You can’t say what it is about Frisk that reminds you about Chara, really. When you think about it, they couldn’t be any more different. Frisk is your size, for one thing, and they don’t telegraph their body language as much. Quiet as they are, it’s sometimes hard to remember that they aren’t reserved around you, and that you’re just used to Chara’s teasing.

Chara’s a hundred years dead, but according to Frisk they were still alive in their head for a while; relentlessly sarcastic at first, but steadily warming to Frisk as they progressed and kept making friends. (You can’t imagine anyone not warming to Frisk. You’d killed them in a dozen disparate timelines and they’d still held out their wings to you, let you curl your neck around theirs.)

Chara, you'd thought guiltily, wouldn’t have done that. Long after you'd found them they tensed up in an unhappy ball whenever people talked in loud voices or when anyone but your family came near them, and kept telling you that you shouldn’t trust them so easily. You’re my best friend, Asriel, I don’t want to lose you.

You agreed easily with them — what was there to disbelieve? Chara was common sense and sharp-eyed reason and you’d seen the thrown-away bandages, your mother shooing you away too late to hide the cuts torn down their skin.

And, even more than that, you'd liked Chara. From the moment you'd met them you'd thought they were so brave and smart, thinking and saying things you never would have come up with on your own. They could be abrasive, but you could always tell that they really cared about you; there were gestures of trust in every piece of advice they gave you, even their history darkening their face like a stormcloud, and it glowed in your heart like a second soul.

You still remember when you gave them the box, so long after you'd met them that all their scars had faded to white lines across their chest, that they smiled every so often even if it usually wasn't very convincing.

They'd raised their head from where they were curled up in your twin nests, white eyes unreadable as always. "Open it," you'd prompted, and the paper had fallen from their paws with more grace than when it was under your clumsy mouth, trying to tie the ribbon just right.

The necklace they held up was the twin of yours, the jewel in theirs shining blood-red. "I got Gerson to take me to the jeweler's to engrave the words." you'd said, the words falling out of your mouth much too quickly in excitement, you'd looked at everywhere but them. "Do you like it?"

A blush rose to their cheeks, red underneath yellow fur. Their throat bobbed in a swallow. "Yeah, I do."

It was undeniably a happy look they'd given you, then, glancing up from under their mantle of feathers. "Thanks, Asriel."

That had stayed with you. The memory of Chara's smile, welling up under your ribs, till death and afterwards, long after being stifled with boredom and even the anger from not being able to feel had left you: nothing you could do would recreate that feeling. You missed them like a hole in your heart, you hated them for leaving you alone. There was no point, in this or in anything, without Chara.