He was right there. Right in front of him. All these years later, after so many mistakes, after so many trails and errors, Sans was right there. Anxiety suddenly crawled up Papyrus’ back as he looked at his brother, the dead body before him long forgotten. 

Papyrus hadn’t thought this far ahead. What should he say? What should he even say? Was Sans going to attack him? Yell at him? Hug him? Did Sans despise him still, or did he forget about Papyrus?

Sans was still as short as ever, but he still looked more mature than the last time Papyrus saw him. However, there was some differences that made the skeleton stick out. Small horns protruded from his head, and a medium sized bone tail softly swayed behind him. Two eyelights, one yellow and blue, and one red, flashed before him. Sans was part demon. It made sense.

Papyrus didn’t even have a chance to say anything before everyone else reacted. Of course, they were his children, they had a right to their Father.

“Dad!” Everyone but Addy yelled.

Cole had been the one in front moving to hug his Father but Bean had pushed him out of the way.

“Hiya Dad!” Bean yelled, engulfing him in a hug after she had shoved Cole to the side.

“Hey, he’s my Dad too!” Cole objected, pulling himself up quickly. 

“Oh my Toby Fox, thank the lord you all are safe!” Sans breathed out, hugging Bean back. “You didn’t kill too many people while I was stuck here, right?”

“... No,” Bean said, looking to the side.

“We’ll talk about it later,” Sans told her, “But come on in the hug, kiddos! Bean won’t bite anyone when I’m watching her.”

“Not that you could stop me,” Bean snorted.

Cole and Leonie quickly closed in, Tondra and Addy following. Hewey had to come in rom the side on his chair to hug his Father, but did nevertheless. The children all talked at once, distracted by their reappearance of their Dad to not care about interrupting one another. The adults all lingered by, waiting for their chance to hug their husband, Silky with them.

“Get in the hug or you’re grounded,” Sans told Silky, opening up one of his arms.

“Hugs are juvenile,” Silky replied, but still walked forward to embrace her Father and other siblings. 

All of the siblings continued to talk at once, ignoring the others.

“And then I had too many stickers but-” BoBo was saying.

“And my phones out of battery and if you don’t give me yours right now Dad I’m actually going to die,” Leonie said to him. 

“-Then god turned out to be a dog, so I’m planning on first conquering China because of the coronavirus, and make them all my army so I can take over the rest of the world,” Bean had said, “And then after that we can go conquer heaven and I’ll become ruler of heaven and earth. We can make myself ruler of hell right now so that won’t be a problem.”

“If you ever take me down to hell again I will run you over,” Hewey was saying.

“My skin is now like a shell, so nothing gets under it now,” Tondra said.

“And then- I- we- uh, um…” Wayne stuttered nervously.

“Your left horn is a centimeter too far past the right eye socket. This is unacceptable.” Silky reached to grab one of them. “Is there any way to remove these or to fix them?”

“I missed you super duper much!” Sally said.

“Silky almost got me killed!” Cole shouted.

That had gotten Sans’ attention above the other statements, the skeleton looking at Silky with a face that made her quickly retreat her hand from his horns.

“Did you?” Sans asked, “Another one of your social experiments?”

“Yeah, she totally left Cole to die, Papyrus actually had to save him,” Jeff said.

“Ooohhh, Silkys in trouble,” Bean giggled, a hand placed over her teeth in a surprised manner.

“You of all people should know how that feels,” Hewey told Bean.

Sans thought for a moment before his clawed hands were gripping his hoodie strings, pulling one farther down than the other while he made direct eye contact with his daughter. Well, the best kind of eye contact they could make for a skeleton and a girl without a face.

“Dad please, not again,” Silky said, reaching for is hoodie strings. “Please, Dad, let’s discuss this.”

“Nah, I gotta go smooch my many husbands,” Sans said, dodging her hand to move to towards the others.

“Sansy! I haven’t seen you in at least five seconds and I’ve cried at least eleven times!” Splendor said, hugging his husband.

“I feel like the others should have the right to hug me first,” Sans said, gently pushing him away. “I love you but once you start hugging you don’t stop.”

“Just like me!” BoBo said, clapping excitedly.

“I don’t see four of my harem, they alright?” Sans asked.

“Yeah, we think so,” Masky said, hugging him. “Laughing Jack ended up trapping himself in his box with Toby and Jane, and Slender was being targeted by the proxies so he hid to lead them away rom the kids.”

“But we should focus on the current problem,” Silky said, “Zalgo is planning on starting that machine soon, and if we don’t stop him, that’ll mean, naturally, world destruction.”

“Yeah, give me like a minute,” Sans said, wrapping his arms around Eyeless Jack’s neck. “I’ma make out with him real quick.”

Everything around them suddenly started shaking before it calmed down once more, making Sans stop his movements.

“I guess we can wait for that, we should start going,” Sans said.

“Darn it,” Eyeless Jack whispered.

“I don’t think the best place to make out would be in hell,” Hewey told Jack.

“Yeah, but still,” The blue masked man muttered.

“Do you know where the machine is to shut it down, Hew?”

“Yeah, we can take the elevator.”

When Sans started to walk towards the three, Papyrus tensed. What was he going to say? Oh no, Papyrus wasn’t ready. He should be, he waited so long, but he wasn’t. Yet he stayed strong, ready to face whatever Sans threw at him. If his brother was angry, and even wanted to kill him, Papyrus was willing to accept that.

Until Sans walked past him.

He didn’t even glance at the three, he pretended they didn’t exist. Like Papyrus, Undyne, and Alphys weren’t even there.

“Give him some time,” Silky had said, stopping next to them to talk to the three. “I think he’d rather deal with the demon trying to kill everyone than you guys right now.”

“Yeah,” Papyrus said, smiling gently at her. “But thank you, for all of this.”

“Don’t thank me, I tried to ditch you, you would’ve never saw Sans again if I had left with Addy,” Silky said, looking at her skeletal sister. “Thank her. She’s the one who stood up for you. Now excuse me as I try to go fix my Dads hoodie strings.”

~~~~~~

The elevator ride was understandably awkward.

Papyrus and the two girlfriends decided to distance themselves from the others, allowing for Sans to focus more on the problem at hand. There was a silent agreement among them to not talk about their history together, especially with the fight that was about to go down. 

As soon as they reached the floor, Papyrus could feel the tension of the impending fight. Everyone else around him could feel it too, the people shifting from foot to foot.

How did this even happen? How did his life get so twisted around to the point where Papyrus was about to fight the Lord of Demons himself? His Father, nevertheless. How did this even come to this point?

Maybe it was the monsters escaping underground that started all of this, reaching the surface had really been Papyrus’ turning point. Although, was it really? Papyrus always had been so focused on himself that he never noticed Sans or the problems he was going through. Of course, looking back now, he could see clear as day for the red flags signaling his brothers depression. They were all there, all along.

He just never chose to look.

Mistakes, they all made them. Papyrus would never forget the phone calls of Sans, desperately trying to reach out for his brother, only to be turned away by Papyrus’ ignorance. He’d never forget the insult of even believing his brother was a pedfile, when he knew very well it wasn’t true. And he’d never forget how the most important thing at the time had not been family, had not been friends, but himself.

But as the elevator slowed to a stop on the floor, Papyrus straightened his spine. He learned his lessons now. As much as the tall skeleton wished to go back into the past, to change the events and to show Sans the love he deserved, he couldn’t. It was already over, long over.

It was time to focus on the future, and to save it. 

Not for glory.

Not for popularity.

Not for power.

For his family.

And it was the only reason he needed to step off of the elevator.