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With the pain in his leg being so severe, it took everything in Papyrus' willpower to not just drop on his front porch. Sans would likely be at his job today - his work days were Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, as far as he knew. That meant he'd have plenty of time to heal his leg the rest of the way, then he could hang out with Frisk.
When he got inside, however, he could hear bustling in the kitchen. Panic seized him for a moment, but the smell of butterscotch pie told him it was only Toriel. Even still, he felt hesitant to step further into the house. With his leg like it was, she was sure to notice something was amiss.
The boss monster must have heard him come in, because now she was walking towards him with a smile. Her apron was splattered with flour and little bits of egg shell, proving that she was cooking before he had arrived.
The large woman leaned down slightly as she spoke. "I see you are back. Sans told me you are usually exhausted when you come back from your ventures these days, so I baked you some pie."
Normally, Papyrus would heartily agree to having some of her wonderful pie, but now was not a good time. Clenching his fists and adjusting his hurt leg, he smiled politely. "Thank you, Miss Toriel, but I think I just need to lay down for now."
"Alright dear. Tell me if you need anything."
Papyrus tried walking to his room regularly, to avoid suspicion. He found the pain to be too great, and had to stop for a moment, hissing lightly. The now-obvious limp had Toriel worried - exactly what the wounded monster had been trying to avoid.
"Papyrus! If you are injured, I can heal you." One of her furry paws was placed lightly on his shoulder.
The pain subsided after a moment, and Papyrus was once again able to speak clearly. "I'm fine. It's not that bad."
"Dear, you can barely walk. It'll only take a moment."
There was no stopping this woman, apparently. She was already on the floor by the time the skeleton opened his mouth to protest. Upon closer inspection, the fissures in the bone were obvious. It seemed to have been healed quickly and sloppily. The cracks went all the way through the bone, suggesting that it had been snapped in half before being put back together.
The tiny gasp she made sent panic through Papyrus' whole body, but he couldn't escape now. His room was too far away, Toriel would catch up to him long before he ever reached it.
"My goodness, how did this happen?" The woman picked Papyrus up with ease, placing him on a chair and beginning to heal the wound.
"It was- it was an accident."
"You mean you healed this yourself and drove all the way back?"
Papyrus nodded quickly. Toriel made quick work of her healing. The scars left behind would fade eventually, but they would never go away. As she finished, she checked over the leg to make sure she had healed all of it. What she found, however, would worry her even more. Similar scars ran across parts of the leg, most of them fairly recent. Matching scars ran across the other leg in an identical fashion, those ones much older.
"Oh, Papyrus, who did this to you?"
At the words, the skeleton tensed. "N-no one. It was an accident, like I said."
"These are no accident. Please, just tell me who did it." A short pause after, and Toriel put a hand over her mouth to stifle a gasp. "Did you do this to yourself?"
Papyrus' eyes widened, and he was shaking his head frantically. "No, no, I would never."
"Then who did it?"
The question went unanswered, with Toriel's patient looking everywhere except at her. A different approach, then.
"Will you at least allow me to check over the rest of you, then? I won't ask anything else until I am finished."
Only a moments' hesitation followed. "Okay," was the soft reply.
Slowly and carefully, Toriel removed Papyrus' shirt, searching every moment for even the slightest evidence of pain. The skeleton had to give his healer credit - she didn't once ask a question about anything she saw. The large scars across his ribs only caused her to clench her jaw for a second, and the bruising on his shoulder just made her close her eyes for a minute. When she was done checking him and healing what she could, she placed the shirt back on his body.
"Is there anything else bad?" Toriel said. Her voice was quiet - she was obviously holding back a lot more questions than that. Papyrus appreciated her restraint.
"No, nothing else. That's it."
Toriel paced a hand on Papyrus' face, looking at him with pity. He hated that look, but said nothing. She was just worried, that was all.
"Now, will you please answer just a few of my questions?"
The trade seemed fair enough: a few answered questions for a healed body.
"Okay."
The mother pulled up a chair to sit across from her friend. For a moment, it felt like this would be an interrogation, but Toriel's paw lightly resting on Papyrus' knee reminded him that she was asking these questions out of fear for him.
"How long has this been going on?"
Of all the things she could have asked, this was both the easiest and hardest thing to answer.
"Around a year and a half," he said, instead of the thousand other things he had at the tip of his tongue.
"Not a human, then," Toriel whispered, more to herself than to him. Indeed, they had only been on the surface for five months now.
There seemed to be some imaginary checklist she was going through in her head. The concentrated look on her face suggested it was not going as she planned.
"Is it someone I know?"
That, too, had a thousand answers - in a way, in many ways, in another timeline, met long ago, saw just recently - but he declined all those for a more simple one. "Probably."
"Someone close to you?" The gleam of uncertainty in her eyes spoke a thousand words. Really, she was asking about Undyne and Sans - those were the only two close to him that she knew of. His answer had to be calculated, then.
"Kind of." Maybe it would be better if he came right out and said it. "It's not Undyne. Or Sans. If that's what you're asking."
Of course it was, and Toriel looked a bit ashamed that her accusation was found out. "I just had to be sure." She looked down at her feet, then back up into the skeleton's eyes. "Please, please tell me who it is. If you think I'll get mad at you, or that I'll do something crazy, I won't. I just don't want you to get hurt again."
At this point, the answer was begging to come out. Really, if he told one person, what difference would it make?
"There's, uh..." Toriel visibly leaned in as he began to speak. "In the ruins, there is a small flower. He does it, when I go up to Mount Ebott to talk with him."
"Then why do you go up there? If you don't, he won't hurt you."
That was more than Papyrus was willing to answer, and it must have showed on his face, because Toriel backed off. "Your brother will be home soon. I will not mention it, but I think you should talk to him."
Toriel got up, took off her apron, and folded it away in their cupboard. When she was finished cleaning up, she came back to Papyrus. "If this happens again, however, I will take matters into my own hands."
Papyrus knew it was a serious warning. Toriel hugged him quickly and said her goodbyes. After she left, the skeleton couldn't find the energy to move.
When Sans arrived, his brother was in the same position the boss monster left him in, idly looking at his gloved hands. Sans dropped all his stuff near the door - something that would have been normal for the short skeleton a month ago, but lately he had been trying to tidy up his habits. That meant something was bothering him.
"i spoke with tori on the way over. she said you might need to talk to me bout something." Oh, that was why. "is something wrong?"
Looking up at Sans, Papyrus felt like he was going to cry. Sitting alone for twenty minutes just thinking certainly hadn't done him any good.
"I don't-" A loud gasp escaped him, cutting off his words. Tears were pouring down his face as he crumpled in on himself.
"paps." Sans hurried to his brother's side, carefully putting a hand on his shoulder. "what's wrong? what happened?"
The sobs wracking his body made it nearly impossible for him to speak, which meant Sans wouldn't be getting any answers until he calmed down. The hand on his shoulder moved to his back, and began rubbing circles into his bones.
"S-Sans I'm s-so sor-ry."
The shorter skeleton shushed hum quietly. "you don't have anythin to be sorry about. just take deep breaths."
The two stayed there for a long time, waiting for Papyrus to stop crying. When he did, Sans moved them to the couch to talk.
"now, just tell me what happened."
Wordlessly, Papyrus pulled up his pant legs and showed Sans the scars. His brother almost broke down right there.
"when did this happen?"
Papyrus let his pant legs slide back down. "You know how I sometimes drive off in the afternoons?"
The admission was enough to have Sans fuming. It was strange - he was usually not very expressive, and now anger was practically rolling off him in waves. "you mean, all these months...?"
"Longer."
Clutching his hoodie, Sans sighed loudly and closed his eyes, trying to compose himself. "who does it?"
"You know that flower I told you about? The one that talks to me." After a short nod from his brother, Papyrus continued. "He's not just an echo flower. Sometimes, he tells me things that haven't happened yet, or secrets. Sometimes, he hurts me."
"and you go back anyways?" There was an incredulous look on Sans' face. He didn't understand.
"Yes. He needs me, Sans. He's lost, and hurt, but I still believe in him. I have to."
"you don't have to let him hurt you!"
"I know. Most times I don't like it. Once in a while, though..." Papyrus looked away, and spoke softly. "it's nice. All I have to think about is the pain."
Sans was moving closer, and tears were in his eyes. "no, don't talk like that. i'm supposed to be the depressed one, remember?" Sans forced Papyrus to look at him with his hand. "don't talk about it like that. please."
"No, Sans." It's all coming out now, Papyrus can tell. He's held it in for so long, now everything is coming out. "You always treat me like I'm some child. I'm almost an adult, and I'm not an idiot."
"of course you're not. you're the smartest guy i know."
"Then why are you always lying to me, like I don't know how things work?"
The question made Sans pause, looking for an acceptable answer. Papyrus took it as an admission of guilt.
"That's what I thought."
"fine, fine, i'm sorry bro. i'm sorry, okay? that was unfair to you." Sans pulled back a bit. "i mean, i never lied to you about anything important, at least."
"Not in this timeline, no."
These words from his brother make him double-take. "what do you mean, 'in this timeline'?"
"You know what I mean."
"but, how do you know what's happened in other-"
"Flowey told me. He told me you've lied about my friends' deaths. That you said they were all on vacation, that you insisted it for weeks, right up until the human reset."
This seemed so familiar to Sans, and he was a bit sorry that he couldn't even deny that he'd do that. It sounded exactly like some elaborate lie he'd pull to protect Papyrus' innocence. This made him finally realize how manipulative he'd been to his brother.
"i- i'm so, so sorry. i promise i'll stop, as long as you promise not to let that flower hurt you again." The situation must have been more serious that Papyrus had originally thought, because Sans almost never made promises. He hated making promises about anything.
"Okay. I promise."
Sans hugged him tightly upon hearing the words. "i promise too. i love you, papyrus."
"I love you, too, Sans."