songs for the fallen

frisk takes a shortcut

Frisk
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"All that gives my life validation is explaining the Echo Flower," comes a voice from a tall blue flower, its shining petals waving despite the stillness of Waterfall's wet air. "No one can know..."

    Next to the flower, a scaly orange monster wearing a fishbowl as a shirt cringes in embarrassment. Frisk does their best to bite back a laugh. They rub their knuckles against their throat--the scratches are starting to scab up, but ignoring the pain isn't hard. They've been hurt a lot worse by people a lot bigger than them. The weird voice in their head has nothing on them.

    "You know," they start, about to say something nice and reassuring to the fishbowl monster. They don't get very far. It cuts them off before they can make another sound.

    "Never trust a flower," it says, voice cracking with shame. "That's one of the constants of this world."

    "Sure." They let out a puff of air, the closest thing to a laugh they can work up. Despite...everything from earlier, they're feeling a little more optimistic than before. At least they're in Waterfall now. The air is warmer, and even though the humidity is making their already tangled hair impossibly frizzy, they feel much less liable to snap at any given moment. God, they hate the cold. At least they never have to go back to Snowdin again.

    Sans is sitting at a sentry station, pink-slippered feet kicked up on the table. His eyes are half-closed with sleep, but he kicks his feet down when he sees them approach, resting his elbows on the table instead. "what? haven't you seen a guy with two jobs before?"

    How did he get here? Was he still at his and Papyrus's house when they left this morning? They can't really remember. Dumb messed-up brain. "Lots of people have two jobs," they say. "This girl Marisa from the Krafts Mart worked there and also at Chunky Jim's. But then she quit Chunky Jim's because she was doing college online." He doesn't care, they can tell. Why would he care? It has no bearing on his life. They stick their hands in their pockets, feeling horribly awkward.

    "fortunately, two jobs means twice as many legally-required breaks," he says, getting to his feet and stretching. They wonder briefly if skeleton monsters have joints, or tendons. Isn't stretching supposed to be for muscles anyway? "i'm going to grillby's. wanna come?"

    They wrinkle up their face reflexively at the thought of stepping back out into the cold. They can feel the hair on their arms standing up, their body's feeble attempt at protecting them from the chill they can feel even now that the air is warm. They don't want to go. They really don't. But they're hungry, and they can always come back here, and at least Grillby's is inside...and they do feel kind of bad for not hanging out with Papyrus. "...Sure," they say, not really wanting to commit.

    "well, if you insist. i'll pry myself away from my work," he says. "you aren't a big fan of the cold, huh? i get it. it must be hard, having skin." He steps out from behind his sentry station, looking up at the snow on the roof. Frisk follows his gaze, wondering how the hell it got there. It's definitely too warm here for there to be snow. "well, don't worry about it. you don't gotta be out in the cold. i know a shortcut."

    They don't really want to know what that entails.

    He waves for them to follow him, and, despite their better judgment, they do. He's heading in the wrong direction, going the exact opposite way of Snowdin Town. He ducks through a rugged archway in the rock, and disappears into the shadows beyond. They follow him, only to trip over a worn, yellowed floorboard, nearly falling flat on their face. They barely manage to catch themself. The rough, gravelly blue ground beneath their feet has been replaced with the worn wood of a dive bar floor, and they suddenly have a terrible headache.