User blog:Orion's Dagger/Facing Faces

A young man finds himself walking cautiously into an ancient Roman temple. He is unsure why he is here, yet he follows the pull of fate whenever he can, if only to avoid the painful punishments that torment his mind and body whenever he fails. The door closes behind him. Panicked, he attempts to open it, but is stopped by a voice behind him. He turns to find a two-faced man.

"We must talk," speaks the man. Both mouths move, doubling his words in a strangely hollow echo.

The young man replies cautiously, with the question weighing on his mind, "Why am I here? I see no reason, no beings for this curse to have me effect."

"Abloec, it is time."

"Don't call me by that name! I am Janus Chance, the Hand of Fate and Guardian of Destiny...Its time for what?"

The man pauses before his reply, "No, Abloec. I am Janus. And you do your job poorly."

"...I see your faces, that was fairly clear Lord Janus."

Abloec is clearly uncomfortable, the door separated him from his fox kits, Truth and Deception. He'd do a lot for their assuring presence in this moment. He fishes for his keys, but finds that the Roman god before him holds them in one hand.

"It is time Abloec."

"I don't understand."

"Try to understand."

Denying this, Abloec attempts to open the door in any way possible, but slumps to the ground after what seems like ages of trying to wrench the stone open.

"Why can't I open this door! I've never had a door that I can't unlock...not even before I was cursed."

"It will remain shut until you understand yourself Abloec."

"Myself!? There is nothing I need to understand about myself!"

"A lie you tell yourself. If it were true, the curse that afflicts you so would not change you so much."

Abloec angrily snarls a retort back at Janus, "I lie to everyone except myself."

"Abloec, I was supposed to be your father."

The statement cools Abloec's temper cold with shock.

Janus continues, "However, something went wrong. I am not your father. A mortal man, instead, was your father. The paths have disconnected for you. A discord in the doors of the past and future leaves you not quite who you should be."

"...What would you have me be."

"Yourself. Right now, you deny all you think you shouldn't be. You are scared of being important. Scared of responsibilities you never asked for. Today, I give you a choice."

"A...choice?"

"I present two doors to you," Janus raises his arms, and on either side of himself a door opens from the solid stone wall. Peering in, Ableoc can see nothing, "Abloec, you must choose. Step through the past, and allow yourself to change to what you are supposed to be, or step into the current future and let the world change you forcefully instead."

"Lord Janus, I don't understand," Abloec says the words without thinking. His entire body is shaking as the two doors before him seem to loom over him like the shadows of the planets. He cannot think rationally.

Janus looms before him, both his visible eyes staring deep into Ableoc's own, in a way that seems to rip into his soul. In a panic, Janus clutches his mother's crow feather bracelet on his wrist. Suddenly, he can think. His mind races through the possibilities, the advantages and disadvantages of either door.

He sees no correct decision in either.

Abloec looks back at Janus, and struggles to think of something that would get him out of such a hopeless decision. Soon, words come to him.

"Lord Janus. What are choices, what is fate, if one isn't allowed to change their own fate if they don't want to make a choice?"

"I would call that a mistake, Abloec."

"Lord Janus, I would call that giving themself more time."

"You've had plenty of time, Abloec."

Janus was right, and Abloec couldn't find a way to argue that point, so he changed the topic.

"And what if I like who I've been? What if I like who I've made myself? What if I don't want to be forced into a future, and what if I don't want to force others into futures they may not want?"

"..."

Abloec's heart pounds as he takes a deep breath. He knows what he wants to do, even if its not what the world thinks he should. Even if it might kill him for choosing what shouldn't be an option.

"I'm not choosing either door. I, Janus Chance, Hand of Fate, am making a gamble," he steps forward with such conviction that the two-faced god actually falters, taking a single step backwards, his back pressing against the wall, "and I, Janus Chance, son of the Morrigan and bringer of chance meetings, choose to walk away from this decision."

In another two steps, Janus stands before his namesake.

"I choose to give choices. Many more and far better and equal than yours have ever been. Including the choice to fight onward despite what the world decides for them."

He takes another step, directly into the god. Janus feels a strange buzzing, his vision seems to split for a moment before returning to focus. The Roman god of doorways, beginnings and endings, and transitions, is gone. There is only one Janus now, and forevermore from now. Only Janus stands within the temple. His hair, black once more, save his single red streak, sways in the breeze from the open door behind him.

He walks out.