"Okay. Let's see here..."
Dr. Scarlett hovered over the blueprints for the air/water purifier, painting a picture of what the finished project might look like in her head. She had the dimensions of the project jotted down, but upon remembering that the garbage dump was cluttered with...well, garbage, she decided it might be wise to alter its size, and perhaps even find a decent place to situate it ahead of time.
And there was only one way she could practically do the latter.
"...Guess I'll pay the Trash Zone a visit," she said to herself, a bit intrigued by the idea of such a place.
She'd never been there in person, but knowing that it was where monsters first figured out how to utilize surface technology in the first place, and that they'd used it to learn as much as they could about the world above, it seemed like a very important location in monster culture.
And the supposed bottomless abyss was REALLY something that captured her mind. Especially after she'd gone over some of Dr. Alphys' written documents stocked up in her old desk drawers and found out that the former Royal Scientist had tried to study the abyss herself by sending a few probes down it...All of the experiments ended up with the mini-radars losing signal and the readings being lost.
...And then she'd decided to go down the pit herself after Mettaton and Asgore died.
The doctor sighed at the thought. How many other monsters might have taken their lives there, as well? She couldn't say for sure, and that alone was disturbing enough.
Yet another reason, she realized, to study the nature of the abyss. It just might save a few lives.
The parrot monster nodded, then grabbed a case, packing multiple sensitive frequency radars, radiation detectors and the like, along with a handful of drones to send them down the pit with. It only took her a few minutes, and once she was done, she stepped outside of the Hotland Lab, met with a humid blast of air. She breathed in, then set off, her eyes set on the Trash Zone.
...
"YOU KNOW WHAT I THINK WOULD BE INTERESTING?"
"What's that?" Undyne grunted as she pulled a few of the spears out of the wall of her house to inspect the damage. At that point, it didn't seem like it'd take much more to make it to collapse into itself completely; but that also meant future potential to build another house there, should she ever accumulate the needed amount of gold.
"TRAINING BY BATTLING AGAINST EACH OTHER IS SPLENDID, NO DOUBT, BUT WHAT IF WE WERE TO FIND AN OPPONENT AND SEE WHAT A TEAM ATTACK WOULD BE LIKE?"
"Whoa...That's...actually a pretty good idea! Yeah!"
Her eye flashed with a bit of recollection.
"And I know just the guy..."
"WHO?"
"The ghost in my old training dummy. Used to sit right there," she said to him, pointing at a slightly caved-in patch of moist earth in front of the house to the left. "He sorta moved out, I guess, after my house burned to a crisp, but I've seen him around these parts before. We don't really see each other much anymore, though...It's a shame we don't. That guy's got spunk! He'd make a great opponent! Hey, if we're lucky, we might even run into him at the garbage dump!"
"REALLY! WOW...! WELL, IN THAT CASE, HOW ABOUT WE START ON OVER THERE?"
"I was just about to say that," she grinned, putting an arm around him as they began making their way west through the Quiet Zone. "Man...Racin' around my old property hurlin' magic attacks for an hour or something really gives you a workout, don't it?"
"IT DOES. BUT THE GOOD NEWS IS IT'S SO FUN, I DON'T EVEN REALIZE I'M TIRED UNTIL WE'VE FINISHED."
"Yeah..."
"...I WONDER IF SANS WOULD MAKE A GOOD OPPONENT?"
"Hmm...Well...You remember at the hotel, he had that crazy-lookin' blaster thing, right?"
"OH, YES, I REMEMBER...I FEAR THAT IF HE HADN'T REALIZED IT WAS US AS SOON AS HE DID, WE'D HAVE BEEN BLASTED INTO OBLIVION. I HONESTLY FORGOT HE HAD A SPECIAL ATTACK LIKE THAT FOR A WHILE...A VERY LONG WHILE."
"Have you ever seen him use it before?"
"ERM...JUST ONE TIME, I THINK. BUT...I CAN'T REMEMBER THE DETAILS, FOR SOME ODD REASON."
"Huh...Weird."
"MAYBE I'LL REMEMBER IT CLEARLY ONE OF THESE DAYS," he shrugged. "AS FOR SANS USING IT AGAINST US? NYOO HOO HOO, NO THANK YOU, I'M SORRY. SOUNDS LIKE MY SECOND LEAST FAVORITE NIGHTMARE."
"What's your first least favorite, then?"
"SPINNING CONVEYER BELT PUZZLES."
"Oh...Oh, yeah, I remember you saying that!"
"YOU DO? I THINK IT WAS WHEN...ERM...THE HUMAN WAS PASSING THROUGH HOTLAND AND GAVE US A CALL. SO IT WAS QUITE A WHILE BACK."
"I dunno. Things tend to stick out better when they get brought up, am I right?"
"I SUPPOSE THAT DOES MAKE SENSE," Papyrus nodded in agreement. "WELL...HERE WE ARE."
The garbage dump stood before them in all its discarded glory. Piles upon piles of things the humans had deemed unwanted or broken were scattered across the marshy pit, ranging in condition from beyond repair to just barely worn. Some of the items were strewn about the shallows by themselves, as well; what could float bobbed along the surface, and what didn't simply sank to the bottom of the half-foot deep water, sometimes partially buried in the sediment. There was the faintest pungent odor about the place coming from the rubbish, but it was nary enough to bother anyone much.
The two monsters who had come to visit were so excited themselves that they barely noticed it at all.
"WHERE DO YOU THINK WE SHOULD LOOK FOR STUFF FIRST?"
"Let's just work our way through it from here 'til we get to the other end, how's that?"
"SOUNDS GOOD TO ME!" the skeleton smiled. "ALTHOUGH, YOU'RE THE EXPERT. PERHAPS GIVE ME A RUNDOWN OF WHAT I'M LOOKING FOR AND HOW TO FIND IT?"
"Well..." she began, heading over to one of the piles to demonstrate. "The most important thing is to trust your instinct. If you really, REALLY feel like something good might be buried somewhere, then that's where you look. And don't stop looking until you've turned the spot upside-down, even if you get filthy!"
"FILTHY?"
"I mean, it is trash."
"EH...TRUE. I GUESS I SHOULD HAVE EXPECTED AS MUCH," he nodded. He wasn't the biggest fan of getting dirty, but he didn't want to disappoint Undyne, either.
"...I CAN JUST HOP IN THE SHOWER WHEN WE GET BACK HOME. YEAH! I'M NOT AFRAID OF A LITTLE DIRT! THERE'S TREASURE TO BE FOUND!"
"That's the spirit! Now, just watch how it's done!"
The next thing he knew, he was watching Undyne leap up and dive head first into the rubbish pile, disappearing from view in mere seconds. The only indication she was even in there was the shifting the pile made and the loose pieces of garbage that fell into the shallows as she slowly toppled the mass from within.
Finally, he heard her exclaim excitedly, and she dug back up to the surface of the trash and popped out of the top, something clutched tightly in her right hand.
"Like that! This is just an example, though, I can prob'ly do better than this..."
She held up the item she found, revealing it to be nothing more than half of a broken vinyl record, sporting an image of four humans walking down the road in a line. The disc was broken just above their heads, so they could see their faces clearly, but neither of them had any idea who they were supposed to be.
"Kinda wish the other half were down here somewhere."
"WHY IS THAT ONE WALKING BAREFOOT?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah...I wouldn't know. Humans can be pretty weird, huh?"
"I KNOW THAT FROM EXPERIENCE. NYEH HEH HEH!"
"Yeah...Same," she scoffed, placing the disc back on top of the heap. "Don't think we can use this. So, you get the gist of what you gotta do, right?"
"ABSOLUTELY!"
"Okay. Where do you wanna start? This pile?"
"HMM..."
Papyrus scanned the mountains of trash, eyeing the sharp turn to the west just up ahead.
"...I GET THE FEELING WE SHOULD EXPLORE FURTHER INTO THE DUMP FOR THINGS. PERHAPS NOT FAR FROM THE FLOWERBED."
"Where the First Flow is?"
"YES! THAT WAY, WE'LL ALSO BE ABLE TO CATCH SIGHT OF NEW THINGS AS THEY COME DOWN!"
"Ah...You really are a lot smarter than I thought you were the day we met, you know?"
"I AM A MASTER OF IMPRESSNG PEOPLE!"
"No joke," she remarked, taking him by the hand and heading over to the other end of the Trash Zone with him.
The First Flow was a part of the dump almost directly beneath a flow of water cascading down from a cave system, carrying trash with it. It was theorized that the origin of the waterfall was on the surface, likely not far from a surface landfill or recycling station, and that most, if not all of, the trash that fell into the Underground flowed in from that fall. It was a bit hard to locate, since it was mostly hidden within a cave system it'd carved out through the earth, but it was there, and from that source came most of the discarded items in the dump, from food scraps to barely-used machines.
The skeleton eyed up the pile right beside it, a glimmer of curiosity in his eye socket.
"...I'LL TRY THIS ONE FIRST."
"Let's see how well you do, then!"
With that said, Papyrus bent down in a pouncing position, then took a deep breath and sprang head first into the rubbish.
"That's it!" Undyne cheered.
It wasn't long until Papyrus emerged from the pile of junk, sputtering and gasping for air as though he'd just spent a whole minute underwater.
"You okay?"
"QUITE ALRIGHT," he assured her, flashing a thumbs up. "JUST NOT USED TO THE SMELL YET."
"Oh...Find anything in there?"
"I THINK MY INSTICNT NEEDS SOME MORE TRAINING."
He dug his hand out from the garbage to show off...
An unfinished loaf of bread. Long stale and covered in pine green splotches.
"...So that's what spoiled food looks like."
"OH, REALLY? IT LOOKS...VERY INTERESTING."
"Yeah, moldy food isn't exactly something you see everyday down here...Guess that's a good thing."
"CERTAINLY SO," he agreed, stepping out of the pile and tossing the old bread loaf to the side. "SO, THAT DIDN'T GO AS WELL AS I HOPED IT TO."
"Try again. With a different pile, this time. You just need a bit of practice, is all, you'll get the hang of it!"
"ALRIGHT, THEN..."
He dove into another nearby pile in search of something other than spoiled food, remembering too late that he'd forgotten to hold his breath to keep out the stench.
OH, DEAR ME...JUST TRY TO IGNORE IT. YOU'LL GET USED TO IT! he said to himself.
About ten more seconds went by, and then Papyrus re-emerged with somethingdifferent in his gloved hands.
"HOW'S THIS?"
This time, it was badly bent golf club, the handle of which was broken off.
"Wow...That's definitely better," she nodded. "Keep it up! I'm gonna go look over by the abyss for stuff!"
"TELL ME IF YOU FIND ANYTHING REALLY GOOD!"
He watched, slightly mesmerized by the sight of her, as she dove head first into another pile of garbage, seeming to have as much passion for it as she did diving into action on the battlefield when she was in the Royal Guard...That was one of the things he loved about her the most, just how much she just loved to get out and DO things; a bit of a stark contrast from is brother. Not to say he didn't love Sans all the same, still, but Undyne was just the kind of person who made his life...exciting. And in the best of ways.
She popped her head out of the trash heap and showed off...
"...WHAT IS THAT?"
"It's a freaking ANIMAL SKULL!"
"A WHAT!?"
"Here, catch it!"
She tossed it at him, and his hands fumbled a bit as he tried to keep it from falling to the ground and breaking.
Yep, it was a skull, alright. Complete with a mouthful of sharp teeth and yellowed with age and exposure. Papyrus was slightly unnerved by the sight of it; being a skeleton, he was essentially holding a severed head. At least he knew it'd belonged to an actual animal and not a monster(as the only remains a dead monster left behind was its dust.)
Even from the distance she was at, Undyne could see the disconcertedness in his eye sockets.
"Oh...Oh, my gosh, I'm sorry," she apologized as she approached him, not realizing at first that me might be disturbed by something like that. "I-I didn't...I wasn't thinking about what you might-"
"NO, NO, IT'S NOT QUITE SO BAD, UNDYNE," he promised her, handing the skull back to her. "I GUESS I JUST FEEL A BIT BAD FOR THE ANIMAL THAT DIED, IS ALL...IT'S A SHAME THEIR SKELETONS CAN'T SIMPLY GET UP AND WALK AROUND LIKE ME AND MY BROTHER CAN, ISN'T IT?"
"Ah...Yeah, it is a shame...Especially since that actually sounds REALLY cool, now that I think about it."
"WHAT KIND OF ANIMAL DO YOU SUPPOSE IT BELONGED TO?"
She took a closer look at the skull; the snout was too long to be a cat, and too blunt and rounded to be a dog, but it had the same kinds of teeth as both...Could cats and dogs cross-breed on the surface and produce...something like this? Unlikely, seeing how dogs and cats tended to interact with each other, but...What else could it be, then?
"I don't know...You know anybody who might?"
"WHY DON'T WE CHECK THE LIBRARY AND SEE IF WE CAN FIND ANYTHING! I'M SURE THEY HAVE A BOOK ON ANIMALS SOMEWHERE IN THERE!"
"Hey, that's a sweet idea!" she beamed. "Yeah, we haven't been to the library in a while, have we?"
"I MAY PICK UP A FEW OTHER BOOKS WHILE I'M AT IT LATER," he said to himself. "IN THE MEAN TIME, HOW ABOUT WE KEEP SEARCHING FOR OTHER THINGS?"
"Way ahead of you, Papy!"
"I WISH YOU THE BEST OF LUCK OVER THERE!"
She flashed him one of her signature grins, then dove back into the trash heap. Papyrus was just about to bend down and do the same...
When he caught sight of something flowing out right into the water from the First Flow.
Before it could disappear into the rest of the trash, he grabbed hold of it, then pulled it up and out of the water to examine it.
...It was an old DVD case. The box was dirty, and the plastic that held the cover picture was wrinkled and ripped in places, along with the cover itself, but only around the edges. The picture itself was still in good shape; it depicted what looked like a human boy who was riding through the air in some sort of suspended cart, and sitting on either side of him was a pack of mangy-looking dogs. They were all looking right at him, almost as though begging to be saved from an eternity in the garbage dump.
Normally, if dogs were involved in ANYTHING, Papyrus would refrain from taking part in it; the troublesome creatures had given him more than enough of a pain in the pelvis to last him a lifetime...But with the way they seemed to stare at him, pleading to be given another chance in the hands of a monster, he didn't have the heart to turn them down.
Deciding to see if it'd be worth it to bring the movie home, he popped open the case and examined the DVD inside, which revealed to have a LOT of scratches. The good news, however, was that they were all rather thin, and therefore, easy to repair. Some of them might not have even been big enough to cause a problem.
He nodded in satisfaction, then stuck the DVD back in its case and stored it away in his scarf as he went around searching for other things worth his while. He wondered if Undyne would be interested in the film, seeing that she was into gritty as much as she was into sappy stuff.
Excited by the idea, he smiled as he jotted that down on his mental to-do list. Today just kept getting more and more interesting.
...
"Ha! I KNEW I'd find another one of these someday!"
Undyne had found herself lucky enough to stumble across an old sword in a worn sheath. The blade was short and a bit bent along the middle, and the tip of it was stained slightly red with rust, but it was a sword, nonetheless, and it was actually in better condition than she thought it would be, for something deemed to be thrown away.
"Man...I almost feel bad for whatever idiot threw this away," she smirked mockingly. "You, sword, are coming with me, and I'm gonna bend you back into shape the next chance I get...I need to practice more of my fire magic, anyways. Ha!"
She stuck the thin blade back in its sheath, then scanned around the vicinity, wondering whether or not she might even be lucky enough to find a helmet, or piece of armor of some sort; Papyrus would definitely appreciate the thought, after all. She knew well enough after giving him her old morion from her days of training for the Royal Guard; he was practically in tears when she explained its significance to him.
And the next thing she knew, SHE had been in tears after he gave her that photo album...Looking back, she wondered if that gift had been what sparked her feelings towards him in the first place.
Well, if it wasn't as much that as it was everything that happened before it, it was at least the icing on the cake, she said to herself, looking around for anything else of interest.
And she found her eye falling onto something bright and colorful sitting amongst the dull, worn objects, half buried in it.
Undyne tilted her head to the side curiously, then pulled it out of the rubbish to inspect it.
"...Huh."
It looked like a stuffed bird of some kind. It had a blue head, a bright red body, and green feathers on its wings and tail that faded to grey the closer it got to the tips. There was a gaping hole in the left side of the bird's red stomach, and stuffing poured out of it; it seemed like it'd already lost quite a bit of filling, really.
So it was a lot easier for Undyne to realize the bird had something hard inside of it.
As she reached in to inspect it, she pressed the top of the object from the outside, and the next thing she knew, it was making noise.
Undyne jumped a bit; that was DEFINITELY not something she expected to happen. But her nerves quickly eased, and then turned to wonder, when she realized the sound coming from it was actually a bird's call. Most likely, the call of whatever kind of bird it was that the plush was modeled after.
"Wow..."
This was certainly an interesting find. Were there birds like this on the surface? She knew one thing for sure, though; she would definitely know if she saw one, because a bird that looked like that would stick out like a sore thumb, as this fake one had done right here in the dump.
That hole needs to be fixed, though, she said to herself. ...Wonder if Papyrus is having any luck?
She knew he was intrigued by the activity of scouring the garbage dump for things of worth, but she was also very well aware that he wasn't a fan of getting mucked up. A little dirt or dust on him? He was able to handle that just fine. But not so much mucking around through garbage and getting himself covered in...well...slimy garbage residue.
I've got two things here, she thought as she turned away from the garbage piles to go find him. Maybe he'd like to start heading home now, so he can get himself-
And she stopped in her tracks.
There, right before the abyss, stood the figure of a monster, head bowed down and looking into the bottomless pit.
A strong sense of deja vu came over the former captain. Someone in a white lab coat, peering into the infinite blackness of the abyss, looking very deep in thought...
For a brief moment, she actually thought it was Alphys standing there, and she was reliving the day they met all over again...But when her initial surprise wore off, and she got a better look at the monster, she realized it wasn't so, and that such was impossible, anyway.
The figure was a lot taller and slimmer, this time; just a handful of inches below the two of them, and they had striking red plumage rather than yellow, along with a hooked beak in place of a blunt, scaly snout. But they still had that intelligent glimmer in their teal eyes, sparked with quiet, almost grim contemplation.
The couple exchanged glances, the looks on their faces serving as all the communication they needed.
You think something's wrong?
I DON'T KNOW...WANT TO CHECK?
Probably a good idea...
Slowly and cautiously, Undyne approached the stranger, the sound of her boots sloshing through the shallows being drowned out by the soft ambiance of the flowing water. She only stopped when she was standing just barely two yards away from them, tensing up ever so slightly when she saw the avianoid cock their head to the side, seemingly curious about the bottomless pit before them.
The fish woman drew in a breath, then quietly cleared her throat to make herself known.
The stranger jumped a bit, then quickly turned to face whoever was behind her.
"...What's up?" the piscine creature asked.
"Oh..." she breathed, having gotten over the startle. "Pardon me; I was so mesmerized by the abyss, I forgot I was supposed to be studying up on it."
"Study, huh?" Undyne repeated, raising a curious eyebrow.
"That's right. I brought a few reading instruments along with me to see if I can pick up any odd frequencies from down there."
"What kind of frequencies?"
"Anything that might be of interest. Magic, soundwaves, radiation...Anything that might answer a few questions about it. We don't exactly know what's down there, after all."
"Yeah..." she nodded solemnly. "...So...That's why you're here? To send stuff down and see if it picks anything up?"
"Yes."
"Well...Just don't get too close to the edge. Wouldn't want to lose anyone."
"Oh, no need to be concerned over that. I have wings I can use if the need arises." she grinned, showing off just a bit of the blue and gold flight feathers beneath the sleeves of her lab coat. "But you do have a point; it is best to maintain a distance of at least six feet from the edge."
The parrot monster stepped away from the abyss a bit more, and Undyne eyed up the fairly large case full of measuring tools, probes and the like sitting on one of the raised wooden platforms sitting on either side of the abyss, as well as what looked like blueprints for a marge machine of some sort.
"...You makin' something?"
"Hm? Oh, oh, yes," the monster nodded. "You know how the water in these parts tend to get dirty, right?"
"Oh, yeah. I don't mind wading, or even falling in it much, but I wouldn't drink the stuff, that's for sure."
"It's going to be a water purifier, basically, but with a few extra functions. What it'll do is extract impurities from the dump water, and then use those elements as a fuel source. The water will be transported through Hotland through the ground to moisten it, therefore giving plants a better chance to grow and overall making it a more habitable region...My theory is that if more people could make homes there, the capital might finally have its overpopulation problem solved."
Undyne whistled, very impressed by the idea.
"Wow...Well, I'm all up for making Hotland less of a death pit. I almost fried to a crisp over there, like, three times," she told her. "Dang...So, you've got the lab coat and all the fancy gear, so I'm guessing you're into sciency stuff?"
"Well, as the Royal Scientist, I would certainly hope that I would. I mean, how else would I have gotten the...job...?"
The intrigue on the fish monster's face had turned into blank shock in two seconds flat.
"Um...Miss?"
"You...You're the Royal Scientist."
"Yes. I've been in the position for just under a month, now, and it's been...well, eventful, to say the least."
Undyne suddenly fell silent, looking down the abyss, then at the doctor, then casting a glance down at the abyss again. It didn't take that long for the latter to catch on.
"Oh, I see. You know about...what happened here, with the last...You know," she acknowledged. "...That's not why I came here, though, I can promise you."
The fish monster looked her in the eye again, head still looking down.
"...Do me a favor."
"What's that?"
"No matter what happens...And no matter how low you think you've fallen...Don't ever think to throw yourself away like garbage. Because you're not."
She drew in a deep breath, tensing up a bit before releasing it through her nostrils.
"...No one is, even if it they think they're beyond repair...A place like this is especially proof of that."
"Oh...I see."
Another few brief moments of silence went by before the Royal Scientist suddenly brought a feathery hand to her face.
"Oh, I'm so rude. I just realized I never properly introduced myself, did I?"
"No...Me neither, though, so, it's cool."
The bird monster extended a wing, and her feathers met the other's scales.
"Dr. Scarlett Arra. Royal Scientist...Of course, you already knew that part."
"Cool beans. Name's Undyne."
Now it was Dr. Scarlett's turn to go wide-eyed.
"Wait...Undyne?" she echoed. "As in...Captain Undyne?"
"Oh...Yeah, that's me. Ain't no captain anymore, though. Nowadays, I play piano gigs at Grillby's over in Snowdin."
"Oh, really?"
"Yeah. Used to live around these parts...But then I burned my house to a crisp while makin' spaghetti. That's me for ya, ain't it?"
"Oh. Um...That's...Not good."
"Eh. Big deal. Stuff like that happened more than once, anyways! Fuhuhuhu...!"
"Oh..." she answered blankly, slightly confused, and even a bit off-put by her being so casual about it. It seemed as though the rumors at New Home University about nothing being able to phase the(now former) Royal Guard Captain were indeed true.
"Yeah, I'm situated in Snowdin, now. Livin' with my boyfriend and his brother...It's been pretty good."
"Ah, I see..."
"WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO OVER THERE, UNDYNE?"
"Oh, ho! Speak of the demon, and they will come!"
Both of them turned to see the image of a particularly tall and lanky skeleton coming towards them.
"Sorry, Pap. Kinda left you hangin', didn't I?"
The parrot's eyes widened at the sight of him. Where did he come from, all of a sudden? And...What on EARTH was he wearing?
"NOT A PROBLEM...IS THIS A FRIEND OF YOURS?"
"Eh...Friendly acquaintance, I guess. I mean, we literally just met, so..."
"Well...Nice to meet you, sir," the parrot monster greeted, extending her wing again.
"OH, YOU NEEDN'T CALL ME 'SIR,'" he told her as he met her with his own gloved hands, in a particularly friendly fashion. "WE'RE PROBABLY ABOUT THE SAME AGE, ANYWAYS. THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AT YOUR SERVICE!"
"Dr. Scarlett Arra. Royal Scientist."
"WELL, IT SURE IS A PLEASURE TO..."
He paused, expression tensing a bit.
"WAIT. DID YOU JUST SAY YOU WERE THE...ROYAL SCIENTIST?"
"Yes."
"OH...ERM..."
He looked over in Undyne's direction, noticing that she was beginning to distance herself a bit from where they were standing.
"...WHAT BRINGS YOU TO THE GARBAGE DUMP?"
"Not what you're thinking," she assured him. "I just came here to do some studies and take a few measurements."
"NYEH...I SEE," he remarked, some of his apprehension being relieved as he eyed the bag full of equipment on the raised platform.
"She was worried about the same thing...Seems that Dr. Alphys doing what she did here left an impression on this place, didn't it?"
He turned to Undyne again, and saw her flinch, the faintest indication of a tear in her eye.
"...I MEAN NO OFFENSE," he said quietly, his tone very gentle, but also slightly grim. "BUT WOULD YOU BE SO KIND AS TO...REFRAIN FROM SPEAKING OF THE EVENTS WHICH OCCURRED HERE? SEE...SH-SHE AND DR. ALPHYS KNEW EACH OTHER ON A PERSONAL LEVEL, AND THEY WERE VERY CLOSE, INDEED. IT'S NOT YOUR FAULT, DOCTOR, NOT AT ALL. I'M JUST...I DON'T WANT UNDYNE TO GET UPSET. ESPECIALLY NOW, SEEING THAT THE REASON SHE WANTED TO COME DOWN HERE WAS TO TRY AND FINALLY PUT THE PAST BEHIND HER."
"Oh..." she replied, realizing her folly. "...My apologies."
"YOU NEEDN'T BLAME YOURSELF FOR ANYTHING. YOU DIDN'T KNOW UNTIL NOW."
"You're certain?"
"POSITIVE."
He gave her a reassuring grin and a thumbs up, then turned to face the former captain. She'd completely turned away at that point, and was a good two yards away.
OH, DEAR...I DO HOPE SHE'S ALRIGHT.
He stepped over to where she stood and bent down to face her lowered head. Undyne's expression was tight and strained, as though she was fighting back whatever tears were building up inside her. Papyrus let out a sigh; he just couldn't stand to see her like this.
"...DO YOU HAVE EVERYTHING YOU WANTED TO TAKE ALONG?"
She nodded, fearing that if she opened her mouth, a sob would escape her instead of anything coherent.
"ALRIGHT, THEN," he cooed, gently pulling her into a hug. "...WOULD YOU LIKE TO START HEADING HOME?"
He got another nod in response, and he took hold of her free hand as they began making their way out of the Trash Zone.
"DOCTOR, IT WAS NICE TO MEET YOU," he bid the Royal Scientist as they left, Undyne giving a small wave goodbye as well. "PERHAPS WE'LL SEE YOU AGAIN SOME TIME!"
"The pleasure is mine. Have a safe trip home."
He gave her one last smile in return before the couple turned the corner north and disappeared from view.
Scarlett sighed and shook her head in pity. If only Dr. Alphys had known just how much she would be missed...Then, she might not have made that deadly leap.
She stared down into the abyss, peering into it as though it she were looking at Alphys' dust pile itself, and spoke as though her ghost was listening, and looking up at her from the seemingly endless void.
"If, somehow, you can hear me...I just want you to know that everyone remembers you in a good light. And I promise you, and everyone else counting on me, that...I won't let them down. I won't let you down...I swear."
With that, she opened up her case, then prepared the drones to see if she got lucky enough to see if she could learn anything new from the bottomless pit, almost hoping that she might even unearth the fate of whatever fell into there and vanished into the darkness.
...Including Alphys.
...
"YOU DOING ANY BETTER, UNDYNE?"
She let out a long sigh, then turned to face him.
"Yeah...Sorry about all that, I just...I didn't think there'd be...You know?"
"I DO KNOW, UNDYNE, AND I COMPLETELY UNDERSTAND," he said to her. "I WASN'T EXPECTING TO SEE ANYBODY LIKE THE NEW ROYAL SCIENTIST THERE, EITHER."
"...Is she the one who found out about the Amalgamates?"
"I...THINK SO, ACTUALLY," he remembered, recalling the day Sans told him about the message sent out to the Underground just before they left for the Resort Hotel. "...WAS IT JUST ME, OR DID SHE SEEM A BIT...HOW DO I PUT THIS...STIFF TO YOU?"
"No, that wasn't just you. I mean, nothing's wrong with formality, but she was talking to us like we were the darned king and queen, or something like that. And she might have had a lab coat over it, but who the hell wears a business-casual blouse and skirt to the Trash Zone where it's probably gonna get mucked up like we are? Seems to me like she needs to loosen up a bit."
"AH, YES! MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY! YOU PUT IT INTO WORDS BETTER THAN I COULD!"
"Heh...Well, just speakin' my mind, you know?" she replied, turning slightly puce.
"NYEH HEH! LOOKS LIKE YOU'RE DOING A LOT BETTER ALREADY!"
"Yeah...You really know how to lift people up when they're down, you know?"
"IT'S ONE OF MY KEY ATTRIBUTES, AND I AM VERY GLAD I HAVE IT! NYEH HEH HEH HEH HEH!" he guffawed. "HEH...SO, I DIDN'T FIND MUCH THAT WAS IN DECENT CONDITION OVER THERE EXCEPT FOR THIS MOVIE, HERE. THE DISC IS A BIT WORN, BUT DON'T THE HUMANS KNOW THAT MOST OF THE SCRATCHES ON DVDS CAN BE BUFFED OUT WITH A SMIDGEN OF TOOTHPASTE?"
Undyne took a look at the cover.
"...I thought you didn't like dogs."
"NORMALLY, I WOULD SAY YOU'RE RIGHT. BUT THIS LOOKS INTERESTING TO SAY THE LEAST, DOESN'T IT?"
"Yeah...It does. You wanna watch it this evening?"
"MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY!" he smiled. "THAT'S ALL I HAVE, THOUGH. DID YOU HAVE ANY MORE LUCK THAN I DID?"
"Found this cool sword. It's a short sword, and it's a little bent and has some rust on the tip, but sword is sword, right?"
"CERTAINLY! IT'LL MAKE A FINE REPLACEMENT FOR THE BIG ONE YOU LOST IN THE HOUSEFIRE!"
"Yeah, that one was a little clumsy, anyway...Also found this stuffed bird."
"OOH, IT LOOKS VERY NICE! THAT RIP IN THE SIDE COULD PROBABLY BE REFILLED AND STITCHED BACK UP!"
"Check it. It still makes noise."
She pressed down on top of the bird, and it produced a very pretty and delicate-sounding twitter, sounding off twice for just a few seconds each time before going silent.
"WOWIE...THIS MUST BE SOME SORT OF SURFACE BIRD. DO YOU THINK MR. GERSON WOULD KNOW WHAT KIND OF BIRD IT IS?"
"Maybe. The only way to know for sure is to ask him, though," Undyne shrugged as she traded over the bird for the movie. "How 'bout you show him?"
"WILL DO! EH...YOU'RE COMING, RIGHT?"
"Yeah, just...I might fall behind, some. I'll catch up, don't worry."
"OH...I SEE. HAVE A FEW THINGS ON YOUR MIND?"
She nodded.
"I UNDERSTAND. IN THAT CASE, I'LL MEET YOU OVER THERE, THEN!"
He turned and headed over to the shop where the old Hammer of Justice resided, and Undyne trailed slowly behind, looking down at her boots as they trudged through the soft, damp earth. She frowned; her first visit to the Trash Zone in months hadn't exactly gone the way she hoped it to. There were just...too many reminders of what happened to Alphys there. And what was even stranger to her was that she thought she'd have gotten over her a long time ago, knowing that Alphys had been ready and willing to throw herself away without a second thought about what SHE might think if she did...Papyrus would never do that to her. He was always ready and willing to face any mistakes he might have made, and ready and willing to lift her up when she was down.
She finally managed a smile when he entered her mind; how glad she was that she'd managed to see all of this. And how glad she was that the two of them were together.
She picked up her pace a bit and looked ahead. It was about time she caught up to-
"UNDYNE!"
Papyrus shouted nearly at the top of the lungs he didn't have, running out of Gerson's shop to face her, looking very, VERY alarmed.
And that by itself was enough to make alarm bells go off in her own head.
"What is it?"
"IT'S...I THINK..." he stammered. "JUST COME QUICK!"
With that, he rushed back into the shop, and the former captain picked up her heels even more, finally turning the corner into the old den. And when she stepped foot inside, her eye drifted down to the floor and beheld...
"...Oh, no."
15:
I have a feeling this might be the last time I write in here, if all goes well.
The flower has been injected with the necessary traits: hope, love, compassion, and
the smallest pinch of DETERMINATION to get everything into gear. The amount is too
little to make the body of a monster break down and melt, as I've seen with Undyne,
but I know full well that just a little bit goes a long way.
However, even with the positive results Asriel yielded, I'm still not completely positive
as to whether or not it will work. There could be other factors to Asriel's miraculous
rebirth that haven't been uncovered yet...But I wouldn't know where to start if I were
to get into the nitty-gritty of the time, or the state of the dust, or the environment.
...The environment he was in is something I definitely can't go out and study. There's
no doubt I'd not only be seen, but recognized.
And I can't face them all yet.
In the mean time, all we can really do is hope. And in the case that everything goes
according to plan, then it's probably safe to say that...Then would be the time for us
to all go above.
We'll free everyone.
And we'll do it together.
...That's all.
A/N: Just in case nobody got the reference in 'Speak of the demon, and they will come,' since it's hard to catch, but it's actually a reference to what Chara says to the player if you complete the Genocide run a second time. Damn, Chara, you creepy...
Up next: I mean, with how this chapter ended, you can...probably figure that out.