I had just finished eating lunch with Papyrus when I heard the Ruins door creak open. I watched as the kid dodged the traps, sneaky little brat. I walked into the open, like I loved to do, and glared at the kid.

"Hello again, Murder. I've been thinking." They started.

"Thinking about how you're gonna die?" I smirked.

"No, just thinking about what would happen if I didn't come back."

"What do you mean?"

"I just decided, that this time, I'm not going to reset."

"What are you going to do? Give up?" I felt myself sweating. This was a joke, right?

"That's exactly what I plan to do. I hope you have fun in this dystopic world you've created!"

"Wait, y-you're not serious, are you?"

"Oh, I'm very serious. You made this decision. Live with the consequences."

"Please don't do this."

"Oh, I'm doing it. Our little game has ended, Murder. I'll see you in the next life. Until then, old friend."

"DON'T!"

Too late. The kid surrendered to a trap. They must have been joking, right? They can't just not reset, right? They can't do this, right? I'm not alone, right? I have Papyrus! And I think there's some other ghosts down here...and the amalgamates...yeah! I should be fine! I'm glad the kid's gone! They were probably bluffing anyway. I'll just wake up in my bed, and start the whole thing over. No need to worry, they were just trying to scare me!

"Brother, did the human mean what they said?" Papyrus worried.

"Nah, they were just bluffing. No need to worry, Paps." I assured.

"That is good. What should we do until the next reset then?"

"We could go on a scenic tour or something."

"Murder, how are we supposed to see anything with all this dust?"

"We'll see the dust then. I don't mind looking through a few lives."

"That is a good idea, brother."

"Thanks, bro."

I scooped up some flakes of dust and let them rest in my hand. I studied the flakes closely, letting their magic surround me. Contrary to previous belief, monsters are not fully gone when they die; some magic remains behind, allowing somebody to look into their life, if they know how, of course. I recognized this dust as the old lady's. I had looked through her life before, many times. One more couldn't hurt. I was then hit with a sudden feeling of betrayal: what she felt when she dusted. I hated that feeling. Then, I saw flashes of war, and death. I observed children, one of them human. She locked herself away in the Ruins, vowing to protect whoever fell. She wished she could have done more. In the end, she just wanted her family back. I felt tears forming in my eyesockets: a side effect of some of the more emotional backstories.

I decided to walk home to write the log for this reset. I shut the door behind me and skipped up the stairs, as usual. I entered my study, ran my fingers across the books, and pulled out the current one. I guess being stuck in a time loop forms some habits. 

'The kid threatened to not come back. I don't believe them.'

With that done, I decided to sleep until the next reset. I entered my room and laid myself on the floor, allowing myself to fall asleep. I didn't feel any reset occur. I assumed I just didn't sleep long enough. That happened, sometimes. Well, I supposed I'd just keep going back to sleep until it reset. 

I was determined.

What I thought was a few hours later, I woke up again.

"Paps, how long has it been since the kid died?" I wondered.

"Twenty-one hours, fifty-three minutes, and eight seconds." He replied.

"Huh. How long do they average until the reset occurs?"

"Their recent average is fifteen hours on the dot."

"Have they ever taken this long?"

"Not since I started becoming a ghost."

"Huh. Paps...do you think they could have been telling the truth?"

"About what, brother?"

"Not...not coming back..."

"Murder, you are overreacting! Of course they weren't serious about that!"

"Then why do I feel so..alone?"

"You are not alone, you have me!"

"I know, but.."

"But what?"

"Nevermind. What do you wanna do?"

"Brother, you should get something to eat! Food will help you think."

"You're the best, Paps."

"I know, I am the Great Papyrus, after all!"

I chuckled and left my room, continuing to tell Papyrus how awesome and cool he is. He really is the best brother in the history of the world, even sticking with me after I killed him, and keeping me determined when things got rough. He is the best. I walked to a food stash I had; I made these to keep the kid from healing when I kill them. I either burned the food that they could get, or put it in a stash, like this. It was actually Papyrus's idea, further proving how cool and awesome he is. I picked up some chisps. They should hold me over until the reset, plus Papyrus told me to eat them.

When I finished my snack, I wondered how long it had been.

"Time passed?" I requested.

"Twenty-two hours, thiry-one minutes, and forty-eight seconds." Paps returned.

"I don't feel the world growing younger."

"Neither do I, brother. This is growing worrisome."

"Paps, I want to get my mind off this. What should I do?"

"Hmm..The human likes weapons. Perhaps you can also become skilled with them."

"Paps, you have the best ideas."

"I know. Now go swing something around."

"Yes, Papyrus."

I walked to a weapon stash where I had put some of the kid's favorite toys. Sharp things, blunt things, heck, there was even a gun here. I didn't really want to use a weapon other than my bones and blasters, but maybe it'd pay off. I couldn't predict the future. I picked up the toy knife the kid had sometimes. Heh, I remembered that time the kid did genocide with a stick. I didn't know a branch hurt so much when you got hit with it. I didn't even think the stick could do anything. Now I knew better; anything could be used as weapon if you used it correctly, so why didn't I start small? A slingshot sounded decent. I could play with knives later. Heh, I remember when I was a kid I used to want a slingshot. I never got one, but I always desired one. I thought I made one when I was ten, then it got taken away. Well, guess what: there was nobody to take my slingshot away this time. 

I looked around for a suitable piece of wood to create my weapon. Upon finding one, I took the toy knife and started widdling away at it. After an hour or so, I had a nice start. Pretty good for my first experience with woodworking. I knew I had some rubber bands in my house, so I walked there to get one. I would teleport, but sometimes, magic was not the answer. I reached my house, and, shutting the door behind me, I started the search for a rubber band. I found one in my room, flying in the tornado. I wondered how that kept going without my magic flowing through it. Eh, that was a thought for another time. I attached the rubber band to the wood and created a decent looking slingshot. It wasn't the best, but it certainly wasn't the worst, either. Now I just need some small rocks; that part should be easy, since rocks were everywhere.

I exited my house, leaving the door open, and picked up a tiny rock I found on the ground. This would do fine. I placed the rock in the rubber band, and pulled back. I aimed for a tree nearby, and released. I missed by about five feet; I guessed I'd need to practice this. I repeated the process, getting closer to the tree each time. After about eight tries, I hit the tree on the side. After twenty tries, the rock was consistently hitting the tree. Not in the same spot, but I only just started, so I wasn't too worried about that. After fifty tries, I managed to hit the tree from different distances, some of them I was proud of. After a thousand tries, I was doing pretty well, and I had my mind completely away from the fact that the kid hadn't reset yet. After five thousand tries, I assumed I had been going for a really long time. I was hitting trees from different angles, distances, and I was pretty good at precision. I decided to take a break then.

"Papyrus, how long since the kid died?" I asked.

"Three days, one hour, fifty-five minutes, and forty seconds." He responded.

"Are you sure?"

"Very sure. The human has not reset yet."

"What should I do?"

"You should sleep, brother. You have been awake for days."

"Okay, Paps. You're the best."

"I am the Great Papyrus!"

I then walked into my house, shut the door, and skipped up the steps, ending up in my room. I laid myself down on the floor and fell asleep. It was no surprise that I had a nightmare; I wasn't scared of nightmares, since I was pretty good at distinguishing dreams from reality. I had to be, with the way I would sometimes destroy my room if I had a particularly bad one. After some mental training, I no longer woke up from nightmares screaming. In fact, sometimes the nightmares actually finished, which was awkward, seeing as they weren't really supposed to. When nightmares finish, it seems like a joke; trying to scare you, just to turn out being Papyrus's spaghetti in a superhero costume. Dreams are weird like that. I remembered when Papyrus would wake up in the middle of the night with a nightmare, and come into my room to cuddle with me. He thought I didn't wake up, but I did. It was honestly adorable; He was such a nice kid.

When I woke up, I was still on the floor. No reset for me, I guess. Yet. The kid would reset eventually, I knew they would. You don't just give up that kind of power in order to make somebody suffer. Not that I was suffering. I was merely annoyed, and I would wait for as long as I had to. I didn't really have a choice. The other human souls disappeared during resets now, so my escaping was literally impossible. I wondered why they disappeared. They didn't before I started trying to stop the kid. Maybe something changed, or the souls escaped. If I was a soul, I wouldn't want to be trapped in a jar. Either way, I didn't know why they disappeared, but I wasn't going to whine about it. If the souls were free, I was happy for them. No soul deserves to be trapped in a jar just to await eventual destruction. Except maybe the kid. And maybe me. I was not a good skeleton, I knew that.

I rolled over to see Papyrus. 

"How long?" I questioned.

"Three days, ten hours, sixteen minutes, and seven seconds." Papyrus said.

"What should I do?"

"Go entertain yourself with something."

"Okay, Papyrus."

I got up and decided to practice more with my slingshot. That would distract me for a good amount of time, and I did have fun doing it. I decided to make it a bit harder for myself this time by placing a can on a fence. Slightly cliche, but I didn't care. I was pretty good at shooting by this point, so hitting the can wasn't too hard. I bet the kid wouldn't do something like this, practice, since they could just come back after dying. Of course, they may have just considered the runs practice. They did get better at them as time went on. Not that it was a good thing; it wasn't. I didn't know how many times I saw them strike me down; must have been thousands. Maybe it was just hundreds, and I was exaggerating. I wasn't sure. What I was sure about is that I died quite a few times to that kid, but they'd died more times from me. I practiced for a long while until I got a bit bored. I decided to chat with Papyrus.

"How long now?" I inquired.

"Four days, zero hours, eight minutes, and three seconds." He stated.

"I thought they would have reset by now."

"Do not worry, brother! I am sure they will reset soon."

"I don't know, Papyrus."

"Cheer up, brother!"

"Paps, what if they never reset?"

"Murder, you are getting worked up over nothing."

"Maybe so. I just can't shake this feeling."

"What feeling?"

"Dread."

~~~chapter end woot~~~

Poor Murder bean.

Thanks for reading my lonely writing! 

Bye!