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It was dark, and he was alone.
Mettaton NEO lay sprawled out on the floor, face down.
Where…?
He remembered the human stepping forward with the dusty frying pan, the sudden fear that had lit his circuits on fire, the loud cracking noise when his chestplate buckled-
Now, here.
Mettaton moved forward a few inches, scraping his chin across the floor. He wriggled his arm loose, repositioned the hand that didn't have an arm cannon and propped himself up with it. Look down, he told himself. You have to know. Smooth, unflawed metal greeted him. The wings still glowed on his back, the cannon unscathed, the chest piece perfectly seamed. Nothing wrong but the scratch on the side just like how Alphys left it, when she threw aside her welding torch with seconds to spare.
He ran a diagnostics check. Everything seemed to be running fine.
Mettaton stood up suddenly. Though the spinning feeling in his spirit levels almost made him drop to the floor again, he felt more comortable with the situation under his own power.
Why had the human's attack failed?
First things first. What was this place? Pitch blackness, as far as the eye could see. Even if your eyes were high-tech video cameras optimized for contrast. He lit up his LEDs about as bright as they could go. Still nothing. He dimmed them a bit. At least anyone else who happened to be here could see him. The silence buzzed in his ears.
“Hello?” he tried.
Nothing.
He adjusted volume. “Hello?”
He heard a muffled reply from far off into the distance and his heart leapt. His wings spread as he threw himself into the air and sped towards it.
It had come from here, just about, he thought, hovering. He moved to drop to the floor, then chanced to look down. Directly below him was Sans, lying flat to the ground.
“Sans, you waste. I almost trod on you.” snapped Mettaton, but honestly just felt relieved. Sans, the friendliest face in the underground.
The skeleton pushed himself up. “no great loss. tread on me anytime.”
“Fool.” Mettaton replied, but fondly. He crossed his arms and uncrossed them again. Might as well cut to the chase. “So. The human...killed us.” He kept his tone deliberately flippant.
Sans turned his head away, “they definitely killed you. I, ah, got to watch.”
“Pleasant.”
Mettaton looked around at their location further, which was a mostly pointless exercise. “I honestly thought the afterlife would be more impressive than this.” Then again you didn't exactly live like someone expecting to be judged, did you now, he thought.
Sans tapped the ground with his knuckles. “honestly, I'm not entirely certain that's what this is. i think the human might be trying to cheat the rules.”
“Bending them to our favour, or theirs?” said Mettaton. He knew less than Sans about this type of stuff, but he knew more than most. More than he should.
“ours? the human erased the world. but tried to cheat that they erased it. they took...whatever our world was stored on and got rid of it. put it in here, so they could start again with a different version of us.”
Mettaton shivered. “You keep saying here. You know where we are?”
“theory time: we're in what's sort of like...” he gestured vaguely. “a metaphysical trash can. That we can't leave ourselves.”
“Well that's just… fantastic,” Mettaton strode around Sans with a neat half-step and began to pace, “Truly fantastic. You know, my stage persona might have been found in garbage but I sort of hoped he'd depart in a better fashion.”
Sans watched him pace, still half-sitting. “do you have to keep those lights on? you're probably using up a lot of battery.”
“If anybody else is there, they need to be able to know we're here.”
“figures. you always were good at being looked at.”
Mettaton ignored the jibe. “Some talents never go away, one supposes.”
He shut off a few of his battle functions. He didn't need them right now.
Sans fidgeted with the fur on his jacket. “so, ah, what happened when you fought the human? You kind of..”
“Died instantaneously?”
Sans averted his eyes “yeah.”
“I was...Alphys built this body last minute. I didn't want that human to reach Asgore. He'd slaughter everything on the surface if he got that seventh soul.” And I might not even blame him, thought Mettaton. No, there had to be good humans. Had to be. “The plan was to scare them off. Make something they wouldn't want to fight.”
Sans shook his head. “logic like that doesn't work on people that crazy to complete what they've started.”
“I suppose. Really though, I wanted to see,” he ran a finger down his perfectly sculpted cheekbone, “To see if they'd attack something that looked like a human. If they were a danger to that world, as well. I could just take the hit and see how willing they were.” he dropped his arm back down to his side, “I didn't expect to become corporeal, but...some things...”
“you became corporeal like that?” Sans winced, “have to admit. seeing that kid wasn't much of a pleasant emotional experience for me either.”
“It was awful,” The words spilled out without thought, and sounded more hollow than he realised they would. Almost like his ghost voice, way back then. “But- the human killed you too. I wonder- could we have done anything? Anything at all? Against something like that?”
“probably not,” said Sans quietly. “but that doesn't sound like you.”
Mettaton sighed, running a hand over his cooling arm cannon. “That's that, then.”
Sans slumped back down again. “all there is to do is wait. wait until the human gets round to deleting this offshoot. maybe hope they don't screw us up this badly the next time.”
“Forget it.” said Mettaton, “I'm looking for Alphys and the others.”
He ripped off a loose LED with a battery pack attached and tossed it to Sans. “Keep this on, ok? So we can find each other again.”
Sans barely glanced at it, his eyes locked on Mettaton, the light in their sockets intense pinpricks.
The robot snaked his metallic fingers around the bony ones of the skeleton. “When I get back with the others, I want to hear all your worst machinery puns. And I do mean all of them.”
Sans squeezed his hand surprisingly tightly, then his fingers went limp. “you'll regret that.”
Mettaton stood up to his full height. “Use the light, ok? I'll find them. All of them.” He ignited his wings, took a few running steps then launched into the air.
Sans watched him as the spark of light grew smaller and smaller, until eventually he couldn't see it at all. He gently set the LED aside and took a pack of cards out of his pocket. There was nothing to do now but wait.
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