The agony through his eye enveloped him quickly, dragging him down into the dark. In the muted blank space, he could distinctly hear sobbing. He headed towards it, and there was no invisible walls this time. They're ready. The whispers echoed around him like soft breathing, it reminded him of the echo flower field. As he moved, he began to see soft lights of yellow and blue light pulsating in the distance, and headed towards that, confused by what the hell was going on around here. He came across a child, looking about the same age as Frisk's physical age, give or take a few years in either direction. They were collapsed and wrapped in a cocoon of blue and yellow, light weaving in and out their skin on their arms and legs, into their their ears, out of their eyes, with no seeming beginning or end. Tears streamed down the face as they cried pitifully, but strangely now that he was closer the sobs were quieter.

"who are you? where are we?"
"No more. I don't want any more. Please, stop it." It was like they hadn't heard it at all.
"hey. kid." He bends down, and takes their face in his hands, tilting their head back. The incandescent streams part around his limbs, swallowing his arms and he feels his soul hum in response. The deja vu that sees him through and the red stained eyes make it click. His pupils dim in anger. "you're them, right?"
"S-Sans?" The eyes focus on him, and he sees relief flood them. The voice is small and pitiful. The tears fall harder. He's torn between sympathy and so much hate that he drops their face in disgust. He stands, hands in pockets, looking down on their small, hunched form. The lights keep them entwined. "It h-hurts. please... help..."
"and i should help you... why?"
"You… can't just … please help me." They reach out a hand, and he steps back, making the light extend. His left eye flared with magic, and Chara cries out, hand dropping. Their body trembles like a leaf.

Was... this … him doing... this…?

"you know… it's a beautiful day outside. birds are singing… flowers are blooming… why shouldn't I just leave a kid like you... to burn in hell?"
Everything about them shrinks more inward with a flinch at his tone. But then… They surprise him. "M-maybe you should. I don't… deserve your help." As they speak, he sees numbers flare around their spirit. Numbers he knows well; numbers only he knows how to see and read the symbols of. They tick down.
"I did horrible things. I hurt my mother." Tick
"I hurt my father." Tick
"I killed my brother."Tick
"I killed your brother." Tick
"You." Tick
"Everyone." Tick.

"I don't deserve your mercy. I don't deserve anyone's mercy, or their love, or their hate, or anything from them." They start ticking down slightly faster. Chara brings shaking hands up to their face and bury it, but the voice is still audible and completely unmuffled. "Everyone showed me love down here. Every time. And every time I show them LOVE. Then, I tried to completely erase them. I don't... even... know why anymore."
He says nothing, standing over them, but left eye's glow slowly dimming. The lights around them dim, too, not yet disappearing.
"I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. And I would do anything to tell them that." The numbers settle, and hang in the air, surrounding them with the same set of symbols repeated over and over shining a dark grey over the endless black.

*LV 1 HP 20/20 AT 0 DF 0 EXP 0

Well, that was new.

He bends down… and extends a hand towards them. They look up at him. "it's not going to stay there forever." They hesitate, then take his hand. He helps pull them up to their feet and they mutter a thanks, but won't even look at him. He puts his hands back in his pockets, staring right through them. He wonders if this what the child who had initially fallen was like? The one the stories said the underground had fallen in love with immediately. The lights slowly fade, all of them, and they are in a void of nothingness. The sobs have stopped, but their face still shows the wet streaks down their cheeks. "if i decide to let you leave, what are you going to do?"
"I don't…. Know. Honestly. I just want to… stop hating everything. Stop hurting them all."
The black around them slowly brightens, and fills with an orange light. It's like a hazy copy of the judgement hall where they spent so long fighting. A copy of a memory in a dream. "how?"
"With... everyone's help. Doing things my way always end in destruction and death. Without getting angry just because I'm not winning or getting my way. Without LOVE in my heart but with love."
"hmm... sounds like a tall order, with a steep learning curve."
They look up, the hazy form of twilight on their face making the tear streaks shine. And they smile. "I can't get any better guides than the ones I have around me now."
He smiles back, and removes his hands from his pockets. The arms spread wide.

*SANS IS SPARING YOU

Chara doesn't hesitate. They close the gap, put their arms around him, and they cry.

"I-I'm still n-not g-g-getting a response … wh-what do I do?" Alphys is fretting, pacing around the space after checking him for about the hundredth time. Frisk puts an arm out from where they are sat beside Sans, other hand on his, catching Alphys's sleeve. They motion to him, and they notice the eye has dimmed, leaving hollow sockets.
"What if we try scanning him? The magic seems to have stopped… leaking." They really need a better phrase for that.
"U-uh, yes. Maybe." She pauses, and takes a breath. "O-okay." Frisk pulls the machine back over Sans' rib area, and stands to the side. Alphys shakily starts typing into the machine, and it comes back to life, seeming to roar in the tense and shaky silence. A moment later, and she sighs with relief. "T-the levels a-are more st-stable than they were. Still t-t-too high, b-but… b-b-better."
"Then we wait. We should put him in one of the beds."
"Y-yeah. B-b-b-but how? n-neither of us i-is st-strong enough..."
Frisk gives a sharp whistle, and Endogeny appears from around the corner, amorphous body moving as fast as it can move it. Which is quite a speed. It enters the room, and stands over Frisk, ready. They point at Sans. " He needs to go to the beds. Can you help us?"
Endogeny moves over to the bed, and puts their hole over Sans. A burbling sniffing can be heard, then the amalgamation lowers their head and body down as low as possible with a sad-sounding gurgling whine. Frisk nods to Alphys and they both get him settled on the back of the beast. "Thank you. Go slow, he might get hurt if he falls." They stand, and slowly lead the way to the rest area, only stopping when they are by one of the beds. They then sink down again so Frisk and Alphys can carefully shift him. Still no response, eye sockets still open and vacant of the pupils.

"He'll be fine." They're not sure if they are reassuring themselves, endogeny, or Alphys.

They're sat in the imprint of the hall where they judged and were judged so many times, Chara doesn't think it is on purpose but they find it fitting. Chara sat with their arms folded around their knees, Sans sat with his legs outstretched and leaning back on his hands. The silence was more comfortable than either of them would have ever thought it could be, but it had to be broken eventually.
"...I won't tell anyone about this… whatever this was."
Sans sighs next to them, shifting his weight slightly as he shrugs. "even I don't know. i have a theory, but i would have to run it past alphys first."
"...Are you sure you want to? You're not exactly an open book. And you're even harder to read even if you get the front cover open."
"you going for a pun or a metaphor?"
"Hmm…. Both." He chuckles quietly next to them, and they both lapse into silence. He decides to extend them a branch of trust. He's not ready to be 'besties' to steal Undyne's term, or any kind of friends, but it's just them two here and it'll also be interesting to see what they do with the information with their little insight.
"you know the whole soul speech, so i'll skip to the part that matters. a monster's magic is like a manifestation of their soul, right?"
"...yeah…" they reply hesitantly, cautiously, no idea where this was going and waiting for the trap.
"bearing that in mind, why don't you think I talk about it?" He looks at them unreadably, before cocking a grin. "and I don't mean the shortcuts, although it is hilarious to prank pap across the space-time continuum, but that's mostly just science with a little help making connections." They lean their head onto their knees, trying to put the pieces together that he obviously thinks they have. It feels like trying to put a jigsaw puzzle together without a picture to guide them. Or a picture on the jigsaw either, trying to jam together blank and oddly shaped tiles until they make a rectangle. But Sans doesn't say anything more, leaving them to think it over for as long as it takes. They think... the think they get there. Eventually.
"Because… because it's karma, right? Undyne was really affected by it although it didn't do much damage because I'm guessing her LOVE is not so high? And every time you've fought…" a breath "that you've fought me and Frisk, our LOVE was so high that we took much more damage but didn't feel the effects so much because we were so distant from the violence and the hurt we'd caused." He nods, encouraging the line of thought. "It's like... Your magic doesn't attack the body, it attacks the soul. Kind of, any way. And… you think, and this is a guess because by now I am sure that only you will ever know what is actually going on up in that empty skull of yours, that it's somehow a bad thing."
"isn't it?"
This surprises them. "What do you mean?"
"seeing people as a jumble of numbers, only being able to hurt based on how much they hurt, not having enough strength or hp to take more than a single hit. it's not exactly a good manifestation, is it?"
"Why not?"
"a monster's magic is a reflection of their soul… so what does it mean for me? magic that rips you apart and drags you under with no hopes of escape, designed to destroy and only after you've done enough that the world is filled with dust. i can't access even the smallest amount of healing magic like most can. It doesn't say a lot about the soul that reflects that magic, does it?"

They pause, thinking it over. "I think… you're looking at it from the wrong angle." He turns his head, cocking an eye socket questioningly. "I wouldn't be here right now if your soul was a soul designed to destroy. You've watched as we've destroyed everything over and over, yet every time Frisk comes through that door, you try to make them happy when they're in control. And I know what you say about how it doesn't matter because of the resets and that you're just trying to keep the anomaly happy and because you promised mom, but… who else would do all that? Who else would do all that when they know what you do AND not tell anyone about it? On top of whatever else it is that you are researching and trying to solve. Everything that makes your magic unique… comes from a good place. I'm sure of it." They stand, and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Try thinking about it later. We have to wake up now."