Canterlot Castle, Medical Wing
Celestia spun around quickly. "You're awake!?" she asked excitedly. Finally, it was time for her to get some answers.
The skeleton's eyes were glowing dimly, its ever-showing teeth seemed to form a shallow grin. "seems like it, pony," it said weakly, "I'm awake for once, alive as ever, and kinda confused as to why."
Celestia walked up to the edge of the bedside and sat down on one of the few chairs in the room. "To be honest,” she said, “we are just as confused as you. You simply appeared out of nowhere in the middle of our garden in a critical state. We have tried to patch you up as best we can, Mr...?"
The skeleton attempted to move one of its arms, but stopped when a stab of pain went through it. It let its arm fall back down and said, "name's sans, sans the skeleton. i'd like to deliver on my previous offer-" he glanced down at the giant slash in his chest- "but tibia little bit honest I don't think I'm up to the task."
Celestia giggled a bit at the skeleton's pun. She was worried at first, but he seemed to be likeable enough. "I am Princess Celestia, co-ruler of the land of Equestria. It is a pleasure to meet you Sans."
Sans eyes widened at this revelation. "a princess, huh? if I knew i was going to be in the presence of royalty after that fight I might have worn some better clothes. right now they're just the barebones of my wardrobe. i don’t suppose you’re as easygoing as asgore?” Celestia looked confused. “hmm, that look on your face… you have no idea who i’m talking about, do you? guessin’ you don’t know anybody else, either, like undyne or papy-" Sans jumped in panic and began to look around frantically, "oh, shoot! where is it, where is it, where is it?!"
Celestia stood up and looked at the skeleton curiously. "Where is what? Are you missing something?"
Sans looked back up at Alicorn speaking rapidly, attempting to push himself into a higher position as to see better. "a red scarf. Was there a red scarf with me when I was in your garden?” His voice took on a more serious tone, somehow, and his eyes darkened. “I NEED that scarf."
Celestia was slightly taken aback by this. Why would the skeleton need a scarf? He was clutching it whenever he was found, but she wouldn't think that a skeleton would get cold and need a scarf. Getting cold isn’t really something bones do. Then again, bones aren’t normally made out of raw magic, either. Shoving those thoughts to the back of her mind, she placed her two forehooves on the worried skeleton's shoulders, gently pushing him back to a lying down position. "Sans, please stay resting. You’re still wounded. Yes there was a scarf in your hand when we found you. We have it in the forensics lab now. We initially thought you had been killed and your body had been placed in our garden I can have it retrieved it if you would like. May I ask why you would need a scarf though? Are you cold right now?"
Sans cringed in pain as he gently set himself back down. "no, i'm not cold, and yes, please. i would like you to retrieve papy- I mean the scarf."
Celestia looked at the skeleton for a little bit, whose mood had been significantly reduced from his previously happy state. She then turned, walked out to the hall and spoke to one of the guards by the door. "Corporal, I need you to go retrieve the red scarf from the forensics lab and bring it to me."
The guard saluted. "It will be done, your majesty." He then galloped off towards the lab in all haste.
Celestia walked back into the room, "Sans, I have a question for you. You had said you were fighting someone before you were brought here, I can only assume that they were the ones to do this-" she gestured to the massive gash- "to you. I would like to know why you were fighting them. From the very, very limited view of you that I have seen so far, you don't seem like the type of person that would try to fight somepony. Why were you doing it? ...Does it have anything to do with the ‘Papy’ you keep mentioning?"
Sans haltingly sat up, his right suddenly going dark and his left eye glowing with an eerie blue light glaring down at his legs. Celestia took a step back; the amount of rage on his face was immense. His voice was perhaps the most serious she had heard from him, or in general. "That kid, that DEMON child, it took EVERYTHING from us." His voice began to quaver. "It took Mettaton, it took Undyne, it took the voice from the door... it didn’t even think to spare anything in its path, and it even went out of its way to try and kill every last creature before moving on. My brother, Papyrus, tried to talk to it..." Sans eye was now a burning a color of blue beyond what Celestia had ever seen. Even from there, she could sense the fury and magic emanating from him. "It sliced his head from his body without a second thought." Tears were now running from Sans eye sockets. "He only wanted to be friends! AND IT KILLED HIM! IT KILLED HIM! WHY?" Sans began openly sobbing.
Celestia stepped back towards Sans, lifted him up in her magic and slid him over so she could sit alongside him. She wrapped her wing around him and began to gently rock him back and forth. "Shhh, it's alright, I'm here." Truth be told, Celestia did not have very much experience with situations like this, but she knew what Sans needed most right now was a shoulder to cry on.
Sans continued to sob, tears of brilliant blue magic flowing openly. "I would have been dead too, if I hadn't been pulled here. May God have mercy on the souls of the rest of the monsters in the underground. Even if they are hiding, they will eventually run out of food. They don’t deserve to die in that way, no one does."
Just then the guard ran in with the scarf, only to see the skeleton crying and his leader hugging it. "Umm, I'll just leave this here," he mouthed to Celestia. He set the scarf on a table in the room, then rapidly backpedaled out.
Celestia lifted up the scarf in her magic and brought it to Sans, wrapping it loosely around his neck. Sans continued to cry softly, clutching the scarf as if it was his only lifeline while being wrapped in Celestia’s comforting wing.
After about an hour of slowly rocking back and forth and quiet sobbing, Sans finally fell asleep. Celestia slowly lowered him down so he could rest. At that moment Luna walked in.
"Tia, what are you doing here? We need to lower the sun and raise the moon."
Celestia gripped Luna's muzzle tightly with her magic and pointed to the sleeping skeleton. She then gestured for Luna to follow her out of the room.
When they were out of the room Luna immediately began to question Celestia."Tia, what was that all about? Did the skeleton awaken after I went to sleep?"
"Yes Luna, the skeleton did awaken,” Celestia responded. “I was able to have a short chat with him and find out a few things about him. First off, his name is Sans. He says he knows no more about how he got here than we do."
“Secondly, I would like for you to specifically look into his dreams and make sure that no nightmares happen to him. From what he has told me, he has gone through some serious hardships."
Luna looked confused, "Hardships? Of what sort?"
Celestia sighed, "He told me how his entire society was being slaughtered by a ’demon.’ What exactly this entails I do not know. He claimed to have watched his brother be decapitated by the monster after attempting to make friends with it. He also says that many of his friends were killed by it too, and those that are left hiding in his community are trapped with no way out. They are being starved to death without any support.” The princess shook her head sadly. “The amount of trauma that Sans has gone through has not been seen by the ponies of our land since the unification days. I would like to be able to get a psychiatrist in here to be able to talk to him about what happened. That and find out what kind of a threat the creature that he spoke of is to us. If that demon were to be able to get here as well..."
“Well,” Luna said, “chances are the skeleton’s arrival- Sans, was it?- is due to the taller skeleton that, er, died earlier. Without him, there should be no way for this ‘demon’ to come to our world. We should be safe from it.”
Underground, Judgement Hall
Chara was confused. Why wasn't she at LV 20 yet? It made no sense. She had finally hit the annoying comedian. She had seen him hobble off to die. It wasn’t that the comedian didn’t give enough EXP. Chara’d already checked, not a single extra point had even been gained. Something was different from the rest of the timelines... For one thing, the comedian didn’t give any EXP. For another, the underground lost its power a few moments after she hit him and saved. What was going on?
She walked back towards the core and was shocked to see the core itself was torn open. She backed up slightly, gripping the real knife tightly. "This, this is not normal," she muttered to herself, before grinning. "Finally, something new! This should be fun.."