Welp, looks like that's a big NO for Pastebin. Worldbuilding notes will stay as they are! ^.^
Feel free to vote for any one of these titles below! Since nobody's told me otherwise, voting for the series title will close in one chapter.
The Magic of Souls (1)
Tales of Monsters, Humans, and Fairies (1)
Fairies and Monsters Gone Fowl (6)
Stories About Fairies, Monsters, and Two Bizarre Humans
Fairytales (16)
Temporal Dynamics for the Magically Inclined (16)
Okay Flowey, Stop Traumatizing the Fairies (8)
Underground Fairies
A Fairy Strange Crossover
Fairytales and Temporal Dynamics are tied now, wow (Thank you for voting!)
Frisk was actually physically trembling by the time the fairies, and they themselves, had landed. Even passing through the honest-to-God holographic projection that hid their landing site from view couldn't rid them of their anxiety, and the closer the ground had gotten, the more nervous they'd found themselves becoming. When their feet had finally touched down on solid earth once more, they were one big bundle of panicked nerves, shaking and clinging even more tightly to their cam-foil for some semblance of comfort.
Around them, several fairies materialized, shimmering into view like mirages in a desert. The dull green-suited figure of Crane was still there, but now there were also a couple of fairies that Frisk distinctly did not remember from Dublin that seemed to have joined the little group – and every one of them, just like Crane and the fairy that had flown them in, had futuristic weaponry on their belts. Frisk tried their hardest not to gulp at the sight, and to keep the fear off their face.
God, I really hope I can talk the fairies out of whatever they're planning to do… otherwise, I might not be able to get away, not with all these fairies keeping an eye on me.
The fairy that had flown them in tapped something on his wrist, the same wrist he'd tapped back in Dublin, and Frisk stumbled with a yelp as gravity abruptly returned and their limbs felt like they'd turned to heavy lead.
"Whoa there, kid. Careful." Crane put one gloved hand on their shoulder, steadying them. "Sorry about that. Moonbelts can be a little disorienting if you're not used to them."
Sucking in a breath to calm themselves and steady their voice, Frisk glanced at her uncertainly. "Moonbelt…?"
The woman nodded, and, with her hand still on Frisk's shoulder, gently started leading them forward, towards the small hill they'd seen from above. "Lessens the pull of gravity on you and whatever you're carrying to one-fifth of the Earth's norm. Pretty useful, especially when you need to carry heavy equipment with you. Come on, we're almost there."
From above, the small hill had looked just like that, a small hill. But when Frisk looked up at Crane's words, what they saw was, although more or less the same size and shape as the hill, definitely NOT a hill. Though there was still enough grass and dirt to suggest that it might have been just a hill once, the structure in front of them was made of weathered metal, supported by solid steel pillars and topped with a shining dome of some sort of dark glasslike material. It honestly looked like someone had taken a futuristic moon base and dumped it into the middle of Ireland, and the contrast between the metal and the rolling green that stretched them around them was more than a little jarring.
It was even more jarring once they'd actually reached the hill, and Crane had done something with a keypad that opened a sliding door into the interior of the building, revealing an interior that would definitely have been right at home in a sci-fi movie. The glassy dome on the ceiling turned out to be a massive skylight with an amazing view of the moon, though thanks to how bright the inside of the building actually was, it didn't give the best view of the stars. Everything was all metal or some sort of plastic, carefully cleaned and polished. Frisk's first thought was that the place might be some sort of laboratory, with how clean and bright everything was, but then they spotted what looked like some sort of waiting area, reception desks, an odd clear tube filled with clear liquid running along the ceiling that looked big enough to hold a car. There were signs attached to the ceilings, too at intervals along the roof, with arrows pointing to different parts of the building and labels in an odd language that looked like it was entirely composed of nature-based symbols – possibly the written form of the same language they'd heard Crane speaking.
All in all, except for the weird tube on the ceiling, the place looked more like some sort of station than a laboratory. Maybe a train station, or even an airport, and probably a place that normally got a lot of traffic.
And though it didn't have a lot of traffic right now, there was definitely activity, because there were at least another couple dozen or so fairies inside. Some stood to attention – guards, maybe – but some were running around with machinery in their arms. Still others were disappearing out of view through a door on the other side of the room that seemed to lead down, deeper into the hill. All of them were dressed in the same futuristic armored suits as Crane and the other fairies they'd already seen, and all of them had the same weapons on their belts.
This time, Frisk didn't try to stop their nervous gulp. God, there were so many of them…
A sigh drew their attention back to Crane. She'd reached up and taken off her helmet, revealing a very pretty and definitely adult face, with feminine features, high cheekbones, and long pointed ears which Frisk had admittedly been expecting. What Frisk hadn't been expecting exactly was the woman's jade-green skin, and the short hair so blonde that it was practically white that had been swept back from the woman's face and held back with what were probably barrettes.
"Much better," Crane mumbled, rubbing at the tip of one of her ears with a grimace. "Those helmets are more than a little stifling." Noticing Frisk's stare, she gave them a faint smile. "Yes, the green is natural."
Frisk flinched, and quickly looked away, scanning the room around them. They saw Crane's smile drop out of the corner of their eye, giving way to what was definitely an unhappy and guilty expression.
"Hey," the fairy said softly. "Don't worry, kid. You're not in any danger. We don't kill people if we can help it. That's not the way we operate."
I'm not worried about dying. I'm worried about whatever else it is you might do.
Crane put a hand back on their shoulder, obviously meant to be comforting this time. "Don't worry. We'll get you back to the monsters soon, and we'll be sure to tip off the police about the threats made against you and them as well, okay?"
We'll get you back to the monsters soon.
Those words would have been comforting under any other circumstances, but now they just made Frisk's heart skip a beat.
They're not going to kill me, and they're not going to lock me up again. That means that memory-erasing is still a possibility.
And memory-erasing was worse than being killed or locked up. Erasing a memory was like erasing a piece of what made you you, taking away a piece of self. And, even worse, who knew what sort of side effects there were in the long run? Best case scenario, none, and Frisk would simply keep on living and doing their thing without ever remembering the fairies. But the worst case scenario?
If the fairies messed up, for all Frisk knew they'd be sent spiraling back into the same horrible mindset they'd had during the Genocide Runs. And having that happen when the monsters were finally on the surface again, when Frisk had been helping them for years as they worked towards their happy ending, when the monsters knew them as their Ambassador and their friend…
They'd never see it coming, and I'd slaughter them. Them and maybe anybody who got in the way.
They couldn't risk that happening. They couldn't.
*That won't happen. I won't let it.
Chara's grim determination was almost comforting, but it wasn't enough to completely calm them down – especially not when Crane started leading them towards the door on the other side of the room. Deeper into the building, and farther away from the door. Farther away from an easy escape. And the other fairies were definitely keeping an eye on them too. Even though most of them were still wearing helmets, Frisk could see their heads following them as they walked.
If they did try to make a break for it now, they probably wouldn't be able to get away, at least not without having to hurt someone. Not with so many eyes on them, and so many people to run interference.
Then the entrance was out of sight, and Crane was leading Frisk down a low-ceilinged corridor made of the same metal as the rest of the building. There were more fairies here, bustling to and fro – most of them in the same black or dull green uniforms as the fairies they'd already seen, but there were also others in less combative looking gear, and some in what honestly looked like the sort of uniforms that someone at a reception desk might wear. Those fairies took double-takes when they saw Frisk, and some even went so far as to edge away from them to stick close to the wall with wary expressions.
"Don't mind them," Crane murmured. "Most civilian fairies have never seen an actual human in person before."
Frisk nodded numbly, watching another nervous fairy edge past them. Then they were moving out of the hallway and through a large sliding door that wooshed open like something out of Star Trek, into a small room. Judging by the screens on the wall surveying the building, including the entrance area they'd just walked through and what looked like an honest to God docking bay for some sort of spaceship-like craft, this was probably some sort of security center.
There was a big machine in the middle of the room, with lots of buttons, and a big screen. Fiddling with the buttons was a figure considerably taller than the other fairies with four legs, a tail, and a definitely human-like torso.
*Oh my god. Is that a centaur?
They definitely looked like a centaur. Frisk tried really hard not to gawp as the fairy looked up from the machine to look at them, revealing a long face with horsey features.
"Finally," the centaur groaned. "What took you so long? Did you decide to stop and enjoy the scenery?"
There was a huff from behind them, as one of the other fairies that had escorted them from Dublin – possibly the one that had actually carried them – audibly took offense to this. "Well, some of us had a Mud Kid to carry, centaur. I'd like to see you try that."
This earned an offended whinny. "Hey!"
Crane squeezed Frisk's shoulder once, then finally let go. "Leave the banter for later please, Foaly. Now's not the time."
"Alright, alright, fine…" The centaur – Foaly – waved off her concerns, and then turned his full attention onto Frisk. "So, you're the little monster Ambassador, huh? You're even smaller than you look on TV!"
They shifted uncomfortably and tried for a smile. It came out more scared than they would have liked.
Foaly let out a blustering sigh and shooed some of the other fairies in the room away. "Guess I should have expected this… don't worry kid, I'm not gonna hurt you. Hell, I don't even really have any magic to use against you!"
Frisk pursed their lips, giving him a skeptical look. He might have been telling the truth, but they weren't entirely sure.
"Don't give me that look kid. I mean it. Nothing bad's gonna happen to you here."
"T-then you're not erasing my memories?"
That gave the centaur pause for a moment, and he shifted uncomfortably. "Well, yeah, I am."
Frisk narrowed their eyes at him, heart pounding. "Without magic?"
He snorted, turning to gesture at the machine he'd been working on, picking up an odd little headpiece thing as he did. "Don't need magic with this baby, and the mesmer's not good at erasing loads of memory at a time anyway.* Come on over here, Mud Kid. I don't want to do this, but the sooner we get this done, the sooner we can send you back to the monsters, and the sooner I can go and yell at the Council for being idiots."
Frisk was barely even listening to him. Their heart had started pounding too loudly to hear him over after the first six words.
The fairies don't need magic to erase people's memories.
Having a memory-erasing hypnosis power was frightening enough, but at least that power could be negated. All it would take was Chara taking over their body and the effects wouldn't hold. But a machine? Real life ghosts couldn't mess with machines the same way the ones in movies could. Chara had told them so, hundreds of timelines ago.
Which means that Chara can't do anything. If I let them use that machine on me, there's nothing either of us can do to stop our memories from being erased.
Crane gave them a gentle pat on the head. "It's alright. It won't hurt. Come on." Her hand brushed against Frisk's own hand – maybe intending to hold onto it to lead them this time – but Frisk jerked away before she could, taking a step back away from the machine.
One of the other fairies sighed. "Kid, come on. You're not going anywhere until you've been mind-wiped."
Frisk shook their head, eyes wide in growing panic. I can't let them do this. I can't! There's too much that can go wrong!
"Y-you can't," they whispered desperately, not even bothering to filter the fear out of their voice. "Please."
Crane winced, looking very much like she wanted to reassure them but couldn't find the words for it. The other fairies were far from reassuring though – they seemed downright impatient.
"Come on, Ambassador. We don't have all day. Just go sit down in the damn chair."
They're not going to take no for an answer, are they? They're not going to let me go until they erase my memories.
"Hey, be a little nicer about it, would ya?" Foaly rolled his eyes at the fairy that had spoken. "The kid's scared enough as it is, and they're not anything like the humans we're used to, you know."
I can't let them do that. I can't let them do that, but they're not going to let me go! What do I do?! Chara, what do I do?!
One of the black-suited fairies groaned and took off his helmet. Dark green eyes made eye contact with Frisk's wide, terrified ones.
*Don't bother trying to talk them down! Just run!
The fairy's voice came out sounding like a choir of tinkling, beautiful notes. "Ambassador, go sit –"
Chara wrenched control away from one of Frisk's legs, and they kicked the fairy in the groin. Hard.
The mesmerizing voice petered out into a pained squeak, the fairy stumbled back, face going white with pain, and then Frisk and Chara, as one child, ran.
I can't let them. I can't let them.
Behind them, Frisk heard surprised shouts, as the fairies in the room realized exactly what they'd just done and came after them.
I can't let them I can't, I can't, I CAN'T!
Their legs suddenly darted to one side – Chara had wrenched them off a collision path with a fairy that had come rushing at them from the other side of the hall.
*Frisk pay attention damn it!
But Frisk could barely hear them. Their vision was tunneling, and the only thoughts in their head was a repeated mantra of can't let them can't let them, run away, run away. They were well and truly panicking now, heart beating so wildly it should have come bursting out of their chest, and the fear was pushing Chara's voice to the back of their mind, out of the way. Pushing the ghost out of the way, too, though Frisk barely registered that. They weren't taking full control of their shared body like they usually would, just taking over control of limbs in fits and bursts to send them careening away from an onrushing fairy.
Then Frisk was tearing out of the hall and headed for the door to the outside, and every fairy in the room lept after them. There still couldn't have been more than a couple dozen fairies, but a couple dozen people were still rushing at them, in between them and freedom, and so Frisk, already in full fight or flight mode, acted without thinking.
Chara may have been the physically stronger and faster of the two of them when they were in control, but that didn't mean that Frisk couldn't fight.
The first fairy to get too close got clocked right in the face, so hard it sent him stumbling back into another fairy.
The second was hit with a whirling kick, a move that looked more like part of a dance than an attack, but still strong enough to send him tumbling to the ground.
Frisk barreled through the fairies like a tiny missile, punching and kicking and biting anything that came close enough to bite, almost feral with panic.
With every kick and punch, they could have sworn they saw an orange glove or a ballerina slipper... where they had only bare hands and sneakers.
One of the fairies finally got lucky enough to slam into Frisk in a full-body tackle, sending them toppling to the ground. His visor was up, revealing his eyes, wide and shocked but grimly determined.
"Calm down, human," the fairy said, voice tinkling like crystal. "We – "
Frisk hit him hard in the stomach.
One of their hands brushed against a weapon on his belt – some sort of baton, with a button on the handle – and Frisk grabbed it automatically and shoved it through the fairy's visor while he was still winded. Chara twitched their thumb over the button and there was a crackle of electricity and a sharp yelp.
The fairy stumbled back, tumbling onto the floor and landing flat on his behind, and looked up just as they were readying the still electrified baton to bring it down on his head, blue sparks of magic lighting up in and around his left eye.
For one moment, just one, horrible moment, they weren't in a futuristic fairy fort anymore. They were standing in a golden hall, with sun streaming in the windows, with their knife raised over their head to bring down on a head sporting familiar sockets, one lit up with a glowing blue pupil.
Frisk froze.
Then something hit them over the head, and everything went dark.
About a minute later, several fairies dragged the unconscious Ambassador into the security room, and Foaly was thanking every lucky star he had that he wasn't an LEP jock.
"You lot look like you lost a fight with a troll," he said.
One of the fairies, an elf with a huge bruise on his face already being erased by blue sparks, scowled at him, and let go of the human with one hand to make a rude gesture at the centaur.
"Couldn't you have helped?" One of the other officers huffed. Foaly snorted loudly.
"And get myself beat up by a little kid? No thank you, I still have some pride left."
The looks he got in response to that made it very, very clear that if he didn't shut up immediately, then every fairy in the room was going to be guilty of murder, and he balked. "Alright, alright, don't give me that look! Just get the kid onto the chair, and I'll mind-wipe them and we can all be on our way home!"
Still glowering at him, and looking very much like they wanted to commit homicide, the officers maneuvered the unconscious kid onto the chair. The sprite Lieutenant that had come in with the kid flitted over to them as they did, hovering like a helicopter over their shoulders with a frown on her face. When the other officers had moved out of the way, she flitted right up to the chair, pausing for a moment, and then reaching out to touch the back of the kid's hand. Sparks of blue flickered along her fingers, targeting the Ambassador's fingers. The magic raced along the surface of their skin, targeting bruises that Foaly barely had time to notice before they were wiped away. Some of the magic actually sunk beneath the skin as well, healing unseen injuries.
Swelling, maybe? Bruising beneath the skin, or maybe a tendon got torn?
The sprite pulled her hand back once the bruises were gone. For a moment, she hovered over the kid, a guilty look on her face. Then, after a brief glance at Foaly, the sprite left the room along with everybody that wasn't a techie, leaving Foaly to finish setting up the mind-wipe with trembling fingers.
He'd seen every last second of the little Ambassador's escape attempt on the monitors. There was no way he wasn't going to watch, if only because he needed to make sure the kid didn't get away. And in all his years, he'd never seen a human child go on the attack like this. He'd never seen a human so… vicious.
He'd also never thought a Mud Kid that wasn't a Butler could take down armored LEP fairies, but it had happened only a hallway away from him, played out right there on the monitors in front of them. The kid had been like a miniature troll* that had been driven mad by light and noise and fear –
Fear. Gods above, they were scared. The kid had been so frightened of them – no, of the mind wipe – that they'd almost trampled the officers between them and escape underfoot. So frightened that they hadn't noticed they were injuring themselves in the process of trying to escape.
Why were they so frightened of losing their memories that they'd ignore injuries and barrel right through a group of armed military personnel to get away?
Well, he wasn't going to get an answer by stalling. He may not have agreed with mind-wiping the kid, but recording their memories could answer a lot of questions, and orders were orders.
Speaking of orders…
Foaly trotted over to the Ambassador once the fairies had finished securing them to the chair, just in case, and stared at them for a moment. They looked so calm now. It was almost unnerving, since they'd practically been going rabid with terror barely a minute or two ago.
"Hey, Mud Kid," he said, quietly. "I'm not sure if you can hear me, but for the record, I'm sorry about all this. The Council's ordered the mind-wipe, and while they're a bunch of morons that are practically gushing stupidity out of their pointy ears, orders are orders." He huffed indignantly. "Me and the Commander and a bunch of other people are positive the mind-wipe won't work on you for long, anyway. You've already got at least one monster that can tell you about the fairies, and all it takes is one trustworthy person telling you what you forgot to bring it all rushing back."
He carefully fixed the headpiece, sedative seals and all, over the human's face. "That and you're clearly not a normal human. You're a genius, and running theory is that you've got some sort of magic on top of that… we're gonna have to check that, actually... and we've got no idea how that might affect things. Your memories will probably be right as rain soon… hell, maybe even by the time you wake up."
He stepped back, eyed the kid for a moment, then sighed. "Just… just don't hold it against us, okay? I know you've got every right to, but the People can't afford a war with the monsters. We'd lose, big time." He shivered. "And I'd like to, you know, not die. I've got a wife to get home to, and she'd probably come after my ghost with a vengeance."
He trotted back to the screen, swiping his hands across the mind-wipe terminal and activating it. Gnommish symbols flashed across the screen as the machine began filtering through the human's memories.
"Welp," Foaly muttered. "No more use in stalling. See you later, Mud Kid."
He activated the machine, and the erasing of the Ambassador's fairy memories was underway.
I wonder how many people are gonna hate me for this chapter…? :3
To those people who thought that Frisk and Chara would get away before Frisk's memories were messed with… haha, nope. The Council didn't want to take any chances – while they may be stupid when it comes to dealing with potential catastrophes, they're not stupid enough to risk Frisk getting away when they wanted them mind-wiped so badly that they were willing to save them from terrorists to do it.
And yes, to those that might think to ask, the reason Frisk's good at fighting is mainly because of the Genocide Runs, and some Neutral runs as well – they fought a LOT of monsters during those timelines, and because of the SAVEs, LOADs, and RESETs, they had loads of practice. They prefer not to use those skills if they can help it, though… mostly because of what you saw in this chapter with the flashbacks. Poor Frisky needs some serious therapy to help with those, methinks…
*Trolls: Trolls in the AF 'verse are huge ape-like creatures with serrated tusks, natural sedatives, and dreadlocks (for some reason). They're deep-tunnel dwelling predators, vicious, and generally considered the most dangerous of deep-tunnel creatures by the fairies. However, because they're deep-tunnel creatures, they hate, hate, HATE light, and too much noise is ALMOST as bad as light to them. Any troll that ends up either in an area with too much of either of those or the surface tends to go crazy, and attacks everything around them out of fear... and this can cause a LOT of damage, if there isn't a Retrieval team on standby to take care of them... and sometimes even if there is one. Fairies loose a lot of officers to troll attacks underground, and that's in familiar territory...
And now for worldbuilding: Jack54311 asked "Do all red SOUL types have the ability to RESET upon death? If so, then why aren't more RESETs occurring? Does it have anything to do with Frisk and Chara sharing Determination? Also, are RESETs only triggered by a violent death and a strong Determination to try again?"
Firstly, a reminder: Resets, SAVEs and LOADs aren't the same thing in this 'verse. What Frisk and Chara do, with the whole "die and then come back to life in the past thing" is LOADing from a SAVE point, not Reseting. Resets send them all the way back to when Frisk originally fell into the Underground. Now that that's out of the way, no, not all red souls have the ability to SAVE or LOAD upon death. In order to use the SAVE points, aka in order to SAVE and LOAD, there's a number of conditions someone needs to fulfill.
Firstly, the person needs to be able to sense the SAVE points in some way (as SAVE points, at least in the Underground, are naturally occurring.) Not everybody knows they're there, and it's not just Determined people that have the ability to sense them somehow - they're just the ones that see them the most clearly.
Secondly, the person intending to use a SAVE point must not only have high concentrations of Determination but also have magic that is compatible with the SAVE points. Now that the Barrier is down, any Determined soul that doesn't already have magic that wanders down into the Underground won't be able to use the SAVE points, even if they might be able to see that they're there – the Barrier is what gave Frisk latent magic that let them use the SAVE points in the first place, after all.
Thirdly, who actually has the ability to LOAD is dependent on how much Determination that person has, on top of the magic they may or may not have. Generally speaking, the people that can use the SAVE points are those who are a magical being with the most Determination. Before Frisk fell into the Underground, this was Flowey, as he had both magic and Determination that was greater in quantity than anyone else with magic in the world at that time. After Frisk fell and before Flowey took the Souls, that being was technically Frisk (though an argument could be made that because they're sharing their DT, that being is both Frisk and Chara at once) because they now had developing magic and had a full Soul of Determination whereas Flowey didn't. And, initially, after Flowey took the Souls during the first several hundred timelines or so, Flowey once again became the most Determined magical being. However, this only lasted as long as Chara's soul was in poor condition. Once Chara's soul began to heal just enough that they could start producing their own Determination again, Frisk and Chara were once again the most Determined because even with all the Souls combined, Flowey just didn't have enough sheer Determination to match them. After all, none of the souls he stole were Red souls, which means that they didn't have nearly as much DT as Frisk and Chara did.
Finally, the Resets... the Resets are triggered by a variety of different events that don't seem to have any common characteristics between them, for the most part. The only guaranteed trigger is Frisk dying when they either haven't SAVEd since the last Reset, or dying after they've run out of LOADs in a SAVE point without SAVing again. (Remember, SAVE points have a limited number of LOADs in them in this 'verse.) However, that's far from the ONLY trigger. Other events that have triggered a Reset include Frisk staying for a year in the Underground without the Barrier being broken, a huge group of humans in the United States rioting and slaughtering large numbers of monsters, and the monsters being forced back into the Underground after being free to live on the surface for several months, thanks to false accusations pitting the public against them, and many others besides.