Chapter 21: Run into the Marshes

I wasted no time, and dashed forward, pulling Frisk along with me, as Undyne launched out her volley of spears. We managed to get ahead of where she was aiming, but she immediately summoned another volley.

Looking ahead, while the bridge was one continuous path, it was clear to me now that many planks have fallen off over the years, and it had become a winding path, including many hard turns. But was still a bridge, so...

Using my magic, I leapt over a large gap on the bridge's side, Frisk trailing behind me, and Toby barking crazily.

The spears continued to rain down on us, as I weaved through them, barely slipping through the onslaught, as Undyne chased after us from behind the stone pillars.

Another leap and...

"GAH!" I cried, as a spear manage to cut through my shoulder. My hand got split from Frisk's, but we both landed back on the bridge further down, Toby was still in my arms...

And the Blue Soul magic was still active.

"Keep going!" I shouted, as I got up, followed by the kid. With both of us still under my gravity spell, we now had to jump separately. Frisk, not fully trusting her jumps, I guess, made smaller jumps from one side of the bridge to the other, rather than making the big gap leaps I was.

I was in full run mode. Nothing else occurred in my mind, just escape. A few more spears knicked me, but my focus was on running, as I heard the knight chasing us start to growl in annoyance and frustration.

Until... just as we were about to get away from the stone pillars... I turned to make sure Frisk was still following...

Just to see her, in the air...

Get hit by a spear.

She was luckily launched to the side, back onto the bridge, but she was down. And as I heard the skidding of metal on dirt, and a large number of magic spears formed above her... I knew she couldn't recover in time.

Memories flashed in my mind, of watching Frisk get attacked by Undyne, in the last timeline. And my anger flared. Not again. I wouldn't let this happen again!

I spun back around, and without a second thought, I summoned a Blaster above Frisk as I ran towards her. It charged its power up, and then fired a blast of fire, spinning in a circle to destroy all of the spears. Meanwhile, I formed a fireball in my hand, condensing more and more flames...

Until I reached Frisk, and threw it at where Undyne was.

It burst into an incredible blast of fire, lighting up the area behind the pillars, with flames spewing out from between them.

I didn't think much about that, as I grabbed Frisk's hand, helped her up, and started pulling her away, Frisk not fighting it as she was eager to get away too.

As we ran across the last stretch of bridge, I heard a loud splash behind us. After the bridge, there was another large patch of grass, which we slid into, hiding underneath, as I turned to look back.

And at that moment, something jumped out of the water, and onto the bridge. I could see Undyne's armored body, steaming from my fire attack, but now cooled off from the water. And, with her yellow eye turning towards where we were hiding, Undyne began to approach.

I was now in my fight or flight instinct, trying to decide on which was the best choice, when Undyne reached us, swiped her hand down to grab at us...

...And lifted up a smiling Monster Kid with one hand, said hand covering one of his eyes.

...Since when did you get here!? I thought.

Undyne simply put Monster Kid down, stood there for a moment, still, as if contemplating what just happened, and then she turned around and left.

She slowly back away through the grass, away from the direction Undyne had left. Once she was gone, and we got out of the grass, the Monster Kid ran out after us.

"Yo... did you see that!?" he exclaimed. "Undyne just... TOUCHED ME!"

"Yeah... you should be more careful, you know," I replied.

"I'm never washing my face ever again!" he continued, oblivious to my concern. "Man, are you guys unlucky. If you were standing just a LITTLE bit to the left..."

We'd be screwed, I thought.

"Yo, don't worry! I'm sure we'll see her again!" The Monster Kid ran past us, tripped onto his face again, and got up and continued on.

Both me and Frisk looked at each other, pretty much thinking, what was that about?

After using my healing magic on me and Frisk, we just decided it was for the best to move on. We passed what was a familiar sight: Chess on a table, and a mouse hole. Except a magical crystal had grown around the cheese. Thus it was still stuck to the table. (There was also an Echo Flower that was repeating "squeak".)

Frisk seemed to find another one of those "stars" she could see. At least I guessed so. So I said, "Knowing the mouse might one day extract the cheese from the mystical crystal... It fills you with Determination!"

Frisk looked up at me. Are you okay?

I sighed. I suppose I didn't look too good. "This... used to be my home. And now that maniac of a captain is roaming around here. It used to be safe... for me... and now..."

Frisk came and hugged me.

"Thanks. Let's keep going."

So, of course, we'd run into Sans. He was standing next to another telescope.

"sup, chara. i'm thinking about getting into the telescope business," he said as he noticed us.

"Oh, that can't be good," I teased.

Sans chuckled at that. "it's normally 50,000 G to use this premium telescope... but... since i know you, you can use it for free. howzabout it?"

"What's the catch?"

"no catch. trust me." And he winked.

"Right..." But, the glutton of punishment I apparently was, leaned down to look through the telescope.

And all I saw was red. Literally just the color red. Nothing else.

I stood back, saying, "yeah, I think something's wrong with it." My eye felt a bit weird, but I chalked it up to trying to squint so hard, looking through the telescope.

I looked to Frisk, and she looked away sheepishly.

"Frisk?"

Your eye... looks weird, she signed.

"Huh?" And lifted my hand to my eye... and felt something on it. Moving my hand into my vision to look, and it was some kind of paint. I pulled out my phone, and turned on its camera to look at myself.

My left eye was surrounded by red paint.

I turned to Sans. "Really?"

"huh? you aren't satisfied?" he replied, non-seriously. "don't worry. i'll give you a full refund."

"But I didn't pay anything. And my eye is red."

"so, someone hit ya?"

I just groaned. I knew he was messing with me now. Toby jumped up on my short self (but still a rather impressive leap), and licked the paint off of my face. Then we walked off, and found a doorway to my left. I thought I saw someone in there, someone I recognized.

Going inside, I found the nice cream guy.

"Hey there... you seem down," I noted.

"Oh, hey. I relocated my store, but there are still no customers..."

Maybe because you're in an unmarked room? I thought. He was kind of out of the way now.

Then he perked up. "Fortunately, I've thought of a solution! Punch cards! Every time you buy a Nice Cream, you can take a punch card from the box. If you have three cards, you can trade them for a free Nice Cream! They're sure to get the customers to come back!"

"Sure..." I sounded.

"Nice Cream! It's the frozen treat that warms your heart! Now just 25G!"

To be nice to the Nice Cream Guy, I called out, "hey, Frisk, do you want a couple more ice creams!?"

She came running in, and I ordered three Nice Creams, got some Punch Cards from the box, and gave him them for a fourth free Nice Cream. Two for each of us. I just wanted to throw the guy a bone.

As we moved on, enjoying our ice cream, we passed by a teardrop-shaped monster.

"What's a star?" it asked.

"...Like in the sky? Out above the Surface?" I asked. There was an answer, but it was some complex science thing that Gaster told me. Not helpful to know in the Underground.

"Can you touch it?" it continued. "Can you eat it? ...Can you kill it?" It paused for a moment, looking at us. "...Are you a star?"

That took me off guard. Was it implying... that I was something to kill? I didn't know what to make of that.

"Let's keep going," I said, not wanting to think about the implications here.

Continuing on, we entered a large marsh area, with several small landmasses above the somewhat shallow water, which was dotted with lilypads and water sausages, and bridges connecting the landmasses.

There were Echo Flowers around, so I let Frisk and Toby wander a bit, while listening to what they had to say.

Another passing conversation... "So? Don't you have any wishes to make?"

"...Hm, just one, but... It's kind of stupid."

"Don't say that! Come on, I promise I won't laugh."

There weren't any more flowers around the marsh area, at least ones easy to reach, so I called Frisk to come back.

Then I got a call.

Answering, it was Papyrus. "HELLO! THIS IS PAPYRUS! IT SEEMS THAT YOU HAVE SURVIVED UNDYNE'S FIRST AMBUSH."

"Yes, yes we did," I said. It was a bit frustrating that his warning was so immediate, but I knew it wasn't his fault.

"YES, AND... IT WOULD SEEM... THAT HER OPINION OF YOU IS VERY... MURDERY. BUT I BET YOU KNEW THAT ALREADY!"

"Yeah... I may have figured that out."

"WELL, I AM HOPING TO CHANGE THIS! I WANT TO BE ABLE TO HELP YOU AND HER BECOME FRIENDS!"

"Papyrus, I... Okay," I sounded. "Thank you, but-"

"DON'T MENTION IT! I CALL YOU BACK ONCE I HAVE A PLAN."

And he hung up.

Awesome. Just Awesome.

Then I heard a pitter-patter behind me. Looking back, Frisk was coming back up, holding a pair of familiar shoes. Ballet Shoes.

So the outfit is complete. Frisk now had everything she had on where I first met her, before the Reset.

Then I saw something else behind her.

"Frisk, look out!" I shouted.

Frisk looked behind her, and saw the monster following her, and then she dashed behind me.

The monster was a sort-of living washing tub, with a round head with a blank face, a rubber duck floating on its water-filled body, a crank-like tail, and reptilian legs.

It shuffled up, shouting, "those shoes are filthy. And that tutu, as well."

I calmed myself, and told Frisk, "this is a Woshua. These humble germophobes seek to cleanse the whole world."

"Out! Darned spot!" the Woshua shouted. And then he sent out a bar of soap as an attack. We had to skip around to avoid it as it bounced around us.

As I recomposed myself, and started to plan my next move, the Woshua... started rinsing off a pizza.

...I didn't think I was going to be hungry for a while.

Then Frisk signed to me an idea.

"Hey, uh... it's been a while since I had a shower," I told it. That wasn't wrong, but at the same time... "Could you maybe..."

It began to hop around excitedly. "Green mans clean."

It then shot out a spiraling water spray, and I noticed some of the spray shots were green. Healing magic. I spun around to avoid the shots, Frisk joining in (really looking like a ballerina in her tutu), and then the three of us jumped at the chance to get caught in the green sprays.

Well... it was healing magic, but it was also wet. We were now covered in soapy water, head to toe.

But the monster was pleased, and bounded off.

"Okay..." I sounded. Then Toby shook all of the water, spraying us even more.

I just sighed, then I noticed some more ancient writing.

"The power to take their Souls... This is the power that the humans feared."

Right, okay... I thought.

We continued on, which led us down a long strip of land along the march, towards an entrance into another cavern.

The problem was that it was a LONG strip of land...

Me and Frisk started walking down, and then I noticed something to the side, coming from the water. And I saw a tentacle rise from the water's surface.

Toby started barking behind me, and I looked to find another tentacle behind us.

I grabbed Frisk's hand, and began to pull her along, as I started to walk fast, Toby following behind and still barking.

Then the tentacles fell below the water... and something rose out... something big...

And whatever it was... even I wasn't expecting. Especially with such a cheerful face.

It was basically a massive squid, but with the head of an onion. And he seemed super happy to see us.

"Hey... there... Noticed you were... here..." he greeted. "I'm Onionsan! Onionsan, y'hear!"

"Hey..." I nervously waved back. "I'm... Chara. This is Frisk, and the dog is Toby."

"Hey! You're visiting Waterfall, huh! It's great here, huh! You love it, huh!"

"I guess..." I replied. We began to do a sort of walk and talk.

"Yeah! Me too! It's my big favorite!"

"That's nice to hear."

Then his head fell below the water, as he blubbed, "even though, the water's getting so shallow here... I... have to sit down all the time, but..." He popped back out, "he-hey! That's okay! It beats moving to the city! And living in a crowded aquarium! Like all my friends did!"

Now I started to feel bad. "...Are you okay...?"

"Y-yeah. And the aquarium's full, a-anyway, so, even if I wanted to, I... That's okay though, y'hear! Undyne's gonna fix everything, y'hear! I'm gonna get out of here and live in the ocean! Y'hear!"

"I-I hear ya..." I was trying not to tear up.

We began to approach the cavern exit, and Onionsan noticed. "Hey... there... that's the end of this room. I'll see you around! Have a good time! In Waterall!" he cried out in goodbye, sinking below the water, and drawing out the "Waterfall".

I meekly waved goodbye, as we disappeared into the next cavern.

Mommy, are you okay? Frisk asked me.

"I... no, not really." Did they really trust Undyne that much? That... crazy killer?

But at the same time... I guess they needed to believe in someone. Believe that someone could free them. I just... wished there was a way to help these monsters. At least... without having to kill Frisk... or me. I certainly no longer had the will to die, and I knew Frisk didn't either.

Author's Note: Man, I am going to be honest, I had no idea how I was going to end this chapter. I mean, I knew how it was going to start, obviously. I had to answer the cliffhanger from the last chapter.

I think I've been delving too deep into Deltarune too much as of recent. I mean, in comparison to Undertale. I've been into other stuff, too, like Legend of Vox Machina, and the new Kirby and the Forgotten Land. Between Undertale and Deltarune specifically, I've been more into Deltarune, ...which to be fair, it is much more recent.

But because of this, I forgot that Onionsan was even in Waterfall. Heck, I might not just be Deltarune, because I barely remember that he was in Deltarune, too. Ironic, considering in Deltarune, he's written as being forgetful.

But that's what pre-recording me playing Undertale is for, so I have that reference. And it gave me a good point to end the chapter, which is what I needed to know.

Speaking of which, I am also still forgetting that Toby / the Annoying Dog is part of this story, and I am still beating myself self up over it. Part of having Toby planned for the story involves a new / altered, crazy scene that I planned for a long time. And as far as I can tell... that is going to be taking place next chapter. So, yeah, I need to find a better way to remind myself of that dog, and get him more involved.

Okay, so back to the chapter itself. I don't have much more to say, but with Papyrus... I figured the best thing to do with him now was to start making it more clear that he wants to arrange a situation where Chara and Undyne could be friends.

Now, he obviously did this in the game itself, but at a later point (during the Waterfall last boss). Not that was a bad thing, but for this story, it's probably more important that Papyrus does this. He may not realize it, but Chara already has a low opinion of Undyne, so his help may be needed here...

And that's the next best thing about being reminded of the Onionsan scene, because looking over it, I realized that I should add in something that I actually didn't think of:

Having Chara start to see another side to Undyne. This is probably important to what I already have planned, so this will be important for me to lean in on. Luckily, I know which character could be used to help here.

That's all from me. See ya!