VOXISTALE: Novel Edition

Chapter 117

Alphys wiped at her brow, frowning down at the device on the ground before her. It was . . . okay, it was pretty bad. There was barely any material around here to use for such a device. Sure, she'd assembled Mettaton's first body from nothing but scraps and garbage, and she'd been good at making it look official and pretty, but at least the dump had material. These ruins had been before a time that allowed her creative juices to flow correctly. In other words—it lacked metal and conductors. Tossing the wrench onto the stone floor beside the sphere-like machine, Alphys felt the crushing weight settle back onto her shoulders.

She'd been doing her best to focus on her work. To try and put off her grief for just a bit, at least until she could afford to mourn. This device, which Alphys had yet to give a name, had a simple function. The Messiah seemed to rely more on weapons than magic, aside from their more prominent figures. There was no way to destroy their weapons, considering none of them seemed to operate digitally, so trying to put them "offline" would be a fool's gamble. She'd pondered the question on how else she could help. That was when Mosu had given her an idea; after he'd explained his SOUL to her, she realized that she could possibly create some kind of artificial drainer, something to weaken the SOULs within its radius. A bold, complex undertaking to be sure. She wasn't even certain the device would function as she hoped. If it would have the radius she desired, and she wasn't exactly about to test it out on someone, even though Mosu had volunteered, as had Truck. Her mind drifted back to Undyne.

Undyne . . .

By Orion, she missed her.

Things had been . . . rocky between them, to say the least, for a while now. They just never really saw eye-to-eye on much. Undyne's work and Alphys' own had resulted in the both of them spending very little time together, and when they did, it was mostly in shared awkward silence. They never felt like doing much. Alphys wished she'd tried harder.

Shaking her head, fighting back the well of tears about to overflow, she re-focused her mind on the device. The . . . what would be a good name for it . . . the . . . SOUL Dillutor? SOUL Dilluter? SOUL Deteriorator? That sounded like an Asgore-tier name, almost, but it felt sufficient enough. SD for short. SD-01. Perfect. Now she had a name.

Biting the inside of her cheek, Alphys turned her gaze away from the SD-01 to look out of the window she'd been standing near. A chilly breeze gusted in, making her shiver, but Asgore's fire magic was good at keeping the interior warm. Outside she could see Mettaton and Papyrus laughing. The way Mettaton was staring at the skeleton as they walked along through the snow of the courtyard, it was unmistakable. Of course, Alphys had always assumed Mettaton had a thing for Papyrus. Seeing it here and now, thinking about it, only seemed to remind the lizard monster of what she'd lost.

"so . . ."

Alphys nearly leaped out of her scales as her eyes widened and her heart thumped methodically against her chest in a rapid fashion. She quickly turned to stare at the older skeleton brother, who was standing beside her, staring out of the window as well. When she looked at him, he slowly turned his gaze to look back. "Stop doing that!" she lightly punched his arm.

He flinched jokingly away, letting out a chuckle. "sorry," he winked, emphasizing he wasn't sorry in the slightest. "how's the thingy comin' along?"

"Fine," Alphys shrugged, glancing back over to the SD-01. "It's a prototype, so we won't really know if it even works right until it's time."

"not even gonna test it out?" Sans asked. "what if it melts humans or something, and some of ours get caught in the crossfire?" He had a good point. Then again, that made Alphys even less inclined to test it out on her volunteers. Sans seemed to catch onto this, closing his eyes. "course, that would make testing trials . . . complex."