Work Text:
5 days remain
It’s the 20th of December. Walking through the forest with snow covered trees in the forest. She’s looking for something to photograph; searching diligently through the array of trees. There’s a small white rabbit bouncing around, poor guy. She’ll look tomorrow.
4 days remain
It’s the 21st of December. Dess is walking down the hall of the school walking to an open locker. Speaking up to the person in front of it.
“Hey Azzy.” she leans on the locker next to his.
“Howdy Dess! How are you?” Asriel smiles at her speaking softly.
“I’m good, how are you and Krismas?”
“I’m doing well too! Kris is also well.” He shuts his locker door standing straight while looking at Dess, “How’s your photography assignment going?”
“Meh, I haven’t found anything interesting yet.” She looks down, speaking with a frustrated tone, “I was searching the forest yesterday, but couldn't find much. Found a cute rabbit though.”
“Poor lil’ fella must’ve been cold.”
“Yeah… Do you know any good spots where I can take a picture of something?”
“Hmmm… well what are you meant to take a picture of again?”
“Something interesting.” She says with a sarcastic flare while shaking her hands.
“Hmmm that's a tough one.” He sets his hand on his chin pondering, “You could try all those fun decorations your mother has around your house.”
“Those don’t seem interesting enough, I wanna do something… weird.”
“How weird?”
“I dunno, just weird.”
“How ‘bout after school we can meet up and search around together!”
Asriel gives Dess big excited eyes like a small puppy asking for another treat. She stares at him for a moment, as if she isn’t convinced, then smirking she says:
“Yeah, sure thing Azzy.”
“Alright, see ya after school then Dess!” He says with a chipper tune and grinning ear to ear.
3 days remain
It’s the 22nd of December. Even with Asriel's help there wasn’t anything interesting enough to photograph. Dess sits in her history class, bored, thinking about the assignment. Laying her head on her desk. Where's somewhere we could go that’s weird? There's lots of places in this town that are “weird” , maybe that weird skeletons store. Maybe the library has a book with a funky cover, maybe a mushroom out in the forest that lives during the winter is in the forest. Maybe the-
The bell rings. Dess sits up looking at the clock. Time sure does fly when you’re bored. She gets her papers and folders situated in her bag before leaving for her next class. Through the whole day she can’t stop thinking about where to go next for something weird. Checking the forest again with Asriel might be a good idea. Maybe there’s some lost toy or a tree stump with a ton of rings. Dess gets her final class of the day sitting in her chair, tapping her feet to a song she heard earlier in the day.
I’ll check there as a last resort.
1 day remain
It’s the 24th of December. After spending the previous days researching on the internet for weird places around the area, Dess couldn’t find anything. But she has a plan for today. Dess walks into school again, going to Asriel's locker like the previous days.
“Azzy!” She yells excitedly.
Asriel turns his head to her, greeting her, exchanging questions about how they are again. Dess is basically vibrating from excitement.
“What’s got you all excited Dess?” He asks, intrigued, “I haven’t seen you this excited in a while.”
“Wanna go to the forest with me to scout out for things to take a photo of?”
“Oh! Yeah sure? I can do what, what time?”
“After school, we’ll meet at the front and then we can go from there.”
“Alright, sounds good-”
“‘Kay thanks Azzy bye bye!” Dess runs off excitedly, Asriel just smiles at her as she runs off.
After school Dess is leaning against the brick walls of the school, running her fingers between the bricks while waiting.
“Howdy!”
Dess looks over at Asriel who’s suddenly appeared next to her smiling like he always does. She smiles back.
“Heya Azzy, are you ready to search the forest?”
“Yup! Sure am.”
“Alright. Let's go!” Dess grabs his hand and starts to walk, dragging Asriel along.
Searching the forest Dess has her camera ready to snap a picture of anything that Asriel points out. Asriel is looking around diligently. The two spend about 3 hours looking at stumps, around trees, holes in trees, trees in general. There aren't a lot of things out during winter. Dess sits on a stump, defeated. Asriel sits next to her, putting his hand on her shoulder to comfort her.
“Didja have any other ideas of places you can look?”
“No, not really.”
“Nothin’?”
“Well… there's one.” Dess says, turning her head towards north.
“Where?” Asriel looks at her confused.
“You know that creepy bunker at the back of town?”
“Hm… that is a pretty weird place.”
“I have the code for it.”
“Really?”
“Yes. It’s a last resort place though, I bet there's something SUPER weird there.”
“You want to look there?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.”
“Theres a lot of rumors about it, Dess.”
“Yes, and?”
“I dunno, I’m just… worried about that.” Asriel looks at Dess with concern, she has a stern, almost determined, look on her face. He signs, “you’re gonna do it anyways aren’t you?”
“...mabye.”
“Dessss.”
“It’ll be fine Azzy.”
Asriel hugs Dess suddenly. Dess sits there for a moment, thinking, then hugging him back.
“Stay safe Dess.”
“I will Azzy.”
0 days remain.
It’s the 25th of December.
Dess marches to the bunker ready with her camera. Just before this she was talking with Asriel.
“Are you sure about this Dess?”
“Yes I’m definitely sure Azzy, trust me.”
It won’t be as bad as Asriel thinks, the most that’ll be in there is probably a bunch of mice. That’d be something to take a picture of, a group of mice, maybe she can put them in a bowl and have a bowl of mice, that’d be more funny than weird.
As Dess reaches the bunker there's weird, garbage noise coming from it. Ripping off the panel inputting the codes she got from her moms room, the doors open. Asriel’s words ring in her ears. She steps in; each of her steps echo in the room, it feels larger than it should be.
Suddenly, there's a slam, the door shut behind her and its pitch black. Luckily she brought a flashlight. Grabbing it from her bag, she takes out her camera and the flashlight, with the camera in her right hand, and flashlight in the left.
“Thank god I’m ambidextrous” she says to herself, she stares at the darkness in front of her.
“I’m sure of this, I’m sure of this, I’m sure of this” Dess thinks over and over in her head.
Dess continues walking looking around, the room seems like it’s infinitely going. Papers rustle below her feet. Each step heavier than the next, the darkness getting darker yet darker, Dess can’t get Asriel's words out of her head. Dess stops.
There's nothing here.
She looks at her camera. But there is no camera.
She couldn’t find her camera
She couldn’t. Find. Her. Hand.
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