((Hello again.

I believe, last chapter, I said that I had no plans to continue the story.

However.

Lately, I've had an idea of a post-Undertale world I wanted to try. At first, it was going to be separate. But, y'know I came pretty far with Over and Over's versions of the characters so- why not continue from here instead? And, surprise surprise, my idea started working better as a direct continuation rather than something new.

I'm pretty busy right now (I'm working on Echoes of Blue and a small mini-series, as some of you know), so it might be a small wait before I really get started, and I'll put a notice up on my profile page for when I start the story~

Until then, enjoy this sneak-peek of chapter one of By and By!))

By and By

Tentative Summary: Life returns to normal. But what, exactly, is normal, now that humans and monsters are once again living together side by side? Frisk and Sans both grow to realize that maybe, things after the last RESET can't go so smoothly after all... and what about those left behind? (Main Narrators are Sans, Frisk, and Chara.)

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Frisk could feel the stares drilling into their back and making their skin crawl. They shifted, uncomfortable, and their red SOUL pulsed rapidly in front of their chest, identical to a heartbeat.

Frisk was used to seeing their SOUL by now; everyone who had traveled through the Underground thought it was normal. It was a common occurrence, a regularity, a side effect of the magic that filled both monster's SOULS and the very air of the Underground for reasons that Frisk didn't quite understand.

But humans did not have magic.

None of them... except for Frisk, the lone human who had survived the trip to the Underground.

Frisk had tried saying it wasn't magic per say- it was just their SOUL, nothing more and nothing less. And when that hadn't worked, Frisk had tried to hide it.

That hadn't worked out as well as Frisk had hoped.

Frisk covered their SOUL with one hand, self conscious, and told themself that they should be used to this; they should know better by now. Three months on the surface, and already they had realized with a sinking feeling something that they hadn't wanted to admit to themself.

They missed the RESETS.

No, that wasn't quite right. They didn't- didn't miss the long, lonely walks, the long days of solitude and of fear. They didn't miss being trapped and used.

What they missed was knowing what would come. What would happen next. And knowing, that if they somehow messed up, it would be okay. They could fix everything- even things they had once thought impossible. Sans was fine after all, wasn't he?

"Hey… isn't that…?" A voice murmured, and Frisk jerked their head up, scanning their surroundings quickly. Humans made them nervous, too. Frisk hadn't exactly forgotten what had happened prior to their journey Underground, after all.

"Yeah, I'm sure of it. It's the monster's human ambassador. The little kid."

"Huh. They're smaller than I thought. You don't think the rumors about them are true... do you?"

"Which ones? There are a lot."

"Y'know, y'know! The rumors that they're a changeling or something. Like, a monster just pretending to be a child so the monsters look harmless and friendly. I mean, they don't even talk, right? For all we know, the lot of those monsters could eat humans or something..."

Frisk felt their SOUL pulse in response to their sudden shift of emotions and they sped up, walking faster. They didn't want to hear this. It had only been a few months since humans realized monsters were real, but Frisk had thought people's feeling would change faster about the monsters than this. Frisk had accepted monsters within a few days, after all, in the first RESET alone... why couldn't everyone else?

Worse, Frisk realized the Surface made them nervous. They had known, of course, getting used to the Surface would be hard for them just as it would be for everyone else, but they hadn't realized just what the RESETS had done to them.

They had been gone for nearly three years, trapped in that repeating loop. And during that time, Frisk hadn't seen any humans other than Chara, who wasn't exactly the best reflection of humanity themself. And now that their SOUL still came out of their body whenever they were feeling strong emotions…?

Frisk knew they belonged more with the monsters than the humans.

But it was their duty now to bridge the gap between humans and monsters so… so why did Frisk feel so hopeless about it?

"hey, kiddo!" A familiar voice called. The humans' voices faded to distant background noise, receding from Frisk's concentration, as a familiar skeleton drove up to Frisk in a moped. Frisk's SOUL vanished back into their body, and they let out a breath of relief. Sans slowed down, grinning down at Frisk and winking. "c'mon, frisk, we don't want to be late to dinner again. this time should be the first time paps' food is actually edible, and you don't want to miss that event."

(Miss it? Me? I'd never,) signed Frisk with a small smile. They hopped up onto the moped behind Sans, grabbing hold of his hoodie.

Sans glanced back at them and smirked. "throw me a bone and don't tell tori i let you ride without a helmet, okay kid?"

Frisk, their hands unavailable, squinted back at Sans and stuck out their tongue. Sans chuckled, and the moped sped up with a whirring sound, the wind snatching at Frisk's hair.

Despite the promise of the pleasant evening and weather, however, Frisk couldn't help but glance back.

Monster's child.

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