A/N: Here's a fun fact; when writing this story, I frequently tab back and forth between the new chapter and your reviews, just so that I can remember who I'm writing for. So whether you've got blind praise, furious vitriol, or, god willing, some constructive criticism, feel free to say it.
Normally I beg for comments and such at the end of the chapter, but I felt an author's note at the end would spoil the mood a bit. You'll see why in a bit.
Oh and one more thing. Recommended listening for this chapter:
(at the start of the chapter) Undertale Soundtrack: Undertale
Followed by,
(some time later) Undertale Soundtrack: Small Shock (Extended)
Trust me, you'll know when to switch tracks. Or you know, if you're not in a place where listening to those is a possibility, or if you just don't want to, that's fine. Like I said earlier, it's a fanfic, not a movie. Hope you enjoy reading the chapter as much as I did writing it.
New Home
For the first time in many years, a human arrived in New Home.
Like the others before them, the human shuffled out of the elevator and looked around. An ancient underground city sprawled around them in every direction, great towers and dwellings that ringed a well-worn path to an old castle. Like every time before them, the vast city was deafeningly quiet, as though every resident had fled, or was too afraid to make a sound.
The human took a step and paused, as if only then noticing the lack of noise.
Then they started walking towards the castle, just as their predecessors had done.
New Home passed me by in a sleepwalked blur.
I was barely taking in the details. A whole city, untainted by war and radiation and hundreds of years of degradation. A little worn and worse for wear over time, no doubt, but still. There were storefronts and hotels and libraries, actual restaurants and an honest to god sign for an aquarium.
I bet most people in the Wasteland wouldn't even be able to define that word.
But I couldn't gawk at it. Didn't even want to. Everywhere I looked, windows were boarded up and eyes darted away when I turned to them. Chara told me, once, that the city was always awake, that no other settlement in the Underground could compare.
It certainly didn't fit that description now. The brickwork looked beaten, houses abandoned, and more than anything the city just looked…
Gray. More dead than alive, only still around out of habit.
Maybe I'm projecting a bit.
Just thinking about the kid was enough to pull me out of those thoughts, drag me back to the present, the reality of gotta keep moving and exit's up ahead if I can just make it.
I let myself get so absorbed in the motion that I almost didn't notice the house until I heard a crunching sound underneath my boots. Pieces of dried up leaves scattered at my feet, and I saw-
I stopped.
-A very familiar-looking house, directly on the path to the castle up ahead. Two windows, a stone plaque above the doorway, some bushes. Old and weathered, but still standing proud.
It was all so achingly reminiscent of…
(*The kind and lonely old woman who tried to save everyone she could. The way she cared for all who fell. She didn't deserve to die.)
...I don't really know what happened after that. I knew I opened the door, checked out the all-too-familiar interior and all that, but the actions were all subconscious, the way your brain takes over when it knows you're not up for what's coming.
I saw a lock on the stairs, read it, and found out where the keys were. Deep down, I knew I could just vault over the banister or pick the locks, but I didn't. I was a passenger in my skin, too hung up on replaying those words in my head to really pay attention or remember much of anything.
I don't know how I would have made it through that place if I did.
"A long time ago, a human fell into the RUINS."
The words echoed through the near-empty house, drawing the attention of the human to the pair of froggits on the floor.
"Injured by its fall, the human called out for help."
The human barely reacted to their presence, walking into the kitchen and grabbing a key off the counter. They paused at the crumpled recipes in the trash can, hands shaking only for a moment before moving on.
"ASRIEL, the king's son, heard the human's call."
"He brought the human back to the castle."
Again, the human did not respond.
The monsters were not bothered by this, and they kept pace with the human as they walked through the rest of the house.
Even if no one listened, some stories needed to be told.
Like I said, I don't remember a lot. And what I do recall seems out of place, enough that I give it 50/50 odds on whether I hallucinated the whole thing or if it all actually happened.
What I do remember is stumbling through that house, which was so frustratingly similar to Toriel's that I couldn't shake the comparisons even in my half-lucid state.
I passed an assortment of monsters I had never seen before, telling me the story of what had to be the first human who fell into the Underground.
An ancient children's bedroom, full of dusty toys and unused beds. A yellow flower pot. A picture on the dresser. Cracked and faded from the passage of time, but clearly displaying the smiling faces of Toriel, some other monsters, and…
Chara.
And it took a little to cut through the realization of just who exactly had been tagging along with me throughout most of the underground, but the rest of the monsters' words that I had been tuning out started to come into focus.
"...Then… One day…"
"The human became very ill."
I had to get out.
"The sick human had only one request."
"To see the flowers from their village."
"But there was nothing we could do."
I had to get out.
And I did, staggering out of the oppressive air of that godforsaken room, down the hall and snatching the key off a rogue nightstand even as Chara's death was narrated to me in storybook form.
I almost jumped when I looked up and saw myself in a mirror, not two feet away from me. Red eyes and menacing armor, all of it looking incredibly out of place.
A demon in an idyllic little household.
I don't know why I tried looking into the glass. Maybe just to prove that analogy wrong. Had to take off my helmet so I could really see, and-
(*You saw a pair of tired gray eyes that had seen too much. Two trembling hands caked with blood and dust. A man who couldn't remember the last time he felt hope.)
(*You saw... you.)
-and I paused. Three seconds passed.
Four.
Five.
Then I spun on my heel and walked away. I went to the front of the house, unlocked the gate, went down the stairs, and tried to steer my mind from the uncomfortable realization that I couldn't recognize myself in the mirror.
Or who that goddam voice was talking about.
The human walked through the halls of New Home, and the monsters told the tale of Asriel and the Fallen Human.
They spoke of the Fallen Human's last request, to see the golden flowers of their village, and Asriel's attempt to honor it.
They spoke of Asriel's power, how he crossed the barrier, armed with the soul of a human. They spoke of his restraint even as the humans tested the limits of his body's durability.
They spoke of how he made his way back home, surviving for so long, only to fall into dust amongst the garden.
The royal family, heartbroken. Asgore seeking to kill every fallen human.
A promise that freedom wouldn't be long now.
The human kept walking all the while.
After everything that happened, a church hall was the last thing I expected.
Yet there it was, right in front of me. Or at least, something that looked like a church. I managed to walk forward for maybe half a minute before I had to stop because…
Because Jesus fuck I don't even know how to begin describing it. For just a moment it all just clicks, and the tiles, the pillars, those windows- had to be stained glass, they were all shining with a radiance you wouldn't be able to find outside of a storybook, the kind you would encounter maybe once or twice in your entire life.
Sunlight was streaming in, perfectly warm and lighting the place up in a way no bombed-out wasteland shelter or earthly church or cathedral or whateverthefuck could ever hope to achieve. The windows reached high and far, taking that light and turning it into this- this pristine shade of gold that was so vibrant it didn't fit with my idea of what the world was like. The whole room couldn't be more than a hundred yards from end to end, but standing there, being there and looking at it the way I was looking at it, anyone could have been convinced they were in the presence of something truly worth worshipping.
It was beautiful beyond all words.
That was a hell of a time to snap out of the autopilot haze I'd been in for so long, because just as soon as the feeling of being so small in such a grand place faded, I heard footsteps.
And standing there, right in the middle of that room and backlit by a thousand windows…
"HELLO AGAIN… COURIER, IS IT?" said Papyrus, with that same unwavering grin. "DID YOU TRULY THINK THAT YOU MET THE GREAT PAPYRUS FOR THE LAST TIME IN SNOWDIN? I DID SAY I WOULD STOP YOU, DIDN'T I?"
"I…" I didn't know how to begin responding to him, and that's when I noticed…
Papyrus's smile slipped a little, then a lot.
"...I'M SORRY," he sighed. "I THOUGHT FOR A MOMENT THAT I COULD KEEP IT TOGETHER, BUT…"
And for just a moment, it was like I could see just how much pain was etched on his face, how much of a struggle it was not to break character of 'the great Papyrus', and how very painful it was when that moment finally came and the only one around to see it was me.
"…OH, WHAT DOES IT MATTER," he said, more to no one than to me. "THERE'S NO ONE LEFT TO IMPRESS WITH THE WHOLE 'ROYAL GUARD IN-TRAINING' ACT. AND NO ONE REALLY CARED ANYWAY."
"I DON'T EVEN THINK I WAS ANYTHING TO ANYONE, OTHER THAN SANS, AND-" He paused.
I flinched. Visibly. There was no anger in his words, not even an ounce of judgement, and it still felt like a punch to the gut.
"I'M SORRY," he apologized again, and how fucked up is it that I just stood there? "IT'S… IT'S NOT YOUR FAULT, COURIER. I THINK I'VE BEEN ALONE FOR A LONG TIME, I'M JUST REALIZING IT NOW."
Papyrus is speaking from the bottom of his soul. And there I am, the Courier who could talk angry Super Mutants into backing down without a fight, at a loss for words. I used to be good at this, convincing anyone of anything if I felt like it. I did it so many times with such practiced ease and yet…
…It felt so long ago that the words wouldn't even form right.
"You don't belong here," I said, defaulting to another response without even noticing. "I'm sorry. But you should leave."
Papyrus looked at me with an expression I couldn't identify. "YOU CAN'T KEEP DOING THIS, COURIER. YOU KEEP TELLING PEOPLE TO GET OUT OF YOUR WAY, TO LEAVE YOU ALONE, DOES IT EVER WORK?"
And the question is asked so earnestly, it's so utterly bereft of guile that I almost said-
No. Never has.
"COURIER, I DON'T THINK YOU UNDERSTAND. I CAN'T MAKE THAT CHOICE, TO GO HOME. I CAN'T SEE MY FRIENDS AGAIN. YOU MADE THAT CHOICE FOR ME."
I faced the ground. The words were delivered in that same tone, devoid of any judgement or hostility. If anything, Papyrus sounded apologetic. Now I knew what that expression was. It was something approaching pity.
I wished he'd just tried killing me. It would have been so much easier than… this.
"I CAN'T LEAVE. AND YET DESPITE EVERYTHING YOU'VE DONE, AND ALL THE DUTIES I HAVE TO STOP YOU, I… I DON'T THINK I CAN BEAR TO TRY."
I looked up.
He sighed, deeply. "I THINK THAT'S WHAT UNDYNE KEPT TRYING TO TELL ME, WHENEVER SHE REFUSED TO TRAIN ME. OR WHY NO ONE REALLY TOOK MY ASPIRATIONS SERIOUSLY, NOT EVEN SANS. THEY ALL KNEW I DON'T HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO PROTECT ANYONE."
Another sigh, so weary I wondered for a moment how he was staying on his feet.
"I GUESS THEY WERE RIGHT, IN THE END."
"Papyrus…" I started, then stopped.
For a fleeting moment, he smiled.
"BUT! I DON'T THINK IT WAS ALL FOR NOTHING! BECAUSE YOU'RE HERE, COURIER. YOU CAN LEAVE THIS PLACE BEHIND. YOU HAVE THAT CHOICE, AND IT'S A VERY IMPORTANT ONE TO MAKE BECAUSE… FOR PEOPLE LIKE US, AT THE END OF THE DAY, OUR CHOICES ARE ALL WE CAN CALL OUR OWN."
His grin faltered for a second as he looked at me, and for a second I wondered just how much I had underestimated him at first glance.
"IT TOOK ME A LONG TIME TO REALIZE THAT. AND I CAN SEE IT IN YOU AS WELL. YOU'VE… YOU'VE LIVED A LIFE WHERE MOST OF YOUR DECISIONS WERE MADE FOR YOU, HAVEN'T YOU?"
The sensation only lasted for a second, but part me of wanted to kill him for that. The knife was at my hip, gun on the opposite side, just like always. It would have been so easy.
And yet...
...
Maybe it was because he was right, said another part of me. A quieter, more halting part of me. Or maybe all the people I'd killed, people who wouldn't get out of my way, were finally catching up to me in a moment of clarity; that I really had been nothing more than a slave to circumstance, starting the moment I got out of that grave in Goodsprings.
Maybe something was really, really wrong with me, if Papyrus could see it through the armored gas mask.
"I CAN'T PRETEND TO KNOW WHAT YOU'VE BEEN THROUGH, THE HORRORS YOU MUST HAVE FACED TO HAVE A LEVEL OF VIOLENCE LIKE THAT…" He shook his head. "BUT I DO KNOW THAT YOU'RE HERE BECAUSE YOU THINK YOU HAVE TO FIGHT ME. AND I'M HERE TO TELL YOU THAT… YOU'RE WRONG."
"Wha-" and that was as far as I got before Papyrus… stood to the side, motioning to the end of the hall.
(*Papyrus is sparing you.)
"I THINK WE'VE BOTH SEEN ENOUGH VIOLENCE FOR QUITE A WHILE," he said. "THAT'S WHY... I'M GOING TO LET YOU PROCEED UNIMPEDED. WHATEVER HAPPENS NEXT, YOU SHOULD HAVE A CHOICE IN HOW THIS ENDS. I THINK… NO, I KNOW YOU'LL DO THE RIGHT THING, IF YOU JUST HAD THE CHANCE."
He took a few steps, back the way I came in, before he turned again, and…
"I BELIEVE IN YOU, COURIER. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT."
And then he was gone.
Who knows how long I stood there, silent and still, trying desperately to refute what he was saying. I certainly couldn't tell you if I tried, too occupied with thoughts of I'm not a goddam slave and everything I did, I did because it was good, because I had to.
The words had never sounded so utterly hollow until then. Even I wasn't believing them.
I stood there for a while longer before moving forward, then halted. There was an unfamiliar weight in my pocket, and I fished it out. A note that definitely wasn't there before Papyrus showed up.
It just said: -n't risk any more than one trip
I turned around, about to ask what that was supposed to mean.
But the hall was empty.
Sunlight continued to stream in through decorative windows, bathing the room in golden light that couldn't hold my interest anymore.
I heard the ring of a bell. Louder than you can imagine. Three knells, so loud that you could feel it with your bones more than your ears, the reverberations enough to make me shudder.
Then it stopped. The last fading echo died.
The hall was completely silent, save for the sound of footsteps headed for the exit.
(*...)
(*File saved.)
A/N: …