#ClockWork!Undyne | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

songfell-ut · 5 years ago

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Chapter 15 took forever ergh

Man, this was a thing. In this thing, Sans cannot do poker face, and Undyne is half bro and half troll. Chapter can be found here.

Frisk wiped the sweat from her forehead and clutched the envelope tighter as she crept over the last "bridge." The monsters in Hotland were supposed to have disarmed all the traps and puzzles for the humans’ visit, but they had replaced them with a bunch of regular wooden planks, not bothering with supports or railings to keep people from falling into the lava.

There! She was across. Puffing a little in the heat, Frisk trotted up the ramp and saw the doctor’s laboratory – helpfully labeled “LAB” – right where they’d said it would be.

But no one had said there would be a crowd blocking it. “…your very eyes!” someone was shouting from a stage in the main area.

It wasn’t very impressive, just a rickety platform with one corner curtained off and a few musicians standing around. The only thing on it was a giant metal rectangle that rocked back and forth on a single wheel, with no human features except for strange, floppy arms ending in white gloves. Yellow and red lights twinkled in elaborate patterns on its front as it raised an arm and twirled in place. “No, you say? It’s not enough?” asked a tinny voice.

Frisk had no idea what it was supposed to be – some kind of loud statue? – and neither did the rest of the audience. The rectangle spun itself impatiently. “Well, then, behold!”

Just like that, the thing froze in place, and there was nervous laughter as it began to look like it was broken—until something darted out from behind the curtain and whacked it in the back. There came a POP and a grinding sound, and the rectangle exploded in a plume of smoke!

But before the audience could work up to a proper state of panic, they heard a silvery laugh. Out of the smoke stepped a dazzling figure; it was shaped like a human, but as the air cleared, the stagelights shone on a monster made entirely of bronze and steel, its features delineated in ivory. Sleek black lacquer served as hair, and it winked an opalescent eye at the gawking crowd. When they didn't get the hint, it raised its hands and tapped them together, then bowed graciously as the applause started in earnest.

This must be the automaton she’d been sent to find! Somehow, Frisk doubted she was supposed to get up on stage to give him the note; if she was, the answer was—

“Yes!” At that cue, the musicians broke into a swift-paced dance tune. Mettaton bowed again, then launched himself into a series of amazing leaps and twirls, hopping around the little stage like an agile, attention-fueled clockwork toy. The audience cheered and clapped along, which seemed to put an extra spring in his step, as Sans would say.

Frisk had crept closer and spotted a set of steps beside the stage. She started up them on all fours, hoping to catch Mettaton after this song. A Royal Guard moved to stop her; Frisk showed her the fancy seal on the note she was carrying under her armpit, and the cat-woman directed her to go up and wait behind the curtain.

The human did so, and immediately bumped into someone. “E-excuse me,” another monster said apologetically. Frisk turned to see a stocky lizard monster with bright yellow scales, wearing glasses and a doctor’s coat; she offered a sheepish smile as the human child backed up. “I’m just here to m-make sure M-M-Mettaton doesn’t s-squeak too much,” the doctor said, holding up an oil can. "I hope he s-stops after this number so I can—"

The audience was applauding again, and the lizard gulped as Mettaton launched right into another routine, the musicians scrambling to keep up. Frisk couldn't help poking her head out from the curtain; she had never seen anything like the automaton, especially not this close.

"I'm so g-g-glad that I finished him on time," the yellow monster said quietly, as if to herself.

"You made him?" the child whispered back in astonishment.

The monster looked a little frightened, as if she'd been caught doing something wrong. "Um...just his b-b-body." She shuffled her feet. "It w-was nothing."

Frisk watched the automaton do a series of backflips ending in perfect splits. "That looks like a lot. It's incredible," she said honestly.

"Really?" The lizard squinted at her to see if she meant it. "W-Well, if you think so..."

Out of nowhere, Frisk felt a cold sensation sliding down her back. The same way one has to sniff at something that looks rotten, the child had to peek out at the audience: sure enough, there was Chara at the back of the crowd, frowning up at the stage.

As Frisk stared, the woman's gaze shifted until her eyes met Frisk's. Chara smiled thinly, and the child's gut knotted. How did—

Another grinding sound pulled Frisk's attention back to the stage. Mettaton’s ankles were starting to smoke as he moved faster and faster; to Frisk's horror, one of the joints locked up, and the automaton's heeled boot skidded across the stage, lurching him off balance. The little human had a panicky mental image of the poor monster lying in a heap, people trying not to laugh too loud, Chara rushing up to help because everyone was watching...

Maybe that was what gave Frisk the courage to drop the envelope and dash onto the stage as Mettaton came careening toward her. She grabbed the nearest pearly-gloved hand and swung him around with all her might, nearly wrenching her shoulder out of its socket.

But it was enough: the automaton slammed his knee and his other hand into the stage and used the momentum to twirl back onto his feet...all in time with the music. The child didn’t have time to catch her breath; Mettaton winked at her with a little clicking sound and then caught her up to dance in place with him, setting her down long enough to let her pose dramatically.

The first time she did it was just freezing up as she faced the audience, but they cheered so loudly that she tried it again the next time she came down, and the next. To her amazement, she wasn’t embarrassed anymore. This was fun!

All too soon, the song ended with a crashing flourish, and she panted happily as Mettaton held her arm up, prompting the now-huge crowd to applaud both of them. The automaton turned to address everyone, but Frisk was glad to stagger back to the side of the stage, where the lizard monster was waiting behind the curtain. “Th-thank you so much,” she said. Despite her scales, she appeared to be sweating, beady eyes fixed on Mettaton. "He's g-going to be s-so upset with me..."

Frisk hated how miserable the doctor looked, as if she expected the automaton to blame her for the mishap because it was her fault. The human tried to think of something to say, and spotted the note in the monster's hand. “Oh, you found it! Thank you!” Frisk cried, as if her life had been saved, and was rewarded with a shy smile as the lizard handed her the envelope. “Here, sir. This is for you,” said Frisk, turning to Mettaton as he came over.

Sure enough, he was scowling. "I was just telling the doctor how amazing you were," the child said as gushily as possible. "But, um, you're so amazing that we're worried about you pushing yourself too hard. Please take more care so you can keep performing for us," Frisk finished.

The automaton blinked, his attention diverted. “Why, thank you, darling,” he said, ruffling her hair fairly gently, “and thank you for your assistance! That was marvelous! Any time you’d like to come back for another performance, my little beauty, you are absolutely welcome.” He gave Alphys a brief glare, then allowed her to creep forward and begin re-oiling his joints as he tore the note open, eyes flicking over the words with inhuman speed. “Ah, duty calls.” The metal monster smiled at Frisk again, working his ankles to spread the oil evenly. “I’m heading to meet His Majesty now. Would you like to come back with me, darling?”

“Thank you, sir, but I promised the Queen I’d stay and meet more people in Hotland,” Frisk lied. She turned to the other monster and gave a half-bow. “My name is, um, Kris. What’s yours?”

“Uh…m-my n-name?” The lizard pushed up her glasses. “I-I’m Dr. Alphys, the r-royal s-s-scientist. It’s n-nice to m-meet you, Kris.”

“I’ll see you later, then, Kris!” Without further ado, Mettaton stepped out of the curtain and leapt off the stage, sailing clear over the astonished humans’ heads and pirouetting once more before he pranced out of sight.

“Um…” Alphys was fidgeting with her claws. “So, d-do you like…stories? Novels or p-p-plays?”

“I don’t know,” said Frisk, rubbing her sore shoulder. “I’ve never read any.”

Alphys’ eyes got wide, and wider. “C-c-c’mon!” she nearly shrieked. “Do I have s-some things to sh-show you!” And she was off, racing down the steps and tearing the doors to her laboratory open as though her tail had caught fire.

Frisk started to follow, but another bad feeling crept up on her, and she had to turn to look at the audience, praying she wouldn’t see—

Chara was still there, still staring at Frisk. But this time, she wasn't smiling. She looked...thoughtful.

Why did that seem so much worse?

Sans lay on the floor in his room, flat on his back, his head spinning. For a long moment, he had no idea what'd just happened. He'd woken up and had to get away in a hurry—from Undyne? Because he'd been chewing on Frisk? That was a dream...right?

But if it was a dream, what was he smelling? The boss monster glanced this way and that. All he saw was his pile of long-outgrown socks, his too-small treadmill shoved against the wall, and the wadded-up sheets on the kiddy-sized bed. Sans grunted and turned onto his side, curling up with one arm under his head.

Then he blinked, grabbed a handful of his shirt, and jammed it into his nasal bone, inhaling so deeply that he almost sucked the material up into his skull. Ha! Frisk's scent was all over him! It wasn't a dream after all. Heh, as if he could've imagined her saying those things, making those little noises and tasting like—

Sans tried to leap to his feet, but he made it about a third of the way before he staggered and fell back with a butt-rattling thump. No good; he'd done too much yesterday and gotten too little sleep. That last shortcut had completely drained him.

It was just as well, when Sans gave it any thought whatsoever. He'd gotten out of Frisk's room fast enough that she had a decent chance of convincing Undyne he hadn't been there. It'd be about eight flavors of stupid to go back to her now, no matter how badly he wanted to.

And boy howdy, did he ever want to. The giant skeleton stared at the ceiling, fighting the urge to rub his face in his shirt like a damn cat. His tongue came up and ran slowly across the back of his teeth, remembering the taste of apples—she must've had some before she went to bed. He'd never be able to eat one again without getting twitchy.

In fact, he had a feeling that life was going to be trickier in general from now on. Being around her had been distracting enough before he knew exactly how soft she was, what it smelled like snuggled into her neck...

Shit. No wonder humans were such obsessive morons about this whole thing. Magic was already tingling throughout his bones, especially his pelvis, a helpful reminder that it was there in case he wanted to have his way with anyone; Sans had to bring his fist up and clonk himself square in the forehead to snap out of it.

...And it didn't even work. The harder he tried not to think of Frisk, the more irritated he got, and he also had a headache.

It was a profound relief to feel the house shake as the front door was thrown open. Undyne shouted something, and Pap's door also banged open; Sans had to smile as his brother loudly rejoiced at seeing Frisk. Footsteps pounded down the stairs, and a moment later, Frisk shrieked with laughter—probably because Pap had picked her up and swung her around, just as he had swung Kris around all those years ago.

Sans sighed. The stairs were too small for him, and he wasn't sure he could manage a shortcut to the living room. Maybe it was just as well: he was tired and cranky, and he hadn't calmed down enough to trust himself yet; better give her some time to get reacquainted with Pap first, before they started handing out everyone's gifts.

Oh, crap. She'd asked him to do something last night with the wagons, but he'd been too distracted by the other stuff she'd said, and too intent on proving that he could do stuff, too. He had spent the past couple days thinking it over while he was pulling the stupid wagon, theorizing that he could cram some of his accumulated magic back down and revert to a lesser height for short periods; listening to Frisk whistle, he'd wondered if he could do that, too, and then gone off a long mental tangent about lips.

Maybe those self-adjustments had worked so readily because he'd had so much practice manipulating his other body parts, or maybe he'd just wanted it to happen badly enough. Maintaining his crammed-down form was something he'd have to work on, and he didn't know if he'd be able to do it at all outside the Underground and its ambient magic, but...

He closed his eyes, letting his body relax, ignoring Undyne's stupid loud voice through the floor. He was home, his brother was happy, they had Frisk here...

Some time later – a few minutes, or an hour – he jumped as the door banged shut downstairs. The boss monster wondered irritably if someone else had come in, or if they'd left, or what. Then, picking up at a random point where his mind had left off, he wondered whether his body felt as awful to Frisk as hers felt good to him. Was it like making out with a coat rack?

The only thing that saved him from another five or six hours of tortured introspection was the smell of pancakes. Sans shook himself, sat up, thought of the living room, and took himself downstairs, where he was met with...no one. To his disappointment, the house was now empty, save for a single plate and a note on the table:

SANS! YOUR GREAT BROTHER (ME) HAS KINDLY AGREED TO ALLOW YOU TO SLEEP IN LIKE THE SLOTHFUL SACK OF BONES YOU ARE WHILE WE ESCORT OUR DEAR

Another set of handwriting, much less elegant and more emphatic, had scribbled out KRIS so hard that the paper was almost torn through, replacing it neatly with Frisk.

FINE THEN OUR DEAR FRISK TO GRILLBY'S AS A CONVENIENT PLACE FROM WHICH TO FURTHER DISTRIBUTE PANCAKES. PLEASE PARTAKE OF THE DELICIOUS BREAKFAST PREPARED WITH LOVE BY YOUR BROTHER, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AND CONSIDER JOINING U

There was a trailed-off line where the S should have began, and a smear of ink as testament to a struggle for the pen before the other handwriting victoriously resumed,

We're at Grillby's!!! (Much smaller:) see was that so hard

NO ONE SAID IT WAS HARD, NYEH!! I WAS MERELY TRYING TO CONVE (smear)

Why are you actually writing NYEH you damn goober

WHY ARE YOU NOT

oh my god (Much bigger:) SANS EAT YOUR PANCAKES

Sigh. Sans obediently picked up a fork, then realized no one was around, folded the stack in half, and shoved it down his throat. He remembered another time with a fork and breakfast being crammed in his face; little did he know then...

With his mouth still full, Sans abruptly stood up and gathered himself for to a shortcut to Grillby's—only for his magic to sputter and fizzle out. Dammit! Had he only gotten enough back to teleport into the living room?

Well, Grillby's might not be very far, but after the past couple days, he was completely sick of walking. He could just wait a few more minutes for his magic to regenerate. It wasn't like he'd die if he didn't see her right this second. Right?

He glanced at the fork again.

A moment later, he was closing the front door behind him, shuffling through the snow with his hands in his pockets.

To his surprise, one of the wagons was parked outside the house, most of its contents sitting on the ground. Aaron and Ice Wolf were busy moving packages into the shed; the only things left in the wagon were the crates of vials, seedlings, and other items for Alphys. Sans caught Aaron's eye, and the merhorse flexed nervously at him before returning to work.

Hm. Toriel must've told them to bring the wagons to Frisk in Snowdin, and then Undyne had gotten Pap to unlock the shed and made these guys unload all the gifts. Nice! That was one less thing to worry about.

Ice Wolf was setting down one of the last packages and climbing back into the wagon. Sans watched in sudden apprehension as the wolf pulled out a crate and trotted down toward the river, raising it over his head to—

It really wasn't Ice Wolf's fault. Apparently, he'd heard Frisk tell Undyne that the crates were all accounted for, and now they needed to go to Hotland; it was already his job to send things there by throwing them into the water, so he figured he might as well help with these, too. One flying tackle and a heated discussion later about the difference between chunks of ice and irreplaceable scientific materials, the wolf monster was directed to the Royal Guards' ferry, which could transport the crates without anything getting waterlogged or melted.

Okay. That was one wagon safely disposed of. Time to follow the other one's tracks in the snow past the deserted librarby – heh, he'd never get tired of that – to Grillby's.

Sure enough, the other wagon stood empty right outside the bar, which was absolutely packed. Sans could smell why: for the first time in months, Grillby was serving hot food. If Sans knew Frisk, no one would have to pay for it, either.

Free pancakes or not, things were quite orderly. The monsters were waiting in a line stretching out the door and along the side of the building; the Royal Guard Captain could be heard directing traffic inside, and those without were politely ignoring Papyrus as he strode back and forth, instructing them to keep waiting. "SANS! THERE YOU ARE!" he said, cheerful as always. "IT'S GOOD TO SEE YOU, NYEHH! I WASN'T SURE IF THE HUMAN IN MY HEAD WAS ENTIRELY TRUSTWORTHY, BUT IT SEEMS SHE WAS CORRECT AFTER ALL! I'M SO GLAD THAT YOU ARE BACK SAFELY!"

"Yeah, I'm here," answered Sans, giving his brother a friendly nudge in passing. "An' speakin' of the human—"

"AH-AH, BROTHER!" Papyrus flung his hands out to block the doorway. "YOU MUST WAIT WITH EVERYONE ELSE."

Sans stared down at him. "What the crap, bro? I already ate. I just wanna get in ta—"

"IT IS A DIRECT ORDER FROM UNDYNE! NO EXCEPTIONS!"

"Well, you're bein' exceptionally dumb!" He tried to stoop to see in the door, but to no avail: there was no room between the monsters in line and those leaving. "Come on, Pap! All I want is—"

A red-gloved finger stabbed up at him. "BACK IN LINE, SANS! NYEH-HEH-HEH!"

And just like that, for one second, Sans was so irritated that he wanted to pick his brother up by the spine and toss him aside. It took far too long to remind himself that he loved Papyrus more than life itself, his brother was just being himself, and Sans shouldn't pick him up by the friggin' spine! What was wrong with him today?

Sans shook himself, pulled a face, and started ambling toward the end of the line. The moment Pap's attention was elsewhere, though, the boss monster turned on his heel, speed-sneaked up to the doorway, tapped on a couple of shoulders, and said, "'Scuse me."

Somehow, no one else seemed concerned that he was cutting in line. A duck, a wriggle and a side-shuffle later, Sans was in the bar, ignoring his brother's orders to come back that instant!

There were so many monsters inside that they'd had to shove the rectangular tables against the wall. Undyne was seated at the high table near the back door, keeping her eye on the line as it moved toward the bar; Grillby had set up a griddle and was silently dispensing one pancake and one blob of hash browns to each monster—not much, but it was still human food, equivalent to a couple of good-sized meals. The stools at the end of the bar were laden with plates, forks, and napkins, but almost everyone was ignoring them and devouring their food on the spot.

Where the hell was Frisk? Even at Sans' height, it took him a moment to locate her. But someone finally moved aside, and his SOUL leapt like an excited little dog at the sight of its favorite human. She was perched on a corner of the bar, tiny feet swinging, wearing her black cloak and a high-necked gown; an intrepid kid had wormed his way into her lap, and Frisk was petting his seahorse-shaped head as she listened to old Gerson. She said something that made the elderly tortoise chortle and whap the bar with his stick, and Sans tried to edge forward.

"Hey!" barked Undyne. The entire place fell quiet as the Captain got down from her chair and stalked over to Sans. "You shouldn't be in here," she scolded him. "Does this look like a good place to just hang out right now? Huh?"

The boss monster ignored her and glared at Gerson, who was occupying both barstools at that corner. Then he looked at Frisk, who was smiling at him, and he immediately forgot what he was mad about. He tried to think of something witty: "Uh." Shuffle. "Hi."

"Ugh! I know the note said we'd be here, but I didn't mean for you to come right in and—are you listening?!" The fish monster had to sock him in the radius to get his attention. "Look, doofus, if you're gonna take up space, do it over there!" She pointed at the gramophone in the corner.

Sans obediently trudged through the press of monsters and stationed himself near Frisk. Undyne followed him, nodding respectfully to Gerson. "So, boss. How was it, living in the lair of the enemy?" the Captain inquired, leaning against the bar. When he looked blank, she prompted, "How'd the humans treat you?"

Why was she asking this now, and what was that look she was giving him? ...Oh, fuck, that was right. She might have seen him on the floor in Frisk's room before he shortcut away, and was fishing for information. Ha. He didn't know whether Frisk had successfully denied it or not; better err on the side of being dickish about humans. "It sucked. They're dumb, they smell weird, an' they all stared at me like a friggin' zoo animal," he complained.

Frisk shifted to look at him, and he quailed at her expression. "Excuse me," she said coldly. "Are you going to mention that you had your own room with a bed even bigger than you are, or how much food you had brought straight to you every single day? All you had to do in return was read and put things in bottles!"

"Seriously?" Undyne punched one fist into her other hand. "Didn't you have to fight for your life against terrible odds, or steel your resolve and withstand all kinds of torture, or something?"

"It was a feather bed with silk sheets," said Frisk, and Undyne made a retching sound.

"Wah ha ha!" Gerson thumped the bar again. "If you ever need another apprentice, girlie, sign me up! Won't hear me complainin'!"

"Me neither," said the kid on Frisk's lap. To Sans' absolute disgust, the seahorse's curved head was snugged up under her bosom, the cloak tucked in like a blanket. Her hood was down, and in the bar's overhead lights, he was reminded of that fateful moment where he'd seen her clearly for the first time, the delicate symmetry of her features and the beautiful red tones in her eyes...

Sans didn't realize he was staring until Undyne coughed. "So all humans are gross and dumb, huh?" She scratched behind her right fin. "Well, if you had to get stuck with one, at least you wound up with Frisk. I mean, she's not that bad, right?"

"Uh..." Fuckin' Undyne! Was she being sarcastic, or actually trying to figure out how he felt? If so, should he try to convince her that he wasn't interested in Frisk, or at least that he wasn't completely batshit in love with her?

...Crap. They were waiting for the next batch of pancakes to finish cooking, so the line had stalled, and now a bunch of other monsters were listening. All it would take was one idiot gossiping about Sans' interspecies love affair for it to get back to Asgore, who would lose what was left of his big dumb mind. Sans had to throw them off...but what could he even say?

Double crap. He made the mistake of looking at Frisk, who had picked up a fork from the bar and—god damn it, she was looking back at him and tapping it against her lips! As if he needed a reminder that she was still stunningly beautiful, or to think more about kissing her. The seahorse was now asleep on her lap, completing the picture of a woman he couldn't hate any less.

Sans gave himself a mental kick in the nuts: he had to say something before someone noticed him ogling her. "Well...it...coulda been worse," he said, turning his head dismissively, "but you should see what she does t'books. She folds the pages up like a damn kid!"

"Oh, yes, I just loved having a ten-foot mother-in-law telling me what I could do with my own things," the human shot back. She turned to address the snickering monsters: "Not only did he get literally one hundred eighty square feet of bed to himself while I slept on the couch like a vagrant, he spent an hour in the tub every single night. I kept having to bang on the door and wake him up! And he has the nerve to complain about how I treated my books?"

The snickering increased as Sans' skull grew warm. Was she playing along, or was she actually mad? Why didn't anything make sense anymore?! "Yeah, well, you snore" was all he could think to say.

With unnerving speed, Gerson swung his stick up and around till it was pointing at Sans' sternum. "And how do you know that, sonny boy?" he demanded.

That was a good question, and the others were eagerly awaiting his response. Sans didn't have the guts – ha – to look at Frisk, so he just shrugged. "I could hear it through two closed doors," he said casually.

Their listeners chuckled, clearly buying it, but Undyne grinned wider. "Good thing he doesn't like humans. You never had to worry about him trying anything weird," she said loudly to Frisk, who was covering her face with one hand. The Captain glanced back at Sans. "Right? 'Cause you don't like humans?"

"Right," said the boss monster. Just in case, he added, "'m not interested. They're too...uh...lumpy."

"Lumpy?" Undyne repeated, voice cracking.

"Lumpy," Frisk mumbled into her hand, and Sans bade a silent farewell to his chances of making it through the day alive.

Gerson snorted. "Never you mind him, girl. I remember when you were even smaller, and you flirted with every monster you met—why doncha try it again? Promise I won't laugh this time!"

The human raised her head long enough to say, "No, sir, but I think you'd fall asleep before we got anywhere interesting," and the monsters roared with laughter, all except Sans.

"That's a fair point," Gerson admitted, once he'd recovered. "A doll like you shouldn't be stuck with a stinky old thing like me. Maybe one of these other fine specimens of monsterhood would suit ya better?"

"Yeah, I'm a fine specimen!" someone called out, prompting more laughter, and cries of "Me too!" and "I'm not, but I'll learn!"

"I don't think so," Undyne said flatly, to Sans' eternal gratitude. "Frisk has a lot of work to do, and she's not gonna be here that long. Anyone who messes with her on my watch is gonna be my new training dummy. Got it?"

"Agreed," the giant skeleton muttered. "Don't want anybody interruptin' her bein' a perfect princess an' fixin' all the world's pr—"

Tng went Frisk's palm on the bar, slamming the fork down and nearly startling Gerson onto the floor. "Don't call me that!"

A moment of apprehensive silence, and then the line began moving again, the monsters whispering to each other and glancing over their shoulders. Well, it'd definitely worked, Sans thought, trying to get his SOUL moving again. No one would think anything was going on between them now. ...How was that little shit still asleep on her?

"Okay, okay," said Undyne, chagrined. "Geez. You're one to talk, boss."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Frisk asked suspiciously, saving him the trouble.

Gerson gave three rapid thumps on the floor. "Very true, Miss Undyne! Very true. Here's an interesting fact for ya," he said to the priestess. "When it comes to sowin' their oats, your average monster's not in any hurry, but bosses? They're almost as determined as humans! Wah ha ha!"

Frisk smiled weakly. "Ahh, I'm just funnin' with you. Don't worry about Sans," Gerson assured her. "Most folks don't know this, but romantically speaking, boss monsters ain't much of a threat to anyone. Sure, they've got that drive to have offspring, but they're too picky to do much about it." He waggled his stick in Sans' direction. "This fella's SOUL ain't interested in anybody weaker than he is. If he can't find another boss monster, he won't fix on anyone at all."

Sans' mouth fell open, and clicked shut. "Wait. What?"

The old tortoise cackled again. "Haven't you noticed, sonny?" he asked. "You're not interested in the ladies – or gents – 'cause none of 'em have enough magic to handle ya. Your SOUL can tell when you meet someone who might work out, and it ignores everybody else. It's instinct—keeps you from hurting a lesser monster by mistake. 'Course, the royals have each other, or at least they did, but..." His shrug was eloquent, almost pitying. "Not sure what to tell you, young skeleton. Hope you find a way to scratch that itch someday."

"Are you serious? How do you know that? Why the hell didn't I know that?!" Sans was too angry to notice how red Frisk was, or how wide Undyne's eye had gotten. "D'ya know how much I've been worryin' about what'd happen if I—" He caught himself just in time. "—got really interested in someone? Yer tellin' me that just bein' interested means it's safe ta go for it?"

"Wah ha! It sure would!" Thump thump. "Ya really didn’t know that? Didn't you get 'the talk' from Asgore or Toriel?"

Sans shook his head. He'd never talked to the King about personal stuff, and Toriel knew how much he hated being a boss monster, so she hadn't brought it up. She certainly never told him what to expect if he did find a potential mate. Sans couldn't really blame her; how was she supposed to know he'd meet someone like Frisk?

Gerson harrumphed at him. "Well, some of us remember how the King and Queen were before the Prince was born—couldn't keep their hands off each other! I had to have a talk with 'em about corrupting our youth with their bad example, and Asgore went on and on about how their SOULs couldn't help it! Poor Toriel wouldn't look me in the eye for a month afterwards!" He cackled yet again. "Not the sort of thing I'd go around repeating to just anyone, is it?"

"Yeah, well, I wish you'd repeated it to me!"

"How fascinating," said Frisk, tilting her head to feign curiosity. That wasn't fair: he knew she was faking, and it was still the cutest damn thing he'd ever seen. "So I don't have to worry about Sans bothering me?" she asked innocently.

"Not unless you're a boss monster, too!" The tortoise had a hearty chuckle at that idea.

No one really joined in, especially not Sans, who was remembering his own words to Alphys. "If humans had anythin' like boss monsters, she'd be one fer sure"...

Suddenly, the little seahorse on Frisk's lap jerked awake, sitting up and rubbing his eyes with one long, hand-like fin. "Good morning," the priestess said kindly.

He yawned a weird little yawn, and mumbled, "Good morning, Princess."

Frisk stiffened. Sans resisted the urge to tie the kid in a knot as the human said, "No, dear. When Sans called me that, he was being sarcastic," with an inflection that made the skeleton wince. "I'm not actually a princess."

Blink. "Oh." Blink. "I don't get it. Aren't you Chara? You were here before, and Lady Toriel said—oww!"

Gerson had rapped the seahorse between the ears with his stick. "Pay attention, sprout," he said severely. "Chara died before you were even hatched. This here is Miss Frisk, you got that?"

The little monster mumbled an apology, ears drooping. Grillby saved them all from further awkwardness by moving over and crackling something at Gerson, who nodded and leaned over to whisper to Undyne, who stood up in turn and stomped the floor for everyone's attention. "Two dozen pancakes left, and we're out of hash browns!" she called out. "Everyone who hasn't gotten theirs yet, count off! One! Two! Three—"

Groaning arose as "Four," "Five," "Six" came down from the head of the line, ending in a triumphant "Twenty-four!" near the door.

"What the hell," complained the twenty-fifth monster. "I didn't come all the way from Waterfall to get screwed again!"

"You shouldn't have come to eat our food in the first place," Dogamy snapped.

"Everyone was already lining up, and I was all the way at the back! So I came to get something for the kids—"

"Well, you should've thought of that before you went and had another one," Faun cut in. "It's people like you who're the problem, making more mouths to feed instead of helping the rest of us!"

"Oh, like you ever get your lazy carcass out to work the fields! I'm trying to keep our race from dying out, and you—"

"No, you—"

Someone shoved someone else, and in a flash, Undyne interposed herself between them. "Take it outside!" she ordered, addressing the angry latecomers as a whole. "Or, don't fight each other over something we can't control! Put some of that energy where it counts!"

"Like where? Going out to look for food and getting captured by humans like her?"

It was no use: more squabbles and counter-squabbles started breaking out, and within seconds, the place was in chaos. Sans moved in front of Frisk, knowing he couldn't trust himself to join the fray—he was already agitated, and it’d be too easy to kill someone by mistake. Undyne had no such qualms, and was dragging a couple of miscreants around in headlocks when an ear-splitting whistle brought everyone to their knees.

The only exception was the child on Frisk's lap. The priestess had shielded his ears with one hand, and was lowering the other from her mouth. "There's more coming," she said into the pained silence, voice clear and steady. "Sans has arranged to pick up several hundred pounds of food, two days from now. We'll bring it straight back here, and every last one of you will have some, including your families." Frisk gave the room a slight smile. "If I'm lying, feel free to eat me instead."

Before anyone else could speak, Gerson tapped the bar next to her. "Is it true that you're in talks to buy us that place on the river?" he asked.

"Yes, and we can improve your existing farmland in the meantime," replied Frisk.

Murmurs arose throughout the room, hope warring with skepticism. "Well," Gerson said slowly, "on behalf of the entire Underground, I've got to say—"

"OH MY GOD!" Sans and Frisk both sighed as Papyrus waved from the doorway. "CAPTAIN UNDYNE! THE QUEEN IS HERE! SHE WANTS TO SEE KRIS RIGHT AWAY!"

The crowd gasped, monsters hurrying to stand aside for Frisk; she waved away Sans' proffered hand, set the kid on the bar, and hopped down. "I'll be right there," she called to Papyrus, and walked out through the aisle, smiling at each monster in passing.

That was what did the trick, Sans thought, along with Pap getting her name wrong—good reminders of the warm-hearted human they'd known and loved. The murmuring started right back up again, but now the thoughtful or hopeful voices were much louder, the pissy ones silent.

The seahorse had floated down to the floor and was bobbing his way through the crowd. Watching him go, Sans wondered about Frisk's reaction to being called a princess. Not only should she be one, as far as he was concerned, she should be in line to rule the whole damn kingdom. Judging from her performance as High Priestess, she'd be damn good at it, much better than her scrawny little half-brother...

Undyne had left right after Frisk, and the other monsters were filing out. When the place was nearly empty, Gerson muttered, "You've got to do better than that, son."

The giant skeleton shook himself and scowled at the old man. "Whaddya mean? I didn't attack anyone. I was just makin' sure nobody went after Frisk."

Another laugh, shorter and more cynical. "You're about three hundred years too young to play dumb with me, boy!" Gerson brandished the stick at him. "What I mean is, I don't blame you for bein' sweet on her, but you can't keep looking at her like that. For one thing, it's embarrassing! Wah ha ha!" Thu-thump. "More importantly," he said, sobering in an instant, "people 'round here have nothing to do but talk. No one's forgotten the whole mess with Chara, 'specially not His Majesty. Better not give him a reason to think history's gonna repeat itself."

Sans tried to formulate a denial, and also several questions, but then the old tortoise banged his stick on the floor again, this time to assist himself in sliding off the barstools. "I'd tell you to leave her be," he grumbled, "but if your SOUL's made up its mind, I suppose there's no helping it." A gross, multi-part sniffle. "That little lady, strong enough to match a boss monster? Ha! Will wonders never cease?" He adjusted his pith helmet. "Well, feel free to come see me in Waterfall, the both of you—but not till tomorrow! This was plenty of excitement for one day! Wah ha!"

"Hold up!" Sans protested as the tortoise started shambling toward the door. "What do you mean, 'the whole mess with'—"

Right on cue, there was a cry of "BROTHER!" as Papyrus popped his head in. "BROTHER, COME AND SEE! KRISK HAS BROUGHT PUZZLES! THERE'S ONE FOR YOU, TOO!"

Ah, the gifting had begun. Sans waved him away. "Tell 'er ta get started without me."

"REALLY? IF YOU SAY SO... OH! HELLO, SIR GERSON! THE HUMAN SAID TO TELL YOU THAT SHE HAS PEANUT BRITTLE, NYEH-HEH!"

"Ooooh," the elderly monster said, perking up. The moment Papyrus was gone, Gerson turned and rapped his stick on Sans' patella. "There you have it, boy! It's like my old mam always said: 'Gerson, if you ever find a girl who remembers how much an old fart like you loves his peanut brittle, you hang on to her, human or not!'"

Sans highly doubted that Gerson's old mam had ever said that, but he wasn't in the mood to argue. In fact, he wasn't in the mood for much of anything. Instead, he turned to the bartender as Gerson gradually left. "Hey, Grillbs. I’ve got a few minutes—what's on tap today?"

It was disgusting, he knew, but the simple fact was that Grillby had to stay in business somehow. When there was no food to serve, he could always sell drinks, and when there were no drinks, he had gotten creative—for example, the "mudslide" he slid down the bar to Sans was named for its primary ingredient and sprinkled with enough magic to…still taste like mud. But it was a drink!

The bartender wandered over as Sans downed the whole thing at once, remembering too late that he could have just put his tongue away and avoided tasting it at all. Clearly, he needed to drink a little more and get his head on straight. The skeleton gestured for another, and when Grillby crackled at him, Sans just said, "Don't worry, Frisk'll pay my tab."

The flames on Grillby's eyebrows rose higher, but he produced another mudslide and watched Sans gulp it down. "So," said the boss monster, "I kinda remember what happened with Chara, but my memory ain't what it used to be since everythin’ blew up in my face." He held his mug out. "Wanna tell me a little more 'bout ‘er?"

"...and this is for you, too," said Frisk, placing another box in front of Toriel.

The goat monster shook her head. "Goodness, child, you shouldn't have! How am I supposed to carry all this back with me?"

"Make Sans do it," Undyne suggested, to general approval.

They had decided to tackle the gift distribution in stages, starting with Papyrus, Undyne, and Toriel, and were opening them in the skeleton brothers' living room. Papyrus was happily occupied with his first gift, an interlocking ring puzzle; he'd declined to open anything else yet, ostensibly to wait for his brother, but mostly out of impatience to get the rings apart.

"Speaking of which, where is Sans?" asked Toriel. Papyrus was already muttering to himself, the rings clicking as he began tugging harder.

"Who knows, Your Majesty?" Undyne had only a few boxes by her feet, and was doing her best not to look at them too hard until everything had been doled out. She brightened as Frisk set two more down for her. "Is that all of 'em?"

"That's all for everyone here." Frisk picked up the very last package, straining a little to lift it, and took it to the back room. When she returned, she said, "You can open them now, Lady Toriel, or wait until you get home. Since we're staying so close by, Undyne, I think you can go ahea—"

The Captain had already ripped open her first box and tossed the lid aside. She paused and squinted at an array of bottles nestled in white cotton. "What's all this?"

"There's regular moisturizer, waterproof moisturizer, burn ointment, treatment for scale rot, an antiseptic for small cuts, and armor polish," Frisk explained, pointing to each in turn. "I infused everything myself, except the polish."

"Thanks! I hope you don't expect me to remember all that," Undyne commented, bending to grab the next box and catching herself mid-rip. "Oh. Uh, sorry, Your Majesty. Your turn."

Toriel smiled. "Please go ahead, Captain. I—"

The box was already wide open. "Whoa!" It was a set of the "history books" Undyne had admired on the humans' last visit—the most action-filled comics Frisk could find, much more violent than the story-driven ones Alphys liked. She grabbed the top one and flipped through it gleefully. "Ha ha! I can't believe it! Are those his guts?"

"NYEHHH!" Meanwhile, Papyrus was now reduced to banging the rings on the arm of the couch. "HUMAN! I DO NOT WISH TO ALARM YOU, BUT IT SEEMS THAT YOU HAVE BEEN SOLD A DEFECTIVE PUZZLE!" He gave the rings a final shake and threw them on the floor, then plunked himself down on the couch, arms grumpily folded.

Undyne glanced up from her comic and snickered. Papyrus looked very hurt until his friend bent to pick up the separated rings, holding them over her head like spoils of war. "See, Pap? You gave it your all, and look what happened!" She threw the rings back on the floor and caught his arms to pull him up for a triumphant noogie. "I knew you had it in you!"

"Y-YES, OF COURSE! THE GREAT PAPYRUS CAN CONQUER ANY PUZZLE! N-NYEH-HEH-HEH! ...PLEASE STOP CELEBRATING MY GREAT VICTORY!"

"I believe I'll open something now," Toriel murmured, leaving Papyrus to extricate himself. She unwrapped the paper on the top box, peeked inside, and immediately gave a squeal of joy. "Oh, my goodness! My child, how did you—" She clasped her hands. "Are those real vanilla beans?! And—"

"I didn't know the exact recipe, so I got every pie ingredient I could think of," Frisk said, grinning at Toriel's excitement. She slid out the bottom box in the stack. "Check these next, please. I couldn't remember if you needed salted and unsalted butter, so I got both."

"Yes, I do! But..." The boss monster pulled out tall jars of milk, buttermilk, and heavy cream, then looked at her narrowly. "I don't wish to be rude, but how long have you been transporting these? I know the weather is cold, but won't they have spoiled by now?"

"Not on my watch," declared Frisk. "I used a few preservatives—if you put a little in the jar beforehand, it keeps the contents fresh for up to a week without affecting the flavor."

"Seriously?" Even Undyne was interested. "That's pretty neat. Is this the kind of stuff you've been teaching Sans?"

"Yes, it is. He knows how to make preservatives, medicine, fertilizer—I brought the recipes and ingredients for those, too. You'll be able to save a huge amount of magic using them."

"I see," Toriel said slowly. She smiled, almost a grimace, as she put the jars away. "It may not have been under the best circumstances, but I am very thankful that he met you again, my child. His life has very hard since...since the accident, and I have not been as supportive as I could have. Spending time with a wonderful friend like you must have been such a relief to him."

"Don't be so hard on yourself, Majesty. You had a lot of problems, too," protested Undyne.

"Yes, but I..." Toriel was definitely grimacing now. "I suppose you're right, Captain. Still, I am very glad to know that he has been in Frisk's care."

Frisk was fighting another blush. Her neck still itched from the healing spell the innkeeper had given her for the “crick” in her neck before they checked out that morning. "I hope I’ve helped. I know what it's like to lose someone, and to feel alone. I've missed you all so much," she said truthfully. "I just wish it was safe for some of you to come back with us for a visit."

Toriel's golden gaze sharpened. "With 'us,' my child? What do you mean?"

"Sans is gonna escort her home," Undyne said quickly. "Also, she wants bring some of our stuff back with her to show off, but she doesn't know how it all works. The humans are kinda used to Sans by now, so we figured he might as well tag along."

"That does sound like a good idea," Toriel agreed, and Frisk caught Undyne's eye for a grateful moment. "Would you like to open something else now, Papyrus?"

"HM?" The skeleton was playing with the rings again, figuring out how to lock them back together. "NO, THANK YOU, LADY TORIEL. I'LL WAIT FOR SANS. WHERE IS HE?"

Undyne was already tearing open another box, unasked. "Oh, no way! Are these targets?!"

"Of course! They look like wood, but it's actually metal." Frisk got up to look out the window. Where was Sans?

"Who knows? Maybe he found a lady friend," Undyne said absently, flicking the metal discs to test their sturdiness.

"That's not a nice thing to say, Undyne," Toriel reproved her.

For half an irate second, Frisk thought Toriel was angry on her behalf. Then her brain caught up, and she turned to ask, "Why? Because there aren't any other boss monsters?"

"Exactly," said the former Queen, "and a lesser monster would not suit him. It's honestly a bit cruel to suggest that he—"

"WHAT ABOUT A HUMAN?" Papyrus asked without looking up.

Pause. "A human?" Toriel repeated as Undyne and Frisk glanced at each other in alarm.

"YES. HUMANS ARE PLENTIFUL, AND SOME OF THEM HAVE MAGIC! COULDN'T SANS BORROW ONE? FOR EXAMPLE, FRISK IS VERY—"

"No."

Everyone froze at the vehemence in Toriel's voice. The boss monster breathed in, and out, almost baring her teeth. "I...excuse me. I need to check that this is everything necessary for a pie."

Undyne let the targets slide off her lap as Toriel took her boxes to the kitchen. "What's the matter with you, Papyrus?" the Captain hissed. "Why’d you have to go and bring up humans? Don't you remember what happened with Chara?"

The skeleton's brow creased. "JUST THAT THE HUMAN PRINCESS WENT TO LIVE WITH OTHER HUMANS...WHEN WAS IT AGAIN?"

"A little over…what, twenty years ago? I guess you were probably just a kid, but still…" Undyne saw how intently Frisk was listening, and sighed. The Captain checked the kitchen, where Toriel was occupied with moving things around and muttering to herself, then beckoned them closer. "Okay, here’s the short version. A bunch of humans came to see the King," she said quietly. "They were here for a couple weeks, and Chara got really depressed after they left. The King wound up sending her off to marry one of the guys she'd met—didn’t you learn this in history class, Pap?"

Papyrus still looked blank, and the fish monster sighed in exasperation. "Anyway, she came right back here 'cause the marriage didn't work out, not sure why. Asgore had a huge fight with Asriel and the Queen about whether Chara should stay here or go marry another human. He made her leave again, but she never got married to anyone, and she didn't come back until the visit where everyone blew up."

"OH." Papyrus looked at the reconnected rings in his hand. "WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH SANS MARRYING A HUMAN?"

There went Frisk's face again. "Because," mumbled Undyne, "as far as everyone is concerned, it all happened because a human got too involved with monsters—an adult human,” she clarified, nodding at Frisk. “The whole problem with Chara was that there was no one here for her to pair off with. Monsters can always figure out a way to combine their magic if they really want to have kids, but she didn't have any magic at all, so it wouldn’t have worked. Besides, humans barely even live sixty years. Asgore thought it'd cause too much heartache if she stayed."

Papyrus digested this information for a moment, then said at least part of what Frisk was thinking: "DIDN'T IT CAUSE A LOT MORE HEARTACHE TO SEND HER AWAY? THIS WAS HER HOME, AND THEY WERE HER FAMILY, EVEN IF SHE COULDN’T GET MARRIED."

"That's exactly what Asriel and Toriel thought, and they never forgave him for it. Then both Chara and Asriel wound up dead, and Asgore blamed every single thing on the humans. Then Toriel stood up in front of everyone and said it was his own damn fault for throwing their child out like a dog, twice, and here we are now."

Frisk shivered. Those were Chara's words from the day Frisk hid in the living room and overheard those terrible things. As a child, she hadn't understood why Chara seemed to hate her kind, loving parents so much. Poor Princess, Frisk thought bitterly, digging her nails into her leg. "Papyrus," she said aloud, "check your gray box. It's not a puzzle."

A moment later, Toriel looked up at a strange sound, like air hissing out of a broken pipe. She finished re-packing the pie ingredients and turned to see Papyrus holding up a bundle of dry pasta, some ground beef, various herbs, and a bag of fresh tomatoes. His sockets were the size of salad plates, and he was making a noise that could best be described as a pre-scream.

"Hey, would you look at that, Pap! You haven't made spaghetti in years! What have you done?" Undyne said through gritted teeth, ending with a glare at Frisk.

As expected, Papyrus paid no attention. He had just enough presence of mind to set the box down gently before he exploded into a rapturous, unbroken "THANK YOOOOU" that lasted at least two straight minutes, starting with a huge hug-and-twirl for Frisk, then Undyne as she rescued the human, and finally ending in the kitchen with "LADY TORIEL!!! LOOK!!!!"

"That is wonderful, Papyrus, but…oh, dear! Look at the time," Toriel exclaimed. "Ladies, may I expect you at my house tonight, around eight o’clock? I'll have a pie waiting!"

Frisk bit back her reflexive protest about Sans. "What about the rest of your gifts?" she asked instead.

Toriel smiled at her. "We can come back here tomorrow, of course! After all, I missed seeing Sans today. We don't need to stay cooped up in the Ruins for your entire visit!"

"AND IT MAY BE POSSIBLE THAT I WILL HAVE LEFTOVER SPAGHETTI FOR YOU, LADY TORIEL!" added Papyrus. "NOT THAT I EXPECT IT TO GO UNEATEN, NYEH! I WILL MERELY BE SURE TO MAKE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE. I WOULD HATE FOR YOU TO MISS THE TRIUMPHANT RETURN OF CULINARY PERFECTION!"

"Yes, of course," the former Queen said kindly, eye twitching only a little.

The priestess hesitated, and Undyne stepped in again: "We'll see what happens this afternoon, Your Majesty. We've got a lot more stuff to give out, and Alphys wants to see Frisk, too. I don't know how late we'll be back here tonight, and it's a long walk to the Ruins—"

"That's what Sans is for!" Toriel said gaily, and Frisk felt a twinge of irritation. "If I come across him," the boss monster continued, gathering up the boxes of ingredients, "I will be sure to send him straight here. Until then, my child, please enjoy your stay. I'll see you this evening!"

There was no way out of it, so Frisk smiled and nodded and waited for the door to close before she said, "Dammit."

Undyne shrugged sympathetically. "It's a mom thing. Mine was the same way."

Frisk bent to pick up handfuls of packing paper. "So was mine," she muttered.

The Captain waited for more, but Frisk went on grabbing and folding up paper until it became apparent that that was all. Undyne shrugged, glanced at her unopened boxes, and shrugged again, reaching for the comics. "Just put it outside," she advised as Frisk looked around for a larger trashcan. The human sighed, draping her cloak over her shoulders as she opened the door.

Papyrus was puttering around the kitchen in sheer bliss. Out of habit, Undyne got up to supervise, and they were soon embroiled in a deathmatch against the tomatoes and noodles. "Higher! HIGHER!" the Captain yelled. "Remember! You have to break your foes' fighting spirit! Hear their cries of defeat and smell their agony!"

The skeleton clanged the wooden spoon harder against the sides of the pot. "Yes! I hear it!" he exclaimed.

"Yes! Good! You—" Undyne stopped. "Wait. I hear it, too." She went to the door, through which came a distinctive, high-pitched sound. "Oh," she said in disgust. "What the hell is he doing here?" The fish monster reached for the doorknob. "Close your ears, Pap."

Papyrus blinked, spoon still poised for a mortal blow. "But I don't have—"

Undyne opened the door, and the skeleton dropped the spoon into the sauce mixture as a shrill mechanical voice cut through the air: "I simply can't believe it! My little beauty grew into such a real beauty! What a sight for sore eyes amidst all these...these monsters!"

"Shut up, tin man," snapped the Royal Guard Captain, coming onto the porch. "I—oh! Hey, Alphys! Where did you guys come from?"

"From a place with manners." Mettaton adjusted his fur stole and swept back his fringe of real black hair. "That awful skeleton said my little beauty was here, so I came all this way—"

"Do you know where Sans is?" demanded Frisk, who was still recovering from the shock of going to take out the garbage and encountering Mettaton instead.

"Y-yes," said the scientist, coming up behind the automaton. "He came to see me in a p-panic because he forgot how to teleport home. I hope he's still sleeping back in the l-lab."

Frisk stood stock-still. “He forgot…?”

“Pffffahahahaha!" The fish monster slammed her fist into the side of the house. "Oh my God! I knew I should have dragged him out of Grillby's when I had the chance! He was drunk, wasn't he?"

Alphys just sighed. Frisk growled under her breath, which made Undyne laugh even harder. "He..." She choked back a sob. "He was right here, and he walked all the way to...to..."

Pause. "I think he t-took the ferry," Alphys said, and moved back as the Captain collapsed into a snorting heap.

Oh, for God's sake, Sans! "Never mind. It's wonderful to see you again, Mettaton!" she said with unfeigned enthusiasm, shaking the automaton's still-pearly-gloved hand. His arms were much less floppy now, his body more streamlined, face smoothly outlined with tiny gemstones. Before he could launch into any further praise, the human moved aside and took Alphys' clawed hand. "And thank you so much for coming all the way here, Doctor. It means a lot to me."

There was that shy, scaly smile. "Th-thank you, um, Frisk. I'm r-really glad you're here." She chuckled nervously. "This is going to t-take some getting used to. But...you are v-very p-pretty."

Frisk smiled wider, and bent to give the scientist a hug. “Thank you,” she said in Alphys’ ear. “I’ve really missed you.”

The scientist mumbled something, then yelped as Undyne suddenly scooped them both up. "You know what else? This lady brought a buttload of presents for everyone,” she announced, setting them down on the porch. “Go on in while I grab your stuff!"

"I..." It was no use pointing out that the living room was about a third of the size required to open all the additional gifts, especially Mettaton's: Undyne was already charging toward the shed. "Yes, please, come in," said Frisk, leading the way inside. It would pass the time till Sans got back, she thought ruefully.

It wasn't his fault. Grillby had talked, and Sans had drank mudslides, and then Sans didn't know where he was anymore.

Everything was a blur for a while after that. He had no explanation for why he kept walking back and forth past his house, or how he wound up on the ferry, or how long he'd been lying outside the lab when Mettaton's rib-prodding woke him up. Sans had made it inside and found some nice cool floor to collapse on, and nothing else happened for a while.

Then a horrible, oozing feeling of dread crept over him, starting at the top of his cranium and trickling down till it hit his SOUL. He twisted to look upward at a familiar little pair of feet. The demon-child was suddenly peering down into his face, waving merrily, whispering, “Good to be back.”

And then it was gone. It stayed gone, too—no more fear, no nightmares, nothing. That was a relief, but a really weird one. The thing probably hadn’t even been there; it was just the mudslide talking…

The next time Sans awoke, he was alone, and any lingering apprehensions vanished as he looked at the clock. It was already late afternoon, heading into the evening. Shit! Where was Alphys? Where was Frisk?!

...Right. She was in Snowdin. Okay.

Where was Snowdin?!

Think, think. Snowdin: he lived there. It had his house. Sans took stock of his magic, which was doing well, and his mental capabilities, which could probably direct his teleportation now without getting him encased in solid rock or dropping him hundreds of feet from the cavern ceiling. The giant skeleton concentrated, and a moment later, he was back on the floor in his own room.

An odd smell was drifting up from the kitchen almost directly below. Dammit, he'd told Frisk not to actually get any spaghetti stuff! Oh, well, Pap sounded pretty happy. Where was everyone else?

A faint thud on the side of the house answered that question; Undyne was outside, laughing her ass off. Not long after, the front door crashed open and more voices flooded the house. To his surprise, he heard Mettaton and maybe a little of Alphys before Undyne and Papyrus drowned her out. There was Frisk, too, directing things—how the hell were they going to fit everyone inside?

The answer seemed to be a combination of Papyrus sitting on the stairs and Undyne smushing up against Alphys on the couch. Sans wished Undyne would hurry up and ask her out already; Al could use some non-fictional companionship, and the house could use a little less time with Undyne in it.

Should he at least come out and say hi, even if he had to stay upstairs and lean over the railing? But he didn't feel like talking to everyone, or making them feel like they had to find room for him. Besides, for all he knew, Frisk was still mad at him, just because he'd been a stupid jerk in front of people and then disappeared without warning for half the day...

No, better stay where he was for now, safe in his room, listening to them have fun as Undyne brought the presents in, and not feeling jealous or lonely at all.

Mettaton went first, because he was Mettaton. He also had the bulkiest set of gifts, including several bolts of very expensive silk; the automaton was so overjoyed that he promised to have his tailors make a couple of things for Frisk, too, and loan her some of his new hair accessories. Sans just hoped he wasn't going to make her wear the literal paint she'd bought for his face!

Did she even own any makeup? He'd never seen her wear more than a tiny bit. Come to think of it, he'd never seen her wear anything fancier than that dumb, sexy purple dress for All Souls Day.

There was more mechanical jubilation from downstairs, this time over the sets of dance steps and sheet music. Now MTT was proposing a grand fete after the next shipment of food arrived and Frisk's measurements had been taken, perhaps toward the end of her visit. After all, she still couldn’t be sure that Asgore was willing to make peace between the two kingdoms, and whether the dance would be a celebration or a permanent send-off; more importantly, they couldn’t start planning till the caterers knew exactly what they'd be working with.

Sans smirked into the darkness. A party, huh? As long as it didn't remind anyone of the farewell gala thirteen-ish years ago, then whatever, Frisk would love it; he'd be careful not to stare too hard if she got dressed up. He'd seen plenty of fancy ladies at the castle, and he was sure he could handle the sight of any—

Cries of dismay came through the floorboards. The boss monster was ready to zip downstairs and start busting heads, but the furor died right down, and he soon pieced together what'd happened: Papyrus had come over to admire something with a plate of spaghetti in his hand, only to trip over...probably nothing, and Frisk had thrown herself between the silk on Mettaton’s lap and the flying arc of tomato sauce.

The good news was that Mettaton was offering to take her laundry back with him, including a stain treatment for her sacrificed dress; the bad news was that she didn't have anything clean to wear in the meantime. There was a moment of silence as they tried to figure out what to do, with Mettaton's entourage all the way off in Hotland and the shops already closed for the day.

Alphys spoke, and after another quiet moment, Papyrus yelled something, his footsteps tramping excitedly up the stairs, Frish right behind him. They clattered around for a minute in Pap’s room, probably the closet; then she headed to the bathroom at the end of the hall, Sans trying not to tense up as she walked by.

He must have made some kind of noise, because now Papyrus was knocking on his door. "BROTHER? IS THAT YOU? IF THAT IS YOU, COME OUT THIS INSTANT! WE HAVE ALL BEEN CONCERNED ABOUT YOU AND YOUR TENDENCY TO DISAPPEAR FOR LONG PERIODS WITHOUT BEING HERE!"

Sans cringed. Of course Pap would be worried about him not coming back! Feeling like a complete ass, the boss monster got up slowly, yawning wide and rubbing his sockets as he opened the door. "Hey, bro," he mumbled. "Sorry 'bout that. I just thought I'd get some rest, didn't know I was gonna fall asleep."

"HMPH." Papyrus didn't just make the sound; he always had to say "hummff." "COME DOWNSTAIRS AND SAY HELLO TO OUR GUESTS. AND SPAGHETTI!! THE GREATEST GUEST OF ALL!!"

Oh, for God's sake, Frisk! Why had she—no, there was no use crying about it now. He couldn’t count on giving it away to anyone, either: even the starvingest monster remembered what Pap’s cooking was like. "Whoa, really? Lemme see," Sans said with enough enthusiasm to make Papyrus race downstairs to the kitchen.

The boss monster came out and paused at the head of the stairs. There was a small table in the corner at the foot of the staircase; he lifted it up and set it down next to him in the hallway, then zipped himself down to sit in the now-free space. God, he hated being huge. "Hey, guys," he said, pulling his legs up to his ribcage.

"What do you mean, 'hey, guys'?!" Undyne was glad for the excuse to put down her spaghetti, though it was difficult to find room for it on the floor. "What the hell have you been doing, besides being drunk and stupid?" She tried to stay angry, but a smirk kept showing through. "Did you seriously go all the way to the lab because you couldn't find your house?"

A beat of silence. "Yes?" hazarded Sans.

The only thing that saved Undyne from another attack of the giggles was the bathroom door opening upstairs. "Is that you, Sans?" called Frisk.

His SOUL went pitter-patter again. "Yeah, I'm back. Couldn't stay away from Pap's spaghetti," he replied, earning a soft “NYEHH” from the kitchen.

"I dunno, this might not be the right batch for you," Undyne said, loud enough for Frisk to hear. "The sauce is, uh, good, but it’s..." Snort. "It's..." Cough. "It's really lumpy."

More silence. It took Sans a second to remember why he wanted to punch her for saying that, and then fucking Papyrus had to add, “LUMPS ARE ESSENTIAL FOR PROPER FLAVOR!”

It was quiet upstairs; then Undyne snickered, and Frisk burst out laughing, the sound echoing down the stairwell and setting Undyne off again until both women were near tears.

"Private jokes are for children, darling," Mettaton informed Undyne, nudging his own plate away with his foot.

"You're for children," she mumbled, and Mettaton rolled his crystalline eyes.

“WELL?” A moment of crisis united them again: Papyrus was in the kitchen doorway, looking expectant. Alphys bravely twirled up an entire forkful and crammed it in her mouth, moving her cheeks to fake a smile.

They all fell respectfully silent as Papyrus went back to the kitchen, Undyne grabbing a glass of water for Alphys to help wash it down. "Oh, d-dear. Well, getting back to your idea, M-Mettaton," the scientist wheezed, "we should r-really ask His Majesty b-before we have any big events like that."

Mettaton clicked at her. "Oh, Alphys, it won't be anything excessive! Just a band, a few tables, every single monster in the Underground dressed in their absolute best—"

"Like this?" Frisk asked wryly, coming down the last step.

Sans had angled himself to face the others, and he stayed that way long enough to see their reactions first. For some reason, Mettaton looked as if he’d swallowed a bug. “Really, darling?” the automaton asked distastefully. “It’s like wrapping a star sapphire in toilet paper.”

Papyrus, on the other hand, was absolutely delighted: "AH HA! I KNEW IT WOULD FIT YOU, HUMAN! SANS, LOOK AT WHAT I'VE HAD IN MY CLOSET ALL THESE YEARS, JUST IN CASE, NYEH-HEH!"

"I l-like it. If w-we ever had a costume party, that w-would be perfect," Alphys remarked, adjusting her glasses.

Undyne snorted. "Yeah, except he didn’t look like that up top!"

Sans had no idea what to expect when he turned his head. He’d just been imagining Frisk in a ruffly ballgown, and it occurred to him much later that if she’d come downstairs wearing something really fancy or weird, he’d have been fine. But she wasn’t, and he wasn’t.

Frisk was wearing his old clothes. The blue hooded jacket, the white shirt, the black pants with white stripes—there they were, wrenchingly familiar and yet very different. For one thing, they were a bit too small on her; the pants reached the tops of her knees, while the shirt just barely covered her midsection. She wasn’t a lot taller now than he’d been before the accident, but as Undyne had immediately noticed, Frisk was filling it out far better than Sans ever had.

Her perfect figure notwithstanding, it also hit him that she was wearing the most shoddy, unfashionable, lazily masculine clothes possible – hence Mettaton’s distress – and she still looked like a princess.

"SPEECHLESS AT MY FORETHOUGHT, EH, BROTHER?" Papyrus had puffed his own chest out. "THE CLOTHING YOU WORE TO THE GALA MAY HAVE BEEN DESTROYED, BUT I HAD A SECOND, SECRET SET HIDDEN AWAY! DID YOU NEVER WONDER HOW I ALWAYS WASHED YOUR CLOTHES SO QUICKLY WHEN YOU WERE IN THE SHOWER?"

Sans tried to say "Sort of," or literally anything else, but too many things were crowding his mind, starting with nostalgia, and amazement that he'd ever been that small, with some bemusement that she was still so tiny. But that outfit also represented everything he used to be, everything he wanted back and couldn't have...and Frisk, who he was supposed to pretend he didn't want.

That was plenty of emotional crap to work through, and it wasn’t even his biggest problem. When Sans tried looking down to get ahold of himself, he found himself staring at the one thing that fit her perfectly.

“YES, I EVEN PRESERVED YOUR SOCKS FOR POSTERITY!” boasted Papyrus. “I HAVE ALLOWED YOU TO KEEP THAT GIANT PILE IN YOUR ROOM, EXCEPT OF COURSE FOR THE ONES I MADE INTO SOCK PUPPETS. BUT THOSE THAT I SAVED AS REGULAR SOCKS HAVE BEEN AWAITING THE DAY WHEN SOMEONE COULD WEAR THEM AGAIN!”

Sans made a noise. It could have been a disagreeable noise, or a polite one, or anything in between. He didn’t know, or care, because her feet were right there, and his dumb old socks had somehow become the most erotic thing imaginable—and he could imagine a lot of things. Sure, her feet had always been cute to look at because they were so small, but so was the rest of her. Those stupid goddamn socks were…more cute. A lot more.

Not for the first time, he thought of last night, smelling and hearing and touching, and wondered what’d happen if they ever got around to that stuff again with more lights on. He could handle seeing her, or everything else at once, and literally no combination thereof.

Frisk was looking at him, wine-colored eyes wide with puzzlement. “Sans?” She raised one foot to scratch her other calf. “Are you—”

Noooope nope— The only thing Sans could do to keep from tackling her in front of everyone was yell, “Be right back!” and take a shortcut to the first place he could think of.

There was stunned silence in his aftermath. Alphys gave a faint, heartbroken moan of “Oh, c-c-c’mon, he was right at the best part!”

“My, my,” Mettaton said slowly. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was being…amorous.”

“Nope, no way, he’s just weird,” Undyne muttered. “He probably doesn’t have a thing for feet at all. …Geez, did you guys see the way he was staring?! What’s wrong with him?”

Frisk was beet-red. “Well, dinner was absolutely delicious!” she chirped. “Thank you, Papyrus! So, Alphys! Why don’t you open your gifts now?!”

By unspoken consent, they turned to watch Alphys pick up her first box, passing their plates back for Frisk to discreetly scrape back into the pot and shove back into the refrigerator. Luckily, Papyrus wasn’t paying much attention; he was still staring at the foot of the stairs where his brother had been. “HOW STRANGE,” he muttered. “I REALLY THOUGHT HE’D LIKE THE SOCKS.”

One hour later, the clock struck eight, and Asgore jerked upright, staring blearily into the semi-darkness. Only the kitchen light was on; the fireplace was down to the last embers. The King of monsters retrieved his cold tea, threw it into the grate, and got up to put the mug in the sink.

A sound at the front door made him look up; a heavy knock made him scowl and raise his voice a little more than necessary. “Yes? Can it wait till morning?” he asked brusquely.

“I don’t think ya should, Yer Majesty,” said a familiar voice.

Asgore’s scowl deepened until he was nearly snarling. With great effort, he said, “One moment, Sans,” and tossed the mug into the kitchen, ignoring the sound of ceramic breaking. He took his time crossing the living room, and was in no hurry to unlock or open the door. “Good evening,” he eventually greeted the other boss monster.

Sans was a couple of steps down, putting him and the King on eye level. “Evenin’,” he replied. “Sorry ta be here so close to bedtime, but I owe someone a favor.”

Asgore raised an eyebrow. “A favor? What do y—”

“Dreemurr.”

The King stood as though he’d been changed to stone: not even his eyes moved as Toriel emerged from behind the leafless black tree in the courtyard. She nodded grimly, folding her hands. “I am here to say something to you about Frisk. Anything you say in return will be a waste of breath.”

No reaction. She nodded again and took another step forward, voice flat, eyes cold and hard. “You’ve allowed Frisk to be here, but I know you, Your Majesty. You’ll let the rest of her visit pass without so much as a word to her, and you will let her go home empty-handed, hoping Stephin will forbid her to come again and save you further discomfort. Never mind the possibility of procuring food for your people and freeing our kindred from slavery, unless you—”

“Tori,” grunted Sans. “Leave ‘im alone. Get to the point.”

Asgore glanced at him in surprise. Toriel ground her teeth, but after a moment, she said calmly, “You are right, my friend. I will be brief: I wish to inform His Majesty that if any harm befalls Frisk for any reason while she is here, there will be consequences…and that if His Majesty does not meet with her in a diplomatic capacity before she returns to the humans, I will do so.”

Both men started. “You can’t do that,” the King protested. “When you left here—”

Sans braced himself, and sure enough, Tori drew herself up till she seemed about thirty feet tall. “Do not tell me what I cannot do, Dreemurr!” she thundered. “When I left here, I ceased to be Queen, but I have not ceased to be me! You will not take another child from me, and I will not allow you to deprive our people of their last hope because you are too proud to admit your own incompetence! Do you understand?”

One more long, frozen instant. Asgore took a deep breath…

He slammed the door shut.

Sans coughed theatrically. “So. That…that happened.”

Toriel’s eyes closed. “Take us to Snowdin, please” was all she said.

Sans complied, letting her come up and lay a furry hand on his arm before he whisked them through space and onto the porch of his house.

“Thank you, my friend,” said Toriel. She gave him a tired smile. “I am so sorry. You wanted someone to talk to, and I made you take me straight to that close-minded, selfish—” The former Queen shook herself. “I…don’t suppose that whatever you wanted to talk about can be discussed in a minute or so? I’d like to collect the girls and head home now. If you want to stop by tomorrow—”

“Nah, the timing’s my fault. Don’t worry, it’s a short thing,” Sans said absently. He glanced at the door, wondering if everyone was still there, then ceasing to wonder as he heard several different voices at once and also some clanking. It sounded like they were playing charades. “It’s more of a thing I’d like ya to think over so we can talk about it later. And don’t tell anyone. Please.”

Toriel nodded pleasantly. “Of course, Sans. What is troubling you?”

Sans grabbed the doorknob, said, “I’m in love with a human,” and opened the door to boisterous greetings of “Sans!” “Where have you been, punk?!” and “SANS! THANK GOODNESS! QUICK, HELP ME EXPRESS THE CONCEPT OF ‘SUMMER RAINDROPS’!”

#songfell #shoulda been like three ones oh well

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popatochisssp · 6 years ago

Text

Snips & Snails 4/7

Series: Undertale, Horrortale Relationship(s): (Unfulfilled) HT!Undyne/HT!Alphys, HT!Sans & HT!Undyne, Suggested HT!Undyne/??? Chapter Warnings: Briefly referenced suicide, not graphically described

There are some things only she can do... even if it hurts her. Undyne learned that from someone really important to her.

AO3 Link

KINDNESS

Undyne’s never had so many letters in her life.

The pile looks especially huge on her modest little writing desk. It feels like it gets bigger by the day and there was a time she’d have laughed at the idea of being intimidated by a measly stack of paper, but that time is well behind her.

She gets it now, and looking at all her letters just makes her feel an uncomfortable kind of sick.

They remind her of the letters she found in Alphys’ lab, after she…

After she…

…

Undyne wonders if she felt this kind of sick, too, thinking about what nasty, accusing words could be in the unending stream of letters delivered to her. She wonders if Alphys stared at them like she does, trying not to think about all the people she failed and wishing they’d all just…go away and leave her alone.

Were they the reason Alphys did…what she did? Was she thinking about Mettaton or Asgore, or was it the letters that made her feel like she needed to escape so badly that she was willing to…?

Undyne should’ve noticed.

She was so caught up in everything, so hurt and so angry, but Alphys was struggling, too. If she’d paid just a little more attention, maybe she could’ve…

Maybe she’d still be…

Damn it…

Undyne’s not supposed to think that way and she knows it. It’s not ‘healthy,’ or whatever, to dwell on what-ifs and coulda-woulda-shoulda’s, she’s heard that enough times from her shrink.

But the letters make her think stuff like that and maybe that’s why she keeps pretending they’re not there.

She already gets all the updates she needs about the outside world from her visitors, anyway.

Papyrus probably tells her the most.

He comes by every other week, like clockwork, and he yammers on and on about as many of Undyne’s former subjects as he can think of.

It’s nice to know what everybody’s up to, that they’re doing okay, and really the only downside is that he always tries to sneak in a lecture at her in between all the important stuff.

‘Did your best’ this, and ‘forgiven you’ that, she doesn’t wanna hear any of that mushy crap…

Gerson’s a lot easier to deal with, even if he only checks in on her every couple of months.

Undyne doesn’t take it personally, though— he’s the King of All Monsters now, and she knows how busy that job can be.

Either way, he’s not as sappy as Papyrus but he still talks a lot. Mostly about how he’s working on reducing her sentence all the time, and that’s its own kind of annoying.

She tunes out a lot when he starts talking about stuff like getting monsters’ imprisonment counting towards her time served and extenuating circumstances, blah blah blah.

Undyne, uh… actually has no idea how long her sentence still is and how much of it she has left to serve.

It’s not her fault, though, that crap is just so boring!

All she knows is that Gerson keeps threatening that ‘in just a couple years,’ he might be able to officially name her his successor, like that was actually a good idea after how that went the first time.

Undyne knows better than to argue with the old man by now, though.

“Now, listen here, ‘Dynie,” he said last time, “you were a good queen when things were bad, so when things are good, you’re bound to be a greatone!”

She’d scoffed at him, rolling her eye and pointing out, “You still have to dust before I can succeed you, y’know. Aren’t you immortal or something? Fossil.”

“Keep that kinda talk up and I really will live forever, just to mess with ya’! Wa ha ha ha!”

…Crazy old codger.

But his opinion is one that she…

If he wants her to take another shot at the Queen thing, if he thinks she should, then maybe…

Hell, she’s done crazier things.

But she’ll burn that bridge when she gets to it.

Undyne has another visitor today, one who’s never come before, and she’s not sure what to expect.

She’s gotta give him one thing, though: the red glow of his eye, watching her in the darkness of her cell is actually pretty damn spooky.

“Are you here to kill me or what?”

The question makes Sans flinch, and she immediately feels a little guilty for asking it.

It makes her bluster a little, demanding, “Well, what am I supposed to think? Sneaking around in the dead of night like a ninja, all creepy…”

But Sans hadn’t always looked so creepy…had he?

That was Undyne’s fault.

Before everything, Sans had just been Papyrus’ lazy older brother and her absolute worst sentry, with harmless white eye-lights, a whole skull, and a lazy grin.

He never asked to be her executioner and it wasn’t fair to keep trying to pin that role on him.

“How’d you even get in here, anyway?” she wonders.

Finally, Sans speaks. “does it matter?”

……Fair point, she supposes.

“Alright. How about…why are you here?”

Undyne can’t imagine anyone would break into even a minimum security prison without a reason.

“…gotta question for ya,” Sans admits after a moment. “always…always meant to ask. never felt steady enough before.”

She hears the unspoken, ‘but i do now’ and it makes her feel…

Good.

Undyne is glad he’s steady. She’s glad he’s doing better, and she’s even glad for whatever role that…human…spouse of his had in it.

But she’s starting to feel like it’s the letters all over again, that dread of the unknown rearing up in her gut.

………

Fuck that.

“Ask away,” she says, because if there’s anybody she owes answers to, it’s him.

Sans looks her dead in the face and asks, “why’d you take the fall?”

Well.

Somehow the most obvious question he could’ve asked her, and she still didn’t see it coming.

It makes her laugh a little, at herself.

“What,” Undyne chuckles, “you really can’t guess?”

That red light is still locked on her, immobile in its socket. “don’t wanna guess. i wanna hear it.”

And she guesses that’s fair, too, so she bites the bullet.

“Come on,” she says. “We both know I wasn’t the best queen, don’t we? Things were bad and…I wasn’t ready for the responsibility. But that doesn’t really do much for the people who got hurt, does it?”

She knows her meaning is clear, but she gestures towards the glaringly huge hole in Sans’ skull anyway, void-black even in her already-dark room.

The victim of her handiwork just shrugs.

But really, that’s just an explanation for what she did, not an excuse. And even if it were an excuse, Undyne’s not big on those.

“I really hurt you. I know that.”

“ya’ hurt Papyrus, too.”

It’s probably the quickest retort Undyne’s heard out of him since she cracked his skull open. She’s not too surprised it was in defense of his brother.

She rolls her eye, anyway.

“Duh, dude, I was there, I remember. But that was…”

She struggles for a word that won’t make the both of them feel like crap.

“…Fixable.”

She fails.

At least Papyrus’ teeth could be filled in and set straight. With his braces off these days, he looks almost the same as he used to, like that awful fight never even happened.

There isn’t a brace in the world that can put Sans’ head back together, and they both know that it isn’t just a superficial wound.

He has to deal with what Undyne did to him every day of his life.

Sans huffs, something that could almost be a laugh. “so…what? it’s guilt?” he asks. “y’wanted to do my time for me, make things ‘even’?”

Sorta…?

But that’s not everything and she wants him to understand.

“Hey. You used to be friends with Alphys, right?”

“………?” The confusion in his silence is palpable. Eventually he admits, “wouldn’t say ‘friends.’ worked together. knew her.”

“Yeah, good enough. You heard her talking about her history tapes at least once, then.”

“…her…? oh. her anime.” It looks like Sans is wondering if he missed a piece of the conversation somewhere. He obviously has no idea what Undyne’s getting at and it’s almost funny. “what about it?”

There’s no way she could explain it right.

Alphys had such an amazing way with words when she was excited, so passionate and overflowing and there’s just no way Undyne could ever replicate that night she remembers so fondly now.

“O-oh, this next one i-is one of my favorite episodes,” Alphys had gushed, her claw over the PLAY button. The light of the TV was reflecting off her glasses and she’d looked so cute, but Undyne was too chicken to try to hold her hand, so she just kept her mouth shut and let her talk. “It’s, it’s actually really s-sad, but! It’s r-really powerful, too, ‘cause Wan-Wan comes back and, and even after he wrecked Mew-Mew’s school at the beginning of the season, he has a change of heart right before the final battle! And he cuts off his own tail just to heal her and it’s really, really cool because, y’know, it shows that he’s not really a bad guy, he just made a lot of mistakes, but that’s not all he is! He can do good things, too, when they give him the chance to, and he does it even though it hurts him and he can’t fly without both of his tails, but it was something only he could do and that’s just so! It’s really beautiful and important and—……oh jeez, I just…s-spoiled the whole thing, d-didn’t I? Oh no, s-sorry, Undyne…! I-it's still good, I promise, we c-can still watch it, r-right…?”

Undyne does her best to sum up, the memory of Alphys’ shyly reddening scales bringing a tired smile to her face.

“It’s something she told me,” she explains. “There’s some things only you can do, even if it hurts you. And this is my thing.”

She’s not sure Sans understands yet. He’s still just standing there, staring at her, so she keeps going.

“You’re…you’re a good guy, Sans,” Undyne says, as gently as she has in her. “You never wanted to hurt anybody. I knew that. You’re not…like me.”

Because she did want to hurt somebody—anybody, after Frisk did what they did and vanished—and it was not keeping that in check that messed things up for everybody; that made Sans do her job for her.

She still remembers, vividly, the hollow expression on his skull when he stood before her that first time, telling her that he’d secured a human soul. It was a sad look, pained and reluctant, yet…

Determined.

He reminded Undyne so much of Asgore, then. He still does, and it makes it feel even more right that she’s doing this instead of Sans.

“Besides,” she smirks, “you’re way too soft. You’d never survive in jail, not even cushy, rich-human jail! Me, I’m tough as nails, so just…go back home and…let me do this for you, alright?”

By the light of Sans’ eye, Undyne sees a slow smile start to break across his face.

“heh…you gotta way of hammerin’ your point home, don’cha?”

A pun.

Two puns, technically.

Sans must really be doing better these days if he’s punning again.

Good.

Undyne’s grin falls a little when Sans adds something else, though.

“listen. …you were…probably a better queen than ya’ give yourself credit for.” His tone is begrudging, but that just makes her feel more like he actually believes what he’s saying. “just ‘cause it didn’t work out great for me, specifically, doesn’t mean… doesn’t mean there aren’t a whole bunch of monsters out there that really care about you.”

……Oh, stars above, not him, too!

But before Undyne can think of anything to say, Sans and his glowing red eye are gone, leaving her alone in her cell.

Typical Sans.

Undyne flops back on her cot and tries to go to sleep, even though she’s feeling…

She’s not sure.

But the next day, when she sees the letters on her desk… she doesn’t feel the same dread as before.

If what Sans and Papyrus and Gerson said is even a little true, then maybe…maybe whatever’s in there isn’t so bad?

Undyne rummages through the pile, half-heartedly at first, until she find something that sticks out to her.

The stationery is neon pink and smells like perfume…and a little like the dump, honestly. Like water and rusty springs and…stuffing?

It’s familiar, but what really gets her is that it says it’s from Mew-Mew and it’s gotta be a joke, but hell, it has her attention.

Undyne opens it up.

“Dear Undyne,” it reads in a flowing, cursive script, “sweet, strong, violent, perfect Undyne, I hope this letter finds you well! You may not know me, but I have very fond memories of you…”

Missing scene from Fur a Good Time, Call…

A/N: Maybe someday, Undyne will write a letter back to her secret admirer...

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#snipsnsnails #undertale #fanfiction #undyne #sans #horrortale #ht!sans #myfic

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