Underdoom - Chapter 32

Alphys’ eyes went wide, taking in as much of the sight as they would permit her. The flash was near blinding, but she couldn’t bring herself to look away. The enemy had been defeated.

“Oh my gosh they did it…. YOU GUYS ACTUALLY DID IT!”

_____________

The falling world around him seemed to come to a standstill. The sound of his army disbanding, of the storm he had gathered dissipating, of the thunder of cavalry and men advancing ever further below him, all were muted at once. Memory flooded his consciousness, until it gave room for nothing else.

Perhaps it was the way Hell’s magic brought to the mind a perfect recollection of guilt. Maybe, for the first time in years, his own conscience was calling out to him. He was powerless to resist either way.

_____

“Olivia, think about what you’re doing. Do you have any idea what you’re about to bring upon yourself?”

“I’ve known all along, Samuel.”

An automated voice blared over the intercom. *WARNING. LAZARUS WAVE GENERATER, UNVERIFIED ACCESS DETECTED*

“You’re about to kill thousands….”

“And become a GOD in the process.”

“They are the ones who set the terms. You know they’ll betray you in the end.”

“All I know is this, Samuel. When this is over, when the imperatrix and I are one, when the portal is opened, when we’ve swallowed all of mars and earth whole, I’ll make sure I have a special place made just for you to rot in.”

“You know what I’m going to have to do.”

“He can’t stop me. Neither of you can.”

The sound was muted by distance and weatherproof safety glass, but the light and shockwaves emanating from the Lazarus labs was unmistakable. The Cyborg looked on, not in surprise or shock, but in disappointment. His old pupil had turned against him. People were going to die. There was no question about that. In fact, there was no question as to how many would survive the event. The computations in Samuel’s head all pointed to estimates in the single digits, at the most generous.

There was only one thing left to do that could salvage the project now.

“Time to wake him up.”

______________

The pieces of the Icons body fell and sizzled away into dissipating vapor all around him. Digital distortions clouded his optics with blackened sections blocking out nearly half of all he saw with strobing flashes of reds and greens that occasionally pierced the dark. Past the blotches, he could see the tendrils of the crux. Still intact for the moment being. Maybe, if he stuck his landing just right, there could be hope. If he could summon what strength h had left, he could fight against the Doom Slayer and his allies.

His hopes were stillborn. His entire lower half had been severed.

Messages warning him too late about the lower thoracic damage flashed halfway between what was visible and what was distorted.

This was certainly the end.

________________

It was the first thing about Olivia that had shocked Hayden since the Lazarus team went silent.

“It can’t be… you were lying about a lot more than I thought, Olivia.”

The discrepancies between the official codex and Olivia’s were staggering. Several runes on the Helix, many of which she had personally shared with him, now further revealed the true depth of her deception. Half the translations were ruses. That was why the Helix had remained so cryptic; not because they couldn’t find its secrets, but because those secrets they had searched for had been hidden away. So many things they already knew and thought to be innocuous or unimportant now took on meanings of such magnitude, it could have changed the foundations of the program. Just enough was left untouched to tap into Hell’s pilfered Argent energy properly. Just enough to get away with and remain unsuspected. The thought made Hayden’s head burn.

Those insipid monsters and their new guard dog were going to have to wait. He hadn’t needed to mull something over like this in a long time. Betrayal had gone so much deeper than he had ever thought. Long before her sickly condition and the bionic suit made to remedy it, long before Lazarus was first established. She had hidden her plans from the very beginning. Her treachery was not implanted, but inborn. All the time they had been friends, from her spunky youth to her reclusive ageing, had been steeped in the Icon’s bidding. There had never truly been any friendship, any bond at all.

The very thought gave Samuel conniptions.

His student an Iscariot, his operation in shambles, and now his only hope to bring a little of it back would not respond to him. The Crucible would not recognize him as master in full, and it would only partially yield to him. So far, only portals could be opened, but the power from which they sprang was inaccessible.

Unless…

“Let’s see what your codex says here, Olivia.”

_____________

The ground got ever closer, but somehow, time just kept on slowing, almost to the point of standstill. Maybe it was his own tortured mind. Maybe it was Hell’s aura affecting him. It was torturous, seeing death coming so slowly yet so certainly towards you.

Where did it all go so wrong?

He saw the Doom Slayer advancing and prayed the hard ground would finish him quick.

_____________

This changed everything.

His original plan, to hold the monsters’ world hostage in exchange for the Marine’s cooperation, was no longer needed.

It was bold. It was dangerous. It would put the Doom Marine’s price on his head, but it was one he was sure he wouldn’t pay.

The Siphon Rune and its surrounding glyphs marked clear his new, bloody path.

The Monsters’ world would have to fall, but so what? His would be saved. The power of every world would soon fuel his, and the mere mortal hero he once aspired to be was now all but a footnote. Now he would become something far more glorious, and with the power of the Crucible and Siphon in his hands, to bind the soul of Baphomet to his own, it would be he who set the terms, and he who would be the master.

He would become a God.

He readied the new Home module, the bracers, the ammunition, everything his pawns would need.

“Your pain blinded you, Olivia….”

That monotone voice spoke over the intercom. “COORDINATES RECEIVED. TETHER OPERATION UNDERWAY IN T-MINUS TEN SECONDS.”

“I’ll show you how it’s done.”

_______________

Then, the ground hit. It was oblivion.

Or so he thought, for a few, almost happy seconds.

His sensory processes regained their function, at least in part. Enough for him to lament his survival for a few seconds before the familiar cadence of heavy boots stomping his way made it to his auditory sensors.

He could still see the crux. Its central receptacle, a great stone eye sitting atop a hollowed-out pedestal betwixt the iron and flesh tree branches from which it drew power, hummed with raw Hell energy. It was his last hope. His only hope. With his remaining functioning limb (the other arm had been too far crumpled by the fall to be of any use), he tried crawling to the crux, hoping something would stop those boots, or that the steps wouldn’t come any closer.

He felt a terrible force slam him back down onto the ground, and he knew the Hell Walker was already upon him. His boot came crashing into his side, further crumpling his chassis and sending him a few feet ahead on his back. His shadow, VEGA’s shadow, and the silhouette of every monster fell upon him, casting themselves over all his last crumbling ambitions.

The Doom Slayer readied a finishing blow with the Crucible, but VEGA stayed his hand, blocking him gently with his forearm. None advanced on the fallen Cyborg but him. All fell silent.

He stooped over his creator, eyeing him with a mixture of pity and contempt. “I almost want to ask you why you did it… what you were thinking….”

He didn’t respond. VEGA glared down at him all the harder. “Are you gonna tell me?”

Still nothing. His fingers balled up, clenching the sand beneath him, but nothing else.

“Fine…” The AI pointed his cannon at Samuel.

“VEGA, wait…”

“…”

“I…”

“What?”

“I only wanted to-…“

“’Wanted to,’ what?!”

“… My first and primary object was to save earth… you remember when he destroyed the Argent Tower… we were doomed.”

“I suppose that’s your excuse?”

“Please just listen to me… I was going to use their world, the monsters’ world as collateral. Force the Praetor into cooperating, show us the secrets of the crucible himself… until I saw Olivia’s codex.”

“I remember. Why did you show it to me?”

“Didn’t-“

“How would you think I would have reacted?!”

“You never let me finish. I wanted to give you a seat beside me. As soon as I knew you were still alive, as soon as I knew I hadn’t lost you, I wanted to make sure I’d never lose you again. We’d save our world, and more. We’d have everything! When I lost Olivia, I found I had actually lost her years ago. When we decided I’d lose you, I thought that would be the end for me. I would-“

“You’re pathetic.”

“Wh-wha-?”

“It’s like you’ve forgotten my capability to analyze synaptic activity. Now that your failsafes are gone, I can read you like a book. You know what I see, Doctor Hayden?”

“But I-!”

“I see desperation. I see dishonesty. I don’t know what you really planned to do with me, but I don’t think I care. I just know you’re lying to me.”

“VEGA, I’d never-!”

“You used me. You lied to me about the tether. You lied to them about your intentions. Why would you ever stop lying? This is the first time you’ve utilized pathos in your speech patterns since you first created me, doctor. I have no reason to believe you are sincere.”

“I only wanted what was best for us!”

“No. You only wanted what was best for you. All you’ve ever wanted is glory. All you’ve ever wanted was to be the hero. Now you’ve taken it too far.”

The AI stood up, glaring down at the ruined man he once called master.

‘VEGA, no…”

“All this has to be answered for somehow, Samuel.”

He checked the charge in his forearm diode. Only 7%. Not enough in his eyes. He outstretched that arm, and the forearm unlatched and rotated on its yaw, reversing it completely to reveal another hand as the cannon end latched into the elbow socket. His hand was open, asking for something to fill it.

The Doom Slayer knew the gesture. He pulled out his hinge shotgun.

“V-VEGA, what are you doing?!”

“You know what I’m doing.” His fingers wrapped tight around the shotgun’s furniture.

Hayden pithily tried to crawl away, his arm slipping in the sand. “VEGA, please!”

The AI was silent. He pointed the shotgun at his maker.

“No… NO!”

BOOM

Cordite burned, sparks flew, and gun smoke cleared. Half of the outer shell of his cranium had bene shot away. The inner casing, transparent and partially cracked, revealed what life was left in the now twitching, convulsing cyborg. What remained of his brains sat nestled with supercomputer processors, reddish pink mingled with dark blue and black, with sturdy wiring intertwining the two. His convulsions worsened as he tried all the harder to escape, his hand hammering the ground more than clawing it, and his vocorder sputtering out distorted samples of his voice.

VWGA held his hand out again, and it was soon filled with another two shells. He opened the shotgun’s action, ejected the smoking, spent casings, and reloaded.

He took aim.

Somehow, Hayden still had the wherewithal to speak, albeit now only in a garbled mess, barely recognizable as a voice.

“VEGA, NO!”

“Goodbye, Doctor.”

“PLEASE!”

BOOM

A horrible mess of computer components, high impact polymer, and bloody grey matter spread out towards the crux for several feet. Smoke rose from the Cyborg’s hollowed, ruined cranium. His limbs didn’t so much as twitch. His bright blue optic, cracked and broken, faded into black.

Doctor Samuel Hayden was dead.

No one dared speak as VEGA took a moment to drink it in. Regret and sorrow vied with anger and disappointment in his mind, dashing around with the speed of his inhuman synapses. He just needed a moment to come to terms with it, remind himself that it was justified.

Then, he noticed the Doom Slayer passing him by, Crucible and Siphon in hand, walking straight for the Crux.

VEGA and the others soon followed.

“Doomguy!” Undyne followed him closest. “What happens next?”

He pointed to the Great Receptacle with the tip of his sword as everyone’s pace quickened to a sprint.

Toriel took the Hint and spoke into her bracer. “Alphys! Doctor Alphys, come in!”

_______

The Scientist hadn’t seen the events of the past few minutes. All she had seen was the Icon’s destruction, and that had been enough to send her back in her seat, head leaned back, sighing giggling a little with tears of joy running down her cheeks.

The Queen’s voice shook her out of it. “Alphys, come in! Can you hear me?! Are you alright?!”

It was becoming apparent that she thought some stray demon had made short work of her. Alphys quickly answered to assuage those fears. “Still here, your highness!”

“We’ll need you to tether us out of he-“

“WAIT! Not yet…”

Her eyes snapped to Sans, his focus almost completely on the crux. “We can’t do that yet. The tether uses Hell’s mainspring to work, and since the well was destroyed…”



“It uses the crux. I remember us going over this…” Alphys rested her head on her hand, trying to think. “Well how are we gonna go about this? I can tether you guys back, but then we wouldn’t be able to destroy the crux.”



“Just give us a second…” Asgore’s mind scrambled for an answer but solving this sort of dilemma was not his forte. The Praetor’s shadow caught his gaze, as did the now brilliant white light coming from his weapons. “Wait, Doomguy, you can make a portal for us, can’t you?”

The Praetorian shook his head and pointed to the crucible’s blade. No longer crimson, and no longer sporting its runes. Its power had been spent. No one needed it spelled out.

“So, we’re not getting out of here via portal…” Mettaton paced a little, eyes to the ground and hands behind his back. “Well what can we- wait… wait, DOOMGUY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”

No one could have stopped him. His blade was already deep into the stone eye of the receptacle, nearly to the hilt. The many branches of the crux began to glow with an eerie sanguine light.

VEGA wasted no time in mental paralysis as the others did. “What are you doing?! These people have no other way home! I have no other way home! You can’t-!”

Another sound of thunder, and two portals opened from the lower nodes nearest the ground on either side. On the left, one could see a sunset dipping below a range of familiar mountains, and a skyline off to the north. On the right lay ruin and waning fire and smoke, and it took most of the monsters a few seconds to catch on. That was VEGA’s home.

Asriel couldn’t peel his eyes off that sunset on earth.



Frisk… It’s beautiful…

Just wait ‘till you see it up close.



The Prince took a second to take his eyes away. “Wow… well that solves the portal problem, but what about the crux? One of you guys said something about resets.”

Toriel was still fixated by the light emanating from the crux. “We destroy this, we end resets for good. Only question is how…”

Then, the Doom Slayer twisted his sword. The stone cracked, and the light withdrew back to the center. An ephemeral haze rose from the ends of the upper nodes, taking caprine form and screaming out in a high and terrible wail, fraught with despair and the fear of oblivion. Everyone recognized the visage, that of the original Icon.

That pilfered essence would be his no more. The Doom Slayer sent his sword in to the quillon block, and all the light from the branches, all that remained to give that soul its current form, were drained of their power, the branches and nodes from all but the bottom two waxing gray and collapsing, crashing onto the shattered obsidian with ear-splitting report.

Another loud wail, and the image was shattered outright, dissipating into nothing within seconds. The soul of the Icon of Sin was no more.

The Doom Slayer could barely keep up on his knees, his hands holding the Crucible’s hilt above him. \

It was done.



Alphys watched on as the crux began to fall. The probes had recorded the raw Hell energy signatures. Things were destabilizing very fast.

“You guys are gonna want to get out of there! Those portals will only last as long as something’s lending them power! You have to-“

Then, she saw the Praetor latching the Siphon onto the Crucible’s pommel again.

The Hell energy within the central receptacle was draining. Those portals would only last a few more seconds.

“NO! GUYS GET OUT OF THERE NOW!”



He raised the Siphon and activated it, its shield once more awash with scarlet. He deactivated it, and turned to VEGA, tossing it to him.

Alphys’ voice blared out of Toriel’s bracer. “Guys, do you hear me?! Those portals are about to close! You need to leave!” Nobody was responding.

Papyrus reached out for him. “Doomguy, what are you-?”

“Go.”

That voice froze the blood of all that heard. It commanded respect. It commanded obeisance. It was low, gravely, and powerful. It silenced every other voice in its range.

It’ was the Dom Slayer’s.

“All of you go. Now.”

“Doomguy…” Undyne drew near, next to Papyrus. “You’re not telling us to leave you behind, are you?!”

“I am.”

VEGA felt a debt weighing down upon him. He couldn’t leave him for dead here. “That isn’t necessary!”

“It is.”

The crux continued to crumble. The portals were starting to wane.

“You either leave now, or you won’t be leaving at all.”

“Whether it’s their world or mine, I won’t let you rot here!”

“You don’t have a say in the matter.”

His hand clasped VEGA’s chassis, and with little effort, he threw the Ai into the portal leading to the Mars Facility.

VEGA tumbled several times over, the Siphon still clutched in his hands. It took him just a moment to get back on his bearings, but when he looked back up, he saw his portal collapsing. The reddened edges collapsing on themselves, giving off sparks of residual, infernal power. Through it, he saw the Doom Slayer’s face, and the monsters quickly rushing to see him one last time. Asgore bid farewell, and it would be the last he would ever see or hear of them ever again.

“Goodbye, VEGA…”

“Goodbye, your highness…”

And he was gone. They were all gone.

He turned back around to behold the remains of the Mars Facility. Everything was in shambles. The Argent Tower, split from the top down in four quarters, cast its shattered shadow onto the mountains behind it, lit by the fires engulfing the adjacent buildings. So little was left. So little Argent reserves to feed humanity with. There were only so many caches in storage. It would last Humanity only a decade or two tops.

Luckily, it would not be the end. VEGA looked down at the artifact in his hands. It would take years to find out how to properly purify the raw power held within it, and just as long to build the proper facilities to contain, refine, and process that power to be used by billions.

But it meant there was hope. Past all the burning buildings, past all the deaths that had ensued, past all the loss and destruction, it gave him hope.

He walked forward with that hope in his arms, towards the ruined facility. He had work to do.

_____________

Alphys’ tears began to overtake her again, once more in panic. “GUYS! YOU HAVE TO GET OUT OF THERE! THAT PORTAL’S GONNA COLLAPSE ANY SECOND!” Still, she heard no reply. “I CAN’T LOSE ALL OF YOU! UNDYNE! ASGORE! FRISK! I CAN’T LOSE ANY OF YOU!”



The Doom Slayer heard her cries and nodded in accord. “You heard her.”

Not a single one of them could leave him, but their fear of being trapped in hell overshadowed their fear of losing him, at least for the moment as the portal began to shrink. They all ran, crossing over and escaping Hell’s oppressive heat to feel the sun’s caressing warmth. All of them stopped mere feet away from the portal, looking back at him as he kept his hands clenched around the hilt of his sword.

Undyne knew in her heart how he would answer, but she had to try nonetheless. “Doomguy, come with us! You don’t have to stay there!”

“I can’t”

“Why?! We’ve beaten them! We’ve fixed time, we, stopped Hayden, we’ve destroyed everything they could possibly use to hurt anyone ever again!”

“They will return eventually if I do not stay and finish the job.”

Papyrus joined in. “That’s crazy! They have no more means to invade anyone! Come on, just come with us!!”

“You don’t understand-”

Asriel’s calling nearly got to him. “No, you don’t understand! I owe so much to you! We all do! Why can’t you just stay with us?!”

“You all have something to live for.”

No one could offer a rebuttal.

“Me? This is all I have. This is all I can have. This is all I’ve known. This I what I live for. That cannot change. It cannot afford to change. No more blood can come upon my hands. This is my duty. My obligation. My fate.”

Sans stepped up. “I’m afraid you have no say in the matter, pal…”

The Scourge felt something in his bosom, changing, physically weighing on him. The skeleton looked deep within him and saw his soul from betwixt his fingers, now a deep shade of blue. Sans pulled his hand back, and he clung to the crucible harder than ever, the force behind Sans’ pull strong enough to induce further cracking in the receptacle.

“You have no idea what you just did. Ever since I found out about time and resets, my life has been meaningless. Nothing ever mattered. Not as long as it would all just be set back one day, without me knowing, without me remembering…”

“Enough…”

“We ain’t leaving you here!”

“I SADI ENOUGH!”

The power behind that voice was enough to utterly break Sans’ resolve, and in turn, his magic. It wouldn’t be enough to overpower the Doom Slayer anyway.

The Praetor stood on his feet and extracted the Crucible from the crumbling crux.

The Portal began to close ever faster. Soon enough the monsters would lose sight of him.

“I’m glad I was able to help you all. I’ll never forget any of you.”

The quietest whisper rose from Undyne’s throat. “don’t….”

“Now go. Live. Be happy.”

“don’t…”

‘…For me”

The portal was shut.

Everyone just stood there, waiting. Hoping for something to happen, perhaps for the portal to reopen. Perhaps to hear his voice from behind them. Everyone knew better, but that didn’t make any of them want to move. So much was on their minds. So much had transpired in the past two days. So much had been lost, won, and triumphed over. So much now to work on, to rebuild, so many futures to realize, and yet no one knew at the moment how to go about any of it. Their minds were too crammed. Their souls were too heavy. There was just too much to process.

“Mom… he’s gone, isn’t he?”

“Yes, Asriel. He’s gone.”

There wasn’t much else to say about it. Everyone knew it, and all were still in the process of accepting it.

Then Asriel turned around to see the sunlight, having felt it on his back. As he turned, all the others turned with him.



I told you it was beautiful.

I believe you…



No one had anything to say. The feeling was mutual with all of them. Past the melancholy, past the intensity and the peril, there was now hope. Happiness, even. For some of them, it was déjà vu. It had only been two days since they last saw all this, since they felt the last sunset fall upon them. The feeling was serene. Peaceful. Such a stark contrast to the events of the past forty-eight hours. It was enough, at least for now, to bring the coveted feeling of peace fall upon them.

No one kept track of the time as the sun continued to set. Apparently, it had been long enough that it gave Alphys time to run to the exit herself, exhausted and out of breath.

“Guys! I – *pant* - I told the civilians we were clear. They’re waiting for-“

“Alphys?” Undyne patted the ground by her side. All had sat down to bask in what was left of the evening’s light. “Here.”

“Hey Asriel, we might wanna-“

He looked at her, wordless, but smiling. The message was clear. It could wait just a little while longer. She nodded and redirected her attention to the sunlight.

True, there was still much to do. The Civilians had to be introduced to the humans, Frisk had to have her soul re-implanted, things need to be both rebuilt and burned.

But for now, that could wait.

For now, they had each other. The had hope. They had happiness.

They finally had tomorrow.