#rifts writing

[fleurrot]

A WIP of a fic I'm working on >:3

Hermitcraft Royalty AU (this wip focuses on Grian & one of the Watchers) Also the Watchers are lesbians. And they're like Grians parents. (ONE EVEN CALLS HIM THEIR SON HEHEHSHEHAHEAA)

Only CW that I can think of for this part is speciesism

“I’m here on a task.” Grian responded simply, not bothering to sugar coat the statement. “I’m afraid I cannot disclose any more.”

<3

“So…” One of the hybrids in the cell whispered after the nobles left. Grian looked over at them, waiting to see which had spoken. “You’re… new? I never saw you around the empire before.” The mooshroom hybrid stated, staring at Grian.

The three hybrids looked between each other. The mooshroom didn’t look back at Grian, only looking down at the dirt ground after parting from the others. The other two, a phantom and a creeper, just stared at him. The silence was almost deafening, and if Grian wasn’t used to tense silences, he would have been a bit paranoid.

“Sure. Whatever.” The phantom hummed, looking away from him. The creeper followed the action, going back to cuddling with the mooshroom.

Grian watched the three for a second longer before turning away from them. As much as he wished they weren’t there, there was nothing he could do. Nothing he would do. He would not push his home towards the brink of a war.

“Watcher Azur!” Fawlls Emperor greets, the shock hidden on his face. “Pleasant surprise to see you here. How is the wife?” A smile spread on his face as he spoke to the Watcher.

<3

They tugged at the collar of their robe, a soft yet faux expression on their face. “My wife is well. But I’ve actually come to retrieve somebody so I ask that we do not go over a meaningless discussion.”

“Oh? I do not believe we have any Abyssonians here at the palace. Who is it you are after?”

“My voidling. Or, in your peoples terms, my son.”

#grian #watcher grian #evo smp #evo grian #evo watchers #grian fanfic #fanfic #evo fanfic #hermitcraft fanfic #hermitcraft #rifts writing

[starry-eon]

poem excerpt by me | a uquiz i'm unable to find | Jodi Picoult, My Sister's Keeper | Natalie Diaz, A Brother Named Gethsemane | tiktok | tumblr | Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz | The Bible

#webweaving #poetry #poets on tumblr #quotes #poem #writerblr #literature #dark academia #light academia #writing #web weaving #cain and abel #siblings #Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe #sibling rifts #growing up

[happy-hermit]

HELLO HELLO EVERYONE :D

This is a fic for an AU where young teenager TCD Scar comes through Grian's rift :) It's a trauma reveal folks <33

Enjoy!!

===================================

Grian was beginning to believe that the rift had some form of sentience, given that at times it appeared to become quite… temperamental. Some days it would be almost eerily still and slow. Others it would— Well, it would do what it was currently doing. 

The rift was swirling with more shades of purple than usual, dark patches appearing and disappearing with alarming frequency. There was an electricity in the air that made the hair on his arms stick up, and Grian had the strange feeling in his stomach that the thing was emitting some sort of sound that was too low or high for human ears. It felt a bit like a thunderstorm. 

Grian had set up shop immediately upon noticing something was different, resorting to sitting in a chair staring at the Rift waiting on it to do something. It was horrifically tedious. Grumbot — in true Grumbot fashion — was refusing to give him a straight answer. Grian was beginning to suspect that he simply didn’t have one. 

So he waited. With several cups of coffee and messy notes strewn around him on the ground, he waited. 

He was sleeping when the whole thing really started —  because the Universe hated him personally, he was sure. 

He was already sitting up by the time he regained consciousness, heart beating in his chest, eyes wide and darting around in confusion, trying to make sense of his surroundings. It was too bright, and his vision was too blurry from sleep, and where in void’s name was that wind coming from?

The rift chose that moment to start spitting lightning at him, and Grian let out a strangled yell as he dove behind Grumbot’s messaging system, abandoning his empty coffee cups to an uncertain fate. He ducked down and shut his eyes tightly as the glow of the Rift got brighter and brighter, as the high pitched noise emitting from it got higher and higher, until finally something in the fabric of reality snapped under the strain. 

From across the room, there was a short, terrified yell, cut short by the impact of something hitting the ground, and a clatter, like the person had dropped something. There was sudden and complete silence, until it was broken by a quiet groan. Heart in his throat, Grian opened his eyes and shifted, peeking over his makeshift shield to check things out. 

The Rift was back to what he considered to be normal, glowing a serene purple, calm as anything. His notes were strewn about the room and burned at the edges. His coffee mugs were nowhere to be seen. 

On the ground was a person. They were curled up on their side, clutching at their head with gloved hands. Their clothes were ragged and torn, bandages peeking out from under them as the figure shifted slowly. And then they sat up, and their face drifted into view. 

Grian’s breath hitched, his knuckles turning white where he gripped the blocks he was hiding behind. It was a kid. He had messy brown hair, jagged and uneven, like he’d cut it himself, and a bandage creeping up the side of his face from under his chin. He had a bandana tied around his neck, mostly a faded green, except for the faint splatters of dull red. His face was gaunt and his eyes were wide and scared as he patted himself down frantically, muttering to himself. The kid couldn’t have been much older than fifteen. He did not look like someone who believed he would live for much longer. 

Grian let himself poke his head just a bit higher over the barrier, frozen in shock and confusion as his unplanned visitor started whirling around and looking at the floor. His gaze finally landed on something that Grian couldn’t quite see, and his shoulders dropped in what seemed like relief as he went to pick it up. 

Grian… didn’t know what he was expecting. A sword, maybe? No. 

The raggedy little teenager had popped through an interdimensional rift in Grian’s basement, looking like absolute hell, and he picked up a gun. 

The kid checked that it was loaded in practiced movements, almost with the grace of a soldier. It contrasted sharply with the youth of his face, and the way his shoelaces were untied and tucked into his shoes. It painted a very concerning picture. 

His visitor was just beginning to gather his bearings, hauling himself to his feet with suppressed sounds of pain. He was favoring one leg. The gun was poised at the ready in his arms. 

Never let it be said that Grian was a smart man, given what he did next. 

“You can’t have those here.”

The kid made a strangled noise of alarm as he whipped around to face where Grian now stood apart from his makeshift cover, his hands raised in what he hoped was the universal gesture for ‘I mean no harm’. And then he was staring down the barrel of a gun. It wasn’t the usual kind of chaos that happened around here, but he was going to try his best to take it in stride. What was the worst that could happen? He’d get shot? 

He’d respawn. But the kid was staring at him like he wasn’t aware of that. Like maybe he was counting on the opposite to be true. 

Grian forced himself to look past the very threatening weapon pointed at him to get a better look at the person's face, and he met his eyes. They were a striking shade of green, trained on him with pinpoint accuracy and refusing to waver. At first glance, he looked almost angry. Grian knew, though, that it was only a thinly veiled cover for the heart-stopping panic crowding in behind it. For the confusion and pain and fear. (And why could he read a stranger so well?)

“I won’t hurt you,” Grian said, calm as he could manage, wings tense behind him. “But you’ve got to put the gun down.”

“You can talk,” the kid said, quiet and shaky. Like it was surprising. Something about it made Grian’s chest squeeze. 

“Yeah, I can,” Grian said, gentler now. “So can you. Can you tell me your name?”

The gun trembled for a moment, just slightly, and then went eerily steady once more. The kid swallowed hard and glanced around for a second before locking back on to Grian. 

“You’re not… infected?” The kid asked finally. 

Grian frowned a bit in confusion, his brow furrowing and wings rustling in unease. Infected. It sounded like a word with more weight than was really warranted. Like it came with a history. 

“I’m— No, I’m healthy as a horse,” Grian said, cracking an awkward grin. “Eat my vegetables and everything.”

The kid tilted his head, just slightly, and the gun dipped just a bit more towards the ground. Or, well. Towards Grian’s stomach. 

“A horse?” The kid repeated slowly, still in that carefully quiet tone, and if Grian didn’t know any better he’d think that he didn’t know what a horse was. Maybe he didn’t. 

“Yeah, you know— sort of like cows,” Grian said, now feeling absolutely insane. He was explaining the concept of horses while held at gunpoint. “But they’ve got longer faces, I think. And you can ride them.”

The kid, if anything, seemed more confused by that, and Grian gave up on the agriculture lesson for now. 

“You don’t need that here,” Grian redirected, gesturing carefully at the gun. The kid flinched a little at his movement, and Grian softened his voice as much as he could. “You’re safe, here. It’s safe.”

It was the wrong thing to say. 

The kid's shoulders tensed even further, the gun recentering itself firmly on Grian’s forehead and those oddly familiar green eyes shuttering back into a mask of calm. Only the slight tremble of his mouth gave away his fear. He was scared. A tangle of frustration and heartbreak and helplessness coiled in Grian’s chest. 

“It’s not,” the kid said, firmly. “It’s not safe anywhere.”

Where had he come from, that he believed that?

“Look, you— You see that behind you? It’s a portal,” Grian explained, motioning to it in jerky movements. “Wherever you were, you’re not there anymore. You’re somewhere new.”

The kid shook his head, desperate eyes flickering from Grian to the Rift and quickly back again. They were shining with unshed tears, his mouth wobbling almost imperceptibly, and for a moment he looked terribly, horrifically young. Too young to be holding a gun. Too young to be scared of the world. Too young to be so convinced that it couldn’t change. That there was no more hope for things to get better. 

“But I— No. I didn’t go into any portal,” the kid said, voice raising a little, accusing. “Then how did I get here? Did— You did something.”

“No no no,” Grian said, hands raised again. “That thing has a mind of its own, I didn’t do anything. I just sat here.”

“Well I didn’t do anything, either!” The kid said, sounding slightly hysterical. 

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Grian said, as gentle as he could manage. His protective instincts were going haywire; he didn’t really know why. “Look, just— Weird things just happen sometimes. Trust me, I’d know.”

“Then where am I?” The kid asked, voice shaking horribly. 

“It’s called Hermitcraft,” Grian said, voice still carefully calm. “We’re in my house. Well— Under it.” He paused, hesitating, and his next question came out hushed. “Where did you come from?”

The stranger let out a shaky breath, gun unwavering and silence hanging in the still air around them. He didn’t answer. Grian could guess that it was nowhere good. 

They had run out of ways to stall the inevitable, in which the kid had two options. Shoot him or don’t. They were at a standstill. Something had to give. 

A soft noise from across the cavern interrupted Grian’s racing thoughts, and it took him a moment to place it as a muffled baa from one of the sheep in his sheep farm. It was barely anything, and yet the kid reacted as if it were a creeper beginning to explode, whirling to face the noise with wild eyes, swinging his gun in that direction. Namely, away from Grian.

Before he could think better of it, Grian rushed forwards, using his wings to propel him, and he disarmed the other before he even had the time to yell. A stray bullet shot somewhere into the ceiling in the brief struggle, loud enough that Grian knew someone would be coming round to check on it soon, and when the dust settled he was holding a gun, looking into the pale face of a terrified stranger.

“No!” The kid shouted, the loudest he’d been since he’d arrived, pushing at Grian with shaky shoves as he grappled for the gun. Grian deflected his attacks, heart sinking into his stomach as he watched the other grow increasingly frantic, breaths coming fast. “It’s mine! Give it back, it’s mine! You can’t have it, it— it’s mine. Please, please, it’s—”

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Grian said, out of his depth, practically pleading. “Nothing is going to hurt you, okay? But you— you can’t hurt anyone else, either.”

The kid just shook his head, tears clinging to the corners of his eyes as he backed away, hands in trembling fists at his sides. He glared at Grian with all the fire of a hardened soldier and all the fear of a child, green eyes flashing dangerously. Something prickled at the back of Grian’s neck. Some feeling he couldn’t identify. Déjà vu, maybe.

“It’s mine,” the kid repeated, firmer and quieter. “It has my name on it.”

Grian looked down, mildly curious among the adrenaline and confusion. 

He stopped breathing. Froze completely, hands white-knuckled on the gun. His skin went cold, heart tripping over itself in his chest. 

On the gun, in capital letters, was a name. 

[ SCAR ]

A name that he knew. 

Slowly, Grian looked up, breath hitching in his throat when he met the eyes of the stranger(?), now looking a little confused himself. There was a bandage on the side of his face. Judging by the size of it, it was covering a pretty nasty wound. Likely to leave a scar.

Grian knew exactly what it would look like, when it healed.

“Scar,” Grian said, his voice sounding odd in his own ears, blank and emotionless. “Your name is Scar.”

“I named myself,” the kid — Scar — said, still shaking a little, glancing around near-constantly. 

Grian swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat, mind void of any clear thoughts.  “It’s a good name,” he said, chest aching.

“Do you have one?” Scar asked. His hands were fisted in the front of his jacket, twisting anxiously.

“A gun?” Grian asked faintly.

Scar shook his head. “A name.”

“I’m… Grian. My name is Grian.”

“Grian,” Scar repeated, nose wrinkling a little, like he thought it was odd. Scar — his Scar — had made the exact same face last week when he’d come across a problem at his park. Grian felt sick. “You’re—”

The rapidly approaching sound of fireworks cut off whatever the kid had been about to say, and he flinched like he’d been struck, turning wide eyes to the sky as he stumbled a few steps back, towards Grian’s content generator. Grian looked up as well, torn between relief and frustration. The kid had finally seemed to be calming down. 

“It’s okay,” Grian said, rushed and panicked as he held out a placating hand towards Scar. “It’s just one of my friends. They won’t hurt you.”

“Friends?” Tiny scared Scar hissed, like the very idea was ludicrous, and Grian was mildly offended.

Before he could come up with a reply, there was a call of his name from above, and Grian snapped his gaze back skyward, heartrate accelerating. 

Of course, Grian thought, watching as Scar crashed unceremoniously into the ground a few yards away. Of course it was him. Grian took a steadying breath and prepared himself. This was either the best possible option, or the worst. There was no telling where luck would have him fall, this time.

“Grian, I heard explosions!” Scar said, elytra disappearing as he straightened up from his rough landing. “Are you blowing things up without me? You know how much I—”

The builder cut himself off with a strangled noise, face falling quickly into something haunted. Almost scared. Any doubt Grian might have had about who the kid was vanished. They had the same way of being afraid. 

The way Scar was looking at the gun Grian was still holding confirmed it. He was looking at it with wide eyes and tense shoulders, breathing quick and shallow. He was looking at it with recognition.

“Where did you get that?” Scar asked, in a voice that Grian had never heard from him before, dark and small and shaking. 

Wordlessly, Grian stepped out of the way. 

And he watched as Scar locked eyes with his younger self. Just another day on Hermitcraft.

#phil aresonist this ones for you /lh #goodtimeswithscar #grian #hermitcraft s9 #the rift #hermitcraft #hermitcraft season 9 #tcd #jay's journal #gtws #desert duo #j writes

[sssammich]

the romance of an alternate universe

to think that you can imagine a different world so easily beyond this one, if only to pacify, if only to forget. the bittersweetness of your joy in another world where little currently exists here. the longing that doesn't come away empty handed because there, she likes you, trusts you, has no reason to ever question years of friendship and the traces of more.

you only have the one life here, in this one, in this universe, in this timeline, in this moment and that's all.

but the possibility in others, even in just one other, is enough to make you hope that things here will eventually blow over better for you.

knowing the existence of alternate universes, having traveled to them, aches inside your chest because there, your dreams are real. there, your heartbreak is soothed. there, she does not regard you with hatred, disdain, anger, disappointment, heartbreak. there, you did not commit mistake after mistake, each one chained to one another until in the end, you come away with cuffs that lock you, an imprisonment of your own design.

maybe you consider moving to an alternate universe, weighing to suffer the consequences of your choice there instead of here. because it beats being here, it beats having ruin and ashes as the world you live in now.

your friends and family won't understand. they can't understand. all your good intentions remain good, but your impact have been nothing but disastrous.

certainly the rogue alien pummeling you into the rooftop of her tower doesn't understand. but maybe he's traveled here from an alternate universe of his own. and he's just trying to get away. that, you understand.

despite the blood and grime all over you, you wrap your arms around his neck and you don't let go--he's a growing tidal wave as he attempts to rid himself of you. but you hold onto him, locking your limbs around his back, and you don't let go. if there's one thing you'll do right today, it's defeat him.

the rooftop doors open and you see her. she is so beautiful today. and you, bloodied and aching, are exhausted.

you cannot read what her eyes or face are showing--might be the pounding headache and blurred vision on your part. but she is still looking. and it's more than what you can say for the last four miserable months of your life.

you think you hear her say your name, but you're not sure. you don't want to get your hopes up.

he's punching your side and you just tighten your hold around his neck which only pisses him off more. well, get in line, buddy, you're not the only one.

agents rush out to surround your duel with him, and you hear your sister command this small army that has circled you. her appearance just means that you have to hold on even more knowing that one wrong move and you're endangering two people you love.

this alien has just about had enough of you, and you can't agree more, so you try to subdue him by using what remaining energy you have to deliver an unconscious blow, but he gets a hand on your ankle and yanks you off of him before slamming your body down onto the concrete. a crater with your name on it.

there are muffled gasps and you hear your sister order for agents to attack and he wails above you in anger as specialized bullets hit him. his massive hand grabs you by your emblem and he pushes you into the ground, your lungs fighting to breathe at the heavy weight. your hands paw at his wrist to push him away, to no avail. your powers are waning, your energy is zapped, you really are so very tired.

when you look up, there is surprising calm in his onyx eyes despite the rumbling storm around you.

and you think this might be it for you.

you expect pain on the final blow but instead of pain, your body is heaved forward and into nothingness, the weight of his hand on your chest now acting as an anchor.

you hear your sister call for you. but you also hear her, her piercing scream cutting through your consciousness. there is panic, there is worry. for you.

and then they’re gone.

and so are you.

only to open your eyes in the exact same place as before underneath the exact same sky. except there are no agents. there is no rogue alien. there is no sister.

but there is her.

tentative, frightened, curious. she is looking at you and you are looking at her and you realize she is not who you know. and you wonder if the crushing weight on your chest is a phantom pressure from the rogue alien who was seconds away from killing you.

she is kneeling beside your body that's still stretched out flat on the ground. and she is looking at you with just so much.

and she is saying, “who are you?"

and you.

you begin to cry.

#samficlet #samfic #supercorp #i mean listen when i have things to do that are due soon #i end up doing literally not that #so here we are #anyway sad rift vibes as a treat #but also potential universe hopping #maybe i will write more of this #maybe i never will touch it again #who just really knows ya know #supercorp fanfiction

[sixteenth-days]

If you want a prompt maybe eldritch!XB? :0

At the bottom of the ocean, something which had been sleeping woke up.

Every now and then, when XB's shoulders started clicking and he developed a cough and a persistent pain where the base of his spine would be, he knew he'd been too small for too long. It was inconvenient, but not catastrophic.

Whenever that started happening, he'd put all his gear away, let the hermits know he'd be away for a few days or weeks, and find a secluded cove to crawl out of his skin and into the blessed embrace of the saltwater. It always felt like a balm against his real self, dried and desiccated from so long spent in the air and sun. He'd slip into the ocean and spread out like an oil slick, all black and blue and eyes, invisible beneath the play of sunlight on the water, slide down to miles and miles of seafloor, and rest.

But now he was awake, and it felt too soon. Something must have woken him. Scales blinked open up and down his spine, searching for any disturbance in the water immediately surrounding the greatest concentration of his mass, but found nothing that might have roused him.

Ugh. He didn't want to get up. But something was wrong, a sense of unease creeping in through all the estuaries and rivers where he lay, rubbing wrong against the rubber and scale and sand of him.

He heaved a sigh that shoved waves against distant beaches, gathered up a pair of forelimbs from where they dangled in an underwater magma cavern, and pushed himself upwards.

Something about the water around him felt strange, as he ascended through the oceanic zones. A slight shift in the salinity, maybe. Up, and up, from the midnight to the twilight, as the water began to slowly lighten around him. Black water turned blue, and bluer, and bluer, until he was drifting the final few meters to the surface, feeling unaccountably hesitant.

Something was wrong.

He broke the surface, blinked a constellation of eyes against the sudden air, reared up and dug claws into a birch-plank bridge that creaked warningly under his weight. It was immediately obvious that he had not come up where he'd gone down, and that was going to be really inconvenient, if he couldn't get back into his skin, but- one problem at a time.

Starting with: if he's not where he entered the water, where was he?

The air against his scales was stagnant, dusty, untouched by breath or word. This world was clearly abandoned. He caught a glimpse of a sign, affixed to a nearby fencepost: By JoeHills and IamSp00n.

Ah. He'd come up in the wrong ocean.

(Send me Hermit fanon switcheroo asks!)

#you ever think about when xb entered the rift and jumped between two old hermitcraft seasons and then the empty corpse of empires s1?? #what was that about . my god #asks #fanon switcheroo prompts #my writing #xbcrafted

[goodboytown]

oh, right. the flash drive. the flash drive with the emperor's schematics on it. the flash drive the resistance wants. the emperor's flash drive

#drawings i did while writing ch2 #altho two poses are sneak peeks for ch3 haha #ratchet and clank #emperor nefarious #rivet #rift apart

[riftwalker-limbro]

yknow these little guys?

little sawgaw floofs? yknow them?

i made fanart of em :)

#rift noises #warframe #rift art #i guess??? #this was a Very Interesting freehand project #i did write down the pattern while making it but the assembly process at the end gave me some new ideas about it #took roughly 8 hours? ish? #tiny bit goofy looking but tbh that fits the ingame aesthetic of floofs as having visible seams etc #& yes those are screenshots from my orbiter it's looked like that for a week now #crochet

[pixiemage]

"...okay, but if there was an accurate toy version of you-"

"Tango!"

"No, hang on, listen. Okay? Listen - Jimmy!"

Tango stifled laughter as he fended off a sudden faceful of feathers, batting the golden wing away with the hand not already clutching a rather adorable Sheriff plushie to his chest. He flopped backward across the grass he and Jimmy were sitting on, his grin widening and his eyes crinkling at the sight of Jimmy glaring petulantly at him, his feathers all puffed up and his lips curled into an annoyed little scowl.

"Just hear me out, okay?" Tango went on, trying and failing to hide his amused chuckling. Jimmy, to his credit, only rolled his eyes and sighed and waited in silent expectation, his protests on pause for the time being.

"Okay so-" Tango sat up again, the fur-lined hood of his robe falling back off his head to sit fluffed around his shoulders. "So. He made you a plushie, but I dunno if I'd choose that route. I'm thinkin' more like those fancy super-detailed action figures, ya know? Like - made outta wood and paint and stuff, with sturdy metal rods inside so you can pose it properly. Make a real action scene out of it with a lasso and a six-shooter-"

"And a hat?" Jimmy asked, and despite the mild exasperation lingering in his expression, Tango didn't miss the light in his eyes. He grinned and reached out to flick at the brim of Jimmy's cowboy hat, earning a startled little "Hey!" from the Sheriff.

"Well of course a hat!" Tango agreed, as if this was obvious. (To them, perhaps it was. What was a proper Sheriff without his hat? They were both in agreement there.) "And a metal badge and real leather for the vest and a horse and stuff."

"Mhm," Jimmy hummed, casting him a sidelong look. "...an action figure, huh?"

"Yup!" He popped the 'p', then glanced out over Hermitcraft's spawn without really seeing it, his fingers tightening slightly around the plush he still held in his lap. "...although..." He glanced down, a soft sort of smile playing at the corner of his mouth. "Maybe I'd keep part of it all soft an' stuff. Mostly badass, but maybe just the torso'd be plush. Since you're such a softy at heart."

"You - Tango," Jimmy groaned, shoving his shoulder, and Tango snickered when he noticed the slight flush in the other player's cheeks.

"What?" he asked, grinning cheekily. "If I'm gonna toy-ificate the Sheriff I've gotta make it accurate! Strong and huggable, like the real you. Perfect for cuddling with extra cuddles."

"Tango!"

Jimmy buried his face in his hands with a strangled sort of sound and Tango couldn't help but laugh, leaning against his soulmate's side and dropping his head against Jimmy's shoulder with a giddy and amused grin.

"Aww, c'mon Jim, you know I'm right," he teased. "Besides-" He poked at Jimmy's cheek, drawing the avian's attention along with his flustered and half-hearted glare. "-I'd love to have a lil' mini-you to keep with me for when we're too busy to visit each other. That little plushie dude that fell through the rift is cute and all, but it's not close enough to the real thing."

Jimmy reached over and tugged the plush in question from Tango's hand, ignoring the netherborn's strangled and aborted protests as he stood from the grass, leaving Tango to fall sideways without Jimmy there to lean on.

"Well you already have the real thing," he told Tango, "so if you don't mind, I'll be destroying this."

"Wh - no!" Tango clambered to his feet, trailing after him. "Jimmy, c'mon, it's kinda cute!"

"You just said it wasn't accurate!"

"Well - no, it's not, but it still looks like you! I was gonna keep it-"

"Tango-" Jimmy spun back to face him.

"Jimmy," Tango mocked back, hands on his hips, his tail curling playfully back and forth behind him.

They stayed like that for a long moment, Jimmy pouting and glaring, Tango mirroring him mockingly and fighting back a grin. When Tango pounced, desperately trying to salvage the Sheriff plushie from Jimmy's hold, and when Jimmy squawked and his wings flailed in his attempt to keep it out of reach, they inevitably ended up in a tangled heap on the ground. If any of the Hermits asked where the loose golden down feathers and scorch marks in the grass around spawn came from, neither of them were about to admit to anything...though perhaps the faint marks of soot on Jimmy's clothes and the victorious grin on Tango's face and the slightly grass-stained toy now perched proudly on a shelf in Tango's base were anything to go by, the story was telling all on its own for anyone who was willing to try and piece it together.

#Team Rancher #Solidaritek #TangoTek #Jimmy Solidarity #SolidarityGaming #Empires SMP #Hermitcraft #HC x Empires #The Rift #Toy Sheriff Jimmy #Sheriff Jimmy #Pixiemage Writes

[wolfie-bee]

the lies we tell

could have sworn I'd already posted this old twitter fic to ao3, turns out I did not so naturally I had to add more words and then post 😅

#supercorp #supergirl #lena luthor #kara danvers #the lies we tell #5x01 scene extension #my toxic trait is that I think that most of their issues can be solved by kissing idk #finally posting this fic to ao3 #rift era angst my beloved #my writing #my fics

[sapitties]

all the dreams and how they interact with sapnap little heacannons brewing up in my head :D

For cc!dream its pretty obvious childhood friends to lovers he's loved sapnap for so long without realising the extent of his love that grew past platonic but he refuses to loose him because of his feelings as they continue to grow closer. they do eventually get tgt before all the other dreams show up and afterwards he starts to grow possessive now that he has to share saps attention

c!dream its a little more complicated (i assume this is after the c!dreamnap confrontation) he can't shake the fear he has of sapnap despite their looks being completely different. it helps a little but every time he hears his voice he can't help but shrink away to his room and completely avoid him it takes a lot of coaxing for him Tk finally open up and find healing and this new sapnap that's kind and understanding and do right by his wrongs in some fucked up way by treating sapnap they way his own deserved

Nightmare likes to be cheeky, a lot more confident and forward than cc!dream he liked to fluster sapnap a lot, enjoying how red his face gets at the simplest of touches. he hugs him a lot, kisses his cheek, whispers dirty things in his ears (and maybe he also is fuelled by the jealous looks dream give him from across the room) he feeds off the chaos he creates which includes minor pranks throughout the house

Blob is basically the size of patches and spends a lot of time with the kitties. When he's with sapnap while he's working on his PC he likes to stay on his shoulder, nuzzling into his neck and takes naps in his hair. everytime sapnap sees blob he takes off his hat to let him nestle in his soft hair which is not a privilege he gives most ppl. when they're lying down blob usually stays on his tummy or lap, loving the warmth his body provides

DreamXD is like nightmare but more tame. Unlike cc!dream, cc!sapnap reminds his a lot of c!sapnap but in a positive way, the way he speaks and carries himself. he likes talking to him about random topics, enjoying when he often goes off on tangents about random things. he treats him almost like a pet, petting his head randomly throughout the day or bringing little gifts to see him get excited. he's amused by his actions and can't help but be attached to his human ways

mh!dream is a mix of c!dreams feelings with cc!dreams fear. he's always on high alert around him, keeping a knife that none of them know about at his side incase sap decides to pull a fast one on him. it takes a while for the knoledge that this sapnap isn't here to kill him or hunt him down to sink in and that he can finally rebuild a friendship with his once best friend without the fear of being hunted just like old times

#idk if this makes any sence but yh😭😭 #c!dream meeting cc!sapnap is my favourite dynamic i think theirs so much angst potential dream whos scared shitless and sapnap whos just no #the wiser #idk how they all come tgt tho maybe a secret rift in the universe that end up being located at the dteam house #i am unable to write anything that isnt sapnap cetric 😭 #pigeon brainrot

[inkedroplets]

Wait what Lena/Peggy fic?!? I was scrolling and just had to stop and die a little at the possibility of this existing lol Lena Luthor and Peggy Carter? Two of my favorite characters ever? Together? Time travel? I don’t even care how, just want you to know I would read this ship soooo fast!

Not just time travel but Lena getting yeeted to another Earth.

I don't know where I would even begin to try and explain the plot spaghetti in my head. But essentially it would begin with Lena's portal watch malfunctioning and finding herself on a completely different Earth, scooped up by Coulson.

Much much later, (I cannot stress how much later) the time stone makes an appearance much later and Lena being Lena can't help but run a gamut of tests on it. Which sends her back in time where she happens to meet Peggy...

But here's a really brief snippet just for fun. It hasn't been edited at all and there's very little context but still:

“You wouldn’t happen to be an enhanced individual, would you, Miss Luthor?” Coulson asked

“I’m sorry?” Lena said, the first real hint of discernible irritation shining through her overly calm facade. “Where exactly are you looking, Agent Coulson?” She crossed her arms over her chest, the thin line that was her mouth somehow narrowing even further. There was a flicker of understanding and then horror that passed over Coulson’s face before his expression reverted back to that of a friendly but put-upon bureaucrat that would like nothing more than to punch out for the day. “At your file, Miss Luthor.” He held up a manila folder that he had obscured by his clipboard. “Or rather, what would be your file.” He tossed the empty folder down on the table. “The  problem is there’s nothing in it and not for lack of trying.”

“Does SHIELD not know how to use Google?” Lena glanced down at the empty folder wondering how anyone searching for the name ‘Luthor’  could come back with nothing to show for it. “Funnily enough we tried that too after we exhausted all other avenues. There is no record of, well, you, anywhere. Not a single hit on any of the databases my team scoured and before you try and impugn my team’s tech savviness again, our hacker was incredibly thorough. It's the first time I've seen her so perplexed,” he said. Instead of sounding annoyed or even angry he looked almost impressed. 

“So you think I'm lying,” Lena said, feeling that much was obvious. She was being interrogated, after all. Which was why it surprised her so much when Coulson shook his head. 

“No, Miss Luthor, on the contrary, I believe you are who you say you are. If you were going to try and obscure your identity with an alias, I assume you’d choose something less…” He looked down at his hands for a moment. 

“Less what?” 

“Less conspicuous. Lena. Luthor,” he said, enunciating each word clearly to hammer home the inherent strangeness in the symmetry of her name. 

“One of the many downsides of being a Luthor,” she said self-deprecatingly and gave a halfhearted shrug of apology. “Too many L’s.” 

Coulson who moments ago looked all too happy to let her ramble, perhaps hoping she might monologue her way into revealing something about herself held up a hand to stop her from continuing.

 “That's not the first time you've spoken as if that's supposed to mean something. Your last name,” he clarified. “Should it?” Of course it does, Lena thought bitterly.

#asks #my writing #would it surprise anyone that this would be another rift fic? #I still don't know how to tag this story #supercorp

[fleurrot]

I need more whump stories where the Whumper absolutely refuses to touch the Whumpee, not even going within 4 feet of them on most occasions. Whumper just wants Whumpee to themself but doesn't want to chance hurting them. All to the point that Whumper even scares off the people Whumpee surrounded themself with so that Whumper is the only one they recognize w

#im not finishing this. #i made this while drunk and i dont know where i was going with it. #take it as you wish. #CONTINUE as you wish. #psychologically torture your whumpee #isolate them until they know nobody but whumper and whumper doesnt even go near whumpee so in reality whumpee has nobody #whumper just watches #whump prompt #whump #writing prompt #half written writing prompt made while drunk #that should be a tag #rifts writing

[artblock-tm]

Redesigned my OC Yazmin recently :) she’s gotten SUCH an upgrade in how she looks

#doodle doodles #traditional art #oc: yazmin #and then it dawned on him #^ name of the story she features in #Broooo I need to finish shadow rift so then I can write for my OCs….. #ugh I need the world to know about Yazmin and Gemi and Switch they’re so goofy

[deityoftherain]

isn't that jimmy's hat? - Ranchers during Hermpires Rift Fanfic

Rating: Teen

Relationship: M/M

Archive Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Status: Completed Oneshot

Word Count: 2,751

Summary: Tango accidentally grabs Jimmy's hat when trying to grab the hat Shubble gave him and puts it on... oops?

Click here to read on Tumblr

@gumzau MADE ME A ABSOLUTELY STUNNING COMIC FOR THIS GO CHECK IT OUT https://www.tumblr.com/gumzau/748128729759399936/isnt-that-jimmys-hat-deityoftherain-empires

#deity writes #jimmy solidarity #tangotek #team ranchers #hermpires #the rift #hermitcraft #empires smp #double life smp #hermitcraft smp #double life #life series #traffic light smp #traffic smp #trafficblr #fanfic #traffic light series #traffic life #trafficshipping #traffic series #empires smp s2 #team rancher #ranchers duo #rancher duo #fanfiction #trafficfic #hermitfic #empiresfic

[kaitcake1289]

you are watching mythic quest season 3. i am watching the mythic quest season in my mind where cws death has an actual effect on most of the characters that prompts their development. we are not the same

#someone ask me to elaborate (PLEASE) #jk i’ll do it anyways #i just think that. for me death is something that is very emotional and to see it unutilised here is disappointing to say the least #like the fear of death coping with loss is something i KNOW these fuckers aren’t equipped to handle #and it doesn’t effect all of them and it’s not cw all centric #ian has a midlife crisis rachel loses her creative mentor david starts thinking about death and how people will #remember him (s2ep8 callback) we even saw brad moved at that bit to stay close to your friends! #poppy is too shunned to care dana is too emotionally healthy and doesn’t know cw that well jo. jo #david being in this state can also help brad show jo he’s weak (seeds of doubt in david’s leadership) #and ALSO dana not having an emotional reaction to cws death can also create #more of a rift between her and ian because it’s something she just can’t relate to #ian also mourning in silence also would’ve been so much fucking sadder after sarian knowing the two parental figures that admired and #inspired his creativity are gone #god #this show is evil anyways #also i have a long sad letter cw would write rachel from the grave would y’all like to see that #mythic quest #kaitlinshottakes #poppy li #brad bakshi #ian grimm #cw longbottom #jo mythic quest #rachel mythic quest #dana mythic quest

[riftfic]

16. Together Apart

The final chapter before the epilogue.

Warnings: strong language, injury

Featured Characters: Sans, Chara/Frisk (Reader), Papyrus, Toriel

I had a really hard time choosing a moment to illustrate that wouldn't be a total spoiler, so I made this instead and buried another illustration in the chapter itself for payoff. I think the epilogue is going to have 3 illustrations? I might be a masochist.

< Load | RESET | Continue >

Drifting incorporeal beleaguered the mind like a lengthy shortcut. No breath. No sight. No sound. Sans sensed your presence near him, conjoined with a red ribbon of fate . . . or was it determination that bound you now? It didn't matter. What mattered was that you each refused to let the other go.

You recognized this sensory deprivation chamber. You had lived this way for years buried behind yellow carpals, detached from a truly compatible form. The only word that had ever come close to describing it was "limbo." It was neither pleasant nor unpleasant, save for the tiresome pull at your resolve.

You could feel the time turner draining you, hungrier and hungrier. Even though your well of determination flowed ceaselessly, the machine very nearly outpaced you. Then, when the situation felt dire,  Sans' soul drew its attention away and allowed your supply to replenish. 

That greedy mechanism thought nothing of the lives fueling it. Just as it had guzzled down your determination, it drank dry from him. His determination did not rejuvenate as plentifully as yours; after all, he was only half the flesh and blood that grounded you. He still dusted when he fell. He still needed hope to survive. You refused to let it overdraft from him, as he had done for you.

It went on like this in an endless cycle. Whenever he nearly emptied, your determination caught fire and refilled his cup. Then he did the same for you, even if less impressively. Back and forth and back again, your collective determination fought valiantly, but slowly, steadily trickled down.

After what could have been years or seconds, that atrocity of metal and magic finally licked its lips with satisfaction. Your souls clung to one another, nearly spent, and yet determined to return to a world where you could forge ahead together. If the machine could listen, maybe it would take you there.

The white light finally dispersed into smaller and smaller fragments. The pieces drizzled in cold flakes from a crystal ceiling that looked nothing and everything like the stars. Snow. Sans stared up from where he lay and once again found it easy to imagine he soared through space. His head swam. His body felt stiff and immovable, pinned, though his arms wrapped around something warm. 

He dipped out of consciousness again. Though it felt like the blink of an eye, when he woke next the snow no longer fell, and a blanket of crystal white tucked him into a sharp and crooked bed. The warmth in his arms remained, though colder than before.

He clenched his eyes shut and grimaced. A cloud of dust and mist hacked its way out his mouth. He grunted to feel something jagged snaking between his ribs. Coughing only made it worse.

He turned his faded eye lights dizzily around him. Clearly he lay in Snowdin, though where or when escaped him. It took a moment to remember what had happened before the world went white, but when it finally returned to him, he bolted upright.

ouch.

That was a mistake. He huffed a gravelly breath and collapsed back into the rubble and snow that cocooned him. 

When he focused enough, he could make out what was left of the basement roof and the frame of his home in shambles. Fallen stalactites and crystals littered the ground among cracks in the earth. The machine stood resolutely where they had left it, though the lever had broken clean off and its monitor had shattered. 

He found the bravery to look down into his arms.

There you lay, alive, not spirited away into an alternate universe where you remained asleep forever under a golden flower garden. You must have fallen on top of him, your head where his stomach would be, your hands also bound to his sides. Albeit nearly as buried under plaster, wood, and other rubble, you breathed easily. 

"kid," he tried to say, but it hardly left him in a whisper. He shook you lightly instead. 

You didn't wake.

"frisk," he managed to force through whatever was stuck in his ribs. "wake up."

Your eyelids fluttered open. Pebbles once stones sprinkled off your head as you lifted it only inches. You took the same pause he had, calculating where you were, when you were. 

Sans' face split with a relieved smile when you moved. In the corner of your eye, you caught his expression and reflected it.

"We made it," you breathed with relief.

"sure did," he murmured. He coughed again and this time tasted a little magic. "shit."

"What's wrong?"

"mm . . . can't move," he hummed tiredly. "somethin's got me kabobbed in the ch . . . chest."

You also tried to sit up, but failed. The weight of what remained of his house pinned you down at the knees. You struggled just a moment longer, then dropped to rest your head against him wearily. Your soul ran nearly empty.

Sans' eyes felt heavy again. "you okay?" he murmured.

"Tired," you mumbled back. "Cold."

He nodded knowingly. The way his soul felt now, the ordeal must have pushed him just short of his limits. He couldn't imagine yours fared any better.

Slowly, painfully, he managed to free his arms from the wreckage. He pried the sleeves of his jacket off, then paused to catch his breath. Through clenched teeth, he mustered the strength to pull that indigo coat over his head amid a rain of snow and powder. He draped it gingerly across you like a blanket.

You had nearly fallen asleep again when its weight fell over you.

"don't worry, kiddo," you heard him wheeze faintly. "it's . . . gonna b . . . be . . ."

When he failed to continue, adrenaline sharpened your wits. You forced your eyes upward.

"Sans?"

He didn't answer.

You struggled upright again and pulled harder against the grave of debris gripping your legs in place. Sheets of wood and plaster slid away from you into the crossbeams of old rafters like a broken carapace. The rubble felt to cinch tighter around your legs. Just as you began to worry that moving did more harm than good, a crack and whump of falling bricks proved you right. 

The sensation that something had gone terribly wrong in your left leg shivered up your spine into the back of your head. It was a pitifully late messenger, warning you of the pain now flooding you with stars and dripping eyes. You cried out and collapsed under Sans’ jacket.

After a moment of gasping and crying, you remembered he needed you. You steeled your nerves. Shaking, you began peeling away pieces of the upper floor from his torso. The last block of wood revealed a jagged chunk of metal protruding from his core, straight through the bleeding heart graphic on his t-shirt. You worked your fingers into the fabric to rip it wider and see how you could fix this.

As the shirt split open, you realized this might be beyond your power to solve. The beam skewered his cavity at an angle from shoulder to hip, where it disappeared into that mess of a foundation. Though it had thankfully done its best to pass between the bone rather than through it, harsh abrasions tore across his ribcage and spine. A hairline fracture split three ribs and his collarbone where they met the sternum. His soul rested against the metal rod, slowly trickling cyan blue down the shaft. Its red interior had all but faded away, down to a faintly warm center. Its ruthless scars nearly faltered you.

You wrapped your trembling fingers around the icy metal and tugged outward slowly. Though he could not tell you if it hurt, the way his ribs clung to the rod and groaned like splintering wood gave you pause. Hadn’t you learned? What if moving it only made things worse?

You let go, and not entirely because you had meant to. Pain and weariness had surged in time to your pull on that harpoon, and the moment you braced to try again, you couldn’t hold onto anything anymore.

Every time you were aware enough to know it, you felt colder. At some point you must have slipped your arms into the sleeves of Sans’ coat and pulled the hood over your head. It slowed the inevitable chill that deepening pile of snow exhaled down your neck, but did not impede it altogether. You shivered, extremities tingling, numbing, burning.

You couldn't tell how much time passed. Nothing seemed to stir the air but the occasional flurry and the cold cave’s natural draft. The Underground sounded empty, and it very well could have been. The only comfort you found was in feeling Sans' bony body still lying whole beneath you, not dust, though not breathing either. A reassuring glimpse showed you that his soul no longer hemorrhaged magic, even if it glowed a little more dimly than before. 

In hours or days, voices finally stirred you back to the waking world through a thick fog. A warm light behind the wreckage mound flickered, tinting the darkness red. 

You opened your mouth but nothing came out. You were too tired, too weak. To your relief, they found you anyway. Your vision swam as if that fire rounding the corner were a mirage. You recognized Grillby, leading Papyrus and Undyne through the dark among several more monsters and . . . humans?  

A flurry of sound rattled your head, difficult to parse when fading in and out of consciousness as you did. You picked out tense voices, the whirring of machinery, the hum of magic, the crunch and shuffle of loose debris as it was thrown around and stomped. Suddenly you could breathe better. Suddenly you were warmer, safer, bundled in arms of fire that sank deep into your skin with purpose. The pain in your leg had dulled, though your head and mouth felt like cotton in exchange.

Through the din of screeching metal, you heard a hard, ironclad snap. You watched two firelit silhouettes carefully set aside a long metal rod stained blue and red. A glow of green illuminated Undyne’s scowling face from below. She was crouched over Sans, grumbling insults and curses under her breath. You listened to her mutter something about the damn skeleton not knowing how to stay in one piece for five seconds.

“. . . It’s . . . okay,” breathed a crackling voice overhead. 

You lifted your eyes to a pair of glasses over an expressionless wall of fire. You noticed that colors like blue and wine red accented Grillby’s flames in a way you’d never seen before—not that you had spent much time with him outside a few weekends and nights Sans visited with friends.

“. . . He’s going to . . . make it,” he hissed. A pop and flurry of golden sparks punctuated his sentence. “. . . You’re both . . . safe now.”

You hadn’t known you needed calming until those words spread through your soul like honey in hot tea. You breathed and relaxed, and in his arms you fell asleep more deeply than you had since lying in your old bed at the foot of Mount Ebott.

Through a third story window in Fresco Community Regional Hospital, North Medical Plaza, sunlight dappled in rays through palms and the near branches of a flowering tree. Birds chirped and twittered in an array of calls, from mockingbirds to sparrows and goldfinches. The occasional roll of tires on concrete, a humming engine, or voices outside the door buzzed gently through the air. 

Sans smelled the sterile saline-and-lemon scent of the hospital room first, a human phenomenon he hadn’t come to terms with as a monster. It bit at his sinuses, tart and bitter. Next, he felt the warmth of sunlight gently burning against his skull, dying the vision behind his closed left eye red like rose-tinted glasses. Too optimistic, he thought. He inhaled and winced. 

A rustle of paper to his right forced him to open his eyes. 

His gaze slowly circled the room with equal parts confusion and amazement. This was the surface; he couldn’t deny it. Humans had such a recognizable way of adorning public spaces, and while bland, the sight glittered to him now like gold. 

His ribs had been sutured and bandaged with hospital grade healing cloth, and his right arm crossed his midriff in a taut sling. Behind the semi-upright angle of his bed, machines that integrated human and monster technologies monitored his health. A drip of magic fed down a tube to his very soul, which felt full and satisfied. Strange, he thought, but not nearly as strange as the stacks upon stacks of flowers, various plant arrangements, and other get-well pleasantries stuffed into his room. He glimpsed notes from Doggo, Grillby, MK and his family, Shyren, Alphys . . . he swallowed the bashful flush sneaking onto his face.

After traveling from these gifts to the open window curtains to the television screen airing rerun morning game shows, his eye light finally came to rest beside his white-sheeted hospital bed. 

Papyrus sat cross-legged in a small armchair, immersed in a book of advanced sudoku puzzles. He wore fairly ordinary if gaudy human clothing: a snap-back cap embroidered with the meant-to-be-ironic statement, “full of life,” under a cartoon skull; a short sleeve button up with meatballs patterned on the left half and spaghetti graphics swirling on the right; the baggiest sweatpants Sans had ever seen; and Crocs absolutely littered with Jibbitz. Sans had known Papyrus to wear this sort of outfit on the surface before, but it had taken years to develop this much coordination behind it—and hadn’t he been the one to introduce him to sudoku, at a much simpler level no less? His face compressed as if this information tasted how the air smelled.

“you missed a three,” he muttered hoarsely. “row two, box one.”

Papyrus narrowed his eyes searchingly at the puzzle blocks, and then sighed. “REALLY, SANS, HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I ASKED YOU NOT TO SOLVE MY PUZZLES FOR ME?  IT TAKES ALL THE FUN OUT OF IT!”

He nearly spasmed out of his seat, then, as if struck by lightning. His book slapped the ground, and his pencil rolled away under his seat. 

“SANS!” he shrieked.

Sans smiled back warmly, nervously, somewhat worried for the state of his chest if his brother decided to hug him. He quickly realized that, although Papyrus leapt forward and wrapped his arms around his shoulders, he had nothing to worry about. The hold was soft, considerate. He held him back with his left arm, even if the motion dug like a knife into his collarbone.

Toriel burst into the room not a moment later. She too wore a dress that could be found in a human department store, royal purple and patterned with large yellow flowers. 

“What is going on?” she demanded, nearly frantic.

Sans smiled gleefully over Papyrus’ shoulder. He sheepishly wriggled the phalanges of his left hand in greeting.

“heh, ain’t like you not to knock, tori,” he teased.

“Oh, thank goodness,” she breathed with a purity of relief that echoed like pleasant bells around his skull. She exhaled a long, long sigh, hand on her chest, then glided to his bedside as if carried on a feather. “Thank goodness, Sans.” She slipped her arms around both brothers and rested her cheek on his skull.

Silence drifted over them comfortably.  

“um,” Sans ventured as they finally set him free. “i like your new threads. heh . . . get attired o’ the old stuff?”

Toriel and Papyrus exchanged hesitant glances. Sans felt his soul twist into knots.

“IT SEEMS,” said Papyrus, “WHEN TIME, ER . . . REWOUND . . . IT ONLY HAPPENED FOR US.”

Sans’ eye sockets darkened into black pits, only in small part because Papyrus knew about time travel. “what.”

“We left the mountain to find we already had homes here,” said Toriel. She gestured to her clothing. “Belongings. Entire lives left behind, though we cannot remember them.”

“IT’S THE STRANGEST THING, LIKE OPENING A PRESENT TO YOURSELF FROM THE FUTURE!”

The statement, while optimistic, settled heavy like lead on Sans’ soul. “you don’t remember any of it?” he asked slowly. “nothing new at all?”

“THINGS ARE . . . FAMILIAR,” said Papyrus. A puzzled look crossed his face. “IS THERE SOMETHING IN PARTICULAR YOU WANT ME TO REMEMBER?”

Sans’ heart sank. He became acutely aware of Toriel’s hand petting his arm and his brother’s hand in his. He watched Papyrus’ happy yet somehow somber expression and harkened back to a day so similar, when he had awakened in a hospital bed underground one brother fewer. Papyrus had been at his side then as he was now, blissfully unaware of what he had lost. 

“no,” he muttered. “suppose not.”

“The humans never forgot,” said Toriel gently. “From their perspective, we had quite literally vanished. Our homes remained empty for over six months, as if we had simply slipped away in the night without packing any bags. Some of us outright disappeared before their eyes.”

“the fuck,” Sans whispered. 

“LANGUAGE.” 

“how’d they deal with that?”

“Many moved on,” said Toriel. "I would have expected the rest to celebrate, but . . . they tried to find us. They scoured the city and the Underground for clues, but from their side it was abandoned. Strange, is it not?”

“I FOUND IT QUITE TOUCHING!” Papyrus said. “THEY EVEN FORMED A TASK FORCE! SOUL: SEARCH OPERATION FOR THE UNDERGROUND LOST.”

“heh, really?” Sans asked, beginning to find his humor again.

“YES, REALLY!”

“Everything is exactly as we left it,” said Toriel with a sad smile. “Likely a little dustier but . . . the activists were quite adamant about keeping our homes intact, and for that I am grateful.”

For a moment, he couldn’t think let alone respond. His left hand felt around the blankets as if searching out an emotion.

“it’s . . . exactly as we left it,” he echoed quietly. “time here . . . didn’t turn back.”

If he hadn’t been so stunned, Sans might have laughed. After all his hopelessness and despair, he wouldn’t have to rebuild his life from the ground up. He wouldn’t have to struggle as hard as he had before, and neither would anyone else. His heart pounded behind his battered ribs to know soon he would be going home, back to the small house in True Home, back to his porch swing with its perfect view of the forests and rivers below a range of mountains threatening to tear the sky in half, back to nights sandwiched on their maneater of a couch between Papyrus and . . . His joy stuttered.

“where’s Frisk?” he asked.

As if summoned, you appeared in the doorway, hobbling between a pair of children’s crutches. Your left leg had been set and wrapped in a bright blue cast from thigh to foot. Nearly every monster must have signed and graffitied its mold with paint pens and permanent ink. Above that, you wore a pale blue hospital gown and a scowl. 

“What’s going on?” you demanded. “Is Sans okay?” 

“Frisk, my child, what are you doing here?” Toriel admonished, albeit patiently. She hurried to you as if you might fall. “I requested that you stay behind and rest.”

“Yeah, fuck that.”

“My child!” Toriel gasped, and Papyrus’ jaw nearly dropped off his face.

Sans laughed, then, a grateful sound that had tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. His smile was so genuine that, if you hadn’t been so feisty and relieved, your heart might have fluttered away in its wind. 

“i’m better than okay, now that you’re here, kiddo,” he said fondly. 

Your steps were awkward, but you were determined to reach him. Nothing could stop you, not Toriel or those stupid crutches you had yet to master. At the bedside, Toriel finally relented and helped you sit on the mattress beside him. She squeezed your shoulder gently, reassuringly.

“THIS CHILD’S INAPPROPRIATE LANGUAGE IS YOUR FAULT, ISN’T IT?” Papyrus whispered, leering at his brother.

Sans attempted a sly shrug, but hissed an expletive when a stab of pain cut his collarbone. 

“CASE. IN. POINT.”

“Come, Papyrus. Let us give them some privacy,” Toriel said. “They have much to discuss, of that I am certain.”

Papyrus hesitated, but when Sans smiled and pressed his hand, he agreed to follow her out. The door shut behind them with a gentle snap. 

In the ensuing silence, the two of you simply took in each other’s faces, beaming like the sun you had unveiled once more. The daylight reddened your hair and yellowed the wall above Sans’ head in a steady shaft, as if to mark you both as its own. It would never let you leave again.

“you did it, kiddo,” he said as warmly as that nearest star. 

The congratulations prickled color into your cheeks, and though you smiled, you shook your head. “No, you did.”

“heh, you first.”

“I think last is what matters most.”

“coming in last does sound like me,” he mused playfully. The light of his left eye twinkled and he took your hand. “let’s compromise on a good old fashioned ‘we,’ then. we did it. how’s that?” 

You nodded brightly. 

He sighed, resting back comfortably into the sitting angle of his mattress. That truly lazy smile, the one he had faked for so long, now pulled at his cheekbones genuine and unprompted. Oh, how you had missed it. 

“get the sense i’ve been out a while,” he said. “what all have i snoozed on?”

Much had unfolded since waking nearly a week before him, and even more in the time preceding. After the barrier had broken and the rift had run rampant, the underground almost entirely collapsed. Thankfully, most monsters had already assembled in the capital to aid you. Among those trembling walls, Asgore needed no explanation to evacuate them. Meanwhile, Alphys had sent an alert to all else remaining, and monsterkind heeded her. 

Not everyone made it out in time. After unpacking what Toriel and Papyrus already explained, many humans had offered their unconditional help to find you. Alongside SOUL, Asgore established HEART, the Home Excavation and Recovery Team, which worked through the ruins to rescue anyone left behind. No one would be left unaccounted for.

“There are still people they can’t find,” you said somberly, and then a happy glimmer lit your eyes, “but a few more monsters showed up that no one expected. People that had been . . . forgotten.” 

Sans dared to let hope spark blue in his left eye. Through bated breath, he asked, “like . . . who?” 

You wracked your brain. “I don’t know their names,” you said. “A few scientists, a businessman . . . MK’s twin sister.”

Goner Kid. The machine beside him beeped when his magic pulsed faster than it should. 

“shut up, i’m fine,” he hissed and sat up straighter. “is that . . .” He hesitated, eyelight dimming. “did they find . . . anyone else?”

Your auburn eyes deepened, and it was enough of an answer. A resigned nod bobbed his head.

“They’re still looking,” you said. “I talked to dad—Asgore. He remembers now about your brother. I told him everything you did for me, and for Asriel. What you did for everyone, really. He’s grateful, Sans, like . . . tears in his eyes happy.” You tittered at your next thought. “I think he wants to knight you or something.” 

Sans snorted. “no way,” he said enthusiastically. “absolutely not. he damn well pressured me enough into the old man’s judge gig; i do not have the shoulders for another title.”

“What, ‘Sir Sans’ doesn’t have a nice ring to it?”

“i am a fan of alliteration,” he answered pensively. “maybe if he can tack on an adjective, like ‘sir sans the sedentary’ or . . . ‘sir sans the science man . . . s.’” 

“Sir Sans the Sensational?” 

“sir sans the slam.” He threw you a finger gun. “dunk on that, kid.”

You snickered. “You know how dad gets, though,” you went on. “He’s on a mission now. There’s still hope we’ll find him.”

Sans nodded, and for once he allowed himself to feel that hope. It was timid, and it was terrifying, but he had already reached the light at the end of this long tunnel. Only one more step and it would consume him fully.

As you brushed your thumb across his phalanges, your smile slowly fell.

“Sans,” you said, “there’s something really important I need to ask you.”

The skeleton searched you uncertainly. His mind dashed to the machine, to the final confrontation with Asriel, how he had come to retrieve his soul, how he had escaped the void with a task. If you accused him of manipulating you, it would not be unfounded, regardless of his motivations, regardless of the outcome. His eye lights dimmed. 

“well, shoot, kid,” he responded. “go for it.”

Your brow furrowed as if the thought were painful. Then, you gripped your broken leg and swung it around to rest across his lap.

“Will you sign my cast?” you burst.

Sans froze as if an error message had shorted his brain. Then, he chuckled from that place deep inside him, the laugh you liked most, the one that only happened when you had subverted his expectations beyond the bar. He grimaced past it and chortled, “ouch, kid; you’re breakin’ my funny bones, here.”

You held out a marker.

“permanent ink,” he noted. “dunno if i can handle that kind of responsibility.”

Once he had caught his breath, he eyed the wild graffiti incredulously. Where on earth would he sign it? Undyne had already carved her name across one half and Papyrus the other. Every other inch had been filled with good luck wishes, drawings, and signatures, from King Asgore himself to the humblest Froggit.

“eh, that’s okay,” he said with an easy smirk. “i think i’ve left enough of a mark on ya already.”

“But I saved you a spot!”

You had to search for a moment but finally you pointed out a tiny box by your knee with the small acronym “VIP” written just above it. 

His grin widened. 

“‘kay,” he said. 

He was wise enough to shrug with one shoulder now before popping the cap off the marker and lazily sketching a skeletal smiley face in the enclosure. You giggled with satisfaction. Then, perhaps hesitantly, he took your wrist in his hand. The breath in your lungs lingered as a circle appeared in black on the soft skin below your palm. Zero.

Your fingers traced the new counter to replace your old one. Maybe one day when you were older, you would have it tattooed there. For now, the gesture spoke more than words could. You returned the gentle smile in his eyes.

“gonna be a real treat teleporting you to your room and back when we get home,” he mused dryly. He punctuated his statement with the sealing click of your marker cap. “ain’t nothin’ handicap-accessible about those stairs.”

As he handed it back to you, your face sobered again in earnest. You slid the pen into the pocket in your hospital gown, stalling. 

“I do have something I want to tell you,” you said.

Sans eyed you expectantly. The sun had shifted down to highlight his bandaged chest and captive arm. Everything you had put him through, all he had done for you, only further embittered the taste of your next words.

“I think,” you said slowly, “I’m going to move in with mom . . . this time.”

“oh.” 

An invisible weight dragged down on his shoulders, heavy with too many emotions to place. Confusion, sadness, regret. Heartache. He failed to answer why the decision had caught him off guard when the reasons seemed so obvious now. He pondered his response, struggling to hide the painful disappointment that crawled through his marrow. 

“that . . . would be good for her,” he said hoarsely at long last. He cleared his throat. “yeah. makes sense. especially now, with your memories and all.” He avoided your eyes another pensive moment. “you’ll probably want your stuff, then. heh, clothes won’t fit for a while, though—”

Suddenly you were hanging off him, your chin tucked into the nape of his neck, your arms around his shoulders. 

Sans didn’t understand why he was crying. You weren’t leaving him forever. You would be living right down the road. He would still see you. He would still take you out for burgers and stargazing and summer nicecream beach trips. You would still have movie marathons and sit on the porch swing to watch the sunset. You would still be his kid . . . wouldn’t you? 

He wrapped both arms around you, sling and all. Even though it hurt like hell, the alternative would have broken him.

“you come over or spend the night whenever you want, okay?” he wept. “call me if you get nightmares. heck, call me if you just want to talk. i don’t give a damn what time it is. and . . . and be nice to your mom, okay? don’t give her that attitude i saw earlier. you can be a real piece of work when you’re upset and she doesn’t deserve that. a-and . . .” He choked on his next words. “don’t . . . don’t forget i love you. please. i might be a cynical bastard but i love you so much it hurts. i really do.”

Now you were crying. You could hear the plea in his voice not to leave him and most of you answered in kind. After everything you had been through together, leaving his side—even for a moment—had become almost unthinkable. 

It couldn’t be helped. You knew that and you hated it but it would be for the best. Your adopted mother and father, though separated, recognized who you really were now. Asriel had finally come home. Choosing to live with Sans over Toriel now would be a crime far more cruel.

You agreed to his terms a hundred times over.

The two of you sobbed into a wet mess in each other’s arms. Finally, finally, after ages resisting, he couldn’t handle the teeth in his chest any longer. You helped him reposition the sling, and he held your hand instead. From inside his blue-flushed eye sockets, those bright lights peered through the tears in your own red-rimmed eyes.

“hey,” he said gently with a voice like gravel. “we’re gonna be okay. all right?”

You nodded.

He reached out a thumb and wiped the remaining saltwater from your eyelashes.

“i’m here for you,” he said. “i’ll always be here for you. where you live won’t ever change that.” He swallowed back another surge of tears and hissed, “heck if i’m not gonna miss you, though.”

“Me too,” you breathed.

“Frisk?” called Toriel. She popped her head cautiously into the room. “Come, now; let me take you back to your room. You should be resting, and so should Sans.”

“Okay, mom,” you answered shakily.

You bent in for another terribly long, though bitterly short embrace. He held you to his heart with the intent to keep you there forever if he could . . . but he could not. So instead, he settled for your shoulders at arm’s length and smiled a loose, endearing scrawl of a grin. He cupped your face in his hand. 

“you’ll always be my kid, right?” he asked through a stone in his throat.

You nodded and melted your cheek into his bony palm. You remembered the first time he had done this, when you were small enough in age to match your stature, how it had been frightening and surprising and heartwarming in one. Now, you could only describe the feeling as “home.” 

“I love you, Sans,” you finally told him, and you realized all at once you never had.

“i love you too, frisk.”

For the first time since falling down, you allowed yourself to believe it.

NOTES

YAY, resolution! Next is the epilogue. <3

I hope you enjoyed! If you have thoughts, I love hearing them.

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#riftfic #rift #undertale #ut #undertale fanfiction #undertale fan art #sans #frisk #papyrus #toriel #my art #my writing #creative writing