Underdoom - Chapter 13

The entrances to New Home had fallen silent. Demons had mostly cleared from the entryways and passages that lead into the core, save for a few larger beasts looming a ways back with their accompaniments of a few smaller imps and the like. The royal guard too was dormant. Some kept watch on the doorways with fading focus while their compatriots leaned against the walls or sat lazily behind the ballistas, twiddling their thumbs or even napping as they waited for the ordeal to be over. At this point, the whole thing had become a waiting game. There could only be so much time before the shore party would do whatever it was that they had to do top stop this. Some worried about their captain while others tried to calm their fears with boasts of their famously stalwart commander. Similar talk could be heard of the King either way. There was some mourning over fallen brethren: the nineteen guards who had perished in new home were well loved by their brothers in arms. Still, at this point, even that seemed to be dying down, feelings of grief mixed and replaced with consolation and consolidation.

The mood in the air was anxious, but somehow calm. No one on the core side suspected anything but an end to the debacle at large and a safe, uneventful return home

Until they all felt a rumbling under their feet.

They all stood up as they felt it. Accompanying it was a low, electronic droning that wavered and ebbed every few seconds.

And then it happened.

The blu and red lights of the laser defense systems immediately went dark, and with them, the minds of every guardsman manning those doomed stations.

There was a pause. A tense, uncertain, heart-stopping pause. Both sides suddenly opened slackened eyes and stared at each other for a few seconds. The Guardsmen trembled, hands shaky and unsure whether or not to take up arms, even if their conscious minds knew it was immediately necessary. The demons reacted similarly, though not with fear but aggression. Was now really the time? Was the waiting finally over?

A few more seconds, and both sides knew exactly what was about to happen.

A straggling Shyren, running along the dirt road leading to Snowdin with a rough sack of her favorite piano music sheets dragging on the ground, stopped in her tracks. She could hear the roaring and screaming coming all the way from the core. As she did, she dropped her little bag and raced towards the ruins.


The excited atmosphere had not changed much since the massive throng had entered Snowdin. Now, as the evacuation trail led along the once vacant lanes and corridors of the ruins, that excitement and anticipatory glee had only further permeated the stuffy subterranean air. The small confines of the old complex only amplified the noise, but this discouraged no one from their chatter.

Toriel, Frisk, and Papyrus stood at the head of the massive group, guiding them through to eventually exit what had been the Queen's home for so many years. She felt some shame as she passed through, knowing what some might be thinking as they saw her rather comfortable place of self-imposed exile. Where was she while everyone dwindled away in hopelessness? Where had she been while everyone pined not only for their lost prince, but their lost Queen? These were not the only accusations that Toriel's pained consciousness had hurled at her in the past few hours. With her supervision, she could have prevented Alphys from making so terrible a mistake. Part of her wanted to blame Alphys entirely, but what did she know? Where was her blame? When Alphys made a poor target, she turned in her mind to Asgore, but yet again she met a dead end. Supervising was never his forte. He was the public face of the monarchy while she was the thinking head. If she was around, she could have kept it from happening. Asgore couldn't have done it if he tried. Upon those realizations her aching heart bore them as yet another burden. Trying to blame others, eh? Too afraid to realize that you could have prevented it, and that you were always the one would do better in that regard?You little coward, You shrew, you wretch. As if you didn't demonstrate your hypocrisy enough when you did nothing but berate Asgore for his willingness to atone. Remember how you belittled him? When you painted his grief and guilt as drama to make yourself feel superior? How dare you. Who knows where he Is now, trudging through some hellish pit looking for your son while you once again take the easy job, the easy way, just like before.....

The hideous accusations were almost more than the queen could bear. As much as she tried to conceal it, her remorseful, bleeding heart would not let her. Her stoic, gentle face receded into a blank, broken stare with every step she took through the courtyard and into the anterior ruins. From there, it only degraded further, her eyes getting wetter, her lips curling downward, beginning to tremble. Her breathing sharpened and became audibly irregular.

It didn't take long for her companions to pick it up.

Papyrus' voice of concern, laced with sweet consideration and courtesy, some how only agitated the sense of shame and self-loathing within the Queen. “Your Majesty, are you doing alright? Is something wrong?”

Indeed there was something wrong, but on this day, when Monsters were about to experience their long awaited freedom, she couldn't let her decorum fail her. “Oh, it's nothing dear. I.. I just have a few memories to aort ou with myself, I suppose.” She had been tempted to say “Fond Memories,” but fodnness was the furthest thing from her mind at that particular moment.

Then, she felt Frisk's hand tugging hers. She looked down to see the child's eyes looking back up at hers. She didn't have to say a word. She had heard the heated conversation between King and Queen. She was there when they discussed the fate of her son. She knew what was wrong, and in those eyes of hers, a silent message of consolation and understanding broke through Toriel's inner self-torment, even if only a little.

In return, Toriel too was silent, but her slight nod, loving, tear filled eyes, and slowly returning smile were all Frisk need to know she was saying “Thank you.”

Then, almost without noticing, they entered the chasm which marked their exit.

“I belong here... I belong here....”

Those words were painful to hear no matter how many times they were repeated. No man would ever want to hear his son's voice utter those words in such a dreadful context as this. Asgore wanted to console him, but he knew what he would get in return. More screaming. More screeching. More of that horrible voice that he knew wasn't his son's. Having contained the flower, he tried to call the control panel.

“Alphys? Doctor Hayden? Can you hear me?”

No answer.

Exhausted and not wanting to take another breath of the rotten necropolis air, he called them again with deep chagrin. “Alphys? Doctor Hayden? Does anyone read? Anyone?!”

Still nothing.

The King cursed under his breath. “Must have had some technical problems...” With frustration and grief governing his footsteps, he decided to trudge back to the portal. It was obvious that no tether was coming to him any time soon. Yet more he had to climb. Once more, he had to brave bloodied bone and cold, rough, bone ridden stone to get to his destination. All the while, the flower didn't stop its weeping nor its mantra of self-hatred. The weight of the whole situation was beginning to break Asgore, in mind, in body and in spirit. The hellish landscape made his entire consciousness squirm in unease and dread. The knees ached and his back felt like it was on the verge of snapping, tired from all the climbing and quivering in anticipation of the next inevitable climb. His son's cries – or what were at least the cries of what was left of his son – pierced his soul like needles. He didn't know what hurt more; the fact that his little boy was in so much pain, or that the crying plant hidden under his cape was only part of his son. It was Asriel, but not completely. IT was as if his boy had been cut in half and only one half had been retrieved – a half which was still talking and moving. That thought made Asgore's blood curdle. He cursed his consciousness for ever dreaming up something so horrible as he slowly walked back to the initial point of entry.

As he did so, he only thought of one thing.

“Maybe one day.... I'll have peace.”

“hmm....” Papyrus rested his head on his chin, looking up into the outside sky. Twice now he had seen it, although now it looked far less accessible. “I don;t suppose we have any ladders ready, do we?”

Toriel had recovered enough from her self-loathing to chuckle a bit at Papyrus' postulation. “Oh no dear, As I mentioned earlier, there is a stairwell that our kind used to climb down here when we were first banished. It's quit caved in now and terribly overgrown, but we'll have it cleared out in a-”

Suddenly, screaming could be heard from amidst the din of excited monsters. Her voice called out from the back. It was high, it was terrified, and it was desperate. Everyone's idle conversation stopped almost immediately as a girl's high pitched screams of terror rang out through the ruins, stopping everyone cold.

Its source came scurrying through the tunnels, past the guards men and through a quickly forming corridor between person and possession.

“THEY'RE COMING! THEY'RE COMING!” Shyren shreiked as loud as she could, her terror only intensifying upon seeing her scream's seeming impotence as almost no one moved or seemed to know what she was talking about.

Toriel and her companions rushed to the back to meet her.

“EVERYONE RUN!! PLEASE! WE HAVE TO GO NOW! THEY'RE COMING!” Her voice felt worn out upon her horrified yelling, having only ever used it for singing ir whispering.

“Who's coming?!” Toriel asked upon finally meeting the little fish monster halfway through the no visibly worried crowd. “Oh goodness, you're not talking about-”

“I am!” Shyren had no more capacity to scream, but the fear that had fueled her shrieks still burned within her all the more intensely between each labored gasp. “I – I heard them from Snowdin! Th-th-they pant were-!”

Everyone's fears were realized when a guard picked up his radio. “Hello? Yeah, we read you silv- Oh no..... you mean the defenses” Desperate screaming could be heard from the other end of the radio before ti went silent. The guard with the radio immediately hing up before his voice boomed out to the quickly panicking crowd. “EVERYONE MOVE MOVE WE NEED TO LEAVE NOW!”

Bedlam ensued. Everyone dropped whatever they had in their arms or whatever they intended to bring to the surface in a desperate bid to retreat.

“GUARDS!” Toriel's voice called out over the tumult only with great difficulty and strain on her part. “GUARDS, START CLEARING THE STAIRWELL! THE REST OF YOU IN the BACK WITH ME!” She then turned to the little child at her right. “Frisk, you go up there with them! You stay safe, do you hear me?!”

“Toriel-!”

“Just go!! Papyrus, go with her!”

“Yes, Ma'am! Come on Frisk, upsie-daisy!” The Skeleton picked the child up over his back, carrying her piggyback to the front of the crowd.

Toriel eventually made her way to the back of the fleeing multitude to join the few guards that stood by the ruins doors. “Close them now!”

“Yes ma'am!”

“WAIT! WAIT DON'T CLOSE IT YET!”

“Oh no...”

Amid a steady, creeping hellish haze, a staggered group of guards could be seen making a beeline for the ruins entrance. Only ten or so were left.

The guards at the door beckoned their brethren to haste to the door. AS they drew closer, the gleaming, bloodthirsty eyes do the horde could be seen int eh darkness, swiftly closing in. “C'MON! C'MON! GET IN! HURRY!”

The demons were closing in.

Toriel wasn't about to let the underground's denizens or her adoptive child fall prey to those abominations. “HURRY!” she screamed with all the fervor of a desperate parent. “HURRY! WE CAN'T HLDO IT OPEN ANY LONGER!”

The frantic, beleaguered leftover guardsmen made their way inside, the horde mere yards away.

The de facto captain of the guard's voice boomed in the choked Snowdin wind. “CLOSE the DOOR NOW!”

As his men complied, the Queen, set a barrier within it, just as she did before. Nothing from the outside could get in.

Or so she thought.

The doors nearly burst open on the first blow, and the opaque, white barrier gaev all on the other side a second's glimpse at the infuriated enemy.

All were silent, stewing in their own fear and dread.

The door was pummeled again.

And again

and again.

“DOCTOR HAYDEN!!”

The Cyborg paid no heed to his old creation as he shot his way through an advancing horde just outside the lab door. His speed equaled his marksmanship as demon after demon fell or staggered in his wake. The AI tried to give chase, but was blocked off by another troop of meddling hellspawn. Fury boiled within him as he cut them all down, wading through them like a woodsman desperately cutting through underbrush. Aggravation clouded his mind. They were slowing him down. Hayden was escaping. That fiend, that usurper who had used him like a tool and thought nothing of his life, was quickly escaping his sight. Nothing else registered to him. Not the demon gore quickly covering his frame, not the rushing horde that encircled him.

Perhaps not even the feminine cries for help he heard behind him. That is, until he paid enough heed to realize h=who it was.

“VEGA!” Alpshy cried out, desperate tears soaking her cheeks and her glasses. “VEGA I NEED YOUR HELP!”

“Hayden's escaping! I can't let him-”

“Mettaton's about to die! The security console is busted! Hayden locked out comms to the shore party! PLEASE!” Interrupting her was an imp who had taken notice of the mewling girl. She shot it down with her phone pistol before it managed to get too close. “Everyone's gonna die! I need your help! I NEED YOUR HELP!” her cries only got more desperate as more imps and other lesser demons took notice of her, many of which were practically impervious to her paltry attacks.

VEGA couldn't bear her frantic, terrified pleas any longer. He cursed under his breath as Hayden disappeared completely from view. Fueled by rage, an emotion he knew he was capable of feeling, but never had occasion to feel until now, he tore his assailants apart before knocking Alphys' attackers to the ground and entering the lab door with her in his arms. Hitting the panel to close it, he plugged a probe into its keypad system, activating a lockdown protocol that would keep just about anything from entering.

The doctor gasped for breath as VEGA set her down. Not wasting any time, she went over to her beloved creation who now lay in a puddle of black oil on the floor, barely moving.

Crouching down over him, she called out to the indignant AI. “'ll fix Mettaton! You get eh security station fixed!”

“And the shore party?”

“We'll get to tthem!”

Alphys then felt a familiar, trembling hand shakily resting on her shoulder.

“Alphys, Alphys I'm sorry...”

“Mettaotn, It's okay, I've got you-”

“I'm so sorry-”

Alphys was already at work, trying to save Mettaton while consoling him. “Mettaton, it's alright, it's alright, you did good, okay?” her eyes raced between the robot's fearful, rueful face and his badly damaged core.

His soul capsule was still intact, but a lot of the wiring that tied into his motor control had been shot. Several vessels carrying the hydraulic fluid he needed to move were burst open, leaking the black liquid hastily onto the floor. The most critical damage was done on the upper capsule receptacle, linking his soul with his body. Knowing that if it stopped working, he would separate from his soul and die, she turned her attention to it first.

“Alphys... please... I never meant to-”

“Hey, look at me.” She said, looking back up from her desperate repairs. A second of silence, broken only by the sound of VEGA's tools at work on the busted security console, ensued before she spoke up again. “You don't have to be sorry.”

“But I left.....I-I judged you and I-”

“I' made mistakes. It's okay. We've both made mistakes.” Alphys' tearful reply finally got the automaton to stop quailing and guilt drained from them both. “Everything's gonna be okay, Mettaton....”

VEGA was making some progress, and as he fixed the video feed cables, shot of demons making their way to the ruins met Mettaton's eyes. “Oh no-”

“Hey, we'll stop them...” Alphys had only barely managed to make some repairs on his receptacle. She only had limited tools and the repair wouldn't last him forever, but it bought him enough time to fix it completely, especially now that she was going to work on his self-repair complex, fixing a few severed cords that kept him from accessing and using it. “Let's just get you up and going, okay?”

“Okay....”

“Let's just.... There! Got it! Here.” She pulled out a canister from her nearby toolbox. “It won;t get you running, but it'll at least get you back on your feet.” She poured the hydraulic fluids into his system, some of it leaking through her makeshift repair. “I got your self-repair complex back online, Think you can handle yourself from here?”

“Yeah...” he gritted his teeth just a bit as he got up. He felt weak, but he had just enough steam in him to walk, at least. His control over the repair complex was a bit slow, as the wires had been somewhat hastily soldered together, but it was enough for him to start getting his nearly ruined body back in order. Relief washed away the pain in his expression as he felt the various tools of the complex go to work inside him. “I'll be fine.”

“Okay.. okay then... VEGA! How are we doing on that security station?”

One more hit

Then another

And another

Toriel braced herself, as did the guards

The crowd had only gotten so far away. Their screams could still be heard. Cries from the terrified crowd could be heard shouting at the guards on the long encrusted stairwell to hurry up

Sweat formed on Toriel's brow.

“It's almost done.. here, are you finished repairing Mettaton?”

“Yes!”

“Good, then finish this console! You can't do anything to undo Dr. Hayden's encryption, I'll get to work on that!”

“Okay, I'll get to the...” She looked at the screen in Snowdin. “Oh no..”

Another blow nearly burst the barrier.

“Here we go boys!”

Silence for  few dreadful moments. Nobody moved. Nobody spoke. Had the demons given up? They all wondered to themselves in the dreadful quiet. Was the barrier too strong for them? Had they gone off the look for another entrance?

Toriel and her armored accompaniment lowered their arms for just a second.

Then it broke.

A deafening blast rattled the entire ruins as the magical barrier burst asunder, destroyed by one last blow from a Baron outside, who fell toe th floor after putting all of its weight into the breach. It's screeching, snarling brethren wasted no time in climbing over it.

“HOLD TEHM BACK!” The queen's voice roared out of her throat like the fire roaring from her hands. “DON'T LET THEM PASS US!!”

The guards had no ballistas to help them anymore. Only their bows and spears and swords were left to them now. Regardless, none of them opposed Toriel's order. They all fired in unison, taking out wave after wave of imps and lost souls and other lesser creatures. Within seconds, bodies had begun to pile up at the ruins entrance, but the height of the smoldering pile of demon corpses proved no deterrent against their living brethren. The small group of defenders slowly pulled back, trying to avoid the horde's attacks without giving them too much leeway. Toriel's fears rekindled upon seeing some of the guard get hit, dusting them instantly.

“Oh no no no no NO NO NO!!” Alphys' fingers were reduced to a blur as she wrapped, soldered, and connected whatever wires were left  unrepared. The horde was closing in. They were gogint o kill everyone in the ruins if she didn't work fast enough. “VEGA! Have you taken down Hayden's encryption key?!”

“Almost there....” the AI worked furiously, impressed by what Hayden had managed to cobble up. It was things like this that reminded him that the Cyborg had cybernetically enhanced his processing capabilities to that of near super computer speed. This almost looked like something he himself could write up. A few more frustrating seconds however and it was down. “Comms are live, Dr Alphys!”

“Good, put em on.... “ Alphys gasped a little

Mettaton, croaked out from behind her. “What is it?”

“I see King Asgore....”

A biter sense of relief washed over th king as he clambered atop the mountain of jagged bone and unforgiving rock atop which sat the Doom Slayer's first Portal. Just one leap and he's be through. No more climbing. No more fighting. Yes, there was still a ways to go before Asriel would be back to normal, but that didn;t matter right now, horrible as it was to think of even saying. Rigth now, he had a chance to maek things right

But as the King clambered out of the portal, he looked up to behold a sight out of his very worst nightmares.

The lasers were down, and demons were pouring into the underground.

At first, they didn't notice him, and it almost seemed as if he didn't notice them in return.

And then he exploded.

“That's enough....”

Fire erupted from his hands, pluming in great flames to either side of him that reached up almost to the top of the chamber.. He turned around, sweeping his flames in all directions around him

“That's enough!”

Cutting off his flames to preserve his magic, he shot lesser, but still formidable spouts of fire at whatever had not been immolated in his initial attack.

“ENOOOOOUUUUUGH!!”

he pulled out his trident, and charged at whatever he saw. A crippled Baron, a fleeing imp, a waddling mancubus, whatever got in his way. He thundered from place to place, impaling and roasting whatever was unlucky enough to cross his path.

VEGA ran up alongside Alphys, shaking he rby the shoulder. “Doctor Alphys! We need to shut the-!”

“King Asgore's still in there! I can't just lock him in!”

VEGA was good with context, and from just a one look at the screen, he knew who she was talking about. “Let me talk to him then...”

“DIE! ALL OF YOU DIE!” Asgore's fury had been kindled. There was no stopping him. Demons fled, terrified almost as much as they were at the Doom Slayer as he cut more of them asunder with blades of flame.  “I'll kill you!! I'LL KIL YOU ALL!!”

Suddenly, he heard footsteps that sounded nothing like the thundering cadence of a baron or knight. They were mechanical, metal feet hitting stone ground while servos audibly powered synthetic legs.

“Dr Hayd-!”

“MOVE, YOU OLD FOOL!”

Samuel violently shoved him violently to the ground, knocking the capsule containing the flower and breaking it.

“Asriel!” Asgore cried out with an inkling of breath, having lost most of it upon Hayden's impact.

The flower broke out, looked at him  for a second, and took off after Hayden.

“NO!”

Asgore tried to get up, only to feel a Baron lift him by his neck.

He almost surrendered to his grief and defeat, doing nothing as the beast raised its claws to strike him down.

Almost without thinking, he pulled out his trident, pointed it backwards, and impaled his foe, who cried out in a roar of pain before Asgore dispatched it for good, turning around and skewering it through the head.

His mind was going blank. Was this it? Would this be how it ends?

A call from his bracer gave him his answer.

“King Asgore!” an unfamiliar voice called out from the bracer.

“Who are you...”

“We're about to reactivate the laser security system! You need to get inside now!”

He looked back and saw no sign of Hayden or the flower.

Amid both furious and grieving tears, he summoned the will to comply.