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[Frisk shrugs as they lick some of the chocolate icing off their spoon. They might need to wash this down with something, they think. Water, or milk, or maybe tea. Tea is good for when you're coming down from something like this. Sugar might just make you more jittery.

So they get up and start heating up some water, again keeping their movements slow and composed and steady, keeping their back turned for more than necessary so Chara can make those manifold minute adjustments you make after nearly passing out from the sheer weight of your own breathless anxiety. They know the system. Wiping at your eyes, straightening your sleeves, rearranging your expression into something deceptively normal.]

It's not your fault. I know it feels like it, but it's not.

[LV 8. It's not even halfway to the ceiling, though. It's enough to hesitate. It's enough to do more than hesitate.

LOVE isn't so nearly cut and dry as they think Chara thinks it is. As Frisk thinks they still think it is sometimes, when they catch themselves longing for it. Wishing they had it. Wishing they could...but, no. They're not going to do that to everyone again.

They've made their peace with that.]

[There's... there's something Asgore-ish about the way they move. Looking away more than is necessary, so Chara can take moments to do something other than smile. Try to get themselves back together, try to be a reasonable mimicry of a composed, put-together human being. Shuffling off to... ha ha, they recognize those routine sounds. To make tea.

Knowing just how to comfort. Knowing exactly what will help.

They try to breathe deep. Uncurl. Sit up straight.]

You really do understand, don't you?

[Not the "I love you but I'm scared because I don't understand this" Asriel had done his absolute best with. Beyond even that. Someone who knows because they've lived it too. Someone who makes it feel like inhuman, incomprehensible, just-born-all-wrong, because it's possible for another human being to feel that way, too.

You're the only one who understands me.

Again, the dull pulse of guilt. They said that about Asriel. Now they're saying it about Frisk.]

You might understand even better than I do.

[A limp little laugh as they straighten out the hair their terrified pressing hands knotted into disarray. When did they let themselves get so untidy?]

[Do they? They...don't really know how much they understand. They understand panic, to a certain extent. They understand why it happens when they're lost and scared and upset and start hyperventilating on the floor of their room because it's all just so much and their hand is bleeding, and a Mirror is telling them about all the bad things their best friend apparently did. But that's one thing. They understood that. It sucked, and it hurt, and it was like an ironclad fist clenched in their gut, but they understood it.

They guess maybe they understand this too. Buttercups instead of butter, and dust instead of flour. Some things default into other things, and then your head latches onto that track with an alacrity you can't control.

They look through the array of tea tins that they've got at their disposal. Loose leaf and bagged and all sorts of different brews. Loose leaf, they decide. Takes longer to brew. There's a whole soothing ritual to it. There's a lavender blend in here that looks good for nerves and things.]

I used to get them a lot. On the surface.

[They say it simply, without much gravitas. It's just...something they do. One more broken thing about them.]

Still do, sometimes. Doesn't always make sense why. Just...too hot, or too cramped and - uh-oh, there goes Frisk again. Freaking out over nothing.

[They punctuate it with a wry twist of one side of their mouth. It wasn't always nothing. But it still felt like were getting gutted with a spoon anyway.]

[On the surface.

They admit it so... so candidly. So frankly. It's a little funny, right? The things that are "on the surface" are the things they bury deepest.]

Tantrums.

[That's what the surface called them when Chara did it.

And that's what they are, isn't it? A kid making a lot of irritating noise. Causing a scene because they aren't getting their way. Making a theatrical display of distress just to get attention. The kind of bad behaviour you have to fix with discipline, so that the kid knows better than to act like that in public.

And they do know better. They're better now. Hair tidy, eyes dry, sitting up straight. Hands at their sides. Hands gripping the chair. Hands neatly folded in their lap. Hands scrunching and crinkling up their sleeves. Hands squeezing their arms, hugging themself. Digging in, like they have to wrestle themselves into submission, like they have to cage themselves up, pin themselves down - no, wait, no. Not too hard, not too hard, don't do anything that might rev you up again. Treat yourself like a skittish wild animal, because you're not really human, so maybe you're a beast, huh?]

Acting spoiled. Looking for attention, fishing for pity. Grow up, right?

[They try to laugh, but it comes out more as a dry exhalation. It's not funny. It's just humiliating. Shameful. Just... aches. Like the surface always does.]

[Tantrums. Freakouts. Acting out. Must be doing it for attention, must be doing it because they were feeling left out or angry, and not because they were terrified because their chest felt tight and their head felt like it was spinning and their heart felt like it was pounding so hard it might burst. Just overreacting. Just Frisk being like that for no reason.

The water finishes heating, and they add the leaves into the kettle to let it steep. It smells nice. Lavender and a mix of other things, soft and gentle and soothing.]

'Cause kids can't feel scared or upset about things like that. Kids don't understand anything, so they just act out 'cause they feel like it.

[There's a bitterness there, one that wells up without their really thinking about it. They're...they're still angry at those people for making them think that. And they still hate that they feel that way sometimes. That they shiver and shake and feel like their head is outside their body and their lungs can't pull in air and the room is spinning and they can't breathe. Sometimes for a good reason. And sometimes for no reason at all.]

They made it feel like it was your fault. But it's - it can't be. Can't control it. We wouldn't feel like this if we could avoid it.

My actions are my fault. If I'm not responsible for what my body does, who is?

[Right? Isn't that how it works? Accidents are excuses. There's no such thing as "it just happened." Those devil-made-me-do-it excuses are a weak mind trying to worm its way out of the punishment it deserves. It's even more important to own your body when you've shared it with other people, right? Chara was the one who picked up their body and carried it past the barrier - Chara was the one who did the wrong parts, not the right parts. Chara was the one who killed everyone. Who had control during the wrong parts. They'd owned it then too, right? It's me.

See, Chara? You like it, don't you. You're enjoying this too. Your body says yes.

That's just how the world works, is it not?]

If we could avoid it, I wouldn't feel anything at all. That may not be the best metric out there, ha ha.

[LOVE had been such a wonderful thing, hadn't it? An unbroken promise. LOVE would not lie or cheat or pull the rug out from under you at your most vulnerable moment. When they knew what it was, what it stood for...was there any reason to not pursue it? To not gather as much close to them as possible, hoard it, clench it tightly in their fists and never let go?

The more you hurt others, the less you hurt too. Better you than them. Better to never risk it. Never chance it.]

No one's responsible, Chara.

[They pour the tea out, aliquot it into two ceramic mugs so they can carry it over. They don't drink theirs, not yet. They don't do much of anything with it, but they have it just to hold it in their hands, softly steaming.]

I know you...hold yourself accountable. That's what you do. But maybe there's things that - you can't blame anyone for. Can't change if it rains, right? Can't change what makes you scared, or panicked. It just happens.

[Nobody's fault. Nobody's fault? Can that really be right?

...How far, they wonder, does that go? Was it nobody's fault when a parent gets into one of those moods, flies into one of their unpredictable rages, smashes a glass against the coffee table? Was it nobody's fault that everyone in the village took away the wrong message from a body being gently laid to rest among its favourite flowers? Is it nobody's fault that seven human children were tucked into coffins in a basement?]

Where does that line exist, Frisk? When does a person stop being a helpless victim of their own circumstances? Determination is all about having the resolve to change fate.

[They look down, accept the mug gratefully. Soak in the warmth against their grasping hands, breathe in the scented steam.]

Is it better to be at fault, or to be so powerless you don't even have control over yourself?

You have to be one or the other?

[If they're allowed to forgive some people and not others, if they're allowed to be angry at some and not others, if they're allowed to be mad about some things and bitter about some things but not about others - why should anything else be any different?]

Is it my fault if I panic at a bad time? It's...easy to blame myself when it's happening. Think it's stupid. But how was I supposed to stop it? How're you?

[But then what's the alternative? Simply avoiding everything that makes you afraid? If they did that, they never would have left that patch of golden flowers. Or they never would have even climbed the mountain in the first place.]

[How? Boy, if only they knew. They try and try to bootstrap it. To suck it up. To shout themself into place, to keep the leash so tight it strangles, and still it isn't enough.

It is weakness, they wonder, if they don't accept that it must be a lack of willpower? Is it giving up if they stop thinking that, gee, guess you don't want to be normal badly enough?

What would Toriel say, they wonder? She's maybe the wisest adult they've ever known. Knows best for you.

Well, they know what Frisk would say. They have their partner's guidance. Carefully, blowing on the mug, they venture a sip. It teeters on the border of too hot, just barely shy of scalding. Good.]

Ha. The flesh prisons strike again, huh? Sometimes the roof just caves in arbitrarily, I guess.

[Frisk laughs. Flesh prisons. Their little inside joke. Something darkly humorous, maybe, but humorous all the same. Being human, they think not for the first time, really and honestly and truly sucks. They might be sturdier than a monster, but it comes at a price they're reluctant to pay.]

Yeah. That's...kinda why I thought it was such a good word. Prisons.

'Cause you can't control anything about them. Whether they're thirsty or hungry or shaking or anything.

[Wouldn't it be nice to be able to just magic that away? Or just, or just exist based on happy feelings and light fluffy imaginings? Subsist off magic food, not having to sweat or bleed or cry.]

[Can't control anything about them. Hah.

If you're acting that way, then I guess you must not want any supper. Sometimes they don't, sometimes they don't want to face that uncomfortably silent table, just waiting to snap into interrogation and argument, but they're weak. Too weak. Hunger makes them give in, makes them hoard fruit snacks and chocolate bars in the crevice between the dresser and the wall.

Demons don't eat, they lie.

They whimper in their sleep. Mutter things that are hard to explain, that Asriel eventually learned to stop asking about. They wake up with sharp gasps and horrible flinching jerks when the house creaks and settles, when Asgore only opens the door a teeny bit to check his children are sleeping peacefully. On the very worst nights, they sleep under the bed, pray it's so strange and inhuman that nobody will even think to look there for them.

Demons don't sleep, they lie.

Someone claps a hand on their shoulder, a thumb sweeping against the nape of their neck inattentively, and their stomach turns inside-out, jumps into their throat, they twist and lash out and they've given another kid a black eye. Why did you do that? Demands a tearful voice, and how are you even supposed to say you had a good reason to do something so mean?

Demons like hurting people, they lie.]

Sounds like I was getting the better end of the deal back when I was a whisper in your head. Never had to rest. Couldn't taste a thing.

...Actually seems like kind of a fair trade, right? If you can't be made of magic and love, you can at least get by pretty well being made of nothing at all.

Edited 2016-10-20 07:11 (UTC)

I'd rather be made of magic and love.

[But without that, what would they be? It'd mean sacrificing every ounce of their determination, the sole thing that truly, truly defines them. It would mean that they might as well be no one at all, huh?

Maybe that's for the best, hah.]

But, um. Since we're not. I...don't think it's bad if you have some bad days. If sometimes things make you scared and you don't know why.

[Immediately after saying it, they feel like they should say something else, keep talking, fill the silence, but don't have a single thing to say to compensate. Is that a flesh prison thing, or a 'Frisk is inconsolably speechless sometimes' thing? Talking a lot, even to the people they know is - it's still...

They lift their mug to their lips and take a sip of their tea to give their hands something to do instead.]

[Not bad. Isn't bad. It's not supposed to be bad?

Everything they do is bad, though, right? They're inherently something evil. They can only pretend to be something else. Act like someone else, someone nicer than they are. Trick people into buying that they're human, that they can act like a reasonable human being, that they're a real person. Just suppress that LOVE with all your might, put a smile on, and fake it 'til you make it, right?

They sink into contemplative silence, turning it over in their head as they stare down into their tea. Keep taking tentative sips, keep letting the... it smells like lavender, they think? Keep letting the something-or-other do its job. They don't really... ha ha, they don't even really notice the quiet stretching between the two of them? It feels too natural to be around Frisk, whether they're talking or not. Too used to narrating to someone who didn't necessarily have to offer up commentary in return.

When they pipe up again, it just comes on its own. Born of taking some much-needed stillness and silence in. It's tireder, softer, because the crashing tsunami of panic that tore through them feels like it tore them down completely, but it's not so taut.]

...It's... nice, sort of, the atmosphere when it's this late. Like we're the only two people in this entire house. Just us.

[The oddly liberating idea of... of what it'd be like if the end of the world happened, and everyone was just gone. Roaming through empty, still streets of cities they knew to be swarming with people, surrounded by absolute tranquility.

They realize belatedly that the idea might carry scary connotations to it. Trudging through Snowdin, completely empty save for a single child. Helping themself to the contents of an empty shop.

Please don't hurt my family.

And they hadn't.

Only because they hid too well, of course.]

Like, um. Like Waterfall. One of the only places Underground that didn't feel confined or crowded, right?

[Even if it was. All the Underground was confined and crowded. Frisk never saw the capital, stacked up on itself. Aquariums and parks and museums all being converted into housing, monsters desperately paring away everything as they tried to fit inside their cage.

But it's still presenting a prettier picture, they hope, than a ghost town.]

[It does feel nice, they won't deny that. They let the words linger in the air without any undue pressure to pursue them further. Sip their tea, when it cools enough.

But the prolonged quiet, the blissful, complete emptiness, that is something that has a certain lure to it. They can't say it doesn't in good faith, because it's absolutely true. Even if staying up late is...bad for children, isn't it. Supposed to get a full night's rest. But no one ever told them what would happen if they tore awake, gasping because of nightmares of hands reaching in through the windows or from beneath the bed, because the first and only time they woke someone up because they were sobbing, scared, they'd -

They'd never done that again. They'd stomached it silently. Held themselves rigidly beneath the covers with the sheets screwed up in a damp sweat-stained wad in their palms, afraid to move, afraid to peer out from beneath the covers for fear of the great nameless Thing that might be lurking there, whatever extant remnant of their nightmare might be waiting for them to let down their guard so it could rear up at them, shrieking.

It's nice to simply be able to roam about like this, without worrying about being accosted by people who might skewer them with concerned looks.

Frisk smiles, one-cornered.]

That was my favorite spot. Waterfall.

[They'd liked it for the way it looked and sounded and felt, and not simply because it fell between the two extremes of Snowdin or Hotland. The wetland sometimes squished underfoot, and the soil had been dark, and they'd been running scared for most of it, and it hadn't always been pleasant, but there was something soothing about the bioluminescent glow of the flowers, the formless whispers of long-gone wishes, the strange lights that hovered, inexplicably suspended, like fireflies. Something about the quiet rush of water running over rocks that they'd found calming.

Something about that secluded spot, just a bench and a quiche and an echo flower, that had allowed them to stay there for a long, long time, maybe even hours, before they could fill themselves with enough determination to continue.]

I dunno why. I guess I just liked how quiet it was most of the time.

[When Undyne wasn't throwing spears at them, anyway.]

I could tell.

[They don't offer up any commentary about what their favourite spot was.

Those blurred lines obscured a lot of things, but even in that muddled-together state, they could remember long, still silences.

Hiding behind a waterfall in a secret cave, holding the remains of a lost child. Hearing an anonymous voice that just wasn't ready for the responsibility, and staying immobile on a bench for so long it felt like they might sprout roots. Standing next to a monster child, gazing at a far-off destination. Staring at glittering stones in the dark, thinking about how monsterkind confined their wishes to a single, tiny room. Learning of the Delta Rune and the prophecy they all pinned their hopes on. The angel who had seen the surface.

Ancient glyphs and a very unsettling illustration.

Listening to a tinkling music box.

It sounds like it came from over here...
Oh! You've fallen down, haven't you...?
Are you OK? Here, get up...

Chara, huh? That's a nice name.

My name is A s r i e l D r e e m u r r .

* Those flowers...
* One day they just started to grow there.
* I swear, it's like they have a mind of their own.]

Go figure you would find the place you're hunted relentlessly the most peaceful of all. Nothing says quiet and tranquil like being cornered by a spear-throwing maniac, right?

Edited (i forgot how many ellipses are in this dang game's script. also: grammar, stanley) 2016-10-21 05:07 (UTC)

[Perhaps it was a sad place for a couple of humans like them to be. A place where monsters whispered their wishes and hopes, and where those dreams would gradually wither into disappointments, as all dreams inevitably do. Wishing upon sparkling stones stuck in the ceiling just isn't effective as wishing upon stars, it seems.

But it's not so hard to figure why Chara would have fond memories of that place as well, though. A music box, a solemn statue with its head bowed and the soft strains of a chiming tune. A piano that opened a hidden crevice in the wall. It had been nice. Peaceful.

When they weren't running, screaming for their life.]

I guess it's a little funny.

[They laugh, a quiet, rueful little chuckle.]

I don't know. I miss them sometimes.

Echo Flowers.

...I liked them too.

[They'd loved flowers.

Traced their roots, even, deep into the soil. Dug their fingers into the dark crevices between the world's arcing ribs, pulled up whispers from Echo Flowers too lost to ever be found. A broken refrain of Error! over and over.

Whispers. Lost wishes.

* I’m gonna run around in a huge field of flowers.
* Maybe I could jump without hitting my head.

* ...I wanna... I wanna...
* You wanna ride a train, right, honey?

* I’ll climb this mountain, and...
* I just want everyone to be happy...]

I thought Waterfall was mournful.

[They blurt it suddenly, then regret saying so. Frisk liked the tranquility. Didn't think it was haunted, thought it was serene.

Maybe it wasn't Waterfall that was mournful.]

But... in a pretty way.

Maybe if you asked, the closets would let you have Echo Flowers.

[But Chara's always liked flowers. The flowers on the surface, golden and perfect, a patch of them that they'd so loved. One of the few things they must have genuinely missed, because that seems to have carried over. Love of gardening, of watching things grow. Botany.

Herbology.

The foreign word flits across Frisk's mind, but they dispel it before it can take root. Ha, take root. That's a good one. They'd have to tell Sans sometime. Or maybe not. Maybe that'd just worry him further, and he's got enough to worry about.]

I guess that's why I liked it. I didn't always feel like I really...belonged there, though. You know?

[They shift on the spot, their expression twisting.]

I mean. It was a place where monsters wished for things. And there I was, a human, just...taking all those things away. Taking away all their hopes.

[As though they were sullying the ground with every step, painting it black with each tread of their sneakered toes. Corrupting it, spreading their awful human taint everywhere they walked.]

You were their hope, Frisk. You are our future, remember?

[None of us can do it without you, human. We'll never be free unless you do something.

Just don't go thinking of yourself as an angel, though. That's somebody else's job.

They pull the tub of rainbow frosting closer, take a spoonful. It's almost unbearably sugary, and it makes a weird pairing with a tisane, but they don't mind.]

...All those times we went through, you never wished on any of those rocks, did you?

My SOUL was the hope.

[They weren't anyone's future until they reached a certain point, and by then Waterfall was mostly a memory, or a place where they would trek back to speak to Undyne, assuming they hadn't killed her or anyone else.

They weren't important because they were special, or especially kind, or whatever they happened to be during whichever loop. They were the future because they had a human SOUL. Because of what they were. Not who they were.]

I dunno what I'd wish about. [It's an honest admission, but then their brow crinkles in thought.] Did you? Ever...wish on those rocks?

[...They don't refute that. Their SOUL was the hope too, back when they still had one. It wasn't anything about them that made them the future of humans and monsters. Nothing about the way they spoke or acted or what they hoped for. Just... just the useful resource lurking inside of their chest.]

No. Never.

[Yes. Yes, they had. More fervently and wholeheartedly than they'd ever wished on the surface. They'd believed in those stupid rocks even more than they'd believed in real stars.

But that just sounds... it sounds stupid, right? Naive. Pointless. What kinds of things would a bleak little destroyer like them ever wish for? The only thing an inhuman force of nature like them wants is destruction.]

I thought you had plenty to wish for back then, though. To stay alive. To make it out. To be safe. To be free. For... for a real friend, right? For someone who wouldn't hurt you.

Edited (casually leaves entire words out) 2016-10-22 01:58 (UTC)

I wished plenty on stars on the surface.

[There's a bitter twist in their gut as they say it. They still remember that, that frustration, that clenching in their stomach as they'd wished and wished and even prayed, sometimes, for someone to hear. Supplicated themselves to whatever deity might be listening.

That was the first time they learned that nobody came.

And nobody ever would.]

If that didn't work, what good was a bunch of fake stars gonna do?

[They stare down at their tea, something in their chest sinking a little. Just like it does every time Frisk verifies that the bleak, dark ugly things weren't all just Chara's murky venom leaking into their SOUL. Underscores that humanity hasn't improved one bit in the past... however many years it's been since Chara's death. Underscores that they never, ever will.]

Guess it's no good waiting around passively, hoping someone else will come save you.

[Didn't work for Asgore. Didn't work out for Flowey, really. Guess it sort of worked out for Alphys, though? Worked out for all monsterkind. And it's not like taking matters into your own hands ever got Chara anywhere, either. It just made things worse.

...Turns out it's a good thing they didn't admit to wishing on those rocks. Frisk was smarter than that. More grown-up than that. Chara just would have looked like a baby.]

It's like that one saying, right? If wishes were fishes, then... something something.

[They don't know how the second half goes. Then beggars would ride?? They'd ride the fish?? That's stupid, Chara. That doesn't make sense.]

We'd all be fishermen? I forget.

[If wishes were fishes, we'd all be eating sushi? They don't know how the saying goes, really. Waiting passively and hoping for someone to SAVE you never really works out, in their experience. They saw some of those grainy old movies, sometimes. Stories about princesses who got whisked away to magical balls thanks to a kindly old woman with wings. But they could wish and think and hope and dream all they wanted - they'd never be deserving of that same kind of cosmic kindness.

The most they could do was hike up that old mountain themself. That was the only out they'd be getting.]

I dunno. I guess wishes lost their luster a while ago.

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(a very hidden) csa allusion cw

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abuse allusion cw also This Kid Is On A Roll

please help these kids

PLEASE

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