Last Cup of Coffee
By TwoDaysMaybe

The sun is just starting to set behind the trees as Veth pushes the porch door open with her shoulder
The sky is a brilliant golden orange, the clouds painted in soft, moody purples above the silhouette of the forest at the edge of her... no, their property
She stands and watches for a moment, a long, warm breeze catching her ponytail and blowing it forward over her shoulder, then soaring on to send languid ripples through the grass of the meadow
She takes a deep breath, smells the clear country air with its hint of wildflower, and smiles quietly to herself
It's a perfect day, she thinks
And that's why it has to be today
In front of her sits her husband, Kris Dreemurr, legs dangling off the steps of the porch
He's slouching more these days. His once chestnut hair has long since gone gray, his handsome features lined and weathered
He spends much more time staring at nothing
Not senile.
Veth would have noticed. She's been looking out for it specifically, in fact
That said, she worries, sometimes.
That he's drifting away.
That what they have isn't as important to him anymore.
But as he glances over his shoulder, smiles at her, his cherry-red eyes lighting up, she sighs with relief
No matter what, he's still Kris
"Krith. What are you doing outthide at thith time of day? You'll catch your death."
The reedy creak on the edges of her words reminds her that Kris isn't the only one who's gotten old
Her hands are wrinkled, her skin paper-soft and fragile
As she kneels to set the mug of coffee she's carrying by Kris's side, all her joints scream in protest and she winces
"Just... thinking, I guess." Kris glances down at the steaming mug. "You didn't have to do that."
"Yeah, well. I did. Drink up."
He nods silently, taking it in his hands and sniffing the steam

There's a certain melancholy in the air between them. A satisfied melancholy, but a melancholy all the same
The end is coming
They both know it, somewhere deep down, on an instinctual level
But it is the end of a life well lived
Veth sits next to her husband on the porch in silence
She says nothing as he raises the mug of coffee to his lips
She says nothing as he sips, though she does turn her head, seemingly to watch a cardinal land on the corner of the roof and take a few hopeful pecks at the seed-black shingles
She doesn't even say anything after he's drained his mug, setting it on the deck with a hollow clunk and a happy little sigh
But her face, which until this moment has been set in the idle half-smile of a quietly cheerful old lady, splits from ear to ear into a demonic grin
Got you, you stupid bastard!
The feeling is ecstatic. Electrical. It pulses through her body, the finest of all highs, making her hands shake and sweat
It takes every fiber of her being not to burst into peals of cackling laughter. She presses her hands to her mouth, breathing heavily through her nose, praying that Kris won't notice for just a minute, just a second longer
She wants to savor this
She has been planning the death of Kris Dreemur for years... no, decades! Ever since he first foolishly showed her mercy in her defeat, she has plotted his downfall
At first it was a simple little thing
Ingratiate herself with him, with his stupid friends, look for an opportunity to strike them when their backs are turned and flee to fight another day
But then came the long looks
And the stammering even when they were talking about nothing of import
And the blushing
And Veth's heart had practically leapt out of her chest, because this stupid, stupid hero had just handed her the opportunity of a lifetime

So she went to the dance with Kris (Idiot kept stepping on her feet, no matter how much she tried to wrench him into the right steps)
And she dated Kris (And God, what a pain it had been, acting all sugar-sweet with those suspicious friends of his)
And she married Kris (A worthless ceremony. Toriel cried, wailing like a wounded animal in the middle of the ceremony. It made Veth want to vomit)
And she bore his children (That had been... acceptable. She is proud of her children, though she does wish they would call more often)
She lived with him
She supported him, through good times and bad
She held herself back at every opportunity.
Every time his back was turned, her hand shaking as she held the kitchen knife.
Every time he stood by a ledge or a railing and her pulse quickened as she looked for witnesses.
Every time he foolishly let her prepare dinner and she stared at the space under the sink and all the lovely, lovely chemicals...
Because she was not plotting a murder
She was plotting a demonstration.
Kris possesses the power to set everything, all of his victories, all of her defeats, back to zero
He would never use it, of course
Why would he? He has everything he could ever want. Lifelong friends. A loving wife. Children he's insufferably proud of.
But what if she could prove to him that it was all for nothing?
That all of it, all the candlelit dinners
All the moments of sleepy passion in the early mornings
The look in her eyes when he knelt in front of her on the beach that night and stumbled through the most important question of his life, hands shaking so hard he nearly dropped the ring into the sand
All of it was just the world's greatest prank, played on the world's most unbelievable fool?
What if, right at the finish line, Veth could show him that he had wasted his life playing house with an unrepentant villain?
Well, wouldn't that be upsetting? Wouldn't it be depressing?
Wouldn't it make anyone want to start all over?

And so she sits next to Kris, her shoulders quivering with cruel and evil glee, tears springing to her eyes as she barely suppresses the cackles itching at her throat
Kris coughs, wheezing as he clears his throat
"How'th the coffee, dearetht?"
If he notices the joy in her voice, he doesn't let it show
"A little bitter today. Did you buy it from the place by the librarby, or-"
"No!"
Veth's grip on her own leash slips
She whirls on him, eyes manic, grinning so wide she's practically just baring her teeth, a luminous flush in her pallid cheeks
"That taste, dearest, would be the stingray spine and aconite powder!"
The laugh burbles up out of her as she presses her hands to her cheeks
Just a little giggle at first
But then it grows more forceful, louder, echoing out across the meadow and off the trees and into that picture-perfect sky
It's so strong it hurts, banging against the cage of her ribs like it's a living thing, like the real Veth is trying to tear her way free of the doting wife she's pretended to be for all these years
"You FOOL! YOU STUPID BASTARD!" She's screaming it now, unable to control herself. "YOU FELL FOR IT! Marriage?! Love?! How FOOLISH could you possibly be?!"
Kris says nothing. He takes the mug in his hands again, stares at the last few stray grounds at the bottom
But Veth won't let him escape that easily
The point wasn't killing him. It never was.
It was letting him live
Letting him live all the way to the end of a perfect little life... only to find out seconds before the finish line that it was all a trick
Letting him live just long enough to realize the enormity of the trap he's been living in
And forcing him to admit defeat to free himself from it
She crawls over to him, grabs his hair. Her hands are still uncannily strong even at this age
She twists his head to look into his eyes, panting feverishly

"I never loved you, Kris Dreemurr. It was all a sham. Every single minute! You've been dancing in the palm of my hand since the very beginning! Isn't it sad?! Isn't it a tragedy?!"
Veth pushes his hair back, already practically drooling at the thought of his expression
"Do it, Kris. Reset! Live your whole sad little life again, knowing that I have defeated you utterly and completely-"
It's... not what she was expecting
His eyes are clear, even though they're already starting to dilate from the poison
He's smiling. A little sad. A little twitchy as the shakes set in
And he says it.
"So that's how it was. I was wondering."
Veth pauses, her eyes narrowing to grey slits
"'That's how it...'" They go wide with disbelief. "You knew?!"
"I knew you were probably going to kill me. The when and why..."
He coughs, so hard his body shakes, a spray of crimson across his fist.
"I wondered. I suspected it might be something like this."
Unexpected, to say the least. She lets go of his hair, sits back
"You..."
It doesn't make any sense.
"If you knew, then why not do anything about it?"
Kris is quiet. Sweat is pouring down his face. He grips his sides, trying in vain to stop the convulsions that are starting to wrack his body
He has minutes left, at best. There's no saving him, there never was
The point of the poison was to leave him alive just long enough for Veth to force his hand, and no longer
"Because it was fun. Because I enjoyed being with you. Even knowing that you wanted me dead, I-"
He gasps, gagging and sputtering as he topples to the side. His legs spasm, scuffling across the hardwood like a dying spider's
Veth is paralyzed for a moment, doubt blooming bright red in her chest
It can't be. He's lying. This is just him playing the hero one last time, a stupid cope to pretend that it meant something, that it-
She scrambles over to him, her breath catching in her chest

"Shut up!" she snaps. "Shut UP! Listen to me, you stupid man! I NEVER loved you! I NEVER cared for you! It was all a trick! YOU HAVE WASTED YOUR LIFE!"
Kris breathes in sharply, clenches his hands into fists
"No. None of it was a waste. I don't care if you didn't love me. I was happy. I am happy. And I... I loved you. Still do, honestly."
Veth's jaw clenches, a growl curdling in her throat. It's not supposed to be like this! He's ruining it with this stupid goody-goody bullshit, acting like he doesn't care!
She grabs his chin, pushes his hair up. His face won't lie. She'll see it, that last, ruined expression, the despair and the tears and the self-pity and then finally he'll have no choice but to-
She doesn't
His eyes gleam crimson, burning fierce even at the edge of death
A grin splits his face, narrow and sharp and cruel
This isn't the expression of a martyr, or a coward, or a hero lying to himself
It's the expression of a winner.
Of a gambler, laying out his royal straight flush
"Thanks, Veth." His teeth are gritted, blood flowing freely from his nose. "I... I had a good time. Thanks to you. All of this. It was all thanks to you."
And it hits her
She wasn't the only one playing the long con
She dated Kris
She married Kris
She had his children
She shared his life
She made him happy. In a way that maybe nobody else could.
And, in the end, she took it all away
But he doesn't care that she took it away. He just cares that he had it to begin with, that he had it at all
It meant something. He values it. He believes that, really believes that, right up until the very end
And that means that her contingency, her life's work, her time machine powered by his suffering is...
A titanic failure.

She didn't prove that this life was a worthless joke
Quite the opposite, actually
She gave his life meaning. An incalculable, invaluable meaning that carried him from the moment he spared her life until the finality of today
A meaning that he refuses to sully the permanence of, that he refuses to undo even when he knows it will cost him his life
All of it. All of this. All her plans and plots and scripts...
It was all for nothing
"Pff."
The little chuckle puffs out of her lips, steaming into the early evening air
"Unbelievable. Truly. You are a truly unbelievable man, Krith. Turning my own planth againtht me, jutht by being..."
She smiles. Wistful. Lonely. Looking for all the world like the woman she pretended to be for so many years
"Just by being who I always knew you were."
He doesn't respond.
He can't.
Not anymore. Never again.
She sits with him, taking his cold, limp hand
Watching the sun set
Watching the moon rise, and the stars overhead
Letting the cold sink into her bones as she thinks about the whole stupid ordeal
And she squeezes his hand, one last time
"...It was pretty fun, wasn't it?"

This one's inspired by these anons' posts about Veth continuing to try and kill Kris even after marriage. First time writing Veth, so hopefully she's not too out of character. I've been sitting on this for a while and revised it after doing a Veth archive dive, but I'm still a little iffy about some parts of it. In any case, hope you all enjoy.