

She paused for a moment. “You told me once, when I began my experiments, that just because something is dangerous doesn't mean it isn't worth doing. Believing that nearly got me killed, but it didn't kill me, and I’m stronger for it.” The desperation in her voice could be felt on his skin as she leaned in to tell him: “I believe in you, and because of you, I’m standing here telling you that it is worth the risk. How can it be a lie if what you feel is true?”

Lucas looked to the ground for a long time before saying anything. His voice, nay his whole body, was filled with an odd nervous sincerity. “There is just one more thing that I must know.” It wasn't a request, since Habré had made it perfectly apparent that there wasn't anything she wouldn't do for her mentor; even if she wasn't around to ask.
> Act 3 | Written in Black and White
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The approach to Zecora’s treant was a quiet one. There was nothing left to be said between the two changelings. Lucas stopped short of the home of the rhythmic zebra, and turned to the mare that was accompanying him.

“Zecora…” he started but paused to consider how to proceed. “She said that we had met her before. The first time we met her...” He stopped again in frustration at the realization that the word “first” may mean something different to Habré than it did to him. He shrugged it off and restarted,  “She said that we insulted her while asking for her help.” 

Habré’s ears looked as though they were about to burst into flame. While the incident flashed in her mind, it brought with it the familiar rage that he had grown accustomed to seeing in her. “Cunty bitch. What about it?” she barked as to keep her outburst to a minimum.

Lucas replied in a more sensible tone, “I am going to try to relive that memory, and need to you take the form you were wearing then, if it is different from the one you’re wearing now.”

Habré grew indignant as if he had just asked her to pose provocatively before replying, “We showed her our partials... but I suppose you don’t have one anymore.”

It would seem that, in a sense, he had in fact asked her to do just that; knowing as he did just how personal a partial transformation was. “Please, Habré,” he said, “I need a reference to the memory so I can draw it out.”

Habré Kadabré was reluctant but eventually conceded and produced a conjuration assisted transformation. In a brilliant flash a whole new pony stood before him. She was taller than he expected, taller than even him now, but not so tall as the queen. It was domineering. 

Her monochrome palette spoke well to the black and white nature through which she saw the world. Her silver hair faded from dark at the roots to light at the tips. It fell only to her right side; the left being completely shaved. It was long and pulled up in three intertwined loops, the end of two of which were clipped in place at the base of her skull, while the third was left to dangle naturally. The changeling holes in her mane and tail served well to show how layered her look was which, in turn, spoke to her inner complexity.

A gold chain descended down from a clamp piercing in a natural changeling hole in her ear, across her cheek, up her muzzle, and between her eyes before connecting to another clamp in the middle of her horn. And, while not chains, similarly styled gold jewelry adorned the holes in her hind-legs and fore-hooves. The base of her horn was enshrouded in a white silk sleeve with gold embroidery on either end. 

She even possessed, on her bottom, a cutiemark of a four-piece broken-heart. A heart that was enveloped in the fangs of her vampiric nature, which also served to round out the sides. Though it was far from subtle, such a trait was something that no pony could ever accuse her of possessing. Her skin was a stark white offset by the black stripes of a feral zebra. It was with no coincidence that Zecora found fault with Habré Kadabré, who immediately spoke up.

“Please don’t call me that.”

Confused, as he had not yet said anything, Lucas was about to ask when she answered: “I know how you see me, and my cover identity is not who I am. This is the form of Alalia Witchwild.”

Lucas took some joy in knowing that she was still her clever old self, taking the name of a speech impediment to describe her take on her element.

“Thank you, Alalia.”


***


The approach to Zecora’s isolated hut was filled with questions. How. Why. What if. All of them being voiced by Dissolution to Deception. Deception found herself explaining several times, in different ways, that the perception of choice was more important than the actual existence of choice. That, she hoped, the way to get Zecora to overcome the history between the Changelings and the Zebra was to give her the opportunity not to, and rely on the misguided tendency to take the high road.

It was in protest that Dissolution asked her last question: “But how do you know?”

Deception could only parrot what her previous mentor instilled in her. “Because it is impossible to find an impossibility in a world of magic, and if it turns out to be just highly improbable…” she shrugged, “Then I too will go to my grave trying to beat the odds.” 

Deception could see that it troubled Dissolution to see her new mentor, and student, going down a path that nearly killed the Dissonant of Magic only weeks earlier, and certainly killed her predecessor. Though the path was Deception’s to walk– she wouldn't be walking it alone. Everything had been accounted for, and now was the time to put all those plans into motion. Only one piece remained, which was what led them so deep into the Everfree Forest.

The pair of mares stood outside the door, to take a quiet moment to steel themselves for what was to come, before Deception knocked. It was only a brief moment of waiting before Zecora opened the door, answering: “Oh? Travelers of the Forest Everfree, what brings you to my humble tree?”

Deception took off her hairband and bowed slightly. “My companion and I have come in search of a cure for a mysterious ailment, that originated in a far away land.” Now free, her hair rustled like needles flowing through a colander, as the carefully prepared half-truth flowed from her mouth. She rose from her bow and asked, “Might we come in?”

While motioning them inside Zecora jokingly added: “I do not see a reason why not, so long as you haven’t got the trots. Though strange travelers are those, who wear no robes or mysterious clothes.”

The mare with the wheat-gold mane smiled nervously while responding, “Yes, allow me to introduce myself, my name is Latere Vesco...” With a lingering pause she hesitantly transformed. “No more deceptions,” she corrected with a note of remorse for starting out an introduction with habitual false pretenses.

Her dust brown coat grew polluted with the hard dirty tint of her alternate identity. The roots of her hair grew a deep grass hew, and a single tuft of cloud white popped out. Holes riddled her legs, mane, and tale. Her hair grew coarse and unmanageable. 

She opened her eyes to reveal hazel irises locked in fleischer rings. A symbolic representation of the heavy thoughts that deposited themselves in her mind, and danced behind her eyelids at night. After she matched the gaze of the horrified zebra, she turned to Dissolution and nodded, indicating that it was safe for her to do the same.

The monochrome visage of Alalia Witchwild more than mortified Zecora who protested, “Monster without face, who have wiped out my race, have the gall in my sacred place, to show my people’s stolen face!?”

Alalia’s rich black stripes lost some of their luster as she looked down to the ground in shame, until Latere spoke up in her defense. “We are what we are and, until now, we've never been given a choice in the matter.” Her irises took on to the Zebra as her lids narrowed at the slight. “We came to beg for your help not insult you. This form is a very special thing for a changeling,” Latere added as she indicated the partial transformations. “The eclectic set of physical traits we display, are what a changeling feels most accurately represents who they are as an individual,” she paused for the message to sink in before nailing it home, “We are not just our Canterlot Black combat fatigues. We are not monsters.”

As offended as Zecora seemed, it was apparent that she understood that she just insulted the core essence of an individual that identified with her people and their struggles. 

Alalia defensively explained, “Mysterious and curious, reaching for magical knowledge you damn well know that you fucking shouldn't. Now that, I get. I really fucking do.”

After several long seconds of soaking in the moment, Zecora raised the next natural question, “So what do you want of me, that you would address me so auspiciously?”

The question was a difficult one to answer, but Latere had been thinking about it for a long time. “I want the choice. The one that we were never given,” she stated bluntly, “I want to become solid.” 

It was a reference to the ephemeral nature of Madness, something she feared deeply, as she could easily be described as half way there. The fear was so ever present that it defined itself in her Partial, as was the transgendered state that the two shared. Though, as expected, Zecora was unaware of the subtext of the statement.

To say Zecora was testy would be an understatement. “I know of no potion that I could brew, that would soothe my troubles of the likes of you.” 

These sentiments were not unforeseen, and Latere tried to play off of them by putting the mares on the same side. “We’re here asking for your help as fellow survivors,” she pleaded, “I believe that I can reconfigure my mind, but it has to be totally wiped before anything new can really take hold.” 

Zecora’s frown made it clear that she should also offer some incentives.

“I’m not here to hide from my mistakes, or lie to myself about who I am. I’m here to do something about it,” Latere continued her explanation with fervor, and while paying no mind to her naked state, “All I have ever known is a highly honed ability to exercise subversive forms of control through social engineering.” She lifted her hindquarters slightly at the statement to indicate her own cutiemark. “Even now I’m engaging in a form of hedonistic calculus, to force the integration of my differentiated self. Even this conversation is just another variable. The outcome of the choice I am presenting to you... another factor.”

She sighed as Zecora rose her eyebrow at the deception of admitting she was trying to manipulate her.

“I’m tired of thinking that way,” she stated dejectedly, as though exhaustion were the only feeling, other than fear, that she could genuinely feel. “Of thought without feeling, and plans without passion.”

It was not difficult to see the distrust in the eyes of the legitimate zebra in the room, as she voiced her concern. “And what if I do participate, and this plan of yours does not take? Or worse even still, your mind should completely unreel?”

Latere was hardened to the question though Alalia still looked uncomfortable. It was something else that she had considered often, and could only find one answer to. “If…” Latere began in a slow and calculated tone, “If I am beyond salvation, and give you no indication that I am interested… no sign.” She paused to survey the scene as though it were her last moment in Equestria. “Then you must kill me, and… if you feel vindicated by taking out one of them… so be it.”

As Zecora pondered the statement, she let out a low hum while Latere went on: “Deceiver's Dust may be easiest,” she paused for a moment to think what else might help, “I will even have Alalia make some for you to catch me in what ever form I may take.” Judging from the materials present in Zecora’s residence, and the quality of alchemist those materials implied her to be, each present knew that would be unnecessary but the Latere still felt the gesture was worth making.

The concessions on protection were more than enough to get Zecora to sign off on the idea just long enough to ask: “Many things you ask to see, but what exactly would my part be?”

Latere sighed in relief as she looked to Alalia to explain the findings from her experiments.

“We've run some fucking crazy experiments, relating to the magical nature of our totally fucked up bodies.” Alalia started, though seeing the implication that the profanity was hurting her credibility, she began to curb it. “I think it’d be possible to change the nature of the magical energy that flows through us. That is, if we don’t mess with the levels of energy we run on.” She cringed seemingly at the memory of trying to channel more energy than her own body was capable of holding, or possibly the converse of withering due to not having enough energy to survive.

Zecora nodded adding: “Into a cocoon a caterpillar goes, but out again a butterfly grows. Though the being does change, the cocoon’s volume remains the same.” Her statement signified that she understood the basic concept.

It was a difficult thing to ask but Alalia persevered: “Will you help us?”

“No.” The unexpected word came, not from Zecora, but from Latere. “Don’t decide now. Whatever you decide, I won’t be around to know it,” Latere said as she got up and moved to the door, while motioning to Alalia to join her. “Just keep it in mind ‘till you meet him.”

As the mare spoke of her alternate self one question was left for Zecora, “A stallion: is this correct? Just whom am I to expect?”

Stopping for an introspective smile, Latere turned to Zecora and transformed into Lucas Greymane, with an auditory note of the name. Alalia followed suit returning to her guise of Habré Kadabré, and with that they took their leave.


***


A note of concern could be heard in the clearing as Alalia asked: “Dude, are you fuckin’ okay?”

Confirming with a nod; Lucas turned his attention back to Zecora’s tree. A thin line of smoke trailed out one of the hollow branches. When they circled around to the front door they could see Zecora enjoying a glass of tea. As they passed her window, she leaned over and poured two additional glasses. They arrived at the front of the home to find the door was open, which invited in the cool evening air, to help balance the heat of the fire inside.

Upon entering the humble hut, Zecora noted over her tea: “There is much pain in our history, but only one partial do I see. Does that mean your identity, is fully a stallion of the Everfree?”

Across from the small table that held the kettle and glasses, one for each respective guest, sat chairs in which they could rest. In the center sat a strangely shaped flask containing a mysterious emerald-green liquid; the shade of which matched Lucas’s glamorous glimmers.

His voice quivered as he looked to the zebra in gold chains and piercings, then to the one wearing only tribal rings, “Is…” he briefly hesitated, “that what I think its?”

A sly grin was occluded by a glass of tea that rose to Zecora’s mouth, as an eyebrow raised in an equal measure. She gave him a look over the rim as to imply only if he was who she thought he was. After a long and enjoyable sip, she confirmed his suspicions. “Yesterday, I agreed a potion was to be made, though I admit the context was quite vague.” She set the glass down and joked: “Lucky for you, and Applebloom too, as I did not wish to explain how changeling roots grew.”

An audible gulp from Lucas which was met by a hearty laugh from Alalia. “You stupid mother fucker! She was actually going to do it!” 

A chuckle rose from Zecora who added: “Yes, that was true, but such a fate was never meant for you.” She set her glass on the table and picked up the potion. As she played with it, she eyed Lucas curiously asking, “There is something I do not understand. What happens after this potion changes hands?”

The question bothered him primarily because he didn't have an answer. Lucas scratched his head. “I don’t really know what comes next.”

Reaching out with the potion in hoof Zecora pulled it back at the last moment while adding a coy look to the recipe, “Perhaps you will start living your life, in the company of a foul-mouthed wife?”

Both Alalia and Lucas were caught by surprise at the indictment. The monochrome mare began to show signs of living color, in terms of a full-body blush, as Lucas shook his head.

“No,” he said plainly and simply. As oddly close as they were, he couldn't see any world in which that could happen, and he regrettably cited their history: “I saved her life, and now she’s saved mine. I think we’re even now.”

Of all the conflicted emotions that Lucas suspected Alalia to be feeling, he was glad to hear her sigh in relief at the notion being dismissed. He recognized that they had different goals and ambitions. He also knew that they had nothing left of their elements to teach each other, and that she would be reassigned to somepony new; just as he was at the end of his partnership with Madness.

There was a slight look of disappointment as Zecora reached out to Lucas with potion. Perhaps she thought that because he wanted the life of a normal pony, that all the changelings now shared their values, though of course that was not necessarily the case.

With that, Lucas cleared his mind, and had only one question left. “Is this permanent?”

The potioneer pulled back slightly with a wry look as if he knew better than to ask that. “For a creature born of change, there is no question that is more strange.” They both shared a smile as Zecora once again reached out with the potion. 

However, before it could come into his possession, a silver aura enshrouded it. An aura that carried into the open fore-hooves of Alalia Witchwild, whose defiant glare and still glowing horn threatened the uneasy peace brokered by months of manipulation.

"I can't let you have this," the feral zebra claimed as the charge in her horn grew even brighter. "She was quite adamant." With that one changeling burst out of the home, and the other quickly on her hooves, both pursuant to the truth.
> Act 3 | The Mare of Smoke and Mirrors
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I'm so sorry, Lucas" Alalia whispered as she caught her breath far from Zecora's cottage, "But I made a promise. She wouldn't let you go without knowing, and there is only one way to know for sure."

"Knowing? Knowing what? What are you talking about?" Lucas asked knowing full well he was only inviting disaster on a soul that was already troubled by this latest intervention.

Alalia lowered her head in embarrassment, "The experiment can't end with only half the data. We both know that. You have to see her. The real her." The zebra-coated changeling bashfully shuffled her hoof in the grass. "I wasn't there, and I've never heard the story. Fuck! I can't even fucking tell you what to expect. All I can do is show you where she hid the damn seams."

She stopped speaking when Lucas caught her catching him smiling. The inundation of seriousness had broken him, he supposed. That all he could do to get through this moment was take pleasure in the simplest of things. The audaciousness of a mare who would turn away from no experiment however unethical—monstrous even—could not even look him in the eye when describing what he was supposed to have been capable of.

"Canterlot..." she slowly said as she brushed a large loop in her mane from her eye that she turned them up to meet his. "I mean, she was always fucking psycho," she added with a shrug, "but Canterlot changed her."

"It changed me too," Lucas knowingly added.

"No," Alalia refused to accept the comparison, "For the worse. Fucking worse than anything she's let you see yet."

Lucas accepted her vote of confidence, and nodded to signify that he was ready to proceed. To which Alalia’s changeling transformation added a pair of wings to her zebra-unicorn partial. She spread them wide and cast a simple back-lighting spell that caused her eyes, nose and mouth to project white light as she spoke the words: "It's what we do. The impossible." 


***


The infiltration of the castle took insignificant effort. Relieving the guards during a shift change was all too easy and, once the guards’ guard was lowered, they were easily incapacitated. No muss, no fuss, and certainly no ruckus would work its way into this false-flag carrier's plan. M and M saluted as the hall chilled on Deception's approach. Despite the batpony forms, it was simple enough to tell the two apart by the way one's eyes drooped, and the other had a barely contained smile tucked away behind its fangs.

She paused for a moment to cast her gaze out a glass stained window to the Vault of Harmony from which the fabled Element Bearers were being drug away. It appeared that the assignment of Dissolution to the so called sun code as a needless precaution to compensate for the shadow of doubt cast by an overly analytical mind. At least, so it should appear to her new student whom she did not yet trust to think critically of deception.

"You will remain here," she instructed to the pair, more so to Melancholy than to Madness.

"And if you can't handle it?" Melancholy, the Disonant of Laughter, directed his life's suspicion of inherent failure to the mare who had known nothing but success this day.

"Then I will die. But you? You will remain here," she repeated authoritatively whilst Madness's filly-like giggles carried its appearance closer to that end. Latere shot it a sharp glance but said nothing as her mind was on bigger things.

The doors swung open and, after M and M's eyes could be pried from the sleeping alicorn's four-post bed curtain, Latere Vesco stepped through and closed the large doors behind her. Though elegant in design it was a simple thing. Flimsy, and as transparent as any lie. It was decorated in a manner that, with all likely-hood, was supposed to accurately depict the endless expanse of stars in heaven above. Though the position of the stars were totally out of alignment, the dull grey hemming told why. It was the night's sky as seen from the moon.

To carry such baggage to bed on the eve of every day piqued Latere's curiosity as she made her approach. A horn burned out of her earth pony facade as the changeling reared its ugly head. It was not in the plan to kill the alicorns. Though Princess Mi Amore's return heralded the return of the fabled Crystal Heart, Latere wondered just how catastrophic events would half to be to wretch it from Chrysalis's grasp, such that keeping these sisters alive would be worth the investment.

That thought lit Latere's horn with malice. When she leaned through the gossamer, it melted around her, as if it intended to escape the harm she had in store for the Night Princess; when a sudden outburst caught her unawares.

"We are in the presence of great evil, child! Go from this place. Turn away from the path of destruction!" Luna cried in her sleep as she lie confined in her bedding. Entombed.

The sudden shock of the statement caused Latere to question the turn of events. She turned to the door and gave thought to Madness's lessons but Luna's continued wailing drew her attention to another question. How was it even possible for this mare of dreams to have nightmares?

"You? This monstrosity is thy doing? No... such an innocent child. It cannot be. ‘Tis all a lie! Thou art being deceived!” The accusation came in a tone that reflected an unfinished nature of the argument, as if Luna had not had the chance to object to what ever truth she held inside.

"Deceived?" Latere's was not willing to see beyond her own situation to consider that there may be no pain she could inflict on the aliorn greater than what Luna had suffered already. She was determined, however, to prove her mentor wrong. She tilted her horn toward the restless alicorn and fired a green bolt deep into her body, scorching through tender flesh, and surely piercing her delicate heart. Strangely Luna did not die, nor was she awakened by the attack, but she did stir once more– this time with purpose.

Smoke bubbled out of the wound that dark crystals quickly sealed before paving the way for future flesh. Into her coat micro-crystals grew giving the Mare of the Moon her tell-tale black-satin shine. A dull fire cast off light from beneath the cracks of her tightly closed eyes—as if she had no more need of it, being at home in her inner darkness—before its source burned itself out. It was the raw power of Nightmare and Latere could scarcely imagine it. The terrible power that filled Luna's body, and polluted her mane, was the consequence of circumstance.

Nightmare Moon rose from the bed as if she were falling into it, but in reverse. When her hooves touched down on the marble floor, crystal grew up around them to form her pointed princess slippers. As a black moon eclipsed her heart, a crystal fog too spread from it to form her battle armor. A small crack of white completed the emblem as the would-be queen opened her mouth to speak. 

Finding no words, a hellish shriek instead proceeded an expulsion of malevolent energy that blasted the doors wide open, and the guards from their feet. It lingered on the walls and floor transforming the room into a hellish planescape of phantasmal fire.

The tiniest pinpricks of sunlight was enough to cause the Nightmare to shy away as her eyes opened. She focused her eyes on the interloper and fumbled. Borrowing words from its host, the Nightmare echoed with Luna's hauntingly empty voice. "A child? What brings you before us?"

Despite the timid cowering of Melancholy and Madness it was apparent Nightmare Moon was addressing Deception. "Consequence," Latere muttered not quite believing herself. "Beyond my control?" she muttered again and as she did so she could feel her voice slipping away under the strain of a truth that freed itself from her battered mind.

"A genie!" the excitable voice of M called from the hall.

"N-n-nightmare Moon!" the cowardly voice of the other M called afterword.

Deception's horn lit once again, though not to do battle, and as she tilted her head the doors closed on her command. Nightmare Moon grinned at the wide in response to the wide varied interpretations of the menfolk. Though it was Deception who first turned hate filled eyes to the other mare.

Organs that played a processional, that marked the itinerary of Shining Armor's approach to an altar somewhere in the distance, distracted the alicorn as the phantasmal flames threatened to flicker into reality. "The one that got away?" Nightmare asked in confusion but was interrupted by Deception as the last pieces fell into place in the mind of Latere Vesco.

"No. Your business is with me now."

The dream-weaver lashed out with another burst of flame that had washed impotently over Deception. Of the two mares the alicorn's lies had no power in the waking world. "Why did you summon me from the moon?" Nightmare reverberated the question through Luna's hollow soul, "Back to this world of magic?"

What began as terrified crying built steadily into laughter. The maniacal kind heard only at the end of days, and from there, slowly descended into fevered speech. "I didn't," Latere laughed while her mane split and frayed. In the same way that Madness's gender changed with his mood, her body began unraveling with her mind. "I have no such power," her eyes widened at the realization, "Even the choice to believe I do is a deception I perpetrate on myself!"

An odd hesitation crept into the demeanor of the alicorn, that was characterized by rapid glances in all directions. A search that marked the fear of an event a thousand years ago, or perhaps the more recent repeat that caused the formation of the Harmony Spell Breakers to begin with. "You, who are so close to Honesty, yet approach from the other side. Where are your other five whom seek to destroy me?"

A reluctant sigh from the younger mare put the older one at ease, if ever so slightly, as her fear was replaced with suspicion.

"I did not come here to destroy you," Latere half-giggled and sensing Nightmare Moon's objections she added in a more serious tone: "I came to feel. To know what it is to feel. I shot you, content in the possibility of your death, just to feel something. Anything! And, oh the revelation that action has given me."

Bemused the Nightmare was not in a position to question sanity, and beckoned the child to tell her what truth she had uncovered, but Latere only shook her head. "If you are to be destroyed, then your fate is already sealed, unavoidable. If I am to live, then it shall be in pursuit of my own death."

A wicked smile carved across the black blight of Nightmare Moon "Then the elements will be undone once again, and with the Crystal Heart sealed away I'll–"

The diluted machinations of this monstrosity gave Deception an even clearer picture of her own fate. "Oh, you poor thing," she interrupted with expert knowledge, "You have so terribly deceived yourself. I am not an Element of Harmony, the Crystal Heart is within our queen's grasp, and your host grows stronger every moment."

With that vote of confidence that did not go unmeasured, a struggle broke out from within the possessed alicorn. As Luna fought to regain control, the crystals in her blood broke and the bleeding began again as she flopped back onto the bed. 

Latere Vesco took the opportunity to take what she sought. Once more her horn took on a magical green aura and the doors opened revealing two changelings still uncertain of their role. "I want just one thing now," she said, addressing all parties involved as she calmly stepped out into the hall, whilst Luna lie atop the covers writhing in pain behind her. Madness turned away when Deception approached Melancholy directly.

"There's no way!" Melancholy stammard as he connected the dots that lead Madness away. One profusely bleeding alicorn and one untouched changeling, "You can't trust her! She’s the enemy. We’ll tell the others she was changing. They won’t question it."

Deception leaned in and whispered into his ear, "That's not what I need."

Confused and cautious Melancholy belabored his plight, "What do you need?"

"A reason to feel guilty."

Maligned to this inevitable end, Latere changed forms, donning the mask of flesh from the mirror pool, and harnessed all of her raw destructive magic. Unbridled, unfocused, and unrefined she poured it all into her fellow changeling just as she imagined one might do in an emotional fit. She turned from the blast that sent Melancholy flying through the window whilst Luna flopped onto the bed victorious in, but consumed by, her own personal struggle.

In her about-face she called to Madness, with the male voice appropriate to her guise, "I will create a choice where none exists."

"Oh?" Madness called back as the doors slammed shut once more.
> Act 3 | Laughing Lake
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The stillness of the empty cave, which featured a magical pool, was ocasionally broken by the hunting echo of a rhythmic cant. Then by the voice of Madness, who suggested: "Lets say, for the sake of argument, that you were to turn your back on the changelings forever."

These types of hypothetical games were common for the mare-allion, but this one went a little too far, even for it, and offended Latere's sensibilities. "I would never!" the model changeling proclaimed with a stamp of her forehoof that so perfectly encapsulated the rigidity her earth pony form was representative of. However whimsical her mentor Tantric Tempest was, it had a special quality, some force to be reckoned with, such that she just couldn't dismiss its more outlandish ideas out of hoof.

"That is a choice you would never make? Under any circumstance? How can you be so sure?" the stormy pegasus asked with a slight upturn of its primaries. "Fate perhaps?"

Latere peered into the reflection she cast that was not her. She hesitantly reached out to touch it when a haunting echo of Laughter slipped through time shrieking: "Doublely mared!" and she pulled her hoof away.

"Fine, I'll play this game," Deception said to Madness, "It is because I know myself too well."

Though it remained far from the reflective pool, as if scared of what might escape should it get too close, Madness indicated it was more than able to see the disjunction between the mare and her reflected stallion. The nongendered changeling frowned in quiet preponderance, "I thought I had taught you better by now. Perhaps I don't know me as well as I think, either."

Latere's face turned to a disappointed scowl as she turned to her master and student, "Deception is a funny thing, to fall prey to vanity and pride... are you suggesting I've done so?"

Tantric Tempest's voice filled with a wisp of discordant laughter the locale was known for. "No my dear La'Te-air," he said, "That suggestion comes from within. From doubt." It took a more masculine appearance, while his puzzled faced reflected the severity of the last word, before going further. "Would you not say that doubt is also a form of deception, some half-truth?" He nodded slowly, obviously trying to show what he had learned from his master, while his words encouraged her to consider what had been learned as his student, "That there may be some kernel of truth that prompts us to worry?"

She gave careful consideration to his words as he went on to point to the mirror-still pool, and his ever present Prench accent was all the more prevalent in his excitation of the improbable. "Why not pretend for a moment that the future could be seen as clearly as the past or present. What might it look like?"

Latere huffed, "Because that's crazy; even for you. It undermines the nature of free choice that we both just agreed is a trait of our existence."

"Come now," Tantric Tempest pouted and his feathers ruffled, "You think I've not considered that?"

The earth pony sighed and conceded to the whim of the pegasus. "I suppose if the future was set in stone then free choice would be a lie, but I just can't see how that could be." When they played these games it was often Madness who interjected with some impossible yet undeniable thing that would connect the two ideas.

"Earlier, you said 'never' what does that mean?" Tantric Tempest asked with a flick of his tail, "Does that mean you can imagine no circumstances where you would choose to break your oaths to Mother?"

The key word did not go amiss with Deception. She felt like she was being led somewhere, but by now had learned this was just how Madness worked, and she allowed it to continue for sake of seeing where.

"So that would mean you're choices are predetermined by your nature, and the circumstances you find yourself in," Madness slowly added as if the very idea had been preened and waiting for this exact moment. For this opportunity to be expressed.

Deception wanted to object but couldn't find the grounds to. She stopped herself and slowly worked though the logic of it, to see where she went awry. Her first thought was that her choices were such that they furthered her goals, and objectives, but those goals in turn came down to her nature as well. Eventually she nodded and Madness continued after waiting so patiently for her to be ready.

"No matter how small, the act of choosing has consequences, does it not?" Madness took a carefree step forward, his wings in full splay as he balanced on diagonally opposite hooves. Yes was the obvious and inevitable answer, and it did not matter who spoke it, so Madness continued. "Those consequences shape new circumstances too then?"

Yes, again was the obvious answer, and the more Madness led, the deeper pit became in Deception's stomach.

The pegasus continued to teeter its way to the pool, as it spoke an underlining glee took root in its voice, and its physical form shifted to a lighter, airier female persona. "So every choice, everything learned and implemented is a matter of consequence," Madness lisped as she placed her wing on Deception's flank.

Never before had the teeth of those interconnected gears feel so gridlocked, as though time itself had stopped. 

"Your whole being," Madness said and a mirthful sigh followed, "Everything in you that drives your choices, was determined as a consequence..." a haughty pause punctuated the inevitable "of the choices made by those before you." With each word a new curve was cut into the blocky-seriousness that was represented in the near-stallion form of Madness, until a petite, carefree mare was left to add as an afterthought: "And they the choices before them, and so on."

Madness less-than-gracefully balanced on the lip of the pool whilst avoiding gazing directly at her own reflection, occasionally glancing over to her student, Deception, who had desperately fumbled through the logic while never averting her eyes from her own reflection of this mysterious stallion.

"It didn't change," Latere noted after silence had long since overrun the cavern.

"Hmm? Why would it?" Tantric Tempest asked.

Latere Vesco's eye twitched at how seemingly obliviousness her mentor and student was to the magnitude of what she had just explained. Even trying to rationalize it for herself took a toll such that her mane greyed a little. A few locks of hair broke from their tightly controlled places beneath the band of gold that arrested them, and she could feel her mental sprockets bending under the strain of the idea.

"If what you say is true," Latere prefaced the statement with what little doubt she had left, "then how I understand the nature of choice will forever be changed. The manner in which I decide things will have changed. Would my fate not also change?"

The pegasus's knee buckled under the stress of Deceptions inquiry, and she flapped up above the weight of it. "You ask that," she said in a trifling tone befitting her Prench demeanor, "as if I had some choice in keeping this knowledge from you. That is not what I am." She flexed her wrist and gently landed at the lip of the pool while gazing in. "That is not what dissonance of loyalty is."

After but a moment of matching her gaze Decpetion immediately wished she hadn't. A murky nightmarish energy brimmed from every fiber of being in Madness's reflection. Immutable, daunting, and absolutely terrifying.

"You say that the only cure for deception is grief. You've been deceived but are not yet grieving," Madness said with such a note of seriousness that her form swiftly shifted back to its masculine nature before turning a sharp eye to his student. "I say, that the only consequence of loyalty is pain. And, you have only just begun to learn of loyalty."
> Act 3 | The Night Mare's End
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The eerie silence deep in the Everfree forest was broken by a sob. "Alalia... I... I..." There were no more tears and Deception collapsed into the dirt from whence his form came. Lucas could finally begin to grieve.

"I'm proud of you." As she stood over his broken body Alalia Witchwild let out a final breath of relief. "... I'm finally free."

"But I-" Lucas started but was cut off by Alalia.

“No!" The authoritative syllable came with an explosion of force. "She! She did this for you. I'm not proud of helping her but my mentor died that day!" Alalia haphazardly tossed Zecora's potion into his lap. "Drink it. Or don't. I don't fucking care anymore," she admitted, "If you can't see she did this for you. Then I'll..." The mare shook her head when her bluff was called.

"You'll what?" Lucas cried out.

Alalia loosed a single introspective laugh, as though she learned something about herself. "I'll do nothing. I mean, I'm the goddamn Dissonant of Friendship after all. So go ahead. I taught you all the magic I can. Use it. Mix up whatever shit you want. I won't stop you from killing yourself on this fucking stupid quest for perfection."

The form of the rabid zebra disappeared in a flash of green light leaving only the sandy-tan unicorn. As she began the walk home Lacus's thoughts turned inward. Not to his own mind, but those gifts left by another. Latere's dream that HK so vehemently defamed on his own death bed. It always came back to that. To what motivates. To dreams.

It was never Lucas's dream to become a better pony, that must have been a remnant of Latere, instead his only desire was to be the best version of himself he could. A sentiment he learned of himself in his first hour. From the moment he made a promise to a mad mare whom saw through him more thoroughly than he could see himself. That, and to know whom that pony was. Who he was.

A crestfallen grin crossed his face as he soon realized the clumsily phrased idea could literally be any of the mares in his life, from Screwy to Madness, Alalia to Luna, and back to the Queen of the Changelings herself.

"To mothers," Lacus said as he raised his glassware in salute and, when he lowered the emptied bottle, he added: "and sisters."


***


The evening was growing late, and the last train north had just pulled into the station. A solidary sandy coat stood on the platform, her shale hair swept back from her face, carried away with her a memento of her mentor. Having placed the gold hairband on her head, she pulled it back, so that it rested on the base of her skull.

As Lucas Greymane helped Habré Kadabré load her things onto the train, the awkward silence was filled when she blurted out: “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone!”

This caused Lucas to smile. Though he was no longer Deception he could still recognize a lie when he heard it. “Yes, you will.” His tone was one of freedom not heard since Madness had asked why the form had to mean anything because, now that he had the answer, he was at peace. “You won’t be able to avoid it. I’m living a documented alias, and I’m not going to change my name after fighting so hard to earn it.” It was a sad truth that he knew she needed to hear. “I’m going to be on the watch-list now, and you will be questioned. I've taught you all that I know, and hope you can find some use of it.”

A look of shame crossed Habré's face for her inevitable betrayal, then she glanced back to Lucas Greymane. “I’ll... I'll never forget you.”

Lucas said his goodbyes with a wry smile: “What a fucked up thing to say, Alalia.”

The doors to the train closed as the undercover changeling hung her head in her hoof. After the train pulled out of the station Lucas headed home to get some rest. He had a big day tomorrow—the first one of his new life—and thought it would be best to turn in early. 

While passing his mailbox he considered taking her name down, but instead left it as it was. She would always be welcome in the changeling house so long as it was his. He returned to his room and took a moment to clear the to-do board before crawling into bed.


***


"Ideas."

"Dreams are ideas."

"... Nightmares too!"

"And ideas only hurt when they're somewhere they're not supposed to be."

An equine lie in the fetal position on the abstract plane. No name. No face. No facade. It was neither Lacus or Latere. Not Lucas or Deception. Just a bundle of frayed nerves that came ever closer to unraveling completely; save only for the knot in its stomach. Lacking any traditional ascription of form, these loose ends tightly grappled something more important than life itself. A fact made all the more evident by the response given to a motherly concern voiced from across the endless expanse.

"Tis a poison, child." The call came from the princess of this domain. A call not well received by the creature that could only be described as a consequence.

"It's mine," it said unmoved by the princess's warning. "It is my nightmare."

The precariousness of the situation demanded delicacy as to not disrupt the tethers of the knot tied by chance. A knot that frayed into a central nervous system, as if blown together by the winds of fate, and formed a changeling from the strands of manifest destiny.

Luna hesitantly confronted the pony with the face of deception and eyes of madness: one in the past the other in the future, both unable to see the present. "Then," she protested, "thou must see it will be thy undoing. Thou wilt surely die."

"Yes," The voice of dissonance returned, "but before it is, and before I do, it will give me strength. It will motivate me. It will be my nightmare until it is just my dream."

The Night Princess watched helplessly as the form turned Canterlot Black at the embrace of inner darkness. Different than begrudgingly accepting the Nightmare held in the orb on high, every fiber of this entity’s being willfully became a bar in its own personal prison. "Entrust in me, child, some spark of thy light. That it may be preserved should thee ever desire it again," Luna begged but changeling shook its malformed mind. Only one could be trusted with such a task.

"I am the cage, and the bird inside," Latere Vesco cited, "My wings keep me confined. So I will break them and walk free."

A sad contemplative look filled the redeemed light of Luna's countenance as each hole in Latere's legs filled with misery. With grief. So too did the opposite radiate from the patron saint of Nightmare Night and, from within her, an aura of harmony and love spilled out. A peace that was drawn from her memory of the twice damned Elements themselves. The phantom rainbow washed over the Dissonant of Honesty to no avail as there was no desire, nor even the shadow of such an inclination, to let harmony into her soul.

"Call them," Latere ordered.

The visage of another alicorn, or nearly such, whipped into existence and Luna regrettably connected the facsimile with the Queen of the Changelings that it represented.

"The other one too," Latere added, "the stallion of dirt and grass," but this only drew a blank from the princess.

"You dare summon me?" Chrysalis barked at the pair of mares, her indirectness indicated a lack of clarity regarding whom was to blame.

"My queen!" Latere subordinated herself in the presence of her ruler. "I have come to know the true nature of Honesty, through its dissonant: Deception. Though I have no Element to show, I think my work will speak for itself. I humbly ask–"

"I have no need of reminders," the queen remarked, which caused the visage of Latere to shimmer, before the real Luna interrupted the scene, and dispelled the illusion of one changeling in favor of the other.

Deception's eyes were still on the queen when it broke, and Lucas Greymane stepped out from under it. He stood and questioned Chrysalis as an equal: two changelings with real names. "Does your decision still stand then?"

As Luna stood far away from what was not hers to interfere in, Chrysalis eyed the insolent insect and proclaimed: "You will never be one of them."

Lucas frowned at the half-truth and obvious non-answer. "And I can never again be one of ‘us’. With them I am free to be myself, but I need to know where we stand." It was fitting that the memory of his first meeting with the Light of Moon would be his last under the shadow of the swarm. He turned and walked away from his queen, knowing full well that Chrysalis could strike him down at any moment. Each step toward a new ruler was filled with dread anticipation. He felt like a moth being called to the flame, and awaited the final release that never came. It had, after all, never been done before… it was impossible. Yet it was permitted. This much Lucas knew: that for good or ill there was still so much that a patient queen may learn about ponykind, especially if a changeling though himself among them.

As he reached the hoof of his new princess, he uttered a final word for both regal mothers so that they may pass along given the opportunity. "Thank you... for keeping this dream safe for me when I couldn't, Alalia."
> Bonus | Unauthorized Field Report
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Princess Celestia,
“I learned this today…” That’s how this’s supposed to start, right? I’m not really a fan, so I wouldn't know, but rumor has it you still love to get these things. I don't really know what else to say so let me tell you what I’ve learned about friendship. 

Friendship is a bitch, and the things ponies do in its name fucking sickens me. 

My time with N.W. and with D. was not wasted. I know you don't know them, but they've taught me a whole fucking lot about friendship. What it means and how it fucking works. In particular N.W. taught me that it’s a beast not seen in the wild, and that makes it unnatural. Yeah, I mean there's family, sure, but that's just genetics. While D, on the other hoof, taught me how much it can personally fuck you up. It gets in your fucking head, hollows you out, and fills up your soul with fucking weakness and lies. 

It changes a pony.

I guess I should tell you about my fucking friendship problem, huh? My problem with D. I mean, that’s what your faithful fuckin’ student would do, right?

I had this friend—well not a “friend” exactly, but I don't think there's a translation for the word that describes what we were. This friend of mine, she’s a psycho cunt. A real winner. The kind that uses and manipulates everyone she meets, and she used me too. She hurt me, and made me hurt myself, all to teach me some little truth about deception. As a consequence I almost died. She would have let me die. So, let me tell you princess, exsanguination is fucking terrifying. 

Anyway, I fucking walked the hell away. Good for me, right? Some psycho bitch abuses the shit out of you, so you cut that fucker off. Well, that’s just not how friendship fucking works, and I guess we both know that now. I mean, what with your sister and all, I ain't gotta tell you what it's like to deal with somepony who is completely fucking wack-a-doodle. Truth be told, that's why we're in this mess.

So, yeah, you would know. As destructive as she had been in my life, she was far and away more fucking destructive to her own; and all I could do was watch. I couldn’t even get out. And that, dear princess, is how friendship fucking works. It binds your mind and chains your soul. It rewrites who you are with a little bit of somepony else, and you fucking pray that part of them—that part friendship stole from you—you fucking pray that it’s worth it. 

You fuckin’ have to because it never is.

That’s the fuckin’ thing princess: friendship. This mutual bond of self-identity, and fucking dependence, it doesn’t care. It doesn’t matter to friendship what you thought of yourself before you were made a part of another pony, or that pony was fucking made a part of you. It doesn’t care if you fucking like each other. And, it doesn’t care if they’re fucking unhealthy for you. It’ll fucking obligate you. Indenture you, and steal your fucking life.

It’s insidious, and that ain’t even the worst fucking part. The worst part is that you’ll want it to. You’ll want that part of you—that part it fucking stole from you—to succeed. To thrive, even when its host should fucking burn. You’ll want it to so you won’t have to face the fact that it took the fucking best part of you, and just gave it to somepony else. Somepony who doesn't even deserve it.

You see Celestia, I had this friend, and I had to kill her; and with her the best part of me fucking died that day. I died. I died a little more every day since. Every fucking day that I have had to look into that empty shell, and remind myself that she could never fucking come back. That I can never come back.

That is what I learned about friendship, Celestia. Some ponies can’t walk away and you fucking call them loyal. Well, I call them mad. Some ponies are there to help their friends fucking laugh, and it's so melancholy that I can't help but throw up. Some ponies tell the truth—the kind of truth I’ve had enough of, and I won’t listen to another fucking word. For a group, friendship is about kindness, but for an individual it is the fucking cruelest thing imaginable; because once you have friends, you’ve lost yourself.

Your student would say friendship is fucking magic, but more than anypony, you know the ruin it brings to a soul. Especially if you, and your shared friendship, are the reasons that friend is banished from the only world they’ll ever really know. I guess that all I can do is try to keep that part of her alive. The part friendship stole from her, and forced upon me.

Ever Vigilant,
A.W.