The last of Frisk's story hangs in the air.

Aofil walks around the table and kneels down next to the kid who's story ended where theirs began, "Frisk?"

The child nods.

Aofil reaches out for them, "Come."

Frisk embraces Aofil and buries their face into Aofil's shirt.

Aofil lets Frisk stain their shirt as much as they want, "Get it all out, Frisk," they pat the poor kid's head, "though I'm not sure you'll ever be able to."

Aofil can't imagine the amount of sorrow behind Frisk's wails. So much pain, so much fear. But behind the fear is relief, so much relief. They have finally told their tale to someone after keeping it locked up for, how long? Months, years of resets? Aofil won't burden Frisk with the question, they've been through enough to last more than that by far.

Aofil strokes Frisk's hair, "Feels good to finally have it out in the open?"

Despite all the strength escaping Frisk they still manage to muster the tiniest of nods. Aofil puts their chin on Frisk head, like how Toriel did with them.

There's one question though that Aofil must ask. It pains them so hard to do it, they still don't want to burden the kid.

"Frisk? At the start of your story."

Frisk hands tenses and their grip hardens of Aofil's wrinkled and soaked shirt.

"The first time you met them."

Frisk stumbles on their words. They can't form an apology or plead, and tears flow like the mightiest of rivers.

"I know you were scared, Frisk. They did all attack you, and it's gonna be hard for me to look past that despite everything I know about them. All alone in the Underground, and everyone wanting you dead. My heart bleeds for you, kid."

Frisk curls up, trying to make themselves as small as possible.

"How you told it though. To me it sounded like you weren't scared at all, not after," Aofil breathes out, "not after you killed Toriel."

A pained sulk is forced out of Frisk.

"And you say it was Chara's fault? They egged you on?"

Another weak nod.

Aofil doesn't want to believe it, that their twin is the source of the genocide. Maybe Chara couldn't control it? Maybe they were just as afraid as Frisk? Maybe they didn't know?

They look at their hands, hands that have held dust, hands that have killed as well. They know the feeling as well, the surge of determination. But it's because of their, and Chara's, curse.

Aofil needs to learn how to control it, it has taken too many lives. But if Chara couldn't figure it out, how can they?

Chara shared it with Frisk, their taste for dust. Did they do it willingly? And why would they tell Frisk to do it? Are they really evil, like Frisk said?

Is Aofil really evil? Is there just a question of time before it consumes them, and their friends?

Frisk looks up at Aofil, at them remembering the feeling of dust, of determination.

"It really is a curse," Aofil finally says, "But Chara can control it, right?"

Frisk feels their chest and nod.

"Your fear triggered it? And you both lost control?"

Frisk nods again.

Aofil puts their hand over Frisk's, "It must've been terrible for you feeling Frisk and you killing your family and friends, Chara. I'm sorry I didn't realize when we spoke before."

They know that Chara can't say anything, but perhaps they can hear. And if there's the slightest possibility of them knowing that Aofil still remembers them, then Aofil is willing to bet on perhaps.

"I'll not be near them when I succumb to it. I promise you that."

Frisk grabs Aofil's hand and shakes their head.

"I need to move, Frisk. I can't be near them anymore. I bring back their memories. I also don't know if my curse is stable, if one day something will cause me to lose control permanently. I can't imagine the horror you felt when you realized, but I don't know if I would ever realize if I got to that point. I could just go on forever," they scoff and a couple of tears fall on Frisk's hair, "I'll be easy to stop though, with my weak and broken soul. I don't want my last memory of them to be rage and hatred though, and I don't want their last memory of me to be rage and hatred."

Frisk hugs Aofil.

Aofil grabs their arms and tries to pull them away, "Frisk."

But Frisk holds on tight. They refuse.

"Frisk, I can't stay."

Sans puts his hand around Frisk and shortcuts them to their own chair, "could you at least fix the memories before you go, aof?"

"Won't they stop when I leave, right?"

"the worst ones, sure, but there are more things they can be reminded of."

"Then how?"

Sans pauses for effect, "asriel."

"What? Toriel and Asgore's son?"

"and your twin's brother," Sans reminds, "also, frisk said that you made a promise that you would come back for him."

"That was before I saw him melt away and scream at us to get out before he lost control and killed me and Frisk. He was pretty close," Aofil also reminds.

Sans shrugs with his hands in his pockets, "so we make him whole again, no biggie."

Aofil scoffs and waves their hand, "Yeah, sure," their face freeze, "Wait, you want to do like what I did? Startle them into sanity?"

"i can't think of anyone else that could do it, can you? trust me when i say that i'd rather not try this with all of them being this unstable."

Sans waits a second for Aofil's face to thaw, but it stays rock solid.

"look, it's either this, or trying again with my old friend."

The memory shocks Aofil back, "Alright, let's say that it is somehow possible without erecting a new Barrier and killing seven new kids, how do we do it?"

"first, we need to get flowey."

Aofil is drained of color. They grip the edge of the table, "No."

"listen."

Aofil's eyes don't blink, "No, I'm not going back to him. I thought you meant using a memory box or something to bring him back," they feel their whole body ache as the fight comes rushing back, "I. Am. Not. Going back."

Sans nods, "good, because you're not going back."

Aofil cocks their head, "But then why did you?"

"chara is going back to try and convince flowey to come with them up to the surface."

Aofil's eyes snap to Frisk, "What, we're bringing them back first? Their soul is bound with Frisk's, and getting those two untangled would probably be harder. Why would you even consider that?

Sans puts his hand to his chin, "hm, who do we know that share chara's soul, their hair."

Aofil sighs deeply,"Sans," they try to interrupt.

Sans ignores it, "curse, cheeks," he continues counting on his fingers, "age if they were alive, knowledge of what happened."

Aofil raises their voice, "Sans!"

He finally stops.

"I get it, you want me to go down there and convince him that I am Chara," they laugh into their hands, "Ignoring the incredibly bad taste of me impersonating my dead twin," Aofil takes an unsteady breath, "I'm also gonna face the monster that tried to kill me, and who would've succeeded if Asgore hadn't interrupted in the absolute last second."

Sans smacks his lips, "yup."

Aofil shakes their head in their hands, "This plan is getting better and better by the minute," they snark.

"i'll be there just in case," Sans tries to relieve.

Aofil keeps their head lowered, "Sure, Sans. Well, if I die it at least it solves the problem of my determination permanently. Don't worry about Flowey absorbing my soul," they let their hands fall heavily on the table, "I'm pretty sure it's useless to anyone but me."

Aofil sighs, "Let's say that I convince him that I am Chara."

"good, the plan hinges on that."

"What's the next step?"

"did you ever hear alphys say something about a machine of some sort?"

"Yeah, I think so. She sounded quite distraught that it was left behind in her house when it burned down."

"good, if we're lucky it's still there since they wouldn't have time to move it. i'll relocate it to your basement and tell alphys that asgore moved it. and vice versa."

"You seem very comfortable lying about it," Aofil notices.

Now it's Sans' turn to scoff, "i'm one of those silly monsters that don't want my friends and family to suffer mental trauma," and shrug, "but hey, that's just me."

Aofil nods, "Sorry."

"now, once you get flowey here."

"How?" Aofil intercepts.

"use a pot or something. anyway, once he's here we can extract what's left of asriel from flowey and discard the rest."

Aofil isn't convinced, "And that will bring him back, how?"

Sans lifts up a small box from his pocket, "your guess weren't that off, to be honest. we'll let his soul grow from his own memories. frisk's idea, from an earlier reset."

Aofil meets Frisk's eyes, "And this will work?"

"not a clue," Sans puts the cube back into his pocket, "never tried it before."

"So we're doing this on nothing but our hopes and dreams?"

Sans nods to Frisk, "worked for them."

Aofil sits in silence. Sans pours himself a cup of tea.

After a long while Aofil opens one hand towards Sans, "But what about the Surface Lab, can't we wait for it?"

"i don't think asgore will be stable enough to build it."

Aofil shakes their head, "That's not true, Toriel and Asgore's meeting with the Mayor went really well, and really fast."

Frisk shakes their head.

"yeah, you only heard what asgore and toriel thought happened. in reality things went a bit," Sans breathes through his teeth, "worse. they brought up some things that they couldn't know. they had to make a much bigger offer than last time to get the houses. right, frisk?"

Frisk nods.

Aofil turns to Frisk with a tired expression, "Still not talking to me, Frisk? Even after all this?"

Frisk rolls their thumbs with their head hanging low.

"If we get him back and this all sorts out, will you at least say goodbye to me?"

They shake their head and jump into Aofil's arms.

Sans lifts them off, "first things first, kiddo. we'll convince aof to stay once we've gotten all heads straight again."

Aofil runs their hands over their face, "I guess we're doing it. Step one, Sans?"

Sans puts a hand inside his jacket and pulls out something Aofil hasn't seen for a very long time. A video tape.

"step one is homework. you have anything that can play this?" Sans asks while waving the tape in his hand. Tiny drops of gooey liquid fly off it and lands on his shirt.

Aofil motions for Sans to hand it over. They inspect it for a while before remembering, "I think I have something like this in the attic."

Aofil leads the way upstairs with Sans and Frisk behind them. They bring out the chair Papyrus slept on and with it as help they pull down the hatch for the attic.

Dust rains around them and Aofil pulls up their shirt over their mouth.

"Should be a flashlight in one of those drawers, Sans," they instruct through their shirt. Sans digs around for a while before finding one.

"Does it have batteries?"

Sans flicks it on under his chin,"yes." Seeing the light illuminate the inside of his skull makes Aofil a bit uneasy. Sans shuts it off and hands it to Aofil who climbs up the ladder.

The attic is very dusty, but Aofil's already covered in it so it's not a surprise. They do keep their chin down though to prevent them from coughing and making everything worse. Having a flashlight proved to be a bit useless since the afternoon sun casts thick rays of light through a round window at the end of the attic.

Aofil shoves a box labeled 'toys' aside and crawl ever deeper. They note to themselves that none of the boxes is labeled 'Chara'. Must have been hard for their parents to know that they couldn't leave any clues behind.

A wooden container catches their eye though. It is heavy, and the floorboards under it squeak as they drag it closer to them. As they swipe the dust off the lid they feel that there's an area where the texture is rougher than the rest. It's like someone has scrapped something off it. There's a name written on the rough texture with felt pen. It's Aofil's.

Two loud clacks shakes the chest as Aofil unlocks it. Inside are things that Aofil remembers as theirs, because their parents told them it was theirs. Aofil recognizes none of them though.

A tear rolls down their cheek, leaving a clean streak among dust. This isn't Aofil's stuff, it's Chara's.

There's a couple of old dolls, some striped shirts, and a jeweled case. Plastic jewels, but jewels nonetheless. Aofil opens it carefully.

Inside is a hand mirror with its backside facing up. It's plastic as well, but not jeweled. It's small, and very light.

Aofil flips it over and sees that their pink cheeks are missing in the reflection. Two spots of lightly colored makeup, like their skin, like Chara's skin, is smeared on the plastic mirror. Holding it just right, the spots cover Aofil's cheeks.

Their curse is not in their reflection. Aofil smiles at themselves being normal. The reflection could let Toriel heal it if it got hurt, without worrying that it would attack her. It could be around its friends without making them question reality, and descend into madness.

The reflection would also have a twin sibling next to it, and the sibling would also be normal. They would be together, with their parents, and with the monsters as well.

A tear lands on the mirror and dissolves one of the spots on the mirror revealing their curse.

"No!" Aofil screams out. They try to pat it back but it's too thin. Their cheek is visible again, and their curse is back.

They beg the reflection to come back, to show them how things could've been. But the mirror has been stained by their curse, just like everything else.

If only the reflection was real. Everything would've been right, everything would've been good. Aofil's family and friends would've been there, happy, and alive.

They look themselves again in the mirror. Did Chara think so as well? Is that why they put the makeup on? Did they also dream of being normal? Having a real family?

In a sense though, Aofil looks at the mirror again, didn't they both get one? Chara fell and met the Dreemurrs, and Aofil had their own parents. They both had a family to call their own. A family that loved them.

But Chara is dead, and their human parents as well. Left is Aofil, and the monsters, who are hurting because of their curse.

Aofil dries the other spot off. They can't live in 'what ifs'. They need to face it, so that no one else has to die. They owe that to their family, and their twin.

And it starts by disguising themselves as their dead sibling to try and bring back their dead brother.

Aofil stares into the words they just thought. They look weird and out of place. But they have to do it. They have to save Chara's family by impersonating them, like any respectful twin would do. Aofil sighs.

A cloud of dust swirls up in the air. Aofil tries to fan it away as they close the chest, causing more dust to cloud around them. With one hand over their mouth they crawl over to a corner and accidentally topple a stack of boxes.

More dust.

They fumble their hand around in on and find an old VCR and quickly crawl back to the floor below. They close the hatch quickly so that the dust cloud stays in the attic and hand the VCR to a confused Sans.

Still coughing, they enter the bathroom. Their hairdryer jumps with joy as it sees Aofil.

"Clean me," Aofil commands in between hawks.

With a whir of its motor the hairdryer dances around them, blowing the dust away into a neat pile in the corner. It ends by blowing the dandruff out of Aofil's hair. Aofil points to the trash can and the hairdryer sweeps the pile into it with pinpoint accuracy using small puffs of air. Even though they leave it while shaking their disbelieving they're still mighty impressed.

Sans hands the VCR back to Aofil as they exit the bathroom, "took you a while. heard you yell as well up there. were you atticked by anything?"

"Never a wasted opportunity, Sans."

He nods, "i have some in storage."

Aofil motions for a nearby room, "So I've noticed."

An old and small TV stands on top of a drawer. Aofil moves some figurines aside while trying to look at them as little as possible. They put the VCR next to the TV and start tinkering with the cables. After some swears they finally get it set up. As they turn around to ask for the tape they stop.

"You know? This was my little sisters old room. Mine was the one adjacent to this one."

Aofil points to the wall on the other side, "Knock on it, Sans."

Sans gives it a couple of taps with his knuckles, "hollow."

"Yup, she used to knock on it when she was scared at night, and I would knock back to let her know that I was there. Thing is though, the wall serves no other purpose. Since it's hollow it didn't work as soundproofing. It was a bit annoying when she would watch her cartoons on repeat."

Aofil let's the memory sink in a bit before continuing, "Doesn't carry the house either. It's just there to split the rooms. My parents never confirmed it, but I think I know why now."

Aofil moves to the door, "This wall is structural. Yet, there's a door there," they bang on the wall above the door, "Hear that? There's a balk here. It's been cut off which means that the door wasn't here when the house was built. It was added later. My door was here when the house was built, the style fits all the others. This one was added later, like the wall separating the room."

Sans and Frisk share a look, "cool, i think."

Aofil sighs, "I checked the model of this door as well," they grab the handle and swing the door back and forth, "it was only available a month after Chara and Asriel attacked."

"oh."

Aofil nods, "Yeah, they put up that wall and made this door so that I wouldn't remember me and Chara sharing a room together. I guess they also did it to ease in my sister's adoption. For both her sake," Aofil closes the door gently, "and mine."

"do you feel like they replaced chara?"

Aofil shakes their head, "No, since I didn't remember Chara being my sibling. My sister was my sibling, I loved her above all else. It's just that, I don't know. I can't really describe it. They're both mine, except not, and for different reasons."

Aofil sigh is very unsteady and they rub their forehead as they hear it, "Dammit, I need to stop thinking about it. At least for now. We got homework to do."

Sans hands Aofil the video tape, "that we do."

The old VCR complains for a while before it rewinds the tape. Aofil takes a seat next to Frisk and Sans on their sisters' bed. After a minute or so of spooling it switches mode with a mechanical clack.

The TV is black, there's no picture. Aofil could've sworn that they inserted the cables in the right holes. Yeah, they're correct. Aofil scratches their head, "Why isn't it?"

They give it a hard pat and the speaker wakes up. There's some commotion coming out of it, like someone's fumbling with the camera.

"Okay, Chara, are you ready? Do your creepy face!"