Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The distant light of the sinkhole is, as it always has been, gentle and soothing as a wake up. The patch of flowers it shines down on bask in its faint warmth, eager for a taste of the surface they’ll never see.

Sometimes, Frisk would linger here until Toriel came to find them. After an especially fraught reset, it was nice to just… rest. Whether the rest was peaceful or not, well. Frisk isn’t sure even a decade later.

And. They definitely don’t have time to ponder it again. Because something has clearly gone very, very wrong.

I am… in so much trouble, Frisk thinks slowly, sinking deeper into the petals of their deathbed. The flowers are large enough to be comfy to lie on, unlike the flat dorm room mattress they’d fallen asleep on last night. Because they’re nineteen, and in college, and very happy to be so.

They swore to never alter their SAVE file again. They swore to never RESET again. To preserve the beautiful future unfolding for all their friends and family, and be worthy of the trust placed in them. Maybe they’ve reminisced fondly about the Underground, but they wouldn’t undo all their growth just to go sightseeing.

Also, now that they’ve gotten to the point of adulthood, Frisk can firmly say they wouldn’t want to go back to being a child.

Is this Chara’s doing? Frisk can’t hear or feel them. Which is normal… in the future anyway. The longer Frisk lived on the surface with everyone, the quieter and more at peace the resentful spirit had become. For weeks at a time now, Chara stays asleep.

Frisk doesn’t think it was them, not with how close to being ready to move on they are. Could it have been Asriel? Somehow??

But Asriel is as happy as he’s ever been. It wasn’t easy to get Flowey out of the Underground, nevermind integrate him back into society, but they’d done together with their family. Asriel was on a roadtrip with the skeleton brothers last they heard; touring natural landmarks and helping test out Papyrus’s new RV (and Sans’s moped).

…What if Frisk did do this? Even if it was accidentally? They’d been thinking about the loops lately, what with the ten year anniversary coming up. What if they’d subconsciously-?

Frisk reaches for their SAVE file, panic making their SOUL shaky. It doesn’t matter how this happened. They can fix this. They didn’t SAVE in the Ruins yet, they haven’t overwrote the future. They just have to go back to their recent save point in the student lounge, then they’ll call Sans and apologize for the scare-

They brush against the option to view their file.

Frisk  LV??  ?:??

??? - ???

❤ SAVE     RETURN

…They may be in even more trouble than originally thought.

A displeased face appears over Frisk, yellow petals dipping down as the flower frowns at them. “Oh, guess you didn’t die,” he says, then visibly arranging his features into something more friendly. “Howdy! I’m Flowery the flower. I was worried you had died , human, since you’re just laying there. I’m so relieved that isn’t the case!”

Frisk gazes silently at the beady black eyes of the flower, at how empty they are. This would happen every time Frisk lingered in the flowerbed, the flower monster getting impatient waiting for the human to get up and start exploring before he sprung his ‘welcome’ on them.

At this point in time, their friend is a shell of who he could be. Who he should be. The malice behind Flowey’s smile is easy to spot; Frisk is too familiar with his manipulation tactics to miss it. They’re also familiar with the faultlines of his psyche.

“Hi, Asriel,” Frisk says softly, so no one can overhear the name. Flowey’s expression instantly shutters.

“Where. Did you learn. That name.” Each word changes the flower’s face, eyes growing angrier, teeth getting sharper.

“You told me it, because I know the real you,” Frisk says, not dishonestly. They hold still as vines begin to weave through the flowerbed, the simmering tension of Flowey’s temper liable to trigger at the first sign of fear.

Flowey is staring at them, searching Frisk’s mask of calm for cracks. Or maybe for something else, because he then asks in a very hesitant voice, “...Chara?”

“No. I’m sorry. I’m Frisk. I’m still your friend, though.” Frisk debates for a moment, then adds, “Chara is asleep right now, but they’re here, at least a little. I don’t know when they’ll wake up.”

Flowey has a blank look on his face, hiding whatever emotional reaction he’s having. Or whatever lack of one. The distance and distortion of his emotions… Frisk understands better as an adult how muddled it makes him. They move slowly as they sit up, watching their friend for the conclusion of what he’s thinking over.

“You’re being very casual about all this,” Flowey eventually says. He smirks. “How many times have we had this conversation?”

“This conversation? Only once. But we’ve had others a lot of times.” Frisk lost count of how many times. (Sans probably has a guess. They won’t ever ask him.)

“So you do have the power to RESET this world,” Flowey accuses. He grins at them, faux friendliness back in full effect. “Oh boy, if we’ve talked enough times you know who I am, you must have discovered everything about this place. Well have you? Did you find every hidden treasure? Did you uncover every secret?” His grin stretches, teeth sharpening and eyes darkening. “Did you get bored yet?”

“I never got bored,” Frisk defends without thinking. They ignore Flowey’s mocking laughter. “I didn’t . They’re my friends, I wouldn’t ever be bored with them.”

“Then you haven’t done this enough times yet,” Flowey says loftily, spiny vines twisting near Frisk’s knees. “Doing the same ol’ patterns again, and again, and again? Anyone would get bored eventually. Start wanting to be more… creative. ” He looks at Frisk for a long moment, then starts laughing again. “And I can see it in your face. You already have!”

Their sins are crawling up their back.

“I stopped looping,” Frisk says, forcing themself back to calmness. Flowey is impossible to argue with when he’s like this, there’s no point in trying. “I broke the barrier one last time and took us all to the surface. I promised everyone would keep their happy ending for good.”

Flowey blinks, then looks around himself with exaggerated confusion. “Hm. This doesn’t look like the surface to me.” He turns a smug smile back on them. “Guess that means you RESET it all anyway, even after your ‘final’ happy ending. How awful of you!”

Frisk balls their fists. “I didn’t.”

“How long did it take? A year, maybe three? How long until you got bored and wanted to go back again, try it a new way?”

“It’s been almost ten and we’re happy, I wouldn’t undo all that just b- I never would, no matter what.”

“No need to lie to your pal Flowey. After all, I did the same thing!”

“I didn’t! I wouldn’t! This wasn’t me!” Frisk swipes at the flower, missing him as he dodges.

Flowey is cackling even as he dives into the ground, reappearing on the edge of the flower patch. “If it wasn’t you, who else could it be?” he jeers one last time, before disappearing into the ground. He doesn’t come back again.

Frisk is left alone in the cavern, where they let out a long sigh. Their heart is thrumming too fast in their ears. They flop back into the flowerbed, trying to even out their emotions. It feels like their child body can’t handle the full depth of how worried they are right now. Everything feels so much more overwhelming than it should; they shouldn’t have been baited so badly.

(…It wasn’t them. They would never do this to their friends. They promised, they wouldn’t break that promise, they wouldn’t- )

“Oh! Little one, are you alright?”

Frisk jolts upright at the sound of their mother’s voice, sending petals scattering around them. The tall and kindly goat monster is at the entrance of the room, already striding over towards them. “Don’t be afraid, child,” Toriel assures them as she kneels, holding out a hand. She smiles with all the warmth Frisk knows her to have, but none of the recognition or love she usually would.

…Flowey wasn’t entirely wrong about them. About their desire to uncover secrets and hidden knowledge. As a child, Frisk could treat it as a game. Earning the love or hate of each monster of the Underground. But that was a long time ago, and Frisk isn’t that selfish child anymore.

Now, the blank slate of their relationships makes a profound agony spread through Frisk’s chest.

(Their SOUL is intact, but their soul is breaking into pieces.)

Toriel makes a surprised gasp when Frisk flings themself into her arms, clutching tight the robes she wears. It only takes a moment for the old monarch to gently fold the scared child into her embrace, hope kindling in her chest that perhaps this one will stay where she can protect them.

Frisk talked to their mom just two days ago. They wished they’d called her last night, even though they’d been exhausted from classes. They have no idea when they’ll be able to talk to her again.

-/-

Frisk will blame being nine years old again for the crying fit they have. They’ll cut themself a break for it, since the universe won’t.

Frisk ignores the save points they pass, terrified to wreck something worse. Everything else goes as it should; Toriel leading them by the hand, teaching them with the Dummy, re-meeting all the enemies who steadily become friends… Nothing else is out of place. Just the glitched file.

(Flowey doesn’t show up again, but Frisk knows he must be watching them closely.)

Frisk has to take a deep breath a few times to center themself. As much as they want to rush forward and make it to Snowdin as fast as possible, there’s a chance this can’t be fixed. If they can’t just jump right back to where they’re all supposed to be, then Frisk has to make every choice count.

The way back to the future might be the long way around. So everything has to be perfect in order to get there.

Frisk knows every inch of the Ruins and every monster there like a best friend. A decade isn’t long enough to forget the endless time they spent looping through the Underground. They dodge every attack, SPARE every opponent. They compliment Napstablook into submission with poise and accuracy, sending off their awkward friend in no time.

They feel anxious through the whole experience. About the uncertainty of their way home, whether this is their fault, if they’ll really be able to make it from start to finish without a single misstep… But DETERMINATION has yet to desert them, and Frisk concludes their no-hit speedrun of the Ruins with 100% completion.

Toriel blocks the way, just as she always does. Frisk knows the safest way to approach the fight is the tried and true Script, but they can’t help but speak where they wouldn’t have before.

“You don’t have to be scared for me, mom,” Frisk says during their turn. “I promise I’m always going to be alright.” Nothing can kill them permanently, after all.

“All the others promised me, too,” Toriel returns, grieving each and every little life lost. “None of them were able to keep that promise.”

Frisk dances through the volleys of fire, familiar with every pattern Toriel has to offer. The heat reminds them of home. They choose TALK again.

“I wouldn’t be happy here, not for forever,” Frisk says, knowing Toriel would agree eventually. “And you aren’t either. You don’t have to shut out the world, mom!”

“What would I want from a world that would senselessly kill children?” Toriel snaps, flames growing larger. The pattern is full of holes though, showing how emotional she’s getting.

“A future for yourself! And I swear to be a part of it, if you’ll just let me show you how!” Frisk shouts, thinking of the beautiful home Toriel built for herself, of her dream of opening a school coming true, of every amazing year Frisk spent growing up with her.

Their future is far from this moment, but Frisk will get it all back. For her, for everyone, for themself!

Frisk chooses to SPARE.

-/-

The forest is so quiet. The warmth of their mother’s hug fades quickly in the cold of Snowdin’s weather, biting at the tips of Frisk’s fingers. Their striped sweater is the only thing preventing them from freezing solid.

Well. Now for the hard part.

They wave at Alphys’s camera in the bush, then set off at a brisk walk. The consequences of that action can’t catch them if they powerwalk fast enough. The crunch of snow under their boots is their only companion for a while, the noise swallowed by the dense foliage of the forest. Any encounter in this area will have to wait for them to doubleback, Frisk has to talk to someone first.

The sturdy stick lays across the snowy path. Frisk marches up to it and stomps purposefully, then pivoting in order to face the figure lurking in the shadows.

If Sans is surprised at the break in Script, he doesn’t show it. His expression doesn’t change even as he steps out of the shade of the trees, smile in place and posture casual.

He’s looking at them like he does on bad days.

“human,” he says, the word flat and exactly like the way he used to say it. Sans starts to take his hand out of his pocket. Frisk is already walking toward him. He extends his hand, not flinching at the way they’re speeding up. “heh, you sure know how to greet a new-”

Frisk slaps their palm against his and grips tightly, the whoopee cushion deflating so fast it’s like a gunshot in the quiet.

“I didn’t do this!” Frisk says emphatically. Their friend just stares at them. They waver a little, seeing the grief in the bruises under his sockets. “I didn’t reset on purpose. I swear, I have no idea what happened.”

“...you’re familiar with the ol’ whoopee cushion in the hand trick, huh?” Sans says, ignoring their words. “too bad. you seem enthusiastic about a classic either way.”

Frisk feels frustration well up in them. First Flowey, now Sans too. Can’t someone just believe them? “Sans, I’m telling the truth!”

“you’re already familiar with my name, too. great. we can just get on with things, then.” Sans’s grip on their hand gets tighter, his eyelights gone. “see, i’m a sentry who’s supposed to be on the lookout for humans like you-”

“Sans, please,” Frisk begs, wincing as boney fingers dig into their skin.

“-and while i like to take it pretty easy, my bro has been kinda on my ass to work harder at my job. be a little more proactive.”

“I didn’t do this, I promise I didn’t!”

“maybe i’ll start today.”

Frisk gasps as their SOUL turns blue, one knee buckling as they barely catch themself under the weight of the blue attack. They can feel the start of a battle on the edge of their awareness, the borders of it ready to snap into place the second either of them makes a move. Frisk keeps perfectly still, kneeling in the cold snow and meeting the empty gaze of their closest friend.

“I. Didn’t. Do this.” Frisk says each word through gritted teeth. Their lungs feel tight under the pressure of the attack, as well as their kneejerk panic of seeing Sans so angry.

“you expect me to believe that, kid?” Sans asks tonelessly. “we had a good run. but this is where it’s always gonna end up, right? you’re never gonna let us leave. not permanently.”

Frisk hears the sheer desolation in his voice. They’ve heard it only a few times over the years, when their friend let his defenses slip. The longer a loop plays out, the more he remembers of it next time. Every anniversary that passes adds to that potential recall.

Ten years is a long time.

Their lives are so good now. Frisk knows waking up in the Underground- it must have hurt him so deeply.

Frisk will fix this, somehow. They won’t force Sans to relive his future a second time. No more loops , they promised the final time they broke the barrier. Sans had smiled and said, sure, kid, and didn’t believe them.

Trust is so hard earned, and broken so easily.

Frisk forces their shaking legs to stand. The veil of a battle falls over them both. The blue attack is still coating their SOUL, making each movement heavy, but Frisk selects TALK and carefully chooses each word.

“Something is- wrong. With the file,” they say, desperate to defuse the situation but mentally preparing themself for an onslaught. “I was just going to reload back to where we were last night, but it’s gone. I don’t know what’s going on.”

They wait, sweat beading their forehead. Sans has them pinned and could zero out their HP with a blaster if he wanted. And since they didn’t SAVE anywhere, it would set everything back to the start.

Frisk doesn’t think either of them would handle that well.

A long, tense silence. Long enough Frisk starts to worry he’s using a special attack and just didn’t bother telling them this time.

At last, Sans chooses to TALK.

“say i believe you,” he says, eyelights coming back, “then what?”

He brings Frisk’s soul a little closer to his side. His hold isn’t quite as stifling anymore, easing up into a firm grip instead of a crushing one. Frisk stays still and lets him have the comfort of keeping control of the situation.

“Then we work together to figure out what went wrong,” they say, meaning each word. “Look at my stats to start with. There’s something wrong with them, too.”

They wait patiently as Sans takes his turn, feeling a brief ping in their SOUL as the check starts. His eyelights glance at something and he visibly pauses.

“huh,” he mumbles, staring. He releases Frisk and abruptly ends the battle, SPARING Frisk. Frisk ignores the drain of all the G in their inventory.

Frisk

LV  ??
HP  ??/??
G  0

“you been messin’ with spacetime, reality or something?” he asks with a small chuckle, only a little forced sounding.

“No more than usual,” Frisk replies, wiping their brow as they relax. Sans laughs a little more, before going quiet.

“...sorry, kid,” he says, shoulders hunching as he slouches. “i really jumped the gun on that one. wasn’t cool of me.” With just the two of them in the woods, he’s letting more of his exhaustion show than he otherwise would. Frisk watches the way he drags a hand over his face, pinching at the bridge between his sockets.

They can tell he’s more than just tired, from that gesture. He feels guilty, too. This is also familiar ground; their friend turning his turmoil inwards whenever they have a rough patch.

“It’s fine. I would have suspected me, too,” Frisk assures him. Their words just make Sans glance sideways at them, clearly disappointed.

“you don’t haveta take my shi- shoddy behavior, kid. i shoulda trusted you.”

“You’re trusting me now, that’s all I care about.” Frisk wrinkles their nose. “Also, you don’t have to censor yourself. I’m not actually a child.”

“pretty sure nineteen is still a teenager of some kind,” Sans teases. “‘sides. your mom would have my butt if she caught me swearing in front of you. best get into the habit now.”

“Undyne is gonna make that effort pointless.”

“undyne is also gonna get suplexed for it, so.”

They both pause to remember the time Toriel got tired of politely asking Undyne to stop swearing in front of ten-year-old Frisk.

“your mom’s a pretty rad lady,” Sans sighs.

“The raddest,” Frisk agrees. They stretch their arms above their head, sighing as something untenses in their back. A nine-year-old’s body is so much more elastic than an overly tired nineteen year old’s. They’ll miss having no kinks in their neck when they get back.

(Definitely not enough to want to stay, not even a little.)

“So! Papyrus, puzzles, and then dinner?” Frisk asks, judging with their internal clock for timeline events. Papyrus should be almost here as he searches for Sans, what with them delaying like they did. “I have a Spider Donut to keep me going until then, but I want real food while we brainstorm. Your treat.”

“figure i owe ya at least that much,” Sans sighs, like he ever pays for anything at Grillby’s, above or below ground. Whatever their arrangement for Sans’s tab is, it’s one of the mysteries Frisk has never been able to suss out, no matter how many loops they did.

They both perk up as a trousle starts approaching, the jaunty aura of their favorite cool guy coming up the path. Frisk grins, before smothering the expression into neutrality. They see Sans take on a perfectly casual posture and cheshire grin.

All the actors are in position. It’s showtime.

-/-

You blink at the light in your eyes.

You blink at the light…

You… blink…?

Kris blinks at the light in their eyes.

…They slowly sit up. By themself. They feel the soul in their chest, pulsing contentedly, but not even trying to take control of their motions.

A small field of golden flowers bloom around them, basking in the spotlight cast by a high up hole in the cavern’s ceiling. Ancient pillars line the room, vines growing up their stone. The air is warm from the distant sun, but musty from the age of this place.

Kris shifts, feeling the soft petals crush under their gauntlets. They look around themself- unnerved by how little resistance the soul is giving them.

Susie is asleep next to them. Ralsei is on their other side. Susie looks… off. Kris frowns as they realize the girl is dressed in her Dark World armor, but colored like she’s Aboveground. (But… then how is Ralsei here?)

They tug at their bangs, checking the color of themself. The dark brown of their hair means their skin under their armor is tan, not blue.

* Something is different.

Kris thinks the happy pulse of the soul is a bad sign of what’s to come.

Chapter Text

“Y’know, I’m getting a little tired of that Knight’s bullshit,” Susie announces to the cavern. “Couldn’t they wait until after the festival before trapping us in a Dark World again?” She claps Ralsei on the shoulder without looking at him. “At least we’ve got you right away this time, toothpaste boy.”

“Hahaha, yeah! At least we have that.” Ralsei seems more nervous than usual, eyes darting around the ruins they’ve landed in. “Not that I have any memory. At all. Of getting here.”

“Now you know how we felt,” Susie laughs as she starts to walk off. Kris and Ralsei hang back to exchange glances.

Do you know something? Ralsei’s look seems to ask. The question for once is actually aimed at Kris, and not someone else.

Kris gives the subtlest shake of their head they can. They have no idea where they are or how they got here. The soul in their chest has so far been completely passive; where Kris would usually have to strain their muscles and mind to move without its prompts, there’s… empty air.

Ralsei frowns, before smoothing the expression with his more typical cheer. He hurries to catch up to Susie, who is asking aloud why they’re lagging behind. Kris waits to see if the soul will take over, but it remains inert. They feel uneasy as they take their place at the front of their party, unused to the responsibility firsthand. The adventure pose they do with the party is familiar-unfamiliar movements; they notice their footing is wrong too late to fix it and hope no one saw.

This isn’t how things are supposed to go.

A short, dim hallway leads them into a room with another patch of sunlight; this one smaller than the other, and with only grass growing through the cracks of the stone floor. Kris- who isn’t used to having to actually stifle their own reactions anymore- jolts clumsily when a large yellow flower bursts from the grass. At least Susie and Ralsei startle just as badly.

“Howdy!” the darkner greets them, bouncing its petals. It falters for a second, gaze going past Kris- toward Ralsei?- then rallying itself. “You all seem a little lost. Why not ask your ol’ pal Flowey for some direction? That is… if you need it?”

The flower- Flowey- is looking right at Kris. Kris stares back, carefully expressionless. They have no idea why it’s singled them out. (That voice- where have they heard it before?) They wait for the soul to supply a response, but there’s still nothing. Susie talks instead.

“Uh, if you’re offering, then sure. Where are we? We kinda just… woke up here.” Susie scratches the back of her neck, a subtle way to prepare to draw her axe if needed. “Did you see who dropped us on those flowers back there? Like… a freaky knight or something?”

Flowey tilts its head, stem bending as it considers the question. It's still looking at Kris as it speaks. (Why does it feel familiar?)

“Hmmm… Nope, didn’t see any knights except for your human friend here,” it says. It perks up suddenly. “But I did see another human! They just left the Ruins- which is where you are, by the way. Are they your friend too?”

Ralsei makes a funny choking noise, covered by Susie exclaiming loudly, “Another human? In the Dark World?”

“The what world?” Flowey asks back, tone losing its cheery helpfulness for a second. Its attention is on Susie and Ralsei now, scrutinizing them.

“The Dark World? Y’know, the place we are?” Susie repeats. She elbows Ralsei. “C’mon, tell him. If we weren’t in one, you wouldn’t be here, right Ralsei?”

“I- well- it does feel like one,” Ralsei stutters. He glances around them, uncertain. “You’re right that I wouldn’t have appeared with you if we weren’t, but…”

Something is different. The ominous words the soul said before going silent… Kris knows they’re true. This place isn’t a normal Dark World.

“You’re a little old to be playing pretend games,” Flowey says somewhat derisively. Kris is having déjà vu for certain- that annoyed tone, they’ve heard it before…

“Anyway!” Flowey says, ignoring Susie’s outrage at its comment. “I helped that other human, so of course I’ll help you too! The Underground has a special greeting for everyone who comes here, and I want to share it with you all.”

A small array of white dots manifest around it, shaped like sunflower seeds. “These are friendliness pellets, we give them to new friends. Would you like some?”

The direct prompt for a response- it still doesn’t elicit a reaction from the soul. Kris has waited this whole conversation for it to interject, but it’s just sitting in their chest. The only thing they’re getting from it are subtle emotions… Which, it’s never done that before either…

Kris is so focused on mentally prodding the soul, they miss Susie accepting the gift from Flowey. As they look up, there’s barely a split second for them to raise their hand to catch the pellet headed for their chest.

It goes right through their palm, leaving a bloody hole as it exits and dissipates.

Kris flinches at the pained shout from Susie, eyes darting to their party. Ralsei is shaken, but unhurt. The attack missed him. Susie is clutching her arm close, teeth bared as blood drips through her clenched fingers.

Flowey is laughing at them. Wild and raucous, it sounds like a warped version of a laugh Kris has heard before many times… Throughout their whole life, in fact.

Their words get caught in their throat and won’t come out, but their lips silently form the name attached to that laughter.

Asriel?

The little flower even has his dumb crooked fangs their family couldn’t afford to fix with braces. The left canine juts more outward than the right.

I’m seeing things, Kris tries to tell themself, but they don’t believe it.

“You’re so stupid!” laughs Flowey. “But maybe I should say careless instead. Didn’t your parents teach you to be wary of other monsters’ magic?” He looks at Kris again. “Or do you just not care to be?”

“You’re not a darkner,” Ralsei says suddenly, quiet at first, but loud as he repeats, “You’re not a darkner! What are you? Where are we?”

“What’s a darkner? I’m just a friendly little flower, here to make sure fools like you understand how this world works.” Vines begin to slither out from under the floor tiles, thorny and thick, while Flowey’s stem extends so he looms over the three of them. “In this world, it’s kill or be killed.” A ring of pellets appear around their whole group, and Flowey grins with too many teeth for his small face.

Kris puts aside their trepidation about Flowey’s identity, more focused on the obvious issue at hand. Seriously. What the hell is this guy’s problem?

“What the hell is this guy’s problem?!” Susie shouts, echoing Kris’s silent ire. She summons her axe and slams its blade into the ground, snarling at Flowey. “If you wanna fight, just say so!”

Kris draws their sword a beat late, the battle starting at Susie’s command instead of the soul’s. Ralsei and Susie are already in their places, ready to make a move; hopefully neither saw Kris’s stumble.

“Hey, hey wait, what is this supposed to be?” Flowey stops them, staring around at the staging of the fight. He whips his head around to glare at Kris again. “What the heck kind of fight is this? And you’re all ganging up on me too? Talk about rude!”

Kris exchanges confused glances with Susie and Ralsei. They all lower their weapons and pause the battle. “Do you… need us to walk you through how battles work?” Susie asks awkwardly.

Flowey puffs up in offense, apparently mad enough that his pellet attack disappears. “I know how to battle! You’re the ones doing it wrong! The human is supposed to face me one on one with their soul first, then I fight one of you when I defeat them.”

“Why would I just stand here and let you beat up my friends?” Susie asks, glaring at Flowey like he’s dumb.

“That’s how it works! You- ugh, nevermind!” Flowey ends the battle and shrinks back down to his normal size. “This isn’t even entertaining anymore. Whatever game you’re playing with that other human, keep me out of it. Seeya never.”

He sinks into the patch of grass and disappears. Kris sheathes their sword, seeing nothing else they’re supposed to do here. A handful of unfamiliar currency appears in their inventory.

“Well that was weird. And a waste of time.” Susie lets her axe disappear, dusting her hands despite the short battle. “Hey Ralsei, that guy was confused or something, right? You literally couldn’t be here if we weren't in a Dark World.”

Ralsei is pensive as he nods. “No, I couldn’t… I don’t know what’s going on. If that wasn’t a darkner, I don’t know what he is. He didn’t really feel like a lightner either.”

“You ever met a monster like that before, Kris?” Susie asks. “I haven’t.”

Kris doesn’t bother waiting for the soul to reply, shaking their head silently. Their throat feels too tight to speak right now. The flower… thing, has unnerved them. The fight was too fast for them to even try checking his stats.

The fact that Flowey speaks in a younger version of their brother’s voice… Kris doesn’t know what to think.

‘Let’s go deeper,’ they sign slowly to their party. They haven’t tried signing to Susie before, and they’re relieved when she seems to understand. Kris just assumes Ralsei will know already.

“No sense in lingering around here,” Ralsei agrees, and they all decide to put the strange encounter aside for now. There won’t be more answers found in this empty room.

The next room is a large entry hall, with twin stairways on either side of it. A glowing SAVE point illuminates the red leaves scattered around the area, flickering as Kris approaches it. They reach for it, caressing the heatless light.

They see the file savescreen in their mind, overlaying the world for a moment. Kris pauses as they read the text.

Frisk     LV ??    ???:???

Ruins - Entrance

❤ Save     Return

The other human… They can see the save points, too. Kris hasn’t ever known anyone else to have access to this part of the world. They wonder if the human knows the same things they do.

(Is this human also-?)

Kris overwrites the existing file with their own and SAVES.

????    LV 4    ???:???

Ruins - Entrance

❤ Save     Return

* The bookends will meet in the middle… This shelf is out of order.

* HP fully restored.

The hole in their hand heals over and the gauntlet is patched up like new. Kris flexes their fist, metal clinking faintly. So long as the SOUL avoids being hit, their HP stays full. While they can’t feel the damage their body takes in the Dark World, it’s inconvenient to drip blood wherever they walk. 

Susie doesn’t seem to suffer that minor issue, all her injuries being bloodless so long as it's during a fight. It probably has something to do with her soul being her own, and not… something else’s.

Speaking of: Kris is wary of the glitched out file name. Is it because they’re the one who made the SAVE, rather than the soul? It might not be able to register both their inputs at the same time and gave up trying. Kris lingers an extra minute in front of the save point, waiting to see if the soul panics and tries to fix the glitch.

Nothing. Kris briefly sneers before turning on their heel and marching away.

The Ruins are silent as they walk further on. They only encounter one more battle, bumping into a Froggit. It doesn’t seem to recognize Kris or Susie at all, only croaking at them rather than speaking. It visibly startles at how the battle is laid out, just like Flowey did.

“Do you think we’ll get in trouble if we fight your neighbor?” Susie asks Kris while she crosses her arms for extra defence.

‘I won’t tell if you don’t,’ Kris signs at her, suppressing a slight smirk when she laughs. Kris and Ralsei both prepare their defenses, ready for whatever Froggit does next.

Kris feels a check ping the soul, which is still ignoring everything happening. The Froggit’s eyes bulge and it somehow goes even paler than it was.

It abruptly flees the battle, so fast that the currency they win is left scattered on the floor.

Kris hadn’t even bothered with a check of their own; another attempt to bait the soul into behaving properly by blatantly ignoring a step of the fight. They have no idea why the Froggit got so scared.

“Maybe it was just too intimidated by how cool we are,” Susie jokes lamely, stooping to pick up the gold coins. She clearly wants to move on from how frightened their opponent was, going by her tone, so Kris decides to let it go.

“That wasn’t a darkner either… What are all these lightners doing here?” Ralsei mumbles to himself. He looks again at Kris, who shakes their head more firmly this time. His suspicion is warranted, but Kris genuinely has no idea what’s going on.

The rest of the journey is uninterrupted; they scarcely catch a glimpse of monsters fleeing the room whenever they enter. All the puzzles they encounter are already solved, too. The doors of every passage are left wide open. The only momentary issue is a spiked walkway over water, which doesn’t have any specific indicators of how to cross safely.

“You’re gonna hurt yourself,” Kris mutters to Susie, who has gotten impatient searching the blank walls and is tapping the spikes with her boot. The trap is definitely enchanted to be sharper than normal…

“The soles are thick, it’s fine- FUCK!” Susie yanks her foot back, hopping on one leg and shaking the other. A few droplets of blood spatter the stone flooring, much to Ralsei’s distress.

Kris doesn’t even have to say anything, allowing themself to indulge in a narrow-eyed smirk. Susie flips them off while Ralsei heals her. “What’s your plan to get across then, smartass?”.

Kris wordlessly unsheathes their sword and starts stabbing until a set of spikes depresses.

Susie grumbles the whole way across.

There’s a single bright spot in the gloom that’s overtaken the Ruins, when they happen upon a room full of cobwebs and… baked sweets? Given how every monster has fled at the sight of them, they’re short on G and can’t technically afford the treats. The solution is somewhat unscrupulous.

“Put it back, we can’t pay!” Ralsei hisses.

“We left double the amount in dark dollars, it’s fine,” Susie argues, scooping up three Spider Ciders and Donuts.

“We have no idea what the conversion rate is here, this is basically just stealing and wasting our money!”

“I can’t hear you over the sound of how good this shit tastes. Kris, you want in or are you gonna-?”

Kris, having not eaten since the diner hangout with Susie or the chocolate milk at Noelle’s house, shoves the entire donut into their mouth. The stupid soul never bothers to feed them unless someone directly prompts it to eat, so they’re starving all the time lately. Dark World food might not count, but it helps psychologically at least a little…

Except, the donut settles heavy in their stomach, the dense and delicious texture of the royal icing lingering on their tongue. Kris marvels for a moment at the sensation of being full after three days of skimming on leftovers at night. (The soul pulses softly, a faint feeling of apology coming through.)

“Fuck yeah that’s a good donut,” Susie agrees. She hands Kris a cup of cider, intentions clear in her eyes.

They pour the cider into each other’s mouths. It’s awesome.

Ralsei calls them both thieves and refuses to eat his share. Kris tucks the treats away in their inventory, signing that they make no promises about not eating it themself.

-/-

They find a set of stairs that takes them above the long halls of the Ruins. Stretching out into the darkness, the sight of a desolate city is barely visible in the directionless light.

Kris glances at the railing of the balcony, seeing the sheer drop downwards to the empty street below. They idly wonder if the soul would stop them if they tried to climb over.

“We could make that jump,” Susie remarks, also looking down. “Pretty sure the fall from Queen’s rollercoaster was higher.”

“We also had trashheaps to catch us then, Susie,” Ralsei reminds her.

“Sure, but me an’ Kris jump from way higher every time we come visit you. We’d totally be fine, and even if we weren’t, me n’ you could heal us!”

Kris mumbles, “Broken bones don’t count if you can unbreak them right after.”

Ralsei puffs up, stomping his foot. “We are not jumping off of balconies and that is final.”

“Lame,” Kris and Susie say, mostly to bug him (Susie), a little bit out of disappointment (Kris).

Their party should probably be more preoccupied with whatever fallen civilization once inhabited these Ruins, but honestly? They have more interesting things to think about. Like whether this Dark World is another version of the church’s; they’ve seen a few Deltarune motifs worked into the infrastructure so far… But why would the Knight have brought them there again? They already got what they needed from it.

(Kris eyes the innocuous spot of perfectly normal stone tile as they descend from the balcony. For whatever reason, it feels like something was supposed to be lying there.)

-/-

There is a house inside the Ruins.

It’s Kris’s house.

In a funhouse, scrapbook kind of way… this is their house. Pieces of it reassembled into a new shape, but their house nonetheless. Suddenly, they can’t maintain the veneer of distance from this adventure like they have for all the others. Kris feels their physical heart start to beat faster, while the metaphysical one stays infuriatingly calm.

What the actual fuck is going on. This wasn’t in the plan, this wasn’t even in the prophecy. Kris has no idea what’s going on and it’s now too real to keep cool about it.

Susie looks just as unnerved to see the interior of Kris’s home like this. Ralsei, who has managed to contain his anxiety for the most part thus far, is tightly gripping the ends of his sleeves, claws pulling the fabric.

“Are we inside your house again?” Susie asks quietly, eyes scanning the out of place staircase in the center of the home.

“No, this world is different from that one,” Ralsei corrects her. “It feels like somewhere else entirely… But I don’t know where. I haven’t been able to sense the doorway connecting it to Castletown.”

Kris is barely listening to them. They’re straining their ears for something else.

A clatter comes from the far left. Kris is striding towards it before they’ve processed the impulse, the feeling not unlike when they’re piloted by the soul.  has nothing to do with the urgency they’re feeling right now; moving straight past the fireplace (unfamiliar), the chariel (they spent many nights curled up there, reading with their parents-), the table set for only three (where’s Kris’s seat-?).

Kris swings around the corner and enters the kitchen, startling Toriel into almost dropping her mixing bowl.

“Mom,” Kris says breathlessly, throat closing up after that single word. What is she doing here? Undyne was taken in her place, the plan has changed, Toriel doesn’t have to be involved anymore-

Toriel is staring at them with confusion.

“Young one… do I know you?” she asks, shifting into a wary stance.

What?

What? What? Huh?

I’m dreaming, Kris thinks, then dismisses the thought. She hit her head? But she looks uninjured, baking a pie like normal. Something is different. The soul feels giddy.

“Ms. Toriel?!” Susie shouts past Kris’s ear, her and Ralsei skidding to a stop next to them. Toriel’s wariness evaporates upon seeing them.

“Asriel?” she gasps, tears springing into her eyes. Kris has no time to react as they’re shoved aside, knocking into Susie as Toriel pushes both of them away. She picks up Ralsei and cradles him close, letting out a strangled sob.

“My baby, oh my baby, Azzy you came back to me,” Toriel whimpers into Ralsei’s fur. She starts crying in earnest, holding the dark prince with all the love of a mother missing her child.

“Um- no, ma’am- oh please stop crying,” Ralsei stutters, patting her wide shoulders. He casts a desperate look at Kris.

Kris is somewhere to the left of their own body. There is ringing in their ears, getting louder. Their mother is kneeling on the floor and crying, calling the name of her son, and she doesn’t know who Kris is.

Toriel doesn’t know who they are.

Something has been done to her.

Kris is going to kill Carol Holiday.

(They were promised she’d be safe, they were promised no real harm would ever come to their mother. Kris charged Tenna with protecting Toriel just in case. The deal was no one would hurt Toriel, and they LIED.)

“Kris, Kris you have to breathe!” Ralsei shouts in their face, shaking their shoulders. Kris processes that the darkner had shoved Toriel off of him and gone to Kris instead, worry writ in large font across his face.

Kris exhales a sharp breath as Susie punches their side, shocked into inhaling again after. A garbled noise comes out of their mouth, barely resembling actual words. They think they’re about to start screaming.

“It’s okay, we’ll fix this together, I promise we will, it’ll be fine,” Ralsei comforts them, repeating the soothing words as he lets Kris grab at his robes. If they let go they’ll fall through the floor and keep falling forever. “Deep breaths, you’re okay, no one is falling, you’re gonna be okay…”

“They- her,” Kris says nonsensically. They hurt her, they hurt their mom, they promised nothing would actually happen to her- they as in the others, they as in Kris-

It’s their fault, they made a deal, it’s all their fault

“Is the human alright?” Toriel’s voice asks, a stranger asking about an accident they happen to pass by. Kris is embarrassed to find their next gasp for air makes them start crying.

“Lady, I’m only gonna ask one more time. Give us some space.”

Susie has put herself between them and their mom now. She’s bristling like she’s gearing up for a fight, overlarge fangs all bared as she growls.

“This is my house,” Toriel sniffs.

Susie doesn’t bother speaking, letting her ripcord snarl say everything she means. Kris can feel it in their bones even as Ralsei ushers them away from the standoff.

That’s my mom, be nice, Kris wants to sign, but can’t convince their fingers to unlatch from Ralsei’s clothes.

Ralsei sits them down on the stairway together, far enough from the kitchen that any voices are muffled. It feels humiliating, being unable to wrestle their body’s reactions back under their control. Kris hadn’t realized until this moment how much the soul’s presence has dulled their reactions. It feels like trying to stem a flood where it used to be a trickle.

Their chest heaves with stifled sobs, their face is tacky and probably scrunched up and red. The initial sweeping panic has ebbed, now the aftershocks won’t stop making their breaths shake.

“Kris?” Ralsei asks tentatively. “Do you want a hug?”

The soul has made Kris hug Ralsei a few times before. This is the first time they initiate one for themself. Ralsei is soft like a downy comforter, his fur barely wiry against Kris’s cheek. His form is small enough to tuck up against Kris’s side, barely mindful of the armor they’re wearing as he squeezes them.

He smells the same as he has before: like their childhood blankets in the back of the linen cupboard.

Kris is reminded of home, though where they are couldn’t be further from it.

Susie finds them as Kris is trying to keep Ralsei from wiping their tear tracks with his scarf. She gives them a onceover, frowning deeply at the state Kris has worked themself into. “You feeling better?” she asks gruffly.

‘If I say no, do I get a Susie hug?’ Kris asks, deflecting from the sincerity of the situation.

“As if!” Susie says. She sighs. “Listen, whatever’s going on here… We’re gonna figure out how to fix it. Like Ralsei said, we’ll do it together. So you don’t gotta freakout again, alright?”

Kris feels themself flush. Guess they should have known one joke wouldn’t get Susie off their back; she’s too… good.

‘I’ll do my best,’ they sign, jabbing the motions to emphasize their annoyance.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Susie starts to say, but Kris waves her off. They know, they just can’t stand talking any more about it.

“Should we go clear up the misunderstanding?” Ralsei suggests, looking to Kris. “If you’re not up for it, we can do it ourselves.”

Kris stands instead of answering, scrubbing their face roughly. They viciously shove all their emotions into a box and clear their expression. They’re fine, obviously. This is probably their mess anyway, it’s only fair they help clean it up.

(They try not to think about how, through their whole breakdown… the soul had felt excited.)

Chapter Text

The bedroom smells like house dust.

No doubt Toriel has been keeping it clean, but still. The smell of disuse lingers on the carpet, the mattress… the stuffed toys. This bedroom has been empty for a long time.

Susie is snoring away on the floor, a few feet from Kris. Ralsei got bullied into using the small bed by her; Kris had just laid down on the blankets Toriel folded for them and refused to move. Kris is fairly certain the darkner has finally drifted off, even if he’d protested in a whisper that he doesn’t need to sleep, really!

Kris doesn’t especially care if he’s sleeping or not. They aren’t either.

Kris has been staring into the darkness of the room for hours, ever since Toriel shuffled them off to bed. The wall they’re facing hasn’t offered any solutions to the problems at hand: this world is maybe, possibly, probably not their own. And they have no idea how they got here, or how to get home.

They’d tried, initially, to gently probe Toriel with questions. Test how extensive her memory loss was. Kris had stuttered through a few words and then switched to handsigns, unable to maintain their voice. They’d stared at the floor as they signed, awkward and a little afraid.

‘Your name is Toriel, you were married to Asgore Dremurr, you have a son named Asriel. You adopted me when I was a baby. My name is Kris.’

Kris didn’t get further than that, when Toriel had put a paw over their hands to stop them and make them look up. Kris had jolted when she did, shocked that their hands were silenced that way.

“I’m sorry, young one,” Toriel had said, “I don’t know the hand language you are speaking. Could we try communicating a different way?”

Susie had started to snap at Toriel for the action, but Kris stopped her. It didn’t matter. After their meltdown, Kris didn’t really have the energy to continue explaining anyway. They shifted the responsibility onto their team and just listened the rest of the conversation.

Toriel listened patiently to the whole explanation… from Susie and Ralsei. The details of the Dark World were omitted, as well as Ralsei’s title of Prince, but the rest was simply the truth of who they were. In the end, Toriel had taken a break to make them all tea and sat them at the table, fetching a spare stool for herself to sit on. She also brought out a photo album.

“My name is indeed Toriel, and I was married to a monster named Asgore. We had a son named Asriel, once, but as for an adopted human child…” She’d turned the album around for them to see, pointing to one of many photos. “…This is Chara. They passed the same time as Asriel.”

Kris had stared and stared at the photos, when the album was given to them. Pale, with rosy cheeks, smiling mischievously. Tawny hair with a yellow flower crown. Cuddled close to Asriel, seemingly the same age.

Red eyes. That’s all they shared with the human Chara.

Kris saw their family, without them. And they were happy.

Kris has laid awake wondering if that means anything. Could it have been any human, then? Did it matter that it was Kris their parents picked to love? Or could it have been any of the other children posted for adoption the year they were born.

The question is unanswerable.

Susie’s breathing hitches. Kris holds even more still than they have been. They hear the monster girl groan and roll over in her sleep.

Susie is taking in stride most of what the conversation revealed. Or at least is trying to. Toriel had gone on to ask how a human and two monsters came to be friends, and when they (Susie and Kris) told her of their hometown, she’d been surprised. In this world, monsters have been exiled to the Underground.

Monsters have always been a smaller population than humans, this Kris knows. Their long lives make their civilization move at a slower pace, expanding less quickly than human ones. But to whittle it down to such a small size, that it could be trapped inside a single cave system…

The thought is too depressing to think deeply about.

Ralsei had tentatively asked if there were plans to escape the Underground. (He’d been obviously somewhat rattled by how similar he and the dead prince were, but Kris just. Didn’t have the space to ask about it.)

Toriel told them of Asgore’s plan. This is when Susie’s bravado faltered.

Kris, holding the album still, had stared at a smiling photo of their father and thought of blood on his paws.

“Any human that falls down here will be hunted, mercilessly,” Toriel had told them, grief and anger exaggerating the wrinkles in the corners of her eyes. Wrinkles Kris’s mother doesn’t have. “Every child I have allowed to leave these ruins… none have ever survived. I fear the human child that left just before you arrived will meet a similar fate.”

Kris is still struggling to comprehend ‘oh my god, my dad is murdering children’ as well as ‘and my mom sent him ANOTHER??’. They could see the same reactions on Susie and Ralsei’s faces at the time.

(“Dude,” Susie had whispered, heartfelt.

‘No,’ Kris had signed firmly. They are not even going to try approaching that right now.)

And then Toriel had turned to Kris had asked if they had any younger human siblings, because the previous human looked very similar to them. Similar enough to be family.

-/-

Kris can’t contain their anxious energy any longer and finally surrenders, getting up from their bedding and leaving the bedroom. Neither of their party members stir when they open the door.

The bathroom of the Ruins Home is small for a monster Toriel’s size, but roomy for a human like Kris. They use the toilet and then wash their hands, taking the time to splash their face and drag their bangs out of the way. Their dampened hair slicks back, giving clear vision of their tired red eyes.

There’s a slight glow in the back of their sclera, only visible in pitch darkness. It’s probably why they don’t struggle in low lighting. Kris’s childhood pediatrician told them it could indicate monster heritage somewhere far back in their bio family. As a kid, that was a comfort. To be more like their adopted family.

But it could also be a random mutation; more likely to be one, even. They have no other indicators of monstrous heritage, after all. No unusual teeth, tails, or even pointed ears. No horns.

It’s more a taunt than anything else these days.

Does the other human have red eyes? Kris wonders before they can help it. They frown minutely, then smoothing the expression. No need to give the soul any more ideas of their moods than they already have today.

The stupid thing made them sit through the whole talk with Toriel, and then the evening dinner on top of that, without interjecting a single time. Kris hates half of what it makes them say, but for once they would have preferred it take over. They’d forgotten how frustrating it is to be around someone who isn’t accustomed to their muteness. Someone who doesn’t know even basic signs.

…They can’t lie that it doesn’t hurt, coming from someone who looks so much like their mom. Who is their mom, just not in this universe. Timeline. Whatever is going on here.

It doesn’t help that Kris can tell they make Toriel… uncomfortable. The insane sounding story wasn’t even the thing to do it, no- it’s the armor, and probably Kris’s age.

Look, they know they’re not a cute little human pup anymore. Puberty made them all angles, with shoulders broader than the muscles strung on them, legs that are knobby, fingers closer to spiders. The armor at least makes their gaunt body seem athletic instead of awkward. Maybe even sort of heroic in the right darkness [and if you’re lying]. But the second Kris had taken off most of their Dark World outfit, she’d visibly become more relaxed.

A devastating war with humans… one that Toriel was alive to see… Kris can only guess what phantoms the old queen sees in their place.

But a human child is fine! Nothing to be scared of at all.

Kris has been wrestling with the weird jealousy they felt, hearing how endeared Toriel clearly is to the child they knew for one day. And then let run off to go get murdered! It’s dumb and definitely not something to focus on, but for whatever reason, hearing this alternate Toriel speak fondly of another human kid made them… a little territorial.

Kris had tried to keep that out of their reactions over dinner, but from the somewhat concerned glances Ralsei threw them, they probably didn’t succeed.

The soul throbs with an emotion Kris knows isn’t their own, and staunchly refuses to recognize as ‘sympathy’. Because that would mean it’s invaded even their thoughts, and no, they need at least that privacy, or else everything will fall apart too fast--

They’ve stood for several minutes, basically having a staring contest with the mirror. Neither their reflection or the soul is going to blink first, so Kris gives up. It was a half-hearted bait anyway.

They open the door to the hall and nearly slap Ralsei in surprise. Luckily, the darkner has good reflexes when he needs.

“Are you alright?” he asks in a whisper, like he didn’t just scare a year off Kris’s life. “Um. Also, sorry, I thought you heard me knock.”

“…You use the bathroom?” Kris asks, genuinely curious. Didn’t the guy tell them recently he’s never eaten before? Or was that just cake.

Ralsei huffs, probably blushing in the dark. “No. I was just coming to check on you. Today was a lot… and you didn’t come back, so… I was worried?”

He says it like an apology. Kris knows they can be a bit prickly, and things between them are definitely sort of weird, but they don’t dislike Ralsei. He’s as caught up in all this as they are. They have their roles in the prophecy, everyone has to play their part. It’s not his fault.

…They can usually remember that, anyway.

It’s impossible to be actually upset with the princeling. Even if he represents a lot of ideals Kris can’t ever achieve, he’s a nice guy. They can’t be friends, but they at least shouldn’t have to walk on eggshells around each other.

So, they make the effort to say, “Thanks. ‘was just… washing my face, got lost in thought. We can go back to bed now.”

As they move past him to start walking back to the room, Ralsei’s dull claws catch on their wrist.

“Kris, your soul… why haven’t they…?” His glasses are even harder to see past in the dim hall, but Kris knows his expression would probably be one of confusion, edging on fear.

Kris sighs a heavy breath. This is why they can’t be friends. Because Ralsei doesn’t actually want them, in the end.

“Dunno,” they mumble, trying to hold onto their altruism. It’s late though, and they’ve had a bit of a shit day. They pull their arm away and don’t look back.

Susie has stopped snoring when they enter the bedroom. Kris doesn’t have to check to see why, heading to their folded comforters and lying down.

“Hey, Kris,” Susie asks, whispering badly. Kris glances at the shape of her in the dark, listening. “Why did Ralsei look so much like the little kid version of your brother?”

(Susie has said a few times that she’s not very smart. Kris personally thinks overwise. She sees the outline of things, if not the center. It might be enough to find the truth anyway.)

“Dunno,” Kris repeats, adding one more lie to the pile they’ve told. They turn over and shut their eyes. “Goodnight.”

They wait for Susie to push for a better answer, but she doesn’t, thankfully. Ralsei comes back a little bit later and crawls clumsily into his bed, like he’s never slept in one before. The three of them lay awake and pretend to be sleeping for as long as it takes Kris to actually drift off.

-/-

Frisk would love to still be asleep, but they hadn’t felt it was fair to make Sans get up by himself in the middle of the night. So, even though it’s been over an hour already, they’re waiting on the couch, wrapped up in the burrito of blankets Papyrus gave them. It’s cozy, but also makes it hard to keep their little kid body awake.

So, they made coffee. Which tastes terrible. Children really do hate bitter things, and Frisk is not exception at this moment. The cream and sugar barely make it drinkable, so they can only force themself to sip every so often.

Today was long, but good. Like feeling the creases of a well-loved book, Frisk got to revisit everything they love about Snowdin. They managed to keep the fear and sadness of their situation from tainting that. Frisk stuck to the old script perfectly, with the exception of booking a room at the Inn for the night. Sans had nudged them toward his house instead when everyone started to head home from Grillby’s.

Papyrus has been a delightful host, of course. A fully decked out ‘sleepover worthy’ couch for them to sleep on, pre-emptive midnight spaghetti left in the fridge if they get hungry, and a promise of a three-course breakfast tomorrow morning when he gets up… At 5am.

Frisk pretends to not see the digital display on the DVD player stating 3:14 AM. They’ve done worse hours for college finals.

Damn, but kids sure get eepy, they think with minor frustration, blinking through a wave of sleepiness. They’re so tired they don’t even flinch when Sans appears from nowhere during that blink.

“pretty sure that’s bad for growing kids, kid,” he says, stealing Frisk’s mug. Because he’s an evil, evil bone man and has no compassion. “hey now, i resemble that remark.”

“Just gimme the details, funny guy,” Frisk grumbles. Sans sips his stolen coffee and drops a pile of paper on their lap. The light from the kitchen is just enough to see a solid blue line and unclear writing printed on the top page.

“Where did you go to get this from?” Frisk asks, curious.

“true lab. lucky me, alph never actually got around to cleaning out the older rooms. there’s dust like an inch thick, but everything still works fine.”

Frisk hasn’t ever tried to mess with the outmoded tech they know is spread through the True Lab. They’ll have to take his word for it. Freeing their hands from the Confines of Comfort, they try to flip through the stack, finding it to be one of those accordion printouts that spills off their lap and onto the floor in one long zigzag.

The blue line from the first page just keeps going, straight through the middle of all the others following. The stack is three inches thick; the line is the only thing printed, with the exception of ☟︎⚐︎💧︎❄︎ 👎︎⚐︎💣︎✌︎✋︎☠︎🖳︎ ✌︎☹︎🏱︎☟︎✌︎ ❄︎✋︎💣︎☜︎☹︎✋︎☠︎☜︎📬︎ ❄︎✌︎☼︎☝︎☜︎❄︎🖳︎ ☼︎☜︎💧︎☜︎✌︎☼︎👍︎☟︎♉︎✌︎💧︎💧︎✋︎💧︎❄︎♉︎💧︎📂︎ at the top of the first page. Frisk strains their eyes to make sense of the gibberish and gets a slight twinge in their skull for their trouble.

“I think your printer’s busted,” Frisk announces.

“i think your file is busted,” Sans corrects. He’s smiling, but sounds distinctly unhappy. He produces another same-size stack of paper from his pocket (how? Sans shenanigans) and drops it on top of the previous printout. Frisk flops it open and immediately sees the difference: the second printout has dozens of branching multi-color lines, that start and stop all along the blue line.

“this one’s from tonight,” Sans points at the lone blue line, “and this one is from two days ago in this timeline,” he taps the busier printout. He takes a sedate gulp of his coffee, before adding, “aborted or otherwise, we should be seeing here all the paths you’ve taken or could take. but we ain’t and i dunno know what that means.”

“But you can guess?” Frisk asks, pensive.

He shrugs. “i’d guess it’s a sign something’s more broken than we thought. you said you still haven’t saved yet, right?”

“Yeah. I didn’t want to make something permanent if we still had a chance to go back.”

Frisk’s words seem to make Sans’s smile tighter for a beat, but he covers it quickly with a long gulp of coffee, finishing it off. “right. good plan up to now, but i doubt it’ll benefit us long term. better you go back to saving regularly while i keep investigating.”

“I can help?” Frisk offers immediately. “I’ll make a new save point in town tomorrow, then we can go over all of Snowdin again together. See if we missed something today.”

“good an idea as any… might even want to do that for every area. jeez, you’re gonna have me do a year’s worth of walking...” Sans sighs and starts to make his way to the kitchen, where Frisk left the coffeepot warm for him.

“We could talk to Papyrus?” Frisk suggests, making her friend pause. His silhouette casts a long shadow across the floor. “C’mon. You know he’ll probably have some insight into where we should be looking for answers.”

“...only after we try everything else,” Sans says grudgingly. He ducks deeper into the kitchen, throwing over his shoulder, “i don’t wanna involve him if we don’t have to.”

“He’s not a kid, he can handle it,” Frisk chides. A blanket telekinetically throws itself over their head and they squeak in offense.

“but you are, so what i say goes,” Sans replies smugly.

It’s too late as well as early to have a big argument about who to bring into the fold. Not that either of them is an especially forthcoming person about their unique relationships with spacetime. But sometimes, you have to call for help, and Frisk knows their family will always answer.

…Maybe not right now, but give Frisk another week to re-befriend everyone and then they will.

Frisk decides to settle for sticking their tongue out at Sans’s general direction. They laugh when another blanket gets dropped on their head.

“go to sleep, kid,” Sans tells them on his way by, kitchen lights now turned off. He snags both the printouts with his magic as he goes, refolding them neatly.

“I’m going, I’m going.” They return themself to the warm embrace of the blanket burrito, laying down with a relieved sigh. The coffee only delayed the inevitable backslide into sleepiness, and their eyes burn with the need to close them.

They can feel Sans’s gaze on them through the darkness. Frisk waves cheekily before rolling over and giving into exhaustion.

Sans watches the kid, a little envious of how quick they are to pass out. He can feel that his insomnia has sunk its claws deep into his bones already; there’s no timeline where he sleeps tonight. He leaves in a silent jump between spaces, not wanting to disturb his brother or their houseguest.

The workshop has great soundproofing, so he doesn’t need to worry about making too much noise. Unfurling the two printouts to their full length in the air, Sans takes one more glance at what he’s already spent too long staring at, anxiety worsening with every minute.

He’d reset the parameters of the search several times. Cleaned the old clunker’s circuits by hand. Turned it off and on again. The timeline still only shows as this eerie, isolated stripe of color, no matter which person Sans targets with it.

In the end, he admitted defeat and printed it out.

Frisk hadn’t seemed too dismayed by the discovery, but Sans knows the kid is a tough nut. They don’t crack under pressure easily. Sipping his black coffee- and wishing for a frothy takeout latte he doesn’t have access to anymore- he again weighs the chances of this being a new level of manipulation.

Frisk is acting like Frisk, the person he’s seen grow and change as they got older. Maybe a bit more immature than usual, but that can be blamed on the younger body they’re inhabiting. They seem genuine in their emotions whenever the two of them have had a private moment to discuss things. They’re… probably telling the truth.

But he’s been burned before by believing too soon. Hundreds of times they’d been on the surface for months, and then he’d wake up back in his Snowdin bedroom. Those resets were always the most painful. At least when he died, those memories would eventually meld into all the others like them. The memories he keeps from pacifistic timelines stay with him in painful clarity.

Sans wants to trust Frisk. He has to, or he might give into the desire to lie down in his bedroom and never get back up.

He is a weak monster. Going back to the resets would break him, for good.

Sans breathes through the crushing emotion and closes his sockets, picturing the thing that will get him through this. His brother’s RV, parked for the night and all the windows open to let the breeze through. Pap sleeping on the big bed in the bedroom, Sans stretched across the pullout in the dining area. Asriel quietly reading from his big planter box on the window, the special nightlight Papyrus got him for his birthday flickering like a candlelight.

All three of them, several thousand miles away from the Underground. This is where Sans had found peace.

He’s willing to go the long way around to get back to that, but before he resigns himself to living through ten years again (yikes), he’ll try fixing whatever sent them back to this point in the first place.

He gives the printouts a final baleful look over and then flicks them away, collapsing their lengths and storing them inside the first locking draw of his work counter. He turns to the tarp covered machine against the wall.

Welp. He’s already mangled it once, and if the timeline resets again it’ll be undone anyway. The old sensor might as well get a chance to fulfill at least one of the tasks he’s assigned it.

He drops a couple items from his inventory onto the counter, shrugging off his hoodie to lay it beside them. It’s a collection of older lab equipment he doubts Alphys even knew she had; if she ever looked in that particular closet, he would imagine her eyes slid over the storage boxes without fully processing their existence. Tools and possessions belonging to the previous Royal Scientist tend to be treated as such.

The device he’s got half-planned in his mind won’t be pretty, but it’ll do the job just fine for a first prototype. He’ll do another all-nighter tomorrow night and fine tune whatever glitches he encounters later today.

Taking another sip of his coffee before putting it down, Sans prepares himself for a long few hours before breakfast call.

-/-

Kris delays putting back on their armor, when they’re all woken up for breakfast. They would rather pretend for at least a little while that their other-mother doesn’t find them off-putting to look at. They skirt the edges of everyone’s sleepy morning conversations, slipping outside to make a save point they should have made last night.

* This house could almost be called a home. There is an absence.

Kris is getting tired of these cryptic messages. They SAVE and go back inside.

The meal is a generous slice of homemade butterscotch pie. It smells and looks exactly the same as their mother’s baking does. Kris can’t bring themself to do more than lick some of the whipcream topping before they store the rest in their inventory, soon as Toriel isn’t looking. Ralsei quietly slides his over to them to do the same; citing they don’t know what’s ahead and they shouldn’t waste healing resources on him.

Susie eats hers in a few huge bites and tells them they’re both missing out.

Kris manages to drink the morning tea served with their food, again finding the taste of their home. It should be comforting, but it’s disorienting instead, just like the monster sat at the table with them.

“Thanks for letting us stay the night,” Ralsei says when it feels appropriate. “But we need to get going now. The only way we’ll figure out how we got here is if we explore further.”

Toriel seems uncertain. “Asgore will have his royal guards hunting for your friend… It won’t be safe once you leave here.”

But you already sent out one human kid, Kris doesn’t comment.

Susie snorts. “We can handle a few measly guards. We’ve fought a Titan before and defeated it- couple’a guys in armor aren’t sh- um, so tough in comparison.” Kris says the word ahem at her. She rolls her eyes and shoves at their shoulder. “Not you, idiot.”

“A titan?” Toriel questions.

“Huge thing, like the size of a skyscraper!” Susie enthuses. “It had like, a million points of health, so we couldn’t exactly kill it, but we sealed it so the world didn’t end. It was kinda scary at the time, but really cool in retrospect too, right guys?”

Kris thinks about how close to the wire things got; what would have happened if Gerson hadn’t shown up to encourage the soul and Susie. They’d been a spectator of the fight, emotions muted by the presence controlling their body. They’d been scared, in a distant way, that the plan was finally going to slip the knife’s edge and get someone seriously hurt.

But they pulled through. Mostly because of Susie.

Kris might have been copiloting at the time, but they’d still been there, spiraling into the gullet of the Titan with Susie. They’d felt the way the soul radiated in response to Susie’s determination and hope. It’d felt like they could burn from the inside out.

They aren’t sure if they’d call that cool, but it was definitely… something.

Kris gives a thumbs up in the girl’s direction. Ralsei hums and says, “You were definitely cool, Susie, but I’d rate the overall experience… distinctly un-cool.”

Toriel looks at them all, a thoughtful slant to her frown. If she doesn’t believe the bizarre tale, she doesn’t say so. She finishes her tea and stands from the table. “If you all want to get ready, then, I’ll meet you downstairs in the basement. Don’t take too long if you can. I still have to go back and reset all the traps I didn’t get to yesterday.”

Kris retrieves their armor pieces from the bedroom, strapping it back on and watching in mild fasciation it meld into a single outfit again. The buckles are only there when they look for them with their fingers. Their capelet is last, laying it smoothly over their shoulder. They look at themself in the mirror of the hallway, making sure they haven’t made themself look stupid with a backwards pauldron.

Their face is tired, bags under their eyes and their eyes mostly hidden by their bangs. Their hair is growing unevenly out of a bob. Their neutral expression could be seen as a grimace.

That’s me, Kris thinks somewhat derisively.

* That’s you!

Kris flinches when the soul speaks, not expecting it at all. The silent voice entering their mind and coming out their throat without any chance for them to stop it. They whip their head around to see if anyone else is in the hall, but they’re alone for now. Susie and Ralsei must be fighting over the borrowed hairbrush from Toriel still.

They control their breaths, waiting for the numbness of possession to overtake their limbs. Finally, things are getting back on track. Kris is sick with relief at the thought of getting to just step back from this mess of an adventure. Mire in their thoughts while someone else drives their body around, try to find the angle of why the three of them might have been sent here.

The soul is a kindly entity, it always takes the option that will benefit the people around Kris the most. It loves secrets, hunting for clues in corners not even Kris has ever glanced at. It adores Susie and Ralsei. It will make sure this adventure goes smoothly, or at least that no one dies.

Kris waits. They stare at the mirror, their own perfectly blank expression staring back.

They wait some more.

Susie emerges from the bathroom, fussing with her hair and complaining about white fur being stuck in it now. Kris keeps waiting. Ralsei comes out, ears neatly groomed and fluffy. Kris is still god damn waiting.

“You practicing for a staring contest or something?” Susie asks, leaning close to be in the mirror’s reflection.

“Kris is good at almost everything they try,” Ralsei compliments as he joins them, smiling contentedly. “I think the only real challenge left for them is to stop eating every patch of moss we find…”

The soul hovers in Kris’s chest, silent and unmoving again.

Kris looks at the three of them gathered in front of the mirror. They wish not for the first time that any of this was real.

“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it,” Kris says, who didn’t mind the moss eating. Texture like crazy…

“Yeah, it’s not half bad actually,” Susie grins. “You can have the first bite next time we find some.”

Ralsei giggles. “Thanks, but… no thanks!”

They make their way downstairs. Toriel is waiting at the bottom of the steps; the basement is made up of the same purple stone that the rest of the ruins are. The hallway she leads them down is long, their footsteps echoing off the walls. Toriel keeps glancing over her shoulder at them; Kris consciously tries to not let their armor clink against itself too much.

Eventually they arrive at a large stone door, sealed shut hopefully from this side. Even if it isn’t, Kris knows a Rude Buster could topple it if needed. Toriel stands facing it for a long moment, forcing them all to linger in the now heavy silence of an underground tunnel. There’s no airflow down here, just the smell of decay and something… burnt.

Kris notices the scorch marks on some of the wall tiles. Their heart kicks up. (The soul thrums.)

“Each time I have come down here, I have had to say goodbye to the wayward children that come under my care.” Toriel turns smoothly, her religious robes flowing around her bare feet. Kris has been to church with their mom every week since they were adopted, but she’s never looked like this. Ethereal white fur against a dark backdrop of stone carved into the Deltarune, robes worn but repaired with skill, a regal, tormented air about her.

“I tested each of them, because I couldn’t bear to send out any who weren’t ready. You three have told me some of your adventures. You have experience and skill that those children did not, but I… I must know for certain. I have to know if you will survive.”

The battle stage comes up around them as Toriel conjures a handful of brilliant red flames.

“Prove to me your strength,” she commands them. “I won’t accept anything less.”

Chapter Text

Kris wishes the heavy feeling weighing down their arms was the soul taking possession. Instead, it’s their own indecisiveness that’s responsible. Their mind struggles to comprehend the situation they’ve been forced into, time moving in slow motion as they take an unsteady breath.

Toriel, like the other monsters they’ve encountered, seems briefly confused by the way the battlefield has manifested. But, it doesn’t stop her from refocusing on Kris and their team. Her flames crackle, ready to attack, waiting for Kris to take first the turn.

Susie and Ralsei are similarly ready, although Susie holds her axe low, the blade angled to the floor and held loosely. Ralsei and her are both looking at Kris, apprehensive. Susie has a deep grimace, fangs poking out as she chews her lip. Ralsei’s glasses just don’t quite hide the way his eyes dart around, looking for something that hasn’t appeared.

Kris’s real heart is beating in staccato. Horror and a refusal to accept reality swirl in their chest, alongside their stolen soul. Once again, as it has for each fight they’ve found themselves in, the soul is unmoved by prompts to act.

Their mother wants to fight them.

The soul is doing nothing, neither refusing nor accepting.

Kris’s panic starts to slow. They let the haze of terror ebb away until their mind has clarity of options again. They finally, after stalling in silence this whole time, draw their sword. The smooth motion is accompanied by sharp ringing, its pale pink blade red in the light of Toriel’s flames. Kris sees the way Toriel’s face becomes grim, preparing herself for what the young human knight does next.

Kris flips the blade around in their grip and stabs down into the stone floor, lodging it deep between two slabs of huge tiles. They step back from it, crossing their arms.

“Nuh uh,” Kris says.

“The fuck you mean ‘nuh uh’?” Susie responds without missing a beat. She’s grinning.

“Not fighting,” Kris states firmly.

“...I’m not giving you alternatives, young one,” Toriel tries again. She flares the fires in her palms brighter. “Fight me for your freedom.”

Kris isn’t budging on this. “No.”

“You have to.”

“Says you.”

“Exactly!”

“Well I say no.”

Toriel’s snout scrunches as she takes a frustrated breath. “Human. Take your turn, and fight me.”

Kris pretends to consider it. Then shakes their head and says, “Nah. I’m not fighting someone who looks like my mom. That’s weird.”

Susie is laughing loudly at Toriel’s baffled expression, the sound booming off the hallway walls. The monster queen doesn’t seem to know what to do with someone straight up refusing to play her game. Ralsei has a hand over his eyes and is acting like he’s embarrassed, but Kris can see the subtle shaking of his shoulders as he represses laughter.

Listen, alright? The soul hasn’t intervened. And no one else has the right to tell Kris what to do, so. They’re just gonna do whatever they want for now.

Susie finishes laughing, swinging her axe up to rest on her shoulder casually. “I mean, if you’re that uncomfortable… I could do it?”

Kris slowly turns their head, leveling Susie with a look that perfectly conveys ‘try me’. It just sets Susie off again; she’s not at all intimidated. “Alright, alright, no fighting. I get it. Do ya… want me to break the door down or something instead?”

“Do not,” Toriel flusters. She sounds a little like Ralsei. “This door is an ancient last line of defense-!”

“I was considering it,” Kris says, just to make the goat monster more upset. “But no.”

Susie lets her axe swirl away into her inventory, habitually dusting off her hands. “So what hell are we doing, then?”

Kris sits down next to their sword, letting their actions speak for them. Toriel continues to sputter.

“Not exactly heroic, but we can make an exception just this once,” Susie sighs, joining Kris on the floor. “Honestly, I woulda felt weird fighting your mom, too.”

“I’m not their mother,” Toriel protests, though her flames have gone out and she’s lost the imperious command to her tone.

“I don’t think that matters much, your majesty,” Ralsei says as he sits, folding his robes under himself so he sits polite and pretty. “The resemblance is enough that this just isn’t a confrontation we feel comfortable seeing through. Sorry.”

Toriel looks at each of them in turn, her stern disappointment in their choices like a precision beam. Kris ignores the reflexive shame. She’s not their real mom, she can’t tell them what to do. Susie and Ralsei are equally unmoved, although their awkwardness under parental disapproval is showing.

Toriel eventually sighs. “You could have at least had the decency to use your turn to talk.”

“And then you would’ve attacked us when it ended,” Kris points out. Toriel doesn’t deny this.

“Won’t you at least try demonstrating your skills for me?” she asks again, somewhat pleading. Kris has a memory of their childhood, of her coaxing them to try riding a bike without training wheels. It makes them feel a little like punching a wall.

All at once, they’re sick of talking to her, this person who is-but-isn’t their mother. Who wants to fight them, who doesn’t trust them. Kris angrily channels those thoughts at the soul in their chest, trying to spur it into getting off its ass and doing something. They don’t want to have to be in control of this anymore.

The soul gives off the vibe of something shrugging its shoulders. Somehow.

“Could you check our stats instead?” Ralsei offers to Toriel, when Kris remains silent for too long. “We’re no pushovers, so I really don’t think you have to worry about us out there.”

“You would have to end your turn… Hm. If you are really so confident in your abilities, that may be enough for me. If you would, young knight?”

Kris apathetically selects TALK and mutters, “No pulling a fast one, okay?”

They tell Susie and Ralsei to stay where they are- the menu reads it as the group action Sit Around & Find Out-  and ends their turn. Toriel’s check is silent but noticeable, the magic directly connecting with the soul and their team’s stats all together.

Kris doesn’t know what menus or stats look like to others. They know it's different for them, because of the soul. Whatever Toriel is seeing, though, she isn’t expecting it.

“Oh,” she says, in a voice that’s quiet and tense. One hand comes up to cover her mouth as her eyes rove over their group, a new evaluation of what she’s looking at.

“What?” Susie asks, not bothering to wait for a turn to speak.

“You really are strong, aren’t you?” Toriel asks, though it sounds rhetorical.

Susie doesn’t seem to catch the change in Toriel’s demeanor. She’s busy puffing up in pride as she replies, “Absolutely. Even though we’re not gonna fight you, you can trust us to be okay out there now, right?”

“Yes… I suppose I can.”

Kris stares at Toriel through their bangs. What does that expression mean?

The former queen finally ends the battle, the field melting away from the edges of the room.

Kris lets out a quiet breath, relieved to be done with this intensely uncomfortable situation. They wrench their sword free of the tiles as they stand up, sheathing it and letting the weapon vanish. As they and their team approach Toriel, Kris sees that the monster is watching them all closely. They finally place her expression as one of wariness.

“You told me your hometown is a peaceful one,” Toriel asks them without segue.

Susie is confused. “Huh? Yeah, it is peaceful. Literally nothing interesting ever happens around there, until… well, this.”

“Then how have you become so strong?”

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Susie asks, annoyed. “We fought people, we won ‘cause we were stronger- the end. That’s all there is to it.”

“Did they attack you first?”

“I mean, usually yeah, but-”

“And all within the safety of your village?”

“Technically it happened somewhere else-”

“And do your parents know?”

Susie gets a sour look on her face, not answering. Kris says nothing. Ralsei volunteers an unhelpful, “I don’t have parents.”

Toriel is looking to the ceiling, like the Deltarune’s light might descend and give her guidance. “How old are you three?” she asks.

“Fifteen. Kris is fourteen, but their birthday is in a few months,” Susie supplies. At Kris’s startled glance, she blushes. “What? It’s not weird to know your birthday. Your mom always brings those awesome mini pies for lunchtime.”

Toriel glances at their last member. “I’m a little younger than Kris,” Ralsei says non-specifically.

Toriel nods, still looking at the princeling. “Tell me,” she addresses him, “how is it that you’ve concealed your soul? I was able to view your status, but I couldn’t see the hue of your soul when I did.”

“Um-!” Ralsei catches his panic before it shows too clearly, pasting a sweet smile on to cover it. “Oh, it’s, um, part of my magic? I’m… sneaky. So my soul is sneaky too.”

“It’s just hiding!” Susie adds. “He’s totally got a soul, it just hides itself when we’re, uh. Fighting.”

“Can’t damage what you can’t see,” Kris says, trying to make their tone as trustworthy as possible.

“…I’ve never heard of such an effect, but it does sound useful,” Toriel agrees. Does she believe the bullshit they’re spewing? Who knows. Kris doesn’t plan to see her ever again, so it doesn’t matter.

“Can we go, now?” Kris says, internally wincing at their own rudeness. Their brain to mouth filter is bad right now. They just really want this over with.

Toriel is hesitating. Why is she hesitating? Kris tamps down on the return of their earlier panic; they need to act calm. Somehow, the flat expression they compose doesn’t seem to ease Toriel’s concerns.

“Do you swear that in all the battles you’ve previously fought, it wasn’t you who struck first?” Toriel asks. Her eyes linger on Susie, but settle on Kris. They move their hands behind their back, fists balled tight as the insult rankles.

She doesn’t trust me, she doesn’t trust me, she doesn’t trust me- the knowledge eats at Kris’s thoughts, the cloying hurt of it making their voice raspy as they mumble out, “We don’t go looking for fights.”

“I promise we only defend ourselves,” Ralsei says, laying a hand over his chest. “And we always try to end things as quickly and peacefully as is possible.” He sounds so much more convincing than Kris when he says it.

Toriel weighs their words, her eyes closing as she decides. Eventually, she sighs and nods, looking at their team solemnly. “I am willing to trust your words. You may leave.”

She steps away from the door and to the side, hand brushing over a hidden switch. The double doors make a grinding noise as unseen gears turn, presumably unlocking it. Turning back to their group, Toriel laces her fingers together and raises them to her chest. “I pray that your journey is uneventful and swift, and that your hearth is warm when you arrive. Go, in peace and with blessing.”

“May the angel watch over you,” Kris says, the same time as Toriel. They avert their eyes as she looks at them, surprised they know the casual version of a traveler's prayer. How couldn’t they? Their mom said it to Asriel a hundred times before he went to college.

They start towards the door. Susie joins them a beat late, pushing open the door opposite to the one Kris does. They let Ralsei slip between them, Kris then holding it for Susie to do the same. Kris looks back one more time at Toriel, who has walked further down the hall.

The old queen meets their gaze; the conflict between her well-wishes and her instinctive apprehension towards Kris is clear in her expression.

“Do not return here again,” she says to them, tone final.

Wasn’t planning on it, Kris refrains from saying. They step away from the door and let it heave shut. The hidden locks slide back into place, barring re-entry into the Ruins.

Kris walks away without another glance back.

-/-

“So you seriously don’t have a soul?” Susie pesters Ralsei as they walk. The corridor out of the Ruins is long and barren, the light conversation between the two is the only thing to hold off the desolate feeling Kris is sinking into.

“I’m a darkner. We’re not real people like you, Susie,” Ralsei replies. At her scoff, he rolls his eyes. “I meant real as in lightner real. I don’t need a soul to exist, I’m fine as I am.”

“Still… What’s it like not having one?”

“What’s it like to have one?”

“Normal, I guess.”

“It’s normal for me, too.”

“Weird…” Susie says. She says the word with wonder, like this is something to appreciate about Ralsei. Would she be so accepting of Kris’s situation? Not likely. “Is that why you turn into a pile of fluff when you get knocked down?”

“Yup. If my body gets too damaged- well, there’s nothing there to keep it together, so I just- poof.” Ralsei says this with gestures, blasé about his own tendency to disintegrate into loose stuffing.

It’s better than Kris’s deal; their body just tanks the damage until it can’t physically hold itself up anymore, broken bones slicing into unfeeling flesh under their armor, blood sluicing down their pantlegs and into their sabaton. They get all the sensation of it, but none of the accompanying pain. It’s all-around disturbing and probably pretty disgusting to see. Is this another layer to the price they’ve paid, or is it a blessing? Hard to say.

At least healing magic and items fix it right up. Broken bones don’t count, etc. Their blood even evaporates off their armor, neat and tidy. The convenience of the Dark World is great; shame they can’t do the same thing for their bedroom carpet.

The corridor finally opens into one more room. A patch of grass grows in the center of it, dirt having accumulated from the hole in the cavern ceiling. Sunlight shines on the empty patch. Kris tilts their head at it as they all walk by; the feeling of something being absent tickling their senses again.

The door out is oddly light compared to the last one. It only takes a little pushing on Kris’s part to get it open, the door mostly slowed by a pile of snow on the other side as it swings out. They shiver a bit as biting cold sweeps over them, the metal of their armor immediately cooling in the lower temperature.

Susie and Ralsei step out past them, and Kris lets the door close as they follow. The sound it makes as it shuts reminds them of how crypts do in horror movies. Sealed shut forever…

The outside world is almost blinding after so long in the dim tunnels of the Ruins; a dense forest sprawls out in front of them, with a thin path leading from where they stand. Twinkling lights along the ceiling of the cavern illuminate the way; whatever generates those artificial stars, it’s thankfully bright enough to see by. Kris would place it about the same level as an overcast winter day.

“Cool,” Susie says, kicking a pile of snow. “My socks are gonna be totally soaked after this, aren’t they?”

Kris goes to reply, but chokes on the words as a sudden wave of foreboding washes over them. A check scans their team, so unexpected it’s like a jab to their senses. Kris moves unthinkingly as they draw their sword and lash out, slashing through the bush next to the path.

A camera lays in the snow, sparking as its wires are exposed to wetness. Its light blinks rapidly and then dies forever.

Kris is breathing shallowly, taken off-guard by the malicious intent they felt aimed at their team. They only manage to lower their sword as Susie and Ralsei come to stand next to them.

“Oh… I hope that doesn’t get us in trouble later,” Ralsei says despondently, crouching to poke at the destroyed device. “Maybe they were friendly?”

Kris is forced to sheathe their sword in order to talk with their hands, even though they want to stay armed right now. They settle for leaving the weapon manifested at their side, hooked into a belt that wasn’t there before.

‘It didn’t feel friendly,’ they sign. ‘Bad vibes.’

“You’re kinda jumpy lately, huh?” Susie remarks sardonically. Kris does their best to look innocent of that evaluation.

‘Not sleeping well,’ they excuse themself. Internally, they feel the stress of the soul’s lack of control compound further. People- Susie- are beginning to notice the difference. Kris has to get the soul back on track sooner than later. If they can’t maintain trust between their teammates… It will all be for nothing.

Kris leads their team away from the Ruins exit. The hushed sound that the snow naturally creates is somewhat eerie, although Kris thinks they might’ve enjoyed it if they were dressed properly. As it is, the cold is just severe enough that their armor is chilling to wear. Susie’s shoulders grow tenser as they walk, the bare scales of her arms paling the colder she gets. Ralsei burrows into his scarf, tucking his nose into its folds. Kris is somewhat worried for his shoeless feet.

They pass a bridge with baffling architecture. Is it… supposed to be a gate? Susie has to duck her head to avoid the overhead bar, but otherwise they pass through easily. Further ahead, some kind of watch station is by the path, empty of whoever is supposed to be waiting in it. There’s a lumpy shaped lamp next to it… for some reason. It isn’t plugged into anything.

Through a bend of trees, Kris is relieved to find another save point gleaming above the snowdrifts. They don’t want to risk getting reset back to before the fight with Toriel- it might actually make them snap if they had to do it again.

* Why do the rocks stay quiet? Because the trees are always listening.

Kris scowls at the save point. Is that a mangled reference to something?

The pathway splits into two directions, but they can see that one is a dead-end at a riverbank. The other takes them past a chest nestled in another snowdrift. Checking the chest shows its inventory is mostly empty, save for a few donuts, a slice of Toriel’s pie, and a single dirty garden glove. Kris knows it all belongs to the human they’re following in the footsteps of.

A petty part of them wants to steal a few healing items. Maturely, they resist the impulse and close the chest without partaking in the treats. Even if their stomach is starting to complain as much as their cold hands are. (Their own fault for skipping breakfast.)

Their team treks on, conversation quiet in respect for the unfamiliar forest. There’s no sign of anyone else in the woods; it’s early yet in the ‘day’ of this place, so perhaps they’ll find other monsters as it gets later. Still, the warnings about monsters hunting Kris for their soul- it really puts a damper on the usual spirit of their adventure.

They find another watch station, this one made from cardboard and shoddily constructed is clearly a well-crafted sentry station. Kris blinks, feeling like their thoughts skipped a beat. They stare at the weird incredible cardboard structure a minute longer, just taking it in.

…Kris moves on quickly from it, feeling strange.

A sign is staked into the frosty ground up ahead. It reads nonsensically (Absolutely NO MOVING!!!), which isn’t the oddest thing they’ve seen printed on a wooden sign before, but it isn’t quite normal either. The next sentry station is past it, this one built with wood and decorated with the carving of a dog's head.

It looks empty, too, so Kris starts to lead everyone past it. The sudden scrabble of claws and panting stop them, as a black and white blur jumps out from behind the counter.

“Something moved, I know I saw many somethings move!” the dog monster barks, brandishing two short swords at them. His eyes are darting around, but not quite landing on any of their group’s members.

“Isn’t that the guy Undyne arrested the other day?” Susie asks Kris, getting over her surprise. Kris shrugs; they hadn’t been paying much attention when the soul was exploring their hometown.

“I can hear you, too. And smell you.” The dog monster levels a sword at them. “Two monsters, and one… snff… One who doesn’t smell like a monster at all!”

The dog monster casts a ranged attack at them, the magic bright blue as it hurtles toward Kris. They flinch and try to dodge, but the attack comes too fast and slices horizontally across their torso. Kris coughs around the sensation of the soul taking damage, bloodless but painful.

Kris grits their teeth, drawing their blade and triggering the battle. The cold makes them feel clumsy, hunger gnawing at their stomach. They don’t feel up to this.

The attack was a weak one at least, only depleting thirteen points. It must have only glanced the soul. Susie and Ralsei weren’t targeted either; both have full health meters, something Kris can feel at the periphery of their battle awareness. This is an overall okay start to a surprise fight.

Kris can feel the soul shuddering in their chest, briefly pained the same way they were. However, they think it might be starting to get excited again, like it did when they were panicking yesterday. The longer Kris examines the feeling, the more certain they are.

But about what? It didn’t care about fighting Toriel- why would it be excited about a no-name monster they found in the woods? And it isn’t even trying to take control! It’s just infecting Kris’s own emotions, tangling up their frustration with foreign giddiness.

Kris has passed by several chances to explore extra paths, or to snoop behind the counters of the sentry stations. The soul also ignored all of that, in a way it never has before. Kris doesn’t understand what the hell is wrong with the entity, it’s been happy to play along up until now. They’ve tried everything to bait it into behaving again- nothing is working-

“Kris? You gonna go, or what?” Susie asks, glancing at them. Everyone is looking at Kris, at how they’ve frozen up.

Kris looks at the dog monster that attacked them. Actually… they’ve tried almost everything to bait the soul.

Kris adjusts their sore fingers around the grip of their frigid weapon.

-/-

Frisk spoons more sugar into their coffee mug, stealthily stirring the grains until they dissolve. Papyrus already stole one cup from them, proclaiming those still in stripes shouldn’t drink it, since it’ll “STUNT THEIR GROWTH”.

Sans hadn’t even tried to help them. He’d just pointed to himself as proof of concept. Jerk.

With their coffee finally sweet and creamy enough to tolerate with their childish tastebuds, Frisk downs half of it in one eye-watering gulp. They try not to choke audibly, since they can hear Papyrus fussing over Sans by the front door still.

“-AND YOU’LL MAKE SURE THE HUMAN IS ENTERTAINED?”

“for sure, pap.”

“WHILE STILL GETTING YOUR REST.”

“definitely.”

“AND IF THEY FINISH ALL THE PUZZLES I’VE LEFT OUT, YOU’LL CALL ME IMMEDIATELY, RIGHT?”

“you know i always got you on speed-dial.”

“AND DON’T JUST TAKE THEM TO GRILLBY’S FOR LUNCH. THERE’S NUTRITIOUS PASTA LEFT OVER FROM LAST NIGHT STILL.”

“waste want not, got it.”

“AND SANS?” Uh oh, Frisk can hear the disappointment in Papyrus’s tone. “REMEMBER YOU CAN ALWAYS COME WAKE ME WHEN YOUR INSOMNIA GETS THIS BAD. I’M POSITIVE THE GREAT PAPYRUS COULD HAVE RESOLVED YOUR SLEEPLESSNESS AND PREVENTED YOU FROM MISSING YOUR SHIFT TODAY.”

“i promise i won’t sleep on that option next time it happens,” says a lying liar. Frisk knows his MO too well to believe that.

“THE LACK OF SLEEPING ON THINGS IS IN FACT PART OF THE PROBLEM, NYEH HEH HEH.” Frisk can hear the door opening. “I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, SHALL WORK TWICE AS HARD TO MAKE UP FOR YOUR UNUSUAL NON-LAZINESS. REST EASY! NO HUMANS SHALL MAKE IT PAST MY BRILLIANT TRAPS.”

“except for the one in the kitchen right now.”

“EXCEPT FOR THAT ONE! GOODBYE, BROTHER AND HUMAN FRIEND FRISK.”

Frisk peeks around the corner, sipping their coffee. Papyrus is already gone, dashing off into the forest for a patrol he’s late for as is. He’d stuck around this morning to make sure Frisk had activities to do and that Sans ate a real meal. Sans has let himself slump against the doorframe now that his brother is presumably out of sight, the cool morning air wafting in through the open door.

Frisk comes over to stand next to him, sneaking a glance at their friend’s face. The dark bruises under Sans’s sockets are worse than yesterday, making his typical relaxed smile less believable than he’d probably like. He looks so tired; Frisk doesn’t even argue when he steals their nearly empty mug.

“pap is gonna hide the coffee machine if you keep snitchin’,” Sans warns, finishing the drink.

“’m tired,” Frisk says quietly, then, snapping their fingers so their friend looks at their hands, they sign, ‘Used a lot of words yesterday. Had a late night. Needed something to wake me up. It won’t be a habit.’

“fair ‘nough,” he concedes. He swaps the empty mug from his hands for something else, the objects trading places almost faster than Frisk can notice. The new… thing is an ugly mess of wires and disjointed, taped together electronic casing. It’s bigger than two fists, has a central screen and a mini-keyboard, and has short twin antennae sticking out the top. Sans twists a flat dial on the side of it, causing a faint whine to start up.

“made a thing,” he says, showing Frisk inscrutable graphics running on the screen. There’s an outline in one corner that looks like them, labelled ❄︎✌︎☼︎☝︎☜︎❄︎. “we’re gonna check all the spots that’re anchor points for the timeline, look for anything out of the ordinary. you can clear waterfall tomorrow; i’ll monitor its anchor points while you deal with undyne, then we can compare data. see if there’s anything different between residual scans and real-time ones.”

‘I thought you were supposed to be resting,’ Frisk points out.

“i’m on a walk for some fresh air. for my health.”

Frisk guesses there’s a fifty-fifty chance that Papyrus swaddles his brother in blankets whenever they next run into the tall skeleton.

The walk to the save point is quiet; the two of them didn’t sleep well (or at all), and the knowledge of their task ahead quashes desire for small-talk. Frisk takes in the late morning traffic instead, while Sans fiddles with the dials of his machine. Shops are open now, early patrons browsing inside. Child monsters run past, wide awake and ready to play. The decorated tree in the middle of town already has a handful of loitering bodies, hanging out around its evergreen boughs.

Frisk takes them over to the Inn, approaching the miniature star no one else can see. No matter how it’s explained or presented to others, the save point can’t be perceived by anyone besides Frisk (and Chara by extension). Asriel knows what it looks and feels like, but can’t see them anymore.

Frisk and Sans both watch his little machine blink and whirr; it can pick up the presence of the saving point, at least. One of the readings on the screen- which reminds Frisk of a Richter scale- is waggling up and down rapidly.

“cool, it actually works,” Sans says, relieved. “try a save and see what happens?”

Frisk nods, reaching to the shining light. Their hand goes right through it like air.

…

What? The heck?

Frisk swipes their hand through the save point again. It flickers merrily, completely intangible. They try cupping it between their palms, feeling no sensation even as the star tines pierce through their hands.

All Frisk can feel is the cold air of Snowdin.

“kid?”

Frisk opens and closes their mouth, at a loss. Their hands are motionless, unsure how to even begin explaining what’s going on.

The readings machine disappears into Sans’s inventory, as he uses both hands to maneuver Frisk away from the save point. He’s gentle and slow, closely examining Frisk’s expression. They don’t know what their face is doing, but it’s making his own smile tense.

“hands or words, kid, you gotta throw me some kinda bone, here,” he jokes reflexively. “what’s going on?”

‘I-’ Frisk thinks they would be panicking, if their emotions weren’t sliding into a grey calm even as their hands shake. ‘I… can’t touch it. I can’t SAVE.’

“…you can’t touch it,” Sans repeats, tone flat. His eyelights have gone out.

Frisk shakes their head. Their hands aren’t shaking anymore. They’re calm. They refuse to freak out, suppressing the adrenaline of terror before it can take hold. ‘Maybe this one is broken,’ they rationalize, rapidly signing their thoughts as they flow. ‘Maybe it’s because I didn’t SAVE at the start. We can just go back, mom won’t mind, and we can bring her with us this time-’

Frisk drops their coffee cup before Sans can take it from them, his magic catching the mug but spilling its contents on their feet.

“this is why paps is gonna hide the coffee machine on us,” Sans teases. “caffeine jitters before ten would be a latte even for an adult.”

Frisk stares at him, wondering if this is what he felt like. If every time they did this to him, he felt this scared, this powerless.

“…wasn’t my best, but gimme a break,” Sans says, “it’s bean a lungo night.” He waits for Frisk to have any sort of reaction and gets none. “…kid?”

How could someone else have this power? No one is as Determined as Frisk. No one. And they couldn’t- their file isn’t accessible anymore, when did that happen? How did that happen? The timeline is theirs to control, to safeguard- they’re the only one who can ensure the happiest outcome for their friends and family. Frisk wouldn’t trust anyone else to have this power. They can barely trust themself.

Sans’s hands guide them back to the couch, gentle and firm. Frisk sits when their legs hit the cushions, no longer able to stay standing. They’re shaking again.

Sans kneels in front of them. His smile has become tense. “hands or words, kid, you gotta throw me some kinda bone, here. what’s going on?”

Frisk swallows around a lump in their throat. They feel approximately the same age as their body is, right now. Small and afraid and young.

‘We just looped back,’ they explain slowly, fingers clumsy. ‘But I’m not the one who triggered the reload. I think somebody else has control of the SAVE file.’

Chapter Text

Kris instructs Susie and Ralsei to raise their defense, neglecting to tell either that their own turn will be spent attacking.

It’s a nasty feeling, but a part of Kris is glad to finally have a target to lash out at. They couldn’t fight any of the enemies in the Ruins, and they refused to fight someone who resembles their mother. And of course, the soul isn’t accessible while they’re in a Dark World.

Kris also counts this as an unfortunate but necessary decision. It isn’t the fault of this monster- Doggo, says their menu as they select a basic attack. He’s just collateral.

Kris can feel the shape of their attack before it goes off, catching it at the start of its build-up and minimizing the amount of damage it’ll do. They just want to scare the soul, force it to take control of them before they drive off a potential recruit-

The ranged slash of their sword bisects Doggo’s torso, completely separating the halves. The monster’s pained yelp is cut off as he dissolves into white dust.

The battle ends, G depositing itself into Kris’s inventory. A handful of XP stack onto the LV of each team member. The world is ringing with silence as Kris stands there, blade still drawn. Staring, confused.

Wait, Kris thinks, their thoughts sluggish. Wait, that’s not right. That’s not supposed to happen.

The silence is broken by Ralsei’s anguished cry, his feet churning up the snow as he breaks formation to run to the- to where Doggo’s-

He kneels in the snow, paws hovering over the dust, the dust, a monster’s DUST-

“No no no no no no,” Ralsei chants, green healing light sparkling from his claws. Kris feels their team’s HP get topped off, although it’s already full. There’s no other target for the magic to latch onto. “No, no we were doing so good, we were- we were going to change things, we were being good-!”

Wind rolls through the trees, scattering particles of dust across the snowdrifts. Ralsei is crying.

A fist seizes Kris’s collar, dragging them off their feet. Susie holds them in the air, hot breath billowing condensation like smoke as she breathes fast and fearful. Her eyes, however…

Fury is too light a word, for the look in Susie’s blazing eyes.

“What. The hell. Was that, Kris?” she asks, her tone tightly controlled. Kris’s stomach drops as they watch her expression twist, lips curling back into a vicious snarl as she shouts, “What hell were you THINKING?!”

“He- I-” Kris’s throat is burning, bile at the back of their mouth. They can’t think straight, can’t talk- their eyes dart between Susie and Ralsei, breathing uneven and shallow. They look at the sword still clutched in their hand. A noise of shock and horror escapes them.

Impossibly, white powder clings to the length of their weapon. It spreads up their forearm, sickeningly obvious against the black of their bodysuit.

I killed him, I killed him, I killed him, I killed him-

“TALK!” Susie demands, shaking them. “Fucking explain yourself!”

Kris manages to open their numb grip on the weapon. Their sword falls with a quiet thump.

“It- should’ve stopped. Me.” They swallow around the sickness in their throat. They hang limply in Susie’s grip, feeling for the soul.

It feels like it’s- excited, still. Energy thrumming through its connection to Kris. Why? The fight is over.

Why didn’t it stop them?

“It? What it?” Susie shakes them again.

Kris doesn’t say anything. They can’t.

Susie curses violently and throws them away from herself, sending Kris tumbling into a pile of loose snow. She turns her back on them, snapping, “Fine, be that way. I’ll deal with you after me n’ Ralsei fix this.” Susie throws a final furious glare over her shoulder, hissing, “Stay put if you know what’s good for you.”

Kris lays where they fell, the icy cold of the ground seeping deeper into their body the longer they stay still. They wish it would freeze over the burning, constricted sensation in their chest, where the soul continues to exude positive emotions. They watch as Susie and Ralsei talk in rapid, panicked voices. Susie gesturing and shouting, Ralsei shaking his head again and again, until he finally snaps a shrill, “-we can’t heal someone who’s dead, Susie!”

“The revivemints-” Susie tries desperately.

“They only work during a battle, for teammates. He’s- he’s gone, Susie, I’m so sorry, I’m so, so sorry.” He starts sobbing again. The sound of it, each ragged inhale, scrapes against Kris’s very marrow. It hurts.

They can’t stand this. They can’t live with this.

Kris forces numb limbs to respond, gingerly sitting up. Ralsei’s attention swivels to them, and Kris sees now that he’s not only heartbroken, but very, very angry. Tears born from fury to match Susie’s.

“You couldn’t just play along, until they came back?” he cries at them. “You couldn’t just be good, like me? Why? Why? You’re ruining everything, Kris!”

“Until who comes back? What are you guys talking about!” Susie asks angrily. The arm she puts around Ralsei’s shoulders is far gentler than the hold she had on Kris. “Neither of you are making sense, so just- just- speak normally and explain!”

Kris has no idea where they would start, even if they wanted to.

They shove themself to their feet, fleeing back up the path from their mistakes. They hear Susie and Ralsei both yell their name, footsteps rapidly following them as they run. Their sword is left abandoned where it lays.

Kris sucks in harsh breaths, the air like ice shards in their lungs. I’m sorry, they want to scream, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to, I promise. It was just a joke. I didn’t want to hurt anyone, not for real. I loved her, I’d never hurt her on purpose.

I’m sorry.

I’ll fix this.

The three-way intersection of paths is ahead, the brilliant light of the save point glinting off the snowflakes starting to fall. Kris can hear the others gaining on them, can almost feel the grasping hands on their back-

Kris grasps the cold starlight, glancing over their shoulder as their rapidfire use of the save file goes through. Susie is close, claws aimed to snare Kris, her fangs bared as she shouts their name again. Ralsei is further behind, like he’s stopped running suddenly. His scornful expression is also one of thoughtful confusion.

Kris feels the RELOAD take effect. Their vision cuts out and returns in less than a blink’s time.

Susie is abruptly further away, idly looking towards the dense treeline surrounding them. Ralsei is rocking back and forth on his heels as he waits for Kris, his eyes on the path leading toward where the sentry stations are. The atmosphere of the forest is relaxed, if lonely.

Kris takes a slow step away from the save point, leaving the position they’d been in when they last SAVED. Their hesitant movements garner a glance from each teammate- both give them a nod (Susie) and a smile (Ralsei). Waiting for direction of what’s next.

Kris takes a step back. And another. They watch those calm expressions become concerned ones, as they keep backing away until they hit a tree and slide down against the rough bark. The snow piled around the base of its trunk is a distant sensation, crunching as they sit gracelessly on it.

Their sword pommel juts into their side, at a cramped angle against the ground. Kris struggles to unhook it and throws it away as far as they can, not caring where it lands. They check their hands. They’re clean. No dust.

The reload fixed it, of course there’s no dust, they try to reassure themself. Broken bones don’t count if you unbreak them. A death doesn’t count if it didn’t happen. It’s fine. No one knows. No one will ever know.

A white paw enters their downcast vision, making Kris jerk away. Ralsei startles minutely, then recomposes himself to have a comforting smile. “Kris? You’re hurting yourself. Do you wanna hold my hand instead?”

Kris realizes they’ve got a vice grip around their sword hand, the fingers of their gauntlet biting into the meat of their unprotected forearm. They release their limb but shake their head at the offer. They couldn’t stand to touch someone right now. They curl their legs close to themself to prevent any part of their body touching Ralsei’s.

“Do you need a break?” Susie asks, hovering awkwardly behind Ralsei. “It was super weird to fight, uh, Other Toriel… We can just chill here if you need a minute. Literally. It’s stupidly cold out here… You’re already shivering though, so maybe not a good idea.”

Kris can feel their body shaking, the phantom effects of adrenaline lancing through them with each harsh beat of their heart. It feels like their chest is overfull, between their flesh heart and the stolen soul both. The horror they feel is making just as much of an effort to crush their lungs.

The only thought that they can focus on is how they can’t ever, ever tell Susie or Ralsei about this. It circles round and round miserably in their mind, the knowledge that they’d hate me, if they knew they would hate me.

Toriel was right not to trust them.

“Here!” Ralsei says, making Kris jump again. He quickly unwinds his scarf, looping it around their neck without touching Kris. “If you’re cold, you can borrow it for now.”

Don’t, Kris tries to say, but the word is caught in their throat. They can’t even make their hands sign it; they’re shaking too much still. They curl up tighter, trying to get away from the worry and care Ralsei is aiming at them.

“…D’you wanna be alone?” Susie asks.

Kris manages a nod. Ralsei makes an Oh! shape with his mouth and backs up, leaving his scarf with them. “We’ll be close by, so- make sure you call us, if you need?” he says fretfully. He wants to stay, Kris can tell, but they can’t take another minute of this without bursting.

“There’s some kinda river over that way, you wanna go look?” Susie suggests, jerking a thumb towards the riverside that Kris ignored the first time around. Good, the more distance from that course of the timeline, the better.

Ralsei casts one more worried smile at them- he always smiles when he’s upset, it’s a bad habit- before walking off. Susie starts to go, but stops and backtracks. Kris doesn’t even have the chance to try protesting, as she shrugs off her sleeveless jacket and tosses it over their head.

“Warm up and then join us, okay?” she says gruffly, striding away without letting Kris do much more than pull the jacket off their face.

With her back turned, Kris spots a nub of a tail sticking out through the slit of her pants. It’s hardly longer than their hand, lavender in color and pale from the cold. Kris has never seen Susie without some kind of long coat covering it. The offhand act of trust, giving them her jacket…

Painful. Sickening. Kris doesn’t deserve an ounce of this kindness, not when its all been earned by someone else and can be shattered by them in a moment’s time.

Their gauntlet scrapes against their breastplate, where the scar center of their ribcage is. The tissue there is raised and irritated at all times, ripped open every time Kris tears the soul out. It always bleeds when they do. They want to shove their gauntlet right through their armor and claw it out of their chest, damn the consequences. They want to pry the stupid, misbehaving thing out of their body and beat it bloody over the pristine snowdrifts.

“Why didn’t you stop me,” Kris whispers viciously to themself. “Fuck’s sake. You have one job, fucking do it already. What the hell is wrong with you?”

The soul is warm and bright behind the bars of Kris’s ribcage. It feels like it’s calmed down somewhat, no longer so energetic, but there’s a lingering excitement. Like it’s enjoying what’s happening.

The soul has, since the moment it truly woke up in Kris’s body, been a benevolent hijacker. Sometimes, Kris feels like their teeth will rot out of their mouth from how sweet the entity makes them act. It takes every chance to be a pacifistic, well-intentioned hero. It gathers allies and friends like breathing, somehow picking the right dialogue for every interaction. Every enemy it ever encountered, it spared. Even the ones that nearly killed it. The soul is kind. The soul is good.

So, what’s wrong with it? Why is it suddenly so passive? Why does it feel like it’s getting a kick out of Kris tying themself up in frantic knots, trying to figure out what the fuck is going on?

Why does it feel like it likes their pain?

The soul, for split second, thrums something close to the emotion of apologetic at them. Kris stifles a frustrated groan, hiding their face in the scarf and jacket both.

Make up your mind, they think crossly, because getting mad about it is less messy than starting to scream.

Kris spends a few minutes with their eyes covered, taking measured breaths. When the horrors finally feel manageable again, they organize their thoughts. One: the soul, no matter what Kris does, isn’t willing to possess them. Two: attacking monsters here has consequences, and true death is a real risk for all of them. Three: does that mean they’re really not in a Dark World?

Kris considers the fact, once again, that Ralsei has manifested perfectly fine, and both Susie and Kris have access to their magic. Nothing adds up. They set aside that question for the time being (again).

…Four: if the soul really isn’t going to take over for the foreseeable future, then Kris needs to work harder to be like it. Susie has only noticed small discrepancies so far, but pebbles add up in weight. Ralsei wasn’t wrong when he accused them of ruining things; they need to be less of themself. (He doesn’t remember, but Kris does, and the words sit like splinters under their skin.)

They just… need to be good. Good like the soul when it’s being normal, making everyone like it and want to trust it. Kris sighs into their crossed arms. Right, as if that’s not something they’ve always struggled with.

They lift their head and stare at the jacket lain over their folded legs. Susie manages to be good, like no one else Kris knows. She’s rude, and messy, and loud, and Kris… is really glad it was her that came to the school closet with them. Because, as the soul has gotten to know her, Kris has seen sides to the girl that they never would have imagined.

Kind, brave, loyal… Susie is more than her rough exterior lets on. Kris wishes they could know her for real, not just as a bystander to someone else’s relationship. (But maybe that’s for the best.)

Susie is a good enough template for Kris to work from. They doubt they could emulate the heroic earnestness of the soul, but they can try for something close to Susie’s brash positivity. Maybe, maybe that will last long enough for them to get out of here and for the soul to go back to normal.

Mind made up, Kris stands and trudges after the direction of their team. They wrap Susie’s jacket around their shoulders, one hand holding the sides together over their chest. It’s big enough on them to feel cozy.

Their sword, half buried in a pile of snow, is cold even through their gauntlets when they pick it up. Kris banishes it to their inventory and finds themself reflexively wiping their hand on their pants.

They find Susie and Ralsei playing with a fishing rod someone left out. Well, Susie is playing with it. Ralsei is dodging the flailing hook as Susie yanks it in and out of the water. He’s laughing, though, so it’s probably fine.

“Can I try?” Kris asks, trying for the tone of genuine interest the soul always had. They think it works, since both Ralsei and Susie seem relieved. Kris shrugs off their gifted clothing items and holds them out.

“Trade you,” Susie grins, snatching back her jacket and putting it on. She sighs as she wraps it around herself, shivering. “God, it’s so fuckin’ cold out here. Hope the town is close by.”

“I think I saw some sort of information booth up ahead?” Ralsei says, taking his scarf from Kris gratefully. “Maybe someone there can give us directions.”

Right. Round 2 is coming up. Kris suppresses a grimace and just casts the fishing line. It makes a plop sound and bobs in the fast-moving river flow. They all stand there and watch it, waiting for something interesting to happen.

“Does anything even live in there?” Kris asks doubtfully.

“Probably not, it’s very cold waters,” Ralsei replies.

Kris looks at the bottom of the rod, examining the broken off nature of it. They look at the ground and find an anchor point left in the snow, with matching jagged edges.

“It was like that when we got here,” Susie says before Kris can ask.

Kris rolls their eyes, hidden under their bangs. They put down the pole and leave some dark dollars as an apology to its owner.

Their team backtracks to the intersection. Kris stops once to SAVE again, before turning them all toward the unseen challenge lying ahead. They contain their dread to one part of themself, focusing on the mantra of be good, be good, be good. They can get this right; they just have to try.