Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The underground is a prison.

It was a fact that every monster knew by now, but none knew it better than Chujin ketsukane, having just witnessed his creation go against his orders and kill the human it was supposed to apprehend. There before him, lay a decapitated corpse that was once considered a human.

“I HAVE FUFILLED MY DUTY CREATOR.” Chujin’s creation said with the same monotone voice any other steam-works robot may have.

Chujin simply stood in silence, staring at the human before him. He wasn’t sure what to do, while he could give the soul to Asgore and pretend this never happened, he knew it wouldn’t be put to use as well as what he could use it for. Chujin never really did agree with Asgore’s plan of using the souls to take over the surface, he knew it wouldn’t be as simple as Asgore makes it out to be. especially after what he had just witnessed the human do. He knew he needed to do something to stop the humans from destroying his family and any other monster they may find. It’s time to take action.  “Axis, collect the humans soul and remove the evidence, I don’t want anyone to see what happened here, atleast not yet.” Chujin said with as much seriousness as he could muster, still haunted by the image before him.

“OK CREATOR, I WILL DO AS YOU ASK.” Axis preceded to place the humans soul in a container and hand it to Chujin before starting the clean up process.

Chujin stared at the soul for a few seconds until something suddenly dawned on him.

“KANAKO! I got distracted in all this and I forgot about her! I need to make sure she’s ok!”

Chujin hid the soul and ran to Snowdin as fast as he could, hoping not to run into any guards or worse, the captain. As he ran he could hear the sound of his beloved creation dragging the human somewhere, Chujin didn’t even want to know where they would end up.

When He arrived at Snowdin it was still in a panic as it was when the human first arrived, Though it has died down a bit since the human had left, some townsfolk were still hiding in their homes or behind magic barriers. in the middle of the town was Kanako, who seemed to be looking for someone who had likely ran off a while ago.

“Kanako! There you are! Are you Hurt?! Did the human do anything to you?!” Chujin said in a panicked tone.

Kanako stopped her search and Ran over to Chujin with the saddest face he had ever seen her with.  Kanako was on the verge of crying, but she still managed to speak. “I’m okay daddy, but… I don’t understand. Why would they do this?”

Chujin was stunned for a bit as he was also unsure of the answer to this, but he did his best to give his daughter an answer.  ”Humans are dangerous, and feel no love or mercy for anyone but themselves.” He wasn’t actually sure if that was true, but the current event was certainly giving him the idea.

”They can’t all be like that though, right?” Kanako asked.

”I…..I don’t know, Kanako. I wish I could give you a better answer. But it’s important that we make sure we take care of ourselves in times like these, what do you say we go home?” Chujin offered.

”Yeah…. Okay, let’s go home.”

The walk home was quiet and somber, Kanako was gloomy most of the walk through the marsh wetlands of waterfall while Chujin was constantly looking around, attempting to see if any guards were watching them, being caught with a human soul would ruin all of his plans, and there was no way he could let that happen. He did still make sure to pay attention to Kanako as well, the human attack has drastically changed her demeanor, all the way up to the entrance of the dunes.

It wasn’t too far of a walk from there, with only a few houses and shops to pass by, it only took them about 10 minutes to reach their house, where they were greeted by none other than Ceroba, happy to see the two come home. As Chujin expected, the news of the human hasn’t reached the oasis yet, so he would have the break the news to her…. Great.

”Hello honey, and hello Kanako.” Ceroba greeted them.

”Hello my love, I hope you had a great day today.” Chujin was trying his best to hide how exhausted and paranoid he was.

“It was a wonderful day today dear, I finally finished that art project I’ve been working on.”  Ceroba recalled the day she had.

”Thats wonderful to hear, I wish I could say the same for us though.” Chujin’s voice began echoing sadness.

”Why is that? Did something happen today?”Ceroba now had concern in her voice.

”Kanako, go to your room please, me and your mother need to speak privately.”

”…Ok.” Kanako didn’t have the energy or motivation to rebel as she usually would. Today was simply too much for her.

”Okay, now that that is sorted…” Chujin began.  ”a Human came to Snowdin today.”

”Really? What happened when they showed up?”

”Our little girl wasn’t harmed thankfully, but the human fought some of the Snowdin monsters and even that vampire friend Kanako hangs out with while we were there. But… She was so close, she could’ve been next. And I don’t know what I would have done if she ended up dead.”

Ceroba was terrified at the thought. A human coming in and destroying her family was a chance that she always knew was possible, but was pushed to the back of her mind as she didn’t really think she would ever meet a human.

”The human ran away after beating up Kanakos friend, Dalv, I believe his name was. I decided to bring her back here, this day is bringing the underground into a panic.”

”Is the human still out there?” Ceroba asked.

“Maybe, but I’m sure one of the guards or the captain will get them eventually. Don’t worry, I won’t allow a human to harm Our family. In fact, I think I might have an idea on how to stop humans from harming monster kind once and for all.”

”Now Now Chujin, you remember what I told you about trying to play the hero of the underground. We appreciate all that you do, but you shouldn’t destroy yourself trying to protect us, you matter just as much as me or our daughter. Now come, we should make dinner for the 3 of us.” Ceroba stated, trying to go back to her warm demeanor, but she couldn’t stop cycling the thought of what could have happened to Kanako in her mind.

”Ill join you in a second dear, I just need to do something first.” Chujin said, before quickly going to his secret office under the kotatsu in their house to drop the soul off somewhere safe. He would see about doing some tests on it later, but family comes first. Chujin felt a great weight lift from him when he set the soul down, now feeling less paranoid of guardsmen and safe in his own home. He could now help his family with cooking. So he quietly came out of his office and to the kitchen where Ceroba was preparing corn chowder, a favorite of the Ketsukane family.

”Make sure to stir well dear, you don’t want the ingredients to stick together!” Ceroba was preparing corn for the chowder.

“I know dear, I will.” Chujin went to the pot to stir the ingredients.

A few seconds pass by.

“By the way, how did Kanako feel about the human? She seemed completely down when you two got here.” Ceroba asked.

“She’s extremely upset at the humans choices and lost her usual attitude. Can’t say I blame her, I was upset at it too.” Chujin admitted.

“Well I think we need to talk to her at the Kotatsu and see how she feels about it.

“I suppose so, but I’m not sure we will be able to get much out of her, but it’s still worth a try.”

Chujin and Ceroba would continue to make the corn chowder while talking about their day and Kanako. Chujin set the kotatsu up while Ceroba finished the last part of the chowder. Once every thing was set up, they called Kanako down for Dinner.  “So Kanako, any thoughts about today?” Ceroba asked while eating her chowder.

“I just don’t get why they did that, did something happen to them before they got to Snowdin? I didn’t think I did anything wrong.” Kanako said sadly.

“You didn’t do anything wrong Kanako, they made bad choices just like humans always do, it’s practically in their nature.” Chujin stated, still eating his chowder as well.

“But they can’t all be like that, I don’t believe it!” Kanako exclaimed.

“Kanako dear, we know you want to believe the best of others, and we love you for that. But that trait could get you harmed if you aren’t careful with it.”Ceroba explained in a way that Kanako could hopefully understand.

“I know but I wish I could have helped them, or at least understand why they did it.”

The rest of dinner was silent with the 3 contemplating the day they had, they all agreed that the day had tired them out so it was best to turn in for the night and hope the next day would be better.

“I put Kanako to bed dear, I suggest we do the same.” Ceroba said in a tired voice.

“I will my love, I’m just thinking about today.” Chujin was currently lost in thought.

“Listen hun, I understand and appreciate that you’re worried about Kanako but she is okay, that human didn’t harm her and I doubt another one will show up anytime soon.” Ceroba reassured him.

“I’m aware but… what if one does?”

“I trust that we or anyone else will be able to protect her, It will take more than a human to bring us down and I think today proved that even more.”

“….You’re right Ceroba, you always are.” Chujin said, trying to reassure himself as well.

“I’m glad to hear it. Now come on my love, we both need rest after today.” Ceroba guided Chujin to their bedroom.

“Thank you my love.” Chujin uttered.

“You’re welcome Chujin.”

The two would then kiss before going to their bed to rest for the night. at the moment, Chujin was just happy to be by Ceroba’s side once again. But he still couldn’t sleep, the thoughts of what took place today wouldn’t stop haunting him, and he was practically having a mini-panic attack. This wouldn’t go unnoticed however.

”Chujin honey. You’re shaking. please calm down, you and Kanako are safe now.” Ceroba tried to hide her sleepiness.

”…”

”come here, my love.” Ceroba cuddled up next to Chujin and held him tight. This was finally enough to calm him down.

”…Thank you Ceroba.”

With that, Chujin was finally able to sleep.

Chapter Text

It’s been a good 8 months since the day of the Snowdin incident. By this point the guard has given up on finding the human and declared them as missing. This was perfect for Chujin as he now had all the time he needed for his research. Currently his prediction is that it might be possible to use the humans soul and extract a sample of a boss monster souls to turn anyone into a boss monster.

This would allow for any monster in the underground to gain immense power and have a much better chance against humans. He just needed the boss monster sample, that would be the difficult part. He knew no one would agree with what he was doing, so if he needed a sample… he would have to get it from himself. This would be incredibly risky. Human souls haven’t had much research done on them due to their rarity. so their was no guarantee on what would actually happen once Chujin injected the soul into himself.

“Chujin honey! Can you come here for a bit dear!” Ceroba shouted from across the house.

That made Chujin jump a bit.

“Of course dear! Just give me a second!” Chujin yelled back, quickly leaving his secret office and going to Ceroba’s location.

“Can you take Kanako to the wild east today? she wants to see Starlo and his gang.”

“Of course dear, I would be happy to take her.” Chujin’s heart was still pounding from the realization he would need to use his own soul for the serum.

“Are you ok honey? You seem tense… And exhausted, did you have trouble sleeping last night?” Ceroba was deeply concerned.

Chujin panicked for a second but quickly came up with an answer.  “Well now that you mention it, I did have trouble sleeping, old habits from work die hard I suppose.”

“Well do you need me to take her instead? You seem like you need to rest.”

“No no my dear, I’m okay really. You should be able to enjoy today without worry.” Chujin responded.

“Well alright, I’ll let it be for now, but you should really take better care of yourself honey. I’m starting to worry about you.”

“I do appreciate it My love, it was just a bad night though. I don’t want you to worry too much about me.”

”hm.” Ceroba wasn’t very convinced but she decided to let it go so Kanako could get ready.

speaking of which, Kanako had come down all ready for a day at the wild east. So Chujin and Kanako walked out of the house and towards the wild east. Their house was only about 5 minutes from it so Kanako loved to visit it whenever she got the chance. The wild east was a little town that Starlo had set up around human culture a while back and it made the dunes quite a popular place. Chujin himself wasn’t all that into it but it was fun every once in a while. He and Ceroba even dressed as cowboys for it once on one of their dates. Good times.

When they arrived at the entrance of the wild east. They were greeted by a familiar face.

“Howdy there Chujin, N’ howdy to you too Kanako.” Starlo came up to the pair when they entered the town.

“Uncle star!” Kanako happily exclaimed before running up into Starlo’s arms.

“Hello there Starlo, my daughter wanted to see you and your posse today.” Chujin said.

“Well alright then! They’re all napping right now but I’m sure they’ll be right as rain in a few minutes. But in the meantime, why don’t we go to the saloon and get a drink? I don’t usually see ya in the wild east Chujin.”

“Well Ceroba is usually the one that would bring Kanako here but she needed a break today, so I’m the one bringing her.”

“Well of course! I’m sure she needs a break after yesterday’s oasis diner Squabble, couldn’t blame her one bit.”

Chujin had almost forgotten about that already. Yesterday when they went to the diner for lunch one of the guests was being extremely rude to him and his family. He told them off about it as he would to any other rude person but Ceroba decided to take it one step further and just throw the guest out of the restaurant through a window. He had to admit it was quite funny but it also got them banned from the diner. Honestly he considered it worth it.

Regardless, Him, Kanako and Star all went into the saloon and ordered some food and drinks.

“So, how has your town been doing since I last visited?” Chujin asked Starlo.

“Quite well actually, we even got some new additions. Some more cowboy equipment as per usual, all the buildings finally got repainted, and best of all, we finally have an actual train for those train tracks we have around the dunes!” Starlo excitedly replied.

“Now that’s impressive, how did you manage to accomplish that?”

“it’s pretty funny actually, Some old Steamworks engineers told us they could build a train if we gave ‘em a couple hundred G.”

“Really? I didn’t think they would still be around this area after all this time.“

“well some of ‘em certainly are. And with this new train we could go all kinds of places. Well, -er All kinds of places with a track. We haven’t actually finished the track yet.”

The three of them continued eating their food until they heard talking from outside.  “Hey! Star! Where are ya at!” A voice suddenly called out

Starlo quickly recognized the voice.  “That would be Mooch, must mean the gang is ready to go.”

Kanako hopped out of her seat and out of the saloon. Excited to finally see the gang again.

”wonderful, Me and Kanako can both-“ Chujin’s phone began ringing before he could finish his sentence. Chujin picked up the phone.

”yes dear, is something wrong?”  Chujin began.

”Hey honey, could you pick up some corn while you’re over there with Star? We ran out 3 days ago and I haven’t had the chance to get some more.” Ceroba was talking over the line while working on one of her art projects.

”Of course dear, I’ll get it for you.”

They both exchanged their goodbyes over the phone before Chujin turned to Starlo.  “I need to go to your farm to get some corn for the house, can I trust you to NOT give my child a gun again?” Chujin remembered the last time Kanako was left with the gang and didn’t want a repeat of it.  

“Of course Chujin, don’t worry so much about it. That gun thing happened a month ago.”

“Hmm.” Chujin remarked. He wasn’t all that convinced, but he figured Kanako would much rather be with them than go pick corn. So he left for the farm.

Starlo walked out of the Saloon to find Kanako already playing with the gang.

“Hiya Star! You got a plan for today?” Mooch called out to Starlo.

“Indeed I do mooch, now Chujin said no guns for Kanako, but I have another idea we could do.”

Starlo turned to Kanako.  “Hey Kanako, you wanna drive a train?”

Kanako immediately got excited, she didn’t actually know what a train was but it sounded exciting enough to want to do anyway. Starlo and the feisty four brought Kanako to a new building that housed a giant steam locomotive and a few train cars ready to go and drive along the tracks.

“Woah, this is so cool uncle Star!” Kanako exclaimed.

“Ain’t it? Sadly it can only go through the dunes right now, but eventually I want to use this thing to go through the whole underground!” Starlo responded.

“Can we drive it?! Please?! Please?!” Kanako pleaded.

“Well I don’t see why not, get up on there!”

Starlo grabbed Kanako and placed her in the driver seat of the train. Kanako immediately began pushing buttons and pulling levers, making the train start up.

“Yay! Let’s go!” Kanako happily exclaimed.

“Ed! Put some coal in the train!” Starlo yelled.

“On it!” Ed yelled back before shoveling some coal into the engine.

The train slowly began chugging down the track and out of the building. The view from it was very beautiful, being able to see across the vast desert. This went on for a while until the train began picking up speed. Kanako didn’t actually know how to control the speed of the train, so it was moving extremely fast down the dunes, much to the shock of many passing monsters who had never seen a train move so fast before.

In fact, it was still picking up speed, to a pretty concerning degree. It was a good thing most of the dunes was a straight line but there would eventually be an end to the tracks.

“Ok Kanako, going fast is pretty fun but we should really slow down a bit!” Starlo was  trying to keep his hat on while the train speeds.

“Yeah, I’m having trouble holdin on here!” Mooch was hanging on one of the railings from a different train car.

Kanako looked at the trains controls, having trouble trying to decipher what actually slows trains down.

“Hey Kanako! If we get near waterfall Pull down the 2 levers near the window to stop the train! I’m not sure how close we are but I know that’s where the tracks stop!” Moray yelled out. They were trying to look ahead of the train.

Kanako decided to look through the trains window to see the where they were. Sure enough, she could see the entrance of waterfall in the distance. and the end of the tracks…

She quickly scrambled to pull down both the levers, activating the trains brakes. The train was now sparking everywhere, and finally losing its speed as Kanako kept looking through the window to see if it would be fast enough. She didn’t have a lot of hope, as it looked like they might end up crashing. Kanako closed her eyes, praying to the angels above that this wouldn’t end badly.

…

…

…?

She opened her eyes again. The train had stopped right at the entrance to waterfall, just barely fast enough to stop a crash. She breathed the biggest sigh of relief she had ever done in her life, and looked towards the back of the train to check on the others.

Starlo had also shut his eyes expecting the worst as well, Moray had hid behind the coal car to cover themself, ace was gripping his hat like his life depended on it, Ed had fallen onto a different train car, and Mooch…. Where was Mooch?

Oh, there she is. She jumped off the train expecting a crash and was now face first on the ground like a pancake, it would have been a pretty funny sight to Kanako wasn’t so concerned with what almost happened. Near misses really seemed to be a trend in her family huh?

“Owwwww”. Mooch quietly grumbled.

“Ok, well I think that’s quite enough cowboy adventuring today. What do ya say we get back to the east and bring you to your father?” Starlo said, trying to calm his nerves down from what just happened. “Now let’s back the train to it, slowly.” Starlo emphasized.

Kanako pulled the levers backward, making sure to do it slowly this time, causing the train to begin moving backwards at a much more manageable pace. They were all now sitting on one of the flat train cars, awkwardly watching as they passed by residents who were unsure why the sheriff of the nearby town let an 11 year old drive a vehicle.  “Well uh, Ceroba’s not gonna be happy with me today eh Kanako?” Starlo nervously laughed.

“No, definitely not.” Kanako sadly responded. She felt bad again. Just like she did on that one fateful day. Though this time for very different reasons.

…

“Well ya still had fun right?”

“Absolutely, that was awesome! I’ve never gotten to do something like that before!” Kanakos sadness seemingly melted away.

“Well I’m glad this adventure was still worth it to ya. I should see about gettin some speed limiters installed on this train though.” Starlo pondered.

The train eventually pulled back in to the wild east, where the feisty four got off and went to their house for a nap. Starlo had grabbed Kanako and brought her back to the saloon to wait for Chujin. It only took another 15 minutes before he had shown up with a basket of corn in his hands.  “Hello there Star. I’m glad to see you kept Kanako safe like I asked. Everything go ok with your little cowboy adventure?”

“Yup, everything went well 100%. in fact I don’t think I’ve ever felt better.” Starlo nervously told Chujin, trying his best to hide what happened.

“hmm. Okay.” Chujin grumbled. He had the feeling Star did something stupid again.

“And how about you Kanako, how was it?” Chujin turned to Kanako who seemed to be as happy as could be.

“It was great Daddy, I got to drive a train!”

“Oh is that so? Well I hope Star taught you well. It’s always good to learn new things. Not guns though, do not give my daughter those Star.”

Starlo put on his best “hide the truth” smile.

“Well, I’m thankful that my daughter had fun here, but we should be going now. I need to get this corn to the house for tomorrow.”

“Of course, see ya next time Chujin.” Starlo said.

Chujin and Kanako then walked out of the Saloon and back out of the wild east towards their house through the dunes. Kanako was sure to have lots to tell her mother with such an eventful day.

Chapter Text

It’s time. This is the day Chujin had planned to commence his experiment.

He didn’t want to admit it but he had been putting off going through with the injection. Frankly, he was scared of what it would actually do. For a while he distracted himself from it with other work he did in his actual office near the bedroom. Where he had the rather embarrassing night he fell asleep while doing work. But enough about that. He can’t keep putting off his experiment when it’s so close to producing the result he needs. Such a thing was dangerous, but that was the game of science, especially science as untapped as this. Though he couldn’t help but notice he was having second thoughts…

He wasn’t 100% sure that would go well. So before he could commit to this, there was still one more thing he needed to do. He came out of his secret office and towards Kanako’s room where she slept. He hugged her as she slept on the bed. There was a non-zero chance that this experiment may just end up killing him, so he needed to atleast see her before he went for it. But if it would keep his family and all of monster kind safe, Then it would all be worth it…. Right?

He then went back down the stairs and into his bedroom where Ceroba could be found sorting through the closet, looking for her other robes. She noticed Chujin walk through the door.  “Oh, hello honey, how are you doing?”

“I’m doing well my love, I just wanted to see you, that’s all.”

“Awww Chujin, well I’m happy to see you too.”  Ceroba stopped what she was doing and went over to hug Chujin.

“Although, you seem tense again, honey I really think we need to talk about this. I’m getting really worried.” Ceroba admitted.

“I told you it was just an old habit from work, I’m doing okay my love.”

“You always say that, but I never get any more convinced.” Ceroba was annoyed from hearing this excuse yet again.

“Really dear it isn’t anything serious, if it makes you feel better I have been taking my sleep supplements to rest better. I really am trying honey.” Chujin defended himself.

Ceroba didn’t want to admit it but this frequent dodging of her questions her husband was doing was now beginning to piss her off. She could tell that he has been lying to her for quite a while now, but she couldn’t figure out what it was. Clearly she needs to be more firm if she’s going to get an answer.

”well, that was all I wanted to say, so I’ll be returning to my work.” Chujin said, he began turning back to his office until.

”Chujin…”. Ceroba began, anger rising in her voice.

“Yes dea-“ Chujin wasn’t able to finish before Ceroba grabbed and pinned him against the nearby wall.  He was about to question what she was doing before she began speaking again in a now much more stern voice.

”Listen Chujin, You are going to tell me exactly what it is you’re doing on your little “work projects”. I tried to be nice about it dear but it’s obvious you are committed to keeping it from me.” Ceroba demanded.

”I can assure you dear, it was just a few bad nights!” Chujin was not expecting this of all things. he was hoping she would let this go long enough for him to commit to his experiment.

”IM DONE WITH YOUR EXCUSES! Don’t think I haven’t noticed you disappearing randomly every time you go into the dining room. is that where your little project is?!”

”well… it’s… umm..”. Chujin was truly at a loss for what to say right now. A part of him was extremely tempted to just tell Ceroba all that he had been doing these past few months. The pressure of hiding something this important was eating away at him. But at the moment, he was too worried to say anything.

Ceroba took a deep breath to try to calm herself down after noticing how terrified her husband was.  “Im sorry I snapped at you honey. But If what you’re hiding is important enough that you feel the need to keep it from me, then I can’t imagine what it’s doing to you. Please… please just tell me what it is.” Ceroba had tears beginning to form in her eyes.

Chujin was in deep thought. Had all of this really been worth it? He hated seeing his beloved like this. He hated all those sleepless nights he had looking for an answer. But most of all, he hated what he had become because of it. He grew colder to his family all because of some dream to stop something that was almost entirely out of his control. Is this really the monster that he wanted to be?

No. No it wasn’t. As much as he’d hate to throw all this progress out of the window. He needed to admit his mistakes before he did something truly unreversible. He was blind to how bad of an idea this was. How bad this would be if this experiment really did end up killing him. He just needed someone to call him out on it to realize that.

”Very well Ceroba. I’ll let you see exactly what I’ve been doing. But… please try to understand my reasonings once you do.” Chujin said, his voice trembling.

Ceroba let go of Chujin from the wall.

He led her to the dining room and down to his secret office. Ceroba didn’t see anything off about it other than the fact that it was under the Kotatsu until she saw a bright blue soul sitting on the table in the office.

“…How did you get this?” Ceroba turned to Chujin and asked, disbelief painted across her face.

”The soul never really was missing Ceroba. I’ve had it for quite a while now.”

“What could you possibly need a human soul for?” Ceroba wasn’t sure if she really wanted to know the answer. The implication that her husband had killed a human was not something she ever expected.

“Well… in theory, if I had injected some of its soul into my own soul I could create a serum to make any monster powerful. If everyone could become as powerful as the royal guard then maybe we wouldn’t have to worry so much about humans.” Chujin tried to explain in a way she could hopefully understand.

“Honey, science like that is barely explored. I may not know as much about science and engineering as you but I know what you’re doing is dangerous to your health.” Ceroba responded.

”Im aware dear. But at the time I considered it worth it. I couldn’t bear to think about another Snowdin incident happening.”

”Remember what I told you Chujin. I told you I didn’t want you to play hero if it meant it would bring harm to you. I meant it back then and I mean it just as much now. You shouldn’t kill yourself trying to Protect Kanako.”

“…”

“Listen honey, I appreciate that you’re willing to go through all of this just for our sakes. But I don’t want you to do this anymore. Starting tomorrow, we are cleaning this room out and bringing this soul to Asgore. If you don’t wish to talk about the human you killed right now then you may not. I don’t think I can handle it right now.” Ceroba stated.

it took Chujin a bit to accept that, but he finally responded. “I suppose that is only right that I give it up. Thank you my love.”

Ceroba said nothing back.

The two came out of the secret office, now wanting nothing to do with for now. Thankfully Kanako was still asleep so they could avoid very difficult conversations for another few days. They both went back to their bedroom down the hall and simply laid in bed together. tonight, they didn’t cuddle up next to each other or really sleep at all. This was going to take a lot to process. Chujin was thankful this didn’t seem to break their relationship too much. But this would take some getting used to for the both of them. Honestly though? having his truth finally revealed made Chujin feel like a lot of pressure was lifted over him. This would be a new era for the Ketsukanes for sure, but he would try his best to make it a good one. Besides, he likely wouldn’t even see another human.

Little did he know, a certain human with a sense of justice was well on their way.

Chapter Text

Justice was needed, and clover was more than willing to get it. No one else was willing to. Though Their impression of monsters was very limited. they only heard stories of what they could do and how dangerous they were. But Clover would find a way as they always did. Those children needed to be saved.

Their impression upon entering the underground however drastically changed their worldview. They had expected Monsters to be these hulking beasts and instead they seemed mostly harmless. Granted that first frog might have tried something but the Goat and the talking plant? They didn’t seem like they would hurt a fly.

“Right this way buddy!” Flowey told Clover. Clover fell down a second hole upon entering the ruins and ended up in this dark place, with their only friend being flowey. Clover found it weird to become friends with a talking plant of all things, but they needed help in order to complete their mission, so it would have to do. They passed through an archway and found some levers, likely being a puzzle.

“Ummm…” Clover wasn’t sure exactly a fan of puzzles, so they just flicked levers randomly to try and lower the spikes.

Amazingly, this stupid plan actually worked and allowed clover to move deeper into the dark ruins. If clover could get to the end of this hallway they cou-

*Flier blocks the way!

What? Clover didn’t really think there would be many monsters in a place as dark as this.

“Uhh… hello?” Clover awkwardly said.

“What’s up little human. Wanna see my new gains? ; )”. The strange monster asked.

Clover looked at the very round body the creature had and could tell it wasn’t gaining much of anything.

“Uhh. gains where exactly?”

That comment made the monster extremely sad.  “That hurt me on a personal level.”

The monster then started attacking Clover with flys. Clover dodged them rather easily as they were pretty slow.

“Don’t be sad partner, I didn’t mean it. You should live your life the best you can.” Clover told them.

“You’re right, something needs to change.  I shouldn’t have gotten upset by your comment.”  Flier quickly left the battle, going to improve himself.

Clover was surprised by how easy that was, but they continued on through the dark walkway until they eventually heard what sounded like someone’s voice. And with it, a strange cloaked figure talking to himself.

“Is it wrong to hold doubt in my actions?” The figure asked seemingly nobody. Clover thought about actually responding until the figure suddenly turned around to face them.

“What?… how did you?… No. I must be seeing things, you can’t be here again.”  The figure ran through the door.

Clover attempted to chase after him but he was already gone before they could catch up. They were hoping he could tell them how to get out of here.

“Hey buddy! Need a save?” Flowey popped out of the ground.

“Sure flowey. did you see where that hooded guy went?”

“That weirdo who guards the ruins? Not sure why you want to bother with him, but yes. He went past that corn field over there.” Flowey pointed a vine to a nearby corn field.

“Thanks flowey!” Clover yelled out as they ran off to try and find him.

Unfortunately, they would have to go through this maze to actually progress. They were having trouble for a bit, it was honestly impressive the corn could even grow here and make a large maze. After a minute though, Clover grew tired of trying to navigate this thing.  “Hey Flowey! Can you see over this thing? Where am I supposed to go?”

“Just take another right buddy! I can see the exit from here!”

“There’s no right here flowey.”

“What do you mean there’s no right?” Flowey was getting annoyed.

“I mean there’s no right. Only left and forward.” Clover defended themself.

What an idiot. They’re facing the wrong direction.  Flowey thought to himself. He didn’t feel like trying to redirect Clover, so he opted for just using some of his vines to tear a path through the corn. Clover wished he didn’t destroy it as this counter someone’s hard work, but they decided to just thank flowey and keep walking, making sure not to trip over any edges on the platforms. Wherever they went it was a long way down, and Clover wanted no part in it. One part of this platform was practically pitch black, and Clover was holding their hands out. Trying not to bump into any walls. Though they could hear what sounded like… flapping?

“Quiet please!” The voice said.

“Hello? I’m sorry I can’t see you right now. Can you help me get to a place with better light?” Clover tried to reason with whoever was talking.

“Move forward in silence, and you will find your way, Hush hush.”

Clover did as told and could see a light begin to form at the end of whatever hallway they were in.

“Stop, Hush hush. Move left in silence.”

Clover turned to the left and began walking forward, the light was getting bigger now. Atleast this thing was helping them.

“Move right in silence, Hush hush.”

Clover turned right and walked forward, now they could finally see the rest of the hallway. The lighting was much better now. Clover turned around to see who was talking to them. Only to be greeted by a strange bat creature with 4 wings.  “You have passed my test of quite well. You are worthy of being an honorary sentinel of silence.”

Clover gave a silent nod and watched the bat fly back into the darkness. That was a nice change of pace from the usual encounter, but they still had a mission that needed to be completed.

“Need a save buddy?” Flowey popped out again.

Right on time as usual, at least Flowey was consistent if nothing else. Clover saved and went back to their journey. Hopefully it wouldn’t be too long before they could leave these dark ruins. They came across an honestly not very well hidden tarp that led them into a cave-like area. It wasn’t all that different from any other area in the ruins but they did find a nice feather that they put on their hat. Through the cave though, Clover could see the hooded figure they had been chasing. So they started running to catch up to him again, making sure to wave to their bat friend who was hanging on a nearby pole as they did so. Clover finally caught up to the hooded figure as they were walking up a set of stairs.

“You again? I don’t know who you are, but I ask you, please leave!” He said as he walked up the stairs and through an archway.

Clover ran after him yet again through the archway until they found him again standing in front of a large door.

“And I was just starting to accept my reality, the cruelty. Never mind, words aren’t enough. I don’t want to fight anybody, but you’ve invaded my home. The exit is blocked and you can’t leave. I won’t allow it.”

“I don’t want to fight you, I just wanna find the children.” Clover stated.

“Only one thing left to do.”

The figure took off his hood and prepared for a battle. He looked to be some sort of vampire like the ones Clover heard in some legends. They never expected to actually meet one though. Clover didn’t want to fight this guy, so they decided to act instead.

*DALV -- ATK 6 DEF 4

*Wants to be left alone.

Dalv began to charge his magic and started throwing bolts of lightning in Clover's direction. Clover began running away from the lightning bolts but quickly stopped themself when they reached the water after realizing how bad going in the water would be here. Dalv began speaking again.

“Where did you come from anyway? There aren’t any accessible entrances.”

Before Clover could respond multiple bolts of lightning formed a circle around them, clover attempted to leap through them, but they ended up getting zapped. Clover looked at the burn mark left from the zap after the attack stopped and winced in pain.

“You aren’t a phantom, but could it be? …No. no it couldn’t.” Dalv told himself before charging up more magic.

“Partner I really don’t know what you’re talking about but if yo- “. Clover couldn’t finish before they got struck down by a jolt of energy. Clover was now in extreme pain and felt their skin burning from the heat of the electricity. They needed to end this soon or they would be done for.

“You…. You look so Helpless. Different. But is it a front?” Dalv asked himself before opening his cloak to send more energy jolts at Clover. Clover managed to dodge them this time, however.

Dalv was having trouble telling what was real and what wasn’t. He wanted to end this fight already. So, he charged the strongest bolt of electricity he could muster. And sent it at Clover with incredible speed.

Clover knew they wouldn’t be able to dodge this one, so they did their best to cover themself and hope this didn’t kill them. But right before it could hit them, a wall of vines erupted and blocked the bolt from hitting clover. Clover couldn’t hear it, but Flowey was swearing like a sailor behind the wall from the pain of the lightning hitting his vines.

Dalv used all of his energy into that attack, and couldn’t muster any more magic, so he collapsed to the ground, not having any more fight in him. He was expecting to be killed any second now. The human however, offered their hand instead.

“You want me to… shake your hand? But… that is a sign of friendship, is it not? You really want to be friends even after I wrongfully attacked you?” Dalv was just confused now.

“Of course, partner, I’ve been trying to be since we started this mess.” Clover kept their hand held out.

“You definitely aren’t who I thought you were, I’m sorry. But umm… what does being friends entail again? I apologize, I haven’t had a real friend in a long time.” Dalv asked.

“Well, we can start by telling me how to get out of this place.”

“Right! It’s actually past my house, if you’d like to see it.”

Dalv and clover went towards a large stone door that went into a tiny cozy house. The inside was small with blue painted walls and drawings plastered on multiple tables.

“If you excuse me, I have to… fix something in the other room. It might be a bit, so feel free to rest.” Dalv walked away into said room.

Clover decided to sit at one of the tables and inspect some of the drawings, most of them were landscape drawings of places with snow and water but one of them caught Clover's eye… It was a picture of a small fox looking creature wearing a little kimono. Clover was curious about who this was, hopefully they could ask Dalv whenever they came back. For now Clover would just wait for Dalv to get back, maybe then they could create a better course of action.

Chapter Text

Clover got up from the table when they heard Dalv come back from his room. Though now he was wearing a very large coat that covered most of his body and a bit of his neck to. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and… I know we just became friends, but I want to help you through the underground.” Dalv said with the best look of determination he could make.

“Well that would be helpful, but are you sure you wanna do that partner? I’ve heard this place was dangerous.” Clover asked.

“That’s exactly why I want to help you. I don’t want to simply rot away in these old ruins anymore, I need to leave this place.” Dalv tried his best to sound confident.

“Well, I appreciate any help I can get. the names Clover by the way, I don’t think I told you.”

“Clover… alright, I think I’m ready to go if you are.”

“Alright then partner.”

The two began heading towards the back door before Dalv quickly ran back. “Pops! Hold down the house for me while I go with Clover okay? I’ll come back in a while!” Dalv yelled out. Clover wasn’t sure who Pops was but they didn’t pry with that. They also put the picture of the fox into their satchel to ask him about it later. Now wasn’t the best of times. Both of them went towards the back of the house.

“I’ll get these boards of the door for us.” Dalv said before ripping off said boards. He then opened the door to reveal snow. A lot of snow. Clover took a step out to the new area and instantly regretted not bringing any sort of jacket. Now they understood why Dalv brought that coat. But they would brave it out as usual. A little cold isn’t enough to stop this hero.

“This is Snowdin. I used to live here before I ended up in the dark ruins.” Dalv informed Clover.

“Why did you move into the ruins anyway?” Clover asked.

“…I don’t like to talk about it.  It brings up bad memories.”

“Fair enough I suppose.”

The two began walking through this new area. It was quite beautiful even if the cold was bothering Clover. It had extremely tall trees and large mounds of snow that seemed to never end.

“So which way partner?” Clover asked Dalv.

“If I remember correctly, this route should take us to the resort. There we will be able to warm up and maybe form a better plan.”

“Alright, anything I need to worry about?”

“Well… sometimes guards are stationed down here, so there is that. You will need to stay out of sight if we see one.  They’re job is to capture humans like yourself.”

The two continued down the path, occasionally seeing some monsters pass by. Clover guessed they weren’t attacking because Dalv was around them. That certainly made this easier. The two walked up one of the mounds and eventually found what looked like a kid stuck to a pole.

“Hey! Can you hep ne ofth thith pole?” The kid tried to speak, but their tongue was the thing stuck to the pole.

“Naybe thome waum cawfee will fwee ny poor tongue.”

Clover felt bad for the kid but they didn’t have any coffee or method to help them.

“I’m sorry little one but we don’t have any coffee, and my magic can’t help you. Don’t worry though. we’ll see about sending someone over here when we get to the resort.” Dalv assured the kid, he honestly wasn’t sure how to fix this problem but he didn’t want to be dragged into another kids issues when he was already dealing with one.

Clover and Dalv then made a right through a heavily shaded area with a lot of trees. Clover decided to try and get some information on this place.  “So how long have you lived here before the whole ruins thing?”

”A few years or so.  It’s been quite a while since I’ve been here.  It’s still just as beautiful as I remember though.  When I lived here, I had a friend I would always hang out with, I think she was one of the only ones who understood me.”

”sounds nice partner.  I’d imagine living out in the ruins impacted that a lot.”

”It probably did, but I think she’s the one who’s been giving me corn for awhile now.  It helped me live in that dark place and made me feel less lonely.”

”well, what was her name?” 

“Kanako.”  Dalv told them.

they stopped walking as they heard someone tampering with something around a corner.

“I’ll go ahead Clover, that sounds like it could be a guard.” Dalv said before turning the corner to be met with a large Blue bird Monster, who seemed to be finishing up on a puzzle.  “Recalibrate the lava rock puzzle, check!” The blue bird exclaimed before turning around and seeing Dalv.  “Oh, hello mister! Did ya need something?”

“Umm… yes. Could you open the gate so I can get through?  I need to get to honeydew resort.”  Dalv asked, trying to hide how nervous he was talking to a guard.

She looked over at the gate. “Well, I’m not technically supposed to… but you don’t seem like an intruder, So sure!” She flicked a secret lever behind a bush that bypassed the puzzle and opened the gate.

“I’m Martlet by the way!” The blue bird said, holding her wing out for a handshake (or wing-shake?)

“Dalv.” He took her wing and tried to do what he thought was a handshake. He wasn’t sure how to do it with someone who has a wing.

“It was great to meet you Dalv! I need to go work on my other puzzle now though, so I’ll see you later!” Martlet said before flying off somewhere.

“Ok Clover! The guard is gone!” Dalv yelled out as soon as he confirmed Martlet was completely gone.

Clover came out from behind the corner. “Do you think she’ll be a problem?”

“No, I don’t think so. She doesn’t seem as much of a fanatic of hunting humans as some other guard members are.  If she’s the only one here, I think we will have an easy time getting through Snowdin.”

“Okay then, that’s good, let’s continue on. This cold is really getting to me.”

Dalv and clover Walked through the gate and further down the path. Eventually they found a cup of coffee sitting on a strangely placed table. When Clover tried to reach for it, a monster slid out of seemingly nowhere and grabbed the mug.  “BAM! Who am I? Nobody of note ya know. JUST THE BEST DARN SALESMAN EVER!”

“Wha-“ Clover didn’t get to finish.

“Now the fact that ya tried to get your mitts on this here mug only tells me one thing. You’re lookin for somethin to hit the spot right? well of course you are!”

The monster threw the mug away. “The names MO. And I got somethin that just might peak your interest kid! A patented hot popsicle! Comes in many different temperatures, cuz liquids? So last season.”

“Uhh… sure I guess. I’ll take the hot pop.” Clover quickly gave Mo the small but of G they had and got the hot pop. They didn’t really want anything to do with this guy so Clover tugged dalv along out of there.

They continued on with Clover eating their hot pop, that surprisingly, was actually hot. On their way they passed multiple monsters, a strange snow castle that seemed to have infinite smaller castles, a wolf throwing ice in the river, and a poorly built house.  All things Clover was surprised to see down here despite the circumstances.

“When I move out of the ruins, I think I’m going to try and move into that house.” Dalv said, pointing at a dilapidated house.

“The broken one? That seems like a hard thing to try and work with.” Clover said.

“Yes but it would be worth it to finally abandon that place for good and come back where I belong. Right after I help you of course.”

The two. came up to a large archway, where the Honeydew resort could be seen from a distance.

“Weird, I remember there being cups that blocked the way to here…. Well I guess that makes it easier for us. Let’s go Clover.” Dalv said, holding his hand out for Clover to take.

Clover took Dalv’s hand and walked with him into the Resort. He was right, it was a lot better in here. Everything in it looked cozy and well maintained, with a band playing jazzy music and people drinking coffee. The two picked a table to sit down in.

“Alright Clover, we need a plan if we’re going to get you out of here.” Dalv said.

“Right to the king, right?  I know we gotta reach him.” Clover asked.

“Well, we will have to pass him to get there. Which will be the difficult part. He’s a very powerful monster, they made him king for a reason.  I can’t really help you with him.”

“I’ll find a way Dalv, I’ve survived well this long right?” Clover wasn’t actually sure how true that was.  From what Flowey told them, it seemed like the king had killed humans, and would probably try to kill them too.

“Well, to get there we should avoid waterfall. That’s where the captain should be. She’s one of the strongest we’ve got and would absolutely kill you on sight. so instead, we should head straight to Hotland. There, it should just be a straight walk through the capital city and to the throne room.”

“Loud and clear partner.” Clover said.

“Perfect, I’ll take you there in a bit. But would you like to eat first? I don’t think you have since you got down here, aside from that pop of course.” Dalv asked.

“Well now that you mention it, I wouldn’t mind eating something.  I’ve been down here long enough.”

Chapter Text

Both Clover and Dalv went up to the counter to order.

“W-Welcome to the Honeydew Resort! (Was that the line?)” the shopkeeper said, visibly nervous.

“Hello there. Could me and Clover get 2 orders of pancakes please? You do still sell those right? I apologize, I haven’t been back here in a while.” Dalv asked her.

“Of course we still do! It’s our most popular item after all! Oh, um by the way, I think I remember you! Y-You were the one who would sit and watch the band all the time right?”

“Uhh… yes that was me.” Dalv found those days embarrassing and wished she didn’t bring those up.

“Well it’s g-good to have you back! (What am I doing with myself?)”

“Here Clover, I’ll get the bill. It’s the least I can do after all.” Dalv turned to Clover and said.

He preceded to put a decent amount of G on the counter and received 2 plates of pancakes from the shopkeeper. Dalv thanked the shopkeeper and brought the pancakes back to the table. Him and Clover began eating the pancakes.  “This stuff is good, I can see why this is so popular.” Clover said in between stuffing pancakes into their mouth.

“It’s sort of been the main thing people come here for. It’s nice to see that they’re still as good as I remember.” Dalv said.

Clover finished all the pancakes at an incredible speed. Dalv stared in amazement as all the pancakes were gone in less than 2 minutes.  He really didn’t know much about humans after all.

“That was good, partner. I’ll pay you back when I hopefully get more G.” Clover said.

“…no, Clover, it’s fine.” Dalv managed to speak.

“Well, I’ll be waiting for ya outside.” Clover said as they got up and walked out the door.  When they stepped out into the snow, they were greeted by a familiar friend. “Howdy pal! Hope you didn’t forget about little ‘ol me hanging out with the town weirdo.”

“Don’t be mean Flowey. He’s helping me get to the king.” Clover defended Dalv.

“Im just kidding buddy! But it might be worth saving here, just in case anything happens.”

“Yeah, sure.” Clover saved Before turning back to Flowey.  “By the way, how come you never show up whenever someone else is near me?  I’m sure Dalv would like to meet you too.”

“I’m just a little nervous around other monsters Clover!  You’d understand if you were a plant like myself.  Monsters like count introvert over there aren’t usually the kinds of monsters you want to be around.”

”I guess I can’t argue with that, but you really should come out and meet some new people some day Flowey.  Ya know, get out of your shell -er stem?”

”Maybe someday buddy, but today is not that day.  The weirdo is coming back now so I’ll have to see you later.”

Flowey went back into the ground.  A few seconds later, Dalv came out of the resort, having ate his pancakes and ready to continue onward.  “Ok Clover, I’m ready to go now.”

“Uhh… Alright partner, let’s go.”

The two walked past the resort and into a more secluded area where a strange bridge with moving parts could be seen.  Clover looked at the strange contraption and turned to Dalv.  “Is this one of the guards puzzles?”

“Looks like it, doesn’t seem too hard though. Just time it right.” Dalv told them.

Dalv went first and past the first 3 moving planks relatively easily. Once he got to the fourth though, he tripped and fell on the bridge. thankfully, that fourth was the last moving part of the bridge, so Dalv didn’t fall through and successfully made it to the other side. Clover carefully timed 2 of the planks before realizing that they could just jump over the gaps rather than timing it. So they just jumped over the last 2. Dalv wondered why he didn’t just think of that in the first place, but at least they were both past the puzzle now.

“Ya know, I sorta expected these puzzles to be more difficult.” Clover said as the two kept walking.

“Well, they were probably built by only 1 guard. They don’t expect humans to come down to this part of Snowdin, they only really expect you to be at upper Snowdin.” Dalv responded.

“Seems weird to do that, I was expecting this place to be more dangerous. It sorta just seems like a normal town, even if it doesn’t have a lot of buildings.”

“That was exactly why I lived here, it was a peaceful life.”

“I can see how it would be, I personally wouldn’t live anywhere this cold though.” Clover admitted.

The two came across another puzzle locked gate like the one they were near at the beginning of Snowdin.  “Another one? I really don’t wanna do these things. Do you have anything that can just bypass these Dalv?” Clover asked.

“Well… I might have something.” Dalv aimed a lightning bolt at the gates locking mechanism. Once he threw it, the lightning bolt completely destroyed the puzzles inner workings, but it did allow the gate to be freely opened by hand.

Now past the last puzzle, there was nothing stopping the two from leaving Snowdin. At least, that’s what they thought until they came across Martlet, who fell asleep in her kiosk.  “Ok Clover, same plan as last time. I’m going to distract her, you sneak past the kiosk.” Dalv whispered to Clover.

Clover nodded and hit behind Dalv’s over large coat, which did wonders for hiding them. The two walked over to the kiosk, the noise of the snow crunching underneath them making Martlet wake up. “Oh, uh, Hello!” Martlet suddenly stirred awake and said. “Oh, hey! it’s you again! Hello mister Dalv! Did you need help finding where to go?” Martlet asked, now recognizing who was in front of her.

“Actually yes, I did. I was wondering if you knew any easy way to get to Hotland?” Dalv responded.

“You bet! There’s a few different ways to get there actually.”

Clover took this chance to crouch low to the ground and carefully sneak around the kiosk while the two were talking. Once they made it past the kiosk, they got back up and began slowly walking to not make any loud footsteps. They looked back as they walked to see how Dalv was doing. Unfortunately, one of the poffs of snow was deeper than they expected, and they tripped into the snow, making a loud crunching sound.

“What the?” Martlet peeked her head out of the kiosk to see a human that had stumbled onto the ground. Martlet gasped in excitement.  “Is that a?!” Martlet tried to speak before pulling out her guard book to read a page.  “It is! It’s a human! Oh my goodly goodness, I have to take this opportunity!” Martlet said as she came out of the kiosk and towards Clover, who had now got up from the snow and was just blankly staring at her.

“Hello human! I am Martlet of the royal guard, and it’s my job to apprehend you!” Martlet said with enthusiasm.

“Uhh… well can ya not do that?” Clover asked.

“Nope! Sorry! protocol and all. You know how it is.” Martlet tried reasoning.

As soon as she got ready for battle, Dalv quickly stepped in front of the human.

“Umm, sir. You’re standing in front of them.” Martlet told Dalv.

“I know. I’m sorry Martlet, but I can’t let you have Clover.” Dalv said in defense.

“Really? But that’s…”. Martlet began frantically looking through her book for a page on this.  “Protocol 4, in the event that a human has a companion helping them… ignore protocol 1 and apprehend both of them.” Martlet read from the book.

“I’m really sorry about this Dalv, but I have to take both of you in. Protocol 2, my attack!” Martlet said as she summoned multiple feathers that hovered around her for a bit, before targeting Clover and Dalv.

Clover ducked down into the snow to dodge the feathers while Dalv tried to quickly dash away. it’s been a long time since Dalv has been in a fight, and it certainly shows here. As hard as he tried to dodge, one feather did get lodged into his coat.

Clover decided to act, determined to not fight Martlet.

*Martlet ATK 8 DEF 10

*A little scatterbrained.

“?” Martlet wondered why the two were not fighting back. She summoned another barrage of feathers and aimed it at them. Dalv had an idea this time however. When the feathers began targeting them, he summoned lighting bolts around him and Clover, burning the feathers on contact.

“Wha- hey! You can’t do that!” Martlet yelled out.

“We won’t attack you Mrs Martlet, but we also aren’t going to let you win.” Dalv said.

Martlet huffed in annoyance and decided to change strategy’s. She began to flap her wings and fly over Dalv and Clover. They were confused as to what she was doing until she began dropping a bunch of random junk that they didn’t even know she had on her. Nails, snow globes, bowling balls, you name it. Clover wasn’t expecting the random objects and got hit on the head with a snowglobe, knocking them to the ground. Right as another one was about to hit, Dalv swooped above Clover and took the hit instead, taking some of his hp.

Martlet was now beginning to feel extremely bad.

“Hey, you guys can attack back. I can take it! I swear!” Martlet offered.

“Not happening.” Clover said as they got back up from the ground.

“You are really making this difficult to do ya know.” Martlet replied.

She then proceeded to summon and throw tool boxes that exploded on impact when touching the ground. Clover managed to shoot one out of the sky with their toy gun while Dalv summoned balls of electricity and collided them with the other 3. It was clear this fight wasn’t really going anywhere.

“Uhh, oh! Last week. I apprehended this girl! She didn’t attack me exactly but she got real aggressive when I captured her like ‘what are you on about?! I’m not a human. Clear the feathers out of your head!’ Can you be aggressive like her to make this easier?” Martlet asked.

“Uhh, sure? Your uhh… boots look bad.” Clover said, they didn’t really mean that but it was the best they could think of.

“There you go! What kind of royal guard wears boots like these right? It’s not like I spent months trying to find ones that fit or anything. Haha…”.

Martlet began summoning feathers again, though this time she made them spin around in a tornado like fashion, Dalv was going to burn the feathers with lightning bolts again, but the feather tornado caused enough wind to blow Dalv back a bit. Now clover had to face the tornado without Dalv’s help. They managed to nearly dodge 2 of the feathers, but unfortunately, two got lodged into clovers arm. This made Clover immediately collapse to the ground and yell in pain.

“Clover! Are you ok?!” Dalv ran up to Clover and asked.

“Ughhh. Yeah I’m good partner.” Clover grumbled.

“Here Clover, you need this.” Dalv pulled out a pancake he saved and gave it to Clover, this healed back the hp they lost.

“Thanks, Dalv.” Clover said, getting back up from the snow.

Martlet felt like the scum of the earth. She always knew she would have to do this as a part of her job but she was banking off the idea that a human simply wouldn’t show up or just go to a different area. As exciting as this opportunity was, she really didn’t want to fight a kid who wouldn’t even fight back.

“Alright. Let’s continue.” Clover said with determined look on their face.

Martlet mustered up the courage to summon another attack.  This time, she opted to only target Clover with boxes and feathers.  Clover had managed to dodge most of the feathers, but they ended up getting hit in the chest with one of the boxes.  This caused Clover to grunt in pain again.  Martlet couldn’t take the pressure anymore, she didn’t want to see this kid get hurt even more than they already were.

”I’m ready for your next attack.”  Clover said through pained breaths.

“Actually, I don’t think I want to do this anymore.” Martlet admitted.

“What? Isn’t this your job?”

“It is but… I really don’t want to hurt you two, you won’t even fight back and… it just doesn’t feel right anymore. There has to be another way to do this.” Martlet was in deep thought. Then she got an idea.

“I know! If the royal guard doesn’t know your here, then they won’t know I broke protocol! We just need to get you home before they notice!” Martlet said, pointing at Clover.

“So you’ll help us then? Well that’s great! We can use really any help we can get.” Clover said.

“Yup! Speaking of, you said you needed to get to Hotland right Dalv? I have a boat that can get us there. Follow me!”

Clovers luck was really amping up. They now had 2 allies they could hopefully rely on to get to the king. They followed Martlet all the way up to a dock where a small boat could be seen.

“Ohh… the boat is too small to fit all 3 of us.” Martlet realized.

“Well can’t you fly over there while we ride the boat?” Dalv asked.

“I technically can, but i shouldn’t stay flying for that long. Getting tired mid flight could be really bad for me, wouldn’t want to fall on something.”

Dalv thought for a second and realized that Martlet would probably be better to take Clover home than him, being a royal guard, she likely knew the underground better than him.  He could probably find another way to them anyway.  “Ok Clover. I don’t think all of us will be able to continue together. don’t worry, I’ll find another way to reach you, but I should ask… do you trust Mrs Martlet enough to go with her?”

Clover looked at Martlet and tried to decipher any possible bad intentions. But frankly, they couldn’t see any malice on the bird. She genuinely did seem like she wanted to help.  “I trust her Dalv. I’ll see you in a bit partner.”

“Very well then, I hope you two make It there safely. Dalv said before walking away, likely to go back to the resort.

“Don’t worry Clover. I’ll guard you with my Soul! We should get going though, wouldn’t want the guard to find us!” Martlet said.

“Alright partner, let’s go.”

Chapter Text

Martlet untied the boat and quickly got on it before it sailed away into Waterfall. Clover began look through their satchel and found the picture of the fox monster. Looks like they had forgotten to ask Dalv about it. No point in dwelling on it now though, for now they could relax and see the sights.  “So, Hi! Enjoying the boat ride? I named her Ava, she’s the best boat I’ve ever ridden. And also, the only boat I’ve ever ridden now that I think about it.” Martlet said.

“It’s great Martlet. How long will it take us to get to Hotland?” Clover asked.

“Should only be a few minutes, I think. But could you take this questionnaire I have for a second? It’s sorta a legal thing. You know how it is.”

“Sure partner.”

“Alright! Question 1. How would you rate your encounter with the royal guard?”

“Uhh. Fine I guess, you didn’t capture me so I’m pretty happy with it.”

“I’ll just put you down for a 2 then. Ok, question 2. How would you rate the puzzles deployed in Snowdin?”

“I actually skipped most of them with Dalv. Sorry about that.”

“…I’ll just put you down for a 1 then.” Martlet said sadly.

Some time passes by as Clover and Martlet both look at their surroundings, taking in waterfalls beauty.  “I won’t lie to ya Martlet. I’m a little scared of what might happen when I get to the king.” Clover admitted.

“Oh clover…” Martlet went over to Clover’s side of the boat and hugged them.  “It’ll be okay Clover, I promise.” Martlet said while hugging them.

“Thanks Martlet, I’m sorry I have to burden you to keep myself safe.”

“You aren’t a burden to me Clover, don’t ever forget that.  If anything, I should be the one apologizing for attacking you."

They spend a while hugging each other until one of them heard something.  “Hey, do you hear an abnormal amount of running water?” Martlet asked.

“Well now that ya mention it, I have been hearing that for a bit now.” Clover said.

The boat began picking up speed at an incredible rate. They now went out of the waterfall area and into a tube over what Clover guessed was Hotland.  “Martlet, where are we going?!” Clover yelled out.

“I may or may not have been down this route before!” Martlet yelled back.

The boat went right past the area and into what looked like a cave.  “Ohnoohnoohnoohno!” Martlet spoke out before the boat crashed into a rock, sending Clover plummeting downwards while Martlet quickly began flying. Clover landed in the ground below with a loud crashing sound.

“Clover! Are you ok?! Don’t worry, I’ll go get help!” Clover could somewhat hear Martlet say before hearing her fly away somewhere.

“Ughhhh. Well, that’ll be number 3 on the falling list.” Clover grumbled before picking themself up off the ground. Thankfully, they didn’t break anything yet again.

Flowey popped out near the boat to greet Clover.  “Hey buddy! That was a nasty fall you had there. It looks like bird brain decided to leave you alone too. Guess it’s just us now!  Make sure ya save before you go though!” Flowey told Clover.

“Yeah, yeah I know.” Clover was just annoyed hearing that now, but they still saved anyway. They were beginning to wonder if they even needed these saves.

They decided to go through the rest of the cave to exit, where they found… sand. And an entire desert. They shouldn’t be surprised there’s an entire desert down here but it still caught them off guard. Regardless, they began trekking through the sand and over to a nearby hill.

*Dunebud blocks the way!

“Right on time as usual.” Clover said to nobody.

The Dunebud began throwing what looked to be tumbleweeds at Clover. They managed to dodge all of them with relative ease. Clover was thinking of how to get past this monster until they noticed how much it just keeps wiggling as if it’s trying to dance. So they got the idea to mimic the Dunebud and wiggle with it. This seems to have made it happier.

This time Dunebud began jumping over to Clover to try to go for what they could only guess was a body slam. They managed to dodge the monsters attacks twice but they got hit by the third one. Though Dunebud's body seemed to be similar to Jello, so its attempts at attacking didn’t hurt very much.

“Aggooo?” The Dunebud spoke, though Clover couldn’t understand what they were saying, they still found it adorable.

“Awww, aren’t you a silly little thing.” Clover said as they decided to pet the Dunebud on the head. This seems to have calmed it down.

“Oooooo.” The Dunebud spoke again, now being Completely calm. Clover took this opportunity to leave the happy Dunebud and continue on.

They continued through the vast desert until they noticed the extremely high winds that were pushing sand everywhere, Causing what was basically a sandstorm. They decided to hide behind objects to take cover from the winds, this worked pretty well actually and They continued on with this idea all for a good 5 minutes until they finally reached the end on the high winds. Only to realize all of this was caused by a giant fan that was just sitting here for some reason. Clover found this annoying and turned off the fan, completely ignoring the look the nearby monster was giving them.

They passed the fan area and saw a giant tree that was growing surprisingly well for how harsh this environment was.

“Howdy! How’s life treating you?” Flowey popped out and said.

“Ya know you really gotta warn me before sneaking up on me like that partner.” Clover told him.

“Sorry Clover, can’t really help it being a plant and all.”

“Sure ya can’t.” Clover sarcastically said.  “Ya know, I never asked, but how come you agreed to help me anyway?”

“Because you need my help buddy! Getting to the king is no easy task, and I’m more than happy to help someone in need.”

“There’s gotta be more to it than that Flowey.”

“Well I will say there is a bit more to it. I don’t like how the king treats humans. Killing all those innocent kids! How could someone do such a thing? That’s why you need to make him answer for his crimes Clover.  I can't do it myself."

“Yeah… right.” Clover honestly wasn’t betting on their chances against the king. From what they heard of him so far, he was powerful, and Clover’s confidence dropped the more they heard about him.  That wouldn't stop Flowey from trying to hype them up though

“Don’t worry buddy! I’ll be with you every step of the way!” Flowey reassured Clover.

Clover was sort of put off by that.  Unlike Martlet, Flowey gave off this strange vibe that told Clover they shouldn’t trust him. They found it weird that Flowey was only willing to show up for them and no one else for whatever his reasonings were.   He definitely wanted something from Clover, but they couldn’t figure out what.

Regardless, they said nothing about it and saved again to head off past the tree. Once past the tree, Clover could see a large mountain with many workers who seemed to be mining on it. Before they could get to it though, a tumble weed fell in front of them. In fact, a lot of tumbleweeds did, and more were coming.   They quickly ran through the path of falling tumbleweeds hoping to not get hit. this mostly worked, but It did ended up with Clover taking a tumbleweed to the chest.  Thankfully they didn’t really do all that much just being a weed and all.

They wanted to just go past the mountain, but there was a giant rock standing in the way of the path. Which meant they would have to go through the mineshaft. Clover went Inside the mineshaft and found a belt buckle that someone had just left on a shelf. They figured they may as well take it; it could be helpful later. With the buckle equipped, Clover went to the right to find an elevator, where two workers were staring at it, likely attempting to open it.  “Having trouble, you two?” Clover asked them.

“The elevator’s jammed with a stick, we can’t get the door to open.” One of the workers replied.

“Well then just use the pickaxe you got and break it.” Clover said, pointing to the pickaxe on the workers waist.

“Oh.” The worker grabbed the pickaxe and smashed the stick out of the door, fixing the elevator.

“I feel like an idiot.” The worker said before getting on the elevator. Clover decided to join them, they needed to get past this mountain as soon as possible if they were going to complete their mission anyway.  Clover rode the elevator all the way up to the top, where the workers got out along with them. Looking down the hallway. Clover saw a mine cart that they could ride to the other side of the mines, so they went over to it and got in. The mine cart started heading down the track into this extremely beautiful cave with an assortment of gems and stones that almost resembled stars. Clover spent a good amount of time looking at all the pretty gems. unfortunately, they leaned a little too far trying to get a better look at one of them and ended up de-railing the cart of the track and into the pit.

Clover instantly panicked for a second, but the cart somehow fell on another track. They had no clue how they got lucky enough for this to happen, but anything seemed to be possible down here. Clover looked ahead to see where this new track went, hoping it would take them where they needed to go, maybe even faster than the other track.

Yeah, Nope, this was not where they needed to go, this track took them into an even darker cave with barely any light to see. They couldn’t tell where they were going now, just that the cart was moving somewhere. Clover sat in silence in the cart for several minutes until it seemed to get stuck on something, stopping the cart completely. The section of the cave it had stopped in had a little more light to work with, but they couldn’t see a lot in the cave other than spider webs… a lot of spider webs.

They got out to see what had gotten the cart stuck, until they heard a voice in the cave.

“Ahuhuhu~” a female voice laughed.  “I heard a human in a cowboy vest and a hat would show up here.” It spoke again.  “I heard that they love to kill spiders.” She seemed to be taunting Clover.  “I heard that they love to play hero."  Clover was beginning to worry about who this voice was and what they wanted.

“I heard…. That they REALLY should have thought before stealing our products.” Clover could now see who was talking. She seemed to be a spider monster, wearing some strange dress and carrying teacups in her multiple hands.  “I’ll give you this human, I wasn’t all that mad about you stealing from our humble little stand in the dark ruins. That thing doesn’t make much money anyway. I would have been okay with letting that go. But since you came right to us instead~”. She said before walking Closer to Clover. Now that she mentioned it, Clover could remember that they took some lemonade from that stand without paying. They didn’t think anyone ran it anyway.

“I wouldn’t mind having a new ingredient to work with~”

She trapped Clover in a large web and began calling spiders to crawl over to Clover. They couldn’t dodge this one easily, so they did their best to weave around the spiders as they crawled, managing to just barely avoid getting bitten. Clover decided to CHECK this new monster.

*Muffet 8ATK 8DEF

“Hey! What’s your problem!” Clover yelled to Muffet.

“Nothing's wrong with me dearie, just taking a new business opportunity~”

She began throwing Croissants and calling more spiders to attack Clover. One of the spiders managed to bite Clover this time, causing them to yell out in pain. Clover struggled against the web, managing to pull out an arm and a leg. If they could pull some more, they might be able to flee.

“It’s pointless to struggle dearie~”

Muffet started throwing donuts directly at Clover, which distracted them from dodging the spiders. They managed to weave around most of the spiders, but one of them managed to bite them again. Clover struggled against the web with all their might, they managed to pull their other leg out, if they could pull one more time, they could run from this.  Muffet went and climbed on a web above them to pour excruciatingly hot tea over their chest, burning their torso and causing Clover to try and pull even harder.  With that last bit of effort, they managed to free themselves from the web.   Clover wasted no time to run back to the cart and push it through the webbing that it got stuck in. With enough force, the cart went free, and Clover quickly pushed it down the rail and got in it, hoping to flee Muffet.

“Leaving so soon? Wouldn’t you like to meet my pet first?~”. Muffet said.

Clover wondered what she meant before they saw what looked like a giant muffin with spider legs, chasing their cart down the track. The track began curving downwards, causing the cart to speed up. This didn’t stop the strange muffin creature from chasing them though, and it let out a roar as it began catching up to the cart. In desperation, Clover pulled out their toy gun and aimed at the legs of the creature. they figured this wouldn’t hurt it, but it would get it off the track long enough for them to escape.  They began firing at it, causing it to make loud roar sounds and crawl over the track even faster.  The track began twisting and turning similarly to a roller coaster Clover might have been on back home.  the creature jumped off the track for some reason, presumably back to Muffet. Clover breathed a sigh of relief, though they wondered what had made the creature jump off.  Then they noticed the track curve downward, this made their cart pick up speed rapidly.   As they looked down, they could see where the track would curve up into a ramp formation, and light from what they assumed was outside. They held on to the cart for dear life, unsure as to what might happen.

Martlet was flying in the air of the dunes looking for Clover. She had gotten Dalv from the resort and had him come to look for Clover as well.  “Do you see anything Martlet?” Dalv yelled out to her.

“Nothing yet, it’s like they just aren’t here!” Martlet yelled back. She was beginning to worry of all the things that could’ve happened to Clover. Maybe a guard had found them and taken them, maybe they got lost and couldn’t find a way through, maybe they-.

Martlet couldn’t finish that thought before something caught her eye. In the air, was a… mine cart? Martlet wondered how someone had launched a mine cart that high into the air, but then she noticed something crazier… Clover was in the cart, hanging on as best they could. She was simply stunned out of her mind for a moment, amazed at how much distance the cart was making. She snapped out of it though as she watched the cart finally plummet somewhere into the nearby oasis valley.

“Dalv! I found Clover! Quick, we need to get to them!” Martlet yelled, now running over to oasis valley, hoping that Clover was ok.

Clover was in the worst pain they think they’ve been in this whole journey, as lucky as they considered themself to even be alive, they felt like one more beating might actually do them in. Clover lifted their face out of the sand and looked around at their surroundings. The cart they were in had crashed into a nearby cherry blossom tree, destroying some of its branches and throwing Clover onto the sand where they were now laying. Clover looked past the tree and noticed the large ornate house they were close to. In fact, they were on the inside of the large ornate fence and gate that would have kept them out otherwise. They tried to get up off the ground but instantly fell back down again in pain.  They sat in horror for a moment as they realized that this crash had completely broken one of their legs.

“Dalv… Martlet… Flowey… Help me please.” Clover didn’t have enough strength to yell it out. They simply layed on the sand in pain for a few minutes, though it felt like a few hours.  and they cried, this journey was really getting to them.

…

No. Clover can’t give up now. This would set them back quite a lot, but if they needed help, they were going to have to get up and get it.  They need to stay determined.  They grabbed a nearby fallen branch to balance themself, and slowly got back up, beginning to limp over to the front of the house, hoping someone in it could help them. At the front entrance, they managed to limp up over the few stairs and knocked on the door of the house. They waited for a bit until someone answered the door. It was a little fox wearing a kimono… exactly like the one on the picture Clover had in their satchel.

“Hello! Do you need something?” The little fox asked.

Clover was shocked they had managed to find the fox from the picture and simply stared at her for a moment, giving her a better look at them.

“Wait, are you a…?” The little fox asked.

*FILE SAVED

what was that?  Clover just had a strange feeling, but they brushed it off when they heard another voice from inside the house.

“Kanako dear, who’s at the door?” It called out.

Clover looked into the house and could see what looked to be a taller fox monster wearing a green montsuki, purple fur, and green goggles. The taller fox came down the hallway and stopped, likely processing what Clover was. Clover was about to say something, but the fox quickly sprang into action, summoning a strange staff with red ribbons and a bell, and ran down to the front door where they went past the smaller fox and hit Clover right in the face with the staff, knocking their branch away and sending them down the small set of stairs.

“GET BACK KANAKO!” The fox yelled out Before closing the front door and going down the stairs and onto the sand where Clover now lay.

“Please…”. Clover could barely say anything.

Without a word, the tall fox began to beat them with the staff again and again, with unrelenting anger. A loud *crack* could be heard as the staff had completely broke Clovers skull. Clover could feel their body give out. It seems like, despite Their tenacity, this cowboy wouldn’t be able to complete their mission after all…

*FILE LOADED

-“Kanako dear, Who’s at the door?” Another voice called out.

Clover felt a strange sense of Deja vu for some reason, but still looked into the house and saw what looked to be a taller fox with monster wearing a green montsuki, purple fur, and green goggles. The taller fox came down the hallway and stopped, likely processing what Clover was. Suddenly, the fox quickly sprang into action, summoning a strange staff with red ribbons and a bell, and ran down to the front door where they went past the smaller fox monster. as if on instinct, Clover quickly held up the branch they were carrying and blocked the incoming hit from the fox. They were both now clashing their weapons, staring intensely at each other, With the smaller fox also staring in shock.

“Sir, please stop!” Clover quickly told the fox.

“I will not allow another human to harm my family.” The fox told them.

“I mean no harm! Honest!” Clover yelled out, they weren’t sure how much longer they could keep clashing like this, their broken leg along with Chujin’s strength was beginning to make them falter. The smaller fox went back inside the house, calling for someone, Clover could only hope that whoever it was, they would take their side.

As their grip on the branch was beginning to slip, someone called out from the ornate gate.  “Chujin! Stop what you’re doing, please!” That was Martlets voice.

Clover looked back to see that Martlet had flown over the fence while Dalv was standing on the other side of the gate. Unfortunately, this distracted Clover enough for the fox to push the branch out of their hand and knock them to the ground. Clover was worried about what the fox might do next, but before the fox could do anything, Martlet quickly got in front of Clover.

“They're my friend Chujin! They won’t hurt anyone!” Martlet told him.

“Martlet, don’t you know how humans are?! Once your guard is down, they will destroy you.”

“They won’t Chujin! This human, they’re different, they haven’t hurt a soul! Please give them a chance at least.”

Chujin was about to object before another fox monster came out of the house, this fox monster was a bit taller than Chujin, wore a white kimono with some red on it, and had a ribbon in her hair.

“Chujin honey, what’s going on out here?” The new fox said, seeing all the new faces in front of her.

“Oh, this is going to be such a pain to explain.” Chujin sighed.

Chapter Text

Flowey was debating his current options.  He had already saved and loaded a file after Clover got injured to keep his entertainment going, and seeing Clover take a staff to the face was extremely funny.  but now there was no reloading back to the mines to get them back on track.  So he could either RESET or let this continue on.

Truthfully, it would probably be easier to RESET and start again.  Clover breaking a leg meant there was no way they could make progress for at least a few weeks.  but he thought to himself, Did he really wanna do all of this again?  Send the cowboy through the same old ruins to do the same old things yet again? Timelines with these kinds of outcomes were rare.  usually that old vampire wouldn’t go with Clover, or that fox lady’s deranged husband would be long past dead as usual.  This was something different.  Something Flowey hadn’t yet seen before.  Maybe he should let this play out a little more.  After all, He’s got all the time in the world, and he could probably get Clover to continue on once their leg heals, so why not enjoy this new possibility?

“Ok Clover, I’ll let you have your little happy friend time for now…  See you soon.” Flowey said to no one in particular.

Somehow, Clover could practically feel an argument incoming, but they still needed to get help for their leg, so the best thing they could do was try to grab Martlets attention.  Clover used their one good leg to tap Martlet a few times, causing her to turn to them.  “What is it Clover?”

“My leg don’t work so good no more, can you help me?”  Clover sheepishly looked up at her.

Martlet looked at Clover with deep concern as she realized she had forgotten to ask how they were doing after getting caught up in this mess.  “Clover, I’m so sorry for not checking on you before.  Here, let me help you!”

Martlet went down to Clovers level and took out some bandage wrap she had on her incase she flew into something.  She wrapped it around Clovers leg.  Once their leg was fully wrapped, she picked them up in her wings.  thankfully Clover didn’t weigh too much so it wasn’t too hard to carry them.

“Thank you Martlet, you are a really… good… friend…” Clover could barely finish before falling asleep in Martlets wings, exhaustion from the day finally getting to them.

“Oh Clover… I’m sorry this world is so mean to you.”  Martlet looked at Clover with a sad face.

Chujin couldn’t believe what he was seeing.  Not only was his apprentice defending a human from him, she was now taking care of them as if they were her own.

“See Chujin?  They’re just a scared child.  I know you’re worried about what happened the last time.  But can’t you see that this one is different?”  Martlet desperately hoped he could understand her point of view.

“…”

“Did you do something Chujin?”  Ceroba asked him, now looking at the sleeping injured human.

“I attacked the human when they were on our doorstep, they were far too close to Kanako for me to not take action.”  Chujin defended himself.

Ceroba was shocked for a second, as much as she wanted to keep Kanako safe just like he did, attacking an innocent person for it was much too far.  “You attacked an already injured child?!”

“I didn’t check to see their condition Ceroba!  I just acted on instinct!  I know how humans are!”

“You can’t just make assumptions!  What if you actually killed them?!”

“I will do what I must if it means protecting you and Kanako!”

“Have you learned nothing from when I got you to stop those experiments?!” Ceroba sighed, she had hoped Chujin would’ve quit being so paranoid about humans after she stopped his science rampage, but its clear that he never truly got over it.  She needs something to make him see the error of his ways, but how?

That’s when she looked over at the human who was still cradled in Martlets wings.  She got an idea, if what Martlet said was true, then this would be the perfect opportunity to finally get Chujin to get over his fears.  “Ok honey, since you attacked Clover and likely made their injury worse, we are going to take care of them until they fully heal.”

“What?!  You can’t be serious!”  Chujin couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“I am very serious Chujin, you need to make up for your mistake.”

“No, I will not have this Ceroba.”  He challenged Ceroba’s authority.

Ceroba proceeded to give Chujin a look that could strike fear into king Asgore himself.  Thats when he knew there was no way he was winning this argument.  He had lost yet again.  “…fine, But they will not be staying anywhere near Kanako.” Chujin accepted defeat.

“I can accept that.”  Ceroba said.

Martlet was ecstatic that someone was also willing to help her.  Truthfully, she didn’t know how to help Clover heal their leg, so she really needed some help to heal them.  “Thank you Ceroba!  You have no idea how much this means to me.”  Martlet told her.

“It’s the least we can do.”  Ceroba gave Chujin another glare.

“Can I ask for one more favor though?”  Martlet asked.

“Sure, what is it?”

“Can you open your gate and let Dalv in? He’s still stuck out there.”

Ceroba and Chujin both looked towards the gate and sure enough, Dalv was just awkwardly staring through it, waiting to be let in.

Chujin sighed before going back inside to grab the keys to the gate.  Ceroba decided to use this time to bring Martlet inside the house and get Clover to the guest room.  Martlet looked around at all the nice decorations and trinkets that seemed to be scattered around the house as they walked.  She never got to visit her mentors house before.  The two entered the nicely arranged guest room, where Martlet set Clover down on the bed.  “Rest well Clover, we’ll try to help you as much as we can.”

“Ok, healing is going to take a few days or maybe weeks at least.  Ceroba informed her.  “I will do my best to understand how the human healing process works and try to find any healing magic that could help with this.  My husband actually has a book on human inventions, maybe one of those can help.”  She took the book off a nearby table and flipped pages towards the medical section, hoping to find something.  “I’ll check this book, you go into the kitchen down the hall and see if we have some food to make dinner later, I’m sure they will want it when they wake up.”

“On it.”  Martlet left the room to look for the kitchen.  She passed Chujin, who was conversing with Dalv after he had let him in.

“…So this human will be staying with us for a while.”  Chujin said to Dalv as they walked through the house.

“Well, that is a relief.  I was worried something bad might happen to them.”  Dalv kept fidgeting with his fingers.  He peered into the room where Ceroba was assessing Clover and breathed a sigh of relief.  Now he had less things to stress about.  There was still someone he wanted to check on however.  “Is Kanako here Mr Chujin?  I wanted to thank her for giving me that corn these past months.”

“Kanako?  I was the one giving you that corn Dalv.  Kanako wasn’t actually allowed to go all the way to Snowdin for a while after the incident.”

“Really?!  That was you?”

“Yes.  Consider it a token of my thanks for protecting my daughter.  I figured you could use it since you insisted on hiding away in those old ruins.”  Chujin began walking away to the kitchen but turned to Dalv to mention one last thing. “Kanako is upstairs by the way.  I’m sure she would love to see you again.”

Dalv nodded and headed towards Kanako’s room.  He had to mentally prepare himself before knocking on her door.  Once he did though,  Kanako opened the door, and almost immediately lit up upon seeing her friend. “Dalv, it’s you!”  Kanako hugged Dalv’s cloak.  To which he lowered himself to hug her easier.  “I’m so happy to see you again as well Kanako.”  For once in a long time, he had an actual smile on his face.  If he wasn’t so concerned with Clovers well being, he likely would have tried to play a game with her again.  But he embraced the hug for as long as possible, taking in just how much she had grown since the last time ha seen her.  Of course, it had to end eventually, with Dalv saying his goodbyes to Kanako before going back downstairs to check on Clovers condition.  He entered the room Ceroba was in, watching as she wrapped a strange device around Clovers leg.  He was originally going to remain silent and watch the process, but he was curious as to what she was doing exactly.  “What are you doing to Clovers leg?”

“I’m wrapping a device that humans call a ‘splint’ around them.  I found out about them in this book on human inventions we have.  It’s supposed to help their bones heal I’m pretty sure.  I don’t have an actual one though, so I had to have Martlet help me quickly make one.”  Ceroba responded as she put the splint on them.  .  Dalv mostly just watched her work for a minute until she spoke to him again.  “So, you and Martlet both care for this human?”

“Yes, I met them in the old ruins Ive been in.  They showed me kindness and made me rethink hiding away from everyone.  When we met Martlet, I defended Clover from her and got her to stop fighting.  Both of us are trying to get them home now.”  Dalv recalled the story to her.  Hearing that prompted her to ask what she’s wanted to know for a bit now.  “Tell me, would you consider them trustworthy?”  That question confused Dalv for a bit, but he didn’t want to leave her unanswered.  “Yes?  I would say so, why do you ask?”

She turned to Dalv to tell him her plan.  “My husband, Chujin.  He’s not willing to trust any humans.  I understand why, I was mad at humanity for what happened during the Snowdin incident for a long time as well.  But then I remembered the king and queen’s children.  One human and one monster, and they were a happy family.  One that could have brought peace to monster kind.  As a mother, I can’t stand seeing a child be hurt like this.  If…”. She paused in thought for a second.  “If I can get Chujin to realize that humans and monsters aren’t that different, then maybe he will finally stop being so afraid.”

Dalv stared at her for a bit after hearing her plan.  Truthfully, it did sound plausible, but he didn’t know Chujin as well as Ceroba or Martlet did.  He always saw him as a slightly overprotective parent if nothing else.  He supposed he could go along with Ceroba’s plan though.  He wasn’t ready to try to bring Clover to Asgore anyway.  “That sounds fine Ceroba, but let’s just let them rest for now.”

“Agreed.”  Both left the room to let Clover sleep.

A few hours went by,  it was now around time for dinner.  Since they were both guests, Ceroba has offered to make dinner for Dalv and Martlet as well, to which they graciously accepted.  Clover was still mostly asleep, though they wouldn’t be for very long.  In fact, they seemed to be waking up right about now.

“Ughhh.”  Clover opened their eyes once again,  wondering where they were exactly.  The bed they were in was nice and comfy, and this room was extremely pretty as well.  A far cry from the room they had back home.  They lifted themself up off the pillow, and instantly noticed both the splint in their leg…  and the same purple fox from earlier in the room with them, who seemed to be reading some kind of book.  Clover instantly tensed up upon seeing him again, which made him notice Clover and set his book down.  “Hello human, it seems you woke up after all.”

Clover backed themselves up against the headboard of the bed, there wasn’t anything they could defend themselves with this time.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you.  My lovely wife Ceroba has decided to let you stay with us to heal your injury.  So I suppose you should consider yourself quite lucky.”  Chujin told them, he wasn’t sure why he was the one who had to check on them.

No response.

“In any case,  dinner will be ready soon, and I’m sure you would like Ceroba’s cooking, human.”

“…Clover.”  Chujin finally got a response.

“What was that?”

“My name is Clover.”

“Right.  Clover.”  Chujin wasn’t going to bother calling them by their name, but he supposed it was better than just calling them human all the time.  “Well Clover, Martlet has generously made you some wooden crutches based on the ones in one of our human inventions books,  sorry if it isn’t completely accurate.  But it should allow you to walk while your leg heals.”  Chujin informed them before grabbing the 2 crutches and setting them near the bed.

“Why are you helping me now?  You tried to kill me.”

“Well I doubt I’m the first one that tried that, considering you have my apprentice as your caretaker.  But to answer your question, it’s because my wife and your 2 friends want you to be safe.  I myself don’t trust you, but they do,  So I’m overruled.”

“What do you have against me?  At least when Dalv and Martlet attacked me it was out of fear or obligation, you just seem to hate me.”

“You sure ask a lot of questions.  But to put it simply, I hate all humans.  It’s nothing personal against you specifically.”  Chujin said extremely monotony, like that was just a completely okay thing to say.

“Well… why?”

“…” Clover asking him that made him remember that dreaded day again.  The day he almost lost his daughter.  You know what? He should make this someone else’s problem.  He didn’t want to talk about it right now.  “I may consider telling you later.  Dinner is probably done, I can bring you to the kitchen if you would like some food.”

“Yes, actually.”  Clover did have to admit they were extremely hungry again.  They got up from the bed and attempted to use their new crutches, though they were having difficulty.

“Here, let me help you balance.”  Chujin walked over to them and held their crutches in place to allow them to get used to them easier, As much as he didn’t want to have anything to do with them.  He guided them out of the room and towards the kotatsu, where Dalv and Martlet could both be seen sitting at.

“Clover!  You’re awake!” Martlet was ecstatic.  She had thought they might be completely out all day.  Not only that, but Chujin was actually helping them, rather than ignoring them like Martlet originally thought.  Maybe there really was hope for him.  Clover went over and sat next to Martlet, leaning against her.  Chujin went into the kitchen to check on Ceroba, where she noticed him enter. “Hello honey, has Clover awoken yet?”

“Yes, they’re in fine condition,  just hungry.”

“Well this is the perfect time,  I just finished the last of the corn chowder.  Bring Kanako down and let’s eat.”

Chujin called down Kanako and brought bowls over for everyone while Ceroba brought over the pot of corn chowder.  She poured everyone a bowl, and sat down at the kotatsu.  “I hope you all like it,  corn chowder has always been a favorite of ours.  Star’s family grows the best corn the underground has.”

Clover took a bite of the chowder.  It was good, really good.  They’ve never actually had chowder back up on the surface, but this was a pretty good impression of it.  Kanako stumbled down the stairs and over to the kitchen table where she could now see that Clover was actually awake.  She was a bit weary after remembering her father’s warning, but the possibility of making a new friend was too exciting for her.  She ran over to Clover’s side of the kotatsu.  “Hello Clover!  My mom told me a bit about you!”

Clover stopped eating their chowder to speak to Kanako.  “Oh, howdy.  You must be Kanako.  Nice to get to actually meet ya rather than…”  Clover didn’t want to bring up the whole weapon clashing thing.  “Well, it’s nice to see ya regardless.  You seem to be lucky to have such great parents.”  Clover wanted to try to give off a good impression for the Ketsukane family.  It’s probably best not to do anything stupid as they need this place to rest.  Of course, that wasn’t going to stop Kanako from preparing a barrage of questions to ask them.  “Sowhatslifelikeonthesurface?areyouanactualcowboylikestar?isittruethathumansridemonstersintoafireysphere?howlonghaveyo-“

“Woah Kanako, slow down!”  Ceroba quickly stopped this question chaos before it gave her and likely everyone else a headache.  “Why don’t you just eat today and ask your questions tomorrow?  I’m sure Clover has had a long day even with the nap they took.”

Kanako went over to a different side of the kotatsu and grabbed a bowl of corn chowder.  Martlet was trying to hold in a laugh from that interaction while Dalv was just sitting awkwardly, eating his chowder.  The best way this dinner could be described was awkward.  But of course it was, it’s not every day a human shows up to your door after all.  Clover decided to try and make conversation.  “So how long have y’all lived here?”

Ceroba chimed in.  “Quite a while I’d say.  I don’t remember the exact number of years, but we really set up our lives here.”

“It certainly is a nice house, I think y’all did a good job on building it.”

“Why thank you Clover.  This house was actually built by my husband over the course of 2 years, But it was all worth the effort it took.  Isn’t that right my sweet little engineer?~”  Ceroba nuzzled her snout against Chujin’s face in a flirty fashion, causing him to blush a bit. “Come on honey, you know I don’t do those engineering jobs anymore.”  Chujin responded, trying not to embarrass himself in front of Dalv and Martlet.

“I know, but I still love that you did.  You set up a great life for us.”

“I suppose I did.  I don’t regret any of the hardships that we both had to go through for all this.  It was truly one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”  he couldn’t help but kiss Ceroba on the cheek.

Martlet found the couple’s interactions quite adorable, but she still had one more question that needed to be answered.  “So, me and Dalv don’t exactly have the time to go back to our homes, can we stay here for the night?”

“Well, I suppose you can, we do have some sleeping bags from one of our camping trips, but won’t the guard notice you’re gone?”  Chujin informed her.

“I actually already clocked in when I left Clover on their own.  They won’t notice I’m gone.”

“Ok then, you both can sleep in the guest room along with Clover.”

“The sleeping bags are already in that room I’m pretty sure, we put them under the bed.”  Ceroba offered.

Kanako decided to chime in.  “Can I sleep there too dad?!  I love sleepovers!”

“No Kanako, you cannot sleep near that human.  I will not allow it.”

“Awwww :( .” Kanako knew that if her dad was committed to this, it would be insanely difficult to change his mind.  She would have to accept defeat for now.

Clover somehow finished their corn chowder before anyone else, quickly excusing themself to go back to the guest room, presumably to go back to sleep.

A few minutes later, Martlet got up from the kotatsu after both her and Dalv finished their food, and brought Dalv to the guest room so they could both comfort Clover.  They figured that they could use their company, so they left the Ketsukane family to sort out their own problems.

Chujin sighed.  “I can’t believe that this is what happened today.”

“Oh don’t be like that honey.  I saw you smiling at the dinner table.  You enjoy their company, don’t you?”  Ceroba teased.

“I- well…”. He admittedly did enjoy having guests over.  He hasn’t seen his apprentice in a while, and it was nice seeing Dalv finally stop isolating himself.  And Clover… Well, maybe it was just a fatherly instinct, but he somewhat wanted to help them.  Yeah no, he needed to bury that down, no way was he going to help a human more than he already has.  “It doesn’t matter, what’s done is done.  And now, a human is in our house.”

Ceroba sighed.  “Come on, you should give them a chance at least.  The incident happened so long ago now, I’m not saying you shouldn’t be weary, but you shouldn’t be so presumptuous.”

Chujin didn’t want to hear any of it.

“How about this.  Tomorrow, once Clover wakes up, you should talk to them.  And I mean ACTUALLY talk to them Chujin.  Talk to them like a monster with some decency, rather than an animal threatening its prey.”  Ceroba offered.

“…Fine.  Since you’re so insistent that they deserve one, I will give them a chance to prove themselves.”

“Thank you my love, I knew I could get through to you eventually.”  Ceroba went over and hugged him.  “Now come on, we should head to bed.  We have a big day tomorrow, we should rest.  you too Kanako.”  Ceroba pointed over to Kanako.

“Ok mom!”  Kanako got up from the kotatsu and ran off upstairs to her room.  Ceroba went up there with her and tucked her into bed.  “Love you lots.”  Ceroba said to Kanako as she closed the door to her room.  She looked over towards the guest room, debating whether to check on her guests or not.  She ultimately decided not to, they probably needed space for the time being.  She went over to her bedroom, where Chujin had just finished making the bed and set out pajamas for both of them.  “I really hope you’re right about this my love.”  Chujin said, going to the next room to change clothes.

“I’m confident this is the best decision.  I really think this could be good for all of us.”  Ceroba changed into her pajamas and waited for Chujin to re-enter the room.  Once he did,  they both layed on the bed, Managing to get to sleep after a bit of tossing and turning.  Tomorrow will be a better day, surely.

Martlet and Dalv were in the guest room setting up their sleeping bags.  Dalv got his set up relatively quickly, but Martlet was a bit distracted, looking at Clover who was currently just silently laying on the bed, not even sleeping.  she figured she should probably say something.  “Are you okay Clover?”

“I could be worse I guess.  at least Mrs Ceroba is good at mimicking human medical stuff.”  Clover looked at the makeshift splint Ceroba had put on them.  It was holding quite well Despite being made of wood,  they figured Martlet probably helped her with it.  It’ll probably be harder to sleep with it on though.  Hopefully they can get an actual cast tomorrow.  “I’m also a bit cold, this desert place seems to be freezing at night?  How does night work here?”

“I’m not sure myself Clover, but would you like me to get the Ketsukane’s to bring you another blanket?”

“Nah, don’t bother them.  We already bothered them enough today.”

“Well, do you need anything?  I want you to be comfortable while you’re somewhat stuck here.”

“I’m good, just tired.  *yawn* g’night Martlet, you too Dalv.”

“Oh… Good night Clover.”  Martlet finished setting up her sleeping bag and got in it.  For a while, she sat in silence, thinking about the time she’s had so far.  Am I doing enough for them?  The thought crept its way into her mind.  She felt as though she was at least partially responsible for what happened.  She was the one who went with the faulty path, she was the one who went to grab Dalv rather than immediately checking on Clover.  Thanks to her,  Clovers life just went through a drastic change, and it didn’t seem like a good one.  She buried the thought down, hoping that if she didn’t think about it enough, she’d be able to sleep.  She did manage to rest, but there would be no sleeping peacefully tonight.

Chapter Text

Rise and shine! The sun is still as bright as ever! Though Clover still didn’t know what the ‘sun’ down here actually was. Or if it had even set at all when they had went to sleep, maybe they could ask about whenever they got the chance. They lifted their head off the pillow and looked at the floor towards Dalv and Martlet, who were still sound asleep in their sleeping bags. They debated going back to sleep with them, but sounds from the kitchen piqued their curiosity. Carefully, they lifted themself off the bed and grabbed their crutches that were sitting right next to it. They quietly snuck over to the door of the room and left to head towards the kitchen.

hopefully the sounds was someone making breakfast. They were quite hungry again, and the food the monsters made down here was good, it might even be better than some stuff back on the surface. They made their way down the hallway and peered into the kitchen to see what was going on. What they found was Kanako, who had stacked a bunch of pots, pans and boxes on top of each other to reach a high place. Clover was a little disappointed that they didn’t find what they were hoping for, but they were still curious as to what Kanako was doing. “Hey Kanako, why do you have all that?”

Kanako looked down from the top of her stack. “I’m just trying to reach the cookie jar mom and dad put on top of the fridge.” She went back to reaching for it.

“Your parents don’t want you havin’ it?”

“Nope! They always say that it will ‘spoil my appetite.’ Well I don’t believe that for one second!” She finally managed to reach the jar and take 2 cookies out of it. “My parents are awake in their room by the way.” She said as she shoved one of the cookies in her mouth.

“Well alright then, make sure ya don’t fall off of that thing.” clover turned to head towards the Ketsukane’s room. As they walked, they could hear Kanako talk back. “I’m not gonna fall silly! I’ll be fine!” She went back to the jar to grab more cookies. Her greed truly knows no bounds. Clover went over to the next room down another hallway that lead to what they guessed was the Ketsukane’s room. Truthfully, Clover didn’t want to bother them, but they didn’t know any cooking skills to make their own breakfast, so they would just have to ask the other two adults. They opened the door to the room, only to see Ceroba sitting on the edge of the bed, with Chujin sitting behind her, combing her hair. both of them had much more casual clothes than yesterday, with Ceroba now sporting a dark red sweater and white pants, and Chujin wearing a black sweater and brown pants.

“You two certainly love matching.” Clover blurted out from the bedroom door, to which Ceroba finally noticed they were there. “Certainly. I actually started doing it about a year ago. It’s been a fun little thing for both of us to try and find the same type of clothing for each other.” Ceroba pointed over to the open closet, which had tons of different clothing neatly hung, with the matching clothing hanging right next to each other. “Though, the clothes you saw yesterday are sort of our ‘main’ outfit’s.” She admitted.

“Well that’s nice. I’m glad you two found something to be happy about. I was just coming over here to ask if I could have some food, I hope I’m not bothering y’all.” Clover asked.

“Of course not, I was about to start on breakfast anyway. I just needed my hair straightened out a bit. It gets messed up during the night.”

Chujin chimed in. “I’ve woken up with hair in my face more times than I can count. It got to a point where I wore my goggles in my sleep one time just so I wouldn’t have it over my eyes.” That got a small laugh out of Ceroba.

“Ok love, I think my hair is fine enough. I’ll go make breakfast, you tell Clover what I told you this morning.” Ceroba got up and walked into the hallway, making a friendly gesture to Clover as she made her way towards the kitchen. Clover looked back into the room at Chujin. “Y’all got a plan for me already? Man, you’re already doing more for me than…”. They pause mid sentence as an unpleasant memory from the surface came to mind. “Well, never mind.”

As much as he didn’t want to admit it, hearing that made Chujin a little concerned about Clover’s well being. He had been taking notice of some strange things about them, like how damaged and untaken care of their skin was, and how not well fed they always seemed to look. There was no way all of that could have accumulated from just their journey down here, broken leg or not. Everything in him wanted to disregard it as just a human thing, but he knew better. Maybe he should ask them about their life on the surface? Would they even answer him? He thought of what to say, but his thinking was quickly interrupted by a loud crashing sound.

“What was that?” Clover asked, turning to look towards the sound, where Ceroba could be heard yelling from the kitchen. “I can’t believe you Kanako! If you wanted a cookie that bad you should have just asked! Ughhh.”

“I’m sorry mom! I just thought that… uhhh…”. She didn’t have an excuse prepared for this.

“I don’t want to hear it right now. go to your room. I will discuss this with you later.” Ceroba pointed over to the hallway. Kanako obliged to her demands, and sadly walked over to her room. Now the only thing that could be heard from the kitchen was Ceroba picking up all of the boxes and cooking supplies that have fallen.

“Do you need help over there honey!” Chujin yelled from the bedroom.

“No, thank you, I’m okay!” She yelled back.

“I told her she would fall doin that.” Clover remarked. “Anyway, you were saying?”

“Right.” He debated trying to ask again, but ultimately decided not to. “First things first, you need a bath, and a change of clothes.”

“Yeah that’s fair. I’m keeping the cowboy hat though.”

“That’s fine, just make sure you try to not get the splint wet too much” Chujin pointed to it on Clovers leg. “How old are you anyway? If you’re close to Kanako’s age, you might be able to fit in some of her old clothes.”

“13. Just turned it a month ago.”

I tried to kill someone who’s barely even a teenager. The thought invaded Chujin’s mind. He quickly pushed it down before he started feeling bad for a human of all things. “Hmm, Well Kanako is 12 now… Hold on actually, let me find something.” Chujin began rummaging through the closet in the bedroom. “If I remember correctly I should have… there.” He pulled out a gray shirt and some tan shorts. The shirt had the words ‘number #1 Steamworks engineer’ printed on in bold pink letters. “Before you ask, they gave me these as a souvenir after the Steamworks shut down, they just happened to get me the wrong size. Not that it would’ve mattered, I wouldn’t have worn them anyway.” Chujin set the clothes on the bed.

“Well you’re being oddly nice to me today.” Clover sarcastically remarked.

“I’m quite over the shock of seeing you now, make no mistake though, I still would’ve preferred you never showed up.”

“Yeah, that sounds more like you.”

Chujin chose to ignore those last words. “Come on, I’ll show you to the bathroom, by the time you finish bathing, I’m sure breakfast will likely be ready.” Clover grabbed the new clothes off the bed and followed Chujin to another room that was close to the bedroom. “You may set your current clothes on the counter. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.” He walked away, leaving Clover to themself. To which they opened the door to the bathroom, revealing a surprisingly standard looking room compared to the over the top decorations in every other room. Clover found it to be a breath of fresh air all things considered. Though now that they thought about it, how does one shower with crutches and a splint? Eh, surely they could figure that out, it couldn’t be that hard.

Ceroba was in the kitchen, prepping food to make for breakfast, until Chujin walked in. “You don’t have to do that honey, I’ll make breakfast today, you already made food for us yesterday.” Chujin offered.

“I appreciate it love, how is Clover doing?”

“They’re currently bathing, they’ll probably be done by the time breakfast is ready.” Chujin walked over to the stove and cracked some eggs into a pan.

“I’ll go wake up the others then.” Ceroba walked over to the guest room, knocking on the door once she got there. “Hello, are you two awake yet?” movement along with tired groaning could be heard from the other side. She decided to let herself in, to see Martlet, who somehow looked as if she just worked a 10 hour shift despite literally just being asleep. “Oh, Hey Ceroba.” Martlet said with none of the usual energy in her voice. Dalv was also up, only he seemed about the same as yesterday. She supposed he didn’t really need sleep that much being a vampire and all.

“I hope you are doing well today, Ceroba.” Dalv said.

“I’m good, thank you. Breakfast is being made by my husband if anyone would like some.”

“Sure, it’s been a while since I’ve eaten non-corn food, aside from the pancakes yesterday.” Dalv admitted. Ceroba couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. Nevertheless, she led both him and Martlet out into the dining room, where they all waited for breakfast to be finished. After a few minutes of talking about themselves, they noticed Clover enter the dining room, now being fully clean and wearing an honestly pretty ugly shirt. They were also carrying their older clothes in hand. Ceroba couldn’t help but laugh. “He gave you that shirt? I forgot he still had that.”

“Yeah, apparently this is the only one he had that fit me.”

“Well, suppose it could look worse. I’ll take those dirty clothes off you, you sit at the kotatsu.” Ceroba grabbed Clover’s clothes and walked off somewhere, while Clover sat down next to Dalv. “So, how are y’all holdin up? I thought you might’ve had to run off to your guard post today.” They looked over at Martlet.

“I’ll have to later today. But I can stay for right now.”

“Nice. How about you Dalv?”

“I’m just going along with the Ketsukane’s, I didn’t really make any plans out here.”

“I should’ve expected that honestly. I did sort of drag you into this after all.”

Suddenly, Chujin walked into the room, carrying multiple plates of omelettes. He set them all down on the kotatsu for everyone to see.

“Woah, you never told me you could cook, Chujin.” Martlet admired the amazing looking omelettes.

“I’ve known how to for a while now, I didn’t want Ceroba to have to always be the one cooking, so I learned it. Besides, these omelettes are relatively simple.” Chujin called for Ceroba and Kanako to come to the dining room. The two came over after a bit, and sat at the kotatsu with everybody else.

“You went with omelettes today?” Ceroba asked her husband.

“Yes, I figured it might be nice to do that instead of making pancakes or corn again. Besides, you like my omelettes don’t you?”

She took a bite of the omelette. “Still as good as ever. Thank you honey.”

Chujin gave a victorious smile. “I knew it.”

“Anyway, Clover…” Ceroba began in between eating. “The main thing we want to do today is get you an actual cast, the splint is supposed to be a temporary thing.” She pointed her fork at the splint. “However, the only way for us to get one is to go to the Wild East’s clinic.”

Clover perked up upon hearing this. “The wild east?”

“Yes. It’s a pretty nice town, it’s probably the only place that will have a cast given that’s it’s been built based on human cowboy movies that fell down here.”

“Just make sure you avoid the sheriff.” Chujin added. “He’ll probably freak out if he saw you, and you’re in no condition to be dragged into his ‘cowboy adventures’.”

Ceroba nodded in agreement. “So, I’ll go with you to the town. Would anyone else like to come with?”

Martlet raised her hand like a student in a classroom. “Oh! I’ll go! I can fly above the town to see where this ‘sheriff’ is!”

“Good, that will make this easier.”

“Can I go too? I haven’t really gotten to hang out with Clover.” Kanako sheepishly asked.

“Sorry Kanako, we are going to the east to retrieve something, not to play. You can’t come with us. You can hang out with them when we come back though.” She assured her, causing a defeated sigh from Chujin. He supposed Kanako was going to find a way to be with Clover no matter what he said, so he won’t bother fighting it. Clover’s likely too weak right now to fight her anyway. If only he could see that when they first arrived, maybe then he wouldn’t have to try to ignore how guilty he feels about attacking them.  But he needed to stand his ground about humans.  After all, if he was wrong in his perspective then…  All those years he spent with this mindset…  No, it couldn’t have been for nothing.

Clover meanwhile was sitting in disbelief, an actual Wild West town was just sitting here in the underground near them. This was exactly what they would have always wanted. Well, minus the whole broken leg thing, that really brought the mood down. But regardless, they couldn’t wait to see it.

“While you three do that, I am going to tend to the garden before work.” Chujin said. “Dalv, would you like to help me?”

“Sure, I have a lot of experience with plants, Mostly corn though.”

“Then it’s settled.” Chujin finished his breakfast, bringing his plate back into the kitchen before re-entering the dining room. He gave Ceroba a quick kiss on the cheek before leaving again to tend to the garden.

“Thank you love.” She said before he left. “Whenever you’re ready to leave Clover, just tell us.” Ceroba informed them.

Clover ate the rest of their breakfast quickly, excited at the prospect of going to a new town. It didn’t take too long before they were practically already out the door. Ceroba smirked at their antics. They really were just like Kanako in some ways. “Alright, be careful on the way out Clover, I’m not sure how well those crutches will do in the sand!” Clover did not listen, instead opting for slowly going down the porch and into the sand, where they nearly instantly fell. She was right, these things suck.

“Do you need me to carry you again Clover?” Martlet offered. Clover was initially going to reject the offer until a second attempt at the sand nearly made them fall again. They reluctantly accepted and just decided to deal with the embarrassment. It would all be worth it if it meant they at least got to see the Wild West town. Martlet gently picked them up into her wings once again, smiling down at them. “Don’t worry Clover, I’m sure your leg will heal soon! Then you won’t have to worry about stuff like this!”

“I guess.”

Ceroba then came out of the house, ready to go. “Alright, I got the key to the gate, let’s go.”

The three went over to and out of the ornate gate, bringing them into the oasis valley town. Clover decided to try and look around from their spot. they didn’t really get to see the town on their way down from the mountain. The town consisted of a nice pond of water and some buildings, none of them being quite as nice looking as the Ketsukane’s manor. Some residents were also scattered about but they all seemed to ignore them as they passed. Martlet began bringing them down a set of sand stairs into a different area of the town. This one looked about the same as the other side, but there were some stands here with monsters selling random items. Though Through the corner of their eye, Clover noticed someone familiar running one of the stands. Their heart sunk almost immediately upon recognizing her. It was that creepy spider lady from the mountain, and it looked like she noticed them too. “Ahuhu~, Hello there dearie~”. Muffet called out to them, causing Martlet and Ceroba to stop in their tracks and turn to face her. Martlet assumed she was just trying to sell something and tried to be nice. “hello! Sorry, we aren’t here to buy anything.”

“Martlet, please get me away from her.” Clover begged.

“Clover, don’t be mean, especially to people you don’t know.”

“I do know her Martlet, and I don’t want to see her.” They gave her an annoyed glare.

“No need to be so rude~, I was only trying to make better use out of your soul then the king would. you would have made such a delicious pastry~” Muffet giggled to herself, creeping the whole party out. Clover began reaching for their toy gun so they could put this stupid spider down. only to realize they didn’t actually bring it with them.

“Im with Clover on this one.” Ceroba admitted, wanting to walk away from the situation. Martlet, however, got defensive. “Wait, what did she do to you?” She asked Clover.

They looked up at Martlet with a sad expression, before lifting up a part of their shirt, revealing a large burn Mark from when Muffet poured extremely hot tea on them. Both Martlet and Ceroba were saddened by the sight. Sure, it wasn’t the worst injury they had, but it was definitely noteworthy.

“Clover, I’m so sorry I wasn’t there.” Martlet apologized, even though she knew she probably wouldn’t have been able to do anything.

“It wasn’t your fault Martlet, just please get me out of here.” They asked again with haste in their voice. This time Martlet obliged, Quickly taking them away from the stand, with Ceroba following the two. “Come again dearie!~”. Muffet yelled at the party before they were out of hearing range. Martlet ignored the antagonizing, but Ceroba turned back one last time to give Muffet an angry look. The party continued through the oasis, making it to a beautifully lit hallway that connected the town to the rest of the desert. Clover figured it would be a few minutes before they reached the town, and they couldn’t take the awkward silence anymore, so they tried to start a conversation. “Hey, Ceroba?”

Ceroba turned to look at Clover. “Yes?”

“I’ve seen Martlet use magic against me before, what kind of magic do you have?”

“Well, all of my family actually has access to some amount of florakinesis.” Ceroba summoned a cherry blossom in her hand for Clover to see. “Along with that, I can do support magic like healing or shielding, which is actually part of the reason we are getting you a cast now. Once you have it, it will be easier to use magic to speed up your healing process.”

“ya know, I’m not sure if I ever said thank you for everything you’ve been doing to help me, so I’ll say it now. Thank you Ceroba.”

“You’re very welcome. It’s the least I can do after all.”

“Well it’s just that I sort of popped in your life when you probably didn’t need me to. I’ve never been one to bother people, didn’t want to be a burden to anyone.”

Ceroba stopped in her tracks upon hearing that. “You think I see you as a burden?”

“Well… yeah, don’t you? I mean, I showed up randomly and took over your family’s life all because I accidentally ended up here. My parents always said that it was important to make yourself useful so you wouldn’t just be a leech to people.”

“what?” What kind of teaching is that?  That wasn’t like anything her and Chujin taught Kanako. Why would a parent ever tell that to their own child who, now that she thought about it, didn’t seem that much older than Kanako?

“Did I say something wrong?” Clover asked Ceroba, snapping her out of her confusion.

“I… No Clover, you didn’t say anything wrong. I just strongly disagree with your parent’s teachings. I don’t think that’s a healthy thing to ingrain in a child.” It was more than that, she had some choice words that she wanted to say, but it’s not like Clover’s parents could hear her anyway.

Clover remained silent, likely lost in thought just as she was. She debated pressing about their parents and what they actually did to them, but she ultimately decided now wasn’t the time. The whole party remained silent for about 4 minutes until they reached the wild east.

“Alright, we’re here.” Ceroba announced.

“Already? That didn’t take very long.” Clover looked over in front of them and sure enough, a large Wild West themed town stood nearby. Ceroba began speaking again before Clover could truly admire it. “Ok, Martlet, I’ll need you to fly over the town to see if the sheriff is there. He always travels around with his posse, so you’ll know him when you see him. I’ll bring Clover to the clinic to get that cast.”

“On it! Just make sure you help them balance please.” Martlet gently set Clover on the ground and gave them back their crutches. She waved to Clover before soaring into the air, watching the two make their way over to the clinic. With that, she scanned the nearby area, searching for the sheriff of the town. Most of the area was pretty dry and empty, with only a few people walking around. Though there were two monsters near one of the cliffsides. One of them was a large pink monster with a little hat and the other had a pretty convincing sheriff getup. She figured that this was likely them, so she flew over them to see what they were doing.

“Star! Your movin the fence wrong! Ya need to move it to the right!” The large pink monster said.

“Yeah yeah I know, I’m tryin to get the fence post on right!” The star monster began hammering down the fence, trying to hold it in place. All this ended up doing was breaking the post. He sighed, readying another fence post to try again. He began hammering the new, but he ended up accidentally smashed one of his fingers with it. “Ow! Are you kidding me?! This is like the sixth time!”

“I think you should let me hammer it down Star.” The pink monster offered.

“Nah, Ed. I got this!” He lined up another fence post to try yet again, this time managing to hammer it down correctly. “See? I told ya I could do it.” Star said, feeling incredibly proud of himself.

“That’s great but uhh… You do know to build the whole fence you have to hammer a bunch of those right?” Ed pointed out to him. Star looked over at what they have built so far and realized they had only put up four out of thirty fence posts, causing him to look down in defeat. “Ya know what Ed? I’m just gonna take a break and get my finger looked at.”

“Yeah, that’s probably for the best.”

It took a second for Martlet to process what that meant, but she quickly realized it and flew over to the clinic as fast as she could, swinging the door to it open, much to the shock of the people inside. She looked around to see Clover on one of the beds with Ceroba right next to them. She quickly ran up to her. “Ceroba! I think that sheriff is coming here!”

Ceroba pondered what to do for a second, but quickly came up with an answer “I had a feeling we wouldn’t be so lucky. You stay with Clover, I’ll distract him.” She walked out of the clinic, leaving Martlet and Clover with the nurse. As she expected, she saw Starlo outside, who noticed her almost immediately. “Oh, howdy Ceroba! I didn’t know you came here today. Nice new outfit by the way.

“I only showed up recently. I wanted to see how you were doing. it’s been a bit since I’ve been here, and thank you.

“Well we haven’t made many changes from last time, all we’re doing right now is getting a new fence up.” He pointed towards Ed who was hammering down more posts. “So hopefully we won’t have to worry about anyone falling down the cliff side.”

“That’s sounds great Star.”

“It is, I’ll tell ya more in a bit though, my finger got beat pretty badly and I need the nurse to see if it’s fine or if I need some healing magic.” Starlo began walking towards the door, before Ceroba quickly blocked it. “The nurse is actually very busy right now. If you want, I can take a look at it, I know some healing magic myself.”

“Uhhh… okay?” Starlo presented his hand to her, to which she tried to figure out which finger was the damaged one. She didn’t have as good of an eye as the nurse, so she just decided to use healing magic anyway, hoping it would heal the right one. She put her hand against his, and began channeling her magic through him. As the healing began working, he noticed how nervous Ceroba looked. “Are you doing alright ‘Roba?”

“Of course, I’m doing quite well today.”

“Well… If you say so… Oh, hey, wanna hear about this cool cowboy movie I watched earlier?”

“Is it the same movie you told me about before?”

“No, no, It’s a new one. This one was amazing!”

“Sure then.”

“Ok so first…”

Inside the clinic, the nurse was setting the cast on Clover. “Make sure you don’t move for this part, I need to make sure this is perfectly set.” The nurse asked them, to which they tensed up so as not to move as much. The nurse managed to get the cast to wrap around their leg, checking for any breakages or faults in the material before doing so. “Almost there and…” She got the last bit around, fully wrapping it up. “All done! In pretty good time too. I’ve never really gotten the chance to do this before.” The nurse held the old splint in her hand that was removed before the cast was placed. “I’ll just throw this old thing away, make sure you don’t do anything to break the cast and you should be just fine.”

“Thank you so much!” Martlet shook the hand of the nurse with her wing, before turning to Clover. “How does it feel?”

They inspected their newly casted leg. It was certainly more comfortable than the splint was. “Try moving around with it.” Martlet asked them. Clover grabbed their crutches from the side of the bed and began pacing around the clinic. Indeed, this was way better than before, and it made balancing a little easier. After a bit of walking around the clinic, They soon finished their pacing and went over to hug Martlet, much to her surprise. “Thank you Martlet, it’s great.”

Martlet wrapped her wings around them to return the hug. “You’re welcome Clover! Though, you shouldn’t be thanking me. This was all Ceroba’s idea. Speaking of which, let me see how she’s doing.” She walked over and creaked the clinic door open. It looked like the sheriff was still talking with her.

“We’re gonna have to get you out of here soon. This is looking like a pretty close call.” Martlet told Clover from the door.

“Already? But I wanted to meet the sheriff.”

“I know, but we already went over why you can’t right now. I promise we’ll take you back here once you’re healed up.” She tried to assure them.

“I guess that’s true, still disappointing though.”

“Keep your head up Clover! It’ll be sooner than you think, I’m sure of it!”

Ceroba quickly walked in before they could respond again. “All clear, I managed to get him to leave. Are you guys done here?”

“Yeah. Got the new cast. I’m ready to go when you are.” Clover said with confidence.

“I’m impressed. With how much you seem to like cowboy’s I was almost convinced I would have to drag you out of town.” Ceroba joked.

“Believe me, if I wasn’t in this situation, you absolutely would have.” They joked back, getting yet another laugh out of her. Seeing her and Martlet smile made Clover happy. like they were still doing something to help even when they weren’t actively on their mission. Despite the short timeframe being with these people they were clearly getting attached. Should they try to…?

No. Those five kids still needed justice. It’s important to remember that this is just a temporary thing.

“Are you ok, Clover?” Ceroba waved her hand in front of their face, snapping them out of their thoughts.

“Huh? Oh, yes, I’m fine.”

“Well, we’re going to be leaving. I’ll carry you this time so Martlet doesn’t have to.”

Right, Clover supposed they would have to deal with that again. Well, the wave of embarrassment has mostly worn off, so they decided to just go along with it, allowing Ceroba to easily pick them up.

Ceroba was surprised at how light they were to carry. Even Kanako, who was a bit smaller than them, was heavier. Could this have something to do with their surface life or was this just a human thing? She decided to keep that in the back of her mind for now, making her way to the door of the clinic. She checked to see if Starlo had come back. Once the coast was all clear, Her and Martlet left to make their way back towards the entrance of the town. Clover mostly just sat in thought. Thinking about their mission and what they were actually going to do once they completed it. They really did like these monsters they met, what would happen to them if they could kill their king? Could they even do it? Questions like these swarmed Clover’s mind. With a good 10 minutes or so before they would make it back to the manor, Clover had all the time they needed to think about where their life was truly headed.