Edited 2024-07-18, after much procrastination. Originally posted 2020-07-06... wow. holy heck. and this wasn't even the original chapter two, either.
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Alright, second chapter! Let's do this! It's a little late at night, but I'm rewriting this and nothing can stop me!
...Except sleep. I'll probably have to sleep pretty soon.
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The next week passed uneventfully. Error destroyed extra universes for six of the days, bringing his Balance close enough to-- well, balanced-- that even if he was incapacitated for a few months, the Multiverse wouldn't implode. On the last day before the trap would be set, he rested, doing his best to recharge his magic.
For that whole day, he stayed in the Anti-VOID, laying half-buried amongst a pile of puppets, reading a book Blue had brought over. It was nice to rest, for once. (Too bad he'd never rest again.)
And then the metaphorical sun set and rose again, and it was the day of the battle.
Error decided he should write a letter in case he died, telling the Dark Sanses what to do to maintain his Balance and... saying goodbye.
So he did.
If he was still there after the battle, he would destroy it.
Once the ink dried, he folded the parchment and slipped it into an envelope, sealing it shut with magic. In long, flourishing handwriting, he addressed it
To Fresh, Nightmare and his gang, or Blue, whoever finds this first
and tucked it halfway under a box of puppets.
Just as he was standing up, a sharp pain in his SOUL brought him back to his knees, bracing himself against the non-existent floor of the Anti-VOID.
It passed quickly, as it always did, and he summoned a portal to the false universe Inky had just created.
As he took one last look at his 'home', the Voices whispering anxiously, he was glad he had given Blue his present earlier that day, instead of waiting.
He touched his friendship bracelet lightly, then took it off, wrapping his most attack-resistant strings around it and tying them around his sternum, so the cocooned bracelet rested inside his ribcage. It had been a gift from Blue, back when Error had kidnapped him, and was made of two blue and three black threads, intricately braided to look like blue flowers on a black background. Blue wore an identical copy, but with opposite colours.
He smiled sadly, glad he had gotten real yarn for it, because his magic would dissipate if (when) he died.
As Error stepped through the portal and onto the rocky ground, corrupted Sans outfit carefully repaired to look his best for his final battle, he suddenly dropped low, rolling to his right. An attack pierced the ground where he had stood a moment before. He closed his portal and prepared for a fight.
"c4n'T g3t Me Th4t 3a$iLy, 1nKbLoT." He glanced around, noting that not only were the Star Sanses there, but nearly a thousand other Sanses-- all copies, luckily, according to the Voices-- surrounded him, glaring with killing intent. "4h, 1 sTaNd CoRr3cTeD. 1nKbLoT aNd Fr1eNd$. i Gu3s$ i Sh0uLdN't 'BrU$h' Th3m As1de, H3h."
Error was forced to dodge several Gaster Blasters, so he guessed they didn't really like his comment.
The battle went on. Error got hit with one of Dream's arrows as he ducked under a circle of bones, was unable to dodge a splatter of yellow paint while he surreptitiously destroyed a stray Blaster, and barely missed a large swath of red when he tried to string up a Sans. The large crowd of copies, while ineffective at actually hurting him, constantly barraged him with attacks.
Eventually, Error grew tired. His reaction time slowed-- not by a lot, but sometimes it only takes a moment.
And this was one of those times.
Ink finally managed to hit Error with burning red paint as his back was turned, throwing him off-balance. The subsequent three attacks hit the mark as well. Someone's blue magic pressed him to the floor, and before he could break through it, all the remaining Sanses were throwing whatever they had at him. Bones, arrows, Blasters, anything they could twist their magic into forming.
Finally, Error got his chance when a sharpened bone pierced through his left eyesocket, coming out the other side of his skull. The gruesome visuals of that made many Sanses gag, focusing on not being ill rather than their attacks.
Error stood up, graceful despite the dust flaking off his bones. Some Sanses were still attacking, but they were shaken and exhausted. It was time to do his SPECIAL ATTACK.
"YoU kNoW, 1nKy--" Error ducked to avoid Ink's paint, stringing up another Sans. "--1 k1nD oF w4nTeD--" He jumped over several sharpened bones. "--t0 b3 y0uR fRi3nD oNc3." This had the wonderful effect of stopping every monster in their tracks, allowing Error to catch his breath.
"I-" Ink clearly had no idea how to respond. "You... did?"
Error shrugged, using the lull in attacks to inch more strings towards them. "Ye4h. WhY w0uLdN't 1?"
"Because you're the destroyer?" one of the braver Sanses piped up. They winced immediately, expecting to get dusted. When Error merely chuckled, they hesitantly peered through their fingers to watch.
"Th4t'$ tRu3, SuGaRt4l3 $aNs CoPy 54. We FiGhT aLl Th3 t1m3." Error's strings had almost encircled all the remaining Sanses.
"You said 'once'," noticed Dream. "What changed?"
Error smiled sadly. "NoTh1nG d1d." His SPECIAL ATTACK was ready. "4nD tHaT's Th3 pRoBl3m."
With a twitch of his fingers, the thick strings surrounding them pulled everyone into the air by their SOULs except Ink.
Blue watched in terror, eyesockets widening. Had Error lost control? "E-Error! Please don't--" His cry for help was cut off as the strings tightened around him. The sound of a thousand SOULs shattering was deafening in the near-silent universe. The smell of dust filled the air.
Blue waited to feel himself dust, too.
A second passed.
Then another.
After yet another second, Blue opened his eyesockets-- when had he closed them?-- when the unforgettable feeling of dying still hadn't come. The strings were firm around his SOUL, but not painful. He looked around, trying to find another living monster through the clouds of dust.
Out of the nine-hundred-some Sanses, only three remained:
Dream, shaking with the terror that still echoed across the battlefield,
Ink, desperately trying not to wince at the nine hundred universes about to collapse,
and himself.
Error gently lowered them to the ground, but did not release the strings. As he turned to open a portal, Dream called, "Wait! You had us at your mercy, so why-- why SPARE us?"
The Destroyer looked back, surprised by the question. As their eyelights met, Dream regretted saying anything.
He was painfully aware of the attack still wrapped around his SOUL as Error tilted his skull, thinking. "HmM, h0w To PhRa$e Th1s. 1nKbLoT c4n'T d1e BeCaUs3 h3's S0ULLe$s 4nD y0u $h0uLdN't Di3 BeCaUs3 oF tHe BaLaNc3 y0u HeLp Ke3p."
Although this left Dream with more questions than it had answered, he could only ask one as the strings released them. "Wait, what about Blue?"
But the Destroyer had left.
Blue smiled sheepishly when Dream turned to him. "I'll, uh, explain later?"
Finally, the universes of the dead Sanses began to crumble, and Ink let out a small cry. The other two Star Sanses rushed to comfort him as he felt a pain where his SOUL would be, several magnitudes greater than anything he had felt while Error had been destroying a universe. That made sense, of course; Error destroyed one universe at a time, while this was nearly a thousand crumbling into the VOID at once.
As soon as he could push himself to his feet, Ink opened a portal with no further destination in mind than 'where Error is', which usually worked. "Come on! He's still healing from the battle!" the god of Creation convinced. "If we can't kill him, we'll wear him out so we can capture him!"
Blue, though reluctant, hesitantly agreed. Capturing was better than killing.
Dream, on the other hand, was still worried about Ink, and tried to convince him to rest a little longer before another battle.
Ink waved off his concerns. "I'm perfectly fine," he told his boyfriend. "It just hurts a bit when a universe collapses."
Dream raised a brow skeptically, knowing that was an understatement, but he, too, nodded his agreement. "As long as we retreat if you start feeling worse," he amended.
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As Error stepped through the glitching portal, he saw the familiar sights of the original Outertale. None of its copies ever had the same stars, and, for whatever reason, only the first Outertale had his favourite stargazing spot.
It was a small clearing in Snowdin forest that overlooked a cliff. It had the best view of the stars, but that came at a price: the cliff led directly to the VOID, due to a coding error he had never been able to fix. It made the universe rather unstable, which is why he had never destroyed any of its copies or variants. He didn't know whether the death of a copy affected the original, but this was not the way he wanted to find out.
As he wrapped his wounds in light blue string, Error mused on what Dream would make of his answer. It was almost funny how the only people who knew of the Balances-- besides the Life-Death Balance, which was common knowledge-- were on the Dark side, the 'bad guys', while their Light counterparts were completely oblivious.
Almost.
Soon, his newest injuries were naught but scars, though he had a particularly nasty-looking one where the bone had gone through his skull. He closed his left eyesocket experimentally. Things looked normal, so his eyelight hadn't been hit. That was good; he really didn't need to be half-blind.
He had just desummoned his strings when the empty feeling of Ink's magic filled the air, like the rainbowy outline of a bubble. Sighing, Error stood up, ready for a fight. He made sure he was well away from the cliff as the Star Sanses jumped through the portal, but almost immediately hopped a step closer to dodge some purple paint.
"Just give up and let us capture you!" shouted Blue. It wasn't a very subtle way of telling him their plan, but subtlety wasn't necessary right then.
Error shook his head lightly. "$oRrY, 1nKbLoT, w3 c4n'T h4v3 a Pl4yDaTe RiGhT n0w." He blasted several of Dream's arrows before speaking again. "1 sHoUlD r3aLlY g3t BaCk To Th3 4nTi-V01D."
Little by little, Error was forced to dodge closer to the cliff. None of them realized just how close he was until Ink threw another ball of purple paint at him, and Error took a step back, crouching low. He was teetering on the edge.
Blue lunged forwards, grabbing Error's sleeve, but it was too late. Off-balance from the momentum, the two tipped over the cliff. Ink, being the closest, was the first to reach Blue, though Dream was only a step behind. His phalanges caught Blue's bandanna, which had loosened during the fight, and as he tugged it came off in his hands.
Ink and Dream watched in horror as their best friend and their worst enemy
F
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So, how was that? I hope you like it!
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As I used to sign off, leave your questions, comments, and concerns in the comment section! This book is 5 years old now, I should really do something special for that...
1852 words