Work Text:
Alphys waded through the water.
There were many things on the young scientist's mind at the current moment; such things included how much of a failure she was, and how little she'd deserved everything that had been given to her. People's family members had turned into horrifying monstrosities because of her; she couldn't just unleash them back into the world, not until she found some kind of cure. Too many people would be broken if they knew the truth.
Not even thinking of her one sort-of success gave her any solace. She and Mettaton both knew that the rectangle-on-one-wheel body was not at all what he'd envisioned as the body that truly spoke to him. Sure, she had been working on what was to be his final body, but it was far from complete at this point; the battery life wouldn't even last him a single show, among other things.
She had to tell people about the Amalgamates. She had to complete Mettaton's body.
But she kept putting both off.
She knew in her heart that, as soon as she did either of those things, the people involved wouldn't be relieved. Instead, given the amount of time that had passed, they'd have only one question for her.
"Why didn't you do this sooner?"
And as she kept putting it off, she thought she'd avoid that question. Instead, however, she would get it from the one person she couldn't avoid: herself.
Yeah, Alphys, why didn't you do this sooner? You're supposed to be the Royal Scientist, not this... this pile of trash who sits around and does nothing but eat ramen, watch anime, and let people down! Asgore... he appointed you to this position, and this is how you thank him? By screwing everything up for everyone? No wonder the world hates you!
There was no way to win, was there? And yet, she thought, maybe this was how it should be. Someone like her didn't deserve to win; she had chances, she blew them, and now she had to accept the consequences. Sure, Asgore still kept her as his scientist, but she just knew that if he discovered her crimes, he'd show her the door in an instant. And just forget any possibility of her being able to act on her crush!
She approached one of Waterfall's namesake features. This was where the surface-world trash came to rest; the heavier items would land in the garbage dump, but the lighter items would keep going over the edge, falling and falling until...
Well, who knows what was down there?
Alphys felt the damp wooden boards shift beneath her feet as she crept a little closer to the precipice. How easy would it be to just... join the rest of the lightweight trash? To just fall, letting the water soak her the whole way through, until she finally hit the bottom? An apropos descent into Hell, if she'd ever heard of it. Even if someone actually wanted to go looking for her, no one would ever know that she'd fallen into the abyss unless they actually climbed down. And even then, who would recognize a pile of dust as being specifically hers? Especially if it'd already been washed away...
"You can see forever, can't you?"
Alphys wordlessly yelped. When did someone else get here? She turned around and looked into the eyes (or more accurately, single eye) of a grinning fish woman.
"Oh!" My god! "W-when did you get here? Uh, I mean hello! I... I was just..." Alphys started sweating, knowing she couldn't continue her previous train of thought like this; it was called "being alone with one's thoughts" for a reason. And besides, didn't this woman know who she was? Why was she smiling as casually as greeting an old friend? Why was she smiling at all, and not even in the form of a malicious "I'm going to enjoy this" rictus, but a genuinely friendly smile?
The woman waved it off. "Don't mind me. I was just passing through. But I couldn't help but notice you standing there..."
Alphys blushed slightly. Had she been there for that long?
Suddenly, the woman walked up next to her and took a seat. "Heh. Y'know, sometimes I wonder about this place, too. It's like, where does it all go?" She looked over at Alphys. "What do you think?"
"Uhh..." Alphys bit back the temptation to say she didn't know. It was a legitimate question, especially considering that not even two minutes ago, she was seriously considering going there herself. "W-well! There could be lots of different answers to that question!"
The woman's eye seemed to sparkle as she smiled. "Like?"
Oh boy, this was going to be tougher than she'd thought. Alphys cleared her throat. "Okay!!! So!!! The most logical answer to that question might be that it's all just a big pile of garbage at the bottom. But, given the phenomena I've witnessed underground, I've come up with some other potential hypotheses!" With a nervous laugh, she adjusted her collar. "Like, for example, it could have the biggest, most complex puzzle in the entire Underground - so complex that no one's managed to solve it yet! Or, maybe there are some monsters who only live there, and never come up to the surface! Well, the Underground surface, and not the surface surface. That... that makes sense, right?"
A grin slowly appeared on the woman's face. "You mean like a secret society of skeletons?"
Alphys blinked. "Maybe. Why specifically skeletons, though? Monsters of any kind could be living down there."
"Have you been to Snowdin recently?"
"N-no. I don't do so well in the cold." Alphys remembered the last time she'd been there; all she'd wanted to do was lie down and sleep, and given that her energy returned when she was closer to home, it was not merely fatigue.
"Oh. Well, there are these two skeleton brothers who live there, and nobody in town knows where they came from. The lady at the store says they just showed up one day and started asserting themselves. But they had to come from somewhere, didn't they? So, what if there are a whole bunch of skeletons down there, and those two were the only ones who wanted to leave... or were able to leave?"
The woman flashed a big grin. "Plus, 'secret society of skeletons' rolls off the tongue, don't you think?"
Alphys laughed nervously a second time. "It does."
"Yeah." The woman shrugged. "But enough about my thoughts. I wanna hear more of yours!"
"All... all right! Well..."
For what felt like hours, Alphys described every possible idea she had of what could lie at the bottom of the abyss. They ranged from the very likely (a giant lake filled with trash remnants, various natural rock formations) to the less-likely but still somewhat plausible (the king's secret treasure hoard, passages to long-lost sectors of the Underground) to the completely outlandish (a portal to the land where all the fictional characters live, an artifact that turns everyone who touches it into a magical warrior). While the other woman would put her two cents in here and there, for the most part she remained silent and listened to Alphys tell her theories.
Finally, Alphys reached a point where she could honestly say she couldn't think of any other possible ideas. "And, well... I don't know what else there could be. There could be more stuff, though; I just can't think of any more specific stuff." Suddenly, she realized just how long they'd been talking, and blushed. "Oh! Uh, I hope I'm not keeping you from anything."
For a second, the woman's smile dropped. "Hell no! If there was an emergency, someone would have called me by now." The smile returned. "Besides, that was an awesome conversation. I never even thought of some of that stuff!"
"Oh! W-wow..." Alphys shyly smiled; this was one of those rare times when someone seemed happy to see her.
"In fact, I think I like you! We should trade phone numbers." As the woman reached into her pocket, she suddenly frowned. "Wait a minute..."
"What...?" Alphys felt her soul beginning to pound like thunder.
"I never told you my name, did I?" The woman reached out for a fist-bump. "My name's Undyne. And you are?"
Alphys gently pressed her fist against Undyne's. "Alphys..."
"Wait..." Undyne lowered her fist. "You mean the Royal Scientist, Alphys?"
Oh. No. Alphys wanted to shrink and disappear, even as she nodded. Just when she thought things were going to get better...
...and then she felt the pat on the back.
"Hey! That's awesome!"
"Huh?" Alphys looked up and saw a larger-than-ever grin on Undyne's face.
"I just became the Captain of the Royal Guard not too long ago! So we both work for King Asgore!" There was a twinkle in Undyne's eye. "This is freaking awesome! And I know I said that already, but I don't care, 'cause it's true!"
"Wow," Alphys repeated. To think she thought this woman was a complete stranger; then again, there was that old concept of "six degrees of separation", which, given the size of the Underground, would probably be smaller for monsters.
Once the two traded phone numbers, Undyne stood up. "Well, I probably should get going now. My place isn't too far away from here. See ya!"
As Undyne ran off, Alphys couldn't help but smile. She glanced at the cliff one more time, and then slowly walked away from it.
This was one thing she wouldn't be ashamed of putting off.
Alphys waded through the water.
Here she was, back in the garbage dump. This time, she had on her favorite dress, and she had company with her from the start. The human child was following close behind, looking somewhat confused. Alphys herself had been thrown for a loop as well, ever since she saw that letter that the child gave her. She never would have expected them to feel that way about her, especially not after Mettaton blew the whistle on her lies. (He did, at the very least, appreciate the progress she'd made on his body, even if the battery still had yet to be fully optimized.)
However, once the date actually started, it was a misfire from the very beginning. Alphys had tried to give gifts to the child, only to realize too late that humans didn't have scales, and that she'd never seen the child wearing armor or using magical spears. And then, when Alphys briefly hid because Undyne happened to be walking around in the general area looking for her, it didn't take long afterwards, after Undyne had left, for Alphys to confess the truth to the child.
Sure, Alphys had previously had a crush on Asgore, but in spending all that time with Undyne ever since that day at the waterfall, she felt the sparks of something real beginning to ignite when she and Undyne were together. While Mettaton had previously teased her about naming programming variables after her and writing fanfiction in which the two lived together, now she was forced to confront her feelings head-on in a serious context. Fortunately, the child seemed to be completely understanding of Alphys' true feelings. They even offered to roleplay with Alphys to help her build her confidence, much to her surprise. This wasn't like when she participated in anonymous Mew Mew Kissy Cutie roleplays online, and yet, she still had fun.
However, she had a little too much fun. By the time she was screaming at the top of her lungs for Frisk-as-Undyne to hold her, the real Undyne returned. And this time, Alphys had no chance of hiding. After falling over her words several times, she decided to finally admit the truth about several things, including her feelings for Undyne. She didn't have much to lose at this point.
Therefore, upon learning that Undyne felt the same way about her, she felt like a big weight had been lifted off her soul.
Of course, it didn't take long for things to get weird after that. After getting thrown into a garbage can, Alphys figured things would go back to normal for the moment. But then, one of the skeletons from Snowdin, whom Undyne had apparently befriended (Alphys was pretty sure his name was Papyrus), showed up and invited Alphys to jog a hundred laps with him while the two proclaimed their greatness.
While Alphys ran alongside him (faintly hearing Undyne yelling something about anime in the distance), she did indeed feel a rush. If she could confess to all those other things, she could confess to her big secret as well, especially now that she knew how good it felt to admit the truth.
But she had to start small; even with all the adrenaline in her system, she knew it would be too big of a risk to just tell everyone upfront.
She formulated a plan.
Alphys waded through the water.
This warm, salty ocean water, coupled with both the gentle breeze and the sunlight, felt like a faraway illusion not that long ago. And yet, she could really feel it now.
Especially when Undyne splashed her.
"Hey! What--" Alphys felt the water dripping off her face.
Undyne laughed. "Come on, I'm thirsty. Last one on land's a silly dork!"
Alphys couldn't hold back her own laugh as the two ran across the sand to the concrete together.
Maybe it was just her having spent her entire life underground until a few months ago, but Alphys couldn't help but feel that the surface was a mysterious world. Even as monsters continued integrating, they were only just beginning to make their impact on the surface. There were so many places Alphys and the others could go now, so many things to do and see, so many things that the humans had taken for granted, but were totally new to all but the oldest monsters...
Ever since Undyne had found out that there was a public beach not too far from the mountain, for example, she knew she wanted to go there. And ever since she knew she wanted to go there, she knew she wanted to go there with Alphys. The waves crashing on the warm sand, the near-limitless potential activities, the sight of the sun setting over the water in the evening... it was like a dream come true for Undyne, and she would be remiss if she didn't invite her new girlfriend to share in it with her.
And so it was that as the two sat on the concrete and sipped their drinks, Undyne put an arm around Alphys and gestured out to the world around them.
"Think about it, Alphy. An entire new world for monsters to share with humans. No more being trapped underground and only dreaming of what the surface is like." She grinned. "We're not just gonna see the world; we're gonna take the world by the horns and freaking suplex it!"
"Heh heh..." Alphys had a weird smile on her face.
Once they'd finished their drinks, Undyne offered to get rid of the containers. While she went off to do that, Alphys took out her phone and started texting all of her friends - Frisk, Mettaton, Bratty, Catty, Sans, and others - to tell them about the fun she was having at the beach. The general theme of her text messages was "if you haven't been here yet, you should".
She was in the middle of texting when, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Undyne return. After greeting her, she went back to her phone to tell more of her friends about her day. This was so engrossing for her that she only just barely noticed Undyne slowly scooting closer and closer.
And then Undyne kissed her head.
Alphys froze, realizing what the sensation was, and feeling it register.
Undyne. Just. Kissed me.
Bit by bit, a blush creeped across not just her face, but her entire body as well. Before she knew it, she'd slumped sideways on the concrete, her claw pressing down the 9 key on her phone's keyboard. In the midst of her mind running in overdrive, she could hear the sound of Undyne's laughter steadily growing louder - and was that the sound of concrete cracking?
Finally, once the shock wore off, and her scales returned to their normal yellow color, she sat up and looked at Undyne for a few seconds...
...and then burst into her own fit of laughter.
"That got your attention, didn't it?" Undyne asked with another laugh.
Alphys tried to answer, but she was laughing so hard that all she could do was nod, trying to hold it back with her claws before giving up and letting it out once more.
"Anyway..." Undyne stood up. "I was gonna tell you that I'm gonna go play in the water some more. Feel free to jump in any time!"
Undyne ran back out to the water.
"Heh... hey! Wait up!" Alphys got up and ran after Undyne.
If there was one thing Alphys had learned in the past months, it was that, despite her failures, she still had people who loved her. They were more than willing to point out all of her successes, even when she was sure they didn't exist.
Asgore would be there to offer her guidance when she needed it.
Frisk would stand up for her, just like how they stood up for themselves and the other monsters.
Mettaton would never leave her behind again, after all the work she'd put into giving him the best body possible.
And Undyne... Undyne wouldn't let a team of wild horses take her away from Alphys. In fact, she'd probably suplex the horses instead.
Alphys looked up at the bright blue sky and smiled.
Maybe life is good after all.