Royal Blue

What's Left of Truth (Chapter Twenty)

The sound of the hollow rung in Alphys's head, empty and cold.

Maybe it was just how loud the silence echoed down here, or maybe all the pain of all her  many, many failures, finally breaking her.
But the tightness in her chest felt all to visceral for that.
Like a hand wrapped around her heart, slowly closing it's grip.

And in that violent quiet, like the crack of an egg-shell under too much force, she could nearly hear her soul begin to break.

There was static; somewhere. At the edge of her mind.

But more importantly, just beyond the door, there were voices.

Alphys stood, scrubbing at her tired eyes. She hadn't remembered falling asleep...

Alphys shuffled to past the door and down the stairs, entering her poor excuse of a kitchen area, complete with a fridge, a second, hot fridge, a sink, and a rickety old table with a couple mismatched stools at it.

The voices had probably just been Undyne muttering to herself, Alphys figured... but somehow, it didn't seem that way.

"U-Undyne? H-How long was I out...?" Alphys asked, squinting into the surprisingly well lit room, scrubbing the sleep from her eyes.

"Oh hey Alph," Undyne greeted calmly.

Alphys gave a hoarse hum in response. She had expected to find Undyne in her kitchen, so the familiar voice was not a surprise...

"Hello there, Dr. Alphys," Toriel greeted.
Now that was a voice she had not been expecting.

Alphys blinked, stiffly lingering in the doorway.

She had definitely not been expecting to find Frisk either, who waved energetically upon seeing her, and the bloody Queen, who offered her a pleasant smile.
All sitting at her rickety table on mismatched stools.

"A-Ah!! Oh, o-oh dear," Alphys choked tensely, as if only just now noticing the state of her hap-hazard stance and incredibly wrinkled lab coat; which she immediately did her best to straighten and smooth out.

"Oh dear, we did not mean to wake you," Toriel said softly. Ever so motherly and caring.

"N-N-No!!! You didnt!! I-I was... er..." Alphys shook her hands wildly as the words came stumbling out. She tapped her foot anxiously, figuring maybe she'd be a bit better if she knew what the heck was going on.

"W-Wh-What are y-you doing... here...?" Alphys asked softly.

Toriel's hands clasped together on the wooden counter, and she let out a soft, almost melodic sigh. Turning more fully toward the Doctor.

"I have come to ask your aid; and along the way, I have been..." Toriel's eyes darted to meet Undyne's, "updated... to the fact that there may be more problems than I had been aware of."

As Toriel's words formed, Alphys's grew tenser and tenser.

Her inner monologue was racing. They knew. 
They knew what she had done, and; How would they ever forgive her?

Papyrus and Zero, subjects to now another horrible, horrible Soul experiment that she'd gone into blindly.
Hoping for the best, and daring to be surprised when it turned out for the worse.

And even the findings from the experiment were useless; just like her!!

Alphys wanted to laugh at fate.
She desperately more wanted to cry.