Sorry for the late and short updates recently. The other writer for this just got back from Florida, and this is the first time we've spoken in a few weeks. Next chapter will be longer. In the meantime, have another short chapter packed with plot.

I'd just wanted a drink.

Nothing much; just some water. I didn't think that was too much to ask.

Apparently it was, though. Because if I wanted my water, I would have to get the short skeleton with a blue jacket out of the way. He didn't even have pupils-just pinpricks of light that seemed to substitute-but despite this, his stare was cold and dead.

"Um…excuse me." I said.

He didn't budge.

"Look, you're in the way of the cups, and I'd really like something to drink. So, if you wouldn't mind moving over-"

"what's my name?"

"I don't know." I answered. "I've never even met you! Now, please-"

"kid, seriously."

"Seriously what?!" I demanded.

"What is my name?" His tone darkened, and the lights in his eye sockets vanished.

"I already told you, I don't know! Now please, move!"

"don't screw with me, kid."

"I-I'm not screwing with you!" I exclaimed. "I swear, I haven't got a damn clue what your name is, who you are, or why you expect me to know either of those things!"

"do you really…"

"Really what?!"

"whatever. if you're lying, ya can't keep it up forever."

And with that, he was gone. There was no stomping off, no promise to get us, not even any poof of smoke at the very least. He was just gone. No one else seemed to notice the sudden outburst-that, or they didn't care. Finally, I got my water, and then…I bumped into yet another skeleton.

"HELLO, OTHER HUMAN! I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS!"

I flinched. "Um...hi?"

"AND THE SHORT ONE OVER THERE IS MY BROTHER, SANS!"

"Oh…okay."

He kept talking a mile a minute, but I couldn't hear him over my blood roaring and heart pounding in my ears. When he pointed to the short skeleton-Sans, apparently-from before, God, I swear I had a heart attack. He was far away-impossibly far away. Even if he had used some sort of a diversion trick or something to get away, there was no way in hell that he could've gotten that far.

Ugh. Whatever. I was tired. It was probably nothing. Really, it would make sense for me to have weird visions like this-for the love of God, I'd murdered someone. Plunged that knife straight into her chest. What had I thought was going to happen? Frisk kept giving me crap about how I'd had to do it, and it was in self-defense, and dammit, at this point I wasn't sure who she was trying to convince. Did she not want to believe that her sister was a cold-blooded murderer, or did she not want this to haunt me for the rest of my life? I didn't even know.

When I tuned back into reality, I was back in the castle. I didn't know when or why I'd started walking; my body had just been on autopilot, since I'd been panicking too much to control it. I just needed to get away from that meet-and-greet-esque thing, away from that skeleton, away from everything.

"There's definitely something up about that Sans guy."

Frisk was lying on her bed, glazed-over eyes directed towards the ceiling, when I said it. "You can say that again." She agreed. "It feels like he knows something. Something we don't."

"But he expects us to know it." I said. "He asked me what his name was before, and he refused to believe me when I said I didn't know. He said something about how I couldn't keep it up forever if I was lying, but…why would I lie about that?"

"He made a big deal about our Determination SOULs." Frisk said. "I think I heard him say something about how we 'really don't remember.'"

"Don't remember what?" I exclaimed. "We'd never even met him before today!"

"He doesn't seem to agree." Frisk replied.

"He's hiding something, that's for damn sure. It has to do with us. And I'm damn well going to find out what it is."

Fight. Act. Item. Mercy. In the following weeks, we learned so much about those things that I could probably recite everything about them from memory. Apparently a fight involving the SOUL revolved around them, and Toriel had quite a strong opinion about the first of those four.

"Children, fighting is only the last of your last resorts. I trust that you will only do it if you are absolutely positive that there is no other option."

I couldn't meet Toriel's gaze without being flooded with guilt for a month after that.

The section of the Underground we lived in was apparently called New Home. "Dad's never been good with names," I remembered Asriel telling us. It took a while, but Frisk was eventually able to navigate New Home without falling.

And me? Well, eventually I was able to put down my knife for weeks-months, even-on end without instinctively grabbing it when I felt threatened. Frisk was proud, to say the least.

I don't know how, but a year went by when we weren't looking. This strange new world became our new normal, and I was starting to like it here. To feel comfortable, like maybe I belonged.

Honestly, I was beginning to put the past behind me, too. The key phrase, though, was beginning to. The memories of what I'd done never left me alone completely; my sins never really stopped crawling on my back. But no matter how bad it got, I never mentioned it-not to Toriel, not to Asgore, hell, not even to Asriel or Frisk. Because they would just try and help me, and as much as I cared about them, it wouldn't do anything. There was no way they could help me, and God knew I couldn't help myself, so I would just live with it. I deserved it, after all.

Review replies!

Xemtlenc: The monsters can heal wounds and injuries but only to a certain extent. Let's say you have a deep gash on your leg. That's something that the monsters can fix, as it is a physical injury. Brain damage, though, cannot be healed. (At least via monster magic idk about real life)

Dragonsrule18: Aw, thanks! We'll try, although our schedules get a bit wacky and we don't see each other in person very often.