//------------------------------// // FIGHTs, ACTions, and Time Paradoxes - Part 2 // Story: The Call Of The Void // by Jahbraz //------------------------------// Music for this chapter (interchangeable, no one theme is the only one for this chapter) Now you'll never leave... THE UNDERGROUND, TRUE LAB, EARTH A terrible scream rent through the air as the Determination Extractor began to violently tear the Determination from the Player's host body. Writhing in agony, the Anomaly was just barely able to glimpse Sans and the other monsters looking on in satisfaction. Eventually, after several seconds, it was over, the Player left gasping and groaning in pain on the hard metallic floor. In just seconds, the Determination Extractor had done what took Sans almost a hundred tries to do with Flowey; diminish and destroy the enemy's Determination. Immediately, the skeleton brothers leapt into action; Sans activated his blue magic and began slamming the human into the walls of their SOUL's battlezone, and Papyrus sent a wave of bone walls and jumprope attacks to start shaving off health, with the Mystery Man using the energy of the Void to buff Papyrus' attack patterns. Disoriented, but still somewhat alert, the Anomaly attempted to dodge the sudden assault of bones, but with their SOUL already sapped of quite a bit of energy, and their host body being flung into the walls of the facility, their attempt was an almost comical failure. The bonewalls sent out by the younger of the two brothers plowed through the possessed Frisk's SOUL like a knife through butter, with G's buffs providing a healthy amount of Karmic Retribution. Already, the Player had been reduced to half their health. Recovering quickly, the Player used their turn as an opportunity to heal up, before jumping back into the fray as Sans began bringing his blasters into the fray. The older of the two brothers wasn't even quite paying attention to the battle, his eyes on the tablet he held. Presumably to monitor the condition of the DT Extractor, the damned thing, the Anomaly thought, before being quite literally yanked out of their thoughts as the Mystery Man launched a surprise attack with blue magic and... symbols? Caught off guard by the strange new attack, the Player failed to avoid the impact of several of the Wingdings and paid for it with some more of the health. The attack ending, the Player found it was their turn again. Seeing an opening, they lashed out with their knife at Sans, expecting for Sans to dodge. They did not expect for Papyrus of all monsters to raise a bonewall in front of himself and Sans for protection. "Not this time, human! You'll have to go through me to get to Sans!" Papyrus shouted. Sans seemed surprised by this too. He quickly reset his expression to his normal neutral grin. "thanks bro." With this new revelation in mind, the human leapt into the next gauntlet of attack patterns with gusto, dodging Gaster Blasters and hopping through gaps in bonewalls. Platforms came into play, and glitchy symbols were launched. Many times, the human vessel came very close to being shattered, with the skeleton trio's attacks being violent and ingenious enough to where the Anomaly was forced to use their ITEMS during their turns rather than attack. Eventually, there came a lull in the attacks, the skeleton trio taking a moment to catch their breaths. Seeing an opportunity, the Anomaly decided to try and attack Papyrus. As they (somewhat) expected, the slash was blocked, by a bone staff that Papyrus summoned from thin air. What was unexpected that time around was that the younger sibling seemed to be somewhat... frustrated? That's new, the Player thought. Never seen Papyrus get angry or even frustrated to a degree like this before. "You're beginning to test my patience, human! Give up now! Let Frisk go free!" Cheekily, the human replied, "But this route is so interesting! Why would I stop now?" "maybe because we'd like to have some semblance of peace?" retorted Sans. Tiring of talking with the Anomaly, who obviously wasn't going to listen, Sans summoned some more blasters, only for his younger brother to fling out a hand. "Wait! Let me deal with this, Sans. You may be powerful, but you tire quickly," Papyrus said. Relenting, Sans stepped back, but not before firing his already positioned blasters, shaving off another dozen health points from the Player's SOUL. "*sigh* Sans..." Papyrus grumbled indignantly for several seconds, then turned back towards the human. "Human! We have been fighting for a while now! It seems we shall have to settle this feud through 'different' means!" Papyrus shouted. "It's time I put my skills into full throttle!" Humorously, the younger skeleton's eyes bugged out as he goofily postured and snapped his fingers. "Wish me good luck!" "Oh?" queried the now curious Player. "Behold, my greatest attack yet... my SPECIAL ATTACK! (for real now)!" Papyrus bellowed, as a white light began to shine in the center of the Battle Box. Covering their eyes to avoid blinding themselves, the Player eagerly awaited the summoning of Papyrus' attack. A flash filled the room. Uncovering their eyes, the Player looked upon the glorious... bone? "what." Seems Sans shared their thoughts. "paps. what is this supposed to b-" The older sibling was suddenly cut off as the bone suddenly morphed into a rather familiar shape before resolving into a fully-fledged Gaster Blaster of Papyrus' own. "Say hello to my good friend FRANK! My very own Gaster Blaster!" Papyrus gleefully shouted. The newly dubbed 'Frank' was not too dissimilar from Sans' own blasters... but it seemed it took more after Papyrus, judging by its' comically bugged out eyes. Papyrus, satisfied with his successful (and uninterrupted) summoning of his special attack, turned back towards the human, singing Frank's praises all the while. "His ruthlessness is unparalleled, his strength stemming from my own!" The Player was so preoccupied by the hilarity of the blaster's appearance (read: laughing hysterically) that they almost didn't notice the blaster begin to move. Tensing, they prepared to dodge... only for their jaw to drop as the blaster maneuvered over to a nearby wall and began eating it. Is Papyrus' blaster that stupid!? was the somewhat hysterical Anomaly's thoughts. Papyrus seemed to share the Player's thoughts. "HEY! Pay attention, this is your time to shine!" Or not quite. It... didn't seem that intelligent, compared to Sans' blasters, which seemed like wolves loyal to an alpha... while this blaster seemed more like a lovable puppy of sorts. Still snickering, the Player readied themselves for the inevitable bombardment of laser beams as Papyrus moved his blaster over the Battle Box. Suddenly, the Battle Box elongated, and a pattern of bones emerged from the ground, as the Player felt their soul lurch and fall down into the floor. "heh. nice, paps. didn't know ya had a blaster of your own," Sans praised. "i wonder what yours is like." "You shall see in just a second, Sans." Papyrus replied, before returning his attention to the Anomaly. "Human! Prepare yourself!" Tensing, the Player watched the blaster above them. "GO!" The blaster began firing, but the Player was already ahead of them. Stopping, they expected the turn to end, but were given a shock as Frank continued firing instead of firing once and leaving like they expected. The beam passed through them, reducing their health to a mere third of its maximum value. The human groaned in irritation. It seemed that 'Frank" differed from his siblings in more than just appearance. Taking the opportunity to heal yet again, the Anomaly hopped, leapt, and ran through another gauntlet of bones and lasers, with Frank leading two of Sans' blasters (who seemed rather amused by their strange cousin) against them. This routine repeated several times, with Sans, Papyrus, and the Mystery Man sending out attacks, the Player dodging, then attacking or healing every so often. At one point, the enigmatic figure summoned some familiar equipment from the CORE - lasers, actual ones at that - to bring to bear against the Player. It was quite humerus to see the shocked expression on the entity's face from seeing what it thought were simply utilities being used as weapons against them. Of course, this couldn't go on forever; Sans and Papyrus both only had so much stamina and magic, and Doctor G was constantly expending energy just by simply existing and having a stable physical form, let alone attacking. The monsters had to hurry if they were to free Frisk. Sans was already starting to sweat profusely. Eventually, though, it seemed that a turning point was near. The Anomaly was at 1 HP and was out of healing items, enough for Papyrus to capture them so the DT Extractor could finish the job. "Human! You're weak now! Cease your fighting and allow me to capture you!" Papyrus shouted. Too exhausted to make a snappy retort, the Player simply resorted to glaring hatefully at the skeletons. "uh... paps? g? something's wrong with the extractor." Snapping his head over to look at his older brother, Papyrus frowned slightly. "Oh, dear." Sans, tapping at the tablet he was holding, looked back up with a grim, but determined look on his face. "we're just going to hafta make do with what we've got," he said. "W-Well, we didn't come here to give up, did we?!" Papyrus agreed. "Let's finish this!" he cheered, before dodging an errant slash from the now recovered (if still low health) human, his eyes bugging out in surprise. Sans, not amused by the blatant sneak attack on his brother, launched his iconic 'strongest attack', slamming the human into a bonewall, flinging them through a gauntlet of bones, and hitting them with a barrage of Gaster Blasters. Unfortunately, even that attack failed to land a single hit on the Player, who seemed to be very cautious and wary. A frantic beeping from his tablet caught Sans' attention. He looked down, trying to diagnose whatever new problem the DT Extractor had, when he heard another slash. He looked up, paled, and promptly dodged out of the way of a red DETERMINATION-empowered knife slash. *CRASH!* What Sans didn't mean to do was allow the DT Extractor to get hit. Paling further, Sans looked up at the old, now damaged and going haywire, machine with dread. The human, emboldened by their small victory, sniggered with glee. "What's the matter, Sans? Did I break your toy?" they said in a condescending tone, before trailing off as the critically damaged machine began to glow with an ominous blood-red color. "Ohhkay... that doesn't look good..." "we need to run. n o w," Sans said, fearfully. Papyrus was all too happy to oblige, and the Mystery Man was already gone before Sans had finished his sentence. The skeleton trio booked it with all the energy they had left towards the door leading out. But for all the speed that the monsters had, they were too slow to reach the exit as it slammed shut as alarms began blaring and the power began to fluctuate. "LET US OUT!" Papyrus shouted. "THE MACHINE'S BREAKING! WE NEED TO GET OU-" The younger skeleton sibling was cut off as the DT Extractor finally gave up the ghost and exploded violently. The blast then immediately reversed itself, imploding inwards and forming a singularity of nearly infinite power. The sound was deafening. Papyrus couldn't hear anything, and with the lights flickering so badly, he couldn't really see anything, either. Which meant that when the singularity began to pull him towards it, he almost didn't notice until he bumped into a desk in front of him, sending it flying into the wormhole. Shouting in fear, Papyrus attempted to back up, but his boots could find no purchase on the smooth metallic floor, and his scrabbled uselessly against the ground as he flailed about like a maniac. Spotting a railing, he grabbed onto it and held on with all of his might. He briefly caught a glimpse of the human being sucked into the singularity when he felt Sans fly past him. "SANS! NO!" Papyrus shouted, as the older brother was sucked into the wormhole. Unfortunately, although Papyrus had a good grip on the railing, he did not forsee the door into the lab slamming open and distracting him. Undyne and the other monsters stood there in shock as the tall skeleton went flying into the singularity, screaming his signature "NYEEEEH!" all the while. By the time his boots disappeared through the wormhole, it was too late for the Guards to do anything. "PAPYRUS!" Undyne howled. "NO!" The singularity, already unstable, began to collapse. A flash and an ear-shattering *BOOM* sounded out, forcing the monsters to brace themselves against the shockwave produced by the wormhole's collapse. Looking back up as the explosion subsided, Undyne mournfully surveyed the thoroughly trashed facility. The Skeleton Brothers were nowhere to be found. There was, however, a curious-looking object in the center of the room that raised her hopes - a portal. "Hmmm... they must have gotten sucked through that portal. We're going to have to go after them," Undyne muttered. Turning back to the remaining monsters, Undyne began ordering the Guards to start cleaning up the area and for the scientists to begin salvaging what they could and repairing the equipment in the lab. It was over... but at what cost? ELSEWHERE... It was peaceful and quiet in the Everfree Forest. The wildlife was content - no new disasters or outlandish events had occurred recently, so the birds and rodents it safe enough to run and frolic about as they pleased. One particularly enterprising squirrel had 'borrowed' a small burlap sack from the nearby settlement and was scooping bucketfuls of nuts into it, hoping to get a large haul for the winter, when they sensed something... off. Wrong. Looking up into the sky, they didn't see anything. Squinting, the squirrel stretched their head out of their little hidey-hole for a better look. Still nothi- *ZAP!* Squeaking in surprise and fear, the rodent leapt backwards in fright as a spark of electricity appeared out of nowhere and began to increase in size and intensity. Squealing in terror, the squirrel ran as fast as their tiny legs could propel them towards the only pony resident of the Forest. Had they stuck around, they would have seen the singularity deposit a short, bipedal skeleton on the grass, unconscious. A similar scene played out near a wooden hut deeper in the Forest. Meanwhile, back in Ponyville, a young lavender-coated alicorn frantically ran about as her magic sensors near the border of the Everfree Forest went haywire. "What is going on over there!?" Princess Twilight Sparkle cried as she flitted from machine to machine, attempting to narrow down the source of the surges of magic. "No, no, no! UUGGH! Spike!" The aforementioned dragon leaned into the room, having fled it the moment he noticed his adoptive sister's mane start to get messy. "Yeah, Twilight?" "Take a letter to Princess Celestia. Inform here that there's been a huge, anomalous, and potentially dangerous surge of magic in the Everfree Forest... and that I'm going to go investigate with my friends."