Papyrus skidded to his knees, arms out stretched to catch only the dust and now empty jacket of his big brother. Undyne wasted no time, summoning a spear and jabbing it at Flowey. He let out a frightened and hurt squeak and burrowed into the ground.
"SANS!" Papyrus yelped.
"Relax, Papyrus." Undyne hissed "He'll just come back, won't he?"
"But what if he doesn't!?" Frisk cried. Undyne looked down on the child with a frown.
"Uh… is that a human?" she asked.
"NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR THAT, UNDYNE!" Papyrus yelled. Undyne mumbled under her breathe, shot Frisk a warning glare that went ignored, and ran over to help up Alphys. The small scientist clawed at the ground, staring at her clenched fingers as tears ran over her snout and dotted the floor with dark spots.
"Alphy?" she said slowly, putting a hand on her shoulder. The immediate response she gave was turning and quickly enveloping Undyne in a hug. The fish warrior returned the embrace and patted gently. "It's alright, he'll just come back." Alphys's head snapped up and tears streamed down the face.
"No he won't!" she cried. And burrowed her face under Undyne's head, leaving the warrior confused. Dogandgy shook itself, limping into the room and going ignored for the most part. It dragged its large, blobby body over to Alphys and tried to give a comforting nudge, but instead fell onto the floor. Then it laid there, panting heavily. Reaper Bird, Lemon Bread, and Snowdrake-Alike peered out from around a corner, too afraid to do anything. Papyrus tried to ignore everything and gently shook his brother's coat.
"COME ON, SANS. HURRY UP AND COME BACK PLEASE." He asked, trying not to let his voice waver. Frisk walked over to the grieving skeleton and knelt before him, putting a small, shaking hand on his. They shot him a smile.
"Don't worry Papyrus." They said. They didn't sound convinced "It'll be alright-"
And as they said that, a white soul fluttered up from the dust.
…
Then it turned black, dripping as if it were covered in ink and tar and like a flash flickered away into nothing.
…
He was back in the void.
He honestly expected as such, and he looked around with little to no interest. It was still pleasant, but not necessarily likable. Sans floated there for what felt like a very long time. Slowly, his soul appeared before him. His shoulders tensed and he prepared his magic.
He got the feeling the flower didn't want to kill him for the heck of it, this time.
The white glow of his soul filtered on his face but he paid it no mind. Instead, he looked about the void, prepared to… Do something. Suddenly, he felt a hand take a grip on his chest. He flailed, letting out a shriek of protest. The blue and silver lights flickered out and it was completely dark save for the glow of his eyes. …
And hers.
Red eyes shown, melting away from the darkness, a smile set underneath them. Slowly, as if tearing herself from mud, came the rest of her body. Green sweater, brown pants, black boots. That damn smile. Her finger dug cruelly into Sans's soul, and he felt her nails in his chest. He wheezed a painful breathe and glared. From his soul, strings reached out and tied him to it. She smiled pleasantly as she watched, taking joy in his inability to escape from her.
Sans gritted his teeth and tried to move but found the threads wrapped wildly around him and weighed him down like chains. They pulled him down, but his soul remained still, being held by the human. From the void, she drew a knife. Not one meant for killing, rather specifically made to cut vegetables.
Sans got the feeling that wasn't what it was going to be used for.
"It's so nice to get to meet you face to face." The human hummed.
Sans didn't respond. He couldn't. One of the strings managed to wedge itself in his teeth. And now weighed down his jaw. Flossing to the EXTREME.
"My name is Chara. Do you remember me, Sansy?" she chirped. She dragged him up to her face harshly, ignoring the grunts of protest at it. She grinned, her red eyes glinting like a shine on her knife. "Remember when I killed Papyrus?"
His eyes blazed. Dust covered the ground, everywhere. Toriel wouldn't respond. Papyrus still believed in them-
Still believed in this piece of sh-
"Oooh, scarryyy." Chara smiled "You know Sans, you're the reason why I killed everyone in the first place, right?" Sans still couldn't respond. His eyes started to catch on fire, spreading out across his eye sockets and climbing onto his skull. "The first time around, I didn't kill anyone. Yay! But the second time, I realized Papyrus REALLY annoyed me." She giggled "So I killed him." She pulled Sans in closer and her grin grew wider "That's when you didn't show up again until your… 'judgement'. Then I realized something.." She loosened her grip and stroked the left side of his face, completely ignoring the magic that tried so hard to hurt her. Her voice lowered. It was almost a whisper "You are very interesting. So the next time, I killed everyone. I wanted to see what happened when you got pushed over the edge. I was not disappointed."
"Sansy, I'm sure by now you know at least something about what happened to Asriel. You don't know exactly? That's okay. I'll tell you. You know that flower? Yeah, that's him. Poor Azzy can't feel a thing. No joy, no sadness, nothing. So I thought… " suddenly her voice changed, and Sans could recognized it as the voice that echoed Flowey's "I need to help my sibling!" Chara's voice returned to normal "So I just have to get him a soul. First, I tried to get the humans'." She sighed "Didn't work. So I thought 'Oh! Maybe he needs a monster soul!' But where to get one? If I used Asgore or Toriel, Azzy would've been so sad, would've felt HORRIBLE. So I tried Papyrus. He wasn't strong enough for his soul to last. So I moved on to Undyne. Still nothing. Useless. I kept going, killing every monster I saw until I could find a soul that could last long enough for me to give to Asriel." She patted Sans on the head and almost sounded nice "Then I found you." The knife she was holding was quickly through a thread, severing it from the soul and watching them drop downward, dragging its weight down on Sans.
"You were promising. So I kept watching you." Another cut. Another loose string "And kept watching you. I even let Frisk wander around a few times. Just so I can watch you." Chop "Of course, I couldn't let them leave. I couldn't let them help you escape. Not until I got a soul for my dear brother." She smiled down at him again. "So each time, at the last moment, I took Frisk's body and did something… ghastly." She fiddled with one of the threads, tightening it into a chord. Sans let out a pained gasp, trying not to let Chara be aware of it. She was. "I kept watching you, Sans. I kept my eyes on you. And this time, something different happened!" she beamed a grin. "You fell down and DIED. But then you didn't. Want to know why?"
He couldn't respond even if he did know the answer.
Chara narrowed her eyes and grinned "A little something called 'determination'. A really demented, mangled version of it, but it's still there. Determination without purpose." She giggled and then drew her knife. Chop chop "I want your Soul, Sans. I will TAKE IT." She sliced three strings at once "And I will give it to Azzy so he could feel again! I need it for him! I need it for Asriel!"
That, Sans could understand. He could understand doing things like this for someone's brother. But he didn't like HIS brother being sacrificed for this.
Chara wasn't done. She grinned "I need Asriel to feel again." She leaned in really close, her breath warm on his face "So HE could feel betrayed when I KILL HIM."
"yep. you're crazy." Sans rasped and tried to pull away. Chara cackled hysterically, throwing back her head.
"All he HAD TO DO WAS TAKE SOULS. I KILLED MYSELF FOR NOTHING!" she wildly swung the knife, cutting off several more strings until there was only one left. "NOW HE'LL DIE FOR NOTHING!" Her voice was suddenly soft "And so will you."
Sans winked "determination, char-char." He gritted through the pain, rose his legs and stuck her in the stomach. Chara let out a startled shriek as Sans propelled himself away and then the weight of his soul strings dragged him down into the endless dark.
He waved as he went.