A Work In Progress
Chapter 2: The Enemy of my Enemy?
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Another chapter, and more work getting done in general. I am going to be working on some cover art and chapter arts to add as well.
As always, this stuff is in the raw, I am not trying to make it perfect. So there are likely to be errors. If you like the story despite its many flaws then you reader are my favorite.
Other disclaimers still apply, I don't own Undertale nor its characters. This game is awesome and if you haven't played it yet, why are you reading this story ?
Now we're off!
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Sans had his boney hands in his pockets walking along a familiar trail at a reasonable amble. He wasn't in any rush, no need for short cuts.
Besides, not much else to do this day.
Other than to figure out why, after so many years, the weird time shifting anomalies had started happening again. Sans rubbed his face, it was hard keeping up with the changes, for awhile it seemed as if they stopped and were not going to happen again, and then suddenly a little over a couple weeks ago, they started up. Most times it was only a few hours lost, sometimes whole days.
It frankly was annoying.
As he reached the doorway he found it suddenly open up before him, before he could even take out a hand from his pocket to knock and see if the Lady was in and willing to share a few jokes.
Instead he found himself staring at a human child, eyes huge and face half smeared with blood.
"What the-" he was startled, not expecting this at all, and caught off guard.
The child's face creased with a stubborn determination and grabbed his arm pulling him behind them into the ruins.
"Hey Kiddo! What's the rush? There a fire or…" his voice trailed off as he felt his eye flash, his chest close.
Rather like if he actually had lungs someone just decided to knock the air out of him.
The small living space was bedlam. The walls smeared with blood furniture destroyed, a hastily extinguished fire was kept from spreading.
And the middle of it all was the former Queen of his people, Breath shallow as the child went back to her side and was next to her, holding her furred hand tightly in her own and crying.
"What.. happened?" did this human do this? Wait.. no.. if that had been the case the child wouldn't have brought him back here, obviously they were trying to save the old Lady. They looked up at him with such a pleading gaze.
Sans, wasn't sure what to do. Hell he didn't even know what happened. "Kid, can you tell me what went on here? Looks like a war zone?" he found a cloth, going over to Toriel and as he knelt next to her he check her breathing, checked the condition of her soul, her health was slowly bleeding out with the expanding blood.
The child's hands flew, like fluttering birds. If those were words he was not catching them.
"It was.. a demon." A voice suddenly said and he shifted his blue eye to another form he had not really expected to see, not here anyway.
In an old mixing bowl, the sides cracked and chipped, was a yellow flower who was usually about the place. Sans narrowed his eyes at the bud and it recoiled from him, trying to sink into the makeshift flower pot.
"Just what happened." He said.
"The others are dead, all the monsters in the ruins, Frisk has been trying to save them…" Flowey stared down "They managed to save me.. and Toriel until now, but the .. thing… Its getting stronger, as if everytime Frisk is forced to…" he paused and took a breath "Is she alive?" he seemed honestly concerned.
"Not for long if we can't get her to help." He said and pulled out his phone, he was going to need help to move Toriel. "Look, why don't you two get out of here, Go to Snowdin, it's up the path." He said "Rest, get cleaned up there, tell them at the Inn I'll cover your charge."
The child reached out and held his sleeve, their other hand moving, he glanced up at Flowey.
"Frisk wants to know if you will be safe, the demon has been dogged in hunting us."
He gave a shrug "Who knows, but I'm tougher than I look. Get going. I'll make sure the old lady is ok. Get her somewhere safe." The child was still staring at him with such a pain filled expression, concern creasing their brows and making them look older.
He paused and reached out ruffling their brown hair, "Get going, you can't be here when help gets here, else we might have a bigger mess."
After a few more moments the child rose and picked up the pot holding Flowey. Sans, really wasn't sure what was going on that the kid was trying to protect that monster too, but for the moment, there were other concerns.
But they left and he turned back to his phone, ringing up his brother he sighed "Paps, get Undyne and Alphus, we need help out here at the ruins, seems someone been on a bit of a rampage and there are a lot of dead monsters about."
There was a pause and thankfully his brother only said he was on it, Papyrus could be a real goof at times, but when the chips where down he knew that his little brother had his back.
Toriel shifted a bit and he reached out to her, closing his phone and shushing her. "Help is on the way old Lady." He said to her.
"Frisk.."
"I sent the kid to the inn in Snowdin, they will be safe there for now. "
She held up a hand and he took it, offering a smile and the touch as the only comfort he could give right now, one might even call it a cold comfort. Mentally he kicked himself for that one, no time to pun. Well there was always time to pun but currently there were more important things to deal with.
"Promise.." she panted and he shushed her.
"I Promised to keep an eyesocket on the kid for you." He said, "I will do that and I promise I will protect them to the best of my ability, until you are up on your feet again."
"I'm not sure, I'm.. getting up from this one." She admitted.
Sans wished his had lips he could bite like he'd seen others do. It looked like one of those nervious habits that he really wouldn't mind being able to have right now. "Help is coming," he told her "Just hang on a little longer, what attacked you?"
"… a demon. It.. wasn't human, nor monster." Every word was punctuated with pain, "it hunts Frisk.. my child!"
He stopped her from trying to get up again, "easy easy there sunshine, The kiddo is safe."
"Sans?" the familiar tones of his brother
"Over here!" he called out "The others?"
"On their way." Papyrus came into view. "I brought medicine" he held up the box. Sans waved him over and went through the box looking for something to stabilize the old lady.
Pap looked around looking understandably freaked out, it looked bad.
"What happened?"
"Seems something unknown is loose in the underground, and it means to give us all a very bad day. But when I find it, I'm going to send it straight to hell."
He had no promise to protect that thing afterall.
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Frisk sat in the small room. The bunnies had been nice, when she and Flowey told them what Sans said they got her into a room and even a bath.
Now she sat dressed in a stripped sweater several times too big for her tiny frame and pants. Her own shoes had been saveable at least. So she wasn't going to have to worry about tripping up in them.
Flowey's pot sat on the bed net to her and the once evilest thing in the underground looked uncertain. As if he didn't know what to do.
"its, all different now, I… don't know whats going to happen anymore." He admitted to Frisk. He sounded pouty. "I'm not against killing everyone, I mean rest and it never happened, but… that thing was going to kill me." The flower shuddered huddling down on himself "until you saved me.. why did you do that?"
Frisk glanced up at him and signed.
"… why would you consider me your friend? After everything I tried to do, everything I have done, why would you…" he lasped into silence.
*The Enemy of my enemy is my friend.* Frisk offered.
The Flower snorted "Ok, that I can understand, and well, until we know what's happening, you are going to need me to translate for you."
Frisk nodded, *I don't write that fast yet.*
"And not all monsters can read."
*If I die..*
"we end up resetting and are no closer to figuring out what is going on." Flowey sighed. He'd been aware of all the resets that Frisk had already tried, trying to fix the situation, but everytime, "that demon just seems to get stronger everytime you've gone back."
Frisk nodded staring down at kicking feet *So, I can't keep doing that. Going back isn't going to make that thing go away, its going to make it stop trying to hurt people.*
"So that's why you left the ruins?" Flowey asked Frisk, who shrugged.
*It was the only thing I had not tried.*
A knock at the door and the skeleton who had helped Frisk earlier poked his head in. Seeing the child seated at the bed with the flower next to them he came in and found a chair, taking hold of it he spun it around and stradled it, "The old lady is likely to make it." He told them and saw the child start to tear up as their shoulders relaxed. "Hey there, no need for water works." The child was making a sign over and over, touching their lips and taking their hand out to touch the palm of their other hand. He glanced at the flower for a translation.
"Frisk says Thank you."
The skeleton rubbed the back of his boney head "Heh, look it was …" he seemed to decide not to say whatever he was going to say and instead looked seriously at them "Tell me everything you can about this demon. We have to find it, and stop it, before it kills everyone."
Flowey sighed "Not much to say, a couple weeks ago Frisk went back to Toriel's and then… " the flower looked unsure of how to continue.
"turned back time a few hours." He offered.
"I'd almost forgotten that you are aware of the resets." Flowey sighed "Frisk was trying to stop it." The flower glanced at the child who clapped for attention and then started signing.
"Frisk says, 'I'm just a kid, and its stronger than me'"
"I'm sure you tried your best." Sans offered, not sure yet if he should be comforting this kid, but, well the child looked so distressed.
His words didn't seem to offer comfort, instead more tears.
"'But I'm not good enough'" Flowey filled in for the child. Then went on it his own voice again "Eventually the creature changed tactics and instead of attacking just Toriel, it attacked everyone, like it was getting stronger. Everytime Frisk reset to save someone, two more would die. "
"So this last time you decided to try something different?" Frisk nodded. Then pointed at him.
"Frisk decided to leave the ruins, to see if someone would be willing to help." Flowey said "I thought it was a bad idea, I.. " the flower gave a gusty sigh "Its like it was stalking Frisk, so it seemed that long as we stayed in the ruins so would it, but now we're out here so,"
"So might this monster. We'll figure it out." He promised "I don't want more monster dying either." He stood up and hand in his pockets he looked at the child for a long moment, there was a glow in his eye as if he was weighing his options.
Frisk was not looking up at him, so did not know that perhaps she should be afraid. But Flowey was. He was terrified.
Because that look seemed to be weighing the option if their lives were worth the rest of the underground.
Then the moment passed and his eyes seemed to be normal looking and his stance relaxed. "Hey, instead of being all depressed here, come on down to Grillby's with me, I'll get you something to eat. You can meet my brother, he's always wanted to see a human." Well he wanted to catch one, but Sans was pretty sure that this little cutey had little to fear from his brother, well other than being buried under barely edible spaghetti.
Frisk looked up at him and seemed to weight their options, before the grumble of their stomach decided it for them and they got off the bed coming over to Sans' side.
The child took his boney hand in their own and he shook his head, he glanced at the flower who shook his head "Unless you want me for translation, I would feel better staying here for now."
"Sure, " he said "I'll find you something that ain't going to fall apart any moment." He said about the makeshift flower pot.
"um, that would be appreciated."
"I'm pretty sure I have an old boot laying around."
He could see the little face twitch before twisting up "I AM NOT GOING TO BE PUT INTO A BOOT!"
Sans closed the door on the raging flower and chuckled as he took the kid down the hallway. "Lets go kiddo."
He glanced down through one eye socket to see the child was laughing at the way he'd riled up the flower. He smirked a bit, for the moment he could only keep them as relaxed as he could, because they were going to have to figure out what to do very soon.
Before the King found out about there being another human.
"Oh Geeze." He muttered and saw the child looked up at him curiously he just shrugged "its nothing, just seems I have the return of an old headache." He said "Nothing Grillby's won't cure."
Why did he have to make a promise to watch out for this kid? He wasn't cut out to be a babysitter.
End Notes:
Right so I'm putting together a bit of a playlist, anyone have a suggestion if I like it I'll add it and when I do my playlist here I'll try and credit those who gave the suggestions.
Past that, this is hopefully going to be an interesting story, though likely also going to be a fairly short one. We'll see.