There are a couple of things that I'd like to make clear before we begin.

First of all, the first spark of inspiration for this story came from The Game Theorist video called 'The Tragedy of Deltarune' where MatPat theorised about how the entire journey into the dark world was simply Kris' imagination as they played with Susie trying to break her out of her shell. There's much more about that particular theory, but what's important for this story is that nobody who originates in the dark world actually exists and therefore will not make an appearance. I'm sorry if this disappoints any of you. Nevertheless, this is particularly a story about Kris and what goes on in their mind.

Number two: I write this at the time when only the first chapter of Deltarune had been released. If other chapters exist by the time you read this, chances are this story will have some canonical inaccuracies. Forgive me for that as well. However, I feel like this fanfic isn't as much about expanding the universe of Deltarune and/or Undertale as it is about using known characters to tell a story that I feel needs to be told.

And finally: This story will be dealing with depression and other related mental issues. If you're uncomfortable with this topic, consider this your warning. If you're interested, I hope you will enjoy!

PROLOGUE

The king wasn't happy. One could even say he was unhappy.

The tension between the humans and his own kind was rising steadily. It had been going on for a couple of months without a real reason, at least it seemed that way to the king and all monsters. And yet the human hostility towards them was becoming more and more obvious by the day.

Apparently, it only took a couple of fanatics to turn all of mankind on their side. These ambitious leaders openly warned about the monster's hypothetical abilities to absorb the souls of the humans they had killed and become dangerously powerful. This was true; but it hadn't happened in centuries, not since the two races agreed to rule the surface together in peace. Monsters were far from being as bloodthirsty as humans thought and feared. But with the two communities being so inclusive, it was hard for the two sides to discuss anything.

The king was afraid that at this scale, a human attack was only a matter of time. His council agreed with him, but nobody knew what to do. No-one in the entire monster kingdom, as far as the council was concerned, wanted to hurt any humans. And because their willingness to fight, or lack of it, would transfer into their physical strength if it actually came to that point, there was no doubt that the monsters would face a real possibility of a genocide.

The throne room reeked of despair and the harsh atmosphere that creeped upon the kingdom. The king was alone, sitting on his throne with his face buried in his hands. He had just sent his council outside; he needed a break from the constant talking and dealing with everyone's annoyed mood. It was a good thing he stopped bringing little Asgore to these meetings, he didn't want him to see how everybody's spirits break. In the meantime, Asgore had been helping his mother in the garden. It looked like he was becoming really passionate about flowers. Not the most kingly characteristic, but at that moment, the king was glad that at least his son found some peace in these times.

He stood up and slowly walked towards the window. It was a beautiful day outside. Birds were singing, flowers were blooming... Just as he suspected, the king saw a handful of gardeners attending to their work outside, and Asgore was hopping around them, helping in any way he could with his little hands. The king had to smile. What he would give to be able to be down there with him, help him water the golden flowers and not worry about ruling or preventing a war.

There was no denying it, the kingdom had to prepare their defences in order to protect its own peace. The king only hoped that keeping his son's life in mind in battle would give him enough willpower to repulse the human attackers.

Just as he was readying to call in Gerson to inform his troops about this, a weird noise cut the silence of the throne room. The best way to describe the sound would be the opposite of explosion, like hundreds of small particles were pulled in violently by a strong force to form a shape. And indeed, there was suddenly a person lying on the floor face down, quietly moaning and putting themselves together.

The king reflexively pulled out his trident, but was hesitant to be on alert. On one hand, the intruder looked a little bit like a human -arms, legs, a bald head, by the looks of it. But on the other hand, if this were a human wizard trying to sneak in and assasinate him, they did a terrible job at it. The king thought that the humans would have at least sent in someone more... suitable for the job.

On top of that, when he shook off the initial surprise, he could feel the stranger's monster soul. Even though there was something offsetting about it, this was without a doubt one of their own; but he didn't recall ever seeing them.

The monster got up to their knees and took a deep breath.

"wow, ok. something definitely happened," they said to themselves. "is this the right place? or the right time, for all that matter?"

"Ahem." The king cleared his throat to make his presence known to the stranger, and he put his trident away again. "Howdy! How can I..."

The monster looked at him. The king stared right into the face of a reanimated human skull. Their eye sockets were softly shining with a blue light, almost as if they reflected the light of a blue flame burning right in the middle of the eyes, but the fire itself was missing. A few flashes of red color intertwined with the blue light every now and then.

"oh! hello there. i didn't see you, my bad." The skeleton stood up and took a good look around. "are we in the throne room?"

"Um, yes?" said the king.

"cool. are we on the surface?"

The king paused with his mouth opened. What kind of question was this? Of course they were on the surface, monsters weren't living in caves under a mountain or anything.

"it doesn't look like our throne room, anyway," the other monster continued. "i think we made it. fella," he looked right at the king; "you wouldn't happen to be king Asgoliath himself, would you?"

"Why, yes, I am," said the king. He felt his patience slipping away; the stranger had yet to introduce himself, and the more he talked, the more confused Asgoliath was. The skeleton's entrance was weird enough on its own, but the mystery surrounding him was deepening even further every second, and the king didn't know what to make of it.

He stepped closer towards the monster. "Excuse me," he spoke up, "but would you care to explain what any of this means?"

"whoops, sorry 'bout all that," the stranger replied and stratched his head. "i'm still wrapping my head around all this too, i forgot how confused you might be, your majesty."

The skeleton's eyes closed for a second, and when he re-opened them, the odd lighting was gone. Asgoliath was looking into a pair of empty eye sockets; but this sight was ironically perhaps more calming than the light show which preceded.

"my name is sans. sans the skeleton." The monster bowed his head slightly and smiled. "and i came to you with a warning."

"Warning?" The king sighed. "Gosh, we're drowning in warnings these days. Is this about the humans too?"

"humans, huh? so we did get a good timing, too, i suppose." Sans' expression didn't change, he looked just as relaxed as before.

"My apologies, mister Sans, but..." Asgoliath took a step forward and tried to look as authoritative as he could. "If I may, I would like to know exactly who you are and where you come from. I think I know most monsters in my kingdom, but I have never seen anyone like you around."

"i'll take that as a compliment," said the skeleton and winked. "let me be honest, on any other day, i would just tell bad jokes until you don't ask any personal questions. but something inside me is telling me that now's not the time for that."

"Then what is the time for now? It sure must be urgent if you decided to invade the throne room so rudely. You didn't even knock on the door."

Sans chuckled. "oh yeah. totally missed the opportunity there. welp, first of all, it may be best if we don't involve anybody else in this, so i didn't wanna have to walk by everyone on the way here. secondly and more importantly, it's quite difficult to move through shortcuts if you're not sure where they lead. the fact that we made it into this room, by the time you're alive, nonetheless, is really kind of a miracle."

Asgoliath was just about to question the "we" in the monster's sentence, but a different word asked for his attention more urgently. "Alive? What's that supposed to mean?"

"yeah, total spoiler alert, i'm really sorry. but that's part of the reason why i'm here." Sans came closer towards the king, and his face suddenly turned way more serious. "the war between monsters and humans... it might happen any day now, is that right?"

"Well... we are all fearing that, but it's still not certain."

"trust me, where i come from, the war did happen. the humans were victorious." There was just a hint of intimidating light in the skeleton's eyes while he spoke. "monsters were facing complete annihilation. they imprisoned what was left of us inside a mountain and sealed the entrance with a magic barrier which could only be broken by the same amount of power that created it, the power of seven human souls. the surface was lost to us, and we suffered."

Asgoliath was speechless for a moment, a rather rare occasion for him. "How do you know all this?" he finally asked.

"welp, i was there." Sans shrugged. "i mean i wasn't there from the very beginning of it, but i saw the aftermath. it wasn't a nice sight."

"So you just... traveled here from the future? I've never thought that to be possible! How do I know you're not making this all up?"

"you don't." The king's guest reached out to him with his right hand and grinned. "you'll just have to take my word for it."

Asgoliath hesitated for a moment. None of this made any sense whatsoever. A complete stranger showed up, claiming he has seen -no, been in the future, which in itself was ridiculous; and warned him about the consequences of a war that was just about to happen.

But on the other side, Sans seemed honestly troubled, and at this point, the king would probably shake anyone's hand if it meant saving his kingdom. He lifted his arm and with a forced smile took the skeleton's hand into his.

A farting noise resonated throughout the chamber.

"i'm sorry, your majesty, i couldn't resist," the monster smirked and showed the baffled king a tiny pillow which he had been hiding in his hand. At one side it morphed into a short hose. Asgoliath assumed that the thing was filled with air, and when their hands pressed against it, it made the farting sound as it was being pressed through the hose.

"by the way," said Sans as he was putting the cushion into his pocket, "i bet you didn't invent these yet. maybe that's a proof that i'm from the future, whaddya think?"

The king suddenly laughed. This little trick definitely cut the tension a small bit.

"Alright now," he spoke up. "You have my attention. Tell me: why did you come from... wherever you came from, to tell me about the war? Do you have an idea as to how should we prevent it from happening?"

"maybe. it's definitely worth a try." With absolute platitude, Sans sat down into one of the empty chairs and put his legs on the table; Asgoliath gazed upon a pair of fluffy purple slippers. "i happened to know a human, you know. or, i guess i will know her. depends on how you look at it.

the mountain had an unguarded second entrance. a couple of humans had fallen inside over time. i only got to really know the last one. a small girl, filled with determination to always do the right thing. a real sweetie and a delight to hang out with."

The skeleton chuckled, but suddenly tilted his head to the side, as if he was listening to someone else talk. "i know, i'm sorry. but it's all true," he responded to that unheard sentence.

"So I take it that you took a liking in this human child?" Asgoliath asked as he sat down on his throne. "Was it not dangerous? If the humans were so cruel to you..."

"yeah, that's what everyone else thought at first," said Sans. "but this kid had proven everybody wrong. she was so kind, pure-hearted and innocent that the entire underground decided to maybe give humanity a second chance. well, third chance, really. but it's not my place to talk about about what happened with the second one."

"I find it hard to believe that a single human child changed everyone's mind like that."

The skeleton looked at the doubtful king with a face of endless patience and such a trustworthy persuasion that Asgoliath couldn't help but feel all of his uncertainties vanish in the air. Sans had no reason to lie to him, and although every word he said left more questions unanswered than not, he was honest the entire time.

"what matters," the guest continued, "is that we learned over time that there are humans who mean no harm to us. it was no use to put them all into one basket. and you guys shouldn't make the same mistake."

"What do you mean?"

"we both, monsters and humans, are born peaceful. and most of us want things to stay that way. i bet the fact that you're fighting now is only because you don't take enough time to get to know one another."

"Well... that may be true. Our races don't meet very much, with the exception of merchants, probably."

"see? the humans fear you because you're leaving too much to their imagination. they don't know you don't want a war, or maybe they don't wanna know. makes little difference."

Sans stood up and took a step closer towards Asgoliath. And there it was again, a sudden hint of a red and blue flash in the skeleton's eyes. When it went by, his face was suddenly more serious and urgent.

"walk among the humans," he told the king. "do it yourself, or send others. start with those who are closer towards the bottom, they don't care about politics, so they're more likely to listen. show them who monsters truly are, show them they don't have to fear you. get to know each other better. it's not too late."

"Is it not?" Asgoliath sighed. "Sans, your words are meaningful, but... what you suggest will take a lot of time and patience. I'm afraid we don't have time, and the humans have no patience."

"you're the king, your majesty. you are the future of monsters and humans, you can't give up just yet." The skeleton narrowed his back and smiled once again. "it's your best bet, anyway. i know it ain't gonna be easy, but you have to stay determined. if you persuade enough people, they won't listen to the naysayers anymore. not one ruler, but his people are those who have the power to change things. but i'm sure i don't have to tell ya."

"I..." The king wasn't fully convinced. Achieving peace without a single clash of weapons? It was just what he needed, but at the same time, the stranger's task wouldn't be easy. Sending any monster beyond the borders of his kingdom seemed like a huge risk in these times, and even then, who would guarantee that it'd be good for anything? If monsters and humans started to openly communicate more, and if the humans would see their peaceful intentions, and if enough of them were to refuse to fight, and if the human leaders would even take that into consideration... It all seemed way too far fetched at that point.

But it was still a better plan than any other that they had so far.

"I have to think about this," he said out loud. "I don't think I can decide on our next step on my own. Let me bring in the council, and you can tell them what you just told me."

"nah, that's not a good call," Sans refused. "if you want to, you can tell them this was your own idea. but i'd rather not get involved into that more than i have to."

"But why? They would listen to you. You've been there, you've thought about this for some time, I'm certain. It's definitely going to be more convinving from you."

"i'd just rather be your secret little advisor for now. chances are, i -or, another version of me -is gonna be born some time in the future. i'd rather not be a historical figure by that point. besides..." The skeleton awkwardly scratched his head, and he actually looked uneasy for a second. "folks would ask about how i even got here to begin with."

Asgoliath rose his head. "Yes, I would quite like to know that too. I don't think any monster should have the power to go back through time, it's just beyond our natural-"

And then, within a fraction of a single moment, all the dots in the king's head finally connected, and his eyes widened with realisation.

"Oh," he said.

"yep." Sans was apparently glad that he didn't have to explain anything to Asgoliath. "it was her idea."

The king had gotten lost in his thoughts for a while. His fingers tapped on the table before him as he was reaching a conclusion.

"Alright," he eventually spoke up. "I will do what you suggest. I'll tell everyone that this came from my own head. But," he stood up; "if I may ask this of you, I would like you to help us with our effort, should the council agree with your idea. As one of the many monsters sent to speak with the humans. Your secret will be safe with me," Asgoliath added with a soft smile.

Sans was tremendously relieved. "thank you, your majesty. welp, i guess i should get going now. let you have your meeting. there's little time to waste, and you've got a... skele-ton of work to do:"

The king snorted.

"thanks. it's nice to say that to someone who doesn't know it yet," said the skeleton, and disappeared in the air before Asgoliath could say another word to him.

"Wait-" he called out into the empty room, but it was too late. The king paused just to be able to take in everything that happened.

Sans the skeleton appeared out of nowhere, offered them a way out of this mess, and then left again within a blink of an eye. For all Asgoliath knew, it could have been his own mind playing a trick on him.

If Sans was real, though, the king would forever be in his debt.