It was such an irritating cycle.
One that he couldn't break free from. Something he had no power over.
Sans was helpless when confronted with RESETS. The first few had him terrified he was losing his mind, to so suddenly be sent back to a point he'd already lived through. But the more he saw of the human, the more he began to understand. Sometimes it wasn't a full RESET, only losing a few minutes at best. Other times hours. It wasn't until Undyne died that he finally understood what was happening. Each time the child should have been defeated and their soul harvested, everything reverted, back to a point before the confrontation even started.
Undyne shouldn't have been killable, not a warrior as experienced as her. But Sans had taken to watching how the human worked, enraptured with the grotesque horror of this little being memorizing his friends' attack patterns. Spotting weaknesses. Repeating the process over and over again until they finally achieved some sort of flawless victory. Every so often, the child would grin, sickly and demented. Other times, the dust that gathered upon their clothes brought forth a bored scoff at best, like a child who'd played with a toy far too many times to find joy in it anymore. It was terrifying to behold, to even begin trying to process.
But even the fear he once felt ebbed into an aching sort of apathy.
Even watching Papyrus die so many times lost some of its sting. After all, death had lost its sense of permanence after the tenth RESET. Sans had once felt the inklings of hope when the once murderous child managed to reach the end of their quest without harming a single monster. That too was cast aside, because still they would RESET. Always someone else to save, always another path they hadn't yet taken. By the time monster kind had finally reached the surface, Sans felt as though he'd lived one too many lifetimes over. Weary and hollow, unable to come to terms with the freedom everybody else so joyously celebrated. Instead, there was a snide voice that had far too many things to say about that child, Frisk. How he yearned to tell everybody of what really happened before, that the child was demonic, something to be put down before they had a chance to get bored and RESET.
Somewhere along the months that passed, Frisk had approached him. As always, his facade of nonchalance and puns was in place. No matter how tired and old it was, it was his only constant, even if he didn't feel the part he played was truly his anymore. And they told him of Chara, the fallen child who's spirit so often managed to take hold of them. They told him how hard they tried to fight to remain in control, and then after learning that, how difficult it was to save Flowey. Or, as everyone had come to find out, Asriel. It was understandable Sans thought it was all a load of bullshit, even if it did fit the events that played out remarkably well. Even as he came to accept it as the truth, the shortstack of a skeleton only had something else to be weary of now. Laying awake at night with his bony fingers gripping at the blankets underneath him, trying to estimate how much longer it would be before Chara managed to take back over.
The answer was a year.
A year, towards the end of which he was finally coming back out of his broken state. All the days and effort put forth into healing, into bonding again with the others. In allowing his closed off heart to feel emotions as fully and as deeply as they were intended.
From a family dinner to standing in the perpetual, familiar chill of Snowdin yet again.
Sans couldn't tell you what it felt like to break. Truthfully, there were no words to describe it. When the smiling faces of his loved ones were so suddenly replaced by the forever falling flakes of snow, something inside of him merely ceased to be. As if a void simply took over where there was once something important to him. He felt smaller than his body, as if suddenly there were pieces of him missing that he knew he would never get back. There was nothing left, not even anger. Nor hatred. Sans was only silent as his feet began moving of their own accord, body falling back into the pattern it once repeated so many times over.
"Human. Don't you know how to greet an old pal?"
[an] : a very quick, short little one shot i originally uploaded on my Quotev, Apathineuros . i figured it could use a spot here as well c: