Beginning notes:

Funny lore time :D

Error huffed as he rummaged through yet another refrigerator, finding the container stacked full of various types of ice cream just like the other 10 in the house. Seriously, he just wanted to find one dark chocolate ice cream bucket, was that too much to ask?

He breathed out a sigh of relief when his gaze fell upon the item he had been looking for, delicately pulling the tub out from the back of the shelf with his strings so the rest of the tubs wouldn't come crashing down with it. With a final tug, the dark chocolate ice cream fell into his waiting hands, and he slammed the fridge door shut before opening the lid with an excited grin.

Blue had gone off to find some "actual food", but Error really didn't see much of a problem with eating sweets and only sweets as a food source. He guessed Blue just had weak taste buds and left it at that, but if he were to actually ask Blue why he thought eating pure calories was a bad idea, he'd probably just get punched in the face for his stupidity.

He didn't feel like getting his face caved in today, thank you very much.

So, he stuck with carrying his findings back to the house Blue and him had claimed as their own and flopping down on the couch in the living room. They had guessed the house used to belong to the original Sans and Papyrus of this AU, but they weren't going to be there for the rest of eternity, so it wouldn't hurt if they used the house for a while.

Grabbing a spoon from the kitchen (because it was quite impossible to enjoy the ice cream using his hands), he wolfed down the food as a new episode of Undernovella played on the screen he'd summoned.

It was an old episode detailing the murder of Toriel, which had apparently been faked by Asgoro to get Sin to give up on wooing his wife. Toriel, however, had been enraged once realizing what Asgoro had done and had left the house after an argument had broken out between them, slamming the door in Asgoro's face and leaving the goat monster dumbfounded, confused and lost on what to do.

Then, the episode had ended, leaving Error on the edge of his seat in suspense. He groaned when the credits rolled, already hyped for the next episode despite having watched the series and its spin-offs an obscene amount of times.

Huffing, he stood up from his place on the couch and unceremoniously dumped the empty tub of ice cream into the trash can, knowing better than to leave it lying around after Blue came home. They were both neat freaks (although one more than the other), so it wasn't much of a hassle anyway.

Stumped on what to do, he was about to go and walk around a bit and enjoy the bizarre scenery of Candytale when Blue suddenly stumbled through a portal with taco supplies in hand. He seemed panicked, like something had greatly spooked him and had made him instantly leave the AU he was gathering items from.

This was concerning, considering almost nothing terrified Blue anymore besides a certain list of things Error didn't want to think about right now.

"What's got you all in a twist?" Error questioned, seeming indifferent to the skeleton's nervous appearance as he glanced at him half-heartedly before resuming his sightseeing of the sweets-composed terrain outside their house.

Blue snorted at him, closing the portal behind him with a wave of his hand. Error was the one that had granted him the power after a complicated transfer of magic that enlarged the magic reserves he had, which allowed the Underswap skeleton to not have to entirely rely on the god to get them from place to place.

"Well, if you must know, I kinda-sorta ran into the Bad Sanses?" Blue replied, wincing slightly when Error snapped his head up and glared at him.

"How could you have run into them?! You know how to pick out their magic signatures, and I specifically told you to avoid any AUs they were raiding!" Error hissed, 'ERROR' signs flaring up across his body.

"I know! The AU I chose was nowhere near their path; they just so happened to pop into the AU at the worst time possible!" Blue defended, clutching the taco ingredients closer to his chest. "It wasn't my fault they just so happened to spawn in Snowdin while I was stea- borrowing taco stuff!"

"Were you seen by them?"

"I- well, you see..." Blue trailed off, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly with his free hand.

Error glowered, darkening his gaze. "Blue-"

"Alright, fine! Yes, I was seen by them, BUT-" Blue quickly continued when Error opened his mouth to interject. "But, I managed to trick them. You see, I decided to confront them head on, but not in an actual fight. I pretended to be the AU's Sans, which was pretty convenient considering it was an Underswap copy. After luring them towards the actual Sans of the AU, I took the chance to run, and I managed to grab the supplies before creating a portal here."

Error sighed, his tense posture relaxing slightly. "Well, it's a good thing you didn't have to fight them. Doing so would've exposed your existence to them, and I'm pretty sure it would be better if we didn't have a group of murderous skeletons at our heels."

Blue grimaced with a shared sentiment. "Tell me about it. Anyways, what should we do now?"

"Wanna go spy on the Council?"

"Aw, hell yeah."

-----

The room was filled with panicked shouts, the inhabitants yelling at each other with anger or worry in their tones. Ink sighed, looking at Dream for help just for the guardian to shrug helplessly in return.

Clearing his throat, Ink shouted, "HEY! QUIET DOWN! PANICKING WILL NOT HELP THE MEETING IN ANY WAY!"

Slowly, the voices in the room died down to a reasonable level, giving Ink the ability to actually be heard by everyone. "I know this is a tough time, but we need actual communication instead of just yelling at each other. From what we know, Error is on yet another destruction spree and the Bad Sanses have not halted in terrorizing world after world."

"While this may seem like something we can't prevent, we are able to do something to at least incapacitate them."

A frown crossed Blue's face at Ink's words. He leaned away from the one-way window Error had created for them to spy on the Council, exhaling sharply and massaging his eye sockets as the glitchy skeleton gave him a questioning look.

"Stars, I remember this meeting." Blue groaned, letting his hands fall to his lap via his kneeled position. "I was so naïve back then. I completely supported this idea and it sickens me."

"What happened?" Error asked.

"See for yourself." Blue mumbled back, finding a sudden interest in picking at the rug they were sitting on instead.

Error did as instructed, turning his attention back to the meeting in front of him with a newfound sense of curiosity. Ink had waited for his words to soak into everyone's minds before continuing, so he hadn't missed much.

Then, Falcon spoke up, his black wings ruffling behind him as he fidgeted with the goggles on his head. "How would you do that? Error is a god- a powerful one at that- and the Bad Sanses are so coordinated they would sniff out a trap from miles away."

"I have a plan. It might need some more work, but it's a plan, nonetheless." Ink responded, a grin slowly forming on his face. "We get Error and the Bad Sanses into one AU that isn't specifically a trap AU, but it will have traps inside that will shift the tide to our favor. That way they can't detect that it's a trap until the last second, and by then I would've locked the AU down so they can't escape."

"We lost so many to this idea." Blue whispered, bringing his knees up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. "Most were copies, but there were originals that were sacrificed for nothing, basically. Ink was able to recreate them afterwards, but I knew most of those originals, and most of them were never the same as I remembered them."

"Oh." Error mumbled, an awkward tension in the air at the sudden change of mood. "Well, should we stop them?"

Blue shook his head, his eye lights dimmer than normal. "Nah. This was a major turning point in how the Council saw the Bad Sanses and you. In summary, while we were able to gravely injure you and Nightmare's Gang, we lost too many and were forced to retreat. Right before that, however, you managed to tell us what the balance between Creation and Destruction was before teleporting away, probably back to your Anti-Void."

"But I don't remember telling them I was forced." Error pointed out, the 'ERROR' signs across his body flickering momentarily.

"That's the thing. You didn't." Blue watched as the realization dawned on the god's face. "I assumed it was mostly because you were insane at the time and enjoyed destroying, since your Forced Destroyer Arc only came after you regained your common sense."

"Forced Destroyer Arc-" Error choked out with a laugh.

Blue fixed him with a deadpan glare. "Tell me I'm wrong."

"I- well-"

"Exactly. Now, if you're done watching that, I wanna cause some minor terrorism, if you're up to it."

"Sure. Wait, where the fuck is my scarf-"

-----

"You look distressed, Time. What's wrong?" Destiny asked, floating over to the deity in question with their hands clasped behind their back.

Time glanced up from the screen they were hunched over before sitting up straight and stretching. "Nothing much. I'm just having trouble establishing the telepathic link."

Destiny blinked. "...You could have simply asked me. I am familiar with the practice of communicating with others outside the astral plane and creating the link between us and Error and Blue would have only costed me a couple of seconds."

Time stared at the misty deity for a moment before mumbling something under their breath and waving at them dismissively, their chrome-like form shifting around a bit. "Well, you go ahead and do that. I wish to return to my work as quickly as possible."

Destiny nodded and twirled their index finger around in a spiral. Blue, mist-like magic travelled from their fingertip and floated in the air, splitting off in four directions as two beams went to the two deities' foreheads.

They both jumped in surprise when the screams of Error and Blue reached them.

"BLUE, RUN GODDAMNIT!"

"I'M TRYING, BUT THEY'RE SO FAST-"

"Blue, Error, is everything alright over there?" Destiny questioned, their face twisting with befuddlement. They looked over at their fellow deity and saw that Time had a puzzled look on their face as well.

"Destiny! It's been a while! Nah, we're fine, aren't we Error?"

"NO WE ARE NOT FINE, THEY'RE SHOOTING BULLETS AT US BLUE-"

"See? Totally fine!"

The breathy rasp in Blue's voice said otherwise.

"If I may ask, what's going on over there?" Time inquired, glancing away from their work to try and peer into Fate's multiverse only to receive a red 'X' in return.

A moment of silence passed before either skeletons answered. When they did, it sounded like they were out of breath, but it also seemed like they had stopped running from whatever had been chasing them.

"Well, Error here thought it would've been a magnificent idea to visit the Undernovella AU he'd been watching so he could see the drama in person." Blue scoffed, unbridled sarcasm dripping heavily from his tone. "As you probably heard, they don't take well to other Sanses in their world. Probably thought we were trying to steal Toriel away or something."

The destroyer's voice quickly shot up in protest. "Hey! This was the opportunity of a lifetime! I couldn't just pass it up like a heathen !"

"Error, in all honesty, it really wasn't."

"So...are you two are alright or...?" Destiny questioned, their face scrunching up in confusion. "We do not need to worry about your screaming earlier?"

"No, no, we're all good! We're actually making our way back to our hiding spot right now, so you two can continue doing whatever godly duties you were up to before we interrupted."

"That's greatly relieving. Another moment wasted when I could be working is always a stressful thing." Time sighed, but quickly sealed their mouth shut when Destiny shot them a venomous glare.

Clearing their throat, Destiny said, "Well, remember to contact us if you ever need our help. We would prefer if you both stayed alive throughout the duration of the loops."

The two skeletons quickly bid their goodbyes before the link fell silent, and all the deities could do was gaze at each other and shrug helplessly.

Once he closed the portal, Error promptly flopped down onto the couch face-first, groaning. Blue sat down in the unoccupied space and patted Error's head comfortingly (neither of them commented on how little 'ERROR' signs popped up across the god's body at the action).

"It's alright, Error. Not everyone who meets their idols has the best interaction with them."

"Shut the fuck up, Blue, they're not my idols."

"Says the one who has an Undernovella sweater and creates a new one every single Christmas."

"Blue, I swear to the fucking stars, I will strangle you."

"Aww, you wouldn't do that, Erry." Blue's tone was almost teasing at this point as he poked at Error's skull. "You're too much of a big softie to h-"

The Underswap Sans was quickly shut up when Error sat up, summoned his strings, and tied Blue to the ceiling. He then walked out of the room to grab another bucket of ice cream, presumably another dark chocolate flavor from one of the 11 refrigerators in the house.

"Error, you better not be grabbing another tub of ice cream! That's your fourth one today!"

"And what are you gonna do about it? Stop me? Oh wait, you can't, 'cause you're tied to the fucking ceiling! Hahahaha!" Error cackled, his voice echoing clearly from the kitchen despite the concerning amount of crashing noises there were.

Jeez, he forgot how rude Error could be sometimes. Oh well.

Blue grumbled, shifting around in the strings' grip so he could cross his arms with a pout. Well, hopefully Error wouldn't leave him up for too long; he still needed to get started on his tacos!

And maybe, just maybe get a small spoonful of blueberry ice cream along the way, but he would never admit that out loud with how much he'd scolded Error for eating ice cream today.

-----

Somewhere else in the multiverse, a massive battle raged on. Two gods, two guardians; facing off against one another in a battle that would change the perspectives of many.

Reaper stood off to the side, coaxing newly dusted souls over with a wave of his scythe and a somber smile. He didn't know if this was for the better or worse, but all he could hope for was that something good came out from the fight with how many lives were being lost.

Originals were lost, marrow was spilt, and tears were shed. In the end, the two sides stood at a stalemate, knowing neither would truly conquer in the end without the possibility of losing more than they already had.

A secret spilled from the Yin god's mouth, words tumbling out faster than his mind could comprehend despite the warm liquid filling his mouth and dripping down his body. A shocked revelation hit all that were present at once, but no questions were answered before the destroyer of worlds teleported away to his Anti-Void to heal and rest.

The Bad Sanses left quickly after, the leader seeing how bad of a shape his lackies were in and knowing better than to leave them to dust. The brother of that leader called out for him to stop, reaching out a desperate hand to the guardian just for his pleas to be ignored and swept to the side. They were gone within a minute of the God of Destruction's departure.

The remaining monsters were left to mull over the god's words, and after a moment of collective silence, Ink and Dream started transporting everyone home.

Right after the last monster was transported back to their AU, Blue rushed over to Dream with a hopeful look in his eye lights.

"Yes, Blueberry?" Dream asked, directing his dimming pinpricks to the blue-clad warrior with a tired smile.

"About what Error said- is it really true? That there's a balance between Creation and Destruction?" Blue asked, ignoring the unfavorable nickname in favor of asking his question

Dream thought for a moment before nodding slowly. "I would assume so. He has no reason to lie about those kinds of things."

"But what if that meant there were other balances too?" Blue continued, his eye lights quickly turning into stars from his excitement. "Life and Death is a pretty obvious one, but what if there was also one between Positivity and Negativity? That might be a reason why you've been feeling so tired lately!"

Dream sighed, slumping his shoulders as an exhausted look overcame his features and his façade of confidence quickly crumbled away. "That...that could be a reason, sure. We'll talk about it more after we've all rested up, Blueberry, but right now, I'm drained as shit and I don't have the mental capacity for this right now. Sorry."

Blue muttered a small 'language' under his breath, but nodded at the guardian's words, nonetheless. Ink had already left halfway through their conversation, and Dream made a portal to Blue's world after waving the Sans a goodbye.

Dream closed the portal after Blue went through before slumping to the ground with an exhausted sigh, rubbing the edges of his eye sockets in a failed attempt to wake himself up more.

Yawning, Dream managed to crawl over to a nearby tree and slump against it right as his eyes started to droop close.

The temptation to sleep right then and there was unbearable, and he was so drained after the battle...

'Well, nobody else is around, so it wouldn't hurt to close my eyes for a moment...'

-----

"Jeez, Cross. You're gonna end up wearing the floor down to the ground at the rate you're pacing. Then Nighty's gonna make you replace all the floorboards." Killer snickered, watching as the former royal guard took one good look at him before flipping him the middle finger.

"Can I not think in peace for one day without getting interrupted?" Cross snapped, his eye lights burning with annoyance.

Killer's smile only widened. "No."

"Fuck you."

"Gladly."

"Ugh, no-"

The offending skeleton cackled at the other's misery before being promptly tackled off the top of the couch he was perched on. The two rolled around on the floor, trying to gain the upper hand in the fight until Nightmare's voice reached their ears.

"What the hell are you doing? You're both grown adults, not children, so stop acting like 10-year-olds." The guardian hissed, his impatient tone causing the two to instantly stand at attention despite the murderous glances they were still giving each other.

Nightmare sighed, rubbing his eye lights as his tentacles flicked lazily behind his back. The enticing smell of Horror's breakfast wafted into the air, but they all knew it would still be a short while before it was ready.

Sitting himself down on a couch that hadn't been toppled over, Nightmare allowed himself to sink into the cushions with his eye sockets partially closed. The skeletons in the room knew better than to bother their boss at the moment, knowing the guardian had taken most of hits in the fight and had, essentially, protected them all from dusting on the spot.

Nightmare would always claim it was only because his minions would be no use to him dead, but they all knew the real reason behind the guardian's actions.

With a well concealed yawn, Nightmare watched as Dust groggily made his way down the stairs before tripping and falling the rest of the way. The Sans remained (mostly) unharmed by the time he face-planted at the base of the stairs, but he made it quite obvious he didn't have any plans of getting up again.

Perking up at Dust's comedic arrival, Killer walked over from where he was having a stare down with Cross to poke fun at the skeleton lying on the floor. Snickering, Killer said, "We really need to get you one of those help buttons that those elderly have. You're literally the definition of, "Help, I've fallen and I cAn'T gEt Up!"

Dust reached up without raising his head and slapped Killer over the head. The latter let out a sound that was a mix between a laugh and a noise of pain before Dust rose from the ground and shot Killer a look that said "You and me, backside of the mansion, right now."

As if reading their thoughts, Nightmare grumbled from his sunken position on the couch, "Killer, Dust, if you even think about fighting near the house, I will assign you both janitorial duties until the day you die."

Dust and Killer pouted silently at this but knew better than to defy their boss's words. Stretching and making his way over to an unoccupied chair, Dust sat down before asking a question.

"Hey boss."

"Hm?"

"What do you think glitchy's whole deal with the balance between Creation and Destruction was? Like, he looked really annoyed when he was talking about it." Dust said, his purple and blue eye lights flickering with curiosity.

Nightmare hummed, thinking over Dust's words for a moment as the skeletons waited for his answer. "I don't really know, to be honest. When he was talking about it, I could feel the insanity slowly drip out of him and instead be replaced with what felt like desperation? It was odd."

"Well, what if all this time, he was just like Ink, but he didn't really care because he enjoyed his job?" Cross said, gazing around the room as everyone's eyes were snapped towards him. "If he was feeling desperation, maybe this is a sign his hand was forced as well."

"Yeah! Ink's been blabbering all about voices in his head that "force him" to create misery AUs, but it doesn't seem like he's really fighting them that much. Error probably tried to reject whatever voices that bastard of a deity sent his way, which resulted in insanity as a punishment." Killer added, and Nightmare's face adorned a thoughtful look.

"That may be so." Nightmare agreed, and the room was left in a comfortable silence as the skeletons mulled over the theory.

Then, Cross decided to speak up again. "So...nobody's gonna talk about that weird Blue copy we saw a couple days ago?"

Killer snorted. "Gotta be more specific on that, Crossy boy. We've probably wiped about 4 Underswap copies since then."

"I mean the one with the Blue that led us to the other Blue. The one we caught raiding their own house?"

"Oh, right! I remember them. What a dumbass." Killer joked, but Cross blatantly ignored his comment.

Continuing, Cross said, "You could easily tell he was a visiting Sans. And, if you looked closely enough, there were these tiny error signs that popped in and out of existence on his body."

"I gotta agree with Cross here." Dust said. "That Blue was acting really strange, and he wasn't afraid of us, like, at all. Usually, an Underswap Sans variant would either try to challenge us to a battle to prove we were "worthy" or try to become friends with us. This time, though, he just waved us over and led us into the woods."

"I noticed dissimilarities as well." Nightmare concurred, shifting around in his seat. "That Blue's clothing in general was a darker tone than the Blue we met after he left. Alongside that, he appeared to have a small scar at the bottom of his skull, and the Sans of the AU we were in did not have that, nor the Star Sans Blue we all know and hate."

"So who could it be? It can't just be a rogue Underswap variant, 'cause they're not powerful enough to summon portals outside of their world, and we know it's not starry Blue." Killer said, looking mildly intrigued in the conversation despite his nonchalant position on the couch.

"I think I might know."

At Horror's voice, everyone turned around to see the Sans standing there with an unreadable expression on his face and a silicon spatula in hand.

"There was an AU I tried to access. It had already been cleared out by a previous raid. It was a normal Candytale variant." Horror started, his raspy voice making it a bit hard to hear him. "It blocked me from doing so. When I tried to access it again, it asked for an eye light identification scan for either Error or Blue."

"Wait, so those idiots have teamed up together? Already?" Dust asked, raising a nonexistent eyebrow.

Horror shrugged. "I dunno. It got pretty weird when I went to Error's Anti-Void and asked him about it."

Nightmare jumped up from his seat, his singular eye light blazing with anger and worry as his tentacles flared to life. "YOU WENT TO ERROR'S ANTI-VOID!? WHAT ARE YOU, AN IMBECILE?! HE COULD HAVE DUSTED YOU!"

"Sheesh, Goopmare, calm down. Let the guy explain." Killer said, only to earn the guardian's piercing glare in return.

"I will impale you if you don't keep your mouth shut."

"Nothing bad happened, I promise." Horror assured, raising a placating hand. "I just told him about the AU, he tried to wipe it, but it didn't work. He even tried to access it himself and did the scan, but it refused to open a portal for him to that world. You all could probably try the same thing and it wouldn't work."

This sent a wave of surprise through the group. Never before had Error not been able to access or destroy an AU, even if it was on lockdown. They then all tried to open their own portal to the world but were greatly unsuccessful.

"You said it required either Blue or Error to access it?" Nightmare asked, and Horror nodded. Then, addressing the whole group, the guardian said, "Well, looks like we've got a couple of skeletons to crack down on. Let's move out."

The group of Sanses (excluding Nightmare) cheered at the declaration of a new mission, and they all quickly hopped through their own portals and started the search.

*1 Year Later*

It had been a stressful year.

Somehow, Nightmare's Gang and Error's past self had found out about their hidden AU and had tried accessing it in all ways possible. Most of Error's time spent during the year was enforcing the code of the world as far as it would go before going out with Blue to blow off some steam with some minor terrorism.

They had even gone as far as to try and find Blue and him themselves! It got so intense to the point that the two were required to stay in their AU until things died down a bit, but Error had forgotten how determined Nightmare's Gang could get at completing a mission.

Finally, though, they had made it to the end of the year, and they were standing on the Surface of Candytale as the sun set on the last day.

"Are you two ready to go?"

Blue looked at Error, exchanging glances with the god before nodding his head firmly. "Yes, we're ready."

"Alright then. Enacting the next time loop in 3, 2, 1..."

Then, a brilliant flash of white light enveloped their vision, and everything faded to black. 

End notes:

pain