"Kids like you… should be burning in hell."
I shivered. The skeleton may want me to burn to death, but I thought I was pretty far from that stage at the moment. I always got cold when I was nervous.
The skeleton pulled out his Gaster Blasters. I leapt from side to side, dodging the blasts, rolling once to just barely escape being burnt by the energy beams. "Stop it!" I yelled. "I didn't… I didn't do anything!"
"You can never run away from the past, kid," the skeleton said, balancing one of his bones on his right index finger. He sent it flying at me, and I sucked in a sharp breath as it struck the top of my right arm.
"I never wanted to hurt anyone!" I sobbed, sinking to the ground.
"A likely story," he replied. He filled the ground beneath me with a field of his bones, and I felt my soul shatter to pieces. That's it. All of my determination is gone.
I can't keep fighting anymore.
-:-:-
"Frisk! Frisk, wake up!" I whimpered as I felt someone shaking my shoulder.
"Get away from me!" I snarled. I felt them retract their hand.
"Frisk, you were just having a bad dream. Wake up. It wasn't real." This time, I could identify the voice as Toriel's.
I cracked my eyes opened. "I'm sorry," I said remorsefully. It was just a bad dream. So why had it felt so real?
"Come downstairs for breakfast, Frisk," Toriel said, her voice as kind and patient as ever. "You will feel better after some cinnamon-butterscotch pancakes." I smiled. It had become tradition to flavor things that way.
"Certainly better than more of Pap's spaghetti," I grumbled as I sat up. The skeleton insisted that everyone in the house that we all shared had at least one bowl of his "world-renowned" spaghetti each day. And while he had certainly gotten better (somehow) with Undyne's lessons, his meals were still pretty regrettable.
Toriel smiled. "Nobody will disagree with that." She patted my shoulder twice, then departed from the small room.
I groaned as I got out of bed, shivering as I left the protective warmth of my blanket. I changed swiftly, pulling my sweater over my head as quickly as I could before heading downstairs.
"GOOD MORNING, HUMAN," I heard Papyrus say, as eager and energetic as always. He had drawn a self-portrait with syrup on his plate.
"How are you so energetic this early in the morning?" I grumbled, grabbing two pancakes off of the tall pile of flapjacks that Toriel had made.
"IT MUST BE PART OF MY SPARKLING PERSONALITY," the skeleton replied as I took the maple syrup from him and drenched my pancakes in it. "EVERYONE SHOULD TRY BEING AS CHEERFUL AS ME. I HEAR IT'S GREAT FOR YOUR MENTAL HEALTH." I grunted in reply.
"Where are the others?" I asked him.
"ALPHYS AND UNDYNE ARE STILL DOWNSTAIRS SLEEPING." He began licking his self-portrait off of his plate. "WE WERE GOING TO LET YOU SLEEP TOO, BUT YOU STARTED SCREAMING," he added. "SANS JUST WOKE UP. HE SHOULD BE DOWNSTAIRS SOMETIME WITHIN AN HOUR."
I glared at him suspiciously as he said that, but he seemed oblivious to it, engaged in noisily cleaning the dishes (by eating it). I sighed to myself. Maybe I was letting my nightmares get to me. I knew that Sans and I were still friends. I was done RESETing. We'd been living happily on the surface for several months now. No more timelines jumping all over the place. For all I knew, Sans didn't even remember the other RESETs. The others certainly didn't. Yet for some reason, I still felt vaguely uncomfortable around the skeleton.
"HERE HE IS NOW, ACTUALLY," Papyrus said, standing up. "GOOD MORNING, BROTHER!"
Sans groaned as he stepped down the last stair. "mornin' paps. mornin' kid." He paused by the coffee maker, waiting for some to brew.
"YOU HAVE TO ACTUALLY PUT COFFEE IN IT, BROTHER," Papyrus said. Sans glanced at his brother, then tipped the bag of coffee into the filter cup, not bothering to measure any.
"Sans, I have told you that coffee is bad for you. It stunts your growth," Toriel said from her seat at the head of the table.
"MAYBE THAT IS WHY YOU ARE SO SHORT, BROTHER. YOU SHOULD HAVE COME TO HELP HIM LONG BEFORE YOU DID, TORI," Papyrus added. "EVIDENTLY IT IS TOO BIG OF A JOB FOR ONE SKELETON."
"too late to change habits now," Sans said, "ive already stopped growing." The coffee maker beeped to indicate it was done brewing, and Sans took the pot out of the coffee maker, setting it down on the table across from his brother. Nobody seemed to care about the fact that he didn't bother pouring it into a mug, although Alphys probably would, as the only other one who drank coffee.
"At least eat something, Sans," Toriel said. "I made cinnamon-butterscotch pancakes."
"How could I resist?" muttered Sans, plating three pancakes.
"Want any syrup?" I offered.
"No thanks, Ch- Frisk." I glanced up at him sharply, but he did not seem to notice his blunder. Neither did anyone else, I noticed, glancing around. The skeleton made his way over to the fridge, where he grabbed a bottle of ketchup before heading to the table. We all stared at him.
He finally looked up. "what?" he asked, seeing our astonished expressions. "You all know me by now." He uncapped the ketchup and squirted a healthy portion onto his plate.
"BROTHER, DO NOT RUIN TORIEL'S PANCAKES WITH KETCHUP," Papyrus said.
Sans shrugged. "i'm not ruining them," he said. "i'm enhancing them."
"Sure you are," I muttered.
"Well, if it allows you to greater enjoy them," Toriel said doubtfully. Sans shrugged and slathered the blob of ketchup over his pancake before shoving the entire thing into his mouth at once. We all turned our attentions away from him.
"DO YOU HAVE SCHOOL TODAY, FRISK?" Papyrus asked.
"It's Saturday, Pap," I pointed out. "I never have school on Saturday."
Papyrus perked up further, if that was possible. "SO YOU WILL HAVE THE WHOLE DAY TO SPEND WITH SANS AND I!" he said happily.
"Uh… Y-yeah," I said, looking down at my plate. Hurriedly, doing my best to seem natural, I cut a piece of the pancake with my fork and shoved it into my mouth. I glanced back up, my eyes locking with Sans's as I did so. His face was expressionless for a moment, then he grinned.
"glad to have you along, kid," he said, finger-gunning me. I smiled back.
"Along?" I asked. "Are we going somewhere?"
Sans winked. "it's a surprise," he said.
"YOU NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT A SURPRISE TO ME, BROTHER," Papyrus said indignantly.
Sans gazed levelly across the table at his brother. "If i did, pap, it wouldn't be a surprise." He stood up, grabbing his ketchup-covered plate as he did so. "you wouldn't want the surprise to be ruined, would you?"
"Ruined like those pancakes?" I said under my breath. Sans gave no sign of hearing.
"anyways, kid, pap, hurry up and get ready. you wouldn't want to be late, would you?" he tread off. "fortunately, you can't be late to this one," he said cryptically. Papyrus and I exchanged glances.
"ANY IDEA WHAT HE MEANS BY THAT?" Papyrus asked. I shrugged.
Less than an hour had passed before Sans called us into assembly. "We don't need to get this early of a start if we can't be late," I muttered.
Sans stared at me for a moment. Then, instead of replying to my statement, he simply grumbled, "nice necklace." I looked down at my chest, then glanced at him sharply. Hanging on a gold chain around my neck was the Heart Locket-the same one bore by the first human. Papyrus seemed oblivious to any of the undertones Sans and I were exchanging.
"WHERE ARE YOU TAKING US, BROTHER?" he asked.
Sans grinned. "you'll see," he said, pushing us out of the house. "close your eyes," he said. "it's a surprise, remember?"
"How are we supposed to walk anywhere with our eyes closed?" I hissed. The skeleton disregarded my statement, continuing to push us down the road. I tripped a total of seven times before he removed his skeletal hand from my back and announced that we could open our eyes.
It was dark. I could barely see, save for a faint blue glow that echoed around the wall in front of us. It appeared to be rock, and speckled green-brown vines cloaked most of it. I blinked several times, and eventually, when my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw Sans standing in front of Papyrus and I, standing before a ubiquitous castle door. "What the hell are you-" I began, but Sans cut me off.
"go on, go inside," he said, pushing Papyrus forwards. I moved forwards to follow, but Sans stepped in front of the door. I noticed through narrowed eyes that the blue glow that seemed to emanate from the rock previously had disappeared.
"What… what are you doing?" I asked, my hand fumbling in my pocket nervously. Eventually, my fingers fell upon the knife I had kept since before we broke the barrier. I felt a flash of deja vu, and resisted the urge to take the knife out of my pocket. I felt my heartbeat speed up.
"We need to talk," he said. His voice had lost his normal jocular tone.
I took a step back. "What are you talking about?" I asked. "I haven't done anything."
"Stop playing me for a fool," he snarled. His hand shot out in front of him, and two gaster blasters automatically shot towards them.
My pulse was almost shaking now, with little pause between beats. Moving instinctively, I took the knife out of my pocket, tossing the sheath to the side. "Stop it!" I begged. "You don't want to repeat this!"
His eyes narrowed, then the left one began glowing. "Hehehe…" His laugh echoed around the small, mostly enclosed space eerily. A blue pulse shot across the door to the Underground, and a mini barrier ignited there. "So you do remember," he growled. "So much for 'I haven't done anything.'" He flicked his hand, and the cave disappeared, replaced by the all-too-familiar judgement hall. "You won't find it so easy this time," he snarled. "You don't have any LOVE."
"Stop it!" I shouted. "That's the point! I haven't done anything!"
Sans closed his eyes. "Imagine the timeline for a minute. Dozens, no, hundreds, of tiny paths lined up next to each other. Now, imagine your place in those timelines. Is there one of you in every time line? No. There's one of you in all the timelines."
"That doesn't make sense."
"Fine. You're an anomaly, understand? There isn't a new one of you generated every time a new timeline is formed. No, you're the same person in all of the timelines. You get the privilege of keeping your memories. You get to keep your humanity.
"Now, imagine me. Where am I? What am I? Am I like you? Do I get to create new timelines with the snap of a finger? No. But I exist outside it. I do not follow the stream of time. Understand, human?"
I hesitated. "No," I said. "But that doesn't give you an excuse to kill me."
Sans gave a low laugh. "Excuses," he spat. "You had no excuses, yet here we are. Congratulations, Chara. You're a murderer. Whoop-dee-doo. Now. I'll tell you what I am. I'm a guardian. I protect those timelines. That's not all. I protect the Underground. Understand? You destroy the timelines. You destroy the Underground. I destroy you."
"Then why wait, skeleton?" I growled. "You've had all this time to kill me. Ever since I first crawled through the Ruins door into Snowdin, you've had dozens upon dozens of opportunities. So why wait? Why wait until the nightmares consume me before deciding to end this?" I closed my eyes briefly. I felt a familiar power twist within me. I knew that power. That was the power of determination, more than one human was supposed to have. I laughed dully. "How ironic," I added, "That you decided to call me by that name." I ran my finger down the blade of the knife.
Sans halted. "So I see it has begun," he said. "What do you say? Should I give you the speech? For old times' sake?"
I finally opened my eyes. My right eye tingled uncomfortably. "Go ahead," I growled.
Sans took a deep breath. The lighting lowered dramatically, although I am uncertain why. Sans's eye was glowing. "You've already made a mistake," I said, a smile flickering across my face. Sans scowled and shut his eyes.
"It's a beautiful day outside… Birds are singing, flowers are blooming. On days like this kids like you-"
"Yeah, that's enough of that," I growled, darting my knife forwards. An uncomfortable tingling spiked in my right eye. Sans opened his eyes, alarmed, and barely had time to sidestep. His eye began glowing once more.
"I see you're not following the script," he growled, flinging his arm forwards. "I would have expected better from you." He raised me up into the air. I struggled briefly, then ceased, feeling adrenaline course through me. I was familiar enough with his attacks. Bones would appear from somewhere. "By the way," he added in a conversationalist tone, "Are you aware that your eye is glowing?"
I was not expecting that. "I- what?" My eyes widened, startled. They had never done that before. Although, now that he mentioned it, the glow on the walls was purple, not blue. Sans's eye was most definitely not purple.
"Gotcha," he said, a gaster blaster appearing beneath me. I did my best to leap out of the way, but the tail end of my sweater was seared off. The skeleton dropped me, and I ran towards him, hurling my arm out from behind me in an arc designed to slip the knife between his ribs. Sans laughed. "You're going to have to do better than that, he said, leaning backwards and grabbing my wrist tightly.
STOP IT.
I halted. The skeleton released his grip on my arm. We glared at each other for a moment. STOP FIGHTING. We both hesitated. My eye ceased tingling, and the purple glow faded to blue. Sans's anger remained ignited for a few seconds, before his eye, too, returned to normal. COME BACK.
Sans blinked. "You hear that, I assume."
"Noooo," I drawled sarcastically. "Who is saying that?! What gives you the right to-" STOP. I did.
Sans hesitated, then flicked his wrist. The judgement hall faded around me. The power coiled within me seemed to die out. My companion had been evicted. My remaining power was weak, at best.
We had returned to the room leading to the underground. Sans dispersed the barrier over the door. "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?" I heard Papyrus said. He emerged through the doorway seconds later. He glared first at Sans, then at me.
"So it was you," snarled Sans, advancing upon his brother.
"Sans, stop!" I cried.
"...SANS? SANS, ARE YOU OKAY?"
"You had no right to interfere!"
"ENOUGH!" The word echoed around the room. I turned around, trying to identify its source, before realizing that it was, in fact, coming from me. Chara had taken over my body, even after her SOUL was forced from my mind. I frowned. Chara was not supposed to be the pacifist.
Something finally seemed to get through to Sans. He halted mid-step, lowering his head. "I... I am... sorry," he said. He turned to me. "Forgive me," he whispered. His body matter shifted slightly. Papyrus and I started at him, uncomprehending of what was going on. He took on a shifting, glitching appearance. I saw pupils reappear in his eyes and he smiled slightly. "I am sure you understand, Frisk... Chara..."
"SANS, WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?" Papyrus asked. "WHAT HAPPENED?"
Sans looked away. "You've been possessed, too, Fris-"
"I'M SORRY, WHAT?" Papyrus said. He looked extremely scarred. I buried my face in my hands.
Sans rubbed the back of his with his right hand. "Uh... nothing, Paps. Heh. Anyways..." He appeared to glitch once more. "Chara, I still don't forgive you, understand? It was a terrible plan from the beginning."
I took a step towards the skeleton and gripped his forearms. "Sans," I said, my voice wobbling slightly as I lowered it. "We really shouldn't talk about-"
"heh," Sans said, yanking his arms out of my hands and putting them in his pocket. "screw shouldn't," he said, turning and facing the outside of the shadowed overhang. His bleach-white bones reflected the orange sunset brilliantly. "stop possessing my friends," he said absently.
"SANS?" Papyrus said, understandably confused. "SANS, ARE YOU ALRIGHT?"
"yeah, paps. don't worry about me." He tossed his head. "mind if I talk to the human in private?"
"SANS, THE LAST TIME YOU DID THAT YOU TRIED TO KILL EACH OTHER."
A faint smile crossed the shorter skeleton's face. "yeah. well, some of this stuff you shouldn't exactly be hearing."
"SANS!" Papyrus exclaimed. He sounded mortified. "I AM SEVENTEEN!"
Sans smiled and shook his head. "that's not what I meant, paps."
"THEN WHAT EXACTLY DID YOU MEAN, BROTHER?"
Sans looked between Papyrus and I. He seemed hesitant. Eventually he turned away and began walking slowly. "heh. forget it."
"SANS, WAIT!" Papyrus said, running after his brother. I stared after them for a few seconds, feeling a surge of emotions rise within me. I bit my lip to stop from calling out after him. What I had to say was not for Papyrus to hear.
Forgive me, Sans.
I said I never did anything wrong. That's a lie. So what if there was a fifty-year-old demon child inside of me? Heh. That doesn't excuse the fact that I killed someone. I've done all of this dozens, hundreds of times without Chara being responsible for deaths of anyone.
I... I don't think she actually wants to hurt anyone, Sans. No. I don't think you were alive when she died, but... she cared a lot for everyone. For Toriel. For Asgore. Above all else, for Asriel. No... she wouldn't have torn apart their world. I guess that's what fifty years of being alone does to you, huh? I guess I wouldn't know. Still, though, I was the one who called the first shots. Part of me wanted her to step forwards, I think. Part of me wanted to feed the demon inside of me. Heh. And they call all of you the monsters.
So, that's my story. I can't bring myself to tell you all of this in real life, so... here we go. Here's my story. Hope it brings you some peace.
I'll be resetting soon. Hope I can call you a friend in my next journey. See you there, lazybones.
~Frisk