Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

If he was going to miss anything, anything at all, it would probably be two things: Happy Hour at Grillby'z and the fact that he wouldn't ever get closer to remembering all the things that he had lost, which was really the only other thing that he actually wanted to expend effort achieving. But those things weren't worth everything else that they were packaged up in, that was for sure.

If he was going to miss any people after doing this, and if he really thought about it, it would probably be only two people: the old lady that he often talked to from behind the door to the Ruins, and that kid that gave him a laugh every now and then wandering through this dangerous Underground. Just those two.

But he would see them again, so that wasn't a huge deal even if it did make him hesitate the slightest bit. He would see them again very soon, even if they wouldn't be quite the same as the ones from his memory. Even if he wasn't going to be the same as they remembered, either-although he would do his best, for whatever weak measurement that was.

For the first time, his heart wasn't racing because he was afraid, but because he was excited, the glow of the machine lighting up his face.

This was it. He wouldn't continue to sneak away to the shed and just watch anymore. Today was the day he actually did something about it, actually did something about something for once in his life. He'd been taking notes on it all this time; beside him he had a book full of them that he flipped through for a second, reconfirming his calculations.

Then, tearing off a piece of the notepaper and a piece of tape, he punched in the coordinates for the machine. Then he stepped inside, and as he heard the whirring of the engine coming to life he quickly, clumsily, set the timer for the explosives on the inside of the booth and on the engine. They would give him plenty of time, at least two hours unless he, on his second trip, set them to blow sooner.

With everything in place, he disappeared.

There was a distortion, the kind that no one would notice except for someone whose job it was to look for it. And no one was really assigned to a job like that, so it went completely unnoticed by everyone. The sky dipped into rainy weather for a couple minutes and then went back to sunny, and that was all that the weather was willing to do to acknowledge that something was different and wrong today.

A second distortion occurred in the world, and with it the clouds returned but this time they had no rain to give. After that, the source was still around even when the glitch in the coding was mended. A small skeleton was checking himself over in a messy room, one that was only a little less filthy than his own.

Everything here was just as he had seen it in the viewer on the machine, further assuring him that he was in the right place. He held, grasped tightly in his sharp clawlike hands, a blue hoodie that he experimentally put on. It fit perfectly, although it smelled like it hadn't been washed in hundreds of years. There were hot dogs in the pockets, which he started to absently munch as he sat down and thought. Judging by the light streaming through the window, it was already late in the afternoon. That meant that his other self had been sleeping way into the day, which was bizarre to think about. Should he come out of the room? Should he stay in until nighttime? And what was that water that fell down past his window earlier?

Maybe it would be better to make the decision after affecting a few cosmetic fixes. He couldn't change everything, but at least he could make his differences a little less... noticeable, to those who weren't making it their business to notice. After that, he'd decide if he wanted to have a good rest or go out and explore the house.

His heart was still beating hard. If only because he hadn't expected it to go so well as it had. It was surreal. It was like he knew it wouldn't last.

But it would. He had seen to that.

Sans groaned. For some reason, his head hurt a lot more than usual when waking up. Maybe it was because he had been woken up by a small series of crashing and scraping sounds, or maybe it was because he had woken up lying on a hardwood floor rather than his usual mattress. Immediately he knew that something was very wrong, something had happened in the early morning that was just outside the range of his memory. The aching in his head only got worse with that realization. So with a little bit more effort than he wanted to give, he pushed himself off the floor and into a sitting position.

There was a piece of paper taped to his forehead, which flopped in front of his eyes as he came upright. "?"

Reaching up, Sans tore the piece away and then realized that the tape, which had held it there, was still stuck on his skull. He gave an irritated grunt as he scrabbled to pry it off, succeeding only after making several painful scratches against his throbbing head. That was over with. If this was Papyrus telling him to take out the garbage again... But then he looked over the note, the corners of the grin usually frozen on his face slowly moving down until his expression looked like a grimace instead.

Then, when his eyes had finished their cursory glance over the note's contents, he turned around where he sat and looked at his surroundings a little closer. They were familiar, and yet at the same time not. It was what looked like a dingy shed with only a couple working lights, the floor bare and the space almost empty of anything but a table and drawers stuffed to bursting with papers.

Well that wasn't entirely true. The room had that table and drawers, and it also had a rusted machine that was set in the corner. It was tall and resembled a booth, with a set of controls on the side of it, but the booth and the engine next to it looked like it had been made with junk. Of course, that assessment might be because it was crumbling and obviously broken, the engine busted and the booth collapsing in on itself. From the way the metal was softly groaning, Sans could tell that it had been destroyed recently. Very recently.

The noise that had woken him up, perhaps.

He glanced down at the note, looking it over for a second time. He couldn't comprehend it. He knew enough to understand, but at the same time everything was registering so slowly, more slowly than usual. And outside he could hear disturbing noises, like someone screaming in the distance, that occupied his attention for a moment before returning to reality.

Scrawled on the notepaper, in messy handwriting and with the texture of someone using a wall for a hard surface, was:

hey there shitstack,

i don't really know if you'll know who and what i am. I got my machine working, but from the looks of things you never did the same for yours. weird, huh? works out fine for me, though. also, thanks for doing me the favor of being asleep when i dropped by. all i needed was a little bit of medicine to keep you knocked out. hope I didn't accidentally kill you, but if i did you wouldn't be reading this so uh.

I could have just left you here now that the machine is destroyed, but i guess since you're me in another world I owe you at least an explanation. the short of it is that i'm sick of this place. hang around here for a while, you'll see what i mean. and your world, or at least what i've seen of it, looks a hell of a lot easier than mine. so I decided that we're trading places. forever.

sorry buddy. but don't say i didn't do anything nice for ya. i left one of my coats and shoes there for you to wear, because you're gonna get pulverized if you walk out in pink slippers, loser. and in my room i left a list of things that you're going to need to know about this world if you want to survive-couldn't include it here since I'm running short on time. but i'm sure you know where my room is. it's a lot like yours. don't get caught by papyrus when you go up and get it, though. he's always got a bone to pick with us.

i'm sure you'll do fine.

Sans.

Next Chapter: Kid Gloves

Chapter Text

Many-worlds--that is, parallel worlds--were supposed to only be a theory, written in an article that someone threw into the garbage. An article that was one day found by Sans, read from page to page while he was with other people that left a hole in his memory. They weren't supposed to actually come over and drag him into completely new surroundings without a chance for escape. That wasn't what the article suggested at all.

As Sans studied the broken machine in front of him, he considered that he had colossally underestimated... himself, apparently. According to the note, this machine had been working up until just now. Some of the metal that he touched experimentally was still warm, lending credence to this idea. But it certainly wasn't going to work anymore, not unless he could fix it. Even as he thought that, Sans remembered that he had hardly been able to make his own machine work back at home, so what hope was there for him to fix it here?

No, thinking way wasn't going to do anything for him. Sans couldn't help but keep looking at the note in his hands as he rolled the tape into a tiny ball and tossed it away. This other him... what kind of person was he? What kind of place was this? The answer to both these questions didn't look very good. Before he could help himself, he might as well try to get his bearings in this new universe. It was better than standing in this shed and starting to panic, after all, as someone else in his situation might have done.

Just as the "note Sans" had promised, after a little bit of searching Sans found a dark jacket and sneakers folded up in the corner, almost hidden because of the dim lighting of his surroundings. He didn't have his hoodie or slippers anymore, so he might as well put them on even if he wasn't sure yet if it was a good idea for him to impersonate this other version of himself.

The sneakers were easy, the laces untied; on his feet, they would stay untied, whether that was how the other version of him did it or not. The jacket, which was an overall black but red and gold in areas, felt a little stranger. The hood had a fur lining it, something that he wasn't used to, and it itched a bit. He was also way too tired of this already to try and work the zipper, so for now his undershirt remained in view.

The coat smelled like rotting meat for some reason... Putting his hands into the pockets, he found that there was an old, uncooked hot cat in it which this version of him must have forgotten about. With a disgusted face, he tossed it out into one of the other forgotten corners.

Well, as far as he knew, he looked the part. He also thought he must look pretty dumb. More like a teenager than his actual age... which he also couldn't quite recall. Oh, well, what was he to judge somebody's clothing choices? No, he was judging more the fact that he had been kidnapped and left here by this jackass than the smelly furry coat. But there wasn't even time for that- the longer Sans stayed in the shed, the more at risk he felt in this world. He tried the knob, and it was unlocked, so he stepped outside at last.

What came to his attention immediately was that it was colder than it currently was at home. On the surface it was actually almost summer, making the blustery wind and snow that assaulted him now stick out a lot. Luckily, as a skeleton, the cold wasn't a huge problem for Sans, but even so he was glad that he had the jacket. In fact, it almost felt worse than living in the eternally wintry Snowdin- at least there, he didn't feel that he was freezing to death as he suddenly did now. Now, Sans actually found the will to zip this thing up.

As expected, he walked out with his back to the actual house. It was an easy matter to walk around it to find the front. When he did, he couldn't help but notice something that made his marrow freeze in his bones.

He was standing in Snowdin.

Or, rather, he was standing in a version of it. He didn't remember the small town that he once lived in as looking quite so trodden down and pathetic. The buildings that were within range of his vision were all crumbling in some manner or another, and there was absolutely nobody traversing the broken path through the town, a path that was covered in dusty snow. Far above, he could see the ceiling. The way he used to before he knew what the sky looked like. Somehow, even the ceiling looked harsher than it was in his world. Was this what he'd been trying to escape? The other him? Was he so desperate to get to the surface that he took his place?

Somehow that didn't seem right. Even Sans had stopped caring about the surface for a while, although it had been coming to him in pieces over the few weeks of freedom that he'd had, as more and more time passed without it disappearing. Now, looking at the ceiling, he could feel that draining despair come back to him again. He was back underground. It wasn't even in the way that he thought it would be. He had thought it would be as simple as losing his memories, but this was ten times worse.

Hell, Snowdin itself looked ten times worse. It was clearly in the afternoon, judging by the lighting down here, so where was everyone?

Sans cringed to think about what the rest of this place must be like, all while having the unpleasant feeling that he was going to find out sooner than he wanted. This definitely wasn't good. He needed to get to that list.

Looking up at his house, which was the most immaculate building there--although that wasn't saying much- Sans held his breath and stepped inside.

Well the indoors were also immaculate, and aside from the layout of the house it was almost completely unfamiliar to him. There was no carpet, everything hardwood floor like the shed had been, and the interior had none of the goofy, somewhat warm colors that he and Papyrus had picked out together. Seeing this, and remembering the warning on the note, he looked warily for this version of his brother and found nothing so far. Of course, Sans didn't know what the Papyrus he was looking for would actually be like. He dearly hoped he was not as much of an asshole as the other version of himself apparently was. He also hoped that his room was on the same side as the one in his world, and that the other version of himself had had the decency to leave it unlocked for him, or else he would have to play things completely by ear and he honestly hated the energy he had to put into that.

Here went nothing; Sans tried the door. It was unlocked.

"His" room was the only one that wasn't clean and in order, and Sans sighed in some relief to see that some things didn't change. There was no tornado, and the treadmill that Papyrus had bought him for his birthday wasn't here either, but there was still the mattress, all blankets and one pillow tossed to the floor, and socks piled up in odd places. A dirty lamp flickered when he turned the lights on, and that was the only other thing in the room aside from the drawers.

Speaking of, above those drawers he found another piece of notepaper taped to the wall. Sans tore it free and, already in a bad mood to see this handwriting, perused the list in front of him.

list of things to know in the underground if you want to live:

- papyrus goes by "boss." do not call him papyrus. do not call him bro. DO NOT call him anything except boss.

- watch out for papyrus

- watch out for everybody. it's kill or be killed here.

- that crazy lady by the door is alright but if she leaves food outside for you don't take it.

- i don't drink ketchup you loser.

- don't let papyrus catch you skipping out or sleeping on sentry duty

- keep your room locked whenever possible.

- i fixed your mug to look like mine but the magic wears off. hope you know how to do that yourself.

- take care of the human kid

that's all i can think of right now. good luck,

Sans.

Everything else Sans took in relative stride, aside from his appearance changing; he reached up a hand to check his face and found sharp teeth where his normal smile once was, and was horrified. He didn't know how to do that. But there was something on the list that distracted him from even this. Take care of the human kid. So, even though they weren't free yet in this world, there was still a Frisk. Or, to be honest, it could have been one of the earlier human children too, but in his world all of the earlier ones had already fallen down by the time he and Papyrus moved to Snowdin. And there was only one that he actually took care of. So it was unlikely to be referring to anyone else.

What was the parallel world Frisk like?

Just thinking about that, another question rose in his head that was far more unpleasant: What was happening with the Frisk in his world right now? Or, rather, anyone that he knew. Even Papyrus. They all were with that impostor, while he was still figuring out the basics over in this place-and as bad as the basics looked from this list, it was much worse to think about what was happening to the others.

It made him feel exhausted, very exhausted. He closed his eyes and sighed.

But he only had a minute to think about this before something else took his mind off it, the sound of a door slamming outside his room. Sans jerked to attention, knowing without seeing him that it was this world's Papyrus. Shit.

"SANS!" At the very least it sounded a lot like him, the same font and the same loud voice. But there wasn't that theatrical affectation that he had gotten used to Papyrus making since he'd begun his "royal guard training". This voice was shrill and sounded like he had a sore throat. It made sense. Shouting constantly would do that to you.

Sans lingered for a while, trying to decide if he should get out of his room or not. But Papyrus' voice made the decision for him. "SANS YOU PIECE OF SHIT I KNOW YOU'RE IN HERE! I TOLD YOU NOT TO TRACK MUD ALL OVER THE FLOOR!"

Oops. Papyrus back at home was always telling him that they had a welcome mat for a reason, although he didn't track so much mud anymore now that they were living in New New Home.

Taking a deep breath, Sans exited his room, calling, "heya, sorry about that." Laying eyes upon this world's Papyrus, Sans was both shocked and not surprised at all. For one thing, although he was still wearing a "battle body" like the one in his world it was very clearly not just a costume, but the outfit of someone who was actually in charge of something, complete with a badge or two. That surprised him a little. But predictably, it also had the same dark color scheme as the coat Sans was wearing, with a glisten of metal underneath the black material and torn red cape. It was clearly supposed to look intimidating, but Sans fought the urge to laugh.

He would just love it if it turned out that everybody in this world dressed the same, in blacks and reds and golds. Like some kind of dress code.

Papyrus didn't look like he'd appreciate his older brother laughing, though, at least from what Sans could see from the second floor. "YOU'RE SORRY? IS THAT ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY ABOUT IT? THIS IS COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE!"

"look, br-" he caught himself just in time, "-oss." Papyrus' eyebrow rose, but he didn't comment. "i've had a long day. it was an accident, okay?"

But the other was far from willing to let this go. "I HAVE TOLD YOU TIME AND AGAIN NOT TO TRACK MUD IN HERE! DO YOU THINK I WANT TO SPEND TIME CLEANING UP AFTER YOU? DO YOU THINK I HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO!?"

He was a bit gruffer, in fact a lot, but so far the shouting he could handle. His own Papyrus nagged him all the time. Sans' expression didn't change much. Out of his mouth came, as he shrugged tiredly and leaned over the railing, "i dunno do ya?"

The look, then, on this Papyrus' face was astonishing. The absolute rage, which was even more effective on someone with sharp teeth, was something that Sans had never seen before. Suddenly he felt cold in the pit of his not-stomach. Even worse than that, the shouting stopped. Papyrus just stood there for a second, before saying in a voice that was possibly even louder than before, "GET DOWN HERE, SANS."

"...nnnnah i'm gonna stay up here." Clearly he had crossed a line somehow. And, clearly, judging by how the rage on Papyrus' face grew, this was also crossing a second line painted somewhere beyond the first. Oh, well, he always had a penchant for getting on his brother's nerves.

"I SAID-" Something gripped at the core of Sans' SOUL, as Papyrus slashed a claw-like hand in an arc through the air, "TO GET DOWN HERE!" His SOUL turning blue and body with the weight of an anvil, Sans let out a startled cry as he crashed through the railing and down to the ground floor of the house with a loud crack, lying in a heap while broken bits of wood rained on top of him.

"what the hell?" He couldn't keep from saying that out loud.

His head was starting to ache again, as he looked back up at his brother with eyes like needlepoints. He struggled to get up, but found his body still pulled by the intense gravity of Papyrus's blue attack. Being banged up like that was something that could lower his health, so never in his life had he ever thought Papyrus- any Papyrus- would try it. And even more shocking was that he apparently wasn't done.

In fact, he had a large bone in his hand, which he was holding like a club. "I DON'T KNOW WHY YOU THINK TODAY IS THE DAY TO PUSH YOUR LUCK, SANS," he was saying, watching the smaller skeleton struggle vainly to stand up. He seemed only vaguely puzzled by the shock and anger on Sans' face, as his subordinate should be well used to this routine by now, "BUT IT LOOKS LIKE I HAVE TO EDUCATE YOU ALL OVER AGAIN. I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY. IF HAVING TO CLEAN UP YOUR FILTH MAKES ME LATE TO MY MEETING WITH UNDYNE, THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES."

"why the hell," Sans muttered into the floor, giving up trying to move. "are you getting so worked up over cooking lessons?" He knew it was a stupid question-maybe the meeting was actually important-but he didn't care. The minute the blue attack wore off, he was going to-

CRACK!

Sans' vision exploded with white as bone met bone, his head banging into the floor when struck by the end of Papyrus' club. All thoughts vanished from his mind except for how painful it was, his head ringing. Through the ringing, he could hear Papyrus say, "-ALL THE WORK THAT I'VE DONE FOR BOTH OF US, WHEN YOU HAVE DONE NOTHING BUT LAZE AROUND DAY IN AND DAY OUT, AFTER ALL THE EFFORT I'VE PUT IN TO JOIN THE ROYAL GUARD YOU WOULD DARE MOCK ME LIKE THIS WHEN I'M IN THE MIDDLE OF PUNISHING YOU!"

"..ow..." Sans grunted, rubbing his head. He then felt himself lifting by the back of his jacket, Papyrus pulling him off the ground. He still felt the pull of the blue attack, dangling uselessly, and could only listen to his parallel world brother continue to shout at him. It wasn't helping the ringing in his ears. "I BET YOU DIDN'T EVEN DO YOUR SENTRY DUTY TODAY! YOU JUST SLACKED OFF LIKE THE USELESS LITTLE SHIT THAT YOU ARE!"

He was in pain, but he was not scared. Gritting his teeth, Sans uttered, "y.. yep."

And then the whole house spun before his eyes as his body banged against the wall on the opposite side of the downstairs. He fell and hit a table, where a badly placed rock jabbed into his ribs, before he rolled and struck the floor with a groan. Now something like that really could have killed him. Yet he wasn't dead yet. This whole scenario was so... surreal. He could feel the pull on his SOUL loosening, at last, but he was too dizzy to stand now.

Papyrus was talking above him, after striking him hard in the back, as Sans gasped for air, "I COULD BREAK YOUR ARM THIS TIME BUT THAT WOULD MAKE IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR YOU TO DO ANYTHING. YOU'VE LEFT ME IN A CONUNDRUM. AND I COULD BREAK YOUR BACK," he said, striking again. Sans only grunted, fighting blackness in his vision. "BUT YOU'RE ALREADY 'SPINELESS.'"

Holy crap was that a pun?

"I GUESS YOU'RE GETTING OFF EASY THIS TIME!" Papyrus finished, hitting Sans for a third time. "BE GRATEFUL THAT YOU HAVE SUCH A MERCIFUL AND AWESOME BROTHER AS ME!"

There was no reply from the figure lying on the ground, the smaller skeleton too preoccupied with staying conscious. Growling, Papyrus punched the wall and made the whole house shake. "I SAID BE GRATEFUL!"

Sans didn't reply to that either, still shaking from the attack. His health was still 1 HP, more or less. He wasn't dead. But he'd been hit so many times, he wondered if this was how monsters felt when they were.

Was this even Papyrus?

This couldn't be Papyrus. Not even a parallel version of Papyrus. Himself, he could accept that somewhere there was an asshole version of himself, but this pointy bully standing over him...

"SANS!" Papyrus whined before stomping on the ground like a child, then kicking the smaller skeleton in the ribs. Sans groaned; it was the same spot the rock had chipped. "ANSWER ME!"

Curling up on the floor, Sans looked up at Papyrus and grinned through the pain, through his wincing. "n-no." he grunted.

The response was completely unexpected, so said the expression on this cruel Papyrus' face, eye sockets open wide and glistening sharp teeth parted. But that soon turned into a rage so white-hot, Sans was sure that, whatever way this person was pulling his punches, it was about to stop. So before he could get hit again with that giant club, he took a shortcut out of there.

Next Chapter: A Life Up Above

Chapter Text

When Sans stepped out of his room, he also looked wildly throughout the house for Papyrus. Since it was so late in the day, and since from what he'd seen Papyrus was always so busy, it was unlikely that he would find him here. All the same, he was eager to find him. He didn't know what he would do yet-it depended on how he was feeling and how this version of his little brother was acting-but he knew whatever it was would make his day. Sans poked around the house looking for traces of him, traces of Papyrus and of his own alternate self which he had seen only through a blurry screen.

It wasn't just out of his own curiosity; unlike the Sans of this world, no one had graciously left hints for what he should do to blend in. He had a few ideas from watching this world, but it was a limited view. Just from the house alone, though, he could tell things were radically different from his own world. For one thing, he would never have picked out the silly-looking carpet, and he knew Papyrus wouldn't have either. That and everything else about the decor choices made the house almost unrecognizable. His old one was so austere.

There was a mess in the kitchen, too, which surprised him. He had no idea which of them had been cooking, but it smelled faintly of garlic in that part of the house, and there were some uncooked noodles still on the floor. Come to think of it, the mess looked recent. There was still a pot on the stove, a little bit of water left inside, although it wasn't boiling anymore. Pieces of vegetable were scattered on the counter. It was unlike Papyrus to let a mess go uncleaned, even if he himself refused to become a maid no matter the universe; maybe he had to go somewhere in a hurry.

There wasn't too much to comment on otherwise, except for how different the styles were. There was still a rock in the living room, although this one was covered in sprinkles. "heya bub," he said. The rock ate sprinkles and didn't reply to him, moving a little bit to the left. Sans sneered; standoffish bastard. Some things stayed the same no matter what world he was in, eh.

Papyrus' room was locked, which disappointed him greatly. Although all the signs telling him to keep out were... interesting. He think he remembered having signs like this when he was a teenager. Obviously not by the time they moved to Snowdin. He was still chuckling about this by the time he stepped outside. But when he stepped outside, all of that stopped. Instead, he stared at the ceiling for a long while, his jaw (if he had one) slack.

He was staring at the ceiling for so long because he realized in another second that there was no ceiling. He blinked several times, seeing a sky of blue and white clouds drifting lazily overhead. A blue that seemed to go on forever, no cavern walls cutting it off. A blue that couldn't be reached no matter how high somebody threw you, that couldn't be touched even if you yourself flew up to it. There was a bright light from somewhere, and it illuminated the whole street in a warm way that magic light couldn't do.

The wind that blew through him was also warm.

He knew where this was. He knew what that was. Above him right now was the sky, a sky that he'd never seen for himself, only in books stacked in piles at that moth-eaten library.

In his head, he said it. I'm on the surface. Everybody was on the surface. All around him was a city, full of monsters that kindly ignored him and chatted with friends as they walked down streets lit by sunlight. There was no cold and no snow, there was no screaming and no ruins.

From where he stood, Sans was faintly shaking. There was an awful moment where he feared he might fall into that sky if he didn't hold onto the ground tight enough. Awful moment as it was, it was soon replaced by a faintly real smile on his part, as he continued to look. Then, surely conscious of what an idiot he was starting to look like, he directed his eyes back towards the city around him. He was sure that he would've been living in Snowdin with just some cosmetic changes, but this wasn't even a wintry town.

Was this a world where the war never happened? Did that explain all the... the... Things he couldn't describe right now? All of the differences between this world and his. He supposed it was possible; he hadn't expected such a huge change, though. It made it difficult to proceed from this point. Was there even another human like his? Was Asgore still the king? Did he still know Alphys? How did things work around here, on the surface, between humans and monsters? All of these questions that he would have to get answered quickly before he was found out. Right now Sans really, really didn't want to be found out.

He was still thinking it over when he heard a "Hi, Sans!" From across the street. It was one of the monsters passing by, one that he didn't recognize but looked to be a Snowdrake. Normally he would be shocked and irritated by the gall of the monsters here, as nobody in Snowdin got his attention unless they wanted to get a beating. But now he gave a stunned wave; this at least satisfied the monster and they continued on their way happily. Well so far things weren't that bad; he had gotten over his first hurdle, and he had even met Papyrus yet.

That wasn't going to last long. "BROTHER!"

Hearing that voice -that voice- even knowing what he did about this world already, Sans froze where he stood. His magic, impotent as it was, flared up in his body and his eyes changed as a result, one of them flashing red. He struggled to suppress it before turning, grateful at how easy it was to keep the smile on his face. He could see the Papyrus of this world running towards him, dressed in his ridiculous costume. There weren't as many spikes as his own. He tried to ease the tension in his shoulders, suddenly anxious that this one would know something was wrong. "h-hey bo-" shit, shit, "Papyrus."

"YOU'RE UP EARLIER THAN USUAL!" Papyrus said with a big smile on his face, "I'M PROUD OF YOU!"

Really? He was proud of him for getting up early? Not even that early, seeing as the sky was so bright already. The immediate contrast between this world's Papyrus and his own was enough to make him laugh, "well uh, all that water on my window earlier woke me up."

Papyrus frowned a little, and the tension rooted in his back- did he say something wrong? "SANS, IS SOMETHING WRONG WITH YOUR THROAT? YOU SOUND DIFFERENT."

The heart in his not-chest was already beating too hard, and Sans cursed himself repeatedly for being this easy to scare. There was a very easy explanation for why his voice sounded different, he already had it in mind, in fact it had already been said by "his" little brother. But he didn't reply for what he felt was way too long. "uhhh..." Calm down. He didn't know. He was too stupid to know. After all, it was Papyrus. "uhh i... think I might be coming down with a cold. so. so. yeah. sore throat or something."

"I WARNED YOU THAT IT WAS COLD AND FLU SEASON," Papyrus began to say, as Sans let out a deep breath that he had been holding in. He hoped that nobody would notice how much he was sweating. "OR IS IT ALLERGY SEASON? MAYBE YOU HAVE ALLERGIES?"

"allergies?" He better not be allergic to anything on the surface; that would really suck. "i dunno b-ro. do I have allergies?"

"I CERTAINLY HOPE NOT?" Papyrus was saying, eyes wide at the thought. "YOU SHOULD STAY AWAY FROM ALL THOSE SURFACE PLANTS JUST IN CASE, THOUGH." He gave a shifty glance towards the grass that grew between the sidewalk and the street, and in the yards of many of the houses around this area. There were flowers blooming in a lot of them, flowers he had also never seen in person before, ones that didn't mock you as you walked by.

Sans smirked. "i have a feeling it's just a cold, boss." Shit, why couldn't he get that right?

The effect on Papyrus was instantaneous, and Sans wished with all his might that he could take it back. "SANS! DID YOU JUST CALL ME BOSS?"

All he could do was sputter ineffectively. "uh."

"YOU'VE NEVER DONE THAT BEFORE!"

"uhhhh."

"DOES THIS MEAN I'M YOUR BOSS?"

"uhh?"

"HMMMM." Papyrus made another shifty glance to the side. "YOU'RE BEING EXTREMELY NONVERBAL. COULD IT BE? YOU ARE FINALLY RECOGNIZING HOW AWESOME I AM AND IT HAS PUT YOU BEYOND WORDS?"

The tension suddenly broke for him, and Sans burst out laughing, almost doubling over with the strength of it. This Papyrus-this Papyrus-ah, he was too good. He wanted to flush his head down a toilet. He wanted to noogie him until he begged him to let go-if only they were the same height. "ha ha ha! nope it's definitely just a cold, ahahahaha!"

Again, as his laughter died down, he worried that this behavior was out of character for the Sans of this world. Papyrus looked some odd mixture of hurt and something else, and Sans had never seen his Papyrus make such a face ever. "ehhh, uh, maybe someday buddy."

"YOU DEFINITELY SEEM SICK TODAY," his older brother said with a sage nod, returning to normal. "YOU SHOULD DRINK MORE FLUIDS!"

If he was sick back at home, his own little brother would start yelling at him about how inconvenient it was, as if it was his own fault that he had caught some virus when the whole town was a dump. And being sick wouldn't keep him from sentry duty. Did he even have sentry duty in this world? What did he even do? From across the street, another monster called to him to say hello and Sans waved at them with another glance towards Papyrus. "i'll... get on that. what's... uh, on the agenda today? i could just sleep in."

"REALLY? BUT YOU ALREADY MADE SO MUCH PROGRESS WAKING UP TODAY," Papyrus said, and it almost got on San's nerves. He wasn't that lazy, if only because no one ever let him be. Heck, he had built a machine that took him across dimensions (albeit that wasn't what he intended it for at first,) waking up in the afternoon was actually a step backwards. "BUT MAYBE REST IS BETTER?" Papyrus scratched his chin. "I'M GOING TO THE HUMAN STORES TO FIND THIS 'NOODLE AISLE' THAT I'VE HEARD SO MUCH ABOUT! I'LL PICK UP SOME ORANGE JUICE FOR YOU!"

Holy Jesus. "aw jeeze, thanks papyrus."

"YOU'RE WELCOME! I SHOULD GET GOING! UNDYNE WANTS TO COME WITH ME SO I DON'T GET 'CREAMED' BY THE HUMANS OR SOMETHING? I MIGHT BE THERE A WHILE, BUT I'LL SEE YOU WHEN I GET BACK, BROTHER!"

Undyne was here. And she still talked to Papyrus. Knowing that much was almost enough to put Sans in a bad mood, although everything that he had heard from this goofy taller skeleton was giving him some pretty good clues as to how things worked here. Maybe even this world's Undyne wasn't as bad, wasn't as cruel, as the one that he remembered. He grinned and nodded, trying to look cheerful, "okay. see ya paps." He just had to not choke on the nickname part. Maybe he could practice while Papyrus was away. He waved as this version of his brother walked down the street, until he disappeared from his sight around the corner.

Then he stuck his hands deep in the pockets of his hoodie and let out a deep breath. Second hurdle passed. It was okay. He could do this. Nobody was going to know that anything was different. Or even if they suspected, they wouldn't know that he was a different person entirely.

Judging by how suspicious his brother was of plants, Sans was going to hazard a guess that they had not been on the surface for too long. Maybe they were set free somehow. Maybe the kid that fell into this world was actually dead, and the King's plan did work after all, although he would've expected this world to look more like a wasteland if it had. Whatever the case, it was nice. "lessee..." he muttered to himself. "let's look for familiar faces while we're up, shall we?"

All he really wanted to do was wander around the city, keeping a snapshot in his mind of where their house was situated so that he could get back there before Papyrus returned.

As he was walking he thought that he heard somebody call this place "New New Home"? Asgore was probably still the king. Not everything was going to be as nice as this neighborhood, surely. But... from the look and feel of things, everybody was nonetheless a lot friendlier. Didn't matter who they were, whenever they spotted Sans the monster would give a wave, or call out a hello, or some other greeting that he was only starting to get into a routine of returning, although at first it really caught him off guard. Everybody knew him back in Snowdin too, but this was because he was the brother of a royal guardsman, Papyrus. And because he had a penchant for picking on anything smaller than him.

Looks like even this version of himself was friendlier. As he walked, smelling pleasant smells and enjoying the warm sunlight, Sans wondered how that version of him was doing in his Snowdin. Had he met Papyrus yet? The thought made him chuckle, quietly and to nobody. That must be a pretty nasty shock after living in this place.

He would feel bad, if it was even possible for him to feel bad, except that while that version of himself was there, he was here. Eh.

After a while of walking, he was surprised to see the laboratory that rose above some of the other houses, looking a little bit like the one that he remembered if not for the fact that it was clean and not covered with soot from Hotland-although, seeing as it wasn't in that magma infested hell in the first place, that only seemed natural. Despite the knotting in his stomach, Sans made the decision to walk up and knock on the door. He just had to know what everybody was like, after seeing Papyrus. Surely the Alphys who answered would not be as... bad.

Sure enough, she actually answered the door instead of shouting from the other side of it or passing notes. The little yellow lizardlike creature looking back at him blinked several times through her thick glasses, while all Sans did was look her over. Finally she said, in a tremulous voice, "O-oh, hey Sans!"

"sup."

"I w-wasn't expecting you today. I-is there something you need?"

What was up with that stammer? Was she afraid of him, or just afraid in general? Sans grinned a little bit wider. It was a nice reversal. "nope. just thought I'd drop by and say hi." Was that not something that the Sans of this world did either? It figures if he didn't want to spend time with this loser. The only reason that he knew her in his world was because she was the most useful of any of the monsters. If not for her help, he would never have gotten the machine running, after all. Some of that gratitude, he was all right with letting it spill over onto this world's Alphys. So for now, the smile was genuine.

To his amusement, she smiled back. "W-well, hello! U-uh, did you want to come i-inside, or-?" She took a step back from the door, allowing him a little bit of a view into her laboratory house. It was pretty messy, from what he could tell, which was also the same as his Alphys. Friendlier or not, should he really risk going inside? There had to be reason why she was so twitchy.

"actually..." He paused, giving a shrug. "i've been feeling a little out of sorts today."

"R-really?" Her expression went blank, and then sympathetic- albeit also confused. "Why's that? I-is there anything I can h-help with?"

"well that depends," he said. How much help she was going to be would directly correlate with how much of this world she knew and how much of it she was willing to say without wanting anything in return- to say nothing of asking him why he wanted to know, or why he didn't know it already. He was going to have to play it by ear. He could already feel his heart rate going up, and just hoped that nobody would notice. "sure. i can step in for a moment."

Alphys stepped obediently back to give him room to walk in, and Sans shuffled inside. It was weird; only wearing slippers, he could feel every change in the ground that he walked on. This house was covered in tiles. It was probably easier to clean that way, and knowing her as he did she probably got crumbs everywhere. He kept a lookout for TV Dinners and junk food splattered and crushed on the floor, although if she had any hard lemonade lying around he would be happy to take it off her hands for her.

While that was a no to the TV Dinners. Instead, what Sans saw were empty cartons of microwave ramen littering every surface possible, although there were stains on some of the surfaces indicating that she had been trying to clean up recently, or at least put some of the trash away. On a desk was a half-finished two liter of something yellow and fizzy titled /Lanta Cola/, which was, to his disappointment, probably not hard lemonade. It was just like his own house; in layout it was identical, but in decor...

He couldn't help a grin, relaxing just a little bit. "nice place."

"A-aha, thank you," Alphys said as she shut the door behind them. "I-I-I'm sorry for the mess, you see I didn't know a-anyone was going to come over today."

"i've seen worse," was all he said with a shrug. "it's a place to live, am I right?"

Her response to that took a second, which he spent sitting down on the nearest chair he could find, sweeping a few empty cartons off. Seriously, was he saying something that the other version of himself wouldn't? Alphys was so ill at ease. "Um- right?"

"right," he repeated, scratching the back of his head.

Finally she seemed to calm down a little bit, taking a deep breath and following him deeper inside. "Is there anything you want? I-I mean to e-eat or drink...?" As Sans shook his head, she nodded and then asked, "S-so... uh, then, what c-can I help you with, possibly?"

Here came the hard part. He had to decide how to phrase this in a way that wasn't too suspicious. Trying to keep the smile neutral, Sans uttered, "uhhh i guess i just find it... hard to believe that we're on the surface. it's… uh, taking a while to sink in." That was a good place to start, right? Anyway, it was true. But it was partially because he had no idea how they ended up on the surface to begin with.

"Well it wasn't that long ago," Alphys said, some of the tremors in her voice gradually smoothing out. "It's only been a few weeks, after all."

"a few weeks..." That struck a chord with him for some reason, but he would not dwell on it yet. "yeah. not a long time." Time to probe a little further. "and... to be honest... at the time, i didn't think that we would ever..."

When Alphys took over, Sans let out a breath that had building in his chest, "Yeah, I- I kind of think no one really believed that the barrier would be broken. And if we did, I certainly didn't think it would be this way. ...I am glad it was, though. Being able to actually live n-near humans, instead of destroying them all..."

"uh yeah, that part's great," he said, perhaps too fast. "although also... extremely hard to believe, if you get what I'm saying."

"No, I... Understand," Alphys said with a small smile. How understanding this one was. Or at least, how eager to be a yes-man. Yes-woman. Something like that. The other Alphys was the same, provided the person speaking to her had an advantage. "You kind of feel like you'll wake up one morning and it will all be gone. We'll be at war."

Sans had actually had that kind of feeling before, but that probably wasn't what Alphys was talking about. "...yeah."

"But I don't think that will ever happen! After all, we have a pretty good ambassador," she was chuckling. "We don't have to worry about the humans anymore. We should thank Frisk for that."

Everybody in this world was somebody that he knew. So when that name came up, which he had never heard before, like an idiot Sans asked, "Who's Frisk?"

And cold spiked through his spine as he realized his mistake, Alphys blinking slowly at him through her glasses. "They're the...? Human that I was just talking about?"

"OH." He grinned big, trying to make it look as if he had just woken up, trying not to show how badly he was shaking. "sh- crap, i completely forgot... their name. wowww i am really out of it today, aren't i?"

"I-I-I mean, you do sound a little bit different. Are you coming down with something?"

Was everybody that he met going to comment on his voice? Sans took another deep breath. He tried to laugh, but it came out a little bit shaky. "ha ha, maybe. papyrus said... he was going to bring me back some juice from the store. maybe i should check to see if he- came back."

"Oh..." Standing up, clasping her hands together, Alphys put on a smile that was even faker than his. "W-w-was there anything else that you wanted to talk about...?"

Not up to this not up to this. "there was, but uh. uh, jeeze, just about everything is falling out of my head lately. hey, uh, if you could--give me directions to... toriel's place, that would be great," he said somewhat hoarsely. "can't seem to figure out where it is again." Unless she was also a crazy woman sitting behind a door all day.

But Alphys didn't regard the request with any suspicion, only affected by the first slip-up. "O-oh! R-right, this place is... pretty big, so I understand! It's not far though. It's a few blocks away fr-from Asgore's castle, um- let me just-" She glanced left and right. "... Get you the address."

Asgore's castle. Greeeeaaat.

Sans gritted his teeth as he continued to smile, no longer speaking while she scribbled the address down on a sheet of paper. He was glad that he had magic to mask a little of the hostility he felt for this stammering, sweating monster. When she handed him the note, he made his grin bigger, "thanks a bunch."

"N-no problem!" Alphys nodded, finally letting out a breath and trembling less. "Feel better, Sans."

"i'll try," he said with a mocking salute, which fired off all kinds of alarm bells when she looked at it strange. "...see you later, alphys." Get out of there get out of there get out of there.

The worst part of that all was probably that he couldn't even laugh that the kid's name was, apparently, something as nonsensical as Frisk. He was too busy trying to regain his composure before he even tried to find Toriel, taking deep breaths behind the first house he could reach. Hoping that he didn't ruin it all. Going over multiple scenarios in his head as to how he most certainly did not just ruin it all by showing he didn't even know the human's name.

Idiot.

He'd be more careful. He swore he'd be more careful from now on. When he visited Toriel, and found the twerp apparently named Frisk, he'd be more careful. He'd make his own list of things to do and not do here.

Then he'd start having his fun.

Just had to be more careful, that was all.

Next Chapter: Should Have Kept that Hot Cat

Chapter Text

Now, he didn't do this anymore since going to the surface, because he was actually trying to do more with his life as time passed up there, but in the past when he wanted to get away from things, Sans went to Grillby's. The shortcuts there he knew by heart. Everyone there knew him, and liked him, and although Papyrus often complained about the grease he thought the food was pretty good. And Grillby was a good enough sport that he didn't- or at least pretended not to- notice when he swiped some of the ketchup.

Taking the shortcut to this spot was, then, just a reflex. Who knew if the same was true in this parallel Snowdin. For all he could guess, the local hangout here was some kind of cesspool where everybody wore red and black and gold and snarled at each other. Sans sat at the side of the building for several minutes, still shaking a little bit as he physically recovered from Papyrus' attack, and weighed the pros and cons in his mind of trying to go inside. For one thing, he was starving- hadn't had anything to eat since lunch yesterday- to the point where he almost wished that he had not thrown out the rotten hotcat in his other's jacket pocket. For another, it was still freezing outside and it was getting to a point where it was actually starting to bother him. There was no way he was going back to take shelter in his own house.

The third pro was that, seeing as it was red, the likelihood that this version of Grillby had ketchup was high enough for him to want to risk it.

The con was that he might actually get beaten up again, with his luck, if he stepped foot in there. Sans shivered again, down to his bone marrow, and wondered how long he could stand out here before inevitably walking inside. The list hadn't said much about Grillby, just warning him off from one of his favored magical condiments. Was mustard okay? How about relish?

"hup," he took a breath and stepped through the door, the cold wind on his back vanishing immediately as soon as he was inside.

As far as changes went, this one wasn't too dramatic, at least not at first. Nobody called his name when he walked in, and in fact Sans was sure that he got a couple of glares, one hiss, and a few even stopped talking. That was fine. He wasn't really in the mood to socialize, especially not with these people. Many of them were wearing black, as he had expected and hoped, but surprisingly he did see some wearing white or not wearing clothes at all. A large percentage of them were smoking. Someone was passed out in the corner.

And... At one table he saw gathered a group of wolflike, feral dog monsters all wearing glistening dark armor, armor that reminded him of the Papyrus he had met recently. They probably weren't asking for pets when one of them walked up to him, looking a bit like Dogamy with a black hood over his face and a huge (bloody) axe in hand. He had a lot more crooked teeth than usual.

Sans stood completely still as the parallel Dogamy pressed right into his personal space, sniffing. "...d'ya mind?" He said as the canine guardsman's nose went into his jacket on both sides, sniffed his sneakers, and pressed against his back. What could he possibly be smelling for? He just got here.

At his retort, Dogamy growled at him, raising his head a little. Sans could see bloodshot eyes under the hood, the eyes of somebody who was very cranky and tired. He resisted the urge to raise his hand and just watched as the dog monster went back to the table with the others. Sans heard him mutter, "I got nothing," to Dogaressa.

A part of him wanted to ask what the hell that was about, but the rest of him was smart enough not to. Probably the other version of him had gotten in trouble with the law more than once; he wouldn't be surprised. With a grunt, Sans shook the experience off before walking to the bar. His regular stool was unoccupied, so he sat down and resisted laying his head on the counter, instead resting it on one hand propped up by an elbow. There was a heat coming from the other end of the bar, one that, he had joked back in his own world, took the chill out of his bones. But this time it was almost unbearable, like he was sitting too close.

Sans glanced to the side and took notice of the source for the first time since walking in. Even Grillby, it seemed, was affected by all this. He was a different color than Sans was used to. In fact, the fire monster was looking a bit more well groomed at the top, too. The previous Grillby was comprised of a lazy orange and yellow flame, which flickered constantly at customers like a hand waving. But this one burned with an intense blue flame that made his head into more of a teardrop shape; it stayed still for the most part, but as Sans watched Grillby mix up drinks he saw that flame still give an occasional encouraging flicker.

After Sans had stared long enough, Grillby turned his head in his direction and approached him with no change in expression- not that fire monster's had much of an expression- as if he had known the skeleton was here the whole time.

Sans knew that he shouldn't do it.

Too late. "hey grillbz, why so blue?"

Someone snorted nearby.

Although Grillby had looked like he was about to say something, now he stopped and blew out a little fire from within like a pent up breath. Sans stiffened; don't tell him that he had crossed a line again. But apparently that particular worry was not the case; instead, the blue bartender took off his glasses and squinted at his new customer for a few seconds, before cleaning them on his shirt and squinting again with them on. Sans shifted uncomfortably, unsure what these people were looking for. As far as he knew, his altered appearance was still the same- he even touched a finger to one or two of his teeth, and sure enough they were all still as sharp as earlier.

But Grillby didn't persist, apparently preferring to picking up a beer mug and clean out with a rag than squint at Sans any longer. In a familiar voice he said, without looking up. "I hope you, at least, are going to pay me on time."

"yeah, i-" oh, well crap. Did even have money on him? "wait." Sans dug through his pockets for a second. There wasn't any in his pants pockets. He rifled through the jacket, while, standing across from him, he heard Grillby utter a low sigh. Maybe he was used to this kind of routine. sorry bucko, i'm not trying to do this on purpose.

10g. That was all he had, in the end, tucked in an inner pocket of this stupid fluffy jacket. With a sigh of resignation he flipped it in Grillby's direction; without missing a beat, the fire monster caught it out of the air and nodded, smirking at his customer in a way that Sans didn't really appreciate. "What will it be?"

"i just want something to eat. i dunno. one hamburger, please." If Sans cared to glance around, he would've noticed that some of the other bar patrons were giving him strange looks by now. It was lucky for him that he did not care to glance around. Lethargy was setting in.

Grillby nodded, "One hamburger, then. ..." Something seemed to catch his attention from the other side of the bar and he turned sharply, sighing.

Two teenagers were leaving, and as Grillby scowled and the kids tried to practically dash outside Sans wondered if they were not as upfront about paying as him. The bartender made a gesture to somebody who stood at the back of the big room, a white Snowdrake, and it hissed with a bound forward. While Sans watched, it caught the teenagers just as they stepped outside of the bar. Although the door was already closing, he quickly looked away when he heard them start screaming through the door, offering apologies and excuses between cries of pain.

Grillby tilted his fire covered head, listening to the noise, and then all of a sudden it stopped. He looked back at Sans. "They were on their third strike," he offered as the only explanation, when taking notice of his customer's expression. "Your food will be out shortly."

"... thanks," was all the skeleton could think to say, not caring if somebody looked funny at him for his manners. The white Snowdrake walked back inside and everyone else acted as though nothing had happened while it tracked dust to the corner it stood in.

Keeping his eyes on the counter, Sans resisted the sudden urge to start laughing- and not because he thought any of this was actually funny. At least he knew now why the other version of him was so sick of this place; by the same token, he himself couldn't wait to get out here and back to the normal Grillby's where everybody paid their tab and nobody got killed for not doing it.

He just had no idea how he was going to get back. The machine was already destroyed. He had no idea how the other him had got it working in the first place... And working for a purpose it was entirely unintended for. Sans put his hands over his eyes, sockets going black, and groaned.

In almost no time at all he heard a clink on the counter, and he peeked between his hands to see his food on a clean white plate in front of him, a fat juicy burger with all the fixings and half of it wrapped in wax paper. Sans felt a little bit of warmth return to his soul; he hoped that it looked as good as it tasted. He had a feeling he wouldn't be enjoying it too much with all the smoking everyone else was doing, though. He took two bites and was unable to separate the smell of nicotine and the taste of the burger- or the filthy language of the monsters around him, for that matter. The air and atmosphere in this place was suffocating him. Which was really a shame because apparently both Grillbys were pretty good cooks.

Grillby had gone back to mixing up a drink for someone else; Sans called to him, "you mind if I eat this outside?"

"It's your food now," was all he said, with another shooting glance in Sans' direction. "Don't take the plate."

"can do." He didn't want anything close to a strike. On that note, getting clean bottles of condiments was probably going to have to wait until he got back home, too.

As he took the burger into his hands, Sans thought he heard Grillby mutter something like "-n't believe it worked-" before going silent again.

... The burger in his hands better not be poisoned; his ribs and back still ached. As suspicious as Sans was now, though, his not-stomach was still growling, even more so now that he had actually taken a few bites of real monster food. So he would take the chance that this world was not so screwed up that someone trying to run a business would poison the food.

Even being right outside the bar wasn't good enough. He could still hear them. On the broken footpath that lead into the bar, dust was scattered through the cracks that the wind had yet to take away, and the grains were blending with the off-white snow in color. His stomach turned, and Sans took another shortcut with the burger in his hands dripping sauce onto the mix.

In Snowdin, one of the other areas he inevitably spent a lot of time at was his sentry post, even if he usually ended up sleeping at it instead of doing actual sentry work. So that his Papyrus didn't catch him away from it too often when he used to be "watching for humans," he knew how to get there quickly. He had apparently misjudged where the outpost was in this world, however. He was in the clearing in Snowdin forest where it used to be. Where it still was, actually. He hadn't taken the time to move it up to the surface yet.

The actual outpost wasn't here in this world. All he arrived at was a clearing in a dark, spooky woods, without any place to sit or store snacks. Grumbling, Sans took another bite of his burger and started moving. He would find a place to sit and enjoy his meal, even if his bones froze first.

The excess sauce that was dripping from the burger froze as soon as it touched the ground. What a mess. He caught a little of it into his mouth while he walked, trying to pretend that this was the regular Snowdin forest- although it was hard when there were so few evergreen trees, everything looking dead instead. But he tried. Tried to pretend that he was going to go back up to the surface soon, and had only dropped by to visit the snowman or some of the monsters that were not ready to leave yet. Or tried to pretend that if he turned around and walked the other way he would find the door to the Ruins, where he could go knocking and talk to Toriel. The real Toriel. He wasn't interested in seeing what the parallel world Toriel was like, especially given what was written on the list.

At last, closer to the river he saw the sentry outpost, tucked behind the couple of crooked trees with branches like gnarled fingers. If he hadn't been looking for it, it would've just melted away into the shadows, no sign attached to the front or anything. Off the path, and in the trees... although it was dark the wind wasn't quite so harsh, and Sans felt less like he was being watched by eyes he couldn't see. He had to congratulate his other self on picking a secluded spot for him to eat at.

It was his outpost all right. For one thing, it was filthy and covered in stains from what looked to be countless dinners at Grillby's. The surface was also scratched with names and notes, dug into the wood with a penknife, although most of them had already been made illegible by the elements. Along with a half-empty mustard bottle just lying at the bottom. Sans took a couple curious swallows and then grimaced, gagging on the taste. It was spicy.

Sans sighed and took another bite of his burger before moving to sit down. The gentle burbling of the ice cold river not far from where he sat was lulling him into a false sense of security.

Right before he was able to sit, something jumped on his back. Startled and forced to double over from the weight of this sudden creature, Sans screeched, his eye flashing blue and yellow. Small hands were pawing at his jacket and grabbing at his arm, something sharp knocking into his spine and catching in the back of his ribs. Was it a trap? Was he not allowed to enjoy a burger by himself? The skeleton growled and straightened up with force, throwing whenever it was back on the ground.

Before he could even turn it had scrambled back and crashed into him again. His blue magic flaring, Sans searched for the SOUL of this monster before realizing that those small hands were grabbing at his burger, and with one hand occupied trying to cast blue magic he was helpless to stop them from tearing the sandwich out of his unprepared bony fingers. "Hey."

The creature scrambled back, and Sans whirled around, "I was eating that," he snarled, half lamenting the loss of his food and half concerned that he was about to get into another situation that required effort on his part.

But the magic in his hand faded; both of his eyes took in the small child munching on what remained of his burger as if it was the only food they had eaten in days. And if this is where they had been hiding the whole time, that might actually be true.

"... kid?"

In appearance they were almost identical to the one in his world, but there were differences. Their bowl of dark hair was a mess- Sans doubted that it had been combed in all this time- and it did a good job at first of concealing their face while they ate. The rest of them didn't look that much better, and the colors on the clothes didn't match. The sweater that they wore, this one orange and black, was badly stretched out at the collar and one sleeve, and even from where he was standing he could see that their undershirt, this one a dark grey, was stained by something dark. Their pants, a similar grey, looked tattered and resown at the bottoms, while the shoes were falling apart. It was clearly different, but...

The child- the parallel Frisk- looked up to hear him speak again. Finishing off the rest of the hamburger, their dark eyes narrowed and they stood up, sticking their tongue out at him. Playing the quiet game that his Frisk had often played, back when they were first getting to know each other. Sans took a step forward. "human, don't you know it's rude to take someone else's food without asking?"

Their expression changed immediately, and the child took a step back. He felt guilty in his core, because he could read that look well and he knew that they must be afraid of him. Their eyes kept darting warily forward while they licked sauce off of their grubby little hands.

Sans sighed. "guess you were pretty hungry, huh?"

"..." Now their expression became just a little bit different, although the fear was still there and they took another step backwards. He couldn't quite tell what this one was. The way that they cocked their head at him, probably he wasn't acting very much like this world's Sans. He loosened his shoulders and tried to smile at them, as friendly as he could manage with a mouth full of uncomfortable sharp teeth. "hey, take it easy kiddo..."

Now the child trembled, eyes searching his for something and not finding it.

What? What did they want from him? "i'm not gonna hurt you."

But this Frisk didn't seem to take any comfort from that either, and as he took another step nearer their stance itself changed from one cowering in fear to one prepared to do something about it. Something swung into their hand from somewhere, pointed at the ground like a sword.

It was a... frying pan?

"kid?"

They glared in his direction. Was even this Frisk... evil? Or at least, a foe? Sans cringed. He really didn't want to fight them.

It was a fight he couldn't win.

 Next Chapter: Imposter Sans

Chapter Text

You feel like something is very wrong.

She could rely on facts, even here in this dark world where most people betrayed one another. Facts, after all, were more sincere than smiles. They just were a bit more difficult to determine, that was all. It took her weeks to learn enough to survive, for the most part, on her own- to not get killed at every opportunity.

An easy fact for her to figure out was that Sans, as harmless as he was, was still an asshole. That fact, she had thought, was reaffirmed today when he not only forgot to bring her some lunch (again,) but when he finally showed up at his sentry outpost with food he started eating it as if she didn't even exist. She wasn't surprised by that. She wasn't going to tolerate it, the taste of stolen sauce still on her tongue, but she wasn't surprised.

But he'd been different, and now Frisk didn't have her facts straight. She trembled where she stood, weapon out, unsure if it might be a trap. Maybe today he'd finally decided that he was sick of her and several members of the canine unit were going to come running into the trees at any moment. The smile that he was giving her was so completely alien. Intrusive thoughts whispered that she should attack now, before he did, but like usual Frisk ignored them. Still, as she faced him her SOUL burned and became visible just outside of her chest, a pale red.

Her blood was running and she took a deep breath. Surely one of them was going to attack soon, although since it was him it would probably not be a magical attack, so she could handle it. She knew she could. Sans was an easy fight, unlike everybody else. He only had 1 HP and he was unable to use magic. But that was exactly why she was so nervous. It was an easy fight, but she wasn't going to have an easy time of it. And that was even more true if he had "help" in the form of the canine unit.

Although even as her imagination was getting away with her...

Oh look, Sans is sparing you.

"i don't want to fight, kid," said the bizarre, friendly smiling Sans. "why don't you put that thing away?"

Frisk tightened her grip on the pan instead. Whatever his game was, she wasn't going to get caught in it.

Sans is still sparing you.

"please? please put that thing away, frisk," he was saying, no longer stepping forward, and the child's eyes widened. "i... know you must be upset, but i promise i'm not gonna-"

Everything came together for her, out of all the facts that she knew, and for the first time in days she spoke without being prompted as she blurted out, "You're not Sans."

Following that, there was a silence between them. The monster standing in front of her, who looked like Sans, watched her with his soothing, trying-to-reason-with-an-idiot-friendliness startled right off of his face. So she guessed that even that blurted out statement was correct. The pan went a little bit limp in Frisk's hands when she realized this, and her first scenario for why he was acting so strange was at least proven wrong. But her gaze and her mouth turned hard, her hold becoming stronger, when more scenarios filled her head. Whoever this imposter was, she wasn't going to get drawn into his game either.

The imposter didn't seem to be too upset, though, that she had found him out. "heh heh heh heh." He shoved his hands into his pockets, grinning at her. His eye wasn't the harsh, angry red that she was used to, both of them white pupils instead. Come to think of it, that had been her first clue for Frisk that something was off. She had only seen him look that way twice in all the time she'd known him. "you're pretty smart. nope, i'm not sans."

Frisk gritted her teeth, taking a step closer with the pan. But as she did, the imposter continued, "at least, i'm not the one that you know. so although my name is 'sans the skeleton,' i uh, don't think it means the same thing to you as a means to me and my friends. am i making any sense?"

The child growled at him, "No. What did you do to the real Sans?"

He laughed again, and her fear spiked as he winked lazily at her. But so did her anger. What was wrong with this guy? "it's not what i did to your sans, kiddo, it's what he did to me."

You should-

Frisk wasn't even listening to the intrusive thought; she was acting on a reflex that told her to fight dirty. She ran at the imposter Sans with the frying pan in her hand, her teeth bared. But as she ran, taking a swing at him, he suddenly wasn't in front of her anymore. "god damn," he said from behind her, and Frisk whirled on her feet, flipping lots of hair around her face. She tried again, as if encouraged by the fact that her weapon couldn't connect with anything, and again he was gone before the frying pan could make impact. "you're a little snot, arent'cha?" Again, his voice came from behind her. Frisk turned a little more slowly- she could only swing her pan for so long before her arms got tired- and this time she just ran at him.

"look bucko," he said as he disappeared from in front of her again. "this is only going to end one of two ways, and something tells me that you don't want either of those ways to happen. so why don't you put that thing away and we can talk like civil people?"

She was about to turn around and take a swing, that voice seeming a little bit closer than before, when she felt a familiar tug on the SOUL in her chest. She was just able to whirl around again and see him smiling placidly at her before, in another second, that SOUL turned blue. Suddenly unable to move froward, Frisk's body flew back several feet instead and she skidded into a tree. "!"

Seconds passed as her SOUL remained blue, and pinned to the tree by an unseen force Frisk could only growl and squirm in vain, having dropped her weapon upon impact. It was like Papyrus's attack, but clearly the direction was different. Her Sans was capable of this, too. While the child struggled and snarled, this one approached her with the smile still big on his face. "there. now was that so hard?"

"Let go of me shithead!" Frisk snapped as she tried to push herself off with her palms, only succeeding in moving a few inches before thudding back into place.

"uh wow language," the imposter Sans remarked, and Frisk let out a scream of frustration. "i'll let you down after we talk."

"No!" Frisk shouted, her voice getting louder, "Let me down now!"

"do, uh, you seriously want to keep drawing attention to yourself like that? because this place doesn't seem that kid friendly to me." At that, Frisk's struggles became smaller and she stopped screaming, although still glaring. "that's better... ? i guess."

"What do you want?" She asked, roughly throwing hair out of her face with her arms.

And he sighed. "i just wanna go home, kid. but from the look of things that seems to be nearly impossible." Frisk stopped moving, huffing and narrowing her eyes. She knew that feeling. But that was only if he was telling the truth, which she had no reason to believe when he wasn't even who he looked like. So with no input from the child, the imposter Sans went on, "uh, where do i start? your sans... is the prick that wore this coat, right?"

"Don't call him a prick, you dick!"

He laughed at her. "oh okay. the dick that wore this coat?"

"Don't call him a dick, you prick!" She accidentally smiled, and immediately forced her face back into the ugliest frown she could manage.

The imposter Sans relaxed, chuckling. "whatever he is, he... uh... listen, do you know anything about parallel worlds or alternate realities? alternate dimensions? a world aside from this one where everything is similar, but also different?"

That strange gray monster child that she saw when she was in Waterfall cropped up in her mind, but the meeting had been so terrifying that she tried to sink a little deeper into her sweater instead of responding. She could hear the imposter saying, "something tells me that you do. y'see, i come from that kind of place, originally. i'm a sans from another world, one that's... marrrginally like this one."

"That sounds like a load of b-"

"not done talking kiddo," he said, cutting in easily. Frisk gritted her teeth, but continued to listen. "your sans is a pretty smart guy. a bit smarter than most people give him credit for, i think. did you know that? ...heh ...well, anyway, he created a machine that could take him to these other worlds- or mine, anyway. Slipped me something and tossed me in here before i had the chance to figure out what was going on. meanwhile i'm guessing that he's in my world right now pretending to be me. kind of like something out of a storybook, isn't it?"

On the tree, still rooted in place, Frisk had started to curl up, knees out and heels against the bark while she folded her arms over her chest. While she stared at the ground in silence, he finally added, "otherwise how else would i know... that your name is frisk, right?" A bead of sweat appeared on his skull. "'cause it seems like that's not something he's supposed to know. the frisk in my world, though, told me their name."

That had been proof that he wasn't Sans, but that didn't mean that it was proof he was a Sans from somewhere else. Even though she'd told literally no monsters here her name, and he was still so similar to Sans despite the clear changes in personality... Taking his claim at face value also seemed stupid, except that he was also correct about one other thing. Sans- her Sans, the Sans- was pretty smart. But she didn't think that he was this smart. She didn't think that he was scientist smart. She also didn't take him for the kind of person who would just leave without warning. ... Except, that was pretty much all he ever did, now that she thought about it. Just on a smaller scale. "...Why would he...?"

"uh, i still have his note here if you wanted to read it. the short of it is that he's sick of this place, and, uh, that's an actual quote."

To that, Frisk at first had no reply. She absolutely did not want to read the note that he left; her stomach was as curled up as she was, and she glared even harder than she was already glaring, as if willing daggers to fly from her eyes. No matter how hard she tried to be intimidating, though, the Sans imposter just kept up that big smile. She buried herself in her overstretched sweater. It wasn't like she could accuse him of actually being the one to drag Sans out and replace him, because honestly, who would do that? Who would willingly come here?

Before she'd even noticed, her butt was back on the ground, and the hold on her SOUL released as gravity returned to normal. No more of that blue magic was being used, and overall the imposter Sans was looking a little more tired than a moment ago. Without looking at him any further, without saying anything, Frisk snatched up the frying pan and put it back where it belonged on her person, although no longer wielding it.

"hey."

She looked up.

"wanna hear a joke?"

For the briefest of seconds, she thought that this Sans didn't look that much like hers after all, wearing a face without quite so many harsh triangles for teeth. Shooting him a look of disgust, Frisk stood up and started brushing snow off her pants. She wasn't going to dignify that question with a response; the only sound that came out of her was her stomach growling, not satisfied with the half-eaten magical hamburger, and the little grunt and cough that she made trying to cover it up.

"knock knock," the speech was punctuated by an actual knocking sound, which Sans- the fake Sans- achieved by gently rapping on his own head. Frisk looked at him in disbelief, and he added, "this is where you ask 'who's there?'"

"Go away," she snapped, walking around him. "I don't want any."

"aw c'mon kiddo," the crunching of snow Frisk heard from behind meant that he was shuffling after her. "he may have been a jerk, but i'm sure even your sans told jokes."

"Yeah, well they weren't funny," she growled. Which was a lie- only the ones that he said she was too young to understand weren't funny- but he didn't need to know that. He didn't seem the type to make those kinds of jokes anyway.

He was still following her. "hmm. well if it makes you feel better, i'm told my jokes aren't funny either."

This time Frisk looked back, though that was only to stick her tongue out at him and then keep walking. She had already picked the sentry outpost clean before he got there, and the most there was was condiment packets. Surely she could find something to eat somewhere, or if she asked really nicely Flowey would be brave enough to go buy or steal something for her instead- whichever one it was depended on how much of her hard-earned money she was willing to part with today. So while she was banging her heel against the ground, in the code she used for "get up here immediately," she unbelievably heard the imposter Sans start talking again. "okay then, what do you call a flower that kisses you?"

She turned her head half a fraction and he took that as incentive to continue. "tulips."

A pause, and then Frisk slapped her hand over her face. "That was retarded."

The voice behind her laughed anyway, although whether it was at his own joke or at her reaction she couldn't tell. Speaking of flowers, Flowey wasn't showing up when he was called again. Was it because there was someone new here? Or just because he thought Sans was here? He was probably watching from a distance like he sometimes did, so Frisk turned her head in multiple directions while trying not to look back at the imposter Sans. "why didn't the bicycle work?"

A grunt.

"because it was two-tired."

Why. Why was he doing this?

"why did the chicken cross the road?"

She snorted. She had heard this one before. "To get to the idiot's house."

"... ..." That threw him, and Frisk felt a little glow as he halted the dumb joking for a second. "... actually it was to follow the turkey. but, uh, sure, maybe that was both their destinations."

Sans tells a joke about poultry. You don't understand it because you're an idiot and he didn't tell it right.

Frisk snarled and finally turned all the way around, but in the snow and thickness of the trees she still couldn't see Flowey anywhere. Standing in one place, even though she had protection from the wind she was starting to feel very cold again. "Stop."

But Sans just put his hands into his pockets and leaned forward. "knock knock."

Suppressing a scream, the child put her hands over her eyes. Fine, fine, if he wasn't going to leave her alone she would play along. "Who's there?"

"it's the chicken."

Quiet, except for the wind rustling the dry tree branches above them. Frisk peeked out from between her fingers, studying the face that was in front of her. It took her a few seconds, while it processed in her mind, but then she flashed an uncontrollable smile and giggled at him. That also only lasted a few seconds, and she murmured through her hands "This time I'm the idiot..." in dawning.

"heheheheh."

Now that she took her hands away and viewed him a little more closely, the things about his face that reminded her of her Sans weren't visible anymore. It was as if, now that she was looking for differences, they were presenting themselves to her; the rounder, softer eye sockets, teeth that weren't spikes, and not a gold tooth in sight. The only thing that he had in common was the jacket he was wearing, and his small skeleton stature. Even the way he talked, which she had noticed quickly, was different. Not as strained, not as harsh.

Frisk tilted her head left and right and then laughed again, but this time she gave him a nasty smile. The imposter Sans tensed. "I don't think that you're going to last very long here~," she sang, turning to resume her search for food in this forest.

"... we'll see about that, kiddo," he said behind her. Frisk only laughed again, but then she heard, "but you stay out of trouble now. i'll probably be talking to you again soon."

"?" She turned her head back, but he was gone.

Stomach growling, and scowling nervously, the child kept moving.

Next Chapter: Goddamned Phone Technology

Chapter Text

For the first time since coming back up to the surface, Frisk didn't have anything to do that Saturday- at least, nothing obligatory.

She couldn't count all the arguments that she'd had with the mayor of the human city after becoming an ambassador. She met with him and with Asgore every other weekend, and even a couple weeks days when she technically should have been in school like an ordinary kid. (Ordinary kids did not attend a monster school, at least not yet, but still.) It turned out that brokering peace between two races was more complicated than she thought.

She wasn't worried, but it made her really appreciate this Saturday when she didn't have to go discussing human issues with having monsters live next door. The child even slept in until ten, and woke up to a still-warm pie slice by her bedside which ended up serving for breakfast.

Lazing about was done; it was time to get down to business, the kind of business that she liked to do. Childish business.

Frisk was dead-set on drawing everybody who had formerly lived in the Underground, and she had the paper, colored pencils, and time to do it. She had already completed a handful over these weeks of their freedom, but there were several she was missing still, not to mention the hundreds of monsters that she hadn't met yet, mostly from New Home, that she still had to go find in and outside of the new monster city. ...Some might say that, given the sheer number of them out there, this task was impossible.

She just got out her pencil and sketched Shyren on the floor of her living room. Her locket swayed each time she assumed a new position, turning her sketchbook this way and that, and she bit her tongue in concentration. A tune started playing through her head and she hummed along, murmuring lyrics in a voice so quiet that she hoped no one else could hear her, if anyone were to walk in.

The music was interrupted by knocking on the door.

"Frisk, dear, could you get that?" Toriel asked from the stairwell. "I've got paint all over my hands."

"'Kay," the child called, running and opening up the door wide.

As soon as she did, she smiled to see Sans on the other side. When he saw her, his eyes... didn't widen, exactly, because they were just sockets, but she was sure that she saw surprise. And then Frisk thought she heard something like, "heya twerp!"

The smile vanished from her lips, "Eh?"

Sans coughed, and said a bit slower, "-i said nice shirt."

After a second of hesitance, she gave in to the compliment, having hoped someone would comment each time she stepped outside. Grinning big again, Frisk rolled up her striped sweater to show the shirt underneath, this one bearing a starry field pattern. "Oh yeah, it's all the constellations you told me about! I couldn't find that lion one anywhere though, even when I turned off the lights so it would glow- in the dark..." her voice trailed off as she let her sweater go, face going sheepish.

"heh. looks inaccurate as hell but it's cool," Sans said, and Frisk stared at him with her mouth open. It wasn't that she hadn't heard the word "hell" before, but she hadn't ever heard it from Sans. At her gaze, a couple beads of sweat went down his skull. "...what?"

"You swore," Frisk said, suddenly grinning.

"...what, hell? hell's not a swear word," Sans stammered, before cutting himself off, "a-a-ctually, isn't this supposed to- uh... is Toriel here?"

He never got flustered before. He must be up to something. Frisk nodded, pointing deeper into the house to where her adoptive mother was still painting the stairwell a bright blue. Ever since Frisk it told her that blue was her favorite color, she had apparently made it her quest to paint the house. Frisk didn't want to be rude by pointing out that she had other favorite colors too; her room looked pretty cool now, at least, and the walls in this old place really did need a fresh coat.

Sans stepped in while Frisk swung back with her hands still on the door handle. "in there?" The child nodded, and he muttered, "talkative as ever, i see." As Sans walked past her the child followed and absently thumbed her locket. She prepared to make a dash and protect her drawings from being seen before they were all finished, if necessary. But he didn't go into the living room. He just called out, "...toriel?"

"Oh!" As Toriel came down the stairs, wiping her wet and washed hands on her robe, Sans' back arched. "What a pleasant surprise, Sans! I did not know that you would be coming by today!"

"... aaha..." exhaling, he seemed to need a second to respond, his posture still stiff where he stood staring at her. Toriel stood in the entryway to the kitchen, waiting patiently; playing again with her locket in her hands, Frisk stepped quietly to the side of Sans to see them both better, pressing her back into the as-of-yet yellow kitchen wall. "y... well, uh."

Toriel and Frisk exchanged looks, as Sans struggled to make words. Hopefully this wasn't something she had to leave the room for. But then Toriel prompted, with a kind smile, "Is something the matter?"

Slowly, Sans exhaled again and scratched his head. Finally he said, "-no. uh... how are you feelin' today?"

She chuckled, "I am feeling fine, thank you! And you, my friend?"

"-pretty good. actually," he nodded in kind, smiling more earnestly at her. Although soon his smile waned, and he added, "well, i guess i've been feeling off lately. woke up today with a sore throat or something."

Exchanging looks again, Frisk and Toriel both frowned. Her guardian came forward, saying, "Let me feel your forehead." Without saying any words, Sans stood completely still and just kept his eyes trained on Toriel, although he grumbled something about "don't worry" under his breath. Pressing both the back and the palm of her hand against bone, Toriel mused, "You wouldn't be the first monster to get sick since our excursion up to the surface. It's only been minor illnesses, luckily. You know, disease is not nearly as rampant in human societies as it was before the war."

"that so?" Sans mumbled.

"Yes! Frisk told me just the other day about a human invention called vaccines that is responsible for that," Toriel said as stood back. "Although all that aside, I don't feel any fever on you, Sans."

"Can a skeleton even get sick?" Frisk piped up.

Sans touched his bony fingers to the spot where Toriel had rested her hand and smirked, not bothering to look over at Frisk, "honestly, i don't have any idea. never been sick before."

"All monsters catch diseases, sweetheart," Toriel said gently. "Would you like me to make you some soup, Sans, just in case?"

"no."

There was a pause between all three of them, before Sans added, roughly, "i mean you don't have to go to the trouble of... making anything, toriel. papyrus is already picking things up from the store for me."

"Nonsense! Perhaps I can at least give you and Frisk some for lunch?"

"uh... sure."

You feel as though something is wrong.

Frisk couldn't put her finger on it, but Sans was definitely acting strange. She could chalk it up to the fact that he had even said he woke up sick, but somehow that didn't seem right either. Someone sick would be tired, right? But Sans was on edge, it felt like. That was the difference in his voice, more than anything else. It jarred her whenever he spoke.

Did something happen? She wanted to ask, but wasn't sure if she should when Toriel was there with them. The boss monster didn't seem to notice anything, and then... she had enough to worry about. Lots of kids at the school were calling in sick with colds and flus.

The soup was delicious, at least. To give her a better sense of flavor than monster magic could provide, Frisk's bowl had human vegetables added into it. Both she and Sans ended up slurping it up at the table, to Toriel's dismay, and too the milk that came afterwards. ... Actually, after that, Frisk felt better and let it go. Sans didn't look any different.

Once full she flopped partway over the table and just let them talk, Toriel carrying most of the conversation this time. It was hard to keep track of- her mind was already wandering back to her project, to the half finished Shyren picture. After making a sketch it was fine, but some monsters she wanted to get done today she was having trouble remembering in clear detail, like Shyren's fishy manager or Final Froggit.

She knew where the Final Froggits congregated.

"T-mom!" She lifted her head, and Toriel broke off from her speech on the word "apricot". "I'm gonna go out and take pictures, is that okay?"

"pictures of what?"

While Toriel nodded her assent, Frisk spoke quickly, "Of the other monsters! It's hard to keep in mind what all of them look like, you know?" Sans squinted at her and she scoffed, "Maybe you don't know, since you know everybody, but still..."

At that, he grinned. "if you say so f-frisk." She was already scurrying into the living room and sliding her colored pencils back into their case, shuffling and putting away her papers, and looking for her phone.

"Please make sure to ask permission first, dear, you know some of them can be camera shy," Toriel said, and the child hesitated. Asking permission to take a picture of someone was something that hadn't even occurred to her until now; it wasn't like she was going to post them anywhere, it was just for reference. She didn't need to ask permission to draw pictures of people, right? "Frisk?"

"Uhhokay," she finally said. She had the cellphone in her hand at last, and grinning the child snapped a quick one of her own face. She didn't need to ask herself permission, at least. She turned, and Sans was still watching her carefully from the kitchen. Tilting her head at him, Frisk started out slow and quiet, "...Did you wanna come with me, Sans?"

He exhaled. "uh-... sure."

"Have fun, you two! I have a house to get back to!" Toriel said; soup finished, she turned an energized look back towards the stairwell. "I promise that by the time you get back, the whole upstairs is going to be blue as the sky!"

As he stood, Sans glanced towards the stairwell, "eh- why?"

"For Frisk, of course!"

Frisk put a hand over her face and peeked at Sans, blushing. He smirked back. "that so... hah, don't let this kid give you the blues, toriel. try red instead."

Toriel's muffled laughter followed the two of them out the door, and Frisk pictured an entirely red house as opposed to a blue one. Then, while Sans was looking back at the door as though able to see Toriel on the other side of it, she snapped a picture of him with her phone.

"-! hey!" The child dodged from his grasp, darting down the steps, "oh, think you're pretty funny eh? don't disobey the lady, she might stop being so friendly to ya," he said.

Frisk halted and looked back, Sans following her onto the sidewalk. "... Wait, what does that mean?"

Sans put his hands in his pockets. "...it's a joke. possibly."

"Possibly?" Frisk held up her phone again and, with a blank expression, snapped a second picture.

Sans tensed, "-okay stop."

Snap!

"i'm gonna take it from you." His grin was huge but his eyes were definitely harsh. Frisk grinned huge back and started to run down the sidewalk. "gh-! get back here kid!"

She thought she'd gotten a good start, but it felt like only half a second before his bony hand was yanking her to a stop, grasping one arm tightly. "Ow!"

His other hand snatched the phone out of her grasp, "there we go."

She laughed, but only because the pain of him holding on to her arm was slowly fading. "Heyyy, give it back..."

"nnnah," he closed one eye lazily as he flipped through the phone, "not until i delete everything on it."

"No don't!"

She reached to grab it and he laughed, holding it out of her reach. "what, you want it back?"

"Sans!"

"okay. but, uh, first how do you erase stuff on this thing?"

"I worked hard for those pictures!"

He still didn't hand it back, using one hand to push her out of reach as he looked through her photos. The child felt the barest stab of panic. One that was, surely, completely unwarranted. "you can work hard for the new o-"

The shrill response that had been building was stopped in her throat, and Sans' taunt as well, by another sound that neither expected. It was a ringtone, one that she didn't recognize. Sans' pupils had turned to tiny pinpricks in his eyes, and while he froze in place Frisk was able to slide out from under his hand and recapture her own phone. She backed away a few steps, assuring herself that most of the images were safe.

Sans reached into his pants pocket and brought out the cellphone, staring for several seconds. Frisk was about to ask if he was going to answer it when the skeleton finally opened the thing, putting it close to his skull with his smile wavering. The panic that had entered Frisk's gut returned and she thumbed her locket, putting her phone away for the time being.

From the other end of Sans' phone came a voice, slightly tinny, faint, and distorted by static. It came out suddenly and shouted, loud enough for even Frisk to hear, "SANS!" Upon hearing it, Sans ripped the phone away from his head, and Frisk stopped in her tracks. He said, in a hiss, "fuck-"

The voice continued on uninterrupted, "WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN..." It kept occasionally shorting out, and Sans was just staring at it with wavering eyes that were like needle-points. Frisk gripped the locket in her hands tightly, a nervous smile plastered on her face to match the smile on the skeleton in front of her. "...JUST FUCKING EVAPORATED AND I GOT VERY BONETROUSLED LOOKING FOR... ... ... DECENCY TO CALL..."

"Who's that?"

In asking, she broke the chain of screaming from the phone; as she did Sans's eyes flickered in her direction, beads of sweat going down his skull. "... wrong number?"

"...ALSO FIXED THE RAILING SO YOU'RE WEL-" Sans turned the phone off and the voice vanished, leaving a vacuum silence.

Finding herself shaking, Frisk dropped her smile and curled up her nose, "Was that Papyrus?"

Sans was breathing a little funny. "... ...apparently? he, uh. he didn't sound good, did he?" One of those funny breaths came out as a shaky laugh. "that was... really weird, am i right?"

Frisk nodded, and tilted her head, "What does 'fuck' mean?"

"uhhhh listen, kid," Sans crossed the distance between them both, smiling wider but with more sweat, and plopped his hand on her hand. "can you... not tell toriel that i used that word?"

This would be a good opportunity to say she would if he promised not to steal her phone again. But instead, the child looked down at the ground and then back up, frowning. "Is Papyrus okay?"

Still looking towards the phone at rapid intervals, the question took him off guard. "huh? what?"

"I've never heard him talk like that before," she tried again, clasping her hands together. "Is something wrong?"

Sans' eyes, which had retained that startled look the whole time since the phone first started ringing, returned to normal at last. But the child still wasn't satisfied, and those eyes roved over her face.

"is something wrong...?" He repeated, without a reply. The panic in the child became worry, until Sans said with a smile, "nah, everything's fine here. ...i'm sure he's just having a very bad day."

Hands moving behind her back, Frisk stared.

You suspect that Sans might be lying to you.

The staring continued, with neither one of them speaking or moving farther down the sidewalk. In time Sans' smile drooped, then grew abnormally large as his eyes took on a harsher glare, his shoulders visibly tensed. Although seeing it made her heartbeat increase, nothing changed on Frisk's face, and then he jerked his posture loose.

"...y'know what," the skeleton said finally, winking at her, "you should just focus on taking pictures of people other than me. that is what you want to do, right?"

The more familiar Sans had returned. "Yes..." the child offered a weak smile and rubbed her arm. Then with more energy, she said, "Let's go!"

When she turned to march down the sidewalk she heard him exhale sharply, one more time.

Next Chapter: Not Tired, Tired

Chapter Text

The phone.

Meeting with Toriel, meeting face-to-face for the first time in his life, was a strange experience- one that he would even describe as pleasant. She definitely wasn't like the Toriel in his world, or maybe she was, or... Well, it was a strange experience and he liked it. He would have been more polite back in his world, though, if he had known he was talking to royalty the whole time.

But the fucking phone.

Why hadn't he just left it behind? He didn't even know that it was possible to call him on it, especially not between dimensions. No, it shouldn't be possible. It should be impossible, it should be a pipe dream, and yet here he was with his phone off and likely several missed calls from Papyrus building up on it as he, rigid, walked around with the kid. He didn't dare turn it back on, not even to check his messages- as if he even wanted to do that in the first place. No need to hear that godawful voice again, screaming at him in that affected deep growl because of- what was it this time? Evaporating? His parallel self must have been up to something.

Not his problem. Not his problem anymore.

Sans put the offending item in the pocket of this hoodie, but it continued occupy his thought for hours while the afternoon wore on. He was just lucky that, like his Frisk, this child wasn't one to force conversation. They were taking pictures of freaking everything, or at least every monster that they came across, humming some tune to themselves as they went as though believing that nobody could hear them. It sure wasn't any tune he had heard before; the sound started to get in his head on a loop, but when he noticed it he didn't dare tell them to stop. He had displayed enough suspicious behavior for today.

So much for being careful. It was a good thing that the brat was an idiot.

The monsters in this world were different too. He had already learned that, but now he saw in more detail just how different. It wasn't that they were unrecognizable, but all of them were so much... softer. He was only able to put his finger on it when they reached the community of Froggits, which had taken up residence in an abandoned human village outside of the city, one closer by Mt. Ebott. Sans had never in his life seen a regular Froggit. They were so soft and white and squishy, calm and dumb as they hopped from place to place and stood stoically by empty houses. They didn't mind at all when the child took pictures, which they inevitably ended up doing despite the fact that the objective was the Final Froggits. When the two of them finally found those, they ended up being few in number, when back home those were the only kind to be found.

If they were this placid in this world, would it be possible for him to actually kill one without taking damage? Not that he really could fight the way he was right now, but it was a thought that Sans liked having.

Frisk looked so cheerful while they croaked with the monsters that again Sans had that feeling of the alien, the transient. He kept glancing at the sky, keeping the softly cloud-covered sun in his eyes to assure himself that what he was seeing was real.

"Sans, look!" One time he did this and he almost missed it when the child had climbed onto a stack of them, only to lose their balance and fall at the last moment. He'd burst out laughing while they picked themself off the ground with a hard breath; they glared as hard as they could muster, it only made him laugh harder. It didn't last too long before he moved, though; then he felt the weight of the phone in his pocket, and his thoughts clouded over again.

Mercifully, at some point they headed back to New New Home.

As they passed small and half-finished buildings, the whole place obviously under construction, Sans frowned and murmured, "aw jeeze, papyrus is probably wondering where i am." It was true in both senses. How long did it take to go to a human store, anyway?

Frisk got that look on their face, the same kind of look as when his real bro had called. It was hilarious, the twerp being worried about either of them, but he kept from laughing. He just waved, not answering to their concern, and said, "takin' a shortcut. see ya later, pipsqueak."

ah shit.

Oh well, he was already gone from there, back to the place in his mind where his new house was situated. This time Sans had to be careful not to direct himself all the way down to this world's Snowdin, under the mountain.

When he got there Papyrus was already waiting for him, making something in the kitchen. Seeing him, again, some of the tension returned and he stiffened. But he had been able to keep his eye from freaking out the whole time he was with Frisk, so surely with him too he would keep it under control. Sans sharply exhaled, and the sounds alerted his "brother" to his presence. Papyrus looked in from the kitchen, "SANS! I WAS WONDERING WHERE YOU GOT OFF TO! I GOT BACK A WHOLE HOUR AGO, I WAS CONCERNED WHEN I DIDN'T FIND YOU HERE."

get off my back. "oh, i just went to hang out with the kid for a couple hours," he said with a shrug. Unbelievably the nagging ended at that, as he heard Papyrus say, "WELL I HOPE YOU SAID HELLO TO THEM FOR ME!"

"uhhh."

"NEXT TIME YOU SHOULD. I DON'T HAVE AS MUCH TIME TO SEE THEM IN PERSON AS YOU DO! WHEN YOU'RE AS COOL AS ME, YOU ALWAYS HAVE BUSY DAYS."

"uh." As he spoke, or rather resisted speaking while the other skeleton went on, a smell reached Sans' nostrils and he perked up, cutting Papyrus off mid-sentence, "are you... cooking something?" From his vantage points he hadn't been able to see this world's version of his brother cook anything, and he definitely didn't have this experience with his own. Still in a mild state of shock, and have wondering where he might have been learning, Sans kept sampling the air. It smelled like lasagna?

"YES! I'M SO EXCITED! SANS YOU SHOULD HAVE COME WITH ME, THEY HAD SO MANY DIFFERENT KINDS OF NOODLES!" Papyrus had darted out of the kitchen, wearing a "kiss the cook" apron, and Sans rolled his eyes. "IT WAS HARD FOR ME TO REMEMBER THE NAMES OF ALL OF THEM, SO I BOUGHT THIS COOK BOOK AND IT TURNED OUT TO HAVE SO MANY RECIPES INSIDE!"

"hey uh, did you get the orange juice like you said you would?"

At this Papyrus hesitated, before beaming proudly. "OF COURSE I DID! I WASN'T SURE WHAT KIND YOU WANTED SO I BOUGHT ONE OF EACH IN THE STORE." Sans walked past him, opening up the door to the refrigerator, and stared at the brightly colored cartons before his eyes. "...OF COURSE, NOW NOTHING ELSE CAN FIT IN THE FRIDGE."

"holy shit," Sans wasn't even sure that he liked orange juice, he had just been going along with the being sick idea. He only ever tasted the stuff in the context of stealing a carton from the garbage- granted, these would probably taste better than that one had, but still. His smile broadened. A few of these were probably going to go bad. "are you sure you got enough?"

"W-WELL!" Papyrus folded his arms defensively, looking again startled by his brother's language. "YOUR HEALTH IS AT STAKE!"

"haa, holy shit."

Now he was doubly startled, as Sans looked back at him, blinking, and then back to the fridge that had been mostly empty this morning. It took Papyrus a second or two to get back on track with what he was saying, "YES...! AND... YOU NEED ALL THE VITAMINS YOU CAN GET! AND AS FAR AS I'M AWARE, HUMAN FOODS HAVE THE MOST VITAMINS, SO NATURALLY I'M GOING TO GET AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!"

With all that rambling something else occurred to Sans, then. "this is human orange juice, though, isn't it? are you sure that we can digest this?"

"NOT TO WORRY, BROTHER! UNDYNE SHOWED ME HOW TO MIX HUMAN FOOD WITH MAGIC SO IT GOES DOWN EASIER!" Sans would be happy if it didn't go down at all, actually; the twerp had explained to him once about how human food was made of more physical stuff than monster food, and had laughed hysterically at the idea that anything he ate would just fall out of his ribs and make a mess on the ground. He'd tweaked their nose pretty hard over that.

But nonetheless, as Sans glanced anxiously over the liquid Papyrus was assuring him, "I ALREADY TRIED IT WITH SOME OF THE LASAGNA JUST NOW AND IT WAS GREAT! IT TOOK A BIT LONGER TO DISSIPATE, SO MAAAYBE WE SHOULDN'T EAT TOO MUCH, BUT IT TASTED WORTHY OF A CHEF LIKE ME!"

"really?" He glanced left, seeing the steaming human food already cooked, cooling on the counter, and yet... sparkling. Smelled okay, didn't look appetizing. "...huh."

"SO ALL I HAVE TO DO NOW IS TREAT EACH OF THE CARTONS WITH THE SAME AND YOU SHOULD BE ALL SET!"

"uh. you're gonna do that to all of these?"

"YES!"

"...-cool."

Papyrus came back into the kitchen and Sans stepped back, slamming the door shut on the fridge in anticipation of the shrill order to close it- an order that never came. Despite the loud noise it made, his not-brother was still geeking out over the dumb human food and didn't notice, "ANNND AS YOU MIGHT HAVE JUST HEARD ME SAY, THERE IS ALSO LASAGNA THAT I LEARNED HOW TO MAKE USING THE COOK BOOK AND SOME INGREDIENTS FROM THAT HUMAN STORE! I THOUGHT I'D TRY IT INSTEAD OF SPAGHETTI TONIGHT." Papyrus frowned, touching a hand to his jaw, "HOPEFULLY UNDYNE DOESN'T MIND ME MAKING SOMETHING NEW WITHOUT HER..."

Pressed into the corner, Sans sniffed the lasagna again. As long as he didn't have to see Undyne here. "nah."

"WELL," his parallel brother shrugged, "I SUPPOSE IT DOESN'T MATTER NOW." He paused, looking Sans over. The smaller skeleton was still sniffing the dish, only half-focusing. "DID YOU WANT TO EAT DINNER WITH ME? OR IS THIS GOING TO BECOME BREAKFAST?"

At this, Sans looked up. "the fu- breakfast?"

"SINCE YOU SOMETIMES START SLEEPING ABOUT NOW!" Papyrus shrugged under Sans' incredulous gaze, shifting his eyes left and right. "UH, NOT ALL THE TIME? JUST SOMETIMES. ... ... YOU KNOW YOU DO! DON'T DENY IT!"

"i'm not fuc- i'm not denying anything i'm just-" hands in his pockets, Sans' shoulders arched; he knew immediately that he had to stop, and so exhaled. He made his smile a bit brighter, albeit only estimating what it must look like with his altered face. "i mean, i'm not tired. 'course i'm eatin' dinner. you can... uh, tell me all about the human city while we eat." Dinners with his own Papyrus didn't always go smoothly, hence why he usually spent evenings at Grillby'z instead. He was curious about this one.

Here, Papyrus looked positively ecstatic, and Sans' breath caught in his throat again for a millisecond. "WOWIE! OKAY! I HAVE SO MUCH TO TELL YOU!"

Sans chuckled, helping himself to the bizarre sparkly food. "i'm all ears, bro. ... well, it would be more accurate to say that I am no ears-" and so is little timmy because someone chopped those suckers off amirite? "but i'm sure i'll ear you just fine either way."

Papyrus let out a muffled scream and Sans winced, "-MY DAY WAS GOING SO WELL, I LET MY GUARD DOWN."

A second passed, and then Sans ventured, "...your royal guard?"

Papyrus flung his hands over his face, dramatically, to hide his smile, "STOP."

For the first time in years he was making puns around this joker and not getting slapped upside the head for it. Sans, too, was ecstatic.

So the evening passed.

That night, after an unbelievable round of reading Papyrus a very gruesome bed-time story, his not-brother helplessly protesting that this "is not how Fluffy Bunny goes!" the whole time, Sans still didn't sleep even after leaving him alone.

Instead, with the phone still heavy in his pocket, he spent the time looking for the key that the parallel version of himself must have. The key that would open up the shed at the back of the house. He knew that that shed was there; he had seen it several times already, unnoticed by everyone else in New New Home but hiding secrets he had glimpsed through the viewer of his machine.

Sans' own shed key- which he had unfortunately forgotten to bring with him- was gold, and it wasn't assured the colors would be the same, but he could reasonably assume that it would be the same shape. So he searched, keeping his eyes peeled for this version.

...

But it wasn't where he thought it would be.

In the harsh, windy Snowdin that had not been evacuated up to the surface, a tired and cold Sans finally came back to the deadened woods. It was only after a long couple of hours had passed, hours that he was dissatisfied with.

Making absolutely sure to keep out of sight of this world's Papyrus, he tried to check out the machine in the shed again, and even more than before he felt exhausted and out of his depth. Even if he was able to put the booth in the rest of its parts back together, the engine that was used to power the machine, or at least the pieces of it that he could make out, was something that he never encountered before. And that was not just because it looked like most of the parts had been taken from the garbage and modified.

If he was going actually fix it, he was going to need more resources and knowledge than he currently had. He was also going to need to be able to work openly without sneaking around.

So, so tired already.

After making another quick stop, Sans took a shortcut back to the site of his sentry outpost and wandered from there. He paused with each step, looking for any raggedy little kids carrying a frying pan, and kept his hands firmly in his pockets. As the bitter cold tried its hardest to bite into him, failing because he had no flesh to bite into, Sans wondered why it was that the human wasn't shivering all the time, staying out here as long as they apparently did. They didn't look bothered when he met them.

He only wondered for a little while. After walking for some ways, he heard the kid's voice again. They were talking to somebody.

A little slower, and a little quieter, he approached. He could just see their tiny form through the trees, hunched over in the snow with the frying pan set beside them. They were talking to somebody low to the ground, but from his vantage point he couldn't see them- their body was blocking the way. A realization hit him; this whole setup felt familiar. Could it be…?

"heya," he called out; as expected Frisk jerked around to see him and, in the process, fell on their butt, giving him a good view of their little friend in the snow.

It was a face that he really wasn't hoping to encounter.

Even if it had a harmless appearance, a little yellow flower with a little face and little waving leaves, that was more or less the point. Sans had only seen this creature a few times, and the last time he met him up close that harmless little thing, as he understood it, had tried to kill everyone. Well, he might have also destroyed the barrier- the details were fuzzy- but one thing still clear in Sans' memory was the feeling of those gigantic vines crushing him and tapping into his soul, all while he tried to kill Frisk.

So the skeleton understandably stiffened to see this flower again.

Talking to this world's Frisk.

"Oh look, you came back," from beside Flowey, the child spoke up again with a sneer on their face. As the flower, shaking faintly, began to wilt under Sans' gaze, he glanced at the child instead. She sneered, "...What's your problem?"

"didn't know you'd taken up gardening," Sans replied, voice low.

At first the child had crinkled up her nose at him like he was crazy, but another second later they understood. Looking over at the cowering flower, Frisk sighed, "Uggghhh, Fake Sans, this is Flowey, my friend."

"H-howdy!" As he stepped closer Flowey bent low, like he was bowing, but his trembling face still stared at him. "F-flowey the... flower..." His voice got fainter until it trailed off, and Sans grinned at him.

"sup. sans the skeleton."

The name carried some importance to him, apparently, because it made him shiver. He stammered out, "B-b-but you're not the-" the flower looked up at him hopefully, small fangs in his wavering smile, as he spoke, "The same as the other one, right? You're a different Sans."

"Yeah he's the retarded Sans I told you about earlier," Frisk cut in before Sans could reply.

He took the insult and he let it go, pulling four packages from his pockets. "i see that you're still in a bad mood, kiddo. but i picked something up that might help." Two of the packages he tossed their way, and without missing a beat they caught it. The other two he kept for himself; wrapped up cinnamon bunnies. As a child started to unwrap theirs, he spoke up, "careful, they're hot." That rabbit storekeeper hadn't even seen him, too busy occupying herself with a gentleman in the back room- this was good for him, because he didn't have any money left.

"..." Without a word, Frisk tore into the cinnamon bunnies with their teeth and discarded the wrapping paper in the snow. Frosting and cinnamon glaze smeared around their mouth as they ate, taking huge bites, and they finished in only a few seconds. The brow of his skull raising a little bit, Sans took a look at what was supposed to be his portion and also tossed it the child's way. "looks like you could use some more."

The kid finished those off quickly, too, although less so as their stomach finally stopped making noise. Without so much as a thank you, Frisk rubbed their face on their sleeve and licked their hands; what little of the glaze and frosting remained on their sleeve they also tried to get by chewing on the fabric. Sans resisted the urge to laugh, walking over, "hey c'mon kid, you're gonna get sick doing that-"

"You're not the boss of me," Frisk snapped, backing away with a glare.

So he shrugged, staying where he was. "nope." He scratched his head, saying, "i actually just wanted to talk to you. thought that maybe you could help me out here."

"Why should I do that?" Asked the child, sitting down with their back against a tree, not facing him.

"dunno. i guess because you look bored. and, uh, i get the distinct feeling you prefer the other version of me to me," he wondered if he should add some kind of bribery into the mix, but judging from what he could see of the expression on Frisk's face... He had better not risk patronizing them. The kid was too prone to violence to take lightly, that had been clear from their first meeting. "you don't have to do much. and hey, you might not actually know anything about what i'm asking, so you might not be any help anyway." At this, now they turned and glared at him. "can't hurt to try, though, right?"

"I-I-I don't think it would hurt," said the other version of Flowey; since it had been painfully pounded into him from the get-go that everything here was so opposite, Sans only steeled his smile and tried to forget that that same trembling voice had also been laughing maniacally as he stole SOULs in his world. Right now, it seemed like this Frisk was listening to that voice. They glanced over once or twice, scowl softening.

"What do I get if I help you?" The human asked.

Perhaps the bribery angle would be a good way to go after all. "i could try for more cinnamon bunnies."

"Don't bother, I hate cinnamon."

"oh," he blinked. "what do you like, then?"

"I want Iscream."

The word tripped him up; Sans paused for a long second, the first image in his head being of an overly cheery blue bunny monster with a cart and a dream, peddling frozen foods in a town of total winter. "uhh... Nice Cream?"

"What?" Frisk sneered, crossing their arms. "I said Iscream, you shit. Like ice cream. It's a pun."

It finally registered. At that, he couldn't help but grin, despite the cursing attached to it. "heheheh. i get it. that's a terrible pun."

"Are you going to get it for me or not?"

He stepped forward until he was standing over them, the smile a little lesser now. "i don't have any money, so in order to get this for you i'm going to have to steal it. you get that, right?"

Frisk didn't reply, just staring at him.

"i've already stolen once today and i didn't like it," he said, gesturing to the wrappings they littered the ground with. "so you promise that if i get it for you, you're going to cooperate with me?" He could tell from their face that they were already getting bored of that question, but he kept his gaze level until, even without true facial muscles, he could get the point across.

As they were about to speak, he could tell from the way their eyes rolled into their head that he was going to get frustrated, but before any words could come out they were both interrupted by Flowey's weak voice again, "We promise!"

Frisk leaned to glare over at him before looking back up at Sans and nodding their head.

He exhaled slowly, "good. i'll be right back."

And he actually was.

The Iscream man was even worse at guarding his merchandise than the shopkeeper; it probably had something to do with how miserable he looked as he sat as far away from his cart as possible, staring at the snow. Feeling a twinge, Sans grabbed a handful of red ice creams on lollipop sticks, all of them shaped like round screaming faces. When he appeared before the human again, he at least had the consolation of seeing their expression change, face lighting up at the sight of his plundered goods

As they munched, Sans cleared his not-throat. "well, looks like I carried out my end."

Frisk was salivating too much from the taste of the Iscream, so when they looked up from it to talk the child ended up having to wipe the drool from their mouth. It was already getting colored red with the food dye anyway. "Oh, yeah." Another bite. "Fine, ask your stupid questions."

He asked them if they knew anything about the machine that this version of him had created. They replied that it was the first time they had even heard of it- or rather, they communicated as much by shaking their head.

He asked, then, if that version of him had never mentioned anything about this- anything about leaving, or bringing somebody else in from another world. Frisk screwed up their face and shook their head again. It matched their previous reaction to hearing about this news, anyway.

He asked them if they knew anything about there being many worlds in the first place, and the child shook their head hard- this time, accompanied by talking.

"I didn't have any reason at all to think that today was going to be any different from the day before that, or the day before that, or even tomorrow," they had snapped as they crunched an Iscream. Those angry brown eyes almost disappeared when their uncut hair flopped over their face.

Sans scratched and thought, looking the child over. Amidst everything else, there was at least sincerity there. "okay... i guess that rules out any the possibility that he told you about this, huh buddy?" His expression softened. "the only other thing i can ask, then, is if you know if there was anyone else he might talk to?"

Frisk was down to the stick of their last Iscream, and they sucked on the dribbling juice thoughtfully. Their face entered a stony expression as their eyes half closed and their mouth became a straight line. His own Frisk had worn an expression just like that before; seeing it summoned just a little bit of homesickness. For this version, it dipped into something more sullen. They murmured, "The only person that I know he talks to is... Toriel."

Toriel. Of course.

He'd been avoiding it, as was typical for him. His smile pained, Sans asked, "oh, right. what's... what's the toriel of this world like?"

Frisk broke the stick in half using their teeth for leverage. "She's a bitch," was all they said, and on their face was something dark and moody- it had been getting steadily worse all this time.

"noted. do you think that she would still talk to me?"

"Don't talk to her." Frisk said, plopping down on the cold grass. "Sans talked to her all the time, that doesn't mean you have to."

"uh, actually, that's pretty much exactly what it means."

"Whatever." Frisk dropped the pieces of the stick and dug out a very old looking phone, opening it up as though to check something before closing again. "Am I done?"

Sans took a cursory look around and realized that the flower wasn't listening in anymore. Pathetic little thing must've gotten bored while they were talking. Frisk also looked very bored, and he sighed. He wasn't going to get anything out of this kid for now. "... yeah, you're off the hook. see ya, kid."

"..." Frisk didn't look at him again. Sans stepped away, walking back onto the path with a sigh, as he rubbed the bony bridge of his nose-hole. Dealing with this brat was a pain.

Oh, well. That was done; now for something that threatened to be even more painful- although the other options were even worse, because they required more effort on his part. At least Sans knew that the door to the Ruins was just a little walk away; after a couple minutes, he could even see it in the far distance, almost obscured by the snow rolling over and over in the wind. Instead of the familiar purple, the door was black as if covered in soot, with the insignia white. The insignia, as well, looked different in this world, although he couldn't quite describe what it was about it that threw him off.

In any case, he was interrupted again by the sound of somebody clearing their throat at his feet. "?"

"H-howdy!" It was the parallel version of Flowey again.

"hey." Sans took a look back, but Frisk wasn't following him. "whaddya want, bucko?"

"O-oh," the flower dipped shyly away; he just couldn't be real. "I heard that you were going to visit Toriel, and, well... I heard what the human said earlier, and, I just... don't know what kind of person you are yet. But you seem, at least, nicer than the other Sans." There was another fanged, hopeful smile.

"i could be," Sans said, smiling wryly at him. "just depends on the kind of person you are."

Flowey didn't seem to know how to respond to that. He shook, petals trembling, and continued, "Well, I just wanted to let you know, the hu- A- Frisk, is wrong. Toriel's not a bitch. They just said that because... they don't understand."

"... yeah?" Sans' brow raised.

"And you... you're an adult, and you seem nicer, s-so... Maybe you will understand. So, uh, please be nice to Toriel."

He couldn't say that he saw this coming. He stared at the little creature in shock, to a point where Flowey started to nervously dip away under his gaze. "... hey, why do you care anyway?"

"We.. we were... friends. I lived in the Ruins for a long time before I met Frisk," was all that the flower would say.

"huh." Sans looked from Flowey back up to the door. "gotta say, you're pretty different from the flowey in my world, sprout."

"Eh?" He didn't seem sure if he should laugh or apologize.

Not caring to wait for either, Sans started walking again towards the door. "no promises, but i'll try."

And as he went, Flowey followed silently.

Next Chapter: A Few Days is Nothing Up Here

Chapter Text

Frisk wasn't one to put things off, especially when her schedule was always so full. So in the early morning after breakfast she headed over to Sans and Papyrus' house, the events of yesterday still playing on her troubled mind.

She had known Sans and Papyrus for a while, now- several weeks, which felt like forever to somebody of her age. She had known them long enough, at least, to know when something was very wrong with both of them. The way that Sans acted yesterday, the way that Papyrus sounded on the phone... Was there something they were both hiding from her? Frisk frowned while she went down the sidewalk, waving to her neighbors as she passed, until their tall planky house came into view. Although Papyrus kept telling him to do it, it looked like Sans still hadn't taken down the Christmas decorations from the roof and doorstep.

Not sure what to expect, Frisk knocked and waited for Papyrus to answer. He might be out doing chores, but she hoped to not be waiting too long. The voice on the phone rose again in her head and blinked hard at her own memory; she couldn't quite see all that coming out of Papyrus' mouth.

Because soon enough, he answered, and he looked as goofy and cheerful as ever. "HUMAN! YOU'VE COME TO VISIT! DID YOU MISS ME WHILE YOU WERE HANGING OUT WITH SANS YESTERDAY?"

Immediately, Frisk felt guilty for thinking that anything was wrong with him. She grinned big, hoping that she wasn't interrupting anything, and nodded. Papyrus smiled wider, ushering her inside. "I KNEW IT! COME INSIDE! I HAVE LEFTOVER LASAGNA FOR YOU! ...ALSO, LOTS OF ORANGE JUICE." His eyes immediately turned serious, though, as Frisk looked towards the fridge. "BUT THAT'S FOR SANS, SO ASK HIM BEFORE YOU DRINK ANY OF IT!"

She wasn't actually in the mood for orange juice, but that and the lasagna squished on top of the cartons was apparently the only thing that Papyrus had in his fridge at all, and her throat was pretty dry. The child moved around the house, then, and yet saw no trace of the smaller skeleton. "Where is Sans, anyway?" His room was pretty quiet that day. She usually saw lights and music coming from there even when Sans wasn't home, perhaps something to ward off potential thieves or, as he said, snooping little kids.

At that, Papyrus shrugged, "I HAVE NO IDEA! HE LEFT AN HOUR AGO. HE SAID HE WANTED TO TAKE IN THE CITY FOR A WHILE!"

Frisk nodded faintly, returning to the kitchen. Maybe she would just have water. She grabbed a paper cup off the counter and helped herself, smiling back at Papyrus as if to say with her teeth, "That sounds nice."

"YES, HE'S BEEN GETTING OUT AND ABOUT MORE OFTEN LATELY!" Papyrus said, puffing out his chest proudly. Frisk didn't bother to point out all the times that he was out and about while she was traversing the underground, which for the most part seemed to be just an accidental secret between Sans and her. "AND YESTERDAY HE STAYED UP FOR A LONG TIME!"

You drink Papyrus' water.

Although your health is already maxed out.

This gave Frisk pause, while she took in cold water from the paper cup; with a noisy gulp she tilted her head to Papyrus, asking the question with her eyes. Sans was a monster that really liked his naps, and that included the "big nap" Papyrus referred to which every other monster knew as just sleeping. Oh, she and others would try to get him to stay up, when she could spare the time. Playing video games together, watching a scary movie that she probably was actually too young to watch, it would all end the same. She would look over and find that he was asleep; with a sigh of defeat, she usually joined him.

Papyrus caught the look and put a hand to his jawbone thoughtfully. "EH? YOU WISH TO KNOW HOW LONG? I BELIEVE HE WENT INTO HIS ROOM AROUND MIDNIGHT." Seeing Frisk's alarm, Papyrus sweat a little and continued, "I KNOW THAT SOUNDS STRANGE, BUT IT WAS FUN! ...FOR THE MOST PART?"

For the most part?

Frisk took another gulp of her water and tilted her head in the other direction, and Papyrus shook his head, "WELL... HE HAS BEEN ACTING A LITTLE STRANGE SINCE HE'S GOTTEN SICK! FOR EXAMPLE..." The taller skeleton's brows shot down, furrowed deeply, as he remembered, "SOMETIMES, INSTEAD OF 'PAPYRUS', HE KEEPS CALLING ME 'BOSS'. AND AT FIRST I THOUGHT IT WAS GOOD?-? BUT NOW I THINK HE'S BEING SARCASTIC???" Papyrus folded his arms, shaking his head again, "AND HE TURNED FLUFFY BUNNY INTO A CANNIBAL WHEN IT'S OBVIOUS THAT HE IS BY NATURE A VEGETARIAN! AND HE ALSO WOULD NOT CANNIBALIZE THE REST OF HIS FRIENDS, OF THAT I AM CERTAIN!"

"He what?" Frisk blinked, pulling open the fridge while Papyrus talked. Perhaps the statement would make more sense if she knew what cannibals and vegetarians were.

As Papyrus' voice filled the whole house, the child pulled out a square piece of lasagna and carefully placed it on a paper plate, sliding it into the microwave and clicking the Not Spaghetti setting, "... DISRUPTIVE AND HONESTLY THAT KIND OF STORYTELLING IS JUST NOT WHAT I NEED WHEN I'M STARTING MY BEDTIME SHIFT!" He squinted into the floor, "I KNOW THAT HE HAS CLEARLY NOT RESEARCHED THE CHARACTERS TO THE EXTENT THAT I HAVE, BUT USUALLY WHEN SANS IMPROVISES HE IS AT LEAST A BIT CLOSER TO THE CANON OF FLUFFY BUNNY!"

"Uhhh," was all the child said as she edged the lasagna out of the microwave.

Finally, the monster sighed, "BUT, WELL, HE IS SICK, SO I GUESS THAT MIGHT BE WHY. I'VE HEARD PEOPLE GET WEIRD WHEN THEY'RE SICK. IT'S LUCKY THAT I AM TOO COOL TO CATCH VIRUSES!"

"Sans is really sick?" Frisk asked with a mouth full of lasagna. It crackled in her mouth with a sort of energy that she could not describe, and shortly after swallowing her mouth full she burped. "'scuse me."

Papyrus frowned, sweating a little more, "WELL HE HAS TO BE! HIS THROAT SOUNDS ALL SORE AND HE ISN'T BEING HIMSELF! LIKE I SAID!"

"He was acting weird around me and Toriel, too," Frisk said as she took another bite. "But Toriel said that she didn't feel any fever on him or anything."

"THAT'S ODD." Papyrus said, squinting off to nowhere in particular while the child burped and excused herself again. "BUT THEN... I DON'T THINK ANYONE IN OUR FAMILY HAS EVER CAUGHT A VIRUS BEFORE. THEY AREN'T VERY POPULAR IN THE UNDERGROUND. SO I HAVE NO IDEA. IT'S PUZZLING, BUT NOT IN THE FUN PUZZLEY WAY." He sighed, and for once his cheerful expression almost disappeared completely. "I GUESS I'M JUST A LITTLE BIT..."

"...Bonetrousled?" Frisk finished suddenly, in the midst of chewing.

Papyrus blinked at her. "...YES???"

Growing quiet, child now looked into her empty cup and contemplated sticking her tongue in, trying to get the last drops of water. "Say... I forgot to ask you, did you call Sans yesterday?"

"NOPE!" Frisk looked up, also squinting her eyes. Papyrus scowled, "I DON'T BOTHER CALLING SANS ANYMORE SINCE HE NEVER KEEPS HIS PHONE CHARGED. I KEEP TELLING HIM, BUT..." he sighed. And then, just as quickly, he brightened. "I DID TALK TO ALPHYS OVER THE PHONE, THOUGH. SHE ALSO ASKED ME ABOUT SANS, AND THEN WE HAD A GREAT CONVERSATION ABOUT OUR UNDERNET PICS."

The reheated food wasn't really appealing to her anymore, but it would be unthinkable to just leave an empty plate when she had so easily helped herself to the lasagna in the first place. She took a last bite of the stuff and then, when the taste of it left her mouth completely by a burp of misplaced magic, Frisk chewed on the paper cup instead. "Are you sure you didn't call Sans? Maybe you just forgot?" The voice had been so unmistakable, even while at the same time so different. Sans had also admitted to it.

"HMM... I DON'T THINK I FORGOT!" Papyrus said. "BUT! AS LONG AS YOU'RE HERE, DID YOU WANT TO TAKE SOME OF THE LASAGNA WITH YOU?" Sheepishly he looked back towards the fridge. "I NEED TO MAKE ROOM FOR MY SPAGHETTI."

"I'm fine," Frisk said, grinning sheepishly back. "We don't have room in our fridge either."

"AWW. BUT MY SPAGHETTI... I WONDER IF I CAN CONVINCE UNDYNE TO TAKE IT..."

Frisk nodded, "Good luck with that. I better get going."

"NYEH-OH! OF COURSE, I HAVE MANY ERRANDS TO ATTEND TO! SEE YOU LATER, HUMAN!" Papyrus said, straightening. Frisk waved cheerily as she stepped out the door.

Some of the cheer dissipated by the time she was outside.

She didn't understand. Papyrus was just the same as he ever was, but Sans was still... not. She couldn't just forget the tension in his speech, and in the speech of the Papyrus as she heard on the phone. And she was still convinced that that was Papyrus that she heard.

Unless they had a third sibling, or cousin, that also spoke like that. But that wasn't likely.

So why did Papyrus lie?

Frisk felt a little sick in her stomach as she went down the steps and walked down the road. Well, it was time to talk to Alphys. If she had really called Papyrus, and that wasn't another lie, then she had also talked with Sans. Maybe she would have a better idea what was going on.

Despite the piece of lasagna that she ate, and the breakfast that she had eaten even before that, Frisk was still a little bit hungry when she went to Alphys' house soon after. But then, no matter how much magical food she ate she never seemed to get full. True, the lasagna had almost done the trick, but Alphys' food was sure not to.

The child smiled warmly after the lizardlike monster opened the door.

Alphys smiled warmly back, overjoyed to see them, "Frisk! Come on in! I-I wasn't expecting a visit today!" She quickly stepped back, allowing the child to walk in. "Did you want to finish watching Mew Mew Kissy Cutie with me? We only have ten more episodes to go!"

...If she said yes, she could ask for food to watch the show with. But if she said yes, she whould also probably end up spending the entire day watching this stuff. It was addicting.

So smiling weakly, Frisk shook her head. "I'm sorry, actually I came to ask you about something. I think I need your help."

"H-huh?" Now Alphys eyes practically shined like stars to hear such a thing. "Y-you need my help? With what? Is it more of your homework assignments? Just name it and leave it to me!"

Her enthusiasm, at least, was encouraging, although the child didn't think that she would be as happy when she heard the question. "Actually, it's about Sans." Just like that, sure enough, Alphys' grin disappeared. It looked like she was going to say something too, so Frisk took the initiative and spoke first, "Something doesn't seem right with him lately-" and true, lately just meant yesterday and today, but this was also a long time for her. "-And I heard that you also talked to him yesterday? Papyrus says he's sick. Did he seem sick to you?"

"H-huh? Is Sans sick?" Alphys hesitating, huffing, "Well he... he said he was feeling under the weather when he dropped by. I-I-I don't think that he looked very sick, but he wasn't here... for very long. S-sorry!"

Frisk scratched her head; she just couldn't make sense of it. "I think that something was bothering him. But I can't figure out what. At first I thought that something bad had happened to Papyrus, but... well, I'm just confused," the child finished, smile disappearing.

"I-I'm sorry..." Alphys stammered.

"What did you two talk about, anyway?" She asked with a tilt of her head. "Was it anything important?"

"Uh..." The look on Alphys' face told Frisk that she was reluctant to speak. Whether it was because something bad had happened, or just an issue of confidentiality, she didn't know. But Frisk didn't really care about confidentiality; that was just a word that Sans used on her once or twice. So she smiled brightly again patiently, expectantly. Alphys sighed and continued, "Well... um... Just said he was feeling a little under the weather. Trying to get used to us living on the surface and everything. I-it was taking a while to sink in that we were at p-peace with the h-h-humans and all."

That was what he was worried about? She felt even more guilty; it was supposed to be her job to keep the peace, and for the most part she thought she was doing all right at that (they'd see her skills as diplomat put to the test the next time the Bannungsritual-Fest came around in the city.) But if Sans was having doubts, that probably meant everybody was.

The girl looked at the ground, brows furrowed. As she did, Alphys chewed on her lip and then added something else, sweating terribly to a point where she had to clean her glasses, "It...it's not a huge deal, but there is... something else, though, that... surprised me."

Frisk, of course, looked up. Alphys shrugged, forced a smile, and then uttered, "Well... We were in the middle of talking about that, a-and... When I said your name, he didn't seem to know who you were? Like, he had, uh..." Frisk's eyes were growing big, so Alphys cowered back a little bit as she spoke, "He said he had completely forgotten what your name was??"

"What."

"A-and!-!" Alphys clasped her hands together, grimacing, "And, uhhh, I thought that there was a little bit odd?? He also forgot where your and Toriel's house was, but I've been needing a map to get around by myself even now, soooo..." Another shrug, a helpless shriveling of the shoulders. "I... I don't know?? That was the most off thing. I mean, I get that a lot of people still call you 'h-human' and nothing else, so... but... um... yeah. Idon'tknow. Itwasweird."

Under the child's stare, nothing else was said. Even Alphys' nervous squirming eventually disappeared, as she instead ran her eyes over the human's face, looking for a change in reaction at all. But Frisk wasn't interested in giving one. Until at last, it was Alphys that again had to carry on this conversation. "Uhhh ...alsoooo... Did you... want anything to eat, or-?"

"Do you have any tea?" The child asked quietly.

"Y-yes! It's orange, though, is that...? Okay?-? Okay, I'll... b-be right back!"

And then in the laboratory house, the only sounds were the humming of machinery somewhere above and now the sounds of tea being boiled on the stove. When left to herself in that silence, Alphys sometimes started humming herself, and Frisk smiled a little despite the utter confusion going on inside. She clenched her hands together and frowned at them as if that was going to help her solve this puzzle.

A few minutes passed, and then there was a dinging noise in the kitchen. Alphys stepped out of it with a pot and two cups. "Here-! Here you go!"

You drink Alphys' orange tea.

It tastes like oranges. You are surprised.

The make of the cup and Frisk's messy drinking made a noisy slurp as she took the liquid in. Out of politeness, the monster sitting across from her waited for her to finish her first cup before relaxing and pouring her more. "Look, Frisk... Sorry that you're worried. K-kinda sorry for calling Papyrus, too, if that made him worried. ... ... ...B-but I think that everything is going to be fine."

"Yeah?" Frisk slurped a bit quieter.

"Yeah." Alphys smiled. "I-I know this stuff. When somebody's life changes so dramatically, it, uh, it takes some getting used to, you know...? And going up to the surface was a- well gee, it was a huge change for everybody!"

This was true; Frisk laughed a little, thinking of that.

And Alphys sighed as if in relief. "I guess what I'm saying is, give it a couple days. I'm sure he'll snap out of it."

"If he doesn't?" Frisk tilted her head as she asked the question; her second cup of tea was gone already.

The monster blushed, put on the spot. But then she said, with a forced confidence, "Then y-you can leave it to me! Andsomeoneelsewhocantalktopeoplewithoutflinching??? Probably. Umm??" Deep breath, "It's... this is... a problem you shouldn't worry about, is what I'm saying. It's a problem for adults. And you've already done a lot, so- don't be concerned!"

It had been a stammered blur, but it did make her feel better. The knotting in her stomach, at least, had undone by now. "Thanks, Alphys," Frisk said, smiling. And then, like with Papyrus, soon enough she found herself wandering down the street, hands behind her head, watching the clouds drift on and off the sun.

That all was a relief, at least. Despite their beginnings, if she could trust anyone with a sensitive situation like this it was Alphys. Or so she chose to believe. And the advice sounded good; give it a couple of days. Nothing bad was going to happen in a couple of days, right? Days could pass quickly in New New Home.

With that over, though, Frisk had other business to get to before her homework.

Childish business.

She still had all of her pictures to draw.

Next Chapter: Who is There?

Chapter Text

Sans stalled in front of the door for a while, aware that the whole time he did, there was a talking flower watching him without a word. There weren't any sounds coming from beyond it. Not that he expected there to be, given his own experience with the door in his world.

He didn't know why he was taking so long. Even if he knocked, it didn't mean that Toriel was going to answer- although, something about the way the flower was watching expectantly made him think that he might get a reply after all. Sans' smile became a grimace. Standing in one spot like this was starting to make him cold in his bones, despite the fluffy jacket he was wearing. It had gotten to a point that he was even starting to shiver. Or maybe he was shivering for some other reason. Taking a deep breath, relaxing, he knocked on the door.

The response was slow, and he almost didn't think he was going to get one. But then, after a minute passed, a soft and familiar voice came to him from the other side, "Who is there?"

It didn't sound any different, and Sans relaxed further. As if slipping into old habits, he replied, "doris."

Flowey looked at him like he was crazy, but the skeleton only grinned over at the flower, as from the other side of the door he heard, "Doris who?" It was quieter than the first response had been.

He said, "doris locked, that's why i'm knocking."

Then everything took a slight turn for the worse when there was no howling laughter from the other side, and a few beads of sweat went down Sans' skull; if he listened closely, he might be able to hear a little bit of sound, a little bit of giggling, instead. Quiet, and confused, just barely reaching through the stone. He looked to Flowey, whose leaves only waved and drooped helplessly while the bewildered laughter went on.

Sans stepped closer to the door, resting the palm of his bony hand against the cold surface. "L... lady?"

The laughter cut to a stop. "Oh... it's my turn... knock knock."

"uh, who's there?"

"Fuck."

The only sound was the noisy wind harassing tree branches all around them. Sans stood still for a full minute, staring blankly at the wall and trying to picture the woman who must be sitting at the other side of it, waiting patiently for his answer. When he started to move into the second minute of this Flowey hissed, "Say something, please," from where he was crouched in the snow and Sans shook his head, clearing it of that vision.

He took in a deep breath. "uh. fuck who?"

"Fuck you," said this world's Toriel, from the other side of the door.

Sans lapsed back into the staring.

But as he did, after a few more seconds her voice came again, and it wavered over the air like her confused little laughter, "Sans? You... You are not laughing. Did you not... think that it was funny?"

"heh..." He pressed closer to the door, saying at last, "it was uh, clever. it's just... not my kind of joke."

Like in the past it was hard to tell what she was thinking when there was a door between the two of them. There was only silence instead; Sans closed his eyes and continued, desiring to fill it, "i'll level with you, okay? i'm not the person that you probably think i am. sans. i mean... my name is sans, but i'm not your sans. ...get it?"

The silence went on, until finally, "That was not a joke."

He sweat more despite the cold, smile weak, and nodded, "yeah. uh. that wasn't a joke, more like a statement of fact, if you will."

"... ...You... are not Sans," she was murmuring, just loud enough so that he could hear. Every time that he thought she was done talking, at which point he would take a breath to explain it again for her, her voice would rise back up as she puzzled it out, "You are a... different Sans. A kind of Sans... that tells different kinds of jokes...? Two monsters... named Sans... that like jokes... who knock... are they multiplying? No, no. But two... monsters named... Sans?"

He sighed, "uhhh, lady..." she kept going, her voice getting quieter and her speech getting more slurred.

Running out of ideas, he knocked. She stopped immediately; "Who is there?"

"it's the other sans."

"... The other Sans who?"

"no, this isn't a joke."

"Oh."

Flowey was cringing in the snow, covering his eyes with his leaves. Sans shot him a glare, tugging harshly on his jacket, "what do you want from me?" He mouthed. Given no reply, he turned his attention back to Toriel, "look, uh, would it help if i told you what happened to the other sans, and why i'm here instead?"

"I noticed," Toriel murmured, "that he was late the last time too. And the time before that. And before that."

Late to meet with her? Sans filed that away for later. "well, uh, if he gets his way, i don't think that he's going to be coming back."

There was a rustling sound. "Oh?"

"he made a machine," he began again, slowly, alert for any instance of the woman not understanding something. She made no noises while he talked, this time, "one that could travel to other worlds like this one, worlds that are similar but differ by choice details. in this case, a lot of details. using it... he, well, swapped places with me. he sent me back here through the machine, and then destroyed it so i couldn't go after him."

"... ... Oh my," Toriel said at last. "And he seemed like such a nice young man. Told the best jokes... no offense, other Sans."

Sans laughed, weakly. "no, it's... fine." He wasn't really offended when he knew what kind of jokes this Toriel apparently liked. Other Sans must have had a dark, or at least rude, sense of humor. "but, listen, it's because of all that i wanted to ask you, since i was told he talks to you the most, if you knew about any of this beforehand? if you think back, did your sans say anything at all about this? about building the machine? the slightest theory that he might have run by you? anyone he was getting help from?"

"Mmmm..." Sans stood outside, shivering in a nonsensical attempt to get warm, listening to the sound of her hemming and hawing. Toriel hummed a tune, like a broken record, as she thought. It was almost to the point that he suspected she had forgotten the question. But then she replied quietly, "I'm sorry. He only told jokes. And sometimes we discussed small things... ... children... recipes... promises... he told me a riddle, once."

He perked up. "riddle?"

"I thought it was strange." As if reacting to his interest, as she spoke Toriel's voice became a little clearer. "He came to the door and asked me, 'How can you remember something that didn't happen?'"

The interest died. "uh, what was the answer?"

Toriel lapsed into silence, and there was a rustling sound for a minute before she answered, "He said, 'you can't.'"

"... ... anything else?"

More silence. A long silence. And softly, she said, "That's all I can think of."

He had guessed it was a long shot. "that's okay. i'll find some way to get home. i don't want to go without being sure, but maybe he was contac-"

"Oh!" Her words rose in breathless volume and Sans was again cut off; he jumped back on the path, startled. "You...?" Something changed about her voice; it became shaky, waving haphazardly through the air. "You... wish to go... home?"

He shivered again. "y-yeah. i-"

Just as violently as it rose, Toriel's voice became sharply softer, but Sans didn't dare move closer to the door to hear her better. "I will help you... get home..."

"ah, uh, that's okay, i'll figure it out for myself. if i can just get to this world's hotl-"

"What..." Sans stiffened. "...what is your favorite... flavor?"

"... what?"

The voice came again, a little louder, almost impatient despite how slowly it choked out each word, "For the pie... what is your... favorite flavor?"

Sans' smile waned. He looked back to Flowey, but the flower had fled at some point during the conversation. So much for his help. With some consternation and anxiety, he turned back to the door, and the woman behind it who was still waiting for his answer. Pie? What did she mean? Was this some kind of codeword? After a few moments' thought, he said, "you- you don't have to- uh. uh just- pick whatever flavor you want."

Toriel took another few moments to respond. "Whatever flavor...? Cinnamon pumpkin... I do believe that that... that is the human's favorite flavor."

Sans perked up. Cinnamon pumpkin pie; at least it sounded good. Even if he didn't know where she would get pumpkin filling in the Ruins. But something that he heard recently made that statement sound off, nonetheless. "really?"

"Yes..." Toriel took a deep breath. Her voice was getting softer and softer all the time. "The human also wants... to go home, did you know? I'll make- a pie for both of you. You can share it... with them... eat all of it up... and then you'll both be able to... ..."

Sans had never actually felt his heartbeat moving in his chest before. "...t-toriel?" Her voice was a gentle murmur that he couldn't understand now. But he also thought he heard something else, like heavy breathing, through the door. "... ...toriel? lady, are you okay?"

The murmuring and heavy breathing went on, and then even that got fainter suddenly; like she was moving away from the door. "...It'll be ready soon..." She whispered, a little louder.

Then, Toriel was gone.

"uh." Sans stood in place for a little while longer. When he started to shiver again he slowly turned around and walked away from the door, pupils directed straight forward and small in his sockets. The trees rattled above and he stopped, letting out a cold sigh.

There was a muffled crunching from in front of his feet, and the skeleton looked down. Flowey had sprouted up from the ground again, face grim and petals curled inwards. "Howdy."

Not the same flower as he was familiar with; he again reminded himself of that. Sans slumped. "she sounded so... out of it," he said finally.

Flowey bobbed up and down in a sympathetic nod. "She's not well."

"the toriel in my world isn't like this," he said.

"...Well," the flower cleared his... throat? "I don't know what happened in your world, but in mine... ours... some very sad things happened to her." Flowey said, his voice sounding strange, as if begging for pity.

"... like kids dying sad?"

Surprised, the flower nodded. "Uh, actually, yeah. Years ago, her children... um, killed themselves in front of her."

"they what?" That wasn't the story that he heard. Yes, there seemed to be major differences in this world compared to his. "why would they do that?"

The flower realized he'd said too much and his face twitched. Then his petals drooped. "Who knows why anyone does anything here?" While Sans waited, he drooped more and more until it seemed his stalk wasn't even enough to support his little head. Tired eyes glancing right, he murmured, "She also couldn't understand why. She's still trying to understand why."

Releasing his clenched hands, Sans looked up at the cold ceiling far above and exhaled. "no offense to you, sprout, but i'm already sick of this place." How long has he been here? Less than a day, surely.

"It's okay," Flowey said.

He tried to think of a joke and then "tulips" came to mind again; Sans smiled a bit more, in spite of himself. That was a classic.

Then he shook his head. "welp.. come on, might as well check on that kid. got no leads from this lady."

"Thanks for not yelling," Flowey said, giving a quick nod as he disappeared below the ground.

"eh?" Sans glanced back at the door. He couldn't even imagine the reaction he would get if he had yelled. Did his other him yell? Yell at who? But the flower wasn't there for him to ask, anymore. "nah... no prob'."

You feel sick from eating all the Iscream.

Frisk sat curled up by Sans' sentry outpost, back against a tree, fighting the urge to vomit all over the grass. Her lips and tongue were still a bright red from the dye of the treat, and every few minutes she spit out saliva that was gathering in her mouth. It disappeared in the snow each time.

Her butt was getting cold. She wrapped her arms around her knees and rested her head, enfolding her face in the warm sleeves of her striped sweater. It got even warmer as she huffed hot breaths into the fabric.

But however warm her face was, it didn't stop the fact that her butt was cold.

In her burrow across the river it was probably cold, too; it iced over whenever she wasn't inside it for a couple of days. Frisk wanted, not for the first time, a toasty house to sleep in instead. There were probably one or two abandoned houses in Snowdin right now, but it would take forever for her to get there from Sans' sentry outpost. When it got too dark, the way was starting to get now, she could just grit her teeth and bear an hour of scraping ice off of the dirt and wood planks in the burrow.

Those were the only thoughts she had. It was unpleasant to think about anything else, and she was too nauseous anyway. So Frisk ended up just staring at the trees in front of her with no thoughts, intrusive or otherwise, waiting for the magic nausea to die down.

It was finally starting to dissipate when she heard footsteps. Her heart raced, until she glanced right and saw the small shape of the other Sans shuffling through the trees. She tensed, and then looked back at her feet. The fake Sans. The imposter. The replacement Sans. He was getting close enough that she could make out the little white orbs within his sockets.

During that brief times when he had disappeared right in front of her, Frisk had caught a change in those eyes. One socket blacked out completely, while the other turned vibrant, a flashing blue and yellow iris with a tiny pinprick pupil in the center. It was awfully close to how her Sans' eye looked normally, if only that blue were replaced with red.

Perhaps in recognition of this, in her head it was almost like she felt "Imposter Sans" be crossed out and replaced with a slightly easier label, "Blue Sans."

Now Blue Sans was standing in front of her and Frisk didn't dare look at him again. Her stomach was a knotted, burning ball that churned with magic her body only barely knew what to do with. And he was just smiling at her.

"apparently i'm getting pie," he said.

Frisk glared up at him from over the sleeves of her sweater. "You fucking idiot," was all she said back.

Still regarding all her abuse with a cool expression, Blue Sans merely replied, "don't worry kid, 'm not a total idiot. i also got a list from jerk-me warning me about her already."

The girl straightened. "What?" Ignoring all of the physical complaints that she still had, she stood up, "He gave you a list? Let me see!"

Obediently, Blue Sans dug a hand into his pocket and brought out a crumbled piece of notepaper, his expression sharpening just a little. "now you want to read this stuff? eh sure, here. he didn't say an awful lot, though."

Her hands were shaking just a little bit as she pulled the note open, but hopefully it was not to any amount that the Blue Sans would notice. Her eyes scanned over the scrawled handwriting in front of her, unmistakably his. As she did it a thought intruded, unhelpfully,

You read over the note Sans left... himself.

Predictably, you're hardly mentioned. What were you expecting. . . ?

And all that aside she could still hear Blue Sans talking, though it didn't take her long to take in everything her Sans had left behind in this note. Her eyes itched, "as you can see it doesn't give me a lot of room to go on. if i want to go back home i need to know more about what this guy has been up to, who he's been talking to... and toriel didn't give me as many leads as I hoped."

Frisk resisted the urge to tear the note into pieces. At that, she could smile. Sans had really made things difficult for this guy right off the bat. What an asshole. "... So what's your next move?"

"in my world, the only other scientist i could talk to about these things lived all the way in hotland. but i don't know the relationship that this 'me' has with her," the way he talked, it almost sounded like he was just musing aloud. "it'll be a long trip. after all, it would be risky to just pop in without knowing what about the landscape has changed. even something as small as a ledge being in a different spot..."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

He smirked at her. "you have a serious language problem. i'm just saying i need more information. but i'm a little stuck."

"If you're stuck, we can help you."

Frisk wasn't the one who said that.

Blue Sans and the child both looked down to see the flower that popped up between them both, weak friendliness all over his face. Frisk had never been more pissed off at Flowey than she was today; first it was urging her to cooperate with him for the Iscream, and now once again he was offering her help to him without the actual child giving any input. He was never this helpful to all the other monsters that had tried to kill them.

And, true, Blue Sans hadn't tried yet, but every monster had at least one tally mark. It was only a matter of time for this one to gain his.

The skeleton monster chuckled, "that's nice of you to say. how about you, kiddo?" he winked lazily, "something tells me that you and the buttercup don't always see eye to eye."

Now Flowey twisted around in the ground, and he was staring up at Frisk. "Who's it going to hurt? He just wants to go home." He said quietly, and the girl felt her muscles tense up.

"Since when do you care about the monsters here?" She hissed back, all the time aware that Blue Sans was watching them both.

"But he's not from here," Flowey hissed back.

"So?"

Now the expression on her friend's face hardened, the tiny little fangs in his mouth growing more prominent and eyes a little darker. It was an impatient face Frisk had only seen on occasion. "Just trust me, okay?"

"..." She didn't know what to do. It wasn't as though Flowey was the one calling the shots in their relationship – instead, it was usually the opposite. But if it's something that he insisted on... That meant it meant a lot to him. And Blue Sans added, hesitantly, "you know, usually i would be against trusting talking flowers, but since it's helpful to me-"

"Shut up!" The girl snapped.

And Blue Sans chuckled, "you can't tell me what to do, buddy."

Sometimes she would get a gut feeling, or intrusive thoughts, which directed her toward something. But her head was quiet, and so was her gut. "... ..." She sighed. "I guess if you promise to help me too, you can stick with me for a while."

"thanks, kiddo." Blue Sans said, and the sleepy expression on his face made him even look earnest about it. "i'll owe you one."

"BUT," she snapped, and Flowey at her feet groaned loudly. She ignored him. "You give me any reason at all to think that you're gonna betray me, and I'll dust you."

Blue Sans shrugged, and Frisk felt a flare of irritation. "uh. well. okay then."

There was nothing for it. He was just going to keep acting this way; the other Sans, as wheezy and clammy as he was, also never seemed fazed by anything she did. So the girl sighed again, "Like I said, you're probably not gonna last long here. You don't know anything about this world. Whereas I have been here for weeks now. So... so if you want to survive to get back home, I'll tell you everything I know and you're just gonna listen, capisce?"

"... sounds reasonable," Blue Sans uttered slowly, one eye opening a little wider than the other.

What the hell was his problem? Frisk was about to retort, only to stiffen right up. "... But, we probably shouldn't do that here," she murmured. There was a crackling sound from far away, as well as what she thought was a low howling. The Canine Unit was on the lookout again as it approached nighttime. A shiver ran down her back. "We'll get caught if we stay here all night."

It gave her a little bit of satisfaction to see Blue Sans also listening warily. "well like you said, i don't know anything about this place, kid. where can we stay instead?"

Frisk pointed through the trees, across the freezing river. "That way. They're too stupid to follow us over the water. I have a little place that I made on the other side." She looked the short skeleton over, and then with a sneer she added, "You'll probably fit."

She wasn't really worried about it, but Frisk felt a momentary surprise when she didn't feel sharp hands tweaking her nose at the veiled insult. Blue Sans just sighed, only offering a shrug of defeat. "lead the way, then."

Next Chapter: Protagonists Do Stupid Things Don't They?

Chapter Text

For somebody who could not properly hold a pencil in his hands, Leo was excellent at shading with the pencil that he held in his teeth. Frisk was impressed, and kept looking over from her work to look at his with wide eyes, the picture of Edogeny coming to life as the monster bent over it laboriously. Politely, and in kind, he would then glance over to look at her work with a smile. Frisk was glad that she had decided to enlist his help after all; these pictures wouldn't look half as good without it.

They both worked without words on that evening, dinner eaten, homework done, and the setting sun shining through the living room window. Leo could not speak when he was drawing, and Frisk wasn't fond of talking when she didn't need to, anyway. She was in the zone now, trying to get a picture done that she should have done ages ago of Toriel her adoptive mother was napping upstairs. She ground her colored pencil to a stub, trying to get it in all of the hem of her robe, turning it a thick and rich color of blue.

She hadn't finished yet when she heard Leo give a cry as he dropped his pencil, "I'm done!" Edogeny's picture lay finished on the floor and with his foot he scooted it towards the pile that they'd been growing next to their little workstation.

"It's not a race!" Frisk said; immediately afterwards, she said, "Buuuuut I'mdonetoo!" And she threw her pencil down on the wood floorboards.

They both laughed when it bounced.

As Frisk handed off her picture for him to shade, Leo asked, "What's next?"

The child looked at the clock. 7:30. Leo was going to need to go home soon, and she had a bedtime at 8:30 when it was a school night. They wouldn't have time for a whole lot more. So in response, she picked up her phone and started to slide through the pictures, "Let's not do one by memory. Let me see..." A lot of the ones that she had captured from last Sunday and today look harder than she wanted to deal with right now. Eventually she found herself scrolling to the pictures of the Final Froggit "cloister" and she frowned; although she didn't remember clearly, there shouldn't be any new pictures beyond these ones. Still, she sideswiped.

Leo dropping his pencil again when he heard Frisk give a loud shriek. "!?" She had jumped up, coming onto her knees, her eyes wide as she stared at the cell phone cradled in both her hands. "What is it?"

"Uhh, uhhh," Frisk looked from Leo to the phone, and then did it again. "Uhh, I..." She came onto her feet. "I need to... Check something!"

"Huh?" Leo also stood up. "What is it?"

"I gotta go-" Frisk looked towards the door, mouth stretched wide in a grimace.

"Uh. Do ya need me to come with?" Leo asked.

"Yeah, you c-" Frisk started to say, and then she stopped when she looked at the clock and at the stairwell; it led to a hallway of blue bedrooms, and Toriel was sleeping in one of those bedrooms. "Actually, you should stay here. If – if Toriel comes down, tell her I'll be right back, okay?"

Leo wrinkled his nose. "Um, okay."

Taking a final look at the cell phone, Frisk dashed to the door and closed it with a slam, calling out as she did, "I'll be right back!"

For somebody who was so messy and vulgar most of the time, the child he had thrown his lot in with kept very clean quarters.

...Although to call the burrow that they had created out of the ground on the other side of the river "quarters" was stretching it a bit. Still, it wasn't as bad as he was expecting. It was a very large hole, wide and deep with enough space for three small people, and it looked like it had taken hours, if not days, to dig. When asked how they managed to do it, Frisk just glared at him and Flowey offered, popping out of the ground, that they had had "help."

The hole was dug into the side of a small hilly part of the ground, somewhat reminding Sans of a "hobbit hole" from that movie that Frisk forced him to watch, if such holes had no doors and no furniture and went just far enough to shelter from the wind. Along the floor, Frisk had set wooden planks that were now covered over with frost. Without either of them speaking another word, once Sans was fully inside the child had started chipping the ice off with a sharp edge of the pan.

In the very back there were even more planks, these free of ice, set against the wall. He studied them while Frisk chipped, the child not responding to anything else he said. Each plank had a name inscribed on it in marker; under each name, there was a series of tallies.

The names were all familiar. Sans read "Undyne," "Toriel," "Papyrus," "Dogamy," "Greater Dog," "Aaron," and countless more, enough that some of the planks were layered on top of each other. With that in mind, the tallies were a little bit disturbing. Finding "Sans" shuffled near the back, he saw only two tallies. Under Undyne's, seven. Most of the other monsters named on the planks only had one or two tallies, like his own.

Under Papyrus' name ... Were too many tallies for Sans to count at a glance. The plank was almost filled up.

"papyrus give you a hard time?" He asked, looking over at the child. They weren't even halfway done with getting the ice off; in response to the question, they stared hard at their task and scowled.

"...nah, it's okay," he said, looking back to the plank. Five, ten, fifteen, twenty... "he gave me a hard time too."

At this they looked up with confusion. "Your... Papyrus?"

"my-?" Twenty-five, thirty... He snorted, shaking his head, "no, no, i mean this one. i, uh, ran into him shortly after i woke up here. he tried to beat the tar out of me."

Flowey then appeared between the two of them, shivering while he spoke, "He did that? Boy, that must been a harsh introduction to this world!"

Still chipping, Frisk was smiling. "You caught him in a bad mood."

Sans didn't like that smile, especially not on that face. "yeah... does that... happen a lot? the beatings?"

The child shrugged and the smile faded. "Sans says that they're fairly regular. If he doesn't get out of the way when Papyrus is in a bad mood."

"... that's awful."

"He deserves it!" Flowey snapped, and then he cowered back when he caught Sans glaring at him. "I-I-I mean, they've always been picking on each other since before Frisk even came- Sans and Papyrus- t-that Sans and Papyrus, not yours. Papyrus wasn't even big enough to fight back until recently. And I know that if Sans could u-u-use magic, then h-he would be..."

"You always take Papyrus' side," Frisk growled, and the flower trembled.

Sans was staring at them both. The human had no interest in answering that stare, so again it was up to the flower. He said, softly, "It's just the way that things are here." Then he added, looking carefully at the skeleton's face, "But... It isn't that way in your world is it?"

Sans shook his head. "no. it isn't at all like that where i'm from."

"M-must be nice..."

He didn't have a reply to that for a minute. Yes, it was nice. It was so much nicer, the Sans from this world had decided to take it for himself. Sans' expression hardened. "and now that guy who you say picks on his little bro is over there with mine," he said at last.

If he was the type to get angry over little things, Sans would have been enraged to hear Frisk giggling from where they were kneeling, following that statement. "Sucks for your Papyrus," was all they said.

Flowey shook once more; if not for the fact that he started to talk again, Sans would have said aloud that he kept shaking like a leaf, "Oh! W-w-w-well it might not be that bad. Li-like I said, he can't use his magic."

"yeah..." one eye widened, the brow of his skull raising, at that. "how exactly do ya figure that?"

"I know," Flowey said, smiling weakly, "Fr-f-from experience. He can't do any attacks. Mental block."

He wanted to ask what experience that was exactly, but with a sigh Sans let it go. "i wish that his papyrus had that mental block. have a bad feeling i'm going to run into him again when i go back to his house."

"Why go back there?"

He grinned wryly at the flower. "i can't figure out what relationship this guy has with this world's alphys without rifling through his stuff, now can i?"

"Alphys didn't mention Sans when I talked to her," Frisk spoke up.

"oh, you talked to her?" Sans asked, and then the scowl returned to the child's face. "how far did you get, anyway? i was wonderin' that since you're staying all the way back here."

Frisk didn't reply. After a moment, they brushed hair out of their eyes and murmured, "If you want to avoid another beating from Papyrus, you should probably learn how to act like this world's Sans."

"i kinda got the impression that he would beat me up no matter which sans i was."

"A lot of people are going to beat you up when they realize that you aren't the real Sans," they snapped. "You want to get everyone suspicious?"

The skeleton just shrugged, and she huffed, going back to the chipping that was starting to make her hands look red. Watching her work for a little while, and then looking back at the Papyrus Plank, Sans scratched his head. "well okay. i'll bite. can you tell me about this world and its sans?"

As it turned out, there was a lot to tell. Sans' spirits deflated with every word.

Blue Sans was at least a better listener than her own. In this case that was a very good thing; if she had kept getting interrupted every other sentence the way it would've gone with her Sans, she would have just given up and stopped talking altogether. Still, it made her feel a little uneasy, having somebody pay this much attention. She became more and more aware of the gaps in her own facts. Flowey had even disappeared before she began, so he wouldn't be chiming in with his mysteriously-gotten knowledge. She drew, as best as she could, on what Sans and other chatty monsters had relayed to her over the weeks.

The law of this underground world was "kill or be killed".

It wasn't just a statement of pessimism. Monsters in this kingdom were encouraged to kill each other, or to at least kill something, by the rewards that were given to those who were capable of it. Killing others was how monsters grew strong- at least, as far as she could understand, it was the fastest way- so there was a clamor to become strong, always. In such a world, everybody who wasn't a relative was looking to pick a fight with you, to kill you and become strong in the process. If someone was strong enough they would get everything. Job opportunities in the royal guard, for one thing, and money from the king- she assumed. This was a law that the king of the monsters, and the strongest one of all, had put in place centuries ago.

"why would asgore write such a stupid rule?" Blue Sans had said, in one of the few times that he interrupted.

"More food and junk for everybody else, obviously," Frisk had told him. There was no overcrowding problem even in this dark enclosed place.

This kind of rule also applied to humans. Almost every monster underground wanted to be the one to kill a human for their king. That carried more rewards than anything else. After his son died, Asgore's hatred of humans was more apparent than ever before, inflaming a conviction to finally break the barrier and bring his people to the surface, once he had the power to lay them all to waste. For this, he needed seven human souls. He only had six.

Blue Sans told Frisk that he knew this part already, and she'd scowled, "Oh fucking fine, then."

In Snowdin the king's "kill or be killed" law was also in effect, although not a lot of the monsters were strong enough to even carry it out. Just the suspicion of violence lived in every monster instead, hateful eyes watching each other for the day someone tried to pick a fight. In the capital, New Home, it was ten times worse and ten times more violent. So the strongest monster living in Snowdin, Grillby's "bouncer" aside, was Papyrus the Terrible- Blue Sans snorted when she said that name, and for once she didn't disagree with that. He was a member of the Royal Guard already, along with the canine unit.

They were all looking for her.

That was where she finished when he interrupted again, "not your sans, though? he wasn't looking to turn you in?"

"... ..." Frisk sighed, roughly and heavily, before saying, "Course not. Would I have gotten so close- well, not you, but to him- I mean when I thought that you were him- if- if he-! ...Yeah you know what I mean, retard."

"i guess," Blue Sans shrugged. "so. why is that?"

Now it was Frisk's turn to shrug, looking at the ground. She had finally finished chipping off the ice from the planks of wood, and now her hands were sore. "Buncha reasons." She looked up again and squinted. "You know, you're a long way off from passing as him."

He didn't look impressed with the topic change. But he left it, murmuring, "ya think so?"

"Well for one thing, you don't even look like him anymore," she sneered. "And you never sound like him."

Frowning, at least with his eyes, Blue Sans reached a hand to his teeth and shook his head, "feels the same to me. maybe nobody else will notice." She gave him the most condescending look that she could muster, and only said in response was, while lazily winking again, "but that couldn't have been what tipped you off at the start. what was it?"

"..." Now this, she had to think about, her thumb pressed against her lips. "Buncha things. Like..." She looked back at Sans and shrugged, mumbling, "even when your face look the same, your eyes were different. Always those white dots. My Sans has just one big red and yellow eye, almost all the time. It's really badass."

For a second, Blue Sans' eyes changed to reflect what she described, only one socket filled by the flashing iris. "he was like this all the time? that sounds exhausting."

"That's what makes it so badass!"

"uh, what else?"

"Well your voice too. You sound too relaxed. Like some kind of sleepy smart-aleck."

"that so?"

She snorted, "My Sans lives in a hellhole and he knows it. You sound like you..." she gestured sharply, searching for the words. "Like you don't know it yet. PLUS," he looked like he was going to talk again, "You called me 'kiddo'? What the fuck was that?"

He blinked. "well. what am i supposed to call you?"

"He calls me twerp. Pipsqueak. Uh... rugrat sometimes? 'Little shit' if he's in a bad mood."

Now Blue Sans looked angry, if that was possible with that smile, "i'm not calling you 'little shit'."

"I'm not saying you HAVE to, that's just one-" She sighed again, roughly, frustrated. "Whatever, you fucking prude."

It was cold in the burrow. Blue Sans paused, thought that statement over, and then grinned at her as his posture relaxed. "... heheheh. do you even know what 'prude' means?"

She didn't. Frisk's face turned red. "Never mind! Another thing is, Sans was helping me whenever I was out here in Snowdin. And in other places, sometimes." Blue Sans' eyes widened with some surprise. Frisk added, "But no one else knew that. So don't tell anyone. ...You know, maybe you should be writing this stuff down."

"mmnah," Blue Sans shook his head, closing his eyes. "sounds like too much for me to remember. i'll just wing it." Much to Frisk's disbelief, he then sat down and put his hands behind his head, leaning back on the rough wall of the burrow. "but first, i'm gonna take a nap."

"What?"

He cracked one eye open a fraction. "it's nighttime. what, don't you sleep?"

"Not when I have something important to do."

"relax, kid, i'm taking a break," he said, closing his eye again. "tomorrow i'll go to papyrus' house and see what i can find out. if we're lucky, other me might have left a few schematics lying around and i won't have to go to hotland at all."

"Then shouldn't you be checking that out right now?" Frisk asked.

Blue Sans didn't reply, relaxing where he lay.

"... Can't you teleport?"

"...zzzz...zzzz..."

The Blue Sans is obviously faking snoring.

Frisk shook her head, straightening up.

Although it did sound fake, Blue Sans didn't move even when she poked him with the sharp end of her pan multiple times. The child chewed on the side of her mouth in slow irritation.

What phrase had her Sans taught her before? "You're just dicking around, retard!" She called to him, watching for a change in his expression. There was none. He continued what he was doing, whether it was "sleeping" or sleeping, peacefully. "Didn't you say you want to go home? Hey!"

No change. Whatever happened, it had happened fast.

Frisk sat in place for a while, chewing the sore insides of her mouth, watching this person who was so unlike her Sans.

Even if there were, after all, some similarities. She uttered a low growl that nobody else heard, feeling her legs started to go numb under her.

With her blood rushing and her irritation high, as well as with the cold coming in outside and all of the thoughts, intrusive and her own, crawling in her head, and then... the sick feeling that gripped her heart in an instant- Frisk couldn't sleep the way that he was. She suddenly wasn't tired. Instead, the child got back on her feet and crawled out of the burrow. "i'm taking a break," he'd said. Well, she knew what that meant. There was a nasty scowl on the girl's face, and she held her pan tight.

"Take your break, then." Frisk said, and started off over the snow, watching the other side of the river for when the first buildings of Snowdin would appear beyond all the traps. "I'll find out what he did myself."

Oh. I guess it's off to Papyrus' house.

Papyrus and Sans' house loomed in front of her; although it was peaceful and quiet that night, the child wasn't looking at the house when she approached. She kept looking rather, back at her phone with continuous, anxious glances. At the picture that was displayed to her; occasionally she would have to press a button on the phone to keep it lit, as she just couldn't stop looking. She was trying to find out the trick.

Trick or no trick, her heart was pounding. So Frisk pounded on the door instead. For a brief second she wondered if Papyrus was even awake. But that was a dumb thing to wonder. Of course he was awake. She'd never seen him sleep once. Still, it was taking him a while to answer the door, a while that she really did not appreciate. She took another glance towards her phone.

What she hadn't accounted for was the possibility that someone else was also awake. The door opened, and the next thing Frisk knew, she was staring at Sans.

Although Sans looked very different. Frisk looked from the phone to his face once, twice, three times. All while the monster stood there with some surprise, blinking at her. "uhhh... what's up?"

What she saw on the phone was reflected in reality. Or maybe it was the opposite. On the day that she had taken his picture, and she had noticed that he was acting strange, her phone captured the likeness of a skeleton with a perma-grin filled with sharp teeth, a skeleton with harsher eyes. One of his teeth in the picture was made of gold, and now standing in the doorway a gold tooth also shone at her on the real Sans. His face had changed to be completely unrecognizable, at least as unrecognizable as short skeleton monsters could be from each other.

And so now Frisk couldn't think of anything to say, even as he was standing there waiting.

So Sans spoke to her first, his expression hardening. "... what's with that face, twerp?"

She didn't know what to say. She didn't know what this meant. She stammered out, her voice hoarse, "Wh-where is P-Papyrus?" But then suddenly she wondered if she really wanted to see him. If she took a picture of Papyrus with her phone, would he change too? Become ten times scarier?

"inside," Sans said coolly. His grin had become menacing. "like i said, what's up?"

Frisk's heart was beating harder than ever. The last time she had SAVED was only two weeks ago, but those were two weeks that she wasn't eager to repeat. And if she did repeat them, then what would happen for this...?

Sans is blocking the way.

He came down from the front step, and Frisk backed up several steps herself. "you look like you've just seen a ghost, frisk," he said, still grinning huge in that menacing, toothy way. "why're you holding your phone like that?"

"I-I wanted... who... why..." She struggled for words. "What happened... To you?"

"what's that supposed to-" Sans cut himself off mid-sentence by quickly closing the distance between them; he grabbed the phone out of the child's hands and pushed her back. While Frisk recovered her balance, he looked at the picture and then back at her. Studying her expression. "hahah. now that you mention it, though, i do seem to have changed recently."

"I- I'm gonna go visit with Papyrus," Frisk tried to say as she ran to the door, but he grabbed her sleeve and pulled her back. His fingertips, his fingertips looked so sharp, they were poking holes in the fabric.

Sans took a deep breath, still grinning at her. And then another one. A quicker one. And then he took a fourth breath. As though the air had gotten thinner. While he was doing that, Frisk tried to pull herself back towards the door and in response, he yanked hard on her sleeve. She wanted to tell him to stop, that he was going to stretch the sweater, but-

Sans said, in the kind of voice that she knew she had never heard before, "fucking seriously? three days? that's the longest I can go for? idiot. fuck," his breaths were accompanied by the curse, "fuck, fuck, fuck." His eyes changed, glaring at Frisk. One socket went black, and the other one was nearly filled by a bright red eye with a pinprick black pupil. "fucking phones."

A chill went through her entire body. "Um..."

"lucky for me that you're stupid, i guess," Sans said, still breathing awkwardly. "amirite? hahaha fuck."

Her only hope was trying to wiggle out of the sweater, but when she tried to do that he let go of her sleeve and grasped her arm instead. More chills were shooting through her body. She took a deep breath, "Hel-"

You called out for help.

But Sans was faster.

Sans' red eye flashing yellow, the two of them disappeared.

Next Chapter: Papyrus the Terrible

Chapter Text

While she was in the middle of her walk Flowey popped out of the ground in front of her, expression incensed and looking as though he was set on stopping her. In her opinion, though, he pushed up too late.

"What are you doing?" He said.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" Was all Frisk snapped in reply, walking around the flower and continuing on her way.

Flowey dug back into the earth and sprouted up again in front of her, this time throwing clumps of snow with how violently he rose. While she came to a reluctant halt he hissed, "It looks to me like you're headed somewhere dangerous without SAVING."

Again, she walked around him. "Well then buzz off."

"Frisk!" He popped up for a third time. ... When she didn't even stop he had to pop up for a fourth time, as well. "Frisk!" And then for the fifth time, "Frisk!" And then for a sixth time, this time shouting, "You've got fifty-two tallies under Papyrus' name, remember? Going into his house is just asking for another one!"

She finally hesitated at that, putting her hands on her hips. "I told you to buzz off. I'll be fine. I'm not going to fight Papyrus, I'm just going to look through Sans's things."

"But what if you get caught?"

"I won't!" Honestly, he was such a coward. "You were the one that told me that we had to help this person. Now I'm helping him! ...besides, if I die now I'll get a chance to save up the Iscream he got me instead of eating it all at once."

Whether he recognized the point she was making or not, the child couldn't tell. But all the same Flowey wilted, "...It's still a lot of backtracking. Can't this wait until later?" He tried to give her his most sympathetic, sad face. It was marred- or perhaps enhanced- by the tiny fangs in his mouth. "I really don't want to do all this again."

"And when is 'later' gonna be?" When Flowey only scowled at her, she stuck her tongue out. "...I'm not gonna die! I'm going now whether you want me to or not." And at that, before he could could protest again, she continued walking.

When Flowey shot through the snow several paces later she prepared to stomp on him, ignoring the panicked expression that he had on his face. "Wait, Frisk, if you die now, what's-" then he yelped, forced to go back underground when her foot almost collided with his face. He didn't pop back up after that, not when she crossed the river and not when she crossed the bridge into Snowdin less than an hour later.

This snowy town never changed; everyone who wasn't asleep already was too scared or lethargic to get out of their homes and spot her, so the place void of voices was only inhabited was a whimpering wind. (Still made a wide berth around Grillby'z, though, just in case.) Unswept steps and stones, as well as large clumps of snow, occasionally rose high enough to hide prowlers like her. The piles of white gave her the most unease.

Although whenever she got close enough to one to check for anything in it, Frisk would feel a sudden wave of realization for how foolish she was being.

It's just a snow poff.

Waltzing out in the middle of this place might be a bad idea, but Frisk was tired and most of the monsters that would cause her problems, like the canine unit, were asleep anyway. So she made her way to Papyrus' house with her pan dragging in her hand, making a little trail in the snow, and didn't bother to hide behind snow poffs.

When the child finally stood in front of that big, dark wooden house, clear on the other side of town, she didn't feel any fear. All of the lights were off.

Frisk tried the knob and, finding it unlocked, stepped inside.

She had never seen the inside of this place before, never had the need or opportunity. If she had the vocabulary for it, the word she would've used was "austere". No extra decoration, no carpeting, not an awful lot of space, and there was a crack in the only TV she could see there. On a walkway on the second floor, between two doors, was hung a painting of a grey skull. Even the sofa was black. In fact, the most vibrant colors in this whole place were the big red and blue "keep out" and "The Lair of Papyrus the Terrible" signs plastered across the left-hand door on the second floor walkway.

Frisk wrinkled her nose up at everything. She didn't know how her Sans could stand living here.

Oh. Right.

Scowling, the girl went up the stairs and past Papyrus' door, flinching every time she heard the floorboards creaking under her. But no one came to investigate the noise, and Papyrus was certainly not barging out of his room. So she chose to believe that he was out for the night.

A quick tap on Sans' door, and it creaked in. She wrinkled her nose up at Sans' room too; it was a pigsty, trash and underclothes and moldy food everywhere. She wasn't surprised, given the state of the sentry station. "Slob," she muttered to herself.

You probably won't find anything in this mess.

Ignoring her own thoughts for now, Frisk switch on a dirty old lamp and used the light to see by when everything else was so dark. She rifled through papers and socks and partly eaten sandwiches. She uncrumpled old letters, notes that made no sense at a glance, grocery lists, and notebook sheets filled up with crossed-out rants. She tossed underwear in the corner, pushed aside a black cat that hissed and ran out of the room, found a "thank you" letter addressed to someone named Krampus, and then finally pressed her face into Sans' smelly unmade bed to let out a muffled scream.

In the drawer there were was just more clothes wadded up and shoved in. Shorts, shirts, a black hoodie and a red hoodie, and another fluffy jacket. The jacket, Frisk pulled out to inspect with a smile, sniffing it like Dogamy. It smelled new- or at least, there was no rotting meat or spicy mustard caught in the pockets. The hood had fur lining it and Frisk ran her hand over it. Soft, like a small animal, not yet worn down. It must be a spare.

A sick feeling took a hard hold over the child's heart; her face distorted while she held the jacket up, but she shut her eyes tight and resisted it. She almost considered putting the clothing on, even though it would have made the feeling even worse, but as she did...

"A Sans Jacket" - Armor DF 10

Feels like Sans, except not as filthy.

It wouldn't be worth it. The child folded the jacket up until another thought occurred to her, again all so suddenly-

You think you can feel something in the pockets.

She couldn't feel it before, but when her hand brushed over the fabric again she did touch on something a little hard inside. "?" Unzipping the flaps, she stuck her hand inside and, after being scratched by something sharp, she found a little package wrapped up with brown paper and twine.

She struggled with the twine for several minutes, biting and pulling until there were red marks on her hands, before finally getting it open. What spilled out of the brown paper was a series of letters, not folded up in envelopes but crumpled all into wads and pressed tightly together into one box shape. Frisk was starting to get the idea that Sans couldn't fold anything even if he tried.

It wasn't hard to figure out who the letters were for, and who they were from; the ink was smudged, but not on the addresses. Some were from Sans, addressed to Dr. Alphys in Hotland. Some were from Dr. Alphys in Hotland, addressed to Sans.

Dr. Alphys had really tiny handwriting.

Frisk sat in the middle of the room with a lap full of creased letters, unsure which to read, and then she heard the door slam.

The door slammed.

Which meant...

"SANS!" A familiar voice shouted out, sending a chill through her spine. Frisk looked to the cracked-open door to her left and swallowed a lump in her throat.

Papyrus paused, and then said again, "SANS, ARE YOU BACK YET? IF YOU ARE, I'M GOING TO KILL YOU! HOW DARE YOU KEEP ME WAITING SO LONG-"

You shoul-

Taking her pan back into her hands, Frisk jumped to her feet and dashed out the door before the impulsive thought could even finish forming. Her shoes scattered the letter-balls in all directions and she even kicked one off the walkway.

It hit Papyrus' head.

"!?" He looked at the human in front of him. His eye-sockets were smaller than Sans', but they looked even wider now, "NYAH!? HUMAN, WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN-"

Frisk blinked. His voice... sounded way different now. A lot higher, less harsh. But he cleared his throat, and as his face took on a fierce glare the deep growl returned, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN SANS'S ROOM?"

The child didn't speak. They only glared back.

Papyrus snarled, magical energy rising. Frisk took on a more defensive stance, mentally berating herself for getting caught so easily. Nonetheless, a feeling in her gut told her not to fear. She just had to get around him and to the door... It would be much easier if she could think of things to throw at him from up there.

Papyrus is attacking you.

"YOU MAY HAVE CLEVERLY MANAGED TO DEFEAT ME LAST TIME, BUT I WON'T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES AGAIN," the skeleton was saying, as blue and white bones flew through the air around Frisk's head and feet. She dodged with moves that were familiar to her, jumping and ducking and even battering a few of the attacks back with her pan. "THIS TIME I'LL BE SURE TO CAPTURE YOU!"

A growl ripped from the girl's throat as she darted right, one of his blue attacks smacking her in the side when she did. - 5 HP. Although was painful, it was only painful for one turn before she was catapulting over the stairs. Bones were rhythmically swinging at her head from every side and she was constantly ducking as they did, making no sound except for a grunt each time one managed to hit. When she reached the bottom of the stairs she rolled on the floor and jumped over an attack that came swishing at her through the floorboard.

Papyrus' scowl deepened. "YOU HOLD STILL!"

He slashed his hand through the air at an arc and immediately Frisk felt a tug on her SOUL, the heart before her turning blue. "-!" Damn it, he cheated again. She gasped out as gravity increased, feeling like her feet were glued to the floor. It was only with a lot of effort now that she was able to dodge some of the attacks coming at her. Some of them were too fast regardless. - 5 HP - 5 HP.

But she knew how to cheat too, so with her pan she was striking back the bones like they were baseballs- all of the ones that weren't going at her feet, anyway. - 2 HP. Every turn her pain lessened, and every turn she lessened it with a stale piece of food hidden in her belongings; that was the only reason she was still standing upright.

Running past Papyrus wasn't possible right now. Frisk started to sweat.

Payrus is getting impatient with your futile efforts.

The menacing figure in front of her stomped his foot. "DAMMIT! I TOLD YOU TO HOLD STILL! FINE!" Then he waved a hand, summoning a chain of the bones that all went flying right for the child. "I'LL JUST USE A STRONGER ATTACK!"

If Frisk was watching, she could have made out "Papyrus is the coolest villain ever" on the chain of bones. But she wasn't reading it. She was trying to avoid getting slammed into by every word, face pale and hands clammy. On "coolest," she failed even in that. And as a result, even with the blue magic still working on her she was thrown backwards into the wall with a sharp cry. Something snapped, and she hoped it was one of his bones instead of hers. Her vision got blurry and dark as the rest of the bones slammed into her as well, feeling like their sharp points were tearing into her skin. Something else snapped, and she fell down.

"NYAHAH??" Frisk heard, and she blearily struggled to get up. Her leg hurt. Ah, oh god, her leg really hurt. In her blackened vision she saw Papyrus standing over her, bending down to inspect his work with wide eyes. "HUMAN?"

The pain was fading. Slowly fading.

Papyrus was still staring, one hand raised to his jawline in thought. "WOW, APPARENTLY THAT ATTACK DID A LO-"

"heya."

Frisk coughed, and Papyrus turned around. As her eyes cleared the child could see Blue Sans standing in the middle of the room, grinning a pained grin. Idiot, what was he doing here? But all the same, while his sudden appearance distracted Papyrus she was picking her heavy body back up with a low groan. The pain in her leg was nearly gone, reduced to a dull sting.

"...SANS, THERE YOU ARE!" He choked out at last, scowling. "YOU'VE BEEN MISSING FOR HOURS, WHERE THE FUCK DID YOU GO?"

"uh, well."

"NEVERMIND! I'LL BEAT YOU FOR IT LATER!" Papyrus looked back at Frisk, and she tensed. "HELP ME CAPTURE THE HUMAN SCUM!"

"nah."

There was an audible crack from how suddenly Papyrus turned his skull back in Blue Sans' direction. "...WHAT?"

Blue Sans just shrugged, winking at them both. "eh, well, i can't say they're my favorite human. but if it's all the same to you i think i'd rather help 'em out."

"IT IS NOT ALL THE SAME TO ME!" Papyrus screeched. There was another surge of energy as he was, consciously or not, summoning more attacks. "I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS! ARE YOU ACTUALLY DEFENDING THE HUMAN???"

"yep."

Papyrus stuttered for a moment until the shock became anger. "BETRAYED... BY MY OWN BROTHER!"

"y'know, maybe you could stop being such a douche to your brother and he won't betray you as often," Blue Sans said, giving a shrug.

Frisk smiled at that, but Papyrus wasn't amused. Before saying anything more a blue bone swung right through Blue Sans, having no impact while the smaller skeleton turned rigid. Ten more white ones took its place, all spinning like turnstiles hyped on caffeine, and this time Sans moved almost too fast for either of them to see him, jumping backwards. "YOU'RE GOING TO WISH YOU NEVER SAID THAT!"

Twenty more bones, the ends pointed like spikes and some blue, came flying towards Blue Sans. He exhaled, uttering, "crap," before dodging low and then to the left, just missing getting nicked. So scowling, Papyrus threw his blue magic at his new opponent, and just like that Frisk felt her SOUL and body grow much lighter. She ran, dashing up the stairs.

In the meantime down below Blue Sans had started talking again, his voice strained with the effort of moving under Papyrus' blue attack "y'know, there's no way i'd ever want to hurt my brother, no matter what version of him it was. even if it's some punk version of him that likes beating up short people."

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!?" Papyrus said, as he tossed bones along the ground that his opponent just barely managed to avoid.

And then in the smaller skeleton, a dramatic change appeared with his eyes. One turned blue and flashed yellow, an exertion of magic that was so strong it threw off the hold Papyrus had over his SOUL. He stood still, drawing out one hand. "but, uh, you're not really leaving me a lot of options. so, sorry, i guess."

A huge skull materialized beside Sans, a skull that looked like it belonged to a dragon or a dog. Its face was also lit within with white pupils.

At the sight of it everyone else froze. Frisk froze behind the railing, Papyrus froze where he stood on the ground floor, and Sans kept a steady gaze with him, keeping the skull at his side even after his eye turned back to normal. And then the skull opened up, and the whole house burned with light as a white-hot beam of magic shot at Papyrus the Terrible.

Frisk covered her eyes.

Although when she peeked between her fingers, disappointingly Papyrus was not reduced to cinders at the end of it. If anything, his outfit only looked a tiny bit singed. But the expression on his face, or at least what she could see of it... "SANS... YOU-? ATTACKED?? ME??" Again that growl had disappeared, almost like his voice was cracking.

"yup."

And then it came back, with a stomp of his foot. "BUT YOU CAN'T EVEN USE MAGIC! HOW DID YOU SUMMON SUCH AN ENERGY-COSTLY ATTACK?"

Blue Sans shrugged. "probably should have told you this earlier, but you got the wrong sans, bud. sorry to disappoint you, turns out i'm not your bro after all."

"NYAH!? YOU-!?" Papyrus squinted, and then suddenly his eyes widened as if he was seeing something for the first time. Something Frisk thought should have been obvious. "...SHIT, YOU... YOU REALLY ARE AN IMPOSTER! WHERE IS MY BROTHER, THEN!?"

"i got no idea."

That answer didn't satisfy him, and Blue Sans flinched as Papyrus cast his blue magic over him again. "TELL ME WHAT YOU DID WITH SANS! OR I'LL BREAK YOUR BONES!!!"

But no one else was going to get a chance to tell anything, and nor was Papyrus going to get the chance to hear it. Right as Blue Sans was about to speak again there was a cry from above them, accompanied by a small child flying off the railing- or jumping, more like.

Falling fast, Frisk brought down the sharp edge of her pan directly on Papyrus' head, hard.

He screeched once on impact before falling silent, and then collapsed on the floor. Landing on top of him, the child rolled off and got to her feet with another grunt. She held her weapon close to her chest, waiting to see if the monster would get up, but he didn't.

For the second time, she had won against Papyrus. She didn't even die this time. A big smile spread across Frisk's face.

K.O! The crowd goes wild! Except not really, because this isn't a wrestling ring.

The smile disappeared.

"wow," Sans said next to her, SOUL freed. "thanks, kid."

She scowled at him.

"what? are you mad 'cause i followed you?"

"I thought you were taking a nap," Frisk said, her face turning red as she uttered it. There was a feeling in her chest that made her want to scream, and not knowing how to verbalize that she just said, under her breath, "Prick."

Blue Sans didn't respond to the insult, "dumb flower woke me up. sorry for stealing your thunder and all, but it looks like you 'pandled' the situation just fine."

"I'll smack you," Frisk said, raising her free hand threateningly. But Blue Sans didn't so much as cower. She sighed, letting it go limp. "But also what was that? That head thingy?"

"this?" No flashy eye this time, but he lazily winked at her as he summoned the skull. "it's called a Gaster Blaster."

She watched it with one foot stepped back, eyes on those huge teeth. "Is it your... pet?"

"pet?" He took a second to think about this, while the skull disappeared again. "nah, don't worry. it doesn't have a SOUL, s'just a cannon."

There was more she wished to ask, but Papyrus groaned by her feet and cut it off. Ah, right, it would be a mistake to ignore him. So she positioned herself and raised her weapon high, as he opened one eye. Strangely enough it had been so much easier to do this last time, in the heat of battle.

But before she could bring the pan down, "WOAH, woah, wait what are you doing?"

"..." She looked back at Blue Sans, her face turning red again. "I'm... breaking his legs?"

From below her, Papyrus whimpered. Blue Sans' eyes widened, while so did his smile, and a bead of sweat went down his skull. "uh. no, we're not doing that."

"Why not?"

"S-SANS..." Papyrus' voice came out as a burbled groan, the skeleton clutching his minusculely cracked head. "WHY DID YOU..."

A sigh, while he watched Papyrus look up from the ground. "like i already said, buddy, i'm not your sans."

The injured other skeleton paused. "THEN... WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?"

"that's... a long story." Blue Sans said, his gaze becoming tired and pupils dulling. The whole while, Frisk inched behind him and glared at the skeleton who had, a few seconds previously, been throwing bones at her. "...or at least a confusing one."

Papyrus slammed his hands on the ground and propelled himself back up on his feet, clacking his sharp teeth together, "WELL, I WANT TO HEAR IT! WHERE IS MY BROTHER?!"

"okay, but if you get confused it's not my fault," Blue Sans replied. "sit down."

If this world's Papyrus was confused, he refused to show it by the time Sans was done talking. He just sat on the couch, arms folded over his chest, that sharp-toothed scowl on his face as if it was frozen there. But then, Sans tried to put it in as simple terms as possible.

When he finally finished, his not-brother spoke. "SO EARLIER TODAY, THAT WAS ALSO YOU AND NOT MY SANS?"

"yep," Sans nodded. "your brother is probably in my world with my papyrus still, doing god knows what."

"I SEE..." Papyrus nodded, and looked at the ground. While the two had been talking, the parallel Frisk was leaning against the opposite wall, thudding it against their back every few seconds. The kid was glaring from underneath their bangs, and when Papyrus looked up their eyes met.

His scowl deepened and he stood; "WELL THEN," he said, facing Sans, "IF YOU REALLY AREN'T MY BROTHER, THEN I APOLOGIZE FOR BEATING YOU EARLIER. IT WAS RUDE OF ME TO ATTACK A STRANGER, EVEN IF YOU DID NOT TELL ME YOU WERE THE WRONG SANS SO IT'S REALLY NOT MY-"

"What?" Frisk spoke up in a hoarse voice, cutting off both Papyrus and Sans, who had been taking a breath to speak. "You'll apologize to him for hitting him a little but it's fine to almost kill me?"

Papyrus put his hands on his hips. "PAPYRUS THE TERRIBLE DOES NOT APOLOGIZE TO HUMAN SCUM."

"You fucktard."

"kid, please," Sans said, waving dismissively in their direction. "not the time." He had his own thoughts to keep bottled for now. Frisk just snorted. So he returned his attention to Papyrus, who stood avoiding looking at the human again. "apology noted. now, would it be too much to ask you to let me search your brother's room?"

"I already did that," Frisk sneered from behind him.

Startled, Sans look back at the human child. "you did? why didn't you say something?"

The kid just frowned at him, and then picked a wadded paper ball up off the ground. "I'm saying something now, aren't I?" They walked to him and held out the paper ball, which he gingerly accepted. "I found a bunch of these hidden in there. They're letters Alphys and him were sending each other."

"LETTERS TO ALPHYS? WHAT DO THEY SAY?" Papyrus asked, running to peer over Sans' shoulder as he smoothed out the paper. "I DIDN'T KNOW THAT SANS KNEW ALPHYS!"

"Mmh," following footsteps, and that grunt, there came the reluctant sucking of a fridge door being pried open.

Papyrus' head sharply turned again in Frisk's direction with another unsettling crack. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! I DID NOT GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO RAID MY REFRIGERATOR!!!" But the child was already pulling out takeout boxes, eyes shining hungrily. With an exasperated hiss the parallel version of his brother was stalking over to the kitchen, snapping, "HUMAN SCUM, STOP THAT THIS INSTANT!"

"Make me, fartface!"

"don't fight in there okay?" Sans said as he looked over the letter, tuning out the whining voices of the other room. It was definitely the same handwriting as on the note he still had in his pocket. "don't wanna scrape either of you off the floor."

He didn't hear their reply, if they made one.

Smalphys,

i have a theory i wanna discuss with you. i'd rather talk more about it in person but it's about the humans, sorta- it's all kind of related to what we were discussing about the twerp last week. after they came back here to snowdin, i found out something new and now i have a theory.

it kind of sounds weird on paper, so even if i did want to tell you in a letter i won't. so yeah I'll be visiting you in a bit, probably a little while after you get this. it'd be sooner but i'm in hot water with the boss right now because of that twerp and you know how it is.

also what the fuck was with the battery you gave me? it fucking sucks. dies after just two startups? try again, geek. i know you got more than junk in that lab.

Sans

Not the way he would have worded it, but the sentiments were... familiar.

Sans sighed, looking back over at the kitchen where Frisk was shoving a cold hamburger in their mouth and Papyrus was trying to take the rest of the food from their arms. "guess what, kiddo? i gotta go to hotland after all."

Frisk bit the burger in half and the rest fell to the floor as she chewed, "Oh, to talk to Alphys?"

"well if there being a big pile of these is any indication, it seems your sans talked to her a lot. she has to know what he did to reach my world..." Sans murmured, his smile becoming a grimace as it downturned. "if anyone does."

No need to mention the "theory" for now.

He'll just get the kid disentangled from "Papyrus the Terrible" in the meantime.

Next Chapter: I'll Settle on a Name Eventually

Chapter Text

Frisk felt disoriented and sick the moment everything came back into her vision. The feeling was similar to whenever Sans used his "shortcuts" back underground, but ten times worse. It felt like they'd gone over miles, or at least some long distance she couldn't traverse on foot. She might throw up if she wasn't careful. Her arm released, the child fell to her knees and leaned over the ground, breathing slowly, struggling to fight the dizziness.

In front of her Sans stood trying to regain his own composure, the skeleton taking a few steps back. Frisk looked up at that sound of his own heavy breathing, sweat on his skull and toothy smile turned down. He'd stopped looking at her. He really did look sick now. She stared with wide, studying eyes while her stomach turned.

Sans' big red left eye caught on to hers. "what the f-fuck-" he wheezed, "are you looking at?" No matter how many times she blinked, that eye didn't go back to a white pupil, and the other socket stayed dark like a blind person. "i'm fine, kn- - knock it off! give me a fu- fucking minute..."

Sans seems to be having trouble breathing.

Among other things.

Frisk looked away from him as instructed, instead rolling up her poked sleeve. After assuring she wasn't bleeding from his claws holding her earlier, the child glanced around at their surroundings. At first, seeing no sky above, she thought them underground. But then she recognized the stone walls around them, the faint dampness and round exit some distance away. Opposite the exit was a passageway faintly adorned with weathered stone messages in the walls and pictures made with old paint. Some were vandalism, but some were much older than that.

"where the fuck are we," Sans said breathlessly, following her lead in looking around.

"... This is the cave I went in when I first climbed Mt. Ebott," the child said. "Farther in is where I fell down." She frowned. "I showed you... last week..."

Sans sneered, "no, that cave's a bit to the le..." he smacked his face, then, with a clawed hand, and broke off in a final wheeze. While Frisk watched, he murmured, "...hahah, the mountain's configured differently than my world... shit, i coulda just killed both of us." Dragging his hand down, Sans smiled brazenly again. "sorry 'bout that, twerp."

"What are you talking about?" Fearing that he would approach her again, Frisk struggled to get her legs back under her and stood up, taking a step away as he grinned at her. "What do you mean your world? Are you an alien?"

The skeleton monster looked upon her for a brief moment while her question sunk in. Apparently she had said or done something funny, then, because he broke out abruptly in uproarious laughter. Laughter which she didn't know whether to stand or just run from. This terrifying new version of Sans replied, only after some of it had calmed down, "an alien? really? that's your first guess? you think i'm an alien?"

Actually, her first guess had been that he was sick. Or a vampire- despite the fact that she didn't know how exactly a skeleton could turn into a vampire when they had no blood to start with. She looked at her shoes and back, face turning a little pink as he laughed. Quietly, the child said, "... you mentioned 'your world,' so I..."

"ahahahahahahaha!" He covered his face with one hand as he laughed, almost doubling over. "you little nerd, what do you think this is, invasion of the body snatchers? don't you have listening comprehension? ahahahahaha!" The child said nothing, fighting the dark blush on her cheeks and tightly wringing the bottom hem of her sweater. Sans' usual laughter was much gentler, even if a lot of it sounded immature. These guffaws, in contrast, sounded mean.

Eventually, it stopped. Sans wiped a tear from his eye socket and said, "nahh, i'd love that but, unfortunately kid, monsters don't come from outer space. i mean world in a different sense." When Frisk didn't reply, he continued, "not that you need to know any of that, really. the less you know about how i got here, the better."

The words fizzed in her head and didn't pick up. Despite her fear, her embarrassment, and nausea, Frisk tried to smile at him. "... S-sans, are you playing a prank on me?"

"boy, i wish," Sans said. "that sounds a lot more fun than what i'm doing right now. nope... ... listen," in response to that terrified face, he waved his hand and her SOUL turned blue. Frisk yelped as a strong force pulled her to the ground, making her sit, and Sans began to talk with a sigh, "you weren't supposed to find this-" he gestured to his face, "-out. especially so fucking quickly. i guess that that's kind of my fault, so i'm not mad at you or anything. still, i don't know what i'm gonna do with you now."

Although not afraid of death, the child shook nonetheless. Suddenly the tug on her SOUL went in a different direction, and she slid on the ground over to Sans.

He held out his hand. "okay... first, give me the phone."

Frisk didn't move.

"give me the phone now."

She still didn't move.

Sans grabbed the front of her sweater and lifted her up off the ground, with empty eyes. "G i v e  m e  t h e  p h o n e."

With a whimper, the child held the cellphone up to his grasp. Sans snatched it from her and threw Frisk back on the ground. Then, with a nasty grin, he smashed the phone under his sneaker. "there we go." He looked back over at her, sneering, and taking a step back, "pretty clumsy of you to break your own phone, twerp."

"Ah-!" Frisk crawled to the smashed phone, as if thinking she could salvage it somehow from its own remains, and Sans laughed again. All of her pictures, not to mention all of her contacts. They were lost to her now, and her stored items were beyond her reach in this cave.

"still, doesn't solve the problem one hundred percent," Sans murmured as Frisk whimpered on the ground. He hesitated at the sound. "... what, are ya gonna cry? 'cause that'd be hilarious."

But she didn't cry. "... Who are you...?" She asked instead, looking up from the pieces in her hand. "Why are you doing this?"

"well uh your phone had photographic evidence as we'll recall."

"Sans," she snapped. And then quickly amended, "Or whatever your name is."

He raised a brow at her as he shoved his hands in his pockets. "still sans. just, maybe you're not used to this one. but you know," he added, trying to affect a more friendly expression on his face, "i can be a lot like that other guy if i tried. if you give me a chance."

"You just broke my phone!"

"yeah," he snorted at her indignant face. "but that was nothing. just think of what i can do to you, or to something else you like," His red eye disappeared, sockets black."If, like that phone, you try and show people the truth."

Frisk didn't say anything to the threat, just staring with wide eyes. Sans relaxed, his red eye returning. "but, like i said, if you're a good kid i won't have to do anything like that."

The silence carried his words a long way in her head, but they seemed to affect her just as little as the threat. Looking away from him, Frisk missed how much he was starting to sweat. Instead she wrung her sweater hem and then forcibly gripped her locket, as she finally replied in a soft voice, "I... still... don't understand." Who was he? Where was the real Sans? Why did this... evil Sans show up in his place?

"you don't have to. all you need to know, squirt, is that i'm here to stay. and, uh, kidnapping, blackmailing, and broken phones aside," he chuckled a little at his own list, "i don't want to cause trouble. i just want to live here. you can understand that, can't you?"

"... ..."

"well, that's all you're getting for now," he said. "but y'know, if i'm in a good mood later, i might at least tell you what happened to your buddy."

Still no response. She looked over at him and then back down.

"aw c'mon, twerp, you're making me nervous." Sans poked her in the side and she yelped, taking a step back but keeping her eyes on the floor. "i need to know you won't tell. this could actually be fun, yknow? if you don't tell."

No answer.

"...cause if you do tell someone it's going to get very nasty really quick."

"You'll tell me where Sans is if I don't... ?" Frisk said, at last, looking back up.

The tension slipped from the new Sans' voice, just a little. "yeah, sure. that's what i said, right?"

She sighed, and said quietly, "I won't tell anyone. For now."

You totally intend to tell Alphys.

Sans was still looking her over as he relaxed, smirking. "... heh, you've got that creepy way about you too. not phased by much, are you pipsqueak?" She wrinkled her nose at him, but didn't know how to answer that. So he shrugged and kept going, "yeah, well i just started thinking that as long as you know, maybe you can actually help me."

"Help you?"

"sure? i mean why not?" He said with a wolfish expression, "i'm clearly having trouble fitting in, and you would know more about this world than i do. so just... give me some tips, every now and then, so that people stop asking me if i'm sick or somethin'. i don't think that's asking for much."

It'd be asking for a lot, considering that essentially she would be helping him to replace Sans. Frisk shook her head, keeping her eyes averted. She could keep a secret-well, kind of-but actually helping him was too much. She could also hear her gut telling her to say no, which only confirmed her conviction.

The other Sans grunted. "if this is about the phone, i can replace it." The child looked up, curious if he really meant that, he uttered, "... at some point." Frisk looked away again and he went on, "besides, it would put me in a good mood, y'know? and i already told you, i'll tell you what happened to your sans if i'm in a good mood." He then said as a final note, his teeth bared in a snarl and red eye flaring, "and if i'm in a bad mood i might just cut your face up."

Frisk's hands went to her face.

"capiche?"

He wasn't fighting her. If he was fighting her, it would be easier to know what to do. Odd as that sounded.

"Mmmh..." Was all Frisk said.

Not-Sans smiled again. "i'll take that as a yes. how about we start right now?"

"I have school tomorrow..." the child mumbled.

Now he scowled, "fuck school, this is important to me."

"Toriel's going to wonder where I am," she tried again, with a light frown.

This time, it made him hesitate. "hm." He looked up at the ceiling thinking, eyes almost closed. Before he resumed his regular stance, finally shrugging, "yeah i don't give a shit."

"The real Sans doesn't curse like that," Frisk grumbled, glaring at him.

"'ey," he said, winking at her, "there ya go twerp, that's the spirit."

"He doesn't call me twerp, either."

"i get the feeling that a lot of the pointers you're giving me are specific to you," the toothy Sans mused. "how about we broaden this out a little bit? for instance, i'm having a lot of fun with papyrus as it is, but i-"

The child couldn't help it; as the phone call and that morning's conversations came back to her she blurted out, "Papyrus!" And although this new Sans- really, she needed a name for him- looked irritated at being interrupted he stopped and allowed her to continue. "What's wrong with Papyrus? Was he also replaced- I mean, that phone call you got- and-"

"oh," he shook his head at her. "nah, squirt, don't worry about-uh, that wasn't him over the phone. right now, he's fine. right now. now being the key word."

So he hadn't lied after all... Frisk was relieved, albeit briefly. She let out a breath, one that had been lodged in her chest. She couldn't let it all out though; after all, she still had a huge problem with Sans. And even if her phone wasn't broken, she would have dreaded looking at it and seeing the time, remembering that both Toriel and Leo were waiting for her back home. This Sans was still glaring expectantly, though. She sighed. "Then... You have to stop picking on him. The real Sans wouldn't do that."

He scowled. "i'm not picking on him. did he tell you that i was picking on him?"

"No... Not in those words... but..."

"well fuck, then i'm not picking on him, am i?"

The child chewed on the inside of her cheek. "He told me that you made fluffy bunny a... cannibal?" As the monster's grin got wide, she continued with a red face, "and apparently you don't normally do that?"

Evil Sans(?) began to chuckle, as if at the memory of it. "i'll say i don't! you should have seen the look on his face..." He then cleared his throat, adding, "noted, though. what else?"

"Um..." It wasn't as if she knew the intimate details of their relationship. "I dunno... I guess you're usually... a lot sleepier. And I think, Papyrus scolds you a lot, but you're both always nice to each other. So as long as you're nice..."

Something about his expression changed that she couldn't identify; Sans himself was the one who read expressions, not her. He grumbled, "doesn't seem worth it to be nice to somebody who's nagging you all the time."

"He got you lots of orange juice just because he thinks you're sick!" Frisk snapped.

He blinked. "yeah. he, uh, he did do that." Dark Sans relaxed. "question. is papyrus obsessed with setting traps?"

"Traps? I don't think so," Frisk said, scratching the back of her head. "He likes puzzles."

"puzzles? hrrh... puzzles aren't as much of a pain in the ass," Sweaty Sans murmured. "uh. anything else? and if you lie to me, I'll rip your face up," he added, taking his hands out of his pockets and showing off his sharp bone claws.

Frisk blanched; she wasn't good at lying. That warning had been completely unnecessary, though. "... I can't think of... Anything else right now," she murmured. "But you, you just don't sound like him at all."

"yeah, yeah, i know that much. i heard his voice enough times, it's just, hah, taking a while to imitate it." So saying, Red Eyed Sans looked over the sullen child and then the broken phone between them. His smile faded down. "you look tired, so we'll pick this up tomorrow."

"Yeah?" She avoided looking too grateful at that. "Are you going to take me home..?"

"well you already told me that you won't tell anybody else," Not Sans mused, regarding her warily with his big red eye. "so as long as you hold yourself to that, i don't see the harm in it. as long as you hold yourself to that."

Frisk began to sweat.

You're still totally going to tell Alphys because she is totally going to know what to do yes.

Cursing Sans looked at her for a long time, before finally shrugging and saying, "welp, i'll be keeping in touch, kid. heheh good luck explaining this to toriel." He then held his hand out to her.

Frisk smiled weakly at him, bending down and scooping her phone into her arms before extending one hand to meet his bony claws. His red eye flashed, and they both left the cave in a whirl of motion sickness. In the next second she was standing outside of her own house, feeling sick and dizzy, and Sharp Sans let go of her hand. His eye flashed again, and then he was also gone the moment she blinked. Leaving her alone, hoping that Toriel had not woken up despite the fact that it was very likely past the point where Leo was supposed to go home.

It was silly to be worried about that at all when New Sans' cruel laugh and threats was still in her ears. Yet she was capable of worrying about many things at a time. If only because, while she was trying to think of a strategy for talking to Toriel, she kept having other thoughts about Sans butting in.

You don't know what's happened to Sans. He could be dead, hurt, or locked up somewhere while this other monster's walking around in his place.

You don't want to fight Fake Sans.

Frisk put a hand up to her head, wishing that the thoughts would go away. But really, it was her stomach that hurt. She wasn't feeling queasy anymore, but she was a bundle of nerves there. And it kept her frozen in place, while a piece of her phone dropped from her arms and on the sidewalk.

Maybe, just maybe, you can persuade him to tell you where the real Sans is.

Any minute now, Toriel could open the door and see her adopted child standing there with no clue what to say. Mayb she could say she wanted to take a picture and she got lost and- or, better, she could not say anything at all.

Maybe, if you're careful, you can persuade him of something else.

After all, if fighting him is not an option...

She took a deep breath and turned the knob, scooping the fallen piece of phone back up off the ground before she did. She could also tell her that she had been kidnapped by an evil version of Sans who said "fuck school" and the whole lot of other things. ... But no, she couldn't tell her that. She was already going to be upset, and she had already been upset.

Another parent had called Toriel after dinner that day; their child would not be able to go to school for the next week. They caught the flu.

You think that even now you can do what you always do.

Toriel was in the kitchen waiting for her.

What you do best.

Perhaps, in this situation it might be better to not say anything at all. That was something else that she did best.

Next Chapter: Kindness and Patience

Chapter Text

Her secret weapon was being kind, of course.

Granted, Frisk had never been kind to someone who was this mean to her before. (Actually she had, although that was a very complicated case and she wasn't sure she could do exactly the same for this... new monster.)

And it didn't help her that much that she was grounded for the next week. As it turned out, Toriel could be a very strict parent when broken cell phones and staying out past one's bedtime were on the table. And it also turned out that not saying anything at all wasn't the best strategy.

The fact that she now had no phone, because Bad Sans broke it, only compounded her grounding. So... Visiting and calling Alphys was out, and with it so went any chance of getting her help discreetly. Unless she snuck out, that is.

Frisk kind of didn't want to sneak out. But the same time, she was already getting anxious waiting for the moment that Evil Sans would get in 'contact' with her again, and being the only person to know the truth was maddening. She heard next to nothing that Toriel said in school the next day, and she hoped that when this was over her mother would forgive her for that. She wasn't even good at math to start with.

Typically, while Toriel stayed behind to tidy up and meet with the volunteer faculty, Frisk walked home with Leo. She didn't really talk while they were walking, but it was normal for him to. Today she couldn't hear a word that he was saying, either.

The way back home wasn't too long. They were already halfway there when they passed the dump, divided from the sidewalk and the surrounding grass lots with a long metal fence. Frisk stopped, re-shouldering her backpack, and looked over the pile of people's trash next to them. All of those mountains of garbage that the monsters had unbelievably moved all the way from Waterfall for the sake of its familiarity. The dump had become home to jobless dummies. Some of the rusted appliances and smelly plastic cartons on the bottom were still wet, despite all the sunshine they had been getting, but the dummies didn't appear to mind.

Some people could live anywhere, even when it was literally a dump.

Where did that new Sans come from that was so unbearable?

"Frisk?" Leo stopped several paces away and turned back, realizing that his friend wasn't following. "You okay?"

She looked back with a start. "Oh! ... Yeah, I..." The child looked down at her feet. "Maybe you should go without me."

"Oh." He smiled at her, awkwardly shifting from foot to foot. "Well, okay. Did you want me to look for my mom's pencils when I get home?"

Frisk blinked. "... Sure." What was he talking about? More pictures? "Um." The dump was lying open beside them, wet and stinking and full of old discarded human things. "Actually, could you send a message to Alphys for me?"

"To Dr. Alphys? Sure!" Leo padded back to her, careful not to trip himself up on cracks in the sidewalk. "Whaddya want me to say?"

She had to take a look around, searching the surrounding area for hiding places, for unaccounted for shadows, for short skeletons that might be listening in. She kept her voice low, forcing Leo to bend over to hear her better. "Could you tell her to come meet me in the dump at midnight?"

"Tonight?" Leo frowned. "But, uh, aren't you grounded?" Before Frisk could get a chance to saw anything, fumbling for an excuse, he added with a grin and a whisper of his own, "Are you gonna sneak out to meet her?"

She turned her toes inward. "Maybe..." she mumbled.

"Yoooo!" Leo hopped up straight. "I can totally help you if you want! I know all about sneaking out! I can come meet you near midnight if you want."

Frisk couldn't suppress her smile in the face of Leo's hopeful expression, the other monster bouncing on his toes even though, without arms, he was likely to fall over doing that. At this point the smell of the dump didn't even bother her. She unconsciously fumbled with the straps of her backpack, and said through that smile, "Uh, okay."

"Great! I'll go pass on your message to Dr. Alphys for you, 'kay?" So saying, Leo ran past Frisk in the opposite direction of her house. He almost tripped, and she flinched, but he soon righted himself with his other foot and kept going with an awkward laugh. "I'm fine!"

"Thanks, Leo!" She called out before he disappeared.

True to her melancholy, Frisk had to stop and watch the dump for a little while longer before heading home, even with Leo gone. She was able to judge how long it would take to get home based on the rocks that she passed by, which are in the same spots as they always were well they haphazardly lined the sidewalk. So busy she was with the rocks, she didn't notice that anyone was in her way until she nearly ran into him, stopped only by his greeting. "Nice day today, Frisk?"

Asgore's gentle smile always warmed her heart somehow. Frisk wasn't very far from her house, nor from his castle, so he must have left recently; he had his cape and armor on, rather than his flowery casual clothes, so perhaps it was official business. And yet he hadn't called her... "I guess so." In her opinion it was too hot out. A lot of the monsters seemed to like it, though.

"You look deep in thought," he mused. "Is something wrong?"

You decide to evade the question.

"You look like you're going somewhere," said the child, scratching her head.

Asgore looked down at himself, "I look like I'm going somewhere? ...So I do! Well, I thought that I would take a visit to the human city to discuss this cold and flu problem we've been having. If the humans have medicine for themselves, perhaps we can work together to create some for monsters."

"Isn't that something I should be helping with?"

He paused, coughing, "Well... I heard that you were grounded and not allowed to go out."

When Frisk glared, he added sheepishly, "And I don't want you to get sick." Flushing a little, he said with an embarrassed chuckle in his voice, "I think I picked something up myself, you see. I guess that my visit is a little bit self-serving, isn't it?"

"Oh!" She felt a twinge in her heart; his speech did seem to be a little snufflier than usual. At least he wasn't confined to a bed yet like some of the other monsters. "Well you- you should get better soon, sir! Maybe it would be easier if someone else went to see the humans?"

His smile softened and he said in a quieter voice, "Oh no, I can't ask anyone to go out and do this for my sake. Besides, so few monsters know how to safely interact with humans right now. Something could happen."

That might be true, but Frisk still took a breath, preparing for words to debate with. But at the end, no words came out. She just re-shouldered her backpack. Asgore's smile had drifted off, and now he firmly reaffixed it to his face as well. "I hope that all is going well with you?"

"... Aside from being grounded, I'm fine," Frisk said, and Asgore's smile turned sympathetic.

He patted her on the shoulder. "Well, that's good at least. Please take it easy; I'm sure that Toriel will have mercy on you and lift it before you know it!"

"... Thanks, Asgore."

"No problem! I'll see you later, my child," he said, and walked past her.

Soon he too was gone, and Frisk was left standing alone on the sidewalk, head hurting. She was hoping in the back of her mind that she didn't catch the flu from King Asgore on top of everything else that was happening. And she really thought that this might be the end of it for today. That she could just go back home and nap before sneaking out that night.

But when she took another step, her house in her sights, she heard someone else. "aw, you didn't get grounded because of me, did you?"

A chill ran up and down Frisk's body; the other Sans, the Sans with the red eye. He wasn't next to her, in front of her, or behind her; he was leaning against the wall of the Great Dogs' big blue house, almost blending in with it while wearing that blue hoodie. Frisk could only see him clearly after taking a few steps forward. She saw the hoodie first, and despite a different tone in the voice some part of her was still expecting her Sans to be the one wearing it. But those sharp teeth were the same as what they were before.

Red Sans- Red Sans- smiled at her, the third smile she had seen on the way home, the most cheerful, and yet the least disarming. "hiya. you look surprised. didn't expect to see me today?"

Frisk grabbed the strap of her backpack and leveled a mutual gaze at him, her mouth in a straight line. He started to sweat a little, "... what's with the silent treatment? are you still mad about the phone? ...or, ha ha, the whole 'switching places' thing?" His tremulous voice went unanswered. So his features hardened, "ugh, knock it off."

"I'm..." Her stomach was burning now, and it wasn't because of fear. Nonetheless, Frisk took a deep breath; she had to do this. In order to find the real Sans. "... I don't know what to say, that's all."

He scratched his skull, making a little noise as sharp bone claws ran against bone. "well fuck if i know. i'm still really surprised to see mr. grouchypants there being such a dork." He noticed the bewildered expression on the child's face and laughed, "... he's not called that over here, is he? i mean asgore. uh. i guess i was expecting him to be a lot... meaner."

Her eyebrows rose. "Why would you expect that?"

"no... no reason," he said. "everything is just. i mean, everyone is... i mean. over there, where I came from, was... weird."

"Weird how?"

He waved her off, dismissively. "ah, forgettaboutit. story for another time. actually came here to ask you something else." Red Sans started walking beside Frisk, and she resisted the urge to pick up the pace. "what's my relationship with toriel supposed to be, here?"

The child squinted. "... What?"

"you know... " he raised and waved out his hands, helplessly trying to illustrate his point, "like. are we. friends, or...? or are we, uh, y'know? ...maybe you don't know. like. uh. what term would you use?"

"For what," Frisk asked blankly.

"uhhh..." Red Sans furrowed his brows. "are we dating, or...?"

All the hairs on her neck stood on end. "What?"

"why is that such a weird question?" Red Sans flung his hands out again. "we're both adults, and she's really p-"

"That's so gross!" Frisk screeched, cutting him off. "Sans does not date Toriel! He has never dated Toriel!"

Sneering at her, Red Sans just put his hands in his coat pockets and relaxed his stance. "woah twerp, who put a bee in your bonnet? still, even if we haven't dated yet, would you say, theoretically, we could date?"

"No!"

He cocked his head. "that just your opinion? 'cause i'm not really looking for your approval."

The house was before them. Frisk ran quickly from Red Sans up the front steps, stamping her feet. "N-no! You really can't date Toriel!" She wrung her hands. The only monsters out at this hour were all out too far away from the two of them.

"oh yeah?" Red Sans' gold tooth glinted. "why?"

"Because- um-" She croaked and stammered, and Red Sans' teeth glinted at her. Her heart was awash with a horror that she hadn't even expected to feel today. Finally, Frisk burst out, "Because- because dating you- she would get suspicious right away! You sound weird, you're forgetting- stuff- you're- um- um- all sweaty and- and rude s-sometimes and- and that's not even the biggest problem- you-" she hesitated, while Red Sans was staring at her expectantly. "You- you've been here for days and you didn't even tell one joke!"

He leaned back, indignant. "eh? i've said plenty of jokes, brat."

More croaking, more stuttering, "N-no, you only said puns. Sans doesn't just make puns, you know."

It was a dumb idea, a distinction that was splitting hairs more than anything, but it seemed to actually make him think. "hrrr... actual jokes, huh?" Then, a nasty expression came on Red Sans' face, as Frisk grabbed the doorknob. "oh! i've got one. why did little billy drop his ice cream?"

She turned it and stopped. "Why?"

"'cause he got hit by a truck."

"... ... ..."

"... ... ..."

Red Sans studied Frisk for half a minute and then burst out laughing.

The child screwed her face up. While he was still hysterics she took her opportunity, ripping the door open. "We'll work on it BYE Sans," she said. Then she walked into the house and slammed the door closed, as Red Sans continued to laugh outside like some mobster Joker.

You feel like this is going to be hard.

Waterfall was a large place, one with winding dark caverns only traversible by rocks and plant life that glowed a sickly greenish blue color, one that made a monster-or human-unused to the light queasy after too long. Aside from the monster capital, as the area with the most tolerable climate it was where a majority of the creatures underground lived. They were tucked away in various neighborhoods around the dump, around shops, and around crystals. Frisk often saw such monsters walking around the area on their way to work, to a friend's house, or on their way to a FIGHT to strengthen themselves; Aarons, Woshuas, a flaring Moldbygg or two.

If any of them ever approached her, as she quickly demonstrated to Blue Sans, she would slam her pan on the ground in a show of force. Many of these things she had already fought before. Even if there was a reward for her, they weren't as dumb or as brave as the Canine Unit.

Frisk had a promise to keep, so it was only natural that she accompanied Blue Sans through these treacherous, sickening caves; she led the way with a step that had memorized every room, while her squat skeleton companion trudged behind her. It was a little more surprising when Papyrus offered to come with them too; she had even suspected at first that it was to get back some of the food that she had stolen from the fridge.

But, "IT IS MY JOB AS THE RESPONSIBLE BROTHER TO KEEP SANS OUT OF TROUBLE AND PUNISH HIM WHEN HE'S BEING A LITTLE SHIT." Blue Sans hadn't looked happy about that proclamation, but said nothing. "AND STEALING PEOPLE'S LIVES FALLS UNDER THAT CATEGORY I THINK."

The whole time Frisk was miming "no" from behind Papyrus. Luckily, the new Sans had enough sense to say just that. "you just keep an eye on your brother's shed, okay? make sure that his machine doesn't get any more broken than it already is."

"BUT WITH JUST THIS HUMAN SCUM, YOU MIGHT-"

"i really don't think you need to come with us on this," for the first time, Frisk thought she heard something like anger in Blue Sans' voice when he said that. But it was too faint to tell, especially with him mumbling the way that he did.

But Papyrus, glaring, had acquiesced. Although not before giving them his cell phone number.

Frisk tossed the number out as soon as they were outside of Snowdin. For the most part, there was no need to talk, so they didn't talk. The only sounds to be heard, aside from the snide mocking of the echo flowers and the burbling of water, were Blue Sans shuffling after Frisk, and Frisk kicking loose stones while she walked. The only time that she stopped to talk was when something brought her up short, in a cavern full of twinkling fake stars.

Blue Sans had stopped to look up at the ceiling, no light in his eyes, and Frisk averted her own. She walked down the hallway perpendicular to this room, over to the wall that she assumed had concealed the exit, like the last time that she came through here. Somebody kept resetting this trap, but it wasn't a very hard one to figure out.

She tapped the stone wall, running her fingers along the ocean patterns thoughtlessly, expecting it to collapse into sand as it had before. But nothing happened. "What the hell?"

"What the hell?" Whined an echo flower at the other end of the hall. "What the heeell?" Repeated its neighbor.

"what's up?" Asked Blue Sans; his voice was so quiet that the flowers didn't pick it up. Frisk looked back at him in exasperation, and he nodded thoughtfully. "can't find the way outta here?"

"No, I can find a way out," she snapped. "It's just... It isn't opening."

"It isn't openiiiing," shrilled the flower closest to her.

Gritting her teeth, Frisk walked back to the main room and grabbed the stalk in her hands. With a grunt, she pulled until the large flower was dangling from her arms, completely uprooted and completely silent. All the rest of the flowers went quiet as well, and giving an involuntary shudder Frisk could feel their nonexistent eyes staring at her. Murderer. least they weren't whining now.

When she looked back at Blue Sans, he too was staring at her as if she had killed a person. So she stuck her tongue out at him, and he quickly went back to his "stargazing." "Yeah. Something is wrong with the exit."

"uh, are you sure you're hitting in the right place?" Blue Sans said, lowering his head once more. "did you check the telescope?"

She glanced at their surroundings. "What telescope?"

And then for the first time Blue Sans was taking in more than just the ceiling. "oh. he, uh, didn't set one up i guess."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"... nothin'."

"I did this trap before, dipstick!" Frisk snarled, her blood starting to boil again.

"i believe you," Blue Sans grinned.

The only response she gave to that was a squint and a scowl. Ignoring him and his constant smile she paced instead back to the door, poking it in all places with the pan and yet feeling no give. "Something's wrong with it. Did somebody change the trap?"

Back behind her, Sans shifted on his feet and she scowled harder at him. "uh, when you say trap... are these lethal traps that you're talking about? And if so, is it really a good idea for you to be jabbing around like that?"

At this point, Frisk's face was starting to hurt. She huffed and stopped poking, turning away from the short skeleton again. She didn't understand; why change the trap now, after leaving it solved and easy to pass through for so long? It wasn't exactly a secret that a human passed through this cavern.

Surely there was a secret to it. The other monsters needed to have the solution on hand if they wanted to get through to the rest of Waterfall, right? She bent and examined the ocean-wave stone that surrounded the once-false wall, tiny fingers feeling for an indentation or a slip of paper stuck in the crack. A message written in permanent marker. A switch.

You examine the wall.

You're not smart enough to find the answer.

She let out a long breath and stamped her foot. "There has to be a way!"

"oh yeah, looks simple to me," Blue Sans mused behind her, surveying the perpendicular hallway with one eye. Far off to the left, an echo flower whined the same thing and Frisk's eye twitched. "not lethal at all. i'm sure you'll get it."

Did that mean he already knew the answer? She flung her hands, again exasperated. "What? What'm I supposed to do?"

"if i told you that, i'd be spoiling the fun," Sans said. He coughed, several times, drowning out the growl that came out of the girl's throat. "'scuse me. yeah, like i said, i'm sure you'll figure it out."

She rolled her eyes, "This would go a lot faster if you just told me the answer."

"nah. it's fine."

Gritting her teeth, she said, "You're the one who wants to go home, aren't you? How come you're being such a retard, then?"

"wow," he just said, readjusting his furry coat, "crazily enough, you calling me a retard repeatedly does not make me more willing to help you."

"Well if you don't help me you won't get home, retard!" She snarled.

"heh heh heh... is that why you charged to anti-papyrus' house without me when i was napping?" He said, and Frisk turned rigid where she stood. In her silence, he finished, closing his eyes, "... like i said, you'll figure it out. i have the utmost confidence in ya."

"I have the up-most confidence in ya." When Blue Sans' eyes snapped back open, she was glad to see his irritation and put on an innocent smile, quickly hiding her yapping hands behind her back. "Echo flower."

He sneered, "good luck, kid."

And then the smile on her own face dropped as he shuffled left, out of her range of sight. Gritting her teeth, she marched out of the little hallway, prepared to take her pan out, but Blue Sans was already curled up in the corner sleeping. She continued marching, standing before him in as menacing a manner as she could. "Are you kidding me?!"

No response.

"That's not funny! I know you're not sleeping!"

Blue Sans fakes a snore.

She jabbed her pan in his side over and over; Blue Sans snorted, but said nothing. "Wake up!"

No answer.

Her blood boiled, driving her foot down again and again onto the stone floor until it smarted. "Wake up! Wake up! Fuck! Fuck! Tell me the answer to this puzzle, now! Hey!" She waited for a second, but there was no response. Frisk growled and slammed her pan on the ground once, and then swung it against the wall twice; the sounds resounded through the space and caused the rocks to shiver.

When Blue Sans didn't even flinch she tried again, driving her makeshift weapon against the ground even closer to him with a loud bang. "HEY! I'm talking to you! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" Her voice became a shrill screech, and the Echo flowers all became unintelligible whining as they repeated it back even higher until it could no longer be heard.

Wow Blue Sans is so unimpressed with your childish temper tantrum.

Frisk slammed her pan on the ground and let it stay there, dented and battered even more than it already was. Warm prickles gathered in her eyes and she turned quickly away, running back to the other hallway. "I hope you die you shithead, god!"

The obstinate new version of Sans leaving her alone, Frisk struggled to catch her breath and suppress angry sobs.

Simple? It didn't look simple to her. It looked as impossible as the exit having been replaced with a plain rock wall, one that she obviously was not going to be able to break through. Maybe she was just stupid. That must be the opinion of the flowers, anyway, as they kept repeating "you shithead" in lower and lower voices. To be honest, the only reason she had solved this trap in the first case was because she had poked at every wall and the fake one gave way easily.

Wiping her eyes of the hastily summoned tears, Frisk sat down and stared hard at the rock. I don't get it.

Ring, ring...

"!"

...There was absolutely nobody underground that knew her phone number or that she even wanted to call her. Frisk stared at the device for a while while it rung; since the noise wasn't waking up Blue Sans, she finally put it to her ear and answered, preparing to make her voice low and gruff like a monster's. But before she got the chance she heard, loud and rougher than she could ever imitate, "HUMAN!"

Frisk's heart dropped. "... Papyrus?"

"... YES! IT IS I! YOU NEGLECTED TO CALL ME AFTER I GAVE YOU MY PHONE NUMBER."

"That's because I..." she wrinkled her nose. "How did you...?"

"HOW DID I GET THIS NUMBER? I CALLED EACH ONE SEQUENTIALLY UNTIL I FOUND YOURS!"

She looked behind her and then back at the wall in front of her. "So you've been calling every single monster and shouting 'human' at them when they picked up?"

"YES."

Frisk put the phone down and covered her eyes with both hands. "Wow."

Even when the phone wasn't held up to her ear, she could still hear Papyrus' voice very clearly, "I'M A VERY PROACTIVE PERSON, EVEN WHEN IT COMES TO HELPING SCUM LIKE YOU!"

"I guess."

"WHAT? YOUR VOICE GOT VERY QUIET ALL OF A SUDDEN."

Frisk leaned over the phone. "I SAID, I GUESS!"

"WELL NOW YOU'RE JUST SHOUTING AT ME! YOU'RE LUCKY I'M NOT THERE WITH YOU!" Frisk snorted. "WHERE ARE YOU, ANYWAY?"

What harm was it going to do? At least he was talking to her. "We're in Waterfall. We're in the room with all the rocks on the ceiling."

"... THAT'S A LOT OF ROOMS, HUMAN. A LOT OF ROOMS HAVE ROCKS ON THE CEILING. THAT IS THE POINT OF WATERFALL."

She wrinkled her nose again; she had thought that the point of Waterfall was all of the waterfalls. Taking another deep breath, she said, "It's just past the bridge trap."

"WOW YOU HAVEN'T GOTTEN VERY FAR HAVE YOU?" She heard his raspy laughter from the other end of the phone and covered her face again, grinding her teeth. "YOU MUST BE VERY STUPID!"

"Oh shut up, you fucktard."

"DON'T CALL ME NAMES!" Again she rolled her eyes, although there wasn't really a point when he couldn't see her. There was a crackling, and then, "ARE YOU STUCK?"

Feeling a headache come on from all the shouting, Frisk rubbed the bridge of her nose. "Someone changed the trap in here. The door was supposed to be behind this wall but it's not. It's solid stone and I can't see a switch anywhere."

"NYAH HAH HAH! I SEE! AND YOU CALLED ME BECAUSE YOU NEED THE EXPERTISE OF PAPYRUS THE TERRIBLE?"

"... ..."

"WELL I'LL GIVE YOU A HINT!" Frisk picked the phone up and peeked over the corner at Blue Sans; he hadn't moved from the spot, but if she stared hard enough she thought she could see him peeking behind his closed... skull lids. Although it might just be her imagination. "... I... HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED THERE. BUT I HAVE A HUNCH THAT I KNOW THAT KIND OF TRAP!"

"-Awesome!" Frisk rushed back to the formerly false wall, putting the phone back to her ear. "So can you tell me the answer?"

"NO, THAT WOULD RUIN IT!"

"Fuck you."

It wasn't possible to hear, but she could almost imagine that Papyrus was shifting a little, uncomfortably, where he was. "WELL... I WANT THIS RESOLVED QUICKLY. SO I WILL TAKE PITY ON YOU, PATHETIC HUMAN. I'LL GIVE YOU ANOTHER HINT."

"Yay."

"CAN YOU WHISTLE?"

"No."

"OH. WELL, THEN YOU'LL HAVE TO HUM INSTEAD."

"What?"

"TRY HUMMING SOMETHING. HUM IT VERY LOUD."

She rubbed her eyes, "Humming what? What the hell is humming going to do?"

"WELL IT'LL OPEN UP THE DOOR SMARTASS!" Papyrus roared, "AS LONG AS YOU KNOW WHAT TUNE YOU'RE HUMMING!"

Come to think of it, she was familiar with that kind of trap. How, when, and why it was put into this door, however, she had no idea. Frisk eyed the stone warily. "What tune am I supposed to hum?"

"uh... ... UH, YOU FIGURE IT OUT. I GAVE YOU TWO HINTS ALREADY! IF YOU NEED MORE THAN TWO HINTS, YOU'RE EVEN DUMBER THAN SANS!"

The child sucked in her cheeks. "But I still don't know what to do..."

"TOO BAD FOR YOU, THEN! NYAHAHAHAHAHA!" There was more crackling, and then, "HAH... GOODBYE!"

He hung up...

Frisk let out a groan and covered her eyes with her hands, putting her phone away. Hum something? Hum what? It wasn't like in the room with the piano where there were directions and clues what she was supposed to recreate. This trap looked specifically made to stump her with no clues at all, except that apparently Blue Sans and Papyrus knew it just on description.

Well... Another trap was like this too.

Glancing around, subconsciously bunching the hem of her sweater in her fists, Frisk hummed the piano room tune in a tremulous waver. When nothing happened, she made it louder and louder until she stopped abruptly, cheeks burning. She either wasn't doing it loud enough or that wasn't it.

A different tune was needed. There was one already in her head, playing on repeat. It was always playing on repeat in Waterfall. But that was different from hearing it out loud, such as from a music box.

Still, she was getting desperate in her frustration.

She started to gather breath, before a different plan bade her to let it all out again. Frisk walked back to retrieve the pan that she had left near Blue Sans, and after ascertaining that he was still pretending to be asleep she walked back to the hallway with it held at the ready. She sat down, crossing her legs, and drew it over her lap. Then, using her nails, she tried to tap out the tune in her head instead. If whistling would do, and humming would do, and a piano would do, surely this would do as well?

Before she knew it, there was a grinding noise from directly in front of her and it was as if the stone had retreated from the wall, retracting up into some unknown abyss in the ceiling. "Ah!" She jumped up, her face splitting into a big grin.

The exit has appeared.

"Ah!" Frisk jumped up and down, clapping her hands.

After getting more hints than necessary, you kind of solved the puzzle.

"heh, it's always a music puzzle. nice one, kid."

Looking left, Blue Sans stood right next to her, as if he had been there the whole time. The fake nap was over, apparently. Still jubilant, the girl just sneered, "I solved it! No thanks to you."

"nope. i told you that you could do it," he said. "isn't it great when i don't have to lift a finger?"

In response, Frisk stuck her tongue out at him and pulled down on the bottom lids of her eyes. Blue Sans just laughed until she stopped, unaffected, but even so her smile stayed behind.

She charged onward into the next room.

Next Chapter: Song That Plays When You Befriend Frisk

Chapter Text

After completing the music puzzle, progress through Waterfall went a little bit quicker; their travel over the exposed to docks was, fortunately, bypassed with the help of a parallel version of Ned, soaking in the water as always despite the fact that his attitude was a lot grumpier and he was red instead of purple. That grumpy attitude didn't stop them; all Frisk had to do was swing their pan menacingly and Ned carried them both to the opposite dock.

Sans really didn't approve of the way this child made the other monsters cower, but he also wasn't exactly in a position to criticize. It was a pretty good shortcut, anyway, when he couldn't risk making his own. Waterfall was much more bearable than the icy cold Snowdin, that was for sure, but it still was an uncomfortable place, too dark at times and too bright at others.

At the same time, though, it was such a nostalgic trip. Shortly after arriving on the opposite dock, Sans saw the room with a piece of cheese lying half-eaten by a mouse hole and a half-wilted echo flower, almost as he remembered from back home.

Cramped, hopeless sights, but nostalgic all the same.

While he'd been hesitating over that piece of cheese, Frisk pushed him out of the room and said there was 'something that they had to do.'

"what's that?" He had asked.

The question achieved nothing but getting him shoved out of the room even faster, as they said, "Get off my back!" And that was the end of that.

At any rate, it didn't take them long to catch up with him. They continued on for a little while longer, over black platforms surrounded by sickly glowing water and echo flowers that whined as they passed. They had also passed through the cavern that, as he recalled, used to hold Onion-san. Shortly before they entered, Frisk banged their pan against the ground three times; the octopus monster did not appear.

At the other end, in the next room, the child finally said abruptly, "I'm tired. I'm gonna nap."

He had pretended to nap a few times already, but this was something Sans could actually get behind. "right behind you, kiddo."

It was startling how quickly they fell asleep while curled up on the stone floor. But then, they must be used to sleeping on hard surfaces by now. Poor kid. Sans yawned and did the same, propping himself up against one of the walls. Soon he too was snoring.

But eventually, predictably, he had his sleep disturbed some time later.

It was faint, but Sans could hear the distinct plinking of piano keys further on in the corridor, with the child nowhere in sight. Feeling queasy, Sans shuffled down the cavern to another room, one with an old piano on the right-hand side and the open door in the center of the opposite wall. Above the piano, someone had scratched arrows into the stone.

Meanwhile on the piano, Frisk was playing along on the keys, head bent in concentration. The melody was one he was unfamiliar with. They might have just been goofing around, making a cacophony of notes.

But he felt a little better, all the same. "i didn't know you play, kid."

They looked up, startled, and then away again with red rising on their face. They continue to play, halting and broken notes going on as if Sans had not come in at all. So he approached until he was standing right next to piano, listening with half lidded eyesockets. While he listened the child mumbled, without looking up, "only know three songs, though."

"three songs? that's a lot to me, i don't know any." Frisk didn't reply, so he continued, "can i hear?"

The playing stopped. They looked back over at Sans and then bit their lip. He wasn't sure if he had done something wrong, but a moment before he could ask, the kid started to play again. It was a different song-or, rather, it was an actual song at all-one with a slow and repetitive pattern. He could swear he'd heard it a long time ago, in the back of his recollection. On reflection, he realized with a tap of his fingers that it was the song played by the music box behind the statue in his world, and probably in this one as well. Memory.

No wonder the door here was already open.

Frisk played the song for about a minute and then stopped. They said, under their breath, "One." Then they played anew, and Sans didn't recognize the next song. It was faster, a little cheerier, although something somber still rang through in a simple notes that Frisk laid played. They didn't look at him while they played it.

The ground unearthed next to him and, to Sans' surprise, Flowey had sprouted up next to him. It figured that that thing was following them both, or maybe he had been there the whole time. Certainly Frisk didn't react, continuing to play despite the additional audience member.

But Sans raised his brow at the flower, and the flower stuck out his tongue and winked as he said, by way of explanation, "I heard playing."

"amazing what you can hear when you're under the ground like that," Sans mused, and Flowey chuckled nervously. The little plant didn't reply, instead choosing to sway to the piano.

"You should tell him the title of this one," he added.

"No." Frisk growled.

"i didn't know it had a title," Sans said, as if prompting. The child only glared at them, face reddening again, before returning their focus to the task at hand. "this song about anyone?"

"No," was all they said back.

But Flowey was quick to chime in, "It's about me!" Although at that, the music cut off in an abrupt crash of keys.

By now Frisk's face almost look like a tomato, and Sans could only fight laughing at the sight. He turned back to Flowey, "that's cool. they write it for you?"

"I think so!" The flower bounced. "It's called 'Your Best Friend'!"

Frisk did not say anything, except for "Two," in a little, gritted-teeth growl.

But, "it's cute," Sans said. "i like it."

Out of the corner of his eye, as he kept careful watch over Flowey's jubilant expression, Sans could see the child starting to smile through their blush. For him, it was an immense relief. They were finally starting to act like a normal person. "what's the third one?" He asked finally.

Flowey looked up in wonder, "Golly, you can play three now?"

"Mm," Frisk placed their hands over the piano and hesitated, still keeping their eyes averted. Then they constructed with the worn keys a rapid and soft melody, like a fluttering heartbeat. It was definitely different from the first two. "Fallen Down," they mumbled.

But they only played for a moment before a sour key ring out and they stopped, punctuating their misstep with, "Shit!"

Sans and Flowey both remained quiet while Frisk tried again, and again a few seconds passed before another false key was struck. "Shit! Shit!" They paused. They poised their fingers, ignoring the audience, and tried a third time.

For a second it looked like the third time was the charm. The song went on for a little longer, and Sans could almost make out the child humming something along with it. But by the third iteration of the pattern, Frisk hit a wrong note and slammed their hands down on the piano, "Shit!" And then, setting off several notes at once, they put their head down.

"Uh oh. Play time's over," said Flowey, shortly before he disappeared back into the ground.

The whole thing would have been funny if not for the fact that Frisk wasn't moving from their spot and Sans was getting just a little bit anxious that they had maybe started crying. He placed a hand on the piano, trying to spot any heaving breath or shaking "uh, don't worry about it kiddo," he said. "you still play a lot better than me."

Unexpectedly they raised their head at that, although it was only a little. Their hair flopped again, and they squinted at him before relaxing; luckily, he saw no tears in their eyes. Although he thought he saw something... else... on their face. "Hey, are you sure you're actually a Sans from another world?"

He blinked at the question. "pretty sure, why d'you ask?"

Now the child ran a finger along a piano key in vain distraction. "Just... Sans, my Sans, mentioned having a cousin once or twice. I was just thinking, maybe you're him and you're playing a prank on me."

A face appeared in his mind and he banished it. "nah, i'm no one's cousin anymore."

"Oh." They preoccupied themselves now with pressing down on the same key, repeatedly and slowly. "Okay." It was quiet, save for that repetitive note, until the child followed that up with, "Is there a Frisk in your world too?"

It was easy enough question to answer, but he had a suspicion that what he said was more important than this Frisk was letting on. "eh? my frisk?" He had been trying not to think about them this whole time. Considering that they were so far away right now. "yeah. they're... uh, definitely a thing."

"What are they like?" They asked.

A single bead of sweat dripped off his skull. "what're they like? uh, why d'you ask, kid?"

Like it usually went, he had to wait for the answer from this one. "Mm." They slid off the piano stool, apparently done playing, and continued until back in the adjacent room. He shuffled after them as they went on from their; the hall ahead in their journey he remembered clearly, the "rain tunnel" as he liked to call it. There was no bin full of umbrellas, but the prospect of getting soaked didn't seem to bother the kid that much.

They marched through a puddle of water, dauntlessly, before he heard them speak again, "If you're like this... in that world, I must be different too."

"oh, yeah, uh, i think you could say that everybody is different. me, papyrus definitely, that flowey, you..." Sans flinched as the water dropped down from above, striking him on the skull just a little too hard. His other self's coat was to some extent waterproof, but he knew he was going to get soaked a bad headache anyway. His bones were already shaking.

"Uh huh," said Frisk. For a moment that was all. They took out a spider donut, swiped from Papyrus' pantry, and ate it noisily in the rain before continuing, "So how are they different? Are they all... ...?"

"retarded?" Sans offered.

"... Yeah," Frisk snapped, turning back for a second to sneer at him as they moved forward through the manufactured rain. "Are they all retards like you?"

If he had cheeks made of flesh, Sans would have sucked them in. But since he didn't, he just shivered harder instead. "i guess by your standards, you might say something like that. they're all pretty good people, though, my frisk included. although i guess you two are kinda similar. they just don't curse like a sailor is all. they do a lot less monster beating, too." The child flinched up ahead of him and then Sans flinched back, like a reflex. "... uh... y'know what kid, i'm gonna meet you up ahead."

He made an estimation of where to end up next, remembering the spot where the "rain tunnel" ended in his world. He disappeared to that room before he could even hear this Frisk protest. Although he swore he could see them racing and splashing over the puddles, just before his eyes left the room, as if they somehow believed that they would be able to beat him to his destination. It was a foolish thought. When he reappeared in another cavern, surrounded by reeds, he appeared alone.

While he waited for Frisk Sans coughed and shook, trying to shudder off some of his wetness. Despite the dim lighting of the new room and his own faint dizziness, he recognized it well; behind him, there was a jagged break in the rock wall that opened up to a much larger cavern, one with houses, mazes, and traps sprawled about a mile below. Far beyond the sprawling was the familiar sight of a large castle looming large in the distance.

The castle was also sharper and vaguely more terrifying than in his memory, the spires a dark pointed red and the stone covered in cracks. That was Asgore's home, but who knew what the Asgore of this world was like. Rather than linger on that, he studied the glowing "stars" instead. They were dim and also that nauseating green.

Maybe it was better if he just didn't look at anything. So Sans closed his eyes, sighing.

A noise startled him out of his melancholy, moments later.

The kid had made it over, stepping into the room soaked to the skin; they weren't looking at him, and their hands were behind their back. In a quiet murmur, they said, "I'm sorry I called you a retard."

"what."

The two stared at each other, but it was out of the corner of their eyes. The minute twitches of their expression would have gone unnoticed for other monsters, but for Sans it was all the difference between the Frisk that he had just seen in the rain tunnel and the one facing him right now. A downturned mouth, but with downturned eyes and lids that threatened to squeeze tears. He couldn't say that he had seen that coming. If he had, he might've been a bit more considerate and just put up with the falling water.

Oh, well, no way to undo it now.

Frisk just stood in place, speaking in a low voice, "If I stop calling you a retard, will you stop appearing and vanishing so quickly? Wigs me out."

"all right," said Sans. If he could, he would milk that phrase for what it was worth and disappear slowly. But that kind of cheating wasn't possible. So while Frisk crossed over the distance between them he just said, with his grin, "it's a deal."

"Good." The child shifted uncomfortably and started walking; as before, he had no choice but to trudge along after them. "... He did that a lot too. Especially at first. Like fucking Batman."

"like who?"

Frisk's head, at least from what he could see looking at the back of it, dipped down at the query. There was no reply, except a little exhalation that told him nothing. It must be a human thing. The Frisk back home always loved to explain human things to him and Papyrus, but he could understand if this one got tired of it. Trapped underground and away from humans for so long, there weren't an awful lot of visual aids for them to use.

Feeling a brief pain, he wondered if it would be better or worse here to try and change the subject. Eventually, and studying their body posture closely, Sans said in a not-entirely-telligible voice, "hey, eh..." They turned their head, and what he saw of their expression was neutral, so he kept going, "you didn't tell me what that song's about. the one you played on the piano. what did you call it, 'fallen down'?"

Facing forward again, Frisk swung their arms back and forth. "I... 'm... it's... about stuff."

He snorted. "'bout stuff?"

"Yeah."

"what kinda stuff?"

"Well I," they stopped, started, looked back and then faced forward. "I heard it sometimes." There was a loud snort. "I don't really know what it means. Okay? You happy now?"

No, he was not happy... Not that he was unhappy, at least about this. He coughed. "that's fine. not everything has to mean somethin'."

Repeating their own snort, Frisk stretched their arms behind their head and said, "That's right. I don't know why you even gotta ask in the first place." Each time they spoke, their words got quieter and quieter while the sentence went on, "It's a dumb song anyway, jeeze Louise..."

"actually, my name is sans."

"I fucking knowwwww that already," they said, and he couldn't help but laugh. He was encouraged too by the fact that when he did, he could hear them laugh just a little bit too.

The pained feeling relaxed in his chest, and Sans exhaled as he and his bones relaxed with it.

Next Chapter: Like Yourself

Chapter Text

"ISN'T THAT KIND OF IMPRACTICAL FOR THE SUMMERTIME, SANS?"

While rolling his eyes, Sans reminded himself that this was not his actual brother talking over his shoulder right now, and so a retort of "mind your own fucking business" would be inappropriate. After all, pointing out that a fluffy coat was impractical for the summer was more reasonable than simply shouting at him to put it back and giving a cursory smack to the head. So, grinning wryly while Papyrus couldn't see, he only said, "true, but you never know when it's going to suddenly start snowing. don't want me to freeze to death, do you?"

He grunted and sucked in a breath when he felt his not-brother squeeze him tight in a hug from behind. "NO! NO I DO NOT!"

"okay great," he said hoarsely.

Oblivious to everything as usual, Papyrus let him go and then proclaimed, "I'M GLAD YOU'RE BECOMING SO PROACTIVE, BROTHER! EVEN THOUGH I DON'T THINK WE REALLY NEED WINTER CLOTHES, IT'S GOOD TO BE PREPARED."

"yeah. uh." More than anything what he wanted was to get the red one, or the orange; they weren't like the coats he had at home but the colors appealed to him more than blue. Buying a red furry coat, though, might look too out of character, so some sacrifices had to be made. "... want me to get you one?"

Papyrus patted Sans on the head and stepped off to another part of the Rabbits' "New Home, New Threads" store. "NO, I'LL BE FINE! DATE CLOTHES ARE THE PRIORITY FOR ME! THIS TIME I WILL NOT BE SO CARELESS AS TO GET THEM TORN UP LIKE, UH, LAST TIME."

Sans slid off his hoodie, the better to make sure the thing fit. Hundreds of sizes were required for hundreds of different kinds of monsters, and it made shopping a pain in the ass at home, too. "the hell kind of dates have you been on?"

Papyrus' voice faltered, "WELL- YOU REMEMBER, IT WAS-" And then it picked up in volume, "SANS, DON'T DISROBE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STORE! USE THE CHANGING ROOM!"

"i still got a shirt on, paps," Sans snapped.

"IT'S STILL INAPPROPRIATE! THAT'S WHAT IT'S FOR! THIS PART OF THE STORE IS FOR PICKING OUT CLOTHES, NOT FOR CHANGING INTO THEM!"

He huffed, unzipping the jacket. "oh shut up."

But Papyrus was serious, apparently, his skull "flushing" as it were- embarrassed at his rude older brother refusing to follow clothes' shopping etiquette. "SAAANS THE CHANGING ROOM IS RIGHT THERE."

He would show him mercy this time, carelessly shrugging at him and grinning. "eh. whatever." Just like his Papyrus, he was so easy to get riled up. So desperate to get his own way, except that unlike the old Papyrus, he was not willing to use violence for it. Sans walked into the changing room, holding the blue hoodie of his parallel self in one hand and the new fur-lined jacket in the other. He'd already riled his new brother up a lot today, might as well take a break.

Besides, he was getting worried about his appearance in other ways.

There was a large mirror in the changing room; throwing both jacket and hoodie on the bench, Sans walked up to it and peered closely at himself reflected in the glass. He had a perfect memory of how the other version of himself appeared, that face memorized after many different looks through the viewer in his world. He also, for obvious reasons, had a perfect memory of how he was supposed to look. It was integral to the charade that the two appearances didn't mix, and more importantly that he never looked like himself again.

Pressing up against the mirror, Sans tapped his teeth with one bony finger and felt along the ridges of his skull. It had been a couple days since he arrived, not yet a week. But in the days that he had been here, he was already found out by a small child based on just his appearance. Granted, that was because they had seen who he really was through something outside of his control- and he definitely was never going to get his picture taken again- but it was still worrying. He would have to be more careful in the future.

His "normally" straight teeth were looking a little crooked that evening. It would need fixing before somebody noticed and commented on it, like some people were still commenting on his voice. Although his eyes still looked all right, they probably should also get fixed up while he was at it. Sans shook his head and dug into his pocket, taking out a little tin marked with a red "A." He pried open the lid and scooped out some of the white goop inside.

Alphys promised Sans that the material in the tin was self-regenerating, although just to be safe he used it sparingly when possible; if he couldn't mask himself permanently, it wouldn't matter how hard he tried to fit in while in this world. With a little of it on his fingertips, he pressed the substance up to his mouth and molded, grimacing at the taste. Soon enough it looked acceptable to him, the magic substance vanishing from sight as it created the illusion around his teeth. He did the same to his eyes, and even molded it around his fingertips for good measure. Although no matter what he did, it wouldn't fool the kid anymore.

With some amusement, he thought back to to when he first applied this thing to his face, remembering how strange it felt. There was also when he applied it to his parallel self too, surprised even the gold of this tooth was preserved in the illusion. Alphys had done a very good job; not that he was surprised by that, having given her good enough motivation.

If his illusion was in need of touch-ups after this amount of time, then the same must be true of his other self. It wasn't like Sans was going to actually give him any of this to maintain it. It was too sparse and precious for that, self regenerating or not. Maybe people had already seen through the mask he wore, regardless.

Not his problem anymore.

After fixing his mug to look more like somebody else's, and after sliding on the new coat, Sans had a bizarre moment where he couldn't recognize the person in the mirror. Sure, he was short and stocky like him, but he was very obviously not this dude. Whoever this reflection was, he looked a lot nicer than the person standing here in the real world. A lot more relaxed, a lot more in control- or, at least, not sweating all over about his own lack of control. Someone who had multiple jobs, and didn't steal and swindle money out of his fellow monsters to make ends meet- he was still figuring out all the jobs that this Sans had. Luckily a lot of them were odd, and irregular, which made it easier to take them on slowly without arousing suspicion.

Wearing the blue hoodie might have also caused this bizarre feeling in him. But in addition to the unfamiliar appearance of the coat there was the fact that, back in his world, he wouldn't be able to buy that coat at all.

Sans blinked multiple times and took a step back. It unsettled him, but not in the usual way. Rather, he liked to be this unsettled. It was almost nice, that he didn't feel like himself today.

When he finally came out of the changing room, Papyrus was ready to go. He had an armful of dorky clothes, including one with sunglasses on the sleeves, that he insisted were proper date clothes; years of being smacked for joking about the boss's clothing choices were all that kept him from commenting, although he had the huge grin on his face as usual while going through the checkout, watching each article of clothing be scanned.

When they got outside, it was pretty dark; Sans didn't think that they had taken very long in there, but then it had been sunset when they went into the shop.

Today with this new Papyrus was a busy one, without much time during the sunlight hours to buy clothes. Sadly that meant there also wasn't a lot of time to search for his other self's shed key, which he couldn't find in any of the crannies in their house anyway. He'd have to search during the night again. He was actually starting to get tired at this rate. He wanted to ask new Papyrus about it except for the fact that he didn't know if this one was aware of the shed. There was no way in hell that he would tell his own about it, after all.

Walking side by side with his not brother, who happily carried all the groceries, Sans sighed.

"SANS? WHAT'S WRONG?"

He forgot that a sigh couldn't go unnoticed here. He smirked, "oh. i got a new job at a soda recycling factory."

"-!"

The big googly eyes on the poor sap's face made Sans realize that he had heard this one before, and his smile turned mean. "it's just soda pressing, y'know?"

"SANS."

"but then again, if I didn't have a job that would be a total bummer."

"IT'S ELEVEN O'CLOCK AT NIGHT, SANS."

"have we been out that late?" He paused, as if in thought. "uh oh, i think i eleven oven on."

Papyrus pressed their multiple shopping bags over his skull with a noise that sounded like "nYOOOO," and Sans couldn't help laughing. His reactions were pretty funny, especially when they didn't end in Sans getting hit upside the head. The mean smile still on his face, he half wondered what kind of reaction he would get if he told the other joke that was lying unsaid in his mind. I got fired by my bitch manager this morning, though. I'm apparently not allowed to press all the cans in that factory. It was too bad the topic switched so fast.

Well, he would think of another, and then he'd get to see those googly eyes again.

That was his plan, but then a drop of water hit his skull a block from his and Papyrus' house. It sprinkled the ground around them in a sudden light shower, one that, judging by the clouds, had been poised for days.

And then everything else fell out of his mind, leaving behind a sucking vacuum which drained the night's good mood away.

Sans wasn't an idiot. He knew where rain came from; he had read all about precipitation when he was a little bone, with nothing else to occupy his time in New Home but pranks and human books. That was a long time ago, but it was there somewhere, in the back of his patchy memory of his youth. Water was warmed by the sun to create clouds. Those same clouds, when they got too heavy or cool, turned back to water and started the cycle over again. It was natural on the surface. He knew that.

But at that moment, suddenly, he didn't know that. Suddenly, with those drops of water falling around him, he was back underground. In Waterfall. In the "rain tunnel." Or even under a cascade of water, with how quick the rain was starting to pick up. He wasn't on the surface. He was back in the caverns. Where was the water coming from, if not from some underground river flowing over rocks and dripping through cracks? How was it falling all around them, if not from a ceiling?

Growing soaked in his hoodie, and with Papyrus next to him, Sans made a shuddering gasp. "uh... h..."

"SANS?" The loud voice next to him only made it worse. There wasn't enough air. Unable to breathe deep enough, his chest hurt and he made another gasp, this one even larger than the first. "SANS ARE YOU... OKAY?"

"get off my back," he said in a rasp. Why- why, after eons of being so careful, why had he suddenly picked today to start having one of these attacks in front of the boss?

Despite his deep and rapid breathing, that perpetual uppercaser didn't get the point and put a hand on his shoulder. Sans pulled away quickly, huffing, eyes wide and struggling to take in the truth past the imaginings of his hysterical mind. He and Papyrus were standing in the rain tunnel back home. Everything that he had accomplished over the last few days was gone, erased, reset.

Reset.

"B-BROTHER?"

There was a strange look on his brother's face that he didn't remember ever seeing before. Papyrus could not be concerned for him, so he must be mad at him instead. Was he going to get beaten and left in all this smelly water? Sans took a step back. Why? Why? Why? Why did they reset? Except, he'd never remembered the resets before. They were only a theory. A terrifying theory that sucked. If he remembered this time, was that because-

Papyrus was approaching him. Sans couldn't breathe fast enough, nor hard enough. He felt woozy now. Was he dying? "SANS, YOU'RE KIND OF FREAKING ME OUT?.?"

No, this- this was not a reset. This was not a reset. This was not Papyrus. Not his. The clothes were completely different! The face was different! So why couldn't he keep from hyperventilating? Stop it, stop it.

"PLEASE SAY SOMETHING-!"

get off my fucking back get off leave me alone leave me alone- If he attacked Papyrus, he'd be attacked back. Attacking anybody meant- meant he'd be attacked back. He wasn't even safe to defend himself. It was crossing a line that he desperately wish to cross and yet knew he never could. And so the magic had always stayed right beyond his reach while his SOUL trembled, fearing the reset, fearing the beating, fearing death and endless cyclings of it. That had been the case every other time. But this time Sans' mind and SOUL were made to process multiple things in quick succession.

The first thing was that this, that this Papyrus wasn't going to attack him. He was too nice.

No one is going to kill me.

And with that, something snapped back into his SOUL's reach.

But then after those two things came the realization that had already been brewing on the edges of his panic. That was the realization of what an idiot he was being. it's surface rain you jackass. There was no need to panic, nothing had reset. But by the time that realization came to the forefront of his consciousness, it was already too late.

He already threw his magic, rising willingly for the first time within him, at the new "boss" who was approaching him. "G e t  b a c k."

Papyrus shrieked as a wave of spiked bones flew at him, and Sans stood frozen while they drove into the other skeleton, dealing all just 1 point of damage and yet so many of them flying out at once. Before he could be ripped to pieces by the sudden swarm of attacks, Papyrus summoned his own wall of bones and blocked the rest of them. Sans didn't send any more; now he was hyperventilating for a whole new reason, taking several steps back from his not-brother.

"Sans, Papyrus are you guys okay?!" A little monster without any arms ran across the street towards them.

Sans was breathing too hard, and now with all the rainfall shivering too hard, to respond. He looked over at Papyrus. His not-brother's eyes were almost bugging out of his skull, checking himself over for cracks. Not too many attacks got through; what injury Sans had just done could be healed quickly enough. But the way he was looking at Sans...

He should run. He could hide in the woods and live in the woods for the rest of his life.

"S-SANS- WHY DID YOU DO THAT? THAT WAS SERIOUSLY SCARY- SANS?" Papyrus tried to approach again, and automatically Sans backed up with another wheeze. "WH-WHAT DID I DO-"

"Should I call someone?" The monster child asked.

At that, Sans struggled to speak, "n-no..." no more witnesses to his idiocy, please. "i... i...'m... sorry..."

"YOU LOOK REALLY HORRIBLE, I THINK WE SHOULD CALL ALPHYS!"

"Well actually-"

"no," Sans wheezed, desperately. "just... just... give me a minute." He looked up at Papyrus, pupils contracted when he saw the crack on his not-brother's skull. "uh-hh, you alright?"

Papyrus raised a hand to his skull, wincing before quickly covering with a smile, "OH!.! YES! OF COURSE! I'M ALRIGHT! UH, IT WOULD TAKE MORE THAN THAT TO HURT THE GREAT PAPYRUS! UH, ALTHOUGH, I DON'T KNOW WHY YOU'D WANT TO-"

Oh god did he suspect was he going to hit him was this actually passive aggression? "i don't- i- i mean- was just an accident-. sorry bo- bro-."

"IT... " Trying to keep the obvious fake cheeriness on his face, Papyrus rubbed his skull and nodded. "IT'S NOTHING. LIKE I SAID, I'M ALRIGHT! I GUESS I CAN UNDERSTAND BEING STARTLED? BY THE RAIN?... ? ... I MEAN, IT'S NOT SOMETHING WE HAD UNDERGROUND SO..."

He nodded eagerly, maybe a little too eagerly, "yeah, yeah, i... i think i'm still on edge cause of... uhh.. being sick."

"RIGHT!" Papyrus latched onto that too, and yet for Sans there was not even the barest minimum of relief to know that he was buying this. He just felt unsettled, a very bad kind of unsettled. "WE SHOULD GET OUT OF THIS RAIN THEN... AND ALSO OUR CLOTHES ARE SOAKED."

That meant that new his coat was soaked too. "...aw shit," Sans said, and then he remembered that there was a kid staring at both of them. "...whaddyou want?"

"Oh! Uh! I just wanted to make sure that you guys were okay!" The monster kid said with a nervous cough. "But, um, I have to meet somebody in an hour so I think I should get going- back home- right?" He looked up, over at Papyrus with large eyes. "You'll be okay right?"

Evidently they knew each other. Papyrus waved off his concern, "OF COURSE! A LITTLE HEALING WILL FIX THIS IN NO TIME."

"C-cool!" The kid gave another glance over at Sans, a squinting one that made him uneasy all over again, and then scrambled off. He tripped once and fell without any arms to support himself, and Sans struggled not to laugh in front of Papyrus. It was only a brief respite from his screaming nerves, anyway.

In front of him, Papyrus was wringing his hands despite still weakly propping up that cheery, everything-is-fine expression. "S-SANS...? INSIDE...?"

Sans was no longer looking at him. This was too much. Trying to keep up the act was too much. Too much, with the rain still pouring and the magic inside him still swirling, disturbed for the first time in a long time-

What could he do? Go to Toriel? No, that twerp was right before, he was far too unpracticed to pull it off around her for too long, and right now he was-

Ah, well.

That twerp.

It's not ideal, Sans thinks. But with Papyrus, an injured Papyrus staring at him with such utterly alien concern on his face, sure to become suspicion any moment, he didn't care. He didn't even know where the fucking Grillby'z was here.

"look, i-" another deep breath, smile worn, "i gotta go. you, uh, go inside and dry off, okay?"

"BUT-" he didn't mean to, but something changed in his expression when he heard that voice speak up again. god dammit, my papyrus isn't this nosy, he couldn't stop himself from thinking. He smoothed it over, but he wasn't sure if it had gone unnoticed. Papyrus only said, "WELL... DON'T BE TOO LONG! PLEASE DON'T GET EVEN MORE SICK!"

"i," he had to go. He had to go now. Before he started hyperventilating again, "yeah, uh, i won't. ...see ya, bro."

It was all Sans could do to wait until he was out of sight before he took a shortcut. He didn't even see Papyrus shudder all over when he was gone, the fake cheer dropping entirely from his face.

The rain tapping on the windowsill, louder than it was last week, broke Frisk out of her mindless study of the silver key in her hands.

With dark and worried thoughts, she had been trying to stay awake and at the same time terrified to do anything to wake Toriel up. Thumbing through her keys- ones that she mercifully hadn't had on her keychain at the time that Red Sans crushed her phone- the girl was just waiting for when her clock would turn to 12, and then she could watch for Leo at the window. The secret she had in her chest was already making her ready to burst, and it had just been one day.

Toriel thought her quietness at dinner was being sullen over her grounding. "You have to learn not to do such dangerous things," she'd said. "I know you've spent a long while on your own, but this isn't Mt. Ebott, and you're a growing child. You have to be safe, now."

Frisk didn't even understand what that meant; no one had ever grounded her or worried about her before Toriel. But even talking about it was too much to risk when all she really wanted to say was it wasn't her fault at all so stop being mad at me please. She'd silently picked apart her dinner and went to bed; being grounded killed a bit of her appetite for drawing her pictures. She no longer had any of the photos of the monsters she had yet to draw anyway.

In her room she listened to music and read a book, then did her homework until Toriel said it was time to sleep.

She pretended to go to sleep. And now here she was, looking at the clock every few minutes.

Still had an hour left, unfortunately.

The key presented its own puzzle to her bored mind. She had already used it once, to see into Sans' shed. What she found there confused her more than anything else about him, made her wonder if there really was a "truth" for her to discover after all, and if she had missed it. The machine, the blueprints, the picture, all of it seemed to be from a part of his life utterly separate from what she knew about him.

Frisk half-wondered if it was because of that shed, or at least its contents, that he was gone from her now. Maybe it was responsible for the Red Sans' existence, or... it could be the key to finding the real one again, at least. She lay on her back and moved her legs through the air as yet another distraction; if possible, while sneaking out she could check the shed with the key, that is if Sans hadn't replaced the locks yet.

When she told him she'd swiped his key, he called her rude and said he would do just that. But this was Sans; it took him forever to do anything.

11:05. Frisk sighed.

There was a "knock-knock" on the door.

"Uh?" The girl slid her legs off the bed and popped back onto her feet, cocking her head. "Tori?"

And then came a voice that jumpstarted her body like electricity, starting Frisk running towards her bedroom door. "... no, you say 'who's there?'."

"Red Sans-"

He was staring at her, body shuddering as he smiled, on the other side of the doorway. Frisk just had the presence of mind to shove the shed key in her pajama pocket before she was in his full range of sight. "hiya," he said. "the fuck did you just call me?"

"Uh- oh, uh- I said Sans." She took a step back, frowning. "Why are you in my room?"

He looked a bit like how he did when he was first exposed for who he really was. Heavy breathing and sweaty; Frisk felt her gut turn. "uh, well. just needed a spot to, uh, be more like... well, not really that, but," a deep breath, "i mean, did you wanna hear a joke?"

A joke? Her gut told her no. Frisk shook her head.

"aw c'mon, it's funnier than the other one," he said, giving her what looked to be the friendliest smile he could manage. "the other one was what i like to call an anti-joke. this is not an anti-joke."

Clutching her pajamas, Frisk nodded.

His smile got bigger, and he stepped closer. "great. okay, what do you call a human on your doorstep with their arms and legs cut off?"

She squeaked.

"a mat."

"... ..."

Again, he burst out in uproarious laughter while Frisk closed the door in a panic. "ahahahahahahahahaha!"

"Stop!" She begged as he continued laughing, "You're going to wake Toriel up!"

Still giggling, Sans shook his head, "your face, though. that's never gonna get old."

Frisk folded her arms, "Why are you here?"

"i just need a minute," he said. Frisk glanced towards her clock and fidgeted, and he followed her gaze. "yeah, i'm sure little brats like you need sleep. i just need a minute."

"A minute for what?"

Even though it looked to her like his teeth were always gritted, this time it sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth, too, "just. a minute. you can give me that much, can't you?"

She wasn't the Lord of Time, but whatever. Frisk climbed back onto her bed and sat, feet kicking slowly over the edge. As long as a minute didn't translate to 55 minutes. "Okay."

"thank you." Red Sans stayed quiet for a while, just breathing until she couldn't hear him do that anymore. His skeletal body was slowly shuddering, as well, creating a faint rattling noise that persisted for a while longer. It hadn't really stopped when he spoke up, "hey, hypothetical question."

"Uh?"

He shifted. "did your sans and papyrus get into fights a lot? and, uh, if they did what would they do afterwards?"

Frisk had to take a moment after her stomach seized up, feeling cold at the thought that this wasn't a random at all, and he had just fought with Papyrus. "Th-they don't- they don't really fight. I guess they- they argue, sometimes, but they're usually- usually okay after a while. They don't hurt each other."

Again, he shifted. "huh. what if either of them did by accident?"

"Did you hurt Papy-"

"no. fuck." He snorted, his golden tooth glinting. "it's a hypothetical situation. don't you know what hypothetical means?"

Frisk curled up on the bed. "I don't, actually."

"-oh. well look it up," the skeleton monster snarled. "Jesus."

After a few seconds of thought, the dictionary too far away, Frisk pulled her knees up to her mouth and mumbled through them, "I think that Sans would make extra sure that Papyrus is okay."

Red Sans took a deep breath. "i bet he would. gotta remember that for next time."

Next time?

She wasn't exactly feeling great to begin with, all things considered, but the change in her body and mood was instantaneous. Every hair on Frisk's neck stood on end, and she crossed her arms over her stomach as it turned over, the skin on her face tingling.

She had to do something. Papyrus was in trouble.

She looked back at the clock and bit the inside of her cheek.

Red Sans is ignoring you.

It was true, he wasn't looking at her anymore; Frisk cleared her throat. "Did you want to go up to Mt. Ebott with me sometime?"

Now Red Sans blinked at her, genuinely surprised. "huh?"

She couldn't believe that he was making her have to repeat it; it was hard enough the first time. But with a burning stomach, Frisk said, "I thought we could go up to Mt. Ebott again sometime soon, just us two. Since you can teleport and everything, I wouldn't have to take the bus up to it. It's really- um, really pretty in the summer."

Not to mention the fact that inside the mountain it was possible to SAVE.

In front of her she heard an um?, and Red Sans' smile had been almost startled off his face. "... you asking me on some kind of date, twerp?"

Well, despite the fact that the phrase "you ask Red Sans out on a date" did enter her mind, she wouldn't have called it a date herself. More like an outing, if anything, since none of her dates with monsters have ever gone well. But holding her hands together, she nodded.

Clearly that wasn't the answer he was expecting; maybe he'd been expecting flustered denial or sarcasm. Whatever it was, Red Sans just blinked again at what he got instead. He even edged back a bit, eyeing her warily before breaking out into an incredulous smile. "... hah! you're not serious."

Frisk nodded, pressing her mouth into a straight line. Trying to communicate without words that she was very serious.

"... ... uh." He searched her expression for a second, but this was one thing Frisk could hide from his scary mind reading powers. "... what's the trick here?"

She hoped that he couldn't tell how much she sincerely did not want to hang out with him under normal circumstances. "No trick," she whispered. "If I can't see my Sans again, I might as well get to know you better... right?"

"i'm not an idiot, pipsqueak," he said, and the girl froze. Then, like the old Sans, he lazily winked at her. "but i don't mind the offer. i'm pretty sure you're way too young for me, but hey, you're cute in a human kind of way. but maybe we should wait until you're... not grounded anymore?"

Frisk squinted at Red Sans and he laughed again.

"-I hope it's soon," she said. And then gave in to anxiety about the clock, as he shrugged, "... But yeah speaking of being grounded, I don't think Toriel wants me to have company over either. And I think it's been more than a minute."

"aw, look at you kicking me out so fast. you're just like that other..." His voice cut off and he sweat a little, again. His pupils moved off to the side, as Frisk snapped to attention. Then he uttered, "... hey, nevermind. i'll see you soon, twerp."

Good, get out of here before Leo comes. Frisk forced a smile as he waved a hand at him, pulling her feet in off the side of the bed. "'Bye."

Red Sans gave a little crescent wave at her and then paused, "oh, before i go, do you know where grillby's bar is?"

Frisk just stopped herself from saying, "Do you know where the real Sans is?" Frisk bit her tongue instead, and shook her head. She knew how to walk to it, but had no idea the street number or how to give directions to an outsider.

"welp, thanks for nothing." Red Sans said as he disappeared with a flash.

And all alone, giving another look at the clock, Frisk let out a huge sigh of relief.

Not much longer before midnight.

Next Chapter: Midnight Meeting of the Sans Rescue Team

Chapter Text

When the number on her clock turned to 12, Frisk heard something hit her window aside from rain. "Ah!"

That was quick; she hadn't moved from her spot since Red Sans left, which wasn't too long ago. She was too busy trembling and feeling cold to do anything but sit there, half finished thoughts and possibilities running through her young mind. When the smack came from her window, she almost jumped a mile and climbed quickly off the bed, which would have been the primary target of anything trying to burst into her room.

She trembled beside her bed for three seconds before she realized both the time and what it meant. She climbed back on her bed and crawled to the window, peering out at the drizzle outside that was soaking the buttercups underneath her windowsill. "Leo?" She was surprised. That was really quick.

She was also surprised because it wasn't just Leo waiting there, spitting out the other rock that he had picked up in his mouth. Frisk squinted down at the two figures standing in the rain together.

"Papyrus?" Papyrus was holding an umbrella over Leo's head, although he and his "battle body" were still getting soaked- her view was too fuzzy right now to tell if he wore any injuries. Regardless of the rain, regardless of anything Red Sans might have done before he came to visit her, they were both staring at her window. She didn't think that they could hear her, but all the same she said to them, pointing outside her bedroom, "I'll be right down."

It being so wet out she changed out of her night clothes into her normal sweater, shirt, and pants, having no desire to get Toriel even more upset by finding her in wet pajamas. After an inordinately long time of creeping downstairs and avoiding the squeaky floorboards, Frisk laced up a big pair of rain boots and pulled on a yellow raincoat, fumbling with the zipper for a bit before giving up. The loudest noise that she made, unfortunately, was the door squealing open as she stepped down to the rain. But she wasn't going to wait around to see if it woke up her adoptive mother; already, she was racing to the side of the house. "Papyrus! Leo!"

Leo jumped up and down as she approached. "Yoooo Frisk! Sorry about all this rain, it makes sneaking out a little harder." She tried to say that it was all right, he moved back and forth on his feet a little guiltily. "I was actually going to call it off for tonight, and suggest that we do it tomorrow, but..."

As he trailed off, Frisk looked over at Papyrus. His eyes looked big and somewhat watery, despite the fact that his eyes were just sockets; if he wasn't holding the umbrella up for Leo, he might've been wringing his hands instead. There were no injuries that she could see, but her heart was still in her mouth when their gazes met. Startled, Papyrus smiled at her, another sweaty skeleton. "HI FRISK! I HEARD FROM LEO THAT YOU WERE SNEAKING OUT! NORMALLY I WOULDN'T APPROVE SINCE YOU WERE GROUNDED, BUT-"

Frisk glanced back at the house, starting to stutter that maybe he shouldn't talk so loudly when Leo intervened, "Great Papyrus! One of the rules of sneaking out is that you have to wait until you're far from your house before you start talking to anybody!"

"OH! RIGHT! MY BAD!" Papyrus made a motion like zipping his teeth, and Frisk smiled back at him. Then he said, in just as loud a voice as before, "TO THE DUMP!"

After the two children were done flinching- and there was no sign of an angry Toriel bursting out of the house- the three of them moved through the rain, down a street of New New Home that was becoming filled with puddles. There was some kind of awkward tension between herself and the other two that Frisk couldn't describe, as if Leo and Papyrus were just waiting for her to speak first and give them a chance. It was never fun to be the conversation starter. Still, her conversation with Red Sans was stuck in her head, so she cleared her throat. "Um.. m... How come you decided to tag along, Papyrus?"

"WELL... I WANTED TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT-" Rarely had she seen him stutter this much. "ABOUT SANS, AND I FIGURED THIS SHOULDN'T WAIT IF YOU'RE ALREADY GOING TO TALK WITH ALPHYS."

"Do you think Alphys will even be there?" Leo mused. "I mean, she probably doesn't want to get soaked too."

"She'll be there." Frisk said. But then she looked back to Papyrus. "What about Sans?" She asked softly.

Papyrus suddenly looked frustrated, shaking his head. He came to a stop, and the two children came to a stop with him. "OH, IT'S STUPID! I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON EXACTLY!" He sighed, "BUT SANS... ISN'T BEING HIMSELF AT ALL."

"... it's not stupid," Frisk said.

"NYEH, BUT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!" Apparently needing full use of both of his hands, Papyrus handed off the umbrella off to Frisk to shelter Leo with, while he was trying to communicate what he meant, exactly, with helpless gestures. "AT FIRST I JUST THOUGHT IT WAS BECAUSE HE WAS SICK, AND THEN I THOUGHT THAT THIS WAS ACTUALLY A GOOD THING?.? BECAUSE HE'S BEEN DOING MORE STUFF WITH ME AND HE'S BEEN GETTING OUT MORE AND SHOWING INTEREST IN THINGS HE HASN'T LOOKED AT IN A LONG LONG TIME," Frisk and Leo exchanged looks while he talked, Leo's face confused and Frisk's grim. "EVEN IF HE'S... KIND OF WEIRD ABOUT IT. LIKE, REALLY WEIRD ABOUT IT. IT'S STILL FINE!.!.! AS LONG AS HE'S GETTING OUT AND DOING THINGS!

"BUT TODAY- I MEAN TONIGHT, HE..."

Frisk felt as if her heart might stop.

"I KNOW SANS WOULD NEVER HURT ME, NO MATTER WHAT! ... BUT, HE DID NOW."

She jumped forward, "D-did he hit you?"

Leo jumped forward too, eyes blazing, "Oh my gosh, is that what happened!? I thought I saw him use some magic!"

Papyrus shivered and tried to smile again, as if suddenly remembering that there were two kids here who looked up to him. "-WELL IT WAS NOT ON PURPOSE, HEH-HEH-NYEH! IT WAS NOTHING TO SOMEONE AS COOL AS ME, THE GREAT PAPYRUS! BESIDES, HIS ATTACKS ONLY DEAL ONE DAMAGE ANYWAY."

"But he hit you?!"

"WELL, YES, AND I DON'T UNDERSTAND BECAUSE SANS WOULDN'T EVER DO THAT. IT WAS LIKE I WAS... UM..." His veneer of cheer slid off again and he wasn't looking at them. "I DON'T KNOW WHAT IT WAS LIKE! BUT HE..."

Between Leo's outrage and Papyrus' uncharacteristic stammering, Frisk couldn't hold it in anymore. In case he was watching her somehow through the rain, although in her opinion the secrecy ship had already sailed, her voice ended up being a loud hiss, "That's not Sans!"

Papyrus froze. "...EH?"

She took a step back, now that the two of them were staring at her, Papyrus' eyes going googly. She took a look around. There was no one on the street with them, most of the monsters taking shelter from the weather. "... That's what I needed to talk to Alphys about. He isn't the real Sans."

"NOT THE REAL SANS?" Papyrus scratched his head. "THEN... WHAT KIND OF SANS IS HE?"

That wasn't the easiest question to answer. She still had no idea where he came from or how, or even when it was that he switched places with the real Sans. "A much pointier one. I don't know where he came from, but he says that he's here to stay. He's really scary."

"WOWIE..." Papyrus let out a breath, putting his hands over his head. "HE MUST BE A MASTER OF DISGUISE, TO HAVE FOOLED ME SO COMPLETELY...!"

Frisk lowered her head. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner. I only found out yesterday..."

The response was immediate, not weighed down by anything that was going on around them, "IT'S ALRIGHT HUMAN! I KNOW YOU MUST HAVE BEEN SCARED, KNOWING THIS ALL ALONE..."

"Uh."

"BUT YOU KNOW, THIS DOES EXPLAIN A FEW THINGS," Papyrus mused. "I'VE ALSO FELT LIKE SANS HAS BEEN VERY FORGETFUL LATELY. BUT IF HE'S NOT THE SAME PERSON, NATURALLY HE-" His jaw dropped. "WAIT, IF HE'S HERE, WHERE'S MY BROTHER THEN?!"

"Uh." As Papyrus and Leo stared, Frisk looked around the rainy street and backed up, trying to find the junkyard in the drizzle. "I... ..." No images or locations were coming to mind. And what was worse, wherever he was, he had been there for a very long time at this point. Days, in fact. Longer than she would've expected him to be gone, if he was still...

With two friends still looking at her, she turned around and started to walk. "We shouldn't keep Alphys waiting, okay?"

"Oh!"

"AH, RIGHT!" In the rain it was harder to see how Papyrus faltered. But then in the next moment he went racing after Frisk, picking Leo up off the ground when he tripped on a crack.

Alphys was indeed already waiting for them among mounds of trash, huddled under an umbrella in her pajamas and a raincoat, rubbing her eyes. She didn't see the three of them at first, too occupied with her own yawns and shivers, but the splashing caught her attention when Frisk entered the gates of the dump. Papyrus' splashes were even louder when he came in behind her. "Oh! Y-y-you guys!" She straightened right up, "I... I didn't expect you to be coming w-with other people... Hi P-Papyrus!"

"DR. ALPHYS!" Papyrus set Leo down next to himself as he skidded to a stop in the wet gravel of the dump, splashing Frisk's shoes. "WE'RE ALL VERY WORRIED!"

"W-w-what? Worried about w-what?" She looked up at them, blinking through the rain with blanched scales.

With a nod Frisk stepped to the side, allowing her more vocal skeleton friend to take the stage. Handing the umbrella off to her, he clenched his hands into fists and cried, "FRISK SAYS THAT SANS HAS BEEN REPLACED WITH A POINTIER SANS! AND HE DOESN'T ACT LIKE MY BROTHER AT ALL, WHICH MAKES THIS A PROBLEM. EVEN IF SOME OF IT IS ACTUALLY NOT A PROBLEM SINCE- WELL! IT IS STILL PROBLEMATIC!"

If there were any traces of sleepiness on Alphys' face, then it was startled right off of her with those words. She trembled under the umbrella. "W-what?" And then she looked over at Frisk, "Th-this explains -w-well- i-i-is this true?"

Taking another look around the junkyard the child nodded, fiddling with her index fingers. She was startled when Alphys jumped forward with large eyes, grasping her hands. The cold stick of the umbrella pressed into the space between Frisk's thumb and index finger. "P-p-please, t-tell me everything!"

Swallowing, Frisk nodded and began to speak.

Alphys sat back on a broken fridge as she processed the information given her; the next moment she squealed when her pajama bottoms became soaked in gathered rain water. Cheeks burning, she looked to Frisk and the others, who were all silent. "... W-well, I guess it's- uh. It's not yo-y-you're usual problem."

"So you mean Sans is from another world entirely?" Leo jumped in, eyes like saucers. "Like an alien?"

"No," raising her voice Frisk glared at him, and he shrunk back. "Not like an alien. He's not an alien."

Papyrus raised a gloved hand to his jawline, eyes shifting left in thought. "MAYBE ME AND SANS SECRETLY HAVE ANOTHER COUSIN, ONE WHO LOOKS LIKE HIM, AND HE CAME TO VISIT!"

"Another cousin?"

As Papyrus started to reply, Alphys spoke up loudly, "W-w-well, wherever he came from, isn't the more important question what he did with our f-f-friend?" She pushed up her glasses, which were getting slick and sliding down on her snout. "W-we can't just let him walk around pretending to be Sans!"

"Yo, we should tell Undyne about him! I bet that she'll know what to do!" Leo suggested, recovering from Frisk's dark look, "I bet that she would punch him right in the face! And this time it will be somebody who actually deserves it!"

"P-p-perhaps it would be better to have somebody take him into custody," Alphys murmured quietly. "In case he does more harm..."

Leo was enthusiastically agreeing beside her. Frisk, on the other hand, rubbed her arm and didn't say anything, thinking back to her encounters with Red Sans so far. His sharp claws and teeth, his constant wheezing, and now his attacking Papyrus with magic. As she thought about it, she subconsciously raised her hands to her face and shivered; in her chest, her heart had started beating harder. Telling Undyne about all of this was definitely going to mess up her plan. And the real Sans... She should say something.

She could say either "let's do that," or she could say "let's not," but she was already leaning the hardest towards the latter.

Yet Papyrus, who had been standing so quietly next to her, was the one to say it first, "I DON'T THINK WE SHOULD DO THAT RIGHT NOW. IT SOUNDS RISKY TO ME."

As Frisk nodded, Alphys adjusted her glasses and squeaked at the two of them, "W-what are you talking about? I-I think if anyone could handle this g-guy, it would be Undyne."

"BUT, BUT-" Papyrus sputtered, shaking his hands at her, "EVEN IF HE'S MEANER AND POINTIER THAN MY BROTHER, HE'S STILL A SANS! IF UNDYNE GETS INVOLVED, HE COULD GET SERIOUSLY HURT!"

"And then he'll never tell us where the real one is," Frisk added in a low voice.

"YES, THAT TOO!"

"Th-then," Alphys looked down at her feet, "We should tell Asgore. O-or someone like that. ... U-uh, you don't like that idea either, F-frisk?" The child was playing with the locket around her neck, frowning deeply. "W-what do you think we should do... a-about him?"

You try to think of a solution, but none come.

Frisk tried to speak, and a croak came out of her mouth.

But Papyrus picked it up for himself, "I THINK THE ANSWER IS OBVIOUS! THIS PERSON MUST BE UNHAPPY AND THAT'S WHY HE'S HERE! RATHER THAN ARRESTING HIM, WE SHOULD MAKE FRIENDS WITH HIM! IT WOULD BE A CINCH FOR ME!"

This did nothing for Frisk's hands on her face, and she pinched her own cheeks. "U-um..."

"YES! I'M CONFIDENT THAT I CAN GET HIM TO TELL ME WHERE HE PUT MY BROTHER!"

Leo blinked and then jumped, "Yeah! The Great Papyrus befriends everyone!"

Alphys was sweating, and Frisk had left light red marks on her cheeks after she pulled her hands down to her locket. "But-" Another quick glance; it was just them for now. Even the dummies minded their own business. "He'll get mad if he knows you know."

"DON'T WORRY ABOUT THAT, FRISK! I'LL BE SURE TO DEFUSE THE SITUATION!"

"Will you?" Frisk looked up at him with dark eyes, almost hidden in her wet mop of hair.

Almost immediately she regretted it; for the barest of seconds, Papyrus hesitated and his confident grin wavered. "WELL..." His eyes shifted to the right, and he seemed to go somewhere far away. It only lasted for a short time. Just enough that she wouldn't have noticed if she wasn't looking right at him. Papyrus' usual cheery expression bounced right back. "... YES!"

"Could you wait..? For a while?"

"EH? WHY?"

"Because..." As she tried to speak again, Frisk's voice trailed, and she tried to communicate instead with her face.

Papyrus, unlike his brother, wasn't so quick to pick up on it. He just looked at her in confusion before petting the child on the head. "WELL! I DON'T KNOW WHY, BUT IF IT'S IMPORTANT TO YOU I'LL HUMOR YOUR STRANGE REQUEST! IN THE MEANTIME, I'LL TRY NOT TO TIP HIM OFF. HMMM..." Papyrus shook his head, again rubbing his jawline. "IT WILL BE HARD TO LIE SO BRAZENLY, BUT I KNOW I THE GREAT PAPYRUS WILL MANAGE IT!"

"Aww, so we aren't telling anybody?" Leo whined.

Before Frisk could worry about trying to explain the sick feeling in her gut, Alphys mercifully cut in. "F-frisk is right," she stammered, and Frisk sighed in relief. "The situation is t-too d-delicate right now. We, uh, we need to- to find out where this person came from a-and why, an-and... st-stuff like that?" Leo, Papyrus, and Frisk were all nodding at each other with their own levels of reluctance, while in the meantime Alphys muttered in a lower and lower voice, hands clutching her own snout, "OhmygodthisisjustlikethatepisodeofOtsukisamaDimensionalHallwhereAkira'smirrorcametolifeandturnedhimintoanevildoubleandhetriedtostealthecrownrightfromAdelaide's-"

"Alphys?"

Frisk had approached her slowly while she muttered. Opening her eyes wider as if she had just realized that the child was right in front of her, Alphys let out a loud squeak. "Wah!"

Unbothered by the sound, Frisk just blinked at her. She cleared her throat and dug a hand into her pocket as she quietly spoke, "I... think that maybe this may be involved, too." Her hands clenched into a fist, she held it out for the pajama-clad scientist.

Alphys held out a hand to accept the object, which turned out to be the small silver key. "Y-you want me to take it? What's t-this?"

"It's they key to Sans' secret room in the shed," Frisk said, and tried to ignore Papyrus exclaiming "SANS HAS A SECRET ROOM IN THE SHED?" behind her. She rubbed her nose instead and continued, "There's a lot in there I don't understand. Maybe it will help?"

With a decisive nod, Alphys pocketed the key in her pajamas. "I-I-I'll check it out."

"What do I get to do?!" Leo asked, hopping up and down in the water beside them.

Frisk turned her head to him and stammered, "Uuh. Well I'm still grounded." She hesitated, putting her hands in her pockets, and grimaced. "I also don't have a phone, so..."

"Yooo! I can help you pass messages without a phone!"

For the first time that night, Frisk smiled at him. "Are you sure? Toriel might get mad at you."

"I'm not scared! It'll be like we're all secret agents!"

"Secret agents?" Without meaning to, Frisk grinned yet again, even larger. "We need secret code names then."

Papyrus' eyes filled with a sparkle unseen in eye sockets. "I CALL 'AWESOME SKELETON' FOR MY SECRET CODE NAME!"

"Then I want to be 'Awesome Monster'!" Leo yelped, bouncing up and down. "Can I be?"

"OF COURSE YOU CAN!"

Frisk didn't know if she could take "Awesome Kid" without looking like she was copying...

"G-g-guys," Alphys cut in. "Can we maybe discuss this when it isn't raining on us? Not th-that I have any problem staying up late, but..." She shivered, as if to illustrate her point without finishing. "Papyrus- err... Awesome Skeleton, er, um, please keep an eye on this new Sans."

"OF COURSE!"

"I-I'll look into where he might have come from. Frisk, s-since he's talking to you, keep us all updated on the n-new Sans too. Leo can help you out there?... ?" Frisk nodded, and Alphys exhaled slowly. "L-let's all go get some r-rest for now. IhaveafeelingIwon'tbesleepingtonight, butokay."

It's alright Alphys, Frisk thought as she scratched her nose, exiting the dump with three friends she was very grateful for. I probably won't sleep either.

Next Chapter: SAVE File

Chapter Text

Over wood docks, through caverns, down waterfalls, the pair traveled alone and quietly. It went a bit faster this time. There was only one more unexpected trap on the docks that dumped the child right into the water. A rooky mistake; she'd let her guard down now that there were no monsters attacking her anymore. But Blue Sans never even realized it was there, as she sidestepped it the second time. Frisk did stop in the dump to pick out a few candy bars, as bitter as they tasted, and then they waded out into the next room. A room branching into five others, with a dark little pool in the center.

It was there that she encountered a miracle, and Frisk urged Sans out of the room immediately with a series of violent shoves. "Get! Out! I! Have to! Do! Something!"

"geeze kid," Blue Sans said, and foreseeing a pun or a sarcastic remark of some kind she shoved him out entirely, before any more words could come from his mouth.

He didn't come back in, to his lazy credit. Frisk stayed near the entrance for several minutes, waiting to see if he'd reappear or at least stick his head in. But when she didn't see a trace of the skeleton poking through the darkness, she cracked her knuckles and stepped away, trudging back to the pool.

It was quiet here, and there were no other monsters around to trouble her. Not even Aaron and Shyren were hanging around today, to challenge her with their abysmal brawn and singing skills, respectively. For that she was grateful; listening to Blue Sans coughing every so often was making her own throat start to hurt. She'd take a drink from here if possible; before then, though, as she told Blue Sans there was something she needed to do first.

The black water here was so calm, bouncing off the light of the rocks on the ceiling. So calm, in fact, that Frisk could see her own face inside the shallow pool, without a single ripple to disturb it; her colorless reflection glared up at her once and then disappeared. Because, straightening up, she sat down by the edge and closed her eyes. Then the child clasped her hands together, taking deep breaths and relaxing every muscle in her arms, her legs, and her back. She drooped forward.

You feel a still dread wash over you.

And then, just as suddenly, every muscle in her body tensed; she summoned every ounce of courage she could muster, every ounce of desire, and poured it into her heart. It was hard, sometimes feeling like it was harder than others. But then Frisk's eyes snapped open, alight as if burning inside but without a fire in sight. They were, rather, reflecting the light of something sparkling over the water, directly in front of her face.

You are filled with determination.

The yellow light engulfed everything and returned to a dull point in an instant. Within that instant, Frisk felt this terrible world become lodged whole inside of herself like a stubborn, omniscient memory, one she couldn't inspect for herself.

Your game has been SAVED.

...You SAVED something else, too.

Frisk relaxed again and flopped on her stomach in front of the pool.

"You found one!" She looked left, where Flowey had popped up beside her.

The child stuck her tongue out at him, pushing herself back into a sitting position. "Yeah, no thanks to you again."

"Well, I guess they just show up in different spots for you," the flower replied in a tremulous voice. "Sorry about that..."

"Are they as scarce for you as they are for me?" Frisk half-turned where she sat towards the cave where she'd left Blue Sans. If she called for him now, Flowey might accidentally tell him everything. "Sometimes I feel like I can't find any."

"Oh," Flowey bobbed on his stalk, "I mean, I think I just have an easier time SAVING is all. After all," as he spoke he stuck out his tongue and winked, and Frisk squinted. "Not having a SOUL does wonders for your concentration."

"Doesn't seem to do wonders for anything else," Frisk grumbled, and Flowey's smile disappeared. She picked at a stray thread on her abused sweater. "... I'm sorry."

Flowey's gaze moved back and forth over the ground, and then he gave a little fanged smile, "You seem to be doing alright for the moment. You're almost at the River-person's post. There's a rock trap there, but I think you'll spot the tripwire from a mile away. With that new Sans you've got, it shouldn't be hard to convince them to give you a ride."

"Yeah." Frisk picked at her nails next.

"You should also buy some supplies from Gerson," Flowey continued, and afterwards disappeared into the dirt. Frisk waited patiently until he had returned, bearing a bag of GP. Frisk took it and put it with the rest of her things, nodding. "I'd say... lots of liquids."

Frisk buried her head in her arms, groaning aloud. "Ugh, I fucking hate Hotland."

She heard Flowey laugh, "Yeah, I'm not too fond of it either. Better do what you have to quick."

"Yeah." Frisk leaned back and looked again at the cave; Blue Sans still had yet to appear. "Thanks for the help, Flowey."

"Hehe! What would you do without me?"

"Don't be a little shit about it," Frisk said, standing, and the flower huffed as he disappeared. She walked to the cavern where she'd shoved Blue Sans, rubbing her eyes. "I'm done! Hey!" There was no reply, so she raised her voice, "Blue Sans!"

"yo."

Frisk suppressed a scream and turned around. Blue Sans smiled over at her from the pool. Her smothered scream became another yell, "You said you'd stop doing that!"

"sorry kiddo, you just make the funniest expressions," Blue Sans said with a helpless shrug, and Frisk snorted in disgust.

"Well." Frisk looked to the passageway on the top left side of the pool. "You better be more careful, retard. This is where Undyne lives."

That took a bit of the mirth out of Blue Sans, as he too glanced in that direction. "not a great person, huh?"

Frisk turned and walked in an opposite direction, to the right side passage. "She's a bitch too." There were a lot less tallies on Undyne than the likes of Papyrus, that much was true. But it certainly wasn't for lack of trying on Undyne's part. And it didn't mean that Frisk ever wanted to recreate their fight again. "Come on, she might show up."

"got it." Blue Sans spared just a look in the direction of the warrior's house and followed.

Gerson's shop wasn't far, either, set just a bit away from the neighborhood. Frisk stopped beside the entrance and counted up her GP, while Blue Sans raised his brows at the dark rocky entrance. "oh, great. we gonna see what this world's gerson looks like?"

Frisk didn't reply, satisfied that she had enough money for now. She gestured to Blue Sans and walked inside without another glance behind, down a short tunnel that was pitch black and empty of glowing rocks. Cracks in the ceiling and walls remained from a time when they had apparently all been removed. But the light returned only a short while later, as they stepped into a little room on the other side.

The glowing stones adorned the wall, filling it with a brilliantly sickening green and yellow light. Countless shelves of junk, food, thermoses, and fish lined those walls between the stones, bathed in their color, while below the shelves were piles of other objects that didn't fit. In the middle of the room a wizened, hairy and dark-colored turtle sat cleaning off a thermos that had gotten dusty, his dully sharp teeth poking out from under his cracked beak. He wore what Frisk incorrectly dubbed "an Indiana Jones" outfit, with a safari hat, shirt, and pants.

When he was done dusting off the thermos, he took out a magnifying glass and began to inspect it for cracks. His eyes were absorbed in his task, but he looked up when he heard Frisk clear her throat in front of him. For a brief second his gaze jumped to Blue Sans and he squinted, but then returned to the child.

Blue Sans' posture straightened beside her as Gerson stood, as if automatically, his eyesockets empty while he surveyed the old man. Frisk put a hand to her pan, as always, as said old man then approached. She could already hear his crackling laugh in her ears, "Weh heh heh! If it isn't the human with the suspicious ton of cash!" Then he faced Sans. "Didn't expect to see you here with 'em, though."

As Frisk silently held her ground, Blue Sans sputtered, "-what?"

"Normally you don't risk other people seeing ya with this kid," Gerson mused, scratching his beard. Up close, his eyes were red and bloodshot. "Is something going on?"

"-oh," Blue Sans looked at Frisk, who stared sullenly back. "you think i'm the other guy."

Gerson raised his magnifying glass and peered at Blue Sans with one eye bulging through it. "Eh? Now just what do ya mean by that?"

The pupils in Blue Sans' eyes moved, looking to Frisk for some kind of input. Spotting them, Frisk just shrugged and refused to comply. Her opinions on Gerson were mute; he had only one tally to his name, and had never added another. So it was unlikely he'd attack Blue Sans for learning the truth. But he better not be expecting her to tell it to the old turtle.

Eventually Blue Sans made a decision. "wrong sans, that's all. the one you're thinking of dropped me off here."

"Wahahahaha!" Gerson jumped back, roaring with laughter, and both Blue Sans and Frisk tensed as a result; Frisk drew her pan out completely, holding it at the ready like a sword. Although no attack was forthcoming; Gerson just wiped his face and blinked at them. "Well shoot, you look like the right Sans to me. Something does look different, though. Didja hit your head recently? You do look a little pale."

"It's a long story," Frisk grumbled.

At that, Gerson glared. "That's not a problem! I've told you lots of long and exciting stories. Did they fall out of your head, whippersnapper?"

"Look, I just want food and drinks," she snapped. "I'm not telling you anything, you old shit."

"You're terrible," Gerson said, waving his magnifying glass at the child. "Every time you've come in here you've learned nastier words." And then, with Blue Sans straightening his back again, he waved his glass at the skeleton too. "I'm sure that's your fault."

"not me, teaching is way too much work," Blue Sans protested, coughing.

"I don't see anyone else here, sonny," Gerson said, and then took a step back with more laughter. "Well, don't mind me. You here to take some of this trash of mine off my hands?"

Giving a dutiful nod, Frisk picked out her bag of GP and poured some into her hands, handing it up to the crackling turtle monster. "Eight crabapple teas and two crabapples."

"hey, i just learned the secret to why you're so crabby," Blue Sans said behind her, and she half-reached for her pan with a growl.

But Gerson nodded and looked over his merchandise, taking and counting up the money. "Everything looks alright to me! Errrr, gimme a second, here..." He turned from the two and began to search.

While she waited, Frisk looked left and realized that Blue Sans had wandered farther into the store, farther than she'd dared to go before after the last time. Gerson didn't seem to notice now, and the other monster drew close to a flag hung up on the back wall, a flag Frisk had seen before. It held a picture made of simple geometric shapes, the background white and the shapes gold.

At the time she first saw that pattern, on Toriel's tunic, she had been interested in the design. She had even tried to work up the courage to ask Toriel about it directly before things became terrible between them. But seeing it everywhere since then, her interest had waned and disappeared. Yet Blue Sans was looking at the flag on the wall very, very closely. And she heard him breathe, "i can't believe i didn't notice before."

Frisk edged over to him, keeping her eye on Gerson as he rifled through his piled junk. "What?"

"oh," Blue Sans shrugged. "this insignia is the symbol of the kingdom of monsters. 's different in my world, that's all."

Also turning her gaze over to study the picture more closely, Frisk sat down at his feet and took her shoes off to rub her aching soles. "How's it different?"

"uh," he shrugged, sighing as if she had asked some difficult question. Frisk wrinkled her nose, and this lazier version of Sans continued without a choice, "... it's supposed to be a circle with wings on the top, and three triangles on the bottom. but this has got three circles on the bottom and a winged triangle on the top. wings don't look the same, either."

It was true, but she didn't know what all the fuss was about. "Oh." She squeezed her toes.

"That insignia is what started all this," Gerson mused behind them, and suppressing a hiss the child jumped an inch where she was sitting. "It predates the war, y'know."

"You said that last time," Frisk said.

But Blue Sans shushed her by the next second, flicking her temple. "what do you mean it 'started' all this?"

"Well, I mean the 'kill or be killed' law, of course!" Gerson said, with another "Wa ha ha". He put the magnifying glass away, then, and his expression became a little more somber. Unlike any he'd worn around Frisk before; his eyebrows furrowed and he frowned, as much as he could with a turtle beak. "My, my, Asgore wasn't in the monarchy long when the war hit. He was impressed by humanity's cruelty and brutality as they slaughtered us."

"yeah, that'd be a bit of a bummer," Blue Sans noted. Frisk shifted uncomfortably where she sat, pulling her shoes back on.

"When we were locked underground, the monsters here had just about lost hope of escape. That was when he made his decision, y'see," Gerson said, and then silently wandered back to his junk pile.

This part of the story Frisk had never heard before. "What decision?"

"Well, kiddo," Gerson pointed back at the insignia and then picked out an armful of crabapple tea, which he handed over to the child cup by cup. "It all goes back to that neat old thing. It's said that the circles at the bottom are meant to represent us monsters. That little flying triangle at the top, on the other hand, some say it's a demon."

"a demon?" Blue Sans' voice was so quiet while he looked at the flag.

"Yessiree! A demon." Gerson handed Frisk a crapabble, and she bit into it with a screwed up face while he continued, "One meant to eradicate all of our enemies, according to prophecy. Or us. Or, well, the whole world, really. I don't rightly remember now! But it's gonna eradicate something! Wahahaha!"

"for pete's sakes," Blue Sans grumbled.

Undisturbed, the old timer rolled another apple off of Frisk's head, and she snatched that up just as hungrily as the one she held, half-eaten, in her hand. "But ol' Grumpypants Dreemurr decided it was the first one. He decided... that the flag prophesied our destiny underground, and that meant only a demon would save us.

"So he said to us all, on that day, 'we have to kill each other.'"

Blue Sans and Frisk both went stock still, the child shuddering and Blue Sans stuffing his hands in the coat pockets.

"That's the path to freedom, he thinks," Gerson chortled. "That monsters gotta turn into demons! Wahahaha, ain't that a hoot?" Then the laughter stopped. "... By gaining LV. Terrible, isn't it?"

"Monsters suck," was all Frisk said, taking another big bite of her apples.

Blue Sans took a step away from the flag, sockets empty. He didn't say anything, and to that Gerson's expression softened. "'Course, people like me are exempt since I'm from before the war. Hoo golly, it's hard to watch monsters get dusted so often, too. I couldn't do it even if I tried."

As Gerson laughed again, the laughter seeming more and more mechanical as he went, Frisk just thought to herself, chewing on apple seeds, Yeah, you just kill people trying to get fucking food to live on-

Blue Sans nudged her and she flinched. "i, uh, think we've spent enough time here."

"Take care, you two!" Gerson said, as the child nodded and stood. "Mind the traps, Sans, you're liable to hit your head even harder! Waha! Aha!"

Frisk stuck her tongue out at the monster before following Blue Sans back out of the side-cavern. She suddenly found him much farther than she was when she turned back around, and could feel all the cups of tea rattling in her pockets as she ran to catch up. When she reached his side, the skeleton monster slowed but didn't stop, moving towards where the River-person always docked their boat.

"he seems nice," he uttered at last, grinning.

But the child didn't feel like responding. She jumped across a tripwire that Blue Sans stepped over without missing a beat.

The River-person was in sight now, hunched over the tip of a wolflike boat that glared over at the pair from across the water. Frisk poured more GP into her hands, preparing for the moment when they would be difficult about giving her a ride. But before reaching them, she remembered that Blue Sans was also with her. "Hey. You should make that guy give me a ride."

He paused, glancing casually her way. "make 'em? what do you mean?"

Frisk took a deep breath. "They always charge me when I ask for a ride, but if you show them your dog-cannon thing I bet-"

"uh, frisk, i'm not really in the intimidation business."

"Come on!" The child clenched her hands into fists, turning to face him proper. "Just pull it out for a second! Like when you hit Papyrus."

Blue Sans was shaking head, "i'm not gonna do that."

"Why not?"

"for starters-" he began, but then his speech choked off. Blue Sans' pupils shrank to a startlingly small size, and he finished hoarsely, "behind you."

Frisk whirled around. She could see it too, then, standing before the river person. It was a huge, jet black suit of armor covered in spikes, with a trail of bright red streaming out of it at the top.

From within the helmet, a bright eye glistened with murderous intent.

A circle of red gleamed from the ground around Frisk's feet. She only had time to speak one word, with the last sight in her vision being Blue Sans' panicked face. Funnily enough he almost looked like her Sans, again, when he was staring at her like that. "Fuck-"

A roaring pain rocked her to her core, ripped a scream from her lips. Glowing red spears plunged upwards into her body and shot out the other side into the cave ceiling, their shafts crisscrossing at her midsection. They left behind her singed body as it crumpled onto the rock.

The black suit of armor approached, but Blue Sans was even now standing next to her, albeit completely still. Frisk's scream died, turned to gasps, as the black metal feet stopped in front of her face.

Then the gasps died too.

And after that, nothing was left to die except for Frisk. Her pale red heart burst into pieces.

Next Chapter: The Warrior Appears

Chapter Text

A voice boomed in the dark, deep and rough.

It forbade her from fading away.

"Child if you go, I'll swallow you whole!"

it said.

When Sans walked back into the room with the pool, thirty minutes eaten up by waiting for that kid to call for him, he found Frisk just staring at the wall.

He paused at the entrance to the much larger room when he saw them, standing there quietly as they might have been all this time. They weren't looking at him, or indeed anything really; it took a second, and only with some prompting, for them to glance Sans' way. Their eyes looked hollow; beside them, the bedraggled little Flowey was cringing as their feet and looked as if he wanted to say something—but was unable to.

The only sound between all three was some water dripping from the ceiling.

He'd missed something. He was certain of it. Feeling very alone in this cavern all of a sudden, Sans blinked and shot a look off to the side. "...don't you two look awfully cheery."

Frisk blinked back, before uttering a soft growl and scowling at him. They then turned and, wordlessly, started to walk away. Sans blinked several times harder, as the child trudged to the upper left-hand tunnel- the one that, in his world, led to Undyne's house. Looking from them to Sans several times, Flowey dug back into the ground and presumably followed after his friend.

The kid seemed untroubled to go over to the house of such a formidable monster like Undyne. Was she friends with this version of her, despite clearly being enemies with Papyrus? Somehow Sans doubted it. It was because of what he "missed," he knew. Back in the other room, away from Frisk, he'd felt funny for just a single second. As if he had been moved slightly, or like the world had needed a second to resettle from an earthquake.

Furrowing his not-eyebrows, Sans decided to take a shortcut there and head them off.

He appeared beside the house, just next to the ear, everything luckily in the same spot as it used to be back home. The exterior of the fish house was even creepier than the one back home, though, although that wasn't saying much when having an angry fish head for a house was in his opinion pretty creepy to begin with. The training dummy in the front yard of it was also completely decimated; Sans didn't want to think about what happened to the ghost that was inhabiting it.

Undyne was standing outside, and it didn't take long for Sans to spot her; she was in her everyday clothes, or so he assumed. Like everyone else in this place, her outfit was noticeably different from the normal Undyne. Instead of jeans, she wore what looked like black leather leggings and red high-heeled boots. Her shirt was black and ripped at the arms and waist, showing a midriff and arms covered in bandages. When she turned, over the front was a red heart design.

In his opinion, she looked like she really needed some vitamins; her skin was a muddy turquoise. And while, like the old Undyne, this one kept her hair meticulously contained to a single point on her skull, it was still an unkempt and ratty ponytail.

"Different or not he's still Sans, and if he's Sans he's still a sack of crap," the woman was saying into the phone, and Sans rolled his eyes.

On the other end, he could just make out the other Papyrus' voice. "I'M NOT DENYING THAT! BUT IT WOULD BE BETTER IF YOU DON'T ATTACK THIS ONE! AND THE HUMAN TOO! AT LEAST NOT RIGHT NOW."

"Woah, you don't want me to attack the human either?"

"I SAID NOT RIGHT NOW! COME TO THINK OF IT, THEY MIGHT BE PASSING BY SOON."

Something in Undyne's yellow eyes gleamed, and she smiled- a smile revealing countless razor-sharp teeth. "That brat's coming back here?" As she spoke, Sans looked down the path and tried to catch even a glimpse of Frisk in the darkness, but so far the kid hadn't shown up yet.

Papyrus' voice was shrill, and for a second Undyne held it away from her webbed ear with a wince while he went on, "YES, BUT REMEMBER DON'T ATTACK THEM."

There was only one beat of hesitation. "Fuck that," she then hissed as she licked her sharp teeth with a long red tongue, "It's time for a rematch."

She set the phone right down on the rocks, summoning a bright red spear into her hands. Then, she stepped to the near-demolished practice dummy in her yard and began summoning even more, firing each one in one direction. They pierced the material of the dummy with ease, and it was all too clear that she was imagining the human child in its place. Her eyes with bright and her smile wide.

Sans pressed up against the ear of Undyne's house, resting one hand on the ridges and making sure to stay to the shadows. The whole time she was moving around, Papyrus kept on going, "NO! THAT IS WHAT I JUST TOLD YOU NOT TO DO! UNDYNE! UNDYNE! ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME?"

"Can't hear ya," Undyne said, pulling on black metal gloves hung beside her door.

Papyrus was even louder, and Sans felt sorry for anyone in earshot of him back at his house. "I SAID DON'T ATTACK THE HUMAN! UNDYNE YOU'RE NOT LISTENING! UNDYYYYNE! UGH, WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS?" At this rate, Sans was hoping that Frisk could hear all the commotion and wasn't coming after all.

The fish monster had no trouble ignoring her subordinate's shrieks while she started buckling on her black armored boots. "This is why I'm the captain and you're-"

Whatever she was going to say next died when the sound of soft footsteps reached her, even as noisy as her front yard was right now. They reached Sans too, and when he scanned the darkness he found the source coming into the light of the rocks. He sighed, not for the first time since coming to this awful place.

Undyne kicked off the unbuckled metal boots and stood, amazingly still in her heels. She grinned big, "You. Somehow I knew you'd be coming about now."

Dented metal pan in their hands, Frisk didn't say anything to the opponent before them. The flower was, again, nowhere in sight. And even Papyrus on the phone had fallen silent, a small click following afterwards as his not-brother hung up. There was no sound around Undyne's house except for the excited breathing of the fish monster herself.

"You ready for a rematch, you clever little shit?" She said, summoning another red spear into her hands. "En guarde!"

Frisk didn't move. And when Undyne slashed her spear in an arc, and their SOUL flickered green, they couldn't move. Their mouth was set in a grim straight line, and their eyes were the same, the child pulling out their pan—which also glowed green. If Sans didn't know better, he would say that this was one brave little kid he ran into, much like his own Frisk always seemed.

Although since he did know better, he estimated that they must have done this all already, about... four times? That meant Undyne's tally marker had just reached eleven.

He would have thought it'd be more fruitful to not approach this crazy version of his friend at all, and to just hurry on to Hotland. But maybe that was just him. They did seem a little overeager to use violence.

Regardless of his input, the battle had already begun for Frisk and Undyne. Smiling maniacally, Undyne summoned a hail of red and golden spears that shot towards the child like burning arrows; they scattered in all directions inches from her stoic face, wrapping around to pierce her on all sides. Eyes barely moving, Frisk's wrist twisted and their arm snapped back and forth like a snake. The green of the pan glowed and expanded the weapon's surface area, a round shield protecting the child's whole side made more visible with each impact. They brought that pan-shield to the spears on every side with each snap of their arm; when, out of the corner of their eye, they saw a spear flying towards their back, Frisk turned halfway and blocked that too.

The golden spears were more durable, and flipped around to other sides of their body. Only after four deflections did they break down. Although Sans was surprised to see how strong the gold magic was, Frisk held that same unruffled face through battle. The storm of spears went faced head-on.

Undyne's grin became a snarl each time one volley failed to pierce and burn Frisk's body. Only once or twice did one shoot through them, and both times Sans flinched when Frisk cried out, their SOUL flickering for a second. But whatever injury the spear did, it did not seem to last, and it wasn't long before the human was back up and fighting like normal. He was impressed; he hadn't even seen them eat anything. Undyne, too, was irritated by their recovery rates, howling out, "Oh COME ON, you were a lot more of a cry-baby last time we fought!"

At that, Frisk spoke for the first time since before the battle started. It was a taunt, the kid's mouth turning for a second into an uncontrollable sneer. "Well you just suck; Papyrus was harder than this."

And the storm of red arrows became so fast that they were almost a blur. The sneer disappeared, but Frisk went right back to deflecting with the green pan.

Green magic such as this was based on a timer; eventually, Frisk's captured SOUL turned back red and they were set free for just one moment, just one turn. The pan was also reduced to its normal state, no longer a shield on a stick.

Undyne held a spear in her hand and snarled; Sans watched as she charged forward, not content to wait her turn, and tried to stab at Frisk herself. "Fight me, coward!"

But the human was able to run, now, and very quick. They dodged Undyne's jabs and dashed around her, blowing her a raspberry as she went. While Sans was still watching, the child ran up to the mouth of Undyne's house and slammed their pan into the teeth, not once but three times. There was a noise, like the whole structure was groaning, shuddering. Frisk prepared to "knock" a fourth time, but the teeth opened up.

Their momentary shock was enough that Undyne just reached them; she grabbed the child by their right sleeve and pulled hard. Frisk shrieked as they stumbled backwards, their pan flailing in their other hand.

Intervening at this stage was probably pointless; that was what Sans could hear in his head when the thought even showed up. After all, they could probably handle themselves, and he was getting too cold and achey- even if Hotland was as warm as a blowtorch, it might be worth it to take away the chill from his body. Too cold and aching to intervene with this murderous Undyne. But his own body had different ideas, as at that moment Sans started coughing loudly behind the ear of Undyne's house.

As a result she hesitated, and the human slipped from her grasp and scrambled inside. For the moment, Undyne didn't notice anymore. "What the fuck-?"

Sans looked up from his coughing fit to see her standing over him, her one uncovered eye blazing. He grinned weakly, clearing his not-throat. "uh. heya."

"Sans? Oh," Undyne bent and picked up the phone she'd abandoned, clicking through numbers before closing it in disgust. "That's right, Paps told me about you."

From inside the house, there was the faintest of rattling and crashing. What was the kid doing, trashing the place? Sans repressed shivers, most of which were not because of the warrior standing in front of him, and shrugged with his hands tucked away. "yeah, i'm the guy who's still a sack of crap."

"You don't look less pointy," she sneered.

Sans tapped his teeth, finding them still the same as when he got here. Even so, Frisk and Papyrus both seemed to have noticed his real self beneath them. He smirked at her, "look harder. ... eye can see how that would be hard for you, though, come to think of it." When her eye widened and she snarled, he took a step back. There was no telling that this one would avoid killing him the way that Papyrus did. "what i mean is, i promise i'm not pointy."

"What are you doing here?" Spear finally dissipating, Undyne gave a rough jerk of her head in the direction of the house. "You helping out the kid, punk?"

His grin got weaker. "uh. sorta."

She grunted, snarl relaxing just a tad. "You better pick some other pet, then, because this time I'm gonna kill that brat."

"uh, right, but... how about not killing the brat? you seem good at that too."

Although it was priceless, the enraged look on Undyne's face then was enough to make him take a second step back. But no more words were spoken on that; Frisk shrieked again from the house, and both of them turned expecting a crash. There had been plenty of them already.

But instead, they heard music coming from it. Badly played at worst, and repetitive at best, but it was still music. Sans tilted his head and glanced over at Undyne. Not looking back at Sans, her eye bugged out of her head and her hands had tightened into fists.

"WHAAAT ARE YOU DOING!?" She roared, turning and screaming into the window of the house. The yelling did not stop the plinking music, and she shrilled again, "THAT'S MINE, DON'T TOUCH MY PIANO YOU FREAK!"

Before he could stop her, she'd run back into the house and Frisk started shrieking louder, again repetitive sounds.

When Sans shuffled into the house after her, there was a huge mess in front of his eyes- and unlike Papyrus' house, it wasn't just because everything was too austere. Most of it was from the cupboards and kitchenette across from the entrance; many of the plain surfaces were covered in mud and pebble tracks, while the cupboards were ransacked with former cooking ingredients spilled over the floor. Plates were smashed, cups were broken, the fridge was open and empty; Sans whistled at the destruction. Someone had worked fast.

Now they were running, with Undyne chasing them around the table and throwing spears. From the look on their face, it seemed that this course of events was new, and all the stoicism of earlier was replaced by raw panic while their beaten shoes squeaked over a cracked linoleum floor. Although as fast as they went, Undyne was only unable to catch them because the concentration of summoning her magic was slowing her down.

If she was thinking clearly, she probably would have just stuck to one or the other, but Sans caught frustrated rage on her face. She wasn't even bothering with green magic anymore, and her spears were flying erratically.

One of the golden ones missed their course when Frisk smacked it, and flipping around it went diving towards Sans.

He could dodge, obviously. But Undyne dropped the magic before it got close enough for it to be a problem, her eye bulging again and the lady stopping in her tracks for an instant, "Shit!"

That instant didn't go unnoticed. From the other side of the table, Frisk's eyes flashed in Sans' direction too. They skidded to a stop, as well.

Undyne glared at them from across the table, and the two huffed. Then the human darted away from the circle, breaking the pattern, and Undyne screeched, "Get back here, prick!"

Instead, though, they dashed towards Sans.

"wh-!?" The next thing he knew, the child had grabbed him by the shoulder and swung just behind him, eyes concealed in shadow. They held up their pan and swung it in front of his sternum; when he tried to move, it raised up to cover his neck and nearly choked him. Frisk straightened their stance to stand just behind him, grabbing both ends of the pan with both hands.

"What do you think you're doing!?" Undyne yelled, although not moving from where she stood.

"Attack me again and I'll dust him!"

That rough proclamation was followed by a short silence; despite Frisk standing still, their tiny body was quivering with suppressed energy, which Sans could feel through the jacket. He raised a skeletal hand to the pan and they shook it with a growl. Brows raised, he coughed. "did not expect."

There was no movement from the fish monster at that, still frozen in her old position. But she took a step forward, towards the two, and Sans felt the weapon press harder against his vertebrae. "I mean it! I'll crush his-" There, their speech faltered.

"neck?" Sans offered.

"Shut up!"

"Fuhuhuhuh... you're not going to dust him," Undyne said, although even as she laughed mechanically her visible eye was twitching. She straightened, although her hands were still out and fingers ready, wishing to summon more magical attacks. "I've heard a lot about you, brat."

"Yes I will!"

"You haven't dusted anybody," she continued, taking another step forward. When she did, Frisk hissed and pressed down even harder; the pressure becoming painful, Sans hissed back, and Undyne froze. She only remarked, now still, "You don't have the guts."

"Yes I do!"

Despite no longer approaching, the fish monster was still roving her gaze over both of them, eyes flicking rapidly as she thought. Sans started to sweat, while she went on, "You're not leaving my grasp again!"

"I know you don't want to kill him," said the small child holding him hostage, "So you don't want me to kill him either."

"You won't kill him."

Frisk dragged him back a step. "Try me!"

"please don't try them," Sans choked.

For a minute there it was really hard to breathe, both from his not-windpipe being crushed and from the tension thickening the air in the house (a house that also could use some air-freshener, if he stopped to smell it.) But Undyne took a step back, her muscles and her enraged face relaxing.

She chuckled, and through his jacket Sans felt Frisk stiffen. "You remind me of someone, human." A red spear came into her hands, but it seemed to be for show more than anything else, as Undyne threw it over her shoulder and licked her teeth. "Fuh. Threatening someone else to get your way like that. You and Asgore both seem harmless at first. But even though you're a wimpy loser, you still have fangs."

Frisk didn't respond. Undyne frowned and let the spear hang by her side. "This isn't the last time we're going to fight. Next time, I won't let you get the upper hand. ...But for now, you better leave with your pet before I decide that piece of shit's not worth it."

Immediately, the metal handle was dragging him backwards by the neck, Frisk taking that as their cue to skedaddle with him in tow. He grunted, almost tripping, not used to the effort it took to walk this way- at least, once they had made their point, the kid relaxed their grip on him with the pan handle.

Heheheh. Panhandled.

Right as they exited Undyne's house, he heard a fragile little whisper next to his head. "Thank you."

He would have said something back, probably the panhandle pun he just thought up. But Undyne exited the house too, a mere a second later, watching them for any opportunity to strike. So Frisk affected a snarl, reaffirmed their hold on Sans, and dragged him away step by step.

It was a very long, uncomfortable walk to the River-person, despite the short distance.

When they finally got there, that was when Frisk let go of Sans and put their pan away, although they still gripped him by the sleeve while demanding a ride from the hunched monster in a black robe. The River-person didn't look all that different, really. But the rate they charged for traveling was much steeper than back at home; he heard the child grumbling as they handed off a whole bag of GP to them.

He was a little more distracted by the fact that the "boat" they rode was a snarling wolf, rather than that cute cat it was normally. He hoped it didn't bite. There wasn't a whole lot of room on the River-person's craft, either. The way that it ended up, Sans sat in-between the River-person and Frisk, the child sitting on the edge. They kept themselves still, for the most part, after the two of them were on board; a lot of movement on such a tiny platform would have led to somebody falling off.

"Where would you like to go?" The River-person said softly.

Frisk called out "Hotland" first, folding their arms and staring moodily down at the water. Their escort didn't say anything more before nudging the platform beneath them, which rose on its four legs obediently.

Everything was going smoothly again. Undyne reached the edge only after they had embarked, and she stood staring hungrily at Sans and Frisk while the "boat" carried them farther and farther away. The River-person began singing a demented and soft little tune. When they picked up speed, the wolfish craft leaping across the river, the fish monster disappeared and the last image he had of her was Undyne licking her teeth again.

They definitely had worse problems than Papyrus in this place. Sans wondered how awful Hotland was going to be compared to Waterfall. He wondered what this world's Alphys would be like.

For the brief few minutes they would be going down this way, he decided to get some more shut-eye. Despite their vocal protests, the kid made a decent pillow.

Next Chapter: Intention Impaired

Chapter Text

It was five o'clock in the morning, still raining outside, and Frisk had an hour before it was time to wake up for school. Overall about five hours of sleep in a warm bed, with a wet coat stashed underneath it, wouldn't be that bad. Although, her sleep filled with endless nightmares of monsters and maniacal flowers, it wasn't the best either. Still, maybe she wouldn't fall asleep in class.

But she wasn't destined to get five hours of sleep, her best being four hours and five minutes. Just as she was being dropped into the maw of a giant spider within her dreams, the child gripping her pillow on the outside in a cold sweat, she woke with a start.

At first, she didn't know what had woken her. She usually couldn't escape from those kinds of dreams on her own, so for one bleary moment she expected to see Toriel standing over the bed with a warm cup of tea.

But standing before her was pretty much the opposite of Toriel. And now the child realized that she had been much too cocky, assuming that this was the last she would see of Red Sans tonight- even if it technically was the early morning at this time. She was thrown from one panicked nightmare into another, and as soon as the fog of sleep was off her mind she threw herself back against the other side of the bed.

Because he was bristling with rage. His red eye was flashing fire-engine red and pale yellow, his teeth glinting in a murderous grimace.

And his voice, which was already usually tense, was indescribable. "you told papyrus," he hissed. "You told Papyrus of all people."

The realization hit and chased away the rest of her nightmare, but replaced it with something worse and, unlike Muffet's pet, very real. Frisk's heart almost stopped. She didn't speak. Red Sans was wheezing again, slow and heavy, air moving aggressively through his permanently shut teeth. The light of his eye washed the child in red. "You told Papyrus."

Her heart, it felt like, had never stopped hammering from the time she woke up to right now, with her back and head pressed against the window. It was so cold outside. When Frisk tried to talk, tried to address his accusation, all that came out was a croak. Her throat was closed, and that explained why she couldn't breathe either. Red Sans was doing all the breathing. She was doing all the shaking.

His voice rose, albeit only an octave. "Answer me, you little shit."

The only words she could get out were monosyllabic, choked from her tight chest, "N.. no-... I..."

"oh, you DIDN'T tell papyrus?" His grimace turned up into a cruel, incredulous sneer. "he just found out i'm not his sans SPONTANEOUSLY, that it? Is that it?"

I don't know what 'spontaneously' even means. Call for Toriel. Call for Toriel. Call for Toriel. The child opened her mouth, but then realized there wasn't any air in her lungs to call with. Frisk took in a breath, and in the process she took in too much, making a noisy gasp. But it didn't want to come back out again. She was too frozen. "T... a.."

Red Sans' expression shifted, his eyes narrowing, and he uttered a low growl at the child. "you remember what i told you. you know what i said i would do if you told anyone else about me."

Her face, her face, he was going to rip her face off. "D-!" Frisk curled up on the bed, whooshing out air and breathing in too much more. "-Don't hurt me-"

As his voice cut into her plea her eyes flung open wide, and she shook violently, "i have to fucking live with this loser and you told him that i'm not his brother i'm gonna fucking rip your organs out you little brat."

From her wide open eyes, her vision was blurring and spinning. "It's not my fault," she squeaked. Even as she managed that, however, Sans crossed the distance between them. His sharp claws latched onto her head and yanked on her hair; with no more air in her lungs, Frisk yelped.

"it's not your fault?" His voice was much louder in her ear. "it just slipped outta ya, huh?"

Flinging her hands wildly, Frisk struggled and pulled her hair from between his bony fingers. Her pulse rang through her head, almost sounding as if it was warning her that her death was near. "You hit- him-"

"That was a fucking accident."

She was about to cry; he was pulling her back by the sleeve of her nightshirt. To hide her tears, and especially to protect her face, Frisk flung her free arm over her eyes. "Sans- doesn't- hit- Paps. I d... didn't..."

Red Sans grabbed her hair again and tugged harder; she cried with a little more air this time, and he snarled in response. "he found out from you. i know he found out from you so stop lying to me you little shit."

"Leave- me alone-" She had to reset. She had to go back, even if it was back such a long time. Surely she could do it right the next time around, make sure that Papyrus didn't find out or that Red Sans didn't find out or that he was put in jail by now or- "I didn't- I didn't-"

"okay, then i gotta different question for ya," Red Sans said suddenly, releasing her hair and pushing the child away. "W h o  e l s e  d i d  y o u  t e l l?"

Once again, Frisk could no longer speak. She curled up on the bed, covering her eyes and suppressing whimpers, unable to sit still and unable to look at the terrifying, angry other Sans. Call for Toriel, call for Toriel. But her lungs wouldn't obey.

"Was it Asgore?" She heard. And the most she could do was shake her head.

"Was it Undyne?" Again, she shook her head.

"Was it Toriel?" No, no, no. None of them.

"Alphys?" A brief second- a brief second where the child didn't breathe, and shook her head quickly. She hoped that Red Sans hadn't noticed.

"It was somebody, wasn't it?"

Frisk squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head as hard as she possibly could. Red Sans' words then sounded incredibly close. "are you lying to me?"

Somehow, someway, that threatening question gave her a bit of hope. Because, after all, he didn't say "you are." Frisk curled in tighter and shook, her whole body shaking with her. "Just Papyrus," she squeaked.

"so you DID tell Papyrus?"

Shit, to use one of his words. There was no way that she was going to unfurl from this position now. "No!"

Red Sans' response wasn't quite as quick, suddenly. She didn't know what he was doing, now, as he kept breathing heavily and motionlessly in front of her bed. But at least he wasn't ripping her face off.

Pinpricks against her arm alerted her that he had grabbed her arm again, wrenching it away from her face; the rest of her locked in place, Frisk looked back up and found his face awfully close to hers. Her breathing, which had only just returned to normal, hitched. Her locket, or rather the locket that she always wore, was on her bedside table. She would have been wearing it to bed if Toriel hadn't told her it was a choking hazard. It sure felt like she was suffocating right now, without it.

He released her arm. The utter fury in his eyes was enough to hold her still, though. It was a fury that she never saw in her Sans before- heck, she'd never even seen him angry before (annoyed, maybe, but that was all.) And yet he put those sharp claws back into his hoodie and spoke instead, while she sat shivering in front of him. Gradually his words were increasing in volume, "you think you can do something about this, but you can't. i don't want to go back. I am never going back. It doesn't matter how many people you tell or what you do, human, I'm not going back!"

Sans never raised his voice before, either.

Frisk hoped, if he ever did, it didn't sound like this.

But then they both froze; there were footsteps from the hall, and Toriel called out, "Frisk? Are you alright? What is that noise?"

"crap," Red Sans' eyes widened and, before Frisk could say another word, he disappeared. But not before saying, "you say a word, uh- someone's ribs are getting broken."

The sight that Toriel walked in on was Frisk sitting up in bed, trembling and finally crying. "Oh, no-!" Immediately, she ran to her, pulling the child into a tight and warm hug. "Oh no, oh no... what was it? Was it another nightmare?"

She didn't say a word. It was hard enough, anyway, with all the gasps and huffs and problems she was having breathing right now. And then there were other things... Whose ribs? Whose ribs?

You consider calling Papyrus. Or Alphys.

You probably couldn't talk much to them right now.

Although through everything, through her sobbing and Toriel's bewildered attempts to calm her down, through the sight of Red Sans living up to his name, something else made it through into her mind.

Her face was still intact. All of her was completely intact, despite those numerous opportunities.

Only holding on to that was enough to quieten her crying. Unfortunately, Toriel's lullaby didn't have much effect tonight, even if Frisk let her think that it did.

But she still would not be sleeping again.

When Blue Sans refused to move, and unable to raise the voice it would take to tell him to get off, Frisk instead spent a minute checking the food she'd taken out of Undyne's fridge. The skeleton's minor weight bent her back, but she could get into her pockets just fine. And since she wouldn't be going to Gerson's again, she dearly hoped that it was worth all of the trouble. There were five new items she'd taken from that house; first she brought out a package of something red and yellow and limp.

Leftover Spaghetti - Heals 2HP

It's in a plastic bag, like someone couldn't eat all of it. It feels squishy.

Wrinkling her nose in disgust, Frisk moved on to the rest of her haul. None of it was quite so nauseating to her as the spaghetti, thankfully, although it wasn't all good either.

X Lemonade – Heals 12HP

"Adult" Lemonade.

The smell is not for the faint of heart.

Crackers – Heals 6HP

Cookies that crackle like fireworks.

Tuna – Heals 5HP

She eats- fish?

Suspicious Sugar – Heals 0HP

On closer inspection, it's actually bone meal.

It tastes terrible.

Bone Meal – Heals 0HP

It would all have to do, as little as it was; by the time she was done spitting and coughing, the craft she and Blue Sans were sitting on had reached its destination. Through the cavern in front of them, the boiling heat of Hotland was only just visible with a dim red light.

The River-person's song reached her ears again and the boat shook. "Tra... la... la... la... we've arrived."

Frisk catapulted from the boat when it growled at her; left alone, Blue Sans' head conked against the wood and he grunted, startled awake. Frisk studied the tears and thin spots of her clothes while he stepped off after her, chewing the inside of her cheek. When he was again following behind, she walked to the edge of the cavern and took a deep breath.

As soon as she stepped into the red lighting, marking the point where Hotland began and the damp waterway ended, the heat hit her like entering a furnace. Her wet clothes and shoes dried almost instantly, and Frisk resisted the urge to try out what X Lemonade tasted like just for some moisture.

Shortly after, she heard Blue Sans exclaim behind her, "wow, someone turned off the AC."

"It's Hotland. It's hot," the child grumbled into her shoes while she walked up the red steps. It was bright, too. They'd stepped into one of the many stone walkways and rock islands that comprised Hotland, this one a set of stairs. Below them, rivers of magical magma churned and lapped against the base of each platform, emitting heat in unbearable quantities and, even more so, emitting the reddish light that illuminated the caverns day and night. Frisk rubbed her forehead as she began to sweat, although keeping her striped sweater on as it always was.

There was a zipping sound and, behind her, Blue Sans took off the fluffy jacket. "it's not supposed to be this bad."

Frisk couldn't help but stare; she was so unused to seeing Sans without his outer layer, standing now in just a t-shirt. He looked smaller, now, though not quite her level of short.

He caught her stare and looked left and right, "what?"

The events of the past hour caught her barbed tongue before she could use it, "..." Instead Frisk rubbed her arm, turned, and kept walking.

Unfortunately they couldn't go that far. The way to Alphys' lab wasn't long now—in fact, they were just a room or less away; the stairs they were on opened up to a cross intersection, and the lab was a quick walk to the right. Frisk had gotten to it easily on her first try, although it was from the left side of the intersection rather than the stairs. The distance, even in this sweltering heat, was not the problem.

A gang of Pynooses were gathered together in the middle of the intersection, their flames adding to the temperature of the air and their shoes periodically pounding down the broken rock at their feet. They hadn't noticed anything was different, just talking together. They were the problem.

All the same Frisk's heart trembled, and she wielded her pan before her like it was still a shield.

Although before she could move and start anything, Blue Sans' bony hand appeared at her shoulder, holding her back. "hey kid, how about we leave 'em to their talk?"

The pan lowered and then was put away; the bony hand also withdrew, with Blue Sans now standing next to her. Frisk sat down on a step to keep from the monsters' view, huffing as the heat went on around them, and he did the same.

She picked at a pebble next to her shoes, ducking her head down. Her stomach got ever queasier as the only noise around was the crackling of Pynoose flames and their almost unintelligible FIGHT Club discussion they were having. But Blue Sans spoke up again, resting the jaw of his skull on one hand. "so you've gotten this far, huh?"

Frisk looked up, but only momentarily. She pulled her knees up to her face and bit her lip.

"what made you quit? did the heat get to ya?"

Without speaking, the child shook her head. She expected him to probe further, for which she wasn't prepared, but when he didn't she felt just as queasy. He just uttered a "hmm."

"Blue... Sans?"

He sat back at attention. "what's up?"

You try to apologize to Blue Sans for your disgusting behavior.

Frisk breathed in a lungful of hot air. "About before, I..." She rubbed her nose and mumbled, "Before, I was... I was bluffing."

"i figured," he said, and when she risked looking over at him she saw the skeleton lazily wink. "no sweat, kiddo."

By now, her normal Sans would be tweaking her nose so hard it turned red. The fact that this one had hardly responded to her through all the time they'd been together made her... anxious, more than anything the other Sans had done. She lowered her head and murmured into her pants, "I bet you hate me."

"heh. well let me put it this way," Blue Sans said, and Frisk peeked in his direction. "you're not a very nice kid. at all." She narrowed her eyes, lashes brushing against the fabric of her clothing. "...but i notice that not many people here are. so the way i figure, it'd be too much energy to hate that many people. ...does that make sense?"

Flowey was the only kindhearted person she'd met down here, and even his kindness to Frisk was, she knew, motivated by fear. She nodded.

"besides," he added, relaxing against the steps behind his back, "i got respect for someone who doesn't kill anyone in a place like this."

Unrelated to the magma flowing beneath them, Frisk's face and ears had started to grow hot and she hid it again in her knees. "...Mmkay."

"huh," she heard, and she hid it deeper. "what? did i say somethin' weird?"

"I dunno," was all she said, and Blue Sans laughed again. Not outright mocking, but it all reminded her of her old Sans all the same. Except that, before that Sans left her behind, he didn't exactly say he respected her for not killing anybody.

Behind them the talk of the Pynooses was devolving into an argument; the way it went with the more hot-blooded Hotland residents, they would probably be battling each other soon. Frisk wiped her face on her sleeve and uncurled to crawl up a few more steps, if only to watch them at the moment they started throwing fireballs. She never understood how fire attacks could harm fiery monsters like them, yet she had seen several turn to dust in brawls like these.

Blue Sans looked deliberately away from the fight. "hey, frisk. as long as we're waiting here, i got a question."

She had been a millisecond from getting the X Lemonade out to watch them with. "What?"

"earlier i saw something on your face." All Blue Sans did was tap the left side of his skull and Frisk flinched immediately. By how his eyes shifted, it was clear he had well seen the brief movement. "... yeah, it kind of looked like a scar. i was just wondering where it came from. since, uh, you seem so good at healing yourself."

It was suddenly a little harder to speak, although the explanation presented itself automatically. "Uh." But Frisk shook her head, realizing how silly she was being, and just said, "I don't always have food around, doofus."

"i guess. was it a monster?"

"Actually-" Her queasiness was draining out of her, along with the tension in her muscles, as she sneered, "-it was Sans."

The look on his face upon hearing that made the tension return; Frisk took in a breath when Blue Sans said in a halting tone, "-what?"

A little less proudly, Frisk rubbed her cheek and temple. "Yeah. Um, it was an accident."

"-oh."

"... I don't remember when he did it."

Still smiling as always, Blue Sans' eyes crinkled and he stood up. "-uh, okay." The child looked down at the rock, frowning, and he turned to look back at the intersection. "whoops- looks like those guys are bookin' it, kid."

Frisk scrambled to her feet. It was true; the Pynooses, all of them as of yet accounted for, were running from each other towards the water cooler. "Oh! Then come on!"

There was no telling if other monsters would show up soon or not; Frisk didn't have any of them cowed the way she did the weaker ones in Waterfall and Snowdin. She walked quickly and silently into the intersection before turning right, seeing Alphys' scorched and cracked lab in front of her. The lab where she'd met Mettaton.

At that sight her bravado halted, the child shivering despite the heat. At that hesitation, Blue Sans walked in front with his expression set, gesturing for her to follow.

It was a first, him leading her. Frisk breathed in and out deeply.

In reality, she remembered it well. She poked at the numb flesh just beside her eye, wondering how bad it would have been if his claw had hit her face half an inch to the right. Sans had told her later that it would have looked ten times as badass, potential blindness in that eye aside. But that wasn't anything like what he was saying when it happened.

He'd been breathing funny, as he sometimes did. It was one of the first times she ever heard it, that gasping and choking as if he wasn't getting enough air, as if he had just been drowning.

Wheezing.

What's wrong with him?, she wondered.

Usually Sans could sense her presence before she could utilize her element of surprise, but this time Frisk was right next to him and had no acknowledgement. Just the funny breathing, his back and body stiff. Annoyed, she poked him in the side, "Sans?"

And immediately regretted it.

"FUCK-"

The business end of one of his claws smacked her face and dug into her soft skin, ripping it open in a straight line. Frisk shrieked and fell back on her bottom, hands going to the burning side of her face that spilled red down her cheek. The whole blizzarding forest became blurry and tears streamed from her eyes instantly, as if someone had put them there.

Sans stood to face her now, one hand covered in droplets of red and sweating like crazy while his eye wavered. "-fuck," he hacked. "why did you –fuck- why did you sneak up on-" Frisk writhed and wailed, and his single pupil shrank. Every wheeze of his was punctuated by a curse, "-oh fuck- are you okay –fuck- i'm sorry –fuck, fuck- fuck, you're bleeding-"

She wanted to scream his words back at him, or say anything really. But she was crying too hard. It hurt, it hurt so much.

"stop crying, -ah fuck-" He approached her and she wriggled back. "stop, i'm-"

"Don't!"

"i'm trying to heal-"

His hand touched the side of her head, glowing green, and she screamed. "It hurts!"

"i'm not GOOD at it, -mother of fuck-"

As she tried to pull away, her screams devolving into loud whining, he yanked her back by the sleeve of her sweater. She cried harder to see his hand glow green again, "Don't touch me!"

Sans took a big gulp of air, yanking again as she struggled, "you little shit, it's gonna scar-"

"Let it scar!" She had said.

Weeks of injuries, and yet that little white line was the only scar she'd gotten so far. And it was an accident.

Blue Sans was knocking on the door, and Frisk giggled to herself.

Next Chapter: Literal Scum

Chapter Text

Five minutes had passed since Blue Sans had knocked on the door, and yet there was no reply from inside. He shared a glance over at Frisk, who sighed heavily; having met Alphys before, she was expecting some kind of behavior like this. He gestured to her at last, and then towards the entrance with no doorknob or handle. "uh, you wanna try?"

The first time that she ran into this lab, she was forced to get in through a side entrance, one that she would never have noticed if it weren't for Flowey's help. That side entrance was since boarded up a few days ago, again something that she was told from Flowey. Frisk didn't know what to do to get Alphys to actually answer her door, and so could only shrug at Blue Sans. At the same time, surely her Sans must have done something to get in. She folded her arms. "Maybe you should knock again." And then, after a second of thought, added, "You should probably put the coat back on too."

"i'm gonna roast in this," Blue Sans said, regarding the furry hood with disgust.

"Her lab is air-conditioned. And Sans never took that off, even in Hotland."

She couldn't help but grin again when his frozen face turned into a grimace. "really? what a masochist."

"What's a masochist?" Frisk asked, inclining her head, and her only reply was for Blue Sans to knock on the door louder and harder than before. There was still no answer, although both of them thought they heard a rustling sound from beyond that solid door.

There was no peephole, keyhole, or window to clue them in to what was going on in there, but knowing Alphys as she did Frisk had a hunch. The rest of the building was plain and ordinary, scorch marks and soot aside. It was a big box-shaped lab colored slate gray, featureless save for two tubes that ran through the wall, and a small black circle that was higher up. A big shiny circle.

When Frisk was littler and went into a public bathroom for the first time, her roommate told her that there were secret cameras everywhere in every device on the ceiling, through which creepy men were watching and waiting for her to pull down her underwear. ... As a consequence of that story, she ended up holding in a huge bottle's worth of water.

More reasonable adults laughed the concept off later, but the memory stuck with her. Especially right now, looking at that black circle on the building. It didn't look like a window. Frisk pulled her lips into a tight line and squinted at the ground. She then whispered to Blue Sans so that nobody else could hear, "I'm going to leave. You start yelling at her to open the door."

Blue Sans was quick to pick up on her plan, or at least she hoped so, mumbling just as quietly, "got it."

"This is a big waste of time," Frisk said then, raising her voice. "I'm leaving."

Blue Sans also spoke louder, "aw c'mon, kid..." But she was already marching down the broken rock path, making it clear with a loud huff that she was not interested in anything else he had to say. She heard him sigh loudly.

She didn't hide too far away, nestling herself behind a rocky outcropping in the room with the intersection, one foot on the stairs. From this distance, she could just hear the yelling from Blue Sans. It startled her; when he was talking this way, he sounded almost exactly like her Sans. "HEY! smalphys! do you think I like waiting out here for you to screen visitors!? open the fucking door!"

Frisk blinked, unaware until this point that he was even capable of talking like that. There was silence following it; or at least, something that she couldn't hear. Blue Sans continued, "okay well the human isn't HERE, are they? ...i'm going to give you until the count of three and if the door isn't open by then, human or no human, i'm gonna-"

His speech cut off right there, and it quick-started Frisk's pulse. There was no time to waste, so after taking a quick look around at any potential monster challengers the child dashed over the walkway to Alphys' lab.

As she suspected, the door was already open and Blue Sans was standing just inside it, preventing it from closing again. Alphys herself was also standing near the doorway, illuminated by dark florescent lights in the lab behind her. Not interested in stopping until she was inside, Frisk barreled into her when there was no other space in the doorway left.

He stepped in after Frisk and the door closed behind him, leaving them at the blessed mercy of the AC in the lab rather than the boiling heat outside. "you really like jumping on people, don't you kiddo?"

Frisk merely brushed herself off and reached for her pan while Alphys was chattering a few feet away, trembling violently and hissing periodically at her. "Y-y-y-y-you y-y-you're th-th-the- why-y-y-you lied to m-m-me o m g-"

Her lab coat was buttoned- or, at least, one of the buttons was done on it; it was still possible to see the red and black striped dress she wore underneath. Her crooked and dirty glasses- which to Frisk always made her eyes look a little bit crazed and confused- were even more off-kilter on her face, and she was wearing dripping red gloves. While the monster struggled to straighten up her appearance, stammering, "o m g you l-lllliteral s-s-scum-," Frisk wondered what kind of work she was doing that they interrupted.

"you doing okay, buddy?" Blue Sans said, eyeing her warily. Frisk stepped back until she was beside him again.

"You k-kNEW," Alphys screeched, and Frisk's pan was already out. Blue Sans had put another hand on her shoulder, but she wasn't going to put it away this time. "You KNEW that h-humans are- oh god I'm so t-t-t-triggered-"

Blue Sans looked over at Frisk, and she rolled her eyes. So Blue Sans looked back to Alphys with as sheepish an expression as a skeleton could make. "uh, look, is this gonna take all day? i gotta talk to you about something important."

The effect that this sentence had on her was almost immediate. The stammering stopped, and so did the violent shaking, Alphys raising her head from where she had been rubbing it all over with the red gloves. It was reduced only to a light shiver, one that was punctuated by a glance over at Frisk; since Frisk was content to snarl back at her, she kept her eyes off of the child and instead kept staring at Blue Sans.

Her eyes narrowed, and she clacked her pronged teeth together, before she finally whispered, "-Why do you sound like that?"

Somewhere on the second floor there was a buzzing noise, and then the lights flickered. Frisk flinched, but Blue Sans only narrowed his eyes back at the scientist. "i dunno. why do you think I sound like that?"

"Oh no," was all Alphys said.

Blue Sans' grin became significantly less than happy when his eyes became skeletal slits. "so i guess the answer to the question of 'did you help my other self kidnap me' is... yes?"

"You weren't-" Alphys breathed, backing away. "You w-weren't s-supposed- to- WAH!" and then the next moment she turned and ran across the dirty lab floor, nearly tripping over the black end of her dress.

Before Blue Sans could disapprove or hold her back again, Frisk took off after the other monster with a loud growl on her lips. As though she was channeling Greater Dog, she tackled her opponent to the floor and bit into the sleeve of her lab coat. While Alphys wrestled, Frisk pressed the handle and end of her pan into her stomach, as strongly as possible while she kept squirming like this, and tried to use even her minor weight to pin her down. The whole while Alphys was screaming incoherently, swinging her large tail and snapping at her with sharp buck-teeth. She smacked the child in the face with one gloved hand, and with her grip on the sleeve broken Frisk bared her canines at her, instead.

Channeling Greater Dog was fun; she started gathering saliva into her mouth and foaming it through her teeth like she'd seen rabid animals on TV do, growling loudly.

However, like always whenever she got the upper hand it came to an end too fast. She'd been menacing Alphys for all of thirty seconds before her own SOUL turned blue across her chest and she lifted into the air, right up to the ceiling. Underneath her, she could see Blue Sans with his hand up; he slowly drew that hand in an arc until he was pointing sideways, and the child was dumped gently on the floor next to a gigantic TV monitor- one which was currently showing the back of her head.

"that's enough," he said, glaring her way.

"You weren't su-supposed to be able to come out here," Alphys whimpered, standing back up and wiping slobber off her face. "I mean-! No! It-it wasn't my idea! It was all his idea! He forced me to!"

"calm down lady, i'm not a complete animal," Blue Sans said, although still glaring as he turned his gaze to her. "unlike my partner over here."

Frisk tried to get back up, but could feel the increased force of gravity pushing back down- her SOUL was still blue. "Let me go! This is all her fault!"

"Th-that's not true!" Alphys wailed, inching away towards a back wall. "He told me that if I didn't help him he would rat me out to A-a-asgore, I didn't w-want to help him! I didn't even think that he would succeed! It was a dumbass plan anyway!"

"You still did it," Frisk barked, getting to her feet with difficulty.

Blue Sans sighed heavily, rubbing his temple and shutting his eyes for a moment. "i don't care, I just need you to tell me what you did. he destroyed the machine and i can't fix it."

But even as he said that Alphys was shaking her head, glaring at them. "I-I wouldn't want to help literal sc- look, um, you don't understand." She pulled off the red gloves and tossed them to the side, on top of the computer desk that was already covered in trash. Trash which had grown in number since Frisk's last visit- torn and water-damaged comic books, TV dinners both open and shut, glass bottles, ripped open snack packages, paper, and now the pair of gloves.

Alphys snatched one of the glass bottles off the desk and pried the cap off with her claws, taking a long swig of the yellow liquid inside. "If I help you get back, he's going be so angry, sooooo no."

Blue Sans just grinned at her. "why are you worrying so much about him when you should be worrying about me?"

"Ulp," Alphys stared at him.

"like, for example, i heard from some people that the sans of this world couldn't do magic attacks. but i-" he punctuated his point by summoning the dog cannon- what he had called a Gaster Blaster- in front of Alphys' face. "-have no such problems. it's not really something that i want to do, but, buddy," the Blaster became three. "i'm really tired at this point."

Frisk folded her arms and huffed, even while Alphys was trembling hard. "Oh, so you won't do it to save me money but you'll do it to intimidate her?"

Blue Sans turned a bewildered expression her way. "uh, come again?"

"... Nothing."

Back in front of him, Alphys gulped at the three Gaster Blasters staring her down the glowing eyes, watching their motionless forms from over glasses. She gave a crooked, wavering smile over at the two of them and said, "I-I-I-I-I'll get the schematics we used."

She turned and scrambled to the other side of the lab, running through a door that led to what Frisk originally thought was just a bathroom.

No sooner had she left than Blue Sans started to glare at her again. "what the hell is your problem, kid?"

It startled her; he hadn't gotten mad at her even when she used him to get away from Undyne. Getting queasy again she looked in the direction Alphys had left and crossed her arms tighter, her face turning red. "...She's usually way worse than that."

"why? how many tallies does she have?"

The child twitched, and out of the corner of her eyes viewed him. The question was an earnest one, the anger on his face gone while he looked. But then he shook his head, studying her trembling vision. "none, huh?"

Her Sans and this one both had that same way of reading her mind. Frisk just examined her fraying shoes, rubbing scratched arms. "It's more like... it was never her specifically. But..."

"jeeze." Blue Sans made that sigh again, and she couldn't help but think of how differently both Sanses breathed. "oh well. can't expect this alphys to be different from the trend."

Finally, she put her pan away. "What's your Alphys like?"

"oh, she's real sweet," Blue Sans said, closing his eyes. "we're kind of buds, although she spends most of her time online, uh, since she has trouble communicating with real people. which, i get. but still, she's real sweet- she chats with my bro a lot too."

"She sounds dumb." Looking over the cracks in the tiled floor under them, the words came out before Frisk even realized it.

But he just shrugged. "nah, she's actually pretty smart. smarter than she thinks she is."

"Um," was all Frisk said in return.

The two of them were quiet, while elsewhere in the lab they heard numerous clashes and clangs. After several minutes of it passed, Alphys finally reemerged holding several rolled up papers in her arms, schematics and blueprints. With a sour expression, she laid them down at Blue Sans' feet, huffing and trying to fix her glasses better on her face while he slowly scooped them up. "There. That's everything that we made together while we were working on it. If you're half as smart as he is, I'm sure that you can figure it out yourself, although if you can't then don't come crying to me, scumlord." The last word she said while glaring over at Frisk. The child stuck her tongue out at her.

"holy crap," Blue Sans said as he unfurled one of the papers, keeping the rest tucked under his arm. "this isn't... anything like my original design."

"It isn't?" Alphys laughed, the obnoxious laugh that Frisk suspected was intentional on her part. She waddled over to stand right next to Blue Sans, nudging him with her hip, and she peered over at the designs. "Well we've made a lot of modifications this month. And last month too, come to think of it. It was originally designed as a time machine."

Frisk couldn't help it; thumbing one of the comic books that she found tossed over the desk, she barked out a laugh, "Hah!"

She went ignored. "what changed?"

And Alphys took off her swirling glasses, wiping them on her dingy coat. "Well for one, we finally got it to do something. It just- it wasn't what he thought it would be. I'm sure even you can guess what it is, right?" Before anybody could answer her she went forward anyway, and quickly, "Instead of reaching another time period, the machine picked up the state patterns of other dimensions. These modifications were in order to reach those dimensions physically."

"How do you manage that?" Frisk spoke up, flipping through the faded, heavily inked pages of the comic book.

She wasn't done wiping her glasses, having to spit on them and searching for a part of her coat that wasn't too oily, "It's not my job to tell you. Go educate yourself, brat. ... And put that down," she added once the glasses were back on, eyes red and irritated.

"think of it as a matter of zigging instead of zagging, kiddo," Blue Sans called while he rolled up one blueprint and went to studying another. "but wouldn't you also figure that, well, once you've proven the existence of other worlds, it'd be easier to go to them in that machine than it would be to go back in time?"

Frisk slapped the comic book back on the desk. Going back in time was easy. "So does that mean you can fix it?"

"... yeah." Eyes tired, but smile on his face, Blue Sans sighed less heavily at that. "gonna be a lot of work though. not my favorite thing to do." Rolling the next paper up, he then looked meaningfully at Alphys. "maybe you should help me with that too."

Alphys, scooting away from him, curled her lip and looked back at Frisk. "Why should I?"

"B e c a u s e  I 'm  v e r y  t i r e d  a n d  f e e l i n g  n a u s e o u s," said Blue Sans, the pupils in his eyes vanishing. While Frisk avoided eye contact the lizard monster shivered at the sight, taking several steps back; at that he relaxed. "uh, look, if i could pay you back some other way that'd be good too. as long as it's actually something i can do."

Now she appeared surprised, the hostility falling away from her face. "Oh? ...Are you- are you telling me the truth?" She stammered out.

"'m not much for lying," he nodded. "... our meeting aside."

Sharp fingertips touching, Alphys looked away. "If you r-r-really mean that. There is... something... to be honest."

"yeah?"

"Uh, oh-" She looked at Frisk, who scowled. She wrung her hands. "M-m-maybe we can discuss it later. I-I promise i-it's not much, but, as someone from another world, y-you... um, yeah, you know."

If Blue Sans was as suspicious about this as the child was, he didn't show it. Frisk, personally, was curious why Alphys was so quick to change her tune for 'literal scum'. "cool. so you're gonna help me?"

Holding her hand out after just a moment of hesitation, the scientist firmly nodded. Blue Sans took her hand with his own, and they shook without another word in the way.

"heh. good." He then put his hands in his pockets, grinning. "hey, maybe that means i'm almost done with this place."

Frisk, sitting down on the only clean chair available, wasn't so sure about that. It wasn't just Alphys who had changed her tune; even the music that played here in her head, usually on constant repeat, had... become something new. The song that played instead filled her with a sense of foreboding, and after all the sweat from Hotland was gone she shivered under the AC of the lab. While Blue Sans started talking to Alphys in earnest, she reached out to again hold her pan in her hands.

But she didn't feel any safer.

Next Chapter: There's a Benefit to Getting Some Sleep

Chapter Text

Sans appeared back in his parallel house and, for what might have been the first time in days, he conked out on the couch. It wasn't typical for him to do, but he had been awake for nearly every night since he got to this other world. With no alcohol, no smaller monsters to pick on, nothing else to calm him down, he'd been run out to exhaustion. As a result, he was just able to reach the nearest soft surface before passing into unconsciousness.

When he opened his eyes again a few hours later, feeling a little less lousy and still groggy, he wasn't alone in the living room. Instead, he found himself making eye contact with this world's Papyrus.

Again he had a moment of painful anxiety, heart moving hard inside him, while they stared at each other. Papyrus looked just the same as before, eyes almost bugging while taking in his appearance again- apparently startled that he had woken so soon. Neither of them said a word, either a greeting or a threat.

But then, Sans reminded himself of how stupid it was, of who he was dealing with here. why should i be the scared one? So he jumped up to his feet, relaxing and smirking at the other version of his brother. "yo. you just come down?"

Snapped out of his own shocked state, Papyrus sputtered, "Ye-YES!!! ...AND YOU JUST WOKE UP."

"no shit," he sneered. Now, judging by Pap's face, that was a bit out of character for his brother. But it was too late for that, wasn't it? Thanks to that kid. Well, and because of his own carelessness too. Surely, given that he was called "pointy" earlier, Papyrus already knew his true face, so it was probably impossible for him to look friendly; even so, he eased his expression a bit. And he spoke without a care in his voice, "i'm kinda thirsty. you don't mind if i get more orange juice, right?"

"WHAT A STRANGE QUESTION," he heard, and once more he was caught off guard; Papyrus wasn't quivering all of a sudden. "I BOUGHT IT FOR YOU, REMEMBER?"

A strange question? Sans snorted, rolling his shoulders. "...you bought it for your bro, not me."

"WELL-" Yes, that made his new brother stumble, his red-gloved hands coming together in a tense motion. "T-TECHNICALLY YOU... ARE MY BRO, RIGHT?"

Sans raised a brow, and then there was another loud snort when he resisted laughing. Wow. That was one way of looking at it, although that didn't seem very loyal of this Papyrus. This is definitely not how his old one would have acted to find some imposter in his place- although he couldn't imagine the imposter having too hard a time there either, saving his brother the trouble of taking him out. "i guess," was all he said.

Despite how relaxed he might seem on the outside, the truth was that even as he walked past Papyrus into the kitchen he was still waiting for something. Every couple of seconds he would breathe and realize the tightness in his chest, reminding him of the anticipation, and there was no way to truly relax. Papyrus was saying little to him, just standing there and watching, alternating between cheer and that anxious, grimacing expression. As if he thought Sans didn't notice his discomfort.

Sans silently took a carton of orange juice and carried it back into the living room.

Previously when he was drinking from these, he had used a glass because he figured it was something his other self would do. ..As it turned out, the other Sans also drank straight from the carton, but Papyrus was ecstatic to see him using a cup instead, so it worked out anyway. This time Sans didn't bother, uncorking the carton and taking several long swigs. He didn't hear any objections from his new brother while he gulped it down, so he supposed the glass-using period of his time here had fortunately come to an end.

When he finished, he wiped his mouth and grinned meagerly over at Papyrus. If this guy wasn't going to say anything, beads of sweat going down his skull, then maybe Sans would have to do that. "aha," he started, huffing and and poking a claw into the carton. "well boss, i'll be honest."

His pupils flickered and faded away, leaving black sockets. Papyrus stiffened.

"i really, really did not want you to find out."

With that, he took another gulp of orange juice. It wasn't half bad, this magic human drink. It felt a little heavy, taking several seconds longer than usual to turn into magic matter, but it tasted great. He was feeling it swish in his skull when Papyrus finally replied to him. "BUT DON'T YOU FEEL BETTER NOT HAVING TO KEEP IT A SECRET ANYMORE??"

"not really."

"OH. MAYBE YOU JUST NEED TO GET MORE THINGS OFF YOUR CHEST!" He took a quick look around the room and added, "LIKE WHERE YOU'VE HIDDEN SANS, FOR INSTANCE!"

How transparent. "nope, can't tell you that," he said, picking unconsciously at the carton with his claws. "you'll have to make do with me."

"BUT WHY NOT?"

He couldn't believe he was having to explain this to him, the fool looking completely earnest as he stood with his hands clasped together. Eyes returning, he said, "because if i tell you where he is, then i'll have no choice but to go back to where i came from. and i am not ever, ever doing that," with a bit of a growl in his voice, he added, "as i already told the human."

"BUT WHY??"

"why?" Now his pulse quickened and he jerked up, glaring. What part was he questioning? Was he going to have to explain himself? That alone made his breath a little shorter. "-what do you mean, why?"

Papyrus paused, putting a hand to his jawline, and then continued on in that same unruffled speech, "I WILL EXPLAIN IT SLOWER FOR YOU." He ignored Sans' irritated expression, or perhaps didn't even see it. "YOU ARE A SANS, RIGHT? EVEN IF YOU LOOK... DIFFERENT AND YOU ACT... DIFFERENT FROM MY SANS."

Not what he expected. "... yeah." Sans started drinking again.

"WELL, IF YOU'RE ANOTHER SANS THEN THERE MUST BE ANOTHER PAPYRUS AROUND THERE SOMEWHERE TOO, RIGHT?" Now Sans started choking, and Papyrus' eye sockets widened. "I'M RIGHT, AREN'T I??"

"fuck off," was all he was able to sputter out, orange juice seeping through his teeth.

But the skeleton in a ridiculous costume refused to be daunted, apparently even by his swearing, "THERE MUST BE!! IT'S IMPOSSIBLE FOR THERE TO BE JUST ONE OF US! SO... if.. IF YOU HAVE A BROTHER, THEN HE MUST BE MISSING YOU RIGHT NOW JUST AS MUCH AS I MISS MY-"

But his proclamation was cut off by Sans' own flat and sardonic laughter, wiping the juice off his skull with his hoodie sleeve. "i can guarantee you that is not true."

"BUT HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT???"

The only thing that kept Sans from snapping from the frustration was that dumb, oblivious look on Papyrus' face, marred by a disturbed quirk of his eyebrow. Both his brothers were so easy to read. Sans counted from ten, rubbing his hands on his face. "well, i'll explain it slower for you."

Immediately Papyrus was shaking his head, "NO, THAT'S OKAY, I HAVE A SHARP WIT!"

"sure thing boss," he sneered. The disturbed quirk returned, and he took a slow breath. "okay, uh... do you see this gold tooth?" The gold tooth he now tapped; he'd worn it for a while now, and the thing was treated by everyone as if he had always had it. Just another obnoxious part of his appearance. But the truth was it had only been "installed" in his mouth less than two months ago.

Papyrus nodded, "YES, I SEE IT!"

"good. this tooth..." his voice trailed off, as the raw memory came back into his mind. His eyes narrowed, and changed; Papyrus took a step back, seeing his left eye flashing red so suddenly. Scowling, Sans finished and glared with that red eye. "i got this tooth because of 'my papyrus,' you see?"

There was sputtering, likely at the sight of the eye. But then, "WOWIE! HE GAVE YOU A GOLD TOOTH?"

"wha- no!" Rage flared, but he's not so weak as to lose control to rage, even given what already happened. "-i mean yes, but no. i mean he knocked my tooth out." Honestly, it was a miracle that hadn't happened sooner. But maybe his Papyrus had been waiting these last few years of beatings, waiting for a special occasion to do irreparable harm; surely, being made a Royal Guardsman was a very special occasion. Sans smiled bitterly. "knocked it right the fuck out."

"OH-" There it was. An awkwardness, a halting of his speech. And then, just as quickly, the other skeleton bounced back. "-BUT NOW YOU HAVE A COOL GOLD ONE!"

It was juvenile, and it was a lie, but Sans hissed, "i wanted it to be silver."

That shut him up, until finally he said, "BUT..." For a moment, Sans expected more to come after it. There did, in the form of another, "BUT-..." Papyrus touched a gloved hand to his mouth in thought. His expression continued darkening, brows furrowing, eyes searching for an answer on his fingertips. Sans, by contrast, took in his troubled posture with disbelief, his own brows raising. "...WHY WOULD HE DO THAT??"

Some twisted sensation went beating through his chest, and to push it away Sans scoffed, albeit weakly. "... cuz, he can't stand me. that's how it's always been."

"I DON'T BELIEVE THAT!!"

A pause. Then Sans bared his already bare teeth, "yeah? why don't you?"

"BECAUSE IF HE'S REALLY ANOTHER ME-"

"yeah, yeah, i get it," he cut in, and Papyrus put his hands on his hips with a frown. Sans shrugged, "you can stand your sans. i'd wager that you can even enjoy having him around, if you wanted to. but my bro isn't really like you. he's, uh. well. pointier."

He finished off the carton in his hands and considered another while Papyrus went on protesting, eyesockets getting big. "THAT'S TERRIBLE! I THINK THAT-... CLEARLY THIS OTHER PAPYRUS IS NOT AS GREAT AS THE TRUE GREAT PAPYRUS, AND HIS INADEQUACY HAS CAUSED HIM TO ACT OUT. IT'S NOT NATURAL FOR BROTHERS NOT TO CARE ABOUT EACH OTHER!"

"whatever you say, boss."

"THAT'S THE SPIRIT, POINTY SANS!" A second of cheer was interrupted by more thoughts; Sans wondered the precise speed at which Papyrus- any Papyrus, really- could think. With those big eyesockets he had begun staring at Sans again, and not for the first time he wished that he hadn't found out so that he wouldn't look at him like that.

Sans shrugged it off, tossing the juice carton into the trash for an excuse to turn away from that face. "well, nothing you can do about it, buddy. now you know."

"...MAYBE I COULD COME WITH YOU WHEN YOU GO BACK!!"

Now he froze and whirled back around, his own eyesockets wide. "say what?"

"YEAH! I CAN TALK TO YOUR BROTHER FOR YOU!" Papyrus took a step forward, pumping a fist, and Sans nearly choked. "AND... UH... YOU COULD GIVE ME MINE AFTERWARDS!"

"that's a terrible idea," he snapped, and before Papyrus could say anything else he added, "because that assumes that I even want to go see that son of a bitch again. and i don't."

This time there was no input from his taller, more cheerful, stupid new brother. He was wringing his hands now, surprisingly at a loss for words from Sans' proclamation. Sans grimaced at him, huffing for a little more air. "...couldn't even if i wanted to, anyway. there's no way back from here."

The face looking at him now was also something of a grimace. "REALLY? WHY'S THAT?"

"none of your business," he grumbled, starting to sweat again. "so, uh, if you want to kick me out, now, that's fine. it's been lots of fun." Another weak sneer. "but i'm just saying, you're not gonna see the other sans again just by doing that."

But Papyrus waved his hands at him, shaking his head, "NO, NO. I DON'T WANT TO KICK YOU OUT."

"... you don't?"

"LISTEN TO ME, POINTIER SANS," Papyrus said, crossing the distance between them and laying a hand on his skull. "I KNOW THAT YOU MUST HAVE HAD A HARD TIME ON YOUR OWN WITHOUT A PROPER PAPYRUS TO HELP YOU."

"do not touch me."

"BUT THAT'S WHY JUST THROWING YOU OUT WOULD BE WRONG! YOU SEE, I'VE DONE A LOT TO HELP MY BROTHER, SINCE HE'S ALSO LAZY AND IRRESPONSIBLE LIKE YOU ARE. BUT WE BOTH TRY EVERYDAY AND HE'S BEEN GIVING IT ALMOST 30% LATELY, WITH MY HELP!"

Sans looked upon Papyrus helplessly, brushing his hand off. "... are you mocking me?"

"OF COURSE NOT!" He patted Sans on the skull, not noticing how he flinched at each touch, before retracting his hand. "I MEAN THAT I CAN HELP YOU TOO, IF YOU WANT! AS LONG AS YOU TRY, I'M SURE YOU'LL BECOME A MODEL CITIZEN AS WELL!"

This was not what he expected when he realized that Papyrus had found out. Shrinking in posture, he backed up a few steps and avoided looking him in the eyesockets, his mouth of locked together teeth still put in a twisted grimace. At this point, even his own brother would've kicked him out. But at the same time, he didn't know what "turning him into a model citizen" would entail. He didn't think that this one used the punching and kicking method, but... "uhh." Apparently he couldn't speak very well right now, but at some point- once he had his voice together- he'd have to make sure that Papyrus didn't go blabbing, like the human.

While he was having these dashed and anxious thoughts, he heard more talking from his less violent brother. "BUT... UM... WHILE WE'RE ON THIS SUBJECT, I WANTED TO ASK YOU SOMETHING."

"ask me what?" Sans felt that if this went on too much longer, he could actually start wheezing.

As was becoming usual for him in their conversation, Papyrus looked a mix of unease and fake cheer. "IF YOU CAN'T BRING SANS BACK, COULD YOU AT LEAST, UM, TELL ME IF HE'S ALRIGHT?"

Was he alright? There wasn't a good, honest answer to that question. He hadn't been thinking about it at the moment that they switched, but his world was surely much harder to stay alive in than this one. Sans shifted uncomfortably. Without any means to look in on that world, unable to get into the shed and ignoring his brother's phone calls, there were a number of ways that this Sans might have died and he wouldn't know about any of them. The worst-case scenario was that, worse than being dead, he might've already been erased from existence- if his theories were correct about that kid.

So Sans swallowed and said hoarsely, "yeah. uh. he's probably fine."

Then he, for the first time, saw resolve on Papyrus' face- and yet, didn't know what this resolve was for. "THEN..." He was sweating too much, the rate of his heartbeat rising, watching such an expression. "... FOR NOW, THAT WILL HAVE TO BE ENOUGH."

Luckily, while indoors he didn't notice someone toying with the lock on his shed with trembling yellow fingers. Now that it was morning, now that the rain was gone, it was much easier for her to focus on the task at hand. Alphys studied the key in her hands for only a brief moment before using it to unlock the door, taking a deep breath.

When she was inside it would be even harder for him to notice, for as soon as she was inside the small little lab, Alphys closed and locked the door behind her with that small silver key. She took several deep, shuddering breaths, mumbling to herself, "Y-you can do this, you c-c-can do this, y-you can do this... I-i-it's for Sans, you can do this." So repeating the mantra to herself, until even the stuttering disappeared, she walked into the lab and explored the drawers built into the counter.

Everything in the lab, in contrast to San's room, was put away neatly and organized. There were no scraps of paper or junk on any of the surfaces, will save for a single blueprint on the counter and a tall rectangular shape covered in the blanket in the corner. It was the blueprint that she concerned herself with initially, and after that with a trembling hand Alphys pulled the blanket off of the machine, to study in conjunction with it.

"Oh w-wow..." She breathed, looking over the contraption in front of her. A little bit like a phone booth attached to an engine and a complex keypad, but anyone with the blueprints in their hands like Alphys could probably tell that it was so much more complicated on the inside. On the front was printed the word "TIME" in big silver letters, just above the doors for the booth. Alphys took a gulp of breath as the blanket crumpled to the floor in her hands. "W-w-wow, I didn't think that he had gotten this far without me..."

She looked back at the blueprints, comparing them to the machine, looking over the wiring and Sans'scribbled notes. Then, again trembling, she pushed a small power switch on the front of the engine. Nothing happened, and Alphys sighed. "Y-yeah, didn't think he'd... g-g-gotten it working yet."

Her search wasn't over yet, and rifling through the drawers she murmured again to herself, "Can't let myself... get distracted..." Surely she didn't have an awful lot of time. "Ah, darn it Sans... wh-where did you go?"

Next Chapter: The Many Worlds Theory

Chapter Text

In the late morning, when the sun had been up for a few hours, there came a knock on the door that neither of them were expecting; rubbing her tired eyes and munching on what was left of her cereal bar, Frisk called out to Toriel that she would answer it.

But when she made it to the door, her hand stopped a few inches from the knob. She bit her lip, thinking of last night, and tried to check in the peephole. Unfortunately, it was too high for her. The child jumped up and down several times trying to align her eye with the little glass window, but couldn't see anything even when she thought she could see into it.

"Frisk, are you going to get the door?"

There was another knock; Frisk' back felt tight as she called back, "Yeah, just a second!"

When she turned the knob, someone pushed the door in lightly from the other side; Frisk gulped and stepped back to avoid getting nudged. When that was out of the way, her eyes proved right that sense of foreboding in her gut and the blood drained out of her face. Standing on Toriel's doorstep was Red Sans, wearing a big grin and sweating.

At the very least, his eyes also widened with surprise. "dude, it's like 10:00am. the hell are you doing at home?"

"Oh... school... got cancelled," she said, hand latching onto the door and gripping it hard. He was wearing a fluffy blue coat that looked too warm for summer; maybe that was why he was sweating today. "Too many kids called in sick."

"that's a shame," Red Sans murmured back, glancing around Frisk's shoulder. Then his gaze turned to the kid proper and he laughed, "what's with that face, twerp? wanna hear a joke?"

"No-"

Giving a huge grin, Red Sans took a quick look over her shoulder again and then went on, "what did the blind, deaf, mute quadraplegic boy get for his birthday?"

Frisk bit the inside of her cheek. "What did he get?"

In a voice tense with anticipation, Red Sans said, "cancer." The look on her face must have told him immediately what she thought of the punchline, because it was followed up by his howling laughter. "ahahahahahahahahaha it's just a joke, come on!"

"Darling, who is at the door?"

Red Sans remained silent, and sweaty, while the child turned back in the direction of Toriel's voice. Gulping and taking a deep breath, she called back, "It's... ... Sans, Tori."

"Oh! Let him in, then."

Frisk didn't budge, though, continuing to stare at him with a pale face. Red Sans looked back coolly, not making a move to push, drag, or strike her like he did some hours ago. So, slowly, without saying any words, she stepped back to let him inside. She closed the door behind him and yawned hard.

"she's alright with you having friends over?" The terrible monster asked, the tone mocking to her suspicious ears.

But she just nodded weakly. "Not grounded... after last night."

Grin turning sheepish, Red Sans rubbed his skull. "yeah?" He raised his voice and called into the living room, "how's it goin', tori?"

"Oh, it is going well." Came a call back. "I am just catching up on grading papers, now that I am free for the day."

Red Sans looked to Frisk expectantly. "grading papers?"

"... She's the teacher," the child uttered, and Red Sans barked a laugh. Frowning, she spoke in a lower voice that Toriel hopefully couldn't hear in the slightest, "What do you think you're doing here?"

As if last night had never happened, he shrugged back at her. "hey relax, pipsqueak. i'm not here to hurt ya."

But she refused to be fooled. "Then what are you here for?" She hissed. Her eyes then widened, "What did you do to Papyrus!?"

"he's dead, obviously," he said, and Frisk's throat closed up. Red Sans began laughing even harder than before when she choked vowels aloud, "AHAHAHAHAHAHoh my god kid calm down he's fineahahahaha-"

"Now what is so funny?" Toriel called to them both.

No; if she said it was a normal, or even bad joke, then her adoptive mother would come over to hear it for sure. Frisk screwed her eyes shut and, flashing them open, directed her hardest glare at Red Sans- Red Sans still stifling laughter. "Nothing, Mom!"

The huge grin was still on his face, but finally Red Sans seemed interested in speaking seriously, after looking around Frisk's shoulder again. "okay listen," he cleared his throat, face returning to his normal menacing smile, and she stiffened. "i actually was wondering, if you've got nothing else to do, uh... is it too late for that date thing you asked me on?"

"...What?" Some of her suspicion, and some of her tiredness too, while she was at it, ducked below the surface of her surprise.

"what you mean 'what'?"

Frisk quickly shook her head, "I mean- what?" Was this just a trick to get her into a secluded location? "Why are you agreeing to this all of a sudden?"

He rolled his shoulders, shooting another glance towards the living room- she followed it, wondering if Toriel was coming to greet them, but didn't see anything noteworthy. "don't you remember? i already agreed to it. literally a couple hours ago."

"But that was before Papyrus found out-"

"yeah, yeah, i know, i got a little peeved." He waved his hand at her dismissively, and the child's nostrils flared. "big deal. i'm not mad anymore. so, uh, lemme make that up to you, okay?"

Frisk still glared at him; at the same time, he sounded genuine enough- considering it was him. Not to mention that he was getting all sweaty again. And she had a lot to gain from going up there.

So the child half turned and yelled, "Mom! Sans wants to take me to Mt. Ebott today!"

Red Sans smiled at her with huff of relief, pulling a bottle of spicy mustard out of his coat pocket and drinking it, somehow, through his teeth. With his white normal eyes, the smile almost looked friendly to Frisk. Meanwhile from the living room, there was the scrape of paper against paper while Toriel stood up. "Mt. Ebott? That is a long trip, is he prepared for it?"

"don't worry tori, i brought lots of food-" Red Sans insisted, when Toriel appeared in the doorway to regard them both with warm eyes. He choked a little on the mustard and cleared his throat, "uh, uh, wouldn't do to let a kid starve, y'know?"

"Indeed." Her adoptive mother, in a newly laundered set of robes, leaned against the doorway into the living room and slowly studied Red Sans. "I like your new coat, by the way."

"uh. thanks."

The way that he looked at Toriel made Frisk want to be physically ill, or so she thought while she was wringing the hem of her sweater and trying to keep a disgusted grimace off her face. "Yeah mom we'll be just fine," she said, trying not to speak through gritted teeth. "And I know you're busy and all, so can we just go?"

"Oh, you are in such a hurry," she laughed, ruffling the child's hair. "I suppose if it is so far away... it would be good to get a head start. Please promise me you will keep them from harm, Sans."

Luckily she didn't notice Frisk staring daggers at Sans as he said, "... uh, yeah, i, uh, i promise."

Soon the door creaked shut behind the two of them, the sun shining brightly that morning. Frisk looked back at the building and then shook her head, stepping after Red Sans. "She's always acting so weird."

"she's stressed out," he said back, squeezing more mustard into his mouth. The condiment didn't seem to impede his speech at all. "give her a break, brat."

If he could just stop calling her a brat, that would be great. Frisk held her hands behind her back. "If you say so."

"as a matter of fact, i do," he grunted, putting the mustard away. "majority of your class gets sick, that's cause for concern. i bet you haven't asked her once how she's feeling."

It would also be stressful to find out one of your friends was replaced by his evil twin and is probably dead by now but you told me not to talk about that. The child rolled her eyes and said in a sullen voice, "My Sans doesn't lecture me. And you haven't asked her either."

"maybe i will later." He stopped, taking a look around, and Frisk did the same. No other monsters sprang immediately to their vision. "well, if you still want to do this, whaddya say we take a shortcut to our destination?" He held out on clawed hand to the child.

She accepted it, albeit with knotted nerves. "It's better than a bus ride, I guess."

The moment she took his hand, Red Sans' eye flashed and the world distorted around them. Air fled to fill the space their bodies left behind, as they disappeared from New New Home altogether. Instead, they shoved air aside as they immediately took up space in the entrance cavern within Mt. Ebott, Frisk falling to her knees and letting waves of dizziness roll off her from the jarring transition. It was how she expected to feel when her particles were picked up and placed somewhere else with no journeying in-between.

While she resisted retching, Red Sans beside her chuckled. "get a stronger stomach, twerp."

She did her best to ignore him, getting used to his teasing by now. Picking herself off the ground, Frisk took in their dark surroundings as her eyes adjusted. The same cave with the unintelligible words etched onto the walls, the floor littered with ever more scraps of underbrush blown in by the mountain wind. There was a whistling from somewhere while it blew through the holes in the ceiling, taking her back a long time for a second. "...Oh, this place again?"

Red Sans shrugged. "it's the only place i know on this mountain. it'd be irresponsible to shoot for anything else."

"You're supposed to take someone somewhere special when you're on a date," the child remarked, crossing her arms. "How about I show you where that is?"

Red Sans didn't answer at first, grinning, but when Frisk turned and experimentally walked to the exit he followed after her. "what, did you also take that dating rulebook out of the library?"

"I just have a good memory. I've dated before." She resisted asking him why he had done that too.

The outside was indeed windy today, and she was grateful for her sweater as always. The grassy slopes of Mt. Ebott changed color every minute as the wind took the blades and flowers in every other direction, summer pollen drifting through the air. It was always loveliest on the top, when blossoming nature could be seen for miles around. And on the very top, where it sometimes got cold enough to snow- especially since the cold-climate monsters had moved there- was also located the town of Snowdout.

It wasn't Snowdout, and it wasn't the top of the mountain, that Frisk was hiking to, however. It was, however, farther up than around the base of Mt. Ebott where the cave was located. Her aim was the ledge where she had first come out of the Underground, which was on the other end of the mountain, on the second hill sprouting from the base, and it obviously quite a climb. It had taken her a long time to get to that point from the cavern when she was actually in the Underground, although granted there were a lot more obstacles in her way. Were she not held back by anything, it would have taken only a couple hours. And presumably she wouldn't take hours to get to the ledge on the outside.

Although it wasn't long before she heard Red Sans huffing and had to stop, the monster sweating and breathing funny. "why does it have to be so far?"

"It might go easier if you weren't wearing that heavy coat," she called, walking back to where he had lagged behind.

"screw you," Red Sans said with a manic smile, "this coat is my something nice."

She blinked, "Your what?"

"yeah," he pulled out a familiar little book that had Dating 101 printed on the front, flipping through the pages. "step three: put on nice clothes to show you care. and i'm sure you know, new clothes are nice clothes. hence," he slammed the book shut and exhaled sharply, stashing it away in his pocket, "this new coat is my nice clothes."

"Oh!"

The mistake she made in this situation had suddenly become apparent to her. Hurriedly, Frisk took off her locket.

You equip the faded ribbon.

"Now I'm wearing nice clothes too."

"hah," was all he said, lazily winking in her direction. "you look like a dork."

Something did occur to her, though, while she stuck her tongue out at the skeleton monster. "... But you didn't know that I was ungrounded until I told you, and you already had the nice clothes on. So how did you know...?"

Red Sans' smile became a little frozen. "huh? ...you wanna know why i was already wearing dating clothes?"

Frisk nodded.

"uh... how about you take me to this place instead of asking dumb questions?"

On the ledge of Mt. Ebott, everything this side of the mountain was plain to see. The dense, lush forests that covered almost every space in sight, the fields of yellow flowers that peppered even the few meager free spaces, and the village that lay a short walk from the base of the mountain (taken over by the froggits.) Farther out one could see a coastline in the far distance, the water lit up by the rising sun. On either side of the coastline, a second mountain and the skyscrapered human city that Frisk once came from. Everything was washed in a blue morning hue, and in the evening it would turn gold with the setting sun.

The climb up didn't bother her if only because of the sights themselves. Next to that human city was a rather new sight of New New Home, rising bit by bit each day. The progress that the monsters had made to relocate their capital, all in in just about a month, was amazing.

Red Sans had stopped complaining at some point and just stood next to the child, catching his breath.

"hahh... hahh..." He looked over the whole landscape and then closed his eyes. "imagine stargazing from here."

"I like it too." Frisk sat down, swinging her legs over the edge, and just enjoyed the wind cooling the sweat from her face. Not far behind them was the entrance into Asgore's castle, one of her easier places to reach SAVE points. Still, for now the child didn't mind staying where she was. She hadn't died once over the past several days, and it didn't feel like she was going to right now either.

Nothing interrupted the stillness on the mountain, not even Red Sans making another horrible joke. Instead, he was also overlooking everything without moving a muscle. "i'm jealous," he said finally, quietly, like it was to himself. "nowhere in my world is there a view this nice."

The difference in how he was acting today was remarkable, when only last night she had seen a terrifying side of this Sans that yet lingered in her mind. She yawned and turned her head and gaze in his direction, until his eyes flickered to look at hers. Cautiously, Frisk ventured, "You keep saying stuff like that. 'In your world' this, 'this version' of that. What does it mean?"

"i have a feeling if i tell you, you won't keep it a secret," he snapped.

She clasped her hands together, eyes wide. "Pleeeeaasse?" Red Sans heaved an aggravated sigh, and she could only hope that the good mood he was in would be enough for her to get a proper answer. "Please... ?" This Sans, she had noticed, talked a lot more than her own.

Sure enough, he rolled his shoulders again and uttered, "eh. why not. kind of told papyrus already, anyway." The brow ridge of his skull raised as he surveyed her eager face. "i don't think that you'll understand all of it, though."

"That's okay," Frisk said, easing around and sitting crosslegged in front of him.

He snorted, easing tension from his stance. "okay kiddo, pay attention because i'm gonna give you a little quantum mechanics lesson."

You buckle in for a lot of words that make no sense.

He cleared his throat once, and then, twice, glancing down at his feet and back. "the basic measurement of the quantum state of a system, so far as quantum mechanics is concerned, is the wavefunction. uh," he scratched his head, grinning sheepishly, "i only saw that explained in one textbook before, but supposedly the one who posited that was some human named werner heisenberg in 1927. it's basically that you can take any portion of the universe, big or small, to put under analysis. The wavefunction is kind of a description of that portion being analyzed, a description of every possible eigenst-

"...to put it in simpler terms," he restarted after a moment, catching Frisk's already glassy eyes, "let's use you and me on this ledge together."

Frisk stood, brushing dirt off her pants. "Okay. We're on a ledge."

"there are many, many ways that this kind of encounter can go," he gestured to their surroundings. "for instance, i could walk right up to you and push you over the ledge. or i could throw a stone at you. i could also decide to use a magic attack on you, all various ways of bumping you off once and for all."

"...um..." Frisk reached a hand into her hair, preparing to unequip the faded ribbon and put on the much stronger locket again.

"but," he went on, as though oblivious, "it's equally true that i could do nothing at all, or that something else could take you out. these are all possibilities of this single measured moment, and there are countless more. you don't know which one will occur, so technically they're all possible. the superimposition, the collective of all these possibilities at once, that's a little like the wavefunction."

There was a pause, then, while Red Sans opened his eyes again and studied Frisk. "uh, are you with me so far?"

"I could die a whole lot of ways right now," Frisk repeated as she sidestepped away from him.

He snickered, "yes but to be fair, i could die in a lot of ways too. we'd, uh, we'd be here all day if we listed every single possibility. but the wavefunction lists every single one, in a way. human scientists determined that this was only true of a quantum state that was being unobserved. they say that once observed that wave function collapses, and then only one possibility remains of the multiple that we just discussed. like you not dying, that becomes the only possibility since, uh, it's the one we observe happening right now.

"see?" More breathless laughter at the bewildered, vaguely frightened expression on the girl's face. "therefore you're just fine."

"...Right."

"but that's complete bullshit," he hissed, and Frisk stiffened.

The fur lining the hood of his coat seem to fluff out as he spoke, Red Sans' toothy smile wide and white pupils big in his sockets with his excitement. "that's what this human proposed, this guy named hugh everett. the wave function collapse is bullshit. you are dead. right now, you just died."

"I don't feel like I died" Frisk whispered, taking another step back. Her heart was pounding.

"not here you didn't. y'see, everett proposes that instead of the wavefunction collapsing on observation, all possibilities in a quantum state become actualities, all at once. but in doing so, each possibility splits into another reality. each possibility is resolved by the universe splitting apart into a parallel world.

"so to go back to our example," he took out the bottle of mustard and drank as he spoke, and Frisk trembled with a nervous smile on her face. "right here and now i made a decision. a decision not to kill ya. but i could have decided to kill you a second earlier. in making that decision, the universe split. there must exist a world where i did make that decision to kill you. it's the same for you. every decision you make, every move that this world makes, splits the universe off into worlds where something different happened in its place, hell, so many worlds you can't even care about any of 'em unless you're in one.

"...something like that." Red Sans swallowed, seeming to calm down some, and looked earnestly at the child. "uh, did i lose you, kid? i tend to ramble if nobody stops me. to be honest, this is the longest i've talked about this stuff without the boss telling me to shut up."

Honestly, her head hurt, and it took a moment to realize that he didn't mean he was going to kill her. Decisions create different worlds. Somehow? Frisk rubbed her temple to combat the ache. Slowly, she said, "So you mean, you... come from... a similar world where someone made... a different decision than in here?"

"heheheh, you're pretty smart." She smiled at him, and yet he shook his head. "it's more like, in my world, multiple different decisions were made. y'see if it was just one decision, i'd be a lot more like your sans. but as it is, my world is pretty far removed from yours."

Like cousins who are twice removed? Not that she knew that phrase either. But she did miss the normal Sans. Frisk sat back down, rubbing her forearms. "So what's it like over there, in your world?"

"... of course if you prescribe to the theory of the butterfly effect, and taking into account this is the only world my machine picked up on..."

"Red Sans!"

His eyes flickered again. "uh? fuck, you called me that before didn't you?"

Face turning red herself, Frisk covered her mouth in the collar of her sweater. "I asked what it was like in your world."

The eager expression Red Sans was wearing faded, and he shrugged gruffly. "what do you think it's like? kid, look at the differences between me and your sans. then put those differences on everything else in this place, and you'll get what mine is like."

"No wonder you left," she mused into her collar.

"now you're catching on."

She didn't know where to look after hearing that. But the first thing that she thought of was her own Sans; if this one came from another world altogether, did that mean that he put his parallel world self in this place? Meaning that Sans was trapped in a horrible world as they spoke. Sans with his 1 HP and 1 DF. She was very glad that she already had Alphys on her side; this would be useful information for her, right? The child stood up. "But, um, even if it's different, there are a lot of things in your world that are like this one, right?"

"i guess." He'd spilled a drop of mustard on the coat and was distractedly trying to scratch it off, bottle set by his feet.

Frisk glanced towards the former site of the Barrier, the entrance into the underground and Asgore's castle. She had to get into there. But she was also curious, if he came from a completely separate world, and now looked over at him with as neutral an expression as she could manage. "Is there another Frisk there too, where you came from?"

Red Sans stopped moving, not looking at her. He finally said, "...they're... a thing, yeah."

"Are you guys friends too?"

His pupils flickered, growing faint, and she wondered if they would blink out entirely. "friends? ...something like that."

She grasped her hands behind her back again, innocently staring at him. "Then how come you left them behind?"

The flashing red eye appeared abruptly, moving in her direction, but he didn't budge. Frisk's breath caught in her lungs; his good mood from earlier looked to have evaporated, and she wondered what exactly was the deal with her other self. She couldn't be that bad, could she?

But then a moment passed, and he smiled big with his sharp teeth. "haha. cuz i'm a bad friend."

"-And what does that mean for me?" The child felt a chill and her arms rose with goosebumps, frowning hard.

"relax twerp, you two are... completely different. and i can adapt to a less- as you keep saying- pointy reality, if i have to." He dug into his pocket and brought out a hot cat, smothered with mustard. "for instance, how about an early lunch on me?"

There was no telling what kind of trick this was. Red Sans looked genuine but he did just admit to being a bad friend. Heck, even her Sans wasn't above hot sauce on a hot dog. Frisk took a deep breath, "Actually, you mind if I, uh, excuse myself for a minute?" Her eyes went to the entrance of the underground, and so did his. "I need to, uh, go to the bathroom."

"... like i told you before, I'm not an idiot, pipsqueak," said the monster in response. "why would you even need to take a bath right now?"

"What? No, it's so that I can-" Face flushing, she abruptly gave up and just said, "I mean you're welcome to follow me but I'm sure you don't want to."

The grimace that he was giving her looked particularly puzzled, but then the white pupils in his eyes lit with understanding. "oh, i get it. you wanna SAVE, right?" Her breath caught, and he chuckled, "my frisk was, uh, they were also touchy about that for some reason. s'okay, i don't care. in fact, i got my own little theory about SAVE-ing."

He smiled menacingly. "wanna hear it?"

Taking the hot cat he offered, Frisk nodded.

Next Chapter: Theorizing to the Tune of Metal Crusher

Chapter Text

The child didn't have a lot of time to stew in her suspicions, watching Blue Sans pour over the notes of his other self. All she could do for a moment was study Alphys' face, not liking the nervous smiles and the way that she anxiously kept fiddling with her fingers. ...The way she kept mumbling into the floor, or the way that she would sometimes look over her own shoulder as if expecting someone else to appear. She didn't know if Blue Sans could tell either- although she would hope that he could, given how much he was able to read her own mind at times- but if he did notice, he certainly wasn't showing it. He was more interested in discussing the inner workings of that world-jumping machine, which she supposed she couldn't find fault with.

Must be nice to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

A thought occurred to her, not an intrusive one but uncomfortable nonetheless. When he goes home, will Sans...?

Frisk stood up and wandered to the other end of the lab, where a stack of TV Dinners and more of that "X Lemonade" was located. There was no microwave downstairs, and half of the dinners were partially frozen, but it didn't matter; she peeled back the film and examined the cold contents.

It was grilled chicken and mashed potatoes, the potatoes molded into the shape of snarling face like it was for babies who liked dinosaurs. Mashed potatoes, or maybe they were more accurately called masher potatoes. Ignoring the chicken for a moment, she scooped it out with her fingers and started eating, filling her mouth with the cold, lumpy food until it crumbled. She had a suspicion that there were peas mixed into it, and she half-wanted to spit them out, but she kept eating. The chicken was more tolerable, although with each bite she could taste the ice lining it.

Alphys' harsh, obnoxious voice hit her ears from behind and she ignored it. "What are you doing?! Humans are literal barbarians I swear to god."

Frisk ripped off the film from the chicken pot pie TV dinner and began to eat that with her fingers too, scooping out vegetables and meat and breaking off pie pieces. Yeah, she thought bitterly, glancing at a comic book from the nineties, that's why you have human stuff all over your lab. Barbarian fetishist, that's what you are. A word that Sans taught her.

That thought aside, she did feel barbaric, and not in a good way. After all, it was really weird to eat everything cold. And yet it wasn't long before she was done with the chicken pot pie and searching through the pile for something else.

She wondered for a second why Alphys wasn't coming over to stop her, despite repeatedly calling for the child to leave her food alone.

But then she wondered, as she started eating a frigid brownie, why Blue Sans had stopped talking to Alphys altogether, uttering, "uh, kid," behind her back.

She been so busy eating that she didn't hear anything else until it was directly behind her. Now the human paid the price.

Four clawed hands dragged her screaming into the air.

Her intrusive thoughts knew what was going on faster than she did.

Mettaton Ex – 16 ATK, 4 DF

A Killer Robot in its strongest form.

It was true that he didn't actually trust this version of Alphys, and noticed how increasingly nervous she was becoming while they talked. Mettaton arrived so fast, though, and this Frisk was so oblivious, that Sans found himself doing nothing again while a new threat arrived to cause problems for them both. Now there Frisk was, being held aloft, shrieking like an idiot as four sharp gloved hands were exchanging them between themselves.

It was almost enough to make him laugh, seeing that even Mettaton wasn't immune to the fashion statements of this other world; his elongated, spiked metal human body was a fashion statement to red, black and yellow. But his target wasn't the killer robot, at least not at first. He turned to Alphys, instead. "what do you think you're trying to pull?"

"I c-called in a little HELP to take out the trash," Alphys said, although she shrank under his withering gaze. "S-since I'm not a monster traitor who h-h-elps scum like this human and t-triggers innocent monsters..." Her teeth chattered. "-No offense."

His retort was cut off by a deep, mechanical voice, "Oh, no, did you summon me to interrupt something important, Alphy?" Sans glanced up at the two. Frisk was swinging their pan wildly and yelping each time they were tossed to a new hand, juggled like an orange by their new opponent. Mettaton, on the other hand, looked completely at ease as he smiled down at Sans. "Friendly reminder that I'm not an on-call butler."

"Forget about that! You're literally holding the human in your hands!"

"That's right!" Mettaton abruptly stopped his game of catch with himself, holding the child upside down by the ankle with one hand, arm outstretched so that he was out of range of their weapon. "Let's get a look at you, darling. You seem a lot scrappier than you were the last time we worked together."

Already exhausted, Frisk panted, staring at the metal man holding them prisoner. Their eyes flitted to where Sans was still standing and staring, and he saw them scowl at him- the only thing he could do back was shrug helplessly; at that, the child looked to the robot instead. "Met... atton?"

A tinny gasp rang out. "Oh!" He shook the child lightly, and they snarled. "You haven't seen me in this form yet, have you? I'm saving it for our little televised finale that you made us put on hiatus. So sorry to ruin the surprise! But now that it is ruined," he chuckled and gestured to the rest of his body with his free hands, "What do you think?"

Although recognizable to the Mettaton in Sans' own world, there were a lot of key differences- the main one being, of course, that his tacky pink was replaced by tacky red and, occasionally, tacky yellow. The cracked heart in his midsection was encased in what resembled a metal cage rather than a glass canister, one filled with honey-colored liquid. There were far more spikes welded on his body at every opportunity, even his teeth sharp as razors, making him rather resemble a deathtrap car. His bloodshot eyes were twice the number than usual, and the same went for his number of hands.

Immediately, Frisk stuck their tongue out at him. "I think it's ugly, like the rest of you."

Mettaton's smile slipped, and his voice got an octave lower. A touch sharper. "Somehow, I suspected that you were going to say that." He shook his hand, and Frisk again yelped. "Why so crabby, love? Do you somehow not enjoy being humiliated on live television?"

Alphys took several steps away from Sans, although Mettaton posed enough of a distraction for him while he watched for any sign of a real attack; this was just a prelude to another reset, more time lost. It would be easier to use his magic if the kid wasn't so close to the line of fire, when as it was they could be crushed in the instant it took for him to do serious damage.

Strangely, though, despite his anxiety for another tally to show up in that kid's burrow, he didn't see Mettaton doing harm yet, only playing with his catch. It was for that reason, though, that he doubted bluffing would be very effective either. There was no sign of fear or even the bluster shown by all the other monsters.

While Frisk was being shaken up and down their sweater slipped around their waist, exposing their bloodstained grey shirt; Sans caught sight of the brown corner of something else on their stomach. Mettaton seemed to notice it too, and his eyes flashed with delight. "My, my, what are you hiding under here?" Given no reply, he shot a free hand forward to probe their waist.

Frisk squealed. "Get back!"

His hand grasped something, and with a manic chuckle he pulled it out from under their sweater into plain view; attached to their waist with rubber bands and strings, this Frisk wore a long rectangular piece of cardboard under their sweater.

Scribbled in marker on the front was: temy ARMOR!

He released the cardboard, and it snapped back into place in an instant. "You clever rat, is this how you've survived all of our shows so far?"

"No, I survived them because you suck!"

"look, clearly you guys have some tension to sort out between you two," Sans said at last, and all heads turned in his direction. "but the kid's with me and i'm not really in a mood to deal with it. so if you could put 'em down-"

Alphys pushed her glasses up higher on he snout. "This isn't your problem anymore, other Sans."

"it actually kind of is."

At that, she snorted. "Why? You don't need the human anymore. And besides, this can be one of the ways you help m-" Although starting out confidently, her voice got weaker as she actually looked at Sans' face. "-Well look, maybe things are different w-w-where you live, but, here our freedom i-is important. you are literally telling us we aren't allowed to be free, so??" So saying, she clasped her hands together as though strengthening her resolve and snapped at Mettaton, "So go ahead and kill them already!"

But even as Frisk wriggled, teeth bared, Mettaton frowned. "What, you mean right now?"

"YeEes! Now! You've got the tools at your disposal!" She gestured to his own body, and Mettaton squinted with his lower eyes. Sans sighed; maybe if he fired directly at those arms over several angles at once, the shock would be enough to make him release the child and leave him open for further attacks.

"Fight me right side up, you coward!" Frisk screeched in the meantime, starting to swing their pan again as the robot regarded their little form.

Mettaton laughed, breathlessly. "I think that's something we want to catch on camera, don't you think?"

"Forget about the cameras!"

"We can't just forget about the cameras! Th-the- isn't the final confrontation between myself and this human supposed to be televised for the monster world to see?" Mettaton drew one arm over his face dramatically, moaning, "If I have to kill them right now and no one sees it..."

Alphys slapped her hands over her own face. "It doesn't matter," she cried. "We'll make a reenactment!"

"A reenactment doesn't get ratings."

"If you keep arguing they're just going to escape again!"

"Oh you don't know anything about show business, Alphy."

"Do you want me to make you look worse?" She snarled.

Then Sans understood, eyes widening, and in that same moment saw two opportunities. While Alphys was flinging her claws at Mettaton with that same snarl, and before Mettaton could respond, he grabbed the sleeve of her labcoat. "not to interrupt your murder thing twice now-"

She jerked immediately, as if he had just tried to brand her. "-Hey, friendly reminder- I don't want to make Mettaton kill you, but you can't th-threaten me like-"

"no, no." He cleared his not-throat, releasing her. "i was just thinking," he said, looking up at Frisk, "that if you were to kill this kid i might not get a chance to ask you about something later. so would you let me ask you now?"

Alphys swallowed and pushed up her glasses, "...Uh. Yes?"

Now Sans dug into his coat pocket, keeping one eye on Mettaton and his sharp talons. With a rumble, he brought out the wadded up letter and handed it to the lizard monster for inspection, "y'see i found one of 'my' letters to you at anti-Paps' place. it mentions some kind of theory... about the human. d'you think you could elaborate?"

Judging by the open shock and discomfort on her face, Sans guessed he was asking the right thing. "Y-you found that?"

"what's that look for?"

She snorted, "It's a dumb idea."

"Nonsense!" Mettaton crowed suddenly, startling them. "You love human theories just as much as I do, Alphy!"

Alphys turned beet-red. "-Shut up! Humans are gross human beings."

It worked well as a diversion, although there was one more hitch. With one toss and catch Mettaton had flipped Frisk upright, holding them by the back of their collar, and as they kicked at him they snapped, "What theory!? Who the hell cares about some dumb-"

The robot clamped two hands over their mouth, muffling their enraged voice. "Please, Alphy, continue. I know I'm interested. Especially if it has to do with this brat," the robot said, arms like vises and unaffected by Frisk's struggles.

Alphys' expression changed rapidly, from embarrassed to suspicious to understanding. "I-I guess it is something you should know. B-but, it's not my theory," she added, glancing sharply back Sans' way, "-and I don't know if it's true."

If it came from him, then it was true.

But Sans didn't say anything, just waiting and watching.

Alphys took several steps back, away from everyone, and cleared her throat. "W-well. Uh. It was a while ago, uh, I guess. A-about a week. Sans came to visit me to talk about the human... because he said he learned something new. Previously I- he- we- believed that they were using their Determination to travel back in time." As she spoke, Alphys glanced at Sans for any reaction, any confusion. She ignored Mettaton's widening eyes; Sans refused to give her anything, and she continued quickly, "Because of the irregularities we found... We assumed they had the ability for them to go back to a previous point in the timeline, to prevent dying each time. Or just when they felt like it," she added, glaring over at Frisk. "...And that this has been happening for who knows how long."

This ability was already obvious to Sans. It was the same way in his world; his own kid was a time traveler.

But if this was the prelude to his other self's theory, then what on earth was the theory?

"He found a new irregularity." Alphys looked away, sneered to herself, and then said, "This kid told him that... that their 'friend' remembered each timeline that they aborted."

What?

"...huh?"

"Mmph!" Frisk pulled their head through Mettaton's hands, although disturbingly putting the robot in a position to throttle them if he so desired, "Why is that such a big deal? Of course Flowey remembers everything! It's a good thing, too. Like I'd waste time telling him whatever shit I did each time I died."

Sans just shook his head, blinking his eyesockets. "flowey? flowey remembers?" He frowned hard at Frisk, who frowned blankly back. "...but he can't possibly be coming back with you each time you die."

"That's what Sans said!" Alphys exclaimed as Mettaton muffled the kid again, her crooked-toothed expression triumphant like she was in on a joke. But Sans felt cold in the pits of his bones, as if his marrow had frozen over. "How is that flower able to remember, if he isn't traveling back in time with this human?"

Frisk's expression, or what he could see of it, was one of utter confusion. Naturally; they might not understand what this meant, they might be too young or too quick to accept such things... but the riddle that this world's Toriel said went through Sans' head. How do you remember something that didn't happen?

His spine stiffened.

You can't.

"it's not time travel," Sans said, looking slowly back up to Alphys. "that's his theory, right?"

The stone-serious look on his face seemed to wash away the smug smile on her own, and even Mettaton was leaning in to listen; the only one in the room who wasn't somber was Frisk, who looked more bewildered than anything and had given up fighting for the moment. Although he didn't understand why they were looking so hard at him, when he wasn't the one with the theory.

It was Alphys they should be looking at. He definitely was looking at her.

She cleared her throat, grunted, and smoothed her dress. "He got more... annoying... the longer he talked about it, but yes. He said that he didn't think the human was going back in time at all. He said he thought that they were only- only wanting to go back, or something like that. But even with magic, going back in time is, is physically impossible. And so that want, it- it manifested as this ability, instead, which I guess to him is possible??? The human wants to go back, so they... make it like they have."

"'make it like they have'?"

She nodded. "He said it differently but whatever. It's basically... each time they die, this brat does- does things, I guess? Um? Things that make it like they- like it never happened. Like it's all how it was when they SAVED."

"Question." Mettaton absently picked at his teeth with a single free hand while he spoke. "What do you mean when you say 'SAVED'?"

Alphys twitched. "Look it up."

When he harrumphed, she went on, "Things like that, though, you see? All of our bodies changed to how they were hours, even days earlier, moved to where we were once standing. Objects rearranged and replaced, the dead brought back to life, our deeds undone, uh- important special edition videos rewound-" She snapped her eyes over at a stack of VCR tapes and back. "And finally our memories of the last 'timeline'... erased.

"Everyone and everything is returned to its previous state according to the template of a SAVE File. So perfect that to even our calculations it would look like someone messing with timelines, but in reality would only be an approximation of it." She heaved a breath, running out of voice. "According to him, that's the only way this human can 'go back in time' and yet have someone uninvolved, anyone, remember something that happened before; it's if that person slips through the cracks of the template.

"He said that's their real power," she finished in a croak, shivering unconsciously as she stared at Frisk over her glasses. The child had gone still. "To reconfigure the very world at a whim."

No one else said a word, and Alphys' proclamation unfurled into the tension between each of them, human and monster and robot. Somewhere on the second floor there was a sputtering noise from some machine, beeping and whirring. Alphys glanced up and swallowed worriedly, but nobody else moved and so neither did she, rubbing her claws together in quick agitated strokes.

Frisk had gone pale, almost as much as Sans' white skull.

"... ...You mean you've been cheating all this time!?" Said Mettaton at last, cutting Alphys off at a breath. He flung Frisk out into the air again, releasing them save for his one hand on their sweater collar. "Why that explains ev-'ry-thing!"

"Mettaton it's only a crazy-" Alphys began, scowling at him over her lenses, but he abruptly cut her off with a wave of one of his hands.

Instead, his four pairs of yellowed eyes were fixed on Frisk, smiling wide to reveal his sharp metallic canines. "No, no, I'm VERY curious now. Tell me, human: if our old Sans is telling the truth, then how many times have you died on my show, just to come back? Fifteen?" He shook the child. "Seventeen? Eighteen? Was it over nineteen? Oh, you little attention whore!"

The child still wasn't moving, but after a few moments of this prodding began to speak through gritted teeth, cheeks flushing. Quietly, Frisk said, "I lost count after seventy."

The glinting, manic smile froze to Mettaton's face. "S-seventy?" He laughed, loudly. "And you kept coming back that many times? Such determination, it's almost like it doesn't even matter if I kill you or not!" He sneered at Alphys, "Not much of a human hunter, am I?"

"Yeah, especially as you're not killing the human right now."

Mettaton sputtered, and Sans gathered magic into his hands with his eye on the robot- if necessary, he could even have his trusty "novelty cannons" bite that arm like dogs tended to do in commercials, and provided that it didn't just make Mettaton mad it could do the trick without a risk of hitting-

Knock, knock.

Everyone went quiet again.

No one went to get the door. But on the other side, there came a voice that was badly distorted by the metal material, "Dr. Alphys, are you home?"

Sans didn't have time to ask who it was before both Alphys and Mettaton nearly jumped out of their skin, the former crying out in a stage whisper, "King Asgore!" And her face breaking out in a sweat. "What is he- what is he- why is he-"

There was a soft yelp when Mettaton released Frisk, who fell and rolled on the floor.

"Oops!"

"Mettaton!"

"I said 'oops'!" Before Sans' eyes, he was starting to transform, parts of himself folding in and compressing together, his height decreasing rapidly. The only thing that wasn't changing was his arms, that stuck out waving like antennae. "He can't see me like this before the finale," was all he said in a metallic hiss. An electronic metal casing came around the whole works, a wheel popped out, and suddenly this Mettaton looked a lot like the one from last season.

Knock knock knock.

Frisk was scrambling to the back of the lab, and Alphys was scrambling to the door, while Sans resisted the impulse to laugh at the sudden shift in tension. He had been completely forgotten by everyone.

In a way, that was definitely a blessing. After all, it was easiest to slip away when you weren't being noticed, and badly did he want to slip away and not face whatever disaster the red-and-black King Asgore was in this exhausting place. So right before Alphys opened the door, Sans took a shortcut from that too-bright and too-dingy lab room.

Not far, of course. He still had to keep an eye on that kid, regardless of what kind of powers they may or may not have, and regardless of how cold he still felt in the pit of his not-stomach thinking about it all. They seemed to handle things fine, but then for all he knew this too was a scenario they would soon see twice, three times, or even more.

Unfortunately, from this angle he couldn't also see Asgore when he entered the lab.

Just the look on Frisk's face when he rumbled, far more clearly, "Howd'you do? I see you have company."

Next Chapter: Ragnarök

Chapter Text

She'd never met him before. Because each time he came near, she heard the panicked rambling of monsters that alerted her to hide or run away. No such luck, this time, although Alphys continued to ramble in panic, in a quiet voice.

The terrifying figure of the king of the monsters loomed across the lab. He was almost too big for the door, having to duck to come all the way inside, and he towered over everyone in the room, save for perhaps the former Mettaton Ex. He stepped inside the lab on huge feet, either one of which could easily crush Frisk's head, draped in a black-red cape and adorned with jagged gold armor.

His eyes were the same kind of yellow and bloodshot as Toriel's were. Even his face- some cross between a goat and a wolf in shape- was like Toriel's, with glinting sharp teeth (which she could see when he smiled,) and yet covered in coarse black hair on both his head and face, sprouting from him like an unkempt lion's mane. At a cursory glance it was easy to see that they were the same kind of monster, although King Asgore was clearly larger, broader, hairier. She wondered how deep their similarities, or even their differences, went.

It wasn't his appearance that frightened her, but rather the fact that after so long they met at all. Asgore only stopped and stared upon seeing her there, eyes a fraction wider. But the shock was gone after a few moments, and Frisk began to tremble the moment that he spoke.

"Howd'you do? I see you have company," he rumbled in the deepest voice she'd ever heard, glancing to the side at the shivering Dr. Alphys. He didn't wait for a reply, slowly moving step by step towards the child that shook against the opposite wall of the lab.

And Alphys stuttered as she stumbled along behind the giant monster, "Y-yes, sire, the human, I-I was just about to c-c-call you, but- h-how did you know that-?"

The red curve of his back hunched, like it was too much effort to stand on two legs. He chuckled, "Oh, I got a weird call from a skeleton some time ago. I called him back, and he told me his brother had been kidnapped by the human. He said I might find them here."

Frisk squeaked.

"I don't see the skeleton," Asgore said, looking around while Alphys squeaked too, "But that's alright." He scratched his black beard in three harsh, mechanical strokes. "I see the human. Perhaps he is close by. Or, perhaps, he is already dead. That is always possible."

And he stepped closer.

And closer.

Frisk could barely hold her pan out in front of her, she was shaking so much.

Asgore Dreemurr - 200 ATK, 200 DF

...

With every step he took, the child's eyes got bigger and bigger. "Y... your voice..." she choked.

"My voice?" Said Asgore. For just a moment he grinned wider, baring his fangs. "Your voice is so small. What is the matter?" And once the child said nothing, he stopped and stood straight, the distance between them almost crossed by half. Gigantic, white and clawed hands appeared as he drew his red cape aside. Covering his body was more armor, with that demonic symbol on his chest. "I asked what's the matter."

His tone was soft now.

Whenever she heard it before, in the dark, it was always screaming. Frisk realized that any minute now she was going to throw up, going to start crying, going to do something, and the calm in him would break into more screaming, like those times- it all churned within her gut and stomach. "Nothing," she mumbled, and wondered where the word had come from.

And so Asgore kept walking towards her, again.

Where was Blue Sans? Did he already leave? Even Alphys was curled up by her monitor, swirled eyes intense in her direction. Once again in his black boxy shape, Mettaton didn't move either and seemed to be imitating dumb machinery, his arms curled around himself like loose pipes. Asgore didn't look at any of them anymore, in any case. His eyes were only on Frisk.

"I have been mentally picturing when you might drop by for a visit," he said, quietly, sniffing the air with a lazy tilt to his head. "But you have never come. I take my tea alone, as always."

Frisk wielded the large side of her pan in front of her, as if it might be a shield for what was to come. Her legs shook, weak, too much so to even carry her from that spot.

Big deal, I'll just do everything over again, she thought, this time one of her own thoughts. Big deal.

Asgore drew out a gigantic trident from somewhere within his cloak, wielding it with both hands; his tone had not changed, "Not, of course, that I can do something as simple as offering you a cup of tea."

"I don't like tea," Frisk said in a voice that dropped and cracked, her face contorting as her shoulders shook.

"..." The big beast of a monster squinted at her, shifting his grip on the trident and clacking his big claws on the unblemished material. "I do not have any now."

The sound of her teeth chattering competed with the pounding in her head. Somewhere above, the light was starting to flicker, not enough to bring the lab even darker but just enough to irritate her eyes. "Oh."

Once more, Asgore bared his teeth. He almost looked like one of the wolves in the Canine Unit when he did that, if not for his floppy ears and massive horns. His eyes sparked. "It's just as well you never came to meet me."

His trident came at her as though out of nowhere, glowing a stark and brilliant blue; as it sliced right through her midsection Frisk uttered a scream, anticipating and thus feeling the stinging pain through her sides and stomach before realizing that the weapon hadn't done any damage at all. She was standing completely still, her little shivers aside, and the blue attack passed her over. Now, of course, she did move when her legs gave out and she came crashing to the floor, pan ringing while it struck the tiles beneath her.

Frisk bit back another scream and stared at the floor, tears gathering again. It was as if the whole world had gone darker and darker until this moment, when it was just her and Asgore in the black laboratory.

A trident that now shone orange smacked her in the face before she even had time to act. Frisk screamed even louder then, sent flying a few feet over the lab before thudding on her back. She just had enough muscle memory to hold onto the pan a little tighter when she flew, a reflex that proved wholly necessary over these past weeks.

-18 HP

It was hard to move through the pain, but she was distantly aware that the room around them was getting hot, red sparks of flame lighting and fizzling out all around the two fighting figures. Asgore stood over her even bigger than before, staring with those big bloodshot eyes. While his trident pulsated red before slowly returning to orange, the child suppressed a sob and reached into her pocket, pulling out the bottle of X Lemonade.

You down the X Lemonade.

It tastes okay, but smells horrible. You feel a little dizzy.

+12 HP

+1 HP

The orange trident came at her again. This time, it didn't slam into her.

No, what she felt was something wholly different. It ripped a loud shriek from her lips that she hadn't made in a long time, not since she had first fallen.

Two of the thorny ends on the trident stabbed deep into her shoulder, and then just as quickly Asgore ripped it out again. A spurt of blood, and the sound of ripping flesh, was almost enough to throw her out of consciousness if the pain didn't do it.

-14 HP

You feel that this is the end of your time here.

Frisk's thoughts were moving faster, or at least more coherently, than she was; the child had given up to her screaming, waiting for the pain to disappear. With nothing of more use than that lemonade, she was done for in the next turn regardless. Out of her blurry vision she saw the trident turn red and then orange again, the boss monster's eyes sparkling with magic, and he bared all of his fangs before her.

In just a few hits, he had won. She could see his victory imminent in that twisted snarl.

Instead of "Don't go," that voice from his mouth said, "Goodbye."

But the next time Asgore stabbed down his trident, it smashed against the tiles and shattered them instead. "Hah!?"

There wasn't any new pain, the old one in her shoulder ever so slowly vanishing as the Temmie Armor did its job. But Frisk was someplace dark, not in the big room of the lab anymore.

She didn't have the presence of mind to ask why, between the effects of X Lemonade and the wound still gushing blood on her shoulder. But through the haze, it was possible to distinguish the only light source in her dark new room- Blue Sans' blue eye, which returned to normal a moment after. Then all she could see were two tiny little dots of light, and on her other side a cracked-open door that showed the big room in the lab.

Just outside that door, "...Where did they go? Human, where did you go?" The voice gradually rose in volume.

"I-I-I-I have no idea-"

There was a little bit of dry, scraping coughing. "uh, orange means you're supposed to move," said Blue Sans after, taking hold of her hand. His bones were cold and shivery, just like her own palm. All on his own strength, he pulled her up into a sitting position, causing her to hiss. She didn't say anything to his remark except for in her head, shaking too hard to speak. I fucking know that you fucktard fuckwit fuck fuck I'm bleeding I'm bleeding just let him finish me off I'll kill Undyne and we'll leave sooner-

Blue Sans said something that she didn't hear. From the other room, Asgore roared, "Come out! I'm not done! And I can still smell you..."

"S-s-sire, um-"

Asgore's head turned in their direction, sniffing, and his eyes just caught on the door they both stood behind. Feeling cold in her head, Frisk's heart almost stopped, and Blue Sans' eye changed color.

"I smell you."

The lab disappeared in a flash and was replaced with dirty white.

The battle is over, it looks like somebody cheated.

The child was then even colder than she was a moment previously, and overcome with such dizziness that she had to lean far forward where she was sitting now, feeling bile rise in her throat. She swallowed it back down. "Ah... uuu..." Unearthly noises burbled from her lips.

"... ...looks pretty ba... ..." Blue Sans was still standing next to her, but had released her hand instantly. "... eal it, but maybe even anti..."

Frisk retched once, then twice more, but could summon nothing up the whole way to her throat. "...No..." she had the presence of mind to gasp. Heal it? No, healing hurt. Let the armor do its work. "...Fi-..." Where they in Snowdin? It looked like it. At least, they were near to it. She vaguely recognized the path, more blustery than the whole rest of the area-and that meant something. Her legs out of everything else were so cold, like they were going to freeze off.

Leaning over herself like this, she realized why.

And her fat tears brimmed over her eyelids, and her breaths became hitched and ugly sobs, and Blue Sans beside her took a few steps back. Her arm was already feeling a little better so she curled in on herself, stifling the loud noises that accompanied each gasp, hiding her tear-streaked face and preventing those same tears from freezing to her cheeks.

"uh," Blue Sans said while she cried into her manufactured darkness. "uh. uh. you okay?"

It might have been drowned out but she hoarsely replied, "Uh-huh."

jesus kid, where do you think you are? walk it off, that's what her own Sans would have said, no stuttering attached. She didn't mean to cry, she honestly didn't. And now, regardless of what she wanted, she was being so loud, shivering so hard that her muscles were quickly becoming sore as well as cold. what, you think i'm gonna feel sorry for ya? stop it.

No words or faces could frighten it away. Frisk had thought the days where she cried were over, but now... She felt as if she wasn't going to be able to stop at all this time.

Beside her, Blue Sans tugged on her sleeve. "uhhhhh, we should probably, uh, get inside? it's cold out here."

That was a good idea. It meant standing up, though, which made that impossible. The child just whimpered.

"uhhh. so, uh, any time that you're done, that'd be cool."

More than anything, she wished it was Flowey she was talking to- but who knew where he was. Her face was the only warm part of her now, and she was loathe to expose it, but she uncurled one arm to latch on Blue Sans' sleeve. Her mouth was pulled in a rictus grin of struggling facial features, and she kept her teary eyes squeezed shut. "... um..." She began, before another sob and welling shame broke her speech.

Blue Sans tugged limply on his caught sleeve. "?"

Frisk took a deep breath that almost spiraled out of control. "Um-mm," more tears, and now they were freezing to that side of her skin. Her voice dropped to a strained whisper. "I n-need a new pair of pants."

"-oh," he said back, and she curled back up. "uh. well, you clearly aren't going to find it out here."

Her obnoxious sobs rose to a wail inside her arms, and Blue Sans sputtered again, "well, uh, hey, it's okay, uh. i'll just, uh, use another shortcut. uh. i'm sure your sans and you are close to the same size. so. uh. yeah."

He grabbed her hand in his for another time, and she trembled. "uh, that sweater also needs washing anyway. it's kinda all covered in blood. we'll just. uh. clean you up and then i'll go throttle that anti-papyrus. sound good?"

So saying, and with no reply from Frisk but more sobs, they crossed the small space from that frozen road to Papyrus' house. Mercifully, Frisk heard no commentary from the intrusive thoughts inside of her head.

It might have been unfair of him to allow the new Sans to go over to Lady Toriel's house, particularly without sending Leo to warn Frisk first, but Papyrus was too great to not recognize a good opportunity when he saw it. (And was Leo even fast enough to make it to Frisk before Sans did?)

The minute that he walked out the door, Papyrus rushed straight to Sans' room. Usually the door was locked, but this time he found the knob turned easily. The room, of course, was just as he left it, with very little out of place. It might be that the other Sans wasn't sleeping here, or wasn't sleeping period, given what he himself had seen over the past few days.

This was a good thing! It meant that once he was able to get his Sans back, everything would be relatively the same as how it was when he left it. No bad posters or even different clothes- although Papyrus wondered if this was his first actual opportunity to clean this place up without his brother here to get upset.

No, no. That would be an underhanded thing to do.

Sans' room being pretty much the same was also a bad thing, though since it meant that there were no obvious clues about where this Sans came from or even, to be specific, what he was. There weren't even any clues about the other Papyrus that he talked about, which might be for the best since this Papyrus wasn't sure that he was interested in meeting him, to be honest. There were no new papers, no new socks, no new scratches in the drawers or anything under the lampshade. The dog that usually rode around in Sans' tornado was missing, but that dog came and went most days anyway. Still, after a minute Papyrus came up with an idea.

He spotted the blue hoodie, like the sort that his brother always wore in warm weather (because a regular t-shirt would have been too little apparently) and that the new Sans also had been wearing. Despite that, right now it was discarded on the greasy bed since the new Sans was off doing something in that fluffy coat- at least he didn't stoop to wearing two layers of outer clothing.

Since he had worn it for a while...

"Nyeh!" Papyrus said, before remembering that no one was here to listen to him. "-MAYBE THERE'S A CLUE HERE!"

This hoodie was, after all, what the new Sans was wearing all the time before he changed into the new coat they bought. It probably also belonged to his Sans, before the new one stole it. Snatching it up in his gloved hands, Papyrus hesitated and swallowed a lump forming over his vertebrae. He pressed the clothing close, and then resisted the urge to jerk it away when he got a whiff of it.

...It definitely belonged to his Sans first, and neither of the two had washed the darn thing in all this time. Mustard and ketchup and relish stains adorned the inside.

If his Sans wasn't wearing this, then what was he wearing?? Surely he was keeping warm, wherever he was!

Papyrus didn't want to think about it.

The clothing felt a little heavier than it should, so with tentative hands Papyrus rifled through the pockets inside and out. For the most part he found nothing, and was even disgusted to find a piece of rotting hot-cat in one pocket, which he promptly threw away. (oh he was going to need to wash this with super-industrial soap before the other Sans got back.)

Still, though, in the last pocket he could find, he found something solid that was almost too small for his hand, and he brought it out with supremely narrowed eyes.

It was a cellphone.

Next Chapter: A Massive Phone Bill

Chapter Text

It wasn't a perfect fit. All of Sans' clothes were a couple sizes too big for her, but it served while her normal clothes were in the wash. Sans' shorts, which functioned like pants for how short his legs were, also functioned like pants for Frisk--and to keep them from falling down, she could only sit in place in Papyrus' house in the corner. Her bloodied grey shirt was a lost cause, so she kept it on while her sweater was also in the wash. Without the sweater she felt terribly exposed, and tucked the Temmie Armor under her grey shirt for the time being.

On top of it, though, Blue Sans was happy to give her one of the jackets in Sans' room--not to wear, but to loop around her shoulders for now. It was warm, albeit it smelled like rotting meat. As Sans tended to smell.

She asked him once why he always carried old food in his coat. He'd told her that was what he wanted the dogs to smell whenever they checked him out, instead of her sweaty human stink. She yelped at him that she didn't stink, and he pinched her nose and said she just couldn't tell from her position.

All wrapped up, and legs no longer freezing off, Frisk just sat in her corner curled into a loose ball. Since becoming overwhelmed with tears they remained on the edge of her eyes, her chest and gut aching like a serpent was coiling around her innards. Every once in a while, she needed to shudder using her whole body to prevent them from taking over again. Papyrus was also in the house, and if she became overwhelmed in front of him then he would surely win. It was a mercy that he couldn't guess what happened to her previous clothes.

Blue Sans carried a plate of something brown and crusty over to her after putting her clothes in the laundry--the fridge had been restocked since her last visit here. It was only then, as promised, that he turned sharply to the other skeleton and started 'throttling' him, a word which Frisk took to mean yelling at Papyrus in his lower-case way. "okay so what the hell, you told on us to asgore?! explain to me how exactly that helps us when we have a deranged goat-man on our trail!"

You taste the plate of food.

It's bread, but it's all chunky and full of gross stuff.

Frisk began to eat it ravenously. The taste of the food was only amplified by the fluffy feeling she had in her throat as it crumbled into magic upon swallowing, like cotton candy or an ice cube that soothed her injuries. It was delicious, something she enjoyed the most out of all the awful experiences she had here. No matter what the food, no matter how thick and hard it was, as long as she had been underground it would crumble. The only things of substance she had was the water, which she took from wherever she could.

Her stomach continued to growl.

"I DIDN'T WANT TO TELL HIM!" Papyrus whined, "HE CALLED ME BACK AND ASKED WHAT I KNEW AND I COULDN'T TELL THE KING SUCH A BOLDFACED LIE!"

"oh you lied plenty," Blue Sans snapped, eyes narrowed, "don't give me that crap."

The chunks dissolving on the back of her tongue might have been fruit, and Frisk gagged even as she shoveled more into her mouth.

"WHY ARE YOU SO MAD ABOUT THAT, ANYWAY? I WAS COVERING FOR YOU, YOU WOULDN'T HAVE GOTTEN IN TROUBLE!"

"how is that better? he speared the kid like they were a pig-"

It was already gone. "I want more food," Frisk said, licking her fingers.

Blue Sans' eyes snapped in her direction and then back to Papyrus, one eyesocket twitching. "in a minute."

"No, give me more now," she said with a scowl, her stomach growling as she spoke. More cotton candy bread.

Papyrus gestured to her before folding his arms, and her own arms crept over her eyes. "YES, WELL, WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES THAT MAKE? YOU ALREADY GOT WHAT YOU WANTED FROM ALPHYS, DIDN'T YOU? WHY DO YOU NEED THE HUMAN SCUM?"

Blue Sans hissed, "i'm trying to think of a way to explain this to you in a way you could understand. i do not want the human dead, okay? if you cause the human to die, then that is a bad thing. okay? do you understand. is this getting through your thick skull?"

"I'M NOT IN THE MOOD FOR MORE JOKES," Papyrus remarked, stomping his foot down on the wooden floorboards. Blue Sans sighed, and Frisk scratched her itchy legs, baring her teeth. "WHAT KIND OF WORLD DO YOU COME FROM ANYWAY, WHERE YOU'RE NOT TRYING TO KILL THE HUMANS?"

Maybe it would be worthwhile to summon Flowey, even if she didn't know if he would hear. Frisk began to rap on the hard floor with her fist. "-no, no, we tried to kill the human there too." At that from Blue Sans, her head raised and she blinked. "but it never takes. and it's not worth it, anyway."

"NOT WORTH IT?"

"nope." To her shame, when Blue Sans glanced her way Frisk had to wipe her face again, scowling fiercely to hide her glimmering eyes. He quickly looked elsewhere. "i mean, it all worked out in my world. and me and that kid are kind of buds, now. so, it could go that way in your world too."

After a moment, Papyrus glancing from the other skeleton to the child with shifty eyes, his sharp-toothed face twisted and he roared with laughter. "NYAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Blue Sans shrugged Frisk's way, as if to say, "i tried."

"FRIENDS WITH THIS SCUM?" Papyrus continued, sneering. "I DOUBT IT! AS UNDYNE OFTEN SAYS, THE ONLY GOOD HUMAN IS A DEAD ONE."

The floor rattled under Frisk's feet, and she curled up deeper into the folds of the warm furry jacket. It was drafty in this house, particularly in the corner that she'd picked, unwisely, by virtue of being the farthest from the creepy pet rock that always stared menacingly at her. There might be a window cracked or a bit of wood eaten away. She raised her voice, before Blue Sans could say any more for or against keeping her alive, "I'm hungry."

Blue Sans rubbed his forehead. "kid, there's a fridge full of food-"

"I'm hungry," she cut him off, bunching the fabric of the shorts in her cold hands. "Cook me something, I want meat!"

"ARE YOU SURE I CAN'T JUST GIVE THIS ONE TO UNDYNE?"

"look," interjected Blue Sans, and suddenly two blue SOULS became visible, one before Papyrus and one before Frisk. As if on instinct, both of them tried to move, Frisk to stand and Papyrus away from the other monster, but they stood rooted in place. With tired eyesockets, Blue Sans had them both in his grasp. "look, i know everyone hates each other and you've been having a really shitty time down here, but if you two kids can just cooperate with me i will not only not kill either of you," at that, with a strong surge of magic his eye flashed and then returned to normal, "but i will be out of both your hairs soon enough. ...heheheh, well maybe just one of your hairs."

Someone growled, and staring at her feet instead of Blue Sans Frisk didn't know if it was her who did it or the spiky royal guard with the high tally mark. From where his feet were stuck to the ground Papyrus twitched, shifting his weight while he folded his arms again. "I... I CAN IF THE HUMAN WILL."

"I'm hungry, dipsh-..." Frisk stuttered to a stop, staying utterly still save for a quick wipe across her face.

Blue Sans smirked. "i'm gonna take that as a yes from you." He released his hold on them, and when no one rushed to move he continued, "i've got all the schematics and blueprints from alphys that i need. i just need the materials, and then i can start fixing everything. anti-paps, i'm sure you can help me with that much."

"I'M AN ENORMOUS HELP WHEN I WANT TO BE!" Papyrus puffed indignantly.

Ignoring the screaming, Frisk scratched the floor, looking for even a trace of golden petal or roots crawling out from underneath. "glad to hear it. now you, kid, you can stay here for the time being. it's probably a lot more comfortable where you've been staying, anyway."

"ARE YOU JOKING? I DON'T WANT MY HOUSE SMELLING LIKE-"

"and when i start working on the machine," Blue Sans snarled, eyes flashing dark, "i'm gonna be in the shed a lot over the next few days. so i'm expecting both of you to get along while i'm working." He coughed, once and then four times, before finishing, "got it?"

A tiny root peeked at Frisk from underneath the house, waggling at her from under the wood like a tiny tongue. Frisk grasped it between her finger and thumb and wiggled the small piece of the plant, stomach giving another rumble. Smiling faintly, and then returning to an ugly scowl, the child glanced over at the sweaty and coughing Blue Sans. Maybe she didn't want him to be cooking food for her after all... "Got it."

"FINE."

Leo was already waiting for Frisk when she walked to the steps of her house, and her stomach felt sick with Red Sans standing right next to her. "Yo-oo!"

She swallowed and smiled. "Yo! What are you doing here, Leo?"

Unfortunately, Leo noticed Red Sans staring at him as well. The scaly skin on his face turned a shade paler, and a chill struck through Frisk's stomach at the thought of even more secrets getting blown. So before Leo had even a chance to stutter, and while Red Sans studied him strangely, she said, "Oh! Are you--are you here to help me take more pictures for my collage?"

"Huh?" Leo gaped, and thankfully that was all that he said, while Red Sans scratched his skull. A proper look from her, which she hoped that the monster in front of them didn't notice, was able to shut him up.

Luckily, Red Sans seemed amused more than anything. "you're still working on that?"

"...Yeah. Since," at this, Frisk gave him a meaningful glance, "I broke my phone a few days ago."

Red Sans rolled his shoulders back and cleared his throat, flinching. "oh yeah. uh, good luck with that then, kiddo." His eyes, the white ones, took in the two children and then he awkwardly shifted on his feet. "i think i better go... see ya around."

"Bye R--uh, Sans," Frisk said, touching her fingertips together.

At first she hoped that that was the last of him, when he turned to walk off; relaxing, she smiled over at Leo who trembled and smiled back. But then Red Sans whirled back around, and both children became ramrod straight. He flashed a wary grin, teeth glinting in the afternoon sunlight, and said, "hey, promise me you'll think about what i told you, okay pipsqueak?"

She dug her nails into her fingertips and tried not to change her dulled expression. It was, luckily, her specialty. "...Yeah."

When the skeleton was gone, Leo let out a loud whoosh of breath and drooped forward, like all the tension fled his mouth. "Gee whizz, did you see his face?" Frisk also sighed heavily, and Leo jumped up and down on the front step. "He looks like a vampire! I didn't even notice that before! Like an actual vampire!"

"What are you doing here, Leo?" Frisk asked, trying not to smile while she looked in the direction that Red Sans went.

"Oh wait!" Her friend straightened, "Papyrus said he wants us to meet at Alphys' house! I mean-!" He cleared his throat, "Awesome Skeleton wants us to meet at Trash Queen's house. He says there's something really important he needs to talk to us about."

Frisk glanced at the door inside, imagining Toriel making a meal for herself on the other side while waiting for her child to come back home. She wouldn't expect her back yet, not when she and Red Sans were at Mt. Ebott. But then, before the girl could respond to Leo, she remembered what else Red Sans said to her today. So she nodded and said, "Give me a minute, I'll be right over."

It took more than a minute before she finally arrived at the town lab, swallowing a mouthful of homemade strudel and licking her fingers. When she stepped inside, the rest of their little rescue team was waiting for her as expected, each of them using whatever was immediately available in Alphys' messy house for a chair. Frisk was the only one that thought to sit on the arm of Alphys couch upon entry. "Hey, Alphys, Papyrus, Leo," she said, wiping her mouth.

"FRISK, YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO USE THE CODENAMES!" Papyrus said; he was holding something in his hands that she couldn't yet make out.

Stepping for a closer look, she scratched the back of her head. "Oh, sorry... but what's this about?"

"ANYWAY, I'M SURE YOU'RE WONDERING WHAT THIS IS ABOUT," the skeleton continued, and the child just nodded at him. "AND IT IS ABOUT--I FOUND A CLUE IN SANS'S ROOM!!"

Frisk was about to respond to this, eyes widening at the possibility that something new was uncovered, but before she could speak Alphys cleared her throat and said in a quiet stammer, "And a-actually, I also wanted to talk about-about what I found too." She smiled apologetically at Papyrus. "But, um, you should go first s-since you seem pretty uh, confident."

Papyrus gave a quick glance to what was in his hands and shook his head, smiling as always. "NO, YOU GO FIRST IF YOU HAVE SOMETHING IMPORTANT TO SAY! I CAN WAIT!"

But even as he was saying that and everyone else was agreeing, Frisk frowned; she was the most curious about his clue, not to mention that she had her own information to share from her "date" earlier. She half wished that she could fast-forward while turning to Alphys with a neutral face, "Uh?"

"It's about the shed." Alphys pulled out her tablet, clicking points with her stylus until a little colored display popped up for them all to see- the inside of Sans' shed, and the little laboratory within.

"THAT CAN'T BE SANS'S ROOM," Papyrus said, "IT'S TOO CLEAN!"

Alphys swallowed. "W-well, I did find a lot of things in this lab that belonged to Sans, a-although I didn't know that they d-did... like, uh," she pointed to a drawer on the display, and everyone leaned in. "I f-found, um, a badge in there that was supposed t-to go to people who worked in-" She shook her head, "N-no, I mean, and then o-of course the biggest thing is this machine in the corner. I-I hel- I mean he-"

Flustered, Alphys took a breath and began again, "This m-machine is supposed to help someone t-to manipulate... a-and travel through... time, although it-it isn't finished, I-I mean it doesn't work, but..."

"WOWIE, SANS DIDN'T TELL ME ABOUT ANY OF THIS!" Papyrus said, rubbing his jawline.

"I also found some p-papers that looked like they were w-written by someone in... an odd way..." She started to scroll through the tablet again, while Leo stood enraptured.

Oh. Suddenly the child realized when all this was about--something Sans might not be happy with--and her gut dipped briefly. Now biting the inside of her cheek, Frisk gave Alphys a sideways glance as she murmured, "Uh, that's all really nice, but I don't think it's related to this. I saw a lot of those things before this other Sans even got here."

Alphys face turned beet red and again Frisk felt terrible. "R-r-r-really? Oh, uhm, n-never mind, sorry! I," while she spoke, Alphys cringed back and sweat, "I, I didn't mean to waste your time, sorry guys!"

"It's okay," Leo said brightly. "That was really interesting anyway!"

Frisk chewed on her thumbnail and Alphys pressed herself into her beanbag chair, still struggling to keep a smile on her face. "I-I thought so... too..."

After that there was silence not even Papyrus was eager to break, so for once the kid used it. "Well, I learned that this other Sans came from another world entirely that's a lot like ours."

"Huh?"

"I ALREADY KNEW THAT," Papyrus puffed proudly, suddenly regaining usage of his voice again, and Frisk screwed up her face. "HE TOLD ME THAT HE EVEN HAS ANOTHER PAPYRUS!"

"He did not."

If he had a tongue, Papyrus might have stuck his out at Frisk, squeezing his eyesockets shut. "NYEH! HE DID SO! AND THAT'S WHY MY CLUE IS THE MOST IMPORTANT!"

Frisk put her hands on her hips, frowning hard. "Why, what's your clue?"

"THIS!"

Alphys' news was immediately forgotten, to be recalled some other day. Papyrus was holding a black cell phone in his hand, and he showed it proudly before them all. "IT WAS IN HIS POCKET, AND IT'S NOT MY SANS'S."

"The phone!" Frisk cried, and covered up her mouth in the next moment. "You found it!" Now she remembered, the first inkling she had had that something was terribly wrong was because of that thing. The voice on the other phone...

Another Papyrus that swore, a Red Papyrus. Frisk shuddered trying to picture her friend in front of her with a gold tooth and evil eyes. Right now his talking didn't sound anything like that angry growl that she heard, even if she recognized both voices. "YES! HE LEFT IT IN HIS OTHER CLOTHES SO I DON'T THINK HE'LL MISS IT. IF IT'S HIS, MAYBE WE CAN CALL AROUND AND FIND OUT WHO HIS FRIENDS ARE! ... AND THEY CAN GIVE US TIPS???"

"Yooo, that's a great idea!" Leo said, jumping up and down. "I wish I could call..."

"Why can't you--oh," Frisk bit her lip. "Right."

Alphys wrung her hands together, and Papyrus was glancing around at them all with blank confusion. "I don't think I... I... i-i-imagine what kind of friends this kind of Sans would h-have... I'd p-probably mess it all up."

Frisk had similar sentiments, and she just shrugged when Papyrus tentatively held the object out to her. In her mind she could still hear that other Papyrus, wondering how she could have ever thought it was the same one that she knew. He was holding the phone in both hands now, squinting with something that could be called determination. "HMM..."

Then, without any sense of hesitation or fear, Papyrus pressed redial and pressed it up to his own skull.

The phone didn't ring for very long.

It was only the next day when Alphys arrived to the house, much to Sans' surprise.

Progress getting the materials went even quicker than he expected, although not everything was accounted for, and the scrap metal remains of the old machine would need more work before he could use it. Aside from the near-constant demands for food, the kid stayed quiet and out of the way even after getting their old clothes back. Even those demands were carried out more often by Flowey, who arrived hours after their escape--which was just as well when Papyrus was irritated enough that he was being eaten out of house and home by the human. His task was going quickly, all things considered.

Of course, he was far from done. Far, far from done. But it was a hopeful kind of start, which he desperately needed.

Alphys' sudden appearance, too, was more than he had expected. Evidently Frisk hadn't seen it coming either, coming to the door to stand beside him with their pan out in plain view. It was possible that they wanted to block the monster from entry, however, as they took up the remaining space in front of the open door. Sans didn't mind their presence there, given what had happened already. At least Mettaton wasn't in sight.

To both their questioning looks, Alphys stared dully from the rims of her glasses and raised a lip in a bitter snarl, "Don't look so surprised, either of you. Asgore has left my lab in ruins thanks to that human, what else is there for me to do but come here?"

"It's not my fault your king is a batshit," Frisk said, sticking their tongue out at her.

The lizard monster tried to push further in, only for Sans to shove her back by a single nudge, and she snapped, "Actually it is your fault, not that that matters very much right now." She folded her arms, looking away from the child for the time being. "But I'm not here for them, I'm here because of our promise. I intend to help you until that machine is finished."

"cool," Sans said, ignoring how Frisk protested by means of making the most insulting faces and particular hand gestures.

Papyrus wouldn't have her being put up in his house, so Alphys was to stay the night in the Snowdin Inn when not helping Sans with the machine. This seemed to work well for everyone.

The day after she arrived Sans was getting food from the squeaky fridge for himself, pouring a bowl of something that didn't look poisoned, when he heard Papyrus' phone ringing in the other room. He didn't pay attention at first, but could hear every word when his not-brother picked up. If only because he was so loud that each word he spoke was impeccably clear.

"HELLO? ... HELLO? ... HELLO? WHO THE HELL IS THIS?"

The cereal that he ate tasted way more disgusting than the bright colors indicated, and Sans almost gagged it back out on the first bite; instead of being sweet, or even tangy, as monster cereal was supposed to be, it was bland and bitter on the edges of his mouth. Deciding it wasn't worth the effort to swallow it down, he pushed the bowl away and watched with amusement while Frisk, on the opposite side of the table, dragged it to their spot and started to drink down the cereal like it was soup.

"I'LL USE WHATEVER LANGUAGE I WANT, THANK YOU, IT'S MY PHONE!" Papyrus' voice continued ringing out. Frisk slammed the bowl down, took a spoonful of cereal, and held it out to the flower whose stem and tendrils were curled around the table leg.

Flowey didn't look hungry; he was the only one paying attention at first. "YES I WILL! YES I WILL! I AM PAPYRUS THE TERRIBLE AND I DON'T TOLERATE IMPOSTERS! AND I CERTAINLY WON'T TONE MYSELF DOWN FOR THEM! IF I WANT TO SAY FUCK THEN I CA--WHAT?!"

Sans perked up, and Frisk licked the bottom of the bowl. "Pour me more," they said.

But all he did was poke their cheek, no longer looking at the human. "that stuff's nasty."

"YOU'VE STOPPED MAKING SENSE. CALL ME BACK WHEN YOU MAKE--AND WHY IS THAT? UH," here, Papyrus' voice faltered. "WHAT? SANS ISN'T HERE-"

"hold up," The spiky Papyrus took being proven wrong with a muffled shriek, as Sans was now very much right next to him. "who are you talking to?"

"I HAVE NO IDEA," the other skeleton snarled, "BUT HE'S PISSING ME OFF WITH HIS BAD IMPRESSION OF ME!"

Sans' eyes widened, and with a burst of blue magic he snatched the phone before the parallel version of his brother could protest. He pressed it to the side of his skull, and without seeing anyone else he said, voice hoarse, "papyrus?"

On the other end of the phone he could hear a familiar voice--and not just familiar because he'd been hearing a distorted and growlier version of it over the last few days. "WOWIE! YOUR VOICE GOT A LOT QUIETER-"

"papyrus."

"OH! SANS?"

While in person Sans' bones felt like they were turning to gelatin, his voice bounced back from the swell of feeling as he laughed. "yeah bro, wassup?" From the corner of his eye he saw the other Frisk bounding into the room with Flowey on their shoulder and the other Papyrus watching him, arms folded and eyes indignant at having his phone stolen.

He didn't care. There was only one Papyrus he cared about at this moment. "SANS! IS THIS THE REAL YOU?!"

The real him; he had figured out the fake him already. Sans coughed, took several steps back from the other occupants in the room, and exhaled sharply, "y-yeah, it's not any bone double you're talkin' to."

"SANS THIS IS NOT THE TIME," Papyrus said and Sans laughed, almost losing control of it, in spite of everything. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING ON THE OTHER END OF THIS PHONE LINE?! WHERE ARE YOU!? I'VE BEEN ALL BONETROUSLED FOR DAYS NOW, AND WE'VE ALL BEEN LOOKING FOR YOU, YOU SHOULD HAVE CALLED!"

For once, he was overwhelmed. Not only with relief, which was enough on its own, but by too many questions rising in his gut. He put his free hand to his bony forehead, struggling not to laugh or start hacking while on the phone. "well this isn't my--i mean what are you doing on the end of that--wait, what do you mean 'we'?"

"I MEAN," the other Papyrus raised an eyebrow and the other Frisk was standing a little too close next to Sans; he suddenly felt anxious that the kid would steal the phone and he pushed them away with a sidestep, "THAT ME AND AWESOME MONSTER AND TRASH QUEEN AND COOL HUMAN HAVE ALL BEEN LOOKING FOR YOU SINCE YOU DISAPPEARED."

"what?"

"OH WAIT, UH, YOU DON'T KNOW OUR CODENAMES-"

He laughed again, unable to stop it. "codenames? are you serious?"

"DON'T MAKE FUN!" Papyrus screeched. "IT WAS TO GIVE US ALL AN ADVANTAGE! YOU SEE, AWESOME MONSTER IS LEO, TRASH QUEEN IS ALPHYS, AND COOL HUMAN IS FRISK! PRETTY CLEVER, EH?"

His laughter quieted to snickers, still clutching his forehead. "god, it's good to talk to you again."

Papyrus' own tone also lowered, becoming something approaching soft, "I'M GLAD YOU'RE OKAY." There were noises on the other end of the phone line, and he added in a more serious voice, "BUT YOU SHOULD TELL ME WHERE YOU ARE SO I CAN COME PICK YOU UP!"

"wh--uh." Sans rubbed the side of his skull, now. "uh, listen, you said that Frisk and Alphys are in on this too?"

"YES!"

"are they there? could i talk to them for a minute?"

There were more noises from the other side of the phone line, and he heard a hesitant, "YES, OF COURSE!" Breathing in and out through his teeth, there were a few moments of static and then a quiet voice from the other side, "Hey Sans?"

It wasn't Alphys, and as much as he also wanted to talk to this one he felt a flare of impatience at this; the benefit of his fused-skull condition was that Sans could chew the sides of his mouth or grind his teeth, even a little. Maybe he should have specified he wanted to talk to Alphys first. Oh well. "heya kiddo, how's it going? i heard that another version of me has been giving you trouble."

"He swears a lot," said the child on the other end of the line, and they then added, "...I was worried he killed you or something."

He gave a dry little laugh. "that's kind of how people are over here. no worries, i'-" he couldn't technically sneeze like a human, and he had no reason to since he had no nose, but Sans was forced to make the motion anyway beyond his control. He clamped a hand over his face to muffle the noise, and rubbed the edge of his bony nostrils. "ahgh, ghh, i'm aces."

The kid's voice grew quieter, and like usual he had to strain to hear. "You're over in his world, right?"

The other Frisk was staring at him. Sans stared back, daring them to interrupt while he spoke into the phone. "yeah, his world. his papyrus, his--uh, house, it's pretty surreal. i bet you'd have a blast trying to put up with this place."

"ARE YOU TALKING TO THE IMPOSTER ABOUT ME?" The parallel Papyrus screeched.

Sans squinted at him. "...yeah, that was him just now. he's a real piece of work, huh? how did you figure that much out, anyway?"

"I'm smart!"

He chuckled, but somewhere beyond the room there came the eerie doorbell squeaking through the house. "yeah you are. me i've been trying to find a way back, do you think you guys can hold out for a while? d'you think i can talk to alphys about what's going on at her end?" The parallel Frisk, with Flowey curled around their shoulders, glared at the two of them; they turned away when neither Sans or the spiky Papyrus made a move to answer the door.

"He's not being that bad, so I think so. Oh ...Can we talk later if you do?"

Not that bad, that was a relief. Sans sighed. "yeah, yeah. i'll-" Frisk was standing on their tip-toes by the door, and while their little eyes couldn't see into the window Flowey extended his stem and looked out to the blizzarding outside.

"Alphys is here!" He called back tremulously.

Sans groaned, rubbing his eyesockets. "okay--actually, i'll have to call you back later, okay?"

Papyrus sneered, "WITH MY PHONE."

Ignoring that, Sans glanced to the door and nodded at the other Frisk. Hearing his Frisk stutter across the phone, he quickly cut in, "i'll explain everything then, okay?"

"Okay-"

Sans turned the phone off as Frisk opened the door, slapped the phone back into Papyrus' hand, and then this world's Alphys stepped in.

No need to go trusting everyone around here with everything.

but hey, he thought to himself, flashing the scowling other doctor a typical smile, this other me is going to get one hell of a phone bill.

Next Chapter: Hellhole

Chapter Text

With Alphys there to do and suggest god-knew-what, Blue Sans was again in the shed working on the machine--that or, as equally likely, he was making more phone calls to the other Alphys.

She wished that the machine wasn't in there, and that Alphys wasn't in there. It was awkward with just her and Papyrus in the house, even if Flowey was there. Because, like usual, he didn't make a move to anger Papyrus and carried out almost everything in simpering subservience or secrecy. At least Frisk got to eat almost regularly, which had the bonus of giving her an excuse not to talk to anybody while her mouth was full. There wasn't nearly as much meat in Papyrus' fridge as she expected or wanted, but it was fine. Lasagna, spider cake, cheese sandwiches, anything she could get her hands on, it was fine.

Downing a glass of Suspicious Milk that Flowey poured for her, Frisk shivered. It was cold in this house, nearly all the time. Drinking something cold may not have been the best idea on her part, but no way was she going to try the tea.

She crept around the edge of the kitchen doorway and stared at where Papyrus sat, watching TV with a sour expression. Was he angry that his brother was missing, that he had a human in the house, or that he hadn't been able to defeat her yet from his own perspective? Or maybe, because he was a skeleton, his mouth was stuck like that like with Sans'. Frisk ducked back into the kitchen, picked her nose and then walked into the living room with as much bravery as she could muster. Papyrus' eyes didn't have pupils, but by the way he tapped his claws on his folded arm she could guess that he saw her.

She plopped on the couch next to him, and he scooted to the other side. She looked at the TV, seeing one of Mettaton's game shows playing quietly across from them. The child wrinkled her nose, memories of her time in front of the camera bubbling up unwillingly. "Why is the volume so low?"

Papyrus harrumphed. "ALL OF THE SCREAMING GETS ON MY NERVES."

"Yeah." She picked at a loose thread on her sweater. "It's worse on-set."

The monster didn't reply to her, so Frisk shrugged and leaned back into the couch. It wasn't comfy, but at least it was big. Gradually, to pass the time instead of watching that awful thing, she began to hum. It wasn't a conscious decision, the song just something that popped into her head, but soon she became aware of the noise coming from her own throat.

"DO YOU MIND?" Papyrus snarled at her.

Frisk shivered, but only because of a sudden draft from somewhere behind the couch. "Nope."

She continued humming.

"UGH." Papyrus turned off the TV and stood up, and Frisk stood up with him, hands behind her back and song still playing in her head. "I'M GOING TO MY ROOM."

"What's in there?" Frisk asked, matching his walk step by step.

At first he didn't reply to her, making a point to ignore her beyond his menacing noises, but as soon as he heard the child jump up on the stairs after him Papyrus gave up and whirled back around. "NOT YOU, FOR ONE THING."

At his scary face she only grinned bigger. "Cool, can I see?"

Bewildered, the skeleton squinted, trying to give the question logical thought--or so it looked to her--before roaring, "NO, YOU MAY NOT. THAT WOULD RUIN THE POINT OF THE YOU NOT BEING IN THERE."

"Okay," she said, jumping two steps up after him when he tried to continue on. "But while you're up there can you turn the heating on? Because it's cold as balls in here."

"'COLD AS BALLS' SAYS THE HUMAN," Papyrus scoffed, crossing his arms. Frisk crossed her arms too. "I'M STARTING TO SEE WHY MY SPINELESS AND CRUDE BROTHER FOUND YOU AMUSING."

Shooting up from between the floorboards Flowey crept up the banister on his prehensile tendrils, watching the two of them, but she gave him no acknowledgment save for a spare glance. Sneering at Papyrus, Frisk folded her arms. "Yeah, yeah, because when he was still here, he told me it's cold as balls in here too."

"OH HE DID NOT."

"Maybe he left to find a Papyrus who turns the heat on."

Now Papyrus twitched. "HE DID NOT. THE TEMPERATURE IN HERE IS PERFECT."

"It is not, retard."

His voice got even louder, but the child was well practiced in resisting flinching. "IT IS TOO." And then he shifted his stance, and then Frisk was not having fun anymore. "THERE IS JUST A TRICK TO IT. AS I SHOWED SANS. LET ME SHOW YOU THE TRICK TO IT."

He stood up and reached for her; Frisk screeched and stumbled back down the steps, out of his grasp. "Don't touch me!" But the thought was already in his head, and he would not be dissuaded; Papyrus marched over to the child and picked her up by the back of her shirt. Held aloft in the air by someone tall once again, Frisk kicked and swung. "Lemme go! Stop! What are you doing!?"

Papyrus held her out away from him like a bag of trash and, scowling, only silently carried her to the exit. He opened the door, and before Frisk could land a hit he plopped her on the front step and slammed it shut behind her. Leaving her out in the freezing snow and winds. "BY THE TIME YOU COME BACK INSIDE," he shouted from the other side, realization dawning over the girl, "IT SHOULD FEEL TEN TIMES WARMER."

Her hands were already shaking when she curled them into fists and pounded on the door, the cold biting at her cheeks. "Are you crazy!? Let me back in! I'll freeze to death out here!"

But when she paused to breathe, she heard not even a response from Papyrus, let alone the sound of a door unlocking. Frisk's stomach clenched and she gritted her teeth, pounding harder on the door, "Papyrus! Let me in! Hey! Hey! Shitstain! Let me back in! I'm fucking cold!" Her voice rose, increasing in pitch, and she scratched at the wood with her freezing nails. "There's other monsters outside!"

Realizing that her efforts were making no damage, the girl pulled out her pan. She stood back a step, one foot testing the crack on the bottom step from the door and the other planted firmly in the door. "Hey! Hey! Let me in!" Frisk shrilled, each shrill cry punctuated by her pan swinging on the door with a great thwock!. It bent, it groaned, and it looked each time like it was going to give--but each time she swung her weapon back for another blow, that door also bounced right back into place.

Muffled by its thickness, there came a single, "NO."

"Fuck!" She shouted at him, striking the door again; with her current momentum, she couldn't help but keep going. "AGH fuck fuck fuck! Fuck!" One swing finally knocked her off balance when it rebounded, and she fell on her butt. Beside her, a little white dog that she saw often barked and growled at her. Frisk screamed something--what it was even she couldn't guess--and she kicked it on her way back to her feet. The mutt ran off yipping, and with the pan left behind the child rammed her head into the door instead.

"Ow! Shit!" Tears burned over her eyes and cheeks. Still she couldn't stop. Her voice cracked, high as it was, while she kept on screaming, throwing her whole body against the door. "Fucking let me in fucking shitstain bitch shitpig dickhead fuck fuck fuck fuck!" Her words devolved again and again, and her tears dripped into the snow.

Frisk didn't even know when she stopped, heaving for air on the front step, until she heard Papyrus say, "... ... OH. MY GOD. ARE YOU DONE?"

Her face was red, as well as covered in a layer of painful frost that was gradually healing. She gulped more air, limbs aching. Although she wanted to say "let me in," her voice had been spent in the span of a few minutes. A little whimper was all that came out.

"HELLO? DID YOU DIE SPONTANEOUSLY?"

Frisk rolled off the front step and into a sitting position, still gulping breaths while she scooted off the bottom step. Her pan she took up gingerly and put it away with a quick swipe to her even yet running eyes. She half-crawled to the other side of the house and wiped her eyes even more, waiting for her breathing to even out and her chest to stop hurting.

"UH--HUMAN?" The door whined. "...UM? THEY EVAPORATED?"

Frisk scooted farther down the other side of the house, her cheeks burning again.

"Don't--don't worry about it! I-I'll go find them!" The new voice sent her tears spilling again, hands becoming fists. She wasn't going to look at Flowey when he popped out of the dirt, quivering like he was the door or the little white dog.

Regardless, he started talking. "G-golly, that was... A-are you okay?"

"Fine," she said over her sleeves. "Why don't you go check on your new best friend instead?"

The hesitation made it worse. "...Ehehe, but you're my best friend, Frisk." Flowey's stem shivered with his own nervous laughter.

"You don't act like it." She wiped her whole face and snorted loudly, and so got a glimpse of Flowey's deeply unhappy expression. It was almost comical enough to send her into a giggle fit, if she weren't held down by the tears.

He was drooping, "Aw, Frisk, you gotta try and understand him like I do."

"That's what you said about Toriel."

Flowey's whole visage trembled and his voice grew faint. "W-w-well it's also true with-"

"Forget it!" She leveled a dull glare at him, each word she'd said already leaving scorch marks in her mind by way of her intrusive thoughts. "Just shut up and stop being so annoying."

"Okay."

So he stood there silently, watching her shiver--shivering himself for reasons other than cold--and Frisk sat silently too. Gradually the snow was piling on her shoes and soaking the seat of her pants, her nose turning red from the wind. It was harsh enough weather that there weren't a lot of monsters out, and she noticed over hours of looking out the window that few monsters liked to walk too close to Papyrus' house anyway.

Still, that dog was yipping somewhere else in town, annoying thing. It reminded her that she and Flowey weren't the only ones sitting out there to witness all the yelling and screaming she'd done. Flowey piped up first, "Do you think we could go in with Blue Sans for a while? Maybe he won't mind if we say Papyrus kicked us out."

"Blue Sans..." Frisk straightened up, the cold house pressing into her back. It was probably a good idea, but she chewed on the tip of her thumb while looking to the shed where he was working.

Flowey bobbed back into her sight range. "Frisk?"

"Oh," she mumbled once she'd glanced at him. "I was just thinking something. Like," she pulled on her pants as she mumbled even softer, "if his machine gets broken again, do you think that he'll have to stay here?"

Humming in thought Flowey reeled back, then shaking his head. "Maybe, but I'm sure nothing will break it this... time..."

She wished he wouldn't look at her like that, so suddenly and suspiciously. It wasn't any of his business. Frisk curled up. "I wish he'd stay here. I like him a lot."

Frowning, her coward flower friend looked off to where the shed was and his leaves shook. "But if he stays, then that means your own Sans will never come back, doesn't it?" And then quickly, he added, "N-not that that's such a bad thing to me, of course... b-but I thought-"

"You really think that he's going to come back, just because Blue Sans leaves?" Flowey paused, eyes widening. Frisk shook her head, rubbing her hands together in the cold air. She said more quietly, "I don't... I don't think so. Why would he? I know that if I had a way to get out of this hellhole, I would take it without a second thought."

"Exactly." Flowey's expression was different now, eyes creased with his wavering little fanged smile, a face that almost turned skull-like in shape. It made her feel sick to her stomach.

It really was unbearably bitter out there anyway; the wind even made it harder to hear, both Flowey and her own voice. "... Let's go. I bet he's got food too."

The door inside wasn't locked, like she'd expected. She came in eagerly from the cold--Papyrus was right, after the wind disappeared from her back she began to feel much warmer, even though the shed didn't have the best heating either.

She'd never been in the shed before. It wasn't messy in the same way as Sans' room, but it looked pretty worn down; cracks spider-webbed over the tiles, on the light fixtures, even one or two running up the walls. There were cobwebs too, occasionally lurking in the corners. A big twisted hunk of metal and wiring stood in one corner, roughly hammered out into the shape of a booth with junk beside it, which Frisk guessed to be the machine that Blue Sans and Alphys kept talking about. Schematics and blueprints from Alphys' lab were in loose piles around it, next to tools which she didn't care to name.

There was no need to worry about being yelled at for intruding. Blue Sans was sleeping, resting against a counter sunken into one wall with his jacket draped over his body, and Alphys was nowhere in sight. Frisk shut the door slowly, putting a finger to her lips while Flowey crawled up to her shoulders. She tiptoed across the tiles and to Blue Sans, picking up the piece of paper next to his slumbering form.

It's nothing of interest.

Screwing up her face, Frisk put it back down. She looked instead to the jacket that Blue Sans wore; there was a flaw in Papyrus' trick, which she slowly realized while standing there--eventually, it was going to feel too cold in the room after the relief of being inside was over. Again putting a finger to her lips, she pulled the jacket off of Sans and wrapped it around her own shoulders.

You scum.

The furry hood of Sans' jacket tickled her nose and she rubbed it, smirking for a moment. Looking at her, Flowey giggled quietly and she shushed him, tiptoeing over to the machine. Behind her, Blue Sans' snores were a gentle sound compared to all the screaming and hitting.

The machine's engine was what made it run, right? It looked utterly decimated, by her estimates. Its insides were a mess and outside, plugs and wires and maybe something like electrodes--those were as many words as she knew, though.

"How do you think this thing works, anyway?" Flowey asked Frisk, his voice just under a whisper.

Frisk didn't know, but she bet these pieces on the ground were important for it. She picked it up gingerly, feeling a thrill for how its sharp edges rested on the skin of her fingertips, just threatening to slice them open. She put it back down, and picked up another that was even bigger, surely even more important. It all looked so complicated. Frisk sat back with her piece and pressed the palm of her free hand into her eye. "Mmm..."

Break | Do Not

"what's up?"

In unison with Flowey's squeak Frisk inhaled sharply, tossing the piece back to the pile in which it belonged. "Oh!" Blue Sans was awake, and standing right next to them with the usual grin on his skull.

White eyes going to the engine and then back to Frisk, he only said, "careful. alphys'd get mad if we have to replace some of these things."

"I was-" The child tore the jacket off her shoulders, holding it in front of her instead. "-Just looking. Where--um, where is Alphys?"

"stepped out. we're gonna need a welder," he said, and chuckled at the way her eyes lit up at the word "welder." Frisk continued to knead the jacket through her fingers, and his eyes widened slightly--hand going to his shoulder--as if just now realizing he wasn't wearing it. "huh. you in the habit of taking things that aren't yours?"

She stood up, wrapping her arms around the coat like it was a stuffed toy. "Yes. My Sans says you snooze you lose."

"what a cold-hearted kid you are," he said, shutting a tired eye at her. "i'm kinda chilly in here. you already got a sweater, so i think you can give that back?"

Aside from being chilly, he sounded like his sinuses--not that he had any--were clogged. Frisk stuck her tongue out at Blue Sans, though, for just a little longer. Then he said, "unless that jacket happens to be, uhh, important to you..."

So she tossed it in his face. He didn't mind. "hehe."

His sockets were covered.

Frisk eyed the pieces of the engine once more.

Break | Do Not

"How are you feeling, Blue Sans?" Spoke Flowey at last, as the skeleton pulled the coat on.

Frisk stepped away from the machine; suddenly Blue Sans' eyes were visible again, a little narrower than she remembered. "good. how about you, sprout?"

"Good! Frisk is good too." He bobbed and made a sound like wetting his lips, "W-we wanted to come check on you."

"that so? hmm..." he glanced over at the engine, and Frisk felt her heart sink. "i got a question for you, kiddo."

Another step away from the engine, looking down at the broken tiles. "What?"

"if you're a god, how come you can't fix this thing for me?"

Frisk's eyes shot back up immediately; Blue Sans had thrust his hands into his pockets, gave a bigger grin, and he sniggered at her shocked expression. The child plucked her sleeve and scowled, "I'm not a god."

He shrugged, "being able to move each individual point of the universe kind of does make you a god. so the way i see it, if you can do all this reset business, you can fix this machine."

"That's retarded," she snapped, although the thought did almost make her smile. "You just don't want to do any work like usual."

"true as that may be," Blue Sans admitted with a shrug, and she did smile then. "i don't think the theory is wrong."

Of course he didn't. Her Sans must have believed the same thing. Frisk wondered if he would be wheezing right now, or if he was wheezing then, and her expression fell. "Well I'm telling you I'm not a god. And if I was," she added, folding her arms. "Then everyone should start being nicer to me, don't you think?"

"maybe." His pupils disappeared. Frisk almost stopped breathing. "if you can control it."

"I can't," she said quickly. Maybe too quickly, but she didn't care, it was the truth. "I mean, I can SAVE and that's it." And he wasn't even supposed to know that much. She squinted at him, and Blue Sans squinted back.

He took a moment to pause, and finally yawned, "well, that's a shame. i was hoping to get out of working on this today. i'm so tired already i can hardly see straight."

Flowey bent around into Frisk's view, and the two shared a look before turning back to the monster. "Well if you're tired you can take a break or something, make Papyrus stop being an asshole instead." Frisk uttered. "...Until Alphys gets back. Or just make Alphys do the work."

"take a break?" Sans looked sideways. "what a novel concept."

Next Chapter: Wheezing

Chapter Text

He'd briefly considered that, given the circumstances, he could go back and buy the red coat instead of being stuck with the blue one. But... more people than just Papyrus could notice if he acted strange. Although he sometimes thought that that ship must have already sailed, a thought that was extremely uncomfortable, he still couldn't risk it. Oh, well, the blue was fine. Blue wasn't going to kill him.

His other self put up with it well enough, even if it was kind of bland to dress in blue and to also be a blue magic user. It was fine.

However, because it was away from other people's eyes, Sans was considering making changes to his room. For one thing, he had plans to haul out that dumb treadmill- someone was going to end up tripping on that thing, right in the middle of the floor like that. Then maybe repaint the walls and change up the floor, make it something that he had wanted. Something his old Papyrus didn't allow.

Papyrus might not be too crazy about the idea at this stage, but Sans was willing to bring it up- especially since he already ordered the paint he was going to need. That day, as soon as he was done picking up all of the cans and moving them to his room with a little cheating, his intention was to head back home and tell his new brother of his plans.

Naturally he spent a couple hours not doing that, then. It was much more fun to explore the town. Scare little dogs. Do some of the work that the other Sans apparently did in his free time, or swindle people out of their cash- the latter was more his style. He almost ran into this world's Undyne during his excursion. That narrow encounter, which he almost used a shortcut over, was what finally drove him back to his house for the day. No matter the world, Undyne was more trouble than she was worth. If she found out that he was a fake...

When he walked in the door, he thought he heard Papyrus talking to somebody. It wasn't in a hushed voice, for he sincerely doubted that any version of his brother knew how to be quiet, but it was a little more strained sounding than usual, and that set him on edge. Stepping closer in, he could see that Papyrus was talking in the kitchen, specifically- his hand to his skull.

"NO! IN FACT I'VE NEVER SEEN THEM ACT LIKE THAT BEFORE IN MY LIFE. BUT IF THEY'RE ANYTHING ALIKE, THEY MIGHT BE A LITTLE HAPPIER IF YOU GAVE THEM A GOOD PUZZLE TO WORK ON! HUMANS LOVE PUZZLES!" he said, not yet noticing that anyone else had entered the house.

Now Sans relaxed, at least a little; just chatting on the phone, eh? He'd wait until he was done. His not-throat was burning, though, so he entered the kitchen anyway to silently take another carton of orange juice out of the fridge.

Papyrus' eyes almost bugged out of his skull to see him, and Sans grinned, but he kept going, "NO I THINK A PUZZLE SHOULD BE LESS... UM... I COULD GIVE YOU SOME OF MY DIAGRAMS?? ...OF COURSE IT IS!! IT'S ALWAYS BETTER TO..." his voice trailed, and he continued to glance at Sans. "WELL THAT'S JUST WEIRD."

Sans gulped juice and stared, swishing it in his skull.

"LOOK IF YOU'RE NOT GOING TO TAKE MY ADVICE I'M JUST GOING TO HANG UP. ... YES I WILL! I WILL TALK TO YOU LATER. GOODBYE." Frowning, as much as possible for Papyrus anyway, he switched the phone off.

Then there was an awkward silence, one Sans had been hoping to avoid, but they kept stumbling into them. It wasn't as though he didn't know why they kept stumbling into them; despite his new brother's proclamations, it had to be impossible to stop thinking about what he actually was. The sooner he got used to the idea that he was staying, the better, right? And eventually he had to. His own brother would.

No one was talking, Papyrus just having the phone clasped tightly between his gloved hands. Sans paused and ventured, "who was that?" Taking another gulp of juice.

"OH! ER, JUST LADY TORIEL. YES THAT'S IT." Sans raised an eyebrow ridge, and he added, "THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT FRISK."

Sans tilted his head, "huh. she upset?"

"UH. NO. NO, SHE-" his speech cut off mid-sentence, and he put his free hand to his jawline. "ACTUALLY, I FORGOT TO ASK YOU BEFORE!!"

He took a step back, eyeing Papyrus suspiciously. "ask me what?"

"HOW YOUR DATE WENT WITH TORIEL!" As a skeleton he couldn't get any paler, but it sure felt like he blanched. Papyrus didn't notice, bless his idiotic soul. "DID YOU FOLLOW ALL THE INSTRUCTIONS IN THE BOOK? DID SHE WEAR NEW CLOTHES TOO?? TELL ME ABOUT IT!!!"

"uh, uh, actually," the smaller skeleton scratched his skull, backing away again. "i didn't get around to asking her date me."

"WHAT?!" Sans flinched. "WHY NOT??? ISN'T THAT WHY YOU WENT OVER THERE? ISN'T THAT WHY YOU'RE WEARING YOUR SPECIAL CLOTHES EVEN NOW?"

Actually it was because he liked it too much to take it off. "this isn't really your business," he grumbled, looking at the tiles of the floor. "i don't know. errrrm the kid was there and i kinda lost my nerve."

"OH NO." Papyrus' nearly agonized expression almost made him laugh, but he couldn't help getting anxious, wondering why he cared. "THEN, UH... OH!" He snapped his fingers. "YOU SHOULD GO BACK TO HER HOUSE! RIGHT NOW!" A bead of sweat appeared on his skull, and Sans smirked. "LIKE IMMEDIATELY?? AND GO ASK HER OUT?"

"immediately, huh?"

"YES! AFTER ALL, TRUE LOVE IS THE BEST WAY TO REFORM SOMEONE LIKE YOURSELF INTO A MODEL CITIZEN. LIKE IN THE MOVIES!!"

What a concept; Sans snorted, and then shook his head. "there's a problem with that. if i couldn't work up the nerve last time, what makes you think i can this time?"

"YOU JUST HAVE TO BE MORE LIKE ME!" He said, and Sans rolled his eyes. But he continued, "IT'S EASY! JUST BELIEVE THAT YOU CAN GO DOWN THERE AND ASK HER ON A DATE AND DO WHATEVER IT IS YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO WITHOUT FEAR OF REJECTION. SO!"

Sans squinted. "so?"

"SO, YOU SHOULD GO DOWN THERE AND ASK LADY TORIEL OUT RIGHT NOW BEFORE YOU DO ANYTHING ELSE! AND... ERM..." suddenly it clicked, watching Papyrus fumble for words. "...NOT COME BACK UNTIL A LONG TIME HAS PASSED."

He chuckled dryly. "look, boss," he said with a lazy smile. "i can see you're trying really hard here, but i also know you're just trying to get me out of the house again."

To his credit Papyrus didn't miss a beat, "THAT DOESN'T MEAN I DON'T THINK IT'S TRUE! I'M ALWAYS TELLING MY OWN SANS THAT YOU HAVE TO GIVE SOMETHING 200% IN ORDER TO GET WHAT YOU WANT! IF YOU'VE ONLY GIVEN IT 50%, OF COURSE IT'S TOO EARLY TO THROW IN THE TOWEL! YOU CAN DO THIS, I KNOW YOU CAN!"

Damn it, the carton was empty. "... you really think it'd go well?"

Th fact that his not-brother was even considering it seemed to re-encourage the more boisterous skeleton, and his declaration made Sans flinch again. "OF COURSE I DO! NOW HURRY UP!!"

"jesus, you're optimistic." Sans grumbled.

But Papyrus just folded his arms, face puzzled. "... DO YOU NOT LIKE TORIEL??"

Sans' heartbeat flickered and he sneered at nobody in particular. Then his sneer faded, becoming a bit of a grimace, and his eye turned red. The red faded. His eyesockets narrowed and he pulled a painful grimace. Papyrus had never seen his Sans go through such a rapid range of expressions.

Sans turned around, and Papyrus smiled in triumph. "...welp, i'm headin' out. later dude."

With him gone, Papyrus returned to his conversation on the phone. Luckily for him, Sans left too fast to hear who it was with.

Strangely, Frisk didn't answer the door again when he came knocking. At first, he thought with an inner chuckle that they might be avoiding a repeat of a few days ago and another terrible joke.

"They went to go play with Leo," Toriel told him when he asked. "But I do hope you will consider staying with me a while, all the same?"

It was again a little bit difficult for him to resist saying no, not through any fault of her own. It wasn't even based on anything that actually- no, it might've happened, but it wasn't based on anything he remembered personally. But this kind of instinctual suspicion, this uneasiness, was what kept people alive in his world. He did his best to ignore it. "sure, i'm always up for a visit. ...plus," he mused, looking at the walls around him, "you look pretty blue today."

Toriel giggled, sitting down at the kitchen table. "Thank you, Sans, I appreciate the company."

He smiled, in earnest, "no problem, tori."

So far, so good.

She offered him a plate of blueberry pie that she had made that morning, and despite not being one for desserts he accepted the offer. She sat beside him when dishing out a plate for them both, and he dipped a claw in some of the dark filling that was spilling out from under the crust while trying to think of how he was going to word his proposal to her.

don't call it a proposal oh my god. That was going to make him even more nervous, thinking of it like that. But suddenly the fear was the same level, wondering if she was going to say no or something terrible like that. Or maybe Frisk told her like they told Papyrus. Although, she was talking to him too placidly right now for that to be true, in his opinion.

Still, maybe it would be better to wait... Until he knew his way around the relationship better. The things that the kid told him at the start kept coming back to him. Sans sighed soundlessly with the decision, the fear of rejection leaving in the motion. He was going to have to go back to his new Papyrus and tell him that he hadn't given it 200% or even 100%, and that he definitely wanted to repaint his new room.

Something else occurred to him while Toriel talked, though.

what if this is the only chance i'll ever have to ask her out and i can't do it?

Just as quickly he rejected the thought.

After all, he destroyed his machine pretty thoroughly.

...But even if that was true, it didn't mean that he was safe where he was. It didn't mean that everything was going to be fine now.

He knew that the machine in this world couldn't work, but he also hadn't been able to even get into the shed, not even to check in on his old home. Undoubtedly calls from his brother had been building up all of this time, because the other him was apparently even worse than he was at pretending to be someone that he wasn't, and it was only lucky for him that there were a lot less people to miss him over there then there were here. Lucky was a weird way of phrasing it, though.

Papyrus was far too stupid to know how to reconstruct the machine to the specifications that he built it, so it wasn't like he was going to show up out of nowhere to beat him literally within an inch of his life. That is, he wouldn't be able to do it without help, but...

"...but Frisk was such a dear yesterday," Toriel said, and Sans' gaze snapped back over at her. "They asked me how I was feeling and we had a nice conversation over lunch. They don't usually take such an interest, they are always so preoccupied by their duties and games."

"that so?" Sans smirked, picking at some of the pie on his plate. He noticed that this version of the kid was a lot less of a little stinker; he didn't really expect them to change their behavior, so this came as a surprise. As he remembered it, the kid in his world would get upset and stay quiet the way they sometimes did. He wondered how they are getting along with his other self, if they were getting along at all. A bit of his breath caught in his not-lungs. Anything further he was going to say in commentary disappeared.

But for now, Toriel did not seem to mind. She ate up her slice with a carefree smile. "I do not mind telling you that I have been a bit tense. I think things are going to be better now, though. Some of the parents of our monster children have been calling in and saying that their little ones are feeling a little better. It really helped me for you to take Frisk off my hands for a while the other day; I got all the grading done and I have many more worksheets prepared for them all."

"oh," Sans cleared his throat, glancing away nervously. "i'm glad, 's always grade to have a break."

She giggled again, having to clamp her hands over her mouth to muffle the noise, and his chest felt ten times lighter. She was so cute, even if he'd really only seen a couple of her moods. The Toriel in his world was, even if understandably, much less expressive. Her switch was usually between quiet and out of control, but this one had... well, Sans imagined she had several switches.

And then she said, "Now Sans, don't be a little sheet," and then he was laughing uproariously too. It was great.

It didn't last.

Because it's not going to last, he thought. It was a thought that accompanied another hitch in his breath, cutting his laughter off at its end.

This time he couldn't shake it. While Toriel was finishing off her crust his breath hitched for a second time. What if the machine does get repaired? What if he's found out here, by more and more people, and they get the machine working here? Papyrus and Frisk, in this world, they knew who he really was. Papyrus and Frisk, in his world, knew who the other Sans was as well- at least, he would be very disappointed in the pipsqueak if he found out they hadn't guessed the truth, as clever as they've been for such a small human. That made four people- five, counting his other self.

The number can grow.

Suppose that this Toriel, with such a friendly disposition, were to learn the truth? As much as he'd learned from this Frisk, how could he completely imitate the friend she had gotten to know for so long? Did he even put Alphys' goop on recently enough? What if his face changes back?

Sans couldn't breathe, and his eyes itched. i'm gonna end back up in snowdin the boss was going to smack the hell out of him for leaving, shout at him in his grating voice, put him through so much backlogged sentry duty, and it will all be just like how it was before.

"Sans, are you feeling alright?"

like a reset.

He struggled for air and it came out in a huge, painful gasp.

they're gonna reset

That gasp became another one, his breath rasping through his teeth. Toriel's shocked face spurred him to move, to stand and back off from the table, and yet the only thing that accomplished was to make him feel dizzy. He couldn't even release the air he'd taken in until several seconds too long. Those old feelings were coming back, coming back at the worst time.

Why was this happening now? Why right now? Magic was rising and gathering in his body, rushing to his head. Toriel had also moved, standing from her seat. "Sans?" No, no, no, she couldn't see his eye flare up. Sans wheezed and his hands scrabbled for a place on his jacket.

Chest too tight. Can't stop thinking about it. it's all going to disappear in some way or another. He couldn't even just get it over with.

Can't breathe.

"Shh, shh."

Sans almost screamed when Toriel rushed to him, faster than he expected- without any air, it just came out as a sharp croaking noise. But along with the scream, he also tried to move, to push her away, and that caused even more stabs of fear at the thought of his sharp claws digging into her face just like-

"Sans, Sans, look at me," she said, though, and one large warm hand gently held him still. He thought his red eye might have flared for only a moment, but he couldn't tell if she was shocked at that or at everything about this. She was suspicious, she was she knew. She knew he wasn't- "Sans?"

He wheezed.

"Look at me, it's okay," she said to him, her face right before his. "It's alright, you're safe here. You're doing very well. Take some deep breaths, as slow as you can. Do you need something? Any medicine, or something you might normally use?"

"no-" he said, the whites of his eyes turned to pinpricks. Normally use? He usually calmed down by laughing at somebody. If that.

Kneeling down to his level, her other arm rubbed his back while she held his hand, her voice going on, "Shh, shh, Sans, you're alright, you're going to be alright. No one's going to hurt you here. You are not in danger. Breathe in and out like this, okay?"

Snowballing thoughts threatened to keep cutting off his air. San shuddered and choked but fixated on that voice, on her warm hands and her face, and her slow deliberate breathing. He struggled once, and his magic nearly flared too, but gradually over the minutes he stood there it faded. His wheezing grew quieter, turning to whimpers that moved through his warped and strained smile.

He didn't feel any better. For one thing, his not-gut turned with shame at having such a display in front of her, of all people. It was even worse than when he did it in front of this world's Papyrus, if that was even possible. Why, why was this happening in such a peaceful world? All of these people were so nice...

Even if he still felt like crap, though, the wheezing had slowed and stopped and his body stopped shuddering; he could breathe again. "hhah..." he didn't want to look at her, but there was little else to look at. "hhyou... i'm sorry..."

"No, no," she said, giving his head an affectionate rub. Sans stiffened again, wondering why his face felt so tingly all of a sudden. "You have nothing to apologize for, you are doing well. Do you want something?"

Really, Sans felt slightly numb. Like he couldn't quite put himself back in this room. "uh."

Toriel kept her patient smile, standing, "Maybe I can make you a warm drink to calm you down? And I can get something for you to breathe into if it will help. But you are doing a good job."

She seemed so on top of this, at least when it came to suggestions. "Uh... drink...?" Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out- like her own breathing. fuck, did this kind of thing happen a lot with my other self? He seemed pretty laid-back to him. No, no, this was new to her. Her reactions made that evident. She didn't know what he needed. "i, uh... you do this a lot?"

"Oh, well," Toriel fished for a clean cup in the dish drainer, "I'm sure that they would not want me to talk about this to just anyone, but, Frisk often has moments like this."

Again Sans' breath hitched, and when she turned back to look at him he struggled to unhitch it. "r-really? the kid does?"

She filled the mug with water and selected a bag of cocoa mix. "Yes, yes, occasionally. Mostly at night." She made some kind of noise, and not facing her Sans wasn't entirely sure if it was a sigh or something else. "Sometimes they will call me in because something has unsettled them in the dark, or they've had a nightmare."

He couldn't help but scoff, a motion which panicked him again and turned into a faint nervous laugh. "oh, nightmares." Nightmares were things that all children dealt with. It wasn't exactly comparable.

But even so, Toriel had a more somber expression as she set down the mug of steaming hot chocolate on a table. "In a sense. Although I would hesitate to call them just that. ...They are vivid." She spared him a look, and Sans hesitated before walking to the table and taking the mug in his hands. His breathing still seemed shaky. "They often awaken unable to distinguish their room from their dream, and even when they can they insist I stay with them all night. It terrifies them. They end up, well..." She crossed a hand in front of her muzzle, eyes narrowing as she looked elsewhen. "Wheezing, much like you."

Sans sipped and his teeth felt warm. "...what kind of dreams?"

"It is a recent occurrence. ...But, it is... often to do with their time underground," Toriel said at last, frowning. "... I am not surprised. A child can only go through so much without it being... etched with them."

And suddenly he felt cold in the pit of his stomach. oh. those kinds of dreams. Frisk looked just fine every time he saw them. Except for, of course, the times when he was scaring the crap out of them. "ah fuck," he said, the words slipping out.

Looking enviously, suddenly, at his cup of cocoa Toriel sighed, "It is alright, Sans. These kinds of things are not anyone's fault. ...There are some choice individuals I will not be sending holiday cards to," she mused, voice suddenly turning icy, and Sans sat straight at attention with a little choked cough. Alarmed, the boss monster smiled gently at him, "But you will get a nice card come that time of year."

"ah, geeze. i just didn't know," he mumbled into the cup.

"Well as I said, it is a recent occurrence." She rested her head on her hand, watching him thoughtfully. "I am quite proud of them, you know?"

Sans took another sip. holy fuck this is sweet, he thought, as he resisted gagging. He was out of mustard. "frisk?"

"Yes," she nodded sleepily. "Even facing these dreams, even becoming so... uneasy... about some of the monsters here, they try to reach out and live normally. Many of the monsters they see in their dreams... are also their friends."

If this world really modeled after his own, then yes. Some of the people they hung around with had to have opposed the human at some point. Undyne, Asgore, random monsters, even Papyrus. But, even so, in this world, weren't they...?

His own Frisk popped up in Sans' head, as they had been doing as of late. If anyone was going to get nightmares it should be them; he had seen the tallies they kept, watched their moods get dark so often and for such unbearably simple reasons. And yet, their sleep always looked peaceful to him whenever he was able to get a glimpse of it. It might just be a difference in environment. But then, in a world that looked so easy to his eyes...

Why did this Frisk have nightmares? He didn't understand.

Even if it was too sweet, he kept drinking the hot chocolate. "... probably easy with you as their mom."

This made her laugh, a little more than he had expected. In fact, he was even suspicious; a few seconds longer than she should have, Toriel said, "That may be it. Either way, I think that they must be a very strong child. They will not let the things that frighten them control them."

Sans gulped.

"Hmm?"

Now he thought of Papyrus again, his own, and tried to keep his breathing steady. That damn phone was still in his other clothes. Slowly, Sans closed his eyesockets, only to open them again in the next moment, grimacing. Fear was not easy. Fear made him choke. Not just him, either, but somehow he never figured that to be so significant before. "...i think i gotta go."

"Oh- right now?" Her expression turned startled, and perhaps a little speculative. Did she think it was her fault? But it wasn't anything she said. She was great, as usual. "Are you sure?"

"yeah. i need to go make a phone call," Sans murmured, scratching the side of his face- it felt a bit tingly again. "i'll... see you later, tori." And with that, he stood and prepared to walk out.

"Wait, Sans," his not-heart thudded as she grabbed him by the sleeve, stopping him in his tracks. More quietly, then, he heard her say, "Knowing you as I do, perhaps you would rather not discuss it, but... if there is something causing you bother..."

i can't. Sans stiffened, the answer already in his head before she'd finished.

"...Please know that you can always talk to me."

He smiled big at her, and hoped his fangs weren't showing. "i do. 'bye."

And with his destination in mind Sans left, the cup of cocoa on the table half-empty and his slice of blueberry pie pretty much uneaten.

Next Chapter: Sans Can't Hear the Foreboding Music but It's There

Chapter Text

Since locking her out of the house, Papyrus had been behaving a little oddly towards Frisk. The snapping and cursing that characterized the last few days with him had almost disappeared completely, replaced by uncomfortable silence. That was fine with her, and her own behavior was also characterized by a quiet, sulky silence, replying in short sentences to anything Flowey or Blue Sans said.

Engrossed in whatever it was that was making him so ill, Blue Sans had stopped working on the machine entirely, which was just fine for Frisk. He took to napping, on the couch since Frisk had already taken over Sans' old room, and that was where he spent the majority of his time. Alphys seemed fairly upset by his inactivity, but only because she had to do the work herself. Frisk wondered why she even bothered.

Whenever the lizard monster complained Blue Sans would cough and murmur that it was fine. He didn't really look that sick to Frisk, though. She even found a flashlight somewhere in this austere house and shined it into one of his eye sockets and nose, looking for mucus or pus, and all she got was being transported away from the couch by the thick of her SOUL. It looked more like he was faking it to her (monsters couldn't catch human diseases, right?) But she wouldn't say anything, if only so that she wouldn't disrupt his torpor.

She was still working up her nerve, to take advantage of a moment when Alphys wasn't around.

It was a rusty action for her.

At some point on another day, Flowey found a bag of Iscreams in the freezer, and Frisk devoured ten of them greedily before Papyrus had time to stop her- the instant she finished, of course, she regretted it. She threw up on the kitchen floor- or, rather, tried to, but magic is not so easily expelled from the body. Queasy, and with Papyrus lecturing her in his deep screechy voice, she sat on the couch next to Blue Sans for awhile.

During those hours she pulled out two Iscreams she had saved and offered them to him, her skin hot and prickly while she did. "Iscream?"

"i didn't hear anything," he said.

She pulled the gift away with a sneer. More retarded jokes. "Har har har, nevermind."

"aw c'mon, i'll stop," he said, fumbling for it without moving from where he sat. Frisk squealed when his hand touched hers and tossed the packages in his face. "thanks kiddo, that's really sweet of you."

Sans makes a pun that is kind of on the nose.

She didn't have time to snatch the packages back, growling, before he swallowed them- paper and all. Instead, she growled for a second time in the back of her throat and scurried up into her old Sans' room. Blue Sans wasn't unsettled by her behavior in the least.

There wasn't anything to do there except mark tallies on the wall, tallies made by Undyne which she didn't wish to be forgotten while so far from her burrow. After making them she nearly lost her mind in this room. I stunk too much, smelling like the anxiety that Sans so often exuded. She ate a hamburger she found in his sock drawer- already hungry and way past her dinner time- and screamed into a mattress.

By the time she came back down, Blue Sans wasn't on the couch anymore. He was snoozing on the table, next to the rock covered in chocolate sprinkles. She frowned; Papyrus was sitting on the couch again, flipping through channels. Out of his room again; Frisk kept a groan from rising in her. "Did you move him over there?"

"HE DIDN'T WAKE UP. HE WON'T MIND," he snapped, waving her off. He hadn't yet settled on something to watch.

A lot of the channels were weird things, if it wasn't another Mettaton show (Papyrus often complained that they were all reruns lately;) there were old kid shows that Frisk watched when she was younger, a few science fiction series that the grown-ups had watched when they thought all the kids were asleep, movies that were in black and white and severely damaged, and more than a fair share of shaky camera home movies that the monsters had apparently made. As Sans explained it to her once, people in the underground didn't have the budget to make high-quality television shows like the humans. They just broadcasted whatever media they could get their hands on, human or monster; Mettaton was the first one to ever make a long-lasting television show.

It explained well enough why he was so popular despite how gruesome some of his stuff was. ... Not that she expected much taste from monsters. Frisk dully watched the channels change before retrieving her train of thought. Frowning at Papyrus, she stomped her foot repeatedly and waited for the creaking of floorboards that signaled her so-called friend's arrival. "Don't be a jackass, he was sleeping there."

One eye-ridge raising, Papyrus turned back in her direction. "EXCUSE ME? IT'S MY COUCH!"

"But he's a guest, and you're supposed-"

But the skeleton was already raising his hand, waving her protest off while his sharp voice cut in, "HE IS NOT A GUEST, HE'S SANS. EVEN IF HE'S A SQUISHIER... MORE ASSERTIVE VERSION OF HIM. I WANT TO WATCH TV, I DON'T SEE THE PROBLEM."

A guest, or just a parallel version of his brother? It suddenly stopped making sense, and the child's head hurt. So her voice broke against the curve of her throat and she hissed. Papyrus sneered, satisfied, and turned back to the TV. Frisk heard the floorboards crack and squeak, and so took a step closer. "Well, what if I want to watch something on TV? I'm a guest, aren't I?"

"AND THIS AFFECTS... SANS... HOW?" Papyrus was staring rigidly over at her, his fingers still clicking through channels.

It didn't, but it would hopefully mean that he would leave. He didn't seem to even like sitting next to her. "I dunno," she could only say, "But I want to watch TV. And you should also put Blue Sans back."

He snorted at her, "NO WAY!" And as if that finished the discussion, he sat back on his couch and looked ahead.

Frisk gritted her teeth, sensing a boiling feeling in her stomach. She sat down next to Papyrus, sticking her tongue out at him; she was going to watch whether he liked it or not. This time, he would leave her in peace and she would let him. She started to hum the tune that played, like last time.

Only this time, he didn't leave.

Instead he snapped, "WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THAT?"

Flushing, Frisk buried herself deeper into both the couch and her sweater. "Doing what, fucktard?"

"DON'T CALL ME NAMES," Papyrus shouted, stomping his foot. She could see Flowey popping up out of the corner of her eye, face as terrified as always. "I MEAN THAT THING YOU KEEP DOING!"

"What thing?" Frisk said, and preceded to hum.

"THAT!" Papyrus stomped his foot again, sitting rigidly upright. "YOU KEEP MAKING THAT NOISE, WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THAT? IT IS EXTREMELY DISTRACTING?!"

The child folded her arms. "You mean me humming?"

"... YES. THAT IS WHAT I MEAN." Papyrus shut off the TV, and Frisk voiced her protest over his continued shouting, "I AM NOT GOING TO LISTEN THAT TUNE COMPETING WITH METTATON OR ANYONE ELSE ANNOUNCING THINGS ON MY PROGRAMS!"

"Why not?" Frisk sniffed bitterly. "I have to."

First he started to reply, taking a big breath without any lungs, but then it cut off short. Twice, and both times more rapidly, he tried and cut off, squinting his eyesockets hard in confusion. "...UH. WHAT?"

Feeling hot and prickly again, she stood. "Th-the song- it's like when you have something in your head- and it won't go away- ever- and it's like- when it's always- but it's not like actually hearing it, it's just there-"

Papyrus stood too, eyes wide and voice rising in pitch. "-WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?"

"Stuck in your head!" Frisk shouted, louder than she meant to. Blue Sans was still snoring through it all, unbelievably- yes unbelievably. And with Flowey there, that made an audience of three. Her face flushed. "Like! When you hear a song and it's constantly playing and- except, except this time, it's because you're here. It's always there when you're here!"

Now he wasn't saying anything, just staring with wide eyes and raised brows. "UH?"

"It's like-" Her gestures became more animated, more frantic, as she tried to explain. "It's like, Papyrus walks in, and then- and then- then there's that fucking- music- again- and- it was nice- at first- but it keeps- fucking going- and-and um- it- um- like this-" Face beet red now, Frisk hummed the first several lines of that tune, which was a constant, and watched Papyrus' shocked expression get even worse. "-Except not like that, it's got more- um-"

"WHERE DID YOU EVEN HEAR THAT?!"

"I didn't!" She yelled. "It's just there! Like- like- the moment I met you, I-"

He squinted again, the crack in his skull flaring. "WHEN WE MET? BUT-"

"-Like it's your theme song or something-"

"MY THEME SONG? OH MY GOD." Papyrus took a moment, digging into his pocket, until whipping out the phone that kept causing all the trouble. "IT'S MY FUCKING RINGTONE!"

The cellphone in his hands, as if on cue, began to ring- the tune, indeed, the same as the one that had been playing in her own head. Somehow she never noticed their similarities before, the music always cutting off too soon.

Papyrus let out a shriek, almost dropping and then fumbling clumsily for the object, and Frisk began to laugh. He glared at her, quickly answering the thing without another word to the child. "YES? WHO THE HELL IS THIS?"

In her opinion, the question wasn't necessary. Only one person was calling him for the last few days- well, perhaps it would be more accurate to say only one world. ... No, that wasn't right either. But in any case she knew it was going to be that other Alphys, or the other Papyrus, or that other Frisk, all of them calling for the same purpose. The sneer on her face faded and she twisted the end of her sweater while her Papyrus listened to the other end of the line.

His response was just as she expected. "OH, GREAT. NOW THERE ARE TWO OF YOU TALKING TO ME. WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

Frisk might have suggested something, but before she had a chance to talk Blue Sans was standing next to her, very much awake. "they probably want you to give me the phone, anti-paps."

"DON'T THEY KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS?" Papyrus snarled, and something came from the phone. He frowned deeply, snapping, "NO, NINE! YOUR CLOCK IS INFERIOR TO MINE!"

"give me the phone."

One more look at Blue Sans was enough to convince him, and he reluctantly handed his cellphone over. The volume was loud- like everything Papyrus- loud enough that, standing next to him, Frisk could hear almost everything that the other Frisk was saying to the other Sans. Talking in a voice that didn't sound all that much like hers. "U-uhh... Hi? Red Papyrus?"

And Blue Sans, although always smiling, was more noticeably doing so now. "it's me, kid. what's up?"

Frisk was as cheerful as they always were- at least, so it sounded to Sans. It was nice that someone could keep up their spirits in this situation. Although, as he pointed out to himself mentally, this kid wasn't the one trapped in this worse world.

"Oh! Well Alphys was wondering what you guys were using for a power source, since your machine doesn't seem to have one anymore?"

Power source? Before, he was using different kinds of magical batteries that ... had designed. It didn't look like the same was true for this thing. "you might, uh, wanna ask this world's alphys about that when she gets here tomorrow."

"Okay." And Frisk cleared their throat. "So how are you doing, Sans?"

That wasn't an easy question to answer. "i'm doing fine. not hacking up as much, so, that's a good sign right?"

There was a little laughter. "There are some kids who are getting better too. It makes sense to me; whenever I get a cold, it doesn't last very long."

"to be honest, i'm not sure how monsters could catch a human disease," Sans mused, ignoring the three other occupants of the room all staring him. It was like that every time he accepted a call from the his world, which is why he wished he could just steal the phone away from this world's Papyrus and conduct the call in privacy, but it didn't work out very well the first time he tried that. "i'm gonna want to look into that later. ...uh, but anyway, how's paps? is he there?"

"No," Frisk said, "I just came from his place, though. He looks fine to me."

"no cracks or anything, right?"

Around him he could hear the peanut gallery talking. The Frisk from this world was saying, "Sans wouldn't make a crack."

And in as low a voice as he was probably capable of making, this world's Papyrus retorted, "THE HELL HE WOULDN'T. THIS PAPYRUS IS OBVIOUSLY NOT STRONG ENOUGH TO CURB HIM."

"watch your mouth," he growled, and they both shut up. On the other end of the phone line Frisk made a confused squeak, and he had quickly "not you, kiddo. but that's good. i wish I could talk to him right now, you say hi to him for me."

"I will!" Aside from just their voice, he could also hear crunching, like on leaves and other carpetings of nature. They must be walking through the woods again. "I'm sure he'll be a lot happier once the machine is fixed, from you on your side or Alphys working on mine. I know I will be."

Sans felt an inexplicable weariness wash over him. "i'm sure you guys'll get it figured out soon."

"Or you will," the kid insisted. "You're really smart."

He could say something like, "you're a literal god," but that was harder to say to them then it was to say to this kid standing near him. "smart? heheheh, have you not been payi-" Something changed on the other end of the phone line, and Sans cut off in the middle of a modest protest. Crunching noises, a sharp gasp. Something else. Sans' heartbeat quickened. "frisk?"

There was no reply.

"uhhh, kid?" For a second he thought he had lost them when gentle static took over the phone, but then it faded.

He had lost Frisk, though, because there was a new voice on the other end of the line. "hiya." It was very familiar. "so, uh, you know that kind of bad mood you get in when you realize that literally everyone is conspiring against you?"

San said the first thing that popped into his head. "oh, it's me. hey."

Meanwhile Papyrus and Frisk, as well as Flowey, straightened and watched in shock. Flowey with a little extra queasiness, as he was the only one the spoke out, "H-h-he's on the phone?"

"i got a question," said the other version of himself. Talking to a voice that sounded identical to his- even if that was mitigated by the static of the phone- made Sans' skin crawl. "how long have you guys been talking? i just want to know so i can figure out... how pissed i should be." Something sounded near him, and he had a good hunch that it was Frisk saying something, judging by how the next thing his other self said was "zip it, you little shit." And then he added, "i wouldn't do that if i were you. you reset, and you're just adding to the time that your 1 HP friend has to stay in my crummy world."

So much of his speech, Sans was coming to realize, was punctuated by sharp gasps. It wasn't Frisk making them.

Slowly they were tapering off, though. "you've been causing me a lot of trouble, bud," he mused. "you don't have to cause any more."

"looks like i do," hissed his other self. "if you've been working to get back all this time. not to mention the jokers in this world."

"I wanna talk to him," the other Frisk whispered, tugging on Sans' sleeve.

He ignored them for the moment. His chest was still pounding; somewhere on the other side, right now, in a place he couldn't reach, his Frisk was in danger. Well, not in danger, danger- unless they really were. But the kid getting hurt or killed yet again in their short lifetime wasn't appealing to him either. It was easy for someone like him to keep his cool even under that threat, however, so his chest didn't reflect his cool words, "as you might say, the jig's clearly up. you can come back now. or at least let me come back, y'know? it's kind of my life you took."

"oh no," said the other Sans. "i'm sorry, can't do either of those things. the only thing i can do is make sure you stay put. for that, i guess i'll have to do a little breaking and entering once i'm done dealin' with this brat," and so saying, he finished with a rattling breath.

Sans' eyes narrowed. "can't?"

"nope."

"I TOLD YOU!" Papyrus roared, "WHEN I GET OVER THERE I'LL SHOW HIM FOR RUNNING OUT ON-"

He kept on shouting, but Sans could hear the voice over the phone clearer, "holy shit, is that papyrus in there with you?" Then laughter, harsh and breathless. "fuck, tell him to shut up. i'm sick of hearing him go on. nobody fucking cares, you're not ever seeing me again anyway."

Just from those words, Papyrus had almost frozen completely with rage, unable to make another sound. His gloved hands were in shaking fists. So, wary for another outburst, Sans murmured, "come over here and tell him yourself."

"I wanna talk to him," said Frisk again, tugging on his arm harder. Sans nudged them away. "Please? Please?"

"don't want to." Something thumped on the other end and there was a shriek. "-a-ha oops."

An image of Frisk breaking their head open popped into his skull. How badly he wanted to say "oops what?" But Sans couldn't utter another word before the child on his end stole the phone from him by force. They took several steps back and glared at everyone else, daring them to come take it with their pan in one hand. Flowey climbed up their legs, back, and settled onto their shoulder with his vinelike tendrils, and the kid shuddered.

But then, and still periodically glaring at everybody else, they spoke into the phone. "Sans, it's me."

Since could only just barely hear his other self talking, faint from where he stood; what a pain in the ass. He hated having to keep is not-ears at attention. At least the voice that he heard also sounded rattled, "... oh, uh. y-you're here too. hiya pipsqueak, it's been a while."

"If you'd given me your phone number I could have called you earlier, asshole," Frisk said in a quiet mumble, face as red as it often was.

A little of that darkness in his voice was gone. "oh. i coulda done that. uh, i-i wasn't answering anyway."

"Um." They looked to Papyrus, who stared in disbelief, and then at Flowey, who was shivering hard on their shoulder. They scratched their head and continued the little mumble. "Look, stop being a jackass. Whatever it is that scared you away, come back here and face it like-like a man!"

And he laughed at them, doing an awful lot of laughing over this conversation. "i'm a monster, not a man, i don't gotta do shit."

"Sans," they tried again, and this time their voice cracked- if just a little.

Sans, himself, was starting to approach the kid, his eyesocket twitching and smile turned an obvious grimace. He heard the voice that sounded like his say, "besides, your new sans is doing fine, isn't he? seems to me like he already got my old brother under his heel, which is a lot more than i could do in his place. and you don't sound as weak and scratchy as you normally are, so i assume he's doing what i told him to do."

"But-" they began to say, but he cut them off again.

"by that same token, i'm having a great time here." Now Sans could feel his magic flaring underneath bone. "well, i was, but i think it's still ten times better than being there. everyone here is an idiot like usual, but they're fun idiots. especially his papyrus," his other self laughed. He laughed, and suddenly Sans wasn't aware of himself anymore. "he's hilarious, and i even found out he doesn't hit back."

"Y o u  w a n n a  g o,  b u d d y?"

He didn't even know that he'd stolen the phone back from Frisk until he was snarling into it. The monster on the other side of the room and the kid backing away, Frisk and Papyrus had gone utterly silent, just watching him. He didn't care. There was a roaring in his ears that he seldom heard, and it surprised even him.

But it didn't matter what he said or how he said it, evidently. His other self on the phone wheezed and laughed, "hahahahahahahaha! I didn't see that coming, ahahahahahaha! you must really care about him- god, what's that like? but if you think that's going to do anything, you must've forgotten who i am- i can make that voice too. you don't scare me, sans."

Sans' own breathing, as well, was different from how it normally was. "for being another version of me, you are one dumb sunovabitch," he growled into the receiver.

But again, the voice that came out just chuckled harshly. "no, i'm a genius. wanna know how I figure?" Without waiting for an answer, he said, "because the way i see it, between the two of us i'm the evil one, right? i get the feeling... and mind you, this is just my impression from your friends... i get the feeling that you're a nice guy. that you wouldn't hurt somebody to get to somebody else. but i, on the other hand, am not a nice guy."

Sans felt cold in his rib-cage.

"Oh he's bluffing." Frisk sneered, not that it eased the feeling. "He wouldn't do anything."

"the better brat should really keep their mouth shut," his other self grumbled. "but anyway, it's up to you if you wanna believe me or not. i have other stuff i gotta do. as you pointed out, i might not be able to pass for you for much longer... so i'll have to improvise from now on. starting with this lying little piece of shit over here.

"and later our lying little brother, just because i'm really pissed now."

Sans' heart jumped again, more roaring and buzzing in his ears. "Don't!"

"see ya, shortstack."

Click!

He hung up. Sans closed his eyes. Around him, Papyrus was speaking in a hoarse voice, "... HE NEVER SHOWS THIS MUCH SPINE AT HOME."

"...He's bluffing..."

"Shh!" Said Flowey.

When Sans' eye-sockets opened again, his pupils were sharp and clearly defined, one of them in an outline of ice-cold blue. His body was still and straight, his smile set by rage. "don't bother me, i'm going back to the shed."

Papyrus had nothing, looking startled and ill at ease. But Frisk's hands were clasped into fists, their own expression set with narrowed, unreadable eyes; Flowey was the one watching them, instead, with the same ill at ease face. It confused him, or it would have, if he wasn't so caught up in his own whirl of energy, energy to which he was unaccustomed.

"and you." He glared directly at the child and they blanched. "if i see you anywhere near the engine, you're gonna have a bad time. got it?"

Eyes wide, Frisk nodded. Whether or not they actually got it was something he'd just have to worry about later.

This had all gone on for long enough.

After a perilous journey over snow, water, lava, and filthy city streets- a journey that had taken days-

A white and yappy little dog stood barking at the gate of Asgore's castle.

It had a human's shoe-print on its hindquarters.

Next Chapter: No One Wants to Play Underfell

Chapter Text

Traipsing around in Snowdin, playing music in Waterfall, avoiding or running through Hotland as quickly as possible, throwing rocks far away into the distant streets of New Home. Stealing food, buying food, playing keep-away with the meager and temporary possessions she had to her name, patching up her clothes, playing hide and seek with monsters that wanted her dead. Constantly telling herself that today was the last day she was going to wait, that tomorrow she would go out and try for the barrier. These were her memories of the last several weeks. Some of them were also the memories of the last couple days.

She couldn't help but feel restless.

In the early afternoon Frisk woke up in Sans' room again, hanging off his mattress and with the coat she'd been using for a blanket tossed aside. She squinted at the wall until the cracks in it became visible, and she counted the tallies that she had marked there earlier. Below them were dead tendrils, markers that her coward flower friend had been a fly on the wall while she slept. She didn't know if it made her feel happy or something worse to find him looking out for her; happy was definitely not the mood that she would describe herself in right now.

Blue Sans was still working in the shed. He hadn't stopped since last night, and probably wouldn't stop until it was finished; some time before she fell asleep she had heard an awful lot of squawking, too, probably meaning that Alphys was working overtime as well.

Rubbing her eyes of sleep and running her fingers through her hair- the closest thing that she had to a comb- the child spat in a corner and felt nothing but sorry for herself.

The terrible mood refused to lift, even when she got up and put on her sweater, even when she ate a crunchy Spider Muffin she snagged from Papyrus' pantry. Wiping her mouth of crumbs she stared at the tally marks again, and thought of all the planks of wood in her burrow gathering frost. Undyne's was due for more marking.

And... She squinted bitterly at the wall. If the marks that she made were supposed to count the times that these monsters "broke her heart," then in a brief moment she considered that maybe Blue Sans had earned one after all. Or maybe it was her Sans that had (definitely her Sans that had.) Maybe it was everyone that had. She didn't expect anything different, of course. But as she was thinking as much, a thought intruded into her head and almost made Frisk hide her face in shame.

You act overdramatic like the bad type of queen .

Regardless, she was suddenly uncomfortable in his house. She wanted to go back in and add those four marks to where they belonged. She wanted to be somewhere else, anywhere but this austere and dusty house.

Nobody would notice if she left.

Even though it was impossible to restore her sweater collar what it once was, she tugged it over her shoulder and picked up her things from the floor. The collar crept back into place while she wandered outside into the big room, seeing nobody around. Papyrus was in the worst mood that she had ever seen, constantly trying to call his brother's cell phone and finding no response and then getting angrier each time. So that was probably a good thing, that he wasn't in sight right now. Frisk wasn't really interested in watching any more of that.

Again, she couldn't call Sans on her own phone because she didn't have his number. And Papyrus refused to give it to her. Frisk sighed and walked into the kitchen, for one more raid of the fridge. She'd almost eaten everything in it, but stuffed in the back she did find a sandwich and a leg of something that she assumed was chicken. She didn't have room for the leg along with her other possessions, so she ended up eating it.

It tasted like fish. Maybe that was an omen; she wandered to the front door and opened it up, and when she did she saw Undyne staring at her with her piercing single eye.

"HEY!"

"Eep!" The first thing she did was slam the door shut, the color scared out of her face, and if she could have locked it she would have done that too.

It groaned from Undyne pounding her fist against it, and the child stiffened her back. She already determined that this door could withstand a lot of horrific abuse, but even so it was Undyne that was behind it. For a crazy moment she even considered calling to Papyrus for help, even though she'd already learned that he was friends with this psycho.

She shouted from outside, "LET ME IN YOU LITTLE TWERP! You think if I really wanted to I couldn't bust this thing down!?"

Shaking her head and wrinkling up her nose, Frisk took a step away into the living room with her hands mangling each other. Through the window she saw Undyne's single eye glaring at her, the pupil retracting like a cat's. The growling monster threw her weight against the door, and in that moment the child pulled her weapon out with a snarl on her lips.

But before anything could happen she saw a flash of red and black from the corner of her eye, and Papyrus walked into her field of vision with his hands on his hips and a scowl on his face. "RUDE," he barked at Frisk, before marching to the door.

"D-don't-" she tried to say, but before she could finish her protest he had thrown the door open.

Undyne stepped in and sneered at Frisk while she did, her chipped razor teeth huge as always. She rested a palm on her hip, flipping her long red hair back- she was in her civilian clothes again. "So, Papyrus was telling the truth. You really are staying with him."

"Get back," Frisk hissed, once more backing away herself, "I'll kill you."

Undyne threw back her head, barking out laughter. "Fwahahahaha!" Taking a deep breath, she looked down upon the little child. "Relax, loser. I've got too much class to fight someone else's houseguest."

Undyne unimaginably shows some class, went a thought in Frisk's head, and for once she agreed with it. She still kept on holding tight to her pan, and instead of talking to the fish monster she glared at Papyrus instead. "Why is she here?"

Looking at them both Papyrus coughed, "WELL OBVIOUSLY SINCE MY BROTHER IS BEING SO DIFFICULT I- I FIGURED WE WOULD NEED HELP GETTING HIM BACK."

Like an accusing finger Frisk flung her pan out to point at the fish monster. "With her? She'll kill him! She'll kill me too!"

"Oh I will not," Undyne snapped. And then sneered. "Unless you want another rematch right now, punk? Someday I will beat the shit out of you for making such a big mess of my house." And then, when Papyrus cleared his- throat?- she added quickly, "Just not today."

"UNDYNE IS THE CAPTAIN OF THE ROYAL GUARD!" The skeleton added, with a defensive sniff, folding his arms. "OF COURSE SHE KNOWS RESTRAINT AND PROFESSIONALISM!"

The yellow eye flickered in his direction and Undyne grinned even wider. "Look at you, sucking up to me," she crowed, and she pulled him down into a headlock. The skeleton let out a yelp as she rubbed her fist on his skull. "Fuhuhuhu! That's exactly why a little maggot like you is the vice-captain!"

"OW! STOP PROVING ME WRONG IN FRONT OF THE HUMAN!" Her vice-captain screeched, struggling desperately in her grip. Frisk didn't know if she should laugh or not, but her lips curled up in spite of herself. The scowl had returned to her face, at any rate, by the time Papyrus had pulled free and rigidly straightened his outfit back out, skull changing color.

Undyne's barking laughter began anew. "Boy, it's just too bad that you don't have any hair to mess up."

"UGH."

Sneering, Frisk unconsciously took out a Spider Donut and started munching. "What makes you guys think that Blue Sans will let you come with him, anyway?"

The two monsters glanced her way and frowned, Undyne in particular before bursting out laughing again- Papyrus always, or almost always, had a sour expression on his face anyway. "Well it's not like it matters if he LETS us come with him. We can always strong-arm the issue."

"WELL-" Papyrus said, and the Captain of the Royal Guard glared in his direction. "THIS SANS ISN'T LIKE MY BROTHER. HE CAN FIGHT BACK."

"Not well, I'll bet." Undyne sneered.

"ACTUALLY-"

All parties were silenced by Undyne pounding her fist into her palm. "The point is," she snarled, "We're doing him a favor, right? There's no reason he'll object to that, right?

"Or, plan B," she continued, and suddenly she was bending down to gather the collar of Frisk's sweater into her fist. The child's eyes went wide as she yanked her up off the floor, and she could feel that collar stretch again, just a little. "This human is your brother's pet, aren't they? We could just tell him to come back or we'll cut their head off. Ha!"

It won't work, he knows you already cut my head off five times, Frisk thought to herself, squirming in Undyne's grasp. No use in protesting that she was not a pet, even if Sans did occasionally feed her and take her on walks through the forest when he was still there. The next moment, the fish monster dropped her and she fell down on her back, shouting, "Fuck!" on impact and choking on what remained of the Spider Donut. Papyrus was eyeing her, expression inscrutable, while she stood and brushed herself off with a growl.

Once she appeared unharmed he clenched his teeth before saying, "THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE. HE ISN'T ANSWERING HIS PHONE."

"Eh, it was a long shot. Don't worry Paps, we'll figure something out." Undyne shrugged, and Papyrus made a whooshing "huff" of breath while grumbling into the floor. With another sneer Undyne punched his shoulder, and he nearly staggered. "Say, while we're waiting, have you got something to eat? I'm starving."

"THAT DEPENDS ON WHETHER OR NOT THE HUMAN ATE EVERYTHING ALREADY," Papyrus growled, and Frisk rubbed her backside without affirming or denying the truth. The contents of his fridge were still in her pocket, after all. No way she would share.

Without another word, save for a bit of laughter, Undyne marched into the kitchen. Doors opened and slammed while she searched through the pantry, through the fridge, and through the cupboards. While she ravaged his stores, Papyrus and Frisk traded glances in the living room. Frisk scratched her itchy head of tangled hair and stared at her feet after a while, and Papyrus did the same, squinting his eyesockets. His skull hadn't quite returned to its normal color.

"Don't bet on Plan B," Frisk said at last, quietly. Papyrus stiffened. "I'm going out."

His brows raised. "OUT? OUT WHERE?"

"Out of here," said the child. "I did what I promised Blue Sans I'd do. Helped him out. So I'm going back into hiding now."

Expression changing, Papyrus looked like he was about to say something, but Undyne entered the room laughing. "Hiding? You're not exactly great at that, human. You're just lucky you're a celebrity around here."

"What do you-" Frisk began to say, but the door opened and again precious words were lost.

Alphys, her glasses swirling in a daze, pushed the door open and wiped her sweaty forehead. Her coat was fully unbuttoned and her dress was a mess, covered in grease and tears. She was muttering to herself, "Flower always getting in the way, I did not make him f- AAAGH!"

The scream was preceded by her eyes lighting on Undyne, whose eye had gone wide with shock at such a loud sound. Slowly, and with a face still startled, she waved one gloved hand at Alphys. "Uh... hey?"

There was a silence, one which was filled with something Frisk did not understand. She didn't understand why Undyne had gone so suddenly rigid, and she did not understand why Alphys had turned such a bright color of crimson, or why she had begun to sweat and shake so desperately. There was an electricity in the living room that certainly she was too young to feel. It was making Undyne's hair stand up, at least at the base of her ponytail.

Alphys broke it by screaming, "Hi Undyne! Bye! Bye Undyne!"

And then she turned and ran out of the house- much faster than Frisk thought she was capable of running.

The silence that ensued lasted for a short time, and even though Frisk didn't know how scales could turn red- just as she didn't really know how a skull could turn red- Undyne's face changed color and she pounded her fist into her palm, first once and then even harder a second time. She laughed, a little weakly, "That was weird?"

Papyrus put a hand to his jawline. "ALPHYS IS ACTING STRANGE. DID YOU DO SOMETHING TO HER?"

"ANYWAY," she barked, and Papyrus flinched. "I'm going out to buy some food, because all you have is crap. I'll be back in a sec."

Rather than wait for a reply, she dashed out the door as well, and Papyrus blinked. Frisk coughed. The door was left wide open, and yet in spite of that neither of them moved to close it.

It occurred to the child that this was as good an opportunity as any. She rubbed her face and said, "I don't wanna wait for you to kill me, so I'm going now."

As if on instinct, her host immediately replied, "OH PLEASE, LIKE I NEED YOU TO WAIT-" Frisk walked onto the front step and grabbed the doorknob. "WAIT!" She slammed the door as hard as her little body could slam it, and faintly she heard his shout on the other side, "...FINE!"

Shivering once outdoors, she was surprised by how that put an end to it, expecting Papyrus to come walking out after her and seeing nothing. Did he not care? Maybe he wanted to clean up all the messes she had made, now that she would be making no more. He seemed to hate a dirty house. It was an immense kindness that Sans' room got to be as filthy as it was without him nuking it, she was sure.

Rolling her eyes, and without thinking, Frisk next walked to the entrance of the shed. There was no sign of Alphys outside; she must have fled back to the safety of this little wooden shack, from whatever it was that spooked her. She might be talking to Blue Sans about the machine again. Flowey might be in there watching them, if Alphys was speaking from the present. Frisk took a deep breath and raised her fist.

Then, the child discarded the fist and grabbed the knob forcefully, trying to rip the door open. Unlike last time she came in, however, it was locked.

Did he think that she, even now, was going to...? Asshole.

Frisk wiped her face and released the knob.

Fine, she would leave him alone. Leave them all be. Stretch her legs. Go add the marks. Go steal food from Grillby's trash cans. Wait until Flowey was ready to start paying attention to her again. Plan her future, something she hadn't been doing in a long time. Hope that Blue Sans noticed she wasn't around to say goodbye to, and that he felt bad about it.

Like the bad type of queen.

Her stomach felt like a black pit.

Sighing heavily, Frisk took out her pan- in case sneaking out of Snowdin town ended in a worst-case scenario- and walked away from the locked door.

It was, fortunately, a quick trip sneaking through the town and into the woods again; this time, since it was during the day, and was a little strange to not see a lot of monsters out, but she didn't care. She was on a mission, and didn't stop or lighten her pace until she made it into the deepest part of the forest, even beyond Sans' outpost which she took a bit of pains to avoid.

She recalled these woods, and how they looked at the start. Over the weeks that she stayed in Snowdin the terrifying appearance of the trees gradually softened, even if the weather was still pretty sharp. But at the beginning, it looked bigger and meaner than the whole world, was colder than any weather she'd experienced on the surface, and there were no friendly faces to save her (except for perhaps Flowey.)

Back then she was just a kid weeping bitterly, without any words to substitute for her noisy tears. That must've been how she looked when Sans met her first, the girl trudging through the snow and wiping her eyes- pitiful and small, noisy and obnoxious. Easy prey for anybody. That must've been how he thought of her while he quietly stalked her through the forest. She was freshly injured, maybe not in body but in other, nonetheless noticeable ways. And despite her suspicions, despite her already rough edges, back then she was weak to a smile and outstretched hand.

With a killer joy buzzer inside it.

That was his first tally mark.

Later, when the smile- much like the trees- lost its frightening edge, he would ask her over and over to tell him what the mark was from. But she would never tell him that story. She didn't know why she didn't.

Frisk squeezed through the broken set of wooden bars that had beforehand kept her from progressing, seeing the door to the Ruins not so far away. The sight filled her with a little anxiety, but she knew it was unwarranted. All she had to do was turn right and have Flowey help her across the river, if he was even paying attention to her anymore- that was where her burrow was.

But there was something in front of the door that wasn't there before. Frisk frowned and forgot her mission for just a moment, running along the path. There was a lot of snow pushed over it recently that she had to trek through, soaking her ankles and sneaking into her shoes, but she didn't notice. Her heartbeat raced, but at times it seemed as if she was a slave to her own curiosity. That small little shape at the entrance to the Ruins, giving off wafting steam into the cold air, captured her attention too quickly.

Maybe it was because she was always looking after food.

Deposited practically on Toriel's doorstep was a small orange pie that smelled like cinnamon and pumpkin, a small dab of whipped cream smothered over the wet and squishy surface. Next to it was a note, written in old-fashioned script, that said Enjoy.

Frisk took one smell of it and began to gag and choke, covering her mouth as it uttered the most wretched of noises. She spat on the ground and scooted away from where she had been kneeling, eyeing the pie like it was a bomb.

From the Ruins door there was a voice. It should have been evident that she would be waiting there, waiting to see who might take the bait. Her voice turned her blood cold. "...My... child...?"

Frisk didn't dare to breathe or speak, sitting perfectly still in the snow.

But that didn't stop the voice from talking again, and she thought she heard the stone of the door creak. As always the voice was slow and difficult to hear from where she was, but she wouldn't move closer. "Was that you...? Human...?" Silence between them both. "Did you finally... come back? I have been waiting for ages... for you... and your new... Sans... I made the pie, as promised..." Toriel whispered, her speech gently rising and falling.

Still the child said nothing, although breeze made her smell the pie again and she couldn't help but gag and cough. At that sound, the voice behind the door became re-encouraged. "You must be there. You have finally returned. Let me see you once more..."

To Frisk's absolute horror, the door did creak and grate as stone slid across the stone. It started to move. A thrill shot down her body. "Don't come out!" She screamed at last, staggering back to her feet. "Stay there!"

The grating stopped.

The child held her pan out in front of her, as she did so often, yet her hands trembling unlike all other times. No licks of flame traveled under the door, no resumed sliding of stone on stone to signal the door opening, and there was no low voice for several minutes; slowly, she lowered her hands. But eventually she did hear the speaking resume, and she nonetheless trembled. "My sweet... human... why did you come back?"

"I didn't come back for you, I-I'm going to leave soon," Frisk said.

There was a sigh. "Yes, I believed so. In that case, take the pie with you. It's your... it's your favorite..."

"I don't want your nasty-ass pie," snapped the child, wrapping her arms around her middle.

A moment of hesitation, and then the speaking resumed again, "Then, take it for your new Sans."

The thought of him eating it, dissolving into dust after only a few bites, turned her stomach. "He doesn't want your nasty-ass pie either."

The silence that followed became prolonged, and Frisk looked self-consciously around the rest of the forest. It almost sounded like something was moving among the trees, even though few monsters came to this part of the woods. (After all, there was the whole reason why she stuck around there for so long.) She would have preferred an encounter with an enemy monster to having another conversation across the door, however.

Toriel sighed, and then chuckled, "You're such a noisy little child. All I want is to help you."

"You want to kill me!" Frisk shouted, slamming her pan against the stone, the volume of her own words bouncing back and hitting her.

By contrast, the monster she spoke to was always soft. "All... I want... is to help you."

"... If you really wanted to help me, you'd take me home instead of giving me deadly pies," said the child.

"Children seldom understand the intentions of their parents," Toriel said, and it startled her how clearly and quickly she said it. "You don't understand, either, human child..." She breathed in and out loudly. "In this place there is no... is no... home. There is no home on the surface... there is no home here... so you die, instead. And you're happy."

Uttering a grunt Frisk slid down to the ground, rubbing her bangs off her forehead with one hand. "You all seem to like your home here well enough."

Toriel laughed, a shrill and shrieking laugh that frightened Frisk. "Like it here? We like it here? Here? ...Do you... like it here?"

"Of course I don't," said Frisk without thinking. "I hate this place."

Laughing again, she heard, "Then why do you stay?"

"I can't..." She frowned. "Can't... get out right now."

"...Exactly," Toriel hissed. "My... my child, no monster wants to be here. This cavern is home to no one."

That sent Frisk back into silence, her back and butt getting cold. It was such an obvious point- for, after all, when had she ever seen a monster happy Underground?- but maybe it was because of everything that had happened recently that this obvious point gave her so much pause now. She rubbed her face and resisted inhaling too deeply, thought of Sans and how far away he went just because he also couldn't stand this world any longer. She thought about Flowey, too, who was following her just for a ghost of a chance to escape, himself. All the mocking cries of the echo flowers.

All of this time she was trapped in a world where she didn't fit in. It never occurred to her before that the monsters didn't fit in either.

Frisk stood up, squinting at the pie again. It still made her nauseous, but she picked it up, holding her nose, and stowed it away. "I'll take your goddamn pie, fine, if it'll shut you up."

"I will miss you, human," Toriel warbled. "I will miss the new Sans too. He seemed like such a nice boy..."

"I'll tell him that," said Frisk with a sigh. "Goodbye Toriel." Suddenly she didn't feel like going back to the planks of tallies. A feeling in her gut, which she hadn't heard from in days, told her to go back instead. With Papyrus, Flowey, and Blue Sans in mind she left the Ruins door behind. She kept walking until she even passed Sans' sentry station, without an urge to vandalize it.

Strangely enough that was when she felt its presence where she never felt it before, just beside the path and just outside of the thick trees. A small miracle. It would have saved her so much heartbreak and time if she had found it any time before now, that just to feel it here made the hair on the back of the child's neck rose with suspicion. Why find it now?

But, even suspicious, she was one to take full advantage. She sat in the snow and clasped her hands, mustering everything within her heart. Thoughts of the last few days, of the last several hours, almost clogged her mind, but in the end she was able to grasp this world again into a SAVE File, each muscle in her body trembling with cold and energy.

The cold wind and creepy trees loom over everything in this forest.

Nonetheless you are filled with determination.

Your game has been SAVED

... You SAVED something else, too.

There that thought was again, even though she still didn't know what that "something else" was. Frisk stood and rubbed her chest, frowning at the sensation- a sensation of the world being archived in her SOUL. For the first time, she wondered if Blue Sans was right- if she was a god, or something like it, not a time traveler at all.

Some god, if she couldn't do anything more than this. If she was really a god, she would force her Sans to come back. She would make everyone in this world be nice to her, make everyone love her. She would be able to just walk back to her home.

But Frisk knew she could not do any of those things. Tears pricked the backs of her eyes, and wiping her face with her sleeve the child stalked down the path, wishing that Sans would just keep his theories and ideas to himself sometimes. He's such a fucking idiot, who does he think he's kidding?

Stomping her foot repeatedly didn't produce any Flowey, so Frisk gave up and began her journey through Snowdin Forest again. Her thoughts remained dark and full of curses until she got too tired of it, and then she just stared ahead on the blustery path with barely any thoughts at all. At some point during her walk, her phone rang- almost scaring the life out of the child- but she turned it off rather than answer.

She glanced over at Papyrus' guard station when she passed it, raising a brow at how it was also gathering frost from neglect, left untouched for days. Doggo's station wasn't far, so she would have to slip into the trees or risk being noticed by that movement-sensitive wolf.

However, the child wouldn't get the chance to hide before a large shape came barreling down the path, appearing to her out of the blizzarding snow.

Frisk let out a shriek and prepared for battle, seeing the light glint off of the dark, spiked armor of one of the Canine Unit members. Greater Dog.

He came to a stop shortly before he barreled her over, baring his fangs at her, and she bared her own while her pale red SOUL glowed visibly before her chest. But it quickly became apparent that the wolfish dog was not alone; standing out from behind him, and then beginning to encircle her, were several other of the smaller dogs in the unit. Dogamy and Dogaressa in particular stepped even closer to Frisk, sniffing and muttering to themselves while she shivered lightly.

Barking like crazy at Dogamy's feet, there was also a small little white dog that snapped its sharp fangs in her direction.

Frisk had faced each of these enemies before, but all of them individually- with the exception of the wedded couple, who stood on either side of her in their black hoods, growling low and threatening. Never before had she been forced to face them all as one group, the subordinates of Greater Dog moving behind her and blocking off her exit. It was a scenario that she had feared for a long time, and she could only be grateful for all the food she'd stolen beforehand as she flourished her weapon.

All of the Canine Unit blocks the way.

You don't know how they found you. You've only just been clodding all over town in loud and smelly shoes.

She wasn't going to waste any time talking, but to her surprise Doggo spoke to her instead, brandishing his knife. He stepped a little too close and Frisk backed up, almost bumping into a shivering Lesser Dog. "It's been fun but it has to end now." He swiped at her with his knife, missing by a mile, and the child swatted his face with her pan.

While he was whimpering in pain she looked to one of the other dogs; the circle was gradually tightening around her, greater Dog in particular casting the largest shadow and pointing his sword directly at her throat. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It's over for us if you keep living," said Dogamy, sampling the scent of her sweat and days old bloodstains on her shirt. "We have to do it now."

There was a general murmur and whine through the group, their sharp teeth white as the snow. "It's not like killing a puppy," Dogaressa barked at her husband, and the two of them pounced forward on the human with no other warning, their snarls filling her ears. Frisk screamed again and struck them, as she had done their fellow Doggo, hearing their yelps as the metal connected with fur. Nonetheless she could feel their sharp claws raking against her legs and shirt, the axe held by Dogaressa just narrowly missing her head.

"You try and kill me and I'll kill you!" Frisk choked, but it was drowned out because now Lesser Dog and a newly recovered Doggo were joining in on the fight. Their claws hooked into her clothes, and then their teeth dug deep into her skin. Frisk's screams rose in pitch. Swords, axes, dual-wielded knives, they tore her apart and she dropped everything.

She lost consciousness, lost everything really, just as the annoying little white dog dug into her pockets and pulled out the pie. He ate it all up greedily and then her SOUL burst into pieces.

Once her vision shot down into black, Frisk heard:

You are not allowed to leave us yet!

Become determined!

That's a tally mark for all of them. ...Later.

The second time, she half-ran a wide arc around the whole path. They didn't find her then.

Instead, and not too far from town, it was Flowey that did. This was much to her surprise, despite remembering a second later that he would of course realize when something like this happened; he pushed out of the snow with a blanched expression on his face.

"Frisk, something really really bad happened!"

She stomped her foot, "I know, I know! I had to reset! The Canine Unit was-"

"No, no no no, it's not that!" Flowey cried. "I mean I-I was wondering about that, but there's something more important-!" He raised some of his roots out of the ground, latching on to Frisk's pant leg and tugging frantically. "You have to follow me, hurry!"

Without even asking she looked towards the buildings in the distance and, taking a deep breath, she began to run. Without missing a beat Flowey's root wrapped around her leg and he too was ripped out of the ground, using tendrils to climb up her back and coiling around her shoulder. "Please be careful, please, it's-it's-"

"Just stop stammering and tell me what it is!" Frisk said as she ran past the Snowdin Inn, pretending that she didn't see all the rabbits and bears who stopped on their doorsteps to stare at her. Unlike the stupid Canine Unit they were no match for her and they knew it, even as low a LV as she was, and it was clear that hiding wouldn't do her a lot of good now.

Particularly when Flowey said into her ear, "It's Asgore. He's here."

It came as a shock to her system, like a punch, and she felt sick. Frisk came to a stop outside of Grillby'z. "Where?"

"S-someone led him here-"

"I asked where he was you fuckwad!"

The flower stammered, his prickly thorns raking against her body, and she grabbed at his stalk with one hand. "I-i-I-it's in Papyrus' house, he's in- looking for you-"

She remembered Alphys lab and flinched. "He called him...?"

"No! He had no idea!" Flowey said, his voice at a wailing pitch. Just as suddenly Frisk began to run again, the whiplash throwing his stem back briefly. "Wait wait wait where are we going now-"

"Papyrus' house!" Said Frisk. "You see, uh, I just had a thought."

"Wh-what kind of thought?"

Papyrus' front door had finally given way, lying on the front porch a cracked and splintered mess, and some of the doorframe was cracked up and missing as well. As if someone with a big temper and a large frame had forced their way inside. The front steps were split down the center and crumbling into themselves, and Frisk had to jump over them to keep her foot from getting stuck. "I-I'll tell you later," she said breathlessly, her previously colorless face turning bright red instead.

"I hope it's not that you have a death wish." With a strained whimper Flowey dived down into her sweater, and Frisk stepped through the wide doorway.

The living room in front of her eyes was also a mess, the TV screen shattered and the couch punctured. Beyond that, the railing had been freshly divided into pieces, those pieces littering the floor, and Undyne was sprawled on the stairs with a huge slash across her middle, her one eye open and creased with agony while she was rolling onto her stomach. In spite of everything Frisk started to run to her, on a gut instinct, but stopped when babbling and shouting from the other end of the house reached her ears.

The whole world started to black out. What's happening? She was here only a little while ago.

Asgore's cloaked form was unmistakable, and if the upper floor were not included in the living room he would have surely been too big for the house. His bloodshot eyes looked crazed, and he had his glowing trident in hand while he roared at Papyrus, who was as of yet still conscious. He always towered over her and definitely over Sans, so Frisk never noticed how small Papyrus actually was before.

His voice sounded completely different while he was begging for mercy, too.

"-where he got that idea I haven't seen the human since they took my brother, of course I wouldn't let them stay here-" he was saying, and Frisk barely could catch her breath.

She screamed over him, over Asgore's incessant growling, "I'm right here fuckwads!"

Asgore stiffened and Papyrus stopped talking, head tilting in her direction and eyes bulging. The furious king also looked at the human child, and his jaw was set in a snarl, one wholly different from that of the Canine Unit. His own angry eyes were bulging now, and he whipped his head back to Papyrus as though in preparation to literally eat his head off.

Frisk took out the first thing she could get her hands on- which was the bag of bonemeal- and threw it at his head. "No! I'm not over there! I'm right here! Are you blind?"

"WHY DID YOU DO THAT!?" Flowey screamed from under her sweater, and Frisk turned and ran.

Thunderous footsteps followed behind her and were followed by a roar. She barely got to the doorway before something hit her backside and sent her flying face-first into the hard stone street, snow coming up to her ears. From behind her, and still in the house, Asgore said, not loudly enough, "To be absolutely clear, you two are both fired."

Head spinning, the child rolled over and sat up, trying to summon the presence of mind to stand while Asgore squeezed through the broken doorframe. Flowey's tendrils were curling around her arms and legs, the thorns pricking sensation back into her ice-cold limbs and wrenching her into movement as well, as though she were a puppet. She could hear him making all kinds of noises at her back, no doubt wishing he could slip into the ground as in every other fight.

King Asgore approaches you. He looks really pissed, good job.

Frisk's hands felt too weak when she held out her weapon, not at all for the first time today. Her back was still stinging, the sting going slowly to a dull point.

"And when I'm finished with the human..." said the king, his trident filling with orange magic before her and light flashing in his eyes. Barely had he spoken, with the rest left in the air, than had he brought his trident down upon Frisk.

Blue Sans' words returned to her- orange means move. Crying out, she dodged to the left, and the speared tips passed harmlessly through her body like a ghost. Roaring he swung again in her direction, and the child dodged backwards this time, almost tripping, and stumbled forward instead to take her turn. With the tip of her pan, Frisk struck Asgore across his front before bailing.

Causing only the tiniest, tiniest chip in his health.

You're going to die again.

She couldn't let her intrusive thoughts take over, she absolutely could not. Even if it was probably true. Asgore thundered forward and did something new, something terrifying and yet so expected. Red flames blossomed from his hand and singed the air around them, spiraling towards her with percussive speed. The intense heat hit her first before the actual magic attack, and stunned Frisk could only stumble and feel it burn through her. - 9 HP

She screamed, and more spirals of fire coursed around their makeshift battlefield in reds and oranges, flashing her back to her very first fight with a boss monster. Her clothes grew black with soot. It was all she could do to run, uselessly, in screaming circles while Asgore pursued her, wreathed in flame. If she looked carefully it almost was as if Asgore was spitting smoke himself. - 5 HP

She didn't even have time to eat, the fire cheating and streaming over the space between them. - 5 HP

Weak, healed slowly by the Temmie Armor, she stumbled and fell down.

Yes, you're going to die.

It's your fault.

Asgore switched to his trident, towering over her. "Goodbye now, human."

Desperately, vaguely aware of how tightly Flowey was holding onto her, she shouted with a hoarse throat, "I don't understand!"

Miraculously it stayed his hand for a moment, making another moment of health. "You do not understand what?"

"If-if-if you want me dead so much, then why, why do you keep calling me back?" She said, voice cracking and rising at a whim. "Why do you keep doing that?"

Trident poised over her head, Asgore blinked at Frisk. "Now I do not understand."

"You'll do it this time, too," the child said, struggling to move. "You'll call me back, like that, like you keep doing, how come you...?"

For yet another moment, making three so far, his hand was stayed, and little by little her burns were healing. But the confusion on his face clouded back over into something nasty, and she knew she was out of time. "Goodbye, human."

The next thing in her line of sight, bizarrely, was a beaten up placard that said "LIEBRARY". Frisk was whipped off into the air, and for a second time the trident shattered the ground where she lay. Asgore let out a sound between a roar and a whine, snatching sight of her just out of his reach. "What the hell is it this time!?"

It was Flowey.

Frisk could see him beneath her, roots digging into the ground, his face sculpted into a shape she never saw it make before. Vines were budding off his stem and wrapping tightly around her limbs to keep her hovering above the snow. In all her time here, not once had he ever demonstrated such strength in that tiny plant body. In that instant Frisk had no more breath in her lungs, and she took a gulp of air.

The gulp was over with when he whipped her continually left, traveling through the earth in a speed he had also never demonstrated before. Asgore, naturally, bounded after them, this time running on all fours.

Passing the Grillby'z sign, watching Grillby calmly putting a "closed" sign against the window inside, Frisk struggled against the tendrils that held her motionless. They dug into her and hurt by no small amount. "Flowey-!"

"Shh!" They passed the town tree covered in toilet paper and shoes.

"Flowey, where are we going!?"

"Shut up!"

Then, suddenly, they were going right.

She whipped past Asgore and the king was making that whining roar again, scrambling to turn and failing in the momentum he built for himself. Flowey was almost dragging Frisk along the ground at this point, kicking up snow and unswept dust, but it was no less fast than it was before.

Past Grillby'z again, past the library, Flowey brought them right back to Papyrus' house. And then he dragged the child around it instead, towards the shed that she had so uneasily avoided. They stopped only for a second, and Frisk struggled in that second to no avail at all.

Flowey's face was like Asgore's, and that terrified her more than anything else. Like a smaller horned, beardless, younger little Asgore. The same fangs she always saw on his flower face fit in perfectly on his lips now, fangs Toriel had as well. With a heavy vine, and without even trying to meet her eyes, he broke open the shed door and threw her inside.

By then, his plan became obvious.

He heard the door banging violently, and that finally jerked him out of his utter work-induced daze, since the loud noises that had been happening in the last several minutes were not enough. ...Then of course the door to the shed was destroyed and he really had no chance of finishing up his work, of screwing the covering over the engine.

With a face like a boss monster, the flower moved like a serpent as he entered and flung Frisk harshly onto the floor. There was shouting from outside; Sans didn't think, and apparently neither did Alphys, both of them rushing to check on the child whose clothes were covered in burns and whose eyes were streaming with tears.

But doing so, they left the machine alone, and it became overrun with plant growth, vines and roots fiddling with the engine and switches lined along the control panel. The uncovered engine crackled and whirred to life, and it was only that noise that alerted him to what Flowey was doing. "hey, get away from that!"

Flowey was not looking at him. He was looking at Frisk, petaled head rapidly dissolving into the likeness of a skull with two tiny pinpricks for pupils. Frisk's own pale and wide-eyed face matched, in its way. "You said that if you had a way to get out of this hellhole, you would take it without a second thought, right?"

Instinctively Sans clutched Frisk's arm, holding the child down rather than helping them up. "wait a minute-"

But there were gigantic footsteps just outside. Sans knew that the kid didn't have a minute.

They shoved him and Alphys aside, looking at him just once with eyes crazed by fear, and darted into the booth of the machine.

Flowey laughed, a laugh that was shrieking and strained, and dipped inside after them. The door slammed, and his extra overgrowth all over the tiny lab grew brown in an instant- but before it did, there was a flash from the machine.

"kid!"

That was all he could say before both he and Alphys were blinded by the light. And when the light was gone, the booth was empty and the engine was still sparking and whirring dangerously, although nowhere near as noisily as the creature suddenly standing just outside the shed. He understood what it was what sent the child running into that booth, and they weren't the only one to feel jumpstarted by fear- or shock, whichever.

Asgore's large face seemed to fill the doorway. Alphys screamed and pressed into a corner, but his gaze fixed first on Sans. "You," he breathed, his voice nowhere near the calm that it once held. "You are not him."

does it show? "nah," Sans said, with little air left in his body.

"The human," Asgore huffed. "Is gone."

He glanced towards the machine, and the boss monster caught his glance. "yep."

"Then I will kill you." The monster said, and he stabbed into the entrance with his red, shining trident.

At first, Sans felt something that he could call fear- if only he had felt it a little more often in his life to be able to tell. But then, as he stared at the mad king of this horrible little world, it was taken over by something colder, something oppressive, and his body gathered with magical energy.

"goodness, grandma," he said, facing him with a stone smile. "what a high LV you have."

Next Chapter: Co-Op Mode

Chapter Text

A new light burst forth from the tiny lab in a harsh stream, shot out of a cannon with sharp fangs. The light hit Asgore square on, and the king let out a startled grunt as he was thrown back on his hindquarters. Sans watched him from still inside the shed, hands in his coat pockets and the same smile on his face while another blaster, and then another, then two more, materialized behind and in front of him.

He glanced to Alphys in the corner and raised a bony finger to his teeth, magic twitching and sparking through his skull. "i think this is gonna take a bit, so can you make sure the machine is, uh, machining properly?"

Hardly had the frightened monster nodded, her glasses crooked on her face, than Sans walked out of the lab and fired each cannon at the still shocked and terrifying king in front of him. This time, however, Asgore demonstrated that he himself had some experience with dodging attacks, only one attack hitting out of the four. His eyes filled with rage and his growls agonized, he brandished his trident and pointed it in Sans' direction. "You are definitely not the Sans that I know."

"yeah?" Asgore swung an orange trident at Sans and he moved out of range of the weapon entirely. "so, how much did you know this world's sans, anyway?"

"That is none of your business," said the king with a psychotic smirk. "Someone who is about to die does not need an explanation."

"got it."

Less blasters and more bones, that was probably the best way to go. He ran to the side of the house while he was pursued by that giant trident, but even doing so Sans summoned his bone attacks into the air and flung them in his opponent's direction. Along the ground, in different angles through the air, and even on either side of Asgore's massive frame. They came at him in an irregular rhythm, and it was impossible for to dodge them all with the way that he was. He could see the damage that each hit did, in the quantifiable terms of HP if not by the stony expression on his face.

When the king's turn came around, though, it was also all that he could do to evade, himself. It was painfully clear that Asgore had been using the human kid to warm up, so to speak, and now he unleashed everything at Sans. Fire blazed over the cold town, and the streets they were fighting on were even beginning to melt from all the heat. Sans' skull broke out into a sweat, both from all the fire magic that just grazed him and from how much energy it was actually taking to survive.

Technically, he and Asgore had never fought back in his world, but he hoped that if they ever had to his king wouldn't be quite so... hard to win against.

He kept on the defensive for the next several turns, as a result. Constantly he was moving back, never able to draw closer as he fired blasts and struck with bone. It took a few seconds only for their trail to wrap around Papyrus' house, and then in a minute Sans was fighting in front of Grillby'z. The only time he wasn't moving back, or around some building, was when he was able to construct a bone cage around his opponent- then he had at least a few seconds to catch his breath before Asgore broke out of it.

And yet, and yet...

Slowly, bit by bit, his HP continued to decline. It never quite stopped- and as long as Sans continued his attacks, it would not ever stop either. Not until it was gone, completely. Not until this beast of a king turned to dust would he let up, this beast of a king who was the reason why, at this second, his other self might be killing Papyrus and Frisk and who knew who else and instead of being over there he was here.

Once or twice, the magic in his eye even flashed as his power burst to its highest intensity and then leveled out. Asgore was a big guy; for Sans to throw him around by the SOUL was extremely difficult, but damn him if he couldn't do it at least once. His eye flashed when Asgore was sent flying into the library, destroying the front door.

He summoned a legion of blasters the turn after that, and his eye flashed when they all fired.

Then it leveled out, and his eye faded, when he saw the king stumble, no longer quick to take his turn. The fire that was raging around Snowdin all too quickly turned to embers and vanished.

Sans kept his blasters up while he waited. Asgore slouched, gasping and no longer looking at anyone. As Sans had been hoping, the time had finally come when his karmic retribution was too hard to ignore.

Although through most of the fight he had remained silent, when he knelt from the weight of his injuries was when Asgore finally spoke up again. "...This much power... is not... possible for someone of your LV. I do not understand."

"oh, well, don't get the wrong idea about me."

From the look in his eyes it was evident Asgore didn't even know what other ideas there were. Sans stepped a little closer, finally dropping his cannons to catch his breath. "all the people you killed, all the people you hurt," he murmured. "that's what's killing you right now." Staring the monster down, he uttered a weak chuckle. "sorry, (i'm actually not sorry.) must feel like hell."

Asgore's face twisted with pain, and he stabbed his trident into the ground to pull himself to his feet. "I am accustomed to hell," he grunted. And with a firm RESOLVE on his features he rose to his full height, breathing hard and fast. His HP shot back up even as it continued to drop.

Not for the first time, Sans had doubt. "shit."

Fire and skull-shaped cannons circled around them both once again.

The cowering citizens of Snowdin all thought afterwards that it was quite the light show, at least.

To be honest, it wasn't the kind of escape that she wanted. Not by a long shot.

The flash of the machine blinded Frisk too; feeling sharp thorns as Flowey encircled her, all she could do was cover her eyes with her singed hands. The floor of the booth disappeared beneath her feet, and she fell silently into darkness as though through a trapdoor.

A resounding snap against her being, when her body hit the pane of this reality, was all it took to render her unconscious. She fell down, down, not seeing or feeling anything. It was as though she were within a void with no gravity, her own momentum all that kept her going in the direction that the machine had shot her from. It was a blackness tinged with grey.

Someone saw her when she passed, and she passed the pathways to other more distant places, but she and Flowey were alone in this world. Frisk's eyes almost fluttered open during the fall, but vertigo closed them tight again. She snapped against something new, and even that small disturbance was overcome from the impact. The child exited the empty space and entered something else.

She hit a mattress, squishing greasy sheets underneath her, and gasped awake in an instant. And for just a minute Frisk lay there on the sheets, taking deep breaths. If she wasn't careful, moving too much would cause her to throw up all of the nothing that was in her stomach again.

Above her, a familiar wavering voice reached her ears while a small vine tendril prodded her back. And the child stiffened. "F-F-Frisk...?"

Frisk sat up and sat more properly on the bed, turning her head right. "Flowey?"

"B-behind you," he stammered, and she turned further with a deepening scowl on her face. The scowl hitched, hesitated, when she saw behind her a big grey door set into the wall, one that didn't look quite there and yet, surely, had to be real. It didn't fit into the rest of the decor- the walls were a cool maroon and the carpeting jazzier than she had ever seen while underground, not a speck of grey anywhere else on the wall. Burping up nothing, Frisk raised a hand towards the door, and immediately found a vine coil around her wrist, pulling it back down.

Flowey smiled nervously up at her, rising in front of the door. "W-w-wait... this door leads back the way we came. A-A-Asgore might still be back there..."

Violently Frisk pulled free of the vine, although Flowey released her in an instant. "You- you mean the machine worked?" She took another long look around, her eyes becoming as big as dish saucers. It... it did look a lot like the room she'd been sleeping in for days, change in style and treadmill aside. The mess was even still here, although far more active than her Sans' messes. So, this was Blue Sans' room.

Blue Sans. "But- how come Blue isn't here?"

Flowey squished himself down while her eyes were off him. "Uhh..."

Frisk stumbled off the bed and stood, "I thought he'd... be right behind us..." She kept looking to the door, expecting him to pop through and quietly scold her the way he had been doing. The fact that he hadn't come yet made the idea of throwing up even more tempting, if not for the fact that there appeared to be no wastebasket in this room. "How come he isn't here?"

"M-m-maybe he'll be along soon," Flowey suggested.

The child didn't reply, but instead looked elsewhere in the room, brow creased. Asgore had been right behind them too. She couldn't imagine Blue Sans being killed so easily, but even so...

To distract herself for a moment, she studied the contents of the room more thoroughly. The only thing she found of interest to herself was a line of paint cans placed neatly in a column against one of the walls. She bent to inspect them, and new thoughts intruded into her mind like rockets with each look.

It's a can of black paint.

It's a can of white paint.

Oh, look, it's another can of black paint.

Oh, it's actually navy-blue paint?

No one cares about the paint.

Stop.

The door still hadn't opened yet. Frisk touched her index fingertips together. "Maybe we should go back, Flowey. Find out what happened." She again reached for the handle on the grey door.

Again Flowey's vine coiled around her and brought her up short, his face (normal once again) blanched. "No! I-I-I mean," he added in a frightened stutter, Frisk's gaze hardening into a glare, "This is-! This is the world that he came from! S-so, doesn't that mean that your old Sans is here, right now?"

"Ah!" In a heartbeat, all other thoughts had been chased from Frisk's mind. "Yes, that's right! Sans-!" She dug into her pocket and brought out her cellphone, before remembering she still didn't have his number and shutting it with disgust. "We better find him quick, before he does anything else stupid."

Flowey relaxed, climbing gently back up to her shoulder from the ground. "Yeah, yeah, that sounds like a good idea." He must have been serious, Frisk reflected when she stepped out of the room. Flowey hated Sans for reasons that he would never share (although it probably had helped that he played "loves me not" with his petals once before Frisk had a chance to rescue the flower.) Asgore, though, was ten times worse.

That was why, walking out onto a familiar indoor balcony, Frisk almost tried to ask about his strange transformation only a short time before. His face like a boss monster's, and his aggression practically spiked through the roof. It looked to be gone by now.

Seeing Papyrus wandering around on the bottom floor distracted them both, however. Flowey let out a loud gasp, smothered by a leaf he pressed over his face, and Frisk also clamped her hands over her mouth.

Just as Blue Sans was smoother than her own, at least in terms of teeth and claws, the Papyrus she saw walking around was not at all as spiky as the one that she had left behind. His "battle body" was white, blue, and red, and looked like something somebody had stitched together on a lazy afternoon rather than armor issued out by Undyne. His teeth were pearly, straight, and smooth- no fangs to be seen. He was humming a tune.

A tune that was suddenly familiar, and yet different in her head.

Frisk backed away until her back hit the door to Sans' room, beginning to sweat and shake. Flowey whispered in her ear, his voice at an excited and squeaky pitch, "It's another Papyrus!" And she nodded silently. Clumsy, thudding beats began a quick rhythm in her chest. He still hadn't noticed her- he was mixing something up in a bowl, his humming turning to whistling a moment after he ran out of breath.

Maybe she could wait until he went into the k-

"Hi Papyrus!"

Flowey was sliding off of her and wrapping his roots around the bars of the railing, leaning out over the open space. To the child's complete horror, the skeleton responded immediately by dropping the bowl of whatever he was mixing- it looked like a salad? One that had been chopped to hell and back. Trembling as though it was below zero in the house, Frisk stood near the door while Papyrus, hesitating over the bowl, then looked up and waved. "FLOWEY...? WOWIE, I HAVEN'T SEEN YOU IN A LONG TIME!"

"Gosh, I don't think we've ever met!" Said the flower with a bit of a blush on his face. "I'm actually a different Flowey."

"OH! THAT'S FINE! ...I'VE ALREADY MET A DIFFERENT SANS LATELY!" Papyrus mused, squinting somewhere else. He looked behind the flower next, and his eyesockets aimed directly at Frisk. "HUMAN!"

Frisk squeaked.

"YOU LOOK DIFFERENT TOO... ARE YOU ACTUALLY A DIFFERENT FRISK?! YOU DON'T LOOK NEARLY AS CLEAN AS YOU USUALLY DO."

"I have to go sorry," Frisk said, and without bothering to try and pick Flowey back up she was running to the stairs, jumping down them two at a time until she reached the bottom. Despite all the jumping around that she was currently doing until reaching the bottom, out of the corners of her eyes she spotted Papyrus rushing over to her and her body became wired with adrenaline in an instant.

Frisk smashed her pan against the floorboards, splintering one or two, and Papyrus froze in place, eyes bugging out in a way that was also familiar, but different. "Don't!" She screamed.

"N-NYEH!?"

She took a step forward, and he took a step back. Then, giving a vague shudder, the child dodged around him and ran as fast as she could towards the door out of this new, surreal house. She slammed the door behind her, and prayed that the new Papyrus wasn't going to follow her out; rather than wait around for her prayers to come true, she then took off again- stopping to take a detour around to the back of the oaken house. The shed had to be in the same place as in her own world, right? If she could just make sure that there was another way back to her world, if that grey door disappeared...

Although as soon as she saw the shed, Frisk clapped her hands over her eyes and peeked through the fingers. This was because the door and much of the front of it was charred and burned, the door collapsed into dust. As a consequence, much of the lab inside it was visible; the corner where the machine was supposed to be was a hunk of metal that wasn't even smoking or emitting heat anymore.

"Sun-ov-a-bitch," she whispered, carefully testing each syllable on her tongue. Sans had certainly wasted no time.

Then the door out of the main house opened, and the sound of Papyrus calling her by name sent a chill down Frisk's spine. So, no longer inspecting the damaged shed, she ran-

Ran-

Down the sidewalk...

And stopped completely.

Because she had been expecting Snowdin, or something like it- maybe, God willing, it wouldn't be as blustery, wouldn't have as many cruel monsters in it, and there might actually be something nice to say about it. Something befitting the world that Blue Sans came from.

And moments earlier, she hadn't really been paying attention. But she was standing on the sidewalk of someplace that was entirely new to her, nothing at all like Snowdin and nothing at all like any other place that she had visited while underground. It was warm, without a speck of snow, dust, or any other white thing on the ground except for a patch of white daisies growing on someone's lawn. There were plenty of buildings around, some tall and some strange colors, some looking a little out of place, and some that reminded her of the buildings in her city. Next to the sidewalk was a street, one that was without cars for the most part but still smoothly paved in preparation for one.

Frisk looked up in a daze; the sun was shining down on all of this from an angle, set like an eye on a big blue sky.

Blue Sans' world was... on the surface.

The child stared ahead at the continuation of the sidewalk, seeing blue bunnies and white dogs walking along with their children and their bird friends. Someone, somewhere on the street, called out, "Hey, Frisk!" In response she tensed, not moving a muscle, and begged whoever it was to continue walking.

Monsters surrounded her. Some waved. Most kept on going about their business. She could do nothing but stand there, delaying the moment when everything would click horribly in her mind.

Someone put a hand on her shoulder and she screamed out loud, turning some eyes her way. When she turned around, the new Papyrus was standing behind her, looking more concerned than her Papyrus ever looked. Frisk stayed curled inwards, wondering if he was just as powerful as his other self. "HUMAN, YOU REALLY SHOULD NOT RUN OFF LIKE THAT! IT MAKES IT DIFFICULT TO TALK TO YOU!"

She backed up a step, still with no word- her teeth chattering as much as they were, there probably wasn't a point to trying to talk anyway. Beside her, the dirt unearthed and Flowey pushed up from it. "Frisk!"

Her eyes lit upon Flowey and then Frisk turned and ran, hearing them calling to her while she did.

"WAIT! PLEASE DON'T GO!"

"Frisk!"

Even as bewildered and pleading as they sounded- particularly on Flowey's part- she would not stop running, pushing aside any monster that happened to get into her way. After running for a second, eyes aching, she ended up squeezing her eyes shut while she fled further down the sidewalk.

That was a bad idea on its own because in another moment she hit someone and screamed again before falling to the ground.

She opened her eyes and saw Asgore.

So, of course, she screamed a third time and fell down onto the sidewalk. This was an action that was more controlled than it may have looked, for the first thing that this new Asgore said was, "Oh my goodness! I am so sorry, Frisk!"

He looked different, but familiar. To be clear, he wasn't wearing anything close to the same clothes, instead wearing sweatpants and a white dress shirt. There were more differences, but the child in that moment could not see them. All she saw were the crazy eyes and the violent spikes of the Asgore that she left behind, the one wielding a red trident that glowed other colors on occasion. Her injuries might have healed by now thanks to the Temmie Armor, but Frisk felt a sudden itching, phantom pain where they once were- where he had burned her, stabbed her. Scooting back, she couldn't help but emit a low whimper.

"U-uh, child," Asgore was saying, alarm present in voice and face. "What has happened? Did I- did I scare you-?"

Even if he didn't have the trident he could summon flame, wreath himself in it like the demon he longed to turn into. He tried to step closer, so in response Frisk pulled out her pan and returned to her feet in an instant. Her body and heart wavered and she sucked in air through her teeth.

"A-ah, Frisk, I-" he stopped trying to approach when their eyes met, and in fact took a step back, hands held up with the palms open for her to see. "I sincerely did not mean to, if I have scared you... um, I should have been looking where I was going-? No, your clothes look beat up as well..."

You threaten this other Asgore.

You idio-

In part to shut up her intrusive thinking as much as it was to further warn off her opponent, Frisk slammed her pan on the stone sidewalk. The sound alarmed every monster in the vicinity, all heads turning to look at her. The child noticed them, with rising panic, out of the corner of her eye; Asgore, on the other hand, was-

He was-

"It's-it's alright, don't be afraid... Please, tell me what is wrong." He was kneeling, closer to her level now. He was still holding no weapon and still wreathed in no flame, making no sudden movements.

It all clicked horribly in her mind.

Again Frisk ran, even as her beautiful surroundings blurred in front of her eyes.

The irony has worn off.

Frisk opened her eyes, awake almost purely because of how bright the late-afternoon light streaming under her eyelids was. Head throbbing, the ground under her hands spinning through her vision, she groaned and at first just tried to lay still. But a thought pushed into her head, one that scared her just a little. So, at the very least, even if she couldn't stand up she still got on all fours. Swaying, she rubbed her aching cranium and felt for cracks or bumps, certain that there must be one or the other.

You have a concussion.

Her memories were fuzzy, at least her more recent ones, but she was sure that Red Sans was the reason why her head hurt so much. The ground smashing into the top of her head stuck out to her out of the blurred events in her brain. She had been... upside down? Suddenly, gravity had worked in the opposite direction and then corrected itself. Red Sans was grinning at her, at the time. It must be...

Frisk groaned louder and eased into a sitting position, almost falling onto her back in the process. It was so hard even to focus on her surroundings, her head hurt and spun so much. It was definitely not outside, though. A house? Frisk stood up, fell back on her bottom again, and blinked at the wood door she was sitting in front of. Why was it so bright in this house anyway? The sun she saw through the door window could not be real.

It wasn't a very big place, either, and not a house she had ever stepped inside of before. There were only four rooms, that much she could see spinning around in place on the floor- two bedrooms, this entryway, and a kitchen. Maybe it was just a home for one person.

Red Sans! She started to stand, wobbling the whole way, until she was back on her feet and stayed there.

He, obviously, wasn't in this house with her. The last she remembered, he was saying some nasty stuff into the cellphone... he knew everything, now. And he looked really, really mad about all of it too. He must have put her in here after she conked out- too be honest, Frisk was surprised to still be alive at all. But that wasn't good enough. She stumbled to the door outside and tried the knob; as expected, the door wasn't locked but it was definitely stuck. Gritting her teeth, and pushing past her dizziness, she stomped towards another room in the house, silently begging it to have something she could use to break the door down.

In the bedroom she entered she found a lone and dusty soft-cover notebook, lying on the floor next to a worn mattress. The rest of the room was utterly bare of furniture.

It hit her that she was probably trapped in one of the houses in the old Mt. Ebott village, the one that people had abandoned about a decade ago. Curious as always, the child picked up the notebook and examined it.

A small notebook. It has 'Alice Engel' written sloppily on the front.

All of the pages have been ripped out of it.

"Alice." The given name was familiar to her.

But with the pages missing, it sure wasn't enough to hold Frisk's attention. She tossed it on the mattress and continued her search with an aggravated sigh at the wasted time, and found nothing of use in the other bedroom either. In the kitchen, that was where she finally got some results. It was also stripped bare, but with luck she found an abandoned stirring spoon in the corner beside a grimy stove.

Well, maybe not luck. A stirring spoon probably wouldn't break the door down either.

Whoever lived here didn't seem interested in cleaning the place up before they left- it was covered in stale food caked on it from the last meal it ever helped prepare. Frisk touched her tongue to the stuff and shuddered hard, swaying dizzily. This kind of food was not going to heal her. In fact, she had no healing items at all- her pockets were entirely empty. If she ever got into another dangerous monster battle she was screwed

It was when she realized something else she could do, if breaking the door down was not an option.

This spoon would work for it. Slowly Frisk stumbled up to the door, again rubbing her aching head, and she beat against it with the spoon. The noise hurt her ears, but it was louder than she ever wanted to be with her own voice and surely it would be heard by the colony of Froggits that lived in this worn-down village. All she had to do was beat at the door until somebody answered.

Also she was going to try not to worry that, at this moment, Red Sans was also giving Papyrus a concussion.

You better be back soon, Sans, she thought to herself.

If he didn't have the ability to cheat, Sans conceded, he would have died a few times over by now.

That thought wouldn't normally bother him except that, without any Frisk of any kind currently in this world, he sort of felt like he was going without a safety net. Another whirlwind of flame came rushing towards him and he slipped into a shortcut, behind Asgore instead. It was one of several manipulations he had ended up doing over the course of their battle, in which Asgore himself was no longer playing fair.

No one else was supposed to be able to cheat.

No one was supposed to see him cheating, either, with pointed exceptions, but this ship had long sailed by that point.

Growling as he turned, Asgore brought his trident down upon him by the flat side, as if intending to turn him into a Sanscake (heh). He only just managed to get out of the way of that with a jump backwards, breathing hard at the exertion.

For a split second, Sans felt sorry for the kid who may very well come back to this crazy monster to fight, even if they would have more than Karmic Retribution to pack a punch. But it also occurred to him, cheating again to dodge a sucking vortex of flame, that if he killed this guy right here and now that might actually solve their problems, would solve everyone's problems down in this dark world.

Sans took the split second he had before Asgore turned to summon his troop of cannons, Gaster blasters bathing the king in bright beams of light before they dissolved into dust. Hearing his screams upon their impact didn't give him pleasure, exactly, but it took his mind off of his aching bones.

At this point the king was getting clumsy. Rather than swing at him with his trident or try to close in on him with fire, he charged at the skeleton like a bull with some really pointy and long horns. That was something that Sans easily ducked out of the way of, light in addition to being small and as a result a very annoying target. Asgore reeled and tried to swipe at him with his claws, but even that was predictable and easy to evade. Once he was done jumping through the air like a showoff, panting hard, he summoned another wave of bones.

As Asgore roared again, HP dropping like a stone, Sans realized that he was starting to accumulate an audience. The Dr. Alphys of this world hadn't been content to just sit back and tend to the machine's engine, she was peering out from several feet away, wringing her hands.

They had had a very sloppy beginning, and obviously the kid hated her guts, but really she wasn't all bad. The deal that she made him swear to was proof of that, in its own bizarre way.

She was joined by Papyrus and a limping Undyne too, as Sans noticed when he had to teleport from being bowled over by the crazy monster king again, this time not noticing his charge quick enough. Right, don't get distracted by the weird people who looked like his friends.

Still, he wanted to be distracted by them, by someone. Sans wanted to curl up on the ground and sleep. He wanted to go inside Grillby's and make himself a cheeseburger and then fall asleep before he was finished with it, and probably if it was this world's Frisk they would end up stealing it and if it was his world's Frisk they would take a selfie right next to him and the burger like a third wheel.

Sans sniggered and Asgore's claws ripped the front of his jacket. "...rude." He threw bony letters into the king's face, letters that spelled, "sans is something something."

This time when Asgore went down he didn't get up, pawing at the ground and making utterance after utterance in his pain. The RESOLVE that had been keeping his HP from hitting 0, even that was slowly deteriorating.

Sans was glad. He was pretty sure he'd be the one to pass out first in this fight. How embarrassing would that have been?

"hey buddy," he said, squatting down in front of his growling face. "not to be mean, but, you're pretty annoying. you're not even the one that i have the biggest bone to pick with."

Asgore, for his part, seemed too far gone for words by now. He just made weak reaches for Sans, restricted and agonized by the weight pressing down on him. Sans straightened up. "it's not even my job to worry about you. i mean, i'm not even getting paid for this. the person whose job it is... they're gonna have it pretty rough if they come back here and you're still alive."

The drain of karma slowed. Asgore's HP was well into single digits, and he wasn't moving anymore except to breathe. More monsters were watching him, coming out of the woodwork with the battle almost concluded. Sans-freaking-tastic (heh.)

"and you kept me from getting back to papyrus," Sans continued, "my bro."

His eye flashed bright blue and gold.

"you like hell so much? go burn in it, buddy."

The air sparked.

Frisk ran, half snuck around streets, ran, stopped to read street signs, and ran. She couldn't stop, for the longest time; each monster that she saw walking around was familiar to her. Someone she saw in Waterfall or Snowdin, or even god forbid Hotland. And the worst part was when she was noticed, and pointed out by their very familiar voices calling out to her. "Hey, Frisk!"

"Human!"

"Where are you going, Frisk?"

Where was she going? At least nobody was chasing her, so that when she finally found an alley that was empty she was able to stop and catch her breath. Catching her breath was a lot harder than it was supposed to be, though. She slapped the wall and leaned against it, wiping her eyes as many times as it took, staring down at the clean and fresh-looking pavement she was standing on. It was too hard, it was downright painful, the way her chest kept tightening up with each breath. Maybe she had been doing way too much running lately.

When she was in control of herself again, the child peered back out at her surroundings, trying with clenched muscles to keep her body from shaking.

This city wasn't New Home, at least as far as she knew. She had never actually been there, but Sans had showed her some photos of the location from before he and Papyrus moved to Snowdin. It looked awfully dark and filthy, much like the Ruins only not as closed off and seemingly lacking air. Was this New Home on the surface? From what little Blue Sans said, she had thought that the monsters were also underground... Everything here looked new, too.

It clicked, again.

...This place was beautiful. With each picture of it she made, the child compared it in her mind to her own.

Far in the distance, away from the city, Mt. Ebott rose above unfinished skyscrapers, set high against a late afternoon sky and breathtaking. No menace could be found in its green slopes, unlike the crag that she remembered. Shading her eyes, she studied the growing oranges of the sun dipping down lower and lower, an orange that was once the shade on her own shirt before it was worn by countless abuses.

Asgore's face- this one and the other- wavered in and out of her mind's eye. Papyrus, too. Blue Sans. Blue Papyrus...? Blue Asgore...? Blue world. Sunny world. Flowery world.

Sans was somewhere in this city, of that she was sure. All alone, Frisk called out weakly, "Sans?" He wasn't at Papyrus' house, and he wasn't apparently just walking around in the open like everybody else. "Sans...?" It might help if she had any idea at all where things were in this little city. The house of this world's Alphys, for example. As much as it turned her stomach to think of asking any Alphys for her help so explicitly. Frisk continued to wander, keeping up a suspicious watch for anyone nearby.

Wait...

Frisk stomped frantically on the ground beneath her and waited, fidgeting.

It was to her immense relief that Flowey pushed his way out of the ground to her in a few minutes, apparently just as relieved to find her again. "Frisk! You really scared me there, why did you run off like that?"

"We don't know these people, Flowey," she said, offering her hand to climb up. "I wish you wouldn't be such an idiot and call to them."

Embarrassed, he nonetheless protested. "Oh I don't think this Papyrus is that bad..."

"'That bad' is 'killed me fifty three times'. Do you really think I care if this Papyrus is just 'kills me five times'?" She said with an almost hysterical scoff, and then flicked him in the face as soon as he settled properly on her shoulder. "Don't be so stupid."

But Flowey didn't respond to that.

"...Anyway," she tried again, "Do you know where Sans is? I can't see him anywhere."

The flower shook his head, sighing, "He isn't exactly easy to find when he doesn't want to be found. I don't know if we really have a shot at finding him without asking around for the spooky scary skeleton making a mess of other people's stuff."

He probably had a point, but that would mean that she had to actually talk to these people, and Frisk wrung the ends of her sweater with a huge frown at the thought.

She sighed. "Can you... do the talking part?"

Flowey hesitated for just a second. "O-o-oh, if you think I should. Sure! Ha! You can be like my private taxi and take me places."

"That's all I've been doing lately," Frisk grumbled, but she didn't say no as she patted Flowey's head roughly.

That was it then. Unfortunately enough, if the child had not been killed by the Canine Unit she might have missed the other version of herself altogether, going more confidently through the city with just her buddy near to help her find Sans.

But she did, so she didn't.

It started when a monster with no arms mistook her for her counterpart.

"Get away from me!"

It was nice to have a ride to where she needed to go, for once- everything was so big on the surface, and yet there weren't as many modes of transportation to cut short all the travel time. No igloos out in the countryside, for example.

However, there was a cloaked monster giving ferry-rides not far from where the Froggits broke the door to her makeshift prison open. They were all too happy to have someone take a ride on their "boat" after so long.

"La ti tum, if I'm not a river-person any longer, should I be called the field-person? Tra la la..." they sang, and as usual Frisk gave no reply but a polite thank you when they got to the city.

The ache in her head had at least subsided a little by then.

It was only a little while into her walk when she heard the scream, one that was odd in a way she couldn't yet place. Munching on the River-Person's crackers, she ran towards the sound as if on an instinct.

"Woah, woah, wait, stop! Yo, what did I do!?"

By a row of unfinished houses, Leo was backing away from a human child, the most stricken expression on his face- the child, on the other hand, was holding a frying pan in their hands and growling scratchily from the back of their throat. Her first thought was the child of one of the crazy former villagers that she was always having to talk to the mayor about, but they looked familiar. They also had messy hair and looked like no one had washed them in days, if that.

Regardless, they slammed their pan on the pavement and Leo yelped at the loud noise. Frisk raced to his side as fast as he could, hand briefly touching to the heart locket she wore around her neck. "Hey! Leave him alone!

"Yo- Frisk?" Leo looked from one child to the other, and quickly ran behind the one who looked most familiar to her.

It was great that he was out of range of being hit, but Frisk wasn't exactly thrilled by what was looking to be another opportunity to get a concussion from this wild-child in an orange and black striped sweater. Their eyes widened, and they stopped growling, but did not move from their threatening stance.

"Who are they?" Leo whispered in her ear.

The other child was breathing hard. A flower looked as if it were blooming on their shoulder while she watched. "I d-don't know..."

"Geeze, I thought they were you!"

The flower on the child's shoulder had eyes and a mouth. With this and by Leo's statement, it suddenly all made sense. Frisk didn't look into mirrors often, so right away she hadn't seen it, but it was obvious now. They were identical. Eyes widening in understanding, rather than cower when the pan struck pavement again, she straightened up and stepped forward. "You're... his Frisk, aren't you?"

Still holding their weapon out, shoulders tensing, this other Frisk- Red Frisk? Just to be consistent; they had no speck of red on them- didn't move or speak, but she knew she was correct. And yet, what an awful thing to be correct about; she couldn't help but grimace. "I don't want to fight you." She pulled out the dull knife she always kept in her pocket. "Don't hurt my friend."

Again, Red Frisk didn't move or speak, only breathing a little heavier. Their eyes were also getting wider, studying her.

Frisk thought that just maybe it wouldn't be so bad when they started droop, the pan in their hands scraping against the path. She took a step forward. "I-it's, um, it's okay. Maybe you can give me that...?" The Flowey on Red Frisk's shoulder bizarrely nodded, shivering.

Then before she knew what happened, she was sprawled on the sidewalk with a pain in her head even worse than the first.

Why are you hitting yourself?

Blood was rushing in Frisk's ears.

And it was also bleeding out of a wound in her other self's head.

It was so, so different when somebody bled. Monsters, at least none she had seen, bled. And that blood was even on the edge of the pan, the edge that had hit the mark. Frisk trembled hard like she was stuck in Snowdin, chest tightening; she took a step back, and then several more, away from the other kid- the other Frisk in a purple and blue sweater. This Blue Frisk was holding their head, struggling to get off the ground, although the best that they could do was get onto their hands and knees.

"U..u-um..."

"Ow," they moaned.

The monster brat that she'd been trying to hit in the first place at first yelped and tried to tend to his friend, nudging them with his muzzle. But then when it occurred to him that he didn't have arms he charged at Frisk instead, planting his feet firmly on the cement. "You're gonna pay for that! I'll show you to start smacking people, you big bully!"

"M... me?" Frisk said dumbly. The other child on the ground lifted their head, and their eyes met. Frisk's expression hardened and with that glare in her eyes she looked back at the monster brat. "Me?"

Something was creeping up her arms. Frisk dodged aside of the monster brat's attempt at a headbutt and she exhaled to feel that something tighten, pinioning one arm and almost doing the same to another. Pinpricks of pain reached her skin; she screamed, "Flowey!"

"Frisk you're-" That was as far as he got before her free hand reached back behind herself, fingers grasping for his stem. "A-aaAh!" She missed, several times in the span of a few seconds, but the coils of his tendrils loosened anyway. She jumped out of the way of another charge by the monster brat, and she swung with her pan. It didn't connect and she swung dizzily, readying for another turn at the same pace as the monster brat.

Blue Frisk was on their knees, bleeding from their head wound. "Stop!"

Frisk took a look at them and almost retched, rubbing a sleeve over their mouth.

-2 HP

Then the monster brat slammed his head into her side and she shrieked in pain, staggering. Sticking out a leg to keep from falling, she whacked him with the handle of her weapon and he crashed to the ground seeing stars. The only one standing then was Frisk, as it always was.

She lost her grip.

You have another concussion.

To say that this was unexpected was an understatement, but when she really thought about it Frisk didn't know what she had been expecting out of herself in a world that was supposed to be ten times worse. She was pretty sure that the pain she was going through was worse than when Red Sans knocked her out, and yet it was still slightly better than when Papyrus had pelted her to a pulp with bone attacks.

It was difficult just fighting not to lose consciousness, and also fighting not to throw up suddenly on the sidewalk. Something warm and wet was running down her neck and on her chin.

What did Red Sans call her before? A little shit? That seemed like a title better applied to this other child right now, whom she got a bit of a closer look at when struggling upright onto her knees. Their clothes were ratty, torn, restitched, covered in faint little bloodstains. Like someone who had been in hundreds of fights. When she hit Leo, adrenaline fired in Frisk's veins and she thought that maybe Red Frisk was about to be in one more.

Well... except even being upright ended up being too hard. And before the dizziness had even stopped there was a clatter and footfalls.

Frisk winced and looked back, but Red Frisk was gone.

"What the... hell?" She said, a word she had learned much earlier. And then she watched Leo pick himself up off the ground. "Oh! Leo!"

He didn't look hurt, rather stunned, and snapped out of it at her voice. "Y-yo! Are you okay? What's all that red stuff?"

"My head hurts," Frisk burbled, lying back down on the sidewalk.

"Oh geeze, um, um, okay, let me try and fix you up, uh, uh," Leo scurried over to his friend's prone form, saying a little too loud, "I've been practicing!"

The monster kid was still young, and not very experienced at healing, but he nonetheless pressed his muzzle to her head and applied the itchy green magic to it. Frisk's pain became bearable, and she stopped worrying that a girl just as young as her had managed to crack her skull open. Something small touched the tips of her fingers and she also felt the tingle of magic spread along her body; it was the other Flowey, the one she had seen on Red Frisk's shoulder. His vines were coiling on her sweater sleeve and his petals brushed her palm.

"Eugh-!" The child yelped and tried to shake him off.

The plant hung on tighter, "No, no, no, no, I'm trying to help you!"

"You're the evil Flowey!" Frisk said stubbornly, shaking her arm again. "And my Flowey is pretty bad to start with!"

He was a stubborn thing too, though, digging in with sharp thorns. "No, no, no, I'm not- well, I wouldn't go that far." He smiled nervously at her, and Frisk could see tiny little fangs poking out from under his lips. Frisk shrieked again and started shaking, and whipping up and down he protested hysterically, "I'm not evil I'm not evil I'm not evil I'm not evil I swear!"

"Dude!" Leo said, looking at him with big eyes. "Talking flower!"

Something occurred to her, though, and she decided for a second to give this thing the benefit of the doubt. "But wait, you guys are the other Frisk and Flowey from that world Sans is in, right?"

"Yes!" Flowey said in a high pitch, clinging to Frisk's arm in a death-hug. "Yes, yes, yes we are!"

She tried to pluck him off and that didn't seem to help either; then again, the little flower was starting to look pitiful with how much he was trembling, petals curled inwards. Maybe he was the opposite of her Flowey instead of an intensification.

On the other hand, that meant that Red Asriel must be-

You suddenly remember that Sans needs you still.

Oh, right. "How did you two get here in the first place? Do you know where Sans is?"

At this, the Flower perked up, and then drooped again. "He, uh, he got the machine w-w-working, and we came here through it. It's just, he didn't f-f-follow us through it."

"What? Why not?" Flowey inched up closer to her shoulder. "Is it possible for me to go to him from here?"

Squeaking, he said, "I-I would not advise it, b-but-"

"Then we gotta get going!" She looked to Leo, who nodded. "He can help us sort all this other stuff out, I'm sure of it."

"Yo, I'll go get Alphys and Papyrus!" Leo said. He was practically jumping, earlier injury forgotten.

Smiling at him for half a second, Frisk turned and began to run, with his going clumsily after her. "Show me where to go, Flowey."

She would try not to worry and wonder where her Red Frisk had gotten off to.

"Red Frisk" actually hadn't left at all. She was just hiding, peering at them while they talked from behind the window of an uninhabited new house. Not that she knew it wad uninhabited when she ran into it, but it was fortunate there were no more monsters inside when she had already dropped her only means of defending herself on the street.

Only when she was safely out of view did Frisk realize, as well, that Flowey wasn't even on her shoulder anymore. He was with the other Frisk out on the sidewalk, glowing green and climbing up her arm the way he did for her. A second later she watched him panicking and stayed silent, waited while the other child who was covered in dried blood calmed him down. Through the window, in the shadows, Frisk watched all of it, all up until the three of them left to find Sans and Blue Sans.

When that happened, Frisk exited the house and slowly returned to the sidewalk. From there, she noticed that she had never stopped shaking, and she stood in place taking deep breaths.

It was her.

That was... not her.

They looked the same, but that was where the similarities stopped.

It was that way for everything in this world.

And something came back to her, something she'd heard.

"Shit, shit, shit..."

Frisk rubbed the old scars and scabs that her sweater sleeves hid, squinting hard and cursing so quietly under her breath.

The reason why this monster kingdom is happy and on the surface, and the reason why the other monster kingdom is miserable and trapped underground.

Sitting down on the sidewalk curb, she put her head in her hands and started crying.

At first it was just some tears squeezed from her eyes, as it had been for the past few days. Then, it was messy and uncontrollable, like it was on the day that she met King Asgore. Her breathing became noisy and painful sobs, her body being wracked with them and muscles squeezing so tight they ached. Then it moved even beyond that, becoming messy and loud, outright bawling.

She couldn't stop. However much she wished to stop, the sobs kept coming and turning to hard hiccups, her face kept twisting, and tears soaked her sweater sleeves. She had nothing else in her head except for how sorry she felt for herself, and such thoughts couldn't let her stop.

Such a crybaby. I'll try harder not to, she always told herself, and it was always the dumbest things that brought all those tears back.

Frisk cried until her head hurt, until her back hurt, until her eyes and nose were sore, until she was also having to wipe snot from her nostrils in addition to the tears on her cheeks- why not? She was already a mess. She cried until she couldn't think anymore, until her arms were tired of clinging to her knees, until her throat ached.

She cried until Sans said, "oh, boy. i know that pathetic sniveling anywhere."

Still in the middle of a sob, Frisk looked up from where she sat. At first, she didn't recognize him for who he was- she almost thought that it was Blue Sans, wearing a fluffy blue coat now that he was back in his own world. But she knew to whom those words belonged, and his crueler features became clear to her in a moment.

She couldn't speak, couldn't even start telling him what an idiot he was and how he was going to come home with her right now like how she'd rehearsed in her head. Couldn't even say hi. Shock had stolen whatever voice hadn't been lost in all her bawling. So she just stared at him, hiccuping and biting her lip to keep from sobbing so loudly again. She wiped her eyes, desperately, and failed.

But for the first time, he wasn't pinching her nose and threatening to give her something real to cry about. Instead, her Sans mused, "i should have figured you of all people would get over here first, pipsqueak. just didn't think you'd get so emotional over it, amirite?"

Frisk didn't stop, couldn't stop. She bowed her head in shame, and Sans' smile turned into a grimace while sweat gathered on his head. "h-hey, come on, cut it out. i haven't seen you in like over a week. i actually, i actually have some questions i want ask you now."

"..don't... wanna..." She choked out at last, only precious few words making it past the lump in her throat. "Be... the b-b-bad..."

His white pupil eyes roved over her and then were replaced by his more familiar, glaring red eye. "i didn't quite catch that."

Frisk put her head in her hands and with an uncooperative throat she scratched out, "I don't w-w-wanna be the evil Frisk!" Saying it aloud just made all the tears come faster, unfortunately, and that was it.

Out of her sight, Sans murmured, "oh. uh. is this... because of what i said earlier?" His only response from the child was a lingering whimper, and he exhaled sharply. "look, pip-...squeak, uh, i, when i said that, i was just being- well, i didn't mean... i mean i'm probably- but- you're not-" The child started to unfurl, still wiping her eyes heavily with her sleeves, and Sans was grimacing hard.

"uhh... oh, hey!" Perking up suddenly, he gave a quick glance to Frisk before rifling through his pockets. Soon enough he pulled out a large something wrapped up in paper. "i almost forgot, been holding on to this for you."

"You got something for me?" The girl choked.

Sans nodded quickly, unwrapping the package. "yeah! um... was not entirely sure, uh, how to get it to ya, but well here you are now."

He handed it to her quickly, the object that she accepted with shaking arms. To her utter surprise, it was a big plush bunny that was half her size, and she didn't really know how Sans had kept it in his pocket in the first place. It was incredibly soft to touch, white with an orange chest, and really the last thing she would have ever expected from him.

The child looked up, fighting more tears. "...what's wrong with it?" She whispered.

"-fucking hell," he sputtered, "nothing's wrong with it! what makes you think something's wrong with it?"

She pressed it tight to her chest, and it didn't explode. "...There's always something wrong with it."

"well," Sans hissed, and then swallowed uncomfortably. "there's not. this time."

Maybe that was true; Frisk held the toy out in her arms, studying it more closely. But the more that she looked, the less and less guard she had to keep herself in check, and the tears that she had just managed to dry mere seconds ago rekindled. To prevent Sans from seeing, she buried her face into the fur of the rabbit and soaked it instead.

"ah shit," he said. "fuck if i knew it was just going to make you do more of this i wouldn't have given it to you." She heard his footsteps, and his shadow darkened her when he stepped closer. "is this still about the 'evil' thing?"

Smiling through her tears, or perhaps it was because of them, she could only say, "Ye-s... s.."

"i'm not good at this, kid," he said to her hoarsely. "come on, quit it. you think crying's going to accomplish anything?"

"Sans..."

He wheezed, albeit softly. "s-stop it, you're just throwing a tantrum. you- you know you're not that bad."

And maybe that was also true, but in spite of that Frisk could not just stop. If he wanted to leave, if he wanted to stop listening, then he could. But for now she spoke, in the lowest voice she possessed, past her constricted windpipe. "I did all these mean things..." another intake of breath. "And-and I didn't... want to do them, but I didn't... know what else to do."

"join the club, twerp," said Sans. He had not left yet.

She knew Sans so well, or at least she thought that she did. In this case, at least, she knew what he was angling for. But even though her lips formed the words that she would use to replace these tears with, it was her throat that refused to cooperate. And the only noise she could make, instead of a curse, was just another ugly, loud sob.

But Sans didn't leave even then, and something new happened. "look, hey, hey," he said suddenly. "it's not you, okay? it's just the place. it's that world that's bad." When she didn't respond, he continued, "i-i-i mean, that other pipsqueak, they- if-if they were put in your situation they would be exactly the same as you, y'know?"

"No they wouldn't," was her immediate response, said mostly to herself.

"they wouldn't? they wouldn't?" He repeated with an edge to his speech, rapping on her head with his knuckles. "i bet that they would. there is a way to test that, y'know," he said with a wheezy chuckle. "whadd'ya say we toss that brat into your world for a while, let you live here? after all, you guys look... pretty alike, don't you think?"

Frisk raised her head, red-rimmed eyes wide and staring at Sans. He nodded at her, smiling again, red eye shaking in his socket. "yeah, c'mon, at least think about it. you could get a bath, eat as much stuff as you want, go to school, have friends like a normal kid... you'd never die- ever again. no one would be able to tell the difference."

"He's right," Frisk nearly jumped out of her skin, seeing Flowey sprout beside her. "No one would know. And even if you don't throw t-the other human into that world, it'd be a good escape."

Sans took in the sight of Flowey with a cool eye. "see? even the weed agrees with me."

"Sans... Flowey..." Frisk wiped her face again and sniffed, trying not to sneeze. At Flowey, in particular, she shot a meaningful gaze. Was this your plan from the start? From the very moment he suggested they help Blue Sans. She had thought it was out of character for him to help someone he didn't know.

Sniffing again, Frisk shook her head. "I can't do that... I have to go back." She stood. "We... we both have to."

Immediately, something in Sans' expression changed, and he took a step away from her. "no."

But wiping her eyes and snorting excess mucus, she held out her hand to him. She affixed a more determined expression on her face, one that was much better than the blubbering that she had been doing. "We have to, come on. Blue Sans is in trouble back in our world."

"you fucking named him blue sans?"

Frisk stomped her foot, while his red eye blazed. "Sans!"

He coughed, "uh, gee, that seems more like his problem than mine, doesn't it?"

"It... it is your problem, though." Even as she argued with Sans, Frisk knew that his counterpart was very probably dead or worse when facing Asgore, or whatever was keeping him for so long. "Because it's your fault that he's there."

He shook his head quickly. "no, it's not my problem."

Frisk wiped her nose and eyes again. "Sans, we have to go home now."

"that's not home," he snarled, and the air around them changed. The sky wasn't so bright anymore, although with the hours wearing on as they were that might have been a coincidence more than anything else.

Truth be told, it scared her a little. Flowey, as well, shooting back under the earth where he was safe. At times, Frisk really hated him more than anyone else for having such a safety net. She, she had to swallow her fear and walk forward. "Whatever it is to you, you're coming with me and helping me get Blue Sans back."

He laughed, but it sounded different. "leave if you want, i'm not going anywhere."

"That's not good enough."

More wheezy, odd laughing. His eye began flashing yellow, shoulders moving faintly with his breaths. "good enough? but we're evil, remember?"

"So help me God, Sans!" Frisk snatched her pan from where it lay on the street, and in the same motion stowed the rabbit away. She pointed the bloody end at him like a rapier. "You're coming back with me even if I have to drag you the whole way, you fuck!"

Sans blinked at her, slowly, well into heavy breathing by now as if he had just run an uncomfortably long distance. Frisk hesitated just once in her pose to wipe her runny nose again, and his smile full of sharp teeth grew maniacally broad. "Okay then, Plan C," he said, in a rarely heard voice.

Frisk took a step towards him. And then felt a tug on her SOUL.

Sans jerked his hand forward. "sorry."

And so she went flying into the side of the nearest building.

You feel like you're not going to have an easy time.

Next Chapter: Proving Hall

Chapter Text

"If I let you out of there, do you promise to get right back in?" He asked. "Before anyone notices?"

"I promise."

"...You said that too fast. Forget it."

"I said it because I mean it. Please?"

"No, I don't trust you. What kind of idiot is okay with letting themselves be caged?"

"The answer is exactly the reason why you should let me out of here."

Frisk took a second to catch her breath, the unfamiliar voices of just seconds ago vanishing once she stood back up on her feet. They were banished by a new melody playing in her head, another one that she had never heard before. It was surely because, here and now, she was standing in a battle with Sans. He stood in the middle of the street, like he was getting ready to throw her again.

There was no dirt to dig her feet into, so Frisk could only brace herself. The first move he made had resulted in no lasting damage- in truth, it only amounted to startling her. That didn't mean that he wouldn't do something worse with his next turn.

Sure enough, her SOUL flashed blue and he tossed her down on the ground; this time, while she was lying there like that a range of sharpened magic bones materialized overhead. The child rolled and scrambled out of the way, and they only shot harmlessly through the pavement.

Through these first few seconds, neither of them said anything. For Frisk, it was taking her time to process that Sans was fighting her. Sans, for his part, may not be feeling his most chatty. He stood in place waiting for her turn to be over, waiting for her to stand up and act against him. Frisk didn't feel particularly injured, and attacking Sans directly wasn't an option unless she wanted to turn him to dust right then and there. So naturally she did the only ACT she tended to do in a battle, her heart pounding and stomach twisted with numb hurt.

You taunt Sans.

"You-you blunderhead, what makes you think you'd even stand a chance against me!?" She shouted, smacking her pan against the building that her little body had just crashed into. "I know that if you could have killed me you would have done it at the start!"

Sans stared her down, studying her with his wavering eye. "well, some things happened while i was over here. needless to say..." A giant skull head appeared over his shoulder, shaped roughly like a dog's- it looked exactly the same as Blue Sans' cannon attack, save for one of the teeth being gold. Frisk swallowed. "i realized that i can dish it out if the other person won't."

The blaster fired, and Frisk was in too much shock to make a relatively simple dodge. The searing heat of the blast made her think, for an instant, that she was going to be reduced to a cinder and she screamed.

-1 HP

A moment passed, she was still standing there. Sans had started laughing at her stunned expression, standing there and smoking slightly as though she were a cartoon character. Cheeks flushing red with embarrassment, all she could do was shout, "Are you kidding me!? This is nothing!"

Sans wiped a tear from his eye and grinned big, still chuckling raspily, "goddamn don't just stand there, move out of the way next time!" and then his expression darkened, several more of the cannons materializing and aiming right at her face in a semicircle. He stopped laughing. "...didn't you tell me once that i have two tallies on that little scoreboard you made?"

He did, but neither of those tallies meant much at this moment. "Only two-" she started to say, and then yelped as she hit the ground, the blasts from the cannons shooting harmlessly overhead. Even as she hit the pavement, however, she felt something else shooting upwards into her stomach, practically knocking the wind out of her. The cage of bones that rose around her body and sank back into the ground gave her an idea as to what it was, and all the child could do was utter a grunt. Well played, Sans.

-1 HP

-1 HP

It hurt a little more than she expected it to. Sucking in air Frisk struggled back to her feet, glaring, and took in her surroundings. There wasn't a lot of space where she was standing, she had to move, get out into the street empty of cars. She wiped her face and again chose to ACT, shouting at Sans, "So this is your big plan to stay here!? Killing me in public where everyone can see?! You're even stupider than I thought, shithead!"

You taunt Sans.

He shook his skull. "callin' me shithead now?" Bones flew in her direction, and Frisk yelped as she tried to evade, recognizing the rhythmic pattern of attack that Papyrus had used on her time after time in battle- only much faster. "boy, guilt-slinging is not even a THING with you, is it?"

She couldn't even ask what "guilt-slinging" was before a bone smacked her in the forehead and she rolled off balance. Reeling, Frisk leaned forward instead into a run out onto the wider street. A wall of bone shot up from the ground and caused her to skid to a stop in the center.

-1 HP

-1 HP

-1 HP

-1 HP

"maybe that's one of the reasons i like you so much."

The cruel irony is starting to dawn on you.

She only got hit three times, and already she felt so much weaker. Breaths coming in hard and fast, Frisk dug into her pocket and brought out the first thing that she could get her hands on, an Iscream that she had forgotten to eat earlier, and she chomped down without a care for how much it hurt her teeth.

Your HP was maxed out.

"and no, to answer your question," Sans said after his turn was up again, a ring of blasters surrounding the child. "don't want you to die. can't promise it's not gonna happen, though. i just want you to give up."

The blasters all began firing in sequential order, and she practically danced to keep herself out of the searing bright light. She got dizzy fast, as with each blaster to disappear another one took its place, and she'd ended up spinning in a circle three times before the attack was over. This was another kind of thing that she expected Sans to start laughing at her for, but by the end of it, he wasn't making any other noise- he did, however, send more bones her way, so she began to cry out and swing her pan wildly in a bid to keep them from hitting her.

-1 HP

-1 HP

One hit, and she stumbled. They were coming faster, each attack. The cracks and booms that came from his magic, and the cracks that came from her pan, were additionally starting to attract more attention than she was comfortable with. A blue rabbit with a striped shirt and a polar bear in a purple scarf came running around the street corner, and her heart-rate spiked not only for the battle but how it must look to everyone else that might be looking in.

Sans didn't react to them, at least not to her ears and eyes, but began summoning more and more bones that sliced along the ground like Jaws sharks. The magic moving through the air looked to be enough to send bystanders back to a safe distance. At least she wasn't going to have to talk to them, and maybe none of them would do something stupid like try to intervene and attack him or her.

-1 HP

-1 HP

-1 HP

-1 HP

"Ow!"

Something sharp sliced open the sleeve of her sweater and her arm bled from the opening, a sharp bone flying past. The weakness that she felt growing in her body started to worsen. Even though she was only being struck by these minor attacks, why...?

Every turn, she was expecting the pain to disappear, for her energy to be rejuvenated. But she jumped and danced over an array of spinning bones under her feet, rolled out of the way of three blasters in a row, and at the end of it her arm was still bleeding.

Sans must have caught sight of her narrow, confused eyes. "'why isn't my temmie armor working?'" He said, mimicking her voice in a falsetto. "that's what you're thinkin'... right?"

Frisk's blood was dripping down the handle she held ever tighter in her little hand. She didn't say anything, didn't make any noise except to rip open the package of instant meatloaf she took out of Papyrus' fridge and eat it raw.

Your HP was maxed out.

She was beginning to understand. She could not be hit, period. Or, somehow, somehow Sans, with his 1 HP and 1 ATK and 1 DF, somehow he would drain the life out of her like a vampire or Muffet with her poisonous spider-bites.

Easy.

He started talking again at the widening of her eyes and the increased speed of her dodges, racing from side to side of the street in an attempt to stop being such a stationary target. His voice was low and wavered, so that she almost didn't hear it. "you couldn't even kill one person. not even to save your own life. you're some kind of freak is what you are." A freak with freakish jumping, albeit a talent that had been perfected over weeks of battles, as the child leaped over a literal wave of bone clubs. "if you had just... killed... one person..."

This wasn't the first time this topic came but, like every other time Frisk couldn't think of anything to say to it. So, like the other times that it did, she said nothing at all, only holding out her weapon and staring down her opponent. The bitter smile on Sans' face twitched and he surrounded her with blasters, which she tried to run away from rather than go through that dizzy dance again.

It took just a slight adjustment of the blaster pointed in her direction, and another searing blast struck through her body. "Ow!"

"but you didn't. and that's killing you."

Frisk's knees buckled and she hissed, standing quickly. She threw her head up and struck pavement, but this time when she did Sans didn't flinch. It must be that that trick was getting old. "I'm not dead yet. All I have to do is wait for you to get tired. And when you do-"

You taunt Sa-

Her turn wasn't even over yet and tiny bones began flying towards her. Frisk yelped, startled, and was knocked off balance yet again. As the battle went on a myriad of cuts, bruises, and scrapes were beginning to accumulate over her body, the impacts blunted by her clothes but not enough to prevent injury. "Ow! Shit!"

"don't stop moving, twerp," said Sans. "not everyone fights fair."

Sans slid down the banister, barreled out the door, and tripped and fell on the front step of his own blessed house. His vision was blurring and getting blacker at the edges, which was slightly worrisome- or it would be, if his mind wasn't already occupied. He slowly stood upright, coughing and harshly rubbing his face with the bony palm of his hand; the adrenaline from his earlier fight with that insane king was definitely rubbing off now. His body felt like it was on fire.

Stumbling backwards, he quickly regained his balance and called out, pinprick eyes darting in every direction, "PAPYRUS!"

He hadn't been in the house, and there was a broken salad bowl lying on the ground.

Naturally Sans assumed the worst. "Papyrus!"

Until this whole misadventure in a new world, he'd never not known where his brother was.

Suppose that he was somewhere else in the city or even beyond, somewhere that he wouldn't be able to find in time? Or suppose that he was trapped somewhere, or that his other self had decided to take his rage out on Papyrus completely like he said and his little brother was cracked open or completely turned to dust? Or suppose that-

A little bit of adrenaline left; Sans straightened and started running down the sidewalk. "YO PAPYRUS!" He shouted louder than he ever had, even as much as his throat was beginning to hurt. He had an idea, and it was a little bit of a mean one, the likes of which probably came from living in a hellpit for so many days. Sans took a big deep breath he shouted out all the same, "I'M GOING TO EAT EVERYTHING IN THE KITCHEN AND THERE'S NOTHING YOU CAN DO TO STOP ME!"

He waited, huffing, wiping his skull of sweat, for any response. There wasn't one for ten long, excruciating seconds. So Sans waited ten more, looking left and right down the sidewalk in quick, frenzied motions.

Then and there he gave a start, uncomfortable with how badly his heart was racing, for the first time in a long time. Everything that willpower had pushed back fixing the machine was crashing back in on him, a whole heap of things that he hadn't felt in a long time. This was the kind of thing that he hadn't missed in the days where he felt so little. Hoarsely, Sans tried again in a volume more his speed, "... paps, i said i'm gonna-"

"OH HO NO YOU'RE NOT!" A big hand grabbed him by the hood of his coat, lifting him into the air; Sans yelped, sticking his hands in his pockets to keep the coat from being ripped off. "THAT FOOD IS FOR OUR SECRET ORGANIZATION MEETING!"

He was face to face with his brother, whose eyesockets became filled with his huge eyes when he took in the face of the one he was chastising. Sans grinned at him in winded relief. He croaked out, "what secret organization is that, bro?"

Papyrus pulled him into a tight, equally-as-winding hug in that next second, rivers of tears flowing from his eyes. "SANS! SANS! IT'S YOU! IT'S THE REAL YOU! YOU CAME BACK! I KNEW YOU WOULD! I KNEW YOU'D BE OKAY!" He squeezed him even tighter, and for a moment Sans couldn't even breathe. "OKAY ACTUALLY I WAS A TINY TINY BIT WORRIED THAT YOU MIGHT HAVE GOTTEN HURT, B-B-BUT I THINK THAT'S ONLY FAIR, RIGHT!? BECAUSE YOU'RE S-SO SMALL, AND HOW COULD YOU MAKE IT WITHOUT ME TO LOOK AFTER YOU!?"

Sans grunted, struggling in his brother's viselike grip. "y-yeah, that's why i came back."

"YES, YOU DID! I KNEW THAT YOU WOULD!" Papyrus held Sans away from him at last, looking him over with an attentive eye. "YOU DON'T LOOK SO GOOD, THOUGH! IT'S A GOOD THING I SAVED ALL THAT ORANGE JUICE! I HOPE THE POINTY SANS WON'T MIND!"

The pointy Sans. He knew what that meant. Sans struggled and Papyrus, expressing waning, set him down quickly. "yeah, that other me, have you seen him lately? did he hurt you? where did he go?"

With a little look of regret, Papyrus put his red gloved hands together. "WEEEELL, HE WENT TEARING OUT OF HERE HOURS AND HOURS AGO AND ACTUALLY HE NEVER CAME BACK." Something occurred to him, and he brightened. "OH! WAS IT TO GET YOU? DID HE CHANGE HIS MIND."

"no-er-something like that happened-" he sputtered, now trying to find any cracks or injuries, particularly in the vicinity of his brother's head. "w-where did he go? did he say?"

Papyrus shook his head. "NOPE! HOW COME HE ISN'T WITH YOU?"

"uh, i don't know. uh, are you sure that he didn't hurt you?"

Again he shook his head, giving a somewhat weak smile in return. "NOPE! THERE WAS THIS ONE TIME A LOT EARLIER, BUT, UH, I'M FINE! AND I THINK IT WAS AN ACCIDENT BECAUSE-"

he hit you the motherfucker actually hit you i'm going to pulverize him-

"SANS?"

Sans looked up. Even this feeling, at least in intensity, was vaguely unfamiliar. He retained his usual smile by a thread, "i'm pretty tired, paps, sorry. did you say something?"

"OH! WELL, IF YOU'RE TIRED, YOU SHOULD GO REST!" Papyrus mused, putting a gloved hand to his skull. "AND I CAN GO LOOK FOR THAT POINTIER SANS AND... UH..." He looked away, squinting, embarrassed. "BURN THAT COAT YOU'RE WEARING BECAUSE IT SMELLS LIKE SMOKE AND ROTTING MEAT."

That made him laugh, which restored some of his earlier self beyond all the crap he'd been going through. And so did realizing that despite his fears, Papyrus didn't look any worse for wear. "no, no... i'll be just fine, i promise. i just need to... catch my breath. i think i'll try doing that 'throwing up' thing that humans do."

He made like he was really going to, bending over the grass, and Papyrus screeched. "EW NO DON'T, YOU'LL JUST GET IT ALL IN YOUR MOUTH!"

Another set of frantic voices grabbed his attention, however dizzy and full of regret he actually was getting from leaning over. Sans straightened up, turning his head in the direction of the shout, and saw a familiar kid in a striped sweater racing towards them.

Well, well, that was two bursts of relief, to see that Frisk was still at the very least alive. Even if it was mitigated by the fact that they had a very noticeable splash of dried blood running down their head.

"No!" They dived at him, too, and almost knocked him off his feet. "You leave Papyrus alone!"

"aw c'mon bucko, i haven't seen him in like a week," he said, the child's small hands grabbing at the sleeves of his jacket. "gimme a break!"

They looked up at him, their brown eyes huge for once. "Sans...?" They asked, far more experimental than Papyrus. There was a little bit of an accusatory look to their eyes, Sans wondered which person they were currently mad at.

He flashed his smile, "eyup, i'm afraid it's me, buddy."

"Oh!" They released him, only to give him a hug almost as soft as Papyrus' one from a minute earlier. "You made it! And you're wearing the coolest jacket ever!" That was their opinion, at least, before smelling it and stepping back to hold their nose. They gave him a sheepish smile.

"well i didn't want paps here to be sans a brother, now did i?" He said, and he heard Papyrus groan loudly beside him. "but, uh, how's your head?"

Frisk raised a hand to the closed wound and took a breath, but then their eyes lit up and they blurted instead, "Did you come through the grey door in your room like that Flowey said?"

"which flowey? i don't see him with you."

"OH! THAT'S THE FLOWEY I SAW BEFORE! AND HE WAS WITH ANOTHER FRISK!" Papyrus piped up with pride, and immediately he became the kid's primary center of attention. "DID YOU MEET HIM TOO, FRISK? HE SEEMED VERY NICE!"

"Yeah but he ditched me," Frisk admitted, scratching her bloody head. "When did you see him?"

Sans cleared his throat, just a tiniest bit anxious. "kid?"

"Uh?"

"i asked how's your head?"

"Oh!" They scratched harder at the caked on blood as though it was just a bad case of dandruff, making a disgusted face when some of it got off on their nails. "I'm fine! Leo healed me already. I'm hoping that he'll be back with Alphys soon..."

"even so don't pick at it like that, eww," Sans said, grinning big at them.

They laughed, embarrassed, and at last Sans was able to go back to feeling like himself. He was back on the surface, the sun shining down low in the sky, and fresh air breezing through that was nowhere near as harsh as that other Snowdin's.

However, there was still a lot to do, as evidenced by how the ground between him and Frisk and Papyrus suddenly burst open and a little flower popped up from it, his body shaking with undisguised fear.

"You two! You've got to stop him! He's going to kill Anna!" The other world's Flowey yelled.

Woozy and no longer up to speed, Sans blinked. Frisk frowned, squinting in just as much confusion. "Who's Anna?"

Flowey gulped, blanching, and quickly stammered, "-Frisk, I mean Frisk, he's going to kill Frisk."

"But I'm right here?" Frisk said, pointing to herself.

"Not you!" The plant shivered indignantly, before turning to Sans instead. "You can stop him, right? I'm very very very sorry about before if you can save the human for me!"

Frowning, Sans nudged the thorny stalk with his foot. "you're talking about the other Sans, right? Why don't you do it?"

"OH NO! WHY IS POINTY SANS TRYING TO KILL FRISK?"

Perhaps Flowey expected him to answer Papyrus first, but Sans kept his gaze firmly on the trembling flower. The expression on its face shifted, becoming increasingly indignant as he sputtered for a reply to the question. Finally, and bowing his head in shame, he said, "-I'm afraid. Sans is scary."

So Sans sighed, "wish i could help, but, uh, i was just planning to take a nap right about now." If he fired at himself, could he even see straight enough to aim? Evidently everything that he had was taken up from defeating Asgore in battle. "yep goodnight." He lay down in the middle of the sidewalk, to more yelling from his brother.

"SANS AT LEAST GO INSIDE!" He puffed out his chest, then, turning to the little thing in need before him. "DON'T BE AFRAID, OTHER FLOWEY! THE GREAT PAPYRUS WILL TAKE CARE OF IT FOR YOU!"

like hell you will, Sans thought as he pretended to sleep.

Flowey's continued hemming and hawing, uttering a plain "U-h-uum-" at the offer, was cut off by a thundering crash next to them all. "AAAH!" Still squealing, Flowey dug back under the earth before the debris had even begun raining down on the grass. Frisk, in the meantime, dived down to the sidewalk covering their head, while Papyrus did the same. Sans cracked open an eye.

There was a hole in the building across the street. From its trajectory, a small body crashed into a building and knocked loose bricks and chips of brick alike, falling along with them into the grass. They hit their feet and their knees buckled, but they stood a second later.

Torn and stretched sweater and hair that really needed washing. Now the Frisk of that darker world could add bruises and scratched up pants to the list, the child rubbing their head with gritted teeth. To have survived a collision like that, they must be made of iron. Or in the middle of a monster battle.

Sans stood quickly, and so did his own Frisk. His kid, in fact, let out an astonished gasp before ducking behind him. "It's that other-!"

His Frisk clasped their hands over their mouth. The messy Frisk's eyes shot in their direction and widened, their back stiffening at the sight of them all.

But even surprised, their mouth was in the grimmest line and their eyes carried the sharpest glare. They began to brush dust off themselves as if being tossed through a building was the most natural way to make an entrance in the world, keeping their glare steady. At first Sans wasn't sure what he did to deserve that glare, until he realized that her eyes weren't looking at him, but rather his kid, who was currently clinging to the back of his jacket and peeking over at the other Frisk.

"-Oh fuck you!" The other Frisk spat at them at last, before turning back in the direction of the hole they just made with their body.

Following their gaze, he saw finally what everyone else had been talking about. Himself, with a mouth full of fangs- one of them glinting gold- and a fluffy blue coat that looked like something with the kind of zipper that he was too lazy to figure out. The so-called pointy Sans.

He didn't mind his Frisk being in hiding; in fact, he was wondering if he could inconspicuously stuff Papyrus behind him too.

The other Sans took one looked at the scene he had caused and began to laugh, a hysterically charged sound very unlike his own. "welp, what do you know. its your blue sans. i guess that works out well for you, huh?"

His Frisk, rather the one holding onto their burnt frying pan, only turned their glare his way.

Beginning to sweat, the bizarre new Sans croaked, "well if he's already here you can just leave me alone then."

And Frisk said, taking out what looked like jerky and gnawing at it, "No."

Sans watched the expression freeze on his other self's face, and then warp into something terrifying, his sockets empty. "oh." Without waiting for anyone or anything, Frisk swallowed their snack and ran at their opponent. He disappeared from right in front of her, but reappeared in the air a second later behind her. "fine, then, that's fine for me. I'll do this the hard way you little shit."

He surged with magic once he landed, and right before Frisk turned around two blaster cannons solidified and fired. Sans, and perhaps only Sans, could hear the grumble coming from his other self. "hell, doing it there would be ten times harder anyway." The kid had the sense to duck from his attack, but after the next moment passed the other Sans grabbed their SOUL and tossed them away down the street. Scarcely could Sans' own Frisk, who was no longer cowering, shout at his other self to stop had he vanished. Clearly he was not concerned about cheating in front of people anymore either.

In the distance they all could see the two figures, the orange and black figure of Frisk continually racing towards Sans only to be thwarted, as they moved slowly farther and farther away. Cannon blasts and rattling bones punctuated each turn, and Sans knew that the kid had to be due for getting hit soon.

"They're going towards the forest!" His Frisk said, clasping their hands on their locket. "Papyrus, you gotta tell Alphys and Leo that there's been a change in plans!"

"BUT THAT MEANS YOU WANT ME TO STAY HERE AND LET YOU GO ALONE?!" His brother shouted, before glancing in the direction of the huge indentation that Frisk made in the wall earlier. "ERRR, I MEAN, MAYBE WE SHOULD BOTH STAY?"

Frisk whimpered, and watched the huge flashes from the distance. "I don't understand, why is he attacking his own Frisk?"

Sans wiped his skull, also keeping a close eye on them. "i think i know what he's doing. it's really stupid, though."

"What is-ah!" The other Frisk disappeared from view, thrown through the window of Grillby's seven blocks away, and Sans' own Frisk yelped. "-That looks like it really hurt."

To be honest, he was not all that worried about them being hurt. He was more concerned with them being something worse. Because as he thought about it, if that Frisk was being attacked by their Sans after just arriving, that meant that his Frisk had probably not saved before the battle. Or, really, any time after this Frisk entered this world.

That Frisk hadn't SAVED this world, and no one had SAVED them.

So if his Frisk reset, even to stop their counterpart dying...

"hey kid," he spoke sharply, startling them. "no time to explain, but we're going to mt. ebott."

The child, to their credit, only nodded, but Papyrus began to immediately lecture how inappropriate it was that he wanted to go out on a date at a time like this, and especially with it being so far away, and a bunch of other things that made him really wish his little brother was not watching for this next part. He said his apologies and grabbed onto Frisk's hand. The magic he had left he summoned into his eye, into the CHEAT CODE.

"i can at least do this much," he murmured, and his eye flashed once before he and Frisk vanished.

The Frisk who had just been thrown into a bar window, on the other hand, was imagining how cool that must have looked to the patrons as she stepped out of the broken shards, hands and cheek bloody but little else injured by the monster-built pane of glass. Dizzy, she ignored their shocked stares and grabbed the nearest hamburger right out of a duck man's hands, growling, "Gimme or I'll dust you."

Although encountering no resistance, Frisk had to grip the table with both arms to keep from falling over. She chomped on the sandwich until the cuts and bruises disappeared, and looked quickly out the broken window.

He wasn't there.

-1 HP

A brief curse. Frisk wiped the remaining blood from her cheek and turned to the bartender, who was stopped mid-glass-wipe and staring just the same as everyone else. He was a monster with a chill orange flame instead of the uptight blue one, but she didn't have time to appreciate it. "You! Do you have a back door?"

Without a word alternate Grillby nodded, pointing to one beside the bar that Frisk wished she had noticed first. Nodding with a flushed face, the child snatched another burger from a fanged plant monster, "Gimme or I'll dust you!" and stuffed it in with the rest of her healing items.

She wrenched open the back door and stepped out onto the other street, and soon enough she found him standing on that new street as if simultaneously waiting for her and yet hoping she would not find him.

"Hey fucktard!" Frisk barked. If he didn't see her, he would now.

"shit are you still doing this?" Was what he said, and she ran at him across the pavement with a yell, pan ready to strike. Of course when she did strike, reaching him just as his eye flashed, it didn't even come close to hitting him. It wasn't just because he dodged, but it was a matter of her own aim as well. Her target was always the ground by his feet.

You try to intimidate Sans by faking an attack at him.

He flinches.

The sound of his breathless voice alerted her that he was far behind her again, and she spun in his direction. "yeah, yeah, always striking but not actually trying. what, are you afraid that you'll kill me or something? that's funny."

-1 HP

"why does that scare you so much?"

The flinch just before he vanished rattled her, for once. While her health still was dripping from the last time an attack connected, nonetheless she felt strong enough to stop for a moment. Stop and pick an action she'd not picked before.

You try to reason with Sans.

"Look, Sans, I know how you feel, trust me-"

But she felt instantly, with a sinking heart, that it was a mistake. Something in Sans' smile twitched horribly, he made a wheezy breath, and he grabbed Frisk tight by the SOUL. Instead of throwing her away, though, this time he dragged her closer to him, her shoes scratching the road. She struggled and kicked in his grip, and with his eyes burning into hers Sans growled, "no. you have no idea how i feel."

He threw her down in front of his feet and she jumped right back up, evading a circle of bones that would have surely jabbed where her stomach was a second before- with her weapon, Frisk snapped them in half for good measure. "you're the one that can reset. you're the one who can go back if things don't go your way."

-1 HP

His voice was full of tremors. "Sans-" Frisk darted to him and he jumped backwards from her grasp, a good several feet, like some kind of Chinese acrobat.

"you die to me? you can reset. you die to papyrus? you can reset. break a puzzle on accident? you can reset. waste some food? you can reset," he said, punctuating each sentence with another blaster at another angle, and Frisk had to fight not to get hit by a single one. "you reset, and you keep a goddamn tally each time, and one day you won't even have enough space for them all."

With no words to say to such a proclamation, Frisk just stood there and fished for the hamburger from earlier. How many tallies did she have? She used to know the number right off the top of her head.

And Sans, lifting Frisk's SOUL up along with a cage of bones over her head, just chuckled humorlessly. "so, in the end... you think that this route is too hard? you can reset... all the way back to the beginning, right? you can take the easier path, the path that probably hasn't occurred to you yet." His smile dipped. "... don't know what's worse. that i wouldn't be able to stop you from doing it, or that sometimes i want you to." The cage of bones began descending over Frisk. "i'unno, for some ungodly reason i just prefer that scenario more."

-1 HP

Ripping the hamburger up into her mouth, kicking her way back down to the ground before the cage of bones could smack her in the head, Frisk snapped "What the hell are you babbling about?"

"you can do that!" Sans snapped with a choking gasp of air, tossing her away from him. "ah fuck it, nevermind. you can't reset now, so why don't you just give up on me already?"

Once her SOUL was out of his hold Frisk ran at him again with a growl, and incidentally ran into the blast of a trio of skull-shaped cannons.

Mt. Ebott was chilly today, or at least it was because of a furious wind that was blowing. Losing her grip on Sans, Frisk wobbled and fell on her knees while the disorientation of the shortcut took effect.

Sans offered his hand, and it was with some effort on the part of her legs that she stood up. "Woah, you went really far. I didn't think you could."

"yeah, well, it's not fun," he wheezed; the noise made Frisk glance at him in a sudden anxiety- shamefully, it was not because she was worried for his health, but more because she had heard his look-alike make similar noises over the last week or so. "please tell me that the SAVE point is close."

They stood on the very same ledge that Frisk had walked on as she stepped back onto freedom with her friends. "It should be just inside. I'll be right back!"

At that Sans hesitated, as if he was about to say that he wanted to go back in with her. Typical Sans, though, eventually he ended up lying on the ground instead, smile weak and closing his eyes. "ughhhhh okay." Frisk hoped he could recover enough for the return trip. She patted him gently on the head before running into the cave alone.

The soonest point where she could SAVE really wasn't that far. She walked through the entrance into the cave where the barrier used to be, giving an involuntary shudder while she did as though there was still something magical there to forbid her passing by.

From there, through the black cave, she walked until she found herself going through another entrance into a black hallway. It was right in this spot where she had once stood trying to get her willpower up for her upcoming fight with Asgore.

This spot was one filled with a lot of painful memories. There was a SAVE point there, yes, but Frisk kept on walking from that spot in spite of herself.

She walked until there were no more black hallways, the black hallways only reminding her of the same things that she saw in her dreams every night. She wanted a change of scenery, desperately so. A change of scenery and a SAVE point wasn't that far away. It wouldn't make that much of a difference where she did it; this castle was riddled with them.

Farther still. She walked over a wilting golden flowerbed where it was possible to see the sun again, to hear the singing of the birds that flocked to the mountain in droves. Even beyond that throne room she walked, on and away from the same old scenery.

If she had the time, Frisk suddenly felt as if she could walk forever until she was back at the Ruins door.

But she didn't. It was important she SAVE soon, she could guess from Sans' own urgency- even if she wasn't doing it as soon as he probably wanted. Oops.

She eventually came to a stop, though, in the grand and brightly colored hall, lit with the same twilight that it was lit by the first time she walked into it.

The Last Corridor. There weren't any nightmares surrounding this room. Only fond memories of having an inexplicable, if tense, meeting with Sans, one that they never actually discussed afterwards. She always thought it was a beautiful room, colored in alternating orange tiles and decorated with gold pillars, big butter-colored windows, and flower patterns etched on the ceiling. On her first entrance the scale of all of it intimidated her, but that wasn't true anymore.

Frisk walked through it with a hand out to touch each pillar, and she wondered what this room was like in Red Sans' world. Would it be anywhere near as pretty? Was he going to say the same kinds of things to Frisk as her Sans said to her? She doubted that.

The SAVE location waited at the very end of the hall. There used to be a chest in this spot, as well, but someone had removed it.

Frisk stood where she remembered to stand and reached out, clenching her hands tightly together. It wasn't hard to muster her determination, drawing on everything that had happened to her in this room alone. This time, she would use that determination to SAVE while someone else was fighting outside.

Well, she would, but nothing happened.

The tranquility of this hall and the sun outside it washes over you.

But that was it. Frisk blinked. "Huh...?"

She tried again, and then again, to SAVE, putting herself through the same thoughts as she always did before. "Uhh?" It didn't do anything. She was just a kid squeezing her eyes shut repeatedly. "W-why-"

Even though Frisk longed to hold the world she stood in within her hands again...

"Karma's not very nice, isn't it?"

That voice was all too familiar, and she screamed and turned around.

It wasn't Asriel she was looking at.

It was Flowey, curled on one of the corridor pillars.

Her Flowey. She saw no fear in his face, only cruel amusement, while he took her for in the first time since she had faced him in the barrier room. "Hey!" He said, laughing at her horror, "It's me, remember? Flowey! I bet you were expecting someone else, weren't you?"

Trembling, Frisk held the locket in her hands. "W-w-w-what did you do? Why can't I SAVE anymore?"

He tossed his head like a shrug. "Oh, you got me! I didn't do a thing, hehe!" His smile curled up on his little buttercup face, his eyes sinking back. "I just know that if you can't do it anymore... then there must be someone else out there like you. Someone equally as powerful... and equally as determined."

The other Frisk came to mind. "O-oh..."

"It's a shame, isn't it?" The flower said, tendrils lacing across the floor of the corridor in a boxy pattern, his stalk growing to extend him out to where the child was. "Having the powers of a god isn't a first-come, first-serve deal after all. And losing that power, having no safety net... not for you or anyone you love..." Flowey stuck out his tongue in a big silly grin. "Now you're just like me! Hehe!"

The locket grew warm with her pulse, the child unable to move or speak as vines grew and snaked about in the space around her. The maniacal flower continued. "Now you're just like me... waiting for them to die or get the heck out of here!" His smile turned into a skull before her eyes and Frisk squeaked, taking a step back. "...So, who is it?"

"U-uh..."

Flowey retracted, laughing. "Aww, you don't know, do you? Golly, that's alright! And hey, if you're feeling upset, I know one way that you can have enough determination to SAVE everyone again."

If she couldn't save, she couldn't reset either. If she couldn't do either of those things, then that meant she couldn't control for things going wrong with Red Sans and Red Frisk, or for anything else for that matter. Struck with fear, she looked to Flowey in frozen expectation, waiting for him to give his solution as if it may somehow be worth it.

He came close to her, eyes sunken holes and mouth jagged and sharp. Frisk could feel prehensile vines picking at the sleeves of her sweater, rising behind her slowly, and he said. "I could take y o u r  S O U L."

A vine grabbed her arm. Chills ran down Frisk's spine and she screamed, louder than she might have ever screamed before. Before she knew it, she had equipped her dull knife and slashed it down at the offending vine. It dug deep into the plant flesh, and Flowey retracted all overgrowth with a loud hiss.

Frisk didn't spare him another look, the soles of her shoes pounding over the tiles of the hall.

"Come on!" Flowey cackled behind her, "I was just kidding!"

Tears streaming, heart sinking into her gut, Frisk wouldn't stop running until she found Sans again. The flower's resounding laughter echoed in her ears the whole way.

But Flowey himself didn't follow her. His smile dropped off and he merely slunk away through the darkness, deeper into the abandoned castle.

After what felt like ages and ages of fighting, the next thing that Sans threw Frisk into was a cluster of trees just outside of New New Home. And bless their rude little heart, that goddamn kid got caught in the branches. He couldn't help snickering while they fought to get down, only succeeding in getting more entangled, like a mindless animal in a trap. "Shit! Shit! Fuck! Ow! Fuck!" An animal with a funny vocabulary.

It was a good opportunity to catch his breath, to try and get it out of his ribs where it was stuck. Eventually, when he had recovered a fraction, he used the force of gravity to pull them down himself.

Their face turned bright red and they stood up, reaffixing their hold on that old frying pan they loved to swing so much. Still no giving up out of them, huh? It was his turn, so with no hesitation and a little difficulty breathing Sans summoned a fleet of bones and threw them their way. One in particular sailed right towards them; with a crack! that rang out in the forest they smashed it in half, only to get knocked clear off their feet and carried away by the next set. Winded and injured, they groaned and lay there for a moment.

Sans almost hoped that that would be it, and their next move would be to surrender. After all, by counting he was pretty sure they had run out of all their healing items and their HP was running lower and lower. but that was before they sat up, and he got a good look at the emptiness in their eyes. A single-minded vacancy, such as he had seen in every battle he was witness to. Most clearly, it had appeared on the day they defeated Papyrus- a battle that was only fifteen minutes long for both of them, but for the kid had taken unimaginable hours. The vacancy only filled when they smashed his little brother's legs.

ah, you're insane, pipsqueak. Maybe they always were, or maybe it was because a little human like them went through all kinds of crap that most monsters only go through gradually.

Which gave him a thought.

Frisk ran at him again and he vanished, reappearing behind them. It was clear by how they turned, shouting, and stumbled from their own movements. They were not any closer to giving up.

But they were also obviously getting tired, and he was getting tired, and he hadn't gotten anywhere with this yet. He had to do something.

He extended his hand to them, giving a wavering smile. "look at you, kid, you can't even stand up right. and you're just gonna get weaker from here."

"I'm not giving up just because you tell me to!" They growled. Fucking hell.

"i know you're not," Sans murmured. "but i'm getting really tired of all this. to be honest, outright fighting someone isn't really my style... and you know that, right?" They took a step back when he stepped forward, face twitching in utter confusion. "that's why you won't let up, right?"

"-Uh- right," they said.

Sans took a deep breath, sweat beading on his skull. "s-so... how about we just forget about all of this, huh? i- i give up. i'll come back with you, if th-that's what you really want. okay?"

The pan lowered little by little, and Frisk looked at him in shock. But, of course, they flinched as another point of HP was sapped out of them. Sans flinched too. It would be nice if he could use Cruel Irony on someone who deserved it, but that would defeat its function. Still, whether it was because of that or because of him talking, they didn't move away while he approached them. "thanks. it doesn't look like i'll be welcome back in town anyway, right?"

They were close, now, and Frisk let their pan dangle from their hand entirely. Sparing him in gesture. "... Yeah. You fit in better... back in our world."

Chuckling dryly, Sans rested a hand on their head. "...you have no idea how hard this is." All that planning, all that deception, all that work...

Frisk sighed, but they gave him a grudging smile; they were calm.

So was he.

It was strange how calm he could be on the outside in service of being cruel.

"get dunked."

And with that hand on their head he jerked them facedown into the dirt, taking a shortcut to a few feet away right as he did. Frisk let out a startled yelp when they hit the ground.

There were no bones, no cannons, no letters, no attacks. Just that.

Sans laughed and laughed, and some of it was because he thought it was actually funny. "oh my god you're so fucking easy hahahahAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

He watched Frisk stand up slowly, brush themself off, their little body shaking. His howls didn't stop until they turned back around, the sound finally fading into tiny chortles. But after they turned they showed him their expression, and what little of his mocking laughs were actually composed of mirth died too.

Staring at the ground the child's expression trembled, as did the rest of them, while they stood in place. Their eyes sure weren't empty anymore.

That was the expression of someone remembering the rest of the cruel things that he did to them, too. Each time he tricked them, each time he pranked them, each time at the beginning when he led them right into his brother's traps with a big grin on his face. Probably they were remembering the two tally marks as well, whatever the hell it was that they were caused by.

Maybe they were even remembering the terrible things that other monsters had done to them over the weeks, outside of him.

Their face screwed up while they played with the pan in their hands. Watching that his heart stuttered- not for the usual reason. It was the same kind of reason that made him scrape all the hot sauce off his burger when Frisk stole it from him once in what would become a routine; they had started gasping in pain at the spicey condiment, and then kept right on eating through their tears, ruining a perfectly good joke by causing that feeling in him. And it was the same kind of reason that was why he tried to heal them, even when they were the one who startled him and so it was technically their own fault. Those times too, his heart stuttered.

But in a second, as their eyes brimmed, Frisk's face twisted harder. It turned ugly, as they filled with a rage that canceled out all the sorrow.

Then Sans' heart stuttered for the usual reason. The reason it stuttered when Papyrus smacked him to the ground when he was in an especially bad mood, or when some other monster decided to be a hot-shot and take them on. His stuttering heart told him what he already knew when Frisk ran at him screaming, swinging their pan at his face.

Which was, in his own fashion, You're kinda boned (heh.)

The pan connected and she didn't know what it connected with. The blood was rushing through her ears, she couldn't breathe, she couldn't see or hear anything even with her eyes and ears open. Only seeing red, Frisk kept screaming and screaming and screaming and slamming her pan into whatever it was. She wanted it to snap, wanted it to crumble away before her rage. She wanted everything to disappear, she wanted everyone to suffer, she wanted to just thrash and cry and bite until she got her way.

She never, ever, ever ever got to have her way. She wished that everyone else was dead.

You're a lunatic.

But not even her intrusive thoughts could stop her now. Each hit resounded in her hands and in her ears, and even in the ground under her feet, until the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet tingled. Until she couldn't breathe.

Until, like every other time she saw red, she slumped down exhausted and struggling to catch her breath, her tear-stained face flushed and hot. By then, she realized that she couldn't see Sans anymore.

-1 HP

The irony has worn off.

The drain that she'd felt for almost the whole battle stopped, and Frisk almost stopped breathing with it. She looked left and right, tried to take step, tried to speak, and couldn't do any of those things. Searching the grass for dust, she found nothing, and yet her first thought was that the wind must have blown it away. She had actually tried to hit him.

She actually tried to...

But even as the child was agonizing like this, dropping the pan and covering her mouth with her hands, she heard him. Her bloodshot eyes opened and she whirled around, this time falling on her butt.

He was just fine, albeit much sweatier. "i have so much more respect for you now."

The child stared, unblinking.

He continued, huffing, grinning, "...uh, and boy, uh, i'd hate to be that tree right now."

A tree... that was what she'd been hitting all that time? Sure enough, she'd really scratched and indented the bark over the course of her tantrum. Unable to summon her voice, Frisk made a question with her paling face while she gulped for air, and Sans shrugged.

"what? you thought i was just gonna stand and take it?" He closed his eyes, smirking. "i'm too chicken, you know that already. heheh, but not you, it looks li- ahfuck-" He hadn't even finished talking when Frisk barreled into him, tripping over her shoes while running over to the sweaty skeleton and almost knocking them both over. "fuck-fuck what are you doing?"

He wobbled back a step, but it just brought Frisk along with him. She rolled with it, digging her arms under his coat and around his waist while she pressed her face into his shirt. (It was quickly creeping her out that she could feel his ribs jabbing her as she did this.)

"uhhh get off we're not done-" she could hear him wheezing, could feel his body shuddering with each one. "we're uh we're still fighting-"

"Don't want you to die," the girl whimpered into his shirt.

Sans stopped moving, inhaling sharply and painfully. "ah, twerp... c'mon, don't take a swing at me and then take it back."

Frisk said something unintelligible, muffled by her own closed throat and Sans' shirt. They both stood still for a second, the only noise being Sans' raspy breathing. He rested a hand on her head; from habit she tensed up, tightening her grip, but he didn't end up throwing her off balance this time. When he felt her flinch, he stuck both hands deep in his pockets.

When next Sans spoke, his speech cracked. "h-h-hey... if you can't even kill me with a straight face how are you going to get home?" He wheezed. "don't you... don't you know what you'll have to do at the end?"

When she didn't respond, he rasped, "you're not gonna make it."

Frisk finally lifted her head; Sans' eyesockets were firmly empty, without even a white pair of pupils. The only thing on his face was a sad, pointy smile. "you're not gonna make it," he repeated, breathing faster. "you're not... gonna... you can't do it. you can't do it..."

Her lips parted, but she pressed them together. "Yes I can," she said.

His eyes flickered back to life and stared at her.

"I can do anything." Frisk said. "And you know that already too."

One wheeze turned into a chuckle, which grew. And Frisk finally took a step back when Sans let out a more genuine laugh. It didn't last very long, but whatever had started looked like it stopped with that laugh. When he talked again his voice was merely hoarse. "you say that like you believe it."

Frisk put the pan away, grinning. "I do. I beat you, didn't I?"

The pupils in his eyes shrunk, ten times more expressive than a human's pupils could be. She was always so jealous. "oh. we're not fighting anymore are we?" He gasped. "ohshit you won didn't you-"

"Yeah I did fartface," Frisk said, sticking her tongue out at him. "You better be prepared to pay my hospital bills back home."

"ha. ha. ha. fuck." Sans put a hand to his skull, sucking air, and even looked like he was going to nibble the ends of his claws- although how, she didn't know. "i don't want to go back, i don't wanna-"

Frisk rubbed the dirt off her cheeks and grimaced. "We're going back. The Sans you gave me instead sucks balls."

And in spite of himself he was laughing again at that, but he was also freaking out at everything else. "i fucking hate this why're you making me do this-"

"Because you beat the shit out of me!"

"you tried to kill me!"

"Because you pushed me down!"

And it was an argument that she was carrying on deliberately, even if she believed it was an argument that she could win, In truth, above all else Frisk had never felt more relieved in her life that this was a battle she won. And only with an HP of 3 left at that. The overworked and underpaid Temmie Armor was little by little restoring it to her previous 20, but the dried blood was still all over her and her clothes were torn to all hell. But she won. She wasn't even mad anymore.

She might have been stalling with this argument, however, because deep down she believed that maybe, just maybe, she wouldn't do as well getting out of this world.

And that wasn't because she would be fighting anyone.

In the end, though, her other self and Blue Sans arrived on their increased shouting match too quickly.

Among other pointier people.

Next Chapter: It's Not That Kind of Story

Chapter Text

Frisk and Sans found Frisk and Sans fighting by the edge of the city. However, it wasn't the kind of fighting that they were expecting to see.

Frisk walked in on Red Frisk and Red Sans arguing instead, weapons put away and no magic attacks flying through the immediate vicinity. And as soon as they spotted her, it was over with. Which was a good thing, since her Sans had collapsed in the middle of the street some while back. After returning from Mt. Ebott, all they had to do was follow the line of destruction to where the forest began, and as Sans said he wasn't in a very followy mood. He told her he would catch up.

Well, everything was unfolding directly in his line of vision so maybe it would work out okay that way.

There was some kind of terror of both Reds' faces when she called out to them; immediately putting their argument to an end, Red Sans faced the child and Red Frisk made a dodge hiding behind him.

Taking a second to catch her breath, she took them both in. "Did you guys stop... fighting already...?"

"yeah!" Said Red Sans immediately, winking at her. "i won."

"No you didn't," Red Frisk hissed venomously from behind him, and he sharply exhaled. The fake cheery look on his face dropped.

Frisk scratched at the flakes of blood in her hair and tried to think of a place to go to from there. It did look like someone had won, at any rate. "Well what happens now? Are you going to try to throw Sans back wherever you came from?"

"... nah." And he put his hands in his pockets, not quite looking at the child. "'m not gonna do that. ...haha, the twerp over here won't let me," and he started to gesture towards Red Frisk, or rather where he thought that they were, before realizing that they weren't there. "the hell? twerp?"

He sidestepped, and the other kid came into view again before ducking again to his back. "No."

"ya gotta be kidding me."

While Red Sans tried to shake them off Frisk tapped her fingers together, a faint smile playing on her lips, and she began walking towards them. "Hi!" We haven't properly met. Except for when you bashed me and my friend in the face with a frying pan. Smiling more brightly, she held out her hand.

Staring with squinted eyes the other Frisk hid away from her hand. Frisk herself was starting to get worried that she was going to have to chase this other kid all the way around her skeleton friend. That is, until Red Sans gave a cruel chuckle and vanished from where he was standing entirely, leaving the two children relatively alone with each other.

Red Frisk - LV 1, HP 20, ATK 20 DF 20

You, from a worse world. Their sweater reminds you a little bit of a pumpkin.

And for a second time she extended a hand to Red Frisk, waiting patiently for reciprocation. Standing exposed, Red Frisk stood in place trembling, their head lowered so that Frisk couldn't even see their eyes. Their arms they held awkwardly, stiffly, at their sides, fingers curling with the tension. It was if they were afraid that she was going to bite. Frisk wondered if she should say something...

But finally Red Frisk said, shaking and speaking quickly, "I-I'msorryaboutyourhead."

Feeling her cranium, Frisk murmured, "Well it healed already. So..."

"-I don't-" spoke the other, cutting her off. They made a noise like they had just swallowed something bad, and then lifted their eyes to meet hers. Those eyes had so much more distrust, a gaze that was so much more unpleasant. But at that moment, too, they looked like her own. "I don't make friends with handshakes."

Frisk dropped her hand. "Oh! ...Uh, what do you make friends with, then?"

"... ..."

Red Frisk tries to think of an answer, before realizing that they have no friends.

Feeling uncomfortable, Frisk did what came naturally to her and winked at Red Frisk. "Well, either way, I just wanted to tell you that you look really cute!"

You flirt with... yourself?-?

At that, Red Frisk's jaw dropped. This was of course an unusual case, because the child looked like she had been dragged across a couple hundred gravel driveways before talking to her, so "cute" definitely did not mean "clean" or "neat." But Red Frisk was still Frisk, after all. And right now they were sputtering, before putting their face in their hands. "-That was dumb," they finally choked out.

"You're dumb," Frisk said back, sticking out her tongue.

With flushed cheeks, Red Frisk picked at a twig that had become entangled in the shoulder of their sweater, saying quietly, "Well fuck you, then."

It shocked her, just like it shocked her back when she was fighting, and Frisk put a hand to her mouth to smother her little gasp. She knew by now that it was a word that only adults were allowed to say, so for this Frisk, someone who was as young and small as she herself was, to say it as though it were only natural, as though she wouldn't get in trouble...

Without really meaning to, Frisk began to laugh.

Red Frisk jerked up in alarm and their face turned even redder, quickly hiding their face again. "Stop!"

Feeling a hint of doubt, Frisk stifled her giggles and smiled at her, showing teeth. "What?"

"Th-that-that's my laugh!" They sputtered, hands curling into fists.

After a beat, though, that only made Frisk laugh harder. "That's so funny!"

The other child watched them, flustered and fighting embarrassment, until she said that- their eyes widened when she said that. Frisk was almost afraid it was going to end in her being hit again. But then Red Frisk, rubbing their nose and eyes quickly, sniffled and grinned.

It was a crooked grin. It didn't look like something they did normally.

She was about to comment on that too, but they two of them were interrupted a moment later by Red Sans reappearing closer in proximity to the two Frisks. His eyes were small and he was sweating, panicked. "you guys are making me nauseous and all, but please hide me."

"Why-" Red Frisk began, only for a loud screeching to bring the children up to speed immediately. Frisk would have her chance to "talk to herself" properly later, but at that moment there was someone else who had business with the Reds. Business that was evidently far more urgent, or at least far more loud.

"SANS!" Said the voice, "DON'T YOU THINK THAT YOU CAN HIDE FROM ME! I SEE YOU!"

A Papyrus wearing black, and with really spiky fangs, was marching up to them with a disgusted grimace on his skull- the kind of expression that she had never seen on her Papyrus' face, not even once. At the sight of him Red Sans was a sweaty wheezy mess, his red eye flaring, and he was trying ineffectually to hide between both of the children. But this Papyrus just reached over them once he got close enough, letting out a loud snarl as he pulled Red Sans close by the lapels of his coat. Red Sans had started to whimper.

"Red Papyrus, I presume?" Frisk said. Red Frisk glared at her.

Red Papyrus' eyebrow rose and he squinted the other eyesocket at the new child. "WHAT?"

"more like dead papyrus amiri-" Red Sans began, and then shrieked when his enraged brother began shaking him back and forth, "i'msorryi'msorryi'msorryi'msorry-"

Honestly, Frisk wouldn't be surprised if she saw smoke or flames pouring out of Red Papyrus' skull, to hear him going on at Red Sans- she had to cover her ears, it was so loud. "TO HAVE THE GALL TO MAKE A HORRIBLE PUN WHEN YOU KNOW I AM ALREADY GOING TO KILL YOU! WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING!? YOU REPROBATE GOOD-FOR-NOTHING SACK OF SHIT!"

"-i'msorryi'msorryi'msorry-"

"DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU'VE DONE!? WHAT HAPPENED BECAUSE OF YOU!? AND YOU DIDN'T ANSWER EVEN A SINGLE ONE OF MY PHONE CALLS?! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU!?" Red Papyrus continued to screech, shaking Red Sans until he was starting to look dizzy.

"-sorrysorrysorrysorry-"

"WERE YOU SERIOUSLY GOING TO JUST RUN AWAY FROM HOME AND THINK THERE WERE NOT GOING TO BE ANY CONSEQUENCES FOR IT!? DO YOU THINK JUST BECAUSE WE ARE BOTH IN PUBLIC I'LL HESITATE TO TEACH YOU A LESSON YOU VERY OBVIOUSLY DESERVE!?"

"-sorryi'msorryi'msaaaaaaugh-"

"LOOK AT ME WHEN I'M LECTURING YOU!"

Releasing one hand momentarily, gripping his brother with the other, Red Papyrus smacked Red Sans' skull hard and Frisk let out a gasp, covering her mouth. And she might have intervened, but standing still and watching personal drama unfold was what she did best sometimes. Besides, that Papyrus looked like he wasn't going to be so friendly to her if she did interrupt.

It was Red Frisk who did something, in the end. They whipped out their pan and hit the tree with it, with a resounding crack. "No!"

Red Papyrus hesitated, looking up from his current target. "NYAH?" Going limp in his grasp, Red Sans let out a continuous sound that was halfway between a whine and a whimper, until his brother gave him another hard shake. Then he just hung there, shaking like he had just gotten off of a ride in a state fair. Red Papyrus ignored it. "OH, I DIDN'T SEE YOU THERE, HUMAN."

Red Frisk's eyes shot from their Sans to their Papyrus, expression set. "Don't do that."

Bewildered, Red Papyrus only sputtered, "WHAT?"

"Don't hit him," they said.

"...THIS IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS, HUMAN."

And, with another loud crack, she struck the tree- everyone flinched, that time. "You hit him and I hit you."

"..." Red Papyrus twitched, turning back to his brother- who was still as of yet shaking and gasping and unaware of what his friend was even doing for him. He looked at Red Frisk, and Frisk could have sworn that she saw a hurt expression on his features, before it quickly passed and hardened. "... FINE. BUT HE REALLY REALLY DESERVES IT."

Red Frisk blinked, as if they had been expecting to get into a fight with Papyrus instead- maybe, judging by their apprehension, one fight of many others. But then they sighed. "Also, I'm sorry I got you fired."

The effect that had was extraordinary. Contrary to what Frisk was expecting, Red Papyrus dropped Sans and his eye-sockets filled up, appearing to be on the verge of tears as he stared off into a memory. Sleepily, just coming back to reality on the ground, Red Sans murmured, "y... you got fired, boss?"

Struggling for dear life not to actually cry, Red Papyrus didn't have a chance to answer anyway.

"We both were."

It was Undyne who said that, dragging with her an as of yet sleepy Sans by the hood of his coat. But it wasn't an Undyne that Frisk was familiar with. No, for one thing she had too little clothing on, exposing her arms and midriff. Her scales were a paler and greyer color; the red of her hair, lips, gloves and boots was the red of blood, striking a chill in the child's heart.

But she didn't seem interested in attacking. The aptly named Red Undyne deposited Sans on the grass and said, "The underground you left is in chaos, Sans." She nudged the normal Sans with her boot, and he didn't seem to feel like responding except to wave over at Frisk. "Thanks to this guy?"

Red Sans blinked slowly at Sans. "eh?"

"He defeated King Asgore in battle," she said, and both Red Frisk's and Red Sans' eyes opened wide. "Snowdin's in an uproar... by now, the news probably has reached Waterfall, Hotland, and New Home. We don't have a king anymore."

"asgore is... dead?" Red Sans pushed further, getting to his feet.

Undyne shook her head. "No. No one knows where he is. He disappeared out of thin air."

Red Sans blinked again. And then his skull features became twisted with pure rage as he turned to Sans. "you didn't finish him off? YOU DIDN'T FINISH HIM OFF?!"

"eyyyy, LV 1 all the way," said Sans with a lazy smile.

That seemed to enrage Red Sans further. "You fucking piece of shit you had one job you had one fucking-"

He yelped as Red Papyrus pulled him away by the back of his coat, albeit he continued to shout at Sans until his brother overtook his voice with his own, "I'VE HAD ENOUGH OF LISTENING TO YOU FOR ONE EVENING, SANS. DO ME A FAVOR AND SHUT UP BEFORE YOU EMBARRASS ME FURTHER."

Although silenced, Frisk could see everything in the shine of that red eye of his, the small skeleton breathing hard through his teeth in a way different from his wheezes. When Red Papyrus put him down, he continued to glare with it.

She didn't understand. Mercy was a good thing. Why was he so mad?

Ignoring him for the moment; beside her, Red Frisk looked like they were about to fight again, their weapon out. Frisk put a hand on their shoulder, and was immeasurably happy when the other child didn't pull away from her. She just spoke to Red Undyne, "What are you doing here? Just to tell us that?"

The fish woman sneered, giving a little cackle of a laugh. "Don't worry, kid. I'm not interested in killing you anymore. I'm no longer part of Asgore's Royal Guard, so why should I do anything to service that bastard?"

Red Frisk began to mumble, "Or maybe it's that you're scared of losing to a k-" but Frisk covered their mouth before the entire insult could come out. Red Undyne didn't notice; she was already taking in the view of this undoubtedly more pleasant world, grinning with razor-sharp teeth.

"So this is the surface, huh?" She said, licking her fangs. "I didn't think it'd be this hot."

"It's summer," Frisk offered, smiling at her.

Scratching her nearly bald head, Red Undyne turned to look back at the peaceful, slightly torn up streets of New New Home. "...Well, it's not unbearable, anyway. I think I'll take a look around this place. I'm interested to see what the strength of these monsters is..."

"PLEASE DO NOT HURT ANYONE," said Red Papyrus.

"I wooooon't geeze!" Summoning a red spear into her hands, she held it behind her head with her arms looped loosely around the painful looking magic. "Don't talk to your former superior that way."

Red Papyrus folded his arms, looking away uncomfortably. "I'M JUST SAYING, YOU HAVE A HABIT OF DOING THAT."

"See you later, loser," the monster said as she strolled off.

Red Sans still looked angry from where he was standing. Frisk ultimately was more worried about hers, of course, as she offered him a hand to stand up with. He took it with a weak smile; she had a hard time believing this guy could defeat anybody in battle, much less Red Asgore.

Red Frisk approached her own Sans in the meantime, and she softly said behind Frisk's back, "You should tell me a joke."

He sputtered, "what, right now?"

"Yeah."

"forget it kid," he was saying, "i'm not some kind of coin-operated-"

"Oh!" Frisk knew she had to turn around for this. Red Frisk dug into her pocket and pulled out 1G; smiling huge, she chucked it into Sans' eyesocket, exclaiming, "One joke, please!"

Red Sans' eye twitched and both sockets went black. "y-you little shit," he said.

Frisk put her hand up to hide her smile.

And while Red Sans told a disgusting joke about "baby dip," Frisk touched her fingers together, surveying the three Red people. She said to Sans, who looked a little dazed himself, "These guys caused a lot of trouble, huh? I bet that Toriel will help sort it out, if we ask her."

Scratching his head, Sans followed her gaze. "That's a lot to put on her plate, kiddo."

"Toriel's great with plates!"

"i have no problem with this plan," piped up Red Sans, who was currently leaning forward trying to extract the coin from the inside of his skull.

Frisk gestured to him, and Sans looked a little less cheerful. "should we really be bringing them to her? can't we just chuck them back through the machine's door or..." But something happened as he spoke, and it went against Frisk's expectations to. He exchanged a look with Red Frisk, who was no longer smiling or frowning. Red Frisk glanced away, and Sans closed his eyesockets. "...well, i guess a stop at her house wouldn't hurt. don't expect me to take part in the 'sorting things out' process."

"WHO'S TORIEL?" Red Papyrus hissed in what could only be described as a screaming stage whisper.

"i'll tell you on the way, boss," Red Sans said- he finally, finally took his hand out of his eye with the 1G tightly pinched between his fingers.

Frisk, ecstatic, volunteered to show them all the way.

Before they went, though, Red Frisk lagged behind; a small flower popped out of the dirt by their feet, and they bent to speak to it with an anxious expression.

Frisk didn't hear their conversation, but it looked like it went well. The flower came out of the dirt and climbed up the child before coming to rest on their shoulder, and Red Frisk ran to catch up with them all.

As expected, the battle between himself and Frisk attracted a lot of attention, and the city was in a state of confusion. Not a whole lot of people knew what was going on; the most consistent story was that Frisk had snapped and was trying to kill Sans, with Sans in his own defense tearing up the neighborhoods and local eatery establishments. But of course, not everyone here believed that such a nice child like Frisk would be capable of such violence.

Well, Jerry thought that they were. But Jerry was a douche even in Sans' own world, just a douche in goth makeup.

Answering questions after a crime wasn't Sans' favorite thing to do. Like always, he lagged behind his brother and let him take care of all of it, explaining a very rudimentary understanding of who they were in relation to these weaker monsters, and how Sans was a useless thug who would soon be going home with him. Every time Papyrus said something like that, Sans would get a tightening in his chest.

It didn't stop when they got to Toriel's house, either. If anything, the thought of having to explain everything to the lady made it ten times worse. He refused to go inside, and waited on the sidewalk while this world's Frisk knocked on the door, realized that Toriel had already left, and called her to say she was already home. He tried to duck discreetly behind Papyrus when she drew closer, and his blasted brother took a moment to whack him on the head, not interested in being his hiding place.

Thank God that before Toriel arrived, his other self had the foresight to clean off the blood that was still in that "Blue" Frisk's hair.

When she arrived, it was a blessing and a curse that there was nothing to be done for the state of his kid. They were the first thing that Toriel noticed, instead of the suspicious and guilty looking Sans who had been beating up kids all day.

But he tensed, all the same, when she ran to Frisk with that worried expression. He could see Frisk reaching for their weapon before they even did it, and he gave their SOUL a gentle tug as if to remind them of where they all were.

"Oh my heavens, what- who- where did-" Toriel tried to ask, racing as fast as she could in that robe. She came to stand close to the more beat-up of the Frisk's kneeling down at their level. The child began to shiver, sucking in a breath to restrain themselves and their face pale. "Are you alright, little one? What has happened?" She raised her hand, her aim to caress Frisk's face, but Frisk took a wary step back and glared like a particularly aggressive animal. "Oh!"

Bewildered, Toriel next looked to both Sanses, both Frisks, and a very obviously different Papyrus from the one she was used to. "I... I do not... I don't understand." She glanced first at the Sans in the blue coat, who started to sweat, and then to the one currently wearing his dark coat. "Sans?"

"what?" They both said.

"This is why the Red Sans and Blue Sans thing works!" The other Frisk yelped, cutting everyone else off. Maybe they had a point.

Toriel stood and she frowned deeply, looking at her child. "Frisk, would you mind explaining to me what's going on? And where were you? I was worried sick!"

Under her glare, Blue Frisk smiled sheepishly, anxiously, and played with their fingers. "I..." they looked to their Sans for support, but he just shrugged. Their smile became bigger, showing off teeth, and they finally settled on one reply. "I. I made some new friends."

Toriel didn't look convinced, but she sighed. "...Fine, fine. We can discuss this over something to eat. It's getting late, and I'm sure you must be starving." From how Sans saw it, they weren't the only one. At the mention of food, his Frisk's eyes widened considerably and they looked like they were going to start drooling at any minute. Noticing out of the corner of her eye, Toriel smiled gently. "And your friend, as well."

He wasn't just anxious for the moment that this Toriel turned murderous towards him, now- Sans also wondered just how terribly everything was soon going to go with his Frisk. Excitement to eat aside, they appeared nervous at just the sight of Toriel. They hadn't exactly had the best experience with boss monsters.

Uneasily, they followed her into the house, with Blue Frisk grabbing hold of their hand. Sans noticed that neither child pulled away.

It was alright as soon as the food hit the table, at least as far as Frisk was concerned. Toriel only had time to put a bowl of reheated soup on the table before the kid started to slurp it up, no utensils or anything, putting to shame the Blue Frisk who was just watching her eat.

Raising her head from the bowl, the messy child exclaimed, "It's fucking real!"

Sans was only willing to watch from the doorway- he still wanted a chance to make a quick getaway, and even Papyrus expressed no interest in entering a "civilian" home- had he already forgotten that he was fired? At Frisk's outburst he stifled a laugh. He couldn't help himself; little kids cursing still cracked him up, it was the whole reason he taught them all those nasty words in the first place.

Toriel, on the other hand, was not amused, particularly once she noticed the admiration in Blue Frisk's eyes. "Young one, do not use such language at the dinner table."

An evil grin made its way to Frisk's face, and Sans almost groaned. He knew what that expression meant. She took a deep breath, stood, and began, "Fuck, bastard, shit, whore, hell, damn, cunt, prick, ass, co-"

Their list cut off in a yelp, Toriel holding their hair in her hands. The no-nonsense look she had in her eyes made Sans' heart flutter. "Child, if you do not wish me to take away your supper then you will not say those words again."

Trembling, Frisk squeaked, "Yes ma'am." Released the next moment, and turning bright red with embarrassment, they ducked their head down into their bowl and continued slurping. Sans was again fighting chortles, putting a hand over his sharp grin. The rest of the room was silent.

Of course, Toriel pulled out a plate of chicken and then Frisk forgot herself in the food, forgoing the soup and instead ripping off a leg to gnaw on. So the moment passed. Toriel let out a breath and relaxed, as well.

"...Honestly," she said, looking to the other Sans that was munching slowly on a microwaved hot dog. "Where did this new Frisk even come from?"

So while Sans watched, the lazier other version of himself began to tell the whole story to her, just out of earshot. Frisk continued eating all that was put in front of them as if they had not eaten in months, and occasionally Blue Frisk would chime in to softly add something to the tale.

Occasionally, while listening to the story, Toriel would shoot the Sans in the doorway a dark look. Giving her a tremulous, anxious smile each time, he simply wished he could disappear into his coat. The glares were getting more intense the farther along the story got, and he was cursing Blue Frisk inside for apparently not censoring any of it. Sans let out a sigh, coming to the realization that he had been holding his breath in all this time.

That was how it tended to feel almost every time he exhaled, really. Was he always going to be this way? They return back to his version of the Underground would have more of the same. He turned around and looked out beyond the door frame, clouds passing by the house far above, far far above. An hour hadn't gone by that he wasn't pausing to look at it, but he hadn't seen enough of this endless sky. i don't want to go.

Another pent up sigh, and Sans leaned against the door frame back in the house, his eyes flickering out. Oh, well, these people could badmouth him all they wanted, he didn't need to ever talk to them again.

His Frisk was still ignoring it all, and the only words that they would say were "more" and "more please," once corrected. He smirked; at least they were having a good time. They hadn't even hit dessert yet; poor kid, at this rate they were going to get sick, and Toriel hadn't even presented the tiny cake she bought for dessert yet. It was just like all the times back in Snowdin when they greedily, hungrily ate as if starving to death.

Maybe, for a human, monster food didn't cut it sometimes. Maybe they should bring more human food back with them.

Sans was getting a bit hungry himself. He took out his bottle of mustard and squeezed it into his mouth, sloshing it around in his skull until it dissolved. Even the stinging from Papyrus' smacks were fading away into nothing. He didn't exactly relax, but he felt better.

Frisk shoved the last piece of store-bought cake in their mouth before slumping over on the table, defeated and groaning into their food coma. The story was finished by then, and Toriel smiled at the sight while Blue Frisk poked their counterpart's head.

"Goodness, you finished everything on your plate... even the vegetables." the boss monster mused; she tried to stroke the child's head as she did, but even with their head down Frisk scooted out of reach. It made Sans feel a twinge, if only because he was certain for a fact that their treatment of Toriel was entirely undeserved, but there wasn't much he could say when he was trying to be inconspicuous. "I think that my child could learn a lesson from that."

"Vegetables are good," moaned Frisk. "Meat is good. Cake is good."

Toriel beamed. "I am glad you liked it all."

"it looks like you have a bit of a stomachcake, though," mused the other Sans. Frisk let out a screaming groan. Sans scoffed where he stood; he would have made that joke too, but it was a little on the nose.

Blue Frisk, then, wiping their mouth of their own dinner, poked Frisk on the arm. "Does your stomach hurt too much? Do you wanna go out and play before it gets too dark?"

"Play?" Frisk rose their head to stare.

Hell, did this kid even know what playing was, anymore? The closest they came in Snowdin was Sans telling them the most disgusting and cruel jokes he could think of, and them laughing like an idiot at each one. Or maybe it counted when they beat the stuffing out of some monster until they were able to go on their way unharassed- that looked like fun, at least to him.

"Just so long as you stay in the backyard. I'd rather not search the whole neighborhood again," Toriel said. If it weren't for the fact that every time she looked at him she looked at him like he was scum, Sans might have offered to keep an eye on them both.

His other self just said, "have fun, kiddo."

So Frisk finally, and turning red again, said, "Uh-um-okay."

And Sans blinked.

Against all expectations to the contrary, that tough and filthy-mouthed kid ended up blushing so easily.

He had honestly been mentally preparing himself for someone more impressive or even more of a threat, remembering their conversation on the phone. But this pointier version of himself was honestly pretty transparent.

He'd fled outside as soon as the two Frisks did, and a few minutes later Sans saw him standing by the side of the house, watching the children playing.

Sans took out a jar of relish and began scooping some up in his fingers to eat, standing next to him so quietly as to not alert him yet. When he spoke, he saw his other self jump a mile, "how's it hanging?"

There wasn't a response initially except for wheezy breathing. It was laughable that he could be intimidating to himself, and Sans shut one eye while downing a little leftover ketchup from his hot dog lunch. "you sounded so much scarier on the phone."

His other self sunk into his fluffy coat, eyeing him with that exhausting looking red point of energy. Sans was halfway wondering when they were going to switch clothes, although even that blue winter jacket wasn't really his thing. Especially not in summer. As if reading his mind, the toothy other him murmured, "you can keep that. and i paid for this."

"'kay." He couldn't squeeze any more out of the bottle, so he put it away.

They both watched Frisk for a while- his and the other. They seemed to have no trouble keeping up with each other on games, quickly growing bored of tag at the same rate and progressing to pretend. The Frisk in an orange sweater pawed at the ground and began to talk at a surprising rate, glancing once or twice their way. His Frisk remained oblivious as they listened.

He finally heard, next to him. "so... uh. do you like... uh... earthbound?"

"i might have spent a few nights on it," he said back, smirking. It was a clever game. "would have thought it was a bit too soft for you."

"that game was cruel," said his other self, grinning with those sharp teeth. "i liked it."

"...yeah uh, not sure if we're still talking about the same game." Sans said.

The other exhaled, and began in a faintly tremulous voice, "...i didn't actually mean you any harm or anything like that, y'know? it was just..." He looked to the two Frisks. Sans' own was charging like a bull, and the Frisk in an orange sweater was using their overstretched sleeve like a matador cape. His other self shook his head. "it's that damn kid's fault, really."

"how so?"

He hesitated, as if unsure how to phrase, and then began again slowly. "i make... lots of promises, but i never seem to keep any of 'em. a long time ago, this friend of mine told me to promise her something. to, i guess to put it in her terms, 'bring the human home as soon as possible.' i," he chuckled, "didn't know at the time that she meant for me to kill 'em straight out, but that's neither here nor there really."

Sans thought back to his own conversation with that world's Toriel, and feeling a weight on his shoulders he repressed his shudder.

The other Sans continued his story, eye burning dully. "i wasn't going to keep that promise either, cuz i don't give two shits about some human. but... uh..." he scratched his skull. "this kid, it's hard not to give a shit about them after a while. i knew they would make it all the way to the end. and i knew what happened next," he took a deeper breath, "and then it gets hard to breathe, y'see. i wanted to leave for all these, i'm sure, obvious reasons, but leaving them alone with that would... only make me miserable wherever i was. i figured if it were someone else, someone stronger than i was...

"so, in summary, it's the damn kid's fault."

Watching that Frisk, clothes still banged up from their earlier battle with their friend, Sans snorted. "you care an awful lot for someone you attacked so viciously earlier."

"hah!" His other self grinned big at him. "you think ours is the kind of story that rewards you for being good in the end? ...it's not." And then he sighed, heavily. "and because you didn't fucking kill asgore, i'm back where i started."

"not completely. have a little faith in that kid. mine had impossible odds too." He shrugged. "even though i didn't end up trying to kill them in our corridor."

"no, i'm sure you wouldn't hurt your kid for anything," his other self grumbled bitterly.

But Sans thought, and he said, "no. i would kill them for something. it just hasn't happened yet." The Sans who preferred spiky black jackets was surprised, and he laughed. His Frisk was tired out of bull charging and had taken to whispering things into the other's ear. The two were glancing at them and giggling together, their laughter identical. Slowly, Sans said, "...kidding."

"whatever dude," his other self muttered, before turning his attention to the two Frisks. "okay what the hell is so funny!?"

"You!" Shouted his Frisk, although the other kept motioning for them not to do it. "Frisk said you look like a boo!"

"... what the hell is a boo!?"

"Oh my god," said his Frisk, putting their hands over their mouth. "Remember all the boo puns? 'Little Boo Peep,' 'Peekaboo'-"

"'Combooter'!" Snickered the other.

"If he had a tongue he'd be exactly like a boo!"

He could have sworn that he saw his other self's coat fluff flare as he shouted back at the giggling children, "the fuck? don't make me come over there!"

His Frisk blew him a raspberry, "Try it, shithead!"

"i really wish you hadn't taught that kid how to swear," Sans said, while the other was growling low in his not-throat.

"too late for that," he said, grinning dementedly big at him. "it's time for a rematch."

Not only wheezy, but his other self was certainly very different in personality. In a way, Sans envied him his energy, since he seemed to have so much of it. It was only a shame, the kind of story he and his kid came from.

A little time later, Sans was napping against the side of the house while the kids played.

It was very late, and everyone was very tired.

Blue Frisk suggested that the intruders into this world could sleep at their house, and even if Toriel appeared uneasy with the suggestion she ended up agreeing. At least, for the sake of the other Frisk, anyway, whom she commented could do with a bath and a good night's sleep.

But Frisk didn't want a bath, or sleep. The bath itself was excruciating, when Blue Frisk had finally convinced her to go along with it- Frisk's only condition was ultimately for the other child to be in the room with her, in case Toriel tried to drown her in the bath. Blue Frisk insisted she wouldn't, but agreed; like a baby, she stood in the corner not looking when Frisk undressed, as if she hadn't seen herself naked before.

Flowey did the same thing, fleeing the room, but since he was a flower she was more confused than anything, that he of all people would be embarrassed.

Frisk just about cried when Toriel took her sweater away to be "repaired"; she knew it was adult code for throwing it out and getting a crappy replacement. When the monster saw all the blood stains and tears on her shirt underneath, she put a gigantic paw to her face and looked sick to her stomach. Frisk was uncomfortable with such an expression, and she shouted at her to stop staring- it was rude.

Toriel took her shirt too, for "repairs". Only Blue Frisk being around kept the child from crying outright, in a show of strength.

Her shoes that were days from falling apart, she took too. Her pants almost went for "repairs" as well, but she was just barely able to convince Toriel to let her keep them- after all, all her stuff was in them.

It was strange, being mothered again.

It made her more anxious than anything else. Toriel's touch was gentle, and she didn't flinch whenever Frisk shoved her away for no reason, didn't scold her. Nor did she ever grab her, or hold her down under the water like Frisk expected in the back of her heart. Just patiently helping her clean and, in particular pulling all the junk out of her hair that had accumulated for so long. She was only firm once to scrub the backs of Frisk's ears, finding lots of dirt and dried blood there. She was quiet and didn't keep trying to make conversation, as if she had done this kind of thing before.

Still, Toriel had been gentle in her world too.

Her stomach was sick the entire time, and she couldn't enjoy the sensation of being clean.

After the bath, Frisk was given a new starry pajama shirt to put on with new underwear, new socks, and her old pants (she refused to wear pajama bottoms.) As soon as she could, she slipped the Temmie Armor back on underneath.

Looking at herself in the mirror, with these new clothes and finally combed hair, she almost didn't recognize the person staring at her with such bloodshot eyes. She almost wanted to ask, what's the point of being clean when she was going to get dirty again? But Toriel hadn't asked about her going home yet, and Frisk didn't want to bring it up. She didn't want Toriel to know she wanted to leave, or else...

Bed time came after a while of this inspection of herself. There were a few guest rooms that they could sleep in, although Papyrus marched off to an inn, dragging Sans behind him, on the grounds that they couldn't possibly embarrass themselves by imposing on Toriel's hospitality any longer.

So it was Frisk and Flowey alone who would be guests in this house. She wished Sans had stayed; either one, really, since Blue Sans had his own house and his own Papyrus to carry him back to it (they sure seemed to get along great.) But Frisk wasn't going to ask them to stay like a baby.

Toriel asked her if she had anything that she needed, anything at all, and she didn't understand- so she, yet again, shoved her big paw away and said there was nothing. She could sleep on anything.

...Except a bed.

Half an hour later, she opened her eyes alone in the dark and realized she still hadn't fallen asleep. She felt as if she was drowning in the mattress and in these sheets, and no amount of waiting could make this pass. With a soft groan, she turned over and found Flowey snoozing from his perch on the dresser.

Feeling queasy, Frisk rolled over to face the door- it hadn't been cracked open when she left it.

There was a pie on the floor beside her bed.

Frisk jumped out of bed, reached for the pan in her inventory, and kicked the plate across the room- the plate just fell harmlessly back onto the ground, but pie hit the wall next to the doorway and made a slick squish when it caved in, sliding down the blue wallpaper. Frisk knelt to examine it, not daring to taste it; cinnamon butterscotch.

Look what you did.

The pie. The pie.

Her heart was pounding. Frisk ran out of her room, still holding her weapon tightly. She knew which room was her counterpart's; Blue Frisk at first wanted them to share the same room, until Toriel pointed out there was no bed there. She dashed to that room now, shivering and watching the walls while her pulse echoed over her ears.

The setting was different, the Toriel was different, the Frisk was different, and yet everything looked more and more like the suffocating dark Ruins that she had entered once. It was so, so similar. It was too similar. How did that not occur to her? Frisk was already berating herself, already wide awake.

There was a soft whimpering, a gasping, a sobbing sound- all of it coming from Frisk's room.

And like that, it was as if her worst fears were realized.

Her hand was just about to touch the knob. But...

"Hush little baby, don't say a word..." Toriel's voice reached her, singing a soft song. "Mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird... you're safe now, and-er- and mama's here... mama's going to let it sing in your ear..."

The pan went limp, and Frisk breathed. The whimpering from the other side went on, but so did the singing. "If that mockingbird won't sing... mama's going to buy you a diamond ring... shh, shh, it's alright. If that diamond ring won't shine..."

It was a song she knew, even. And her singing was so sweet, despite the small tremors, the small stammers that she could hear from the other side of the door interrupting her song. The tiny sobs were turning to hiccups.

Frisk's fingertips grazed the door and she listened. She listened for the sound of her other self being killed. She listened for the crackling of hot blue flames. She listened for the agonized cackling, the pleading, and the hisses that it was for her own good. The "Because I'm your mother and I said so"s

"Mama's gonna give you a-" She stumbled, stuttered, and then said, "-rocking chair?"

There was a breathless laugh among the hiccups.

And like that it was as if her worst fears melted. As they melted Frisk screwed up her face, wringing her pajama shirt in her hands. "Dammit," she said, face turning red, throat restricted and words quiet, "dammit, dammit, dammit."

She tried to go back to bed, but with the pie splattered in her room she eventually walked downstairs instead.

...

This whole house was fucking blue, it really hammered things in. It was creepy at night.

Frisk chose the couch in the living room to sit at, lying back on it and turning her eyes to the dark ceiling. From the bottom floor, the house seemed still. She couldn't seem to close her eyes, though. It suddenly felt too warm.

Her eyes hurt, feeling heavy and strained. To keep from crying, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the big fluffy rabbit that Sans bought(?) her, hugging it tight to her chest so that the ears framed her face like a pair of scissors. It was soft, and squished under her grasping fingers. But the sensation just caused more tears to threaten the edges of her vision. So she curled up, pulling the bunny over her face entirely as she choked down weak sobs.

Slow, trickling tears soaked her pajama shirt, soaked the bunny.

By the time she pulled away, her head hurt and there was little for her to do. She wasn't going to go to sleep like this either. She took the fluffy bunny by both its arms, tried to pull it apart, and then smoothed down the fur on its chest. "Mmm..."

Something pushed apart the floorboards by her toes, and Flowey was looking her way. "Frisk?" He whispered. But she didn't say anything to him. He slunk up with his vines to be on the couch beside her, eyeing the stuffed plush. "Can't you sleep?"

Frisk shook her head.

"Oh. Hah, me neither," he said, with a hopeful smile.

She didn't reply.

So he added, smile falling, "Are you sure... that you're not mad at me?"

"Yeah," she whispered. "You were trying to help." What he hadn't understood was simply that there was no way she could stay in this world. She had to go back. Now, more than ever, this was true. She gave him a weak smile, and he smiled back, before returning to the bunny.

Flowey seemed content with that, at least. He relaxed his stalk, "sitting" with her in the dark while she did nothing. Finally, though, she held her bunny out and, a bored smirk on her face, she started to twist it back and forth in a dance. With a voice hardly above a croak, she sang, "Little bunny Foo-Foo, hopping through the forest. Scooping up the field mice and bopping them on the head." Flowey was staring, curious, and she said in a hiss, "One day the good mother said, 'I'll give you ~three chances~. And when the ~three chances~ are up, I'll turn you into a goon."

"please tell me you didn't name the bunny 'foo-foo.'"

Frisk gasped, a chill going up her spine- but it was just Sans, in his usual breaking and entering style. At some point he must have broken out of Papyrus' grasp; he still had the customary sweat on his skull for disobeying his "boss". Flowey grunted with displeasure near her. She, however, simply squirmed up farther on the couch, clutching the bunny close, and nodded. "Yeah it's Foo-Foo now."

He laughed, and she put a finger to her lips. Sans looked up, "oh. everyone else asleep, huh? figured."

Too many people were crowding in her sulking time. She regarded Sans suspiciously from the corner of her eye. "...How come you came back?"

"oh. uh." He shrugged, murmuring, "just wanted to check on ya. it's weird... sleeping in a different house from your own. and, haha, you don't even have one, right?" He sweat a little more. "i guess you're, uh, staying up instead?"

"Can I ask you a question?" Frisk asked, slowly but at the same time too suddenly.

Anxious, shifting, he nonetheless said, "y-yeah, sure, kid."

"Did you have a mom and dad?"

He didn't reply to her right away, closing his eyes for a second and heaving an irritated-sounding sigh. But he also didn't tell her it was none of her business, either, and so she had hope that he was just griping because of how late it was to be asking something like that.

Soon enough, he opened his eyes again and smiled. "nope. never had any."

"Not even a skeleton mom and dad?"

"well," he scratched his skull, squinting. "i mean, we did have them, i guess. everyone does. never met 'em, though, i guess they're dead or somethin', being skeletons and all," he sniggered, shrugging again. Frisk held on tight to the bunny, and seeing that the child wasn't amused he tried again. "uh, we had a grandpa, back when we lived in new home. but i wish we didn't. he was smelly and pushy and liked to beat us a little too much."

"Oh." Frisk hugged her knees, with the stuffed toy between them.

"i always figure, if our parents were still around, they would be the same way. so i'm not too broken up about not meeting them." He didn't seem very affected, and in fact maybe he wasn't, about his own words. But Frisk was trying hard not to resort to more tears. He looked at her sideways with that big great eye, like he was looking through her, and she flinched. "why d'you ask?"

The child looked back up above. "... That other Frisk... sure seems happy with their mom."

"huh," Sans coughed. "didn't notice."

Liar. "... I want one too." She just played quietly with the bunny Foo-Foo, ignoring the stares that Flowey and Sans surely were giving her. Her eyes fluttered close to closing, looking through her eyelashes. "I'm jealous of 'me.'"

Sans didn't know how to reply to that, so those words hung there for a while. He just stood in place, getting sweaty, unsure of what to say to her next- and Flowey was of course not going to venture anything with Sans around.

Finally, as if realizing it was going to be his turn to break the silence whether he liked it or not, he shifted in place. He gave a small chuckle and began. "ugh, uh, look, kid," were the first words that slid through his teeth, and Frisk tensed, wondering if he was going to book it for now. But that wasn't it. "this isn't something i usually do... never had a reason to before..." He coughed. "uhm. ummmmm. yeah. right." He shoved his hands in his pockets. "so, actually, i came to say. uh. thanks, for what you said with papyrus. no one's..." He scratched his skull, looking away. "... ever... stood up for me before?"

"Thanks". The words felt alien coming from him. Frisk pursed her lips and then quickly hid behind the bunny. "Aw jeez."

"!" Sans walked up to her and she squeaked. "don't you 'aw jeez' me, ya little twerp. i'm not getting mushy! i'm just sayin'- ugh- i really appreciated it-!"

The bunny flopped in her hands. "Aw jeeezus."

"oh my god," he said, flicking her forehead, "see if i ever thank you again."

Peeking from under the rabbit, Frisk smiled at him. "I didn't even think he would listen to me."

"no?" Sans shrugged, flashing his red eye at her. "i'm not surprised. he'll probably listen to a lot of things you say, from now on. he's crazy about you, brat."

"What?"

With her eyes wide with incredulous shock, Sans grinned huge at Frisk. "yeah, he's been going on about you whenever it's just the two of us. apparently you're best buddies now? said something about how you saved his life and all, so clearly now you're friends."

"I'm not friends with him!" Frisk sputtered, face pale with horror. Feeling a spike of worry for how loud she was becoming, she added in more of a hush, "He's a jerk! He hates me!"

Sans was laughing, and she had to again shush him, his eye shining with a light of schadenfreude. "c'mon brat, this is a good thing. you made friends with my bro. friends don't steal friends' SOULS, y'know?"

"But he hates me!"

"clearly he doesn't anymore," mused the skeleton, grasping and pinching her nose between his thumb and forefinger. While she struggled for freedom he continued, "he's funny that way. and by funny, i mean fucking irritating."

Frisk rubbed her aching nose and looked at Flowey, who was beaming back at her. "...I didn't think making friends was so easy."

Sans grinned. "turns out you just have to not attack them."

"... Weird."

"yeah it is."

But when all was said on that front, Frisk didn't have anything left to say, so tired as she was. She could feel her thoughts wandering back to that other version of herself. That other Toriel. She was still jealous. Even this world's Papyrus seemed to be... seemed like... someone that wouldn't even try to kill her. Her face melted into a bitter, sad frown.

It must have been terribly easy for him to read. Rolling back on his feet Sans laughed, a weak and anxious laugh. "... we could always take this one. u-uh, this toriel. i-i mean, i wouldn't mind. h-ha ha."

"That's your solution to everything," she said, closing her eyes, and he snorted at her. Frisk pressed the fake fur into her cheek and she murmured, "No. I decided that when we go back, I'm going to..." She opened her eyes again, before she could nod off. "I'm gonna go... all the way to the barrier. I'm gonna go back... back home."

She glanced Sans' way while she spoke, and she saw his grimace again- eye sockets empty. So she took a deep breath and kept going, "I'm gonna go... find my own mom. Or... my own dad. Just, someone. Until I'm... not jealous anymore." Another deep breath. "I know I can do it. I. I'll get better. I'll be nicer. I'll act like this world's Frisk. I won't hit anyone or steal anything or yell at anyone-" The deep breath she took next became a sob, and it broke both her concentration and her speech. Ashamed, she curled up and again hid, hugging her knees close.

There wasn't any word from the two others. It didn't surprise her they had nothing to say. Sans, indeed, was beginning to breathe raspily in front of her. Finally though, he said, "i think you're nice."

Frisk looked up, peering over her arms. "You're just saying that because you're worse."

"hey now, you're not a serial killer and you eat your vegetables. that's really all a mom or dad can ask for in a kid," he countered, winking at her.

And again she flushed. "Thanks, Sans."

"aw jeez," he grumbled, and she smacked him with the bunny.

She and Toriel snuck up on Red Frisk while they were sleeping still, face pressed down into the pillow. They woke the moment that the two of them approached the bed, and their eyes widened to see what Frisk was holding in their arms: the orange sweater, free of tears and free of abuse, even the stretched sleeve and neck returned to their proper size.

They started crying, and quickly wiped their eyes while Frisk and Toriel pretended not to notice the display. Their full eyes threatened to overflow again when Toriel handed them their shirt and shoes as well, which had been given the same treatment, and they hugged all these precious, yet trivial items to their small body for dear life. They looked up at Toriel in confusion, and Frisk was glad that this time, when Toriel reached a hand to Red Frisk's head, Red Frisk didn't dodge away- only giving the merest flinch.

"I did tell you I would be repairing them, did I not?" Her adoptive mother said. "I did not want to keep you waiting."

To be honest, Frisk didn't know when she found the time to do that- perhaps sometime during the night, while both children were asleep, she rushed out somewhere to get the spiders to do it. As she put it once, they owed her a lot of favors.

Red Frisk looked down at the clothes and sniffed, before wiping their face again. "Thanks."

"You are welcome," Toriel said. Then the smile she wore turned sad, as she said, "It would not be proper for you to return to your world in pajamas, after all."

Red Frisk's face fell, and then they looked away. "Yeah."

They were leaving? Frisk bit her lip, looking with increasing distress towards the two of them. Red Frisk was pulling off their shirt to change right in front of them, pressing the fabric of their sweater to their face repeatedly as if in love with the texture. It was probably ten times cleaner now. Were they leaving... today? Her heart sank, and she tugged on Toriel's sleeve, whispering as if Red Frisk couldn't hear, "Can't they stay?"

Red Frisk tensed, and Toriel sighed. The next words, she spoke with difficulty. "Only if it is what they want."

"I can't stay," Red Frisk said suddenly, just barely keeping from cutting her off. "I have to leave."

"But do you have to leave right now? I just met you," Frisk protested.

Red Frisk jumped off the bed, keeping their hands behind their back. "No," they said, and Frisk heard their voice waver. "I have to go as soon as possible."

Toriel put a hand on Frisk's head, and the child silenced herself. "I understand. Where should we take you?"

Her other self took a breath, and slowly they said, "The way back is in Sans' room."

And they went after a quick breakfast, Toriel not so much as arguing. Red Frisk called Red Papyrus and Sans, who said they would call Red Undyne and, evidently, Red Alphys? They would meet them at Sans' house for their final goodbyes. Frisk could feel her own heart break, thinking of it.

Evidently, Sans had been too uncomfortable sleeping in the same room as an inter-dimensional hole, and the trio found him passed out on the couch when they came inside.

Leo was already there talking to Papyrus in the kitchen, which surprised Frisk. Red Frisk was tentatively poking Sans, which Frisk already knew was not going to work in waking him up, so she ran to the kitchen to immediately interrupt their conversation. "Yo!"

"Yoo!" Leo and the child butted heads, and Frisk laughed in spite of her gloomy moods. "You missed that creepy other Alphys!"

"NOW LEO, IT'S NOT POLITE TO CALL CREEPY PEOPLE CREEPY," said Papyrus, and the boy smiled sheepishly. "EVEN THOUGH I STILL CAN'T STOP THINKING IF THAT WAS BLOOD ON HER SHIRT..."

"You guys are talking about Red Alphys?" Frisk asked. Now she really felt bad for missing her; she had been interested in seeing what the eviller version of her friend looked like. "I didn't even know that she came over here! What was she doing?"

Leo puffed out his chest proudly. "I'll tell you what she was doing, since I'm the messenger! She was really keeping Alphys busy, that's what she was doing! Apparently yesterday she barged in asking all kinds of questions."

"Questions?" Frisk wondered how Alphys could even handle something like that; she wasn't very articulate under pressure, that was for sure. "Questions about this world?"

Leo shook his head, and then thought better of it. "Sort of. I guess it was more than she kept asking about... Alphys's relationship with Undyne? Like, Alphys said they she asked stuff like, 'how did you guys get together' or 'how did you get the courage to talk to her' or 'do you think she'll like All-Star Grey Ghost and other stuff like that. Alphys said it was pretty flattering, after it stopped being terrifying. Hehe! No one has ever gone to her for relationship advice before, even if it's herself from another world."

Thinking back on Red Undyne, Frisk wasn't sure why anybody would want to date her in the first place. She seemed pretty scary... But maybe that was attractive to somebody who liked such a trash comic as All-Star Grey Ghost. "Uhh, so did she answer all those questions?"

"Yep! She said then they watched a movie together, although that other Alphys fell asleep halfway through. After she woke up, that's when Alphys called me so I could bring the- the other Alphys back here, so she could go home- cause I guess after yesterday Alphys came down with a bug or something and wasn't feeling well." Leo beamed. "I've been pretty helpful this morning!"

Frisk giggled, "Awesome Monster, you've preformed admirably!"

"AWESOME SKELETON HAS PREFORMED ADMIRABLY TOO! I'M HELPING THE OTHER SANS AND OTHER ME REFORM INTO MODEL CITIZENS!"

"Really?"

As if to disprove his point, the three of them heard the loudest trumpeting sound from the living room that any of them had ever heard, accompanied by someone screaming, "WAKE UP!"

Red Sans and Red Frisk had become a duo, the former holding a trombone in his hands and the other with their hands cupped around their mouth. Their attempts to wake Sans, so it seemed, did a lot to startle everyone else in the house but didn't do anything to stir the sleeping skeleton. He just continued to nap on the couch, not so much as affected by anything going on around him. Of course, as had been the case occasionally in the past, he could just be faking it. Red Frisk seemed to think so, grumbling a curse word at him before giving up.

"ayy, that's it? i don't get to play this thing that often," the disappointed Red Sans said.

"HONESTLY, SANS, YOU'RE SO EMBARRASSING," Red Papyrus snapped at them both, stepping into the house after them. "YOU CAN'T JUST BLOW THAT DUMB THING IN PEOPLE'S FACES!"

"We should have told Papyrus to shout at him; that would have woken him up," murmured Red Frisk.

The taller skeleton folded his arms, pouting, "ABSOLUTELY NOT!"

"i don't think we even have to ask, he's doing it right now," snickered his brother, and it looked as though Red Papyrus only resisted swatting him on the head because the other Frisk was in the room, giving him a pointed look.

They were followed by Red Undyne, who looked very bored when she stepped inside. Perhaps her exploration of this world had not yielded the results she'd been hoping for? "Let's get the show on the road already, I've still got a huge mess to clean up when I get back home."

"yeah but where's your hurry?"

With all of these darker counterparts to his friends standing in one room, Leo seemed to become uncomfortable. "I think I'm gonna head home. U-uh, my parents are probably worried about me."

"OH! TRAVEL HOME SAFELY, LEO! - I MEAN AWESOME MONSTER," cried Papyrus, and Leo jumped with joy at being called yet again by his title, before scurrying to the door of the house.

"Oh, also!" Leo suddenly spoke, turning from the doorway and glancing back at Frisk. "I almost forgot, but I ran into Asgore and he told me to pass you a message too! Since he's been trying to call you and you don't really have a phone..."

Red Frisk and Red Sans shared a look, and Frisk scratched her cheek. "Is it about this next Saturday?"

"No, actually-" Leo frowned as he remembered. "He said he ran into you yesterday and you looked really freaked out and weird. He was afraid that he scared you somehow, so he just wanted to make sure you're okay."

"I didn't see Asgore at all yesterday," Frisk said, squinting in thought.

Leo's eye-line went a little bit to the left, at the silent Red Frisk, and he laughed, "Oh! Then it must have been you! I'll tell him that everything's fine."

"Stay out of trouble, dear," Toriel said, closing the door on the monster child's way out.

Papyrus and Red Papyrus had somehow gotten to talking on their impending departure. It seemed Red Papyrus was going to try and help clean up the mess that had occurred from King Asgore's defeat as well, and for some reason Papyrus believed that technical puzzle manuals concealed the answer- and that his counterpart simply had to take all of them back with him.

Odder was that Red Papyrus was accepting each one that Papyrus handed over, looking over each manual with scrutinizing eyes.

"Alright, are we going now or what?" Red Undyne snapped, cutting off the child's observations.

"you can go on ahead," Red Sans murmured, tugging on Red Frisk's sleeve. "i wanna talk to you alone for a second, brat."

"-Okay," Red Frisk just managed to get out as he dragged her over and out the door to the house. Undyne shook her head and walked in the opposite direction, up the stairs to Sans' room. Frisk let out a breath and felt some tension let out of her shoulders when that woman was gone.

There was still some tension, though. Toriel was frowning at the door when it closed on Red Sans and Red Frisk, muttering to herself, "What could he want now? And I do wish he would not call them a brat."

"I don't think he means it, T-mm, mom," Frisk said, picking at the sleeve of her robe. "I can check on them, if you want."

"Alright," Toriel said, patting her on the head. "But do not eavesdrop, it is rude."

Frisk nodded and crept silently out the door, listening for the sounds of discussion. The two were not standing on the main step when she did, but they were definitely talking. She found them standing at the side of Papyrus' house, Red Sans and Red Frisk, and Red Flowey clinging to his apparent master too. It was a perfect place for her to eavesdrop, not quite peeking around the side but able to hear what was being said.

Red Sans was the one talking, with more feeling in his thug voice than she had heard before. "that's not how these things happen. look, i- uh ha, it's not an easy thing to say, but there's a reason that more of the humans haven't escaped from our world, and it isn't just because my brother or Undyne or anyone else killed 'em first. i mean you're the boss' first human encounter, so uh that should be obvious. one human SOUL on its own can't get through the barrier. has to be a monster and a human SOUL."

When sneaking a glimpse or two, Red Frisk's face was inscrutable. "What does that mean?"

"it means that mercy isn't always going to be an option. it means that, asgore and toriel are the only people in the whole underground whose SOULs won't instantly disappear when they die." Sneaking another glimpse, Red Sans' eyesockets were empty again. "it means you have to kill one of them to get out of here."

Red Frisk spoke out, nearly cutting him off, speech tremulous. "I don't want to kill someone, there has to be some other-"

"there's not," Red Sans actually did cut her off. "trust me, there's not. listen kid, if i could kill someone for you i would, but i'm useless against monsters like the dreemurrs." His voice turned soft, then, as he continued, "i mean, when it comes to killing people, i think everyone would agree there's few who have it coming more than asgore."

Red Frisk didn't say anything.

"hey, uh, frisk, twerp, i saw that pie you're carrying around with you. our toriel made it for you, right?"

Pie? Is that why they didn't eat the one that had been made for them last night? Frisk sneaked another look, but there was no pie out at the moment. Just Red Frisk standing with their back leaning against the wall, hands stuck in their pockets and looking down at their feet.

And with white light pupils in his sockets, Red Sans was saying, "when you get to the end, when you have all of the underground under your thumb, i want you to promise me something. promise me you'll find asgore, and when you do use this pie. he'll eat it. you won't even have a scratch..."

Red Frisk didn't say anything.

And there was a harsher edge to Red Sans' words, "trust me when i say he will find you and not show you that same hesitation. promise me you'll do it. ...at least... that you'll take someone's SOUL."

Frisk ducked back away before she could be spotted, holding a hand to her mouth. Back in the conversation, she heard the quiet, hiding, and stammering Red Flowey whisper, "D-d-don't promise that."

And finally Red Frisk said, "... This Frisk got up... without killing-"

"you think that their story is like ours?" Red Sans wheezed. "it's not the same, kid. mercy doesn't work in our world. you knew that, you fought every single monster you came across. there is no other way." He wheezed again, coughed, "either asgore or toriel dies, or you die. that's the only option."

"Frisk..." whispered Red Flowey, and for a moment they were just quiet. "You don't need t-to promise him anything..."

"stay out of this, weed."

"I promise."

Frisk covered her mouth again, this time with both hands. Although it wasn't her who said it, hearing a voice so much like hers actually say it- actually promise-

Red Sans breathed in and out in a rasp. "good."

Now Red Flowey didn't say anything, but then Frisk didn't stick around to hear it. As quietly as she could, she crept back inside the house. Inside Sans was finally sitting upright on the couch, yawning and rubbing his tired looking eye-sockets. "is it morning?" He mumbled.

And when the Reds all stepped back inside, Frisk well away from the door, it was evidently- and too soon- time for them to go. With their anxieties and promises and dark expressions, they went to the door in Sans' room. Frisk followed them, as did Sans, although it quickly became too crowded for anyone else. Sans' room was just not that big.

So the most Toriel did was hug the orange-striped child tightly before they went inside, which ultimately and unfortunately it only seemed to make them a little more nervous that something bad was going to happen. Frisk hoped she never met Red Toriel.

The grey door just stood there, closed but there, and Red Frisk and their Sans stared at it, both with uneasy expressions. One more step and it would be over, they would be back in their horrible other world.

Frisk held her locket in both hands, seeking peace from the upset that was twisting her insides. Red Sans at least, could always come back if he kept his machine working- even if he wouldn't be exactly welcome among everyone.

I just met you, Frisk thought, watching Red Frisk. Why can't you stay a little longer?

But she already knew why. She couldn't stay in place for even another moment when she was trapped underground. Even though things were surely harder over there, it was probably the same way for them now, now that they had made up their mind.

Red Papyrus came inside after a goodbye to the Papyrus of this world, shouting in his growlier tone, "-YOU WERE VERY INFORMATIVE. AND IF YOU LOSE MY PHONE NUMBER I'M GOING TO BE VERY PISSED AT YOU SO MAKE SURE YOU KEEP IT!" When he turned to look at the occupants of the room, he noticed his brother and the other Frisk hadn't moved towards the door yet. "WHAT? WHY IS NO ONE MOVING?"

No one spoke for a second- after all, Frisk didn't speak when watching such personal issues unfold, and Sans was probably still too tired to do much of anything. Red Sans didn't say anything either, though, although it was probably obvious why he wasn't eager to go back.

Meeting Red Papyrus' gaze and then discarding it, her counterpart self finally answered, "I'm just thinking. I have a lot of people left in my way."

Red Papyrus scoffed and folded his arms. "SO? IS YOUR OBJECTIVE NOT TO GO BACK TO THE SURFACE?"

"Yeah," the child muttered, eyes darting at Red Sans, who began to sweat, "But I guess I- just don't know if I'll be able to-"

"NO!"

Something changed on Red Papyrus' face, and the outburst startled everyone- even Sans, who had started to fall asleep again, opened his bony lids halfway. Red Papyrus' eye sockets flung open wider than usual, even with that crack on his skull, and he had swooped down before anyone realized it. Kneeling down closer to their level he grabbed Red Frisk by the arms, his giant gloved hands and clawlike fingers almost wrapping around their entire midsection. "YOU ABSOLUTELY CAN NOT TALK LIKE THAT!"

White as a sheet, Red Frisk sputtered, "-Huh?"

"HUMAN! AS YOUR NEW BEST FRIEND I ABSOLUTELY FORBID ANY KIND OF SELF-DOUBTING BEHAVIOR, DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME!?"

"boss-"

The child trembled. "Um-"

So Red Papyrus kept going, "PROMISE ME YOU WILL NOT EVER TALK LIKE THAT AGAIN! PROMISE ME!"

"But-"

He shook her, with a violent jerk, "PROMISE ME!"

"Ipromise-"

"GOOD!" But unfortunately for that Frisk, he wasn't done. From where he'd taken cover in the corner, Red Sans rolled his eyes. "FROM THIS DAY FORTH, REMEMBER THAT YOU ARE FRIENDS WITH PAPYRUS THE TERRIBLE! DO NOT LET YOURSELF HAVE ANY DOUBTS THAT YOU ARE MAKING THE RIGHT DECISION! DO NOT HESITATE! GO THROUGH HOTLAND KNOWING THAT YOU ARE NOT GOING TO TAKE ANYONE'S SHIT EVER AGAIN! FACE YOUR ENEMY AND SAY 'YOU ARE NOT TREATING ME LIKE THIS ANYMORE SANS'-" A beat. "-OR METTATON. OR ASGORE. WOSHUA. WHICHEVER. IT'S UP TO YOU."

"gee," said Red Sans, and scowling Papyrus threw a bone at him.

There was a small moment of silence from everyone; even though Red Frisk's face was normally noticeably tanned in color, like Frisk's own, right now it was the color of pancake batter.

Clearing his throat uncomfortably, and straightening back up, Red Papyrus didn't look at the child he had probably just turned deaf as he reached to grab his Sans by the back of his coat again. "UM. I THINK WE SHOULD LEAVE NOW."

Red Sans made a face, but he didn't resist. "ghhhhh-"

"DON'T WHINE IT IS VERY ANNOYING," his Papyrus snapped. He looked to the two children, and then the other Sans, and be bowed curtly. "GOODBYE OTHER HUMAN, OTHER SANS. OUR HUMAN, I WILL BE WAITING FOR YOU BACK IN SNOWDIN."

Red Frisk waved, still frazzled, and before wasting another moment the two pointy skeletons disappeared through the grey door.

Now it was their turn, and they'd disappear too. The child turned their head a fraction, looking back at Sans and Frisk. They scratched their nose, and then rubbed it, trying to lift the corners of their lips. "Maybe he's got a point."

Remembering the other promise that they made, Frisk said nothing. But Sans, still yawning, took a step forward and offered his hand. "i guess this is it for now, huh? you take care of yourself. i think you have more friends than you've been counting."

Red Frisk didn't raise their hand in turn, though. Their eyes became shiny, and they croaked, "I don't do handshakes sorry" before jumping forward and grabbing Sans in a hug, instead. That, even more than Papyrus' yelling, woke him up from his stupor. Red Frisk's face pressed into his shirt, Frisk hearing the tears they were fighting against.

"Thanks for staying with me. And for being so nice," they sniffed, careful not to hug too tight. "Even though I'm such a rotten kid."

Having this shivering little orange body clinging to his midsection, the look on Sans' face was one of shock, although it was harder to tell with him sometimes. After a moment of it, whatever it was, he ruffled the child's hair and smiled as he always did, giving them a lazy wink when they looked back up. "you're on the right track, kiddo. cut out the cursing and you're not that bad."

They smiled weakly back. "U-uh- I like cursing though."

"heheheh, then what are you worried about?"

Red Frisk stood upright and blushed, wiping their face furiously. "Nothinnnng." They took a big breath, and with a glance in Frisk's direction turned. "Okay, now I'm-"

No, you're not.

Before she even thought about it, Frisk grabbed her other self by the arm and pulled her back around, grabbing them tight in a hug of her own. The shoulder of their sweater was soft on her face, and then they grabbed her tight back.

Without saying anything, in the next second they let go. And...

You put the Dull Knife in Red Frisk's hand.

The other child shocked, in the next moment she felt it passed back.

Frisk tried again, adding with quiet words, "He might not eat the pie..."

"I don't need it," Red Frisk said back just as quietly, although their face was taken by confusion. From their shoulder, Flowey was peeking out of the neck hole of their sweater.

Frisk frowned. "But.."

There was a smirk, now, as they understood. "I did make a couple weird-ass promises just now, didn't I?" They mused. "But, um, I don't really think I'm going to keep them."

As Frisk held a question in her eyes, her other self answered, "I really like Sans. And maybe I'll even really like Papyrus. But they're confused. They don't know what kind of story they're in either. ...I'm not sure yet, but... I feel like I'll find a way, without doing something terrible like... like killing someone. Because... if I do... all the times I haven't killed anyone wouldn't be worth anything. All those tally marks... would be for nothing."

The tally marks. Suddenly embarrassed for thinking any differently, Frisk put the knife away before Sans could so much as see what they were whispering about. "Ah-r-right."

"Thank you," they added quickly, a little louder. They looked like they were going to cry again. For all the cursing and fighting, they sure did that a lot, Frisk remarked to herself. "I'm glad I met you. I actually don't hate you at all."

Uh. "I don't hate you either, I guess," Frisk replied with a blink.

"And, um," Red Frisk said, as they wiped their face. "You probably won't know what I mean when I say it. But... um... the song that's playing in my head..." Frisk watched them patiently, as they rubbed their eyes clean of tears yet again. "...I never knew how much more there was to it until today."

Frisk just smiled at them. She had a feeling that she knew. It was the song that was playing in her head too, that had played on those occasions where someone who loved her was by her side.

One of a fast heartbeat, and of faith that's rewarded. It was a song she was familiar with. It was hers.

Both of theirs, perhaps. As the two eighth children who had "fallen down."

"I don't know if you understand," murmured Red Frisk, as their counterpart went several seconds without speaking. "I'll show you what I mean someday," they said, turning over to her a trembling smile. "When I get an ending like yours."

Frisk beamed at her, and Red Frisk beamed back, with a face unused to beaming. They did, in that instant, almost look identical. "And you'll come right back then?"

"Fuck yeah, I'll come right back."

That was what she said, and as before when she swore Frisk thought that she sounded so cool. Red Flowey, with a far more relaxed expression, sank down beneath Red Frisk's sweater and the child turned to the grey door once again. They said, taking hold of the knob. "...But now I have to go."

Frisk did not see how their eyes brimmed again, and their smile became a screwed up grimace again, once they stepped through into the other world. She did not see the pain they would have to endure, the deaths and suffering yet to come.

But she could guess all of that. Because, although she told no one, her story hadn't been the happy kind either. Even if it did end that way.

Once the other child was gone, Frisk's smile drifted down, and she twisted the ends of her sweater with an anxious expression. As the only one left in the room was Sans, she found herself murmuring, "Hey... how are they going to do that?"

"mm?" The skeleton said sleepily.

"How are they going to get our ending? If Flowey is friends with them, and most of the other monsters still hate them...?" Frisk wrung her sweater even tighter. "How are they going to break the barrier? Should they even do that?"

Sans just shrugged. "beats me." After the child exhaled sharply, he paused and said, "but i didn't think you'd be able to do better than leave, too. and, uh," he laughed a little, although without much humor. "when you're a reality warper, i bet you don't really need to worry about those tiny details."

Frisk looked at Sans, and then back at the door. "Mmmmm..."

Reality warper or not, they were just a kid like her.

Little by little, before their eyes, the door disappeared. Upset again by the disturbance, the sky burst into a sudden pouring rain as it had been doing lately.

But soon after, as before, the sun reemerged on New New Home.

Next Chapter: The Child Named Alice and the Child Named Anna

Chapter Text

Alice is the name that I was given.

But that is not my true name.

As of yet, there is nobody who knows my true name, nobody who may ever know. When I am always called by "Alice," what is the difference to an outsider looking in on my world?

And yet I don't really feel the same as I did when I was a kid. When I was a mere human I felt many things, but I do not feel so much now. Not even my desires and drive to achieve them are mine, but belong to the kindred spirit whose SOUL resonated with mine; although my thoughts are my own, I can't help but pay attention to her's, as well.

My knowledge has also been expanding a lot lately. Recently I had a lesson on quantum mechanics. Before that I've been studying the blueprints that make up this world, the design of Frisk's surroundings that are kept safe in her SAVE file each time we remake everything. I have been looking at the power that we have to SAVE in the first place, which seems so limited and yet so far-reaching. The reason why we have it, what it can do, on a large scale as in reloading and on an individual scale as in restoring other people...

I have found it fallible, but applicable to more situations than even Frisk realizes. You see, the benefit to them having someone like me on their side is that I can think logically and rationally about situations that they are experiencing in the heat of the moment. They can be overcome by it as fully as they like, but for me I am distanced enough to analyze. As a mere child I also felt that way, honestly distancing myself and thinking so clearly for it, and it has only gotten better after my death. Even the hatred I felt back then has dissipated, if only because Frisk exercises little ill will herself...

Perhaps my only flaw is talking too much. I see a need for commentary, and I digress.

My point is that when it comes to our powers, I have figured things out that Frisk may not have yet. First and foremost is that although the theory of our SAVEs was posed by someone who is ultimately inconsequential, it is not wrong. We moved through the underground like gods. I knew from the start it could not be mere time travel.

We both collapsed and reconfigured this reality so casually, in a way only such a boosted human SOUL could. Each time it was her decision, while as of yet I have only watched. There are some things that I can do without her, but they are things I would rather do with her.

After all, we are partners.

Yet... we are not able to do everything. Some parts of this world slip through our fingers, some rearrangements fail, and some parts cannot be reached at all.

But most disturbing is what we have both learned recently. Surprisingly, against my expectations, this planet that I call a "game," and its "code," can surrender itself to the will of somebody else. It's not first come first serve. And so easily, too easily, we lost out.

That other Frisk and that other child with her, frankly, disturb me.

And yet Frisk desires to be friends with them. For the first time I find myself disagreeing with my partner, even though my heart does agree with them- but that's just because it's her heart in the first place that I am borrowing.

In the end, with no SOUL of my own I can't help but want what Frisk wants, and we will always get it regardless of what anyone else wishes or desires.

So unless I get one- that is, a SOUL- how can I maintain our status quo?

That is what I wish to learn.

But I have not introduced myself. I do not see it as rude because you likely already know who I am, in a story where no one else does.

Nonetheless, greetings. I am Chara.

Anna is the name that I was given.

But it is not my true name.

It is likely the same for many children, wherever they may be, who move with names someone else wrote them. Beneath it, so that you might never even see if you don't look, there is a true name, even if it's ultimately inconsequential. I met a child recently who was much like me, with the given name "Alice." Their true nature is the same as mine, although they hide it behind strange pretensions. We are not enemies, and I don't think they will get in my way. They are just curious.

The child they have attached to, their "Frisk" is not the same as mine, which could account for the meager differences. And yet they are both, in their own ways, ugly children. I can't help but wish to strip them of everything that they want. I can't help but hate them.

Make no mistake, although I despise them both, I feel the most strongly for my own Frisk. Because my own Frisk is what allows me to feel the most strongly. I experience her feelings at a distance, and hear her ugly, petty little thoughts on an hourly basis.

My feelings... I gave all of them up on the day I died, when I pushed poison down my throat. I entrusted them to someone who betrayed me, someone who was little more than a coward beyond all his bluster. And then after death, I woke up to someone who was more of the same. I do not even have a SOUL of my own anymore.

I have been learning more and more recently. I have been expanding my knowledge of myself and of Frisk. I don't yet know what is most important to her, but when I find it I will know what to do. I'm well versed in what this Frisk can do, and what I can do- not just from observation, and I'm sure there is much more we have yet to observe, but because I have gained a new understanding of what the SAVE ability really is. I can thank that insignificant being from the other world for that.

More than that... I believe there may even be things I can do without her.

Now that she no longer wishes to give up, the end of the "game" that she plays is coming soon. As I say, what Frisk holds most dear isn't clear yet, but I suspect that I'll see the answer after that ending.

And I'll take it.

I'll break the status quo.

You can't always have what you want just because you want it.

But for those of you watching...

My greetings to you. I am Chara.

The child named Alice and the child named Anna

Across many worlds

Are both Chara.

The End