Chapter 13 - Here, Again
MT Ebbot, The End...
Gael adjusted the blanket on his horse. Time was short. He didn't want to leave but someone close to him needed to be found.
He was mesmerized by the color the underground had, what little he had seen. But he knew deep within his fading heart;
The grass of the surface will once again be green, the sky will be blue, the bark of trees brown and their leaves the color of fall; whatever those colors were.
The birds will sing, flowers would bloom.
Our happy ending... After two thousand years... Is finally almost here...
Gael brushed his great shire's mane, handing her a handful of oats.
"But will I be here for it? Will I see it? Do we...?"
Gael somberly thought to himself.
"You wouldn't believe it... It's... like magic."
The overwhelming abundance of things the surface had none of for a long time - to think that all of this and more existed just beneath his feet;
"It's all here, Missy... Everything! The aroma of flowers... The scent of foods... Real, authentic color in such unimaginable abundance... It's... It was all here this whole time... waiting-..."
It flooded through Gael like a river after a waterfall. It took everything Gael had to not break down from it all.
"It was here... This whole time... And... And..."
Gael didn't know if what he felt was sorrow or joy and caught himself juggling between more-so.
"Are you leaving?"
Alphys had returned with another bowl of freshly-cooked noodles. Though she claimed that the meal wasn't great, Gael was happy just to have a full stomach. He gave his breakfast to someone else so he hadn't eaten 'till now.
"It's alright, Doctor. I am... I'm..."
Gael couldn't simply feel one emotion. He felt so many at once;
Joy, sorrow, nostalgia, longing, pain, relief - it was like a storm of emotions that Gael couldn't ever express in his own words or body language, yet... All this he felt with only a glimpse of grass. For the first time in what felt like eternity, Gael felt vulnerable. He felt ALLOWED to be vulnerable, as if just for a moment, every evil under and over the sun, moon and earth couldn't hurt him as if it did not exist. It left him unable to finish his own words, and he felt allowed to allow such emotions to temporarily hold him hostage.
"Gael... Thank you for telling me about your nephew." Alphys discretely blurted.
Gael nodded in reply.
"If we see him down here, I'll let you know. Okay?"
Beneath that red hood, under all those bandages, fresh burn-cream and dried tears, Gael allowed himself to smile.
"Thank you, doctor-... Doctor Alphys..."
"Oh, and Asgore sent me a message; Adrian is with him and they'll be here soon."
"Here?"
Gael's stature jolted to the mention of the name.
"Yeah. Did you want to wait for him?"
"Ye-no-I mean... Just-... Just tell him..."
What would he think of me if he saw me here?
"Tell him that I'm searching around the mountain and the woods, making my way around, if that makes sense..."
Alphys remained silent for a moment before nodding "yes", turning to leave back to her lab.
"Doctor..."
"Yes, Mr. Gael?"
He was silent and still for a moment, slowly taking a few paces toward that patch of grass;
His giant-like demeanor hidden beneath a crimson cloak. He took a slow, deep breath like an ancient oak tree bending to a gust of wind. He then looked upward toward the arch-way leading to the King's garden before quickly turning away from the color again to brush Missy's Mane.
"There was a time..."
"...I'm listening." Alphys replied.
"A time so long ago when we knew the name of every color, every plant, every pigment... We... Knew what color was... Yet I couldn't... I couldn't tell you..."
He pointed toward that patch of grass.
"The very first color that I first saw and treasured deeply from so long ago..."
Gael buried his head into the saddle, his hands holding his hood onto his head, his voice stuttering.
Is this how far we've fallen? He whispered to himself, grieving.
"That I couldn't..."
Gael whispered to himself, taking another breath.
"Do we deserve to have this back... After... Everything that happened to everyone?"
His question whispered through the cave-like hall followed by a cold silence. He and rubbed his eyes with his ice-cold hands before pulling himself together to tun back to Alphys.
"I'm sorry. I-I'm a bit of a mess. I'll be going now."
Gael lifted himself onto his horse with the warm wind blowing into his scorched, bandaged face.
"Gael." Alphys blurted again. Gael paused immediately, keeping attentive.
"Gael, again, thank you for telling me about... Well, for opening-up to me... In general... It probably wasn't easy, but..."
Am I really the type of person to offer console? That's more of Papyrus or Undyne's thing... But I... What am I supposed to say?! I forgive you for something that happened before he was even born?! What if that rubs-off wrong?! What am I supposed to actually say?!
Gael nodded. "Thank you doctor for your kind words... But I only ask of this one thing."
"Yes, Gael?"
"Don't tell my brother Adrian... that even someone as strong as me... occasionally shatters under darkness. He always views me as the "strong big brother-figure", you know?
"Would he still look-up to me and rely on me or even listen to me, if he knows I'm just as broken, as vulnerable of a person as him?"
Alphys didn't reply.
"I'm sorry Doctor... Again, thank you. Thank you!"
Gael kicked his spurs - riding off, disappearing in the descent down into Ebbot's woods.
Alphys stared blankly at the exit with a solemn expression.
"This... Isn't good."
This was supposed to be our happy ending...
Everything was supposed to just work, just this once...
But now we... No... This can't be the end.
Frisk didn't give up on me, even after... So I...
I won't give up either!
Alphys pulled herself together and started heading back down to her lab.
"If a human child helped us out... I think we monsters can, at the very least-"
She paced into the elevator in a fast-walk, hitting the button with a drive she almost didn't notice was there.
"A human saved us... Now, we're going to save them" She almost giggled - partly from her words, mostly from the irony of it.
"I'm going to help save them!"
She paced into her lab, dusting-off old records and checking sample inventory of experiments past, rewinding her surveillance tapes to the moment the barrier fell, switching-on old lights and changing the appropriate light bulbs - the absolute works! She sat down at her computer and started working.
"Hold on, Jamie. If you're down here, I'll find you. Just stay alive..."
She scanned entire minutes and hours of footage in mere seconds.
"Just stay alive-" Alphys caught movement from the Ruins Exit bush-cam. Someone left the ruins an hour after the Barrier fell. The monster looked out of place yet familiar.
"Eh?" Alphys enhanced the bush-cam footage, but couldn't tell who it was. The monster was covered head-to lower-shins with a cloak. Despite being in shreds, it did a good job masking whoever this one was.
She analyzed the footage further. The monster couldn't be any taller than Frisk, funny enough. She analyzed the footage as much as she could. In a frame of a second, she caught a small detail;
As the monster re-adjusted the cloak-like apparel around itself, tiny Paw-like hands could just barely be seen.
"I'm gonna give this one to Frisk and Toriel. They're on their way here anyway so..."
She took a snap-shot with her phone and sent it to them immediately.
"Saw exiting ruins. Any 1 know who this is?" Alphys put under the photo for context.
She waited for a minute.
"Unsure, sorry. Will keep an eye out." from Toriel.
Nothing from Frisk, seeing as she was more of a call-person than a text-person.
Alphys glazed-over the messages.
"Strange... Ok" and she went straight back to working.
Hey everyone. Sorry this took forever. Didn't mean to keep you all waiting. I've actually been helping a friend out with some of his stuff and I just wasn't able to get back until recently. Sorry folks. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I hope I can get cracking on the next soon. Thank you so much for your patience