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You sat on the old green carpet of your bedroom floor, cross legged with something in front of you, tucked under your desk. A cracked old box, with a dial like an old radio. It wasn’t big, taking up around half the space under your desk, the height of two or three meters. It was a basic machine. It only did on or off.
However, this machine was special. It had been brought to the surface by monsters when they surfaced 6 months ago. Humans in the typical bigoted fashion had had issues accepting them, but gifts of technology and magic like this went a long way to helping them along. That and the gold which they used as currency. It was difficult for humans to hate a race which had appeared and solved a few of their worst problems in once sitting, including the changing of geothermal energy into electricity and some monsters had the ability to clean the atmosphere as well as some being able to heal, saving more lives that hospitals couldn’t do anything for. Inevitably monster human couples began to appear and no one seemed overly shocked.
But you digress. The machine. It allowed the person to hear the voice of their soul mate. Everyone had one. From the age of 10 people were allowed to use it, a sort of ritual, a coming of age. There was of course another way for people to check, an inscription known as a ‘soul mark’ which appeared with your soulmate’s first words to you on it. Of course the box had made that sort of redundant. There were rules to using it of course. Such as you couldn’t tell the person your name, age, or gender. They weren’t rules imposed by the government but by the magic on which the boxes functioned. People physically couldn’t tell each other. Luckily mobile phones and Snapchat overcame that barrier.
Your name is ___ and you've never heard anyone on that box. You're 18. You've been searching for 8 damn years and have just accepted no one is ever going to speak back. You’ve never heard of someone not hearing anyone on the end. No one had ever missed their soulmate. Somehow the two people (or more) always just happened to be using it at the same time. You suspected magic must be involved. You were sure a study had been done but you were damned if you were going to put in the effort to find it. People had tried going against the box but had always come back, admitting that it was right. Your soul mark isn’t exactly useful either. All it says is ‘knock knock.’ Knock knock? Seriously what kind of first impression is that? You sighed.
It was a quiet day, a few months after your 18th birthday and you had decided to try one more time. Then, if you didn’t hear anything after today you wouldn’t use the thing again. You had a soul mark right? So maybe you’d meet them by yourself.
You reached out and turned the dial to on with a click. You couldn’t deny you were nervous. Even though you didn’t expect to hear anyone you couldn’t help thinking what if.
You were met by the usual static. And then...
"How do I....Ah! Hello? Anybody there?” A voice. Hold on. A voice. Your soul mates voice. It was warm and deep and made you feel reassured. “Ah shit. I knew it. Welp can't say I didn't try.”
Holy butts, they were going to think you weren’t there!
“Wait! “ You yelped.
…
Silence. Did they turn off the box? Were you too late? No! This could have been your only chance…Then, suddenly...
“...Knock knock” Your eyes widened in shock as you realised this was actually your soulmate. What a great impression you were making.
“What?” You asked in confusion. Oh great, their soul mark must be the word what. Excellent. What good impressions they must have of you.
“No you're supposed to say who's there.” The voice on the other end teased. It sounded lighter than it had a moment ago, like it was relieved someone had replied. But also…there was a hint of something else. Nervousness?
“Oh. Who's there?” You replied, still not sure what to make of the situation. Weren’t first words to soul mates meant to be deep and personal and romantic? Then again…you weren’t sure you could deal with something like that from someone you didn’t know, soul mates or not.
“Flower” Was this a knock knock joke? What? Was this guy mad? Maybe.
“Flower who? “ But then you were playing along, so maybe you were too.
“Flower you today sweetheart? “ What. The punchline was so dumb you snorted. Then giggled. Then lapsed into full laughter, only stopping when you accidentally snorted, hands clapping over your mouth in embarrassment.
They didn’t say anything for a moment. Then “Heh. You know that’s the second best reaction I’ve ever gotten. That’s a real nice laugh you’ve got there sweetheart. I snortenly
liked it.”
Was that…a pun?
“Ah jeez. Thanks I guess? Sorry about the delayed response. I wasn’t expecting to hear anyone.”
He didn’t ask why. It was almost like he knew. “Yeah, me either. So whadda we do now?”
“I uh…don’t know? I guess most people swap numbers so they can tell each other their names and send photos?”
“Wow. Kinky. Steady on sweetheart, we’ve only just met. Soul mates or not, it’s a bit early for ya to be trying to jump my bones.”
God Damn. Well there went the last of your dignity as you flushed fire truck red.
“I-I’m not! Y-you asked-“You were cut off in your embarrassed protests by him laughing on the other side. Holy damn he had a nice laugh. Rich and warm. Ohhh you wanted to know what he looked like!!
“Here buddy, I’m just ribbing with ya. I’ll give ya my number it’s XXX-XXX-XXX”
You keyed the number into your phone and then sent a quick text. You figured a joke was a good way to open up since he did the same.
*Hey, why didn’t the skeleton go to the party?
-I dunno, why?
*He had no body to go with.
-Heh. The joke is old but if you could see me you’d get why I’m laughing.
You tilted your head but bid a goodbye to the voice on the box, since you were texting now.
"See ya bud."
‘Ding’
There was a picture attached to a text message. Curious, you clicked on the picture. Only to find yourself looking at a skeleton. A skeleton monster. An actual skeleton, after you just made a skeleton joke. Shit. He was cute too. Double shit. He seemed shy in the picture. He was holding the camera at arm’s length, pulling a sheepish half smirk. His cheeks were tinted with blue- what was that all about? And his sockets were big with small pinpoints of light in them which must act as eyes as the seemed to be directed towards the camera. You could see he was dressed in a blue hoodie and some form of black on his legs, trousers or shorts you couldn’t tell which. And, even though he was a skeleton…he looked odd. Like he had a physical substance to him. He looked really cuddly. You smiled and saved the photo to your gallery. Dang you had a cute soulmate. Wait. Would you guys even be able to kiss? Eh, it didn’t matter that much.
Clicking the back arrow on your phone you glanced at the text under the photo.
-The name’s Sans. Sans the skeleton.
Grinning you opened up the camera and took a few snaps of your profile. Then you clicked on the one you thought looked the best, although your cheeks were tinted red from his suggestive comment earlier. Would he mind that you were a human? Clicking send, you typed quickly underneath.
*They call me ____. Oh, I didn’t offend you with the joke or anything did me? I’m so sorry!
Then you clicked onto your contacts where you saved Sans’ number under Sansational.
-Nah, you’re good.
-Woah. Looks like I got me a cutie. I think we’re gonna have a lot of pun.
You smiled. You thought you could really get to like this punny guy.