Chapter Text
Chapter 1: The Broken Record
Sans' eye sockets narrowed. The golden glow of the judgment hall was exceptionally bright that day. A mental note; pack shades in the inner pocket of his jacket for the next time... for there was always a next time. Or had he made that note before? It was so hard to keep track of anything anymore. A skeletal hand rummaged about the left pocket of his coat. An odd comfort to feel the little worn black book touching against those somewhat decently dressed, for that day, bandages covering his blackened bones. It was perhaps one of the only solaces he would have.
An echo of footsteps caught the sleepy skeleton's attention. So, the brat brought friends again... neat. An exhausted inner sigh escaped him, his posture slumping into something more familiar; a lazy bend to his spine, mostly hidden by the large blue and dark gray patterned coat that was more or less his trademark. What friends had the brat gathered? By the sounds of it, it was nearly all of the main cast of gullible monsters. The brat's usual. Sans' close friends and family.
The column blocked him from view. Being forced into the hall for the umpteenth time after the last harrowing defeat was about two annoying dogs beyond getting on the skeleton's nerves. If it even mattered, he'd have just had his bed placed behind the damn column! At least then he could nap while the demon did what it wanted. Making friends or whatever the flying shit it wanted to do that run. He could feel the buzzing of his magic rustle about in anger, the very same emotion he could do nothing about, he had a part to play.
The Judge
What was he even judging anymore? How fast the kid could get from slashing Toriel at the door to cutting down Papyrus then to watching Undyne melt after her overload? It was all meaningless and yet he refused to divert from that path… at least when he could. He could change it, he could make it so much harder or worse on the anomaly, but it wasn't his place to do so, Sans had nearly convinced himself of that. All he wanted was to get his little brother to the surface, was that too much to ask Universe?
Apparently it was... with the universe again refusing to answer his mental questioning time and time again. His mental derailment was enough to settle the buzzing in his soul. A sigh escaped from between his teeth. A lax but exhausted grin rested on his cheek bones. 3... 2... 1
“SANS?” The concerned voice of Papyrus echoed through the hall. Sans' eye sockets were wide, Paps was never the first to speak. One would think after so many times the brat couldn't surprise him. “SANS? IS THIS WHERE YOU ARE HIDING? IT IS I! WE CAN TALK ABOUT THIS! FOR I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AM ALWAYS WILLING TO HEAR OUT ANY SIDE OF A DISAGREEMENT.”
Disagreement? Sans allowed his fluffy pink slipper clad foot to shift out from behind the column. It may have been wiser to have taken a shortcut, his surprise was evident, even more so with the watery spear of Undyne sprouted right where his other lazy foot would have landed. “-....?!” A lazy joke froze in his nonexistent throat by the display.
“UNDYNE!” Sans was right. The entire lot of them were there. The golden glint of a massive pauldron indicated that even Asgore was there. How did he get past him? He'd been awake the entire time! Or.. had he been? “WE AGREED NOT TO BE VIOLENT!”
“I didn't agree to nothing, Paps. Your brother's been keeping us down here for years! We could have been free from this place but no. This is some kind of sick game to him.” Undyne sounded angry. More than her usual raspy growls, no. She was livid. The frothing fizz of the watery spear was enough to display her fury. Steam billowed from the manifested weapon as it slowly lost its shape and seeped into the crack it made in the flooring.
The brat had a new game. A new game making him the target.
“U-Undyne. H-h-he can't free us if he's d-dust.” Dr. Alphys tugged on the pants leg of the much taller blue scaled fish monster. “T-th-there has to be a logical explanation for his choice.”
At least Alphys wasn't an idiot, the lack of reaction told him it hadn't been said out loud as he had originally feared. Sweat bedded on the shorter skeleton's brow. “what's this about me being a gatekeeper? heh.” His voice wavered only a little as he dedicated himself to the bit. “the only gate I manage to keep closed is the door to my bedroom, ask paps. i was born in a barn.” A wink later and he had his default grin firmly planted on his face.
“Enough of your jokes, Sans. I’m going to give you the count of three to talk or else.” Undyne snarled, her sharp teeth bared. The brat had riled her up in particular, like a hive of angry bees stuffed in a jar and shaken before being released… also neat.
“What Captain Undyne means is,” Toriel, the voice of reason finally spoke up before anyone else could open their mouths. “We only have pieces from the human child.” Her large paw-like hand rested on Frisk’s shoulder.
“you’ve goat to be kidding me tori, you’re taking the word of a human kit about me doing what again?” Sans was lost, usually he had at least some bits of information for the game. Instead he was completely lost. The sick grin on the demon’s face was all he needed to know though. This was intended. He was intended to not know the rules of the game this round. Another attempt to make him slip up. The last time it had almost worked, he had almost lost his patience entirely.
… And the brat hadn’t been able to let that little moment go, they were too invested in screwing around with him and his world. Sometimes they repeated old choices to relive old memories, to force his hand to play the old roles he had before. To only slash it all away in the end.
“Sans,” Toriel’s frown grew. “Now is not the time for jokes. Isn’t there away to ex-”
“you want an explanation?” Sans’ voice echoed throughout the hall. “i would also like one, considering this is the first i’ve heard of it.”
“YOU HAVEN’T BEEN FEELING WELL LATELY, BROTHER.” Papyrus was the closest one to him. “YOU DON’T SLEEP, YOU DON’T EAT. IS IT BECAUSE OF THIS?” A gloved hand rested on Sans’ shoulder. Since when was he so close? Was he losing fragments of time all of a sudden?
“paps… i don’t know what you’re talking about.” The term lying through one’s teeth applied to the elder skeleton brother, having been caught off guard. His grin wider, exposing those fangs he did so well at hiding.. Papyrus’ touch felt different. It was all different and stressful and.. Charged. Sure, his little brother looked concerned, but what else was it? Undyne was always quick to attack and ask questions after, but what was her deal?
“THE HUMAN HAS TOLD US A GREAT DEAL ABOUT YOUR ADVENTURES TO THE SURFACE.” Papyrus replied, his stance shifting. “We Know, Sans. It’ll Be Better If You Talk To Us. We Only Want To Help.”
“help…?” Sans’ mind was going a million miles a minute. He’d been to the surface? Adventures? What the literal fuck did this demon feed them this time? It was so outrageous… and how did they even fall for such a bullshit story to begin with? “*paps. You’re smarter than this. *you all are.” The older skeleton glanced around his brother’s arm at the rest of them. Frisk? Or the demon as Sans called them continued to smile. How could it be that none of them saw what he saw? Was he losing his mind?
“Sans.” Papyrus actually took a more stern tone with him. “You Aren't Well. Let Me Help You.”
And that was it. Sans couldn’t take their stares anymore. Their demanding, judgmental stares, or the kids or anyone's. The light in the judgement hall was just too bright. He needed shades. What was that mental note again? Right. Inner Pocket. All of that mental monologuing was done in a fraction of a second. Long enough for his right hand to leave it’s pocket, summoning a whisk of his magic to lift his brother’s soul up and off to the side.
“i’m surprised i haven’t heard you laughing yet, brat.” The older skeleton hissed through his grin. Papyrus looked from him to the human child named Frisk in confusion.
“BROTHER-”
Undyne’s spears flew, the only way Sans heard them coming was the frothing heat coming from them. Her uncanny ability to control the temperature of her spears was amazing, if not unsettling at times. Dodging the hailstorm of boiling water spears with a few quick shortcuts would have been an accomplishment if the last one didn’t snag his right shoulder blade. The raging water cut into the thick coat, boiling water soaking into the material, and scalding his bone in the process. “Enough! We tried it your way Papyrus. Now it's my way!"
“Undyne!” Toriel pulled the child closer to her, still oblivious to the unnatural grin across their face.
“Too busy getting answers, talk to you later.” Undyne’s magic surged, sending a volley of icy spears that frosted the ground toward the shorter skeleton. Sans’ bone attacks breaking through that very ground as a defensive reply. “Hold still dammit!” There should have been a clever quip, an attitude diffuser coming from Sans, however nothing came from the usual jokester. Instead all that was given was responses to her attacks. Dodging, shortcuts, and more bones. The floor of the judgement hall being littered with ice shards and bone fragments in no time at all.
Steam began to fill the hall. The difference in Undyne’s spears left the room harder and harder to see into the more they fought. Sans landed with a soft padding of his slippers in what he could only assume was the center of the fourth set of pillars. Fog was something the fish monster could move freely in, as it was very common in Waterfall, her home. So finding the off footed skeleton was easy!
Springing from the left it was Undyne’s goal to pin Sans to the ground using neutral spears, she had them summoned and hidden within the billowing steam that had been stirred up from the battle thus far. From high above the other monsters head she launched another volley, snagging the large jacket full of rips and tears. “I know you can’t fight me for real, Sans. Just give up!”
His left socket flared with cyan flames, startled by the attack, the mistake was noticed far too late. Sans’ left hand had summoned a large blaster, the conjured feral magic enhancer gathered a fierce shot of energy with a distorted charging sound and fired. The beam forced Undyne to make a choice, stand in front of it to protect the others or dodge it. As the defender of monster’s the captain of the royal guard stood in the face of the magic drooling construct and took the beam head on with a summoned wall of spears in the attempt to lessen her own damage in return.
Her choice had been correct, the fog cleared, revealing the fest of their friends and family had been left unharmed. Undyne’s spears had shattered into splinters, including the ones that had been jammed into Sans’ body as well as the ones left in the floors and walls. It didn’t occur to him that he had started to bleed, damage wasn’t something he worried about anymore.
“S-Sans?” Papyrus rushed to his older brother side once the fighting had concluded. Undyne panted for breath while dealing with and exacerbated Dr. Alphys. “Sans. You’re… What is This?”
Sans looked down, the cyan light in his eye extinguishing. His oversized clothes ripped and shredded, his bandaged hand pressing and tugging into his periwinkle turtleneck, already shifting to an odd shade of purple with the blood stains added to it. “i uh…” He’d never had to explain the blood before, not this much. Ketchup hid the little nicks and bumps back in the day, but his health pool was much larger these days thanks to being glitched early on in the hellscape he had been forced to relive the same string of events time and time again. It was always in these moments he envied the others. They didn’t have to remember but.. He did and it was all jumbled together. “i..”
“Oh don’t worry about it paps.” Frisk finally spoke. They had left Toriel’s protective nest and walked up to the skeleton brothers. “Sansy here just keeps to many ketchup packets in his big ugly coat. Don’t you, trashbag?” Their grin thick, spreading across their face in such a disgusting way.
Papyrus taking offense, “I KNOW HE HAS KEPT THINGS FROM US BUT THAT IS NO REASON TO BE MEAN, HUMAN.”
“Oh, of course it is. There’s always reasons…” They glanced to the snarling glaster to the left, poised. “Isn’t there, Sansy?”
“you sure do love to push all the right buttons, don’t you kiddo.” Sans huffed, he couldn’t muster a grin. He'd taken far too much damage from the fight, he needed to focus on the mental leash he needed to keep that blaster in check. The focus of that was taking nearly everything he had left.
“These aren't buttons, comedian.” Frisk pulled from their inventory a knife. “These… are just continued lessons of who is in control… and who serves.” The knife hadn’t even been noticed by the younger brother as his concern was solely on Sans.
The knife was raised to the pinnacle of the humans reach before slashing downwards.
Papyrus was shoved out of the way, his battle body stained with blood from Sans’ touch. It was just a reflex. A reflex to save his brother like always. The cold steel of that kitchen knife cut through his already damaged garments, slashing into his rib cage. More of that crimson liquid spilling from between his teeth.
But he couldn’t just die there could he? Frisk had taken the moment to pull the remains of the dusting skeleton to them, the shocked gasps of the other monsters echoing around them. “Now.. let this be a reminder to you, Sansy.”
His eye sockets were wide, as wide as they could be, as he was forced to look up into the face of their world’s tormentor yet again. The sounds of the feral blaster getting louder while his own vision darkened and faded. “no… no no no..” Sans' last struggle was in vain. The last thing he could see before the darkness took hold once again was his own blaster firing through Undyne, finishing the job.