Chapter Text
As if anything couldn't get any sillier, Steven was greeted with a paper on the ground, complimented with two skeleton brothers just ahead of it. As he approached, the taller skeleton brother who stood next to Sans (somehow) took notice and turned to face Steven.
"HUMAN!!! I HOPE YOU'RE READY FOR..."
Papyrus glanced around, as if something was lost. With slight anxiety, he glanced over to his own brother. "SANS!! WHERE'S THE PUZZLE!!!"
"it's right there. on the ground."
That's what the paper is?
"trust me. there's no way he can get past this one."
Steven curiously approached the paper, kneeling and picking it up to get a closer look at it. Upon further inspection, it seemed to be a word search which had been monster-themed. On the left was a character of sorts that could only be described as an icecube with a dog face on it. It was drawn saying "Hey kid's! Can you help me solve this puzzle?"
If Connie or Pearl were here, they'd have a field day with this grammar.
He checked his back pocket, expecting a pencil, to be greeted with his ice cream stick and wrapper from earlier. Standing up and holding the paper, Steven asked, "Hey, do either of you guys have a pencil?"
Sans, dug through his jacket pockets in search of one. Completely baffled Steven even wants to actually do this word search, he walked up and handed a number two pencil to him. "heheh, here. guess i should have put one down, too."
Steven would thank him and kneel over the word search on the ground, glancing to the list of words to find at the bottom.
Fall, monster, cigars, skeletons...
...What's this????
A "word" that could only be described as a keyboard slam was printed out on the page, specifically saying giasfclfebrehber. This caused Steven to laugh out loud as he readjusted his sitting position.
"...SANS, WHAT IS HE LAUGHING AT??" Papyrus walked over to Steven and knelt down, curious about his brother's puzzle.
"This!" Steven flipped around the word search and pointed at the fake word to show Papyrus. "I have to find this in the puzzle!"
Papyrus squinted his eyes and brought the paper closer to read it properly. Suddenly, an expression mixed between anger and absolute laughter spread across his face, as he glanced toward Sans. "SANS, THIS ISN'T EVEN A WORD!! IT'S LIKE YOU SLAMMED THE KEYBOARD AND JUST WENT WITH THAT!"
"yeah, that's kind of what i did." Sans suddenly appeared next to Papyrus, who jumped slightly. "i ran out of words to put."
"PAPYRUS???"
"ok, yeah, i could have put that."
Steven had turned the paper back around, and glanced across the puzzle. Right away, he already spotted some of the words. He'd cross and circle them when appropriate, even counting the amount of letters just to make sure it was correct.
Eventually, the final word he had to find was the keyslam. He saved it for last, because of how absurdly long it was. Steven knew where it was located-- at the top of the word search, but as he did with the others, he wanted to check each and every letter.
"G... I... A... S..." Steven mumbled to himself as he held his finger and pencil to the word on the search and its list. So far, each letter seemed to match, However, when he got to the second F, something was... wrong.
"...The letter after the F is different!!!" Steven sat up, looking absolutely defeated. That's what Sans meant by how I wouldn't get past it!!! "The word here isn't found anywhere else!!"
"WAIT, LET ME SEE!" Papyrus took the word search and pencil, checking via the same method as Steven. When he encountered the same problem, he glanced at Sans angrily. "SANS, YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO MAKE IMPOSSIBLE PUZZLES!!"
"why not?" Sans had a grin on his face, where he knew what he was doing, and was messing with people about it.
"BECAUSE???" Papyrus dramatically slammed the paper to the ground in front, using a hand to emphasize his point. "THAT'S JUST NOT A PUZZLE AT THAT POINT, THAT'S A TRAP!!! AN UNFAIR ONE AT THAT!"
"isn't that the point of your puzzles? to uh, y'know, trap and capture steven?"
"NO??? THAT COMES AFTERWARD!"
"after each puzzle?"
"NO, AFTER THE LAST PUZZLE, OF COURSE! IT'S AS PER TRADITION!"
"what tradition?"
Papyrus opened his mouth to continue, but, paused. He hesitated, pondering. "WELL, ASIDE FROM PUZZLES BEING THE TRADITION, I SUPPOSE THERE ISN'T ANYTHING ABOUT HUMAN CAPTURING." He looked at Steven with a curious look in his sockets, wondering if he should even do what his brother suggested-- just capture him right then and there.
Steven, previously enjoying the time spent with the skeleton brothers, now squirmed a little under the tall one's look. Please don't capture me right here and right now. We were having fun, as friends, right??
As if he read his mind, Papyrus took the pencil from Steven's hand and lifted up the paper. "WELL, I'M STILL DOING IT THE WAY I PLANNED OUT INITIALLY!" He neatly folded the paper into a small square and handed it to Sans, along with its pencil. Before turning to leave, Papyrus glared at his brother in a goofy yet disappointed way who shoveled the previously given items into his pockets. Once again with his trademark laugh, Papyrus dashed into the far distance. "NYEH HEH HEH HEH HEH!!!"
Steven stood up and mentally facepalmed when he realized something he should have done. Auugh!! I forgot to tell him my name!! I just had the perfect opportunity!
"something on your mind, kid?"
"Oh, um, nah." Steven's mind immediately jumped back to the word search, reminding him. "--Actually, yeah!" He jokingly nudged Sans in the shoulder, continuing, "Why'd ya make it impossible??"
"heheh, i didn't think you'd actually try and complete it." He snickered and rubbed an eye with his boney palm, continuing, "i figured you'd like, look at it and walk past."
He thought about it for a moment. I probably should have just walked past, it, should I? Continuing on this thought, Steven smiled. "Well, we did get to spend good time together, right?"
"oh, yeah. guess you're not wrong on that." Sans ruffled through the child's dark curly hair, making him giggle. "speaking of solving stuff actually, my brother yesterday got stumped tried to 'solve' the horoscope."
The horoscope..? His mind drew a blank for a moment, confused on what that was. It sounded familiar... Then, Steven then remembered-- the horoscope was one of those "time charts" that sort of described you as a person! That's right-- Connie told me about those!
"--Oooh! Honestly, I remember being really confused when I first saw one."
"heheh, papyrus would agree with you on that one. he spent all day trying to solve it."
"He did??"
Sans nodded.
"Heheh, oh my gosh. I feel like I could've done that." Lightly snickering about it, Steven would idly glance ahead, noting a table sporting a microwave and... a plate of something? "Well, I'm going to go ahead, see you around!!"
"cya 'round, buddy."