A pair of teeth clicking against his was not what Cross had expected. He was way too stunned to even react before the other skeleton pulled back – and rose back to his own height, towering over Cross with a wide grin on his teeth.

"Wassup broski, haven't seen ya before," the skeleton spoke, pulling out a colourful notebook and pen. "What's ya name?" Cross noticed how the text on his glasses changed as he spoke. Now they said "Name?"

"Cross.." he answered, still a bit taken aback by the sudden kiss. He had no idea how he should react to it.

"Mhm," the tall skeleton hummed thoughtfully before writing something – probably Cross' name – down. "Radical ta know brah," he added, nodding.

"And yours is.?" Cross asked, furrowing his brows a bit. He didn't know how to feel about this guy, so he was a bit skeptical.

"FRESH!" called out a new voice. "You know that Geno will be upset if he finds out that you've scared Cross away! Do you want to make your brother upset?" Reaper lectured as he floated to the scene.

"I wouldn't care otherwise, but he's been in a bad mood today, so I feel like he would find a way to blame that to me somehow," he mumbled away, pouting, but didn't actually seem offended or upset.

"Ain't tryna scare him away, y'know. Geno broski got nothin' ta worry 'bout!" Fresh grinned widely to the God of Death before him.

"Randomly kissing someone on the teeth isn't a very good way to introduce yourself to someone if that's what you were doing," Reaper announced, but he was clearly unimpressed. "Don't think too much into it Cross, he does that to everyone," he added, placing a hand on the ex-soldier's shoulder.

"Creeped the funk out–" Cross stopped.

"Yeah, he does that as well," Reaper sighed.

"And what is that exactly.?" the monochrome skeleton raised a browbone, suspiciously.

"Swearin' is pretty unrad brah," Fresh answered before Reaper could. "Don't do that," he hummed, grinning to Cross and Reaper from above.

"And somehow he's related to Geno, and Error," Reaper reminded with a dramatic sigh. He didn't seem to quite understand how that was possible, but neither did Cross.

"And what's going on over here?" a smooth, enchanting voice cut through the conversation. Cross stiffed immediately. Fresh and Reaper only turned around, both unreadable.

"Ringmaster," Reaper nodded, tone respectful, yet dry, "I was just telling Cross about Fresh since the two of them hadn't met yet," he explained, firmly keeping his gaze on the Ringmaster, not showing any signs of fear. (But well, why would the literal God of Death be afraid of some random mortal?)

"Ah, the parasite is back," Nightmare scoffed, raising a browbone to the 90s nightmare next to him. "Did you get enough of Farm's bullshit or why did you return already?" he asked, not quite happy to see Fresh.

"Farm is a skeleton who works on a farm a few kilometers in South of here. The farm belongs to the circus and that's where a lot of our food come from. We aren't allowed to go there without a permission, but the Ringmaster allows Fresh to go help Farm with all the work when there isn't a show since he doesn't quite like him," Reaper explained to Cross quietly, leaning closer to the monochrome skeleton while Fresh kept Nightmare distracted with whatever reason he had for his arrival – Cross didn't quite catch the reason, being too focused on Reaper.

The God the lowered his voice even more and added: "Fresh would be dead if he wasn't needed in the shows.."

The coldness and hate towards the Ringmaster in Reaper's voice sent shivers down Cross' spine. A sudden spike of fear made the Ringmaster glance towards him, smirking for a second before turning back to Fresh.

"Reaper, take Fresh somewhere else," he ordered, turning on his heels to get away from the parasite. A disturbed look sat on his face, but Fresh didn't seem bothered by that. "Cross, come with me."

The monochrome skeleton froze. He made the mistake of letting his eye lights meet the Ringmaster's. Faint purple dusted his cheekbones, but luckily Reaper and Fresh were already marching away behind his back. Reaper casted a worried gaze back, but he couldn't see Cross' face.

"I do not know if you are aware, but we do smaller shows in the city for different kind of events. The city is hosting a kind of winter festival this weekend and has asked for a circus performance," Nightmare began explaining while walking. Cross hurried along, browbone a bit raised. "It won't contain many performers since there isn't enough space for that, but a few acts we can perform. It's a good way to attract more audience and better our reputation," he hummed, grinning widely.

It made Cross' spine shiver to think about how good of a reputation the circus already had when the public knew nothing about what went down behind the closed curtains.

"I was thinking about adding a knife throwing act, and I want you to do it." Cross stopped dead on his tracks. It wasn't a question, it was something that Nightmare had already decided and there would be no arguing back.

"Wouldn't Killer be a better choice for that?" he blurted out before he had even gotten a chance to realise that he had opened his mouth.

"Killer is more experienced, yes, but I want you to start performing as well. This is a good opportunity in a smaller show where messing up doesn't matter that much." But he would still be punished for it. "So, what do you say?" The Ringmaster's grin was wide as he looked down on Cross – as if he had choice, of course he didn't – with his cyan eye light glowing slyly.

"I agree," Cross nodded slowly.

"How wonderful! Just as I expected!" Nightmare clapped his gloved hands together. "You should go find Killer and tell him to teach the basics that we usually use in shows. He should know what to do," he continued, grinning widely at how easily Cross had agreed.

"When is it exactly?" the monochrome skeleton asked.

"This weekend. I'll have to ask the hosts for more information. Tomorrow at eight in the morning, I need you to the Big Top along with everyone else who is coming. Then we'll go through all the information. You better not be late!" Nightmare explained. He was still walking forwards confidently. His chin was lifted and hands resting behind his back. In Cross' opinion he was walking as if he owned the whole place and everyone there. (And that just happened to be the truth.)

"I'll be there, on time," Cross nodded, after all, obeying orders was what he was good at, and timing as well. Battles had never waited for no man.

"Good, that's exactly what I wanted to hear!" Nightmare grinned widely, satisfied with obeying. "I will be seeing you then!" And with that the Ringmaster vanished into the shadows.

-----

     "So..." Chara stared at him. "What did you get yourself into?" 

"A performance in the city this weekend," Cross answered, thoughtfully. "We haven't seen the city after we came here," he pointed out, staring out of the window, into the forest surrounding the circus.

"What a great chance to see people who might recognise you," Chara scoffed, rolling their eyes.

"Don't–"

The bell by the door chimed once, cutting Cross off, before the flap was unceremoniously shoved open and in marched the still living Chara.

Cross gave them a curios look as they flopped onto the bed across from him, the same they had always stayed in whenever they had visited.

"Punched a hole through my tents wall, now that place is as cold as a freezer, so I'm stuck here again," they mumbled, throwing a backpack on the floor.

"I see," Cross nodded, a bit concerned. "I don't mind you here, stay as long as you want to," he added carefully, offering them a gentle smile.

"How many babies does it take to paint a house? Depends on how hard you throw them," Chara said, catching Cross off guard. His mouth gaped open and he blinked a couple of times, trying to figure out where it had come from. His own Chara was laughing – either at the joke or his dumbfounded expression.

The human performer held back a proud smirk at Cross' speechless reaction. "Would you like another one? What do babies and baseballs have in common? The neighbour gets angry when you throw them through their window."

"I–," Cross didn't even know how to respond to it. His Chara however seemed to find it funny. (During the war they had always entertained Cross and him with dead baby jokes, which had always left him horrified, making Cross earn a lecturing about how children should not be taught jokes like that.)

"What? Do dead baby jokes sound wrong to you?" Chara inquired teasingly, raising a brow. "Hitting too close?" they joked.

The small eye lights were filled with fear and tears.

Cross' SOUL skipped a beat, but he didn't show it. Instead he rolled his eye lights and sighed, "I would be asking where you got this type of dark humour, but I have a feeling that the answer lies everywhere around us."

Dust coated his shaking hands.

"I probably should have expected this," he added, giving them an unimpressed look, yet the corner of his teeth was twitching upwards.

The weight from his arms was gone.

"We all have a dark taste in humour, or at least most of us, Geno was horrified when I told him one, Reaper however was laughing his ass off," Chara shrugged, still smirking proudly at their actions. It warmed Cross SOUL to see that they were getting comfortable being around him.

The crying stopped.

"I can definitely see that happening," Cross hummed, nodding in agreement.

The world went quiet.

"That resulted in one long lecture about how those jokes are not appropriate," they remembered, smirking at the memory.

Way too quiet.

"I can also see that," Cross snorted. Definitely what he would expect from Geno. His eye lights shifted to his own Chara, who was still recovering from their laughing fit.

"I learnt nothing from that lecture," the human performer informed. "How do you get 100 babies into a bucket?"

"No–"

"With a blender." They were grinning widely at Cross disappointed look.

"Isn't it past your bedtime already?" he asked, still decided whether to laugh or cry at the jokes.

Chara rolled their eyes, scoffing slightly amused, "What bedtime? We have no bedtime in here. I can go to bed whenever I want to," they announced, followed by a yawn.

"It's really late. You should go to sleep," Cross hummed, glancing towards them. All the daylight had died a long ago and the whole world was swallowed by the darkness of the night.

"Alright, alright," they mumbled, eyes already starting to fall shut. Cross could feel that they were tired, but that wasn't the only feeling they had.

He felt that they were in pain, emotionally. The jokes had been a cover-up so he wouldn't notice that they were feeling bad, but little did they know that he had an ability – or curse – to tell him that.

Cross' eye lights shifted towards the living human, who had rolled onto their side with their back towards him. He furrowed his browbones, concerned. What had happened to them?

-----

     Killer was starting to get annoyed. He had spent good ten minutes looking through the boxes he and Cross had brought to Ink and Blue.

"Where's it?" he mumbled to himself, brows furrowed. "I definitely put it in one of these!" he groaned.

"Maybe it fell off?" Ink suggested, seeming a bit confused as well. "Or then someone took it while the boxes were waiting outside."

"Fuck!" Killer swore, kicking over the box he had been rummaging through. "I wanted to read that letter. It coulda answers!" he sighed, glaring at the parts that had spilled onto the floor.

"But what answers do we even need anymore.? The Ringmaster told us what happened to him, there's nothing left to find out," Ink pointed out, hopping off of the table he had been sitting on to collect everything back into the box.

"Ya think I believe that piece of shit?" Killer scoffed, rolling his eye lights. "I'm gonna keep lookin' for answers 'till I find the real truth!" he announced, stuffing his hands into his pockets.

"That's not a smart idea. If you plan on going back to the abandoned tent, I mean. You know that the Ringmaster will be angry if he finds you there," Ink reminded him, concern painting his face.

"Doesn't matter, he won't find out," the knife thrower replied, crossing his arms. "He didn't even notice the last time," he pointed out.

"It's still not a good idea." Ink stuck to his point. He didn't want to see his friend getting hurt for doing something stupid.

"I'll be fine!" Killer assured him.

"If you say so..." Ink hesitatedly mumbled, returning his focus to cleaning up the floor.

Words: 2202

[26.3.2023]

So, Fresh is a nightmare to write– His design will be coming later once I get the chance to draw him. I'm currently busy watching Gravity Falls through as many times as I can before we switch Disney+ to something else.

Anyways, this weekend I went to a con. Yesterday I was Empireverse Cross and today Geno. Here's pictures of both of them:

EV!Cross I made by myself with help from my grandma, it's the first cosplay I've made. From Geno's outfit I made the shorts and crocheted the scarf, plus stained the clothes with fake blood.

The funny thing is that I changed from Killer to Geno at three am on Saturday despite having never cosplayed Geno before. I finished the outfit after the first con day and just crossed my fingers. It turned out pretty great :D

(And let me once again say that my Tiktok is shado.cosplay)