//------------------------------// // 19 Desperation and Joy // Story: A new chance at one HP // by Emeraldleafeon //------------------------------// Crystal Empire Chara stepped out of the castle, idly stretching her arms. At the peak of the stretch, Chara could hear her joints popping, making a satisfying sound. It felt nice to stretch. Red eyes glinted dangerously off the knife in her hand, reflecting the sunlight. Last night had been… busy, all things considered. The, now former, occupants of the castle had tried to resist her. It went about as well as everyone else’s attempts at resistance. Which is to say not at all, she thought, just a tiny bit smugly. None of them had even gotten close to causing her a reset. The child sighed and shook her head. After yesterday’s boring events, maybe the town would be more interesting. She had noticed that ever since she had killed that dark king the castle got a bit brighter and more of those ‘ponies’ were walking about. Her smile from her previous day’s work was returning. “Don’t you worry comedian,” the child spoke in a tone not meant for anyone to hear. “Once I’m done with my new friends here, I will be sure to pay you a visit. That is a promise!” If one was to view from afar, all they would have seen was a small green dot move down the stairwell and into the town. But even from that distance, they would have no troubles hearing the screams. Canterlot Castle Sans awoke slowly, the light from the window making him blink. The sun cast a gentle warmth on him as he slowly rose. The skeleton thought for a moment, before flopping back down. Too early to get up. “Oh, I’m sorry sans, I didn’t mean to wake you,” a soft voice whispered to him from the right. “I had to do my morning duties.” “mmm?” The skeleton groaned and rolled over. “‘s ok, you didn’t know i was gonna get up, had to wake up sometime...” Sans, against his better wishes, rose back up from his pillow. He looked over at Celestia, who was now sitting next to him. “guess this would be the best way for me to wake up.” He sat up and stretched, listening to his joints pop. The solar goddess smiled, “I guess it was. You really needed that sleep, didn’t you, Sans?” She nuzzled the skeleton as her wings enveloped him. “We’re all here for you, Sans. Luna, Papyrus, Heart Savior, Monster Kid, Alphys… I’m sure even Flowey is in support of you.” Celestia leaned in and looked directly into Sans’ eye sockets, “Sans, I’m here for you. I care about you more than you know. I will always be here for you.” Sans blinked, smiled and then leaned into Celestia, “thanks…” he whispered softly, before sighing. “it’s just… this whole thing… I just feel so emotionally drained. more than usual. can’t even make a pun.” The skeleton looked around the room, “where’s pappy at?” Celestia hummed in thought. “I believe he mentioned something about a ‘feel betteri spaghetti’ or something like that. Luna asked him what that was and he seemed to freeze for a moment…” The alicorn grew a devilish grin. “Papyrus had wrapped himself around Luna and proclaimed what it was. I believe it was something along the lines of-” Celestia puffed out her chest- “THIS SHALL NOT DO, LARGE BLUE PONY, YOU SHALL ENJOY THE FEEL BETTERI SPAGHETTI TOO! YOU SHALL BECOME THE GREAT PAPYRUS’S APPRENTICE FOR LEARNING THE SECRETS OF PASTA AND ITS GLORY!” Celestia sat back down, having spread her wings at some point in that sentence. “After that, he ran off with Luna to what I assume was the royal kitchen.  That was around… ten minutes ago, I’m not sure when they will be back.” “the staff are gonna love that I’m sure,” Sans chuckled. Celestia’s grin remained, although it was less impish and more motherly. “Ah yes, I’m sure those two will have a grand time together. I’m also just as sure the kitchen staff will have just as grand a time cleaning up Luna’s mess. They’ve had to do it often enough in the past.” Celestia’s eyes grew distant. “When we were younger, before the Nightmare Moon disaster happened, Luna loved to ‘cook.’ More often than not though all she accomplished was making a barely edible ‘meal’ and dirtying up half of the dishes in the kitchen. Did you know she once put salt and garden herbs in a cake?” The older sibling shook her head. “Ever since she’s come back she hasn’t had time to enjoy her old hobby, she’s been far to wrapped up in catching up with the modern era. I hope this will allow for her to lighten up a bit.” Sans continued to smile, “yah, papyrus is pretty much the same way… loved to make his spaghetti. our fridge was always halfway full of noodles and sauce. never actually ate the stuff… he just wanted to share it with everyone around him. in fact, when that demon came down…” Sans stopped talking for a moment. Celestia cleared her throat, and Sans nodded. “when it came down, he tried to give it a plate. he even went out and got a microwave, asked alph for stickers so he could make all of the settings say spaghetti. he figured it’d make them laugh. “of course that little demon blew past all of his work and killed him.” Sans’ fists clenched tightly, his face now having formed a tight grimace. “and now that brat is here and saved. nothing short of a miracle is going to save us now.” He flopped back down on the bed, his arms forming a ‘t’. “it just seems so… pointless now. I couldn’t beat them, flowey didn’t stand a chance, undyne died saving monster kid. what are we gonna do?” Celestia’s face had grown dark during the latter half of her friend’s monologue. She grabbed the defeated skeleton with her magic, and lifted him into a sitting position facing her, though his head remained downcast. When she let him go he flopped back down. Exasperated, she instead grabbed him with her hooves and held him up. “Don’t EVER think like that, we will find a way to stop them. Life is not pointless, I can promise you that. I know how you feel right now, to feel like everything you love is ripped or going to be ripped away from you. I had to send my sister away for a millenium. Life isn’t always fair, but we are able to overcome that. Sans, ponies care about you. I care about you.” She used her hooves to lift his skull. “I love you, Sans, and I don’t want to see anything happen to you. We will get through this and we will stop them.” The alicorn stopped her tirade. Sans blinked, looking up at her. If he had eyebrows, they’d be raised. “you know, tia… if you wanted me to not focus on the bad stuff, gotta say, dropping a bomb is a good way of doing it.” Celestia turned to look at the skeleton in a questioning manner. “you did notice the elephant in that sentence, right? the l-word?” The solar alicorn’s face turned the same shade of lovely pink that her sunrise was right now. “Well…umm… Would you like for me to take it back and try again later?” The skeleton shook his head. “nah, what’s done is done. redoin’ things leaves a bad taste in my mouth.” His face turned a light shade of blue, barely noticable. “besides, can’t say with absolute certainty that I don’t feel the same, so your confession worked. I think. so, uh, thanks. but that is gonna have to wait until this is all over.” Celestia frowned her previous blush mostly gone. “I agree, we need to stop them before we are able to do anything else… I have sent some of the ERAF scouts up to the North for flyovers of the Crystal Empire. The initial run should be back in a few hours, hopefully they will give us an idea in the empire. I hope the empire isn’t completely gone…” The small skeleton shook his head. “tt's definitely not completely gone, at least not yet. the empire is way bigger than the underground and it took the kid several days to clear it out.” Sans clenched his hands. “it’s always thorough. we’d probably have about two or three weeks before she would show up, and that’s if we don’t do anything.” Sans’ eye glowed, faintly but visible. “before, I was mostly fightin’ them out of spite. didn’t like them, wanted them to be punished. but now? that place had an evil overlord for years, and it was just taken out. I wouldn’t want to have my first few hours of freedom to be living in fear of death by some creep with a knife. they probably don’t either.” Celestia looked thoughtful for a moment, glancing at Sans. "I don’t want to raise your hopes,” she began,” but the Elements of Harmony might have some effect. They did stop Nightmare Moon and Discord, they might be able to stop Chara.” “they’re those gems from the history books, right?” At the princess’ nod, Sans sat silently for a moment, before continuing. “I’m not sure they would work… but there’s no proof that they wouldn’t. the elements are really powerful, world altering even, but I’m not sure it would be enough to stop them. no matter how strong they are, they can’t turn back time like it can. planning will be basically useless. chara’s forcing us into a dangerous game, and the only winning move is not to play. she’s making sure we do.” The skeleton put his hands to his skull. “urgh, I just don’t know what to do. ‘m not fit for a guard or a planner. I’m just a lazy guy with cool tricks.” Celestia put a wings around Sans again. “I’ll start having some of my officers thinking about what to do,” she assured him. “They’ll be briefed about what they are up against. Don’t worry about this for right now. We have dealt with world ending enemies before. This one won’t be any-” Celestia paused. “Well, I’m not going to say this won't be any different, this is certainly more terrifying. But it is beatable. We will find a way. Now, lets get breakfast.” “sounds like a plan,” Sans agreed. 4 hours later, Canterlot Castle Throne Room “You want us to do what?” “you heard me, purple smart,” Sans said. “trust me, I like it as much as you do.” Rainbow Dash hovered, quivering in excitement. “So we beat Nightmare Moon, Discord, and now we get to beat the guy that killed Sombra!?” She cut off the skeleton before he could reply to Twilight. “We’re breaking records here! Just imagine the look on that guy’s face when we blast ‘em!” “not as much as she does, though,” Sans muttered. Twilight turned to her friend, incredulous. “Rainbow Dash, you realize that we are fighting something on a different scale here? This ‘Chara’ is basically controlling time. We have to fight a TIME MANIPULATOR!” “I know right?” Rainbow cried. “We’re gonna be so cool! They’re gonna be all like, ‘You can’t stop me I control time’, then we’ll be like ‘Oh yah? Watch this!’ and then we’re gonna activate the elements and they’ll be all rainbowy and they’ll be like, ‘NOOOO, my powers!’” Rainbow Dash stopped flapping her wings and fell to the ground dramatically with a hoof in the air. “They’re gonna be all ‘Bleg…’ and skeletony’ll be all like “you hurt a lot of ponies and that was a mistake, and we’ll be like ‘We showed you!’ Ha ha! This is going to be awesome!” Twilight facehooved. “Rainbow, what Ah think what Twiligh’ means is that th’ time warper might be able ta stop our powers with their time stuff,” Applejack replied for the exasperated purple unicorn. “YES! My point exactly! Thank you Applejack!” Sans cut in. “listen, I know you may not like doing this, but as of right now you are the last shot we have of beating this thing. if you don’t stop chara here and now she’s only going to get stronger. I could only stall her at LV19- if she gets to 20, everything is doomed. there’s a strong possibility that a lot of ponies are going to die if you fail. actually, we’ll all die if you gals don’t stop her.” Applejack paled at the tone of his voice. Dash glared at Twilight, “See? We need to kick this creep’s flank! All we have to do is fire the elements at this thing and we get a new window!” “not quite,” Sans muttered. “were it so easy, I wouldn’t be here in the first place. this isn’t gonna be easy, believe me. if it were, I’d have stopped them in the underground myself.” Rarity looked up at Celestia who was sitting on the throne. “So when are we going, your majesty?” Celestia looked down, “We are waiting for more information. Once we received word from the scouts, we are going to strike. As of now we are going to be waiting for the next couple of hours, then we will launch the strike.”