"WELL...! *HUFF* IT'S CLEAR... YOU CAN'T! *HUFF* DEFEAT ME! YEAH! I CAN SEE YOU SHAKING IN YOUR BOOTS! THEREFORE I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, ELECT TO GRANT YOU PITY! I WILL SPARE YOU, HUMAN! NOW'S YOUR CHANCE TO ACCEPT MY MERCY."
Frisk sighed in relief when the battle ended. It had been extremely tough to avoid all of Papyrus's attacks, but they had managed it. They were drawn out of their thoughts when they heard Papyrus talking again.
"WELL! IT SEEMS YOU'VE PASSED THE TEST, AND WITH SUCH GRACE AND SKILL, TOO! UNDYNE'S GOING TO BE IMPRESSED BY YOU. BUT... I DON'T REALLY WANT YOU TO LEAVE YET… WHO WILL I TALK TO WHEN YOU'RE GONE? AND EVEN WORSE, MY FRIEND QUANTITY WILL REMAIN STAGNANT!"
"We can be friends, Papyrus!" Frisk said, although they were feeling even worse for being unable to control themselves now that they knew he doesn't want them to leave.
"REALLY!? YOU WANT TO BE FRIENDS, WITH ME? WELL THEN... I GUESS... I GUESS I CAN MAKE AN ALLOWANCE FOR YOU! WOWIE! WE HAVEN'T EVEN HAD OUR FIRST DATE... AND I'VE ALREADY MANAGED TO HIT THE FRIEND ZONE!" Frisk laughed. "WHO KNEW THAT ALL I NEEDED TO MAKE PALS... WAS TO GIVE PEOPLE AWFUL PUZZLES AND THEN FIGHT THEM? YOU TAUGHT ME A LOT, HUMAN. I HEREBY GRANT YOU PERMISSION TO PASS THROUGH! ANYWAY! THAT'S ENOUGH TALKING! I'LL BE AT HOME BEING A COOL FRIEND! FEEL FREE TO COME BY AND HAVE THAT DATE! NYEH HEH HEH HEH HEH HEH HEH!" Papyrus then proceeded to do one of the most impossible things Frisk had seen him do so far, which was fly over their head and back to his house.
As they were watching him fly off, they caught a glimpse of Sans watching both of them from the treeline. They waved at him and he lazily waved back, before heading off in the direction of Grillby's again. Frisk watched him leave curiously, and a bit guiltily. They had heard him calling them and walking over here in the hallucination (?), but hadn't seen him come here this time. Maybe he had just not called, since he could see them already. They had to wonder, though, whether anyone else had the hallucination either, and whether they had remembered. Papyrus clearly didn't, that was for sure, but Papyrus didn't seem to notice much anyway.
While pondering this, Frisk was walking back to Papyrus and Sans's house, which Papyrus was standing in front of.
"SO YOU CAME BACK TO HAVE A DATE WITH ME!" Papyrus exclaimed. "YOU MUST BE REALLY SERIOUS ABOUT THIS… I'LL HAVE TO TAKE YOU SOMEPLACE REALLY SPECIAL… A PLACE I LIKE TO SPEND A LOT OF TIME!" Papyrus concluded, before running off into town with Frisk following at a quick pace. Just before they got to Grillby's, however, Papyrus took a U-turn and went straight back to his house, with Frisk tagging behind confusedly.
"MY HOUSE!" Papyrus shouted, before entering the house. Frisk headed inside after him and was immediately greeted by a variety of weird and amusing things. There appeared to be one floor with the living area and kitchen, and another floor with the bedrooms. On a table to the right of the entrance was a rock on a plate. "THAT'S MY BROTHER'S PET ROCK. HE ALWAYS FORGETS TO FEED IT. AS USUAL, I HAVE TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY." The rock was covered in sprinkles.
Frisk continued to inspect many of the items in the household, earning amusing comments from Papyrus – and 20G from the couch. At one point Sans even popped out of his room to play on his trombone. Speaking of Sans' room, something was up with it. It had fire coming out from under the door! Maybe Papyrus wasn't kidding when he said it was a world of its own.
After trying to open the door and realising it was locked, Frisk moved on to Papyrus's room. The door had a sign on it that said "NO GIRLS ALLOWED. NO BOYS ALLOWED. PAPYRUS ALLOWED."
"THAT'S MY ROOM! IF YOU'VE FINISHED LOOKING AROUND… WE COULD GO IN AND… DO WHATEVER PEOPLE DO WHEN THEY DATE?" They entered the room and looked around. Next to the doorway was a box filled with bones. "HEY, THOSE ARE ALL THE ATTACKS I USED ON YOU. GREAT MEMORIES, HUH? SEEMS LIKE IT WAS ONLY YESTERDAY… EVEN THOUGH IT BASICALLY JUST HAPPENED."
Frisk moved around and inspected some more things, gaining more comments from Papyrus. It was the only reason they were still doing it, really. "THE INTERNET! I'M QUITE POPULAR THERE. I'M JUST A DOZEN AWAY… FROM A DOUBLE DIGIT FOLLOWER COUNT! OF COURSE, FAME HAS A STEEP PRICE… A JEALOUS TROLL HAS BESEIGED MY ONLINE PERSONA. ALWAYS SENDING ME BAD PUNS IN A GOOFY FONT…" Frisk snickered at that and moved on to other items in the room.
"THAT'S MY CLOEST! THERE ARE NO SKELETONS IN THERE… EXCEPT ME, SOMETIMES." Papyrus said when Frisk looked at the closet.
"ISN'T THAT FLAG NEATO? UNDYNE FOUND IT AT THE BAY… I THINK IT'S FROM THE HUMAN WORLD? NOW, I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE THINKING. WHY WOULD A HUMAN FLAG… HAVE A COOL SKELETON ON IT? WELL… I HAVE A THEORY. I THINK HUMANS… MUST HAVE DESCENDED FROM SKELETONS!" Papyrus said when Frisk inspected the pirate flag on his wall.
Well, that's a logical conclusion given the evidence he has, I guess, Frisk thought.
"THAT'S MY BED!" It was shaped like a sports car. "IF I EVER GET TO THE SURFACE, I'D LIKE TO DRIVE DOWN A LONG HIGHWAY. WIND IN MY HAIR… SUN ON MY SKIN… OF COURSE, THAT'S JUST A DREAM. SO INSTEAD I CRUISE WHILE I SNOOZE."
After Frisk was done looking at everything, they went to talk to Papyrus. "SO, UM… IF YOU'VE SEEN EVERYTHING… DO YOU WANT TO START THE DATE?"
"Yeah, sure, Papyrus." They replied.
"OKAY! DATING START!" Papyrus exclaimed, drawing out Frisk's soul and into what seemed to them like a battle, but without the threat of death.
This is different to human dating for sure… They thought.
*One date later…*
When Papyrus had pulled out the spaghetti from under his hat and Frisk had seen the red tomato sauce, they had to fight back the urges to maim and kill. They had managed to not do anything drastic, but they could feel claws growing slightly where their fingers usually were, and suspected their eyes had gone more bloodshot. After attempting to eat the piece of spaghetti that Papyrus had offered them and feeling it turn to ash in their mouth, they decided not to try and eat anything else. (Especially since they felt quite bad when they saw Papyrus's look after he figured out they couldn't eat his spaghetti.)
They had also dealt with Papyrus's rejection pretty well, since they hadn't really expected to be going on a date with him anyway. And after he had offered them his phone number and realised that they didn't actually have a phone he gave them one of his old ones, too, so at least they gained that out of the whole thing. Before they left, though, they decided to test if the phone actually worked.
"WOW! IT ONLY TOOK YOU FOUR SECONDS TO CALL ME! YOU MUST BE VERY DESPERATE FOR MY HELP! WELL! DO NOT FEAR! THIS IS PAPYRUS'S HOTFUL HELPLINE! JUST DESCRIBE YOUR LOCATION, AND...! I WILL DESCRIBE SOME HOT TIPS! SO, WHERE ARE YOU?"
"Oh, I'm still in your room-"
"... ... YOU'RE STILL IN MY ROOM? ... HAVE YOU HEARD OF SOMETHING CALLED A... DOOR? WAIT! DON'T WORRY! I'LL DRAW A DIAGRAM FOR YOU!" They laughed at that, but before they could reply he hung up – probably to draw that diagram for them. They called him again to tell him that they'd be fine, but… "HOLD UP! I'M STILL DRAWING!" … he just hung up after telling them he was still drawing.
Frisk decided it'd probably be better to go and tell him in person. After doing that, Papyrus offered to escort them the rest of the way to Waterfall. They agreed, since they'd miss his company, even though they had his number.
"THIS IS WHERE I TESTED YOU! WHAT A TERRIBLE MEMORY!" They snapped out of their thoughts and looked at Papyrus suspiciously. He wasn't looking in their direction, so he didn't catch the look.
What does he mean by that…? He seemed to be having fun while we were battling… Maybe he knows more than he's letting on… Frisk thought, while Papyrus continued chatting.
"WATERFALL... I BARELY KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT. BUT I'LL DO MY BEST TO INFORM YOU!" They paused to look around. They were heading into what seemed to be a series of smaller caverns inside the big cavern that was the Underground, with a river flowing by the edge of the path. The big ice blocks they had seen earlier were floating down the river. Most of the snow seemed to have melted, too.
The two of them continued walking and eventually reached an area with a couple of monsters in it, including Sans, who seemed to have another sentry station here as well. Strangely, the station had snow on it. Papyrus saw them looking and said, "YES, HE MANS TWO STATIONS AT ONCE. AMAZING, ISN'T HE? HE SLACKS OFF TWICE AS MUCH AS NORMAL! ORDINARY FOLKS CAN ONLY DREAM OF SUCH SLOTH... WELL, I'LL BE LEAVING YOU HERE! UNDYNE SHOULD GET HERE AT ANY MOMENT, SO I'M SURE SANS WILL KEEP AN EYE ON YOU WHILE YOU'RE WAITING. ISN'T THAT RIGHT, SANS?"
Sans jolted awake and murmured "nngghh… yeah, paps, whatever you say…" before falling asleep again. Papyrus muttered "UGH" loudly before stalking off. When they looked back, Sans had one eye open and his grin was slightly larger than usual.
They had a closer look around the room. There were two other people in there with them, not including Sans, and a strange flower. One of the people was the armless dragon monster who they'd seen in Snowdin earlier, who seemed to be a bit younger than them, and the other was a fish monster who was standing next to the strange flower. They approached the fish monster and asked about the flower, and he seemed more than happy to explain. Apparently it was called an "echo flower" and it repeats the last words it's heard. They also went to talk to the monster kid, who rambled on about some woman and how cool she was, before asking Frisk not to tell its parents it was here. There was also a waterfall flowing down into a dark pit in the middle of the room.
Finally, they went over to talk to Sans. "hey, kid. wanna know the best thing about having more jobs? you get twice as more legally required breaks." Frisk snorted in amusement before commenting that it didn't seem like he needed it to be legally required to do it. "heh, yeah. speaking of breaks, i'm going to grillby's. wanna come?"
"Sure, why not?" Frisk replied.
"well, if you insist… i'll pry myself away from my work…" Sans got up and exited his sentry station, before heading in the opposite direction to Snowdin. "over here. i know a shortcut."
They moved to follow him, but before they could they were suddenly in Grillby's. They shot Sans a suspicious look, which he didn't seem to notice. "fast shortcut, huh? hey, everyone." Sans got a few hello's back from the other people in the bar, but most of them were watching Frisk warily. They recognised some of them as the dogs they had seen back in the forest, but they hadn't seen any of the others before. Also the bartender was made of fire.
As they moved towards the bar someone called out. "Hey Sans, weren't you just here for breakfast a few minutes ago?"
"nah, i haven't had breakfast in at least half an hour." He winked. "you must be thinking of brunch." A rimshot went off and the other monsters in the bar laughed and relaxed slightly, although they were still watching Frisk closely. Sans gestured to one of the bar stools and said "here, get comfy." before moving to sit down on the one next to it. Frisk sat down and heard a whoopee cushion go off. They gave Sans an annoyed look as he said "whoops, watch where you sit down. sometimes weirdos put whoopee cushions on the seats. anyway, let's order. whaddya want…?"
"Oh, don't worry about me. I don't need anything." Frisk looked away from Sans, his gaze unnerving them.
"alright then. grillby, i'll have the burg." The bartender went through a door that was behind the bar, while Sans pulled out a comb and started… combing his… skull?
Maybe he thinks it's funny.
"so, what do you think… of my brother?" They were startled out of their thoughts as Sans asked the question. Another pang of guilt twisted inside of them, and they looked away again before answering in a quiet voice.
"He's really nice… and trusting. And funny. He's… cool."
"of course he's cool. we live in snowdin." Sans chuckled at his joke, and you laughed slightly. "you know his outfit? he'd only take that thing off if he absolutely had to."
But he took it off for the date…? Was he just trying to make me happy? Everything Frisk learnt about Papyrus made them feel worse and worse about themselves.
"oh well. at least he washes it. and by that i mean he wears it in the shower." Sans continued, before pausing the conversation when Grillby came back with his burger. Sans pulled out some ketchup from his hoodie. They thought he would put it on the burger, but instead he drank it. Frisk didn't have too much time to contemplate that, though, before they turned their head away. They could feel the hunger become very apparent as their claws started growing, but once again they held it back. By that time, Sans had finished the bottle of ketchup and was watching Frisk closely.
"anyway, cool or not, you have to agree papyrus tries real hard."
"Y-yeah." Frisk agreed, voice strained.
"like how he keeps trying to be part of the royal guard. one day, he went to the house of the head of the royal guard… and begged her to let him be in it. of course, she shut the door on him because it was midnight. but the next day, she woke up and saw him still waiting there. seeing his dedication, she decided to give him warrior training. he's been an apprentice in the guard for a while, but… it's, uh, still a work in progress." Sans turned away to finish his burger. She took the opportunity to relax and become a little less manic.
"oh yeah, i wanted to ask you something." Suddenly, everyone froze. Frisk whirled back to face Sans. He was watching them, again. "back when you were fighting paps… you looked like you got pretty shocked when you saw his blue attack. any reason for that? i did warn you about it."
He seemed to be waiting for an answer, but as Frisk wracked their brain they couldn't seem to come up with a good excuse. After an awkward amount of time with the two of them staring at each other, he seemed to give up on getting an answer. Time resumed as normal, and he got off his barstool.
"welp, that was a long break. i can't believe i let ya pull me away from work for that long." Sans walked over to the exit, turning back to look at you when he was in front of the door. "by the way… i was going to say something, but i forgot." Then he left.
Instantly, the atmosphere in the bar went tense, with every monster there looking directly at Frisk. Some sort of bird monster coughed nervously before saying, "Grillbz says no bar fights."
Frisk decided that it'd be a good time to leave.
They got off of the bar stool they were sitting on and quickly made their way to the exit. So quickly, in fact, that no one even saw them move – they were just sitting down and then gone in a second. As they stood outside, shocked at their own speed, they thought it was nice that being a vampire at least had a couple perks.