#Everybody haaaaates Saaaaans

[stripestheboar]

Stagnant Decay Chapter 1

Well, here comes my first Undertale chapter series. 

Synopsis: Sans and Papyrus live a happy life on the surface and everything seems to be going fairly well for them. However, Sans is having a bit of trouble keeping his name clean when something that looks, walks, and talks like him keeps getting him into trouble with frequent killings around town. Meanwhile, Papyrus begins to keep secrets when he finds something he really shouldn’t have. Something that could get the both of them killed at any moment. But you know Papyrus. He could never deliberately get rid of something that needs his help.

This chapter and later chapters may contain: Undertale, Dusttale, Sans, Papyrus, the main cast making some minor appearances, fight scenes, tears, a really creepy Murder!Sans, tender moments, crazy moments, and completely SFW brotherly love.

This is mostly just a chapter to getchya settled in.

Next ->

Every so often, Sans would forget something. It was occasional, but it still happened. It wasn't that he never want to remember anything; in fact, he would prefer to not to remember anything at all. But with that all too familiar cloudiness swarming his skull, he couldn't help the way he was.

Luckily for him, Papyrus was always there to help him remember. No matter what it was or the time of day, even when he thought he was alone, Paps seemed to be just a couple steps away to shake him back into reality. Sometimes he would forget where the house was. Papyrus always showed him the way. His brother was always so helpful. Sometimes he would forget what section of the Underground he was in. Papyrus would pointed out the noticeable features of the landscape, such as the snow or lava. His brother was always there for him. Sometimes he would forget to eat. Papyrus would make sure he didn't fall. How did deserve his brother? Sometimes he would forget what happened. Papyrus didn't let him forget. He never let Sans forget. But that was okay. He still loved his brother will all his soul.

And yet, sometimes, he just forgot. He blamed it on the stagnant state of the world around him. Papyrus never blamed anyone.

"Sans! Can you lend a hand to me?" Papyrus called from the kitchen, heaving a few bags of groceries onto the kitchen table, a few dastardly cans slipping out to hit the floor. A quick sigh rocked his frame as he surveyed the bagged foods before getting to picking up some of the fallen goods. On cue to his question, he heard something shift around in the living room on the couch his brother could usually be found at. "Sure thing, bro," came the deeper, slower drawl Sans was known for. "Just be sure you give it back." There was a faint pop sound as Papyrus began to process Sans' words, only to be interrupted when something flew from the other room and clattered onto the floor beside him. He blinked in surprise and gazed down at the detached hand that had landed; it was smaller than his own and slightly thicker in each individual bone. His sockets widened some in surprise and he was quickly developing that familiar flustered feeling whenever Sans did something asinine. "Sans!" he scolded. "That's not what I meant, you lazybones! Get in here and reattach your hand! That's not good for our joints!" Moments later, the lazy skeleton sauntered in, amusement clearly placed over his skull as he bent down and picked up his severed hand. "Sorry, bro," Sans chuckled, "I was just trying to be handy." Papyrus gave his smaller brother an impatient look, but a sigh was really his only response. While his jokes were painfully unfunny and immature, the self proclaimed 'mature one' of the two had learned to just live with them. After about a year of living on the surface, he sort of had to bear with it ever since such a wide array of jokes had been opened up. The very first week of being free, Sans went on a pun-filled rampage (don't talk to the human like that; it wouldn't be humane. Sans fit the hand back onto his ulna and radius, the carpals seeming to just snap back into place upon making contact with the two larger bones. With a flex of his metacarpals, he looked over at the bags of food. "Gee, Paps. Did ya bring all this in with one go?" he asked, looking up at Papyrus as  the two began to put away the food. The taller skeleton immediately welled up in pride that needed to be boasted. "Why, of course! The Great Papyrus does not need to make two trips! I cannot split my efforts in half!" he boasted. He saw Sans give an amused roll of his eyelights, but he just ignored it. As Papyrus was putting away a few boxes of pasta, a phone rang from the living room. From the loud goat noise that emitted from the device; the phone was obviously Sans'. His older brother dropped the groceries he was holding and rushed off at an astounding speed of 2 mph (a new record for him), snatching the phone off the arm of the couch. After a quick glance at the caller ID, he went out the backdoor to have the conversation. Despite Papyrus' respect for his brother's privacy, personal calls were a rarity with him. Usually when it rang, it was just Miss Toriel with a few more awful jokes ready to be told, and Sans would always make sure Papyrus stayed within earshot to listen to just how painful they were. Calls had not been kept private since his brother started becoming the lazy slob he is now. That was years and years ago. When all the groceries had been put away and the bags were stored for later use, Sans was still outside, presumably having a talk with whoever had decided to call. It was longer than last time, Papyrus noted. While it wasn't a particularly bad thing, it still had his curiosity itching. 'Perhaps it is just Frisk needing some help with their homework or their royal duties,' he reasoned with himself. After all, with all the business the human had to go through with King Asgore, there were bound to be stories to tell or advice that was needed. 'But Sans of all monsters?' he thought for a second. 'That sure is a bit odd.' Sure, he was smart, but his brother hadn't the slightest inkling of how to be regal. It was around that time of being lost in his thoughts that Sans had finally come back in, his hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket as usual. The urge to ask Sans who the caller was floated up to the forefront of his skull, but Papyrus quickly brushed it off in favor of respecting his brother's privacy as Sans had done so many times with him. Or, at least he hoped he did. Sans' little adventures in bending the laws of time and space always did make him a bit weary, especially after the treadmill prank a few years back. Yet, even still, he kept his mandible locked tight as he watched Sans walk up the stairs. Papyrus checked the time and took a quick look out the window as he usually did around this time of day. Just as predicted, the sun was beginning to set as it did every day. He dropped what he was doing to rest his arms on the windowsill and just watch the sun fall behind the horizon. Unsurprising to those who knew him, Papyrus always watched the sun rise at dawn and fall at dusk. How could he not? With it's bright orange and magenta colors and it's slow transitions of the times of day, he was truly fascinated by it. There was something about watching the sun come and go that was always so special to him. Having been born in the Underground, he knew that the sun wasn't just something to be taken for granted, unlike Sans, the lazybones. It had been an entire year since Frisk had freed them from the Underground, and everyday at dawn and dusk, Papyrus was always there to watch the sunrise. In fact, he had never missed any of them once, as hard as it may be for some to believe. He didn't plan on missing any in the future, either. That would surely be a tragedy. Once the tall skeleton was satisfied that enough light had left the sky, he immediately got out two boxes of noodles, the angel haired variety to be exact. Thinner noodles mean room for more pasta, after all. Sans tried to to reason once that two boxes was an awful lot for just two skeletons, maybe even a bit too much, but blasphemy wasn't tolerated in this household, so he dropped it. As he began to boil the water, he couldn't help but have his mind wander to Sans again. He had been so secretive over the past week. Hiding calls, going out during the later hours of the day, and being tight-teethed about his actions were just some of the things that hinted his brother was hiding something. He hadn't been this way since around the time he had first met Flowey. In fact, that particular secret still remained just that: a secret. Was something wrong?

After a quick shortcut to Alphys' lab, Sans took a minute to prepare himself. He took a few swigs of the ketchup he brought with him, he made sure his nerves were in check, and he reminisced over all the times Papyrus had scolded him. It was a strange ritual for sure, and he just hoped he wouldn't have to do it anymore after this session. However, no matter how much he had prepared himself, every time he walked through those doors to greet his favorite cold-blooded couple, he always found himself needing some alone time afterwards. A lot of alone time.

After a another quick drink, he took in a ribcageful of air and casually opened the door to the lab. Alphys and Undyne immediately looked up at him from the island counter they had been talking over. "Sans! D-do come in," Alphys said, quickly shuffling over to her bag to grab, and fumble with, a blue folder. He watched her and her nervous scamper to the table and sat down on a stool, scooting closer to the island. It seemed that it had been cleared off for this occasion. His eyelights flicked up to Undyne to evaluate how bad this situation was. Upon seeing the gears turning within the fish's head and hard at work, he knew this one was particularly bad. 

"So, lay it on me," he sighed, folding his arms onto the table. "Another one?" Undyne shook her head. "Three this time. Two monsters. One human." That was surprising. After a week of murders happening around town and at the most random of places, never once had a human been attacked and killed. "A human? Geeze, that takes some guts," he murmured, before looking at folder Alphys had brought with her as she sat down. "I'm going to guess that's whatever's in that won't clear me off the list." Alphys gave a sort of apologetic nod as she opened up the folder, revealing a few non-confidential reports and photos inside. "We were never sure, at first," she said, fingers diligently moving the photos around so they would be spread out. "But that's only because monsters dust when they die. With this, it's absolute." Steeling himself, Sans brought his gaze over the numerous photos. They weren't pretty.

He was immediately sickened to see the different positions of a dead human body, this one being a male. While none of them were of the crime scene (that would get Undyne in deep trouble), they seemed to be from a coroner's table. It appeared that Alphys put in a request to get them specifically for him, which was surprising seeing how she couldn't take death very well. The most noticeable feature of the body was the giant hole in the middle on the abdomen. Geez, it's like this guy was impaled on a tree. Upon further inspection, he eventually saw the various broken bones and caved in parts of his body. It looked like someone took a baseball bat to this guy. Whoever did this clearly did not like humans one bit.

"The fatal wound as well as the other bruises and breaks were caused by something large and blunt," Alphys explained, turned away from the folder so she wouldn't have to see it. "It took a while, but it was eventually figured out that the marks and indentations within the body directly match a large bone. A femur to be exact. The residue left over confirms the bone was made of magic, and the only monsters that can conjure bones are skeletons. As far as we know, there are only two."

'Three,' Sans corrected in his mind, though his thoughts should be elsewhere right now.

"That's four times now," Undyne sighed, laying the side of her hand against her brow as she sighed. "Three sightings near the crime scenes and one body of physical proof. All in one week. Sans, the station's been urging me to bring something in. If this keeps up, I may have to actually do something." Sans grimaced the best he could through that permanent grin of his. Who could have been doing this? And why? There were no other skeletons (the feasible of them anyways) that would do something like this. Just the thought of another possible skeleton reeking havoc on the town shivered his bones. His LOVE remained at the basic one, so unless Papyrus was secretly a stealthy serial killer that was able to make himself look short and round, he was completely stumped on this one.

The three were completely silent for a minute or two. Finally, Undyne spoke up. "I think you should tell Pap-"

"No."

And so that topic was settled.

"Okay, listen. I'll put out team to find out whoever this guy is," the fish said finally. "But, we're running out of options here. If we don't find this asshole, the entire kingdom's going to be raging for my to bring you and Paps in." Sans felt his soul drop like a sack of rocks. This whole situation was bad enough since it was happening to only him, but it would be a cold day in hell when he'd drag Papyrus into it. "Over my dead body," he nearly snapped, his sockets void of light for the moment. It would take a lot more than that to intimidate Undyne, though. She just seemed to brush his sudden change in behavior off. "Well it just might be," she responded in a similar snappy fashion. "There's nothing you can really do, Sans." Her lone visible eye softened some in sympathy when she saw Sans look down at the ground, seemingly at a loss for what to do. She gave a sigh. "If I were you, I'd go home and spend some time with Pap. The way this is headin', it ain't lookin' good for you."

Sans thought the situation over. While it was easy to prove that he was innocent, he didn't think it would be so easy with the rest of the monsters. Eventually, even the humans would climb into the bandwagon, and knowing how prominent they were around here, he wouldn't stand a chance. There were still tensions between monsters and humans, after all, and there have already been a few unsavory acts committed by the groups onto the other.

Sans finally let out a small huff of frustration, though on the inside he felt like screaming at the stars. It's not every day he was being accused of murder. He's have to do a bit of investigating on his own, wouldn't he? He just hoped it wouldn't get him into more trouble. He grumbled, but begrudgingly stuffed his hands into his pockets. "Hey Undyne," he snapped, looking over at Papyrus' best friend. "Make sure you catch this bastard, okay?" Undyne smirked some and gave a nod. "Can do, ya bag of bones. Say hi to Paps for me. We still have that cooking lesson tomorrow, alright? And make sure he's pumped up! I won't tolerate rookie level cooking, got that?" Sans looked back at Undyne, unable to help but chuckle. "You got it, fish lips."

And with that, he left the lab.

Undyne watched the door for a bit, as if expecting him to come back in. She then gathered the photos up in the folder, gave Alphys a quick kiss, and left as well. 

She had a killer to catch.

#Undertale #Sans #Papyrus #Undyne #Alphys #Murder!Sans #Dust!Sans #Stagnant Decay #Dusttale #Everybody haaaaates Saaaaans #Fanfiction #Coonfics