Yes, I'm still on hiatus with my other works. I'm sorry. But I swear on the River Styx that this has no impact on how long it takes me to get back to my other stories.

This is a one-shot, despite the dramatic dun-dun-dun ending, though it may be followed by another short or two, if the fancy strikes me. This is also going to serve as a receptacle for any other Undertale one-shots or drabbles that may appear (there's something about how Undyne lost her eye bouncing around in my brain, but it's nowhere near solid yet). Feel free to send in suggestions or requests, but I make no guarantees I'll actually do any of them XD

This was actually written by hand while I was at school *shaking out hand cramp* Undertale has eaten my life seriously this is ridiculous

SPOILER ALERT: Spoilers in this story for the Genocide Route and some spoilers for the True Pacifist route.

Word count: 1,345

I didn't realize until it was too late. And by then, there was nothing to be done.

Every word I had told them was true, by the way. Very few of their actions had been mine, despite what they'll tell you. They'll say that I possessed them, that I was the one in control. That's not true. I didn't have the power to do that, especially if I'd had to fight their determination. Theirs was just as strong as mine. But, fortunately, I didn't have to take control. After all, it had been their actions that woke me, and it was their actions that kept me awake and fed me strength. I just came along for the ride.

And after all that, they wanted to take it back. They could have had any other world, any other universe, but they stuck around the empty void of code that was left over from this one, pining after it. Why? Some misplaced wish for redemption? A strange kind of nostalgia? A bizarre urge to create more timelines? Was it some sort of compulsion, resetting the world over, and over, and over?

Or... was it just some sick desire to do it all again? Destroy the world again?

At least that, I could perhaps understand.

But the world was gone, and I followed them back to the void left by their actions again eventually. I had the power to reset the world, of course, even in this state of raw code. I knew how to do it, while they did not. But there was something I needed to do that. Something I had lost when Asriel had let the humans destroy us. I was not sure how my mind had remained intact without it, frankly - perhaps it was a result of being part of a fused being with Asriel. But I wanted it back, and they had one that could replace mine.

A SOUL.

We struck a bargain. A world for a soul. And they foolishly went on as if nothing had happened. But now I was a permanent passenger, waiting for such time as it would be convenient for me to seize our body.

But something went amiss. And I realized that I had failed to understand a crucial detail. I had assumed that my original soul, the one that rightfully belonged to me, had been destroyed upon Asriel's death. I had not considered the possibility that it was still intact.

Until one night, when we were laying awake at night, and I abruptly realized that I could hear a pulsing hum in the room. And it felt familiar - very familiar.

They had not noticed. It was then that I decided to remind them of my presence. I swung our legs out of bed and padded over to the nightstand. Their start of panic was not unfamiliar; they recognized the feeling of no longer being under their own control. I ignored them, for the moment, and after a few seconds had hunted down the locket.

Our throat closed up, body responding to my emotions instead of theirs for the moment. Best Friends Forever. A naive promise made by two naive kids. But that wasn't what had caused my breath to catch. No, that was due to the pulse I felt emanating from the locket. It was beating. Like a heart.

A heart. A red heart. The shape and color of the locket.

Only now did it occur to me that they were identical to the shape and color of the soul currently in my thrall - and, more importantly, the soul I had originally possessed.

Was it possible that, instead of being destroyed with Asriel's soul, my soul - my precious, stubborn, determined soul - had persisted not only after my first death, but after my second as well? That it had fled to the place and the thing most dear to it? That it had taken refuge in a new receptacle? A receptacle such as this very locket?

As if sensing my thoughts, the pulsing from the locket seemed to grow stronger. I ran probabilities, theories, pulling all the information I had available to me on souls up to the front of my mind. I knew living beings could absorb human souls (or the souls of boss monsters, if they were fast enough), but was it possible for a human soul, persisting after death, to find itself a new home that was not a living creature? I suddenly found myself thinking of the True Lab, of Alphys' ill-fated experiments. 'If something without a soul were to be given the will to live...' Flowey, who was really Asriel, poor Asriel -

'Poor Asriel'? Whose thoughts are these?

It was a sarcastic thought, a rhetorical question really, but I actually received an answer, which took me a little by surprise. Mine. Their voice.

Excuse me?

I want to help you.

Under any other circumstances, I would have laughed. However, our minds were in direct contact, and the shock of their sincerity made me sit down hard on the edge of the bed. I closed our eyes and tightened my control around their core, dragging us both into the depths of our shared soul.

I landed on my feet, then watched them crash down in front of me, causing their scarlet form to glitch and reconfigure for a moment. They stared up at me, then at our monochromatic surroundings. The soulscape was all in shades of red - scarlet and ruby, garnet and maroon, salmon and crimson - reflecting the color of the soul we shared. "Where are we?"

"Still sitting on the edge of our bed, out there," I said dismissively, gesturing vaguely upward. "This is just a place we can talk face to face... more or less. But that doesn't matter. What do you mean, you want to help me?"

They seemed to hesitate for a moment before replying. "Well... if that locket contains your soul, you probably want it back, right?" I narrowed my eyes. "I know I would... if it were me."

"What's your point?" I snapped.

"I know things."

"Bravo. Things like what?" They raised their eyebrows at me. Inviting me to come to my own conclusion. It seemed to be a popular game for them. But I was no more fond of talking than they were. "Oh, don't be coy. Let's not forget the last time we talked."

They shivered. Actually, the entire soulscape shuddered, vibrating for a moment before returning to normal. They paused, made nervous by the tremor, then forged on. "I know things about souls. Monster and human."

"So the kid has two brain cells to rub together. Give 'em a hand."

They didn't seem perturbed by this, which was mildly irritating. "I've seen your thoughts," they continued. "You're... fractured, somehow. If I had to guess, it's because you've been hanging around Purgatory - or wherever you were - too long, or maybe it's because you've been without a soul for so long. I don't know. But a lot of your memories are cloudy, including what you know - or used to know, anyway - about souls."

"And you think you can, what, fill in the gaps?" I stopped for a second, realizing they'd tricked me into admitting they were right about my failing memory, but ruled it irrelevant and moved on. "What's in it for you?"

They paused, debating on how to phrase their words. "If you have your soul back," they finally said, "you won't need mine anymore."

I threw back my head and laughed. Peals of amusement bounced off the edges of the soulscape, coming back sharp. "So let me get this straight. If you can help me get whatever's left of my soul out of that locket and back into my chest, you get yours back?" They nodded. I deliberated for a moment, then added, "And if it doesn't work, you still belong to me." They nodded again. "Seems like a win-win to me." I stuck out a hand.

"We have a deal, Frisk."

Reviews, please! Thank you for reading, and I'll see y'all next time. (Whenever "next time" happens to be, that is.)