Chapter Text
Undyne had noticed that there were too many forms involved in living on the surface world. Not even interesting kinds of forms, like battle formations. Their time on the surface had been peaceful so far (fortunately, she constantly reminded herself), so they had to deal with the paper kind of forms.
She had finally passed her driving exam (Papyrus had passed it before her, which still galled), for instance, and had to stand in line in a boring dusty government building for hours before she could actually drive anywhere on her own.
“T-this will take two minutes, tops!” Alphys said. She peered around. “This is a really weird time to do this, so there won’t, there won’t even be a line. I’m…I’m sure of it!”
“You know it!” Undyne said.
This government building was bigger than the one she had gone to for her license. It was a huge, plain, boring box of a building. They went in and Alphys scanned the long list of different offices by the elevator. Undyne stood next to her, grinning toothily at the humans trying not to stare.
Alphys noticed the humans, too, and shrank against Undyne’s side. "Uh…I t-think it’s…“ her voice kept getting softer. "I think it’s…the fifth floor?”
“Great!” Undyne was pumped to get this over with. They were getting pancakes once Alphys signed and handed in her forms. Apparently you had to get permission to carry around certain substances that Alphys needed in her experiments. Sure, okay.
At least no one got in the elevator with them, so Alphys had a minute to take some deep breaths and calm herself down. Just as the doors were about to open, though, she started flipping through her papers, absolutely positive she had forgotten one of them. Undyne steered her out of the elevator and Alphys almost fainted in relief when she spotted the sheet she was looking for.
The panic came right back when they saw the line of humans heading out of the office and into the hall. "Oh no…“ She fell down, limp, onto a bench. "God, Undyne, I’m…I’m s-sorry….Maybe I should try again tomorrow? God! Look at them all!”
“Nah, Alphys, it’s fine. Let’s just get it over with.”
“But…w-what if it takes hours and they don’t serve pancakes after noon?”
“Well, then, I’ll MAKE them serve pancakes! Or get something else, Alphys.” She always got pancakes when they had to come into the city, so maybe it was time to liven things up.
The tedium of standing in a line calmed Alphys down. The humans were staring, but who could really blame them? She and Alphys were the most interesting things to look at, and they were all bored and tired of standing.
Undyne wasn’t going to let everyone suffer like that. Not all the humans there had to wait in line, were there with a friend like she was, and she demonstrated to three of them that she could lift all of them at the same time. She hoisted the bench they were on over her head, and they had to duck to avoid the ceiling.
“Uh…this…t-this really is taking a while, huh?” Alphys sighed. "Um, I hate to make you wait with me. Why don’t you go for a walk? I bet there’s someplace fun and we can go there later, once this is all over with.“ She glanced nervously up at the three humans chatting with each other in midair.
It took a little convincing, but Undyne eventually went back downstairs, alone and bored again. She glanced at the long list of different offices in the building, curious what other nonsense humans had to fill out forms in order to do.
She stopped short at one particular listed office.
Twenty seconds later, she burst upstairs.
"Oh! T-the line barely moved at all? It’s been two minutes since you left, Undyne.”
Undyne grabbed Alphys’ hands and yanked her out of line. Alphys looked back at her spot, distressed.
The old woman who had been behind Alphys said, “Oh, I’ll hold your place, my dear.”
“No, you don’t have to! Let’s do it tomorrow, Alphys! Do you know what they have here?”
“Um…cool vending machines? I t-think I saw…boat registration?”
“Really?? Alphys! Why don’t we have a boat??”
“I th-think we need one first to register it…?”
“No, that’s not what this is about. Alphys! They have marriage licensing! Let’s get married! Right now!”
“W-what…? Oh my god???”
It didn’t turn out to be as simple as going to the office, but by the time Alphys actually signed and turned in her forms, it was her wife she brought along with her to help her deal with the crowd of people.