ColonyTale
by Nicolle
Disclaimer: Undertale belongs to Toby Fox. ColonyTale is my AU. Story copyright to me.
Chapter One
"Oh my God. You're awake!" Alphys ran to her patient. "Don't get up! Just wait! Um..."
Alphys gently touched her patient's face, carefully adjusting the bandages around the eyes.
"While you were in cryo-stasis, several of your internal organs failed, including your eyes. I was able to clone and replace the damaged organs except for your eyes. I had to replace them with cybernetic ones."
The patient's fingers moved, and Alphys held them briefly. "Can you understand me?"
Just a whisper, "Yes."
"Good. Um..." Alphys reached for a pair of shears. "I'm going to remove the bandages from around your eyes. If your new eyes are correctly engaged with your brain, you are going to see a yellow lizard woman." Alphys snipped the wrappings on the right side of the patient's face, and carefully pulled them away.
The patient's eyes opened, completely black. The patient blinked and the mechanical iris spun as it closed in, filling the eyes with a myriad of shifting colors around the black pupil. The patient linked again, eyes yellow orange, and regarded Alphys.
"You aren't freaking out?"
The whisper came again, strained from the exertion, but amused. "You told me you were a yellow lizard woman. I didn't have any reason to believe that you were lying."
Alphys smiled nervously. "I'll give you the run down on where you are and how we found you while I do a vision test to make sure you're seeing okay." She fiddled with the I.V. lines to the patient's arm, checking the fluid levels before grabbing an ophthalmoscope. "We found your cryo pod floating in the middle of no where, approximately two hundred light years from M64."
The whisper strained with worry. "The Black Eye Galaxy?"
Alphys checked the reaction of the mechanical pupils to the light of the ophthalmoscope, before looking in the magnifier. "Yes. Is that significant?"
"My ship was going in the," the voice was losing to strain, "opposite direction."
Alphys blinked a few times and sat back. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
"Two."
"Can you read the sign on the wall behind me?"
The eyes, green gold, narrowed on the sign and then focused on Alphys. "It says, 'Get Well Soon.'" The patient took a deep breath before speaking again. "How do I know that? The language you speak is familiar, but the letters on the sign are unfamiliar."
"Several thousand years will do that to a language." Alphys blushed, looking away. "When I was reasonably sure you would survive, I put an implant in your head. I hoped that the language program I ran would allow you to 'catch up' as it were. I'm really glad I was right!"
Alphys put the ophthalmoscope down. "Your muscles suffered considerable atrophy because the system that approximated normal body motion in the pod broke down. The bed your in now has been moving you while you recovered from the transplants, but it's very likely that you will need to use crutches at least while going through physical therapy."
The patient nodded. "Are you an alien?" The voice was getting stronger, the whisper disappearing.
Alphys cocked her head to the side, thinking about that. "I'm not sure how to answer that. Are you from Earth?"
"Yes."
"Then I guess I'm not." Alphys head bobbed a little as she thought about her answer. "The ship you're on came from Earth and everyone here is a descendant of the monsters who left Earth so technically, I'm not an alien in relation to you. On the other hand, people on the ship think Earth, and humans, are myths."
The patient smiled. "When I left Earth on the FTL, monsters were a myth."
Alphys relaxed, suddenly disarmed by the patient's smile. "Based on the age of your pod, this ship left Earth about a thousand years before you did."
"How long have I been asleep?"
"Twelve hundred years."
The patient blinked and sank into the pillow, staring at the ceiling.
Alphys sighed, shoulders dropping. "I'll let you be for a bit while that sinks in." The lizard woman stood. "Your pod only had a serial number on it and medical information. It didn't have any other identifying information. Do you remember your name?"
"My name is Frisk."
Alphys left the room and found His Majesty, Prince Asriel Dreemurr and special investigator Sans Boneheart watching the patient through the observation window.
Sans rocked back on his heels, bare phalanges clacking against the tiled floor, boney hands shoved in the pockets of his blue hoodie. "*what's the news, alph?"
"She's awake."
Asriel crossed his arms over his purple clad chest, black pants shoved in his boots, black utility vest pockets bulging with all manner of equipment. He looked over his shoulder through the glass, causing his long hair to twist around his shoulders. "Status?"
"Biologically female human, physically twenty three years old." Alphys gave a side long glance at them. "That's a young adult for humans." She straightened and continued. "Scans showed no sign of brain damage after removal from the cryo-stasis pod and the most recent scan showed full function even after terminal implant. All replaced internal organs are functioning properly and the language program I fed her through the implant appears to have worked."
"And the ghosts?"
"They turn up left and right, even Napstablook. Though no official information on the human's location on the Delta has been released, the ghosts have been here day in and day out. All six of them."
Asriel frowned and watched as one of the Blook family ghosts floated into the room from the far wall. It peered around the curtain next to the bed, watching quietly. "At least they don't seem to be inclined to reveal her location."
"Mettaton was rather insistent to the rest of his family that they keep it under wraps." Alphys watched the ghost through the window. "Which is funny when you think about how, with the exception of him, the rest of the Blooks are phenomenally quiet."
"*so what's the plan, boss man? there's a decent chunk of monsters who think we should just dump the kid out an air lock."
Asriel glared at the skeleton. "I am not inclined to kill someone based on a legend about how we ended up on the Delta over two thousand years ago."
"She mentioned that monsters were myths to her. That would seem to indicate that whatever sent us searching the stars, even the humans of her time had completely forgotten about it."
Asriel raised an eye brow. "Her time?"
"*information pulled from the stasis pod indicates that the human has been floating out there for twelve hundred years."
Asriel's jaw dropped. He turned fully to the window, hands now resting on the sill. "That's impossible."
Sans shrugged. "*impossible or not. we now have a living, breathing myth living on the ship. does she have a name?"
"Frisk."
The skeleton's eyes went completely black. "No. That can't be right." He put both boney hands on the glass of the observation window staring at the patient with an intensity that matched Asriel's. "Frisk... Frisk is supposed to be a child."
Asriel looked down at Sans. "Technically speaking, she will be as a child while she adjusts to living among monsters." He sighed. "Is this the human you've been waiting for? The one other versions of you seem to collect? The other Sans-es seemed very keen that the arrival of the human named Frisk was a serious boon to monsters."
Sans looked up at him, whites returning to the sockets. "*i thought it'd be a kid." His left eye socket glowed a bright blue. "*papyrus says that the glacial biome is now under full quarantine."
Asriel growled. "With this microbe that's invaded the ship, I have an actual crisis to deal with and I know the press conference is going to be filled with questions about the human." Supreme annoyance flooded his eyes, only to pass as he watched the patient.
Frisk had noticed the ghost and turned her head toward it. She reached out weakly with one hand and the ghost floated down to her.
Asriel sighed. "Record their conversation. I'd like to know why the Blooks are so interested."
Alphys nodded and hurried to the comm.
"*you know why they're interested."
"But Alphys doesn't, so I need to make it look right."
Asriel watched Frisk for a few moments more before heading out of the Lab. Sans continued to stare through the window. After three weeks of watching her quietly cram as much information about the Delta as she could between physical therapy, Sans was bored. Asriel came to watch her from the window every other day, but the goat prince hadn't been much for conversation. Sans went in the room.
"*Human. Don't you know how to greet a new pal? Why don't you shake my hand."
Frisk reached out slowly and put her hand in Sans' boney one, only to jump at the whoopee cushion deflating.
"*heheh... the old whoopee cushion in the hand trick. it's ALWAYS funny."
She smiled brightly. Her hand fell, losing the strength to hold her arm up for too long. She looked at the food in front of her, the mess made from trying to eat with muscles refusing to work properly. Her smile fell.
Sans reached out and took a fork in his boney hand. "*here. let me help." He began feeding her. "*i'm sans. sans the skeleton. i'm actually supposed to be keeping an eye on you. keeping you in the lab. but, you know, i don't think you'll be going much of anywhere. but my brother, papyrus, he would love to meet a human. he's a human legend FANATIC." Sans smiled. "*hey! i've got an idea. why don't we go see him?"
Frisk gave him another bright smile.
Sans angled the wheelchair around a corner, speeding past shocked monsters on the walkway. Frisk giggled as they shot past the corridor connector into the Snowdin Biome. A bit of blue magic had the wheelchair up a ramp and onto the snowy forest path, slowing down to a regular walking pace.
"Woah..." Frisk gazed at the simulated night sky of the biome. Her breath rose above her in a soft mist. "It feels like I'm going to grandma's on Christmas Eve."
Sans smiled, pulling a blanket from the void to cover her. "*is it like earth?"
She nodded. "Yeah."
They came upon a clearing and Sans hid Frisk behind a conveniently shaped snow drift just as Papyrus in his blue and gold police uniform came into the clearing.
"*sup, bro?"
"YOU KNOW WHAT 'SUP,' BROTHER! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE GUARDING THE HUMAN TODAY! INSTEAD I FIND YOU STARING AT A SNOW DRIFT!"
"*it's really cool. do you wanna look?"
"NO! I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THAT!" Papyrus stamped his foot. "WHAT IF THE HUMAN ESCAPES THE LAB? IT'S BAD ENOUGH THAT I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, HUMAN LEGEND EXPERT! HAVE NOT EVEN HAD A CHANCE TO SEE THE HUMAN!" He pointed at his brother. "AND YOU STAND THERE, LOLLYGAGGING AROUND, SHIRKING THE GREATEST PRIVILEGE THAT HIS MAJESTY COULD BESTOW?! OUTRAGEOUS!"
Frisk's laughter flowed over the snow and Papyrus' righteous indignation faltered. His arm fell to his side and he stepped carefully to look around the snowdrift.
"IS THIS THE HUMAN?"
"*i think it's a rock."
"I am not a rock!" Frisk attempted to throw a snowball only to have it fall flat before it could hit Sans. Her shoulders fell, but her smile only grew.
"NO, NO, NO. THAT'S NOT HOW YOU DO IT!" Papyrus grabbed a huge handful of snow and shoved it in Sans' face. "THAT IS HOW YOU HANDLE MY BROTHER! NYEH HEH HEH HEH!"
Frisk let out a howl of laughter before holding out her hand. "I'm Frisk."
Papyrus took her hand very gently in his gloved phalanges. "A PLEASURE TO MEET YOU, HUMAN FRISK!"
"And you, Papyrus!"
"And while we're on the topic of pleasure, your little joy ride caused quite a stir through the Niven Corridor, Sans." Asriel stood there with his arms crossed over his chest.
Alphys hopped nervously behind him, glancing between Asriel and Sans rapidly.
Asriel sighed, arms dropping as he walked to the wheelchair. "Thankfully, no one thinks you were carting Frisk around." He knelt to tuck the blanket around her a little more tightly. "I know how hard it is to be cooped up in one place for too long." He looked at Sans. "The next time you feel like a field trip, notify me of where you're going first." He stood and headed back toward Alphys. "Also let Alphys know so she doesn't turn into a nervous wreck wondering where you've gone." He went back down the path to the corridor.
Alphys jaw dropped. "Did he just let you off with a warning? I thought you were dust!"
Sans shrugged. "*that went well." He winked at Frisk with his left eye. "*don't sweat it, kid. i'll keep an eye socket on you."
"I'm older than you."
Sans' smile grew. "*only technically. ready to see the rest of the biome?"
Frisk nodded and snuggled down in the blanket.
"*i bet you're hungry by now. how about a bite? my favorite place is just around the corner and i know a short cut." He pushed the wheel chair forward and disappeared with Frisk.
Papyrus' shoulders sank, head drooping. "I HATE IT WHEN HE DOES THAT! AND I HAD SO MANY QUESTIONS!"
Alphys patted his arm. "Just come by the Lab." She looked in the direction of the corridor.
Papyrus followed her gaze. "I AM A BIT OFF PUT BY HOW..." He struggled for a word. "LENIENT HIS MAJESTY WAS."
Alphys nodded and ran down the path, quickly heading after her sovereign. "Your Highness!"
Asriel stopped in the corridor and looked to her.
She bounced nervously. "I'm sorry to have bothered you with this."
"It's no trouble, Dr. Alphys. It was only a matter of time until Frisk wanted to see the ship. Status on her therapy, please."
"Oh! Uh... Frisk has been progressing well. She tires out quickly though."
"Her HP is still very low. You have permission to give her food that will raise it."
Alphys jaw dropped. "But her LOVE..."
"Is not as high as mine. Make sure Sans takes Frisk through the rest of the original biomes. Once she's done that, I'll come by to talk to her about her past."
Alphys nodded.
