Chapter Text
You knock on the door.
“General Serif?”
“Sir, are you there?”
…
You opened the door.
What’s going on?
Stop . Stop thinking about that . Why are you thinking about… that? You’re too busy to dwell on the past. Especially when it’s something that didn't even happen in this life. You have groceries to take home and put away. You have projects to plan. Focus on the now and stop thinking about that.
Currently, you are trying to walk home in a downpour like a fool. The weather is brutal. It’s the type with earth-shaking booms of thunder and blinding flashes of lightning. It’s so bad you’d think the sky is trying to tear itself to shreds. Admittedly though, you enjoy this weather. Maybe it’s the dramatics of it. Maybe it’s the sounds of the rain that forces the city to quiet.
Maybe it’s the memory. You used to love sitting with your mother on the porch of your childhood home and listening to the rain. She would tell you stories and fables and make the two of you special warm drinks to combat the chill of the rain. She was so kind and tried so hard to care for you after you slowly started slipping. You remember your past lives. Not perfectly, but you do. Your consciousness carries on after you die, but you still have the mental limitations of a human. You won't remember every little detail from every life. As you age, non-linearly, you’re bound to forget things. The thing that has resigned you to this fate of eternal death told you it does not handle the body or soul, so it cannot surpass your natural limitations. It only has domain over the mind. You have tried to ask once why it kept you alive, but you got no answer. You’ve accepted that you never will.
It at least had half a mind to slowly introduce your memories over the course of years. Pouring hundreds of lifetimes of memories into one child’s head all at once is a recipe for disaster. That doesn’t mean you took to like a champ. Not at all. As you started to remember more and realize what it all means, your mental state pretty quickly deteriorated. In this life, you were lucky enough to end up with a healthy, loving family. So when your parents noticed their child falling into a horrible depression, they tried so hard to take care of you. They took you to specialists, and therapists, and tried to make every day the best day ever. None of it worked of course. How could it? You can’t tell anyone the truth, you’d be institutionalized for delusions of grandeur. You remembered so much, including how you have never made it past your
mid-thirties. That’s so young. Your parents would still be around. They would have to bury their own child.
So, the second you were legally recognized as your own person, you were gone. You left a single note telling your parents that you’re safe, sane, and to never contact you. It’s for the best. You didn’t mention the part where you knew your life was on a much shorter timer. They called you of course. They called, emailed, and even wrote a few times. You’re not completely sure how they found your old address, but then again it isn’t all that hard if you have internet access. Good excuse to move, you told yourself. Then, far too slowly for your heart to bear, they stopped trying. They hate you and that's good. If they hate you, they won’t mourn you. You don’t want to put them through that, It wouldn’t be fair.
As you reflect on the one of many ways you are most definitely a horrible person, you feel a grocery bag start slipping from your shoulder. It’s an older tote bag you got from the New New Home (also known as New Ebott City) farmer’s market. According to all the monsters you have asked about the odd name for the city, their former king is just abysmal at names. Stopping to readjust, you realize just how drenched you have become. You bemoan to yourself about how you wish you brought an umbrella or raincoat. You choose not to acknowledge that even if you had known you were going to have to walk in this weather, you would not have brought anything anyway as to not be forced to carry anything around for the seven minutes it takes to walk to work and the five to the grocers, not to mention the five more back home. Oh well. You quickly realized that this also means that you are going to have to clean mud and puddles off your floor once you get back home. It’s something to keep you busy you suppose. It’s always best to keep busy.
The rain-soaked walk from the grocers to your townhouse is over and you have made it to the front stoop. You drop some bags to free up a hand and fish out your house keys from wherever you decided to shove them. You step into the entryway and start peeling off your waterlogged layers. You find the grocery bag that only contains a jug of juice and replace the jug with your (impressively) muddy shoes. After, you start taking off your sweater and shirt, tossing them in a pile somewhere off to the side with a heavy splat. You don’t need to be that mindful about floor germs if it’s all going in the wash anyway. You lean and take off your socks and toss them as well. Your jeans were starting to hurt. The dried clay dust and glaze particles were starting to irritate your legs, but that in combination with the rain rehydrating it into a squishy mess made the sensation insufferable. After you practically tore your pants off, you had the mind to toss them in a slightly different direction to not cross-contaminate. The warmth of the entryway is a welcome feeling to your chilled body.
As you were slowly warming up, you went and found a towel to pat yourself off. With your body no longer actively creating puddles around you, you backtrack to put your groceries away. On the way, you try to make a quick pass over any puddles you left in your wake. There’s no need to be thorough, you’ll have a go at the hardwood with a mop a bit later. You look around to see where your clothes ended up and it happens to be by your couch. And judging by the dark spot, you managed to hit the back of it as well. Damn.
You start picking up your sopping wet clothes before you quickly and violently remember that you have freezer items just sitting out by the door . On that note, you drop the clothes and scurry over to pick up the rapidly melting freezer goods off the floor and get them where they need to be.
Grocery time. Take this out of the bag and put it in that pile. Put that one away. Take that out of the bag and put it in this pile. Put this in the fruit bowl. Your hard work is rewarded and you get your groceries put away in record time. Great job! You check the time and think about starting dinner. Wait, no. There’s a towel and a pile of wet clothes on your floor. You can even see them from where you’re standing. You’re also still very wet. You should shower first. You go back to problem number one (soggy clothes) and work your way to the new problem number three (shower).
You manage to finish both tasks without further distraction. You picked up your clothes on your way to the bathroom and walked upstairs. As you made your way to the bathroom, you dropped your clothes off in the laundry machine and took a very rejuvenating shower. Your shower took longer than you realized and now it’s much later than appropriate to cook a meal. That’s the tragedy of a good deep clean. You need to find something to eat, but a freezer meal doesn't sound appetizing right now… take-out it is then.
You decide to try a new Monster-African fusion place that opened recently. You looked through the online menu to see if anything sounds appealing and luckily it did. Unluckily though, a lot looks really good and you are trying to reason to yourself that buying half the menu isn’t smart. You decide to get a bit more than you usually do and save whatever you don’t eat now for a snack later. You got soup, a rice dish, and a few proteins.
It took about half an hour before you heard a knock on your door. Food! You jump up, scrambling over to the door, and open it to see a tall insect-looking monster holding a few bags of food. You completely forgot to account for portion sizes. Guess you have lunch for tomorrow as well.
“Is this… uh…” The monster seems quiet.
“Oh yes here,” You give your name and outstretch your hand to take the food. With a simple nod, they pass the food.
“Sign… here please…” Their antennas twitched as they held a clipboard and pen out to you. You take the clipboard and give it back with their tip attached. As they turn around to hurry to their car, you bid them good night.
As you walk back to your spot on the couch, the aroma of the food fills the house. You’re practically drooling. You pull out the takeaway Tupperware full of ogbono soup first. It looked pretty standard until you noticed a faint shimmer of magic. That must be the fusion part then. You of course got jollof rice. The tray was so packed full you started doing mental math on how long all the food you got is going to last you. Lunch tomorrow easily. Maybe it could make a full dinner too? You consider that maybe you shouldn’t have bought this much food at once, but your hopes are high, and don’t feel disappointed yet.
As you continue unpacking the food you find a package of utensils. Most of the food you got is specifically eaten with your hands but it's always convenient to have a fork off to the side. You tear the pack open and start getting to work inhaling all the food you got. It seems your gamble paid off big time because all the food is outrageously good. Not to mention how well-priced everything is. Your job at the ceramics studio teaching classes alongside your product sales doesn’t leave you hurting for money, but it’s always nice to save a buck. You turn on the t.v. for some background noise and enjoy your meal.
With food and hygiene out of the way, you decided to work until you pass out. Wait, no. Sarine, your work wife, would have your head if she found out you intentionally worked yourself to exhaustion… again. You check the time: 10:48 p.m. You decide to spend an hour or so doing some work on your business; maintain a social media presence, and remind your buyers about the upcoming restock, real exhilarating stuff.
You finish a first draft for your mailing list about an upcoming sale before checking the studio calendar. Damn, the next staff bisque fire is sooner than you remembered. You can probably make that work if you stay late. As you are comparing calendars, you pull up your shift calendar to see what you are doing tomorrow. You look at what you are scheduled for tomorrow and quickly realize you might have completely forgotten that you have a brand new beginners class that starts at 9:00 am tomorrow. Yikes. You should really drag yourself up to bed then. You can’t be exhausted and barely functional around people that need especially close instruction. That’s rude and won’t instill confidence in your students! You need to have the energy to get peppy and make them trust you. If they trust you they will trust themselves more.
It seems that your responsibilities are nearly done for the night. You clean up your dishes and pack away the leftovers. You can deal with portioning out a few meals tomorrow. You grab your things and head upstairs. Once you unceremoniously dump your phone and computer on your bedside table, you walk to the bathroom to do your nighttime routine. Once your teeth, skin, and hair are all cared for, you collapse onto your bed and curl up into the covers. All you can do is hope you can sleep tonight.
Gold hates his name. He hates that he can never use his given name. He hates that no one recognizes him as Sans anymore. He hates that it’s not even a nickname. It’s on every forged government form and official employment contract. It’s the only thing he responds to nowadays. Living with people that share his and his brother’s faces doesn't help. If you asked why he stays in this house in the woods he wouldn’t tell you. He couldn’t tell you because he has no idea himself. He asks himself every sleepless night and tired morning why he chooses to stick around as he still has no answer.
He finds his “doubles” insufferable. Some of them are so kind-hearted he feels nauseous. The others are so similar to him that he’s repulsed. Not to mention how clueless the majority of them are. The prime brothers—the ones that created this whole mess in the first place—are the only other duplicates to have spent time on the surface. Gold is one of four monsters living in this house that had any idea how the surface worked before being pulled into this universe. Even then he finds it hard to go out. Monsters assimilated so easily here. How is that fair? Why can’t his universe with his people deserve a life of peace? A chance to finally rest? He isn’t sure how his brother adapted so quickly, but as far as he can tell Pawn is doing pretty well. They still don’t talk as much as Gold wishes they do though.
The first week after he was pulled here was a messy one. Gold is strong. He is— he was Queen Toriel’s right hand. He could stop an insurrection in his sleep, but never needed to fight versions of himself and his brother. He hasn’t needed to live under a false name and identity in years. This entire situation constantly brings back bad memories. Once the first week passed, reality finally hit him like a freight train. His life is gone. His rank has been practically stripped off his back considering it holds no weight here. He has left his friends and his people to defend themselves on the surface. No one else in this house gets it. No one understands how much he has lost and the gravity of his absence. He can only pray to The Angel he has prepared his people enough to be able to take care of themselves.
Somehow that’s all nothing compared to the utter boredom he feels. He read a study once that people would rather put themselves through great pain than be bored for a short amount of time. At first, he thought it ridiculous. How was sitting, doing nothing, for fifteen minutes so excruciating that painful electric shocks are preferable? Now he gets it. He is the prime subject to study the effects boredom has on the psyche. It’s not like he can do very much to stave it off. He isn’t built for free time. He hasn’t had free time since he was a babybones. Even then he wasn’t relaxed. Sitting and waiting, not sure if your older brother was gonna make it back. He’s never learned how to “take it easy”.
Not to mention Sans said to not draw attention. “Don’t get a big-wig job somewhere and get your face plastered on a billboard or bench,” he said. “Don’t get too comfortable,” he said. What a joke. It’s been two years with no sign of home or even significant progress on the machine. Gold has accepted that he’s not going home and he knows that quite a few doubles have no interest in going back to the hellholes they were yanked out of anyway. Not that anyone would say it out loud.
He took up a security job for a bank. Graveyard shift. You’d think the hours of nighttime silence would get to him, but Gold has honed his ability to black out and do a job. He clocks in, zones out, and clocks out. Easy. He’s gotten quite good at running himself to exhaustion without showing it. He wasn’t able to find a day job that wouldn’t kill him in combination with an overnight job, so he makes household chores and miscellaneous crafts his whole life. He cleans, and gardens, and landscapes, and shops, and busies himself as much as he possibly can. He hasn’t given any stray thoughts a chance to reach his consciousness nor will they be able to outcompete the constant noise Gold has going to distract himself.
He doesn’t sleep much though. Gold has always been able to function at full capacity on only a few nights of sleep a week, but recently sleeping for more than a few hours at a time just two or three times a week has been a struggle. That certainly doesn’t help with the avoidance tactics. At some point, he’ll start thinking about things he doesn’t want to. How he misses his friends and his job. He wanted to experience all the good things the surface had to offer with his people. These aren’t his people. This isn’t his surface. He can’t even talk to his ambassador because they are dead. Chara is dead and Queen Toriel’s adopted child lives instead. Frisk is the one that freed the Monsters. If he thinks about it too long, his head starts to hurt.
It’s not all bad. Gold is naturally a busybody and workaholic. With a limit put on work, so he has been increasingly adventurous in trying new things. His bedroom is a testament to that. On the surface it’s immaculate, but the second you start looking in or under things, it’s a train wreck. His dresser is double the size he realistically needs for one reason only. He needs somewhere to put his crafting supplies. The left half of his dresser drawers are what you’d expect: pants, shirts, sleepwear, and undergarments. The right side though? The bottom drawer is stuffed so full of fabric and sewing supplies it's hard to open. The drawer on top of that is a disorganized mess of needles, hooks, thread, glue, and precision tools for his miniatures. The next drawer is knitting and crochet. The only thing you’ll find in there is balls of yarn and half-finished projects haphazard shoved into a giant woven mess. The top drawer is the neatest. That’s to say it’s “neat”, Gold just utilizes the packaging the jewelry-making tools and beads came in. That’s all just the dresser. There are potted plants on every surface strong enough to hold one, a weight rack by the door, a mannequin and sewing machine in the closet, and a desk covered in glue and miscellaneous small bits holding all his miniatures. Don’t ask about the space under his bed, you don’t want to know. Luckily very few have eyes sharp enough to see past the immaculate surface to the mess underneath.
Gold is sitting at the aforementioned desk working on a mini table when he hears a knock at his door. What is it now? People don’t tend to seek him out unless they want something. There’s another knock (three light, one heavy) and a voice.
“yo.” Oh, It’s Papyr- Pawn. It's Pawn.
“YOU MAY ENTER. WHAT DO YOU WANT?” Straight to the point.
“hey bro, the edge lord wants to talk to you. don’t know what about.” Pawn gets how to talk to him the best: get the point across as fast as possible in as few words as possible.
“HMPH. HE COULD AT LEAST HAVE THE DECENCY TO COME FIND ME HIMSELF.” Edge is one of Gold’s least favorite housemates. He’s childish and self-important, and it pisses Gold off.
“heh, yeah that's what i said,” Pawn pauses and glances around his younger brother’s room, “what’s the new project by the way? your room’s a mess.”
“YOU’RE ONE TO TALK,” He is actually “I GOT A COMMISSION FOR A DINING ROOM SET. I HAVE BEEN TASKED WITH CREATING ONE OF THE MOST DETAILED AND ORNATE SCALE MODEL TABLES YOU’LL HAVE EVER SEEN MWAH HAH HAH!”
“heh, cool shit bro. have fun.” Considering the conversation over, Pawn turns and walks off.
“STARS HE HAS ABSOLUTELY NO CLASS.” Gold mutters to himself.
Gold spends a few minutes tidying his current project space for no reason other than wasting more of Edge’s time. He knows he was in the wrong when he said Pawn has no room to talk. His brother has what he has described as “a functional mess.” Gold thinks it's bullshit but hey, not his room. Once he has decided that enough extra time has been wasted (enough to seriously annoy him but not enough to induce a tantrum) he leaves his room to hunt the tall drama queen down.
If Edge is asking for Gold’s audience, he’s probably in a communal space. Gold checks out the window into the back garden as he makes his way downstairs. He really should have asked Pawn where Edge is before letting him slink off to wherever it is he hangs out. Gold was about to start looking around the entire first floor before he heard banging and crashing in the kitchen. Great. He walks in to see Edge working on a pot of something , the stovetop ablaze as usual.
Gold stands in the doorway in the most casual pose he can manage, a parade rest, and clears his throat.
“YOU WANT TO TALK TO ME?” This better be worth it.
Edge turns to check who interrupted him, “YES, I DO. WOULD YOU BE WILLING TO PUSH OUR SPARRING SESSION TO THE AFTERNOON TOMORROW? I AM BUSY IN THE MORNING.” Is this a joke? Gold had to go find Edge himself for such a simple question? He feels his eye socket twitch.
“THAT WILL BE FINE EDGE, THOUGH I DON’T SEE WHY YOU HAD TO ASK MY BROTHER TO GET ME. THIS COULD HAVE BEEN A TEXT.”
“YES, WELL I AM CLEARLY BUSY WITH MY MASTERFUL COOKING FOR DINNER TONIGHT” Dinner burnt to charcoal ten minutes ago and is completely inedible, but it’s not like Gold is going to step in. He doesn’t eat what the others cook.
“OF COURSE… WELL KEEP AT IT THEN, I’LL BE OFF.”
As Gold walks off, he grumbles to himself about how he can’t stand most of the skeletons he’s stuck living with. These complaints don’t mean much considering the alternative is to live alone in a foreign universe where he doesn’t even have the safety of name or rank. But hey, he has some formidable sparring buddies now, so it isn’t all bad. He still needs something else. He needs someone else. He is back to being as friendless as he was underground. This time he can’t pathologize it the same way he did. He isn’t some big-time government official that can make an excuse as to why he is always alone. Right here, right now, his loneliness is something he has to face head-on. He has been losing his mind living in the mansion in the woods. He has been wandering through the surrounding forest for hours just to mix it up. Should he instead be wandering around the bustling and very walkable city instead? Yes obviously but that’s probably not going to happen anytime soon.
You feel like shit, but it could have been worse! It only took you an hour of staring at your bedroom ceiling until you finally fell asleep. Was your sleep restful? Not in the slightest, but that isn’t out of the ordinary for you. At least you didn’t have any nightmares. How are you functional? Now it’s a new day and you have so much ahead of you! Currently, that’s breakfast and oral hygiene, but after that! So many possibilities!
On that note, you crawl out of bed and make your way downstairs to the kitchen. Your kitchen is one of your favorite features of the house. The dusty green cabinets and original unique tilting were a massive selling for you. Not to mention that it’s big and has been professionally renovated to be compatible with monster tech. You don’t have much considering you have… concerns… about a hot fridge and lack the ability to properly utilize a magic stove. Damn the world for giving you the worst version of immortality instead of fire magic. You would give a lot of things to have a nice home-cooked meal, it being made with fire magic which is inherently more sensitive to emotions is just a bonus. Imagine eating a meal where you could literally taste the love cooked in.
Anyway, as you rummage around for something to eat, you notice you are much lower on butter than you initially thought. Darn, and you were hoping to bake something today. Oh well. You make a mental note to start a list of things you need so you have an excuse to walk around Main Street after work. You love any excuse to walk around the shopping district and pop by your favorite cafe and grab a snack and drink. Time willing you might even be able to play a few rounds with the owner Cirice. They’re a hundred-handed (close to it but not literally) metal elemental that runs Lark Under the Sun. They’re a powerhouse at games and puzzles and have a promotion where if you can beat them once you get a free drink, twice is a free appetizer, and thrice is a free entree. One could imagine that these games aren’t easy if the reward is free goods. You would proudly say that you have gotten quite good at puzzles since you started going to Lark Under the Sun regularly. Possibly a bit too regularly.
You decide on something pretty simple: rice & eggs and some fruit that’s pushing overripe. You put on some music and start preheating a pan for the eggs. Humming and bopping along, you crack the eggs into the pan and grab some seasonings out of the cupboard. You sprinkle a bit of whatever you find into the pan. As the eggs finish cooking, you dance your way over to get some leftover rice from dinner out of the fridge. You portion and reheat it, then go over to your fruit bowl to pick a few items out of it. Grabbing a knife, you cut up a peach and a banana. Oh hey, it seems like some of the bananas are overripe. Guess you should make some banana bread later. You dish up all your food and walk over to your couch to eat.
You are washing the dishes when you realize you might want to check the time. You try to get to the studio pretty early before any classes to set up. You pull out your phone to see it’s 8:45. You can work with that. Your first class isn’t scheduled to arrive until 10:30. That gives you more than enough time to get ready and get to work early. On that note, you finally finish the dishes from breakfast and head back upstairs. You brush your teeth and do your morning skincare, taking care to take note if you’re low on any bathroom supplies. You finish up and walk into your room to get changed. You pull out a designated work shirt, something that is cute but it’s not a big deal if it gets messed up, and some overalls caked with glaze stains, paint, marker, and other mystery marks. They are well-worn and your favorite pair. Aprons are only one layer of protection, designated art pants that live to be destroyed are an important backup.
Checking the time, you go back downstairs to pack your lunch and get your stuff together. Amazing how time flies. You toss a random assortment of last night's leftovers and a drink into your lunch bag. You try to remember where you left your computer the night before. You took it upstairs last night… you start to greatly question your life decisions before dragging your ass upstairs for the second time. Once you grab your laptop and verify that you definitely won’t need to come up for a third time, you pack everything into your bag, put on your shoes, and head out the door.
You have been told a non-zero amount of times that if your head wasn’t attached, you’d lose it. You hate to say it but they’re all right. In your cumbersome haste to get to work, you didn’t think to double-check the weather. It’s a nice late spring warmth that is quickly soured by yesterday’s rain. The gross, sticky humidity is awful. Maybe there are downsides to highly walkable cities, and that is walking. In humid weather. Seven whole minutes. How will you survive? You do for the record.
You walk into your beautiful ceramics studio. It’s a lovely building in the shopping district with the prettiest floor-to-ceiling front windows. The studio owner Cherlissa had a bunch of stained glass pieces installed. That, combined with the window boxes and planters overflowing with native pollinator plants out front, makes it one of your favorite places in the city. Plus you get to work here! You walk in and see the darling Cherlissa herself at the front desk. She’s a dark-skinned black woman and one of the most radiant people you’ve met. She’s someone you wish you could consider a friend. Can’t get too close to people of course. You don’t want to hurt them.
“Morning Cherry,” You greet.
“Hey love! How was your walk?” Cherlissa asked in a way that told you something was amiss and you haven’t noticed yet.
“Not bad, I guess.” You run through a mental checklist of all the things that could be wrong. Shoes, shirt, and pants are all good so what?
“Yeah, I can tell,” you watch as her eyes travel up to your hair and she tries to fight a smile, “For no reason in particular, I have an extra scarf on me.”
“That bad?” Oh no.
“Oh yeah.” Nooooooo. You sigh and fish out a bandana from your bag and tie it around your head.
“Other than so rudely insulting my beautiful, perfect, absolutely intentional hairstyle,” She smiles and rolls her eyes, “What else are you up to? Teaching today?”
“Nah, but I do have some pots I need to work on. I’ve been commissioned again for another boring, rich people, brutalism vase. The commissioner pays good money upfront so whatever.”
“Ouch, big?”
“And slate grey.”
You laugh and continue to banter as you walk over to your cubby to drop your things off. You consider yourself increasingly lucky to have coworkers you like. If circumstances were different, you’d consider these people some of your best friends. Way to dampen the mood. You try to shake off the thought and set up for your first class of the day.
The classes went by fine. Your beginner class from this morning was actually a very skilled bunch. Everyone got used to throwing on a wheel almost immediately. You were quite impressed. Not to mention they were complete angels that never got an attitude with you when they were struggling. You had your usual group of intermediate students without much issue as well. There was a minor accident after one spilled a pot of white slip, but that was cleaned up with ease. Your late afternoon class wasn’t coming for another few hours, so you switched over to working on products for the studio and your shop.
You spent a little while making some mugs, before Sarine, a beautiful reptile-esque monster, asked you to help her load some student greenware into the kiln. She was the first monster to start working at the studio and was insurmountable in helping make the place monster accessible. She donated a load of specialized clothing and tools to make sure all monsters could use clay without issue.
In the time it took to load, unload, and organize everything from the kilns, the class you were most dreading was due to arrive: the Middle School field trip. There are a lot of different issues with youth classes and somehow all of them converged on this one. Maturity issues? Terrible, you were dealing with short tempers left and right. Lack of fine motor skills? Yeah, these kids weren’t naturals and wheel throwing isn’t easy. Too much energy? Good god do you know it. These kids were so pent up on the excitement of the “field trip” that they were having more fun squishing raw clay instead of the delicate work that is decorating a mug. The chaperones tried their best but at the end of the day, 12 rowdy kids are 12 rowdy kids.
By the end, 8 mugs made it to the drying rack and (miraculously) 14 assorted items were ready for the glaze kiln. The teacher's assistant, Emery, if you remember their name right, said that they'd be the one to pick up the finished creations the following week. Despite how drained you were and knew the other adults must be, their obvious affection for the kids was quite admirable. Finally, with your final class of the day done, you could go shopping!
Papyrus is at his wit's end. He tries very, very hard to keep his household afloat, but even someone as amazing as The Great Papyrus can’t pull off a miracle. To be quite honest he is completely sick of the mental, physical, and emotional labor that’s been forced onto him. At first, he thought he could handle it, he can handle a lot, but stars above he just wants a break. He wants to go one day without having to play the mediator. He doesn’t understand why half of his “cousins” haven’t just moved out yet, but it’s not like he’s gonna be the one to ask. He doesn’t have the energy to listen.
Somehow, one of the most upsetting things about the whole situation is that he hasn’t improved his cooking at all. Before “The Fuck Up” Undyne and himself had signed up for cooking courses. He was increasingly excited to have the chance to learn more about human culture and food from somewhere other than a nasty book he found in the dump. He and Undyne were able to attend a few courses together before she set off for her honeymoon. They were not allowed back after they destroyed the kitchen for a second time. After Undyne left, Papyrus got busier with his job as the Monster Mascot, with lots of public appearances and interviews and the like. Even then he still managed to find time (and another cooking class) and attend once in a while. His food was finally becoming edible once Undyne’s influence was gone. It wasn’t great by any means, but he was getting there. Then “The Fuck Up” happened. His brother just had to continue messing with the machine in the basement and punch a hole through the space-time continuum, bringing duplicates of him and his brother.
Sans has suggested a few times that Papyrus should go back to taking classes since moving to the edge of New Ebott City. Especially since no one knows about his and Undyne’s reputation for blowing up student kitchens. It just isn’t the same without Undyne. He doesn’t see her as much since moving to the sister city, and their schedules rarely line up anyway. Papyrus has resigned himself to trying to improve on his own at home. At least he gets along with some of the people in the house. Staves off the soul-crushing loneliness he doesn’t want to admit he’s been feeling again.
“HEY, PAPYRUS.”
“NYEH!? AH HELLO BLUE! HOW CAN I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, HELP YOU?” Blue has a very light foot and uses it to his full advantage.
“MWEHEHEH DID I SCARE YOU?” That advantage is terrorizing his housemates.
“WHAT?! NO!! NO ONE CAN SCARE ME! NOW, WHAT IS UP?”
“MWEHEH, I WAS JUST ABOUT TO GO ON A GROCERY RUN. I’M ON DINNER DUTY AND MISSING A FEW INGREDIENTS FOR A RECIPE I WANT TO TRY. I WAS WONDERING IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO COME ALONG. I MIGHT ALSO WALK AROUND MAIN STREET FOR A BIT TOO.”
“OH OF COURSE I WOULD LIKE TO ACCOMPANY YOU. I HAVE BEEN MEANING TO STOP BY THE BOOKSTORE ANYHOW.”
Blue is one of the few skeletons he considers an actual friend. They are similar enough to get along and just different enough to not bore each other. It’s a very delicate balance. This means that any chance at getting out of the house with someone he actually likes is a chance he will always take. Papyrus was the one to help Blue find a hobby on the surface. When Sans was looking for a house big enough for 6, they would regularly take drives into the forest around Mt.Ebott. They would hike for hours on end and collect snippets of all the interesting plants and fungi they saw. Blue suggested they try cooking with the stuff they collect, and one nauseous night later, Papyrus presented Blue with a local foragers guide. They tend to go out together on hikes pretty often after that. Blue has even started learning how to can and preserve foods. There are a lot of pickles in the fridge all the time.
“-AND SO I SAID THAT I THOUGHT HIS BOOTS LOOKED GREAT BUT NOW I FEEL BAD. WHAT IF HE KEEPS MAKING BAD FINANCIAL DECISIONS BECAUSE I SAID I THOUGHT HIS UGLY ASS BOOTS WERE NICE? I FEEL LIKE I’D BE AT FAULT SOMEWHERE.” Blue was rambling on about a coworker and red cowboy boots.
“BLUE I REALLY DON’T THINK THAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN.”
“MAYBE, BUT WHAT IF IT DOES??”
“THEN IT WOULD STILL NOT BE YOUR FAULT. WHAT’S NEXT ON THE LIST?”
“BUT– OH UH TOMATOES. WE NEED PEPPERS FROM THE PRODUCE SECTION AS WELL”
“OKAY.”
Blue clears his nonexistent throat “UM… PAPYRUS?”
“YES?”
“HAVE YOU BEEN DOING OKAY? AND NOT JUST TODAY OR RIGHT NOW! YOU’VE BEEN, I DON’T KNOW, SHORT? HAVE YOU BEEN ALRIGHT?”
“NYEH-HEH-HEH! OF COURSE! SOMEONE AS AMAZING AS MYSELF IS THE POSTER CHILD OF UNDERSTANDING AND PATIENCE.” Papyrus gives a small signature pose, “I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS.”
“BULLSHIT, BUT I’LL DROP IT…” Blue doesn’t believe a word of it.
The pair continue on with the shopping and checking items off their list when they get stuck. The person that runs the deli isn’t at the front, and neither of them can seem to find the correct type of cheese. They circled for more time than pride allows either to admit but found nothing. Sadly they are the only two in the store at the moment— wait! A human has just walked in. This human also seems to know what they’re doing!
Papyrus checks to see if Blue has found what they’re looking for. With a negative from Blue, he decides to walk over and ask. Papyrus makes sure to move clearly into their field of view before speaking. He has found out the hard way far too many times that skeletons spook humans.
“EXCUSE ME, HUMAN.”
‘Huh,” You jump at the sudden noise before looking over, “Uh yes? Do you need something?”
“I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WAS WONDERING IF YOU COULD HELP ME FIND SOMETHING?” You jumped at him speaking to you but oddly enough didn’t look at him strangely. Even the most tolerant humans would double-take at the existence of a skeleton. Weird.
The strange human tells Papyrus that the cheese he wants uses a different name at this deli, not for any real reason the owner just likes to be a pain. They were quite helpful and pointed out a few other cheeses that he and Blue could get depending on the dish. It’s a shame neither skeleton managed to catch their name.