Author's Note: Hey guys! You may have noticed that this is both a shorter chapter and an.. off title today. This is because I'm busy on vacation by the time you're reading this (sometime on the 22nd hopefully) and I'm writing this only a week away from Monika's birthday and the usual yearly upload that comes on said birthday to express my love for her. The issue is, I'm only a week away from that day and I vanish on the 18th (so if I never return you know that I probably died sometime that week) for my trip, and due to scheduling errors (namely trying to create a sizeable and well-written chapter of LiFOS) I don't have nearly enough time to write out what I'm hoping to write out for the actual MoniTale chapter, which should take us to the end of Undyne and Waterfall.
So instead I've decided to create this, a short AU in which the characters of Monika and Player take over someone else's role in the Undertale story. It's a nice and easy story for people to enjoy while I'm gone and preparing to write the next MoniTale chapter proper. I cannot promise any particular release date, but I hope to have a new full chapter for you out by Mid-October. I'm working on a lot of projects all at once at the moment, so be patient if this isn't the case.
Additionally I will be skipping review replies at the end of this one as well, I'll get to all reviews for both this and the previous chapter in the next one, for now...
Disclaimer: I don't own Doki Doki Literature Club or Undertale, however I do own the plot of this story and our Player.
Across time, across space, many stories exist. Some play out with tales of heroism and drama, some play out with tragedy and suffering, and others, like this one and so many others featuring these two, are at their core, stories of love.
Hopes, Dreams, Love. The three components that make these two individuals who they are, no matter the time, no matter the world, no matter the stakes. The feelings that make up their SOULs.
In this world, rather than be thrown into what was once a game to them both, the duo known as Player and Monika have always lived here, existing on the Surface for a brief period of time before falling into the Underground. However, neither of these two "Humans" were what they claimed to be. They lacked conventional SOULs, and therefore couldn't be used to break the Barrier, as was uncovered by the Royal Scientist, Alphys, when she ran tests on the two.
Thusly, Asgore was not able to justify fighting and killing them, and so the pair were allowed to remain in the Underground as neither of them were able to pass through the barrier.
The timeline we shall visit regarding these two is one of peace and hope for a better tomorrow just on the horizon, wherein a young child known as Frisk has appeared in the Underground, and has just passed into the pair's home, Snowden...
Monika blinked her eyes, smiling a bit as she observed the small shape slowly passing by her, she had a feeling that taking some time to write while hiding in the trees was a good idea and lo and behold, it was. A Human had appeared before her.
She slowly slipped from behind the trees and approached the small shape, her shoes quiet against the snow, but a snapping branch beneath her foot nearly gave her away, good thing she teleported back into the trees before the kid could turn around.
'Phew.' She thought. 'Getting caught would be bad, after all I need to catch this kid if I want to..' She shook her head softly, mentally tired out from writing so much back there. 'Gotta catch this kid for my darling before I nap. Oh I'm so tired, how long was I writing?' She had in fact been writing for a few hours, but hadn't noticed the time passing since she was so engrossed.
She teleported in front of the kid now. "Hey there." She greeted kindly before shaking her head softly and getting serious. "Aha, sorry about that, but I can't really let you get passed me. It's sort of like our fee for living here, otherwise Asgore would get angry at us."
"W-wait but.. you're a human too!" He? She? Monika wasn't able to tell, They it was then, said, pointing out the obvious.
"Well you're not wrong, but my SOUL doesn't have the right properties to be considered... "human"." Monika replies as the world around her darkens a bit. "That said, yours does." Her welcoming smile grew a tad more dangerous as she said those words. "Which means I'm going to be taking it..." She gave the kid sad eyes for a moment. "Sorry kid. It's a pretty day outside too, the birds are singing, the snow is comforting, on days like these, kids like you..."
"MONIKA!" A voice interrupts her, and both she and the kid turn to see Player quickly rushing up to her, his face giving a smile as he pushes up a pair of glasses quickly. "You CAN'T... oh oh... I am.. I am out of shape.." He pants a bit from running, and she giggles.
"Don't tell me you ran all the way here from checking your traps!" She asked, moving towards him and patting his back. "That would be a run even for me. Breathe and tell me why I can't." She tells him, patting his back in a comforting manner, softly and lovingly, as if she's aware that he doesn't need it but still wants to do so anyway just to be near to him. "Is it... because it'd be childish?" She asked, her eyebrows lifting up and down and a smile creeping over her lips, as if absolutely aware of the badness of the joke.
"That's... not funny." Player finally recovered, clearing his throat. "It is in actuality because I, THE GREAT PLAYER OF THE ROYAL GUARD, shall-"
"Play with them?" She offered.
"Rgghh, no I am going to-"
"Snow them the way to Asgore's?"
"Monika-"
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cause any Harm-"
"Okay good now-"
"onika."
"MMMFFT- BABE, PLEASE LET ME FINISH, IT'S GETTING TOO HARD TO NOT GIGGLE!"
Throughout their conversation, Player had been getting increasingly giggly and was actively grinning despite his best attempts to look serious, and now at a slight eyebrow wag by his beloved, he finally gave in and laughed at her humor, letting himself be doubled over for a second time but this time in laughter, using her shoulder to steady himself before finally breathing a sigh. "Okay.. Okay, may I now?"
Monika put her finger to her lips for a moment, thinking about it with a slight "hmm" in her voice. "I can't think of anything else right now, so let's stop hanging around."
Player looked away as he tried not to laugh at a joke only they would properly understand. "Heh.. ahhh you're the worst."
"I know you love them." She pressed herself closer to him, leaning her hands on his shoulder with her face sitting on them.
"Well you're not wrong~." His arm came around her waist and looked into her eyes lovingly before suddenly perking up. "Wait I was doing something wasn't I?"
"Mmmhmm." Monika nodded slightly, her smile curling back into a mischievous one.
"Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm- AHTHEHUMAN!" He spun around, looking for them. "WHERE DID THEY GO?"
"Maybe behind that conveniently shaped lamp?" She asked, pointing behind her boyfriend at an indeed conveniently shaped lamp, where the young child had actually scurried behind, not that he was aware.
"This is absolutely no time for those kinds of jokes my dear! I need to find them or else Asgore will be most unpleased." Player said, sitting Monika up and turning tail. "I'LL FIND THEM AND THEN WE HAVE BUSINESS TO ATTEND TO IN ANOTHER PLACE!" He called as he took off.
Once he was gone, Monika chuckled to herself and walked over to the lamp, pushing it out of the way. "It's okay." She assured the kid, offering her hand. "I won't hurt you anymore, I promise. Besides, I'm not really the one who cares about getting the last SOUL and getting back to the Surface. Now, my boyfriend? Heh, he's like a human hunting fanatic." She chuckles. "He left something up on the surface he wants to get back to really badly, I think it's cute but you might not." She warns the kid before yawning a bit. "As for me, I'm tired." She says, taking a seat behind the guard station and putting her head in her arms. "I'll catch up with you guys... awn later..."
The child, Frisk, is terrified, a bit giggly from the pair's comedic interaction, and.. confused. This girl was willing to take them on just a few minutes ago, and now she was suddenly taking a nap not far from them? She definitely was an odd one.
Still, the girl's soft snoring filled them with DETERMINATION, and thus the youth pressed forward.
Frisk faced off against talking dogs, dangerous Snow Monsters, and... these.
"These" were in fact traps, shockingly dangerous in fact. It seemed that this Player had an eye for being dangerous to his enemies. Frisk had narrowly avoided falling into spike traps set up in snow drifts that seemed to have gold stashed on top (thankfully, there was a sign warning people not to step on the drift, for there was a trap beneath), being fried by electrical floor traps that he'd set up to be impossible to remember the steps too (after about 3 separate tries), and being shot with Blue and Orange laser traps. Regarding those, they weren't so bad as they just had to memorize that Blue was stop and Orange was go.
After all of that, she came across a town and... Monika?! "Wait, how did you get all the way here without passing me?!" They demanded, coming up to the brown haired girl, who was standing next to a cart and wearing a badge reading "temporary Nice Cream girl".
"Oh hey, you're still alive!" Monika says, seeming surprised back and also not answering their question as she allowed a wry smile to appear over her face. "I guess that means you can be my first customer."
"Hey, you answer the question!" Frisk stomped their foot.
"Only if you ask nice-creamly." Monika said, offering a nice cream to Frisk with one hand while the other went into her green hoodie and pulled out a jar. "I also take tips." She said, clearly messing with the poor child.
Frisk sighed. "Okay I'll buy one, I thought you were a guard lady though?"
"What, never seen a girl with two jobs before? I'd say I was trying to pay off my student loans but I didn't go to college, I've been at cool-lege." She smirks.
"That one wasn't as funny."
"I'm... still working on the material, poetry is my real passion, comedy is just a side thing." She admits, bobbing her head slightly. "Also that'll be 10g. 15 with tips."
Frisk forks over 20g and Monika gives them a Nice Cream Cone. "Thank you for your patronage."
"Your boyfriend's traps are... really dangerous.." Frisk informs her. "But... the signs around them give them away..."
"Aha, yeah he doesn't want anyone to get hurt by them even if they've been set up to be very dangerous." Monika admits with a scratch to her head. "Still though, some of them could be pretty dangerous, especially if you don't know about Blue Stop Signs."
Frisk glowers. "Oh I know all about those!" They say, pouting their lips slightly at the girl, who giggles.
"You got to see the lasers that the Royal Scientist gave us, didn't you?" She asked, putting one hand in the front pocket of her green hoodie and the other up in a hand sign like a finger gun but with only her pointer finger sticking up. "My tip for those kinds of attacks is to stop moving right when you see them starting. This way you don't get injured, trying to bypass them before they show up will only get you hurt." Monika says, before chuckling to herself. "I guess that's Monika's battle tip for today, huh?" Her eyes fill with melancholy for a moment but she shakes it off. "Anyhow, Player is waiting for you once you pass the gates of town." She points a thumb behind her. "He's gonna want to fight you so let me give you a tip for FIGHTING him."
Her hand falls onto the kid's shoulder and she bends down at an angle that's almost unreal. "Don't." Her bright green eyes lock with the child's red ones, her usual calm smile is so... menacingly that Frisk nearly takes a step back but is only stopped by Monika's deathgrip on their shoulder.
She then rights herself and shuts her eyes, giving a cutesy look. "Sparing someone is so much nicer than fighting. We wouldn't want anyone to get hurt now, would we?"
Frisk frantically shakes their head "no".
"Great! Have fun, I need to sell some more Nice Creams~!" Frisk scampers away from the girl, who's fingers wag in a wave.
The child shudders. and decides that perhaps they should consider trying to talk to Player. After all, killing Toriel was hard on the kid. They would have spared her, but she wasn't responding to any of their usual attempts to talk her down and... they only had the one option.
"Hello there, child." Player said as Frisk came to a stop in the snow, not far from him. "I... do not have anymore grandstanding left. No more joking around or making myself out to be a Saturday morning cartoon villain... Don't get me wrong, I AM the Greatest! I am the most amazing member of the Royal Guard ever, even if I am.. not officially recognized by Undyne and... if my existence is only tolerated on a technicality by Asgore-" He shakes his head. "It is of no concern what I am right now. What is of concern is..." His eyes softened. "I really hoped it wouldn't come down to this. Whether or not me and you have the same kind of SOUL.. We are both of the same species. I do not know if I have it in me to kill you."
He looked down, unable to meet the child's gaze, unable to even look at them. For a moment the pair said nothing and merely stood apart from each other.
And then, all at once, Player sucked his breath in to continue talking.
"You know, Monika and I, well actually Just Monika, we were... running from something up there. She had done terrible things. I just wanted to help her and- and I did and I still am. Up there is home, it's where we can atone and where we can live out a better, happier life." He said, his voice filled with an incomprehensible sadness. A sadness, Frisk felt, of friends lost. "I helped her become a better person. To accept her reality for what it was and see it for what it could be I- I did that. Even after she hurt.. our friends." His face softened and then hardened up, as if he was steeling himself to do what he must do next. "And I will continue to help her. Even if it means..." He swallowed and met Frisk's gaze again with harder eyes than before, eyes filled with a resolve, unlike anything the child had seen before. "Even if it means I must hurt and kill you, child. Prepare yourself! For now you face-"
The world around Frisk and Player darkened, and suddenly long knives appeared in the space between them, floating in the air and sunk into the snow. Frisk took a deep breath as their Red Soul appeared. They were determined to win this.
"THE GREAT PLAYER OF THIS GAME!"
*Player, 20 ATK 13 DEF
*The Human Guardsman attacks
Player's first attack was to throw his hand out, releasing a long rope from his hand with a noose tied at the end like a lasso. It was orange in color and though Frisk moved to avoid it, it flashed twice and turned blue when Player moved his hand left, catching Frisk by surprise and wrapping the noose around them, pulling them to the center of the knife field.
Player's other hand lifted two fingers and the knives shot up out of the ground, but they were blue colored! Frisk stayed perfectly still and was fine.
"I see you've mastered my darling's technique of using Blue Stop Signs. Yes, she became quite adept at avoiding Blue Attacks on the Surface." Player mused as Frisk hit the ground, the attack ending for now.
"You have to listen to me, killing me and taking my SOUL is the opposite of helping her out! You said she hurt your friends, well I think we could be friends too if you'd let us, and hurting me isn't helping your case!" Frisk said, standing up to prepare for what comes next.
Player glanced away.
Frisk glanced over at the shadowy red-eyed figure who had been helping them so far.
It shrugged. "Player ATK down. Player DEF up. Not bad, Partner."
"That doesn't matter." Player announced. "We could never be friends. You must die for the Barrier to break!" He yelled, holding his hand out and firing-
"Cupcakes?" Yes indeed, magical cupcakes appeared from his hand and flew at Frisk, the treats weren't very nice though, in fact they were hard like they were burnt, and struck the child against the head and in the SOUL before they reacted and avoided the final one.
"My ability to do magic is a bit.. tainted thanks to the friend group I keep." Player admits, putting his finger and thumb beneath his chin. "Why did she use her SOUL to make cupcakes..? She had normal recipe books I think.."
Player's musing gave Frisk time to think themselves, as well as heal up by consuming the Nice Cream Cone.
"HEY I SAW THAT! No healing in my battle, especially not with something you bought from my girlfriend!" His hand swept out in front of him, and more magic infused knives shot at Frisk, these ones were only white colored however, and the child was forced to duck and weave between the blades as they flew. Player's attack wasn't up yet however as he dragged his hands down, summoning two big nooses on either side of their battle zone. Which he then controlled by crossing his arms over his chest, causing the nooses to swing towards Frisk.
Frisk used battle physics to their advantage however, and jumped up, floating above the noose strings and in between where they would meet to avoid the attack before landing once it had passed.
"Think about what you're doing, you're hurting me just like how she hurt your friends! You showed her that wasn't the way, so why are you doing it?" Frisk demanded.
Player's face contorted in pain and his resolve almost broke, but he shook his head. "I need to do this, it's the only way for not just us, but everyone to be happy!" He replies, raising his hand. "It's what Undyne believes, and I agree with her!" He slapped his hand down onto the snow, creating a construct out of the snow. A large...
Monkey, which leaped at Frisk like how a Monkey would, it's hands going above it's head and threatening to slam down on them. They moved out of the way but were hit by the edge of the massive creature's fist.
"Monkey's can climb.. what else was that one about? I never remember it." Player muttered, memories of a certain pink haired young girl flooding through his mind. He cleared a tear from his eye before pressing on. "Ah, I don't care. I never got her simple poems anyway."
Frisk slowly got up from that last one, they were definitely bruised, nothing a bit of Monster Food wouldn't take away but it still hurt. "You said you were able to help Monika accept her reality... Why can't you accept this new one? Down here is so beautiful and wonderful and.." Frisk also felt a tear try to break away from their eye. "There are so many good things to see down here too."
Player said nothing, the figure did however.
"Player DEF down, Player ATK down."
Frisk coughed and pressed on. "Even if you can't accept that.. shouldn't you at least try to find another way? To set a better example for the girl you love? What kind of example does it set for her if you're allowed to hurt people but she isn't?"
"Stop." Player orders. "I have had enough. I will finish this battle here and now and we will go to the surface and SEE OUR FRIENDS AGAIN!" Magical energy surrounds Player and his SOUL appears.
"Uh, can I check this?"
*Player's SOUL. He is preparing his final attack.
*He is filled with RESOLVE.
"Oh." Frisk says. "Oh no."
Player's SOUL glows bright and his SOUL begins to shift open, revealing a book with a single eye-
An annoying dog jumps up, snatches the book from the SOUL and then scampers off.
"Wh- hey no get back here! I.. need.. that.. ergh.." He sighs. "Okay so I..." He licks his lips and looks at Frisk before making a face where his lips are bent inwards in a look of "well I've messed up."
"I... don't have a... backup... attack." He admits.
"Sooo..."
"You... have defeated me this time.." He says, taking a seat in the snow. "Plus.. I don't really want to kill you, child. You're just a kid after all."
Frisk pats his shoulder. "It's okay. And I really meant what I said before. We should become.. friends some day... Just.. make sure Monika doesn't hurt me."
"Oh did she do the "don't" thing to you?"
"Yeah actually."
"Yeah she does that to me too, usually when I repeatedly do something stupid that she told me not to do."
They sit in the fog for a moment.
"Your girlfriend is terrifying."
"That happens to be one of the reasons I love her... but oh god are you right."
And with that, the child stepped away, onwards to the next step in their journey...
Author's Note: Aaand that's it for this timeline, at least for today. Maybe in the future we'll explore more but for now this will sit as a special chapter done for this circumstance and really this circumstance alone. I hope you guys all enjoyed and for now-
Until Next Time, True Readers
And happy birthday, Monika.