3. Lapse
[[File 3.1 JA-20150702-5-3 MW 556-7]]
He always remained sequestered in his room on this day, lying on the floor, staring at the ceiling, waiting for the hour to pass. At one time in his life he might have rushed out east, frantically charging through the snow, hoping to reach the rendezvous location in time. At least, he would trod slowly toward the aftermath to learn the results from this round.
He would not even do that anymore. It was no use. He would find his answer soon enough simply by waiting for time to pass behind a locked bedroom door.
His SOUL pulsed nervously inside his ribcage. Anxiety rattled his bones. No matter how many times he experienced this moment, he never ceased to loathe it. He could keep his outer self calm, and even his inner self was becoming numb… but never… entirely… numb.
It was 12:53 PM. There were two more minutes to wait. Two more minutes until he learned what he needed to know.
He glanced at his cell phone – for once containing enough battery power to operate – and then let it slide through his finger bones and clunk onto the floor. It slipped and clattered next to a pile of mostly-dirty laundry and the base of a treadmill he never used.
In his other hand, his right hand, he held a far older piece of technology, one which he had buried in his workshop many years ago. Only on this special day did he dust if off and pay it any mind. Now he lay his right hand and the device against his chest, feeling the cold combination of metal, plastic, and bone rest against his belly.
He glanced again at his phone, pulling it up for a brief time check. It had hardly been any time since he last looked… but… welp… he needed to know.
12:54.
One minute.
His fingers curled harder over the device. While the rest of him lay flaccid, sprawled listlessly across the floor like his discarded shirts and dirty pants, his right hand continued to tighten. He could feel the sharp ninety-degree angles on the thin, rectangular box. He could feel the buttons. He could feel the texture change between the metal frame and the slick display screen up top.
He craned his skull upward reluctantly with his vertebrae, angled his right hand back, and peered over his round belly to see the display screen. A line graph, constantly updating, scrolled across in pixelated blacks and whites, but he only cared about a single line of text above it. MW: 556.
So far so good.
His eyesockets fastened to the screen.
Right at 12:55 PM the number switched. The line graph spiked, rising up. MW: 557, Sans now read.
He threw his skull back, letting it thump to the floor. His hands lost their grip of the device, went limp, let the device tumble off his round belly and join the chaos on the floor.
He knew what he would find if he stepped outside now. He knew exactly where he could walk to find it.
A dusty orange scarf lying on the snow without an owner.
[[File 3.2 SA-20150701-#-# ##]]
Papyrus would never understand why the human had needed to die.
Instead, he would glance cumbersomely toward Sans before leaving the house. He would cough, shuffle his feet, and painstakenly avoid glancing at the kitchen – still in ruins, still untouched by cleaning or care. He would not engage in their typical banter or even rant about the accumulating number of mismatched socks littering the floor. He would not mention humans in any capacity. He would speak in a voice too forced by optimism, exuberance cannonballing over innocent topics, obviously pushing himself to sound upbeat and handle their visitor's death with obstreperous denial. But through it all, Sans could feel Papyrus' radiating internal discomfort. He could tell. Even though Papyrus tried to hide it, Sans could tell. Papyrus felt leery.
It was not that the brothers had reached some insurmountable wall in their relationship – they were far too close for that, and had ridden through harsher tides than this – but it would nevertheless take time before Papyrus could again comfortably interact with Sans. The last twenty-four hours had felt awkward. Very awkward. And Sans suspected they would ride a few more days with uncomfortable coughs and carefully worded conversations before all returned to normal.
With a sigh, Sans watched the door close behind Papyrus. Papyrus mumbled "BYE, SANS," before his gloves pulled the door handle behind him, leaving the other alone in the house.
Of course his brother would respond this way. Of course Papyrus would glance askance at a sibling who inexplicably seared his houseguest into a pile of ash. Of course. He would expect no difference, and… he understood. He understood.
Sans could see through the windows his brother heading west down Snowdin's main street. His orange scarf flowed behind him. When Papyrus disappeared from sight, he let his shoulders fall in a slump, he turned away from the door and windows, and trudged into the kitchen. Technically he should have started his sentry shift an hour back, but he did not care. He needed to attend to other matters. He knelt down on the orange and maroon kitchen floor.
The Royal Guard no longer needed to examine the house for information regarding the human's brief presence and passing; there was no lingering reason to leave the evidence lying about – but on the contrary many good reasons to clean the mess. And now that his brother had headed off to the poorly-constructed sentry station to seek a second, living human that would never come, Sans could breathe alone in the house. He could confront the piles of bones strewn through the kitchen.
It would be impossible to explain, Sans reminded himself, as he stared at the decimated countertops, at the bone-stabbed oven, at the damaged refrigerator and cupboard doors. He did not even understand it – how then could he distribute the information to his brother? No. It was better to remain silent. He could clean up the kitchen and be done with the incident.
Sans hated cleaning. Loathed it. Never managed to get around to it. Papyrus handled all cleaning matters in the household, from dusting to vacuuming to dishes to laundry. Yet Papyrus, uncomfortable with what had befallen in the kitchen, for once avoided attending to matters. His little brother would not feel comfortable touching the bones which had caused a creature's death.
Which left the cleaning to Sans.
Welp. As much as Sans loathed the chore, at least this would allow him the opportunity to handle his own dazed thoughts.
Sans now knelt on the floor and handled the double messes on the floor and in his mind. His phalanges brushed over the nearest bone. As long-settled magic often did, it crumbled, the bone falling away into a grainy powder. Sans reached toward another bone on the kitchen floor and it too turned to dust, another death in the kitchen.
Papyrus wanted an explanation. Sans knew that. Though his brother avoided speaking of the incident, he stared at Sans with a certain… worry… a certain expectation… a certain hankering… to hear the reasoning behind the event. Papyrus was prone to forgive anything. But he did not much enjoy unsolvable mysteries.
Sans sighed as he brushed away another bone. He knew he could not speak up. As much as his brother might believe the contrary, an explanation would not placate Papyrus. It would frighten him. And if word leaked out to any others – a sure thing, given his brother's large mouth – then he very well could be decried as crazy.
No method could successfully relay Sans knew it was true.
The human had needed to die.
It had been the only way to save his brother.
[[File 3.2 SA-20080305-0-# MW 68]]
Nothing on television appealed to him tonight.
He held up the remote and switched listlessly between program options anyway, as if some wonderful new show might magically appear in the half minute it took him to cycle between the underground's three channels. The first station, designated to follow the news, currently covered a sensational story about a squirrel somewhere in Snowdin forest. While that would electrify Snowdin's canine population, Sans personally could live without knowing every time a squirrel stepped paw outside the Ruins. The second channel appeared to be some live action drama with a plot as ridiculous as one actor's poor excuse of human makeup. The fish monster obviously had scales, not skin, and even the most uninformed monsters had seen enough ancient artwork to know humans had four rather than six limbs. The final channel was a game show rerun which he had probably watched half a dozen times already. He hardly felt inclined to watch the contestants predictably answer – for the seventh time – what the capital of the monster world was. Duh. New Home.
Granted, the underground had never boasted an exemplary television network. With hardly any equipment, much of it salvaged from the dumps in Waterfall, the monsters owned little working media technology. It meant the movie industry business and the television networks struggled with limited experience and mediocre quality. Nevertheless, tonight's programming suffered more than usual. Had he been in a better mood, he might have found entertainment in the drama's poor acting, but as it was, he could only stare at the television screen with disinterest.
After thumbing through the channels for the umpteenth time, he elected to set the remote down and watch the not-really-news. The video camera angle juddered wildly as a cameradog raced after the squirrel. The camera's rapid motion made interpreting the scene difficult, but Sans believed he could see the tail of the squirrel disappear up a pine. Likely, this meant the news crew would stake out at the tree and point the camera at the branches for half an hour, hoping futilely that the squirrel would climb down, while viewers literally watched nothing except pine needles wave in the wind.
On any other day, this would have been as entertaining as the drama channel, something over which to laugh at its utter ridiculousness.
He did not feel like laughing today.
Lower and lower he felt himself slipping on the couch. Nothing could make this couch comfortable, especially because the seats had a tendency to slip out from underneath the sitter. Slightly shifting one's movement, or simply leaning back, would cause the cushions to slip to the floor. It took great expertise to sit on this couch without capsizing. As it was, even with his experienced knowledge of the sofa, he could feel himself beginning to slip further and further down, sinking slowly with gravity.
The door to the small apartment burst open.
This sudden flash of movement did not make Sans even blink. With a heavy-lidded, uninterested glance, he turned his head slightly toward the motion, and then let his vertebrae straighten out back toward the television screen. Surprisingly, the news station had switched from the squirrel-in-Snowdin video to the main station, where the newscasters were, for once, discussing actual news.
"The CORE elevator is scheduled to reopen next week after the accident which…"
The newscaster's voice was interrupted by the heavy-marching individual who had entered the apartment room. "SANS!? WOWIE! ! ! YOU'RE HOME EARLY!"
"oh. hey, papyrus." Sans exerted energy and held up his hand to wave. It collapsed back down into his lap like metal to a magnet. He could hear the bones rattle as they smacked his thigh.
His brother responded, "I THOUGHT YOU WOULD STILL BE AT WORK.
"WAIT A MINUTE! YOU'RE NEVER HOME THIS EARLY!" In a rare state of astute observation, Papyrus squinted, eyes shifting, perplexed at this peculiar anomaly.
Of course he would notice. Of all the times he did not notice, it would have to be now. Once matters involved working or not working – a subject Papyrus regarded of great importance – the skeleton would finally notice something off.
"WHY AREN'T YOU AT WORK?" He craned his neck, tilting his skull to an awkward angle, and peered at a clock hanging up on the wall beside the door, where the numbers confirmed Sans' early home arrival. "IS IT A HOLIDAY? MUST BE! 'COME HOME EARLY FROM WORK DAY'!"
Sans avoided eye contact with his brother. It was easy enough to pull off inconspicuously with the television on. He maintained a steady stare with the newscasters.
"The reopening of this elevator, which passes through the CORE and connects Hotland with New Home, is the first successful reconstruction process after the incident five months ago."
Thankfully, Papyrus, ever the optimist, failed to notice his brother's conspicuous lack of answer. He began conjuring his own rose-tinted explanations for why Sans arrived home early.
"COULD IT BE? IS IT HAPPENING? YOU CAME HERE BECAUSE OF HOW MUCH YOU WANTED TO SEE ME? ? ?
"AS MUCH AS I ADMIRE YOUR WORK ETHIC, IT HAS LEFT US FEELING A LITTLE MORE… DISTANCED THAN USUAL." A euphemism. The brothers never spent time together.
"BUT YOU NOTICED! ! BECAUSE YOU'RE SMART! AND BECAUSE YOU CARE! ! ! SO YOU DECIDED TO TACKLE THE PROBLEM SKULLFIRST AND SPEND QUALITY TIME WITH YOUR BROTHER!"
The optimistic monologue only half-entered Sans' consciousness. He sank further into the couch and maintained a zombie-like stare at the screen, despite the fact he no longer quite knew what he was watching. Colors faded before his eyesockets.
He could hear his brother shuffling from beside him. Papyrus must have recognized some of his brother's inattentiveness, yet prompted, with hopeful lingering enthusiasm, "RIGHT! ?
"YOU PLANNED TO COME HOME EARLY SO WE COULD ENJOY A PROPER DINNER TOGETHER! ! ?"
The news continued to drone in the background. "Most hallways and rooms remain off-limits to the public. As you all will remember, earlier this year, scientific experiments in the CORE Royal Laboratories branch…"
Sans hastily turned off the television and shifted his focus to his brother. It was hard to think. He desperately attempted to recount all the words his brother had said, fumbled with his recent memories, and vaguely recalled the last sentence Papyrus had spoken.
He pulled out an answer the best he could. "yeah, that's it," he said, pointing at Papyrus with both hands and winking. Hopefully that act would be convincing enough for his brother to believe it.
And indeed his brother's grin widened. The lie had been accepted. "WONDERFUL! ! !" Papyrus crowed.
"I RELISH THIS EVENING ALREADY!
"WE'RE TWO RIBS TOGETHER IN THE SKELETAL RIBCAGE OF SIBLINGHOOD!
"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEAS WHERE WE SHOULD GO TO DINE?"
He was met with a blank expression. Sans' mind chugged slowly. "uhhh…" Sans shrugged, returning to his slouching position on the sofa. He finally managed out the words, "you pick."
"OKAY…" Papyrus contemplated their options for a moment, then clarified, "SO WE'RE NOT HEADING TO YOUR USUAL?"
Sans emitted out a half-hearted, "eh, whatever. sure, somewhere new, if ya want."
Papyrus paused, detecting something abnormal about his brother, who was increasingly melding into the cushions of the couch. He would have made a fine pillow had he been wearing a shirt of softer material.
"GOOD. I HATE CARBY'S," he finally settled on answering, though with a little uncertainty at what was occurring. Sans could tell Papyrus was beginning to suspect he had not returned home early for dinner. When Sans failed to defend his regular dining location as custom, his brother's smile began to fall to a frown.
"YOU'RE NOT HERE BECAUSE OF ME, ARE YOU?"
"ohhh, papyrus." Sans' whisper was soft.
"YOU'RE NEVER HERE BECAUSE OF ME!
"…
"…
"I DO NOT LIKE TO PRY, SANS, BUT I AM VERY CURIOUS WHY YOU HAPPEN TO BE HERE."
Sans was almost One with the sofa.
He did not respond… unless his eyesockets falling downward counted as a response.
Papyrus sighed. "DO YOU WANT DINNER?" he asked at last.
"eh."
"I GUESS MAYBE WE CAN ORDER A PIZZA LATER." Disappointment radiated through his words. Letting the conversation drop, Papyrus looked away from Sans, realized he had left the apartment door wide open, and rushed to shut it. He had to shove half his shoulder into the sticky door to force it closed.
After that action, Papyrus let his arms fall to his side, his brothers' morose body language spreading onto him. This night would not be as enjoyable as Papyrus initially imagined.
He then noticed, lying close to Sans' feet, a sheet of paper resting on the floor.
He leaned down to pick it up.
"um… paps, please don-"
Sans never finished his intended verbal warning. Papyrus took the paper in hand, and with a scrutinous eye socket, panned over the single-paged message.
"IT'S A RESIGNATION LETTER…"
Well. Now Papyrus knew the real reason Sans arrived home early.
"YOU DIDN'T EVEN PUT IN A PROPER TWO WEEK'S NOTICE?
"YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BE WORKING AT ALL! ?
"I THOUGHT… YOU LIKED DOING ALL THAT SCIENCE FICTION STUFF?"
Sans sighed, body collapsing into the cushions. "some things should remain science fiction."
Uncomfortable silence.
"DO YOU NEED TO TALK ABOUT IT?"
Nothing.
"I'M GUESSING NOT. THAT IS OKAY. WE CAN TALK IF YOU EVER WANT TO!"
One more sheet of paper lay on the floor, nothing more than a tiny scrap, but Papyrus, wishing both to maintain a neat apartment and avoid Sans' strange laconic disposition, bent over to pick this one up, too. He studied it for a moment, confused. "HUH." Trying to change the subject to something hopefully more lighthearted, Papyrus held the slip before Sans and inquired, "SANS, DID YOU DRAW THIS ART? IT'S… VERY GOOD? ?" He was forcing a compliment over something he obviously did not understand.
Sans did not even look at it, but asked, "is it a bunch of weird symbols that look like hands and snowflakes?"
"YEAH!"
This conversation seemed no more enjoyable to Sans than the last. Though Sans' answer was sufficiently long – more than could be said of some of his last responses – reluctant sadness dripped through his voice. "oh, that's just an alphabet an old friend of mine made up. he was always doing geeky things like that. secret code for him and his little caboodle of friends."
"COOL. WHAT'S THIS SAY?"
Sans glanced at it only briefly before responding. "oh. it says, "i'm a stupid doodoo butt'."
Papyrus huffed. "I DON'T LIKE YOU SULKING LIKE THAT. STOP IT! IF YOU DIDN'T WANT ME TO KNOW WHAT IT SAYS, YOU COULD HAVE JUST TOLD ME." He tossed it aside.
Another pause.
Papyrus' face fell as he decided to leave Sans alone. There would be no pleasant conversations this evening, no lighthearted family dinner. Heading toward his bedroom, Papyrus muttered, "MORE SECRETS! WHY DO I GET THE FEELING YOU NEVER TELL ME ANYTHING?"