Silence. Eerie silence. What was going on?
Ginger slowly stood back up, shielding her face and eyes from the blinding light with the cape of her cloak. What'd just happened?
Finally, the lights dimmed again. She cautiously peeked open an eye, and she beheld a mist that now covered the entire room, obscuring everything.
That was when the spotlights came back on from above, and it shone down through the fog onto the silhouette shrouded within it. In the place of the killer rectangle, there now stood a far more humanoid figure.
"OHHH MY."
Ginger was dumbfounded beyond comprehension; what was going on? Who was this? Where was Mettaton at?
...Was THIS Mettaton?
"IF YOU FLIPPED MY SWITCH, THAT CAN ONLY MEAN ONE THING."
Yes. Yes. It was Mettaton. But she remembered his silhouette looking a lot more...square than what she was seeing in the mist.
"YOU'RE DESPERATE FOR THE PREMIERE OF MY NEW BODY."
New body? Was this what Alphys had intended to happen? She had so many questions; it was getting stranger by the second.
"HOW RUDE...LUCKY FOR YOU, I'VE BEEN ACHING TO SHOW THIS OFF FOR THE LONGEST TIME. SO...AS THANKS, I'LL GRANT YOU A HANDSOME REWARD. I'LL MAKE YOUR LAST LIVING MOMENTS..."
A gust of air scattered the mist on the stage, and Mettaton came into crystal clear view. And the sight of him was...
"ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL!"
The Huntress was utterly stupefied by Mettaton's new form; instead of a block on a wheel, she now stared up at a slim, six foot tall, perfectly polished figure that was one-hundred percent certainly made to look like a human.
"...What."
"ALRIGHT, THAT'S ENOUGH GIBGAB! IT'S SHOWTIME, BEAUTIES!"
Stage lights blared, music sounded off, and in seconds, the entire stage transformed into nothing less than a dancefloor. One flashy enough to put any other to shame. And to top it all off, a monitor opened up on the wall behind him, displaying a chart of viewers and ratings, recording the data from across the entire Underground.
"MAKE THE FIRST MOVE, WHY DON'T YOU? SHOW THE FANS WHAT THEY'RE IN FOR!"
She knew there were cameras on her, so she decided not to make a fool of herself.
Mettaton watched as she turned her back towards him, then fired the arrow she had ready straight up into the air. She kept her eye on it as it slowed down, reaching its peak, and then the arrow tilted downward, hurtling towards the ground. It was the same trick she'd used to impress the mercenaries in the rest of the CORE...
But with a twist.
She reached out her gauntleted hand, and right when the arrow was about to land, she clenched her fist, and the tip of the projectile hovered only a foot over the ground.
She caught it. And the ratings gradually began to increase.
"NOT A BAD START, HUMAN...NOW IT'S MY TURN!"
A series of bullets came down from above, extending over the entire battleground.
...Legs. They were bullets. In the shape of his legs.
Why?...WHY?
But it didn't matter what they looked like. A bullet was a bullet and it had to be avoided. Ginger tried firing at them to see if they would dissipate, but instead of doing that... They instead began from the right to the left and back as they descended. At least now she had an opportunity to didge them as they moved out of her way.
But dealing with them was tricky; she only had so much time to get out of their way as they went from side to side, and she ended up being clipped by two of them, being struck right in the face by the pointed tips of them...Not a pleasant sensation.
But she didn't go down so easily.
"LOOKS LIKE I MANAGED TO SNAG THE EVASIVE HUNTRESS A FEW TIMES, EH, FOLKS? WELL, IF SHE THOUGHT THAT WAS HARD, THEN LET'S SEE HER GET A LOAD OF THIS! LIGHTS! CAMERA! BOMBS!"
"Bombs?!" she echoed.
Sure enough, from above came the explosive bullets; it looked like she was going to have to fire at them to set them off before they reached her.
Ginger's SOUL was still in Yellow Mode, so with the aid of the phone provided, she could aim projectiles at them from where she stood. This was exactly what she did, quickly moving out of the way of the four-way explosion before her bullet set it off. She did this six times, and then the attack ceased.
"SO YOU'RE GOOD AT BOMB DODGING," the robot acknowledged. "BUT SURELY YOU CAN DO MORE THAN SLIP PAST ATTACKS AND SHOOT ARROWS, RIGHT?"
"Try me," she snarled, tightening the gauntlet on her hand.
"OOOH, YOU'RE COMING INTO CLOSE QUARTERS, ARE YOU? WELL, LET'S SEE HOW WELL YOU CAN LAND A HIT!"
The Huntress' brow furrowed, and she emitted an aggressive snarl as she dashed at him with a clenched fish. Her punch was blocked by a gloved hand in a split second, and with one swift motion, Mettaton sent her spinning across the floor like a top. She careened across the floor in a U-turn, returning to her opponent, and he didn't hesitate to catch her, spin her around with him and lean her back like she was his dance partner.
"THAT MUST HAVE BEEN FAIRLY UNEXPECTED, NOW, WASN'T IT?" he teased.
"Yeah..." she admitted. "...And so is this!"
Mettaton didn't realize his folly until it was too late, and the human sent a her metal-gloved knuckles slamming right into his face. In the less defensive form he'd taken on, her attack actually managed to do some damage, and he lost his grip on her and staggered back. Again, the ratings steadily went up; the audience seemed to be enjoying the high tensions between them.
"YOU CRUEL CREATURE! IS THAT HOW YOU THANK ME FOR THE DANCE?"
"That was supposed to be a dance?" she taunted. "I'd say you have two left feet."
"OH, THE AUDACITY! WELL, IF YOU THINK YOU CAN DO BETTER, LET'S PUT THAT TO THE TEST!"
He summoned another weapon from above.
"IT'S A PANIC AT THE DISCO, PEOPLE! LET'S SEE IF SHE CAN KEEP UP THE PACE!"
It cast down blue attacks, passing through the human as she stood still, awaiting the snare. When she caught sight of a white attack coming her way, she fired at the disco ball to see if it changed anything; the white laser turned blue, and all of the past blue ones turned white.
"...So that's how it works."
All she had to do was fire as the attacks switched in order to stay safe, and it worked. Finally, they stopped.
"YOU FIGURE THINGS OUT QUICKLY, I ADMIT. VERY CLEVER...WHY DON'T WE SPEED THINGS UP A BIT?"
He fired up the same attack from before, but the blue and white beams had now doubled in speed as the passed through her. But she wouldn't let herself be dragged down; she only made a single mistake, having turned the final stream of magic white instead of blue during her rush, and receiving some damage. But since the very end had been her only mistake, it was safe to say that the Huntress had proven her skill with flying colors.
And despite the initial pain of the bullet landing, she managed to fire three good shots at Mettaton from her SOUL right when he'd stopped his attack.
"*OOF.* HA...THAT WASN'T TOO TERRIBLE, YOU KNOW, HUNTRESS? BUT ARE YOU AS GOOD WITH WORDS AS YOU ARE IN WAR?"
Something rose up from out of the floor in front of the human. It was a keyboard, it looked like, and a monitor appeared on the screen behind her adversary.
"THIS ONE'S AN ESSAY QUESTION, MS. WINGREN. CONSIDER IT A CALLBACK TO OUR FIRST ENCOUNTER!"
The question displayed itself on the screen.
'What do you love most about Mettaton?'
She scoffed at the idea, and the killer robot caught sight of her sly grin stretching across her face as she tapped away on the keyboard. After several seconds, she stepped away from the panel, and Mettaton curiously turned around to the face the monitor behind him and see what she'd written.
"He belongs in the Trash Zone with the rest of the scrap metal."
"VERY FUNNY, HUMAN. THIS ESSAY IS SUPPOSED TO BE ABOUT ME, NOT YOU!" he teased, the ratings declining just a bit.
"Last time I checked, I was made of flesh and blood. Where do you think Dr. Alphys found all of the metal to make you, huh?"
"WHY, THE SAME PLACE A CERTAIN TEMMIE FOUND THE METAL TO MAKE THE ARMOR YOU'RE WEARING RIGHT NOW."
"Well...At least mine can take a punch."
"OOH, STILL JUST AS PAWKY AS EVER, AREN'T YOU, DARLING? I WILL ADMIT, YOUR LITTLE ESSAY REALLY SHOWED EVERYONE YOUR HEART...WHY DON'T I SHOW YOU MINE?"
The cavity in his middle opened up, and his SOUL was exposed to open attacks. That was his weak point. That was his charisma. His ego.
...His pride.
And the Huntress had every intention on trampling it down into the dirt.
She fired at it, and was quick to discover that his SOUL was not only surprisingly durable, but could launch its OWN series of attacks, sending out a wave of white bolts from every direction. At least they were predictable; all Ginger really had to do was keep her distance until they spread out far enough for her to pass through easily.
But while the bolt bullets were flaring out, Mettaton himself conjured up a few more weapons for variation and sent them down from above; smaller white bullets...made to look like his original, rectangular form. Was he really that conceited that he even had to make his magic projectiles look like himself? They weren't just for show, however; Ginger thought she could dodge them easily, seeing how far they landed from her, but as soon as they got low enough, the mini-Mettatons sent out a secondary array of missiles that'd been aimed right at her! At least they were slow and straight enough to evade easily...But still!
Heart missiles... she frowned. Oh, because all your fans love you so much, and you're the greatest? What a joke.
When the next two mini-Mettatons descended, she tried firing at them to see if that did anything...And it did! Upon impact, both of the bullets dissipated in a flash!
Well, now that she knew their weakness, she could focus on her actual target.
The human continued to fire at Mettaton's SOUL, not holding anything back, even while she was dodging bolts and shooting miniatures. Finally, his SOUL retreated back into its owner, and she heard a mechanical crash of some sort come from inside her opponent. That noise paired with the pain conveyed by on his face meant that she had to have done something. Maybe she'd damaged him on the inside. Whatever she'd done, it was a good start, she had to admit.
But he shook it off in a hurry, or at least did his best to hide it. Mettaton wasn't going to give up so easily.
"YOU SEEM PLEASED WITH YOURSELF, DEAR HUNTRESS. HOW MUCH LONGER DO YOU THINK YOU CAN KEEP THIS UP?"
"I've barely been hit at all so far!" she boasted. "And I'm willing to bet I can slide right past your next move without a scratch!"
"OH, I'M JUST WARMING UP! TRY YOUR HAND AT THIS!"
Ginger straightened herself out and prepared for the next wave of attacks.
The ratings chart sloped upwards as a whole swarm of mini-Mettas came down from above.
Despite the sheer number of them, they came in clusters, and were easy to take out in one swift sweep before they could even get the chance to send their hearts her way.
"SO YOU DO LIVE UP TO YOUR CLAIMS? WELL, DON'T GET COCKY YET. YOU MAY HAVE LASTED LONGER THAN I ANTICIPATED, BUT IF YOU GO TOE-TO-TOE WITH ASGORE, YOU'LL FIND OUT THE HARD WAY THAT YOU MADE A MISTAKE NOT GIVING YOUR SOUL UP TO ME INSTEAD!"
"Cocky? Speak for yourself for a change, why don't you?"
"HMMM...GOOD IDEA! I'M SO HOT, IT'LL BLOW YOU AWAY! HEADS UP, DARLING!"
All he had to do was point up, and the Huntress found herself looking at another array of bombs coming down, and with each one, there was an indestructible white bullet. It was a good thing she already knew how these explosives worked, so she was able to fire at them, then move out of the way quickly enough, and THEN move out of the way of the white bullets. Fortunately, it was a lot easier than it sounded, seeing how fast she already was.
"Ha! Ya really BOMBED that one!"
"PERHAPS A BREATHER WOULD DO ME GOOD...TIME FOR OUR UNION-REGULATED BREAK! STAY TUNED VIEWERS!"
The music and flashing lights dimmed down, and the monitor behind him swapped out the ratings chart for a flashing "HAPPY BREAKTIME" announcement as everything got quieter. Mettaton stood still, ceasing the action, and the confused Huntress stared right into his gaze.
"...What are you doing?"
"DON'T YOU KNOW WHAT A COMMERCIAL BREAK IS? WHAT IF SOMEONE HAS TO USE THE BATHROOM?"
"Monsters don't use the bathroom, you twit."
"HA! THAT WAS A TEST! AND IT SEEMS LIKE YOU ARE AS SMART AS YOU MAKE YOURSELF OUT TO BE! THEN IN THAT CASE...WHAT IF SOMEONE NEEDS A REFILL ON POPCORN? OR HAS TO WALK THEIR PET? OR SELL THEIR SPIDER DONUTS?"
"Sell their..."
Wait a second.
That reminded her; how did Muffet describe the person who'd offered her a fortune for the human's SOUL?
"Six feet. Maybe a few inches over...I swear, he looked like a male model, he was so glamorous. And he was...very strangely humanoid. With his head of black hair, and his broad shoulders...Ah," she sighed. "...I didn't think it fitting on any man beforehand, but he looked surprisingly good in pink."
"Hmmm..." she hummed mischievously, tapping the tips of her metal-gloved fingers against each other as a sly smirk spread across her face.
"ALRIGHT! BREAKTIME'S OVER! ON WITH THE SHOW!"
That was it? It'd barely been a minute long...
Oh, well, she decided. At least I know what to throw at him now.
But it turned out that insults and humiliating revelations weren't the ONLY things she'd have to be firing.
"WHY, WE'VE GROWN SO DISTANT SINCE THAT TERRIBLY LONG BREAK, DARLING," he drawled. "HOW ABOUT ANOTHER HEART-TO-HEART?"
His SOUL came out into the open again, with the same bolt attacks as before...But this time the SOUL itself was guarded by a spinning shield of the weaker block bullets that she'd seen in former attacks, which she had to take care of first. At least there were no mini-Mettas this time, so she could concentrate on this more.
Every few seconds, the block shield would disperse, exposing the SOUL, only to return moments later fully repaired. It was a good thing they could be gotten rid of so easily, and more still, the few seconds it took for them to return gave her the opportunity to fire, and she did NOT waste it, shooting her own bullets from her SOUL right to his.
Finally, Ginger heard another mechanical break, but this time, it was far louder.
And THIS time, the damage was much more apparent.
Ginger watched in utter shock as Mettaton's arms were blown clean off his body by the internal explosion!
Now this was something she was taken aback by. She'd seen and heard far worse from the battlefield before, but despite having been practically mutilated, the robot did his all to keep at it like nothing was wrong, striking even more poses for several good, long moments after the damage was dealt before having to stop.
"I didn't think I'd ever say this to the likes of you, but...uh...Should I be concerned by this?"
"HA...! YOU SHOULD BE VERY CONCERNED! FOR YOURSELF!" he retorted, trying to hide the pained expression forming on his face again as white smoke started to emit from the empty sockets.
"Your arms freaking blew off!"
"A...ARMS? WHO NEEDS ARMS...WITH LEGS LIKE THESE!?" he huffed, striking yet another pose. "I'M STILL PLENTY STRONG ENOUGH TO DO YOU IN!"
"We'll see about that..." Ginger answered him, convinced that she was well on her way to yet another victory. With the amount of damage she was seeing, it was unlikely that he would last much longer.
"YES, WE WILL...! RIGHT NOW!"
Another series of bombs started their way down. This time, there were four bullets per row, giving the Huntress the option to either shoot a bomb or one of the cubed bullets. Just to play things safe, she took the latter option, which worked out well enough, and it looked like she was in the clear...
That is, until the column came to a halt and began to backtrack upwards again.
"What!?"
She tried to rewind her own path through the bullets, but they came up too fast and too closely, and she ended up hitting a lot more than she expected to.
"SEE!? WHAT DID I TELL YOU!? I'VE STILL GOT IT! JUST GIVE UP THE SOUL ALREADY!"
The human hissed out a counter as she held onto her bleeding side. But despite the pain, another smug grin spread across her face, and her eyes narrowed slyly.
"Do you think..." she growled. "...I came unprepared?"
With a smooth, swift motion, she withdrew another trump card; the Starfait.
"OOH! ARE YOU PROMOTING MY BRAND? THE AUDIENCE MUST BE GOING NUTS RIGHT ABOUT NOW!"
"And for my next trick...I'm gonna make it disappear!"
As quickly as she'd pulled it out, the Huntress popped the lid off and downed the entire thing. The blood running down her side and staining the leather of her armor ceased to flow, and all other wounds faded into nothing as though they'd never been there. The ratings displayed on the monitor began to skyrocket.
That was when Mettaton got over his excitement and realized what'd just happened.
"HOW DARE YOU USE MY OWN BRAND AGAINST ME!"
"Well, maybe if I had any SPIDER CIDER, that might not have been the case."
"I BEG YOUR PARDON?"
"Don't act like you don't know," she told him. "You're the one who bribed Muffet into taking my SOUL for you! Looks like your little hired assassin plan was a bit short-sighted, eh? It's a shame, too...You could say we had a discussion, and she seemed pretty charmed by you."
"WELL, GOOD FOR HER! EVERYONE WITH HALF A BRAIN IS!"
"Too bad she's about to find out the real reason you're doing all of this. Taking my SOUL so you can dessert everyone down here for humanity? Imagine the heartbreak."
He actually seemed to falter with his words for a moment before answering, the smoke pouring from his empty arm sockets turning black.
"I HAVE...NO REGRETS! THE SHOW...MUST GO ON...!"
The next attack was a mixed cluster of bombs and cubes, and Ginger shot a pathway through it like it was nothing. Everyone knew the Huntress was cunning and quick, but she was a fairly new face. The sight of her going up against the likes of the Underground's long-running idol in a one-on-one battle to the death, paired with the fact that she was obviously winning? It was the most intense thing anyone beneath Mount Ebott had ever witnessed. Some viewers remained loyal to the original star, and rooted for her destruction. Others cheered her on to victory. The entire Underground was ablaze with the voices of many.
"He's not goin' down yet, bro! Show that human who's boss!"
"Come on, lil' dudette! He's almost down, you got him!"
"This is bonkers! Like, how much longer do you think he can go without his arms, Catty?"
"I dunno, Bratty, but we're gonna find out here soon!"
"Come on, little buddy...Kick that guy till he's down like he did me...!"
"So his heart betrays his face...Hmm...I wonder what robot donuts would taste like...?"
"Oh, boy...Glad sellin' ice cream's safer than showbiz."
"Mom! Dad! That's the human who saved me from falling! Yo, come on, Ging'! You've got arms, throw some more wicked punches!"
"I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO THINK! UNDYNE, WHO DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO WIN?!"
"I don't know and I don't care! I just wanna see them both KILL EACH OTHER!"
"SANS! WHAT DO YOU THINK WILL COME OUT OF THIS!?"
"come on, papyrus...we both know she's got this one in the bag."
"...Heheheheh. Enjoy your fame while it lasts...Enjoy your LIFE while it lasts. You idiot."
"L...LIGHTS! C...CAMERA...ENOUGH OF THIS! DO YOU REALLY WANT HUMANITY TO PERISH!? OR DO YOU JUST BELIEVE IN YOURSELF THAT MUCH!?"
Another stream of bombs came in for the assault; this was a familiar attack, and Ginger breezed right through it.
"I've gotten past everyone else so far," she reminded him. "The king should be no different! Call this off or I'll probably ACTUALLY end up killing you!"
"HA...! HOW INSPIRING! NOT TODAY, HUMAN! IT'S EITHER YOU OR ME! AND I THINK WE ALREADY KNOW WHO'S GOING TO WIN! BEAUTIES AND GENTLE-BEAUTIES! WITNESS THE TRUE POWER OF HUMANITY'S NEXT GREATEST STAR!"
One more time, the cavity containing his SOUL let it free. This time, a pair of bombs orbited around it as it fired out the bolts.
So THAT'S how he wants to play...
It turned out, this was his longest and most versatile attack yet; she was firing at his SOUL while at the same time making sure not to hit the bombs where they could land their cross-sectioned explosion on her and ALSO avoiding the bolts coming out of it.
But the REAL, LITERAL kicker was when the spot of the battlefields that Ginger was on flashed red, and she could have sworn she saw an exclamation point of warning blink inside of it.
She decided just a moment too late to move out of the way, as another row of those accursed leg bullets formed inside of it and ended up kicking her in the face.
And then the same thing happened on her opposite side, too soon for her to react.
"So that's how it's going down!?" she snarled again, her fury returning with triple its original strength as she regained her fighting composure. "Fine, then! DO YOUR WORST!"
The assault didn't cease; she eliminated the two bombs first, just barely missing the explosions that followed, and then fired at the SOUL like it was a rabid beast that had to be destroyed, carelessly moving about the battleground and getting hit by a good number of the bolts. But she could barely feel any of it through her own anger.
The rage that all Pure Ones were instructed to hold and store for war. She had released hers in a fiery inferno of zealous, untamable wrath.
And all the while, she spewed out a series of insults to accompany it, saying something new every time she landed a hit on him.
"That's for patronizing me!"
"That's for kicking me!"
"That's for trying to blow me up!"
"THAT'S for hiring people to kill me!"
"THAT'S FOR PUTTING ME THROUGH HAGSMIRE ON THIS ALL-HELL TELEVISION MASSACRE!"
Finally she threw the phone down, letting it clatter onto the ground as she charged her adversary like a raging bull.
"OH NO..."
"AND THIS IS FOR YOU AND ALPHYS PLAYING ME LIKE A DAMNED! FOOL!"
With her last two outbursts, she landed two of the hardest, angriest blows she ever threw at anyone. The first, a punch to the face...
And the second, an unrelenting kick that landed right in between his legs.
Mettaton tensed, and just as soon as he did, something else went off inside of him...
And then the legs themselves fell away.
The synchronized gasp let out by all of the viewers in the Underground could nearly be heard all the way to the nearest human civilization.
...
"...What was that?"
Nyra looked out to the northeast. She could have sworn she heard something come from there. Like a distant gust of wind blowing a giant tree, or...Something of the sort.
In all reality, it almost sounded like the forest had gasped. As though it had beheld something it had never expected to behold. For a moment, she thought it had just been her imagination getting a bit out of hand...
But the old Sooty Owl that perched beside her heard it too.
"Mount Ebott, my queen," he answered her. "That is where it came from."
"Isn't that the mountain we presume the young General is trapped in? The one inhabited by monsters?"
"Correct."
The white Barn Owl narrowed her eyes at the mist-shrouded mountain off in the distance, the gold ring that surrounded each pupil glowing brighter within the rest of the blue iris. One would swear that an eternal a solar eclipse had settled in each of her eyes. Of course, she had been born on the night of an eclipse, so perhaps that was where it came from.
"...What do you think has happened?" she asked.
"Something big."
"Something terrible?"
"Mmm...I don't think so."
"What makes you rule it out?"
"I get that feeling of odd anticipation, but not one of dread. The gizzard is a complex, but wise thing, as you know. One must learn to trust it more than the head."
"But what if she hasn't a gizzard anymore?"
"...I suppose humans have an alternative."
"Like what?"
"A gut, I believe...Not as strong and sophisticated as the gizzard, but it can get the job done. It's more of an instinctive thing than it is of the soul."
"A soul...My Lord."
"M-hm?"
"This brings up another question I have. Twice since young Ginger has left, I've felt a...strange sensation. Not within the gizzard alone, but it felt like...like the entire world shifted for just a moment. It's hard to explain, but it almost feels like I've forgotten something, and should remember. Like in a sudden burst, several memories faded, never to return...Like they never even happened."
"Hmm...Strange."
"I should say. Do you think it has anything to do with...whatever she's doing?"
"I cannot confirm that," Metal Beak answered her. "I suppose we will find out when she re-emerges."
"IF she re-emerges..." the Ablah General sighed. "...Are you POSITIVE it isn't wise to send a squadron down there looking for her?"
"I have already explained the risks. We can't lose any more owls to magen like that."
Nyra opened her beak, as though to protest, but no noise came out. His expressed concerns of sending a fleet into the mountain of monsters to go after her had been well-said, and she realized she could not argue against it.
"I am as worried for her as you are, love," he acknowledged. "I know she'd become almost like a daughter to you...But we can only wait so much longer on one owl."
"When do you propose we depart for the Kingdoms again?"
"Four more nights, unless I sense anything by then. The Guardians can only do so much in our absence; Stryker knows what he's doing over there. And he especially will not take any risks should they come knocking on our castle walls. Why, he'd be more relentless against them than even I normally am."
"You don't suppose he will try to permanently usurp your position as king, do you?"
"Well, it's like I said; four days. If he knows what's best for him, he shouldn't make a stupid decision like that in such a short timeframe...He shouldn't be able to. The soldiers were instructed to obey his authority...UNLESS he try to steal the throne. There's only one Stryker, and nowadays his 'fans' are dwindling."
"Hmph...I suppose you're right."
"She'll get out of there. Even if it is after we leave, she'll get out of there at some point."
"You don't suppose she's gone mad herself, do you?"
"Her? Mad? With power, no. But with rage...Much more likely. That should help her get along just fine...Granted she doesn't end up doing anything she might regret."
"Well..." Nyra replied. "Let us hope against it."
...
One would think she'd just run a mile at full speed without stopping at all, the way she was breathing.
Having not bothered to dodge most of the last attack, she looked positively ghastly; fresh blood trickled down her chin, cuts and bruises streaked the rest of her face, her already worn cloak had now lost another small chunk from the corner of the cape, and there was a new flesh wound in the opposite side of the one she'd healed during the fight with the Starfait, staining the leather of her armor and the shirt underneath a dirty crimson color.
But it wasn't so much the damage she'd received that made her look so horrible as it was the look on her face.
Her pupils were barely bigger than the head of a pin, and her blue eyes were still fixed in a venomous glare, but at the same time they were drained and tired, and distressed tears now burned in the corners of them, threatening to spill out. She blinked to try and expel them, then swallowed the lump in her throat as she looked down at her opponent.
Mettaton had been reduced to nothing more than an immobile torso with a head attached.
"HA...HA...!" he laughed in spite of himself, looking back at the ratings on the board behind him. They'd now reached well through the roof. "WOULD YOU JUST LOOK AT THESE RATINGS! THIS IS THE MOST VIEWERS I'VE EVER HAD! LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, I HAVE AN ANNOUNCEMENT! WE'VE REACHED THE VIEWER CALL-IN MILESTONE! WHICH MEANS ONE LUCKY CALLER WILL HAVE THE CHANCE TO TALK TO ME BEFORE I LEAVE THE UNDERGROUND FOREVER! WELL, DON'T WAIT UP, VIEWERS! LET'S SEE WHO CALLS IN FIRST!"
A phone speaker appeared beside the monitor, and the lucky first caller dialed in.
"HI! YOU'RE ON T.V.! WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY ON THIS, OUR LAST SHOW?"
And the caller spoke.
"...oh...hi...mettaton. i...really liked watching your show..."
Ginger didn't know it right then and there, but it turned out that BOTH of them knew exactly who that was.
...Napstablook? she silently acknowledged.
"my life is pretty boring...but...seeing you on the screen...it...well...it brought a lot of...excitement to my life...vicariously, i mean. um...i can't tell, but...i guess this is the last episode...? well...i'll miss you...mettaton..."
Ginger saw that Mettaton's usual stuck-up grin had unexpectedly faded into nothingness. In fact, he almost appeared ready to shed tears himself.
It was...strange seeing him like this. It didn't seem natural for the snobbish celebrity to suddenly look so...humble.
Do I feel sorry for him? she pondered for a moment, but she immediately dismissed the possibility. No...I don't. I would never. Not after all that.
"...oh...i didn't mean to talk so long...i'm sorry..."
"NO, WAIT. WAIT JUST A SECOND, BL..."
He was a moment too late.
"H...HE ALREADY HUNG UP...AH...W-WELL, I'LL JUST...TAKE ANOTHER CALLER!"
And in they all came.
"Mettaton, your show made us so happy!"
"Man, Mettaton, I don't know what I'll watch without you."
"Mettaton, there's a Mettaton-shaped hole in my Mettaton-shaped heart."
"Yo...Are you seriously leaving?"
"...AH...I SEE..."
Ginger looked down at him, now convinced that she, for some reason, actually felt the tiniest shard of sympathy for him.
He smiled, moved by the kind words of his loyal viewers.
"...EVERYONE...THANK YOU SO MUCH. YOU DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH ANY OF THIS MEANS TO ME..."
So, he was finally starting to see past his own nose? It was about time.
...But at least it was happening.
"...DEAR HUNTRESS," he addressed. "I UNDERSTAND IF YOU'RE...NOT THE GREATEST FAN OF ME, BUT WOULD YOU STOOP DOWN TO MEET ME AT EYE LEVEL? JUST FOR A MOMENT? IT'S...A MIGHT IMPORTANT."
She raised a skeptical eyebrow, but decided to comply anyway.
"HEARING ALL OF THIS FOR MYSELF, I REALIZE THAT PERHAPS IT'D BE BEST FOR ME TO...YOU KNOW...STAY HERE FOR A LITTLE WHILE LONGER. I MEAN... OF COURSE I'D LIKE TO SEE WHAT THE HUMANS OUT THERE THNK OF ME SOMEDAY, BUT...THEY ALREADY HAVE COUNTLESS STARS AND IDOLS. DOWN HERE, MONSTERS...ONLY HAVE ME. IF I LEFT, THE UNDERGROUND WOULD LOSE ITS SPARK...AND IN ITS PLACE, I WOULD LEAVE AN ACHING VOID THAT COULD NEVER BE FILLED...SO I THINK IT'S FOR THE BEST THAT I DELAY MY BIG DEBUT."
"...Hmm."
Maybe there was a twinge of a good person buried in there, after all.
"AND ANOTHER THING, MS. WINGREN. I'D LIKE TO...APOLOGIZE. FOR THE ORDEAL WE...ERM...I PUT YOU THROUGH. WHEN YOU FIRST CAME TO RIVAL ME, I THOUGHT YOU WERE JUST...WELL...SHOWBOATING TO ENTERTAIN, AS I SO OFTEN DO. BUT IN REALITY, YOU'VE PROVEN TO BE VERY STRONG...PERHAPS EVEN STRONG ENOUGH TO FIND A WAY PAST ASGORE. HAVING SEEN IT ALL FOR MYSELF, I'M SURE YOU'LL BE ABLE TO DEFEND HUMANITY."
Something inside of him made a clanging noise again, and what little was left of the energy in his eyes began to drain.
"Oh, no..." she breathed, realizing quickly how bad off he seemed. Had she really...?
"HA...I...I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE THINKING," he told her. "SEE, THIS FORM'S ENERGY CONSUMPTION IS...WELL...INEFFICIENT, TO SAY THE LEAST. IN A FEW MOMENTS, I'LL RUN OUT OF BATTERY POWER, AND...WELL...IT'S A FEW LOST LIMBS. I DON'T HAVE ANY BLOOD TO LOSE LIKE YOU DO. IN GOOD TIME, I'LL BE ALRIGHT. DR. ALPHYS WILL FIX ME UP JUST FINE."
"...What about what you said about-"
"OH, PAY NO MIND TO ANYTHING I SAID. ABOUT YOU OR DEAR DR. ALPHYS. NONE OF IT. I WAS JUST PUTTING ON A SHOW. AND...I APOLOGIZE FOR ALL OF THAT, TOO, IF IT...HURT ANYONE IN ANY WAY...COULD YOU FIND IT ANYWHERE WITHIN YOURSELF TO FORGIVE ME?"
Now, this was DEFINITELY something she hadn't expected. Mettaton, one of, if not the biggest high-hat she'd probably ever met, the one with all the fame and all the fortune, now sat at her MERCY, asking for her forgiveness. Ginger had very mixed feelings about this, and she might have put him down had she not been one hundred percent sure that he was being completely sincere in his words this time.
But she was.
And wouldn't declining his apology make HER the snobbish one?
"Well..." The Huntress let slip a grin, and she removed her hood to reveal her face. "...It'd be pretty stupid of me not to, wouldn't it?"
"HA...THANK YOU. YOU ARE INDEED A WORTHY OPPONENT...NOW GET OUT THERE AND KNOCK 'EM DEAD, DARLING. AND TO EVERYONE WATCHING THIS FROM HOME...I THANK YOU AS WELL. YOU'RE ALL A GREAT AUDIENCE!"
The lights began to flash a blinding white again, and Ginger shielded her eyes to protect them. All the while, she felt the raised stage that'd served as their battlefield begin to descend from its great height, getting lower, and lower, and lower until...
It stopped once it met the ground again, right where it'd started from. The blaring stage lights had turned off, the music had stopped, and the monitor and phone speaker had both disappeared. The only trace left that there'd even been a battle were the two figures standing in the now dark, calmly quiet room.
The Huntress stared down at the somewhat depressing image before her; Mettaton sat there, limbless and motionless, without any signs of awareness at all about him. But the soft, mechanical whirr coming from somewhere within him, paired with his SOUL still hovering inside its cavity signaled vitalism. He wasn't dead. Out of power, but not dead. He would just have to be repaired, recharged, and then he'd be back on his own two legs again...
...His smooth, slim, almost grossly seductive legs.
At least she wouldn't have to be around to see that again.
Ginger heard a noise come from outside the closed door behind her; it was the metal hissing sound of a heavy lock opening, then the whooshing of the door opening...
And right when it opened, in stumbled a very sweaty, shaky, but also smiling Dr. Alphys.
"I...I managed to hack into the lock and deactivate it!" she announced, nearly tripping over her own feet as she approached. "Are you two oka-"
She stopped short at the sight before her; Ginger was towering above the dented, limbless, motionless form of Mettaton.
"...Oh my God...!"
"Alphys. I think he just-"
"METTATON!"
She scrambled over to him to asses the damage.
"Mettaton, are you...A-are you..."
Her already heavy breathing got worse, and her brown eyes glossed over with tears again. She scanned him up and down, but she only found a couple of bad dents where Ginger had landed her two final blows, some internal wiring that needed to be replaced, an almost completely drained battery and, of course, the empty sockets that simply had to have the limbs reattached.
It was nothing lethal.
"Oh, thank GOD, it's just the batteries," she heaved, placing a hand over her chest in a vain attempt to slow her rapid heartbeat. "I-if you were gone I'd...I would've..."
Ginger cleared her throat, and Alphys slowly turned her head to look in her direction.
"Heh...I-I mean, hey, it's n-no problem, y-you know?" she assured her. "H-he's just a robot. I-if it got messed up s-somehow, I could always...j-just build another, right?"
The Huntress came up to her from behind.
"So...He WILL be alright?" she asked, just to confirm.
"Yeah! H-he'll be fine! Y-you didn't do too much, you were just...You were just d-defending y-yourself! I...I'll just take him back to the lab and fix him up a little bit. S-see his SOUL still in there? Yeah, he's okay, see? He'll be fine..."
Her breathing was finally slowing down some, but she was still extremely shaken by what she'd just witnessed.
"...Wh-why don't you g-go on ahead of me? I-I'll catch up," she squeaked out.
"You okay?"
"Yeah..." she squeaked again, her speech almost coming out a whimper. "I just...need a moment. I'll be right there."
"I'll wait for ya."
Alphys received a small pat on the head as the human passed her by and departed for the next room. The Royal Scientist noted the small wounds on her face and the tears in the dark teal fabric of her cloak that hadn't been there the last time she saw her on any video feed. Mettaton really HAD tried to right out kill her.
And she hadn't done anything to stop it for real.
In fact, she realized that she was the one responsible for it in the first place.
They were all threatening to break down the dam behind her eyes, but she only allowed one tear to slip. She couldn't let the human see her in that state again.
The monster hiccupped, then wiped her face dry before giving her greatest achievement a pat on the shoulder and leaving him to rest in the calm room for the time being.
...
Ginger had turned the corner to the right and stood just beyond it, waiting patiently for Alphys to show up. It didn't take her very long to catch back up to her; shorter than she'd anticipated, really. Much shorter, in fact.
"Ready to get a move on?" she asked, motioning to the path ahead.
"Y-yeah! S-sorry about that, I, uh, got a little c-caught up i-in things, is all. Um...Let's keep going!"
She followed Ginger's brisk gait, almost going into a jog; her squat little legs had some difficulty keeping up with her.
"S-so...W-we're about to g-go met Asgore here p-pretty soon, huh?" she commented. "You must...b-be pretty excited about all that, huh?"
"Sort of...Maybe sorta nervous...But, hey. Almost everyone down here's wanted to kill me at some point, and I could convince everyone else to change their minds in one way or another. Why should Asgore be any different?"
"Heh heh...Y-yeah...A-and when you do that, you'll finally...g-get to go home!"
"M-hm..."
Suddenly, the human began to slow down. Alphys stopped behind her as she came to a halt not too much farther from the elevator.
"Uh...Is...S-something wrong?" she asked, but she had a feeling she knew what the answer was already.
"...Can I ask you something, Alphys?"
Oh no...
"Um...S-sure."
Ginger sighed.
"...Look," she began, though not sounding particularly angry. "He admitted it himself back there that a lot of what he said was just to tick me off...But he sounded so serious about it before we started the fight. And then you didn't even defend yourself over the phone...I wanna hear your side of the story, Alphys. Were you two really playing me like a fiddle through most of Hotland? Did you actually set all of this up so I would think you were too good for me to leave behind? Is that all true?"
The Huntress was not answered straight away. When she turned around to face the Royal Scientist, she found her hanging her head in shame.
"P...Partly," she confessed. "I-I started having everything set up while you were still in Snowdin. A-and yes, I...I did plan for M-Mettaton to, uh...g-go after you in some cases and...d-do the stuff he did. Th-that was planned pretty far ahead...But...I started having second thoughts a-about the whole thing. S-so I went to the dump a few times t-to think things through a little more...Th-there were a lot of other things going on, too, though, so I started thinking about...Y-you know...And that's when, um...That's when we bumped into each other. L-literally."
She almost managed a bit of a giggle.
"S-so, anyway, wh-when you actually showed up at the lab, I...I didn't expect that we might have a-already known each other. S-so, when I found that out, I...I-I was about to call everything off r-right then and there. T-tell you everything and g-get it over with."
"So, then...Why didn't you?"
"I...I couldn't do it. I-I knew you'd hate me i-if you found out what I'd been planning to do, a-and I'd only just m-met you to the face. I-I thought that m-maybe we could be
...friends. And if you knew, then I wouldn't...You wouldn't have wanted anything to do with me."
"Alphys, I doubt I'd have flat out-"
"And while we were talking in Hotland, I...I thought that maybe I could stop everything if I c-convinced you that you could...s-stay with us, under here? A-and then we could go talk to K-king Asgore after y-you decided you wanted to stay j-just so he knew you were h-here, and t-tell him th-that everyone loved you and that..."
She stifled another sob, and practically squished her eyes into her head in attempt to keep from becoming an emotional mess all over again.
"But you remember what I said, right?" Ginger reminded her, cautiously reaching a hand out towards her to offer some reassurance. "About me just passing through, then coming back with a way to-"
"That's just it!"
Dr. Alphys' loud and sudden outburst surprised both of them. The monster's gaze widened for a moment, but then crinkled up into a distraught grimace again.
"I...I lied about that, too!" she admitted. "J-just your human SOUL isn't going to be enough to cross the Barrier."
"Doesn't it take a strong SOUL? I'm pretty sure mine is strong enough to-"
"N-no...It takes at least a human SOUL...And a monster SOUL."
"...What?"
"This is why I didn't want you to leave," she told her, furiously wiping away at her eyes. "If you want to go back to the surface, you're going to have to take Asgore's SOUL, you're going to have to kill him to get back there!"
She was mortified.
"Alphys, why didn't you tell me this...!?"
"I don't know why, I'm stupid, I can't do anything right!"
She turned away from the human and hid her face away in her clawed hands, too ashamed of herself to face her anymore.
"Al', wait just a moment," the human continued, her arm still outstretched in case the monster needed it. "Maybe there's still a way we can-"
"No, there's not. I'm sorry I didn't tell you this, I'm sorry I let it get this far, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!"
"Wait, where are you going!?"
Alphys didn't answer. Instead she fled the scene and disappeared back around the corner, bawling her eyes out all the while.
"ALPHYS!"
Ginger went after her, but when she turned left again, Alphys had already disappeared.
And so had Mettaton.
And this time, neither of them were coming back for her.
"...So, what? That's it?" she spat. "After everything we've been through, and after everything I've been put through, you're just going to leave me when I needed you most? You're...just gonna leave me in the dust? Just because you think you're not good enough? Is that what I get?"
She felt extremely betrayed, and as though she'd never cared in the first place, the human flicked her cloak off to the side and turned her nose up in the direction the Royal Scientist had run in before heading back to the elevator the rest of the way alone.
She almost smashed the elevator button, she was so angry, now. And when the doors slid open, she stormed into it in a huff.
"Don't you forget this, Alphys!" she called out, just in case she could still hear her from somewhere. "I'm going to King Asgore alone, without your help and without anything to prove my word! And if something happens, then..."
The doors began to shut.
"Then it's YOUR FAULT! TRAITOR!"
They closed right when she said it, and Ginger landed a gloved fist against the elevator wall, shaking the entire system and leaving a good-sized dent in the metal. It made her hand sting badly, but it was nothing compared to the growing turmoil on the inside.
As the elevator slowly rose up to New Home, Ginger's legs caved in beneath her, the clenched fist sliding down the wall with the rest of her form until she fell all the way to her knees. And when she did, the once proud and noble Huntress wrapped her cloak around herself, collapsed forward onto the elevator floor, and wept.