entranceway | video, 9/09; it won't be you if something's got to give

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video, 9/09; it won't be you if something's got to give

[For about ten seconds, there’s nothing but a dark matte black and the quiet ticks and taps of white noise that separates a live feed from a dead one. Then a light flicks on, illuminating the empty, utterly nondescript room in which the feed is taking place, and the phone’s focus struggles to accommodate the abrupt shift in lighting with flaring and fading irregularity.

Then someone steps into view.

* It’s you!

Only...it’s not. Not really! Surprise.]

Hello, Wonderland!

[It becomes more immediately apparent that this is not the Frisk you may have come to know and love. They smile too readily, too brightly, and as they continue to speak, it’s with a liberating enthusiasm that hints at the mess of coiled energy beneath their too-radiant exterior.]

Boy, it is great to be out and about, isn’t it? Feels fantastic! In fact, I know just the way to celebrate! [And they reach down for a moment, dipping out of the feed.

They jerk back up into the frame, and this time they’re not alone. They’ve got their hands fisted into the hair of a child that looks very much like them. That is them. The Real Thing! What little of their face is visible is a veritable mélange of multicolored bruises. They struggle faintly, but it's a weak effort at best. Whatever took place between the pair of them, Frisk's Mirror undoubtedly came out on top.

Frisk drops their Real with a dull, careless clunk.]

Oh, don’t worry, they’re not dead. Yet, anyway. But that does lead very nicely into my next point, which is:

Which of you would like to die in their place?

See, I have this problem. [They spread their arms wide in an exaggerated shrug.] I’ve gotten nothing from this little event aside from your run-of-the-mill suffering and betrayal and theatrics and blah blah blah, I won’t bore you with the details. And this little martyr with a savior complex a mile long - [They deliver a vicious kick to the child at their feet.] - is only too willing to walk into every sword that's pointed at them! And where’s the fun in that, I ask you?

[The Real Frisk says something that the microphone doesn't pick up, only for Frisk's Mirror to plow over them.]

That was rhetorical. There’s no fun in that. None whatsoever! I’m going to need a little something to keep me going when this is over, and that something is EXP - which I doubt my Real self here is going to offer, since they’re a little baby pacifist who doesn’t FIGHT anything, ever. I require something more palpable. Someone who, perhaps, would be willing to fall on their sword for a change.

So, I present you with this.

[They steeple their fingers innocently beneath their chin, regarding the feed with a faint smile, honeyed and sedate.]

At the moment, Frisk is fine. For a certain value of "fine," anyway. [That value being next to nil, but what else is new?] However, they will very quickly not be if my terms are not met. And for every hour my terms are not met?

[They reach down for a moment.

The crack of breaking bone is readily audible, as is the yelp of pain that follows.]

They lose a little something!

[Frisk straightens up with an artless grin.]

They’ve got plenty to lose, mind you, but god help you if they start to run out.

And don’t bother trying to track us down; this little broadcast is prerecorded. Just let me know if you’d like to take their place, and we can arrange a powwow, just for you! Won’t that be Fun?

[Their hand closes over the feed to shut it off, but not before they whisper their parting words:]

So, you know. Call me maybe.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I would not call myself the only one.

[Literally everyone loves Frisk. Nobody here even mildly occasionally dislikes Frisk. Nobody's even mostly indifferent toward Frisk, they're sure of it.]

All this is going to do is set an army of every monster and probably also every human who's met Frisk at least once hunting you down. You'd be lucky if I'm the only one you have to contend with.

[The grating friction of heavy wood on wood. Inside, not outside. Nowhere carpeted, nowhere tiled. But... which side? There are two mansions, both too huge and limitless to pull a top-to-bottom scour. Every wasted second means...

They can't waste a second.

...Mirror side? If they had to hide, they'd want territory they were familiar with, not territory they'd set foot on for the very first time this week. The mansions are presumably identical, but... presumably. How would Chara know?]

Frankly, if I were you, then I'd want to get some EXP knocking at my door before the angry mob showed up.

Then it's a good thing this mansion is so dreadfully big, isn't it? The rooms are infinite, if you wanna get technical abut it.

[Their voice is a little bit strained. They're shifting something that's a bit on the heavier side, evidently.]

I'm asking for a martyr-type, not a villain with delusions of relevance!

[Hard to guess what they're moving. Frisk themselves? Barricading the exit with furniture? Trying to set a hideout up somewhere?

More guesses: not a public space, maybe not a room with too much space, too many exits? That idea seems to favour the rooms, which is bad news, because there's far too many of them with nothing especially telltale about any of them.]

Golly! Aren't you picky! You ask for EXP, you get EXP, and suddenly it isn't good enough?

[You quietly and secretly swallow down buttercups, and that doesn't make you a martyr. It makes you selfish, cowardly, doesn't it? You're not so noble.

You're the kind of person who will kill.]

LV 8. That's a lot more EXP than you'll get from a monster, mirror, and you must surely realize that. You really don't want to get even after the last run-in we had?

Look, Chara. I'll be straight with you here.

[There's a clunk as they set something else down. Yes, that makeshift barricade should hold nicely in the interim. A dresser, a big impressive stool-thing - it's very modern art-esque, they think. Very much a statement of some kind.]

I don't trust you as far as I could throw you. Actually, I trust you even less. If I just go ahead and say why, sure Chara, I trust that you're not gonna try a sneaky little thing like trying to kill me under the guise of turning yourself in, well - I wouldn't be a protagonist, would I?

I'd be dead.

[More heavy noises. What does that mean? Can't tell what's being moved from sound alone. Tearoom chairs? Something way out there like... a speaker or a safe or some kind of future-looking-room doohickey?

If it's a room, then it's probably an unoccupied one. Does anyone on that side trust Frisk enough to give them free run of their room? Room 12 seems far too obvious. So that narrows it down to... about a billion possible rooms. Great. Good. Fine.]

Suppose I come unarmed? No Knife, no backup knife, not even pocket sand. Would that be reassuring enough for you?

[This is taking too long. Their patience is fraying every second Frisk is left alone at that thing's utter-lack-of-mercy.]

Find a way to prove it, and then we'll talk. Little bitty scalpels count as knives as well, I think you should know, even if they're mostly useless in a pinch.

[Rich, coming from the person who ran from someone who was wielding little more than a scalpel BUT STILL. Still. That's not the point here!

Tick-tock, Chara!]

Tape over your camera, or cover it with your sleeve or something. I don't care. Just accept video.

[Crossing back to the real side is easy, at least, if they aren't leaving the mansion. It's not out of their way to detour to Room 12 (don't look at the unmade bed or the drawings taped right onto the wall or the box of treasures). Switch to video, so the mirror can watch them pull a lockbox out of the closet. In goes the Real Knife. Four scalpels. A paring knife, the big chef's knife they took on their first day here, that prized old switchblade. Broken razors. Scissors. Knitting needles with a foot and a half of pink yarn active on them. Anything that looks even sort of vaguely sharp, they guess, because they just know this mirror would love to nitpick, love to get off on a technicality.

They snap it closed. Turn the camera on themselves. Shake out their sleeves, make a show of emptying out their pockets.]

Sufficient?

[Their hand snaps over the feed as they watch Chara dispense a frankly impressive amount of cutlery into the lockbox. Their voice is muffled by their fingers partially covered the microphone, but they sound satisfied.]

Yes, I think that should do nicely. Keep the video on yourself the entire time, now!

[A moment later, Chara gets a private text detailing the coordinates of their location. Fourth floor, room 299 on the mirror side.]

Chop-chop!

[Fourth floor, room 299.

Can't waste time. Can't. Mirror will see them if they try to send texts, mirror will hear if they say it out loud, mirror will question if it sees them looking for a pen. They climb back to the mirror side.

The angle of the phone goes a little odd, first as they cross to the other side, then as one hand darts down to the hem of their shorts, to a wound on their thigh that even healing magic couldn't completely erase. Reopen. Dig blunt, dirty fingernails against the seam. Hurts, but it bleed, it bleeds.

They take a deep breath, point their phone back at their face. Step out of room 12. Keep the lens trained on their face, only their face, keep the shoulder out of frame, scrawl a "4 299" on the wall outside the door as they pass. Sloppy, getting fainter as their filthy makeshift ink runs out, but a sign for Dipper.]

Frisk?

[They raise their voice as they walk. If the mirror hears it, so does Frisk, surely.]

I'm coming. Stay determined.

You're lucky, Frisk!

[There's a soft thunk as the phone is laid down on the floor, facedown. The barest flash of gray carpeting is visible for a moment until the lack of light swallows it out.]

Another ten minutes and you would've lost another finger! How many does that make again?

[There's nothing but the ragged syncopation of asynchronous breathing for a moment. Footfalls sound lightly as the Mirror begins pacing restlessly, Dagger clasped behind their back.

Then a distant shuffling, someone drawing near with excruciating slowness. The words, when they are breathed faintly in the direction of the device, are so quiet they're nearly inaudible but for the soft hiss of the consonants.]

You don't have to do this.

[It is, for the record, very stupid to reopen a leg wound shortly before climbing a couple flights of stairs and going about three hundred rooms down. They push themselves to run, but it throbs with each footfall, oozes sticky hot blood. Even if Dipper can't comprehend what those numbers mean, they're bound to be leaving an easy trail to follow.

Gray carpet, a probable furniture barricade. If they're being steered to the wrong room entirely, dragged on a wild goose chase, then they'll know.

A precaution they should have taken sooner. They dig in their claws, pin down spacetime. Cement their message in place, now that they know the mirror didn't detect them writing it.

* Determination.

They know the mirror can feel it, too. Makes sense, though: it's making sure they don't harm Frisk before Chara can get there.

Can barely hear the words over their phone, between their own ragged breaths and the unsteady limping beat of their steps and the concentration a SAVE takes. But they hear. Set their mouth into a grim line, harden their resolve. Aren't sure if a face-down phone muffles their answer too much for it to be heard, but whisper regardless.]

I don't, but I choose to.

[The breath that fuzzes over the feed is short and pained, as much of a thank you as time will allow. The Mirror, however, has zero time for that sentimentalist crap.]

Who said you could talk? I didn't say you could talk. Get back to your damn corner.

[Thunk. A foot goes to the ribs, and that's when they feel it, the epicenter of another SAVE being formed. That's fine. It's fine!

They crouch down over the device and snarl at it, low and intent:]

I'd hurry, if I were you. Frisk is down an entire hand thanks to some interference by one of your lessers.

[What the hell did -

Their fault. They did this, didn't they? All Charas ever do is make it worse, ruin what they touch, make the people who care about them suffer. They'll break the fingers of every last Chara in this cursed place for this, make them pay too, make them face the consequences of -

No time for self-loathing. Frisk needs them. Frisk. Frisk. They repeat the name to themselves with each lance of pain, hack it into their mind to the steady pounding of step-hurt-step-hurt. Count the numbers. The steady increase, passing doors ticking toward 299.

299.

They reach it. They're here. No time to SAVE or plan or strategize or consider what might happen if the room is utterly empty or speak to the phone in their hand or plot what to do if Dipper never comes, only a frantic, frenzied ache to save Frisk from more pain. Recall the sound of dragging furniture. A barricade. Might be a barricade. They seize the knob, twist, throw their shoulder against the door as hard as they can.]

[They pass the time with pacing, fervent and furious, and their Real watches them with a patient, even gaze that they hate, even if they're bruised and bloodied and curled on the ground, holding one broken hand close to their chest.

They stare at the Mirror, and say nothing.]

What? [they snap at last, glowering.]

You really think this is gonna work? [the Real says softly, with an indolent lift of their eyebrows.

The Mirror's lips curl into a snarl.]

Shut up.

Chara's on their way. You're really gonna get it now, [says the Real, sounding oddly intent, oddly pleased at the notion.

The Mirror starts forward, one fist drawn back, ready to shut them up by force, but then there's a dull clunk of someone throwing themself at the door and the makeshift barricade they put up. The dresser trembles, but the door doesn't give just yet.

Frisk whips around and presses their ear to the door.]

Who's there.

Your best friend!

[Announced sweetly, which isn't a good sign. Another thud rings out as they impact against the door again, too impatient for inaction, throwing all their weight against the wood one more time.

For, you know, all the good a scrawny preteen's truly formidable body weight does.]

Open up.

[It's confirmation enough. They double-check the feed anyway. Can't be too careful, after all!]

One moment.

[The Mirror braces one shoulder against the dresser and pushes it out of the way with the weighted drag of wood across hardwood floor. They kick the smaller ephemera out of the way in a disinterested scatter and unlock the door with the click and slide of bolts.

Then, just as a precaution, because they doubt this is a charitable maneuver and because they know it will irk everyone involved, and because they know there's a one in three chance that Chara will be able to plow over them, they SAVE.

They -

They try to SAVE.

They try to.

The Mirror SAVEs.

The Real SAVEs over them.

They half turn, the door abandoned for a moment as they glower at the Real.]

What're you doing?

[The Real says nothing. Again, the Mirror tries to SAVE, and again, the Real overwrites them with a vindictive, apparent effortlessness. There's not a shred of resistance to the space as it happens, it simply happens, and they regard their Real with a steadily mounting fear of realization. Of dawning horror. They reach for their SAVE file a third time, and a third time, the stake is slammed through their attempt, and the Real Frisk's face is closed and bereft and blank as always, but there's a hard glint in their stare.

Then, slowly, in a twist of motion that reminds the Mirror powerfully of Chara, they smile.]

Gotcha.

[They feel the SAVE anchor itself into existence - then get overwritten. Again and again.

Chara sees what's happening here.

The mirror didn't think to factor in Frisk. Thought it was only Chara's broken little fraction of a SOUL they had to override. Assumed Frisk would play a helpless victim. Seems pretty stupid of them, since they're quite literally a reflection of Frisk from a timeline where they were anything but a helpless victim.

Well! Here's Chara with an unlocked door, and with an opponent who is probably very distracted with their partner. A clear motive, a clear opportunity. Time to commit homicide with their bare hands! They throw the door open. Don't pause to take in the scattered furniture, don't let themselves look at the condition Frisk is in, just identify where their target is and hurl themselves at the mirror's back like a wild animal. They'll crush the breath right out of its miserable body. They'll claw its eyes out. They'll make it suffer so much it'd be lucky if it doesn't survive this!]

[Damn them, anyway. Damn them for not being the absolute pushover they'd pegged them for. What the heck, Frisk?

So they're not facing the door when it bangs open, nor do they twist themselves around in time to see anything but a streak of green-and-yellow before the Mirror is abruptly caught in the middle and brought down to the floor in a hard tackle. The carpet stings their cheek as they're driven to the ground in a flurry of biting, clawing, scratching, and god Chara really is like a wild animal at times. Every time. All the time.

This is...

The Mirror thinks, for the first time, that they possibly may have miscalculated.]

[There's the smash of glass breaking as Dipper uses his bigass containment bubble gun to break the window open. He aims the gun carefully, leaving enough room for Mabel to slip in behind him.]

CHARA, MOVE!

[He doesn't want to get the wrong kid.]

[did you miscalculate the two kids with jetpacks also, mrisk? 'cause yeah, that's happening. while everyone is busy with their kicking and biting and GIANT GUNS, Mabel idles her sparkly jetpack in through the window and hits the floor, moving over to put herself between Frisk and their assailant, just in case they try to come back for more. ]

Looks like you've got something new to reflect on, Mrisk.

[Who gave the children jetpacks? Was it Alphys? Did Alphys give them phone-jetpacks? WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS AND WHO CAN THEY STAB AS RECOMPENSE.

You've got to be freaking kidding them.

The Real Frisk is already throwing themself back so they're out of the line of fire, like they just implicitly know what the hell they're supposed to do in these impromptu combat situations, which is not fair.

They scramble to SAVE, but again, their insufferable Real slams down the fourth consecutive SAVE on top of theirs. They glance wildly in their direction and find, to their incredible chagrin, that their Real is still smiling.]

[They don't want to let go, ha ha. They positively itch with the feverish need to bite, to scratch, to hit, to give this sickening thing ten times worse than what it inflicted on Frisk.

But it's not LOVE or revenge they're doing this for, they forcefully remind themselves. Frisk has to be safe. That comes before everything. Chara plants their foot on the mirror's back and pushes off, making an ungainly dive toward Mabel and Frisk.]

One more SAVE as soon as they're caught, partner. Dipper didn't come unarmed!

[They suggest it to Frisk, knowing they can overwrite much faster than Chara's straining partial-SOUL could.]

Hope that don't-call-him-a-raccoon's as good at guns as he is at jetpacks. [Dipper waits until Chara's clear, then pulls the trigger, sending a wave of crackling energy at Mrisk. It coalesces into a bubble made of some sort of electric forcefield, surrounding Mrisk and separating them from the Real kids.]

Okay, come on, let's move!

[Mabel moves to help Frisk up, trying to avoid looking at how injured they are. She knows Chara will either want to help her or insist on it, so she doesn't move forward just yet, waiting for them.] I got Frisk!

video, 9/09; it won't be you if something's got to give

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[action] don't worry kids no need to look far

[action] OUR HERO

[action] i wasn't sure if other people wanted to go so I held off tagging this back lol