0-0-0-0-0
The song of chirruping crickets serenaded Sans as he stared up at the ceiling, the droning of a late night game show only barely heard over the insects, but he wasn't listening to either.
One arm lazily draped over himself and the other dangling over the edge of the couch, Sans let out a long, drawn out sigh as the dimly flickering light washed over him in a low hue. Evidently, it was going to be one of those nights where sleep was hard to come by. He ran over the statistical probability of Toriel putting a fist to the side of his head for upsetting Frisk so badly, and seriously rethought, if only for a moment, Papyrus's warm gesture to share his own bed.
Then again, maybe he was better off on the couch.
This way he had a better view of him.
The little golden flower stared back at him through the darkness, his porcelain pot shining in the moonlight bathing the countertop. He could see the little beady eyes watching his every movement, almost as if he were waiting for him to fall asleep.
"... You just gonna stare at me all night long?" Sans asked flippantly, causing Flowey's eyes to narrow. "Or do you just really like what you see?"
Flowey didn't answer.
"Take a picture. It'll last longer."
"I don't have fingers," the golden flower finally responded in a venomous hiss. "Believe me, if I did I'd have strangled you out of aggravation already."
"I already don't believe most of the things you say," Sans returned his gaze to the game show, where a group of humans were gathered around a colored wheel. If Flowey was irritated, he couldn't see it, but he didn't have to to know it. At some point or another Sans had flipped upside down on the couch, head dangling off the cushion.
Without warning, Sans jerked out of his stupor and stumbled to his feet, startling the living flower.
"I've gotta go take care of something," the skeleton firmly put on his slippers and readjusted his jacket. "Don't go anywhere."
"If I didn't know you better I'd say you were being a smart ass."
"Oh, puh-lease," Sans rolled his eyes. "I'm smart all over my body. And quit staring."
It was several moments after Sans had already left that Flowey finally managed to close his mouth, still slightly flabbergasted.
"I do not stare, you egotistical, smarmy- dammit he's gone," he grumbled angrily to himself. Flowey scowled viciously instead at the spot Sans had been, several good comebacks only now occurring to him. Most of them were sprinkled with a very choice variety of very rude remarks and language that would have surely made Toriel blush. Regardless, he was sure to have quite a few lined up for that eternally grinning jerk the next time he saw him.
0-0-0-0-0
How many hours had it been?
It was clearly still nighttime, though whether it was late evening or early morning Sans was unable to tell. He shook off the thought and resumed screwing in a fixture beneath the mass of wires protruding from the machine looming above him, the heat from his breath gradually turning the overhanging tarp into a small sauna. He wasn't quite sure whether or not skeletons could sweat, but if they could he was surely doing it now. Sans patted the concrete floor of the basement a couple times in search of something, fingers grasped tightly around a set of blueprints. The glow of his eye lit up the room for a few moments as he scanned a number of long mathematical equations with no apparent solutions, waving pictographs intersecting at apparently random intervals and schematics that he could barely follow.
Sans closed his eyes for a moment of contemplation, power drill in one hand. For a brief second, he wondered if it was still even worth it. It would be much easier to cease all of his problems with a flick of the drill. Simpler. Faster. Efficient.
He was swift to shake off that idea as well, forcing his weary mind to return to the task at hand. This was no time to let his mind wander to dreary places, not when there was work to do.
He was interrupted by the sound of slowly shuffling feet, and Sans quickly squirmed out from beneath the behemoth machine, glistening metal nearly blinding him as he struggled to yank the tarp (mostly) over the device.
"Heyya, bud," Sans leaned against the tarp, sticking his hands into his pocket. "What are you doing up so late?"
"I heard noises," Frisk rubbed her eyes with one hand, the other tucked awkwardly behind her back. Was she... hiding something? "I thought you were leaving again, so I w-was hurrying..."
She trailed off uneasily, wide eyes latched onto his own. Sans suddenly felt like rubbing the bags he must have had beneath his eyes, a strong sense of weariness hanging on his shoulders.
"Nah, are you kiddin'?" Sans made a 'pssh' noise. "All the fun times are here, kiddo. Wouldn't miss that for the world."
"... Are you okay, Uncle Sans?"
Great. Now everyone but the freakin' flower is doing it.
"I am both fine and dandy at the same time," he lied instantly, crossing his fingers in his pocket. "Dandier than candy and finer than brandy. Come on, you should know better than to worry about me, kid."
"I-I didn't say that..." Frisk started, but it was blatant from her expression that she wasn't telling the truth. "I mean, well, um..."
She kicked her bare feet suddenly at a bit of dust on the cold floor, unable to meet his unblinking gaze.
Sans only gave a little chuckle.
"Come on, kiddo," he shook his head, firmly tucking the blueprints into his pocket and officially retiring for the night. "I think it's past our bedtime. Plus if Tori finds out you're up at this time of night she'll throw the book at me."
"I thought you got to stay up as long as you wanted? She gets mad if you stay up past bedtime?" Frisk blinked.
"No, I mean she'll literally throw a book at me," he grinned, leading the child up the stairs. "Last time it was 'One Hundred and One Uses For Snails'."
"Oh!" Frisk perked up as he held the door open for her. "Wasn't that when you called Miss Helen a bucket of cun-?"
Sans slapped a hand over her mouth just in time.
I swear this kid's gonna give me a heart attack.
"Do – not – say that word," he breathed. "Just pretend that you never heard me say that, and for the love of all that is holy don't repeat it in front of Toriel."
"Don't worry," Sans cringed at the sound of Flowey's voice from the mantle. "I'll be sure to not repeat that."
"Thanks Flowey!" Frisk beamed at him, apparently oblivious to the flower's wicked grin.
"Hey, no problemo," he flashed a mischievous smile back. "You know the saying, three can keep a secret if two of them are dead."
"... Um, no, I don't think that's how it goes..." Frisk frowned.
"Go to bed, kid," Sans pointed up the stairs in an oddly empty tone. Frisk was quick to comply, giving both the skeleton and the flower a small peck on the cheek before traipsing away to her room, humming a little tune.
Flowey glowered at him through the dark, his face glowing a little.
"... I know what you're doing."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Sans crashed onto the couch, curling up and facing away from the still flickering television set.
"It isn't going to work, and we both know it..." Flowey whispered in a mocking tone. "Just give up already."
"Just because Frisk spared you doesn't mean I'll be so nice," he flipped the flower a rude hand gesture without turning around. "I kid you not if you don't go to sleep I will literally force feed you fertilizer."
Flowey opened his mouth to respond, but quickly closed it and muttered darkly to himself before struggling to turn the entire clay pot away from the skeleton.
"Just because you live here doesn't mean anyone wants you here," Sans heard him whisper after a long bout of silence. He could almost hear the twisted smile in his voice. "You're just an entertainment piece. Eventually, you'll just be thrown away. You'll get boring. You'll get bored. You're too powerless to change anything at all. You can't run from yourself forever."
"Which begs the question..." Sans replied softly. "Which one of us are you trying to convince with that?"
And to that, once again, Flowey didn't seem to have an answer.
0-0-0-0-0
A/N
Man
I just wanna write sad Sans :V
Also I'm writing more words and stuff if anyone cares