seriff | empatheias IC contact

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empatheias IC contact

IC CONTACT
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[Sans nominally resides in a small two-bedroom apartment on the outskirts of Verens' usual Otherworlder housing district, but is pretty much never at home. Mail sent to that address is unlikely to ever see the light of day again. Mail sent to an Enforcers office with his name on has a marginally better chance of reaching him, if not of being read in a timely fashion. Mail sent to him via his brother had the best chance of all, but only while Papyrus was still around.

It's somewhat easier to track down him down in person: his current job involves patrol routes all over Verens, and when not frequenting diners or comfortable sunny benches he often even does it. He also turns up in Shaarnath from time to time - usually by himself, usually for the food. Still, he rarely shows up in the same place twice on a given day.

(Please include a rough IC date in thread headers, but otherwise go wild! No need to preplan.)]

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[They don't know what they're feeling right now; there's so many things and they're all mixed up and jumbled together. Some of it's good, some of it's not as much, but all of it's there and intense. But their trial made them think about some things, and how some of what they'd said to Ochre... were important to themselves too.

The more they think about this, the more they know this is probably long overdue.]

Sans... [Ngh... that doesn't make it any easier, though.] We gotta talk.

[They're not taking a rain check on this one.]

Edited 2016-03-21 18:06 (UTC)

[...Huh. This is kind of rare. If those Arehtei trials hadn't been loudly publicised before the big day, Sans might have been caught off guard. Even as is, there's a fraction of a second between Frisk tapping into his mind and his usual emotional wall going up - just long enough to catch the sensation of a shiver.

Oh well. He'd wonder why now, but regardless of what the kid wants (from the confusing bubbling of emotion he's faintly picking up on from the other end, do they know what they want...?), he supposes today is as bad a time as any.]

Whoa, sounds serious. Your thing went that badly?

[It's a long way from a yes, and it weighs a little heavier than something said in such a light tone of voice should. On the other hand, it's not a no.]

Huh?

[The confused jumble of emotions fades a little, overlaid by surprise. Then there's probably the impression of a laugh - amusement, relief, wonder, but also sadness, because any other time they'd be delighted. But not while talking with Sans.]

Oh, no. It... it went really well.

[Say hello to Piphron's youngest representative. Not that there's much of a pool to pick from for that one, but that's beside the point.]

But um... it made me think about some things. And maybe stuff I shoulda done a while ago? [They pause for a moment, unsure.] But I'm doing it now.

... Uh, OK.

[No point in objecting. If he's honest, he expects them to press him no matter what he says. They're like that.

What he's going to say once they do... depends on what exactly they hope to press him on. Just gotta try to think ahead for now. Yeah, that's the only important reason why his noncommittal response sounds slightly muffled despite not giving anything in particular away.]

[They probably would've, for this. They'd have preferred not to and they'd have protested mightily at him if he'd tried to shut them down. And maybe it would've taken time, but this is a conversation that's needed to happen.]

I want to tell you what happened for me back home. I'm... I don't think I'm the Frisk you know. You look at me and you keep seeing them, and that's not fair. [...] If you're gonna keep being mad at me, or- or hate me, then I want it to be for what I did. Not them.

[To a certain extent that means they need to stop thinking of him as anything like the Sans they know. Probably. But maybe neither is gonna be completely possible for them.]

...

[The wall isn't going to crack from something like this. It's solid, well-constructed - more than up to the task of keeping his temper buried deep in the dirt with everyone else.

With that in check, he can safely find this kid's spiel... pretty funny, let's be real here. That's the only obvious emotion that leaks through into his silence. If they're this wound up already, what would happen if someone tried to give them a real lecture on temporal metaphysics? Their head might literally explode. It would be - uh - less hilarious than a lot of other things he can imagine. But anyway -

Oh, and someone other than him, of course. Lectures are work.]

Is it that common a name...? Who woulda thunk.

I'm being serious, Sans.

[They know Sans rarely is, rarely on the surface, but the amusement when this is taking so much resolve and dare they say it Determination to do, laughing in the face of it stings. It's almost like he's making fun of them. Which also hurts.]

Thought so. [With tight control, possibly too obligingly, the feeling of mild amusement withdraws and leaves a blank.] Doing good so far. So what now?

[Where do they start? The beginning, beginning? The legend of Mt. Ebott? When they met him, their judgements, the phone calls? Do they talk about how they found out they could reset, the reason they climbed the mountain in the first place? Now that they're here their nerve is failing them, a little.]

Do you wanna do this like this? Or... Do you wanna meet somewhere?

[It's an actual question this time. They've used up their imperatives for the next several months.]

... As a representative... I'd say it's your call.

[This time, it's harder to tell - well, not to tell that he is still joking, but maybe to what degree.]

[There's sort of puff of air that could be a laugh. Sans can't see it, but Frisk closes their eyes, thinking. Part of them wants to stay away, in case there's a reprise of their first meeting. But the other... feels like that isn't right. Like they're hiding. And the whole point of this is to not hide what happened, right?]

There's spot, down by the lake a little outside the city. It's got a tree with it's branches all low that's easy to sit on, and there's some flowers even though it's still cold. I'll meet you there?

[They're already getting to their feet.]

Twist a guy's tibia, why don'tcha... I'm gonna need another break after this.

...Well, later.

[He doesn't sound bothered in the slightest, but he does drop the connection pretty quickly.

After that, he... actually takes his time drifting off his patrol route and out towards the lake. Hey, the easiest way to identify a tree like that is going to be the kid already sitting in it. How well he'd be able to identify the kid is a different, irrelevant question.]

Thanks Sans.

[It takes them a bit over a half hour to get there, and from there, they sit, hands twisting anxiously in their lap. The tree they're sitting on seems to reflect their nervousness, the budding leaves trembling slightly even though there's no breeze.

The time it takes him to get there does give them some time to think though, which they're also grateful for.]

Heya. Nice place you've got here.

[Sans's speaking up is the first sign of his otherwise silent arrival, maybe five minutes later. He's leaning back against the trunk, hands in the pockets of his Sosyne hoodie and eyesockets half-closed. The second sign is when the lowest branches close to him cease their quivering and go still.]

Still have something to tell me?

Yes.

[They barely jump when he appears. They've been bracing themselves for it ever since they got here. There's hesitation there, but it's for less than a fraction of a second. Their fingers don't unknot themselves from their lap, though.]

... you know I can Reset.

[It's not a question.]

I've been through the Underground three times.

[They might as well have admitted to taking three cookies from the cookie jar. He tilts his head up a little to watch them after their reaction, but otherwise waits patiently. It's pretty obvious that there's more to it.]

Three, huh?

[And to be fair, the number is news to Sans, sort of. There's no way he could have sussed out what went down that day from the kid's point of view without living it himself.]

Three's an okay number.

[Still - they're the one who wants to have it out, they can set the pace. He won't elaborate.]

[The seemingly casual reaction doesn't really reassure Frisk at all. They've barely even started.]

The first time... I was so scared. The first person I met, he seemed so nice. But then he tried to... [They grab a fistful of air over where their soul would be and mime tearing it away from them, violently.] Mom saved me, and she took care of me. But she wanted me to stay there with her. I didn't know what to do, I didn't- I didn't feel like I was supposed to be there. But she tried to destroy the door and then we... We..,

[Their shoulders are shaking now, their face twisting with such anguish that the weather around them skips rain entirely and jumps to sleet.]

I thought it was what she wanted! Sh-she said to p-prove Icould s-survive but I didn't think she'd f-fight till she...

[Frisk almost never cries. Usually if they do show their pain or grief, they do it in other ways. They're crying now, big fat tears rolling down their chubby cheeks, as they shiver from something more than the sudden cold. As they remember a trembling voice telling them to be good.]

A-and U-Undyne and M-Mettaton and the others too... I didn't ever w-want to h-hurt anybody, I j-just didn't want to d-die. I'm sorry, I'm r-really, really s-s-sorry-

[If Sans has anything to say so far, now would be the time, while Frisk curls up miserably and tries to reign their emotions back in.]

Edited 2016-03-22 15:58 (UTC)

[Wow, awk.

Less of the sudden unseasonal deluge lands on Sans than it should, although that's not his doing for once. It does, for a moment, appear to have extinguished his eyes. Look at this. This is where it begins.

... There's a name missing, even so. Rightly so.]

Uh. Y'know, I realise this isn't the best time to remind you... but I'm not in the judging business any more.

[He looks down, his grin unchanging. He trusts that they're still getting to their point one way or another. Trust is a funny thing.]

We all make mistakes. Isn't that right?

People died. That's not just a mistake.

[Any other time with any other person that might've- no. No it would never be comforting to call what happened mistakes. Even if they could go back. The idea just made something inside them squirm. It does pull them out of the worst of their grief, though they remain in a little cocoon of self-loathing.]

Wh-when I got to Asgore, he destroyed the Mercy button. I couldn't... No matter what I did he wouldn't listen. I died a lot. But at the end I did it anyway. I didn't want to hurt anybody anymore.

But then, Flowey killed him instead and took the human souls and- [Their throat closes and the sleet falls harder than ever, hard enough Frisk jumps off the tree branch, trying to shake themselves off, even as ice forms at their feet, marking their steps. At last they turn yo face Sans.]

We fought. [They refuse to elaborate.] We fought until the human souls fought against him too, and escaped.

I spared him too.

[The sleet slowly starts to morph into the more peaceable snow.]

He was so confused. He'd kept saying the world is kill or be killed. But then he said I'd shown him different, and if I could do it all without killing anybody, he'd show me how to get an ending where everyone would be happy.

[They hadn't known, at the time, whether to believe him or not. But they'd wanted to... So....]

Edited 2016-03-22 18:01 (UTC)

[Sans remains silent, but at last he shifts a little to duck out of the continuing snowfall, tugs his conspicuously stupid-looking whale-patterned hood down to overshadow his expression.

...They sure are taking their sweet time. Good thing he's never minded doing nothing.]

[They said they were gonna tell him what happened to them. And they are.]

So I did.

I did it all again. I died a lot. But I didn't hurt anybody. Then I faced him again and he said... That it wasn't enough. That I needed to make friends.

So I did that too. I made friends with Papyrus and Undyne and Alphys and y- the other you. And then when I faced Asgore again everyone tried to stop him.

But um... Flowey had lied, sort of. He took the human souls again and everyone else's and- [Here they pause again, but it's different from before. They can't reveal Asriel. They promised.]

We fought again, but it was different. I helped him... Remember things. And... And he stopped, and he used his power to break the barrier. Then he let everyone go. He had to stay behind, but he said he was okay with that. Then Mom asked me to stay and Asgore asked me to be ambassador.

[They take a deep breath. Let it go. Square their shoulders and look determined, even with tears still shining on their face.]

I don't want to reset anymore. I told you that and I mean it. All I wanted was a family again, and now I have one. I don't want to lose that.

And that's what happened. [They look down and away.] You can still be mad. Or hate me. But that's the truth.

Edited 2016-03-22 18:42 (UTC)

...I see. Cool story. Now we're on the same page.

[They blatantly aren't. All the same, he's picked up one or two things between the halting words that might be worth remembering. So close, so damn close to making up his mind.

He straightens up to look back at them anyway, eyes bright and cold under his damp jacket hood.]

Goin' out on a limb here, but it sounds like you've wanted to unload this stuff on someone for a while. Like maybe you're not proud that this is where you're coming from...? Maybe that's a stretch. But I get ya there.

[By this point, none of the still-fluttering snow is touching him. Just as the individual flakes are about to land on him, they vanish - a few with a hiss, the majority with no sign that they existed at all.]

So, let me rephrase what I just said. Everyone makes mistakes... accidents, bad calls. Killer mistakes, sometimes. Ones where it kills you to just suck it up and keep going somehow. But that's all you can do.

Then there are the things that we can't call mistakes. Things that aren't so easily walked back.

[He shrugs, just as if that was another joke - just as if part of him, behind that flawless wall, isn't burning. Hell, let's just go.]

Do YOU want to hear the truth...? The truth is... those don't matter any more, either. Any more than the real mistakes. Look around us. We're still trapped on an island, but we've got the whole of the sky.

Why would it matter... what you left underground?

[Frisk blinks.]

I-

[They don't know what to say. They'd barely had any idea what to really say up until this point. Now they have none at all.

Instead of answering, they turn, taking a few steps to meet the shore of the lake. Kneeling down, they poke at the water. It freezes where their fingers meet, and, fascinated, Frisk does it a couple more times, creating small discs of ice that float away.

At last they look up.]

Because we can't forget what we left there.

[Because it matters to us.

Because it matters to you.

Because you matter to me.]

[So, dust. And, perhaps, a loose end or two that they didn't quite spell out. Yeah, he can see where that leads even clearer than he could before coming here. Decision time.

He lets his silence stretch out a little, like the ice the kid is making on the surface of the after.

(Decision by decision, minute by minute, day by day.)]

Here's my advice. You don't have to take it. If you want a happy ending, the one where you come out on top...

[He grins mirthlessly.]

Quit while you're ahead. That's what I do.

[Whatever reaction Sans is expecting, it's probably not the one he gets.

'maybe sometimes it's better to take what's given to you [...] is what you have to do really worth it?'

Those words. They weren't in the same order or quite the same intentions behind them maybe. But Frisk knows them. Frisk whirls around to stare at him, breath catching in their throat as the snow dies away completely.

'well, if I were you, I would have thrown in the towel by now.'

A smile spreads across their face, a wistful and hopeful thing all in one. Unbidden, small yellow flowers peek out from around their feet, covered in frost as they are. Frisk shakes their head.]

I don't think I can. I didn't... get this far by giving up, did I?

[Especially not on people they care about.]

Edited 2016-03-23 04:55 (UTC)

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seriff - 2016-03-23 09:00 (UTC) - Expand

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empatheias IC contact

amulet voice; shortly after Arehtei challenges

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And today on "I don't have an adequate icon for this"

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