Chapter 8 | He Knows

One week. Frisk was sick for a week. It was a great week for them though. Chara did everything they said without complaining. It was sometimes funny when they asked them to get things that were clearly in reach. But they felt bad for them too. Frisk deserved some of the blame. Sans was still upset with both of them, but over the week he lightened up. Frisk never knew what was going on. It was almost as if everyone was keeping secrets from them. Chara, now more than ever, still never smiled. Not once this week had Frisk seen them crack a grin. They were pretty upset with what happened. Frisk tried to make them smile but they always said

"Please leave, Frisk, I'm not in the mood."

Frisk wasn't sure what was wrong but they needed to know. So when Chara was sulking in their room, Frisk came in. the sat on their bed. Chara didn't look up.

"Chara? What's wrong?" Frisk asked

Chara didn't answer. They stayed silent. Frisk would ask again and again until Chara said

"Please go away."

Frisk left. There had to be a reason. There had to be and they were going to find out.

When Sans came home Frisk asked him

"Why is Chara so moody?"

"I'm not sure. Have you asked them?"

"Yeah! Only all day! And they tell me to go away!" Frisk needed to know if Sans knew something about Chara that they didn't.

"Have you tried not asking them?"

Frisk thought Really? This is your advice?

"I can't talk to them at all! They won't let me!"

"I'll talk to them then."

Sans went up the stairs. It wasn't a minute before he came back down again.

He was also rejected. He shrugged at Frisk. Frisk got a bit upset.

"I just want to know what's wrong with them!'

"They want to be alone Frisk."

"They wanted to be alone all week!" Frisk was angry

They wanted to know if their best friend was okay.

"Okay...let's go try to talk to them then. Again."

Sans and Frisk went up the stairs and opened the door. The lights were out and all they could see was Chara on their bed, head on their knees, which were pulled up on the bed.

"Chara. We need to talk."

"I already told you, I don't want to talk." Chara's voice was monotone.

There was no emotion whatsoever.

"Chara, if something's troubling you, you know you can talk to us, were your f-"

"No," Chara interrupted him "I can't. I can't talk about," Chara sulcked even more.

Frisk was very worried. They just wanted Chara to feel better, but they didn't know what they could say.

"Chara listen, we'll listen to what-"

"NO!" Chara looked up right away.

They got up and walked over to where Sans and Frisk were.

"You don't understand! I CAN'T talk about it! If I did, I...I...you wouldn't even understand!" Chara storms past them and down the stairs.

Frisk and Sans follow quickly . Chara opened the front door.

"Chara wait. Please don't leave!" Sans went up to them.

He put his hand on their shoulder trying to comfort them. Chara shrugged it off. Frisk just watched. They were stunned. They couldn't understand why Chara was so angry. They were yelling at Sans. Frisk did not like this side of their friend.

"I can't okay! You wouldn't understand! It's everything!"

"Chara just calm down," Sans was still trying to undo Chara's unknown anger.

"NO! I lied! I lied about everything! I don't like here! I can't, I could NEVER call this place home! My home is on the surface! And I'm going there. No matter what!" Chara ran out the door.

Frisk tried to run after them but Sans stopped them with his arm.

"Sans! We need to get them back!" Frisk tried to get around Sans.

"No. They need their space,"

"But Sans! Isn't it dangerous outside? What if one of those guards sees them?" Frisk was filled with concern.

They knew something was wrong. They needed to get Chara and make sure they were okay. Sans let go of Frisk. He went out the door and Frisk followed. They saw a trail of footprints leading to Waterfall. That's where Chara went. So we're going to find them!

Chara ran. They needed to get through Waterfall. They were already at the wishing room. They ran until their legs hurt. They stopped to rest. They looked around and saw no one. They collapsed to the ground.

They cried. Why? Why did I do that? They looked at they locket again.

They didn't like it.

This had been with them the whole time and they didn't find out anything about their past. They took it off, crushed it with a rock nearby and and threw the pieces behind them. The weed lied. Just as Chara thought that, the flower appeared in front of them.

"Golly, you look upset,"

"You. You lied. I didn't learn anything!" Chara grabbed the flower and pulled them out of the ground.

Their eyes looked more red than ever. They were staring at the flower with hatred.

"You didn't tell me anything! The only thing you did, was got Frisk sick, and me depressed and angry!"

The flower was in shock. He was utterly stunned. He had no words.

"You little weed. Tell me one good reason I shouldn't kill you right now!"

Chara's soul appeared in front of them. There was also a small, glowing, white dot in front of the flower as well but they paid no attention to either of them.

"Be-because I can tell you wh-what you need to know!" The flower was scared.

"Okay. Then tell me!" Chara stared at them more.

"Okay...well, where do I start?"

"How about the beginning!" Chara held tighter on the flower.

"Okay…" The flower cleared his throat "Remember when I said that this world is broken? Well I wasn't lying. It is."

"How?"

"Well, everything here isn't right. In The Ruins, there are supposed to monsters to fight, but there aren't. And there's supposed to be a goat lady named...Toriel…"

That name. Toriel. Chara knew that name. Somehow, their memory was coming back a little. Toriel was my….mother?

"And you know, Smiley Trash Bag? The one you call 'Sans'? He's supposed to have a brother."

Brother. A brother? Brother was another word that triggered something else. Something important.

"Is that all?"

"N-no. There's more. But.. we don't have time for that." The flower said turning head towards sound.

Chara heard footsteps coming from in front of them. They let go of the flower and it wiggled it's way back underground. Chara was taken aback at what they saw standing in front of them. It was the royal guards.

Frisk and Sans came to a stop. Frisk bent down and picked up a piece of Chara's red locket. They showed it to Sans and they kept walking. They heard a noise coming from behind them. Frisk turned around to see a yellow dinosaur with big nerdy glasses and a lab cost running after them. Frisk hid behind Sans who asked the dinosaur

"Alphys? What are you doing here?"

"I-I came here a-as fast as I c-could. I'm sorry Sans."

Frisk was confused and scared. They didn't know who this 'Alphys' was. But if Sans seemed to trust her, then maybe they should too.

"Sorry? About what?"

"The K-king. He...s-saw the t-tapes...he knows."

Sans jolted. Frisk didn't understand any of this. But Sans did. They grabbed Frisk's arm and told them to hold tight. All of a sudden, blue stuff was surrounding them. Frisk looked at Sans who had one blue eye glowing. Frisk closed their eyes and held onto Sans. When Sans told them to open their eyes, they saw lava and a castle. They weren't in Waterfall anymore. Sans picked up Frisk and ran into the castle.

Chara woke up. Their head hurt like crazy. They must have blacked out. They looked up and saw a person standing in front of them. Chara knew, just by looking around, they were in the castle of the King and the person standing in front of them, WAS the King.

hey were taken aback again. They weren't expecting the King to be so...big. He was looking right at Chara with an angry face. He had a giant red trident and fire was surrounding them. Trapping Chara in with the King of Monsters. Then, he started to attack Chara with fire. Chara got up as quickly as they could to dodge the fire.

Their soul had appeared in front of them again. This was a battle. Chara figured out that the soul appears only in battle. They had somehow dodged the first attack, but the king looked frustrated. He sent more fire. His attacks were now in hard-to-dodge patterns. Chara tried but, they got burned. Chara didn't yell out. It hurt but, they had to be strong. The attacks kept coming and Chara kept getting burned. They weren't feeling to good. They knew they were weak. They couldn't go on. The King looked almost impressed. He must have thought that he almost got the soul.

Chara had dropped to the ground in pain. Tears ran down their face as their soul appeared above them, slowly cracking even more.

They heard footsteps running. They saw Sans and Frisk run into the room yelling,

"STOP!"

Sans ran in front of Chara. He was protected them. The King looked unimpressed. He yelled out to Sans,

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THIS IS THE LAST SOUL WE NEED! GET OUT OF MY WAY!"

Sans looked down at Chara who was probably almost dead. He looked back up at the King and said,

"No. I will not move out of the way so you can kill another innocent life. These two have been nothing but kind and I will NOT sit idly by again and watch you murder my kids!"

Sans stood his ground.

Chara was surprised. They didn't know Sans felt that way. They had been living in his house for about 3 or 4 weeks. I guess he really, really cared. A lot.

The King was very angry. Chara was starting to black out. They couldn't hold on much longer and their soul had almost cracked all the way through. They heard a distant cry. It didn't seem like Frisk's it was another child's. They called their name. Chara could just barely hear what it was saying,

"Chara...let me help you...let me save you, as one once did for me…"

They slowly closed their eyes. Everything went white.