Positive feelings shouldn't be such a bad thing. Actually the idea of them never have been, but depending on who they're from can determine whether or not it's cause for celebration.

Being prone to feeling what everyone else is feeling tends to be overwhelming. To those who know him, well, sometimes he wondered if they took advantage of the fact he can't be upset for long.

Regardless though dream knew what he felt. Felt through error, felt through you. Positive emotions after a sudden burst of negativity. But would anyone believe him?

"Alright! So this plan shouldn't be so bad! Error won't know what hit him!" Ink's voice startled dream out of his far off thoughts gazing wistfully off to the side wondering about those emotions he felt.

"Mewhehe! The eldest human shall safely return home soon!" Blueberry, or perhaps it's better to say the sans of your world, laughed happily delighted that progress was being made.

"What do you think dream? Don't we have this in the bag now! It's like an even better game now that we're all playing!" Ink pressed the palms of his hands against the wooden table of the living room in the skeletal brothers' home up on the surface. A twinkle in his eyes as he gazed at dream who simply blinked turning to look back at his friend.

"I don't know," dream hesitated, "something feels off."

Clasping his hands together close to his chest dream looked down at the carpet hearing the sounds of Chara and Papyrus cooking some snacks in the kitchen. Dream closed his eyes still lost in thought. Nightmare was always a presence within his abilities to sense emotions. A bad presence that kept him from reaching his friends or people in need.

There was something off about him too. He seemed distant like he was far away, and too gleeful at something that happened as if it was all apart of something bigger. Dream sighed heavily feeling his friends gaze upon him.

"What do you mean friend? Is something wrong?!" Blue seemed worried leaning forward from his criss crossed state against the floor towards the coffee table.

"It's not that something is wrong, but the fact that there's nothing wrong." Dream felt like he was speaking in riddles as he opened his eyes looking up at the ceiling.
"Error and (Y/N) are feeling positive emotions right now, but I'm not sure if that's a good thing."

There was silence.

"What do you mean? Would could they both be happy about? Only thing I've ever seen error happy about is destroying an au or chocolate." Ink shrugged as he spoke.

"Maybe the eldest human has befriended error! It's not impossible!" Blue seemed hopeful hopping up with his deceleration.

"Maybe.." dream trailed off sighing before shaking his head.
"Are we sure this plan is going to work?"

"I'm sure it will!" Ink seemed nonchalant about the whole thing.

"It has to!" Blue's reaction made dream smile a bit. He was always so positive, actually it was part of the reason Dream was here.

Of course when ink last saw Dream it was at the beginning of this whole mess, and dream had intentions of seeing if his brother was involved in some shape or form. The odd thing was Nightmare was no where to be found, and thus dream was led back here to help ink and blue devise a plan to help rescue you.

Still dream found it odd he didn't see his brother in his normal stalking places, nor did he see any of his lackeys. No killer, No horror, well basically no one in sight. It was a hit too odd but dream couldn't hang about those places for long.

"Mm!" Chara's strained noises finally reached everyone's ears as they, mostly ink and blue, spoke. At last causing everyone to turn their attention to the small child.

Chara had their cheeks puffed up displeased, carrying a plate of carefully made chocolate chip cookies, seeming as though they had been trying to get the teams attention for a while now. Papyrus wasn't far behind a cool smile against his lips, but his posture was tense and he was smoking his 10th cigarette over the past 2 hours. (Though no one needed to know he snuck off to Muffet's new bar to smoke in between baking.)

"Ah! Human! I'm terribly sorry we did not mean to be rude!" Blue cheerily skidded over your his friends looking upon the plate of delicacies with stars in his eyes.
"These look delicious! Mewhehe! Looks like my cooking lessons have rubbed off on you! Too bad these aren't taco cookies or they'd be even better!"

Blue happily accepted a cookie going back to sit at his place. Ink took one next but dream politely declined offering a soft apology for not wanting one at the moment. The plate was placed against the coffee table neatly in the middle.

"What's our plan of action?" Chara signed eagerly.

"Well," ink chomped down on the cookie mid sentence, "it's kinda complicated kid! But don't worry we'll say your sis in no time now that I've got a team!"

Ink seemed so sure of himself despite the harsh loss he faced not that long ago. How long has it been now? In your au? A few months. At the most 3. For you though? In truth the same time had passed. Though in the anti void time was irrelevant. So what felt like hours were days. (It was a rather complicated reality.)

"Yeah! I shall accompany my friends in retrieving the eldest human!" Blue put his hand against his chest plate nodding his head.

"I don't want ya goin bro, what if something bad happens to you too?" Papyrus seemed more on edge at the thought, loosing a friend is one thing but loosing his brother again. He couldn't take that. Not in a pacifist timeline that seemed the best out of a lot of timelines.

"But brother! I just aid! We are a team! I have helped them before!" Blue seemed insistent.

"Ah how about we talk about who goes in a moment? There's still a lot left to consider." Dream tried for defuse to rising tension, to him negative feelings were overwhelming. Almost like they made him sick. Having Papyrus upset already was too much as it was.

"Dream is right, I don't think error's home right now anyway." I know shrugged leaning back now resting his weight against his hands.

"It's been a long time already, I thought the plan was finished by now." Chara seemed saddened. Dream looked away a bit sucking in a breath.
"You keep saying that you'll save her soon, but every time we see you you're talking about something else. Like how underfell is doing or outertale, or mafiatale, it's like you don't really want to save her."

Chara's signing was slow and hesitant seeming as though they were upset with ink's behavior. Ink just smiled waving his hand in dismissal.

"Nah! It's not like that at all! I just wanna draw out the game a little longer." Humming satisfied with his answer ink reached for a cookie stopping at the look blue was giving him along side his brother. Dream was too lost in thought to really hear the words ink had said.
"What?"

"Game?" Papyrus spoke slowly chopping down a bit too harshly against his cigarette causing it to hiss at the added pressure. He didn't care about the taste of tobacco in his mouth as smoke fell from his jaw and nostrils.
"This is all just a big game to you?"

Ink glanced at blue who seemed to shift uncomfortably. The room was quite again. Dream's eyes looked towards his friend seeing the tension in the room but there was nothing he could do to stop it. It's always been a game to ink but dream figured as long as he's doing "good" in his game then what's the harm of letting him see it like that. Still that didn't mean he should just say it so casually.

"Well you see it's not like that, I just meant-" ink seemed on the spot trying to come up with a lame excuse.

"Why aren't you helping?! You've just finally had the idea to make a plan, just finally had the Gaul to do something to save her! She risked herself for us! Even though she didn't have to!" Papyrus was getting louder as he spoke, more vicious. The cigarette fell from his teeth and was discarded on the stopped over by his shoe as he walked over to ink yanking him off the ground.

Ink didn't seem bothered at all as he dangled up in the air, the fabric of his shirt straining to the tight grip Papyrus had against it. His hands digging into the fabric with a building rage. He just couldn't calm down.

"She didn't even think when she sacrificed her self to save us. And you, you just sit around and act like everything is fine when it's not! You make me sick, just looking at you is making me sick. How dare you-" Papyrus was shaking, unable to control his anger as he snapped at ink who just seemed indifferent to being spoke to so harshly. Eventually before Papyrus could do any harm to ink Chara and blue got involved.

The negative air was too much, but dream tried his best to calm down the situation which resulted in Papyrus crudely dropping ink to the floor marching away towards the kitchen and then not being heard from. Ink didn't seem to bothered like the others dusting himself off and then placing his hands against his hips.

"Well he seems a bit grouchy today." Ink just grinned but it fell shortly upon seeing the disapproved look of his friends.

"Ink, this is a serious situation." Dream spoke cautiously.

"Papyrus is kind of right." Chara signed hesitantly. Blue found himself looking away.
The negative energy returned.

"Okay so maybe I've been away for too long. But it's all apart of the plan!" Ink puffed his chest out a bit with a hum.

"Is it?" Chara seemed to roll their eyes.

"We should stop arguing amongst ourselves, this is getting us no where and we don't even know if (Y/N) is okay." That was enough beating around the bush, Dream decided, looking around the heavy room in hopes of trying to ease the tension.

"Dream is right! Our friend, our family! She's out there waiting for us to go save her! We shouldn't lallygag any longer!" Blue held his hands up close to his chest now clenching then into fists with a nod.

"I want to help too remember? I want my sister to come home!" Chara seemed determined nodding along side blue. There's a good feeling. Dream smiled placing his hand against his chest.

"I'm happy to assist in what ever way I can too, if we leave her for too long Nightmare could get ahold of her."

That was true, at least dream thought so. Being alone so long in an anti void with no real company could drive you to anger. To sadness. Bad emotions that could lure nightmare to you. You'd be a different case compared to those in his ranks but, you could infect your whole AU. Drag blue and Papyrus down with you. Dream didn't think it would be a good thing if error got to you.

Or worse, your code could be slightly corrupted and rejected from your home au leaving you to have to permanently retire to the save haven. If Nightmare knew where that was, if error knew where that was. It could cause trouble.

And it could only get worse from there, your code may not even be acceptable for the safe haven, and unacceptable to create an anti void. You'd be torn between both reality and that space in between labeled just as the void. You'd be like him. Like every version of him. What a sad fate that could be.

"Well then! I guess we should pack it up then!" Ink smiled closing his eyes rather pleased. It was almost like what happened with Papyrus never actually happened.

"But didn't dream say there's still more to consider?" Chara looked towards dream who smiled timidly.

"That is true." Dream couldn't lie about that, that was for sure.

"What?" Ink opened his eyes missing what Chara had signed.

"The human said that dream had mentioned there was still a lot left to discuss!" Blue saved Chara the hassle of trying to repeat themselves.

"Oh, right." Ink huffed now displeased.

"Maybe before we do anything I could go check on her, she's feeling positive emotions I could go see her for a moment! Then maybe that could patch up any holes in the plan." Dream smiled looking amongst his friends who all gazed at him, waiting with baited breath over what they had to say.

"I think that sounds good, and it could give her hope and determination that everything will be okay!" Chara seemed hopeful themselves as they signed. Ink seemed disappointed it wasn't him going but agreed after blue seemed eager to let Dream go on.

He guessed it was decided, he'd go and check on you. At least you were happy some what. Dream wondered what it was that was making you so happy but he guessed he'd find out soon enough. Help was coming, hopefully it wasn't too late.
                    __________________
How much longer. How much longer did this fragment of himself have to remain here. Trapped in an endless void, shards of soul scattered across time across space. Versions of himself he didn't even recognize all clamoring to do different things.

The original, and those similar to him, they stayed quite and just observed, the more aggressive versions constantly screamed to be released to be freed. But then there was him. Created for something but what there was no telling. Was he good? Was he evil? He wasn't sure. But unlike the others, he had no physical body. (When physical is said, he was just a voice in the wind, the others were like ghosts reflections of the past coming to the present or future.)

But what he did know is he desired a body. An escape from this endless void. Watching you and error in outertale was interesting. Your code, it's made differently as if it's sole purpose was to also exist outside of your au for long periods of time with our corruption. It was fascinating. What made you that way? By now surely you should have succumbed to the rules of this universe but no, you remained intact.

He was nothing but a form of consciousness lurking in the shadows listening to whispers of passerby's. But like the others he remembers. Remembers what he was before being nothing but a conscious fragment of a soul. A scientist. A man who wanted to know the inner workings of the universe. So it was only natural that he wanted to know what made you tick.

Now what he didn't know was what to align himself as. Was he good? Was he bad? He was certainly selfish. Wanting to use you as a means of escape from what felt like an endless hell. A host until he finds a more suitable one. But that didn't necessarily mean he was looking to cause any real trouble.

He craved freedom, craved to see the world again and it seemed the more he studied you the more you seemed like a suitable host until he could figure out where to go from there. It was just a matter of merging his soul with your own. Then once that was done seeing how he could travel safely between realties. It seemed error could with out a problem. The same with ink dream and nightmare. What made them different.

So many questions and not enough answers. But that's what he did he looks for, the answers. No matter what him you'd encounter, whether it was the original timeline, or any other universe, he always found answers always sought them out.

For now though he's watch, watch you from the shadows as you and error safely walked about outertale. Your eyes gazing up at the vast galaxies ahead of you while error momentarily stared at you before looking away. It was all interesting.

It was all...

Interesting.