I have been working on this story for several months now. It does include mention of sexual assault/rape and the feelings that the victim has afterwards, and one mention of a suicide attempt. Personally, this was a very hard subject to write about, which is one reason why it took me so many months to finish it despite not being all that long. Overall, I felt it rather freeing experience once I finally finished. I can only hope I did the topic some justice.

Skin Deep

The gentle prat-a-tat of the rain against the apartment building's roof provided the soundtrack for Napstablook's daily journey into the recesses of their mind. Thankfully there was no thunder to accompany this particular rainstorm. That always ruined the atmosphere...as well as unexpected guests knocking on the door without warning.

"Oh...a visitor...they must be lost," the ghost mused sadly as they headed towards the door, floating up to view out the peephole.

Mettaton's face, the metallic surface shining from the splatter of rain, greeted his. The robot's one visible eye was closed, his synthetic hair plastered over the other one. Napstablook quickly opened the door. Mettaton had his arms wrapped around his chest area, his face ducking down with a sorrowful expression over it. He looked like he was shivering as if he were cold, but that was impossible. Robots (and ghosts) were unable to feel the elements like other creatures could.

"Blooky," Mettaton said softly. Napstablook could still recognize his cousin's voice even if it was padded and somewhat distorted behind all that metal. "Is...is it all right if I come in, darling?"

"Oh...um...sure, if you really want to..."

Mettaton gave his thanks, stepping forth into the small apartment. His shiny leather boots left small foot-shaped puddles on the floor, prompting his cousin to summon a towel to mop it up with. He curled up on the couch, a gift he had given Napstablook when they first got to the Surface. "Just in case you have visitors, darling!" he had said.

The robot wasn't being his usual peppy self, a cause for concern. Napstablook hadn't seen him this down in the dumps since...well, since before he became Mettaton. He had always been the happier-appearing of the ghost cousins though, from time to time, Mettaton's inner turmoil would show itself. He used to lay on the floor in a depressed state as much as Napstablook currently did when that happened.

"Do you...want me to leave you alone?" the little ghost said, not really sure what to say or do. "I know I'm not very entertain-"

"Blooky, no," Mettaton sighed as he pulled down the blanket that had been draped over the couch (another gift, "in case your guests want to cuddle! Mwah!"). "Your company is the only one I prefer right now." The robot covered his body with the sheet, including part of his face.

The ghost hovered about, feeling uneasy about this. They didn't want to nag their cousin out of fear of potentially making him feel worse, so they slipped over to their computer, silently listening to music through their headphones.

A couple of days passed. Mettaton lay on the couch facing the ceiling, the blanket clutched in his metal fingers against his chest. He hadn't moved off the furniture since he arrived. The silence in the room was only broken by the occasional electronic noises that the robot's body emitted.

"Shyren said to tell you hello," Napstablook said meekly from the computer, logged onto a music forum.

"Hello," Mettaton said flatly, not tearing his eyes from the ceiling. It was the first thing he'd said in days.

The ghost sighed, spinning around to face the couch. "Look...cousin...I'm...I'm glad you're here...but...is there..." They suddenly felt selfish wanting to know private information like 'is there something wrong?'. "N-nevermind...um...w-would you like a snack? Oh, but I don't know if robots can eat...and all I have are ghost sandwiches..."

A crying noise filled the air. It had an indescribable, haunting echo to it. It was unlike any cry that had been heard before. Mettaton sat up on the couch in a hunched over position, his hands covering his face.

"Oh no...no, I'm sorry, I...please don't cry..." Napstablook frowned, wanting to disappear in shame. "I never do anything right...I should just go..."

"Bl-blooky, dear, it's...it's not you," Mettaton sobbed, lifting his face enough to wipe away tears from his eyes. Being a robot, his tears were actually nothing more than leaked machine oil, brown trails going down his silver cheeks. "You've been great, r-really. It is I that isn't so great..."

Speechless, Napstablook could only stare in shock. "What...what do you mean? I...I think you're-"

"Disgusting." The bitter tone was unexpected. "I'm disgusting...look at me. A talking garbage can..."

"That's not true..."

"It is!" Mettaton pounded the back of the couch with a fist, making Napstablook cower back behind his little chair. "All I wanted was for my outward appearance to reflect how I am on the inside! I never realized until a few nights ago that it meant I desired to be...to be trash! Nothing more than an item to be used by others and then thrown out in the gutter where I belong!"

The ghost trembled in fear, never having seen their cousin like this. Their eyes widened in horror when the robot began to punch at his own face, screaming in a fit of agony. It was like someone shouting into a microphone at too close a range, electronic feedback mingled with the howling.

"No, stop!" Napstablook cried out, flying over to him in a panic. Mettaton would not stop though. He clawed at his flawless face, the screeching metal-on-metal sound accompanied by small sparks. Incorporeal tears flew from the ghost's eyes. "Pl-please! Happy, stop!"

"Don't call me that!"

Napstablook cringed fiercely, whining quietly when Mettaton snapped at them. The robot's enraged face quickly shifted into one of deep remorse, tears flowing more steadily when he realized what he'd done. "Oh...oh Blooky...I'm sorry...I didn't mean..." He tried to stretch a hand out, the little ghost floating backwards just out of reach.

"Ohhhhhh all I do is make things worse!" Napstablook wailed as they began to fade away. "I'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryyyyyyyy!"

"Blooky, don't go!" Mettaton tumbled off of the couch, landing roughly on his knees just as the ghost disappeared from sight. "Blooky! C-come back, I'm sorry, please!"

He was greeted with silence.

Mettaton's joints groaned as he picked himself off the floor, hugging himself with his arms. How could he treat his cousin like that, the one individual who had always understood him, never judging?

"I think you're the best, Happy! Way better than me..."

"Nonsense, darling! You can be anything you want to be!"

"R-really? You think so?"

"Of course! One day, Blooky, I'm certain that you and I will achieve our dreams! Together!"

"It's a nice thought...if anyone can make their dreams come true, I'm sure it will be you."

Mettaton choked a sob out as one of his hidden compartments extended out, displaying a hand mirror. The robot looked at himself...the matted hair, the marks on his face, his oil-stained cheeks from all the crying. The image sneered back at him.

A mess, an absolute mess.

It perfectly reflected what he felt like on the inside.

The mirror smashed against the floor, shattering into pieces. Mettaton's faintly glowing heart on his belt buckle, which contained his essence, throbbed as if it were in actual pain. Wiping his eyes, Mettaton flipped a tab on the buckle, displaying a set of batteries. Alphys had made them to where they would last days at a time instead of just a few minutes, a fatal flaw that had besieged this body the first time he had used it. His hand trembled as it hovered over the lifesource.

Time to take out the trash.

"O-oh thank God, I-I was so worried! M-Mettaton, can you hear me?"

The familiar timid stuttering made the robot almost wish he would slip back into unconsciousness.

"Alphys."

A sigh of relief. "I'm so relieved, I...wh-what were you thinking?! Good thing your body still had enough reserved energy in it to keep you alive before-"

"Why are you here?" Mettaton didn't want to open his eyes; didn't want to see whatever looks of pity, or disgust, the scientist was surely casting at him.

"Oh y-your cousin, told me you were in, um, distress," Alphys replied quietly. "They didn't know what the problem was exactly, but they thought for some reason I could help. And g-good thing I came over because...well...you w-would've been a goner."

Mettaton felt a pang of guilt that he had caused Napstablook so much grief. It hadn't been his intention. He turned his back to her, facing the back cushions of the couch he was still lying on. "You should have let me go, Alphys...I'm...I'm no good to anyone."

It took a few seconds for the lizard to collect herself. "No...no good? Mettaton, that's...I-I used to think the same about myself," she sighed. "But you, you're so full of life and confidence and gusto and...and...why do you think you're no good?"

"Do you remember when I first showed you a sketch of how I wanted my new body to appear?"

Alphys was not prepared for the question, glancing around as if trying to find an escape route. "Um...y-yes I do...I could never forget that...why do you-"

"What was your opinion? Tell me the truth."

"The...the truth?" Alphys fanned at herself as she briefly recalled that day. "I...well, um...I...I really liked it?"

"You thought it was attractive, didn't you?"

The bewildered scientist's eyes bulged out of her head. "D-d-did I...wh-what kind of question is that?! A-are you kidding me?! Of course I did, so does everybody, anyone would, they'd have to be blind to not think that way!" She put her claws up to her mouth in shock that she had just spit all that out. "Oh my gosh, I-"

Mettaton sat up very slowly, Alphys holding her breath. The robot's hair hid their profile. "You think I wanted to look this way because I...wanted attention." He hugged his arms around hist torso. "Wanted to be...noticed."

Alphys forced herself to swallow, not sure exactly where this conversation was leading. "W-well...I...I might have...isn't that...I thought you wanted a-admirers and-"

"It's true...I did want those things," Mettaton agreed with her softly, almost regretfully. "But that is not why I designed myself this way. You see, as a ghost, I imagined myself looking like this all the time. A fantasy persona. I wanted to be as beautiful and fabulous as I felt on the inside. Of course, sometimes, I would slip into a state of self-loathing because of my incorporeal nature. I never felt like 'myself'."

He hung his head down against his knees, his bangs covering his face. "That's all I wanted. To look like how I thought 'myself' was."

"Mettaton, I...I understand that, really, but...what does any of this have to do with you trying to...er...end yourself?"

Silence fell between them. Alphys glanced about nervously, feeling twitchy.

"It happened a few nights ago." His sudden voice made the lizard almost jump off the chair she was sitting on. "I didn't have a show scheduled, so with my spare time, I decided to mingle...

"Everyone seemed to like me. So many wanting to dance with me. A few groups of friends pulled me into singing karaoke with them." He smiled faintly, still hearing the music and the laughter of those having a genuine good time. "That said, if I'd known what was waiting for me outside, I wouldn't have gone."

"Tata, darlings!" Mettaton beamed as he waved goodbye to the group of giggling college students that he had exchanged numbers with. He relished in the fact that he was fitting in with the humans, a lifelong dream of his. He let out a little 'squee' sound as he practically skipped through the parking lot, a shortcut to get to the bus stop.

"Hey, fella, ya gotta sec to help a brotha out?"

Mettaton paused when he heard a man's voice coming from a nearby large green van, no windows except for the small ones on either side of the cab. He looked around to make sure that they weren't perhaps talking to someone else in the lot. When he saw that no one else was around, he pointed at himself questioningly.

"Yeah, you, who else would I be talkin' to?" The man looked a little annoyed at not having his request obeyed immediately. "I need some help over here."

"Oh of course, darling," Mettaton smiled. My, my, he was getting along so well in the human world, that they were just naturally calling to him for assistance with tasks! Life on the Surface was going much better than he ever anticipated.

Mettaton approached the back of the van, the interior of it being rather spacious and cleaned out except for a large blanket rolled out over the floorboard. "Hmm, I'm confused, darling, I don't see where I would be of any serv- oh!"

The robot felt himself getting pushed heavily into the van, his arms flying out to prevent his face from being slammed against the flooring. Before he could spin around to defend himself against this unexpected threat, he felt a shock of electricity zip through him.

Mettaton cracked his eyes open, groaning as his systems started rebooting. He felt his artificial brain glitch a few times, his vision blurred with static not unlike a faulty television program. He tried to move his arms and legs only to find that he could not. Someone had handcuffed his arms above his head, his legs chained apart from each other in a spread-eagle position. On further notice, he also recognized that he was still in the van from earlier.

"Hello?" His voice crackled like an old radio program at first. "Hello, anyone?"

The doors to the van flew open, startling him. A flashlight beamed in his face to blind him, which only disappeared when the light's owner had crawled inside and slammed the doors shut behind him.

"I see you're finally awake, pretty boy." It was the man from earlier, the one from the parking lot.

Mettaton was more than confused at what was happening to him right now. "I seem to forget what it was I agreed to help you with, darling, and I certainly don't remember allowing to be restrained." He again tugged on his arms and legs, still unable to free himself.

"Damn, are all you monster sorts this innocently naive?" the man snorted. "No matter. You're all a bunch of freaks anyway, and I bet that's true in more ways than one."

The feeling of warm flesh against his cold metallic chest made the robot startle. "Wh-what are you doing?"

"Hey, what'sa matter?" The man's smirk was just barely visible in the dim light that was provided by the cast-aside flashlight in the corner of the van. "What's the point of looking like that if no one's allowed to touch?"

The question stunned Mettaton, his jaw open slightly as he tried to conjure up an answer. He wasn't even sure he fully comprehended what had been asked of him.

"You're just a damn tease," the man continued to speak, his hands going to his pants. The sound of the zipper being undone made the robot cringe, trying to crawl backwards away only he was physically unable to. "Flaunting yourself around in a pretty package, getting the rest of us riled up as if this were some game."

"N-no, stop, please don't," Mettaton begged him, his head turning away so he wouldn't have to look. This isn't happening, this isn't happening...

"Isn't this what you wanted though? Some attention?" Mettaton jolted at the man's hand caressing down his metallic chest, stopping just above the area between his legs. "Isn't that why you look like that?"

He was a robot. He had no anatomy. Only metal plates fused and screwed together served as his 'skin'. He couldn't even feel things the way a normal person would. And yet he still understood this to be a degradation of his self, that what this person was doing was a violation of his personal rights.

"Please...stop..."

"Relax and enjoy it. You know you will."

"N-no..."

He felt like-

"Just shut up and look pretty."

an object.

Alphys sat in uneasy silence after Mettaton finished talking. The robot was still curled up in a ball, hugging the blanket around him.

"I'm...sorry," Alphys finally forced herself to say. It was stupid of her to apologize for nothing, but she honestly had nothing else to offer at the moment. "I can't even begin to imagine how that must have felt."

"Do you think it's true?" Mettaton asked her. "Is it true that it's my fault this happened? Because of how I wanted to look..."

"God, no!" Alphys put a hand on Mettaton's shoulder. "Mettaton, all that crap that man said...that's all it is. It's just crap!"

He still wouldn't meet her eyes, his posture still slumped over in a defeated pose. He flinched when he felt Alphys's claws on his chin, forcing him to turn his head.

"Look, I'm not gonna lie. You're...well, attractive," she blushed. "But that's because you see yourself in a positive way! There's nothing wrong with making yourself look good, Mettaton. It's the perverts like that creep that are doing the wrong thing, making you feel bad for being yourself and trying to drag you through the mud to make themselves feel better."

Alphys heavily breathed in and out, not having taken any during her entire spill. Her clawed hands had curled up into fists without her having noticed it; she must have been more passionate about this topic than she realized.

"So there's nothing wrong with me wanting to look...this way?"

"Of course not," Alphys sighed. "Don't let appearances be everything though. It's what's on the inside the counts. But if your inside desires to have your outside look as attractive as you feel, then there shouldn't be any shame in that. And you certainly shouldn't let some creep make you feel that way."

"I know," Mettaton said sheepishly, glancing away from her. He shivered in disgust at remembering the man's touch.

"I mean...how do I say it? After going through something like that, you're going to feel awful. I know I would...but just know that you have people who truly care about you out there, okay? We're all here for you."

The robot managed to smile lightly, looking at his friend. "Thank you, Alphys. It's still going to take time, I think, but your words do help."

"You're welcome," she smiled back, patting him on the shoulder. "I really need to go now, Undyne's going to be starving when she gets home from the gym with Papyrus, so I need to have dinner cooked, but text me if you need something."

"I will."

"I'll also tell Napstablook that it's okay to come home."

Mettaton gave her a thankful look. "Thank you."

It was the next morning before the timid ghost felt brave enough to enter their own apartment, phasing through the front door. Hopefully Alphys hadn't been lying when she said it was all right to go back home. "Cousin?" Napstablook called out softly.

"Blooky?" Mettaton's heavy footsteps were heard stomping down the short hallway from the bedroom, and then his actual body was seen. "Oh, Blooky, I'm so glad you came home."

"Is everything all ri-" The ghost was rendered speechless when the robot knelt down and wrapped his arms around them. True, it was a useless action as Mettaton could not actually hug a ghost, but the gesture provided the same feeling of warmth and belonging. Blooky relaxed their guard and projected what could be interpreted as arms from their body in an attempt to return the affection.

"I am so sorry I frightened you," Mettaton told him in a quiet voice. "That was never my intention."

"It's okay..."

"It's not. I abandon you for an extended period of time only to come back and scare you out of your own home with my personal troubles." The robot rocked back a bit, his arms hugging himself across his stomach. "Blooky, something...happened to me. It distorted my view of myself. I wanted everything to end there for a while."

"You...did? But why, you're so wonderful...much better than me."

"No, that's not true. You're special too, you just need some help realizing it. Alphys was here earlier today, and she taught me some things." He didn't think his cousin needed to know any details of the conversation. "Blooky, I'm going to help you the same way Alphys helped me, all right? I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure you never feel meaningless again. I've experienced that for myself now, and I realize that I don't want anyone else feeling that way. Especially you."

Napstablook had no idea what to say. "This is...sudden."

"I know. I'm sorry I'm springing all this at once on you, but I felt the need to say it. So what do you say, Blooky? How about you and I start doing music together like we said we would long ago? We can include Shyren too if she's interested."

A ghost of a smile grew on Napstablook's face. "R-really? You mean that?"

"Of course I do," the robot winked. He was already beginning to feel like his old self again. "Heck, let's get started right now!"

"O-oh, right now? Um, I-I don't want to bother Sh-Shyren if she's b-busy though..."

Mettaton wagged a finger and made a "tsk tsk" noise. "Nonsense, she's probably sitting at home practicing her singing to whatever tunes you've been sending her online. No excuses for either of you!"

Blooky wasn't sure but they didn't want to ruin the happy mood with their own pessimism. They floated out the door as Mettaton swung it open, the robot standing there for a moment. He looked up at the sky, which had been cleared of all clouds since the last time he was outside. The sun warmed his metal casing, his body glistening with a gentle sheen. Mettaton put his hand to his face, his fingers gliding over the ridges that he had left in his cheek from his emotional breakdown. Alphys would have to fix that.

But not right now.

There were more important things than keeping up his appearance after all.