A/N Well, this is something I didn't think I'd do. An AU of an AU. Especially of Dusttale. This is a type of story I've never really tried before, but the premise was just too interesting and I couldn't ignore it. It just popped into my head one day and before I knew it, I had the whole story thought of. It originally wasn't on my list, but I couldn't help but add it.
Now, this isn't as long as my other stories. It's only five chapters long with an average of six pages per chapter. Relative to the rest of my works, this is a short story. But I still gave it my all and made sure it was as good as everything else I have and will write.
With that, I hope you enjoy!
It never ended. It was something Frisk had come to accept after hundreds of Resets. No matter what, the nightmare always happened. Chara, if that's who they really were, had full control over their body. They moved Frisk's body, spoke for them, and killed despite Frisk not wanting to. They were so done with the genocide, but Chara refused to give back control for even a single run.
Frisk wasn't sure when it began, exactly. The never-ending genocide just seemed to have always been happening at this point. But there was a point before, when they made friends with everyone and saved the Monsters, freeing them. But then they got curious and started killing them all. And then Chara had taken over, killing in their place, murdering Monsters for the EXP and LOVE, ignoring all of Frisk's pleas to stop, wanting to see something change.
And then, after hundreds of runs (327 if that demon was to be trusted) something did change. Sans suddenly remembered and snapped. It then became him killing everyone for EXP to try and match Chara's Determination. Only it failed. Now, Sans was trapped in another loop, only this time, he was the one killing everyone. It was bad enough when Chara was killing everyone with their hands, but now they were making Sans do it in a futile effort to defeat them.
Frisk was so tired. They couldn't even remember what it was like to feel happy anymore. Chara tried to entice them, to give in and enjoy the constant show. But they refused. They wouldn't become like the former human. So, they just blanked out the horror and waited for those brief moments between Resets when they were alone within their own mind. Those were the only reprieve they got from the nightmare; dreaming of a time when things were better.
But eventually, the dream would end and the nightmare would begin again. It was inevitable. Just wait and pray for something to have changed. That was all Frisk could hope for at this point. But they knew waiting for change was pointless. Nothing would ever change for the better. It was only changing for the worse. Hundreds of runs. Countless massacres. Endless broken hearts. Repeat, repeat, repeat. It was all Frisk had to look forward to anymore. Nothing would ever change.
Until, something did.
It wasn't apparent at first. Frisk awoke on the golden flowers once more, waiting for the moment Chara stood them up to begin the genocide all over again. They lay there, waiting the beginning of the nightmare once more. But it didn't happen immediately. Thinking that Chara was simply taking their time, they continued to wait, laying there for the moment their will would be stripped away once more.
Time passed, and yet they still lay there. They decided to take these precious few moments to remember. To recall a better time. To relive their only happy memory on these flowers. It was with him. The Monster who they grew to care for, perhaps even love. Sharing the few precious moments they had before he became a flower once more and lost himself. They had wanted, so badly, to help him. To restore him permanently. But that wouldn't happen without seven human Souls. And there was no way to gain another.
More time passed and now Frisk was puzzled. What was taking Chara so long? When were they going to stand them up? Why hadn't the nightmare already begun? What was going on?
Eventually, Frisk blinked of their own accord. That had startled them so much that they quietly gasped. And when they felt their lungs and mouth respond to their will, it shocked them. Chara usually took complete control of them by now, making it impossible to move of their own will. But now, they had just moved of their own accord, twice. And that little revelation made them realize how quiet their own head was. There was no manic laughter, no crazed speech, no sadistic glee.
Just quiet, beautiful, blissful silence.
Hesitantly, Frisk sat up on their own, slowly raising themself. When their hand touched the flowers, they could feel them in their grasp, instead of some ghost of the sensation. They ran their fingers through the stems and petals, almost crying at the feeling.
Then, inch by inch, they stood up on their own legs for the first time in… forever. They brought their hands up to their face to feel their own skin. It felt wonderful. They couldn't contain it and cried, feeling the tears roll down their cheeks and hands. They were beyond elated at having control again.
But… why? Where was Chara? Were they gone? Did something happen to them mid-Reset? They couldn't hear Chara's voice anymore. And Chara's presence within their body was missing. But they had to be sure.
"Chara?" their voice cracked. They coughed. They hadn't used their voice in so long, they almost forgot what it sounded like. "Chara?" they tried again.
Only silence greeted them.
That was it then. They were free.
They nearly broke down at that revelation. They were master of their own fate again. They could make their own choices once more. They could free everyone. They could rescue the Monsters, get them out and keep them out this time. They could…
Sans! He might still be on a rampage! He probably still thought they were going to kill them all! They had to stop him!
They nearly tripped over their own feet as they tried to run. They had to move fast, before he started killing them all. They skidded into the room where they first met Flowey to find it empty.
…Except for a lone pile of dust.
Frisk gasped. No. It had already begun. They began to cry, mourning whoever that pile of dust might have been.
It was then Toriel showed up, walking through the dust, apparently oblivious to what it was.
"Greetings, my child," she greeted pleasantly. "I hope you have not been waiting too long. I was letting somebody…" she trailed off as she saw their tears. "Is something wrong?" she asked.
Oh, no, except for the fact that the person you've been trading jokes with through the door you just let him through is going on a murderous rampage to try and stop an undead demon from killing everyone, except that demon is gone, which means he's killing innocent people for no reason, is what they didn't say. Toriel might be loving and doting, but even she wouldn't believe them if they told her the truth. She'd probably write them off as crazy and immediately lock them up.
But they still needed to save her. They had to get her somewhere safe and quickly, before Sans tried to kill her and hope they could reason with the skeleton before it was too late.
But it was then Toriel's phone rang.
"Oh, my cell phone. Please excuse me, my child," she said, pulling out her old phone. "Hello?" Her face fell. "How do you have my…?" She listened to whoever it was, though Frisk was certain it was Sans. She spoke with him for a while longer, before the conversation ended.
"Apologies, but I must attend to something," she said. "Please stay right there until I return." She then left, leaving Frisk by themself.
Yeah, that's not happening, Frisk thought. They immediately headed for the next room, tentatively touching the gold star. They felt their file save. At least that still worked. But what could they do? They had to stop Sans, but what were the odds he'd listen to them? He probably hated them and probably still thought they were going to kill everyone. How did they convince him otherwise?
They were going to need help. And there was only one person who they could turn to in this instance.
"Flowey!" they cried out. They didn't like trusting the flower, but he was their only option. "Flowey, please," they pleaded. They couldn't do this alone and he was the only one who could help them. He wasn't showing. They guessed he was probably too wary of them but they knew he was nearby, listening. They just had to say something he couldn't ignore. "Asriel Dreemurr, show yourself!" they shouted.
That worked. Flowey popped out of the ground in front of Frisk, surprise on his face. "What… what did you say?" he stuttered.
"Flowey, thank goodness," they breathed. "For a moment, I thought… well, never mind." They sat down on their knees. "We need to talk."
"Okay, but first, how do you know that name?" Flowey demanded.
"I learned it in New Home," they said, deciding there was nothing better to do than to just get it all out of the way. "I heard it from another Reset, one much different from this one."
Flowey looked stunned for a moment, before he let out a rather childish giggle. "And here I thought the craziest thing I'd see would be Smiley Trashbag killing a few Monsters."
"He's going to kill a lot more than that," Frisk said. "Sans has lost it."
"Oh, really?" Flowey questioned. "And how do you know what he's going to do?"
"Because I've watched him do it hundreds of times," Frisk explained. Flowey looked stunned before Frisk continued. "This is not even close to my first time. But this is the first time in hundreds of Resets that I've had control of my own body again."
"W-what's that supposed to mean?" Flowey asked.
"I'll explain it all later," Frisk said, standing up. "But right now, we've got to warn people! He's going to kill them all if we don't do something. We need to let people know what's going on and we need to tell Toriel." They reached for him. "And I need your help to talk to Sans. We need to stop him before he's too far gone."
As they reached for him, Flowey got a brief glimpse of something. His eyes widened as information overwhelmed him. It was the memory of hundreds of deaths all perpetrated by the figure before him. He screamed, the terror overloading him.
"Ahh! Please don't kill me!" he screamed before vanishing.
"Flowey, no!" Frisk screamed. "Come back! I need you!"
They stood there, saddened. They weren't sure what to do now. Without Flowey, how were they going to convince Sans?
Maybe they'd see the flower again. Until then, they were going to have to warn people on their own. They ran, hoping they got to Toriel's house as quickly as possible, before Sans killed her.
They ran through the Ruins, their memory of the puzzles allowing them to easily deactivate them. They saw other Monsters on their journey, but only a scant few, and they were all scared, but not of them. They warned them to hide, to seek safety, before they were hunted down and killed. As they ran, they also found the occasional pile of dust, a sign of Sans' killing spree. Each pile of dust they found was like a knife to their heart. These Monsters were victims of a war between Sans and Chara, a war that was over. They had to stop Sans, before it was too late.
They reached Toriel's house, praying that she was still alive and somewhere other than the basement. They ran inside, looking it over from top to bottom, praying that she was upstairs. They checked the guest room, her room, the living room, even the kitchen, but she wasn't there. That left only one place where she could be and they prayed to every god there was that she wasn't with Sans.
Reluctantly, they walked down the stairs, traversing the long hallway that led to the only known exit of the Ruins. Once they turned the bend that led to the doors, they stopped, as Toriel was there, and right before her was Sans, his sleeves and slippers already greyer than normal.
She was talking to the skeleton, assuring him that the killer he was so worried about couldn't get to them. Toriel didn't know that Sans was the killer and they could see he had one hand behind his back, the toy knife clutched in his grasp, shaking. His low LV meant he was hesitating which bought Frisk some time.
Immediately, they broke into a sprint, hoping to tackle Sans and stop him. "Toriel, it's a trap!" they shouted, hoping to warn her. Both the skeleton and the goat lady looked at them, both surprised.
"My child, what are you…" She didn't get a chance to finish. When Sans saw them sprinting, he briefly panicked, before his smile became unsettling and he quickly slashed Toriel, cleaving her from shoulder to hip.
Frisk stopped in their sprint, tears beginning to roll down their cheeks. Toriel fell to one knee, a hand clutching her wound. "You were him, weren't you?" she said morosely. "You told me all those jokes. Behind the door… I trusted you. You t-told me this was important. So, the only killer I should have been worried about… was you." With that, she turned to dust.
Frisk covered their mouth with their hands, tears streaming from their eyes. Sans looked back at them for only a moment, regret in his eyes, before he dropped the knife, pulled his hood up, and walked out of the Ruins.
Slowly, Frisk went over to Toriel's remains, picking them up in their hands, the fine grey powder falling through their fingers. "Mom," they sobbed. Memories of her countless deaths went through their head, tears dripping into the grey pile.
"You're actually sad?"
Frisk looked over to see Flowey there, confused.
Frisk sniffled. "Yes, is that so surprising?" they scathingly asked.
"Well, from what I remember, you didn't care before," Flowey said.
"That wasn't me," Frisk said. "It was… something else. It possessed me, killing everyone, even when I begged them to stop."
"Who?" Flowey asked.
Frisk looked down at the pile of dust that used to be Toriel, the first real mother they ever had. "They called themself Chara."
Flowey straightened. "C-Chara? But… why would they…?"
"I'm not sure it was Chara," Frisk admitted. "At least, not anymore. It was… something else."
Flowey shook his head. "No, no, I don't believe it." He looked at Frisk. "How do you know Chara? And how do you know my name? How do you know all this stuff?"
Frisk turned to face the flower. "I've… done more peaceful routes before," they admitted. "I've been through timelines where the Monsters go free and I've met you in such timelines."
"Then why don't I remember such timelines?" Flowey questioned.
"You voluntarily erased your memories of those timelines so I could do it again," Frisk explained.
"Then… what happened?"
"I got curious," they answered. "Too curious. I decided to kill them all and it ended up with me selling my Soul to the thing claiming to be Chara, which eventually took control of my body, deciding to kill them all for all eternity, just to see something new."
Flowey looked to the Ruins doors. "And eventually, he snapped and decided to stop you, no matter the cost."
Frisk nodded. "Only thing is, it didn't work. Chara managed to defeat him and erase his memories to ensure he couldn't change anything, and that he'd be stuck in the loop of killing everyone forever."
Flowey shivered. "And they're doing this, just to see something new?" Flowey questioned.
"They were," Frisk answered. "But they're gone now. I don't know what happened, I just woke up and they weren't here."
Flowey looked down for a moment before facing them again. "So, what now?"
"I have to talk to Sans," Frisk said. "Convince him that it's over and he doesn't have to kill anyone anymore."
"He might try to kill you," Flowey pointed out.
"I know, but I have to take that chance," Frisk insisted. "If I can get the perfect ending again, and everyone can go free, it'll be worth it."
Flowey sighed. "So why do you want me?"
"I… might need your help and you're the only one who'll believe me," Frisk explained. "Please. We need to end this."
Flowey looked down for a long moment, debating. Eventually, he looked back up. "Okay. I'll help you," he agreed.
Frisk stood up, wiping the dust off their hands. "We need to find him, fast. Luckily, I know where to go."
"Lead the way."
Frisk forged ahead, pushing open the exit of the Ruins. They could do this. They had to. They would end this nightmare, for good.
End of Chapter 1
