Half-light...
I keep fading into the half-light...
I know I've been here before and survived,
But if you could keep me close in sight...
In sight...

Halfway
Closer still, but I'm still halfway...
I'll take your hand if you think it's okay...
'cause I don't want to lose what's right,
This time,
To half-light...

-Vertical Horizon, "Half-Light"


The shadow of Mount Ebott was growing ever longer as the sun slowly dipped below the horizon.

Sans' green motor-scooter was the only thing on the road, which made sense, since there wasn't a whole lot of civilization around the actual mountain itself. The streetlights flickered on just as the road was becoming more difficult to make out, prompting the skeleton to turn on his headlights in response.

He hadn't really had to test his ride out this hard before. It wasn't necessarily the fastest thing on wheels before, but after a few...modifications, he found himself easily breaking eighty miles-per-hour. It was a speed he was unaccustomed to, and he had a shortcut at the ready in case the worst occurred.

He had to be just careful enough. One shortcut means less magic to use when it was truly needed. Less magic to traverse dangerous terrain, to maybe help his brother, or to save himself from...anything.

The Entity.

He shook the thought out of his mind and went back to counting the lights as he progressed. He couldn't think about Papyrus in danger right now, he couldn't allow himself to worry about the worst-case-scenarios. He had to focus. He had to be in the moment, as much as the resets caused him to hate that idea.

It still left him plenty of time for self-loathing.

Sans felt a strong, burning sense of anger at himself for letting his guard down. Of course, right when he looks away for just a second, something would happen. Of course it would. That's how all his mistakes happened. Open the door just a second, and life finds a way to shove its foot right down your throat.

He was supposed to be a sentry.

He couldn't even guard his own heart.

His mind's eye flashed back to Undyne. Calling Papyrus stupid for pulling this, he couldn't explain just why he felt that it wasn't. He always came to his brother's defense before, no matter the reason, but there was something about this that didn't seem foolish at all. Papyrus is Papyrus, after all. It only made sense that he'd want to help everybody, and with them both having dreams and memories of their nearly-erased father, what else would Papyrus truly do?

How could Sans have been so stupid?

He was finally becoming okay with who he was. His memory's slow return even showing him that he hadn't killed any kids before...

He was just about ready to start moving ahead. Moving on. With Frisk, Papyrus, Toriel, Undyne, Alphys...all of them, together. It seemed that Papyrus had more...optimistic plans.

Sans felt the vibrations of the scooter beginning to feel strange. It was a sensation specifically from his right side, down near his leg. It was stronger, and it was almost like it was interfering with the more normal sensations of the scooter itself. It felt localized to a small part of his thigh, almost as if it was inside his pocket.

His phone!

He slammed on the brakes, causing the tires to bark angrily as he pulled off to the shoulder. He stopped right under another streetlight, still bracing himself from slowing so hard. His hands almost fumbled as he pulled his phone out of his pocket, still trembling.

Papyrus?!

"oh, h-hey tori. what's up?"

Dammit.

"Oh! Sans, I was worried you would not pick up!"

"sorry, i was riding around, had to find a good place to stop."

"Ah, how very diligent of you!"

"yeah, well, i don't wanna get pulled over, at any rate. anyways, what'd you need?"

"Oh! Undyne called me just now, saying that she wanted to take Frisk to school for the next few days, I was just making sure everything was all right, since you're usually the one who..."

"...yeah, yeah it's cool."

A lie.

"paps wanted to show me a surprise, but it's gettin' real late and I just wasn't sure if we'd get back in time, so I asked Undyne for help."

Another lie, even among the bits of truth.

"Oh! Well I sure hope it is a good surprise!"

"of course, my brother would never surprise me with something bad, unless it's his cooking."

He had always been rather good at lying.

"Well then I do hope you two have a great time, be good, won't you?"

"of course, tori. take it easy."

Beep.

He sighed and shook his head. More lies. Lies on top of lies just to keep the lies under control. Complications. He was used to complications like this.

When it came to Toriel though...something about lying to her really bothered him. She was one of the first real friends he'd made, one of the few he ever decided to open up to. Papyrus had always been a bit jealous at how the people at Grillby's always knew his name, but Sans had never really gotten to know them very well at all. There was always a sense of mistrust among the patrons there. The skeleton who arrived out of nowhere, with a three-year-old brother in tow, living in a house whose owner everybody had begun to forget.

Keep them at arm's length. Don't let them in. Don't let them hurt you, don't let them hurt him. Stay strong for yourself and your brother.

But he let Toriel in. Fitting that they'd met at opposite sides of a massive locked door.

"sorry, tori. this might be a bit...rough."

He kicked his motor-scooter back into gear and resumed his journey, trying to get his self-pity to go back into its closet. Counting streetlights again, he found them becoming more and more sparse. A sign that he was getting close.

The city of Ebott shone in the distance, about twenty miles away or so. Hard to believe that when they all left the underground, they managed to walk that far. Even Frisk had to walk so very far just to fall into the Underground in the first place. A child...all the way out here.

Wait...if he was that far, then that meant...

There it was. Papyrus' car.

It was parked under another streetlight, next to a gap in the guard rail. He pulled alongside, parked, and hopped off his ride to examine the scene. Hopeful thoughts entered his mind at first. A foolish sentiment, really.

There was no boisterous skeleton in sight, the doors were locked, and the engine was cold. It was obvious that whoever drove this car had been gone for hours now. Papyrus never did waste time when he wanted to accomplish something.

"papyrus! you out there?!"

Of course not.

Sans took a deep breath, to prepare for the next leg of the trek. If he followed this path, he'd eventually find his way to the mountain and the eventual cave that would lead to his destination. He pulled out his phone again and dialed Papyrus' number, letting it ring nine times. Papyrus almost always picked up after three.

"no bars. right," he rolled his eyes.

He activated the flashlight function of the phone to illuminate his way. After another twenty minutes of walking, he had reached the path that would eventually lead to the cave.

"papyrus?"

Nope.

Coming around the bend, he found the familiar sharp turn that led to The Underground. It had been well worn by monster foot-traffic at this point, so there was no mistaking it. Beyond here, a dark cave that once housed the best view a monster could ever want of The Barrier. Beyond that...Asgore's castle.

New Home.

He cracked his knuckles, did a few stretches, cracked his neck and popped his back.

"here we go."


It smelled like Gaster's son...and garbage.

The caves of Waterfall were just as flooded as ever, as Papyrus trudged his way toward where he thought that "The Abyss" would be. He remembered the story that Undyne told him, about where she'd met Alphys, and he had to line up the pieces. She said that Alphys was "staring off into the abyss" and "looking contemplative."

He knew what that meant, and he had to shake those kinds of thoughts out of his head. That wasn't why he was here, nor was it a reason for anybody to be here. And considering his more recent encounter, sadness wasn't exactly something he wanted to be weighing down his heart.

He lifted the strap of the heavy duffel bag he was lugging around, rotating his shoulder before deciding to move the bag to the opposite arm instead. The water was getting a bit deeper now, up to his knees at the most, as he waded his way onward. He had to find just the right spot...

Aha!

A small island of trash, piles of wood or perhaps boxes, were the only things weathering the storm from the waterfall's never-ending torrent. From above, the water crashed into the piles of garbage, but below.

Below. Here we are.

He remembered very clearly what Alphys had said the other day, about how the world under The Barrier would have been flooded if nothing could truly escape it. That the water had to go "somewhere" for that to not happen. It was mere child's play to deduce that wherever the water was flowing, it would be into The Void.

Papyrus hoped that there was still a way in there. Sans and Alphys' scientific jargon still went over his head a little bit, but he remembered the important parts. About a world that existed in a different kind of space-time, now returning back to where it was always supposed to be. The physical laws that were altered were most-likely restored to their original strengths once The Barrier was gone. If that was the case, there wouldn't be a need for a Void, right?

Then again, he still received dreams from Doctor Gaster. It couldn't just be another one-way street, right? That just wouldn't be fair. Besides the Doctor told him "don't come here."

That meant that there had to be a way.

...did Gaster want him to find the way? Wouldn't he just have said it was impossible?

Papyrus gazed long into the darkness that spread below him. He squinted for a second, although he found that even less helpful, since it was now dark and slightly blurry. He reached into his duffel bag and fished out a small personal spotlight, borrowed from the brilliant Dr. Alphys earlier in the day. He clicked it on, surprised at just how bright it really was. It didn't to much good against the yawning black maw underneath, as it only seemed to just swallow the light with no remorse.

He channeled his magic, summoning a short, white bone. He grasped it and threw it as hard as he could. He had hoped to find out just how far down the chasm went, and he might have, if the bone hadn't just fallen into the waterfall itself. He chuckled as he shook his head. What a silly idea.

He focused again and created a small platform made out of bones, and stepped up onto it. It bobbed very slightly with his weight, which he tested by bouncing up and down upon it. He felt no real strain on his magical energy, and he was surprised that the platform was as sturdy as it was. Maybe this would work after all.

It reminded him of one of his earliest sparring sessions with Undyne, before she'd changed the Royal Guard training curriculum to more...culinary exploits. She was every bit the stronger of the pair, physically, but Papyrus was always one step ahead of her when it came to combat tactics. Many times Undyne would find herself tripping over bones, or find her attacks blocked by walls of osseous matter.

"How can you do that? Make those appear when you're not touching them?"

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN?"

"I mean that you're making your magic appear wherever you want to. Monsters almost always have to draw it out from their soul, like a starting point. They have to be fired out from the monster in some way. Even I have to do it, and I'm the strongest monster down here! ...Next to Asgore, of course."

"I DON'T KNOW. I JUST...WANT IT TO BE THERE, AND THAT'S WHERE IT APPEARS."

"That's crazy!"

"NO IT ISN'T, IT'S PERFECTLY SANE!"

"No no, I mean it's crazy awesome!"

"...IF YOU SAY SO!"

A monster using the magic of their soul, they always have to fire it from their actual being in some way, but Papyrus didn't have to do that. He never really thought about it until now, but the pieces seemed to be fitting just right.

Gaster.

His powers to manipulate space. He remembered the photo of Gaster grasping a cup from across the room like it was nothing. This was another ability that Gaster's magics allowed him to do. Papyrus couldn't teleport himself like his brother could.

He could teleport his magic though. The implications were huge.

The skeleton gave a little smirk. He believed that his powers paled in comparison to Sans, but he never had a jealous mindset about it. He'd always felt like Sans seemed to waste his powers in order to be lazy, that if he had power like that, he would be a shoo-in for a Royal Guard position.

Even now, he realized that being able to materialize bones anywhere in his vicinity...it was just what he needed to get away from that...

He shook his head again. This wasn't the time to dwell on the past. Onward and...downward.

He continued to create platforms for himself to step upon. As he walked forward, he had to regulate his breathing to maintain his resolve. He was now standing on a small square of bones far beyond the waterfall. Below him was nothing but darkness. The kind of darkness that was terrifying because of just how daunting it truly was. Nobody had been down here. Ever.

Papyrus began to summon the platforms in lower and lower positions, creating a sort of perpetual staircase that led down. The slope was gentle enough, and because the steps were magical in origin, they thankfully gave off a soft light. It was enough for him to find the right spot for his red boots to step down on and continue forward.

The sounds of rushing water began to grow distant as he took steady, deliberate, and confident steps onto his own magic. By the time the sounds had disappeared completely, he found himself almost completely alone. Standing on top of glowing platforms, in thin air, lost in the middle of a choking darkness, never knowing just how far he still had to go.

He hated it. Being alone.

It hurt.


Sans' own nervous habits had shown themselves again, as his hands never left his jacket pockets.

Papyrus was already so far ahead of him, but Sans also had to wonder if Papyrus really took everything in as he walked through these caverns. The only ones between the Underground and the rest of the planet. This one cavern stood between every monster, and the true, warming light of the sun. No magic to filter its rays, no barrier to trap its heat inside. The cavern was strangely cooler than he'd remembered, probably because of that very reason.

Every now and then, the sound of some machine or another would echo through the chamber. Probably coming from The Core and its constant shifting around. He wondered if anybody was still there operating it, since he did know a few monsters who never really left this place. Maybe somebody was out there, reactivating and deactivating puzzles in accordance to some kind of personal calling.

Another loud crash snapped him out of his reminiscent mood, and he was a bit tired of standing in the dark anyway. A single green patch of grass, lit by one solitary ray of sunshine, and he was gone. Through the door, take a right, and he was right back...here.

This is where The Barrier was.

Here, a single human stood against the monarch of the entire kingdom. A scared human, trapped by the sorcery of their ancestors, and a king, trapped by his sworn duty to his subjects. Both of them weighed down by their guilt. Both of them at the mercy of the power of magic.

Maybe...maybe nobody really deserved that kind of power. Magic was nothing but a source of misery for so many. Humans feared it so much that they decided to banish it, and if the surface world was any indication, any hints at its use by human hands was stricken by any and all records. Maybe it was for religious reasons, maybe it was just forgotten.

But...he was made of magic. His brother was made of magic. Everybody he cared about was made of magic, except for one single, incredible being. That being that proved to be stronger than all the monsters of the Underground combined.

This was the place where, according to Frisk, they faced Asriel.

The story was still quite unreal. He wanted to pick Alphys' brain about her experiments with determination after hearing the entire story. Maybe he just wanted to help her come to terms with what she had done in the past, like she did a few days ago. Help her move on, scientist to scientist.

Asriel. The prince of all monsters. A boss monster, only the third known boss monster in existence. Frisk had told him that they felt so sorry for him. That he tried to kill them, and they reached out anyway. They called his name, over and over again. They tried to save him, and they succeeded! Except...

Wait.

Something obstructed Sans' leg in the dark. His hands left his pockets to clear the obstacle so that he wouldn't trip, but he felt something lash around his wrist. Then his other wrist. Then his other leg. The original blockage had entwined his last free leg and stretched all his limbs out as far as they could. They pulled him up, suspending him in the center of the room, until he decided to flash his left eye's magic again. The magic told him everything he needed to know.

Vines.

He hadn't expected this. How could he have been so stupid?

"Howdy, Trashbag! It's been so long!"

That twisted, smiling face.

Six golden petals.

It smelled like your best friend.