"The anguish-inspiring character of death signifies the need which man has for anguish. Without this need, death would seem easy to him. Man, dying poorly, distances himself from nature, engenders an illusory, human world fashioned for art: we live in the tragic world, in the false atmosphere of which "tragedy" is the completed form. Nothing is tragic for the animal, which doesn't fall into the trap of the self. It is in this tragic, artificial world, that ecstasy arises. Without a single doubt, all object of ecstasy is created by art." - George Bataille, 'Inner Experience'
Papyrus was grieving. No explanation was needed; Sans already had done enough for Papyrus to figure the rest out for himself, leaving the youngest disillusioned with his elder brother. The crushing heartache that bore on his chest encumbered Papyrus as he drowned in his own regrets, seeking retribution for his fall from grace.
The length of this cycle of death and suffering was yet to be determined. To Sans's knowledge, the child's determination still knows no bounds—an admirable attribute and a deadly character flaw, all in one. If only Frisk had fought back the urge to search for alternate routes, Sans wouldn't have turned out such an esoteric nihilist, poorly understood even by the one monster closest to him (at least my jokes were still hits with the Underground crowd, thought Sans). His younger brother's existence out of the many godforsaken timelines brought him respite.
But not for long.
The doting profoundness between the duo was fading away. Their japes are nothing more than a distant memory. Sans's facetious remarks—which annoyed Papyrus daily—turned out to be a sham. Papyrus's light-hearted nagging, along with the high standards he set himself to, have been broken down, failing to be a role model for his insincere brother. Their altercations from past battles brought on a rift between them; the dire consequence of their inability to empathize with one another in the face of very gory adversity—it's enough to numb the strongest of behemoths. Such conflicted feelings carried onto the next LOAD and beyond. Their descent from harmony clearly pleased the human so. How they could recompense for the damage dealt to their psyches, let alone truly look each other in the face, blights them with worry and dread. What would it take for the two to reconcile? To find that strength, the tenacity, the unity they had the first few dozen times? Coming to terms with the situation would be the first step in ending the human's ambition to end their world—to let Sans and Papyrus be—once and for all.
Somehow, they had to atone for their sins. One of them just wanted to stop caring altogether; not much of a difference from previous timelines. The youngest felt disgusted with his elder brother and was having difficulty adapting to his newfound independence. Yet, Papyrus and Sans held on firmly to hope (hope that they will get over this latest mental obstacle); to compassion—their combined empathy could bring them far; to love—accomplishing what was once thought to be impossible through the mere power it held, the power that let Papyrus survive the slaughter. With so many dead in the Underground, what better time than to rely on each other? To trust each other? To, perhaps, even fight together with a new sense of resolve, without succumbing to ever-lasting pessimism for their future? To have hope for the future?
The circumstances, at this present moment, kept them (almost) resolutely mute, still as statues in thoughtful solitude. Their eyes met the ground in self-disgust.
". . . BROTHER?" Papyrus timidly shook Sans's shoulder. He needed Sans's undivided attention, for a start. Their feelings could not go unspoken for much longer. Papyrus knew better now; his brother admires him like no other. Sans is my biggest fan! How could I ever forget? Papyrus couldn't. They both couldn't.
Despite it all, Papyrus was still him.
". . . SANS?"
No response.
Papyrus sighed sadly. "HOW MUCH LONGER CAN THIS TAKE," he lamented. "I DON'T KNOW IF I CAN KEEP GOING LIKE THIS. IT HURTS . . . SO BAD. MY SOUL IS WOUNDED. I DON'T KNOW HOW LONG I WILL LAST.
"I DON'T KNOW HOW YOU HAVE LASTED AS LONG AS YOU DID."
I don't want to kill my friend. I don't want to lose what Sans and I have.
I don't want to lose anybody.
"SANS, PLEASE," begged Papyrus. "SPEAK TO ME! SAY SOMETHING! ANYTHING . . ."
Sans mumbled, ". . . something . . . anything . . ."
Papyrus resisted the urge to groan at his brother, and grinned. "NOW THAT'S MORE LIKE IT!"
"anytime pap," said Sans, staring morosely at the ground.
It was clear to Papyrus that Sans was not up to talking about much of anything. Papyrus was there for him for all the wrong reasons—fighting and killing. One does not need a brother to do either of the two. His focus on the end goal ignored Papyrus's moral dilemma. Sans felt that Papyrus's change was his punishment for his selfish intentions.
Well then, we'll just have to forgive each other our trespasses, won't we? I will get us out of this hole of self-loathing, put us on the straight and narrow, and have one goal in mind: peace in unity until the day we die! Circumstances be damned, we are brothers!
Determined and whole, Papyrus cleared his throat. "ARE— ARE YOU READY?" he asked.
"ready as i'll ever be, bro."
Papyrus grunted in agreement, but would not be deterred. "SANS, YOU SOUND SO DEAD INSIDE."
"what'd ya know, pap," Sans responded, deadpan. "inside and out. i finally made it."
"DON'T SPEAK THAT WAY NOW, BROTHER!" said Papyrus in admonishment. "I DON'T LIKE IT. WHY CAN'T WE JUST START OVER?"
"we did," Sans said dryly with a glance at Papyrus, "and look where it got us."
"IF YOU INSIST."
Papyrus looked back into his tired eyes, and spontaneously took Sans into his arms. "SEE? AREN'T WE THE BEST? OF COURSE, I'M CLEARLY THE GREATEST. AND YOU, WELL— YOU COULD USE A LITTLE IMPROVEMENT. BUT YOU ARE STILL YOU! AND I'M OKAY WITH THAT, BROTHER. EVEN IF THE OTHER SIDE OF YOU WORRIES ME TO NO END, I KNOW DEEP DOWN, THERE IS ALWAYS GOOD IN YOU! YOU NEVER ABANDONED IT. I BEG YOU, SANS, TO SPEAK UP! DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE.
"I'M TIRED OF FEELING ALONE, TOO, SANS," sighed Papyrus. "AND YOU KNOW WHAT? IF WE ARE BOTH ALONE, LET'S BE ALONE! TOGETHER! IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO MOVE ON AND PUT A STOP TO THIS NONSENSE. WE ARE BROTHERS! ARE WE NOT? NOT STRANGERS! SO PLEASE, DON'T ACT LIKE ONE. YOU ARE BETTER THAN THIS, SANS! I— I WILL FIGHT ALONGSIDE YOU FOREVER IF IT MEANS I HAVE YOU WITH ME, TILL THE END OF TIME! TILL OUR UNIVERSE FALLS APART AND NEVER RECUPERATES!"
Sans brightened up a little. "really bro? are you serious?"
"ABSOLUTELY! HOW COULD I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, NOT HELP SOMEONE IN NEED OF ASSISTANCE? ESPECIALLY WHEN THAT SOMEONE HAPPENS TO BE YOU, MY DEAR BROTHER! IT WILL TAKE TIME TO COME TO TERMS WITH, BUT I'M SURE WITH ENOUGH . . . PRACTICE"—Papyrus said the word with distaste—"I WILL BE ACCUSTOMED TO THIS KIND OF HELL— I MEAN, HELP!"
Sans's glum look diminished completely, as he began to accept Papyrus's unconditional embrace, hugging him back. "heh. this is pretty hellish, papyrus."
Papyrus grimaced. "YOU ARE TOO RIGHT ABOUT THAT."
"talking about hell, pap," Sans plopped down from Papyrus's arms, facing the human once again, "here they come."
The footsteps stopped at a fair distance away from the skeletons.
"hmm," hummed Sans, "that expression . . . that's the expression of someone who has died one hundred and six times in a row."
"ONE HAS TO WONDER," said Papyrus thoughtfully, "WHAT HAPPENS AFTER A WHOPPING ONE HUNDRED AND SIX! SANS?"
The hollowness of Sans' eye-sockets were telling. "how about we find out?"
Frisk was pulled into the air, their SOUL enchanted blue by Sans.
Then the birds outside stopped chirping.
"WE ARE NEAR, HUMAN—"
"—near you, closing in."
"HANDLED ALREADY, HUMAN, SUFFERING WHAT YOU SUFFERED—"
"—as though the body of each of us were your body, human."
Papyrus diverted his gaze to the golden window, wistful for a time that never was.
Standing on the precipice of Mt. Ebott, staring out at a setting sun as dusk embraced his friends and the only family he ever had . . . .
The reflective, lustrous glass distinguished the spitting image of himself; the destruction of his immaculate virtue incarnate, shadows worn into his skeletal face.
With a glint in his eyes, Papyrus said, impassioned: "BEG, HUMAN—!"
"—beg to us for forgiveness!" followed Sans with a cry.
"We are near," they incanted.
"WEARY WE GO TO YOU—"
"—confront you as we bend over backwards."
"TO LIVE WE CONFRONT YOU, HUMAN!"
"we saw the blood, human—"
"—IT WAS WHAT YOU SHED."
"it always gleamed, human—"
"—IT WAS GLITTERING!"
A distinct blink—whorls of magic mingled and crackled in the air, the pressure phenomenal. Their auras glimmered like distant stars.
"your eyes and mouth are void, forever empty—" the human, still held aloft by Sans, looked on in horror as they choked, Papyrus's eyes flaring like the setting sun "—IT CAST YOUR IMAGE INTO OUR EYES FOREVER, HUMAN!"
"We saw your image!"
Papyrus commenced; he unveiled an array of bones, pushing forth from the ground and the ceiling, imprisoning the human as their attempt to jump out of the way failed.
"we went and fought you, human—!"
Sans took control of the human's SOUL, throwing them onto the piercing bones, back and forth. Frisk was wildly launched to the opposite side of the corridor.
"—WE WENT AND DANCED OUR TERRIBLE DANCE!"
Papyrus evoked a labyrinth of his own as the human's magic-induced vertigo impaired their sense of balance, traversing at a wayward speed.
"we saw the blood, human! you served us—"
Sans readied his blasters from all sides. The crashing battered the human greatly, leaving them at the mercy—or the lack thereof—of Sans's blasters.
"—AND WE DRANK IT WITH OUR EYES!"
The maws came from each corner, each side, each angle, each direction at an inconsistent sequence, the cacophony shattering the sun-lit windows.
"We saw your image!"
An ominous sizzling sensation disintegrated and burned their skin, the smell inducing the bile at the back of their throat to be vomited.
PEW! PEW!
"WE WENT—!"
CRASH!
"—and bent—!"
BANG!
"—AND CONVULSED!"
BOOM!
"WE—SAW—YOUR—IMAGE!"
Frisk's efforts to maneuver themselves out of the merciless onslaught from the relentless, dauntless skeletons were an absolute waste. Their body made known the extent of their trauma. Broken, sedated and worn from all sorts of maladies, their mind vacated elsewhere; the light of Frisk's pupils dimmed out of fear from the sheer shock of tandem power. The human came to a bleak conclusion as they lay there dying.
Sans's blasters are too irregular, yet coordinated with cool precision. Papyrus's attacks are. . . beautifully magnificent, said the pleased voice of Chara. So who killed me this time?
Does it matter? thought Frisk as they welcomed their end, their clothes bloodied and in burnt tatters.
"We saw your image, human," the whispering echoes of Sans and Papyrus resounded in their ears, "and we drank it with our eyes."
With a faint celebratory shout of 'One hundred and six!' everything turned black.
"Beg, human—we are near . . ."
Author's Note:
Poem 'Tenebrae' adapted by me for the use of this story; poem originally written by holocaust survivor/poet Paul Celan.
The original 'Tenebrae':
We are near, Lord,
near and at hand.
Handled already, Lord,
clawed and clawing as though
the body of each of us were
your body, Lord.
Pray, Lord,
pray to us,
we are near.
Wind-awry we went there,
went there to bend
over hollow and ditch.
To be watered we went there, Lord.
It was blood, it was
what you shed, Lord.
It gleamed.
It cast your image into our eyes, Lord.
Our eyes and our mouths are open and empty, Lord.
We have drunk, Lord.
The blood and the image that was in the blood, Lord.
Pray, Lord.
We are near.