Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It felt like literally yesterday that they rebuilt the old Mt. Ebott Theater. For what, the internet had told me, was probably the tenth time in its lifetime. The place seemed to have a horrible reputation of being destroyed. After the ninth version of the building was burned to the ground, also not the first time that had happened to the poor theater, they’d decided to put their money somewhere else. Somewhere that wasn’t at the edge of the forest of, previously, no return, at the foot of the mountain of, previously, no return.

Mt. Ebott Theater was apparently so old that the poor monsters that’d been locked inside the mountain were shocked and heartbroken to find that what had previously been a pretty sizable theater was now an empty, fenced off, dirt lot. It was their enthusiasm, actually, that had brought the place back like a bird from the ashes. Almost like it had never disappeared.

Someone from the revival group had made the place a Facebook page, and from there word had gotten around to me that they were in need of… everything. Stagehands, actors, patrons, an audience, techies, makeup people—everything. And the page gave off a vibe that they were hoping for more human support. So with a quick emailed application, my twenty-something ass had been recruited into the new, brand new, enthusiastic mostly-monster thespian group.

I had barely interacted with monsters up until this point–they’d just rejoined the surface world—so this was all new territory for me. The only thing I knew for sure that I did know about was being a techie. Everything else was, and will always remain, a mystery. I suppose.

I arrived at the theater, pretty on edge if I’m honest, at about midday with a backpack, another resume for some reason, snack bars, and…. stuff. Stuff I threw in my bag to feel like I was going somewhere important. Which I was, I guess. My first real big… thing in a while.

Anyways, so I got to the theater, I checked my phone again to make sure I got the right instructions, and walked in. The lobby was clean, with deep red carpeting and warm wood walls. My first thought was that it was pleasant, my second was that wood seemed like a bad idea, and my third was… not words, but an odd ease that set in quickly. The place was comforting already.

Spotting the door that said “office”, I knocked before opening it.

“Hello? Is Ms. Toriel here?”

A large, white, goat-like woman looked up from her desk, taking her reading glasses off to blink at me. With a kind smile, she asked, “You must be (y/n), aren’t you?”

I half-smiled back and nodded. “Yeah, I’m here to help backstage with set construction?”

Ms. Toriel stood from her desk, walked over and took my hand to shake. From this alone, she came off as a strong but very kind woman. She said, “Come this way, I’ll show you the theater.”  Leading me out the door and into the rest of the building, she continued. “I would introduce you to the co-manager of our theater, but Mr. Dreemurr isn’t here right now–he’s running an errand. When he gets back I’ll be sure to introduce you to him, though!”

Pushing through the double doors into the theater’s house revealed an open, decadent theater that could comfortably seat a few hundred. It was lavish in cherry wood, with bright lights flooding the stage. A thick velvet curtain peeked out from the wings, where it was drawn back for the time being.

On the stage, some… eclectic actors were running lines and working through blocking on a scene. I was on edge again. Thespians are always weird, I assure you, but this was my first time working with thespian “monsters”. Thinking about it now, it’s really kind of odd that I didn’t expect such a wide variety of… “monster” types? Types. It’s really cool though. It’s. Exciting. I guess, you could say…?

The group stopped their scene to greet Ms. Toriel and I, but a small child (?) hushed them. Ms. Toriel chuckled and shook her head, “I guess I’ll introduce you to them after they’re done as well.” She took another step and gestured to two other monsters, which were coming out of the backstage. “Catty! Bratty! Come over here, dears, to meet your new co-worker!”

The cat and alligator girls came trotting over. Immediately dropping what they were carrying—with enthusiasm. They started yelling questions to me one after another with no breathing space, before they even got up to me. So fast that I couldn’t actually answer anything.

“Ohmygod first backstage human!” The cat girl—Catty? Catty seems right. She is a cat, after all. Or is that racist?

Before I could say anything, the alligator girl cut in with, “We’ve been waiting for a human to join the backstage! All the humans are like ‘I wanna be an actor! I wanna have my face in lights! Lights that I didn’t put up!’ Which is lame, we wanna meet more. And now you’re here!”

Not sure what to say to all of this, I opened my mouth to try with a simple ‘hello’. It didn’t happen fast enough.

“Yo! Ms. Queen Tori! There’s a fire!” The room gasped and Toriel’s head whipped around to see the smol armless child screaming from the open doors. “On the phone! It’s Grillby!” Everyone let out an audible sigh, except for me. Who was very confused. What’s a grill-bee? Why is it on fire? That sounds like a health hazard. Call the fucking firefighters.

Toriel hurried to take the call, leaving me with the two backstage hands. From a part of the set previously unnoticed, a water bottle was tossed between the two girls and I.

“Hey guys.” We followed the voice up to the person leaning out from a window on-set, who’d thrown the water bottle. “Where’s the fire? I’ve got the water.” He had a bottled water of his own.

I replied, “On the phone? It’s a. Grill-bee.” I threw an uncertain glance to the stagehands.

“Oh thanks kid, toss the bottle back up then. Grillby’s a pal.”

“I’m in my twenties.”

He seemed shocked, leaned out the windowsill to get a better look, and stumbled over himself to apologize. “Oh sh-sorry. You’re in a striped shirt. I assumed.”

There was a pause. “What?” I asked.

“It’s a monster culture thing, don’t worry about it.” The… he’s a skeleton. “Name’s Sans, yours?”

Catty answered for me. “They’re the new set maker!”

“Hi New Set-Maker.”

Bratty then mentioned, “We don’t actually know their name yet.”

“Yeah, uh, it’s—” I tried, but then the child approached.

“The narrator says you look like Fixit Felix Junior.” They said plainly.

“Narrator?” I asked quietly.

The child nodded.

The stagehands cheered. Sans mumbled ‘Junior?’

The child put out their hand. After a moment, I took it and shook gently. They introduced themself, “I’m Frisk.”

“I’m—” There was a quiet shout of ‘Fixit Felix’ in the distance. I submitted. “Junior. Senior is my non-existent father, I guess.”

Sans called out, amused, “Non-existent? Eheh, same.” I wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.

Frisk let go of my hand. “I’m stage manager. Toriel’s my mom.” I nodded as if this made perfect sense.

“So… who’s head set construction?” I asked. “Who is anybody, if I could ask? I got here ten minutes ago. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Frisk pointed to the robot, who had nice boots. Very pink. “That’s Mettaton. He’s… the leader. Who’s not the director. Or the manager. He’s a personality.” That didn’t answer any of my questions. But now the robot was very much interested in talking. And taking over the conversation.

Mettaton strutted over, “I’ll take it from here, darling! I’m Mettaton, star and lead writer. Frisk here is our wonderful stage manager. Sans does… things. We’re not sure. He’s here. His brother, Papyrus does costumes. Catty and Bratty you know. Alphys is the leader of your particular… department.” He gestured vaguely. “And Undyne is her second. They’re doing something important. Something girlfriend important. Napstablook is sound, they’re in the booth right now. If you ever need them, go up there.” He turned serious for a moment. “Please, go up there.” The serious melted away quickly. “Doggo is the prop master. Stand still if he gets anxious. He can’t see you if you’re standing still.” I wasn’t sure if that was a bad Jurassic Park reference, or if he was serious. I also wasn’t sure how that was supposed to diffuse anxiety.

Mettaton leaned forward. “Any questions?”

I paused a moment to see if anyone would interrupt. “Who’s the director?”

“Oh goodness, I forgot! Asgore, King Asgore of course is the director.”

I also was not sure if the mentions of royalty were serious or not. Thespians. Thespians are weird. It could go either way. Oh god. Should I be worried? I had another question. “So… then, okay. Where is… Alphys? You mentioned ‘girlfriend’ things?” That sounded super unprofessional, if I was honest.

Mettaton laughed, “Anime, darling. They’re in the dressing room.”

What? That didn’t make sense. That didn’t make any sense. That made less sense than just not asking. “Where’s the dressing room?” Catty and Bratty grabbed me by the arms, dragging me along and chittering happily. I waved goodbye to the present cast members.

Backstage was cavernous, connected by a long hallway. It almost felt familiar. There was a distorted noise off in the distance which bounced off the walls. “Was that the dial-up sound?” I asked.

“Oh, no ohmygod that’s just the ghost. Don’t even worry, he’s just spooky noises.” Bratty said.

“No one has even died yet, so it’s not even exciting.” Catty added.

I nodded. Thespians. There’s always a ghost.

Eventually, we came to a door labelled ‘dressing room 1’. Catty and Bratty knocked, and asked together, “Are you decent?”

Then they opened the door without waiting for an answer. It seemed to be a running theme.

We stepped inside into utter chaos. A fish woman was wrestling with a very tall skeleton as a yellow dinosaur look on in horror. The fish woman suplexed the skeleton, then slammed him into a headlock. She then proceeded to noogie him until he shouted, “Do not noogie the skeleton!”

There were costumes spread about the room like discarded napkins.

I paused. “Should we come back later…?” The trio looked up, a sudden silence falling over them. The moment quickly ended, and dissolved into screaming again.

The little yellow dinosaur shuffled over to us. “I—sorry, they kind of just devolved. It’s not normally this bad, but opening night is in a month. They’re nervous… I’m Alphys, c-can I help you?”

Catty cut in with, “This is the new set constructor! This is Fixit Felix Junior!”

“That’s not my name,” I tried to say. I don’t think I was listened to.

“Nice to meet you… Felix? Fixit? I’m sorry, which do you go by?” Alphys asked.

“Actually,” I replied, “My name is (y/n).”

“But we call them Fixit Felix,” Catty said.

“Junior,” Bratty added in a whisper.

“Oh!” Alphys bounced a bit, more alert now. “I can, sorry, ah, um,” She turned to the odd couple still wrestling. “Undyne! Pap! Could you uh—sorry could you stop? We have a newbie!”

The two untangled themselves, and by that I mean the fish woman threw the skeleton across the room.

She strutted up and put her hands on her hips. “Hey ki—ah sorry. Not a kid right? Just… striped shirt. You should change that. It’s confusing. Name’s Undyne. I do the heavy lifting.”

“I still don’t get that, but no. I’m not a kid. I’m an adult person.” I said firmly. I was pretty positive about that. “You already heard my nickname, but uh. Yeah. I’m, yeah.”

The skeleton—Papyrus—picked himself off the floor energetically. “The Great Papyrus is at your service! Costume manager extraordinaire! And secondary star actor! We’ll get along great, I’m sure!” Everything he said seemed to be an exclamation of joy. Pure, screaming. At the top of his non-existent lungs.

Alphys excused herself from the other two and came out to the hallway with us. “Did you guys show them the workshop yet?”

“No, we came to find you guys first!” Catty said enthusiastically.

“How about you two go back to moving stuff? I can show them the current project and stuff.” Alphys said hesitantly. Catty and Bratty left us to go back to lifting.

Alphys showed me to the workshop where partly constructed set pieces lying about. Along with introducing me to where everything was, she handed me a copy of the script to flip through. It was a slight rework of Romeo and Juliet, replacing the Capulets with a monster family. Leaving me to read through the script and familiarize myself with the workshop, Alphys went to go make sure her friends were not causing too much chaos.

I sat down on a fake tree stump to go over the script. I set my hand down to relax, but pulled it back quickly when I felt something wet. Looking down, there was an odd black muck on my fingertips and smeared on the stump. Not sure what it was, I wiped my fingers off on my pant leg and continued reading. As I read, I could have sworn I heard that distorted noise again, calling from the nearby trapdoor to under the stage.

Chapter Text

I didn’t think much of the noise until I heard it getting louder- it got the point where I couldn’t focus on the script in my hands. I put it down, getting up from the stump uneasily. Maybe someone just dropped their phone down the trapdoor? They might be calling it, or their alarm might be going off. Either way, they’ll want it back.

Balling my hands into fists, I ventured to the trapdoor and pulled it open. With a deep breath I readied myself, turned on my phone's flashlight, and took a few steps down. Not seeing anything directly, but hearing the noise echoing off the cavernous walls of the place, I took a few more steps down until I was at the bottom.

I waved my flashlight around slowly, hoping I would see the phone nearby and not have to venture any farther, but sadly there was nothing. The noise seemed to be getting louder, however, and I was starting to get actually creeped out. My mind drifted back to Catty and Bratty’s ghost “story”. But that would be ridiculous. Ghosts aren’t real, and every thespian superstition is just silly and for funzies.

Just when I figured I’d give it up for lost and just let somebody else know about the ringing, my flashlight lit up something white off in the distance between the beams. It looked like a mask. Not that weird, considering this was a storage area. But then it moved.

And then I ran. Quickly. Loudly. Fuck.

Alphys walked in just in time to see me catch my breath at the top of the staircase. She seemed worried, which was fair considering I probably wasn’t supposed to be down there. “Uh, are you alright?” She asked me.

I waved my hand vaguely. “Yeah, yeah I’m fine. Just heard something. I think a phone’s down there? I went to check, but uh, gurhk-gosh I think somebody’s down there. It freaked me out. Is there a light switch? I can hear it going off. The phone that is.”

Alphys, and I couldn’t tell if she believed me or not, walked over and hobbled down to flip the light switch on. “There you go! I don’t hear anything right now, but that might just be because it stopped ringing. One of the stagehands might have lost their phone down there, we’ll ask around. But yeah, it’s over here if you need to turn on the lights.”

I squinted to try and see where I saw that mask, but whoever was wearing it was gone.

“Do you see anything?” Asked Alphys. “I can’t.”

“Uh, no, but whatever I thought was a person doesn’t seem to be around anymore, so…”

“Oh, maybe it was Napstablook! They might have been playing some of their music. That might have been what you heard.”

“Oh, the sound tech?” I asked.

“Yeah! They’re a ghost, so they might’ve just zipped away back to the booth. They’re kinda skittish, but they’re super nice.”

I paused. “Ghost?”

She ambled back up the steps. “Yeah.”

“Ghost.” I followed her up the stairs.

“Yes? Is that going to be a problem?”

“No, no, I just didn’t know that ghosts were a thing. And I kinda need to rethink my outlook on the afterlife now, unless they aren’t a ghost like what I’m thinking of.”

Alphys paused at the top of the staircase. “Did you not know ghosts were a thing?”

“Uhhh. No. No, that hasn’t been scientifically proven. Yet. But now, I guess, if it’s what I’m thinking of , then. I guess. It has now been.”

She stepped aside to let me get out before closing the trapdoor, then asked, “W-what are you thinking of?”

“Dead people’s spirits? Like, their souls? That have not ‘moved on’?”

Alphys nodded, seeming to understand. “Oh yeah, when you die your soul sticks around. Just like your bodies! Monster souls don’t do that, really. It’s really fascinating the difference between monster and human physiology! Now that I have access to the information, I’d love to do further studies into the differences. Anyways, let’s get to work!”

With this new information still processing in my brain, I followed her and tried not the derail the conversation about set design as we worked.

A few hours later, with some good work done towards finishing Juliet’s balcony, the cast and crew parted ways for the evening. A good portion of the cast and some of the crew were gathered around each other rambling about some restaurant and how they were all hungry. I was hungry too, but I didn’t know them well enough to butt in on the conversation. So I gathered up my bag from the cubby Alphys had assigned me, and started to head out. I was on my way out until I felt a tugging. Looking behind me, I saw the child, Frisk, firmly attached to my shirt.

They didn’t say anything at first. After a moment of staring, I said, “Hey. Do you need something?”

“You look hungry.”

“Yeah. Uh. Long day. I was going to go home and make something. In, like, the microwave. Probably.”

“You should come to Grillby’s. Everyone else is coming. It’s good.” They made an ‘okay’ sign with their hand.

“Grillby’s, like the phone fire?”

Frisk nodded. I was about to say I was fine, when Frisk looked behind themself to the group, and said, “I think Felix is gonna drive me.”

Toriel pouted. “Honey, did you actually ask if they were going to come?”

Frisk looked back at me.

After not saying anything to each other for another minute, I cleared my throat. “Uh, yeah. Anybody else… need a ride?”

“I need a ride!” Mettaton came strutting over from the group.

Alphys seemed confused. “Don’t you get a ride from Undyne and I? And we’re going to the same restaurant…”

“And guess who else needs a ride?” Mettaton didn’t seem to hear her. “Blooky does! To Grillby’s! Where we will eat!” There was a pause. “I’ll go get them!”

I could hear Alphys mumbling, “Neither of them need to eat… Mettaton only comes because he likes the company. This seems a little sketchy.”

Undyne shrugged and everyone split up to go to their respective cars to leave. Frisk yelled out, 'we’ll meet you there!' to which Toriel waved back.

Frisk and I waited a few minutes for them to come down. At some point I idly asked, “So, is ‘King’ Asgore your dad if ‘Queen’ Toriel is your mom?”

“It’s complicated, but yeah. And mom doesn’t really like being called queen. She says she kinda ‘cast it off’ or something.”

I wondered if it was their status as Frisk’s parents that was complicated, or their titles as King and Queen. Before I could come up with a question that had tact, Mettaton arrived back in the lobby with a ghost in trail.

An actual, cartoon-looking ghost. A very sad, actual cartoon-looking ghost. Or, perhaps more like someone-wearing-a-sheet-ghost. That is to say, they were about half my height, sad looking in multiple senses of the word, wearing a sheet, and floating. Hot shit. That’s a ghost.

Mettaton stepped forward. “So, Blooky, this is Fixit Felix Junior. Juni for short. And Juni, this is Napstablook, or Blooky for short.”

“Hey, there. People have been calling me Felix, actually. But, my name’s—” Mettaton interrupted by throwing the front door open.

“To the car! They’re waiting for us, I can feel it.”

And with that, we made our way to the car and started driving over to the restaurant. Mettaton sat in the front giving directions, with Blooky and Frisk in the back talking quietly amongst themselves.

The restaurant was surprisingly close to the theater. Almost intentionally so. Thinking back on it now, it probably was. We could have walked there in twenty minutes. I mentioned this to Mettaton.

“We’ve been on our feet all day, darling! It’s easier to drive. You owe it to yourself; treat yourself.” He flipped his hair dramatically. Throughout the ride, he kept throwing glances back to Napstablook worriedly.

I cleared my throat, and said in a quieter voice, “Is there something wrong?”

“Oh, no, they’re very shy. Just want to make sure they’re comfortable.” He said in a surprisingly subdued fashion. I eyed him, but didn’t respond.

When we got to the restaurant, it seemed that people were waiting for us, and a table had already been claimed. Walking into the place, the first thing that hit you was how warm it was. The lighting was low, but an overwhelming glow of a fireplace seemed to come from the whole of the back wall- behind the bar area. All together, it was comforting. I could see why the theater troop wanted to come here.

Frisk and Mettaton spotted the table where everyone else was seated immediately, and quickly made their way over to it. Napstablook and I trailed behind, exchanging a quick nervous glance. Looked like this was their first time coming here with the group as well. I gestured for them to follow, and made my way over to the table. The group looked up again when we approached, and some of them pulled chairs out for us. Most of them -namely Undyne, Catty, and some other cat person- were deep in some debate about arm wrestling, and Ms. Toriel was chatting with Sans about something including the phrase ‘funny bone’. The conversations all took a momentary pause to greet us. There were a few ‘hey Blooky!’s and a ‘glad you decided to finally come!’, among the welcomes.

We sat down, sandwiched between Mettaton and Sans. Sans handed me a menu. “The burgers are the best here.” He suggested. “The waiter’ll be back around soon.”

I nodded, honestly not sure what to get, and waited for the waiter to come around. It seemed like Blook and I had something in common, as neither of us were really sure how to join any of the conversations going on around us.

Did ghosts eat? Alphys had mentioned something about neither Napstablook nor Mettaton being able to eat. Yet Napstablook had a menu neatly laid out in front of them, and Mettaton was busy flipping through one of his own, feet up on an extra co-opted chair. He was still throwing glances at the ghost occasionally. I honestly wasn’t sure if it would be rude to ask if they ate or not. Playing it safe, I didn’t ask.

After a few minutes, someone tapped me on the shoulder and I looked up to see a bright, burning figure standing by our table in a finely tailored uniform- complete with glasses and notepad. It was so distracting that Sans had to tap me on the shoulder again to snap me back, so I could give the waiter my order. He was soft spoken and seemed to glide as he walked back to the bar after taking everyone’s order.

“So, ” Sans started. I looked over at him, to be met with the biggest shit-eating grin I’d ever seen. He continued, “That was Grillby. He owns the place. Close friend of the theater too- and a pretty important patron.” He leaned his elbow on the table, and rested his chin on the palm of his hand. “What do you think?”

“He-” I paused, not sure if I wanted to let my thoughts slip. “He’s like a… Like a hearth. Warm and inviting. And really hot.”

Somehow, Sans’ smile got even more shit-eating. I could hear some of the others sitting at the table snickering, and I was tempted to hide my face in my hands. He leaned in and said, “Don’t get hot under the collar, now.”

That was the opposite of helpful. I covered my eyes with a hand and stared at the table.

“Your face is almost as red as Grillby’s, maybe you should chill a bit.”

“Sans. ” I mumbled.

“Come on, you’re warming up to the puns. Admit it. He sparked somethin’ in you, didn’t he.”

“Sans let’s stop talking about this.”

My phone immediately notified me of a new text message.

It was Sans. And more fire puns. God damn it.

“Sans!”

“'Sup, Juni.”

“How did you get my number?”

“Your resume.”

“Wh-” I shook my head. He seemed close to Ms. Toriel, maybe he helped her with hiring.

Sans didn’t break eye contact, but my phone buzzed four more times in rapid succession. More puns.

“Sans!” I said, even louder. “Sans! ” I repeated.

“What’s up, Jun?” He asked. I lifted my phone up and gestured to it. “Looks like you got some primo one liners there, Junior. You know what you should do with those?”

“What? What could I possibly-”

“Go try one of them out on ol’ Grillbz over there.”

I stared him in the eye sockets. “Are you serious.”

“I’m always serious.”

Undyne shouted from the other side of the table, “That is a bold faced lie, Sans!”

He was not phased at all, and kept the same steady grin.

After a few moments of silence, I asked, “If I go use one of your bad, terribad, pickup lines on Grillby, will you stop teasing me?”

He used his free hand to give me a thumbs up. “Let’s shake on it, Junior.”

We did, and I got up.

God save us all. Specifically me.

I made my way up to the bar and found a seat in front of where Grillby was standing. Folding my hands, then unfolding them, and then checking my phone, and folding my hands again for good measure, I cleared my throat.

The bartender looked down at me. I could just hear him ask ‘yes?’ in that calm voice of his.

All of Sans’ bad pickup lines left my mind. I stared blankly at my phone, and the many more texts I just received filled with puns. Sans types incredibly fast on a smartphone for someone with no skin. I couldn’t seem to process any of the puns he sent me.

The silence was palpable. Oh god. Oh no.

I panicked.

“Do you possibly enjoy the courtship of a possibly same-gendered individual? Because you are flaming, sir .” Grillby’s expression remained emotionless, but the orange fire that made up his face turned blue. I was now sweating extra hard, because not only was I embarrassed but it was getting incredibly, uncomfortably hot. “Now…” My voice started to falter and die off. “I can’t stand the heat… I’m getting outta the kitchen. Bye.” I fled.

Back at the table, I gasped for air as the group both hollered and stared at me. Sans gave me a double thumbs up and Undyne smacked me on the back painfully.

“Good job, Junior.” Sans nodded. “So what line won him over?”

“Don’t make me say it again, it wasn’t one of the ones you sent me. I can barely remember. I think I blacked out.”

“Huh, I’ve never seen him react like that. It must’ve been a good one.” I looked over my shoulder to see Grillby ignoring our table, back purposefully facing us as he organized the bottles behind the bar. His head was down- I could see the blue reflection in the bottles.

“Nonono, I think he hates me. I don’t think I should come back here again. Maybe I should leave. I might’ve offended him.” I worried.

“Nah,” Sans replied, “he’s probably heard worse from me.”

“I don’t think you get it.” I said slowly. “It was bad. I don’t even remember what it was, but it was a bad pun.” I ran a hand through my hair. “I’m just gonna- I’m going to ask for my check and get going.”

“You’ll have to go talk to him again then.” Sans pointed out. “If you can stand the heat some more.”

“You said no more teasing.”

“ You didn’t use any of my pickup lines. You admitted it yourself, so our agreement is null.”

I groaned loudly.

I was saved, for the moment, from more of Sans’ torment as Grillby himself arrived with all of our food. The plates were dolled out, and before he excused himself, Grillby leaned down to whisper something to Sans. Sans got that same grin from earlier as Grillby walked off, throwing one last silent glance my way.

“Looks like you,” Sans said, pulling his phone out again. “Just scored a phone number.”

With that, my phone buzzed with a text containing Grillby’s number.

I have no idea what happened from then until it was time to go, except now I had the number of a very attractive man on fire and I had found the most delicious burgers on the planet. Now, I was back in the car driving Napstablook and Mettaton home. Mettaton apparently lived by ‘Doctor’ Alphys, while Napstablook insisted that we not worry where they were staying.

“So, uh,” I asked, after the idle chatter had died down. “How did you two meet? Was it through the theater?”

Mettaton was oddly quiet, and after a moment, Napstablook spoke up. “Well, uh, we-we met because I watched his show in the Underground, and I got a phonecall with him on TV. I uh… I hung up because I panicked b-but he found my music online! And um, he uh, when the theater was getting formed, he reached out to me to learn how to w-work the sound board. And so now I do that. I actually live in the theater. And… I still go back home in the Underground, sometimes.”

“ Oh, ” I said, “Hey, were you, by chance, under the stage earlier today?”

“No, I wasn’t… why?” They replied nervously.

“I, um. I saw something under there. It was probably nothing. Probably just some prop playing tricks on me, honestly.”

“Oh… yeah.”

Mettaton piped up, “Blooky, you should play Juni some of your music next time they’re in the booth. Your new tracks are exceptionally good.” He insisted.

Blook sunk down in the car nervously.

I looked over my shoulder at them. “Yeah, sure. Definitely.” Absently, I wondered how many nicknames I was going to end up with. It had only been a day and I had multiple.

I dropped them off and went home. The next day, I came back to the theater, ready for another dose of whatever that all was.

I stopped before I dropped my bag into my cubby, just in time to not crush a small bundle of flowers that had been gently placed there.

“ Sans!” I hollered. “ Sans are you still teasing me!”

“Nah.” His voice was suddenly behind me, and I jumped in surprise. “I would’ve gotten roses.”

“Sans. Where did you come from. How did you get here.”

He didn’t answer any of my questions. “Looks like someone’s got a secret admirer. You work fast, Junior. You’re popular.”

I was about to say something when Catty and Bratty made their presence known at the door, loudly. “You’ve got a secret admirer!” They both chanted.

Oh gosh. Oh no.

Chapter Text

I called out, “No, wait, stop! It’s not what you think!” Except it was, so that didn’t help much. Plus Catty and Bratty were already running down the hallway screaming, letting everyone know the news. And probably interrupting the practice that was already going on, on the stage.

I looked back at Sans in exasperation. He was still smiling, and I was half-convinced that was just the natural state of his face. Which, to be fair, skeletons don’t have any lips to cover their teeth, so that would make sense. I was still upset though.

“Sans,” I asked, “can I pay you to stop?” I picked up the bundle of flowers, scrutinizing them.

“I didn’t do it, Junior. My hands are clean—I washed them this morning.” He gave me finger-guns with one hand, the other deep in his pocket. Hiding something, probably. More flowers? Secrets? Torments?

Papyrus walked by the open door, “He didn’t wash his hands. He’s a liar.”

“Why do you lie to me, Sans? You know that won’t work. I can see right through you .” I said, dead-eyed.

Sans, unfazed, replied in rapid-fire, “You know, I think you need to relax. Take a snooze, 10ccs of nap straight to the heart. Maybe a chill pill. You know who’s great to take naps with? Grillby. He’s warm, cuddly. Like a space-heater. Put a blanket over him and he’s like a kotatsu. Also he’s super lonely.”

There was a minute’s silence. I turned away from him. “I’m gonna go… to work now. I’ll see you.” That was really weird. Not gonna lie. I wasn’t sure who was more invested in Grillby at this point, but it seemed to be Sans.

As I left, Sans called out, “Yeah, but seriously you should text him.”

Okay, Sans. Okay.

I got to the workshop and Alphys greeted me with a shaky smile. She and Undyne were working on finishing the balcony. Alphys’ grin turned to confusion when she saw the flowers.

“How’d you get into the prop room?” Alphys said

“Hm?” I asked. “What?”

“The flowers. They’re from the prop room, right?”

Undyne nodded, stopping what she was doing to look up. “Not taking things from the prop room, right?” She asked pointedly. “Doggo doesn’t like that.”

“Uh, no, no! Someone put them in my cubby. Sans said something about a secret admirer, but I think he’s teasing. Help.” I defended. I pushed the flowers into Alphys’ hands.

“I’ll go put them back in a few minutes,” she said. “We should finish this up first.” She set the flowers down on the tree stump in the corner, and we set to work.

We got a good chunk of the way done, in fact we finished the balcony and started on a multi-use table that would be in a number of the scenes. Eventually, Alphys called for a break.

Frisk, with impeccable timing, wandered in. “Mom and dad need you for something, Alphys. It’ll just take a minute!”

Alphys excused herself, and waddled after Frisk, leaving Undyne and I alone. I was totally prepared to sit there awkwardly, not saying anything. I was actually quite enjoying sitting still. Undyne had other ideas.

“Hey, let’s go put those flowers back. I can let Doggo smell you.” She all but shouted, grabbing my by the shoulder.

“You mean show me to Doggo?”

“No, smell you. He has terrible eyesight. I don’t know how he lives.”

I did not bother to bring up that Undyne only had one working eye. Pot, meet kettle.

There was a moment of silence as we looked around the workshop, just standing there. “So, uh, shortstop. Where’d the flowers go?”

“Uh,” I mumbled, “they were on the stump. I’m pretty sure.”

“Well they’re not there now. Eugh, maybe they just fell off. Or something. Let’s go look!” She dragged me over to the corner, investigating.

The flowers were gone, a black smudge of an unidentifiable substance in their place. Now things were getting eerie, on top of getting annoying. A single blossom was sitting by the trapdoor.

“No.” I said.

“Huh? ‘No’ what?” Undyne asked.

“I’m not going down there. Give them up for lost, I’m not going down there again.”

“What, the trapdoor? Under the stage? Nothing but… dust and… dust under there.”

“Under where?” Sans walked up.

“Under there, duh.” Undyne responded, pointing at the trapdoor. “Where else?”

Sans took a look and tutted. “Oooh, well, sorry Juni. Looks like you’ve got a case of the ‘ghost crush’. Nothing for it, it’s terminal.” Sans sighed. “Guess we’ll have to break the bad news to Grillby; you’re a dead human walking.”

“Sans, that made exactly negative sense. And I can prove it mathematically. I’m a math student.” I said.

“I thought you were a theater student?” Undyne mentioned.

I paused.

Sans snapped his fingers in front of my face and I blinked.

“How did you…” I mumbled. “How do you snap your fingers with no skin?”

“You can’t just ask a person that, (y/n). You okay?” He said.

“Yeah, uh, what were we talking about?”

Undyne threw open the trapdoor and grabbed me by the collar. She began to lower me very gently, and then dropped me the rest of the way. She jumped in after.

Sans looked in at us, “I’ll be lookout.” He sat on the stump.

I groaned as I searched for the light switch, “Undyne, do we have to?”

“Doggo will be livid if we don’t get those flowers back. He picked those out personally!” She started walking inwards before I could turn the lights on. I ran to catch up, forgoing the light switch.

“Don’t just leave me!” I grumbled, jogging to catch up. “Undyne, do you even have a flashlight?”

She wove her arm out to keep me back. “Heck yeah, watch this!” There was a bright flash, and a glowing blue spear formed in her hand.

I stared in awe, fear, and— “ What. ”

She snickered. “Jealous?”

“No! Why do you just have a spear on tap ?”

“It’s my magic, obviously. What are you, stupid?” Undyne scoffed.

I yelled back, “Magic didn’t exist until you all— sh-shut up!” I stumbled but managed to keep up, now that the area was better lit. “This place is like a… like a catacomb.”

Undyne shrugged. “Well, people have supposedly died here before so… I’m not that surprised. Also it’s a creepy place.”

“People have died here? ” I stopped in my tracks.

She looked back and shrugged. “Probably? Maybe. I dunno. It’s old. Why, you scared?”

“This place is like half a year old at most how have people died already!”

“What?” She asked. “No- no I mean. Overall death. As in all versions of this build- nevermind , it doesn't matter! ”

We kept walking for a little while in silence, looking around on the floor for the flowers. It felt near-impossible that they would be this far into the trap room, but we kept looking.

Eventually, Undyne cleared her throat. “So uh, what do you think of Alphys as head of set design ‘n’ construction? She’s been doing well, right?” She seemed almost nervous. Almost.

“Hm? Uh, yeah. Yeah she’s been fine. Why?”

“No reason.” She quickly went back on that, muttering, “She just has a crippling fear that you secretly hate her.”

“Uh-” I stuttered. “What-why? I don’t hate her- why would she think I hate her?” I struggled to think of what I might’ve done that would’ve given her that impression.

Undyne didn’t look back at me. “She’s nervous . Just, naturally. She always has been. Probably… prolly always will.” Then, she glared back at me from over her shoulder. “You don’t dislike her, at all. Right? ”

Was. Was this a threat? This felt like a threat. This is definitely a threat. Oh my god. She was actually threatening me- “ No! Also is- is this a, are you- am I in trouble for some reason?”

Undyne seemed to catch herself and her expression went slack briefly. “No, no of course not.” After a breath, she turned to face me, then looked around self consciously. “No, but. Mn-” she sighed, leaning on one leg with her head tilted to the side. “If I come off, like I’m mad. Chances are it’s just... “ She gestured vaguely. “I’m an intense person. So, yeah. You’re fine.”

After a moment of silence I shrugged in response, since it seemed she wanted one.

Undyne shrugged back and took a steadying breath. “I could use a min-, uh,” She cleared her throat. “We should split up, cover more ground, all that. Meet back here in a few, or uh, I’ll come find you?”

I shrugged again, not actually wanting to be alone but also not wanting to disagree. “Sounds okay I guess.”

“Scream if you find something.” Undyne turned and walked off, leaving me alone with only the light of my phone and the distant glow of Undyne’s spear, letting lonely me know that she was still around. That was nice at least.

“...’Scream if you find something’?” I mumbled to myself uncertainly. I wove my way through the shelving and props, eyes trained on the floor.

Without someone to distract me I suddenly realized just how stale the air felt, and how cluttered the whole place was. I could feel the grime of it between my fingers and in my mouth, but I tried to ignore it best I could. It was crowded enough to shrink my lungs as I tried not to let the anxiety get to my head.

Focusing solely on the spotlight from my phone, I noticed, impossibly, the flowers.

They were sitting daintily on a something- on a, a prop?- way too far down deep into this place- down here .

My chest hurt.

Taking a breath, I gingerly reached forward to receive them. They were oddly sticky? Kinda grossed out, I turned and my light landed on a glinting masked pillar standing a foot from me. Dizzying panic overtook me and I think I started screaming- and I definitely threw my phone. It lit up the stranger like a horror film with shit cinematography. The creature shook and shrank away from the light, letting out a horrible noise like a warbling, static-y dial up tone. Its body was slick and melting, with shadows highlighting the grit, hair, and dust that had stuck in odd clumps throughout its barely held together body.

It moved with surprising speed, fearfully slipping away as fast as Undyne could sprint over. She too was screaming, which I only noticed once I stopped screaming. Ohhh god, my throat hurt. My legs came out from under me and I dropped the flowers, uselessly flailing my arms for something to hold on to.

Undyne called for me, but I didn’t hear her clearly until the third or fourth time.

“Hey- hey!” She kneeled to look me in the eye, spear illuminating the two of us in cool blue. “Breathe, come on. Are you okay? Are you with me?”

I panted and wheezed. “There- there was a… The flowers.” I threw my arm out in the direction I dropped them in.

“Yeah yeah okay nice that’s fine good but why did you scream! Are you okay? Are you hurt? Oh god, and what was that noise?”

“M-monster.” I gasped out.

She stared at me. “Which one.” There was a pause. “Felix?”

I blinked. “Sorry- it- there was a mask, and it was made of- of slime or something.”

Undyne’s grip on her spear tightened, and she looked around quickly. Taking hold of my arm, she pulled me up. “We should get out of here-”

I gasped. “The floor!”

There was a wet trail leading to where the thing must have escaped to. Undyne ushered me along, stepping over the trail, until we were safely out from under the stage. She sat me down on the stump, sharply telling me to sit there until she was back, before sprinting off.

Sans, useful as always, was sitting not too far away. “So,” he started. “Did I miss somethin’ important?”

I looked up at him with what I assumed was an even expression, but judging by his odd mouth twitch, probably wasn’t.

I spoke breathlessly. “There is someone. Living under the stage. It is melting.”

“The stage or the person?”

“ The person. ”

Sans’s expression didn’t change. “Ah. Gotcha.”

“Do you ever have an emotional response to anything?”

“Eh.” He shrugged. “Yeah. Do you?”

“I literally just.”

He shrugged again, “A fear response?” Then, he stood up. “I uh… I gotta…. Bye.” I blinked, then somehow- he was gone.

With a sigh, I shakily reached for my phone. Except, I didn’t have my phone. Oh god, I realized, it must still be down where I found the flowers. Dread filled me and twisted my insides for the next few minutes until Undyne came back with Frisk in tow.

She pushed a juice box into my hands after putting the straw into it. “Drink it.”

I briefly started mumbling something, before taking a breath and drinking the juice. My eyes fell on Frisk, who put a tiny comforting hand on my knee. We shared a glance, and they nodded. Knowingly. I got the distinct impression that they understood everything perfectly, at least emotionally. An odd peace settled into my heart, which was nice since most of me was still vibrating from shock.

After finishing off the juice box -which never takes long, they never put enough in a juice box what is even the point- I took a few more breaths and declared, “My phone. Is still. Down there.”

Undyne looked unsurprised, to say the least. “By the monster?”

I paused, then nodded.

Undyne sighed, “Frisk, stay here with Felix. I’m going in. Papyrus should be here in a-”

“UNDYNE!” Papyrus screamed, standing in the doorway, scarf billowing from some non-existent wind. Must’ve been magic. I guess? “I have come to assist you as you requested!”

“There you are!” She yelled back with a grin. “Come on, let’s go get to the bottom of this nonsense.”

“Uh-” I tried, but was drowned out by them hollering at one another, psyching up for their small adventure. I wanted to tell them that being loud would just… alert the thing that they were coming, but…. There’s no stopping a force of nature. And even less stopping two.

Papyrus and Undyne trudged down the steps, Undyne with her spear to light the way and Papyrus holding a flashlight. The moment the duo made it out of sight, Frisk took a few steps down to turn on the lights for them. They flickered on after a short delay, and there were a couple of shouts of surprise in the distance.

Frisk made their way back up to me and sat down by the stump, pulling another pair of juice boxes out from someplace. Offering one to me, we sat quietly and drank.

“So… where did, where were you holding these?”

“Inventory.” Frisk shrugged.

“Ah.” I replied, not understanding.

“This is a game.”

“What?” I felt slightly offended, for some reason.

“A game, with rules, and words.”

I didn’t say anything back, staring at the kid. They finished their juice box and took out another.

After a moment, Frisk shrugged. “Mhm.”

“You said ‘narrator’ yesterday.”

They nodded.

Frisk didn’t seem like they were going to explain any further on their own. After a few more minutes and juice boxes later, they offered a little bag of homemade fish crackers. “Mom gave me a lot of these, if you want some? They’re good. Mom makes them.”

“Uh,” I reached out to take the offered snacks. “Thanks. So, how did… I mean,” Shit. “You’re adopted by royal monsters?” Fuck. Why did I.

Frisk nodded, just like I hadn't asked something horribly tactless. “Mhm. I ran away, and then liberated the monsters from the underground. So, I guess I’m kind of a hero? But,” they shrugged again, “people say they’re happy. That’s what’s important.”

This child ran away from home and maybe has birth parents somewhere what the fuck. Is this. Is this illegal? “Oh. Wow. That’s. That’s amazing.” I replied.

Is this child okay ?

Frisk shrugged again, looking down at the crackers in their hands quietly. “As long as people are happy...”

I got the distinct impression that this tiny child was holding something big back. And was probably older than I first thought.

There was a tense pause. I ventured to ask, “Are you…”

“No one needs to worry.” They replied.

Thankfully, that was about when Papyrus peeked out from the trap door. “(y/n)? Felix? Did you maybe, perhaps leave your phone someplace else? We’re having some trouble finding it.”

“Wh-” I gaped. “I was using it to see!”

“ Yes , but. However. It is not there. It seems to have disappeared. So perhaps, maybehaps, you perchance maybe left it elsewhere, when in reality you had some sort of flashlight.”

I stared at him. “No.”

He sighed. “Could you look anyways? Please?”

I sighed, heavier than he did. “Sure, Paps, fine.”

His expression lit up. Literal stars, in his eyes, I swear. “You used a nickname. Are we friends? ”

I wasn’t sure what to say. “I- yes? I- thought, yes? We all got.. Dinner. Isn't that like… step… two of the friendship manual. You’re like the… the little brother I-” I started coughing violently, choking on dust.

He seemed more excited. “There is a manual?”

Then I double didn’t know what to say. Shit man, I was- this was joke time. I was joking! “Y-” Oh no. “Yeah.”

“Could I borrow it? I could… very much use it. No-not that the Great Papyrus would need coaching on how to befriend someone! I am just hoping for some pro-strats!” He quickly corrected.

“Yeah. Yeah I just… gotta find it. I’ll… get it to you fast as I can… Bye.” I turned sharply and left to sit by my cubby.

Feeling dejected, I pushed the door open to the dressing room where my cubby was. There was trail of snail slime across the floor leading from the closet to the cubbies. My heart sank. No.

I cautiously approached the cubbies to look into mine to find- my phone? Underneath it was a near-illegably scrawled note, that after a moment I recognized at that font no one ever uses on word docs. The- the symbols one. The one that makes absolutely no sense for why it exists.

My phone seemed perfectly in tact after wiping away some residue, even after flipping through it a bit.

Then, my eyes trailed down to the floor. After a few moment’s hesitation, I slowly approached the closet. One hand wound back to defend myself, the other on the door handle, I threw it open.

Chapter Text

Throwing the door open without any regard, I pulled my punch at just the last second. Sans, who was  i n s i d e  the god damn closet, yelped as my fist was launched forward, too fast for me to stop. I yelled something unintelligible just as Sans disappeared. My fist hit the wall with a solid thud, and I let out a shout of pain, immediately cradling the injured hand with a groan.

I could hear a small clattering noise, like a clicking of bones behind me. Gasping for air, unable to really process what just happened, I rotated.

“Sa-Sans? Sans?” I asked.

Sans’s eyes were black- the usual small lights inside them just, gone. He was still smiling.

“Sans?” I was getting nervous, on top of being guilty. “Sans, I-I’m sorry.”

Sans didn’t look at me.

“Sa-Sans?” A knot was forming in my throat and behind my eyes. I reached out to touch his shoulder. He flinched and looked up at me. The little lights in his eyes returned, but his smile still seemed strained.

“You’ve got some skeletons in your closet, eh, Juni?” He joked. His voice was faint.

I rubbed out the tears that had collected in my eyes. “What? Oh-the- uh- no. It’s. I’ve had a really stressful day, Sans I-” tears were collecting in my vision again and I think my nose started to run. “I’m sorry I-”

Sans shrugged and patted my shoulder. “Hey, Junior. It’s… Fine. It’s fine, see? We’re good. It was just a prank gone wrong, you know? It happens. Plus,” he knocked his fist gently against his skull and winked at me. “I’m pretty hardheaded.”

“Why were you in the clos-”

This is when Papyrus opened the door. “I HEARD YELLING, IS EVERYONE OKAY?”

“Bro,” Sans answered. “We talked about this, you gotta use the inside voice backstage.”

Papyrus cleared his throat. “Right. Yes. That is correct and I, the Great Papyrus, had just forgotten in my worry for my friend. Which Felix is.”

Sans’s smile seemed genuine now. “Hey, sweet. They’re my friend too, that’s pretty awesome, huh, Fe?”

Is that. Also my nickname now? “Yeah.” I replied weakly.

"So now what was all that screaming nonsense?” Papyrus asked again.

Sans and I spoke over one another.

“I spooked Felix.”

“I almost punched Sans.”

After a beat, Papyrus yelled, “What? Great jeepers both of you need healing!”

“Wh- healing? Healing?” I looked between the two of them. “What, with like, mana? Are we LARPing now.”

Papyrus cocked his head to the side. “Mana? What’s mana?”

“Man-a, I just don’t know.” Sans said.

I did not acknowledge that he said that. “Nobody’s hurt, Pap, it’s fine. We’re fine.” I, of course, said this while cradling my hurt hand.

Papyrus waltzed in and gestured to take a look at it, which I sighed, rolled my eyes, slumped my shoulders, and let him.

“Do you know anything about human hands?” I asked.

“Of course I do!” He replied, turning my hand over in his. “Humans are just skeletons wrapped in a strange blanket of squish, and I see skeleton bones all the time.”

Infallible.

While we were busying ourselves with that, something caught Sans’s eye and he wandered out of my vision. After a few seconds more, he cleared his throat. “Hey so uh, who’s sendin’ you love letters in wingdings?”

I whirled around awkwardly to look at him. “ What? ”

“Yeah.”

“No what? You can read that? Is that- was that- what?”

“Yeah.”

“The ghost is writing in wingd- you can read that? God you better be joking about that being a love note, right?”

“Yeah. No.”

Papyrus seemed as perplexed as I was. Yet. Oddly... unsurprised.

He asked, “I thought it was ghost, not a skeleton?”

Sans shrugged and gave a half-smile. “How would I know?”

I cut in, “But you can read that!”

“Yeah.” He answered.

There was a pause.

“Read it, Sans.” I prompted.

“Oh. I did.”

Another pause.

“Out… out loud, buddy.” I said quietly.

“Oh.” Sans cleared his throat again, smiling, and mumbled out some strange, unintelligible nonsense.

“That-that- that is not English, Sans.”

“Yeah. It’s wingdings, Junior.”

“S a n s.”

He snorted. “Okay, okay, pay attention this time. ‘Hello, dear backstage hand. I did not mean to scare you, and for that I deeply, sincerely apologize and feel dreadfully sorry. I meant to introduce myself properly and greet the lovely new addition to our team-’” Sans paused and gave me a bored look. “I don’t know what he’s on about, he’s not a part of the theater team. He just loiters. He’s a loitering ghost.”

Papyrus jumped in, “ Sans , I thought you said you didn’t know about the ghost! Are you lying again?”

Sans continued reading. “‘...didn’t mean to scare you,’ blah blah ‘introduce myself’... eehh...okay, ‘greet the lovely new addition to our team. For now I think this letter will suffice. If you would like to find me, you know where I am. I have returned your phone to your storage box safely, and once again I am very sorry for scaring you. I do hope you will forgive me. Yours, WD Gaster.’”

Sans folded the letter, putting it back in my cubby. “There ya go.”

“That.” I started. “Doesn’t change the fact that following me is creepy .”

“Is it really following you, if you work above him?”

“Why does he live there?!”

“Cause that’s his house, duh,” Sans replied, “If you find it so creepy then tell him to stop.”

“That would require going into the basement. Which, no.”

Papyrus put his hands on his hips. “Felix, the only way you’re going to deal with your problems is by dealing with them.”

There was a discordant, sad warble from the closet.

“Someone’s asking if he’s a problem. I’m not sure who,” Sans rolled his eyes, “but someone.”

I gestured sharply and gave a wide-eyed look at Sans. “Why is he in the closet again? ” Panicking, I turned on my heel. “I’m out, I’m leaving, goodbye. I will disappear into the aether!”

Papyrus gasped. “No, friend, don’t leave! Don’t leave m- your problems!”

There was another sad warble from the closet and I started running.

I ran faster than I ever had before, jumping over obstacles and dodging around a few other people. Fumbling my phone out, I quickly tapped “Ssa e me there is a crazh ghost stalkinf me Im die” and sent it to someone. I wasn’t looking as I typed.

I ran by a tall goat monster on my way to the door. I grabbed the handles and threw the grand double doors open and-

Sans.

“There’s a skeleton in your closet, dude, you need to go back. His name is WD Gaster and he’s very sad. I said Grillby was sad? WD is like Grillby times 50.”

Speaking of Grillby, my phone buzzed. I had apparently texted my flurry of panic to him. His response was a long string of question marks and exclamation points ending with “Are you okay? Where are you?”

I responded with “i’m at tthe theater. THE KIDS R NOT ALRIHT” and gave Sans an exasperated look. “NO.” I shouted, and slammed the doors shut. I whirled around, ready to run to the emergency exit.

Sans.

“S T O P. This time I will punch you.”

The goat that I ran by walked up, and I noticed first the incredibly loud Hawaiian shirt he was wearing, and then the very concerned and slightly scared look on his face.

“Is everything alright?”

“No. This is-this is illegal! I want to leave and this small teleporting wisecracking asshole skeleton cannot stop me! And Sans don’t you dare say that was a pun I know it was in the- skels- closet!” I was out of breath, rather dizzy, and I think my fist was somewhere.

The goat guided me to a chair gently. “Just take a breath, it’s going to be fine. Would you like some tea?”

Toriel decided to make an appearance, hurrying over in concern. “(y/n)! What is going on here? Asgore, what did you do?”

Hawaiian-shirt goat, King (?) Asgore, straightened up very quickly, putting his hands up in… surrender? “No no, Sans was pranking poor… (y/n). I think they need to take a break.”

The doors then flew open with a crash.

Grillby.

“WHERE. ARE. THE KIDS.”

No one said anything, and the only noise was Grillby panting. Did he... run? It was an odd crackling noise, like a fire, starved of oxyg - wait. Oh.

It then dawned on me and I shot up. “Nonononononono it was a saying there are no kids I was without myself I didn’t know what I was typing I’M SORRY.”

Grillby paused. “There are no children in danger?”

“No.” I said. “I’m sorry.” I said much quieter.

Grillby hung his head, breathing out a sigh of relief. “Okay, half the danger is gone.”

“What's the other half?” I mumbled.

He walked over and started ushering me out the door, to Toriel and King Asgore’s surprise. “You’re being stalked, yes? Time to go.”

Toriel, from behind me, exclaimed, “Stalked?!”

Asgore in a surprisingly intense voice added, “Sans. Explain.”

There was a very long, drawn out, “Well… you see… you know the ghost?”

In my daze, I didn’t say anything. I kept my eyes on Grillby. It wasn’t hard- he’s very eye-catching. For many reasons.

The doors shut firmly behind me.

I was then lead, in the quiet midday, to a-

A moped.

It was unexpected, but I oddly enough wasn’t surprised. It fit perfectly. Next thing I’m gonna learn is he’s the single father of a teenage girl or something, another thing that would have fit perfectly.

He sat down on the light blue moped and patted the seat behind him. “We could walk instead if you prefer, it is a nice day out.”

“I’m done pretending to have an opinion, let’s just go. I’m done.” I strapped on the helmet he handed to me and sat down.

He drove. So slowly.

“You know, we could drive a little faster,” I said, as an excuse to lean my chin on his shoulder.

“I’m going the speed limit,” He replied.

“There isn’t a speed limit on the sidewalk, Grillby. In fact, I feel like this is illegal.”

“The sidewalk is safer! Didn’t you say you were done having an opinion?”

“Oh, now you’re sassy . I see how it is. You save me from being stalked, and then sass me. Fine.”

His shoulders moved like he was chuckling.

“Stop laughing at me,” I said in a dead voice. “Cease. Desist.”

He laughed loud enough I could hear him. Worth it.

When we finally got to the family-friendly bar- he has to be a dad, now that I think about it. Anyway, when we got to the bar I noticed it was closed.

“Did you close the bar? Because of me?”

As he unlocked it he replied, “No? Maybe?”

“Isn't this your source of living? Don’t you have employees? Please don’t close your bar because of me, it’s your source of living.”

“Isn’t your life your source of living? Aren’t you in peril?”

I stared at him. “Don’t sass me, boy.”

He chuckled again and opened the door for me.

“But no, seriously, it was slow. It wasn’t a problem. I gave everyone an hour lunch break.”

“Wait, I wouldn’t be in your contacts list yet. Why did you bother responding to me?”

“Somebody was in danger.”

“How did you know which theater?”

He shrugged. “I assumed.”

“Wait did.” I thought about how quick he arrived. “Did you speed? On a moped?”

He shrugged again. “Will you arrest me if I say yes?”

I paused. “Do you… Want me… to?” Is this flirting? Save me.

We both stared at each other for a minute.

“Would you like a drink?”

“Please. Just… please. The day I have had.” I gestured vaguely.

“Would you like to talk about it? You can take a seat at the bar.”

I did. “Prepare your preparations. I’m going to ramble. This is some Grade A bullshit.”

“Before you begin, what would you like?”

“Fuck me up.”

“Really? It’s only one in the afternoon.”

I put a hand on the table and leaned in. “Exactly.”

Grillby seemed very concerned, but started mixing something.

“Okayokayokay, this is the most absurd thing I have ever witnessed in all of my days. This is my second day of work. I think. Yeah, yeah - this is like, my second day of work. The first day? The first day comprised of me seeing a ghost. Today I met the ghost. And we screamed at each other. And he wrote me a love letter . It was creepy . And then he was in the closet. And so was Sans, and then I almost punched Sans, and then the ghost was in the closet again and if Sans turns out to be WD Gaster so help me I will end him. ” I paused for breath, and Grillby seemed to digest this information.

“Continue,” he prompted after a moment. He finished mixing my drink, and set it down on a coaster in front of me.

I took a long drink and set it down again. The burning in my throat made me cough.

“Too much?”

“Not enough.” I took another drink. “Sans isn’t telling me something, and I can feel it. I can sense it. And everyone in that theater is crazy! And I feel kind of like the world’s dissolving!”

“Drinking probably won’t help any of that, but okay. Whatever floats your metaphorical boat. Just be aware that after drinking that you might start feeling like the world’s dissolving more.”

“Grillby, what did you put in this drink?” I set the drink down.

“You gave me vague instructions, I made you a vague drink. This is what happens when you distract the bartender.”

“What.”

“Sorry, you’re just very distracting for me.”

“I was just venting! Like every other bar patron! You asked me to!”

He spoke very quietly. “I’m sorry. I was trying to flirt.”

“Ooooh. Oh.” I was quieter and stared down at my hands. “Oh.”

There was an uncomfortable silence.

I said, “So, uh. How was your day?”

“It was nice. I have to pick up something for my daughter later, she needs something for an after school club.”

I slammed my drink on the counter and pointed at him, “I knew it!”

His fire flared in surprise. “Y-You… knew my daughter needed something?”

“No, you’re like, totally a dad. You exude dad-ness.”

Grillby suddenly seemed very self-conscious. “Do you- is th- do you not like that? Is that a bad thing?”

“No, no, it’s just nice to have confirmation. It’s good to be right. It’s a good thing.”

He turned blue.

“What is this. Is this blushing? Are you flustered? Are you scared? Did I do a bad?”

He grabbed a rag and started polishing the counter-top, sunglasses trained downward.

“Why are you wearing shades indoors? It’s darkish in here.” I deflected, attempting to get away from the awkwardness of everything.

Very quietly I could hear Grillby say, “You’re too hot, I have to wear shades.” There was that awkwardness again.

I downed the rest of my drink and set the glass down. “That doesn’t- I don’t. Grillby. Why- no. That makes no-” I stopped talking. “We’re both bad at this!”

“Ha!” He smacked the rag down onto the counter in triumph. “Now you’re flustered. How the turns have tabled.”

I stared at him. He slowly turned blue again.

“We. Need to stop talking. We should probably just not talk. This is very awkward. We’re so bad at this. This is flirting, right? We don’t hate each other? ‘Cause my filter is dying and I like you, but I’m terrible at showing it. And I’m very stressed today, just had a very strong drink that I probably shouldn’t have had without food, and I just want to go home.”

“Do you need food?” Grillby asked.

“Yes please.”

He left into the back, presumably to make something, and the bell above the door rang as someone walked in. I heaved a sigh of relief, thankful there was someone else to break the awkward that had filled the room.

I didn’t look up, happy to just stare at my hands, but the moment I saw blue in my peripheral vision I knew. I feared.

Sans.

“Hey, uh, buddy. Pal. Friend.” He sat down on the bar seat next to me. “I came over to apologize, uh.” He scratched the back of his head with one hand.

“This better be good, Sans. This is a lot more serious than you are pretending it is.”

“Nonono, I know. This is my serious face. You can tell because I’m slightly less grin. Normally I’m running on 90%, this is more around 75%. Which is the best I can do, my face is kinda stuck this way. I mean that seriously. I kinda just have teeth.”

“Yes, Sans, get to the point.”

He took a breath. Or pretended to. “I’m sorry. This is a lot weirder than I thought it would be. Listen, I know WD, and he really wants to be friends with you, but he has absolutely no idea what he’s doing. No clue. And he’s terrified of everyone. How he even managed to talk to me, who knows. He’s a good person.”

“So you were lying.”

“Yeah.”

“Like, four times. To both your brother and I. And you were willing to lie about lying.”

He seemed very sheepish. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry.”

“You also lied to Papyrus, you should apologize to him.”

“Papyrus can’t know.”

“Why not?” I demanded.

He struggled for words and gestured. “It’s really complicated.”

“Then uncomplicate it, and explain.”

“Felix, that’s not really how it-” his eyes went dark. He started over. “I’ve tried explaining. Papyrus doesn’t get it, I don’t think he remembers.”

“What.”

“People don’t remember him.”

“Catty and Bratty are constantly talking about him. He’s ‘The Ghost’. Capital ‘g’ and everything.”

“Yeah, ‘The Ghost’, not ‘Gaster’.” He made air quotes with his hands.

“Explain better. ”

“He doesn’t exist. There. I explained it. If you just write him back and explain you want him to stop, tell him you want him to leave you alone, he will. Just know that, like, you’re probably the only one aside from me who’s going to remember his name.”

“That’s manipulation, Sans. And really weird. And I’m not sure if I believe you.”

“If you don’t believe me, just as Papyrus next time you see him. Ask him what the ghost’s name was. And you’ll know he’s not lying, because my brother couldn’t tell a lie if his or even my life depended on it.”

Grillby then came out holding a plate of french fries. Thank god. I’m saved.

Grillby took one look at my face and turned to Sans. “What did you say? Did you apologize?”

“For all the trouble? Yeah, I just did.”

“Good.” He set the fries down, rummaged around under the bar, and pulled out a bottle of ketchup. “I assume you want the usual?”

“You’re my best man, Grillb’.” Sans said with a wink. How does his face work.

Grillby nodded. “I know. I’m an enabler.” He looked pointedly at my empty glass. “It’s my job. But for the record, I’m cutting you off there. You don’t need any more drinks, Felix, was it?”

“Actually, it’s (y/n). But,” I looked at Sans. “Sure. Wait, were we not introduced?”

“No, we were not.”

“Shit, you came and saved me on your moped after vague texts? And flirted with me. And I didn’t tell you my name. Ohhh my god.” I rested my head in my hands.

Sans gave me a look. “You two were flirting? Aw. You didn’t even need my help.”

“No. No I didn’t.” I gave him a pointed look.

I noticed Grillby shaking his head lightly, and the conversation continued in a light tone as customers and the few staff members ambled back into the restaurant. It felt so natural to be here with the two of them. I could almost forgive Sans for being such a shit earlier, though I still had my hangups. The time passed without notice, and before I knew it, Grillby had pulled his phone out.

“Ah. I looks like I need to go.”

“Hm? For, for what?” I asked.

“The things I needed to get for my daughter... I need to pick them up now, since she'll be done with school soon.  If you’ll excuse me,” he trailed off.

“Wait- uh,” I stuttered. Sans was giving me a questioning look. “Mind if I come? You, were my ride here.” I defended.

Grillby looked at me for a moment, processing it. “Right, of course. You don’t mind, do you?”

“No, course not.” I offered him a smile, and got up to follow him back to the moped.

Chapter Text

I made a beeline for the moped, buckling the helmet Grillby gave me onto my head. “My turn to drive!” I said excitedly.

Grillby, somehow, got there first. He sat down, looked me dead in the eye, and said very quietly, “No.”

I leaned over the moped’s handles dramatically, “Bu’whynot.”

Grillby stared at me, almost as if to say ‘you have the answer right there.’ I, in turn, insisted on getting an answer. I insisted with my eyes . A little louder than before, he said, “You’re buzzed. Buzzed driving is against the law. Get on the back.”

I let myself flop forward. “What’re you gonna do, h’arrest me?”

“Yes.”

“Liar. You’re a liar. Just like Sans. Sans is a liar. You’re all liars. Papyrus is the only trustworthy person in this,” I took a deep breath, “Place.”

Grillby patted the empty seat behind him. He had the patience of a goddess. Thank goodness, ‘cause I don’t know where I’m going with this. Or where we’re going. Probably to the store? He said the store. Which store? I don’t know where the store is. Thank god I’m not driving. That is too much pressure.

“Grill-bee,” I enunciated with precision, “Where, pray tell, are we going? Exactly?”

He patted the seat behind him again. “We’ve got a little bit of a schedule, Felix. You can stay behind if you like, but if you do that you’ll have to sit with Sans.”

I rolled my eyes, got on the moped, and wrapped my arms around his waist. “Safety precaution.” I mumbled. “So where are we going?” I said louder.

“The store, the supermarket? There’s only one supermarket in the area.”

There was a long pause. “Riiiiight. Right. Anyways, let’s go. Get this thing in gear. Pedal to the metal. Kick it.”

“That’s not how mopeds work.”

He twisted the thing and we started to move. “It’s just a figure of speech, Grill. It’s all in the figures.”

“That figures.”

I started screaming softly, weakly. It turned into giggling. I could hear Grillby quietly laughing.

“Let’s get you some water when we get there because you’re, kind of, hm.” Grillby hummed, trailing off.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I said indignantly.

“You’re uh, a bit of a train wreck right now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Between all the trains and non-trains I’ve known, you’re my favorite train wreck. You’re just kind of… drunk-ish. I probably shouldn’t have made that drink so potent.” he corrected himself.

“First of all,” I huffed, “that’s probably racist against trains. Which I’m assuming are sentient, since you’re saying you know them? Second of all, you served me that drink. I was being polite in drinking it all.”

“To be fair though, you did ask for the house special, ‘Fuck me up.’”

“You know, for a fire, you sure are salty.”

“Only a sprinkle, or I wouldn’t be here.”

“That’s a pun, I can sense it. I just can’t pinpoint why.”

“You’ll probably figure it out once you, you know, stop being so buzzed.”

“We can’t all be perfect, Grill.” I paused for a moment in thought. “Does ‘healing’ cure drunkiness? And bruises?”

He suddenly sounded a lot less relaxed. “ Healing? What do you need healing for, why are you bruised ?”

“Oh ah- it-you know how I said I almost punched Sans? By not punching him, I-uh, hit the wall. Surprisingly hard.”

The moped came to a sudden but safe stop. Grillby took my hands from around his waist and pulled them forward, which yanked my face directly into the crook of his neck. “Which hand? How much does it hurt? How hard is surprisingly hard?”

The only coherent thought I could voice was, “Grillby why are you plush. Why does your body have give to it? Aren’t you made of fire?”

Grillby found the bruising on my knuckles with no help from me, which was good since I was useless.

My phone buzzed, and I yanked my good hand out of Grillby’s grasp to check it.

It was three texts from Sans, “L”, “O”, “L”.

I responded with, “Why is this? Cease.” I shoved my phone back in my pocket and nudged Grillby’s shoulder with my head. “Give me my hand back. It doesn’t hurt that much anymore.”

“So it does hurt.”

“Only if I touch it or aggressively clench my fist. I’m fine. Let’s go. We can get some ice if you’re that worried, you know, at the supermarket. Where we’re going.”

“Right. Yeah. Uh, yeah.” He released my hand and we continued on our journey.

Once we got off the moped at the supermarket, we wandered over to the vending machine. As Grillby was putting in a few dollars and was getting me water, I decided to ask a very important question.

“So are you made of sticks?” I paused. “That was really rude of me, I’m sorry. I have like a deficit of tact. But, I-um-I. Yeah. You’re plush.” I patted my arm to demonstrate. “You’re soft, you know? Just like Sans said, you’re cuddly. It’s weird. A good weird.”

“Sans said that?”

“I… yes?”

“Huh. Okay.” He seemed introspective for a few moments before handing me the water. “Down this like you downed that liquor and you’ll be fine.”

“Sure. But seriously, you have shape. You fill that vest out nicely—shit I mean. What I meant to say is. You have. A nice form—fuck. Uh. Bye is what I meant to say. I’m going to walk to my car. I’ll see you when the show airs, which is never because this is a live production, probably not going to be filmed. Eh uh bye.”

I turned heel.

“What?” Grillby asked. “Felix, stop it. Take a breath. It’s fine. Drink the water. You sound kind of like you have heat stroke.”

“And who’s fault is that, I wonder? Maybe I wouldn’t have heat stroke if you weren’t so he-heated.”

Grillby offered me a hand. “Let’s go.”

“Where?”

He gestured to the door of the supermarket.

“…Right.” I unscrewed the cap of the water bottle pointedly and took a drink. I felt Grillby’s gentle hand on my back as he lead me into the store.

There was a considerable number of people in the store for whatever the fuck day it was. I, in all honesty, am not fond of crowds. And at some point my hand found its way into Grillby’s. So we don’t get lost, of course. He apparently didn’t notice, or at least he didn’t say anything. I let him lead me along the aisles of the store I had probably been to before, but I didn’t seem to know where anything was.

By the time we reached the office and art supply I had downed at least half the bottle of water. Clearing my throat and wiping my mouth of with my wrist, I said, “So what do we actually need?”

Grillby leaned away from the uncapped bottle of water that I was carelessly waving around. When it seemed like I didn’t know what to do with my arm, he gently nudged it downwards so the bottle was away from him. “Poster board,” he replied.

“That’s it? Tri-fold, or like, foam core? Paper? Is there a color? I- am a student. Possibly of art. I have done many presentations in my time. I’m a college student.”

“I know.”

“I’ve been to school before. I’ve attended college. I’ve been through grades.” I took another swig of water while he considered the limited number of options before us. “So,” I asked, “do they have what we need? What your daughter needs?”

Then it hit me that I was in a date-ish scenario with an adult someone who had a daughter, and I decided to stare into the middle distance while twisting the half-empty bottle without saying anything more about the surreal situation. I’m an adult-thing. Who’s into another adult.

He looked back at me after a moment with a sterner expression than he normally had. “I… don’t actually know.”

“Is this like something important? What’s it-what’s it for?”

“I don’t know…” He looked off, embarrassed.

I took a drink, then asked, “So maybe, we could text her and ask? Or we could just get her a poster and it should work? I mean, does it have to be on a table?”

Grillby, increasingly concerned, once more replied with, “I don’t know.”

“What did she ask for then?”

“Uh, she just asked for a poster board. For a presentation. For her club.”

“What’s the club?”

“World culture, which now includes monster culture.”

I snapped my fingers, “Tri-fold. Get a tri-fold, no way to go wrong with a tri-fold.”

He was quiet for a moment. “What’s a… tri-fold?”

I took a deep drink from the thing, capped it off, then started flipping through the poster boards on the shelf until I found one. “It’s one of these things, it’s folded three times. So that it’ll stand up, you know? Like, on a table.”

He hummed in understanding and smiled gently.

I, gracefully as ever, twitched a smile back. I then realized my face was rather warm, so I’d probably been blushing the whole time. It was most likely not a very charming smile, though he seemed to be amused by it, as he smiled more and shook his head.  

I’m fucking smooth.

I hate myself.

“Do we need anything else? Should we-should we get anything? She only needed a poster board, right? No, like, glitter pens or markers or something? Glue? Construction paper? Biographies?” I wiped my face with a hand, “I’ve never been in a club. I’ve never done anything. ”

“You seem to know a lot about theater and construction, from what I’ve heard. Or at least taking orders for construction.”

“Yeah! Well. Uh, yeah.” I didn’t really have an answer for that. “I just, kinda, yeah. I don’t know. It’s easy. I just kind of do it on auto-pilot, you know. I mean, I pay attention, I just… yeah. Ignore all that.” I turned away, crinkling the now empty bottle in my hands nervously. I felt Grillby pat my shoulder kindly.

“Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah! Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry, things are just a little weird lately. But I’m fine.”

He looked at me as though to say, “That’s a lot of ‘yeah I’m fine’s”, but only squeezed my shoulder in response.

We started making our way to the checkout, and my hand found his again. Didn’t want him getting lost, after all. Eventually we found our way back to the moped, and I found a trashcan to throw out the bottle.

“Hey Grillby, how are we going to carry this, actually?”

“I figured you would.”

“Is that why you brought me?”

There was a long pause. “No.”

I gave a mockingly offended scoff, then took the poster board from him. “ I see how it is.” I sat down on the back of the moped and patted the space in front of me. “We’ve got a schedule, right?”

Awkwardly, he got on with me holding the poster board- trying my damndest not to get it super bent up and ruined. With little fanfare, and little wobbling, we were off. My free arm was wrapped around his waist securely, and his warmth kept the cool breeze from getting too cold. My arm was getting tired, but I didn’t say anything.

With only the sound of the rushing wind to distract me, my thoughts drifted over the strangeness of the past day and a half. The bizarre turn that it had taken in such a short amount of time, and at least for now, the bizarre turn it looked like it was going to continue taking. Was this going to last? Did I want it to last? The play was going to happen for real in less than a month, and after that… then what? Would it all be forgotten and fade away, if I didn’t- if they didn’t want me back?

This was stupid- I was being stupid.

It did feel too quick to be real, though. Like it would end just as abruptly as it started.

But then, there was Grillby. Plays end, and friends go, but there was something here, I think. And even if I embarrassed myself too much to come back to the theater, or the ‘ghost’ became even more of a serious problem that no one is reacting rationally too, there would be that family friendly bar with its quiet owner.

This was the first time I’d felt like an adult, that I could remember. Grillby was certainly an adult, and I’d been an ‘adult’ for some time now- but before I’d never really thought about it. He had a child, that I was about to possibly meet , he owned his own business that served alcohol , and there didn’t seem to be a childish bone in his body. At least, from the little bit of time we’d spent together.

Was I old?

Was I a real adult?

Oh god, oh god this was weird.

I felt almost like I was pretending to be something I wasn’t. Still, I held tightly to him until the high school came into view. We pulled to a gentle stop, and I let go of him to get up.

“Poster board’s made it through fine.” I mentioned.

He nodded, taking me on my word. “Your arm doesn’t hurt, does it?”

I shrugged it off. “Uh, no.” Together, we walked into the building and through the halls. “So what’s your daughter’s name again?”

“Fuku. She’s a freshman.”

“Ahh,” Oh god she’s less than a decade younger than me . “So how old is she then?”

He tipped his head to think it over. “A teenager.”

“But- uh, so is she like… fourteen?”

“Fourteen what?”

“Years. Years, Grillby.”

He looked at me like I was crazy.

“ What? Don’t, don’t give me that look, I’m the normal one here.”

“What do years even mean to school level?”

I resisted waving my arms around. “What- What? What?”

We both were quiet for a moment.

I remembered we were in a school and tried my hardest not to shout. “ Grillby how old are you ? ”

“How… old? I’m…” He looked like he was doing some serious math in his head. “Somewhere between one hundred and fifty eight, and two hundred and thirty seven. I lost count some time after Fuku was born, since I started counting from there after she arrived.”

I fell a few paces behind him, and he looked back at me in worry.

I caught up to him and said, “ I see. ” I did not see. “I’m… Two decades and two years. Old. Or. Somewhere around there, give or take time.”

“Humans age incredibly fast, hm.” He mused.

“Yeah- yeah, uh yeah we just, zoom right along.”

He stopped in front of one of the doors and opened it, peering his head in. A young girl’s voice called out “Dad!” and he brightened literally. Like adding another log to a campfire. It was sweet.

Grillby entered and I shuffled in behind him silently, still holding the poster board. A bright green kid made of fire bounced on her heels, talking to him about the project she was about to work on. Apparently they’d cut out everything they wanted to put on the poster already, and just needed the actual board to work on. That was when Grillby gestured to me.

The girl, Fuku, looked over. I gave an awkward little wave where you just move your fingers side-to-side. I didn’t say anything.

There were a few moments where no one said anything, I guess because they both expected me to introduce myself. But I did not catch that hint, so I didn’t.

Grillby finally saved me with, “This is, (y/n). They joined the theater.”

“Ooh,” Fuku said. “Okay.”

“I got a… I helped your dad get the poster board.” I added.

“Cool. Thanks.” She reached out to take it from me, and I gave it over.

Were high schoolers always this small, or did they get smaller?

Fuku thanked her dad again and turned to start working with her friends, so Grillby ushered me out. Thank god, because I was basically a stalled car in there.

We walked back to the moped in relative silence. Grillby seemed comfortable, and I would have been if I hadn’t been wondering what was next. I had abruptly left the theater. It was strange that I had not received any update calls, and the closest that I had received had been a text from Sans . A slightly dickish text. A text that was strangely appropriate for the situation. Too appropriate.

“ Uh, hey Grillby? Do you mind if I uh, I gotta make a call real fast. Before we go.”

He shrugged.

I dialed up Toriel, and prompt as ever, she answered on the first ring.

“Hello? (y/n)?” She sounded relieved.

“Yeah. Hi, Toriel. It’s me.” I stared at the ground and scuffed the dirt with my shoe. “How is, uh, everything?”

“I should be asking you that, my dear! You should not have been… harassed the way you were, I’m very sorry. Sans gets a little out of hand at times.”

That was one way to put it, I supposed.

“Uh, yeah. Yeah. So, um,” I paused. “So I’ll see you…” I paused again. I could feel Toriel waiting on bated breath on the other side of the phone. The thought crossed my mind of just not going back, now that I wasn’t there anymore. “Should I come back in today or see you tomorrow? I’m sorry about leave, I’m really sorry about it. I’m not usually like this, I don’t think I’ve ever done this before.”

“Oh no, dear please, it’s okay. Come in tomorrow. That will never happen again. And if it does, Sans will have more than a few words pass between me and him.” I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but I’m sure it meant something. I didn’t think I wanted to know.

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.” I stated.

We said our goodbyes and she hung up.

“Everything squared away?” Grillby asked.

“Yep.” I replied with a sigh, sitting back on the moped. “What time is it, anyways?”

“About four.”

I sighed again. “Uh, Grill? Can we stop somewhere and get some food? I really don’t think those french fries are gonna hold me over for much longer.”

Grillby sat down. He tipped his head to the side, thinking about something. “Well, we could go back to the bar, or we could go somewhere else to get food. And you still are probably not okay to drive. Do you have a preference?”

Do I have a preference? What the shit is a preference?

“What the shit is a preference?”

“Language, we’re still at a school.”

“What the heck is a preference, then?”

“An opinion.”

“You choose.” I said, drawing out the words.

Grillby tipped his head to the other side. “Okay.” Grillby started the moped and I strapped on the helmet. “I’ve got it.” He finished.

We glided through the streets into the lower part of town, where there were more shops and cafes. It wasn’t a big town, so the downtown wasn’t large, but it had a couple of nice places. I don’t think I’ve been to any of them, though.

“Not going to drive on the sidewalk this time?” I teased.

“That would be dangerous when people are making use of it.”

“But it’s ‘safer’ and more ‘illegal’.”

“It’s only illegal when there are people around to see you doing it.”

“Woah there, Grill-True-Neutral-by.”

“Excuse you, I’m a Neutral Good. I have good intentions for the world. I’m a patron of the arts. ”

“Do… do you play DnD…? Is this a monster meme? Do monsters have memes?”

Grillby did not grace me with an answer to this.

“No seriously,” I repeated, “Memes. Tell me some monster memes.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t you act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. You’re lying, I can hear it in your voice. You have a daughter , a high school daughter, so tell me the memes ! I need to know.”

I continued to hound him as we parked and walked over into a cafe and were seated in a courtyard.

“Gosh, this place feels fancy.” There was a lingering pause. “Is this. A date? Has this become a date?”

“Hm?” He looked up from the menu.

“Um. Nevermind.”

“It’s… I guess so. I guess it could be?”

“I said nevermind.” I said quickly.

Grillby laid his hand on the table in front of me gently. “(y/n). I’m patient, but not for this nonsense. Do you want to go on an official date later? This feels kind of slapped together.”

I hid my red face behind my glass of water with a long drink. “Yeah!” I said, hoping to sound mature. Esteemed, even. “I mean, I would love to.”

He smiled.

Faintly, I could hear. Something. It sounded vaguely like ‘60s electric piano in the distance. I didn’t think anything much of it, but then the singing started. The lyrics were rather fire themed. Coincidence, right? I felt the urge to check my phone, but then brushed it off. Coincidence, definitely.

The waiter came by and took our orders. I got the classic of chicken tenders. Never underwhelming and never overwhelming.

The song faded out, and Grillby said something but I was distracted by the distinct sound of trumpets. I looked off to try and see where they were coming from instinctively. Was that Johnny Cash? It totally was. This was another fire song.

Grillby called my name.

“Do you hear that?” I asked him.

“Hear what?”

“The fire music.”

He paused for a moment. “No.”

“Oh, sorry. Sorry.” It was either my imagination, or it was too quiet and I was the only one paranoid enough to notice it. “What was your question?”

“I was wondering how the production was going.”

“Oh, yeah, it’s going great. We built like, pretty much all the big sets. And everything else seems to be going okay. The kid seems to be a decent director, I really have not been watching them practice. What I’ve seen of Papyrus and Undyne is. Exciting.”

He nodded. “That’s good to hear. They’re not too overzealous, are they?”

There was a lift of electric guitar, this time louder than the other two songs.

“No, no this just seems to be how they always are. But their hearts are in the right place.”

“We don’t have hearts.”

There was an awkward pause. “ What ?”

“We don’t have hearts.” Grillby repeated.

“Figuratively or literally?” I said with worry.

“Literally?”

“I was speaking figuratively. Why don’t you guys have hearts?”

“Why would you need a heart if your body is made of pure magic?”

“Is that self flattery or just truth, and is that why you break the laws of physics -That turned out to be more crass than I meant for it to be- I’m sorry.” I quickly amended.

A chorus of “I’m burning for you” flittered through the background of the conversation.

“Okay, seriously, do you hear that?”

“What, the song?”

“So you do hear it.”

“Is there a problem?”

I stared at him as if realizing I’ve been an idiot this entire time. Because that’s what I felt like. I was being paranoid. I pulled out my phone. Something in me told me, this was somehow the work of Sans.

I texted him, “Do you know anything about fire songs?”

“Uh, no. No problem, sorry.” I answered Grillby. “Nervous.”

He nodded. “Are you alright?”

I waved it off. “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

The small talk continued until the food showed up, and I noticed the songs had changed to 90s garbage. Again, louder. And again, romantically fire themed. I wasn’t sure why it bothered me so much.

I checked my phone with a strange anxiety. Sans had texted me back. “yeah why? sup.”

I resisted the urge to text him back, continuing on eating my chicken strips and enjoying Grillby’s company. At some point my free hand had made its way to rest next to his, and our fingers brushed up against one another gently.

I was jarred out of the sweet moment though, when I recognized REM’s “The One I Love” in the background. I pulled out my phone swiftly, but as I was typing “THIS IS NOT A LOVE SONG” it was abruptly stopped. I realized I was making a minor scene, smiled politely, and put my phone down.

I opened my mouth to say something, but stopped as I recognized the dulcet tones of a teenaged Jonas brother. Quickly I changed my text message to “STOP PLAGUING MY DATE WITH INCIDENTAL FIREY LOVE SONGS” and sent it.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Grillby asked, concerned.

I threw my hands up. “Sans.”

“I see. Are you sure?”

My phone buzzed.

The message read, “oh so it is a date. this would have been awkward otherwise.”

With an exasperated look on my face I said, “Yes.”

Grillby chuckled mildly. At least he found it amusing. Maybe I needed to lighten up. I needed to relax.

We finished off our meals, paying on separate checks.

The cool evening air felt nice on my face as he drove me back to my car. The sun was setting low behind the mountain, casting us in an evening light. It would’ve been a little too cold if not for how warm Grillby was. Seems being on fire all the time does have its perks. Who’d’ve thought?

Grillby parked right next to my car, and after I got off I passed him back his helmet.

“Thanks.” I told him. “For uh, everything tonight. I’ll see you later?”

He nodded. “You’re welcome. Stay safe.”

I gave a half-smile. “Of course.”

He nodded again and I waved as he drove off. Fishing my keys out of my pockets, I unlocked my car and sat down. My mind wandered for a bit over tonight, and wondering whether or not I’d overreacted. It felt like I overreacted to a lot, to a lot of things, just in general. That wasn’t great. Always tomorrow, hopefully.

I turned the car on and gripped the steering wheel. I felt my mind wander into nothing,

and from nothing,

I pulled into work again, the morning sun glinting in my rearview mirror.