Hello, everyone! Jack of Knaves here, and welcome back to Interlopers! You know, given everyone's reaction to that first chapter, this may shape up to become my finest work yet! Truly, this is my chance to be a big shot!
Now then, looking through the reviews and comments, I noticed that people had some questions, and I'd like to take a moment to answer those questions.
First off, yes, the Fun Gang is fresh off a not-so-fun Snowgrave Route, which means that Noelle is responsible for turning several innocent Darkners, as well as Berdly, into ice sculptures. While the guilt of this weighs quite heavily on Noelle's mind, Kris, although he's got his own feelings of guilt, writes off Berdly's fate as an accident, or self-defense at worst, as he told Berdly to let him and Noelle proceed, as in, he told Berdly to get out of the way, but Berdly took it the wrong way and attacked the both of them, Naturally, the guilt that Kris and Noelle feel about their roles in Berdly's death will play a part in this fic at some point, but where that is exactly is yet to be determined. Most likely when Frisk vows to kill Betty and his LV hits 19, but I'm not certain yet, as I'm developing this on the fly.
Also, while I am indeed aware that Darkners need the Fountain of Darkness in their world in order to avoid being turned to stone, I would also like to point out that Ralsei seems to be exempt from this rule, as he seems to be able to run around the Cyber's World without becoming a decidedly not-so-fluffy paperweight just fine, so following that logic, Ralsei should be just fine running around the Underground and/or the Surface in this fic.
Furthermore, Kris, Noelle, and Susie's abilities have been altered due to the means of dimensional travel used, i.e. being yanked from their universe by a glitch with Sans' machine. One such ability is being able to switch from their normal appearance to their "Delta Forms" (aka their Dark World appearances) at will, as well as these forms now providing a variety of augmentations to Kris, Noelle, and Susie.
Also, due to being both Chara AND Frisk from an alternate world, Kris has both of their skills and abilities, as well as a few unique ones of his own, such as X-Slash, and is as powerful as the two of them combined. While this might seem like I'm making Kris stupidly overpowered, one must remember that this version of Kris is also the Roaring Knight, which means that these abilities will ultimately prove to be a formidable challenge for our heroes to overcome, especially considering that the Knight is also slated to be combining forces (and becoming romantically involved) with Betty Noire.
Speaking of romance, I feel I should mention that, while Kris is in love with Noelle, Noelle still has the hots for Susie. Unfortunately for Noelle, Susie doesn't see Noelle in that light, plus she harbors feelings for Lancer. What I'm trying to accomplish here is a natural shift of Noelle's affections from Susie to Kris, rather than being cheap and forcing the Kriselle ship into existence when clearly Noelle has feelings for someone else throughout Chapter Two, and this is set after that on the Deltarune front.
Oh! And before I forget, allow me to introduce my new co-author on this endeavor. Goes by the handle of Diamond Ninja. I've seen some of his work in the Discord server we're both in, and he's pretty good. With his help, I am certain this project will become something great!
Now then, I think that covers all I wanted to go over, so without further ado, let's get this show on the road!
Chapter Two
The Fun Gang
The Underground-Snowdin-Sans' And Papyrus' House
Susie groaned as consciousness returned to her. Her vision was fuzzy, but she could see a wood ceiling. She was lying on something cold and hard. It only took her a moment to realize that she was lying on the floor in somebody else's house.
Sitting bolt upright and quickly looking around, Susie was partially relieved to find that her friends, the human Kris Dreemurr, the bipedal reindeer Noelle Holiday, and the Prince from the Dark World, Ralsei, were lying nearby. However, that still begged the question of where the hell they all were, and more importantly, why were she, Kris, and Noelle back in their Light World clothes?
Susie reached over to Kris and started shaking him awake. "Kris, Kris, wake up!" she growled.
"No, wasn't me, didn't eat the pie this time, not guilty, I plead the fifth…" the human boy muttered as he returned to the realm of waking, and quickly came to realize that not only was Susie the one who woke him up, but that the place where he currently found himself was not the last place he remembered being. "Uh… Susie? Where the hell are we? We're not in our Dark World outfits, so this isn't the Dark World… but, this place obviously is not the Computer Lab, let alone the Public Library…"
"First off, that's my line," said Susie. "Secondly, I have no idea where the hell we are, and third, we're not the only ones who made the trip here to scenic who-knows-where," she said, jerking her head towards where Ralsei and Noelle were currently lying unconscious.
Kris breathed a sigh of relief when he saw his good, fluffy friend and the reindeer monster that he had been neighbours with for as long as he could remember, were okay from the looks of things.
Kris frowned as a cold feeling of dread passed through him… Noelle might look okay on the outside… but was she okay on the inside? She had mentioned that she wasn't feeling well after that… presence… within himself that he had been feeling for the past few days had gotten him to pressure Noelle into that Snowgrave spell… a spell that Noelle didn't even know until she had used it to freeze Berdly in a block of ice. The fact that this strange presence that Kris felt within himself knew about a spell that not even Noelle herself knew until it, through him, pressured her into using it… made Kris feel uneasy on a number of levels.
Okay, I'll be honest, I feel as guilty as you do about what we made Noelle do to Berdly, the fact that it gave that living meme Spamton the chance he needed to rise to power and that we more than likely tainted Noelle's pure soul notwithstanding... Damn salesman nearly killed us both before I called out to Noelle for help, a small voice that Kris associated with the presence, whispered in the back of his head. But, be honest, Kris, was Berdly REALLY trying to protect Noelle from you? Last time I checked, he was attacking both you AND Noelle. If he was really trying to protect her, why didn't he just fight you one-on-one?
The presence made a thoughtful hum. You know, now that I think about it, considering the fact that birdbrain was attacking both of you, a case COULD be made that what happened to him was self-defense on yours and Noelle's part, the presence reasoned before heaving a sigh. Look, I won't tell you what to tell her, but you need to talk to her about what happened, and get that Thorn Ring away from her. We need Noelle to be in the right mindset, and she needs to be in possession of all her marbles, especially if we are where I think we are… and if that's the case, then which version is it…? Don't think it's Errortale, thank god… and is the kid doing a Pacifist, Neutral, or, god forbid, a Genocide run? Either way, we should be okay… just as long as HE doesn't try to take the controls from me again…
Kris was pulled out of the presence's musings by the sound of Noelle and Ralsei waking up from their slumber. Pulling themselves up off the ground, Kris and Susie made their way over to Noelle and Ralsei, concern evident on their faces as they came to their friends' aid.
"Hey, there, you guys all right?" asked Kris as he knelt beside Noelle and helped her up, while Susie helped Ralsei up.
"Y-yeah, I'm fine, Kris…" Noelle said as her consciousness slowly started to return to her before she realized the place she found herself wasn't the last place she remembered being. "Um, Kris…? Where exactly are we? This doesn't look like the Computer Lab…"
"If I had to guess, I'd say we're in somebody's house… but the real mystery is how we got here." Ralsei said thoughtfully.
"Well, I think it's a safe bet we're not in the Dark World anymore, considering Susie, Noelle, and I are back in our Light Word clothes…" Kris said thoughtfully as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a mechanical pencil. "Dammit! Our weapons have turned back into useless Light World items…"
"Whoa, now, what's this about a Light World?" a familiar voice from nearby.
Kris, Susie, Noelle, and Ralsei turned to see a familiar-looking skeleton with a perpetual grin wearing a blue hoodie, black shorts, and fluffy pink slippers. Deciding to put on a friendly face, Kris smiled at the familiar skeleton.
"Nice to see you again, Sans… is this your house?" the human asked the skeleton.
"Nice to see you too, kid… even though we've never met before," the skeleton, Sans, said before blinking a couple times. "Whoa… gettin' a touch of the old deja vu… like you and me have had this conversation before… weird… anyways, yeah, this is mine and my brother's place, and I got some friends over who've got some questions for you guys…"
Sans then poked his head out the door and hollered "Hey, guys! Our guests are awake now! Get up here!"
A few moments later, a very unusual group of characters appeared in the room. What seemed to be a talking flower emerged from the ground, a stern glare on its face indicating that it didn't exactly trust the new arrivals, while entering through the door into the room was a rather tall skeleton similar to Sans with two fractures on his skull, one leading up from his right eye, while the second led downward from his left eye. His head looked a bit like an egg, and he had a pair of holes in his hands and wore a black long coat with a dark grey turtleneck underneath, brown pants, and black dress shoes. Accompanying the skeleton was what was unmistakably another human boy around the same age as Kris with tan skin and shoulder-length black hair wearing a blue and indigo sweater, brown pants, and black shoes.
Upon seeing this human, Susie leaned over to Kris and muttered, "Long-lost relative of yours, Kris?"
"Not that I'm aware of…" Kris replied. However, despite this, Kris couldn't help but feel some sort of connection to the other human, like he knew this other human intimately, despite the fact that this was the first time Kris had met him.
"So, where are we?" Susie asked, pulling Kris out of his thoughts.
"My house," Sans replied with a confused look and a shrug.
"Yeah, we kinda figured that out but… how did we get here?" Susie pressed.
"It's a long story. But, the short of it is, you arrived through my machine. It's supposed to pull people from the Void, like I did with Gaster." he gestured to the taller skeleton nearby. "I'm not sure how you got here, but it made some weird popping noises and you four tumbled out. Are you from the Void?" asked Sans. The confused looks on their faces clearly said no. "Well then, where are you from?"
"We come from Hometown. You know, here. I've seen your house before, and we've even talked once before," Kris said.
Sans shrugged. "Only humans we've ever seen down here are Frisk and Chara, but we don't talk about Chara for… certain reasons," he said as he gestured to the other human.
"Down here?" Susie's eyebrows knitted together as she crossed her arms and frowned "Where is 'down here'?"
"The Underground. More specifically, Snowdin," Sans said nonchalantly.
Kris raced to the window, with Susie, Noelle and Ralsei in pursuit. They looked out and saw a snowy trail meandering by the house, with a snowy forest beyond. Further down the trail was a town, and several different monsters walking around. In fact, unless his eyes were playing tricks on him, a very strong possibility all things considered, Kris thought he saw another Susie hanging out with a clam girl that neither he nor Susie had ever seen before in their lives.
Kris stepped back, his mind racing about a thousand miles an hour. "I don't understand… We've seen this house before. In Hometown, it was autumn there, not winter! I'm not crazy, right?" Kris said as he looked at Noelle and Susie for support. They nodded.
Sans shrugged again. "This is my house, and as far as I'm aware it's the only one of its kind."
The taller skeleton, Gaster, stepped forward. "Perhaps where they're from, there is another of this house, and another version of you, Sans. Perhaps they're not from the Void, but perhaps, they're from… another dimension."
Sans crossed his arms. "Do they exist? Other dimensions, I mean?" he asked, sounding skeptical.
"Other timelines within our own dimension exist, do they not? I wouldn't say it is too far of a stretch for other dimensions to exist aside from our own," reasoned Gaster. "As a matter of fact, the Void could very well be considered another dimension itself. Perhaps the reason for our young friends' arrival in our dimension lies hidden in that theory…" he said before letting out a small chuckle. "Apologies, I just realized… We have neglected to introduce ourselves. I am Doctor W. D. Gaster, the, ah… former Royal Scientist who has been away for quite a lengthy period of time. Pleased to make your acquaintances."
Sans nodded, his smile as wide and beaming as ever. "I'm Sans. Sans the Skeleton. But, then you knew that already," he said.
"I'm Frisk. Just Frisk," the human, Frisk, said with a smile.
"Howdy! I'm Flowey! Flowey the Flower!" the small yellow flower said, a bright and friendly smile on his face.
Kris frowned at Flowey and stared at him for a moment. The teenage human didn't know why exactly, but he felt like he knew this flower from somewhere… and that he had been very close with it, but, Kris was pretty sure that he'd remember being best friends with a talking flower… assuming his father didn't try to either put it on display at his flower shop or scream about demon flowers and try to kill it with fire.
The presence within Kris chuckled. Oh, you are going to be so surprised when you find out who he really is… it said within Kris' mind.
"Nice to meet you guys," Kris said with a smile. "I'm Kris Dreemurr, and these are my friends, Susie, Ralsei, and Noelle," Kris said, gesturing to each of his friends in turn. Flowey, Frisk and Sans' eyes widened as Kris said his last name.
"Dreemurr?" Frisk spoke softly. "But… that's…"
"The royal surname," Flowey finished.
"Well, well, well!" Susie said with a smirk. "Congratulations on your ascension, your Highness," she said as she took a bow before Kris, her smirk growing ever more devious. "You know… now that you're a certified Prince and all, you and Ralsei can finally hook up! Heh heh heh!"
The results were instantaneous. Ralsei turned beet red and suddenly started looking anxious while Noelle struggled to contain her laughter and an embarrassed look crossed Kris' face.
"Oh, come on, Susie! We've talked about this! While I admit that Ralsei is indeed a very cute and fluffy boy, you know I don't swing that way!" the teenage human said, embarrassment in his voice. "Moving on," Kris said, clearly eager to change the conversation. "I had a question."
"Shoot." Frisk said with a nod.
"You mentioned Chara. Who's Chara?" asked Kris.
Frisk's face clouded. "Chara… was a friend of mine. Sort of. But he's become some kind of demon. He took my determination," Frisk held up his hollow soul, eliciting a gasp from Kris. "And is now trying to do… something. We don't know."
Kris blinked as the presence within him spoke up again. "Yep, that settles it, we're in the Glitchtale AU… but, then that means… oh, crap… we gotta deal with HER, don't we?"
"Chara… took your determination?" Kris said aloud, tuning out the presence. "Jeez. How?"
"A machine. A determination extractor," explained Frisk, while a guilty look crossed Gaster's face for a moment.
"So what do we do?" Ralsei cut in. "How do we stop him?"
"Something tells me pacification is off the table…" Kris muttered.
"And I'm not certain my ice magic can do much to a demon…" Noelle muttered, causing an alarmed look to cross Kris' face as a particular memory crossed his mind.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a minute," Susie interrupted, a serious look on her face. "Kris, Noelle, Ralsei, can we talk in private for a moment?" Susie led the rest of her friends into a corner.
"What did you want to talk about?" Kris asked.
"Why are you guys worrying about them? We're in another dimension, for Angel's sake! We need to figure out how to get home!" said Susie.
"Susie, these people are in danger!" Ralsei cut in. "We can't leave!"
"They seem capable, I'm sure they could do it by themselves. And besides, what if we get embroiled in this and never get home? What if another fountain is created in our world and we aren't there to seal it?"
"Wait, what?" Noelle asked as she looked between her friends in confusion. "What are you talking about?"
"Nothing that concerns you right now, Noelle. Can you go talk to Frisk? You and I will talk in a little bit," said Kris.
Noelle looked a bit sad about being left out. Kris turned back to the group, a guilty look on his face as he heaved a sigh.
"I feel we should stay. We don't even know how to leave, and besides, something about Frisk and that flower… maybe we can learn something here that can help us in the future, especially if we go up against that Knight guy that's been mentioned a couple times in our adventures. And besides… no one, not even that prophecy, said our jobs as legendary heroes stopped at the borders of our dimension," Kris said firmly.
Susie looked down pensively. "You're probably right. I just don't like that we're so far away from home," she said gruffly.
Ralsei went to put his hand on Susie's shoulder, but as he was too short, he put his hand on her arm instead.
"I'm nervous too, Susie. But we can't dwell on it. We need to focus on something we can do, which is to help these people. Maybe when Frisk regains control over the timeline we can go back," Ralsei reasoned.
Kris nodded agreement. "Yeah… hopefully…" he muttered as he and his friends returned to Noelle and the others.
"All right, the others and I were talking things over, and we've decided to help you guys stop Chara," Kris said. "But, before we head out, we need two things, the first being that Susie, Noelle, Ralsei, and I need weapons to defend ourselves with," said Kris. "Susie likes axes, Ralsei uses… scarfs… Noelle uses rings and I like swords."
"Not to worry, I'm sure I can whip something up," Gaster said.
"Thank you, doctor. The second thing, however, is something I need to talk to Noelle about, in private," Kris said, an expression on his face that showed that he would not entertain an argument on this matter.
A spark of nervousness ran through Noelle, caused by the look on Kris' face. "O-okay," she said before following Kris outside. With a single look at each other, Frisk, Sans, Flowey, and Susie made a beeline over to the window, all of them intent on eavesdropping on Kris and Noelle, while Ralsei heaved a sigh, pressing his hand against his forehead, while Gaster chuckled and shook his head before walking to begin work on the new arrivals' new weapons.
Outside The House…
"A-all right, Kris, what did you want to talk to me about?" asked Noelle, although a suspicion was lurking in the back of her mind.
Kris sighed. "I wanted to talk about… what happened to Berdly... you know what happened in the Dark World wasn't a dream, right? I mean, how could it possibly be a dream, considering we've been sent to, of all things, an alternate universe?"
Noelle gasped, her suspicions confirmed, as a horrified look on her face appeared, tears starting to form in her eyes. "Th-then... what I did to Berdly... that was... oh my Angel, what have I done?!" she cried, sobbing into her hands.
"Hey, hey, none of that," Kris said, grabbing Noelle's hands and rubbing his thumbs across them in comforting circles. "Look at me, Noelle," Kris said, the utmost seriousness in his voice.
Slowly, Noelle's tear-soaked eyes rose to meet Kris' crimson ones. "Look, Noelle… what happened to Berdly... it was an accident, okay?" Kris said firmly. "At worst, it was self-defense. I had asked Berdly to allow the two of us to proceed, and stand aside, but instead of letting us pass, he chose to attack us. Remember, Berdly wasn't just attacking me, he was attacking you too. If he truly wanted to protect you, why didn't just attack me and me alone? What kind of friend does that?" Kris reasoned as Noelle sniffled.
"I'll be honest, I feel as terrible as you do about what happened to Berdly… but, at the end of the day, what happened to him was an accident, or at worst, self-defense. Do you understand?" Kris said firmly, to which Noelle nodded, pulling her hands out of Kris' and wiping away her tears.
"Y-yeah… I understand, Kris… it was an accident," Noelle sniffled sadly.
"Good…" Kris said with a nod. "Now, with that being said, we can't take the risk of that happening again. So, I'm gonna need that Thorn Ring back. It was only after Spamton sold us that thing that you were able to use Snowgrave after all, right?" Kris said, a serious look on his face.
"Y-yeah, sure. G-guess this is why you asked Doctor Gaster if he could make me a new weapon too, huh?" Noelle said as she grabbed ahold of the Thorn Ring and, with a decent amount of effort and pain that was clearly etched on her face, pulled it off her finger, although there was a decent cut on her finger from where the Thorn Ring had been, with some blood leaking from it onto the ground, and handed it to Kris.
"All right, now let's head back inside, and get that finger of yours taken care of," said Kris as he put the ring in his pocket and turned to walk back into the house.
Noelle nodded. "Okay," she said, before following Kris back into the house, doing her best to ignore the dull throbbing on her ring finger from where the Thorn Ring had been.
As well as the feeling of her sins crawling on her back that Noelle knew, in her heart of hearts, still existed, even with Kris' reassurances...
And thus concludes Chapter Two! I hope my co-author and I did a pretty good job overall. If you liked what you saw here, then be sure to fave, follow, review, and make sure to join us next time as Frisk and the Fun Gang square off against Chara Dreemurr! See you then!