Compa and Iffy left Grillbys with full stomachs and ready to face what was next. Compa smiles, "I wonder if we can beat Papyrus without hurting him. He is such a nice guy, and he does not seem so bad."

Iffy sighs, "Yeah, to be honest, I was kind of not looking forward to this fight. I get the feeling he is going to make things difficult for us, so I guess be ready for anything at this point."

The two head towards the end of town. As they trudged forward, the snow started picking up. Iffy keeps seeing Chara out of the corner of her eye as she trudges along with Compa. They see in the distance a tall skeleton figure among the snow and it is approaching them through the blinding snow. The figure was Papyrus due to his tall stature. "Humans." He shouts, "Allow me to tell you two about complex feelings. Feelings like the joy of finding another pasta lover. The admiration for another puzzle-solving skill. The desire to have a cool smart person think you are cool. These feelings. They must be what you are feeling right now! I can hardly imagine what it must be like to feel that way, after all, I am very great!"

Iffy and Compa look at each other and then back at Papyrus, both girls saying, "What are you talking about?"

Papyrus continues, "I don't wonder what having lots of friends is like, yet I can't help but wonder if you have friends at the surface, because I heard you say the name Neptune a few times. Are you friends with a Greek god of the sea?"

Iffy busts into laughter, "Oh man, I am going to rub that in her face when I get up there! Yeah, we have lots of friends on the surface, and they are counting on us to get home."

Compa adds, "And you would fit right in! I am sure you would have lots of friends."

Papyrus spoke, "I see, then perhaps I, The Great Papyrus, will be your…" He suddenly paused, and then, regained a new composer, "No, this is all wrong! I can't be your friend! You both are humans! I must capture you, then I can fulfill my lifelong dream! Powerful! Popular! Prestigious! That's Papyrus! The newest member of the royal guard!" Papyrus initiates combat causing both Compa and Iffy hearts to glow.

Compa chuckles nervously, "Wow, he is really fixated on his goal, isn't he?"

Iffy lets out a sigh, "Somehow, I knew we would end up in a fight. This is just Nep 2.0 skeleton edition!" Papyrus cackles as he sends out a wave of small bones at the girls, "How original, bone attack from a skeleton," Iffy mocked.

Compa bunny hops the small bones and asks Papyrus, "Mr. Nice skeleton, why are you attacking us?"

Papyrus was taken back by what Compa said way out of context, "What? Flirting? So, you finally reveal your ultimate feelings! Well, I am a skeleton with very high standards."

Iffy glares at Papyrus, "What the hell? That is not what she meant at all!"

Compa awkwardly scratches the back of her head, "We can be friends, Papyrus, and I can make Spaghetti if you like."

Papyrus shouts, "Oh No! You're meeting all my standards!" He cackles nervously, "I guess this means I must go on a date with you, blonde human! Let's date later after I capture you!"

Compa scratched her head in frustration, "I am not blonde!"

Iffy gnashing her teeth with sheer jealousy, "A date? What the hell, Papyrus, are you that stupid 'cause she makes spaghetti and now you instantly want her?" She slashed the bones coming after her as she spoke under her breath, "This imbecile is trying to steal my girl."

Compa jumps over more bones that Papyrus made and shakes her head, "Why do we have to fight? We don't want to hurt you, Mr. Skeleton."

Papyrus grins, "So, you won't fight? Well then, let's see if you can handle my fabled blue attack!" The skeleton then throws a flurry of blue bone projectiles that harmlessly pass through the girls. Suddenly Compa and Iffy's soul turn blue and they feel heavier, and he makes a cheap shot at them both, "You're blue now! That's my attack! Nyhehehehehe"

Compa groans as she struggles to adjust to the weight magic, "Why do I feel so heavy!"

Papyrus throws a flurry of bones at the girls while saying to himself out loud, "Hmmm? I wonder what I should wear?"

"Hey, bozo, she's…" Iffy spatted at Papyrus not realizing the heaviness of the blue attack, and she tripped over one of the bones and fell flat on her face in the snow. She growls as she stood back up, "Damn it, I let myself get distracted." The ghost of Chara watching from a distance laughing at the fact that Papyrus is making a mockery out of Iffy, "freaking undead."

Compa hops over a bone and rushes to Iffy, "You alright?"

Iffy chuckles as she gets up, "Yeah, just I am about to give this bonehead a fight because he wants one so damn badly!" Iffy charges at Papyrus rearing back a fist.

Compa chases after Iffy only for her to trip over one of the bone attacks, causing her to tumble down the hill and crash hard at the bottom, "Owie!"

Papyrus dodges Iffy punch and pulls out a bone like a sword, "Whoa ho! Do you dare challenge the great Papyrus? Very well that have at thee!" The skeleton smacks Iffy on the side conceals her in a bone-like cage, and fires more bone projectiles at her, "I have you now!

Iffy breaks free in time to jump over Papyrus's projectiles while poor Compa gets hit by the same attack, "Owww! Not again, that really hurt bad!"

Iffy runs forward to Papyrus, "Try again! Bring it on!" She swipes at Papyrus with one of her blades.

Papyrus raises his bone to block Iffy attack, "I can taste my popularity!" He parries away Iffy's attack, kicks her away, and proudly pronounces, "Papyrus! Head of the royal guard!"

Iffy rolled away from the next flurry of projectiles that Papyrus threw at Iffy as she was kicked away, "Geez! Stop talking with that inflated ego of yours!"

Compa hops over the projectiles that Iffy dodged as well, and nervously laughs, "This is not going well and getting way out of hand. Papyrus's ego is making Iffy very mad."

Papyrus cackles and shouts proudly while casually throwing more bones at the girl, "Papyrus, the unparalleled speghetitore! No one can match my cooking, no one!"

Compa smiled and twitched her eye at that comment, as she casually pulled out a giant needle right from nowhere and smacked the bones away, "I think Mr. Skeleton is in way over her head, especially with that last thing he said."

Iffy grabs some of the bones off the ground and throws them like shuriken at Papyrus, "Who freaking monologues in a middle of a fight?"

Papyrus continues to speak as he rushes towards Iffy with his bone sword, "My brother… well, he won't change very much."

Iffy rushes Papyrus as she clashes her blades with his bone sword, "Seriously, dude? Do you ever shut up? Damn, you are worse than Neptune."

Papyrus's smile weakens as his arrogant demeanor slightly changes for a moment, "I will have many admirers, but will anyone like me as sincerely as you two?"

"What? What in the hell are you talking about?" Iffy responds with a raised eyebrow

Compa scratches her head, "Is he having an existential crisis in the middle of a fight?"

Papyrus jumps back away from them and ponders for a moment, "Someone like you two is really rare, and dating may be kind of hard, especially with two at the same time."

Iffy tilts her head, "What are you on about this time?"

Compa chuckles awkwardly, "This is so awkward now."

Papyrus does another blue bone attack but misses completely due to being distracted by his thoughts, "After they capture you, you will be sent away," Then he regains his focus, "Ugh! WHO CARES! JUST GIVE UP ALREADY!"

Iffy throws her hands in the air in sheer disbelief, "How can someone this so indecisive be this damn stubborn? This is crazy!"

Compa sighs, "I am totally lost now."

Papyrus grits his teeth as he stomps the ground causing more bones to emerge from below, prompting Iffy to jump out of the way and Compa to run out of the way, "Give up, or face my special attack."

Iffy rolls to the side dodging the incoming attack from Papyrus. Iffy Holds up her weapons defensively, "Bring it on!"

Papyrus cackles as he stomps the ground making layers of bones coming from the ground going towards Compa and Iffy, "Yeah! Very soon I will use my special attack."

Compa squeaks as she runs away from the encroaching bone attack, "Aiiieeee! I was just about to rest for a minute!"

Iffy jumps over the attack and is still feeling the weight of the blue magic and begins to feel tired, "Well?"

Papyrus tries to play it cool, "Not long before my special attack!"

Iffy scoffed, clearly losing her cool, and shouts, "If it's so damn impressive of an attack why the hell are you just talking about it, instead of you know, using it?"

Compa laughed nervously, "Iffy, I don't think you're supposed to give them that advice."

Iffy complains, "he keeps going on and on about it. This is the weirdest fight I have ever been in."

Papyrus scratches his head, "I am warning you this is your last chance before my special attack."

Iffy blows her top and screams so loud it even spooked Compa, "GET ON WITH IT ALREADY!"

Papyrus cackles nervously, "Sheesh! If you insist, no need to be pushy, human! Behold my special attack!" He reveals a strange bone, and unlucky for him a dog was chewing on it, "What the heck!? That's my special attack! Hey, you stupid dog, do you hear me? Stop munching on that bone!"

Iffy facepalm and suddenly starts laughing out of nowhere. Dark thoughts come from the recesses of her mind, "I am losing it! This place is crazy! I am going crazy!"

Compa looked at Iffy and started to become worried, "Uh oh. I think Iffy is losing it."

Papyrus stomps his feet and begins chasing the dog while angrily shouting. "Come back here with my special attack, you meddlesome canine!"

Iffy is just laughing not out of joy but slight insanity, as sees Chara behind Papyrus and causing past traumatic images in her mind taking advantage of her mental state. Iffy begins pinching herself, "This is a dream! This is a freaking screwed-up dream."

Chara's voice echoes in Iffy mind, "Wow, this deity of Sin must have really done a number on your world."

Compa runs over to Iffy, "Snap out of it Iffy."

Iffy regains the strength to recollect herself, "Get out of my head, you psychopathic ghost!" with that Chara disappears and Iffy returns to her normal mental state just in the nick of time, for Papyrus gives up chasing the dog, "Oh look he is back."

Papyrus grunts and sighs, "Blasted dog, here is an absolutely normal attack" he fills the entire area with bones and projectile attacks.

Compa screams and gets hit by several bones and Iffy reacting quickly jumps between her and the attacks coming toward Compa. Iffy begins slicing and dicing several bone attacks while shouting, "This what you call a "normal" attack?"

Papyrus cackles, "Oh, now you're not so eager to feel my power, welp you did ask for it earlier." He continues to throw more of every single bone attack he has at Iffy who is still slicing, parrying, and deflecting them but Compa can see she is starting to take damage, so she gets up to help Iffy by casting some healing magic. Papyrus comments with a tear, "Such beautiful comradery I must commend you for such teamwork."

Compa strains and then stops her healing, "I can't do much more, Iffy."

Iffy focused on the barrage and just kept fighting against barrage of attacks until a bone on a skateboard caught Iffy foot as she was kicking away the small bones, "What the whoa!" She falls back hitting the ground hard, "I got beaten by a freaking skateboard of all things." Iffy could tell she was going to be out for a minute because her body ached from all the pain she was in by overstraining herself.

To add insult to injury, the ghost of Chara floated above Iffy looking at her, "Wow, that has got to be embarrassing."

When Iffy fell she could see Papyrus starting to breathe heavily, "One down, one more to go." He summons all his strength to hurl one gigantic bone at Compa.

"Oh boy." Compa hesitates for a moment then decides to do something that is absolutely insane and jumps screaming, "DEEEESSSSUUUUU!" She jumped as high as she could and she could not explain it, but she kept going up and up as if there was a force helping her over the bone. She sticks the landing and is confused about how that happened, "did that just happen."

Iffy slowly got back up and limped towards Compa, "Compa, are you ok?"

Compa runs to Iffy, "I am ok! But your…" Iffy collapses from exhaustion, "IFFY!" Compa catches her.

"Well…" Papyrus shambles towards them clearly exhausted, "It's clear you can't defeat me," He takes a deep breath as he approaches, "Yeah! I can see you are shaking in your boots, therefore I, The Great Papyrus, elect to grant you Pity! I will spare you!"

Compa laid Iffy down, bandaged her up, and applied medicine to Iffy. Compa's smile is completely gone as she says in a cold voice, "Yeah thanks."

Papyrus solemnly spoke, "Again, I could not beat two humans! Undyne will be so disappointed in me."

"She should be," Compa said under her breath.

Papyrus raised an eyelid, "What was that blonde human?"

Compa slowly gets up and turns towards Papyrus. She suddenly slaps him and then shouts at him, "I AM NOT BLONDE!"

Chara's ghost jumps back in shock, "Whoa, that's something I did not expect to see."

Compa in tears continues to rant, "This Undean should be mad at you! We just want to go home, and you say you want to help people and be a role model. How can you do that when you don't think about other people? You were being a jerk this entire time and threw us into a pointless fight that hurt Iffy and me. Some friend you are!" Compa gets on her hands and knees, "I just want to go home! I don't want to be here! This place is scary! We feel alone, and we miss our home! I just want to go home! I just want to go home." She starts crying, "I just want to go home."

Papyrus drops his bones and walks up to Compa, "I can see you are very sad, homesick, and now worried about your friend because of me. Nyheh, I think I have overdone it with your friend she was battling quite well and it was the first time I fought like that in a long time."

Compa continues to cry, "There you go again, being selfish."

Papyrus disengages the fight and kneels down to Compa, "I think you misunderstood me human. I was saying you fought valiantly, and I truly did not mean to seriously harm any of you. Regardless, we are done fighting, so instead let me help you two back to Snowdin to get everyone patched up okay?"

Compa sobbing says, "I am sorry. I didn't mean to get mad at you."

Papyrus cackles, "I actually understand, you are mad because I went a little bit too rough with your significant other."

Compa gets red and asks, "How? How did you know I was in love with her?"

Papyrus laughed, "Wowie! Call it experience, but I notice that look when my little sister Frisk gives to Scarlet."

Compa shyly spoke as she calmed down, "Yes, I do love her. I had been planning to tell her before we got down here, but we wound up here before I could say anything."

Papyrus chuckles, "Called it! The Great Papyrus is very intelligent, Nyhehe! As I can tell you both are smart."

Compa sighs, "But Iffy thinks I am stupid sometimes even if she doesn't mean it, but I don't…"

Papyrus cuts her off, "That is preposterous! Surely you might be a bit slow, but it in no way makes you stupid at all!"

Compa smiles returns to her face, "Thank you, Papyrus! That helped me out of some things I needed to work out in my head."

Papyrus grins, "I do appreciate your thanks, Blonde human."

Compa smiled though her eye twitched from annoyance, "How about you call me Compa instead."

Papyrus agrees, "Consider your request honored, Compa and Iffy!"

Compa blinked, "How did you know her name was Iffy?"

Papyrus answers, "Because you literally screamed her name not two minutes ago."

Compa chuckled softly and realized Papyrus wasn't a bad dude, and he just made stupid mistakes. Compa feels a bit bad for going off on him but gets the feeling he has already forgiven her though she apologies, "Sorry for yelling at you. I don't normally lose my head often. You seemed to be a nice skeleton, even if you could get on our nerves. We can still be friends with you."

Papyrus smiles and brightens up his own mood, as he picks up Iffy, and carries her over his shoulder. Iffy, who is passed out and is apparently dreaming says, "No, I can really do tricks with fire magic."

Papyrus spoke as he helped up Compa to her feet, "Wowie, we haven't even had our first date and already managed to hit the friend zone. Who knew all I needed to make pals was to give people awful puzzles, fight them, and then help them through traumatic experiences!"

Compa nervously looks at Papyrus not even sure how to respond to that statement, "I guess that makes sense?"

"You taught me a lot, human, er, I mean, Compa." Papyrus stumbles upon his words.

Compa chuckles with a confused smile, "I'd… say it is a work in progress."

Papyrus cackles, "I hereby, grant you permission to pass through! And I am willing to give you directions to the surface! Continue forward until you reach the end of the cavern, then when you reach the capital, cross the barrier. That is the magical seal trapping us all underground. Anything can enter through it, but nothing can exit. Except for someone with a powerful soul! That is why the king wants to acquire a human. He wants to open the barrier with soul power so that our monsters can return to the surface."

Compa ponders on what Papyrus said, "So that is why we are being hunted, for our souls?"

Papyrus starts walking as Compa follows, and he remembers something as they walk, "Oh, I almost forgot to tell you! To reach the exit, you will have to pass through the king's castle. The king of all monsters, He is well a big fuzzy pushover! Everybody loves that guy! I am certain that if you just say, "Excuse me, Mr. Dreemurr, can I go home?" He'll guide you right to the barrier himself! Anyways, that is enough talking, let us return home and get you all better for the journey!"

"I would like that very much, and if it is truly that easy maybe we can go home without hurting anyone. Monsters here are nice, even if they are a bit weird and don't understand anything about us." Compa replies and continues to walk with Papyrus her ditzy smile returning and a hope to return home.

Elsewhere at the pathway between Snowdin and the door to the ruins was a small woman with broken cybernetic wings, short sky-blue hair with a wild style, and red eyes with a power symbol within them that was blinking, she wore a white-like techno bathing suit with black lines, long white gloves, and white stockings that are torn to shreds with her arms and legs cut and scraped badly. Her entire body is cut, bruised, and scrapped badly. She is holding her side in pain This strange woman walks upon Frisk which rightfully freaks her out, "Oh gosh! Another human? What in the world happened to you."

The woman looked out of it and weakly replied to Frisk, "I am…. Blanc. Where am I? Where's Ram and Rom." She trips and falls forward making Frisk instinctively catch her, "I got to get back to them. Warn Gamindustri about this dangerous monster."

Frisk hoists up Blanc and asks the woman, "What are you talking about? Never mind, I am going to get you some help."

Blanc's last words were, "So cold" before passing out and falling completely unconscious causing Frisk to hold on to her and gently set her down on a nearby tree.

Frisk checks Blanc's pulse and feels a weak pulse. She calls Sans on her phone keeping her emotions together, "Sans are you there? I need you here stat!"

Sans just pops up next to Frisk with one of his shortcuts, "Sup! What the big…" He trails off as he sees Blanc and tries to make light on the situation joking, "Hey Frisk was it me or did you get another girl to fall for ya? Hehehe!"

Frisk glares at Sans as she picks up Blanc, "Sans, she could be dying! Now is not the time for jokes."

Sans raises his hands, "Alright! I can see this might be a big problem, so let's take her through a shortcut." Sans takes Frisk and the unconscious Blanc through a shortcut to his lab. "Here we are!"

Frisk lays Blanc on the medical table. Frisk outstretched her hands to a nearby wall groaning and feeling nauseous, "Still getting used to that."

Sans chuckles, "I see you do it all the time Frisk, you learned my shortcuts well."

Frisk sighs, "Still get weezy every now and again."

Sans shrugs, and then he examines Blanc on the medical table as Frisk begins to get her bearings back and goes through the lab and starts hooking up IVs, "Say, Frisk? Are you sure she is a human, she is well you know more techno-looking than human."

Frisk hooks up Blanc to an IV, "Don't know, for all we know she might be a cyborg. Time has changed a lot outside of here. Living forever and aging very very slowly until I hit my prime, I believe. This might be one of the leaders of humanity from old thrown-away newspapers and old files that wind up here. There has not been much of anything for a while since then."

Sans helps Frisk rummage through more medical supplies, "Yeah, the surface got strangely quiet for a while until recently."

Frisk uses a handheld scanner made by Alphys to scan Blanc, "weird, her body is not normal. It's infected with the Mana virus, but her body is fighting it."

Sans scratches her head, "That… seems familiar. I can't recall why, though."

Frisk sighs, "Yeah, it seems weird like the man who speaks in hands weird."

Sans nods slowly, "I am glad he is in the void where he cannot hurt anyone ever again. He started the whole war between humans and monsters with his curiosity. This was before I was born, Frisk. I just know good old Gaster is really bad news, and the cherry on top is he did not even once participate in the war. He fell into the core shortly after we were sent to The Underground, and that is what banished him to the void. It was very very very very long ago."

Frisk reads the handheld scanner that gave her results, "According to this doohicky, she is an extremely powerful human and seems to be in a transformed state. Unfortunately, she does not have the determination trait, but she does have the trait of justice. She might be one of those anime superheroes Alphys reads about. Except this one is very much alive."

Sans ponders, "Ok, so what ya telling me here, Frisk, is that this is an uber-powerful human, right? This begs the question, how in the world did this one get beaten up so bad, what could have done this much damage, and do we even stand a chance should we come across whoever did this?"

Frisk takes a deep breath as she shakes her head focuses her attention on Blanc and uses the strange scanning device, "She seems to be somewhat healthy otherwise, but we must keep an eye on her. Hate to say it, but I don't want to go back to the surface and meet whatever did this."

Sans hooks up Blanc to an IV and some medicine to stabilize her wounds, "Alphys would have loved to see this lady. Anywho, she won't be waking up anytime soon, so I will keep her in here, and then when she is starting to feel a bit better take her to my room. Can't have Paps freaking out about a third human."

Frisk sighed and nodded as she headed out for a bit of fresh air for a moment until her phone buzzed in her pocket she opened it up to hear a message from Scarlet, "Frisk, this is Scarlet, I was calling to let you know that I witnessed the battle with the humans and Papyrus, and now is heading back home with one of them being knocked out from exhaustion despite their victory. That is all I have to say. Love you Frisky!" The message ends.

Frisk chuckled to herself, "Now they have to deal with Waterfall and one of the greatest challenges in the underground."

Authors Note: This chapter was tricky since I wanted Papyrus to really get Iffy upset to the point where Chara almost took possession of her, but Iffy fights back. Also, I wanted Compa to show actual worry and even get mad at Pap, but also to immediately apologize after getting her head together. The last thing I wanted to do was show Papyrus is really a good person and help them out after the fight.