(26)
Going through the rest of Waterfall between Leo and Hotland was, as before, a calm and peaceful affair. He'd encountered some odd monsters on his way through the dark area, seeing identical looking cat-like monsters quietly flitting in and out of his Light spell's range, their eyes reflecting the magical light in all manner of colors. None of them seemed particularly brave enough to get close to him, but he was able to see that all of them had identical outfits as well, that being some kind of blue shirt.
After Leontius got through the dark area they didn't seem keen on following him anymore, but he did hear them start loudly talking amongst themselves in what he could only describe as a droning babble, punctuated by the occasional loud yelling of a "Hoi!" that he could hear well into the room with the thin footbridges.
After that was the long, slowly heating up walk between Waterfall and Hotland proper, the large glowing sign proclaiming its welcome to Leontius as he passed by. Just as he passed in front of Sans' empty- and still snow-covered- Sentry post, he noticed that a pair of clam monsters was heading his direction, likely on the way to Waterfall. He stepped to the side in front of Sans' post to give the two people space to walk by, recognizing one of them as the same clam man he'd first encountered in Hotland when Undyne collapsed. The two were chatting as they went, and Leontius could hear little of it. He did catch a name, though it meant nothing to him.
'Suzy.'
Other than that, Leo couldn't pick anything else out of the passing conversation. He kept going, walking up to the big white building's strange sliding door and going in, still not totally sure just how the doors detected him as they did.
The inside of the building was, thankfully, lit up. Leontius wandered about the lower floor, not seeing Alphys anywhere. He did see that the holes Mettaton made in the wall and ceiling had been repaired, but he could still vaguely tell where the robot had popped out of the wall thanks to a color difference in the paint. Other than that, no Alphys.
Leontius was about to ascend the moving staircase up to the second floor when a door to his left opened as he passed by. He stood and silently stared into the dark doorway. The last time he was here, this door remained shut even when he passed in front of it, and he'd not seen Alphys enter it…
He decided to just call out up to the second floor, still looking into the doorway. "Alphys!"
No response.
The door was still open, and Leontius needed to find Alphys. He figured the door could take him to a basement or something similar, so he walked in. A few steps in and lights sprung to life, revealing that the door led to an elevator, not unlike the one just outside. A panel on the far wall presented two buttons, one an up arrow and the other a glowing down arrow. He pressed the down arrow, and the elevator began to descend at a leisurely pace, then it violently halted without warning only moments into the descent.
The sudden stop ruined Leontius' balance, and just as he braced himself he could hear the faint sounds of mechanisms outside of the elevator struggling to function. Moments later he felt weightlessness, and a sudden realization hit him.
The elevator was in freefall, and it was taking him down with it.
Thinking quickly, he grasped about his waist to try to get a grip on his sheathed claymore in order to cast a Fall Control spell. He managed to cast the spell, and only a few seconds later he slammed into the elevator's floor as its descent abruptly ended, the lights dying with the force of the impact.
Unlike the last time Leontius had relied on it, the spell worked perfectly. He felt no worse for wear, but he could see absolutely nothing in the dark elevator compartment, not even the buttons were glowing anymore. Before he could do anything else the issue seemingly took care of itself as the elevator door automatically opened, letting in a scant amount of light.
'I am beginning to dislike these elevators more and more. If it is not jostling me about, it decides to just fail and nearly kill me outright…'
Leontius picked himself up off the floor and exited the elevator, finding himself in a long hallway that was just bright enough to see in. Dark green floor tiles and walls with an occasional crack in them made up the hall, and as Leo walked down it he realized he could hear absolutely nothing besides the sounds he himself was making. It was an eerie silence indeed.
At the end of the hall was a room with some odd machines and mechanisms on a far wall, a pair of dead potted plants on either side of the hallway's end, and what looked to be two possible ways to go. Leo decided to investigate the machinery, finding the thing on the left to be some form of food dispenser that required gold to operate, the middle was a locked door with a sign above it that read "Power Room," and the thing on the right was some kind of wall-mounted device that activated and displayed text on its surface when he neared it.
The locked door seemed to need four keys by the looks of it, and Leo still entirely lacked money to even use the food dispenser. He decided to read what the wall-mounted device had on it, seeing as it was the only thing he could interact with at the moment.
"ENTRY NUMBER 1: This is it… time to do what the King has asked me to do. I will create the power to free us all. I will unleash the power of the soul."
'This must be Alphys' journal on her scientific endeavors…' The short entry was followed up by an arrow shape pointing down as if to indicate there was more to read beneath. It took Leontius a bit of fiddling with the machine before he figured out that he was supposed to actually touch the arrow to continue to the next entry.
"ENTRY NUMBER 2: The barrier is locked by soul power. Unfortunately, this power cannot be recreated artificially. Soul power can only be derived from what was once living. So, to create more, we will have to use what we have now. The souls of monsters."
'She was searching for an alternative means to break the barrier, then. That certainly sounds like a request Asgore would make.' Another arrow appeared at the end of the entry, so he touched it to bring the next one up.
"ENTRY NUMBER 3: But extracting a soul from a living monster would require incredible power. Besides being impractical, doing so would instantly destroy the soul's host. And, unlike the persistent souls of humans, the souls of most monsters disappear immediately upon death. If only I could make a monster's soul last…" Another arrow, another entry.
"ENTRY NUMBER 4: I've been researching humans to see if I can find any info about their souls. I ended up snooping around the castle, and found these weird, really old audio tapes. I converted them to something a bit more modern and... I don't feel like Asgore's listened to them. I don't think he should."
Leontius was unsure what an audio tape was, but he figured the next entry may go into further detail, so he poked the arrow, transitioning to the next entry.
"ENTRY NUMBER 5: I've done it. Using the blueprints to create the machine, I've extracted it from the human souls. I believe this is what gives their souls the strength to persist after death. The will to keep living, the resolve to change fate. Let's call this power… 'Determination.'"
While it didn't elaborate on 'audio tapes,' that last entry, in particular, was very interesting. Leontius knew of only one thing that could possibly be this "Determination" that the entry described, and it was Humanity. If Alphys was experimenting with something as volatile as fragments of the Dark Soul itself…
'I can only imagine she has halted these experiments in light of my news and Asgore calling off his plans, but if there were any results from this, they could prove to be horrific.'
The record device seemed that it had shown him all the entries stored on it, so he decided to get a move on. He tried the rightmost exit out of the room, but the door simply refused to open like the ones above, leaving him with the exit on the left side as his only option.
That doorway led to what looked to be an operating room. The gray, sticky operating tables reminded him all too well of the Undead Asylum's examination rooms and operating theaters, as well as being stared and prodded at like some experiment or exotic wild animal.
He turned his attention away from the tables and instead focused on another wall-mounted record device next to them. Like the previous one, it turned on when he neared, presenting the first entry in its series.
"ENTRY NUMBER 6: Asgore asked everyone outside the city for monsters that had the 'falling sickness.' Their bodies came in today. They're still comatose, and soon they'll all turn into dust. But what happens if I inject 'Determination' into them? If their souls persist after they perish, then… freedom might be closer than we all thought.
Leontius had never heard of this 'falling sickness,' by the sounds of it it was some form of disease that rendered monsters entirely vegetative. The idea of injecting diseased monsters with Humanity seemed dangerous to Leontius, but he did hand over a piece of his soul to Asriel to keep him alive, and that action's full consequences were yet to be seen… he decided to just read the next entry.
"ENTRY NUMBER 7: We'll need a vessel to wield the monster souls when the time comes. After all, a monster cannot absorb the souls of other monsters, just as a human cannot absorb a human soul. So then… what about something that's neither human nor monster?"
Leontius' answer to that question was simple. An undead like himself could contain both human and monster souls, but he doubted Alphys could bring about something comparable to an undead or hollow using monsters, no one on the surface was entirely certain what brought the curse upon mankind to begin with. Another entry was available.
"ENTRY NUMBER 8: I've chosen a candidate. I haven't told Asgore yet, because I want to surprise him with it… in the center of his garden, there's something special he told me about. The first golden flower that grew before all the others, the one from the outside world. I wonder… what happens when something without a soul gains the will to live?"
That certainly sounded like the origin of Flowey to Leontius, unless there was some other soulless flower out and about that he hadn't seen. Yet another entry presented itself.
"ENTRY NUMBER 9: Things aren't going well. None of the bodies have turned into dust, so I can't get the souls. I told the families that I would give them the dust back for the funerals. People are starting to ask me what's happening. What do I do?" That was the device's last entry.
Leontius left the entry device be, the panel shutting down as he walked away from it. The room had little else in it, and just as he was about to leave a short-lived red light in the corner of his vision caught his attention. A row of three modern-looking washstands with cabinets beneath them drew his eye, and as he looked at them longer he saw the red light pulse out of the leftmost one's basin.
Leontius walked up to the washstand and saw a small metallic key with the pulsing red light inlaid into it stuck in the drain of the basin. He figured it could fit into the previous room's door so he reached in and removed it. He was about to pocket it when he saw an odd white substance begin to leak from the washstand's spigot, then rapidly pour out and fill the basin despite the drain still being open.
Leontius stared at the odd liquid, then took a step back as it seemed to rise from the basin, creating a solid and upright form as it did so.
The form the thing took looked like a mass of faces with rolling pure-white glowing eyes, all sitting atop a spine-like stem. It stared back at Leo with all of its eyes, then split its head at the stem into three exact duplicates, all of which seemed to scan him up and down momentarily.
As the strange creature eyed him, Leontius slowly reached for his claymore's handle and talisman. He wasn't sure if he'd draw on the thing or not, but being able to cast a defensive miracle if it decided to attack him wouldn't hurt.
Thankfully, the thing seemed to deem Leontius as outside of its interest, reforming its heads into one and screeching at him in a strange, broken sound before reliquifying and rapidly slithering up the wall and onto a metal pipe. It stayed there, an eye forming and staring at him.
The longer Leontius looked back at it, the more he suspected he could sense something familiar within it.
'There is no mistaking it. That… thing… has Humanity within it. This must be a result of Alphys' experiments, something little more than a base animal by the looks of it.' He decided to leave the room, and by extension, the thing.
Once back in the other room, Leontius went straight for the locked door and slotted the glowing red key in one of the keyholes, finding that it didn't need to be turned to work. Once it was fully seated it stopped glowing and a section on the door began to glow the same color in its stead, and the sound of a door opening to the right caught Leo's attention.
Passing through the now opened right door led Leontius to a kind of bunk room. It had nine beds in a staggered three by three arrangement, what looked to be an animal's feed bowl in one corner, two more potted plants, another record device on the northern wall, a doorway to the North, and another to the East. He also noticed that there was a thin fog about the room he'd initially missed, and that, oddly enough, one of the beds was unmade.
While at first Leontius had to wonder why he found the unmade bed so strange, it became clear as he stared at it for a little while longer. He sensed another signature of Humanity coming from the area around the bed. It was about as strong as the head-thing's, but whatever it belonged to was invisible. He decided to attempt to avoid the invisible creature and just head around the beds to the northern side of the room and check the device.
The device sprung to life, displaying: "ENTRY NUMBER 10: Experiments on the vessel are a failure. It doesn't seem to be any different from the control cases. Whatever. They're a hassle to work with anyway. The seeds just stick to you, and won't let go…"
'By the looks of it, Alphys' experiments seemed to have had a rocky start and result… Humanity is nothing to be trifled with.'
Another entry, however, the device seemed to have skipped entry eleven. "ENTRY NUMBER 12: Nothing is happening. I don't know what to do. I'll just keep injecting everything with 'Determination.' I want this to work."
'Just how much Humanity was she able to pull from those six souls…?'
"ENTRY NUMBER 13: One of the bodies opened its eyes."
"ENTRY NUMBER 14: Everyone that had the sickness… has woken up. They're all walking around and talking like nothing is wrong. I thought they were goners…?"
"ENTRY NUMBER 15: Seems like this research was a dead end… but at least we got a happy ending out of it…? I sent the souls back to Asgore, returned the vessel to his garden… and I called all of the families and told them everyone's alive. I'll send everyone back tomorrow. :)"
Leontius knew better from what he'd already seen and felt in the lab that must not have been the case, and the device's last entries seemed to confirm his suspicions.
"ENTRY NUMBER 16: no No NO NO NO NO"
"ENTRY NUMBER 17: monster's physical forms can't handle "determination" like humans' can. with too much determination, our bodies begin to break down. everyone's melted together."
'And those diseased monsters became these creatures. I suppose it was for the best that her efforts resulted in failure. If she found a way to break the barrier…' The entire situation was doomed to result in everything going wrong either way, there was no way Alphys could have known what she was dealing with. This was the lesser of two evils.
Leontius put the thoughts out of his mind and decided to keep searching for keys to the "Power Room." He went through the bunk room's northern doorway and found himself in yet another hall, notably free of the fog that filled the previous room. The hall presented him with a choice of going East or West. He decided to try the western way first and found that the hall had another small doorway leading North before its actual end.
Leontius was about to just walk into the room when he heard an odd noise issue out from it and echo about the hall. He had no real way to describe the sound, but he ran into that issue plenty of times in his journeys. After waiting a few seconds to see if the sound would come again, he entered the door and found that it led to a short corridor ending in what looked to be a bath covered by a purple curtain. He could see a faint green glow coming from behind the curtain…
The moment Leontius took another step forward the green glow ceased to exist mid-pulse and was replaced with a shadowy figure behind the curtain. The figure began to move, waving side to side behind the curtain at a slow and steady pace, its motions punctuated by the same sound Leo had heard out in the hall.
Leo calmly set his left hand on his claymore's handle, then slowly made to approach the bath. As he got closer, the shadowy figure began to sway faster and faster, and the noise it produced increased in pitch. Once he stood just before the bath, the thing was rapidly flailing about, the sound at a fever pitch. Somewhat disturbed, Leo outstretched a hand to swipe the curtain aside, only pausing as he detected yet another trace of Humanity coming from whatever was in the bath. Putting the hint of the Dark Soul aside, he hastily pushed the curtain open and found…
The glowing green key. The waving thing vanished the instant the curtain was opened, its trace of Humanity gone as well. Leontius blinked a few times to be sure his eyes weren't playing tricks on him, then shook his head and just picked up the key, he knew what he felt.
He decided to just leave the bathroom-corridor and get to the end of the hall, finding that it led to a room with some massive machine hanging down from the ceiling, suspended by what looked to be thick metal-coated tubing. There were two exits out of the room, one continuing West, the other going North. There was also another wall-mounted device on the far wall, and…
'Another key, just laying on the ground…?'
Sure enough, there seemed to be another of the glowing keys, this one just laying in front of the huge machine. Its pulse of light was yellow, and at a slightly faster rate than the previous two keys. Leontius approached the key and knelt down to pick it up, only realizing something was off the moment he simultaneously detected another Humanity signature and was beset upon by the incredibly heavy form of the key while it was in mid-transformation.
The thing currently atop him rapidly took form, shaping itself into a vaguely familiar fish-like body with a pair of muscular arms, topped by a horrific looking glob of slime that had solid sections in the form of a wide maw surrounded by teeth. Eyes sprouted from the amorphous head, staring angrily down at Leo as he struggled.
The thing then lowered its head, opening its mouth wide and releasing an unexpectedly sweetly-scented breath as it spoke to him in an unsettlingly calm voice. "Welcome to my special hell."
Leontius' features twisted with effort as he put all of his strength into getting the thing off of his chest, grabbing its midsection and pushing himself up with his legs to throw it off him towards the hallway he'd just exited. Now relieved of the creature's weight, he quickly sprung up on a hand and flipped back to his feet, facing the direction he'd tossed the Humanity-injected monster, finding that it too had recovered and was upright.
As he stared the creature down, Leontius realized he was entirely uncertain how to approach this. Was it still considered a monster? Was this one smarter than the head-thing, considering that it spoke to him?
The creature slowly slithered towards him on its fishtail, opening its mouth as it did so. "Do you think I'm pretty?"
Again, that strangely sweet smell practically assaulted Leontius' nostrils. 'No, I am fairly certain this thing is out of its mind, though it definitely seems hostile…'
Leontius slowly backed away to match the creature's advance, but that effort was short-lived as the thing suddenly rocketed into him, clamping its massive maw solidly upon his right arm as it momentarily stunned him with the impact. Its beefy arms instantly wrapped around his torso and lifted him up into the air, seemingly attempting to squeeze the air out of his already non-functioning lungs.
It spoke again despite its mouth being occupied by Leontius' right bicep, the sweet scent filtering through its teeth. "Stay here with me…"
Leontius was most definitely surprised by the sheer agility and power the diseased monster was putting on display, he needed to act quickly before it did something drastic like rip his arm off or crush his bones. He'd been in plenty of dire situations before, so panic had yet to set in. He quickly came to a conclusion; if the creature was empowered by Humanity, then he could potentially tear the sprite from it using the Dark Hand with his still free left arm and deal with the situation in a single move. He was unsure if it would survive, but that was rapidly falling on his list of concerns, there was no telling what would happen if this of all monsters got a hold of his soul or the free soul energy contained within him.
Leontius powered up the Dark Hand in his left fist, the familiar black and crimson aura quickly coating it. As he was about to move to thrust his fist into the creature's body, he saw one of its eyestalks reform and gaze at the dark-coated hand, its pupil shrinking to a pinpoint as it did so. It then released him from its bearhug and spat him out, the undead managing to fall to a knee instead of his face or back.
The monster quickly backed away, its teeth shaking and body pulsating. "I've felt this before." It looked around itself for a means of escape before shrinking into a minuscule ball shape and speeding down the hall behind it.
Leontius stared down the hall as he stood up, watching the thing as it fled. He rolled his neck somewhat to get out the crick the monster's crushing hug put in it, then looked at the state of his right arm. The sleeve and some of the cloth covering his shoulder were perforated, and some small amounts of his blood coated the edges of the holes. He could also still faintly make out that sweet smell…
He silently reached down to his belt for his Estus flask, still staring down the hall as he drank a dose from it to heal up the wounds the thing inflicted.
He gave his arm a slow windmill motion to test it out, finding that it healed just fine. 'That was odd… its attacks were actually physical. Not even Asriel in his Godform had wholly physical attacks, perhaps with the exception of his swords…' With the threat of the creature passed, he decided to figure out what this room and its odd machine had for him.
As Leontius stood before said machine, he couldn't help but feel like it was designed to be a massive head of some kind, as if it were intended to be fitted atop some humongous golem. He approached it and laid a hand against the surface of one of its strange downward protruding mouth-like sections, once more detecting traces of Humanity. The machine absolutely reeked of the stuff, he could almost convince himself it actually had a scent after he sniffed the air close to it hard enough.
'Perhaps this is the machine Alphys mentioned creating using blueprints… but who down here would have the knowledge to extract Humanity? Even above, that is rare knowledge, and it is a secret the Demons are willing to die for…'
Leo decided to check the panel on the wall to the machine's left, finding that it was just a display of the "DT machine's" current status, which was inactive. After reading the device he went to enter the nearby West exit but had to turn back considering wherever it led had a thick, opaque fog that obscured everything in the room beyond recognition. He then went to the North exit, walking into a small room with some machinery and a table with a chair against the North wall.
Leo could make neither heads nor tails of what the machine was, it had a number of slots, buttons, and a small black display similar to the wall-mounted devices, but it was completely black and silent. It was connected to a small white thing built into the wall by a cord of some kind, and uncoupling it didn't appear to do anything. Atop the machine also sat a large stack of strange, thin discs with holes in their centers. All of them featured a side that was matte gray with a white rectangle on it, and the other side was near-reflective and faintly shone with the colors of the rainbow as he manipulated them.
Leo left the machine and discs to instead sit at the table and inspect the things atop it. There was a small, blue circular device that had a thin black cord coming out of it, the cord splitting into two more cords halfway about its length and ending in odd rubbery nodules with holes in their tips. Besides the device and its cords was a pile of five small black rectangular boxes, with labels ranging from one to five on white sections of their chassis. There was also a cylindrical container holding five of the same discs the machine had sitting atop it, only these too were marked one to five on the white sections of the gray side.
Leo was certain the discs were intended for use with the blue circular device, they seemed to be just about the right size to fit inside it somehow. He fiddled with the device, pressing any buttons on it he could find to figure out how to make it work. None of the buttons on its face were phonetically labeled, only being shapes like a square, sideways triangle, a pair of small bars, bars and triangles… and a large silver oval. Pressing the oval caused a large portion of the device to flip open, revealing the insides of the machine. Sure enough, there was what looked to be a space for one of the reflective discs, a peg in the center looking like it would snap a disc into place if presented with one.
'Perhaps I am getting better with this strange monster technology, now to see if I can make this thing serve its purpose…'
Leo picked up the first disc, simply labeled "1," and set it in place in the machine's innards with the reflective side facing down. He shut the device closed, and waited for something to happen. No such thing came, prompting him to turn the device about some more until he found a switch labeled "Power" on the device's backside, currently in the position labeled "OFF." He switched it to "ON" and heard a slight whirring come from the device. The face buttons also became illuminated, with the sideways triangle glowing green.
Leo pressed the inviting green button and heard some sounds coming from the rubbery nodules at the ends of the bifurcated cord. He picked the pair of nodules up and held them closer to his ears to try to make out the sound, pulling down his hood as he did so. He still couldn't quite make out the noises so he put the nodules closer and closer to his ears until he'd essentially pushed them in until they stuck, hearing Toriel's voice mid-sentence, somewhat surprising him.
"-ssst. Gorey, wake up."
The voice of Asgore, somewhat slurred, responded. "Mmm.? What is it, dear? ...er, and why do you have that recorder?"
"Shush! I want to get your reaction. Gorey, dearest. What is my favorite vegetable?"
"Hmmm… Carrots, right?"
"No no no! My favorite vegetable is… Eda-MOM-e… Get it?"
A moment of silence elapsed before Asgore responded. "...Go back to bed, dear."
"No no! Not yet!" A mischievous laugh from Toriel… "Now, if I were a dog, what breed of dog would I be?"
Asgore seemed disinterested in his response. "Hmmm… I don't know honey. What kind of dog would you be?"
"I would be a… MOMERANIAN."
Asgore's disinterested tone seemed to be a ruse, if his jovial laughter was anything to go on. "You sure are excited to have this child. You know, if you keep making jokes like this… One day, you could be… a famous MOMedian."
Another moment of silence, which Toriel eventually broke. "Well, I am going to bed."
A bit of shuffling noise and Asgore's voice came somewhat louder and closer. "Hey! Come on Tori, that one was funny!"
A heartfelt laugh from Toriel in response… "I know, I am just teasing you. Goodnight, dear."
Some more shuffling, then Asgore's voice came again, somewhat muffled. "Goodnight, honey."
A "click" noise sounded out, and the device was silent again. Leontius was baffled by the device, something that could record the sounds of past events then replay them thousands of years later? It must have been powerful monster technology, such a thing could make record keeping far more efficient. Leo opened the device up once more, disc 1 slowing itself from a spin as he popped it out and set it aside to replace it with disc 2.
As he closed the lid, he heard the disc spinning up, followed by the device's audio.
Some strange, loud noises with muffled voices and a pair of laughs, followed by Asriel's voice. "Oh! wait, I had the microphone covered with my thumb… what? You're not gonna do it again…? Come on, quit tricking me!" A short laugh from Asriel, and the same click from before sounded out, marking the end of the disc.
'Strange that Alphys would retain such personal effects of the Dreemurr family, she recorded that she was searching for information on the souls of man and found these, yet never bothered doing away with or returning them…' He decided to see if the other three discs would contain some deep insight on his kind's souls and popped in disc three, setting disc "2" atop "1."
Again the spin up preceded the audio automatically playing.
Asriel's voice sounded out again. "What? Oh, yeah, I remember. When we tried to make a butterscotch pie for Dad, right? The recipe asked for cups of butter… But we accidentally put in buttercups instead."
A quiet, almost inaudible whisper of a voice responded.
"Yeah! Those flowers got him really sick. I felt so bad. We made Mom really upset. I should have laughed it off, like you did… Um, anyway, where are you going with this?"
Once more, a very muted voice spoke.
"Huh? Turn off the recorder…? OK."
Leontius was beginning to doubt these tapes had anything to do with Alphys' research and experiments, these were beginning to sound like they were leading up to Asriel and Characas' plot to get to the surface. He pulled disc "3" out and replaced it with disc "4."
Asriel was the one talking again. "I… I don't like this idea, Characas."
The quiet voice of Characas responded, his barely audible rebuke still laced with venom.
Asriel sounded upset, his voice going unsteady. "Wh… what? N-no, I'm not… big kids don't cry. Yeah, you're right. No! I'd never doubt you, Characas. Never! Y… yeah! We'll be strong! We'll free everyone. I'll go get the flowers."
Another click signified that the audio recording was finished playing. There was only one disc remaining, so he popped disc "4" out and set atop the growing stack, then reached into the container to retrieve "5." The disc was being difficult as if it were stuck, so he upended the container to get the disc out. The disc eventually came out shiny side up as it fell and rattled about the tabletop. Another thing fell out of the container with it as well, the yellow key, this time for real.
Leontius would have considered it odd that the key was in such a place, if not for the fact that he was in a laboratory filled with strange creatures, most of which seemed to have little regard for normality. He pocketed the key and inserted disc "5," the machine doing its usual thing of spinning up before playing the audio.
Toriel's somewhat distant and pleading voice was the first thing Leo heard from this disc's recording. "Characas… Can you hear me? We want you to wake up…"
Asgore's voice followed, just as emotional as Toriel's. "Characas! You have to stay determined! You can't give up! You are the future of humans and monsters…"
A long period of silence elapsed after Toriel and Asgore spoke, only interrupted occasionally by the sounds of cloth loudly rubbing against the recording device. Leontius was about to end the audio, but Asriel's whispered voice stayed his hand. "...Psst… Characas… Please… Wake up… I don't like this plan anymore. I… I… no, I said… I said I'd never doubt you. Six, right? We just have to get six… And we'll do it together, right?" A few more loud cloth noises and the click sounded out again, the device falling silent once the disc inside halted its spin.
Leontius popped the noduled wires out of his ears and didn't bother to remove the disc from the blue replayer device, but he did at least turn it off and set it next to the pile of discs and their container.
He just sat for a little while after putting his hood back up, thinking about what he'd heard. 'Most definitely recordings of the children's plan, along with that first one of Toriel and Asgore… to think that there was information regarding the truth of what happened to their sons in their own home, the whole time…'
Leontius could see why Alphys would want to keep these hidden from Asgore, the information could have proven volatile, but…
'They must know the truth of the matter. Asriel is alive again, and I have heard this tale twice over now. To keep it from them, from Toriel…' He felt especially awful at the idea of hiding the truth from Toriel, he already had some guilt about keeping her in the dark on how time had gone amiss, but this was another matter. He decided he might take it up with Alphys, but to do that he'd both need to get out of this sublevel of the lab and find her.
Leo left the room and passed by the huge Humanity extractor as he walked into the hall the last diseased monster fled through, since the other way was still totally obscured by the soupy fog. He saw no trace of the thing in the hall, so he decided to keep going down the hall to its end, opting to explore it fully before returning to the bunk room.
The hall ended in a tighter, more confined section that had walls consisting of a grid of large metal frames with plates of angled metal suspended inside their centers. The plates would spin somewhat freely if Leontius pushed them. More interesting than the odd flower-looking metal plates was the fact that the light fog was back, as well as a number of strange white particles floating about weightlessly in the air. He could move them about and hold them, but he had no idea what exactly they were even after inspecting a few of them. Other than that, there was only one other thing of interest in the tight corridor, a button against the far wall. It was actually somewhat difficult to spot in the fog, but its metal frame gave it away.
Leo walked up to the button, white particles parting away as he did so, like he was in a liquid of some kind. He ignored the oddity and pressed the button, a satisfying "Click!" issuing out of its frame. Leo was somewhat caught off-guard by the immediate sound of the framed metal plates all around him springing to life and producing loud whirring noises. A considerable draft began building up, and the air began circulating around, likely throughout the whole sublevel if the loudness of the sound was to be believed. The thin fog had dissipated, but the white particles remained in their places, totally unaffected by the air currents.
As Leontius made to leave the switch and the whirring plates, the particles rapidly began to move. They started coalescing into a ball, then fell to the floor not far from him without a sound. As he stared at the thing, he realized something he should have suspected the moment he saw the odd particles. A signature of humanity emanated from the mass, but he couldn't detect it when it was split up like it had been.
It was another trap.
The ball instantly expanded into its true form, that being a white-furred beast with six legs, a thin tail, and a massive neck-head that had nothing but a pitch-black hole for a face, framed by a pair of pointy 'ears.' Its bulk took up the whole of the tight corridor and was about a head shorter than Leontius. The thing cocked its head to the side almost inquisitively, a black substance oozing out of its facehole.
Leontius was unsure how to approach the situation. The last thing was hostile and seemed at least semi-intelligent, and this one had him cornered. There was no getting around the thing, and attempting to jump over it was out of the question thanks to the low ceiling. He decided to see if he could scare this one away by just showing it the Dark Hand, so he lifted a hand out towards it, about to power up the ability.
The thing saw Leontius hold his hand out and its head snapped to attention, a loud wheezing almost-bark issuing out of its now contracting and expanding facehole. Leo was distracted by the oddly doglike behavior and was rushed by the excited creature. It forcefully shoved its head against Leo's outstretched hand, using it to rub its head.
Leo was almost knocked over by the force of the charging monster, but managed to stay upright by placing a hand against the wall behind him. He was a little shocked, but the monster seemed as though it was satisfied with just rubbing its head against his hand. A sudden realization came to him.
This thing was most definitely too doglike for it to be a coincidence, he believed he knew exactly where this creature's constituent monsters were from. He slowly began to actually pet the monster after that thought, causing it to calm down significantly. It folded its legs beneath it, the gaps between them fading into darkness that was soon filled by the white outlines of what looked to be dog faces, all sporting looks of contentment.
Even when diseased, injected with Humanity, then melted and combined together, all it took was a good petting to calm a dog… thing... down.
After about another minute of just petting the creature, Leontius was surprised when it suddenly jerked its head away from his hand, facing down the hall behind it. It got up from its squat, its facehole no longer changing size as it seemed to scan about. It then sped off, crawling all about the walls and ceiling with not even the slightest regard for gravity, seemingly vanishing into thin air as it went.
With the monster gone, Leontius decided to take the opportunity to get moving before another of the creatures appeared. Reasoning that the fog may too have gone from the room past the Humanity extractor, he walked through the long hall once more, only stopping to see if the fog from the dormitory room had also been lifted.
Sure enough, the fog was indeed gone. It also seemed to reveal the thing that was standing by the bed. It appeared to be some kind of tall, pure white cylinder with an oblong shape projecting off its top, like a 'head' of some kind. The thing slowly rotated its top to face Leontius, and seemed to almost stare at him as he peeked into the room. After a moment of the two silently staring, it produced a long arm from the side of its body and actually waved at the undead before vanishing like the dog-monster.
Leontius shook his head at the oddity and went back to walking down the hall, eventually passing through the extractor room into the previously foggy room. It featured slightly darker green tiles and a row of tall, rectangular metal machines that had pairs of doors on their fronts. He recalled seeing a similar looking machine in the lab's main level next to Alphys' desk, but he had no idea what any of them did.
Like the odd machine from the recorder room, these too were attached to small white sections of the wall by cords coming from their chassis. He opened some of the machines, finding that they let out a wave of cold air as he did so. Some were entirely empty, while others held glass containers filled with what looked to be samples of some unidentifiable material. He opted to not tamper with them.
Other than the refrigerating machines, the room was empty. Leontius decided to just look in all of the machines, seeing as it was entirely possible for the key to be in one. As he approached the last one in the row after checking all the others, he again detected Humanity. He backed away from the machine as it turned white and changed shape, shrinking down to a form that looked rather familiar.
The sick monster in question looked almost birdlike, but rather melted and having faces where its eyes should have been, their mouths acting as blinking black eyes instead. Its 'feathers' were white and often seemed to drift away from its body, only to return to their place seconds later. From the posture of its body, it seemed almost as if the monster was weakly trying to sit up from a lying position, its left arm lost in a melted pool of itself while its right struggled to keep its body and head upright.
It was a rather pitiful sight, and the diseased monster made little motion to interact with Leontius in any way, only weakly breathing in long, drawn-out wheezes from its cracked beak as it looked at him at a slight angle.
Leontius felt as though he recognized this monster, then it hit him. It looked like the same species of monster as that father bird and his son he'd had come across when Kirk was attempting to invade him. He was unsure, but it was possible this amalgamated monster was made up of a relative of theirs.
He decided he would attempt to speak with it, perhaps it would understand. "Erm… I am unsure if you understand me, but I think I may have run into your family in Snowdin's forest before. A pair of bird monsters, a lost son and his father who seemed to have been searching for him…"
Slowly, a look of recognition came to the visage of the melting monster, its mouth-eyes opening more, the sides of its beak almost curling up a little.
Leontius decided to continue with his description. "I recall the father wearing glasses and a bowtie, having a rather strong accent, both of them had white feathers with some hints of blue, but I believe the son had more white than blue."
The monster nodded its head, small globs of melt falling a little further away from itself. Then, in a vaguely feminine voice, it spoke. "Sn… o... wy... " A look of realization came to it, and it looked at Leontius with somewhat greater vigor than before. "I remem… ber. Thank… you…" It then moved its left arm somewhat, pushing something out of the melted pool of its form, a key, this one glowing blue.
Leontius knelt down before the monster, picking up the key and getting another attempted smile from it before it slowly vanished.
After standing back up, Leontius couldn't help but think about these monsters. Some seemed better collected than others, some were hostile… some were rather pitiable. Other than the lack of normality and their strange abilities, they seemed not all that unlike the undead of the surface. Just normal people who'd lost themselves and become something else, with some giving in while others desperately try to hold onto even the slimmest pieces of themselves and their pasts. A sad state of affairs to find one's self in.
Leontius decided to get a move on, he'd found all four keys. There was one part of the sublevel he'd not explored yet, and that was accessible from the dorm room. He debated with himself as to whether or not he wanted to bother, but by the time he walked into the dorm room he decided to check the eastern hall he'd yet to go down.
This way led to a kind of hall with a row of floor-to-ceiling mirrors on the left wall, and a table of rather dead looking golden flowers set into a recess on the right wall. At the end of the hall, Leontius could make out what looked to be a door leading to a separate room. Since nothing caught his attention in the mirror and flower hall he just headed straight for the next room, finding it to be a small office of some kind.
The office had a solitary desk with a little less clutter on it than seemed typical of Alphys, as well as another of the smaller monitors she had upstairs. Other than the monitor and its associated attachments, the desk also had what looked to be a smaller portable version of the wall-mounted recording devices. Leontius picked the device up and turned it about, finding a silvery button on one of its edges that turned it on. Sure enough, the device had some records on it.
The first one its series picked up where Leontius previously noticed a gap in the entries. "ENTRY NUMBER 11: Now that Mettaton's made it big, he never talks to me anymore… except to ask when I'm going to finish his body. But I'm afraid if I finish his body, he won't need me anymore… then we'll never be friends ever again… not to mention, every time I try to work on it, I just get really sweaty…"
Leontius was unsure just how old this entry was, seeing as Mettaton certainly had a body already. 'Perhaps these are personal entries that were not relevant to her experiments.'
He checked the next entry, finding it to be rather short. "ENTRY NUMBER 18: The flower's gone."
'I suppose that was all she knew of Asriel, or rather, Flowey, becoming conscious and leaving.'
The one after that was a bit longer. "ENTRY NUMBER 19: The families keep calling me to ask when everyone is coming home. What am I supposed to say? I don't even answer the phone anymore."
Another was available, so Leo clicked the arrow to bring it up. "ENTRY NUMBER 20: Asgore left me five messages today. Four about everyone being angry. One about-"
A sudden sound from behind Leontius made him drop the device to the table and whirr around to see what had managed to sneak up on him, reflexively moving to unsheath and ready his claymore.
It was definitely another of the sick monsters, and it was floating in the doorway, staring at him. The creature had a large, roundish head with what looked to be a singular massive eye, a sharp beak projecting off the side of the head, and a long neck that ended in a body that had thin and spindly legs and a pair of what could tentatively be called 'wings.' As it stared at Leontius, the head would occasionally shift sides in an odd manner, instead of simply turning it the monster would absorb all the features back into the head and rotate them to their opposite side, the beak seemingly rotating about the head as well.
And it just floated there, staring.
Leontius again found himself not entirely certain as to how he was going to handle the creature. He slowly moved his hand away from the handle of his claymore, uncertain if the monster would be hostile or not.
As it saw him do this, the creature's head craned forward in response, its beak opening somewhat. It then uttered another of the strange sounds, and now that Leontius was paying attention he could tell it seemed to almost be a cacophony of various voices and sounds, all jumbled into one and attempting to speak, or in one case, ribbit, over one another.
The undead had to shake his head at the confusing mess of noise, he couldn't make out a thing. "I do not understand you, there are just too many-" The bird thing interrupted him, blurting out another drawn-out mess of sound. Leontius was beginning to become annoyed trying to understand what was even being said. "You voice… I cannot understand, it is jumbled nonsense!"
In response, the creature cocked its head to the side almost as if it understood the exasperated undead's outburst, then tilted its head over and opened its beak wide. It then essentially coughed up a white ball that splattered onto the floor, then recollected itself and began to form up into the vague shape of a humanoid figure. The figure had rounded-off limbs and a head with a pair of round, black eyes, and what looked to be a blunt and mouthless snout.
The floating monster spouted another line of nonsense words, surprisingly ending with an understandable section of speech, that being "so afraid of?" It then opened its mouth again, this time expelling a mass of what looked to be pure-white butterflies that swarmed the humanoid figure's head, causing it to raise its arms, shake violently, and fall to its knees in what seemed to be pain.
Leontius merely raised an eyebrow at the odd display but was put on alert once more when the figure stood, still shaking. It then began to slowly walk towards him, the mass of butterflies swarming about its head beginning to disperse to head towards the undead's direction.
Leontius hastily drew his claymore and powered up the Dark Hand in his free left hand. He currently lacked a shield, but the Dark Hand was nothing if not versatile. It could project its dark energy in a manner similar to a shield and serve rather well for blocking non-physical and magical attacks. He held out his left hand and splayed his fingers as wide as he could, causing the Dark Hand to distort the space in front of it with its energy.
The magical butterflies- which were indeed magic projectiles, just oddly shaped- flew against the dark barrier with no regard for attempting to circumvent it, vanishing in small white puffs as they did so. The bird monster saw the strange dark field and again cocked its head to the side, as if interested in what it saw, rather than afraid.
After a few more steps, the humanoid figure stopped about a quarter of the way through the room. Its head was now devoid of butterflies, but it was still violently shaking while standing in place.
Leontius was unsure exactly what it was about to try, so he powered down his Dark Hand and held onto his claymore's talisman for a moment, preparing a Great Magic Barrier miracle to better protect himself. He noticed that, again, the bird monster was watching him closely the whole time. It saw him preparing the miracle and seemed as though it recalled something, its neck straightening back out and its focus no longer on the undead in question. As it did so, the white humanoid figure vanished, and any errant remaining butterfly projectiles went with it.
The bird monster gave Leontius one last look, speaking as it did. This time its voices were distinct, and all could be understood. One was a simple croak, one said "I've made my peace" and the last said, "Finally someone gets it." It then compacted itself into nothingness and was gone, not even a trace of its Humanity could be detected.
Leontius was unsurprised by the strange sight this time around, the novelty was beginning to wear off. He sheathed his claymore, canceling his miracle preparation and allowing his magical focus to calm itself as he did so.
'I believe I have seen everything there is to see down here, beyond some of Alphys' personal information I have no real interest in. I should be leaving before any more of these monsters halt my egress. Quite a bit of effort just for a conversation…'
He left the small office and swiftly walked through the halls of the sublevel back to the first room with the locked door, not encountering any more diseased monsters along the way. Thankfully, he found that the door was untampered with and the red key was still slotted into its place. He pulled the other three colored keys from a pouch at his belt, slotting them in with no particular order.
Like the red key, the keys ceased their slowly strobing glows and transferred the color to the door, and once all four were in place it activated and detected Leontius like the other automatic doors, sliding open for him. Passing through led him into a room that was slightly smaller than the previous one, with many metal pipes and black cables snaking about its walls, feeding in and vanishing this way and that to go off into different parts of the structure, all of which originated from a large machine built into the middle of the room's wall opposite to the entrance.
Seeing as it was the last thing down here he could interact with, Leontius sorely hoped this machine would be his key to getting back out of the lab's sublevel. Upon closer inspection, he saw that it seemed to have had a thin covering of some odd, gray residue, mostly focused around the pipes coming out of the machine's sides and what looked to be a large central button of some kind, which was marked "POWER."
Leontius pressed the large button, and not seconds later lights set into the room's ceiling sprung on, and the sound of the sublevel similarly coming alive rang through the walls of the power room.
Just as Leontius turned to leave he saw the door to the room open, and Alphys stepped through.
She seemed rather surprised to see him. "O-oh… that makes sense. I was wondering why the power went out in the lab, then I tried to use the elevator but it was gone so I had to climb… anyways, um, it seems like you were a step ahead of me and got it done, but…" She gave the undead man a rather nervous look as he walked closer to her and the door. "Why are you uh… down here?"
Leontius fiddled with his gear belt as he responded, closing up the pouch he'd put the keys in and refastening his claymore's sheath latch. "I had things I wished to talk to you about, so I came here, found the lab deserted, and the door to this level's elevator opened up. I entered, thinking you would be down here, only to end up trapped when the elevator ceased functioning and dropped me down here. I gathered a set of keys around the sublevel to unlock this room, and here we are."
Alphys seemed almost hopeful at that, her nervous expression relaxing a little. "Well, uh… you didn't you see anything… weird… down here, did you?"
Leontius only gave the short reptile woman a somewhat unamused look in response, how could he not have seen what was contained down here? "I believe you know the answer to that already, Alphys."
Her demeanor dropped considerably after that. "I guess you know everything about this place then, huh?"
Leontius' simple nod answered that question easily enough.
She gave a depressed sigh, the floor the only thing she could bring herself to look at. "I did record my work, and they do have the run of the place down here…" She slowly looked back to Leontius, noticing the bloodied holes in his right arm's sleeve. "Wait, did they attack you?!"
The man slightly adjusted his arm as he looked at it in the better light, seeing very clearly there was still a good bit of dried blood on the perforated sleeve. "Some of them were hostile, most were just… strange. One of them, the one with the large mouth and muscular arms, managed to get a hold of me and clamp down on my arm. That was the only injury I took down here."
Alphys looked somewhat aghast at that. "Oh, I'm so sorry! I haven't brought them their food today, and they can get really testy when they're hungry… you're not still hurt, are you? I know you have that healing thing you drink out of…"
Leontius gave a brief shake of his head at that. "No, I am fine. I managed to get the creature off me before it did any considerable damage."
Alphys listened, slight alarm coming back to her. "You didn't hurt any of them, did you?"
Leontius gave her a simple "No" in response, not elaborating any further.
Visible relief flooded the reptilian scientist's features. "Okay, that's good… I don't know what I'd do if any of them… erm…" She looked pensive about her previous statement, but she moved away from the subject. "Let's um… let's get back to the main lab and talk there, I'll deal with these guys after that, alright?"
Leontius gave a nod at that, his left hand idly resting atop his claymore's pommel. "You will get no argument from me at that, lead the way."
vvv
After a quiet and somewhat awkward elevator ride out of the sublevel, the scientist and undead were now back in the main level of the lab, the reptilian monster going to her desk and falling into her chair, looking as though something was weighing on her mind. Leontius was close behind, standing near her desk and in front of her refrigerator as he waited for her to get comfortable.
After running a claw through her top crests, Alphys finally addressed the idle undead. "So uh… what did you want to talk about?"
Leontius shifted somewhat, unsure exactly what to start off with. "Well, I originally wanted to speak with you about the whole issue of Hotland's puzzles and Mettaton being placed in my way, then I also wanted to ask you something concerning me about Asriel, and something Undyne told me about, but… what I saw down there in that sublevel is a bit more concerning, and I am entirely certain has to do with what Undyne was talking about."
Alphys set her arms on her desk, resting her head atop them as she spoke. "Well, did you read my entries I left all over the lab?" Leontius' silent nod made her continue. "Then you know the whole point of the experiments. I was trying to use Determination and monster souls to find an alternate way to make them last and break the barrier, but… I failed. I failed and ruined everything. Then, I just… clammed up. I can't bring myself to do any more than just keep them down there and feed them. Their families have pretty much given up on asking about what's going on, but… I just don't know what to do."
Leontius piped up after Alphys fell silent. "I believe I can give you the hard facts you have yet to learn about your experiments, if it would provide you any solace. Would you be interested in hearing me out on what I know?"
Alphys looked up to the man as he practically towered above her, ambivalence evident upon her features. "I guess… It's not like it'll hurt, or anything…"
Leontius gave her a nod. "I am no more learned on the subject than anyone else above, but I can tell you what I know. The… substance… you call Determination is referred to as "Humanity" by my people. From what I have heard, they are fragments of our true collective soul, the Dark Soul. Everyone was born with at least one fragment of it within their body, contained deep inside them, even past their soul. Some were special, born with Twin Humanities, others were even rarer, having special fragments that radiated false but still functional copies of smaller Humanities. They would eventually be called Firekeepers, and they would come to serve a special purpose in the world above, but..."
He then reached down to his box at his belt and procured the same Humanity he showed to Undyne and Sans from it, letting it float above his hand while Alphys looked on in astonishment at his ability to just handle the sprite-like he was doing.
"...one thing is common among those three kinds of Humanity, it is raw, untamed, and unstable if tampered with. The reason why it reacts so poorly with monster bodies is that it is pure dark, and introducing large amounts of it to an individual, even to a human, can be detrimental. But…"
He then tightly gripped the sprite until it stressed, and eventually was crushed in his hand. A loud and mysterious sound accompanied its energy absorbing into him.
"...Undead are essentially fueled by it, as we are something other than human now. Without it, we become soulless Hollows upon death and are at risk of fading into nothingness. It allows us to persist after death, even after hundreds of them."
He looked at the agape scientist, his expression neither judging nor entirely soft. "There is no possible way you could have known these things. What happened was merely the result of you doing your best with what knowledge and resources you had, following your king's orders. You are not the first to find out just how volatile Humanity and the dark can be, you likely will not be the last. I understand that your failure has affected you greatly, and I mean to tell you that it is in the past, and there was simply no way you could have foreseen what would happen. What matters now is how you handle things moving forward."
Alphys looked away from Leontius, seeming like she was at least somewhat resolved at hearing that. "Thanks… I… I just felt like I messed up somewhere, like someone smarter than me could have figured out a way to make it all work, or even fix what happened when it all went wrong. But to think, it was actually something so powerful… it could have gone way worse, couldn't it?"
Leontius gave a thoughtful look at that. "I am uncertain. It is a mysterious subject, and trying to learn more about it has inherent dangers. What else Humanity could do is beyond me, since I merely utilize it like other undead do. But what you should be concerning yourself with now is how to handle the results, not worrying about what was or what could have been."
Alphys sat up, giving a thoughtful nod at that. "You're right, I'm just… sorry. I can't help but worry like that. I don't think there's any way to turn them back into individual monsters, and even if I did, they'd still have the falling sickness… but as long as they're fed well they're actually pretty docile. Some even talk still, and most of the time they just act a bit strangely and that's it. I think… I think I'll just come out and finally tell everyone what happened. I'll release the amalgamated monsters back to their homes and families, and… try to finally move on."
Leontius gave her an encouraging look. "If you believe that would be best, then go with your instinct on it. As for the events you set in place for me on my way to the Core…"
Alphys looked back to the man, slight nervousness setting in once more. "Yeah… about that, I um… I was really depressed for a long time after everything just fell apart on me during the experiments. I felt useless, and after I stopped talking to people I started having pretty dark thoughts… I was in a really bad place, but then you came! I saw you, heard about your plans, started to root for you, and I felt like I had to help. But it was a pretty straight shot from here to the Core, so I decided to start putting puzzles in the way, then help you solve them. I just… wanted to feel like I was doing at least something good, you know?" She gave Leontius a hopeful look, but it dropped somewhat when she noticed he was quiet. "You're… not angry at me, are you? I understand if you ha-"
Leontius interrupted the monster scientist, he didn't need her going down any more self-deprecating paths. "No, I am not angry, Alphys. Considering Mettaton told me his side of the whole ordeal, I just wanted to be sure it was the truth. They were short-lived roadblocks, and yes, I found some rather irritating, but none presented much in the way of a real threat to my mission."
Alphys' concerned look slowly shifted to her trademark nervous smile. "Okay, good… I don't know what I'd do if I got on your bad side, of all people. I uh… saw the fight with that huge knight guy. I actually sent Undyne out there, and watched the whole thing. You're... um… really strong. And fast. And your magic is scary. And your armor is huge, and your sword…" She managed to catch Leontius' nonplussed expression and slowly raising eyebrow, and with a cough cut off her slow decline into rambling before it got any more awkward. "Uh… what else did you want to talk about, again?"
Leontius lightly leaned against the refrigerator next to Alphys' desk as he answered, but stood up straight again when it rocked back slightly in response to him doing so, and he instead opted to just fold his arms. "Ah... it was something concerning Asriel. A few things, actually."
"Oh, Asgore and Toriel's son? I uh… heard you managed to bring him back to life somehow…" She gave Leontius a genuinely curious look. "How did you do that, exactly?"
Leontius unfolded his arms, thinking for a brief moment before answering. "Well, in light of recent discoveries I made in your lab, I believe it was also partly thanks to your efforts during your experiments."
That statement caught Alphys entirely off-guard, a look of nervous uncertainty etched into her features. "W-what? I don't… I'm not sure what you're talking about…"
Leontius decided a brief statement would suffice in jogging her memory. "The flower."
It took her only a moment before she put the pieces together. "The fl- oh! Wait, the vessel that escaped? You mean that was…"
Leontius gave a brief nod. "Asriel. Yes, that flower you injected with Humanity, that held Asriel's spirit. It was a stopgap vessel for his being, and he went soulless for quite a while from the sounds of it, but thanks to your experiments you inadvertently managed to make it possible to save him from death. A few days ago, do you recall feeling… what did he say it was… a sensation of pulling and a flash?"
Alphys' somewhat delayed nod answered his query.
The undead continued. "That was Asriel absorbing every monster's soul after stealing the six human souls as the flower and regaining his form. After that, I fought him for a short while, then managed to free everyone's souls from him. He released the human souls, and feared he would revert back to the flower… but I gave him a small piece of my own soul to ensure such a thing did not occur."
Alphys was again agape at what she'd just heard. The human was just full of surprises today. "That's… to be able to just pull a part of your own soul out, how're you able to do that…?" She then looked as though she recalled something in a brief moment of clarity. "Wait, is it that crazy power you used to beat that knight? You stuck your hand into his chest and just pulled his soul and Deter- er, Humanity out of him, didn't you?"
Leontius nodded, he decided he didn't need to demonstrate the ability considering she'd apparently seen its effects first hand.
Alphys just sat for a silent moment, thinking on the idea of such a power's capabilities, however, she soon came up with a question to ask. "Do you think you can… uh… use that on monsters? Because if you were able to just… pull a monster's soul out while they're alive…" She didn't elaborate further, letting the question hang.
Leontius found her train of thought odd, reasoning that she may have been thinking about her experiments once again. "I believe the Dark Hand would be entirely capable of doing that. I was able to use it on Asriel to pull monster souls out of him when he had essentially achieved godlike power, so I believe using it on a regular monster would likely be relatively simple. Of course, I have no reason to do such a thing… but beyond all of that, I still had a concern regarding Asriel I wished to ask you about, in light of things..."
Alphys did indeed seem like she was thinking about something else, but was knocked from her thoughts by Leontius redirecting the conversation. "Oh, what is it?"
Leontius' disposition dropped somewhat, his worry on the subject becoming rather visible in his body language. "Asriel has a soul again, and it is essentially just a fragment of mine, but that is exactly what is worrying me. He has a human soul and nothing else in his monster body. Strange things are already happening with him, such as the fact that he is growing at a rather alarming rate, and has horns growing in that are of odd coloration. Neither he nor Toriel seem greatly concerned by it, but I am uneasy at the possibility of Asriel's unique case developing some strange unforeseen complication."
The taller man then gave Alphys an almost pleading look before continuing, looking right at her directly through his normally obscuring hood. "You are the most qualified out of anyone I know of to ask, seeing as you experimented with such things… do you think there could be some issue that might arise out of this for Asriel?"
The royal scientist couldn't help but feel somewhat paralyzed by Leontius' gaze, she found it incredibly disconcerting that Leontius of all people could be so unsure, maybe even scared, about something. "I uh… um…" She broke her gaze away from his, blinking and lightly shaking her head as she thought on it. "There could be some… um… problems with his physicality that might come up, but that may only be something that happens when you put Humanity into a monster. The growing I'm not too sure about. I do know how Boss Monsters grow, and considering he's got a part of you, he could be drawing his energy from you, maybe? I just have no idea, it's a really strange situation…"
Leontius wasn't sorely disappointed about Alphys essentially being only a little less in the dark about the problem. As he'd said before, it was an entirely unique case. "I see… I suppose we will just have to wait and keep an eye on him, then."
Alphys was contemplative for a bit before she decided to comment further. "Actually, I do have some equipment that might be able to test his body, at least on the physicality thing. Just… let me handle the monsters down in the lower level and make my statement to the people. I'll uh… send you a message when I'm done… somehow."
Leontius caught her somewhat annoyed tone at that last bit, but what she was annoyed about was lost upon him. "I will have to present the idea to Toriel and Asriel first, ultimately it will be their decision. You also reminded me of something in regards to messages, I need you to tell Asgore something, it is a matter of the Underground's security."
Alphys was again able to look at the undead, now that his worried mood had passed. "Alright, what's it about?"
Leontius believed she may have already seen the destroyed Ruins door considering she was able to warn Undyne about the Pursuer, but he reasoned the detail may have slipped her mind. "The door to the Ruins is completely destroyed thanks to the knight smashing through it. I had sealed it, but… apparently, it did not do much to stop him."
Alphys looked somewhat concerned, realizing she had glossed over that detail entirely when she saw it. "Oh yeah, I saw that through one of my cameras too… he just put his sword right through the door like it wasn't even there. Did you want Asgore to get it repaired, or something?"
Leontius gave a subtle nod. "It was more than just the door though, I surveyed the entirety of the Ruins. The whole area suffered a great deal of damage. You must tell Asgore the damage needs to be repaired, preferably in a manner that seals that whole area up for good. No doors, just solid walls and the like to prevent any more surfacers from getting through."
Alphys silently reached into a pocket on her white coat and pulled out a small device, then set about fiddling with its screen for a few moments, small audible clicks sounding out as she did so. "Done."
Leontius had to be sure he'd heard her correctly. "...That quickly?"
Alphys held up the small device and turned it about as though it were entirely normal, like it was an everyday thing to simply send messages at such speed. "Yep, cell phones can instantly message just about anyone else who also has one."
"...That would explain Undyne's response time, I suppose. There is one more thing, I need to leave the Underground to seal up one more way into here, there is a hole in the mountain's West face that leads down into the Ruins. If I close up that opening, no one will be capable of getting into the Ruins in the first place. I should be able to leave by passing through the section of the Barrier in Asgore's castle, correct?"
Alphys looked at the man somewhat sideways, slowly getting ready to message with her phone once more. "Do you know if your soul is at least as strong as one monster soul and one human soul combined?"
Leontius was more than certain he met that qualification, so he answered with a simple "Yes."
Alphys continued after Leo's assurance. "Well then, I guess you should uh… be able to just come and go through the barrier, no problem. When did you want to get that done, exactly?"
Leontius wanted to seal the hole up as soon as possible, but he had not forgotten Toriel's plans for dinner, which was likely approaching soon. "I have other plans for tonight, so I suppose having Asgore get the materials prepared for me any time tomorrow would be best."
Alphys set to sending the king yet another message, and after a few more moments seemed to have finished. Her phone then made a sound, having received a message in kind from Asgore. "Asgore says he'll get people out to the Ruins to seal it up as soon as he can, and he'll get some construction supplies from them set aside for you." She then dropped her phone back in its pocket. "Good luck out there, from what you said it sounds really dangerous up there."
Leontius wouldn't deny that outright, but it wasn't quite the case for the mountain in particular. "This place, the mountain, is actually quite a good distance away from most sources of danger, especially my peoples' Ruined Kingdom. Sealing the hole will likely be a simple task, but the safety it will grant will certainly put me at ease."
Alphys was going to say something addressing the 'good distance away from danger' thing and how two surfacers managed to find their way here, three if she included Leontius himself, but abstained since she felt the undead man would probably have some explanation behind it ready anyway. "Well, you did come from up there, so I'm sure you can handle going back for just a bit. So… was there anything else you wanted to talk about? Because I'd like to get started on figuring out how I'm going to address everyone…"
At first, Leontius felt as though he had covered more than everything he'd originally wanted in the conversation, but recalled the audio recordings he'd heard in the sublevel. He wondered if he should bring up the issue of the truth behind Asriel and Characas' deaths, but got the feeling Alphys had enough on her plate as it stood. He decided he'd handle the issue alone, and try to keep her from being implicated in knowing about it. "No, I believe I have gotten all I wished to speak with you about out of the way, so I suppose I will be off. Thank you for taking the time out of your schedule to talk with me, Alphys."
Alphys made to turn and face her computer as Leontius started leaving, giving her goodbye as she did so. "Alright, I'll see you later then." She then turned in her chair once more to face him, just barely catching his attention as he got to the door. "Oh, Uh… sorry you got stuck down there and had to deal with those monsters, really, I should have made sure that elevator was locked before I left…"
Leontius didn't seem too overly concerned about the whole ordeal. "Do not worry about it, it was more my fault for being impatient and going places in your lab without permission, instead of just waiting. Now, I must be going, I would prefer not to be late for my arrangements." He then kept walking, the door detecting him as usual and letting him exit.
Alphys gave the man one last look as he left, turning back to her computer once the automated door closed behind him.
She powered the computer on, and once it booted up she opened a new text document and got to writing her public statement on the experiments, the weight that had been pressing down on her for the longest time slowly lifting with each word she got down.
(26)
