Hello, readers and gentlereaders! I'm sorry for the long delay; I'm attending two schools right now so free time isn't exactly what I have a lot of. But hey, I'm glad I managed to finish this chapter before the 28 days mark! Still, by the looks of it, I don't think this story will be finished this year.
Also, who in here is a fan of Slenderman? MWHAHAHAHA.


Chapter IV: A Lot To Explain
(Lynx's perspective)

With the end of school, Lynx quickly found herself in a state of constant boredom. Sure, she was looking forward to starting her undergrad studies, but that was too far ahead. For the time being, she was stuck in the town, with most of her friends gone on vacation, mum always at work and dad too busy and far away to visit or at least let his daughter come over to his place.

The secret trips she was taking with Sans were one of the very few things that kept her above water those days.

The skeleton was kind enough to keep showing her every tiny inch of the underground, and every area was special and fascinating in its own way. Lynx had seen the entire city of New Home by that point, and the two of them also visited a few interesting places in the Hotlands as well as the Waterfall. They weren't even going to the mountain for that long, but with Sans's powers, they could cover an half-hour trip within a blink of an eye.

But Lynx's new friend had also shown her things that few or no monsters at all have seen before them. For example, they visited a museum which was completely free of any visitors and exhibitions alike which gave the huge building a strange, surreal feeling of emptiness. The duo ended up playing a game where they approached blank spots on the walls and took turns in describing made up paintings, each crazier than the previous one.

Another time, Sans took her to smaller caverns which were hidden within the mountain, inaccessible from the main cave. The skeleton told her that he discovered these by accident: one day, he saw a mouse snooping around and running in and out of a tiny hole in the wall. He soon learnt that there might have been an entire new tunnel complex that the mice used to move all around the underground. Sans found several rooms that were big enough for him to be in, but that was pretty much it – there was nothing but stone walls and a few tunnels that were too small for anything and anyone but the rodents. Still, the possibility of having perhaps a whole new world somewhere inside the mountain was really exciting, for both of them.

Unfortunately, Sans didn't have enough free time to take her to the underground every single day. And Lynx wasn't going to betray his trust by taking the trip on her own.

Emphasis on wasn't.

The past few days weren't exactly easy for her. Sans told her before he had some business outside of town and therefore won't be able to acompany her to the mountain until next Tuesday – which was still 4 torturing days in the future. It wouldn't have been such a big deal on its own, but for the last week or so, life was showing a certain hostility towards her. All sorts of broken furniture, plates and glasses, friends being depressed or arguing with her over small things, mum leaving her home alone all the time... Eventually, Lynx realised she was going nuts and decided she needed to escape.

To be fair, she only wanted to spend some time alone in the woods at first. At least the weather is nice, she thought while walking forward, not even looking where she went. The day was sunny and hot, but at least there was some gentle wind to cool everything down a little bit. And no storms were supposed to happen anytime soon, which was always good news.

With her mind overwhelmed with the depressing memories from the last couple of days, she realised her feet were taking her to the top of the mountain. And why the heck not, she said to herself. It's a beautiful view from the terrace. Now that Sans is always taking me through a shortcut, I never get to go up there anyway.

Not too long after that, she sat in the shadow of a pine tree, her back leaning on the trunk, and looked into the distance. Green forests all around, some large bird circling the terrain looking for prey, and the town wasn't bigger than her hand. All of Lynx's troubles felt just as small, and she felt as if she could just grab them and throw them over the cliff. Sadly, that would have been irresponsible – she knew she would have to come back to them once she's back.

A strange feeling irritated her. She looked over her shoulder. The cave entrance was right there. Lynx almost felt like it talk to her.

'What?'

What?

'What are you doing?'

I'm not doing anything, I'm just being here.

'Well, whatever you're doing, stop it. I'm not going to go inside.'

Good, 'cause I don't want you to come inside either.

Then, a few moments of awkward silence.

"Oh screw it," she said eventually, got up on her feet and walked right through the entrance.

I knew you'd come around, a voice in her head told her.

'Shut up.'

Lynx walked through the first corridor to the throne room and beyond while trying to stop feeling guilty and anxious. Soon enough, these feelings were silenced by the pure joy of seeing the place she learned to love during the past few weeks. It became clear to her that she needed this.

Over time, the underground became a second home to her, a safe place which she kind of selfishly considered her own. In here, everything was suddenly fine. There were no people to let her down, noone to tell her who she had to be or how to have fun. Lynx could dare to just be herself.

Or was it Sans's presence that gave her that feeling? It was hard to tell. Now that she thought about it, she realised she sort of missed the skeleton here. He was an indespensable part of this world, at least she felt that way. Walking through the caves on her own was like she was missing a vital part of her. Incomplete.

Nevertheless, the stillness and kindness of New Home filled her with peace which she wasn't able to regain since last time she'd been here. Lynx caught herself wishing she had brought her sketch book and drawn everything she could; she rebuked herself, for it was the exact thing she was forbidden to do. It was bad enough that she was even coming to the underground, but had she brought out drawings for anyone to see, that would be inexcusable.

It was sad that noone was able to see this all again. But aside from that restriction being more or less reasonable, Lynx also felt a little relieved that nobody was going to invade her safe place.

She looked up to see she was standing in front of a street she didn't see before. She chose to walk down there out of curiosity. Soon enough she found out the street was rather short, ending just after the first left turn with a cool looking building...

...which had the word CORE written just above the front door.

Lynx hadn't tried to ask Sans about The Core again since the first time he accidentally mentioned it. She figured he had some issues with that place and didn't want to return for his own sake. However, she was still curious to see how the monsters built it. And since the skeleton wasn't here, and since she was already in the undeground anyway...

She opened the door and entered a lobby. A quick look at the writings on the wall next to a staircase told her that this was probably something like an administration building or operating centre. There was, however, an arrow with the word CORE above it that led downstairs. That must have had been the passage to the complex itself.

Lynx felt her heartbeat all over her body as she walked down the stairs. It was a rather long set of stairs; she thought she had been descending for at least five minutes by the time she reached the bottom. Only two sets of doors were at the bottom floor, and one of them (as she found out herself upon opening it) was merely a broom closet. She took a deep breath and pulled the handle of the second door.

In front of her laid a black corridor. Since the complex was apparently carved into the mountain itself, there were no light crystals anywhere; only the emergency lights designed to shine without electricity gave out a dark red shadow which made everything barely visible. She heard a distant sound of air roaming through the empty corridors.

Overall, the scenery was considerably spooky. Lynx remembered all the horror games she knew, and shivered at the thought of a tall faceless man creeping behind her back. Before her brain could tell her this was a bad idea, she convinced herself that none of it was real and there was nothing awaiting her there. She closed the door behind her and took the first few steps forward.

After a few minutes of walking, she became somewhat comfortable with the place, and her steps gained more speed and confidence. Lynx opened up some of the doors she met along the way and saw some strange looking pieces of technology, but since all power was hopelessly off, she couldn't have known what the devices were supposed to do.

Reaching the first split, she decided to take the left path. The key to finding a way out of a labyrinth was to always follow the same pattern; if she always went left on every split, she will know to always go right when she'll want to return.

Eventually, she saw a warm light somewhere ahead of her. Reaching that point, Lynx found herself on a bridge built at the top of a tall cave. There were a few other bridges underneath, and all the way at the bottom laid a pool of lava which provided enough light to make the entire cave visible clearly.

It was worth going down here just for this view.

She decided she wanted to find her way onto one of the bottom bridges. She remembered she saw a staircase just before she walked to where she was, and turned back to walk there. Suddenly, she saw a white paper note on the wall; she hadn't noticed it before.

Lynx went to read it. She considered a lot of possibilities for what would be written there; but she did not expect to see what she saw. Her heart almost skipped a beat, she backed away from the paper and frantically looked around to see nobody. But the note still indisputably said:

I KNOW YOU'RE HERE.

Ok, don't be paranoid, she told herself. For all you know, this could be an inside joke that someone left behind. Buuuut, you know, maybe it would be a good time to leave...

Lynx, clinging on to her bravery and sense of realism, calmed down and chose to walk downstairs nevertheless. She was about to leave this place right after that, but since she was already on her way to the bottom of that cave before, she wanted to at least finish what she started.

She didn't come far before she found yet another note with the same message. That was weird, but she was glad the papers at least weren't threatening her. Descending further, she realised the same messages are being placed on the walls on every floor. Whoever left them there probably wanted to make sure the recipient would get to them wherever they went.

However, the notes weren't making much sense on their own. Were they meant just to make fun of someone? Was the person behind them actually looking for someone? If so, why didn't they ask the other monster to react to the messages? Lynx was annoyed that she had no way of finding out. She considered writing a response on one of the papers but quickly remembered she wasn't supposed to be there on the first place and therefore shouldn't leave anything behind that might lead to her.

All of a sudden, she heard a spontaneous silence. Only now it occurred to her that she'd been hearing deep mechanical sounds for the last couple of minutes, and now it was gone. She stopped walking and breathing at the same time and listened carefully. Nothing. She let out a deep breath.

In the distance, a single cough echoed through the corridors.

She almost screamed. She wanted to turn around and get the hell out of this place, but her feet weren't listening to her just yet. She listened again and prayed that the noise was just her imagination.

Nothing else could be heard in the next few moments, so Lynx began to walk back upstairs, making as little noise as she could. The last thing she wanted was to alert whoever could be wandering through The Core.

She finally made it back to the top level where she found the first note. Soon, she'll be out and pretend this all never happened.

Footsteps right around the corner.

Lynx never ran faster in her life.

She didn't care about making noise anymore, she just wanted to get as far as she could.

Before she even realised how she got there, she was crouching behind a rather big machine in one of the rooms. The Core was huge, so even though she was basically cornered, she was hoping she would be lucky and the mysterious person would just walk around.

She wasn't lucky.

The slow footsteps stopped right at the door. She tried not to breathe, even though she was shivering all over her body.

The person spoke up.

"i know you're here."

That voice...

"come on, get out. i don't have all day."

Lynx peeked out. Of course it was him, standing there with his arms crossed and looking anything but happy.

"oh, it's you," Sans said and took a few steps forward.

Just like that, she felt she won't be able to hold it any longer. All the fear, guilt and overall chaos were looking for a way out. Her throat clutched and first tears found their way into her eyes. She wasn't able to think straight right now.

"why the hell," he continued in a semi-dangerous voice, "are you here, of all places? not only you went to the underground on your own, but you stick your nose into the one place i told you not to go."

Lynx sobbed. Salty waterfalls began to slide across her face.

"oh, grow up. don't try this on me."

She kneeled, buried her face in her hands and cried incontrollably.

As softly as he could, Sans placed his hand on her shoulder.

"hey, it's okay. i'm not gonna hurt you."

Lynx could only hiccup in response. The skeleton softly caressed her arm; with a sense of empathy she wouldn't have expected from him, he postponed his upcoming anger.

"don't think i'm forgiving you just because of this," he said. "after you're done, you still have a lot to explain."