Work Text:
How boring will it be?
Undyne made a whoosh sound with her spear. And another. In the dark, something fluttered away in fright. She didn't care, she was thinking.
I should never have agreed to accompany her. A conference for historians? Boring. BO-RRRRING!
But of course she couldn't say no to her friend. Alphys had been so insistent.
"You'll see Undyne, it's really something once you get into it" the scientist had said with her usual enthusiasm, her crest perked out in excitement. Undyne couldn't refuse her anything when she was like that.
The fearless heroin stared into the dark waters flowing by from the direction of Snowdin. She could really use the time off. The royal guard could take care of itself for a short while, with everything so calm and peaceful. And Snowdin was in good, competent hands. Well, it was in good hands. Well, it was in… hands.
Skeleton hands.
But should I really? I know Asgore told me to, but...
Her phone rang and her face flared with anger as she grabbed it without looking.
"I SWEAR, IF THIS IS A WRONG NUMBER AGAIN I'LL-"
"Ummm… Undyne?"
The voice on the other side instantly soothed her. It was as if a soft harp music had started playing all around her. It was confusing but felt right at the same time.
"Oh, it's you Alphys. What's up?"
"...Just... checking on you... is-everything-good-in-Waterfall-are-you-having-a-good-day?"
"You sound agitated again, just breathe like I taught you to.”
On the other side, Alphys uffed and puffed.
“Jeez, why are you so nervous around me sometimes?"
"Sorry, I'm just so excited about tomorrow…we're still going to the thing, right?"
Undyne thought about it for a second, but there was only one answer to that.
"You're such a dork. Of course we are, girlfriend!"
"Gir… G… Whu..."
"We're best friends! Best buddies! It'll be fun, right? Like you said!"
"..."
"I'll pick you up in the morning."
"..."
"...Alphys? Hello?"
"..."
She must have blanked out again thinking about an equation or something…. Scientists.
Oh well. She hung up and had a nervous shiver. She had almost given herself away. " Girlfriend"? REALLY? Smooth, Undyne, very smooth! She liked Alphys. Really liked her. But she didn't want to ruin everything by taking anything for granted. Sure, they spent a lot of time together, but she didn't think that Alphys had "noticed" her. They always spent their time chatting and watching historical documentaries... Undyne didn't think that was an activity Alphys would have offered if she had her sights on her. You don’t watch documentaries with someone you’ve got a crush on, right? You do more exciting stuff. Sure, okay, that was Alphys we were talking about, but…
Nah. They were friends, close friends, and if it stayed that way, well… It was good already. Maybe one day I'll have the courage to actually ask her out but… Just hanging out would already be nice. I need it.
Suddenly, she became aware of something: she threw a spear into a nearby rock. The tip went in a good ten inches and the harp music that, she'd realised, had actually been playing for a while finally stopped. A skeleton with a unwavering grin raised up holding a harp and slowly walked away backwards. Cautiously, Sans kept his face towards her until he was completely gone. You silly annoying little creep, go annoy your annoying brother.
I have a trip to plan.
The weather in the Hotlands was the same as ever. Hot.
It's HOT.
Damn, I’m boiling up. If I was wearing anything more than a shirt, I'd have passed out by now.
Undyne ran up to the lone water fountain and grabbed a cup of water. Whoever put that thing here is a saint and I'd gladly kiss them.
The science lab wasn't too far, and by the time she was there she could see that Alphys was already outside, getting ready.
"I thought I was picking you up" she said with a smile at the lizard, who was busy cramming cardboard boxes into the trunk of a weirdly decorated vehicle.
"Well, I had all this stuff to bring so, I thought it would be best to do this instead."
Alphys turned around and crossed her arms with a smile.
"Also, you're on foot. that's not how you pick someone up."
"Whatever" said Undyne, and they hugged briefly.
It was good to see her friend. She'd personally been a bit busy with the royal guard recently, and it felt like forever since they'd last crashed together on a couch to watch war documentaries about humans and their cool robots.
Speaking of which, there was something disturbing about the car that made her think of one of these occasions… One night when Alphys had INSISTED to show her something. Undyne looked at the car more closely. It's too colourful for it's own good, and what are those moonrunes all over it? Wait, this face, is that…
"Is that Mew Mew Kissy Cutie?"
"Uuuuuh..."
"Is that a Mew Mew Kissy Cutie friggin' ADVERTISING CAR?"
"Uuuuuuh...Maybe?"
The tall fish warrior looked down at the small lizard scientist in disbelief. Alphys squirmed uneasily.
"I mean, yes, yes it is. Why? Don't you like it? It's just a car you know."
Undyne took a long breath. The air was hot and she coughed.
"Alphys, people… People are going to make fun of us. We can't show up in this… thing!" She gestured at the car. "Don't you care about your street cred, or science cred, or whatever you guys have in the scientific community? It's a conference full of colleagues of yours! Historian scientists! This isn't serious!"
Alphys fidgeted a bit more. There's something she's not telling me.
"Well you know, actually…"
WELCOME TO UAC12!
12th Underworld Anime Convention
The sign was massive. Gigantic. For all to see. Undyne felt very tiny under it.
"What."
Dumbstruck, she just looked at Alphys, who had a big goofy smile and was unloading the car like a gif animation of herself, looped backward from when she was doing the opposite earlier.
"What is this."
The lizard's head appeared from behind a box.
"I told you, it's a history conference. About humans."
"But it says convention."
"Does it? Well it's basically the same to us scientists."
"And why is the sign so colourful? Human history is serious business. Badass business. There's something fishy here, and it's not just me."
Alphys paused and then beamed. "We'll have fun, you'll see!" Then she almost tripped under the weight of a box. "A little help here?"
"Gmrmrmrlblrlmblmbrlmbrlmml FINE."
Undyne helped her friend to finish the unloading then to install some sort of stand. A long table, a few chairs, she understood now why the car had been necessary (and vaguely wondered how Alphys had made everything fit in there. But, you know… SCIENCE). it's only when a cardboard box toppled down and a slip of paper inside caught her eye that the royal guard realised something really weird was going on. She was almost certain she'd saw a drawn picture depiction of her on that paper, and there was Alphys, too.
"Huh, what's this now?" she said out loud, reaching for the box.
Alphys followed her friend's gaze, her yellow scales turned bone white, and she jumped to shield the box and its content from Undyne with her body.
"What are you doing?" protested the fish warrior. "Get out of the way, I just want to-"
"NO, GET BACK! THIS BOX SHOULDN'T BE HERE! IT'S PERSONAL IT'S A MISTAKE WHY IS IT EVEN HERE!?"
The lizard was clearly panicking and Undyne stepped back.
"Calm down, Alphys, I…"
"Nooo nooooooooooooo nononono" lamented her friend "please turn away I need to get this back into the car pleeeease I can't explain…"
Undyne felt bad. She had never seen her friend so upset, and she didn't like that she was apparently the cause of such distress, or at least the trigger.
"I'm sorry Alphys. I don't know what you're talking about but I'll be over there, looking around, alright? Just… just do whatever you have to, buddy."
With what she hope was a reassuring smile, she left the stand and headed into the convention proper.
All around her, Undyne could see historians dressed with clothes from different places and time periods: techno-samurais, schoolgirls, heroes with more or less clothes on them… Some of them were dressed as famous historical villains, like Frieza or Sephiroth, which unnerved her. Maybe there were facts about those that she didn't know about, and made them endearing to the scholars who studied them? Truly, this was a place of great knowledge and wisdom.
She passed by a stand with speakers blowing some kind of unimaginative, bland electronic music and recognised that weird guy Burgerpants attending there. he wore a hat that looked stupid on him and had a very smug look on his face. The stand itself was colorful and decorated with pictures and fanarts of multicolored bears with various symbols on their belly. Some of them looked like they could have come from some sort of nice cartoon series, but others were unsettlingly adult themed, or blatantly contradictory to what appeared to be the show's spirit.
"Hey, Burger, what are you doing here?" She asked. "I didn't think I'd find you in a History conference."
"Ohh, I don't know what you're talking about, Undyne, but I'm here because of... well, my favorite show. It's called Carebears: Friends are Wonderful. It’s a reboot from an old show, and I like it so much better. It’s well-written, it’s funny, it has perspective… It's about nice bears with various colors who all have a personal tummy symbol , but they renamed them belly badge at some point which I think sounds weird but I could get behind it in time, and by the way…"
Woah. So many words. Sounds like Alphys.
"I'm a fan, we call ourselves Bearies" finished Burgerpants. "Since I'm well on my way to become a great musician, despite what my haters on undernet say, my contribution to the fandom is music."
Undyne tried to listen to the tunes again, but she gave up. She definitely couldn't tell how it was supposed to be specifically related to Carebears: FAW. It was just generic trendy music full of pointless wubs that you could find by the dozen on Undertube. She shrugged.
"That's, uh, that's great. Keep up the good work, I guess."
She turned and almost collided with her neighbour Napstablook. She was surprised to see them here, and said so.
"Ohh, ummm… I'm just here with Hapstablook" said the ghost, hovering apologetically. "He dragged me here to meet someone from his human fanclub or something." The ghost looked around. "Huuh, ummm.. what is this… this terrible… noise…?" They looked over at the beary's stand, shook their head and floated away. "See you later… Undyne…If you really want to, at least..."
And he was gone. Undyne resumed her exploration of the convention and was still wondering about the relation between a kid's show with adult fans and Human History when her steps finally took her to a big space that had been filled with chairs in front of what looked like a stage.
"Oh, excellent, you came here on your own!" said a voice behind her. It was Alphys, and she was carrying two big dufflebags. Had these been in the car? Maybe, but Undyne couldn't remember.
"Alphys? Whu-?"
"Come on, let's go" said her friend hurriedly. "We need to get dressed."
"Dressed? Why?"
Alphys had a toothy grin. She opened a bag: inside was a costume.
"Remember when I told you we'd have fun?"
Backstage, Undyne took the costume out of the bag and did a double-take. It looked like...
"Is that Killer Jack's costume from Akuma No Kirā X?"
"YEEEEEEESSS IT TOTALLY IS!" Shrieked Alphys. "I did it myself! For you! DO YOU LIKE IT?"
At a loss for words, Undyne looked at her friend. The lizard had put on a costume that the royal guard instantly recognised as the one from the first season of Mew Mew Kissy Cutie. Alphys looked good in it. Very, very good. She felt her cheeks grow hotter and quickly searched for something to say.
"I guess I do! it's…" She tried on the gloves, the boots… it felt amazing. "It's AWESOME, Alphys, thanks! You should have told me people dressed up as historical heroes in these conferences!"
"Conventions" Alphys corrected her with an embarrassed tone that Undyne didn't notice.
"OH NO!"
"Wh-What? What's wrong?"
"MY SWORD! MY BIG-ASS SWORD! I left it at home! I should have brought it!"
Alphys shook her head with a smile.
"No, I wanted to surprise you, I couldn't ask you to bring it. There's an easy solution, though. Your own spear."
"My spear? What about it?"
"Didn't you notice the special tear in your costume, just below the shoulder? It's the costume from episode 27, A LIFE LESSON? Carve it into your heart! "
Undyne had a blank look and Alphys stomped her foot.
"Come on, you KNOW this! It's the episode where…?"
"Huuh.. where… OH I KNOW! That's when the Dark King manages to hide Killer Jack's sword so he spends the episode with a spear instead."
"YEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS"
"I really sounded like a nerd right now."
"YEEESSSSSSSSS"
"Stop that."
Alphys grinned. "So you see, you just have to use one of your own spears! It's canon compliant!"
"I swear sometimes you just make up words" grunted Undyne, but she finished putting her costume on. She felt really good in it. More educated, in a sense: she was doing what historians did.
"Ok" said Alphys, grabbing her arm. "Now for the last part of the surprise".
Alphys led Undyne forwards and they found themselves on the stage. By now, most of the convention attendants were seated and looking at them. The royal guard realised she was reveling in the attention. She suddenly felt worried for Alphys, who she knew was the last person to enjoy big crowds and be the center of attention: but she was astonished to see how confident the small scientist actually acted beside her. In her lovely Mew Mew costume, she was radiating confidence.
Undyne's heart started to beat harder. But as she was about to say something, people appeared on the other side of the stage. They were in costume too, and she recognised enemies from Akuma no Kirā X and Mew Mew Kissy Cutie.
"What the f-" she started to say, before Alphys stepped in front of her and cut her off.
"OH NO! KILLER JACK, LOOK! THE DEMON KING HAS ALLIED HIMSELF WITH MY OWN ENEMY, LORD BADSTAR!"
The lizard was gesticulating and Undyne found her energy invigorating. The next moment, she was shouting too.
"BY THE TWELVE SAINTS, YOU'RE RIGHT! THIS SHALL NOT GO UNPUNISHED, I SWEAR BY THE DEMON KILLER'S CODE!" Then she called forth her spear and the crowd went ballistic. She heard people mention episode 27. Alphys, you're amazing.
"HA HA, YOU FOOLS" shouted back the demon king over the loud cheering, and Undyne thought she recognised the voice and the general silhouette of the guy. "I WILL NOT BE DENIED BY, umm, oh, BY A PUNY KILLER AND HER LITTLE PINK FRIEND! TODAY… Dear me, what was the line again... Oh yes, TODAY YOUR WORLD FALLS!"
There was a crack of energy, and the king brandished a massive foam sword.
Undyne was sligthly puzzled. She expected something else, but she wasn't sure why. Why am I so sure it should have been an actual trident…?
NO WAIT, DON'T TELL ME?
On the other side of the stage, Asgore took a step forth in his demon king costume.
"I mentioned the convention to him once" whispered Alphys. "He said he was intrigued so I told him everything about it and we kinda planned your surprise together."
"You two arranged that for me?"
"Well, no, there also was…"
"NYEH EH EH!" laughed the guy in Lord Badstar costume as he stepped forth as well. "You shall rue the day... is that correct? Yes! You shall rue the day you crossed me, human! I mean Undyne! I mean... uh... NYEH EH EH!"
"...Of course he'd be here too." muttered Undyne. She turned to Alphys, grinning. "I didn't realise history conventions also had live-action reenactments. I'll fight with all my might! It will be just like in the documentaries!"
Then she shouted, for the benefit of the crowd "IT IS NOT MY WORLD THAT WILL FALL, BUT YOUR EVIL AMBITIONS! TRULY, I AGREE, DEMON KING! SOMETHING ENDS TODAY, BUT THAT WILL BE YOU!"
She started running towards them, spear sending sparks flying behind her as she dragged it along the floor.
"Wait!" called a suddenly very worried Alphys. "You do realise it's just pretend, right?"
But her words were lost in the subsequent explosion as Undyne, laughing with glee, smashed into her king at full force.
"Oh well", sighed Burgerpants. He was sitting among the smoldering remains of his setup. A huge piece of stage had been hurled across the convention center and had crashed into his stand, smashing everything to bits. He sadly picked up a half-burnt Carebear official collector's miniature and stared at it for a while.
"Meh. I wasn't really good at music anyway. These undernet haters were right. I'll try dubstep again in a few years, when it's going stronger than ever." He stood up, threw his scorched trilby hat away and walked towards the exit. "I should follow another dream. Movie star, perhaps…? I've got the face for it."
"I'm sorry guys, I thought we had to actually fight, you know? For historical accuracy or something" pleaded Undyne as she helped the convention staff to clear up the mess she had caused.
The staff members didn't answer. Alphys smiled faintly at her and kept working. On the other side of the devastated stage area, Papyrus and Asgore had also stayed to help. At first, the convention people had found awkward to clean up alongside their king but Asgore easygoing personality had made it work. He also had promised everyone tea and biscuits when they were finished.
"That was SO COOL!" shouted a voice, and her neighbour Hapstablook came floating in front of Undyne. The pink ghost was very excited and kept bobbing up and down.
"I didn't know you were a fan of humans too! You need to join my fanclub!"
"Here you are, cousin… I finally found you…." said Napstablook behind her. "You shouldn't annoy Undyne... she has things to do…"
"Oh? Oh, you're right, cuz." The two ghosts saluted and hovered away, leaving Undyne alone with Alphys again.
"So" asked Undyne, suddenly remembering something. "About that box..."
"Forget it!"
“But I saw…”
“You saw silly fanart. It wasn’t meant for you. Please, d-d-drop it, it’s just boring.”
“Jeez, OK, fine, I’m sorry for intruding” said Undyne, shoving her hands in her pockets. She really didn’t like how hurt and embarrassed Alphys looked at this very moment. She would have loved to be able to make it go away somehow.
The lizard looked up. "Anyway… Did you have fun?"
Undyne was taken aback by the question but smiled, grateful for the change of subject.
"yeah, I guess I did."
"Okay, because… WE CAN ALREADY SIGN UP FOR UAC13! If we do it early, we'll probably get a better placement for the stand! Will you help me write a doujin? It'll be about us! I mean, sort of. Here, listen to the pitch. We're both watching Mew Mew Kissy Cutie one night, and then you ask to watch Akuma no Kirā X instead, and we fight about it, and we break one of my machines by accident and it zaps us into the TV and we become heroines…"
Undyne sighed, and waved at Asgore and Papyrus. They waved back.
"...and we have to find our way home and…"
She slowly went back to sorting through the rubble.
Yeah, I had fun.
Because I was with you.