aiko's otter den

red as the blood you didn't shed - Your name, a long time ago, was Frisk. AU.

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8. VIII

You meet Asgore again.

It starts all over again. This time, however, Toriel stops it, firing at Asgore with impunity. She tells you not to be afraid.

You don’t say anything to this. You can’t. Your heart is in your throat. Everyone is coming here. Everyone is running here to stop the fight because you don’t have to fight, do you?

Except, you realize, you do. Your fingers curl around the rainbow knife, but you don’t unsheathe it. Everyone looks happier, talking to each other and smiling a little. Your heart aches for them. Chara squeezes your hand. You let go of the knife and let it rest at your side. You’ve only had it for a short time, but it comforts you.

We all have our safeties Frisk.

You smile at everyone and pretend like nothing’s wrong. Sans notices, but he’s still grinning like nothing’s wrong. They have to, you think, or it’ll all fall apart.

Frisk! Chara hisses. The gays are gonna smooch. Look away! Look away!

Why? It’s not a big deal, and even now, Chara seems to find it funny.

Toriel interrupts whatever that was going to be and places her hands over your shoulders. “Child, I was separated from a friend of yours.”

You nod slowly.

“If you’re willing to stay here a bit longer, we will help you find her and you can stay with us, your friends.”

You nod and smile obediently. You watch Sans out of the corner of your eye.

“Say Papyrus,” Alphys says and you turn your head. “You gathered everyone here and I got here before you. How did you know to come here?”

“A tiny flower helped me!” Papyrus chirps at once.

You can’t help the urge to drag your hand down your face from forehead to follow it and sigh.

Chara’s right. Papyrus is an idiot. The best idiot ever.

Flowey pops up and says, “I GOT THE HUMAN SOULS CHARA!”

“That’s great,” you say before your brain catches up with you and multiple pairs of eyes go wide. “I’ve got a knife!”

He laughs. “You think a puny human knife will stop me?”

“No but I think we can.” Chara settles once more in your skin and you feel a steady, puzzling warmth. Perhaps with the knowledge that this is the end, you are comforted with their death.

Flowey screeches laughter. “This is all your fault either way. You made them love you. You made them care about you. And now they’re mine.”

Funny how everyone thinks that but me. You smile and say, “Don’t be jealous you don’t know how.”

The rage on his face is harsh and sharp and you smile at it. After a moment, he smiles back and says, “Aren’t you going to ask why I’m doing this?”

“It’s not going to be an interesting answer,” you reply. Chara grins and your teeth feel sharp.

“I’m still playing,” he shouts like you didn’t answer at all. “If you win, you’ll leave and you won’t play. I can’t allow that!”

This should be terrifying, but it isn’t.

There are things you fear worse than death.

He’s not one of them.

He tries to kill you, of course. He’ll try to kill you one million times.

You simply stare at him as he tries. You do not fear death. He’s made sure of that.

But then you are surrounded by fire. It protects you. You blink in surprise. The others, they keep protecting you. You wish they wouldn’t. You are not afraid of Flowey. You are afraid for him.

It makes something hurt inside you though, that they protect you. It feels like it hasn’t been earned.

Chara says nothing.

They believe in you, they expect things from you. And you don’t know how to tell them that even if they come true, it’s at the cost of someone else.

Once, you were a lonely child, trapped underground in the dark, fighting to breathe air and see light. YOu spent a long time clawing your way out of that, and then you fell stagnant in the little light you grasped.

You are still angry for what Flowey and the monsters did to you and Rachel, but you think that, in the end, that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve something worse than this.

So you wait. You smile at your friends, you smile at the hopes on their faces, and you wait. Because this is how Flowey works. He is only good at pretending. He is only good at playing games. This isn’t real to him, not yet.

You both must find the moment to make it real. Only then, will you win.

He shrivels away from them, shrinking in on himself and still pelting you with pellets that can be easily brushed aside.

“Feeling lonely, Flowey?” you ask softly, SOUL trapped in a box. “It’s okay. I’m always alone. It gets better.”

IT doesn’t, and you know he knows it. You know he knows the isolation in his petals.

“No,” he grits out. And then he smiles.

And this isn’t the moment, but this is one of them.

“I just have all of your idiot souls in my hands!”

And the world is awash in white.

Then a child stands in front of you. Like you now, they wear a striped shirt. They’re shorter than you by a good amount. They flex their hands, shake themselves a little. Then they exhale.

“Finally,” he says, and he sounds like he means it. “I was so tired of being a flower.”

You watch him turn to look at you and smile, a bit shyly at that. “Howdy,” he says. Asriel looks a lot like Toriel, you think, and you hunger for a moment in your guts. “Chara, are you there? It’s me, your best friend.”

And year hear the name in a thousand tongues, from a thousand voices, from a thousand alternate lives.

“Asriel Dreemurr.”

You swallow and get ready to dodge.

Because what forms is someone who looks like Toriel but sharper and colder, stronger and angrier.

This is going to hurt.

The six SOULs aren’t with you this time, but you feel them anyway, stubborn and strong and as determined as you are. You buoy yourself with it.

Ready, Chara? You ask.

Always, they say. And you run like hell.

---

Once, Rachel called you a cynical child without any hopes or dreams. Looking back on it now, she may have been right.

But things, you think, holding on to the hope that you can save everyone, that even an unchosen one like you are can do something, are different now.

You tug on the dream of a world where this doesn’t have to happen.

The world burns with color and sears your eyes. Wow that’s hurt more than everything else done to you.

Chara snickers but it’s half in pain.

And then you’re dodging stars. After one flays your cheek open, you decide that sorry Rachel, but stars suck because they hurt.

They’re not real stars, Chara tells you half-heartedly but you ignore them because right now you need to have hopes and dreams and you suck at that so it takes more effort out of you to not die.

“I don’t care about destroying the universe,” Asriel declares and there is a part of you that wants to tell him that is dumb but you are busy dodging the chaos saber or whatever Chara is helpfully warning you about it being with this dumb grin on your face. “I’m gonna reset everything!”

“That’s nice,” you say, spitting blood. It’s really hard because all this light is hurting your eyes. This is why your name means twenty-fifth night, not twenty-fifth day.

You duck your head and dodge another blast of lasers.

I cannot believe I’m saying these without cringing, mutters Chara as you clasp your hands and dream of a happy future with all of your might. You don’t really know what it looks like, you’ve never been able to really envision the sky, but you think it’s the people you’ve met beside you, like Chara and Monster Kid and Rachel, and no longer being killed for their sake.

Your body warms, the light softens, and you can breathe more easily.

Hm. Good enough.

“You’ll keep doing it anyway,” Asriel crows. “Because you want a happy ending! Because you love that stupid girl and your stupid friends! Because you never give up! You’ll be my plaything forever!”

You bite your lip, the words in your throat. And then you softly say. “At least I’m not a bully.”

He doesn’t hear you, but Chara smiles with your mouth. Asriel shakes his head at you, smug and superior.

“It’s time to purge this timeline once and for all!” he declares and you grit your teeth.

Hold on, you and Chara whisper together.

The goat head laughs. And it pulls you back. You plant your feet and you grit your teeth again and you refuse to move. It sucks in the world.

You refuse to move.

Debris hits you.

You refuse to move.

Finally it ends, and he’s staring at you with a modicum of respect. (You like that new word.)

“Even after all of that you’re still here?” He laughs. “Fine, I guess you deserve to face me at full power after all.”

God he’s a sore winner, mutters Chara as the world warps around you.

You agree.

The void opens to what looks like a fallen angel. It grins at you with a heart in its chest and giant wings that dwarf you with ease. You can’t move your body. Heck, you can’t feel your body. You look down at it.

You’re still here Frisk.

Despite everything, you’re still here.

You struggle. You can’t move your body. You’re hit, and the little bit of energy you have gives and you drop.

But, even so. You refuse it.

And your body warms to life again, Chara humming softly.

More deadly little flames. Concentrating, your soul twirls away from them. “Every time you die,” whispers Asriel, “Your grip weakens, your friends forget you a little more.”

You don’t feel like they’re your friends, but even so, you don’t loosen your grip.

I can hold on for eternity except for my lack of fingers, Chara assures you. We can’t LOAD though, so.

“Your life will end here, in a world where no one remembers you.”

I remember you, Chara promises, and you hold on tighter. I’ll always remember.

You struggle on knowing that. You struggle on believing in that, if nothing else.

They could be good friends to you someday, Chara tells you. You aren’t like me. You forgive. I don’t. I can’t. That is what makes you different from me. That and I’m obviously smarter.

You huff out a laugh. You try to reach your SAVE. Nothing happens. You try to move your body. Nothing happens.

Seems saving is impossible after all but… if Chara is right. If that is what SAVED the souls before… maybe there is a way to make this happy ending after all.

Maybe, like Rachel did, you can SAVE someone else.

It won’t make up for your mistakes, or the time you have spent together, or everything you saw inside of her and yourself but… she still saved you.

So you’ll save them. Maybe like this, they can change things.

You reach out with your hand and call out for help. A single green light pulsates and your soul flickers —

“Humans are our real enemy,” Undyne declares as she rushes at you. Her voice is so monotone. You hate it. You raise your spear and block her attacks as they fly. You grin back at her. “You’re keeping us from the surface!”

You dodge again and tap your soul against her shoulder, before dodging once with a giggle. Like this, she’s not so scary. Just a big, muscly mush pile. A cool one but still.

Another spear rises up to smack you in the eye but Undyne’s scaly hand lands on your shoulder. She grins down at you.

“Eh,” she says, “You’re not so bad I guess.”

You offer two thumbs up and you’re propelled forward as Chara laughs, falling into Alphys. She doesn’t attack you. She shrivels away from you, not crying, but you can’t see her face to be sure. It might be worse than crying.

“You hate me,” she says, and there’s a flash of yellow sparkling in the corner of your eye. “Everyone hates me. I lied. No one likes a liar. But I have to do keep doing it or you really will—”

You nudge her shoulder and ask about her favorite cartoon, dodging bullets with ducks of your head.

She stops, struggles in place for a moment. She almost slumps over in defeat and then you ask her another question. And another. Because you don’t know anything, not really. But if anyone can tell you, it’s likely her.

And the answers burst out of her mouth. You keep asking, keep smiling because you don’t blame her. You realize you can’t blame her. Or any of them. You cannot love them, but you cannot blame them either.

“You do like me, don’t you?” she asks in a teary voice.

You nod. You see her glasses through the fog.

“My friends like me,” she repeats as if in awe. “And I like them too!”

You exhale in relief and fall backwards into a jail of bones.

“Just give up,” Sans says behind you. “I did.”

“You just need to take a break,” you tell him. “I could use one too.” You pat the ground that doesn’t exist. He regards you and you realize finally, that you’ve actually always been taller than him.

“Everyone will love me if I capture a human,” Papyrus insists from your right.

Idiot, says Chara fondly.

“Everyone does love you,” you say instead. “We do. Show me a recipe. I want to cook something!”

Papyrus wavers.

Chara takes over your mouth and says something, you don’t know what it means. But Papyrus groans and Sans laughs out right so it must have been bad. But the two of them are grinning at you. Papyrus picks you up in a squeezing hug.

Dizzily you flop away and fall in front of —

Asgore and Toriel.

You think of fire. You think of pain. You think of buttercups and dead bodies and screaming.

And you smile a bit as the flames come again.

“This is for your own good,” Toriel tells you gently. You leap out of the way and hug her instead. She trembles. You take her hand. And then you pull away gently and look at Asgore, who looks so forlorn and solemn despite you being unable to see their face.

“I won’t hurt you,” you promise. He tilts his head and sends a giant fireball in your direction.

“This is my duty,” he tells you.

You shake your head. “I won’t let you fulfill it.”

Slowly, you continue to dodge their fire, it’s waning now. You’re feeling more energized.

Chara takes a deep breath and you both say, “I’m sorry.”

Something in them relaxes and they see you. Not another fallen human, not the hope of the world. They see you.

It hurts.

“Don’t be sorry,” Toriel says to you. “We’ll meet again, my child.”

“You are our future now,” Asgore says.

You smile, but it’s flimsy.

Just a little more.

You’re facing Asriel again.

“Ready, Chara?” you say.

Chara nods.

Asriel freezes as you slowly suck in a breath and wrap your fingers around your SOUL. You clench tighter, the other six souls struggling to wake again, struggling to breathe again.

“Asriel,” you say together, steady and strong and unafraid. There is one more left.

He freezes up again. “Wh-What are you doing?”

You push with all of your might. You push your save forward with everything you have. You push the past forward with all of your strength. The past that you lack, that Chara has, it’s… it’s time.

I’m ready, Frisk, Chara says steadily.

You nod. Your face hurts.

Chara’s existence has always been, you think, apart from yours, distant from yours. Even the merging was incomplete. Their voice with yours, their mind along with yours. This… this is becoming yours.

I’m pretty sure it’s the only way for me to move on, they’d told you in the dusty lab, when you’d both laid out the promises. And to save Ree. There’s something up with your body. I think it can do things humans and monsters alone can’t do. One last time Frisk, please help me. Then help yourself, okay?

And Chara’s memories flood into you, raw, sterile, fire-hearted and bloody-minded.

You remember being born, something Chara’s mind doesn’t recall, the sterile smell of the birthing place — hospital, hospital, hospital — and blurry faces above you that you’ve never seen before. You remember being held, the sensation of being cherished and cared for —

You remember trying to swipe at something with your fingers.

You remember scorn.

It speeds through you, barreling and burning through bruises and blood, the smell of a butchery, the taste of the rain on your tongue, you are suddenly full to bursting of things that must belong to you now or they will be lost forever.

And then you see — Asriel.

Fretting over you — Chara — helping them back, helping you to the hands of the kind king and queen. You quail, you smile, you bury your face in flowers and you burn you burn you burn —

Asriel isn’t smiling now.

You reach out again and call his name.

“What is this…” he croaks.

You call out to him again, louder this time, stronger this time.

“No!” he shrieks. “I don’t need anyone! I don’t! You left! You don’t get to come back!”

You just want to save the person in front of you, so you call out again.

You can’t dodge these bursts of energy so you don’t try. You twist your soul around a bit and it relaxes you enough. You can move your arms and legs properly now.

Just like before, you offer mercy. You don’t know if it’s the right thing to do. You honestly don’t care. If you can help the person hurting in front of you, isn’t that enough? If you can do something to make up for the sin you must have been created with, isn’t that fine?

You call out again, urging a little more power from your fingertips.

This time, all of his attacks miss as Asriel screams at you both. Then he weeps fire, he weeps and weeps and babbles on about things that hurt Chara — you — a little more. But you continue to call out. You continue to reach out to save him.

“I’m doing this because I care about you more than anybody else!” Asriel screams in effort to stop you, to fill you with more guilt than determination. You can feel your legs. The hold of impossibility is weakening. You push off of the ground into the void. Asriel quivers and tries to float away.

“No!” he shouts. “No you can’t. I’m not ready for this to end! I’m not ready to say goodbye! You can’t make me! You can’t!”

What if this was you, you wonder. What if this was what you became? You don’t want that. You definitely don’t want that now.

“Let me win! Let me do this and just let me WIN!”

You continue to push yourself forward even as he raises both arms and fires a rainbow laser at you. You can’t see, you can’t hear, you can’t feel, but the two of you push on. Closer and closer, further and further. Your Soul throbs but you touch it against Asriel’s chest.

“Ree,” you both say. “I’m sorry I left you alone here. It must have hurt a lot. I’m here now, okay? We’re both here.”

Something gives and the form, the godly, almighty form, shrivels away and once again you’re looking at the child. The child who died sobs in front of you, sobbing hard and long and loud. You watch, frozen with concern.

“I’m so sorry,” Asriel sobs. “For all of it, I’m so sorry.”

After a few moments, he collects himself. He giggles wetly. “I was always such a crybaby, wasn’t I Chara?” He pauses and looks at you. “No… Chara’s gone, aren’t they? They’ve been gone a long time.”

“Close,” you both say. “Been waiting a while, Ree.”

Asriel stiffens. “What?”

You don’t step back, but you gingerly lift the knife from where you’ve kept it. “Look familiar?”

Asriel stares at you for a moment, then you’re tackled to the ground and sobbed on all over again. You reach out and pull Asriel tighter to you and hold them close. You aren’t Chara, but you can do this.

“How?” he sobs. “How?”

“I’ve been haunting this place for a long time,” Chara says through you. ‘Cause I was stupid, mostly. I saw everything, every reset, every change, every suffering.’ Asriel stiffens. “I think it was my punishment to watch, like I made you watch as I was going to make you kill people. And now you’ve done it. It’s all kinds of terrible, isn’t it? But… I think… now, from being here, I think it was worth it. After all, now I can save you.”

Asriel trembles. “You can’t. I haven’t got a Soul anymore. I don’t have any compassion or anything!”

“That’s why we’re here.” Chara sounds smug. “You have the whole underground’s souls in you now. And you have the human souls. And you have me. Us.” They push Asriel off of you gently.

“Let’s make one more miracle,” Chara says. ‘Once more, together.’ Your body shifts, your curl your fingers around the knife. “Hold Frisk’s hand, Asriel.”

Asriel does so, looking puzzled. “Your name’s Frisk? That girl’s soul says it’s Bam.”

“She named me Bam,” you say quietly. “I also like Frisk.”

“Oh. Okay. Those are… nice names.”

You smile. “Thanks.”

Your knife glows red and you feel the sound of hundreds of voices at your ears, the cadence of a million lives at your breath. You feel and you hear and you are —

You, truly, are able to reach further.

You must, Chara urges you and you reach and reach without hands nor feet nor eye and you gape at the enormity of the universe before you.

The power thrums, beckoning, calling your name.

You ignore it, its beautiful blue likeness, sharp and fierce.

You ignore the many voices but you don’t drift. For a moment, you think you will. You think of the promise laid bare on your impression of yourself. You think of the broken tears, the many promises, you think of the things left behind on the souls. You think of why you’re here right now. You think of who you are here with right now. You think of the dream that is beginning to etch itself into your heart.

And you are filled with determination.

With a strength you didn’t know you had, you push. And out it flows, the souls the life the death, the darkness of the cave you’d been left in, the warmth of the hands that left you there, the blood that wavered around your skin, the voices of the people who’d loved you —

“Violet.”

“What a strange name for a dead child.”

Of the people you’d lost but never met.

Of the lives you could have lived but didn’t. For a moment, you understand the power that must have been feared when the underground was sealed. It is thrumming, boiling, thriving within you.

But you do not fear it.

You reach out and grab once more at the ability to save and you tug on it with the last dregs of yours and Chara’s power. Chara laughs as the souls come loose from Asriel, as the world seems to crack and crumble and something, the last bit of what they have, of what you have, slips into Asriel like water.

You fall backwards and with a squawk, Asriel catches you. “Frisk?” he yelps, worry in his voice. You smile and with a shaky hand, you point forward. Asriel turns his head and finally, finally, you both can see your ghost in the shadow. “Chara…” he whispers.

The ghost stands there, the six souls floating by their hands. They really are paler than you, cheeks permanently flushed and dark hair wilder. Their eyes are a brilliant ruby red like stoked coals, something you know and understand now. Your eyes, you realize, must be the same. They are dressed in green and yellow and black and their smile is much rounder.

Chara smiles over at you and lets go of the yellow SOUL. Rachel’s soul darts away to your hands, quivering, but you pass her to Asriel. They both make varying vibrations of confusion, but you ignore it, looking firmly at Chara.

“You don’t have to keep it,” Chara says.

You nod. “But I’m going to.”

You see a brief flicker of mist in the dead child’s eyes. But then they nod and straighten up. “Then, we’re going now.”

“Goodbye Chara,” you say, and you’re proud that you don’t choke on it.

Asriel makes a horrible, sorrowful noise. But then he swallows and smiles. “Bye, Chara!”

Chara doesn’t waver, they just turn and walk slowly away with the other five souls, deeper into the darkness, and soon out of sight.

You take Rachel’s SOUL back and hold it gently, and you let Asriel have his moment. You can see it under Asriel’s fur, without looking very hard, the thrum of determination, real and human under his monster body. The solidity is there.

“Asriel?” you say softly. “It’s time to go.”

Asriel flinches. “Maybe I shouldn’t.”

You take their hand in yours, the other cradling Rachel’s SOUL. “You need to make up for what you’ve done. Okay?”

Asriel swallows and then he finds his courage. “Yeah… okay. Let’s go, Frisk.”

And so you do.

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