entranceway | [video/text]

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[Chara's outside. They have their device on the ground, propped up against a rock, so their hands are free. They're crouched down in the mud, on the shore of a pond somewhere - there's a bush of purple flowers in the background, mostly obscuring the maze of massive tree-trunks. They're out having some kind of childish adventure, presumably. Two things sit by their feet: a thermos of something-or-other and a freshly-gathered bouquet of white flowers.

They're washing that favourite old switchblade off in the water. Must have cut the flowers, not picked them. They flick it dry, click the blade shut, and pocket it. Pick up the bouquet, hold it up so their face is all but hidden by the lovely white blooms.]

Pretty, are they not? Narcissus. A member of the daffodil family. They get their name because... well, I'm not entirely familiar with the myth, actually. I know Narcissus was some guy who loved himself. He loved himself so much, he died.

[A very abridged version, and they might be wrong, but they think they've got the base details down. They shrug, smile, start to neatly divide their bouquet: a pile of flowers on this side, and they pluck all the leaves off and set them down on the other side.]

It is a tangent, Wonderland, but I wonder. Could you get me up to speed on what we know about the mirror side? Can we cross to that side if we want to? Can the mirror folk cross the barrier as they please? If not, is there someone or something in charge of the decision? I'm curious.

[Their flowers sufficiently... de-leafed... they pick up the thermos. Ginger tea, sweetened with honey. Good for queasiness. Honey makes it taste better, soothes a sore throat. They think, fleetingly, of Asgore. Because they think of Asgore, they think of Toriel. Don't... quite know how to approach the topic of Asriel. Don't want to talk about it. Don't want to think about it. Don't want to bear acknowledging they live in a world without him again. But is anyone else... checking on them?

...Couldn't hurt. Maybe. To just... maybe not about him, can't utter his name. To just... say hi.

They cut the video feed. Reach for their phone, type some texts out.]

[Private text to Asgore]

I was going to attach a picture. I've started work on a sweater - pink again, if that is okay. It's back in our room, though, and I don't think I'll be back there for a couple days.

I suppose I just wanted to let you know you'll have something to look forward to. =)

[Private text to Toriel]

I know it is unkind to gossip, but perhaps you ought to know that Sans took poorly at the end of this last event. I am aware he is a friend of yours, so I feel you should be aware. Perhaps he would feel better if someone came to check on him? Company always makes a hard time easier.

Here is a joke that the both of you might like:
Why did the pie go to the dentist? Because it needed a filling.

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[They have to wait, pause to let their organs settle and stop rebelling against the thing they just slid down their esophagus. Frisk smiles thinly, sadly, the motion pulled easily from their lips, lacking the motivation to prevent it. Chara dispensing their typical commentary. Like nothing's wrong.

Maybe someone will find them here. Maybe someone will find one or both of them dying, Frisk telling stories to a corpse, or maybe they'll both be coiled over one another and puking their guts out.

Lie here and die together. That was the original plan. Too bad Frisk doesn't want to get up and finish the job. Their breathing hitches for a short moment, and then they press forward, their tone even, the words steady.]

The god of the dead had heard such pleas before. Many, many times. But moved by the power of Orpheus's music, he finally agreed that he would let Eurydice return to the land of the living, on one condition.

[Focus on the curve of fingers around their arm. Touch. Always a sticky point for them. It's nice of them to allow this one thing, even if they're the one who's straddling the dangerous line here.]

He had to walk out of hell, and never once look back to check that Eurydice was following. He would simply have to trust that she was behind him.

So he agreed with the terms. He began to walk back out of hell. It was a long journey.

[They pick up one of the pre-picked leaves with their free hand. Toy with it, folding it between their fingers.]

He always wanted to look back to make sure his beloved was there, but he kept his promise. He did not look back. He only trusted she would follow.

[What a story, huh? Loving someone so much you'd follow them to hell. Being so special that you could actually save them from hell.

They have a feeling they might hate this story, no matter how it ends.

Their fingers tighten around Frisk's arm. Bunch up the fabric of their shirt.]

Don't.

[Spoken softly, with a too-casual smile on their face. Like they're asking Frisk for a tiny favour. Like it's just a "hey, get your own Cheetos" instead of a "hey, please don't die in an atrociously inefficient and unpleasant manner."

It'll make their throat hurt if they start laughing.

They try to pile together reasons, pick one out that's nice enough. I don't wanna die with YOU anymore? You're not supposed to want this, you're supposed to be getting better? I don't want this for you. All kind of harsh, aren't they? Not reasons they could lay out without getting them thrown right back in their hypocritical face.

So. Well. There's always...]

If you do, everyone will blame me.

[Maybe they would. Maybe they'd assume, that since Chara was apparently alone, that Frisk simply couldn't handle the sight of them lying there and followed suit. Maybe Sans or Toriel will find them first, and remember...

Maybe...

They hate themselves so deeply for the idea that forms in their gut, amidst the hot boiling of stomach acids eating away at a volatile, potentially fatal thing. Breath catches. Breathe out through their nose and continue the story, a little fainter.

They crush the leaf into another ball, but make no motion to do anything else to it.]

Finally, he felt the sun on his skin. He had made it to the surface, and all without looking back once. Overjoyed, he turned back to face his beloved.

[Fingers digging into their palm, cutting through the leaf and into their skin. Getting the toxins into their body the hard way, huh?]

But in doing so, he'd made an error. You see, Orpheus was meant to wait until they were both out of hell, and Eurydice had not yet reached the surface as he had. He saw her face one last time before she disappeared, forever lost to him now, for the god of death would not allow him to traverse the underworld a second time.

[Whether the horrible dark pit in their stomach is a result of what they just did or what they're about to do, they have no idea.

Slowly, Frisk lifts their hand with its bunched up leaf matter, holds it over Chara's face. Like they're about to feed them their own death.]

Perhaps it was a lapse of trust. Perhaps he simply hadn't realized that they both needed to be free. But because of his error, the lovers were doomed to always go where the other could not follow, united only in death.

[They hold it overhead. Asking permission.]

...Kind of a pointless idea, wasn't it? If he wanted to be with Eurydice so bad, why didn't he just off himself instead of going to all that trouble?

[Question with an obvious answer, that. Normal people don't want to die. Nobody wants to be dead. Death is terrifying. Orpheus wanted to have his cake and eat it too. Didn't wanna give up anything he had. Wanted to be with Eurydice, but not if it meant he had to sacrifice something.]

At least death can still bring them back together. He can't mess that up, right? One promise that we all keep, sooner or later.

[Death won't take them to Asriel. LOVE or suicide. Kill or be killed. None of it really makes it okay, none of it solves the problem. Just makes it easier to not care about a problem that will never be fixed. No wonder they say this kind of behaviour is self-centered, huh?

Their smile goes lopsided, wry, halfhearted. They gaze at the crushed-up leaf that Frisk holds. Wonder idly what Frisk's game is. But they nod their assent, lips parting around a thin little puff of air, not quite forceful enough to qualify as either a sigh or a laugh.]

[Frisk has no answer to the questions, the pointless mockery of a sad story they'd picked up and read in a library, in a compendium of assorted myths and tales about the follies of gods and children of gods. There'd been an awful lot of gods. An awful lot of names they couldn't pronounce. Orpheus's story had stuck in their mind the longest. It had left them feeling melancholy for reasons they couldn't define, feeling like the story had no real resolution. No real ending. Orpheus and Eurydice never get concretely reunited. Maybe if they imagine it very hard, picture Orpheus's cruel demise, they can see the ending that was never written out in the story they read.

Chara nods. Frisk shuts their eyes. They think achingly of Asgore, who may have known the mechanism by which his children died if only after the fact, of Toriel, who had carried the small, empty body back to the Ruins, of Flowey, who had arisen from good intentions and scientific error, of Orpheus, who trusted implicitly but not enough, of Eurydice, who must have faded knowing he loved her, knowing he had tried, and perhaps not hating him for making that fatal misstep at the last second.

They think of Asriel.

They lower their hand. Chara's mouth is open.

The only warning is the split second in which their fingers tighten across Chara's front, bunching into the fabric of their shirt, and they bring the hand down sharply, the leaf still clenched to their palm, two fingers extended as they aim to drive them down their throat with enough force and depth to trigger the reaction they're hoping for.

They'll hate them. They'll hate them.

But they already hated them, that was the point.]

[They should have known better. There's the fleeting instant where grip tightens, where they're prisoner to someone else's touch, and Chara's not the one who's better at dodging, because for that necessary half-second, they freeze, lock up, go immobile and compliant, and that costs them everything.

Chara bites down, vicious and wild, but it's too late, it's after the fact, it's clamping down on fingers that are already intruding, and it's a stupid, stupid reflex, because it keeps them in place, because the damage is already done, because skin touches the back of their throat and the horrific, repulsed noise that ruptures out of them is more of a shuddering wretch than a scream.

They wrench away, shove themselves up with a strength born of pure desperation, but escape doesn't mean much of anything. All they have time to do is lurch forward, crash through the reeds into the shallows of the pond, sleeves getting soaked and knees smeared with mud as they collapse hands-first into the water, trying to cough for air but it's useless and stupid because coughing turns into gagging turns into horrible, body-wrenching heaves. That horrible bitter taste comes back up a second time in a stinging, awful rush. Stomach acid burns their throat, their tongue. The noise is absolutely vile.

Disgusting. They're so disgusting.

They recoil, pull their arms out of the water, can't look at the filthy mess they've made. Can't back away, because their stomach still twists and shudders violently, like it'll happen again at any moment. Can't look at Frisk, because their eyes water and their breath comes in tight hitches and it must be on their breath and maybe it's in their hair and they're so disgusting. Shame and revulsion boil even hotter than whatever's left in their stomach.]

Why do I keep trusting you?

[A trembling, breathless laugh. Their voice strained, raw in the wake of the... of this. Look at what a mess they are. Befouling a perfectly picturesque little oasis.]

[It's a hideous sound and an even worse sensation, and they know Chara knows the instant something's changed. Their teeth sink into skin and it's less painful than the glass, the glass, the glass that had broken beneath a similarly ill-advised and just as impulsively self-righteous an act. Teeth in the skin don't bury themselves in fragmented, glittering slivers.

The awful sliminess coats their skin an instant before Chara tears away completely, and Frisk lets them, half-collapsing into the mud, because they remember hearing somewhere or reading somewhere or having it said on a TV somewhere that vomiting while on your back will cause asphyxiation, exactly the end result they're trying to prevent. They prop themselves on their elbow, teeth gritted, and now their left hand can exist in painful symmetry to their right - burning and bloodied and coated in what they're reasonably sure is some of the contents of Chara's stomach. That will need to be washed and cleaned so it doesn't get infected. So they don't have to live with that poison in them.

As if it were that simple. They already are poison, poison inside them, and they just spread it to everyone they touch. Chara's hacking up their awful, awful meal. They can smell it, hear it, taste it in the air, rancid with bile and acid and half-digested greenery.

They lie in the dirt, feeling bereft.

Why do they keep trusting Frisk?

Some nebulous answer swells on their tongue, something arcane and vaguely insulting in its abstraction:

Because I'm Orpheus, and I can't let you go.

Ha-ha. They've been listening to Chara too much, haven't they. They breathe, try to inhale the smell of fresh-picked flowers and dirt, and not the results of the pain and frustration they've just inflicted on their alleged best friend. They fail. That's fine.

The words, when they come, are small and defeated and rasping.]

* But I decided... It wasn't worth living anymore.
* Not in a world without love.
* Not in a world without you.

[It's like their body's been given permission to utterly fail them, now, because it tries again. Drowns out their pathetic attempts to make willpower overwrite reflex. They bend over again, retch again, set the reeds rustling with their trembling great heaves. Their nose runs and their eyes run and everything tries to force its way out of them until they're reduced to dry heaves, to being so stuck on emptying themselves out that they're even trying to expel hollowness itself.

It's not fair, using those words.

He said them first. To Chara. In their empty, silent home. He called out for them, and they failed to answer him. Should have been determined enough to overcome death all on their own, should never have reduced him to that. Should never have made him suffer, either with words or with silence.

He almost followed in their footsteps here, too. Because of Chara.

Now he's gone somewhere Chara can't follow.

Now it's Chara's turn to live in a world without him. All over again.

Their breath comes in weird spasms. Coughs, gasps, sobs, whatever they are. They scrub their damp sleeve over their forehead, wipe away the clammy sweat prickling on their skin. Scrub their sleeve over their mouth, and that's gross, they're gross, they're such a vile stain on this place. They look horrible. Why are they even alive?

Chara pulls back from the water's edge. Lets the reeds conceal the evidence of what they've done, at least a little bit. Think of looking for the thermos, trying to rinse this away, but they don't make it that far. Just sink onto the muddy shore, curl up in a pitiful little ball in the dirt, arms wrapped around their stomach.]

I don't want to live without him.

There's no point to me. Why am... why am I the one who's still here? Why not me instead of him?

[You did this. You did this. You brought this upon yourself. Brought this upon them, dragged them away from it. Make yourself a tether. Chain yourself to them. Make sure you never let them go, even if they want you to, even if they ask.

The answer is clotted with foul-tasting saliva in their throat. They spit a few times into the grass and wonder if it means anything. Will they get sick? Lie queasy on a bed for a few days? Their hands close into fists as they push themselves onto all fours, and then onto their knees. The motion hurts uniformly for both, oddly satisfying in its synchronicity. The mud stains their knees and shirt and has gotten tangled in their hair.

They wait for the next wave of sickness to fade, for Chara to speak again. They do their best to look at them, but it doesn't matter. They're huddled on the ground, miserable.]

I don't know.

[It aches to admit it aloud. Why Chara, and not Asriel? Why him, and not them? Why Frisk and Chara? It always comes down to them, hands clasped on the event horizon of their own hatred for their choices and their mistakes.]

You know he'd say the same about you. Didn't understand why he was here. Thought that you were more deserving, that I...

[The words die in their throat. Resolve into a dry sob-like sound. God, they'd all give each other their SOULs in a heartbeat, wouldn't they? Pass along the will to live and succumb to the end they know they deserve.]

None of us wanted to be here. We'd all give it up for each other if we could.

[They don't actually believe that. Maybe, just maybe, Asriel would be charitable enough to find an "I still love you, despite what you are" within himself, but they aren't stupid enough to think anybody would think they deserve anything but... ha. Where kids like them ought to be on days like these.]

He tried to be better.

[Gracious enough to attempt an "I love you," even if he feared them so much he didn't dare put his own name to it.]

You're trying.

[And Chara? It'd be a waste to give them anything. Look how fragile this little act of their is. One tiny snag, and everything unravels. Miles and miles of work to reshape themself into a solid, interlocked web, and the merest tug turns them back into the useless, formless pile of thread they were at the start. They were never what this world asked for, nor can they mold themselves into something newer, better. It's just... this. Relapses into the same tiring antics every time he's here and gone, huh?]

I can't be as good as either of you. I can't even fake being as good as you. What happens if I go after someone again, and you aren't there to save them?

[They don't have a memory of it. It's something that's going to happen. It's a future. Their future. Their inescapable future. Words he gave to Chara, never to Frisk. Frisk would never hurt their friends like that. Frisk wouldn't sink as low as Chara sinks over and over again, like it's going out of style. Frisk gets to be the kind of friend people wish for, the kind of friend who saves people from themselves.

And Chara...]

Please don't kill me.

[That bitter recitation again. Please don't kill me. Frisk's shoulders curl around themselves. They'd done it again, stolen that choice away from beneath Chara's hands, self-righteous and self-interested, wholly self-interested, and simply because they hadn't wanted to be alone. Had this failed...

Had it failed, would they have been content to back away and go home quietly and wait two days in tortuous suspension?

They already know the answer.]

Yeah. Asriel and me, we're the pictures of little angels, huh?

[They can't even inject the words with a degree of exasperation, or resentment. They just feel tired. Tired as Chara probably feels.]

He goes after Alphys. Attacks her. He tries to kill her, then himself. He kills everyone in the Underground, just because he can, so he has to. But he didn't have a SOUL. He was empty.

What's my excuse?

[Their bandaged hand goes to their shirt, over their chest, gripping at the material over their heart.]

It feels better, not to feel anything. It's great. You don't have to worry about how others see you. You don't have to hurt, or care, or anything. You think I don't feel that? You think I don't still want -

[The closure and contortion of throat muscles chokes them into silence.]

[Didn't they see this coming, back when they had been adamantly willing to believe that every bad choice had been because of Chara? That every bit of violence and cruelty could be chalked up to demonic possession, while every bit of kindness and compassion was the real Frisk?

They're Frisk's excuse. Take that away, and...

Chara squirms, curls in tighter, feels their cheek pressing into the uncomfortably damp earth.

He trusted Frisk with the knowledge he was empty. Didn't trust the person who was supposed to be empty, too. Maybe they ought to make another biting remark about leaked secrets, broken promises. Maybe they don't care anymore.]

But that's not what you choose, huh?

[Being good is a choice, people say. A choice you make over and over. And on one side of the scale... there's LV 8. Lunging at a sick monster with a knife in their hand. On the other:]

LV 1.

0 AT, 0 DF. You don't even carry a weapon. I gave you a weapon, and you gave it away so someone would like you more.

[Trying. Constant, exhausting effort. Never hurting a single soul, except maybe for themselves.

...Themselves.]

You should probably... you know. Too. One leaf probably won't hurt you, but you'll...

That was a mistake. I shouldn't have broken that promise.

[They're tired of saying it, and maybe the implicit sorry there is enough to be frustrating and irritating, because it irritates them too. Reliably unreliable, that's them. Lowering ethical standards everywhere.

Their throat still feels slick and bitter from its treatment earlier. They nod, remember Chara isn't looking at them and therefore can't see, and breathe out.]

Okay.

[They shift away a little bit, crawling on their hands and knees because standing is simply too difficult a prospect right now. They could cram both hands down their throat, but with the mud and bloodied bandage and...stuff coated all over the pair of them, that's probably unsanitary. It's definitely unsanitary.

So instead they cast their mind to the abyss in the back of their head that they always pretend isn't there, reach in deep, dredge up all the things they hate most about themselves. Papyrus's head parting from its spine. Toriel's expression, sick and horrified and furious when they crossed the room and ran for her. Asriel, blank-eyed and empty and motionless on the floor. The delicious upward tick of a number. Harvesting the LOVE they knew was meant to be a bad thing, but could it really be so bad if it made them feel stronger?

It comes easily after that. A few dry heaves and their head is spinning, but they sit back on their heels and breathe out and it'll be okay. They hurt, ache all over. They're tired. They're so, so tired.]

I'm tired, Chara. I'm tired of living like this. I'm tired of smiling and being everyone's friend. I'm tired of them pretending I'm not...this.

[They gesture at themselves one-handed, shakily.]

Every time I push them away, they just say that it's fine, it's all okay, because I'm good. I don't feel very good. I don't feel very good at all. I keep breaking promises. I keep saying I trust you, and then I take it back at the worst time.

[Only when it's convenient, right?]

[They don't get up. Just shift in the mud so they can clap their hands over their ears, breathe slowly through their nose, squeeze their eyes shut. Feels like just hearing the sound of someone being sick will set them off all over again. Don't want to remember the feeling of someone else's fingers in their mouth. The goosebumps and clammy sweat seem to start up all over again at the mere concept of fingers inside of them.

Wait until it passes. Wait until it's over. Just lie there shivering in the mud until Frisk is ready to speak again.]

...You're good to them.

[As far as Chara knows. For whatever that's worth. Frisk helps Sans when he's down. Frisk comforts Alphys when she's lonely. Frisk comes to the rescue when Asriel hits a breaking point.

They know Frisk's broken promises they've made to Chara. They know Frisk doesn't trust Chara. But that's...]

It's different when it's me, anyway.

[It's for the greater good. Can't let Chara have the Knife, because who knows what they'd do with power like that? Can't risk Chara cutting Sans down, because who knows how much EXP that will actually give them?]

You don't have to weigh your friendship against managing the threat that Alphys, Sans, Asgore, Mettaton present, because they don't present one. The only one they'd ever hurt is... ha. The human. And it's different when it's the human.

It's always different when it's us, huh?

[They push themselves up on spindly, wobbly arms. Try a steadying breath. Look at the two of them, huh? Filthy, putrid, pathetic little things. Not fit to be seen by civilized company.]

The thermos has... it's ginger tea. Honey. Nothing else. It'll help, if you...

[They cast around, a little aimlessly.]

I might have dropped it.

[It's always different with the both of them, because they're the ones that are like no one else. Anomalies, humans, fallen children with red SOULs. Too much determination for their own good. Even when Frisk wanted, needed, wanted that silence, that peace after death, it was never...well, they could never stop. They were never in that emptiness, that void, for very long. Asgore's voice rumbled in their direction, and then they would be awake again, back at their SAVE point. There was never a choice. They can't remember if it was one or both of them that made that happen, or if it was simply an inherent factor in who they were, anomaly, that made giving up in that sense a physical and metaphysical impossibility. Thing could fling themselves a line of bullets all day if it suited them, relatively speaking, but they'd always come out the other side. Intrinsically, permanently, forever determined. Will that be how it always ends? Will they live on the surface for years and years and find themselves dying of old age and wish for an end to it but see their SOUL splinter into fragments and be greeted by that familiar memory, that familiar tug forward to proceed? There was never an option there. Nothing but RESET and CONTINUE.

And if they CONTINUE, where do they go after death? Can they? Or do they simply start at that point in time all over again, relive their death by kidney failure or cardiac arrest or whatever it is old people die by, because they can't bear to effect a RESET?

You're good to them.

Yeah, they're real nice to all of them. Are they good to Papyrus when they're taunting him for his happiness? Are they good to Mettaton when they're talking about LOVE and EXP, explaining the way by which his world is built and the means through which monster lives are measured? Who are they good to, exactly? Certainly not to Chara. Certainly not to themselves.]

It's okay. It'll pass.

[It'll pass.

Everything passes.]

I guess I...never really realize how much I look up to you. How much I...need you until you're gone. I'm not me. Not really. I'm just half of a whole. Waiting for you.

It's a really bad idea to look up to this.

[There's that self-aware smile as they stagger up to their feet, dishevelled and dirty and sweating and teetering like some kind of back-alley drunken hobo. Ha. They've been a back-alley hobo for brief periods of time, too. As long as they could get away with it.

They stumble upstream, away from the spot they were sick. Over to the mouth of the pond. Cleaner up there. Splash cold water over their face, try and get mud and sick off the ends of their hair sticking to their face. Rinse their mouth out, wonder briefly if the water here would give them dysentery or something. Still mud all over their shorts, their legs, their shirt. Their sleeves are still wet from the middle of their forearms down. Try as you might, you can't wosh u SOUL. Never really clean, just... slightly less foul.]

You remember when I first came here, Frisk? You said you'd thought I'd gone to rest or something.

[Maybe that wasn't the first time they saw that perfect ending? Maybe they remember something past the barrier. Maybe they remember weeks, months, maybe even years on the surface. Maybe they didn't think it was all that perfectly happy, because Asriel hadn't been SAVED the way they wanted him to be.]

Everyone here from the... the best timeline. The good one. They didn't... know me. They just knew the old story everyone hears.

[The king's son, Asriel, and a human who fell. Humanity taking everything from monsterkind all over again.]

I think that means... either I'm not there, or you never tell any of them about me. Proves we don't have to be friends. Don't have to need each other like this. Proves you're okay without me, right?

...Maybe "okay" isn't the right word.

[Not for either of them. They sort of shrug one shoulder. A halfhearted, weary invitation to try and put this sickness behind them, at least a little bit. Wosh u teeth and eyes.]

[They'll undercut any remotely positive thing Frisk says about them. That's just who they are.

Of course they remember the first time Chara came here. They remember it because it's seared into their memory, every panicky text they sent, every pained sob, every beat that passed between a response and retrieving that pair of scissors and doing what no one would think they'd do. That they're too good to do, right? That's a joke. They're not too good for anything.

Their SOUL must've shattered at the fall. It must have. And maybe that familiar motion had coaxed the remnants of that special human persistence from Chara's grave, brought everything together with that high-bright snap of realigning edges. They'd woken confused, their head a possibly-concussed mess. Names were scrambled, thrown and tossed and lost to the winds. Scribbled out. Just a human. Just a child in a striped shirt.

Will every day be like this? They think it and then, ruefully, almost laugh - as if every day isn't already like this. Constantly wrestling each other away from the brink.]

Maybe.

[Can't offer any concrete denial. They've never lived longer than a few minutes past that perfect, golden ending. They wouldn't know.]

I don't know. I don't know where I'd be without you here. If things all go back to how they are at home, I - maybe then we'd get to forget it all. And it'd be easier to act like it's that easy. And maybe then we'd get to, I dunno, discover what we are without each other. Whatever that is.

[They shrug, the motion tired, scornful. Something abstruse like that doesn't really have a place in this conversation. Right up there with Orpheus.]

But I don't care what that is. I don't ever wanna know.

[Chara's quiet, eyes downcast, watching the water.

They... don't like touch. Not really. Not often. Nothing smothering, nothing from people much bigger than them, no being grabbed unexpectedly. Touch didn't mean anything good back on the Surface, whether it was gentle or violent. But they... they sort of... miss it, they think? Want to lay in the wretched soil with Frisk's arm over them. Enough to feel sheltering, but not enough to feel stifling. Sort of want to... hold. Be held. Just deflate, unravel, melt. Be as emptied-out and limp as they feel right now.

But that's stupid, isn't it? That so-called hug was just part of the trick. Getting close enough to get one over on Chara. Wait for them to get comfortable, then spring the kind of gross, horrid touch on them they never wanted or asked for.

For your own good, Chara. You made me do this.

Not gonna get fooled twice. Not gonna fool themselves again. Should be weaning themselves away from it, not leaning on it. Trusting Frisk just leaves them burned. Don't. Needing Frisk just makes it worse every time they inevitably set everything around them on fire again.]

I don't get it. I don't get why it's like this.

[Why they aren't over needing Frisk. Why it's so important to them to let Frisk be happy. Why Frisk has so many nicer, better friends, the kind of friends who do things right and say things right and always believe in them... but it's Chara that Frisk can't live without? It's Chara that's so worth their attention? Chara they still aren't giving up on, even if they nearly lost a friend to Chara's impulsive, deadly backsliding?

They curl up at the water's edge. Scrunch their sleeves up. Just trying to wring the water out of the fabric.]

What am I gonna do if Wonderland takes you away too?

[What if they lose that? What if it gives them a Frisk who doesn't like licorice or thinks Spirited Away is boring or who doesn't understand what feeling this way is like? What if this won't last either, right? There's no "another" Frisk. Only their Frisk.]

[They never want it to happen. They don't even want to imagine it. A world without Chara, snatched away, wholly desolate - they don't know what they'd do. Part of them doesn't want to believe that they could exist at all. The week in which they'd been here alone had been...odd. Unique. They'd spent so much time adjusting to the new circumstances, they hadn't really needed to bother with the quiet in their head, didn't need to address it.

They can't remember much from it. Nothing stood out other than the day of their arrival. Everything else smoothed out into a sort of sameness.

Slowly, achingly, Frisk gets to their feet. It takes them a few tries, first having to balance on their knees and one hand, then just their knees, then nearly falling to the ground again, and then wobbling upright. They tremble beneath their own weight. Legs scratched up and feeble from not enough water and not enough food and whatever they did manage to keep down in the last few days is lying in the grass a few feet away, the awful taste thick and clinging to the roof of their mouth.]

I don't know. I don't wanna know. If one of us goes, I -

[They clung to Chara like their anchor, not daring to relinquish their grip on them. As much for Frisk themself as for Chara, as much for Frisk's own peace of mind and well-being and deep-seated need to be a constant, hypomanic altruist as for Chara's sake, keeping their death counter from ticking lower and lower.]

I don't know. I don't know what I'd do. What I'd be willing to do, I -

[Woke them with a kiss. Love. True fairy-tale-esque love. Snuck into a movie showing under a trenchcoat. Played a game of stupid tag, pretended to dance, watched anime, talked about birthdays and living and not living and pairs of scissors and the different ways to die that are painless and the ones that are not and giving each other slices of pie, and they - they can't think about it, can't bear to think about it, think of one of them existing without the other anymore.]

I, uh... [They laugh, shakily, a sound that barely constitutes as humor.] I guess I really would be Orpheus, huh?

[The urge to hold onto them hasn't dulled. To sob again until their strained, raw throat goes completely hoarse, to cling to each other like they did... ha, like they did last time. When they thought nothing would ever hurt like that had hurt. Boy, serves them right for not expecting things to get worse!

But it'd be... nice, maybe, if they could. Hold on in the way they never could Underground, as two real separate people, both alive and substantial and able to feel. Or hold on like they did Underground, so tightly that every last gap between them melted and they were a single, inseparable entity. Just... something that feels more anchored than this. Less alone than this. Something that chases out the unfathomable what-if of life alone.

They don't. They know better. They just hug themselves, wrap their muddy damp arms around their own frail frame as tightly as they can, dig their nails into their upper arms as if they can burrow safely away into their own flesh.]

Don't be Orpheus, dummy. He ended up alone, didn't he?

[It's not funny. They try a laugh, but it's just a weird, raw hiccup of noise that scratches in the back of their throat.]

I don't... know what else to do, Frisk.

[They admit it quietly. Sort of limply. It just falls out of them lifelessly.]

I don't want to... make it worse for you, I guess.

[Don't want to be the reason they can't be happy. Don't want them following in Chara's footsteps, not like Asriel... god, Asriel. It thuds in the empty space inside their chest.]

But nothing else turns it off. Nothing else stops it. I told you I can't do this twice.

[Don't want to feel. Not this. Anything but this. Anything for a bit of respite from this.]

I won't be able to do it three times. Four times. Five. However many it takes to...

[However many it takes until they don't want him to keep coming back. Until they're sick of him? Bored and apathetic, like he got toward every single person in his timelines? Of him. Of Asriel. The most important person in the world. The one person who means everything, who'll always mean everything.]

[He got torn to pieces, they think. They don't say it. All the Greek myths ended horribly like that. Someone was always getting ripped apart, or turned to stone, or drowned, or killing themselves out of grief. Sometimes it was for a good reason, like the nice giant man who stole a ray of sun for the humans, so they could live and be warm. Mostly it was for dumb reasons, though. A lot of those stories didn't really strike any chords from a moralistic standpoint.

Frisk walks forward a few steps, testing their weight versus their varying balance. They feel distant and poorly-coordinated, like a newborn deer.]

I know. I don't...know how to make any of this better. I don't even know if it gets better. If "better" is a place or a feeling or a...I don't know it. I don't know if it even exists.

[Does anyone they know even live there? Papyrus, maybe. But even then, his perfect smile and seemingly always-upbeat personality isn't airtight. It's not like pain doesn't exist. It's just that he seems to know how to live with it. And god, how does he live with it? They wish it were easy as smiling and making a pot of spaghetti. Wish it were easy as a step-by-step process. It's not. It never was.

They make it to the edge of the pond, and kneel again. Wash their left hand clean, or at least rinse it somewhat. It's bleeding a little bit. That's probably bad. They don't care. The water is cleaner than the stuff sprayed over their skin.

The shake their hand clean, scattering droplets of water over the otherwise still surface.

Frisk straightens up, wiping their hand on their shorts.]

Can't sleep, because it follows you. Can't dream, because it follows you. Can't go another minute, another five, another ten, because every minute is just another minute without...

[Their throat closes, the words dying out. There's a hitch in their breath, their shoulders trembling, their head ducking.]

We're, uh...we're...we're pretty messed up, huh? No matter what we do it, it never - it never stops. And it never gets easier. We just kind of keep going anyway, and even that's just...

[There's no ending to that sentence either. It doesn't really need one.]

I don't even care about "better!" I've given up on better completely!

[Won't EVER be happy. They know it. Some things are broken so badly, even the best technicians out there can't fix it. Nothing to do but throw it out, get a new one. They know better than to think a happy ending has any room for them. Never harbored any delusions about that. Not when they were a passenger in Frisk's SOUL. Not when they had a SOUL of their own. Always understood that the best they could do was set people up to be happy in their absence.]

I don't even need "okay." I just... I just need livable!

I'd settle for "not unbearably painful." For "only suffering a moderate amount." Heck, they'd go down on my knees and thank God by name if something would be willing to grant me moderate suffering! A ten-minute time-out to just get back on my feet, catch my breath! Something! Anything! I can't just keep going anyway. Not... not like this.

[They can't dig their fingers into their arms any harder. Wish for claws, always wish for claws. What kind of demon doesn't even have claws?]

Look at us, Frisk. We're disgusting. I'm shivering in the mud, some kid just shoved their fingers down my throat because I can't be trusted for twelve seconds, can't even manage to...

[They trail off, the brief flare of energy fizzling out as suddenly as it comes. They stand up, too, for no real reason other than the fact Frisk is standing. Makes them unclench their grip on themselves a bit, loosen, because their balance is wobbly and getting up is kind of a funny thing when you just ingested and subsequently expelled a hefty stack of leaves.]

I don't know what's worse. Thinking it's going to be like this every time, or... or the idea that it just becomes our new baseline. That this'll get to be our "normal."

[Frisk says nothing as they speak, doesn't try to interrupt or get a word in edgewise, because it's...it's just how they feel. And they think they might understand it, if on a reduced scale. They think the pain in their chest doesn't really go away, not completely, but maybe it dulls.

We're disgusting.

Frisk almost joins in. The words are thick on their tongue like a rash.

We don't need poison, Chara. We are poison. We were born with poison inside us. We inflict ourselves on others and spread it to them. And there is no cure.

There's no cure for being us.

They think, and stand in silence for a long moment, shivering slightly from the recent abuse they've put their body through, the icy cold of the mud seeping through their clothes and sticking to their skin, their overtaxed muscles and still-healing injuries.]

When I kissed you. Woke you up. That wasn't...all terrible.

[It was a rocky moment, yes, and Chara might still be in denial about it, but it wasn't irredeemably awful. Not like things feel right now.]

When you saved Toriel, woke her up too. When we snuck into that movie in a trenchcoat. And when you... [They huff lightly.] ...I can't even remember all the times you've saved my life. It's not...I know it's hard. And I hate it sometimes too. I hate it so much I can't stand it.

[Like now. Like those few days ago.]

But it's the moments like those that - that make it worth it. That help me keep going when it gets really, really bad, like now. It's not perfect. But it's...it's a little bit easier. A little bit better.

[They don't want to be reasonable. Want to scream about how yes, they're grateful for a handful of breadcrumbs, but they're still starving. Want to wail that none of those little things are Asriel, there isn't going to be more Asriel - or worse, there will be more Asriel, and they won't even care anymore because what's the point? Because it's too tiring to do this he-loves-me-he-hates-me yo-yoing, to have their world come to an end all over again. Why bother, if it won't last, right? You must not have loved him at all, if you're already thinking like that! You're the kind of creature that gets told somebody's your friend, and all you see is a pile of EXP!

They wrap their arms around their aching, uneasy middle. Still hugging themselves, like that's any kind of comfort. No point wishing anyone felt safe enough to hold, you can just hold yourself! Be grateful you even have a body to hold, because you sure didn't always have that much! It's not a dignified way to stand - a little bent over themselves, head bowed, shoulders slumped. Looks sick and defeated and pitiful.]

...This is the worst part. Walking away from... the edge, I guess.

[Being so prepared for respite, even temporarily, and being pulled back. Realizing all over again that you have to Continue. That there's no stopping. You're already dead, but you have to keep living. Feeling like you aren't actually better just because you were stopped. Knowing you should be back to locks on the closets and surrendering sharp things, but knowing you can't - can never, ever surrender the Knife, never again. Knowing you're supposed to want to live now, knowing Frisk's trying their hardest to lay reasons out, and all of it still not being good enough.

They... start walking. Heavy, dragging footsteps. They must look every inch as crushed as they both feel, huh?

They just assume Frisk will follow. Leave this mess behind. Go get cleaned up. Put yourself together, you sloppy disaster.]

Tell me you love me again. Tell me how much you trust me.

[They follow. Of course they do. They have nowhere else to go, and only one person they know how to tether themselves to. They're not sure they'll remember how to unattach their own self to Chara's side once this is..."over". Nominally over. They're not sure it ever really will be wholly over. It never is for them.

The hardest thing isn't deciding to put an end to it. The hardest thing isn't even failing. The hardest thing is the moment where you decide to keep going regardless, even if it's the scariest, most impossible prospect you can imagine.

Frisk keeps talking. Tries to fill the void with noise, quiet words like running water.]

You're my best friend, and you're my family, and I love you. I love you so much that I...don't know how to do it sometimes. Don't know how to love very well. And that's not your fault for being unlovable, it's mine for being unloving. For not being used to it. For...

[For things being easy, resolvable. Give item A to person B, say option C to character D, and things will fall into place. Spare, spare, spare. Show your MERCY. Open your arms in a hug. Smile. It will all work out. Accept the harshness of the world that strikes you when you're down, continue to smile even as they hit you repeatedly, because good children don't fight back.

Good children never fight back.]

I don't know how love works, I think. Everyone I know says they love me, but how can they say that? They don't know me all the time. They don't know everything I've done.

[Every step hurts, in the same way every word is a twisting admission they don't want to look at.]

You do. You've seen every terrible thing I've ever done and thought, and you...you keep being my friend. My best friend. And I don't know what I did to deserve a friend like you.

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cw emetophria thoughts and gross invasion of personal space????

CW NASTY GROSS PUKES

CW CONTINUES

GOOD LORD DOES IT EVER

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cw emetophobia continues

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