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When his eyes reopened, he was faced with a completely blank, white room. There wasn't any furniture or decorations or personal effects, and there was barely even a layout. There were only four white walls, a white floor, and now that he looked a bit closer, a white door that practically blended into the walls.

"Oh, this isn't good," Virgil mumbled.

"True, his room isn't supposed to be blank. It changes a lot, but it's not supposed to have nothing in it," Logan mused.

"Where's Janus?" Patton asked.

"Door."

Thomas stepped over to the door and looked for a handle. He couldn't find one, so he just placed a hand on it and lightly pushed it. Even with the slightest touch, it swung open. More surprisingly, however, was that it suddenly started flickering and appearing as if it was glitching out, with strange squares and lines of static flitting about it.

"I'm… guessing that isn't supposed to happen, either."

"Ah, shit, this is a bad idea."

But Thomas still stepped through the doorway, entering a narrow, black hallway with a low ceiling. It was still high enough to stand and bright enough to see, but it was just as plain as the room they'd left. It seemed like they had to walk for a full ten minutes before they reached the door at the other end.

This door was glitching even worse than the other, but it had some color, at least. It was a bright yellow the same color as Deceit's gloves. So they were probably in the right place.

"Ah," said Logan. "That first room must have been Janus's 'public' room. This is probably his bedroom."

"Public room?"

"It's the room we appear in when you need to go to our rooms during videos," Roman supplied. "Usually, they look like your living room, but they can vary. Deceit's was the courtroom when you visited it last. But we also have bedrooms that we actually sleep in."

"That was the courtroom?!"

"It was," Virgil confirmed unhappily. "But right now, it should be his version of your living room, and it isn't, and that is. Very. Bad."

That just renewed Thomas's resolve to get to the bottom of whatever was going on, so he once again held a hand out to push open the next door. This time, however, the door didn't budge. Instead, it just glitched angrily for a moment before settling back into its original pattern.

"Woah."

"Thomas, step back!"

And he did so, even though the door didn't make any move to attack or anything.

He glanced around at his sides.

"What now?"

"Perhaps we should-"

"HIT IT WITH A MORNINGSTAR!"

And before anyone could stop him, Remus summoned his weapon and slammed the spiked end of it into the glitching door. The door immediately shattered into a thousands pieces, as if it was made of glass, though the pieces quickly faded into the floor.

"Remus!" hissed Roman, unhappy with his brother's hasty antics.

"Hey, it worked!" he excused. "Let's go see what Double Dee's up to, hm?"

This time, Remus led the charge into the next room, with Thomas following close behind, albeit a bit more cautiously.

As soon as they entered the room, Thomas saw a side curled up in the middle of the floor. They were wearing a plain white shirt and pants, but even with the non-descript clothes, he knew it had to be Deceit. Janus had his forehead touching the ground, and his arms were curling protectively around his stomach. He didn't move, aside from the same glitching that had affected his doors. And just like the other room, this room was mostly blank and empty, except for a large spool of tangled, golden thread sitting in one corner.

"Oh no."

Thomas stepped forward and fell to his knees next to the glitching side, who didn't seem to notice that anyone had joined him in the room. Now that he was closer, he could see that Janus's eyes were screwed tightly shut, and he could hear him breathing heavily.

"Janus? Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

But Janus didn't respond, and when Thomas looked to his sides for help, Patton stepped forward as well. He reached out and touched the deceitful side, hoping he would react to that, but he was surprised when Janus's body only briefly flickered to look like Patton before settling back to the plain outfit.

"Oh dear…"

"Oooo, I wanna try!"

And sure enough, When Remus touched him, Janus once again flickered to look like him for only a moment.

"Neat!"

"Do… Do any of you have an idea of what we're supposed to do?" Thomas asked. "This isn't normal, right?"

"No, it isn't," Logan answered. "But maybe… Try giving him a command, Thomas. Instead of asking if he can hear you, tell him to listen to you."

"O… Okay," Thomas agreed. "Janus, please listen to me."

And suddenly, Janus's eyes opened, the pupils darting in Thomas's direction.

It looked like it worked.

"Janus, can you sit up? Sit up," Thomas requested.

And Janus immediately did so, and when he did, Thomas was shocked to see that the snake-like side of his face, which had previously been facing away from him, was completely covered in glitching squares so that none of his scales or his snake eye were visible.

That… did not look good.

"Janus, what happened?" Thomas asked, concerned. "What's wrong?"

But Janus only blinked at him, his one visible eye lazily shutting and opening. The action reminded Thomas of what he saw when Janus snapped out of his staring, but this time, Janus just returned to the staring, looking right at him but not seeming to actually see him.

Thomas swallowed uncomfortably.

"Janus, tell me what's wrong."

He blinked again, but this time it appeared to have worked.

"I can't-"

Janus's voice was barely a whisper, and his face remained blank.

"You have to tell me what's going on, buddy," Thomas tried again. "I want to help you."

Another blink.

"What am I supposed to do?"

The question was spoken a bit louder, and Thomas took that as a good sign.

"You're supposed to tell me what's wrong," he tried yet again.

Blink. Blink.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to do."

And Thomas didn't know what he was supposed to do with that answer. But it seemed like Logan had an idea.

"Oh. Role Confusion," Logan spoke suddenly as he came closer, his voice holding both realization and thinly-veiled concern. "Thomas, I think there's some kind of conflict in whatever roles you need him to fulfill, and he can't do both, so he's shut down. To resolve this, I think we need to identify and negate the conflicting demands."

"But…," Thomas argued. "I don't want him to follow my demands, I just want him to be himself!"

At this declaration, Janus suddenly tensed as the glitching got worse.

"What-"

"Thomas."

Roman joined them, kneeling down to put a hand on Thomas's shoulder.

"I… I think that's the problem."

"W…"

And then Virgil was by his side as well.

"He acts the way you want him to, Thomas. That's who he is," Virgil reminded him. "So telling him to act like himself, while also wanting him to act outside of what you want, is a paradox for him. Because acting like himself means fulfilling the roles, but you don't want that from him."

Thomas shook his head.

"No. No, there has to be…," he mumbled. "There has to be something beneath all of that. He can't just be a blank slate."

"Thomas…," said Patton, placing a comforting hand on his other shoulder. "Even if there is, we won't be able to find it when he's like this."

Thomas looked at each of them, taking a long look at Janus last.

Patton was right. He had to fix this first, and after that, he could work on trying to get Janus to be able to be himself.

So, he reached out and took Janus by the shoulders. He didn't flicker to look like him. Instead, he briefly looked the way he usually did.

"Janus…," he spoke softly. "I need you to go back to normal, okay? If you… If you have to fulfill a role, that's fine."

His heart was filled with hope for a moment as Janus's normal outfit returned again, but it was quickly replaced with dismay as the glitching worsened even further and Janus's blank expression shifted to pain.

"Janus!" he exclaimed fearfully.

"Thomas, he can tell what you really want!' Virgil shouted. "He knows that you're lying when you tell him it's okay for him to just fulfill a role!"

"Then what am I supposed to do?!"

But no one seemed to have an answer, and Janus was starting to whimper from the pain, curling back up again slightly.

Thomas's mind raced as he tried to come up with something that would at least keep Janus from being in pain. And right after he came up with a way to do that, he came upon an idea for how he might be able to resolve the situation.

"Janus," he called out, forcing Janus to sit back up. "You aren't in pain right now."

And just like that, the side's face smoothed back out into blankness and his body went slack, as if he hadn't just been in incredible pain a second ago. The demonstration of the sheer amount of power he had over him made Thomas feel sick to his stomach.

But even still, he took a breath in.

"Okay, buddy, I really need you to listen to me for this next part."

He checked to make sure Janus was looking at him before he continued.

"I need you. I need Deceit, and Self Preservation, and Denial, and any other roles you fulfill," he continued. "But I also need Janus, and Janus can be all of those things without needing to switch himself off."

He braced himself for what he was about to do, desperately hoping it wasn't going to cause an even greater problem.

"Janus, I need you to combine your roles."

And then everything around them, like glass, shattered.

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