Work Text:
In your dreams, you can still feel him.
All around you.
It’s bittersweet, in a way—you see him, and the picture is so vivid in your mind. He’s happy, as he always is, laughing.
His voice is loud, and clear.
Sometimes he’s talking to you—sometimes he’s talking to someone else, or about someone else, or about himself. He’ll tell you to clean your room, it’s too dirty to be inhabitable at this point. He’ll call you a lazybones for doing the exact opposite, and a slob of a brother, but never the names you wish he’d call you; the same things you call yourself, sometimes.
It’s so familiar—so real, that you wonder if they aren’t just memories your subconscious is trying to torture you with. ...Or, trying to comfort you with, somehow.
Either way, it’s working. You’ve started avoiding waking up at this point.
Reality’s too painful and you know better.
You tried waking up before, when he told you to, and you used to believe you’d wake up in a world where everything was as it used to be but you now know it’s not.
He still tells you to wake up and you’re not sure if it’s actually him or a part of you that wants you dead sooner. (Not that you’ll stay alive much longer these days.) It makes you paranoid, and scared, and despite everything you’re still going to be you—so some days you give up.
And you wake up.
And Snowdin is exactly the way they left it.
You can’t even remember what timeline this is, really; if everyone is gone, or only a few. Or none at all, besides...
. . .
You want to be able to remain strong.
You want to be able to remain awake, and listen, if it is him telling you to continue.
But...
The cycle is going to repeat, and you’re going to wake up and he’s going to be here or he’s not.
And you’ll remember it as vividly as possible or not at all.
You really, truly have no reason to go on, as you do.
You’ve watched him die, over and over again.
You’ve tried to ignore it, over and over again.
You have no tears left to cry. Nothing, for anyone.
...Even for him.
If there was ever a breaking point for you—an ultimate, final one—this is it.
There’s no discernable, reasonable reason to do anything, and you’d be perfectly fine to lie down in your bed and go back to sleep, for good maybe.
Prolonging the inevitable is futile.
...
He’s told you over and over again to wake up. Each time.
And, he’s reminded you to believe the best in everyone, each day.
You hear his voice, still clear in your mind.
IT’S NEVER TOO LATE.
You can see him smiling at you, now.
...
. . .
But you can’t do it.
You just can’t.
You can only hope he understands.
...
...You know he will.
He always has.
i’m sorry.
You repeat it, over and over, as you sink into sleep once more.
In your memories, he is here with you.
He doesn’t complain, or nag at you or even try to get you to wake up this time.
He comforts you.
He reminds you that he loves you—no matter what happens. No matter what you do.
Even if he can’t be...
He’s here.
. . .
And you know.
You know that, regardless of what happens next...
You’ll have more than just a memory of your brother.
Soon.