go back to sleep!
Sans doesn't really know why he still comes out to his lookout post anymore. It's not like there's anything to patrol for, to guard against. There's nothing more that's going to come out of the ruins, and there's not even the good company around here that there used to be.
A delicious aroma wafts up from the portable grill he's got set up on the counter. He lifts the lid long enough to roll the hot dog over and take an admiring glance at the thick bubbles of char that have formed on the outside. Almost ready. Sans pulls a bun out of the bag and opens it, setting it face down on the top layer of the grill. He shuts the lid and rummages around to find his condiments.
Nah, he knows exactly why he's out here. Part of it's just that it's quiet out here, and the air is clearer than his room. But mostly it means a lot to Papyrus that he clock in out here.
That, eh. Maybe it shouldn't matter as much as it does to him. But, since he's feeling extra self-honest today, he can admit that Papyrus badgering him so relentlessly for slacking off is one of the things that gets him out of bed in the morning.
Sans pulls the toasted hot dog bun off the grill and lays down a foundation of relish, then two precise squirts of mustard. Satisfied, he picks up the ketchup, points it downward, and starts to squeeze. He moves the bottle back and forth over the length of the bun, making a slow count to five. The other condiments vanish beneath that sea of red. The grill-marked bun stands up to this assault valiantly before slowly soaking through.
Heh. This situation with the kid must be wearing on him more than he'd thought. That's extended houseguests for you. Sans grabs the hot dog off the grill, ignoring that it's way too hot to be touching with bare fingers, and drops the well-crisped water sausage into the abyss of ketchup. He wipes his fingerbones clean on his jacket, leaving behind a smear of grease and char.
Well, not every day's a good day, but no day's a bad day when you've got a hot dog fresh off the grill, skin bubbled and crisp, and slathered in half a bottle of ketchup. He eats it in three bites. That leaves him feeling more like himself.
Might as well get some actual work done while he's got the time and headspace. There's measurements he figures he's going to need to take, but he's pretty sure his probe adapter is busted. Luckily this is strictly intratemporal equipment, so it should be perfectly safe to do it out here. Or at all, for that matter. He's not entirely certain a temporal clean room even exists anymore. Ever did exist. Would exist? Something throbs deep inside his skull, and it's not the convolution of grammar.
He shakes it off and reaches into his pocket, coming up with an unassuming black plastic box, just about palm-sized, coaxial connectors on opposite sides. What else does he need? He sets the adapter down and furrows his brow, concentrating as he goes for the inside pockets of his jacket.
Sans sets a handheld multimeter and a soldering iron down on top of the stand just a few seconds later. A schematic drawn out on a crumpled napkin comes out of his front pocket. He smoothes it out in front of him, and puts the ketchup bottle on top of it to keep it in place.
He goes to pop the box open but after a few fruitless tugs, he turns it over, just to see four gleaming, tiny screws glaring up at him.
"Oh for..." he says. "Really? Screwed right out of the box, I guess." He squints more at the screws, trying to gauge their size, then dips into his pocket for a driver.
Sans cracks the box open and, for a small miracle, finds the problem almost immediately. Well, he finds a couple problems, because of course there's never just one. Blown emergency fuse, that's easy enough to fix. A jumper to the output seems to have snapped loose. And there, one thirty-two pin chip gone all brown and fried from the release of its magic smoke.
He can't even see the part number on the chip, so he goes to the schematic, then starts rummaging for a replacement. Okay, so was the short caused by user error or design flaw?
Eh, whatever. He'll just assume user error because the alternative is more work, and work outside of his field. So just replace the fuse, jumper, and the chip, and this should be fine. Well, fine is probably a strong word, but he should be able to get some life out of the adapter long enough to get the readings he needs.
Sans comes up out of his pocket, finally, with a bag of potato chips. Despite himself, he chuckles, tosses the bag aside, and goes in again, this time getting a shielded bag holding rows of microchips and a few other odds and ends he'd need to pop the dud.
He plugs in the soldering iron then looks to the grill while he waits. Glances to the package of hot dogs. Then he sighs, and picks up his spool of solder, rotating it until he affirms that yes, there really is quite a lot of lead and magical goop in there, and he probably shouldn't be putting on another hot dog while he's working with the stuff. He considers it anyway, and just tests the iron's temperature in the snow instead. The sharp hiss tells him he's ready to go on this anyway.
Thirty-two tiny legs set against thirty-two tiny pads. Thirty-two times he brings the iron in, along with a twist of copper braid, and gets the chip that much looser. After thirty-two, he comes in with a pair of tweezers and pulls the chip away with a single firm tug. He puts it aside, then cleans off the bare contacts, scrubs them with a wad of steel wool. Everything looks intact and good to go once that's taken care of.
But that's the easy part. He opens the bag of components and slides out a tiny rectangle of foam. The difference between the chips is like snow and steam. The old one is dead, brown and burnt. The new one has a lustre beneath the surface, makes the air around him somehow smell more real. Not a temporally-sensitive component, no. But it definitely exists in two different places at the same time, for now.
His vision stains amber on the left side as he grips the chip with his tweezers and sets it down onto the circuit board, twice. It might exist in two places at once, but if you work very quickly and very carefully, you can make those places the same, just a few degrees out of phase with one another.
And Sans needs to try to measure two things that exist in the same place at the same time. An ozone scent fills the air as he works, adhering chip to board with lead and magic and only some duospatial manipulation. Sweat beads up on his skull as he tags each little metal foot with the solder, a soft distorted hiss rising over the sounds of the grill.
He's a little dizzy when he finishes the thirty-second, but he leans back and takes a deep breath of the icy air when it's over.
Everything else is cake, at least: the fuse swaps without any trouble at all, and a fresh length of wire replaces the dead jumper. He checks for circuit continuity and everything looks good, but right now he can only test on the mundane level.
Still, should do, should do. He screws the box back together and pockets his improbably large amount of equipment.
Sans checks his phone. Tch. Still three hours on shift. The eternal question, then: nap, or hot dog? He bends to dip his hands in the snow, shaking the cold off as he lifts them. Another hot dog, while the grill's still hot.
He's just tossed it on when he hears heavy footsteps off in the forest, townside. He tilts his head that direction, listening. Sounds like a pair. He adds a couple more 'dogs to the grill, just in case. He'll give them a good home if he's wrong.
The footsteps draw closer as he pops his bun on the grill. Up the path, two very distinct armoured figures appear, tromping up the path. Bunny ears and dragon fins bob in the air, shaking snow loose from the shorter trees.
"Hey guys," says Sans, nodding to the royal guards. He retrieves his hot dog bun and adds two more buns to the grill. "You're a long way from Hotland. 'Sup?"
"Hey Sans," says 01. "Like, Undyne's sent us on a mission." He looks around nervously, back at his partner. "Well, you know what happened here a while back, right?"
"He must've, bro," says 02. "It's his post and all. Hurry up and ask him. I don't wanna stay put out here."
Sans slathers the condiments on his bun. "Fill me in? Couldn't hurt to... ketchup." He waits a beat, shrugs when he doesn't get the laugh, and adds an additional squeeze's worth of emphasis with the ketchup bottle. "You want a hot dog? Either of you?"
The guards look to each other, and they both shrug. "Sure," says 01. "It's about that human that was running around last month. Like, your brother hasn't managed to capture it, and the local guards are, uh, gone."
Sans pushes the condiments across the stand and pops the hot dogs in the buns. "Hey, one of these's a hot cat. That's lucky, which of you wants it?" 02 raises his hand, and Sans passes it over, letting 01 take the regular ''dog. "I remember what happened. It was... yeah. But everyone who did get evacuated is back now. What's up?"
"That's what's up. Undyne's worried," says 02, avoiding the ketchup (philistine) and just applying mustard to his hot cat. "No one's found a trace of the human. If it's still around and everyone's back, that could be real bad. You haven't seen anything suspicious, have you?"
Sans takes a bite out of his own hot dog to buy himself a minute. Well, he knew something like this was coming. Figured it might have been one of Snowdin's residents letting Undyne know, but apparently he's managed to keep a lid on things there for now. On the other hand, nothing can really hide the full extent of the damage, not that he'd even want to. "No humans running around in the shadows around here, if that's what you mean," says Sans after he swallows. "Not that I've noticed. It's been quiet as a t... yeah, let's not go there. Anyway, it's been quiet. Maybe a little too quiet. I dunno." So long as they're looking in the forest, things should be fine, he figures. Cleanup's pretty much done; Sans just has to start returning the dust and, yeah, he's been putting that off. Of course he has. "Sorry, guys."
"Worth a shot," says 01, eating his hot dog. "Let us know if you, like, see anything? Or pass it on to Undyne?"
"Sure," says Sans. He finishes his hot dog. "But I think it's time for my union-regulated break right now. Swing by Grillby's while you're in the area sometime, I'll buy you burgers. Be nice to have some new faces in the place. You guys should relax some anyway. Let your hair down."
The two guards head off with a little more exchange of pleasantries. Sans starts tearing down the grill before they've vanished from sight, taking his time about the whole thing. The nanosecond they're gone, Sans stashes the grill under the counter, puts his condiments away, and pushes away from the lookout post. He heads in the opposite direction as the guards, taking a shortcut home.
"Hey, uh, it's me again."
"Can't I just call to say hey?"
"... okay, yeah, fair. You're right, and I do need something. I don't think you're gonna like this one, either."
"Well, after that last chat, I figured I did have some things I could look into on my end. And I do, but, uh, I need some controls."
"You should have it already. Just... might need to dig some, that's all. One sec and I'll send you what I need."
"I know. I know. Do you think I- I'm gonna have to put you down, hold on."
Caught! It stumbles away from the door like it's made of fire, forcing this worthless body in the correct directions. But it's too slow, and the door creaks open, the strange miasma that lurks around the cracks dissipating. From the darkness, the short skeleton emerges, lingering at the doorway. He looks down at it, left eye blazing blue like a searchlight. Does it always do that? It scrambles at its corroded memory, but its work has been too thorough and the vessel too damaged to retain that much.
"Heya, kiddo," says the skeleton. He stifles a yawn but the light of patience shines steady and eternal, an inscrutable dare. "You need something?"
Look pathetic! But it doesn't know how to look pathetic, and the wildly thrashing soul inside its body is making it harder to try. It manages to look down at its feet, contort its face into a hangdog expression. The blue light dies when it shakes its head, the motion jerky as the vessel struggles to move some other way.
A memory of its own rises unbidden, stained in golden sunlight. Asriel never fought this much, even when he did wrest control for those critical moments. But Asriel was a monster, with a monster's soul, and no matter how damaged this vessel's mind was even before it fell, the soul within is still a human's, with a human's resilience.
Inconvenient. And an inconvenient memory. It cannot leave that one lying around. Like a thumb through chalk dust, it destroys the thoughts, the connections.
A moment of perverted sentimentality leads it to keep the name for itself, though it no longer knows why. But the name nestles deep inside its pulsing black heart as if it belongs there.
Its hands start to tremble. Not long now before it's driven back. Won't be worth it to try for a reset right now; the vessel's grip is too tight. Best to withdraw, resume the attack, keep hammering at cracks until it can leverage enough determination.
The skeleton scratches an itch, and says, "Well, if you say so. Careful hanging out outside of doors, kiddo. If I was Papyrus, I coulda tripped on you. I'd tell you to ask about the story behind that one, but, you know. I know how it is for you." He jams his hands in his pockets, eyes going dark. "Anyway, it's good to respect people's privacy."
Breaks to the surface, tries not to gasp for air. Where? Turns head around, tries to get bearings. Upstairs, yes, and not alone. What happened? Catches fingers on wall, tries to get steady.
Fingerbones on shoulder, not heavy. "Can you get downstairs okay? There's a thing of cookies in the kitchen. Go get them down, we'll have a snack. Gimme five, ten minutes tops. You seem like you could use some time to yourself."
Gently pushed away. Looks back and up. Makes a tiny nod. Comes easily, without a fight. Puts hand on wall, follows it to the stairs.
The worst part is that if he'd done his setup fifteen minutes ago, that would have been a prime opportunity to get his readings. That was a neat trick the 'kid' pulled, listening at his door. That should be impossible, without some sort of spatial desync. But the moment's passed, and now he's going to have to resort to some special work.
So, current hypothesis: the anomaly is formed by two independent entities forming some sort of antigestalt in the same space at the same time. Probably the levels of determination inherent to the human soul is a factor, but that's why he's needing readings. The mechanical dirty bits clearly aren't going to crack just from thinking about it.
Sans shortcuts downstairs and outside, pulls a key from his pocket, silver with edges that cut space like diamond. He lets out a breath, watches it frost in the air. He doesn't watch his fingers tremble as he shoves the key into the lock and twists it in two different directions at the same time.
He steps inside as quickly as he ever moves, and shoves the door shut behind him.
Of course Sans is aquainted with hate. Still, he avoids doing it whenever he can; it's pretty much only good for angrying up the marrow, and despite everything he still has better things to do with his time than hate much of anything. Hate takes effort.
So he doesn't hate being here. But he really doesn't enjoy being in this room. Or the sterility of the place. He doesn't even want to consider that thing in the corner, sort of wistfully dislikes the picture in the drawer that only exists in potentia, never really wants to think about the oppressive crush of good memories that can never be reclaimed- if would ever even exist.
No way back. But is this a way forward, finally? Who knows. But it's something to do while he's in this limbo of waiting for everything to be snatched away. He imagines he'll miss the kid, the flashes of them he sees anyway, but once this timeline snaps free, he won't really exist anymore, will he? Another Sans will take over.
Cheery. Sans pulls out his scope and probe and starts setting up, rigging a wireless connection between the filament-thin antenna that serves as probe and his newly-repaired adapter.
The next bit takes only a wisp of concentration: he graps the antenna at the base between thumbs and forefingers, and he twists, working the space loose until the probe exists in two places at once. He sets it up in opposite ends of the room. That should do for getting a clear reading; the floor above shouldn't cause any worrisome interference, not with the signals he's tracking.
Sans flicks the scope on and fiddles with the view settings until he affirms that his repair job will get him at least something readable. And that he's definitely onto something with the multiple occupancy theory. Even if one of these waves is... really weird, jumping all in directions that it shouldn't be possible to jump. But a quick bout of troubleshooting suggests that it's actually the reading, not just a botched repair job on the adapter.
Spectrum analysis can come later, though. And the control data could reveal that sort of distortion as being perfectly normal. Could. Probably won't. But that's what controls are for. He scrawls out a few initial notes out before plugging in save parameters on the readings. Good enough for now; he can check back later no problem. And there's cookies to be had. Cookies are important.
He makes sure the door's locked, and returns to his room, so his entrance downstairs looks at least a little bit normal.
Sits by the table. Has the cookies out, just like asked. Waits. Not sure how long it takes. But alone, with nobody coming. Nobody ever coming. Nobody ever came.
Except once. Memory bleeds into view, but foggy. Face pressed into flowers. Everything hurts. Eyes full of tears. Throat raw and screaming something, doesn't know what, until something strangles-
"Hey, kiddo, sorry about the wait. You didn't have any trouble finding the cookies?" Bony hand squeezes arm, lets go, passes by. Fridge opens. Fridge closes. Soft blue blur comes back, sits down, drops milk carton on table. Slides cookies over, opens bag.
Shakes head. Moves a little too easily, feels nervous by that. Still scared about earlier. Still doesn't know what happened. Listening, maybe? But couldn't hear anything at all. Rubs forehead with hand. Kind of sore still. But better.
Sort of wishes it wasn't. Sort of wishes that wish would go away. Kind of wants cookie. Isn't good to want things. Sneaks a look, watches hands pull cookies out of tray, milk get sloshed in.
Hand slides cookies over, sleeve drags in milk. Tray pushed closer, too. "There you go, kid. Can you reach okay?"
Blinks, looks at cookies. Bites lip, waits until cookies get slid closer. Cheeks go hot. Lifts hand, works fingers in same direction, picks up top cookie. Steals look long enough to get nodded at. Lifts other hand, takes other side of cookie. Pulls sides apart. Licks the inside. Tastes so sweet, can't help but smile. Sticks sides back together.
"Heh, heh." Fingerbones rattle, pulling attention upward. "Classic technique. But watch this. I'll do it slow for ya." Cookie gets lifted, rolls across back of bony hand. Flips into air, spins- counts, one, two, three times- drops into milk. Splashes.
Giggles until it hurts, throat all sore. Shouldn't be giggling. Not with everything. Stops it, looks down. Looks back up. Sees a sigh.
"It's okay to laugh, kid. Well, I guess that takes some time to learn. But it's okay for you to laugh. And like cookies." Reaches out and fishes out cookie from milk, pops it into mouth. "Eh, you'll get there. You're getting there."
Nods, sighs. Isn't really smart enough to get it, isn't really good enough to believe it. Keeps getting easier anyway. If you were good, you'd feel badly. Probably just rotten all the way through. Picks up next cookie. Pulls apart. Licks. Watches cookie get dunked, eaten. Thinks of something weird. Makes a sound. "Um."
"What's up?"
Squints. Tries to see better. Tries to figure out words. Tries to make tongue go right ways. "Um. Where..." Closes eyes. What next? Long word. Plan how tongue moves. Move hard in case it fights. "Cookie go?" Two at once! Smiles. If you weren't so stupid, two words at once wouldn't be special. Loses smile. But every word a fight. Shouldn't have to be. Doesn't have to be. Can just... no, would rather fight.
"That's kinda personal, isn't it?" But doesn't wait long enough to feel bad about. "Kidding, kidding. But I dunno how to explain it. Let me try and remember what they taught us in school."
Tummy flips at last word. Remembers something- fingers caught in metal door, fist on cheek, metal crashes from head hitting- whose? Doesn't remember, remembers pain, bites lip hard, wants to reach to remember things, doesn't want to know what they are. Yelling, fighting, fists everywhere. Hands on shoulders, pulling back. Can't picture faces. Doesn't know names. Screaming all through head. Keeps mouth shut. Wants to listen. Can't listen.
Bad memory soothed away like dust, all warm nothing left behind. No more noise, why was there noise? Head doesn't hurt, for once. Easy to listen to words now. Missed some of it. Wants to not have. Too late for that now.
"... so, uh, I guess it's magic. It's a kind of law, it's got a name and math that goes with it, don't remember it offhand. But the gist is that for ordinary stuff like that, the less you think about it, the better it works. Food gets eaten, Grillby doesn't throw me out for doing the mop trick again. Hey, wanna see something cool?"
Nods, curious now. Doesn't know anything at all about magic. Headache comes back slowly, at the edges. Has to work a little to move head, move hands.
Picks up another cookie, holds it out so it's easy to see. Pops it in mouth. Cookie drops right through. Gets caught. Pops it in again. "Heh, see. Just think about it, and it stops working. Convenient, huh?"
Could try another word. Might be able to get a word out? Wriggles tongue into place. Says, "Y-yeah."
Leans across table, puts hand on shoulder, fingerbones squeeze tight. Feels warm, different sort of warm than in the head. "Good kid."
Still isn't used to that. Still isn't used to hearing good. Isn't good. But just wrong, not lying. That means you're the one who's lying. Sad to think of that. Doesn't want to lie. Doesn't want to disappoint. Going to anyway. Always does. Say something, maybe? Not sure. Bites lip. Doesn't want to argue. Reaches for cookie instead. Looks down at it. Puts it in milk and waits.
Sans dunks his demonstration cookie and watches the kid as he waits for the bubbles to stop. It's subtle, but the kid's getting more expression on their face all the time. Is that a good sign? Or a bad one? Dunno. Poor kid. The way they light up at just the hint of praise, only for that light to snuff out within seconds... he's got no idea what to do with that.
Cookies seem to help, at least. That much's universal.
They munch cookies more or less in silence, demolishing most of the tray and soaking up the milk. Sans considers refilling it and taking care of the last of the cookies but he's not all that hungry anymore, and the kid doesn't seem super interested in going for more. He's about to go suggest they go watch TV when the front door opens.
Papyrus runs inside, shutting the door tight behind him. The kid looks ready to slide down underneath their chair even before Papyrus makes it to the kitchen. "Sans! Sans! Oh my god! I've left you five messages! Why aren't you picking up!"
Sans raises his brow ridge. "Just hanging out with the kid here," he says, waving at the slinking kid. "Didn't want any interruptions or anything. What's up?"
Papyrus paces a tight circle around the kitchen, practically wringing his hands. "I was having my daily meeting with Undyne and she was asking about what happened with the human and why I hadn't found them yet! Sans, it's really important you pick up your phone when people call!"
The kid plops onto the floor, knees pulling up to their chest. They wrap their arms around their legs, and press their forehead to their knees.
Too slow. Damn it. Sans leans back, picks up another cookie. He rubs his thumb over the pattering on the outer layer of the sandwich. "Makes sense she'd be interested. What'd you tell her?" Oh, Papyrus, and his giant heart. Of course Undyne wouldn't let up on him, especially if she's investigating Snowdin now. Not after what happened. He should have known he'd be on a clock for this investigation.
Papyrus looks every single direction but directly at Sans or the human. "Um. Well, she might have. Insisted. On asking what I'd been doing. I didn't want to disappoint her! I tried to explain so she wouldn't be so, so murder-y! But that just made her want to murder more!"
Time to switch to damage control. Sans glances under the table, making sure the kid's just saying put there. "Okay," he says. "We can work something out, I guess. Just how far behind you is she?"
The front door crashes open.