"It sounds like it came from over here…Oh! You've fallen down, haven't you…Are you okay? Here, get up…Chara, huh? That's a nice name.
MY NAME IS…"
Sora and the others woke with a start, and found themselves either on a bed of golden flowers once again or the debris of the plank they were just standing on, the main difference being that there was a bit of water on the edges instead of more ground, their various limbs were getting soaked. Donald had the worst luck of it, having gotten a ton of water in his mouth, enough that one could swear that he also spat out Jiminy…scratch that, he did. However, that wasn't important at the moment.
"Did anyone else just hear a voice refer to Chara by name?" Donald asked in a low and calculated tone.
"Gwarsh, you too? I thought it was just me so I didn't wanna say anything!" Goofy quipped.
"Yeah, I heard it. How 'bout you Frisk?" Sora asked as Frisk sat up.
Frisk nodded and wanted to add on, but noticed Jiminy wasn't in immediate line of sight and looked around frantically for him, just managing to spot him floating away on a loose flower. With a silent gasp of panic, Frisk quickly got up and leaped for him, since there was a waterfall along the wall and another one on this level further up ahead to worry about.
"Thanks, Frisk, that sure was some current." Jiminy thanked, brushing off gobs of water droplets from his top hat. "I heard the voice too for the record!" He announced so that the others would hear.
"So, what was that Frisk?" Sora waded over and asked, the water was ankle deep for all of them and somehow he managed to ignore Donald quacking furiously in the background at something in favor of an answer for the curious situation.
Frisk gave a look that wondered how to go about it, or not at all given the circumstances of the truth in the long run. Then they thought of the best answer to give the others as well as why it was so strange for all of them to have heard it.
"Huh, Frisk says that it's extremely strange that all of us heard it since it's a piece of Chara's memories." Jiminy translated, then he got distracted by Donald's incessant quacking and decided to loudly ask the water fowl what was up. "Alright Donald, what's got you so riled up now?"
"GARBAGE! GARBAGE IN THE WATER EVERYWHERE! I SPAT YOU AND THAT SAME WATER OUT! EEWWWW!" Donald shrilled. Everyone else finally took in their surroundings and noticed the piles of garbage, they instantly felt bad for the duck, and gave their own sounds of disgust…
Except Goofy, he was more fascinated by what he could find in the garbage piles, and boy did he find a lot.
"Hey! There's a bunch of neato stuff in here that's pretty useful!" He called over his shoulder to the others. As they came up behind him, Sora gasped in pleased surprise and joined him in digging. There was an Aero spell and an Aeroa as well as a ton of Potions, Hi Potions and at least one Mega Potion. All of which Sora happily pointed out to Frisk since they seemed very interested in how pretty the various potions looked in comparison to each other, as they looked like bottled jelly cosmos of various sizes even though they were drinkable.
Other than the foragables, there were only a few brand names on random junk that Frisk recognized, and a few that neither Frisk nor the others recognized, something about Chocobos…whatever those were, but judging by the faded out picture and text of whatever promotional thing it was supposed to be, it was a yellow bird that was chubby in its infancy and ridable in its adulthood. Everything else in the trash heaps that were scattered further into the next room were simply garbage.
There was also a save point on a plank of its own, hard to say if it was part of the plank they fell from or not, but it was wedged between the waterfall on the wall beside them and the waterfall that was the source of the current that threatened to flush Jiminy away. Just to be safe, they saved. The waterfall here seems to flow from the ceiling of the cavern…Occasionally, a piece of trash will flow through…and fall into the bottomless abyss below. Viewing this endless cycle of worthless garbage…It filled them all with determination.
They continued on into the next room finding more garbage piles, a rusted bicycle with a horn that wheezes in despair, a beat-up desktop computer that was empty, a cooler with two freeze-dried space bars of astronaut food that they took for safe keeping, a desperately scratched up DVD case of an anime, and finally a training dummy that was fairly identical to the one Toriel made them practice on. The group stared into its eyes for a moment and then continued moving on, unknowingly incurring the wrath of something that was watching them back.
No sooner than they were mere steps away from the bar of land that would get them out of the ankle deep water, did they all feel the presence of something and it was behind them. Slowly they all turned their heads just in time to see the training dummy they just passed by gain angry eyes of absolute fury. It was so mad that it jumped and floated before them, blocking their way forward.
"Hahaha…Too intimidated to fight me, huh!? I am a ghost that lives inside a DUMMY. My cousin used to live inside a DUMMY too. Until…YOU LOT CAME ALONG!" It bellowed angrily. "When you talked to them, they thought they were in for a nice chat…But the things you SAID…! Horrible. Shocking! UNBELIEVABLE! It spooked them right out of their dummy! HUMANS! I'll scare your Souls right out of your bodies!" And thus started the 'Fight' with the Mad Dummy blocking the way, as the white walled interface surrounded our heroes.
The Mad Dummy had an attack power of 7, and a - 40 defense, because they're a ghost, physical attacks will fail if attempted.
"Futile! Futile! FUTILE!" the Mad Dummy screeched as it sent little lesser dummies to shoot scribbles at Frisk and Sora's Souls. It wasn't until the shots came from the back most walls that they noticed the Mad Dummy could get hit with them, and since physically attacking wasn't going to work it apparently counted if it was a magical one and a taste of its own medicine. As evidenced by the very helpful slip of the tongue the Mad Dummy made in frustration.
"OWWWW, you DUMMIES! Watch where you're aiming your MAGIC attacks!" Then the Mad Dummy realized what it just said and tried to cover it up but did so poorly. "…Hey! You two! Forget I said anything about MAGIC! ! !" The Mad Dummy started to look nervous. Frisk and Sora tried talking to the Dummy…It, like it's cousin, didn't seem much for conversation. No one is happy with this.
"I'll defeat you both and take your Souls!" Mad Dummy snarled, and started bossing around its bullets. "I'll use either one of your Souls to cross the barrier!" Then the next hit of scribbles made Mad Dummy change tactics a little and start floating back and forth to make it harder to hit with perfectly dodged scribbles. "I'll stand in the window of a fancy store!" It bellowed its dream, and became hopping mad with each hit of a scribble that came in waves. "THEN EVERYTHING I WANT WILL BE MINE!"
Mad Dummy kept getting sneakier as it stayed in a corner to make it even more difficult for the dodged scribbles, but Frisk and Sora were able to manage it anyway. Mad Dummy then started to get cotton all over the dialogue box. In terms of turns, the humans had no other option but to spam the spare button each time it was their turn.
"Huh? Yeah, I guess that'll avenge my cousin." The Mad Dummy said in a white lie, as their eyes looked off to the side nervously. The little dummies added a tactic, they turned red and dropped from the ceiling of the white walls. "What was their name again…?" Gravity went whichever which way for the little dummies when they turned red, as their aim was for the opposing wall though they left a space for the Souls to pass through unharmed. More scribbles were dodged and hit the Mad Dummy. "Whatever. Whatever! WHATEVER! Foolish. Foolish! FOOLISH! Futile. Futile! FUTILE!" Another wave of scribbles and Mad Dummy decided to up things a little.
"Hey guys!" Out popped all the little dummies on all four walls. "Dummies. Dummies! DUMMIES! Remember how I said NOT to shoot at me? Well…FAILURES! YOU'RE FIRED! YOU'RE ALL BEING REPLACED! ! !" The little dummies sadly went away. "Hahaha. Hahaha! HAHAHA! Now you'll see my true power: Relying on people that aren't garbage!" Mad Dummy bellowed maniacally. Mechanical whirrs filled the room.
"DUMMY BOTS! MAGIC MISSILE!" Mad Dummy ordered, and out came little dummy robots that fired missiles that looked like little rockets. They were Soul seeking missiles as they followed Frisk and Sora around with ease, but were easily shaken off with one little circle so the missiles could loop and careen right into a direction that they had to somehow calculate, for the moment they missed Mad Dummy of course and the Mad Dummy responded in kind.
"DUMMY BOTS! TRY AGAIN!" So they did, and Frisk and Sora missed Mad Dummy again. "DUMMY BOTS! You're awful?" The Dummy Bots were fueled with some determination to prove Mad Dummy wrong as a whole slew of them showed up and fired at the Souls. It was enough that Frisk and Sora managed to loop some of the missiles into Mad Dummy this time, and it seemed to be a smidge more potent than the scribbles. This was evidenced by the fact that Mad Dummy was already progressively floating in distinct halves, nearly doing some kind of ska dance, but not quite. The Mad Dummy glared into a mirror, then turned to the humans with the same expression.
"DUMMY BOTS! FINAL ATTACK!" More like one Dummy Bot actually…at first anyways, as only one fired a missile while the little dummies that were fired decided to come back for one last round of turning red and bouncing off a wall to careen into the opposing one. As one could guess this was not easy to dodge all at once. Then another slew of Dummy Bots showed up and fired missiles, and Frisk and Sora expertly dodged and made them fly into Mad Dummy, who was losing its cool in a few ways.
"(N…no way!) (These guys are even WORSE than the other guys!) Who cares. Who cares! WHO CARES! ! I DON'T NEED FRIENDS! ! !" Mad Dummy shrilled and conjured a knife out of nowhere. "I'VE GOT KNIVES!" Mad Dummy threw the knife at the humans Souls, and they dodged it easily. Mad Dummy stopped hopping around and looked awfully bashful. "I'm…Out of knives." They went back to hopping mad. "BUT IT DOESN'T MATTER! ! ! YOU CAN'T HURT ME AND I CAN'T HURT EITHER OF YOU! YOU'LL BE STUCK FIGHTING ME…" They stopped hopping for one word, then progressively continued hopping until their halves were flying all over the place. "Forever. Forever! FOREVER! ! !" And laughed manically.
"AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA-!" Mad Dummy was interrupted by drops of something. "Wh…What the heck is this!? Ergh! Acid rain!? Oh, FORGET IT! I'm outta here!" Mad Dummy finally relented and scooted off to the side and out of sight with the scowl still plastered to its face.
As it turned out, it was not acid rain that had hurt Mad Dummy, but in fact the only thing that could hurt it, a ghost taking a corporeal form…ghost tears. As Napstablook phased in to apologize.
"…sorry, I interrupted you, didn't I? as soon as I came over, your friend immediately left…oh no.. you guys looked like you were having fun…oh no…I just wanted to say hi…oh no…" Napstablook faded out from the white walled interface, but was still floating there before our heroes as soon as the white walls went away.
"Well…I'm going to head home now…oh…umm…feel free to 'come with' if you want… but no pressure…I understand if you're busy…it's fine…no worries…just thought I'd offer…" With that, he headed on into the next room. The gang followed, and found themselves in a lobby of sorts, as there were multiple paths and some save points. Napstablook had actually noticed that they followed him this far and decided that if they actually wanted to come with he could direct them to his house at the very least. "Hey…my house is up here…in case you all want to see…or in case…you don't…" Then Napstablook continued down the middle path across the way from the save point.
Since it was for the best, the gang saved before doing anything more. They all felt a calming tranquility. They're filled with determination.
Frisk then pulled out the cell phone and called Papyrus, for a very important and informational reason.
"HEY! YOU'RE NEAR UNDYNE'S HOUSE! THAT'S TO THE LEFT-UPWARDS. LUPWARDS. ALL THE OTHER DIRECTIONS GO TO THE WRONG HOUSE. NORTH: GHOST HOUSE. EAST: TURTLE HOUSE. SOUTH: TRASH HOUSE." Papyrus then hung up after having said his piece.
"You lead Frisk." Sora quipped cheerfully. Frisk turned to Sora and smiled at him, and promptly lead the group left just to show the gang the little bird that proudly gives a shortcut….for Frisk anyway. As Sora and the others, hopped the gap like they usually did to cheat the 'puzzle' and waited for Frisk and the little bird that carried them over the small gap with heroic sounding music coming from nowhere.
The shortcut lead right to the area where Sans had his telescope that gave them a black eye. Frisk went to the box to sort their inventory before they headed back across the gap, which Frisk took the offered flight of the small bird again while the others hopped across.
Then they went to the upper left path to see Undyne's house, it was half black and half white and looked like an angry fish or sea monster since it actually had a tail on the darker side of the house. No one was home, but there was a training dummy that could talk and judging by its tone, it was the Mad Dummy from before but calmed down….ish.
"What. What? WHAT!? It's a living."
Frisk pulled out the cell phone and called Papyrus. He picked up after two rings. He was loud enough for the others to hear.
"THAT'S UNDYNE'S HOUSE. LET'S GO THERE AND HANG OUT SOMEDAY!" Then he hung up since that was all he had to say on the matter.
There wasn't anything else to see here so they went back and on their way to Napstablook's house. They found two houses actually, but the pink one was locked so they went into the blue one instead and found Napstablook at his computer.
"oh….you really came…sorry, i….wasn't expecting that. it's not much, but make yourself at home." The ghost greeted.
Frisk, still leading the way went straight for the refrigerator. They pointed at it, not opening it since they were a guest.
"oh….are you hungry… i can get you something to eat…" With that Napstablook glided over to the fridge and took something out without even opening it. "this is a ghost sandwich…do you want to try it…"
Frisk and the others nodded vigorously, but as Frisk attempted to bite into it, they phased right through it…
"I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't that, even though it probably should've been." Donald grumbled in his breath, not wanting to insult the already sensitive Napstablook. Thankfully the DJ ghost didn't seem to hear it because of his headphones.
"oh…nevermind…" Napstablook said dejectedly because the ghost sandwich couldn't be enjoyed. After a pregnant pause, the ghost came up with something else to do. "after a great meal i like to lie down and feel like garbage…it's a family tradition…do you want…to join me…?"
Again the gang nodded eagerly, wanting to do anything to make Napstablook happy…even a little bit.
"okay…follow my lead…" So they did, following the ghost to the center of the little abode and they all plopped down on their backs, and because of the tight quarters they circled up. "here we go…you'll lie down as long as you don't move. so…only move around when you want to get up, i guess."
Ten seconds later, they all could somehow see the cosmos, not even their cosmos specifically, just a generic cosmos of the universe outside of all the separated worlds as they could see galaxies as far as the eye could see and just felt relaxed and soothed. For Sora especially, it was like waves on a shore as the cosmos around them swayed rhythmically.
It was all so fascinating, but so soothing that they fell asleep again. They didn't scoot closer to each other to cuddle, not after the last time they tried napping.
Sora opened his eyes again to darkness, but this time it wasn't like the darkness from when he himself turned into a heartless a year or so ago, this was more like the cavernous darkness of the Underground, just a part of it that he hadn't seen before…or yet as it still looked like Waterfall just by the still darkness and a long boardwalk bridge.
"Yo." Came Monster Kid's voice. Sora blinked and saw three figures again, that of both Frisk's ghostly form, and Chara still looking more like Frisk and wasn't blinking to look like their true form, and of course, Monster Kid in front of the Chara controlled Frisk.
"What in Sam Hill are we watching?" Came Donald's voice from Sora's right. Sora jumped at the suddenness of his voice as did the ghostly Frisk, as well unfortunately as the Chara controlled Frisk.
Sora scrambled to cover Donald's beak and Goofy's mouth now that Sora noticed him on his left, Jiminy stayed quiet on top of Donald's head because he was so invested in what was going on. Ghost Frisk subtly turned to give the silent sign of shushing so the not quite memory dream thing could play out without Chara looking even crazier than they clearly already were.
"Undyne told me to stay away from you. She said that you… You hurt a lot of people…. Monster Kid said dejectedly but in a way that they just couldn't believe it even as they said it and proved it in their next question. "But, yo, that's not true, right!?"
Ghost Frisk still seemed to have some control over their body as they forced Chara to turn away in what seemed like guilt and contemplation.
"…yo… Why won't you answer me? A…a… And what's with that weird expression…?"
The trinity trio only got a glimpse of what Monster Kid was referring to before Ghost Frisk lost control again and hissed Chara's name in a pitiful attempt to get them to stop whatever they were about to do. In any case, the expression on the body of Frisk's possessed face was a creepy grin that sent shivers down all of their spines.
Especially since Chara turned back to Monster Kid with an obvious intent to kill as they took a step forward, and Monster Kid took a step back.
"Oh…Oh man…" Monster Kid said sounding panicked. Then they turned away and whispered to themselves, "Man, my h-heart's pounding right out of my chest…what would Undyne do?..." They then turned back around in a small burst of courage derived from thinking of Undyne. "Yo… Y-you'd b-better st-stop r-right where you are…'Cause if you w-wanna hurt anyone else…you're… You're gonna have to get through me, first. A…and…. and…"
And Monster Kid was in Chara's way, looking like free EXP with just an ATK and DEF of 2.
Just as Chara struck out at Monster Kid, Undyne came out of nowhere and took the hit. Without her helmet, the trinity trio witnessed for the first time that she really was a fish lady, with an eye patch over her left eye. The attack completely depleted her HP to zero, but she didn't turn to dust right away.
"Undyne…You're… You're hurt…" Monster Kid choked out looking ready to cry since they themselves were obviously about to die and now their hero was hurt really badly.
"Hurt? It's nothing." Undyne replied encouragingly even through the pain. "Next time, listen when I tell you to leave, okay?"
"Undyne… I…" Monster Kid whimpered guiltily.
"I'll take care of this! Get out of here!" She ordered, and Monster Kid didn't hesitate on following that order.
As soon as they were out of sight, Undyne was now struggling to keep her form from turning into dust as her feet waivered in staying whole.
"…heh… 'It's nothing'…No…s-somehow…with just one hit…I'm already… Already…D…damn it…" The wavering of her feet pulsated faster even though she continued. "Papyrus…Alphys…Asgore… Just like that, I… I've failed you." The wavering ran up her whole body, threatening to turn her into dust.
But somehow… She stayed Determined.
"…No… My body… It feels like it's splitting apart." She admitted in pain, as the wavering moved back down her and pulsated from the waist down. "Like any instant… I'll scatter into a million pieces. But…Deep, deep in my soul. There's a burning feeling I can't describe."
That's determination alright, the trinity trio and the real Frisk thought.
"A burning feeling that WON'T let me die." Undyne smiled at the thought and it sparked back her inner strength but a sudden thought occurred to her about the human situation. "This isn't just about monsters anymore, is it? If you get past me, you'll… You'll destroy them all, won't you? Monsters…Humans… Everyone…."
The real Frisk flinched at this line but it went unnoticed.
"Everyone's hopes. Everyone's dreams. Vanquished in an instant. But I WON'T let you do that." Undyne smiled again. "Right now, everyone in the world…" She opened her good eye and the colors were a reverse pallet of what they had once saw. "I can feel their hearts beating as one. And we all have ONE goal. To defeat YOU. Human. No, WHATEVER you are. For the sake of the whole world… I, UNDYNE, will strike you down!" Her whole body suddenly wavered but only for the sake of her growing determination. When she reformed again, she was whole, no lingering wavers, but her armor had changed into something that looked tougher, despite hearts being a main motif on her chest plate and gloves, and even her voice sounded slightly otherworldly.
"You're gonna have to try a little harder than THAT." She cajoled. A laser beam was constantly shooting out of her eye-patched eye and she was labeled as Undyne the Undying, the heroine reformed by her own DETERMINATIONto save Earth. With 99 ATK and DEF it was obvious that she would be tough, but not as tough as Sans.
"This is earlier in that bad timeline, isn't it Frisk?" Sora inquired finally, since Chara was too busy fighting to bother to pay them any mind, and released Donald and Goofy from the forced shushing hold.
"Yeah, it is. No matter how hard I tried, as soon as Chara started I could never stop them. And as soon as Undyne is finished, its easy pickings to Chara until the fight with Sans at the end." Frisk explained sadly.
Before Donald, Goofy, or Jiminy could even begin to make a comment, Chara had already brought Undyne's HP to zero, again.
"Damn it… So even THAT power… It wasn't enough…? ...Heh… Heheheh…" Undyne chuckled weakly and then broke into a huge grin. "If you… If you think I'm gonna give up hope, you're wrong. 'Cause I've got my friends behind me." Her big grin lessened into a smirk and she was sweating profusely but continued nonetheless. "Alphys told me that she would watch me fight you… And if anything went wrong, she would evacuate everyone. By now she's called Asgore and told him to absorb the six human Souls."
"He won't." Frisk quipped.
"And with that power…" Undyne continued, and started to literally melt as the Determination was giving way. "This world will live on…!" Her melted body was worse, but at least she'd go with that huge grin on her face.
Then she became dust.
And thankfully it was enough to startle the gang to wake up before Chara could properly react to their presence.
A.N.: Sorry for the wait and the shortness folks, I just wanted to get something up for this here 2nd anniversary of Undertale. And also sorry but no, the surprise I had in store is not in this chapter, but it WILL be in the next one for sure.