This is the final part of this story.

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There was a blankness surrounding it, a colorless void going unperceived by eyes that weren't there. This was the first, though it wasn't formed enough to exist quite yet. Its functions were there, allowing the Child to grow and survive, but the Child wasn't old enough yet to be able to give this one a form.

Survival.

The word existed as a concept now, but the Child would eventually learn what the word was, and much later, so would this. But for now, the concept was enough.

The Child was hungry, and it directed them to cry. They would be fed if they cried, and the Child needed food to live.

Meanwhile, it floated like a fluid gas through the Child's mind, making sure their needs were met.

And for now, it did so alone.

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It was eventually joined by something else, though neither one knew it. Neither had the ability to recognize the other, or even themselves. And so, they floated together, melding together and separating without knowing as the Child grew older.

The Child was learning how to exist in the world now, learning that it had hands and could use them, learning that spoons fell when they were dropped, learning that things existed beyond their own sight.

The Child was starting to think beyond survival alone, even though they didn't yet have the words to conceptualize those thoughts.

But even still, the Child was changing, and they were changing with it.

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Eventually, the Child grew even older, and the two of them were not enough to fulfill all of the Child's needs. And so, pieces of them began to split off, still existing as part of the fluid mass but making it more heterogenous than before. These new areas didn't flow as easily as the first two did, remaining more contained and less willing to mix.

After a long while, they were no longer fluid at all.

And a long while after that, they began to resemble the Child.

The first to do so was the one the Child relied on for memory and emotions the most, and once he was formed, it seemed as though the others became a little more fluid again. It still didn't quite look like the Child, though. It had a humanoid shape, had eyes and hair, but the details were still fuzzy and the proportions weren't quite right.

But despite these differences, the almost-child wandered around below them, no longer able to float with them now that it had a form.

The almost-child didn't seem to mind.

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Eventually, another piece of the mass started to grow more solid, this one growing to resemble the Child much faster than the first one.

The almost-child looked sharper now, only a little bit wrong, and he seemed to like having someone else to play with.

This new almost-child seemed interested, in his own way.

And so, the almost-children danced around, swaying like the fluid they were once a part of, even though their bodies were much stiffer.

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The second almost-child started to break apart, but he still remained together for now. He walked around with two, three, four legs, and waved around two, three, four arms.

Two shades of color began to paint themselves onto his body at the same time one color painted itself onto the first.

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The second didn't fully split until the third (or fourth?) began to separate.

This one was much more hesitant, taking a long time to start forming into something, and even as it did, it kept its distance from the other three.

But it seemed to keep the Child safe, so it didn't matter how social it was. It was doing what it needed to do.

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The almost-children, all four of them, soon grew to look almost exactly like the Child, though they each had their own small differences. The Child had met them and started referring to them as his imaginary friends. The Child also gave each of them a name, and something weakly tugged at the fluid.

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The second half of the fluid, who had been there so long that it almost felt like there had never been two, separated and formed very suddenly one day. It began to resemble the child almost immediately after separation, and it barely took a day for it to look real.

This one didn't act like the other almost-children.

It didn't smile, or play, or dance around.

All it did was fulfill the same role it had already been fulfilling, just in a different form.

And still, the original floated around them, enveloping them in a touchless embrace.

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It was quite a few years after that when the original began to take shape. The process was very slow, much slower than it had been for any of the others, and by the time it started to resemble anything close to the Child, the Child was barely a child anymore. They were growing taller, bigger, starting the process that would eventually culminate in adulthood.

But eventually, the first gained a shape, and then features, and inevitably, it grew sharper and sharper.

Soon, it also resembled the Child, but just like the second, it wasn't like the other almost-children. Unlike the second, though, it didn't get up and do anything. Instead, it just sat where it came into existence, staring into what had once been a void.

Until the day the almost-children found it.

The light blue one ran up to him, smiling, quickly followed by the green one, who smiled very differently. The red one approached slower, but more confidently. The second, now dark blue, was different now. He was still stiff, and his emotions were more subdued than the others', but he had them. There was a look of curiosity on his face, though he stopped a few feet away. The purpled one stood even farther back, apprehension clear.

The yellow one, the first, the original, continued to sit and stare.

"Hi! I'm Patton! I'm Morality! Who're you?"

He didn't answer, but a word presented itself to him, silently within him:

Janus.

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Thanks for reading!