entrancelogs | [Open] I suck at pertinent song lyrics, okay

"You're sure?" It sounds so ridiculous in that thin, wavering tone of theirs. What good is determination against a thick crowd of things that want nothing more than to eat them?

But the contact is reassuring, calming even, and Frisk's rapidly-thumping heart slows. A deep breath in. Another out. It'll be all right.

"Do you think maybe we should go out and...and help them?"

"Help them how, Frisk?" They try a smile, though they sort of think maybe it isn't going to help. "Gonna sic me on the zombies like an attack dog on a leash?"

...Yeah. Not helping. Definitely not helping.

"Focus on what you can do here. Going in and out more than is necessary will just increase the chances of the infection finding its way into here. This won't last forever, so it is far wiser to wait it out than to play the hero."

"...I know." They just feel useless like this, huddled away in a booth while their friends might be fighting for their lives. Undyne wouldn't be able to just sit here and wait while something like this happens. But they're not Undyne. They're not even close.

"I just don't know what to do with myself like this. Just...waiting." Usually they're patient, but with danger like this pressing the attack, they don't know how long they can just sit idly by.

"Try believing in your friends. That's the kind of thing you're good at, right? They'll find a way, even if you're not there paving a path for them."

They... understand impatience, though. Understand restlessness. For them determination is action. Making things happen, Seizing fate with both hands and bending with all your might until something happens. Waiting for someone else to make things happen, having nothing to do with the energy building up in your fingers... it's not great. Not ideal.

"...I packed a book," they blurt, try a smile again. Of course they brought their collection of personal treasures. It doesn't even need saying. "If you're bored, do you want to borrow it?"

Frisk sits up straight in their seat, looking at Chara curiously.

"What book?" Is it Kitchen? They've never read it, but they're not sure what kind of insight it might grant as to Chara's...character. Haha.

But seriously, if it's something dark and horrible, it's not going to distract them. It'll just make them more scared.

Of course it's Kitchen. The copy Flowey gave to them. Would it even be anything else?

They remember the stupid backpack they hastily crammed full of said treasures and whatever survival supplies they could scrounge up. Shrug it off, dig in it until they pull out a paperback, already starting to look dog-eared and bent, already full of underlined passages.

"I see two lovers looking over the edge of the cauldron of hell. Are they contemplating a double suicide? This means their love will end in hell."

Remember that?

They set the book on the table. Look at Frisk and smile. A pretty dark and horrible line, admittedly. "It's bittersweet, but it's not... you know. Not what you're probably expecting from me. It's... it's about loneliness. And... and people who grow apart and lose so much, but... they're drawn to each other again. The ending's kind of sudden, and it's not... happily ever after. It's... sort of. It feels real, you know? Not wrapped up all neatly, but hopeful."

They sort of trail off. It's... not a very coherent explanation, is it? They have so many quotes memorized, so many phrases that resonated. The moment of clarity where it felt like you weren't the only one in the world who felt that way, like it was something that could be understood and put into words. How do you describe a feeling like that?

The cupcake backpack, courtesy of Wonderland, is an utterly ridiculous prop in a thoroughly twisted circumstance, and Frisk does not appreciate their closet's sense of poorly-timed humor.

Chara really seems to like the book, though. Frisk isn't familiar with it very much at all, other than those fleeting passages quoted to them here and again, but they're surprised and a little bit touched at Chara's explanation. Despite the gravity of the situation, they smile faintly.

"You really like it, huh?" Something they love to read, well and truly. And this coming from the kid who says they don't enjoy anything.

As disjointed and fumbling as it is, talking seems to be doing some good. The topic's distracted Frisk enough to coax a bit of a smile out of them, at least.

"It... I don't know. It was the first time I read something where the hero was so... sad, I guess? And it's not just... love doesn't just fix it. But it's not tragic, either. She keeps going, even if it's melancholy." They gesture vaguely, feeling utterly and thoroughly like they aren't doing it justice. Not a book they loved so much they could quote parts of it word-for-word, years after they'd read it, years after they could hold that fraying binding and those worn pages in their own hands.

"...Do you even like reading?" They finally think to ask. "Aside from, you know, textbooks on quantum physics. I'd hate for it to bore you. You looked at just about every book you could in the Underground, though, so I guess... I assumed?"

"She's...determined." It's like their shared private joke. Hah. It's been a while since they've had the chance to really immerse themselves in a good book. And it can't be any worse than how reality is right now.

"I do! Even if they're just about, um, water sausages." Always looking at Toriel's books, even if they've read them all a dozen times. "I just - haven't really had the chance to do a lot of it." They did enjoy looking at Alphys's "human history" books too, didn't they?

Besides, if the book is that important to Chara, it's almost like they're holding a piece of them. Something that made them who they are. If they've given it to Frisk, that means...kind of a lot.

"Thank you."

...Determined. Chara sort of laughs, a barely-audible little exhalation, a faint rumble of noise. Not grating and lifeless, not high-pitched and hysterical. The sort of noise that actually does belong to a private joke, they think.

They put their hand on the cover again, pull one of those memorized passages out of their memory. "As I grow older, much older, I will experience many things, and I will hit rock bottom again and again. Again and again I will suffer; again and again I will get back on my feet. I will not be defeated. I won't let my spirit be destroyed."

Determination, right?

They slide the book over. Consider straightening up, in case their weight against Frisk's side is getting too warm or too heavy, but... they drag it out a little longer. Stay put. Maybe it'll resonate with Frisk like it resonated with Chara, give them a chance to feel comprehensible, understood, like they can relate with the world a little. Maybe it won't. Either way... as long as Frisk has something to do that isn't just worrying in circles, right?

"Someone's got to take care of you," Chara announces dismissively. "Next time there's an apocalypse, though, you'll have to pack your own entertainment."

That really does sound like determination. Frisk lets their fingertips slide over the cover, opens it with the quiet creak of a creasing spine. The fallen human never lets their spirit be destroyed. They never die. They persist, forever. For better or worse.

"I've stopped keeping things in my pockets," they admit, a little embarrassed. No slices of butterscotch-cinnamon pie, no packages of instant noodles, no torn notebooks or dusty ballet shoes. "I guess you're way better prepared."

And to think that anticipation had been in case Sans pranked them again. This...hadn't been the ending they visualized for their ongoing prank war. At all.

"You've got one thing, at least," Chara points out, only a subtle hint of warning in that.

* You promised.

"...It wouldn't hurt to carry a little more than that, though. If you let things out of your sight, you give people the chance to take them away. You don't keep food on you, and you're in trouble when you don't know where your next meal's coming from."

Not that a handful of chocolate makes a meal. Maybe... maybe they'd gotten a little less vigilant, too. What a way to end a strange, tenuous week of... harmlessness. Fun. Maybe actually coming close to relaxing.

...Right. They do have the Worn Dagger still hidden in their pockets, even if they don't use it. Frisk's hand drifts to their pocket, partially an unconscious reaction, and partially to assure Chara that they haven't forgotten. It's still there.

"I guess you're right, in a way," they say gloomily. "I didn't think Wonderland would be taking everything away so suddenly." They generally tend to think better of people than that, but in this case it isn't really a person who's the culprit. It's the fickle state of Wonderland and their closets, which have abruptly become a lot less generous.

Their eyes flick down, briefly. A quick and unspoken acknowledgement. Good, partner. You're doing good.

"It's a little foolish to think what you have won't be lost, don't you think?" Sharpness in that question. Boxes on the floor of a bedroom nobody will ever stay in again, items taken to progress onward, just like the items of six other dead children. A mother with a new child, a father with a new ambassador, a new future. A brother with the best friend he really wanted.

A child who surrenders the locket around their neck to their fiercer counterpart, no longer has that point of warmth snug against their chest to remind them of home. Who loses their name completely, who has their agency peeled away from them like a gooey bandage being ripped off. Survival is loss, constant loss, parts always being gnawed off or cut away.

"Not like we really need much, anyway. There's enough food and drink here to last us a few days, I'm sure, even if Wonderland isn't forthcoming."

If they can lose their own name, why would anything else be off-limits? It's a valid observation, and Frisk feels foolish for not considering it. You lose your SOUL, your name, the faces of all your friends. The Lost Souls stand before you. They don't recognize you. They attack you.

There's no easy way out of this one. No extending a gentle hand and a smile to a dead thing full of spores and a brain-hemorrhaging fungus. Unsurprisingly, Chara is absolutely right here. They hadn't been prepared for this at all.

"I'll keep some things in my pockets from now on," they vow quietly. "Just in case. That's a smart idea, and I shouldn't've fallen out of the habit."

They sort of know, on some level, that theoretically, they're not exactly imparting a good lesson. In stories, at least, children are supposed to be safe and carefree and able to trust that something can be secure.

But. Well. In practice, the world doesn't really work like that, does it? So they smile. Encourage vigilance and mistrust. They kept Chara safer than anything else, so surely they can do the same for Frisk.

"That's the spirit, partner! You wouldn't have to reuse those disgusting bandages in every timeline if you had only thought to climb the mountain with a whole box of band-aids." Is that too grim? I mean, Frisk probably didn't think they were going to need bandages for much longer.

...Wow, yeah, that's definitely too grim.

Chara discards the thought immediately. Returns to their backpack. The singular, unimpressive juice box the closet coughed up. A months-old chocolate bar, almost completely gone. Three squares left. One for Chara, one for the empty windowsill... they hesitate, snap one off. Set it and the juice box on the table.

"I know you don't especially like chocolate, but..." They glance away. "Your humble servant, as ever, is here to cover for your oversights."

Ha...yeah. Should've brought a whole box of band-aids. What had they been thinking. Frisk looks away at that joke, a little uncomfortably, but elects to say nothing. It's not a pleasant memory, and it's easy to slide past the mention at any rate when Chara does something abruptly and alarmingly selfless for their sake.

"I..." Frisk stares at the quasi-meal, struck by how much it unexpectedly touches them. It's not necessarily going to keep them going for the whole event, but that's not why it hits them the way it does. It's the symbolism of it, Chara willingly giving up a portion of something they love for Frisk's sake. "...thank you."

That brings the smile back, a faint little flicker of it.

"Y-you're really on top of everything today." Prepared for a crisis. They suppose they'd have to be, always on their toes.

A little hint of smile comes back, and Chara lets out a breath they didn't even know they'd been holding. It's funnier when the joke is about a kid who slept in the soil, not one who doesn't think they'll have to worry about scrapes healing anymore.

"Of course I am," they answer. Smiling, blasé, as casual as if the entire world crumbling around you is some effortless, everyday thing to get through. "I'm nothing at all but the will to survive. Is it at all surprising that I'm ready for hard times?"

And they... they don't talk about their own "before I fell." Ever. But they push themselves a little closer, drop their voice, fiddle with the backpack even if they don't need anything else from it. "I tried to run away from home, a couple times. I'd go to diners then, too. Coffee's cheap, refills are free, and they're open late, so you can... it's better than under a bridge, right? So I've had practice at this. I know what I'm doing."

It's surprising to hear it, there's no doubt about that, and Frisk can't wholly conceal their surprise that Chara mentions it at all. But...they don't need to press it, push them into offering any more than they have already.

"Oh," they say, a tiny little startled word. Paradoxical, that they should mention both their "before" and their "after" in nearly the same breath, but who are they to judge? They seldom touch on their "before" either, even when asked.

"This seems nicer," Frisk says cautiously, after a pause. "I mean, nicer than under a bridge, or any...anywhere else. I don't think they'll charge us here."

"I mean, if we tried sleeping under a bridge now, we'd probably just get devoured by undead abominations. ...I guess it's not a perfect comparison." And Chara laughs, drops the backpack to the side, sort of wonders why they even brought it up. What are they hoping to accomplish here?

A book they treasure, a stupid tiny childish snack, some tuned-out jerk leaning on them, a bunch of really feeble and really not-that-soothing words... yeah, Chara, okay. They had made up their mind to try, but... well. Frisk's not scared, right? They aren't thinking about where their friends are and what could maybe be going wrong right now, right? It's not a total letdown, right? They straighten up, pull their knees to their chest, keep smiling.

"...You know. Since there's no money. You could order all the pie you wanted. Or milkshakes. Or cheese fries. We don't know how long the food's gonna last, but nothing's stopping you from doing whatever you want here. It might even... be kind of fun, right?"

Yeah. Zombie apocalypses. A real barrel of monkeys, those.

Edited (chara's pronouns include they, the, and This Asshole) 2016-04-17 03:14 (UTC)

"If they've got any food here, you mean." Frisk picks up the proffered square of chocolate and nibbles at it, trying to make it last. They haven't eaten since yesterday, and now that the adrenaline has died down they're starting to realize they're actually quite hungry, if the growling in their stomach is any indication. It's not the healthiest meal, but it's something, and that's what matters.

"If this place is anything like ours, they might be having a shortage too." Which is kind of a downer, because pie really sounds good about now. The whiff of cinnamon, the warmth of butterscotch melting on their tongue - the kind of comfort of Home they miss so, so much.

They picture Toriel, hovering anxiously over them, her smile warm and relaxed despite everything. It's surprisingly calming.

"It's a diner, Frisk! Of course they have tons of inventory from before Wonderland decided to do take-backsies." If any place in Wonderland at all still has food, then the diner's the likeliest candidate, right? Maybe... maybe not enough to last however long this event's going to drag on. Maybe they'll be drawing straws by the end of it, but Chara's already bracing themself, already resolved, already determined. Worst case scenario, and there isn't enough... so what? They've had worse than a hunger pang or two!

It's really just... something they can't help, so something they can choose to set aside. There's enough to be worried about as it is.

"Just... ask Souji about it. It might not be ButtsPie, but every diner has pie. That's... a diner staple. Maybe he'll even make butterscotch-cinnamon from scratch, if he has the right ingredients." Not exactly the same as Home, not New Home, but... comforting thoughts. Fishing for things to look forward to, instead of letting the future loom like a bleak, grey expanse of nothing. ...Harder than you'd think, it turns out.

"Or maybe he has snail pie," Chara blurts. Smiles. "Bet you're disappointed you didn't get to try that."

They have to resist rolling their eyes at that one. ButtsPie, right, how could they forget? Only when they reached Asgore, or that grinning skeleton at the end of a dangerous and dusty path, it was simply Pie. Not sentimental. Not regret. Just a useful item that maxed out your HP. Something you direly, desperately needed.

Still, Chara makes a good point. They do have to make this food last a while, though, seeing how long Wonderland events usually last. They've got to make whatever they have here last a few days.

"Why, have you?" Frisk's nose wrinkles. They generally trust Toriel's cooking, but they've never liked the sound of escargot and don't intend to start chowing down on snails now. Besides, they met a few snails Underground, and they were rather nice. And animate. Isn't that kind of like cannibalism if they can talk? "It sounds like...an acquired taste."

"I was down there for a long time," they point out. "Of course I have." Can't have butterscotch for dinner every day. That's for special occasions.

"It... it grows on you," they offer, sort of... shrug. Eat it enough times, you stop having to suppress the urge to wrinkle your nose. You get used to it. You maybe... get a little fond of it, because it's one of those things that tastes like home, too. "It's kind of slimy, though. Everyone else seemed to like it, but... maybe that's just a boss monster thing?"

Certainly didn't seem to be a very common dish elsewhere. Blook's farm, after all, wasn't exactly overflowing with customers.

Frisk can't really hide their shudder. Slimy. Yeah, they'll leave snail pie to boss monsters and people who enjoy it.

"Whatever food's here is gonna have to last us for the whole event." They've finished their chocolate square. It didn't really fill them up, but it's shaved the edge off their hunger and for now, that'll be enough. "Maybe we should wait."

Wait for more people to come, so they can distribute rations evenly, maybe? They're still silently hoping, praying that Sans and Papyrus and Alphys and Undyne show up eventually.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject