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Both, I guess.

[They must've done a better job of blocking all that out than they'd thought. Good enough to obscure it even from Chara. From themselves, sometimes. The reasoning behind it is very simple.

It's because that person wasn't them. Wasn't Frisk. They became Frisk when they made the choice to walk up that mountain, their striped shirt sticking to their back with sweat, their breath puffing out in hot bursts against the chilled air. Walk to the top with their toes balancing over the edge, peering over. They couldn't even see the bottom. Nothing but a sheer drop into inky void. From where they stood, it might have even been a portal into another world. And in a way, it was.]

I guess I decided it wasn't me. With that first SAVE...

[They stretch out a hand, mimicking the motion of forming the golden four-pronged point. The crackling of red leaves underfoot. A new life, a new world, a curious monster who said that she would take care of them. And with the power to SAVE came the knowledge that they did not have to go back. They could not go back prior to that point.]

But I don't know about what happens when we get out.

You worked so hard for the chance to be Frisk again. It's... funny, huh?

[A name that was only recovered at the very last moments of the very last timeline. ...It's not funny at all. LOVE still lurks in them; they think if they decided not to feel guilty about scribbling their name over top of Frisk's, then they wouldn't feel a thing.

They choose to dig for that guilt, and hold it tightly.]

When you say "we," Frisk...

I don't know what happens either. But... I think Sans does. I think he's... seen more timelines than we have.

[Even the end isn't the end, he tells them, and it's enough to make Chara's wavering hold on their overblown emotions crumple like paper. Later, he asks them if this version of them ever got past him. Ha. This version. He sees the Real Knife, and clutches at his chest like he recalls something.]

[Maybe not funny. Weird, though. Ironic? Or is that one of those things people would say is ironic but actually isn't? Frisk is twelve. They have no clue.]

What makes you say that?

[Were there timelines before Frisk made that fateful step-tumble down Mt. Ebott? The other humans, maybe? Or maybe...maybe it has something to do with that memory of the monster that made their eyes and brain hurt, like staring at an uncomfortably bright light for too long.]

I thought...the two of us were the only ones who could - who could do that. Set things back.

It is us, Frisk.

[What Chara refers to, at the very least. There's Flowey, but he seemed to have had his fill of ol' Smiley Trashbag. They know of nothing else that could Reset. Just anomalies. Flowey, Chara, Frisk.]

We... are from the same timeline, right?

["This version." Like maybe they aren't the right Chara at all. Like they're as disposable as the names that summon them.]

Papyrus comes from a timeline where I was in control. Sans does not. We could also be...

[He could be from a "future" point. As much as a word like that can even apply. This version of Chara never got past Sans, but that version of Sans tells them the end isn't the end. That they get past him, but there are still Resets.]

Let me ask. That miserable event aside, do you know what LV20 feels like? Did I ever kill him?

I'm not sure it matters. We still remember everything we did, right?

[Frisk frowns. They still have trouble discussing this so openly, even if they're actively trying to be more transparent about it. They've already tried to tell everyone here the truth, even if it aches to do so.

Pulling their mind back to that time isn't pleasant, but they frown to focus on it. LV 19, inching ever closer. Then Frisk shakes their head.]

I don't think so. I don't think we ever got past him.

It is the same for me. He spared us. We did not come back. We have seen every ending but that one.

I don't think that's the case for him. He's died at my hand before.

[Our hand...? The line between "I" and "we" feels like a dangerous one. They don't want to flirt with it.

And here they pause. They have hinted at their intentions, their plans to bring everything to an absolute and vicious end. But... nobody knows the full extent of their plan. Their idea to shatter every last bit of appeal in repeating the story. To crush the happy ending.]

We are constants across Resets. You're right about that. There is no "other Frisks" like there are "other Sans-es." I... do not know for certain, but I think. If he remembers it. Maybe it's inevitable that we're going to reset.

Even so, I...

[...But surely it would be shooting themselves in the foot to reveal their plan. Isn't Frisk the partner they'd be trying to drag consequences down onto?

They have a lot of very uncertain, contradictory feelings about this.]

I do not know for certain if there is a "we" after you leave Mt. Ebott. But. I think... if you want to continue being Frisk, if you want to keep that happiness...

[Has he? Frisk's heart thuds sickeningly at the thought. Briefly, they strain to remember anything, any version of that encounter in the gold-tinted hall that ended in his death...and come up with nothing. They never saw it happen. But he's a version of him who did.]

What? I have to let you just...fade away?

[With this new, tentative friendship thing happening between them, Frisk isn't sure whether they can put that one down to selflessness or Chara's own crushing desire to just stop being.]

We don't know if that's how it works. We haven't gone that far.

[It is... useless to talk about this, isn't it? If every timeline is connected to the same root, then... it's basically already happened. Even if they spill their guts here, everything gets wiped when they all return home. True Reset, a kind so powerful that Chara doesn't get to override it. They'll return to the Underground, they'll find out how it works, but they certainly won't be friends.]

I had already faded away before you came knocking on my grave, hadn't I?

[Why did they ever use a word like friendship to begin with? They know that eventually, they'll ERASE the world. If Sans is to be trusted, then they will also bring it back. And there's only one thing tempting enough to convince them to reset, right?

The Frisk that was born, more or less, on Mt. Ebott. Who has a Mom. Who has friends. Who has a name. They'll ERASE that instead. Won't they? Chara smiles, folds their hands. Stares down at the neatly interlocking fingers, counts the scars.]

...You will never have what Wonderland gives you back home, you know. You'll go back, and any notions of fondness will have been undone. I won't be conveniently set into a body of my own that will shed dramatic tears with you. I will be empty, and I will be bitter, hateful, dissatisfied.

So?

[There's that barrier, that distance, withdrawing again. The smile. The flat, matter-of-fact-ness in their tone. It's all familiar. Bitterly so.

They'd thought they were past this, but then - it doesn't work like that. It doesn't progress in a straight line. There'll be bumps, slides, obstructions in the road. It's their job to circumvent that the best they can.]

Who says we can't get to this point again? Who says we haven't before?

We don't know what happens after the end. What could happen.

Frisk. Does it not occur to you that ambition is a dangerous thing? You have the chance to be happy, if you just content yourself with your own happiness. If you do not convince yourself you can save everyone.

[We can do it, Asriel. We can free everyone.]

You could satisfy yourself with knowing we were...

[They don't want to say it again. Not in a context where it surely isn't joking around.]

With knowing that in one timeline, for just a little while, we were... whatever this is. Accept what you are given. You might risk losing something far more important if you continue to think you can tailor the world into something even more perfect.

Aren't you scared of that?

And if we forget?

[If they could remember this, they might be content with that. Or that might simply make them more determined to hold onto this, and ensure that Chara doesn't just fade from everyone's heads and hearts and SOULs.]

If there's even the remotest chance that you might be able to be happy on the surface, why wouldn't I want to make that happen?

[Why wouldn't they endeavor to reach that? So much of Frisk's self is reliant on the people they love and care for. To just let someone they've grown to know so well fade away? That seems somehow contradictory to everything they are.]

[It's... Chara doesn't know what this is. The more LOVE they stack on, the more elusive and incomprehensible emotions feel. The harder it is to pin names to things they had forgotten a long time ago. They know anger pretty well. Are they angry? They think they feel ready to argue.

But they don't know how to argue without laying bare what happens after they ERASE, if all goes according to plan. Turning each timeline into a punishment, depriving Frisk of love completely, eradicating them from the story. They know it boils down to a "it's me or you" ultimatum, and they dread how Frisk might answer it.

Oh well. Don't really need to talk about it, anyway. While they're here, none of it matters. Can't ERASE Wonderland or claim any SOULs here! They've already got something beating inside of them!]

If you can remember anything at all from this place... do whatever nauseating Pollyanna thing you must, but. At the very least. Try to move forward while you do it. Don't Reset, even if you fail. I'll make you suffer in ways you have yet to even dream of if you Reset. That is not an idle threat, it is a warning of an inevitable outcome.

I don't want to RESET. I don't want to put you or...or anyone else through that again.

[They only realize it's true after they say it. They've put all their friends, everyone they've come to know and love, through enough. They've put Chara and Asriel through enough. If that was the happiest outcome, then monsters deserve to go free, not be kept in darkness for Frisk's own personal amusement.]

But if I forget everything...how do I know I won't think I can fix things again? Make things...better?

[There's an undercurrent of anger to the word, frustration at their own self's blind insistence that they can singlehandedly make all life better or worse for monsters. That Frisk somehow know how best to do that.]

[They hesitate, trying to shape their answer carefully.

They still don't know how to hope. Can't really bring themselves to just trust in Frisk and think trust is enough to overcome anything at all. They don't know that the temptation won't rise. They don't know that they'll be the arguing voice, mocking and calling them out for insisting the world is just a playground they can shape for themself, sculpt and nudge and ply until every answer is perfect and everyone loves them as much as possible.

Maybe they'll have given up so thoroughly they'll be the temptation. Maybe they'll be what whispers that it can't hurt to try one more time, to see the one ending that still has yet to be seen. You already know how to get this ending, right? You can just go back and get it again, once you've seen what there is to see. Nobody will ever have to know what you've done. Things can be right back to normal.]

...We don't know. We really don't know at all.

[Chara is a memory, in every sense of the word. A footnote, a mumbled aside, more of a prop than a character in the story. But they are also the one who remembers. Who does not let their knowledge ever be RESET away. Could they be blasé, tell Frisk to leave the hard work to them, let them find a way to tap into a determination so strong it remembers Wonderland, or find an erasure so absolute they never come back and lend Frisk the extra bit of power to send things dialing back again?

They don't think so.]

Toriel. Asgore. Undyne. Sans. They couldn't remember, but they still... knew some things. We've never been on that side of a RESET before, but maybe you could, too. Even if it's only a gut feeling.

There has to be something here important enough that it can survive the trip back. Or... what's even the point, right? Why are we here at all?

I don't know.

[And they guess they won't know unless it happens. Determination can do a lot of things. But it can't alter the course of the way things have already happened. Frisk can roll back their own timeline all they want, but Chara will still be dead. Asriel will still be a flower. They'll still fail to remember everything they've lived through here. Apologizing to Sans, to Alphys, to Undyne. Explaining the nature of the SAVE, promising that they were still friends no matter what.

Will that all cease to matter? They'll all forget too, when they go back. It'll be like it never happened. Just a lone human with the weight of an entire world on their shoulders and the fragment of a fallen child's SOUL in their heart.]

I guess we'll only know if...when we go back.

[They can't just be gone from the Underground forever, can they. That might be too much to ask.]

...I don't want to forget.

Neither do I.

[They don't want to forget. They don't want to be forgotten. They don't want to be the hateful, unwelcome threat Sans thought they were, Asriel thought they were, that... even Frisk, surely, must have thought they were. How ridiculous, to be so eager to prove them all right, yet so reluctant to prove that you really are the very worst thing you could possibly be.

God, they're tired of their helplessness. The inability to really change anything, to actually have permanence. Consequence. No ending to that story, not a single one, lets them make up for what they did to Asriel. To their parents. To the whole Underground. None of those routes have room for an "I forgive you" or an "I understand." There's no reset out there powerful enough to let Chara undo their mistakes.

Same here, huh? Even if they change their mind about clawing a SOUL into their possession, that resolve will be erased. Don't bother getting attached, don't bother hoping.]

...We deserve this, don't we. Trying to be happy, but knowing we'll just forget everything we let ourselves be invested in.

[The universe itself is smiling and throwing its arms open, whispering c'mere, pal. And it's more punishment, it's more proof there's no forgiveness anywhere, but it's... it's really not unjustified.]

What a shame that not remembering is so crucial. We'd probably find the irony of it hilarious, if we did. A taste of our own bitter medicine!

[Ha...ha. Frisk is about to refute that claim, but find they can't. Chara's kind of right about that, aren't they? This must be how it feels to be Sans, all the time.

And they put him through hell. They put everyone through hell.]

Then I guess we have to do what we can with our time here.

[Always with the silver lining. Frisk squares their shoulders, tightens their mouth into a determined line.]

It doesn't make everything we do here just...meaningless.

[Sans's ability to remember what he could, that isn't meaningless, even if he eventually decided to believe it is. It matters. All of it.]

[There they go again, holding onto their hopes. Chara thinks about why they're here, but they still come up empty. The hopeful light in their eyes is far too buried to be so easily regained.

But they can, at least, call Frisk their partner. Let them find a silver lining, let them steer the path the anomaly takes for a bit. See what happens before you go trying to tear it all down.

It's not optimism, it's not hope, but... it's close, sort of, to believing in someone. Maybe? If you squint? It's some variety of trying, and they had made up their mind to try, after all.]

I suppose we need some reason to keep going, even if it's not a very substantial one.

[It feels... disingenuous, they have to admit. Deceptive. Acting like they can be happy here, when the knowledge looms over their head that they will eventually drag Frisk down that dusty path again, will go beyond Sans, will kill everyone and everything. They look back on the ridiculous pranks they laughed so openly over, and feel... a little bit of disgust, they think, toward themselves. They question, again, if they really have the right to be anything but not-okay.

They find themselves at a loss. So... they'll just keep looking to the example their partner sets, they suppose. Still seeking guidance, as always.]

But... if I can find a way to tether myself to this world permanently, Frisk, then I'm not sure I would refuse.

As long as it's something.

[It doesn't have to be an important reason. It never was for Frisk. Something as useless or potentially disappointing as "tomorrow is another day" could keep them going for a long, long time. Until one day, as they climbed atop a mountain, that hadn't been enough.

Now, though, they have more to moor them to continuing on. Their friends, the monsters that have become their family. Toriel and Asgore are easily their parents, Sans and Papyrus are like their skeleton uncles, Undyne and Alphys their cool aunts, and Chara...Chara's like that one cousin no one seems to get along with, but somehow gets invited to the family gatherings anyway? Hmm. They'll have to work on that analogy.]

I know some people...are happier here than they were at home. You aren't the only one.

[Happier here... it's still a difficult thing to think about. They're not sure they're happy. They sort of don't know if they ever will be happy, hopeless and broken-souled and full of LOVE as they are.

But... they're here. And even if trying to compare if they're doing better or worse is hard, they can at least tell that they have things they would never have back home. A body of their own, a flesh-and-blood case with a heart that beats. Part of a SOUL is better than none at all, probably, though a bleaker part of them does think the inability to feel would be more blessing than curse. And if they can be here...]

There aren't Resets here. We can't do them. Maybe... those take the both of us.

[If they can be here, then maybe the story will go on, instead of starting over. Flowey can have his wish. Frisk will live their life. No temptation to find out what else is left in the Underground, no friend, enemy, prisoner, or partner rattling around in their head, and no worrying about Chara's fate if that voice ceases to answer them. It doesn't sound so bad, does it? They'd rather separate as... ugh, as friends than be tangled together unhappily, surely.]

...Are you happier here?

[They have to think about that one. Things are simpler here, and they're more complicated. Their fate isn't in their own hands anymore, but in Wonderland's, and the place seems to be fickle at best. The mysteries and secrets all get to come out, and they get to speak plainly to everyone. The rules are broken, the script is torn to pieces, and things are all...different.

Better? Maybe.]

In some ways. We're not really...bound by anything here, are we?

[No obligations. No hard pathways from one location to another. They're stuck in one place, true, but there's still more choice than they had Underground, in more ways than one.]

[They smile at their interlocked fingers again, because it's a question with a lot of layers, huh? No prophecy. None of the knowledge that you were the only hope of everyone in this world. No finite pathways to card through. No SOULS literally bound together, two minds peering out the same set of eyes.

Chara unfolds their hands.]

Yet the lack of direction is... difficult, I think.

[It's the overhanging, looming thought that makes the empty days yawn in front of them like an endless chasm. What is the purpose of their reincarnation? Why have the power to SAVE, if there is no barrier to break or world to ERASE? Why did they survive to this point, despite their own bleak intentions to erase themselves from existence?]

I suppose it is a novelty, at least. I am beginning to realize just how little I actually bothered to find out about you, before we split apart.

I think we took each other for granted, a little bit.

[They say it with the tone of dawning realization. Every figure they met in their journey was a predetermined thing, from the same jokes and puns to the same monsters. Papyrus always leaves a plate of frozen spaghetti. Shyren always hides in a corner. There's always that oddly foreboding shape at the end of a golden hallway.

Constants and variables.]

I mean, we just kind of...everything else was set in place. So why should either of us be any different?

[Permanent fixtures in a malleable storyline. Frisk is always a confused tangle of striped shirt and cloudy past, and Chara is always a voice with an asterisk, commenting idly on things as they happen. Funny how they never stopped to question. Maybe that just never showed up in their ACT menu.]

[There... was a lot they hadn't stopped to consider. A shaky period where they hadn't even been sure there were two people there at all. They were so sure of the things they liked. That instant noodles were better dry, that soda was gross (sickly yellow liquid), that Mr. Dad Guy's favourite tea was the blatantly correct choice. Was that them? Did Frisk agree? Disagree?

Even if Frisk was the only one who could hear them speak, they sure did a lot of talking for Frisk, and very little asking.]

I don't think... I wanted to know you.

[Though they announce it with a little uncertainty. They didn't want attachment, they claim, but...

* You are intimidated by Froggit's raw strength. Only kidding.
* Ah! Wow! Gee! It's a "Hole."
* RATED TEM OUTTA TEM. Loves to pet cute humans. But you're allergic!
* Recovers HP.
* (Hit Poodles.)

They couldn't really call the journey from one end of the Underground to the other strictly formal and businesslike, huh? The whole way through, they weren't always disinterested. They'd been... sort of joking with each other the whole time, even as they'd been warring with each other, struggling to push their body towards fighting or towards mercy.

But even that... even that didn't always change when they went back. Some little things altered, but... the same jokes, the same advice about how to avoid Aaron's attacks, the same false air of mystery around the cameras hidden in Snowdin and Waterfall, even though they knew Alphys was watching. Never ignoring the pomeraisins in a sentry stand to instead ask when their host's birthday was, or what colour they liked best, or if they liked dogs more than cats.]

I guess we... never even tried, did we?

[The quiet hint lurking in a comment about a bed so comfortable, you might never get up, maybe. Force-feeding memories into Frisk's consciousness, reminding them to stay determined. Picking them up after a sharp plummet into the garbage dump, waking them up with a voice that had once picked them up after a plummet of their own. The sepia-toned image of a boy who saved someone who cried out for help, memories thick with love and gratitude and the hope that he could be saved too. They weren't... they weren't very direct ways to talk, were they?]

I only started talking about myself when I thought you weren't listening anymore.

[The date I came here. My drawing. My bed. It's me, Chara.]

I never gave you a chance to talk about yourself at all.

But...I mean, it was easy to just think the other was...gone. I'm not sure I even thought to ask if I was anyone else.

[Who were they? Chara. That's a nice name. A rote exchange, everything all muddled together, two SOULs existing in a place only intended for one.

Who was, Frisk, really? A kid who fell Underground and landed on a mat of golden flowers, very much like the other child who did the same. Chara would be forgiven for being confused, for thinking that they'd been given a second chance (in many ways, isn't that sort of what happened?), for thinking this body was theirs in a new iteration. There were only subtle differences. Thin eyes instead of wide ones, a flat expression in lieu of rosy cheeks, a firm neutral line instead of a wide, wide grin.]

I didn't exactly...assert myself at all, did I?

[That's a problem of theirs, and an asset of Chara's. Frisk was never assertive. The first decision they actually made for themselves was the decision to walk up the slope of Mt. Ebott and never look back, and it took them twelve years to get to that point where they actually felt they could make that decision. Whereas Chara...Chara is far more adapt at ACTing upon what they want, regardless of how Frisk might feel about what they want.]

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WOW COOL COOL NOTIF DELAY DW

i still haven't gotten a notif for this lol

thanks dw

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I Deeply Enjoy not knowing When The Fuck

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