She thought she hit the solid ground with a plump, yet she looked down and noticed the white sheet of flakes, the imprint apparent from the impact of her fall. She slowly moved up her head and saw why. Additional flakes did not fall, yet she knew from the trees and the abundance of snow that she was back where it had all started.

Snowdin Forest was still ever so narrow, allowing for only a small portion of breathing room. Clustered as it felt, however, Frisk both felt and recalled having felt welcome. As it hit her mind, she rose at once and panned her head around the gelid environment. It had been a year, but it still seemed like she had just come across this land, after having left Toriel and passing by that demented flower. She expected that Sans would arrive soon, recalling that his teleportation powers were far from perfect. Knowing to wait a few minutes, she began to walk the only path she could go, the trees enclosing her in a snowy bubble.

Darkness had always come early in the Underworld, the flowers never opting to bloom. She avoided the weeds, and the stems that had attempted to rise but fell into hopeless failure. Frisk looked up at the familiar, menacingly black sky and wondered what even produced her source for sight in the first place. For the first time, she saw the sheer contrast between the two worlds up and below. It frightened her to see how apparent everything suddenly was.

The skeleton's absence having snuck past her, Frisk listened to the sound of her trudging, her feet not nearly protected enough to withstand the dampness of the snow. Her steps ravaged the innocent, blank sheet on the ground. She tried to softly walk across the ever so wide area of snow, but all to no avail. Despite her caution, the ice screamed with every tap of her sole. It had not been this hard before. She recalled having made happy footprints and snow angels in the forest, the snow embracing her as if it understood she was lost. It was not the same, she believed. Something was oddly off-putting, as if it were an illusion. Had Sans done this to appease her? Was there no way he could bring her to the actual Snowdin Forest? Was this the real Forest?

"Sans?" she called out upon remembering he had brought her here. No answer, yet her ears rang upon another slight crack of the ice from afar. Standing completely still, Frisk raised an eyebrow. She tried not to tell herself something was there between the naked trees watching her every step with glaring intent.

"Sans? Where are you?" She added the additional question as if she knew the skeleton were there with her all along. Perhaps he really was there, waiting to play one of his usual tricks. She allowed a small smile to escape from her fright and slowly began to crack the snow forward again.

With every step, she heard an extra step. She walked, it walked. She started to jog, it started to jog. She stomped, forgetting the ice was such a relic, and heard the same from within the forest. Upon hearing the tremor, she paused, remembering that the "few minutes" had been up for a while. She looked up into the sky of the unknown under the guise of night, hoping that Sans would answer this time.

But before she could project her voice to echo through Snowdin Forest, she heard the footsteps becoming more rapid. She heard her heartbeat painfully escalate, yet it seemed like with every thump, the volume of the steps became louder. She looked to her left, in between two rows of trunks. Her eyes caught the apparent irregularity immediately. She thought she saw something in the darkness - something that seemed like two awkward dots, steady and beside each other.

She impulsively bolted in her direction. She knew something was there, her conscious no longer tempting her to give it the benefit of the doubt. She forgot about the ice entirely, as it almost seemed her intentions were to destroy this place.

The cracking stopped, yet hers did as well. It was replaced with a more hollow sound, as if she had landed inside. Immediately, she knew she had reached the bridge.

The bridge. She couldn't help but laugh through her worry from remembering that Papyrus had made the gates of the bridge too thick for a human to be blocked. Her smile truly broke out when her straight-ahead sight corroborated her story.

And just like that, she felt safe in the replication of her own memories again.

"Human."

A familiar, deep voice followed by a few more cracks in the snow. Frisk froze, her eyes opening wide. Her instincts told her it was her pursuer.

"Don't you know how to greet an old pal?" the voice mechanically asked.

The steps ceased, and the silence returned. Out of hope, she dared to break it, yet she didn't dare to turn around. The gate would always be too thick. Nothing to lose.

"S...Sans?" She heard her voice break, so she said it louder, and somehow, clearer. "Sans?"

"Turn around…" The voice waited for her. She thought she heard a restrained chuckle bursting out. She struggled at first, not entirely sure how to feel. As she obeyed, the voice continued.

"…and shake my… h-hey, what's up? why do ya look so…?" The voice, clearly from the skeleton now, stopped in his line. His smile, waiting to expand at the joke he was going to play on her, shifted to a frown after he saw there were tears in Frisk's eyes.

She saw him hesitantly pull back his arm and place it into his pocket like the opposite hand. As he approached Frisk slowly, he put it out again to place it on her head.

"why do ya look so down, kiddo?" he asked, clearly striving to keep a cheerful tone. He managed to creep back into his normal, lazy, carefree mood, yet the small drop of sweat on his skull indicated the remaining concern and confusion. "you don't look like you're in a very humerus mood," he tried as he showed the hand-sized whoppie cushion in his palm.

Immediately, Frisk lost the little control she had. She broke into sobs and inched toward Sans' chest, crying on his shoulder and hiding her face. She muffled herself, as if embarrassed. She felt Sans' hand (having detached the cushion) on the back of her head, offering the slightest bit of comfort, and it seemed like her sobs were briefly reduced to small gasps of air.

"gee, kid. you look like you've seen a ghost." He sighed. He followed his expression of concern with nothing but silence, seemingly unsure of what to say.

Frisk uneasily shook her head against Sans' chest and whispered nothing more than, "No."

"well, it's not like there 'snow problem," Sans said, weakly chuckling as he glanced at the footprint tracks they had both left in the ice. "what's on your mind, pal?"

"Thank you, Sans," she suddenly blurted out and sniffled.

"for what?"

"I don't know…" She had confused herself by her gratitude. It seemed so sudden and like a subconscious action. She wondered what there was to thank the skeleton about.

But the use of Sans' address, "pal" had lit a fire of remembrance in her mind. Perhaps it was partially from the nostalgia of everything - this was how she first met Sans, in this way and at this same place a year ago. The use of the word "old" before "pal" had differed from everything, however. He had always used "new," but the use of this adjective had so suddenly sponged away Frisk's concerns ever since leaving. It was a while until Frisk realized. When she finally did, she scrunched her face up and the tears flowed more as she tightened an embrace around Sans. His hand had not even adjusted.

"Thank you for...for giving me a chance."

She had to think about what she had really meant by "chance." She felt as if she were confessing to Sans completely subconsciously, like she were out of her own body. But it was not hard to remember that Sans was giving her a chance every day just by letting her live with him and Papyrus. Why he would allow a historically confirmed mass-murderer, it was all beyond her.

Thus, when Sans asked what chance Frisk was referring to, she had the answer.

"I hurt everyone, so much."

"huh? whaty're sayin', kiddo?"

"I don't know why I asked you to trust me not to reset. I should have just jumped off the cliff. That probably would have been the best. We wouldn't have this problem now. It's..." she sobbed a few before she could continue. "...all my fault."

And with that, she continued to cry, although her breathing and flow of tears were more constant. "I don't deserve this, Sans. Especially not from you. I should-"

"hey, hey, hey, Frisk," Sans suddenly interrupted her. "i never said I wanted to make you suffer. back then i was just doing what i had to do." He looked down at the top of her head with a frown that he had failed to rotate.

"That doesn't make it okay for me to just say sorry and then be welcomed into your lives. I don't understand."

"we all saw the good in you, Frisk, even at your worst times. i can speak for Pap. when you killed him back then he was so confident in you. even when he was dying, right?"

Frisk reluctantly nodded as she sobbed again, remembering exactly what Papyrus had said, I STILL BELIEVE IN YOU, HUMAN, before turning to dust. She had had nothing but a satisfied smile on her murderous face.

"and the other me spoke to you about always thinking there was a speck of good in every murderer he had come across, no matter the timeline."

Another nod. Sans finally shifted his hand, moving it to Frisk's back, the other arm still in his pocket.

"Then why did you say you didn't trust me?" Frisk asked through her crying, the sound of which had slowly lowered in severity, but was still indicative of her distress.

"it's a long story, but 'tibia honest..." he chuckled. He used his own pun to restore his normal, carefree mood. "...that was really short-lived. i kinda knew after the first month or two that you weren't lying."

"W-what?" she asked quietly. Sans barely heard her whisper something against his chest. Before speaking again she leaned back and looked up at the skeleton and sniffled. "Do you really mean that?"

"yup." The typical Sans answer meant so much more than usual.

Frisk immediately broke into an ecstatic smile. As she looked back up at Sans he wiped her tears away with his thumbs. But no matter; Frisk immediately generated more and buried her head into Sans' chest again. The sobbing returned, yet it was clearly for another reason. At that point, Sans reciprocated her embrace, frowning and gently wrapping his arms around her. Seemed as though that, even for him, it was hard not to be so concerned.

"easy, kid. just relax, ok?" But she couldn't upon immediate request.

His embrace seemed to intensify the crying. "Thank you, Sans. You're my best friend."

He stayed there, rubbing her back with his right hand, and Frisk knew her breakdown was all the cause of her hysteria.

"'snow problem, but we should get going. at this rate we'll miss pap's cooking. now, as undesirable as that sounds, we gotta have something, and it's not like it's that bad."

That pun and funny observation couldn't help but make Frisk chuckle, but perhaps it'd be best ascribed to Sans' reassurement. He never spoke like that, like someone who actually hoped, or even cared. At a time like such, it was impressive to be looking up.

As long as the embrace was, it seemed brief. The longevity was interrupted by Frisk's long-needed relaxation and reassurance that Sans was not an enemy, that the skeleton never had a bone to pick with her for that long. She considered him to very close friend, yet she found it ironic that he was the one whom befriending was the most difficult. Does trust, she asked herself, really mean so much?

Of course it does, she answered. It was what Sans' issue was with her before, the possibility of another reset. It was a trust that Frisk had forced Sans to lose over the timelines, and she knew it had been hindering their relationship.

Then she congratulated herself on completing her goal of regaining that trust. She wondered why Sans was so hasty to trust her soon after. Perhaps seeing the good in people really leaves a deep influence and impression, no matter what sinful act of betrayal followed.

She scoffed at her idealism. She knew there was probably a side she wasn't getting, hence the long story Sans was referring to. She acknowledged she could have been entirely wrong. Did he trust her to begin with?

As Sans slowly moved his hands back into his pocket, she stepped back, not showing her face before wiping the residual tears from her eyes with the linen cloth of her sleeve. The skeleton looked up and around, presumably admiring the snow. It was unusual of him. His smile revealed itself instantly as he looked back at Frisk.

"you must be chilled to the bone."

Realizing she was not even wearing a coat, she burst out laughing. Sans followed and ruffled her hair in the general way he did. As if nothing had ever happened, they walked through the gate and into Snowdin, the next gateway opening to a flood of nostalgia.

Make sure you check out "bird-teethh"'s tumblr page! Thank you so much for drawing the cover picture!