Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Long ago, two races ruled over the Earth: Humans and Monsters. One day, war broke out between the two races. After many years, the humans were victorious. The humans used magic to seal the monsters underground with a magic spell.

In doing so, the humans who performed the spell paid the ultimate price. As humans had power from their SOULS, and monsters had power from their magic, the unification of both is chaos. In combining the two, the humans who used magic became a third species: Eldritch.

Eldritch were feared by all, as the chaos in their blackened souls caused them to do things none could. Stronger senses than possible, the ability to travel through the shadows around them, and to change their very bodies into weapons. All this power came at the cost of losing their humanity, becoming more animalistic, and the need to consume SOULS. Humanity turned on their previous saviors, and cast the Eldritch into the Underground.

To protect themselves from the new apex predators, the monsters created The Ruins. A place meant to trap the Eldritch, surrounded by a freezing forest all to slow them down. In the Ruins, the Eldritch remained contained by those monsters who lived nearby. Those that dared to live near this place were given three rules:

Do not go past the final sentry station. That territory was for the Eldritch, and should not be violated to keep them away. Eldritch are known for sticking to territory unless provoked.
Offerings would be left near the Ruins doors. These offerings should distract the Eldritch should they ever leave, and they would see no reason to venture further into the Underground to find whatever they’re looking for. The sentry on duty will deliver these to the door, as they have training.
If any other monster than the sentry on current duty goes into the territory, then they are on their own. As painful as a rule this is, it is made to minimize fatalities.

With these rules, the monsters began to rebuild in the Underground. After sons of no contact, the Eldritch soon became myth — a story to scare children at night into behaving. The Ruins grew over with moss, the door remained shut, and it was believed that the only problem the monsters would have now would be the barrier itself.

The monsters should have known better than to believe such a thing, as the humans believed the same about monsters. What a horrible, horrible lie…

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You sit up, a sudden abrupt feeling deep in your chest jarring you awake. Vision swimming, you blink repeatedly to try and clear up your sight. After it all settles down, you take a good look around. The world is dark, tinged in purple light that makes it bright enough to see...rocks.

Rocks, rocks, and more rocks. A couple of boulders, just for the sake of spicing things up, but mostly rocks. The air is colder than you’ve ever felt, but you could smell sweetness, and that scent sang to you to follow. You get up, stumbling a bit but not falling. You weren’t sure where this place was, or...even who you are. You knew one thing, though. You were starving.

You follow cavern after cavern — were you Underground? How? You fell asleep in your apartment! — trailing after that smell. You barely notice when the purple light falls away, and in its place real firelight makes the place easier to see. Before you is a house, or what used to be one. Everything is run down, the stones themselves seemingly rotting with blackened stains faded into them. If this house was abandoned, you were using it. No owners to mind a sudden intruder.

The inside smells like a mixture of wrong and right. It was so very dusty, and you probably should have sneezed from such a thing. Instead, the dust smelled wonderful...it felt oddly like home, as though you should’ve been here all along.

Like you have been here before. An odd ache of homesickness is felt, but you force it to fade. You still didn’t know where you were, and you know damn well you’ve never been here before, never mind how your heart felt.

The house was pretty basic. You managed to search every room, and it was as simple as can be. A living room, a kitchen, and a bedroom. One door was boarded up, but you didn’t try to get in yet. Throughout the entire search, you saw no signs of anyone. No pictures, no letters, nothing fresh or even old that clued in who lived here before. Some books, sure, but after a quick glance they looked like fairy tales. No time for that!

It’s passing by a hallway mirror you see it. The corner of your eye catches something wrong and you spin around to face the glass. It’s still you, but some changes have...certainly been made.

Your eyes were purple, now. A deep shade of it, but focusing on them not only made your vision seem clearer but made the color of your eyes brighter. Opening your mouth, you could see little fangs poking up from behind your actual teeth, and your canines were a hell of a lot sharper. Not to mention, your tongue was more like a snake! The changes kept coming, from pointier ears to sharp black tips poking out of your fingers. They weren’t even your nails, just pointed black things poking out of your fingertips — at least, after some focus you could make them go back to normal.

The final fright came from all over, though. Across your skin now ran blackened veins, barely visible but your new sight made a point to help you see them. It looked like ink was running through them, pumping away to the slow steady best of your heart. It was a lot to take in, but you couldn’t help but feel proud of yourself for staying calm throughout the whole thing.

The smell was back, and it made your stomach hurt. You couldn’t remember the last time you ate, and honestly it mattered little to you. That smell was so good. Whatever it is had to be amazing, and surely you could have some. Who turns away a starving stranger, after all? Weird looks or not.

You follow the smell down a flight of stairs, and into a long corridor. In front of you stood a heavy set of doors, and it takes only a few minutes to realize these things won’t budge without some serious strength behind it. You couldn’t focus long on that, no, no the scent was starting to LEAVE. You needed out you needed out you needed OUT RIGHT N O W.

The doors budge when you push, the darkness in your veins shining as you do. It’s a small opening but it’s enough for you to squeeze out. You fall face first into a snowbank for that less than graceful exit, but that was fine. Shaking the powder away, you sit back up and look around.

Your eyes take things in rapidly. The ruined house had become a snowy forest, the scent had stilled its departure...and a few feet from you was a plate of spaghetti.

You had to be knocked out. This was some weird twisted dream and there’s no way any of this was actually happening. Still, food is food and that hunger wasn’t going away by itself. Not even caring how it must’ve looked, you devour the plate like a wolf.

You barely noticed the shaking skeleton feet from you, frozen but watching, orange scarf fluttering in an unfelt breeze. Not until you look up, and notice the strangest thing. The sweet smell wasn’t coming from the food, it was coming from him. The smile you give must not have seemed friendly, because he took OFF like a shot leaving you staring in wonder.

Dream or not, it seemed like you had two options. You decided to pick the safer one, and head back into the ruined house. It was shelter, and just maybe those books held answers.

You leave behind an empty plate, but with the tracks being filled in by falling snow and the large door now shut from you heading back in, no one would have ever thought you were there.

Chapter Text

It had taken some work and some time, but the house was relatively clean now. You had started a fire in the living room, and the heat felt wonderful. Using that firelight, you’d managed to fix up the electric lighting system for the rest of the place. You weren’t a professional electrician, but it would do for now. The rest was just basic cleaning and occasionally fixing something broken.

There was running water, too. That was a relief. With your eyes the way they are now the lighting wasn’t that much of a big worry, but water was a definite need for survival. Actually, this whole place seemed prepared for survival, like a bunker or something. While cleaning you noticed how there weren’t many personal items around, no pictures or family heirlooms. As homey as the place tried to be with a soft bed and a welcoming fireplace, those were clearly added in later and the basics made before. It seemed like a mockery of a house. A farce, like this was meant to only mimic a home but never truly be one.

It’s been giving you the creeps since you first got here, but it was time to try and get some answers. The books from before, they were the only reading material in this place and considering what you’ve seen, you highly doubted they were just fairy tales now. You glanced through the titles, noting that some were in different languages — one of them you were certain hasn’t been used for centuries!

You finally found two books and a map that made sense, and proceeded to dump them on the kitchen table. The map you spread out, and then sighed — dammit, it was only of the house you were in! It showed how the top floor was exactly what you just explored, which held nothing that exciting. Seemed that the boarded up door was a master bedroom, might have to break into that later. On the opposite side, was the basement. It seemed the stairs dropped down into a center, and there were four hallways leading away from each other. These lead to four doors, and you were pretty sure you went out one already. The doors are labeled by four colors, blue, red, orange, and purple. There’s nothing on the map that says what these colors mean.

The two books are different in nature. One is a biology book, mostly written in a language you’ve never seen before but it had pretty detailed pictures and the occasional passage in English. You’d look at that one after the second book, which is...a journal! Perfect! This person probably lived here before you showed up, maybe they knew what was going on. The pages had begun to turn yellow around the edges, and it’s disheartening to see some pages clearly torn out. Regardless, you sit close by the fire, and begin to read….

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Day One: It had only been fifteen hours after our victory over the Monster race that my fellows and I were told to meet back at the barrier. We presumed the king was going to thank us for our sacrifice, for the pain we went through casting the spell to trap our enemies below. We were met with swords and the very determination that had helped us win. They claimed we were now tainted, and had to leave. That the magic had permanently broken our SOULS, and now we were no longer human. Neither monster nor man, but a demonic entity in the between.

I loathe to admit it, but I could barely hear them over the sound of their heartbeats. I’ve never felt such hunger before…
We were cast down here. Meant to die in the dark like rats, never mind that we were the ones to save them. They no longer believed us human, so we might as well be to them. Despair is high. I pray we survive the night.

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Day Five: We have begun to change. It was believed to be a disease before, a plague to finish us off. The veins would turn as dark as liquid shadows, and the eyes would glow brighter than the elusive sunshine of above, the victim trapped in a snarling state of hunger. We only found the cure after a Monster found our camp. One of the sick charged them, and proceeded to devour what it could before it turned to dust. Afterwards, the victim would find themselves back to normal. Minus the physical appearance.

Everyone has begun to change. We openly seek out Monsters now. Their dust, their SOULS sing to us and smell so sweet. The taste is even better, I can feel it brings me clarity. It helps us retain a more human form. Otherwise, the darkness spreads and turns us from an odd person into a horrible being. A...Eldritch, for lack of a better word.

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Day Twenty: The Ruins have been sealed off. It seems the four monster kingdoms learned we were here and joined forces to trap us even further. We have built a home here, though, and I believe some have begun to have families. It is...peaceful, for us. I’m sure it is hell for the Monsters. After some experiments, we have learnt our changes make us much stronger. Strong enough to hunt them.

Strong enough to kill them with ease.

In other news, it seems the creation of Eldritch has not stopped above. A short while ago, three others were thrown down here. Already they show signs of changing. We welcome them with open arms, and I fear for the youngest. They can only be six years old. To be thrown away so young...they are ours now, and we will raise them strong.

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Day Six Hundred Seventy Five: The child is gone. Their red eyes are no longer seen amongst our purple. I fear the worst.

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The passages continue and continue, growing darker, darker, yet darker as you went. It seemed these people called themselves Eldritch to honor the fact that they stood between the worlds, and for their horrifyingly beautiful appearance. You figured beauty was in the eye of the beholder, and felt a small bit glad that they could remain so confident with what happened.

There was the occasional warning of the outside kingdoms — apparently, two were quite hostile, but one of the considerably more hostile ones revered the Eldritch as powerful entities while the other was still very much afraid. The other two kingdoms considered them waking nightmares, and wanted nothing to do with them. That must’ve been what the color coding was for, now if only you knew which ones were which. Still, all four still left offerings of food or supplies just to keep the Eldritch from straying too far from the Ruins. Seemed it worked, for the most part. An incident or two was listed, about monsters thinking the Ruins abandoned before getting a horrible surprise.

As you went, the writing soon grew desperate and outright impossible to read. More pages were missing. Names forgotten, people listed as deceased. Then, mercifully, a final passage…

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Day ???: The end is near. No new Eldritch has joined us in so long. I cannot remember the year it is, and I have not heard from the others. I believe I may be the only one left. Perhaps magic has finally left the surface, finally no more will turn into what we became. Should anyone find this, while these words seem dark and dreary, I beg of you. Stay determined. You are as we were, and the magic trapped in your SOUL will listen to you. Be bold, live as well as you can, and fear no monster.

They’re much more afraid of you.

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Hands shaking, you set the journal down carefully. The fire no longer warms you, and you’d swear your very blood has turned to slush in the core of your being. Standing up, you steadily make your way outside the house and into the caverns.

You throw up into a nearby hole. The sick feeling hits you like a bloodied sledgehammer, your mind spinning as you slot together each piece of this puzzle to take a glance at the rotten picture it forms. You have become Eldritch. You were cast away from humanity for something you’re not even sure how you became. Magic was very real, as were monsters, but there lies the kicker. You were the monster’s monster. As far as you could tell, though, you were alone.

Completely alone. That last entry had the date scratched out and the ones before it, well whoever was writing clearly lost it. They had to have been down here for a long, long, long time if the amount of dust —

Oh, gods. The DUST. Didn’t a few entries mention monsters turn to dust when they die?? HAD YOU JUST DISTRUBED A MASS GRAVE SITE?! No, no...it couldn’t ALL be monster dust. Not in the way you feared, after all. It sounded like your new kind preyed upon monsters and possibly humans, so if the dust had been something to eat you would have gone for it on instinct.

The sudden urging to the door made sense, now. You must have turned in your sleep, and the hunger hit you as you woke up. At least with supplies, and some rationing, you won’t have to...do the inevitable soon. Gives you time to get used to the new reality. You stumble back inside, and rush to the kitchen to clean up a bit.

Putting the journal back on the bookcase, you move onto the biology book. From what you can understand, it sounds like Eldritch only go into a more feral mode and form when starving. As long as you ate regularly, and tried to stay as relaxed as possible in this scenario, you’d be just fine! The only other time you’d go into this more feral version, which honestly the picture was beginning to freak you out, was if you felt threatened and let stress skyrocket. Yeah, you could totally do this!

You hear a loud bang come from the basement, and following that the sounds of fighting. You sigh. Of course.

Chapter Text

The fighting was only getting louder, and you could feel your heartbeat begin to pick up the pace with it. The sweet smell was back, and with a vengeance. Monsters must have gotten in...but if they were so scared, why come here? Either way, this problem was quickly becoming one you would have to deal with. You slink over to the stairs, and climb down as silently as you can.

If they didn’t believe any Eldritch were here, that meant you had the element of surprise. If this was going to be your first fight you would rather have all the advantages you could. The fighting was coming from another corridor — not the one you already went out of once. Thankfully, while the lights were working upstairs just fine, it looked like you were once again seeing by the light of your own eyes. You’ve never loved the color purple so much. Hopefully monsters weren’t that good at seeing in the dark too.

Running down the hallway, trying not to think about how you were moving much faste, and the fact that you barely made a sound, was surprisingly easy. You could almost feel a shift inside you, minor changes as you got closer to the fight. Senses working overtime, joints feeling almost looser making your reactions quicker. The predatory response, perhaps, like that feral mindset the journal mentioned? You hope not. You just wanted your unwelcome houseguests to leave, not to hurt them.

If they attack first, though…
All bets are off.

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Whoever it is, has no damn decency. You think you’ve heard, maybe, three things break since they came inside! Granted, with everything dark perhaps they just tripped over a branch or some shit like that.
You hear a loud crack, and then a pained shout. Nah, somebody totally just broke a bone. That or that was the most perfectly timed shattering of a thick stick you have ever heard before in your life.

You’re close to the door now, and you can see red lights invading with a cold breeze of the snowy landscape outside. Two...are those bunnies?! Those were totally bunnies kicking at some guy on the ground! He’s curled up in a tight ball, hands over his head, and the closer you watch the more you see. Literally, you’re pretty sure you see floating numbers over the beaten form.

HP 0.5/1

That can’t be anything good. That sweet smell and the echoing violence is messing with your mind. You ate less than a few hours ago and you already feel so hungry again it physically hurts. You think you might be drooling, and...and it would be so easy. None of them have seen you, not yet. The bunnies are busy with the guy getting hurt, and the guy on the ground has other more obvious things to be worried about some random person in the background watching.

A staggered step forward, and then another, and another. You’re slow at first but quickly gain speed as you rush the rabbit closest to you. You feel your claws slide into place on your fingers as you dig into a warm body, and the close scream that sounds off near you makes you wince — sure it does, it’s so LOUD! — but you don’t slow down as claws bury into fur.

And fangs, yours, digs into the Monster’s neck. Something like liquid floods into your mouth and if you weren’t busy, you’d sigh in relief. It feels like a fire in your very core has been put out, every tense nerve now relaxing. You keep going, even snarling at the movement you sense next to you. You take a minute to notice the other rabbit has taken off back into the forest, but that doesn’t bother you much. You’ve caught something, and that meant everything was perfect.

Up until you notice the texture in your mouth is drying up. Flesh turning to sand, no...no that wasn’t sand. The monster was dusting! Shit, you just started though! You push on, trying to get all you can before you are clawing at nothing more than dusty, bloodied clothes. It’s definitely disappointing, and you feel a bit bothered by that. You...you should not be taking the fact that you just went Hannibal on someone as well as you currently are, but you’ll blame that unearthly hunger for it until you can do some soul searching later. Much, much, much later.

A low whine makes your ears perk right up, and you twist to look in the sound’s direction. Oh, right, a guy was hurt. At least...you think he’s hurt.
It’s another skeleton, just a lot shorter than the one from before. He’s wearing a leather jacket, with white, spiky fluff on the edges and yellow markings. What concerns you is the cracked bones showing, and the fact that he was barely awake to begin with. His whole body was shaking, and looked worse every second that ticks by.

A quick glance over confirms to you that he’s not running anytime soon — his left leg is one of the cracked bones, other than a few ribs since those rabbits were kicking awful hard. Even with these weaknesses, though, the skeleton was putting up a hell of a show through growling and teeth baring. You’re pretty sure your fangs are better.

You raise your hands up, trying your best to look peaceful while disregarding the blood and dust that’s probably all over your face.
“You’re seriously beat up darlin’...how about I take you home with me, and I can help patch you up?” You keep a low voice, but it barely matters as once you make the comment about home he’s kicking up a fuss.

“N-No! Get away from me! G-Get away from me ya...ya FREAK!!” He’s snarling and actually trying to hit you with snow. It takes one minor slip for him to hit the ground though, and you take that slight chance to close the distance between you two. It takes a moment to realize it, but the poor guy has actually passed out. You pull him deeper into the Ruins, and close the door behind you.

After throwing the clothes out into the snow bank. You weren’t about to wear them, and you honestly couldn’t care what happened to them. Maybe someone else will find them and take them. Maybe you’ll get some peace now, for your sake and for the sake of your new patient. You’ll have to find some bandages and whatnot to help him out. There’s totally a chance of finding a healing potion in some underground monster civilization right?

Man...things are just going to keep going like a train wreck, aren’t they? You sigh and continue your half march half stumbling pace up to the main house.

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You set the skeleton down, having him lying on a plush couch in the main room. Making sure he was stable for right now, and wasn’t going to go anywhere fast, you rush into the kitchen. It was time to start snooping, and you had a decent idea of what to look for.

If Eldritch all transformed from humans into...well, into Eldritch, then certain cultural stuff had to cross over. The main one you were hoping on, was the minor habit of keeping something similar to a first aid kit in the kitchen. It’s how your parents had always done it, and you never really questioned it, so you had to have a seriously strong hope there was something in here. Bandages, medicine maybe. Shit, maybe healing potions had to be refrigerated. That’s totally something that could happen right?

Your opening cabinets left and right, drawers left open as you glanced over looking for that beautiful red cross that was so often the label. When nothing turns up, you turn on the fridge. Again, no sudden healing potions or whatever the hell you had thought would be in there. It’s pretty disappointing to not see a glowing red vial, but maybe you’d get lucky in the future.

Leaving the kitchen has you doing a quick check on skeleboy, and a take off sprint down the hall to the bathroom. Location number two in the quest for healing items has now been...unlocked!
You miscalculate how fast you're running and trip when you try to stop at the door. You hop back up, but chuckle at this moment. Seems like instinct only gets you a great fighting chance in — well, in a fight. Running down a hallway at new improved speed? You’re on your own, no help from the instinct brain.

It’s a decent bathroom, and you can’t help but notice it has a modern touch to it. Extremely modern, especially for being so far underground and likely abandoned for so long. You shrug it off, as you’ve already seen stranger and at this rate it would probably just be easier to roll with the punches than question every little thing. Good for one's own sanity, too.

You dig underneath the sink, and let out a loud cheer. Congrats, it’s a proper med kit! You spot nice clean bandages, some anti-infection spray...stuff...you probably should have paid closer attention to all those first aid seminars you were forced to go to. Nothing a little ingenuity and troubleshooting can’t solve, though!

At the bottom of the kit, you see a bottle of tiny green pills. The pills seem to be glowing a bit, like chopped up glow sticks. You don’t think you’re going to willing ingest those until some serious research is done. You’ve already turned into something inhuman, no point adding something like radioactivity or Hulk-ish to the mix of madness.

You’re on your way back down the hall, when you feel the slightest breeze on the back of your neck and freeze. Everything stops. You can practically feel each pump of your heart and you can damn well hear it. Your vision goes sharper, and even with the lights on you had a good bet looking in the mirror would show off purple irises. Slowly, you focus on your houseguest.

It’s barely noticeable. If you hadn’t had this sudden feeling of unease — which, shit, do you have spidey senses now too? — you would never have realized that one of his hands was now behind his back. The tension in his shoulder, and how still he was.
The ass was pretending to be asleep, and you had a good idea of what he was hiding from you. Keeping your guard up, you get closer to the couch and would-be attacker. Moving slow, and keeping one hand ready, you move in to “wrap” his ankle…

He pounces, but it’s not quick enough. The hand armed with a glowing red bone, sharpened at the end, was about to bear down on you when you grab him by the wrist and force him back. You end up straddling his lap, but you could care less right now. Face inches from him, one hand restraining his and another grabbing him by the collar — it’s a literal collar what the HELL — you growl at him. Somehow, he swallows tremblingly.

“Don’t. You. Dare.” You clearly get through to him, because he goes limp under you.
Good. Authority established. Your house, your rules.

Here’s hoping he sticks to that.

Chapter Text

The skeleton monster passes out shortly after your spat, which made sense since this whole thing has to be as stressful as anything. Getting beat up, getting knocked out...technically you kidnapping him. Yeah, long ass day for mister Red.

That’s it, Red! Your nickname for this guy can be Red, it matches his magic and style. You’d just finished wrapping up his bandages — and you even managed to hook up a splint of sorts for his leg — so you set to work in the kitchen. You had to figure out another way for food, since how you’ve been eating lately has been spotty at best.

You find some apples, carrots, and a few cans of broth. You weren’t even going to question why broth was in cans, but it smells nice so you think it’s still good. It’d be easy to make a sort of carrot soup with this. Rummaging through the fridge reveals more vegetables, and you proceed to add more to the soup. It would be an easy meal, and you’re pretty sure even as a skeleton Red needed to eat.

It’s some time into cooking that you hear groans from the living room. Seems he’s waking up. You head out into the living room, trying to seem very non threatening to the already hurt monster. His eyelights look hazy, and you snatch a couple of painkillers you found in the medical kit. It seems like old fashion Tylenol so you’re pretty sure it’s safe.

He’s trying to sit up, and you hurry over.
“Hey, Hey, careful. You’ve been out for a while and I doubt you’ve healed in the small time you’ve slept.” You hold him steady with a hand on the shoulder, and you’re guessing his is still out of it as he barely reacts to the touch.

“W-Where am I? This ain’t Snowdin…” He looks around, confused. You assume Snowdin must be where he’s from, and isn’t that curious? A town underground, wonder how many there could be in the area?

“No, this isn’t. You’re in the Ruins. You, uh, you were attacked by rabbit...people…” Wow you’re pretty sure you sound ridiculous, “I have no idea what was going on so bad that y’all got in a fight, but they’re gone now. So...once you heal up you can go home.” This was uncomfortable. It felt like a pricking in your skin, someone else in here. Strange, you’ve never minded others before but...right now it felt wrong having someone in here.

You’d have to consult your new guidebook for answers. So far, it feels like you’re going through the magical version of puberty. Considering how nice the first run of it was...you’re not looking forward to this.

Red nods, seeming to process what you’re saying, “Yeah, I remember. Told those shits they weren’t supposed to go this way...of course they didn’t listen…” He mutters out, thinking it over and tapping his fingers against his head.
It hits you like a damn train. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know what you are.

There’s no way he’d still be this calm if he knew for certain what you are. By every account in all the reading you’ve done, monsters and Eldritch should never be this close unless it’s a fight.
That, or maybe he has no idea what an Eldritch looks like? It’d make sense. Other things to worry about, and the whole not seeing one in who knows how long could help too.

“Well, they got you good. Still, they’re gone now and you’re safe. So...it’s cool.” You pop out one of the green pills you found, and hold it out to him, “You happen to know what these are? Found them in a medkit but I’ve got no clue.”

This is the most awake you’ve seen him, and he snatches the damn pill out of your hands before swallowing it. Almost immediately, you see small glimmers of green light trace any wounds and...they heal up!
You want to smack yourself. Of course, no red healing potions. Healing magic was green. All that time playing video games seemed to have paid off, but you’ll have to keep certain things straight.

“...Nevermind. I think you just helped me figure it out.” Putting the rest of the pills in a pocket, you laugh and walk away shaking your head, “I guess you’re better now, if everything has healed. Look, I just made soup, stay for some?” You offer over your shoulder as you go back to check on it. There’s silence, before a stuttered out agreement. You get the vibe he doesn’t get invited to dinner often, poor guy.

When you both eat in silence, you try not to notice how the vegetables taste like ash.

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His name is Sans, but “Ya can call me Red, sugar fangs.” is what you get when you introduce yourself to him. You feel a bit uneasy at the nickname but, try not to react all that much.
It’s when you offer to walk him home that he gets defensive.

“Ya didn’t even recognize green magic, fangs. You’re gonna get hurt out there.” Red is insisting, but you’ve already thrown on a scarf and walked him to his Underground’s door.

“Oh, whatever. I’d like to see those punks try, I know how to defend myself.” You sass back, but do a good job at remaining calm. This could get dangerous fast. Red might not have been able to recognize what you are, but that doesn’t mean anybody else might. You’ve managed to hide most of your oddities by keeping calm and ignoring that clawing hunger.

The soup did nothing for you. You’d hoped it would’ve helped. Now you know why they weren’t used.

“Eh, true. Who the fuck attacks with fangs instead of magic though?” The snow crunches underfoot, and you find yourself enjoying the walk. It’s a beautiful pine forest winter wonderland, right out of a postcard. Somehow, though, it’s very dusty here. You hope Red will be safe after you part ways.

“Don’t like using magic. Feels like cheating, besides why bother when I can get it done quick?” You fake some bravado, and it must be obvious because Red starts laughing, you can tell it’s at you. It’s fine, you can appreciate a dark sense of humor.

When you both reach a little wooden stand — you take a deep breath in, it smells like mustard and more dust here — Red stops before turning to you.

“This is my stop, sugar. Thanks fer walking with me, but it might be better if ya go back…” He pauses, looks around, and then sighs. Hard. “You’ve been nice to me, I can appreciate that...but let’s state the obvious. Yer human as they come, even with the creepy fangs, and that’s really not good here. I’m not gonna do anything, favor deserves a favor after all. My brother though…”

The happy smile on his face makes you smile in turn. Sure, sure. He’s trying to warn you about some inevitable danger, but...he genuinely looks happy about his brother. Like, super proud. It’s nice to see that, good for the soul and all.

“My bro’s a human hunting fanatic. Didn’t become second in command of the royal guard for nothin’ after all! Still...you should go back, fangs. He...Boss could seriously hurt ya.” He looks so concerned, that even with your hidden ace you feign a worried look and nod. It really is sweet he’s warning you, especially with it being against his own family after all. That takes major — heh — guts.

“Oh, of course Red. I’ll head right back home. Doubt it’ll take me long, I’m a fast runner.” To mess with him, you wink really hard with a foot already in the air, “You just come by anytime you like though, y’hear me? Don’t treat me like a dirty secret!” You don’t get his response as you’re already sprinting away.

The laughter behind you makes you think it was a good response though.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The minute you get back, you’re digging into the books frantically. There has to be something, anything literally anything that can explain the taste issue. You look through biology books, then the journals, and even go digging through the kid story books just for a glimmer of hope.
Note to yourself; those kid books are like Brothers Grimm on steroids. Monsters are told some scary shit about Eldritch, damn!

It’s after some heavy research that you feel your stomach turn, and for the second time you’re racing away to deal with the sickness. You distantly realize that all the food you upchuck is still whole. Not even remotely digested or disfigured.

You fear for what that could mean. It’s a minute break to clean up, and back to reading. You hope it’s a predator thing, like the fact that you can only eat meat and not...not just…
Oh, holy shit. It wouldn’t even matter would it? You already went down that road. No less than a few hours ago — was it even that? Has it even gone past a day? Time was blurring, everything’s BLURRING — you’d killed a man. Monster, sure you could try and reason with yourself but a life is a life and you took a sentient one. One that might’ve had a family, one that…

It felt like second nature. That’s the worst part. Even with being sick a moment ago, you feel no nausea over this sin. It barely bothers you, like it’s something you learn and just is truth. Two plus two is four, the ocean is blue, and you fucking killed a guy and ate from his body. What kind of world is this, kill or be killed? How could you adjust so fast?

Then it hits you. The tall skeleton, the one who left food behind! You ate that just fine, and nothing! It was just spaghetti too, no meat involved so it wasn’t that. There must have been something in that spaghetti that wasn’t in the vegetables, something that helped you out. If you can get it again, you’ll survive this. You can adapt and not have to hurt anyone, it’s perfect!
...You hope.

Walking back downstairs, you glance around at all four hallways and steel your nerves. You had to go out and explore, search around to learn about this place with experience.
You had a skeleton to track down.

Chapter Text

Staring down the different hallways, it leaves you realizing you...actually had a huge problem with this plan. You can remember perfectly what had happened, you had gone out a door and sought out a nice smell which led to you getting to eat that spaghetti...and the skeleton. The one with the orange scarf and white armor. So now the problem was, before, a simple answer of tracking him down and just talking — because he HAS to know something surely — but then a huge wrench just got chucked at your plan.

You had no idea which door he had been behind. You can remember which one he isn’t behind, after all you had a gut instinct that said he looked a bit less...extreme than Red did. That took out one option, out of four. After that, it truly was a guessing game of where Mr. Pasta Skeleton could be located.
If your research was to be believed, there was three separate worlds behind each door. Taking out a piece of paper, you look it over carefully.

You had managed to jot down some quick notes and a rough map of the Ruins from the journals, combining all the info and making a sort of pocket guide for yourself. Sure...it would still be a struggle to separate which is which but this would make it easier.
The door labeled on the map as “red” funnily enough was indeed where Red came from. You immediately jotted that down as well, for the sake of the future and the fact that you can be forgetful. Forgetting where your friends are would be foolish. It also was one of the more hostile kingdoms, but you also could figure that out by your bunny from earlier. Either way, not what you are looking for.

That left blue, orange, and purple...you check over each one's notes.
The blue door had the words “Alpha Timeline” by it, and where that was confusing you decided it wasn’t that important for the moment. It also had the notes of the monsters behind it being very well informed on the dangers of Eldritch, and the fact listed that even the guard tried their best to avoid the area. Highly unlikely for who you’re looking for.

Purple had the notes of being hostile, and only being ruled by a single queen. The difference from the blue door was that while every monster did know about Eldritch apparently they had a different tactic — which was all it was called this different tactic wasn’t labeled at ALL — for dealing with them then simple avoidance. When you had been copying notes onto your cheat sheet, the word “reverent” had kept showing up. You weren’t even sure what that meant, not entirely enough to be comfortable with knowing how they would react to you. It...concerned you. This place was considered hostile, but the Eldritch from before didn’t seem scared of it? Half of the notes didn’t make sense, and you didn’t like going in blind. Until you got more comfortable with what you are, you wouldn’t go over there.

Which left the “orange” door as your choice. Wasn’t considered hostile, and only the guard was informed of the Eldritch threat — a major oversight, in your opinion, but hopefully the rulers meant well — which made perfect sense for you! That’s why the skeleton had run, he must have either been a civilian passing through and had no idea what the hell just happened so he got scared...or he was a very new guard, knew exactly what was happening, and went to get friends.
Hopefully you could talk them down from a fight if that’s the case.

Satisfied in your research, you head down the hall for the door labeled orange. This had to work out! It just had to.

For your sanity’s sake.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It always starts the same. Perfect, chilly snow and a cold breeze that honestly felt pretty refreshing compared to the dull wind in the Ruins. You notice it’s a lot cleaner than Red’s snowy area had been, and it makes you smile a bit. Less hostile, indeed.

You kept up the single band march until you reached another little guard stand — it looked EXACTLY like Red’s! Ok maybe not exactly exactly, but pretty damn close. It didn’t smell like mustard though, this one smells sweet...honey maybe? Or was it syrup? Holy shit you’d kill for some maple syrup right now that’s the good stuff.

“Sup. You, uh, lost or somethin’?” Startled, you look back the way you came and see...a skeleton! Perfect!
Except he is not the one you are looking for. Sure, he’s got the height but...no shiny white armor or deep orange scarf. He’s got an orange hoodie, and green shorts or you think those are shorts. Honestly, they looked like green sweatpants but someone cut them off at the knees so — shorts it is.

Still not your skeleton but...maybe talking wouldn’t hurt?

“Yeah, actually, I really am. I’m looking for someone, but...I can’t remember our meeting real well. They helped me out of a bad spot and I want to say thanks but can’t do that without finding them!” You chuckle after this, and he chuckles with you nodding, “I don’t suppose you’ve seen any other skeletons in the area? He was wearing some white armor...looked like a guard maybe?”

“A guard huh? Don’t know of any other skeletons but myself and my bro. He’s pretty cool, though, so it’s probably him.” He sounds pretty confident, and it’s making you way more happier than before. Finally! A proper lead! Even if it isn’t him, then you can at least cross this place off and go searching elsewhere. Plus...it’s pretty nice to be able to talk to someone. He doesn’t seem to know or care what you are.
That’s gonna get old fast, having to check who’s not gonna run. Guess you better get used to it…

“That’d be great! Thank you so much, this means a lot to me.” You gush out, smiling wide. You see his eye sockets literally widen, openly staring for a minute and shit your fangs. You close your mouth, no more grin but trying to smile only with lips. Oops.

“Yeah...no prob. We’re actually supposed to meet up here in a few minutes, so feel free to stick around.” Shrugging, he goes back to sitting at the little guard station to chill. You follow his lead...and just sit down in the snow.

“...This worked out better in my head.” Your new friend laughs hard at your comment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

His name is Papyrus, but you affectionately nickname him Swap. It seemed to suit him really well, even though you couldn’t place why, but it worked regardless. He had joked that he’d call you Honey in return but you had managed to convince him to not.
So he’s calling you Hun instead. Should’ve guessed he’s a jokester.

It’s after a short while of talking — mainly you telling half truths of how you got here and why but never revealing much — when he stops and looks over to the right. Smiling, he points in that direction.

“Aaaand here he comes. Here’s hoping my bro is who you’re looking for.” Chuckling, he moves away from the guard station and trails off to go meet his brother. You don’t move, wanting to view this at a distance and if things went south have a good chance to start running. Swap has been super nice to you, and you really don’t want to lose that. Still, safety first.

You catch a good glimpse of Swap’s little brother and…nope. Not your man. He’s got the armor for sure, with a nice blue cape to really pop out, but this dude is short. Shorter than you which is...actually, have you grown some? You’re pretty sure you should be around Swap’s height but even he seems an inch shorter or something…

“Papy! You’re here! The other guards had thought they had seen you at Muffet’s earli...er…” His blue eye lights, one had looked like a star for a minute there and it was adorable, go out the moment he looks over at you. This in turn makes Swap look over his shoulder at you, and give a small smile.

“No need to be nervous, bro. She’s a friend. Ain’t that right Hun?” You nod at the questioning tone, but still can’t bring yourself to move. This...this wasn’t going good...shit you should run. You didn’t want to hurt them, but you can’t take a direct attack — you haven’t dealt with that yet and don’t want to you had to run this was your chance why can’t you M O V E…!

“HUMAN!” You feel a weight hit your chest and you go down with it. Wiping snow from your face, you sit up to see little brother has indeed tackled you and is now sitting on your chest. Both eye lights and back, and they’re big beautiful stars. Aww.

“Human! You have been captured by the Magnificent Blue! Mweh heh heh! Captain Alphys is gonna be so proud!!” Oh thank the STARS he thinks you’re human! ...Which isn’t that confusing. Hadn’t the notes said the guard was alerted towards Eldritch? Whatever, you’ll take any break you can get.

“Yep. You caught me. That’s awesome dude.” You honestly can’t keep the smile off your face, this little bro seems like a great guy — he kinda reminds you of a marshmallow but you’re not gonna say that out loud, “Don’t suppose you’d be awesome enough to let me up though? Kinda cold here in the snow…”

He gets off of you and helps you up all properlike. You dust off white powder, and next thing you know he’s leading you away hand in hand. You jokingly wave at Swap as you both pass. He only chuckles and follows along.

“Don’t worry, human! Captain Alphys is pretty nice. I’m sure we can talk to her and things will work out great.” He sounds so confident — you’re gonna call him Blue, it’s nice and simple plus it really does match his cool cape — that for a minute you completely forget what’s going on.

Minute’s up.

“Wait wait. I was kinda looking for someone...who for the record isn’t you unfortunately.” You say the last part mostly to Swap, who nods and then looks towards Blue with a more serious expression.

“Hun here told me she was looking for another skeleton, someone who’s also wearing white armor. Said he helped her out and she wanted to say thanks but never got a name. Know anybody else in the guard like that bro?” To your misfortune, Blue shakes his head at the question.

“I’m sorry, human. I’m the only skeleton training to get into the guard right now, and I haven’t seen any others. Hmm…” It’s quiet for a moment, but then he snaps his fingers with a Aha! expression, “I know! Maybe we should stop by Muffet’s. If this other skeleton is in the area, then surely they would go there. It’s the only restaurant around after all, and where most hang out at.”

Yes! Another lead has appeared! Oh you could hug him tight if you weren’t honestly worried about hurting him.

“Thanks so much! Can we go, I really gotta talk to this guy.” You barely wait for an answer, and now it’s you leading them towards where you can only guess this place is. You let instinct guide you, and instinct was saying this way be monsters.

“Easy honey what’s the rush?” Swap is laughing after you both, Blue running next to you to keep up and he at least seems to enjoy the enthusiasm. Your gaze, while focused ahead, hardens.

“I have a few questions for him. It’s very important to me.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Snowdin is the cutest little town you’ve ever seen. It literally looks like it’s out of a postcard and you are one jealous bitch over how everyone gets to leave here in Cabin City whereas you are stuck in Cliché Horror Setup AKA the Ruins. Seriously was that a Christmas tree or something in the middle of town?! Jealousy~!

The three of you are crossing over some bridge when you get that spidey sense vibe again. It’s screaming look out and so, you do.
Thank goodness you do, because no sooner than you taking a glance around do you have a spear thrown at you.
You duck, pulling Blue down with you as he had barely noticed the weapon in time. You look to Swap, who you see is just fine, before looking to face your attacker with a snarl on your face and a growl in your throat.

It’s a dog. A pair of dogs. This might actually take the cake on the most confusing event ever so far. What the hell was a pair of dogs doing throwing spears at people? Why attack you, you just got here!
You see what they’re wearing though, and you think your heart stops before picking up double time. Armor, bright shiny armor built for a proper throwdown is on both dogs.

They’re members of the royal guard...and these ones know what you are.

Great.