Unbeknownst to him, Kris was left alone for the majority of the night. But despite that, he still couldn't sleep.
He rolled around in his bed, the sound of his blankets shifting with him. Outside his door he heard his mother walk up the stairs, and in an instant later, the lights went out in the second floor hallway. She was going to bed too. Kris listened intently as she opened her bedroom door and closed it behind her, and that was the last thing he could hear.
Slowly, he pulled his covers back and sat up. His own room was large, the left side empty and still full of Asriel's stuff. The stuff that he didn't bring with him to college. Kris ignored the vast emptiness that yawned before him as he swung his legs to the edge of his bed. He lowered his feet onto the floor quietly and slowly, toes pressing against the firm carpet. Once he was confident that he wasn't heard, Kris moved over to the window.
The night was as black as ink, and Kris could only barely make out some of the buildings that were stuck with hours late into the night. He pulled his curtain back. Stars and the shadows of trees. He unlatched the lock on the window and pulled it open. A gentle breeze ran into his room, gently tugging on his hair and loose shirt. The smell of moist pine was in the air. Kris stood there for a little while, thinking while the outside world spoke to him with soft words. Words that promised him things he couldn't even make out.
His heart pounded in his chest. With one foot out the window, Kris crawled his way onto the rooftop, bracing himself against the slant. He made sure not only to wear socks to protect his feet, but also to muffle his footsteps as he climbed down the house. That was the plan, at least.
Kris pushed the window down for it to close, wincing as it did so a little too quickly and with an unexpected bang. He held his breath and shimmied over to hide from the window's view, plastering himself down with the shingles. Thankfully his mother didn't hear anything, and he could continue onwards. Maneuvering so that he could reach the curve of the porch's ramada, Kris leaned down the side and flung his legs over. He crawled down and crouched, grabbed the edge with his hands. His heart pounded even faster, adrenaline pumping through his system as his legs dangled a couple feet off the ground. With a surge of forced determination, he let go and landed squarely on the ground. There wasn't any pain, just a sudden shock wave that ran up his spine. The first hard part was already over.
He walked out from underneath the porch. The grass was slightly wet underneath his feet from the autumn humidity. Kris took one last look at the house, breathing in the chilly night air, until he ran.
He ran down the driveway. He ran through the empty sidewalks, the ground a shimmering white in the dark. He ran across the empty street and ignored the signs that told him to stop and wait for cars that weren't coming. He ran past the windows of the shops that were somehow still open, zooming past houses and apartment complexes.
Kris ran out onto the grass into the graveyard, and just stood there. He knew where he was going to in the end, but this was just something he thought was important.
There were no words. He stared out at the tombstones, not bothering to read any of the letters that he could barely make out. Instead he just moved into the yard. The ground was covered in flowers, both alive and dead, and old remains of offerings. Candles. Some food. Flies buzzed around lazily and Kris moved his hand around to keep them away from his face.
He took the little antique out of his pocket and placed it on one of the graves. When it was cleaned and polished, it revealed it was a locket. One in the shape of a heart. One encased in gold. And it opened too, but there wasn't anything in it. Kris placed the locket on a grave, the shimmering heart nestled into the ground. There was no telling who it belonged to, but he did know that it belonged to someone. Someone long dead.
"It doesn't go here, I know," he muttered to the tombstone. "But I don't want it. It's not for me. I want to give it to Ralsei, but I don't think he would know anything about it either."
The grass silently rustled with the wind.
"Yeah, I know. Those runes are familiar. They're all over Ralsei's castle. They're a part of his prophecy. But I... I just don't want to make any more speculations."
Kris hugged himself, burying his face into his shoulder. The air made him shiver, and it wasn't because of the cemetery. He knelt down, picked at the ground, and decided to just take the locket. But then he stopped, and thought about something for a moment.
He stood up, grabbing the locket with him. He walked out of the yard and went back onto the streets, this time not even bothering to run. He went up the path, up towards his house, but before he could take the crossroads, he noticed a shadow waiting right in the path where he was going to turn. He opened his mouth and reached for the shadow, but it disappeared immediately into the trees.
That left Kris feeling empty. He pressed a hand against his chest, right where his soul resided. With slow steps, he made his way over to the sound of running water. The ocean, or at least the bank that led to one. There wasn't anybody to wait for, and that strange underwater monster wouldn't come out until tomorrow. Kris was tempted to sit there and become one with the environment, but he instead looked down at the locket intertwined in his fingers.
A pulse of determination flooded through him. He squeezed the locket, and in a moment that caused everything to go blurry, he threw the locket out into the water. It landed with a loud splash, sinking down into the water. Only small ripples were the indication that it ever existed. Kris knew Noelle would be upset by this, but he had convinced himself that sometimes the past just needed to be kept as mysterious and unknowing as possible. Sometimes it would just bring more hurt, and even knowing what happened a long time ago wouldn't stop bringing up even more unanswered questions. Kris noticed that he had stopped asking questions a long time ago, and for some reason that he couldn't understand, those lack of answers bothered him more than the questions that would persist in his head.
Kris turned around and backtracked the same roads that he'd transverse three times now that night. The first time he ran, and the second time just merely walked, but now he shuffled, tried and dull and empty. There were so many things he wished he'd done, and the fact that he was in control of himself tonight made him wish he wasn't in control anyways. Every night he would he was denied his thoughts and his movements.
It was one of those nights where Kris didn't know how to think in these ways where he was completely alone. Even in the Dark World where he was going solo, it wasn't for very long, and he could distract himself with seemingly more important matters. He thought about tomorrow and earlier today and what would happen the next day and what happened the day after yesterday.
He was used to his mind wondering, but not like this. Never like this.
He turned at the street that led to the front of the school. The doors were locked, but that wouldn't stop him. Susie had devised a sloppily made but also clever and quick plan for the two of them to sneak into the campus when they needed to escape into the Dark World. The world that sees them as heroes. The world that thinks they matter. That they were important.
Kris heaved himself against one of the front windows. In all of his life, he'd never break into a building. Well, a building that was designed for the public. True to her plan, Susie had broken the lock that kept the window sealed and Kris was able to slip the window open and move inside. He closed it behind him right after he landed on the ground. Somehow, the school was even colder than outside. His breath fogged before his nose and goosebumps trailed on his arms. Kris shivered but went on.
The building was dark. He could barely see in front of himself, hands nothing but incomprehensible blurs as his eyes were trying their best to adjust. Humans just weren't made for seeing in the dark apparently. He moved around with his fingers stretched out to touch anything he could.
Silver metal? That was a locker. A line of silver metal? A line of lockers. The locker was locked. He didn't know what he expected. The wall turned hard and rough, edges between the feeling. That was most likely the actual wall of the school, made of brick. He traced with his fingertips, felt papers stuck to a bulletin board, then nothing at all.
That was the hallway. The one that led north up to the supply closet. The one that was the entrance to the Dark World.
Trying to keep one foot in front of the other in a straight line, Kris walked down the hall. His footsteps, though soft and socked, were still loud. He winced more than once, wishing that the school wasn't so empty. In his mind, Kris remembered the two walls that closed slightly inwards as the hallway transitioned into a vertical line. He spread out his hands from his person, feeling those walls, confident now that he was going the right way.
It took him longer than he thought it would, the way his eyes finally could see the vague forms of the doors and the walls and the floor. The moonlight that bled through the windows were finally starting to help him, and Kris now didn't have to outstretch his hands in blindness. The closet was right in front of him, and Kris didn't even need to see it to know that it. There was a feeling in his soul, tugging towards the closet. That was probably the residue from Ralsei's Dark Fountain.
Kris shuffled over to the door, feeling for the handle. His fingers wrapped around something, and with an excited smile, he pulled the doors open. But something was wrong. Instead of the warmth of the Dark World, where he could be anyone he wanted to be and do whatever he pleased, there was just a simple closet.
Disbelief dug into his heart like a dagger. He closed the door, then opened it again, hoping that it was just a little trick and that he needed to do some weird sequence. Like how in a video game there was a certain combination of buttons to press for a hidden combo... Maybe this was the same case. Kris knew he was thinking absurd thoughts each and every time he opened the closet and was just met with the same thing every single time. If he counted a specific number, the Dark World would greet him. Nothing. If he repeated the tale of Delta Rune, it would open. Nothing. If he explained that he was the human in the legendary prophecy, it would open. Nothing nothing nothing NOTHING NOTHING!
Kris felt his mind break. He banged on the door, smacking with his palm first and then with a fist. One hand, then two. He cried out, screaming words that faded into nothing but useless static in his mind. Suddenly, a wave of instant exhaustion overwhelmed him, and all of the adrenaline faded from his body.
Kris stumbled away from the door. His hands were pulsing and probably red. His throat hurt from the overexertion. His mind felt blank and the same thought kept running through like a loop that he couldn't break. Over and over and over and over and over again.
His legs buckled from underneath him and Kris landed knees first onto the ground. The sudden pressure sent a shock wave of pain through his legs and up his spine. The pain curled up like a hand with spidery fingers, pressing him onto the ground, forcing him to curl up into a ball. Like a helpless little fetus.
Where was he? He didn't know. The world was forcing him into the ground and making him into another one of Mother Nature's snacks. He would be fossilized, hidden away for thousands of years until someone found him. Maybe they would find him like how he found that locket. Forgotten and filled with mystery, but no questions would be asked about him. He wouldn't get to answer them anyways.
A horrible voice in his mind questioned whether the experiences in the Dark World were real. Maybe Noelle was right. Maybe it was all a dream. A weird, lucid dream, but one nonetheless.
It would make sense why they all woke up in a room that wasn't there to begin with. Why every time he came back, he would just be suffering the same pitiful ending every time. He couldn't change his experiences in this world just because of a little dream. It was stupid. It was wishful. It was childish.
That made him remember the conversation he and Noelle had about Dess. Noelle believed Dess would come back, and her mother thought that was stupid. But Kris didn't.
Did he?
Why did it feel so real though? Why did the pain actually hurt, and why did all of the sensations feel so real? Kris crumbled onto the floor, the cold tile pressed against his cheek. He felt like sleeping, and now, probably never waking up.
Then he heard his name echo through the hallway. A rough, brute raspy voice, that tried to be silent but failed.
Kris snapped his head up.