Chapter Text
Sans remembers the tale from years ago, when he and Papyrus were still in foster care. He used to tease Papyrus about it, especially around Souls Day when monsters liked to gather and re-enact important battles from the Great War. At the end of the festivities, as the sun started to set, someone would tell the story of ‘the curse of the mountain’ before sending everyone home for the night. It always had Papyrus jumping at shadows in the dark.
But that was a long time ago, and the town council one day ruled that mention of the curse should be discouraged. It was bad luck, they said. Memory too, is a kind of magic…one that is believed to be able to give power to things…and no one really opposed the ruling anyway, even if they didn’t want others to think they were being superstitious.
Now, Sans stands anxiously in front of the angled doors leading into the abandoned bunker, finishing off the end of a cigarette where his brother isn’t around to scold him. No doubt Papyrus will smell the smoke on his clothes later, but…that’s a problem for future Sans. It doesn’t help that this is probably his third cigarette. He hasn’t really been counting. Just trying to muster his courage.
See, he used to come here by himself just to think. Or smoke. Or lay on the grass and stare up at the clouds. This was his quiet place. Then a couple weeks ago, he fell asleep out here in front of the doors, and had a real doozy of a nightmare. Sans doesn’t even remember the dream. The thing that really had him sweating bullets when he woke up was the fact that suddenly he could see…shadows? Something like smoke, curling around the edges of the bunker entrance, an eerie current trying to get out.
When he’d tried to get a closer look, the stuff morphed into a bunch of little empty-eyed faces and grasping arms and Sans had popped immediately back to his bedroom without a second thought.
In the story, the vengeful spirit of a human who had fallen during the Great War had found it’s way into the underground city of old, and slaughtered countless monsters who lived there. A clever mage found a way to trap the spirit inside a jar, and being so trapped, the spirit was forced to grant the magician wishes. This monster made a wish that freed all of the monsters trapped in the underground, but the spirit escaped the jar and then took the magician’s soul as payment.
The monsters who escaped sealed the underground city to prevent the spirit from following them, but it was said that the spirit to this day continues to call on the aid of other fallen humans, hoping to take the soul of every last monster for good.
Despite gently egging on Papyrus, Sans had always been a skeptic. To him the tale had been simply that. A tall tale. He knew that humans liked to tear down old buildings and fill in mineshafts when they became too dangerous, and just assumed that was what really happened to the old city. The story itself? Surely, it was just monsters airing out old grievances and fears regarding humans, while trying to preserve a little of their own history.
Or so he’d thought.
During the first week after the incident, he’d talked Undyne into coming over to the bunker to have a look at it. The shadows had flickered and roiled around the base of the doors in broad daylight…but she couldn’t see them. She’d laughed and called him out for his ‘prank’, punched him in the shoulder and then left.
He’d scoured the local library for any information about the city, or about curses, or human souls…but found nothing. He turned to the undernet and found only a handful of monsters reiterating the same story he’d heard years ago, and scathing silence from old-timers. Finally he went through the human internet, posing as a human, and learned a bit about the nature of vengeful human souls from a human perspective. Very interesting he thought, that they call such things ‘ghosts’, but he chose not to comment on the subtle monster-phobia of the naming convention.
Human ‘ghosts’, apparently, can be convinced to stop haunting an area and at last dissipate back into mana form, if they are given ‘closure’ or aided in completing their ‘unfinished business’. Once finding this corner of the internet, Sans took notes and read up on the many different ways in which humans tried to convince a spirit to stop haunting them, and how to protect oneself from their wrath. The most straight forward method seemed to be simply be to converse with the spirit, find out what it wants, and then help it find peace. Calling a human priest to come out and consecrate the grounds was out of the question. The salt throwing trick seemed odd, but Sans packed a salt shaker in his backpack just in case, along with some spare batteries for when his flashlight would ‘inevitably’ flicker out.
The bits that have him the most concerned, are the notes about possible ‘possession’, and the people warning that sometimes what some assume are ‘ghosts’, are in fact ‘demons’. He chooses to wear the symbol of the angel around his neck, in lieu of a human cross. Angels feature in some human religions too, so maybe the spirit…or spirits…will see him as a helpful guide to the ‘afterlife’ rather than a threat.
He told Papyrus that he was going to the bar, and not to wait up for him. He hopes that wasn’t a mistake…if something happens and he doesn’t come back, would Papyrus try to follow after him and meet the same fate? Sans hesitates. Again. Drops the last cigarette and grinds it into the grass with the sensible sneakers he chose to wear.
The real problem is that something deep down in his marrow is telling him that if he doesn’t do something about this—it’s going to become a major problem for everyone in Hometown. If no one wants to acknowledge it, or speak about it, and the only person who might believe him is the the same person who would probably discourage him from putting himself in danger—then who is left to deal with it? How long until whatever this is breaks containment? How dangerous is it, actually?
Only one way to find out.
Sans sighs, takes a deep cycle, and tugs at the handles of the doors. They creak in protest, and he finds it strange, because he doesn’t see any rust. He lets go of the handles, rattled, and tries to rally his courage again. It’s dark out. What if he can’t see the shadows now? What if they flood out like a swarm of unseen wasps?
He slings off his backpack and sets it down to go digging through the contents. Something else he just remembered, is how some old monsters would draw designs on the doors of their houses on Souls Day, supposedly to ward off wandering human souls. The salt trick the humans on the internet talked about feels somehow similar—and he digs out the shaker to make a circle around the doors—feeling a bit ridiculous as he does so. He’ll take ridiculous over petrified any day, though.
When he’s finished the circle he takes out a pocket knife and uses it to punch holes in the ground at intervals along the salt line. He doesn’t know why exactly, it just feels right. Like sewing a patch onto a ripped pant leg, or ‘salting the earth’. Securing a hastily made barrier with intention and sending his mana running through the blade with each little stab. He closes the blade up and claps his hands together, willing this thing to do it’s job and keep the shadows from getting past the circle.
With all that done, he re-shoulders his pack and pulls hard on the door handles again. He has to strain, but slowly and stubbornly the doors creak open. He worries suddenly about the noise. What if someone hears and asks what the heck he’s doing? Strangely, once the doors are open past a certain point, some inner mechanism seems to turn and they finish opening the rest of the way by themselves. Sans turns on his flashlight and ponders the assortment of clockwork-like gears and pistons set into the insides of the doors themselves.
Why are they there? Weren’t these put here last-minute to cover up a dangerous hole in the ground, so no one would fall into the ruins? Wasn’t the original entrance to the city buried with time? If the point was to keep people out, why use a design meant to open automatically—something reserved for a place where you’re meant to go in and out of a place regularly? Did it take them awhile to realize there was a curse to worry about? Why not fill the hole in with dirt or gravel or even concrete?
He moves the beam of the flashlight, afraid of what he’ll see when he does. A few spiders crawl around inside what looks to be a darkened stairwell, but no entities try to claw their way out. He takes his first few hesitant steps down those stairs, feeling his marrow prickle unpleasantly. It’s like stepping into the cool mustiness of a root cellar, but damper, with a magical current that feels unnatural to him.
His bones tremble faintly the deeper he goes in, threatening to rattle. It’s…so quiet in here. So dark. If a spider did exist down in this place, he’d probably be able to hear it walking, he thinks.
The sound of sneakers on stone morphs to the sshff sshff sound of sneakers walking through piles of…what he hopes is leaf litter. When he moves the flashlight around he’s startled by what appears to be a marble column. He swings it around to find more and more. Holy fuck. This isn’t a mine. It’s a ruin.
He has a recollection suddenly of reading about humans investigating ancient tombs and dying from the released spores or gases or something. Hopefully monsters are immune to things like that. With trepidation, Sans points the flashlight up, to see just how tall the ceiling is. The light won’t reach that far. He regrets his choice and keeps walking.
Further and further he goes, until he spies dead vegetation and the columns become a stone hallway. Off to the side is a dust-covered stone table. There’s a rotting tablecloth and a tea set on it. Stone pots and planters bereft of flowers.
He steps then onto some sort of carpet. It’s difficult to decipher it’s color. This leads him to a big, open space that gives him the heebie jeebies. In the center of it, he finds two enormous stone…thrones? Sans just stands there for a long moment staring at them. He’s walked right into the underground. The lost city of the old tales.
For a brief, delirious moment, he wants to laugh, and wishes he’d brought a camera with him. He could start making a whole historical archive of photos and observations. How cool would that be? Uncovering things lost to time in here could be really, really interesting…
Then something makes a long, piercing call in the distance, and Sans remembers to be afraid again. He keeps moving. He still doesn’t actually know how he’s going to deal with the curse, or whatever the hell this is. He has to find the source, the spirit—and figure out how to give it peace.
If that is what he’s dealing with, and not something else entirely.
He makes his way down more stairs. A big long hallway, littered with what feels like broken glass crunching under his shoes. Then…he breaks out into a void of darkness. The space at the end of the hall is so large that his flashlight reveals only the few feet of stone he’s standing on. Sans peers into the dark searchingly, but it’s in vain.
He heaves a sigh and considers his options. He could try to fumble his way forward, but then he might fall and break something, or get caught out by whatever is lurking in here. He could go back the way he came and ask for help—knowing that it’s likely that the townsfolk will vote to simply seal the bunker doors completely. He closes his sockets and makes an aggravated, pained noise, then resolves to fumble. But carefully.
He starts by following the path. Unnervingly, the air itself seems to gradually change and become thicker as he descends further down. The darkness roils away from his light, like sooty clouds of dry-ice vapor. It feels weirdly like walking on the shore of the beach and stepping slowly into the ocean—but this isn’t water.
There’s a faint, electric hum, and in the distance something flickers to life. Sans pauses. The flicker slowly spreads—he witnesses the intermittent struggles of emergency lights coming back on. His soul leaps into his cervical vertebrae at what he’s seeing. The enormity of the city, spread out below the high steps he’s on, is surreal and terrifying. The spread of lights looks to him like an orange, glowing neuron.
Something deep in his soul tells him it’s a trap, that something supernatural is going on—and he tries to apply logic to soothe his nerves. Maybe there’s some kind of mechanism in the flooring, or an old magical crosshair that responds to the presence of a soul down here…similar to walking into a public bathroom that has a motion sensor to turn on the lights to conserve power.
At least he can see a little better now.
He gets to the end of the stairs and his feet meet gravel and dust. There are so many crumbling buildings here—he has to guess he’s now at ‘street level’ in the city proper. The tangible darkness is thinner now, but still hangs around the area like a fog.
If he had hairs, they’d be standing up on the back of his neck. There are little remnants of daily life still present all around him. Clothes-lines strung with disintegrating laundry. Tarnished coins scattered around what may have been a market stall. Rusted, repurposed-iron sculptures decorating the remains of gardens now filled with mushrooms and slime molds.
His flashlight flickers. Anxiously he sets his pack down to grab a back-up flashlight and dig out the spare batteries he packed. He has a solar-powered camping lantern as well that’s already been charged, but he’ll save that for an emergency, as it’s not very bright.
After fumbling one of the batteries he manages to change them. The first flashlight returns to a full beam. He tucks the second in his pockets along with the other batteries and continues on his way.
As he gets closer to the core of the city, he squints, trying to make out what kind of contraption precisely seems to be handling the city’s lighting. A place this old, it has to be an old crystal network, right? That would make sense. The cavern he’s now in is obviously very large. They could have mined for the materials.
When he starts moving again, he nearly trips—something snagged at his ankle bones. He looks down to assess the terrain, and his sockets go dark, the plasm draining from his facial bones. The creepy little faces are back. This time, opening and closing their shadowy ‘mouths’ like baby birds and slowly reaching tendril-like limbs towards his shoes. It looks like they’re stuck in the ground.
Sans runs and hops over the face-creatures like the earth beneath him is lava. Dashing in pursuit of the light at the center of the city, where it’s brightest. Papyrus would be proud of him for his impressive speed record.
He hears a muffled boom in the distance as he’s running—then more and more, each one getting just a little bit louder and closer. Eventually he recognizes the sound of splintering wood and dares to look in the direction of the noise for a second. The shrapnel of a century-old home scatters across his shoulder, and something nearly as large as the house itself crashes completely through the building. Sans curses and his vision goes blurry with tears.
There’s no way he’s outrunning this thing. He’s already sweating buckets just hustling away from the floor-faces. It has way too many legs, and undulates after him like a hungry seal chasing a penguin. Sans looks back to see a maw with half a dozen or so rows of teeth inside it, and his soul seizes. He swings his skull back around to cast a desperate look at the light—and then there’s a weird popping sensation behind his spine—and suddenly he’s in a different place.
It’s well-lit, and quiet, save for the hum of machinery nearby. He drops to his knees, his vision now adding spinning to the blurring. It’s well-lit, and he still can’t see a damn thing. Some part of him registers that he should probably keep moving. That just because there’s light doesn’t mean he’s safe…but he’s too damn tired to move.
He struggles to get back to his feet, suddenly worried about passing out, about being unconscious and vulnerable. As he’s trying his best and failing, something yanks him up off the ground by his soul, and then he’s flying though unfamiliar corridors in a confusing whirl of color and vague shapes.
He hears a pneumatic kind of hissing sound that reminds him of the automatic doors at the shop, only heavier, and then he blacks out.