Chapter 14

The annual festival was in full swing. When the first year of living under Mt. Ebott started to come to a close, some monsters had the idea to have a small festival honoring those who lost their lives during the Human and Monster War, celebrating that they were still alive, and hoping for the day they could see the sun again. The event was so popular, those same monsters hosted the festival the next year, and then the next. By the time the fourth year rolled around, most of the monsters under the mountain expected these festivals to be the norm, and some offered to help plan and prepare. Seeing this as an opportunity to teach the future generations that were being born Underground the history of their people, the newly king Asgore declared these festivals as annual holidays.

This festival was something Asriel had been waiting to show Chara for weeks. There was cotton candy to be eaten and games to be played. Some monsters even dressed up as humans, which was Asriel's favorite part.

With Asgore still being sick, Toriel went to Waterfall castle by herself to give the opening ceremony speech. However, the kids were promised to go to the festival as soon as Toriel returned home. Asriel was excited until he learned that he and Chara would be going with Merla and Toriel and Asgore would be joining them much later.

As displeased as he was with the situation, Asriel did not voice any complaints. It was his and Chara's fault that Asgore was sick. He should have been grateful that his parents were letting Chara and him go ahead of them to enjoy the festival instead of waiting for their parents to be ready to go themselves.

"Now this is a castle!" Chara exclaimed under his breath when Merla and the children rode up to the Dreemurr's Waterfall home. He adjusted himself so he could sit on his knees and look directly out the window.

"Stop gawking!" Merla snapped from the driver's seat. "And sit back down. I swear, you act like you got no manners."

Chara narrowed his eyes at Merla and said nothing as he again sat in his seat. Asriel could tell that Chara wanted to say something but restrained himself. If Chara wasn't so sad he was stuck in bed, he appeared to be constantly irritated. Asriel didn't know what to do with this new personality trait of Chara's. It wasn't that Chara acted mean or rude, but this was still completely different from the funny, carefree kid Asriel had become friends with all those months ago.

When they pulled up to the castle and Merla parked the car, Asriel leaned close to Chara and exclaimed, "Wait till you see the game room! There's enough stuff there to keep us busy for days. And the halls are so long and wide! Every time we visit here, Mom tells me a hundred million times to stop running in the halls, but it's really hard not to. Just wait and see, Chara. Those halls are begging for us to run through them!"

"Okay, Asriel, I hear you," Chara said as he laughed. "No need to yell so loudly."

"I can't help it; I'm excited!" With the car now come to a complete stop, Asriel threw himself out of the backseat and ran to the trunk to grab his suitcase. The festival would last for ten days, but with Asgore being sick for the start of it, Asriel hoped his parents would decide to stay in Waterfall a few days after the festival concluded.

"Someone's an eager beaver." Merla playfully ruffled the fur on the top of Asriel's head, causing the child to laugh and protest.

"What's a beaver?" Asriel asked Merla as Chara walked towards the trunk to get his own suitcase.

Merla shrugged. "I dunno. It's just something my mom always said."

Turning to Chara, Asriel asked him, "What's a beaver? Do you know?"

Chara's chest puffed out. "Of course I know! A beaver is the world's second largest rodent. It's got a flat tail and big bucked teeth used for chewing on wood. They build dams out of trees so they can have somewhere to live."

"Wow!" Using Chara's description, Asriel tried to imagine what a beaver looked like. Since he wasn't sure he was conjuring a proper mental image, Asriel intended to ask Chara to draw a picture once they were settled inside.

"Tch, yeah, right," Merla muttered, clearly not believing that Chara knew what a beaver was. Although that was all she said, it was enough to deflate Chara a little bit. Asriel frowned but said nothing about Merla's unnecessary rudeness.

The three of them, upon gathering their respective things, walked inside the castle. It was large and spacious, nothing like the small house Asriel's family resided in whenever they visited Home; and unlike the castle in New Home, this castle did not have a small home attached to the front of it. From what Asgore had always told Asriel, Asgore and Toriel did not live in the Waterfall castle for long as they missed the hominess they had while living in Home, and they felt a house would be a better place to raise their children when they started having kids than a giant castle.

Asriel, however, never understood what Asgore meant when he said that it would be better to not raise children in a big castle. The halls in most of the castle in New Home were too small for running, and the front yard wasn't as big for playing. If Asriel could have his way, he would have suggested his family move to the Waterfall castle so he and Chara could have plenty of room to play their games.

After Merla led the boys to the room in which they would be staying for the festival, Asriel began to unpack his suitcase as he told Chara, "This is one of my favorite places in the world! I can't wait to show you the game room or take you on a real bug hunt in the yard. But first, we have to go to the festival! I want to go now, but Merla wants us to unpack first. I don't know why we have to unpack instead of leaving everything in our suitcases: we're just going to have to pack again when we leave. Might as well not unpack now so we don't have to pack up again later, right, Chara?"

When his brother didn't respond, Asriel looked over his shoulder and called out, "Chara?"

"Yeah, Asriel?" Chara replied as if in a daze. Asriel saw Chara sitting on a ledge and looking out the window.

Asriel approached Chara to see the human staring out into Waterfall. Unlike the rest of the Underground, which had either magical fireballs lighting the path or natural sunlight peering through the few holes in the mountain, Waterfall was completely pitch black. However, there were crystals embedded in the rocks above, which many monsters said resembled the stars that could be seen in the sky on the surface.

"What are you looking out the window for?" Asriel asked, not understanding why Chara seemed to be so fascinated. Maybe whatever the adults felt when they looked above them in Waterfall was the same thing Chara was feeling.

"It looks peaceful," Chara answered. "It's not raining here, but if I listen closely, I can hear the rain pouring a few miles away."

Not speaking, Asriel listened closely for the so-called rain to which Chara referred. Asriel heard what he assumed Chara meant, but it wasn't anything special. Water, from what Asriel learned when Ms. Ivey taught him about the trailblazing of Underground, fell from a river on Mt. Ebott's surface. The falling of this water gave this section its name Waterfall. Asriel never found the name the most suiting as only about half of this area was known for the falling water.

"Come on, slowpoke!" Asriel said, lightly elbowing Chara. "The sooner you unpack, the sooner we can be outside instead of looking through a window."

"Okay, okay. I'm moving." Chara stood upright and lightly punched Asriel in the shoulder. "This festival better be as fun as you keep saying it is, Asriel."

"Relax, Chara." Asriel returned to his suitcase just as Chara began to unpack his. "You're never, ever going to forget this week!"


Although Asriel had a tendency to hype up activities to the point Chara was disappointed with how the activities usually played out, Asriel's words to describe the festival did not do the festival itself justice. Chara had never experienced anything like this on the surface. It was clear that monsters certainly knew how to celebrate.

There were no rides like Chara expected from his knowledge of fairs on the surface, but rides were not needed. Instead monsters focused their efforts on delicious food of which one could not eat enough, magic shows that astounded even the most affluent in their magical abilities, and costumes as the monsters honored their ancestors who fought in the war.

The boys played games that included knocking over a pile of rocks by throwing an iron ball, going through mazes that were filled with puzzles upon puzzles, and setting fire to woodpiles they built to see whose fire would burn the highest. As much as Merla tried to rein in the boys, Asriel and Chara did whatever they could to run off and participate in the next game that caught their interest. The monsters knew how to celebrate escaping extinction by the Human and Monster War far more than the humans knew how to celebrate trapping an entire race Underground to rot for all eternity.

The show reenacting battles from the Human and Monster War was Chara's favorite, especially the scenes in which the monsters won the battles. No monster shied away from what the humans had put them through during the war. During scenes of what was meant to convey intense violence, as obviously choreographed as they were, Asriel had to look away. Chara watched everything without flinching. Humans had done nothing but cause Chara suffering, and now he could see how much the humans caused monsters to suffer.

The surface should belong to monsters, not humans, Chara thought as he sat in the bowl-shaped stadium with hundreds of others watching this live performance. Monsters are kind and compassionate. Humans are wicked and evil. Monsters should have won the war. Humans should have been the ones sealed away for all eternity.

"Chara," Asriel whimpered as the climax of the deadliest battle began to rise, "I don't want to watch this show anymore. Can we go back to playing games?"

"And miss seeing how terrible humans are?" Chara clenched his hands into fists and pressed them into his thighs. "The humans slaughtered everyone in that defenseless village. They murdered the elderly and kids like us in cold blood! Why do you want to stop watching this? Do you not want to see what your enemies can and will do to you if they had the chance?"

"Chara," Asriel said even softer, "I don't like the way some of the others here are looking at you."

Now that Asriel had mentioned it, Chara pulled himself out of the show to begin looking around. Some monsters, who previously had smiled at him and greeted him along with Asriel, now gave him the same look Merla always did, that look of disdain. Other monsters looked at Chara pitifully, as if it was a shame that Chara was cursed to be born human.

Asriel didn't want to leave because he was too faint-hearted to watch the badly staged battles that verbally mentioned the most gruesome details. Asriel wanted to leave because he didn't sense that it was safe for Chara to stay where humans were painted in their most ugly colors. Although Chara himself did not live through the war, Chara was sure he knew what some monsters were thinking as they glared at the child – How many monsters died by the hands of Chara's ancestors?

As if for the first time in a very long time, Chara was reminded that he, in fact, was a human, a human no different from the ones in the monsters' most tragic history. He may have now lived in a monster world with a monster family and loved monsters as if he himself was one, but Chara was still human. Chara may have hated humanity and saw himself as no exception to how truly terrible humans were, but none of it could ever change the fact that he was just as human as those he loathed from the bottom of his heart.

"All right," Chara said, taking Asriel's hand and gently pulling his near-tears brother away, "we can return to the games. I am sorry for making you stay here longer than you were comfortable."

Walking away, Chara felt his heartrate skyrocket. It was as if every monster in the stadium watched him leave. He tried to swallow but found there was a large lump lodged in his throat, blocking his airway. Chara gripped Asriel's hand tighter as he forced himself to take one heavy step after another.

It wasn't long before the comforts from the darkness of Waterfall became a discomfort. Soon enough, Chara felt that he were walking through a nightmare. Suddenly the monsters dressed as warriors were no longer in costume but instead were all gathering together to destroy Chara. He was human – it would not have been anything that Chara did not deserve. Had they known the truth about him, they would have ended him the moment he was found. Humans wronged monsters, and as they all cast their gazes towards Chara, the young human felt that it was his job to right the wrong. Only Chara, as much as he wanted to, didn't know how.

"Chara, you're hurting me," Asriel said, speaking loudly enough for only Chara to hear.

Realizing that he was indeed holding Asriel's hand too tightly, Chara quickly let go and muttered an apology. "Are you okay?"

Asriel flexed and curled his fingers. "I'm fine, but are you okay? You started looking . . . really intense in there. Then I saw how a couple of the monsters in there looked at you, I was afraid they wondered if maybe your grandparents killed their grandparents."

"I started thinking the same thing," Chara admitted. No longer finding anything in the festival fun or interesting, Chara suggested, "I think we should find Merla and go back to the castle for the night."

Without any arguments or protests, Asriel nodded.


It was two days later when Toriel and Asgore had finally arrived. Overcome with relief, Asriel sobbed at the sight of his father once again strong and healthy. Although Chara did not demonstrate it as strongly as Asriel, he was just as relieved at the state of Asgore's recovery.

Yet whereas Asriel ran to hug his father and spent every moment of the next few hours by Asgore's side, Chara went off to the game room by himself. Lying on the floor, Chara disinterestedly played with the toys. As someone walked into the room, Chara groaned and said, "Not right now, Asriel. I want to be alone."

"I was wondering why you decided you didn't want to give me a hug," Asgore's deep voice responded.

Heart skipping a beat, Chara threw the toys away, flipped around, and pushed himself into a sitting position, all these actions as if in one fluent motion.

"King Dad!" Chara exclaimed, face and ears burning hot. "I am so sorry. I thought you were Asriel."

"No, Asriel and your mother are going to the festival." Asgore sat on one of the toy chairs left in the room for the kids. The chairs were already a little small for Chara and Asriel, so seeing the mighty Asgore seated in one of them would have been comical if not for the situation. "I told them to go ahead and we would join them later. Something tells me there's a lot on your mind, like you can't stop thinking about what happened with the pie."

Looking at his lap, Chara once again apologized, "I am sorry about that. Had I known what those buttercups would have done . . ."

"Chara, I forgave you the instant I knew what made me sick," Asgore said. "I think the only person who hasn't forgiven you is you."

Ashamed, Chara refused to look at Asgore. He could barely think of a response. What Chara did was unforgivable, so it made no sense for Asgore to be so forgiving and still show Chara such genuine kindness.

"You are the hope and future between humans and monsters," Asgore stated, never ceasing to fail to remind Chara of the great burden placed on his small shoulders. "Your future is more than your past mistakes. Do not let the darkness of yesterday affect the light you will shine tomorrow."

"But how can I?" Chara asked, lips wobbling. He thought back to the show in the arena, to the heinous acts humans committed against monsters and the terrible things humans did to Chara. If all those humans were so bad, Chara could barely believe that he, a human, was going to be any better.

"You have to remember that even when it seems that the darkness is never-ending, there is still light to be found," Asgore answered. "There's a light inside your soul that will never go out as long as you don't let go, and you have people who love you and will guide you every step of the way if you let us. You're not alone, Chara, although I do not doubt that you feel that way."

Chara shook his head and explained, "That's not what I meant. What I meant was how can I be the hope between humans and monsters when I'm such a screw up?"

Eyes widening, Asgore appeared as if it was him Chara insulted. "Chara, you are not a screw up."

"Yes, I am!" Chara shouted, rising to his feet. "All I ever do is make mistakes! Asriel is always worried about me. Ms. Toriel holds everything I do against me. And remember what I just did to you?! How am I supposed to be the hope between humans and monsters when I can't even bring hope to this family?"

At this point, Chara could not restrain himself anymore. The floodgates broke, and tears became to pour from Chara's eyes. Furiously wiping his face, Chara internally cursed himself.

Stop crying! Big kids do not cry!

Just then, a large paw pressed against Chara's back and pushed the human against Asgore's stooped body. As Asgore held him, Chara instinctively wrapped his arms around Asgore and buried his face in the monster's chest. Hot tears fell from Chara's eyes, ran down his cheeks, and soaked into Asgore's shirt.

"I'm a demon," Chara muttered, not sure why he was admitting as much. "That's what everyone in my village always called me. They told me that I am a demon."

"They are wrong," Asgore stated matter-of-factly. "You are someone full of hope and wonder. There is a darkness inside of you, yes, but there is so much light within you as well. I only wish you could see yourself the way I see you, Chara."

If you knew the truth, King Dad, you would not see me in any positive light ever again.

Chara hugged Asgore tighter and allowed himself to sob without restraint. The last thing Chara wanted was to let Asgore down, but Chara did not see how he could do anything but be a disappointment. The future between humans and monsters was supposed to be Chara's destiny, but he wasn't sure how much he could believe that when he didn't have hope for his own future.

Then Chara remembered Asriel and what their combined souls could possibly do. At times Chara caught himself thinking about it, he had some ideas to what good that kind of power could do for monsterkind. Chara shuddered as he thought about what kind of future he may have been able to set in motion after all.

Misunderstanding why Chara trembled, Asgore held Chara tighter and said, "It's okay, Chara. I'm here."

Chara clung to Asgore like a lifeline and caught himself wondering how many more hugs like this he would get before it was too late.