Slowly, my eyes drifted open; I didn't know what had woken me. All I was aware of was painfully bright light and a numbing exhaustion. I didn't want to move. so… tired. just wanna… sleep… Right as I started to drift off again, I shifted slightly, trying to roll away from the light… and realized I was floating. Surprisingly, this discovery didn't motivate me to fear, just to make me open my eyes again. I was too tired to do much else. But, I was curious. Without moving my head, I glanced around. My mind was too sluggish to make sense of what I was seeing.
It seemed I was suspended in a semi-standing position in the middle of… a kaleidoscope? Extending as far as I could see in all directions, drifting about and mingling, were scattered layers of snowflakes, shining with color. The very air seemed to be condensed white light with no distinguishable horizon. Occasionally, among the color, images of places and monsters would flash by. Many seemed slightly familiar yet different from the world I knew. My jacket was tied around my waist, fluttering weightlessly. All these things put together, slowly flowing by, made it seem like I was peacefully sinking into a crystal river. It was beautiful.
After a while longer, a dull, throbbing pain started in my forearm. But before I could react, to my surprise, a small blob of warm orange broke away from the swirling flurries and whizzed around my arm. It sorta tickled. Then a pale, shimmery green joined the party, as did other colors, dashing here and there, from head to toe. Strange though they were, I decided these funny little colors meant me no harm. Oddly, the pain soon subsided, and the living snowflakes drifted away. I stayed like that for who knows how long, half asleep, lazily watching the glowing critters. They came and went, seemingly as they pleased.
After straddling wakefulness and unconsciousness for possibly another hour, something happened. All along, it seemed as though I had been floating about, going with an unseen current. Now, I felt a definite change in direction. Something was pulling me somewhere. Before long, a distant spot grew on the nonexistent horizon. As I drifted closer, I saw… myself?! Except, this "me" looked different. It took some willpower to stay awake, but I managed to make out this new entity.
The skeleton's posture said he was sitting cross-legged, except, he was suspended nearly upside down, slowly spinning into an upright position; a flowing, brown, art-stained scarf lazily followed close behind. His brown, yellow-sleeved shirt had a belt pulled diagonally across it; small paint vials in a rainbow array were attached to it. The brown shorts matched the shirt. Beneath both were black leggings, decorated with rectangular blue lines on the inner sides. A light blue hoodie, similar to my own, was tied around the skeleton's waist. Brown and black striped tennis shoes with yellow laces tapped to some silent tempo in his head. His hands, covered with fingerless brown gloves, flew across the face of a sheet in a worn sketchbook. Around him drifted various art supplies, like pencils and erasers, which he would occasionally reach for. Most noteworthy, though, was the giant paintbrush strapped to his back, its psychedelic tip fluttering in the unseen breeze.
Without looking away from his sketch, the skeleton twisted his body, seeming to engage some type of gravity and "land." Walking through invisible space, he came up to me, still not paying attention to anything but his paper. Sticking the pencil he'd been working with in his mouth, he suspended the notebook in the air with a faint blue magic.
Fighting to stay conscious and too tired to speak, I tried to refocus my gaze. It was then I noticed the smudges of black on the skeleton's face and the colors in his eyes. One was a blue circle, the other a yellow star. cool. no, wait—Now one was a purple diamond and the other an orange triangle. No, green rectangle and pink swirl. No! Now they were different again! Every time the skeleton blinked, the patterns changed. It was hypnotizing. Curious, I watched this strange phenomenon with rapt attention.
"Oh good! You're awake," the skeleton exclaimed, consulting his notebook. My mind balked. how did he know i was awake? he never looked up! "Oh, your code shimmered," he explained, "it hasn't been doing that. I had a feeling you were confused, so, yeah," he said, taking a paint-filled glass heart from his belt thing and shattering it in his hands; an identical vile materialized in its place. "Code's not really my thing. That's more of Error's thing, but, I mean, I can still fix it. I think," he added, rubbing his now bright green fingers together and reaching for my arm.
My eyes followed his movement and went wide. Instead of bone, my forearm was composed of shifting particles, falling from 1's to 0's and back again; where the rift ended, dust began. I was barely holding together!
"Don't worry! I'll have you mended in no time," the chipper skeleton assured me, tracing a finger over the ribbon of code. To my surprise, the glittering particles solidified back into bone. "Anyway, you've been like this for days, and you're still here." what? "Yup! I scooped your code from the void," my apparent savior explained, moving around me, either finger-painting or brushing me back into existence. "That was very brave of you, to save your world, deleting n' stuff. Code, I mean." does this guy even know how to "english?" I wondered. "Yeah, I'm pretty scattered," he admitted, then paused awkwardly, his eyes going hollow. "What were we talking about again?"
I blinked in confusion. i must be hallucinating. this is all so crazy. where even am i, who is this guy, why am i still alive, how—suddenly, all I could think of was Papyrus. Tears welled as the questions quelled. if i'm here, that means he's safe. The strange skeleton had made his way behind me and now gave a little sigh of exasperation.
"Bother. I was hoping it held this time," he said, sighing.
There was a rustling sound. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw long white threads spread into the air; simultaneously, I felt air pass lightly over my spine. The back of my shirt had unraveled. I gasped, but the skeleton took no notice. I sensed him lean closer, humming in disapproval, then drew his finger across my shoulder blades. I shivered, remembering the path of the knife. Seemingly concerned, he pulled away, and I could hear more shattering paint vials. Then, a tingling sensation filled the gap as he carefully tapped his dripping fingers atop the gash; involuntarily, I jerked. It hurt!
"That hurts? Sorry, didn't think of that. I suppose it might. You weren't awake other times I've used healing. Oh, I can make sure it won't!" he jabbered, then quickly added, "hurt. I can make sure it won't hurt, not the healing, just… What was I saying? I forgot…" he muttered. "Well, sleep well!"
With that, I felt a light tap on the back of my skull, saw a blinding explosion of psychedelic, radiant color, then blacked out.