Death vs. The Undying
Do you remember when Papyrus asked Undyne what it was like to dance with Death, and Undyne responded that it was cool because "she's like super hot"?
Turns out she knows from personal experience.
Death vs. The Undying
an Undertale story
by Monophylos
Undyne's claws scrabbled over the slats of the bridge underneath her as she pulled herself towards the infuriatingly spry figure of the brown-haired human who remained just beyond her reach, dancing ahead of her into the steaming, sweltering atmosphere of Hotland. Her armor was growing heavier by the second. But if she could just make it another five yards she'd reach her darling Alphys's gift to her and she'd be as fresh as ever.
The human looked uncomfortable too, sweat streaming down their dark-complexioned face and dripping off the ends of their long hair. But the dark eyes remained fixed on Undyne, wide with...
No! Stop it! she ordered herself. Don't falter because they're looking at you that way! Don't waver because they're telling you they don't want to fight! It's got to be a trick!
The thought spurred her to fresh effort and she hauled herself forward toward the human another few yards, but it felt like hauling herself into a blast furnace. Her vision dimmed and her strength ebbed.
"But I can't..." she whispered through cracked lips, one webbed hand reaching toward the maddeningly distant human as if to grasp them by the neck. "...I can't...give up..."
Everything went red.
Undyne blinked, realizing she was still lying on her face on a bridge in Hotland, and scrambled to her feet, shaking her head to clear it. Everything looked the same as it had a second before; the exasperating human in their stupid purple and blue shirt was still standing there, gawping at her.
"What're you staring at you little punk?" she growled, taking a step towards the human, who did not respond or even move a muscle. With a sudden shock Undyne realized that the human was frozen in mid-movement, one foot still on the ground while the other was stretched forward. Their eyes were open even wider and their face looked...stunned? They were reaching toward Undyne with both arms.
"Still a human trick," said Undyne to herself, uncertainly, trying to think if any of the historical shows she'd watched with Undyne had featured anything like this. Sailor Pluto? she thought. Then how come the human was the one frozen while she could still move?
Footsteps in the darkness in the direction Undyne had come from attracted the soldier's attention and she whipped around. Standing in the middle of the bridge leading back toward Waterfall was what looked like a young human woman, with exceedingly pale skin, dressed in black jeans and a black tank top that showed off her lithe figure. Her long, somewhat unkempt hair was also black, as were her lips, her heavily shadowed eyes, and the Egyptianesque tattooing about her right eye. Reddish light from the magma of Hotland gleamed off the highlights of her white face and the silver ankh pendant dangling around her neck. Her countenance was neutral, not smiling but not menacing or sad either. Huh, not bad, not bad at all, Undyne permitted herself to think. Way different from Alphy's style, but not bad.
"Hey there, Undyne," said the woman. "Got a second to talk?"
"Hey there." Undyne nodded her head to the approaching stranger, then gave her a tooth-filled grin and her ponytail-fin a little toss. "Normally I'd be hollering at you to get away from me 'cause I'm in the middle of a fight, but..." She glanced back at the human, frozen with that ridiculous bug-eyed expression on their face. "Seeing as how you're moving and this human ain't, I'm guessing you've got something to do with this."
The pale-skinned woman smiled. "Something to do with it. Also you're not really moving either. Look down."
Undyne glanced toward her feet and started back involuntarily. Lying there was a tall blue figure in a suit of heavy plate armor. "Ack! That's me! I look terrible." Undyne bent down to look down at her own face. Her skin was dried-out and an unhealthy-looking shade, and her tongue was parched and sticking out of her mouth. She looked back up at the woman, comprehension dawning. "So...this is it for me, huh? Wow...I didn't think death would come like this..." She grinned. "Or look as good as you. I'm a little tempted just to go quietly. But--" Undyne crouched down in her fighting stance. She held up her hand and in a moment she was gripping a luminous aquamarine-blue spear. "--I am a Royal Guard in the service of King Asgore of the Monsters. I sneer in the face of Death." Her single eye flickered a little. "Even if you are kinda smokin'."
Death smiled and looked down for a moment. "You really are a determined one, aren't you?" she said in a voice that suggested laughter just beneath it.
Undyne snarled, pointing her spear toward Death. "You think that's funny?"
Death shook her head. "No. I've come for a lot of warriors and fighters over the eons and I've seen a lot of posturing and bluster, but with you..." She gave Undyne a little salute with two fingers to her forehead. "...I can tell it's the real deal. If I were here for you I can tell you'd give me trouble. But I'm not actually here for you, Undyne. You're dying but you're not gonna die." Death's face grew serious and she pointed past her toward the immobile figure of the human. "I'm here for them."
"The human?" Undyne's spear evaporated into glowing blue smoke and she looked behind her at the kid. "They look fine to me. I'm the one who's turning grey with my tongue stuck out."
"Doesn't matter. They're about to save you."
Undyne's face twisted with scorn. "What."
This time Death didn't suppress the laugh. "Well, I'm not exactly sure they're gonna save you. The Universe doesn't work like that, even for me. You know how people think I've got some kinda book that's got all your names written down in it, with a date or something like that, telling them when they're gonna die?" She chuckled again. "Things are a bit more sophisticated than that. Here, lemme show you something." Death held her hands in front of her, spaced several feet apart, and a vast branching network was suddenly shimmering with an intricate network of thousands--no--millions, uncountable billions--of intricate threads and paths, silvery lines all connected with one another at an unguessable number of nodes. Some pathways and nodes shone brightly and steadily; others seemed to flicker on the edge of sight, with a visibility that seemed to change whenever the eye was distracted from them. "Cool, huh? A bit more complicated than a book, but then life and death are complicated things."
"How are you doing that?!" Undyne asked, her mouth wide with surprise as she stepped toward the shining patterns in the air.
"Girl, you're dying. I can put anything in your brain I want at this point! I admit, most people just get the standard life-flashing-before-their-eyes stuff but, well...your situation's a bit trickier than that. That's why I'm wasting all this time on you." Death twitched a hand and the phosphorescent lines shifted, focusing in one on section of the network that seemed, more than any other part of it that Undyne had glimpsed, to flicker on and off strangely, never when her eye was directly on it. Death pointed toward one node from which huge forests of branching, ever-changing connections sprang, a node whose brightness and position in the network was never the same two glances in a row. "That's the kid's record you're seeing there. Baffling isn't it? They just can't seem to settle down and decide what they're gonna do. Whether they're gonna attack or defend, whether they're gonna be a savior or a killer. Depends on when you look, and who's looking. Like Schroedinger's Cat."
"Quantum superposition of states," Undyne murmured.
"Huh?" Death looked at her, surprised. "You know about that?"
"Not me!" Undyne grinned. "My girlfriend Alphy--uh, she's not really my girlfriend, I mean, she doesn't know she's my girlfriend--um, that is, I don't know if she knows if--" She stuttered to a halt, completely flustered.
Death giggled. "I know how it is. But anyway, what did Dr. Alphys tell you?"
"Well," said Undyne, collecting herself and sparing only a moment to wonder how the woman knew Alphys's full name and title. "Alphy's super smart, and she tried to explain to me once how everything we see at any moment isn't just one thing with one state, it's a combination of many states, all sort of existing, like, at the same time. And you can't even say for certain where an atom or a particle is or how much energy it's got, only that it might be here and it might be moving this fast." Undyne scrunched up her face. "It's kinda weird...I can't say I fully get it."
Death smiled broadly. "Not many do. And even your genius lady friend doesn't get the whole picture, I bet. But she's right. Everything in this..." She gestured toward the shimmering network of threads. "...it's both there and it isn't there. It's all a question of probabilities. One chance branches out into a million others. Especially when it comes to them." She pointed at the still-unmoving human. "They're a weird one. They don't quite play by even my rules. But the one thing I'm pretty certain about is that they're gonna splash some cold water on your face from that thing." Death nodded past her glowing display to the water cooler, Alphys's water cooler, just barely visible in the distance through the hazy, heat-distorted air. "Oh, there's a small probability they won't. But even if they don't, you've got a lot of determination. I have an idea you'll pull yourself together and crawl back to safety."
Undyne glared at Death, confused. "Okay, so what you're saying is, I'm not gonna die here? They why the hell are we having a chat over my unconscious body?"
"'Cause there's still a pretty good chance that even after this kid dumps cold water on you, you're gonna wanna kill them anyway. And that's a decision that affects a lot more people than you as it turns out."
Undyne growled and clenched her fist. "Of course it does! That human's soul is all that stands between us monsters and the Barrier that keeps us jailed down here! Their death means life and freedom for all of us! Our hearts and our souls are united in this! Even you're not stopping all of us, gorgeous."
Death nodded and looked all around her, as if to take in the entire Underground at a glance. "Oh, believe me, I can feel it. I'm not one to stand in the way of anyone's freedom, really, even if it means that seven and a half billion humans die in the process."
"They're humans! After what they did to us they deserve it!" Undyne snarled. "Ngahhh, why should you care? You're Death. What's a few billion lives more or less to you?"
Death smirked at Undyne. "Yeah, I'm Death. And really I don't care about human lives one way or another. Well, I shouldn't. Truth to tell I'm a little sentimental about Earth and its silly, self-important people...I'm a bit fond of a few of them, even. But that's not the main thing." She pointed straight at the human. "I told you they were a weird one. You've got enough determination to give me some trouble but them?" Death's voice sank low indeed, and even in the torrid atmosphere of Hotland her words chilled the air that Undyne breathed. "They've got enough determination to give a whole Universe trouble. Just a little push, one direction or another...that's all it might take."
The grim mood affected Undyne. "What do you mean? A whole Universe?"
"I can't say too much," said Death carefully. "But let's just say...if you kill this kid after they've helped you, it's not actually gonna stop them. And they'll remember what you did, when they come back."
"What." Undyne's voice was flat and sarcastic. "Humans can't come back from the dead."
"Not all humans are the same, Undyne. This one can't just come back from the dead, they could raise you from the dead, if they wanted. Well, sort of. They can make it as if you've never died. Or they can decide that maybe they really want you a corpse after all."
"Damn." Undyne took a few steps toward the human, her hand poised as if to summon another spear, but she did not. "They're a flippin' menace then."
Death grinned in enthusiastic assent. "They are. And yet they all they keep saying is that they want to be your friend. Think about that."
Undyne gritted her teeth. "Why are you telling me this, if you're just doing your job, one way or the other?"
Death smiled and walked up behind Undyne, looking over her shoulder at the immobilized human, standing close enough that Undyne could feel the light brushing of Death's hair against the edges of her fins. "Maybe I just feel like it? Maybe I just want to avoid work. If even after everything that they've already done this kid decides that maybe it doesn't pay to be nice after all and goes over to the Dark Side, it'll be a huge goddamn hassle for me." She turned her head to smile at Undyne, and Undyne smiled back. She really is pretty, the soldier couldn't help but thinking. Not quite my type, but still... "Helping people to cross over might just be my job but it's not necessarily one I always love doing. Who the hell ever likes their job a hundred percent of the time?"
Undyne nodded, looking over at the diminutive figure of the human and their shocked expression. She flashed back to when she last saw that expression: only minutes before, when the human watched Monster Kid stumble on the bridge in Waterfall and almost plunge into the abyss.
Undyne sighed. "I know I'm not liking my job that much, right now, come to think of it."
Death nodded in commiseration. "Really I can't take any sides in this fight, Undyne...but you know, this is one case where you might want to think for a second or two before acting."
"Hang on, are you calling me impulsive?"
"Sheesh, Undyne, I know you're impulsive!" Death gave Undyne's biceps a comradely punch. "You've almost been mine a couple times, girl. Not as close as today, but close enough for me to take some notice."
"Fuhuhu, not even. I'm tougher than that."
"Yeah, I know you are." Both of them turned to face and study each other. Death's eyes looked Undyne up and down. "I have a feeling we'll be seeing each other again, more than once, whatever you decide to do here."
Undyne grinned her most threatening grin and raised her arm in a 'we can do it' salute. "And I'm gonna fight you, every time, sweetie."
"I think I might enjoy that," Death replied. "It's been a while since I've had a fight with someone who really had the right sort of passion in it. Put 'er there." She raised her own arm in like fashion, with her hand open for Undyne to take. Undyne gripped it and for a few moments they strained against each other's grasp.
"Damn," said Undyne, single eye open wide. "You don't look it but you've got a lot of power in that grip, gorgeous."
"Yeah," Death grinned, releasing Undyne from their brief arm-wrestle. "Still, you might stand a chance."
"Oh, you might let me win, huh?" Undyne said, scowling a little.
"Maybe. But really, when it comes to fighting Death, is that something to get too picky about?"
Undyne barked out a laugh. "Nah, I guess not."
Death gave Undyne a jaunty wave and began to stroll off the way she came, toward the eternal twilight of Waterfall. After a few paces, however, she turned for a final word. "You might wanna chat with your genius semi-girlfriend, by the way. I think you'll learn a lot more than just some quantum mechanics from her."
"You, uh...you know Alphy?"
Death's expression darkened for the merest fraction of a second. "I've seen her a couple times."
"Uh. Um." Undyne looked down for a second. "Thanks for telling me."
"Don't mention it. If it makes you feel any better...it might not look it, but she's a fighter too. In a different way."
"Yeah." Undyne looked back up again, a fire in her eye. "I know it."
"Good." Death gave Undyne a final smile and salute. "Be seeing you, punk." She walked off into the gloom and disappeared.
Undyne looked back down at her body, still flopped down on the bridge like a beached whale. How was she supposed to do this? I want back in there! she commanded herself. C'mon, Undyne, you can do this! You're determined!
Her vision dimmed again and she seemed to fall back down to the ground, back into the red mist.
Am I dead?
She felt through her bones the wonderful sensation of ice-cold water flowing over her scales and she knew that she was not.