I'm putting this at the top because I think it's important. I almost missed today's cut off. Just want to let you guys know, in case that does end up happening some week...um, I don't have summer vacation anymore. I have school work...and school...which means a lot less time to do this stuff, and even when I do have time...not gonna lie, I'm drained.
I'm still trying to hit that Sunday evening, 18:00 - 20:00 EST mark, but just in case I miss one week, don't worry. Chances are, everything's fine. I'll just upload the chapter the following week. If you're really worried, feel free to PM me, or check the UnderTale forum (I'm the admin of the very first one; it even has my profile pic as the picture so it's hard to miss).
He groaned again as the ball of snow collapsed against cold, hard ice. It'd been the second time this happened, and Mettaton's hands were clenched shut as he stomped back to the beginning.
"Unbelievable!" he cried, once more bending down to scoop up some more snow and pack it into a ball. The snow was cold against his metal, but he didn't flinch. The heat of his emotions would counter it, surely.
When he was finished he plopped it on the floor like a sack of meat before delivering a firm blow with his foot, sending it spiraling across the ice, and Mettaton stomped his heels down into the cracks to hurry after it. Third try. Third try had to do the trick! It was a charm, after all. It needed to-
"No, no, no!"
Another kick was set loose and the ball would smash against one of the sides of the rink, causing it to retrace the path it had gone. It was already significantly smaller than before, and he felt much less resistance when kicking it a final time. Then, collapse.
"Deep breath, Meck...Mettaton," the robot muttered to himself, bringing his hands up and then eased them back down to help steady his breathing. "You got this. We're going to go back to what you did in science class."
The robot reached for another scoop beside the sheet of ice, giving it a small toss once it was compact together and observing the path that it followed. He waited for the ball to skid to a halt before jogging toward it and delivering another kick.
"Uh...Mettaton?"
He heard a feminine-sounding voice beside him and assumed the ghost dino had decided to come into view, however did not bother to look away from the snowball that yet again was sent flying towards a large sheet of even smoother ice than the one Mettaton was currently stomping on just to stay upright.
"Not now, darling. I'm trying to concentrate."
"But…" The woman rubbed her hands over top of each other, eyes darting once on the floor and then bouncing back up at the robot for a moment before glancing over at the side. "...I don't see why you need to keep, um, kicking it around like that."
"Well what else do you expect me to do?" he snapped back, placing his hands on his hips as his eyes trailed after the frozen ball. It began dispersing already, he noticed, and quickly rushed after it, giving another decisive hit and watching it leave behind a snowy trail. This was all starting to seem rather pointless…
Alphys shrugged. "What are you trying to do?"
With a small sigh, the robot shook his head, deciding to leave a small break in order to make his way for the hole in the ice that he was so close to. A metallic hand was extended towards it and he directed his eyesight to the ghost dino to make sure she was paying attention.
"This. I'm trying to get the snowball into this. There has to be a way of doing it…"
In response to this, the woman found herself staring absentmindedly at the hole and blinking. "...Why?"
"Why?" Mettaton frowned, his eyes squinting a small bit as his nose scrunched. "Why? Well why not?"
"Because...there's more things we should be worrying about."
With a frustrated growl, the robot gave a small kick to the snow and then proceeded to scoff, crossing his arms. "I refuse to be beaten by such a tedious game! If you wish to go on ahead, then fine, but-"
"W...why don't you just toss it in?"
"What?"
The scientist made her way to the side of the game, picking up a small piece of snow and packing it into some sort of awkward shape with a smile. That smile faded, however, when after a few moments, the solid object dropped through her hands and landed back at her feet. In honesty, it was surprising she'd been able to build a robot when her physical interactive capabilities were so weak.
It didn't matter. Mettaton would shake his head even if she could do it, letting out a small 'tisk tisk' noise and, "Well now that would be cheating."
"But…" She chuckled a little, bringing up one hand to her mouth as her eye glanced to the side. "...i-it'd get the same result, and you'd be able to proceed with whatever it is you're trying to do…"
Our protagonist trailed his eyes over the snow left in his previous attempts' path, the snowdrops that were beginning to pile up before him. Soon, he might be able to step in snow despite the hard ice beneath him. There were only so many times one could try…
"Fine," Mettaton said with a small sigh. He scooped another handful of snow, feeling it crunch between his palms, before approaching the hole and giving it a small toss. It plopped in without much resistance, and despite him taking a shortcut, he could feel a smile slip onto his face. Perhaps not one of accomplishment, but the win still boosted his sense of pride. Because Lord knows he could use more of that.
A purple pole popped out of the hole, much to the surprise of either of the two. At the end of it was a matching flag, which lie flat against the side of its holder. They approached it curiously. There was a small bit of writing, but the neatly printed sentence at the top was crossed out. Originally, the flag would have read, "Even when you felt trapped, you took notes and achieved the end of 'Ball'," but instead, in rushed scribbles underneath the line read, "oh...you weren't supposed to throw it in…" The latter was clearly fresh, and it caused the robot to tilt his head to the side while the dinosaur squinted her eyes at it.
"Well," Mettaton said after a moment of silence as he ran his hand through his hair, "I certainly wasn't expecting that."
When he felt his companion give his shirt fabric a small tug before jumping behind him, Mettaton then turned his attention toward where her eyes were pointed, though all he could visibly see was snow, and this only proved to further his confusion.
"Yes, darling? What is it?"
"Th-there's another...ghost…"
He strained his magenta eyes, but no matter how hard our protagonist tried, there was nothing his scanners could pick up on. Hm...what did they do on those silly ghost hunting shows? Something with thermal detection, right?
"Alphys, does this have some kind of heat sensor?"
His nervous system was able to tell him that his builder then halted shaking, though her hold didn't loosen and she was still cowering behind his metal.
Her voice was weak when she spoke, only barely loud enough for him to hear. "Uh...I didn't have enough materials for something like that. Your nighttime vision might be able to pick up something, but...it's really shaky. I-It's not even in alpha yet…I didn't have the time to finish it."
In response, he shrugged. "We'll see then. How do you turn it on?"
"Just, um...h-hold your eyes closed for a couple of seconds and it should go…" Alphys took a quick glance over at the generic ghost figure as she spoke. In honesty, it looked a lot like Toriel, though even blander and with white eyes instead of red, a black outline around each. It seemed to have been retreating further into Snowdin's woods, but at the sound of Alphys's voice, stopped. She didn't think it caught sight of her yet, judging from how it was now floating there, staring at Mettaton, but she couldn't be too sure.
There was a moment of silence as Mettaton shut his eyes, took a deep breath in, and counted to ten before opening them again. What he saw was best described as...well, he wasn't sure. A dream, perhaps. He might have compared it to being on drugs, but Meckenzie wouldn't dare hurt his body with those, so he couldn't be sure about them. Most of his surroundings seemed to have disappeared, though any spots of snow that were reflecting light still stayed. There was only blackness otherwise, save for a blue heart hovering about a foot or two away from the flagpole. A nice, soft, true blue- his cousin's favorite- with a white ring around the outside, but it was definitely blue, definitely a heart, and definitely floating.
The robot barely had time to turn around and get a quick view of Alphys (who was nothing but a white heart at that point, several cracks inside of her that were flaked with red) before his vision began returning to normal, snow and trees slowly fading back into sight. It caused him to blink a bit. Thankfully his mind was quick to adapt to the experience, though it was still...interesting, to say the least. However, when he turned his attention back to the area the blue heart had been floating, he saw nothing.
"S-so, uh…" Alphys stared at the robot for a second or so before shooting her eyes over at the other specter and then down at the floor before ending back on the robot. "...how'd it go?"
"I...think we'll need to work on that. I saw what you meant, though."
She nodded. "It's, um, they're just staring at us."
"Could you talk to them?"
"I...could…" Though judging by the drop in her voice, it became apparent to Mettaton that she really would rather avoid speaking with anyone at the moment, let alone some stranger who just so happened to have crossed their path.
The ghost took another glance at her terror and relaxed a small bit when she noticed that this strange, shapeless being began floating down the path. What caught her attention was something she hadn't been able to see from the front, though; a little puppy tail seemed to be sticking out of the back of it, wagging excitedly to accompany the tiny ears at the top, which were so small that it was almost impossible to differentiate them from the rest of the ghost.
"It's leaving," she breathed in relief. Toriel was a boss monster, so her SOUL would be sticking around for a while, and Alphys...well, she wasn't entirely sure how she remained intact, though she did remember feeling rather strange afterwards...unfortunately for her, there wasn't much she could interact with, so testing was out of the question… Perhaps the ghost she had just encountered was experiencing the same thing? It seemed like it could interact with the flag, somehow, and whatever it wrote with, assuming that it was the one to write on said flag, but it didn't have any arms…
The scientist was snapped out of her thoughts when she noticed her robot companion already a few feet in front of her and turning back to wait.
"Well?"
"Uh...w-well what?"
Mettaton rolled his eyes, arching his back a bit to puff his chest out as he let his arms drop. "Are we moving on, or are you going to continue to stand there and watch the snow melt?"
"Oh!" she exclaimed, hurrying forward with her stubby little feet and hastening her breath. It was still found an oddity to her that she could breath, but that was a thought her mind had made dormant for quite some time. "R-right!"
Though, it wasn't long before Mettaton had caught sight of a particular cat-dog and human, and when he did, he felt his hands moving out in front of him, palms face up.
"HOOMAN!"
His eyes skidded off of the tem rather quickly, much preferring to direct their attention to the paper on the ground. Was this another puzzle? He certainly hoped not. They were starting to get a bit dull already…
"I HOPE UR RED-EE FUR DA PUZ-!"
Temmie froze, however, her eyes following the trail that Mettaton's had made and frowning immensely at the sight. Though, it looked more of a pout than anything, and her eyes drooped a bit more in disappointment than sorrow.
"Uh...Frisk? Where da puzzle?"
"Hm. I dunno, Tem," the human beside her said as they let a small smirk cross over them. "This seems pretty puzzling."
She growled, shaking her head and taking a step forward. "FINE! If u no tell where puzzle is, den me an hooman will find it ourselfs!"
They shook their head, biting back a chuckle. "C'mon, I wouldn't want you getting caught up in the crossfire."
"HOW IS DAT EVEN A PUN!?"
Mettaton sighed as he watched Frisk shrug and emit a chuckle. What was he even supposed to say to that? Never mind that the attention wasn't on him currently. It would be in a short bit, and he was already getting sick of these jokes…
"Well, I mean...the puzzle's a crossword." They closed their eyes, shoulders freezing in the shrugging motion as high as they could go so that they were nearly touching Frisk's cheeks. "Not the best pun, but we can't all be like Dad."
"I dun-!" Temmie cut herself off, words jumbling in her mind and sticking in her mouth as she tried to force them out. Her body swiveled around so that the angle was mostly in line with Frisk's- just an inch or so off- and her knees bent. Two furry arms followed this motion by extending out as far as they could go with elbows in the same position as her knees. "Y WUD U USE A CROSSWORD AS DA PUZZLE!?"
"I dunno. I thought it'd be fun. They can get pretty challenging."
Tem scoffed. Her back straightened and once more did her feet twirl so that she now faced the newest "human" to the Underground. With arms crossed, Temmie's attention redirected back where it began. "Ug. Im sorry 4 my frend's lazeness. Obviusly ur gunna find da crossword easy. All u gotta do is fill in da boxs with 'tem'!"
Mettaton raised an eyebrow at this, his hand moving to his hip, which jutted out while the other arm hung lazily against his side. "Tem?"
She nodded, not bothering to explain why (he figured she was almost as vain as she was an idiot), and again returning her expression to a cutesy-looking cat face of sorts. "U shuld've used da junor jumble. I agree wit Papyrus. Is a lot harder den crossword!"
Frisk's face fell from a neutral expression (plus their smirk) to squinted eyes and a tight mouth, the look of "Really?" being sprawled all over it. Their nonverbal question went unanswered, however, as their temmate sprung into the air with a small giggle.
"N E WAY! Imma go make da next puzzle now 'kay BOI!"
Mettaton, this time, didn't even bother to try speaking to her. He doubted that she would pause and come back to answer, nor did he really care to talk to someone of that intelligence… He simply shook his head and strutted forward until the other human was within about a foot or two.
"What was that about?"
They shrugged once more. "Temmie gets a lot of her puzzle ideas from Papyrus… Yesterday I caught him teaching her how to "solve" the horoscope…"
"Solve the...horoscope?" Mettaton leaned forward, pointing one foot out as he did so. What? But...that doesn't…
"She hasn't asked to use his lasers yet, so I'm okay with this."
"Lasers?"
Alphys, though unseen, couldn't help but poke her head up at the sound of that. Since when did Papyrus have lasers? She hadn't remembered Undyne mentioning anything about that when they trained together. The only lasers she could really think of in the first place were at her lab…
"Yeah...at least she's not lase-in' around, eh? Eh?"
They pointed at Mettaton with both fingers, a broad smile on their face and even throwing in a wink, which just made the robot bring his palm to his face and sigh.
"I'm going to be going ahead now. Do catch up, alright?"
Frisk, giving a nod as reply, shoved their hands into their pockets and then trotted off in the opposite direction, back the way that Mettaton had already came.
"Alphys?" he called out when they were far enough gone that his eyes could no longer catch sight of them. Slowly, she faded in, taking the place of the figure that would catch his attention against the harsh white background. Even if her outfit was the same color, the red stripe at the bottom was enough to draw his eyes to her, on top of her yellow skin coloring.
The two began to walk, and it wasn't much longer before they stopped again, this time at the sight of a wooden table jutting out from the cold snow. On top of it was a bowl of...construction paper. For whatever reason, it seemed a bit familiar, but that honestly wasn't of much importance to him at that point in time. The sight was strange, surely, but not all that important. There were better things he could do to waste his time.
*It's a bowl of Temmie Flakes, he heard Alphys say, and when the robot glanced over at her, she was bending down to observe a note that had fallen on the floor. Her hands could cusp it, but only for a few moments before she found it falling through again. And this was the woman who built his body? How on Earth does that work?
With a small sigh, Mettaton reached out to lift up the paper, scanning his eyes over it as he did so.
*I-it's a note from Temmie, um…
HOOMAN! Pls enjoy da temmie flakes! Dey look reel yummy, yaYU! U so ENTICED!
(MMMMM! Temmie's delicius negotiation tacticks evun making her mouth water!)
(But...nnmm...nu, must resist! Or Tem will...NOT PROGRESS!)
He shook his head, looking away from the trap...or whatever it was supposed to be, and instead settling them on a reflective rock nearby. Our protagonist then reached behind him into his bag, pulling out the torn notebook, as well as his pencil, and sat himself down next to it, performing his habit of recording his adventures.
*Knowing that you have to get past Temmie to get to Hotland...but, um, I don't think you need to eat her Temmie Flakes...i-it rekindles your perseverance.
Ahhh I finally found my muse! Chara, while still an awesome Demon Mom, wasn't actually my muse! ...Don't get my wrong, I still love them to bits. Writing them is amazingly fun. But my muse isn't one character; it's plot! Plot is my muse! ...They just have a lot of plot. Huzzah! I have found a way to make this work again!
Hopefully you guys read my note at the top. It's really important...
Please check out my poll. Just wanna know if suggesting music at the beginning of a chapter is helpful or not~ It's on my profile page. Just a simple 'yes' or 'no' question.
I NEED COMIC ARTISTS AND MUSIC PEOPLE. So...I really want to do more with the EquationTale Tumblr...I don't have much, heh... Um. My friend is making sprites, but if someone else wants to do that too, that'd be awesome! I'm looking for any artists, really, that want to help, but especially ones willing to do comics! (because my comics suck)
Also, I did two mashups this weekend! TWO! The first is Alphys's DETERMINATION (Alphys x DETERMINATION, a.k.a. the Game Over song), and hOI hOI bOI! (Nyeh heh heh! x Tem Shop). But...I'm still not very good at this. Those are...relatively easy songs in my opinion. I need help with the others...if anyone is willing to help, anyone, please, contact me.
FOR ANYONE INTERESTED!: You can PM me here, message me on DeviantArt (KuraiTsukiMajutsu), Tumblr (KuraiAnanas or EquationTale), NationStates (Kuraiku), YouTube (Kuraiku), or, worst case scenario, leave a review of a way to contact you. Thank you guys so much.
Reviews!
Tatzbea:
"And I might know who Frisk's dad is"
Oh do you? ;3
Only two skeleys?
So Nice Cream Hands Man can't be Frisk's daddy now? Is that what your saying?
...I mean, it'd be kinda weird, since they refer to him as Grandpa Gaster, but, uh...oh well.
The Final Conduit (you don't know how many times I kept missing the 't' button typing that):
Oh, thank you! Well, thank you to everyone, really, but I'm glad you're taking an interest in Chara! Ah...it's probably pretty evident they're my favorite so far. They kind of have the most complex character, I think. Especially backstory-wise.