Undertale

Chapter 16: There's No Business Like Show Business

 I walked forward and turned right. Ding! 'oopswait hows the humnan doing'. I turned right again. Ding! 'Top Ten Shows That Make You Forget To Do Your Frickin Job.'
I walked onward. I was in darkness again. My phone rang. "Okay, I'm back! A-another dark room, huh? Don't worry! M-my hacking skills have got things covered!"
"Thanks, Alphys."
The lights turned on. A huge television screen on a pipe had a news show on it. Mettaton was wearing a red suit, sitting in a newsroom behind a desk that said 'MTT'. Oh, so that was what MTT stood for! Mettaton! MTT was his company! Headlines scrolled across the ticker at the bottom of the screen: MTT-BRAND STILL TOP RATED – SCHOOL CANCELED OVER REACTIVATED PUZZLES – SCIENTIST DISCOVERED HEALTH BENEFITS OF USING COMPUTER (JUST KIDDING LOL) – LOCAL METTATON VERY RICH FAMOUS AND GORGEOUS – TINY VOLCANO MONSTER TRIES ITS BEST, RECIEVES TINY APPLAUSE – PYROPE IRONICALLY MISSES INVITATION TO THIS SCENARIO 'WOULD HAVE LOVED IT' – LOCAL PLANE CREATES HUGE LINE AT STORE BY SAYING 'IT'S NOT LIKE I WANT TO BUY THESE PRODUCTS OR ANYTHING' CHASIER CONFUSED – HOTLAND TECHNICAL MALFUNCTIONS ACCEDE AND RECEDE IN LINEAR PROGRESSION THROUGHOUT AREA – WOSHUA CLEANS UP LOCAL CRIME, LITERALLY FINDS CRIMINALS AND DOUSES THEM IN SOAP, CRIME DOESN'T GO DOWN BUT IT SMELLS AMAZING – HISTORIC NEWS TICKER HEADLINE SHORTAGE—
On a screen beside Mettaton was the news that was being reported. It was... me! It was a picture of me standing in the very area where I was standing! "Are you serious?" said Alphys.
"OHHHHHH YESSS!!!" Mettaton exclaimed. "GOOD EVENING, BEAUTIES AND GENTLEBEAUTIES! THIS IS METTATON, REPORTING LIVE FROM MTT NEWS! AN INTERESTING SITUATION HAS ARISIN IN CENTRAL HOTLAND! FORTUNATELY, OUR CORRESPONDANT IS OUT THERE, REPORTING LIVE!"
Great. I'm an unwilling news correspondent now.
"BRAVE CORRESPONDANT! PLEASE FIND SOMETHING NEWSWORTHY TO REPORT! OUR TEN WONDERFUL VEIWERS ARE WAITING FOR YOU!!"
"Ten?" Oh, whatever. I walked over to a basketball that was sitting nearby.
"AH, BASKETBALLS. CIRCLES OF FUN. ORBS OF JOY. SPHERES OF AMUSEMENT. BASKETBALL'S A BLAST, ISN'T IT, DARLING? TOO BAD YOU CAN'T PLAY WITH THIS ONE. IT'S AN MTT-BRAND FASHIONBALL. FOR WEARING, NOT PLAYING. PROPER MAINTIENCE IS REQUIRED TO KEEP IT LOOKING GOOD. AS YOU CAN SEE, EVEN EXPOSURE TO HUMAN BODY HEAT CAUSES THE PAINT TO SLOUGH OFF."
"What? The air is stifling!"
"YOU CAN'T GET RICH AND FAMOUS LIKE MOI WITHOUT BEAUTIFYING A FEW ORBS." Uninterested, I decided to look around a bit more. I found a glass of water. "OH MY!!!! ...IT'S A COMPLETELY NONDESCRIPT GLASS OF WATER. BUT ANYTHING CAN MAKE A GREAT STORY WITH ENOUGH SPIN!" Hardly newsworthy. I kept looking. I found the Annoying Dog. "WHAT A SENSATIONAL OPPORTUNITY FOR A STORY! I CAN SEE THE HEADLINE NOW: 'A DOG EXISTS SOMEWHERE'. FRANKLY, I'M BLOWN AWAY." I laughed and kept looking. There was a video game, a present, a packet of paper with Mettaton on it..."OH NO!!! THAT MOVIE SCRIPT!!! HOW'D??? THAT GET THERE??? IT'S A SUPER-JUICY SNEAK PREVIEW OF MY LATEST GUARENTEED-NOT-TO-BOMB FILM: METTATON THE MOVIE XXVIII... STARRING METTATON! I'VE HEARD THAT LIKE THE OTHER FILMS... IT CONSISTS MOSTLY OF A SINGLE FOUR-HOUR SHOT OF ROSE PETALS SHOWERING ON MY RECLINING BODY. OOH!!! BUT THAT'S!!! NOT CONFIRMED!! YOU WOULDN'T (COUGH) SPOIL MY MOVIE FOR EVERYONE WITH A PROMOTIONAL STORY, WOULD YOU?"
"No."
"PHEW!!! THAT WAS CLOSE!!! YOU ALMOST GAVE ME A BUNCH OF FREE ADVERTISEMENT!!" Oh, thank God I didn't. I glanced back at the Annoying Dog. "THIS DOG... STILL EXISTS! THIS STORY... JUST KEEPS GETTING BETTER AND BETTER!" Yay, the dog still exists! "ATTENTION, VEIWERS! OUR CORRESPONDANT HAS FOUND... A DOG! (CUE AUDIENCE AWWS). THAT'S RIGHT, FOLKS! IT'S THE FEEL-GOOD STORY OF THE YEAR! LOOK AT ITS LITTLE EARS, TINY PAWS, FLUFFY TAIL... WAIT A SECOND. THAT'S NOT A TAIL! THAT'S... A FUSE!!! THAT'S RIGHT... THAT DOG... IS A BOMB!!!" The dog's tail suddenly lit up. I backed as far away from it as possible, but all the objects in the area had lit fuses. "BUT DON'T PANIC! YOU HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN THE REST OF THE ROOM YET!!!
Mettaton suddenly shot up out of the ground and was with me in the area, floating with his jetpack, still reporting. "OH MY! IT SEEMS EVERYTHING IN THIS AREA IS ACTUALLY A BOMB! THAT PRESENT'S A BOMB! THAT BASKETBALL'S A BOMB! BRAVE CORRESPONDANT... IF YOU DON'T DEFUSE ALL OF THE BOMBS..." Across a pipe bridge on another rocky platform was... "THIS BIG BOMB WILL BLOW YOU SMITHEREENS IN TWO MINUTES! THEN YOU WON'T BE REPORTING 'LIVE' ANY LONGER!" I almost expected a robotic evil laugh. "HOW TERRIBLE! HOW DISTURBING! OUR NINE VIEWERS ARE GOING TO LOVE WATCHING THIS!" Oh, there were nine viewers now? He lost one? "GOOD LUCK, DARLING!!"
Oh no. I had two minutes to defuse six bombs!
My phone rang. "D-don't worry! I installed a bomb-defusing program on your phone!"
"Of course!" It's like she anticipated this or something.
"Use the 'defuse' option when the bomb is in the DIFUSE ZONE! N-now, go get 'em!"
I ran around the area. Mettaton had moved all the bombs further apart. The dog was still right next to me, and it had gone to sleep. I stood in front of it and defused it. "Great job!" said Alphys. "Keep heading around the room! Try to go for the one in the bottom-left next!"
It was the glass of water, which was zooming through the air at hyperspeed. Overwhelmed, I turned away from it and went over to the basketball, which was bouncing around wildly. I defused it. Right then, the Extremely Agile Glass of Water hit me. With some difficulty, I defused it. I ran back to the original platform and onto the next one. I turned left, and then left again onto a conveyer belt. I ran into the movie script. I defused it. A vent fired me across a gap to another, small platform. I defused the present. "Great job! There's only one left, at the bottom-left!" said Alphys. Oh no! That was through a set of lasers! I only just managed to get through and defuse the video game. "WELL DONE, DARLING!" Mettaton cried. "YOU'VE DEACTIVATED ALL OF THE BOMBS! IF YOU DIDN'T DEACTIVATE THEM, THE BIG BOMB WOULD HAVE EXPLODED IN TWO MINUTES... NOW IT WON'T EXPLODE IN TWO MINUTES! INSTEAD IT'LL EXPLODE IN TWO SECONDS! GOODBYE, DARLING!"I gasped in horror. There was nowhere to run. One... two...
Nothing happened. "AH. IT SEEMS THE BOMB ISN'T GOING OFF."
"That's b-b-because!!! While you were monologuing... I...!!! I f... fix... Um... I ch-change..."
"OH NO. YOU DEACTIVATED THE BOMB WITH YOUR HACKING SKILLS."
"Yeah!" said Alphys. "That's what I did!" Something about her tone of voice was weird... like she was covering up a lie. But at least the bomb wasn't going off. That's all I cared about. You had to hand it to Dr. Alphys, the socially awkward scientist.
"CURSES! IT SEEMS I'VE BEEN FOILED AGAIN! CURSE YOU, HUMAN! CURSE YOU, DR. ALPHYS, FOR HELPING SO MUCH! BUT I DON'T CURSE MY EIGHT WONDERFUL VIEWERS FOR TUNING IN!!!" There were eight, now? He was slowly losing them... "UNTIL NEXT TIME, DARLING!" Great. There would be a next time.
"W-wow... w-we really showed him, huh?"
"Yeah. Thanks, Alphys. I hope you know what you're doing."
"H-hey, I know I was kind of weird at first. But I really think I'm getting more... uh, more... m-more confident about guiding you! S-so don't worry about that b-big d-dumb robot. I-I'll protect you from him!"
"That's good, Alphys. Thanks for your help."
"A-and if it really c-came down to it, we could just t-turn... Um, nevermind."
"...okay."
"Later!" Click...
I walked back past the lasers (which had turned off), up the conveyer belt, and across another pipe bridge back onto the path, which turned left, revealing a view of the CORE. Alphys called back again. "Um... I noticed you've been kind of quiet... Are you w-worried about meeting ASGORE...?"
I shrugged. "A little... I just don't talk much."
"W-well, don't worry, okay? Th-the king is a really nice guy... I'm sure you can talk to him, and... w-with your human SOUL, you can pass through the barrier! S-so no worrying, okay? J-just forget about it and smile."
I wanted to do that... I really wanted to.