Back at the Holiday household, Noelle wakes from her bed after having a nightmare. This was a fairly common occurrence for her, as she tended to get scared a lot more easily than most girls her age. Some kids liked to make fun of her for it, but Dess would always step in to vouch for her when she could. Because of this, Noelle generally turned to her sister for comfort in her sleepless nights. Sure, her mother genuinely loved her, but her stern demeanor often made Noelle see her as unapproachable. Her father was a lot more friendly, but whenever he was fast asleep, it took a lot to wake him back up. Meanwhile, Dess was the perfect older sister; cool, but also kind.

She softly knocked on her sister's door. After not getting a response, she realized it was unlocked and slowly opened it. To her shock, Dess was gone. Not only that, but the window was open.

Distressed, Noelle ran to her parents' bedroom and began knocking on their door.

"Mom!? Dad!?"

Her mother, Carol, got out of bed and answered the door. Her father, Rudolph (or "Rudy" for short) had just barely been woken up.

"What is it, sweetie?" Carol asked.

"I think Dess left through the window again," Noelle responded, with a slight shakiness to her voice. This wasn't the first time Dess pulled a stunt like this, but that doesn't make it any less hard for Noelle to deal with.

"What?" said Carol.

Noelle walked towards Dess' room with Carol following her. When they reached, Carol could see that Dess was indeed gone, and the window was indeed open. She let out an exasperated sigh.

"Go back to your room, Noelle. We'll go find your sister."

Before Noelle left, she gave her mother a hug. She hugged back.

"Good night, dear. I love you."

"Love you too, mom."

Noelle let go and walked back to her room. Rudy, still groggy, walked to where Carol was.

"Come on, Rudy. Let's go."

Rudy groaned. "Yeah, okay, just gimme, like, three more minutes."

"I said let's go."

"Alright, fine."

The two left the house to go searching.

Back at the bunker...

Kris had finally gained enough energy to stand back up. Their muscles still ached, but their heart ached even more.
Dess was gone. All they wanted to do was show her something that comforted them, and now they might never see her again. Their young mind was overloaded with a chaotic storm of emotions.

Hopelessness...
Confusion...
Guilt...

With all of these thoughts clouding their mind, they slowly walked back to town. They had no idea how they were gonna explain this, but they had to at least try.

Eventually, Kris made it back to town. When they reached the "Librarby", they were approached by a familiar figure, one who had been scouring the town.

It was Carol. And she was not particularly happy.

"Hello, Kris."

They froze in their tracks. This was probably the last person they wanted to talk to about this. Kris and Carol did not get along, to say the least. Them being such a rowdy troublemaker didn't help things, but at times, it felt like Carol had a disdain for Kris even when they weren't causing a ruckus.

"h... hi, mayor..."

"You wouldn't happen to know where Dess is, would you?"

"w-well, we, uhh, we..."

Kris struggled to form complete sentences under this pressure.

"I know it was you who broke my locks and snuck off with her."

Her intimidating glare grew sharper.

"So... where is she?"

"she's... she's..."

Her tone became more annoyed.

"I asked you a question, Kris; where is my daughter?"

Kris was so scared that they could no longer form words. All that would come out was unintelligible babbling. Fed up, Carol gripped onto Kris' shoulders.

"Where is my baby!? What did you do to her!?"

Tears were pouring down Kris' cheeks.

"ANSWER ME!"

This was the worst possible way this encounter could've gone. All of this was an accident, but they were being accused of hurting their friend, and they couldn't even defend themselves, both because of their aversion to talking in general, as well as the fact that a part of them felt guilty.

Suddenly, Rudy, who had also been wandering around town looking for info, found Carol and Kris.

"Hey!"

He approached his wife with both confusion and disgust.

"Carol, what the hell are you doing!?"

Her motherly rage subsided into a more confused mix of anger and sorrow, almost like her husband's words forced her to come face to face with her actions.
Everyone in town knew Rudy as "the fun party guy". He almost never got angry, especially not at his wife.

"Rudy, I, uh..."

He stared at her until she finally let go of Kris.

"I-I was just asking Kris if they saw Dess. A-and they clearly did! You saw what they did to our locks, right?"

"I saw. I'm just wondering what you think yelling at them is gonna accomplish?"

"I'm trying to get them to talk to me!"

"Ah, yes, because Kris is just so well known for talking to people, especially ones they don't like."

Kris put their head down upon hearing this. It was indeed true that they did not like Carol. Mrs. Holiday's mannerisms got more defensive.

"Why do you like Kris so much, anyway? They terrorize the town, they scare our poor Noelle half to death, they're a bad kid!"

"Well maybe if you treated them like an actual person, they wouldn't lash out so much.

"Don't talk to me that way, Rudolph. They're hiding something from me, I know it!"

"They're a CHILD!"

"But-"
"You just hate them because they're human, don't you!?"

The air went deathly silent. Carol looked as though she had seen a ghost. Rudy's face immediately turned to one of concern, like he had just slipped out something he had been keeping to himself for years. He approached his wife to comfort her.

"I-I-I'm sorry, honey. You know I didn't-"
"No, no, no, it's... sigh, fine. If you like them so much, why don't you talk to them?"

Carol stepped away. Rudy, who was trying to calm down, slowly approached Kris and leaned down to their level.

"Are you okay, Kris? Are you hurt?"

Kris shook their head no to both of those.

"Do you wanna talk about what happened."

"..."

Kris was still too shaken up to speak.

"That's fine. You don't have to if you don't want to. Listen, it'll be okay. We're gonna get your dad and the rest of the police, they're gonna find her and they're gonna bring her back home. Things are gonna work out. They always do."

Rudy gave Kris a cheeky wink as they wiped the tears out of their eyes.

"You go back home. It's past your bedtime and your mother's probably worried sick. Let the grown-ups take care of this, okay?"

Kris nodded and started to walk home. Rudy could then hear her wife fell to her knees and began to sob uncontrollably. He rushed to give her a hug.

"It's gonna be okay, honey. We'll find her, I promise."

She continued to sob.
"W... what if we don't!? What if our darling little Dess is gone forever!?"

"Let's just... not think about that right now, okay?"

She sobbed even harder as she tightly hugged onto her husband. He held onto her as he helped the two of them stand back up.

"Come on, let's go home. Noelle's waiting for us."

He guided the two of them back.

Meanwhile, Kris had just made it back home. When they opened the front door. Toriel was there to greet her.

"Kris, you're back!"

She rushed up to hug them. Kris felt relief.

"Ooooh, I was worried sick about you! Why do you keep sneaking off in the middle of the night like that? You're scaring your poor old mother half to death!"

Kris eventually started squirming, trying to get out. Toriel noticed and let them go.

"Now, let's get you to bed, dear."

"no..." Kris muttered to herself

"Huh?" Toriel didn't fully hear what they said.

"...big bro..."

"Yeah, I suppose you are old enough to walk there by yourself." She still couldn't make out what Kris was saying as they walked up the stairs.

Toriel was a bit concerned. Kris seemed more... shaken up than usual. Before she could think about it any more, she let out a huge yawn, and decided to go back to bed. Asgore was already fast asleep, after all.

Kris slammed their bedroom door open, waking up Asriel, who was only half-asleep.

"Oh, howdy, Kris. Whatcha doing?"

As soon as Asriel stood up, Kris rushed towards him and hugged him as tightly as they could.

"W-woah, woah... you good, buddy?"

Kris began to sob uncontrollably.

"I see... hey, it's gonna be alright, Kris."

Asriel hugged back. Kris was slowly able to calm down in his brother's arms.
No matter how dark and scary things may get outside, they knew that as long as they had their big brother with them, things would be okay.