Rain had been hurried away back to her little room to rest while Alphys and Sans looked over the wealth of information they had been given. Once they were certain that she was unharmed and not any more of a threat than she usually was, she seemed to become an afterthought abandoned in the shadow of their precious printouts and paper work.

Not that she minded too much. She needed time to try and pull herself back together after that outburst. She felt safer knowing they had Chara boxed in for the most part. The only way out was back through time and neither of them found that to be a pleasant option as of late.

Time passed. Perhaps even a new day started before anyone came to check on her again. She awoke to the sound of Alphys clearing her throat.

“Ppst. H-hey, are you awake?” She whispered.

Rain jerked up from the face-plant she had been doing on the floor and pushed her hair out of the way. “Mhm.”

“Oh. Ok. Good.” She flipped a switch on her side of the wall and the bottom bar of energy shut off. She slid a tray of food and a few slightly water-damaged manga books through the gap. “Here. Thought you might like these.”

Rain scooted over to the door and slid the tray over to her little nest of blankets. Today she got instant noodles and flower tea. Still beats water sausages.“Thanks.” She turned the manga this way and that, inspecting the cover.

“Thought you might like something to read. I-I don’t I think have a lot of um, of real books that would interest you.” She cracked a little smile and laughed. “Un-unless you are interested in building jet engines! But I thought that since you liked Mew Mew maybe..?”

Rain put the book down and smiled. “Thanks. Really, thank you. I will be sure to read these.” She began to eat her ramen.

Alphys didn’t leave.

“Do you…need something?”

“I-I just wanted to make sure you were st-still doing ok.” She looked at the floor. “What happened to you… it looked pretty rough.”

Rain chuckled. “Trust me, I have had way worse. Believe it or not, Funny Bones up there can pack a hell of a punch.”

Alphys frowned, the tips of her teeth poking out of her lips. She did not look convinced.

Rain pressed on. “Sorry if I scared you back there. Chara is not a very reasonable creature to deal with.”

Alphys brightened, genuine excitement making her stand a little taller. “Y-yeah. B-but we learned a lot! I will tell you all about our findings later once it’s all been compiled. I-it should help us figure out how to handle this. I-I-I think there is a real chance we can help you!”

“Great. I look forward to reading it.” She tried to smile but it soon faded. “I, um, I have been stuck like this for a long time. Yet I still don’t understand what’s happened to me.” Her face fell. “ Like, at all.”

She assumed Alphys would make another optimistic promise and leave, now that she had made her social interaction for the day. Yet she remained by the door, picking at the imagined lint on her clothes. She still hadn’t turned that last bar of the energy field back on.

“Is…there something else you wanted to say?”

She began to stutter then fall back into silence before taking a deep breath and stuffing her hands into the inner pockets of her coat. She pulled out several crumpled envelopes, two of them opened. She held them close to her chest and considered them for a moment before sliding them through the gap. “H-here.”

Rain scowled, leaning forward to pick up the closest one.

It was from Papyrus.

“I-I’m sorry. I should have given them to you s-sooner. B-but I didn’t know Sans had told anyone you were down here s-s-so...”

Rain picked up a letter that had already been opened and raised a questioning eyebrow.

“S-sorry! I um, I get a lot of mail and I didn’t think any of it would be addressed to someone other than myself. So I just sort of assumed it was for me without looking at it?”

Rain scanned the large, precise scrawl. It was a daily report about the happenings of Snowdin along with multiple lines of encouragement and questions about how she was doing. “How long has he been sending these?” There were a lot of letters here.

“Um, I don’t know? I don’t actually read through my mail very often anymore and well, um, I-I um, I thought you were really dangerous?” Well, she wasn’t wrong. “S-so I kind of kept them to myself at first because Sans, w-well, I didn’t think he would want you talking to his brother. But now that I know what’s happened to you… well.” She was looking at the floor, voice going soft. “It didn’t seem right, ya know? It-it’s not your fault. We shouldn’t treat you like, um, like her. Because you’re not. You seem like a really nice person a-and I feel kind of dirty for hiding these from you.”

Rain watched Alphys for a moment, trying to decide upon her sincerity. Eventually she smiled and began to read through another letter. “Thank you Alphys. This means a lot to me. And don’t beat yourself up. I know that I… well, you were just trying to keep people safe.”

She smiled, relived that she wasn’t mad. “You’re welcome. Just um, maybe don’t mention this to Sans? Just in case Papyrus um, overheard were you were on accident or something. I still don’t know how happy he would be if he found out that I… you know.”

“Got it.”

Alphys switched the gate back to full power and turned to leave but Rain called her back. “Hey, Alphys?”

“Y-yes?”

“Would you send a letter back to him for me? If I wrote one?”

She considered it a moment before nodding. “Yeah. Um, ok. I th-think I could do that for you.”

“Thank you.” She turned her focus back to the small pile of letters. They were precious little tidbits of goofy kindness.

Maybe things really could change for the better if she just tried.

***

There was never a dull moment for Alphys over the next week or so. She and Sans had a million questions about Rain and Chara, and Rain seemed to have her fair share of questions too; all of which required a lot of testing. And all that testing required a lot of modifications to already established machinery and apparatus.

Rain was completely open with them about everything. She truly seemed to want to be helped. And who could blame her? It couldn’t be fun having that thing stuck to her soul. Unfortunately getting her any sort of help and stopping the impending threat to their timeline was pretty damn tricky when there was this much Determination involved.

Unfortunately the stress that such a threat implied was just another stone weighing Alphys down at night.

Despite the initial impressions Alphys had upon seeing such a weary looking creature, Rain was obviously a very Determined individual. The most Determined living human the Underground had ever seen.

But the other, well, she hesitated to call it a soul, but the other thing was pretty Determined too. It seemed to be a mixture of pure Determination, memory imprints, and vile, negative emotions. Alphys could tell it had once been like all the other souls she had seen. The readings, the shape and its overall existence still maintained the outlines of a human soul. But all those things had become disfigured. Deformed by its own vile nature. Rotted away.

The rot was effecting Rain’s soul now too, although she was fighting it.

It was incredibly sad to see.

Rain called the soul a demon. Perhaps that was an accurate term for it. Humans believed demons to be corrupted human spirits or something, right? There were history books that spoke of how human souls could exist even if they were devoid of kindness and love. There were even stories of what those individuals had been like. Angry, violent, craving power; always seeking something but never finding satisfaction. Cold.

But no one had ever seen what that looked like on the inside.

Alphys now knew what just such a soul was like. A human soul devoid of its positive emotions was far more dangerous than a regular human soul. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say it was simply more destructive in its nature. In the end she could only say this soul was still human in the same way she could say that a butterfly was still a caterpillar.

Since they didn’t have the power or technology necessary to simply rip the two souls apart-which she was secretly grateful for since doing so would probably destroy both souls at this point and she didn’t want to be the one to do that- they were looking into other ways to try and fix this mess.

She wanted to try and find a way to help them. Either by restoring the demon soul to a more peaceful, emotive state or by at least weakening it to a point where it could no longer be a threat.

So far the results had not been encouraging but at least they were informative. For the first time in, well, ever, Alphys was excited to come in to work. The Human’s presence remained a secret for obvious reasons so none of the work she was doing was technically “official” but she was still glad to be making progress in something again. She was glad that what she was doing had the potential to actually help people for once instead of just fusing all their problems together into one hellish, goopy mess.

…Oh god.

Anyway, since the initial slip-up during the first round of scans, she had been much more careful about how she handled things between the two souls. Of course there were still some days when things got a little loud.

And scary.

And for the poor human probably…painful.

She felt horrible on those days. But Rain was never mad. She always smiled at the end. It was a tired smile. A smile all three of them seemed to know how to feign pretty well. Yet the fact still stood that no matter how messed up some of those tests seemed to render her despite their precautions, the human was never angry with them over it.

She always thanked them and often assured Alphys that she had done nothing wrong. She swore the machines weren’t hurting her; it was just one of those bad days where Chara was trying to manipulate the situation and their pity.

So far their findings were rule breaking, wall-shattering and history-making. Alphys was also learning an unsettling amount of facts about the nature of time, which felt kind of odd to be honest because it felt like she was being reminded of things she had already learned instead of researching an entirely new field. She had a nagging feeling that Sans knew why that was but he avoided her when she tried to talk about it.

She didn’t appreciate him keeping secrets of this magnitude; not when things were as serious as they were. Yet he had never betrayed any of her many, many scummy secrets. Not even now, when it was an inconvenience to them both. So she felt she had no right to pry.

Speaking of that tight lipped skeleton, he was late. Again. She checked her watched and sighed, wiping her nervous, sweaty hands on the hem of her lab coat. He had said he would be here around noon. It was twelve thirty five. “Come on Sans. I know you like your naps but this is kind of more important than slacking off at your station!”

There was a brief moment of static and then, “i agree. that’s why i figured i would pick us up some grub on the way over. can’t save the underground on an empty stomach.”

Alphys nearly jumped out of her scales, hands flying up to her mouth to try and cover her surprised squeak. “Sans!” She yelped, hurrying to adjust her disheveled glasses. “D-don’t do that! You know h-how nervous I get down here!” She chided. “A-a-and you’re late!”

“hey now, don’t give me that look. i’d like to think that instead of being late to this meeting, i’m just really early for our next one.”

Alphys gave him a deadpan look that let him know she was not buying it. She let her hands hang uselessly at her sides, shoulders slumped and tail drooping flat against the floor. “Really Sans? Really?”

He shrugged helplessly and offered up a bag of takeout from Grillby’s. “sorry. it’s kinda hard to keep sneaking off like this. Papyrus is taking notice of my unusual levels of activity-”

She tried to hide her sudden guilt. “W-wait, Papyrus doesn’t know about Rain?” She interrupted.

He frowned. “of course not.”

Oh dear.

“not that he didn’t try to figure it out on his own. everyone is looking for her to be honest. and since undyne is back on her feet now, tori has been staying with us and she’s, well, more observant than most.” He scowled to himself. “she’s really adamant about finding her lost human.”

Alphys’s heart stopped for a second. “Y-you don’t think- she doesn’t know about- d-do you think the queen may end up c-coming here?” If it was possible for Alphys to melt into the floor and disappear, she was half way to achieving it.

No one knew exactly how to treat Toriel at the moment. She was royalty and as far as they knew there had never been an official, legal break-off between her and Asgore. She had just up and ditched her subjects and all matters of responsibility to go hide in the Ruins for several years. She hadn’t even mentioned returning to the castle now that she was back. She was staying with Sans and Papyrus instead, so no one really knew just how much power she had over everyone.

Regardless, the thought of the queen storming in and seeing the dark underbelly of the lab and all of the hidden screw-ups she had created, was enough to send Alphys into a mild panic attack.

Sans waved away the question and fished out a box of fries for her from the bag of takeout, trying to distract her form her self-inflicted turmoil. “nah. no one knows i’m the one who took her. they were all too busy trying to keep undyne pinned down in the other room to notice when i snuck her out of there. i got back before anyone came out of the room so all i had to do was fall asleep in an amusing spot and wait to be found.

“they think the human snuck out on her own while i was napping.” His stagnant smile spread into a grin and the bottom ridge of his eye sockets perked up in a smug sort of way. “last soul needed to free the underground and everyone just accepts that i slacked off and lost her. sometimes it pays to be the comic relief.”

Alphys cracked a sad, sweet smile and accepted the fries. “Y-you are more than just the comic relief, Sans. You are smart. And loyal. You are a good friend.”

“didn’t say i wasn’t.”

“a-and when we fix this, everyone will know you weren’t really slacking!”

He cocked a finger gun at her. “hey now, is that a threat?”

She giggled, snorting a little. “Sans! Come on! Y-you have been putting a surprising amount of effort into all this. I haven’t seen you work l-like this in years.”

“work?” He scoffed. “i’m just reading the notes and clarifying what you didn’t already know. if reading was work i’d get paid for my bed time stories. who’s to say i’m not just sticking around because i’m a huge dork who likes science?” His eyes slid off to the side while he opened his own box of food and began to pick a it. “besides, i had to find something interesting to do to help fill the void after undyne got to me. Papyrus wouldn’t let me just stay home and bonedoggle all day. ”

Alphys furrowed her brow while nibbling on some fries. “What?”

His eyes darted away a few times and he rubbed a hand over the crack in his skull, his hand eventually sliding back to rub at his neck. “well, undyne wasn’t exactly thrilled with me letting the saving grace of monster kind run out of her house like that- or the fact that i sort of let the human and the queen slide past all my sentry stations up to that point without noticing. undyne was my boss for like, half the jobs i worked.” He popped a stray fry in his mouth. “and now she’s my boss for only a third of em.”

“Oh!” Alphys gasped, “S-she fired you? S-Sans, I’m so sorry!” She whipped out her phone, thumbs flying across the buttons. “I will talk to her.”

“don’t. s’fine. i still got the mtt gig and she let me keep the snowdin spot, even though i did just let a human and the queen walk right past it. she knows Papyrus will be like a dog with a bone with that position opening if she kicks me off of it and i think by this point neither one of us want him there if something else walks through that door. also managed to convince her to let me keep my prime hotdog selling spot, so it’s all good.”

Alphys cocked her brow. “isn’t um, isn’t that one sort of…illegal?”

“sort of. but the king likes my ‘dogs and undyne doesn’t want to ruin that for the big guy. which is good, because after that last puzzle safety law was passed its now way easier to get away with a cheeky little food cart than it is to explain why you are in possession of a bunch of bullet proof shop shields if you don’t have anything to sell.”

“What do you need those magical barriers for anyway?”

“oh you know, this and that.”

She narrowed her eyes but let it go. “So… have you seen Asgore lately? At your hotdog station I mean.” She was finishing off the last of her fries now, wiping her hands on her coat and turning to look over her checklist before they went to go get Rain. “H-he hasn’t come by the lab in a while. And it’s been days since he answered my last email.”

“nah. pretty sure he won’t be leaving his castle for a while. You know how he gets when a human falls.”

“Yeah. Guess you are right.” Good. At least that was one thing they didn’t have to worry about. “Well,” she handed him her set of notes, “This is what I have so far. Anything you want to add to it? It all checks out on my end.”

He set down his sandwich on a nearby desk and glanced over the notes. “looks good. let’s give it a shot.”

Alphys took a deep breath. She had been hoping he would take more time to run through the note than that. Suddenly she was wishing he had been even later to their meeting than he had was right now.

She cast a reverent look at the skull-like machine looming above them. It always left her feeling both humbled and uneasy. She had built it from the blueprints that she had found abandoned in the lab upon her arrival. Asgore had praised her for her work in assembling such a complex contraption after filling in the many gaps in the half finished schematics but in the end she felt like all she had built was a shrine for the scientist who had come before her. It was a sobering reminder that her offerings were small compared to the previous occupant’s contributions.

Funny how their name always managed to escape her. Yet she felt nothing but a respect for the previous scientist. Well, that and a little bit of intimidation. Big shoes to fill.

“what’s a’ matter?”

Alphys looked around the room, chewing her lip. “I-I think I should go check on everyone before we bring her down here. J-just in case.” She was dry washing her hands again.

Sans’s smile slipped into something a little more serious and the hand holding the offered notes slumped to his side.“alph, i don’t think she would judge you if she knew. a person like that would have no right to. i’m still not convinced she doesn’t already know. someone like her…well, all secrets yield to time and she’s had more than her fair share of that to mess around with.”

Alphys grew quiet. “If-if she saw what ha-happened to the last group of people w-who tr-trusted me, I-I don’t think she would trust us anymore.”

It wasn’t the answer Sans had hoped for but it was the one he had been expecting. “alright.” He sighed, defeated. “it’s your call.” He had long since given up on the whole amalgamate deal. It was all foggy of course but he knew he had helped her fix things and come clean in the past. His inclination that the other monsters would forgive her went beyond gut feelings and into the realm of de ja vu. In order for that to happen he must have gone through the motions many, many times before. Eventually he had had to ask himself: what was the point? If the world reset it was all for nothing.

Now he simply helped her keep her secret. He kept the dogs fed and his ideas to himself. If time ever got out of this rut she would eventually have to come clean on her own anyway, right?

Not that he had much faith in time ever progressing normally again.

Sure, this cycle was new. It was different enough to allow him to indulge his curiosity. It was nice knowing what the anomaly was and as long as she didn’t hurt too many people, he was willing to let Rain do her thing. But he didn’t expect this lull to last. He had seen the reports. He knew it didn’t. Dark, darker yet darker. Who was he fooling to have imagined there was hope?

“Ok.” Alphys sighed, smoothing out the wrinkles in her clothes and bringing them both back to the present. “I will go make sure everyone is where they should be. Y-you can go let Rain know we are ready to start.”

“ok.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and took a step forward, foot hanging in the air as the hiss of static curled in around him and whisked him away.

***

It was an unusually chilly night in the mountains. There was no cloud cover overhead, giving the world an unobstructed view of the countless glimmering stars above while a cold wind made the house creak.

Her parents had fallen asleep early after an argument tonight. They were locked away in their room now, passed out drunk.

Chara bounced her baby brother up and down, pleading in a whisper for him not to cry. If their parents woke up they would be angry. He continued to fuss, always on the verge of crying. She had warmed up a bottle of milk for him and was only now getting him to drink.

When he finally began to show signs of sleep she lowered him into his play pen, not daring to put him in the crib since it was in her mom and dad’s room. She offered him his favorite stuffed animal and gave up her best blanket to keep him warm.“There you go, you little runt.” She murmured, torn between fondness and annoyance.

She wrapped herself up in their second best blanket and wandered over to the kitchen. There would be no dinner tonight. She wrinkled her nose at the option of stale bagels, the standard meal of choice since her parents often neglected going to the store, and instead crept into the pantry. She had been saving a box of macaroni and cheese for just such an event as this.

She poured in the water and noodles and set things to boil. She wandered around a bit while she waited for things to heat up, playing with the idea of booting up the computer to resume the secretive Pokémon marathon she had been indulging in at night but quickly shot down the idea just in case her brother started to cry and woke someone up. Her parents hated Pokémon.

Instead she huddled up on the couch next to her brother’s playpen.

Her tired eyes drooped. She didn’t move, trying her best to soak up the warmth of the blanket. It had been a long and stressful day for her.

She closed her eyes for a moment...

Sleep took her unaware.

Her pot began to boil, the stove’s red glow reflecting off of discarded wrappers and old hamburger helper boxes that had been left scattered across the counter for well over a week. As Chara slept, the edges of the nearest pile of clutter began to darken, having been left too close to the stove.

She did not wake up until the hungry tongues of flame had chewed through the empty boxes and had managed to spread out onto one of the nearby piles of junk mail and discarded napkins further along the counter. By now the greedy flames were reaching out to ensnare larger prey: the wooden cupboards up above. Like most of the other inner workings of the house, their last working fire alarm had died a long time ago and had never been replaced out of pure negligence.

She opened her eyes to angry flames chewing away at the kitchen, smoke choking the air. Chara’s eyes widened in terror as she rushed off into the garage to try and find their only fire extinguisher. She pushed aside several boxes of junk and searched under all of the old tables and broken chairs that clogged the garage like grease in an artery.

Where was it? It had to be here somewhere! Why did her parents hoard so much junk!

She could hear her brother starting to cry back in the main room.

Baby clothes, old knitting material, flattened boxes and Christmas lights. Empty cans of paint and beer, kick-knacks and broken toys- She pushed aside everything but found nothing.

Back in the kitchen the flames were growing.

She had to fix this. She had to fix this! Her dad always accused her of being too young to use the stove! She had been so tired. She had only wanted to close her eyes for a second- she was always so careful!

They would never forgive her for this. They would kill her!

She knew she should wake them up. Maybe they could help. But their anger scared her more than the growing flames that continued to consume the piles of trash left lying about in the neglected house. Her mind was a muddled mess. This was her fault. They would say it was her fault! But maybe she could still fix things somehow before they woke up.

Maybe she could use the spray nozzle from the sink? Dammit, why hadn’t she tried using that first!

She reemerged from the garage and the heat hit her like a wall. The smoke clawed at her mouth and nose while somewhere off to the side her brother continued to cry in the haze. The kitchen was a lost cause, its heat burning her face and the flames reaching out to embrace her as soon as the door opened. The flames had reached the ceiling.

She stumbled away, retrieving her brother from his crib and bolting out into the cold, star-filled night. She tried to hush her brother’s wailing as she coughed; doubling over onto the grass. She tried to catch her breath but her throat felt raw. She was dizzy and lightheaded.The world spun and grew dark.

The next thing she remembered she was laying in the grass, unable to tell if seconds or minute had passed by while her eyes had been closed. Her brother was wailing in her ear.

She turned back to the house. The flames were licking at some of the windows now and smoke was seeping out of the back yard.

She set her brother down and pushed herself up on shaky knees and ran around back to knock on her Parent’s window, coughing as she staggered towards their room. She could see the light of the fire dancing under their door, chewing its way through boxes and furniture with a selfish sort of hunger. The room was a haze of thick smoke.

She continued to bang on the glass, struggling to push open the window with her slender arms while she cried out in a cracked voice for her parents, but the window couldn’t open more than an inch or two on its rusted track.

She screamed their names, tears blurring her vision.

They didn’t get up.

She fell back in horror, mind trying to grasp at how fast the situation had spun out of control. Were they already dead? If they weren’t, they were going to die soon. What could she do? Their phone was still inside the house and their neighbor’s house was a ten minute walk from here! Even if she could withstand the thickening curtain of smoke and get the window open, her dad couldn’t climb out this window! It was too small!

And they would be so mad.

They would be so, so mad…

They would hate her forever for this...

She ran.

She picked up her brother, carrying him away from the growing flames as he cried. She refused to look back at the house, even as its orange light danced against her burned cheeks.

This was her fault. She hadn’t meant for this to happen but everyone always told her she was still her fault when things went wrong.

This was her fault.

She had killed them. She had left them to die. She had killed her own parents!

The tears continued to prick at her eyes but she struggled to keep them from falling. She made a strangled sound of distress and buried her face against the blanket her brother was wrapped in.

“I’m a murderer.” She sobbed.

They would blame her for this. everyone in town would blame her for this. Maybe she should have stayed in the house since she was going to burn in hell for letting this happen to her own family anyway.

Would the police arrest her? Would she be thrown in jail? She was just a kid, but that had never stopped her from being punished before.

For a brief moment her adrenaline-fueled panic caused her world to spin with fear. She was too young to understand that her fears were unjustified. She was too scared to understand she had committed no crime.

As she ran towards her neighbor’s house in a hopeless attempt to get help, her thoughts hardened into a sense of grim resolve.

She knocked on the door.

An elderly balding man answered the door, his mouth falling open when he saw her soot smudged face. he could smell the smoke on her clothes.

She stared at him for a moment while she struggled to find the courage to talk. “Our house is burning.” She croaked, trying to keep her voice level. In the end the news came out sounding deadpan.

Her neighbor got on the phone and called for help. He asked her a few questions then told her to stay where she was while rushed outside to see if there was anything he could do.

Chara took a long drink of water to sooth her throat once he was gone. She set her brother down in the makeshift pen their neighbor had set up for him before he had dashed out into the night.

She looked down at her baby brother, who continued to cry but looked to be unharmed. “I’m going to have to go away now.” She told him, stroking his head. She didn’t smile, she didn’t cry. She almost felt completely empty. She didn’t even feel grief for her loss now. She just felt hollow. Hollow, disgusted and afraid of being punished. “It’s better if I don’t see you again…Sorry.” She whispered, not sure what else there was to say.

She slipped back out into the night and ran. She would head for Ebott. No one ever went there because their superstitions made them too frightened to go near the place unless they had to. It would be a good place to hide.

She vaguely wondered if there really were monsters living on the mountain. Or demons, as some of her classmates claimed. Perhaps they would have a place among them for a fellow sinner to hide.

***

Rain woke up in a fit of terror, coughing as tears ran down her face. She shielded her eyes from the phantom flames and cried out to the darkness in fear and confusion, momentarily forgetting who and where she was.

As the memory began to recede she was left wondering which one of them was the one still crying.

Was it her? Or was it Chara?

She held herself, sniffing softly and rocking back and forth in the empty darkness until she could calm down. Chara regained her composure first and began to retreat.

“Chara.” Rain whispered, reaching out to the darkness as if she could actually touch the troubled child. “Chara, wait. It was not your fault.” She pleaded, using her sleeve to wipe away the tears. “Chara please, you have to forgive yourself for this. You did nothing wrong. The fire... it was an accident.”

Chara’s voice was as cold as winter’s chill when she finally bothered to answer her. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I know you don’t. But if you ever do, if you ever change your mind, I will be here to listen.” She took a deep breath. “You didn’t really kill them.”

Chara seemed to pause for a moment in consideration. When next she spoke her voice was calm again and shrouded in a thick coat of fog. “I know." She sighed, "It took me a long time to understand that, but I know. And you know what else I realized over the years?” Chara's presence shifted. Rain got the feeling that she was staring off into the unfocused distance now.“If I had the chance to go back and save them, I wouldn’t. It’s funny but when I finally learned I wasn’t responsible for their demise I felt…cheated. Jealous even.” Rain felt her chest growing colder. It felt like a constricting layer of ice settling in over a pond. “And If I could go back and do it all again? I would kill them myself.”