Chapter Twenty Three

Daezl stared, bewildered, blinking at Sans and Mizera as if they were the remnants of a dream. For once, Captain Killjoy wasn't even mad. Sans shrugged as their leader shook his head, sighing in relief at the vanishing of his recent injury. Juni's healing magic was powerful, enough so to rid his leg of any trace of damage. A spark flared through his circuits, and he wondered how much of his one HP point that had taken.

He tried to summon his stats-

"What do you mean it wasn't there? Who else would'a found that stupid book? It was literally in a portal to a subrealm, in a haunted house, in the middle of freaking nowhere!"

"What makes you think I know?" He asked with a defensive edge in his voice.

He again put his focus on willing the letters and numbers into his view, only to find nothing but shreds of white and yellow, flicking in and out of his sight like some kind of visual programming bug. Ceasing his efforts, the skeleton made a mental note of that, much too exhausted to have a proper reaction.

"Okay so, I found a single granola bar, and nothing else," said Oro, raising the food in question up over his head as he crouched at their bags.

"I'm fine," Daezl said, though his hunger was clear for all to sense.

Tossing a new stick into the fire, Mizera echoed his claims. She was already dozing off, entranced by the warmth and safety they'd at last managed to reclaim. She was hungry. Oro lied as well, in vain. Juni rubbed her arms, her wings twitching as they were finally allowed to relax. She told them not to worry about her. Sans leaned back, eye sockets heavy, and said he was more tired than hungry. It wasn't a complete lie, and besides, everyone else was refusing to take their last bit of food. He may as well follow the trend.

He watched the other four take on irritated glares, and something rather strange began to happen. They began to fight, as much as a group of rundown, sleep-deprived adventurers could fight over a granola bar. Sans observed with half-lidded eye sockets, a trickle of humor in his soul at the scene playing out.

"Well, someone has to eat it!"

"Then why don't you take it, Daezl?" asked Juni, voice taking on an uncharacteristically harsh tone. "You work so hard to keep things organized."

He crossed his arms, long tail slapping the ice behind his seat. "I told you I'm fine; you eat it."

"No. You put so much of your energy into helping the rest of us. Or Mizera! Look at the poor thing; she looks awful!"

"Hey!"

"So one of you should have a bit to eat."

Miz locked eyes with the bulkier shadow, who'd been trying his best to back discreetly away from the campsite. With a growl, she said, "I'm perfectly okay, you absolute stale potato chip! Let's make Oro eat it, since he's trying to run away."

Sans put a hand to his teeth, struggling to remain as quiet as possible, lest he find himself in the middle of this.

"I-I don't wanna, though," he argued weakly. "I'm fine, really. You take it."

Oro tossed it to the canine, who clumsily snatched it from the air with a dour look. Miz uttered a short refusal and hurled it at Daezl. The shadow threw his hands up as a shield, then flung it over his shoulder to his brother. Their voices became a storm of noise, each vying for a victory in this odd variation of Hot Potato. Each member of this mini war grew increasingly aggressive, rising from their places one by one and only getting rougher with the weaponized snack. Soon enough, as snowflakes fell, magic attacks were joining the fray.

Sans watched in secret mirth, giggles bubbling up from the depths of his soul. It was ridiculous, wonderful, and downright hilarious to see this mess as it played out. He'd a creeping sense however, that he'd be caught in its midst if he didn't turn in for the… day, and leave them to it. With all the stealth of an exhausted skeleton tiptoeing through wet ice, he made his way to the tent.

"Oh no, ya don't. Somebody catch him and make him eat this damn cereal bar!"

He practically dove into the shelter and grabbed the zipper, proclaiming that he simply wanted to sleep. Juni, raucous as could be, yelled that a meal would help him rest all the better as he closed himself in. Oro clutched at the outer zipper, and began to force it back down against his best resistance.

"Stop," he choked through laughter. "You're gonna break it."

"I'm gonna break you if you don't eat this delicious convenience store meal!"

Struggling with both hands on the tiny piece of metal, he fired back, "if it's so good, then you eat it. I need sleep or I'm gonna die."

"You need food, too."

"I need sleep more," Sans argued, losing the Battle of the Tent Zipper. "Go away; this is too in-tents for me!"

The crackling of plastic as it hit him square in the face, catching him off guard. Oro shoved him backward, onto a pile of sleeping bags, and the flaps closed in the blink of an eye. Juni was launching snowballs at Daezl, and Miz tackled him from behind. Oro stood up straight and dusted himself off.

"There. That solves that problem."

Sans laid sprawled across their sleeping arrangements, the last of his humor pouring from him at a steady, slowing pace. Things began to gradually calm. The shadows fed their campfire. Mizera shook herself off and warmed herself by the flames. Juni regained her air of calmness and composure and joined the canine, wrapping her in a ruby wing.

"You better be eating," Daezl warned.

"Heh. If I eat it, will ya let me sleep?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, fine."

Tearing the wrapper off, his jaws parted to take a huge bite of the war-torn snack. It was half crushed, crumbling, and cold. The fruity filling had an odd aftertaste, and the shell had gone stale. Even so, he found himself enjoying every bit of it, and his hunger was far from the only cause. Once done, he tossed the crinkling wrapper aside and cocooned himself in a sleeping bag. He half-listened to the others' idle conversation, as the hazy threads of dreamland fell upon his mind.

Obscure images flashed in his mind's eye. Sans knew, in that inexplicable way that one tends to know in a dream, that they had something to do with the Old Magic. Exhausted as he was, it seemed his soul and the force within it were not done quite yet, as they wove some elaborate tale surrounding ancient monsters and humans, engaging in conflict over what remained of the magic they had known. The theory ruled his dream; some of the monsters had kept hold of the Old Magic's power, and the humans were afraid.

Of course, this wasn't what people were told. His cloudy attention turned to Waterfall, and the story that one would surely find there, those glowing words in the shadows of the marsh. As it went, the humans were afraid of monsterkind's ability to absorb their souls, a feat impossible in reverse. Then they, the much more tangible, and much more powerful beings, attacked the monster kingdom as a measure of prevention.

How much of that was true, his subconscious seemed to ask. And was there any way at all to find out? Sans himself had only heard such terms as "Old Magic" in scarce, passing moments. The where, the when, and the who, he failed to recall. Before he could dwell on the matters for long, however, it all melted away into a new scene. He felt himself grasping for something in his memory, then each and every fragment of the notion was gone. Swept into an oblivion beyond that which mortals could ever hope to comprehend.

His dreams became troubled. He sensed blood and dust, and creatures too exotic and too disturbing to register. They were surrounding him, in an endless void, hundreds, thousands, more. Each of them unique in some way or another, the things moved about in the midst of their own business, and he felt he was at the center of an endless deadly hurricane. The creatures rushed and crawled about in the very definition of chaos, paying no heed as they passed him by, until…

All of them turned to stare at him, their auras like a serpent, rearing to strike.