Chara (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fulllifeconsequences) wrote2036-02-05 12:12 am
fulllifeconsequences) wrote2036-02-05 12:12 am
* IC Inbox
Speak.
[Wow okay cool voicemail there Chara. Voice/text/video away to your heart's content.]
[Wow okay cool voicemail there Chara. Voice/text/video away to your heart's content.]
no subject
They don't hurt. They crouch there with one hand clasped over their SOUL as it fizzles there, torn between two forces opposed. Breaking and not breaking.]
I can't.
[* You reach for your SAVE file...
Again, the hard glimmer of foreign words spring in front of them.
* S̶̷̲̅A̶̷̲̅V̶̷̲̅E̶̷̲̅ C̶̷̲̅O̶̷̲̅R̶̷̲̅R̶̷̲̅U̶̷̲̅P̶̷̲̅T̶̷̲̅E̶̷̲̅D̶̷̲̅.
Frisk's vision swims out of focus briefly as their brows knit together, eyes glazing, and then snapping back to regard Chara with a strange curiosity.]
You can't LOAD when you're dead.
[But they're not dead. It's just like their SOUL can't decide which way it's going to go, and until it does, they can't pull on that power to anchor them.]
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Did they break Frisk?]
Maybe it's just... maybe you haven't gathered enough determination?
[Maybe it'll go away on its own? Maybe it'll heal like bruises do, maybe it's just the shallow kind of cut that doesn't leave a scar behind.]
You're not dead. It's definitely not because you're dead. You're right here. You're alive, you're right here.
[Breathe, focus, think. Fix it. Fix it.]
Should I... should I call Alphys, perhaps? She's an expert on SOULs and DT.
[She knows about things that try to exist, but don't exist at all.]
Maybe she'd know what this is.
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[They cup their hands cautiously around it, the way it spritzes like it's about to break but doesn't. It feels strange, fragile, like their belly is full of nails jabbing softly at their gut, ants running through their bones.
It won't...]
It doesn't hurt, [Frisk says oddly.] It's like it's just - like it can't decide what to do.
[When you're hit with something that essentially amounts to a concentrated ERROR in magic form, perhaps that isn't so surprising. Still. Still, this maybe wasn't the best idea.]
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Maybe we can heal you, then?
[If both halves of a coin that's standing on its edge point to "a positive number of hit points," then maybe that'll... cancel it out? Tip the scales back to stability? There's no such thing as having less than 0 HP, so just about any healing item could do. Unequipping a bandage and using it, eating... there must be some sort of monster food around somewhere, now that there are so many monsters around, right?]
Or... Frisk, all we'd have to do is restore the lost data, right? SAVE it - SAVE yourself. You've got that kind of power, haven't you?
[They both came from the timeline where Frisk discovered they could SAVE people. Surely that power wasn't as conditional as a hypothetical ERASE, surely the fact they're still the same LV 1 no-EXP Frisk they were that whole time means that it's still in reach. So, so this is fine! Right? Everything is fine!]
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ERROR: SAVE NOT FOUND
ERROR: SAVE NOT FOUND
ERROR:
Okay, they think they get the idea. Is this determination still holding them together? Or does their SOUL simply not know what to do when faced with this kind of unreality?
Frisk squinches their eyebrows together. Their SAVE file is...well, it might as well be gone, made unavailable to them.
So perhaps they can...SAVE something else?]
I've never had to SAVE myself.
[Their tone is dubious? Can they? Can they do that kind of thing if Chara isn't there to help? Determination supplementing determination - what gives them that option on their menu? A moment that's suitably dramatic? A person worth SAVING? What if they aren't worth SAVING?
They don't have time for an emotional crisis on top of a technical one. They don't.
Their SOUL wavers, pulsing with a crimson light weakly.]
I don't know if I can - not without you.
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Arguing would be a waste of time, and who knows how long this suspended-animation stalemate will last. They cram it aside, just... just play along. Fake it.]
* You call out to your friends with all your heart. From somewhere, you felt their support...
You're not doing it without me, Frisk. I'm right here, am I not?
[So, even if they can't reach their SAVE file... surely, they still have the power to SAVE something else.]
You have made memories worth cherishing, haven't you? The kind of attachments that can restore what's lost itself.
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[* You think about why you're here...
They're here because they wanted to do something nice for someone they loved. Wanted to make them feel happy, included. Did it fail? Did it backfire? They hurt, a little bit, but mostly they just feel odd, on the verge of dying and not. Dying and simultaneously feeling fine, better than fine, stronger than they've ever been.
Why are they here?
They look at Chara, really look at them and how they're so scared and worried and how they must be blaming themself for this, of course they are, it's precisely what Frisk would do. They look at them and...
* Maybe you can SAVE something else.
SAVE themself?
But they're not worth SAVING.
It had been SAVING someone else that had spurred them on, having someone who could feed those memories of Asriel into them and remind them how he was kind, how he was gentle, how he had smiled and drawn pictures with them and been safe.
SAVE something else.
SAVE the person that knitted a hat with soft ears and horns, like a Dreemurr. The person that offered them a square of chocolate and a juicebox and fought bitterly through everything the world threw at them just to keep Frisk safe. The person that balanced inexpertly on their shoulders with a trenchcoat wrapped around the pair of them, that hissed that you're my family as if it were simply a given, that wears their bracelet always. They imagine...imagine that they need SAVING. Don't they?
They look at Chara with a strange wonderment.
And just like that, it opens to them, pulsing and variegated and glowing.
Their hand hovers over the button hesitantly, almost reverently, until at last:
* SAVE.
Their SOUL fills with a peculiar light, and the room's colors flood back into existence, coloring away the encounter with its shades of black-and-white and green.]
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But the power to SAVE someone... it relied on memories and love, didn't it? Things you treasure. And there's... there's no limit to the things about Frisk that are worth cherishing. They must know that, even when they hate themselves. They must have things that made them glad they were here, because their only death here was an accident. Because they decided they'd rather stay here than go home.
Celebrating a birthday - a real birthday, with a real party. Everyone came. Extending a hand to your consequence, your responsibility, a problem you'd prayed was laid to rest and telling it that it could stay with you. Being held, being leaned on, being understood. Being the reason someone stayed, changed their mind about doing something cowardly. Laughing about inside jokes. Having a family. Having a room that's theirs, full of their drawings and their treasures and their shirts, a place that's safe. A place they belong. They're all... there's so much Frisk could anchor themselves with, right? It'll be fine. It's going to be fine.
Something happens. The color leeches back into the world, and the both of them are left there, Chara pressing their nails in harder, harder, forcefully choking out the impulse to reach for Frisk, to try and, what, cradle their SOUL in scarred, rough fingers? Touching would make it worse. Would break it again. Don't touch. Don't touch.]
Is - is it... did it work?
SAVE 2.0
Saying "someone else" is easier than naming the person you want to SAVE, isn't it?
Slowly, tentatively, they reach out for their SAVE.
* LOAD failed.
* SAVE ᴄ̶̷̲̅ᴏ̶̷̲̅ʀ̶̷̲̅ʀ̶̷̲̅ᴜ̶̷̲̅ᴘ̶̷̲̅ᴛ̶̷̲̅ᴇ̶̷̲̅ᴅ̶̷̲̅
* No data available.
That's familiar. The way the Memoryhead loomed out at them and then promptly vanished - vanished from the Lab, from the Underground, from everything but their inventory, provided they let the Bad Memory slide easily into one of those precious eight slots. So that's...that doesn't work, does it? Maybe that whole stretch of time is just unavailable to them. Denied to them. Like trying to dial an unserviced number. There's no data to draw from, or the data is so corrupt that it's irretrievable.
So they try another route. They're good at dodging. At creating workarounds. And they drive a new bright golden stake into place, wiping away the last one with a spike of determination.
* File SAVED.]
I think so?
[They curl and uncurl their fingers, one by one. Tense each muscle in their legs and arms and middle, twist their head cautiously from one side to the next. They don't feel strange anymore. Don't feel like their whole body is made of television snow, or like they're stuck between dead and not dead anymore. And they can't SAVE if they're dying so...so it must have worked, right?]
I don't feel like I did before?
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Why did they... why did they even have to be like this? Why didn't they learn from their mistakes? They love Frisk, so they trick Frisk into giving them things. Make Frisk start an encounter, make them fight even if they don't want to. They take something that's supposed to be comforting and happy and turn it into a weapon.
They give Asgore a pie. They tell Asriel he can be like Hyperdeath for real, can be strong, can free everyone, can be a hero. They tell Frisk "thank you" and fill their head with nonsense scenarios about being like a real Dreemurr, not a parasite, truly one of them - and for what? Look what happened.
* Look what you've done.
They know. They always knew. They're dangerous, poisonous, take everything pure and kind that's given to them and twist it into something awful and horrible and just break things beyond repair. Why did they even hope-
Big kids don't cry. Chara never says "I'm sorry," because "sorry" is never, ever good enough. They can't undo this, can't right this, can't make it okay - that power was never theirs. So what... what do they do with this feeling? How do they...
Chara smiles brightly.]
Well! I'm never doing that again!
[Can't even think of a joke, of a punchline to showcase the fact that they don't care, they're not taking this seriously, they'll all laugh about it later instead of regretting it for the entire rest of their unnatural, unwanted unlife! So they just dust their hands off, shrug.]
You're certain you're unhurt? Perhaps you'd better get into bed. Rest a while, even just for two minutes. That's enough to make sure your HP is where it should be, is it not? Better safe than sorry; you've only got four more deaths before they start to really count, right?
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[Frisk says the words gently, and as if that's what their body had been waiting for, there's a rush as the feeling returns to their SOUL and the rest of them, the reality that grounds them and roots them firmly back into the way they know existence should feel. No longer just outside their body or a few inches to the left of it. There, present. Real.
Frisk steps forward, one hand half-raised, their brow furrowing with concern.
Chara, they know, isn't okay. They'll find a way to twist this around into blaming themselves, they know it. They know it because it's precisely what Frisk would do.]
It's okay. It's fine. It didn't work, but that doesn't mean - I mean, that's because maybe we didn't know how to work it.
[Trying a SPELL option that until recently didn't technically exist, and without any real basis to what spell they were casting. Of course it didn't go right. It wouldn't have. Right?]
...are you okay?
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My HP's the same as it's always been! You're not deflecting this onto me, Frisk.
[It's not about them.
They made the mistake, they inflicted hurt, so they're the one who has to do something about it. Maybe - maybe what's-his face... Zacharie? Maybe he can take it back somehow. Refund the orb, revoke the magic now that Chara's proven they definitely can't be trusted with it.]
Just... just a little rest? Perhaps a snack. More bandages. Maybe I could manage a healing spell!
[There it is! Found a joke! The kind of awful, scary punchline that makes people wince, that makes them pretend not to hear those hilarious lines about a kid who slept in the soil. You know, they almost broke Frisk, almost... almost Gastered them, almost did something so incomprehensible and awful that surely nothing on earth could fix it if Frisk didn't have the power to fix themselves! But it's no big deal! Everyone's laughing! Like it's just a big game, right? Who even cares!]
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[Maybe not one hundred percent okay, but that's - that's all right too. They did kind of break both their menus, a little bit. The world doesn't it like it when they drive at its formation with chisels and stakes, it seems like.
They smile. It's a little weak, but it's there, small and hopeful.]
I think just...just that we need to learn how to use stuff like this, a little bit. It's like getting, getting whiplash, you know? Like overextending yourself and getting burned for it.
[Is this all right? Are they making sense? Are they just saying words to fill the void with something so intent on being comforting that it's, in essence, comfortless? That seems to be something they do frequently. Way too frequently.]
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[The only person it seemed to hurt was Chara themself, and that's always been acceptable. Was it just because they intended to use it to harm? They were trying to be a weapon, like they're supposed to be? Maybe if they had wanted to hurt Frisk, it...
...Maybe this happened because they did want to hurt Frisk, on some level so deeply-buried even they don't know about it?]
Magic is supposed to be... it's how monsters express themselves. A representation of who they are and what's inside of them. A manifestation of the very culmination of their being - of their SOUL.
[The hollow straw-grasping Frisk is doing seems to slide right off of them. They know what false sympathy is like, know what token comfort sounds like. It's just... annoying, right? It's just pity. It's - it proves that Chara is making this about them, is being a manipulative little parasite, because Frisk was the one who got hurt and they feel like they have to say something to make Chara feel better!
They try to joke again. To shove the whole thing away, dismiss it with a laugh.]
Go figure the only thing that'd come out of my SOUL is broken!
[You can laugh now, Frisk. It's funny. It's a joke. A broken SOUL makes broken magic! A broken person can only express themselves in broken ways!]
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[They're working themselves up to something, they know it. They can see this conversation turning into a slow build, treacherous and maybe unstoppable. And they have to head it off. Frisk moves closer, their expression even and gentle and patient.]
I'm okay now. It worked, there's no problems.
You're not broken, Chara.
[It will never be as simple as just saying it. They've got a whole mess of people standing behind them saying the same things, and it's never sunk in. Maybe it never will.
But if there's the slightest chance that someday they'll believe it, Frisk is willing to devote everything they are to making sure of that - and even if they aren't, they're liable to commit themselves to that road just the same.]
Or if you are, then I'm broken too. I couldn't even SAVE myself, Chara. You know how I got it to work?
[Their tone adopts a fierce edge, eyes hard and uncompromising.]
I had to pretend I was SAVING you instead.
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Already know they can't apologize. "I'm sorry" and "I didn't mean to" are just excuses you make to try and weasel out of punishment, insincere worm that you are. Just saying "sorry" isn't good enough. You have to really show how sorry you are, Chara, give them what they want. Can't say "I was so scared I'd hurt you," because that's more manipulation. That has to be a lie, because if you really loved them, you'd never have hurt them. Can't - big kids don't cry.
So they keep trying to just brush it off, to shove it out of sight with giggles and their mean, unfunny jokes, but it keeps not working because Frisk won't let it be tucked away out of view, and... and laughing it off isn't getting anywhere at all, but they don't know what to do.]
All this time, and you're still blurring the lines this badly? There's nothing here you could use to SAVE anything. I'm unSAVEable, am I not? In fact, I'm the reason you needed to be SAVED in the first place! Bet that was sure the kind of memory that fixed you right up, huh?
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[It's horrible and tight and uncontrolled, everything about this. Like they're on the edge of panic, of hysterics. Laughing, laughing, laughing, as if that will make it easier to bear. It had flown off the rails so horribly. And Frisk had - had facilitated this, hadn't they? Tried to do something nice for someone they loved, and what happens? It backfires. It hits you hard, and Chara finds a way to make it their own fault instead of Frisk's, Frisk who gave them the Orb in the first place.
It can't be just all this, can it? They have to learn. They have to. Learn real, proper magic, like a Dreemurr, like they're supposed to.]
I know you didn't mean to. I know you didn't. I know you'd never hurt me on purpose. Not now.
[Not like they already have, ha ha. Maybe that's the wrong thing to say. It probably is. Frisk never has the right thing to say. And there they go again, making things about them! How selfish of you, Frisk! This was never about you!]
I just mean that - that I couldn't... [What do they say? What do they do that won't make this about them when it's nothing to do with them?] I'm not the one worth SAVING here, Chara. You are. I don't care what just happened. It's okay. I'm okay. We're both okay.
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[Chara's no better than Papyrus, than Mettaton, than Toriel, than Asgore, than... than anyone. Frisk gets hurt and acts like it doesn't affect them at all, the fact the people who are supposed to be safe went and harmed them. Just brushes it off like Undyne's making a joke about how everyone tried to kill Frisk. Oh, it's cool! They aren't the one worth SAVING!]
Stop it. We're not okay. Not if you're saying you're not worth... what did you even think I was worried about? That I'd - I'd have to make an excuse to keep from getting in trouble or something?!
[Of course that'd be all Chara cared about, right? Chara just laughs it off, looks to cover their own neck, doesn't care about anyone. After all, Frisk has to tack a "not now" onto the end of their stupid fake bullhonkey, because Chara has hurt them on purpose! Literally the first thing Chara did in Wonderland was hurt Frisk on purpose! Chara just hurt Frisk now, and that's the reason this is all like this, right?
Frisk can try to trot out their false "I'd never doubt you, Chara," but it won't work. Not when they know how that turned out when Asriel said it. They're smarter than that now. They're not taken in so easily. Not when that kind of belief only gets people hurt!]
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[They actually stomp their foot, grinding their heel into the rug out of escalating frustration.]
I know you hurt me. And I know you didn't mean to. And I know you're sorry for doing it. And I forgive you! I don't - you know that's not the same, that's not the same as what we talked about at all!
[Their arms cross across their chest, bottom lip jutting outward in a defiant pout, brow scrunching down in their imminent frustration. Like Chara is anything, anything at all like the people who left them there, who left them there and told them they'd be right back, who knew how to pinch hard enough so their skin went almost black, and called it love. Like Chara is anything like that. Maybe those people deserve none of their time, none of their thoughts of patience or forgiveness. But that's because they've devoted nothing to Frisk in turn.]
What? Am I not allowed to forgive you? Because you're the exception to the rule? You're not. You don't get to decide who I forgive or why I do. I just do. And you're forgiven. So there.
[And, for good measure, before they can muzzle the impulse, Frisk sticks out their tongue.]
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[They don't even understand why they're just getting more and more upset about this! They could understand this horror and trepidation on the surface, where they knew they'd get punished when they made someone unhappy, but they can't even start to comprehend why it snowballs on itself like this when they're confronted with the complete utter extreme.]
I could have ruined you. I could have done to you what I did to...
[Do they even have to finish that sentence? A pie with buttercups instead of cups of butter. An empty, dusty photo frame and a box of shoes. A flower who stays behind as the Underground goes empty. The kind of corrupting touch that does worse than just killing. That ruins irreparably, that reduces them to a state that can barely be called living anymore.]
You can't be okay with that. What if you didn't come back? What if you came back broken?
[An empty flower, faking cheer and compassion. Doing everything to solve everyone's problems perfectly, and finding out that it does nothing to fix the hollow, shattered feeling inside of you. A few trembling, broken fragments of SOUL, walking around Wonderland and masquerading as a whole person.]
What if I hurt you again?
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[That's what Chara's so good at. What they've always been good at. Punishing themselves, endlessly hurting themselves for perceived injustices. For imagined slights. For making people love them, and forgive them, because no one could possibly see something worth loving and forgiving in a demon, could they? Destroying those bridges so no one else can.
Because no one will love them the way they are. Right?
* Is your flesh as rotten as you?
Frisk almost says something else. Something about how things that are broken cannot possibly get more broken, as if there is a metric for the level of broken that is acceptable - they emerged this way, they know they did, and there's no taking that back. No making it better, or more bearable.
Their tone softens, gently.]
It's okay. It's okay. You don't have to ask like you're those - those people that did those things, who - who did those things to me. You're nothing like them.
[They can feel their SOUL again. Red, warm, and whole. Uncorrupted, they thing. The same as it always was. SAVED, perhaps.]
You're like me.
[Can you feel it beating, partner?]
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Even without a Reset, there's no moving forward. There's no changing fate.
Why did this happen?
They sit back down on their bed. Sink into it heavily. They just... they just feel devoid. They feel every inch like their broken SOUL. Incomplete, not right, in pieces. Straining without closure. Disjointed shards trying to reach out, but... but not enough of them exists to achieve a secure, comforting gestalt.]
I'm nothing like you.
[Similar fashion choices, and that's it. Ha ha, isn't that right, Asriel?]
It's... funny, is it not? I cannot seem to have anything unless I take away from you.
[They weren't the one who carried the Locket and Knife to Wonderland, but they're the one who wears them. Frisk had to go and offer half their room to a walking consequence. Frisk can never call Toriel "mom" again, because Chara steals away the love Frisk deserves, forces them to play scapegoat for all the horrible violent will that Chara was responsible for.]
I'm just like monsters, but not in the way I want to be.
[They'll never be made of love and compassion. It was stupid to get their hopes up about magic that could communicate, could warm but never burn.
They're Toriel's shrill, betrayed giggles, the manic agony as she crows that they really are no different from them.]
I expect you to pay the price for my happiness.
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[You're the only person who understands me.
Maybe...maybe that's not what they should have said. They didn't mean to strike that fresh parallel there, that thing that ached and still aches to think about. But it's - they know it's true. They know it is, it is because Chara is the person who walked with them for every step of the way, who shared their SOUL and their every experience. Their partner. Their SOULmate. The person that is, that always will be, the last and first and most important relationship in their life.
The most important person in their life.
Someone they never could and would let go of.]
You came first. Everything I have I owe to you. I just happened to come along at the right time.
[They shrug, tiredly. The rest writes itself, does it not? A child in a striped shirt, the latest in a long string of them, replacements for children Toriel lost, reflections of the hope Asgore saw in the first human's eyes - the hope that cuts Frisk deeper and deeper than anything, because that hope must have dimmed like a dying star somewhere down the road, and they still don't know at what exact point it did so.]
You're not forcing this onto me, Chara. You're not making me love you. You - you have to know that. I need you to know that. 'Cause I know you're not always perfect, just like I'm not either, and I don't care. You wouldn't be the same person if you were perfect. You wouldn't be you, and you're - you're who I wanna be with, remember?
[We made a promise. Clasped hands. Said we'd never go back.]
That doesn't change. It never did.
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Really are two peas in a pod, aren't they?]
It's not being perfect I'm worried about.
[That's a lie.
The surface taught them what happened when they made mistakes. Even the smallest slip-up brought on catastrophic punishment, yelling and mockery and pinches and slaps in places where nobody would see welts or red marks. The Underground taught them they were supposed to be the future of humans and monsters, the angel that had seen the surface, their only hope - they had to be as perfect as Asriel thought they were, and when they failed to be that... well, look what happened, right? Even in the perfectly happy ending, where every problem came to a tidy conclusion, there was nobody saying "I forgive you, Chara."
...Even Frisk didn't get spared from that. Their every action was judged. They only deserved to be happy when they didn't make a single mistake. Didn't fight back at all. Didn't avoid the people who'd hurt them, because that wouldn't be very friendly of them, would it? They got their praise at the end, but it was only "you're so good," only "you're a softhearted weenie," never an "I forgive you" for them either.
Ha. Is it any wonder neither of them knows the first thing about how to react rationally when they make mistakes?]
It's... you got hurt.
[They don't know how to say it, how to find the right words for it. That they don't care about intentions or accidents, they care that they're just perpetuating this pattern where the people who love Frisk end up hitting them.]
It's not - I'm not saying "I'm sorry," because that doesn't even mean anything.
[They're so sorry it hurts, but the word is never enough. They hate "sorry."]
It's not "it won't ever happen again," because... what if it does, right? No matter how much I... you know, don't want to hurt someone -
["Love" is no easier to say, especially not at a time like this.]
- I don't know for sure I won't hurt you. Maybe I will. Maybe I'll say something stupid or I'll get mad and awful or it'll be another accident, but maybe it'll happen again. It's...
[What is it? They don't have a script to pull from for something like this.]
I wish you hadn't been hurt. You didn't deserve that at all. You were just trying to be nice to me.
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[But the words are just a formless, hopeless litany, as pointless and endlessly spiraling as a circle. Useless in stemming the flow of whatever self-blame Chara must be heaping upon themself - and Frisk knows they've got to be, because Frisk would be doing the same in their place, they know without question.
They do all they can do, all they ever do, and stand there patiently, and smile.]
I've hurt you too. I've broken promises, I've, I've done terrible things to you. You've always...you've still stayed with me. Still my best friend, my family.
[Despite everything, right?
Despite everything.
And they do mean everything.
They've broken promises. They've thrown Chara's words back in their face. They've taken things from them, taken away a family, taken away an object that was theirs and that proved that they existed, treated it like garbage. They've hurt them. They've deliberately taken every vulnerability Chara has displayed, every moment in which they've expressed guilt or pain or regret, and knotted it into a ball to fling into their face with all the energy and disgust they can muster.
But still.
There are promises they've broken, and promises they've kept.]
Why's it okay when I hurt you, but not the other way around, Chara?
[The words are soft and even and patient, as if Frisk doesn't already know the answer. As if they don't already know what Chara must be thinking in response, what they're about to say.]
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cw self-harm in a religious context?? how do i tag this
cw more self-harm references
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