Broken Souls

Chapter 31 - Something's Wrong Again

After her best friend was killed, Casua didn't leave her bedroom for anything. She hardly ate, hardly slept, if at all. All of the life that had once been within her was drained, leaving nothing but an empty husk of a person. It was all Papyrus could do every day to bring her meals and hope that when he came to check on her in the next two hours that the food would have been eaten. More often than not, it had simply gone cold and Casua had just sat there the entire time, un-moving and despondent.

Papyrus tried at every chance he got to try and talk to Casua, but she ignored him, never responding with anything more coherent than a mumble. Sometimes, Sans would sit with her, waiting for her to say something, but she never did. For over a month, Casua didn't speak to anyone. She became thinner due to a lack of food, her face went gaunt and her eyes empty. And yet still there was nothing anyone could do.

The human school called Toriel multiple times about Casua's absence, before she redirected them to Gaster, who just told them to never ring again. After that, Toriel had brought Frisk over to see if they could do anything about Casua's current condition. They entered her room after Papyrus told them that knocking would be futile, quickly heading over to where Casua was sitting on the floor. She looked up at them blankly, not saying anything. They gave her a small, awkward smile and sat down next to her.

"Hey Casua." they said, "Mum told me what happened. Honestly, I didn't think anything bad would happen after monsters were freed. Everyone could just go and live their normal lives."

Casua looked away, her hands twitching slightly as if she were about to sign something. Whilst any form of communication from her was a welcome change, Frisk would have preferred if Casua actually spoke, as they had yet to master the signing language that the skeletons spoke to each other. But Casua didn't do anything else than flex her fingers a few times then sit still once more. Frisk took a few moments to think over what they wanted to say. They had a certain skill with their words, but humans were a lot more stubborn than monsters.

"I know you're probably not in the mood for it but... well a lot of people are very worried about you. I know Mum's teaching Papyrus to cook right about now, so we could go and eat what they make?" Frisk offered gently. Casua didn't respond, but kept glaring blankly down at the floor. Frisk sighed, perhaps there really was no way to get her to move... And then, Casua shifted, turning to face Frisk with a little light in her eyes.

"Yes... Let's go."

She stood up abruptly, swaying on her feet and threatening to fall over again before Frisk managed to catch her.

"Woah! Be careful, Papyrus' cooking isn't that important if it means you'll hurt yourself." Frisk joked. Casua fixed them with an off look that Frisk couldn't decipher as serious or sarcastic.

"My brother's cooking is always important." she deadpanned. Before Frisk could say anything, Casua was out of the room. Frisk hurried after her, finding her in the kitchen with an overly excited Papyrus.

"Oh I knew you'd be okay eventually!" the skeleton cried joyously, "We were so worried, but now you're okay!"

Casua chuckled dryly, stepping back to avoid a fierce hug from Papyrus..

"I'm sorry for scaring you Papyrus, now how about the food Frisk said you were making?"

===

Sans was happy that his sister had come out of her depressive state, of course he was. It was just that... well... She had snapped out of it so suddenly, from entirely despondent and unmoving to her normal self. There was no trace of her sadness, and if anyone asked about it, Casua would pretend it never even happened. She was more... empty than before, however, as if her emotions had been drained a little more from her mind. So out of curiosity, and with the knowledge of what Gaster had told him, Sans went to use his full abilities as the Judge and decided he would Check his sister's Soul.

It wasn't that hard to get Casua to sit with Sans for a few hours, as both of them regularly enjoyed doing nothing productive. Casua had fallen asleep after only a few minutes, but Sans warded off his tiredness to just run a quick scan of her Soul. He wasn't really interested in Casua's HP (he knew it was low, that was just that), or any of her fight stats. He wanted to dig deeper, and find out her Level of Violence. Something that he'd done when he'd first met her, but had never really continued to check.

So that's what Sans did. And he had to say, he was rather confused at the result.

Casua Gaster

HP 10, DEF 10, ATK 70

LOVE 1

*Nothing to see here

She had no LV, which was probably a good thing. Unfortunately, that meant that her apparent apathy, empty stares and forced laughs were caused by something else. Which would be harder to fix, especially as Casua never really talked about that.

Gaster had told Sans that when a Soul, whether it be human or monster, gains LV it becomes numb to emotions. Someone with high LV would be cold, uncaring of those around them and utterly empty. The scientist had also said that LV tended to affect the Soul physically, darkening the colour. A black Soul could mean that the being was entirely corrupted by violence. But if Casua had no LV then her Soul must truly be naturally black. Her apathy was caused by something else, and she was no more dangerous than any other human. Sure she could kill monsters, and with her weird Magic capacity, she might find it easier than anyone else. But she could also not kill monsters. There was simply no knowing.

Sans sighed, shifting into a more comfortable position and closing his sockets. That was that then, all his fears were for nothing. He could finally sleep knowing that his sister was perfectly safe. His family, for the first time in many years, were finally, truly, safe.

===

Later that night, as the monster city slept, Casua lay awake in her bed. She was thinking over the events of the past few months with a carefully maintained detached nature to avoid sinking back into her rut of grief and despair. Everything seemed to be going smoothly, save for those human murders. Yeah... they could have gone better.

Casua turned over, pulling the duvet over her head. She gently pulled her Soul out of her chest, letting it float just by her head. The black surface was darker than her surroundings and shone with an odd anti-light. Casua quickly took a look at her own stats, a smile slowly growing on her face as the number beside her LV glitched and changed.