So... this chapter got done hours ago and I'm just dumb and forgot to post it until now. But you can read it because the-lovely-dobostorte reminded me.

And if any GUH fans are reading this, YES, we are still writing it. Em and I have both... started our sections. It's progress. Please be patient, there will be another chapter.

To Undertale fans, be sure to follow the-lovely-dobstorte and me (undyrus-forever) on tumblr if you like the stories!


Chapter Four


Papyrus had decided that hospitals were places where eternity often visited. This was the second span in the past 24 hours where the wait for something to happen or change seemed to last that long. Within the half hour that dragged its feet, Papyrus could barely feel his own; he'd been pacing as though Undyne's life depended on it.

Sans approached him, putting a hand on his forearm. "hangin' in there, bro?"

Papyrus stopped pacing and started staring at the floor. "I DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH MORE OF THIS I CAN TAKE."

"well, alphys said it shouldn't be too much longer before we hear something."

"BUT WHAT IF THAT'S NOT THE CASE? HOW MUCH LONGER WILL THESE PROBLEMS PERSIST?"

A few moments later, one of the doctors-the very same one who'd told him to stay out of room 915-approached him. "We got her back and she's stable once more. You can see her now if you'd like." He gave the skeleton a friendly pat on the arm and walked past him.

He didn't need to be told twice. Papyrus bolted for Undyne's room, only slowing down once he walked through the doorway. Undyne looked worse for wear, paler than she was before, but at least she was alive. A nurse still remained, working with some tubing and writing things down on a clipboard.

"You're her husband, correct?" the nurse asked him.

"YES, UNDYNE IS MY WIFE AND SHE MEANS EVERYTHING TO ME SO PLEASE… JUST TELL ME WHAT'S WRONG."

The nurse filled out a few more boxes on her form. "She went into cardiac arrest about 30 minutes ago, but was revived fairly quickly, after about a minute. The team worked to get her stabilized and to get her determination levels back down; those levels spiked around the time her heart stopped, but are practically nonexistent now."

"IS SHE GOING TO DIE?"

"At this point, it's uncertain, but she's showing promise of recovery." She wrote down a few more things and smiled at Papyrus. "She's really something else. Compared to what I've seen with other monsters who've gone code blue… they only lasted a few seconds beyond that. In her case, I'm pretty sure it's the determination that kept her from disintegrating."

Papyrus looked at her, still a little confused. "WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?"

"To me, it looks like she just wasn't ready to die."

The nurse remained in the room to keep watch over Undyne for a few more hours, then left. She told Papyrus that he could sleep in the other bed in the room if he wanted to stay with her instead of heading home, but he just took that as an invitation to remain there forever, or at least until Undyne recovered. Goodness knows he wasn't planning on sleeping.

At one point he heard someone calling him from the doorway. There stood Sans, waving him over to talk.

"tori and i are gonna head home for the night, seeing as it's already morning" said the smaller skeleton. "how's she doing?"

"SHE'S STABLE. I DON'T KNOW IF THAT'LL LAST THOUGH. NO ONE DOES."

Sans shook his head. "well, they've done this how many times now, three? they've got it down to a science by now.

"THREE?" Papyrus' eyes bugged. "THREE TIMES? WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY'VE DONE THIS THREE TIMES?"

"ohh boy…" he rubbed the back of his head. "i, uh, spoke with the surgeon after you ran off to tell everyone undyne was all right. she'd already come out of surgery and seemed stable so I didn't think you needed to-"

"OF COURSE YOU DIDN'T." Papyrus felt a flicker of anger igniting somewhere in his ribcage. "WHY TELL ME ANYTHING ABOUT THE STATUS OF MY WIFE?"

An orderly walked down the hallway heard the commotion rising and promptly shushed Papyrus. Slightly embarrassed, the taller skeleton motioned for his brother to follow him down the hallway, back to the lounge where he had met with the others prior to the code blue.

"LIKE I WAS SAYING, WHY WOULD YOU KEEP THIS FROM ME, SANS? GIVE ME ONE GOOD REASON!"

"well, gimme a minute and i'll-"

"YOU'LL WHAT, SANS? LIE TO ME AGAIN?" Papyrus seethed. "JUST LIKE ALWAYS?"

Sans clenched his fists. "fine. you want the whole truth? unfiltered? raw? i'll give you the truth, then. undyne had to be revived twice on the operating table. then again, that's not surprising when the bullet or whatever the hell this psycho freak used messed up her heart, left lung, and shoulder, in addition to all the cracked and broken ribs. and then when you throw in this whole dangerous determination crap, well, things just get even trickier. so to answer the big question on your mind: is undyne gonna die? i dunno. at this point, probably. is that what you want to hear, papyrus?"

Papyrus didn't answer; he just stood there, trembling, filled with a raging storm of multiple emotions.

"anything else you want to know, papyrus? where babies come from? it's not the stork. hopefully you and undyne have been careful with your soul sharing because that could come back to bite you." Sans threw down his empty beverage cup and stormed off without another word.

It took him a few moments, but Papyrus finally found the motion in his feet and headed back to room 915. He stood at Undyne's bedside, watching as she breathed peacefully.

"...I NEVER REALIZED IT WAS SO BAD, UNDYNE." He sat down next to her and took her hand in his. "BUT I'M HERE. FROM NOW ON. I'M NOT LEAVING YOUR SIDE."

Papyrus didn't sleep through the remainder of the night; he'd been holding on to her hand the entire time, watching for any sign of change. It hadn't been completely without communication, though, as doctors or nurses would come in from time to time to keep tabs on her.

"You need sleep," said one nurse at 5 am as she finished checking up on Undyne's blood pressure.

"AH," said Papyrus. "I DO APPRECIATE YOUR CONCERN BUT I'M FINE."

"Well, if you insist," she said, jotting a few things down. "I've noticed a remarkable improvement in her vital signs; chances are good that she should wake up soon. Just try not to let her get too excited about anything. Her heart's not as strong as it was and she's likely to tire more easily from lower energy activities." She headed out of the room.

Papyrus turned to look at his wife sleeping peacefully on the bed. She looked so… comfortable. Surely he could rest his eye sockets for a moment. He put his head down next to hers on the pillow.

"...You talk in your sleep."

Papyrus opened his eye sockets to the blazing sunlight through the curtains. Had he actually fallen asleep? That was unusual. More unusual still was that he had no recollection of dreaming anything. And, to his horror, it was now 1 in the afternoon. He'd never slept late before. Never.

"What was that about the popsicle? You sounded really invested."

He gazed into Undyne's now-open eye as she gently stroked his head with her good arm.

"UNDYNE, YOU'RE… YOU'RE… ALIVE!" Papyrus' head popped off the pillow and he stared into his wife's face.

"Just barely… oww…" She grimaced. "I need more drugs." She picked up a nearby remote button and buzzed for a nurse.

"DOES IT HURT?"

"Yeah."

"...DO YOU NEED A MASSAGE?"

She chuckled a little. "I don't think that's gonna help in this case… Apparently I'm a little too fragile for that right now." When the nurse came in, Undyne asked her for more painkillers, which she adjusted for her.

"WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER?"

Undyne frowned. "Mmm... uh, I remember walking back to my car, some excruciating pain, uh... waking up with some people telling me I just came out of surgery... and not much else."

"GOOD. I MEAN… GOOD YOU DON'T REMEMBER ANYTHING." Papyrus seemed ill at ease.

"Sounds like some serious stuff happened. What'd I miss?"

At that moment, his skeletal eye sockets let loose with a considerable stream of tears.

Undyne's eye nearly bugged out. "Hey, hey, whoa, sorry, Papyrus... If you don't wanna talk about it, I'll just ask Alphys about it later, okay?"

"NO I... IT'S JUST... IT'S BEEN A REALLY STRESSFUL 24 HOURS." He tried wiping away his tears, but they just kept flowing.

"That stressful, huh? We might have to take another trip after this whole issue gets resolved."

Papyrus smiled, eyes still watery, but his smile faded a bit. "YOU FLATLINED, UNDYNE. THREE TIMES."

The fish woman sat in silence for a moment, taking in the new information. But the more she thought about it, the more she had the look of someone who'd sparred with death and come out victorious. "...THREE times?"

"PLEASE DON'T GET EXCITED," he said, motioning for her to settle down as there had been a notable increase in the number of beeps coming from the heart monitor.

She shook her head. "Sorry, sorry… but three times? No wonder you're so wound up."

The skeleton started shaking a bit. "I SAW IT. YOUR BODY WAS WAVERING. ANY SECOND, IT COULD HAVE…" He shook his head, abandoning the sentence for good.

The room was mostly silent for a few moments, until Undyne asked "...I'm okay now, right?"

"NO. BUT YOU WILL BE. WE KNOW THAT NOW."

"Why are you crying then?"

He gulped. "I K-KEEP IMAGINING WHAT W-WOULD HAVE HAPPENED. AFTER TWO W-WEEKS OF MARRIAGE, LOSING YOU…"

"Ohh, Papyrus…" She reached out to him with her good arm, waiting for him to lean into it. Gently, she pulled him close and gave him a warm kiss on the forehead. "Did they get the son of a… a turkey who put me here?"

Papyrus chuckled at her choice of words. He knew she favored these in particular when she was irritated but didn't want to swear around him. But the giggling didn't last. "NO. NOT YET. HE'S STILL ON THE RUN."

"Not for long." Undyne seethed.

"I WISH I COULD CATCH HIM FOR YOU." Papyrus said sincerely. "THEN I COULD… SMACK HIM WITH A BONE MAYBE."

Undyne chuckled lightly. She appreciated his sincerity, though. "Why Papyrus, how gallant."

"ANYTHING FOR YOU, MILADY," he said with a wink.

There was a moment of silence before the two of them burst out laughing. Well, Undyne laughed as carefully as she could with new stitches, but for some reason, she'd found the moment just as oddly amusing as he had.

Once the laughter had died down, he turned to face her. "I LOVE YOU, UNDYNE."

Undyne grabbed his and and rubbed the top with her thumb. "I love you too, Papyrus."

"OF COURSE YOU…" He paused. "ACTUALLY NO. HONESTLY? SOMETIMES I CAN'T IMAGINE WHY."

She frowned. "Whaaat? Why?"

"I CAN'T PROTECT YOU FROM ALL THIS, UNDYNE. YOU SAVED MY LIFE. AND I... I CAN'T EVER REPAY THAT. AND I ALWAYS REPAY MY DEBTS."

A scoff escaped her lips. "Papyrus, who even said there was a debt to begin with? I'd be a pretty bad person to expect something from everyone I've saved... especially the one I love most."

Papyrus looked perplexed. "YEAH, BUT YOU AND EVERYONE WENT ON THAT CRAZY SCAVENGER HUNT"

"You think we wouldn't do that for anyone else? Would you have done it if it was me?"

"OF COURSE, UNDYNE! I COULD NEVER LEAVE YOU ALONE WITH A PSYCHO LIKE THAT. I WOULD GO FAR AND WIDE TO-"

"Then you get why I did it." Undyne rested her arm across her stomach as though she was folding her arms. She let a few moments of quiet pass before asking "Do we need to keep talking about our feelings or…"

"OH NO, I CAN TALK ABOUT ANYTHING!" Papyrus tried to smile.

She nodded a bit, but frowned shortly afterwards. "...Why do I have the strangest urge to talk about cake?"

Her husband couldn't hold back; he found it so random of Undyne to say something like that that he started laughing.

"There's a genuine smile. Finally. I like to see my hubby happy."

"WELL I LIKE MAKING MY WIFEY HAPPY." Papyrus winked at her.

"Where's Sans? Let's gross him out by being way too aggressively adorable." Undyne looked around as if expecting to see Sans popping out of the closet and casually saying, "surprise."

"AHH… ABOUT THAT…"

Bashfully, Papyrus explained what had happened between him and Sans the previous night. Undyne nodded as her husband spoke, clearly thinking it over carefully.

"Hmm… you were both dumb." she said matter-of-factly.

"BUT SANS-"

"Both. Dumb." Undyne repeated more forcefully.

"BUT HE-"

"Dumb."

"I NEVER-"

"Dumb."

"SANS ALWAYS-"

"Dumb."

Papyrus growled in frustration, making Undyne grin triumphantly. When in doubt, she liked to repeat herself until Papyrus shut up. That or kiss him by surprise. The latter was even more effective."DO WE HAVE TO WAIT FOR HIM TO GET HERE?"

Undyne mulled it over for a moment. "...Nah." She motioned for Papyrus to sit on the edge of her bed, and when he did she put her good arm around him. It wasn't like their usual cuddling, but for now, they were happy to be able to cuddle at all. They'd been given the opportunity for sweet closeness, and they were taking it.

"...IT'S ALWAYS GOING TO BE LIKE THIS WITH US, ISN'T IT?" Papyrus asked.

"You mean awesome? Then yeah." Undyne reclined as much as she could, her arm around her husband, and put her head on his shoulder. "All the best things don't come easy. But dang if they aren't worth it."