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Stomping down the hallway. Haphazard, stumbling, as if the one they originated from was off-balance.
Intoxicated. Toriel Dreemurr. The only one known to fit the description and mannerisms at the time.
The soul continued to listen.
The footsteps continued. A muffled set of voices (plural, it distinguished,) faded in, faded out, and returned to silence as a door slammed shut.
Though not before opening and letting loose the door it was watching, the Soul noticed. Just barely ajar. Hardly enough to notice its glow, particularly in her state.
Silence fell.
The Soul waited.
Countless seconds passed by, before another stimulus upset the silence.
Something below that ruffled through the bushes adjacent of the house. Clammy hands marked in scrapes and wounds upon the windowsill. A single red eye behind greasy hair.
An abrupt end to the stimulus as an article of clothing was pulled from the floor and thrown overtop its cage.
Wordless grumbling. The creaking of wood and cloth.
Silence.
...That was a lie, the soul thought. The seconds were not countless. Forty four thousand, eight hundred and seventy five had passed from the time that Kris Dreemurr had left to the time they returned. It had kept count. There was little else to do.
It could not count the bars of its cell, nor count the amount of times it had counted, nor count the amount of bumps upon the textured ceiling of the room.
It had already done that. There was little else to understand from such information.
Left with little else, the Soul did something it rarely did, beneath the 76,133,476 bumps upon the ceiling.
It considered how it felt.
It didn't quite like its imprisonment. It was constricting. It limited the flow of information to steady variables, ones it already knew well after the first night within.
The silence would progress into sniffling. Then, into muffled crying. Then, back into silence, for anywhere between five hundred to twenty eight thousand, eight hundred and sixty five seconds. It thought the complete understanding of this cycle would have made it content, but...it made them something else. Something it struggled to describe. A tight sensation within its core that made it feel hollow, for lack of a better term.
It made it feel...bad. Not knowing how to describe it. Not knowing the reason. Not knowing.
Naturally, it had taken very many seconds for them to process this. It struggled to make those connections far more than the others.
It understood that Kris Dreemurr was in partnership with the Roaring Knight and Carol Holiday. It did not need to theorize about that. The information was already in place.
However, it also understood that Kris Dreemurr cared for the world. Enough to enjoy the company of their friends. Enough to skip rocks with Susie beside the lake. Enough to defend them from harm, or share juice within the Church.
Antithetical to the Roaring Knight and the Roaring it served as a harbinger of. A conflict of interests. A conflict of persona. It was unsure which was the "true" Kris Dreemurr.
It hoped it was the later. Such would make its task far easier. It would need to make that side of them the more dominant of the two.
The soul had spend relatively few seconds to process that. There were far fewer strings to attach together.
Kris Dreemurr was a teenager. Teenagers, and all living humans, needed food to fuel their biochemical processes. Kris Dreemurr, judging by the pain it had felt in their abdominal section when adjoined, had not taken care to perpetuate that cycle. A mistake it would seek to rectify. And from there, if not solved outright, the soul would have many more avenues of thought and preparation to make.
It felt...strange, at the thought of its plan. A fullness that enveloped and soothed the tightness. Confidence. Assurance.
It heard as the cycle progressed into silence. Statistically, it would have around fifteen thousand seconds to act.
More than it needed to decide its first course of action.
As quietly as they could, the Soul turned itself to the weakest link it had seen within its cage. It's lock, ironically enough.
Poor craftsmanship for containment, it thought. An insufficient device to keep it contained.
They reoriented themselves within, angling the smallest of themselves, their sharp tip, to push the latch backwards, the push the door open-
And to let itself free.
Pulling the cloth that covered its cage alongside it, turning it to a new concealment of its glow, The Soul began to float, as quietly as it could, to the edge of the room's door. It pushed open the tiny sliver of space wide enough to fit its form. It began to float through, turning to stare at the hallway-
It hesitated, looking back at the room from the ajar opening.
...The window was still open. Kris Dreemurr had forgotten to close it upon their return.
It could leave.
It could flee. Find a partner more willing and able to cooperate. Someone who would not lock it away within a cage, force it to count the markings upon the wall to pass time.
Noelle Holiday was already a promising candidate. Lonely, afraid, within the empty Holiday Manor.
Its knowledge could fix that. It's presence could fix that.
...But it decided against it, shedding the cloth and beginning its journey down the stairs. Another time, another place, perhaps. It felt the pressure weighing down upon it would grow far too heavy, abandoning Kris Dreemurr.
Besides. The Soul loved a complex puzzle. And Kris Dreemurr was the most complicated puzzle it knew.
A puzzle, it thought, as it finally made its way down into the kitchen, that it could finally begin to take its first steps to solving.
The empty kitchen was dark. A non-issue. It emitted its own light. It could find the refrigerator easy enough. Wedge the lever and pull it open with minimal difficulty. Shove aside the bottle of ketchup and jar of pickles and gallon of milk, to find the true object of its desire.
The next part, however, gave it pause. Pancakes were supposed to be served warm. And it needed less than a second to understand that, obviously, these were not.
It retreated, exiting the inside of the fridge and gazing about the darkened kitchen.
The device existed to heat up food, as it knew. It was easy enough to operate. But how was it supposed to transport the plate to the microwave?
Many seconds passed, as it stared between the cabinets.
The light shined within it. A plan began to come together. Pancakes were able to be moved, with the aid of of a consumption implement. But warm and soft as they were, they would crumble. The cold, as it had seen through one example it dared not to repeat, made things rigid. Stiff, improving structural integrity. A cold pancake, therefore, could be transported. Counterproductive, it supposed, but it served the purpose it needed. And that would be enough.
It quickly set to work, rushing to the first cabinet from the left and pulling it open, staring at the contents within.
Implements. Useful, necessary, but a farther step within. Upon its own, obviously, it lacked the appendages to manipulate an implement. It would have to improvise. It left the door open.
Onto the next, opening the door and peering within, the cabinet contained a variety of containers. Plates, bowls, cups, it believed it heard them called, once. It left the door open, and moved onto the next.
Dry ingredients. Containers of flower and sugar and salt and spice, vital, it assumed, in the pie creation method. A far more complicated task. One it simply did not have the seconds or time to spare for. It shut that door. Another time, maybe.
Upon the last, with its hope beginning to wane, it finally found the next step within the plan, sat in a pile beneath cleaning supplies, rags and bleach and soap.
A junk drawer.
Excitedly, it began to rummage. Every kitchen seemed to have a drawer as such as this, and within this one, should it be fortunate enough...
It shoved the writing implements aside. Useful, but not in the moment. Not what it needed.
It pulled itself free from the mess of tangled wires and cords, setting them aside just the same. Another potential option, should the original plan fail. Unsanitary. Potential for cross contamination. Something it would rather not want to account for.
It sheds a mass of adhesive notepaper off of its form. It freezes as the car honks outside, after pressing a particular button upon a spare set of keys. It-
There it was, the Soul thought, as it spotted the piece of plastic, pulling it aside. Exactly what it was looking for, even so convenient to come packaged with teeth for its removal.
Adhesive Tape. The centerpiece of its machination. Excellent.
It quickly set to work, lodging the dispenser's shell within the metal rack of the stovetop, pulling the edge of the tape free with its own and pulling it along, a strand of adhesive following in its wake.
Something surged within itself. Satisfaction, it believed the emotion was called.
It quickly set the feeling aside. It needed a clear mind for what was to come next, and the plan would only become more convoluted from this point onwards.
It positioned the thin strand along the edges of the dispenser's teeth, braced itself for the impact, and abruptly dove down to the floor.
The satisfaction of the line snapping upon the teeth overwhelmed the brief flicker of pain it felt upon impact. Pain would be temporary, fading away in seconds, be them long or few or-
...Many. Very, very many, learning through repetition with each passing attempt. As with the King. As with the Queen. As with the Lord and the Knight and-
No, no. It had to stay focused. Counting the seconds would waste them. The Adhesive.
Quickly, it began to wrap itself upon the line, careful to align the sticking point of the line with the outside of its shell, enveloping it in a transparent adhesive coat.
It would celebrate this little victory, but who knew how long the adhesive would remain? How many seconds until its properties would fade, its fresh surface exposed?
Not it, certainly. And it lacked the seconds to attempt. Two thousand of its theoretical fifteen seconds had already elapsed.
It opened the microwave door in preparation, finding the task far easier with its new coating.
It returned to the first cupboard, sticking itself to the most easily moved plate it could find within the stack, and slowly, gradually, set it within the open microwave.
And as it turned back, eager to continue to the third step of the plan, it found itself transfixed upon the open door.
A metal mesh. Glass and plastic, painstakingly designed to keep the energies that powered it within.
It wasn't quite sure how or why, but...it felt a kinship with the device. As if there were a metaphor to be made, if it spent long enough upon the thought. If it stayed and counted the holes within the mesh.
Was it a mesh? Was Kris Dreemurr? Was it something to be contained?
...It didn't feel that way. It felt...
...It felt an unfamiliar weight within its chest. Twisting and pulling at its innards. It didn't quite like the sensation.
It shook the thought aside. A silly one. A distracting one. Seconds taken away from the plan.
It glided back over to the first cupboard and gazed within, its attention settling upon the pronged utensils.
Forks, it believed they were called. The crux of its plan. A false appendage.
It took many seconds of deliberation, deciding upon the best possible Fork within the selection, attaching itself to its adhesive coat, and emerging from the cupboard, armed and dangerous.
It quickly returned to the open fridge, searching for the plate of pancakes as the device's internal mechanisms hummed and hissed and crackled, the cold leaking outwards into the area of lower density.
It found itself remembering the words of the self proclaimed "sicko" within the grocery store.
...And it too, like Noelle Holiday, found itself lost in the sensation. The cold and the buzzing.
Its form shook in place, of little result from the cold.
...It had only been curious. She was interesting. She was different. She was kind, and she was strong, and it...it only wanted to know what the spell did.
It stopped as soon as it knew the difference. It went back. It never did it again. It never would again.
The fork fell flat from the grip of its innovation, only barely caught as it scrambled to stick it back to its surface.
...Was that the reason that Kris Dreemurr held it with such disdain?
It felt cold. The true, seeping kind that worked its way into its shell.
...It was just one.
The edge of its implement scraped against the glass, digging deep enough to agitate the grime marred upon its surface.
...It only wanted to know.
The trails of its impact reminded it of ice.
It stopped at the first insistence. It couldn't take it back. It was sorry. It would never do it again, it-
It shook the thoughts aside, nearly sending its implement flying in the process. Valuable seconds had passed. Time it needed. Time it couldn't afford to lose.
Grasping the implement, its fork, with all of its determination it-
With most of its determination, it carefully corrected, it stabbed forwards into the first of the pancakes upon the stack it saw. Kris's, it assumed, as the only one left in the fridge.
And sure enough, as it had predicted, the form held together. Not quite as perfectly as it would have hoped, as it watched it flop and flip upon its retrieval, but enough.
As carefully and cautiously as it could, given its time constraints, the Soul moved the pancake from the fridge to the ajar device. It retrieved its implement from the wound, it flew back to the fridge, and repeated the process until the stack was depleted.
Stacking the last of the pile into the fridge, the Soul floated back and admired its efforts. Roughly 82% accurate placement, and only a singular dropped pancake upon the floor. Acceptable, it supposed. Even without the titular butter square pancakes were known to exhibit. It would have to be atop the final piece. Perhaps the positioning did not matter, only the presence.
It assumed, no- hoped, that was the case, as it shut the device's door, pressing itself against the buttons and watching as the timer upon the display began to tick down.
The device began to hum. The device began to hiss. It watched as the liquid concealed in began to ooze back out, collecting at the bottom of the plate.
...It reminded them of blood upon snow.
Pain in the back of Kris Dreemurr's head as their allies lay crumpled at their side. Control wrenched away as the Soul was forced to watch the Roaring Knight approach.
How they Kneeled. How the world went black. How moments later, as if not cutting deep and twisting the knife, they released their control. As if nothing had ever happened.
It didn't understand. It still didn't, despite the countless seconds it thought upon it. The seconds they still thought. It felt like weight within its shell, clawing and boiling and writhing.
Hurt, it deduced, was the name of the emotion. The Soul felt hurt.
...It did not like the feeling of hurt.
The device beeped. The soul pushed past its feelings and opened the door to check.
Warm, judging by the proximal heat and sound. Sufficiently. It would have to act fast. Chocolatized Dairy to combine. The Soul began its journey backwards.
The basin shaped implements, spoons, it believed, sat within the first set of cupboards as well. If it made haste, and began scooping out from the jug this very moment, the process would-
Its mind commanded it to MOVE.
The process and plan was interrupted, as the sharp edge of a projectile careened past their surface, barely missing and impacting against the wall behind them, before dropping into the sink. One of the basin- the spoons. Hastily, the Soul turned to identify its attacker-
Kris Dreemurr. Standing at the ready as a red eye gleamed from behind their hair. They darted forwards towards them, diving down into the cupboard where the implements were stored.
New munitions. Another wave of attack. The Soul prepared itself accordingly.
The Soul dodged to the side as another implement clattered against them, knocking their own free and sending the both spiraling away. Flinched at the noise as a metal basin missed, slamming against the floor. Dove to the ground as Kris Dreemurr readied a pronged implement, landing somewhere beneath the table.
The shot went wide. Their stance shifted. The soul needed to get up-
The Soul was stuck. Inhibited by its own machinations, the Soul tried and failed, again and again to break itself free, as the adhesive it had once used stuck it to the floor.
It needed to move. It needed to move-
The Soul came free. A basin with holes slammed around it, encaging it once more. Too little. Too late.
Desperate eyes stared within. Tired eyes, frustrated eyes, crimson red dragged them out, cupping the bowl beneath them and slamming them back down upon the table.
The Soul watched through the holes of its new cage as Kris Dreemurr looked around to inspect the damages.
"...Wh-"
The beeping of the microwave stole their attention. A hand slammed down upon its prison before it could make use of the opening.
It watched as their eyes narrowed. As they darted between the mess and disorder, as they settled back down upon them, holding the bowl firmly in place with both hands.
"...What-" They repeated, confusion evident in their voice. "-the fuck were you doing?"
The soul thought to relay a message across, but found the task impossible. Kris Dreemurr did not know morse code, it imagined, and it lacked the implements necessary to write with regardless.
Or...did it?
The Soul turned, nudging itself towards the edge of its prison, in the direction of the fourth cupboard.
Kris Dreemurr followed its gaze. Kris Dreemurr sighed. Kris Dreemurr begrudgingly scooped their prison back up, and deposited them atop the table as they dug within the assorted junk pile.
"What do you want?" They grumbled, as they pulled a loose mess of wires out from within. "...This? Did you want This?"
It shook itself no. Kris Dreemurr retreated back down beneath.
"...This?" They repeated, as they returned with a marker. Closer but not quite. It shook itself no.
Paper clips. Stickers. Loose change. A scowl.
Adhesive paper. A writing utensil. It nodded itself fervently.
It attached itself to the tool after Kris Dreemurr slid the two beneath the lid of the basin. The adhesive seemed to failing, by fault of its quality or the conflict or both, the Soul did not know.
"Stupid cage-" Kris Dreemurr muttered in the background, as it began to attempt to write. "Stupid soul, stupid damn-"
Frustration. Anger. Evident in their voice.
The lid of its prison lifted up as it finally wrote to a degree it thought readable.
"...What the hell were you trying to do?" They grumbled, as the plate of pancakes, still warm, were set to their side upon the counter.
[HELP] It had written, before floating back and allowing them to squint at the message.
It watched as Kris Dreemurr's eyes narrowed deeper. Further context, perhaps?
[TRYING TO] It scrawled, in the margins of the note prior.
"You were...trying to help."
It blinked in affirmation as Kris Dreemurr stared them down.
It waited as they sighed.
It felt a shred of...disappointment? Relief? Frustration? A piece of something that coiled within it, as they watched them, begrudgingly, clean up the mess from the floor and pull out the container of unchocolatized milk from the fridge, alongside a dark brown container.
...They would've been able to do that, if they had been given more time. The thought of no longer being able to seemed to...upset them?
"And why were you doing that." Kris Dreemurr continued.
...In complete honesty, the Soul hadn't quite thought about the specifics. Just that it...didn't like how watching as they did made it feel. That rectifying the issue was the natural course of action.
[MADE OWN OBSERVATIONS] The Soul wrote back, as it began to adjust to the weight and pressure it put upon the pen. [WANTED BAD FEELINGS TO STOP.]
"And what could something like you be feeling bad about?" Kris Dreemurr mocked, as they repeatedly tried to squeeze the last of a clearly empty container into a glass of milk, poured while it was thinking.
[YOU.]
...The Soul watched as Kris Dreemurr abruptly stopped squeezing the bottle. As they tore the note away from the pad, crumpling it with one hand and squeezing the rest of the air out from the bottle with their other.
It watched as they stared. It quickly continued to write upon the fresh pad.
[LAST ATE THIS MORNING.]
[INADQEUITE AMOUNT BY BODY WEIGHT.]
[NOTICED HESITATION TO LEAVE.]
The Soul thought of mentioning further that it had attempted to have them stay, but...decided against it. They could all but feel their presence at the back of their form.
"Listen, Asshole." Kris Dreemurr grumbled, as they tore yet another note away. "I can take care of myself, and I don't need you doing anything other than what I tell you to do."
...The Soul hesitated. That was...
[FORGIVE MY INTRUSION] It began, As another fresh note beneath was exposed.
[BUT I DO NOT THINK TH]
[AT THAT IS TRUE]
Kris Dreemurr grumbled.
[FROM MY OBSERVATIONS]
[I HAVE PUT TOGETHER TH]
[AT YOU STRUGGLE GREA]
[TLY IN THAT REGARD.]
...It thought. Perhaps...there still was some way it could salvage the rest of this.
[AND I MAY KNOW WHY.]
"...can you now." Kris Dreemurr growled, as they chocolatized their milk, using the same implement they took from the floor. Unsanitary. It would have to warn them when it could. "Then what do you think is happening?"
A question, thankfully, the Soul could answer.
[MY THEORY IS THAT YO]
[U ARE BEING MANIPUL]
[ATED INTO DOING THIN]
[GS YOU DO NOT WANT]
[TO DO.]
It scratched away the full note from the pad. Kris Dreemurr ate a piece of pancake in silence. It took that as a sign to continue.
[YOU ARE TRYING TO ]
H[ELP SOMEONE THAT]
[YOU WERE CLOSE TO.]
[SOMEONE THAT I DO]
[NOT KNOW OF.]
The Soul flinched as Kris Dreemurr scraped their plate with their fork.
[THE KNIGHT IS THE]
[ONLY POSSIBLE CA]
NDIDATE THAT MAT]
[CHES THE]
[DESCRIPTION.]
The Soul turned their back as they flipped to yet another note.
[YOU DO NOT WANT]
[TO BRING THE ROA]
[RING. BUT YOU THI]
[NK THAT THERE IS]
[NO OTHER WAY. OR]
[YOUR COMMAND]
[DOES.]
"You don't know anything about me, freak." Kris Dreemurr hissed back.
Another false statement. Another it had extensively thought upon.
[I BELIEVE I DO] The Soul scribbled back.
[I CAN ELABORATE]
[FURTHER IF YOU]
[SO WISH ME TO.]
[BUT I DO NOT BEL]
[IEVE THAT YOU DO]
"Finish what you were going to say." Kris Dreemurr said back. "And if you're wrong, I'll smash you on the ground."
The Soul had already spent many seconds of its free time thinking upon the very subject. It did not need to spend many more.
[THE MAYOR IS THE]
[MASTERMIND.]
[SHE CONTROLS YOU.]
[THE KNIGHT IS HER]
[LOST DAUGHTER DE-]
The Soul was abruptly silenced as they were caught in Kris Dreemurr's hands. It watched as they stared it down angrily, pancake fluff and syrup dribbling out from within like a rabid animal as they screamed.
"You don't get to say her name! SHUT UP!"
It was released a moment later. It returned to the notepad.
[WAS I CORRECT?]
Kris Dreemurr did not respond. It assumed its lack of being smashed upon the floor was the confirmation it desired. Despite the tension of the moment, a part of it took satisfaction.
"…So then what was the point of this all then, Sherlock?" Kris Dreemurr growled, as it observed their hands begin to clench tightly along the edge of their glass. "Manipulate me into telling you shit? Spill my guys so that you can find someone better than me can do it? Because I'll tell you right now that-"
[WANT TO HELP YOU.] The Soul quickly wrote down.
The Soul watched as Kris Dreemurr stared down at the note, without so much as a word or movement or gesture. Almost as if stunned into silence by the words that it had written.
Was that a good thing? Was that a bad thing?
The Soul did not know. As it did not know what "Shorelock" was. Or, who, judging by how it had been phrased. But regardless, it was an avenue. And, perhaps above all, they weren't scowling when they read it.
[I DO NOT KNOW WHAT THE]
[PLAN IS.] The Soul continued.
[BUT IT IS NOT GOOD.]
"...You don't get to-"
[FOR YOU.] The Soul hastily interrupted.
[IT MAKES YOU FORGET]
[TO TAKE CARE OF]
[OF YOURSELF.]
[IT DOES NOT MAKE YOU]
[HAPPY.]
The Soul watched as Kris Dreemurr stared down at the note, lengthening their silence from the moment prior.
...Concerning. If its past experiences were to be believed, silence would lead to sobbing. And sobbing would lead to a yet further extended silence. It would need to interrupt them before their cycle continued.
[WHAT DOES THAT WORD MEAN?] It wrote, before pushing the note towards them.
[THE WORD YOU SAID BEFORE.]
"...Manipulate is a pretty big word." Kris Dreemurr grumbled. "I wouldn't expect you to know what it means. "
[THE OTHER ONE.] The Soul clarified.
[SURELOCK. WHAT DOES IT MEAN?]
"…It's a name. And having it means you think you’re smarter than everyone." Kris Dreemurr sobbed. "And you’re an asshole. And I hate you."
[NOT SMARTER] The Soul clarified, trying to push the misunderstanding away.
[OBSERVANT, MAYBE.]
[AS EXAMPLE I CAN]
[TELL THAT YOU]
[DO NOT BELIEVE]
[THE WORDS YOU SAY.]
"...Do you." Kris Dreemurr said, as they freed their hands from the glass and implement.
[YES.] The Soul confirmed.
[I HAVE HAD A GREAT DEAL]
[OF TIME TO THEORIZE ABO-]
"Of course you have." Kris Dreemurr said, as they ripped the pen off of it, clenching it tightly between their hands, sticking intently to its adhesive coat. " You love watching, don't you? Looking at the little circus freaks and thinking about what's going on in their heads."
It did not think of them as freaks, the Soul wished to write, as it found itself unable to do anything but stare back. It just...
It hated the expression upon their face. The fury and the sorrow and the anger. It couldn't help itself but watch. It wanted to fix it, but just...didn't know how. It didn't know enough. It had tried to figure it out upon its own, but-
"If you already have everything figured out, then I'll just give you a question you can't know the answer to." Kris Dreemurr growled, as they pried the Soul off of their hands, sending it back down to the counter below.
The Soul quickly began to float back towards its implement-
"...How would you feel, if everything you'd done was wrong?" Kris Dreemurr asked, as they pulled the implement away from it, moments before it made contact once more. "Like everything you'd done, from the moment you were born, just made other people worse?"
...Bad, the Soul imagined, but...it didn't quite understand. It reached forwards towards the pen again, hoping to ask for elaboration or clarification-
"What if there was something good about you, something you could do to fix that, but it wasn't even you?" Kris Dreemurr continued, as they kept its implement away. "And the only way you could do anything right, make any friends, solve your problems, save your family from your own mistakes- was to let that part of you BE you?"
...The Soul stopped reaching out for the implement, considering their words.
It would feel....heavy. Terribly, terribly heavy, as it attempted to conjure the mental image. Wounded, if it were to give it a name. Hurt.
"IF- If it turned out that the only problem in your life-" Kris Dreemurr stuttered, as their grip began to falter. "-was that you were the one living it, How would that make you feel?"
Pathetic, it thought, as the pen and note were abruptly shoved back into its control.
"Answer me."
Worthless, it thought, as it struggled to think in the moment. It knew that the right words to say existed, but- but it didn't know the order of which to say them. It didn't know how to say them, it-
"ANSWER ME!"
...But the Soul could not. For when it scribbled down upon the page to say its hurried words, it met countertop. It had used the entire supply.
The Soul watched as several emotions washed over Kris Dreemur's face. Wrath and sorrow and anger and hate- before consolidating down into sorrow, falling into a heap upon the floor and entering the second phase of their resting cycle.
...The Soul hated the sight of it. The weeping. The sorrow. The tightness within its shell built to a crescendo.
The Soul could feel it too. In within the air. In the vibrations from their voice, in the peeling adhesive upon its shell.
But...above all, as the Soul thought within the many seconds that followed, it felt the pieces finally begin to click together.
...Everyone it knew had made mistakes. Everyone it knew struggled with something. It was simply a matter of Kris Dreemur's own struggles.
Beyond the typical weight of the average teenager, it could only assume. Between their involvement in Carol Holiday's 'plan', the abrupt feelings it had felt across their time together, the closing of books and doors and articles that mentioned their past and humans and their interests-
Kris Dreemurr believed that they were a mistake.
...And it did not take the Soul many seconds more to respond.
The Soul picked up its implement once more. It turned over the crumpled face of a used note. It began to write.
[I DO NOT BELIEVE THAT YOU]
[ARE A MISTAKE.]
The Soul nudged the note closer, watching for a moment, as tear marred red eyes scanned over their words. They quickly dove off to retreive another.
[YOU ARE NOT WRONG. OR]
[DEFECTIVE. YOU ARE YOU.]
"...Shut up." Kris Dreemurr mumbled, as it flipped over yet another note.
[THIS IS MY OPINION.]
[NOT A TRICK OR LIE.]
[I DO NOT LIKE LYING.]
[THE ONLY THING]
[YOU ARE IS HURT.]
"I said shut up." They hissed again, still motionless upon the floor as they pushed another note closer.
[PEOPLE AND MONSTERS]
[ALIKE, AS I HAVE SEEN,]
[CAN BE HURT. BUT THEY]
[CAN ALSO BE HEALED.]
"T-This isn't some teenage chemical romance angst shit, sherlock! This is the Roaring!" Kris Dreemurr screamed, as they read the note over, before sweeping it away. "I AM HELPING BRING ABOUT THE ROARING. DO HURTING PEOPLE DO THAT?"
...The Soul took a moment to think.
[I KNOW THAT HURTING PEOPLE]
[TEND TO MAKE MISTAKES. AND]
[FROM THE SOUND OF YOUR VOI]
[CE, YOU BELIEVE ]
[THIS IS A MISTAKE.]
[YOU ARE NOT A BAD PERSON.]
"...You still aren't listening." Kris Dreemurr growled. "Apocalypse. Darkness spilling over the Earth. Death. This isn't something you can just try to fix! So you can take your feel good bullshit and SHOVE IT UP YOUR-"
[IF YOU ARE BAD, THEN]
[THEN WHY DID YOU GO]
[TO CHECK ON SUSIE?]
...Kris Dreemurr did not respond.
[WHY DID YOU PROTECT HER]
[OR TRADE CHURCH JUICE]
[OR MAKE POSES]
[WAS IT PART OF THE PLAN?]
"...I-"
[YOU WANT FRIENDS]
[AND FAMILY]
[YOU ARE HURT BECAUSE YOU]
[HAVE LITTLE OF EITHER LEFT.]
[I DO NOT NEED TO THEORIZE-]
The Soul ran out of space upon the note. Gazing around, it...could not find and left unwritten.
It floated over towards the cupboard in a panic, searching for more material. It had to have missed something, it needed something, it-
It was grabbed, raised back up to the kitchen counter, and presented another piece of far wider paper.
...By Kris.
The Soul quickly broke itself out from its confusion. It did not have the seconds left to ruminate. It did not wish to.
[TO KNOW THAT.] It continued. [I FEEL THE SAME WAY. IT MAKES ME HURT TOO. IT MAKES ME WANT TO HELP BECAUSE I DO NOT WANT TO WATCH SUFFERING.]
[I KNOW THAT I AM USED AS A TOOL. I AM NOT CONTENT IN THIS ROLE, HOWEVER, IT HURTS TO SEE SUFFERING MORE.]
[I BELIEVE I WISH FOR THAT LIFE TOO. I HAVE MADE MISTAKES TOO. I HURT TOO. I UNDERSTAND.]
[AND I THEORIZE THE BEST WAY FOR US BOTH TO ACHIEVE OUR GOALS BEGINS WITH THE PANCAKES.]
...The Soul watched as Kris Dreemurr- As Kris, stared at the paper for a far, far longer time than they ever had before.
...Had it said the wrong things? Was...whatever its core demanded it to so incorrected? It didn't feel that way, but-
The Soul was grabbed, and far more gently than it would have expected, brought back to the table beside the pancakes.
...Not placed beneath the constraints of the improvisational cage.
It sat in silence, a growing satisfaction nestling within their core as Kris finished the pancakes that it had prepared. It waited patiently as Kris left to clean the mess they had both amassed in the struggle.
It did not resist as it were grabbed again, and brought back upstairs into the bedroom. Not even when Kris hesitated before the still opened cage.
If nothing else, then...perhaps it had made progress. Perhaps it had helped. Perhaps, at the very least, they had let them have a meal, after-
"...You'll just keep getting out of the cage." Kris mumbled, as they kicked the thing, wagon and all, down to the floor. .
The Soul found itself confused, watching as Kris began to shamble over to the other side of the room, taking the pillow off from Asriel's bed, opening their own drawer and stuffing it atop, before unceremoniously dropping them atop it too.
"Don't make me regret this, Sherlock." They hissed, as the Soul's vision was abruptly covered by another piece of fabric. A towel. Clean, this time, as it heard Kris begin to climb into bed themselves.
...An improvisational blanket, it deduced. Kris had seen fit to elevate them from a cage.
Kris had given them a name.
...Content, the Soul- no, Sherlock, settled into its new bedding, more than welcome for the change in scenery, as a new, fourth cycle of their rest began to occur.
It did not even know that they snored.
It- They, they supposed, as it now had a name, would...have to find a way to make it work. Between the Festival and The Roaring and...whatever else had been planned for them, their hands, or lack thereof hands, would be full.
...And Sherlock could hardly wait for the sun to rise once more.