Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Reality pushed himself up with shaky arms, his skull ringing slightly from a headache as he blinked away the bright, blinding burst of white he'd seen upon going through the portal. The first thing he was aware of was the crusty dead grass under him starting to regain some life, becoming more green and vibrant as he stood there, seemingly in the middle of a grassy field. The second thing he was aware of was Shattered's theme playing, a second glitching theme mixing into it.

The next thing he was aware of was the amount of negativity, not just here but everywhere. This whole multiverse seemed to be so angry, sad, scared, you name it on the negative side of the emotional spectrum. It was especially negative here, actually, and he could sense Shattered and someone else-

"look out!" Reality was thrown out of the way of several tentacles he hadn't noticed as blue magic grabbed his soul, sending him flying back. 

Reality looked up in confusion, looking around for who sounded like Error, but he didn't see him. Instead he saw glitching black bones in front of him, which had pixels coming from them that were every color of the rainbow. He looked past them to see the source, and his eye sockets widened in surprise. He'd known that this multiverse would have things reversed, but he'd never expected this.

Error was standing there, but... different. His eye sockets and nasal cavity were dark blue instead of red, and his left eyelight was a swirl of rainbow colors with a black pupil while his right eyelight was white. His right eye socket had a red, an orange, and a yellow stripe coming down from it, and his left had a green, a light blue, and a purple stripe, similar to Error's blue markings. He still had the blue scarf, and he was wearing a loose black jacket, his left sleeve ending in a blur of red, orange, and yellow while his right ended in a blur of light and dark blue, purple, and pink, and the bottom of the jacket itself faded down to green.

He was wearing a light blue shirt, and a dark brown sash with seven pockets on it, each latch a color of the rainbow. His pants were black, fading to inverses of his sleeves, and he was wearing black socks and brown fingerless gloves. His segments of his fingers had different colors, too, those being orange and yellow, and upon closer inspection his toes did too, his heels green while his toes were light blue to dark blue to purple. His teeth were a lighter shade of yellow than Error's were, too, but the angry look on his face and the error signs matched Error's to a T.

"you pest!!!" Shattered snapped at the other version of Error, who smirked slightly.

"what? you didn't think i'd let you get away that easily, did you?" He asked, dodging more of Shattered's tentacles with agility Reality didn't think Error was capable of, doing a backflip and landing in a crouch a bit away, "who else did you terrorize, huh?"

"that's really none of your business." Shattered responded, rolling his eyelight, "now stay out of my damn way, error."

"ha! not a chance!" The glitch laughed, summoning several Gaster Blasters, which were black and had his eyelights, eye sockets, and streaks under them, and they fired bright, rainbow lights at Shattered, who dodged them, "it's nice knowing i give you such a problem, though! for you to have to go wherever that was through that portal to get away from me!"

"i didn't even go there willingly!" Shattered snapped.

"yeah well you sure as hell didn't wanna leave, now did you?" The Error's opposite replied, dodging more tentacles while using some rainbow strings to cut through them, "just admit it, i put up too much of a fight for you!"

"you do not!!" Shattered snarled.

"then how come you haven't landed a hit on me yet, huh?" He grinned, and Shattered growled, increasing the frequency of his attacks, Error's counterpart laughing while dodging them.

Reality could sense the swapped version of Error's emotions, and while he was angry, he was also having a blast. It was like he was purposely egging Shattered on to amuse himself, making him positive, and in the process, making Shattered lack in immediate negativity. It was a strategy Reality hadn't seen before, and he liked it. He teleported out from behind the bone shield in a plume of black and glittering gold smoke, landing next to the glitch and using his purple blades to slice through some of Shattered's tentacles that had stabbed out of the ground behind him.

"reality!! stay out of this!!" Shattered hissed.

"nope." Reality refused, and he looked over at the other Error, "you up for a team up?"

"if it pisses off shattered? then absolutely." He nodded, and Reality nodded back.

They both teleported out of the way as Shattered stabbed more tentacles down at them, Reality reappearing to his left while the Error lookalike teleported to his right. The anomaly sent sharp bones and Gaster Blasters at him while Reality used his purple knives and claws, the two of them slicing and blasting through Shattered's tentacles to try and do some damage. Reality was well aware he couldn't really injure Shattered that much, but the glitch's surprising positivity was fueling him, giving his blades a yellow sheen that burned Shattered at contact. Reality smirked as Shattered looked at him in surprise, and he kept attacking. Error's swapped counterpart was fighting similar to how Error did, which made sense, and it also allowed Reality to play off of his fighting techniques.

"you're outnumbered again, shattered! give it up!" Reality told him.

"since when have i lost when outnumbered?" Shattered questioned lowly.

"since today!" Error's opposite yelled, and he lunged forward, landing a punch against Shattered's face that sent him flying back, something Reality had not anticipated.

Error had haphephobia; he refused to get into close proximity with someone, and this one just... punched the hell out of Shattered. Reality looked at Error's swapped version's hands, seeing some sharp bones between his fingers, and there was some deep gouges out of Shattered's face that were quickly healing. He threw the sharp bones into the air, which glitched to be absolutely gigantic, and they stabbed down at Shattered, trapping him inside. The other version of Error summoned Gaster Blasters again, creating them between the bones, and they blasted down at him.

This happened in less than a second. A bright, rainbow light engulfed the area, momentarily blinding Reality as it sent him flying back a bit, landing on his tailbone, and he had to blink several times to clear his vision. He rubbed as his eye sockets as the effects of the blast dissipated, revealing a massive crater in the ground, and Shattered was nowhere in sight, and from what Reality could sense, he'd teleported away. It made sense that Errors were all at least somewhat destructive, and this one... definitely was. Wow.

"haha!! coward!!!" Error's swapped version laughed a bit away from him, gloating, and Reality sighed quietly, shaking his skull.

Yup, he was still an Error...

The other Error vanished in a glitch of colorful pixels before reappearing in front of Reality, offering him his hand to help him up, something that was again surprising Reality.

"hey, you ok?" He asked, and Reality accepted his hand, quickly pulled to his feet.

"yeah, thanks, umm..." Reality trailed off.

"oh! i'm error! i don't recognize you, so you must be a somewhat new au, right? wait, then how did he know you-" Error's opposite froze, before grinning, both eyelights stars. "are you from another multiverse?! i mean i'm assuming that's where shattered was, but are you from there too?!"

That amount of excitement and curiosity was... wow... it was a lot. This Error was so different from the one Reality knew, but it was kind of nice seeing a version of him that wasn't a childish, sadistic brat.

"i uh.. i'm actually from this one. my name's reality." Reality introduced himself, "i uh... it's a very long story about what happened..."

"well then let's go! i know just the spot we can talk where ol' sludge-bucket can't eavesdrop!" He prompted, snapping his fingers.

The crater in the ground sealed up with a few glitches, replaced by a grassy plain, just like what had been there before. The next thing Reality knew the ground was out from under his feet, and they were... somewhere else. Reality looked around to see what looked like a giant galaxy, matching in colors to the Outertale, but it was... somehow such more beautiful, filled with stars and colorful clouds.

The next thing Reality noticed about it were the countless pixelated vortexes all around the area, all colorful and having holographic, colorful labels next to them that displayed their name and a number, probably an ID on their variant. There was some Reality recognized, but others he didn't, and he knew Abyss or Sci would freak if they saw this place. Reality and Error's swapped version were floating in a space without a vortex present, and there were some colorful beanbag chairs, all having at least a few stickers or patches on them. The other Error sat on a blue one, getting comfortable on it, and Reality sat on a yellow one.

"do you want anything to drink or eat?" The glitch offered, "i can make pretty much anything in this multiverse appear here! other than souls, that is- well, i can bring people here, but i can't just create copies of them!"

"i'm ok, thank you." Reality declined, this version of Error's enthusiasm and all around friendliness downright shocking, "what umm... what is this place?"

"oh this? this is like a multiversal hub! i can access any au from here, and i can access pretty much any code, but only here!" He explained, "otherwise i'm limited to the au i'm in. so, umm... what was this story about shattered? did he get his coccyx kicked a lot?!"

Error's opposite grew a lot more excited at the last sentence, and Reality laughed a bit. He was still reeling from seeing a version of Error like this, but he was getting used to it. His positivity was helping a bit, and so was his friendliness, as Reality honestly found it endearing. He just... he still wasn't used to anyone being so friendly and eager to talk to him; his time in the other multiverse with Dream and the others still hadn't gotten him fully used to anyone wanting to be friends with him. This was... honestly kind of nice.

"heh, kinda. i'm uh... i dunno how to explain this, but i'm from this multiverse- shattered's au, actually." Reality replied.

"oh! you mean dreamtale?" Error's swapped version asked.

"yeah, i wasn't sure if the names were the same here for aus or not." Reality nodded.

"well, some of them might be the same! oh! i wonder which aus the multiverses share! wait- how come i didn't see you in dreamtale? i searched that au top to bottom except for shattered's lair, and i never saw anyone like you there." The other Error questioned.

So that's where I was? In Shattered's lair in this multiverse?...

"yeah, i was probably trapped in stone there..." Reality sighed.

"he trapped you in stone?!" The glitch exclaimed, anger flaring up inside him as his voice grew much more glitchy and distorted.

"no, no, he didn't, i don't think..." Reality said, "i uh... i don't know how i got trapped, but i know it was when my brother died... he was dream."

"i'm sorry for your loss..." He apologized, and Reality could sense some sympathy from him, another surprise, and it seemed to click, "wait, shattered is what became of the corrupted positivity guardian- dream! wait, shattered is your brother?!"

"that thing is not my brother." Reality stated, "he's just.. what remains of him, unfortunately. dream would.. he would probably hate himself if he knew what that thing was doing, and i'm trying to do right by him by stopping shattered, or at the very least protecting and helping who i can. it's what he would want."

The other Error nodded a bit, "that makes sense... it's honestly a really noble thing for you to do, reality. honoring your brother like that... don't take this the wrong way or anything, but uh... shattered's the worst."

"oh i'm not denying that." Reality laughed a bit, "i hate that thing, but uh... the other multiverse was nice. i uh... i got to see my brother again."

"dream? wait, he wasn't shattered over there?" He asked in surprise.

"yeah," Reality nodded, and he looked off to the side with a grimace, "instead, i uh... i was... i don't know who was worse, honestly. shattered did some messed up crap over there, but i don't think i ever learned the full extents of what that thing possessing that other me's corpse did before i got there, but i know dream had a lot of trouble with him for a while..."

Reality looked down, thinking about how many times Dream and Nightmare had fought each other. How much Dream was probably hurt by seeing someone attacking him with a twisted version of his face. Dream told him for a while he'd believed Nightmare was him before realizing the truth, and Reality could only imagine what Nightmare did to torment him. It almost made him sick.

"hey..." The other version of Error spoke up, getting Reality's attention, "i can guess what you're thinking, and... look, it wasn't your fault. you yourself said that shattered isn't dream, and that other version of you isn't you. don't let yourself get upset over what happened over there, since it wasn't you. there was nothing that other version of you could've done to prevent it from happening, and there was nothing you could've done to prevent what happened to dream. some things are just... scripted."

Reality nodded a little, and he looked down at his hands again, "i know, i just... i can't help but think that somehow it was my fault-"

"reality." Error's opposite cut him off, "it wasn't your fault. all aus have stories; they all have set paths that can't be changed, and unfortunately this was yours, and it was that other version of your au's. it's awful, but inevitable."

". . . thank you..." Reality mumbled, "why... why are you so nice to me? i mean, with shattered in this multiverse, this place has to be hell."

"well, it mainly is." He replied, "see, shattered was around before i was, and from what i can tell, anyone without a lot of determination is... very twisted. there's been so much pain and suffering, so much cruelty and hatred... it was awful forever, and sure, some aus like underfell are a lot tamer than others- actually some of the safest aus to be in, but... things got a lot better after shattered vanished."

Underfell? Safe?!

"that doesn't make sense... shattered is attached to this multiverse, any effects he's had on this multiverse wouldn't have just vanished." Reality thought out loud, and then realization hit, "wait, that's when i woke up over there... do you think...?"

"that you helped balance things out? that's exactly what i think!" The other version of Error nodded, "monsters started acting a lot less feral and dusthungry, so it's completely possible..."

"well, umm... you're welcome?" Reality responded, and the other skeleton laughed, snorting a little through giggles.

"better late than never!" The glitch snickered, "oh! i never introduced myself, did i?"

"no? i mean there was an error in the other multiverse, i wasn't sure if that was your name too or not." Reality answered.

"it is!" He confirmed, "well, kinda! i never really thought about another nickname other than the nametags."

He flicked an error sign with a finger for emphasis, and Reality snorted a bit, "nametags? oh i am so using that against him once i find a way back there to visit- if you don't mind, of course!"

"help yourself! what was this other me like, anyways?" He asked.

"well, he was fed up with nightmare and shattered, that's for sure." Reality answered, "he was uh... not exactly a model skeleton, though."

"nightmare's the name of the corrupted version of you, right?" He questioned, and Reality nodded, "just checking! wait, what'd this other version of me do, anyways? he couldn't have been that bad, it's not like i was purposely destroying aus or anything." Reality grimaced a bit, looking off to the side. "right?... reality?"

". . . like i said, not a model skeleton..." Reality sighed.

"WHAT?!" Error's swapped version exclaimed, shocked, horrified, and mildly outraged.

His eye sockets filled with an array of colors and error messages, and he went motionless, going into a crash like Error tended to. A rebooting screen popped up in his eye sockets, and after a few moments, the error messages and colors vanished. It took him a moment to collect himself and remember what he'd heard, Reality sensing when that realization hit a second time.

"alright, yup! name change! i am not going to be associated with someone like that!" He decided.

"it's an opposite multiverse, and i'm the only one besides shattered who's been there!" Reality pointed out.

He didn't want Error's opposite thinking he had to change his name just because of another version of him.... Reality only did it because of association and it just kind of stuck. If anything, he was pissed that thing stole his name.

"yeah, exactly! any time shattered says my name, he'll be mocking me because of that other version of me! seriously, how could any version of me destroy an au or want to hurt anyone in them?!" He questioned, dumbfounded, and he started to pace on the invisible floor.

"because according to him, 'they're all anomalies and dirty glitches'." Reality sighed.

"ugh, that version of me sounds like bleach..." He groaned, flopping back on the blue beanbag again.

Bleach? Another version of Ink, maybe...

"you still don't have to change your name, error. really!" Reality told him.

"oh yes i do! shattered will just use it to piss me off, and i don't wanna be associated with someone like that! either his or my name changes, no if, ands, or buts! . . . heh, butts..." He giggled, snorting a little, and Reality sighed.

So he was still childish, just... not at all a brat... Reality could live with that.

Reality sighed, shaking his skull at the joke, and he asked, "how awful are you at nicknames, anyways?"

". . . i don't think you want to know the answer to that." Error's opposite winced, and Reality laughed a little.

"so pretty bad, got it..." Reality said, and he hummed, "hmm... you're kinda glitchy and pixelated, and glitch is probably much more of an insult, so... pixel?"

Error's swapped version looked at him with wide eye sockets before grinning, eyelights stars, "yes!! i love it! thank you!"

There was that enthusiasm again, and... wow, yeah, Reality still wasn't used to that. The other version of Error- Pixel, was definitely enthusiastic, and Reality was actually getting overwhelmed by how positive he was right now. 

"you're welcome." Reality smiled, Pixel's good mood contagious, "so umm... you've been fighting shattered this whole time?"

"yeah, he's such a pain!" Pixel sighed, becoming more annoyed, "bleach is, too- he's the one destroying things here, and he's almost worse than shattered! core's a brat, and speaking of, they're probably still looking for shattered, if they haven't found him already..."

Core was evil here? And knew Shattered?...

"you haven't had any help?" Reality questioned.

"well, everyone usually looks out for themselves or someone occasionally helps out, but otherwise not really. thankfully core doesn't fight and bleach and shattered both despise each other so i never have to worry about them teaming up, but otherwise... not really much help. most of the time unless we're both in the same area." Pixel answered.

"well, i'll be helping out now, and you'll definitely need the help. shattered learned about creating teams, and he's probably gonna be recruiting..." Reality sighed.

"that... will definitely be a problem." Pixel groaned, "- shattered recruiting, that is! having an ally in combat will be amazing! i don't really have any help with fights, and for the aus i can't save, that's where dev comes in!"

"dev?" Reality asked, confused.

"oh, they're the coolest! i'll have to take you to meet them!" Pixel responded, "hey, if you know which aus were enemies over in the other multiverse, would you be able to use that knowledge to find allies here?"

That... was honestly a really good idea...

"i could try? i know xtale is-" Reality started, but Pixel cut him off.

"nope. nuh uh. definitely not an ally." Pixel stated.

"really?" Reality questioned, "the sans there was an enemy in the other multiverse."

"yeah, well, let me say this much, the xtale sans is not a good guy. at all. i don't run into him often, but he's... yeah, you need to hope you don't run into him..."  Pixel said, "he doesn't really have a name, but you know him when you see him."

"that's.... a change. his name was cross in the other multiverse... what's his deal, anyways?" Reality asked.

"well, his au is the only one without color." Pixel said, pointing to a distant point that Reality couldn't see, "other than some purple pixels, maybe. not sure what his deal is, that's more of a legend question- someone else you definitely need to meet, but otherwise... yeah, never go to that au, he's bad news."

"would shattered recruit him?" Reality questioned, and Pixel's eye sockets widened a bit.

"y'know, he's messed up enough he just might work for him. he doesn't really take orders that well, but he might put up with shattered if he feels like he needs to to entertain himself..." Pixel mumbled, probably mostly to himself.

Chronic boredom? XTale?... . . . Oh. Uh oh... Knife, or well, Killer.

"wait, did uh... did he kill everyone?" Reality asked, and Pixel's eye sockets narrowed in confusion at the urgency in his voice.

"well, yeah. countless times, actually... why?" Pixel answered.

"i... i think i know who he is, going off of the other multiverse, anyways..." Reality frowned.

"who?" Pixel questioned.

"trouble." Reality sighed, "definite trouble..."

"told ya he was bad news." Pixel mentioned.

"yeah, we definitely need to get a team together." Reality said, "soon. shattered's probably already working on that, and his knowledge of this multiverse and who he could recruit could be a serious advantage for him..."

"i never really looked into recruiting allies before... you're sure we'll need to? we make a really good team!" Pixel asked.

"yeah, i'm sure.. i'd rather not be horrifically outnumbered..." Reality answered.

"well, i hate dragging people into this, but we could talk to dev; see if they know anything..." Pixel said, "besides, you're gonna need somewhere to stay, anyways..."

While Reality was wracking his mind for who Dev could be, Pixel opened a glitching white portal on the floor, and Reality yelped as his beanbag chair tilted forward. He slid into the portal as Pixel jumped in, laughing a bit, and Reality landed on his coccyx on soft ground which thankfully didn't hurt too bad. He took a moment to examine his surroundings, and his eye sockets widened in shock. The ground was made of fluffy grass, and he could sense positivity emanating from the area, and while negativity was still present, it wasn't too bad.

He could hear laughter from playing children, along with idle, relaxed conversations between older monsters, most of which seeming to be Underfell variants, but there were some exceptions. The surrounding buildings were relatively nice, ranging from apartment buildings, hotels, businesses, restaurants, and there was even a park nearby. Looking up, Reality saw a sunset- an actual sky in this timeline, and it was sunset. The sky was filled with several shades of orange, pink, purple, and yellow, and it was honestly beautiful. It almost allowed him to forget the fact that Pixel had just dumped him into a portal!

"uh... pixel? where are we?" Reality questioned, looking up at him as he pulled him up to his feet, "i mean i know you said someone named dev would be here, but which timeline is this?"

"oh! this is something we call the beta timeline! it's a sanctuary dev made out of an abandoned timeline, and the best part is, only certain people can get in here!" Pixel grinned, "so it's one of the safest, most secure places in the multiverse! aside from where i stay, but practically no one can get there!" Pixel paused, mumbling, "i really need a better name for it..."

Huh, so this was the Omega Timeline over here...

"I've been telling you that for a while, Error." A new voice spoke up, walking over to them.

They looked... kind of like Core, but also like Player. They looked like Player but with Core's color scheme, their body black and different shades of gray. They had light gray, shoulder-length hair, almost white skin, a dark gray sweater and kilt with black stripes, along with black boots. Their eyes were black voids with white dots in the center, and their mouth just seemed like a black void.

"hey, dev!" Pixel greeted, "i made a new friend! his name's reality!"

Dev smiled a bit, saying, "Hey, Reality. Welcome to the Beta Timeline. Feel free to look around and make yourself at home. Let me guess... Bleach destroyed your AU, right?"

"not exactly... shattered's back, and-" Pixel sighed.

"Ugh, there goes our break..." Dev groaned, "He corrupted your AU, didn't he?"

"no, just... he's complicated. he's possessing the corpse of my brother." Reality explained, and their eyes widened.

"Oh my god... You're Nightmare!" Dev exclaimed, "I've been looking into Dreamtale for years, and I heard a lot about a second brother, but I could never find you!"

"yeah, uh... i was stuck in stone for a while. not an experience i'd recommend..." Reality grimaced.

"yeah, he got out after shattered disappeared! apparently they were in a whole other multiverse, one opposite to ours! he was fighting shattered over there, and now he's here to help us!" Pixel explained, "speaking of, after learning some... things about the other version of me, i have officially decided to, with reality's help, give myself a new name! he thought of pixel, and i really like it!"

"Pixel? It's got a nice ring to it. Love's gonna love it." Dev mentioned, "What'd the other version of you do, anyways?"

"what bleach does! can you believe it?!" Pixel exclaimed, "how could a version of me be so awful to do that?!"

"you're never gonna let that go, are you?" Reality asked.

"He's not." "i'm not!" They replied in sync.

Reality sighed a bit, pinching the bridge of his nasal cavity as he shook his skull a bit. For a multiverse that's been dealing with Shattered for centuries, the two people he'd encountered so far were surprisingly nice, meaning that either he was really lucky, or something was wrong. He couldn't sense any bad intentions from either of them, especially not Pixel, who was thrilled to have him as a friend and ally, and Dev didn't have any hidden intentions either. They were exasperated with Shattered, but they seemed almost... hopeful?

"hey, uh... don't take this the wrong way, but... why are you being so nice to me?" Reality questioned, Pixel and Dev exchanging a look.

"look, like i said, not many people help me fight shattered, and you... you're a good person, reality. a genuinely good person. i can see it, and so can dev." Pixel replied, Dev nodding.

"Besides, you have this... this aura around you." Dev mentioned, "It's... I dunno, kinda relaxing? It doesn't really mess with your head, but it's reassuring almost?"

Reality hadn't noticed that, honestly. He'd known from the others and from Dream himself that he had Dream had a similar aura, but he'd never known that he had that as well. It made some sense, he supposed, but it was still a bit of a surprise to learn. Then again, he'd somewhat figured out how to use positivity in his attacks back in Outertale, but he wasn't sure how he did it.

"yeah, that too! besides, shattered doesn't seem to like you, so any enemy of shattered's is a friend of mine!" Pixel grinned, slinging an arm around Reality's shoulders, "besides, not that many people put up with me! i'm too 'energetic'."

"you do act like you're on a constant sugar high." Dev mentioned, "You've been taking it easy on the chocolate, haven't you?"

"of course i have!" Pixel responded, though he was lying from what Reality could sense, and Dev didn't seem to need to be an empath to tell that Pixel was lying.

"Riiiiiiggghhht." Dev said, unconvinced, "Look, how about I get Reality set up somewhere, and you help with the decorating."

"actually, before we do that, which- YAY, DECORATING! but um.." Pixel cleared his throat, "reality had some bad news. from what he said, shattered had made a team over in the other multiverse, and reality thinks he might try it again over here, and he wants to beat him to it. do you know anyone here who might wanna help us?"

Dev thought for a moment, looking off to the side, "That... would definitely not be good; he's already a problem... I might be able to put some fliers up and get in contact with some people. I don't think Love would help since she doesn't like combat, Legend wouldn't be too interested either... . . . I could call Azrael?"

"azrael? like- angel of death, azrael?" Reality questioned, remembering the name from some books he used to read.

"That's who he's named after, yeah. Last time I saw him was when Shattered hit Birdtale a while ago, and Azreal might be open to helping?" Dev shrugged, "I could talk with Void when he swings by again too, he should be coming to update his multiverse guide in a week or two."

"multiverse guide?" Reality asked in confusion.

Void? Could that be Abyss?...

"Yeah, he writes guides on the multiverse for people who can AU hop, letting them know which AUs are safe, which are dangerous, etc." Dev explained, "He drops by a few times a month, and he was just here yesterday. You two might hit it off."

"do you think he would help?" Pixel questioned Dev, "i mean, what happened was awful, but it wasn't his fault..."

"wait, who?" Reality asked.

Pixel and Dev exchanged a glance, Dev sighing, "His AU.... there was a genocide loop, which I'm assuming you know about, but... he was one of the more sane people, and the human went through killing everyone over and over again, since Shattered corrupted their mind. His Determination was a curse for him, and he took some measures to try stopping it, and we think Shattered was involved there, too, but we aren't a hundred percent on that. Soot's been here for a few years now, though, and he hasn't gone easier on himself..."

Soot?... Dust? They sounded similar enough, with their similar stories.

"we could try talking to him?" Reality shrugged, "he seems like an opposite version of an enemy i had in the other multiverse, and he had a counterpart who was actually a friend of mine."

"That makes sense. Some Dusttales have different endings, and it makes sense for some to be good after the genocide while some choose evil." Dev mused, "I'll make some calls and I'll let you know who bites tomorrow. Azrael should hopefully help out, just don't mind if he's a bit... you'll see."

"i don't actually need to sleep or eat or anything, i don't need a place to-" Reality started, but Dev shook their head, holding a hand up.

"Reality, look, you're going to need a place to recharge and relax. Besides, once you get some allies, you'll probably want a place for everyone to hang out, right?" Dev mentioned, and Reality sighed a bit, realizing they had a point.

"besides, when i wanna visit you, i need somewhere to go instead of just... i dunno, a park or something. no friend of mine is gonna live on a bench." Pixel said.

"i wouldn't be living in a park-" Reality started.

"great, so you're accepting help! let's go! i know just the spot!" Pixel grabbed his hand before running forward, pulling Reality along behind him.

He stumbled a bit before he managed to keep up, running behind him. Pixel was surprisingly fast, and while Reality was able to keep up, Pixel was still fast. The area around him blurred from their speed, and while Reality tried paying attention to his surroundings, he couldn't read most signs and addresses. They ran through a neighborhood around the edge of a forest, and after a few minutes all together of running, they got to an open clearing in the woods.

Reality... felt a bit more at home around all the trees, and he wondered if Pixel did that on purpose, though he suspected he did. Pixel was a lot more thoughtful than Error was, and while Error was intelligent, he just wasn't nearly as emotionally aware as Pixel seemed to be. It was a surprise, but it was a pleasant one. Pixel stood confidently in front of a clearing, hands on his hips after he released Reality's hand, and they both looked to their right as the space there glitched a bit, Dev teleporting there. 

"So, Reality, how do you feel about treehouses?" Dev questioned.

A treehouse?... Reality used to sleep on the branches on the Tree of Feelings a lot, be it hiding from bullies or just to relax for a bit, and while he missed it, he never considered the possibility of being able to do so again... Though what they had in mind was probably a bit different.

"i... would be ok with one, i guess?" Reality answered.

Dev nodded, snapping their fingers as a massive weeping willow formed, Reality having to tilt his skull up just to see it completely. It had a spiraling staircase wrapping around it's trunk, seeming to be made of smooth amethyst with dark purple cushions on each step, and the tree had long branches with green leaves, some of the branches almost reaching the ground. Reality could see platforms nestled between large branches of the tree, connected together by ladders or bridges, and the platforms had either walls or fences around them. Reality would be lying if he said his jaw didn't drop a bit in awe, taking a moment to process what he was seeing.

"Do you like it?" Dev asked, "I can alter it however you want."

"it's amazing!" Reality reassured, trying and failing to hide his enthusiasm.

Pixel laughed a bit, grinning, "dev is the best at making places to live! they've offered to make me a house a few times, but... i dunno... didn't wanna lose my view?"

"well how about i make you a room here? that way you can hang out here whenever you want, and you can go back to that spot in the multiversal hub anytime you want?" Reality offered.

"you're the best!" Pixel exclaimed, and Reality quickly found himself tackled in a hug.

He grunted a bit as he hit the ground before laughing, patting his back a bit. Pixel's positivity was still intense, but it was also quite contagious, Dev laughing a bit as they watched them. He hadn't expected his first day back to go anything like this, but he was pleasantly surprised.

Pixel was definitely someone to get used to, that was for sure; he was a bundle of energy and excitement, and while the visual of Error acting like this was hilarious, he would keep that to himself for the sake of Pixel seemingly hating Error. Dev was nice too, kind of like Core but also like Player; they weren't nearly as energetic as Pixel was, thankfully, since that much energy was exhausting just to watch. Reality suddenly found himself pulled up by Pixel again, who was bouncing on his feet slightly in excitement.

"now, for the best part!" Pixel grinned.

"what's that?" Reality asked, though he could guess the answer.

"decorating!!" Pixel beamed, grabbing his hand before running towards the treehouse, Reality stumbling and laughing as he followed after him.

Reality didn't need sleep. He didn't even get tired very easily, but he could just tell he would be exhausted by the time they were done decorating, wow...

Chapter Text

The boredom was suffocating. There was nothing to do, nowhere to go... no one to kill... It was all just so... empty. Creating timelines to kill had grown boring and repetitive no matter how many different ones he thought of, all of them somehow the same despite how different he tried making them. No matter how many mazes he created for victims to hide, he found them so easily due to creating the damn maze and knowing exactly where to go.

He'd even run out of ways to kill people, which he never thought could happen but surprise, surprise, it had. He'd been locked in this timeline for... he wasn't sure how long, but judging by the rainbow pixels that sparkled over the sky like stars, he'd say his escape wasn't coming anytime soon. You stab a guy in the back one time and he prevents you from leaving this AU on your own because you were 'too dangerous'. He scoffed, grabbing one of his knives from his belt and stabbing it through a nearby wall like it was made of room temperature butter.

He withdrew it and put it back into the sheath on his belt, fingers clenching and unclenching as he started to walk, stalking the area. Sometimes multiversal travelers stopped by, so he could mess with them until they left, and sometimes kill them if they didn't know Legend... or if he just simply didn't tell Legend, but he somehow always knew regardless. He let out an irritated sigh. Legend hadn't stopped by in a while, something about that Shattered guy being missing.

From what Legend said, Shattered was bad news, but then again, he was bad news. He didn't really have a name, despite how much Legend tried giving him one. Sans, Chara, neither fit anymore, so he just went with none. He saved his small bursts of creativity for trying to entertain himself, a name was the least of his problems.

Besides, it wasn't like anyone would use it besides Legend, so why bother coming up with one? Sure it was something to think about, but he had better things to do with his time... He just wasn't sure what those things were. . . . He'd figure it out. . . . Eventually.

He flopped back onto the ground, glaring up at the glitching sky and flipping it off with both hands, unsure if Error could see him but giving him two middle fingers regardless. There was just nothing here. He could create anything he wanted, sure, but he'd run out of things to create, of things to try, and he had no one to talk to that he didn't want to kill. He didn't do attached, not with those Papyrus, Frisk or Asriel guys.

That was who they had been attached to, and he wasn't them. He had fragments of their memories but their shared hatred for XGaster. Was XGaster his creator? He wasn't sure.

XGaster had created Sans, but he hadn't created Chara, so maybe he was his half-creator? But then who created Chara? Who created him and Frisk? Ugh, he didn't feel like thinking about this again, but he didn't have anything else to think about!!

Thinking about this meant thinking about them which meant thinking about him and how and why he existed! He didn't feel like contemplating his existence again, but with nothing else to think about.. he was left with nothing to do but reflect. XGaster created the first worlds, then he began to kill people off through circumstances in those worlds, sometimes having Frisk do it. Then Chara tried rebelling, failed, lost half of his soul, killed Frisk, who he vaguely remembered was Chara's brother, and then Overwrote himself into Frisk to remake him.

From there, XGaster kept messing around, having Frisk kill everyone in a genocide loop, Chara briefly took control, overwrote Sans to have his memories to try striking a deal to overthrow XGaster and free himself from being trapped inside Frisk, and wow was Sans stubborn. He met Legend, kept trying to resist the deal, but he broke eventually, though, accepting the deal, Chara fusing their souls together, and thus he was born! Well, more created from the two of them, not them but having their hatred for XGaster and Chara's addiction to killing due to how much being trapped in Frisk for the genocide loop had messed him up... Or maybe that was just what Chara had liked telling himself.

He didn't know, and he didn't care. Those two were long gone and had been. They'd been gone before he killed XGaster and the rest of his creations and Overwrote this world just to remove all traces of him. He didn't consider himself spiteful, but with their shared hatred for XGaster... . . . he wasn't merciful or slow in killing him, and he wasn't sloppy in removing all traces of him.

The only traces remaining being his body. Sans was the one with the body while Chara was more of a phantom, and once he separated himself from Frisk, Frisk was... pretty much nothing but a mindless puppet for XGaster. He was the first one he killed after Sans and Chara fused their souls together, if he remembered correctly. His first moments were kind of a blur of black, white, and gray.

That wasn't an issue in his memory, though. Everything was those shades- Legend said he was colorblind, and he was, except for magic, strangely. Those were the only colors he could see; maybe one of the reasons he hadn't killed Legend yet, those rainbow flames of his... He caught a glance of himself in his reflection in one of the windows of his surroundings, something he hadn't been paying much attention to.

The royal guard coat and sashes Sans used to wear was black, with a white turtleneck underneath it, the coat's fur hood black and the black and white scarf built into it. His shorts were white with black 'x's on either side, and his socks were white, boots black with 'x's on the top of them. His two knives were sheathed in the black belt, the blades having black handles, a jagged separation between them and the blades, which were hollow in the middle and sharpened on all edges, inside and out. His eye sockets, as pretty much always, were hollow, and the only source of color in this world was his soul, which was a target, made of white, red, and purple.

He kept walking, not paying his reflection any more attention, and he continued wandering aimlessly. His legs didn't get sore, they just decided not to work anymore after he walked too much, or maybe they were sore and he couldn't feel it? Despite it being his body, he wasn't really aware of it's physical needs or sensations. His sense of touch was nonexistent, his ability to feel pain was gone with Sans and Chara, and while the rest of his senses were sharpened, he wasn't aware of hunger or tiredness, he just... existed.

He walked, and walked, and walked, searching for something, anything, be it Legend returning or someone else winding up in here, but no one came. His legs gave out, refusing to work, and he held himself up with his arms, which trembled with an effort he couldn't feel. His eye sockets grew more difficult to keep open, and right when he was on the verge of another blackout, he felt it. This... aura, that swept over the area, that made him feel cold, a new sensation, and his eye sockets became easier to keep open as he grew curious.

He pushed himself up on shaking limbs, forcing his body forward to get closer. He'd never felt anything like this before, it was something new, and it had his interest peaked, boredom momentarily forgotten. He looked up at one of the rooftops in this world, and he teleported up to it, reality briefly warping as he adjusted the coordinates of his body's code, and he looked around, seeing the source a bit away. It was a version of Sans that was almost pure black, like a void, and their eyelight was a color he recognized as amber.

He could make out a few details, like a sweater, pants, and a vest with dark gray around the sleeve cuffs, edges, neck flare, and shoulders, a dark gray belt, and black boots with dark gray soles and accents at the top. He was sure that the dark gray was probably amber like his eyelight was, but he couldn't see it. He kept himself pressed low to the roof, arms shaking as he forced them to keep him upright, knowing if they gave out, he probably wouldn't be able to move, no matter how much he wanted or tried to.

He was then suddenly aware of that amber eyelight being locked on him, that cold feeling returning, and he found himself unable to move. His bones tremored, and he couldn't make them move despite how much he tried. What was going on?...

"i know you're there." The other skeleton said, "you can come out... then again, maybe you can't. i can sense your exhaustion from here."

He narrowed his eye sockets a bit at the version of Sans, trying to figure out who this was. Was this that Shattered guy Legend had been talking about? The Sans variant didn't have a code, so he figured out that this was definitely Shattered. He didn't let his guard down, but he wasn't wary either.

He wasn't really... able to feel emotional. He could feel bored, curious, etc., but anger? Sadness? Fear? Almost foreign except for when his soul was stupid. He tried pushing himself up again, finally getting his weakened body to cooperate, and he gripped the edge of the rooftop.

The surface broke under his grip, his hand sliding forward, and he slid off of the roof, falling flat on his back on the ground. His body let out a quiet groan at the impact despite the pain not registering in his mind, and he was left blearily looking up, Shattered audibly walking over him. A shadow fell over his skull, then he saw Shattered looking down at him, his eye sockets heavy but he was forcing his body to stay conscious. The coldness seeping into his bones helped quite a bit, but otherwise... he was sure he would have passed out long before he got this far.

"what.. do you want?" He asked, his voice rough from disuse.

How long had it been since Legend had been here? How long had it been since he'd done the maintenance and upkeep his body needed? He hadn't slept or eaten anything for a long time, not since Legend was here last, he'd just been aimlessly wandering this world... Oh, the goopy guy was saying something.

"-? are you even listening?" He caught the tail-end of Shattered's question.

"sorry, spaced out for a minute." He said, not really apologizing, "what'd you say?"

Shattered sighed, muttering, "you're worse than ink..."

"hmm?"

"nothing. as i was saying, i have an offer for you." Shattered told him.

"oh... which is?" He asked.

"for you to work for me." Shattered sighed.

"why?" He questioned.

"because- i just explained all of this." Shattered said, exasperated.

"i was spacing out." He shrugged.

Wow, this guy really seemed to hate repeating himself... huh.. repeating himself? Repeating?
R     e     pe       a   t        i   n      g    ?    .      ..

"-oh for! that's it, we are getting nowhere until you're more coherent." Oh, he must've spaced out agai-

A wave of exhaustion cut his thought off, too exhausted to think. His mind completely blanked out, something he hadn't experienced in a bit. His vision tinged that amber color, something that overstimulated him and made him shut his eye sockets, and that was the end of it.

The next thing he was aware of was his eye sockets opening again, his thoughts trickling back to him. Shattered was sitting nearby, looking bored, though he did smirk when he noticed he was awake. How long had he slept this time?

He could assume that Shattered had knocked him out with some form of magic, which made his guard raise ever so slightly. He'd play nice with this guy for a while, see what he wanted, and go from there. Odds were he couldn't take him in a fight, so he needed to be careful here and see how this played out. 

"watching me sleep, huh?" He asked as he sat up, acting casual, "creepy, much?"

"well i had to insure you didn't dust from a lack of taking care of yourself, and besides, i believe we can help each other." Shattered responded, and he looked at Shattered curiously, "you're trapped here by error, aren't you?"

"and all because he can't take a joke..." He sighed, gauging his reaction from his words, "you kill some people, pretend to be his dead friend and then stab him in the back, and he freaks out..."

Feigned casualness aside, Error was such an overreactor...

"well, what would you say if i helped you leave this place?" Shattered questioned, getting his attention.

". . . i'm listening."

"i can teleport you out of here, but i won't do this for free. i want you to work for me. you see, error is also an enemy of mine, along with someone else, and they're likely going to be gaining allies. i want to have people on my side as well. i've seen how useful it can be, and if you work for me, you will be rewarded quite well." Shattered explained.

So that's what he wanted...

"was this your pitch that i spaced out for earlier?" He asked, and Shattered rolled his eyelight with a huff.

"no, it isn't. now, will you work for me or not? you'd be provided a place to stay, along with anything material you might want." Shattered informed, "you would also have full access to the multiverse, and as long as i'm aware of where you are, you can go anywhere you want."

". . ." He thought for a moment, "will this piss off error?"

"likely beyond belief." Shattered smirked, "what you'll be doing is spreading negativity throughout the multiverse, terrorizing people and occasionally killing and torturing them, so error will be far from pleased."

That sounded fun...

Legend might not approve, but he was so bored. He wouldn't be able to leave otherwise, not since Legend agreed with Error that him stuck here was best for everyone. Legend was Sans's friend, not his. He was clinging to some ghost of the past, believing because he had part of Sans's soul, that he had some kindness in him... What Shattered was offering was a chance to cut loose, be himself, without being trapped in this hell. 

"so basically, my job is to entertain myself?" He summarized.

"and to help fight my enemies, yes." Shattered nodded.

"so again, my job is to entertain myself?" He repeated, and Shattered chuckled a bit.

"if you find that fun, yes." Shattered nodded. 

". . . where do i sign up?" He asked, and Shattered smirked a bit, "wait, i need a name for that, right?"

"you don't have a name?" Shattered questioned, seeming surprised.

"well, i have nicknames, but none of 'em fit. well, they do, but they're mostly insults and aren't the most unique things to be called in most cases." He shrugged, "why? any ideas?"

"not particularly, but you do remind me of someone." Shattered responded, "quite a lot, actually, which is partially why i want to recruit you."

"i am not sans-" He started to glare.

"relax, i'm not saying you are." Shattered sighed, "i was in another multiverse for a while, and i met someone there who you share several characteristics with, being a sociopathic murderer with chronic boredom, emotional numbness, and an affinity for knives."

"oh?" He was curious.

So that's where Shattered had been... no wonder Legend hadn't been able to find him, he hadn't even been in this multiverse...

"yes, his name was killer, but i doubt you want anything similar to that. you're both quite insistent on being your own person." Shattered mentioned.

So Shattered probably knew a decent amount about him based on that other version of him in that multiverse... Shattered was right, he wouldn't want to be like someone else, but he did like the name... He ran synonyms through his mind, Murderer, Assassin, Homicide, Butcher, Slayer, Slaughterer, Massacrer, Executioner... Sans was a Royal Judge, so maybe he could be the Executioner? It fit, in a way, how he'd executed him... . . . Executor? Or maybe a play on words would be fun, Sans and Chara had both appreciated a good pun, and he had some of that fondness. Codes could be executed as they were run, so maybe Executer would be a fun name? Sure, he hadn't needed a name before, but if spending some time thinking of something to be called meant getting out of this place, he didn't have a problem putting some thought into this... 

"have you made up your mind yet?" Shattered questioned.

"i think so." Executer smirked, using some strength to push himself up, springing to his feet.

The world swam around him, and he stumbled, barely catching himself before he could faceplant on the ground. Executer felt so weak, something he'd been trying not to show to his new... what? Employer? Boss? Did he even have to listen to this guy besides on where to target when he needed him to? Ugh, his head was foggy again, and he didn't think it was from Shattered's magic this time.

"when's the last time you ate something?" Shattered questioned.

"ugh, i don't know..." Executer responded, pushing himself up a bit.

"alright, i'm taking you to eat something." Shattered stated, "if you're going to be working for me, you can't be doing that all of the time."

"oh how considerate..." Executer mumbled.

"i thought so." Shattered smirked, and he extended two tentacles, hooking them under Executer's arms and pulling him up.

Executer didn't appreciate it as much as his body did, which went limp, like it was relieved Executer wasn't able to force it to move anymore. He tried to move out of the loose hold, but his body refused to respond, seemingly out of strength.

"ugh... are you doing this?" Executer questioned, just in case he was responsible for this weakness.

"no? you don't feel it?" Shattered asked.

"no? feel what?" Executer tilted his skull a bit.

"that exhaustion, that hunger and pain... i can sense it from your body, but it seems like your mind is completely disconnected from it..." Shattered mused, "you should be in agony right now, and yet you feel nothing at all..."

"it happens." Executer made his shoulders shrug slightly.

". . ." Shattered sighed, "what did you come up with for a name, by the way?"

"executer?" Executer answered, Shattered nodding.

"it's a good choice. well, executer... sweet dreams." Shattered smirked, and the tiredness from before returned tenfold.

It seemed to seep into his body through the tentacles, which had an amber glow to them, and it took all of his strength to not pass out right then. He fought to keep his eye sockets even slightly cracked open to glare at him, despite how weak it probably looked. He hated feeling or looking weak.

"oh don't give me that look. there's nothing in our deal that says i can't make you sleep should you need it, and you do. you need food as well, but some concentrated magic potions should give you some strength. do you have any idea how close to dusting you are?" Shattered questioned, "if anything, i'm saving you."

Saving?...

Executer's thoughts grew more muffled, Shattered muttering under his breath, but he couldn't make out what he was saying. Everything was so hazy, so blurry...   H  e       c  o     u l    d      b  a   r  e l    y       t      h   i    n        k     .   .      .     . 

He blacked out, going into a void of absolutely nothing before the next thing he knew, thoughts came trickling back. He pried his eye sockets open, being met with various shades of dark gray and black. He was laying on something soft- a bed? He looked around, seeing he was indeed laying on a bed, on his back, and he was alone. Briefly. A door quietly opened, Executer's vision shooting to it with so much speed it made his skull spin.

"take it easy." Shattered sighed, walking over to him with food in his hand, "i severely doubt you ate recently, so i got you something small so your soul doesn't get overwhelmed."

"i don't need anyone taking care of me..." Executer grumbled sluggishly.

". . . you were turning to dust, you fool." Shattered deadpanned.

". . . oh. hate when that happens." Executer sighed as he pushed himself to sit up against the headboard of the bed.

Truth be told, he never really bothered with eating, drinking, or sleeping. His body just eventually gave out and then he came back as good as new, but Shattered couldn't just let his body reset in peace...

"you foolish mortal..." Shattered huffed, Executer resisting the urge to flip him off as he sat the plate in his lap.

He started to eat it, not really caring about what it was, and Shattered sat down at the end of the bed. Everything was quiet for a while, Executer just eating while Shattered sat there, looking thoughtful.

"so, you sleep-talk, and i heard you mention legend quite a bit. is he a friend of yours?" Shattered asked.

"eh." Executer shrugged, "kinda? he says he is."

"and yet he wasn't looking out for you." Shattered noted.

"it's not his job to." Executer said.

"a friend's job is to look after their friends. you lack the ability to take care of yourself, and he should've been there instead of... what  was it you said? looking for me?" Shattered questioned, "some friend he was, checking up on you."

Executer was quiet, looking down at his plate before shrugging, "it wasn't like i was gonna go anywhere. besides, from what legend said, everyone's been real worried about where you were, wondering if you were gonna crack the multiverse in half or something.... are you?"

Shattered just shrugged, smirking, "not this one."

Executer didn't look into that that much, finishing his food and feeling some strength return to him, but not much. 

"don't expect yourself to be back to one hundred percent right away, executer. you almost died." Shattered said.

"should've just let it happen, i would've been fine." Executer sighed.

". . . you just agreed to work for me, i won't just let you die." Shattered said, "unlike legend, i actually care about your wellbeing."

"he does-" Executer started.

"he cares about him, though, doesn't he?" Shattered questioned.

Executer went silent, before saying, "you were in my head, weren't you?"

"i overheard some thoughts." Shattered smirked, "you're right, though. he's attached to him above all else. not you."

Executer looked off to the side, wanting to argue but feeling too tired for it. So instead, he just sighed.

"i don't have the energy for this right now..." Executer told him.

"then get some sleep, we'll work on getting your strength up before you get to go have fun." Shattered said, getting up.

Oh right, he finally got to entertain himself now... Well now he definitely couldn't   s  l   e    e    p   .      .    .

"stop doing that." Executer glared as Shattered pulled on his legs, his torso slowly falling to lay back on the bed.

"not until you can do it for yourself. you'll need your strength, you idiot." Shattered rolled his eyelight, "do it on your own and i won't have to."

Executer went to respond, but the strength he'd regained was out of his reach, and within moments, he was out cold.

Chapter Text

Reality had been in the Beta Timeline for a few days now, Pixel excitedly showing him around, and Reality noticed some similarities and some differences. For example, the Underfell monsters resembled the original AUs in Dream's multiverse, and Reality had not been prepared for a friendly Red. That was almost as jarring as seeing a version of Horror and Famine running a version of Ccino's cat cafe but with hamsters. Reality had had a bit of a crisis over that one...

There was still no sign of that Azrael guy, and Pixel had been trying and failing to get into contact with Legend, but Void was supposed to be showing up today. Reality was sitting at a table by the Beta Timeline's news stand, eating a hamster head shaped lava cake he'd gotten from Mocha's, who was the Horrorfell version of Ccino. Mocha was... honestly surprisingly nice. A bit shy and self-conscious but also with a temper and uh... well, he was definitely a variant of Horror and Famine. He saw a swirl of red and black before a portal opened, someone jumping out of it in a crouch.

He looked like Abyss, but the blue crystal pendant on his chest was a bright red with a gold frame, and the fluffy white fur lining of his coat was black, the coat itself dark red with a black lining and gold zipper. His shorts were black with a red stripe on either side, his shirt black, and his shoes were black boots with a few gold buckles on them with red soles. His eyelights were red, teeth sharp with a gold tooth, and he had a few light scars on his face, his left eye socket having a small fracture going up from it that was scabbed over with some red blood.

Reality... honestly really missed Abyss. Before... everything happened, he never really had any friends besides Dream, and he never had anyone to read with, since Dream hadn't known how. He knew he was going to miss that, and the possibility that he wouldn't be losing that... it had him a bit hopeful. He wasn't sure exactly how to start this conversation though- but with how Void was walking over to him, he was guessing he wouldn't have to.

"hey!" The skeleton greeted, "you're reality, right? error sent me a text about you."

"yeah, that's me." Reality nodded, "you're void, right?"

"yeah!" Void confirmed, sitting down at the table by him, "so, shattered's brother, huh?"

"that thing's not my brother." Reality informed, Void raising his hands in a harmless gesture.

"sorry! didn't mean to offend ya." Void apologized, and Reality sighed.

"no, it's- you're ok, he's just... my brother's dead, is all... shattered... he's not him." Reality explained, Void nodding a bit, resting his arms on the table.

Reality slid a small paper bag over to Void, which contained another lava cake he'd bought for once Void showed up, and Void opened it, looking inside before smiling. He grabbed the dessert's package, opening it up, grabbing the fork inside of it and starting to eat the chocolate dessert.

"so, error mentioned somethin' about ya being in an opposite multiverse for a while?" Void mentioned, and Reality nodded, taking another bite of the lava cake.

"yeah, it was very... different, over there... dream- my brother, he was alive, and i was... well..." Reality trailed off.

"dead?" Void guessed, and Reality nodded.

"yeah... it's still nice over here, though." Reality said, and Void laughed a bit.

"nice? yeah, you're in the beta timeline, it's peaceful here. before shattered vanished, most of the multiverse wasn't exactly peaceful. i mean sure, underfell aus are usually pretty calm, but when shattered shows up not much can be done." Void mentioned, eating some of the lava cake, the chocolate syrup spilling out of it.

"yeah, i haven't seen the worst of what shattered's done to this multiverse, but i can sense it... it wasn't anywhere near as bad over there, but then again, nightmare wasn't as active as shattered was." Reality sighed.

"nightmare, huh? that the other you?" Void asked, and Reality nodded.

"yeah.. it was actually my name before i woke up over there and found out about him and changed my name because that thing stole it. error actually changed his name to pixel after finding out what his other version was doing." Reality informed, and Void raised a brow.

"really? huh. lemme guess, i was a piece of work over there, wasn't i?" Void questioned, shoulders slumped, and Reality shook his skull no.

"actually, no. you actually aren't that different. edgier, yeah, but you're still a good person." Reality reassured, "i'm honestly kinda surprised..."

"yeah, well, i know there's probably an evil version of me running around somewhere, just haven't found him yet..." Void sighed, "pretty much anyone without a lot of determination in this multiverse is a real piece of work. some alphyses are trying to make determination pills or injections that won't kill the monsters shattered's corrupted, but their field tests... well..." Void and Reality both grimaced.

They probably became amalgamates, which was... Reality wasn't sure if that was a better fate or not...

"yeah, i know alphyses mean well, they just have... kinda bad methods." Reality said, and Void nodded with a small laugh.

"you're tellin' me. i used to help 'em out, but..." Void trailed off with a frown, "kinda hard to keep seeing their tests fail. the monsters aren't really themselves anyways, from what i know. i mean, i'd assume they'd be like fell variants, right?" Void asked.

"yeah, pretty much. i interacted with a lot of different aus, and most of the time the classic versions were nice..." Reality answered.

"yeah, the ones with the least determination are just kinda rabid monsters, almost like wild animals... the others with some are more sane, then the ones with the most are the most rational. the humans are fine, just in negative moods, but since you showed up a few days ago, based on err- pixel's text, things have gotten a bit better." Void informed, and Reality looked at him curiously.

"what do you mean?" Realist questioned, finishing his lava cake.

"well, they aren't completely rabid, they don't attack everything in sight unless provoked, and moods are a bit lighter. i'm pretty sure it's because of you, and i can guarantee that it's pissing shattered off." Void smirked.

So just his presence was helping?...

"i don't feel even slightly bad about that." Reality smiled, Void chuckling while eating the rest of his dessert, "what about before that? like a month or two?"

Void shrugged, "maybe a little bit? shattered's aura has still been suffocating this multiverse for centuries, it's probably responding better to the direct presence."

Reality nodded, "that makes sense, actually... you make guides for the multiverse, right? like, where to and not to go?"

"yeah, i've been working on another updated one, but with shattered back and you now here, everything's kinda... outdated... so, i get to go back through every single one of those aus and figure out if they're still safe or not." Void sighed.

"sorry?" Reality wasn't sure what to say.

"why're ya sorry?" Void asked.

". . . i don't know?" Reality shrugged awkwardly, and Void chuckled a bit, standing up.

"alright, c'mon. if i'm going back through these, you're getting a tour of some of the aus." Void beckoned, and Reality stood up, "so, field trip!"

Void grabbed the trash and threw it out in a nearby trashcan before opening a swirling black and red portal like before, the two of them going into it. The two of them poked around for a while in each one, and Reality saw what Void meant about some of the monsters being a bit rabid, but they also seemed to calm down when he was around? It was probably his aura burning away at Shattered's, something that probably helped them, but he wasn't sure if it would last or not.

The Undergrounds were still mostly the same in layout terms, but the monsters were definitely different. It was honestly weird to see them like this, but he knew it was just Shattered's aura, and hopefully he could find a way to fix things. The two went from AU to AU, things mostly the same in each one, and right before Void was going to make a portal back to the Beta Timeline, he paused.

"hey, you wanna come with me to one of the more dangerous ones? just to see if things changed?" Void asked, and Reality thought for a moment before nodding.

"yeah, let's go!" Reality answered, knowing the information of what they found there would be useful.

Void opened the red and black portal, the two of them going through it, and everything was... silent. Eerily silent. They were in a Snowdin, and it was- Reality coughed, dust clogging up his throat, and Void did the same, holding his hands over his mouth.

"crap, genocide i bet." Void cursed, pulling the neck of his sweater over his mouth, handing Reality a black bandana with red fire designs on it.

Reality put it on, tying it around his mouth and managing to catch his breath. As he looked around, he could see that they weren't standing in snow... but in dust... Dust was covering the ground, a fine gray powder, not to mention the monster remains mixed into the air, stirred up from their arrival and mixed with the snow. He'd seen the aftermath of a genocide route before, but this... it was...

"oh my god..." Reality whispered, crouching down and picking some of the dust up in one hand, it seeping between his fingers and staining his glove.

"looks like someone ended up in the wrong au... or he was here" Void muttered, a DNA tendril forming in his hand, and it formed into a sword with a transparent red blade, and the DNA spiral was making up the handle, encased in dark red. Reality summoned his own blades, the glowing purple weapons forming between his fingers, and Void smirked. "nice."

"thanks." Reality thanked him, and he stood up, looking around.

He could see several slashes in trees, some of them completely cut down, and the Ruins doors were exploded open, pieces of the magenta material all around the opening, some half-buried in dust. The two of them started walking, looking around on high alert, and from what Reality could sense, Void had suspicions on who was doing this. He'd mentioned someone before, and Reality was trying to figure out who it could be, but he didn't seem too nervous.

Reality couldn't sense anyone else here past all of the other monsters of the AU, all of which feral, highly aggressive and negative. That meant they were emotionless or the amount of hostile monsters was hiding their presence. The dust eventually faded into snow, the powder crunching slightly under their feet, something was honestly kind of relieving, with how morbid walking on the remnants of monsters was. With each step, he could sense the amount of monsters declining, so he knew whoever was doing this was still here and was still killing.

"so, umm... do you know who this is?" Reality asked, looking over at Void.

"i've got a hunch..." Void sighed, "then again, i could be wrong. if it's not who i hope it is, then we'll have our hands full." Void grimaced, and Reality sensed someone up ahead in Hotland, the amount of other monsters suddenly dropping to almost nothing.

Reality held a hand up, trying to get a lock on who it was and where they were. He could sense them in Hotland, that being the only location there was still life, but the amount of emotions in the area was rapidly declining, and if Reality could guess, there was twenty monsters from this AU left... and whoever this was just killed them in a single second.

"uh... void? i just sensed around twenty monsters in hotland vanish. the only ones here are me, you, and whoever this is..." Reality informed, and Void looked around before looking down.

"ah hell..." Void muttered, crouching down before picking up a black, dusty feather, "i know who this is... it's been a while since i've been able to find this guy."

"who is it?" Reality asked, on edge.

"funny enough? he's kinda an acquaintance. he won't do crap to us, don't worry." Void informed, letting his sword vanish as he kept walking, "he's the one i was hoping was behind this."

. . . What?

"wait wait wait, you know who did this? the whole au's just dead!" Reality exclaimed, following after him.

"yeah, it's kinda what he does. i'm not too happy about it, but... it really pisses shattered off." Void mentioned, and Reality paused, looking after him in confusion before teleporting next to him in a plume of black and glittery gold smoke.

"yeah, i get that, but why?" Reality asked.

"because this au... shattered's aura corrupted it into the monsters being a bunch of rabid batteries basically. he feeds on this au constantly. what azrael does is he kills all of them so shattered can't feed on them. it's like a mercy kill situation." Void explained.

Azrael? The guy Pixel mentioned? 

"alright, sorry, i just- seriously? this whole au's just dead. just like that..." Reality snapped his fingers for emphasis as they walked through Snowdin, seeing the dust covering the snow here again, their steps now muffled.

The buildings were all in ruins, abandoned and desolate- well, the ones that were still standing were. Otherwise they were all blasted down into nothing from a massive blast. The only thing that compared was Knife or Killer's Gaster Blaster, and that... was a bit unsettling.

"yeah, his name means 'angel of death' for a reason..." Void sighed, "just don't be surprised if he's moody, he usually is..."

"he doesn't get lv highs?" Reality questioned.

"i dunno, i never really asked." Void admitted.

"i don't sense any signs of an lv high from him, and he just killed a whole timeline, so maybe he doesn't?" Reality shrugged.

Void returned the gesture, and the two of them made their way into and through Waterfall, the whole area showing signs of a massive fight. The water was practically a paste from the dust, and what wasn't in the water was covering the ground. There was so much of it... This was a full genocide. The death of every single soul in the timeline... an eradication of an entire timeline... and only one monster had done it.

Once they got to Hotland, there wasn't as much dust, which allowed them to uncover their mouths but then again, there was lava down below, so it was entirely possible that it could've fallen down there. Hotland was also filled with signs of an attack, be it from the seemingly massive Gaster Blasters, sharp bones, blades of some kind, wrecked buildings... the whole timeline was in ruins.

The dust seemed to lead somewhere- a tavern in Hotland, the gray powder trailing across the ground in footsteps after a certain point, and it looked like they belonged to sneakers. The windows of the tavern were broken or cracked, and the door was opened slightly. Reality hesitated, but he followed Void as he walked towards it, knocking on the doorframe.

"hey, az! it's void, just so ya know not to kill me." Void informed, and Reality peeked past him to see who was inside, seeing him sitting on at a stool by the bar.

He was a Sans with jet black wings folded behind him, and he was wearing a dark blue jacket and a black sweater. He was also wearing black pants and lighter blue sneakers with black soles and laces. His jacket had a black hood, which was pulled up, and the color continued to his shoulders, fading into dark blue past that point.

Azrael looked back at Void, Reality seeing he had hollow eye sockets, and Azrael's wings relaxed slightly as he realized they weren't a threat. He'd been ready for a fight. He was also drinking some of the alcohol in the tavern, rearing his skull back as he downed a shot before turning back to look at Void.

"oh, hey void." Azrael responded, "who's your friend?"

"his name's reality, he's an enemy of shattered, so you two should get along relatively well." Void mentioned.

"isn't everyone?" Azrael questioned, swiveling around in the stool, his elbows resting on the edge of the bar.

Void laughed a bit, "pretty much. error says shattered's gonna be looking for allies now."

"so he's back? great..." Azrael narrowed his eye sockets in irritation, fingers flexing a bit.

Reality could sense a dark aura around Azrael; one he recognized from monsters with high LVs, and it had him slightly on guard despite himself. Azrael just seemed dangerous... or maybe he was still on edge from Azrael killing this whole timeline without a scratch on him. He was definitely powerful and wasn't someone to be underestimated, but thankfully he didn't seem hostile. He was aware of his surroundings, but he wasn't showing any signs of aggression, which was surprising considering what he'd done here... Then again, Knife had more than enough capability to be a merciless murderer but he acted casual and carefree outside of fights, if not a bit annoying.

"yeah..." Void sighed, "reality here's making a team to stop him and whoever he's recruiting, so-"

"not interested." Azrael cut him off, "i work alone, void, you know that. so what if i saved your coccyx a few times when you wound up in the wrong au, i'm not joining a little boyband."

"boyband?" Reality quoted in mild offense, crossing his arms, and Void sighed, looking down and shaking his skull.

"look, it's not like that. we could use the help," Void said, looking back up at Azrael.

We? Wait, Void was going to help them?...

"yeah, and odds are error's gonna be involved too. you'll be fine." Azrael replied, "you don't need my help and i don't need yours."

"here you go again with this damn lone wolf crap." Void pinched the bridge of his nasal cavity, shaking his skull.

"it's not crap. as you can see, i can take care of myself." Azrael glared.

"oh we saw..." Reality mumbled.

"i'm not saying you can't, all i'm saying is if shattered's back, your genocide spree is gonna piss him the hell off. you have a major target on your back, az. that's dangerous." Void told him.

"and again, i. work. alone." Azrael affirmed, wings bristling a bit, and he ran a hand down his face, groaning, "ugh, i'm not drunk enough for this..."

He swiveled on the stool again, turning back to the bar and pouring himself another shot, and Void sighed. Azrael was like... a much moodier Murder, honestly. Reality knew Murder had had to go sober, but he couldn't help but wonder if this was what he'd been like while an alcoholic. Azrael didn't seem like he was from a Dusttale AU though. Sure, he had a hood, but that wasn't an indication, it wasn't just Dusttales that wore hoods, after all. Regardless, Dusttale or not, Azrael was definitely a loner, and Reality could sense some irritation coming from him.

Reality looked over at Void, whispering, "is he always like this?..."

"pretty much, yeah.." Void answered quietly.

"i can hear you two." Azrael informed, looking over his shoulder at them, "look, i just don't play well with others, ok? you guys can have fun making matching t-shirts or whatever, but i'm still gonna go solo."

"azrael, shattered is going to be looking for skeletons to recruit for a team of his own, meaning you won't just be going up feral monsters, you're going to be fighting stronger versions of yourself, and you can and will be outnumbered." Reality informed, "do you really want to risk that?"

"i know when to make a tactical retreat, uh.. reality, right?" Azrael asked, and Reality nodded, "i can manage myself just fine. i appreciate the concern, but i can take care of myself"

". . . will you at least call when you need help?" Void requested, "you never call."

"because i never need help." Azrael shrugged, "i really don't see what the problem is."

Void sighed, "because sometimes others like knowing if you're ok."

"i don't need anyone to worry about me, void. i thought i made that clear." Azrael mentioned.

"yeah well, it's what happens when people care about you. they worry." Void said, "look, even if you don't wanna help us out, do you at least want us to text you if there's a fight and we need help in case you wanted to join in?"

". . . you're not gonna let me back outta this, are you?" Azrael asked with a sigh, wings drooping.

"i just don't want you getting killed or corrupted, az. no one does. look, you've had our backs in the past when we've ran into each other, and i've seen you in the beta timeline looking through my guides for dangerous aus to avoid, and then the au is dead the next time i swing by." Void said, "you wanna help, you just don't admit it."

". . . you done?" Azrael questioned, and Void sighed before nodding, "alright. look, i do not want to be on a team. i can handle myself enough to avoid getting corrupted or anything, so just..." Azrael paused, "i'm ok. i look through those aus for ones that are giving shattered the most power, and i take them out, that's all there is to it."

"you're so full of it, az." Void sighed, "but if you wanna be mr. badass lone-wolf, i know i can't stop you. all i can do is tell you there's an open door in case you ever change your mind."

". . . . . thanks." Azrael muttered, getting up from the stool and drinking the shot, tipping his skull back to drink it before putting the glass on the table, "if i really need help, i might give you a call, just as long as you tell me if you run into an au you think is acting as one of shattered's batteries."

Void relaxed a bit, "that's all i ask.. thank you, azrael."

Azrael nodded, and Reality spoke up, "and if you find shattered... call me? i owe him a beatdown."

Azrael smirked a bit, "sure, kid. sure you do."

"no, i actually do." Reality said, summoning some of his purple daggers, looking at the yellow tinge to them, "i'm one of the only ones that can actually hurt him."

". . . huh." Azrael muttered, "looks like i might not be the only one that can piss him off after all."

"wait, what?" Reality asked, and Azrael just... vanished. Just like that. Reality looked over at Void, asking, "what the hell did he mean by that?"

"azrael's... interesting..." Void sighed, "you'll see."

Void turned around and opened a portal, Reality trying to process what the hell that meant before getting rid of the blades, following Void through the portal.

On the other side of the gateway, Reality looked around to see them in a monochrome world, this almost looking like a city, and Void took one look around before looking panicked.

"oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, wrong au!" Void cursed quietly, and Reality tensed up.

"what? where are we?" Reality asked, on edge and ready for a fight.

"xtale, i think. crap, this isn't good-" Void started, only for someone to walk around a corner.

He looked... kind of like Color, but also like Epic. The top of his skull was open, a jagged mess with rainbow flames coming out of it, and there was a crack down his left eye socket, which was shut and had rainbow flames coming out of it, merging into the ones coming out from the top of his skull. His right eyelight was white, and he was wearing a light purple trench coat that was longer in the back.

The bottom of the trench coat faded into rainbow, and the inside of it seemed to be rainbow colored as well. The coat had a black hood attached to it, a light gray zipper, and a light gray buckled belt around the middle. He was wearing a dark gray turtleneck, black shorts with a white stripe down either side, and brown boots with small wheels attached to the heels.

"he's not here, i've been looking..." He sighed, and Reality could sense that he was worried.

"legend?" Void asked, "where the hell've you been?"

"i had a bit of a... problem with bleach while i was looking for shattered. i came here afterwards to check on him, but... he's gone." Legend sighed.

So this was Legend?... Wow.

"how the hell does he just vanish? pixel locked the au down, he can't leave, and no one's stupid enough to take him with them." Void muttered, but Reality figured it out.

Shattered.

"i think shattered recruited him, he had to have." Reality said, and Legend's eye socket widened.

"he's back?" Legend asked, and Void and Reality both nodded.

"and he's making a team... would he have agreed to work for him?" Reality questioned, and Void and Legend exchanged a glance.

"probably?... he hates authority, but if it benefits him enough... he'd definitely put up with it.." Legend sighed, muttering, "damnit, i shouldn't have been gone so long..."

"hey, you got caught up with bleach, it's not your fault." Void reassured, "just... let's get outta here, just in case. we can fill each other in on everything back in the beta timeline, ok?" Void recommended, and Legend nodded a bit.

"ok... i just hope he's ok and hasn't done anything stupid yet..." Legend frowned, opening a rainbow portal, the three of them going through it.

Reality had a feeling this XTale Sans would be a lot more troublesome to deal with than Cross was...

Where... What?....

He looked around, arms shaking as he tried holding himself up, his head spinning. Everything was so fuzzy, so blurry... He couldn't remember anything- who was he?... He tried to push himself up fully, but his arm collapsed, and he yelped as he sank into the ground.

His arm was covered in a black substance, almost like a goo, and it- no, it was goo, his arm was dissolving into a black puddle- he was melting! His eye socket widened in panic, and he tried scrambling away from his own arm, the rest of his body just like his arm. He didn't want to die, he didn't want to die, he didn't want to die- He curled in on himself, his body sticking to itself, unable to maintain it's form and just sending him dissolving.

He didn't know what happened to him, what caused this, he just remembered- Nightmare! He gasped, skull shooting up so fast it lost it's form, and he fell back to lay on his back with a splat, staring up at the blackened sky. He tried calming himself, taking a few deep breaths as he sat up, his breathing sounding hoarse and like wet, which made sense- oh Nim, was this stuff inside of him?... He gagged, about to reach into his mouth to check before panicking over what if his hand got stuck in his mouth and he started choking and-

A sharp pain shot through his left eye socket, something he couldn't see out of, and he reached a hand up, feeling nothing there. He didn't have an eye socket anymore. He pulled his hand away, some goop coming with it, and he shuddered, his body rippling. It was like a weird liquid, and he couldn't get it to solidify, and he was terrified.

He felt like he couldn't breathe, like he was choking, and he couldn't breathe like he could before. He spat out some of the goo in his mouth, watching the black substance hit the ground like spit. He scrambled back as it zipped towards him with a yelp, covering his face with his arms as it dissolved back into his body. He shuddered, lowering his arms as he looked around again, vision a bit clearer.

He saw the villagers lying around- or well, pieces of them, and while he would normally be panicked or revulsed... he felt nothing. They... they hurt his brother, didn't they? They hurt him. They hurt him while he was trying to protect Nightmare... from them.

That pain where his left eye socket should be came back, and he trembled, wincing. He rubbed at the goop covering it again, trying to remember what happened to it- it was a rock, right? Yeah, he got pushed down and a rock shattered his eye socket... It... it was gone....

He tried to dig it out, to dig past the goop, but the more he tried to shovel away, the more appeared in it's place, and after a few moments, he gave up. He crawled over to one of the villager's bodies, seeing the blood coating the ground, the limbs severed, the torso disemboweled, guts all over... What had done this?... Had it been him?... No, he couldn't have done this, he couldn't even stand up, let alone rip them all apart like this...

He didn't feel regret or sadness as he looked down at the corpse, anger simmering in the back of his mind as he looked away from the body, trying to find his brother. Then he saw the tree. Mom. She was... she was dead, too. Cut down, just twigs and a few dead leaves left. All of the apples were gone, and while he initially worried the villagers had taken them, it didn't feel like they had...

He couldn't remember, but something was telling him that the villagers hadn't been able to get near any of them... He crawled over to her, putting his hands on the stump as he tried pushing himself up, able to get a better look around. The villagers he'd seen before, that was only the start of the carnage. As far as he could see... it was all bodies.

The grass was red, the flowers he and Nightmare used to run around and play in were dead, and he... he didn't care. It honestly scared him, how just... apathetic he felt to it... how he felt like they should've suffered more.... No! He couldn't think like that, he needed to find his brother. He could figure out what happened to him later...

He was sure he was just... in shock? Was that what it was called? He probably repressed his memories after seeing this, after seeing it happen, and that's why his memories were so blurry... right?... It had to be.

He pushed himself up, taking a few deep breaths to try and calm himself down, and he saw his body becoming more formed than before- less liquidy. His legs shook, and he slowly started to walk, keeping a hand on the stump to support himself. He kept looking around, trying to find the familiar purple fabric, hoping that his brother hadn't been caught in the crossfire of... whatever had done this. He walked around the stump a few times, trying to gain his bearings before he started walking through the bloodied grass, every single blade of it dead.

He saw the blanket they'd wrapped around the tree trunk laying on the ground, a bit bloodied and torn but otherwise mostly in tact. He could blearily remember getting it for his brother to make him feel better after the villagers hurt him for what didn't feel like was the first time. The purple fabric wasn't Nightmare's jacket, but it did bring a few memories back.

"brother, here! i got this for you! i'm sorry the villagers are so awful.. i'm trying to get them to stop"

"dream, hey, it's ok. it's not your fault.. i.... thank you for the blanket..."

Dream? Was that his name?... It sounded familiar... Dream looked around again as he bent down to grab the fabric, holding it close as he looked for Nightmare, hesitating before trying to call out for him.

"brother?!" Dream's hands flung to his mouth at the sound of his voice, hearing how much... darker it sounded...

It echoed over itself, sending a shiver through his body. It wasn't his voice... He shivered, trying to clear his throat, trying again.

"brother! it's me, dream!" Dream tried, wincing as his voice didn't change, "i- i know i sound weird, but it's me, i promise! please don't be scared!"

Dream kept walking, looking for him, getting a bit more frantic as he couldn't find him. His body started to melt again, and he tried taking a few more deep breaths as he attempted to calm down. After a few minutes, he started looking again, and past a pile of bodies, he froze. His brother was there, covered in something gray, probably dust. He was curled in on himself, hands shielding his skull with his back to where Dream had woken up, and it didn't seem like he could hear him... He wasn't even moving. Dream's legs gave out, and he winced, crawling over to be in front of him.

"brother?..." Dream asked, putting a hand on his shoulder to try shaking the dust off of him, only for his hand to meet rock hard stone, "brother? brother?!"

Dream was starting to panic again, his body starting to melt, and he forced himself to calm down. He needed to stay calm, he needed to find who did this... Maybe it had been Nightmare since he'd been so scared? Had Dream been like this before he woke up?... He tried wrapping the blanket over his shoulders, hoping maybe that would work, but it didn't work.

"brother? can you hear me?..." Dream asked, trying to shake his shoulders again, "does that help?..."

No response. Dream glared over at some bodies of the villagers, anger creeping up in his mind again, and he felt his back rippling. He looked back to see... tendrils? They were coming out of his back, made of the same substance as his body, and his eye socket widened a bit, remembering a fraction of a memory- those tentacles were ripping a screaming villager apart...

Had it been him? That had done this to the villagers? No, it couldn't have been... but why did it feel like it had been?

"nightmare? please tell me i didn't do this to you..." Dream pleaded, but Nightmare didn't respond.

Dream sat next to him, leaning against his side, and he felt the tendrils wrap around his brother, pulling him closer. Dream pulled his knees up to his chest, and he looked over at his brother's frozen form, a frown on his face. He looked so scared... Maybe he wasn't aware of anything anymore? Dream rested his skull against his shoulder just in case he was alive in there.

"brother?" Dream tried again, "please, are you in there?..."

No response... He was probably just asleep- his eye sockets were closed, after all. He was sleeping, peaceful... safe from all of the pain. Dream looked over at him again, and he pushed himself to stand up. He hooked a tendril under Nightmare's knees, a few more going under him as he held him to his chest, looking around.

He just had to get his brother somewhere safe, somewhere he could protect him and shield him from any more danger. Nightmare had been through so much, he didn't deserve to suffer. Dream was becoming more and more aware of something- he could sense emotions, and not from himself.

There was so much anger, so much pain, so much hurt... it felt... good? It confused Dream, but he didn't think too much of it. He just needed to get Nightmare somewhere safe....

Shattered pulled himself out of his memories, rubbing at where the left eye socket of his host used to be. He was leaning against a cobblestone wall in a chamber, specifically where he'd kept Reality when he'd been stuck in stone. Ugh, he knew he shouldn't have come down here, it always brings back those stupid memories. He hated remembering those moments, where he still thought he was that pathetic excuse of a guardian.

He couldn't believe he'd been so stupid to believe he and that fool were the same person. Shattered huffed, tentacles twitching behind him as he abruptly turned and strode out of the chamber, slamming the door behind him. Executer was gaining his strength, and he'd probably be ready to go out soon, Shattered was getting tired of staying here anyways. He was only even in Dreamtale because he needed somewhere so completely soaked in negativity that Reality couldn't detect him, he didn't feel like dealing with Error or Reality right now.

He was still pissed about being dragged through the portal, but it didn't matter. Daybreak would be successful over there, Nightmare would win, and Shattered could tie up his loose ends here and eventually find a way back there. However, in the mean time...

Shattered heard a thump, and he sighed, rolling his eyelight as he let his form melt down, zipping through the ceiling and to Executer's current room. He saw the monochrome skeleton trying to get up from by the bed, legs shaking, and he sighed. Executer had fallen on the floor

"executer, what the hell are you doing?" Shattered sighed, crossing his arms.

"i'm bored?" Executer answered, sitting on the floor, swiveling a bit to look back at him, hands folded in his lap, legs crossed under him.

Shattered sighed, pinching the bridge of his nasal cavity, "you were near death when i found you, a few days of eating and resting won't fix that."

"oh come onnnn, i can just revive whenever i want." Executer sighed, "i told you that, plattered."

"shattered." Shattered corrected for the millionth time, Executer snickering, "look, if you're going to leave, you need to be at full health."

"and you can relax, i'll be fine!" Executer insisted.

"you can barely walk." Shattered deadpanned.

". . ." Executer was quiet before trying to push himself up again, legs shaking.

They gave out soon after, Executer falling to the floor with another thump, and Shattered scoffed, rolling his eyelight, "you fool. you're going to get yourself killed, and i refuse to allow you to do it the easy way."

"why?" Executer questioned, and Shattered walked over to him, crouching down.

"because if you're going to work for me, you can't do the quick fixes. you are going to take care of yourself, and i will make you hate recovering so much you'll maintain your body as a way to avoid it." Shattered smiled.

". . . you're a real jerk, y'know that." Executer informed.

"yes, well at least i can stand up and walk." Shattered responded with a smirk.

"screw you." Executer huffed, and Shattered picked him up, "hey, no! no more of that sleeping magic!"

"if you're so bored, then you can sleep." Shattered informed.

"yeah well i don't like sleeping, so knock it off." Executer glared.

"then stop being stubborn." Shattered demanded.

". . . fine..." Executer relented, and Shattered smirked, placing him on the bed, Executer crossing his arms.

He wasn't emotional, but he was acting like he was, something he'd probably picked up overtime. Killer did the same thing, so had Ink, under Shattered's orders...

"now, you need something to do, do you? what do you usually do when bored?" Shattered questioned.

"kill people?" Executer answered with a shrug, "it's kinda my thing."

Shattered sighed, "perhaps it is, but you know what else can be?"

"what? and do not say sleeping." Executer glared, and Shattered laughed.

"i wasn't going to." He was.

"then what were you gonna say?" Executer asked.

". . . shut up." Shattered huffed, and Executer smirked, "thought so..."

Shattered sighed, crossing his arms, "do you really have no hobbies? nothing at all? besides killing people?"

"no? never needed one. i've been trying to use my overwrite, but it doesn't work here." Executer frowned, "this universe has no code."

"oh, good. which means you're forced to recover." Shattered said.

". . . is it too late to refuse that job offer?" Executer questioned.

"yes, since you already accepted it." Shattered answered.

"damn..." Executer muttered.

What would Executer find entertaining?... Ink never really got bored, he was either following Shattered's orders, eating, sleeping, or interacting with his teammates, and Shattered hadn't cared enough to pay attention to what the others did in their free time. Nightmare mentioned something about them playing those video games, so maybe that would work?

". . . have you ever played video games?" Shattered asked, and Executer tilted his skull at him.

"huh?" Executer responded, and Shattered smirked, melting into the floor.

He left the AU and zipped through the multiverse, grabbing a TV, game console, and a remote, along with a few random games from a store. He brought the items back to Executer's room, setting them up, Executer watching him the whole time. He gave the remotes to Executer, and left him to figure out how the hell to set everything up.

That should keep him occupied... Otherwise Shattered was knocking him out again.

Chapter Text

Reality was sitting outside of Mocha's Café at a table with Legend and Void, hands folded on the table. It was a wooden one with four chairs around it, like stools, and it was mainly made of a dark mahogany wood. Him and Void had just finished explaining everything to Legend, who was troubled, fidgeting with his fingers on the table, not touching the sandwich Mocha had brought out for him.

"if shattered's making a team and my friend is on it... we're definitely in trouble.." Legend sighed, the flames coming from his skull subdued while also being slightly erratic.

"you still never told us much about him. like, we know the whole 'stay out of xtale unless i'm there' thing, we know he's got some serious homicidal tendencies, but otherwise... not too sure what he's capable of..." Void mentioned.

"he's got the overwrite, doesn't he?" Reality asked, and Legend's eyelight flicked up to him before nodding a bit.

"yeah, and i don't want to think about what he would do with it..." Legend frowned, "he always used it to keep himself entertained, but i don't think he's above controlling other people with it..."

"which could be a problem.." Void sighed, "sure, i don't have a code, neither does reality here, but for others... yeahhhh... this'll be fun..."

"could you reason with him?" Reality asked Legend, trying to look for any ways to prevent having to fight a hybrid of Cross and Killer.

They were already pains to deal with, but together? Killer's personality and mindset with Cross's abilities, not to mention his own? They were so screwed.

"i don't think so... i knew sans before he became.... him... i tried so hard to be there for him, to help him, but..." Legend sighed, shaking his skull, "it was futile, i guess... he insists sans is gone, but i still think there's a part of him in there..."

"what's his story anyways? you never said." Void asked, him and Reality both curious.

Legend hesitated for a moment before sighing again, shoulders slumping, "well, back when i first met sans, he was suffering from a genocide loop that xgaster had started, his code hacked to where he could remember everything. from what he said, xgaster had been treating all of them, including chara and frisk like toys, and he overwrote frisk into killing everyone, and since chara had wound up having to overwrite himself into frisk, leaving him only a phantom... chara was upset. sans said chara allowed him to see him and hear him, and he told me about how much chara wanted it to stop, how much they both hated it... chara wanted them to fuse their souls together to stop it, though, but sans always reasonably refused, not knowing what could happen..."

"which is reasonable.." Void said, before frowning, "he gave in though, didn't he?"

Legend looked down again, nodding, "yeah... the next time i went there, maybe a day or so later... everyone was dead, and he was all that was left... he said he wasn't sans, but he wasn't chara either. i was trying to help him, especially when he'd have moments where he was emotional, but otherwise... he was a wreck. he seemed to at least still like me, but he's... i don't even know how to explain it..."

Reality frowned a bit, sensing Legend's turmoil, "i get it, i do... . . . my brother, dream, he got corrupted. possessed by that thing. shattered.... he still seems to care about me, in this twisted, toxic way. he wants me stuck in stone again, to 'keep me safe'. he views me as his brother even though i'm not, even though he hates being compared to dream..."

"so those two have a ton of baggage together, huh?" Void mentioned, and Legend laughed a bit, a small smile on his face.

Reality sensed surprise, realization, and rapidly mounting excitement rushing towards them, and he sighed, laughing silently as he quickly figured out who it was.

"yeah, you could say tha-" Legend started.

"LEGEND! YOU'RE BACK!!!" Pixel's excited cheer cut him off, and in a flash, Legend was tackled off of the stool, Pixel hugging him.

"error!" Legend laughed a bit, patting his back, "it's good to see you too, bud!"

"where have you been?! i've been worried sick!" Pixel exclaimed, pulling away from the hug to hold Legend's shoulders, looking him over for injuries, "are you ok?!"

"i'm fine, i'm fine! i just had a run in with bleach, that's all! he didn't know where shattered was either, and he's probably gonna be looking for him." Legend informed, and Pixel sighed, groaning in annoyance.

"ugh, just what we need, mr. clean being even more active..." Pixel groaned, flopping back on the ground with a few irritated glitches.

"yeah... also i think shattered recruited my friend from xtale." Legend mentioned quietly, and Pixel abruptly sat back up, pixels and glitches filling his eye sockets.

"WHA-?!" Pixel exclaimed before crashing, a long, droning, quiet beep coming from his open mouth, and Legend winced a bit.

"yeah..." Legend grimaced.

"oh uh... crap i didn't tell you about that.." Reality realized, "long story short, he's got another version of himself in the multiverse i was in with the same name, that one doing what bleach does here, so uh... yeah, error's renaming himself to pixel to 'not be associated with such filth'."

Reality snickered a bit at the end, and Legend snorted, "makes sense."

"-T?!" Pixel's crash ended, his yell immediately resuming, "WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHATTERED RECRUITED HIM?!"

". . . we might be dealing with a small problem." Reality grimaced, "me and void accidentally teleported to xtale, and we found legend there, who said he couldn't find him there."

"SO THAT GENOCIDAL PSYCHOPATH IS LOOSE?!" Pixel yelped.

Reality was... highly aware that Pixel was much different from Error, but the fact that a version of Error was panicking about a genocidal psychopath being loose in the multiverse... it almost made Reality crack up, but he held onto his composure like a vice. Barely. He was probably smirking a little.

"oh yeah we ran into az earlier, he dusted another timeline." Void mentioned, Pixel's eyelights bolting to him as he perked up.

"you did?! is he ok?!" Pixel exclaimed, emotions changing so quickly it was giving Reality whiplash.

He went from excited, to panicked and worried, to angry, to excited and relieved. Pixel was probably highly bipolar. . . . Reality needed to have stuff prepared for the headaches he was sure to get from Pixel overtime.

"yeah, the badass dusted a timeline without a scratch. he won't work with us, though." Void sighed, and Pixel helped Legend up, who hadn't sat up from the ground.

Legend sat down on his seat again, Pixel sitting down on the formerly empty one, and Pixel's shoulders slumped, "of course he doesn't... i still don't understand him. his au was destroyed by bleach, and there's no one else like him in the multiverse, so i can't see those codes or scripts either... ugh, he's so complex! i wanna know how to help him, but i have no idea where to start if i can't find out what the issue is and he won't tell me..."

That was an... interesting use of an AU's codes. Dream never mentioned Ink using it for that, instead just trying to keep the AUs true to those scripts, and Error didn't care about AU's codes much, but he hated AUs that were almost identical to the original's except for a few small modifications. For someone to look through that AU's codes and try finding root causes of someone's issues to know how to help... it was a new development... and it was honestly a bit of a nice one. Pixel was actively trying to help people, and when he couldn't figure out how to help them, he started to spiral a bit.

"to be fair, i don't think he's ever gonna tell anyone. he's a pretty closed book." Void mentioned.

"i know, and it drives me crazy. he's clearly dealing with something, right? i mean, i saw how he reacted when dev told him about what shattered- hell, that's why he does what he does! i just... why take it so personally? most feral monsters at least mostly tolerate their own kind, it's humans they freak out towards or any threats..." Pixel rubbed at his forehead, visibly trying to figure it out.

Reality just shrugged, not entirely sure either, "i have no clue. he seemed like a loner, though..."

". . . speak of the devil..." Void muttered, and Reality looked up at him, seeing him looking behind Reality.

Reality turned his skull to see Azrael by the Multiverse Guide stand, leaning against a wall in the shadows, flipping through the pages for a few moments before vanishing again without a trace, like he'd never been there. Reality hadn't even sensed him, he was just there and then he was gone... then again, Azrael was difficult to sense, and with everyone in the Beta Timeline around, his faint emotions were impossible to sense.

"aaaand he's gone..." Void sighed, Reality looking back at him, "probably out killing again..."

"at least he's making the multiverse safer?" Reality shrugged.

"yeah, but he never really takes break. i've never even seen him eat." Void pointed out, "he's like a killaholic!"

"killaholic?" Reality quoted, smirking.

"what? it's true!" Void exclaimed with a small laugh, "speaking of not eating..." Void nudged Legend's plate over to him, "you gotta eat, ledge. beating yourself up because of his choices won't change anything."

"i... i know, i just... i dunno, i wanted to look out for him, to try and show him that there was still good in him... if shattered recruited him, all of that will just go down the drain! it's like i'll really be losing him. he might not be sans, but i still care about him." Legend sighed.

"we know, but you can't beat yourself up over this. you were dealing with bleach, who's impossible on a good day. you need to eat, sleep, and rest." Pixel told him, and Reality gave him a surprised look, "what? i know what mortals need even though i'm not one."

That made sense, actually, but still...

". . ." Legend was quiet before starting to nibble on the sandwich, and Reality, Void, and Pixel exchanged a triumphant glance.

Reality could still sense the self-blame in Legend, how he blamed himself and felt like he'd let down his friend, and Reality frowned a bit, knowing that that wasn't the case.

"hey, legend?" Reality got his attention, "it wasn't your fault, alright? there was nothing you could've done. even if you weren't dealing with bleach, all shattered would've needed was to wait for an opening, teleport there, offer him a deal, and then that's that. it's not about you being there, it's about the type of monster your friend is. he made his choice, and that's that. it would've happened regardless, especially if shattered really wanted to recruit him. it wasn't your fault."

Legend was quiet, just staring at him for a few moments before smiling slightly, the self-blame lessening, "thank you... that... that actually helps a bit..."

"of course." Reality replied, "besides, he's probably a handful, meaning shattered's probably wanting to rip his nonexistent hair out right now."

Legend snorted, laughing a bit, "yeah, he- he's definitely a handful... shattered's probably regretting his decision right now; maybe he'll give him back..."

"if i were him, i'd wrap him up in a bow and throw him at you before running!" Pixel giggled, and Legend laughed quietly.

"the fact that you'd get near him enough for that says something." Void snickered.

"the bow is made of barbed wire." Pixel's face morphed to look like this... horrifying jack-o-lantern expression, mouth large and jagged, filled with several different colors, his eye sockets wide and flashing several different colors.

It was horrifying. Reality fell off of his seat. Void and Legend were also freaked out, which was highly valid, 

"what the hell is that face?!" Reality yelped while Pixel giggled, snorting a bit.

"what face?" Pixel laughed, acting innocent.

"ah hell nah." Void stood up, walking away from the table, "nope, nuh uh. nope. i'm not going near him when he does that crap. nope."

"take me with you!" Legend exclaimed, grabbing his sandwich before fleeing from the table.

"g-guys, wait!" Pixel giggled, clutching his ribcage while Reality just looked at him in silent horror.

"what... what are you?..." Reality whispered.

". . ." Pixel lunged over the table at him, the face returning.

Reality yelped, bolting up and running away from a laughing Pixel, who Reality could sense was just messing with him. The joy Pixel had was either contagious or Reality was just having fun, but he would blame it on the former as he started laughing, sprinting away from the glitch. Pixel had even glitched his face back to normal, the two of them were just running around the Beta Timeline like idiots... or kids, either way, but Reality wasn't really sure what that was like. Still, this was some of the most fun he's had since he got here... Nothing would ever make him laugh like Dream dressed like an emo though, that was on a level absolutely nothing could match.

Azrael landed crouched on a large tree after flying overhead of one of the worse-off AUs in Void's guide, black wings splayed out behind him as he looked down over the area, eye sockets narrowed. He could see the monsters down below, all growling and snarling up at him, some trying to climb up the tree, and he sighed, rolling his nonexistent eyelights. He flapped his wings, flying off of the tree just as they reached them, the sudden lack of his weight sending the tree snapping back, the monsters flung away. Could they even be called that, still?

They weren't sane, or rational, or coherent. They were practically rabid zombies, fueled only by the need to be fuel for Shattered, to hurt whatever they encountered. Azrael didn't feel much, but he knew that that was a fate worse than death, and not from what they said. No, he wasn't even going to think about that... that... damnit, he didn't have a name for them either. That... . . . them. He wasn't going to think about them right now; he hadn't for a while now, and he wasn't about to start.

Instead, he focused on hovering in the air, looking down over who were once monsters, watching them climb over themselves, staring up at him snarling and hissing, getting dizzy from how much their heads were tilted up, stumbling into each other. They started to bite and lash out at each other, and Azrael sighed. He didn't feel pity, rarely sympathy, but maybe that was his own fall. His LV was through the roof, that must be doing something by now, right? Has it been this whole time and he didn't know? He didn't feel pleasure from killing, or... really much of anything, honestly, maybe fighting someone he hated or disliked?

LV didn't react with him, maybe that c- No. Azrael shook his skull, a frown on his face. He wouldn't think about that either. That was long gone, if it wasn't, he wouldn't have been able to kill them. No, it and them were gone, and he wasn't going to torture himself by entertaining those thoughts any longer. He was past this. It was over, done, he wasn't...

Azrael set his jaw, summoning his pitch black Gaster Blaster and sending the black blast down at the horde, blasting through the husks of monsters, sending dust and snow flying. He landed down in the crater the horde had been centered around, bringing up a wing as a stray pounced at him, his magic coating the feathers in a dark red sheen as he snapped his wing back, flinging it away, and a few sharp bones through it's body finished it off. The creatures gurgled and groaned, some further away only having a few remnants of HP, and Azrael made quick work of them, seeing their movements on or under the dust. He stood in the middle of the crater, waiting for any stragglers to make their moves, but he saw none.

So, spread his wings and rocketed into the air, jumping up and snapping his wings down to propel him up, stirring a large amount of dust underneath him. Azrael flew over the cave system of Waterfall, past the tallest peak of the mountain as he headed for Hotland. The heat settled deeply into his bones, and he tucked his wings in close to himself as he made it to the remnants of the Lab, diving in through a broken window. He summoned several sharp bones, killing the creatures inside before he approached the computer, cracking his knuckles as he walked past and through the dust of his kills, staining his shoes.

Azrael turned the computer on, watching it boot up, which was rare but always useful, and a small smile formed on his face. This would make things much quicker... He typed some things into the computer, activating all of the speakers and having them play sounds of screaming he'd pulled from some anime episodes the Alphys watched before she'd been killed, and Azrael winced as the screaming immediately started playing, loud and air-piercing. He winced, shoving memories back as the computer shut off, a glowing red, bleeding smiley face over his own, and he turned away from it, feathers ruffled as he silently walked over to the window he'd entered through, blocking out the screaming and focusing.

Azrael dropped down, wings quickly opening and flapping to carry him into the dry, suffocating air, seeing the creatures all trying to get to the speakers, rushing out of the tunnel heading into Waterfall. He summoned another Gaster Blaster, aiming it at the pathway and destroying the rock, making all of the creatures fall to their permanent deaths down in the lava. He took care of the Tsunderplanes, flying out of the way and evading their attacks, using sharp bones to break their wings and letting them fall down into the lava. Azrael let his Blaster recharge, feeling his magic feeding into it before blasting it again at a large horde, taking out them and the rock below them.

He flew around, ensuring he wasn't leaving any stragglers, and in a blur of attacks and blasts, Hotland was empty. Azrael teleported back to the crater in Snowdin, walking through the dust and snow over to the Ruins, taking his time to let his magic recharge. He let his Blaster charge up again before firing it through the magenta double-doors, giving him an entrance and killing some creatures in the blast radius before walking through the rubble, heading into the Ruins and killing anyone he could find. Azrael could feel his kill-counter increasing, his magic prickling at the insides of his bones, and he stretched, feathers rustling as he stretched his wings as a steady stream of shivers went down his spine. His LV must've gone up again, something a quick check confirmed.

"K1---L__- s-n---"

LV 999999999
HP 9999/9999

AT 999999999                            EXP: 99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
DF 999999999                            NEXT: 99999999999999999999999

WEAPON: Magic, True Knife
ARMOR: Unequipped

* "They all need to die, they aren't themselves anymore. It's best to put them out of their misery..."

Azrael quickly got rid of his Stats with a wave of his hand, eye sockets narrowed as he continued further into the Ruins, gaze scanning small alcoves, looking for any more creatures. He could feel that more were present, like a countdown in his skull that he couldn't stop every damn time he went to an AU, and looking back at Void and Reality's offer, Azrael couldn't help but snort quietly. Him? Working with a bunch of heroes that didn't know who he was? What he was?

Yeahhhhh, that would go over swimmingly! He was a killer. The primary difference between him and other genocidal maniacs was what he killed. He still had a piece of monsterity in him, and that was enough to keep him from sinking any lower than he already had. He was not a good monster, he was well aware of that, not after what they did, how he'd barely managed to fix it, and even then the damage they'd done was done. He was just... Azrael sighed, running a hand down his face.

He didn't know what he was. He was still a monster, barely, if that even counted, but he wasn't Sans anymore... . . . Azrael's skull shot up and around, eye sockets wide and attentive as he felt with eerie uncertainty that there were no targets left. Not that he'd killed them all, but that someone else had. He set his jaw, summoning a sharp bone into his hand as he abruptly peeked around a corner, only to be met with a light pink mask with two large, black eyes. He let out a startled caw, jumping back as his hands flung to his mouth, his wings fluffed up, and he could hear the human laughing.

Ugh, he hated this kid...

They were a human- Rei if he was unfortunately remembering correctly, and they giggled a bit as they fully stepped around a corner. They had tan skin and short, fluffy sandy blonde hair that ended halfway down their neck except for some of it that was braided with red beads and a red hairtie at the end, the strand ending just above their right shoulder. They wore a light pink sleeveless sweater and a bright pink star pendant with on black string around their neck.

They were wearing light purple fingerless gloves that ended just below their shoulders, and bright pink arm warmers above those. Rei was also wearing light bluish-gray jeans with a few orange buckles attached to them, along with light purple shoes with light pink leg warmers. Despite him being unable to see their face, he could tell they had, once again, enjoyed startling him. He was so sick of humans.

"Howdy, Birdy!" Rei greeted, a smile in their voice, "Back at it again, are you?"

"it's none of your business if i am." Azrael huffed, crossing his arms as his wings twitched, feathers smoothing out, "what're you doing here, rei?"

"Well, I was having fun getting EXP, but then I heard a loud BANG and felt the ground start shaking, and then I heard those monsters dying. So that's when I figured out you were here and figured I should say hi!" Rei answered.

"alright, well, i'm saying bye." Azrael responded, turning on his heel and walking away.

"Raveeeeeen!~ Come on! Why do you have to hate me so much?~" Rei whined as they followed him, and Azrael paused, turning to glare at them.

"why? you can't be serious." Azrael said, "you kill for fun, i do it to reduce the amount of power shattered has."

"Oh c'moooon, you act like that's the only reason! I know how high your LV must be, Crow, you can't tell me you don't enjoy killing!" Rei responded.

"first, how dare you use raven and crow interchangeably, that's an insult. second of all, i can tell you that because i don't. lv has no effect on me." Azrael huffed, and he kept walking down the dusty hallway, Rei skipping to stay next to him.

"My apologies, Chicken!~" Rei responded, and he shot a wing out, shoving them into one of the brick walls.

They grunted quietly before laughing a bit, "I strike a nerve, Az? Sorry not sorry!"

Azrael sighed, wings twitching in irritation as he kept walking, "i wish i'd left a horde alive to throw you into."

"Oh! Free EXP! Thanks!" Rei chirped, and his eye socket twitched.

". . . i will kill you if you don't shut up." Azreal threatened lowly.

"No, you'll try to kill me again, but you'll fail, we'll call it a draw, and then the next time I find you, I'll drive you nuts again! Sound fun?" Rei cocked their head to the side.

". . . god i hate humans..." Azrael groaned. 

"You hate everyone, Birdy." Rei mentioned.

"yeah, but i especially hate you." Azrael glared, feathers rustling.

"Oh, Raven, this is what I like about you! You have so much personality! So much sass!" Rei giggled, "We'd make such a good team, killing AUs together!"

Azrael paused, shoving memories into a deep dark corner of his mind, glaring at them, "not a chance. i don't feel like dying."

"Oh come onnnn, I just had to take care of someone I worked with one time!" Rei responded, but Azrael could tell their fingers were crossed behind their back.

". . . still, no." Azrael replied firmly, "even if i wanted to work with someone, it definitely wouldn't be you."

"Oh? Like you've got so many requests for team ups piling up in your mailbox?" Rei asked, and after a moment of Azrael glaring at them, their voice gained a grin, "Oh, you do, don't you?~"

Azrael rolled his nonexistent eyelights, and they giggled, "shut up, rei."

"Nah, I'm good! Who's giving you job applications, huh? Shattered? Error?" Rei guessed, and Azrael just kept glaring at them, so they huffed, "Fine, be the silent, emo, edgy, lone wolf cliche!"

". . . You done?" Azrael questioned, looking at them in exasperation.

". . . Chat, are you seeing this? He has no sense of humor..." Rei sighed to seemingly no one.

". . . rei, do you ever shut up?" Azrael asked in irritation.

"Nah, but you don't have to be such a drag. I mean sure, being a jerk is kinda your thing, but c'moooon, lighten up!" Rei encouraged.

"no." Azrael refused, getting ready to teleport out of the AU, having had more than his dose of being around with Rei before he starts getting violent towards them... more than he already had.

"Wait wait wait!" Rei yelped, hands outstretched, and Azrael paused, looking over at them in confusion.

"what?" Azrael questioned.

". . . Fart noise." Rei responded, blowing a raspberry through their mask, giggling as they saw his eye socket twitch in annoyance.

Azrael teleported away while they were laughing, leaning against a wall to hold themself up.

He'd say it once, and he'll say it again. He. Hated. Humans.

Chapter Text

Reality was sitting with Void, the two of them going over some of his notes for the multiverse, Reality trying to memorize as much of it as he could. There was a few hamsters around them, as they were inside of Mocha's Coffee Shop. There was some coffee cups next to them, Reality drinking decaf while Void drank what was probably pure caffeine. Did no one sleep around here?!

"alright, so this au here has gotten worse lately?" Reality asked, pointing at one of the AU titles on the notes, one of the older classic Undertales.

"yeah, azrael hasn't hit it yet since it's too dangerous, especially with how close it is to dreamtale. from what i've heard, the closer to dreamtale the aus are, the more shattered's aura messes with it." Void nodded.

"makes sense; i mean, it's closer to the source of pure negativity, it's gonna be effected worse... wait, do you think shattered's hiding out there?" Reality asked, and Void's expression turned thoughtful.

"it's definitely possible. i mean, the au was already soaked in negativity, and if he's using that as a shield to avoid detection..." Void trailed off, and Reality caught on.

"he's in hiding. he's probably trying to avoid a confrontation, which means he's working on something." Reality finished, and Void nodded.

"remember how the xtale sans was missing? maybe shattered's trying to ensure he won't fly off the handle? i mean from what legend and pixel have said, he's a loose cannon at best." Void shrugged.

"it would make sense. i mean in the other multiverse, knife- he was probably that xtale sans's counterpart, and he was highly unpredictable. if that xtale sans is anything like him.. we might have some problems.." Reality grimaced.

"yeah.... anyone who could deal with him?" Void questioned.

"well, color- he was an alternate to legend i think, but uh... he could usually handle him, they were close. knife and murder were, too, they had this weird thing going on where they were queerbaiting everyone but i swear there was something else going on." Reality informed, and Void snorted, chuckling a bit.

"love-hate, huh?" Void asked, and Reality nodded a bit with a small laugh.

"pretty much." Reality replied, and he saw Mocha walking over.

Mocha was... honestly a bit of a weird mix of Ccino and Horror when it came to appearances. He had one red eyelight and a hole in the top left of his skull like Horror and Famine did, but with the sharp teeth like Underfell Sanses usually had. He wore a fluffy red sweater, black fingerless gloves with yellow threads, black shorts with a yellow stripe down each side, and black and yellow hamsters slippers. He had a dark yellow apron with a hamster face in the lower left corner, and it had some pockets with a notebook and a pen in them. Mocha had a tray of the food they'd ordered- some sandwiches, to be specific.

"any luck with your research?" Mocha asked as he walked over, putting the tray out of the way of the notes.

"not yet, really..." Void sighed, "shattered's been hitting aus left and right for centuries, i have no clue how to tell where he's going to go next. he hasn't done anything since reality showed up, and i have no clue where he's gonna strike next. he did recruit someone, though. the xtale sans."

"you mean the one who-" Mocha started to question, pulling a chair over to sit on it.

"yeah, him." Void huffed, and Mocha grimaced.

"yikes..." Mocha winced, "well, shattered has never been predictable before, neither has that guy... could you predict who he'd recruit next?"

"maybe? i mean, reality mentioned he was an alternate version of someone named killer or knife." Void shrugged.

Would he...? No, he wouldn't do that, of course not.... then again, if Shattered was trying to make a successful team like Nightmare... son of a...

"actually, there might be a pattern." Reality said, gaining their attention, "nightmare- the other version of me, he had a team, too. shattered might be trying to replicate it here?"

"so you could predict who we need to deal with?" Void asked, and Reality nodded, causing him to smirk, "nice."

"once the xtale sans shows up i'll have some grounds for this, then we need to worry about a dusttale, a horrortale, and then the xtale over there showed up. if he's swapped with killer, and he almost joined up with dream before something changed... maybe we could beat shattered to the punch?" Reality theorized.

"you wanna yoink one of his possible teammates?" Void questioned, surprised, "damn... you think that'd work?"

"it'd piss shattered off, i count that as a win." Reality shrugged, "can i see your notes again? cross was from an empty timeline and had a human's soul fused with his own."

"ok now that rings bells." Void said, "i know a few like that, we could-"

Void's phone started ringing, gaining his attention. He grabbed his coffee and took a sip as he looked down at it, reading the contact, and he almost spat out his drink. He swallowed it, coughing with shrunken eyelights, and Reality could sense how shocked he was.

"what? who is it?" Reality asked, and Void, while coughing, showed Reality his screen.

'Incoming call: Azrael'

"oh crap..." Reality muttered.

Void answered it right after that, saying, "az! hey! what's u-" Silence, probably Azrael cutting him off.

"put it on speaker." Reality whispered, and Void nodded before pressing the button.

"-inda need a favor." Azrael said, and Reality... felt nervous.

Azrael sounded urgent.

"az, what happened?" Void questioned.

"shattered showed up with a friend, some oreo-looking jackass who locked down the code of the world, i can't get out and he's corrupting this place. i know you don't teleport through code so if you could open a portal, that'd be great." Azrael responded, and Reality and Void exchanged glances.

"alright, where are you?" Void asked, and they exchanged another glance as several explosions sounded over the call, "azrael?"

"undertale number five seven five three two." Azrael informed after a moment, "sorry, the monochrome brat is being a pain. just open it to somewhere else and i'll teleport off, i don't feel like dealing with these psychos."

"alright, uh... on it!" Void told him, and he hung up.

"we're going there and helping, right?" Reality guessed, just seeing if they were on the same page.

"obviously." Void smirked, and Reality smirked back.

"just be careful, you two!" Mocha advised.

"we will be! we'll pay when we get back!" Void informed, and Mocha shrugged.

"on the house! go kick shattered's a-" The two of them teleported before Mocha could finish, Void teleporting them both to the AU.

Reality was hit abruptly by the sheer amount of negativity in the AU, it having him staggering from the amount of it as it rushed into him. The aura in this place was suffocating- and he set his jaw as he steadied himself. Shattered's aura gave him a bit of strength, but it weakened the amount of positivity the apple let him use. He was a Guardian of Negativity, he wasn't meant for it in the first place, and with the sheer power of Shattered's aura... it would be troublesome to fight him.

Reality looked around, seeing and hearing several explosions before locating the source. Azrael was flying towards them, then over their heads in the next blink, several black tentacles chasing him, which Void shot through with one of his Blasters. Azrael turned around and looked at them in surprise before his eye sockets narrowed. Azrael was next to them abruptly, teleporting in front of them and bringing up a wall of bones before turning to glare at them.

"this isn't opening a portal, void." Azrael said.

"oh we know, but we wanted to help." Reality responded, "we need to see what shattered and this guy are capable of."

"no, you don't." Azrael replied, and another bone wall raised up above their heads, blocking several razor sharp bones that poked through the cracks slightly, "i haven't even gotten a full look of him other than he's wearing black and white. and he stole my attack."

"what?" Reality questioned, and Azrael grabbed both of their arms to teleport them as an explosion tore through the shield.

Reality suddenly found a black wing in front of him, another in front of Void as Azrael stood in front of them, looking around. Reality couldn't sense anyone besides Void, and Shattered here. Azrael was a bit easier to sense this time, but when compared to Shattered's aura and Void's emotions, Azrael was practically nonexistent. It was like he wasn't even there.

"az, what do you mean?" Void asked, "none of us have seen you fight before, so you gotta be more specific.." 

"wait- you've never seen him in action?" Reality questioned, surprised, and Void nodded.

"i like being discreet, so what." Azrael responded, and he muttered a curse before teleporting them somewhere else, "just- open the damn portal, void."

"we can help you! it's three against two, az!" Void insisted, and Azrael turned to glare at him.

"void, no." Azrael refused.

". . . azrael, what happened?" Reality questioned, getting the feeling that this was personal.

"i... saw someone i knew in him. and i can't kill him and it's pissing me off." Azrael growled, wings ruffling up as he teleported them again, bringing up another bone barrier and sending several sharp bones out.

"who?" Void question, and Azrael let out this... angry bird sound.

Void and Reality exchanged a confused glance as Azrael teleported them again, only for the ground to vanish from beneath them in a flash of purple pixels. Reality yelped, seeing that they were falling from the sky, and Azrael grabbed them. They suddenly stopped, and Reality looked around to see Azrael hovering there, wings flapping as he held them still. He still hadn't caught direct sight of Shattered or who was probably the XTale Sans, but the purple pixels were a bad sign.

Then, he saw it. A large, pitch black Gaster Blaster with white eye sockets with white lines leaking from them, and he immediately knew his suspicions had been right. Killer. The only difference was the dark purple, almost black blast forming in it's mouth. Azrael teleported them away as it shot at them, and Reality stumbled a bit as they ended up on the ground again.

"az-" Void started.

"you wanna help? stay here. i'll try and knock him out. you see shattered, punch him or something." Azrael instructed.

"azrael!" Void yelled as the skeleton in question suddenly vanished, Void sighing.

Reality peeked out from behind a tree behind him as explosion erupted, and he saw a now very present clearing. It was almost impossible to get a view of anything happening, just blurs of purple, black, and red. He got a few glances of someone in black and white, but they never stayed still long enough for Reality to get a good view. He glanced next to him to see Void peeking from behind a tree, and when he looked back at the fight, he saw glowing red and glowing purple bones summoned, firing at each other.

Reality couldn't even see Azrael, he was moving too fast; weaving around and dodging attacks before Reality could process they'd been formed. They seemed like they were spamming attacks, running through attack patterns trying to find something that would work, if the amount of attacks didn't work, but not one of them could land a hit. Azrael only stopped for brief moments to glance at them before he kept fighting, a sign that he was keeping an eye on them.

"so, you're the one shattered's been so upset about." Reality froze as he heard someone speak behind him, quickly summoning purple knives and shooting them behind him.

The attacks went right through the skeleton, who was wearing a white turtleneck, black jacket, black shorts with a white 'x' on each side, and black boots with a white 'x' on top of them. He also wore two black sashes that crossed over his chest, the edges white, and he had a black scarf with white edges. His eye sockets were hollow, black, soulless voids, and he had black liquid leaking from them, along with a purple, red, and white target floating outside of his chest. Definitely a cross between Cross and Killer... The daggers he'd summoned left purple pixels behind, and Reality quickly glanced behind him at the very still present fight before looking back at the skeleton in confusion.

"how did you...?" Reality started, trailing off.

"a hologram, duh." He waved a hand through his own skull, purple pixels dissolving into his face before his hand reformed once through it, "so, you're reality, huh? i expected you to be less... dorky."

"hey!" Reality snapped, the skeleton smirking with a small laugh, "i am not dorky!"

"yeah!" Void agreed, ". . . legend's looking for you, you know?"

That made the other skeleton pause, before he shrugged, "oh, he finally turned up, huh?"

"yeah, he was dealing with bleach." Void informed.

". . . huh." He didn't seem to care, "i was wondering where he was."

"he's ok, in case you're wondering. he's worried about you, but he's ok." Void told him.

"well, you can tell him i'm just fine." He smirked, "i got outta my cage, and i gotta say, i like it out here. nice and roomy."

"yeah, well, no one likes that you're out." Reality mentioned, crossing his arms.

"too bad," He smirked, "bird-brain definitely doesn't like me, and i can't figure out why. he was the one who interrupted my killing spree."

"oh no, how horrible." Reality said flatly, and the monochrome skeleton laughed a bit.

"you're fun!" He grinned, "i'm executer, by the way. you're reality, and i'm guessing short-stack over there's void?"

"short-stack?!" Void exclaimed, Executer laughing a bit.

It looked like the XTale Sans finally gave himself a name...

Executer went to speak again, only for one of Azrael's sharp bones to fly through his skull, the winged Sans teleporting next to Reality and Azrael as the hologram flickered, seeming to become more solid.

"do you ever shut up?" Azrael hissed, wings flared and blocking Reality and Void from being directly visible to Executer, the two of them having to peek around his wings.

"oh i'm so sorry, mother-hen. i was just introducing myself!" Executer chirped, and as Azrael sent another sharp bone at him, he caught it, a smirk on his face.

"yeah well you can excuse yourself and leave. now." Azrael responded, feathers ruffling up even more.

"awwww, did i ruffle your feathers?~" Executer chuckled, and Azrael let out another angry bird sound that Reality needed to figure out the name of.

Void snorted, and Azrael shot a glare at him, Void apologizing as he struggled to maintain his composure, "s-sorry, sorry..."

Azrael just sighed, snapping his fingers and summoning countless sharp bones, all of them aimed at Executer, who seemed unphased, "oh come on... from one mass murderer to another-"

"i am nothing like you." Azrael hissed, "do not try and find anything similar between us. you did something i would never do, i can see it on your face. you're just like them."

Them? Azrael mentioned seeing someone in Executer that pissed him off, and now he was bringing it up again?...

"oooh!~ do i strike a nerve in you, raven?" Executer taunted, and Reality was tempted to step in, but that aura Azrael usually gave off? It was worse. A lot worse.

"shut up." Azrael spat, wings flaring out, and Reality could actually sense some anger coming from him.

Reality focused on his emotions, and he saw Executer's face distort, replaced by a glowing red smiley face, and he froze. Wait, was Azrael-

Executer went to say something, but a black blast shot over the three of them at him, causing him to teleport. When the smoke cleared, Reality saw a massive crater where he'd been standing. A black Gaster Blaster was next to them a moment later, a dark purple blast firing at them, and Azrael quickly teleported them out of the way. The AU's sky was steadily darkening- or well, the top of the Underground, anyways.

A dark fog was forming over it like a massive storm cloud, and he sensed Shattered's aura becoming more powerful. This wasn't good... Shattered hadn't attacked them yet, at least, not directly, so that probably meant he was seeing what Executer was capable of before getting involved. Reality was well aware that Shattered wouldn't shy away from a fight, so this was definitely a test.

Azrael was still on guard, wings spread as a barrier for Void and Reality, as a method of trying to protect them. Despite how little- no, how he couldn't sense Azrael, he could tell he was prioritizing protecting them. He was putting himself before them, trying to keep them away from the fight, and while it was nice, Reality could handle himself. Executer was clearly toying with them; he had access to the world's code, he could do practically anything, and instead he was playing with them. It was pissing him off.

"azrael, we need to work together to fight him!" Reality told him.

"i've got it!" Azrael replied harshly, "look, i can keep him occupied while you open a portal, then we can get out of here. shattered's aura has too much power over this place, it won't be long before you can't make a portal."

"azrael, let us hel-" Void tried, but Azrael cut him off by turning around, saying lowly, "i. work. alone."

"again with the 'i work alone' crap! what the hell happened to you that made you so completely dead set on isolatin' yourself?!" Void snapped, and Azrael's wings flared.

"guys!" Reality yelled, stopping the argument before it could really get started, "shattered's aura is screwing with us, we need to stay calm."

". . . sorry, azrael.." Void mumbled.

"it's fine." Azrael responded, and Reality heard movement above them, his eyelights shooting up to see Executer crouched on a branch. 

Azrael summoned and sent several sharp bones at him, the monochrome skeleton snorting as they glitched right through him; another hologram. Azrael yelped as he was suddenly flung off to the side, probably by blue magic, and Void quickly brought up a bone wall to block incoming sharp bones. He summoned his sword, and he teleported away, Reality creating the blades between his fingers before doing the same. He couldn't fight Shattered, not with how powerful his aura was, but he could help fight Executer.

He teleported next to Azrael and sliced the blades down at Executer, one of them managing to connect with his cheekbone and slice it open. Executer jumped back, reaching up a hand to touch some of the black blood leaking from the injury, but he only smirked, unphased by the attack. He summoned a bone blade with a hollow center, the space between the black handle and the blade comprised of sharp points, just like the hilt was, and the edge lit up red. Crap. Reality brought up a purple shield as Executer slashed his weapon, the red attack racing towards him.

Reality teleported out of the way, the attack colliding with his shield, causing an explosion. The silence that followed was what allowed Reality to realize there wasn't a theme playing- just ominous silence. It made sense, though. If Executer had control over the AU's code, he might've been able to turn that function off, which would make sense.

Themes often covered up the sounds of people moving, and with how much Azrael was teleporting, Executer might be trying to keep track of where he is. Reality backed up, hearing rustling above him again, and he flinched as he felt his back meet someone else's. He snapped his skull around to see Azrael there, who had done the same and was looking back at him. Reality turned back around, looking for Executer, and Azrael was probably doing the same.

Reality saw Executer teleport in front of them, a flash of purple pixels, but then that was followed by another one of him, and another, and another, and another. They were quickly surrounded, and Reality had no ways of telling which one was real. They suddenly glitched, becoming purple, almost... like mannequins? They had no features, no clothes, just blocky puppets, and then they were surrounded by several large black Gaster Blasters, each of the mannequins creating one.

Azrael reached back and grabbed his shoulder as the blasts fired, Reality finding himself in the air, Azrael's wings flapping as he set Reality down on a large branch. His wings lit up red, what looked like knives forming over them, and Reality watched in shock as he flapped his wings down, the feathers each creating a red slash attack that destroyed the mannequin-like manifestations. Reality didn't get the chance to say anything else before Azrael vanished, and Reality teleported after him, dissolving into black smoke. He quickly heard fighting start again, Executer's soul dark blue as Azrael swung his arm around, smashing Executer into practically anything in the area.

Executer teleported away once the magic faltered for a moment, then he was suddenly back, lunging at them, his mouth opened wide into a jagged, black void that consumed the bottom half of his skull. Azrael froze before bringing up a bone wall, blocking him before grabbing Reality's shoulder and teleporting them out of the way, and judging from the massive blast that followed, Azrael had summoned a Gaster Blaster. Reality could sense Azrael a bit better now, sensing some distress coming from him, and he put a hand on his shoulder, getting his attention.

"are you ok?" Reality asked him, and he nodded.

"yeah, fine." Azrael responded shortly, "where the hell is- oh. oh crap!"

Azrael took off, wings snapping open as he flew off, and Reality quickly found out why. Shattered's aura had covered up Void's emotions, and Reality saw him facing off against Shattered a bit away, and when he went to go help him, blue magic engulfed his soul and sent him flying back. He grunted as he collided with a tree, and Executer teleported in front of him, a smirk on his face, which was better than that cursed expression from before.

"we can do this the easy way or the hard way," Executer began, swirling one of his blades in his hand, "easy way, you come with me, go back in the stone for shattered so he shuts up about you. hard way, i kick your coccyx and drag you to him."

"i pick the third option: no." Reality responded, summoning several purple knives and firing them at him.

Executer dodged, only to get kicked by Azrael and sent into several trees, and that's when Reality got a look at Azrael's Gaster Blaster. It was black with white eye sockets, the black blast causing a massive explosion. It left behind a black residue, almost like a tar, and Reality recognized it immediately. Broken Determination. Executer appeared behind Azrael, but he snapped a wing back, sending him flying away, Azrael turning around before zipping after him. Void teleported next to him, a bit scuffed and cut up, but otherwise alright.

"you ok?" Reality asked, and Void nodded.

"yeah, i think so.." Void replied, "shattered is just a jerk.."

"ugh, tell me about it." Reality sighed, trying to wait for an opening to help Azrael, but the two of them were fighting so fast that he couldn't see one.

Reality wasn't stupid, he knew that Azrael was some version of Killer. Somehow, in some way, he was an alternate version of him, or he at least had a similar backstory to him. Regardless, a lot of things made more sense, and Reality... honestly felt pretty bad for Azrael. Who knew what he'd been through, and he sure as hell wouldn't talk about it... Reality's guard raised as he heard something whizzing through the air, and he tackled Void out of the way as Shattered's tentacles stabbed down at them.

"finally getting involved, huh?" Reality glared as Shattered formed in front of them, holding himself a bit off the ground.

"i got bored of watching executer toy with you. he's skilled, but he's too... how do i put this... bored?" Shattered sighed, "oh well..."

Reality and Void teleported out of the way as Shattered sent several tentacles at them, and the fight was on. Reality used his knives and blades while Void used his sword, bones, Gaster Blasters, and- yeah, he had the flying ability Abyss had. The two of them fought him, but with how powerful Shattered's aura was, it was almost impossible to fight him.

Reality lunged out to catch Azrael as he was vaulted their way, Reality planting his feet and catching him. He winced as he saw the awkward angle Azrael's wing was bent at, and he exchanged a concerned glance with Void. They couldn't win this one, not with Shattered this powerful here...

"azrael, are you ok?" Reality asked him as he steadied himself, wing twitching, but he wasn't showing many other signs of pain. Then again, he couldn't see Azrael's face.

"yeah, i'm good." Azrael replied quickly, and... yeah his wing was definitely hurting him.

"you... huff... put up.... a good... huff... fight..." Executer smirked as he walked over, and... wow.

His body was covered in cracks and fractures, and at least one bone was broken. He held out a hand, the OVERWRITE button forming, and he pressed it, injuries vanishing, and he smirked, "but not enough."

"you cheating son of a-" Azrael started, but Executer cut him off with a laugh.

"bitter you lost, bird-brain?" Executer taunted, and Azrael let out that angry bird sound- a growl again, moving to lunge at him, but Reality held him back.

"azrael, don't. you're hurt." Void told him, a hand on Azrael's shoulder.

"i'm fine, void." Azrael glared, "i've been hurt wor-"

Something he saw cut him off, Azrael's words dying in his throat, and Reality looked around, seeing something falling in the distance, or specifically, a droplet of white liquid. Reality watched the drop fall, followed by another, and another, and another, all seeping from a crack in the ceiling. The white liquid made a puddle on the ground nearby, and Azrael and Void both cursed.

"executer, we're leaving. now." Shattered informed, and Executer sighed, seeming annoyed, but he didn't complain. 

The two of them vanished without a trace, and Void made one of his red portals, saying, "reality, come on! we gotta go, now!"

"wait, why the hell did those two just take off?!" Reality questioned, highly confused as he looked at him.

"look behind you." Azrael instructed as he went through the portal, limping on an almost broken leg, and that's when Reality saw it.

It was a white void, covering everything around it, and once it touched something, it melted into the ground. And it was growing.

"wait, is this-?!" Reality started to exclaim.

"bleach? yep." Azrael used blue magic on Reality's soul, sending him flying into the portal, Void and Azrael following behind him before it was quickly closed, "i hate that guy..."

"at least he made shattered and executer take off. the au was doomed anyways." Void sighed, rubbing his skull, "at least my head is clearer now..."

And Void was right. Without Shattered's aura, Reality could feel some strength returning to him, the apple feeling better after a weight Reality hadn't been fully aware of was removed. The adrenaline seemed to wear off of Azrael, too, the Beta Timeline's lack of Shattered's aura setting in, given how he passed out a moment later, Reality catching him. Reality sighed, exchanging a concerned glance with Void before starting to head to one of the medical centers, somewhere he could sense Dev.

By the time they got there, despite being in eyesight of it when they got back to the Beta Timeline, Reality couldn't sense the previous timeline anymore. It'd been fully destroyed within two minutes at most, and it... made much more sense why everyone else wanted to take off like that. Reality was carrying Azrael bridal style, Void holding his wings up, trying to keep them off of the ground and stable.

"dev! we need some help here!" Reality called out as Void used a red DNA tendril to open the door, and they gasped upon seeing them, Reality able to sense their concern.

"Get him to a bed, quick!" Dev instructed, Reality and Void quick to do so.

They teleported over to it immediately, quickly reaching for his wing and moving the bones to line up, Reality wincing as Azrael's wing twitched in it's socket, his face tense with pain. Void put his hands near where Dev's were, and they moved their own, grabbing some vials and bandages. Reality watched them work, unsure of how to help, not wanting to be in the way. Dev must've seen the look on his face, and they gave him a reassuring smile.

"He heals fast, but his wing needs to be aligned, which is a two person job." Dev said, "Otherwise it could heal wrong, and he doesn't need to worry about that, which is why it's important to move fast."

Reality nodded in understanding as they put some thin metal bars along the broken area before folding his wing, wrapping it in bandages.

"is there anything i can do to help?" Reality asked, and Dev looked thoughtful.

"You have a very calming aura, Reality. Just you being nearby is allowing us to focus and Azrael to stay unconscious. He's very... easy to startle back to consciousness, even after passing out." Dev frowned, looking back at the unconscious monster, "I think the best way you can help is keeping him asleep.

Reality nodded, and he moved to sit next to bed, letting some purple smoke flow from his hand and surround Azrael's skull, keeping him deep asleep. The last time he'd done this was when Error came back practically beaten to bonemeal, and that had just been to keep him relaxed. Dev and Void watched him in surprise, but they quickly got focused again.

"welp, i know who to ask for help when i get insomnia." Void joked, and Reality chuckled a bit.

Dream was always used selfishly by the villagers, but Void didn't have any of that intent in him. He was joking; teasing, meaning nothing by it. Being able to sense emotions was honestly nice for that reason, to know that that wouldn't be the case with him, not that he would let it... it was nice.

It didn't take long for Azrael's wing to be splinted, Azrael asleep the whole time. Once they were done, Reality stopped the flow of magic, allowing Azrael to wake up on his own, which... did not take very long. Within five minutes, Void getting his wounds tended to in that time, Reality could sense him waking up, and his eye sockets cracked open a moment later.

"You're safe." Dev informed, and Reality looked back at him to see his hand freeze by his hoodie pocket, "Are you ok? How are you feeling?"

"groggy as hell..." Azrael sighed, his hand moving away from his pocket as he pushed himself to sit up, looking around the room and seeing him and Void.

"yeah, uh... sorry about that..." Reality apologized, "i kinda used a bit of sleeping magic on you so they could get your wing taken care of."

". . . oh, so that's why..." Azrael sighed, "thought i recognized that... wasn't as bad, though."

"you've had sleeping magic used on you before?" Reality questioned, surprised.

Had Shattered-?

"nah, black-out drunk. it's got a gentler effect than that." Azrael answered, "speaking of..."

"Azrael, you know we talked about this..." Dev frowned, "Look, I'm here if you ever want to talk, you know that. I-"

"dev." Azrael stopped them, "really, it's fine. i don't need to talk about anything. if it makes you feel better, i won't leave the beta timeline until i'm healed, which should take... what? a day?"

That's it?

". . . That does help a bit, thank you. You still know where to find me regardless, Azrael. I'll be there whenever you want to talk." Dev informed him.

"i know, i just... can you let that go? i couldn't have been that pathetic when you dragged me here from my timeline." Azrael responded.

"Of course not. Azrael, you are far from pathetic, you always have been. I just want to be able to be there for you. I can see that you're hurting, and I just want to help."

". . . i know." Azrael said, and he teleported out of the area, and with how difficult he was to sense... Reality definitely wasn't tracking him down...

"will he be ok?" Reality asked, Void and Dev both looking back at him.

"I believe so, yes. He's bounced back from worse, it probably won't take him too long to head back out there..." Dev answered, "I just... I wish he had someone to talk to."

"i'm sure there'll be someone eventually. i mean, he seems to hate humans, he probably doesn't want to talk to you about much..." Void mentioned, and they nodded a bit.

"probably not... would you two be interested in trying? even if he doesn't want to talk to me, i at least want to know he has someone to turn to.." Dev requested, and Void nodded.

"on it. i'll try getting him to open up... but i think reality already knows more about him than we do." Void mentioned, and the two of them looked at Reality, who sighed.

"i recognized some characteristics in him that someone i knew in the other multiverse had, but... he's probably different. he's not like either of them, even though he has the same condition. i don't want to say anything, just in case he wouldn't want you two to know, but i can try talking to him if he won't talk to void? i at least know how one of them worked..." Reality answered.

"yeah, good idea," Void nodded, and he paused, "oh, uh... dev?"

"Yeah?" Dev replied.

"i uh... kinda forgot to tell you, but uh... we found legend's friend." Void grimaced, and Reality realized that they'd completely forgotten to tell Dev about Executer.

"Is he ok?" Dev asked, and Void and Reality exchanged a glance.

"well, uh... he's working for shattered, and he's the one that messed up az so bad." Void winced, and Dev's eyes widened as they cursed, "yeah..."

"This... This is bad... We need to tell Pixel, just so he can be on high alert- wait, did he Overwrite the timeline you guys were in?" Dev questioned.

"yeah, he had control over it, but bleach kinda showed up, and... well, he didn't really show up, he just destroyed it." Void sighed.

"Crap... He's probably going to be on a spree now that Legend isn't keeping him occupied..." Dev pinched the bridge of their nose, "Me and Pixel will keep our eyes out for any signs of him, just to make sure he doesn't try anything. Between Shattered recruiting now and Bleach back to destroying, it's going to be a handful dealing with them.."

"so another busy week?" Void guessed, and they nodded.

"Another busy week." They confirmed.

"can i help?" Reality asked, "i'm an empath, i could try and keep track of them."

"What I mainly need you to do is try and keep and eyelight on Azrael, just to make sure he's ok and to see if he'll work with you. You know more about him than we do it seems, you might be able to help him; probably more than we can. Void, can you help Pixel keep track of AUs and help him if he gets into any fights?" Dev questioned, and Void nodded.

"you got it." Void accepted, and he opened a red portal, going through it.

"Oh, and Reality?" Dev spoke up as Reality turned to head out of the medical center, and he looked over at them, "Thank you for everything you've been doing. I'm not trying to put a lot on your shoulders, but I truly am worried about Azrael. If you could get him to trust you and open up to you, having him working with us would give us a huge advantage against Shattered, and even if he won't, he'll at least have someone to talk to."

"you're not putting too much on me, don't worry," Reality reassured, "i'm... honestly kinda worried about him, too. he looked out for me and void against executer- legend's friend finally gave himself a name- but umm... yeah, no, don't worry about putting too much on my shoulders, i've got him covered."

Dev hugged him, and Reality hugged them back as they said, "Thank you, truly."

"anytime." Reality replied, and after the hug ended, he left the building, heading to start the scavenger hunt that was finding Azrael.

This would be fun... And time consuming...

Chapter Text

Trying to find Azrael was like trying to find a thumbtack needle in a haystack; impossible. Granted he couldn't fly, but Reality also couldn't sense him. Reality had to give Color credit where it was due for always managing to track down Knife, because without being able to sense Azrael, Reality was clueless on where to find him. He checked bars due to Azrael's drinking problem, but he didn't see him at any of them.

He teleported to the tallest buildings, anywhere a bird might go, but there was no signs of him. Reality eventually gave up for a bit, heading to a park to try and clear his head and think of other places to look. Being surrounded by trees always helped him think, and Dev had shown him some of the almost forest-like parks they'd made that quickly became Reality's favorite spot to hang out. He teleported to his favorite spot, which was underneath a large apple tree, and he sighed, sitting down against it, tilting his skull back... which allowed him to see Azrael sitting on a large branch a few trees away.

Reality's eye sockets narrowed, mildly frustrated with himself for not thinking to check a park earlier on, and he sighed, watching Azrael drink something from a bottle in a paper bag. Azrael seemed to see him, since he sighed before putting the obviously disguised alcohol bottle into an inside pocket of his jacket. He probably didn't want to get caught drinking, but Reality wouldn't mention it to Dev if asked; alcohol probably reduced the pain.

"you were looking for me and found me by accident, huh?" Azrael noted, and Reality looked at him in confusion before remembering how good some Sanses were at reading expressions.

"heh, yeah..." Reality laughed a bit awkwardly, hesitating before asking, "how's your wing?"

"eh, it's a wing." Azrael shrugged.

"can i sit by you?" Reality questioned, and Azrael paused before shrugging again.

"not my tree, and dev locked me in the beta timeline." Azrael replied, and Reality teleported to sit on a branch by the winged skeleton.

"you tried to leave?" Reality asked.

"i tried to see if i could. what, were they able to tell and sent you to check on me?" Azrael responded, "i don't need a babysitter, kid."

"i don't know if they knew, actually. that's not what i wanted to talk to you about..." Reality hesitated, "dev and void are worried, azrael, and to be honest i am too... i didn't tell them, but... i think i know what kind of au you're from."

"how?" Azrael questioned, "i mean you're probably wrong, but i've been dealing with void and dev's guesses for a few years, so it'd be kinda ironic for you to get it right on your first try."

"well, in the other multiverse, there was... i knew someone like you, and his name was knife. he suffered through a genocide loop caused by the human in his world," Reality saw Azrael tense, "and they kept trying to get him to kill everyone with them."

"and he accepted? yeah, try aga-" Azrael started, but Reality cut him off.

"he didn't. they hacked his code and made him accept." Reality sensed Azrael become a bit distressed, "is that what happened to you?..."

Azrael was silent, wings fluffed up behind him, and he wasn't looking at Reality at all. Reality frowned, realizing he might've pushed a bit too hard too fast, and he saw Azrael grab the concealed alcohol bottle from his jacket, taking another drink. Reality frowned, and he started to get up from the branch, pausing as Azrael mumbled something.

"huh?" Reality asked.

"blue and red." Azrael said a bit louder, and Reality sat back down.

Blue and red?...

"what was blue and red?" Reality questioned, and Azrael sighed.

"those were the colors of my wings. blue and red." Azrael elaborated, and Reality's eye sockets widened a bit in surprise, "i'm kinda drunk so i might regret this later, but... ugh, right now i just don't care..."

Azrael's wings slumped, a small grimace on his face as his injured wing brushed against the tree's trunk, and Reality watched him in concern but also some curiosity. He gave Azrael time to figure out how to word things, saying nothing and just trying to make his expression as open as possible. After a few minutes, Azrael spoke again.

"my timeline... it was one of the worse-affected timelines because of shattered. most monsters were feral or violent, but... they weren't too bad towards me. me and my brother... we were some of the more sane monsters, asides from undyne, anyways. alphys was trying to help everyone with determination, but that... didn't go too well. they turned into these blob monsters, but they were at least more sane..." Azrael described, Reality paying close attention.

Amalgamates...

"was that better than how they were before?" Reality asked, and Azrael shrugged.

"no clue. they were more rational, but... i dunno, they seemed to constantly be in pain, and their moments of lucidity became less frequent, so they went from rabid mutts into puppies basically... alph kept trying; kept adjusting the amounts, but..." Azrael sighed, shaking his skull, "she couldn't get it right, and eventually there was an accident..."

"did she...?" Reality started, and Azrael shook his skull.

"not yet, but uh..." He hesitated, "she almost did. she got the amount of determination wrong and one of the monsters almost killed her before they died- undyne showed up and killed them. after that, though... yeah, the experiments stopped."

Reality winced a bit, knowing that the 'not yet' meant that she still died in the end.

"you umm... you mentioned your wings were red and blue... how?" Reality asked, still a bit curious.

"in my au, monsters had wings based on their magic. the ones shattered's aura affected the most, well, they couldn't really fly, their wings were too deteriorated for that, which made it safer for the more sane of us- alphys made us houses and everything attached to the ceiling of the underground. but uh... yeah, my wings were cyan and red. patience and determination... my brother's... his were dark blue, green and red, undyne's were yellow, orange, and red- heh, we always used to call her a candy corn..." Azrael laughed a bit, but his emotions were bittersweet, and Reality smiled sadly.

He had a strong feeling none of them survived.

"i uh... asgore, his were orange, cyan, and red, toriel's were red and green, and alphys's were green and red too..." Azrael continued, "determination kept us sane, even though we weren't sure at the time what was wrong with the world..."

Azrael looked down at his hands, grabbing the bottle from his pocket again and taking a long drink before putting it back, and Reality could tell things were about to take a turn... and he was right.

"one by one, though, over the years, they wore down... alphys lost her kindness first after seeing what happened to everyone she tried to help- that's why the experiments stopped. she thought all she could do was hurt people, and to punish herself, she injected herself with determination to see what she put them through... she couldn't take it, and uh... she didn't make it. she wound up as an amalgamate." Azrael sighed, and Reality could feel some remorse in Azrael.

"undyne was next- she found her there... she... she got depressed to the point her determination broke, and she went feral and insane- papyrus and i had to lock her in waterfall to keep her from hurting anyone... from what i know now, toriel couldn't hold out and went insane in the ruins, and asgore, after what happened with undyne- he practically raised her as his daughter after her parents got killed protecting her from some of the more rabid monsters, just like how he practically raised me and papyrus..." Azrael sighed again, "same thing happened, but he locked himself in the castle so he wouldn't hurt anyone..."

"i'm so sorry..." Reality apologized, sensing the faint but growing pain, and Azrael looked over at him.

"it gets worse." Azrael informed, and Reality winced, sympathetic, "me and my brother held out, at least, we did until they came..."

"the human?" Reality guessed, and a low growl came from Azrael's throat, giving him his answer, the pain covered up by anger.

". . . yeah." Azrael confirmed, "they- they were a nice kid at first. they killed in self defense, as was necessary, and i tried looking out for them. my brother did, too, in his own way.... . . . before they showed up, he took a turn for the worse. he was more rational than the others, but... i could tell he'd be next- i don't even know how i lasted longer than him... but uh... yeah, we looked out for the human, but over the resets, papyrus got worse and worse and worse..." Azrael's bones rattled a bit, "he... he didn't last long, i had to lock him in his room, and even then he'd get out and try and hunt them down- he at least tried not to hurt me..."

Reality stayed quiet, solemn, knowing what would probably happen next.

"i- that- they killed in self defense, and while i tried keeping them safe, i also tried getting them to stop killing. sure, they were rabid, but at the time i didn't want them to die, it wasn't their fault, and i'd been trying to continue where alphys left off, but..." Azrael shook his skull, looking down.

"you were trying to save them..." Reality realized, and Azrael nodded.

"yeah..." Azrael confirmed quietly, "each reset i would get a bit more time, but... they kept getting worse- the human did. they started to like killing- it made them feel powerful... i tried to talk them out of it, but they wouldn't... they refused to listen..."

Reality could sense anger and pain building in Azrael's soul, and as much as he wanted to help him, he knew Azrael needed to get this off of his chest.

"i just... they found me safe; they knew i would try to protect them, and i did, but they also wanted me to kill with them..." There it was... "but i refused. i still thought i could save them- i was an idiot.. but still, they relentlessly asked me to kill everyone with them. i refused again, and again, and again, and again." Azrael's wings were more rustled now, and he was more distraught.

"they hacked me- they-" Azrael let out a bitter laugh, "they changed my code. they locked me away in my head and replaced me with some... some murderous puppet that would do whatever they wanted. they hated it at first, but then they kept altering it and giving it instructions on how to act, and eventually they couldn't tell the difference only that their 'best friend' would protect them and keep them safe now..."

"that's awful..." Reality whispered, soul aching from Azrael's pain, something he'd started to focus on.

"i- my wings were still tied to me, i was watching them darken, and i kept trying and trying and trying to break free, but i couldn't... i lost the cyan first, then they were just red, then they started turning black. then... i dunno, after killing everyone with them who knows how many times, after feeling something starting to happen to my soul but with no way to check... i... something snapped." Azrael took another drink from his concealed alcohol, finishing it off before throwing it in a nearby garbage can, "i broke the code, and i killed them... that was the day they really turned black.."

Reality was surprised by that. Azrael broke free of the code before his soul could fully corrupt and change, and he hadn't been in control at all... Reality couldn't even begin to imagine what that was like, or how much Azrael had suffered in comparison to the flickers of it he felt now.

"your determination broke..." Reality said, and Azrael nodded.

"yeah... i could reset, but... i saw no point in it. everyone was out of their misery, it was better that way. they wouldn't be suffering anymore, and when i saw them, i could tell they were suffering... i just... they were right about one thing: it was better for their sakes and safer for others. there was no saving them."

So that's why he killed...

"that's still awful..." Reality frowned, and Azrael sighed.

"i know, but not much can be done about it. anyways, after bleach destroyed my au and dev brought me here and told me about shattered, i figured i could... i dunno, try and avenge them? in the process of saving everyone from being his batteries, i could piss him off; maybe get some revenge for what happened to everyone i cared about... . . . it was better that way." Azrael said, and while Reality could sense Azrael felt a bit guilty about it still, it was so heavily repressed that if Reality wasn't focusing to sense him, he wouldn't have known it was there.

"is there anything i can do to help you? that... that can't be an easy past to live with..." Reality asked, and Azrael shook his skull no.

"nah, i accepted it and what i need to do a long time ago." Azrael replied, getting up, "i need another drink though... . . ." Azrael hesitated, before saying, "thanks for listening."

"thank you for talking abou-" Reality started to reply, but Azrael teleported away before he could finish, and he sighed.

Great, now Azrael was missing again... and now Reality had to process the massive amount of information he'd just learned...

Core Chara was, as they liked to believe, one of the most powerful beings in this multiverse; able to move between universes with ease, not to mention the influence they held over worlds, and over their weaker counterparts. They were from one of the first AUs to exist, having fallen into the Core after... events they couldn't clearly remember. The fall- the second one of their existence, had actually opened up the doors to limitless possibilities. After their body reformed itself, their Determination powerful enough to not shatter and scatter across the Void, they were able to go anywhere.

Granted they couldn't remember their life or anyone in it, but based on their observations of their other weaker, pathetic variants, they could gather enough. However, it was so easy to get bored, going from multiverse to multiverse, but then... then it had happened. Shattered's creation had birthed a new era for the multiverse- one of darkness and despair that covered the multiverse in a shroud of negativity so thick not even some Papyruses could withstand it. It was the most excitement they'd seen in a long time, and it got them curious how things would play out.

Monsters were supposed to be kind creatures, but most had been reduced to savages, and it was highly amusing to see how their codes were corrupted as their minds were, hijacked by the dark entity. Humans were fun to toy with and influence, though, manipulated and possessed by a need for survival turned craving to kill. The endless fighting and bloodshed was thrilling to witness, especially when they got to get others to do it for them. One downside about their form was that they couldn't touch anything- they were practically a ghost.

They could influence the minds of others, especially when they had Determination, but they couldn't even move a feather. It was... frustrating. Luckily, though, they had no need to do anything, not with their ability to influence others if needed. Their favorites were the ones they didn't need to influence, though, one of which they were currently heading to talk to.

After Shattered vanished, Core Chara noticed his influence decline, some monsters becoming less affected by him, and they had to try and figure out why it'd happened since the corrupted Guardian in question was gone. Then he returned, and from what they'd gathered, he was building a team. Something about Nightmare waking back up from the stone he'd told them about, now going by the name 'Reality', and it was pissing Shattered off to no end. So, he'd asked them to meet up with him and the XTale Sans he'd managed to recruit, and they decided to bring one of their favorite murderers along to meet Shattered's new murderer.

Core Chara looked around the AU they'd teleported to- Outertale, and they could tell Rei had been busy. They floated closer to the human, seeing them on their phone with their headphones in their ears, leaning against a decrepit wall. Their phone had a glittery dark purple case with comedy mask stickers on it, and there were pink earbuds connected to it, going into their ears. Core Chara cleared their throat, Rei looking up at them.

"CC!" Rei greeted, giving them a dramatic bow, "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Core Chara sighed, pinching the bridge of their nose as they shook their head, "Hello, Rei. I see you've been busy?"

"Well, I was looking for Azrael, but he's being... complicated..." Rei sighed, "Still not budging."

"Damnit..." Core Chara muttered.

Azrael was.. an interesting case. He had so much LV, so much power- he was on par with the XTale Sans, but he used it against Shattered. Core Chara didn't care how much it infuriated Shattered, not in the least, but he was powerful, and Shattered was an ally... Besides, the thought of having someone with that kind of power at their disposal... Core Chara wanted him.

They'd originally influenced the human in his world, having them rewrite him with the intentions of stealing him once they'd perfected him. However, the plan was derailed when he broke free since the incompetent human hacked him wrong, and now he was one of the biggest thorns in Shattered's side. In all fairness, had Shattered not gone against them and tried corrupting him with what was left of his world, he would've rotted away as a failed project, but Dev had intervened, and now Azrael was out for blood. So Core Chara kept trying to persuade him to their side, which was failing as they couldn't influence him, and he wouldn't even interact with them due to their resemblance with Charas.

So they sent Rei to try and persuade him, but unfortunately he hated them and refused to listen to them as well. Annoying, stubborn brat... If he didn't have so much potential should Core Chara find a way to control him, they would've had him killed a long while ago. His inability to be easily controlled would only make it that much more satisfying when he became their puppet, just like he should have years ago.

"Any signs of Shattered? He still AWOL?" Rei questioned, pulling the earbuds out of their ears, wrapping the cord around their phone before putting it in their pocket.

 "He's back, yes." Core Chara informed, "He's actually invited me to meet up with him, and I want you to come with me to meet someone."

"Oh really? Who?" Rei asked, giving them their full attention.

"The XTale Sans I mentioned, remember?" Core Chara answered.

"Yeah, I remember him. I thought he was locked in his AU?" Rei replied.

"He was, but Shattered let him out. I think you two would get along well." Core Chara answered.

"Hmmm.... what's he like?' Rei questioned.

"He's a genocidal murderer like you." Core Chara answered, "I haven't interacted with him much."

"And you want me there for backup? Oh!" Rei gasped, "Are you expecting a fight-?"

"Rei." Core Chara cut them off, knowing they'd want to know everything, but Core Chara didn't have time for that.

"Yeah?" Rei tilted their head.

"Do you want to come or not?" Core Chara asked flatly, crossing their arms, and Rei sighed.

"Fiiiiiinneeeee..." Rei sighed, shoulders slumping as Core Chara snapped their fingers, teleporting them to Dreamtale.

In a flash they were at Shattered's hideout- one of the old castles in Dreamtale. The whole place was practically falling apart on itself, but it was the most secure AU in terms of avoiding detection. Core Chara started for the door, Rei following behind them as they both headed to the castle, Rei opening the door for them both. The inside of the castle was slightly better than the outside, but not by much.

Then again, Shattered never had a skill or desire for decorating, he just wanted things to serve their purposes. It didn't take long to find Shattered, a hallway leading to the throne room, which was how Core Chara remembered it. It was filled with dead vines with sharp thorns, the throne itself made out of stone. He was sitting on it, one leg folded over the other, and there was someone next to him- the XTale Sans.

He was wearing the black and white outfit that the XTale boss monsters wore, as they were in the Royal Guard, and he had a red, purple, and white target soul and hollow eye sockets. He was leaning against one of the pillars in the throne room, and he looked up upon noticing them, likely curious. While Core Chara would like to take credit for what happened in his world, unfortunately XGaster had done it all on his own. Jerk.

"core, good to see you." Shattered greeted, "who's your friend?"

"Name's Rei!" Rei introduced themself with a wave, "I've heard a lot about you! And you..." They pointed at the XTale Sans, "I don't know as much about you."

"they're hyper." Shattered noted, and Core Chara laughed a bit.

"Theater kid." Core Chara explained with a shrug.

". . . this should be interesting then..." Shattered sighed, glancing at the XTale Sans and then at Rei.

". . . I shouldn't have invited them." Core Chara realized.

"no, you shouldn't have." Shattered agreed, "i could've just gotten the door for you."

". . . Screw you." Core Chara huffed, and Shattered chuckled.

"Soooooooooo, theater kid huh?" Rei asked, teleporting over to the mostly monochrome, who smirked a bit.

"i had a lot of time on my hands and a lot of movies to watch." He replied, "and a lot of access to musicals since shattered here hates them."

Shattered bristled a bit, glaring at him, and Core Chara laughed a bit. Someone has a death wish.

"executer..." Shattered growled, and the XTale Sans- Executer -just smirked at him.

"sorry, sorry..." Executer sighed, before he whispered, grinning, "i'm not sorry."

Rei laughed a bit, hands over where their mouth would be, "I couldn't tell! You were pretty convincing!" Rei looked back at Core Chara, "I can see why you wanted us to meet, he's fun!"

"if i and core were to make an alliance, would you be willing to work with him?" Shattered questioned.

"Oh, so that's why you wanted me here." Core Chara realized, "What's in it for me?"

"entertainment." Shattered smirked, and Core Chara smirked back.

"You always were good at providing that." Core Chara noted, "I might consider it."

"I dunno about it, personally. I like my solo act." Rei shrugged, "I don't like sharing EXP."

"you act like i can't create infinite souls for you to kill." Executer mentioned, and Rei perked up.

"Oh?" Rei asked, intrigued.

"yep." Executer confirmed with a grin, "i can create and modify any code i want."

". . . Still, solo act!" Rei insisted.

"awww, you afraid of being outshone in a duet?~" Executer teased, and Rei gasped dramatically.

"Oh, how dare you." Rei held their hands to where their mouth was, "The nerve you have!"

"i don't have nerves." Executer smirked, "i have sass."

"that you do.." Shattered sighed, pinching the bridge of his nasal cavity, "if others didn't hate it as much, if not more than i do, i would be more opposed to it."

"Some party pooper, huh?" Rei nodded their head in Shattered's direction, and Executer snorted.

"you're tellin' me, i've had to live in nofunsville with mr. hall monitor over here." Executer sighed.

"i am right here." Shattered reminded.

"oh i know." Executer smiled, "it'd still be fun working with ya. never had a partner in crime before."

". . . You know Set It Off?" Rei questioned.

"Oh dear god..." Core Chara muttered, "Shattered, I am so-"

"don't." Shattered cut them off, "you've doomed us all."

Rei snickered, "Not bad, not bad... still not convinced, though. See, whenever I team up with someone, it usually doesn't end well for them."

"Oooo, sounds fun!" Executer smiled, "i'm not just anybody."

"Stilllllll I dunno..." Rei drawled, turning away from him with an audible grin in their voice.

Executer just chuckled, grabbing a black phone from his pocket, pressing the screen a few times before some music started playing, and Rei gasped.

"right here, right now, i'll put the offer out." Executer grinned as Rei whipped around to face him as they pointed at them, "i don't wanna chase you down but i know you see it."

"you ru-" Rei started, but Executer cut them off playfully.

"uh uh uh, solo act. wait your turn~" Executer snickered, and Rei snorted.

Executer cleared his throat before continuing, "you run with me, and i can cut you free. out of the drudgery and walls you keep in."

Rei gave an exaggerated sigh, crossing their arms and looking off to the side.

"so trade that typical for somethin' colorful, and if it's crazy, live a little crazy! you can play it sensible, a king of conventional, or you can risk it all and seeeeeeeeee!~" Executer mimed putting a hat on his skull.

Shattered looked beyond irritated, and Core Chara just snickered, knowing he was putting up with it so that those two would get along. Oh the sacrifices he was making! They were going to work with him regardless, but this? This was beyond entertaining.

"don't you wanna get away from the same old part you gotta play? 'cause i got what you need so come with me and take the riiiiide!" Executer took off the imaginary hat, waving it around before dropping it, twirling on his feet, "it'll take you to the other side! 'cause you can do like you or you can do like me, stay in the cage or you'll finally take the key! oh, damn, suddenly you're free to flyyyyy! it'll take you to the other side!" He lowered his foot to pick it up, and he mimed catching it in his hand before putting it on.

Rei chuckled, "Okay, my friend, you want to cut me in? Well, I hate to tell you but it just won't happen! So thanks, but no, I think I'm good to go," Rei started walking away, continuing to sing, 'Cause I quite enjoy the life you say I'm trapped in!" Rei turned around from a bit away, "Now I admire you, and that whole show you do; you're onto somethin', really, it's somethin'!" Rei started walking back over, "But I live among the swells, and we don't pick up peanut shells," They dropped something imaginary before brushing their hands off, "I'll have to leave that up to youuu!"

Rei walked away before turning around with their arms out, before singing louder as they walked over to and twirled around one of the pillars, "Don't you know that I'm ok with this uptown part I get to play." Rei walked back over before dancing on their feet, "'Cause I got what I need, and I don't wanna take the ride; I don't need to see the other side! So go and do like you do, I'm good to do like me! Ain't in a cage so I don't need to take the key!" Rei started walking past him again, "Oh, damn, can't you see I'm doin' fine? I don't need to see the other side!-"

Executer quickly started singing again as they turned around, about to start walking before they stopped, "now is this really how you like to spend your days? whiskey and misery, and parties and plays?"

Rei continued almost immediately, turning their head to look at him, "If I were mixed up with you, I'd be the talk of the town! Disgraced and disowned, another one of the clowns!"

"we're not clowns..." Shattered muttered.

Rei started walking away, and Executer followed them, "but you would finally live a little, finally laugh a little! just let me give you the freedom to dream, and it'll wake you up and cure your achin'!" Executer stopped walking after them, "take your walls, and start on breakin'! now that's a deal that seems worth takin'!" Executer trailed off as Rei stopped walking, quiet for a moment before singing, "but i guess i'll leave that up to youuuu~"

Rei dramatically thought it over before twirling around, "Well, it's intriguing, but to go would cost me greatly, so what percentage of the show would I be taking?"

"well fair enough, you'd want a piece of all the action. i'd give you seven, we could shake and make it happen." Executer sang back.

"I wasn't born this morning, eighteen would be just fine!" Rei audibly grinned as they started slowly walking back over, and Executer laughed.

"why not just go ahead and ask for nickels on the dime?" They two of them started walking towards each other.

"Fifteen."

"i'd do nine."

"Twelve."

"maybe nine."

"Ten." Rei said firmly as they both stopped, and Executer grinned.

Then there was silence before Rei said, holding their hand out, "Sir, looks like you have yourself a junior partner."

Executer smirked, "what i have is an overcompensated apprentice."

They mimed clinking imaginary cups together, taking a 'drink' before twirling away from each other, and they started dancing. Then they both started singing after, and Shattered held his hands over his face in exasperation.

"Don't you wanna get away, to a whole new part you're gonna play? 'Cause I got what you need, so come with me and take the ride! To the other side!"

"So we can do like I do!" Rei sang.

"so if you do like me!" Executer continued.

They both started singing again, "Forget the cage 'cause we know how to make the key! Oh, damn, suddenly we're free to flyyyy! We're goin' to the other side!"

"So if you do like I do!" Rei vocalized.

"to the other side!"

"So if you do like me!"

"we're goin' to the other side!"

"'Cause if we do, we're goin'-"

They both finished together, "To the other side! We're goin' to the other side!"

The song ended, and they both divulged into giggles, Shattered sighing in what seemed to be relief.

"Not bad, Barnum." Rei admitted, and Executer smirked.

"not bad yourself, phillip." Executer chuckled.

". . . Do you still have the movie?" Rei asked after a moment.

"it's on the tv in my room, if we hurry we can watch it before shattered bans it?" Executer responded.

". . ."

". . ."

The two of them bolted out of the throne room, Executer leading the way while both of them whispered, "Go go go go go go go go go!", and Shattered growled while Core Chara snickered.

"those two will be the death of me..." Shattered grumbled.

"Well, if it makes you feel better, I accept your offer to be allies in this." Core Chara mentioned, and he looked up at them.

"oh really? just to watch me suffer?" Shattered huffed.

"Precisely!" Core Chara smirked, "Besides, Rei never gets along that well with anyone, I wanna see where it goes."

"you mean you want to see how crazy it'll drive me?" Shattered crossed his arms with a glare.

"That too." Core Chara shrugged, "Both are hilarious."

". . . i'm going to regret this, aren't i?" Shattered questioned while Rei and Executer started screaming song lyrics.

"Everyone else will hate it too, though." Core Chara pointed out, and Shattered smirked a bit.

"i suppose i can put up with it..." Shattered relented, and they laughed a bit.

He wouldn't last long, Core Chara could tell. And it would be hilarious to watch his patience slowly run out.

Chapter Text

Reality was heading towards one of the larger buildings in the Beta Timeline, around a block away at this point. Most of the area was red and purple, and there were several others businesses in the area. Then again, Mocha's cafe wasn't too far away from the library, either, since people got books at the library and headed to Mocha's to get coffee or food while they studied. Reality had been wanting to go to the library for a while, but he knew once he got there Pixel would probably need to drag him out since he would not want to leave.

So, he restrained himself and held back, deciding to only go there if he had a lot of free time, or if there was something important he needed to do, and in this case there was. Dev had given him a list of locations on where to find someone who might be willing to help them out- Soot. He was this multiverse's version of Dust by the sounds of things, Reality still hadn't found this version of Murder, but he had a feeling he would be problematic. Executer was a handful by himself, especially as a combination of Killer and Cross, of all Sanses, and while Reality didn't exactly like the idea of anyone being trapped, he had to admit Executer was someone who needed to be on lockdown.

Pixel had been shocked when he'd found out Executer had gotten out, then he was pissed at Shattered, again, but Reality couldn't blame him. Shattered was basically launching a nuke at the multiverse with how powerful Executer was, like he'd opened up Pandora's box and that monochrome reality-altering murder machine was what was inside. . . . That might actually be accurate. Maybe while he was here, Reality could find something about the Overwrite, or at least about XTale that he could use against Executer. Azrael was beyond powerful, but a fight between those two... Reality didn't think Azrael could win, at least not easily.

Speaking of, he'd left the Beta Timeline yesterday after talking with Dev, assuring them that he was ok before they would let him leave, and based on the amount of death occurring in an AU, Reality could guess that Azrael was back at it again. Reality walked past a school supplies shop, and then he remembered another thing about the library. It was split between being a school and being a library, as all of the books here were also usable to teach kids classes, and the areas of the attic of the library acted as classrooms. Reality had never gone to school, neither had Dream. Everything Reality knew he'd mostly taught himself, be it reading or observing the villagers, but he didn't use their treatment of others, i.e him and his brother, as examples for how to treat people.

Then again, he couldn't think of a reasonable person who would. To be honest, Reality had always wanted to go to school, but he hadn't wanted to be around the villagers even more, so he abstained from doing so, and now he was too busy saving the multiverse from that thing to be able to do so either. Dream in the other multiverse was high schooler age, he should be in school, but he was dealing with that thing over there. So in short, parasites possessing their brother's dead corpses prevented them from having a school life, and Reality had no idea if that sentence had even existed before that moment.

Reality sighed, pulling himself out of those thoughts as he walked up the brick steps of the library's main entrance as he got to it, looking up at the building and its yard. The tall building was mainly made out of crimson bricks, the windows having gold frames, and the front of the library had several benches in front of it, dark brown wood with some flower arrangements in the centers, not to mention flowers winding around the gold fences around the front of it except for the front walkway. Lanterns were hanging from chains on the ceiling, flowers and vines weaving through the links and around the base of the lanterns, and there were some butterflies and bees flying between them. There was also several trees around the library, the front yard comprised of tall trees and bushes, some beehives hanging from branches occasionally, and there was also bat houses on the sides of some of the larger trees.

It honestly looked like it was out of a fairytale book, despite the flowers being mainly red and yellow, the leaves orange, red and yellow with a few occasional green, some of the leaves already strewn across the ground. Finding out that Dev had incorporated seasons into most areas of the Beta Timeline was quite a surprise, but it was a pleasant one. Some Sanses here, like Dusttales or others who had suffered from a timeline loop, struggled when nothing changed, so to accommodate for them was nice. Reality had to admit nothing ever changing would suck, but with how Dev tried to make sure nothing stayed the same for them but not to the point of overstimulating them was nice.

It was probably likely that Soot liked this library, there was a new event or activity every day, and with the private studies... it made sense why he liked it; if he wasn't so busy Reality would probably want to live here. Reality made his way up the steps, walking along the brick walkway until he reached the library's front steps. There was some monsters and humans there already, studying while eating and drinking some of the foods and beverages from Mocha's, talking quietly amongst each other or just reading and writing down notes. Reality tensed slightly when he saw them all look up at him, and he gave a nervous wave.

The monsters and humans returned it warmly, some saying some nice greetings and hellos, something that still threw Reality for a loop. Reality said hi back, walking past them and into the library, through one of the tall dark oak doors. The inside of the library had a red marble floor, black and glittering gold between each tile, and there were dark oak pillars along the path into the rest of the library, the front area containing a large map of the library and some smaller maps in dark oak wicker baskets. There was a chalkboard on a dark oak stand, the frame also dark oak and decorated with different stickers and pins, like ghosts, bats, and spiders, all of them iridescent and reflecting different colors as Reality walked.

The chalkboard read, in orange, yellow, and white, 'Spooky month! Today's activity: Scary Stories!' with several candy corns drawn on the board, along with other miscellaneous candies. One thing about this multiverse that Reality found intriguing was how they celebrated Halloween. The residents viewed it as a time to become braver- to challenge the fear Shattered spread by dressing up in their own scary costumes, as a way to scare him back, or at least try to. Others dressed up as more cute and harmless things, but it wasn't the main choice.

Costumes of Shattered were forbidden so a panic wouldn't start... again... Anything else was on the table, though, and there was even some scary costume contests, the winners getting different prizes. All in all, it looked extremely fun, and Reality could easily think of quite a few people back in Dream's multiverse who would have a lot of fun with it.

On the right of the room, the left occupied by the maps and chalkboard, was a dark brown desk with fake cobwebs, plastic spiders, and orange fairy lights on it, and there was a Toriel behind the counter. She was wearing a black witch hat, and a black cloak with glittery gold spiderwebs and glittery red and gray spiders on it. She had bright red eyes, the whites of her eyes yellow, and her fur was white with some gold spider earrings in her ears.

"Hello, my child! Welcome to the Beta Timeline Library!" The Toriel greeted warmly, "Is there anything I can help you with today?"

"uh, maybe? i'm looking for soot." Reality answered, and she hummed a bit.

"Yes, I do believe I saw him come in today!" Toriel answered, and Reality sighed in relief.

"phew, this was the last place on the list pixel gave me..." Reality smiled, before pausing, "not that i was avoiding it! i just- i love books, i figured i would get distracted or something."

The Toriel laughed a bit, smiling, "Don't worry, young one, I understand. You're Reality, right? Void told me quite a bit about you; he's quite excited to have someone else who enjoys learning about the multiverse as much as he does."

Reality nodded with a small laugh, "yeah, void's really cool!"

"Just stay out of trouble, alright? Void has a penchant for getting himself into situations he can't always get out of, and I don't want you or him getting hurt. It's dangerous out there." She frowned.

"we'll be safe, don't worry. fighting shattered is just... he's a pain." Reality sighed.

"Yes, he is. I hate that the duty has fallen to your shoulders, but you're extremely brave for handling it like you have been; the Beta Timeline is very proud of you." The Toriel smiled, "Oh, right! Soot should be on the second floor in study room seventy. He always goes there since it's the quietest, just knock before you go inside, he has some reflexes."

Reality nodded, "i will, thank you."

"Oh, and be a dear and take him one of these?" The Toriel held out two transparent red bags of small cookies, each bag tied by a gold and black ribbon, "The other one is for you, if you're hungry. They're chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal raisin, red velvet, and there's some caramel cashew as well."

"thank you!" Reality thanked her, accepting the bags and heading into the rest of the library.

The main part of the library was... wow. Rows upon rows of bookshelves went on as far as Reality could see, each titled with a different genre or in some cases, different author. There was entire sections on languages, some of them separated into different languages, the bookshelves taller and containing a ladder on wheels that was connected to each bookshelf. There were benches in some of the open spots, vending machines lining a wall, filled with snacks, fruits, and drinks, and Reality... Reality was in heaven.

He shook his skull a bit, refocusing himself on his goal as he made his way over to the brick staircase, black and silver cobweb stair treads on each step, soft plush under his boots. He made it to the second floor, seeing the gold railing adorned with fake cobwebs and Halloween-colored fairy lights, and he kept walking, keeping an eye on the door numbers. Once he made it to seventy, he knocked on the door, waiting for a moment before entering. There was a skeleton laying on one of the couches in the room, the walls lined with bookshelves, and there was three red couches in the room, a dark oak coffee table in the middle, and there was some board games under the table.

The skeleton, soot, was reading what looked like a horror book, and based on the LV emanating from him, Reality guessed he had the right room. He was wearing a black jacket with dark gray stains on it, his hood having a fluffy tan trim around the edges, and it was pulled up over his skull. His sleeves were dark gray, and he was wearing charred fingerless black gloves, his fingers sharp but also showing some burn scars. He was wearing a red shirt under the jacket, the shirt having a lot of dark red and black stains on it, and his shorts were black with a red stripe down each side.

He was wearing black boots that looked highly insulated, dark gray and black powder sticking to the soles, along with bits and pieces of rocks between the grooves. He had a red eyelight in his left eye socket, the pupil in the middle slit and outlines with dark gray. He had dark gray and black stains on his face in patches, and he looked up at Reality as he opened the door.

"can i help you?" The skeleton asked, the typical gold tooth Underfell Sanses had missing, and Reality felt a bit bad for intruding on his reading.

"maybe, umm... you're soot, right?" Reality asked, and he nodded.

"yeah. void send ya? or error?" Soot questioned, and Reality nodded a bit.

"the toriel downstairs too, she umm... she sent cookies." Reality held up one of the bags, walking over to sit on one of the empty couches, handing the bag to Soot.

"thanks." Soot muttered, setting it aside, "you want my help, huh?"

"how'd you-?" Reality started, before realizing, "right, yeah. you can analyze faces..."

"yeah, kinda a common thing for sanses." Soot shrugged, shutting his book, "i'm surprised you're not more on edge. i don't exactly have a reassuring aura around myself."

Considering the monsters Reality has met since he was freed from the stone, Soot wasn't really his definition of intimidating. Sure, he had a dark aura around him, but Reality had encountered far worse. That name-stealing parasite, Shattered, Dust, Error, Azrael... Fresh. Soot was about as intimidating as Murder was, and Reality knew that Murder wasn't going to hurt him. Soot was basically another version of Murder, and without the exposure to more LV, he was a lot calmer than most monsters with an LV of 20. 

"i've met way worse, trust me." Reality laughed a bit, rubbing the back of his neck, "you uh... you don't really intimidate me, no offense."

"heh, nah. it's actually kinda nice for someone to not be on edge because of me for once... granted it's not a good thing, but either way." Soot responded.

"why isn't it a good thing?" Reality asked.

"because you've met someone much worse than me for me to not intimidate me. you were more worried you were interrupting my reading than about being killed, which says something." Soot replied, "so that means you met azrael."

Yeah, Reality had definitely met him... 

"yeah, and shattered... to be honest, azrael isn't that intimidating compared to him." Reality said, and Soot sighed before nodding.

"no one is as intimidating as shattered." Soot replied, "not even azrael... maybe bleach, but at least if you run into him you don't suffer long. shattered keeps you alive even after you died just to feed on your suffering."

Reality winced, shuddering a bit, looking down, "yeah, i'm uh... i'm trying to deal with him."

"but you need help, right?" Soot guessed, and Reality looked back up at him.

"if you want to. i won't force anyone to fight him unless they truly want to." Reality responded.

". . . kid, let me tell you something. shattered sank his aura into my au and broke it, and me in the process. i didn't get the chance to fight for my timeline before bleach showed up and destroyed it and i got yanked through a portal here. if i'd had it my way, i would've gone down with my timeline, but i didn't have that option." Soot told him, "and shattered was one of the reasons my au was so screwed up in the first place."

"so-" Reality started.

"so fighting shattered is the next best i can get for avenging everyone i cared about, which means i'm in, on a few conditions." Soot finished, and Reality sighed in relief.

"what are they?" Reality asked.

"first of all, i get to drink on the job." Soot held up a finger, ". . . it helps me focus, ok? secondly, if azrael shows up and he's a jerk, i reserve the right to punch him."

"you don't get along, do you?" Reality guessed.

". . . it's complicated." Soot sighed, "but in short, no. third, if i see shattered, i reserve the right to punch him in the face if possible."

"i don't think you ca-" Reality began.

"great." Soot cut him off, and Reality sighed.

"your funeral..." Reality mumbled, "so uh... you'll help us?"

"well, to be honest once i heard from void about the xtale brat getting out, i figured you'd be sent my way to ask for help." Soot said, "granted i wasn't completely on board, but void can be convincing."

"how come?" Reality asked.

He didn't think Void would blackmail or guilt trip anyone into helping, but convincing a Dusttale to do something they didn't want to was next to impossible.

"well, void's one of the few people who actually talk to people like me- y'know, mass murderers, no matter the consequences. he tries understandin' us because he thinks there's more to it than the lv. for the older timelines, there's less to it since shattered's aura messes everyone up so much, but when an underfell kills everyone... yeah there's usually a lot to it... so he always tries to understand. not a lot of people do that." Soot explained.

Reality nodded in understanding, "in the other multiverse, in the omega timeline, it was like that too. people tolerated others from more tragic aus but they never really... you know..."

"wanted anything to do with them?" Soot guessed, and Reality nodded, "yeah, usually it ain't too bad, but sometimes people are more reasonably upset. void, error, dev, sometimes azrael when he gets his skull outta his pelvic cavity, but otherwise he's... how do i say this nicely?... eh, no way to say it nicely. either way, yeah, void's actually nice and he brought up some important points, but that's for another day."

"i'll have to thank him later." Reality said, mostly to himself.

"he'll know." Soot said, ". . . and just for the record, i'm not just doing it for him. he was the one who mentioned about shattered being the reason my au went to hell, so if anything i'm fighting for my au. even if bleach wiped it out, it doesn't matter. shattered still made everything awful before that, and i want payback."

"well, for whatever reason you're helping... thank you." Reality thanked him, and Soot sighed.

"you're welcome..." Soot sighed, and Reality saw the cover of what Soot had been reading.

"the legend of sleepy hollow?" Reality read, and Soot smirked.

"one of the things i like about the beta timeline is the library- especially around halloween. they have tons of horror stories out on display. granted they do anyways, but the time of year makes it better. besides, it's about a bunch of humans getting decapitated, what's not to love?" Soot smirked, and Reality laughed a bit.

"that's fair. i don't really like the idea of innocents being hurt or killed, but either way, you do you." Reality replied, "i always used to love books on the ways things worked, like gravity."

"you ever get into physics?" Soot asked.

"sometimes? it wasn't really my strong suit, but i did enjoy biology and psychology books- probably because i'm tied to emotions." Reality responded, and Soot nodded.

"yeah, i used to read physics books all the time- i actually worked in a lab for a while before some things happened, but uh... yeah, i can relate. learning how things work and how people think is nice. it helps with strategy a lot- not to manipulate people, but to consider what they'll do and how they'll respond to things. being able to read faces is one thing, being able to predict people is another." Soot said, and Reality nodded, agreeing.

"i can sense emotions- well, in most cases, mainly when the emotions are present. it makes it easy to tell what most people are thinking or feeling, but when people are emotionless..." Reality trailed off.

"you're clueless." Soot finished, Reality nodding again.

"yeah... i always focused on how people feel things, not what they will feel, or at least what they'll do. i can make some educated guesses, but..." Reality sighed, shaking his skull, "executer- the xtale sans, he just.. he's invisible to me."

"most people like that are. when they're emotionless, you can't predict them the normal way. they're not tied to anything emotionally so you can't use leverage against them, and you can't get them upset to distract them and throw them off their game. they don't feel guilt, most of the time not even pain, and when they do it's from something mostly fatal, and they still don't care. just completely apathetic and unless they have self-preservation they keep fighting until they die." Soot said.

"was the human of your world like that?" Reality asked, and Soot scowled a bit.

"yeah, but when the loop didn't stop, they got easier to predict. they predicted everything i would do, so i just needed to play off of that. unfortunately for me they were more than capable of changing things up, so i just started doing something they couldn't predict or stop."

What could that mean?...

"like what?" Reality questioned, curious.

". . . it's complicated." Soot replied, "nothing you need to worry about. point is they couldn't do anything about it, and i used it to try making them give up, but before i could..." His hands clenched into fists, growing angry.

"bleach destroyed your timeline..." Reality finished, and Soot nodded.

"yeah. if i could, i'd punch him in the face. doesn't help that no one ever sees him besides error- or pixel, as he's calling himself, but no one ever sees bleach besides him. i know pixel mentioned something about him, bleach, and shattered all fighting each other years ago, but he didn't go into detail." Soot replied, and Reality's eye sockets widened a bit.

That must have been absolutely brutal...

"jeez..." Reality winced, looking off to the side, "did he say who won?"

"it was a draw, according to him, but with how beat up he looked i'm guessing one of the others walked away in better condition. it's what happened when three immortals have it out, i guess." Soot shrugged, "they're not the only immortals- i mean for all i know azrael's some kinda grim reaper judging me for my actions- which is fine, i deserve that much, but i don't think he's mortal."

Reality stayed quiet, knowing that Azrael definitely wasn't any type of god- granted he was strong enough to fight one based on how powerful Killer and Knife were, but Azrael wasn't a god.

"yeah, who knows." Reality shrugged, looking off to the side, "pixel can't find anything on him and-"

"you know." Soot cut him off, and Reality's eyelights snapped back to him.

"wha-?" Reality began.

"your face. you know his past, because he told you, and you don't wanna say anything." Soot observed, "and my best guess is that you didn't tell dev, void, or pixel either."

". . . you're way too good at that..." Reality huffed, and Soot smirked.

"it's kinda my thing. look, i don't care if he's grim reaper or an average joe, just don't try lyin' to me, 'kay?" Soot said, and Reality nodded, "thanks. it's not that i don't appreciate the sentiment- i mean you're watching out for him and not spilling his most closely guarded secret behind his back. i can respect that and i won't pry. i mainly say don't lie to me because it won't work. just for future reference."

"yeah, i won't." Reality accepted, and everything was silent for a moment.

". . . it was tragic, though, huh?" Soot guessed, and Reality sighed.

"he needs years of therapy." Reality muttered.

"heh, thought so." Soot laughed humorlessly, and Reality started eating out from his bag of cookies, and they were surprisingly good.

"soot, have you tried these before, oh my god..." Reality asked, looking down at the bag with wide eye sockets, and Soot laughed a bit.

"yeah, i've had 'em. i'm just not a sweets guy. if there was a chili pepper cookie, now that i would eat." Soot smirked at the way Reality's face dropped and slowly grew horrified.

". . . are you insane?" Reality asked.

"eh, schizophrenic but either way, they're good. especially with chocolate." Soot chuckled, and Reality made his pointer fingers into a crucifix.

". . . just why?" Reality had to ask.

"because of that." Soot grinned, pointing at Reality's face, "the taste is good too, but either way."

". . ." Reality knew with certainty at that moment that Murder and Soot would get along- if Soot was anything like Murder, though, he would probably hate Knife... then again, Murder and Knife had that weird thing that still had Reality confused.

There was a knock on the door, Reality and Soot both looking up, and Void peeked through the doorframe, smiling a bit, "hey soot, hey reality! you two getting along?"

"yeah, i think so." Reality replied, and Soot nodded.

"yeah, you were right; kid's pretty nice for the not-brother of shattered." Soot mentioned, and Void laughed a bit.

"he told you that?" Reality asked with a sigh.

"yeah, he did. i mean i personally don't see the family resemblance." Soot responded.

"yeah, because it's not my brother!" Reality exclaimed, and Soot snorted.

"alright, alright, i get it. you're not related to the ink demon. happy?" Soot questioned.

"no, but it'll do for now." Reality sighed, and he looked back at Void, "sorry, uh... were you here for a reason orrr...?"

"oh, right! i was just checkin' up on you two, and coming to tell you about a new... development." Void grimaced at that last part.

". . . what'd shattered do now?" Reality asked.

"well, azrael came back from his most recent kill spree," Void said, and Reality felt Soot become a bit more negative, "and uh... he ran into a problem."

"executer there again?" Reality questioned.

"no, but shattered's upping his aura, and the monsters are getting stronger. a friend of mine was in an au and said it was a lot more hostile, so he talked to azrael and he went there and eradicated it before it got too bad, but it could be the start of a bigger problem." Void explained.

That explained the increase in negativity lately...

"that... isn't good." Reality grimaced, "is he ok?"

"oh he's fine, as always." Void sighed, "he just said, it was harder to kill them without getting hit a single time."

"cocky brat..." Soot muttered with a huff, and Reality sighed.

"is az the only one killing the worse-off aus?" Reality asked, and Void nodded.

"to my awareness, yeah. bleach just destroys them at random, and no one else kills them off. executer might if he gets really bored from what pixel and legend said- he's got some serious chronic boredom problems and shattered might get fed up with him." Void answered, "either way, this could get bad."

"i'll stay aware of the negativity levels of the aus... would azrael let me point him towards the aus shattered is focusing on?" Reality questioned.

"would he? he'd probably call you just to ask for locations on what to kill. if it pisses shattered off, he'll go for it." Void replied, and Reality nodded.

"i'll bring it up next time i see him." Reality said, and he saw someone peek past Void.

He was a human- almost dead looking, with pale skin, blue freckles, and tinged blue lips, and his eyes were whitened, pupils milky blue, and he looked like he was wearing eyeshadow. His hair was short and white, fading to blue at the ends, and he had a pair of black-rimmed glasses on, along with black headphones around his neck. He was wearing a white shirt with a black vest with white edges and music notes stitched onto it, along with pale blue jeans and black ankle-high boots with white soles and laces. 

"hi?" Reality greeted, and the human seemed anxious.

"hi." The human replied quietly.

"oh yeah, this is ghost!" Void introduced the human, who waved a bit, Reality waving back, "he's the one who found the au shattered was focusing on. he travels between aus a lot and he let azrael and me know."

"thanks for the information, ghost, you probably just caught something before it could become a big problem." Reality thanked him.

"of course, i umm... i try keeping my eyes out for anything- i don't want anyone to get hurt because they didn't know somewhere wasn't safe." Ghost replied, and Void nodded.

"me neither, that's why i like working on guides with you. that way we can cover ground twice as fast." Void added.

"and it gives azrael a hit list." Soot remarked, "he preaches so much about not killing rational people no matter what and then he slaughters entire worlds. they might be aware in there and he doesn't even know it."

"they aren't- at least most of them aren't. shattered corrupts their emotions and drives them insane. azrael views it as a mercy." Reality responded, "i can sense it, they aren't... they aren't in there anymore, soot. azrael's just killing corpses"

"so azrael's just the graveyard shift?" Soot questioned, and Reality and Void both snorted a bit.

"that... is the tamest way to sum up what he does, actually..." Reality realized.

"the perfect job description." Void agreed.

". . . i still think he's a hypocrite." Soot huffed.

"at least i don't get on you for drinking all the time." Azrael's voice came from near the doorway, and the four of them jumped a bit, Ghost and Void looking to their left.

"why do you always do that?!" Soot questioned as Azrael poked his skull into the room.

"so sorry, soot." Azrael responded sarcastically, "lucky for you, i'm not here to judge your life choices, i'm here for you, reality."

"me? wait, how'd you know i was here?" Reality asked.

"eh, pixel told me you were here to talk to soot, and he always picks this room to read." Azrael shrugged.

"stalker." Soot muttered.

"well if something starts on fire i need to know where my prime suspect is, don't i?" Azrael responded.

"oh my g- it was one time, and it was an accident!" Soot snapped, eyelights turning red, his left eyelight having gray on the outside, and it had a black smoke trail coming from it.

"sure." Azrael said flatly, not sounding convinced, "anyways, reality, we gotta talk."

"uh... ok?" Reality accepted, getting up from the couch, and he followed Azrael as he walked away from the room.

"azrael isn't on the team, right?" Reality heard Soot asking.

"no, we offered a few times and he keeps refusing." Void answered from behind Reality.

"good." Soot responded, and Azrael walked into another study a few doors down, waiting for Reality to walk inside before closing the door.

The study was similar to the one Soot had been, but there was several bat decorations hanging from the ceiling and attached to the bookshelves. Otherwise it was identical to the other one Soot had been in.

"sooo... what was this about?" Reality asked, sitting down on the couch on the left while Azrael leaned over the back of the one across from him.

"alright, ghost found more than just an au becoming more volatile." Azrael said, not sounding happy, "shattered's up to something."

"like what?" Reality questioned.

"i don't know. it could be nothing, but these things usually aren't nothing. best guess is he's making training grounds, i could see marks in trees and buildings." Azrael answered, "so he's probably preparing executer and whoever else he finds for combat, and these things were... they were strong." 

"you don't think he's making them better batteries?" Reality asked, and Azrael shook his skull no.

"no. shattered has a passive aura that infects monsters, turning them into those mindless husks; those creatures. he doesn't have to put effort into it. however, when they become more volatile like they were, that means that he's putting magic into them- magic he would usually be stocking up instead of using. so when he starts using that magic..." Azrael trailed off.

"he's using it for a reason. he's not gaining anything from them if he's putting it back into them." Reality finished, "but wouldn't that make the... creatures as you put it more negative, letting him feed off of them more?"

"not really. it doesn't cost him much magic i don't think, but he doesn't gain anything from them, and it probably requires his focus. meaning he's doing this on purpose, and he was probably funneling his magic into them to make them more powerful. so, it was probably a training exercise that executer didn't get to use." Azrael said, "but that's not what i'm worried about- well, not worried but more so preparing for. if shattered realizes he can make monsters more powerful with that, not to mention potentially controlling them..."

Reality's eye sockets widened, and he realized, "you think he would use that to fight us. if he found us in an au and funneled magic into monst- creatures in order to make them harder to stop and defend ourselves against."

"bingo." Azrael nodded, "keep an eyelight on void, ghost- any au traveler. put out a notice to treat every au as a dangerous one."

"wait, why can't you tell them?" Reality questioned.

"because they'll view that as me wanting to keep them here. look, i need that information just as much as they want to au hop to get it, but if they go somewhere thinking there's a low threat level and shattered pumps it full of steroids..." Azrael replied, and Reality nodded in understanding.

"then it could be disastrous, got it." Reality caught on, ". . . thank you for telling me."

"yeah, don't mention it." Azrael shrugged him off, heading for the door, but he paused, "no seriously, don't. just say it's something you thought of."

". . . i can still thank you." Reality said.

"thank me for what? i didn't do anything." Azrael responded, and Reality sighed.

"ha ha. . . . azrael?" Reality questioned after a moment.

"what?" Azrael responded, hand on the doorknob.

"thank you... for trusting me enough to get that off of your chest. it means a lot, and umm... in case you've been worried, i haven't and have no intentions on telling anyone. your secret's safe with me." Reality said, and Azrael's wings twitched a bit before lowering, some tension leaving them, the skeleton they belonged to looking back at him from over one of his wings.

"i figured when i didn't get harassed by pixel and void about my past, but uh... thanks." Azrael replied, "take care of yourself, alright? you can't kick shattered's coccyx if you're too injured or overworked to."

Reality smiled a bit, "take care of yourself too, azrael."

Azrael just shrugged, saying, "maybe." before exiting the room, and Reality sighed a bit.

It was nice to know that Azrael at least had someone he felt that he could trust and turn to with information, and Reality could tell Azrael was slightly relieved by the confirmation Reality had no intentions of telling anyone about his past. Still, Reality wished Azrael could count on more people, but for now, Reality was content to be the first one Azrael let his guard down around. Reality had a feeling he knew why; the aura the positivity apple gave off was reassuring and comforting, and it probably let Azrael feel comfortable enough to even slightly let his guard down.

It made sense, with how Dream spread positivity everywhere he went and made everyone feel safe, it was just an affect he had on people, and it seemed like Reality had it as well. Regardless of the reason, at least Azrael felt like he could talk to him about things, and Reality considered it a win. Especially with the information Azrael had just given him, because if Shattered realized the potential for feeding more of his magic into corrupted monsters, they were in trouble.

Chapter Text

It'd been a few days since Shattered had made his alliance with Core, and while their help would be useful, there was one small problem. Actually a rather large one, one that had been making Shattered want to stab something or someone. Executer's chronic boredom was a... drawback, despite how powerful the skeleton was. Rei continuously stopped by, and when they didn't, they texted Executer.

When they weren't keeping him occupied, Executer turned to bothering Shattered, and it took every ounce of restraint he had to avoid grabbing him in a tentacle and throwing him out of the castle. He couldn't even send out Executer to go on a killing spree after funneling more magic into an AU to make it stronger without Azrael killing it! How had Nightmare even tolerated Killer before he'd recruited the others? Executer had such a complete and utter lack of personal space, and when Shattered just gave up on awkwardly sitting in silence with Executer in the room, the brat stalked him.

Shattered couldn't sense him, but every time he glanced behind his shoulder, Executer was peeking out at him from behind a corner. The castle was massive and yet it felt so stifling with his damned constant presence. Shattered almost wanted Rei to come back after they left since they kept Executer occupied, but then the musicals started, and the screaming. . . . This was hell. And so, Shattered decided to do the most logical thing possible: make it someone else's problem.

Following what Nightmare had told him, he had a version of Killer- despite this one being more powerful but also probably more annoying, Nightmare had recruited Dust next, primarily to keep Killer occupied. However, there was a problem. Dusttales and Something News didn't get along from what Shattered could see- far from it, actually, but perhaps conflict would keep Executer engaged... unless Shattered went to that Dusttale. The Sans was worse-off than most; more mentally unstable and unpredictable, but with the right efforts, he could be useful.

Nightmare had given everyone he recruited nightmares when they first arrived at his castle- a way of putting himself in the place of a comforter and gaining their trust by reassuring them, siphoning the magic he'd instilled away to make them feel safe. Shattered knew how much fun it would be to craft nightmares for them, aimed to hit every single weakness they had to make them vulnerable, then ease their pain. However, with how much Determination some Sanses had, it could be difficult to give them nightmares, especially the Dusttale he was thinking of.

But, he was the only one who might not want to kill Executer on sight, which meant Shattered wouldn't need to supervise too closely. Shattered could sense his hatred from Dreamtale, and while his AU wasn't far, it wasn't close, and it was easy for him to pick out from the surrounding negativity.

"executer." Shattered said.

"yeah?" Executer peeked out from around a corner, and Shattered sighed.

"i'm going to recruit someone else, don't destroy anything while i'm gone." Shattered instructed, "just... sleep or something, i don't know."

"what's the newbie gonna be like?" Executer asked.

"you'll see." Shattered responded.

"when? how murderous is he? oooooh! more than me, somehow?~" Executer tilted his skull, and Shattered sighed, growling a bit.

"as i said, you'll see. just... do not break anything." Shattered repeated.

"do not? donut? hey, speaking of-" Shattered teleported out of the AU as Executer was talking, more than fed up, and he reformed in the Dusttale AU.

The timeline itself was a barren wasteland, everyone except for one skeleton dead. Dev usually tried helping the victims of Dusttale timelines, be it the murderer or the ones the murderer missed, if the genocidal being was rational enough to not kill outside of their AU. This one, Dev had tried helping, but the Sans was... less than rational. It wasn't that he was psychotic or insane, which he was but not to extremes, it's the amount of hatred that he harbored.

This Sans hated the multiverse as a whole, not understanding why they were so lucky where he hadn't been, and so it made him very prone to rage and hatred. Dev had left him after his outburst, and no one had come here since, leaving him here, alone, stewing in his hatred. The human no longer Reset, and Shattered fed on his negativity for years. However, Shattered figured it was time to cash in on his hatred.

He'd gotten even worse since Dev revealed the multiverse and his misfortune to him, consumed with jealousy and rage, along with uncertainty on why he'd had to suffer such a cruel fate. He felt that everyone turned their backs on him, more now than ever. He didn't want to leave his world but he didn't want to stay, and he was filled with such spite he wouldn't take himself out of it. He had a lot of potential, especially if Shattered gave him a target for his aggression and fury.

Core had been watching and informed him of the situation years ago, and Shattered had been keeping tabs on this AU ever since, to see how negative he became. The Sans had so much Determination, and Shattered had wanted to see if someone with such an amount could fall to his aura's effects. Unfortunately, out of sheer spite, he hadn't, but his stubbornness helped Shattered in other ways. He'd been abandoned, alone, for years, with no one to free him of his hell.

With this isolation in consideration, Shattered knew that the skeleton would be more inclined to accept his offer, twisting the situation to his advantage. So, as he emerged in the middle of the woods in Snowdin, plan already in mind, a smirk formed on his face. The ground was covered in snow, as was typical for most Snowdins, but the dust that was surely once covering it as well was buried far beneath it. Shattered could sense the Sans in the Grillby's, probably scrounging around for supplies.

The Sans wasn't suicidal- he didn't want to die. He had too much Determination to want that, and even if he wanted his existence to end, his Determination would prevent him from ever following through with it. Which, in turn, made him the perfect source of negativity. However, Shattered needed him to do more than just give him negativity to feed off of, and the Sans would comply.

Shattered melted his form down, zipping through the timeline to the Grillby's, manifesting his form again outside of the building. It, like the rest of the surrounding buildings, was broken down and decrepit. Windows were busted out, evidence of attacks marred the walls, and there was dust visible inside of the structures. Shattered could hear movement inside of the Grillby's, and he could sense the only soul in this timeline inside.

Then, everything went quiet, the skeleton likely sensing his aura, and in a blink the Sans was gone, instead right behind Shattered. He paused, a smirk on his face knowing that the Sans was right behind him, likely holding an attack to his skull. He turned around, being met with a razor sharp bone in his face, but he ignored it, unworried.

The Sans was glaring at him with two dark red eyelights, both of them rings with several small, sharp points coming out of it, like a sawblade. His left eyelight had a ring of faint blue around it, dark purple sparks coming from it, similar to bolts of lightning. His face and body was covered in dust stains, and he had a few minor cracks around the underside of his left eye socket, possibly a defensive wounds from a victim. The skeleton was wearing a denim jacket with a few black-buttoned pockets on the lower half, one on each side, and there was a shut zippered one on the top left of the coat.

The jacket had a dark gray hood, which was pulled up, and it had black hoodie strings, each ending in a silver nub. He was wearing a black shirt underneath the jacket, which was zipped halfway up, and the black shirt showed the dust stains quite well. He was also wearing black cargo shorts with a white stripe down either side, the strings of it black and ending in silver, and the pockets had either a silver zipper or a black button. One of his socks was unrolled, going halfway up his left leg, while the other was rolled up, and he was wearing black sneakers with white soles and black laces. 

Seeing he was unphased, the Sans got more irritated, and Shattered rolled his eyelight, saying, "if you want to intimidate someone like me, you need to try harder than that."

Shattered reached a hand up, closing it around the magic attack, watching the Sans's eye sockets widen as he stumbled back, much more on edge. Shattered just wiped his hand off on his jacket, watching as the skeleton regarded him much more carefully.

"who the hell are you?" He asked, and Shattered's smirk sharpened.

"someone far beyond your power level." Shattered responded, "and i suggest not trying to attack me again. it's pointless, but it's in your best interests to not piss me off."

"yeah, i noticed.." The Sans muttered, looking at his own hand, which had previously held the sharpened bone, and then he began to glare at him again, "wait... you're shattered, aren't you?"

"oh, you've heard of me, have you?" Shattered observed, and the skeleton took an additional step back.

Shattered could tell what he was thinking, his emotions giving him away. He, intelligently, had figured out that he couldn't beat Shattered, so he was preparing to retreat. What he wasn't aware of, however, was that that was also futile. Besides, if Shattered wanted him dead, tortured, or worse, he would have done that already. 

"that human- or whatever they were- they mentioned something about you." He answered, and Shattered nodded.

"dev?" Shattered asked, and the skeleton paused for a bit before nodding, "yes, i do have quite the reputation, don't i?"

"you're also the reason my world went to hell." The skeleton glared.

"i'm the reason everyone's aus went to hell, you're far from special." Shattered responded with an eyelight roll, "what happened here is no different from other worlds, you just weren't granted aid like they were."

"they mentioned taking others in..." The Sans mumbled to himself before he scoffed, "and i was too 'unstable'..."

"yes, i noticed. i could feel your emotions that day. the anger, the jealousy, the hatred, the pain." Shattered listed, counting with his fingers, "it's been a while since i sensed pure hatred like that."

"and you're here to toy with me now, is that it?" He accused, "because you know no one's coming for me?"

"no, i'm here because i want to offer you something." Shattered responded, and the skeleton narrowed his eye sockets further.

"like what?" 

Shattered smirked, "the hate you harbor for the multiverse- i share it. i've been trying to snuff out the lucky, hopeful souls for a long time now."

"you had no problem doing that to mine." The skeleton muttered bitterly.

"the effects my power had on your world were passive, i didn't specifically target you, so get that notion out of your skull, now." Shattered hissed, tentacles sharpening, and the Sans tensed up slightly, "i am not out to get you, you're a victim of circumstance. i may have caused all of the negativity, but they are the ones who acted on it and allowed it to control them. others suffered far worse, i assure you."

". . . why are you here?" The Sans asked after a few moments of silence.

"because we can help each other. you envy those who have it better than you- who got dealt a better hand while you suffered, and you hate that they didn't help you. that you were abandoned. i want to see them break, just like the rest of the multiverse, and you want them to suffer, don't you?" Shattered questioned, and he nodded a bit, glaring off to the side.

"it wasn't fair..." He muttered, "i lost everyone- everything, and they just..." The monster's fists clenched, "they just go on without a damn care..."

"and that's not fair." Shattered smirked, feeding into his growing anger.

"it's not!" The skeleton exclaimed, "why did i have to suffer from that thing?! why did that human talk about everyone living in 'peace'? a place where people from other timelines could live in 'harmony'! there's no 'harmony'-" He did finger quotes, "-with humans! with anyone who doesn't understand how it feels to lose everything! not just their timeline or their friends, no. everything. the lucky brats don't know how well they have it- they don't deserve to have it like they do!"

Shattered watched as he started pacing, ranting his anger and envy, eyelights blazing from fury and jealousy and hatred, and Shattered loved it. He knew this would be a good idea, especially with how his aura kept feeding into his growing loathing. The Sans ranted for.. probably five more minutes, ever entertaining, before he finally stopped.

"i agree, it wasn't fair. you didn't deserve it, just as they don't deserve to have it so good. everyone should suffer, shouldn't they?~" Shattered asked, and the skeleton's eyelights snapped over to him.

"and you want me to make that happen?" He questioned.

"to say the least. i'm recruiting others who experienced the worst of this multiverse as well- in fact i already have someone on my side who went through a loop similar to the one you did." Shattered informed.

"and you didn't target either of us?" The Sans asked, and Shattered shook his skull no.

"no. while your negativity has been quite rejuvenating and fueling, i'm giving you an option. would you like to continue to be the victim, isolated and alone, or would you like to make others experience your pain? to know a semblance of what you felt? the choice is yours." Shattered offered, extending a hand.

". . . and if i agree to this- if your offer is genuine... what's in it for me?" 

Shattered sighed; of course he would want more than to inflict his pain onto others, "you'll stay at my headquarters in another au, and i'll provide anything material you want. you'll never have to return here again. all you need to do is follow my instructions regarding which au you'll be attacking, how, and when, and not kill your teammates. you can fight, but don't kill them."

"how tempting will it be?" He questioned.

"very." Shattered sighed, "he likes to push limits."

"that oughta be fun..." The skeleton muttered.

"you also need some form of nickname to distinguish you from others. there's multiple sanses, after all." Shattered informed, and the monster became thoughtful for a few moments.

". . . what about massacre?" He suggested, and Shattered smirked.

"perfect." Shattered approved, and he looked up as he saw a stream of white liquid falling from the roof of the underground, "that damn pest..."

Shattered pulled Massacre out of the way, watching the stream zip over to the ground a few feet away, and he sharpened his tentacles, pushing Massacre behind him. He wasn't about to let Bleach kill one of his best versions of Dust; that skeleton was highly useful for Nightmare, and Shattered would not be missing out. Bleach formed from the white liquid, looking like he usually did, and Shattered was not pleased to see him. He was wearing a black turtleneck that faded to white halfway down, a white short-sleeved jacket over it, the turtleneck's sleeves fading to white at the ends, and he was wearing white gloves.

He also wore black pants that faded to white, flecks of dark gray across the fabric, and he wore white socks with white sneakers. His eyelights were a soulless white, like Ink's, but Bleach somehow managed to look more irritated than Ink ever pretended to be. Then again, Bleach was actually quite annoyed, capable of more emotions than Ink- having close to the emotional capacity of a Flowey. He also lacked the black paint splotch on his cheekbones, just a frown on his face, but he did have a long black scarf that faded to white at the ends.

"bleach." Shattered glared, crossing his arms, "what brings you by?"

"i was gonna destroy this stupid place. what brings you by?" Bleach countered, crossing his arms in return.

Brat. This is why I tortured Ink so much, because of pent up anger at your stupid coccyx.

"none of your concern, bleach." Shattered huffed, rolling his eyelight, "have fun with your hobby, but we'll be going now."

"'we'?" Bleach quotes, leaning to the side to see Massacre behind Shattered, and his skull tilted, "oh. i didn't know you were collecting existence typos."

"the hell did he just call me-?" Massacre started to question, and Shattered sighed, creating another tentacle and holding it in front of him as he started to approach Bleach.

Massacre was irritated, but he didn't realize Shattered was saving his miserable life.

"you heard me, misprint." Bleach responded, and Shattered sensed Massacre's anger spike.

Shattered wrapped the tentacle around Massacre, who was five seconds from attacking someone who would not hesitate to kill him, and sure, it probably hurt, but Shattered didn't care. He didn't want him dead like Bleach did but he didn't care if he hurt him saving his life. He was more useful alive.

"first of all, fu-!" Massacre started before Shattered covered his mouth with a tentacle, noticing how Massacre was quickly in pain.

"ahem." Shattered cleared his nonexistent throat, "my business is none of yours, bleach. now, we'll both be going. feel free to do your thing here."

"my 'thing'?" Bleach cocked his skull to the side, eye sockets narrowing, "what's that supposed to mean, rotten banana."

Shattered scowled, "first of all, never call me that again, and second of all, it means your thing. of destroying aus. i'm taking the only inhabitant of this one, feel free to clear up space for error to fill it with something else."

Bleach clenched his jaw, "once error does show up, i'm kicking his coccyx. then, i'm kicking yours."

"sure you are, bleach." Shattered rolled his eyelight, and he saw Bleach's foot twitch, his attention honing in on it. 

Massacre said something from behind him- something muffled that was likely laced with profanities, and he sighed.

"i am. good luck dealing with your kidnapped mistake. i might erase him next." Bleach responded, and Shattered quickly teleported himself and Massacre as white liquid shot out from Bleach's foot, rapidly consuming everything it touched.

Once they emerged in Shattered's castle, he let Massacre go, who quickly put distance between them, rubbing at his mouth. It had without a doubt hurt, but Shattered didn't really care.

"you'll thank me later. bleach would've killed you had you said what you wanted to." Shattered said, and Massacre gave him a pained glare.

"did you have to hurt me that damn much, though?" Massacre questioned, wincing, "i have a high pain tolerance but that felt like acid..."

"it wasn't intentional, it's just what my form is made of. the longer you're around me it should lessen. my aura is different than my form itself." Shattered replied.

"and it won't... drive me insane or anything?" Massacre asked.

As if he wasn't already...

"no. my aura effects you the same. your body is just going to get used to being around my magic itself instead of just my aura. i'll be keeping effects to a minimum, but if i ever need to pull you out of the way of any attack or teleport you, it shouldn't hurt as severely." Shattered answered, and Massacre accepted it.

"fine... who was that guy, anyways?" Massacre questioned after a moment.

Shattered sighed, "his name is bleach, he destroys aus as a passtime. we personally don't get along very well, considering he destroys some of the most negative aus occasionally, which leaves me lacking negativity."

"so you what? you're kept alive through negativity?" Massacre asked.

"yes. i don't exert energy into making others negative, otherwise it's not worth it. i funnel some power into certain aus to make them more dangerous, for the purpose of training the other skeleton i recruited, but a certain pest keeps killing them." Shattered sighed, dragging a hand down his face.

"bleach?" Massacre guessed.

"someone possibly worse; azrael. he specifically targets the aus that give me the most fuel, and out of sheer spite." Shattered clenched his fists, "i hate him."

"as much as he hates you?"

"possibly more. he's been a thorn in my side for years, and he's only one problem." Shattered huffed, glaring off to the side.

He still needed a way of dealing with Reality...

". . . and i guess my job is to what? deal with him?" Massacre assumed.

"one of your jobs, yes. your primary one is as i told you; to inflict as much pain and suffering as you please on the happier timelines; drag them down to a semblance of your level. your second job is do fight some enemies, should they show up." Shattered mentioned.

"you... didn't mention that before." Massacre pointed out.

"i didn't think i needed to. it's not as though it's an army, just a few sanses who poke their skulls into business that isn't there. you won't be alone, either. executer will be aiding you." Shattered informed.

"executer?" Massacre asked.

"he means me." Executer poked his skull around a corner, and Shattered sighed.

"are you incapable of minding your own business?" Shattered glared at the monochrome annoyance.

"maybe~" Executer smirked, "who's he?"

"his name is massacre- he'll be helping you." Shattered answered, and Executer hummed quietly.

"huh. never had help before." Executer mused to himself, looking Massacre over, "but at least i'm not the only one with a kill count."

"it's not as high as yours." Massacre responded, crossing his arms, "even they could kill that many souls."

"let's just say i have practice." Executer shrugged, and he smiled at Massacre, "and so do you."

Massacre was getting frustrated, and Shattered sighed, "i have things to attend to. executer, show him around and don't kill each other."

With that, he turned around and started walking, leaving the two of them in the hallway. He could hear them beginning to converse, but he didn't pay attention to what they were saying, instead making his way through his castle. In Nightmare's multiverse, he'd had a great big, grand deceased tree castle. One that was new, one that wasn't filled with old memories like this place was.

Shattered knew this castle inside and out, and while it wasn't a bad thing, he despised how many memories he had here. The fact that he kept remembering his first years, remembering how foolish he'd been... it drove him insane. He could remember finding this place, Reality's statue being pulled along with him. His form used to keep slipping and dissolving- Shattered used to try morphing and coloring into that pathetic child because he was so unused to his new form, scared of it.

The AU was desolate in those days, nothing left alive and what was was in hiding. It'd taken a week to find this place, but the first night he'd spent it in the lower chambers of the castle- down in the dungeon in the deepest part, where he'd put the encapsuled form of Reality and stayed watch to keep him safe. He'd even kept that stupid pot his host and his brother used to fill with flowers! Flowers no longer existed in the AU after his creation, he couldn't figure out why he'd latched onto that stupid ideal so much. Shattered made it to his throne room, sitting down on it and holding his chin up with his hand, elbow on the armrest as he tried not to remember any more details about his past, his eye socket shutting. He needed to get out of this damned AU.

Executer watched Shattered walk away for a few moments, Massacre doing the same before looking back at him as he began to speak, "so, massacre, huh?"

"yeah... so you're the one shattered mentioned would make me wanna kill out of sheer annoyance?" Massacre responded, and Executer laughed.

"maybe~" Executer smiled, "who knew i could be so annoying..."

Massacre sighed, pinching the bridge of his nasal cavity, "i'm gonna regret agreeing not to kill you, aren't i?"

Executer just responded with a laugh, "probably. c'mon, lemme show you something."

Executer turned around and started walking without waiting for a response, and after a few moments Massacre started following him. He led him through hallways and corridors, having memorized the layout of this place by now, and the newbie followed behind him. It didn't take too long for them to get to Executer's room, Executer holding the door open with a smirk on his face.

"newbies first."

Massacre rolled his eyelights before walking in, Executer following and closing the door behind them. Executer had done some work to his room; Rei brought board games occasionally, and they watched a lot of musicals. Executer wasn't sure what their appeal was- he was aware it could've been something from Chara or Sans, but they kept him occupied and he wouldn't complain. Truth be told, Executer just liked having things that kept him occupied, and with how much him and Rei discussed and sang the musicals, it was safe to say that he was kept quite entertained.

He'd be lying if he said it wasn't somewhat fun, because it was, but it wasn't the same as irritating someone. Shattered was fun to bother- Executer barely even had to try, but he knew it wasn't the smartest thing in the world to antagonize someone who thought of himself as a god, and he actually just might be. If Executer knew one thing about Sans's royal guard training, it was that you shouldn't piss off your superiors, and that you should be prepared for anything. Of course, that didn’t stop Executer from annoying Shattered until he got so pissed off that he recruited someone else for him to keep himself entertained with, but Executer wasn't about to let that be known.

The second part of things he knew from Sans's royal guard training, though, was why he brought Massacre here. In his closet was a large whiteboard, and on it, along with doodles from Rei, was a large series of notes. He had notes on Azrael, Void, Reality, and Error, with plenty of space for more. See, when he wasn't pissing off Shattered or hanging out with Rei, he kept himself occupied with this: detailed lists of strengths and weaknesses of his enemies. Executer looked back at Massacre, smirking at how he looked over the board with interest.

"well?" Executer asked, the dark red eyelights- the only thing about Massacre with any color- snapping over to him.

"this is... actually really useful." Massacre admitted.

Executer smirked with a self satisfied hum, flopping down on the fluffy blankets of his bed, "of course it is, that's why i'm showing it to you."

"royal guard?" Massacre asked, and Executer tilted his skull at him a bit.

"uh?"

"this is just... i dunno, reminds me of something my brother would make." Massacre shrugged, giving it another glance over, "it's not bad."

"yeah well memorize it, add to it, i don't care. if you find something useful, just add it." Executer instructed, and Massacre gave him an odd look, "what? i'm not good at figuring out emotional crap so you need more than a look."

"why show me this?" Massacre questioned, "and give me permission to alter it?"

Oh right, Royal Guards are particular about this stuff.

Executer just shrugged, "because i don't care. it's just information and i can just make another. i don't care about anything, and if this keeps you alive so i have someone i can mess with besides shattered, oh well. even if it doesn't i don't give a damn anyways."

Massacre stayed quiet, looking over the information for a few more minutes before asking, "why'd you agree to work for him?"

"because i was bored?" Executer shrugged.

"seriously." Massacre glared.

"that's my serious answer." Executer glared back, but his wasn't genuine, "i was on lock down in my au, shattered showed up, offered me a way out, and i took it. plain and simple."

"alone?" Massacre asked, and sheesh, this guy asked a lot of questions.

"most of the time. i mean i could create whatever i wanted, but that got boring, and the guy that usually showed up to hang out was gone for a long while. when shattered showed up, i was just bored and he offered me something to do and a way out." Executer explained, and Massacre nodded a bit, "why?"

"no reason, i just..." He trailed off.

"rethinking your life choices?" Executer guessed, and Massacre nodded. 

Someone was impulsive, then...

"not everyone is apathetic to everything like you. i'm trying to figure out what i just got myself into." Massacre responded, and Executer nodded a bit.

"yeah, fair. and you wanna know what i've seen from my time here?" Executer guessed, receiving another nod, "well, i've got access to pretty much anything material- which i would anyways if this au had any code, but either way. he put an annoying amount of effort into keeping my body alive after he found me almost dead, but it's safe to say he won't hurt you too bad if he ever does."

"he did cover my mouth around that bleach guy..." Massacre muttered, and that got Executer's interest, causing him to sit up and lean forward.

"wait, you met bleach?" Executer questioned, "damn, i wanted to meet him..."

"why?" Massacre asked.

"because i saw him destroy an au within moments. the second shattered saw a trace of him where we were he took off. best guess is, he's bad news and he saved your life." Executer explained, and Massacre seemed thoughtful.

"huh..." Massacre mumbled, "so he was telling the truth."

"from what i've seen, he hasn't lied so far. the only thing he's done to me is use sleeping magic when i didn't want to sleep, because i needed 'rest'." Executer sighed, rolling his nonexistent eyelights, "and i keep annoying him but he hasn't gotten violent yet, so i'm pretty sure you're safe here."

"i didn't care about that." Massacre said.

"part of you did." Executer smiled, "that determined part did. the part of you so hellbent on survival even when you don't have a reason to be."

". . . it came with the lv i think." Massacre muttered after a few moments, "you have it too?"

"me?" Executer asked, "nah. i know i'll always come back regardless."

"the reset button.." Massacre realized.

"you catch on quick." Executer smirked, "yeah, the reset button. you don't have that though, do you?"

"no, i don't." Massacre sighed, "but they did..."

"the human of your world?" Executer guessed, "yeah, i think mine had it for a while too, but the main one who used it was xxxxxxx."

His speech glitched at the end, and Massacre looked at him curiously, "who?"

". . . not important." Executer decided, "someone i killed first."

Massacre nodded a bit, and after a few moments, he changed the subject, "so, that azrael guy... you've fought him?"

"you've heard of him?" Executer responded with his own question, Massacre nodding, "yeah, i've fought him."

"how dangerous is he? just so i can know how to fight him." Massacre asked, and Executer tsked.

"nah, you aren't fighting him. that's my job." Executer told him, and Massacre bristled a bit.

And he had authority issues...

"why is it your job?" Massacre questioned.

"because he's fun." Executer replied, "he's one of the strongest opponents i've fought, it's like fighting another me. it's entertaining to see who's gonna come out on top. he keeps things interesting. i don't care about you or if you get hurt, i care about fighting someone who won't go down easily."

Massacre looked off to the side, fists clenching and unclenching a bit as he seemed to think about something. Executer looked away from him, flopping down on his bed again, staring up at the ceiling. Massacre was thinking about things, probably trying to be less impulsive, or maybe he was only impulsive in making decisions and less impulsive about analyzing others. If Massacre was going to pick him apart mentally, he might as well make sure he didn't get any wrong ideas about who he was.

"anyone else, then?" Massacre asked a few minutes later, and Executer lifted his skull a bit to look at him.

"hmm?"

"anyone else i should focus on?" Massacre clarified.

"eh, splattered probably wants to handle reality himself- that's his brother i think. you could fight void- he's probably more your speed." Executer answered, Massacre nodding.

"what about error?" Massacre questioned.

"eh, haven't fought him too much yet. stabbed him in the back- literally, a long while back, but haven't fought him since. he's pretty powerful, though. i wouldn't recommend taking him on, even if he won't hurt you too bad. leave him to me." Executer said.

"what about that azrael guy?" Massacre asked.

"he's not on their team. azrael operates on his own. error, reality, and void work together. i doubt shattered will send us after azrael during one of his au exterminations, but if he does, just stay back and watch for a few minutes- figure out his attack patterns, then jump in." Executer responded, and Massacre nodded a bit.

". . . thanks." Massacre thanked him after a moment.

"eh, don't mention it. . . . why'd you agree to work for shattered, anyways? i mean, you know why i did, but why did you?" Executer sat up again, watching him curiously.

Massacre sighed, "because he offered me a way to let all of the lucky bastards in this multiverse understand how lucky they have it. to give me a chance to inflict a fraction of the pain i went through. i went through hell while they sat back, peaceful in their worlds. why did they get to have it so good while people like me and you suffered, and even then, why do nothing to help others who were suffering?"

So he was spiteful, huh? Interesting... And he was probably using that to keep the blame off of himself after killing everyone he loved... He was so absorbed in the notion of deflecting his self blame that it turned into an obsession of causing others to suffer instead of being glad that they hadn't... Oh they'd get along just fine.

Executer kept his thoughts to himself, watching Massacre get worked up, left eyelight becoming red with the smallest ring of blue around it, purple crackles of energy coming from it. Executer kept comments to himself, or for later when he felt like picking a fight with him. He could already tell what made Massacre tick, it was just a matter of when to use it...

"yeah, i dunno why things happen the way they do. to be honest, i don't exactly care, but either way, i see your point." Executer shrugged.

". . . you really care about nothing, don't you?" Massacre asked, and Executer smirked.

"i care about nothing and feel nothing, if that's what you're asking." Executer replied, "got a problem with it?"

"not exactly." Massacre responded, "at least you aren't hiding that you don't give a damn."

"that's one way to look at it." Executer shrugged, and a thought hit him, "wait, you need a room don't you?"

Massacre nodded, "i don't exactly have much to bring, i mean bleach destroyed my world before i could think to grab anything."

"eh, i'll look into getting you stuff for your room tomorrow, just go to the room next to mine for now, or anywhere in the hallway, i'm pretty sure they're all bedrooms." Executer instructed.

"got it." Massacre nodded before exiting Executer's room.

. . . Which left Executer alone again. He sighed, flopping back on his bed and staring up at the ceiling, trying to figure out what to do now. Ah well, might as well go annoy Shattered again.

Chapter Text

Pixel was in the Multiversal Hub, pacing as he looked out over the swirling galaxy forms of the AUs. Bleach had started destroying more of them since Shattered came back, something that made Pixel's glitches worsen and eye sockets itch. He'd been having to clean up after Bleach for the last week now, consistently finding AUs eradicated of anything, left a stagnant, frozen white swirl in the Multiversal Hub. Pixel glanced over at an older AU- a Dusttale variant, watching it undergo the process, white spreading out from the middle like rot, slowly consuming the AU until it froze, stuttering to a stop.

He sighed, knowing what needed to be done now as he walked over to it, across the invisible floor. Pixel put his hand on it, feeling the burn of Bleach's power, and the itch in his eye sockets worsened, as did the glitches across his body. He walked through it, emerging in a barren wasteland with nothing and no one present, just... blank, empty white. Pixel sighed, running a hand down his face as he groaned.

"damnit, bleach. when will you knock it off?" Pixel muttered, eye sockets narrowing in irritation of both kinds as he pulled the rainbow strings out of his eye sockets.

The code was wiped clean, not even the code for a blade of grass remaining, and Pixel knew what he had to do. He hated doing it, but if he didn't, this dead AU would just take up space for new life. He needed to make room for the Creators, and as much as he didn't want to destroy this timeline, he knew that everything that had made it an AU had been deleted already. Pixel let the glitches of his body spread, shoulders slumping as the rainbow pixels spread rapidly through the AU, zipping across the ground and leaving a black void behind, and he extended his strings into the infinite sky, the strings fading from sight.

The ground vanished from under him, leaving him floating, watching what was left of the AU erode into nothing. The surrounding area, including the 'walls' became filled with multicolored pixels before they dissipated. Within minutes, all that was left was an empty, black void, and his strings glitched out of existence.

Pixel remained there for a few moments, looking down at his hands with narrowed eye sockets, watching his digits glitch and buzz with static. One of the reasons he'd hated the fact that that other version of him destroyed everything willingly like Bleach did, was because it reminded him of exactly what kind of destructive potential he had. He could destroy AUs at will- at times he had on accident, and he always felt awful about it. The fact that there was a version of him that did it willingly... it made him feel sick- actually it was.

He doubled over, a rainbow of pixels spilling from his mouth, down into the infinite void below, glitching out of existence. Pixel groaned, wiping his mouth with his sleeve as he leaned back to lay down, looking up at the blank, black void above him. The void that he had made by destroying what was left of this AU. He could hardly stand the fact that he could do this- the fact that Bleach knew because he'd seen him do it accidentally in the middle of a panic attack, and the fact that Shattered possibly also knew.

Pixel would be damned if he let them take advantage of it, too. He absolutely would not let that happen. He reluctantly accepted the fact that his powers were necessary- that they were needed to make room for new AUs after Bleach destroyed an AU, but he refused to willingly use them for anything but that. If there wasn't enough space in the multiverse... bad things happened, and if Pixel needed to subject himself to doing something he hated in order to bring new life into the multiverse and ensure no living being suffered... then so be it. 

After a few more minutes, Pixel left, teleporting back to the hub, leaving the endless void. Once he got back, he slumped over onto one of the beanbags, resting his chin on the back of it with a groan, arms falling over the sides. He buried his face in the fabric, remaining there even as the Creators' voices filtered into his mind, and he cracked his eye sockets open a bit as he listened to them.

𝑰𝒕'𝒔 𝒐𝒌, 𝑷𝒊𝒙𝒆𝒍! 𝑫𝒐𝒏'𝒕 𝒇𝒆𝒆𝒍 𝒃𝒂𝒅 𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒊𝒕, 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒅𝒊𝒅 𝒘𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒉𝒂𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒅𝒐!

𝒀𝒆𝒂𝒉!

𝑩𝑼𝑹𝑵 𝑩𝑨𝑩𝒀 𝑩𝑼𝑹𝑵! 🔥🔥🔥

𝑺𝒉𝒖𝒕 𝒖𝒑! 𝒀𝒐𝒖 𝒄𝒂𝒏 𝒔𝒆𝒆 𝒉𝒐𝒘 𝒃𝒂𝒅 𝒉𝒆 𝒇𝒆𝒆𝒍𝒔, 𝒅𝒐𝒏'𝒕 𝒎𝒂𝒌𝒆 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒔𝒆!

😝

"guys, please..." Pixel mumbled, voice muffled by the beanbag chair.

𝑺𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒚...

𝑵𝒐𝒕 𝒔𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒚.

𝑭### 𝒐𝒇𝒇!

𝑳𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒖𝒂𝒈𝒆!

𝑬𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒊𝒔𝒉!

"GUYS!!" Pixel snapped, glitches worsening, and everything went quiet, "thank you..."

𝒀𝒐𝒖 𝒐𝒌?

"i'm fine, i just... i hate doing that..." Pixel sighed, lifting his skull a bit to look down at his hands.

Hands that had so much capacity for destruction... If he'd turned out any differently, he could be as bad as Bleach, if not worse. He always thought about what would happen if Bleach had decided to give others what he couldn't have like Pixel had, but Pixel had never considered what could've happened if he had decided to destroy everything. If he had done what that other version of him had done... if he still had that capability for evil within himself.

"creators... do you think... what do you think i would've been like? if i'd gone evil." Pixel asked after a few moments, looking up at the infinite 'sky' of the Multiversal Hub.

𝑾𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒅𝒐 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒎𝒆𝒂𝒏? 𝑳𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝒊𝒇 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒘𝒆𝒓𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝑩𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒄𝒉?

"yeah." Pixel nodded, "what... what would i have been like? i'm not soulless like him, but... what could i have been like?"

𝑰 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒌 𝒊𝒇 𝒂𝒏𝒚𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒔𝒘𝒆𝒓 𝒕𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕, 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒃𝒆 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒚. 𝑯𝒆 𝒎𝒆𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒊𝒐𝒏 𝒐𝒇 𝒚𝒐𝒖, 𝒅𝒊𝒅𝒏'𝒕 𝒉𝒆?

"yeah, he did, but i don't just wanna ask what he was like! i mean, i know he must've been awful, but that means that i was awful, and on top of that, what if me and that guy were more similar than i thought? or-!" Pixel was cut off by one of the Creators.

𝑷𝒊𝒙𝒆𝒍.

Pixel was quiet for a moment, looking down at his hands again before looking back up at the infinite expanse of galaxies and stars above him, before finally responding, "yeah?..."

𝑰𝒇 𝒚𝒐𝒖'𝒓𝒆 𝒔𝒐 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒅, 𝒂𝒔𝒌 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒚. 𝑰'𝒎 𝒔𝒖𝒓𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑬𝒓𝒓𝒐𝒓 𝒂𝒓𝒆𝒏'𝒕 𝒔𝒊𝒎𝒊𝒍𝒂𝒓, 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒊𝒇 𝒉𝒆 𝒉𝒆𝒍𝒑𝒔 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒈𝒆𝒕 𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒇𝒊𝒓𝒎𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏, 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒍𝒑, 𝒓𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕?

Pixel sighed, "yeah, but if i asked him, i would need to tell him about how i can destroy aus. otherwise he won't understand why i'm so worried, and i don't want to lie to him; hiding this is bad enough."

But he hides it from pretty much everyone, doesn't he?

𝑨𝒈𝒂𝒊𝒏, 𝒂𝒔𝒌 𝒉𝒊𝒎. 𝑷𝒊𝒙𝒆𝒍, 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒄𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒖𝒍𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒆- 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒄𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒑𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝒖𝒔, 𝒚𝒐𝒖'𝒗𝒆 𝒂𝒍𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔 𝒔𝒐𝒖𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒕𝒐 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒄𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒖𝒍𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒍𝒑 𝒖𝒔 𝒄𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒇𝒆. 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒘𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝒔𝒌𝒆𝒍𝒆𝒕𝒐𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒂𝒓𝒆, 𝒉𝒆 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒑𝒖𝒓𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒆𝒇𝒖𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒎 𝒂𝒏𝒚𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒑𝒐𝒘𝒆𝒓𝒔.

"but what if that other me was awful? so awful that reality doesn't want to be my friend anymore?" Pixel asked.

𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕'𝒔 𝒓𝒊𝒅𝒊𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒐𝒖𝒔! 𝑯𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒅𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕!

"and he probably never thought a multiverse like this was possible; an opposite version to the first one he encountered. i just... i don't know..." Pixel sighed, looking down again.

𝑷𝒊𝒙𝒆𝒍, 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒇𝒂𝒖𝒍𝒕𝒔, 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒔𝒐 𝒅𝒐𝒆𝒔 𝒉𝒆. 𝑯𝒆 𝒊𝒔 𝒂 𝑮𝒖𝒂𝒓𝒅𝒊𝒂𝒏 𝒐𝒇 𝑵𝒆𝒈𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒕𝒚, 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏 𝒊𝒇 𝒉𝒆'𝒔 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒑𝒐𝒔𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒕𝒚, 𝒉𝒆 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒉𝒂𝒔 𝒑𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒏𝒆𝒈𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏 𝒉𝒊𝒎. 𝑰𝒇 𝒂𝒏𝒚𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒖𝒏𝒘𝒊𝒍𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒚 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒔𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒘𝒇𝒖𝒍, 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒃𝒆 𝒉𝒊𝒎.

Pixel was silent, just glitching a bit occasionally as he thought those words over. 

"yeah, maybe..." Pixel mumbled, and he heard some movement, causing him to look around.

He didn't see anything at first, but then he looked down, seeing the source of the noise. A sentient piece of glass- around half of Pixel's height, was looking up at him with big blue eyes that looked like they'd been drawn on with a marker, and his edges were smooth and harmless. Some universes started out like this- a small, fragile thing that would eventually grow up into an entire AU. Pixel wasn't sure how it happened, he'd seen one or two come here, similar to this one before they shattered into dust and magic, sparking and swirling until they became another galaxy, forever immobilized. Sentient AUs were extraordinarily rare, but this one had been around for a bit and was thankfully mostly unharmed. 

"oh, hey clyde. how... how long have you been here?" Pixel asked, trying to hide most of his distress.

Clyde just chirped, adorably, and Pixel mentally kicked himself for the stupid question; Clyde couldn't speak. Clyde's form turned a bit blue, and he looked confused, rotating to the side a little. Oh, he was probably wondering if Pixel was ok...

"oh- umm- i'm ok!" Pixel reassured, "i've just been thinking about something, that's all!"

Clyde rotated a bit more, and Pixel continued, "it was really nothing, it's just about something that's... a bit complicated, but it's nothing serious."

𝑰 𝒄𝒂𝒏'𝒕 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒆𝒗𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖'𝒓𝒆 𝒍𝒚𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐 𝒂 𝒃𝒂𝒃𝒚.

𝑺𝒉𝒖𝒕 𝒊𝒕!

𝑵𝒐. 

Pixel sighed, pinching the bridge of his nasal cavity as the Creators started to talk over each other again, and he squeezed his eye sockets shut as the voices just wouldn't stop. Pixel's eye sockets opened as he felt something nudge his side, and his eyelights darted over to see Clyde next to him on the bean bag chair, his form light blue as he looked up at Pixel in concern. He could see the drawn on mouth move a bit, likely one of those babbles that Pixel found absolutely precious, but he couldn't hear him over the Creators.

It was just so loud... Pixel offered a reassuring smile to Clyde, glitches and error messages in his eye sockets that he tried to blink away. His eye sockets itched and burned, the magic that produced his strings becoming more active, but he just rubbed at his eye sockets.

"there's something i gotta take care of, but i'll be back in a bit, ok?" Pixel told Clyde, but he wasn't sure how loud he was talking, or if he was just mouthing words. 

Clyde chirped regardless, and Pixel gave him a reassuring pat before teleporting somewhere- anywhere but the Multiversal Hub. The next thing Pixel was aware of was the quiet. He couldn't hear the Creators anymore, just the glitching from his body, and he took a moment to try and compose himself, in the forest of a Snowdin of an AU. Looking around, he saw that he was likely in a timeline Azrael had killed, based on the lack of.. anything, not to mention the sheer amount of dust on the ground. He wasn't being attacked, and the AU had Azrael's MO all over it. At least it didn't seem like it was too recent, Pixel didn't really want to talk to anyo-

"pixel?"

Pixel yelped, jumping a few feet in the air before he whirled around, seeing Reality standing there. Pixel crashed briefly, error messages flashing across his vision before they dissipated, and he rubbed the back of his skull nervously.

"r-reality! hey, hi!" Pixel greeted, trying to seem calm, but he was well aware Reality could see through that.

"what's going on?" Reality asked, cutting straight to the point, and Pixel winced, looking off to the side, "i can sense something's wrong, and i can tell you aren't ok, so um... do you wanna talk about it or?..."

Pixel hesitated, looking down at his hands for a moment, watching them glitch, and he blinked as his eye sockets started itching again. He didn't realize he'd sat down cross-legged until Reality sat next to him, a hand on his shoulder. Pixel's eyelights flicked over to him, seeing a patient and concerned look on his face, and he sighed quietly, looking down at his lap.

"what... what was the other version of me like? not ink, but umm... the other one." Pixel asked after a moment.

"well... he was a bit of a jerk sometimes, honestly." Reality answered, "he had sides to him, sides few got to see. he was a narcissist either way, but... he was capable of caring about people. i'm not entirely sure on what he was like when he destroyed aus, but my brother in the other multiverse and him were close. error actually used to be close friends with an underswap sans dream was best friends and teammates with, and he even helped us out with nightmare after his friend died."

Pixel nodded a bit, and while the information was a bit helpful... it wasn't the response he was looking for. there was something else he wanted to know, too. He couldn't just ask outright, though.

"but... i can tell that wasn't what you meant, was it?" Reality questioned, and Pixel mentally kicked himself.

Reality had read him like a book!

"not really..." Pixel admitted, and he started fidgeting with his sleeves, "why... why did he destroy? was it fun for him? just something to do?..."

Reality was quiet for a few moments, probably thinking, but after a bit he responded, "from what i heard, he viewed aus as 'anomalies'- things that shouldn't exist. he thought the original timeline was the only one that should exist, that all of the others needed to be destroyed. he... definitely enjoyed what he did, though."

So he was like Bleach, then... in some ways. Bleach destroyed aus because, from what Pixel had managed to pry out of him, he didn't have an au. he was abandoned and deserted by the Creators, and he didn't think anyone deserved to have an AU if he couldn't. So he just started destroying. Granted there was probably more to it, but then again, Bleach was a soulless being, he probably didn't care about any other reasons, and he probably had fun destroying anyways...

"pixel..." Reality spoke up after a moment, regaining the glitch's attention, "why are you so upset about something involving this? you don't destroy aus- bleach does. did you run into him? did he say something?"

"no, no, it.. it wasn't that." Pixel responded, "bleach... when he destroys an au, he destroys everything inside of it. once he's done, the au is just... vacant. it's still taking up room in the multiverse, but nothing can exist within it anymore. it's just a corpse of an au..."

Reality seemed to catch on, eye sockets widening, "wait, so..."

"i get rid of what's left." Pixel nodded sadly, "i can destroy better than bleach can- i can destroy an au just as fast but without a trace of it ever being there, and i hate it. i have to, otherwise the multiverse would be a graveyard with no room for new life to replace the destroyed aus, but sometimes i lose my grip on those abilities... i just...." Pixel trailed off.

"you wanted to know if there were any similarities between you and error." Reality finished, and Pixel nodded.

"yes... i couldn't ever see myself willingly ending the lives of others, but i wasn't completely certain... i just wasn't sure if i could ever go off a deep end and-" Pixel was cut off by Reality, who grabbed his shoulders and turned him to face him.

"pixel, listen to me. there is no chance of that happening. unlike error, you can create things, not just destroy. you want to create, you want to help others. you're a good monster, pixel. so no, i don't think that could ever happen, least of all to you." Reality told him, looking into his eyelights, and Pixel looked away.

"i- i know that, i just... what if error was a good monster at one point too? sure, i might be different than him, and sure, i might be able to create when he can't, but what if he can too and he just chooses not to? it doesn't matter if i destroy for good reasons, i can still destroy. i never want to hurt anyone with those abilities, but i'm worried that i could... i dunno, if i went off the deep end somehow, maybe then i could!" Pixel exclaimed.

"i know, i can tell, but i can also tell just by sensing you that you are much different from error. you genuinely care about the multiverse. you want it to thrive and be safe and protected- you hate people who threaten those aus like shattered and bleach. that doesn't seem like someone who would start destroying, and i also don't see you 'going off the deep end'. pixel, you're immune to shattered's powers; he can't corrupt you into some evil destroyer. you have too much determination for that, and you're too much of a kind soul for that." Reality said.

"your brother dream was, too, from what you told me about him... i know shattered isn't him, but he in a way came from him..." Pixel mumbled.

"yeah, but again, shattered isn't him. my brother is dead, pixel, and unless you died and something possessed your corpse, that won't happen to you. you are strong, pixel. you fought bleach and shattered by yourself for years, and you're still going strong. you have nothing to worry about, ok?" Reality reassured, and Pixel glanced up at him before smiling a bit.

"thank you, reality..." Pixel thanked him, feeling a bit better.

"any time." Reality replied, patting his shoulders a bit before sitting up, "oh, and i have some good news."

"what is it?" Pixel asked, immediately focused on it.

"soot agreed to work with us." Reality smiled, and Pixel's face lit up.

"that's amazing!" Pixel grinned, "now we'll stand even more of a chance against shattered and executer!"

"someone else, too." Pixel's skull whipped around, and his eye sockets narrowed as he caught sight of Bleach leaning against a tree, watching them.

"bleach." Pixel glared, eye sockets burning as he got ready for a fight, body glitching a bit more frequently than before as he bolted up into a fighting stance, Reality soon to follow.

"relax, i'm not here to fight." Bleach rolled his eyelights, "where do you get the energy to be so ready to fight?"

"since you have the nerve to show up here after destroying an au! why are you here? is this one next on your list?" Pixel demanded, and Bleach scoffed.

"nice seeing you too, error, as always." Bleach responded indifferently, "not that i owe you an explanation."

"it's pixel, now." Pixel informed, crossing his arms.

Bleach wasn't hostile yet, but that could change in an instant. That was something Pixel knew very well. He was trying to keep Reality behind himself, but Bleach was looking past Pixel anyways, eyeing Reality in curiosity.

"huh, so the statue finally broke open after all. so you're the guardian of negativity." Bleach hummed, looking Reality up and down, "i don't see the resemblance."

"because shattered is not my brother." Reality responded, and Bleach cracked a smirk.

Reality, no. Don't give him something to use to piss you off... Pixel internally facepalmed.

"not a fan of him either, eh? pretty much no one is- except, of course, his new help." Bleach mentioned, looking at his fingertips in boredom, and that's when Pixel remembered what Bleach had said when he'd announced his presence. 

'Someone else, too.' Who?

"did you see something?" Pixel asked, knowing how Bleach had a tendency to spy on his enemies- Pixel had been spying on Bleach and saw him spying on Shattered.

"maybe i did, maybe i didn't." Bleach shrugged, not even glancing up at them, and Pixel felt himself growing a bit more frustrated.

"what do you want, bleach?" Pixel questioned, already knowing where this was going, and that got those white eyelights to look up at him as Bleach smiled.

"nothing much, just... you know how much i like black licorice, don't you?" Bleach mentioned, and Pixel grimaced.

"yeah, i know." Pixel replied, and he sighed, "if i give you some, will you tell us what you saw?"

"depending on how much you give me, yeah, i'll tell you." Bleach answered, and Pixel sighed again, snapping his fingers and opening a glitching portal next to Bleach, a large crate of black licorice dropping down from it onto the snow. After a moment of inspecting it, Bleach leaned against the tree again, "i saw shattered in that old dusttale au- y'know, the one you just destroyed. he recruited the sans there."

Pixel's eye sockets widened in realization, "wait, when you say recruited..."

"i mean recruited. i was there about to put the misprint out of his spiteful misery after entertaining myself with a little fight before i overheard those two talking- he's going by massacre now; what a dork. anyways, shattered left with the typo and i wiped the au out. i figured i should do one productive thing there." Bleach finished, and Reality and Pixel exchanged glances.

"why are you telling us this?" Reality asked, and Bleach looked over at him before a smile formed on his face.

"because i know how much shattered's gonna hate you knowing about something he probably wanted to be a surprise, and i get to watch him have a meltdown because nothing's going his way." Bleach answered, and Pixel sighed with a small laugh, "besides, licorice."

"well, thank you, bleach... for once." Pixel thanked him, albeit a bit reluctantly.

"eh, whatever. you won't be thanking me in a minute." Bleach replied, the crate vanishing through a white portal.

"why-?" Pixel started to question before his eye sockets widened, seeing the white liquid spread out from under Bleach's feet, rapidly consuming the surrounding area, "damnit, bleach!"

Without wasting another moment, Pixel grabbed Reality's arm and teleported them out of the AU, muttering curses under his breath as they both reappeared in the Beta Timeline. Bleach was such a damn brat, though that information was useful...

Azrael landed on his feet, looking up at the tree he'd previously been perched on, watching it fall over due to a creature cutting it down, and he muttered, "timber."

The tree his the ground with a loud SLAM, snow spraying up and away from the massive plant like a cloud, and Azrael brought a wing up in front of himself to block the dust. His gaze flicked past his wing to the creature that had cut the tree down trying to get to him, glaring at those dark amber eyes. It screeched, black tar taking the place of its saliva, leaking out of its mouth and strung between its teeth. Azrael rolled his nonexistent eyelights, annoyed, and he grabbed his knife from his pocket. The creature was what was once a Greater Dog, its large size and strength enhanced by Shattered's magic, and it was fast.

It was putting up more of a fight than most. Azrael held his ground, not budging an inch as it barreled towards him, waiting until the last second to sidestep and stab the blade deep into its neck before withdrawing it, taking a few steps back. It let out a pained roar, its HP deleted from the critical hit, and it turned around to snarl at him, black drool pouring from its mouth. The creature stumbled a bit as it ran towards him again, and as he was bringing up sharp bones to impale it, his skull tilted up slightly as he sensed something approaching him. He teleported out of the way as another creature pounced at where he previously was- formerly one of the Dogi it seemed, and it snarled at him.

The first creature turned to dust from being impaled, and Azrael heard a bit more noise in the woods around him. He looked around, seeing flashes of matted white tails, and it didn't take him long to see that he was being surrounded. Azrael spread his wings, letting red magic cover them, each feather at the end gaining a transparent red knife over it, and he waited for the right time. The creatures converged at him all at once, and he shot up into the sky, spinning rapidly and letting the slash attacks form from his wings.

The attacks exploded as they hit the creatures below, the magic slicing clean through creatures and trees alike, leaving nothing but a large expanse of dust below. He landed on the ground, dust wafting up onto his shoes, but it seemed like he'd missed one. Something slammed into his chest, sending him rapidly tumbling back through several trees, only to stop after he slammed into a more sturdy one, pain shooting up his spine and wing sockets from the impact, wings pressed uncomfortably between his back and the tree. Azrael wiped some black blood as it dripped down from his nasal cavity, seeing his knife on the ground a bit away from him, and he looked up to see what hit him.

Damn, he couldn't believe he'd gotten sloppy...

The creature looked like what used to be a Papyrus, eye sockets amber and body sharpened and disfigured but still disturbingly distinguishable, and despite feeling his soul twist painfully, he couldn't afford to hesitate right now. If the Papyrus was in there at all, he was suffering- Azrael needed to do this. He lunged at his brother- the creature, wings spread as he picked up his knife from where he'd dropped it, and he let a red glow form on its edge before he slashed it. The red slash attack shot out from the blade, slicing through the creature and exploding it into dust and an agonized shriek.

His vision flashed, remembering all of the times he'd been forced to watch that code kill his brother under their orders, memories flashing before his vision, and he raised his hands to grip at his skull, then at the hood to block out the sounds of his brother's screams that had started to grow louder and louder and louder. He doubled over, moving to crouch down on the ground as he tried to make it stop, teeth gritted and eye sockets squeezed shut. Then, it went quiet. The screaming stopped, the attack of memories stopped, and he slowly opened his eye sockets.

Azrael looked around, slowly pushing himself up before he stretched a bit, pressing his hands against his lower back as he arched his shoulders back, feeling his joints pop and the pain from his tension and the impact from the tree lessen. He slipped his knife back into his pocket, looking around again to see if there was any more of those things that had been watching and waiting to strike, only to see none. Azrael sighed, stretching his wings a bit as he started walking towards Waterfall, taking his time to try and clear his head.

Azrael's soul was the main source of his current pain, not his back, and a sudden jolt of it knocked the breath out of him. He leaned against a nearby tree, fingers gripping the back as he let out short, quick breaths, blinking back the liquid trying to seep out of his eye sockets.

No, damnit, not now...!

Azrael coughed, hacking up some of his black blood into his fist, wings fluffed up and flared behind him, twitching from his discomfort. He felt the black liquid spill over the rim of his eye sockets next, trickling down his face and onto the mixture of dust and snow on the ground. Azrael hated killing Papyruses- it never got easier, but the remnants of them were also the only things that made this happen. His breathing hitched in his throat from another flare of pain in his soul, and he summoned it to float in his hand, looking at it with squinted eye sockets.

The disfigured thing was unstable again, the warbly upside-down heart, swirling with red and white- the edges were becoming unstable again, and it hurt. Azrael knew what happened to those who couldn't break free from the hacked code like he had- he'd seen it happen to monsters, but it hadn't happened to him. His soul didn't have stages, at least he'd prevented it from happening. His soul had one state- this, but every time something like this happened, it started trying to twist itself further- to attempt to malform even further and end up like theirs.

Azrael refused to allow that to happen; refused to allow himself to fall further than he already had, so he took a moment to calm himself again. He focused on his breathing, on his surroundings, trying to get his soul to stop being so damn stupid. He watched it wobble and shift, alternating between being more or less erratic, and he shuddered, feeling each and every change.

In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out. ​​​​​​​In, and-

"i didn't expect to see you here." Azrael froze as he heard someone next to him, his gaze shooting up to see Bleach standing next to him, and his eye sockets narrowed.

"what- what are you doing here?" Azrael demanded, hiding his soul from view, even though it was likely pointless.

"you know what i was doing here." Bleach said, and he looked around, "and i know what you were doing here, too. killing again?"

"it's none of your business." Azrael responded, and Bleach rolled his eyelights.

"you're right, it's not. oh well, looks like i get to finish your job for you." Bleach shrugged, and Azrael rolled his nonexistent eyelights.

"guess so." Azrael replied, and he tried pulling himself up, but the pain in his soul was sucking the strength out of him.

"heh, for a soartale sans, you've fallen pretty low." Bleach remarked, and Azrael froze.

Soartale?... was that?...

"what... what did you just say?" Azrael questioned.

"nothing. now, as a courtesy for your ability to piss off shattered, i'll start destroying the timeline at the opposite end. try and teleport out of here in time, misprint." Bleach brushed him off, and he vanished into a white puddle. 

Azrael cursed Bleach under his breath, and he tried pulling himself together as quickly as he could. He only had a few minutes to get out of here, otherwise he was dead. His soul twisted again, and he choked out more black liquid onto the ground, wings shuddering behind him, fluffed up and shaking. He tried pulling himself up by digging his fingers between the grooves in the bark, but his sharp fingertips only sliced through the bark, sending him back down. He grit his teeth in frustration and pain, clenching his jaw, and he tried again, but he couldn't focus enough to teleport more than a few feet.

"bleach, you damn brat..." Azrael spat under his breath, and he looked in the direction of Waterfall, seeing the mountain in the distance being melted down and swallowed by Bleach's magic.

Azrael swore again, jolts of pain racing through his body, and he took a few small, short, labored breaths again. He summoned his soul again, seeing how erratic it was, and the urgency of getting out of this damn AU was not helping. Usually these... episodes didn't last this long- killing a creature that still looked mostly like a Papyrus caused these occasionally, but it was worse when he got emotional. It was even worse this time because his soul's attempt to stop the pain was combined with the adrenaline he was feeling from the imminent threat from Bleach.

Azrael looked over to see the trees in the distance melting down, and he knew he had less than a minute left, but he couldn't teleport. He tried pushing himself to stand up, but his legs gave out, agony from his soul making them useless. He started trying to drag himself away from the destruction; attempting to buy himself time, especially because he refused to call for help. No one knew about this problem for a reason, and he wasn't about to tell them what he almost was.

Pain lit up in his eye sockets, vision blacking out for a moment, but he refused to let it stay out. The twisting agony got worse, the black liquid poured from his eye sockets and mouth freely, causing him to choke on it as he tried to either swallow it down or throw it up. He didn't think he could even reach for his phone right now-

"Need help, Birdy?" Azrael's gaze slowly flicked up, seeing Rei standing over him, able to distinguish them despite how blotted and dark his vision was right now.

"rei?..." Azrael asked, coughing up more of the liquid, and they took a step back as it almost splashed onto their shoes.

"Well you sound... great." They mentioned, and he held up a shaky middle finger.

"get out of here.." Azrael glared; he didn't want anyone from the Beta Timeline seeing him like this, much less Rei.

"Yeah, yeah sure." Rei shrugged, and they looked past him as his vision blacked out again, "But first!"

Azrael felt them grabbing his shoulder, and he felt the ground vanish from under him before it was replaced by a different one- this one feeling rocky instead of like snow. He blinked rapidly, black liquid sticking between the lids of his eye sockets as he tried looking around, but he could get glimpses of stars and galaxies- Of course Rei would take him to Outertale...

"You good?" Rei questioned, crouching down by him, sitting him up.

Azrael swallowed thickly and held up a thumbs up, and he managed, "y-yeah..."

"You're so full of it." Rei scoffed, sounding annoyed, "I just saved you, the least you could do it be honest."

So, Azrael just decided to be quiet, just trying to get his bearings and get his soul to stop trying to mutate. He tried focusing on his breathing, and now that he wasn't trying to force himself to teleport out of an AU when he couldn't even stand up, he could do so more successfully. Memories were flashing through his mind still, but the pain was slowly dying down to tolerable levels. After a few minutes, he was able to wipe away the last of the black liquid, spitting the remnants out of his mouth rubbing his eye sockets with his sleeve.

"i'm better now.." Azrael managed hoarsely, and Rei hummed a bit.

"Wanna tell me what that was?" They questioned, and he shook his skull no, "Of course not..."

Azrael started trying to get up, but his legs were still shaky, and he almost fell forward before Rei grabbed the back of his jacket, pulling him back down to sit on the ground. He went to say something, but they cut him off.

"Oh no no no no no. No. Nuh uh. Sit your butt down. You almost just died, Crow. You need more than a few minutes." Rei told him, and he glared at them.

"i don't need your damn help." Azrael hissed, a low growl sputtering out of his throat.

"Well you sure did a few minutes ago! You'd be dead if it weren't for me!" Rei pointed out, and Azrael glared off to the side.

". . . how'd you know i was there?" Azrael questioned as the thought occurred to him, but they waved him off.

"That doesn't matter. What does is the fact that whatever that was just almost got you killed. You! My favorite monster to antagonize! I just can't let that happen, now can I?" Rei asked, and Azrael sighed, mildly irritated.

"thanks, or whatever, but i don't need your help anymore." Azrael said, and they sighed.

"Azzy, Azzy, Azzy..." They tsked, "You don't get it, do you? You almost just died. You were moments away from getting killed by Bleach. Think about what could've happened if I wasn't there. You could've been dead. For good."

"what's your point?" Azrael narrowed his eye sockets at them.

"Work with me! Think of what a great team we could be! You and me, getting EXP and having a blast in the process!" They slung an arm around his shoulders, "We'd be unstoppable!"

"i don't work with anyone, least of all humans." Azrael spat the word like it was poison, "so give it up. i don't care if you want a murder buddy, but it won't be me."

Rei sighed, "Can't say I didn't offer..." They stood up, stretching before looking back down at him, "See you around, Chicken."

With that, they vanished, and Azrael sighed, enjoying the quiet. As insufferable as Rei was, they might have a point... he would've been dead if they hadn't teleported him out of the AU, and while he was suspicious about how they knew he was there, he'd figure that out later. He didn't think he needed a team, but he also never thought that he could almost die from an episode, either... . . . Damnit.

Chapter Text

Reality was in his treehouse, sorting through some notes him, Pixel, and Void had been making about the AUs, flipping through them and putting them in different folders. One room of his treehouse had an entire wall of bookshelves, made out of dark oak wood and decorated with small crystals coming out of it and vines coiling around the legs and going up the sides, a few purple flowers on them. The center of the room had a bright lantern that lit up the whole area, including the soft purple couch, the dark oak desk and chairs, and the dark oak cabinets with smooth amethyst handles, which is where these folders would be going.

As Reality was walking one of the now full folders over to the cabinets, he heard a knock at the trunk of the tree, and his skull lifted up. He put the folder into a drawer and headed towards the main entrance of the treehouse, the purple carpet soft under his bare feet as he reached the door, opening it and looking down below. His eye sockets widened and his eyelights shrunk as he saw Azrael leaning against the trunk, legs shaking, and he looked awful. Black liquid was stained all over his face, his jacket was covered in it, and Reality could sense how weakened he was.

"crap, azrael!" Reality exclaimed, teleporting down to the ground, trying to get a better look at what the hell could have happened to him.

"hey... uh... you good to talk?" Azrael asked, clearly trying to be casual, and Reality almost facepalmed.

"talk?! get inside!" Reality gently but firmly grabbed his wrist, feeling how slick it was from the black liquid which strangely burned a bit, and he started pulling him up the stairs.

Azrael didn't protest, which had Reality significantly more worried as he got him inside. The crystal stairs were cold under his feet, along with slippery, but he would not be falling while a hurt Azrael needed attention. He had no idea what the hell had happened to him, who did this- actually it was probably Shattered, so Reality made a mental note to kick his goopy coccyx later. After pulling Azrael up the stairs, he opened the door and got him inside, leading him over to the dark purple couch.

"i-" Azrael started, but Reality was already getting his magic ready to heal him, or at least to grab a first aid kit under the couch he'd led Azrael over to.

"where are you hurt?" Reality asked him, purple magic forming in his hands.

"i'm not hurt." Azrael said, and Reality crossed his arms, not believing him, "seriously!"

"azrael, i could sense how weakened you were- no offense. there's no way you aren't hurt, so just... please tell me?" Reality requested.

"it's not a physical hurt, ok?" Azrael sighed, flopping back on the couch, wincing a bit as his wings got squished, evident by how he splayed them out behind him.

"so then what...?" Reality started only to trail off, eye sockets widening.

Azrael was the reversed version of Killer- i.e his opposite. He had a similar backstory- well, almost. His soul didn't seem to have stages, he didn't have multiple personalities, he had a moral compass and wanted to do the right thing, meaning he hadn't gone through everything Killer and Knife had. His soul hadn't changed but... . . . but he did have Broken Determination. That was what was all over him, and Color mentioned that Knife expelled a lot of it when he was distressed. 

"oh..." Reality mumbled, the magic fading from his hands as he relaxed slightly, "are you ok?..."

"yeah, i just uh... it's nothing..." Azrael responded, looking off to the side, but Reality could tell he was lying.

"az... since i've met you you've been.... i dunno, untouchable. you killed an entire au of corrupted monsters without a scratch. you gotta understand that seeing you like this is kinda a shock..." Reality mentioned, and Azrael bristled.

"i know, i hate being weak, which is why i didn't wanna come here in the first place." Azrael said, voice tight with irritation, and Reality glanced off to the side.

"sorry." He apologized.

"it's not you, it just- damnit..." Azrael held his hands over his eye sockets, "it's just complicated, that's all. i have... moments. i'm trying to get rid of them."

"az, it's ok to have emotions, you know that, right?" Reality asked, and Azrael scoffed.

"of course i know that, i'm not an idiot."  Azrael responded, "i don't mind having emotions most of the time, the problem was that i almost got killed because of them."

"WHAT?!" Reality exclaimed, becoming much more worried again.

"not like that!" Azrael responded, "oh my god- how the hell are you more emotional than freakin' pixel?!"

"because you just said you almost died with no further context, and you look like you went to hell and back! you said you weren't hurt physically and yet you're covered in your own blood, which tells me this is a soul issue which is a million times worse because i can't heal that!" Reality ranted, "so just- please give me some context, ok? please."

Azrael sighed, flickers of irritation coming from him as his wings bristled, but at least he didn't look like he would leave. He either didn't want to or he just simply couldn't, and the possibility of that second one worried him. He sat down on the couch opposite of Azrael, giving him some space, just trying to be patient and figure out everything that happened.

"my soul..." Azrael started after a few moments, "it's... unstable. from what i've seen from others, my soul is one step away from becoming like theirs, and it's something i don't want to happen."

"like executer's?" Reality asked.

Azrael bristled for a moment again, irritated, before he nodded, "yeah, like his... when that happens, i.... i leak this stuff. it's basically my blood, but uh... i dunno what happened to it. it changed at some point while they were controlling my body."

"it umm... it's mainly called broken determination." Reality said, Azrael looking back at him, "it umm... it's not the best sign. it's stronger than determination but it also means the soul is more corrupted and that the one it's coming from is... not ok. it's permanent damage to one of the fundamental things about someone. in humans it's... it's not nearly as bad as what it does to monsters."

"i've noticed..." Azrael huffed, his skull flopping back onto the couch.

"it hurts too, doesn't it?" Reality asked, and Azrael nodded a bit.

"not sure if it's that or the feeling of my soul trying to mutate. it just... it's immobilizing. it zaps every single bit of strength i have out of me and then some." Azrael explained, displeased with the information, and Reality nodded.

"is that how you almost died? did it... did it almost kill you?" Reality questioned, and Azrael shook his skull no.

"nah, i wish. bleach showed up to destroy the au and i couldn't teleport out." Azrael informed, and Reality's eye sockets widened a bit.

Bleach had, from what Pixel had told him, gone on a major destruction spree, destroying AUs left and right with no signs of stopping, and Reality knew how fast an AU could be destroyed. The fact that Azrael had gotten out of there other times, much less while he was incapacitated... wait...

"wait, how'd you get out? if you couldn't teleport, how did you escape?" Reality asked, and Azrael sighed again.

"there's this human pest that keeps following me around; they want me to kill with them and i keep refusing. anyways, they showed up at the last second and teleported me out. saved my coccyx but they won't always be there." Azrael explained, and Reality caught on.

"so you're here because you wanna team up?" Reality guessed, and Azrael snorted.

"nah, i'm not that desperate." Azrael brushed him off, and Reality gave him a blank look, "i was gonna ask if you could see if dev had some... i dunno, emergency button? i usually can't use my phone when my soul decides to be stupid, so if i had a button to push to let you know where i was so you could show up and get me outta there, it might be a good precaution."

Reality nodded in understanding, "i agree. i'll ask them if they can make something like that and i'll give it to you. in the mean time, will you stay here?"

"i'm fi-" Azrael started, but Reality held up a hand.

"wait, hear me out. you're not doing the best, you just said your soul was trying to mutate, which is not good. if you want to stay out of sight of everyone else, this is one of the best places you could be. i have a guest bedroom up in the loft that you can use if you don't wanna stay on the couch, and there should be food here. just... make yourself at home, ok?" Reality offered, and Azrael lifted his skull up to look at him in confusion.

"why?" Azrael questioned.

"uhh... because i care about if you're alright or not?" Reality responded, assuming it had been obvious, "you're a good guy, azrael. you've been fighting shattered for years, it's not a bad thing for you to get some help sometimes. i know how it feels to believe everything is on you, but it's not. a lot of people appreciate what you're doing, myself included, and i want to show that."

". . . you're not a bad kid either, y'know that?" Azrael replied, and Reality smiled a bit.

"thanks. now uh... i don't have alcohol or anything here-" Reality started.

"and i wouldn't bring any here." Azrael cut him off, and Reality nodded a bit.

"thank you..." Reality thanked him, and he heard a knock at the door.

He could sense urgency from whoever was outside, the emotion drowning out the flickers he could sense from Azrael, and he was both curious and worried about what could be wrong. He could tell by the emotions that it was Pixel, which meant this probably had something to do with Bleach, which... really wasn't the best news.

"to the loft i go." Azrael said, pushing himself up from the couch, legs wobbling a bit as he got his balance. Reality got up to offer help or support, but Azrael held up a hand, "i'm fine."

Azrael walked out of the main room, hand on the wall to keep himself standing as he walked around a corner and went out of sight. There was another knock at the door, and Reality sighed, walking over to answer it while hoping someone else wouldn't drop something like that on him again. He opened the door to see Pixel there, hand raised to knock again, only to withdraw his hand when he saw Reality.

"reality, hey!" Pixel greeted, "i uh... i kinda need your help with something. bleach is at it again and i could use some help..."

"what do you need me to do?" Reality asked, grabbing his dark purple boots from next to the door.

"well, he's been going after some neutral or pacifist timelines, and i could use your help with evacuating who you can. there's not really much that can stop bleach, but if we can save at least a few souls, i'll count it as a win. i just can't fight bleach and evacuate." Pixel explained, rubbing the back of his neck.

"what if we both fought bleach?" Reality suggested, "i mean we might be able to save some people, but i still want to try stopping him."

"i still don't know what his powers could do to you, reality... i appreciate the offer, i do! i just..." Pixel trailed off, Reality catching on.

"i know you don't want me hurt, pixel, but i can and want to help fight him. i don't have a code to be erased, remember? unless... does it matter?" Reality asked, and Pixel shrugged.

"i don't really know, honestly. i mean, i know that shattered isn't really affected, but then again, most magic attacks don't really hurt him, either. i just... i don't want something to happen to you, but i need help with this.." Pixel fidgeted, and Reality could sense him having second thoughts about coming to him for help.

Reality could tell that Pixel had been fighting for a while, and he only came here because he was slowing down. He couldn't save people and fight Bleach, and Reality knew that. He wished that he'd come to him for help earlier on- they were a team, they were supposed to know they could go to each other for help, but in a way it was a good thing that he hadn't; otherwise he wouldn't have been able to help Azrael.

"pixel, relax, it's ok. i'll help evacuate if i can't help you fight him, ok?" Reality said, and Pixel nodded a bit.

"alright... thank you- drat!" Pixel cursed, holding up a hand, a hologram forming from his palm that showed one of the AUs in the Multiversal Hub, a red exclamation point over it, "he's at it again!"

"let's go, then!" Reality prompted, and Pixel grabbed his wrist before teleporting them both.

When their surroundings materialized, the first thing Reality heard was screaming, and the amount of negativity had him on edge. He could see the white liquid spreading across the ground of the Underfell AU, melting down everything it touched, including monsters. Reality winced as he saw a monster get caught in the liquid, and he was mildly horrified when he saw the monster start melting, the white liquid rapidly covering its body before it died. Pixel covered his eye sockets with his arm- or at least attempted to, but Reality pushed his arm away. He could see Bleach on a tall pedestal made from the white liquid a bit away, watching the destruction blankly.

"reality, you don't need to wat-" Pixel started.

"yes, i do.. i... i need to get a bunch of motivation to beat this guy up." Reality said, and Pixel sighed before nodding a bit.

"i've got plenty of that already. now open a portal and evacuate who you can, i'll fight bleach and see if i can chase him off!" Pixel said, Reality nodding, and the two of them split up. 

Reality teleported away, concentrating a bit before opening a portal to the Beta Timeline, purple smoke forming around a black void, and he shouted, "everyone, through here! this will take you somewhere safe! no pushing or shoving, just get through as quickly and calmly as you can!"

The monsters exchanged glances before running over to the portal, Reality keeping it open for them as they ran for safety. He watched Pixel and Bleach fight, and it was like Error's theme mixed with Ink's, but different. From what Reality had heard, Ink, while under Shattered's control, had had a pretty monotone theme, but this was more so, and while Error's had been erratic, Pixel's was too, but it was much more upbeat. The mixture was chaotic regardless, and between ensuring everyone was getting through the portal, he kept glancing at Bleach and Pixel, watching them fight.

White tendrils were coming up from the liquid dissolving the AU, Bleach raising his hand before aiming it at Pixel, the tendrils shooting down at him. Pixel dodged, the tendrils dissolving back into the liquid with a splash before a wave started heading for him, Pixel teleporting out of the way. Sharp spikes formed from the ground, Pixel teleporting out of the way just before he could step on them, glitching off to the side, and that was when Pixel started fighting like Error. So far, Reality had only seen Pixel briefly fight Shattered, but this?.... Wow.

Rainbow strings shot from his hands, wrapping around Bleach and yanking him off of the liquid, which fell upon his disappearance. Bleach was then slammed into several vacant buildings, yanked up into the air before being slammed full force down onto a large boulder, shattering it. Before Bleach could get up, several of Pixel's large Gaster Blasters formed above him, all firing rainbow beams down at him, causing a massive explosion.

Reality watched with wide eye sockets while he kept the portal open and glanced at the approaching white liquid, seeing Bleach free himself from the remainders of the strings before sending a large wave of the liquid at Pixel. The skeleton brought up a large bone wall to block it from hitting more of the AU while he teleported behind Bleach, grabbing him with his strings again before ripping him up high into the sky, slamming him into the roof of the Underground before yanking him back down and into an icy lake. Reality's jaw dropped slightly, and while he wanted to watch the fight a bit longer, they didn't have time.

"PIXEL!! WE NEED TO GO!!" Reality shouted as the last of the monsters got through, the white liquid close behind, and Pixel teleported over to him, tackling him through the portal as the liquid surged forward. They both landed with a grunt, the portal closing behind them. Pixel took a moment to catch his breath while Reality regained his strength from the portal, Pixel getting up and wiping his forehead with a hand.

"phew! that was close! everyone ok?!" Pixel looked out at the refugees, and they nodded, exchanging glances.

In all fairness, that was more than valid, considering the fact that Pixel had just beat the absolute hell out of Bleach right in front of them. It was the equivalent of Azrael slaughtering an AU of corrupted monsters without a scratch. Even then, Pixel was still a lot more intimidating than before, and he confided in Reality that he could destroy AUs!

"grea- oh come on!!" Pixel whined as he held up his hand, and Reality saw the same hologram as before, "he's at it again!"

"again?!" Reality exclaimed, "how?! you just kicked his coccyx!"

"not hard enough, come on!" Pixel grabbed his wrist, and the two of them were gone again.

Reality could tell why Pixel had needed help; this was exhausting. Even just keeping portals open was draining, and he wasn't even fighting Bleach! There wasn't much room to, with how they hyper fixated on each other, but at least the fighting slowed Bleach's magic down somewhat, which allowed them to evacuate the residents better. Some of them were filled with feral, corrupted monsters, in which case evacuating wasn't necessary, but Reality still needed to keep them away from Pixel while he was fighting.

AU after AU, fight after fight, Bleach would not stop. It was exhausting, Pixel was getting worn down, but thankfully it seemed so was Bleach. Hell, they even stopped him once in an Underfell AU since the monsters pitched in and started attacking Bleach while he was weakened, and he retreated. That allowed Pixel to repair the AU while Bleach recovered, and just in time because he was at it again!

If Ink and Dream had had to deal with Error like this, Reality truly had no idea how Dream forgave him. Because either Bleach was worse- which Reality doubted -or Dream was way too forgiving. This AU had one soul in it- well, two but it took up the space of one soul. It was something Reality hadn't sensed since Cross, actually. Even though Executer was two souls fused together, he was one monster and he was invisible to Reality's empathy regardless. Before Reality could try figuring out who this could be, he heard the sounds of Gather Blasters in the distance, him and Pixel both looking that direction.

"i think we found bleach..." Pixel mentioned, and Reality nodded, summoning the blades from between his fingers.

"i think so too. let's go!"

It didn't take long for the two of them to find Bleach, seeing him facing off against another Sans. This one was wearing a black sweater with a dark blue jacket tied tightly around his waist, the hood rimmed with light gray fur, and he also wore white cargo pants with a black stripe down either side and black pockets. He wore a black belt and black combat boots with white laces, and he looked... pretty similar to Killer, honestly. His eyelights were Cross's though, with a red right eyelight and a white left, and unlike Killer, he had emotions, and he was pissed. His Gaster Blasters were the same as regular ones, as were his bone attacks, but he was definitely stronger than a Classic Sans. Then again, his LV was 20, so that probably contributed to something. The Sans glanced over at them briefly, seeming surprised, only to get caught off guard, Pixel using blue magic on his soul to pull him out of the way of one of Bleach's attacks.

"reality, keep him safe!" Pixel called out, already heading towards Bleach to fight.

"got it!" Reality nodded, watching Pixel summon and fire several attacks at Bleach, their mix of themes starting up again. 

Reality glanced over at the Sans of this AU, getting rid of the blades of one hand to offer it to him, asking, "you alright?"

The Sans hesitated, eying his hand warily before accepting it, Reality pulling him up as he replied, "yeah, thanks... uh... who are you guys?"

"oh, i'm reality, the glitchy guy is pixel, and the one you were fighting is a brat i've been trying to deal with all day." Reality introduced, "but uh... yeah, his name's bleach."

"i agree with the brat part." The Sans mentioned with a small smirk, and Reality laughed a bit, nodding.

"yeah, him and pixel have been at it all day; we're thinking he's probably almost out of steam now, though." Reality sighed, "he's such a pest..."

"he... does this a lot?" The skeleton asked, and Reality nodded a bit.

"from what i've heard, he's been on a spree lately." Reality answered, and the Sans grimaced a bit.

"yikes..." He winced, and he glanced off to the side.

Reality couldn't see anything there, but that wasn't saying no one was there. His soul was two souls merged into one, and Reality could sense another presence coming from him, which meant he might be seeing the other half of his soul. It made sense, given what he'd heard about Cross, and it would make sense for this Sans to be similar. Executer was Cross and Knife swapped, while this Sans was likely the opposite. He didn't seem hostile, at least, so there was that... Reality winced as Pixel was flung through several trees, and he watched as Bleach twitched his foot, white liquid shooting out from it and starting to cover the ground. Reality cursed, watching it happen while Pixel and Bleach kept fighting. He wasn't sure if there was any methods or ways for him to stop Bleach's magic; everything he'd tried so far had been futile, with Pixel being the only one who could stop it.

"the hell is that?" The Sans questioned in mild panic, pointing at the white liquid rapidly expanding across the ground, melting everything it touched.

"trouble." Reality grimaced before yelling, "pixel! is this guy safe to bring with us?! we can't stay here!"

"wait- what do you mean bring with you? bring with you there?" He asked.

"i'll explain later." Reality answered, and Pixel responded.

"yeah, he's safe! just keep an eyelight on him to make sure chara doesn't take control!" 

"how the hell-?!" The Sans's eye sockets went wide, confused and alarmed.

"pixel knows pretty much everything about everyone, it's kinda his safe. long story short, the multiverse is real, we're from it and protect universes, or aus, and bleach here is a pest that keeps destroying them. we've been dealing with him all damn day." Reality explained, "when we can't save an au from bleach, we take the survivor or survivors to a sanctuary. in this case, that's where you're going."

"wait, no- i can't leave. you- you can't do anything to save it?" He asked, becoming more desperate, and Reality frowned upon sensing it.

"no, unfortunately..." Reality answered.

"i... i can't leave, i can... i can fix it, somehow- i have to fix it." The Sans tried, "i can't just-"

He cut himself off, glaring off to the side, probably where Chara was, and they were probably mentally arguing. While they were doing that, though, Bleach's magic was getting closer, and they were running out of time. Pixel was holding off Bleach, and while that was slowing down the process, it wasn't doing much. 

"sans, look, we don't have time. we need to get out of here, ok? we can't stop this, i wish we could, but we can't. what we can do is save you." Reality said, offering him his hand, "so will you come with us or not?"

He hesitated, glancing between the empty space, Reality, and the rapidly approaching magic, and he sighed, deflating. He accepted Reality's hand, and Reality didn't waste a moment, teleporting them both out of the AU, Pixel close behind them after throwing Bleach across the AU. This would probably be the end of Bleach's destroying spree, and if it wasn't, he was going to stab something. 

Core Chara teleported to Outertale, expecting to see Rei there with news on Azrael, but they were gone. No, in the place they were supposed to be, was a large puddle of black liquid. No Rei, no Azrael, which meant no update. They sighed, dragging a hand down their face as they started teleporting around the multiverse, looking for where they would be. Azrael was, as usual, impossible to find, but Rei was easier to track down. Core Chara found them after a few minutes, killing a monster in the Ruins of an AU, and they looked up upon noticing them.

"Hey, Closed Captions, what's up?" Rei asked, and Core Chara sighed.

"You know 'what's up'. What happened with Azrael?" Core Chara responded with their own question, and Rei sighed.

"Still didn't go for it." Rei answered, and Core Chara huffed, annoyed.

They'd gotten a visual on Azrael in an AU Shattered had been targeting, killing it, when they'd seen him have another episode. The only thing preventing Azrael from taking the deal with Rei was his stupid moral compass that wouldn't be a problem if he let his soul transform like others had in his situation. He would be much more malleable- much easier to control, but of course he wouldn't allow that to happen. No, he had to be a stubborn brat and resist the transformation every single time it tried to happen.

The flare ups could be brought on by insignificant little things, like when he killed a Papyrus that still vaguely resembled a Papyrus, and usually they weren't bad. This one could have been the one, with how Bleach was there, but Azrael just wouldn't give up, holding onto himself with everything he had. He was so incapacitated by resisting the transformation that Core Chara had had to send Rei in to save his sorry coccyx, and they wanted to try one more time to get him to accept their deal. Given Core Chara and Shattered's alliance, something Azrael would have no part in, he would need his soul broken into the transformed state Something News typically had, but of course, he would likely resist out of sheer Spite.

Core Chara hated how stubborn he had to be. They'd put in so much work and effort into making him their ultimate weapon, only for that to completely and utterly backfire in the worst ways possible. Azrael was so filled with Spite and Broken Determination that he was resistant to Core Chara's and Shattered's influences, and it was beyond infuriating.

They tried everything, be it attempting to manipulate him with their powers, then getting Shattered to try, only for him to fail and get his coccyx kicked because the damn Broken Determination burned him, and now Rei was their more recent attempt. Which was just as successful as the others, that being an absolute failure! It made Core Chara want to rip their hair out, and their hair wasn't even tangible! 

"Of course he didn't..." Core Chara sighed, annoyed. 

"Anything else I can try?" Rei questioned, and Core Chara sighed.

"I have no idea, I've tried everything at this point. You could try breaking him to the point his soul mutates, but that could result in him having an issue with you, something I don't want." Core Chara answered.

"Oh come on, have a little faith! I could take him!" Rei said, and Core Chara gave them a blank look.

"No, you can't. If you could, I would have done this already, but he won't break on his own." Core Chara sighed, "At least he's alone and has no one to rely on. He'll break eventually, and when he does, I will finally get what I want from him."

"Yeah, uh... about that..." Rei rubbed the back of their neck, and Core Chara paused.

What did they do?...

"What? What now?" Core Chara asked, crossing their arms.

"Welllllllll... I mentioned that he would be dead if I hadn't helped him, and while he did insist he didn't work with anyone, least of all me..." Rei trailed off, and Core Chara caught on.

"Do you believe he could be Spiteful enough to team up with them, or at least enlist their help?" Core Chara asked.

"I'm not saying he couldn't be. I mean it's the biggest middle finger to Shattered and you, and if he finds out that you're working together, or that me and you are friends, then that could be his motivation." Rei mentioned, and Core Chara sighed.

"Damnit..." They muttered with a groan, irritated, "And should he team up with them..."

"He'll make your lives hell, yup. It's actually something I like about him- the sheer level of petty he can be and the lengths he goes to to piss people off." Rei said.

"I don't care if you like it about him, I don't, and you shouldn't either. He's making your job much harder than it needs to be." Core Chara told them.

"Which is part of the fun! Me and Ex could definitely have some fun with him; I know Ex loves a good chance to piss someone off!" Rei replied, and Core Chara pinched the bridge of their nose.

At least they were getting along and Rei was going to be helping during their alliance...