SoulFire ( sans x frisk AU)

Dirty Dishes

She didn't do it.

Frisk stood in front of the barrier, her fists clenched to the state of sturdy iron and her stance was that of confidence. She opened her eyes with determination pouring from her palms, her heart pumping it in, out, and through her veins at the pace of a smoldering wildfire. The flames burned and scolded her insides, raising the temperature a few notches with every step she took forward. One foot after the other, one spark growing into another. She stepped closer. Each shuffle of her shoes scuffing through the soundproofed area in attempts to echo and make her presence known to the entirety of monsters that was the Underground. No one could hear, see, or sense her proximity as her soul ascended from her chest cavity. It pulsed animatedly, expanding further out the more Frisk drew nearer to the edge. It was when she'd come close enough for her to press her lips against it. The exterior steps where just on the other side, so close she could see it and almost touch it. Spring flowers, fresh air, fertile dirt and newer sights for the monsters to see. All of it was just a fingertip away. She pounded her hand on the wall separating her two worlds, immediately retracting her outstretched arm back.

Elbow jabbing into her hip, Frisk fell back a few steps with a loud shriek, holding her hand to her chest and writhing under her burnt, bubbling skin that slowly began to peel off her palm. She let her tongue be pierced furiously with the ends of her teeth, blood now dotting up in two places rather than the only reasonable one. She sneered downward as her handprint vanished from the barrier like warm breathe on a glass. Skin pulled itself even further off her body, speckles of red beginning to leak ruthlessly from the new and raw flesh left unsheltered. The Delta Rune continued to glow brightly underneath her silhouetted veins that pulsed violently.

It was a test. A simple, absurd, and unneeded little experiment that completely fried the soft baby skin touch of her right hand. She shouldn't have been so stupid. Had she of listened to Sans she wouldn't be in such a position, forcing herself to lie to her big brother deliberately with absolutely no intent on telling the truth later.

His hands caressed her cheeks while hers clasped themselves together. His eyes burned into her being like a branding, twisting and turning in her to signify he wanted her attention- her attention was his to have right now. And that irked her.

Chara glared lightly at her, lips pursed and brows furrowed. He had been searching for his fellow human since she left early that morning. His voice was quiet and earnest while he rubbed his thumbs across her cheeks.

"Frisk-"

"I already told you, Chara. I burnt my hand while making myself breakfast this morning."

"I know that's what you told me, and I'm calling your bluff."

"What is it about that statement that causes you to believe It's a lie?"

"The stovetop isn't warm."

"I used it hours ago."

"The pots and pans are in the place I left them."

"Because I left them the way I found them."

"Did you now?"

"Yes."

"Alright, then why aren't there any dirty dishes?"

"I washed the plate I used."

For every question he threw at her, Frisk was able to retort with a reasonable answer. It wasn't like her to lie this way, and it frightened her deep down. But what was on the outside was a determination that radiated from her body like steam from a tea kettle.

The prince ground his teeth together, shaking his head irritably. Aside from her story not adding up, Frisk was far too neutral and mellow on the topic. Usually, she would become highly defensive when being accused of ill-doing, but now she seemed more passive on the subject. Now, her gaze was no longer on him, but instead behind him and distant, not focused on any particular item. Her lips remained unpursued, and her eyelids relaxed, and her shoulders were loose. Not an inch of her indicated she just tried stepping through the barrier without all seven souls. Just hers only. She couldn't ask Chara about his old soul personally since never told her about the events that previously transpired. The moment Frisk brought it up, Chara'd know where she had been.

Now she knows to believe in the books she'd read and to listen to Sans when he gives her information. But regardless, it would have been much easier to interrogate the cold prince for answers than run off and try it for herself. Then again, Frisk has always been a self-starter with a help complex. The thought of her having to ask for more assistance twice in one morning was enough to make her head hurt. Too many complications. Besides, she was able to get her work done much faster without needing to fret about others.

Seeing how she now knew what was in need of looking into, stealing the souls without any onlookers, the monster princess could now smile at her big brother kindly. She would think more on the matter later, now was time to put on a show the way she used to. Frisk bat her eyes at him, reaching up with her hand placed gently on his stubbled cheek. She swallowed slowly, standing on her toes to kiss his other cheek.

"I'm fine, you idiot. Stop being such a worry-wort."

Chara's face flushed when she pressed her lips against it, Chara caught off guard and flabberghasted. What screw in that pretty little head of hers had come loose enough for her to scavenge up that kind of nerve? He was too surprised to question her before she'd sauntered down the hallway.

Without missing a beat, Frisk stepped into Gerson's room with less patience than what she did when getting there. As soon as her dress was out of sight, she spun behind the door and pushed it closed with both arms and one hip. She let out a sigh, her heart pumping blood quickly to keep her from fainting at the sight of it blotting through her bandages. Chara could heal, sure. But she wouldn't let him do it all for her.

Rather than being environed by the soothing aura of a warm-hearted tortuous, Frisk was smothered by some raw redolence of spoiled milk and rotten things.

She pushed herself forward towards the elder's bed with disgust, nose scrunched up in wrinkles to the God-awful stench encompassing what looked to be a flaccid lump of bedsheets in the middle of the other bedding. The sheets were stained with piss and sweat, stinking up the small room more. Frisk prayed that the only reason Gerson was nowhere to be seen was that he was well enough to get up and take a soapy hot shower. If so, then good, it was about time.

But when Frisk lifted the blanket with the intent to wash them, she heard a low rumble and felt a hard object under the pads of her fingers. She gagged, the smell had grown worse now that she touched the covers and she had to practically throw them and whatever they had in them down.

The wretched odor stung like acid in her eyeballs, causing them to water the more the covers shifted and shuffled around.

"Please. . . Lauren, let me have five more minutes. . . The king can wait."

Gerson's fragile voice sounded shattered and still busting. Not a single word he muttered came out forgetting to wheeze or crack in half. Frisk shuttered.

"Gerson...?"

She shakily tugged at the cover and pulled it away from the old man, revealing a molded, half-rotted, and disintegrating turtle shell with a skin and bone nub of a tail poking its way out from the bottom. Scaley, wrinkling, crumbling, skinny fingers claw slowly at the bed from the top hole of the shell, an even worse lump of a head beginning to surface. In the claw-like hands was a ball of newspaper Gerson had been reading the other day, crumpled and covered in unimaginable filth. He held the ball out towards her with too much effort.

The expression on Frisk's face twisted from one of disgust to one of horror when those hollowing out grey eyes looked back at her. They sucked her in and swallowed her whole, leaving the only thing to escape being the words he murmurs when she doesn't take the newspaper.

"Do you not wish to feast with me? Oh well..."

Gerson pulled his hand back, proceeding to gnaw on the grotesque ball of paper and feces, leaving Frisk to vomit in her mouth and do nothing but watch as her grandfather gradually went crazy.