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For some reason, Frisk had always –at least, since they had fallen into the Underground– assumed that it never snowed in Snowdin Town. That the snow that covered every house and every paving stone had, as far-fetched as it may seem, appeared out of nowhere one day, and decided that this little friendly town was a nice place to stay in (Frisk agreed with that last statement, by the way).
The weather proved them wrong, though.
They had just ‘escaped’ from (or rather, left, actually) Papyrus’s garage for the third time and they felt kind of bad, to be honest; the tall skeleton really seemed to want to capture them, and they would have loved being able to make him happy, but... They had to find a way back to the surface – they couldn’t afford to stay trapped for too long, especially inside a jail whose bars were spaced too far apart from one another to prevent them from getting out. Thus, as soon as they had read the note kindly left behind by Papyrus, and had a look at the food he had generously provided, they had once again left the garage-
And that’s when a sudden sensation of utter coldness on their nose had surprised them at their first step outside. Soon, the same sensation started tingling various parts of their cheeks and forehead; then the cold fell on their hands, that they had just raised palms up to the sky, and they realized all of these touches of pure coldness were... snowflakes.
Snow was falling over Snowdin Town.
It made a small smile appear on Frisk’s face, at first. It had been a while since they had last seen any real snow fall from the sky. They had no way of knowing whether the snow here in the Underground was real or fake, of course, but from the way it felt on their skin and melted from the heat of their body, it seemed pretty authentic.
There was only one problem, actually: Frisk was still wearing the same clothes they wore when they had fallen into the Underground, in the late afternoon of a rather sunny day... and their jeans and striped sweater couldn’t quite protect them from the quickly dropping temperature. Rubbing their shoulders with both of their hands in hopes it would warm them up, at least a little, they decided to rush to a place where the temperature would be much more pleasant.
A few minutes later, they pushed open the door to Grillby’s bar and let the warmth inside envelop them whole. They were freezing, and there were so many snowflakes in their hair that they probably looked like a senior person, now, but at least they had made it to the establishment before changing into an ice cube. They couldn’t help but smile proudly.
Then, a melted snowflake dripped on their nose, and they sneezed.
Everyone in the room turned their head to shoot Frisk a questioning glance; but among the many monsters, the one the child recognized the best was the first who spoke.
“Heh, kiddo, looks like you escaped my bro again. What was that?”
They walked up to Sans with no hesitation and raised their eyes – not that he was that tall, but his sitting on a bar stool made it rather difficult to look at him from where they stood.
By chance, he was kind (and not lazy, for once) enough to turn around a bit, lean down, grab Frisk under their shoulders, and help them sit on the stool next to him. As they told him they had just sneezed, their nose started itching again, and they put both of their cold hands in front of their mouth before sneezing one more time.
“Sneezing, you say?” The skeleton looked rather surprised, although it was difficult to tell with his usual big grin. “Never heard of that.”
They tried to explain it was something that usually happened when humans were sick or too cold, but their nose began running before they could finish their sentence, and they had to cover half of their face with their big sleeves again.
“Heh, is that a human thing, too?”
From behind their hands, Frisk said they needed a tissue, but it sounded so muffled it was a near-miracle that Sans could hear it and, somehow, understand it.
“Grillby, give us a napkin, maybe?” he asked, his voice sounding not quite as ease as it usually did. When the ever so quiet bartender gave him a white paper napkin, he took it (Frisk was still kind of amazed that Grillby's fire hadn't made it burn) and carefully brought it to the child’s face. “Okay, so... how does this work...”
Well, it probably was a bit difficult to get the functioning of a tissue right when you didn’t have a nose of your own, Frisk supposed. They smiled softly, and took their sweater-clad hands away from their face to hold the bar stool instead. They leaned over – only then was the skeleton able to wipe their nose, in a surprisingly gentle gesture. He was almost too gentle, to be honest; Frisk had to grab his wrist and firmly keep it in place, so that they could blow their nose correctly.
“Humans sure are weird,” commented Sans when the child was done. “Or is it just kids like you?”
Frisk thought of an answer but didn’t speak, as the door was thrown open before they could utter a single word.
“Sans! Are you here, you lazybones?! The human escaped... Again!”
Papyrus –no, the great Papyrus, Frisk mentally corrected themself– entered the bar and remained motionless and speechless (a rarity) for a second. With the door behind his back still wide open and a certain number of snowflakes coming inside the bar, as if fleeing from the storm outside, the entire scene looked rather dramatic – provided that you ignore the snow that had formed a small pile on the top of the skeleton’s skull, of course.
Once someone coughed and the moment was gone, a huge smile appeared on Papyrus’s face, and he let the door close behind him as he rushed to the bar.
“Sans! You captured the human! You finally had your first accomplishment as a sentry! You must have learned so much from observing me, the great Papyrus!”
Sans casually placed his arm on the counter next to him and grinned.
“Yeah, I really worked myself down to the bone to get this done.”
The anger that instantly took over his brother’s features as he screamed his name in annoyance only made his grin wider; he gave Frisk a brief look, and the child decided to laugh quietly. This pun clearly wasn’t the best Sans had ever made, but they still found it funny... kind of.
They suddenly had to raise their head, though, their eyes searching for the previously discarded napkin, because they could feel their nose running again. In a second, they had located it, but Papyrus’s voice stopped them before they could reach it on the counter.
“What is happening to your face, human? Are you hurt? Is that... human blood?!”
Frisk turned their head to give him a puzzled look (or at least, a look that was meant to be puzzled, although it didn’t really seem like it), only to find the tall skeleton leaning over and staring at them with eye sockets strangely full of concern. He seemed genuinely worried that a runny nose might be some kind of human disease; thus the child decided to show him it was nothing, and finally grabbed the napkin to blow their nose.
“Don’t worry, bro,” added Sans. “That isn’t blood, just some weird human thingy.”
“Is that true, human?”
Frisk vigorously wiped their nose and nodded; Papyrus seemed relieved. The child then noticed he still had some snow left on the top of his head (because apparently snow didn’t melt when in contact with a skeleton’s bones) – therefore, they leaned over and carefully brushed all the leftover snowflakes with their hand. Papyrus seemed to appreciate the attention and smiled brightly.
“Now, human! I will bring you back to the capture zone, where you shall wait until Undyne is there!”
Frisk opened their mouth to answer, but was cut off by Sans again.
“That’s great, bro, but don’t you want to wait until the storm blows over? The human won’t escape, since you’ll be there, anyway, and we might even grab something to eat.”
Papyrus seemed to consider the idea for a few seconds, his arms crossed.
“You’re right... No one can escape my extremely close and efficient monitoring! Besides, this human looks like they’re in very bad condition.”
He was probably referring to the fact that Frisk was still shivering a little from the cold, and that their nose might start running again at any time. They firmly nodded in approval when the tall skeleton shot them a cautious glance, and Papyrus smiled proudly.
“Capturing them now would be too easy and I, the great Papyrus, am merciful even to humans! Also, I am sure Undyne would not want a broken human... therefore, I shall repair this one! Then I’ll give her the best human she has ever seen! Nyeh heh heh!”
Sans gave him a thumbs up.
“That’s what I call a good plan. There's no way you won’t be appointed as a member of the Royal Guard after that.”
One more time, Frisk vigorously nodded to encourage the tall skeleton to carry out his great idea.
Half a minute later, the three of them were sitting at the bar, eating warm and tasty hamburgers and fries, Papyrus being the loudest monster in the room while Sans only answered with bad jokes; Frisk gave them an amused smile, swinging their legs as they took a bite of their burger.