(It's soo weird to write a Sans that still has hope. Nihilism is a huge part of his character in the game so writing him without that is... it's just weird.
Please feel free to comment or whathaveyou, I very much feed on the feedback. Like a vampire, except with attention rather than blood.)
.
.
Entry 11: Frisk
.
"what happened to the twenty four hour waiting period?" Sans' voice not-so-gently pulled Frisk from a haze of sleep.
"It is a twenty four hour observation period, Sans." Gaster corrected with a clear disinterest in the point Sans was trying to make.
Frisk pulled one eye open and watched as Sans paced past. Out of the corner of their eye they could see Gaster standing still and watching him with a faint detached amusement. They pulled the blankets a little tighter around themselves, their eye fluttering half shut to watch the two through the curtain of their eyelashes.
"you know what i mean!" Sans said, stopping to throw up his hands and look at Gaster in frustration.
"I'm not planning on taking a jog, Sans. I am simply going to walk Papyrus to school and have a small discussion with his teacher and the head administrator about-" His voice shifted from amusement to threatening, "-improving my child's learning experience."
"i could-"
"You do enough, Sans." Gaster gently cut him off, "I am always grateful that you care for your brother so much but it has never been my intention for you act as a second parent to him. You have your own life to live."
Sans made a quiet sound of frustration.
Frisk opened their eyes and stretched under the blankets. Sleeping in their overalls left them with sore spots, where the metal and thick denim had pressed into their skin. They sat up and rubbed their arm where a button had left a perfect circle of red skin.
"Good morning, Frisk." Gaster said pleasantly, "Did you rest well?"
Frisk nodded.
"you tell him!" Sans said to them, pointing dramatically at Gaster, "even you know he should stay here and not be a stupid bone headed, numbskull with a death wish!"
Gaster smiled faintly.
Frisk paused and yawned, then said "I think, it'll be fine."
Gaster's smile twitched a little more broadly.
Sans shoulders dropped, "what?! that's not-"
"Besides," Frisk said with absolute certainty, "he's gonna do it anyway."
Sans sighed.
"Wonderful." Gaster said cheerfully, "Now that we have that settled-"
"do you at least have the cellphone jack and gob made for you?" Sans snapped.
"I believe it's somewhere in my office."
Sans stomped up to Gaster's office, to retrieve the cellphone, Frisk supposed.
Frisk to the opportunity to stretch and yawn again, rubbing the sleep from their eyes.
"I shall have to get you some more clothes to wear." Gaster said, "I might be able to find something at the apartment that would fit you."
Frisk nodded vaguely and the flopped back onto the bed, wiggling into the crumpled blankets, and debated whether it would be worth it to close their eyes for just a little while.
Sans returned and pressed the strange looking cellphone into Gaster hand, "take this. call if anything happens or you get too tired or, anything, and i'll be right there."
"You are not coming?" Gaster asked, surprise lacing his voice.
"i was gonna take the next two days off and hang out here at the lab with frisk. y'know, to help them settle in? besides," his voice took on a brittle edge, "you're gonna be just fine."
"I shall inform the school." Gaster said, "You won't be missing anything significant?"
"nah. we just finished a bunch of tests. they're just starting on a bunch of stuff i already know."
"Very well." Gaster said. "I shall stop and get some spider cider and doughnuts on the way, as a little treat for breakfast."
Sans sounded much more mollified, "you better get going. pap's already upstairs, probably wearing a hole in the floor."
Frisk pushed themselves up briefly to see Gaster give them an elegant nod farewell and sweep out towards the elevators.
Sans leaned against the headboard of Frisk's bed, making it wobble. They were both silent for a while til Frisk asked, "Spider cider?"
"made with real spiders." Sans said.
Frisk sat up with a bolt, "Really? Eight legs and creepy-crawly and everything?" they shivered.
Sans raised a brow, "they work the dust of their fallen into their pastries to transmute them into monster food. it's how they've done it for thousands of years. they're really good."
Frisk frowned and tried to be open-minded about the whole thing, "Is it gritty?"
Sans snorted, "nah. you can't even tell."
"Ok," Frisk said with a sigh, doing their best to mentally psych themselves up for the experience.
Sans pushed himself up off the headboard and grinned at Frisk, a mischievous look in his eye, "you wanna go upstairs?"
Frisk blinked, "But... Mr. Gaster said-"
Sans waved his hand airily, "pop's won't know. if we go out the back we won't run into anyone this early." He leaned a little closer. "come on, you want to see don't you? soon jack 'n alphys will have that keycard system up and then you won't be able to go up. this might be your last chance."
"Just a quick look?" Frisk said uncertainly, sliding off the bed.
He nodded and beckoned them to follow him, a little hop in his step and grin on his face as they wound through the long dark hallways.
It seemed like it took forever for the elevator to come and even longer for them to ride it back up. It was a very, very long elevator and Frisk wondered how deep underground the lab was. As the carriage slowed and came to a stop at the top, the air became warmer, a dry, prickly, desert sort of warmth.
Frisk glanced around as stepped out into a bright, clean room with pale blue floor tiles and pastel green walls. The upper lab was smaller but the ceilings were high, the lights were newer and brighter and the room was a simple rectangle rather than a labyrinth of corridors and strangely shaped rooms. Next to the elevator there was a conveyor belt leading to a back room, filling the air with a gentle, mechanical whirring sound.
"this way." Sans said softly, leading them to a gleaming metal door that slid open as he pressed a panel by the side.
A wave of dry, stifling heat washed through the door and the sounds of the lab faded with every step, replaced with the sounds of heavy machinery, vents, lifts and tons of conveyer belts whirring together. Below all the machine sounds, was something else, that seemed quiet and yet it overrode all other sound and made the hairs on the back of their neck stand up, a shifting and hissing rumble that they could sense better than they could feel. As if in a trance Frisk walked forward, Sans at their side. Smooth tile gave way to the gritty crunch of stone, gravel skittering away with each step. The florescent lights faded behind them and was replaced by deep red and orange light that seemed to make the air deeper and heavier.
Frisk edged towards the side of the narrow stone pathway, leaning their head over the side with their heart pounding in their throat. Sans caught their hand, holding it tightly, pulling their arm taut, as Frisk looked down into swirling pools of red orange magma, heat hitting their face like a furnace. Following the heat, they turned their head up towards the tall, cavernous ceiling, crisscrossed with precarious stone pathways and metal pipes and vents. And all around, barely visible, were walls of sheer stone, climbing up to a dark ceiling.
They were really truly underground. In a strange new world, made by monsters. The monsters had been thrown in here to die and yet they had made all this! Frisk's eyes widened at the thought, they had been given nothing and yet they thrived.
Frisk shivered. They felt a strange pressure, straight from the center of their being, too tight; just like the moment they had come here, pulled through time and space.
"frisk?" Sans asked, sounding concerned, tightening his grip on their hand.
They didn't answer, focusing every fiber of their being on that feeling and the overwhelming Determination that was filling them up from the inside out until they felt like they could do anything. If the monsters could do all this, they could keep going too! They could, they would persevere. The world seemed to shiver, or perhaps it was their vision going blurry at the edges and the building pressure surged and something small and important inside them broke free.
Frisk shuddered. The intoxicating feeling of Determination, crackled through them like electricity in their veins. It felt hot and too tight and terrifying, and exhilarating. Their heart pounded like they had run a thousand miles. The hair stood up on the back of their neck and prickled down their back like fear.
Frisk held on. They endured the feeling, refusing to run or be afraid. This was magic. This was their magic. They could feel it. It was real and it was theirs.
"are you alright?" Sans asked.
Vaguely they could feel how tightly he was gripping their hand and replied faintly, " 'M fine," too focused on what was important.
Frisk took a deep breath, curling their free hand into a fist, letting their nails dig into their palm. They followed the feeling of the Determination, operating on instinct and insatiable curiosity; they relaxed their hand, spread their fingers and pressed their palm out into open air. They pulled the determination to their palm and it formed like a ball of lightening, yellow-white and crackling violently with power and potential. It buzzed and shuddered, hissing and sputtering. The world seemed to stop, all sound, all movement froze for a breath, until the power settled into something that looked a little like a star and then everything jerked back to life once more.
Frisk slowly lowered their hand, staring at what they had created.
"are you really alright?" Sans asked again, "i think we should head back down."
Frisk looked at him and back at the star. They pointed to it in silent expectation.
Sans squinted in the direction of their finger, "can you see the core from here?" he asked.
Frisk glanced at the star again. "There's a star. Right here on the edge of the path." They pointed again, more emphatically.
He looked where they were pointing. Sans stepped forward and tried to line his arm up with Frisk, to pinpoint where they were pointing, his finger passing right through the edge of the star as he did. He squinted at the star even as he shrugged.
He couldn't see it.
Frisk stared and reached out, brushing the star with their hand, sending a jolt through their palm, up their arm and straight into the base of their skull with a tugging, throbbing, pushing that made their vision spin and go black.
"are you really alright?" Sans asked again, sweat beading on his skull.
Frisk spun on their heel, eyes widening in shock, their hand pulling free of his.
"...i think we should head back down." Sans said haltingly.
They spun back around and looked at the star. Frisk touched it again.
"are you really alright?" Sans asked again, sweat beading on his skull, "...i think we should head back down." Sans looked slightly ill and clutched his hand over his soul, fingers curling into the loose fabric of his shirt. His other hand once again held theirs like a tether.
"What does Determination do?" Frisk asked quietly, fixing Sans with their eyes.
He hesitated, still clutching his shirt and looking faint. "...pops would probably tell you."
"You tell me." Frisk said.
He pulled his eyes away from them, looking away into the vast darkness, "pops always said determination could overcome anything, even death. if you had enough of it, he said you could change reality. that was the theory anyway."
"Like time?" Frisk said softly.
His eyes jerked back and met theirs, "how do you know about the machine?" His grip on their hand loosened and he tried to pull it back. Frisk squeezed it tight.
They bit the inside of their lip to keep from smiling, "I just guessed. I did get pulled into the past by it. So it was a time machine?"
"sort of." Sans said, glancing away, "it could only go into the past. pops was obsessed with trying to get it to go into the future."
Frisk glanced back at the star, little points of information connecting and coalescing in their mind, "The Determination in the machine, it came from human souls?"
Sans jerked back like they had hit him, jerking his hand free, and he looked at them briefly, guiltily, before his eyes darted away. "i-it wasn't- the king was collecting them. they- they were already dead and pops- it would've been a waste not to study them."
"I don't care about that." Frisk said, "The Determination was taken from human souls?"
Sans looked at the lab doors, turning away from them, his voice laced with guilt, "we should head back down. so no one spots you."
It was as much of a confirmation as Frisk was going to get. "The machine can't go to the future because we haven't. The Determination can only move where it has been?" Frisk chewed on their bottom lip, "That would mean that the time machine would've only been able to go back as far as the oldest soul?" They looked up at Sans.
He was staring at them.
"What do you think?" Frisk asked.
Sans shrugged awkwardly, "er, could be? theoretical magic is more pops and koshka's field."
Frisk nodded and asked, "What else do you know about Determination?"
He hunched into himself, stuffing his hands into his pockets and walked back to the sliding metal doors with a, "we have to get back." almost mumbled, disgruntled in a way Frisk didn't understand.
Frisk could feel the star at their back, the pulsing, hissing magic as intense as a bonfire. They didn't reach back, they didn't touch it, they remembered the pull in their chest and the feeling of it and used their Determination. It shot through them like spitting fire, burning from their toes to the fingertips and they replicated the feeling, the pull, the pressure at the base of their skull and-
Frisk blinked at the star in front of them, squeezed the hand in theirs, bone pressing into their soft skin.
Frisk turned and asked, "Are you alright?"
Sans was looking even paler than before, clutching his chest and shaking. "...dizzy... all of a sudden..." his voice came out as a whisper.
Frisk took his hand and pulled it over their shoulder, supporting him and guiding him back into the lab. "You look kinda sick."
He barely managed a grunt of acknowledgment as they stepped onto the elevator and the doors slid closed. The air began to get cooler, damper as they descended. Frisk helped him back to the staff room and the bed he had slept on last night where he lay across the pink bedspread on his stomach, his breathing labored. Frisk wondered how a skeleton could breath for it to be labored.
Sans turned his head slightly to look at them, his brow furrowing slightly, "...did you ask a question?"
"I didn't ask anything." Frisk shook their head. They asked curiously, "What makes you think I did?"
He shrugged into the bedspread, "thought you did. coulda sworn..." his voice trailed off as his brow furrowed deeper and his turned to press his face back into the blankets. He tiredly waved one hand in a way that Frisk recognized as a sort of, whatever/I'm fine dismissal.
Frisk nodded. They patted his arm and turned on their heel, heading to the upper hallway and the media room, to see what else they could learn.
.
(Next Update: Next Thursday, 10/6/16.)