Shadowtale (Undertale AU)

Chapter 3 || In This World, It's Kill or Be Killed

(Frisk's POV)

I woke up rather cold, the pile of blankets not shielding me for long. I blinked sleepily, my eyes focusing, though not having to get used to any brightness. This place was so dark and gloomy.

I heard a strange noise coming from above me somewhere, like a scraping sound that made me shudder slightly. It was a weird noise, like one of those that isn't practical to feel uncomfortable when you hear, but still sends this little chill down your spine. I rubbed my eyes and looked up.

There Shadow was sitting cross-legged, sharpening a knife on a rock. He wasn't looking at me, but then again, he seems to be able to tell exactly what I'm doing even if he's nowhere nearby.

"You're awake." Shadow said in a monotone voice.

"Oh, yeah." I responded hesitantly. Shadow was still rather scary. Sure, he didn't kill me on sight, and he kept me from dying of hypothermia...sort of, but he was still cold, and I hadn't forgotten how he lashed out like that when I asked if he was Sans, which I'm assuming he was by his response. Although apparently, he is prone to threatening people with knives if they call him that. "What are you doing?" I asked, trying to break the silence.

"Fighting a dragon." He said sarcastically. "I'm sharpening a knife, what's it look like?"

"Oh. Yeah, that was sort of obvious, wasn't it?"

"Yeah."

A heavy silence fell over us again.

"Soooo, I don't know, I was thinking, Y'know, if you or the Rebels or whatever just sort of...got and talked with the Undying, do you think you could stop fighting? That...maybe things would get better?" I asked, voicing my thoughts. Shadow's face tightened in what looked like exasperated annoyance.

"No. That's not how it works here. You can't just 'talk' with someone and expect it to get better."

"But why not? Fighting only makes things more tense, more violent! It doesn't make sense! I think if you just tried to-"

"NO." Shadow leapt down from the stack of crates he was sitting on and landing in front of me. "Do you REALLY think that just 'talking it out' is going to change anything?! The Undying are ruthless killers who don't care who they have to hurt to get their way. They don't listen to people's arguments; they don't care who they have to kill. Don't you get it?! In this world it's KILL OR BE KILLED, so GET IT THROUGH YOUR THICK SKULL!" He shouted. He tore his right sleeve up over his elbow as he took another step towards me. There was a good deal of obvious slit marks across the bones of his arm. "You see these?! These marks?! That was me! That wasn't from a battle, I did that to myself! I sat there and carved a slit into my own arm because I couldn't deal with my own SHIT anymore! I hated myself! In your world, maybe kindness changes things, but in this one, NO ONE'S GOING TO HELP YOU! NO ONE'S THERE FOR YOU! YOU KILL OR YOU GET KILLED YOURSELF! And I know it! I've killed people! I've killed because I'm afraid. Because every time I walk down the street, I'm scared someone's gonna jump out and finish me once and for all. I'm a damn coward. And I run away, and I'm WEAK, and I don't know who I am anymore!" Tears of anger and pain welled in his eyes. His face changed drastically from rage to regret as he fell to his knees and stared at the ground. The tears in his eyes finally fell, streaming down his face and landing on the cold ground. "And I just watched...I watched and r-ran as they...they k-k-killed him...and a-all I did was...was r-un..." He stuttered out broken sentences. "And I don't e-even r-recognize myself...This isn't m-m-me. And I h-hate it...I just-just want e-everything to go back to normal..." There was such a drastic change in his demeanor, it scared me. He was hurting. Something awful had happened to him to make him like this. Who was he talking about? Was 'they' one person or multiple? And apparently 'they' had killed someone as Shadow watched? Who?

I kneeled down next to him, not sure what to do. I don't know if he was still mad at me, and if I tried to help, I don't know if he would lash out again. I tentatively put my hand on his shoulder, not knowing if he even noticed. He continued to shiver and breathe raggedly, clearly trying to calm himself, which was more like forcing himself to stop crying. I sat next to him silently.

(772 words)