The Mountain East (An Undertale Fanfiction)

Act II prelude: Chapter 17

Dark.

Darker.

... We've heard this a million times. The void did not need an explanation. Nothingness cannot be described with something. Cannot be compared or visualized. There is nothing like it. It is unique in its emptiness, alone in its bland, monotone state.

Seconds were pulverized into a distortion of physics. Minutes minced into the continuum. Hours floating mindlessly, wandering about in the spaceless, sparse, vast upside-down pit of the vacuum.

He walked.

What surface his feet gripped on, whether he had feet at all, was unknown. He shuffled about. Sound forgot their place. Distance was measured inwards, infinitely.

A blank state. His skin a deathly white. Like a mirror. But what good can a mirror be, abandoned by their ally of light? The rays grew foreign, the slightest feeling sporadic, even normality is uneven, uncomfortable. But he bought with his own time acceptance. Patience, and acceptance. The virtue, or punishment, of knowing that if you can't extract yourself from a situation, other people sure as hell cannot do it either.

... We've heard this a million times. In his head.

In his mind.

Everything. Everything he had ever known. About himself. In... his mind.

It would never escape, he thought. It was also the only thought. And in a country governed only by himself, that thought reigned supreme.

And he sat. He thought. He talked to himself under his breath, muttering as if not to disturb others, despite there being a clear lack of said others. It was not unusual for him to do this. He had taken it as less of a deranged hobby reserved for the autophobic recluse, rather a simple brain's pastime turned into a routine.

And he had all the time in the world, and all the time outside the world to do so.

That was, until he was interrupted.

Just a cough. The voice... it was unrecognizable. Impossible.

Never. Never in his entire memory – memories – had he heard such a different voice. To say he was surprised would be an understatement. He felt like a dove was finally being freed from his stomach, to fly onwards and outwards into the nothingness, to bring back a grain of sand. But the feathers plummeted as he observed his circumstance.

And as he stood up abruptly, the laws of physics helping in his standing ovation he was surely going to give to the anomalous, mysterious man behind him, his eyes shrunk into dilute, white dots. It took a while for reality to sink in.

The man was... Caucasian, with an olive tanned skin and curly brown hair... no, she was Asian, with hazel locks and a slim posture as she sat... wait, no, he was Black, balding, with a muscular physique. And again. All of this in a matter on nanoseconds. Change flurried by, the 5th dimension in this singularity of a void. Very well, he thought. If he could not pinpoint his appearance, he would travel downwards.

He was sitting on a mahogany chair, the antique handles definitely the work of a 16th century Dutchman, the curves slightly weathered and chipped at times... no, it was straight, beige, plastic, with one handle slightly lopsided and pencil marks littering the attached desk... wait, no, it was most certainly ash black, with a cushioned back and seat, complete with a stuffed pillow that had seen more than several incidents regarding spilt English tea. And... again.

This time, he did not see the streaks of change. As his brows furrowed, he saw... what was it? Words, descriptions perhaps? And further beyond, what was it? Numbers, hyphens, a mismatched jumble of chaos? Words that made up words, which made up words, which made up worlds?