The Judgment Hall was silent.
Not the kind of silence you find in a library or a sleeping forest.
No, this was the silence after something terrible happens. The kind that settles like a heavy fog after screaming has stopped. After laughter has died. After everyone is gone.
Golden petals littered the floor, crushed beneath silent steps. Light streamed in through the high windows, the kind of warm gold that once meant hope.
Now it looked like the color of old bones.
At the far end of the hall, Sans waited. Slouched as always, hoodie loose around his frame, one slippered foot resting on the opposite knee. Arms crossed. Grin in place.
But his eye sockets were shadowed.
As the human entered, knife in hand, eyes empty, he let out a slow, almost amused breath.
"heh."
He didn't move. Didn't stand. Just spoke, voice low and worn thin.
"so. you finally made it."
The human stopped a few feet away, motionless.
"guess you've been pretty busy, huh."
No response.
Sans stood. Slowly. Dust clung to his slippers.
"can't say i didn't see this comin" he continued, stuffing his hands in his pockets. "been watchin' you. ever since snowdin."
He tilted his skull.
"papyrus really believed in you, y'know. even when everyone else was turnin' to dust... he still thought you could turn it around."
His voice went quiet.
"guess he was wrong."
A beat passed.
Then Sans' single eye lit up, white and blue, casting long shadows behind him.
"but me?"
His grin widened, dangerous now.
"i'm not gonna make that mistake."
CRACK.
The floor split with a sudden blast. Bones surged upward from the marble tiles like the spears of an angry god. The human darted back, flipping over the first wave as a Gaster Blaster screamed into existence behind them.
The beam fired, searing across the golden hall. They rolled just in time, hair singed by white-hot plasma.
And then Sans was in front of them, just for a moment, hands still in his pockets, but his grin sharper than the knife they carried.
"ready to get dunked on?"
A second wave of bones shot from below.
The fight had begun.
The soul turned blue, and gravity pulled hard.
The human dropped like a stone, forced to dodge while clinging to the ground. Spiked bones emerged in a tight grid, forcing careful footwork. A wrong move would mean instant impalement.
But the human moved with mechanical precision.
No emotion. No fear. Just pure, unfiltered determination.
Sans danced around them with impossible speed. Bones flung from every angle, Gaster Blasters spiraled in pairs, firing in sync. The hall was a kaleidoscope of death, pure white and cyan cutting through golden light.
"man" Sans muttered, watching the human dodge. "you're really stickin' it out, huh?"
He blinked across the screen, vanishing, reappearing, attacking from above, then below.
"guess when you're a homicidal time traveler with nothing to lose, pain's just... background noise."
The human struck. Fast. A knife slash that missed him by inches.
Sans teleported mid-air, landed lightly behind them.
"heh. nice try."
They fought like ghosts. Neither one ever in the same place for long. The human's knife carved the air. Sans' attacks left shimmering trails.
The soul turned red. Gravity returned.
The human launched themselves forward. Another slash, missed.
"geez, kid," Sans said, panting now. "you ever land one of those?"
They came again. This time, so close it scraped his sleeve. A line of smoke curled from the fabric.
His grin never faltered.
"whoops. there goes my favorite hoodie."
A barrage of blasters locked onto the human. Their eyes flicked, calculating. They leapt between the beams with perfect rhythm, slipping through death like water.
"i get it" Sans said, voice lowering. "you're fast. smart. determined. but you're not special."
Bones rained from above like arrows in an ancient war.
"you're just another murder machine with save files. Ever seen a flower doin that?"
And yet.
The human endured.
No talking.
No laughing.
No pleading.
Just the rhythmic heartbeat of their soul and the knife in their hand.
"alright, kid" Sans muttered, standing at the edge of the arena, bones floating lazily in orbit around him. "you wanna play hardball?"
The smile was still there, but now it strained at the edges.
His sockets flickered. His breath was shallow. Sweat dripped from the brow of a being who technically shouldn't even sweat.
"let's turn up the heat."
The battlefield changed.
The very fabric of space around them twisted. Gravity warped and reformed. Bones burst from rotating axes. Gaster Blasters looped in spiral orbits, firing alternating beams in dizzying tempos.
The soul was pulled in different directions with every second, up, down, left, nope now it's right. No pattern. No breaks.
The human faltered. One hit.
They staggered.
"ha! gotcha~" Sans grinned, snapping his fingers. A floor of bones sprang up where they landed, and they jumped instinctively, only to land in another pitfall.
Second hit.
HP dropped.
"what's the matter?" Sans asked, blinking behind them mid-teleport. "you were lookin' real confident a second ago."
Still, the human said nothing. Their expression didn't change. But they were breathing harder now. And their movements, just a shade more desperate.
Sans saw it.
Good.
"i don't get you."
His voice echoed as he ducked another swipe of the blade. The human chased him across the room, slashing, whirling, relentless.
"not even a word? not even some half-baked villain monologue?"
A row of bone platforms formed a staircase in midair. Sans zipped between them, raining projectiles as he climbed.
"you're like a brick wall that learned how to kill people"
The human dodged his traps perfectly, now moving with something like rhythm. Their form was tighter. More exact. It was like fighting a mirror that learned with every second.
Sans grit his teeth.
"i've seen people like you before. y'know, the ones that think they're above it all. who treat people like numbers. hp bars. exp points."
A gravity switch slammed the soul into the ceiling. Blasters tracked its descent like vultures.
"but even those psychos talked."
Another swing. Close. Too close.
"what, you think you're too good to talk to the guy who's about to kill you?"
He laughed, but it was dry now. Hollow.
"or maybe..."
He teleported just inches away from their knife, left eye flaring.
"...you're scared you'll say something you can't take back."
He was sweating more now. Breathing heavier. His timing, once perfect, was beginning to slip.
A dodge took just a half-second longer than before.
A teleport landed a few feet off mark.
The human noticed.
Their blade came faster. Closer. They adapted with terrifying efficiency. What had once been a barrage of missed strikes now grazed, nicked, tore.
A scratch across his ribs.
Another across the shoulder.
Sans winced and bit it down.
"okay" he said through his teeth, "okay. you've got guts. i'll give you that. too bad i'm gonna have to spill 'em."
He pulled out every trick.
Double gravity switches. Inverted controls. A screen filled with rotating bone chains, spinning like gear teeth in a monster's mouth.
Gaster Blasters fired in full-sphere rotation, 360 degrees, closing in like a collapsing sun.
The human ducked. Rolled. Dashed.
One missed input, and they took another hit.
Sans blinked, surprised.
But the human kept coming.
Still no words. Just that same cold, mechanical determination.
"you really don't get it, do you?" Sans said, quieter now. "this isn't some game where you beat the final boss and everything goes back to normal."
He looked down at his trembling hands.
"this is it. there's nothing after me. no one else to stop you."
He met their gaze.
"and you're still going."
They fought for what felt like hours.
Not minutes.
Hours.
Sans' attacks began to loop. The patterns repeated, slightly faster. Slightly sharper. But they were repeating. Repeating because he was running out of tricks.
Running out of time.
He could feel the timeline fraying around him. His awareness stretched thin, like butter scraped over too much bread.
He could feel his turns taking longer.
He could feel the save files loading in the background, just out of reach.
"you know" he said as the hall glitched, just for a frame "you've reset so many times... but every time, you lose a little more of what made you you."
A pause.
"you ever wonder how much of you is left?"
No answer.
Just another swipe.
He dodged it, barely. But the knife scraped his arm, and a chunk of bone flew off like shrapnel.
Sans staggered back, breathing harder.
He was bleeding now. Monster dust leaking from every wound. White. Soft. Like snow.
He knew this couldn't last.
But he had one more move.
One final play.
He waited. Let the human charge. Let them close the gap. Let the knife flash forward.
And then, he didn't move.
No dodge.
No teleport.
The knife froze mid-air.
The human was locked. Their soul, frozen in a blue field.
"heh."
Sans stared at them, arms folded, body trembling.
"gotcha."
Time stopped.
"you're not gonna like what happens next."
...
The screen didn't shift.
There was no [FIGHT], no [ITEM], no [MERCY], no chance to [ACT].
The soul hovered midair, locked in blue gravity.
The human was frozen in place.
And Sans... was standing still.
Hands in his pockets.
Breathing hard.
That damn smile still clinging to his skull.
"heh."
A flicker of exhaustion trembled through his knees.
"guess what, kid. i'm not givin' you your turn."
The hall pulsed with an eerie stillness. No more blasters. No more bones. No music. Just the low hum of a broken timeline barely holding itself together.
Sans swayed slightly where he stood, as if the weight of the moment—of every reset, every timeline, every murder—was finally dragging him under.
"you like to play with time, right?" he said, voice low. "reset... load... kill again and again until it's perfect."
He chuckled.
"well... now it's my turn to play."
And so, he just stood there.
Second after second.
Minute after minute.
The screen didn't move.
The human couldn't act. Couldn't do anything.
Just wait.
Just watch.
"you feel it?" Sans murmured. "the boredom? the itch? the frustration?"
He paced a little, dragging his feet like they were made of stone.
"that feeling like the game broke? like your controller's busted? yeah. that's me."
He grinned—more teeth now than humor.
"figured... if i can't stop you the usual way... maybe i can annoy you to death."
The soul twitched. Still caged in blue. Still no input.
"heh. you're probably real mad now, huh?"
No response. As always.
But something in the air shifted. Barely noticeable. A hiccup in the frame rate. A flicker in the light. The tiniest chime of system strain.
Sans flinched.
"...ah. damn."
He looked down at his hands. They were shaking now. The bones in his fingers flickered like bad reception.
"can't hold this forever."
He leaned against a pillar.
"you'll get your turn eventually. i know that. i just..."
He closed his eyes.
"i just wanted to buy a few more moments. a few more seconds where you couldn't hurt anyone. where the world got to breathe."
Silence.
"but i'm not stupid. i know how this ends."
Then it happened.
A frame skip.
Just one.
But that was all it took.
The soul snapped out of its lock.
And the screen shifted.
It was the human's turn again.
The [FIGHT] box glowed blood red.
Sans' eye flicked wide.
"...shit."
He barely had time to move.
The human didn't hesitate. No dramatic flourish. No words.
Just a straight, merciless slash.
The blade carved straight across his chest.
There was no dodge.
No teleport.
Just the wet crunch of impact and the hiss of dust spilling from the wound like smoke from a cracked lantern.
Sans staggered back, choking.
The grin still lingered, but now it was broken. Like glass with a crack through the middle.
"heh... you're... really something, kid."
He dropped to one knee, hand clutched over his chest. Bones jutted weakly from the floor, more out of reflex than will.
He blinked up at them.
The human stood there, stained with dust and dried blood. Still no emotion. Still silent.
"guess i... tried my best."
He tried to stand.
His foot slid.
He didn't catch himself.
He hit the ground, hard, ribs shattering like brittle chalk.
"just wanted to... take a shortcut..."
His voice wavered.
The single glowing eye dimmed.
"welp."
Another breath. Shallower now.
"i'm going to grillby's after this..."
He laughed quietly, even now. A dry rasp, more air than voice.
"wanna... come?"
No answer.
Just the blade rising one last time.
"...i'm gonna feel so bad if you come back."
And then...
the screen turned white.
Sans was gone.
The room was silent again.
Only the knife remained.
...
Everything's cold.
Not cold like Snowdin, not the kind that bites your fingers and makes you chuckle while you puff clouds of steam into the air.
This is the kind of cold you can't feel.
Because you're fading.
Drifting.
Dust in slow motion.
And for a while... there's nothing.
Just white.
But then
thought.
A whisper of memory.
heh... guess that's it, huh?
He floats, or maybe he's lying down, or maybe he's just not anymore. It's hard to tell when you've stopped being held together by willpower and bad jokes.
that kid... really did it.
tore right through everything. through me. through everyone.
but hey, can't say i didn't see it comin'.
There's no pain now. That stopped somewhere around the time his ribs gave out. Now there's just... a heavy kind of lightness.
And the echo of his own voice, rambling through the blank spaces.
i fought like hell. gotta give myself that.
blasters, bones, gravity tricks... even pulled out the no-turns move. that was a good one.
He chuckles, weakly. It sounds like dust scattering across tile.
still...
A pause.
still wasn't enough.
The silence deepens.
Something stirs in the dark between stars. Not a god. Not an afterlife. Just... a question.
And Sans, despite everything, still has a response.
you ever feel like the universe is just a big, broken arcade machine?
like someone's been slammin' the reset button over and over until the glass cracked and all the tokens got sucked into the void?
He grins in the dark.
heh. maybe that's poetic. or maybe it's just what happens when a lazy skeleton tries to outsmart a time-traveling sociopath with a knife.
guess you can't dodge forever.
Another pause.
Longer this time.
papyrus...
A twinge of guilt. The only thing sharper than the knife that killed him.
sorry, bro.
i tried. i really did.
they got me.
and... if they come for you again... i won't be there to stop it.
i hope you're somewhere safe. somewhere bright. somewhere the timelines can't touch.
somewhere you're still smilin'.
The whiteness is fading now.
Not growing darker, just quieter. Softer. Like falling into the folds of a pillow made from memory.
Sans feels the last tether break.
And in that final fragment of a moment, just before the code of his being unravels completely.
...grillby's better still be open when i get there.
He laughs.
And then, he's gone.
Not screaming.
Not begging.
Just...
dust on golden petals.