Chapter Text
Mount Ebott stood tall and strong in the hazy mid-evening sunset. The wind flowed through the trees, making the branches shake and dance. The air was warm, almost muggy, marking the beginning of a fruitful summer season. The grass was green and dry, rustling as small forest animals bounded through it to their shelters. The sky was aglow with the most passionate shades of warm red, violet purple, and bright orange. It could almost be described as beautiful… had there not been a small human fighting for her life right in the middle of the mountain forest.
Frisk tossed and turned violently against the iron grasp her brother had on her hand. Her feet dug into the loamy soil as she clawed at her brother’s grip, her breathing getting progressively more ragged as she struggled. When that attempt didn’t work, she tried desperately to sign with the one hand she still had free. Her brother glanced over at her, making her feel a little thrill of hope.
Surely, this was all just a prank. He was just upset. He didn’t mean it. He wasn’t really going to throw-
Her brother flashed her a cruel smile, teeth yellowed and sharp. Adrenaline coursed through her veins as she redoubled her efforts to get free, making bloody scratches in his hand. She tried not to scream at how tight his hold was. They rounded a tree and Frisk stumbled on a root, falling to the ground suddenly. This did little to stop her brother’s endless march forward as he began to drag her towards a clearing in the woods.
Towards the gaping hole in the mountain.
Frisk began hyperventilating, which in all honesty, was completely understandable. Her only sibling was about to throw her to her death, her parents probably wouldn’t even notice she was gone, and she had just turned ten yesterday. She hadn’t even begun living, yet here she was, a few feet away from death. Despite the smallest little inkling of hope that her brother would stop all this, claim it as a prank, and let her go home, she prayed her death would at least be quick.
I have to make sure I don’t land on my feet, don't break my legs and still survive, slowly starving to death at the bottom of the pit while my body becomes food for any bugs down there. I have to angle it so my head hits first. That way it’s over immediately. I have to… I have to…
Her brother suddenly stopped and roughly flung her towards the pit, laughing hard as she scrambled away from the lip of the hole. She stood up shakily, finally free from her brother’s grasp. He was standing close enough so that he could easily reach her but she couldn’t reach him. His arms were partially outstretched, as if he expected her to try to run. And, in all honesty, Frisk did want to run. Frisk wanted to turn and run all the way back down the mountain, tripping over roots and breathing in quick gulps of the muggy, hot air as her lungs burned with the pleasure of being alive. Never looking back, never coming back.
But she just stood there.
She knew it was pointless. Her brother was watching her too intently. He wore a cold, calculating glare that made her whole body shiver despite the heat outside. She knew any attempts to escape would be met with a quick shove of one of his hands. He seemed to relax a little when he noticed she didn’t make a run for it and just waited. He moved one step forward, causing Frisk to take a step back. He smiled again, but it was different this time, he looked… so happy. Too happy. Like he had finally gotten something he had been waiting his whole life for.
Like he was finally getting rid of a terrible burden.
“Any last words?” he asked, basking in the irony of his phrasing, since Frisk literally couldn’t speak.
Frisk began to sign out with her hands how she was sorry, and that she didn’t know what happened, but she was sorry for whatever she did, and she wouldn’t do it again, whatever it was, and how she would be so, so grateful if he could just forgive her this once-
The last thing Frisk saw as she disappeared over the edge of the hole was her brother’s outstretched boot and triumphant glare.