Chapter Text
Alphys walked through the dark corridors of the lab- the true one.
Every step felt like it reverberated through every hall tenfold.
She’s fed her patients- what’s left of- no- still her patients. Don’t think about that.
She’s fed them.
That means, she has a window of time to conduct research and extract everything necessary from the new soul before handing it over to Asgore.
The wheels of the cart squeaked as she pushed it forward with a bit of haste.
The yellow soul bopping around the jar had become a bit restless, not unlike a few others had been like the orange and blue ones.
She hurried past the many flowerpots, a bunch of them were full of golden flowers yet among them were also empty ones.
Alphys’ failures staring back at her, pots with mud in them emptied of their seeds due to flowers she couldn’t grow yet.
It’s alright she’ll get to that project one day when she can convince herself to head towards waterfall and look for the perfect conditions.
Then monitor those conditions.
Then check up on all the stages and…
Alphys let out a soft sigh as she entered the room she’d prepared her tools in, it was a room with a keyhole and a note, but its the room she’s kept cleanest and moved her equipment to.
If her patients ate quicker then usual she- she could buy a little time with her location instead.
The scientist picked up the jarred soul with shaking hands and moved it onto the plastic table.
She twisted the lid off of the jar with one movement, the soul kept thrashing around aimlessly as if searching for people.
She was sure souls couldn’t think or look so it’s likely just looking for its body.
Alphys mimicked grabbing the soul and holding it up, the soul stayed away from her hands but acted as if it was touching something anyways.
The instinct of a human to stay away from magic luckily prevailed, even after death, handling them is a bit easier because of it.
She moved the vibrant soul to a type of dome, it was actually a network of antenna that had enough room for surgical tools to be prodded between them.
The antenna can be used to send out soft pulses of magic to keep the soul in one place, Alphys doesn’t have to get into the details of how or why it was made.
Just that she was lucky to still have her job after the incident that inspired this creation.
She carefully picked up a syringe and kept her diagram of a soul closeby, it helped her steady her hands a little, only a little.
Deep breath in… and out.. She jabbed the needle into a specific compartment of the soul.
Extracting a vibrant yellow liquid with a steady pull before removing the syringe.
The soul lost some of its vibrancy, that’s natural, that’s alright, it happened with every soul and they never got that much weaker from it.
It’s just for safety, it’ll still work. It has to, she hadn’t miscalculated anything she can’t- she can’t have afforded to miscalculate anything!
Deep breaths. Stay focused while working.
Alphys put aside the syringe, temperature, stable, between the orange soul and the blue one so on the warmer side.
Energy output, higher than usual, for the safety of the soul and to make sure it doesn’t break itself on the jar Alphys should take a bit of that away.
She supposes that it makes up for supplementing energy to the cyan and green souls that wouldn’t have enough to stay stable with their circulations.
Alphys would’ve liked to know what exactly these variables meant in relation to the human body, but studying such things are both impossible and dangerous.
The scientist didn’t give it much more thought before hooking the soul up to a few wires and a contraption, putting the shell of a heavy duty battery on the other end of the machine.
It only took a flick of the switch and checking the output again for Alphys own soul to find comfort in the more stable and regular output.
She poked the soul with some pliers holding a cotton swab one last time, like the other souls it puts out a translucent type of liquid.
Something that would’ve bound the soul to the body? A protective coating? It doesn’t matter anymore, there’s not an irregular amount of it so Alphys puts the soul back into the jar.
Alphys looked at the results and the specimens, she picked up a small white seed.
Using the cotton swab to coat it with the liquid and injecting it with most of the raw extraction.
The seed turned the same but ant yellow as the liquid, prompting Alphys to seal it into a neat little box one might put delicate jewelry in.
The scientist put the soul back into its jar and started to wheel the jar back to the elevator, she didn’t know how to feel about her new found efficiency in this task.
This isn’t what she studied to be good at and this isn’t what she ever thought she’d be doing when she grew up, but this is where she’s at now and she’s far to deep in to quit any time soon.
Before she knew it, she was back in the more innocent looking lab and at her work station.
She went over to a small salvaged chest under her computer, she opened it, placing the seed among six other identical boxes.
There, safe for storage, now she just had to put the jar into the delivery box and bring it to Asgore.
Her mind wandered a little when she was packing the container soul among soft colored peanuts.
Somewhere she couldn’t help asking when she’d actually follow through on Asgore’s request.
To help let the fallen humans live on in a way after entering these sorry states where they can’t really be seen as dead, but surely aren’t alive either.
It seemed like such a good idea back then, use towers of their soul to grow a new body into heavily magic infused seeds with a thin string keeping the two connected.
After what happened in the true lab…? Alphys won’t risk such a simple plan again, never again.
She won’t be able to stomach it, she won’t be able to stomach having prodded at corpses for what? To desecrate them down more? They were still… children.
The scientist shook that thought off as she taped the box shut, best not to think about it, no one else really does so either.
She was about to take her leave when the door of her lab opened, she thought she’d locked it due to the insistence of patient family members trying to visit but someone- should she fall mettaton back this isn’t—
“Why hello there~”
A cold tone that mimicked warmth spoke in a melodic tone, it made Alphys clutch the box tightly on instinct.
The moment see that entered was smiling, one of the more human-esque monsters.
Dark blue skin, a flower that mimicked a tutu in a lighter color along with a ballerina’s attire.
Their hair was… braids? Alphys things they’re called? Pulled back together into a bush of flowers.
They were taller then her, though parts of their clothes were wilting.
The preformed raised a hand, small bells on the edges of their tutu jingled pleasantly.
“Oh fair maiden, might you be the ingenious creator of the robot titled ‘mettaton’?”
Alphys nodded a little.
“Y-yes mettaton is my m-most well known creation as of now.”
“Oh dear.”
The performer rushed forward taking one of Alphys’ hands, their smile reminded her of a type of fox monster decorated in fuzzy blankets to seem less intimidating.
“It really is you? Might express my most unfiltered gratitude towards your excellent work and most passionate performance?”
Alphys took a step back, this motion didn’t discourage the young performer who twirled around in pirrouhettes.
“Truly, your creation is a very earnest expression love, not LOVE, love, the true kind of love, just like flowers, that undying care shows through on the personality of your creation in the fullest.”
Despite their healthy build Alphys could tell they were barely a teen, there were some hints you needed to pick up on when handling some types of monsters.
Come on! Reply! You don’t want to be chewed out online!
“Y-yes, I put a l-lot of my hopes into creating mettaton I- I am happy to know y-you can tell.”
“Oh don’t worry dear you don’t have to talk when you don’t want to.”
The performer posed and a few butterflies appeared, it made the leaves of their body grow more sickly quicker.
“It’s much more worth it to hold yourself with integrity, i just want to express my gratitude for such a lovely creation making it out into this world. After all not everyone is brave enou-”
“Blue!”
And orange, very short and juvenile monster stood by the door chugging a bottle of water, the mess that was the bundle of leaves that mimicked hair was tied together by a bandana but funnily enough they looked like they had mouse ears.
“Are you done? I’m wilting to death, you promised it’d be quick to green. I’m telling.”
“Oh no, such is not necessary.”
‘Blue’ spun a little and quickly approached the young flower monster.
“If you have done what you needed here then I can’t keep us back and bring us in danger, I wish you a fine evening doctor Alphys, may your performance present itself to the spotlights one day!”
The two were gone almost as soon as they came, Alphys immediately rushed over to the door and locked it, checked the lock, put her chair infront of it and sigh.
She should get the lock checked if someone could waltz right on in.
But first… the soul. To Asgore.
She wonders why flower monsters of all things visited hotland…?