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"Papyrus, you should close the drapes."
The skeleton in question nods but doesn't actually move to cover the window. Outside, snow is slowly drowning the streets and adjacent buildings in white, making the world appear dull and colorless. It's mostly deserted, a stray human bundled up in coat and scarf walks past but besides that, it's like a no man's land out there.
Which is the only reason Papyrus pulled back the curtains in the first place.
"Papyrus-" Sans says, voice edged with something else. Somebody that doesn't know them might think it was a reprimand, an outing of worry, a scolding.
Papyrus knows his brother is more scared than anything.
"It's alright." He quickly releases his hold on the fabric and it falls back into place, making the room instantly darker, colder. They only have the one window and the one light, more like a bulb hanging precariously from the ceiling because neither of them has bothered to go to a store and buy a proper lamp shade. It's dimmed, to make it harder to be spotted from outside, and the light it throws on its surroundings is depressing, to say the least.
"They didn't follow us," Papyrus says, getting up from his place on the windowsill and Sans seems to breathe a proverbial sigh of relief. He trusts his brother's eye above anything else in the world, and if Papyrus says they're in the clear, they are.
But they both know there isn't such a thing as a clean getaway until the following morning.
"Did you cover our tracks?" he asks next, sitting down on the couch instead. It sags under his weight, letting out a small cloud of dust and Papyrus is ever so grateful for the lack of lungs. He's sure normal humans wouldn't be able to get out of this room without suffering at least one asthma attack for their troubles.
"Pretty much," Sans says, flopping down beside him. He lays his legs on the crate serving as their coffee table. His boots and the cuffs of his trousers are sticky with half-melted snow, and Papyrus frowns but doesn't comment. "Would be a hell of a lot easier if Grillby was here though."
"He's out on some other job." Papyrus picks up his trusty sniper rifle and starts meticulously taking it apart and cleaning the mechanism. It's still wet from their outing, and he doesn't want the metal parts to rust. "I didn't ask which one and I don't want to know."
They sit in silence for a bit, the rhythmic sound of the scraping almost lulling them into a false sense of security. Sans has laid both hands behind his head and Papyrus is fairly sure his brother has fallen asleep when he suddenly speaks up.
"You don't like this very much, do you?"
It hurts, just a little bit, to hear the disappointment in that voice. The ever-present self-blame Sans puts on himself and Papyrus knows he can never erase. Not now, not tomorrow, not ever.
"I know it's what we have to do. I know it's what's best for us." It sounds overly rehearsed, like he's just repeating something he read in a book, and that hurts too.
"But you wish it were different," Sans says quietly. He draws out the words in a way that Papyrus hates more than the car chases or the shooting or the smell of blood.
More than the dead humans and the dust.
"I do." He clicks the final bolt into place, lays the rifle against his shoulder, and looks through the scope experimentally, at the cracks in the wall all blurry because of the magnification. When he pulls back the trigger the resulting thud confirms he has done the procedure correctly, not that there was ever any doubt.
Papyrus is notoriously good at puzzles, after all.
"I do too," Sans says, head flopping against his brother's shoulder and Papyrus lays the gun in his lap to accommodate the position. "I kinda wish it were different too, Paps."
There's something bittersweet about entertaining the thought. Something laced with memories of cold nights, sleepless and huddled together between a pair of trashcans and never knowing what tomorrow might bring. Joining Asgore's gang was the smartest thing they've ever done and they know it. "It was the right choice."
It was the only choice would be a more accurate truth, but in the strictest sense it isn't a lie, because Papyrus doesn't lie to his brother and Sans doesn't lie to him, not ever. He's not sure they could anymore.
"Could you imagine though?" Sans says, suddenly sitting up straight again and there's something mischievous to his voice that reliefs the tension almost instantly. It reminds Papyrus of their younger years, when they just got into the whole mob thing and the stakes weren't half as high as they are these days.
"Oh sure, we'd have a little house with a little garden and you would go to work each day with a little suitcase while I stayed home to tend to the house like a good little housemaid." The sarcasm is practically dripping from the words, but it earns him a chuckle from Sans that makes the room seem a little lighter at least.
"Why do I have to be the one to work my ass off? You can do that, I'll do chores."
"Chores are work, Sans. If you did them then the house would look like this," Papyrus deadpans, one hand indicating the abdominal state of their hide-out and maybe if they spend more than a few evenings per week here he would have the motivation to actually do something about how filthy it is.
"Nah, I'm being serious," Sans continues. "It would be kind of fun. We could open up a restaurant, and have people over for dinner. And go to the store without looking over our shoulder constantly."
"We do have a restaurant, Sans."
"That's just a cover, Pap. I take a front to that."
"I can't believe you just made a pun about that." Papyrus sighs, just slightly. He recognizes the effort at cheering him up for what it is and appreciates the intention, but can't help but feel like Sans is just saying it for his sake.
Sans grins wider. "You could spend all your day cooking and I could spend all my day lying around and we'd both be happy."
Papyrus hums between his teeth, mulling it over for a second before shaking his head. "That actually sounds incredibly boring."
They look at each other then. At their dirty, still damp clothes and the scuff on their faces from yet another narrow escape and maybe there's a bit of dust on the lapel of Papyrus' jacket to finish off the picture-perfect impression of two tired skeleton criminals that slipped through the eye of the needle tonight.
And they laugh at the mere idea of a normal life.