Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You nibbled quietly on a french fry from the plate that Grillby just brought over. You were listening to Sans, but only half paying attention as Sans rattled on about one joke or another. For being the “quiet” brother, he had a way with words when he wanted to.

“-and then I said to the guy, i ain’t got the guts to do it.”

You stayed silent, not even noticing as he finished another joke. While the jukebox had been broken since even before the monsters ever came to the surface, someone seems to have brought in a small radio and it was playing. The sound managed to waft through the entire bar as a kind of background noise. Most people ignored it, but you were having a little trouble. You glanced over at it with a frown, willing Grillby to shoot a fireball and ‘splode the damn thing.

“hey bud, you haven’t touched your food or laughed at any of my awesome jokes, what’s with the face? did something decide to eat you instead?” Sans asked, nudging your forearm with his own.

“Huh?” You asked, suddenly tearing your eyes away from the little hell spawn machine. It was right up the list with Mettaton. Damn that robot and his attractiveness, “Oh… um, it’s nothing.”

You nibble on a few more fries to appease the smaller skeleton, but he just gives you a blank stare.

“my bony ass it’s nothing. what’s up? in the time that i’ve known you since coming to the surface, i’ve never seen you like this.”

Sans asked and somehow gave you a sly and chastising raised-brow look, despite not actually having any facial muscles or eyebrows… or eyes for that matter.

To his credit, for only knowing you for about eight months, he already seemed to know you better than even most of your childhood friends. Talk about empathy powers… or maybe it was just skeleton powers. Papyrus always seemed to know just when you needed cheering up too, like that time he waltzed into your English class without warning and started reciting Macbeth in front of the whole class because you had told him that morning that you had forgotten to finish the reading and you’d probably lose points on that day’s discussion. Mind you, he stumbled, but his energy was impressive as always. Thankfully your teacher was so amused by the whole thing that no one got in trouble for it...so long as it wasn’t a repeated incident.

After he finished his impromptu act, he was even allowed to sit next to you for the rest of the class so long as he remained quiet. The skelebros were truly a gift to this world, or at least your world.

“It’s really nothing, I’m just a little tired,” You say, showily plopping another french fry in your mouth.

“how late were you out with pap last night?”

With that question Sans' grin seemed extra, for lack of a better word, smirky in that moment.

“Oh you know, just a while, he wanted to show me his favorite constellation,” you said shrugging, trying to keep as cool of a face as possible. You refused to play his perverted game by acknowledging his innuendo. Friend or not, you were not going to let your crushes' older brother get to you like this. Nope. You were cool, cool as a cucumber.

“there is most definitely a euphemism in there somewhere,”

Sans said, putting his cheekbone against his fist.

“Is not! I mean it literally!” You defend and willed your face as best as you could not to redden. By the sheer heat in your cheeks however, it didn’t feel as if it was working. You sighed and looked down at your food, “He just… seemed so happy that I could hardly say no.”

Sans just snorted at you and his grin softened,

“yeah bud, me too.”

There was a nice moment of peaceful comradery between the two of you until suddenly another freakin Christmas song started up on the radio. That’s it, the thing was going to die. Glaring at the small device you start to push up from your seat until Sans grabs your wrist.

With a glance toward the radio, his gaze turns back to you with a oddly amused look on his face.

“is that what’s been jingling your bell all night?”

You snatch your wrist away, holding it gingerly as if he had bitten you -or something of a similar caliber- and gave him a glare, that traitor! Sans just grins harder at you as you huff and slowly take your seat again. After a long staredown as you gave him a flat, unamused look and he gave his completely-amused look right back, you groan and let your for head hit the table top with a soft ‘thump’. Grillby gave a concerned look, not about you of course, but for the table. After mumbling a sorry and briefly showing the fire-monster bartender that the table was fine, he nodded and moved on. You continued to ignore Sans chuckles and wallowed in your misery with your forehead against the table.

“oh come on bud, sleigh what’s on your mind.”

You gave him a deep glare that resonated with the fiery rage of betrayal you felt in that very moment, “I hate you and we are not friends any longer.”

You stuck your tongue out at him to solidify your statement. Sans just grinned at you, looking downright smug. After months of him basically being your best friend, he’s come to realize when you were and weren’t being serious. He stayed silent for a minute longer, and despite his the smugness of his grin he stayed quiet. Friendship is a thing that goes two ways however and after being friends with the skeleton as long as he’d been friends with you, you’d begun to understand some of his hints. He was stopping the puns for a minute and waiting for you to proceed

“I just can’t take anymore of these god damned Christmas songs Sans… I am going to literally die,” You said, picking up your face and giving the hooded skeleton a look of pure despair.

Sans stared at you blankly for an entire minute before deciding “literally” didn’t actually mean literally in this case. He nudged your forearm again, but you refused to look up, keeping your face planted on the surface of the table. He did it thrice more before you met his eyes with a glare.

“so you could say you’re claus-trophobic?”

He asked putting his hands to the side. He seemed particularly proud of that one.

“You are the worst.” You said deepening your glare. It didn’t seem to phase him though. With a sigh, you continue your dilemma, “Pap’s been so excited about all of the expanded traditions since coming to the surface, especially the Christmas music. He’s been constantly singing the songs since mid-October. I am going to go insane. I don’t know what to do.”

“it’s simple,”

Sans' casualness instilled you with hope.

“you’re scrouged.”

You groaned for the umpteenth time before mumbling, “I’d rather you have said ‘you’re boned.’”

“i still could, i just wanted you to know i care-ol”

At this point you stood up and started getting out of the booth, done with this bullshit for the day.

Sans, simply laughing at your reaction grabs your wrist again, prompting you not to leave.

“alright, alright I promise not to be such a bonehead.”

You sighed, but smiled anyway. At least it wasn’t a Christmas pun. At least now you could sit back, eat your fries and for a sh879ort while not worry about anything to do with the holidays, “Thank you.”

“what’s your problem with christmas anyway?”

Sans asked immediately after. Well there goes that plan.

You cross your arms and give Sans’ glowing pinpricks a flat stare, “I don’t have a problem with Christmas, I just think it should be celebrated in December, not a third of the year. It’s one day for goodness sake!”

“oh come on, it’s not like he’s been at it that long.”

“October 12th Sans. I made the mistake of introducing him to Christmas music on October 12th. He’s been at it for over a month now and it’s only mid-November. They don’t stop playing Christmas music on the radio until the end January Sans! I can’t take two and a half more months of this!” You said, reaching out and grabbing his hoodie and shaking it in your desperation.

“pun or not, i think you really are scrouged. how can anyone hate christmas?”

Sans asked, somehow raising a single brow. You’d have to ask about that later, monster magic.

“I do not hate Christmas!” You defend, standing again with your hands on your hips.

“prove it,”

Sans said evenly, not even bothering trying to calm you down this time,

“if you really do like christmas as much as you say you do, go sing the next christmas song that comes on the radio over there.”

“Fine!” You huff and march over to poor Shyren who had been quietly humming along to the music that played over the speakers. You let your arms fall to your sides and relax your stance as to not frighten the timid monster.

“Can I borrow that?”

She stares at you silent and questioningly for a moment before nodding and handing the portable radio over without a word. Sans' timing seemed to be impeccable, because only seconds after you retrieved the radio, settling yourself on top of the table Shyren was at anyway, Paul McCartney’s “Wonderful Christmas Time” started flow serenely from the device. This was gonna be easy. Who didn’t know that song?

You started by singing along quietly, the patrons in close vicinity grew nearly silent as to listen. After about a minute you looked over to see Sans on his cellphone barely paying attention. You started to sing louder to prompt his attention. How were you supposed to prove yourself if he wasn’t even listening? As you got louder, more of the patrons of the restaurant quieted down and listened as you sang along. At this point Shyren was inspired to join in and she sings along with the melody.

“Siiiimmpllllyyyy haaaavvvvinnnng a wonderful Christmas tiiiime~” You finish off as the song fades out. Everyone in the building was listening to you two at this point, except for the one person who was meant to.

Sans, finally clicking off his phone gives you a thumbs up,

“good job bud, but i don’t think I’m convinced yet. i think you’re gonna have to sing another one to really prove it.”

You roll your eyes at him, but the rest of the customers cheer and whistle expectantly. You give a glance at Shyren, “Wanna join in on another?”

She gives a small nod, a nervous smile on her face. She did look excited though. Grillby somehow meandered through the crowd to take both of your hands and lead you over to the bar. Shyren perched herself on the end of the bar, while you situated more toward the center. Familiar music filled the room and you grinned. Who doesn’t want to sing along any song by Mariah Carey? “I don’t want a lot for Christmas, there is just one thing I need~”

You start off pretty quiet, but by the time you hit the chorus you found yourself standing on the bar. Your voice enfulged the bar in the rhythm of the song as you sang along much louder than the radio could hope to project. You got some wolf-whistles as your hips started moving with the beat, “Oh! I won’t ask for much this Christmas, I won’t even wish for snow.”

A glance over toward the corner booth revealed Sans staring finally staring straight at you, with smirk that rivaled the Cheshire cat. You throw him a suspicious look, but he simply gives you a wink that you do your best not to let affect your impromptu performance. Getting lost in the music, you found yourself getting even louder as you hit the bridge, “Oh! All the lights are shining! So brightly everywhere (everywhere)! And the sound of sound of children’s laughter fills the air! (wooaaahhh)”

You grin hearing Shyren actually sing along with some of the lyrics at this point. Just before continuing you bring Shyren to your side. Your eyes close as you both begin belt out the lyrics, “And everyone is singing! I hear those sleigh bells ringing! Santa won’t you bring me the one I really need, won’t you please bring my baby to me?”

You actually stepped back to let Shy sing the next part and she seemed to be having a blast. You joined back in, facing Shyren at this point as you sang together. You hip bumped her in encouragement and she smiled. It only made her more passionate.

“All I want for Christmas, is yooooouu, baby” Shy sang the first line on her own and you took the break to glance over at Sans’ table. He was nowhere to be found.

“All I want for Christmas is yoooou baby!” You sang this time as the two of you swayed to the beat.

“All I want for Christmas is yoooou baby!” You saw Shy blush as she faltered just slightly in her line as she looked at Vulkin cheering her on in the corner. You grinned at her and gave her a thumbs up before taking lead in the last line of the song. A quick look around the bar showed no signs of the short skeleton, oddly enough.

Your eyes were closed and you took a deep breath, everything was silent. You threw everything you had into that last line, “All i want for Christmaaaaassss, issssss yoooouuuuuu~”

As you finished up the last note you opened your eyes toward the crowd… well at least, you tried to open your eyes to the crowd. In truth though, it wasn’t the crowd that was in front of you any longer. All of the patrons of Grillby’s had parted with only a single figure. You stared down at pinpricks of orange light that had caught in Papyrus’ eye sockets, his cheekbones had tinged orange as well. His jaw was dropped open slightly and you were certain your expression mirrored his. You were frozen in place as the music on the small, portable radio slowly faded. You weren’t exactly sure where Shyren went, but she seems to have disappeared as well. How dare she abandon you? If your mind wasn’t reeling in a million different directions in that moment you might have actually found the will to be angry. In truth, you were were just rooted to the spot, trying not to do anything stupid as that silly, wonderful skeleton stared at you like you were the most precious thing he’s ever seen. You’ve never seen him so quiet for so long while conscious before, especially not while just staring at you. After a couple seconds of complete silence the radio announcer came over the speakers.

“That was ‘All I Want For Christmas’ by Mariah Carey in dedication from our last caller to Papyrus. He says ‘go get em buddy!’ I’m sure all of our listeners wish Papyrus good luck as well!”

The radio may have gone to another song, or someone may have clicked it off. It didn’t really matter, you didn’t notice it at all as he took a step forward toward you. Then another. And another. After he seemingly regaining the ability to move, he made a beeline for the bar and immediately wrapped his arms around your waist. You instinctively put your hands on his shoulders as he twirled you off of the bar top. He didn’t let go once you touched down to the floor, only re-positioning so one arm was settled on your waist and the other cradled your cheek. You could feel his hands shaking.

“HUMAN! I…. I…”

Papyrus' speech came at an uncharacteristically quiet volume.

You bit your lower lip, he had sweat building up on the top of his skull (something else you’d have to ask about later) you knew you weren’t fairing much better, feeling the heat that radiated off of the skin of your face. In a moment of boldness you stood on your toes to reach up and kiss him on his teeth. He stiffened his grip against you for a short moment before pulling you against him and dipping you, while pressing his teeth harder against your lips. You felt pricks of warm magic crackle against your mouth and you were practically seeing fireworks behind your closed eyes.

The kiss didn’t last long. When Papyrus pulled away, practically his entire face was tinged orange. Boney fingers brushed some strands of hair out of your face as the Skeleton stared down at you.

When you finally regained enough composure to remember how to breathe, you noticed the entirety of the room loudly cheering in all different forms for your moment. Papyrus was laughing nervously and you smiled at the taller Skeleton, reaching up to kiss his cheek bone. The unusual orange blush on his face was completely adorable.

“HUMAN!”

Papyrus shouted partially out of habit and partially to be heard over the crowd, he quieted down for the rest of his sentences however as a bashful look came upon his face,

“WOULD… um… WOULD YOU LIKE TO....er… GO ON… A…. uh…. A um…. a DATE… with me?”

Pap looked so hopeful in that moment, you couldn’t even tease him for his flawless impression of Alphys. You responded without a second thought, “Of course!”

Papyrus’ entire face lit up and he picked you up and twirled you around again before leaning his forehead against the crown of your head.

Now that the whole feelings bit was settled, you had to find it in you to somehow convince the tall skeleton to tone it down on the Christmas music a little…. maybe later.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

You had to leave the bar for some fresh air. As much as you loved every single person in that room, you could only take so many people in your face congratulating you before you needed some breathing room. You leaned against the wall and took a few deep breaths, enjoying the open air. You were still reeling from tonight's events. You were going to go on a date…. with Papyrus! It was surreal.

“all of the holiday cheer finally gettin to ya bud?”

A familiar voice had asked from your left.

You weren’t sure if you were ever going to get used to the shorter skeleton brother showing up at any given time, but to your credit you didn’t jump at his voice this time. Instead you just grinned almost as wide as he was, “Yeah, something like that.”

“i’m sure some of the old residents in snowdin could find you a chill-pill to-”

You didn’t even let him finish as you bulleted forward and immediately wrapped your arms around his form, “Thank you.”

As usual, he didn’t seem to know what to make of your hugs, but after a moment he wrapped his arms around you, hugging back,

“yeah... anytime hun.”

Chapter Text

It’s been about seven months since the rise of monsters from the underground. You were mostly used to it by now, but the news stations you had been flipping through -daytime television was the worst- had proven that monsters were still very much in the public eye. Many of the more conservative political figures and news stations tried to paint monsters in a negative light, but thankfully for once, the general public seemed mostly unconvinced. The -former- Royal Scientist of the Underground, a dinosaur monster named Alphys, helped technology grow by leaps and bounds in a short time. Apple and Microsoft were still competitively bidding for her services. So far she had taken up one-device contracts basically as she felt like it. To be honest though, her first contract would have set her up for life and she was on her sixth. She’d complete in days what would be projected to take at least a couple of years. Thanks to that wonderful nerd monster, you’d never have to carry a purse again. You had dimensional pockets in your cellphone and it was amazing. You’ve also never lost service either since obtaining the new phone and that was a small miracle in itself. Since you had inside connections -aka Sans- you got one of the few, “not-released-to-the-public” early designs with a jet pack in it. That particular feature was rejected due to some sort of legal safety clause. While you’ve never actually had the guts to try it out, you weren’t going to look a gift cellphone in the features. It was there should you ever need it.

Though, technology was hardly the only advancement to come to the human world. The monster food craze had spread like mad. Unlike human food, it didn’t leave fatty deposits to store the unused calories because the body used it as a whole instead of actually having to break down the food and separate what it could and could not use. Whole diet plans have suddenly sprung up around humans using monster food. It had to be supplemented with human food of course, monster food lacked many of the nutrients that humans required, but it was an amazing substitute. People often flocked to monster food now when they wanted “junk” food. Students especially seemed to take to the trend because eating it wouldn’t require bathroom breaks during intense study sessions. On top of everything else, it was entirely plant based, which was good news for the vegans of the world like you. You hadn’t had hot dogs so tasty in years.

Papyrus’ friend, Undyne, had taken the U.F.C. by storm, almost literally. You had only met her once before, but she scared you… a lot. She was like a hurricane in the ring. While she wasn’t allowed to use magic or weapons in the ring, it hardly seemed to be a handicap for the former head of the royal guard. After going through several tests and studying what her using magic looked like they determined she did not, in fact, cheat and the ring. She really had just broken the ring all of those times with her own brute strength. So far she was undefeated. No one could believe a humble little gym teacher and occasional piano instructor would rock the fighting world this badly. In just seven months she had practically become the face of UFC. In fact, monsters seemed to be turning up in all sorts of places. There was a monster named Aaron that worked at the local fitness center. Another similar looking monster named Shyren who had just come out with some sort of CD of lullabies. There was a cleaning product company that made a monster named Washuwa their new mascot. Some Whimsums have started at one of the local preschools, something about their fuzzy fairy-like persona made them a huge hit with kids. There was at least one Icecap working with a runway fashion designer in Greenland, but you were pretty sure there was another somewhere in Russia too. Things have taken off quickly. There was also something called a Temmie that seemed to pop in and out of well... basically anything at random. Hell, one of your new favorite bakeries was run by a spider monster named Muffet. Things had gotten weird in some of the best ways. Of course, who could possibly forget Mettaton?

Mettaton was another creation of Alphys and had taken to the screens like a fly to fruit. He seemed to be everywhere right now and being from the underground himself was always happy to advocate monsters. He already had a huge fan-base and was blowing up on tumblr. You’ve never met the Mettaton yourself, but apparently Pap was simultaneously a big fan and a close, personal friend of the robot. He wasn’t exactly your favorite star in the spot-light, but you’d often have to watch his many shows because of Pap’s sheer adoration. With as much as his eyes lit up every time Mettaton came on stage, you did your best not to feel jealous. Thankfully Sans seemed to share your opinion of the dramatic box and happily indulged in other things when it was just the two of you. That was actually part of the goal of today’s movie night. While the skelebros were supposed to show up at your apartment for an epic Halloween themed movie night, you were hoping you could expand your sweet, well-meaning, cinnamon roll’s cinematic tastes. Oddly enough, Sans actually seemed to be the excited one when you asked the duo. It was Papyrus who seemed to have conflicted feelings. He was excited when you first asked, always eager to do new human activities, but when you explained that you were watching older movies and not Mettaton he seemed a little disappointed. As much as it broke your heart to see that dejected look, Halloween was coming up and you were ready to watch some Halloween inspired movies dammit!

You started to sort through your large collection of spooky movies. You set some of the scarier ones aside. Sorry Freddy, Jason, Jeepers. You all are going away for the night. They would be watched at a later date, either with company that wouldn’t be completely horrified or alone. it just depended how the rest of the month went. The rest of your actual “horror” collection went with them. Having not met any vampire-esque monsters yet, you tentatively put “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” into the pile, the movie of course. You would have to ask Sans about vampires when they arrived. The Halloweentown movies went straight into your approved pile -except for the non existing fourth movie we don’t talk about. Something told you Sans would appreciate Benny and Papyrus would probably appreciate the portrayed morals of the second movie. “The Adams Family” series quickly joined them followed by “Hocus Pocus” you had initially grabbed “Edward Scissorhands” to add to the pile, but second guessed yourself and put it back in it’s place. While it was mostly a silly movie about acceptance, the kind of movie you thought the brothers would enjoy, you also remembered that it had a rather sad ending. Edward wasn’t accepted in the conclusion. That wasn’t the kind of story they needed so early in their emergence from the Underground. It was for that same reason that “Phantom of the Opera” was put into the maybe pile. The only thing that redeemed it was Christine’s song near the end when she explains that it was his words and actions, not his disfigurement that made her hate him. “Rocky Horror Picture Show” quickly got put into the hell no area and was hidden behind the other DVDs. Last thing you needed was for them to think you were nuts.

You were running out of DVDs. Honestly you hoped there was something that would maybe appeal. Deciding an old-monster-esque kind of a movie needed to be added, you tossed in “Young Frankenstein” on a whim. With a last glance at the movies you itched to add “Nightmare Before Christmas” to the pile, but the fear of their reaction made you hesitate and ultimately reject the idea. It was too risky. You already were planning out a mini speech in your mind about what the definition of “monster” meant before...well people actually knew there were monsters. The whole Halloween movie night made you a bit nervous because what if you offended them? On the other side though, you were afraid of their reactions without being eased in a bit. The two seemed to have some sort of connection with the King and Queen of monsters so you hoped that if they could learn to enjoy Halloween, maybe the others could too. Leaving the many DVD cases in a haphazard pile that you swore you would fix before Pap got there, you moved to the kitchen to start on the popcorn. They were supposed to arrive in just under twenty. Plenty of time right?

The first kernels just started popping as you found you were wrong, very wrong. There was an enthusiastic knocking on the door. You cursed quietly to yourself and took a breath. How even? They were early!

They were early and things weren’t perfect yet! The popcorn wasn’t ready, the blankets weren’t properly folded, you hadn’t even gotten the pillows yet and the damn movie stack was still a mess.

You felt a blush coming on your cheeks thinking of the state of things. Their house was always kept so tidy, what Pap decided he didn’t like someone who couldn’t even keep their DVD cases straight?!

You groaned to yourself. This was the worst. This crush was going to kill you. You briefly remember the days you didn’t care extensively about the state of your apartment. Now you were going crazy over it because of a guy. How dare that cutie make you like him?! You swore you would get your revenge one day. You’ve been putting up with this torture for months. Seriously though, how dare he be so cute and sweet? Under what cosmos was that allowed?

After taking a deep breath, you decided there wasn’t enough time to remedy the disorder before answering the door.

As soon as you opened the door, a loud, but familiar and charming voice assaulted your ears.

“HUMAN! WE HAVE COME TO GRACE YOU WITH OUR PRESENCE! MOST ESPECIALLY MINE OF COURSE! NYEH HEH HEH!”

Seriously, how could anyone be such a lovable, adorable, goofball? He was such a nerd, but you couldn’t help yourself from loving it. You found yourself staring. The tiniest of pinpricks of light stared back from his eye sockets expectantly. Yup. Now there was heat rising in your cheeks again. Oh body, you can be so predictable sometimes.

“Um… we?” You ask, trying to divert the conversation and most especially, the focus of attention. If he kept staring at you like that he was bound to notice the colorful tones in your face eventually.

“hey bud.”

Another familiar voice sounded from directly behind you.

To your credit, you only jumped maybe a couple inches and let out only a small “Eep!” in response to the sudden presence. You were about to inquire where the shorter skeleton was. Seems he already answered that question for you.

“i see someone’s had a few too many jumping beans today.”

You give him a flat look, “I see Scotty’s treating you well.”

You were actually a little surprised when he snorted. Sans watched Star Trek? Since when? Papyrus had given his normal groan at Sans initial joke, but at yours he just looked at you both quizzically. Well, it obviously wasn’t both brothers then.

“Well um, feel free to make yourselves comfortable. I’ll go get the popcorn,” You said with a shrug, eyeing the DVD pile again. Seriously, telekinetic powers could really come in handy right about now. Nope. Nothing.

You were just about to turn into the kitchen, but in the corner of your eye you saw Papyrus heading straight for the single arm chair in the room. You can’t help, but feel a little disappointed. So maybe in your head you had sort of imagined cuddling on the couch as a thing… a little bit... kind of. Oh well. No biggie. You had a purpose to fulfill by inviting them and cuddling would be a distraction anyway. With renewed vigor you made for the kitchen again, but Sans caught your eye this time. His eye sockets were unusually blank. It sent an odd chill down your spine. Had you ever seen either of the brothers without light in their eyes before? Actually yeah, Pap often had no light or at least, very little. Something about this felt different. Almost like black holes...

Sans winked at you. You blinked. He was gone. After just a second or two you regained control over your limbs, not quite sure what just happened.

“SANS! I WAS JUST ABOUT TO TAKE MY SEAT AT THE HEAD OF THE ROOM!” Papyrus exclaimed as Sans was suddenly lounging in the recliner.

Was that why he wanted to sit there? Actually now that you look at it, the recliner really was in the center of the living room. The apartment wasn’t huge and you had offset the angle set up of the couch, tv and recliner to make some extra room in the farthest corner for a small desk. Wait, if it was the head of the room, shouldn’t you be sitting there being that it’s your apartment?

“sorry bro, i was just re-clined to sit here. Looks like you’ll have to share the couch.”[p>

“OH ALL RIGHT! I, THE MIGHTY PAPYRUS WILL VALIANTLY FORGO MY RIGHTFUL SEAT IN ORDER TO BEST COMFORT THE HUMAN! NYEH HEH HEH.”

You tried your best to mask your confusion, but the way your eyebrows pulled, you knew you were probably unsuccessful. Sans has always been able to seemingly show up out of nowhere, but whatever that was today was taking it to a whole new level.

You took about three steps onto the kitchen tiles before it suddenly hit you that you’d now get to sit by Papyrus. Awesome.

After taking the largest pot you own off of the stove -now literally spilling over from the popcorn- you faced an entirely new dilemma. Having been a great while since you actually required the use of giant bowls for popcorn they were currently stored on top of your high cabinets. That alone showed how frequently you used them. Usually you went over to the brothers’ house instead of the other way around. Between the guestroom, the larger living space and mutual laziness -mostly with you wanting to get your apartment ready and Sans not wanting to put in effort of being a good guest- it was honestly the easier option. This was actually the first time they were here at the same time, now that you thought about it. They’d both stop by occasionally, each on their own time, but you’ve never had to entertain them together before. It was already proving to be… different.

Moving a chair in front of the counter you do your best to climb up and then atop of the counter. Even making it this high, you still found yourself standing on your tiptoes. How the hell did you get the bowls up there in the first place? Your mind drew a blank. It was proving to be one of life’s mysteries as your fingers just barely skimmed the bottom of said stack of bowls. You made the ...misguided… decision to hop in an attempt to give yourself just a bit more leverage on the evasive bowls, but your right foot missed the surface of the counter upon landing. You fell backwards. The damn bowls didn’t even fall back with you. You closed your eyes, waiting for the impact against your back and head. It didn’t come. After waiting a full five seconds, just to be sure, you peek a single eye open.

You see orange.

An strangely angry-faced Papyrus stared down at you as his eye sockets glowed a wispy, orange light.

“HUMAN. I THOUGHT WE AGREED THAT YOU WOULD NOT HARM YOURSELF!”

He actually looked uncharacteristically frustrated. You also noted after a second that every romance movie ever seems to have lied to you, as you weren’t draped gracefully in his arms. Instead you hung at about a 60 degree angle mid air. You noted that parts of your own anatomy glowed from some kind of blue light that seemed to be holding you mid air.

“I didn’t mean to Pap, I just slipped.”

That seemed to placate the tall skeleton a bit as the orange glow faded back to white pinpricks. You were relieved. However, you did have to admit the orange-glowy-intense-look thing had been kind of hot. The skelebros were probably both more powerful than they let on. Since befriending the pair you’ve only actually seen the two perform magical feats a handful of times. While you’ve regularly seen him train with a sword, you’ve never really seen him use magic much. One could argue that you’ve seen Sans’ teleportation trick any number of times, but to be honest, you’ve never actually physically seen him do it. Sometimes when you turn or blink, he’s just there or gone without warning.

“WHAT WERE YOU DOING THAT REQUIRED YOU TO BE ON THE COUNTER IN THE FIRST PLACE? THE SURFACE IS MUCH TOO SLIPPERY TO BE STANDING ON IN SOCKS!”

It was hard to take his chastising seriously when he was literally waggling a finger in front of your face while you were still hanging almost upside down. A look at your feet revealed that you actually were in socks. You had actually forgotten when you originally climbed up.

“I was just trying to get the bowls uptop for popcorn. I couldn’t reach them and I lost my footing.”

He didn’t need to know that you may have literally tried to jump. How do you explain that you were honestly just being stupid and bad decision Bill directed that particular thought process? Papyrus’ light-pins move to stare in the direction you pointed. Just then the bottom of the evil bowls glow blue and slowly float down until they are nestled safely on your counter top and within normal reach.

“NOW THERE IS NO MORE NEED FOR SUCH DANGEROUS EXPLOITS.”

Papyrus finished his sentence with a nod and you resisted giggling at the gesture. He was seriously cute.

“That’s great, thank you, but um… can you put me down now?”

You were still just sort of hanging around. You were struggling against gravity to keep your sleep shirt low enough to keep your middle covered. Already your hair may never be quite the same after exposure to anti-gravity magic.

“OF COURSE YOU MAY HUMAN! I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS ACCEPT YOUR GRATITUDE!”

He slowly let you down until you were laid across the floor. You got to your feet and brushed yourself off, trying to at least get some semblance of presentation back. You gave the tall skeleton a shy smile and the pinpricks in his eyes glowed just a little bit brighter.

After you heard him grumbling about human fragility Papyrus stood in the kitchen and observed -guarded?- you to prevent possible hazards. You didn’t acknowledge it and with your back turned to him he didn’t see your smile get a little wider. Moving to the stove, you evenly distributed the popcorn between the three bowls, before grabbing the deactivated yeast and sprinkling it on your own portion.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO THE POPPED CORN?”

Glancing behind you, you expected to see Pap in his previous place near the kitchen doorway, instead your face was mere inches from his as he was suddenly right behind you, leaning over your shoulder in observation.

Of course you blushed, was that even a question anymore? Your face seemed to be in almost a constant state of heat around that skeleton. It was the worst. Crushes were awful and Papyrus really needed to stop doing things that only made you like him more or you were liable to go insane.

“It’s nutritional yeast. It has a bunch of vitamins and other good stuff for humans so I try to sneak it into my diet in places. It also has a little bit of a cheesy flavor so I really like it on popcorn. It gives the popcorn a little bit of flavor.”

As you explained his head tilted to the side in a way that mildly reminded you of an adorable puppy learning something new.

“YOU CAN GIVE POPPED CORN FLAVOR?”

“Well yeah, of course. Like noodles, popcorn can be made to taste basically however you want it too.”

“SPAGHETTI.”

“Huh?”

“I WANT IT TO TASTE LIKE SPAGHETTI.”

You blinked… he wanted what now?

“You mean… like pasta sauce?”

“YES! PROVE TO ME THE DELICIOUSNESS AND FUNCTIONALITY OF THIS POPPED CORN!”

Even that was broad term as you had just explained, but taking the fact that you’ve only ever seen him make tomato based sauces it seemed like the best place to start. With a shrug you pulled down a small bowl and moved to your spice cabinet, pulling out a sizeable back of your homemade tomato powder. It was pretty easy to make and you liked to use it to thicken up your own tomato based sauces. You took a small handful and moved it to the bowl as your base before going straight for the onion and garlic powders that you kept in smaller quantity. Then moved for the italian spices like oregano, thyme and a liberal amount of basil. After quickly whisking together the ingredients with a fork you put the spices aside for a moment and used the olive oil spray to lightly coat the popcorn. This would help the spices stick. You gave the kernels a quick stir before sprinkling the spices over top and stirring again. That was it, tomato sauce flavored popcorn. All that was left was the taste test.

Handing over the bowl to the taller skeleton, Papyrus seemed to hesitate, staring down at the flavored corn like you had created some kind of monster. After a moment of waiting, sweat actually formed at the top of his skull. If he really didn’t want it you could just make him a plain batch-

He popped a single kernel between his teeth. The once pinpricks of his eyes seemed to explode outward as the light from his eyes pulsed.

“OH MY GOD!”

“Is it good?”

“HUMAN! YOU ARE A GENIUS!”

You grinned at him, but didn’t notice as the pinpricks of his eyes had receded down to nearly normal size, neither of you had noticed when said pinpricks had formed small hearts in his eye sockets. You had actually turned back to the counter and in an additional stroke of genius actually added more tomato powder to the spice bowl with some honey, garlic and onion powder, salt, and a just a little allspice. This one was a little harder to mix up with the popcorn because the honey resisted being spread, but you got it mixed pretty well after a couple minutes of mixing. Papyrus was staring over your shoulder again. You just gave him a wink, tapping off some of the mixture that had stuck to spoon you had to mix it with.

“Ketchup flavored popcorn. For Sans.”

“I AM SURE MY BROTHER WILL APPRECIATE YOUR CREATION!”

“Thanks Pap. Oh and um… thanks again for saving me from that fall. That could have gone a whole lot worse.”

Like, emergency room from a cracked skull kind of worse.

“OF COURSE HUMAN! I WILL ALWAYS BE THERE SHOULD YOU NEED MY SUPERIOR ASSISTANCE OR EXPERTISE! IT WOULD HOWEVER MAKE ASSISTING A BIT EASIER IF YOU DID ASK FOR SAID ASSISTANCE FIRST.”

“Yeah I’m sorry Papyrus. You really saved my skin there.”

“IT IS ALRIGHT! I JUST WORRY IN THE FUTURE YOU WILL NOT ASK FOR HELP WHEN YOU NEED IT AND I WILL NOT BE LUCKY ENOUGH TO BE THERE TO SAVE YOU NEXT TIME.”

Your eyes started to water slightly and you stared into the small little eye lights again. His face was in a frown and brow above each of his eye sockets was raised. He looked very concerned. You gave a trembling smile, sniffed once and then threw your arms around his ribcage. A few tears had escaped your eyes. After a moment you felt bony hands on your back as his arms wrapped around your frame.

“DO NOT FRED HUMAN! I AM SURE THESE WORRIES ARE UNJUSTIFIED! I WILL ALWAYS COME TO YOUR AID SHOULD YOU NEED IT! WHETHER YOU ASK FOR MY ASSISTANCE OR NOT.”

A bubble of laughter escapes your lips. Papyrus gives you a slightly scandalized look, as if he thinks you don’t believe him, but you just hug him tighter.

“Thank you Papyrus. Thank you for always being there for me. You don’t know how much that means.”

The scandalized look on his face softened to… something else. You weren’t quite sure, but you were content enough to not think to hard about it as he held you tighter and your form became flush against his. If you weren’t already a crying mess you probably would have been a puddle of goo by then from the sheer amount of contact. After wiping your eyes with your sleeve, you handed the taller skeleton the tomato sauce flavored bowl, before picking up your own, and Sans’ bowls. Before crossing the barrier into the room however, you paused.

“Hey, Pap?”

“YES HUMAN?”

“You’re my super hero.”

You may not have seen the small heart shaped lights, but someone else did.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Emerging back into the living room, followed by Papyrus, you noticed Sans looked as if he hadn’t moved since you left.

“what took you so long? i was beginning to think you had kerneled over.”

Sans winked at you and Papyrus groaned. It was typical bonebrother behavior. You just smiled, quite used to the jokes by now.

“Well it would have gone butter, but the floor tried to assault me.”

You handed over the popcorn with a cheeky grin, and Sans expression matched your own. Papyrus however was holding a pillow over his face groaning loudly.

“if he keeps that up, he may pop.”

You snorted, but Sans observation did nothing to quell Papyrus’ annoyance. Sans did however, seem to recognize his victory in your mini joke war at your lack of response. He grinned just a smidge wider though when he actually looked at the popcorn.

“awesome. thanks bud.”

You nodded and took the end of the cough that was next to Sans’ chair. Papyrus had already settled at the other end, putting some physical distance between himself and the puns. It was inevitable. He would succumb to the punnery sooner or later. There was no escaping it.

“So I have a pretty good collection here, anything spark your fancy?” You asked in general, but it was a little more directed at Sans who would have had the time to actually look through the movies while you were in the kitchen. Papyrus gave the stack a curious look, but kept silent.

“yeah, I think you should pop in this one, it’s been ages since i’ve seen it.”

Sans reached over and dropped a DVD case you hadn’t noticed he was holding before in your lap. You look down at the cover in surprise of both his choice and the statement he had attached to it.

“You’ve seen ‘Nightmare Before Christmas?’”

“of course, who hasn’t?”

Sans gave you a sly look that you didn’t completely understand. He turned to look at you head on before he continued.

“it’s one of my favorite movies.”

“Mine too!”

So you were a little excited by this revelation. Maybe you didn’t even have to teach them about Halloween after all, maybe they already knew something about it?

“SANS! WHY HAVE YOU NOT SHOWN ME THIS MOVIE BEFORE IF YOU SAY IT IS ONE OF YOUR FAVORITES?”

Wait, Papyrus hasn’t seen it?

“sorry bro, i can be so brainless sometimes. i’m such a bonehead.”

Papyrus groaned again, but didn’t dare say another word, lest risk another punny response.

You put the movie in and as the opening music begins you can’t keep yourself from humming along, it was such a unique song. Sans actually tapped a single finger along with the beat. Papyrus just watched in both wonderment and bewilderment at the whole scene.

It wasn’t until Jack finally emerged from the pumpkin that Papyrus actually seemed a bit disturbed.

“IS THAT WHAT HUMANS THINK SKELETONS LOOK LIKE?!”

“Well not really, the movie’s stop motion animation clay. Basically that means everything you see on screen was sculpted out of clay. They take pictures of the clay scene, move it slightly and then take more pictures. With that kind of processes it’s just easier to keep most of the shapes simple.

“don’t worry too much about it Pap, i’m sure the rest of the movie will make a good impression.”

“WELL IF YOU SAY SO- SANS! NO MORE PUNS!”

“okay”

Sans didn’t seem like he was going to hold back any puns, regardless of his response to Papyrus.

The movie was great. Surprisingly enough, Papyrus seemed to really like Sally and quickly decided she was the best character.

“SHE HAS A STRONG DETERMINATION TO FOLLOW HER OWN WILL AND SHE CARES A LOT FOR HER FRIENDS! THOSE ARE BOTH VERY ADMIRABLE TRAITS.”

You weren’t going to correct him. While you were sure she cared about her friends, it always seemed that it was Jack she cared most especially about, not necessarily because they were friends.

“I always liked Jack, he’s smart, passionate and well meaning, he was actually my very first crush as a kid, real or not.”

You admit with a little embarrassment. You felt the need to defend Jack to people. Most people call his attempt stupid, but could you really fault someone for trying something new? Sure his attempts were misguided, but he found himself because of his mistakes and in the end, isn’t that what really matters?

Two skeleton skulls swung around as two sets of eye lights stared in your direction thoughtfully.

Was it something you said?

Chapter Text

You felt lazy.

You were lounging with your back over the seat cushions of the skelebros’ old, but surprisingly comfortable couch. Your head just barely touched the parting between the two cushions, with your legs draped over, and hanging off, the armrest. A textbook, that you were meant to be reading, was propped up on your elevated thighs. Papers were scattered on the floor beside you, but you had turned your sight away from the glaring red marks that littered the pages. Oh that evil red pen. You were tired of them. You were tired of mathematical functions and learning how to solve for x. Maybe x didn’t want to be found! maybe it was tired of math’s bullshit and trying to start a happy life on its own and to be honest, you didn’t care about y either.

College had only just started less than a month ago, but you were already finding yourself very done. It was hardly surprising when you found your mind wandering. It’s been six months since monsters came to the surface and somehow throughout that time you have found yourself casually being friends with two skeletons and visiting their house almost everyday after school. Sans had become your best friend. He always seemed to give you little nudges in the right direction, just when you needed them. Papyrus…. You started blushing just thinking of the taller skeleton. That was a whole other kind of situation. Since accepting that your feelings may be a tad bit deeper than platonic, it has been rough. You seem to blush, go off on tangents, stutter, trip, and just generally make a fool of yourself whenever he’s around. You were actually a bit relieved that he was doing some kind of special training with Undyne today. Something about magical training that was too dangerous to for humans to be in the vicinity of. If it was that dangerous a part of you worried about Papyrus getting hurt, but another part of you understood that he could handle it and Undyne would never seriously hurt the skeleton. Still… you couldn’t help, but fret a little.

On the other hand, you were still thankful to have the house to yourself for a bit. Sans was liable to show up at any time, but he hadn’t so far. Truthfully, you could technically stay home if you really wanted some alone time, but you had tried that last week and Sans had not only somehow surpassed all of your locks, both your apartment and bedroom locks, but went into your room at about two in the morning and poked your sides until you surrendered on his conditions. He demanded to know why you’ve been avoiding them for about four days.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Trying to explain anything in the middle of the night on a sleep deprived brain was never a good idea. That could be partially why explaining the fact that you wanted some alone time to a short skeleton with magical powers as he stared at you with a brow raised did not go over well. Sans simply pulled your pillow out from behind you and smacked you over the face with it hearing your fuddled explanation. After a full fifteen seconds of your jaw being dropped and him laughing at you, you grabbed your other pillow that had somehow made its way to the floor while you were sweeping and whapped him in the shoulder. Looking back, smacking a teleporting skeleton with a pillow had not been one of your brightest ideas. Apparently you had declared war and in the next minutes it seemed that pillows were coming at you from every direction. You were certain you didn’t even own as many pillows as he was throwing at you. After ending up at the bottom of a very large mountain of pillows that somehow materialized into existence, you pulled a sheet off of one of them and waved it as a substitute flag. Sans was declared both poking and pillow fight king.

As you emerged from your fluffy prison, Sans was grinning at you even wider than usual. You were still on the floor and from this position, he towered over you. Leaning down over you he reached his arm out and for a second you thought he was going to grab another pillow from the pile, but he didn’t. Instead, he ruffled your hair, before patting it back down to some semblance of order.

“our home is your home. if you need space occasionally, me and Pap will understand, but don’t avoid us. it doesn’t matter what reasoning you have. Papyrus misses you…. i miss you too you feather brain.”

You looked up and blew a feather out of your hair. They seem to have gotten everywhere during the resulting chaos, “I wasn’t really trying to avoid you guys… Sorry for making you worry.”

“worry? who said anything about worry?”

Sans winked at you and you knew it was a joke. You returned his grin. “I’ll make sure to stop by more often okay?”

“i expect to see you in the afternoon. Pap’s making spaghetti and he’d be overjoyed if you joined us.”

“Wait wha-” After seeing Sans cross his arms and a somewhat serious expression come across the skeletons face you relented, “Alright, I will see you there tomorrow… today… whatever.”

“and friday we’re going to the park. you’re coming too.”

“Do I not even have a choice anymore?” You asked him with a brow raised, trying to hold back a smile.

“none at all.”

Another pillow was mysteriously flung at your face from seemingly nowhere.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

That was how you somehow ended up going to their house everyday. They both insisted you continue visiting the house everyday from that point, even if they weren’t there. The brothers insisted that they’d eventually show up. You probably spent more time at their house now than you did at home, only going home to sleep and that wasn’t even every day. There was a sizable box in the corner with extra clothing of yours that you could pull from, nightwear and daywear for impromptu sleepovers. The box also had a few select items from each of the brothers as well that you’ve “borrowed” -aka stolen as they’re never getting them back- the whole situation had become rather strange, but you honestly couldn’t say you minded. The last few months were the happiest you’ve been in a long time.

You could remember yourself smiling and laughing more times in the last six months than you could remember in years. Their house was like your second home, if not your first. At this point, their place was starting to feel a bit more homey than your own, but you weren’t likely to give up your own apartment anytime soon regardless. As much time as you spent there it was still nice to be able to get away. Though, you might need to switch the locks if Sans can-

“aren’t you supposed to be reading that? or are you all booked up?”

Speak of the devil.

“Hi Sans,” You didn’t even bother looking toward the voice as you said it.

“i’d normally say ‘you look like you could use a break’ but it looks like you’ve already taken a few.”

Sans nodded toward a few pencils you snapped in frustration.

It was how you kept yourself from throwing a book and breaking your friends’ nice walls. You stayed silent at that, crossing your arms and hugging them to yourself. You were just really frustrated. The numbers were not working the way you wanted them to work and it was ruining your semester. You were supposed to be a good student dammit!

“no need to let your face get all red, it looks like your papers already have more red then you need.”

You groaned and put your hands over your face. You weren’t going to cry, you weren’t going to cry… you weren’t going to- you sniffed.

“hey, wait… i’m sorry…?”

You felt a hand squeezing your shoulder reassuringly and you quickly wiped a few stray tears away with the palms of your hands, “It’s not you. I’m just not used to struggling this much in a class. I’ve been working like hell, but I can’t seem to understand it.”

“that’s nothing to cry over bud.”

Sans plopped down next to your head before reaching down and grabbing a handful of the scattered, red ink covered papers. He ‘tsked’ before shuffling the papers to glance over another. Then he huffed and shuffled them again. This continued for another minute as he looked over the many pages. Then he finally started mumbling.

“why are these so called ‘teachers’ making you go about it like that?”

Your eyes darted up to the skeleton questioningly. You knew better than to underestimate Sans at this point, but him critiquing your teachers methods was still a bit of a surprise. You’ve never heard him critique anything. You even remember him eating Pap’s cooking before you intervened.

“they shouldn’t have marked you off on that one. you left it blank. it was impossible to solve. 'nothing' is the right answer.”

Your brow rose even higher if it was possible and you scooted closer without really getting up. Peaking at the papers from under Sans arms you found yourself leaning against the skeleton’s plushy jacket.

“look, if you just multiply this here, by this, you get your answer much easier.”

You blinked and watched from under his arms as he managed to somehow magically simplify complex math. Numbers just seemed to weave to his will as he different equations quickly were solved longhand under precise strokes of a black pen the skeleton had procured from behind your ear.

“And then you just divide?” you asked, trying to understand everything he was explaining to you.

“well you can’t really divide by zero, it would make the equation naught. instead you want to find the basic values by setting the opposing values to zero.”

You huff, “someone should tell the guy who invented zero ‘thanks for nothing’”

Sans snorted, and you grinned cheekily at him. For once you got the first pun.

“don’t be mean… or mode.”

“Median either?”

“median’s fine, if only just cos.”

“That bad of a pun should be considered a sin.”

“puns are my domain.”

“At least be rational.”

“good puns are the first sine of a good comic you know.”

At this point you finally give. With no rebuttal, you submit to the fact that Sans is the pun master. He looked ready to throw another one your way, but he paused just as he began opening his mouth. The pinpricks in his eyes focused on something to the side. He leaned over and picked up some papers, shuffling through another stack. Oh no those are-

“oh bud…”

Sans looked down at your last three tests with an almost frown. His eyes were what really let you know his expression was upset however. Though, this was not the reaction you were expecting to be honest. You were expecting teasing, puns, maybe even mockery with how easily the equations came to Sans. That wasn’t right though. Thinking about it for a moment, you realized that Sans had never once sincerely mocked you for anything. Was there an occasional joke at your expense? Sure. Was it ever spiteful or mean? Not once. You knew he could tell some mean jokes about certain people, most especially about humans who were “anti-monster” but you’ve honestly never heard him say a mean thing about you. Glancing at the two C’s and the more recent D however, you realized today might be the day that changes. He probably thought you were stupid now.

“i know you can do better than this.”

That was not what you were expecting.

“Math isn’t really my forte’ if you haven’t noticed from well-” You just gesture to the array of marked up papers that still littered the floor and then to those that Sans had taken possession of.

“i thought you were doing good in school?”

Sans had asked with a brow risen. How did he even?

Of course that question only made you feel worse. While your other classes seemed to come easily as long as you kept up, this particular class seems to be eluding you regardless of how much effort you put in.

“Maybe I should just drop the class and take an easier math next semester…” You said, pulling your knees in and wrapping your arms around them.

“you’re giving up?”

“Well I mean… if I can’t do it, I need to drop the class soon or I’m going to have a bad grade on my report. If I get a bad grade, I’ll have to repeat the class and I’ll be right back in this boat.”

Sans gave you a look that could only be described as disappointment. His eyes were trained on yours and it was like a cold knife was twisting in your gut. You felt your heart breaking under that strangely soulful stare. Was this really Sans?

“i thought humans were supposed to have more determination than this.”

If he could make you feel worse at this point, he just did. You put your face into your knees and held back a sob. You wouldn’t cry. Yeah, so maybe Sans thought you were stupid and lazy, but you didn’t need him to think you were a crybaby too. You tried to get your breathing under control, but you couldn’t look at him. That soulful, disappointed stare. It almost physically hurt. Maybe if you curled up enough the couch would consume you and you wouldn’t have to worry about grades or math problems any longer…

You felt a hand on your shoulder.

“oh bud, I didn’t mean it like that.”

You still didn’t look up. You were too ashamed. You had a low C in the class and Sans was able to do the work in a class he wasn’t even in without any effort. No wonder he thought you were an idiot.

“hey, look at me.”

You didn’t. Instead, you hugged your knees a little tighter and tried to muffle a sniff.

Arms wrapped around your back. You could feel slightly rough fingers rubbing up and down your back in slow, careful caresses. Finally you let a few tears escape. The pressure of it all had been driving you crazy lately and you were trying your best to keep it together. Your emotions were getting the better of you now because of it. It felt simultaneously amazing and horrible. You certainly didn’t want to blubber in front of Sans of all people.

The tears wouldn’t stop. Frustration. Embarrassment. Shame. Anger. Disappointment. You were overloaded with feelings of self loathing for letting your grades slip like this again. After finally being marked as an honors student, you were going to lose it all over one stupid class.

“hey, it’s okay bud.”

You finally looked up. He wasn’t sneering or frowning like you expected. In the back of your mind a little voice said that Sans would never do that, but the anxiety that took over screamed so loudly that it was almost lost in the brain waves. Sans used the sleeve of his hoodie to wipe away the tear stains that streaked your face.

“let me help you for once.”

…..

Huh?

He patted the top of your head with his bony fingers and grinned widely at you.

“between the two of us, i bet we can get through those problems, no problem.”

He winked at you and it was unclear how much of what he just said was a joke.

“then we could head for grillby’s after for a couple of his solutions.”

“What?”

“me and you, we’ll work together on it til you’re sure to ace the next test, yea?”

You found yourself nodding before you even realized you were doing it. Something about Sans’ could be so reassuring sometimes. Like he had the answers to the universe. It was weird in the best kind of way. It was times like these that reminded you why you were so thankful to have him for a friend. You found yourself moving forward and wrapping your arms around his middle. His coat was as plush as always so you could hardly feel the bones underneath.

“Thank you.” You mumbled into the fabric.

Sans patted your back a little awkwardly now, without really letting his arms rest against you. Even when he had been rubbing your back before, it was only his hands that rested on your skin. It was just one of those weird little differences you noticed about the brothers. Papyrus always threw himself into every hug, holding you without any regards for space. He was also liable to spring hugs at any given time and you loved the extra attention. Sans on the other hand? He was more aloof. Usually he avoided too much physical contact. A head pat here, a shoulder touch there. Infact, him rubbing your back had been a first. He must have been pretty worried if he risked his ‘cool’ image to try and cheer you up. You took in a deep breath and steeled your nerves. You were determined not to embarrass poor Sans any longer. He had been so nice to you, it was the least he deserved.

You pulled away and tried to match his grin, “Sans, you’re the best.”

He scratched the back of his head, probably trying not to let the mushy stuff get to him.

“i guess you could say i’m acute.”

He grinned wider as you immediately snorted, “No, I don’t think that’s an obtuse observation.”

You were a little surprised when he didn’t answer. He almost never let you have the last pun. Instead he simply scooted over until he was at your side and tugged your textbook until it was situated over top of both of your laps in equal measure.

“so to find the f1 of y equals 1/2x plus 6, first you need to switch the x and the y…”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“SO IT IS SANS TURN TO CHOOSE DINNER TONIGHT MEANING YOU WON’T GET TO HAVE ANY OF MY DELICIOUS COOKING!”

You had to hold the phone a little away from your ear, but you didn’t mind. It was always a treat when Papyrus called you before class just to check on you. It was touching that he cared enough to do so, “Sorry Pap, but I gotta agree with Sans on this one, a burger sounds good tonight.”

You heard him groan on the other side, even though it seemed that he put in the extra effort to pull the phone away from his mouth as he did it.

“ugh… grease.”

You giggled, despite being garbled and muffled, you could still make out his complaints clearly enough, “Sorry Pap, don’t they sell salad?”

“Yes…. most of them have greasy strips in them though.”

Papyrus just grumbled more at the idea of greasy waterdog strips assaulting his leafy greens.

“Do any of the salads not have strips in them?” You asked, trying not to full out laugh at his silly groaning. He was so precious.

“....Yes.”

“Can’t you get that one then?”

“....................Yes……………….”

“See! It’s gonna be alright!”

He grumbled some more. You wanted to hug him so bad. He was seriously, so cute.

“I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS WANTED TO INDULGE IN YOUR HUMAN DISH HOWEVER! YOU SAID WE COULD MAKE LA MEN TOGETHER!”

You fell silent for a moment, not completely comprehending what he was saying right now. Just… what? You sincerely hoped he wasn’t implying what it sounded like he was implying.

Then, all of the sudden, it clicked.

“Are you talking about making Lo Mein together?” You asked with a hopeful smile. If you misunderstood it might make him sad.

“YES! I WANTED TO PARTAKE IN THE CREATION OF THIS ‘LOW-MAINE’ WITH YOU!”

You covered your mouth as you sighed in relief. Your mind had taken you in some weird and slightly confusing directions. You were glad that was cleared up, “I would be happy to make some Lo Mein with you Pap!”

“BUT WE’LL HAVE TO WAIT ALL THE WAY UNTIL THURSDAY UNTIL WE CAN BECAUSE YOU HAVE LATE CLASSES TOMORROW!”

Pap normally swore up and down that he never whined, but that was whining if you’ve ever heard it before. He was right though. You had that evil math class from four to seven on Tuesdays. You usually didn’t make it to their house until almost eight if you went at all on. You’d usually leave by ten then “Maybe if you ask Sans, he’d be willing to switch so you can choose on Wednesday and he can choose on Thursday.”

There was a moment of pause, that either meant Papyrus was considering the idea, or he was gasping. It was really a flip of a coin on which though.

“HUMAN, THAT IS A GREAT IDEA! WE CAN MAKE THE LOWS-MAINES TOGETHER WEDNESDAY! WE’D HAVE ALL AFTERNOON!”

You grin despite the volume. He sounded happy and when Papyrus was happy, everyone around him seemed to be too. He was just this bright light that radiated to everyone around him.

“That sounds like fun! Alright, lets make it a date!” You said without thinking. Then you realized exactly what you said and started choking on your own saliva. It was a feat on its own. Apparently Papyrus noticed your hacking.

“HUMAN? ARE YOU ALRIGHT?!”

After taking a few deep breaths, you started to loose it again from laughing. Well, that was embarrassing.

“HUMAN! PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE ALIVE!”

You put the phone back close to your ear, “Haha, yea Pap, I’m okay sorry about that, just me being a klutz.”

“YOU DIDN’T HURT YOURSELF DID YOU?! WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT THAT?!”

“I’m okay! I promise!” A giggle erupted out of you. Sometimes it just felt so good to have someone care, “Thank you Papyrus. I promise I’m okay.”

He grumbled something else that you didn't quite catch as the sound of talking students surrounded you. Darn them.

The door to your classroom came into view too soon. You’d have to face your teacher. If you were lucky you wouldn’t be called on. However, you were rarely lucky, “Sorry Pap, I gotta go. Class is about to start and I have a class discussion to fail.”

“WHAT?! I THOUGHT YOU AND SANS WERE WORKING ON SCHOOL WORK ALL OF YESTERDAY AFTERNOON?!”

“We were. That was math though, this is lit. I had gotten so distraught over calc that I forgot to read over the play for lit this weekend.”

“YOU SHOULD HAVE TOLD US! WE COULD HAVE HELPED!”

“It’s okay Pap, it’s just a discussion grade. I won’t lose a lot of points over it. Math was what I needed to prioritize with my grades slipping like that,” It seemed he didn’t hear you however. You could hear several crashes in the background, “Pap?”

“DON’T WORRY HUMAN! I WILL BE RIGHT THERE!”

What?

Chapter Text

Huh-whzzzishtsas?

You blink your eyes open slowly. There was some kind of obscure noise. You didn’t register anything beyond that as of yet. You couldn’t see anything. Your eyes barely wanted to stay open. After a moment, said obscure noise stopped. Your eyes somewhat started to focus. It was enough for you to glance at your portable alarm clock and realize it was one o’three in the morning.

Yup. Screw that life. You were going back to bed.

You roll back over, pull the covers up and let yourself drift back into the abyss.

It didn’t last long however.

No matter what media tells you, being awoken by violent shaking is the worst. You curl up in the fetal position and do your best to roll away from your attacker’s grip…. and right onto the floor. Damn. You had forgotten you were in the guest bedroom ....again. Curse that smaller mattress!

“Owwwwww,” You groan, rubbing shoulder that you landed on in your epic escape attempt. There were voices, but you were more focused on the fact that you were in a tangled ball of sheets and blankets, on the floor, and your shoulder was going to bruise.

“a good effort kid, but fall isn’t quite here yet.”

“SANS! CAN’T YOU SEE THAT THE HUMAN IS DISTRESSED?!”

“sorry Pap, didn’t mean to be insensitive to their entanglement.”

“SANS!”

You just groaned. What even was your life anymore?

It’s been about five months since monsters joined humans on the surface. They had been melding in with the rest of society pretty nicely. Sometimes, just sometimes, society could surprise you with their acceptance. Of course, they were still constantly on the news. That monster did this, this monster did that. Boxes among boxes of monster food also seemed to be popping up at hospitals all over at random. It started with the city that monsters first emerged from, but it was quickly moving across the nation. This was especially true for children's hospitals. No one knew who it was. It didn’t mean news reporters and internet forums weren’t trying like hell to figure it out though. The biggest suspicion was that maybe it was the OTHER mysterious figure that was going around and apparently healing “lost cause” patients. Cancer. Trauma. M.S. Heart Disease. Stroke. You name it and this person seemed to be able to fix it with just the touch of their hand. The biggest difference was that this person actually showed themselves… sort of. They always wore a large dark cloak while whoever was leaving the stashes seemed to just disappear before anyone noticed. Both cases of serial-awesomeness were being talked about everywhere it seemed. People were eating it up like it was the second coming of Jesus… or Buddah… or which ever religious or just generally good person people put their faiths in. You of course suspected monster, first off one of them was literally delivering monster food, it was too convenient to have started just after the monsters emerged. Did monsters have magic? You were pretty sure you heard somewhere they did. For being around a couple of them nearly every day you realized you didn’t know much about them. They were just kind of there…

You weren’t too worried about that this minute however. Right now you had other things tying you up, both figuratively and literally. One of your arms was already free of your bedding bind. You had to struggle around a bit to get the other free. Sans seemed to watch you with an amused expression on his face. Papyrus however took pity on you and knelt down to help you untangle yourself. You smiled up at the sweeter one of the brothers. After two of you made quick work of the tangled mess, Papyrus also offered a hand to help you up. He really was such a gentleman. After frowning at Sans’ smirking, you glance at the clock. It felt as if you were only asleep for an additional minute or so. Apparently it had been over a half an hour. Still, why were the skelebros in your room just after one thirty in the morning?

“COME FRIEND! IT IS TIME FOR FAIR TIME!”

Papyrus threw an arm around your shoulders in his excitement and pulled you close for seconds before swirling you out of his grip once again. You spun and reached for the first thing you could hold onto for balance as your less than awake self was still trying to register this morning’s happenings. With a hand on Sans’ shoulder, you were finally able to right yourself. He just shrugged underneath your grip with a side grin.

“you said we had to go when it was dark right? here we are, the darkest part of night will be pretty soon”

“What?” You asked, blinking wildly as Papyrus flicked the room light on. It burnses us!

“OH SILLY JEST HUMAN! YOU COULDN’T HAVE FORGOTTEN ABOUT OUR SPECIAL ‘FAIR’ DAY RIGHT?!”

You just stare blankly and blink again, “huh?”

“sorry Pap, at their reaction, i’m fair-ly sure that they did.”

“DOES THAT MEAN WE STILL CANNOT GO?”

“‘ts up to them. neither of us would really know what we were doing.”

You just pursed your lips, blinked again, tilted your head, “I’m sorry, what is happening again?”

“YOU INVITED US ON A TRIP TO THE HUMAN TRADITION OF THE ‘FAIR.’”

“....So?” You asked, still trying to adjust to the brightness and… volume of the room. Hell, you were still trying to grasp the fact that there were other people around keeping you from the warm bed that loves you very much and vice versa. It maybe wasn’t the bed at your apartment, but their guest bed was quickly turning into your side bitch. Their couch deserved an honorary mention as a random ‘in the moment’ kind of fling too.

“SO WE ARE HERE TO PARTAKE IN THE HUMAN FESTIVITIES!”

Papyrus struck a pose. Even in your sleepy state you had to admit he was pretty cute. Maybe if you went about this right you could go back to bed and steal him as your replacement teddy bear as compensation. Yeah, that sounded pretty good.

You blink and glance at the clock again just to make sure you had read that correctly.

1:37 am

Why was anyone even alive at this hour?

“you said to stop by when it was good and dark kid. somethin’ ‘bout lights.”

It finally registered what was going on here.

“Um… I meant… pm… Like… 9:30 at night?...As in after the evening...” You shuffled uncomfortably under the dual confused stare. Apparently human time measurement still was a strange concept to monsters. They had never really needed to judge things by the sun in the Underground. Actually, you weren’t quite sure how time was measured down there. It was something to ask about. It made sense though that the brothers stopped by when it was dark at the beginning of the day though if you thought about it in a technical sense. That kind of common knowledge of what things are open when and why would probably evade monsters for a while yet.

“Oh…”

Papyrus frowned. He had seemed pretty excited. Strangely, the wave of guilt that washed over you at Papyrus’ dejected tone woke you up more than any of their previous shenanigans. With a sigh you resign to losing your bed for the remainder of the day. You moved and started gathering up your sheets. The bone brothers watched you curiously until you shoved pillows into each of their grips. They woke you up at this ungodly hour, so they could help.

You dumped what you held in a pile in the living room and motioned for them to grab their own sets. It was always funny when the two very different brothers had similar reactions to things. It didn’t happen very often. However, their matching looks of bewilderment were pretty amusing. Not a word was said as Papyrus trudged up the stairs and well… Sans did his disappearing thing. You went straight for the mud closet. Ah-hah! They still kept that box right where you had stashed it.

The boys only had one guest room and while you hadn’t been around for Frisk’s sleepover party some months ago, they had asked to borrow your large air mattress so they could house a few extra people. The party had apparently gone well, but they had never returned the mattress -or, more like you had never bothered to grab it. It worked to your advantage though. As the boys each gathered their sheets and pillows, you went into the garage. It had a built in fan that blew it up automatically with the press of a button when it was connected to an outlet. You let the magic of electricity do its thing while you gathered the bedding that was piled into the living room.

It was soon blown up. You may have pretended to be hulk when you picked it up, took it out to the driveway and threw -hulksmashed- it in the bed of your pick up… just a little bit. While you were dumping the rest of your bedding in the back as well, Sans finally made an appearance with his sheet ball. Thankfully, you knew for a fact that they weren’t actually dirty. Whenever Papyrus took it upon himself to wash Sans’ sheets (not that he need bother, because the guy never used them) he would bring down the sheet ball. then when Papyrus had his way with them he’d wind it all back up in a ball and not touch it again until the taller brother decided they needed to be cleaned again. It was all sort of silly, but you weren’t going to ruin their system. It worked for them so why try and change anything?

“Dump it in there,” You said nonchalantly, hefting the last pillow from the guest room.

He did as he was told, but his usual grin faltered slightly as he gave you a curious look.

“so what’s all this for?”

“Surprise,” You said simply.

For once, you were the one smirking as you simply gave him a wink. Sans actually frowned slightly. It was a rare sight and a little unusual on a skeleton, but given they were made of magic, their bodies didn’t have the same rules as human skeletal remains. Of course, just the fact that they walked and talked proved that to be true.

Sans didn’t say another word, but his usual grin returned when Pap resurfaced with an expertly folded pile of sheets that sat in the exact center of the four pillows he had stacked in his arms. He had a big, proud grin on his face as he set the pile with the rest of the sheets. Mumbling something about winning, you didn’t really catch it all, too focused on the way his eyes literally lit up with joy.

Seriously, he was so adorable.

Would Sans kill you if you kidnapped his brother and made him your permanent hugging companion?

Probably.

Would it be worth it?

Totally.

“Wait here, I’ll be right back,” You said with a smile before running back inside.

Quickly snatching your forgotten keys, wallet and phone off the bedside table in the guest -haha your- room. Thinking about the surprise you were about to show the brothers, you were hit with inspiration. Sans may legitimately kill you for this stunt, but you knew where he kept the extra key to his room.

You tried not to think too hard about the fact that you were in crush’s room as you hurried to Papyrus’ desk. If you weren’t quick they were going to get suspicious. You carefully flip over Papyrus’ keyboard to grab the spare key to Sans’ room that was taped to the bottom, along with an extra house key and another three you didn’t immediately identify. You were pretty sure Papyrus didn’t even know those were there. You snatch it and rush back out, trying to invade as little of his private space as possible.

You rerouted to the other end of the hall and unlocked Sans’ room, moved to the window to grab the object of your desire, after carefully avoiding the trash tornado with unusual grace. The last time you were here that thing tried to suck up your shirt. Ahhhh, embarrassing memories. However, you were on a mission! Quickly folding down said surprise object, you run back to the guest -your- room and grab a nondescript bag.

After successfully obtaining what you were looking for and carefully stuffing it in the ordinary bag, you run back outside. Seriously, much longer and they would come looking for you which would have spoiled the surprise.

“Road trip!” You yell joyfully and hit the keys to unlock the car.

“shotgun.”

“I DO NOT SEE ANY SORT OF GUN BROTHER PERHAPS WE SHOULD GET YOUR SIGHT CHECKED.”

Sans started snickering. You took the distraction to slip the bag into the trunk bed without anyone noticing.

“no it means i get the front seat and you’re in the middle.”

You snort at Sans’ claim. You had front pickup with a bench seat. No way Papyrus would have enough leg room in the cent-

You were mistaken. Papyrus dutifully climbed in the center, seat with Sans following behind. It would have made more sense for Sans to sit in the center for sheer size reasons. The center “seat” had almost no leg room, because underneath it was a ‘hump’ section in your car that went from the dashboard to the center storage area of your car. The part where the seat covered had a couple cup holders in it. To put it simply, it was not a seat meant for tall people.

Somehow, the tall skeleton seemed to manage however. You climbed in, ready to get going… Then you realized how Papyrus’ ridiculously long legs seemed to fit in the car. You bit the inside of your cheek while shifting gears and flinched slightly as you hit the gas. Papyrus had to drape his legs into both your and Sans’ leg room areas because his legs were simply too tall to comfortably place on the bump. That meant, every time you hit the gas pedal your leg was going to brush against his. Your face burned.

Sans was the worst.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

The drive had been… mostly okay. It was still nerve wracking to have Papyrus’ femur almost flush against your thigh, but you almost stopped noticing after the first ten minutes. He didn’t seem to notice at all. About half way through the drive you also noticed something odd. Just as you came close to Mount Ebott, it looked like the lights in Sans eyes were gone for a second there. Then you had to make a turn and started driving away from it. When you had the chance to look again, he looked fine. He had even given you a grin. You were left with the lingering feeling of… something. Papyrus seemed okay however, if anything the look on his face was closer to that of reminiscent fondness.

After about a half an hour of driving you finally made it to your destination. You stopped the car, put it in park -emergency brake and all- and got out without a word. Confusing Sans and Papyrus was quickly becoming one of your hobbies as they each gave you a suspicious and beguiled look, respectively.

You move straight to trunk and climb straight up the back, pulling the various bedding out from the sides of the mattress -so they wouldn’t fly out at random. Throwing it all on top, you proceed to make a giant nest of the various soft things. You balanced your way on the metal sides of the pickup’s bed, before climbing on the roof of the car with the nondescript bag in hand. You slipped slightly, and scraped your knee a bit, but it was hardly a scratch.

“isn’t the red stuff supposed to stay inside your skin?”

You’re not being helpful Sans.

“HUMAN! PLEASE BE CAREFUL! YOU ARE MADE OF SQUISHY THINGS THAT ARE TOO EASILY BROKEN!”

You inwardly scoffed. Right, humans were the breakable ones. Yeah, sure they had cool magic stuff and all, but they were hardly as sturdy as they seemed to think they were. Monsters could be killed by ill-will…. You decided you weren’t going to think about that subject anymore. You shivered slightly and pulled down the sleeves of the sleep shirt that you hadn’t thought to change out of. It was a little chilly.

“Hey Pap, can you find some stray branches in the area? Anything that looks dry enough to burn. It’s already getting a bit cold.” You ask with a grin down at them before moving to the bag. Papyrus gives you a a full salute before running off in a seemingly random direction to do as tasked.

What a precious goofball.

“is that my telescope?”

You shivered as San’s voice sounded in a whisper right by your ear. It almost felt like a breath was on your shoulder. You felt goosebumps crawling up your back. You jumped around to find Sans standing about a foot away from you, which doesn’t quite explain how you heard him as if he was right behind you. Sans’ jaw was tight. His eyes were out as he stared at you.

You were in trouble.

“yes… I thought it would go well with the surprise…”

“yea, and what. is. the. surprise?”

Sans’ looked like he might have been grinding his teeth. Apparently going into his room without permission was the wrong move.

Angry Sans was much scarier than you had anticipated. Your throat caught. Helplessly tongue tied under that dark stare you simply looked up. Sans followed your gaze and slowly, the lights returned in his eyes.

“I um… thought you and Pap might want to see the sunrise outside of the city… I wasn’t sure if you had yet.”

The lights slowly came back in his eyes and you tried very hard to not let your shoulders visibly slump. Above was a star filled sky. The little dots littered the sky in a way you would never be able to see in the city. The plains that you had stopped in were completely devoid of people for miles. Your car had broken down in the area once in the middle of the night by chance. You couldn’t get cell reception or anything and you ended up sleeping in the backseat of your car. However, you did get to see the beautiful night sky shine up above you. It was a little sad to think that if your car hadn’t broken down, no matter how angry and frustrated you had been at the time, you might have never thought to stop and look up that that big beautiful sky from the rural, open plains.

After that moment of reminiscing was over, you glanced over at Sans. He seemed to have cooled down… maybe. It was a little hard to tell with him. He wasn’t giving you a stomach-turning, black hole eyes kind of stare anymore and that was probably a good sign. You took the chance to stare down at your fluff creation.

What a nice, inviting nest of comfort.

And then you flopped on it.

You slowly sank into the wonderful sheets and stared up at the beautiful sky. What a strange night. Hopefully neither of the skelebros ever expect you to ever function as a human being again at one thirty in the morning when you were previously asleep.

You were just starting to close your eyes again when you felt a shift next to you. Sans was laying on your left side, his shoulder just barely touching yours.

“you know i have to get you back for breaking into my room right?”

“Yeah, whatever,” you say barely awake. You hit his slippered foot with your own socked one playfully and he poked your ear in retaliation.

You did it again.

So did he.

This continued back and forth for another few minutes.

You were TOTALLY adults.

“Don’t make me tickle your ribs.” You threatened, knowing one of his weaknesses.

His first reaction was to flinch. His second was to snort, before he started to full out laugh in a deep chortle.

“i wish you could have heard what you just said.”

You think about it for a second before your cheeks turn a bit pink. You get revenge by smacking his shoulder, “Not like that you perv!”

“you said it.”

You stuck out your tongue at him. After a few seconds a translucent cyan tongue-like-thing was stuck out right back at you. You decided not to focus on the how to much. Just… magic. You also decided not to think too much on the fact that Papyrus might also be able to- NOPE docking that thought train right now.

You poked Sans’ forehead with a big grin before diving under the covers like a blanket mermaid. He’d never find you -you know, the blob right next to him. Suddenly there are fingers tickling your sides seemingly from everywhere. You screamed before breaking out in giggles. You could hardly breathe from laughing. The grip was strong and no matter how much you wiggled, you couldn’t seem to get free.

“I HEARD A SCREAM!”

You heard the voice of a breathy Papyrus. The tickling assault had stopped for the moment.

“sorry Pap, you know how the kid can get carried away sometimes.”

Despite being under the sheets you narrow your eyes at the fact that Sans called you a kid again. Seriously? Being shorter than you he had no room to talk!

You peak out from under the covers and give your best innocent look, “Pap! Save me, your evil brother is attacking me!”

There was silence for a moment. Sans broke it when you felt his cyan magic grip around your arms, legs, and middle. You 'eeped' a little.

“oh yea? i’ll give you attacking.”

Someone -Sansthejerk- had used their magic to lifted you up into the air and was spinning you around while randomly stopping you and managing to go after all your ticklish spots. You screamed again when you felt fingers poking at your tummy. Dammit Sans!

“No fair! N-No ma-m--magic you j-jerk!”

If you had eaten anything recently, you might have been sick.

“HUMAN! I WILL DEFEND YOUR HONOR!”

It sounded like something crashed. Then you felt yourself fall back onto the mattress. There was at least some definite ‘clanking’ sounds going on. You peak out to see Sans and Papyrus rolling around and… wrestling? It was simultaneously impressive given that they had no muscles, hilarious and cute. You had to bite down an incest joke for fear of actually insulting one of them or ruining the moment. It didn’t last long. Papyrus had the clear advantage of long limbs and after pinning Sans, the shorter skeleton somehow produced a literal white flag and waved it. Papyrus cheered in victory, you cheered along too and grinned at him.

“Thanks for saving me there. Someone, wasn’t being very fair,” You say giving Sans a sideways look that basically implied that you were sticking your tongue out at him… in your mind.

It didn’t stop him from doing it back in real life with his magic tongue.

Papyrus throws his arms around you and gives you a big hug.

“OF COURSE! I WILL ALWAYS BE THERE TO PROTECT THE INNOCENT!”

Papyrus was hugging you.

“you do know the kid wasn’t actually in trouble right?”

Papyrus was hugging you.

“YOU WERE ABUSING YOUR MAGIC TO ABUSE OUR FRIEND! THAT IS A TERRIBLE THING TO DO!-”

Papyrus lecture to Sans went on for a while. You didn’t really pay much attention to it. When had spoken up Papyrus had just held tighter, almost protectively as he gave Sans a stern look over your head. You’ve actually never seen Papyrus this harsh with his brother before. Sure he often lectured him, but he was hardly ever actually upset. He knew his brother’s behavior better than anyone.

You know what though?

You didn’t really give a damn why Papyrus was being a bit harsher than normal to Sans.

You know why?

Because Papyrus was FRICKIN HUGGING YOU!

He still hadn’t let go. You felt a warm, happy feeling inside of you from your toes to your nose. Nope, nothing could ruin this moment, not even Sans’ pranks.

There was some ‘clinking’ noises. Papyrus must have noticed them too because he let go. Darnit. Sans had gotten on top of the truck’s roof. He pulled a handkerchief out and wiped off the lens of the telescope before looking up at the stars. You just laid back on the various cushions and blankets before staring up at that big, vast sky. Only moments after did Papyrus join you.

“Wow…”

He had barely whispered it as he stared up at the sky, but you heard it. You glanced over and saw the pinpricks of his eyes brighter than you had ever seen them before. He looked so happy and peaceful. You felt a shift behind you as the airbed felt like it lifted slightly. Sans had laid down on your other side, but he laid horizontally so the back of his skull rested on your stomach. He kicked his feet up so his calcaneus were resting on the metal siding of the car. Papyrus shifted, trying to look up at the stars at a particular angle it seemed. His head fell back just barely touching your shoulder. You decided not to go crazy over it this time. There was something so wonderful about this moment. Someone had wrapped their hand around yours and squeezed it comfortingly. You were getting a little too dazed to actually process who though. It was so peaceful and comfortable that you found yourself actually starting to finally fall back asleep again.

It was just so nice that you were-

Were….
...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

It may have only felt like moments, but when you opened your eyes again, orange beams were just starting to waft into the skyline. It must be dawn.

A quick glance around revealed Sans missing, but you weren’t too concerned. He always seemed to come and go as he pleased. On the other side though was Papyrus, who was still asleep. He had both of his arms wrapped around yours, hugging it like a favorite stuffed toy. You grinned at the cuteness of it, plus it was kind of nice that he was holding your arm… even if it was unconsciously.

You shifted to sit up so you could watch properly, trying however to let the sleeping skeleton lie. He looked so happy in dreamland that you didn’t want to bother him. Your efforts seemed to have gone in vain though because he shifted just a minute or so after you maneuvered from his grip. He silently rubbed sleep from his eyes, seemingly too out of it still to even realize that he wasn’t in his room. After stretching, he looked around and seemed to remember what existence was. Surprisingly enough, he still didn’t say a word and instead moved so he sat next to you. The two of you watched the sun rise in comfortable silence.

It really was a beautiful sunrise.

After a while, you felt bony fingers resting on top of your own. You quickly looked over at the source to find that Papyrus had partially covered your fingers with his phalanges and held them slightly, not quite taking your whole hand. He turned to you with a look that you didn’t recognize, the tiny pinpricks in his eye sockets kept sparking in and out of existence. You felt your heart trying to break through your rib cage, but did your best to not declare your eternal affection for the kind, sweet and lovable skeleton that was looking at you with that look on his face in that very moment!

“Thank you… for sharing this moment with me. I haven’t seen such a beautiful sunrise since the day we monsters came to the surface.”

He let out a chuckle, a real one instead of his normal “nya heh’s”

“It’s funny, because that was also the day I met you.”

It was final.

You were madly in love with a skeleton.

There was no going back.

Chapter Text

There was something bizarre about mixing dough. First you put all of the dry ingredients in a bowl and you make a well in the dry ingredients to pour the wet ingredients into. Then you shove your hands in it and squish them all together. It was gooey, messy and at the beginning while you’re still trying to mix it all together, the dough simultaneously makes your hands feel too dry from the unmixed flour and too wet from the overly saturated dough. There is something so satisfying however about actually creating a dough ball and it having that elastic consistency. After kneading it for another minute or so -being careful not to over knead it- you rub it down with some oil and place it in an oiled bowl before covering it with some plastic wrap and setting it up on the counter by the oven for a while. After an hour you’d move it to the fridge to let it expand a bit more overnight. You moved back to the smaller of your work bowls measured out the water and sugar before warming it up slightly in the microwave. You then added the yeast to the concoction. Measuring out the dry ingredients next took almost no time. With about 10 minutes left before you could add the wet ingredients and start making the next batch of dough, you decided to check on the boys.

From your spot in the dining room you could see Sans at the large grill outside cooking some of his water sausages. There was a large stack on a platter of ones that were already finished. Muffet would be pleased. Sans was actually one of the main providers of water sausages from the underground. It was monster’s main “meat” substitute. They apparently used them for hot dogs, hamburgers and the like. It sure did taste like meat. You know, without the whole actually killing animals things. You were pretty pleased for the nearly immaculate substitute. Sometimes being vegan was hard, but still, it was a healthier and non-cruel lifestyle. He apparently was the supplier for Grillby’s long before monsters left the underground. However, since opening up her shop four months ago just after monsters arrived on the surface, Muffet too struck up a deal with Sans. She apparently wanted to make her shop a bit more cafe like to appeal to humans and that meant supplying some additional things besides her normal baked goods. Hot dogs, hamburgers, pretzels, sandwiches and other lunch items had been added to the menu as well, even spaghetti had been recently put on -after you had helped Papyrus tweak the recipe a bit… okay a lot. Sans was usually able to take care of the supply by himself, but he had gotten behind because Muffet’s shop was simply becoming more popular than anyone had anticipated. Who knew that monster food had no calories? So Papyrus had volunteered himself to help his brother out and somehow you had found yourself recruited as well. Skeleton puppy eyes were more potent than one would expect...

After watching Sans through the sliding door a few seconds while you let your mind wander, you decided to go outside and check on him. He’s been out there a while. It was almost a miracle that he’s managed to stay on task this long and instead of going off somewhere to sleep. You decided to get a closer look to make sure that was truly the case and he wasn’t somehow fooling you. Trickery seemed to be one of his greatest skills after all.

“How’s it going?” You asked standing looking over Sans’ shoulder at the sizzling sausages.
He jumped. You had to bite down a laugh. Well that didn’t happen very often. The role reversal was pleasing.

You got a look that was somewhere between exasperated and impressed as he narrowed his eyes at you.

“if i’m being frank about it, i’d say they’re doing okay.”

You giggled at the joke and he gave you a grin, relaxing slightly, “Okay, just don’t forget to ketchup or Muffet will get mad at you for being late.”

Sans made some sort of odd snorting noise that didn’t really make sense considering he doesn’t have a nose.

“she relishes people’s pain. it doesn’t matter if i’m late or not she’ll still try to sic her muffin on me.”

“Well maybe if you hadn’t called it her ‘stud muffin’ she wouldn’t have to,” You said with a hand on your hip. Sometimes his jokes got him into trouble.

“but she made it so easy. people who can’t take a joke are the wurst.”

“Okay that’s enough of that,” Shaking your head you just pat his shoulder. That was about all of the hot dog jokes you could take for the day. Maybe time to go check on Papyrus.

“don’t be a wiener. you’re usually better at taking a joke.”

Nope. You weren’t taking the bait. Just open the door and go back into the house. You take the first step through, but just before you can close the door Sans throws out another one.

“man some people just can’t take a condiment.”

Rolling your eyes you head to the kitchen where Papyrus is slaving away at the stove. Despite the fact that you specifically told him that you really didn’t need to stir the tomato sauce constantly, it was one of the few things he refused to give up after you helped him “refine” his skills.

“How’s the sauce coming?” You ask Papyrus from behind him. Unlike Sans, he didn’t even flinch. Something told you he had gotten used to his brother popping up at random though that he was basically immune. Papyrus turns to you with a smile. It was really cute. Your heart sped up a bit, but you mentally willed it to slow back down. This silly crush needs to be stopped.

“IT IS COMING WELL FRIEND! ARE YOU CERTAIN I SHOULD NOT COOK ANY ACTUAL NOODLES TO ACCOMPANY THE SAUCE HOWEVER?”

“We made and dried dozens of batches of noodles just the other day Pap, they’ll be good for a while. They’ll have to cook them on site though so it’s fresh and hot. The sauce will be separated and frozen so it can be retrieved and cooked quickly.”

“IT WOULD TASTE SO MUCH BETTER FRESH THOUGH! I SHOULD JUST MAKE IT WHEN IT’S ORDERED!”

“But good tomato sauce takes hours if you really want the flavors to meld together. No one’s gonna wanna wait that long,” You point out with a shrug. He was really passionate about everything he did, but sometimes it’s best to just let things go.

“I STILL THINK MUFFET SHOULD HAVE A GOOD ONSITE SPAGHETTITOR!”

You just lightly pat his basketball shoulder pad, “Sorry Pap, Muffet said no.”

The tall skeleton’s formerly rigid pose droops, as he hangs his head and gives a pitiful sigh.

“I know…”

Oh gosh, you had to cheer the poor dear up, “At least you still get to make the sauce!”

He immediately moves back to stirring the contents of the pot while giving off his voluptuous laugh.

“THAT’S RIGHT! IT WILL BE THE BEST SPAGHETTI SAUCE THAT ANYONE HAS EVER TASTED! NYEH HEH HEH HEH!”

You couldn’t help the chuckle that came out at his sudden change in demeanor. Seriously, what even was this guy? At least he didn’t seem to mind you laughing along. With a smile on your face, you simply pat his humerus and head back to the dining room. The yeast should be almost done setting now.

You made quick work of this batch of dough. It needed to properly rise before you could form it into pretzels or as pretzel casing for the water sausages. The giant pot of spaghetti sauce Papyrus was working on would be done in a few hours. Sans would probably be done at the grill by then. All of the water sausages had to be precooked for them to taste right even in dishes where they were ground up. Once the sauce was done, it would be transferred into a few large containers that you could carry to the bakery. Then you and Sans could highjack it to make a large batch of water sausage chilli, something that wasn’t technically on the menu yet, but would be once the two of you perfected the recipe. Well, if you could convince Muffet to sell it. Either way, Sans would be using it at his stands. It was his idea after you had told him that chili dogs were a popular vendor food. Chili was a recipe that somehow hadn’t made its way to the underground, which was surprising on its own. With their alternative, magic plant-based ingredients, it would be easy to make a monsterfood version. Honestly though, you just really hoped it would turn out well. You were really excited about the prospect of a vegan chili dog. You’ve tried making meatless chili before, but it always seemed like something was missing. It was honestly hard to tell if it was flavor, texture or both. It just felt… lacking. You hoped that Sans’ water sausages would compensate for the missing… thing.

In the meantime though, you still had more dough to mix for pretzels. You turned back to your ingredients, already about to fill a bowl of water again to “awaken” the yeast, but you stopped yourself. The bad of flour on the table was almost empty. Was that the last one? Scanning around the dining room, you saw five empty bags of flour pushed to the side, waiting to be thrown away. Ah, that’s right, Sans had been working on his own dough recipe for the hotdog buns that morning. You’d need more flour. Well, if you were truly going to keep everything calorie free you would have to use monster flour, a trip to Muffet’s it was.

Dusting off your clothes a bit, you realize the futility of trying to get the flour prints out of your clothes and shrug it off. Would they really care at a bakery? Sure you were going to walk there, but would the people you pass really care either? There was no point in changing. You were just going to come back and get more flour on yourself anyway. Hell, you’d probably get flour on you as you try and carry the bags home too. You decided going out with flour covering your clothes, face and hair was probably fine. You’d have to tell the boys though, being that Sans is again closer, you go to tell him first.

Instead of actually going outside, you simply slide the door open, “Hey Sans, I gotta get more flour so I’ll be back soon. Don’t slack off while I’m gone.”

Sans turns to you with a fake hurt expression, the sparkling gleam of his eye sockets tells you that he’s either not really offended or he’s acknowledged the truth of your words.

“I did not spend all day helping you catch up on your orders for you to fall behind again because you decided to take a nap on the couch.”

“mustard you be so cruel?”

At this point you just groan. Seriously? How does this guy never run out of puns? You shake your head with only the slightest of smiles on your face as you’re about to turn back to the house and grab your wallet.

“need me to come with?”

“Nah, I think I’ve got this covered. Walk five blocks down, buy a few bags of flour, bring it back.”

“good. i didn’t really want to carry anything anyway.”

You just stuck out your tongue. Sans simply chuckled at your “adult” behavior. Heading back inside, you grab your wallet from its place on the countertop. It was in the corner away from the mayhem of the rest of the kitchen. You didn’t want it to get gunked up like everything else.

“Hey Pap, I’m going to Muffet’s, I’ll see you in a bit!” You call, heading for the front door.

The continuous ‘clanging’ noise of his wooden spoon repeatedly hitting the sides of the pot as Papyrus faithfully stirred the mixture suddenly stopped. From your spot in the doorway you turn your head back and see Papyrus turning the heat of the stove from its low heat, all the way down to a low simmer. Though you couldn’t see it from your position at the front of the house you heard sound of the back door sliding open as well.

“SANS! PLEASE KEEP AN EYE SOCKET ON THE TOMATO SAUCE WHILE I GO ASSIST THE HUMAN WITH THEIR ERRAND!”

Then suddenly, skeletons.

Well, more like there was a tall skeleton in a red scarf standing behind you with an expectant expression as you looked up at him mildly confused.

“Erm, it’s alright. I can make it to the bakery and back okay. It’s like a fifteen minute walk away, tops.”

“NONSENSE! I WILL ACCOMPANY YOU DEAR FRIEND AND PROTECT YOU FROM ALL POSSIBLE HARMS!”

Lately it was a bit strange, Sans and Papyrus have both seemed to go out of their way to walk you places. Okay, so maybe what happened last month wasn’t ideal, but you were fine. This was getting a bit ridiculous. It was the middle of the day in a good neighborhood and the walk would only take about fifteen minutes. You’d be fine. If they could let a tiny preteen traverse the underground by themselves with monsters trying to kill them, they could let you run to the god damn bakery by yourself.

“Pap really I’ll be-” You start, but the silly tall skeleton wore a large happy smile as he stared down at you waiting for you to finally take the first step out the door. Why was it so impossible to say no to this guy? You bite back a sigh and resign yourself to the company. You didn’t really mind that much anyway, Papyrus was a little ball of sunshine. He always seemed to know how to make you smile. You simply took his his mittened hand in your own as the two of you took the first step forward.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

You hear the click of bones against glass, followed by a light, pleasant jingling of bells over your head as Papyrus uses his forearm to push open the cold glass door. The wonderful, sweet smell of freshly baked goods wafts into your nose. This may be what heaven smells like.

“Hello! Welcome to Muffet’s Muffins and More! A store made by spiders, inspired by spiders and of spiders!”

You try not to think too hard about the usual catchphrase as you made your way in. Her voice drops slightly as Muffet seems to catch sight of the two of you.

“Oh, it’s just you two. Is there something I can do for you?” She asks putting five of her six arms on her sides as she rests her chin in her final palm.

“YES WE HAVE COME WITH THE INTENT TO PURCHASE SOME FLOUR PLEASE!”

“Well of course! That will be fifty a bag,” Muffet said with a grin staring deeply in your eyes. You felt yourself shivering under her gaze. Though when the price she gave actually registered, you felt your jaw drop. Fifty?! Before you could say anything Papyrus had already spoken.

“NOW MISS MUFFET! WHILE I DO NOT MAKE IT A POLICY OF THINKING BADLY OF PEOPLE, MONSTER OR HUMAN, I CANNOT HELP, BUT FEEL YOU ARE TRYING TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF MY GOOD FRIEND.”

Muffet just waved him off, “Relax darling. It was just a joke. With all of the spiders free, we do well enough here that there’s no need to charge prices so high. Us spiders are the only suppliers of calorie free monster flour after all. It’s actually surprising how much some people will pay for our product.”

There was a strange glint in her eyes and you knew she must have been doing something devious.

“Well anyway, you’re here for Sans’ order right? It’ll be ten for five bags. As one of our suppliers he gets a special price,” With a snap a few spiders dropped from the ceiling and immediately headed to the back of the store, “Would you mind waiting a few moments while the spiders go to retrieve your order?”

“Thank you,” You mutter, barely able to get your voice out. Despite the warm weather, there was something chilling about that spider lady.

“YES THANK YOU MISS MUFFET! WE WILL HAPPILY WAIT PATIENTLY.”

Muffet just winks at Papyrus before moving back to the counter’s glass case to rearrange the sweets currently on display. You weren’t really sure how to feel about any of what just happened honestly. You silently shuffle over to a booth, with Papyrus following behind, seemingly oblivious to your discomfort.

“MISS MUFFET IS SO KIND, IS SHE NOT?”

The jingle of bells sounded once again and you were glad you didn’t have to answer that question as two human kids wandered in, each with a sparkler in their hands. Papyrus’ attention seemed to be focused on the pair.

“Are you excited for independence day this year?!” One of the kids asked the other.

“I can’t wait to set off all of those fireworks!” Said the other.

“My aunts and uncles are all coming over from their homes and there’s going to be a big party again this year!”

“It’s just gonna be me and my pap, but he promised we’ll get to set off lotsa fireworks after watching the big show in the park!”

“Awesome!” One of the kids say before turning their attention to Muffet, “Can uh, can I have a cupcake please?”

Turning your attention away from the two cute kids, you glance at Papyrus who was much more obvious about his eavesdropping. His jaw was open slightly, there was a slight orange tinge on his cheeks and his fingers made a rattling noise as they tapped against the table. Looking closer, it actually looked like the lights of his eyes might have taken the shapes of stars. Oh no. Suddenly, he turns to you.

“FRIEND! PLEASE TELL ME ALL OF THE CUSTOMS OF THIS ‘INDEPENDENCE DAY!’”

No no no. This was not happening.

“THERE ARE FIREWORKS? AND PARTIES? AND PUBLIC CELEBRATIONS?!”

The star lights in his eyes only grew as he became more excited. You didn’t want to damper his spirits but…. With a sigh, you put a hand over his gloved one, “I’m sorry Papyrus, I’m not going to be celebrating Independence Day this year.”

He looked extremely confused and maybe even a little heartbroken at your confession. How could you explain it to him though?

“FRIEND, I… I DON’T UNDERSTAND? IS IT NOT A HAPPY CUSTOM AMONG HUMANS?”

“I…” You started. However, Muffet decided that was the proper time to wander over.

“Well sweethearts, your order is ready to be picked up and paid for,” Muffet said with a grin that showed off one of her spider fangs. Nope, she didn’t make you nervous at all… not at all.

“Um… thank you,” You said quietly, not able to meet the woman’s eyes.

You weren’t trembling.

“FRIEND, PLEASE GO PAY FOR THE ORDER WHILE I GO AND COLLECT THE BAGS. DO NOT WORRY, SANS WILL PAY YOU BACK WHEN WE ARRIVE HOME.”

You simply nod and head for the cash register, which was on the opposite side of the counter of the purchase. You actually wished that you were the one handling the flour, because paying for the purchase actually put you closer to Muffet… alone.

Muffet stares at you expectantly, you shuffle a bit nervously under her gaze, reaching into your pocket for your wallet. Muffet perks up as you actually pull out the requested amount of cash. Once the cash made contact with her hand, she smiled and decided to strike up a conversation.

“Dearie you two make a sweet couple. It’s refreshing to see a monster and a human hitting it off so quickly.”

Your cheeks reddened. A couple? You weren’t even sure how you felt about the younger skeleton brother yet. Sure, you had a little bit of a crush, but you were certain it would fade after a few weeks or so. The tall skeleton had a lot of good qualities. He was kind and well meaning. He had more self confidence in a single phalange than you had in your entire body. He also reminded you how cool he thought you were almost as much as he boasted about himself. Overall, he was a very sweet guy. You just… monster or not, could you really date someone that was so… childish?

“Um… we… we’re not…” You started, but as getting cut off seemed to be a theme today, Papyrus wandered over with all five bags.

“I HAVE ACQUIRED THE FLOUR FRIEND! AS SOON AS YOU ARE READY WE CAN TRAVERSE BACK TO MY HOUSE!”

“I’ll see you later love,” Muffet said with a wink, giving you your change.

You took it silently with a gulp, hoping that wasn’t a promise and quickly moved to stand by Papyrus. You tried to take a few of the bags from his hands, but his grip only tightened around them.

“DO NOT WORRY, I CAN HANDLE THESE! I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS AFTER ALL!”

“You came to help me Pap, not the other way around. I should at least carry a few,” You argue.

Papyrus frowns at your argument, but does relinquish a single bag to you before holding the other four tighter. That was probably the best compromise you were going to get honestly. You head for the door, with Papyrus right behind you. The bells jangled again, but it was only because you were leaving. With a last glance over your shoulder you see the two human children with their sparklers and wonder why no one seemed bothered by the fact that these two miniature beings were literally holding fire sticks.
...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“FRIEND! LET’S GO SEE THE FIREWORKS TOGETHER!"

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“SO FRIEND, WHY DO YOU NOT WANT TO CELEBRATE ‘INDEPENDENCE DAY?’”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“I’D REALLY LIKE TO GO SEE THE FIREWORKS IN THE PARK TOMORROW EVENING! IF ONLY I HAD A GOOD FRIEND THAT COULD GO WITH ME!”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“OH LOOK FRIEND! A NICE STREET VENDOR GAVE ME THESE ‘SPARKLERS.’ HE SAID TO SHARE THEM WITH MY FRIENDS! I BOUGHT ONE FOR YOU!”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“HUMAN! ARE YOU ANTI INDEPENDENCE? IS THAT IT?! ONE OF THE HUMANS TOLD ME YOU WERE PROBABLY A DEBBIE DOWNER! ARE YOU? GRANTED, I’M NOT ENTIRELY SURE WHAT THAT IS, BUT WITH THE WAY THE HUMANS DESCRIBED IT, IT SOUNDS AWFUL!”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“ARE WE NOT FRIENDS?! IS THAT WHY YOU DO NOT WANT TO GO SEE THE FIREWORKS WITH ME?!”

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Papyrus was relentless. After him badgering you at random times throughout the day over his will to celebrate Independence day, while you still tried to get several things prepared for Muffet, Grillby and Sans’ respective locations of sale, you were exhausted. You weren’t even getting paid! Friendly favor huh? Ha, more like slave labor. At the moment though, you were laying on their overly plush couch. You weren’t sleepy tired, but maybe if you took a nap, Papyrus wouldn’t complain about your life choices for a few minutes. Closing your eyes, you breathe out slowly, trying to relax your body enough that you might just be able to sleep.

“hey.”

Well there goes that idea. To make a point, you don’t even bother opening your eyes, “What’s up?”

“so...why’s Papyrus sitting on the kitchen counter with his arms wrapped around his knees complaining that his best friend doesn’t love him anymore?”

Ouch. Well that one hurt.

“I refuse to celebrate Independence Day with him,” You say with a sigh.

“i guess that would defeat the purpose.”

“Did you really just?” You ask with a groan. Seriously?

“so what’s the big deal anyway?”

You pull your legs up from the bottom of the couch and you feel Sans sit down beside you.

“Independence Day is believed to be the day that monsters went to the underground,” You explain. Finally opening your eyes, you could see that the lights in Sans’ eye sockets were out. Well, he got it at least. “For us humans, it’s a day of pride. We celebrate it as a day where we stood up against oppression. It was so long ago though, no one really knows what happened. Now most people just use it as an excuse to party. Until a few months ago, hardly anyone believed that monsters ever really existed in the first place.”

You look over to Sans, but his expression is decisively neutral. It really was hard to read what he was thinking sometimes.

“I just… I couldn’t break his faith in humanity. That’s why I didn’t explain it. With humans and monsters trying to make peace though, I honestly don’t know how this holiday’s gonna go. I didn’t want Papyrus to know that humans celebrated the banishment of monsters… Hell, people may still insist on celebrating it.”

“i know, i’m callin’ the kettle black here, but… don’t you think you’re underestimating him a little bit?”

You raise an eyebrow in his general direction with a frown. Really Sans? Really?

“yeah okay, so maybe I am a bit protective…”

“More like defective if you think ‘a bit’ is appropriate in that sentence,” you mumble under your breath.

“it sounds like you need to be corrected.”

“Your teachings would be ineffective,” You say without missing a beat, meeting his own challenging stare with your own leveled expression.

“maybe it's time you learn some respective.”

“I think I’m a little objective.”

“then you should take a new perspective.”

“I don’t want to come across as invective.”

"you know better than that, pap’s love is too effective.”

“I have always found it to be reflective.”

“i’ve always thought it was cool that his kindness is so projective.”

“I think you may be right… in retrospective.”

“he can make anyone like him… i’m a bit more selective.”

“Whelp, this has been very directive.”

“i’m glad our little talk has been effective.”

With a big groan you get up and walk toward the barrier between the kitchen and the living room. You had a skeleton to inform that you were joining at the firework show tomorrow after all. However, before you left.

“Thanks, detective.”

You bolted out of the room before Sans could respond, mentally cheering that you got the last word.
...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“FRIEND! WE MUST FIND THE IDEAL PLACE TO HOUSE OUR PICNIC BLANKET FOR PERFECT VIEW OF THE FIREWORKS!”

You have to bite back any remarks on the subject before simply nodding. You could enjoy this, for him. It was just the two of you for now. Sans set up a possiblymaybekindasortaillegal hotdog stand somewhere in the park and was selling to the patrons who had come to see the fireworks. He promised he’d find the two of you before the fireworks actually started though.

Papyrus grabbed your hand and dragged you through the crowd towards the center of the park. You dragged a bit, but followed without complaint. The closer you got to the center though, the more people would be around. What if there were some people who really were celebrating the banishment of monsters though?

What if someone was mean to Papyrus because he’s a monster? Events like these could bring out the crazies….

Oh god, there’d be lots of alcohol going around too! What if someone hurt Papyrus in a drunken stupor?!

As if to prove your point, a lady with her daughter pushed past the two of you with a sneer as you were forcibly shoved to the side. Papyrus was a little more sturdy and they only managed to tilt his shoulder slightly.

It didn’t stop her from barking out, “I’m sorry, but could you freaks not stand in the way, I’m trying to take my daughter to see the fireworks.”

Oh no that bitch didn’t!

You were about ready to give her a piece of your mind. No one talks to the sweet cinnamon roll like that! You weren’t usually good at confrontation, but for Papyrus? You’d do it! You steeled your nerves and with your hands on your hips you were ready to-

“OH MISS!”

Oh, yes Papyrus, rush straight toward the lady who was rude to you. Great plan! You sigh and jog after the tall skeletal figure.

“MISS YOU DROPPED THIS!”

The woman paused in her tracks, an almost demonic look on her face. Her face was in a scowl and a deep red color. Her mouth opened, but simply hung in that position when Papyrus completely bypassed her and knelt down in front of the small girl that had been trailing behind her.

“FAIR MAIDEN, I HAVE RETRIEVED THY’S ITEM OF WHICH HAD BEEN LOST!”

You didn’t notice it before, but he had a small stuffed bear in his phalanges that he was offering to the small girl in a princess tiara. Her gaze moved between the skeleton that knelt before her and her mother who seemed to be performing a great impression of a goldfish.

After a final look at her mother, who hadn’t said otherwise, she slowly reaches for her bear and after a pause, she finally opens her mouth to speak. “Thank you mister sir skeletor.”

Papyrus’ eye lights sparked outward at that single sweet comment.

“YOU HAVE MADE ME A KNIGHT? YOU MUST BE A PRINCESS!”

Without any sort of permission, he picked up the young girl in a hug, swung her around once, before carefully setting her back down on her spot in the grass. She giggled throughout the entire endeavor and she was still grinning around a couple of missing teeth.

“YOU ARE VERY WELCOME YOUNG PRINCESS! I, THE GREAT KNIGHT PAPYRUS, MUST ALWAYS BE THERE FOR THOSE WHO ARE IN NEED!”

At this point, the mother seemed to be literally seething. If steam could actually physically emanate from a person, it would be spewing out of her. “I-”

It looked like you weren’t the only one to get cut off a lot recently though, because just then a little boy decided to run up. He jumpped around excitedly after taking one of Papyrus’ hands.

“Wow, you’re so COOL knight Pa-...Pa...Py-ruz!” The kid said before turning back to the crowd, “Dad! Daddy! Isn’t he cool!”

A man that was maybe in his early thirties seemed to step toward you from the crowd. A proud smile on his face as he looked upon his son. “You’re right. I think he’s the coolest skeleton I’ve ever seen.”

“I know!” The small boy proclaimed.

“He’z my knight!” The little girl said and took Papyrus’ other hand.

“I wanna be a knight too!”

Papyrus just let these small children grasp and tug at him without complaint. It even looked like the lights in his eyes reformed to be star shaped. You weren’t sure if you’ve ever really seen him happier.

“I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WILL ONE DAY TEACH YOU THE WAYS OF A GREAT KNIGHT SMALL HUMAN!”

“Yay! I get to be a knight daddy!”

“I heard,” The man said, ruffling his son’s hair with a fond expression. He sent a look of thanks in Papyrus’ direction, but at some point a small army of children, human and monster alike, had surrounded the skeleton giving all sorts of praise as they spoke of their own dreams. He of course cheered them on and encouraged them to be anything they wanted to be.

“As princess, I ‘clare that today is for h’mans AND m’nsterz to be free!”

“OH THANK YOU SWEET PRINCESS! YOU HAVE MADE THIS GREAT SKELETON KNIGHT A VERY HAPPY MONSTER!”

The entire surrounding crowd that had been watching the skeleton interact with this horde of children had started cheering.

It seemed there may be hope for humanity yet.

The woman who had nearly gone off on the two of you before, just hovered at the side. She seemed to have a humbled expression as the many adults seemed to celebrate the skeleton’s presence, rather than shaming him as she had…As you had earlier feared….

You were simply wrong. Papyrus didn’t need protecting. He could face the world and take care of himself… the Papyrus way.

“well don’t you two look like you’ve had a lot of fun kidding around?”

Sans eyed the still growing group of kids with a chuckle. It seemed like they were beginning to swarm.

“we might just have an in-tot-station on our hands.”

“He’s…. really good with them,” You say, trying to ignore the ‘ba-dump’… ‘ba-dump’… ‘ba-dump’ that seemed to be thrumming against your rib cage. This was supposed to be just a crush.

“yeah… he’s a really cool guy… isn’t he?”

You nod. “Yeah, he really is.”

There was a loud popping noise and you’re gaze is immediately directed towards the sky. Specks of orange light spread out from a single center source. The fireworks had begun.

It looked like Papyrus didn’t need you to come with him afterall. He was still sitting with the mob of kids surrounding him. The little girl in the princess crown was seated on his clavicles, her little hands resting on his frontal bone, with her arms wrapping around his skull. Her chin rested on top of her teddy bear that Papyrus had returned to her, but that was set carefully on top of the crown of Papyrus' skull. It really was a sweet sight.

“so, what’s up with you kid?”

Sans lazily nudged your side with his slippered foot.

“I shouldn’t have doubted him,” You admit, hugging your arms around your torso, “I thought he was being childish, but now… now I think I’m the childish one.”

Despite being the first human, he met, Papyrus seemed to be adjusting to the human world fine. He didn’t need you. You started to feel your cheeks warming as you realized you were the one who needed his attention, not the other way around. He’s over there having a great time in even the most peculiar situation and here you were sitting off to the side being awkward.

You decided…

You decided you wanted to be a bit more like Papyrus.

Sans turned to you with a wink after your confession.

“sometimes it’s the simple things that lead to the most introspective.”

Sans, really?

“Did you really just bring this conversation back?

“well yesterday you were so receptive.”

“Sans no.”

“in fact, i’m feeling downright festive.”

You just groan. Maybe if you ignore him, he’ll stop.

“you have to admit, hasn’t this been a great collective?”

Chapter Text

“HUMAN, GUESS WHAT? WE ARE GOING TO THE BEACH!”

What?

You had just literally been let in the door after spending five minutes on the porch deciding if you even wanted to knock or if the entire idea was stupid. The skeleton brothers had each insisted that you visit at anytime after your time together at the parade, but so far this was only your third visit since then. The whole situation was still a little nerve wracking. Not only were these two guys that you had only met recently that you were hanging out with all alone, they were also monsters…. Were you crazy to be doing this? Mentally shaking your head you glanced back to the situation at hand. Something about a beach.

Papyrus had on a pair of red swim trunks with orange flames going up the sides, a silver muscle shirt that originally must have said “Hot Stuff” but the “Hot” was crossed out and “Cool” was crudely written on top in permanent marker. There were also little floaties on his humeruses. He looked awfully cute. Sans was wearing the most awful hot dog patterned swim trunks, a white t shirt that said “This is my beach body” and finished it off with a giant green swim ring he was holding up around his waist with a duck head on the front. Where did one even find things like that?

“Um, alright. I’ll just head home then,” You say with a shrug. You didn’t want to keep them from their trip. Somehow in the three months that monsters have been on the surface, you’ve found yourself often visiting the skeleton brothers. It was strange how comfortable you were quickly finding yourself getting around these two, monsters or not. Three months and they already have a small drawer in the guest room to keep a few of your things in for the days that you visit and accidentally stay too late to justify going home. It’s happened a few times already.

Your hand was on the cold metal of the doorknob before Papyrus’ phalanges were suddenly on your shoulders steering you away from the front door.

“HUMAN YOU MUST JOIN US FOR OUR BEACH DAY ADVENTURE!”

“yeah kid, it’ll really be a splash.”

You throw Sans a slightly amused smile before turning your attention back to the taller skeleton.

“I don’t want to intrude on your trip. It would be rude of me.” You give another shrug. They probably didn’t want you to feel left out, but latching on to their brotherly trip would have been downright mean.

“IT WOULD NOT BE INTRUDING HUMAN!”

Papyrus ran over and wrapped his bony arms around you. He seemed to practically latch onto you like a Koala, if it weren’t for the fact that his legs were far too long for him to actually hang in any sense of the word. Instead he basically crouched as he unintentionally suffocated you with the bright orange plastic of his floaties. You tried to push the plastic death traps away without actually pushing the tall skeleton away, but it seemed Sans was already ushering his younger brother off of you.

“kid, when we planned the trip, we just assumed that you would be coming too.”

“I-”

“WELL OF COURSE THEY’RE COMING! THEY’RE OUR FRIEND SANS! WE CAN’T LEAVE OUR FRIEND BEHIND!”

“But I don’t-”

“you’re right Pap, what kind of friends would we be if we didn’t bring them along?”

“THE WORST KINDS!”

“Wait I-”

Somehow, before you could blink it seemed that you and Sans were both in the backseat of a corvette, strapped in. You could see Papyrus bounding over as well.

“IT IS TIME FOR OUR AMAZING FRIENDSHIP BEACH TRIP! I MUST PROVE TO UNDYNE THAT I HAVE SURPASSED HER BY BECOMING THE BEST OF FRIENDS WITH A HUMAN!”

At that, Papyrus literally ignored the corvette's doors and leapt over them and into his seat. You could hear the clicks of keys sliding into the ignition.

“What is he talking about? Who is Undyne?” you asked and turning to Sans for explanation.

“i wouldn’t worry about it.”

Sans winked at you somehow despite not having eyelids. Magic skeleton eye sockets.

Papyrus must have slammed the gas pedal because you were thrown back against your seat. Sans seemed to somehow be unaffected. While death by car crashes were hardly rare, you hadn’t exactly imagined you would die from speeding through town like it was a highway in a surprisingly expensive looking corvette. You were going to be wrapped around a telephone pole or something soon, you just knew it. Your parents had warned you years ago that you should never get into a car with strange people. They had never said anything about strange skeletons though. Maybe you should have applied the situation anyway. Not that you actually remember getting into the car.

“hey, it’s okay.”

Sans voice came your left. You felt the hardness of his phalanges through the material of your shirt. It was a little odd to have someone rubbing your shoulder without warmth of blood circulation or the softness of flesh. It wasn’t a bad feeling, but it still seemed a bit bizarre.

“open your eyes.”

You did. Somewhere after the deathtrap that was town with things and people everywhere, Papyrus had directed the car to the highway. Unlike most people, he seemed to be a natural at driving on the highway. It was in town that he seemed intent on running everything over. This was nice though. The wind was gently running through your hair. It was warm enough though that the breeze of the car felt nice. The sun was high, there was a gentle jazzy song coming over the radio. This was a ride to enjoy. You knew the beach was a good ways a way, so you let yourself relax a bit, slouching your shoulders and laying your head against the headrest.

“have you accepted your deadly fate as friends with two skeletons yet?”

Sans threw you a sideways smile and a wink. It made you smile back despite the fact that you knew he was teasing you.

“Is there really no escape?”

“none whatsoever.”

“Then I suppose I must accept my imprisonment.” you joked back with a grin. However when you really looked at Sans, he wasn’t smiling.

“we’re not imprisoning you.”

You blink, a little confused at the sudden change of tone.

“we would never do that.”

What?

“Did I say something wrong?” you ask. Sans wasn’t looking at you. You were growing more concerned.

“just not a big fan of the whole imprisonment concept.”

A weight dropped in your stomach, suddenly you didn’t know how to respond. You literally made an imprisonment joke to someone who's spend their whole life trapped beneath a mountain. You mentally smack yourself. You are the worst sometimes.

“hey, don’t make that face. it’s okay.”

Sans booped your nose and it was kinda difficult not to grin at that, you resisted the smile, but your face betrayed you. Sans smiled back. It was in this peaceful moment that you wondered why Papyrus had been so quiet all this time. Glancing toward the front seats, you could see that Papyrus with shoulders up and skull forward. He seemed very focused on driving. Honestly, he probably couldn’t hear much over the sound of the air rushing by, you could only barely hear Sans who sat just next to you.

For a few moments, there was a silence between you and the other occupants of the car without it really being silent. You listened to the air rushing by as the car sped down the highway and glanced mindlessly at your surroundings. It was nice to just enjoy the occasional moment like this. You felt a tug at a strand of your hair, but when you looked behind you Sans was looking out the side of the car opposite to you. With a shrug you supposed your hair just got caught for a moment or even that you imagined it.

It was only just a bit later that you could see the telltale signs of a beach residing nearby as seagulls flew up overhead. There also seemed to be thin layers of sand covering random parts of the roads and sidewalks. Papyrus wasn’t much better in this town than your own, but this town thankfully had a larger main road with less stop signs and the like impeding him from his reckless speed. So you were fractionally less concerned about him killing people, your worry about your own likely impending death was about the same though. Thankfully -probably due to unreasonably high speeds of the car- it wasn’t long at all before your eyes caught sight of sand dunes in the distance. You could smell salt densely hanging in the air. Something about the cawing of the gulls made you smile despite your lingering fear for your life. It was so nice to see the ocean sometimes. To your surprise, as you approached the public area where you could see a decent boardwalk, Papyrus did not stop. Hell, he didn’t even slow down. The tall skeleton just kept his foot nearly to the floor and passed by the public beach without even a second glance. The car soon found itself in a swanky residential area with houses that were built just a little behind the dunes, but the car didn’t even stop there. A few minutes passed before you found yourself on a bridge you didn’t recognize, despite having visited public area to go to the beach multiple times before. From your seat in the back you could see a single large green house -or maybe a mansion? Either way it was huge- in the distance on its own small island. Did Sans and Papyrus really know whoever lived there?

When the car was parked in front of the house, Papyrus had hopped out of the car and was knocking on the door in .2 seconds it seemed and at some point Sans had… materialized there or something. Honestly, he was still next to you buckled into the seat last time you blinked! You swear!

Papyrus was still pounding on the door zealously.

“UNDYNE! WE’RE HERE!”

Sans just stood off to the side, hands in his pockets. You decided to take this chance to actually get out of the car and walk up to the front door like a normal functioning person. The door was suddenly flung open so hard that it looked like one of the hindges came out of place.

“Hey nerd, you ready for our EXTRA SPECIAL TRAINING SESSION?” A female voice that was almost as loud -but not half as cheerful- as Papyrus’, yelled from inside and before you knew it Papyrus was in a headlock on the porch with some type of fish woman on top of him. Sans looked neither surprised or concerned with the sudden development.

“U-UNDYNE...I-I BROUGHT...A...G-GIFT!”

Despite not having lungs, it seriously sounded like Papyrus might have actually been choking there. You were torn between being confused by this new discovery and worried about the skeleton whose life might actually be in danger here. Thankfully the scary fish lady decided to let go of him then. She whacked the poor skeleton’s back, despite already being on the ground, Papyrus fell completely flat to the floor beneath him after that. From the floor, he reached up with some kind of... dog treat in hand?

“Course you did Pap,” Undyne said with a snort after pulling herself off the ground and straightening up. She accepted the treat and shoved it in a seemingly random drawer on the inside by the door. “Sans.”

“undyne.”

Sans gave her a lazy nod of acknowledgement in return.

Apparently Sans’ demeanor was contagious because after that, her shoulders relaxed and she let her hands rest on her hips in a much more slacken pose than you had expected.

“So who’s your friend?” Undyne asked with a similar nod in your direction.

Papyrus cut in before anyone could say

“THAT IS MY NEW BEST FRIEND AND THEY HAVE COME TO JOIN US ON OUR FRIENDSHIP BEACH DAY AS WELL AS WATCHING IN AWE OF MY SKILLS DURING OUR TRAINING SESSION!”

“I… uh….” You said intelligently as Undyne’s sharp stare was suddenly in your direction. You were filled with… mild terror.

Shit. Her eyes narrowed at you for a moment before she turned to Sans.

“Are they okay?” She asked the shorter skeleton with a single brow risen. It would have seemed innocent except for that big, razor toothed smile on her face. Oh lord, what were these skeletons getting you into?

“OH THEY ARE FINE… probably.”

Thanks Pap...

“they’re probably just internally screaming a little bit.”

Sans winked and shrugged like that was a normal and acceptable answer.

“you do kind of have that effect on people after all.”

Undyne’s expression went blank for a full moment before she broke out into a hearty laughter.

“Hey, why don’t you come in? I need to go and change into my suit anyway!” She declared after flashing the lot of you a big, toothy, totally un-menacing grin.

“THE HUMAN TOO I THINK!”

Despite digging in your heels slightly, Papyrus dragged you into the scary fish lady’s mansion-house before you could even protest. Stupid strong skeleton… He didn’t even have muscles dammit!

“I-I don’t even have a swimsuit!” You pointed out in your panic. Honestly while you hadn’t planned on this beach event being a thing at all, once you were roped into it, you were sort of just hoping you could hang out on the sand and stuff. You didn’t have any desperate need to go into the water.

Everything seemed to stop, which was impressive considering what you knew of Papyrus’s hyperactiveness and what you had already seen of Undyne’s brash behavior. All eyes had turned to you.

“I uh… I didn’t even know we were coming...and..um…” You started, trying to figure out how to explain why you hadn’t said anything about it before. Everything had happened in such a whirlwind honestly. You should have said something in the car, but with Papyrus’ driving it was hard to get even much of a thought in besides internal screaming.

You felt bones thread into the spaces between your fingers.

“don’t worry about it, i’ll take care of it. i know a shortcut.”

Sans grinned at both Undyne and Papyrus before aiming a wink your way. Despite yourself, you did feel a little reassured. Sans really did have a way of calming people down.

“ARE YOU CERTAIN? WE COULD ALL GO AS A GROUP.”

“No way! We still need to get started on your today’s training right away! You aren’t slacking now that you’re a Royal Guard are you?” Undyne asked, squinting her eyes.

“OF COURSE NOT! I ALWAYS KEEP MYSELF IN TIP TOP SHAPE!”

Sans opened the front door, still casually holding your wrist in his other hand.

“why don’t you two go ahead and make waves? we’ll be back in no time.”

“SAN-”

The two of you were out the door before Papyrus could even finish yelling Sans’ name…. and apparently somewhere that you hadn’t expected when you walked through Undyne’s front door. You were at a place that looked suspiciously like your apartment. Is this really happening? Have you been drugged? Was any of this morning even real?

“hey, you okay there? i know it can be a little disorienting.”

Sans was facing you and you continued to switch your attention between your general apartment and Sans’ face.

“What exactly just happened?” You ask probably looking as distressed as you felt about the entire situation. Seriously, how were you here?

“so how about we go find you something to wear at the beach?”

Sans walked a few steps away from you into the sitting area of your apartment and rested his hands on the duck floaty with some sort of finality that shouldn’t have situationally worked considering the blown up duck still resting around his waist. It didn’t help that the floaty made that plastic squeak noise from being shifted.

You huffed quietly to yourself. It was obvious arguing wasn’t going to get you very far in this case. You shuffled past him and into your bedroom, feeling yourself relax immediately. Despite having your own apartment, your room still felt like the only place that was “yours” You did everything from sleep, to work, to relax in here. Speaking of work, you noticed your desktop was still open to a website page you were coding. You quickly saved your work and closed it down. There was no need for you to keep your computer on all day when you wouldn’t even be there. You were ahead of schedule on that one, so a day off at the beach wouldn’t be that big of a deal.

You shuffled over to your dresser and pulled out your favorite swimwear and quickly stripped down, changing into it. A quick look in the mirror on your door and you cringe slightly. Honestly, by now you should be used to seeing the scars. Your arms and your legs were especially covered by them. Sans bringing you to get your suit was probably a waste of time. They’d probably be grossed out if you let them see you like this. You didn’t want to ruin their fun day.

A loud knock on the door made you quickly jump around. “I’m not-”

It was too late, Sans had already opened the door.

“hey, i brought-”

He stopped, seemingly frozen. There was a mug in his hand, but he hadn’t moved or done anything with it. He was just staring at you. You felt… uncomfortable under his gaze. Why was he staring at you like that? He didn’t immediately seem grossed out or uncomfortable like a lot of people. He seemed almost shocked, like he didn’t expect them to be there. It was a little strange considering he saw the cuts when they were still fresh. After another moment of frozen silence between the two of you, he set the mug down on your dresser and walked over to you taking a single step at a time. He picked up your hands and looked down at your wrists.

“those are looking much better. no fresh ones either, that’s good bud.”

“Yeah, I think I would hurt Papyrus’ feelings if there were any. He seemed very adamant after what happened in April. I even started using some vitamin E and lemon juice to try and fade them a bit, but uh… it’s not a quick process.”

“sorry I can’t really help you there, i’m no good with healing magic. you should try asking Papyrus.”

“I… I can’t do that.” You said, pulling your hands out of Sans’ grasp and wrapping them around yourself. You felt yourself getting more and more anxious with every minute you were exposed.

“you never did tell us how you ended up like that back then… or even how you ended up on that mountain back in march. this obviously wasn’t the first time.”

You saw the lights in Sans’ eye sockets glance at different places on your body that had faded lines that told tales of old incidents. Somehow, that made you feel even worse. “I…”

Sans stayed quiet, patiently waiting for you to continue. Patience, you’ve noticed, was one thing he seemed to excel at.

“Have you ever… felt alone? Not alone exactly… lonely. Like, someone should be there, but they aren’t?”

Out of the corner of your eye you saw a flash of blue, but when you looked up it was gone. It was probably just your imagination. Teary eyes can make the lights play tricks on you.

“one or twice.”

Sans seemed to shrug, but you could tell there was more to that story. You’d have to ask him sometime.

“That’s… that’s how I feel all of the time. That’s how I’ve felt all my life, as far back as I could remember. It’s like constantly missing someone, but I’ve never had anyone that I was that close to. I’ve never had a best friend or a sibling. My parents try, but I’ve never been able to really connect with them either.” You try to explain, but you know what you’re saying doesn’t completely make sense.

You felt an increasingly familiar bony hand resting on your forearm, over top of the scars.

“you’re not alone though. you’ve got me and you’ve got papyrus too.”

“Yeah I know, thanks for that... For putting up with me and everything.”

You felt Sans phalanges running over the scars in a way that felt comforting.

“hey, there’s no ‘putting up with’ going on here. we like to be around you. if we didn’t we’d tell you. do i look like the type of person to hang out with someone that i don’t like? kid you insult me.”

You crack a small smile at his joke and he runs his long, bony fingers over the scars one last time before releasing your arm. He moved back to the dresser and carefully picked up the mug he had before.

“here kid, drink this, it’ll make you feel better.”

You accept the mug with a small “Thank you.” before taking a sip. The flavor hit your tongue though and you had to force yourself to swallow down the liquid in your mouth instead of rudely spitting it out though. Ewwww leaf water.

“you okay kid? what’s with the face?”

How were you to explain this without being rude? You look up at Sans’ face and he seems startled. His eye-lights were darting back and forth rapidly between your face and the mug.

“Yeah sorry. Thank you for being so thoughtful and getting me a drink, but I don’t really like tea. I’m more of a coffee kind of a person.”

For just a second, you swore that his eyes went dark. Like, the light was gone, but then you blinked and they were back. You really must have been seeing things today. You’re probably just stressing out too much over this bathing suit thing.

“so uh, ready to go?”

“Yeah, just give me a sec,” you say before pulling back on your regular clothes. You were still undecided whether or not you wanted to swim, but at least one person didn’t seem to mind. You grab a bag and stuff in a towel, sunscreen and some baby powder. “Alright, let’s jet.”

Sans’ takes your wrist this time, somehow his touch just doesn’t feel as reassuring this time as it did the first. The two of you walked through the front door and you managed to keep your eyes open despite the blue, almost painfully bright light that shined your way.

In that second between time, you looked backwards. There was something dark behind you. Darker than dark. It was moving. You couldn’t actually see it, but it felt like something smiled at you. Suddenly, everything faded.

...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

“...kid….ok?”

Huh?

“SANS….ALRIGHT?”

Sans?

“i do….papy....”

Pap?

Light suddenly flooded into your eyes. Sans, Pap and some kind of fish monster were leaning over you. What a weird dream.

“you okay kid?”

Everything was fuzzy. Were you okay?

“Um… I think so,” you reply as best as you can. You don’t feel any particular pain. Just a weird sort of tingly fog that’s settling in your brain.

“YOU HAD US SO WORRIED! YOU PASSED OUT...ON THE DRIVE!”

“we were coming from your apartment to the beach. we were so close to Undyne’s house by then that we went ahead and brought you here. the hospital would have been another half an hour drive."

...That didn’t sound right. Did you drive to your apartment? Were you even at your apartment? You looked around a little bit, Sans was holding a bag you recognized. You must have been then…

“Yeah kid, you totally blacked out! What’s up with that?” The fish lady asked. Was she making fun of you?

“I’m uh… not sure. Sorry,” you replied honestly. You really didn’t know why you might have blacked out. How strange.

“hey, what matters is you’re okay right?”

Sans was smiling in your general direction, but it looked like his normal perma-smile. There was something just… missing now. Something felt different than your encounters with him before.

“Well, now that that drama’s over. IT’S TIME TO GET BACK TO TRAINING YOU SLACKER!” Undyne exclaimed, grabbing Papyrus by the scarf. She continued to drag him out of the door.

“It was nice to-.... meet you,” you say. It was weird because you thought she had been in your...dream? However, if you really passed out on the way up, you would have never seen her before... right?

Right...

“don’t sweat it kid, she’s always like that.”

Sans looked barely affected by the woman’s brash behavior and followed her as she dragged his brother to the sand. You hesitantly followed as well. It was hard to tell if you were supposed to or not. No one really told you anything. On the other hand, staying in a foreign house by yourself would have just felt weird.

You could see the three of them somehow already in the distance and past the dunes. It was a bit of a trek for them to have gotten there so fast. Monsters were really wonders sometimes. Taking a few minutes to get to the dunes, you manage to rejoin the group. Sort of at least.

Papyrus and Undyne were already in the heat of battle it seemed. They were sizing each other up. Undyne was closer to the dunes. She had an over-sized silver spear in her hands. You could see an array of colors glinting off of it as light reflected off of the water and sun onto the shiny metal. It was a pretty effect honestly, but with the way that edge shined, you knew you wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the pointy end of that thing. Just the thought of it was making your heart pound.

Despite your own feelings of fear and dread of the madwoman with sharp teeth grinning predatorily at the skeleton, Papyrus seemed as relaxed as the soft waves lazily rolling onto the shore behind him. Standing on the beach, sans the floaties and staring down the battle ready woman in front of him, he was in his element. There was an orange flash and suddenly a white large sword materialized in his left hand. You were impressed by the fact that he was able to wield it in one hand despite its size. Unlike Undyne’s spear, the sword was unusually matte, and had a few chips along its surface. In his right hand was what looked to be some sort of skull, shaped similarly to a cow’s with more sharp points like horns and teeth.

You knew it was coming, but you found yourself jumping anyway when Undyne suddenly lept. Seriously, why anyone allowed that woman to hold weapons was beyond you. She already looked like she could kill a bear with her hands alone. She did NOT need the help of sharp objects. She swung at Papyrus and he quickly dodged with a shuffle like step that you’ve only seen dancers perform before. As the battle went on, you found yourself overwhelmed with how strong Undyne was. Sand or not, her every missed blow seemed to leave large gaping craters in the ground. Theoretically the sand should have filled in the gapped areas, but it was almost as if she had been creating new miniature dunes. As amazing as that was, Papyrus surprised you. He was fast and startlingly graceful. He seemed to be easily swerving and dodging around while occasionally getting in his own swipes. Papyrus was actually slowly wearing her down. Despite how confidant Papyrus looked in battle, you still found yourself concerned. One of the spears actually got close enough to rip his shirt. Thankfully he was unscathed, but you had grabbed onto Sans anyway in your horror.

“hey kid, it’s gonna be fine. Pap’s at his strongest with a sword in hand.”

Sans glanced over your way with his eye-lights. He looked as casual as ever.

“t’s one of the ways i knew he wasn’t serious about taking out humans when we were down in the underground.”

“Taking out humans?” you asked, attention suddenly pulled on the shorter skeleton. “What do you mean?”

You couldn’t imagine Papyrus seriously hurting a fly, much less a human. The times you saw him hit Undyne in their current spar was with the blunt side of his sword, even though it didn’t seem like she was holding back with the whole sharp edges thing. You saw Papyrus whack her again in the shoulder, before ducking and weaving away from the spear that was aimed his way with a loud and angry growl.

“WOULD YOU STOP MOVING SO MUCH?”

“MAYBE YOU SHOULD TRAIN A LITTLE HARDER UNDYNE! YOU’RE NOT KEEPING UP AS WELL AS YOU ONCE DID!”

Undyne’s entire face turned a bright tomato red, but it wasn’t a blush. Oh no. The woman was pissed.

“I’LL SHOW YOU WHO'S GETTING OUT OF SHAPE YOU UNGRATEFUL SKELETON!”

“WAIT! UNDYNE THAT’S NOT WHAT I SAID!”

Papyrus actually took off in a sprint as Undyne ran after him with a spear held over her head. Any sort of strategy or battle logic the pair had once shared seemed to have been sucked into the new sand dunes as the two ran around the beach like crazy people.

“we should go convince the two to go for a swim or something before one of them sends you the wrong message about what monsters are like.”

Sans gave you a wink, pulling away from your grip. You wanted to stop him. To speak up and ask him about all of the questions you had. Why were monsters after humans? A kid named Frisk had apparently saved them, but from what? Why was Frisk down there? Was that the human Sans was talking about before? How did a literal child save monster kind? Why did the monsters stay in the Underground so long anyway? What was keeping them there? There were so many things you didn’t know about your new friends. So many things left to learn. You were at a disadvantage since it seemed Sans and Papyrus already knew practically everything about you. Normally you’d be unsettled by the situation you were in, but they were just so nice about it…

“hey, you comin?”

“Yeah…” you said quietly before shuffling forward after the casually paced skeleton.

--

By the time the pair of you found Undyne and Papyrus, the former’s spear was sticking out of the sand about ten meters to their left, and the latter’s weapon and shield seemed to be missing completely. The frightening aquatic woman had Papyrus in some kind of arm lock face down in the sand. You were actually a little disappointed to have missed how the situation had come about. It was relieving to see that they weapons were forgotten though.

“SAY UNCLE!”

“THE GREAT ROYAL GUARD PAPYRUS WILL NEVER-OW!”

“AMBASSADOR GUARD PAPYRUS, GET IT RIGHT! NOW SAY IT PUNK! I AM THE BEST!”

“NEVERRRR!”

From your right, Sans shook his head at the sight. Considering he was still completely relaxed and accepting of the situation it must be something else that’s fairly common. You chuckled at the antics. At least he was determined.

“you know what kid? it seems like the battle’s been pretty much a stalemate huh? the whole thing seems a little fishy.”

You blinked, confused at the look Sans was giving you. What? Yeah, sure Papyrus seemed to have been actually winning the spar earlier, but Undyne clearly had Papyrus pinned. What other proof did he need of her victory?

“WHAT DID YOU SAY?” Undyne shouted, releasing Papyrus from the pin. You were pleased a the small mercy, but now the angry woman was walked towards you and that wasn’t exactly a better situation.

“i think a race would prove who's really best, maybe a swimming one, doncha think?”

Sans elbowed your arm and you jumped suddenly realizing he was talking to you.

“Oh…” You said blinking, understanding where he was going with this finally. “OH! Yeah, definitely. Swimming race would prove something like that… uh swimming shows strength in weird muscles...and stuff.”

Wait, skeletons didn’t have muscles.

“I WILL SHOW YOU WHO THE BEST RIGHT NOW NERD!” Undyne yelled before taking off toward Papyrus’ discarded floats. He’d need those.

“I THINK NOT! I WILL SHOW YOU WHO IS BEST ONCE AND FOR ALL!”

The poor skeleton had no chance.

He was up against a literal fish.

Either way Sans’ ploy seems to have worked. Undyne already running down the beach, and Papyrus wasn’t far behind her. Sans followed at his own lazy trot, the hideous duck floaty still wrapped around his pelvis, but you hadn’t moved yet.

Sans may have seen your scars in that weird… maybe dream, but that didn’t mean you were ready for him to see them for real. Plus, there was no reason to worry Papyrus like that and you especially did not want Undyne to see. She was still practically a stranger.

“hey, you comin?”

Sans was looking over his shoulder toward you

“Oh um, nah I think I’ll hang around over here. Catch some sun,” You say managing a partial smile.

“well, we’ll be in the water if you change your mind,” Sans said, rubbing the back of his skull.

You aimed a smile in his direction and that seemed to satisfy the smaller of the skeleton brothers. Pulling a towel out of your bag, you laid it across the warm sand before crawling down and stretching out on it. The warmth of the sun caressed the bare skin of your face and warmed fabric that still shrouded you. Sometimes sunny days like these were just nice.

After a few minutes of just enjoying the comforting heat of the rays beaming down. You glance over to the water. Undyne seemed to be at the end of the impromptu water race while Papyrus was still weakly paddling after with his floaties. Poor skele. Despite his obvious defeat, he continued to paddle after, determined to at least finish the race. At least they all seemed to be enjoying themselves in the water.

You envied them a little. It looked fun, but did you dare? What would your companions think if they saw you?

“HUMAN?”

Papyrus must have finally finished the race.

“HUMAN ARE YOU ALRIGHT?”

You lazily stretch your back like a cat before propping yourself up on your elbows. Papyrus always towered, but from this angle he was especially tall. Your face didn’t even come up to his kneecaps in this position.

“I’m alright Pap, just enjoying the sun,” you explain, trying to give him a smile like you did Sans. “How was the race?”

His happy expression fell slightly, but only for a moment.

“I WAS NOT THE VICTOR! HOWEVER, I WILL FIND ANOTHER WAY TO PROVE MY SUPERIORITY ON ANOTHER OCCASION!”

It was a curious thing how this guy seemed to be so completely sure of himself all of the time. You just weren’t quite sure how he did it. Sometimes it was hard for you to even want to get up in the morning and this skeleton seemed to rush at every day as if each day was his for the taking. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could do that? Just let yourself be happy. Believe in yourself.

How did he do it? How could he love and believe in himself so much?

Sometimes you could hardly even look at yourself in the mirror.

Your eyes caught with a pair of white lighted ones in the distance and you began to wonder if maybe there was a reason the younger brother was so self assured. On the other hand, it could just be his personality too.

“HUMAN?”

“Huh?” You ask, turning back toward the face that was now mere inches away from yours. It may be best to pay attention when in a conversation.

“HUMAN WHY ARE YOU SITTING ON THE BEACH ALONE?”

Startled, you fall back against the towel. That level of volume in your face was just a little overbearing. He quirks his skull to the side, but doesn’t comment. Instead, he just watches you, waiting for your answer.

“I’m uh… just not much of a swimmer.” Lie.

“THAT IS OKAY! WE CAN GO AND ENJOY THE SHALLOW WAVES!”

Papyrus continued to stand over you with his hand held out expectantly.

“It’s okay Pap, you go ahead. I’m just gonna hang around here for a while. I think I’d prefer to stay on the beach a while longer.” Lie.

“BUT HUMAN! THIS IS A GROUP OUTING FOR US TO HAVE FUN TOGETHER AS BEST FRIENDS!”

“I am having fun,” you say simply, forcing a smile.

LIE.

You shake your head of those thoughts and focus your attention back on the eye-lights that were attentively staring at your face. It was actually a little unnerving…

“HUMAN! I COULDN’T POSSIBLY LEAVE A FRIEND BEHIND! SO IF YOU WON’T GO HAVE FUN WITH US IN THE WATER, ME AND YOU WILL HAVE TO HAVE FUN HERE!”

With that Papyrus plops down next to you, without breaking his stare. He seems to be waiting for you to do something. You weren’t really sure what he was expecting.

“Papyrus…” How do you explain this too him? He’s just so well meaning sometimes. “I just… I’m not very comfortable with the way I look in a bathing suit. Please go have fun with your friend and your brother. I’m alright here.”

You tried to reassure him that you were alright. You were used to being alone. You usually were. That was just the life of a socially awkward student who develops websites in their room for a living. Honestly, before the skelebros showed up and started insisting you join them in activities, you couldn’t remember the last time you actually hung out with friends for fun. Was it grade school?

“YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL.”

You jumped, turning to the living skeleton sitting at your side.

Huh?

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

“YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY YOU ARE UNCOMFORTABLE.”

You felt your cheeks heating up, but you were going to blame it on the fact that you were laying in the sun for too long.

“I… um… I…. uh….”

How do you even respond to a statement like that?

“YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO INTO THE WATER OR YOU COULD WEAR WHAT YOU’RE WEARING NOW AND JUST TAKE THE TIME TO SUN DRY IF YOU WANTED, BUT I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE IT IF YOU, AS MY FRIEND WOULD ENJOY YOUR TRIP WITH US. OTHER WISE I WOULD BE FAILING AS YOUR VERY BEST FRIEND! I CAN’T BE HAPPY IF YOU’RE NOT HAPPY TOO.”

You didn’t know what to say to that. How do you respond to someone who was simply so earnest when trying to make you happy?

“I… Papyrus, let’s go in the water.” You bit your lip after saying this. A part of your mind was screaming for you to take it back. That he’d hate you when he really saw you. That he’d think you’re grotesque, but another part reminded you that he’d seen you at your worst already and he was still here. It was the part that reminded you to trust in your friend.

“ARE… Are you sure human?”

Papyrus’ voice grew a bit quieter than normal. He seemed to understand the gravity of the situation. He stood by as you slowly inched off the over-clothing. He was completely patient through the elongated process that should have only taken seconds.

There they were. Your scars laid out in front of the dimming lights of a normally cheerful skeleton. He seemed… sad? No, that wasn’t it.

It was something between somber and curious. He reached out, but held back from touching you, until he caught your eye, silently asking for permission. You nodded and he slowly ran his phalanges over the scars. This felt a little like déjà vu, but it had been a dream… right?

It was different though. You finally noticed that he was tracing the veins underneath your skin, rather than the scars themselves. His pointer and middle digits paused on the inside of your wrist. What was he…?

He was feeling your pulse you realized.

Then he looked up at you and smiled, his eye lights brighter than ever.

“READY TO GO AND HAVE THE BEST TIME YOU’VE EVER HAD WITH YOUR VERY BEST FRIEND?”

You nodded with a smile. A real one this time.

He didn’t wait a moment more before interweaving his bony fingers between your fleshy ones and taking off in a full sprint toward the water. Yeah you dragged behind a bit, but you were laughing all the way anyway.

What a mad crazy wonderful monster.

Maybe… maybe if he liked you enough to want to be your friend. Maybe you could like yourself a little too.

Just maybe.

Halfway to the water Papyrus seemed to get fed up with you dragging behind and straight out picked you up, without slowing at all in his descent toward the waves. You screamed, but ended up just laughing louder. The others all laughed too when you were suddenly dropped in the cold water. When you resurfaced, everyone had a smile on their faces.

Even you.

Sword fighting, counseling and surprising strength for someone who was literally bones. Every day you knew the skeleton brothers, there seemed to be something new to learn every day.

Like magic though, since they entered your life, for the first time in a long, long time you seemed to really be enjoying yourself.

Chapter Text

Hey guys, it's Treeni.

I have been about 2/3rds of the way done with this chapter since the 2nd and was hoping to get this chapter up on the 3rd. Unfortunately, the night of the 2nd, being Wednesday I fell down the stairs and severely hurt my back. I was in the hospital overnight and I was released Thursday and there are no breaks, but it's extreme muscle spasms. I've been on strong pain relievers and muscle relaxers, but healing still seems to be slow going. I'm only able to write this because I'm between doses and in a lot of pain. When I'm on the medicines it hurts a lot less, but I become basically incoherent (finding EVERYTHING funny) and have a lot of trouble focusing.

So I just wanted to explain there will be a delay and I apologize.