The sound of rushing water was filling Frisk with determination.

The river went off in a sharp turn into a different direction. Frisk would have followed the river further, but there was no path to follow it further on, and swimming in a river that ran through a cold area of the underground wasn't a very great idea.

Plus, she didn't know how to swim in the first place. She had never learned how to.

So she continued on forward.

Frisk noticed that the monster kid from earlier was present, standing next to a pool of flowing water. When the kid noticed that she was approaching, he clumsily ran up to her.

"Yo, Frisk!" he exclaimed. "Are you sneaking out to see her, too?"

"See who?" she asked.

"You don't know!?" the monster kid replied. "I'm talking about Undyne, of course!"

That name sounded familiar. Papyrus had mentioned it a couple of times.

"She's the coolest!" the kid excitedly continued with a bright gleam in his eyes. "I wanna be just like her when I grow up!"

He sheepishly turned back to her. "Hey, by the way, don't tell my parents I'm here. Ha ha."

"Anyways, I'll see ya around!"

And the kid ran off, although he looked like he had a poor sense of balance.

As Frisk took a few steps onward in the direction he was heading, she heard a familiar voice.

"hiya."

Frisk turned to the direction of the voice and noticed that Sans was located at a sentry station nearby. It looked like he was bored.

"What are you doing here?" the child asked. "I thought your station was back in the forest."

The skeleton snickered. "what? haven't you seen a guy with two jobs before?"

"fortunately, two jobs means twice as many legally-required breaks," he explained, leaning back in his chair. "actually, i feel like going for one right now."

Sans then got up from his seat.

"i'm going to grillby's. wanna come? I can understand if you're a bit busy, though."

Frisk didn't have anything in particular to do, so she might as well go.

"Alright," she replied. "Let's go."

"well, if you insist…" Sans spoke, "i'll pry myself away from my work…"

Sans started walking off in the direction away from Snowdin, to Frisk's surprise.

"over here," the skeleton beckoned. "i know a shortcut."

Once Frisk got close, the skeleton held out a hand to her. She took ahold of it.

"close your eyes and follow along," he instructed.

The child shut her eyes. Hopefully Sans wouldn't lead her off a cliff or something like that.

The skeleton began to walk, taking her hand along with him, so Frisk followed.

A few steps later, Frisk felt the temperature around her drop. She took another step and heard the crunching of snow.

"you can open your eyes, now."

Frisk noticed that she was back at Snowdin, standing in front of Grillby's.

But… that was impossible. How Sans had done it, she had no idea.

"fast shortcut, huh?"


As they entered Grillby's, Frisk took a deep breath. The air around her was warm, which made for a nice change.

The aroma reminded her that she hadn't had a warm meal since she had left the ruins. In fact… she hadn't had anything at all since the battle with Papyrus. Her stomach growled.

Meanwhile, Sans was greeting the various people sitting down at the tables and the booths. They greeted him like a frequent acquaintance, which was likely the case.

Frisk noticed the dogs at the table playing card games. She recognized them all from her adventures between the exit of the ruins and Snowdin Town.

Doggo, Dogamy, Dogaressa, and the small dog wearing the huge armor were all sitting at one table, while the dog with the extending neck was sitting by its lonesome playing a card game by itself.

The hooded dog couple noticed something peculiar as they sniffed the air.

"Something smells weird…" Dogamy started.

"Like a human!" Dogaressa concluded.

Frisk looked around, noting that her "puppy smell" had been lost. If worst came to worst, she could just run outside and roll around in the snow again. Or maybe she could just cover herself in something greasy.

The large armored dog looked up from its cards. Upon noticing that the child was present, it let out a few yips of excitement.

The dog playing a game by itself turned around due to the commotion. Once it noticed the presence of the human, it also got very excited. It eagerly wagged its tail and made a noise imitating a plane take-off, somehow.

"Oh!" Dogamy exclaimed. "You must have been the human who played with Greater Dog and Lesser Dog!"

"I don't think we've seen them this happy in such a long time!" noted Dogaressa.

Frisk waved hello to the dogs. Doggo looked up and saw the moving human, then returned to shaking his hand of cards so that he could see them.

Greater Dog, the dog in the huge set of armor, rose up from his seat, ready to give lots of love and affection. However, the other three dogs at the table were alarmed and told him to sit back down before he would accidentally knock the table over.

"Anyways, go on ahead." Dogamy said.

"We're technically on break, so we won't attack you now." Dogaressa explained.

That was a relief.

Sans, having watched the events that had occurred, turned to Frisk.

"well, it appears you got out of a ruff situation," Sans joked, not letting this opportunity to go to waste.

Many of Grillby's patrons laughed as they heard the pun, dogs included.

Sans walked up to the bar counter, which had a few tall seats propped close to it.

"Hey Sans," one of the monsters near the counter noted, "weren't you just here for breakfast a few minutes ago?"

"nah, i haven't had breakfast in at least half an hour," Sans replied. "you must be thinking of brunch."

The skeleton shrugged as the monsters chucked again.

Sans gestured to one of two seats. "here, get comfy."

"Just a moment," Frisk said.

She walked over to Lesser Dog and pet it on the head a few times. Not as much as last time, but enough to make its neck grow a little.

Seeing the dog pant so excitedly was amusing to everyone.


As she joined Sans by sitting in the other barstool, the sound of flatulence was emitted.

She hopped off and noticed that a whoopie cushion had been placed on the seat.

"whoops, watch where you sit down," Sans noted, with a pronounced grin on his face. "sometimes weirdos put those on the seats."

The prank object was picked up and thrown to the side before Frisk sat back down.

"anyway, let's order," the skeleton spoke. "whaddya want? fries or a burger?"

A warm meal sounded great. It just didn't feel healthy to have a diet consisting solely of popsicles and cinnamon buns. There was the spaghetti, but… well… no.

Frisk didn't have much experience with fast food, though. She knew that burgers were round sandwiches, and fries were something cut up and fried, but… not much else.

So she shrugged and asked Sans. "What do you think?"

"hmm… why don't we just get both?" Sans suggested.

"Alright." She recalled how Toriel had pretty much done the same thing when it came to the flavor of her pie.

Sans grabbed the bartender's attention, whose head appeared to be on fire. "grillby, we'll have a double order of burg with a side of fries."

As Grillby walked through the back door, Frisk realized that he was composed of flames in a suit. That was actually pretty cool, although she could imagine how that could be very inconvenient at times. No one would want to give you a handshake, for instance.

She turned her eyes away from the exit and back to Sans.

"so, what do you think of my brother?" the skeleton asked. "He's pretty cool, isn't he?"

"Yeah!" Frisk replied, recalling the tense and dramatic "date" that had happened very recently.

"well, you'd be cool too if you wore that outfit every day," Sans spoke. "he'd only take that thing off if he absolutely had to."

Papyrus had taken off the battle body to show off his special clothes, just for her. Understandable, considering that he hadn't gone on a date before, but it made Frisk feel a bit more valued anyways.

"oh well," Sans continued. "at least he washes it. and by that i mean he wears it in the shower."

They both laughed as Grillby brought plates of food to them. After dropping them off, the bartender returned to polishing the bar's glassware.

"here comes the grub," Sans noted.

The child tried one of the fries, then took a small bite of her burger. Both tasted pretty good, even if a bit greasy.

Sans held out a bottle of ketchup to her. "want some ketchup?"

Frisk recalled one time when one of the kids found a nearly-full bottle of ketchup and had brought it back to the orphanage. One of the kids had accidentally spilled some all over himself, so it looked like he was bleeding profusely.

Needless to say, this incident had ruined ketchup for her.

When she refused it, Sans appeared to be a little disappointed, like the disappointment someone gets if he or she had prepared for a prank that didn't work out.

But then he shrugged. "more for me."

Instead of eating his food with the ketchup, Sans lifted the condiment bottle to his mouth and drank the contents from it.

"Eww…" Frisk quietly said, as the last drops of ketchup in the bottle was consumed.

When the skeleton noticed her expression of disgust, he smiled at her with ketchup-stained teeth just to mess with her a little more.

"hopefully you still got your appetite," he teased. "go ahead and dig in if you still want to."

Thankfully, Frisk's appetite wasn't dampened too much, as her stomach was on empty and the food had been very enticing.

As she chowed down, she noticed that Sans was only taking a few bites of his food. When she asked, the skeleton stated that he wasn't terribly hungry. He would probably store it in a bag to have it later as take-out.

"by the way, i've been thinking of selling some snacks myself," he mentioned, absentmindedly munching on a fry. "how does fried snow sound?"

"Why not?" Frisk jokingly responded. She knew exactly why not, as fried snow would turn into fried water, which would just turn into plain old steam.

"well, thing is… " Sans continued. "i don't have any snow. that's the problem."

Of course, that wasn't too much of a setback in Snowdin.

"anyways," the skeleton spoke, changing the subject. "my brother's a real star. he's actually the person who pushed me to get this sentry job."

"maybe it's a little strange, but sometimes… it's nice to have someone call you out on being lazy."

"even though nothing could be further from the truth," he added rather sarcastically.

Sans thought for a moment, recalling an event involving his brother. "say, wanna hear a story about papyrus?"

Frisk nodded eagerly in reply.

"one day," the skeleton began, "he went to the house of the head of the royal guard… and begged her to let him be in it."

"of course, she shut the door on him because it was midnight," he continued, eliciting a chuckle from the child.

"but the next day, she woke up and saw him still waiting there. seeing his dedication, she decided to give him warrior training."

Papyrus didn't strike her as the person who would be taking warrior training. He seemed too friendly.

"it's, uh, still a work in progress."

Oh. That explains.

A question popped up in Frisk's head.

"What exactly is the royal guard?" she asked.

Sans pointed to the various dogs sitting around in the pub. Right now, the four dogs at the table were yelping over a rule violation in the card game that they were playing, while Lesser Dog had given up at poker and had switched to playing Go Fish with itself.

"those dogs are part of the snowdin canine unit of the royal guard. back in the day, they accompanied the royal family when they would go on outings… but in recent times, there isn't much of a royal family to defend."

"so now they just patrol around," he continued. "keeping the peace, searching for humans, that kind of stuff."

Frisk wasn't a fan of that "searching for humans" part. But someone was probably going to do it down here.

"their leader… undyne… she's rude, loud, beats up people that get in her way." Sans explained. "no wonder all the kids love her, right?"

Frisk had lived with a lot of younger, more rambunctious children. She understood exactly what he meant.

"it's best if you don't meet her. there's a reason why the place where she lives doesn't need royal guard members like snowdin. she's that good at her job."

From the way he said that, Frisk inferred that she would have to pass through that place in order to reach the barrier. This scared her.

Sans noticed how anxious she was. "well, try not to get noticed. that's my advice."

By now, Frisk was done with her food, even though a third of it remained. Not that she was full, as the food made by monsters were magically converted directly into energy. It was just that she had gotten sick from having so much grease in one sitting. She pushed it aside and placed her arms on the counter.

"oh yeah, I wanted to ask you few things," Sans mentioned. "i noticed that you were wearing something different during your 'date' with papyrus."

Frisk did recall that Sans was in his room during her date. She wondered what he had been doing in there. He was probably dozing off or something along those lines.

"where did the dress come from?" he asked. "did someone in snowdin give it to you, or… was it from somewhere else?"

Frisk thought over her response for a moment. Should she tell anyone about Toriel? Or would Toriel want her to leave everyone else outside the ruins in the dark? She wasn't really sure, so she decided on omitting the specific details.

"I got it from a friend back in the ruins," she replied. "Why do you ask?"

"oh, no reason in particular. i just found it very… intriguing."

Sans turned his head to face her. "anyways, here's another question for ya. have you ever heard of a talking flower?"

Frisk tensed up, Flowey's malicious cackle echoing in her head.

Sans noticed the grim expression on her face. He could tell that the child was familiar with it, but not in a good way.

"so you know all about it," he noted, "but that expression… it doesn't seem very pleasant."

"It tried to kill me… " she said, her voice shaking.

It was clear that Sans was not expecting that sort of response.

"huh. that's not something you hear everyday. care to elaborate?"

Frisk lowered her head, placing it within her arms. She really didn't want to talk about the experience, but she knew that she must.

"It was the first person I met in the underground…" she explained. "It seemed friendly… but it hurt me when it hit my soul with one of its bullets."

Sans seemed quite concerned by this information. "hmm…"

The pupils of his eye-sockets dimmed. "well, papyrus told me something interesting the other day. sometimes, when no one else is around… a flower appears and whispers things to him."

This information grabbed Frisk's attention. It made her terrified, yet curious to know more.

"things like flattery… advice… encouragement… predictions. weird, huh?"

He shrugged. "until now, i thought that someone must be using an echo flower to play a trick on him."

Frisk recalled hearing about the echo flower from her studies with Toriel, as one of her books had a picture of it. However, Toriel didn't discuss it with her, since there were no echo flowers in the ruins.

Sans noticed her curiosity. "oh right, the echo flower. they're all over the marsh. say something to them, and they'll repeat it over and over…"

"that's what i thought what he meant by a talking flower. but now… i'm not so sure about that theory."

The skeleton's eye-sockets closed as he went deep in thought. "what could a flower like that possibly want with my brother?"

They were both silent for a few moments as the two of them pondered this question.

Meanwhile, Greater Dog was proudly barking in victory over winning the card game. The other three dogs let out a collective grumble.

Sans reopened his sockets. "well, who knows?"

"keep an eye out, ok?" he asked. "i'll be doing the same. although, y'know, I'll be keeping an eye-socket out instead."

"Definitely," Frisk replied.

"thanks."

Sans hopped off his seat, his silly demeanor returning. "welp, that was a long break. i can't believe i let ya pull me away from work for that long."

The skeleton asked Grillby for two paper bags, who had managed to hand them off somehow without setting them on fire. He dumped the contents of his plate into one of the bags, and gave the other to Frisk to do the same with her leftovers.

"oh, by the way…" Sans added. "i'm flat broke. can you foot the bill? it's just ten-thousand G."

"I would," Frisk said, taking that as a joke. "I'm just a little short on money, though."

The response managed to tickle Sans's funny bone, eliciting a laugh from him. "just kidding with ya, kid."

He made a gesture to the bartender. "grillby, put it on my tab."

Sans grabbed his take-out bag and began to walk towards the door, but then he turned back around.

"by the way… you don't want to walk the whole way back, right? come with me, then."

The child hastily put the leftovers into her backpack and walked over to join him.


Soon, they had ended up back at the spot where they had left earlier. Frisk still wasn't sure how he was able to do that.

Sans took his seat back at his station.

"let's hang out again some time," he suggested. "i'll be seeing ya then."

Frisk waved goodbye to the skeleton as she ventured deeper into the caverns.


In the caverns of Waterfall, Flowey waited impatiently. The child should be around here by this time…

Well, it seemed that she went on a bit of a detour. But it didn't matter. Frisk would have to pass through here eventually if she wanted to reach the barrier.

The flower took a bit of time to think about the situation.

After Frisk had been able to use nonviolent methods to get past Toriel, he expected her to spare Papyrus through similar means as well. After all, neither of them had attacked her with the intent to kill.

But the child would have to go through Waterfall. She would have to meet the heroine of the monsters. Since the monsters were so close to being freed from the underground… the heroine would show the human no mercy.

And the question that Flowey had posed at the end of the ruins would become relevant.

What will Frisk do when she meets a relentless killer?

Would she give up on living all together? Would she try to find a method to avoid confrontation? Or would she strike back, resorting to murder to remove the threat in her way?

Well, it would be interesting to see.


AN:

Premonition: a strong feeling that something is about to happen, especially something unpleasant.

I think that's a fitting title for this chapter.

This chapter's pretty short, since it's only of a scene that takes about five minutes to complete in-game. Not too much to say about it.

Depending on how much time I have, the next chapter may come a little late. We'll see.

Next chapter, we actually start Waterfallllllllllllll.