Undersona Chapter 8

The masked shadow

Frisk and her friends got ready as best as they could for the long road ahead. Frisk was able to switch out her toy sword for a real dagger and stocked up on medical supplies just in case. After gathering her friends at Bonies they entered the TV world.

After being greeted by Mettaton they headed straight for the graveyard. Retracing their steps Frisk and the gang found their way back to where they fought Undyne before. This time when they came to the clearing the three were met by an unpleasant surprise.

Standing in the middle of the clearing stood Sans. He wore a blue hoodie, black basketball pants, and slippers. The hood was up and his face the partially covered in shadow. A large creepy smile being the only thing they could see.

"Sans!"

Papyrus called out to his brother but he didn't answer. Instead Sans threw off his hood and shouted.

"WELCOME EVERYONE TO THE NEXT EDITION OF COMEDY FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE WHERE ALL YOUR BROKEN DREAMS COME TRUE!"

He spun around and flashed a pose at the camera.

"We've got some uninvited guests on the program tonight so let's snow them a good time."

Papyrus seemed distressed by his brother's strange actions.

"SANS please stop messing around it's dangerous here."

One of Sans's eyes began to glow blue and he smiled saying.

"That's the point. You can't have comedy without tragedy."

Sans flipped up his hood and began to walk away. Before the party could give chase a large skeleton jumped out of the foliage and attacked the party.

It was enormous and carried a scythe twice as large as itself. It blocked the way forcing them to fight it. Frisk started off summoning her persona sending a fire blast soaring towards the skeleton but it didn't seemed phased by the fire.

It raised it's syth ready to strike but Undyne stopped it freezing the scythe with a powerful blast of ice. The skeleton fell into a heap and that's when Frisk noticed it. Thin strings slowly floated down just barely visible.

It was a giant puppet shadow. They took their advantage and went all out on the downed skeleton puppet. It sprung back to life shaking the three persona users off it's back. Papyrus finished it using his Persona to cleave it destroying the shadow.

With the battle over Papyrus stared up the stone steps to the floors ahead.

"Why do you think Sans would do this?"

Papryus asked to no one in particular. Frisk couldn't believe that was the real Sans but if it wasn't then mabie.

"It had to be his shadow."

Frisk voiced her idea.

"His shadow might be trying to tell us something."

"OR KEEPING SANS FROM US!"

Undyne concluded. What could Sans be hiding they already know he doesn't want to be the owner of Bonies but what was with the graves and why was that shadow a puppet. Maybe if they found out the secret they could find a way to help Sans accept it.

Continuing forward they didn't find the shadow Sans again but they continually ran into leagues of shadows. After what had seemed like an endless dungeon they reached a spot where the stairs lead up to a large clearing like the one on the second floor.

This time In the center of the clearing stood two Sans one Frisk recognized as the real Sans. He was on his knees in the snow as the shadow loomed over him.

"Such a sad life you've lived. When you were born you were doomed to be shackled to that hell of a restaurant. Your brother was able to abandon you for a life as a scientist and it's not like Papyrus could possibly take over the family business."

Sans didn't seem to want to respond he just stared blankly at the snow.

"No that's not true at all. Gaster never left for anything. He died when he graduated high school he was given an offer to a college far away. The plane would never arrive to it's destination. A crash leaving none alive."

Sans snapped into reality. Frisk could see fury burning in his eyes.

"YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THAT! GASTER IS ALIVE AND…"

Sans choked on his own words tears began streaming down his cheek. Frisk looked over to Papyrus but the teen gave no reaction he just stared. The shadow smiled and said.

"I know everything to do with that for u"

With these words Sans shouted back.

"NO! I AM MY ONLY SELF AND YOU ARE NOT ME!"

The other Sans glared at him looking a little mad with his original self.

"So you choose to keep the mask on, then you shall die with that mask on."

With that the shadow erupted knocking Sans to the ground. Papyrus ran over to Sans trying to help him was knocked back by the shadow getting hit by the blunt side of a scythe. Appearing out of the dark energy forming around it the shadow became a giant shadow."

It remained the same size as Sans but wore a black cloak and wielded a scythe with a blade almost as large as it's body. Out of it's back spread two giant black wings. The most unsettling thing about it was the smiley yellow mask it wore over it's face.

"Looks like you've all won. You've found the truth. I am a shadow the true self an H."

With that he raised his scythe and a black spell circle appeared in front of Papyrus. It began to glow purple when Undyne knocked Papyrus to the ground and it exploded. They hadn't seen a spell like that before but Frisk thought it looked familiar.

The shadow gave Frisk no more time to think about this flying up and sending a flurry of attacks at Frisk. Frisk was able to dodge them but just barly. The shadow pulled back from Frisk when Undyne Jumped at it bashing it with her Persona.

Frisk suddenly felt a gripping sense of fear come over her. Papyrus noticed this and rushed over to help her. Papyrus healed her and Frisk noticed a small black feather imbedded into her arm.

The feathers on the shadows wings must be tipped with poison. Taking out the feather Frisk noted that any close combat with the shadow could lead to someone being infected by the fear poison.

Frisk made a plan.

"Undyne the feathers are poisonous. We need to focus on attacking it with magic."

Undyne slashed the Shadow and pulled back just barely dodging a flutter of feathers. Frisk used a fire blast and the shadow fell to ground. Frisk decided too fire again to keep away from the feathers.

They were able to get some more attacks in before the Sans got back up and flew up high. It began to shout something.

"You're all fools for facing me! I decide who lives and who dies. I AM THE GRIM REAPER!"

Holding out his hand blue puppet strings appeared connecting his hand to an unseen object. Tugging on the strings the shadow pulled a rag doll out from somewhere in the trees. The rag wore a patched lab coat with a white head and black button eyes.

Black stitches criss crossed across the face and body of the strange doll. The shadow had flown out of range of the three fighters leaving the doll to fight in his place. The Doll was extremely oversized. It was ten feet tall and much larger than a regular person.

The doll began to swing its arms. Frisk charged an Agi but was interrupted when she heard Mettaton shout.

"Stop! That shadow has created a magic barrier around it. If you use magic the shadow will just absorb it."

Frisk noded and attacked the doll. Then Undyne and Papyrus slashed at the doll ripping a tear across it's body. It burst into shadows and the real shadow returned to the battle.

"So you can see the truth. Infact you destroyed the lies. How interesting…"

The shadow landed and it's wings disappeared. Frisk noticed that it wasn't wearing a mask this time and it seemed a lot less hostile.

"Don't worry I mean no harm. I'm not the thing you just faced I'm a bit more unique than that."

Frisk stared at the strange being. She turned when Undyne called over to Frisk.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING FRISK SANS IS WAKING UP!"

Frisk turned and saw that Undyne and Papyrus had rushed over to Sans who was now standing up from the snow he had fallen down in before the fight. Frisk looked back at the person but he was gone. Frisk turned her attention back to the real Sans.

He stood up and that's when Frisk saw that the Sans shadow had reverted back to it's original form. Sans glared at his shadow.

"So you're still here."

He said angrily but the shadow just stared blankly. Sans walked over to it and said.

"If you really are me then you should know that I'm sorry I ignored the truth. This all started a year ago. I hadn't been there to see Gaster off. I was just so mad at him for making me the next in line to take the family business."

Sans looked away from the shadow.

"When they told me the plane crashed I didn't believe it. So I created lies telling Papyrus he was still around just didn't care."

He looked at Papyrus who just sadly stared at his brother

"but you knew the whole time, didn't you. You just wanted to make me happy like a brother should."

Sans began to tear up and he looked away.

"I promise not to hide from my feelings. I accept that you are a part of me and that we'll fix me together."

With those words the shadow nodded and disappeared. With a flash of light the shadow became a Persona. Frisk was surprised to see the persona was the same as the shadow except the mask was off and Frisk could perfectly see Sans's face.

Sans was given the Persona ability and suddenly fell face first in the snow. Papyrus ran up to Sans and pulled him out of the snow and shouted.

"SANS ARE YOU ALRIGHT!"

Sans suddenly snored loudly and Papyrus wore a shocked expression. Sans had straight up fallen asleep. Frisk and Undyne giggled and Papyrus dropped Sans shouting about how lazy he was and how he fell asleep at the worst times.

It was all over for now but Frisk couldn't help but wonder what could happen next.

Author's notes

BIG Reference too ReaperTale au by Ren-Rin