video/action (forward-dated to 4/20); while collecting the stars, i connected the dots

[skelebro]

[The video wobbles a minute before it steadies, locking onto a grinning skull. It's your friendly neighborhood skeleton, Sans, looking undeniably pleased with himself as he comments to someone just off screen:]

'S lookin' great so far.

[There's a fumbling tapping as the feed gets jostled, and Sans is forced to set the thing onto the ground, face-down. At least the audio filters through, unimpeded if a bit muffled.]

All right. We ready?

[There's a distant sound of affirmation - two, actually, though one sounds a mite more stammered than the first. Kate, it seems, hadn't much wanted to take part in the announcement itself. So when the feed swings up again, there's two distinctively non-human shapes in the periphery - a yellow, lizardlike creature and a small black hedgehog that sharp-eyed cave-dwellers might recognize as Alphys and Shadow, respectively. The video jerks again, blurring the twin blazes of color into smeared linear streaks, and the cave gets a lovely shot of Sans's pink fuzzy slippers in preparation for the finale.

There's a click of fleshless fingers snapping; hundreds of tiny, glowing objects being displaced and then replaced, buried into the rock of the ceiling. Takes a lot out of a skeleton and leaves him a bit stooped from the effort, but it's worth it.

The camera swings up again to pan across the ceiling, now lit with a vast array of blue sparkling stones.]

It ain't Tranquility's illusions, but... [One last whip-pan back to Sans's face, and he winks at the camera, lookin' just a tiny bit more on the edge of exhaustion than usual. Just a hair.] You can consider it a good constellation prize.

[Enjoy the night sky, Hadriel. It'll last for quite a while. Sans, for his part, plans to be stargazing all night. Feel free to find him at the lake, if you're real interested.]

Comments

[skelebro]

Well, I usually try not to. Make it kind of a policy, see.

[But that policy, like so many of his policies, had rapidly fallen apart upon contact with Hadriel for an extended period of time. Seems he really don't know what to do with himself when things go linear, huh?]

Not so easy these days, it turns out.

[journalname]

[Well, he doesn't...know how to feel about that....]

...Sans, it is my place to worry about you. Really, do not give it another thought.

[skelebro]

Just so long as you got someone to worry about you.

[If at all possible, he'd prefer for it not to be him, but if there's nothin' else for it - well. Then there's nothin' else for it.]

[journalname]

Leave it to Undyne, then.

[He smiles, as if it's a joke, but she would probably worry about him also. If she weren't apparently from some sunny future where everything went bizarrely perfectly?

Asgore puts quite a bit of effort into not letting Undyne worry about him anymore.]

[skelebro]

...heh. Yeah.

[A little hum of faint humor, and he lets the word settle there, lets it serve as the dismissal of the subject that Asgore plainly wants it to be. Hard to say if that'll be enough. Undyne, though, she's plenty capable of worrying for just about everyone without it bein' a strain on her.

So far, anyhow.]

Yeah. She's good at that kinda heavy-lifting.

[journalname]

She is, isn't she?

[well thank god we're off that other subject, damn. Asgore can talk about how great Undyne is for a while.]

I am happy for her and Alphys. She has been sweet on her for a long while. [And Alphys seemed flustered when she talked about Undyne too, but she seems flustered more often than not when Asgore speaks to her, so...?]

[skelebro]

[Don't read too deep into it. It's Alphys - she had kind of a mile-long crush on Ahsoka, back when she was around. Back before she...followed the footsteps of so many others, and disappeared into the ether.]

And here I was thinkin' Alphys wouldn't be able to spit it out anytime soon.

[journalname]

Was she the one who did?

[There certainly is a note of surprise in his voice.]

[skelebro]

Man, I got no clue.

[Just goes to show how truly outta the loop he is on any given day, even where Alph is concerned. You'd think he'd make more of an effort. You'd think.]

[journalname]

It seems as though it simply happened all at once.

[Or, perhaps, in that idyllic future world of Undyne's?]

[skelebro]

[His temporal duplicate mentioned that something of the best possible ending, the one where everyone sees the Surface - had somethin' to do with Alphys. Seems like Undyne came from one of the nicer ones, same as Papyrus. Back when he was here.]

Well, people were kissin' each other all over town not long after she showed.

[journalname]

[Asgore chuckles.]

That is true. The gods can have some interesting effects... [He sounds a bit less amused by this now than he might have before the city split.]

[skelebro]

That they do. 'Least we get a break this time around.

[Nothing about his tone implies he's opposed to this, though the observant might detect the trepidation there, that which suggests that he expects things to turn around real soon, and not necessarily for the better.]

[journalname]

Perhaps it will last a while.

[But yes, he knows it's going to end, and probably sooner rather than later.]

[skelebro]

Don't hold your breath.

[Sans the skeleton, always with the cryptic one-liners.]

[journalname]

Ha...no. I was not planning on it.

[He would still like to believe that the gods at least mean well, but one must be realistic.]

[skelebro]

My advice?

Keep your expectations low where the gods're concerned. That way, you're never disappointed.

[Sans that's the worst advice.]

[journalname]

I do not think they truly mean us ill. It seems they do not have as much control over the situation as many people think. And their understanding of us is...limited.

[skelebro]

Maybe not, no. But whatever their intent might be, they sure end up breakin' just as much stuff as they fix, if not more.

[Sounds like someone's bitter.]

[journalname]

That is an easy thing to sympathize with.

[And he bears more responsibility to the Underground than the gods do to them, probably.]

[skelebro]

Yeah.

[Bit too late, he realizes that...yeah. Kinda shone a big ol' spotlight on a wealth of kingly insecurities, didn't he? Great job with that, Sans. Nice work there.]

Literal cosmic power, though. That's the difference.

[journalname]

[Well. We can let that pass.]

And yet, their enemies have killed them all before. I...am not saying I believe we owe them anything. We have no part in this, save being brought through the Door. But I...suppose I have sympathy for their position. That is all.

[skelebro]

[Maybe. Maybe he just ain't the same position as Asgore, to view things with that same level of sympathy. They might be the last of their kind, for all he knows. It seems plenty of 'em might'a once existed, and now they're all that's left. Them, and their enemies.

And now their living emotional batteries.]

Can't blame you for that. Lots of people do.

[journalname]

Do they?

[He sounds a little surprised; it hasn't seemed that way, from what conversations he's had.]

[skelebro]

At least, some of 'em seem to wanna help.

[Not many, but they've seemed to realize that the gods're the best shot any of 'em have for gettin' through this. Don't mean people are gonna like it.]

After the city split, seems the gods kinda had to...contextualize for all of us.