Chapter 4

Alice swam happily for a while, letting the water take her mind off of her thoughts. In fact, a good hour had passed before she got out.

Maybe I should text Mom. Just like, let her know where I am.

The rest of the family was well aware of her coping method. The only thing that her adoptive parents had anything to say about it was for her to text where she was.

"Hello?" The sudden voice made Alice jump, and she dropped her phone in the pond!

"Shit!" Alice rushed to the edge and rescued her phone, but it was too late. Alice tried turning it on, but it wouldn't.

"Who are you?" Alice demanded. A small light appeared, and a person appeared from the light. They shook out their fluffy white hair and put their hands on their hips.

"That's a question I don't hear too much," They commented. "I shift around so much that that just like…" They paused. "Like, that doesn't, doesn't really occur to me. It doesn't occur to me that most humans ask for identity."

"Are you n-not human?" Alice asked, trying again to turn on her phone. They shook their head.

"I'm a shifter. We lived Underground." They explained. "We were created. Created, not born."

"Created?" Alice paused. "Can I give you a name?"

"Sure you can, you c-can give me a name." They nodded.

"Hmm…." Alice tilted her head. "H-how about Kaya?"

"Kaya…" They closed their eyes. "Yes. That fits."

"What are you doing here, Kaya?" Alice asked. "I-I thought I was the only one who ever went here."

"I've been hiding, I've b-been hiding here." Kaya looked away. "There are…" They paused again. "There are forces here, forces here that make it so that I…" Once more. "That I can't be out in the open."

"What forces?" Kaya shook their head at Alice's question. "Can't say?" Kaya nodded. Alice sighed. "Alright. What can you tell me?" Kaya tilted their head.

"Uh…" They pursed their lips. "Not much, I'm afraid. Shifters don't, don't really have a sense of identity or, i-identity or self. We can c-choose our forms. Choose our forms, but that's about it. I prefer presenting as humanish."

"What o-other forms do you have?" Alice asked, giving up on fixing her phone and shoving it in her bag instead.

"Any," Kaya shrugged. "I've presented as. Presented as a dog, a cat, a bird, a cat, a bird, a bunny, and so much, s-s-so much more."

"That's interesting."

Why do they keep repeating words and phrases? Is it just a stutter, like what I do?

They tilted their head, and Alice was suddenly left wondering if Kaya could read her thoughts.

"...I should go." And with that, Kaya was gone and the light that was there prior was gone as well.

"Kaya!" Alice called out. No response. She yelled out in frustration and looked down on her broken phone.

"What now?"

She knew the answer. Before she even knew, she had gotten up and ran after the Shifter, guessing blindly through the forest where Kaya was.

"Kaya?" Alice called, pausing in her steps. She looked around, recognising her surroundings.

It had been a while since she had been in this forest. She took a path towards what she assumed to be northwest (she was bad with directions sometimes) and kept walking, finding the clearing where only 6 years earlier, her, her siblings, and Alex had stumbled upon the body of Frisk's mother. Alice sat down on a rock and closed her eyes.

She could still smell the blood, even so many years later. The mangled body of her sibling's mother was a sight that she would never forget.

Because that could have easily happened to me too. If Chara hadn't killed Paul. Alice shuddered to think of what could have happened if Chara hadn't woken up in time.

She still recalled the feelings that had flown through her head. The fear, the debilitating fear as Paul had brought his knife up above her, and she finally realized that he didn't love her, that there was nothing telling her from a stranger to him.

And killing his own daughter wasn't any different to him either. It had cemented in her brain that there was no doubt, zero doubt whatsoever that he had also killed her mother. There was no doubt that leaving her on the streets, not bothering to tell the police that he had a young daughter, was intentional as well.

He had always commented on how much she looked like her mother.

She decided to cut off her thoughts there.

I'm not ready to even get into what happened in that year on the streets. She looked up, seeing a cat in the clearing. The cat was sitting there, cleaning itself as Alice walked up to it. She recognised the pale coloring.

"Aww, Kaya, y-you're so cute as a kitty." Alice commented. The cat hissed as a flash of light appeared and Kaya appeared, sitting in the same wide legged position as the cat had.

"I didn't think, think that you would recognise me." Kaya muttered.

"Well, I can recognise you anywhere," Alice said matter of factly, sitting next to the shifter. "Say, think you can shift into someone that knows technology and fix my phone?" Kaya lifted their head.

"Normally I would, I would, but I must leave." And with that, Kaya disappeared, just as Sans appeared.

"Heya kiddo." He smiled. "Whatcha doin' in here?"

"Oh, I t-thought I saw something." Alice looked down. "I'm sorry."

"Nah, don't apologise kiddo, looks like your phone's broken. Come on, let's get it fixed." Sans grabbed the girl's arm and took a shortcut back to the house.

*A/N Sorry for the late update! Been busy with school.

Review time!

Sarah: 3

asdf asks: Will Chara get any taller?

Nope.

Dis peep says hi asks: Are any of the new characters going to be monsters? or will they all be humans?

Kaya is a monster, they're a Shifter, and there might be one or two more, but most of the new characters are humans.

MemeTemmie asks: Is this one gonna be as action filled as the last one?

Yes.

That's all I could answer for now! Thank you so much for the reviews and positivity, it means a lot more to me than y'all think.

See you next chapter, and hopefully it doesn't take as long to write!

~Skater