[slightly backdated revival post] good morning sunshine!

[dustless]

 It's too bright. Sharp stuff prickles against the back of their neck, and something else smothering weighs down over most of their body. They're lying down. They were being carried, but then they fell. Got dropped. Something. Their eyes hurt and they're not even open yet, it's awful.

Frisk flings their arms over their face to block out the first thing. In doing so, they discover the weird weight is, in fact, their shirt and probably also their pants.

Right. They died, and they forgot just how unpleasant the castle's revivals are. Not nearly as nice as just reappearing at the last SAVE point. Everything is...a lot. Like waking up for real, except the nap was three days, and their body hadn't felt anything in that time--

There's a weight in their chest. They can feel the very shape of it right now, the diamond. Her. She's not gone, and they're--they're torn. That's bad, that's not a fix, but it's good they don't have to go see Judgement to get infected again.

They peek out of the space between their arms and find themselves staring at the morning sky in spaces between flowers. 

Between...sunflowers. 

The castle woke them up on top of their first grave.

...

They're tired. They don't like any of this. The most important people can find them by their SOUL.

Frisk rolls over, shuffles deeper into the flowers' shadows, and doesn't move until they fall asleep.
 

☼


Later--a lot later--they're heading in the general direction of their room when they find...a door. The door itself isn't weird, but when they look closer, there's a strip of cloth sticking out from under it.

The room they find behind it is magnificent. To them, at least, now that they're feeling well enough to run around. It's full of wardrobes, and the wardrobes are full of robes and suits and dresses and capes and crowns and necklaces and ruffles, and they are going to take advantage of this by trying on everything that catches their eye, yes they are.
 

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[dustless]

Ice in their chest, ice through their lungs and heart and spreading worse than Jack Frost. Their hands press down into the wood, and then slam. And then slam. And slam, slam, slam, there's ripples in the black, their palms ache.

Frisk tries to answer aloud.

The only sound that escapes is a wail.

You can't promise that! they shove at her, chest and jaw heaving with sobs. You can't! And! You won't! I have family!

They won't let Serif and Papyrus and Sans feel terror like that, or their friends, Chara, Kotetsu, Barnaby, Toshi, Kuja, so many more--or anyone, even the King Mettaton or Pitch Black, no. It's not worth it, it won't work.

(They do wonder, though. Is there sea beneath the castle? Is there anything at allm or would it be wreckage endlessly falling into itself in a loop?)

[lyseandpurge]

Their beating leaves solid indentations in the strange liquid that pools over the floor, and with each blow the floor reverberates, the whole room rattling in their ears in a sympathetic chorus of pain.

In the glossy black Judgement is fully visible, armoured fish of wounds and teeth, shuddering down beneath them like a rusty machine tearing itself apart. Something is broken in her, in the way her voice grows only deeper and louder and more dissonant, something is malfunctioning, something is wrong. i know i know it hurts it hurts! there's nothing else i can do, there is nothing, only what i'm going to do anyway.

please—

don't—

Something falls off a shelf and clatters on the ground.

don't spare me.

don't leave me here.

[dustless]

The world tilts--Frisk tilts until they crash onto their side. Judgment is there, Judgement is broken, their eyes are too blurry to see the room but since when do they need eyes to see her?

NOBODY'S GOING ANYWHERE, they scream in their head, not quite matching the incoherent howling in their throat. NOT ME. NOT YOU. EVEN IF YOU DIE OR I DIE OR WE DIE. It won't let us. Frisk drags their face to their knees. It won't let us so stop trying to make me hurt you and maybe I'll hurt less too!

And they so much don't want to hurt. The cell in their chest's been doing too much, their heart is trying to hammer out of it. Are they gonna die again already?

[lyseandpurge]

The black liquid covers the floor, and then, like a breaching whale, she breaks through, showering black liquid from her fins, from the swords and the spears embedded in her back. Her head strikes the ceiling with a terrible crash and it buckles, her fins swipe closets into splinters and piles of shredded cloth as she groans, turning.

i can't she says, her eye shining from behind a grill of gnashing, articulated teeth. i can't stop—we have to try please i have to try

it's the only way her voice reverberates, a great bridge collapsing under its own weight, cables snapping, concrete crumbling it's the only way

Howling wind.

my death is your freedom. i can't give up, but—

The walls give way, and outside there is a red sky, there is a horrible storm, there is a vortex. Judgement strains against its pull, her metal bones screaming.

if you can't then i'll find something that will i will create the tool of my own destruction, and you

do not come back.

A titanic chunk of rock comes hurtling out of the nothingness and smashes into her side, denting it, and then, silently, she falls spinning upwards into the red light. Black rain pours after her, and lightning flashes through the pain-streaked clouds, and the vision ends like a plug being torn from its sockets.

On the floor of the dressing room, empty and untouched, a single black feather too large to belong to any bird rests, dripping oily liquid as it dissolves.