Sans woke slowly, painfully.
His head hurt. And he felt nauseous.
He moaned, rolling onto his side, curling up and pressing his hands against his forehead.
"Sans?" He heard Papyrus ask softly. "Are you awake?" Papyrus's hand settled on his shoulder.
Sans mumbled a vaguely affirmative response.
"Well, here, can you sit up?"
"mmmnnnnnghhh..."
"... Grillby said you would have a headache."
With Papyrus's help, Sans managed to sit up. As Sans rubbed at his eyesockets, blinking against the pounding in his head and slight nausea, he saw Papyrus reaching for a glass of water on the endtable next to the couch.
He made a sort of questioning noise as Papyrus handed him the glass.
"Grillby told me to have some aspirin ready for when you woke up." Papyrus answered. "I already dissolved it into the water."
Sans accepted the glass and lifted it to his jaw, drinking it all. When he had finished it, Papyrus took the empty glass and set it back on the endtable. Then he looked back at Sans.
Sans had his brow furrowed against the pain in his skull, and looked overall just very miserable and tired.
Papyrus let out a small sigh. "Come here, Sans."
When Sans scooted closer on the couch, Papyrus gently grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to lie back down, head and shoulders in Papyrus's lap. Sans put up no resistance, just settling down in Papyrus's lap with a quiet grunt. Papyrus started to rub Sans' shoulders, soft flickers of green healing Magic jumping between his fingers. It wouldn't do a whole lot for Sans' headache, since he wasn't technically wounded or injured in any way, but Papyrus knew that Sans was, for whatever reason, especially susceptible to the calming effects of healing Magic.
As for the headache, well, that was what the aspirin was for.
As Sans started taking slightly deeper breaths, his shoulders relaxing a bit, Papyrus decided now would be a good time to talk to Sans.
"Hey, Sans? Can I ask you something... maybe a little... difficult to answer?"
Sans grunted, and Papyrus decided to take that as an affirmative answer.
"... Why did you drink so much?"
Papyrus felt Sans stiffen a little in his lap.
"It's-- it's okay if you don't want to answer..."
Sans sighed, shifting a little to look up at Papyrus. "n-no... 's alright..." He sighed. "i just... i got tired. and things weren't goin' too well, and i just... i just couldn't... but-... but i'm okay, now."
Papyrus fixed his brother with a stern look. "I'm not so sure about that."
Sans let out a small, pained chuckle. "well, yeah. i've got a pretty bad hangover, but that'll go away."
"And what about your problem?"
"... huh?"
"Something had to have upset you enough to do this, and--... and drinking isn't going to solve your problems."
Sans blew out a slow breath, rolling back over to snuggle against Papyrus again. "... yeah, i know... i'm okay, though..."
Papyrus grabbed Sans up in a tight hug. "But you're not! You said that last time, and then you went and got drunk! Sans, I'm really worried about you! And- and if something like this happened again, if you got drunk again, and I wasn't- able to... What would happen to you, then? I couldn't... I can't bear to see you like this, Sans. You might think you're okay, but you're not, and that makes me not okay, too."
After a few moments, Sans lifted his arms to hug Papyrus, skull falling on Papyrus's shoulder. "... annoying dog, pap, i'm sorry. i-- i wasn't-- wasn't thinking... and... i'm sorry. i'm so sorry. i... i--... i'll stick to ketchup from now on, 'kay?"
Slowly, Papyrus pulled Sans away, still holding his brother in front of him. There were tears in both their eyesockets. "But, Sans... even if you don't drink... that still won't... still won't solve your problems..."
Sans' grin turned upwards in a small, sad smile. "no, you're right. it won't. but i'll work through those, eventually. i promised i would."
"If-... if you're sure."
"i am." Sans settled down, leaning against Papyrus.
Papyrus let him lay back down. For as much as healing Magic and aspirin helped, Papyrus knew his brother must have still had a headache, and rest would be good for him. He set his hand on Sans' back.
"... Oh, and, Sans?"
"... mmnnh?"
"You know... I'm always here, right? And... you can talk to me about anything, okay? I'll listen. And, and I'll help you however you need it. You don't have to do anything alone. I'll always be there to help you. I promise, okay?"
Sans snuggled a little closer to Papyrus. "... yeah... thanks, bro."
Papyrus just held him tightly.
And the next morning, none of it had ever happened. Sans had never gotten drunk, never had a hangover. He had never woken up to have that conversation with Papyrus, never said any of that.
The world had been reset, and none of that had happened.
~o0o~
Things only got worse for Sans.
Materially, his situation stayed the same. Still a sentry, still having nightmares from other times, still trying to build the machine as the world kept resetting.
He found that, a lot of the time, he didn't actually remember the resets, not really. Just the important things, the big, emotional events. With everything else, the boring things like sitting at his sentry station, or working on a particular part of the machine, he would just be struck by an immense feeling of deja vu, and when he looked at the timeline monitor, he would see another twist, another loop, another start, another stop, another jump. He started keeping a notebook just to keep track of every reset, and even still, he would have a huge deja vu sense when writing in the notebook.
All of this, this repetitive deja vu, the nightmares, everything, it just weighed on him. He slipped deeper into his exhausted depression, despite his brother's efforts.
Really, time did continue on, even if it was in a start-stop-side-to-side way.
But, despite his exhaust, and despite the fact that, technically, it had never happened, Sans kept his promise. No more drinking, except for excess amounts of ketchup, and, even if he didn't actually tell Papyrus anything, he always went to His brother when it became too much.
As time staggered on, Papyrus became quite adept at telling when he needed to get Sans moving, and when it was far better to just take Sans home and sit quietly with him. Sans was all the more appreciative for this.
~o0o~
Sans was pretty sure this had happened before. He had felt this same familiarness time and time again, and he recognized it with the familiarity that came with the resets he couldn't remember.
So yes, he was quite positive he had done this before.
Not that it mattered much in the end, anyway. There were some things, he had found, that, while not big enough to remember, were timeline-constants. Things that always happened.
He figured he could just pull out now, do something else, but...
... Nah.
Thus, same thing happening. He was repeating himself. And unless something caused him to react differently, or things didn't reset, he would continue to act like this, he supposed.
The thing was, everyone else repeated themselves in the same way. So if something were to be different, the difference would have to be caused by something who knew what it was doing.
And because of the familiarity-but-not-really-remembering, Sans couldn't tell if what he was doing had been done before or not, and if he already was or wasn't doing what he was supposed to, and if he tried to do something else, then would he inadvertently repeat himself? Or, was he simply repeating himself in trying not to?
Eventually, he had just given up, thinking instead on his work on the machine.
Regardless.
He was in Waterfall, walking towards the house of the Captain of the Royal Guard. He intended to have a word with her.
Papyrus had come home from his first 'training' session, to tell Sans about how he was surprised to learn that cooking was in the repertoire of a Royal Guardsman, but happy to learn it anyway.
Sans knew for a fact that cooking wasn't in the repertoire of a Royal Guardsman. So he was on his way to Undyne's to ask what exactly she was doing.
When he got there, he paused in front of the door. The house was certainly an interesting one, built to look like a huge fish with sharp teeth as a door. Sans could hear dramatic piano music from inside.
He lifted his hand and knocked on the door.
The music stopped, and moments later, the door opened to reveal a tall, muscular fish-monster who looked strangely familiar to Sans. He wondered if he had met her in a previous timeline, or perhaps in a past with his creator that never happened. Or, maybe he had just seen her on tv or in a newspaper when she had become captain of the Royal Guard.
The captain looked a little perturbed. "Another skeleton?! Dude, seriously, don't tell me you wanna join the Royal Guard, too!"
"nah." Sans chuckled. "bein' a sentry is good enough for me. actually, i wanted to talk about the other skeleton, who wants to be in the royal guard. papyrus, my little brother."
She leaned against the doorframe. "Little brother? He's, like, an entire foot and a half taller."
Sans shrugged. "i got the short end of the stick when it comes to height, but i'm the older one. mind if i come in? thanks."
Without waiting for her to finish, Sans slipped by her, using his awareness of space to easily duck away from her protesting flailing arm. Inside he flopped down at the table, and started drumming his fingers against the table.
Undyne closed the door, grumbling a little, before turning to Sans. "Alright, fine. What do you want?"
Sans' grin stretched upwards a little. "my bro, papyrus, is my entire world. i'd do anything for him. now, his biggest dream is to join the royal guard. and maybe you can fool him, but you're not fooling me. i know cooking isn't even remotely part of the royal guard's skill set, otherwise there wouldn't be so many dogs at grillbz every day. so please do explain to me what you think you're doing."
Undyne frowned, taking a step forward. "Now, look here. You can't just barge into my home, demanding-"
Sans stood suddenly, knocking over the chair he had been sitting on, startling Undyne. For a moment, his eyesockets were totally dark, and he almost found himself shouting "I CAN DO WHATEVER I WANT, REGARDLESS OF YOUR UNINFORMED OPINION. I AM THE JUDGE." But he caught himself. Relaxing a little, he rocked back on his heels, giving the very startled fish monster a friendly smile. "i'm just worried about my bro. i don't want his hopes and dreams to be crushed."
Undyne was still giving him a "what-the-heck" look, but she relaxed a little, too. After taking a moment to regain her bearings, she explained. "Look, I get that. It's because of that I'm teaching him to cook instead of fight. Because-.. See, I can't let him into the Royal Guard. Don't get me wrong," she hastily added on seeing Sans frown, "he's definitely strong enough, physically. There's no doubt about it. But, when I was assessing his combat abilities... He's too... innocent. He can't hurt anyone, much less kill an enemy. But-... but you're right. I didn't want to crush his hopes and dreams. So I decided... I would try to teach him something else, and maybe... maybe get him to dream of something else? Like cooking. So that then, I can tell him the truth, and..." she trailed off.
Sans blinked a little. "... heh. wow. okay. that honestly was not what i was expecting. but, y'know, that's a pretty good answer. so, uh, i guess i approve. good luck with cooking, though. inherent family trait, i'm pretty sure we all suck." He started for the door. "... oh, just one thing, though. if you break my brother's soul..." he let the threat hang there. He didn't know quite what he'd do, but he'd seen enough things from the Bad Times and his nightmares to know a thing or two about making people suffer.
And then he slipped out the door, and took a shortcut home.
§
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