#sasi janus

[machrealgirl]

god. janus sanders really is a character of all time, just in terms of concept. when you were a little kid, you did something wrong, and you got so scared of getting in trouble that another little guy was born inside you. and he loves you. and he wants you to stay safe. so he tells you to lie now, take care of yourself now, keep yourself safe. but all the other little guys inside you hate him. he's too mean, too selfish. the little guy that was born from your desire to do good and be good hates him the most, because you're a little catholic boy, and lying is bad. and you're a good boy. so everything inside you that isn't good has to be shut away.

he knows he's not wanted. he creates his own place to stay, a hidden corner where he can't hurt you. because all the others say that he'll end up hurting you, and he can see how scared you are of being a liar, so he lets himself be forgotten. hidden away. this is how he shows his love: by hiding himself, and every subsequent unwanted part that grows inside you, from you. if knowing about their existence is too difficult for you, then he'll hide them all. he loves you. you don't even know his name.

he watches you grow, still unaware of his existence. the others make their presence known, felt. you let them take the reigns, most of the time. he sneaks in his own little influence here and there; small, harmless lies, only when necessary, so you won't even notice. and in the meantime, he acts as a herder of sorts for all the other parts of yourself that you've subconsciously cast away. he keeps them in line. he sympathizes with them, yes, he knows what it's like to be unwanted. but letting you see them would hurt you, and he loves you. so he keeps them there, in the shadow, unknown and unseen, just like him.

one of them, one of his little dark, unwanted things, doesn't want to be hated anymore. he wants to make himself known. he wants a seat at the table. and, in an ultimate slap to the face for janus, he gets it. virgil gets everything that janus was denied from the start. acceptance. power. control. his effort is acknowledged, his necessity is embraced. he gets a seat at the table. he doesn't have to hide anymore. and janus can't help but resent him for that. maybe it's a good thing, then, that the hatred is mutual. not even his own cattle, the ones he kept safe, the ones he kept out of thomas' way, can stand his presence. fine. none of it matters. as long as you're safe, it was all worth it. he loves you. you still don't even know his name.

janus was always thomas' protector. even when none of it was ever seen or acknowledged.

i find his mixed motif really interesting too, because before we knew his name, we only knew him as deceit. the snake. the ancient serpent deceiver, the biblical snake of eden. but then we hear his name. janus. ianus bifrons, two-faced janus, god of beginnings, passage, transitions. i think that his name being revealed was very much the start of thomas beginning to see janus for who he actually is, instead of the heavily modified version of him that he's been seeing, courtesy of his catholic upbringing.

[chirp-featherfowl]

There's a snake in the Garden of Eden.

(tumblr DEVASTATED the quality. click for the version that is more than 10 pixels 😭)

[skittlesking]

Kinda old but some Sanders sides designs i did a while ago. very fluffy hair i did give them :]

[queenofexhaustion]

*The Sides at Disneyland, in the teacups*

Virgil Logan and Roman: *spinning a little and talking*

Remus Janus and Patton: *flying past them spinning as fast as they can, screaming*

[crowncoconut]

him: you better not be a cunty embodiment of deceit when i get home

me:

[lit-vocabcards]

Canon: The Dark Sides would fuck a dragon

[mysticwolfentertainment]

Hey, raise your hand if your part of the group that just remembered one day that Sanders Sides exists and now its once again become your whole personality

[bitchnuggettt]

The most interesting thing about Janus and Virgil's vague situationship is that they share similar goals in their functions as sides, and something I like to think about is how their end goal is a shared interest in keeping Thomas safe from both internal and external threats. For so long I've seen the idea passed around in fanon that Virgil represents "fight or flight" but I think there's an even cooler alternative here

I can't picture Virgil running, when adrenaline kicks in HE'S what kicks in, and if that means LITERALLY kicking someone to shit and death then yeah, he's your guy. He literally embodies that one anecdote of a mother gaining the strength to lift a car off her child in her panic.

So, I offer this; Virgil is fight, Janus is flight.

Virgil compels Thomas to deck any bodily threat to him, or pushes him to confront uncomfortable truths.

Janus convinces Thomas to cut his losses when all else fails and physically hightail it away from fights he won't win, forcing him to be non-confrontational and cut social ties that inconvenience him. Avoidance to the max.

In the mean tweets video, Janus iconically gets offended at his bluff being called, because no, he is NOT a fighter, not when he can just sic Virgil or Remus on anything he doesn't care to confront. Even his choice of murder via poison is indirect and hands-off. (Realistically, snake venom would be his literal poison of choice but that's a story for another day)

Together, anxceit makes up the two sides of the 'fight or flight' coin

[astronomical-bagel]

The brainworms… they got me…

[colresskisser]

svs is my beloved bc of how ace attorney coded it is. also janus i love janus

[machrealgirl]

do you know what would be REALLY sick and twisted. if janus didn't actually understand why virgil left. if there was no big fight, no actual conflict, and he was just gone one day. if his only reason for leaving was that he just didn't want to be a dark side anymore, and janus woke up one day with one of his only friends in the entire world gone without a trace. and when he went out looking for him, he found him laughing and having fun with the very people the two of them had sworn to hate together. the very image of a family that janus had desperately tried to create for the dark sides on his own. he'd assume that he failed, somehow. that virgil left them for something better, which he technically did.

that sort of betrayal would build resentment through the years. the sort that rots your insides. meanwhile virgil, now convinced that the dark sides are evil and harming thomas, begins to hate his own past, and, by extension, janus. this sort of mutual bitterness only grows with their refusal to talk to each other.

but maybe, to this day, janus still doesn't understand why virgil left. i like the idea that if he was somehow forced to tell the truth, janus wouldn't have any confessions to make, only questions to ask. "why did you leave?" "was it my fault?" "why do you hate me?" "why don't i get a second chance?" "why is it always me?"

[manomeansshark]

Loser

[skylarstar1000]

Wife.

[radar-chaos]

My, my. What’s all this about?

[queenofexhaustion]

Remus: So what, now I'm just supposed to do anything Logan does? I mean, what if he jumped off a cliff?

Virgil: If Logan were to jump off a cliff, he would've done his due diligence regarding the height of the cliff, the depth of the water, and the angle of entry, so yes. If you see Logan  jump off a cliff, by all means, jump off a cliff

Janus: You jump off a cliff!

Virgil: Gladly, provided Logan did first

[herdofnerd]

Someone take him away, he’s serving too much cunt and it’s scaring the children.