Chapter Text
You wake up. 9:00 AM. Another Monday. The beginning of the week.
You climb out of bed, sluggish, depressed.
You dress yourself in comfortable clothing, nothing fancy, nothing flattering. You put on snow boots and a very thick coat.
You walk outside. It’s snowing. It’s always snowing. You walk slowly, unworried, bored.
You stop as a group of children, both monsters and humans, run passed you on the street, and you allow them to pass without incident. You watch them as they run to the other end of town. Going to the fair again.
You’ve gone to the fair so many times, you know what happens like the back of your hand. You decide to go somewhere different today. You continue walking down the street.
You watch as at exactly 9:22 AM, the store owner steps out to sweep the snow from her porch. You look away, and know instinctively that at 9:24, three kids jump out and scare her. You’ve seen this a million times.
You find yourself at the edge of town, trees growing into a full forest beyond. You’ve been in there a lot, but you decide to push yourself today. There’s gotta be something you haven’t seen or done yet.
You glance around yourself, and then look at your watch. 9:30 exactly. Around this time, you know that the fair parade comes through, making their way to the fair with the mayor in tow. It’s a big deal for the townsfolk. They’ll be late though, only by a few minutes. You’ve checked it out before, someone gets their costume stuck in the toilet somehow. It’s a lot of drama and angst. It all ends up okay, though.
You’ve grown bored with it by now, anyway.
You don’t need to stick around to see them parade through the town, so you just duck under the town fence and head into the woods.
A while passes, and you find a large stick that you knew was going to be on the ground. You swing it around, batting random trees and rocks with it. You’re bored.
Monday goes by with no incident.
---
You wake up. 10:03 AM. Tuesday. You put on the same big coat and snow boots. You go outside. It’s still snowing. It’s always snowing.
Immediately as you leave your property, you call out without even looking. “Hi, Asgore.” Your neighbor had just stepped out of his house. You lift a hand in greeting as he looks surprised to see you.
“Oh, howdy, Reader! What a coincidence!” He steps down from his porch to greet you.
“Yes,” you agree with no amusement. “A coincidence.” You fake a smile as you wait for the conversation that you know is about to happen.
“I just stepped out to check on my garden, you see,” Asgore explains to you what you already know. “I have to keep my flowers healthy in the winter-time, you see, so that they can regrow themselves come spring!”
You nod, pretending to be interested. “It’s very nice that you care about your flowers so much, Asgore. But,” you glance up into the tree that stands above his garden. “You should keep an eye out on the snow in the branches. You wouldn’t want it to fall and hurt your garden.”
Asgore follows your gaze and his mouth opens wide. “Oh my goodness, you’re entirely right! I will have to clear off the snow up in the branches. Thank you! You’re so observant!” He praises you and all you can think is this has all happened so many times before.
You carry on your way, greeting your neighbors, and Tuesday goes by with no incident.
---
You wake up. 8:46 AM. Wednesday. Same big coat, same snow boots. You go outside. Guess what? It’s snowing.
You’ve lived the same week over and over and over again, hundreds of times. Every Monday the week resets, and no one remembers anything.
Except for you. You retain every memory of every relived week. You’ve grown accustomed by it. You’ve spent lots of time learning the ins and outs of this town, and how each day goes for each individual resident. You’ve even left town on a couple of occasions, just to experience something new for a change. It’s nice when you decide to do that.
You have no idea why or how you got stuck in a groundhog day type situation, but here you are. You guess it doesn’t matter anymore.
You know that Wednesday will be spent with kids out of school, (they’re always out of school, it's a holiday break.) and that one cat-monster who works at the burger joint getting arrested for smuggling burgers in his pants. Undyne’s always been a… strict officer.
You question whether you’re going to warn the affectionately nicknamed Burgerpants or not. You shrug to yourself and begin walking in that direction. When you do warn him, he rolls you a special joint, and you usually just end up getting high with him. He’s a good kid. Wednesdays are usually spent in a blur.
As you carry on your way, you shove your cold hands in your pocket. You look up into the sky and take a deep breath. You look at your watch, 9:14. Right now, Catty’s getting scared by a spider in her room, Papyrus is building a snowskeleton, and the mayor is asleep at her desk after working too late the night before. You’ve witnessed all those things before.
As you get closer to the burger joint, mind set on just finding Burgerpants and getting high off your ass to deal with your stupid existence, you pass Papyrus’s house.
As predicted, he’s outside playing in the snow.
You wave at him and he waves back.
Technically, you had only met him last week. The week before time went all wibbly-wobbly. He doesn’t know you very well. You know him too well, seeing as you’ve had plenty of time to get to know him.
You consider the fact that you haven’t even met his brother yet in this timeloop. It depends on your actions, of course. But you usually don’t really bother. Papyrus’s brother is pretty boring.
Speaking of… Sans opens the door just then. He steps outside and begins talking to his brother. You continue on your walk, and in your head you’re counting down the seconds before--
Fwump! You don’t need to look back to know that a lump of snow from the roof had fallen on Sans’s head as he stepped off the porch. It happens every Wednesday at 9:17 AM.
You don’t stop to think about it as you continue toward Burgerpants.
---
You wake up. 9:01 AM. Thursday. Big coat, snow boots, still snowing, no surprise there. You wonder what you’ll do today. Thursdays are usually dull. The kids in town hold a music show, one of the humans pukes on stage. It’s not a very fun time for those involved, but sometimes it’s funny.
You guess you have nothing better to do. Music show it is.
But that’s not until 4 tonight.
You decide to spend some time in the forest again. Nothing new or exciting happens.
You watch the kids perform, it’s all the same, it’s all the same, it’s all the same.
You don’t feel anything when the kid predictably pukes from nerves.
Thursday passes without incident, with no involvement from you.
---
You wake up. 8:59 AM. Friday. You hate yourself. Big coat. Snow boots. You go to the bar and get drunk the whole day. You’re hungover by 3, but decide to keep drinking. Nothing matters. Nothing matters. Nothing matters.
Friday passes with no involvement from you. No incidents other than your alcoholism.
---
You wake up. 7:39 AM. You throw up a lot. You’re hungover. You fall back asleep.
You wake up again. 12:34 PM. Saturday. Goddamn.
You stay inside the whole day, hurting yourself.
Saturday passes in a painful blur.
---
You wake up at 7:00 AM on Sunday, prepared to go to church after your self-abuse yesterday and the day before. It makes you feel better sometimes. You’ve heard this sermon a million times, and you like to pretend that you relate to it. In the long run it doesn’t help, but it’s the last day before the week restarts. You don’t know what you’re doing here.
You decide to go with your neighbor Asgore and his kids and ex-wife. You decide on a whim to go help with the kids in Sunday School, instead of sit in with the adults. You don’t know why, but the children make you feel better than any old preacher can.
You’re helping the Sunday School teacher (a pretty mouse-girl) round up the kids when the door opens.
You don’t look because you know who it is. It’s the skeleton Papyrus and his brother Sans. Papyrus always comes to Sunday School, he never listens to the sermon inside. Sans likes to hang out, you don’t think he’s religious at all.
You know he likes to keep an eye on his brother.
You welcome Papyrus to the class and sit in the corner to wait to be called by the teacher to help with something. You know at some point she’ll have you hand out papers for the kids to write down Biblical verses on. Later the whole class will go outside for a game.
The class passes with no incident. You and Sans sit in the corners and don’t do anything. You watch the kids and want to cry.
It’s all the same, every week.
Eventually you help the teacher bring all the kids outside, and you help keep them all in order. You don’t feel up to participating in the game, so you sit this one out and decide to stand next to Sans. He’s quiet, he probably won’t bother you.
You’re both standing under a tree heavy with snow. You know that at some point today the snow breaks the branch and falls on top of Sans. Just like the snow on his porch every Wednesday. Poor guy, he’s just got no luck.
You recall that Sans likes to go to Grillby’s after church and drink (defeating the purpose of you even going to church in the first place), so you decide to ask if you can join him.
“Yo, Sans,” you start, leaning in so you can speak quietly to him. “You wanna go to Grillby’s after this?”
You wait for his answer as he slowly, slowly, turns to look at you. You’re a little off-put.
“i don’t think we’ve met before,” he says.
Shit.
You haven’t even met Sans in this timeloop. Awkward. No wonder he looked at you so weirdly. Oh well, time to go. It’s the last day before everything resets, so it doesn’t matter.
“Oh. Oh yeah,” you say. “Welp. Nevermind, I guess.” You turn to leave, when you remember something.
“Oh,” you turn back around. He’s still staring at you. You wait 4 seconds, and then reach out and shove him back.
He reacts instantly, stepping backwards and shouting out “what the f-”
You see a flash of blue in his eye for a split second before the snow from above you falls directly in between the two of you.
Sans stands there, looking down at the snow blankly.
You wait. You’ve never done this before.
Sans looks up at you. “how long have we been stuck for you to memorize every snowfall?”
You stare at him, mouth open.
He knows?
He.
Can’t.
Know.
No one knows.
“You-” you mutter incoherently at the skeleton for a moment. You finally shake your head and speak clearly. “Can you remember everything too?”
Sans is still just staring at you with a blank expression.
“no.”
You don’t know what to do. No one has ever been aware of what’s going on. You still aren’t even sure if he is aware. He’s kind of a weird guy. You’ve never really gotten to know him super well.
You decide, fuck it! It’s the last day.
“The week restarts every Monday at six AM. No one remembers anything.”
Sans blinks slowly. “well, fuck.”
“Yeah.”
"i guess we should go to Grillby’s then.”
“Yeah.”
You both stand there in silence for a moment. Sans glances around awkwardly.
“well, i’ll see you later then.” He turns and walks away.
You have no idea what to think. How the hell could Sans know anything about timeloops? He’s never struck you as a smart guy, or even really that interesting at all. Maybe he’s still just messing with you.
In the few times you have hung around him, he’s never mentioned anything about time shenanigans. He’s never done anything, really.
Well. You guess you know what you’re doing today. Or, rather, you don’t know what you’re doing today.
Your heart beats fast and your hands feel numb. It could be the cold, but you think it’s the excitement, the fear that comes with not knowing what’s about to happen.