//------------------------------// // 9 Joy and sorrow // Story: A new chance at one HP // by Emeraldleafeon //------------------------------// Canterlot Castle, Sans’ room 5 days later Sans sat up in his new bed, blinking in confusion at the bright, early morning sunlight. ‘what the heck is… oh, right. sun. that’s a thing up here. I’m still not quite used to that… maybe I should get some curtains or something. those windows overlooking the courtyard are pretty and all but it isn’t so nice when you’re trying to get some sleep.’ Sans flopped back down in the bed, ‘I really should get up, but-’ A knock sounded at his doors interrupting his thoughts. “Mr. Sans, I am here to clean your room! Are you awake yet?” ‘guess that settles that argument,’ the skeleton grumbled to himself, before responding with, “yeh, I’m up. just gimme a moment.” He rolled to the edge of the bed and pushed himself into a sitting position once again. Standing up, he walked over to the closet and grabbed one of the many identical blue jackets that one of Celestia’s friends had made for him. She had supposedly made a fuss about making such a bland creation (with such unusual sleeve placements), but Sans had insisted on keeping it simple. He pulled it over his shoulders, calling out to the voice, “k, you can come in now!” The maid walked into the room and gasped in horror. “There is so much trash here!” she then scanned the room more and saw the self sustaining tornado of junk. “I... I don’t even...” Sans just shrugged, “it's like my old room. you can clean up what you want, just be sure to leave the tornado and the socks in the corner. I’m gonna head out and see the Celestia, cya later.” As Sans left he noticed her walk into the room with a slight limp and decided to use a Judge on the pony’s stats. Another skill he had kept hidden from Celestia. All monsters could naturally perform Checks (the most basic of spells), but Judges went deeper, actually being able to see EXP and LV. Not many could use them, but Sans had been required to learn before being hired for Last Corridor duty. ‘Clean Sweep. LV 1, EXP 0. HP 16/20, ATK 4, DEF 2. Maid for the royal family. Don’t trust her eyes, this “pony” seems suspicious.’ Sans blinked at the description. ‘That’s, uh... not what I expected. wonder what that's all about?’ Seeing that the maid had flinched, he noted to himself, ‘I’ll probably have to look into this for myself. she can sense my Judgement...’ With that thought behind him, he left the room. Canterlot Castle Throne Room Celestia was preparing for another round of complaints to come from her little ponies, a necessary job for her to perform. Did she truly deserve to be Princess, if she couldn’t be there for her subjects? She did have to wonder at times if some of the cases that came before her could have been solved somewhere else, though, as many of them required nothing more than a little common sense… Seriously! Who lets their own pet rabbits run free in their own carrot patch and then comes to complain about thieves constantly stealing their carrots and only leaving the tops behind? As she was getting ready to see the next inquiry a small bipedal skeleton came in through one of the side doors. Celestia smiled, this would certainly liven things up when a noble came in to complain. She leaned down to the guard next to her. “Private Swift Shot, would you please get a seat for our guest who has arrived from the dignitary wing? I think that he might like to sit in on some of today’s proceedings.” “It will be done, your honour.” With that, the private nodded and headed of to grab a chair from a side room. Sans walked up to the throne. “hey celestia, how ya doin’ today?” Celestia smiled, “Much better now that I have someone to keep me company while dealing with all the proceedings, I hope you will be able to stick around as a sort of ‘adviser’ to me as I go through court cases.” “so, I just gotta sit here and sometimes talk about things?” Sans blinked. “gotta say, this is looking up to be one of the easier jobs I’ve had.” “You won’t be saying that for long,” she whispered to him. Before he could comment on the ominous message, the guard returned with a seat. Celestia directed him to place it next to the throne for Sans to sit in. “Now,” Celestia looked up, “Bring in the next case.” Several hours later… Sans groaned, putting one arm over his head and pulled. He may not have had muscles, but stretching still felt good after sitting in place for that long. ‘don’t think I’ve ever worked for that long in one sitting,’ he mused. ‘I guess having someone to split the load with really does help the time go by. or it could be time magic. you never know.’ “So Sans, how was the ‘work’ today? Not as bad as you thought it would be?” Sans waved it off casually. “it was kinda fun to be able to work with a friend, to be honest.” If he had been paying attention, he would have been very impressed at the synchronized spit-take that the guards did. Especially considering they weren’t drinking anything. “guess sharing the load helps the hours go by.” Celestia smiled. “A friend does help the time pass, doesn’t it? Would you be willing to come back and do this more often?” Before Sans could reply a voice sounded out in the room that caused all the guards to flinch. “AUNTIE!” Celestia facehooved while Sans glanced around for where the voice came from. Celestia looked over at the door that Sans had entered from several hours ago, seeing a blond unicorn walk into the room with his nose held high. She sighed in resignation, hoping her nephew wouldn’t bother Sans too much. Sans on the other hand couldn’t help but start to think of all the pranks he could pull on this unicorn. Not that he would. Not yet, anyway. “Auntie, one of the maids put one of my tuxedos away in the wrong drawer! This has been after I told her to put them away in the correct drawer several times! It’s clear that she is incompetent at her position, and I want her gone and replaced with someone who can do the job-” Blueblood cut himself off as he noticed the skeleton in the room. “AHHHHH! AUNTIE!! A MONSTER, KILL IT WITH YOUR MAGIC!!” He shrieked. Sans noticed a spider crawling along the floor just in front of Blueblood, and chuckled. “hey, that’s not very nice, it’s just a spider. it’s probably just trying to make some money for its family.” Blueblood shrieked again as he saw the spider and ran out of the room, crying about ‘two abominations in the same room’. Celestia looked down at Sans, secretly pleased at how it went compared to how it could have. “Well, Sans… you have now met my nephew, Blueblood. As you may have noticed, he has a rather… disagreeable attitude.” “yeah, I remember you mentioning that before. not gonna lie to you, I already have some pranks I wanna pull on him. like, uh… dying his whole coat a beautiful shade of green. I think green might really be his color.” Sans stuck his hands in his pockets, shrugging. Somehow, these two actions didn’t conflict. “but I guess that’ll have to wait for another time. you also said that he was your nephew, so does that make him a prince or a duke or something?” The solar alicorn sighed. “Yes, he is a prince and he is my nephew, not by blood though. I adopted his Great-great-great-great grandfather while he was just a foal when Luna was stuck on the moon, they have been in line for the throne for centuries. They serve mostly a ceremonial role now that Luna is back.” “not to be rude, but he seemed kind of… entitled, and I don’t think he’s got any idea how to act too.” Celestia just shook her head remorsefully. “I was more focused on raising my student, rather than watching over my nephew. I probably should have spent more time with him. He needed someone to correct him when he acted out… We still love him, even though he acts this way.” “that’s nice of ya.” Sans idly wondered how Blueblood and Jerry would have gotten along, before shaking those thoughts away. No point pretending, and daydreaming about the impossible. “welp, I’m gonna head on back to my room. hope you have a good rest of the day, I’m gonna take a nap.” Celestia chuckled. “Goodbye Sans. Have a nice nap.” Underground True Lab As the elevator went back up, Monster Kid turned to Alphys. “Yo, I… I still don’t understand how we’re gonna do this… She can basically turn back time and stop something before we can do anything. Not even Undyne could beat her! UNDYNE! How are we gonna beat that?” “Here’s how it’ll work, Kid.” Monster Kid looked over at his fellow captive, who hadn’t looked away from her project. “Chara is only able to go back to one point in time, and only in certain places.” “It’s true,” Flowey cut in. “You can’t Save wherever you want, it’s only in certain areas. And for her, the closest Save point is above the True Lab and outside the normal lab. And she can only have one Save File active at once; if she had the power of multiple Souls, she’d have more Files available to her.” “We are going to wait for her to go in the elevator,” Alphys continued. “We know that Chara’s save point is around forty-five seconds away, so taking into account the travel time for the elevator and her walking we can estimate that we have to set the bomb for one minute when she leaves. We’ll then go through the portal thirty seconds after she goes in the elevator. By the time Chara saves we will already be gone and the bomb will have fifteen seconds left. With fifteen seconds Chara won’t have enough time to get back and disarm the bomb, no matter how many times she resets. That’s the only hope we have.” Flowey chuckled, darkly and humorlessly. “All our hopes are riding on one slim chance. And we’ve gotta do it fast; you’ve only got one day left. ...Thankfully, that gives us the chance we need. Chara and I…” The flower hesitated, before continuing on. “We’re very similar. And if she’s anything like I am, she’ll want to taunt us. Like a cat toying with a mouse. She’ll come down. Mention the deadline. Probably make a pun about knives to spite us, knowing her. And then she’ll leave, we’ll plant the bomb and go through, and that’s game.” “But…” Monster Kid’s eyes shone, filled with worry. “What if it fails?” “Then we’re dead.” Monster Kid wished he could have been shocked at the cold tone Alphys had taken, but he wasn’t. She had been like this for a while. “But we WON’T die. We’ll do this, and save ourselves.” Her eyes shone too, not with worry, but with something else. “We have to.” Alphys and her friends were filled with DETERMINATION.