Chapter Text
Sharpened white ivory was flying through the air, like a bird of prey that was hunting. In the distance – a person standing defenseless, holding someone else. The face completely blank as they saw how the spear made of bone was coming right at them, not even trying to move out of the way. A sudden movement of the shadow caught my eye and then a taller person was standing in front of them – protecting them. The spear penetrated the body and instantly the body turned to liquid – something that created a pool of blackness on the floor that was simmering away. I looked down on my hands – one skeletal and one human that was slowly turning to bone too.
“You are to blame. You are guilty. Suffer” The static voice echoed through the hall and I turned around and there I saw something that once had been the tall skeleton – what seemed like void was dripping from him down at the floor and his face wasn’t consistent at all. I swallowed and tried to shield me with my arms as the creature reached out a hand against me.
“You are to blame” suddenly I was back in the cave where the moldy smell reached me and the damp air was creeping up under my skin – making me freeze. I wrapped my arms around me.
“Why?” a dark baritone voice echoed through the cave. I turned around and faced the throne – it was whole and on it was a monster in a blue hood. It was pulled up and I couldn’t see anything but darkness.
“You promised… you promised to never let go…” I slowly backed away as a blue iris started to emit flames from the darkness.
“I – I had too!” I tried but I knew that it was a weak lie – not even I did believe it anymore. The monster rose from the throne and walked towards me instead as he reached out his hand. His hand started to glow blue as he pulled out my soul and covered it with his magic. He made a swift motion and suddenly I felt how I was flying into the throne with my back first.
“You hurt them. You hurt me. You broke your promise…” suddenly black chains came from nowhere and tied me down to the chair. I widened my eyes until I accepted my destiny. I had done wrong and this was my punishment.
A shadow caught my eye again and it was standing behind the short skeleton. In its hands he had a sharpened bone – the same I had used when I killed Gaster. It held it above its head before it let it fall down. At the impact I screamed – the bone sticking out on either side of the hood before the body in it turn to dust.
A dark laughter echoed through the darkness.
The light of the thunder came first before the rumble. I flew out of my bed as I panted – gripping my head with my hands. Rain was smashing against the huge windows on the highest floor in the apartment building. Everything was dark except the light that was letting the night life come into my room.
I swallowed hard before I felt how the sweat was covering my body. This nightmare was still haunting me and it never let me be but what could I suspect after the crimes I had committed, the sins that was still crawling up my back? I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes as I tried to push away the headache that always came right after it. I quickly went out of the bed and went to the wall that was a huge window and looked out. Trails of raindrops raced each other to a doom that had been planned for them since the day they became a part of a cloud – doomed to be separated until they became whole again. As I sighed the exhaled air left condensation on the glass – making the world outside fading in a cover of white. I put my hands against the cool surface – my phalanges making a clicking sound. Nothing helped anymore – words and thoughts were meaningless. I had made a choice all those years ago and now I had to live with – never to be free again.
I opened up when a flash of light shone up my eyelids. Soon the rumbling sound of thunder made the window rattle under my hands.
How many years had it been? How many nights had I been sleeping alone without the warmth of my former soulmate behind me, wishing for him to be with me again? I pushed it away even though one of my hands found a silver chain with a light blue transparent aquamarine formed like a heart around my neck. The only memory I had left from the life I had to leave behind me.
Seven years. It had been seven years since I had left them devastated in the Hall of Judgement – destroyed by actions.
Bad dream? The familiar voice in the back of my head made herself present. I just snorted at her. Gee, woken up on the wrong side have we?
“Shut up”
Sorry for caring
“I don’t need your care”
Yeah right, she said and rolled her eyes at me in her own head. You have gotten a bad attitude lately, she tried again and now it was my turn to roll my eyes at her.
“I’m the one with the bad attitude? Who was sulking yesterday when she wasn’t allowed to get control?” I said and saw an internal image of a teenager crossing their arms over their chest.
Shut up, Chara then went away – not wanting to talk to me anymore. It was fine with me but it was always a bit sad when she did that. I had gotten used to have the dead human spirit inside of me – talking and not leaving me alone.
Suddenly I heard an almost silent knock on the door – just so faint that I could hear it. It was only one silent knock too. I turned around when the door opened up and a small figure snuck in between the frame and the wooden surface of the door. A red messy piece of hair was bouncing up and down as small feet made their way to me. I bent down to my knees and took a light hold of the small arms that held a security blanket – the one with purple elephants that matched the pajamas he had. The childish chins were covered with tears.
“Hey champ, what’s the matter?” I asked softly. He turned his face up towards me and sobbed a bit before he could speak. His green eyes glistering with the salty liquid.
“Th- the thunder is scary” he said. My whole body softened at that. Poor little guy.
“Hey Alex, what do we use to say about the thunder?” I asked him as I pulled him into my arms – a soft and warm human body filled with magic. I could feel his soul pound in his chest as it trembled in fear for the storm. The feeling reminded me of when I had rocked Frisk to sleep all those years ago.
“That it is the good guys that are fighting the bad guys” he sobbed as he wrapped his small arms around my neck. I lifted him up and walked towards the window again standing a bit from it. At that moment a new flash went over the sky and Alex quickly pressed his face against my neck and squeaked.
“And the good guys always wins” I said.
Liar, Chara quickly responded.
Shut up. He is seven years old for crying out loud
Hypocrite
Comes from the horse’s mouth, I responded and flicked her off before I returned my attention towards Alex again.
“But what if the bad guys wins?” Alex asked and I sighed a bit.
Yeah, what if the bad guys wins, Syl?
“If they do, I will protect you” I said softly and brushed his red hair. Alex relaxed a bit in my arms and felt how his soul calmed down.
“Sis?” he asked quietly. I rocked him back and forth before I answered him with a hum.
“Can I sleep with you?”
“Of course you can, champ” I said and turned to the bed. I pulled away the comforter and laid him down before I snuck in myself. He curled up to a ball and I pulled him closer. He always wanted to do this when he was scared or frightened. I started to hum a lullaby I knew would put him to sleep – soon he didn’t even react to the thunder that rolled on outside the window.
Soon I too fell asleep and my dreams were filled with blue flames, screams and blood. As they always had been since that day, over seven years ago.
“BROTHER! COME HERE AND HELP US CARY THE BOXES, YOU LAZYBONES!” Papyrus’ loud voice echoed through the yard at the apartment complex. Sans was resting with his shit eating grin plastered on his face on a pile of boxes while his friends was moving all their stuff into the new home they had gotten after that MTEE had bought all the land around MT Ebott.
“Nah, Paps’ who’s then going to be the judge of your and Undyne’s carrying contest?” He asked and saw both Undyne and Papyrus become still at that before a flame was lightened in both their eyes.
“I’m so going to win this, nerd!” Undyne yelled before she quickly picked up three chairs at once and started to run. Papyrus was quickly to follow in her tracks.
“MY DEAR FORMER CAPTAIN OF THE ROYAL GUARD, I THINK THAT I WILL WIN THIS!”
“Keep dreaming punk!” and they were gone. Sans just smiled and looked inside the van that was filled with their memories and belongings. Everyone had moved from their homes and many of them was now separated. Many monster had moved out of Monster Town after the first year of the treaty even though many of them wasn’t accepted at all. Now they had to move and Sans had packed down everything he owned. He didn’t go to the cottage though – he just couldn’t handle the pressure and feelings that belonged in there - he hadn’t been there since the last night he and Syl been there. He looked around and found a small box and Frisk’s writing was on it. He got of the box he was sitting on and walked towards it and looked at it and felt his soul sink in his chest. On it was a very nice handwriting and Sans let his hand touch it in a try to connect but he knew that it wouldn’t succeed. Sylfaen. He got a lump in his none-existing throat when he picked the box up.
All he knew was that she wasn’t dead. He knew it after that first time the flow of the timeline had been altered and changed. He had tried to find her but there wasn’t any trace of her anywhere – no one had seen the half breed with purple hair. He didn’t even know what he would do if he found her. She had done so much wrong; hurt their friends, Frisk, Papyrus and she had killed Gaster – his father that had saved him that day, sacrificing his own life.
Sans felt a bit of guilt in his chest when he remembered the taller skeleton, his father. He had protected them when Syl almost had killed them. Sans went outside and sat down on a bench in the sunlight in the yard. He ripped of the tape that held the box closed and it was like the time had been still in there – it must have been Frisk that packed these things. In there was some of her things she had valued during their time together. A few books she had loved, some notes on things and brews. Some jewelry, some paintings from Frisk. Sans closed the box and put it on the side of him. He didn’t want to look at it. He had moved on now. Leaving her behind. She didn’t want anything to do with them and that she had made perfectly clear for them – but deep down he wished she would return. Suddenly a shadow was cast over him and he looked up again, seeing Frisk standing there with their stripped shirt. They sat down and smiled at him.
“Hey, kid” he said lazily. Frisk looked from him to the box.
“You found her stuff, huh?” they said and Sans nodded. Frisk had begun to talk to them after a few months after Syl’s betrayal. It was as if they wanted to make an effort to make everyone happy. Even in one of Sans’ weakest moments they had tried to do a reset but the magic was gone. It was as Syl had told them; Chara was the source of the power.
“Yeah…” Sans said and closed his sockets when his smile faltered. Frisk opened the box and picked up one of the drawings that was laying there. The teenager looked at them and a smiled painted their face.
“I remember this. I drew it when we celebrated something. She was happy or at least she pretended to” they said. Sans opened up his sockets and glanced over to the teenager beside him and felt his chest tighten a bit.
“She was happy, kid. There was maybe much she could lie about and pretend, but not that” Frisk put the drawing down and picked up a photo. Sans hadn’t seen it until now but he knew which it was. He took it from Frisk and looked down at it. It was that evening when Sans and Syl had fallen asleep on the couch, before they had made the soulmate bond. Sans pin pricks became blurry at the sight. He loved her already at that time but he didn’t know it then. Her sleeping face were soft and he held her so gently so she wouldn’t fall out of his arms.
“I miss her” Frisk said and kicked away a rock with their sneaker as Undyne and Papyrus came running out of the building and into the van to pick up some more boxes before they ran off again.
“Even after what she did? She beat ya’ up pretty bad back then, kid” Frisk nodded.
“I know, but there’s this feeling I have. It feels as if the memory isn’t real – as if its lying to me” Sans froze at that.
“Why didn’t ya tell us back then?”
“Because it felt so real then, but now I don’t know” Sans sighed and put away the photograph. No need to dwell in the past.
“No idea to dwell, kid. Time to move on – I know I have” Sans said. Frisk quickly took a grip of his wrist and pulled away the cyan blue sleeve of the hoodie – showing him a leather bracelet with a red ruby shaped like a human soul hanging from it.
“Have you?” They asked. Sans chuckled and pulled his wrist to himself – pulling down the sleeve over it.
“Old habits die hard” he said. Frisk shrugged their shoulders before they rose from the seat and looked to him.
“Mom and dad will soon arrive. So I need to pick out my room so I can unpack some things before school tomorrow” they said and smiled.
“Do so” Sans said and Frisk started to walk away. “and kid?”
“Yeah?” Frisk answered as they turned around.
“I miss her too” Frisk just gave him a sad smile before they picked up a box to take up to of the apartments.
My boot made contact with the monster’s jaw as the kick made the last of it. The cat monster coughed and looked up at me with a blue eye and blood running down his cheek. I cracked my hand against the glow I had on my left hand. I hated to do this – why couldn’t people just pay what they owe others?
“You have three days before I will be back, and if the boss doesn’t have his money by then I can promise you that you will bite the dust. Understand me?” I snarled. Burgerpants stuttered a yes to me before I turned around on the spot and went to the car that was waiting for me at the side walk. The beating had taken place in the alley so no preying eyes would see and Rick had covered the entrance.
I sat down in the passenger seat and sighed as I closed the door and Rick drove away.
“Went well?” Rick asked me and threw me a glance. I looked out the window before I answered him.
“He hasn’t the money, Rick. He won’t be able to pay up in three days and Derek knows that… He wants me to make his dirty work” Rick just nodded. Since the day Rick helped me in the alley I had got the information that he also worked for Derek and my mother and he had tried to warn me during the party. I hadn’t listened – apparently.
“What are you going to do?” He said before he made a turn to the right.
“I don’t know. I can’t pay it myself this time… Fuck!” I said and slammed my left hand into the panel in front of me. Rick gave me a suggestive glance.
“I can help ya’ with that you know. You didn’t complain last time” I rolled my eyes at him before gave him the finger.
“You know what I mean, and haven’t you wonder why I stopped sleeping with ya´?” I retorted dryly. He gave me smug grin.
“You thought I was too good for your own good?”
“Because you suck, literally”
Ouch
“You liked it and you know it” he muttered just little before he gave me an evil glance worthy of Chara.
“But if you in the end pay their debt, why do you beat them up?” He asked me after a few minutes. I felt the guilt hit me.
“If I don’t – Derek will see to it in other ways, you know that. It’s better that I do so they have a chance of survival instead to be beaten to death by one of his idiot monkeys” I told him and leaned into the seat dragging my hand through my hair.
“You want to protect them, I guess” he said before he pulled over outside an old school made of bricks. The school was from an early era and only human children were accepted into it. I looked at the clock – it was still a few minutes until Alex class would end.
“Yeah, I guess” I said as my hand came to the pendent at my throat. Rick saw my movement and his eyes followed my hand. He leaned back and dragged his hand through his short blond hair. I glanced over to him secretly. He wasn’t bad to look at – shirt blond hair and an ash blond beard that gave him a rougher look, tattoos that covered both his arms up to his neck and down his back. I knew what they looked like and I was one of the few.
“We should date” he suddenly threw out. I sighed before I hit him on the shoulder.
“That’s why I don’t sleep with ya’ anymore”
Coward
“Shut up” I snarled to Chara.
“But how long have we known each other? Seven years or so? Even longer than that skeleton you were with. What was his name? Snas? Snaf?” I moaned at that and covered my eyes with my hand.
“Sans, and don’t go there” I told him before I opened up the car door – the kids started to come running. Through the mess of kids I saw my little brother’s red head bounce around and he waved to me. I raised my hand to show him that I saw him. A sudden glimmer of a human soul that wasn’t Alex’s I recognized, stood out of the mass.
A striped blue and purple shirt and a ragged bag caught my eyes as it passed and I turned around and saw a person with said striped shirt and a pair of brown shorts and brown hair that reached down to the teenager’s shoulder blades. I quickly turned around and scooped up Alex in my arms and walked quickly to the car. He screamed with hoy, thinking this was a game.
“Jump in and cover your ears” I said and he did as he was told – putting on his headphones. I jumped into the front seat. I quickly covered my soul so no monster or magic sensing human would feel it.
“Syl, what is –“
“Drive!” and he turned on the ignition and the car roared to life before he pulled out into the traffic. As we drove I got a sight of the one wearing the striped shirt. It couldn’t be – could it? I soon got my answer when I saw another monster on the side walk with a cyan blue hoodie, black training shorts and sneakers and as soon I saw him I knew who it was. Sans. The feeling of pressure over my chest came instantly and it was hard to breath.
Now it became fun! Chara chirped inside.
“Rick, for fuck sake! You’re driving like an old lady!”
“Take it easy! I can’t go faster!” he complained and I looked back at the couple at the street. I swallowed and hopped they hadn’t spotted me and that Frisk hadn’t recognized me at the school yard. I was a whole lot different but I still felt my heart pound hard against my ribcage. My soul still called for him even though the bond was severed since years back.
Sans looked a bit strained but still good – and he was still as short as I remembered him to be. Rick turned his head to see what my frightened face had seen and he widened his eyes too when he saw whom it was.
“Shit!”
“I told you to drive!”
“Yes mam” he said and stomped on the gas and the tires screamed as they fought to get a grip on the dry asphalt. Alex screamed with joy in the backseat and I turned around to see so he had his seatbelt on – he had taken off his headphones to listen at the sound the engine made. The kid loved cars.
I threw a last glance on the two on side walk and to my horror Sans turned around to look for the source of the sound. I quickly turned my head as I felt fear, longing and every emotion I had pushed aside during these years coming back to me. Soon we left the scene in a cloud of smoke and Rick drove us home – leaving Frisk and Sans behind. Alex saw that the fun was over and put on his headphones again and swiped into some new music had started to listen to. We listened to the engine’s rumble before Rick said something.
“Fuck” I nodded. Poor Alex – Toriel would have my head if she ever got the hand on the knowledge that we uttered curses in front of a child.
She would have your head either way as she thinks that you hurt Frisk
“True” I agreed.
“Where the f –word did they come from?! This city isn’t even famous and they just suddenly end up here?!” I gripped my head in panic and Rick tried to calm me down. Rick didn’t answer but he did pull over to the luxurious apartment building I lived in together with Derek, Chartom and Alex. I went outside and let out the kid that ran through the door and in to the house. Rick followed me as I went inside, up the elevator, through my door and kicked of my boots and in to my part of the floor. Alex had went into where his father lived and was probably waiting for him.
“Where did they come from Rick? They aren’t supposed to be here?! None of them are!” I screamed at him.
“I don’t know” he just stood there.
“He was supposed to watch so they wouldn’t come near me by a mile! Now Frisk is going to the same private school as Alex! FUCK!” I released my magic and a few vase’s and paintings fell from their stands and walls. Then I suddenly felt a strong pair of hands push me against the wall next to me – Rick pressed his lips against mine in a try to calm and sooth me. I kissed him back furiously as I tried to get rid of the emotions I had. All this we did was just emotionless and nothing more. His hands were soon all over me and my clothes fell to the floor like leaves in the autumn. I needed this – I needed this so bad to get rid of all emotions.
But during the act – all I could think of was Sans.
Sans looked at the black Ford Mustang Fastback from 1965 whose tires were screaming before it went away in high speed. He thought it to be weird. The guy in the driver’s seat had been looking at a woman with red hair and Sans had just shrugged his shoulders but he couldn’t get rid of the feeling that told him that something wasn’t right.
“Sorry kid, didn’t hear what ya’ said” Sans turned to Frisk again that groaned and put their hands on their hips.
“I said that Mr. and Mrs. Andersson’s son goes to the same private school as me. He’s a sweet little red head – looks a lot like his mother” They said. Sans smirked a bit before he shoved his hands back into his pockets.
“That’s nice but why do you care? The Andersson’s moved away as soon as they knew that Gaster had died and wouldn’t get back. Afraid that they would be next – they’ve done much for monsters though” Frisk smacked his shoulder.
“You don’t understand. A redhead picked the kid up today” Sans furrowed his bone that was supposed to be his eye brow.
“So? Wasn’t it Mrs. Andersson that picked him up? She’s a red head” Frisk shook their head violently.
“No it wasn’t. Mrs. Andersson doesn’t have a figure like that.” Sans started to feel annoyed.
“Where are ya’ going with this, kid?” he said.
“Sans, she had Syl’s necklace – the same necklace you gave her seven years ago” Sans widened his eyes and quickly turned towards where the mustang, that was now long gone, had been.
Could it have been? But no, Syl didn’t have red hair and she definitely didn’t look human, plus the necklace had been mass-produced so many women had a copy of it.
But he couldn’t shake off the feeling that he had missed something.