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Chapter Text

     Kris was submerged in a cold drought, mummified in cloth and fabric before they were awakened by the door knocking in the early hours of the morning.

    A soft voice slipped through the slit at the bottom of the door. The dulcet tones were elated and ever so  joyous for another meandering day. The sun slid through the cracks in the blinds without invitation as the teen wished it would drizzle with rain already.

      The room was shared between siblings. The left side was dazzled with details. Glow in the dark stars swept along the back wall and across the ceiling, a shelf sat high above the bed which warped in the centre as the newly polished trophies sat triumphant and sparkling.

    The other side was bare. The wall paper peeled in the corner of the ceiling like a wilting rose. Dust was the only item that adorned the shelf.

   Swinging their legs over their bed, they stood up, already dressed in crumpled jeans and a sweater that had faded in the sunshine.

    Feet dragging along the patchy carpet and towards the stairs, a searing sense of unease seeped into the nonconformist child.

     Kris' fingers dug onto the banister. The heart beat did not drum in thunderous applause. It hummed near silently as their chest laid flat against their unmoving lungs.

     The night came with a terrible price, a price they couldn't afford. So there was a different transaction.

A Deal Gone Wrong.

Candles arranged around the cycle, symbols etched in chalk as melted wax pooled into the floorboards of the attic. Kris had sat in the very centre as their acquaintance flicked through crinkled pages and a deck of cards.

"A premonition," Catti answered softly holding up a tarot card in her white paws, "A sign that a those who walk among stars stalk your path. He has cast his mark."

     Kris was tired of a vast burden and wished to be rid of it.  How they wished Asriel was here.

    Brown boots landed on the cold tiles with a thud taking their final step. Kris stood quietly glancing into the kitchen.

    Spices filled the room with their pleasant stench and the trashcan emitted a floral scent.

     The smell of pastry wafted from the kitchen. A pie sat on a cooling rack by the windowsill, guarded by wax coloured figures made of oak and binded twigs.

    Kris never really understood the tradition. "Wouldn't it be better for kindling?" they murmured as a child before being chastised by their neighbours.

     The living room was vacant of visitors and the TV was unplugged. It was quite an old television set. Boxy and built like half a fridge, the black screen curved outwards almost as if it were an eye shrouded by blindness.

      Asgore, their dad, used to love watching the television during the dark nights and mornings.

     Being quiet enough, they'd sneak on in down and join him, watch films of years long gone and with real human faces, just imagine that...

     Now not even static resided within the screen. Good, Kris thought. They didn't like to see the faces of the others.

     Kris exited the house, the door closing behind them as their mother stood beside the family car.

     Their mother was well-dressed, customary for any self-respecting teacher. She wore thin framed glasses and a lilac jacket, plain sweater and a purple knee high dress.

     They both entered the vehicle, belts buckled as Toriel spoke eagerly with a relaxed smile. "It's a beautiful day today is it not? I hope it stays this way when Asriel visits next week..."

     There was a pained silence before Toriel shattered it with a chuckle," But I do wonder...after the excitement of university, will he enjoy coming back to this little town? "

♠️♥️♣️

     Hometown was a model of mediocrity.

    Just a perfect lil town with no flaws at all.
A perfect town for all Monster residents. It was a quaint place.

    It had a church and a shop and apartments and whatever else was customary for a town such as this.

     The town's folk waved as the van drove past them, this monotonous loop bored the human to submission.The vehicle chugged along and the Monsters outside greeted them with chincy smiles and charagrin grins.

It was a painful cycle.

     Kris could cry if it weren't for the spray-cans and chocolate bars that were tucked away in their locker. They could break the cycle with their rebellion. Until the cops would kick their ass back home. Undyne was lenient thankfully.

    Hometown was, overall, a refuge for the strange. Kris was the only human that lived here but everyone else was as equally as odd.

    Catti was one that sided with witchcraft and the dark arts as one would imagine. Her sketchpads were filled with pentagrams, angel wings and star signs.

    Noelle was intoxicated with Christmas cheer on every single day.

   And Susie...

    Well...she was quiet.  Even quieter than Kris. No-one spoke to her and she spoke to no-one.

     Most expected Susie's existence to be a rumour, a ruse if it weren't for the fact she went to Kris' class every morning.

  The doors would be slammed open with the bottom of her boot as she slunk towards her desk, letting out a snarl if anyone objected to her downtrodden demeanor. She left their substitute teacher quaking in her lab coat.

    Kris was still waiting for their Halloween pencil. It was snatched, chewed and spat on, the lead filling snapping like bone in Susie's maw.

    The van parked directly outside the school in the smallest car parking space imaginable. The doors to the building was crimsonand the bricks were sandstone.  The path leading to the entrance was well kept with mowed grass and flowers were freshly planted around the green hedging.

     They both got out of the car and Toriel held onto Kris' hand as she led them into the school. Less than a few steps later, she turned and encompassed their child in a warm embrace as they remained stalk still.

"Have a good day my child. Stay out of trouble if you can." Toriel remarked with a smile and a wink. Patting their shoulder she stood up, turned and walked down the corridor to the kindergarten.

    Kris slunk away in the opposite direction, walking past their locked locker and other lockers with locked locks into their class.

   The door clicked open. Naturally everyone's head's turned to them as the human entered.

     The yellow scaled lizard in an ill fitting labatory coat smiled with crooked buckteeth "K-Kris!" Dr Alphys stammered as she adjusted her glasses whilst trying to write on the board with a broken stick of chalk. "We didn't think y-you'd be coming in today..." she added with a nasally chuckle.

    Kris could tell by her tone that she'd need to do more printing and rearranging of the classroom. She was a sweet teacher with a nervous lisp.  Alphys was a down to earth Monster who kept prattling on and on about metaphors relating to her dorky hobbies that usually derailed each lesson in numerous ways.

   She scratched behind the three triangular spikes on her head and with an uneasy smile on her short snout Alphys' added,

"We're, uhm, sorting out whose going to be working on the upcoming group projects today! Pair up with anyone you want, so g-good luck!"

    Kris drifted from student to student, desk to desk in order to find a free partner.

    Catti was first up. Rocking a heavy metal band shirt and golden piercings in her feline ears. She waved off Kris as she tapped away at a phone.

"Taken." she smiled coyly.

      Kris lurched towards their next option, Jockington. He was a groovy goober snake with a crocodile nose and some snazzy shades and football cap.

   His movements are as snappy as a jump cut and as vibrant as his green scales."Kris, you know me and Catti are always partners! Ever since our first gym class we've been an unstoppable duo!"

    Kris really didn't know why they even bothered to ask. "Such a bummer, dude. But don't worry brah, there's gotta be someone willing to vibe with you. You're super chill!"

    Kris tried to smile but couldn't be bothered to do so.

     Again, they searched the class for anyone willing to help. Snowy was obnoxious even for a Snowdrakes' standards, sneering their beak away and snivelling at their drole attempts at humour.

     Tem, the resident cat-dog and artist doodled away whilst an hard-boiled egg sat on her desk. "SoRwes kRisP!  Tem AlReadY has PaRtner!", she patted the emotional support egg in glee.

    The classroom selection was beginning to wear thin, there was only three people left.

    Monster Teen was a fellow student on the non-binary spectrum usually referred by 'they's' and them's' and an occasional 'he'.

    Better known as MT, otherwise nicknamed 'Monty", they were an armless yellow reptile with a mohawk of spikes, wearing a crucifix over top an orange shirt.

     "Aw man Kris! I wouldn't have to partner up with Snowy if you were here! He keeps trying to speak to me like a cowboy!" They bemoaned.

     Berdly sat front and centre in the mostly bare room. "How's the third smartest student today, hmmm?" he chirped.

    The blue feathered monster sat smugly in the front row, pens and pencils ordered alphabetical and sharpened.

     "I quite pity you Kristopher, perhaps if you hadn't dilly-dallied, you would have had a chance to by my very own peon!" Berdly scratched his chin thoughtfully for a short moment.

    "Wait, Kris! Maybe your skills may prove valuable for this assignment....NOT! I actually want an A+!" His face crumpled like paper as he snorted.

      Kris felt a fleeing sensation. The joy of strangulation. But being put in jail wasn't in the cards for today.

     Last but not least was Noelle. The deer offered another tacky offering, a pencil with Christmas lights that twinkled when it was turned on and off.

     "H-huh? A group of three? I mean, sure Kris fa-ha-ha! As long as there's no pranking involved I won't s-say no!" Her arm shot up quickly as she stammered out a question before Berdly interjected immediately.

    "Absolutely not! Abort, abort! We're fine by ourselves I assure you Noelle!" Berdly spoke with a shrill.

    Before Alphys could but in, the door slammed open, the hinges rattling.

Susie entered with a grimace across her snout, "...Am I late?"

    "N-not at all!" Alphys answered meekly, "U-uhm, your project partner is going to be Kris for the next week or so!" , the teacher quickly resolved Kris' conundrum.

"Great." Susie grumbled.

♠️♦️♣️

    The next thing Kris knew was that they were outside the classroom, shoved against a locker and an airtight grip was crushing their shoulder.

    Susie's hands were clammy and slick with sweat. She gripped Kris' shoulder tightly before it slid towards their neck, bunching up their sweater collar as the human dangled a full foot from the floor.

    "Don't gimme that look..." her teeth were clenched, "...we all know what you're thinking, you got me! You caught me, you've got me red handed." the purple snouted student said chuckling.

    "But I suppose, this is a lil' bit silly ain't it? Me? Expelled? For stealing some chalk?"

    The lockers' cool surface made the human shudder as they were pressed up against the row of tall metal cabinets.

    "Maybe I'll go for a classic, shove ya into one of these lockers, keep you quiet for a while."

    Kris' hands clenched as the rest of their body remained limp, hanging as if they was no life residing in their flesh.

    Susie snickered. "Seems a bit cliché...." she scratched her chin for a moment, "Well, considering you're holding the trigger, don't ya think it be more appropriate if I got expelled for some real carnage?"

She licked her lips.

    "So Kris, how do you feel....about losing your face?" Her head dipped as she snarled revealing her rotten yellow teeth.

     Kris crashed to the tiled floor, their head ricocheting off the metal door and its locking mechanism as they dropped to the floor.

    Susie stuffed her claws into her pockets. "Nah. That wouldn't be fair on ya mom. Don't want her arranging a funeral."

   Kris cradled their left arm as they slid up the rusted locker exterior. Their ears rang, felt their skin peeling like decades worth of old paint, sweat slithering down their spine.

They took a step before stumbling to their knees. Susie turned back and sneered.

    "Quit it, don't be a crybaby.", she snorted as she slunk down the corridor and turned left towards the supply closet. Alphys needed chalk to start class, apparently.

    Kris clutched their shoulder as sharp pangs lingered across their skin beneath their jumper. Even its thick and firm wool couldn't shield every tumble and crash they suffered.

    Susie brushed white specks from her chapped lips, her tongue dry, coated in an off white paste. Her saliva soaking into the remains of the chalk she wolfed down without second thought.

♣️♦️♠️

Years ago...Light and Darkness were without balance.

     The door of the abandoned closet slammed open, the beige yellow walls of the corridor becoming shrouded in a blue shimmering shades.

   The human took a step back and the monster swallowed her fears. They trudged forward.

    The ground cracked and shook, paper flew, and two teens fell. The human falling as easily as the flutters of paper surrounding them whilst the monster reached out, hoping to grab onto anything, anything at all.

     Now traversing the land, they united with a Prince from the Dark that proclaimed that they must heal the wounds scarred into the earth by a mourning tyrant.

The prince foretold the two heroes of the Legend.

The Legend of Deltarune.

He spoke these words with hasty breath and loose nerves.

For millennia, light and dark lived-in harmony...

But if this harmony was to shatter...a terrible calamity would ensue...

The sky would run black with terror...

The ground would crack with fear and with her heart pounding...the Earth would draw her final breathe...

Only then, from the world's edge and filled with light, three heroes would arrive...

A Human, A Monster, and a Prince of the Dark...

Only they could seal the fountains...

Restore balance to light and dark and banish the Angel's Heaven for the world to be saved.

With these words, they listened intently.

"Delta Warriors! Won't you accept your destiny...?" The Prince of the Dark requested.

"Nah." Susie finally answered and the prince's face fell slack beneath his shrouded cloaked form. "Me? Some kinda hero? Puh-lease, ya got the wrong person."

"B-but Susie-!", the Prince stuttered, "without you, the prophecy-"

    Susie turned to Kris with a snarky expression, "If you wanna play pretend with this schmuck, by all means but I'm going to find my way home, my way." she pointed to herself.

   "H-hold on just a moment, wait-!" the Prince fumbled as Susie turned away from the blubbering member of royalty.

    Wheezing ensued, a spiralling and buzzing laughter filled the chamber as a bike skidded and crashed into the Prince of Darkness, sending him flying away via a bit-crushed, royalty-free explosion.

    "Ho-ho-ho!" the rider grinned as he nudged the kick-stand into position. "The Lightners are already running away and they didn't even know I was here! My dad is gonna make me son of the month!"

    "Who the hell are you?!" Susie said with sweat rolling down her face, recoiling away from the blast of smoke and fire.

     "I'm...", the spade faced rider spun on his bike and pointed to the sky, "...the bad guy!" He smiled at the pair of Lightners before frowning. "Ain't you guys...gonna say anything?"

     Kris and Susie looked at each other before looking back at this supposed enemy.This guy, whoever they were, was way too soft to be a villain. Kris was reminded of a marshmallow as they looked at the spade wearing foe.

    "Usually, ya say your name, not your, uh, occupation." Susie answered.

     The young spade slapped his face with a resounding smack. "Of course I messed up my villains entrance! Blargh! Now I gotta blow up the other prince again!"

    "I'd rather not be blown up again!", the hooded storyteller bleated.

     "Hey man, ya didn't mess up anything. Your motorbike explosion was pretty cool, I guess..." she complimented. The hell does a ten year old get a motor bike and I don't?

    "Oh! This is just a pedal bike!" he proclaimed as he kicked out a pair of stabilisers.

    "Then why is it spluttering out of the exhaust?", Susie pointed at the fire at the back of the bike.

    "I set the thing on fire!" he announced happily, "I'm not old enough to get a proper one, but that's enough chit-chat! I, Prince Lancer, will stop your escapades to seal my father's glorious Dark Fountain and stop you from returning home via my castle in the weast!"

     Lancer did a wheelie on his flaming chariot blurting out the rest of his nefarious scheme. "And I have a two step plan to stop you! First, I thrash you! Second, you lose!"

    Susie snickered, "Heh, that idea ain't half bad, kid."

Lancer smiled brightly, "It is?"

    "Yeah dude." Susie's expression shifted into a terrifying snarl with dripping teeth and her eyes cast in shadows by her hair, "...Mind if we use it on you instead?"

"Oh ho ho! Let the gauntlet begin!" Lancer smiled revving his lack of engines, "Prepare for a great thrashing you clowns!"

Chapter Text

The thashing commenced! 

      Weapons appeared in Kris' and Susie' hands as spades flew above their heads and shattered against castle walls.

     "No idea where this stuff came from, but this is so sweet!" Susie grinned as she swung the heavy axe. Pink rays shot across the miniature battlefield that was this castle's front yard, crashing around Lancer as he dodged with ease.

   "Missed me, purple girl!" the spade goaded.

     "Not for long pipsqueak!" Susie barked back, swinging her fresh axe around like a horror villain. Kris yelled at Lancer to dodge, and the young lad did so occordingly. "The hell, man?! We're meant to be having a scrap! Whose side are ya on?"

     Kris glared at her before complementing the enemy, stating that 'I can't tell where your clothes start and your body begins.'

     "Oh-ho-ho! I'm glad somebody didn't notice!" Lancer grinned.

         "How is that a compliment??" Susie said, confused. Letting out a yelp, she ducked down as spades skimmed past her.

    "Take this, and that! Have another and another!" Lancer delightedly laughed as he bobbed atop his bicycle, busting down moves as he posed and flung out another wave of white spade projectiles.

    "Damn it, Kris! This kid won't let up! Knock some sense into 'im!" Susie argued as she crossed her arms across her torso, bracing herself as bullets hailed down upon her like raindrops.

     Pummeled, she fell to the ground with a tumble and a grimey grimace."When I get my mitts on ya, I'm gonna throw ya over that bloody castle!" Susie screeched.

    Kris leapt forward into a tackle at Lancer before the spade swerved, the human throwing themselves into a wall. Kris fell with a clatter, their chest plate and shoulder pad taking the brunt of the brusing.

      "Ho-ho-ho! These clowns are so happy to beat themselves up. It's hardly a challenge!" Lancer cackled gleefully.

    "I'll give ya a real challenge, kid! I'll make ya into mincemeat!" Susie shouted, winding up her axe and letting it rip like a rotor blade tearing up the floor as Lancer did a wheelie to avoid it. 

     "Bring it on punk-aroos! You're making me sleepy!" Lancer heckled as he yawned. "Man, you guys are gonna send me on a snooze-cruise at this rate!" He then stared at the non-existent watch on his wrist and yelped. 

     "Darn it! I'll be late for dinner! Smell you later clowns!" The Spade Prince saluted, spun around and pedalled away as his bike spluttered smoke...

       Susie mumbled. "Well...that was disappointing."

   The Prince of Darkness scurried out of his hiding spot, slipping as he went. "Susie, Kris! Are you two okay?? I-I'll get a medical kit if you're-"

      "Quit it, pipsqueak, we're good." Susie answered with a grumble, cutting off Kris sharply before they could even register all the aches and pains spiralling across their limbs.

     "Thank goodness for that..." the prince sighed. "If I'm no longer going to be interrupted, I feel it fitting for a more formal introduction..." he started. "My name is -"

      "Jeez man, I can't hear a word outta ya mouth. Take down your hood." Susie commanded, pointing sharply at the person's robes.

     "O-oh, right... very well." The Prince of the Dark sheepishly replied, who had definitely planned on keeping up the mystique of his identity. 

    Fingers fumbled with a tight knitted knot at the bottom of the hood. Finally pulling away at the dull cloth, it fell to the ground with a sad thud as the black furred wizard in a green hat and robe stood shyly.

     "U-um, I...I'm Ralsei..." He smiled as he held his soft paws together, "I-it's ever so wonderful to meet you both! I can just tell that we're going to get on swell!" 

    'Right." Susie grimaced at the green hued softie. There was no way this soft-serve of a punk will help... "The way home is east, yeah?" She asked.

    "Y-yes!" Ralsei straightened his green rimmed spectacles on his stout snout, "That's where Kris and I will -"

     "Got it," She replied as she turned around, treading downtrodden up the stairs towards the derelict town and away from the castle. "Good luck to ya Kris, see ya back at class."

      Susie gave a two-fingered salute, backtracking up the cracked stairs and eventually, walking further into the unknown.

   Ralsei turned quickly to the only person remaining, chest swelling with reluctant pride.

      "I suppose it's just us two, Kris..." He rubbed his hands and nipped at his furred hands. " I know I'm a prince, but I don't even have any subjects. I've waited my entire life to meet the Lightners and I-" 

  Kris chimed in unexpectedly, and Ralsei' face flushed. "No, no, no! It's not a problem, per say!" He answered quickly, "I'm just surprised she's, uhm, more rebellious than I'd imagined." Ralsei said admittedly.

    Without furthur dawdling, Ralsei ran behind Kris, eager to follow in their footsteps wholeheartedly despite Darkners only being animated lumps of plastic, card or plush.

    "Lead the way, Kris! Susie should be heading towards the Dark Fountain in the east..if we're lucky she won't get herself into trouble by the time we reach her." Ralsei said hopefully. 

    Kris, without any options, agreed to the prince's plan, giving him the slighest of nods.

    Slinking up the staircase as the world whistled in their ears, whispering in a silenced mouth. 

     Reaching the summit at this small slice of a town square, shone a bright white star.

      Puppeted forward, the metal gloved hand reached, touched, and saved.

     There was a dissatisfied jitter at their fingertips as they slowly grasped their own hand as if burned with scorn.

  This will happen again. 

      These horrid, shining, and shimmering flecks floated, almost comatosed before a human hand was forced to draw upon them for security. 

      Ralsei remained merry and pointed through the slim street that connected the small rut of shops in front of them. "Nearly there! Just a few turns and-"

   Kris paid no heed to his words, pretending that they were deafened and continued to walk.

    Rhythmic patters accompanied their slow beating heart as the metal boots patted the ground like pots and pans, whereas the accompanying prince was barefoot. 

     The prince... was oddly content in this uninhabited land of desolate hope. 

   Storefronts sat in a saddened stillness, the signage faded as the kingdom surrounding remained stagnant. Clerks and keepers must have wandered, fled, ran, or walked away.

   Brickwork was ornate, exquisitely detailed, and chiselled with black stone with dark blue shading like crosshatching on a comic page.

    Kris always relented companionship, but even now, this emptiness surrounding  made them less inclined to amble around.

    Yet, they did so as if distracted by jangling keys. As if they were a stray cat on the prowl to prod and poke anything of no interest. 

    The soul of a human pressed, pleaded, demanded. A soul always had a resolve. 

   This particular soul wanted to stare at this barren world like a trinket, rusted with age, still cherished despite being so busted and broken.

  Kris denied this resolve. Briskly, they hastened their steps, and Ralsei followed suit.  

    A pawn gladly trailing behind a reluctant knight on the chess board.

  "Of course, I can't forget -" Ralsei withdrew a leather-bound collection of paper and sketches into Kris' unwillingly palms, "-I've been writing for so long it's almost a distant memory...this will teach you everything you need to know!"

   Kris' head slightly dipped in reply. Flipping over to a random page. 

   ACTing, DEFENDing, FIGHTing. 

"You'll be taking a page out of my book, and in turn, I'll learn at your lead." Ralsei smiled.

   Each section was sewn together like a loved blanket that had already fallen apart at the seams. It made Kris' head spin as if flung onto a merry-go-round.

   Ralsei led Kris down a path to the right of the town square. A lowly dummy stood in a corner, its head lulled forward. It was dressed exactly like the robed prince, even to the stitched symbol on the torso, a black heart.

   "Perfect! We can practice before we go after Susie and Lancer!" The young boy exclaimed, clapping. 

  Kris looked at the dusty dummy with a leer. This world was certainly...odd. It would be better if they had any sort of training before heading out wherever Susie and the spade kid went. Might as well...they thought.

  Kris finally nodded, making Ralsei beam with an overjoyous smile. The prince dragged the human closer to the dummy, then dusted off his paws and cleared his throat.

   "In this world, I think there's more to life than just fighting..." 

     Ralsei hesitated. His hand was held forward before reeling it back in, rubbing his fingers together. "... But it wouldn't hurt to learn, just in case, right?"

   Entering this mock battle, the red beating heart lurched into view as leviated in Kris' palms. Their surroundings drifted as the heart was contained in dark slate, caged into a hit box.

     "That's a SOUL, Kris...the culmination of a persons being. If it's hit in battle,well, we might struggle to pick ourselves back up again..." he warned."It would be best if you were to avoid attacks." 

  Pellets shone and surrounded the dummy. "Let's try dodging first!" 

   The friendly pellets trickled forward

The SOUL shimmered as it grazed past the attack patterns. Kris held out their shield. Tension grew as the SOUL persisted. 

  "After gathering Tension Points, you can spend them on spells and attacks!" Ralsei added.

     A tall bar filled like a sand hourglass. Kris's hands trembled as Ralsei smiled.

   " It might be tough to get a handle on things at first, but don't worry. I'll be here every step of the way!" He spoke sweetly. 

      "If we make an enemy tired, I can PACIFY them. That way, we can stop the battle before anyone gets hurt." Ralsei smiled. It flickered. He cupped his hands together. 

   "It's quite an odd predicament we've found ourselves in, isn't it? New world, new people..." The prince's words trailed off as his eyes darted back and forth.

  "I hope...I can be useful to you." The prince gulped with a shudder. Kris spoke quietly. The prince found themselves smiling again. "You have such a way with words, Kris. It's...nice to know that you can see my point of view."

       The human saw no more resson to train. It would be better to get a real sense of battle whilst on the active field. They already had an understanding of it because of Lancer's unprompted visit. The training halted despite Ralsei' enthusiasm.  

   The Lightner and Darkner, two creatures from such vastly different walks from life, were now joined. 

    Walking past the docile dummy, down a short corridor, Ralsei nearly shot outta his robe as a large golden door was left ajar. 

    "The Great Door!" He exclaimed, "Of course, this is how Lancer snuck in. This doorway leads into another Dark-World..."

   He gulped and held his hands tightly. "As soon as we met Kris, there's always been a choice. If we act right, we can befriend everyone we meet...and we'll have a brighter future. If we fight, the results may be less favourable."

   Kris stared at Ralsei blankly. 

       "Oh, I'm sorry! Is that too much to ask of you?" Ralsei asked. The Prince held out his hand to them, beckoning them to fulfil their role as hero. 

     Kris feigned a grin with a twitch and shook Ralsei' hand. "...I knew you had a heart of a hero the moment I laid eyes on you, Kris." 

   The prince and knight walked through the gateway to another land. 

The Great Door slammed close.

Chapter Text

       Susie sauntered away with her claws tucked away in stapled pockets as she walked with quick successive stomps.

 Spiked gauntlets hanging heavy around her shoulders and wrists, causing her to slouch.

      "How the hell does any of this crap work? A castle in a closet? Some dork in robes talking about time and space? Some cosmic prophecy?

      Me, a goody two-shoe hero? It was ridiculous!"

    Her voice scratched as she rubbed her throat, thoughts mulling over in an over stimulated mind. Susie grumbled internally as this path unwound before her.  

    Purple grass and trees of blocky foliage hung overhead, blooming with star shaped fruits and berries. The fields in every direction were very sparsely populated. Susie hasn't seen even a single person yet. Not even that weird wizard. Not even Kris.

       The second that golden door closed shut behind her, a haze of unease spread across her like a cloak. The flat landscape was bare. Quiet and off-putting. 

     "All this junk, just for some stupid chalk..." she grumbled, kicking at the ground. 

     A garbled gurgle groaned from her midsection, eliciting a wince and scrunch of her snout.   She spat to herself, a pitiful curse as yellowed fangs rolled over her bottom lip in a snarl. 

   A singular "Damn it." was all she could muster.

   She was starving. What she would do for a single stick of chalk right about now... Another pang of hunger shot through her like an arrowhead as she clutched her midsection. 

   The dragoness crumpled to the ground as she bore her claws into the dirt, grasping at the grass.  Her fists curled with a shudder. She pushed her hands against the ground and forced herself into a kneel.

   "There's gotta be something to eat... there has to be something..." Susie grumbled, eyes frantically darting around. Her yellow spotlights of a gaze locked onto the nearby trees as if they were stage performers.

      Stars were sprinkled across their branches. Were...were they some sorta fruit? Like some weird apple or something?

   Susie was uncertain, but she had to try.

     She thought hard for a moment, stretching her arm behind her shoulder before she felt it, the varnished handle that slipped eagerly into her mitts as she withdrew her axe from some nebulous, negative space.

    The rules of this world were clay, an ambiguous putty to be felt in the hands, and sculpted into something greater. 

   Susie had to only think in order to grab her axe and swing it forward with excessive force. 

    Her snout scrunched. The teal accented blade was jammed. Slammed into the black tree bark, she lifted her boot and kicked at it.  

    "God damn it, frigging move!"

    She tugged, she yanked, and she pulled at the handle with a growl. The axe wobbled. Susie wrenched it out of the tree, tumbling onto her back and dropping it a few inches away from her.

   Her hands covered her brow and forehead  with a hiss, her eyes clenched shut as little wisps of air howled between her teeth. 

     "...Stay calm, or you'll blow a fuckin' gasket otherwise." she chastised, shaking her head. Her fingers fumbled to the side of herself. Susie grabbed their weapon once more, forced herself up, and narrowed her gaze.

   Another crash of metal against wood as blow after blow was hammered into the dark skin of the trees, the red colouring beneath shining through the peels like veins.

    Nostrils flared as the succulent and ripe stars wafted their sweet scent. The smell of burning caramel and apples.

      Soon, they would be at the pink skinned lady's mercy, ready to snatched and devoured eagerly by the starving serpentine once she had finished lumbering and jacking and lumberjacking.

    Sawdust trickled like sand as Susie chopped away, hoping to make the tree crash down, sawing away at the liquorice plating of bark angrily. Her stomach rumbled with unease.

  Slithering close by, a necklace of Rudinns approached. Green troops that shimmered like emeralds with hooded faces and scowling eyes.

   "Oi! What are you doing?" One let out a shrill shout. "That doesn't belong to you!"

      Susie turned with a bemused head tilt. "Uh, it's a forest? First come, first served, ain't it?" Without a second thought, she started chopping with renewed vigour.

    The Rudinns drew daggers from leather pouches and came closer. Susie paused, her fingers tightening the grip of her axe. Three against one. 

    Her eyes were raging yellow slits of light as her jaw clenched.  "Are you guys serious? It's a tree! No one is gonna miss one stupid tree!"

   Teeth chattered as they slithered an inch closer. "We're just keeping the order. It's none of your business." A Rudinn retorted snidely. 

  "That so? Gonna strike down a kid just like that?" Susie said with a snort. "Go on then, try me." She goaded.

   A single Rudinn stalled. Their hand sheathed their blade. "...She's just a girl, it's not a big deal, right?" 

     Another Ruddinn sneered at such a thought. "Lightners ain't supposed to be here. You heard the boss' orders, we can't fratenise with felons."

    Susie sighed. She left the axe in the tree. She stretched out her palms, the aches dulling for a moment. Her knuckles cracked. 

        "Right." Susie's mouth chiselled itself into a grin.

    Susie tore the axe out of the twisted heap of branches with the sound of the metalic equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. "If you lot really wanna have a scrap, by all means, give it ya best shot."  

    She mocked her enemies with a fake courteous bow. Enraged, two of the Rudinns pounced, drawing their blades.  

   Slicing through the tree like paper being ripped, the tree fell hard and fast. The Ruddins clattered to the ground, pinned under a pile of leaves and splintered wood.

      Grovelling, the Ruddins squirmed and squabbled. Shoving and pushing each other, grasping at the grass with their claws. The other Ruddin, smartly, ran for the hills.

  Kneeling to their level, Susie tugged one of the Ruddins by their chin and smug coyly. "That all you got?"

     The Ruddin cowered, "L-Lightner scum!" Susie's eyes narrowed, fingers tightening around the defeated squirming enemy's neck. 

    "Kinda a weak insult, don't ya think? Lighter scum?", the dragoness chuckled lightly.

 "Rotten child of Light!" Another barked at her.       

      "Lightner beast!" The third spat with venom and vice.  

   Intrigued with a burning rage, she squeezed around the Ruddins chin a little bit harder. " If I'm a 'Lightner' or whatever, that makes you a Darkner, then or something?"

   "Surprised you can even articulate such thoughts, wretched harlot!" The Ruddin spat before suddenly gagging as Susie's claw wrapped around their esophagus.

    "Trying to mask your insults with fancy slang ain't gonna buy you any favours from me." She said succinctly. Yanking then letting go, her gaze landed on a pile of loot that spilt out of the snake soldiers' pockets. 

   Snatching the coinage into her endless pockets, she rubbed her loot between her fingers, feeling the rough curves of indented and pressed gold. 

      I mean, I won, didn't I? Ya beat up thugs and get loot. That's what all those RPGS had taught her after all. 

      Susie walked past the defeated enemies, pockets heavy with her well-deserved spoils, her eyes sparkled in their ancient amber hue with such delight as she scooped up a Dark Candy star from the ground.

    Rubbing it off on her vest, she took an eager chomp and picked up her axe mid-stride with a severe crunch.

     It was a burst of taste, like exotic fruits she could've only dreamed of, mango's and dragonfruit. Soft and gooey like melted marshmallows with a hard candy shell.  

      Susie, shuddering, licking her fingers of the succulent juice, was left practically giggling at how wonderful it felt to consume something that wasn't prepackaged crap. Her guardian was many things, but a cook wasn't one of 'em. 

      She put away her axe and then quickly grabbed the remaining Star Candies off the ground, shoving a few in her pockets but kept two out, one in each of her hands.

    "This day can't get any better!" Susie smiled with a lop-sided smirk between her excited chews of stodgy sweets.

♥️♣️♦️

      It only took her twenty minutes before she found something even better. A hearty slab of frosted cake topped with strawberries, left completely unattended on a yellow table. 

   "Perfect." Susie grinned. Her eyes then narrowed. This was a little too perfect. She had been walloping a load of enemies up to this point, this could've been a set up...

     She glanced around, squinting up at the tree tops, scrounging around the scarlet shrubbery with her scaley mitts,searching for any unwanted visitors or contraptions wanting to ensnare her.

    Brushing off her hands, content with the knowledge that no-one was lurking around, she still cautiously tip-toed to the table; just in case.   

    She had ate half a dozen Star Candies already but, she couldn't resist such a marvelous opportunity like this. 

    The frosting shined like an ice-sheet. Her hands plowed into the cake like shovels as she stuffed a hearty handful of it through her eager lips. Susie could hardly muster a chew as she gulped down hard. 

    Suddenly hit with a spritz of water, she sneered with a jolt, forced to recoil from her delicious prize. 'What the hell?!' Susie tried to yell between unsatisfied gurgles as she got hit with a heavier spray.  

    A yellow man made of sharp angles and a triangular face yelped and hollered at her with a panicked fury. "Back! Back-a away! Shoo!" 

   "I'm trying to eat here!" Susie shrieked back as she managed to gulp down the chunks of cake. 

     "You've-a ruined my greatest work!" The mustached yellow man decried, his black mustache practically leaping from his face. "Go away! No animals steal from my table!" 

    Susie snarled, hands curling into fists. She slammed her hands on the table.

 "Leave me, ALONE!" 

       Her throat clicked as she yelled, a horrific grind escaped her lips. Her mouth vomited violent flames. A furnace that steamed and cooled as if suddenly drowned, snuffed out. 

     Viscous. Her tongue blistered, body suddenly dragged away as her own boots struggled to keep pace with her scurried mind. 

    Staggering, bolting past through the trees, her legs grew sore. Swerving past branches, twigs swiping at her neck. Leaves entangled her wild mane of hair. Knots in her hair were pulled tighter across her scalp. 

    Susie slammed herself against a gnarled trunk, her back turned to it all, to the wall and the table and that weird man that hounded her for just eating some damn food. 

  She couldn't tell if she even turned her back to them. Blocky trees stretched out for miles, orientated in the same direction.

    Slipping down with weak knees, her hands hovered over her mouth, eager to clamp it shut. 

    She pulled her legs to her chest. Susie sat in a pile of dead furns, staring out, leering for something to fixate upon.

      The world was a haze to her honeycomb sclera and inky black pupils. 

   A horrid, blended landscape of wax and crayon colours. Purple and scarlet cubes suspended above her head like clouds. The sky shifting, turning black."Just wanted some bloody chalk...", she grovelled.

     Black smog bled through her teeth. Gums covered in a layer of ash.

   Shuddering, her fingers clenched in anticipation, playing roulette with her own maw, hoping for any semblance of the scorching sensation to die out like a wilting campfire flame. 

    Pin pricks of feeling crept across her fingers, as her cheeks felt damp. Grimacing, Susie swiped at her eyes, rubbing away the moisture on her reddened, flustered cheeks. 

      She punched the ground with a snarl.

    Why was it so strong? Why now? Why today of all fuckin' days?! Why on a day I could get some decent scran?!

   By the time the water works halted, then the gagging and splutters started. Doubling over, coughing long and hard into a fist. Lungs aching as she spat out charred crumbs.

      Breathing literal fire wasn't too fun when you realise you were setting your own innards aflame. Thoughts of burnt curtains and the buzzing chirps of alarms spun inside her head.

 With an intensity of a blowtorch her esophagus was totally crème brûlée'd. 

      Hacking up spittle at the ground, a black tar stained the purple grass as she wiped at her chapped lips.

      Susie rose her head upwards, hitting against the tree with a thunk, her expression glazing over with apathy. "I need to get outta here."

   "I can drink to that!" Lancer proclaimed. Susie scrambled to stand and immediately clonked her head on a branch. "An incredible attack, that tree stood no chance!", he added gleefully.

    Susie fumed as she rubbed her head, shook her head in an attempt to dull the growing migraine, her fists tightening. "Get lost, kid."

   "Get lost? Like you? Confused??! Bamboozled?!" Lancer asked with a wild grin, "Good! So am I! I've been walking in here for hours!" He proclaimed, trying his hardest for his laugh to bellow.

    This blueberry goober was incessantly irritating with his malarkey in Susie's eye's, yet quietly amusing. "What do ya want?", she gasped hoarsely.

     "Ho-ho-ho! Ain't it obvious?" Lancer schmoozed, leaning his arm over Susie despite the fact that he was a third of her size, and puntable like a toddler with a football's physique. "I'm here to gloat, ho-ho-ho! My forest has disoriented my greatest foe!"

   "Sure, right." Susie replied, rubbing at her throat. Horrid pain bubbling to the surface as she held in a cough, only to splutter even harder. 

   Lancer's hooded visage drooped, his grin evaporating for a mere moment...then guffawed and ran towards one of the many trees nearby, his gloved fingers trailing across the rings of age of the wood. "Wanna see a neat trick?"

   Susie tilted her head. Lancer withdrew a spade and Susie flinched, hand shooting to above her shoulder ready to rip out her axe. 

    He paused, near stalk stiff then waved his hand with a snicker. Lancer poked the spade into one of the larger rings of wood and it burst, the rings popping like a grape and splattering across his face. 

   Susie snorted, shielding her snout trying to reel in her laughter.

     Lancer smirked, turning on his stylish blue heels and then stabbed his spade into another part. Only on this occasion, carving slowly into an unblemished trunk. 

     Wittling it down, he produced a cup from the empty black void of his hood, slamming it into the bark. He raked his fingers above the newly carved divot rhythmically," And a tap, two taps, and a third...ah-ha!"

    The wounded tree fizzed and frothed, pouring out a liquid that surely wasn't the usual maple syrup you'd expect. "Here's your refreshment, my fellow, villain! Scratch that, a fellow lover of evil, you splendid villainess!" 

    Narrowing her gaze, she swiped it from Lancer's mitts. Grapsing the cup, she slugged the entire contents in one desperate glug. It was like pure nectar, smooth as honey and just as sweet. 

     "Holy shit, that's good. It's...it actually tastes great!" She breathed out. "Thanks, uh, Prancer?"

"Lancer!" Said Lancer.

     "Right, right." Susie half nodded. Wiping her lips with the back of her arm, she grinned. "Keep up with this kid, and I might, uh, not kick your ass for a change."

   The two of them laughed heartily before Lancer whined indignantly, "But I love getting my ass kicked!" Susie swiftly bust a gut with laughter thereafter at Lancer's unprompted one liners.

      And somewhere in the forest of scarlet leaves, lies a table, with a smouldering plate and chunks of cake.  

Chapter Text

    Susie didn't quite understand this place. Any of it. Not a lick of it.

Destiny and prophecies and Fountains...

   Not that it really mattered in the long run, this was a weird, one-off adventure. She liked this place, she dared to think that she may have adored it, but nice things like this usually didn't last long. 

     Besides, acting a hero was a tough act to keep up with. Somehow being a saviour of the world didn't sit right in Susie's stomach.

     Such thoughts provoked such a visceral reaction from the pink skinned lady, once again, she was totally misplaced in her surroundings once more.

  That was another thing. Scales stained pink instead of her unnatural purple hues.

     Hell, Kris was tan in Hometown and now here they were straight up blue. Susie leaned over the human's shoulder as they led her and Ralsei down twisting corridors. 

     This is was the final stop, Card Castle, the lair of Lancer's father. The Chaos King.

    The halls were flooded with guards. Kris held out their arm in warning. 

    "Do we gotta sneak around constantly?" Susie asked, her usual easy-going smirk replaced with a expression that dabbled in concern. "We need to find Lancer, pronto." 

    Kris replied swiftly to her, they argued that if they didn't dodge as many guards as possible, the time battling them would be better spent to find their oval-shaped, blue ally.

  Susie grimaced but acquiesced their request, very begrudgingly.

   "Fine, keep leading on blue, uh," she stammered, wanting to say 'blue boy' but quickly remembering that Kris wasn't strictly that, and Lancer fit that description more succinctly, "...you blue dork..."

    Kris hummed quietly in reply. Susie hoped that they didn't mind her near blunder.

     "Dork.", they repeated softly, dispelling any possible ill will to the dragon. 

   It was quite quaint to hear Kris be so verbal, their voice surprisingly...it wasn't just smooth, Susie thought, a word like silk or velvet was much apt. 

    Their tone as soft as an arpeggio but hoarse, like worn out piano keys. 

     Ralsei chimed in quietly. "Well, let's hope Lancer keeps his dad occupied, we still have quite a lot of work to do, right Kris?"

Kris nodded, holding out a fixed key. 

  "...Not to be pushy, but do we have to run errands at a time like this?" Susie asked, recollecting how a stall vendor talked of a keeping an eye on a prisoner.

    A key split in three segments, locked away by three keys of their own. A friend's guilt, a land without stars and a path hidden amongst the leaves. 

  Everything about this was setting off so many red flags to the reluctant dragoness.

"Can we even trust that cat guy?" Susie asked.

      Ralsei put a finger to his mouth in thought, "Why would they lie? Darkners live to serve Lightners like you and Kris, I really don't believe that Seam would guide us on a wild goose chase."

   Susie nodded slowly. "Well, if thing's goes tits up, I guess I'll havta drag you two outta it, huh..."

    Ralsei blushed at Susie's words and he gawked at her inappropriate language, "S-Susie!! You can't talk like that, it's impolite!"

  "Didn't ask." Susie answered back with a snap, "You don't got tits, so pipe it down." 

   Ralsei sputtered, his face tinged rosey red across his shadowy visage. "I suppose it's important to, uhm, express yourself..." He said in a bashful tone. Susie could've sworn Kris snickered at that. 

    "Now you're getting with the program, nerd!" She grinned, wrapping an arm around Ralsei's scarfed neck and giving him the world's most powerful noogie, brusing her knuckles as they made contact with Ralsei's horns.

    "Cut it out Susie!" He whined in return. 

    "You keep whining and I'll keep doing it, loser!" She warned.

    Hathy's and Ruddins scoured the hallways, the Lightners and their Darkner ally dodging and diving to and fro, dancing stick figures spiralling as Susie, Kris and Ralsei stumbled into a room. 

   Spikes shuttered into place, blocking the way they came in.

   "Geh-hah-hah, the worms have finally decideth to come hither and play..." a snobbish voice sang.

    "Who goes there? S-show yourself!" Ralsei demanded.

     "Geh-hah-hah, thoust fools!" A beam of light swelled, the black bare box of a room cast in a shimmering, heavenly afterglow.

    A svelte twink of a man, appeared from the light, body adorned in what could only be considered some form of royal regalia, a suit of dark blue with military fatigues.

    Hair pure white, like raw pearls from a shucked clam. Smiling plastered across his thin features, a low strand of flesh binding his upper and lip together across his sparkling teeth.

    "It is I, the Duke of Puzzles, Rouxls Kaard! Thou greatest adversary!" He laughed with obnoxious anti-charisma. "Prepare thou selves for a-!"

    "Who?" Susie asked.

     Rouxls stammered before coughing into his hand. "Let's us, taketh it frome the top, shall we? I am thou greatest adversary! The Lord of Scrambling Thou Weak Minds! I am-!"

  "Ralsei, who is this? What's this bozo's deal?" Susie asked with a wave of her hand. 

    "SHUTETH YON UPETH!" Rouxls Kaard screeched, clawing at the air, his stance bowing with anger.

    "Um, I think he scribbled out the instructions on one of the puzzles? Signed with 'R.K' ?" Ralsei answered quickly.

    "That's sorta lame." Susie said with apathy. "So, we're not gonna fight then?"

   "We fight with oure wits!" Rouxls Kaard beckoned maniacally, hands splayed out pompously. "You may have wriggled thou selves from minest past conundrums, but now thou're at my mercy!" 

      A spotlight shone to the middle of the room, the ground rumbling as the floor spun around revealling a puzzle of great magnitude. A switch and a singular tile. 

  "Toil, WORMS!" Rouxls Kaard decreed with vainglorious laughter, head tilted away as he basked in his pathetic glory.

     Susie snorted. "Looks real difficult." She shook her head, grinning. The purple dragon turned around, passing through the spikes as if they were mere mist.

    " Susie, what are you..." Ralsei tried to speak as she walked through the trap with ease, "...doing?"

      The goat let out a relieved sigh, holding the fabric of his cloak tight around his chest.  "She...walked through them before, of course." He recollected, adjusting his glasses atop his round muzzle.

     "Struggling? Neede my assistance? Too bad'th! Ga-ha-ha!" Rouxls Kaard guffawed, taking no notice of Susie's departure. 

     "Youre fate hath always been foredained! I shall crush thou beneath my heels of magnitude!" He presented his fashionable boots, showcasing how he would stomp out the Lightners' spirits.

   Kris kicked the tile into place. 

      Rouxls' face froze then went slack. His jaw tightened. "GOD, DAMN IT!"

♥️♣️♦️

     Down the elevator they all went. The floor labeled with a trio of question marks. The machine thrummed as the Lightners and lone Darkner descended.

    Susie wondered why a castle would even have an elevator.

    Walking furthur downwards, a staircase led to a singular jail cell. A door of steel containing a peculiar creature, organ music swelling like splutters of fog accompanying the descent to madness.

   Fingers curled around the bars of the cell, yellow eyes gleaming through the darkness. "Boo-hoo, boo-hoo...!" The voice cackled with mocking tears. "Woe is me, me! No-one to set the world free, free!"

    "The four kings saw my fun to be a trouble and I was to be imprisoned...!" The figure announced behind the bars, his gloved hand waving off any such worries to their plight,

   "But I was fast, fast! Clever, clever! In their haste, they locked up their entire race and now I'm the only one free!" 

     Susie flinched as Kris walked towards the door, completed key in hand. "Smart, smart! You've come so far, far...do the stars burn your heart, heart or are you left in the chill of the manor, manor...?"

    Kris stiffened.

     Susie could tell that something awful stirred in the human's head, she reached out her hand only for Ralsei to gently pull it down, the wizard's face sweating anxiously.

      A finger wagged from within the cell. "Too late, too late! This game must begin, begin!" 

    The hand lunged between the bars, Kris recoiling with gritted teeth, dropping the key to the ground. The key spawned a door that twisted into shape out of the bars of steel. The door opened, swinging ajar as a horrid wind howled through it. 

     "Kris...we don't havta do this." Susie started, her palms clammy and slick.

    Kris peered at her, their heart thundering. They looked forward. Their head dipped and stepped into the cell.

    "This feels off. This ain't just me, right?" Susie exchanged a look with Ralsei.

   "Well...Kris will probably needs us. Let's just wait and see." Ralsei said softly, rubbing around his neck. Susie and Ralsei entered the jail cell with a shuffle. 

    "Welcome to the outside, outside!" The creature beckoned. The three heroes were now facing a jester. 

     Eyes black and his head tilting at a jaunty angle. His smile permanently etched onto his pale face. 

  The joker was crowned with a jingling hat and his neck was surrounded with a ruffle. 

   His gaze unpleasantly whimsical as faded paint cried from his eyes.

   "Vee hee hee! A marvelous thing it is to be, being as free as me!" The prisoner wrung his hands. 

   Ralsei, the reliable medic and kind hearted Prince of Darkness smiled most graciously taking a bow, despite the growing tension in his chest. 

     "Its ever so lovely to finally meet you mister!" the shadowy magician answered with a bleat, his pink eyes a shine behind his green rimmed spectacles. 

    Susie took one good glance at this room, if it could even be called that, and crossed her arms. Her posture exuded disappointment. 

   With a cocked brow she spat at the prisoner, "So, uh, how you do fun stuff in here...? Staring at the walls is giving me an aneurysm." She remarked.

    The walls were coloured in a paint that was so dull and lifeless, merely looking upon it made your eyes buzz. 

   Kris gave a reassuring shake of their hand, implying to Susie that this may have been a minor misunderstanding. Susie, as usual, was skeptical. 

    Ralsei coughed into his balled up paw and Susie and Kris quietened in order for him to tackle negotiations.

   The prince was lacking in regards to his compliments to the decor of the cell, his words fumbling as he struggled to make a decent first impression.. "I..I'm sure we'll be quite good friends, Mr...?" 

     The prisoner answered with a grin. "Jevil."

    "...And yes, yes! I do believe so too!" The jester's smile grew wider as his pointed, impish ears swooped back as he took a few steps forwards. 

   "I must say the game we'll play will be absolutely spectacular! The rules will be simple, yes they must be...if you can beat me, well...let's let us see!" 

     "Well Mister Jevil, we'll gladly keep you company." Ralsei answered warmly. "What game are we going to be playing exactly...?", the young prince piped up. 

    "Survival!" Jevil yelled in maniac uproar as scythes hurtled to the ground, Ralsei being yanked backwards by Kris at the last second with a terrified yelp.

    "A simple numbers game it shall be! The aim of it will be simple you see, when your life is depleted, you will be defeated!" 

     "That's it!" Susie shouted "If you wanna fight us, you gotta know that you're dealing with a couple of sharks!" she gnashed her teeth drawing her axe. 

   "Va-ha-haha! From shark to shark, I'd have it no other way! Now let the games commence!" Jevil announced eagerly.

    The battle began, the walls shifting to a foggy mass of swirling shapes, contorted and bastardised carousel components as merry-go-round horses hopped and bopped along. 

    Kris jumped atop the plastic equestrians and ran towards Jevil, their arms rising above their head before swinging an orange blade at the jester.

   Jevil cried out in riddles and rhymes as he brought on a tidal wave of card symbols into the unwavering heroes. 

    "My heart goes out to all you sinners!" Jevil fought with a frightening delight as he cackled with a craving for anarchy as spades, clubs, diamonds, and hearts flew from his palm.   

    "CHAOS, CHAOS!" 

    The jester's body jittered and quadrupled in a fast dance of shadows that swarmed around him, his head lunging on a spring with those makeup-shaped voids with yellow pinprick pupils.

    His black cloak bounced with his swiftness as bells jingled from his shoes and hat as he cried out.

 "I CAN DO ANYTHING!"

   The Lightners spun, defended and healed with all their might.

     The jester was standing stooped, his hand limp beside him as his pupils faded as he hovered, "You boisengirls have really tired me out..."

     Another wave of flying card symbols was sent spiralling across the entire room as Jevil began dancing, hands waving as he jumped from side to side. 

    "Just kidding! Va-ha-ha!" The room turned black as scythes fell from the sky in white beams that sliced through the darkness. Pillars of light burst as the scythes crashed to the ground.

    Susie skidded, Ralsei pulled at her the back of her jacket and Kris ran between the spotlights as the blades of death spun past. 

   The last swing of the orange blade swiped across Jevil's torso. 

   He tumbled backwards before prevailing to his feet with a hop and a round of applause to his combatants. 

         "My, my you three kept up!" he congratulated, smiling, his lips slipping into a lopsided grin as his ears twitched and he held his hands together. 

      Jevil's grin crept furthur his face, his cheeks crumpling to accommodate his sinister sneer. "Think you can survive my final chaos?" 

    He snapped his fingers, the deafening click cursed the three heroes with an explosion of clubs and spades decking them in their faces and torsos.

    Jevil leapt into the sky, his small body twisting into a horrific construction of metal. His body forming a scythe the size of an apartment complex, billowing downwards like a meteor on a crash course. 

   The trio of heroes stared upwards at certain doom. 

   Kris ground their teeth. Sprinting, the sword in their hand melded, melted and ran up their arm as it took shape into a shield. 

     "Kris you're gonna get yourself killed!" Susie yelled with frightened eyes. Ralsei watched on, his body quaked.

     Thrumming with renewed vigour, the Red Soul phased through Kris' chest and then spiralled around their finger tips. "Dodge better or I will evict you."

   With an almost affirmed glow in reply, the Red Soul glided past their hand, shooting past the running knight.  

   The spinning jail cell cast furthur into darkness as the scythe ebbed with blazing, white light.

    Susie and Ralsei stared upwards in horrified awe. "K..Kris will fix this." Ralsei muttered, "Everything is going to be fine, it has to be fine!"

   Susie growled, "To the hell with this!" She grabbed Ralsei and holstered him under her arm and dashed towards Kris. 

  "SUSIE! Put me down!!" He yelped, flapping his arms like a demented penguin.

   "I ain't trusting that runt to not get over their head, get back here you moron!" Susie shouted, yanking her axe from behind her, "We're doing this together!" 

    Kris turned, their faded crimson field of view widening as Susie caught up, Ralsei in tow. "You're not supposed to be doing this." They pleaded.

  "Oh yeah? You got any better ideas?!" Susie retorted, plotting Ralsei on the ground as the world spun into a blurring nightmare.

    Ralsei's pink scarf un-wound and grabbed Susie and Kris by their shoulders and necks, holding onto them tightly. 

    "We're in this, together, no matter w-what!" The lowly prince prayed that they'd be anything left to heal by the end of the battle.

    Susie wrapped her arms around the pair of them and craned her neck away. "...Here's hoping we make it outta this mess."

  Kris' chest hammered.

     The Red Soul persevered against the gigantic blade edging towards cellular annihilation. 

   The floating heart that flickered with a bloodied luster batted the Devil Knifes like a baseball bat. 

    The impact caused the entirety of the room to tremor and the spinning carousel floor to slant, sending the three heroes flying, all three of them tumbling on the manic and tumbling closer to the exit.

    Jevil cried out, head spinning. The absolute earthquake of an impact blew the mad jester into the sky like a shooting star before he came crashing down to the floor, his face taking the brunt of the whallop straight to his imperfect teeth.

    It was quiet. The red soul soaring back into Kris chest before anyone had a chance to witness it.

     Jevil grimaced, laughing gleefully as if he had made himself merry.

    "Vee-hee-hee! Stars spiralling, spiralling...!" He stood up, stepping around like a drunkard before smashing into the ground like a pie to a clowns face. 

   Susie was the first to stir. Cradling her jaw as she laid stooped on the angled ground, she took a glance at the defeated foe with a skewed posture. 

    "...We won?" She laughed. Kris clucthed their chest-plate, then their head in pain. "Holy hell, we won!" She picked up Kris by their armpits like a loosely strung doll and guffawed.

     Kris managed back a laugh, wrapping their arms around her waist with a hoop of exhilaration for the brief moments that Susie didn't burst into a violent rage. 

   "What were ya bloody thinking running head first like that! Didja want to be cut into ribbons you moron!?" Susie yelled, rattling the lanky human in her hands like loose change in a piggy-bank.

  Kris grimaced and pulled themselves from her grasp, dusting off their forearms, brushing off any injuries they sustained. "It seemed like a fair idea in the moment."

    Susie stomped the ground, eyes emblazoned with fury. "Well, it was stupid!" She retorted clumsily.

   Kris fidgeted with their pastel cape draped around their neck and shoulder pauldron, a expression of neutrality diffused across their features. 

    "Vee-hee-hee! Va-haha!" Jevil cackled happily.

   Susie's neck cracked to the side as her face was plastered with a snarling glower, foaming at the mouth at the shit-headed gremlin for still giggling.

     Ready to charge into combat once more, the only thing that kept her from choking out the aggravating clown with gothic make-up was Kris interference as they held out at their arm in front of her.  

   They mumbled to her in a hushed tone. "We barely fought him once, do we really want to push our luck?"

    Willingly, she took a step back. "You've got a point." she relented.

   "Hahaha, what fun!!! You're fast, fast, stronger and stronger! Alas, this is only a taste of what else you may face in the future!" Jevil warned wagging his gloved finger.

       "The hand of the Knight is drifting forward. Soon, the 'Queen' returns, and Hell's roar bubbles from the depths...Lightners, can you stop it?" He questioned with a cryptid, coy smile.

    "Uee Hee Heee! Either way, a mischief-mischief, a chaos-chaos...! Lightners! From inside your little cell!! Take me and do your strongest!" He clapped his hands together excitedly.

   "What does that even mean?" Susie turned to Kris in an angry, confused mutter. 

   "You will achieve whatever your heart desires...I am now one of you!" The jester hummed with white light below twirling and contorting into shape.

      The DevilsKnife was thrown into Kris's hands catching them off balance as they held it with a grimace.

    Rings jingled from the serrated metal like festive bells. 

   "Oh hell no." Susie said incredulously with wide eyes. "We're gonna throw that thing down a cliff or something, I swear-"

    The cell door creaked askew as Kris's hand pushed it away, the DevilKnife's in their other hand, utterly ignoring Susie's complaints.

       Kris, a mere human who was thrust into this world become the defacto leader of the Lightners, simply due to being the only one responsible enough to act sensible in a crisis. 

    Susie followed behind Kris, dusting off her forearms with flared nostrils and a pissed off leer.

     "We should have left 'em to his own devices." she complained, "He said he was fine enough being 'free', now we're stuck with the stupid thing and we're no closer to finding Lancer either!"

     She was prickly, that was a definitive certainty, but she did make an effort to be more patient than she had been. 

     She crushed the bridge of her snout with her fingertips and sighed. "I need some damn food, and some headspace. That funky jail cell did my head in..."

     Ralsei exited the cell last, taking one last disturbed glance into the jail that had previously held the insane demon who tried to destroy them with a series of merry go round horses. 

     Ralsei turning back to his allies and followed them, trying to keep up the pace.

   "Well, it didn't hurt to try and make a new friend!" the optimistic prince yammered to the dismay of Susie. 

       " We would have been toast if it weren't for Kris! At least they got their head screwed on right!" Susie snapped back at the hat shrouded goat before grinding her teeth. 

     Kris remained silent during the whole debacle as they usually did to Susie's annoyance.

   "I'm telling ya Kris, this kid is gonna get us killed one of these days!" she snarled as she reached the start of the staircase and began to storm up steep purple hill of cobbled bricks. 

   "I swear to God, if I see that jester jerk again, I'm calling it quits!" 

     "S-Susie! We're meant to stay together! Wait--Susie!" Ralsei stuttered before clasping his hat and running up the stairs after her.

     Kris was left to contemplate Susie's words. 

        They held the jester's powerful form, Jevil's visage shone in the reflective surface of the silver scythe. He giggled. He cackled. He faded. 

     The human traced the spiralled colored handle, reaching the tassels that dangled from the bottom of the hilt. 

  Kris pulled one of the tassels and the scythe whizzed and compacted into the handle. They pocketed it.

Maybe Jevil would be helpful for another day.

    Kris stared into their palm holding a black bar with white text hovering above it whilst something else shimmered in their other hand, glistening like a puddle. A Shadow Crystal.

    They didn't like how they able to see it and how everyone else could not. If only someone else where to see it...

   Kris stared at the glowing star hovering near the cell. They saved, they slumped and they walked away, eyes watering. 

   It was all foredained, after all.

Chapter Text

     The Chaos King loomed over the Lightners, those who had abandoned him amongst the darkness and left the world to rot in their absence. 

     The King, enraged, snatched his son by his neck and turned the flailing bouncy ball of a child towards the villains. His body was clad in shadow and shrouded from the onlookers he saw as vile vermin.

    "Let him go!" Susie yelled drawing her axe and thrusting it forward in defiance.

    The pink skinned dragon laced with spiked bracelets and a black vest coat stood ready for a battle once again, ready to seek guidance from Kris.

      "You want him to be let go?" The Chaos King boomed as he held his son over the castle's ledge.

    "I'll drop the child over the edge with a splatter...unless you kneel and learn your place."

     The Dark Fountain, a glorious geyser that shot through the sky stood silently as it flowed upwards, granting the world its shape and form. 

       As it ebbed and flowed, it could be seen to be grinning. 

       "S-Susie! Don't! He's bluffing!" Lancer yelped as his body was squeezed in his father's grasp and he squeaked.

     Susie turned to face her allies. Ralsei's horrified face barely hidden under his hat turned to their leader. Kris could only gaze out towards the inevitability of Lancer's demise if they did not concede.

    They lowered their orange blade and kneeled. 

     Ralsei closed his eyes tight behind his pink glasses and knelt as well. 

    Susie followed suit with shattered pride, her axe with the teal and silver blade burrowed into the ground beside her.

     She couldn't save him, she promised him that they'd sort this out. Make his father see the errors of his ways. All for nought.

       The three heroes, heads hung low, awaited fate. 

     "See, Lancer?! This is what happens when you get too attached! Say goodbye to your Lightner heathens!" The Chaos King yelled as large spades materialized, aiming at the three heroes. 

      Lancer threw his arm upwards, and a spade rammed into his father's back and Lancer flew from his strangling hand. 

    "Grahgh! W...what...? Get back here!" The King's voice scrambled. "You traitor! Traitor!" He yelled as Lancer dashed away as the Lightners stood and drew their weaponry. 

    Lancer ran straight past them, staggering to the castle doors, yelling, "Give him hell, Susie!" 

The door locked shut. 

      The King spat at the Lightners. "You've poisoned my own blood's mind! You've corrupted him with your feeble bastardised faith!"

    "Enough! Who the hell do you think you are?!" Susie snarled at the abusive perpetrator. 

      The Chaos King let out a low laugh that sounded like crashing gravel.  

     "To my people...I am a hero... but to you---?!" He spread his arms wide as the darkness wrapped tight around him dissipated, his stomach lined with a toothy maw that roared, its tongue long and reaching. 

    Bound tight in his itching fingers it became a fleshy chain that ended with a large spade as a blade.

        The King's body was a monolith with blue boots and gloves and concrete block sized fingers, his body hunched as wind whipped at his collar and cape. 

     "I'm the bad guy! Bwah-hor-hor-hor!" His stomach twitched into a berserk smirk, and he cackled. "I shall adore turning your britttle bones into dust!"

    The Lightners readied themselves, the ground rumbling. 

       "Mr. King, I don't know if you truly realize, we just want to help you!" Ralsei spoke out.

    "If you just spoke to us, we could be friends!" 

      The Chaos King sneered, "Such simpleminded platitudes, you will fall too soon to realize your naivety. Perish with the Lightners you so wrongly worship!" 

    "Me and my friends aren't going anywhere!" Ralsei threw his hand up in the air and Susie and Kris were healed with a spell of green light.

     Kris pointed forward trying to reason with the King. 

     "Silence! Your very existence goes against ours! We will stamp out the Light! They decree it! By the Knight's will, I shall shatter your crimson heart to pieces!"  The King declared, throwing his spade tendril at the heroes, a crown of white bone protruding from beneath his blue executioner's hood of a head, his eyes a dark mist in the shape of a spade. 

    Spades flew from his meaty paws in a heavy barrage. Kris's sword melted and formed a shield as the projectiles smashed into the orange metal with a clang, and their stance slipped as the unrelenting entourage of hatred rained upon them.

    Susie swung her axe, a streak of teal dashed through the air and hit the King making his mouth secreted in his midsection roar. 

     "Listen up! Lancer's my friend! I don't want to hurt you if I have to..." Susie growled as she was forced into action. 

      "Alive or dead I'll accept my fate, mercy is the Lightners weakness! Show my son the Monster you truly are!" he declared, throwing his arm into the air with grave glory as he stood again. 

     Staying silent for a moment, Susie's hand trembled as she heard a distant roar that lingered at the back of her head, her magenta fringe blocking her eyes from sight.

    "Well, if it's a monster ya want, it's a monster you're getting!" Susie roared.

       Slashes of blue and teal and bursts of green hit and healed, and all the while, the tyrant grew weary.

       "You're strong aren't you...?" he spoke in struggling gasps. He growled and threw his spare hand forward as chains shot forward and burrowed into the ground. 

       Kris ducked and dived and managed a closer swing and struck the King's elbow.

    "Garrgh! Lightner hellion!" he shouted as his arm bled. He wound up his arm and struck Kris, flying backwards then clattered to the ground

     Their armour bore dints, scratches, and scrapes, a cut marked across their cheek. 

     Ralsei rushed to their aid and threw a blast of dark green that blinded his vison.

      The King shielded his eyes, blinking before a boot cracked across his face as Susie launched herself at him.

      His inset nose gave out a crunch and Susie fell to her back as he flung her back towards her allies.

    Jumping back to her feet plumes of smoke shot of her nostrils, "That's the best you got!?" 

      He groaned and cradled the scorching aching flaring across the middle of his face. He fell to his knees and his arms laid limp as he slouched forwards.

      His cape flapped and flew into the as if a life had control of it, even it realized the futility of such conflict.

     "C...cease the battle!" He cried, holding out a weak arm that trembled with an open hand. "Mercy! I beg for mercy!" 

       Susie stood as Ralsei pulled up Kris to their feet. "Serves you right for messing with us!" Susie boasted before blasting into a rage. "And that serves you right for hurting Lancer! He's your kid! He just wanted to help you, damn it!"

       The king grumbled with pained intakes of air.

      Susie took angered stomps forward before Ralsei's scarf un-wound and grabbed her by the wrist.

   "Susie, stop! He's had enough! He can't even walk!" he pleaded. 

       "We're barely standing as it is! He tried killing us first!" Susie said backhandedly. 

      "Susie, you can't do this! You'll just be as bad as he is! Look at him, he's defenceless. Heroes have morals and honour; we must hold ourselves a greater standard...we cannot let ourselves to be consumed by anger," Ralsei advised anxiously as his pink scarf still wound tight around her hand.

      "Please! I'd never want you to be stuck with any guilt! I could not forgive myself if I'd let anything bad happen to you!" he protested. 

     Susie's nostrils heaved out plumes of smoke as she remembered her vow to Lancer. Her scowling face grumbled before shouting in aggravated defeat.

     "Agh! Great, you win again! But don't think I'm happy about it!" 

      "I share that sentiment...I am...not happy." The Chaos King spoke with pangs of guilt, shocks stabbing across his chest. "It has been so many years since I fought like this..."

     He coughed hard as he clutched his chest. "I've grown too old...too frail and so unwise..." 

    Ralsei frowned as he took few cautious steps closer.

      "Mr. King, we really didn't want to fight If you'll allow us, we will gladly sit down with you and drink tea and talk about anything that's on your mind."  Ralsei naively insisted.

    His fur as black as night beneath the encompassing shade of his pointed hat, his small horns imprinting and pushing away at the fabric as it swayed with the howl of the Fountain.

      "Sure, we can best of chums if ya really want." Susie followed his lead, just barely tolerating such a thought. 

      "I remember...when the Lightners first arrived here..." The Chaos King spoke, as quietly as he could manage.

     "The hope they brought, the peace they gave us. I do admit that I long for those days once again..." His head bowed in defeat. 

        "Please Mr. King, that chance hasn't vanished yet. Let's be friends from now on," Ralsei spoke with warmth.

    Susie stepped forward, axe in hand, and Kris pulled her arm. She stifled a groan as she put her weapon away, as did Kris. 

     "Friends...I think I would like that," the King admitted with an exhausted smile before he spluttered into his fist. "Excuse me...my body has grown so incredibly ill with the strain of battle..." 

      "Let me heal you," Ralsei offered, kneeling beside the king and his hand glowed. As the King's wounds shimmered with green light, he clenched his fists, making his blue gloves squeak.

    "How are you feeling, Mr. King?" Ralsei asked after a moment. 

      The Chaos King clenched his fists again as he let out a feigned groan. "Let's see..."

   Spades bombarded the three heroes from above.

Their bodies clattered to the floor.

   He grinned. "Never better." 

      "Y...you...!" Susie croaked as she tried to stand, failing, and managing a cracked kneel. 

    "Did I say you could get up, beast?" the King spat as more spades snapped out from his palm.

    Kris ran, jumped, and held their shield tight, the spades ricocheting. Without their shield, Susie would have been skewered and torn to shreds. 

       "Kris!" she shouted as Kris stood in front of her with shambling legs, teeth grinding as they glared upwards beneath their dark blue fringe. The King rumbled in dissatisfaction. 

     "Enough with the heroics..." A smattering of spades hit Kris and they were catapulted away. Swatted away like an insect.

     Thrown aside from Susie, Kris rolled and clattered onto the floor.

  With heavy, lead-trodden steps, the King shuffled and lifted Kris by both their arms, clamping tight with his mitts.

     The world howled as Ralsei stumbled and crawled towards Susie with vain hope.

     "You're the leader, are you not?" the Chaos King spoke with a pained growl. "What is your plan Lightner? Laugh as you cast me back into darkness like your predecessors?"

   Kris barely remained conscious, unable to speak out.

      The hold tightened, with the pressure crushing their body, and they let out restricted groans. "I'll let you in on a little secret, weak little Lightner..." he whispered before his mouth twisted into a horrific grin, "...quiet people piss me off." 

     Susie's eyes flashed as the world stilled around her. 

    The start of the school day. Stared at, gawked at. The bland and grimy stick snapping, cracking between her teeth. 

    Startled as she turned, staring back at the silent student. 

    The quiet beginning to drone as shouts rang in her ears.

   Kris slammed into the lockers by her furious hands, Susie's face drawing near, saliva hanging around her fangs repeating the same words as the king. 

      Slashing red smacked into the King's arm, and Kris fell with a thud. 

     Her fringe brushed to the side, her arms aching, axe holstered forward, and Susie's yellow gaze shone through the dark as gave him the most smug grin she could muster.

   "Get. Away...From...My...Friend."  Susie grinned.

  The King stifled a gasping guffaw at her threat. 

     "Foolish Lightner...what do you plan to achieve with your plans? Bore me to death? Slice me apart? Try to convince me once more? There is nothing that can convince me not to kill you." he smirked as spades hovered over Kris and Susie. 

      "No," she grunted, still in pain. Clutching at her sore ribs, her face tensed as she smiled proudly. "I'm just stalling."

      "For what, if I dare ask?" the King demanded with a smug, satisfied face.

    The floor rumbled as the doors of the castle was wracked with quakes of rushing, scuffling feet.

"For Lancer." Susie answered. 

     The doors were flung of their hinges and Ruddins, Hathys, and Pippins rushed the king, clawing and grabbing holding him up in the air as he flailed in uncontrollable anger as he was flooded by a mass entourage of his neglected subjects. 

    "WHAT?! What is the meaning of this?! Unhand me, you morons! Get off me!" 

     "Time's up, Dad!" Lancer called out. "It's time for timeout! And I've been declared King! I'm the dad now!" Throwing his arms in the air with a whoop, he gave a celebratory heckle and ordered, "To the dungeons he goes!" 

     "No! UNHAND ME!" The King bellowed."They have posioned your minds with their childish dogmas! They cannot save us, let me free us! LET ME FREE US!"

      "That isn't happening! You need a power nap and a time out!" Lancer replied before the King cried out in dismay once more as he was swept up in a wave of his once-subjects, he was drawn away with shouts of revolution and joy before the castle gates were slammed close. 

    Victory belonged to the Lightners and Darkners alike.

      Kris's legs gave a shivering stance as Susie ran to their shambling side.

    "I got you Kris, I got ya!" She winced as she grabbed their wrists, holding her friend upright. "You took a hell of a beating. Don't scare me like that again, dumbass!" 

    Kris nodded with a small chuckle as they limped along.

    Ralsei slowly rose from the floor as well, a palm to his aching head beneath his hat. He walked to his allies with hollow breath, "You're safe! You're both safe!" 

     "Heh, it'll take more than that to take all of us down," Susie remarked softly. 

     Ralsei stepped back from Kris and Susie, holding his hands sheepishly.

     "I...I should have never healed the King. If it wasn't for Lancer, well, we'd...we'd all be..." He clutched his throat as it grew hoarse as pearls of water edged at the corner of his eyes. 

      " You can't think like that, ya did your best and he took your kindness for granted. Nothing more you can do." Susie tried to remain sincere despite her grievances. 

    " It depends. Sometimes you just gotta fight...but if you keep up your guard all the time, you might hurt someone you really care about." She moved away from Kris and patted Ralsei on the back. 

      "I-I suppose you're right." Ralsei wiped his eyea and bleated a little laugh. "You're really starting to sound like a hero Susie." 

     "Don't get used to it." Susie crossed her arms with a charmed smile. 

      The Fountain thrummed

    The Red Soul pounded within Kris' chest. It was time to go home. It was time to seal the Dark Fountain.

     This adventure was ready to be drawn to a close. 

Chapter Text

  Lights cascaded across the bodies of the would-be adventurers. 

  Standing before the so-called 'glorious' Dark Fountains that the Chaos King had so desperately coveted. 

     Like the aurora borealis, it shimmered with brightened bursts of colour, cycling through shades gently, as if it were a blanket or jacket draped across a shivering loved one in a cold storm.

    Hesitant, Susie stared towards the geyser that throbbed like a distant heartbeat, feeling an ache in her chest where none was before.

   Stepping through this Fountain would mean finality. The adventure would end. Lancer and Ralsei would cease to be.

    Dweebs. Suck ups. Irritants that were ooey-gooey with emotions. Just random mooks that wanted to serve her, treat her right. Be her friend. 

     She longed for them to talk to her again. I mean, i just spoke 'em to a second ago, but this really sucks. They were cool with us messing with the Fountain...so things should be fine, right?

     "So sealing this light show is the only way home, huh?" Susie chewed on her words like a gritty steak, struggling to swallow down the growing lump in her throat.

    "Do we have to do this, right now? What's stopping us, uh, staying, y'know? I mean--it's what ya wanna do, right Kris?"

  Kris would've marched straight forward, should have moved, walked ahead and let the crimson muscle that sparsely spasmed within their tin ribs do all the challenge.

  Yet, they shared much the same hesitation as Susie had. Convictions slipped through less than eager fingers as the human stood, stooped, the light pauldrons around their thin shoulders dragging down their posture.

     "There's nowhere else to go." They muttered with rasping hum, cautiously glancing at her. 

      Susie wasn't sure where they were referring to, exactly. Did this world mean nought to them? Did dull school mean more than this theme park of entertainment and, uh, mild anarchy? Hell, at least they smiled down 'ere, back above they were totally blank...

    "It's getting late. It's getting dark. We have a task to fulfil." Kris said firmly.

    "Heh, this hero shtick suits you pretty well Kris, so damn punctional." Susie answered coolly, her voice stuck between a joyful mocking and the tiniest hint of appraisal.

   "Sorta feels like...we've stumbled onto something really important haven't we?"

   Kris stood in solitary, their expression fitted to bear no thoughts nor emotion. 

   Gaunt with heavy bags under their eyes, dark smudges like charcoal lining their pools of red magma they stared out of.

     Susie clicked her tongue to fill the void as Kris was silent. She missed hearing their velvet tones. 

    "Guess we don't gotta think about it too hard for now." Susie shrugged, her tone both trying to reassure the both of them. "Time for us to head home, right Kris?"

     For a moment, Kris stepped ahead. They held out their palms, pleading for a guide once more. 

    Softly, albeit ghastly, the beating heart slipped through Kris' chest-plate, hovering above their frail fingers. 

    Susie leered, neck twisting as the love heart stalled as it lingered over Kris' hands, an offering to a great pillar that ebbed and flowed like the ocean's depths. 

    It sang, calling out to them, an old song from the sea.

   Kris felt a shiver, the red organ shining with light as they edged closer to the gasping waterfall. Basking in the light, Kris felt their torso heave. This was supposed to be a victory. Yet, the human's body wavered in defiance.

     The Red Soul sealing the pillar of light with a glimmer of hope as Susie and Kris stood close to the brink. 

The Fountain swelled with light. 

♠️♦️♣️

    The darkness was vast. Blanketing the two students in a void of inky blackness. 

      "What the--hey! Who turned out the damn lights!?" Susie bellowed, arms reaching out as she stumbled, crashing about as she was knocked back like being hit with a tennis racket, 

    "Watch it--!" She yelled and then clattered to the ground with an irritated yelp.

   The lights flickering on in retort to Susie's tomfoolery. She grunted as she combed through her messy mane in thought, eyes squinting in adjustment to the basic filament ceiling lights that buzzed like fireflies.

   Rubbing at her cheek, Susie breathed out in exasperation. 

   " The spare classroom? How'd we get here? What was any of that?" She got to her feet, dusting off her sleeves. Eyeing up her claws, noticing that her scales were now stained it's usual purple bruised hue.

    "That wasn't a dream, or anything was it?" Susie toed around the strewn about chess board and purple play mat, pawn pieces spewed across the ground.

   The human was already standing, Susie was unable to tell what they were exactly doing, standing absolutely stalk still near the back of the room.

      "...It felt real." Kris rattled out, vocal chords raw. They stepped to the side, then kneeled down and held up a broken old toy, cotten spilling from it's eye. 

    Susie scoffed, bemused on how such a near mute git would fry their throat, Kris's speech was a winded rasp and they hardly even spoke. 

    Lifting her arms behind her head with a stretch she let out a well-earned laugh,

   "Well, whatever the case, lets--" she paused briefly, "Crap, the teach' is gonna get on our backs...guess we gotta bullshit a excuse, eh?"  

 Susie snickered mildly irked at the thought of furthur confrontation today as she rolled back her shoulders to deal with a series of cramps before slouching into her jacket, hands easing into her pockets.

    "...Technically, we were looking for chalk." Kris offered a rebuttal.

     Susie peered back at the enby with a smile. "I suppose so, but uh, we were gone for what, three hours, maybe?"

    "I'll do the talking." Kris once again offered.

     "Puh-lease, as if I'd let a dork like you speak for me." Susie emphasised with a tongue click before shrugging and resting her eyes briefly, "Ah, what the hell, it ain't too bad to follow your lead."

      The two students sleazed their way out of the unused classroom, the colour of autumn seeping through the windows like tree sap. The sky outside a crisp, burnt orange. 

   "Crap, we've been gone a while..." Susie leaned around a corner with a gulp. She sighed. "No-one 'ere, coasts clear." 

   She was thankful that there were no armed guards this time around as she skulked through the corridor before stopping in front of the supply closet door. Kris followed suit, standing beside her. 

    "Today's gone quick. Sucks we gotta head back." She murmured, scratching her neck looking towards the sunset through a window. 

   A window, noticeably, shattered.

     "That's...weird." Susie gawked at the damage, eyes drifting side to side in mild concern before tugging at her shirt collar. "Just saying it now, wasn't me."

    Kris murmured what can only be considered a dying chuckle as it scraped out their mouth. "I believe you." 

    Susie turned, shared a chortle and then dug an elbow to their ribs. "Oh shut up, smartass." 

   Kris flinched but chuckled steadily despite most of the air being slammed out from the human's lungs.

     Susie smirked.

    Her gaze softened. Reaching out, she patted Kris's shoulder, holding it gently.

"Let's go back there, tomorrow, alright?"

 Without another word, she let go and walked down the corridor.

Kris could hear the heavy metal doors open and close shut with a metalic scrape against the varnished tiled floor. 

 Their head dipped slightly.

 Kris missed her already.

    The doors slammed open and closed with a cacophonic rattle as Susie spread her arms against the heavy push handles. 

    "Tomorrow isn't here yet." Kris said softly.

     "Kris, there's damn cops outside." She wheezed out in a almost startle.

    Kris picked up the pace, gaunt eyes searching her shocked expression as she began rambling.  

     "God, how long were we gone for?? Have we been gone, gone??! Did the closet time travel us??!"

"...We didn't time travel." Kris said in annoyance. 

     "Then what's up with the damn cop cruiser outside if weren't missing for longer?" Susie yelped. "I swear I didn't bust that window! Or meant to bust that windscreen, and I didn't steal anything either! I mean aside the chalk--Kris, don't tell 'em I said that!"

    "We were in the Dark World, you wouldn't have had chance to bust it. And screw the cops."               Kris said succinctly, slipping under Susie's arm as she guarded the front doors and they stepped out. 

     A cop car parked over the curb as the rookie bobbed up and down, floating above the once nicely kept grass. Asgore would've been livid to see his handiwork trodden over. 

     "It's only the intern." Kris spoke quietly, referring to the living dust sheet, a ghost simply called Napstablook.

    "Wait, cops have interns?" Susie peeped her head out before Kris grabbed her and dragged her out. "Hey!! Are ya trying to get me locked up, huh?!" 

   "They're a bit of a doormat." Kris said, "But they're like me." 

     Susie blinked then nodded, easing up a little as her eyes shifted side to side. "Right, enby stuff, got it." She chewed her lip, "Still doesn't explain why there's cops here in the first place."

  Napstablook hovered near the lone cruiser, paint chipped around the wheel rims. 

     Crime was low, practically at zero percent at all times. The Mayor made certain of that.

   Susie's eyes narrowed, her heart stumbling, the heel of her boots already turning in anticipation of her future flummoxing as there she stood. 

    Prissy, perfect , little Miss Holiday. 

      The doe figeted, one hoof swaying anxiously behind herself. Bundle of books in tow pressed against her checkered sweater, the reindeer's scurried out with a dorky tremble of her upper lip. 

    Pathetic, Susie thought with a terrible, taunting tone. 

    Noelle's speech was slick, swiftly leaving her lips before her mind could comprehend her own bashful blabbering. Head tilted to her shoulder, phone firmly planted against her ear as a shrill voice lambasted her coddled cries,

    "N-no sign of anything? Of anyone else? I mean, of course I-I'm not worried about them, especially not h-her!"

      The deer huffed, cheeks puffed with a vile vice, "Look, I know you think she's trouble but I assure you, I-I'm not fooling around! I--well, yes, I'm gonna see dad, I'm not stupid--! H-hey, now I'm not trying to--"

      Noelle's smile shivered as she spoke softly, her tone like melting snow."I--I know, I'll stay out of things...see y-you later, I guess."

    The phone's dial tone hummed as the caller disconnected, the reindeer biting her mouth with an almost snarl. "That bloody women..."

    "Hope you don't mean me." Susie blurted out with immediate regret.

     Noelle squeaked, tripping to the pavement, notes and pages flying and flapping about, her phone clattering. 

     Kris elbowed Susie with a grimace, slinked towards the sheepish role model student and gathered up her accessories. 

    "O-oh, thanks Kris..." Noelle appreciated before pelting out their name and suddenly jostling them about by their shoulders, "Kris! Where have you been?? I-I've been waiting all d-day for you!"

    Kris's eyes rolled around their head like a pair of magic-eight balls as they were shook about. 

       Noelle pulled away as she stimmed, shaking her hands with a squeal as she closed her eyes. "S-sorry, sorry! Today's been so weird! First off you disappear with Susie, then--" 

    Her face suddenly flushed as Susie dragged her legs forward to stand next to Kris. Standing less than a few feet away from Noelle.

   "Uh, 'sup?" Susie said plainly with a playful nonchalance, trying not to combust.

   She picked up Noelle's phone from the ground and gave it a rub, trying to soften the scuff marks as if she was shining an apple.

   "Hope I didn't knacker it too bad."

      Noelle, on the other hand, was ready to detonate like a hand-grenade. Susie hardly mustered a word and Noelle was practically steaming at the ears, slowly peeling her phone away from Susie's heavy mitts.

   "H--Hi, S-Susie..." Noelle squeaked, wiping down her skirt with her spare empty palm.

"Uh, hey. Sorry 'bout that." Susie uttered quietly. 

   "I-it's fine, j-just a lil' startled!" Noelle brushed off. "I'm just glad you're safe--both safe! Y-you two have been gone for a long time..." The deer's eyes darted from side to side, hooves tugged at her curls framing her face.

    "The cops aren't here for us, yeah?" Susie asked, turning up her paw with an almost wince making Noelle snort, 

   "Maybe for Kris, but not you." The reindeer beamed with a soft fluttering giggle. "Uhm, so...what were you guys even doing?"

   "Uhhhh," Susie droned, turned her head to Kris, "We were just, y'know..." 

"Not committing crimes." Kris stated blankly. 

    "Yeah, that." Susie added with a click of her fingers, "We were just, uh, hanging out." 

    "Oh? H-hanging out where?" Noelle asked, eyebrow raised. 

     Susie paused. "Uhh, alone." She reluctantly stalled clenching her fingers tight. "In the closet. Touching...brooms and stuff."

    Noelle's dorky expression wavered, her cheeks flushing pink, a pale tone of rose petals sprinkled like icing sugar. 

   Susie had that certain something. She had a quality to her that went beyond being a mysterious, aloof lady. She had it. 

      Susie had a certain je ne sais quoi, as pretentious as Noelle thought. Wondering suddenly if Susie liked to indulge in red wine and fine pastry, Noelle's mind swirled. 

     Tying a cravat around Susie's slender neck, hooves across her scales as they inched closer together, lips parting as they stood in a just cramped enough cubicle.

     The dragoness looming over Noelle with a tender conviction and hands on her hips with a playful squeeze.

   Teeth bared, reflecting like mirrors as the glistening maw hung over her dainty antlers, ready to be snapped like twigs.

   Legs snapping, horrid weeping coughs oozing from his mouth as he laid across the hospital bed. 

    Rudy's body already a sarcophagus of it's own making as veins froze with black tar, mummifying his tan red flesh. 

    Years he had. Months together. Minutes slipping by. Seconds lost too soon as a flatline drawled. Her father slipping into the void of black ink as the hospital crumbled. 

    Another Holiday lost. Another Holiday she failed to save. 

    "Noelle?" Her voice was called, although distant. A landline buzz flickering through her ears. "Snap outta it, dork." Susie clicked her fingers with a frantic fumble in front of the deer's locked gaze.

    Noelle jolted to her senses, her mind in a staggering fog. Holding her head, a deep want clawing at her soul, desperately needing to scratch the inside of her skull with something sharp. 

  "You, uh, okay there?" Susie questioned.

    "Sorry. Spaced out for a moment." Noelle apologised unnecessarily. "I would suggest, we should all head home. It's been an...odd day."  

     The voice was rigid, a tightness in the throat overwhelming the usual sweetness that came with her tone. A voice so similar to the Mayor that it chilled the human delinquent to their twisted core. 

     Wind picking up, the sky's beautiful autumn tones now stained with muddied greys as a melancholic accompaniment to Noelle's staggering speech.

    "....Broken window?" Kris asked, knowing fine well that their neighbour loved to prattle on about extraneous, exact, intricate detail.

     "Broken windows. Plural. No one really knows who's responsible." Noelle stammered, "There's a c-curfew in place, school got some shattered glass...but--"

   She cut herself off, peered at the ghostly ghoul floating next to the car and lowered her tone to a whisper, "Townhall got hit too, mom was absolutely furious...everyone got sent home early, and when you two didn't come back, I--I really thought you two got hurt."

   Kris' expression switched from a sombre blankness to being purely befuddled.

 Breaking into the town hall was a death wish, dealing with the horrid ire of the mayor was as foolish as prodding a wasps nest.

 If someone deemed it fit to break into one of the most important governmental building in HomeTown, they did it with purpose. 

   "You've been standing here the whole time, for us?" Susie asked, bemused. 

    Noelle stuttered with a breathless giggle then curtly nodded. "I have a responsibility, you know? When Dr Alphys isn't here, I, uh, hold down the fort, I guess?" She stammered although she did so with a smile.

   Kris thought briefly, that it was an odd thing for anyone to break into a school. 

   Especially HomeTown's school. 

    A break in would mean, one would assume, that was something of value was there to be taken. Yet there was nothing. 

    The computers were a decade out of style. The monitors were 90's cream coloured cinder blocks that hardly worked without kicking the server towers or toggling with dozens of settings that made them seethe. 

   The science lab was rudimentary at best and all the flasks were bust or chipped and the chemicals were basic. 

    Dr Alphys would struggle with basic parlor tricks with mixing minerals and solutions to entertain her pupils who mostly ignored her efforts. 

   Kris's thoughts were quickly interrupted as a phone rang, buzzing in their pocket. 

   The human cursed and Noelle, spoke not a word, grabbed back all her studying supplies from their overfilled hands.

    Sliding the phone from their pocket to their ear with a tap, an immediate shrill cry shrieked from the other end.

     "Kristopher Dreemurr! I've been calling you for the past few hours, young man!" Mrs Toriel spoke with startling alarm, "You've had me worried sick! Today, of all days, isn't time for one of your 'pranks', you need to come home, right this instant."

  Noelle flinched, clutching her books tight whilst Susie rose a brow. Kris spoke quickly. 

    "A...friend? You were spending time with a friend?" Toriel repeated incredulously, " I suppose--no, this is great news, my child...just, today has been one of those unfortunate days. But please, do answer my calls sooner..."

    Kris spoke again, quietly. Susie pursing her lips with shock. 

   "Of course Kris, your friend is welcome home anytime...but, don't think your misbehaviour won't go unpunished. No pie and an early bed time." 

   Kris grimaced but reluctantly agreed. 

    Quietly, both Dreemurrs said their goodbyes, Mrs Toriel speaking with kind cadence depsite her chastisement. 

 They tapped a button and the call ended, slipping it back in their jean pocket.

    "You didn't havta say any of that." Susie relented, "You're only late 'cause I was messing around."

   "Friends cover each other." Kris replied softly.

   The car's radio crackled with a frightful fuzziness, a gruff feminine voice barking out commands to the shivering dustsheet. 

   "Hey, we need you back at the station, Napstablook. We gotta question the punk who did all this, we've finally got something to do!"

      The voice ordered with a grunt, irritated increasingly as if someone took a bite out of their metaphorical donut of free time. The female officer was always bored, crime statistics here were an absolute mockery.

   Naturally, all three of the teens listened intently, unable to keep their nebs out. 

  Noelle opened her mouth then closed it again, taking a pause as her stomach twist-tied into tight, anxious knots. 

 "...I'm not supposed to tell but," the young lady began, a lump lodged in her throat, "...there's been whispers about who it is and...well, I think you deserve to know."

    "We're gonna do some sleuthing or something?" Susie asked, hands comfortably sliding in worn pockets. A snug fit as fingers traced the copious holes and stretched stitches. 

    The stocky student's stature slumping, eyeing the plucky do-gooder of a deer and then to her new found best mate. 

   "You wanna keep this adventure going on a bit longer, Kris?" 

    The lizard already found herself smirking, giving the human a nudge with her shoulder. "C'mon, I know ya wanna."

    Kris looked blankly at her. 

   Susie lifted her thick eyebrow, gnarled teeth suddenly slipped down her gums as if she was choking out a shark's maw.

     "Don't be boring Kris." She said in a near sneer before her gnashing blades retracted with a grunt. "I mean, ya can be boring if you really wanna, no issues from me." 

   Her irritated tone threadbare with sincerity masking her reluctance to pass up an opportunity to do something actually fun in this trite town.

   Kris looked at Susie for a long moment. Glancing at the dark rings tugging at her pumpkin coloured eyes; like the bottom of a coffee cup leaving a mark on a table.

   Noelle took in the sight, slim chest hammering away. Front row seats to a glorious display of sharp golden rows as Susie bickered away to Kris's unflinching silent treatment.

     Stealing looks at her dark freckles, the lady's smile irradiated a scuffed smugness. A certain softness glinting in her eyes. Stargazing at the girl who was a mere stranger, her innards were wrapped tight in bows and ivy. 

    Susie didn't look at her. Barely a short glance but nothing more. Never a peek, or a pause or anything of the sort. A girl that hardly looked her way and yet, Noelle was utterly smitten. 

  Maybe, that was why she was so curious about her. Susie never tugged on her hair, pushed her around, bashed her into lockers. Neglecting to act in any discernable way around Noelle. 

     Being bullied was one thing, but being nearly constantly ignored was an even greater pain that pricked at Noelle's soul.

   She considered Kris to be so exceptionally lucky. An entire day with Susie? That was a pipe-dream for someone such as herself.

  Envious, the reindeer thought what sort of antics the duo got up to. What could two people even do in a closet by themselves? It was a bit of a snug fit...

   Her features were framed with a flower petal pink tinge blossoming across her face in a jealous delight.

     Did Kris know? Were they up to something? They wouldn't, would they? Kris had to know how she felt around her, they must have! 

   Smooching and kanoodling right there and then, in the school closet? 

    Hell, she didn't know which way the pendulum swung in regards to Kris. Were they and Susie already so close?

    She knew it was a homerun with her own sexuality. Batters up, a swing and a hit, she was utterly gay.

She was a girl that loved girls.

    Head over heels for the fairer sex. And oh boy, was Susie fair. Well, she was more unfair than anything, she did have a considerable mean streak afterall. 

    She moseyed on down one day, out of the blue. Swinging on her chair at the back of the room, before even Noelle slipped into the classroom for early revison. 

   No announcement, no foreword by any teachers, not even Toriel made a murmur and that lady loved a cheeky little gossip.

   "So we're going to sneak around or what?" Susie asked.

♣️♦️♠️

   The cruiser pulled away from the curb, U-turned and drove away back to the Police Station, the building barely a ten minute walk away.

   The sun started to dim, the burnt orange skies starting to blend into the thinnest traces of dark blue, ready to be spray painted with constellations and star dust. 

   Fine brush strokes of clouds hardened like acrylics as the distant roar of a storm beckoned from beyond.

   Noelle led Susie and Kris down the streets, one straight line from the school to all major facilties of the town, the murmuring heart of this curmudgeonly cozy place. 

   Susie walked behind Kris, eager to find something to hold her interest. Gaze pondering to the sign of the amazingly titled 'Libarby' that she frequented.

     Not for studying though, that'd be stupid. The computers had some great flash games. She liked the skateboards game best. 

  The pinball games on the crusty desktop computers were crazy good too, but it wasn't as fun imagining doing kick flips and rail grinding as she tapped and smacked the space bar but it was a fair distraction.

  Susie wondered how much a skateboard would cost. She felt the empty insides of her pockets, dissatisfied that no dollar bills hadn't spontaneously grown when deciding on what she wanted to buy for herself. 

   After all the magical crap that happened today, it stung even more that she was dead ass broke.

    Skateboards were only a plank of wood with wheels, it couldn't be that expensive. Even if it was, it wouldn't be too hard to bash something together in engineering class. Metal brackets and wheels, nuts and bolts; not too difficult a task, I guess... Susie scratched her scruffy chin.

   The trio walked.

 Susie strutted. Kris ambled. Noelle trotted. 

   The glazed sky shattered like pottery with a crack of thunder. One drop of rain. Then it started to spit. Gutters began draining.

    Noelle immediately flinched at each applause that rattled the grey ceiling above. She squeezed the living daylights out of her textbooks flat across her chest. Her already precarious trotting becoming a shambling shuffle.

   Susie's gaze kept landing at the girl in the front. Chlorine and synthetic sprays of petals, the scent soaked the young lady's hair.

    It was painfully powerful, leaving a bitter note on Susie's tongue as if submerged into a deep pool. 

     Not unpleasant mind you, just jarring. 

   Susie half expected her to smell of sugar cookies and gingerbread, Noelle had a strange compulsion to bring up Christmas festivities no matter the time of year.

   Rain began to spit harder. Soaking the turned up cuffs of her jeans, the fabric darkened. Her strides felt heavier, her feet sopping wet and socks drowned. Screw the skateboard, new boots were the next thing on the docket.

  Kris slowed, letting Susie take heed as she stormed forward. They peered at her and a mumur of a expression tapped at the corner of their mouth with impatience.

   "What's funny?" Susie asked, begging for Kris to spit it out. She found herself already smiling just seeing Kris' string-lipped smirk.

   "Ever get cheap magazines? At the grocery store?" Kris started. Susie nodded as Noelle's ears twitched to attention. "They came with toys. Like a dinosuar. Small and gummy. That grew in water. "

  Susie snorted. "Kris, I promise, you wouldn't want me any bigger. I barely fit through the door at school as is." 

    Kris snickered. Susie grinned, starting to walk on her tip-toes on her roughed up boots, "Well, look 'ere, seems like you were right, I'm getting taller!"

   Kris clamped their mouth shut, foaming as their fangs pressed tight across their bottom lip.

   Susie pushed her luck, taking deep lunging steps on the tips of her boots. Striding over big murky puddles, her grin growing as she did.

   Her ankle rolled. Chin first on the concrete and then the rest of her smashing into a lake of muddy water as Noelle turned on her heel.

   Kris bust a gut as Susie let out a groan as she fell back into the puddle with a grunt, everything but the top of her shoulders, utterly soaked.

  " My gosh, Susie!" Noelle squeaked, "A--are you alright?" She kneeled down, reaching out her hand.

   Susie swiped upwards with her cumbersome mitts, splashing Noelle with a hearty spray of water making her yelp as her books went tumbling yet again. 

   "Susie!" Noelle began to bicker, her eyeliner black running down her face as she wiped her sopping wet face with an irked nose twitch.

     "All my revison notes..." she sighed, the paperback notebooks now sodden mulch on the pavement.

  Susie let out a chuckle and scratched the back of her head, almost bashfully. "My bad." She simply said.

  Noelle quietly fumed as she traced her hair from her scalp and down her neck, stroking it as she breathed out. 

    Her expression switched on a dime, suddenly kicking in a puddle that hit Susie square in the face. The lizard was left gargling and spluttering,  

   "You jackass!", she coughed with a grin. "Are you trying to drown me or what!"

   Noelle let out a giggle. That was the greatest thing about Susie. For a single moment textbooks did not matter nor her grades, neither did her status. 

    Susie made her happy. She made her forget that she was a Holiday. She was just a girl in class.

 And Noelle loved that.

Chapter Text

   Despite the spluttering rain, the three Lightners were in high spirits.

 Sufficiently soaked, Susie stood up and shook her head like a mangey mutt, trying to dry off, wiping her face with sodden sleeves.

"I better not get a cold, you pair of wimps."

   Noelle's voice murmured, wringing her hands. "Uhm, sorry! I didn't mean to get you c-cold!"

    Susie rolled her eyes at the pipsqueak. "It's no biggie."

     "I hope so, you could, uhm...borrow something of mine?" Noelle offered, her vocal chords were spry and gentle. She tugged slightly at her sweater vest, her mouth curling into a smile that shambled as soon as Susie locked eyes with her.

 The purple dragon paused.

    "It's fine." She decided sullenly. She started to take stark strides.

   Rain splashed heavily on the concrete curb and charcoal coloured road.

It didn't matter if she would shiver the rest of the night, tucked away out of sight.

    The wind would growl through the busted shingles and nip at her face and elbows, the knotted up dust sheets tangling up her limbs.The cold was nice.

   "I can deal with it. I'll steal Kris's jumper later." Susie added.

  "O-oh, okay..." Noelle answered softly before skipping with a skittish shuffle in front of the purple girl.

  "I-I'm leading us to the station still, right?"

    Hands splayed out before joining back together in front of her chest, praying to be the one to forge the path for her crush to follow.

    Susie chewed the inside of her cheek. "Aight." She flashed her teeth. "This cryptic crap better be worth it."

   Noelle winced. Leaning forward, hunched over as if wounded by Susie's maw. Eyelids drooping, squeezing her eyes shut for a long moment with a bitter intake of air.

It had been so nice, walking with her. Gazing into the rich honey pot's that the beast glared with.

    So many stitches that have worn down across her tatty attire. Poor needle work. Matte boots that didn't glisten or shine like pearly whites, Susie's visage was so exceptionally repugnant.

   God, what her mother would think seeing this troublesome lady; no, not a lady, but something much worse. Something horrid, a violent brute that made her soul lust for direction, answers, commands.

  Imagine her mother's pretentious face slacken and pale, as this roughed up creature stood at her manor door, beckoning to be let in.

     Very few moments didn't include thoughts of Susie permeating her mind. Constant cackles and laughter as she smothered her muzzle into pillows in her bedroom, legs kicking as she was swept off her hooves time and time again.

    Smashed into lockers, pressed against a lone alleyway wall. Forbidden words spat down her ear as the amethyst beauty cradled her thin frame, foaming at the mouth to explore the potential splendor.

   Noelle's cheeks would go red and she'd screech to herself thinking of the possibe ways she could be...ravaged.

   It started off small.

Pushed around between classes.

   Then tugs around her tucked and neat collar, firm fingers pinching at her thin neck. "Quit staring at me, freak." Susie's gruff throat would crackle.

     Bewitched, the deer would not relent and would stare endlessly. Grabbed by her shoulders, Noelle's back would throb with bruises as she collides with the rusted lockers as Susie hoists her up in the air, feet dangling aimlessly.

      Her fur would bristle, stand on end as the sandpaper texture dragged across her cheek leaving half her face numb as the tendril slid down her face with a sluggish carelessness.

"You look good enough to eat, doll face." Susie would say, tongue pulling back into her mouth.

Oh how Noelle steamed at the thought.

     "You gonna answer me or what!?" Susie lambasted.

    Noelle squeaked, nodding quickly as her cheeks were fuming, "Yes! I--uhm, c-could you...repeat the question?"

   Susie grunted and walked past, shoulder barging past the seemingly clueless reindeer.

  Noelle grasped her shaking shoulder. It ached. Susie was stronger than she had even dreamt of.

    Kris watched as this predicament unfolded. Noelle fumbling every opportunity to seem component, whilst Susie stormed away like crackling thunder at the reindeer's ineptitude.

    Noelle wasn't ready in the slightest, but she was making a decent stride to actually talk like an actual person around the brooding dragon.

     The scratty human looked at their neighbour. Saw that warm, bubbly excitement leave her eyes. Forlorn pupils adrift in thaw.

    Kris held out their hand, skin knitted tight across their knuckles as scar tissue grew like nettles over the emaciated joints.

   "Today was stressful." They simply stated. "We can worry about things another time." Kris's gaunt features flickering with much misplaced enthusiasm. Well as much enthusiasm as the monotonous human could handle, which was very little even at that.

    Noelle mulled it over. Mind running back to a time which she and Kris spoke more often.

Smaller. Quieter. Happier.

     Tangled in Christmas lights constantly, creeping under the bed to give her a frightful jolt. Past the headstones and into the woods, all four of them walking as the sky overhead darkened.

    Whiffle bat resting on her shoulder, sneaking a sneer at the wittering human that tagged along who tugged and pulled at their braces, the chilled steel binding across their crooked grin.

    Knowing them, they'd probably would snake the wire out of their troublesome gob and fashion some sort of shiv.

    "You better behave, Kristopher." Dess pre-warned as she would smirk, holding Noelle's small hand.

    Light bended and refracted as torchlight swayed in Asriel's tetchy paws, pale pink scarf tucked over his neck and shoulder. Glasses already cracked in their rims. Dess could throw a mean shove without realising it. She owed me a new pair of specs, she knew that much.

     "We could head back." Asriel's voice wavered as he whined with the suggestion, head turning side to side. Leaves scrunching under foot the deeper they entered the graveyard of yellow and orange foliage beneath the powdered coal ceiling.

   Dess snorted, "You're sucha crybaby, it's not even ten o'clock." The un-antlered reindeer tensed, gaze falling to her little sister as the tiny doe clutched her leg tight.

    "Too much?" She hummed. Noelle shivered with a stilted nod before Dess kneeled and hoisted the little girl over her shoulder. Noelle's face hid in the crick of her sister's slender neck.

    "Looks like Noe agrees with you." The big sister chuckled at Asriel's words. Kris murmured, prodding their brother with a sharpened stick they carried like a mighty broadsword.

    "Kris, cut it out!" Asriel mumbled, raising his arms away from his rambunctious sibling , trying to avoid any more poked holes in their green-and-yelllow sweater or white button up shirt from choir.

   "I'll slip you a fiver if you get 'im right in the ribs." Dess smiled in encouragement as Asriel decried the miniature assault upon his attire.

     Noelle giggled merrily as Kris attacked, swinging the stick sword around like a paladin, parts of the twig snagging on their oversized purple and blue striped sweater.

     Dess chuckled, holding up her giggling sister on her shoulder.

  "You better keep laughing, I did that for you! Azzy won't let me hear the end of it' hah!"

    Noelle blinked hard, staring back at Kris. They wore Asriel's sweater, the cuffs sagging around their thin wrists.

    Eyes dark pools, deep red like standard hardbook covers.

     They were about as tall as Dess was before...they were taller than her now she reckoned, which felt odd to imagine.

    It had been quite some time since, well, whatever happened, happened.

No answers.

No explanations.

She was with Kris.

They walked. They played. They wandered.

Then they were alone.

Kris was alone.

    "That wouldn't be fair on you." She managed, preparing her childhood friend for what laid ahead of them.

  Kris...was a childhood friend, weren't they?

    "I mean, its....complicated." She continued, clutching over her shoulder. "Remember when, how Dess would...rip off your band-aids when you were scared to do it yourself?"

  Kris gave a stilted tilt of their neck. Their head begrudged a nod.

    "Well, think of that while we..." Noelle's hands fumbled, rubbing the back of her hooves. Spittle ran down her throat like maggots, practically choking herself out as she turned towards the police station.

    Susie was half paying attention, her ears filled with television static as she walked before looking back and shoving her hands in her pockets, clothes still dripping.

    Kris and Noelle...both appeared off. Faces pulled and tugged unnaturally as they spoke.

     Seemed so happy earlier, but now, weren't too sure. Frolicking in the rain and bantering, then they both got all quiet and whispery...

    Panic doesn't suit her face, she should be smiling. Susie's face contorted. She found herself grimacing.

     What was she even thinking? Let 'em feel how they wanna feel, neither of them should pretend to be rosey picture cards at all times.

   Feelings get real messy some days.

     Noelle and Kris walked, not exactly beside each other but obviously keeping an apprehensive distance.

      They stood either side of Susie. Were they...cowering? Something or someone getting both of 'em spooked was quite an achievement considering what they went through.

      Well, Kris was a tough cookie but Noelle...maybe she was too. Not quite certain where Susie got that impression from but the reindeer didn't seem easily startled.

      Susie stared down towards the open glass door of the police station up ahead, leaning back with apprehension. "...Sure the cops won't lock me up?"

     Noelle let out a well-earned laugh, nearly tearing up at the growing tension that was now shattered by Susie's clumsy words.

    "I-I'm sure they won't." Noelle reassured, her smile across her flat muzzle twitching at the corners.

    She held a finger to a her mouth, "Unless you've uhm, stolen anything? But that doesn't sound like something you'd do, would it?"

     Noelle winced at her own words. Great job, Holiday, you've just asked your crush if she's a felon, that'll go swimmingly...

      "Uh, just stole Kris for the day, I suppose." Susie murmured, scratching around the crown of her scalp with a finger.

   "Well, looks like they're in one piece, so uhm, no issues I guess?" Noelle offered, trying to recover any dignity despite her horrendous question.

     Susie shrugged, "Don't hava receipt so I guess I'm stuck with 'em."

       "Can uh, stolen goods even have receipts?" Noelle asked.

    "Stolen goods? Nah, stolen bads more like." Susie snickered as she nudged Kris's side.

  The human's lips moved for a moment. Noelle didn't quite catch what they had, but whatever they had said made the dragon snort with a blustering guffaw.

     "Ah, shut it you lil' weasel!" She struck them lightly on their head as Kris took it in their stride, not bothering to shield their skull from Susie's trivial smack.

    "Defend yourself at least, dork. Ain't fun if you want it." Susie rolled her eyes.

    Noelle's faltering smile drooped, her posture hunching.

    Of course. It made sense. Susie didn't know what the reindeer liked. The two of them hardly even spoke within the few months Susie had attended classes...what had it been, five, six months?

    Why did Kris have to get all the teases? Why couldn't any be aimed at her for once? I mean, to save Kris's pride and all that, the insults should've been directed at her for their sake. No other reason...nope. Not at all.

    The corners of her muzzle twitched downwards, god she'd think I'm such a wimp if she could hear her thoughts rattling around my tiny, stupid brain...

    She'd probably make fun of me for silly I was being. And push me around, and maybe trip me over and call me names and...

    Her face hurt. A smile sliding up her thin and wry mouth leaving her with a dull ache in her jaw.

    She couldn't bare the thought of being bullied by Susie without beaming.

God, her mind turned to mush just tempting the idea of getting on the purple girl's bad side despite how peculiar the idea was.

     The scraggly girl always had that sorta peculiar effect on the hapless doe, for whatever reason. Maybe it was her eyes or the speckles of blotchy freckles, or how her teeth glistened when she smirked...by the Angel, she was pretty.

   "Uhm, Susie!" Noelle blurted.

     Susie tore her head away from Kris and the shenanigans briefly. "Yeah?" She asked plainly.

     "Maybe...give Kris a break? It's been a...um, a long day." Noelle retorted, wanting to wince.

       Susie glared harshly. Upper lip curled. She spluttered out a sigh and rubbed her head and wet, grimey hair. " 'Suppose I can give 'em a little breather." She spoke with a carefree shrug.

    Kris scoffed in reply and crossed their arms, tappung their scuffed shoes on the sidewalk.

   "Spoilsport." They remarked softly, shooting Noelle a look before grinning for a sliver of a moment before returning to a blank, vacant stare.

     The trio walked and then stopped in front of the police station. All three of them downtrodden in demeanour, basking in a sudden storm of anxiety when standing before the basic obelisk of a building.

     Susie held a knuckle to her mouth, holding back the urge to scrape her teeth against it. "So, we're gonna meet a crook or somethin', eh?"

     Noelle was hesitant with her nod. I don't even know why I'm even doing this.

     "The adults need to know where we are, we can't just run off as much as we want to..." She spoke with a quiet laugh that died as quickly as it started.

      Kris stood quietly looking at the star student as she cradled her wrist, slightly swaying side to side.

     Overcome with both macabre nostalgia and a desire to impress her crush, the reindeer came here to seek a new thrill.

   A dangerous one at that mind you, trying to take a peek at a potential criminal but the human relented.

   "It's not like we're gonna dissappear." Susie answered, not too enthused about walking straight towards the cops.

      Kris stiffened and nearly barked out a curse as Susie pulled open the door and ambled inside.

    "Wanna sneak into the bunker, Kris?" Dess asked with a smirk.

     They turned their head to Noelle immediately. She stood, thankfully, not crumpling to the ground like an abandoned marionette when she was upset like usual.

    Kris wouldn't have blamed her if she did.

     Noelle choked and coughed back a cry. She swallowed and ran her hands through her hair, flattening it down.

    "She didn't know." Kris said as fast as they could with a grind of their teeth.

    The doe let out a shiver, bringing her hand to the opposite shoulder, pulling at her black cardigan unsure what else to do aside from fidgeting.

      "It's fine." Noelle exhaled painfully. "She's still... just the new girl."

     The duo looked into each others eyes as they turned to face one another. Her thin, narrow face squeezed and contorted as she put on a smile that so desperately wanted to shatter into a frown.

     "It's been a while, hasn't it?" Noelle said, a near decade worth of fog fading from her red and green pupils.

      As if she had woke up from an avalanche of snow and suddenly stirring with realisation that the human standing beside was more of a stranger than a friend.

     Exchanging mere pleasantries at school wasn't enough. Lose your pencil Kris? Want the candy cane or the one with the Christmas lights?

     It left a bitter taste, knowing that they were both equally strangers to each other now. Noelle hoped Susie would make a more reliable friend to Kris than she herself ever had been.

     Susie blundered out for a moment, leaning out of the doorway with her arm. "Kris, do ya have a brother at all?"

    Her tone slow and befuddled, her head turning back as her eye's glanced to some nebulous notion that something seemed off.

     Kris expression shifted. That wasn't possible. Asriel was in college. He wasn't supposed to be here yet. And he was no criminal.

   They tilted their head, prompting Susie to answer back.

    She tapped her chin with her claw, "Uh, well, seems like they're in jail or something?"

   Kris barged past Susie, Noelle clamouring to reach the human's hand and yank them back.

     "K-Kris, wait a sec , I haven't had chance to tell you about what it is yet!", Noelle squealed.

     Kris's insides were nettles and barbed wire. Hand creeping up their torso and squeezing the middle of their sodden sweater into a clump, their heart jolting wildly.

        Sat solitary in the bare jail cell, it slumped over with head bowed. Skin of grayscale and unflinching stiffness, it sat with arms limp and head lulled.

     It's head rose. As if it sensed the presence of its kin.

    Undyne greeted Kris with grit teeth and an exhale as the two other teens trailed in.

    "Been getting hundreds of calls from your ma', she's been driving me nuts."

     The slim police chief slid from her seat and sat on the bare desk in the centre of the tiny box of a police station, legs crossed as she pulled down her hat, swinging it between her webbed fingers.

      "Cousin, of yours?" Undyne questioned smugly, gesturing her head towards the cramp cage. She threw down her hat to the desk side before she slugged down a scolding brew of coffee

     She was resting one leg on her knee with an impatient bobbing motion.

     Undyne swivelled to face the solitary jail and leaned, placing down her mug and standing up with hands on her hips.

     "Parents will pick you up soon, so sit tight." The cop spoke gruffly albeit with a tinge of humour, basking in delight to seeing some ruffians getting their just desserts. If these kids had stayed put, she wouldn't be knee deep in hell with the Mayor.

       Kris stood with an unflinching countenance. Noelle walked stiffly forward, hand hovering over the human's shoulder.

     "I-I should have--" Noelle started. She winced as Kris' shoulders tensed; involuntary shaken at the sight sitting before them.

     Undyne eyed the trembling teen, a soft smile slipping onto her usual uptight lips. " I can walk you lot home, if needs be. 'Blook can watch over the punk if they're giving you the creeps."

     Swaying back and forward on the tip of her toes, Susie's jaw clenched into an overbite, her face utterly soured.

     Peering at Kris told her plenty. They weren't enjoying this rendezvous in the slightest. Hell, they were practically shaking.

      The figure sat in the steel confinement like a mannequin, laid abandoned.

     Its' face flickered with motion, the darkness of the dingy cell masking exactly what expression or movement slithered across its drab features.

     It shuddered as Kris stepped towards it, curling into itself like a wounded hound, entangling it's body with it's own limbs.

       Susie slunk forward to the cage, drumming bruised, calloused knuckles across the thin metal rods trying to steer Kris out of there silent stupor. "Wanna talk?"

     Noelle wandered over, hands close to her sternum with a tight clasping clamp, "...Can it talk?"

  Susie raised her head, mifted, "I meant Kris."

      It's neck jutted out, like an empty coathanger pressing out a wardrobe door. Fabric falling, a shrawl slipped down to reveal a round face with narrow cheeks.

    The figure raised it's head in turn. Hair clung like moss and vines across it's waterlogged scalp. Sockets deeply sunken, as if it's eyes had been emptied out.

     Kris hunched down, fingers wrapping around the steel bars. The teenager craned their head towards it.

      Many questions lingered, itching, scratching at the synapses. Another human? In HomeTown? How this was possible?

     After all this time, for the entirety of their lifetime, they had never witnessed another of their kind. At least, not the ones relegated to flickering cassettes and VHS...yet, this person was just as static-y and flickering as those old videos.

     The other human suddenly slumped to the ground on it's knee, mere inches away from the metal bars.

     Raising it's hand, mirroring Kris's movements from a moment before, placed its nimble fingers around the metal that contained the grayed out body.

    Like a birdcage, Kris thought. Trying to escape a bird's cage.

Chapter Text

   It's grip was exceedingly tight. A glint of light scarcely passing through it's dim gaze. Eyes glazed over, judging with solemn, murky marbles.

    Kris was yanked backwards, tugged unnaturally behind like their spine was connected to a pulley as the grey skinned person reached out sharply, scarcely missing the cuff of their sweater. 

  Susie looked over to Kris with a muddied expression, her harsh brow knitting together like chain mail. "If it lunges again at you, I'm gonna punch 'em." 

   Her knuckles ached.

   "I wouldn't get too close. Don't know what it could be thinking." Undyne spoke, taking a sip of coffee, her eyes peering sharply at Susie over the mugs rim.

  Rolling up a neglected set of files with webbed hands, tightening it up and then quickly striking the person's fingers right on it's knuckles.

    "This place isn't your personal petting zoo, hands to yourselves.", she added with the rasping chortle of her vocal chords, throwing in an extra smack of the files for emphasis.

   It recoiled away again as the flimsy paper brushed over the peeling metal. Fingers constricting, gouging into it's own shoulders. 

   Noelle tip-toed. She walked over to the human behind bars, and kneeled down, oh so ever courteously.

  Dryness and dullness sat at the back of her esophagus. Words shattered as they were formed on her tongue. 

  She brushed her skirt to steady her nerves. Not too brash. Not too cheery. Just soft enough to be gentle. 

   Holding out her hand, she spoke. "...You look like you've caught the rain. Do you want to borrow my cardigan?" She asked, fingers curling through the bar.  

  Undyne, ready to bark orders, was practically chewing on her own jaw. "I said don't get near the damn thing." 

   The human inched it's head downwards, mimicking the reindeers movement and kneeled down too. Fingers clinging loosely to the metal rods separating the entire world from itself and the figures outside it. 

   It reached out. Felt the fabric between it's fingers. The warmth of her hand despite the dampness of her fur. Her face was framed with a pure radiance it hadn't seen before.

    She had a thin and long face. It couldn't quite make out her eyes, or the nose, or much of her face. It stared with wide, blistered eyes. Irises burst open like ink blots. Neck turning, it's vision was a fisheye lense.

  Noelle pouted, pondering for a moment. They were struggling to keep eye contact weren't they? "I promise, I'm not going to scare you." She said. It craned it's head to the side as it shyly pulled the cardigan from her hand. 

    "Do you need glasses?" She asked. "Did you lose them at the school?"

  Susie glanced over, hands neatly folding between the crux of her elbows, her face aloof. 

  The prisoner held the cardigan at first with limp wrists before clutching it tight, pressing it into their chest, their mouth and bridge of their nose. 

  Susie's face softened. The kid was a real scaredy-cat, huh? Who'd wanna hug Noelle's cardy so much? Then she thought for a moment and her face immediately crumpled, rejecting the very notion.

Cardigans are scratchy and lame, anyway...

  "I don't think they wanna talk." Susie advised, her voice hesitant but firm.

  Yellow spotlights shone through the closed shutters of the police station. Beacons blaring as a low hum of an engine lowered to silence as soon as it was heard. 

  Noelle's expression stiffened.

  High heels and hooves. 

   Strolling in, face stern and eyes burning with a wickedness that only came with a decades worth of sleep deprivation; The Mayor entered. 

   Undyne straightened out her files and her posture, standing to attention. Attempting to start on good terms, the aquatic and athletic anglerfish tried to speak with a wide smile but was swiftly shot down.

    The Mayor wore a blood hued blazer, red rimmed glasses and a golden locket around her neck. A wedding gift from her husband. Shined to perfection.

    "Mx. Dreemurr." The Mayor spoke. Kris turned, locked eyes with her and continued to stoop. "Miss Lacerta." She said next.

 Susie stood rigid with a lump in her throat. "...Ma'am." She responded gruffly, grabbing the back of her neck.

"Noelle." The Mayor finished. 

   Noelle stammered a moment, stopping herself from saying her mothers name. "...Good evening Mrs' C...I-I,  h-hi mam, ma'am...!"

     "It's the Mayor or Mrs Holiday when we're out in public." She said succinctly as Noelle winced. The Mayor gaze lingered and then flickered as she yanked her daughter from the ground.

   "You're absolutely caked in dust, you'll ruin your skirt." She chastised as Noelle was pulled up.

   Noelle paused, fingers hovering with an anxious shiver before she managed a weak protest.

"...I-I was just trying to--" 

The Mayor snorted hard.

   "Trying to worry me, perhaps?" Mrs Holiday concluded sharply adjusting her lapel and silver snowflake broach.

   "I asked for you to visit your father. And you decide to scurry away with two students. Whilst under curfew I may add." The Mayor hummed in dissatisfaction.

   Noelle's ear twitched down as she screwed her eyes shut. 

    Mrs Holiday relented. "Noelle, honey...the curfew was to keep people safe." She placed her hand under her daughters chin and with her other hand, stroked the top of her head.

   Susie's eyes flicked between Kris and the Mayor.  Both seemed, quite frankly, far too used to how handsy and infantilising this was for Noelle. She ain't no pet.

     "You can't keep undermining the rules. A Holiday always keeps a promise." She breathed in deeply. "Promise me you won't do something silly again?"

Noelle's mouth trembled. 

  Susie took a step. "It was my fault, not hers." 

   Noelle's eyes shimmered with wet pupils.

    Mrs Holiday pulled away from her daughter and folded her arms behind her back. "You and Mx. Dreemurr...what excuse do you have for me today ?" 

   Susie tried her hardest not to scowl and answered as calm as she could manage. "I got Kris late, supposed to find supplies for class but I got 'em sidetracked. Noelle was looking for us, we didn't know curfew was 'appening, ma'am."

   Kris was practically glowering at their friend. It was their job to watch her back, not hers. 

   Mrs Holidays eyes narrowed. She pursed her lips a moment. "Sidetracked? For an entire school day?" Her voice was laced with a smug disappointment, her head tilting in bemusment.

  Susie looked down and stuffed her hands in her pockets. "I convinced Kris to ditch class because I was in a bad mood."

    "Susie's lying." Kris immediately retorted, Susie almost busting a blood vessel as they interrupted. "She was keeping me safe in the closet. She heard the glass break. She was protecting me."

    Susie swore and Kris bickered, then she barked in retort and they both began arguing. Mrs Holiday raised her hand and their incessant chattering and haggling on whose to blame ceased. 

    "Today has been...less than ideal.", she started, putting on a amicable smile and cupped her hands together. "It's admirable for you to stick together and I'm thankful that you were both found safe by my fortuitous daughter..." She motioned to Noelle before her brows furrowed as she grit her teeth.    

    "Things could've been exceedingly bad. But you did skip class. And broke curfew."

  Susie was bracing for the worst. Kris glared accusingly. 

   "Both of you will receive detention and have counselling meetings between parents and staff members." Mrs Holiday concluded cheerfully, holding her hands tight together.

   "Detention?? But ma'am, I-" Susie started taking a stilted step forward and her hands leaping in front of herself, ready to grovel for a different outcome.

   "Miss Lacerta. You're not helping yourself here." The refined woman stated, her tone louder, almost bordering on a shout. She huffed, fiddled with her collar repeatedly as her voice flustered. 

   "Mom, this isn't necessary," Noelle managed, "Please, just take a look in the cell, then..." She struggled.

  Mrs Holiday steamed, infuriated by her daughters wailing, turning to her before her eyes caught a glimpse of what sat in the cell mid spin.

Her eyes widened. 

    Noelle gulped, floored that her mother hadn't bothered to chastise her impolite behaviour. "S-Susie and Kris weren't in any real danger...the person who broke the windows is just..."

   "....Human." Mrs Holiday stated. "Another human...?"

   "W-well, I was going to say scared, but that also...works..." Noelle tried to continue as her mother now ignored the rest of her babbling.

  The Mayor held out her hand towards Undyne. "Key." She decided sullenly, staring at the grey human behind bars.

   "You're not seriously going to let them out." Undyne argued with a disbelieving look of revulsion. 

  "Key. Here. Now." The Mayor reiterated.

Undyne unhooked the chain of keys off of her belt and placed it in the Mayor's palm.

  She fumbled for a second before jamming the right key in the lock.

  Metal shuddered as the door slunk open. As if looking at a particularly persistent moth, she grabbed the person's shoulder haphazardly and pulled them up. 

    "You have some explaining to do. I didn't want to deal with this." She yanked the black cardigan out of it's hand, its mouth going agape, as if stabbed.

   "I don't think," Noelle started with a flutter in her stomach. "I really don't think that they can actually....talk?"

  Mrs Holiday, face now gleaming with apprehension, let the tension slip from her grip as her usual enraged and furious brows eased up. 

  "That's...unfortunate.", she said quietly as she relinquished her hold on the humans arm and crossed her arms behind her back. 

     "What do you want doing?" Undyne interjected. "Can't really interrogate someone if they can't chat." She muttered, a tad aggressively.  Mrs Holiday gave her an indignant glare. 

    "Well, strictly speaking." Undyne added half-heartedly with a rub of her neck.

   Noelle stepped forward, watching as the grey skinned teen suddenly clung onto the cardigan in her mother's hand. Mrs Holiday tried to swat it's trembling fingers away. 

    "Maybe, we could help them?" Noelle's voice shuddered as she held her hooves together. 

  "We're doing plenty as is, punk." Undyne barked with a huff as the Mayor glared.

    "They're lucky that I caught them this quick, they've got a lot to answer for." The athletic officer scrunched her face and pinched where the bridge of her nose would be if she didn't have narrow slits for nostrils. 

    "Now, we'll have to schedule court dates and repairs, and keep people calm after this fiasco..."

    The Mayor's eyes bulged from her sockets and she laughed heartily. "Perhaps, we're being too hasty." She decided. Rubbing under her chin for a moment she then hoisted up the thin framed teen. 

   "What else do you expect me to do? They've broken into a school and smashed up windows, they need to be kept under wraps." Undyne argued, "Hell, they ain't even documented as a citizen of this backwater town! You expecting no-one to kick up a fuss?"

    "All of it can be sorted, and things shall be arranged, I assure you." The Mayor answered, plastering up a smile across her straining features.

   Noelle suddenly steps to the grey teen and wraps her arm around theirs.

  "We can take them home!" She announces

   Mrs Holiday stares at Noelle incredulously, her daughter takes a step back, "I-I mean, if...if that's alright with you, ma'am..."

  Mrs Holiday puts a hand to her mouth. She paces back and forth. Her heels click on the tiled floor. Her knuckle rests against her teeth.

    "We...we do have a spare bed at home." Noelle chips in. "A-and it's been awfully quiet as of late..."

 Her hands lock together around the grey skinned appendage of the lanky teenager.    

   "Isn't it our job to look after people? The Holidays always look after the needy...r-right?"

   Susie eyes flickers side to side.

   Kris' gaze lingers on the doppelganger, their mouth struggling to neuter the snarl lingering on their mouth.

  Mrs Holiday looks back at Noelle, her face hardening like stone before immediately crumbling. 

     "Fine." She states, pulling down and folding up the temples of her glasses as it lays across the front of her crimson blazer dangling from an ornate silver chain around her neck.

   She squeezes her brow tight, practically pinching a blood vessel. She denies herself a huff of frustration and turns back to her daughter.  

   "You suggested this idea, so, you're prepared for this mantle of responsibility, yes?" The Mayor inquires. Noelle flubs her words then quickly bobs her head in agreement. 

    Mrs Holiday smiles slightly. "Good. You'll help them settle at the house for tonight." She clicks her fingers together and heads rowards the door.

   Noelle, head slightly bowed, pats the grey human on the shoulder.

  "We'll find a place for you, p-please, just follow me, okay?" She directs. 

   The human's features are stagnant. Noelle leads them out towards the door, the person trundling behind like a lost child.

  Noelle turns on her heel for a split second. Her vision snags on Susie's face. "I-I'll, we, I suppose..."

   Susie stares and clicks her jaw with a subdued crackle. "See ya." She puts simply with a little underhanded wave.

   Noelle nods with a hum. "Take care, Kris." She says and slips away, the grayscaled double tracing her steps.

   Kris and Susie exchange looks. The purple dragoness' posture is the first to crack, her shoulders slouching as she huffed in relief.   

   "...She's very intense." She said with a swallow, tracing a finger around her collar. "Today has been way too strange."

  Kris peered at her intently. Their gaze was obscured by their hair for sure, but Susie could tell that they were staring at her deliberately. 

  "...There's just too much." Kris uttered, their voice coated in a bleak anger.

   Their hand raised to their side, resting it above the space where their crimson spewing organ sat and squeezed, fingers grabbing tight past the stiching and cotten. 

    Thoughts clattered through them, disparaging any order that they had managed to organise during the perilous adventure within the closet. 

  It couldn't just be them, right? Susie must be feeling like a whirlwind too, surely. This was so much. Why was everything so difficult, so different? 

  Susie shoved Kris with a pat to their shoulder, taking a step. "A lil' air might do us some good, don't ya think Kris?" 

  Undyne coughed in her hand. "You two going somewhere?" Her eyes yellow with a sharp gleam.

  Susie stuttered in place, she practically forgot that the police chief was still here. 

  "Just outside." Susie answered firmly, her head turned down. "I don't wanna bother anyone else today."

   Undyne judged the thick-skinned girl. The blue dunkleosteus barked a laugh. "It's fine. It's way too stuffy in here, go on.", she smacked the table with a lean, 

   "Don't be causing anymore hassle, I know where you live kid!", she teased with a holler and jab to the air. The teens were just being teens, they had enough stressing, she reckoned.

   Hand still resting on Kris' shoulder, and hoping that the butch cop was kidding, Susie guided them outside.  

   Her fingertips snagged on the criss-cross wire mesh of the door, another reninder of the mess of hexagons and octagons and other miss mashed scales that clung to her every fractured and begrudgd nerve.

   Susie wasn't the type to coddle, or comfort, she hadn't much experience on receiving it, but the dragon could tell that the human hovering around her was in dire need of it. 

  "Don't pin the blame on yourself, I'm the billboard around here, right?" Susie said as both took a few steps, slipping away beside the station.

    The pair walk slowly, steps gently easing their way from the police station door and hoping the Mayor was way too preoccupied to notice them snoop around.

  They sneaked to the side of the police station, a dingy alley that brushed the orange trees surrounding HomeTown.

   "You fall back on me, not the other way round." Susie continued as she pressed her back to the wall, arm resting on the side of greasy industrial bin.

   Kris scratched at their wrists, around their knuckles, rubbing and picking at the skin. 

   They remarked suddenly. Susie exhaled as she slouched forward, miming with her heavy and clumsy digits before tutting and grumbling, slipping her hands into her jean pockets as she paced.

     "I mean, defending ya from a maniacal King is different." Susie started as Kris offered back a rebuttal.

      "What? No, that ain't what I meant, you've got decent things going on with class, they expect me to be a dunce, don't worry 'bout it." Susie shrugged off.

  " I don't want you gone." Kris said sharply. They crossed thier arms, tugging and twisting the green, tinsel like fragments of wool that comprised their sweater.

   They were sparse with words, they didn't want to be harsh, but they had to get through to her. "I can't let you fall alone. You would be expelled."

  Took the fall. Tch, Kris was being such a dweeb. "You worry too much." Susie dismissed as rolled her shoulder and raised it over Kris' head as she stepped past them, now standing on the curb. 

  Kris wanders over, decides to sit down on the curb cross-legged, spluttering out a retort like the wise-ass they were.

  "You sounded pretty concerned at the lockers."

   Susie's nostrils flared as she was reminded of the incident that steamrolled the both of them into this mess.

Typical.

   Someone had to bring up her shortcomings. It ain't her fault she was prickly. She was just, airing stuff out. It meant nought. Definitely. 

    "Kris, I ain't no schlub, ya don't gotta worry." She barked, "I was just, spewing a load of junk, I didn't mean the half of it.", she replied.

  Kris gave a curt nod, although reluctant to let her off the hook so easily, but a greater issue was at hand. 

    Talk of darkness and Fountains, knowledge privy of a one eyed feline, and a mad jester locked in a cellar was childs play when compared to...this.

  This stranger, this gormless rube now swinging on Noelle's arm.

A petulant child clinging to the reindeer like tar.

    Kris glared from their vantage point. There was more to this. A Dark World erupting, fighting playing cards and chess pieces, and now another human? Events were converging, parts were in place...

   "The hand of the Knight is drifting closer." Kris murmured as their face glowered. 

  " 'Scuse me?" Susie replied. Kris answered back quickly. "Huh...you're thinking this is something to do with the Dark World?" She leered as she leaned on a wall corner, hand resting on its side as she peered at the human loitering next to Noelle.

  "Guess we'll havta do some recon, I suppose." The purple Monster declared. Susie steps towards Noelle and the other human. Kris gurgled in exasperation as they followed behind her. 

  The Mayor is quiet. Her face moulded into a rigid state, inexplicably holding a clipboard as she stood defiantly next to the police car outside. Her voice quick and snapping, reprimanding the ghostly Napstablook. 

    "Standard procedure should not be ignored. This may have been a false alarm today, but any other day this could have been very real."

"...oh...oh well, i didn't know...' Napstablook answered.

     "And no dilly-dallying, Noelle may be a Holiday, but she is no mayor yet. My word is law, not hers. You do not wait for people during a curfew, you search for people, not patiently wait." She added sternly.

"....oh....i understand now..." Napstablook replied.

  Noelle winced as she waited beside her mother's luxurious vehicle, a black car that toed the line between basic ride and limousine. The headlights were polished depsite the spitting, splotching drizzle of the weather.

  "You still have detention." Mrs Holiday reminded as Susie and Kris approached. "Both of, well, three of you now..." She says with a hand-wave, then her face starts to smolder, "Best behaviors."

     The Mayor turns as another set of headlights emerge, the cherry red minivan pulling up to the curb as another anxious mother steps out to greet her.

    "Are they in trouble? Are they okay?" Toriel asks, her voice wavering despite the previous phone calls she's received. She hovers by the door, purse clucthed tight between her paws.

  "All is well." Mrs Holiday says simply, suddenly smiling softly.

   Toriel's body heaves a great sigh, her eyes go wide as she hurried past the Mayor and clasped her child in an encroaching embrace. Kris freezes as the white, fuzzy hands wrapped right across their shoulders and neck. 

   Toriel kneels down, wets her thumb and brushes a smudge of Kris's cheek as their throat rumbles incessantly. The preschool teacher adjusts her spectacles and rubs the side of her child's face.

    "You've given me too many frights today, Kris." She says soothingly as she stands. Her expression is weary in her old age, her worried smile creased with doubt. "We'll have a lot to discuss tomorrow." 

 Toriel's face goes taut as she turns to the side. 

    The grey skinned human stares at the soft spoken figure, basking in the colours. A palette of lavender and white, short horns of a goat. Gazing with blistered eyes, it blinks slowly. 

"...Does this little one need a home...?" Toriel chimes in with a humble offer.

Kris stared with a knife-twisted heart.

  Absolutely, indisputably, hell no.