Chara (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fulllifeconsequences) wrote2026-01-26 10:23 pm
fulllifeconsequences) wrote2026-01-26 10:23 pm
* Application
Name: Snapdragon
DW username: N/A
E-Mail: snapdragonsk [at] gmail [dop] com
IM: temporarycancer (AIM)
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temporarycancer
Other Characters: N/A
Character Name: Chara
Series: Undertale
Timeline: Post-Pacifist, with several Neutral runs and an aborted No Mercy run behind them.
Canon Resource Link: Wiki link.
Character History: (THIS IS REALLY LONG. I'M SORRY. It covers the fallen child's backstory before Frisk's arrival, a nearly-complete No Mercy run, which is relevant to Chara, and an abridged telling of a true pacifist run, since Chara is coming from the same canon point as Frisk.)
Once upon a time, two races existed together: humans and monsters. One day, war broke out between them. Humans emerged victorious, and monsterkind was sealed far underground, trapped by a barrier so powerful only a force equivalent to seven human souls could smash it. There was no way out, but there was a way in: a lonely mountain named Mt. Ebott. It was rumored that travelers who climbed the mountain were doomed to disappear without a trace.
Then, one fateful day in 201X... a child appeared. This was not a happy child, not by any stretch of the imagination. After all, they willingly chose to climb a mountain that was supposed to make them vanish off the face of the earth. Although they never told anyone why or spoke about their life prior to that... they hated humanity, deeply and bitterly. Whatever it was that planted this seed of malice within them, whatever it was that drove them to want to disappear... it goes without saying that it was not a pleasant reason that drove them to fall.
But the fallen child did not vanish. They landed, badly injured, in the Underground. Desperately, they cried out for help, and somebody heard them. Asriel Dreemurr, the monster prince. He carried the wounded child back to his parents, King Asgore and Queen Toriel. The two of them nursed the child's wounds, took them in, and loved them just as they loved their own son. Thus, the fallen child became Chara Dreemurr, the future of humans and monsters.
It's hard to say for sure how Chara's time with the Dreemurrs passed. They cared for their new family, perhaps, in their own way. Lovingly drew flowers and hung them on the wall, knit an earnest but sappy Mr. Dad Guy sweater for Asgore, put macaroni pictures up. Told jokes about two kids who played in a muddy garden, about a kid who ate a pie with their bare hands. Exchanged lockets with Asriel -- beloved tokens with "Best friends forever" written inside them. Joked and teased playfully with their adopted sibling, playing games with the old video camera or making the creepy face just to make him giggle. Even after they'd been dead and gone for a long time, they still gaze on old family photos in silence. They still remember chocolate bars in the fridge. They still know that Asgore's journal entry is the same every single day.
But it's also true that Chara Dreemurr was not a perfect child. Far from it.
They still despised humanity. And there were a few facts about the Underground. First and foremost was the fact that the barrier needed seven human souls to break. Second among these was the fact that monsters could absorb human souls. Third... humans could not absorb monster souls because they faded too quickly. Except, that is, for a certain kind. Boss monster souls. The kind Asgore, Toriel, and Asriel had. Interesting, isn't that?
One day, Chara and Asriel made a pie for their father. Silly little children that they were, however, they used buttercups instead of cups of butter! What a ridiculous mistake! Except... buttercups are not very good for you. Asgore got terribly ill. Asriel cried and cried, wracked with guilt. But Chara... Chara laughed. Was that only an accident that got terribly out of hand? Did Chara perhaps have plans for a boss monster soul? They certainly won't tell -- and you can trust that smiling, angelic face, can't you? Either way... Asgore lived, and Chara and Asriel learned something very important about buttercups.
Well. That was for the best. If you only wanted power, then there were three boss monster souls surrounding Chara, certainly. But Chara never killed a single Dreemurr. At least, not intentionally. No, there was a very specific sort of power that Chara sought. Seven human souls' worth of power. Enough to break the barrier. Enough to free everyone.
So Chara and Asriel hatched a plan. Well... Chara, mostly, but the two of them both steadfastly referred to it as "our" plan, not Chara's, even long after its unpleasant result. Chara had always been clever for their age, though. A gifted speaker, with an impressive vocabulary for a child their age, talented with persuasion -- manipulation, even. A surprisingly advanced reader.
With their silver tongue and just a little bit of pushing (you crybaby), Chara got Asriel on board with their plan. To cross the barrier took the power of a combined human and monster soul. If they wanted to absorb another six souls and free everyone, then that meant it would have to be Chara who died. Asriel would then absorb their soul, cross over, and together they would harvest the power to get the ending everyone wanted. But first... a child had to die. Asriel went to pick all the buttercups he could find.
The very nature of the plan, and the way it was executed, are all very telling in and of itself. That Chara was the one who died. That Chara, who certainly knew knives very well, chose the agonizing, painful death that buttercup poisoning would bring instead of something much more quick and painless. That even as their mouth bled and their throat blistered and their voice went raw with dry heaves, they kept insisting that their last wish was to see the flowers from their village again. Now why would Chara go and set it up like that, when a swift stabbing and a warlike march toward the barrier could have accomplished the same thing much quicker?
It had to be secret; Asgore and Toriel had no intention to break the barrier. Asgore and Gerson, a veteran of the original war that sealed them away, both agreed that escape was pointless. Once they left, humans would simply kill them. So Chara wanted, obviously, to make their death look innocent. A mysterious illness that nobody could be blamed for. They wanted to plant a reason for Asriel to cross the barrier, one that didn't paint him in a violent light. One that Toriel and Asgore wouldn't stop. Did they want to shelter their family from guilt and blame? Did they care that the reputation they left after they perished was a good one? Was it simply necessary to put the facade up in order to make their plan happen? Once again: they're not telling. They never state a word one way or the other.
Whatever the case, Chara passed away in their own bed, with Asriel sobbing that he didn't like this plan anymore. With their father pleading them to wake up, telling them to stay determined, reminding them they were the future of humans and monsters. Wracked with grief, Asriel absorbed their soul. The two of them now shared a body, one where control was split 50/50 between the two of them. Chara took the lead. They picked up the empty corpse that used to be them, crossed the barrier, and returned to the village they grew up in.
When they arrived, the villagers saw a monster holding their body. Furious, they assumed Asriel had killed the child, and attacked. At this point, Chara wanted to unleash their combined power. Get the souls they needed. Not like the humans they despised deserved to keep them, anyway. But Asriel... gentle, caring Asriel wrestled back control, refused to fight back. The humans rained blow after blow down on the body the two children shared, and they did nothing to retaliate.
Fatally wounded, Asriel carried Chara's body back home and stumbled into the throne room. There... he died. Both souls broke into nothing, and their shared body turned into dust that fell across the golden flowers growing there. In a single day, the Dreemurrs had lost both their children, and there wasn't a single soul left to show for it.
The monsters of the Underground were crushed. Chara and their human soul truly had been the hope of the Underground, and now both beloved royal heirs were gone. Beside himself with grief and seeing the way his people were suffering, Asgore made a decision: from that day on, any human who fell into the Underground would be killed, and their soul would be collected. Once they finally had seven, he would smash the barrier, and they would all take revenge on humanity.
Toriel was horrified at his hasty decree. Disgusted that he would go against his son's dying actions, that he would condemn innocent lives to death, that he would string along the hopes of his subjects by waiting for seven souls instead of claiming six as soon as he had one... she fled. She took Chara's body from the coffin that held it and shut herself away within the Ruins directly beneath Mt. Ebott. Chara was buried in the place they originally fell, a tidy square of golden flowers marking their grave.
And thus ends the tale of the fallen child, Chara Dreemurr. The future of humans and monsters. Alas. How sad.
--
Except... it doesn't really end.
Time passes. One of the golden flowers that was coated in Asriel's dust gets injected with pure determination -- the will to live. Asriel awakens, soulless, as a flower. Without love, compassion, emotion, he begins to grow jaded. Adopts a new identity as Flowey the Flower. Alone, he realizes: Chara was right. The world is kill or be killed. With nothing left to live for, with nobody else who understands him, the years pass by, and he calls out for Chara. For the best friend he lost.
But Chara doesn't awaken until the seventh human falls. A child who bears a striking resemblance to them -- ambiguous in gender, age, just about everything but their apparent love for striped shirts. This child... is special. This child is determined. And that determination is what brings Chara back: the flowers on their grave break Frisk's fall, and whatever broken fragment remains of Chara's soul attaches itself to them.
The amount of influence that Chara has over Frisk is ambiguous at best. For most paths, Chara does not exert themselves directly. However, the narration that relays the world is not Frisk themselves, but is a voice of their own. One who consistently refers to Frisk in the second person ("Still just you, Frisk."), one who understands both human and monster culture, and one who seems to respond to the Dreemurrs in particular -- though the narrator consistently has something to say during battles against monsters (often goofy remarks like "Papyrus prepares a non-bone attack, then spends a minute fixing his mistake," or an offhand "Smells like sushi" when facing the fearsome and intimidating warrior Undyne), they fall mysteriously silent and serious when Frisk faces Toriel, Asgore, and even a certain best friend of Chara's.
Additionally, the narrator's opinions do seem to carry over between Neutral/Pacifist runs and a No Mercy run. Snowdrake's family seems to suggest this. Though many ACT options don't explicitly describe saying anything (threatening a Froggit, for instance, only leads to describing the Froggit's reaction instead of what Frisk may have said), both Snowdrake and his mother (who is found in the True Lab, accessible only in a true pacifist run) get unusual reactions.
Heckling Snowdrake starts out only giving relatively benign responses, but the fourth Heckle is not only strangely harsh, but explicitly laid out -- and one of Snowdrake's reactions to being heckled is really morbid, considering they're apparently addressing a completely ordinary, perfectly alive child. Confronting Snowdrake's mother, too, offers some unusual ACT options. If you choose to "joke," then the narrator does not spell out what Frisk said, only that they tell a bad pun. Choose to "Laugh" or "Heckle," though, and the narration becomes unexpectedly personal and subjective, to the point it seems to contradict what Frisk is actually doing.
Oddly enough, a No Mercy run through Snowdin sometimes reveals a strange Save Point message. If monsters still remain, instead of revealing how many are left, the text will state "That comedian...", and the No Mercy run will switch to a Neutral run. This could possibly refer to Sans, who is something of a jokester himself, but if you choose to kill every monster, but spare Snowdrake, then the Save Point specifically calls that out, and the game proceeds as a Neutral run.
Without a doubt, though, the voice that whispers to Frisk when they choose to kill everything and everyone is Chara's. A fact that takes Frisk while to discover, due to the nature Frisk and Chara's ability to SAVE, LOAD, and RESET. Chara is along for the ride for several neutral attempts, and at first, just as confused and lost as Frisk presumably is. After all... they don't know why they are awake again. Their plan had failed. They were dead. Why, then, had they been called back here?
As Frisk's runs grow darker, they begin to understand. The purpose of their summoning. Their renewed existence. The answer is strength. HP, ATK, DEF, EXP, GOLD, LOVE. Each of those numbers increasing. Each formidable enemy that falls. That feeling... that is what Chara is. Chara Dreemurr no more. Not the future of humans and monsters. Instead, they are the demon that comes when its name is called. Just like Asriel became Flowey without a soul, without the ability to love, Chara became... this. A creature digging in its nails. Biding its time. Finally, Frisk tries things differently.
It begins as normal. Their Best Friend, Flowey the Flower, attempts to prey on Frisk. Toriel comes to their rescue. She escorts them through the Ruins, coddles them through the puzzles. Acts... too Toriel. But a time comes when she leaves Frisk alone. And then... things change. No mercy. Nobody is spared. Nobody escapes being hunted down. Chara's control begins to exert itself almost immediately. They don't just wander, they don't just kill whomever they happen to run into. They scour the ruins for every last monster. Cut them all down. Napstablook the ghost vanishes in fear as the child approaches, relentlessly pacing until they destroy 20 monsters.
That's all of them. Nobody is left.
With everyone in the Ruins destroyed, Frisk... Chara... the child arrives at Toriel's home, is reunited with her. Already, Chara begins to speak. They check the kitchen. Where are the knives. They look in the mirror. There is no cheery "It's you!" There's only a simple, blunt, "It's me, Chara." Toriel, loving and protective soul that she is, seeks to destroy the exit to the Ruins, keep the child safe with them. But the child is determined, forcing Toriel's hand. She declares that the child must prove themselves strong enough to survive. Toriel asks them to fight.
And they go. Willingly. Attempting to talk merely nets a dull, flat "Not worth talking to." Toriel is killed. The child... no. Chara. Chara exits the Ruins. Flowey is waiting for them. Flowey knows... they're not really human. They're Chara. Together, the two of them can finally finish what they started all those years ago.
From there, Chara is undeniably the one steering. The Save Points twist to become theirs, announcing in their telltale red how many victims remain. 16 monsters to kill, in total. Once all the lives are extinguished, the Save Points are still Chara's -- instead of lighthearted messages about crinkling leaves and conveniently-shaped lamps, they only announce, "Determination." Sans is the first monster they meet, and even then, it's clear that this is not sweet, merciful Frisk. He opens with a joke, and Chara does not react at all. Nonetheless, he forges on, tells Chara that his brother really wants to catch a human. He suggests that they hide behind a lamp, lest Papyrus find them, but Chara. Chara has no time for pointless japes. Chara is only here for one thing. Chara stands there while some unimportant, boring comic relief plays out. Papyrus comes, Papyrus leaves. Whatever.
Sans... he knows things. He's a perceptive skeleton. Even that early on, he knows what he's dealing with. He casually announces that Chara is only pretending to be a human.
Unimportant.
Chara marches on, ticking those 16 kills off their list. Papyrus and Sans continue to interrupt. Chara continues. They ignore Papyrus' speeches, simply walking on ahead while he attempts to explain his puzzles. Some, a certain flower helps out with -- pressing down switches with vines so Chara doesn't need to bother with anything at all but combat. Sans, to his credit, tries. He attempts to suggest that Chara might have fun with puzzles, if they tried them. But he only tries for so long. Finally, he issues a warning: if Chara keeps on the path they're on, they're gonna have a bad time.
Ha ha. Yeah. Sure. Whatever. Snowdin Town. It's empty, everyone is hiding. This is advantageous to Chara. They don't care to waste time talking -- the narration they supply grows more and more blunt and chopped-off as their control strengthens. They freely plunder and rob the empty shop, carry on. Papyrus gets in the way, tries to say something about guiding Chara to stay on the straight and narrow. Spares them.
Eh. One hit, Papyrus dies. How forgettable.
Waterfall. 18 monsters to kill. A monster kid tags along with them for some reason. Talks a lot about something Chara doesn't care about. The shop here isn't abandoned. Mildly inconvenient. They have to buy things instead of taking them. They carry on through the empty, silent space until the monster kid tries to confront them. Chara doesn't even let them finish talking.
* In my way.
They try to reap the free EXP that appears in front of them, but Undyne intervenes. Takes the hit meant for the kid. At first, it looks like the mighty Undyne will go down with merely that. But she realizes. It's not just monsters that Chara has fixed their focus on. Humans. The entire world. It will be the end of everything if she does not stop them. She pulls herself back together with sheer determination. Undyne the Undying. The heroine appears.
Finally. Something interesting. 99 ATK. 99 DEF. Something in the neighbourhood of 24K HP. A real challenge. Chara's determination gets tested. It's mightier than Undyne's. She utters some nonsense about never giving up or something -- nothing Chara is listening to. Announces that Dr. Alphys has been using that time to evacuate the other monsters to safety, where Chara can't reach them.
Well, not all of them are gone. Hotland and the Core. 40 monsters to kill. Alphys' lab is empty. She wisely chooses to hide. Mettaton, TV star and resident killer robot, appears, but he chooses to flee as well. Just like Snowdin and Waterfall, the puzzles are either deactivated or already solved. The place is empty, save for the encounters that Chara can kill. None of Mettaton's antics slow them down. There is only the grim, silent search for victims. Nothing else.
Some Royal Guards try to avenge Undyne. Star-crossed lovers. Their deaths, one by one, are very tragic. Muffet puts on a big show of trapping Chara. Ha. She dies in one hit, too.
A hotel. Empty, save for one jaded fast-food worker. Irrelevant. The countdown continues through the Core. More monsters to kill. More puzzles skipped. More flavour text ignored. Only killing. Only gaining LOVE. Mettaton appears again, unveils a flashy battle body. Dies in one hit. Minor inconvenience.
Finally. New Home. Chara speaks more than ever, their words redder and redder. They reminisce. My bed. His bed. Our clothes. My drawing. No chocolate. Still has that sweater. The word "you" is all but gone from their vocabulary now, and it shows in those same blood-red words. I unlocked the chain. I've read this already. They find their knife and locket. Not a worn dagger, not some heart-shaped locket. Their items. The real knife. About time! The locket. Right where it belongs.
After all this time hiding and waiting, Flowey finally shows himself again. He speaks to Chara. Tells them about how he awoke as a flower. Without a soul. Discovered that he could not feel at all. His father's care did nothing to comfort him. His mother did nothing. He was incapable of love. Flowey... the being who was once Asriel... the one who was still their best friend. He was crushed. He didn't want to live in a world without love. Without Chara. So he tried to take a page from Chara's book. He tried to disappear.
It didn't work. Fear stopped him. What happens to you when you die, if you don't have a soul? And that... was how Flowey discovered his own determination. His ability to SAVE and LOAD. Suddenly, he was above consequences. He could undo anything he did. He could redo anything he did. His mistakes could vanish any time he felt like it. Just like Chara. Just like Frisk.
At first, he tried to be good. Befriend everyone. Spare everyone. Solve every problem perfectly. But... he began to get tired. Bored. None of it had any point. It was always the same, every time he went back and did it over again. And so... he tried being less than good. Not because he liked it, of course. But because he "could," he "had to." He needed to see what happened.
Ha. Still best friends, after all this time. Still two souls -- or lack thereof -- that understand each other perfectly. Like nobody else possibly could. The sensation of gaining power. The passing thrill of winning. The idle curiosity that makes them try, just to see what happens. Flowey and Chara are truly made of the same things.
Well. Mostly. A few differences. Flowey still clings to the old plan, the one that killed them both. Free all the monsters. Show them what humanity is really like -- that it is, and always has been, kill or be killed. Use that power to give mankind what they deserve, perhaps. But Flowey... hesitates. Begins to think... if he can be together with Chara again, then maybe just living on the surface wouldn't be so bad. They don't even have to kill six others themselves. Asgore already has six, and the soul that Chara has hijacked makes seven.
Chara does not agree. Chara is determined. Chara can no longer feel the things a whole, intact soul allows a person to feel. They have more to kill. They are not satisfied with the absurd idea of calling the whole thing off. They have gone too far to turn back. Once again, Asriel tries to wimp out of the plan, but this time, Chara will not die for it. Flowey... begins to quiver. Sees Chara making that creepy face they can make, and does not giggle. Flowey feels fear. Flowey runs away.
One more battle to fight. Sans awaits them in the Last Corridor. Not to issue judgment. To stop them. To show them a bad time. And Chara... they have a bad time. They have several bad times. So many bad times that Sans loses count. But their determination does not waver. Chara comes back, again and again. Toys with it. Tries to let themselves be spared, once, only to have that apparent mercy turn into bones piercing right through them. Ha ha. Very funny, Sans.
They can try again. They can win this time. They are sure of it.
But they do not get to proceed. Somehow, Frisk still fights for their soul. Pours all their determination into one last Hail Mary. Before Chara can claim their ending, before they can cement their control, before they can destroy the world... Frisk resets.
--
This time, Frisk does it right. The true pacifist route, one where Chara isn't quite so... upfront and present. Everyone gets spared. Somehow, memories that aren't Frisk's whisper to them every so often. When their soul cracks, in their dying moments, they can hear Asgore calling to a child on their deathbed: Chara! You have to stay determined! Frisk plummets down a waterfall, lands in golden flowers. Recalls a memory that isn't theirs: Asriel's voice. Chara, huh? That's a nice name. Frisk finds Alphys' real laboratory. Watches some old VHS tapes of some very bittersweet memories. Asgore and Toriel, expectant and in love. Two children, laughing and playing and teasing each other. The birth of a plan. A plan to free everyone. Asriel in tears as their sibling dies.
Frisk carries on. All the way to the end. The final confrontation.
Flowey gathers up all the souls. Reveals himself as Asriel Dreemurr. Frisk keeps holding on, keeps sparing, even in the bleakest moments. They call out to their friends' souls one by one, help them to remember who they are. Remind them of the friendship that Frisk built with them. The things they share.
There is one more person who needs to be saved.
* Someone else.
One more memory that isn't quite Frisk's feeds into their mind. When Chara first fell. When they lay hurt and crying for help, and Asriel came to their aid. A happy family, smiling and holding armfuls of the golden flowers they love. His name is called.
* Asriel Dreemurr.
He admits why he's doing all this. He cares about Chara. He doesn't want to say goodbye. He doesn't want to lose them again. He's scared, he's alone, he's sorry.
He is saved.
With the souls inside him, with love and empathy restored to him, he shatters the barrier that kept monsterkind trapped Underground. Frisk forgives him. Frisk comforts him. And just like that... everyone is back, everything is better. Frisk is free to reunite with all the friends they made in the Underground. And, in fact, if they choose to walk all the way back to the Ruins, all the way back to where they first fell, all the way back to that square patch of golden flowers... they can see Asriel again, in his last lingering moments as himself.
He tells the truth about Chara. How they hated humanity. How it wasn't a very happy reason that drove them to leap down the great yawning abyss in the middle of Mt. Ebott. How they shared control of their body when Asriel absorbed their soul, how he was the one who held back. That he had no regrets about it. That Chara wasn't exactly the nicest person. That Frisk, instead, is the friend he always wished he had.
The fragment of soul that held tight to Frisk's for all this time is silent. Frisk leaves the Underground, and when they leave, it is them and them alone.
What happens to you when you die if you don't have a soul?
Apparently, sometimes, you end up in Wonderland.
Abilities/Special Powers:
Chara was once a human, and thus, possesses Determination. The quality unique to human souls that allows them to persist after death. This determination -- and Frisk's -- were what called them back from death, even after their soul had shattered. Just like Frisk, this gives them the ability to SAVE. To leap back in time to a point they had already laid down, like nothing had ever happened. They, too, can RESET, can bring everything back to zero and start all over again. As the demon that comes when its name is called, their determination is even greater -- had their no mercy run finished uninterrupted and their control become absolute, they would display the power to destroy the world utterly, leaving only a howling black void. Likewise, they possess the ability to bring the world back from nothingness. A reset far more terrifying than any Frisk could manage. That, however, would come at the cost of bargaining away Frisk's soul.
Since the no mercy run was incomplete, Frisk's soul is not theirs. Thus, they remain soulless, only a hollow fragment of themselves. That means their ability to SAVE is weaker than Frisk's. For game purposes, their SAVEs will work like Frisk's. Chara cannot use them to avoid deaths, but can use them to heal outside of a combat situation, and can restore to the last point they SAVED at, to a certain extent. They can only go back a short time -- a few hours, at the very limit, but more likely only several minutes or so. (Which is to say, saves will only last for whatever thread they're laid in, and can't carry to other threads/logs/etc.)
Because Frisk possesses a more intact soul, if they're in the area, they can "overwrite" Chara's save points, so that Chara can only either try to lay a newer save down or restore to the point that Frisk creates. They won't be blatantly savescumming without explicit planning and permission from threadmates, but that offers an extra IC "failsafe" against the murderchild going too rampagey. The ability to RESET will be axed completely for game purposes.
As a demon/soulless vessel, Chara also has the ability to claim others' souls for their own and possess them. THEY WILL NOT BE DOING THIS INGAME. They have a perfectly lovely body of their own now. Nobody sell their soul to the demon. This is a patently terrible idea.
Chara also possesses Very Fourth Wall Breaking Knowledge, as someone who addresses the player very plainly and directly. They know about the player, about their world as a temporary construct, about other "worlds" that they could be brought to for the purpose of winning the game. They can "kill" the player by crashing the game, they can deny further playthroughs unless they get what they want, and they even speak to the player in the very bones of the "world," the game's code.
Since the No Mercy run was not played to completion, Chara has not conversed with their "partner" face-to-face yet, so there will be no addressing any players or Knowing More Than A Character In A Game Should. Any fourth walling will be done with permission, and it'll stick closer to regular old lampshading than blatant gamebreaking bullhonkey because seriously child come on.
Third-Person Sample:
Wake up, Chara! You are the future of humans and monsters!
Their father's words still echoed within them, even after so long. The last words they heard before they died. They didn't understand why they were hearing that refrain once again, but Chara... Chara stayed determined.
Chara woke up.
The sky stretched above them. The sight was disgusting. This was the surface. Riddled with the humans Chara detested. It wasn't even the sky from the oh-so-lovely good ending Frisk had insisted on. This was not a picturesque golden sunset on a warm summer evening. This was gray, low-hanging clouds. Big, fluffy snowflakes tickling their cheeks and settling on their eyelashes.
They were cold. Cold as... ha ha. Cold as death. Snow, they reasoned. Of course. If it was falling from the sky, then it must be all around them. Soaking their back, sending numbness crawling along their limbs. How long had they been lying there? Why, for that matter, had Frisk woken them up again? What was the purpose?
* Get up. You have better things to do.
They tried to think it, to project it to the SOUL they had attached themselves to. The same whisper they'd used to try and push Frisk toward one action or another countless times before. But there was no response. They tried to push for control again, will this body into turning its head just a few degrees to the side. Enough to get their bearings.
There was a complete and utter lack of resistance. The gesture surprised them with its ease and momentum -- they overdid it, pushed too hard, pressed their cheek into the snow. Cold and wet, just like their back. There were surroundings to look at, but now Chara retreated further inward, alarmed and fascinated by their own self.
Slowly, like dipping a cautious toe into unknown waters, they lifted a numb arm. Reached up to that detestable sky. A damp green sweater sleeve caught the edge of their focus. Old bandages peeked out from the sleeve. Not the gross, gooey bandage that Frisk had when they fell. Older than that. Things that should have been left in an empty coffin. The cold, clumsy hand that flexed in the winter air was undeniably theirs. Pale, with scraped knuckles and familiar faint scars on their fingers from clumsy kitchen accidents long ago. Getting too careless with the knives.
Another hand raised, silhouette against the weak winter sunlight. Also theirs. They pulled back their sleeve, pinched themselves. Did it again, just to make sure. Dropped their arms limply down again, stared up at the sky again. Noticed things they'd already noticed, but now in an entirely new light.
They were shivering. They were cold. They pinched themselves and felt it. Their heart was pounding, their breath coming in uneven, weird gasps.
Chara... just. Just to see what would happen. Chara did something they had not done for a very, very long time. They tried to cry out for help. What came out instead was a weak, raspy noise that crumbled into coughing almost immediately. Their throat hurt. Their voice felt raw with disuse, their mouth tasted bloody, throat as tender and blistered as if they'd swallowed... as if they...
Their shoulders began to shake. Not from the cold, but from laughter their aching throat did not want to strain itself with. It took a few tries to recover their voice enough to form words, and even then, they could hardly decide what would be funnier to announce first.
* But nobody came?
No. Cute, but the lesser punchline here. No, the funniest thing of all. The greatest realization. Slowly, stiffly, they sat up. Got to their feet for the first time in a very long time. Mumbled hoarsely to themselves:
"It's me, Chara."
First-Person Sample:
[The camera angle is a little bit too low, to be honest; it's clear Chara has simply set their device down on the counter, letting it point at the kitchen. They can only be seen from the smile down, but what a cheerful, pleasant smile it is! Rosy-cheeked and warm. Like the face of an angel.]
I thought it would be fun to bake a pie.
[They are a very good baker. Though sometimes they don't follow the recipe too closely. Buttercups instead of cups of butter! Whoopsie!
They hum to themselves as they stroll in and out of the frame, stooping to peer in drawers, stretching to check cupboards. Flour. Here's sugar. Eggs in the fridge.]
Would anyone care to join me? I could use a little help! You see. Some things... I'm having a little trouble finding. I would be very happy if someone could point a few things' hiding places out to me. For instance.
[They pause, half their face still out of the shot. Tilt their head curiously, raise their empty hands in a gesture of confusion.]
* Where are the knives.
DW username: N/A
E-Mail: snapdragonsk [at] gmail [dop] com
IM: temporarycancer (AIM)
Plurk:
Other Characters: N/A
Character Name: Chara
Series: Undertale
Timeline: Post-Pacifist, with several Neutral runs and an aborted No Mercy run behind them.
Canon Resource Link: Wiki link.
Character History: (THIS IS REALLY LONG. I'M SORRY. It covers the fallen child's backstory before Frisk's arrival, a nearly-complete No Mercy run, which is relevant to Chara, and an abridged telling of a true pacifist run, since Chara is coming from the same canon point as Frisk.)
Once upon a time, two races existed together: humans and monsters. One day, war broke out between them. Humans emerged victorious, and monsterkind was sealed far underground, trapped by a barrier so powerful only a force equivalent to seven human souls could smash it. There was no way out, but there was a way in: a lonely mountain named Mt. Ebott. It was rumored that travelers who climbed the mountain were doomed to disappear without a trace.
Then, one fateful day in 201X... a child appeared. This was not a happy child, not by any stretch of the imagination. After all, they willingly chose to climb a mountain that was supposed to make them vanish off the face of the earth. Although they never told anyone why or spoke about their life prior to that... they hated humanity, deeply and bitterly. Whatever it was that planted this seed of malice within them, whatever it was that drove them to want to disappear... it goes without saying that it was not a pleasant reason that drove them to fall.
But the fallen child did not vanish. They landed, badly injured, in the Underground. Desperately, they cried out for help, and somebody heard them. Asriel Dreemurr, the monster prince. He carried the wounded child back to his parents, King Asgore and Queen Toriel. The two of them nursed the child's wounds, took them in, and loved them just as they loved their own son. Thus, the fallen child became Chara Dreemurr, the future of humans and monsters.
It's hard to say for sure how Chara's time with the Dreemurrs passed. They cared for their new family, perhaps, in their own way. Lovingly drew flowers and hung them on the wall, knit an earnest but sappy Mr. Dad Guy sweater for Asgore, put macaroni pictures up. Told jokes about two kids who played in a muddy garden, about a kid who ate a pie with their bare hands. Exchanged lockets with Asriel -- beloved tokens with "Best friends forever" written inside them. Joked and teased playfully with their adopted sibling, playing games with the old video camera or making the creepy face just to make him giggle. Even after they'd been dead and gone for a long time, they still gaze on old family photos in silence. They still remember chocolate bars in the fridge. They still know that Asgore's journal entry is the same every single day.
But it's also true that Chara Dreemurr was not a perfect child. Far from it.
They still despised humanity. And there were a few facts about the Underground. First and foremost was the fact that the barrier needed seven human souls to break. Second among these was the fact that monsters could absorb human souls. Third... humans could not absorb monster souls because they faded too quickly. Except, that is, for a certain kind. Boss monster souls. The kind Asgore, Toriel, and Asriel had. Interesting, isn't that?
One day, Chara and Asriel made a pie for their father. Silly little children that they were, however, they used buttercups instead of cups of butter! What a ridiculous mistake! Except... buttercups are not very good for you. Asgore got terribly ill. Asriel cried and cried, wracked with guilt. But Chara... Chara laughed. Was that only an accident that got terribly out of hand? Did Chara perhaps have plans for a boss monster soul? They certainly won't tell -- and you can trust that smiling, angelic face, can't you? Either way... Asgore lived, and Chara and Asriel learned something very important about buttercups.
Well. That was for the best. If you only wanted power, then there were three boss monster souls surrounding Chara, certainly. But Chara never killed a single Dreemurr. At least, not intentionally. No, there was a very specific sort of power that Chara sought. Seven human souls' worth of power. Enough to break the barrier. Enough to free everyone.
So Chara and Asriel hatched a plan. Well... Chara, mostly, but the two of them both steadfastly referred to it as "our" plan, not Chara's, even long after its unpleasant result. Chara had always been clever for their age, though. A gifted speaker, with an impressive vocabulary for a child their age, talented with persuasion -- manipulation, even. A surprisingly advanced reader.
With their silver tongue and just a little bit of pushing (you crybaby), Chara got Asriel on board with their plan. To cross the barrier took the power of a combined human and monster soul. If they wanted to absorb another six souls and free everyone, then that meant it would have to be Chara who died. Asriel would then absorb their soul, cross over, and together they would harvest the power to get the ending everyone wanted. But first... a child had to die. Asriel went to pick all the buttercups he could find.
The very nature of the plan, and the way it was executed, are all very telling in and of itself. That Chara was the one who died. That Chara, who certainly knew knives very well, chose the agonizing, painful death that buttercup poisoning would bring instead of something much more quick and painless. That even as their mouth bled and their throat blistered and their voice went raw with dry heaves, they kept insisting that their last wish was to see the flowers from their village again. Now why would Chara go and set it up like that, when a swift stabbing and a warlike march toward the barrier could have accomplished the same thing much quicker?
It had to be secret; Asgore and Toriel had no intention to break the barrier. Asgore and Gerson, a veteran of the original war that sealed them away, both agreed that escape was pointless. Once they left, humans would simply kill them. So Chara wanted, obviously, to make their death look innocent. A mysterious illness that nobody could be blamed for. They wanted to plant a reason for Asriel to cross the barrier, one that didn't paint him in a violent light. One that Toriel and Asgore wouldn't stop. Did they want to shelter their family from guilt and blame? Did they care that the reputation they left after they perished was a good one? Was it simply necessary to put the facade up in order to make their plan happen? Once again: they're not telling. They never state a word one way or the other.
Whatever the case, Chara passed away in their own bed, with Asriel sobbing that he didn't like this plan anymore. With their father pleading them to wake up, telling them to stay determined, reminding them they were the future of humans and monsters. Wracked with grief, Asriel absorbed their soul. The two of them now shared a body, one where control was split 50/50 between the two of them. Chara took the lead. They picked up the empty corpse that used to be them, crossed the barrier, and returned to the village they grew up in.
When they arrived, the villagers saw a monster holding their body. Furious, they assumed Asriel had killed the child, and attacked. At this point, Chara wanted to unleash their combined power. Get the souls they needed. Not like the humans they despised deserved to keep them, anyway. But Asriel... gentle, caring Asriel wrestled back control, refused to fight back. The humans rained blow after blow down on the body the two children shared, and they did nothing to retaliate.
Fatally wounded, Asriel carried Chara's body back home and stumbled into the throne room. There... he died. Both souls broke into nothing, and their shared body turned into dust that fell across the golden flowers growing there. In a single day, the Dreemurrs had lost both their children, and there wasn't a single soul left to show for it.
The monsters of the Underground were crushed. Chara and their human soul truly had been the hope of the Underground, and now both beloved royal heirs were gone. Beside himself with grief and seeing the way his people were suffering, Asgore made a decision: from that day on, any human who fell into the Underground would be killed, and their soul would be collected. Once they finally had seven, he would smash the barrier, and they would all take revenge on humanity.
Toriel was horrified at his hasty decree. Disgusted that he would go against his son's dying actions, that he would condemn innocent lives to death, that he would string along the hopes of his subjects by waiting for seven souls instead of claiming six as soon as he had one... she fled. She took Chara's body from the coffin that held it and shut herself away within the Ruins directly beneath Mt. Ebott. Chara was buried in the place they originally fell, a tidy square of golden flowers marking their grave.
And thus ends the tale of the fallen child, Chara Dreemurr. The future of humans and monsters. Alas. How sad.
--
Except... it doesn't really end.
Time passes. One of the golden flowers that was coated in Asriel's dust gets injected with pure determination -- the will to live. Asriel awakens, soulless, as a flower. Without love, compassion, emotion, he begins to grow jaded. Adopts a new identity as Flowey the Flower. Alone, he realizes: Chara was right. The world is kill or be killed. With nothing left to live for, with nobody else who understands him, the years pass by, and he calls out for Chara. For the best friend he lost.
But Chara doesn't awaken until the seventh human falls. A child who bears a striking resemblance to them -- ambiguous in gender, age, just about everything but their apparent love for striped shirts. This child... is special. This child is determined. And that determination is what brings Chara back: the flowers on their grave break Frisk's fall, and whatever broken fragment remains of Chara's soul attaches itself to them.
The amount of influence that Chara has over Frisk is ambiguous at best. For most paths, Chara does not exert themselves directly. However, the narration that relays the world is not Frisk themselves, but is a voice of their own. One who consistently refers to Frisk in the second person ("Still just you, Frisk."), one who understands both human and monster culture, and one who seems to respond to the Dreemurrs in particular -- though the narrator consistently has something to say during battles against monsters (often goofy remarks like "Papyrus prepares a non-bone attack, then spends a minute fixing his mistake," or an offhand "Smells like sushi" when facing the fearsome and intimidating warrior Undyne), they fall mysteriously silent and serious when Frisk faces Toriel, Asgore, and even a certain best friend of Chara's.
Additionally, the narrator's opinions do seem to carry over between Neutral/Pacifist runs and a No Mercy run. Snowdrake's family seems to suggest this. Though many ACT options don't explicitly describe saying anything (threatening a Froggit, for instance, only leads to describing the Froggit's reaction instead of what Frisk may have said), both Snowdrake and his mother (who is found in the True Lab, accessible only in a true pacifist run) get unusual reactions.
Heckling Snowdrake starts out only giving relatively benign responses, but the fourth Heckle is not only strangely harsh, but explicitly laid out -- and one of Snowdrake's reactions to being heckled is really morbid, considering they're apparently addressing a completely ordinary, perfectly alive child. Confronting Snowdrake's mother, too, offers some unusual ACT options. If you choose to "joke," then the narrator does not spell out what Frisk said, only that they tell a bad pun. Choose to "Laugh" or "Heckle," though, and the narration becomes unexpectedly personal and subjective, to the point it seems to contradict what Frisk is actually doing.
Oddly enough, a No Mercy run through Snowdin sometimes reveals a strange Save Point message. If monsters still remain, instead of revealing how many are left, the text will state "That comedian...", and the No Mercy run will switch to a Neutral run. This could possibly refer to Sans, who is something of a jokester himself, but if you choose to kill every monster, but spare Snowdrake, then the Save Point specifically calls that out, and the game proceeds as a Neutral run.
Without a doubt, though, the voice that whispers to Frisk when they choose to kill everything and everyone is Chara's. A fact that takes Frisk while to discover, due to the nature Frisk and Chara's ability to SAVE, LOAD, and RESET. Chara is along for the ride for several neutral attempts, and at first, just as confused and lost as Frisk presumably is. After all... they don't know why they are awake again. Their plan had failed. They were dead. Why, then, had they been called back here?
As Frisk's runs grow darker, they begin to understand. The purpose of their summoning. Their renewed existence. The answer is strength. HP, ATK, DEF, EXP, GOLD, LOVE. Each of those numbers increasing. Each formidable enemy that falls. That feeling... that is what Chara is. Chara Dreemurr no more. Not the future of humans and monsters. Instead, they are the demon that comes when its name is called. Just like Asriel became Flowey without a soul, without the ability to love, Chara became... this. A creature digging in its nails. Biding its time. Finally, Frisk tries things differently.
It begins as normal. Their Best Friend, Flowey the Flower, attempts to prey on Frisk. Toriel comes to their rescue. She escorts them through the Ruins, coddles them through the puzzles. Acts... too Toriel. But a time comes when she leaves Frisk alone. And then... things change. No mercy. Nobody is spared. Nobody escapes being hunted down. Chara's control begins to exert itself almost immediately. They don't just wander, they don't just kill whomever they happen to run into. They scour the ruins for every last monster. Cut them all down. Napstablook the ghost vanishes in fear as the child approaches, relentlessly pacing until they destroy 20 monsters.
That's all of them. Nobody is left.
With everyone in the Ruins destroyed, Frisk... Chara... the child arrives at Toriel's home, is reunited with her. Already, Chara begins to speak. They check the kitchen. Where are the knives. They look in the mirror. There is no cheery "It's you!" There's only a simple, blunt, "It's me, Chara." Toriel, loving and protective soul that she is, seeks to destroy the exit to the Ruins, keep the child safe with them. But the child is determined, forcing Toriel's hand. She declares that the child must prove themselves strong enough to survive. Toriel asks them to fight.
And they go. Willingly. Attempting to talk merely nets a dull, flat "Not worth talking to." Toriel is killed. The child... no. Chara. Chara exits the Ruins. Flowey is waiting for them. Flowey knows... they're not really human. They're Chara. Together, the two of them can finally finish what they started all those years ago.
From there, Chara is undeniably the one steering. The Save Points twist to become theirs, announcing in their telltale red how many victims remain. 16 monsters to kill, in total. Once all the lives are extinguished, the Save Points are still Chara's -- instead of lighthearted messages about crinkling leaves and conveniently-shaped lamps, they only announce, "Determination." Sans is the first monster they meet, and even then, it's clear that this is not sweet, merciful Frisk. He opens with a joke, and Chara does not react at all. Nonetheless, he forges on, tells Chara that his brother really wants to catch a human. He suggests that they hide behind a lamp, lest Papyrus find them, but Chara. Chara has no time for pointless japes. Chara is only here for one thing. Chara stands there while some unimportant, boring comic relief plays out. Papyrus comes, Papyrus leaves. Whatever.
Sans... he knows things. He's a perceptive skeleton. Even that early on, he knows what he's dealing with. He casually announces that Chara is only pretending to be a human.
Unimportant.
Chara marches on, ticking those 16 kills off their list. Papyrus and Sans continue to interrupt. Chara continues. They ignore Papyrus' speeches, simply walking on ahead while he attempts to explain his puzzles. Some, a certain flower helps out with -- pressing down switches with vines so Chara doesn't need to bother with anything at all but combat. Sans, to his credit, tries. He attempts to suggest that Chara might have fun with puzzles, if they tried them. But he only tries for so long. Finally, he issues a warning: if Chara keeps on the path they're on, they're gonna have a bad time.
Ha ha. Yeah. Sure. Whatever. Snowdin Town. It's empty, everyone is hiding. This is advantageous to Chara. They don't care to waste time talking -- the narration they supply grows more and more blunt and chopped-off as their control strengthens. They freely plunder and rob the empty shop, carry on. Papyrus gets in the way, tries to say something about guiding Chara to stay on the straight and narrow. Spares them.
Eh. One hit, Papyrus dies. How forgettable.
Waterfall. 18 monsters to kill. A monster kid tags along with them for some reason. Talks a lot about something Chara doesn't care about. The shop here isn't abandoned. Mildly inconvenient. They have to buy things instead of taking them. They carry on through the empty, silent space until the monster kid tries to confront them. Chara doesn't even let them finish talking.
* In my way.
They try to reap the free EXP that appears in front of them, but Undyne intervenes. Takes the hit meant for the kid. At first, it looks like the mighty Undyne will go down with merely that. But she realizes. It's not just monsters that Chara has fixed their focus on. Humans. The entire world. It will be the end of everything if she does not stop them. She pulls herself back together with sheer determination. Undyne the Undying. The heroine appears.
Finally. Something interesting. 99 ATK. 99 DEF. Something in the neighbourhood of 24K HP. A real challenge. Chara's determination gets tested. It's mightier than Undyne's. She utters some nonsense about never giving up or something -- nothing Chara is listening to. Announces that Dr. Alphys has been using that time to evacuate the other monsters to safety, where Chara can't reach them.
Well, not all of them are gone. Hotland and the Core. 40 monsters to kill. Alphys' lab is empty. She wisely chooses to hide. Mettaton, TV star and resident killer robot, appears, but he chooses to flee as well. Just like Snowdin and Waterfall, the puzzles are either deactivated or already solved. The place is empty, save for the encounters that Chara can kill. None of Mettaton's antics slow them down. There is only the grim, silent search for victims. Nothing else.
Some Royal Guards try to avenge Undyne. Star-crossed lovers. Their deaths, one by one, are very tragic. Muffet puts on a big show of trapping Chara. Ha. She dies in one hit, too.
A hotel. Empty, save for one jaded fast-food worker. Irrelevant. The countdown continues through the Core. More monsters to kill. More puzzles skipped. More flavour text ignored. Only killing. Only gaining LOVE. Mettaton appears again, unveils a flashy battle body. Dies in one hit. Minor inconvenience.
Finally. New Home. Chara speaks more than ever, their words redder and redder. They reminisce. My bed. His bed. Our clothes. My drawing. No chocolate. Still has that sweater. The word "you" is all but gone from their vocabulary now, and it shows in those same blood-red words. I unlocked the chain. I've read this already. They find their knife and locket. Not a worn dagger, not some heart-shaped locket. Their items. The real knife. About time! The locket. Right where it belongs.
After all this time hiding and waiting, Flowey finally shows himself again. He speaks to Chara. Tells them about how he awoke as a flower. Without a soul. Discovered that he could not feel at all. His father's care did nothing to comfort him. His mother did nothing. He was incapable of love. Flowey... the being who was once Asriel... the one who was still their best friend. He was crushed. He didn't want to live in a world without love. Without Chara. So he tried to take a page from Chara's book. He tried to disappear.
It didn't work. Fear stopped him. What happens to you when you die, if you don't have a soul? And that... was how Flowey discovered his own determination. His ability to SAVE and LOAD. Suddenly, he was above consequences. He could undo anything he did. He could redo anything he did. His mistakes could vanish any time he felt like it. Just like Chara. Just like Frisk.
At first, he tried to be good. Befriend everyone. Spare everyone. Solve every problem perfectly. But... he began to get tired. Bored. None of it had any point. It was always the same, every time he went back and did it over again. And so... he tried being less than good. Not because he liked it, of course. But because he "could," he "had to." He needed to see what happened.
Ha. Still best friends, after all this time. Still two souls -- or lack thereof -- that understand each other perfectly. Like nobody else possibly could. The sensation of gaining power. The passing thrill of winning. The idle curiosity that makes them try, just to see what happens. Flowey and Chara are truly made of the same things.
Well. Mostly. A few differences. Flowey still clings to the old plan, the one that killed them both. Free all the monsters. Show them what humanity is really like -- that it is, and always has been, kill or be killed. Use that power to give mankind what they deserve, perhaps. But Flowey... hesitates. Begins to think... if he can be together with Chara again, then maybe just living on the surface wouldn't be so bad. They don't even have to kill six others themselves. Asgore already has six, and the soul that Chara has hijacked makes seven.
Chara does not agree. Chara is determined. Chara can no longer feel the things a whole, intact soul allows a person to feel. They have more to kill. They are not satisfied with the absurd idea of calling the whole thing off. They have gone too far to turn back. Once again, Asriel tries to wimp out of the plan, but this time, Chara will not die for it. Flowey... begins to quiver. Sees Chara making that creepy face they can make, and does not giggle. Flowey feels fear. Flowey runs away.
One more battle to fight. Sans awaits them in the Last Corridor. Not to issue judgment. To stop them. To show them a bad time. And Chara... they have a bad time. They have several bad times. So many bad times that Sans loses count. But their determination does not waver. Chara comes back, again and again. Toys with it. Tries to let themselves be spared, once, only to have that apparent mercy turn into bones piercing right through them. Ha ha. Very funny, Sans.
They can try again. They can win this time. They are sure of it.
But they do not get to proceed. Somehow, Frisk still fights for their soul. Pours all their determination into one last Hail Mary. Before Chara can claim their ending, before they can cement their control, before they can destroy the world... Frisk resets.
--
This time, Frisk does it right. The true pacifist route, one where Chara isn't quite so... upfront and present. Everyone gets spared. Somehow, memories that aren't Frisk's whisper to them every so often. When their soul cracks, in their dying moments, they can hear Asgore calling to a child on their deathbed: Chara! You have to stay determined! Frisk plummets down a waterfall, lands in golden flowers. Recalls a memory that isn't theirs: Asriel's voice. Chara, huh? That's a nice name. Frisk finds Alphys' real laboratory. Watches some old VHS tapes of some very bittersweet memories. Asgore and Toriel, expectant and in love. Two children, laughing and playing and teasing each other. The birth of a plan. A plan to free everyone. Asriel in tears as their sibling dies.
Frisk carries on. All the way to the end. The final confrontation.
Flowey gathers up all the souls. Reveals himself as Asriel Dreemurr. Frisk keeps holding on, keeps sparing, even in the bleakest moments. They call out to their friends' souls one by one, help them to remember who they are. Remind them of the friendship that Frisk built with them. The things they share.
There is one more person who needs to be saved.
* Someone else.
One more memory that isn't quite Frisk's feeds into their mind. When Chara first fell. When they lay hurt and crying for help, and Asriel came to their aid. A happy family, smiling and holding armfuls of the golden flowers they love. His name is called.
* Asriel Dreemurr.
He admits why he's doing all this. He cares about Chara. He doesn't want to say goodbye. He doesn't want to lose them again. He's scared, he's alone, he's sorry.
He is saved.
With the souls inside him, with love and empathy restored to him, he shatters the barrier that kept monsterkind trapped Underground. Frisk forgives him. Frisk comforts him. And just like that... everyone is back, everything is better. Frisk is free to reunite with all the friends they made in the Underground. And, in fact, if they choose to walk all the way back to the Ruins, all the way back to where they first fell, all the way back to that square patch of golden flowers... they can see Asriel again, in his last lingering moments as himself.
He tells the truth about Chara. How they hated humanity. How it wasn't a very happy reason that drove them to leap down the great yawning abyss in the middle of Mt. Ebott. How they shared control of their body when Asriel absorbed their soul, how he was the one who held back. That he had no regrets about it. That Chara wasn't exactly the nicest person. That Frisk, instead, is the friend he always wished he had.
The fragment of soul that held tight to Frisk's for all this time is silent. Frisk leaves the Underground, and when they leave, it is them and them alone.
What happens to you when you die if you don't have a soul?
Apparently, sometimes, you end up in Wonderland.
Abilities/Special Powers:
Chara was once a human, and thus, possesses Determination. The quality unique to human souls that allows them to persist after death. This determination -- and Frisk's -- were what called them back from death, even after their soul had shattered. Just like Frisk, this gives them the ability to SAVE. To leap back in time to a point they had already laid down, like nothing had ever happened. They, too, can RESET, can bring everything back to zero and start all over again. As the demon that comes when its name is called, their determination is even greater -- had their no mercy run finished uninterrupted and their control become absolute, they would display the power to destroy the world utterly, leaving only a howling black void. Likewise, they possess the ability to bring the world back from nothingness. A reset far more terrifying than any Frisk could manage. That, however, would come at the cost of bargaining away Frisk's soul.
Since the no mercy run was incomplete, Frisk's soul is not theirs. Thus, they remain soulless, only a hollow fragment of themselves. That means their ability to SAVE is weaker than Frisk's. For game purposes, their SAVEs will work like Frisk's. Chara cannot use them to avoid deaths, but can use them to heal outside of a combat situation, and can restore to the last point they SAVED at, to a certain extent. They can only go back a short time -- a few hours, at the very limit, but more likely only several minutes or so. (Which is to say, saves will only last for whatever thread they're laid in, and can't carry to other threads/logs/etc.)
Because Frisk possesses a more intact soul, if they're in the area, they can "overwrite" Chara's save points, so that Chara can only either try to lay a newer save down or restore to the point that Frisk creates. They won't be blatantly savescumming without explicit planning and permission from threadmates, but that offers an extra IC "failsafe" against the murderchild going too rampagey. The ability to RESET will be axed completely for game purposes.
As a demon/soulless vessel, Chara also has the ability to claim others' souls for their own and possess them. THEY WILL NOT BE DOING THIS INGAME. They have a perfectly lovely body of their own now. Nobody sell their soul to the demon. This is a patently terrible idea.
Chara also possesses Very Fourth Wall Breaking Knowledge, as someone who addresses the player very plainly and directly. They know about the player, about their world as a temporary construct, about other "worlds" that they could be brought to for the purpose of winning the game. They can "kill" the player by crashing the game, they can deny further playthroughs unless they get what they want, and they even speak to the player in the very bones of the "world," the game's code.
Since the No Mercy run was not played to completion, Chara has not conversed with their "partner" face-to-face yet, so there will be no addressing any players or Knowing More Than A Character In A Game Should. Any fourth walling will be done with permission, and it'll stick closer to regular old lampshading than blatant gamebreaking bullhonkey because seriously child come on.
Third-Person Sample:
Wake up, Chara! You are the future of humans and monsters!
Their father's words still echoed within them, even after so long. The last words they heard before they died. They didn't understand why they were hearing that refrain once again, but Chara... Chara stayed determined.
Chara woke up.
The sky stretched above them. The sight was disgusting. This was the surface. Riddled with the humans Chara detested. It wasn't even the sky from the oh-so-lovely good ending Frisk had insisted on. This was not a picturesque golden sunset on a warm summer evening. This was gray, low-hanging clouds. Big, fluffy snowflakes tickling their cheeks and settling on their eyelashes.
They were cold. Cold as... ha ha. Cold as death. Snow, they reasoned. Of course. If it was falling from the sky, then it must be all around them. Soaking their back, sending numbness crawling along their limbs. How long had they been lying there? Why, for that matter, had Frisk woken them up again? What was the purpose?
* Get up. You have better things to do.
They tried to think it, to project it to the SOUL they had attached themselves to. The same whisper they'd used to try and push Frisk toward one action or another countless times before. But there was no response. They tried to push for control again, will this body into turning its head just a few degrees to the side. Enough to get their bearings.
There was a complete and utter lack of resistance. The gesture surprised them with its ease and momentum -- they overdid it, pushed too hard, pressed their cheek into the snow. Cold and wet, just like their back. There were surroundings to look at, but now Chara retreated further inward, alarmed and fascinated by their own self.
Slowly, like dipping a cautious toe into unknown waters, they lifted a numb arm. Reached up to that detestable sky. A damp green sweater sleeve caught the edge of their focus. Old bandages peeked out from the sleeve. Not the gross, gooey bandage that Frisk had when they fell. Older than that. Things that should have been left in an empty coffin. The cold, clumsy hand that flexed in the winter air was undeniably theirs. Pale, with scraped knuckles and familiar faint scars on their fingers from clumsy kitchen accidents long ago. Getting too careless with the knives.
Another hand raised, silhouette against the weak winter sunlight. Also theirs. They pulled back their sleeve, pinched themselves. Did it again, just to make sure. Dropped their arms limply down again, stared up at the sky again. Noticed things they'd already noticed, but now in an entirely new light.
They were shivering. They were cold. They pinched themselves and felt it. Their heart was pounding, their breath coming in uneven, weird gasps.
Chara... just. Just to see what would happen. Chara did something they had not done for a very, very long time. They tried to cry out for help. What came out instead was a weak, raspy noise that crumbled into coughing almost immediately. Their throat hurt. Their voice felt raw with disuse, their mouth tasted bloody, throat as tender and blistered as if they'd swallowed... as if they...
Their shoulders began to shake. Not from the cold, but from laughter their aching throat did not want to strain itself with. It took a few tries to recover their voice enough to form words, and even then, they could hardly decide what would be funnier to announce first.
* But nobody came?
No. Cute, but the lesser punchline here. No, the funniest thing of all. The greatest realization. Slowly, stiffly, they sat up. Got to their feet for the first time in a very long time. Mumbled hoarsely to themselves:
"It's me, Chara."
First-Person Sample:
[The camera angle is a little bit too low, to be honest; it's clear Chara has simply set their device down on the counter, letting it point at the kitchen. They can only be seen from the smile down, but what a cheerful, pleasant smile it is! Rosy-cheeked and warm. Like the face of an angel.]
I thought it would be fun to bake a pie.
[They are a very good baker. Though sometimes they don't follow the recipe too closely. Buttercups instead of cups of butter! Whoopsie!
They hum to themselves as they stroll in and out of the frame, stooping to peer in drawers, stretching to check cupboards. Flour. Here's sugar. Eggs in the fridge.]
Would anyone care to join me? I could use a little help! You see. Some things... I'm having a little trouble finding. I would be very happy if someone could point a few things' hiding places out to me. For instance.
[They pause, half their face still out of the shot. Tilt their head curiously, raise their empty hands in a gesture of confusion.]
* Where are the knives.
Reapplication samples
A blank sheet of paper, and a haphazard pile of crayons. Abject, utter stillness.
They used to love drawing. Still lifes, imitations, landscapes. Never the fantastic, prismatic make-believe that came so easily to Asriel, of course. They'd never had it in them to dream like he did. Never could imagine a version of themself that was worth interest, that was powerful, that was beloved. Never could quite muster up a Chara that felt good enough to exist, let alone that was the best possible person out there.
But... they'd still played with him, hadn't they? Dreamed up a boss monster that was fit to be in Hyperdeath's tall, eclipsing shadow. The servant of the Absolute God of Hyperdeath, the demon that protected a being too powerful to really need protecting at all. They picked up the red crayon, hesitantly started tracing a few shaky lines. "They'll do all the things Hyperdeath can't do because he's a hero," they'd reasoned to Asriel once, when he'd complained that Hyperdeath wasn't a weakling, didn't need a protector because he was strong enough to protect everyone. "If a hero can't kill the bad guys, then the demon can do it for him."
Maybe that had been the kind of answer that had led him to conclude they weren't the greatest person.
They abruptly stopped drawing, demolished the barely-formed shapes under a sea of angry red scribbles. Characters like that were for babies, anyway. Stupid, cringy, embarrassing little kids. They'd never needed games of make-believe. Why had they ever liked drawing to begin with? They weren't even good at it.
"Perhaps I was better off sticking to flowers," they murmured, flipping the sheet of paper over. Giggled a little, even, because even if sticking to flowers was the one useful thing they ever did with their life, even that didn't exactly qualify as "better off," did it? What a comedic little nibble of irony.
They decided to just end this misguided attempt at wasting time doing what they were best - destroying things. Crumpled the paper up into the teeniest ball they could imagine, threw it away. Snapped the crayons, one by one. Erased all the evidence they'd ever even tried in the first place.
Now that was the sort of statement Chara was built for.
First-Person Sample:
[Watch your step in one of the tearooms today. And also out in the hallway. And also also in the adjoining tearoom. There is a seemingly endless trail of yarn taking up an alarming amount of the real estate, each consuming stretch occasionally dotted with a tangled knot. If you somehow manage to trace this nightmare back to its source, you might find Chara painstakingly trying to wind a ball back up by hand, blunt fingernails desperately trying to pick apart a tightly-packed knot.]
Of all the things in the world to take up, I had to take up knitting, didn't I? I bet sculptors never have this problem. I bet scrapbookers don't deal with this. I should just light this wretched thing on fire.
[If you have stumbled onto them, you might notice their smile is disturbingly placid and unruffled, a telling sign they're completely, unfathomably frustrated.]
Did you know that cats enjoying toying with yarn balls isn't just a cartoon stereotype? If you should happen to see Sans, please give his cat my regards. 4 has certainly made my day much more interesting with his charming antics.
[Pick. Pick. Pick. They continue struggling with the knot, which has somehow tightened itself into a substance more dense than the contents of a black hole. If there were a scientist in the room, then they would certainly be astonished at this wondrous discovery.]
Golly, I'm sorry! Did I say "interesting?" I mean the opposite of that. An abject affront to the very concept of a worthwhile existence. A crime against God. That was what I meant.
Silly me.