Summary: Sans and co. deal with their fancy new smoke machine and a nosy neighbor. A Y/N appears in the background. Shoves her into the kitchen before she can become a reader insert.
Sans grimaced.
He probably should have been more disturbed that the machine only being tested went so theatrically wrong, but, as he waded through the smokey shed with a fire extinguisher under his arm he was surprised to find himself cautiously optimistic.
Yes it had gone badly. Yes the machine was going to be out of action for a good while and they would need to fix it again. But apparently this time thanks to the added combined expertise of three more versions of him and his brother, it hadn't gone so badly as scrambling the laws of physics and disrupting space-time to reveal a multiverse and kidnap his alter-egos.
And, as the members of the household were called on rapidly to search house and streets for any new interlopers, Sans was thanking his lucky stars that it was seeming apparent no more had appeared this time.
Just the extra versions of himself and his brother already stuck in his world for the last year.
He reflected while walking through to re-open vents and assess the damage, that they may have been a little rash about starting an advanced test run so soon. He wasn't oblivious why the others were suddenly so keen, and perhaps he took advantage of that to finally get them back to their own universes and out of his girlfrie- he meant universe. Yep.
It was that damn ex boyfriend setting everyone off. Suddenly every skeleton in the house is realizing how much they care about and want to protect Y/N. Pretty much everyone at once being ready to commit to face the feelings they had mostly been dancing around, and the four of them who were working on the machine recognizing that they either get back to their own universes soon, and hopefully their own version of the girl, or end up too devoted to this one to even want to leave her anymore.
Sans dropped his head down and sighed loudly. Three doors down a much smaller version of him also heaved a big sigh, then looked a bit confused at itself.
So they ended up doing the first test earlier than first planned. They had already been in world for a while thanks to Sans and machine, crammed into a three-bed house, which was why they had to up-size in the first place. Bringing the machine with them, relocated once already from the Underground, again to carefully rebuild in a custom built shed in the back yard.
Three months of diplomatically calming down varying levels of distrust and animosity especially from the more violent world's brothers, three months of grumbling about space until they all had enough and agreed together to all put into financing a house move.
They faced up to the fact they would be in this world long enough that it would be better to at least live more comfortably, plus with more room they could devote themselves as a team to working on the machine together to send themselves home.
As part of the agreement Sans was made to concede on accepting Red, Orange, and Rus to be equal partners in this work from now on. No more little accidents.
A dinging notification chimed out from his pocket, so Sans stepped outside the shed's metal door under the cloudy night and checked his messages, finding among the nights check-ins from his 'cousins', a concerned note from the house next door on the shed's side that their shed was indeed smoking.
He sent a quick reply that all was okay; he was just fixing up their barbeque and don't worry its not on fire (anymore), and looked up to wave at the message's sender in their window as he stood swinging the shed door open and closed to get the smoke out. He must smell like Red right now.
At least it was nice to deal with these situations in a big fancy house with rooms to themselves, he mused. Paps and Blue may have had a ball room sharing, being so joyfully alike each other and not afraid to dive into making friends, and Orange turned out to be decent enough, volunteering to share the living room with him when neither of the other two pairs would budge on sharing a room with anyone but their own brother. Sans had the recliner, and Orange had room to stretch out on the sofa.
By the time they were due to move they had ended up with Red and Rus deciding that they had got to know the others enough to chance that no-one was going to kill them in their sleep, and one took the other recliner while the other took the floor and all the cushions. Between collectively avoiding upsetting their brothers tidiness standards and avoiding a lot of demands, it was a bonding experience.
Talk of the grinning devil, Red appeared behind him to amble out through the smoke, fanged gold tooth glinting to appear first.
"either we pulled through a few who 'r really good at hidin' or ya got lucky this time", he noted. "yer bro and black 'r doin' a patrol of sorts, rus 'n orange are doin' another sweep out further just in case. prolly both gonna end up in the gas station buyin' sweets while their bros aint watchin'. hows the damage?"
"eh, a lot of the circuitry looks fried so that needs pulling out but the core processing section looks like it survived. must've blew the surplus energy through the safeties so good thing we added those in. 'n we need a new coffeepot, that got obliterated"
"my bro's gonna chew me out over breakin' the machine when he gets home from work… "
"hey it was a group effort" Sans shrugged. "but i get the feeling he wont really be too devastated about not going back just yet am i right? i'm bettin' if he was home it could've been him barging in to disrupt things as much as black. hasn't he got that date night tomorrow anyway?"
Red grunted in affirmation. "yeah. he's still pretty pissed blue asked her out before him, wants ta outclass the shrimp's lame movie idea." He stood and scrutinized his counterpart's formerly blue sweatshirt. "c'mon, the shed can wait til tomorrow 'n they'll be home soon, she's got dinner in the slow cooker and you need a shower dude"
He didn't need convincing, locking up the shed and trailing behind Red into the house in time to see the aforementioned pair shedding their scarves and coats over by the front door, acting very happy and familiar with each other as Blue pressed in unnecessarily close behind to help pull Y/N's coat from her shoulders while she giggled and blushed.
"*ahem*"
"OH HI!" Blue's deep voice rang brightly, as they both looked over to Sans and Red.
"Hey guys! Sans, uh you…?" Y/N paused, looking at the state of him.
He shrugged and grinned, "just been working on science stuff"
"In the shed?"
"in the shed"
He looked at Blue. "good movie?"
"OH YES IT WAS VERY SCARY! IT WAS A GOOD THING I WAS THERE TO KEEP Y/N FROM GETTING TOO SCARED AND HOLD HER CLOSE WHEN THE KILLER WAS CHASING PEOPLE ON SCREEN." He bounced on the heels of his feet, raising a blue gloved hand to make a showy fist pump as he puffed up his chest, and Y/N smiled indulgently at the youthful natured skeleton at her side.
"I bet", muttered Red.
"doesn't sound like such a lame idea now does it?" Sans jabbed under his breath at the one beside him.
Red scowled back. "whatever", then turned to go, winking at Y/N before he went, "if ya need me sweet-cakes i'll be in my room", and he teleported away.
As Y/N went to check on the food, Sans took Blue to the side and started to inform him of the mishap with the machine and the precautionary search for threats.
He was interrupted as the front door slammed open and Fell entered the hallway without breaking his stride, and Sans had a brief moment of appreciation for the pay-off they were already getting from installing spring door stops in this new house.
"DID YOU SERIOUSLY WAIT TO MESSAGE ME UNTIL AFTER I FINISHED WORK?! WHERE ARE THE EXTRA VERSIONS OF OURSELVES, HAVE YOU IDIOTS CAUGHT THEM YET? HOW MANY, AND HOW VIOLENT?"
He glared around the hallway, the action confirming there was indeed no-one other than himself, Sans, and a startled looking Blue, and peered down at Sans.
Before Sans could get a word in, Blue sharply turned to face him with an wide sockets and a stamp of his boot,
"MWEH! NOT TO FEAR! WE WILL SHOW ANY NEWCOMERS THIS IS A FRIENDLY AND SAFE WORLD IF THEY WANT TO BE GOOD CITIZENS!-"
"guys-"
"AND SUBDUE ANY WHO DON'T." Added Fell.
Blue momentarily considered arguing this, but conceded; "WHERE NECESSARY."
"guys-"
"WHERE NECESSARY."
Sans pinched his nasal ridge. "guys that's really great but i don't think we bought anyone through the machine this time. everyone's already been out sweeping the area and it's all quiet. it looks like the safeguard we added stopped it from using more than a little energy to search monster magic signatures, so it couldn't grab onto anyone fully enough with any extra energy. worked as designed mostly"
"...think that's why it kinda exploded" He added under his breath.
"OH."
"OH."
Their universes may have been divergent but every now and then, Sans found himself reminded of his own brother in this darker version of Papyrus who had taken the nickname Fell, and even in the jarringly dynamic version of himself in Blue, and felt a small pang at seeing them both look so deflated.
He saw no harm in the idea that occurred in this moment, and glanced towards the kitchen doorway.
"although…"
They both saw him glance at the kitchen and paid attention.
"it might be best to keep guard in the house for this evening in case we missed any intruders. i mean, we weren't at full complement with neither of you on the team tonight so we did the best we could but… "
Fell pointedly turned away from Sans and flung his arms crossed together in a grandiose show of considering the implications. "HUMPH! OF COURSE YOU IDIOTS WOULDN'T DO A GOOD ENOUGH SEARCH WITHOUT MY SUPERVISION. IF ANY DEVIANTS HAVE SOUGHT TO EVADE YOU ALL SO FAR AND YET STILL COME INTO THIS HOUSE, WE WOULD HAVE TO ASSUME HOSTILE INTENT…"
Blue joined in, bringing up clenched fists to square up to the prospect of a fight against such evil-doers, "IF THEY COME ACROSS THE HUMAN…"
"eh, it probably wont be an issue but might be safer if one or two of us keeps in range of y/n. maybe use the excuse of helping her in the kitchen?" Sans supplied, then paused at the pair currently focused on the kitchen and its occupant, and before sidestepping to go added "we dont wanna take the whisk of any uneggspected impastas".
Two skeletons briefly froze before turning to react in sync at the puns.
"MWEH!"
"NYEH!"
Orange, standing slouched with his hands in his sweatshirt pockets reacted with a half-asleep start as they turned to accuse the spot Sans had just been stood in.
He managed to look a bit guilty in place of the errant joker, grinning mildly and eye-lights studying the wall at his side as a bead of sweat appeared on his skull.
They both turned back to each other.
"NYE- INFURIATING! IF THAT MARSHMALLOW WANTS TO KEEP CHALLENGING MY PATIENCE WITH THOSE PUNS," Fell paused to grasp for a suitable threat and excuse to laugh,
"…I'LL MAKE THE TITCH EAT THOSE STUPID PINK FLUFFY SLIPPERS, NYAH HA HA HA!"
An old lady paused with her finger to the doorbell, and looked at the little companion sat presented to face the door in the upturned palm of her other hand. He blinked at his little pink slippers and looked up at her. If she had been a second later to the house or the loud comment came a little earlier, she wouldn't have had pressed it.