Chapter 29

Suddenly, Shannon and Chad burst into the room. Immediately, ballifs tried to hold them back. "Your honor! We have new evidence and a new witness!"

"Who are you two?" The judge demanded.

"Child Protective Service agents Shannon and Chad." Chad held out his badge, which one of the ballifs took.

"They're the real deal, your Honor." The ballif announced.

"What evidence do you have?" The judge asked.

"We have a recording of us interviewing Alice, a recording of us interviewing Sans, and a witness; The king of all monsters, Asgore."

"New evidence and a new witness?" The judge raised an eyebrow. "In that case, I retract my earlier statement in light of this new evidence, and the case will be extended to tomorrow."

"Um, your honor, I also have some evidence." Alice said, shyly holding out the telephone bug in a plastic bag and the photo.

"Alice! Put that away!" Paul scolded. Alice flinched and motioned to put them away, but the judge stopped her.

"What is it, Miss Alice?" The judge asked.

"This is a d-drawer in my house. It's full of these." Alice held up the bug. "And this is a b-bug. Like what you would put in a telephone. If you tested fingerprints, I'm sure you would find my d-dad's. They're his, after all."

"What?" The judge looked shocked. "Ballif! Get these tested!"

"Alice! I can't believe you would frame me like this! I'm your father!" Paul yelled.

"I'm not f-framing you!" Alice cried. "I'm just doing the right thing, which is to get you arrested!"

"You don't even have proof that I put it in there! How could I, they were in their house the entire time!" Paul scolded Alice, who shrunk under her dad's lecturing.

"Actually, your honor." Sans spoke up as the judge, Alice, and Paul looked at him. "My wife mentioned that there was a broken window in the house yesterday. We took a vacation over a course of five days, and in that time, there was no one in the house. Paul could have easily broken in then and placed the bug."

"I never bugged anything!" Paul retorted.

"Baillif! Take Paul into custody. As of now, you are under suspiscion." The judge announced as a baillif came up and handcuffed Paul. "Miss Alice, I will put you in the care of these two CPS agents for the duration of this case."

"Yes, your honor." Alice nodded.

"What's going to happen now, your Honor?" Sans asked.

"Well, the case is still unresolved. We will postpone the case until tomorrow, and we will revisit it then." The judge announced. "I want Chara and Alice to be there to testify, as well as the new witness. Court is adjourned for the day."


"That was close." Sans commented as he walked out. Toriel immediately picked him up in a tight hug.

"I thought I was gonna lose you." Toriel said, crying.

"Tori, it's okay. We're gonna be okay." Sans comforted her. "What did you want to tell me before?"

"I want to try to get custody of Alice after this is all over." Toriel explained.

"We can apply for it if you want. I like the kid quite a bit myself." Sans said.

"I do want to apply for it." Toriel said simply. "And now, I need to bring Frisk and Chara back to school. They have auditions today."

"Oh yeah, auditions! I forgot!" Chara realized. "Let's go! Race you to the car!" Chara took off as Frisk ran as well.

Chara sat in their chair next to Frisk and MK, with a number 35 on them. Currently, they were auditioning number 25-32.

"Are you ready guys? I'm so nervous." Chara admitted.

"I am too, dude." MK flicked his tail. Frisk nodded in agreement. While Chara was wearing their usual leotard, shorts, and tights that they wore for dance, Frisk wore a shirt and leggings, while MK wore a fitted shirt.

"Alright." Mettaton came in and looked at his list. "I need numbers 33-40." Chara, Frisk, MK, and several other kids walked into the audition room, where the judges were sitting.

"Okay, so first, I need number 33 and 34." Linda said. Frisk and another kid stood up and walked to the front of the room. Immediately, Linda waved Frisk off. "I'm sorry, but you can't talk. That immediately takes you off the list for auditions."

"HEY, LET THEM TRY. MAYBE THEY CAN PLAY A MUTE PART?" Papyrus asked.

"There is no mute part." Linda retorted. "If she can't sing and can't talk, she can't be in the play. You know that, Mettaton." Frisk flinched at the casual misgendering, and Chara swore they saw tears start to fall down their face.

"...I…" Mettaton was helpless. "I'm terribly sorry, darling. I'm not the one in charge here, Linda is. She's not going to change her mind. But, can you at least see if they can dance or something?" Mettaton asked Linda.

"No. There's no point in her auditioning if she can't sing and can't talk." Linda repeated as she clicked her pen. "Okay, Frisk, shoo." She waved them off. Frisk visibly cringed and sat off to the side to wait for Chara and MK. Chara felt sadness reminate from Frisk as they buried their head in their hands.

Poor Frisk. They were looking foward to this so much, too…

The girl who was #33 did her audition and sat down a bit aways from Frisk. "Okay, I need #35 and #36." Chara stood up, as did MK.

"Alright. So first, I'm giving you guys both a monologue to read." She nodded to David, who handed them the monologues. "Chara, you go first." Linda was smirking as if she knew Chara was going to fail.

Well, lady, I'm gonna prove you wrong. Chara cleared their throat.

"This morning a bird woke me up. It was a lark, or a peacock; something like that. So I said hello. And it vanished, flew away, the very moment I said hello!" Chara read vividly. "It was quite mysterious. So do you know what I did? I went to my mirror and brushed my hair two hundred times, without stopping. And as I was brushing it, my hair turned mauve." They said vividly, as if they couldn't believe it themselves.

"No, honestly! Mauve! Then red. then some sort of a deep blue when the sun hit it... I'm sixteen years old, and every day something happens to me. I don't know what to make of it. When I get up in the morning and get dressed, I can tell...something's different. I like to touch my eyelids, because they're never quite the same. Oh, oh, oh! I hug myself till my arms turn blue, then I close my eyes and cry and cry till the tears come down and I can taste them. I love to taste my tears. I am special. I am special! Please god, please, don't let me be normal!" Chara finished, the last word lingering in the air. Mettaton looked at Chara proudly, several of the kids in the corner were clapping, and even Linda seemed impressed.

"That was the best audition I've seen in quite a while." Linda admitted. "Now, your turn, MK." MK read his monologue, although Linda didn't seem as impressed. Chara thought that they saw her whisper something to David, who nodded in agreement.

"Alright. Now for your solos." MK went first, and while he was good, Linda didn't seem too happy. Chara went, and after they went, Linda was writing something down, and then she nodded.

"Thank you for your auditions. Next! #36 and #37!" Linda announced as Chara sat down next to Frisk.

That was amazing! Frisk signed happily.

"Thank you." Chara smiled. After the rest of the group went, Linda addressed the auditioners.

"The list will be up tomorrow after school. Have a nice day."

The kids all left, and Frisk and Chara were picked up by Toriel.

"How did the audition go?" Toriel asked.

"Pretty well for me, but they didn't let Frisk audition. Linda completely overrode both Papyrus and Mettaton's objections, and refused to let them audition." Chara said.

"What?" Toriel looked at them in shock.

"It's because they don't like talking." Chara explained.

It's uncomfortable. Frisk signed. I prefering signing.

"I don't think I've ever heard you talk either." Toriel sighed.

"Linda said that there's no point in even auditioning if they can't talk or speak." Chara said.

"Well, Linda's an inconsiderate b-witch." Toriel corrected herself. "I'm going to have to talk to her about this." Frisk nodded, wiping away a tear.


Chara sighed, sitting up in their room with Frisk, sitting across from them.

"Hey Frisk, I got an idea." Chara said. "You don't have to do it if you don't want to, it'd just be a good idea to dunk Linda." Frisk sat up.

I'm all ears. Frisk signed.

"Okay, so first…" Chara said, and then switched to sign language. You need to sign up for stage tech. Frisk nodded. Chara explained the rest.

Are you okay with that? We can disregard it if you don't want to do it.

No, I want to. Let's dunk Linda! Frisk smiled and softly punched their fist into the other hand.

"Alright, it's a plan." Chara and Frisk fist bumped. "Now, what are we going to do about Alice and her dad?"

Well, It should be handled in court. Frisk said.

"Yeah, but I can't help but worry." Chara replied. "I mean, Mom was right. If he could hit his own child, what else could he do?" Suddenly, they got a thought. It was a small, yet horrific thought, and it honestly scared the crap out of them and made their blood go cold to think it.

Chara? Are you okay? Frisk frowned, tapping the bed.

"I just got a horrible thought. Think about it. Paul's obviously a sociopath. He ditched Alice at the age of five to go who knows where, and her mother was out of the picture. Alice said herself that her mother and Paul were arguing and it just suddenly went quiet."

So what are you saying?

"There's a huge part of the case missing. I need to ask Sans what Paul's LV is. Or at least, how to check it so that I can see it myself." Chara said. "Or I can ask Flowey or Alphys. Flowey has Determination, so he might know."


"You want to know what?" Flowey asked as Chara and Frisk were sitting on either side of him. Frisk had grabbed some markers and started drawing on his pot.

"How to check LV." Chara said. "You must know how to do it, don't you?"

"Erm, yes I do." Flowey looked away. "But why should I tell you!?"

"Because if you don't, then there's a huge part of the case we're missing." Chara explained. "You see, Paul has the mindset of a sociopath. Keeping that in mind, go back over Alice's story."

"Hmm..Alice's parents argued a lot. Alice was in her room when an arguement was going on and it suddenly went silent...You don't think that-" Flowey's petals flattened back in shock.

"I do. I think Paul killed his wife." Chara said. Frisk stopped drawing and looked at Chara in shock.

That's a bit extreme. Frisk signed.

"Not everyone's a pacifist, Frisk. This is why I wanted to destroy humans." Chara retorted. "These kind of people, the kind of people like Paul, were the only people I knew. They were the people that-" Chara shook their head, not wanting to reopen old wounds. "The point is, you may have gone through without killing anyone, but I guarantee that there are many people who would have killed. Over and over and over, just for the fun of it." Frisk shivered at Chara's words. "All humans have Determination. They would have reset over and over and over, and gone through killing over and over and over." Frisk covered their ears. Chara then realized how uncomfortable they were. "Sorry." Frisk slowly uncovered their ears.

"Alright." Flowey shook out his petals. "So first, you want to black out your eyes. I think you can, you're not a human after all." Chara nodded. They had done this multiple times with Sans. They blacked out their eyes, leaving everything a duller version of their colors. "Then, you want to look at a person. Decide in your head who you want to judge. Use Frisk as an example."

"Whoa." Chara looked at Frisk, who they suddenly saw in black and white. Their stats were written in a golden color.

FRISK

LV 1 20/20 HP

"That's cool!" Chara said, blinking their eyes to get out of it.

"You can use that on anyone." Flowey said. Chara did the same to see Flowey's.

FLOWEY

LV ? ?/? HP

"Yeah, my levels are weird because I don't have a soul." Flowey muttered.

"Alright. Let's go find Paul and try it out on him." Chara stood up and picked up Frisk.

"Wait! That might be dangerous." Flowey said. "You need a legitimate excuse to see him."

"You're right. What if we went to tell Sans?"

"You'd have to ask Toriel to take you." Flowey pointed out.

"Not neccesarily." Chara said. "I could teleport."

"You still need to let her kow where you're going." Flowey said.

"What she doesn't know won't hurt her." Chara retorted.

"That's a horrible idea." Flowey warned. "Look, Sans is in jail, Frisk is being discriminated against because Linda won't even let them try out for background dancers. Plus some other stuff." Flowey looked away. "She doesn't need to stress out over you just disappearing."

"Okay, what 'other' stuff?" Chara asked.

"She'll tell you when she's ready." Flowey retorted. "I'm not sure myself."

"But what do you think it is?" Chara pressed. "I'm just gonna ask Mom myself if you won't tell me."

"No! Don't do that!" Flowey sat up.

"I'm going." Chara stood up and walked upstairs. "Hey mom?"

"Yes, my child?" Toriel asked.

"Do you mind if I go visit Sans?" Chara asked.

"Go ahead. Would you like me to take you?"

"No, I can teleport. You're stressed out, you need to rest." Chara noticed that she was a bit different.

Is my mom pregnant?

"Alright, thank you, my child. I'm going to lay down. Just let me know if you need anything." Toriel said, laying down on the bed.

"Okay, Mom." Chara said, closing the door behind them.

"Okay, I got permission from mom to go." Chara said. "Frisk's in charge."

"Wait, you're going alone?" Flowey asked.

"Yep." Chara said, teleporting away.

"Hello, may I see Sans Dreemurr?" Chara asked.

"Sure, kid." The guard shrugged and went to go get Sans as Chara went into the room.

"Heya, kiddo." Sans greeted them. "What'cha need?"

"I wanted to ask you about Paul. Do you know anything else about him?"

"Yes I do." Sans frowned.

"Like high LV or something?"

"Actually, yes." Sans said. "he's at LV 5."

"That's what I thought. I think he killed his wife."

"You too?" Sans blinked. "I just started wondering that myself."

"How are we going to bring this up in court?" Chara asked.

"I think we can ask Chad and Shannon to look up his cases. I mean, if both him and Alice's mother went missing, he might have been arrested for it." Sans suggested.

"That's a good idea." Chara said. "I can call them and ask."

"They're supposed to come talk with me sometime today. I can ask then." Sans shrugged.

"Alright." Chara said.


Somewhere, back in the deep, dark abyss, he laid. Eyes closed, repenting his sins.

The process of putting his body back was almost ready. Then, he could procede.

He knew what was going to happen. That would fail, and they would both be gone.

But not if he had anything to do with it.

He owned him that much, after all. He knew that it was too weak to live long. It would take much of the power, and then it would kill the owner of that power as well.

He could help repay through it.

But, he knew that it would be a while. So he prepared.

He called out in a strange tongue, feeling the creature murmur back. A smile was brought to his face.

I can't wait to see her.