XXX Chapter 18: The Plan

Alright, here's the next chapter.

(Feel free to ignore the below rambling, it's just random venting and not super relevant):

Honestly, y'all, I'm not doing so good mentally (or physically), and I'm just so tired. Which isn't to say I'm not gonna keep updating this fic, because I'll probably post at the same rate I have been since Janus is one of the few things that brings me joy right now. I know none of y'all are here for my rambling notes, but I'm just venting a little bit here because I feel like no one in real life is listening to me, so I might as well rant into the void of the internet, I guess? I just really feel like I'm reaching my limit, and I've said as much in plainer words than what I'm saying here, but it seems like everyone is under the impression that I'm bluffing. So sorry for the vent here, but like, I'm kinda talking to a word doc at the moment. Idk.

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They let Deceit take a day to process everything before they tried to talk to him again. Maybe it would have been better to wait a little longer, give him a bit more time, but they were all anxious about leaving things alone too long. The important part of the discussion was how they were going to implement safety precautions, and they needed to put those in place as soon as they could. They didn't want to risk putting it off too long, or Deceit might end up hurting himself again.

They'd all had many discussions about what to do during the eight months Deceit had been gone, and they'd come up with a few things- most of which were things Patton was sure Deceit wouldn't like. At the end of the day, though, they were all for the sake of keeping him safe, so any anger that resulted would be worth it.

Even before that, though, the first hurdle would be getting Deceit to talk to them. Maybe they didn't need to discuss everything immediately, but they should at least inform Deceit of the changes they were going to implement before they completed them. It would just be mean and confusing to do it without telling him, and Patton was pretty sure that Deceit was having enough difficulty without having to piece together why things suddenly changed.

Remus had agreed to bring Deceit to the Light Side for their talk, but the four of them had already been gathered in their living room for almost half an hour before Remus returned, half-dragging a clearly reluctant Deceit into the room. The man shot them all a glare as he entered, crossing his arms across his chest.

Deceit looked annoyed, that much was obvious, but Patton could also see the hints of red in the man's tired eyes. He'd been crying sometime recently, though not within the past hour or so.

"So, why exactly have I been summoned?" Deceit questioned, one eyebrow raised.

Roman went to say something, but Patton shook his head slightly before responding to the question himself.

"We still need to talk about some things, Kiddo."

"Do we?"

Deceit's eyes narrowed, as if he was daring Patton to continue. And despite that glare, continue he did.

"We do," Patton insisted. "Look Deceit, we don't want to overwhelm you, and we aren't expecting you to immediately tell us everything. But we need to make sure you're safe, so we're gonna go over how we're gonna do that. Okay?"

Deceit rolled his eyes.

"Why are you asking? It's not like you're giving me a choice."

"Deceit…"

"Just get to the point. I'm not going to play along with your false attempts at gaining my consent," Deceit huffed.

Patton sighed.

"Do you want to sit down?"

"No."

"…Alright, then…"

"Before we start," Roman spoke up. "Here. I picked it up when… you know."

And with that, the princely side stood and walked over to Deceit, holding out the man's hat. Deceit eyed the item skeptically for a moment before taking it, setting it onto his head in the same motion. It looked like Deceit was about to say something, but when he remained silent, Roman returned to his seat.

It was then that Logan began to speak.

"If you would prefer us to be blunt, that is fine," he said. "There are a few changes we're going to put in place for the time being, with modifications as needed. First, you may have already noticed, but we removed all the knives and other weapons from your room before you came back."

Deceit stiffened.

"You went through my stuff?"

The question was laced with something sharp, a warning. It was, however, a warning that Logan ignored.

"Not me personally, but yes," he confirmed. "Second, the rest of us are going to be checking up on you, similar to what we were doing while you were unconscious.

Deceit didn't respond to that point, but Patton knew that the next part was going to be what Deceit was likely going to have the biggest issue with. He felt his body tense a bit in anticipation of the man's reaction.

"Finally," continued Logan. "We have decided that it would be best to temporarily bring yours and Remus's rooms into the Light Side of the Mind Palace and also to remove your door to prevent a repeat of locking yourself in your room."

Logan finished speaking, and the room went silent for one single, long moment. Then, Deceit's expression shifted from annoyance to fury, the skin of his human half glowing red as he bared his teeth.

"Excuse me?" Deceit exclaimed incredulously. "Why exactly do you think you have any right to decide that?! You can't just decide to move us out of our home!"

"Remus already agreed to this," Logan pointed out. "He and Roman are going to move the rooms after this conversation is over."

Briefly, Patton saw a hurt expression cross Deceit's face before he whirled toward Remus.

"I thought you believed me!" he shouted accusingly.

"It's not about whether I believe you or not, Dee," Remus told him, putting his hands up placatingly. "It's about keeping you safe. I know I'm going to lose track of time at some point, so I can't be the only one keeping an eye on you."

Deceit's eyes widened, seemingly in disbelief.

"You… don't believe me, do you…?"

He watched the emotions drain from the man's face until the only thing left behind was exhaustion.

"Of course you don't," he sighed quietly, looking away from them all.

"DeeDee, I do believe you," Remus insisted. "But in our conversation, you told me a lot of things that show we should still be concerned. We can't stop you from conjuring knives or something else, so we need to be able to check on you in case you hurt yourself or disappear again."

"So I can't even have a fucking door because I might do something?" Deceit shouted as the anger burst forward again. "Newsflash: I could conjure up a gun and kill myself right now if I fucking wanted to! Except I wasn't trying to kill myself, and none of you will fucking believe me!"

Patton couldn't quite manage to suppress his wince.

"It doesn't matter if you were trying to or not!" Remus shouted back. "You did die! You walked and walked and walked until you got to the edge of the Imagination and fell off a cliff! You don't even know how long you walked, and you don't seem to know why either! That's dangerous! You can't just fucking dissociate and wander off into dangerous situations! Your intentions don't matter if you aren't doing it on purpose! And what about the cutting? You could cut yourself too deeply by accident and bleed out if we don't find you in time!"

Patton could see Deceit's lip wobble even as he continued to argue.

"You and Roman do dangerous shit in the Imagination all the time!" Janus pointed out. "You've died multiple times because of it, and no one has ever decided you need babysitting!"

"This isn't about us, Dee!" Remus shot back. "And yeah, Roman and I do dangerous shit, but we usually heal from it! I don't know why, but you haven't been healing the way you're supposed to! And maybe you don't care if you're hurt, but at the end of the day, it's a lot less risky for either Roman or I to be out of commission for a while because there's two of us! But there's only one of you! Even if you don't care for your own sake, I know you care enough about Thomas to not want to put him through all this again. He needs you to be around."

He knew what Remus was doing. He was trying to guilt Janus into agreeing by using Thomas. Deceit's self-esteem wasn't high enough at the moment to convince him using his own well-being, so he was trying to use Thomas's well-being as a tool to get Deceit to care about himself as an extension of Thomas. Patton wasn't so sure he liked this method (nor Remus's insistence that it was less serious for either Creativity to die or get hurt), but he didn't really know what else they were supposed to do. Deceit's perspective on this situation was skewed, and trying to convince him that he needed to be watched was just going to lead into more and more arguing. But bringing Thomas into it forced Deceit into considering how his actions could impact someone else, someone that Deceit was meant to protect.

Even before Deceit's shoulders fell and he gained a look of defeat, Patton knew that Remus's method had worked.

"You know what? Fine, do what you want," he hissed. "I'll just go sit somewhere until you all come up with something else you want to force me to do."

And with that, Deceit stormed away. A few seconds later, they heard a door slam shut, most likely the bathroom based on the short amount of time between when he left and the slam. Remus deflated, burying his face in his hands.

Deceit was angry. And it wasn't exactly unreasonable for him to be, but they didn't know what else to do. They didn't know how to help Deceit, but they had to at least make sure he was as safe as they could keep him.

Hopefully, Deceit would understand one day.

XXX

Yeah, so, they are perhaps not handling this situation in the best way. Everyone's kinda lost at this point and not sure what to do :/

(Also, sorry if anyone is disappointed about how anticlimactic the return of the hat was. I'm leaving it up to interpretation for what Janus was going to say to Roman)

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