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3:49 a.m..
Chara was laying awake in a body that wasn't their own, vision swimming slightly out of exhaustion as they stared at Frisk's alarm clock like it'd somehow make their thoughts stop spinning.
It wasn't like they were risking anything by being awake; it was a Saturday, they were fairly sure. They wouldn't be forcing Frisk into a day of having to do things while unfathomably exhausted.
This also, unfortunately, meant that they had no reason to force their- Frisk's- brain to stop.
And it was a stupid reason, really. They knew they were better than this, but...
That didn't stop their anxiety from being a total goddamn whirlwind, infuriating and ever-present in the way it nagged on their conscious.
It had been about a year since the Barrier had been broken for the final time, although final didn't particularly mean anything to anyone who wasn't stuck in a loop of resetting for who-knows-how-long. Chara had been fairly content to live in Frisk's head ever since, only really intervening or taking control when there was something that truly caught their interest.
(Mostly plants.)
This had been fine for the most part. Being stuck sharing a body with someone rather encouraged getting along with them, and so Chara was willing to play nice just long enough that it stopped feeling like they were just playing.
Really, truly, it was fine. They had a familiarity with Frisk's body that rivalled that which they used to have with their own a century before.
That was where the worrying started.
It had started as a joke Chara had made, they were confident. That they had adjusted so much to existing in Frisk's body that they had effectively become something of a human ship of Theseus. Because they couldn't even confidently tell where they ended and Frisk began at times due to how much had changed between them and how intertwined the two of them had become.
It was amusing for all of an hour. Then they had started freaking out.
...
And maybe that was last week. And maybe they had been laying awake in a stir, hiding their thoughts from Frisk to the best of their ability, for that entire week.
...So maybe sleep deprivation wasn't out of the question.
They couldn't help it, though. The thought scared them.
Chara was someone who prided themselves on stubbornly being themself. No matter what came to pass, they would cling to their principles and identity.
But now they felt like they were going to lose that, however "true" the notion may have been. What if they got so intertwined with Frisk's being that they lost the ability to differentiate themself? What if they ceased to be two people in one body and just became one? Was there any meaningful difference between the two of them to begin with?
Was it even really possible to answer any of those questions? Did-
"That's what you've been worried about?" Frisk muttered, forcing their body to turn away from the alarm clock. They nestled the body more comfortably in their bed with a huff.
Chara paused. Had they forgotten to keep Frisk from hearing their anxiety this time? They had been so good at-
"No, I've known the entire time," Frisk continued, forcing their eyes shut. "'Course I would. You've kept us up for six hours every night for a week. I just didn't think you wanted me to bring it up."
Chara sighed. Of course. They probably should've known better than to doubt Frisk's perceptiveness. Or their mutual exhaustion.
"Sorry," they said in a voice that was and wasn't theirs, because this felt like a conversation they should have been having verbally. "It's just been-"
"Bugging you," Frisk concluded, garnering a slightly ashamed nod in response. "And I'm guessing you would've been willing to go forever continuing to not talk about this, right?"
...Chara couldn't deny that.
"I didn't want to worry you, I suppose," they answered, "nor did I want to make you think that I don't appreciate your constant company."
They felt an amused laugh bubble up in Frisk's throat, and they stifled it on impulse so as not to wake anyone.
"Right, right, because never-ending anxiety is worth not making me a little worried?"
"Exactly. See, I knew you'd understand. Goodnight."
Despite their efforts to stay quiet and thus hopefully actually get some sleep, Frisk now seemed to be trying to keep them both awake. They grumbled. Of course this had to be a thing now.
They could feel their anxiety tangling with what they were pretty sure was Frisk's concern, and they sighed.
"That was the part where the conversation should've ended," Chara noted bluntly.
"No, I'm making you talk about this. If only so it means you stop keeping us up."
...
"Fine."
"Great, thanks," Frisk whisper-shouted, and Chara could feel them clapping their hands together. "You really think we'll end up completely melded?"
"I'm worried it's a possibility. And, more distressingly, that we wouldn't be able to stop it."
They could feel Frisk's mood dampen. This was exactly why they didn't want to discuss it with anyone ever, and were planning to just keep it with them until they either forgot or exploded.
"I mean, it didn't happen with the amalgamates, did it?"
"Lemon Bread would beg to differ, I believe," Chara corrected. "Though I can't pretend to know what's going on in its minds."
So far, this conversation had not been reassuring.
Frisk went quiet for several minutes; they could feel their thoughts swirling, fast enough that they couldn't even get a cohesive read on any of them.
It was bizarre. Normally it was Chara's job to be the one overthinking, not-
"If- I don't know," they began tentatively. "If it really bothers you this much, we could talk to Alphys. See if there's a way to get us both out of this situation. I don't know. Worth a try, right?"
...
"I don't much like the notion of introductions," they replied.
Frisk threw their hands up in surrender, clearly getting slightly indignant.
"That's the only option I've got, Chara. Take it or leave it."
...Well, Chara didn't like the idea of anyone knowing they lived in Frisk's head. The privacy they had gotten by only really existing to their partner was something they had grown to appreciate, and the idea of being under the public eye was... frightening.
They disliked the idea of risking becoming nothing even more, though, they eventually realised. And Alphys was fairly good at keeping things quiet, for better or worse.
They were between a rock and a hard place, but...
"Right. Of course. If you insist. However. I reserve the right to stop you from saying anything if need be."
Frisk seemed satisfied enough with that.
Chara was willing to be the bigger person here. They could be mature, and thus they could be honest about their feelings. At least to themselves.
(And to Frisk by extension, they supposed.)
They hated every part of this conversation.
Alphys had never regarded Frisk with so much scrutiny before, for one. After the initial shock, she immediately moved onto gathering information on their general situation, to which Chara begrudgingly also supplied some personal anecdotes and a rough guess as to the cause of their awakening and subsequent body-sharing endeavour.
(If they were going to make a plea for help, they would at the least be useful.)
After several long minutes of cross-referencing their shared soul with what looked to be old, hastily-taken notes, Alphys tapped her claws together thoughtfully.
"I-I, well... it's n-not anything like I've seen before..." she began nervously. "W-With the amalgamates, their souls are st-still distinct, even if they were all m-melted together."
"So there wouldn't be any way to split us?" they asked, and it took Chara a few seconds to realise it was them voicing their stream of consciousness.
"A-Ah, well, not inherently! Actually, th-this might be easier in some ways..." Alphys answered. "S-See, the problem with monsters is... is since we're s-so bound to our souls, y-you can't really 'transfer' one to a-another vessel easily."
...That explained the issue with trying to get Asriel back, then. They made a mental note to sulk about that later.
"But with humans?" Frisk added, evidently trying to stop Chara from getting lost in their head.
"That's! A-Actually the good news! Splitting your soul into two pieces sh-should be relatively easy. It's something I already f-fiddled with the technology for a while ago, actually... and since human souls p-persist out of their bodies, it should only be a matter of, er, 'putting it back'."
...
There was a slow but sure dread creeping into Alphys' voice as she said the last sentence that Chara did not like whatsoever. Nor did they like the fact that was the good news.
Nor did they like the fact that a catgirl that Frisk fought on a whim while snooping under Papyrus' sink for no reason was apparently relevant to their current circumstances.
"...What's the bad news, then?" Chara finally replied.
Alphys winced.
"Well... s-since we're trying to r-resurrect Chara- who's been dead for a century- there's no... guarantee their body wouldn't just die again upon r-resurrection. They're n-not listening, right?"
"I have been who you've been having the majority of this conversation with."
"Ah."
She laughed nervously, fiddling with her glasses for a few seconds before speaking again.
"S-So! The hard part is just making their- your body and mind... habitable. I-If you could bring it h-here, we could... ah, see what we could do?"
Great. So because Frisk didn't want them to freak out about their own existence for the rest of their days, Chara now had to carry their own body down a mountain while in control of someone else's.
Again.
"Yeah, that sounds fine!" Frisk agreed, before Chara could disagree. "We'll do that... well, whenever we get the chance."
"How are we going to get to Mount Ebott and back with a corpse without raising any questions?" they hissed in the shared space of their mind where only Frisk could hear.
"Don't worry about it. I've got a plan."
Chara would like to briefly reiterate that they hated every part of this.
So, yes. Frisk had found a way to get them to Mount Ebott quickly. In this the two of them were in agreement, and Chara wouldn't argue on that.
Their idea, unfortunately, was asking Sans to use one of his shortcuts.
Sans, who was now standing there at the start of the corridor a few feet away from Chara's grave. Idling like wasn't even bothering to question why the kid that was his responsibility suddenly decided they wanted to dig up aforementioned grave.
The light from the Surface shined onto the two of them the same as it always had when they came here. If Sans weren't here, they could almost believe nothing had changed and they were just starting anew with someone they cared deeply about.
Almost.
The shovel in Frisk's hands made that pretty hard.
"Do you know the first thing about grave excavation?"
"No, I do not!" Frisk replied confidently, sticking the shovel into the ground at the edge of the patch of golden flowers and pressing their foot into it.
The action unsettled some of the loose dirt around them, but it would take more effort to get any major work done. Frisk seemed relatively undeterred.
Unable to help themselves, Chara took control of the body for the sake of glancing over at Sans. He was sipping what appeared to be lemonade, looking at them with one eyesocket narrowed in a way that may have been amused.
"This would go a lot faster if you helped," they said aloud. He shrugged.
"nah, this seems like grave business," he replied. "and i'm a skeleton. no muscles to dig with. but hey, it looks like fun. have at it, kids."
...Kids, plural?
...
They shook the body's head. Not the time to dwell on such a thing.
With a little more fervour but a little less confidence than Frisk had, they heaved the shovel back up, taking a solid patch of dirt and flowers with them. A solid portion of which ended up on Frisk's sweater. Whoops.
It was... easier than they expected, even if they hadn't dug up much looking down. Chara briefly appreciated how strong Frisk was after... well, a while of running for their life, frankly. It was nothing like their own body, which would have probably already passed out from their iron deficiency rearing its head.
That wasn't really something they could note often. They never really got the chance to. But it was nice, and- this was not the time to be dwelling on such a thing. They were trying to dig up their own corpse, which was pretty much an immediate killer for any potentially romantic-leaning thoughts, and if Frisk didn't stop laughing at them they were going to hit themselves atop the head with the shovel.
After a fair amount of time spent digging, time which Sans spent distinctly not being of use, they finally hit something that wasn't dirt.
They weren't sure if it was them or Frisk letting out the deeply relieved sigh that escaped them, a moment of respite despite how the ache of exertion was very much settling in. They forced the shovel back up, kicking up enough dirt to finally reveal...
What Chara was fairly sure was their own left femur. Covered in dirt, grime, and what had to have been a little bit of dried blood.
Eurgh. Well, they supposed it was a start. They were pretty sure Frisk was far less uncomfortable than they were, so they happily took a backseat as Frisk continued the excavation work.
(It meant they could spend more time resenting Sans for just standing there while they were working their asses off.)
...
The rest of their corpse did not look much better than the first part they exposed. Some of it had mummified flesh clinging to it even after a hundred years, mostly above the sternum and one of their left arms; still marred by what they were sure were scars from buttercup poisoning or whatever nasty thought had plagued them on any given night.
Also notably, albeit unsurprisingly, it was covered in dirt. They were pretty sure one of their corpse's eyes had been completely caked in soil.
...Scientifically speaking, this was absolutely disgusting. They would rather not look at it for any longer than they really had to.
(At the very least, their body still had their locket.)
Unfortunately, they had to get it back to Alphys. Which they supposed was why Sans was still here; despite his stalwart refusal to be helpful in any other regard, he was surprisingly good for transportation.
Speaking of Sans, Frisk seemed to be in the process of giving him a nod.
"We just have to get... that... to the lab in Hotland. Alphys said it'd give her more space to work than her setup on the Surface."
He took a few steps closer, almost dropping what Chara was fairly sure was his fifth glass of lemonade as he caught sight of the corpse.
"...right," he replied, one of his hands going into the pocket of his hoodie. "you aren't gonna make me touch it, right? 'cause i'd need to put another set of gloves on."
"No, we- I've got it," Frisk answered, and indeed they managed to carry an entire desiccated body with surprising effectiveness.
...Well, Chara had seen weirder from them.
Really, Chara had tried to make a point of figuring out what all was being done to their corpse. They really did try at first.
Making sure there were no lingering toxins was the first step. This made sense; Alphys had said it would be basically pointless if they were successfully revived and then just dropped dead immediately afterwards.
Then patching it up magically was the second. Ergo, making sure their body's bones weren't horrifically exposed anymore, so that they could function normally if all went well. Making sure their flesh wasn't disgusting and mummified would've been a nice bonus, too.
(They remembered spending several days collecting plants and tree bark with Frisk. They were sure there was some bitter irony in reconstructing their body in a way that made it at least partly plant matter, especially considering what happened with Asriel, but any joke they tried to make about it fell flat.)
There was... a lot of complicated measuring work from there. Alphys had said something about making sure the levels of determination were stable throughout the body so it could flow mostly normally, but Chara wasn't one hundred percent certain how to even begin to quantify that, so it kind of began to tune out.
Perhaps the most notable incident was what they overheard between her and Frisk about two months into the whole effort.
"I-I, uh, think I've gotten everything stable?" Alphys had begun, speaking to Frisk with an air of casualness that would in no way suggest that they were having this conversation only a few feet from a stitched-up corpse. "The main thing is, w-well, since it'd be nearly impossible to get their heart working again- especially w-with all the plant matter we're using- they'll mostly be running on magic in lieu of a p-pulse. Which hasn't really ever been attempted before, but... hey, that's science, right?"
(Chara had briefly wished that the circumstances of their potential resurrection did not involve forcing themself into the role of lab rat. Frisk just patted themselves on the shoulder in response.)
But after three months of trial and error, and what Chara was fairly sure was some kind of miracle, Alphys had workshopped their corpse into a state that, at the very least, did not resemble something that had been dead for a century. They would almost go as far as to say it was good, however unsettling seeing themselves in a sort of stasis may have been.
That meant it was almost time for, well... the most nerve-wracking part. Taking half of Chara and Frisk's shared soul and moving it into a body. Which could almost certainly go wrong in several ways, especially considering their confrontation with Mad Mew Mew had only split their soul instead of fully separating it, thereby making it a different thing.
The good news, however, is that that anxiety almost completely overruled the anxiety that potentially losing their identity had caused them. The bad news was that they now had a completely different thing to worry about.
Most unfortunately, they had to sleep in the Lab the night before the soul-splitting procedure was performed, and then wake up far too early in the morning afterwards. Something about getting it over with as soon as possible.
Alphys had set up the cube bed for them and Frisk, at least. They appreciated the effort.
As luck would have it, they woke up a few minutes early. In thirty minutes, they'd descend into the basement of the Lab and hopefully be put back into their own body.
They took a deep breath, staring up at Frisk's hands vaguely.
"Do you think this is a fool's gambit?" Chara asked quietly, the strange realisation that whatever happened, this would probably be the last time they heard Frisk's voice through their own ears slowly setting in. "More importantly, am I an idiot for starting to believe it'll work?"
They felt Frisk shrug.
"You don't really believe in things unless you're sure they won't backfire," they replied. "So I'd say it's a good sign!"
...That was annoyingly fair. Chara supposed they had to accept it at least partially, then.
That meant they could move to their next question.
"If it does work. And I mean if," they began, a strange amount of nervousness creeping into them before they could stop it, "will we still be..."
They gestured vaguely. Partners? Allies? Two kids who just happened to have a soul-deep understanding of each other due to circumstances that weren't entirely of their own choosings?
Frisk seemed to pick up on what they meant, though.
"I think so. If you want to be, I mean," they answered softly. Chara believed them, as Chara was wont to do whenever Frisk took that tone of voice. It was an infuriating weakness of theirs.
That said, they supposed they were... satisfied. They wouldn't lose Frisk's company, and they apparently weren't a total idiot. That was a good combination.
They continued mindlessly bantering with Frisk for several minutes before they eventually forced themselves up, taking control to meet Alphys downstairs.
The situation at hand still, frankly, didn't feel entirely real. Maybe they were just exhausted from all of the work that had already been done to get things prepared. Maybe they just couldn't believe the notion of their luck finally turning around.
As the elevator came to a halt and the doors opened into the musty darkness of the Lab's basement, Chara felt Frisk's fists clench. It took a moment to process it was them doing it.
Alphys led them both to what appeared to be a slightly modified version of the giant, unsettling machine they had given only brief note to during their many ventures through the basement, her claws tapping together nervously again.
"I, ah, reverse-engineered th-the extractor a little," she explained, giving no mention to when, exactly, she found the time, "and added a p-powered up version of the soul-cleaving technology I had given the Mew Mew d-doll. Chara's body is already in there, so... whenever you t-two are ready, climb inside. O-Or don't! I wouldn't blame you if you... wanted to back out."
Frisk nodded firmly, probably knowing that that would immediately cue Chara into reconsidering if they didn't. They grabbed one of their hands and squeezed it, before climbing into the jaws of the determination extractor with what Chara could only imagine was an expression of pure, unfiltered enthusiasm.
As anyone would have in that situation, naturally.
Alphys gave them a final look before nodding and heading behind the machine, and they heard a few whirrs as it started up.
If they tilted Frisk's head just right, they could see white lights in the top half of the extractor illuminate, almost looking like eyes that could pierce their soul.
And by the Angel, pierce it did.
The initial split wasn't horrible at first, just an odd tugging sensation like Mad Mew Mew had caused them when they fought her. Chara would've tolerated that if it kept up at that speed.
Then the power increased. And the tug felt more like being ripped in two, pain rushing through every part of the body and making their vision swim as they were quite literally broken in two with no source.
They weren't sure who, exactly, of the two of them was screaming, but Chara knew that the fact they had Frisk's company in this horrific experience was probably the only thing stopping them from losing their mind as they were ripped apart like paper.
And then it abruptly stopped, leaving only the lingering aftershocks of their horrific agony and an offputting sensation that they supposed came with having two separate halves of a soul in one body.
As "their" part of Frisk's soul was extracted properly, Chara's stream of consciousness got far quieter for a few brief, glorious moments before they completely passed out.
They blinked awake.
As usual for their awakenings, their vision was swimming.
A dull ache was spreading throughout their body, as was the unfamiliar thrum of what they eventually realised was supposed to be their pulse. Right, Alphys had said it was more magic than bloodflow, because that was the only way to...
...
They paused. Lifted a hand above themself. Almost unnaturally pale, with a faint scattering of scars that they were sure would never heal properly.
...
Chara blinked again. So it had worked, then. At the very least, they were awake in a body that wasn't Frisk's.
Interesting.
They weren't really surprised that being resurrected after a century was so stiff and painful, but they kind of wished it wasn't.
Slowly but surely, they remembered how to turn their head again; the action a little easier than it should've been if only because they were graced with having experience from co-piloting Frisk's body for unknowably long.
They appeared to be laying in one of the beds in the Lab's basement, the blankets having been tucked over them with what they could only assume was care.
In the bed over, Frisk was laying down, either asleep or zoning out. Chara attempted briefly to talk to them through their mental link before realising that the link didn't exist anymore.
Fortunately, Frisk spared them from that despair by stirring, looking at Chara looking at them in blatantly stunned silence before positively beaming, a sight that was as rare as it was appreciated.
"Thought you weren't gonna wake up," Frisk said quietly, standing up from their bed and crossing over to the one that Chara was laying in, shifting until they were resting comfortably atop the blankets a few inches from them.
Chara realised, in the back of their mind, that they needed to respond to that. Their throat felt dry, and it took a moment for them to remember how words worked.
Which was only partially due to the fact they were newly revived, and partially due to the fact that Frisk was incredibly close to them.
"Have I been unconscious for a long time, then?" they asked, their voice raspy and unfamiliar to their own ears. Deeper than Frisk's, at least. They weren't sure how they felt about that.
"A few days? A week, maybe?" Frisk answered. "Hasn't been very interesting, don't worry. At least, I don't think so. I've been kind of in and out of functioning myself."
...Ah. Of course. Chara supposed they'd also have to recover from having half of their soul taken out. At the very least, they were both here and alive.
...
Chara would take "both here and alive", they decided. Their body felt stiff all over, and they realised vaguely that getting used to doing anything again would be a process, but they... didn't mind, for once. Not yet. Not when Frisk was scanning their face with a quiet sort of disbelieving awe, like they were mentally redefining the boundaries between the two of them, or when Chara could actually properly feel the warmth radiating from them, and could count the freckles dotting their tan skin without taking up any of Frisk's focus, or- oh, dear.
They were getting ahead of themself in a way they weren't quite sure they knew how to handle.
Well, so much for having nothing to worry about.