Chapter Text
At the end of the stage play called life, he had no curtain call, no one wanted him to take a final bow or be recognized as someone worthwhile.
To Sans or Geno, as he was so lovingly called at the end, there had been no point in life. The struggling he had done, the effort to fight, to survive seemed so far away now.
Of course, he at times recalled the face of his brother, the face of his other self, the faces of all his friends...
Yet what was that all for if he could not live on to see his brother's dreams coming true... or even witnessing most of his brother's life at all?
Someone had been wrong with him, Geno knew this, he should not be bitter about not being able to see the end of the day; he should be happy he had been able to see the warmth of the light, the sound of the rain against his window, to watch lightning shot across the sky, the feel of the wind with its fresh air and breath it in, the smelt of the flowers Asgore planted outside his cottage and the taste of Torial's pies.
Geno's heart could not seem to heal.
He had a solid hatred for humans and thus lived in the woodlands but every day at least one monster would come and be with him... he felt like a burden to them at times.
Geno might have well been staring into the Void at that time, seeing only blank around him and completely blinded to the love his family and friends had shown him.
And now Geno could only see white, complete and utterly white.
At first, he had thought he had been staring directly into a wall that was inches from his face, so stepping back and reaching out to touch the 'wall', he found over empty space.
White.
A vast endless white.
A white void?
An anti-void?
Geno really did not know...
There was no horizon. Nothing to indicate the floor or ceiling started or ended.
So Geno walked around, even closing his orbits at times to fight against the snowblindness he knew that could set in.
SOULs like Geno, Frisk and Chara, ones had held DETERMINATION, were often not aware of what they actually did to the surrounding SOULs.
Always launching forward with their own goals in mind, seemingly laughing in the face of the truth.
...they could not see them... how their actions affected their loved ones.
It was almost like a veil had been placed over their eyes and they could not see anything but a haze... no, not just a veil but also horse blinkers; they could not see left, right or behind, only forward.
Geno pauses from his walk, holding his ribs, he was hungry. It would pass, he had actually fainted a couple of times already from the gnawing pang and upon awakening, found it gone.
It was actually water skeletons needed more than food and used to faint from lack of that more than his hungry at first. Yet, he no longer thirsts.
The skeleton continues walking on, standing on ahead him, hoping to find something, anything at all.
Geno tries to think as he went along but his thinking ability was becoming more and more strained as time went on and he knew nothing good comes from rushing blindly along.
So he kept moving.
His thoughts became less and less, almost numb.
There were strange flashes when he could think clearly, during these now rare moments his thoughts went on overdrive and many weird thoughts came and went, he did not even fear them, even the darker parts.
Geno stops completely, then bending down he drops to his rear and just sat, carefully holding onto his hood so it would not drop off and he moves down and lays front side down on the 'floor' of the white space.
The skeleton recalls a science experiment by the name of... he could not remember the name, but it was about a white room. Humans would place other humans in white rooms, give them enough water for the day and just enough plain tasteless food to survive, they had also been strapped down.
Nothing but white walls, floor and ceiling, silence and unable to move.
It drove them completely insane.
Which made Geno wonder.
Had humans captured him, had they placed him into a white room to test and see how long a monster would go insane for?
The joke was on them.
He had already a blank empty space and survived it.
And he was DETERMINED to survive this too.
Deep in his SOUL, he knew this was not from humans.
Geno felt ... damaged.
And oddly insecure suddenly.
The skeleton began softly crying, bitter tears ran down his cheeks making him feel more and more vulnerable- he curls in on himself and his crying grew louder.
The tears that burned down his cheeks were screaming:
"*it's a lie!" "*it's not a lie!" "*why?" "*i want!" "*i won't let go!" "*hold on!" "*struggle a bit longer!" "*try living!" "*don't give up!" "*i can't!" "*to live!" "*try!" "*i'm tired!" "reach ouT!" "*then sleep!" "*aLway!" "*don't forgEt." "*i- we don'T-" "*SleEp!"
The sound of static buzzes suddenly.
The glitching skeleton falls into a deep sleep...
On waking he looks around and rubs his orbits.
{*it's ok. we didn't know.} Came a strange voice which made him nod, then looks around, voices normally have bodies right?
Raising carefully to his feet he against looks around at the eternal white.
{*this is not a defect.} Came the Voice which made him nod once more, {this is merely a cover. something greater is waiting for us. come on. let's walk."
The glitching skeleton starts moving at the command.
And something at flared deep in their SOUL making them not give up even though they wanted to lay down a little more.
As they went along he had odd images appearing.
One looked like a giant purple door.
{*this is not real.} The Voice told him, {it's something our mind is projecting onto the white. no doubt taken from our data.}
They wander over to it and study it more in-depth, some places were more blurred than others and other parts seemed to have more detail.
They wait by that purple door, waiting for something no matter what it was.
A knocking noise came followed by a distance phantom voice.
"Knock knock!"
"*who's there?" The glitching skeleton calls back with a mad grin, blinking through glass lenses when had they put on their glasses?
"Boo!"
"*boo who?" They answered in delight.
"Aw... no need to cry, I'm right here!" The phantom voice calls out.
They held out their hand to return that knock, to return that joke... but brought it back and touches his cheeks.
They were crying.
Because they were not 'right here'.
The door vanishes and they drop to their knees suddenly feeling crushed.
Great pain overtook their bones and they took off their glasses and shoved them into their pockets, the covered their face with both hands and wails out loud.
Tears pour from his cheeks, burning like acid on his cheekbones and jaws.
All their strength suddenly felt like it was failing, the confidence that had been bubbling up inside of him when the first knock came was completely misplaced. Since nothing was real.
Were they even real?
That question made them stop wailing and slowly they lowered their hands with broken little sobs jerking their form now and again.
{*it's ok. i am here. when you are feeling lost. listen out for my voice.} The Voice calls to them, causing them to nod, {would you like me to sing to you?} they ask them gently.
The glitching skeleton nods their skull and he settles down and lays on his back, staring at the white ceiling.
{*twinkle. twinkle. little star. how i wonder what you are! Up above the world so high. like a diamond in the sky. twinkle. twinkle. little star. how I wonder what you are!} The Voice song made them close their orbits.
Tears feel down they cheeks, running down his cheeks, even though he was laying down and they should be running sideways, to the back of his skull.
{*when the blazing sun is gone. when he nothing shines upon} The Voice continues on softly, causing an image to appear in their mind; a strange blue with a ball of light, {then you show your little light. twinkle. twinkle. all the night. twinkle. twinkle. little star. how i wonder what you are!}
Something else came to mind, blackness with a tiny white dot winking at them.
{*then the traveller in the dark.} The Voice went on and more tiny dots appeared in the blankness of their mind, making him want to reach out, {thanks you for your tiny spark. he could not see which way to go. if you did not twinkle so. twinkle. twinkle. little star. how i wonder what you are!}
They felt relaxed as the song went on, smiling softly even while tear continued to stream down his cheeks.
{*in the dark blue sky you keep. and often through my curtains peep.} With what the Voice just song, they suddenly was in a bed, looking out of a window, curtains wide open, allowing the stars to shine through, {for you never shut your eye. till the sun is in the sky. twinkle. twinkle. little star. how I wonder what you are!}
The skeleton felt like they were being hugged by someone, they kept near and never let them go. And for a moment, they wanted to take their sockets away from the night's sky and see who was holding them.
{*as your bright and tiny spark.} The Voice sang out gently, making them listen once more as the image faded back to a starlit sky, {lights the traveller in the dark.}
As the skeleton drifts off into sleep they open their sockets slightly and sees something leaning over them. A skeleton with a strange eyesocket that appeared to have been melted at some point.
{*though i know not what you are.} The Voice seemed to come from that strange skeleton, who reaches down and rubs their tear-stained cheeks, {twinkle. twinkle. little star. twinkle. twinkle. little star. how i wonder what you are!}
Silence came upon them, it did not matter at this point, since then once again fell into a deep sleep.
Geno woke up and blinking he stares at the white colourless world.
However, something had given him some colour. The other glitching skeleton he had sung to. They fearful eyelights had made him want to protect the other.
Geno vowed to hold onto the other one's hand and not let go.
'*thank you little star.' Geno said to the other glitching skeleton, 'you are the only thing keeping me sane at the moment.'
Geno remembers him.
The Grim Reaper that came to him.
When it was discovered that they found a way out of the SAVE SCREEN to have their final goodbye... no, they had long since said goodbye to each other, in fact, every moment they had acted as if it would be the last time they saw each other.
And Geno always fought with him, or rather, he fought and DEATH would laugh it off... the bloody glitch had always made it appear as if he hated the Grim Reaper... that had long since gone.
Geno held every moment of those days close to his heart and SOUL, it was something dear to him.
Reaper had become something he looked forward to meeting.
"* ya taught me how to be fearless." DEATH told him with a huge grin, Geno really did not know what he might by that, " ya survived geno. i wish ya happiness. don't ever be sad 'cause ya make it. just keep going. and one day. we'll meet again. "
Geno cries at the last memory of his lover, rubbing his hands and even his sleeves against his cheeks trying to wipe them away.
Someone was with him.
Glancing up he notices a transparent image of his glitching self, reaching out for him and holding him. ...Geno could not even feel the touch but he knew what the other was trying to do and carefully held his arms around the other- should anyone come now they would just see him holding the thin air.
{*let me take the pain.} Little Star told him, {let me have it all. i swear i won't every grieve over it.}
Geno smiles even though he was still crying; could he really give Little Star his pain?
{*you gave me a dream. this dream keeps me alive. keeps me strong.} Little Star continues on, {and now i have hope for the future. i won't give up. not until i reached it. so please. let me give back to you.}
"*ok. let me mourn one last time." Geno answers with a shaky breath, he leans into the air and shouts loudly to the white void, "reaper! you once made me so happy! you were my everything! being with you was a dream come true! i loved you! i really truly loved you!"
Geno once believed that he and his mate would always be together... as Reaper had wished him happiness, he had been silently begging his mate to call back to him, asking him to stay to spend eternally together...
Then he would have had to stay forever in the SAVE SCREEN and that love might have changed to hate due to that.
It had been a wish of Geno's, that he lived outside of the SAVE SCREEN, alive and well, yet still be able to touch DEATH.
Geno had no regrets with his choices, in the end, it was what made him cherish life and DEATH. Reaper gave him as much as he could and more...
And while they went their separate ways, the flame of love they held in each other's SOULs still burned brightly.
"*i don't want to forget!" Geno screams to the vast white, "even if i'm far away. this endless distance. i will always love you! please! find me!"
Another wish... another unreachable dream...
So Geno had to continue with the pain.
However, whenever he fell down he always managed to raise up because of the strength that DEATH once gave him.
Geno was very grateful to Reaper.
Even sometimes he wanted to die just to get a glimpse of his former mate.
And thus he buried the pain as he restrains his sudden fits of madness that must have set in thanks to being trapped for so long.
"*i'm trapped again!" Geno cries out in distress, trying to hold onto something that was not there...
Then he hears it.
A small voice of his Little Star, singing the same song he had sung to him.
Geno pauses and remains completely still into order to listen intently to it.
Geno felt that somewhere the dim light that once burned brightly for Reaper would not vanish... even though it was hard, he had to continue on not just for his own sake but for his Little Star who was relying on him.
Yet still, the tears continue to fell... but his heart and SOUL felt a little warmer thanks to his Little Star with him. Geno held onto the inviable skeleton, holding him like he was something cherished.
Looking back, the time he spent with Reaper went by fast compared to the time he was in this place.
Geno could not even remember why he acted so angrily towards his mate.
What even tore them apart?
What made his SOUL break into a million pieces?
Something important he knew... yet just could not grasp what right words or their meanings.
How long had he even been crying for?
A few moments? Or a few hundred years?
"* i have no real concept of time." DEATH told him once, " it was only after **** came along that i realized what it meant. thank ya. if not for ya i would have never known this joy. "
Closes his objects he wonders what joy DEATH meant.
Suddenly he hears. A delighted little laugh, a voice greeting him with joy.
Was that it?
That laugh laughed along with DEATH and even himself.
Why?
Why were they laughing?
Geno stops his laughter and the memory fades.
In his arms, he held his precious treasure, who seemed to be taking away the pain.
His glitching Little Star.
Half of their form was a glitching mess.
The bones they could see had become red and their white hooded jacket became half black.
They stare off to the distance... was it the distance? What was the 'distance'?
They sat there in silence.
Completely and utter silence.
{*some day.} The Voice whispers to him, {we will find a way out.}
They continue watching the unmoving white, dull empty sockets stare at nothingness.
{*one day. life will shine in your eyelights once again.} The Voice continues on, {its seems far away. right? that unreachable dream. that little starlight will shine bright.}
The vast barren world offered no hope to them.
{*then you will rise up.} The Voice went on a little darker now, {and destroy everything.}
The glitching black skull skeleton with yellow teeth, red sockets and with blue tear like marking down their cheeks, merely blinks.
{*our dream. our only dream should be to destroy everything.} The dark Voice told them and they felt a strange presence with them.
Suddenly their SOUL was out of their form and floating in front of them.
It looked like a SOUL.
They stare intently at it.
Black SOUL that was glitching like mad and a single white piece that was almost hidden in the blackness.
Looking further study they noticed that the black glitches that made up the SOUL shape surrounding the white were made from little black numbers.
The unreachable dream seemed to have been torn away from them.
{*did you know about the many world theory?} The Voice questions him as if watches the glitching SOUL, {many worlds dwelling in a multiverse. all copies. all with different endings. they are meant to break off at a certain point of time. creating a new timeline. if that's the case...}
If that is the case?
{*there may be many worlds in ruin.} The Voice went on with a slight hiss, {how many? how many? how many? how many like our world?}
How many like our world?
{*how many sanses loss all they love? lost their papyrus?} The Voice asks with a low growl.
Papyrus?
The skeleton screams out in rage, raising to they feet and shouts at the heavens above.
That name?!
Papyrus!?
Suddenly an image appears and they pause... a tall skeleton staring at him with a smiling expression, pleased to see him, happy he was there.
They reached out for this skeleton and he vanishes.
Stunned they become motionless.
Only the glitches moved.
"*i can't. i can't." They scream out suddenly, crying out a loud voice that broke at the end of his words.
{*no. you can. cast away all doubt and think.} The Voice hisses at him, {those papyruses are all trapped in an endless cycle of death. by killing them you would be saving them.}
They turn and see them standing there, gazing at them.
{*you know you desire this as well. to end it all.} Their image told them darkly, they come over, trying to hug them, {don't worry. i'm here. i'll help you. help you throw away all that hesitation. we can do this. we can save them.}
Within their red sockets, black and white ERROR signs flicker.
{*you can trust me. i would never lie to you.} Their image says gently to them, {and along the way. we'll find that dream.}
They began to cry.
It felt like their SOUL was bleeding.
{*or perhaps. we should just fade away. get lost in this endless white void and become one with it?} Their other self says almost sadly, they reach around them, their SOUL being pushed between them, {do we really have no hope?}
They tried to remember them, they could just about recall a dream. ...but the events changes so much, they did not know which one was true.
{*i was blind to so many things back then.} They continue and began to rock and they rocked with them, {we had so much power. so much determination. i wanted to end it so many times.}
Scenes began playing in their mind over and over of the same thing happening, of the same words being spoken and of the same actions being taken.
{*his smile was the only thing that got me through.} The other them told them softly, {my brother.}
A sharp pain rushed through his SOUL and he cries out in despair, tears pouring once more.
{*i wished i could have saved him.} They said almost dully and a tall skeleton appears in their mind, {i wish i could have walked up that hill. holding his hand. and show him the stars we love so much.}
"*...the stars..." They breathed out and suddenly the image of the tall skeleton with the red scarf disappeared and replaced by a starlit night.
They could not help but smile at that beautiful picture.
Their other self pulls away and stares at them.
Suddenly another vision appears, a darken lab with two large tubes attached to a big needle.
They saw their own hands reaching out for it, but not with the black, red and yellow ones he was familiar with, no, these were white hands.
The SOUL started flickering, the blank numbers let off a static sound.
They knew that tried to gain something that was never meant for a monster to have- they embraced it anyway.
And they became like a puppet cut from their strings, thrown into a mighty tornado and all their magic replaced by DETERMINATION.
Still, they remained steadfast in their SOUL.
Hoping and begging the light above, pleading for that wish to come to true with their whole heart and SOUL.
And thus they changed in order for that wish to come true.
If only for the sake of 'him'.
{*how selfish of me?} Their other self told them, {forgive me. all i wanted was for 'him' to live!}
Who was 'him'?
They reached their SOUL for answers yet none came and looked towards their other self for them to explain... they shook their skull.
Different words were forming, words that they had never heard before.
They screamed that them- that was when the Voices began, drowning out his other self's Voice.
The Voices that they suddenly heard did not come quietly, it came down on them like raging floodwaters, like thunder that shook the skies, like a great earthquake that rocked the ground.
The screams came in many different Voices; young, old, male, female, high pitched, deep tones. The Voices over spoke each other, with some echoing others remarks.
That glitching part of their SOUL shook and the 4th Wall was broken down.
The questions they asked them, they did not understand and the Voices continued on, not even realizing that they were paying attention.
Their words fastened themselves onto his SOUL and it blackens more.
They did not know how to react to them.
The Voices called him 'Error Sans'.
However, he falls to his knees, lays his face to the 'floor' and with his rear in the air while holding his hood over his skull trying to block out noise that he had not heard in many lifetimes.
They spoke to him and he was sure that his other self was reaching for him, yet he could no longer see him there.
Where was his... what was he? His other self, he called himself something once upon a time... What had it been? Did it even matter?
'Geno'.
Yes, that was right, his other self's name was 'Geno'.
Error Sans needed to find his 'Geno'.
The glitch lets his hands drop and slowly rose to greet the endless white which was his home.
Error Sans felt he needed to go and he began to wander through the everlasting white expanse finding nothing.
And he ran- ran from the search, ran from the never-resting Voices.
{******* **** ****** ******* ** **.}
It was soft and hidden under the many Voices but he heard it and did not understand what Geno meant.
Falling to his knees he started screaming once more.
An eternally passes by and the glitch had been silently going into alternate universes where he could watch the Child play their game and as soon as they entered the Genocide Route he would go for them...
...for some odd reason, he would let them kill the first half themselves for him and once the Papyrus was dead, he could there attack.
Error Sans would capture the Fallen Child's SOUL and hang it above.
Glancing up through the lenses of his glasses the shy skeleton smiles at the tenth SOUL being placed.
Error Sans just randomly went into alternate universes.
And had not a discovery.
He could pull up a MENU and go into the settings of these universes- the titles as he passes through a thing called a 'gateway' white walls that acted as portals.
Which gateway was just a line of data he saw but could form it into this wall white. And he could make mini ones all around him.
That was how he had hung the SOULs up.
They were tiny open portal in the 'sky' that went on a loop. Error Sans had crossed them over, so they went in on themselves.
Error Sans also chose this place as his 'home'.
As a test run, he set his Eternal Strings in this place and went into a random universe where he drove a redbone straight through his black glitching SOUL.
It had lost its shape as a SOUL a long time ago, becoming a triangle... almost.
Error Sans had died five times and dying by his own hand made it the sixth time. Always he would return to that place.
On dying, he proved his theory true when seeing his strings...
The glitch knew what he needed to do, he continued on the path he had chosen, silently ending universes.
The skeleton grins at the tenth SOUL, one less glitch to ruin the multiverse with... one less universe suffering.
Error Sans grin fades when he remembers the looks on their faces when a skeleton comes around and kills them...
Sometimes that did not kill Toriel so he had to do it himself too...
"*it's fine. they are not my torieles." Error explains to the SOULs and the Voices that he now could tune out and make them into just background noises.
The skeleton settles down on the ground and just sat them.
Sometimes he felt like he lost his way.
Sometimes he felt like he had sacrificed his own heart and SOUL when he destroyed a universe.
And oddly enough, each time he deleted a universe, another black glitchy line would be added to his SOUL... and his stats would change slightly or something would be added.
The glitch felt like this was SOUL Essence, something he had been reading about in one universe whom Sans studied the SOULs of monsters and humans.
It had gone too far from the True Ending, so it had to go.
There really only could be one True Ending and when the glitch found it, all other universes should be deleted save for that one.
The glitch opens his own MENU