Caught Red-Handed [Closed log to systemicsupport]

[itstheend]

There's someone quietly padding through the Castle halls late at night, in a green and yellow sweater. You'd be forgiven for thinking it's one of the Charae, since that would be technically true. But it's Frisk at the helm of this one. They've just left the kitchen they met Kalak in, and there's a sense of muted urgency to their movements.

They need to find S-4 before Chara wakes up.

They'd ask their mom, but they're pretty sure she's not here anymore and also sure she'd ask too many questions and get angry about any answer. Angry on their behalf, but still angry. It's better this way.

They don't know what room he's in - Sans didn't tell them, and both they and Chara forgot to ask their other self, and they're mentally kicking themself for not finding out sooner, but they think he'd definitely be inside in this hour, which narrows things down a little.

They occasionally open doors at random as they go. Someone's not getting a lot of sleep tonight.

Comments

[systematicsupport]

S-4’s room is actually quite close to Sans’. Right next door, in fact. Even if Frisk doesn’t know where that may be, they should still find his room pretty easily, right at the end of one of the many halls. There’s just one bed, but it’s more than big enough to hold the two small skeletons curled up beside each other. The shelf next to the bed is well stocked with toys. It’s a perfect room… aside from the fact that the door squeaks when it’s opened.

That squeak is enough to rouse S-4 from his slumber, and he squints into the darkness, still holding Serif tightly.

“Sans? Is that you?”

As his eyes adjust, the lights in his sockets flicker as he realizes that is definitely not Sans, but one of the humans, and an injured one at that. He gasps and carefully untangles himself from Serif’s side to investigate.

[itstheend]

There's an art to opening doors, that Frisk has learnt well. Not slowly, never slowly, that'll make a creak worse. Smoothly, quickly and evenly, but not so quick that it'll get out of control and bang into the wall beside the door.

Even with this technique, some doors just won't play along, (some deliberately so) and Frisk winces slightly at the sound.

"Sorry," they whisper, ever so softly. After a lot of empty rooms, they might have been getting a bit lackadaisical. "Um," they add just as quietly, looking at the still asleep Serif, before stepping to the side a bit and turning their head towards the open doorway and back to S4, eyebrows raised a little. An unspoken question of whether he'd like to talk outside, because they don't want to wake Serif as well if they don't have to. He needs his sleep, from the sound of things.

[systematicsupport]

It seems that no matter what is done with this door, it always creaks. S-4 swears by it, and he doesn’t even have any tricks to try to bypass the sound.

Either way, it means that Frisk’s presence has been noted. The apology is definitely not accepted, because why are they apologizing when they’re bleeding on the floor? But after a moment, S-4 follows their gaze back to his brother and turns back with a nod. Serif shouldn’t be bothered with this. He’ll panic for sure, and if his conditioning kicks back in it could be even more troublesome for them all. So without a word, he leads Frisk out of the room and closes the door as swiftly as possible, hoping the squeak is quiet enough to sleep through.

With that done, he looks back at Frisk, and his voice is full of mounting panic. “What’s your name? Why are you bleeding?” Panic from both seeing a bleeding human and not knowing who that human is, apparently.

frick sorry i should have specified the injury

[itstheend]

"Sorry 'bout waking you up," Frisk says as the door closes - it's in a low quiet voice, almost automatic and clearly prepared beforehand by the way it just runs out and somewhat over the other's panic. They have to switch tracks suddenly, blinking at S-4.

"Bleed... ing?"

They look at their wrist, gripped by their other hand as soon as the task of opening the door was complete. Bright red is seeping through their fingers - too colourfast to be blood, and a little too viscous. Some of it peels off and splats onto the floor, where it evaporates, and pain starts to seep back in where it leaves the hand-shaped bruise. Kalak's magic is wearing off.

Frisk wipes at it with Chara's sweater, smearing it in the weave. Maybe that wasn't the best idea. They look back at S-4 and try to reassure.

"It's okay. Really. Um, remember me?" They're a little loathe to reveal themself, but they don't want Chara to ask questions about what happened here, so they remain as noncommittal as possible. "You helped me when I was... melting."

Hopefully the drip of dissipating determination doesn't bring up bad memories there.

No worries, should have asked!

[systematicsupport]

Frisk’s apology almost goes completely unnoticed, as S-4 claws his way back to the waking world and starts to take in more details of the human’s injury. They aren’t bleeding. It may be red, but instead of them bleeding they’re...dripping. Parts of them are falling off. It’s messy and disturbing and S-4 wants to reach for it and heal right now, but…

But unfortunately, the reminder of Chara’s melting down from determination certainly brings up bad feelings. He pulls his hands back to cradle them to his chest, shaking his head rapidly.

“N-No! I mean, yes, I remember, but I can’t help! I just made it worse when you melted.”

[itstheend]

Oops. Wrong dialogue option. Chara's eyes fly wide in alarm, briefly revealing black, not red, irises, before the eyelids fall and obscure them again. Frisk tugs the sleeve of their sweater further down over the bruise and the red which starts staining the yarn, and hurriedly holds their hands out, trying to express that it's okay in every line of their body language.

"No, no, you helped. You made it better! I was better after, wasn't I?"

Sitting up and talking and no longer in pain, was Chara, despite having lost the vast majority of, well, everything.

"It stopped hurting. It was supposed to happen, I think, but you made it stop hurting faster. You helped."

They're repeating themself, when they're usually not given to speaking this much at all. They cut themself off. They really want him to realise that it's not his fault at all.

[systematicsupport]

S-4 is panicking too bad to see the difference in their eyes, too focused on staying as far away from them as possible. He wanted to heal, but apparently his healing can hurt people, and he doesn’t want that. He’s done with that, capturing humans isn’t his purpose anymore.

“You were… you weren’t human anymore! Didn’t it hurt? I thought I was hurting you, you looked like you were in pain.”

Yes, they were alive, but was it really okay? Was it really fair? S-4 tugs on his fingerbones, looking for some sort of escape method.

“...I don’t know. I don’t want to hurt you again.”

He has to be more careful. Sans will be so hurt if S-4 goes and messes up like that again. He just wants to be good...

cw self harm

[itstheend]

Frisk folds Chara's arms around their midriff, flicking their gaze away as he recoils - they pull themself in and down, small and unassuming and above all non-threatening in demeanor with reflexive practice.

"I was but you made it better," they insist with a strength at odds with their posture. "You're not human but it doesn't hurt you, right? It was just... going between that did. It was hurting anyway."

They shiver. They remember very vividly Chara's flesh melting and dessicating to dust. It's not the sort of thing easily forgotten, as evidenced on S-4's part too. They rub at their wrist with a hand, the sweatercloth fraying across it and unease on their enclosed features.

"Y'don't have to. I don't think you would but you don't have to."

They can... they can think of something else, maybe. Push comes to shove, maybe they can alter the bruise a bit, make it look less like a hand and more like the sort of thing that might come from accident, and even if Chara knows that one it would lower the suspect list. It's... an uncomfortable idea, to say the least. They've hurt Chara enough.

Maybe there's someone else in the Castle who knows healing magic. It's a long shot, but they'd be willing to try in the name of not putting S-4 through undue duress and distress.

[systematicsupport]

S-4 doesn’t want them to hide away, and as soon as they start curling up, he looks apologetic, trying to come a little closer, magic flickering around his eyelights with the desire to help even as he insists that it won’t help.

“I… really made it better? Are you sure? I just… I have to be really careful. I don’t want to hurt anyone else.”

He really doesn’t want to upset Sans again. But he wants to help, as proven by the way he tries to reach out for Chara’s arm to get a closer look at their injury.

[itstheend]

Their shrinking stops as he approaches - while it's purpose is mollification, it was more for his sake than theirs here, a half-conscious reassurance. They look back towards him - they can't remember seeing a skeleton's eyes do that before, save for one notable example. It's possible S-4's did when healing Chara, but their focus had been extremely elsewhere at that time.

They nod, a small but firm movement.

"It's okay."

They see him reaching out, and they wordlessly lift Chara's arm towards him, palm down, pulling back the sleeve to expose the by-now red-magic free bruise in unspoken permission. Their permission at least. But what Chara doesn't know can't hurt them. Anymore, this evening.

[systematicsupport]

S-4 isn't as good as Papyrus at keeping his magic under control. Emotions rise, and his eyes often betray him with sparks of colour and magic. He tries to keep it under control, even if it's not exactly dangerous... but in such a distressing situation, he can't help it.

As he gently touches the human's arm, green magic flickers along his fingerbones and towards the bruise, attempting to soothe and mend the skin. He keeps his worried gaze on Chara for any possible sign of pain.

[itstheend]

There's no pain; in fact, it diminishes as the bruise shrinks and fades under the radiance of green. They don't sigh in relief or anything so evident - Frisk in pain looks very much how they do when not in pain. But there is the smallest crinkling to their eyes that suggests happiness - once more a reassurance. They're not mad, see? It doesn't hurt, see?

They gently turn it over back and forth in his touch, just to show it's gone. He did it, and no harm came of it. They're not melting or dusting. They don't pull it back until and unless he lets go of his own accord.

"Thanks, S-4," they say and they try to put as much warmth in their words as possible. It's not hard - they really are very relieved by this. "Sorry for um. Waking you up," they repeat. Now that the urgency has faded, they're suddenly more aware that they just kind of... barged in here without a lot of thought.

[systematicsupport]

S-4 does notice that crinkling, and he provides the sigh of relief. Apparently whatever magic he could offer was enough, and didn't provide them any pain. They still look like a normal human. It should be fine...

He still checks their arm over for any other injuries, but after a few moments, he reluctantly lets go and offers a nervous little smile.

"You're welcome," he says softly. Not that he should really be thanked. "A-And it's okay. As long as Serif didn't wake up, I don't mind. I'm just... glad you trusted me."