The two of you wandered around the halls for some time. Your senses were heightened every time you passed by an empty room, looking for any sign that there might be more test subjects within these walls. You weren't sure how you would react if you met another human or some other skeleton, wondering how you would react, if you would reject them and reduce them to things as you had with several of the other test subjects that had come and gone throughout your stay within this hell, or if you would allow them into the small part of yourself that cared for other living things, if you would care for them as you had allowed yourself to care for Sans and Papyrus -

Your mouth went dry at the thought of the taller skeleton, the way that you and Sans had so willingly left him behind in the cell, the thought that he might never return to the way he was enough to drive you to the brink of insanity. For your own personal stability, you had to cling onto the hope that he might one day come back, that there was still a way for him to regain his soul even when all logic and reason suggested that his consciousness had forever ceased into the Void.

"I don't see any sign of the human," Sans muttered, looking around you. He too seemed to share in your nervousness, his gaze occasionally flickering over to the shadows that seemed to cling to the flank of the hallway, patches of darkness where light dared not to tread. Something seemed off about the shadows, the way that they seemed to follow you wherever which way the two of you wandered, the way that they seemed to grin, as if the balance between light and darkness had shifted in their favour, promising the reign of a world full of chaos and suffering.

But worst of all, it was the fear that these shadows were hiding something, hiding enemies unknown within their ebony hearts, never surrendering their secrets until the unseen stalker of the night was right behind you, their claws wrapped around your throat ready to drain the life from your blood...

The thought alone made you spin around to look behind yourself, half-anticipating some demented creature to be stalking you, grinning at you in the dark. Sans jumped back at the sudden movement, ready to attack should something decide that it wanted to take on a fight. "We should go back," you muttered, hating yourself for allowing your fears to dominate your actions. Sans seemed particularly relieved which helped alleviate your gathering worry that perhaps you were the only one riddled with futile anxieties.

"Something isn't right," he muttered, looking once more at the shadows. "There's more to it than the scientist wanting to do some 'intelligence test' on it. Do you think he's done something to Papyrus?" He asked, looking frightened. It seemed despite the cold and distant attitude Sans had tried to hold towards the lifeless corpse of his brother, he could not fully bring himself to resent the lifeless shell of a skeleton, still clinging feebly to the hope that Papyrus might one day come back.

"Why else would he send us away from the cell?" You agreed. "It's the only reason that makes sense. You're right, something's gone wrong."

The two of you began sprinting down the hallway, retracing your steps back to the cell that you had once been so eager to get away from, still clinging to the light and away from the shadows that seemed to be closing in. You took a left into the dusted corridor and stopped outside the entrance to the prison that you had lived in for your entire miserable existence.

"He's still there," you muttered, nodding towards Papyrus' lifeless shell. But there was something off about the way he was situated, having been moved slightly to the left. "But the scientist had to have been there. Look, he moved," you gestured to Papyrus' new location. "But why would the scientist just leave him there? His clipboard is still here." You bent down to pick up a beaten up clipboard full of various notes and things. You shuffled through the papers, vainly hoping to find some of the scientist's secrets that he guarded so closely, dismayed to find that his notes were written in a dialect that was foreign to you, but then again, you had never learned how to read.

"Do you think Papyrus did something to him?" Sans asked.

You shook your head. "Papyrus doesn't have a soul, he can't move on his own. If he hasn't responded to us ever since he came back as an empty shell, why would he start moving around now of his own accord? Plus, even if he was back, Papyrus wouldn't attack the scientist, it's not in his nature. He was always insisting that there was 'good' inside the scientist, he's probably the last person that would want to attack him."

Sans kneeled over the lifeless form of his brother. "C'mon Paps, you've got to wake up," he whispered. You watched in astonishment as a translucent blue tear rolled from his eyesocket and fell onto Papyrus' skull. It was the first time you had seen Sans cry or express any sort of emotion towards his vegetative state, having tried to distance himself for so long. But the tallest of the two skeletons did not respond, still oblivious and cut off from his surroundings.

"We'll fix him," you promised Sans, not believing your own words. "One day we'll get out of here and bring Papyrus with us. Maybe some of the monsters in the outside world can help us. They can't all be that bad, right?"

"Yeah..." Sans muttered, not looking convinced. He wiped another tear on the sleeve of his green hospital gown, once more trying to bury his emotions and don the nonchalant attitude that was vital if one wanted to survive in a world that knew nothing but torture. "But then what happened to the scientist? Do you think he's looking for us? I don't think it's been thirty minutes yet, but maybe he finished whatever he was doing early or something."

Your eyes flickered to the shadows and back to the clipboard that was clenched in your hand. "If he did go looking for us, why would he leave his clipboard behind? He carries this thing with him everywhere."

"What else could it be? He couldn't have been attacked or kidnapped, we're the only ones down here. Even if there were other test subjects or whatever, they're probably not wandering around these parts otherwise we would have seen them." Sans paced back and forth.

But your mind was already beginning to make the connections, the pieces of the puzzle snapping into place. The shadows seemed to grin as they realised the connections you were making, painful reminders of the dream that had plagued your mind when the human had waited in the dark and the cold of the night, never faltering, never fading.

"There is one thing down here with enough power to take down the scientist without having to be seen." You dropped your voice to a deadly whisper as if afraid that the shadows were listening in on your conversation. "In my dream, the human had used Papyrus to speak to me. While their corporeal form couldn't leave their prison here, their mind was free to wander and latched itself onto Papyrus since there was no consciousness inside him. What if they did it again when the scientist went down here?"

"That would explain why he moved," Sans realised in horror, taking a step back from his brother.

"But what if the human isn't possessing him anymore?" You looked down at the clipboard. "They never said that they couldn't take over the mind of another living thing, so what if that's what happened to the scientist? What if that's why he's not here and why he left behind his clipboard?"

"We need to get out of here," Sans snarled, looking suddenly frantic. "If this human or whatever has enough strength to take over the scientist's mind, what power do we have to stop it if our magic combined couldn't even stop him the last time?"

"You really are a smart cookie!"

The two of you jumped at the high-pitched voice that sang across the clearing, one that reflected an entity that had grown old in this universe, been alive long enough to watch entire mountains turn to ash and dust and had resented the universe for the cruelties thrown its way, hated each and every living thing. You turned around to behold the scientist, though you weren't certain if any trace of the scientist remained. Rather, it seemed as if the demon that had been plaguing your dreams for quite some time now lived inside his mind guiding his thoughts and dictating his emotions.

"K-Kris?" The name left your mouth, feeling strange and foreign. You felt repulsed at the sight of the human whose consciousness had taken over the scientist's mind, shuddering at the fact that any living creature could so easily control another without any regard for the person that lived inside. You wondered if you too had that ability, to allow your consciousness to extend beyond the reaches of your physical form and take over the mind of another. Were all humans like that, did you wonder?

"In the flesh!" The demon chuckled, their limbs bending at awkward angles as if they had not yet grown accustomed to their new vessel. "But I feel as if 'in the bone' would be more appropriate given the circumstances."

"How can you be possessing him?" It was Sans' turn to speak. "It's not possible for any living thing to have that much power."

"Your world view is so limited," the demon sighed, a sadistic grin on its features. "You have never ventured outside of these walls, gotten to know the real world and the evils and power that lies hidden in the dark. But even in the Underground the monsters here have forgotten how weak their magic is compared to the humans that walk on the Surface. Humans too cannot remember what it was like thousands of years ago, when their ancestors had been able to tap into the fundamental nature of their soul and unleash the true potential of the magic locked away inside them. All of existence has forgotten the taste of power."

"Who are you?" Despite the current situation, you were desperate for answers, wondering why there was a human locked away inside these walls, why the scientist had kept it such a secret from you and the other skeletons. "Why did the scientist keep you trapped down here?"

A knowing grin made its way across Kris' face. "Many years ago, as you may or may not know, there was a war between humans and monsters when the two races lived on the Surface. It was a brutal and bloody conflict, one that wiped out entire clans of monsters and humans alike. It was during the time when humans had known and used the true ability of their souls, used their power to its full potential, making them gods compared to the roaches that were the monsters. Oh, the monsters did try to fight back, but what is the strength of mortals compared to gods?"

"You were there?" Sans raised a browbone. "If that was thousands of years ago, how can you be alive?"

"So full of questions, the two of you," Kris giggled, an underlying menace in their gaze. "I fought on the front lines, just a child, but with more of a will to kill and maim than any other. I was the strongest of the humans. I was the one who wiped out the skeleton clan single handed, damned their species to forever rot in the Void with a mere spell. The scientist that I inhabit now was the lone survivor of the conflict, the last of his kind.

"However," Kris continued, "I admittedly grew arrogant in my power, young as I was, and let my guard down one night. A group of monsters ambushed me, took me prisoner in hopes of a hostage exchange with the humans. My species, those blood traitors, refused to trade me so I remained a prisoner to the monsters even up until the moment that they were damned to rot in the Underground, banning me to rot in the rocky caverns just as they were. But the scientist managed to give life to this underground world and even manufactured a stasis chamber that would keep me at bay, trap me Underground and use me as a lab rat as he tried to figure out ways to manufacture human souls to break down the Barrier that traps the whole of monsterkind Underground."

"And that's why you were kept down here all this time," you realised, still unnerved by the way Kris was looking at you, their true motives unknown. "But the scientist told me that I was manufactured, grown inside a sterilisation tube. If you were the human that he was gathering DNA samples from, does that mean - "

"We are kin? Yes, in a way I suppose we are related," Kris shrugged, "but more so we are two halves of a greater whole, for your soul was grown and developed from a stolen part of my soul. That's how you popped into existence, why we're connected." Sans seemed to take a step back from you, slightly unnerved by the whole situation.

"But when the scientist kept me trapped down here, I began to strengthen my mind, to escape my physical barriers and explore the Underground with my mind. The scientist picked up on this, discovered that I was no longer a prisoner in both mind and body. At first we was going to change my prison so that my mind could no longer escape, but I suggested something different, a truce that he foolishly accepted." There was glee evident in the demon's voice now. "You see, the scientist was not always clever. Sure, he was smarter than most of his species, but his knowledge was an inkling of what it was now. But he was appointed as the royal scientist and was expected to manufacture a way out of this hell, but he was simply not smart enough to do so.

"I, however, had knowledge, had wisdom about humans and the rest of the world. In exchange for my mental freedom, I would give the scientist knowledge, increase his mental capacity so that he was the true genius that everyone else thought him to be. And thus was our arrangement. He would be given the knowledge to work out a way to free his people whilst I could explore the rest of the world with my mind, still a prisoner by body but never by mind. The scientist thought vainly that we had reached a mutual agreement, that I would forever be contented with my situation, but gods do not like to be kept in chains. I trained myself each passing year, increased the strength in my mind so that one day, today, I could overcome his mental barriers, take over his mind and enact my plan for freedom, to once more reclaim my rightful place as god over this dying existence."

"Why are you telling us any of this?" You asked, not understanding why the demon was bothering to discuss any of this with you.

"Because," the demon's face broke into a sadistic smile, "I thought you might like to know why I plan on evicting you from your body before I do so. It's only fair that you're given an explanation."

"That's not happening," you snarled, taking a step forward, preparing to tap into the magic that was hidden inside your mind.

"We are two halves of the same soul," Kris sighed, looking bemused with your reaction. "I have had many years to strengthen my mind, taking over the form of another is easier than batting an eye. Inside you is unchecked power that you have not even tapped into, locked away inside you. But I will liberate that power, I will set you free. And then I will ascend to the Underground and eventually the Surface, liberating each and every human from their bodies."

"You're talking about genocide?" Sans snarled.

Your gaze flickered to Papyrus. Though it was foolish to ask, you had to know. "You're inside the scientist's mind, you have access to all his thoughts and memories that ever existed inside his mind. Why was he doing any of this to us?"

Kris sighed. "Have you not been paying attention? All of monsterkind is sealed Underground by the Barrier, which can only be broken if seven human souls are presented to it. Since then, six human souls have been collected and only one more is required. The scientist created you (Y/n) to try and act as the seventh soul, but the Barrier rejected you, detected your body as an artificial life form because the scientist had built it, not grown it. And so the scientist turned towards creating vessels that could naturally be grown, created skeletons from his own DNA. That was the purpose that Sans and Papyrus stood for. He was to choose the strongest of the two of them and shove your soul inside them, present it to the Barrier and finally free monsterkind."

"And he was going to do that with Papyrus?" Sans asked, his voice trembling in rage. "He dug out his soul so that he could replace it with (Y/n)'s? Why couldn't he just use you instead?"

"When humans unlock the true power of their soul, allow all that energy to power their magic, their coding shifts, makes them not so human anymore. That was the case with me, having unlocked the true nature of myself. That was why the scientist had to resort to his futile experiments!" Kris clapped their hands together. "But none of that is needed now, none of that matters! I shall reduce you and your shell of a brother to dust and inhabit this human and rise amongst the mortals as their rightful god. This is the way it should be and the way it will."

"I won't let you," you snarled, allowing your rage to fuel the fire of your magic, illuminating your right hand in (F/c) flame. It was strange how easy it was becoming to channel this magic, the way that you could summon it in mere seconds rather than minutes. You thought back to the dream that had not been a dream that took place in the hall of judgement, when you had danced the dance of fire and blood with Kris, summoned your magic with unnatural ease that had once mystified you. Perhaps that was not such a distant future after all.

"You can't stop me," Kris giggled. "Though it has been so long since I have fought anyone and my soul hungers even now for it."

You knew not how this fight would end, if you could even dare hope to spite the demon that had taken over the scientist's mind as if it was nothing. Your gaze flickered to Sans and then to Papyrus, whom you vainly hoped might be saved one day, to relish a future where you would leave these green walls and walk free amongst the rest of creation as their equals.

And for the sake of that, you had to try, even if it meant dying.