empatheias IC contact

[seriff]

IC CONTACT
[ amulet voice | amulet image | amulet text | mail | action ]

[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.)]

Comments

[seriff]

...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?

[despiteeverything]

[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.]

[seriff]

[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.

[despiteeverything]

[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.]

[seriff]

...?

[Something flickers in Sans's eyesockets. It doesn't seem like they really get it, and he wouldn't yet have expected them to, but... they're happy with this anyway? What a freakin' weird kid.

Then again, why is he surprised? It's possible that they know him better than he knows himself. If they died as often as they claim, even this early on, that must be a lot more than just three times they skipped back and forth, to learn the shape of what was about to happen... He never had that luxury.

That's what they're going to need, he figures. A touch of guidance from people who are used to knowing a little less. Just a nudge before the point of no return.

Here's hoping they find someone else to give them that, then.

There's a tentative warmth in the air as the snow clears out of the way of the sunlight. It stings like hell, enough to make Sans give his jacket hood another tug. Thank goodness he doesn't have skin, or it might feel worse.]

I dunno, did you? According to you, I wasn't there.