ENTRY NUMBER 07:

* Sans always finds an excuse to leave or change the subject whenever I bring up his brother.
* Maybe it's best to follow that example, and fully devote myself to helping the Underground instead of dwelling on the past.
* I tried to do that, but I can't stop thinking about them, and I'm not always sure that I want to.
* Undyne, Mettaton, Asgore...
* This was supposed to get easier over time, and it isn't.


Alphys nudged her. "It's kind of overwhelming, isn't it?"

Undyne started to protest. She would never be scared of something as dumb as not having a cavern roof over her head, and if she was then she wouldn't admit to it. But Alphys had a sheepish look on her face that made Undyne hold back just long enough to let her finish: "N-not that I'm not, not, y-you know..!"

And that did make a difference, because it wasn't so embarrassing for a total nerd like Alphys to be nervous. "Yeah, I getcha," she said. Undyne slid an arm around Alphys' shoulders for a reassuring squeeze, which was something she'd done about a million times in the past (because hugs were like badass friendly wrestling matches minus the suplexes and eye-gouging, usually) except that now she knew why Alphys always blushed. Because they were... basically maybe girlfriends now, right? There'd been some downtime after the Barrier broke and Frisk backtracked through the Underground to re-pet all the dogs, but it felt weird to discuss mushy romantic feelings with everybody right there. Alphys never said they WEREN'T officially a couple now, though, and they did almost kiss.

But they could do that later, right? 'Cause Alphys was definitely into it, and after freakin MONTHS of trying to not even bring up the possibility... wait, what were they even talking about? "...But, hey, Frisk's a wimpy dork and they've dealt with it their whole life! ...Yeah, that's right, punk!" she added, flashing the kid a grin when they heard their name and perked up.

Frisk blinked at her, poker-faced as ever. They'd stayed by Toriel's side almost from the the moment everybody left the Underground, clinging to her furry paw like it was the most natural thing in the world, and Undyne definitely heard the word 'Mom' leave their mouth at least once. As much as she wanted to dislike Toriel for what she did to the king, the sight of the human kiddo and old goat lady together was kind of adorable. It almost made you forget they'd only met, what, two days ago..?

Misreading the look on her face, Alphys poked her between the gills and whispered, "Be nice!"

"I didn't do anything!"

"You were thinking it. I can tell."

"Pssht. Yeah, whatever you say, thought-police." Undyne bumped Alphys with her hip and making her giggle, which was maybe objectively the cutest sound in the universe, so she bumped her again and almost sent her flying by accident.

By the time Alphys had her feet back on the ground, Toriel and Frisk were already some distance ahead. Undyne waited until she was totally sure they were too far away to hear. "...What'll happen once we get where we're going, anyway? Frisk is happy and Toriel's just going along with it, butthey've gotta have actual parents. And human friends, too... somebody who's noticed they've been missing."

"Maybe they really don't have anyone? I've never heard Frisk mention their , ummm, it's not like I thought to ask."

"Me either. But I WAS a little busy trying to kill them."

Alphys hid a smirk behind her hand. "Now that you mentioned it... what happened back in Waterfall? I didn't get to see you fight, but I would've thought... I mean, Frisk's a human, but still..?"

Undyne groaned. "Let's just leave it at 'I lost' and move on."

"But what happened? What did they do? When I first met them, they looked pretty rough. Did they just run after you attacked?"

Undyne would've found some way to change the subject right then, thankyouverymuch, but another monster interrupted: "yeah, that's pretty much what happened."

She glared at Sans as he passed by, or rather, as Papyrus passed by, since he was the one carrying his brother. "Hey! All YOU did was sit at your station and sleep!"

"i figured you could handle the situation solo. didn't wanna get in your way." Sans gave her a smarmy look. How a guy with a face made out of solid bone could make any kind of face, well... ask Papyrus. But that wasn't the point!

"I WOULD HAVE if you'd... if they... ngah! Let's see how you handle THIS!" Undyne made a grab for Sans.

"BUT, UNDYNE! AREN'T YOU HAPPY THAT NEITHER OF YOU MANAGED TO CAPTURE FRISK? HAD YOU SUCCEEDED, THEN... UH... YOU WOULD HAVE BROUGHT THEM TO ASGORE—" Papyrus swung his brother out of Undyne's reach with a balletic spin on one heel, so that her claws just grazed his scarf. Sans peered over his shoulder like a horrible greasy gargoyle in a hoodie. "—SO NOTHING ABOUT THIS SITUATION WOULD BE ANY DIFFERENT, EXCEPT THEN WE WOULDN'T HAVE GOTTA TO BEFRIEND THEM AS WE DID. IN WHICH CASE IT WOULDN'T BE LIKE THIS SITUATION AT ALL! SO I'M NOT SURE WHY YOU'RE ANGRY NOW?"

"'Cause I forgot before and he's still got it coming! Now get back here!"

Papyrus darted ahead. Alphys yelped as Undyne scooped her up before bolting after him. "HEY, PAPYRUS! HAND OVER YOUR BROTHER AND I'LL LET YOU INTO THE ROYAL GUARD!"

ISN'T THE ROYAL GUARD BEING DISBANDED?"

"IT'S A REALLY, REALLY, REALLY LIMITED-TIME OFFER!"

"I'M FEELING A TINY BIT COERCED HERE!"

"NGAAAHHHH!"

Tall grasses smacked and rattled at the sides of Undyne's rain boots, and she cleared the remaining distance between the mountain's base and the surrounding pine forest in no time at all. Before she could go for a tackle, though, Asgore stepped out and snagged Papyrus' arm, stopping him from going any farther, and raised a hand to gesture for Undyne to follow suit. He must've been waiting there for a little while now, in the name of keeping a respectful distance from his ex and her(?) newly-adopted(?) human.

Sans was, somehow, napping, right there on his brother's back.

"Nothing makes me happier than to see your excitement to be on the surface, but now may not be the best time for roughhousing, don't you think?" Asgore said. "After all, this will be the first encounter between humankind—present company excluded—and monsters in many, many years..."

"Oh, yeah... hff... right. The humans."

Alphys wobbled and giggled breathlessly, grabbing onto Undyne's shirt for support after she set her back down. Her glasses listed dangerously off to one side, but didn't fall off. "Eheheh... oh my god, could you imagine? S-some human walking around... and this skeleton just runs into them?"

"THEY WOULD BE OVERWHELMED WITH GRATITUDE! THE OPPORTUNITY TO PAT A SKELETON ON THE SKULL... IT'S GOOD LUCK!

"i've never heard of that one, bro."

"IT'S TRUE! WHO WOULDN'T BE OVERJOYED BY THE GOOD FORTUNE OF ENCOUNTERING A FINE SPECIMEN OF SKELE-DOM SUCH AS MYSELF?"

"Yeah, they'd be overwhelmed with SOMETHING, all right." Undyne pulled out her hair elastic and scraped the escaped wisps up from the back of her neck. Asgore's words, though gentle, were completely right. Frisk's presence alone would go a long way in proving that monsters were friendly, but for all Undyne knew, they were about to meet the direct descendants of the humans who'd imprisoned monsterkind in the first place.

...Hmm.

Undyne snapped the hairband back into place and ran her fingers over her new ponytail. If not for the little punk, she'd have some VERY different feelings about this little reconnaissance mission. Alphys and the skeleton brothers wouldn't be tagging along, for starters. No way.

Toriel and the human caught up eventually. The goat-woman faced the air in the general vicinity of Asgore's face. "We should not delay if we intend to reach human civilization while it is light." Like he was supposed to just pull some more humans out of his pockets or something.

For such a big monster, Asgore was pretty good at making himself look smaller. Since he clearly didn't want to say anything, Undyne went for it instead. "Hey, Frisk's the one that lives up here. Shouldn't THEY tell us where to go?"

Frisk's knowledge of the mountain's terrain was impressively bad, somehow even less than what Undyne would've expected from a kid who'd managed to fall down a hole in the ground, but it wasn't like getting directions was super necessary. They'd all seen the city in the distance while standing at Mt. Ebott's summit, so it was mostly going to be a matter of getting from point A to point B before the sun set. Frisk did mention seeing a house in the woods somewhere, with some kind of plaque in front of it, so that was also a possibility. Nothing they couldn't all have just stumbled upon by wandering around but hey, whatever, it would take way worse than that to wreck everybody's collective good mood.


"Are you still watching her?"

"yeah. she looks pissed."

"Okay, just make sure she doesn't hurt herself." The pointed tip of the yellow monster's tail quivered. "Ugh, I know there's caulk around here, I was using it before..!" On cue, she turned too fast and let her tail sweep out too far; there was a thump and the hollow crash as she smacked into a bucket full of supplies and knocked it all over. She hissed in exasperation.

(Alphys. That was her name. Alphys.)

"does she... do that?" the other one asked.

(Sans.)

"Ending up on the floor c-counts as hurting herself. Just, just trust me."

(Beeping monitors, tubes red like molten steel pouring into a mold. Someone was nearby, moving with the self-conscious awkwardness of trying not to awaken a sleeping monster. 'Sleepy' didn't describe how she felt right now, though. More like she was a bunch of chewed-up gum recently spit out and squished together in the shape of a person.

...What happened to that kid? There was a kid in danger, she remembered jumping in to protect them, but after that...)

"i dunno what to do if she freaks out again."

(Worthless. A smug smile and all that potential, wasted, just like always. It wasn't that he failed to understand the need for help. He didn't care.)

Alphys tried to set the bucket upright, but it was full of long-handled tools that made it topheavy. It tipped as soon as she pulled her hands away. The noise rattled through the semi-solid skull of the creature that wasn't anyone. "You have blue magic, Sans. P-plus there's the magic you did before."

"speaking of... that. how, uh, serious were you about the 'curse' thing?"

("Is something wrong?" "nah, kid's fine. if tori asks, we're just goin' out for a walk.")

The air against its face felt like a sunburn and the voices overlapped and overlapped until it wanted to smash its head against the glass to make it all stop, but it was in the center of the tank and swimming required moving which required coordination and even more sensory input.

"Kind of? It's what the Madjicks thought. Because we were in the RUINS, I suppose. We heard this... it sounded like a little kid, yelling all these things about... ahh, they mentioned you. And, um... Chara. And, killing people. That was when we found Cabbage, but we didn't see who was responsible. I thought they, or it, or w-whatever it was, that they stayed in the RUINS, but m-maybe it came here instead? I don't... really think it could be coincidental."

"wait, what happened to cabbage?"

"I told you, Sans. The messages should've gone through already, while you were upstairs..."

Sans pulled something from his pocket and looked at it.

(Alphys. Alphy. Sans did nothing but there used to exist a monster that trusted Alphys, trusted her with her life. Alphys would help. She'd fix all this.)

It had tried going back, when it was alone, but that didn't work. There was no back, those memories of a different creature's life, they weren't real they had never been real, the thing in the water had never been anything but a thing floating here, while Alphys and sometimes the flower came to taunt it with their own freedom. But then Sans and that little sparkling monster arrived, and the sparkling one was gone, had probably never been more than a trick of the eye, but Sans was real. The floating creature had never seen him before, but another monster did. She didn't know him all that well but she did know him, because he existed at the periphery of events and relationships that she did care about, or used to care about. If he was real then what else was real?

Nothing. Nothing at all. The memories overwhelmed, most of them weren't bad or painful by themselves but they didn't make sense, didn't connect in any way to the thing's existence beyond the two monsters in the room, and there were too many of them. A secret door was open and only now did it know why it had been locked.

("Mama?")

"welp. guess that was, uh. not a good call, on my part."

"No, but it... didn't turn out as badly as it could have. ...Yet. I'll h-have to th-think of something. God. Wh-why did you have to TELL them?"

(Could not show weakness. Alphys wouldn't help. There'd once been a monster who loved Alphys and had friends and had hope even when everything seemed bleak. She was dead now.)

"i didn't tell 'em anything. they got here first."

(Alphys still hadn't said where they were or why, but her eyes sparkled as she sat at the foot of the cot, feet tucked beneath her. Whatever was going on couldn't be that bad, then, even if this place was all dark and freaky-looking...)

"Still. You could've... well." A heavy sigh. "...M-maybe I should have expected this, a-all along." Alphys picked her way around the mess and dragged a cardboard box out from under the sink. "You shouldn't feel guilty for what happened to them, though. There wasn't any way to foresee it."

("D-DON'T WORRY, HUMANS! WE'RE ALL FRISK'S FRIENDS AND WOULD NEVER WISH HARM UPON THEM! ...ANYMORE!" "my bro's right. they've been underground for days... either they're fine, or they already have whatever you think we do. all's you're doing is freaking the poor kid out.")

"yeah, about... uh, about that..."

The creature sank, clawing with fingers which no longer existed at the place where its left eye no longer existed either. The two monsters ignored it, or rather, Alphys was busy rummaging through drawers while Sans did nothing but watch and grin at its pain. It pressed its hands to its face until they lost their shape.

His clothing gave the illusion of bulk, but underneath, Sans was was hardly bigger than (green scales?) ...a small monster. He could so easily be broken into pieces, reduced to splintered bone and a few scraps of cloth; imagining the sound warmed a hollow place inside the thing's ribcage, distracted it from its own distress. Sans caught a glimpse of its expression and shrank down into his hoodie like a turtle sensing danger. The jacket's collar hid the bottom half of his skull, and with that constant, obnoxious grin covered, his presence was still irritating, but tolerable. It would have destroyed him if it could, but it didn't care enough to hate him anymore. He never did anything, good or bad.

Alphys... she was the one it associated with needles and the pain that came with them, the burning, and the confinement within the tank, and the dark place outside of it. She wasn't as small as the skeleton, but worried-looking and soft, in robes too big for her. It saw her as if for the first time and did not visualize so much as feel its teeth sliding through

NO

Nothing physically hurt, not even its face, but it recoiled as if from a hot stove, before it could even feel whatever it had touched. That Alphys was the clearest source of its unhappiness didn't matter. Some shard of whoever had once existed pushed the thought away with visceral disgust. No. Not... her.

(Why were they still running away? HOW were they still running away?! Alphys said humans were crazy-durable, but..!)

Not her. Despite everything, it didn't even want to hurt her all that much. But it still couldn't get out, couldn't escape and although it had managed to do something when the desperation to return to a different monster's life was unbearable, nothing happened. Nothing. It was still here. It would always be here. That other monster didn't exist, she wasn't real, she was dead.

NO.

There was no point to trying to break the glass anymore, nowhere else to go, but wasn't looking for meaning or purpose, just something breakable that was neither out of reach not off-limits. It barely saw the two monsters outside, or rather the fragments of them, split into a dozen pieces each by the cracked glass; the pieces of Sans didn't move (WHY DIDN'T HE DO ANYTHING WHEN HE COULD HAVE) while the yellow and purple shards of Alphys fluttered all about. The creature she'd made started slamming its hands into the glass but at some point hands became a shoulder became magic, or what would be magic if wielding that power didn't require so much of its focus. The glass splintered and Alphys fumbled with something on the tank's side, silencing the constant gurgle-bubble of the water. In a calmer state, there was a chance that it might have recognized what she was doing and might have tried to act, either by getting farther away or even using the seemingly pointless something-power to go back to before whatever was being pumped into the water reached its gills. Instead it slammed into the glass and tried to scream until the world slid out from under it.

This time, mindlessness was almost a relief.


Was it wrong to be disappointed by her opponent?

Undyne wasn't dumb or crazy enough to, like, WANT to come closer to losing, but the demon that murdered her friends and troops, that abomination that forced her to claw her way back from DEATH ITSELF to right what was going wrong, that thing was dead, and all she felt was tired, and too hot, and sore. A long and dramatic fight wouldn't fix any of those things, or bring anybody back, but... it was kind of anticlimactic to spend more time talking to the human than fighting them, that was all. The thing was strong, all right, and it even surprised her by snagging an energy spear from the air right at the start, using it to try and deflect the rest, even if the strategy failed in the end. That part wasn't a big shock, though. Mind control, mind-reading... Alphys' history books were right. Too bad for this one that those powers didn't make them fast or strong enough to win. Heh.

Undyne slowly circled the dead human-that-wasn't-really-a-human. It lay facedown, bloodied, and with its eyes obscured it didn't look so much like a demon anymore. It didn't look evil at all—just human. A "they", not an "it". And small. Whatever was wrong with humans as a species, they loved their kids, and would grieve for ones that disappeared, wouldn't they?

The thought didn't make her feel any better, but she couldn't pity a creature with the dust of so many monster kids on their hands, no matter how small those hands might be. Maybe that was why this didn't feel right? Ugh. Undyne dragged a glove across her mouth and grimaced, tasting blood and grit, then reached out to nudge the dusty toy knife from the thing's hand with her spear.

Getting rid of the human's weapon was more symbolic than strategic, so when the hand twitched, she practically jumped out of her scales before slamming her spear down so hard that it went through the hand like hamburger meat. It was an embarrassingly panicky reaction for a captain of the royal guard, but pretty much what she would've done in a more rational frame of mind, so who EVEN gave a crap anymore.

The wood underneath the human's hand splintered alarmingly and their body convulsed. After everything, the human lived. Barely. Undyne herself was proof that death could be optional, but she wouldn't have believed any creature could have so much of their blood splattered on the floor and still be breathing, if she wasn't seeing it herself. ... Though she remembered, now, that Gerson mentioned that kind of thing in his stories of the war. Humans didn't turn to dust when they died, they just fell over and quit moving, like animals. Everyone knew THAT, but what they didn't realize, he said, was how easy it was to miss little things; shallow breathing, fingers moving, signs of life a human would intuitively know to look for, but a monster wouldn't.

Losing patience with trying to get her weapon un-stuck and seriously disturbed by the gurgling noises coming from the human, Undyne summoned a second energy spear and telekinetically drove it through their skull—

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Before the human could move to block her attack, they were impaled through the side with one spear and then another in their chest as they staggered—

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They swatted aside two spears at one and moved in to counter, only to be struck from behind—

[FILE LOADED]

The human swayed to avoid the barrage of energy spears aimed at them, and Undyne kind of couldn't believe they were fighting in ballet slippers, but they were good and she couldn't afford to get distracted by weird details. It was a relief (not that she really ever thought she'd lose) when they lost their balance and—

[FILE LOADED]

Damn. Humans really were tough. For a while there, she was seriously worried that—

[FILE LOADED]

This couldn't be happening, it wasn't happening, not like this. Undyne had been preparing herself for the possibility of dying long before this human fell, but the end was here and it was here too soon. By now Alphys would have made the call and told everyone to gather in the lab where, supposedly, there was some secret hiding place beyond the human's reach. That had to be true, because Alphys promised, but the lab itself stood at the very edge of Hotland, directly in the human's path. It wouldn't have been a problem if Undyne stalled long enough, but the fight had been too short. This couldn't possibly have been enough time for Asgore to intervene after absorbing the SOULs, there was no time at all, in two minutes Undyne would be dust and the human would reach all those defenseless monsters as they scrambled for shelter, the human wouldn't even have to track them down like the rest. Those monsters had trusted her, somehow her very SOUL had pulsed with all of their shared hope and determination, but she'd failed them and now they'd all die. Alphys would die...

Undyne mentally screamed at herself to GET UP GET UP, YOU HAVE TO GET UP, but she was already starting to break apart. Even a heroine could only push herself so far beyond her limits before her body decided it was just done with this crap, even if she herself wasn't, and Undyne was no heroine anyway. The human trudged closer, the weird grace of their fighting all drained away, but there was nothing left to do except wait for them to end this. She couldn't even yell or swear at the shambling thing as they stood over her. Was Alphys watching? ...Please, let her not be watching this. Let her escape, use this time to escape, run, hide...

No final attack ever came. Undyne began to wonder if they were dragging this out on purpose, a suspicion that seemed to be right on the money when the human crouched down on all fours to peer directly into her face. She glared back, and would've spit at them if her mouth didn't feel like she'd been gargling sand. And yet, somehow, she also got the feeling that they wouldn't even notice if she did it . From beneath their mop of brown hair, their eyes were just... nothing, there was nothing in them. No compassion, mercy—as if she'd EVER want it—or even that festering hatred from when they'd tried to strike down that little monster kid.

Did they want to say something? If they were getting some sadistic pleasure from watching her die, they were being awfully restrained with the gloating. Or was it guilty, some itty bitty twinge of remorse in the depths of their rotten SOUL? Great timing, there. Great... fucking timing. Would've been nice if they decided that murder was icky a little earlier. ...Though if the human really did regret their actions, maybe from now on, they'd... ...no. It was a pathetic thing to hope for, and it wasn't gonna happen. Alphys, her friends, everyone, they deserved better than that... she couldn't let this happen.

Okay. So physical movement was out of the question, but the human's creepy inexplicable behavior gave her enough time to think of something else, the only other thing she could do. Undyne mustered a last gasp of magic, funneling the power remaining in her SOUL—there had to be something left, if there was nothing then she would've turned to dust by now—and pushing it at the human, the thing wearing a human's skin.

Two things happened: first, her body melted and her SOUL didn't just break, it vaporized. That was okay. It was what "should" have happened awhile ago, anyway. (Hey, look what monsters could do when they believed in themselves!) Secondly, and more importantly, there was a flash of blue light as magic energy splashed into the human's eyes. The attack was pitifully weak in terms of damage, less than what little guppy-Undyne could do before Asgore's training; if the human hadn't moronically put themselves in a position like this, it might've done nothing but momentarily annoy them. But at that same moment, as if sensing her intentions, the human was already sitting up and pulling the knife back. Off-guard, and already moving in the direction she wanted, all they had to do was jolt a little, and that was enough to tip them too far back. They jolted, their arms flailed out too late to catch anything, and they fell.

...Heh. Heh. Heh.

With more time, she would have thought a silent apology to everyone, but she turned to soggy dust as the human's body hit the ground with a crunch

[FILE LOADED]

They barely tried to block anything, throwing themselves at Undyne with a fury that would terrify any other monster. But she wasn't afraid of ANYTHING and they were careless, an easy target, easy to strike down

[FILE LOADED]

The red SOUL shattered—

[FILE LOADED]

The red SOUL shattered—

[FILE LOADED]

The red SOUL shattered...


The cracks weren't exactly gone, but Alphys had filled them in with some pliant material that the tank-creature couldn't pick apart. Its hands just squished into the glass when it tried.

Escape didn't appeal so much with Sans out of sight, anyway. It could bring him and Alphys back with the power it had discovered, but nothing worthwhile happened. The glass splintered and Alphys drugged the creature behind it, then left. The sensation of losing consciousness wasn't pleasant and the dreams weren't any better, so it gave up.

It swam in circles, and slept more, and wet back to swimming, then forgot why it decided to leave the glass alone and hit is some more. It kept doing that even after remembering, for a while, just because it felt good.

(Toriel spread Asgore's cape out on the grass like a blanket, but Frisk insisted they weren't tired, and in the time Toriel spent trying to entice them into it, Sans claimed the spot and sprawled out for a nap. They leaned against him as they picked at the leaf of a dandelion poking up from beneath the cape's edge, fingers methodically moving until their names turned green. Alphys clutched her phone, its screen reflecting on the lenses of her glasses while Papyrus spoke—mostly with his hands—about puzzles, or something.

In the clearing on the opposite side of the path, the window of the research station or whatever-it-was glowed yellow in the dusk. The human hadn't so much stuck their head out the door to see if the coast was clear, in all the time the group had been waiting. Undyne knew, because she'd been watching both them and the road this whole time. It was too far to see, but she imagined them ducking beneath the window, still quaking in terror at the human kid that appeared on their doorstep. Plus a bunch of monsters, too, but...)

Alphys and Sans came back. They didn't go through the doorway but popped out of nowhere, like the flower. Sans took up his old spot while Alphys bustled about, doing the same things she usually did; she acted very interested in the little boxes mounted on the side of the tank, monitors of some kind, and she offered food didn't want, and she climbed up to check the tank's filter, and tried to talk to the thing inside.

Her presence was, somehow, even more uncomfortable and confusing than usual. It stayed away, moving to the bottom of the tank where her face blurred out entirely, and pretended she wasn't there.

("I never told you before... f-for a lot of reasons, but there's, this, ahh..." "You don't have to tell me, Alphy. Actually, it's better that you don't. As long as I don't know where it is, the human can't read my mind to find it out!" "Um... y-y-yeah! That's. That's true. G-good point.")

Alphys and Sans vanished, eventually, but they came back later. Alphys poked at the boxes and checked the filter and watched the creature in the water, fingers locked together. Sans did nothing, he just stood there. Then they'd leave and come back and leave and come back, no need for any special power to make it so.

The only difference from the old routine, aside from Sans' presence and the way he and Alphys just appeared and disappeared, was that it didn't see the flower anymore.


Alphys was writing something; Sans rested his elbows on the topmost rung of the ladder, perched uncomfortably close to the tank-creature. It could have submerged to put more distance between them, but then it wouldn't be able to hear. The semblances of interactions it shared with Alphys and Sans weren't enjoyable, but neither was swimming in circles or banging its head against the glass.

"alph."

From below: "Yeah?"

"y'know, she's... there may be no way to say this without sending the wrong message, but..."

"...She hates me." There was a brittle quality to her voice that didn't like. Wished she would stop. "And you think this is a bad idea. ...I don't like it either, Sans. So if you can think of an alternative, some other way to help her, t-tell me."

("Th-they're... I think they're scared we'll make all of them sick!" "What?!" "That's what th-those masks are for, that's why they don't want Frisk near them..!")

Alphys examined the sealed-up cracks in the glass, touching them with her fingers.

"...howsabout waterfall?" Sans asked. "it won't fix anything, per se, but she wouldn't be stuck down here. her and lemon bread can hang out."

(The dog monster—dog monsters?—leaned into Undyne, its full weight enough to snap a lesser monster in half, which meant she had to readjust her stance to maintain her balance. Not that she wasn't strong enough to pick it right up if she wanted, but it made Greater Dog look like a runt and STILL was way heavier than it looked. "Wait, run this by me again."

"They're... still all the same monsters, fundamentally. Just, their SOULS are all... mushed together. ...M-maybe Endogeny isn't the best example."

Undyne scratched somewhere around where Endogeny's chin would be on a typical dog, brow furrowed as she processed this. The dog(s?) vibrated with what Alphys told her was happiness. "'Cause of this 'Determination' stuff. Okay. So, they're not really new monsters? Just the same people, but they... look like this, now?"

"It's hard to say... but, maybe both? You can see it when they use magic... they still can do some things they always could, but a lot of times, it's... weird. I guess you would have to ask one to be sure. About the, um. The philosophical... stuff. Maybe Shyren's sister?")

Its head hurt. It ducked beneath the water to give its skin a short reprieve from the air, which also helped its head a little. By the time it came back up, it lost track of whatever the monsters were saying, and absorbed even less than it usually did. Words flowed past like a school of tiny fish; reach for any of them, and they all scatter.

"not even the issue, really. Moving her out of here would be t-too dangerous."

"what does she think?"

Alphys didn't look at him. "...Ask her, not me. It's rude to t-talk about someone that's listening, you know."

"can she even... ...uh, forget it. hey, undyne?"

It ignored him.

ignored them.

("beep boop," Sans mumbled over his brother's shoulder, awake after all. "we come in peace. take us to your leader."

Alphys giggled and Undyne had to squash a hand over her mouth to keep from busting out laughing just because of Alphys plus the look on Toriel's face. Poor human, this really was turning into a shitshow. Nice job, Toriel. But hey, as long as they had Frisk here...)

The ladder creaked. The tank-creature let Sans wait and wait for an answer without getting one. It was a good feeling.

"welp, whatever. that's all i got."

"It wasn't a bad suggestion, or anything. Just... I don't w-want you to think I'm being lazy, or something."

"i wouldn't say that. even if i would, well... pot, kettle, et cetera. you ready to split?"

Alphys must've made some sign, because the skeleton slithered down from the ladder and rejoined her. The creature pretended neither were there, and by the time it looked away from the wall, they really weren't, and it was alone with its own mangled thoughts.

It swam in circles. It slept. It stopped moving (the house with the tree in front, was it still there?) or doing anything at all.


Dusty water made its gills itch. Dust fell away from its skin as it swam. Alphys and Sans came and went and came and went and it felt itself crumbling even when it didn't move. The dust was everywhere, and the few distractions had at its disposal were just as bad. What began as a slight discomfort became maddening.

The water was cool. The water scalded. It felt its body being seared from the inside out, constantly disintegrating but somehow never losing mass, and staying submerged didn't help anymore. Maintaining a roughly solid shape took too much effort for it to sleep, and even then, it hurt to move and hurt to stay still. Soon, maybe it would fall apart despite that effort, and its slimy dust would cover the floor of the tank until the filter swept it away.

It noticed the arrival of Alphys and Sans only because they provided a slight distraction. Trying to communicate with them went nowhere.

(Stupid dogs. Yeah, not all of them had the best sense, but Dogamy or Dogaressa should've had the sense to retreat and try to call in reinforcements, namely, Undyne. They were supposed to be smarter than that. They should've... she didn't even know what. How could she be mad, when she would've gone straight for the human, too?)

"alph. alphys. look at her."

"Yeah... I know."

Sans leaned close to the glass, the shiny spots in his big, dark eyes reflecting back against his skull. His teeth gleamed, the corners of his mouth curled up in a crescent-shape. "is there something i'm missing here? 'cause that's a lot."

"It's not as much as it looks. I'll need to use more Determination soon, but she'll be okay a little longer."

Water gurgled in its ears as it tried to find a balance between listening and not-hurting. It tried until its ear fin melted shut, then gave up and settled for watching the monsters talk or argue or whatever they were doing. Sluggishly, the ear healed enough to work again. Bubblebubblebubble.

(Without eyeballs, Papyrus could stare straight into the sun for as long as he liked, whereas Undyne was pretty much blind until her eye started to adjust and she didn't have to walked around with it covered like a dumbass. The Underground had all kinds of artificial lights, and she'd seen sunlight through the Barrier when she visited Asgore's garden, but that was nothing compared to this. ...Heh heh, maybe that was why Frisk always made that face? )

The deterioration would progress until Alphys decided to do something. That was what she'd done in the past, and while she spoke too fast for the creature to follow even if it tried, there was no reason to expect anything different. Sleep, and a syringe, its contents red, glowing the color of a demon's eyes. Afterward it would wake up and still be in the water and there would be nothing but what its existence was already. No escape. Then a glowing syringe.

It could go back to avoid what was coming, but not far enough to matter. The other monster's life was visible but untouchable, behind a kind of glass that did not break.

Somebody knocked on the side of the tank, The vibration traveled straight through to the creature's head, reducing its sight to a mess of starbursts and wobbly dark waves. The world cleared and Alphys was gone, but Sans remained, his fingertips resting on the glass. Either she'd left him behind or he came back without her.

He stood there as he had when he first appeared, when the little white monster by his shoulder. His mouth didn't move, it never did, so the creature couldn't tell if he was trying to speak to it or just watching it, the way Alphys did. It could have stuck its head out of the water to hear, but if he wasn't doing anything then it didn't care what he said. His hands moved, fluttered through gestures that were in some way like words, with meanings it still didn't understand. He smiled. He was free to do whatever he liked and go wherever he liked. That was why he always looked happy.

Sans dropped his hands, let them awkwardly hang. He'd done nothing, he always did nothing. A different monster knew him, once, but he was useless even back then. Why did its past self tolerate him for so long?

(That wasn't right. She was gone. She'd never been here at all. She'd always been here. Both possibilities couldn't be true at the same time, could they?)

The creature that wasn't anyone, but maybe used to be someone, felt the edges of its own hands softening, wavering. Sans turned away, and the world twisted, wringing itself until the light dripped out. When the creature blinked and could see again, it was alone. Sans was wherever he Alphys and the flower went to after leaving this one. The creature never saw them during its short-lived attempt at escape. Wherever they went, it was far away from here.

It stared at the spot where Sans had been, long after he left.

(Alphys licked at the blue dribbles of Nice Cream running down to her wrist. "...Also, don't say 'justice'."

"Why not? That's the perfect answer!"

"It's too abstract! What I mean is, you know... what would YOU wish for, just, if it was for you, individually?"

Undyne flicked the leftover Unisicle stick between her fingers, then chomped down, splintering the thing in two. This was the kind of question you asked at a slumber party as a kid, right after the classic 'if you could have any kind of magic, what would it be?', but it didn't feel so dumb in the wishing room. Blue gemstones twinkled with an inner light. She left the half-stick in her mouth like a cigarette, minus the smoke and whatever gross stuff went into those things.

"Ehh, I dunno," Undyne lied. Pretty much everything she wished for in the future either qualified as 'too abstract', she suspected, or was the kind of thing she couldn't ever admit to Alphys. Not until the barrier broke, and there was no more reason to worry about the bad kind of 'what ifs'. "...Getting outta this dump?")