Other Half

Chapter 7

Frisk stood there for a minute, trying to comprehend what just happened. As she stood there in stunned silence, wondering how it was possible that the skeleton moved her from the waterfall to the Hotel in a blink of an eye, and then just disappeared after handing her his number. Frisk immediately heard an impatient sigh, but the sound originated from within her brain.

"Are you seriously confused? It's obvious, he just teleported you here!" The strange voice said, and Frisk somehow saw a rosy-cheeked child slap its forehead in frustration. This double viewing thing only served to disorient her, but she was determined to get a few answers before calling Sans tomorrow.

"Who are you?" Frisk asked in response. "What's going on?" She stood there in the lobby, accompanied by no one but the lobby receptionist, who looked slightly startled at her words. The being sighed yet again, then muttered something under its breath about dumb timelines that Frisk couldn't hear. However, the image of the child put on a fake, yet patient smile.

"Greetings Frisk, I am Chara, the de- being who comes when you call its name. I understand that you're confused, but you might want to lay off on the questions- at least, until you're alone. That receptionist probably believes that you suffer from schizophrenia." Chara said, and looked at the woman in the lobby. She stared at the girl, a quizzical expression on her face. Frisk felt embarrassed, so she looked away, a small blush on her ears. The human girl attempted to think words at Chara, but her attempt only made the being look up towards the sky in annoyance, allowing the child look both frustrated and self-deprecating at the same time.

"I'm not actually in your head! I can't hear whatever you're trying to tell me unless you say it! You can't just assume that I'm telepathic." The child said, His voice sounding clearly annoyed. Frisk pouted at the realization, but an idea quickly arose in her head. The human girl felt her pocket, and then pulled out a cell phone. She placed the device on her ear, and then let out an arbitrary greeting. At this, Chara hummed in approval. "Finally. For a second, I was worried that I had the wrong person."

"What do you mean?" Frisk asked, pretending to speak into the device.

"You'll understand later." Chara said allowing an eerie grin to grace his face. "Anyway, I'll answer some basic questions that you probably have, and then we'll retire for the night. You need sleep." They said, matter-of-factly. Frisk nodded, then allowed Chara to continue.

"First, the the glyphs mention the void, or an 'ancient power'. I don't know how, but someone captured a little of it, and left it in that room." The being paused, and Frisk took it as an opportunity to ask questions.

"So, can you explain the void for me, and why they call it an ancient power? It didn't do much to me, except for make you…appear." Frisk said, and Chara nodded in her head.

"The void has different effects on everyone." They said. "It can literally do anything. You could have infinite knowledge, or turn into a piano. I believe the effects are random. As for what the void is, it's literally nothing, as the name implies. It's not matter or energy, and it doesn't exist, yet it's there." Chara mused. "I'm not the best person to explain this. There's the other monster that was in the void, the one that collaborated with that skeleton. He would give you a good explanation." Chara said, his distaste for the comedian was apparent, but She couldn't understand why. Frisk decided against asking Chara about his history with Sans.

"Okay, so Sans has another person like you in his…skull?" She asked, hesitant on the terminology. Chara nodded.

"Yes, he was another soul that was trapped in the void. We both ended up in the void for different reasons, but we both saw the chance to leave when you broke that container, and we immediately took it. The void is a timeless, meaningless place." Frisk nodded again, then articulated her understanding instead. After a pause, she asked another question.

"How did you get trapped in the void?" Frisk asked. For a moment, the child's mental projection flickered, and Frisk saw a glimpse of rage. The human girl blinked in confusion, and immediately Chara's normal face returned. Frisk waited for an answer for a few seconds, then as she was about to pose her question again, the hotel's doors flew open. Monster kid ran in, his eyes scanning the lobby. Frisk put the phone down as he spotted her. The yellow reptile breathed a sigh of relief.

"Frisk, How did you get here? And why did you stay in the waterfall?" He asked, his confusion apparent. Frisk looked down, unsure if she should tell her friend about the strange things that happened tonight.

"Make something up. I doubt you want to try to explain me, considering that you don't understand me yourself." Chara said, speaking up for the first time after his strange silence. Frisk felt guilty, but she knew they were right. She was in no condition to explain what went wrong, so Frisk automatically took a deep breath.

"Sans, uh, dropped me off." She said, looking away from Kid's face. She wasn't technically lying, and that was probably why she wasn't sweating, shaking, or turning beet red. Frisk had always been horrible at lying, so she felt awful about this- even if it was just by omission. Kid's eyebrows immediately furrowed.

"Oh." He said sullenly, and Frisk finally met his stare in confusion. She honestly did not expect his response, and his masked anger was a reaction that Frisk had never received from her friend. "Well, I hope you had fun tonight. You should get some rest- we had a stressful day." Kid said, and then subsequently walked into the elevator. Frisk stood there for a second, and then followed him. For the first time ever, Frisk lacked words to say to her best friend, and Kid had no intention to fill the gap of sound. When they finally reached Kid's floor, the monster walked off without so much as a 'good night', and Frisk stood in the elevator silently. As Frisk watched him leave, she realized that despite all of the people she'd met tonight, she felt lonelier than ever before.

Sans sighed as he appeared in front of his home in Snowdin. He immediately unlocked the door to his home, and did the same to his room. After offering the world a tired smile when he noticed that his trash tornado was still intact, Sans collapsed on his bed. After enjoying the familiar feeling for a moment, the skeleton turned on his magic with the intent to remove his phone from his pocket, call his brother, and update him on the events of the tour. Instead, his magic surrounded his jacket, and instead of harnessing his phone, made the article of clothing disappear and re appear in one of the corners of his room. His eye sockets grew wide in surprise.

"What's wrong with my magic?" He asked himself, his eyes lacking his usual white spotlights.

"My apologies." A garbled voice said, and Sans' pseudo eyebrows scrunched together.

"What happened? Did you do that?" He asked aloud, and to his surprise, the voice responded.

"Yes. It appears that I accidentally gave you some of my magic. It was more than what you're used to, so I'm afraid that lessened your control considerably." The voice said, its echoing tone sounding slightly remorseful. Sans looked down at his hands in confusion. The voice changed suddenly, and its tone sounded merely curious, but his words reflected some hidden desire. "You house extreme power, skeleton. Your magic levels seem higher than one would expect." He said. Sans decided against commenting on that sentence, but he tried to hide the mistrust in his voice.

"Okay. Well, who are you?" He asked, and an image of jumbled text appeared in his skull.

"I am Dr. W. D. Gaster. It is…." He seemed to be struggling with a word. "Pleasing. Yes, pleasing, to introduce myself to you." He said, and Sans could hear a small smile in his tone, which he would have been able to see, had he been physically talking to this creature. Disregarding his lack of an image of the monster, Sans took the greeting for what it was and offered him one of his faux easy smiles.

"It's pleasing tibia meet you too, Doc. So, can you explain why you're suddenly in my skull?" He asked, sitting down on the bed again. The aforementioned doctor didn't speak for a few seconds. Fortunately, after a pregnant pause, Sans began to hear words again.

"Your friend," Gaster paused again, and his tone changed to one of distaste. "the Human, gained access to some of the void. I was trapped there for countless time, and when your friend broke the only thing containing that piece of the void, it functioned as an open door, and allowed me to exit." Sans noticed his tone change.

"So, you have an issue with the humans?" He asked, and the Doctor seemed surprised by his perceptiveness.

"Of course." He responded, and Sans frowned. "Skeleton, you may view this as prejudice, but I have seen humans throughout monster history. They are cruel, heartless, disgusting creatures." Sans prepared himself for a long, complicated back-story, yet Gaster seemed like he was finished. It wasn't like him to probe into others' personal business, but he wanted to know all he could about this being in his head.

"You sound like you're speaking from experience." Sans said, his voice a little gentler than usual.

"Believe me, I am. Before I ended up in the void, I was still a monster. Skeleton, it's possible that times have changed, but that does nothing to aid the pain that human beings have given me." He paused again. "Many philosophers have said that time heals all wounds. They are wrong. Time can't heal scars." While a text box usually appeared when Gaster spoke, something different happened. To Sans' surprise, a projection of a skeleton like face became visible. It had holes in its skull big enough to connect what was left of his mouth to his eyes.

"Wh-" Sans started.

"My face looks like this, and it's a permanent reminder of why I hate human beings." Sans, being a skeleton was horrified.

"How- What did this to you?" Gaster let out a dark chuckle, but the sound faded into a sigh.

"Sans, humans did this to me, and I will never trust a human being again."

AN: Hello everyone! I apologize for posting this so late tonight, I temporarily lost my flash drive with everything on it. Finally, Gaster and Chara got some lines in! I really hope I characterized these people right. Thanks for the reviews so far, they always bring this huge, dopey grin to my face when I read them. Monster kid and Frisk had a rift in his friendship, and I may not heal it quickly. Or maybe I will! I haven't gotten that far yet. The length will probably be around 15-20 chapters, but really, it just depends. Until next time lovelies!

Question: What's your favorite Under-tale theory/ head canon? Do you think it could work in the story? If so, let me know, and I'll throw it in if I can! This story follows that one head canon where the monsters are gigantic, or at least considerably larger than humans are. It's weird, but it makes sense and operates on the idea that sprite heights are consistent. If you don't like it, feel free to imagine the characters at whatever height you want!