Asriel slowly opened his three eyes and let them drift around him.

Recollection came slowly- where was he? Right. He was currently lying at the bottom of one of the Great Lakes- he'd never bothered to learn their names, but he knew it was the farthest east.

Why was he here? That came more quickly- he had fallen out of the sky in a fit of apathy as he flew east, desperately trying to escape the devastation he'd wreaked. Had it really only been a few days?

He had hoped, as he flew, tears streaking down his face, that his wrath had not destroyed as much as he thought, but his hopes were sorely dashed as he went: although he did start to see knobs that might once have been mountains and shattered, ashy wreckage that might once have been buildings, there was nothing that had escaped.

Asriel had thought, briefly, that he saw green on the horizon before he fell into the lake, but he didn't care to swim to the surface and check even though it would be barely an effort for him. Why bother? Even if something had survived, he didn't deserve to live in it.

Caleb's soul pulsed, and suddenly Asriel felt himself move to the surface against his own will. No matter, he thought. He can't do anything.

But Caleb could, apparently, and as the colossal body surfaced, the human stretched Asriel's massive wings and shook the water from them.

What are you doing? snapped Asriel.

"It's Frisk." The effect of Caleb speaking with Asriel's voice was more than a little unnerving. "She's... she can't tolerate living as a mere soul."

Death is preferable to this, agreed Frisk, voice tired and weary as she "spoke" for the first time since her death.

Asriel understood immediately, and let out an enraged "NO!" as he wrenched control away from Caleb. "You can't!"

I'm sorry, Asriel. I truly am.

Frisk's soul thrust itself away and out of Asriel's body. It shivered in the air for a moment before shattering.

Asriel's body melted away as he felt himself reverting to his old form, but he could care less about the lost power.

All that mattered was that Frisk was dead forever now. And no amount of sorrow or repentance for his actions could bring her back.


"Mr. President?"

President Orrin Hatch- the title was still strange to him, it had been mere days since President O'Brien's suicide, after all- looked up in vague confusion from his desk. "Yes?" he asked in a voice weary from the responsibilities slammed onto him mere hours after most of his country had been annihilated, including his home state. "What is it?"

Reports were scattered over his desk. One detailed reports from satellites, stating that the gray wastes stretched from the Yukon all the way to Mexico City. Another catalogued the loss of life- more than a half of the population of North America was dead, and the waves rolling across the Pacific that had swamped many islands and all but annihilated Hawaii were even now still wreaking havoc in Japan and China, and less so in the Koreas as Japan had acted as a sort of shield.

He was too old for this.

The messenger fidgeted nervously. "We... We have received reports of a gigantic creature flying over the wastelands. Judging by what few records from the Human-Monster War we still have, it's likely a monster that has absorbed at least one human soul."

Any sympathy President Hatch may have had for the monsters and the extermination they suffered under President O'Brien vanished in a heartbeat. Clenching his fists as he struggled to check his fury, he managed in a level, albeit shaky, voice, "Then that's what caused the blast that destroyed so much of the continent?"

"Almost... almost certainly, sir."

President Hatch slammed a fist onto his desk. "That thing murdered over two hundred million of my fellow Americans. I want it killed immediately!"

"General McConville is already on it, sir."

"That's not enough!" Hatch snarled. "It unleashed genocide on this continent and almost wiped out the United States of America! I want every military unit that isn't needed to keep order in the surviving parts of the country out trying to kill that monster before it unleashes another wave of destruction like that and finishes us off!"

"As you wish, sir." The messenger turned to leave, but as he reached the doorway, Hatch called out, "And another thing? I want Project U.N.E.X. up and running, and I don't care what anyone else has to say about it."

The messenger didn't recognize the name, but the thought didn't cross his mind. He merely nodded and made his exit.


There was a voice speaking to him in the darkness.

.Don't be alarmed by your new form.

.It will be permanent, but that is beside the point.

.You can survive.

.Just...

.Don't die.

.It can't hurt to try.

.I promise.

Consciousness was the first thing to return, memories rushing over him. John A. Pence, that is me, that is my name.

But I'm supposed to be dead... beyond death...

Aren't I?

His senses returned next, the scent of char and ruin drifting into his nostrils. Yet... something felt off about them.

He could hear howling wind, but it was strangely loud, almost like he stood inside a hurricane.

John A. Pence opened his eyes, and there was nothing left.

With a ragged cough, he struggled to his feet. He could feel dust sifting underfoot, and wondered vaguely where his shoes had gone, but he didn't bother checking. He was lucky enough to be alive again, for whatever reason, and if that meant he had no shoes he wasn't going to question it.

Pence turned in a slow semicircle, surveying the area around him.

The gray wasteland surrounded him. Hilly formations, in a similar monochromatic hue, jutted from the blasted land occasionally. Melted pieces of what might have been metal or stone surrounded him.

The most obvious thing, though, was a mountain, or the remains of one, anyway, in the distance. It looked as if it had been a volcano that exploded, as it had mostly crumbled, forming a raised crater.

Maybe a volcano erupted? But that didn't make sense. Pence didn't study volcanoes or anything, but surely there should have been lava and dust blocking out the sky if that was the case.

Whatever. Mulling over whatever had happened weren't going to help his current situation, and besides it was only making his head hurt. Pence forged onward from the hole he had crawled out of, hoping that this world would start making sense soon.

Something gave beneath his bare foot, and with an angry snarl he tripped and slammed into the dusty ground. It wasn't as forgiving as it looked, and pain enthusiastically sprang up all over his body.

Pence reached out his hands to push himself up...

And then he froze.

These were not his hands.

They were covered completely in thin black fur, save for his palms and the pads on his fingers, and small stubby claws had replaced his fingernails.

Horror filled Pence as he reached for his face and found a protruding, canine snout.

"No... NO!" he screamed. "God, no! This can't be happening!"

But the truth was that he had become a member of the species he professed to despise and as a puppet of the Anomaly had almost destroyed, and no amount of terrified screaming would change that.


And in the blasted, demolished ruins of the town that once was known as Alta Nevada, near the remnants of Mount Ebbot, under the twisted, mangled remains of what might have once been a small rock or stone, dust stirred.

Fueled by the pure desperation and rage of the blast, it began cobbling itself back together. First it was just the barest outlines, and then hands, feet, clothes, all began restructuring themselves.

With a small, purple flash, the dust finished coalescing, and a humanoid figure sat, dazed, upon the ruins of an era.

And then, in a small, almost scared voice, Sans said, "i thought i was dead."