Chapter Twenty
Sans turned around and saw the wall to his left shifting. The smooth stone behind Juni and the others parted, impossible lines forming where before there had been nothing. The cracks formed a square in the rock, a low, quiet rumbling resonating through the room. It spun in its place, revealing on the other side, a nonsensical collection of red scribbles. Once in place, the jagged cracks in the wall mended themselves until again there was no trace of disturbance.
There was silence, each of them taking turns looking at each other until Sans said, "think it's a puzzle. Y'know, ancient fusions between diversions and doorkeys?"
"I know what a puzzle is, jerk. Just solve it."
Sans would've argued, even if just to annoy him, but decided against it. He ambled over to the wall and examined the dull red lines. It didn't take much staring to decipher these were different sections of a picture, likely of some kind of animal, though he failed to guess which one.
He blinked at the wall, feeling eyes at the back of his skull. Suppressing a yawn, he raised a finger and lightly touched one of the puzzle pieces. A faint glow appeared around the small collection of lines. Shrugging at the absurdity of this entire situation, he began swapping magic tiles around to make sense of the final product. It wasn't easy; he found himself stretching to reach the higher spots, and failed to understand the species he was meant to be replicating. Some kind of otherworldly being, perhaps? These proportions didn't seem right at all.
"So why'd ya leave earlier? Where did you go?" asked Miz.
"I'll tell ya later," he said.
"Now you sound like Daezl!"
Rolling his metaphorical eyes, he said, "shut up."
The hum of magic drifted through the air.
"No! What happened? Tell us the story," she whined, half-hopping in place to further irritate everyone in the area.
"There isn't a story," he said, flicking fragments of the picture around. "I just… left for a while."
"But why?"
"Because."
"Because why?"
"I swear to everything in the multiverse, if you don't stop whining-" Daezl began.
"Well, make him tell us the story!"
He could feel Juni's exasperation as well as his own. "Dear, you're not five years old."
Sans mumbled, "yep, sayin' that'd be an insult to five-year-olds everywhere."
"Actually, you know what? You know what?" Daezl's voice rose in both volume and pitch as he again got to his feet. "The idiot's right! All this is your fault, you should tell us!"
Again he found himself asking how these people got under his "skin" so well. Weird mystical connections aside, almost nothing could bug him to such a degree. Sans took a deep breath as he fumbled with the puzzle. He ignored the shadowy monster at first, pretending to be so focused he didn't hear the shouting.
"Where'd you go? Why the fuck did you jump up and run away like that? You wanted answers, didn't you? But the second you get em' you-"
"Daezl. Just, stop," he said rubbing his temples as though he felt a headache coming on. "Okay?" He didn't need to see the shadow to know Daezl had that claw pointed at him.
"Also, language," said Oro.
"Stop what, huh? Stop asking questions, like you every minute of every day? What's wrong with you?"
He felt Mizera regret her choices as he abandoned the puzzle with a sharp inhale. He turned back toward the object of his ire, shoving his hands in his pockets. He stepped closer to Daezl. The bottoms of his slippers scraped against the floor, dirt against polished tile. He swatted Daezl's finger away as words poured from him like a shaken up can of soda.
"What's wrong with me? Gee, I wonder. What is wrong with me? Can't be the whole kidnapping thing. No, that's just crazy talk! Maybe it's the "getting chased by a weird cult" part o' this. Or maybe the inter-dimensional creature I keep hearing about that wants to break reality." Daezl leaned back, the leaning turning into steps. "Help me figure this out, Captain, 'cause I just don't know! Could it be that I can hardly remember where I came from? Finding out about a family me an' Papyrus were supposed to know all along?"
"Everything was normal and then you guys just show up like "hey! It's us, the people that screwed up your memory! We're just gonna drag you into some kinda paranormal crap and tell ya it's up t' all of us to save the universe!" You said your weren't even ready for this, yet. You came back early! You said something happened and it made you have to come back early." He had to pause for air. "And I started to remember something. S*omething changed_/ and I was there, and I think that's what set all this off! Apparently, you guys aren't the only ones jabbin' holes in my brain, 'cause something went down!"
"And it makes sense! Even if doesn't make sense, it still does, and I hate it," he said, clutching his skull. "Because those memories feel different. Some other crazy BS happened that I can't remember, sometime last year. We lost months of time- and it wasn't just me! It wasn't me an' Papyrus! It was all of us! And now you're tellin' me some eldritch jerk coincidentally started getting more powerful? I panicked, Captain Killjoy; how the hell was I supposed ta react?"
Oh, crap, crap, crap! He hadn't meant to blow up like this. He wasn't normally so explosive, but Daezl had somehow found the button to detonate, forcing his thoughts and feelings out into the open. Sans made his way back toward the puzzle, where Mizera stood. He refused to meet anyone's gaze as he silently berated himself. Crap. He stared at the puzzle wall rigid as a statue. Since when did he lose his composure so badly? Stars, he'd never felt so stupid in his life.
Or maybe he had. Not that he could recall.
He knew Daezl still stood against the opposite wall, frozen with that finger still stubbornly pointed at the place that Sans had been. Magic hummed in the air as Mizera moved bits of the picture around.
At last, Daezl spoke. "Okay. You might have a point."
Oro couldn't contain himself, choking out a near-instant barrage of cackling. Juni's light giggle drifted daintily through the room, and Mizera put a hand to her snout in vain effort to conceal her grin. In spite of it all, he found himself chuckling right along with them. They existed in this manner for a while, new bouts of laughter arising each time Daezl uttered a, "WHAT?"
The gate began to move, and all eyes turned to the canine, who in an awkward cheeriness told them, "it's a giraffe… Y' see?"