Chapter Text
Rain and thunder roared outside the window, light peering through the curtains and illuminating the bedroom further than the currently active computer monitor. The one in the chair at the monitor does not react to this interruption, laser focused on the windows they have open on the screen.
Man, can 2026 not come fast enough.
The Player had just recently finished their first ever playthrough of Deltarune, and since that ending speech from the voice behind the screen, they knew they were hooked. At this moment they were finishing the organization of their many walk-through tabs in order to complete a ‘real’ pacifist playthrough, guides to take them through things like gaining the key parts for the Jevil boss fight or the best things to do in order to beat Gerson down the line. They didn’t want to get to the end only to find out that something amazing was locked behind the fact that they didn’t get a certain item.
Double-clicking on the game icon, the Player leans forward with tired eyes, resting their head on their hand. They just want to get this started. Complete the side content that they’d missed originally and keep pushing forwards, not torment Kris any longer then they have to.
‘They’re a fictional character, it's all just pixels on a screen man come on’ It matters to them, ok? They like it when the pixels on screen end up in the best possible scenario. Sue them.
Carefully they move through the vessel creation segment, mostly choosing the options they’d picked in the first go around. The pulsing blue void behind each of the interface elements wasn’t doing their exhaustion any favors and as another thunderous crash rumbles the walls of their home upon the selection of the final vessel option, the Player sighs.
“Sorry Kris…” They murmur, voice piercing the quiet room despite its low tone. “...Nothing more than this. I promise.”
The Player could never bring themselves to do a Snowgrave route, the clips they’d seen of it threatening to tank their heart down to the depths. Again, they like it when the pixels on screen end up in the best possible scenario. Let’s try to do that actually- the thoughts of Snowgrave are pushed from their mind as they focus back on the screen. The screen that should’ve transitioned to that typical opening scene by now. The screen that seems… inexplicably stuck on that strange shifting void.
For a moment, they wonder if their internet had disconnected because of the storm. It hasn’t, by the way, it’s still full bars- just as they move their mouse to open Task Manager, a change in the game window stops them.
[ YOU ARE ]
[ UNHAPPY ]
[ WITH THE ARRANGEMENT? ]
The blocky white text stops them in their tracks, eyes shooting open wide. This wasn’t… anything that they’d heard of before. Was this new? Some sort of easter egg? It wasn’t like they’d put in some sort of special name or anything-
A looped mumbling of ‘what? what? what?’ is interrupted as the text changes to a simple question mark. The Player shoots away from their desk at that, wheels on their office chair groaning painfully with the strain. The computer and the user stare at each other in silence, before the text once again changes.
[ I ASKED ]
[ ARE YOU UNHAPPY WITH THE ARRANGEMENT? ]
[ YES ] [ NO ]
…Slowly, as if the computer may lash out and bite them, the Player creeps back towards the keyboard. Just enough distance is closed between the two to allow them to move the selection to ‘yes’ and hit enter. This causes the question prompt to vanish, that swirling void returning as if the one asking the question is thinking. Not as long of a pause as the first change, at least.
[ I UNDERSTAND ]
[ YOUR VESSEL ]
[ CAN NO LONGER BE RETRIEVED ]
[ BUT ]
[ A NEW ONE CAN BE ]
[ ARRANGED ]
“ Oh my god.” They whisper, mystified. “ Secret. Deltarune secret. Is this actually happening to me?”
A circular loading symbol appears in place of the text, the same piercing white as those messages. The Player leans forward, closer and closer to the screen, waiting for some lore-shattering revelation to be dropped upon them. However, the storm has other plans.
A flash of light once more illuminates the room, much brighter than the first few. What few shadows remain stretch out in unnatural ways, inky black spears from places that cannot be seen pulling themselves closer and closer to the unsuspecting gamer. The thunder steps in right as the lightning departs, an absolutely monstrous roaring shaking the entire world around them. It’s no surprise that the little light from the monitor cuts out in this moment.
Jumping up in shock at the sizable thunderclap, it doesn’t take long for the Player to realize what’s happened with the computer- more importantly, with the game. They grab the sides of the monitor, hoping that perhaps turning the screen slightly this way or that will restore what they were about to experience.
“No no no- aaaauugh!!” The power is out. Between the computer’s shutoff and the sudden chilling stillness in the air, that fact settles into their mind with certainty. Of course this would happen right at this moment, curse their luck.
What was that noise.
Somewhere behind them, in that impenetrable dark, the Player can swear they heard something. The shuffle of footsteps on the carpet, maybe? It isn’t their own, the floor beneath them is solid and bare of fuzz.
Maybe staying up so late playing video games isn’t the… greatest, of ideas.
“I’m… I’m dreaming.” They say to the empty air. “I watched too many theory videos, and this is some sort of- weird, video game nightmare.” This proclamation doesn’t keep their heart from beginning to race as the sound of footsteps travels from a soft to a hard material. If they think about it, it sounds like it’s coming from the bed. From something underneath the bed that is now pulling itself out.
The Player turns towards where the monitor stands, reaching a hand out to mournfully touch the glass. “I’m going to wake up, and I won’t even remember this happened. And maybe I’ll have toast for breakfast. And-”
Their hand does not meet glass.
All desperate attempts at feigning normalcy in this experience shatter into mist as the Player very distinctly feels their hand go through where solid glass should be. The sensation stuns them into total silence, a very real and very cold kind of terror settling into the space between their heart and ribcage.
In the darkness, a hand reaches out to grab theirs. Then another hand reaches out, clasping around their arm. And another, and another, and one grabs onto the hand lingering on the side of the monitor, and the frantic thrashing and squealing in terror come far too late to do anything against the unseen figure in the void.
Something chatters behind them, letting out this terrible grating laugh as their body is forcefully pulled through the monitor, and their consciousness fizzles out with a dying sputter.
—
Beyond that screen, in a world far unlike what its Angel knows, gears behind the scenes are roughly moved here and there, accommodating for a possibility that had become a reality despite the fact that it should have been wholly impossible.
The work is a science, and thankfully for its dear scientist, nobody is there to critique exactly how messy the technical aspects really are. All will settle into working order when given the time to do so. He’d think that ‘maybe enough prayers to the Angel above would ensure such a result’ but currently he’s got the Angel in his countless grasps so right now he’s just got to hope that this wasn't a decision to doom the timeline.
Cupping the slowly twitching shape in his hands, they part to reveal the full picture. A simple, humble, red heart. Something so familiar to every fragment of himself that exists extruded through space and time and dimensions that lack names.
How beautiful. How fragile. How lucky we are to need each other this way.
With a whispered prayer more felt than it is heard, the soul is cast off into the dark. Movement in the void is a strange thing, so while to an outsider it would look as if the Player was just chucked off into the dark, the actual matter is… different. They were thrown this way, or maybe that way, and the space folded in upon itself rapidly to take them to their destination. So more like teleportation? But not really.
That doesn’t matter. Not now, at least. The Player has someone to meet.
Darkness all around undulates, forced apart by the changing circumstances, coalescing into a shape that was not meant to be taken yet. The world most certainly cares, but it can’t fight against what’s been set in motion.
Slumped in the darkness, a familiar figure’s bright colors cut through the emptiness. Antennae drooping to the front of his face, screen shut off and body still, Tenna is given form not from a Dark Fountain but instead from something else.
And thanks to this world’s unwilling visitor, he’s about to be given one hell of a wakeup call.
From one direction or another the soul rockets forwards, straight through Tenna’s chest. Once they phase through the unconscious Darkner they only stop a little ways away from his form, despite their own desperate attempts to keep moving. Upon contact the two had been tethered, inextricably linked to one another.
The Player’s already figured this out, so now it’s Tenna’s turn.
Quite literally shooting up from his slumped over position Tenna stumbles around in the dark, television screen flickering between static and color bar errors. He whacks the side of his head once or twice, antennae pulling up until they align in the right way to get a signal. It’s only then that the chaotic flashing of his face evens out into his usual appearance- being his actual face.
“What the- How- wh- buh-” He twists quickly from side to side, coming to a slow stop as all that meets his gaze is darkness. That’s… odd. No, not even odd, downright incorrect. Tenna’s got no clue how exactly he knows this, but he does know he is NOT where he’s meant to be.
Where’s the studio? The Shadowguys, the Pippins, the Zappers, the lights and cameras and action! It’s not like this is just a power outage either- for one he’s up and about, and that wouldn’t be the case if the studio lost power. Secondly, there isn’t a sound of wood or tile beneath his feet as he looks this way and that. There’s no sound at all.
He almost believes there to be nothing to see until a blip of red flashes in his periphery. Turning forward brings the shape into full view, looking as if it’s slamming up against some sort of invisible wall an arm’s length away from his torso.
A simple, cartoonish, little red heart.
Neither party moves towards the other for a moment that pulls itself through the infinite void at a snail's pace. Tenna’s antennae twitch slightly, looking for any sort of message bouncing around the air that he can use to triangulate the where, who, how, what and why of this scenario.
The soul fires upwards without warning, deciding this is some sort of nightmare scenario that they desperately need to get away from.
Tenna jolts back, crying out a startled “HEY-!” as a hand comes out to try and swipe at the shape. Player manages to dodge the first attempted grasp from the Darkner but ends up encountering the same issue vertically as they had horizontally: they’re tethered in a set distance to Tenna. Being unable to escape into the air they bolt off to his other side, forcing Tenna to twirl on his heels sharply in an attempt to catch up with them. This odd little game goes on for longer than either would care to admit, only ending once the TV’s gloved hands clamp down around the red heart, vanishing it from view.
Tenna remains like that for a moment, hunched over with his hands cupped as if his life depends on it. The only thing to break up the isolation being the steady heave of his chest and the furious shuddering of the heart against his makeshift prison.
With a practiced precision the TV adjusts his hands, pulling them down and around the heart, enabling the two to see eachother without risking flight from the latter. Player stills in their thrashing as they are firmly grasped, tilting back to make eye contact with Tenna. The video game character Tenna. The guy from Deltarune. You know, if they weren’t already a cartoon heart, they’d think of some awful quip about how their own heart was about to climb out of their chest and dart away.
“...What in the world…?” Antenna twitching from side to side, Tenna lifts Player up closer to his screen, as if a closer view of the strange being will help him understand the current situation any better. The heart shrinks back from him, twisting unnaturally with the movement. “Are you the reason that the 'show' is, ah…” Casting a quick glance around at the emptiness that is not his studio, he lowers his hands some to a more lax stance. “... wildly off script, little buddy?”
The two rounded parts of the heart come up and down before slumping defeatedly and the TV this registers as a shrug. They look genuine enough… adjusting his grip, one hand comes up to fuss with his tie. “If I let you go, can you try not to run away again?” The question comes with an attempted air of authority, but between Tenna’s shorter height and continuous quick looks around, it’s easy to tell that that’s just a grasp for control. Player nods, feeling almost too tired to even think about it. With that agreement made Tenna lets go, hand reaching back out of view and producing a microphone from nowhere. He doesn’t really do anything with it, the weight resting comfortably in his palm. Player wonders why exactly he brought it out- it was a little difficult to get a read on the Darkner even before they entered a waking nightmare. Was the mic to try and call out into the nothingness, or to be prepared for if something called back?
They didn’t like thinking about that last option, actually. Maybe it was just a comfort thing. God knows they could use something like that right now.
“This isn’t…” He trails off, brows pulling together as his expression twists into a discomforted frown. “This isn’t right. Where are th-”
Player has full view of the way the darkness far behind Tenna warbles, miragelike and sickly, before splitting . It’s as if the void around them peels away in the wake of the distant pillar of darkness like the skin of a fruit. Logically they understand why the image looks the way it does- at the computer, what they're seeing would be the white outline surrounding the darkness upon a fountains opening. But they aren’t at the computer right now.
Seeing the image in a three dimensional space is…wildly disorienting. The way that Tenna’s shape is cast in the moment in complete shadow, his defining features only visible as he whips around towards the source.
“A fountain!” He chimes, antennae sticking up in surprise and recognition before swaying slightly at the confused tilt of his head. “ A fountain?” Shaking the thoughts away furiously, Tenna looks over his shoulder at Player, color returning to his form as the last of the Darkness drifts into the world and pulls itself into a proper shape.
“I’m assuming you don’t know any more about that than I do?” He asks, hands coming up to adjust his gloves. As they shake their head (or more so their entire shape) from side to side in a ‘no’, the Darkner yanks one glove down with noticeable force. He exhales through his nose, brushing off his suit before turning back towards what has now filled out into a distant, colorful kingdom. “Well. Perhaps the kind folks over there will help me reorient myself and get back to the studio! I’ve got a schedule to keep after all- Mr. (Ant) Tenna’s TV Time needs its host! Check out the show, by the way!”
Even though he isn’t looking directly at Player, they can’t help but imagine the wink, that show host persona comfortably sliding into place to mask his confusion at the scenario. At being awake far too early.
Tenna starts off through the darkness, eyes trained on the Dark World off in the horizon. The feeling of his heels clicking cuts through the silence sharp like a knife, and Tenna forces himself to imagine the bright lights and shining cameras of the studio to combat the unease brought on by the silence.
And he walks. And walks. And walks (how far out is this Dark World?!). And Player is dragged right along with him. Initially they were stuck trailing behind him, whatever invisible tether that the two now shared refusing to loosen its grip on their heart-shaped form. After a while the stillness started to get to them. This wasn’t a human body, there were no limbs to stretch or lungs to breathe with while walking. That was when they were roused to life once more, pulling forwards and beginning to drift alongside the TV. The stillness felt suffocating
Tenna didn’t pause upon spotting the little red shape in the corner of his vision, only quirking a brow curiously. All it took to get the message across was a quick tug to the right from Player- displaying once more their inability to leave his radius. For a flicker uncertainty flashed across his screen. Who or whatever this was seemed... much more disoriented than him. Their body language spoke volumes, curled slightly, wavering from side to side in the air next to him. He pulls on a quick smile, one shining with the confidence a show host like him has to wield.
“Well, if you can’t leave, I guess you’ll just have to come with! It’d be nice to give someone a tour of the studio again.”