Editor~Kun is making me drop my average to 1500 words per chapter so it's easier for me to get updates out on this book. I know it's more efficient, but I'm as stubborn as I am ginger so it's weird for me. Anyway, I'm sorry to those of you that have been waiting long for this sequel. My creativity has been dry as of late but I'm hoping to get better with Editor~Kun's Reminders. (Aka 4am text to write and weekly deadlines. No joke) I hope you all enjoy Book Two of the Soulless series!
-Bug~Chan
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"You daft fool!" Gaster was shouting at someone. "Hey! I am not daft, nor am I a fool. It's not my fault the calibrations were a tad off." Jace spoke in reply. 'This is going to be a long day,' I thought to myself. The minutes dragged on, and Gaster and Jace bickered.

I sighed as I spun around in the spinning stool that was cemented in front of the control panel. "You know, I'm not good at science and all, but maybe, just maybe, it would be easier if you worked together."

"Oh shut up Cherry. All you're doing is spinning in a chair." Jace shot back.

"Hey, don't turn this on me! I'm here as brawn." I protested.

"Just five minutes ago you fixed the machine's cooling system and proofed it for humans without telling us. You're smart enough to help."

I groaned and rolled my eyes. "Where's Sans? Make him help."

"He went on a food run remember?" Jace reported.

I stood lazily and trudged over to the machine. Jace was standing adjacent to a table lined with tools, most familiar but some unique to magic dealing machinery. Gaster's form floated close by, his figure visible but it moved like mist, unable to physically act. "Now Jace, let's try this again. Reconnect the main outlet and refigure the wires so that the barrier in the chamber can separate the soul from its parasite, no offense to you, Chara."

'None taken Gaster.' Chara said from within my head.

Months had passed since Jace returned, even more recent that I found he was cursed to the same fate as me, a dead child's spirit attached to our being. After we found out that Asriel had taken to Jace's soulless body, we went to Gaster. He told us, after explaining that he knew, that he already had plans to deal with it.

It's been a month and we were in Alphys' secret lab, Gaster's previous place of work. Work has been slow at times, and quickly some others, and for the most part, the machine is complete.

"Wait... when was a 'flux capacitor' added to the blueprint?" Gaster asked to no one in particular. I began chuckling under my breath.

"It's a fluke, Gaster, an old joke from a classic human movie. Jace probably put it on there for laughs." I explained.

Gaster's brow furrowed as he mumbled to himself, returning to the blue prints. "Cherry, please tightly fasten the bolts around the power cell. If they are not properly secured it could result in a colossal failure."

"Yes Gaster." I lulled, taking a wrench in hand and walking to the power cell, twisting the parts until they were completely secure.

As I switched from bolt to bolt, a sharp snap rang through the air. I bolted up, turning excitedly to face my favorite monster. "Finally you're back!" I chirped, handing him the wrench. "Help your dad."

He chuckled, trading the wrench for the bags of food. "I'm surprised they didn't kill each other." He chirped. "Jace and Dad butt heads on everything."

"I'm not even sure how they managed through the months of experiments on Jace." I whispered.

"I was drugged most of the time." Jace supplied, glancing over his thin-framed glasses. "I'm recovering from the experiments, I would say I was more mellow. Now that I've recovered I'm more-"

"Bitchy?" I suggested.

"I was going to say testy, but that works as well." He sighed.

I dug a hand into the bag of burgers and retrieved one at random, all of them identical since it would be easier. I returned to my seat and swiveled happily as I watched the boys work. Believe me, I didn't like contributing to stereotypes when it came to hard work, but damn am I lazy.

We stopped momentarily so those of us who could eat, did. Sans sat next to me, his shoulder glued to mine as we chattered on aimlessly with a more than willing participant. As Sans and Jace engaged on one of their battles of quips, my eyes wandered the dark, dank lab. Even with the many lights we put in to make it easier to work, it always felt so dark.

I looked at the machine numbly and thought to myself, a form of excitement catching my breath and throwing it a notch faster.

'Chara? What do you think will happen once you're separated from my soul?'

It took a moment, but soon the familiar, cheery tone of Chara responded.

'I'm not sure...' Chara said. 'Maybe it'll just shatter and I'll get to move on.'

'Are you scared?'

There was silence for a moment, then Chara laughed. Not the chilling, psychotic murderer laugh that once haunted you, but a fake laugh, sadness veiled by a fake smile I knew too well.

'I've already died once Cherry. It can't be that hard the second time.'

I frowned. Chara was a terrible liar and she knew it. It's okay to be nervous. There's always the second possibility that Gaster talked about.

The second possibility, the one with a 5. 75% chance of happening. It depended soully on the strength of Chara's soul after it detached from me. It was the possibility that maybe, after Chara was released, she'd be reborn again as she was prior to her all too early death.

'Oh come on Cherry, I don't want to get my hopes up.'

'But you should! This could mean you get to come back! You could say hi to your folks, meet Frisk for real! Become a part of the crew rather than me playing telephone when you wanna say something.'

'I'm not sure Frisk would want to meet me... not after what I made them do.' Chara whispered sadly.

'You didn't cause that. Corruption did, and you can't help it if that happens. Corruption's such a terrible thing...'

'Hey, Cherry, you wanna stop daydreaming some time soon?' Jace asked, drawing himself into my conversation with Chara.

His voice was soothing, like when I last heard it back when we were neighbours above, but damn was it still surprising to hear that voice in my head.

Jace, a little warning before you jump into the conversation would be appreciative.

'Well, excuse me, I don't have any control over when our thoughts connect.' The sounds of this statement gradually picked up in intensity as it was dragged along.

Chara immediately locked onto Jace's silhouette, 'Did you...?'

'There's never a reason for me not to.' Jace replied coolly, and Asriel walked from behind Jace, to his side.

The small child waved sheepishly at his sibling and smiled. 'Howdy Chara!' He greeted.

Chara ran to tease her sibling as I watched from afar, smiling vaguely. Aside for Jace, my childhood had been lonely, so that meant a majority of my childhood had missed the thrills of other children to befriend. Seeing the two so happy together was like a window into what I had missed.

'So, this is what it's like to be in your head... again. So, Cherry, what's your big plan? Other than hoping the machine works.' Jace's voice had a calm, even edge to it, but was as serious as ever.

I shrugged indifferently and looked about the space in my head. "It's so dark in here." I muttered, blatantly dodging his question. "I wonder if there's any way to, like, customize it around here."

"You're evading my question." Jace poked, jabbing at my side as punishment. I yelped and grabbed my side before sticking my tongue out at him.

"I don't know!" I snapped, a little too harshly. "I haven't really... got anything to work towards after this..."

"What about Sans?" Jace asked, raising a brow.

"What about him?" I retorted, smiling because I knew it annoyed Jace when I asked dumb questions.

He knocked my head and grimaced, making me laugh. "You know what I'm talking about." He growled.

"I know. I know." I confessed, eyes returning to the children now chasing eachother. "I'm not sure. I love him, dear god I adore everything about him, but..." I fell short, my eyes falling to my feet as I clutched my arm.

"But what? You love him. Clearly. What's the issue?" He asked.

"I'm... I'm afraid I guess. I've hurt him so many times. I'm afraid that I'll do it again. And what if he ends up hating me?! Like, we can get married, that's great! But science proves that the likelyhood of us having kids is almost impossible. He's a skeleton anyway so how would that work! And even if we do have kids I have no idea what to do! I would just fuck up an innocent child because that's all I'm good at! Not to mention-"

Jace smacked me upside the head once again, harder than before. I winced, holding my palm against the spot as I jabbed my elbow into his side. "What the hell was that for?!" I snapped.

"You're really over thinking this. If you're happy with Sans, especially when he's so happy with you, then that's that." Jace lectured.

"What do you know about romance? You've never dated anyone." I pouted.

"Exactly why it's so amazing I'm better at it than you." He poked, this time smiling.

I relaxed a little and sighed. "You're right. After this whole thing is over, I should focus on Sans and getting my normal life together."

Jace smiled. He tried to ruffle my hair, but his hand seemed to pass through my head. "Oh, well I guess we're diverging again." Jace stated obviously. "Come in Asriel! Time is almost up!"

The small goat child nodded and hugged Chara. Moments later, both he and Jace dissappeared from vision. I smiled as slowly I woke up. "I live in the now. Let's worry about that before anything else." I whispered.

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Hey, Editor~Kun here, yes, I'm doing an end of chapter A/N, get over it. Anyways, yes, I do text Author~Chan around 4/3 AM (we have different timezones), I'll make sure that stuff spreads to other stories. Don't worry about it. :3 I'll see you guys later!